The God Delusion


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Robspierre
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Re: The God Delusion

Post by Robspierre »

DuneFishUK wrote:I downloaded a really (really) nice audio version of the bible to listen to at work.

I do still want to finish it... but I couldn't get past Numbers - it's fucking wierd and really quite boring :P

The Song of Solomon is the only one I really liked, must of been all the sex and masturbation in it though.

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GamePlayer
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Re: The God Delusion

Post by GamePlayer »

It's funny but there's so much abhorrently offensive material in the bible that if it lacked the shield of religion the vast majority of people would morally object to reading it :lol:
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Re: The God Delusion

Post by Crysknife »

I just say thank God we have someone like Dawkins :lol:

If I had to listen to Harris or Dennet all day I'd go mad. I also don't think he's all that militant when compared to who he has to debate against. People in the US are along way from being free of the controlling power of evangelical conservatives and their desire to run this country from all sides, so I say more power to him.

Why focus on the positive aspects of atheism when you have people calling you a devil worshiper or worse, all while they're telling you that they know for a fact that there is a God because he speaks to them everyday? At least Dawkins admits that he might be wrong.....something a true Christian never could. There's no reason to kowtow to them in any respect. But in fact, in face-to-face debates Dawkins is always under control, soft spoken, and civil.
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Schu
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Re: The God Delusion

Post by Schu »

Crysknife wrote:At least Dawkins admits that he might be wrong.....something a true Christian never could.
I do give him a fair bit of credit for this. However, my best religious friend (and one of my best friends full stop) readily admits that he could be wrong, but he's one of the most devout people I know, and would certainly disagree that a true christian could never admit he could be wrong. For that reason, he's one of the best people to talk to about this kinda thing for me.
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Apjak
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Re: The God Delusion

Post by Apjak »

GamePlayer wrote:It's funny but there's so much abhorrently offensive material in the bible that if it lacked the shield of religion the vast majority of people would morally object to reading it :lol:
Ya see the thing about "the Book" it's the entire library of a whole people. If it were Irish it'd have Ullyses in it, and being Hebrew it does: Song of Solomon. The Old Testament is two-thirds poetry, and New Testament is two-thirds personal letters. Psalms is a song book. Most of the histories are what was valuable to Jews 3000 years ago: geneologies leading back to Abraham. The "sheild of religion" has also blocked for what it is, not one cohesive religious guide, but a collection that features religious guidelines, just like anything of that antiquity such as the Illiad. I agree with those who'd say the religious stygma has kept it out of schools, and that is a sad loss. It is undoubtedly the single most influential piece of writing of our civilization.
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Crysknife
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Re: The God Delusion

Post by Crysknife »

Yeah but shu, does that really make sense? If you are a true Christian you can't question the existence of God. Sounds to me like he's either got a few questions himself or he is just humoring people with his supposed open-mindedness.

These people who are in-betweeners I'm not really worried about. It's the people that KNOW and want to push their God on everyone else that I have a problem with....and they are everywhere. Could Dawkins be guilty of this? To some degree maybe, but the burden of proof is on those who make the most outstanding claims. Dawkins just asks for a bit of evidence which no one seems to have.
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Re: The God Delusion

Post by DuneFishUK »

Apjak wrote:
GamePlayer wrote:It's funny but there's so much abhorrently offensive material in the bible that if it lacked the shield of religion the vast majority of people would morally object to reading it :lol:
Ya see the thing about "the Book" it's the entire library of a whole people. If it were Irish it'd have Ullyses in it, and being Hebrew it does: Song of Solomon. The Old Testament is two-thirds poetry, and New Testament is two-thirds personal letters. Psalms is a song book. Most of the histories are what was valuable to Jews 3000 years ago: geneologies leading back to Abraham. The "sheild of religion" has also blocked for what it is, not one cohesive religious guide, but a collection that features religious guidelines, just like anything of that antiquity such as the Illiad. I agree with those who'd say the religious stygma has kept it out of schools, and that is a sad loss. It is undoubtedly the single most influential piece of writing of our civilization.
That's the reason I want to read it. Even at it's most boring ("And the sons of Zebulon; were Sulibon, and Elron, and Megatron, and... ... ...") It's worth wondering how much of these lists of names and ancestors, and ancient ancient stuff about the first cities, have basis in fact. Because these were our oral traditions from thousands of years ago.

Some bits are definitely made up though :P
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Re: The God Delusion

Post by chanilover »

guild navigator wrote:I've browsed through it, it's decent. When you come to the "angry letters" part, tell me what you think, IIRC it's around the 200s in the hardcover. 8)
I laughed out loud at the hate letters, and laughed even more when Princess Dawkins couldn't understand why people who were religious could be so horrid. Whining bitch, fancy printing some rant from an internet loon in his book and bleating about it. He's like science's answer to Combover.
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chanilover
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Re: The God Delusion

Post by chanilover »

Eyes High wrote:
A Thing of Eternity wrote:
SadisticCynic wrote:
They argue without being disrepectful, while maintaining the firm position that there is no god, and anyone who believes so is wrong.
This at least I can respect. Being called deluded isn't exactly a winning argument...
True, but it is what it is. I don’t think people on either side of the argument should censor themselves to the point of watering down their beliefs.

One of my #1 complaints about inter-faith and faith-atheist debates is when people take the whole "respecting other people's beliefs" too far. The fact of the matter is that most people, (aside from some agnostics, religious pluralists, and people from religions that don't exclude other religions from being true) simply do not in truth respect each other’s beliefs, and while I believe we should all strive to respect each other, we should also be honest when we truly don’t.

What do we mean by respect anyways? I think most people actually mean being respect”ful” rather than actually having respect. I doubt very much that many religious people respect atheists, most will eventually admit that they think atheism is an arrogant delusion, and this is true of most atheists’ opinions towards religious people. I can be respectful, but this is very different from respecting IMO. I do think that believing in a god is delusional, and I’m sure most religious people think that I am delusional. I'm not going to insult someone's intelligence by lying to them and saying that I think it's fine to believe in a god. That said - I don’t think that atheists should be purposefully antagonizing religious people, that just makes things worse, and accomplishes nothing. I think real conversation can only take place when both sides of this issue are respectful, while admitting the truth that they do actually lack some respect for the other side.

I think it’s more respectful for me to treat religious people like adults who can handle the truth, rather than sugar coating things. That would be a real insult, IMO. Also, just because I don't have much respect for a person's religious beliefs doesn't mean that I don't still respect them as a human being.

Hope that made sense.
I like the way you said that Thing. :clap: And it made good sense to me.

Of course there are somethings in which we disagree on; however, it seems like we do agree on the still respect the person as a human being w/o having to 'respect' their belief.

I've grown to learn that if you are true to your belief and true to yourself, then people are more likely to respect you even if they disagree with you. Will everyone do that? Of course not. But we should each try our best to set the example of respecting our fellow human being. IMHO

And thank you all who have shown me such much respect and acceptance here at Jac. :dance:

And yeah....each of you are in my prayers. :pray: I know many do not share my belief but I hope you will understand why I pray for my online friends.

Take care and have a nice day.
Oh, thanks! I really fancy a new car, can you put in a word for me? :D
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chanilover
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Re: The God Delusion

Post by chanilover »

Robspierre wrote:
DuneFishUK wrote:I downloaded a really (really) nice audio version of the bible to listen to at work.

I do still want to finish it... but I couldn't get past Numbers - it's fucking wierd and really quite boring :P

The Song of Solomon is the only one I really liked, must of been all the sex and masturbation in it though.

Rob
Book of Tobit was my favourite as a kid. It's about a guy who goes blind and sends his son Tobias who travels around with his dog and marres a woman who is possessed by a demon called Asmodeus who murders her husbands on her wedding night. Tobias survives, I think by using some smelly smoke to ward the demon off then goes back to his father and rubs salve in his father's eyes. Turns out the reason his dad was blind was that he had dried bird shit in his eyes!

It's one of the books which Protestants don't include in the Bible.
"You and your buddies and that b*tch Mandy are nothing but a gang of lying, socially maladjusted losers." - St Hypatia of Arrakeen.
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SadisticCynic
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Re: The God Delusion

Post by SadisticCynic »

chanilover wrote:
guild navigator wrote:I've browsed through it, it's decent. When you come to the "angry letters" part, tell me what you think, IIRC it's around the 200s in the hardcover. 8)
I laughed out loud at the hate letters, and laughed even more when Princess Dawkins couldn't understand why people who were religious could be so horrid. Whining bitch, fancy printing some rant from an internet loon in his book and bleating about it. He's like science's answer to Combover.
Priceless! :D (as well as the non-emboldened bit).
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Re: The God Delusion

Post by Eyes High »

Crysknife wrote:Yeah but shu, does that really make sense? If you are a true Christian you can't question the existence of God. Sounds to me like he's either got a few questions himself or he is just humoring people with his supposed open-mindedness.

These people who are in-betweeners I'm not really worried about. It's the people that KNOW and want to push their God on everyone else that I have a problem with....and they are everywhere. Could Dawkins be guilty of this? To some degree maybe, but the burden of proof is on those who make the most outstanding claims. Dawkins just asks for a bit of evidence which no one seems to have.

I believe it can make sense. You know that I consider myself a true Christian and I do honestly believe that God is real, Jesus is real, and that Sin and the devil are real. But I am also woman enough to admit yeah, I could be wrong. I don't believe I am, but I know there is no way I can prove it beyond the shadow of a doubt on this side of life.

Now I know many of you might have already heard this saying but please allow me to repeat it any way...."I would rather live as if there is One True God and die to find out I am wrong, than to live as if there is no god only to die and be proven that I was wrong."

I think maybe that is what Schu's friend might be doing. He probably believes, just as surely as I, that God is real. But at the same time admitting that yeah, we could be wrong. Only time will tell.

Now I hope I have never PUSHed my God onto anyone; however, I do feel like I need to at least tell others about Him so they can make a decision as to if they will trust in HIm. It is up to the individual as to what they wish to do. I hope that I have been an example that a True Christian can serve God without shoving religion down other people's throats. Christian can witness in so many ways besides just word of mouth. In fact, more often than not, actions speak louder than any words.

I'm not perfect and never will be in this life time. (as several of my posts have testified) But I can admit that I do not hold all the answers, especially when it comes to the mysterous ways of God.
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Re: The God Delusion

Post by GamePlayer »

Definitely no complaints here. If people want to believe in religion, that's their right. I don't believe nor support religion, but I will fight to the bitter end for your right to believe.
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Schu
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Re: The God Delusion

Post by Schu »

Eyes has it right about my friend I believe :)

Where does it ever say that a true christian can't admit fallibility? That a true christian has to not even question the existence of god?

I'm as true an atheist as one can be, I'm settled in my opinion that god does not exist, but that doesn't mean that I don't question it (after all, atheism has strong roots in the scientific method, which in turns has strong roots in skepticism), and that I "know" I'm right.

I think the people that are 100% sure that god doesn't exist and wish to push this on everyone else are pretty damn dangerous too, even Dawkins admits he could be wrong.
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Re: The God Delusion

Post by Crysknife »

I think the people that are 100% sure that god doesn't exist and wish to push this on everyone else are pretty damn dangerous too,
Dawkins doesn't do this. He simply asks why believe without evidence? This is why he is valuable, he causes people to think in ways they never could or wanted to before.

Eyes High, I have no problem with religious people when they choose to live their faith in any manner....until it imposes on my rights and freedoms. You may not try to enforce your ideals and morals on others but I can guess that the organizations that you give money to do try to do this in any number of ways. Again, this is why Dawkins is valuable. We have aright in this country to lobby, support, and indorse any public policy or figure we choose. Dawkins helps rally support for the opposition of which I belong. Simple as that.

Please don't consider me a religious hating monger. People can believe what they want. But I will fight for my beliefs just as hard as GamePlayer fights for yours.
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Re: The God Delusion

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Crysknife wrote:
I think the people that are 100% sure that god doesn't exist and wish to push this on everyone else are pretty damn dangerous too,
Dawkins doesn't do this. He simply asks why believe without evidence? This is why he is valuable, he causes people to think in ways they never could or wanted to before.
Buh? Why did you cut out the rest of my sentence from the quote, saying that Dawkins wasn't one of those people, only to say it yourself?
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Re: The God Delusion

Post by Crysknife »

Sorry Shu, your sentence didn't make much sense to me. If I took it wrong, apologies.
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Re: The God Delusion

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Ah, let me explain it a bit better:

I think Dawkins often hinders the atheist cause as much as he helps it, but then there are some over-militant atheists that do exactly what we hate about religious zealots: being 100% sure with no room for doubt and trying to push it on everyone else. And I'm saying even Dawkins isn't that bad, that he admits he could be wrong.
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Re: The God Delusion

Post by A Thing of Eternity »

Crysknife wrote:I just say thank God we have someone like Dawkins :lol:

If I had to listen to Harris or Dennet all day I'd go mad. I also don't think he's all that militant when compared to who he has to debate against. People in the US are along way from being free of the controlling power of evangelical conservatives and their desire to run this country from all sides, so I say more power to him.

Why focus on the positive aspects of atheism when you have people calling you a devil worshiper or worse, all while they're telling you that they know for a fact that there is a God because he speaks to them everyday? At least Dawkins admits that he might be wrong.....something a true Christian never could. There's no reason to kowtow to them in any respect. But in fact, in face-to-face debates Dawkins is always under control, soft spoken, and civil.
Harris and Dennett are fantastic, they may not get your rocks off as a militant atheist (I'm one too, and I admit, sometimes when those two are talking I want them to just cut loose and explain to their opponent how dumb they really are), but I GUARANTEE you that they do more good for atheism than Dawkins. My problem with Dawkins is NOT how militant he is (I agree, I think he's actually pretty melow), I support that completely, my problem is that he's BAD AT IT - he just fails to put together coherant arguements based on real facts about religions too often and because of this failure religious people are able to just ignore him completely as a nut. I would be happy to see him become twice as militant, if he would also become twice as good at debating scripture, which he needs a wee bit of coaching in.

Harris and Dennett simply cannot be ignored as nuts, they base every argument on absolute researched fact and simple human logic, and they are much better at this than Dawkins.

That said, I know you live in Mormon crazy land, and as an atheist you have to put up with a lot more than I do up here in happy agnostic/whatever you want land. I respect that you get more enjoyment out of watching someone like Dawkins just slam religious people - but I think you vastly underestimate how much deeper Harris and Dennett cut than Dawkins. Dawkins accomplishes only two things, he makes religious people angry (which is fun, yes) and he makes atheists laugh. The other two actually force religious people to think.
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Re: The God Delusion

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I wonder how many athiest believe in global warming?

"The first half of 2008 was the coolest for at least five years."
~World Meteorological Organisation (WMO)

:D
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Re: The God Delusion

Post by SadisticCynic »

Why would there be a correlation between (a lack of) religious faith and belief in global warming?
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Re: The God Delusion

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SadisticCynic wrote:Why would there be a correlation between (a lack of) religious faith and belief in global warming?
Because most people don't check the facts and believe what they are told. I find it ironic that people who don't believe in God so easily buy into a myth like man-made global warming.
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Re: The God Delusion

Post by A Thing of Eternity »

Freakzilla wrote:
SadisticCynic wrote:Why would there be a correlation between (a lack of) religious faith and belief in global warming?
Because most people don't check the facts and believe what they are told. I find it ironic that people who don't believe in God so easily buy into a myth like man-made global warming.
For the love of the gods, just because you have a few sources countering the claims made by the majority of scientists - does not mean that it is a myth. You can absolutely say that it is disputed, or that the jury is out, but you could really stop being so damned arrogant and stating that your sources (who are in the minority) are for some magical reason more reliable than those sources that state global warming is being caused by us. I'm not saying that your sources are wrong (because I'm not a damned scientist), but I am saying that there are intelligent people on both sides of this debate, and both sides need to admit that the other side is NOT being naive, they actually do know what they're talking about.

I agree with you that people need to check their facts and not just accept what they're told - but a lot of people HAVE checked the facts and have arrived at the opposite conclusion that you have - you don't need to insult their intelligence.
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Re: The God Delusion

Post by Freakzilla »

My point was not about being right or wrong and I appologize for injecting my personal bias, but rather that, like many religious people, their opinions aren't based on reason.
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Re: The God Delusion

Post by A Thing of Eternity »

Freakzilla wrote:My point was not about being right or wrong and I appologize for injecting my personal bias, but rather that, like many religious people, their opinions aren't based on reason.
Thanks, and that said - I agree with you. I even have atheist friends who get upset when people who have no idea what they're talking about say that evolution is the obvious truth. Of course, evolution IS obviously the truth, but I can say that because I've studied the evidence and genetics, and can say that I know what I'm talking about.

Someone who just blindly believes in evolution or global warming isn't much better than someone who blindly believes in the supernatural.

And, I like the point you're making - that just because atheists are being logical and rational when it comes to their beliefs in the supernatural, this doesn't necessarily match up with the way they look at other things. The same thing could be said in opposite - many people who for some unknown reason believe in the supernatural are fully rational and logical in other areas of their lives, in many cases to the point where they probably out-do many atheists on overal rationality.

People (believers and atheists both) seem to have (and use constantly) the ability to just turn-off the logical, conscious part of their mind when it comes to certain issues. I don't know that religious people necessarily do this more than atheists, it would be very tough to say.
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