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People Who Spend A Lifetime Crusading Against Religions And Their Followers
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Have these people actually "walked" in the shoes of these religions they seem to spend all of their time and effort slating?
Surely you can only really judge them if you have been within them and know them inside out and have other religions where you've also walked in their shoes to compare them to?
I sometimes look around on the net and see people tirelessly and fiercely crusading against these religions but then see they have nothing to go on except hearsay, rumour and mass hysteria caused by shady media mediums and their uneducated peers, family and friends no less!
What are your views on these wasters of time and tireless crusaders?
Better education at a grass roots level?
Surely you can only really judge them if you have been within them and know them inside out and have other religions where you've also walked in their shoes to compare them to?
I sometimes look around on the net and see people tirelessly and fiercely crusading against these religions but then see they have nothing to go on except hearsay, rumour and mass hysteria caused by shady media mediums and their uneducated peers, family and friends no less!
What are your views on these wasters of time and tireless crusaders?
Better education at a grass roots level?
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Good night Birdie. Only just seen your reply. I was just trying to put my point of view over. Not sure when I'll answer. [not now though, I'm too tired.] It's very hard to put your views across on here without people taking offence [when none is intended] Whatever I say or whatever you say we're
always going to differ in our opinions.
always going to differ in our opinions.
-- answer removed --
It's been irritatingly hard to find any statistics on make-up of charities, but here is one table:
http://
that shows that even atheists bloggers acknowledge that "they have some catching up to do".
And here's another long article making a similar point:
http://
In both cases the studies are based on data sets from some time ago (I'd estimate 4 years for the first, and 13 years for the second), and also the second one at least is based on surveys in America.
It's not a shot at atheistic morality to say this; it's just a presentation of a sad, but fairly evident truth -- that, left to their own devices, most people tend to care more for themselves than for others.
As for a proportion of charities founded by Christians -- that's, sadly, harder to establish. But it's not exactly unreasonable to believe that the proportions are similar to the statistics above. Also, since "advancement of religion" is a legal reason for establishing a charity it makes it more likely that a religious charity can be established than a secular one.
But at any rate it isn't me just making something up to insult atheists. It's got more bearing in truth than that.
http://
that shows that even atheists bloggers acknowledge that "they have some catching up to do".
And here's another long article making a similar point:
http://
In both cases the studies are based on data sets from some time ago (I'd estimate 4 years for the first, and 13 years for the second), and also the second one at least is based on surveys in America.
It's not a shot at atheistic morality to say this; it's just a presentation of a sad, but fairly evident truth -- that, left to their own devices, most people tend to care more for themselves than for others.
As for a proportion of charities founded by Christians -- that's, sadly, harder to establish. But it's not exactly unreasonable to believe that the proportions are similar to the statistics above. Also, since "advancement of religion" is a legal reason for establishing a charity it makes it more likely that a religious charity can be established than a secular one.
But at any rate it isn't me just making something up to insult atheists. It's got more bearing in truth than that.
I’m not sure that can be considered an accurate assessment, Jim. Religion is, in the main, organised and therefore its beneficence widely advertised and recognised. However, whilst non-believers may work tirelessly for charity, generally speaking their efforts remain unacknowledged because they don’t belong to clubs specifically designed for atheists, so how does one even begin to attempt to evaluate an accumulation of individual efforts?
jim - it was indeed deliberately provocative ... towards the people who are making these ridiculous claims that atheists cannot be good people, because they have not allowed god to teach them to be.
and yes it was not a nice thing to say - but then neither is accusing me and millions of other people of being incapable of a moral code.
if you offend me - i can offend you right back - with some actual logic... simple really.
it is sometimes necessary to do that because clearly normal sensible debate and analysis of facts is blatantly ignored by those making the claims.
they make such stupid and wildly inaccurate statements - and i was just doing the same, to illustrate how stupid and irrational they sound
i wanted to see what those who have this idiotic idea would say in response... i will bet they cannot answer it.
and whilst i was being sarcastic and exaggerating to make a point - there is an undeniable logic to what i said, and it is a logic that makes more sense than saying people only know how to be good because god tells them to.
so dislike it all you like jim ... its irrelevant.
and yes it was not a nice thing to say - but then neither is accusing me and millions of other people of being incapable of a moral code.
if you offend me - i can offend you right back - with some actual logic... simple really.
it is sometimes necessary to do that because clearly normal sensible debate and analysis of facts is blatantly ignored by those making the claims.
they make such stupid and wildly inaccurate statements - and i was just doing the same, to illustrate how stupid and irrational they sound
i wanted to see what those who have this idiotic idea would say in response... i will bet they cannot answer it.
and whilst i was being sarcastic and exaggerating to make a point - there is an undeniable logic to what i said, and it is a logic that makes more sense than saying people only know how to be good because god tells them to.
so dislike it all you like jim ... its irrelevant.
Well so long as we're all clear on what you meant we can move on. It's not true that atheists are incapable of being moral, certainly, and it's ad that some people think like that. The evidence also is that for the most part some people are just nasty and religion doesn't always do much, if anything, to change that.
Neither side can really claim to have the moral high ground overall. There was a famous debate between Tony Blair and the late Christopher Hitchens about this, "Religion can be a force for Good in the World", when Blair's (supporting the motion) argument seemed to be that, well, some religious people are good people, and Hitchens's counter-argument, never really satisfactorily answered, was "but you don't have to be religious to be a good person".
Religion can be a force for good in the World, and usually is on balance, but has also been yet another clock nasty people can hide behind. To dislike and persecute other, different groups; to subjugate the masses; and to provide them yet another way to more money and power.
Despite all of that bad stuff, Religion has been a force for good. For a time, it drove developments in Science, Art, Literature and Music. Many people have been motivated by religion to set up charities. Maybe they didn't need to be, but they were. Religion can provide a sense of community and togetherness -- at the moment atheism doesn't really do that, because it's mainly just a set of people spread all over the place whose main feature in common is what they don't believe in rather than what they do. Sadly, many people in the world do need a motivation to be good. Sadly, even with that motivation, many are not good. And, sadly, that motivation often seems to have to be a (what I believe to be) false view of the World.
In time I believe this will change, because all of the motivating factors that Religion provides to drive charity -- community, primarily -- can be provided without invoking the existence of God. At the moment it might just be a weird phase we are going through, when the World slowly moves away from Religion but hasn't quite decided what it is moving towards.
Neither side can really claim to have the moral high ground overall. There was a famous debate between Tony Blair and the late Christopher Hitchens about this, "Religion can be a force for Good in the World", when Blair's (supporting the motion) argument seemed to be that, well, some religious people are good people, and Hitchens's counter-argument, never really satisfactorily answered, was "but you don't have to be religious to be a good person".
Religion can be a force for good in the World, and usually is on balance, but has also been yet another clock nasty people can hide behind. To dislike and persecute other, different groups; to subjugate the masses; and to provide them yet another way to more money and power.
Despite all of that bad stuff, Religion has been a force for good. For a time, it drove developments in Science, Art, Literature and Music. Many people have been motivated by religion to set up charities. Maybe they didn't need to be, but they were. Religion can provide a sense of community and togetherness -- at the moment atheism doesn't really do that, because it's mainly just a set of people spread all over the place whose main feature in common is what they don't believe in rather than what they do. Sadly, many people in the world do need a motivation to be good. Sadly, even with that motivation, many are not good. And, sadly, that motivation often seems to have to be a (what I believe to be) false view of the World.
In time I believe this will change, because all of the motivating factors that Religion provides to drive charity -- community, primarily -- can be provided without invoking the existence of God. At the moment it might just be a weird phase we are going through, when the World slowly moves away from Religion but hasn't quite decided what it is moving towards.
therein lies the problem jim - no atheist would deny the good that has happened in the world in the name of religion - there's lots of stuff, we all know that.
however some religious people seem unable to not only accept the concept, but to even comprehend that its even possible for atheists to be good too.
they actually seem shocked that an atheist could know goodness - the utter ignorance of that is shameful.
yet they also conveniently 'forget' all the abhorrent and terrible things that religion has also caused in the world ... when for many atheists those wrongs vastly outweigh the rights, sadly.
that is the problem
however some religious people seem unable to not only accept the concept, but to even comprehend that its even possible for atheists to be good too.
they actually seem shocked that an atheist could know goodness - the utter ignorance of that is shameful.
yet they also conveniently 'forget' all the abhorrent and terrible things that religion has also caused in the world ... when for many atheists those wrongs vastly outweigh the rights, sadly.
that is the problem
You're right about some religious people, which is sad, but I think you generalise a bit much in saying no atheist would deny the good that has happened in the world in the name of religion -- some do. Whether or not the good outweighs the bad, or vice versa, just as some religious people are blind to the good atheists have done, there are some atheists who are blind to the good religion has done.
Jim, I am not so sure that religion drove development in the arts and sciences. OK, they sponsored some people to produce art works glorifying god but surely these religion's didn't train people for this purpose, they just capitalised on the talents of others.
As for religion promoting science, as soon as there was a suspicion that science didn't glorify god the old blasphemy stuff was wheeled out and it was a matter of repent or die.
Since it was pretty well compulsory for everyone to be a nominal christian or moslem on pain of death, it is hardly surprising that the development of science was led by believers.
As for religion promoting science, as soon as there was a suspicion that science didn't glorify god the old blasphemy stuff was wheeled out and it was a matter of repent or die.
Since it was pretty well compulsory for everyone to be a nominal christian or moslem on pain of death, it is hardly surprising that the development of science was led by believers.
Well it's an interesting question for another thread -- but you're focusing a bit too much, I think, on what happened during the 14th-16th Centuries, and missing what came before -- when developments in Maths and Science were often driven by an Islamic Philosophy of "To know the World is to know God". In the early days, at least, Science was driven by Religion. And it is surprising, too, how often moral and religious debates leaked into Science. The classic example would be Kepler's claim/ discovery that the planets move around the Sun in elliptical orbits rather than circles. Why? A strange logical argument:
We see evil around us so the Universe isn't perfect.
Circles are perfect.
If the Universe isn't perfect, then there is no reason for the planets to travel in perfect circles.
Obviously, the maths then helped... but the religious thinking started the chain. Science, and Art, were for a long time governed or driven by religion -- Be that simply through money, or a more direct influence.
We see evil around us so the Universe isn't perfect.
Circles are perfect.
If the Universe isn't perfect, then there is no reason for the planets to travel in perfect circles.
Obviously, the maths then helped... but the religious thinking started the chain. Science, and Art, were for a long time governed or driven by religion -- Be that simply through money, or a more direct influence.
jim, salicylic acid was discovered in an equally irrational way ie. Fevers are more prevalent near waer fore the cure must exist nearby...thence to willow trees which live near water. It doesn't prove homeopathy correct though because it is a convential type of drug ie. dose in proportion to body mass.
Jim, //developments in Maths and Science were often driven by an Islamic Philosophy of "To know the World is to know God".//
Can a Muslim ever claim to know God? I doubt it. I imagine that philosophy, from an Islamic point of view, would be highly blasphemous. Where did you get it from?
Islam was spread by the sword and, in my opinion, was driven in maths and science by the philosophy that knowledge is power. It was a great collector (and, to give it its due, preserver) of the works of earlier civilisations too and had no hesitation in claiming some of the ideas it found there for its own.
Can a Muslim ever claim to know God? I doubt it. I imagine that philosophy, from an Islamic point of view, would be highly blasphemous. Where did you get it from?
Islam was spread by the sword and, in my opinion, was driven in maths and science by the philosophy that knowledge is power. It was a great collector (and, to give it its due, preserver) of the works of earlier civilisations too and had no hesitation in claiming some of the ideas it found there for its own.
I do not know of many atheists who would try to deny that organised religion has been a force for good, and for compassion, in places around the globe. What any objective observer would have to do though would be to balance out the good works with the relative harms that religion can have; A rejection of science and medicine in favour of faith healing;Interference in the moves toward gender equality; Interference in the abortion debate.Or denying girls education, or interfering in what clothing it would be acceptable to wear. In some religions, the colour of your skin dictated how "pure" you were!
So - bearing all those factors in mind - overall, would you still claim that religion is a force for good in the world? Personally, i think not....
And for those more evangelical and zealous religions, we have the very real harms typified by a lot of the violence we see in the world today.
And there are areas of the globe - developed, first world areas of the globe - where to be a self-confessed atheist would be to end any ambitions of a political role or public high office. In the US, atheism is equated by many with, at best, moral turpitude - at worst, outright evil.
If we wish to encourage the world to become a fairer, more equal place, then atheism needs its crusaders to rally against the negative influences that religion can bring.
So - bearing all those factors in mind - overall, would you still claim that religion is a force for good in the world? Personally, i think not....
And for those more evangelical and zealous religions, we have the very real harms typified by a lot of the violence we see in the world today.
And there are areas of the globe - developed, first world areas of the globe - where to be a self-confessed atheist would be to end any ambitions of a political role or public high office. In the US, atheism is equated by many with, at best, moral turpitude - at worst, outright evil.
If we wish to encourage the world to become a fairer, more equal place, then atheism needs its crusaders to rally against the negative influences that religion can bring.
And one can see straight away from goodlifes response that those committed to religion are extremely reluctant to give up their influence on social and cultural development.
The language use is interesting as well - infidel and atheist viewed as being equally perjorative.
Be careful what you wish for though goodlife - the very last thing that the evangelising religions should want is for the general public to take and objective and serious examination of the bible, because the ensuing cacophony of laughter and derision at the notion that anyone rational could attempt to apply literal interpretations of ancient holy books to modern day living would be deafening....
The language use is interesting as well - infidel and atheist viewed as being equally perjorative.
Be careful what you wish for though goodlife - the very last thing that the evangelising religions should want is for the general public to take and objective and serious examination of the bible, because the ensuing cacophony of laughter and derision at the notion that anyone rational could attempt to apply literal interpretations of ancient holy books to modern day living would be deafening....
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