God - The Bear and Badger

Djornson

jon/mod - I could use aliens, it doesn't matter, the point was delusion, not faith. I already stated it was extreme and that faith was ambigious, i will get to that bit but pointless me trying if you don't agree in theory with the above. Larger entities could be a government which basis policies around something which could be defined as delusional.

Gonzo - your second paragraph is good, i like the bit in bold but not sure i can proof it should be true. My example isn't perfect but i think if we take a leap of faith over the bits i have theorized on there is a point in there somewhere, though it is, confusingly, slightly separate to what i said preceeding it.Â

What i should be asking myself is why i think it's wrong to believe in something without evidence and if good comes from that, is it wrong? What are others thoughts on that?

Facewon

Gonz, how the fuck are we arguing so much when you can post stuff like your first response to djorn. Goddammit.

Rev

Goddammit?
lol facewon.
I like djorns style very much.
That is all for now.
tomorrow will be about auras, and electrical energy and Its relation to religion.
if i get the time.

Facewon

heh.

djchump

Gonzo wrote:

... I just wish people stopped concentrating on religion first, I feel like it's a distraction. ...

God thread, natch.

Djornson

I've been thinking some more, probably going to ramble a lot and not make as much sense as my first post. I'm going to assume we all agree the big bang is a plausible theory.

We have no evidence God did not create the big bang. We also have no evidence that God created the big bang. We simply can't measure anything before it. In the absence of any evidence, why is it necessary for some people to believe God did create it?

One could argue believing it and the rules it entails causes people to live good and happy lives, it gives them purpose and comfort. But.. it also causes some to live bad and unhappy lives.

Why can't we just admit we don't know and recognise what makes us good and happy and try our best to be that?Â

You could argue that some should believe some shouldn't. On a personal level this is OK-ish* But by some believing it encourages others to, it spreads, becomes organised religion and then some who shouldn't believe, do believe (or are forced/coerced/conditioned too.) I'd really like to see what we could achieve in the world without organised religion being a factor at all.Â

This is a very basic version of what Gonzo said, i just want to know what those defending/supporting religion think of it. Also i have strayed from the subject of God quite a lot. Should we make a separate 'religion' thread?

* on a personal level it still seems odd - if you'd never been introduced to the idea of God would it have occurred naturally and seemed sensible? It's impossible to tell i guess. Can we ask a feral wolf child about God? I really would rather somebody was a good person because they made a concious decision to be rather than they were told to be or were scared into being one or they figure some reward will come of it. I would hazard i guess it makes them more likely to continue it rather than give up when they realise it has no reward or purpose other than itself.

Mod74

I think people should be free to believe what they want.

If some people use organised religion for bad things then they're twats and you should blame them not the religion.

Blaming the religion is as stupid as using it for justification. If people are twats call them on it.

Christianity or Islam aren't good or bad religions, they're good or bad when the people following them do good or bad things.

Brooks

Ah but see then you have to identify what's making a person's things 'good' or 'bad' and one of those things could be religion or religious culture and then arhgktoqyo2y52h5434

Facewon

Mod74 wrote:

you should blame them not the religion.

I really don't get the zeal with which people will run from actually, you know, maybe, kinda, blaming religion, for like, you know, anything, or something. Just something, I'd take just something.

It's the teflon don of possible causes I tell you.

@djorn: In brief, I don't get the idea of God as a good answer to what came before the big bang, and yes, I don't know is surely the best answer we have so far. With an addendum that we should probably keep trying our best to work shit out, even though we may never know. Still, you make a bit of a leap there that I'm not following which seems to go God created the big bang ergo moral behavior. I suspect you're just short cutting a little, but I don't know that people's thoughts go quite God did the big bang > I better not piss on my neighbors lawn.

Mod74

OK, I blame religion, and specifically a gilt edged Bible, for a paper cut I had once.

Facewon

There you go.

Djornson

Mod74 wrote:

I think people should be free to believe what they want. If some people use organised religion for bad things then they're twats and you should blame them not the religion. Blaming the religion is as stupid as using it for justification. If people are twats call them on it. Christianity or Islam aren't good or bad religions, they're good or bad when the people following them do good or bad things.

If those religions did not exist those people may not do those bad things.

Or they may find some other stupid reason to do bad things.

It's impossible to tell without eradicating religion.

Which is why i said i'd like to see what we could achieve without it. It could be worse, who knows? but must be worth a try. I'm not blaming religion for everything in the world. Just for the things that, you know, it's definitely responsible for.

The Bible and the Quran say some lovely things. They also say some stupid and ambigious things which make absolutely no sense and people misinterpret.Â

Why don't we forget them and create a new book which only says good things in a clear manner?

Because we are emotinally attached to something which has zero evidence, right? We are taught Â to believe something before we have the critical faculties to question it.

If we could all do as Gonzo does and just read them from a spirtual point of view everything would be fine, but that's not what we (and other countries more so) are told to do.

JonB

Djornson wrote:

I really would rather somebody was a good person because they made a concious decision to be rather than they were told to be or were scared into being one or they figure some reward will come of it. I would hazard i guess it makes them more likely to continue it rather than give up when they realise it has no reward or purpose other than itself.

Nobody decides to be a good person based on nothing - there has to be some ideology behind it. If there were such a thing as purely autonomous consciousness, then how would it come into being in the first place? You have to replace the grand narrative of God with something else otherwise there's no absolute reason to be good or even an absolute definition of what good is. In fact, I don't think you can come up with a concept of being good that doesn't involve some sort of reward or isn't born of fear. So I don't see that there's anything wrong with religion for that reason at least (although nor am I saying that all ideas of good have equal merit, it's just you need to come up with some other criteria for measuring them, which also won't be universally agreeable of course).

Mod74

@Djorn

But it's entirely down to, as you say, interpretation.

If you could say every single bad deed in the history of mankind was as a result of religion then I'd be the first to say lets ban this shit.

People who want to remove religion are just replacing one ideology with another. They tried that, it didn't work out so well.

Djornson

Facewon wrote:

Still, you make a bit of a leap there that I'm not following which seems to go God created the big bang ergo moral behavior. I suspect you're just short cutting a little, but I don't know that people's thoughts go quite God did the big bang > I better not piss on my neighbors lawn.

I have made a bit of a leap. I was trying to avoid delusion and explore my question (to myself) of why it's bad to believe something without evidence. Any believe about God's creation other than creating the big bang could be loosely classed as delusional. Still, there are people who when confronted with evidence that God did not create the world 2000 years ago say "ok, God created the big bang then" and still follow all other Christian teachings.

Djornson

jon - if i am good to somebody it makes me feel good. i guess that's all i meant but yes sometimes there are other ideologies required.

mod - i don't think i have an ideology. i just want to base things on evidence. is that an ideology? if so then evidence is my god. it's allowed us to create a million things which improve our lives and allows us to solve millions of diseases. Also, i don't want to ban religion, just everybody to sort of release it's silly and grow out of it.

not sure where i'm going with this now. going to do some work for a bit and come back later

Rev

Mod74 wrote:

I think people should be free to believe what they want. If some people use organised religion for bad things then they're twats and you should blame them not the religion. Blaming the religion is as stupid as using it for justification. If people are twats call them on it. Christianity or Islam aren't good or bad religions, they're good or bad when the people following them do good or bad things.

I think the main issue with organise religion itself is it's inability to change and adjust according to current thinking. Â
That's one of the reasons I don't follow a particular religion. It should be based around ideas - not rules.
I played Jesus in Godspell in a show some 7 years ago. The show is based around parables form the Book of Matthew and Luke. Â It was about the bringing together of Â community based around the same thoughts and ideals- most of them being about treating each other in the right way, not much of ye olde wrath of God stuff. Â It was more about ideas on how to treat people - not all out 'thou shall do this' Â
It struck me that the Christians I have little problem with are those that follow those teachings.
The ones that seem to throw hatred take their 'gospel' from the old testament. I think it's because they want an excuse to hate, and if you look at any 'teachings' or 'commandments' from any of the main religions you with be able to find enough bile to kill a small elephant.Â
I suppose it depends on what you want to take from it.Â
You could look at the Kids section on this forum and come away with the impression that everyone on here is really supportive and caring.Â
you could look on the No subject thread and think that we are cruel and vindictive the way we talk about Prankster. Â You could take it further. Someone that reads the No subject thread decides that Prankster doesn't fit in with how a forumite should be and starts sending them abusive PMs because everyone is abusive towards him. they feel justified in their actions because 'it says in the forum he is a twat'. How long before someone then decides he should be harmed?
That's when religious becomes dangerous, when people stop thinking for themselves and rely on the masses.Â
That's why I just can't get behind a Catholic God. - and I would probably be smited if did.

EDIT - took so long to write this everyone has said what i said like.... :$

JonB

Djornson wrote:

jon - if i am good to somebody it makes me feel good. i guess that's all i meant but yes sometimes there are other ideologies required.

But where do you get your ideas about what being 'good to somebody' is? How is doing something good and feeling good about it any different from what a religous person does?

mod - i don't think i have an ideology. i just want to base things on evidence. is that an ideology? if so then evidence is my god. it's allowed us to create a million things which improve our lives and allows us to solve millions of diseases. Also, i don't want to ban religion, just everybody to sort of release it's silly and grow out of it.

You can't not have an ideology, and 'evidence' isn't one. If it were you'd expect everyone who followed evidence to end up with similar beliefs, but they don't. You have to think about what social and cultural norms influence you. What has made you think 'evidence' is a principle worth basing your life on? Does that mean you're against imagination and creativity? Couldn't that be turned towards totalitarianism? What motivates people to search for evidence anyway? Is it not some idea fo making things 'better' in some way, and then better how, based on what?

Rev

JonB wrote:

Djornson wrote:

jon - if i am good to somebody it makes me feel good. i guess that's all i meant but yes sometimes there are other ideologies required.

But where do you get your ideas about what being 'good to somebody' is? How is doing something good and feeling good about it any different from what a religous person does?

Â

Â I think it is more about what is judged as a good action by your peers and your family. I think the feeling of doing something good comes from experiences.
A good action towards someone generally results in a positive response usually in some form of attention.Â
The same can be said about a bad action though.Â
The end result is whether the attention is either positive or negative.
As social animals we rely on the interaction of others to measure our own self worth within society.Â
I think that social influence can be greater than cultural norms.Â

As a father of two I have found it more effective to ignore my kids when they misbehave to socially exclude them. I have found that shouting at them gives them attention that they crave.Â
If I only give them attention and praise when they follow my rules or carry out what I deem to be a good deed then they are rewarded with praise.
If they misbehave they are put out of the room and ignored for a period of time. They recognise that only 'good deeds' will warrant my attention.Â
I've seen this to extremes where the child only gets attention where they have been 'bad' i.e. shouted at, and so they continue down this road through to adulthood without social reward for the good things they do. Continuing to the point where they actively do things that will get them any type of attention.Â

This base requirement has been used by religions in order help control the flock they look after. Where certain things are looked upon as being good deeds e.g. regular church attendance (means social inclusion) where as 'bad deeds' such as sex outside of marriage would be seen as something that could have you banned from the church altogether or 'shamed to show your face'. (social exclusion) Its difficult nowadays to show how profound an effect this could have on someone in a closed community. Its still something I hear about in Northern Ireland where church attendance is still relatively high.Â
I can see how a religious act could be right for the 'church' but considered wrong by the whole of society.Â
At the same time I have seen how a church can give people a real positive sense of social inclusion that gives them the 'attention' they crave. I also see the positive sides of the community that a church can create - which is about bringing some people together, even if I don't agree with 'organised religion' itself.

Facewon

Mod74 wrote:

If you could say every single bad deed in the history of mankind was as a result of religion then I'd be the first to say lets ban this shit.
Â People who want to remove religion are just replacing one ideology with another. They tried that, it didn't work out so well.

Good thing I'm not advocating "removing" it then. Also, there must be a name for what you keep doing. Essentialising? Creating unrealistic either/ors? I dunno.

You'd be up for banning religion if every single bad dead was a result of it? I'll only agree to allowing speed limits in cars if you can prove to me that speed is the single cause of every car crash ever.

Rev

Facewon wrote:

Mod74 wrote:

If you could say every single bad deed in the history of mankind was as a result of religion then I'd be the first to say lets ban this shit. Â People who want to remove religion are just replacing one ideology with another. They tried that, it didn't work out so well.

Good thing I'm not advocating "removing" it then. Also, there must be a name for what you keep doing. Essentialising? Creating unrealistic either/ors? I dunno. You'd be up for banning religion if every single bad dead was a result of it? I'll only agree to allowing speed limits in cars if you can prove to me that speed is the single cause of every car crash ever.

It's women drivers.

Djornson

JonB wrote:

jon - if i am good to somebody it makes me feel good. i guess that's all i meant but yes sometimes there are other ideologies required.

But where do you get your ideas about what being 'good to somebody' is? How is doing something good and feeling good about it any different from what a religous person does?

mod - i don't think i have an ideology. i just want to base things on evidence. is that an ideology? if so then evidence is my god. it's allowed us to create a million things which improve our lives and allows us to solve millions of diseases. Also, i don't want to ban religion, just everybody to sort of release it's silly and grow out of it.

You can't not have an ideology, and 'evidence' isn't one. If it were you'd expect everyone who followed evidence to end up with similar beliefs, but they don't. You have to think about what social and cultural norms influence you. What has made you think 'evidence' is a principle worth basing your life on? Does that mean you're against imagination and creativity? Couldn't that be turned towards totalitarianism? What motivates people to search for evidence anyway? Is it not some idea fo making things 'better' in some way, and then better how, based on what?

All good questions and points, i will try to loosely answer them.

Evidence does not equate to a lack of imagination or creativity. Invention requires ideas, ideas require imagination, without evidence those ideas would never come to fruition.

The definition of an ideology is a set of beliefs which guide my actions. I am not claming they are (was tongue in cheek before) but in theory why can't my beliefs be: I believe what is evident. In it's simplest form: If i am nice to somebody, they are nice to me, i benefit. They are nice to somebody, who is nice to them back, etc.

It doesn't always work like that. So why do i keep trying (and disobey evidence?) I don't know. Maybe i was taught too when i was little. If so, that's great. I was taught that without religion. Does that equate to an ideology, how my parents taught me to behave? Maybe..

Why would they do that? If we can say anything for sure it's that we all inately want to survive and our bloodline to survive. We can probably say we want our species in general to survive. Teaching me to be nice is a survival tool for both myself and others.

If we can do that then we can have the good of religion, without the bad. If so, why do we need religion? I guess the argument is sometimes we need religion to do that, because the world isn't perfect? Maybe.. it's all to complicated. I'm going to the Halo thread.

Mod74

Facewon wrote:

If you could say every single bad deed in the history of mankind was as a result of religion then I'd be the first to say lets ban this shit. Â People who want to remove religion are just replacing one ideology with another. They tried that, it didn't work out so well.

Good thing I'm not advocating "removing" it then. Also, there must be a name for what you keep doing. Essentialising? Creating unrealistic either/ors? I dunno. You'd be up for banning religion if every single bad dead was a result of it? I'll only agree to allowing speed limits in cars if you can prove to me that speed is the single cause of every car crash ever.

Djorn was suggesting giving up religion and writing a new book.

--
But speeding is banned because it can cause deaths.

Speeding is banned/bad because it can cause deaths. Driving isn't.

Suicide bombing is banned/bad because it can cause deaths, believing in a religion that may in some very extreme cases locally promote it, isn't.

Again, it's all down to interpretation and the individuals decision to adopt strict adherence or not.

I'll do 80 mph on the motorway, I won't do 80mph outside a school.

JonB

revelthedog wrote:

I think it is more about what is judged as a good action by your peers and your family.

That just puts it back one step. What gives them their ideas of good?

I think the feeling of doing something good comes from experiences. A good action towards someone generally results in a positive response usually in some form of attention.Â The same can be said about a bad action though.Â The end result is whether the attention is either positive or negative.

It's easy to think of contrary examples. Breaking up with someone may be 'for the best' but may not recieve a positive reaction. Or telling someone they shouldn't go out wearing that hat. Governments go to war for apparently greater goods.

We may be talking about a certain positive result as opposed to response, but there again, positive for who?

As social animals we rely on the interaction of others to measure our own self worth within society.Â I think that social influence can be greater than cultural norms.

I kind of get what you mean, but it would be difficult to draw a line between them. I mean, no interaction with others happens outside culture, right?

JonB

Djornson wrote:

All good questions and points, i will try to loosely answer them. Evidence does not equate to a lack of imagination or creativity. Invention requires ideas, ideas require imagination, without evidence those ideas would never come to fruition.

Quite. So 'evidence' is not much of an ideology.

The definition of an ideology is a set of beliefs which guide my actions. I am not claming they are (was tongue in cheek before) but in theory why can't my beliefs be: I believe what is evident. In it's simplest form: If i am nice to somebody, they are nice to me, i benefit. They are nice to somebody, who is nice to them back, etc.

What is 'nice'? Do you always expect to benefit from being 'nice'? If not, does that mean there's some other reason for doing it?

It doesn't always work like that. So why do i keep trying (and disobey evidence?) I don't know. Maybe i was taught too when i was little. If so, that's great. I was taught that without religion. Does that equate to an ideology, how my parents taught me to behave? Maybe..

Certainly. To paraphrase, you simply followed the ideas of others without question because they seemed to make sense? What does 'because I was taught to' have to do with evidence?

Why would they do that? If we can say anything for sure it's that we all inately want to survive and our bloodline to survive. We can probably say we want our species in general to survive. Teaching me to be nice is a survival tool for both myself and others.

So it's self-interest then? Your concept of the good relates to your survival first and that of others second? Does it not have a concept of personal sacrifice at all?

If we can do that then we can have the good of religion, without the bad. If so, why do we need religion? I guess the argument is sometimes we need religion to do that, because the world isn't perfect? Maybe.. it's all to complicated. I'm going to the Halo thread.

The thing is, from what you've said your ideology doesn't seem any more stable than various religious ideologies. It's certainly just as open to abuse.

Some of these questions are rhetorical btw, I'm not suggesting there are always answers (or right answers anyway).

Rev

@JonBÂ

That just puts it back one step. What gives them their ideas of good?

In general? the experiences they have from growing up themselves and what was acceptable within their social circles.Â

It's easy to think of contrary examples. Breaking up with someone may be 'for the best' but may not recieve a positive reaction.

It receives some reaction though. I never said it was necessarily going to be positive. It would still have some reactionÂ

Â Or telling someone they shouldn't go out wearing that hat. Governments go to war for apparently greater goods.

Again - it may illicit some response may be positive or negative but it would result in some kind of 'attention'.

We may be talking about a certain positiveÂ resultÂ as opposed to response, but there again, positive for who?

I'm talking about a certain degree of attention or interaction, this being positive or negative, it is still classed as attention. Â

It's been proved to work with animals - dogs and horses, all based around attention received or possible exclusion from the social pack

I kind of get what you mean, but it would be difficult to draw a line between them. I mean, no interaction with others happens outside culture, right?

Culture to me comes from a result of an agreed social structure. It is the exhaust fumes of what comes from a group that agree on the basis of acceptable behaviour and is more the further exploration of that social structure that manifests itself on how that structure communicates its beliefs and ideas, hypothesiseses and theories.

Djornson

Certainly one could argue we all need to follow a philosophy Jon (i don't think i like the word ideology,) and be taught about it's ideas and why they are good.

What i don't like is following a philosophy which claims it's ideas are good because some being above us for which there is no evidence said so.

Can't we come up with a better philosophy with better reasoning and a better source?

Some_Guy

Djornson,

We can play etymological games all day, and while it is important to talk about what words can mean and how they are defined it is also important to understand what people mean when they use them. The problem with you defining words that I have used is that you are committing the fallacy of equivocation for me.

There is more than one way to define faith. I am using it as a word which means belief without evidence. People also use faith loosely to mean trust in something. This is clearly not the definition I am using, so you pointing out that it can also be evidence based when I have been clear does not actually diminish my point in any way, or justify the sort of faith that I am talking about as being evidence based. If there is no evidence to suggest that something exists, then a belief in that thing necessarily requires faith. I'm not suggesting we ban religion or that religion is all bad, but there is not a religion in existence that does not require this sort of faith on some topic or entity, and if you take those faithful parts out of religion, they cease to be religions and become secular models that are open to rational criticism and change. That is better, and I submit that there is not one tangible benefit to society that religion provides which cannot be achieved through purely secular means.Â Embracing rationality itself would be the end of religion.

There is more than one way to define proof. When I say that I don't use the word proof because it has philosophical implications that make it a ridiculous expectation to only base beliefs on proof, I am clearly talking about philosophical proof. Proof is also commonly used to mean evidence. I am not using the word 'proof' in this way, and you pointing out that faith is defined as belief without proof does not justify the faith I am talking about as being somehow rationally equivalent to other beliefs which are not based on proof. Also, see definitions of faith above.

There is more than one way to define delusion. Delusion has a psychiatric definition as a mental disorder, and common definitions which are much looser. As a mental disorder, delusions are false beliefs based on incorrect inference about external reality that persist despite evidence to the contrary. Some common definitions mirror this, but also extend to beliefs which are held despite having no empirical grounding, whether or not their belief is directly challenged by evidence or not. Common definitions of delusion are based on behavioural manifestations rather than underlying causes of delusion, and there is no greater rational justification for a belief which receives no empirical support than for one which is at odds with empirical support. Both beliefs are exceptionally likely to be wrong. I did not define delusion when I used it because I was trolling Mod a little with my ambiguity :-)

I'm sure you already know what my position is, but to reiterate the point is really this; whether you take it that faith is delusional or not, beliefs that are held either despite having no evidence or in the face of contradicting evidence are not grounded in perceivable reality, patently irrational, likely to be wrong, and indistinguishable from believing in a fantasy â€“ when it comes to claims of truth, a faithful choice is no better than a blind guess. These sort of beliefs are at odds with the idea of building a reasonable society that values improvement through mutual critical evaluation, because these sort of beliefs are uncritical, lead to mistakes, are held regardless of reason and so these people cannot be reasoned with or are resistant to reason.

Lord_Griff

It amuses/annoys me how many times you post an explanation of what you are saying and yet people fail to understand you.

Makes me worry that I am missing something.

Djornson

I basically agree with your argument, i was trying to improve it. Ambiguity can be misinterpreted, offence caused, and wasted time bickering besides the main point of the argument. Those words may mean the above to you and they may mean something else to somebody else. Therefore shouldn't we either stick to the precise definition or explain what we mean every time we use it? Sounds tedious, but so does us going back to previous statements and arguing about the precise meaning of words then changing our response in return.

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