I've mellowed and decided blaming the poor seems mean. I channel my hate at Christian scientists but I'm even losing the will for that tbh.

How can any Syrian truly still believe there is a god?

Religion is entirely valid as a subject of historial and social significance, just don't actually practice the fucking thing.

I was listening to a podcast this morning on the way to work. Basically theres a radio show in usa called Coast to Coast Am. It the biggest paranormal related radio show in the usa. I've been listening to discussions about all sorts of subjects. Anyhow they had a guy on who was talking about NDE (near death experience). This one basically changed his life. He was quite a rich doctor, lived in a mansion drove a hummer to work (get the picture?). He had an accident one day and had a NDE. This NDE wasn't a tunnel with white light and seeing your dead grandparents and feeling all lovely and glowie inside.
He went to a place he described as dark, hot, very frightening. He could hear horrible screaming all around him and evil spirts. Obviously he panicied and started praying for God to help him. He describes an entity/angel appearing and taking him away from that place. It reviewed two former past lives with him and showed him that his soul was still repeating the same mistakes in other lives. It said that it wasn't his time and that he could go back, but if he didn't change his ways then the evil place he experienced at the start is where he would end up.
Since then he quit being a doctor, started to help people, sold his hummer to buy a eco friendly car. Obviously as NDE was his experience, his wife refused to get rid of her maserati and her mansion. But he says he's happier that he is on the right path. Bizarre thing is that he is a Hindu and the question his wife asked him when he told her of his NDE was why didnt you see any of the Hindu gods (of which they are many). Why did you see an angel instead. He couldn't answer....

On the flip side of that I read an article today about a soldier in Afghanistan (could have been Iraq) who was shot by a sniper.
Bullet went through his spleen, liver, diaphragm and lung.
After seeing blood gushing out of his chest.
He said his first thought was to drop off the roof he was on to avoid a second shot.
Then he lay there just wanting to fall asleep. He said when things started shutting down there was no thought, just sleep. He woke up in the UK weeks later as if I a blink of an eye.

MuseChick wrote:

Liveinadive wrote:

The poor fall mainly into the brainwashed category. Also a bit retarded. Pray to god your whole life and get nothing but a shit sandwich, wake up.

On the other hand that makes it more understandable. For some, it's probably easier to believe they're being "tested" or that it's some sort of divine plan beyond their power and the hope of a decent afterlife to cling onto too. I'm sure for some that's preferable to just having to accept it's shit and that's it for you. Of course most won't see it as a decision like that, but I'd be willing to bet that's why it thrives in poorer/really shitty places (besides the lack of education, mixing with other cultures etc)

The thing that truly baffles me is when highly intelligent and educated people decide that a literal YEC interpretation is valid. I've spoken with biologists, physicists, industrial chemists, mathematicians, climatologists and even a physicist who each believe the world is ~6000yo. No geologists or astronomers, though. 

These are people who have demonstrated the ability to construct and understand scientific arguments who are unable to comprehend evolution, to the point they willfully misinterpret it in the crocoduck fashion (I wish I was being facetious here). 

The chemist was even so obtuse as to use the analogy of jar of m&ms as an argument for intelligent design. That is the biggest single misunderstanding of the second law of thermodynamics since Red Dwarf had chocolate eclairs in reverse. At least they had an excuse though.

The question is not so much whether religion is evil or good, but whether it's accurate or useful. It's not accurate but it can be useful for fulfillment of social needs.

Nice typo

Several.

acemuzzy wrote:

I'm basically atheist, but do struggle with "why the fuck is there even a universe to start with (*)" and "what the fuck is conciousness".

A) That's a terrible question, because it comes loaded that implies there is a reason. You should be asking "How did the Universe start?", and I'd point you to the fact that the total energy of the Universe is zero, and there's probably an infinite amount of Universes because of this simple fact, and anything that can happen does happen is what QM seems to be telling us.

B ) Conciousness is enormous complexity that comes from living in an amazingly stable Universe (which there are an infinite number of). It's not understood because 13 billion years is lot of history to wade through, but it's just chemical reaction that allows ever increasingly large chains of atoms to make copies of themselves. There's no why question here either. People are working on the how.

Yeah that's what I meant by (A), just unhelpfully phrased by me, and my footnote is basically as per your suggestion I think.  

On B, not wholly convinced by "it's just chemical reaction" TBH.  But who the fuck knows.

acemuzzy wrote:

On B, not wholly convinced by "it's just chemical reaction" TBH.  But who the fuck knows.

  Well I think we can agree it's not a beardy cunt that nobody can see but is imagined, largely because they were confused about floods, thunderstorms, tides and death. To say it's a just a chemical reaction is maybe doing it a disservice, because it involves all the laws, all that time, and a lot of stuff we maybe don't know yet. What is clear is that this is what atoms do after several billion years of hanging around in this Universe, 99.999999999% of which happened before humans and the idea of God existed.  As for perception, it seems odd that reality can only exist when it's being observed and that really does seem to be the case. Maths never fails though, and because of this we currently believe in the most mental of ideas. QM is essentially built on maths and maths alone, despite the fact it's completely mental. If I were to choose between the mental maths Universe and the mental beardy Universe I know which way I'm swaying.

davyK wrote:

If we could state we weren't affected by a layer of perception then I'd be 100% in agreement. I'd like to think pure mathematics punches through because that doesn't require confirmation/validation via observation. If it can't then we are blind. I agree with the Gazelle's posts , but I'm not quite at 100%, if that makes any sense in this context.

As for perception, it seems odd that reality can only exist when it's being observed and that really does seem to be the case.

QM doesnt actually state the requirement of an observer though. It's just an interaction, not a pair of eyes.

I hate to break this to you, but nothing exists until it is observed.

Are you telling me the Moon doesn't exist unless someone is looking at it SG?!!

Yes, I'm afraid I am.

I'm more impressed about the whole being made of cheese thing tbh.