The God Delusion - ongoing review
- Thread starter GeoffP
- Start date
they are called unnatural because they are made by beings with free will. we aren't controlled by laws of nature because we have free will, we are supernatural, and yet we are a part of nature...
death (change, transformation) is not a bad thing. all physical things wear out and must die some day. it's their fate. these physical bodies are just an advanced form of clothing. don't worry about the death of the clothes/species, we can always make new ones.
Bells
Staff member
Firstly, you should actually read the book. Listening to it can lose a lot of its meaning.
Secondly, atheists are often assumed to actually need to apologise because of the extent to which some theists take offense to even the smallest thing. No one is allowed to offend religion. His quote of Douglas Adams is quite true to be honest. (On page 20 of the book)...
Thirdly, he speaks of an "unhealthy mind" in the sense that it is quite unhealthy to simply believe in something like God, or the tooth fairy, even without proof. Would you deem a grown man who believed in the tooth fairy, prayed to the tooth fairy and left offerings to said fairy as being one of healthy mind? Now replace the tooth fairy with God. See the connection? It is unhealthy because as a child, you are indoctrinated into belief. And you keep that particular dream alive by doing the same to your children. It is unhealthy because some people take it to such an extreme that they are willing to kill for their God. They are willing to disown their own children and family for their beliefs in God. It is unhealthy because people stop thinking for themselves. They stop using their mind, instead preferring to accept, instead of questioning God's existence. Read the book and you'll see for yourself.
First off, could you share the link to what it is you're watching?
Secondly, you're not the first to say that, but on the other hand, there are those who don't get the same impression, some opposite.
Do you view him the same way in all of his videos?
Do you get the same impression when you read his books?
Arthe Xavier
Registered Member
I think it is just as dangerous to take all mysticism away from life - or to generally stive towards debunking all mysteries which still exist. Dawkins is an extremist, and I dislike his approach. He is, of course, entitled to his educated opinion, but he is seriously generalizing the religious community. For many people, religion is only a frame-work - a save haven, so to speak, which gives them stability and certainty in life. Faith doesn't kill creativity or deep thinking, since if it does, then the person has no capability to be creative and / or a deep thinker to begin with as far as my opinion is concerned.
Comparing God to a tooth-fairy is just as superficial, to be honest. The concept of God has roots in our various mythologies, and has been recorded ever since we were able to write. Tooth-fairy, on the other hand, doesn't. Tooth-fairy doesn't represent the entity that God does, for God - whatever it may be - is generally associated with either life or warmth. The concept might not be tangible, but the effects which it is often related to are.
Dawkins might be rational, but I doubt that he has a deep understanding of human emotions. Plus, he would be just as ready to fight and die for science as some people are for religion, so his point regarding this matter becomes somewhat obsolete. Religion isn't dangerous - the human mind, in general, is. If one studies christian ethics, for example, and takes them to heart ( as many religious people do ), then he or she will actually make an effort to live better.
The whole claim that religion is with-helding our growth as intelligent beings is bogus as well. Human kind has been religious ever since the stone-age, yet progress has still happened - constantly. The christian church might have tried to prevent it in the middle-ages, but it doesn't do so anymore. Like somebody said, even the catholic church approves the idea of evolution - even if the approach is a bit cautious.
Comparing God to a tooth-fairy is just as superficial, to be honest. The concept of God has roots in our various mythologies, and has been recorded ever since we were able to write. Tooth-fairy, on the other hand, doesn't. Tooth-fairy doesn't represent the entity that God does, for God - whatever it may be - is generally associated with either life or warmth. The concept might not be tangible, but the effects which it is often related to are.
Dawkins might be rational, but I doubt that he has a deep understanding of human emotions. Plus, he would be just as ready to fight and die for science as some people are for religion, so his point regarding this matter becomes somewhat obsolete. Religion isn't dangerous - the human mind, in general, is. If one studies christian ethics, for example, and takes them to heart ( as many religious people do ), then he or she will actually make an effort to live better.
The whole claim that religion is with-helding our growth as intelligent beings is bogus as well. Human kind has been religious ever since the stone-age, yet progress has still happened - constantly. The christian church might have tried to prevent it in the middle-ages, but it doesn't do so anymore. Like somebody said, even the catholic church approves the idea of evolution - even if the approach is a bit cautious.
I will agree here. Even adult converts to theism can be hard to take.
Bells
Staff member
Why do people need to have that "safe haven"? Are they too weak to face life and the world without it? Do people really need to feel that they are being watched by a great daddy in the sky to make them feel better about themselves? You have pretty much made the point of why it is unhealthy. People who assume that one can only be creative, moral, good, etc, if they believe in God and/or religion are selling themselves short. They are doing themselves a disservice. Because any good a person does is not attributed to themselves or to their own ability to do good, but to a non-existing God. Are humans that incapable of doing good by themselves?
To a small child, it is. So is Santa and the Easter Bunny. A child is 'good' so that they are rewarded by Santa for example. Do you think telling a child there is no Santa will automatically mean that child becomes suddenly bad? Is Santa the only thing keeping that child in line? The same goes for God. Is the belief in God the only thing that is stopping everyone from killing each other? As an atheist, I can assure you, I have never killed a person. Am I somehow abnormal? After all, I don't believe in God, but I also have morals.
So when you tell a child there is no Santa, or tooth fairy or Easter Bunny, you are taking away their warmth and a security blanket. But we do it nonetheless, because well, none of those things exist, do they? So why do adults persist to indoctrinate their children about God in a similar fashion? The effects of believing in both are the same. Santa = be good and you will be rewarded... be bad and you get nothing for Christmas or coal. God = be good and you will be rewarded (heaven).. be bad and you get nothing but pain in hell. See the connection? One keeps the children in line and the other keeps everyone in line.
On the contrary. If one were to study the Christian ethics and take them seriously to heart, then we would be arresting homosexuals and imprisoning them (if they are lucky.. otherwise we kill them and send them to hell), for one thing. We would also ban all forms of contraception and abortion (even for medical emergencies). I could go on.. So would all that make life better do you think?
Saying human beings have been religious since the stone age does not favour your argument. Because you are basically saying that human beings have been unable to move beyond the stone age in the manner and matter of their beliefs. In short, their minds still belong in the stone age while others have been able to move on.
Arthe Xavier
Registered Member
Oh, we do, my friend. We are all weak enough to search the comfort and safe haven from around us - for some it is God, for some it is sports, video-games, or a combination of the above... Actually, we are so weak at facing life that we rather escape it than move towards it - 'thus our tendency to consume alcohol and watch excessive amounts of television; anything that can aid us in our escape. My point wasn't about religious people being more creative and intelligent, but that faith doesn't make a person *less* capable at being creative and intelligent.
Why should it matter to you what the motivation is behind a good deed, ( or the idea of 'being good' ) by the way? According to basic psychology, a 'good deed' is always commenced in the hopes of a reward - perhaps one unconciously believes that if he is nice to a person, people will also be nice to him. Or perhaps it will make him feel better about himself in general. Or perhaps he wants to satisfy God, who he believes is watching his every step, by fulfilling the law "love your neighbour as you love yourself". Why should it matter to you? We are never capable of doing a good deed without any selfish purposes anyhow, and the fact remains that both parties - the maker of the deed and the receiver of the deed - win something from the situation. Why is it better if a person's motivation doesn't involve God, since we are incapable of performing a completely selfless act of good regardless?
I never said that atheists don't have a sense of morality. This defensive thought-pattern is seemingly rooted in your own head - it is you who constantly looks for 'dividing factors' between faithful and faithless people. You need to realize that there is nothing different in you versus a religious person. You probably find comfort and balance from some thoughts / things, while a religious person has his Bible. Different paths, same conclusion.
My point was, if you look carefully, that having faith doesn't necessarily harm a person - it might even give the person the frame-work he / she needs for self-improvement. It is only in fundamentalism where I can sense danger and blindness, too, and very few of the christians I know personally are fundamental.
Actually, you are wrong here. Christian doctrine doesn't blanket a person in the way the idea of Santa Claus does. It isn't about being 'good' or being 'bad' - it is about being humble in front of God. It's all about being able to admit that one has faults and needs a companion - be it God, or another human being - in this life to help him out. I find nothing wrong with this thought-pattern. You see why it might even be important to one's self-improvement? It actually encourages you to face yourself just as you are - a fragile individual in search of solace. Modern society is pushing people towards cynicism - why is that any better? We can never shake our inner child away completely, nor should we.
This paragraph unfortunately shows that you know nothing about Christian ethics. First of all, ruling out gay people is part of the old testament - which, by christian doctrine, represents the previous relationship between humanity and God. The new relationship came with Jesus Christ, who never encouraged people to condemn each other. In fact, Jesus encouraged us to love each other, forgive each other and respect each other. He saved a whore, which - by your definitions of Christian ethics - should have been stoned and sent to hell. Replace the whore with a gay person and He would have done the same. You are seemingly clinging on to the extremist ideals and views of christianity, which - I agree - are harmful. But you are seriously narrowing your view on christianity in general if you think that every religious person thinks like you think they do.
We haven't. We might have advanced technologically, but we are still homo sapiens. Our mathematical and practical thinking might have evolved, but we still share the exact same needs and desires as our stone-age counterparts. This includes the desire to worship a 'greater entity' - be it God, money or a car, for example. What makes you think that we are superior, in that sense, than our ancestors?
Bells
Staff member
Why should it matter to me. Good question. It does because it invariably affects everyone.
Firstly, I was merely mirroring statements made by many theists on these forums. I do not particularly care if someone believes in God or fairies. At the end of the day, both are one and the same to me. Imaginary. But many view their morality as being derived from the imaginary. That without that great being in the sky, we would all fall into a pit of hopelessness. I happen to disagree. I think we, as a human species, are selling ourselves short in how we believe. We restrict our potential. Advancement in science becomes restricted due to its being contrary to religious teachings. People are restricted in how they live their lives, due to religious doctrines.
There is always a danger. Fundamentalism does not need to exist for it to be dangerous. When you have the Catholic Church, as one example, restricting governments of third world countries from teaching sex education and allowing the sale of contraception and condoms, it becomes extremely dangerous. When you have women sticking a coat hanger up into her uterus to perform an abortion on an unwanted child because she cannot legally get one, then it becomes dangerous and harmful.
On the contrary. I think it gives people a way out. Harm someone and beg for forgiveness from God and all is fine. Instead of facing the pain they may have caused someone, all they need to ask is for God to forgive them. It gives them an 'out'. That is where there is solace.
I guess the Catholic priests who refuse to give communion to practicing homosexuals must have missed that bit in the New Testament. I guess they are following the OT when they refuse to give a homosexual communion. But then again, it (NT) classifies homosexual acts and homosexuality in general as being a 'degrading passion', does it not, along with fornication and adultery, all of which are deemed sin's in the eyes of God.
It is nice to comfort one's self with the thought that homosexuals and homosexuality is embraced by one's church. Makes one feel all warm and fuzzy inside. The reality is that discrimination of homosexuals and their families who support and stand by their homosexual relatives are turned away from the church, denied the sacrament and also advised of the grievous sins they are committing.
In other words, we are still backwards and think like cavemen. We still need to believe in something because we are simply too stupid not to. After all, all those stars in the sky, it is inconceivable that they were not created by God almighty. We need to believe in God because we are simply incapable to actually facing the reality. We fear death to such an extent that we are quite willing to accept that a great father figure in the sky will take us to a magical place and make things all better again.
Bells
Staff member
It is how it is described. Sorry, next time I'll be sure to be exact and say 'debased mind'. I would suggest you read Paul's words in Rom. 1:24-28, 32.. "Likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust for one another, men with men committing what is shameful, and receiving in themselves the penalty of their error which was due. And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a debased mind, to do those things which are not fitting;...who, knowing the righteous judgment of God, that those who practice such things are deserving of death, not only do the same but also approve of those who practice them"..
The NT confirms the OT quite soundly, wouldn't you say?
Paul, an apostle, confirms that acts of homosexuality should be condemned with death. Yes, big change there from the OT, eh?
Now imagine people who actually take those words to heart, as all believers of the Christian faith are meant to. Actually no, I do not want to imagine it, because to imagine it would be to imagine the death of millions of people. And if you reject Paul's comments, you also reject the word of God, especially when one reads Lev. 18:22, 20:13.
I wonder, if a Christian kills a homosexual, and then begs for forgiveness, does that person go to heaven? Or hell? Does he even have to ask for forgiveness? Or is that just a something that is given naturally by the almighty God? The Christian groups around the US who began protesting against anti-discrimination laws which "prohibited" harassing and abusing homosexuals on university campuses would probably say hell, don't you think? Did you get to that part in the book Geoff? As Dawkin's states, hate speech is hate speech until it is claimed to be religious speech. So Christian groups protesting to be allowed to harass and abuse homosexuals hide behind the religious freedom, then it becomes 'free speech'. Nice, eh?
So how's the book coming Geoff? Enjoying it?
I really have to wonder how any person can be so accepting of a religious faith that explicitly states that one group's punishment is deserving of death.. all because they happen to be born homosexual. How can one believe in a God who actually decries acts such as condemning a homosexual to death as being a moral? On the contrary, any person who makes or believes as such is not moral. But hey, God is God and he/she/it must be followed to the letter and sadly, some do.
wrong!, how could you come to this conclusion.Mutatis mutandis- and a reverse but accurate description of his proclamation - there are indeed no theist children of any kind, but also no athiest children either.
Surely you know what atheist means.
It comes from the greek "Atheos" "A" = without and "Theos" = god, the same as Asymetry means without symetry, It's that simple.
So to say that "there are no athiest children either", is clearly wrong, children can be nothing other than atheist.
How so, agnosticism requires knowledge of the subject, children until they aquire said knowledge and wish to accept or use this said knowledge, cannot be deemed agnostic.
what he means in this instances is that the religious mind, can be altered by it's religion, (sometimes to the detriment of others) however this can never be the case with the atheist, He is either already unhealthy minded (as you say), or not, (but this is very unlikely, to be unhealthy minded requires a trauma of some kind. Thus an atheist would not be an atheist, if he wasn't thinking clearly.)
Embryonic stem cells come to mind. Efforts to teach ID instead of science in public schools come to mind. You must not be in the USA.
Bells: then there Paul and I diverge. Nor, moreover, will I simply permit him to go his own way, either.
audible: atheist in the conventional definition defines a choice. Children haven't made any such choice. One might be atheistic in the strict sense of the definition, but children could not said to be athiest. As for the healthy mind bit, you again make the assumption that atheism requires a healthy mind. Can a theist be a theist whilst still thinking clearly?
More later on; or not, possibly. Busy, busy week this week. Many grant info requires much analysis and bullshit.
Best,
Geoff
audible: atheist in the conventional definition defines a choice. Children haven't made any such choice. One might be atheistic in the strict sense of the definition, but children could not said to be athiest. As for the healthy mind bit, you again make the assumption that atheism requires a healthy mind. Can a theist be a theist whilst still thinking clearly?
More later on; or not, possibly. Busy, busy week this week. Many grant info requires much analysis and bullshit.
Best,
Geoff
I don't get your argument to be honest. Because god was written about by imaginative stupid ancient people and the tooth fairy was written about by modern imaginative stupid people that the two cannot be compared?
Is there something about a text being written by people that thought the world was flat as a pancake that has merit where modern day text does not?
exactly assumed(fabricated), no factual stuff.
take a look at Iasions threads you'll find there are no eyewitness accounts.