Will Science Eventually Drown Religion?

[Godless]

Gordon, I diddn't have the time to read the whole document, however I picked up on this quickly;

the election in 1976 of President Jimmy Carter, a self-avowed Born Again Christian,America has been through a period of great religious re-awakening. In sharp contrast tothat widely held perception, the present survey has detected a wide and possibly growingswath of secularism among Americans. The magnitude and role of this large secularsegment of the American population is frequently ignored by scholars and politicians alike.

http://66.102.7.104/search?q=cache:...dentification+Survey&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=2

This may help in your query.

 

[audible]

All the former communist Eastern European states were officially atheist, as was China. Even today the offical stance of the Chinese government is that 'The Communist Party has said that religious belief and membership are incompatible. Party membership is a necessity for many high level careers and posts.' (source Wikipedia). I would have thought that this not only defines the country as 'atheist' officially but also 'repressive against religion atheist'.

As another example, Albania is quoted on Wikipedia as follows: 'However, decades of state atheism enforced by Enver Hoxha's Stalinist government, which ended in 1990, caused a decline in religious practice in all traditions'.

Concerning North Korea (again from Wikipedia) 'Religious activities are heavily suppressed by the officially atheist state'.

How many more examples do you want of recent or present officially atheist states?

As I think another contributor has said, you need to do some more research reading!


regards,


Gordon.

this is a common mistake made by theists, typically those of the fundy type, they believe atheism is essentially socialist or communist in nature. Thus, atheism should be rejected since socialism and communism are evil. How stupid!

the first thing we should note is there is an automatic and almost unconscious assumption made by these theists that their religion is somehow equivalent with captialism.

Communism is not, however, inherently atheistic. It is possible to have communistic or socialistic views while being a theist and it isn't at all wrong to be an atheist while staunchly defending capitalism, which is a combination often found among objectivists and libertarians.
their existence alone demonstrates, that atheism and communism are not the same thing.

is christianity opposed to commuism? No, the opposite, actually. There is nothing in the gospels which even so much as suggests a divine preference for captialism, now is there.

quite a bit of what Jesus said supports many of the of socialism and even communism. He specifically said that that people should give all they could to the poor and that "it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.

basic communism states to hold all property in common rather than privately, is practiced by numerous Christian communities now and throughout history. references to it can be found in Acts:

Acts 4:33-35 "With great power the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all. There was not a needy person among them, for as many as owned lands or houses sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold. They laid it at the apostles' feet, and it was distributed to each as any had need. "
The similarity to Marx's principle of "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need" should be obvious.

and here again in Acts:

Acts 5:1-11 "But a man named Ananias, with the consent of his wife Sapphira, sold a piece of property; with his wife’s knowledge, he kept back some of the proceeds, and brought only a part and laid it at the apostles’ feet. "Ananias," Peter asked, "why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and to keep back part of the proceeds of the land? While it remained unsold, did it not remain your own? And after it was sold, were not the proceeds at your disposal? How is it that you have contrived this deed in your heart? You did not lie to us but to God!" Now when Ananias heard these words, he fell down and died. And great fear seized all who heard of it.

The young men came and wrapped up his body, then carried him out and buried him. After an interval of about three hours his wife came in, not knowing what had happened. Peter said to her, "Tell me whether you and your husband sold the land for such and such a price." And she said, "Yes, that was the price." Then Peter said to her, "How is it that you have agreed together to put the Spirit of the Lord to the test? Look, the feet of those who have buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out." Immediately she fell down at his feet and died. When the young men came in they found her dead, so they carried her out and buried her beside her husband. And great fear seized the whole church and all who heard of these things."

their deaths served as an example to all the others of what would happen if they, too, held back profits for themselves instead of giving everything to the community.
so we can see that this was the first christian commune(ist) society.

so please lets get away from this silly reference to atheism and communism being the same, the bible is basically a communist manifesto.

 

[Gordon]

The whole communist thing is getting tiresome. How about rather than looking at regiemes/dictatorships that happen to be irreligious, how about comparing democratic nations that happen to have high levels of atheism (that isn't forced) amongst citizens, to that of democratic nations that happen to have low levels of atheism.

I think Scandinavian and European countries as well as others such as Austrailia and Japan etc, could hold their own in comparison to democratic nations with high levels of theism.

That facts that you do not find comfortable are 'tiresome' is perhaps hardly surprising but that does not in any way affect their accuracy or relevance to the discussion.

Since you mentioned Europe however, here is a little snippet concerning western europe or more precisely the old member nations of the EU:

'To what extent do Christian precepts underpin European values? Is one possible without the other?
To begin to answer questions like these, we have some idea of the state of Christianity and the churches in Europe today. In Western Europe, the trend in Church affiliations has been unmistakeably downward for the last half-century, with Britain, France and Sweden currently competing, according to the European Values Study, for the title of least religious country. Yet if we look at the visible presence of Christianity, we see the picture is a lot more complex. Around 80% of West Europeans still describe themselves as Christians in surveys,'

(Source http://www.secondspring.co.uk/articles/luxmoore.htm )

This illustrates the main problem of this discussion. There is no doubt that over the past 50 years the numbers of people 'in Church affiliations' has declined and accordingly church attendance has decreased although in the UK the latest figures for the Church of England (2003) show that the decline has been arrested and has actually slightly reversed,

'Provisional figures for 2003 from the Church of England show that more than 1.7 million people attend church and cathedral worship each month while 1.2 million attend each week and one million each Sunday.

The figures for 2003 show a small but significant rise of one per cent in each of these measures of church attendance'

(Source http://www.cofe.anglican.org/news/pr0106.html )

But of course the proposition was not whether people were interested in going to church but in whether religion was going to be replaced by 'scientific' (by which I assume is meant 'atheistic' although these two are not synonyms) ideology.

Whilst people in (free democratic) western Europe have definitely started to go to church less, the 80% figure quoted (which is very similar to the UK alone) proves that they have not changed significantly (if at all) from believing in God to believing in no God. It almost certainly indicates that their religion has become more personalised rather than institutionalised but it totally disproves that they have adopted an atheistic ideology.

With the enormous changes in society in the last half century in Europe and the sadly very slow response of mainstream christian churches to those changes, that people go to traditional churches less is perhaps unsurprising.

As I have mentioned in other posts, the people in post modernist Europe have not lost interest in the core product (belief in God) but find the worship (most church services) boring and out of touch with modern society. This is the challenge to the modern christian church and is being met in many ways in many different places but there remain far too many dull boring and dreary church services that I most certainly would never choose to go to never mind those with less faith.

Even outside of christianity, there has been increased interest in all sorts of 'spiritual' beliefs including but not limited to Buddhism, Wicca and even Druid worship as well 'fringe' items such as tarot, spiritualist mediums, astrology etc. so again no comfort for the 'rationalist scientific' atheist there!

It's always interesting to quote from people on the 'other side' so here is a quote from two humanists who went to an Alpha Course (quoted on http://www.humanism.org.uk/site/cms/contentViewArticle.asp?article=2207 ):

'Conclusion

Deborah and I came to the conclusion that Alpha isn’t interested in the hard sell or converting atheists or genuine searchers. They don't pester the unwilling, and their brand of Christianity is on the surface bland and various shades of vanilla. This is consistent with our heartfelt sense of Alpha – that it operates from a soft target theory for people that want to buckle down and be good Christians without too many of the trappings of an established church. Regrettably, given how successful Alpha has been (there were hundreds of people just in our one course) it's just not that hard to convert a lot of people.' (Highlighting of text not in original although content of text is!)

There is an obvious question here of course. If intrinsically 'it's just not that hard to convert a lot of people' why is the British Humanist Movement not increasing dramatically in numbers? And it certainly does not appear to be doing so, although unlike church organisations where all sorts of stats. are freely available, the British Humanist Association is very coy about its actual membership numbers over the years.

Christians would (of course) say that only the Holy Spirit does the converting and therefore the people only need to act as facilitators and do not need to 'hard sell' the product, so it does appear then to be 'easy'. This is my experience of Alpha and also some other Christian conferences.

The church they visited for the Alpha Course by the way was Holy Trinity, Brompton, London which has to have five services on Sunday to deal with its vast congregation and which has over 900 people at some of the services. It is located in one of London's richest areas with a very high socio-economic group population of very well educated, sophisticated professional people.

Against all this, the choice of what you believe is yours but the facts (as stated by atheist humanists) is that those christian churches making the effort, are finding it easy to get converts whilst for instance the British Humanist Association os having to work very hard and is still having rather less success.

Atheism is far from overtaking religion in either the UK or the rest of Europe. If anything in very recent time the opposite may well be true.


regards,



Gordon.

 

[(Q)]

'Conclusion

Deborah and I came to the conclusion that Alpha isn’t interested in the hard sell or converting atheists or genuine searchers.

"The above are the views of BHA Members Anthony Burn and Deborah Hyde, based upon their personal experiences. These views are not necessarily the views of the BHA and should not be construed as such."

 

[Gordon]

this is a common mistake made by theists, typically those of the fundy type, they believe atheism is essentially socialist or communist in nature. Thus, atheism should be rejected since socialism and communism are evil. How stupid!

Implying that I am stupid does not add credence to your case. For you interest I am and always have been a democratic socialist and much further to the left than many. I am not a 'fundy' nor any other infantile name you wish to call me.

the first thing we should note is there is an automatic and almost unconscious assumption made by these theists that their religion is somehow equivalent with captialism.

I am fully aware of the political implications of my faith and I (and many many thousands of other christians) would find it extremely difficult to equate new testament (or even old testament) scripture with the rampant materialistic capitalism that pervades modern culture so it is you who is completely wrong here. Your problem here may be a very common one on this site of equating USA to the world and extrapolating what is purely an US phenomenon into a worldwide one with no supporting evidence that such an extrapolation holds true.

Communism is not, however, inherently atheistic. It is possible to have communistic or socialistic views while being a theist and it isn't at all wrong to be an atheist while staunchly defending capitalism, which is a combination often found among objectivists and libertarians.
their existence alone demonstrates, that atheism and communism are not the same thing..

I have never denied the truth of that.

is christianity opposed to commuism? No, the opposite, actually. There is nothing in the gospels which even so much as suggests a divine preference for captialism, now is there..

No indeed there is not!

quite a bit of what Jesus said supports many of the of socialism and even communism. He specifically said that that people should give all they could to the poor and that "it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.

basic communism states to hold all property in common rather than privately, is practiced by numerous Christian communities now and throughout history. references to it can be found in Acts:.

Biblical quotes dropped to due to not being required. Scripture never denied by me.

But and big but - the ideology adopted by Communist states from 1917 onwards was Marxist communism. This was not the same as Apostolic communism. Apostolic communism was based on helping people as a way of worshipping God and following Jesus' command to love your neighbour as yourself. Marxist communism was totally atheistic because Karl Marx became an avid atheist (probably one of the most famous atheists of recent time!). Thus the eastern European states together with China later (and North Korea later still) adopted atheism as their official ideology in line with Marxist doctrine. (Also of course freedom of thought in relation to anything including religion does not fit well into the authoritarian structures required to maintain the Marxist philosophy in practice across the whole of society)

So whilst communism is not necessarily atheistic, Marxist communism in ideology and theory is, and in practice Marxist communist states not only adopted atheism officially but also tried to suppress religion as well.

so please lets get away from this silly reference to atheism and communism being the same, the bible is basically a communist manifesto.

As above they are not identical. The bible is not any form of political manifesto. It neither supports nor decries any specific political system. It is more interested in the morality of the practical application of the system than in its theoretical construct. Twentieth Century communist states would of course not score very well against that biblical yardstick!

There are other forms of communism to the Marxist model but Marxist communism is intrinsically atheist. Whilst there have been many (and continue to be some) Marxist communist states, there are no biblical apostolic model communist states in existence in the world as far as I know.

As this is a post about getting it very wrong and the whole base proposition of this discussion is completely wrong, here is a good (and relevant) example of someone doing that spectacularly well less than thirty years ago!

'At the present time [1978], about one century after Marx's death, the number of persons who adhere at least nominally to Marxism is close to 1.3 billion. This is a greater number of adherents than any other ideology has had in the entire history of mankind--not only in absolute numbers, but also as a fraction of the total world population. This has led many Communists, and some non-Communists as well, to believe that the future may see the eventual worldwide triumph of Marxism.'

From: Michael H. Hart, The 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History, Hart Publishing Company, New York City (1978), pages 91-92:

regards,


Gordon, left wing socialist, not at all fundamentalist, evangelical, informed, thinking and not particularly 'stupid' British Christian.

 

[Gordon]

"The above are the views of BHA Members Anthony Burn and Deborah Hyde, based upon their personal experiences. These views are not necessarily the views of the BHA and should not be construed as such."

I did not say they were but the BHA seems quite happy to put them on their official web site and has not stated that they fundamentally disagree with them. Indeed they have made quite a thing of this 'experience' of two of their members.

Having failed on all major points of fact in this discussion presumably only such 'nit-picking' as this is left.

regards,


Gordon.

 

[glaucon]

Damn good question!

Actually this is a poor question.

The difference being that saying there is no evidence is a sweeping absolute statement.

 

[lightgigantic]

Actually this is a poor question.

The difference being that saying there is no evidence is a sweeping absolute statement.

What are the grounds for a complete historical lack of evidence not being a sweeping absolute? In otherwords what is that position that enables a competant purview of the complete body of historical evidence?

 

[glaucon]

What are the grounds for a complete historical lack of evidence not being a sweeping absolute? In otherwords what is that position that enables a competant purview of the complete body of historical evidence?

As I've already pointed out, the sentence "a complete historical lack of evidence" does not imply the denial of evidence.

 

[Oniw17]

It's giving the benefit of a doubt that there's some tiny chance that there will be evidence in the future.

 

[lightgigantic]

It's giving the benefit of a doubt that there's some tiny chance that there will be evidence in the future.

The Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. presently contains over 70 million items (books, magazines, journals, etc.). Hundreds of thousands of these were written by scholars and specialists in the various academic fields.

What percentage of the historical body of work compiled in the volumes of this library would you say are within your own pool of knowledge and experience?

 

[lightgigantic]

As I've already pointed out, the sentence "a complete historical lack of evidence" does not imply the denial of evidence.

Generally we experience time as a linear progression, so its very difficult to determine exactly how any type of evidence can exist outside of a historical context - in other words evidence by its very nature is historical.

And as a further complication we are plagued by an inability to ascertain what constitutes historical evidence, since if you take time back far enough we have no real clear idea what happened (can you recall what you were doing at this exact same time 22 days ago?)

If you want to avoid running into the problems of slinging off absolutes your statement about historical evidence should be qualified by your own subjective limitations

 

[glaucon]

Generally we experience time as a linear progression, so its very difficult to determine exactly how any type of evidence can exist outside of a historical context - in other words evidence by its very nature is historical.

I agree fully.

And as a further complication we are plagued by an inability to ascertain what constitutes historical evidence, since if you take time back far enough we have no real clear idea what happened (can you recall what you were doing at this exact same time 22 days ago?)

Not at all. We can easily ascertain what can be described as historical evidence. The difficulty lies in determining the veracity of such evidence.

If you want to avoid running into the problems of slinging off absolutes your statement about historical evidence should be qualified by your own subjective limitations

I've slung not a one absolute statement.

 

[Oniw17]

The Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. presently contains over 70 million items (books, magazines, journals, etc.). Hundreds of thousands of these were written by scholars and specialists in the various academic fields.

What percentage of the historical body of work compiled in the volumes of this library would you say are within your own pool of knowledge and experience?

I'm not sure what the argument is, I was just pointing out the difference between his sentence and an absolute.

 

[glaucon]

I'm not sure what the argument is, I was just pointing out the difference between his sentence and an absolute.

Indeed.
And quite correctly at that.

 

[lightgigantic]

“ Originally Posted by lightgigantic
Generally we experience time as a linear progression, so its very difficult to determine exactly how any type of evidence can exist outside of a historical context - in other words evidence by its very nature is historical. ”


I agree fully.

then what is the difference between no evidence and a complete lack of historical evidence, since evidence is by nature historical?

“ Originally Posted by lightgigantic
And as a further complication we are plagued by an inability to ascertain what constitutes historical evidence, since if you take time back far enough we have no real clear idea what happened (can you recall what you were doing at this exact same time 22 days ago?) ”


Not at all. We can easily ascertain what can be described as historical evidence. The difficulty lies in determining the veracity of such evidence.

Then do you allude to having surmounted the difficulties in determining the veracity of the historical body of evidence regarding the nature of god's existence?

“ Originally Posted by lightgigantic
If you want to avoid running into the problems of slinging off absolutes your statement about historical evidence should be qualified by your own subjective limitations ”


I've slung not a one absolute statement.

Really

And I suppose eschewing reason for mindless beleif in an invisible being qualifies as adequate....

how did you determine that god is imaginary unless by the strength of self defeating negative absolutes?

is the historical body of evidence as easy to negotiate as the back of your hand?

 

[glaucon]

then what is the difference between no evidence and a complete lack of historical evidence, since evidence is by nature historical?

????

Numerous times already I've answered this question.
"No evidence" is the denial of the existence of evidence.

"A complete lack of historical evidence" is the assertion that to date, none has been discovered.

Then do you allude to having surmounted the difficulties in determining the veracity of the historical body of evidence regarding the nature of god's existence?

I do not. There simply has yet to be any evidence found.

Really

Yes really.

And I suppose eschewing reason for mindless beleif in an invisible being qualifies as adequate....

how did you determine that god is imaginary unless by the strength of self defeating negative absolutes?

In the same way that I determine a unicorn is imaginary: no evidence.

is the historical body of evidence as easy to negotiate as the back of your hand?

Of course.

 

[lightgigantic]

“ Originally Posted by lightgigantic
then what is the difference between no evidence and a complete lack of historical evidence, since evidence is by nature historical? ”

????

Numerous times already I've answered this question.
"No evidence" is the denial of the existence of evidence.

"A complete lack of historical evidence" is the assertion that to date, none has been discovered.

then please provide one example of evidence that isn't compiled in a historical format, particularly in regard to an object.

“ Originally Posted by lightgigantic

And I suppose eschewing reason for mindless beleif in an invisible being qualifies as adequate....

how did you determine that god is imaginary unless by the strength of self defeating negative absolutes? ”


In the same way that I determine a unicorn is imaginary: no evidence.

so do you have an absence of belief in god or deny god's existence?

“ Originally Posted by lightgigantic
is the historical body of evidence as easy to negotiate as the back of your hand? ”

Of course.

The Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. presently contains over 70 million items (books, magazines, journals, etc.). Hundreds of thousands of these were written by scholars and specialists in the various academic fields.

What percentage of the historical body of work compiled in the volumes of this library would you say are within your own pool of knowledge and experience?

 

[glaucon]

then please provide one example of evidence that isn't compiled in a historical format, particularly in regard to an object.

Interesting... you imply that 'god' is an object...

In any case.. sure thing: evidence that lies undiscovered.

so do you have an absence of belief in god or deny god's existence?

Absence of belief in a god.
To deny would be illogical.

The Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. presently contains over 70 million items (books, magazines, journals, etc.). Hundreds of thousands of these were written by scholars and specialists in the various academic fields.

What percentage of the historical body of work compiled in the volumes of this library would you say are within your own pool of knowledge and experience?

Given that I have no idea as to the contents, I couldn't really say. Regardless, the point you're driving at is irrelevant: simply because one lacks knowledge or experience of some particular thing, doesn't mean that one cannot make a judgement on that thing with respect to its existence. I can for example, quite validly and confidently deny the existence of the 4-sided triangle.

 

[Fire]

Yet if we look at the visible presence of Christianity, we see the picture is a lot more complex. Around 80% of West Europeans still describe themselves as Christians in surveys,'

I am certainly not surprised by that fact. Most children are indoctrinated to a religion at some point, and even if they are not, they are still born into it. Only 'active' non believers would state they are atheist/agnostic/non-religious etc. In other words, to state that you are an atheist, means that you have given some thought to your position on religion. For people who don't believe in any god but couldn't care less about religion (ie. the 'passive' non-believer), will take the lazy option and tick the box which they were born in to without giving it any degree of thought.

This is plainly seen when you ask the general public two questions:

1) What is your religion

- Even when the option of 'non-religious' is included in the list, the religion of that persons birth will generally be hte most ticked option

2) Do you believe in god?

- The percentage who tick 'yes' will always be lower than that of the people who gave themselves a religious identity in another question. In fact the percentage would be lower the more you clarify the proper definition of god, which is that god is a sentient, concious or intelligent creator. That notion is far more detailed and far more irrational sounding than the general vague sounding 'god'.

There is an obvious question here of course. If intrinsically 'it's just not that hard to convert a lot of people' why is the British Humanist Movement not increasing dramatically in numbers? And it certainly does not appear to be doing so, although unlike church organisations where all sorts of stats. are freely available, the British Humanist Association is very coy about its actual membership numbers over the years.

Well it's the first i've heard of it. So it's not surprising secular humanist groups find it hard to gain members. I for one (a devout atheist) would have no interest in becoming a member. However, I will sepcifically request a non-religious funeral, and I don't yet know if this means I will have to be part of such a group.

Atheism is far from overtaking religion in either the UK or the rest of Europe. If anything in very recent time the opposite may well be true.

That may be true. However rates of non-belief in the UK are between 35% to 45%. And I suspect the true figure would be a lot higher if everyone seriously thought about where they stand on religion.

I personally only know of one person who goes to church for worship. We all of course go to church occassionally for established traditions like weddings and funerals, which is not worship. In fact, the last funeral I attended, the priest was very angry that out of the 85 people, only about 7 people came forward to do that thing were they eat 'the body of Christ' and drink wine... It used to be that people were forced to do it as children, but now we have the choice.