Science Must Destroy Religion

[Freedom_from_Chains]

Science Must Destroy Religion

Sam Harris

Most people believe that the Creator of the universe wrote (or dictated) one of their books. Unfortunately, there are many books that pretend to divine authorship, and each makes incompatible claims about how we all must live. Despite the ecumenical efforts of many well-intentioned people, these irreconcilable religious commitments still inspire an appalling amount of human conflict.


In response to this situation, most sensible people advocate something called "religious tolerance." While religious tolerance is surely better than religious war, tolerance is not without its liabilities. Our fear of provoking religious hatred has rendered us incapable of criticizing ideas that are now patently absurd and increasingly maladaptive. It has also obliged us to lie to ourselves — repeatedly and at the highest levels — about the compatibility between religious faith and scientific rationality.

The conflict between religion and science is inherent and (very nearly) zero-sum. The success of science often comes at the expense of religious dogma; the maintenance of religious dogma always comes at the expense of science. It is time we conceded a basic fact of human discourse: either a person has good reasons for what he believes, or he does not. When a person has good reasons, his beliefs contribute to our growing understanding of the world. We need not distinguish between "hard" and "soft" science here, or between science and other evidence-based disciplines like history. There happen to be very good reasons to believe that the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7th, 1941. Consequently, the idea that the Egyptians actually did it lacks credibility. Every sane human being recognizes that to rely merely upon "faith" to decide specific questions of historical fact would be both idiotic and grotesque — that is, until the conversation turns to the origin of books like the bible and the Koran, to the resurrection of Jesus, to Muhammad's conversation with the angel Gabriel, or to any of the other hallowed travesties that still crowd the altar of human ignorance.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sam-harris/science-must-destroy-reli_b_13153.html

[beam me up scottie]

1. ~

:popcorn:

[silverweb]

57. Ayup.

A ringside seat! Mind if I join you? This is going to be good.

:popcorn:

[stepnw1f]

2. Um... Nah

I don't think so.

[MrModerate]

3. Nah . . . I don't buy it

I'm an atheist completely comfortable with my beliefs, but I don't believe that the survival of mankind depends on the religious people around me suddenly seeing the light of reason and giving up their faith-based existance. Let's face it, human beings -- even the most rational of us -- are full of irrational beliefs, impulses, hopes, etc.

And yet we function.

Where the trouble starts is when religiofascists insist on imposing their particular quackery on other people. And that we sholdn't tolerate.

However, look at the European approach to religion -- mostly, they don't care (this is not to speak of the last 20-years'-wave of immigrants from Islamic countries who cling avidly to their faith -- that's another issue). Science in Europe has nothing to fear from religion. And the same is largely true in Asia as well.

Science slowly wins out and even though we crazy Americans tend to go through waves of intense religiosity, every time the tide recedes, it recedes further. The Kansas syndrome will breed a reaction that will set the course of religious fundamentalism in this country back 50 years.

[tocqueville]

27. most of the European islamic immigrants are secular

maybe in a proportion of 70-80%. What you see in the media is the minority. Plenty of immigrants with islamic background use their faith the way Christians do : rituals for marriage and burial, eventual visit to a mosk for social purposes etc... the vast majority of the younger "islamic" women in Europe don't wear a scarf, and I bet that the majority drinks alcohol and eat pork. All the ones I have met do.

[MrModerate]

28. As in, "how you gonna keep 'em down on the madrassa . . .

after they've see Paree?"

[TallahasseeGrannie]

4. Well let us know how that works out for you, okay?

[beam me up scottie]

5. He does have some good points.

To win this war of ideas, scientists and other rational people will need to find new ways of talking about ethics and spiritual experience. The distinction between science and religion is not a matter of excluding our ethical intuitions and non-ordinary states of consciousness from our conversation about the world; it is a matter of our being rigorous about what is reasonable to conclude on their basis. We must find ways of meeting our emotional needs that do not require the abject embrace of the preposterous. We must learn to invoke the power of ritual and to mark those transitions in every human life that demand profundity — birth, marriage, death, etc. — without lying to ourselves about the nature of reality.

I am hopeful that the necessary transformation in our thinking will come about as our scientific understanding of ourselves matures. When we find reliable ways to make human beings more loving, less fearful, and genuinely enraptured by the fact of our appearance in the cosmos, we will have no need for divisive religious myths. Only then will the practice of raising our children to believe that they are Christian, Jewish, Muslim, or Hindu be broadly recognized as the ludicrous obscenity that it is. And only then will we stand a chance of healing the deepest and most dangerous fractures in our world

edited to say to those who dismiss this as hate speech: READ the damn article for once.

[Lerkfish]

7. um...are YOU reading the article?

"Only then will the practice of raising our children to believe that they are Christian, Jewish, Muslim, or Hindu be broadly recognized as the ludicrous obscenity that it is."

naw....not hate speech at all. :rolleyes:

[trotsky]

11. I think children should be raised as human beings first and foremost.

Putting another identity in front of that ("German," "White," etc.) has generally led to some pretty significant problems in history.

[shrike]

15. I agree with that statement

And I don't often agree with Trotsky.

Remember, everyone's favorite atheist dreamed not only of "no religion," but of no country, either.

Being raised as a member of a tribe, a clan, a group, what have you, leads to a sense of "them" and "us" that never quite goes away.

[trotsky]

22. Takes me back to Obama's speech at the convention.

He did a great job demolishing the "red" vs. "blue" dichotomy - and that's more of this same thing.

[Lerkfish]

16. but if I choose to raise my child as a christian, I'm obscene?

and that's not hate speech?

FWIW, I have no problem with you raising your child as a human being apart from religion. I don't find that obscene at all.

[trotsky]

Did YOU read the article?

I think you completely missed the point.

[beam me up scottie]

14. I don't live in the United States of Jesus land

yet, so I suggest you remember that before you start trying to censor criticism of your god things or religion.

This is EXACTLY why Sam Harris is right on SO many levels.

[Lerkfish]

18. um. nice try to use the passive aggressive bs, but it don't work on me.

I never said anything of the sort.

I'm pointing out that saying:

Only then will the practice of raising our children to believe that they are Christian, Jewish, Muslim, or Hindu be broadly recognized as the ludicrous obscenity that it is.

is hate speech.

[beam me up scottie]

21. Calling criticism of religion "hate speech" is advocating censorship.

Maybe when we become a theocracy you can change the rules.

[Lerkfish]

36. If I call for the destruction of all jews, am I criticizing?

or am I using hate speech?

If I suggest science should destroy religion, is that a criticism or a threat?

If I suggest religion should destroy all science, is that a criticism or a threat?

[beam me up scottie]

38. Read the definition of hate speech again and see if it sticks this time.

Or are you being obtuse?

So hard to tell these days.

And suggesting that religion should destroy science has been the mantra of religious leaders since they realized it was a threat to their invention and its use in controlling the masses.

[Lerkfish]

43. but using science to destroy religion is okeydokey? Both are bad and both

are misguided.
IF you intend to right the past wrongs of religion by committing the same wrongs in the name of science, you've lost the ethical high ground. In fact, you're on a much LOWER ethical rung, because you of all groups should be keenly aware of how misguided it is.


As I stated in another post, science and religion should not be used to disprove each other. They are separate entities and address separate facets of the human experience.

[beam me up scottie]

45. Stop putting words in my mouth, it's irritating as hell.

Not to mention rude.

[Lerkfish]

48. um...dude, that's the generic "you", in reference to the article.

The original article is talking about using science to destroy religion.

but hey, MY BAD. I forgot that DU atheists consider calling for the destruction of religion "criticism" and that if anyone takes it any other way than bending over its our own fault.

ok, from now on, I'm abandoning my faith, as you suggest. The same faith that orders me to be compassionate and understanding of those who are different from me. So, from now on, I will start calling for the destruction of atheism at every opportunity. Is that what you want?


I'm really sick and tired of the passive aggressive bs. Be an atheist -- be happy. don't start jihads against people who aren't like you.

[beam me up scottie]

50. Trying to discuss this with you is like having hemorrhoids.

I'm talking about your snarky little comment "but using science to destroy religion is okeydokey?"

And I'm sick of reading right wing talking points vilifying atheists on DU.



Keep your god on a leash and you won't have any problems with me.

[MrModerate]

53. Umm . . . pardon me, but . . .

I'm an atheist myself, and I consider any sentence that calls my beliefs an "obscenity" to be hateful (even if it doesn't meet your criteria for hate speech).

I think the article makes many good points, many of which I agree with, but goes waaaay over the top with the "obscenity" line.

Over the top and unhelpful. Science will out. Religion is sustained by faith and hierarchy and those are inherently erosible. Truth -- particularly truth updated and polished by the scientific method -- will win.

We don't need to be spitting on anyone.

[Name removed]

55. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[MrModerate]

58. Frankly, I don't want to do anything with your peepee . . .

But please feel free to spank it any which way you can.

I'm just sayin' that the poster whose rant you posted was driven to it by what he/she viewed as intolerance from DU atheists.

Anger breeds anger, and seldom leads to a positive (or controllable) result. Scientific rationalism will triumph, over time, 'cause it's the truth (down to a few decimal places anyway), while supernatural explanations for the universe require constant, sometimes enervating upkeep to maintain. Our strength is that of ten, because our heart is pure.

[Name removed]

63. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Lerkfish]

64. you obviously don't know me. I"m as left as they come.

I just happen to also be religious.
And accusing me of using right wing talking points is bizarre and inaccurate.
It might help if you actually read the user agreement for this site regarding religious beliefs.
might be enlightening.

and, for the record, my objection is to the tone and anger-filled rhetoric being used. Criticism is fine, scapegoating is not.

[beam me up scottie]

68. If you wouldn't have jumped my post calling for people to read the article

I wouldn't have retaliated.

Sam Harris is NOT calling for the state to end religious practice and neither am I.

Claiming that criticism of religion is hate speech IS a right wing talking point.

Remember?

And when I criticize religion, I'm not criticizing you or your faith because as an atheist, I am able to view them separately.

[Lerkfish]

76. "science must destroy religion" is the title of the article.

How am I misreading that?

How am I misreading all the perjorative and incendiary descriptions of religion and faith?
Do you and I speak different brands of english?
I have bolded the objectionable descriptions used by the author. They are self-evident.

considering how flagrantly upset you personally became when I once stated "atheist is a belief"...but I'm not allowed to be upset at calling religion obscene (among other contemptuously derogatory terms)?

You seem to be straining at a gnat and swallowing a camel.

:)

[InaneAnanity]

77. First

Atheism has no beliefs. Atheism isn't even a "thing".

He didn't call religion obscene, he called trhe indoctrination of children into religion obscene.

And I agree, it is.

[Lerkfish]

78. FIrst (response to Inane)

you felt the need to correct me on atheism. bravo. (although I was referring to being previously chastised, so I already knew the distinction)

second, you say that you agree with referring to raising your child in your religion obscene. good for you.

you just afforded yourself two reasonable rights: to correct someone's mischaracterization (or at least differing perception) and you allowed yourself to agree or disagree with the article. In this case, you agreed.

How is that any different than what I have been doing in the is thread?

Am I not correcting what I feel is a mischaracterization, and am I not saying whether I agree with the article (in fact, if you'll note in one post I even stated I agreed with many of the author's points. I disagree with the need to be pugilistic and unnecessarily perjorative in making those points)?

Why is it unacceptable for me, but acceptable for you?

why the double standard?

(the thread hierarchy broke down so I noted who I was talking to)

[InaneAnanity]

79. You are mis-stating his points

Repeatedly, you are mis-characterizing what Harris said, to support your argument.

I haven't done that at all.

Don't compare yourself to me again, ever.

Thanks.

[Lerkfish]

81. LOL, no problem, though I wasn't comparing us as people, merely

showing how we are both attempting to accomplish the same thing.

the difference is point of view. As long as you feel atheism is being unjustly framed, you feel justified in correcting that.
But you seem unable to put the shoe on the other foot, as are others in this thread.

I don't believe I am mischaracterizing the TONE of what he is saying.

but feel free to believe otherwise. As long as you are not the target of incendiary language, its easy to claim there is no slight.
but, as you've just proven, once you are the target, you feel the slight immediately.

human nature, that's all.

[Name removed]

83. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[CarbonDate]

84. I think everybody's guilty of a little bit of projection.

I don't get a tone of claiming persecution from Mr. Fish in this thread. That's just something we instinctively come to expect from Christians because it's done so often.

By the same token, Mr. Harris isn't calling for the destruction of religion in the same tone that the religious call for the destruction of other religions (which is to say through genocide). Mr. Harris, while using inflammatory language, is calling for science to win a war of ideas. That's the scientific way.

I think we could do to take a step back, here.

[Lerkfish]

87. a fair post, thanks.

[CarbonDate]

80. *sigh*

[beam me up scottie]

85. Nice spin. Except he didn't call religion obscene, did he?

You claim to have read the article and yet you're still trying to manipulate it so that you can justify having a snit over it.

Let's see if I can return the proper context to whatever it was you were fussing about:

The conflict between religion and science is inherent and (very nearly) zero-sum. The success of science often comes at the expense of religious dogma; the maintenance of religious dogma always comes at the expense of science. It is time we conceded a basic fact of human discourse: either a person has good reasons for what he believes, or he does not. When a person has good reasons, his beliefs contribute to our growing understanding of the world. We need not distinguish between "hard" and "soft" science here, or between science and other evidence-based disciplines like history. There happen to be very good reasons to believe that the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7th, 1941. Consequently, the idea that the Egyptians actually did it lacks credibility. Every sane human being recognizes that to rely merely upon "faith" to decide specific questions of historical fact would be both idiotic and grotesque — that is, until the conversation turns to the origin of books like the bible and the Koran, to the resurrection of Jesus, to Muhammad's conversation with the angel Gabriel, or to any of the other hallowed travesties that still crowd the altar of human ignorance.

Science, in the broadest sense, includes all reasonable claims to knowledge about ourselves and the world. If there were good reasons to believe that Jesus was born of a virgin, or that Muhammad flew to heaven on a winged horse, these beliefs would necessarily form part of our rational description of the universe. Faith is nothing more than the license that religious people give one another to believe such propositions when reasons fail. The difference between science and religion is the difference between a willingness to dispassionately consider new evidence and new arguments, and a passionate unwillingness to do so. The distinction could not be more obvious, or more consequential, and yet it is everywhere elided, even in the ivory tower.

All the hyperbole and hyperventilation over that?

I must have missed the part where he calls for "jihads against people who aren't like" us, could you point that out?


Spare me.


We're not letting the reichwing take over this country because a bunch of little old ladies get their panties in a wad whenever someone criticizes religion.

[MrModerate]

65. No, m'boy, I want tolerance from you . . .

Because it works, and intolerance doesn't. I'm not interested in improving your character.

[beam me up scottie]

67. Actually, I'm not a boy and I'm sick of atheist apologists speaking for me

So go hold hands with the baby Jesus or kiss a cherub, I'm not interested in being nice.

This is a political forum, not Sesame Street.

[MrModerate]

69. Let's see -- "political forum" = "snarlfest"

I think you've been watching too much Fox, or perhaps Wrestlemania.

So spewing venom and alienating people who -- when they go into the voting booth -- are going to pull the lever you approve of gets us exactly . . . where?

I've reviewed the post of the person you've been ragging on, and as I see it, you're the cranky one. Swallow that bile and take an extra Nexium.

(Sorry about the peepee/boy inference; not many men I know of would have used the term in the first place.)

[beam me up scottie]

70. I don't watch tv, genius.

I give as good as I get and I'm sick of being told to shut up.

So go preach to someone else, this uppity atheist isn't moving to the back of the bus anymore.

[muriel_volestrangler]

42. He doesn't call for the destruction of people, so your analogy is false

He calls for an end to the artificial labelling of children as different from each other, and the indoctrination that goes with it. If a Democrat called for the destruction of the Republican party, that wouldn't be hate speech either. And the Republicans don't even want their followers to send their children to Republican classes every week, while not getting taught by people from other political parties.

[Lerkfish]

44. This is where you atheists fail to understand...

to many people, their religion is so vital to their perception of their personhood, that telling them to abandon it IS the same as calling for the destruction of a people.

If you don't agree with that, fine. live your life as you choose. But never expect calling for people to abandon their religion is the same as asking them to subscribe to a different newspaper or choose a different soft drink because there is no more diet pepsi left.

To atheists, who have no faith, it seems as nothing to ask others to abandon their own faith. That's easy. It would be easy for me to tell Bill Gates to get rid of his millions since I have none. Because it would make no difference to ME if he did, so its easy to tell him what to do. However, if you are Gates and some poor person tells you abandon your riches, it would be a DRASTIC difference in your entire world, so its no small potatoes for you whatsoever.

Should we walk up to a holocaust survivor and tell them to abandon judaism? What right do we have to do so?

I appreciate and support atheism and all other religious or nonreligious choices. I do not expect others to follow my own path, though they are welcome to.

atheists fail to understand you are not asking people to change clothes. You are asking them to change skins. Religion is that important to many people.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

51. oh come on.

science taught us that rubbbing two sticks together could (maybe) provide warmth. And the religionists said IT WAS GOD'S WILL. whether it worked or not.
science taught us that digging for ore got us copper and iron. And that applying heat could create better tools. And the religionists said IT WAS GOD'S WILL. whether it worked or not.
science taught us that hammering certain metals changed their quality and made them harder and sharper in battle. And the religionists said IT WAS GOD'S WILL. whether it worked or not.
science taught us that planets were nothing more than orbs accellerating around the same compressed mass of H and He producing incredible light and energy. And the religionists said IT WAS GOD'S WILL. whether it worked or not.
science taught us that the galaxy we infest is an infitesimal portion of similarly positioned useless suns, in a rather boring galaxy, in a universe so huge that the mind boggles.
science does not teach enough of us enough.

Kansas.

[Lerkfish]

62. Personally, I am seeking to NOT oppose science and religion.

I find trying use science as a bludgeon to kill religion is as misguided as using religion as a bludgeon to kill science.
And it doesn't have to be.
As a progressive christian, I accept and applaud all scientific discoveries and advances. I do not think the earth is only 5,000 yrs old, there were obviously dinosaurs and I'm convinced evolution is a valid theory. I also believe in the possibility of life elsewhere in the universe. I also choose to believe that God created everything, and that whatever we discover scientifically is part of "everything". It is all part and parcel of this material world. I do not reject empiricism per se, nor atheism, nor science. I simply believe there is a spiritual world beyond this physical world. so, actually, I believe EVERYTHING scientists do, and then some.

If I disagree with using science to destroy religion, it does not mean I therefore believe religion should oppose or destroy science. In fact, I believe neither side should be bludgeoning the other. To do so unnecessarily narrows the richness of both science and religion and creates a great deal of useless anger and judgementalism.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

89. but the bottom line is - IT IS NOT A BELIEF!

to say that I have faith in science, or I believe in the law of gravity, or I trust in quantum mechanics is no different than putting your faith in a badly translated historical and hysterical collection of old jewish fairy tales and a later collection of politically correct (for their time) "writings" from a bunch of illiterate fishermen.

The issue is not "FAITH", "TRUST", or "BELIEF".

Science is what it is. Same with math. same with the universe. Every time we place human insecurities and emotions into the equation, we lose.

[manic expression]

98. Wait

something being written by a "bunch of illiterate fishermen"?

Anyway, math is what it is, but that does not come into conflict with religion. Neither does astronomy nor does physics. These things all study facets of the universe, while religion studies other facets, and beyond.

[InaneAnanity]

103. Depends on the religion

If you choose to appreciate science and still believe in a diety that in no way conflicts with science, that is one thing.

But most modern day religions DO conflict with science in their teachings. That's a fact.

So, its not a given that religion HAS to conflict with science (at least issue by issue) but they do conflict in most major religions.

[manic expression]

111. Right

religion and science do not have to conflict with one another. Actually, they should not.

I think the dogmatic monotheistic religions have been getting somewhat of a wake up call from science, as a heck of a lot of the Church's stances have been disproven. However, when it comes to religions like Buddhism, Hinduism, Shintoism, Taoism and others, I do not think that they have had very many conflicts with science at all.

on edit, you are also right about the differnt natures of various religions and the effect they have on the individual.

[MrModerate]

56. Actually, many atheists are adequate observers . . .

of our fellow humans and realize that religion is not only an essential component of individuals' perception of themselves, but a boon (if somewhat wrong-headed) to societies.

Religions are one of the bearers of moral standards that even many nonreligious people adhere to; religions are a fulcrum for the combined energies of their adherents to leverage good works; and religions provide cultural continuity in a world that threatens to collapse into loud chaos at any moment.

As a nonreligious person, I would prefer other mechanisms to achieve the ends I list above, simply because the supernatural component of religion is impossible for me to accept. But am I about to call these approaches to finding one's way in the dark an "obscenity?" Hardly.

[Lerkfish]

60. thanks. If all posts were like yours, there'd be no difficulties.

well stated, as well as "sane" and "rational".

You are a credit to nonreligious persons everywhere.

:)

[Exiled in America]

128. It's very comforting to hear your perspective, a minority on these boards.

Its comforting to find a reasonable, rational non-religious voice amidst the sea of inanity. Thanks for your posts.

[muriel_volestrangler]

88. But it's a long term project

and his call for stopping the indoctrination of children involves no "drastic difference" for them at all - it's like them never starting smoking, so they will never have to go through the process of giving up.

Note that Harris isn't saying that science and our secular society can replace religion yet - he says they need to expand to meet our emotional needs, and for us to understand each other properly. But he wants our attitudes and principles in those areas to be based on the real world in front of us, not stories that date back 3000 years.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

47. ooh give me an effin break.

that is the best argument (non) used by anti rational grrrr bahhh grbah agrh wlwellm,smdf,mn bah.

[beam me up scottie]

24. Explain how criticizing all religion is hate speech.

From Wikipedia

Hate speech

Hate speech is a controversial term for speech intended to degrade, intimidate, or incite violence or prejudicial action against someone based on his/her race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, or disability. The term covers written as well as oral communication.

From the Free Dictionary

Hate speech

Bigoted speech attacking or disparaging a social or ethnic group or a member of such a group

[Lerkfish]

31. "hate speech" was YOUR term, not mine.

but seriously, why is avocating the complete destruction of religion a sign of tolerance?

[beam me up scottie]

35. Oh brother.

Lerkfish posted:

naw....not hate speech at all. :rolleyes :

and that's not hate speech?

I'm pointing out that saying:

Only then will the practice of raising our children to believe that they are Christian, Jewish, Muslim, or Hindu be broadly recognized as the ludicrous obscenity that it is.

is hate speech

Oh, and nice try with the false dilemma, but I posted that the article was not hate speech, not that it was "a sign of tolerance".

Try to stick to the facts, will you?

[Lerkfish]

39. you brought up the term "hate speech" read your own thread....

however, now that you've brought it up, it certainly seems apt.

I will say that the article is typical of arrogant Rand-influenced atheism, to wit: no one is sane or reasonable unless they reject all religion.
The supreme hubris of that, and the irony of doing so to combat "intolerance" is rich.
I find that people who argue things like (note bolded portions) the following are supremely unaware of their own hypocrisy when they claim religion is judgemental and prejudicial.

----every sane human being recognizes that to rely merely upon "faith" to decide specific questions of historical fact would be both idiotic and grotesque — that is, until the conversation turns to the origin of books like the bible and the Koran, to the resurrection of Jesus, to Muhammad's conversation with the angel Gabriel, or to any of the other hallowed travesties that still crowd the altar of human ignorance.

Science, in the broadest sense, includes all reasonable claims to knowledge about ourselves and the world. If there were good reasons to believe that Jesus was born of a virgin, or that Muhammad flew to heaven on a winged horse, these beliefs would necessarily form part of our rational description of the universe. Faith is nothing more than the license that religious people give one another to believe such propositions when reasons fail. The difference between science and religion is the difference between a willingness to dispassionately consider new evidence and new arguments, and a passionate unwillingness to do so. The distinction could not be more obvious, or more consequential, and yet it is everywhere elided, even in the ivory tower.

snip??In the spirit of religious tolerance, most scientists are keeping silent when they should be blasting the hideous fantasies of a prior age with all the facts at their disposal.---

you don't consider that hate speech? ok, calling for the destruction of religion by science and then using those emotional afferent terms to refer to religion is supposed to represent "sane" and "rational" argument?

I agree there are some good points in the article, and I agree with some of them. But overall, if atheist must resort to this arrogant bs to make their points, I fail to see how it convinces anyone other than themselves.

[beam me up scottie]

46. And again with the false dilemmas.

you don't consider that hate speech? ok, calling for the destruction of religion by science and then using those emotional afferent terms to refer to religion is supposed to represent "sane" and "rational" argument?

I refuse to discuss anything with someone who continues to intentionally misrepresent my posts.

[manic expression]

99. OK

so you still refuse to participate in the discussion?

[bee]

12. excellent points. & right on.... (imho). n/t

[Lerkfish]

6. sigh...its a false dichotomy. Science and religion do not disprove

each other. They can live in perfect harmony.

They in fact don't live in harmony, if its science and evangelical or fundamentalism, but they do live in harmony with progressive christians and persons of differing faiths with open minds, and with scientists who recognize tolerance.

not really all that hard.

[trotsky]

8. I have tried to make these points on DU many times.

But not nearly as well as Mr. Harris does!

It's all fine and dandy and rainbows and sunshine to say that everything takes faith, everyone has a valid viewpoint, la dee da da. But when viewpoints collide, ESPECIALLY when one is religious, we have to have some standard by which we determine something is "true" and the other thing is "false." Or, if the data is insufficient, we simply state that, rather than throw up our hands and say, "Well, see? It COULD be my magical box turtle that created the universe! We just don't know!"

[salvorhardin]

66. I don't know about that

My red-eared slider Paradox had an awfully superior air about him. I think he did think he created the universe.

[mom cat]

9. Religion is destroying itself. Science doesn't have to do it.

[Freedom_from_Chains]

20. But the question is, will it also destroy us in the process?

[mom cat]

23. God only knows!

Certainly, fundamentalism of all stripes has been behind most of the destructive events on this planet.

[Freedom_from_Chains]

25. Actually, there are those who understand this truth

besides a fictional character.

[mom cat]

26. Joke man, joke.

Please don't be so humoeless. That is what I expect from the christo-facists.

[Freedom_from_Chains]

29. Hey, these days it hard to tell

I find plenty of people who make statements which are absolutely ludicrous and I end up finding out that they are dead serious.

:hi:

[mom cat]

30. Oh so true!

Everything from the Bush admin strikes me that way. I always scratch my head and say "They must be joking" only to find out they really mean it.

[tx_dem41]

10. This essay represents as appalling a misuse of science as the

advocates of Intelligent Design propose.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

13. uh, yeah. duh.

Do we grow out of our hidebound, brainless, fearful, misguided fairy tales? or do we start looking at the world as rational beings?

On one hand we have expanded our understanding of the universe, and in the reverse direction, we have expanded our understanding of quantum physics to the point that string theories make some (limited) sense.

Between those extremes, we have a separate understanding. Within that, there is a minute, tiny, almost imperceptable, microscopic segment of something dangerous. Faith. Religions that base their strength on faith are fatally flawed, and they harm humanity.

[NeoGreen]

17. Two Different Approaches which are not at odds,

Science seeks the answers to "How",

Religion seeks the answers to "Why",

They come in conflict only when you attempt to elevate one above the other.


I am an Atheist, but I still know awe.

It's not "God", but man is it Spiritual.

[man4allcats]

19. Actually, the business of science

is simply to do science, to test that which is testable. Religion is, by definition, an article of faith or that which is not testable. Science cannot disprove that which it cannot test. As for destruction, science is not an inherently destructive process; it is a creative one. I am a secular person myself, and although most of the many scientists I know and have known are also secular, some in fact are quite religious. Despite their philosophical differences; however, the one goal they all seem to share is simply to pursue knowledge at an objective level. If it can be tested, if it is falsifiable, then they are interested at a professional level. If it is not falsifiable, they my find it interesting but only as a curiosity; not something to occupy their research.

[Name removed]

32. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Freedom_from_Chains]

34. Very well said

To a certain degree mankind has not progressed much from the 16th century to the 21st century, except for the fact that we build a lot more neat things.

[grumpy old fart]

59. Isn't it just weird. Atheists must remain closeted, yet xians are "under

attack". Your statement, "I'm generally hesitant to tell people that I meet out in the world I'm an atheist" really caught my eye.

My profession requires that I deal with a wide variety of people. They can say they are Baptist, Jewish, Methodist without any repercussion or stigma. In fact, it's expected that everyone is aligned with some faith. If I say I'm an atheist, I'm faced with all kinds of problems and prejudice. We are still in the Middle Ages in many respects.

[trotsky]

74. Nice post, ccbombs.

Well said. :thumbsup:

[stray cat]

33. Science shouldn't be used as a weapon against people

Science and religion don't address the same questions and use different methods. Science should be the search for varifiable truth anything that can't be varified falls under the category of theory or speculation. Things that may be true but are not conducive to the scientific method. As a scientist I can't prove or disprove a God, the type of God or the nature of a person's individual belief or faith. Anyone who claims it does doesn't understand the scientific method.

Also science and religion actually share in common a belief that there is such a thing as absolute truth instead of every belief being relative.

[beam me up scottie]

37. Science believes in absolute truth?

Explain.

[salvorhardin]

41. I think he means objective truth

That there's an independent, verifiably testable reality. Religion does not offer that, but many religions do claim an absolute inerrant truth in relation to their beliefs. I don't see the two as being similar myself.

[beam me up scottie]

49. I've got problems with the claim that science "believes" anything.

It smacks of reich wing anti-science rhetoric and the IDiots who use it when they try to convince us that evolution is atheistic science.

That may not have been the poster's intent but the wording sticks in my craw because of what happened in Kansas and Dover.

[salvorhardin]

52. I just reread his post

You're right. I didn't pick up on that when I first read it.

That's a common mistake to say, "science believes...". Scientists might believe many things, hopefully among them that a rigorous application of the scientific method to the natural world is our best tool for understanding that world. But science itself does not believe anything. It's merely the collective knowledge gained from that process. To say "science believes..." is to say that science is animate and sentient.

[beam me up scottie]

54. Yes, that's it.

I'm thinking that the poster wasn't trying to anthropomorphize science, but since this is a war of words with clowns like Dr. Dino, I think it's important to point out how they are co opting language.

[manic expression]

101. I can't speak for him/her

but I believe that science does believe and pursue an absolute truth. That, in actuality, is science itself. Science looks for the truth.

I'm not sure why that needed explaining.

[Peace Patriot]

40. The human faculty that saw pictures in the sky, in the configurations of

the stars, or noticed the behaviors of sun, moon and planets, and created stories about those phenomena to explain what is going on in the heavens, is the same faculty that also began to develop the rules by which the heavenly bodies operate, and began to guess their distances, their size, and their nature as physical objects, and noticed the regularity of their movements, and their usefulness as to the timing of events on earth (when spring will come, when the salmon will return, when it will get cold). Science and religion were once one and the same. Even those great rationalists, the Greek mathematicians, had mystical systems regarding the properties of geometric bodies, the essential religious (or perhaps spiritual would be the word) hierarchy of knowledge and the goal of it all.

It is only VERY RECENTLY that religion and science have separated into two seemingly antithetical modes of thought. The religious mode of thought is now much closer to that early poetic impulse--the desire to understand through story or metaphor--which is as innately human, and valid and SENTIENT, as a strictly fact-based view of physical matter and its properties and uses. And science has become rather a cold-hearted endeavor, often, that serves the purposes of corporations and war, and has acquired a similar set of ethics: whatever makes you rich and powerful is okay. Design depleted uranium weapons? Sure, no problem. Cach-ing, cach-ing. ($$$.)

I part company with Carl Sagan on the his total hatred of the mixing of science and religion. He was very uncomfortable with the Pythagoreans, for instance--the mystical Greek mathematicians, who believed that certain esoterica should be kept from the masses. I think he failed to note the POLITICAL context of the Pythagoreans' elitist views about mathematics. They ran into great deal of trouble with the local Greek tyrants, and were on several occasions on the run from them. Why? I can only guess--and I think I'm right--that the local military dictators wanted to USE the Pythagoreans' knowledge and inventions to make war and to oppress the people.

Anyway, this almost fetishistic view of modern science, that very nearly anathematizes any connection between the religious or spiritual, and the scientific, strikes me as unhistorical--and a blind spot. Astrology was the MOTHER of astronomy. If it had not been for the human desire to be connected to the heavens, and to relate heavenly events with those on earth, no one would ever have bothered to map the stars. It was to PREDICT events on earth, and to understand human life, that the heavens were studied in great detail, and that knowledge was passed along orally or in writing.

Similarly, herbology was the MOTHER of modern medicine. And there were all sorts of gods and spirits and stories connected to both things--to the stars, and to herbal medicines. Incantations. Divinations. Wondrous mysteries. The same with chemistry, and so on.

The magical poetic mind vs. the rational, "scientific" mind, at one time one and the same, now, in the last couple of hundred years separated out. We need to understand and express BOTH kinds of knowledge and experience.

And if concentration on the mystical or religious side of life leads a person to become kinder, more thoughtful, more meditative, wiser--who is to say that that is bunk? It is pure arrogance to dismiss such experience.

And what has science brought us? Many good things, it's true--as well as much more enlightened views about any number of social issues. But has it not also brought us scientists who will do anything for money? Make nukes that may well yet destroy the entire human race? Make toxins that are poisoning our planet? Send whole armies into the field, to slaughter innocent people, by ferreting them out with satellite surveillance or heat censors?

It's a mixed bag, science--as is religion.

Religion, it seems to me, is most poisonous when it is being USED--appropriated by--evil, hypocritical politicians, who think nothing of slaughtering and torturing people in the name of gentle Jesus. They are messing with peoples' minds. And they would use ANYTHING that people hold dear--love of country, love for their families, fear for their families, natural protectiveness, desire for comfort and prosperity--whatever digs into peoples' souls--to exploit them for riches and for power.

They also use racism and hatred--anything that divides people. I don't think it's fair to judge and condemn religion because of its appropriation by powermongers. One might as well condemn family sentiment for the way Bush uses it to make people feel afraid. It's not the sentiment that's wrong--one's love for, and attachment to, one's own. It's the cynical use of this feeling to make us hate and fear others that needs to be condemned.

I am very familiar with the history of the Catholic Church, and, let me tell you, it is one sorry tale. A more un-Christ-like army of patriarchal powermongers has never been assembled, that can beat the list of "saints" and popes and bishops who have used the Church for their own aggrandizement. They, too, have USED the need for people to gather together, their need for spiritual communion, their need for higher goals in life than just material welfare, their need to do charitable works, and their bonds as families, to build an earthly kingdom of property and wealth, ruled by male fetishists, who at one time lorded it over all of Europe. Far, far, far removed from the simple communistic groups that Jesus inspired among the earliest Christians, and as remote as it could be from those simple teachings: love thy neighbor.

But neither does the Church and its nefarious doings invalidate the teaching "love they neighbor" --which comes close to being the universal teaching of all religions and humanistic philosophies. It is the path to enlightenment. It is the golden lotus blossom. It is the only true happiness: unselfish giving.

Science might observe the better digestion or steadier heartbeat of people who love their neighbors and know the peacefulness of unselfish giving, but it can't really tell us much about the mystical belief systems by which people achieve such satisfaction in life. Oh, they play with all their chemicals, trying to induce a healthy state of mind. But the chemicals never quite bring it off--because people are more than their chemical makeups; people are extremely complex beings, whose complete nature may not be graspable by modern scientific methods.

Or maybe it can be. Who can say, as yet?

Mysticism, spirituality, religion may be our clever way of leaping over scientific problems that we cannot, as yet, solve, and achieving higher wisdom intuitively. For instance, a forest defender may intuitively grasp the incredible complexity of a forest ecosystem--that is, a sort of chaos principle that utilitarian science can hardly get hold of--and KNOW that the ECOSYSTEM ITSELF, in all its complexity must be preserved; that you can't destroy or vastly reduce one element--say, all the biggest trees--without losing many essential components of the biological system that depend on each other. Mice may eat a particular fungus that only grows at the base of the larger trees; which in turn get eaten by owls who need some trace of that fungus in their eggshells. And so on. The forest defender may not be a scientist, but perhaps responds to variety of color or smell, or feels a mystical awe at the whole forest environment. So the forest defender--who may have no science to back him up, as yet--because science hasn't yet identified that critically important little fungus, so essential to the owls--and acts to stop the removal by loggers of all the best, oldest, biggest trees.

Based on a feeling, an intuition--that science cannot yet understand.

It's much too simplistic to say that science is right, and all other insights are wrong, stupid and ignorant. One might as well make science itself into a religion, which we must worship unthinkingly, and without our souls.

[onager]

94. If you had read Sagan...

...then you wouldn't be insisting that "astrology is the MOTHER of astronomy." He made it clear, umpteen times, that the real astronomers knew astrology was a crock of shit early on. e.g., Christopher Huygens in the 17th century. And if they didn't know it before, they certainly knew it after the precession of the equinoxes was discovered. Which, unhappily for astrologers, proved that every "star sign" had shifted into the next area of the zodiac.

And if all was sweetness and light between science and mysticism in ancient Greece, then why was the brilliant scientist Anaxagoras exiled from Athens by the mystics and religious believers? He would have almost certainly been killed without the help of his friend Pericles.

What was the nature of Anaxagoras' heresy? He claimed that the sun was a "burning rock" and the moon a "cold rock," among other accurate celestial observations.

The same thing happened to the Atomists, who were already saying that all matter was made up of tiny particles.

Herbology is the mother of medicine? Pfft! A couple of brilliant physicians working in the Mouseion of Alexandria, long before the Myth Of Jesus, had already discovered the cardiovascular and nervous systems, and the latter's link to the brain.

Compare that to the "scientific magic" of the ancient Egyptians, who saved almost every organ for use in the Afterlife...EXCEPT the brain. They just didn't think it was very important, and threw it away.

Sorry. Sam Harris is right in The End Of Faith. Without the chains of religion, mysticism and related woo-woo nonsense, we might have had the Internet in the Fifteenth Century. And as Sagan pointed out, without the same useless baggage, we might be traveling to other planets right now.

[shrike]

106. 'Fraid I must disagree about herbology

Plenty of medicinal plants in the jungle cure all kinds of ills. That's why pharmaceutical researchers have oftimes visited the Amazon. Ancient shamans were often the tribe's doctors, and they did much more than wave their hands and cite incantations.

Indonesian tribes had (have?) a vegetable paste which enables torn flesh to mend with no scar. Sort of like an organic superglue.

Science, I'm afraid, had very humble origins.

[hunter]

108. Ancient medicine similar to today's...

I don't have a good link to the entire article, but it basically says that the medicine practiced in ancient Mesopotamia was very similar to medicine practiced today, even though the ancient Mesopotamians attributed disease processes to the workings of various gods.

Their "unscientific" model was successful because the ancient Mesopotamians based their medicine on careful observation and some experimentation, very much unlike the "rational" Greek medical model of "four humours" which often did their patients more harm than good.

Ancient medicine similar to today's
In Mesopotamia circa 2000 B.C., treatment remarkably advanced, researchers say
By William Mullen
CHICAGO TRIBUNE
Sunday, December 11, 2005

CHICAGO — In the world's first cities 4,000 years ago, people came to doctors for help with much the same problems as they do today, everything from impotence, depression, tuberculosis and cancer to gluten hypersensitivity, hemorrhoids, narcolepsy and migraines.

The treatment they received in ancient Mesopotamia is also familiar in many respects, with medical specialists writing prescriptions for pills, potions and patches that patients would take to a pharmacist.

Studying medical texts inscribed in cuneiform, the first system of writing, researchers JoAnn Scurlock and Burton Andersen found that the physicians of the earliest civilizations were delivering surprisingly sophisticated, knowledgeable and effective health care 2,000 years before Christ.

Scurlock and Andersen describe their findings in a newly published scholarly tome titled "Diagnoses in Assyrian and Babylonian Medicine." At 900 pages and $150 a copy, it is not a likely best-seller.

Even as you abandon the gods, it serves you well not to abandon the practical experience of the religion. :evilgrin:

For further research you might want to check out Isaac Newton's investigations of alchemy. Newton was chock full of "woo-woo nonsense" and this nonsense was very much the wellspring of his science and his mathematics.

[kwassa]

107. Nice post, well put.

"One might as well make science itself into a religion, which we must worship unthinkingly, and without our souls. "

Great writing.

[beam me up scottie]

61. Some comments from blog readers :

I am in favor of science, but not exclusively; it is not the path to reconciliation with God. I think there could be a real debate about the sum total benefits of science over the last 300 years. True, we don't watch our children die of pneumonia, or die ourselves by age 40. But beyond that, do we really believe life is better? And if 2/3 of humanity cannot share in the benefits of science, what have we really achieved besides making obvious our shortcomings?

***

Most of the responses critical of Sam have basically been attacks on straw men. Sam did not suggest that we should make a new God of science, nor did he advocate that we should use the state to force people to abjure their silly little superstitions.

Sure, it makes it easier to villify a writer with whom you disagree if you can bring Pol Pot or Stalin into the argument, but it is a pretty transparent attempt to dodge the real import of Sam's post: the fact that (despite some recent backsliding, especially in the U.S.) human development is historically trending away from religion and toward more scientific modes of understanding the world and our place in it.

I remember being accosted years ago by a self-identified Jesus Freak. Part of his spiel was the revelation that he had once deluded himself into thinking that drugs were the answer, and then for a time falsely believed that Hare Krishna was the one true path. But now the scales had fallen from his eyes, and he had accepted the lord as his one true savior. We listened politely, then informed him that we fully expected that, given his track record, he would be back at our door in a few years with a Dianetics pamphlet or a case of Amway products. I'm hoping he has instead evolved away from religious fairy tales entirely, and that is my hope for society at large. And though it won't happen in my lifetime, I think a true Age of Reason will indeed come to pass one day.

In the meantime, feel free to pray for your own preferred outcomes...

***

Just like the Bible, science also has people who misuse it—one example is the scientist that just admitted fabricating his experiments with cloning. Let me ask you a question—are you ready to throw out science because of those fraudulent people? As good as it is on quantifying and observing our world, science cannot answer some of the basic questions of the human race like “Why?” There is more to life than just observations and theories.

***

When the pro-faith people responding to you say "science" they mean technological stuff. When the pro-science people say "science", they mean information that comes out of a specific process.

Scientific facts are the result of observation, reasoning and experimentation; faith-based facts are the result of different processes.

It's the experimentation part that's the crucial difference between scientific thinking and all other kinds of thinking. Nothing can be accepted as fact in a scientific way unless it has been repeatedly proven by experimental evidence, and new experimental evidence can modify an established fact.

People with scientificly oriented minds expect major claims of truth to be backed up with good quality, multi-sourced evidence. Faith-based people have very different requirements for truthiness - if it feels right, or fits their prejudices, or was taught to them as fact when they were children, that seems to be enough.

So - there are two completely different conversations going on here. We're all using the same words, but the faith-based folks mean very different things than the scientificly oriented folks. I don't think things will change any time soon.

[salvorhardin]

71. You really touched upon an important distinction I think

When the pro-faith people responding to you say "science" they mean technological stuff. When the pro-science people say "science", they mean information that comes out of a specific process.

and

Scientific facts are the result of observation, reasoning and experimentation; faith-based facts are the result of different processes.

and

So - there are two completely different conversations going on here. We're all using the same words, but the faith-based folks mean very different things than the scientificly oriented folks. I don't think things will change any time soon.

At a certain level there can be no conversation. So it's pointless to attempt to engage in conversation at that level. We'll never agree.

What's needed is to find a level on which we can all agree and start there.

Obviously, Sam Harris' article is not it. Too bad. He makes a lot of interesting observations.

[beam me up scottie]

72. Well, I just grabbed a few and ran.

That reader makes a very good point and that's why I posted it.

Another guy addresses the knee jerk reactions to the article:

Most of the responses critical of Sam have basically been attacks on straw men. Sam did not suggest that we should make a new God of science, nor did he advocate that we should use the state to force people to abjure their silly little superstitions.

And this one really has me wondering if it's even worth fighting about at all:

I think there could be a real debate about the sum total benefits of science over the last 300 years.

:banghead:

[salvorhardin]

73. That last statement I just find sad

Remember the conclusion to James Burke's Connections (the original from 1977)? Where he's exploring the various (fallacious) options to dealing with complexity brought about by science and technology? One of the options, which a frightening number of people take seriously was "Scrap it, go rural". That I find to be intolerant. "Oh poor me, the world is just too complex for me to take. So, I'm going to make you all give up everything just so it can all be nice and simple for me."

[beam me up scottie]

75. Yes!

I loathe how fundamentalists try to pick and choose which scientific research is "good" and which is immoral according to what they've been told god wants.

Science can be neither good nor immoral.

[CarbonDate]

82. My two cents:

The language is needlessly inflammatory, IMO. This means that the point is lost amidst the choice of words. This is unfortunate.

Harris is, to me, obviously advocating winning the debate by presenting superior ideas. We're moving in this direction anyway, but I think Harris wants us to be a bit more aggressive. I would posit that we're not going to see the end of religion in our lifetimes, but if I see progress toward increased free-thought, I'll be happy. I can understand how religious people would become upset with the choice of language, however.

Engaging in a dialogue, as Harris suggests, requires that we be respectful of our opponent, if not necessarily their position. Use of inflammatory language, even if not directly aimed at the opponent, fails to be respectful. So while I agree that science needs to overcome religion in order to move forward uninhibited, and that a rational discussion would be to science's advantage, I don't feel that this article is an appropriate first step in that direction. There are others who have explained why they are atheists without insulting those who are religious; Carl Sagan, for example. His book, "Demon Haunted World", planted the seed of rationalism and clear thought that eventually led to me becoming an atheist. But even as a very devout Christian at the time, I did not feel insulted by his explanation as to why he was an atheist; I simply accepted that this was how he thought and went from there.

Some might think that atheists can't understand how religious people think, but this is untrue. Most of us are former Christians. In my case, some of us were quite devout before abandoning religion entirely. It is a gradual process, but when I finally did become an atheist, I must say I felt no real sense of loss. Relief would be a better term.

Okay, so that was more like five cents. Still, I feel that we can have this discussion without insulting one another as long as we accept that the other side is not going to immediately see things as we do.

[beam me up scottie]

86. I agree.

But if it's left up to the knee jerkers, we wouldn't be having this conversation at all.

We constantly have to tip toe around everybody's feelings because some people can't separate themselves and their personal faith from religion in general.

How the hell are we supposed to fight the war against the religious right if we're constantly being censured?


Harris might be a little blunt, but at least he gets people talking and thinking about it.

Well, most people.

[Lerkfish]

90. well-stated, thank you

[hunter]

96. Carl Sagan was an interesting fellow.

I've talked with a few people who worked with him. His PBS television image doesn't reflect the complexity of the actual man. His first national television exposure was on the Johnny Carson show in 1973, and in contrast to his carefully cultivated media image, one person who worked with him then told me Sagan was "haunted" and that he liked to wear black and that he didn't smile much.

Sounds sort of "goth" to me... I see lots of high school kids like that.

Opponents of Sagan, especially the religious fanatics, happily spewed any and all gossip they collected about Sagan (his divorce from Linda Salzman being one of those things) but I think the overall consequence of this was to make Sagan even more distant and protective of whatever wellsprings fed his own humanism and spirituality. I think in some ways this ever-deepening mystery about the man was attractive to some people, in some ironic religious sort of way. ;)

Saint Carl of the Church of Atheism:



http://archives.caltech.edu/search_catalog.cfm?results_file=Detail_View&recsPerPage=1&firstRecToShow=2&search_field=carl%20sagan&entry_type=&photo_id=&cat_series=

The sorts of atheism I see posted here on DU have a very rich history in the western traditions of the Christian Church. In a certain sense, the structure of a person's faith can be simply transfered from a foundation of "God" to a foundation of "Science." The basic patterns of one's thoughts are little changed; they are simply not attributed to any religious tradition.

An atheism arrived at through an eastern sort of religion, for example Shinto, has a different framework to it.

The original post recognizes that a spirituality based on science is lacking, but it does so from a very Western perspective. It's a "zero sum game" in which the old god is defeated by science. I don't think such an atheism can stand on it's own without a rich infusion of traditional "humanism" (which has often been based in religion) and a very large dose of non-scientific "spirituality."

You might call this spirituality "Love" or something else, but it's probably not something you can take measure of scientifically.

[SkiGuy]

91. Sam, you can try all you want

but God is never going to go away.

[Emperor_Norton_II]

92. Well, then we'll just have to kill God.

[hunter]

100. Wohin ist Gott?

Der tolle Mensch sprang mitten unter sie und durchbohrte sie mit seinen Blicken. "Wohin ist Gott? rief er, ich will es euch sagen! Wir haben ihn getödtet, - ihr und ich! Wir Alle sind seine Mörder! Aber wie haben wir diess gemacht? Wie vermochten wir das Meer auszutrinken? Wer gab uns den Schwamm, um den ganzen Horizont wegzuwischen? Was thaten wir, als wir diese Erde von ihrer Sonne losketteten? Wohin bewegt sie sich nun? Wohin bewegen wir uns? Fort von allen Sonnen? Stürzen wir nicht fortwährend? Und rückwärts, seitwärts, vorwärts, nach allen Seiten? Giebt es noch ein Oben und ein Unten? Irren wir nicht wie durch ein unendliches Nichts? Haucht uns nicht der leere Raum an? Ist es nicht kälter geworden? Kommt nicht immerfort die Nacht und mehr Nacht? Müssen nicht Laternen am Vormittage angezündet werden? Hören wir noch Nichts von dem Lärm der Todtengräber, welche Gott begraben? Riechen wir noch Nichts von der göttlichen Verwesung? - auch Götter verwesen! Gott ist todt! Gott bleibt todt! Und wir haben ihn getödtet!

The insane man jumped into their midst and transfixed them with his glances. "Where is God gone?" he called out. "I mean to tell you! We have killed him, you and I! We are all his murderers! But how have we done it? How were we able to drink up the sea? Who gave us the sponge to wipe away the whole horizon? What did we do when we loosened this earth from its sun? Whither does it now move? Whither do we move? Away from all suns? Do we not dash on unceasingly? Backwards, sideways, forwards, in all directions? Is there still an above and below? Do we not stray, as through infinite nothingness? Does not empty space breathe upon us? Has it not become colder? Does not night come on continually, darker and darker? Shall we not have to light lanterns in the morning? Do we not hear the noise of the grave-diggers who are burying God? Do we not smell the divine putrefaction? - for even Gods putrify! God is dead! God remains dead! And we have killed him!

Nietzsche

[Emperor_Norton_II]

104. Or, to quote the popular webcomic Goats:

"I claim my rightful place as Godhead of this universe. God is DEAD. LONG LIVE GOD!"

...but then, I'm a tad overambitious. :evilgrin:

[trotsky]

93. Go away?

When was he ever here to begin with?

[SkiGuy]

95. from the beginning

[trotsky]

97. Ah, I see.

So you were there, then? You can vouch for him?

Or are you assuming your holy book is more correct than all the others?

[beam me up scottie]

105. If he can,

I know a dude in Italy who could really use his help in court.
:rofl:

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

110. Of course not.

Nonexistent things can never go away because they've never been anywhere to begin with.

[hunter]

102. Violating even more copyrights...

Imagine

Imagine there's no heaven,
It's easy if you try,
No hell below us,
Above us only sky,
Imagine all the people
living for today...

Imagine there's no countries,
It isnt hard to do,
Nothing to kill or die for,
No religion too,
Imagine all the people
living life in peace...

Imagine no possesions,
I wonder if you can,
No need for greed or hunger,
A brotherhood of man,
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world...

You may say Im a dreamer,
but Im not the only one,
I hope some day you'll join us,
And the world will live as one.

Writen by John Lennon
© Bag productions inc.

[ozone_man]

109. "new ways of talking about ethics and spiritual experience"

This is what we need, not faith based spirituality. From the same article:

"To win this war of ideas, scientists and other rational people will need to find new ways of talking about ethics and spiritual experience. The distinction between science and religion is not a matter of excluding our ethical intuitions and non-ordinary states of consciousness from our conversation about the world; it is a matter of our being rigorous about what is reasonable to conclude on their basis. We must find ways of meeting our emotional needs that do not require the abject embrace of the preposterous. We must learn to invoke the power of ritual and to mark those transitions in every human life that demand profundity — birth, marriage, death, etc. — without lying to ourselves about the nature of reality."

We have to find other means for providing the sense of community, and the sense of spirituality that is derived from religion. The problems with deriving these from beliefs derived without reason is described in great detail in "The End of Faith", where wars and genocide have been committed throughout history because one cult thought another cult to be heretics. Among many examples, he mentions the crime of host desecration, which is particlurly absurd:

But for sheer gothic absurdity nothing surpasses the medieval concern over host desecration, the punishment of which preoccupied pious Christians for centuries. The doctrine of transubstantiation was formally established in 1215 at the Fourth Lateran Council (the same one that sanctioned the use of torture by inquisitors and prohibited Jews from owning land or embarking upon civil or military careers), and thereafter became the centerpiece of the Christian (now Catholic) faith. (The relevant passage from The Profession of Faith of the Roman Catholic was cited in chapter 2.) Henceforth, it was an indisputable fact of this world that the communion host is actually transformed at the Mass into the living body of Jesus Christ. After this incredible dogma had been established, by mere reiteration, to the satisfaction of everyone, Christians began to worry that these living wafers might be subjected to all manner of mistreatment, and even physical torture, at the hands of heretics and Jews. (One might wonder why eating the body of Jesus would be any less of a torment to him.) Could there be any doubt that the Jews would seek to harm the Son of God again, knowing that his body was now readily accessible in the form of defenseless crackers? Historical accounts suggest that as many as three thousand Jews were murdered in response to a single allegation of this imaginary crime. The crime of host desecration was punished throughout Europe for centuries.

Harris also explains clearly how the Jews were persecuted because they wouldn't believe in the divinity of Jesus, and how, with the help of the Catholic church, this became secular hatred, leading ultimately to the Holocaust. All because of differences in irrational beliefs in mythical beings.

Science alone is not the complete solution, but it must also come with secular means to provide for the derivation of spirituality and a sense of community, not from mythical deities and absurd rites created by ignorant people thousands of years ago.

Harris pulls off the gloves when confronting religion, sort of like the Howard Dean of religion. But he tells the truth, just like Dean, and they think it's hell. :)

Being tolerant of religion means not being able to criticize it. Consequently, it never changes, the Bible is never examined. Hundreds of years ago, people were burned for criticizing it, and they still are in certain Mid Eastern countries. Yet we still can't run for president in this country unless we're a Christian. This has to change and pussy footing around the subject just delays what ultimately has to be done. Doesn't Sam Harris sound a bit like Thomas Paine? We've been going backwards for the last 200 years, heading toward Theocracy in this country, but the pendulum is headed the other way finally, though it may not seem like it.

Toleration is not the opposite of intolerance but the counterfeit of it. Both are despotisms: the one assumes to itself the right of withholding liberty of conscience, the other of granting it.
-- Thomas Paine

"The Bible is a book that has been read more and examined less than any book that ever existed"
-- Thomas Paine

[hunter]

112. Sam Harris expressses the same old western atheism

It hasn't gone anywhere on it's own without religion for hundreds of years -- it's simply a western style "humanism" repackaged without a god. Beyond that it doesn't have a strong voice except in reaction against the prevailing religion. Martin Luther thought about this kind of stuff while he was sitting on the pot.

Well, at least Harris recognizes the void there. (groan)

If you attend some meeting of the Unitarian Universalists or a similar religion, you'll find some atheists there, but they are all explicitly recognizing the spiritual needs of humans, and building up from that. I've attended their Sunday services, their weddings, and their funerals, and people sometimes insist I'm UU at heart, but I honestly enjoy a Catholic Mass or something like it. I've also found liberal Quakers to be very similar to the Unitarian Universalists, but more explicit about God. (BTW, Richard Nixon's sort of Quaker was unusual.)

My own Catholic Church leans to the left, and I don't doubt for a minute that if they leaned to the right I'd be very tempted by a leftward leaning Episcopal church -- which sort of negates any opinions I might have about the spiritual aspects of transubstantiation, despite my Orthodoxy. I've attended services at St. Mark's Episcopal Cathedral in Seattle which were very inspiring.

Yep, there you have it, church-hopping like that I'm surely going to hell according to the fascist right wing of almost any religion that has a fascist right wing.

The issue of transubstantian as a tool of political oppression was important when the Church was the government, but that has little to do with life in the present day United States where politically it boils down to some sort of respect for your neighbor's traditions. Live and let live. You don't abuse your neighbor because he cheers for some other team.

I had a momentarily surrealistic experience this New Year's Mass at a Catholic Church I've never been to before. Little altar girls were waiting underfoot to catch any stray crumbs that might fall. I suppose at my church they don't worry so much if some microscopic bit of Christ gets in the carpet.

I'm fairly certain there's a few dead Popes spinning like eels caught in a fishing line after they read this.

[ozone_man]

114. UU and Quakers are good examples

of secular humanism more than religions, the UUs more than the Quakers. They seem like good examples of how religion can evolve to fulfull the community, social, and spiritual needs of a community without getting into the more delusionary aspects that the orthodox religions have.

"It hasn't gone anywhere on it's own without religion for hundreds of years -- it's simply a western style "humanism" repackaged without a god. Beyond that it doesn't have a strong voice except in reaction against the prevailing religion.

Well, at least Harris recognizes the void there. (groan)"

I would say that atheism and secular humanism have gone much further in Europe. Western Europe is way ahead of us in this respect, as is Australia, Canada too. Europe is much older culturally, they already had their religious wars, state religions, etc., and seem to have gotten beyond that stage more or less.

Harris mentions science as "destroying" religion, and I think he's right. Scientists are the most irreligious group, the most atheistic overall. But, education in general is what is required, along with less poverty, to bring our backward nation into the 21st century where we don't have to eat the body of imaginary deities in the form of crackers to derive our spiritualty. Eventually, even the U.S. will get there, though it will take a while. But as dismal as it seems in the U.S., the Middle East is living in the Middle Ages in terms of their evolution of religion, and Harris points out the dangers involved in having nuclear equipped cultures with primitive faiths that require them to kill or convert nonbelievers.

Another excerpt from Harris' book, describing how The Catholic church could not bear Biblical scrutiny by Catholic scholars, so they had to stop it. The rational mind rebels at the many absurd claims and contradictions of Christianity.

...At the end of the nineteenth century, the Vatican attempted to combat the unorthodox conclusions of modern Bible commentators with its own rigorous scholarship. Catholic scholars were urged to adopt the techniques of modern criticism, to demonstrate that the results of a meticulous and dispassionate study of the Bible could be compatible with church doctrine. The movement was known as "modernism," and soon occasioned considerable embarrassment, as many of the finest Catholic scholars found that they, too, were becoming skeptical about the literal truth of scripture. In 1893 Pope Leo XIII announced,

All those books ... which the church regards as sacred and canonical were written with all their parts under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Now, far from admitting the coexistence of error, Divine inspiration by itself excludes all error, and that also of necessity, since God, the Supreme Truth, must be incapable of teaching error.

In 1907, Pope Pius X declared modernism a heresy, had its exponents within the church excommunicated, and put all critical studies of the Bible on the Index of proscribed books. Authors similarly distinguished include Descartes (selected works), Montaigne (Essays), Locke (Essay on Human Understanding), Swift (Tale of a Tub), Swedenborg (Principia), Voltaire (Lettres philosophiques), Diderot (Encyclopédie), Rousseau (Du con trat social), Gibbon (The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire), Paine (The Rights of Man), Sterne (A Sentimental Journey), Kant (Critique of Pure Reason), Flaubert (Madame Bovary), and Darwin (On the Origin of Species). As a censorious afterthought, Descartes' Meditations was added to the Index in 1948. With all that had occurred earlier in the decade, one might have thought that the Holy See could have found greater offenses with which to concern itself. Although not a single leader of the Third Reich-not even Hitler himself-was ever excommunicated, Galileo was not absolved of heresy until 1992.

In the words of the present pope, John Paul II, we can see how the matter now stands: "This Revelation is definitive; one can only accept it or reject it. One can accept it, professing belief in God, the Father Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ, the Son, of the same substance as the Father and the Holy Spirit, who is Lord and the Giver of life. Or one can reject all of this. " While the rise and fall of modernism in the church can hardly be considered a victory for the forces of rationality, it illustrates an important point: wanting to know how the world is leaves one vulnerable to new evidence. It is no accident that religious doctrine and honest inquiry are so rarely juxtaposed in our world.

"Martin Luther thought about this kind of stuff while he was sitting on the pot."


He was even worse than the Catholic church in his hatred of reason (and Jews).

"Reason is the greatest enemy that faith has: it never comes to the aid of spritual things, but--more frequently than not --struggles against the Divine Word...."

"Reason must be deluded, blinded, and destroyed. Faith must trample underfoot all reason, sense, and understanding, and whatever it sees must be put out of sight and ... know nothing but the word of God."

"To be a Christian, you must pluck out the eye of reason."

"We are at fault for not slaying them (the Jews)."

[hunter]

116. Secular humanism in Europe...

I disagree that secular humanism has gone "much further" in Europe. It seems to me that educated Europeans are simply tired of it all and don't want to think about it. I don't expect Europe will be the breeding grounds of any new and exciting humanistic spirituality. It's more of a "let's move in together and sign some papers" kind of thing there.

For all practical purposes "modernism" is the core of the Catholic Church in America. Latin Masses and distant mysterious Priests are a thing of the past here. Imported priests who can't speak the local language (English or Spanish), and priests who are not willing to take part in local political issues, face some very tough audiences in America. Shape up, or ship out.

You can contrast this to someplace like Austria, where people leave the Catholic Church simply to avoid paying a 1% state mandated church tax, and the attitude among young people there seems to be, "oh well, so it goes." (I'm paying particualar attention to Austria these days since they ripped Arnold Schwarzenegger's name off the stadium, which has everything to do with opposition to the death penalty firmly founded in Catholicism.)

In my own experience I can express my support of gay marriage or my opposition to Supreme Court Justice John Roberts in articles that take up much of the local newspaper's opinion page with fewer worries about what might happen to me in my church than when I post other sorts of inflamatory things on DU.

[ozone_man]

120. Is Europe's health care and welfare system more humanist

than in the U.S.? Is there less poverty in Europe, higher overall education, less religiosity? I think the answers are yes. Western European countries like France, Britain, Sweden, are much less religious than the U.S. We sort of got Europe's fundies. So, the myriad of religious sects came to this country and flourished because of free religion, and the open Westward expansion, the isolation seems to foster more religiosity. Even the Puritans that settled the North East are now the liberal Protestants. But the great inequity in our capitalist society fosters religiosity among the less fortunate, and less educated masses.

I agree that the Catholic church has changed much over the years, and it's the Protestant religions that are the least liberal, starting with Luther and then Calvanism. And from there the development of Protestant evangelism in ~1900 in the U.S. From there, we see the spread of Protestant evangelism to South America and now Africa, where it is especially prevalent (Pentecostals). In Latin America, Catholic Liberation Theology is sort of the liberal, tolerant religion, that respects and integrates the beliefs and traditions of indigenous peoples. But it too will eventally morph into secularism as they modernize.

But I think Harris' positions are correct in that we need to teach rational thinking skills such as scientific method, while pursuing alternative means for exploring our personal sense of meaning or spirituality. It can all be done through secular means without resorting to the superstitious rites of ancient religions. Secular humanists derive these personal needs in many ways such as community involvement, friends, family, reading, even DU. :) The Quaker meeting house or the Unitarian Universalist church seems like more of a place to just get together and feel good, share community feelings. But this can all be done in contexts without mythical beings or ancient rites from a superstitious past.

"The metaphysical insanities of Athanasius, of Loyola, and of Calvin, are, to my understanding, mere relapses into polytheism, differing from paganism only by being more unintelligible. The religion of Jesus is founded in the Unity of God, and this principle chiefly, gave it triumph over the rabble of heathen gods then acknowledged."
-- Thomas Jefferson

"The Athanasian paradox that one is three and three but one, is so incomprehensible to the human mind, that no candid man can say he has any idea of it, and how can he believe what presents no idea? He who thinks he does, only deceives himself He proves, also, that man, once surrendering his reason, has no remaining guard against absurdities the most monstrous, and like a ship without a rudder, is the sport of every wind. With such persons, gullibility, which they call faith, takes the helm of reason, and the mind becomes a wreck."
-- Thomas Jefferson

"It is too late in the day for men of sincerity to pretend they believe in the Platonic mysticism that three are one and one is three, and yet, that the one is not three, and the three are not one.... But this constitutes the craft, the power, and profits of the priests. Sweep away their gossamer fabrics of fictitious religion, and they would catch no more flies"
-- Thomas Jefferson

So, it's taking a bit more time to get where our founders envisioned we might be, but we'll get there eventually.

[hunter]

124. Alas, we export our most virulent forms of capitalism too.

Bad enough that U.S. American missionaries are telling Tsunami and Earthquake victims that it's their own damn fault for pissing off God, but then we suck the money and hope out of places too.

Thanks for the most reasonable reply. I think we will get "there" eventually, but I am an impatient person.

[beam me up scottie]

117. What the hell is "western atheism" ?

Is that when we point out that Ron Ray-gun and John Wayne aren't gods or even heroes?:eyes:

For the last time, atheism is NOT a belief system.

Of course it doesn't "go anywhere on its own without religion".:banghead:

The definition of the word is "without religion".

It's the absence of theism.

The word would not exist if theism hadn't been invented.

It's the default position.

Supernatural beliefs are artificial additives.

[hunter]

118. The history of atheism is rich.

Simply saying "there are no gods" isn't saying much. It's like saying the sky isn't green. At the very least you might compose a song about it like John Lennon did and inspire some people. What are the consequences of your atheism? Imagine...

A lot of people throughout history have so imagined, and thus "atheism" has a history. You don't need to start from scratch.

Everything humans do is by definition "artificial." Religion is part of the baggage we inherit from our ancestors. You can't sit around acting as if religion might simply evaporate, and then the world will be a better place. It's not going to happen, and even if it did the people who are currently dangerous religious fanatics would simply become dangerous irreligious fanatics. The people who are good caring people now would remain good caring people without religion.

I imagine my own ancestors in Europe thousands of years ago witnessing the Christian armies killing pagan people who resisted "conversion" and them saying "Um, um, yeah I'm Christian. That tree in my house? Oh, um, it's a Christmas tree! And I named my kid Christian too. Dunk me in the water and put me on the list."

Later, somewhere in my family tree it was decided that the people who were doing the killing in the name of Christ were exactly the same sort of hypocrites Christ spoke against. So they left Europe for the American wild west because they were pacifists, and Europe was a place of war. Most of the native Americans had already been wiped out before they arrived here, and they considered themselves friends of those few Indians who were left alive. My wife's family, many of them native American, suffered a similar process when Spanish missionaries and soldiers "conquered" the American Southwest. You adapted to the Spanish, and later the "Americans," or you died. Read Geronimo. Or Ishi.

I don't believe that religion is the only framework humans have to raise their children to be good caring people. In my personal life I saw no changes in my sister when she declared her atheism in an email that utterly horrified a few members of our extended family. If my mom who is a very religious person was upset she never expressed it, but I actually think she was sort of proud because my sister expressed her thoughts very well. Even in the wild west, my mom's family had some sort of intellectual tradition. If you shake my dad's family tree, all sorts of atheists and heretics fall out, going back as far as you want. That's why they came to America.

So, beam me up scottie, I've asked you a couple of times about your own spiritual beliefs, and I've never gotten a reply. I'd guess it's some sort of Western style humanism, that "golden rule" love-your-neighbor kind of stuff. So, like some of my gay friends you get a sweet UU minister preside over your wedding, and she never mentions God, not once, yet it is a very spiritual event. Or if you are heterosexual (or in San Francisco on the right day) you get married by some Justice of the Peace and have a great party.

Funerals are a bit trickier. The UU ministers always come in handy for that. Religious people are often uncomfortable doing funerals for avowed atheists. Far worse are those religious people who somehow believe they are snatching up a lost soul for their God by presiding over an atheist's funeral. (The souls of many of my own ancestors are probably kept very busy chasing Mormons off of their clouds. They didn't join the church in life, and I don't suspect they will in death.)

Or perhaps you just say "He's dead, Jim," incinerate the corpse with your phaser, and get on with your life...

[beam me up scottie]

119. See, I don't discuss my "spiritual beliefs" because I DON'T HAVE ANY.

Where do you get your information?

You do realize that it's possible to get married and buried without a minister of any kind, right?



One more time, for the visually challenged and just plain obtuse:


Atheism is not a religion.


We don't go to church, we don't worship science and we're not all humanists.

[hunter]

122. Ah, a Vulcun...

Live long and prosper!



Anyways, I was accounting for that in "you get married by some Justice of the Peace and have a great party."

It works for "buried" too... I've been to some fabulous wakes where the only spirit infusing the place was Johnnie Walker Red Label.

I'm not being obtuse, I'm asking "where do you go from there?" I've seen other atheists go some very interesting places in their explorations of ethics and human society.

As a biologist one recognizes that human beings are social animals. Religion certainly arises from that. Creatures like wolves are social animals too, and many of their behaviors are very similar to human behaviors. That's probably why dogs co-evolved with us, we humans and dogs "understood" one another across the boundries of species.

I do not imagine wolves have any sort of religion -- they don't believe in any Great Alpha Wolf in the sky. Do they have any other sort of spirituality about them? I don't know. It's an even tougher call with social animals like dolphins or whales. Some very knowledgable and experienced people suspect these creatures are telling stories. What kind of stories?

My overall point is that declaring oneself to be an atheist without religion and without spiritualism has a shock value amidst certain segments of our U.S. American society, but in this social community called the "democratic underground," and with myself in particular, that's not the case.

I know that if I listen very carefully I can hear God. This might be, from your perspective, a mental illness or a vestigal organ of my mind much like my appendix, or the emotional baggage of my upringing and ancestors, but that's simply the way it is for me and many other "believers." That's just something you have to accept as if it is a physical reality because the consequences of it are a physical reality. Even if you don't accept that the "crackers" served up in my Church are the body of Christ, that doesn't mean that very real crackers are not being served up in a very real church.

I've spoken before about my lesbian girlfriend whose parents were fundamentalists. Her dad died, but her mom, who used to abuse me horribly with claims I wasn't "man enough" or that I was "retarded," found some kind of acceptance of homosexuality after her daughter married another woman and delivered her first grandchild. Before her grandchild was born she could deny homosexuality or claim it was a sin without any grave consequences to anyone who was in her mind "innocent." But when her grandchild was born, she had to accept that her grandchild really did have two moms if she wanted to have any sort of relationship with the child.

As an atheist you are placed in a similarly uncomfortable situation when you deal with people of faith. You are not going to talk people out of their faith anymore than you are going to talk people out of their homosexuality. You accept it and you move on.

[beam me up scottie]

126. Dealing with people of faith is not uncomfortable.

Dealing with people of faith who arrogantly refuse to accept my definition of my atheism, isn't uncomfortable, it's insulting.

Dealing with people of faith who threaten to vote for Republicans whenever their religion is criticized isn't uncomfortable, it's revolting.

Dealing with people of faith who malign science, claim that faith is its equal, and insist that IDiocy is a valid theory and should be taught in science classrooms, isn't uncomfortable, it's fucking painful.


I have "dealt" successfully with people of faith in every part of my life, private and professional, so you can stop building your next straw man.


As a matter of fact, I don't know any atheists who are "uncomfortable" dealing with people of faith.



Too bad we can't say the same about believers.



Because we're sure as hell a lot more tolerant of you than you are of us.

[hunter]

127. Who are your allies?

I'm a left wing "social justice" Catholic, and no, I don't happen to think your definition of atheism is clear yet. Yes, maybe I'm arrogant and insulting, but I'd like to see you holding your position strongly without tossing insults back at people, especially in tougher neighborhoods than DU. There are many, many very outspoken atheists here on DU.

I suspect we're on the same side politically for the most part, with only slight differences in the structures of our ethical systems. I believe in God, you don't. Big deal.

I'm a person of faith who is never going to "threaten to vote Republican" for any reason I can think of. With any luck the Republicans are well on their way to destroying their own party by their corruption and hypocrisy.

I'm very much a scientist, and I find the anti-intellectualism of some religions abhorrent. I'm not a great public speaker, but I can write my opinions forcefully enough that backdoor supporters of creationism, with their so-called theories of "Intelligent Design" have remained silent when they meant to speak simply because they saw me in the room.

One deals with people of faith in the United States because that's what you have to do. You've got neighbors who have metal fish icons on the backs of their cars and you have to live with them peacefully. But as an atheist you don't have it nearly so hard as, say, the Native Americans did. If you find my religious faith perplexing, then you might want to speak with Indians who attend Mass on Sunday even as the are actively reviving their own historical religious traditions that have been brutally surpressed for hundreds of years. No straw man there.

Let's see now, you are not uncomfortable dealing with people of faith, instead you are insulted, revolted, and to top it off, it's "fucking painful." That sounds very uncomfortable to me...

[beam me up scottie]

134. Get a grip.

"maybe I'm arrogant and insulting"

My post was referring to certain believers as "you", not you personally.

"If you find my religious faith perplexing"

Oh, please.

I don't find your faith "perplexing".

I don't find anything about it at all.

In fact, I couldn't care less about your personal beliefs.

You're the one who keeps asking about my atheistic "spirituality".

Got narcissism?:eyes:

"as an atheist you don't have it nearly so hard as, say, the Native Americans did"

Oh, brother.

And homosexuals in this country don't have it nearly so hard as, say, the slaves did.

Your point?

"Let's see now, you are not uncomfortable dealing with people of faith, instead you are insulted, revolted, and to top it off, it's "fucking painful." "

Perhaps you should take a course in reading comprehension and then read my post again.

If you did, you might actually notice that I specified which believers I found


insulting: people of faith who arrogantly refuse to accept my definition of my atheism,

revolting: people of faith who threaten to vote for Republicans whenever their religion is criticized

and painful: people of faith who malign science, claim that faith is its equal, and insist that IDiocy is a valid theory and should be taught in science classrooms.



But if you've really got your heart set on building straw men, accusing me of intolerance and playing the religious martyr, knock yourself out.


Just let me know where you want the wood delivered.

[hunter]

136. Ah, fire...

:evilgrin:

[beam me up scottie]

137. I hope you're wearing your suit...

:evilgrin:

[grumpy old fart]

121. "Simply saying 'there are no gods' isn't saying much". Oh yeah?

Try saying it on Thanksgiving to a table full of relatives. Try saying to a prospective employer. Try saying it at the next funeral you attend.

Moreover, imagine a world where science and reason alone were the basis of laws and public policy, and not superstition. Simply saying there are no Gods would be saying, and doing, a great deal indeed.

[hunter]

125. Who's relatives? Who's employers?

I think that's the question.

Somewhere around here I posted that one might claim to be a Satanist at my mom's dinner table, and she'd say, "That's nice, pass the potatos." Some of my favorite bosses have been stark raving atheists. Some of my favorite clients are in-your-face homosexuals. I live in vast seas of recent immigrants. White guys are a minority in my world.

I know well I live in a place that is very different from most of the United States, and I enjoy a mostly Hollywood or San Francisco point of view. Except for the perverse abundance of white guys, the democratic underground is a similar place.

Maybe that's the qualification I'd make. "Simply saying 'there are no gods' isn't saying much" here on DU.

But I also think there are hundreds of thousands of adolescents across the United States pissing off their parents by claiming to be atheists and refusing to go to church. Then, after sowing their wild oats, they get married and become the worst sort of fundamentalists.

[grumpy old fart]

133. Well said. My comment came from the fact I'm in the bible belt.....

Greetings from Tennessee. (At least I'm in the big blue corner. Memphis!)

[CarbonDate]

113. Scientific thinking....

...as opposed to scientific knowledge, will help in this regard. It will help people think clearly about our differences.

The one thing that science cannot appease is people's need of self-affirmation. Science has, thus far, only served to reinforce our own irrelevance. This is a purely emotional need, but it is one that religion fills.

Biological reproduction fills this need, as well. Whereas our existence is pertinent to the survival of our off-spring, our relevance is affirmed.

And one thing science has not answered is why anything exists. That's the question that has been bugging me, even as an atheist. I don't have an answer for it, and neither does anybody else (although some like to pretend they do).

[ozone_man]

115. Who needs an explanation?

It just is. That's the practical side of me speaking. I just thank my lucky stars we have this great planet, and the nature that lives on it. :)

I'm sure there's a good reason for the matter in our universe that we're not advanced enough to know yet, for example, something we might learn from Membrane Theory about universe creation. However matter was created, it makes little difference to the here and now, but it has intrigued humanity for eons, spawned magical creators and religions. There are many things we don't know yet. How boring life would be if there were no more puzzles to solve.

As far as existence of life, I would say because it can evolve, order out of chaos. Maybe that's all the universe is as well. Some order or chaos created out of a larger system or multiverse.

[Exiled in America]

131. Maybe, maybe not - I don't think that's the point

The point is that if I speculate different possible explanations than you for the thigns for which science currently has no concrete, objectively verifiable answer - I one day be found to be wrong, but I am not currently doing anything that stands in contradiction to logic or science.

Until such a time as science conclusively demonstrates a truth I'm pretty much free to speculate, and "believe" whatever I want about the unknown as long as such belief and speculation doesn't conflict with the truths that we do know.

So I have personal spiritual beliefs. I just don't have any that stand in conflict with the objective truths of science. So Harris' article really doesn't seem to apply to me, because there's nothing for science to "destroy" in my life. :)

[jonnyblitz]

123. great article. I admire my fellow atheists on this thread

you have far more patience than I do, after reading someone of the hysterical, irrational posts that you have responded to. I don't know how destroying religion got equated with destroying PEOPLE but that's how these discussions usually seem to end up. :crazy:

[Exiled in America]

130. It depends on your definition of religion - institutional or personal

If a definition of religion to you means the organizations, intuitions and hierarchical structures that establish dogma and creed and attempt to convert, then I understand why you wouldn't understand someone equating a call to destroy that with a call to destroy persons.

However, that's not how many people define "religion." Many people define "religion" as the deeply personal and private experiences, understandings and beliefs that define who they are as human beings. They may, like me, not even participate in any kind of structure described in the previous paragraph. Just like my belief in equality of all persons is not something I "put" on over my true self identity like an overcoat, and is also not something I can "take off" on a whim, so "religion" defined in this way is an embedded and inseparable part of one's self hood for many.

So talking about "destroying" religion translates (understandably so) into talking about "destroying" self hood. That's why we ought to do a better job in defining what we're talking about when we talk about "religion."

[Exiled in America]

129. Sam Harris needs to define "Religion," then dial the rhetoric down to 5

The first problem with Harris is the same problem that plagues most people who opt for the most extreme kinds of pronouncements against "religion" - they never clearly define what they mean when they refer to the term.

In most of the article, Harris pretty clearly seems to be defining religion as organized religious institutions and their hierarchical and authoritarian structure, their dogmatic absolute creeds, their evangelicalism and attempts to convert and/or persecute those outside the institutional structure. This definition works very well for the kinds of radical fundamentalist fanaticism we see evolving as a sub-culture in the united states or observe in places like the middle east.

I think all of us can agree that science must win out over that kind of "religion" and any kind of personal believe or organized institution that advocates ideas that are logically contradictory or standing in unequivocal opposition to rational fact.

However, that's not all "religion" if "religion" is defined to mean any sort of belief about the nature of existence that leaves the realm of the purely objectively verifiable and enters the realm of the experiential and interpretive. For some people "religion" is not about creedalism, or institutions, or evangelism, or beliefs that stand in contradiction to science. For some people "religion" refers to personal language of symbolism and metaphor - a way of emotionally and poetically describing a world rich with experience and depth. Such interpretive language need not stand in contradiction with reason, logic or science.

Atheists here have argued vehemently against religious people who try to define what atheism means for them. They have argued against Webster's dictionary definition as being biased and inaccurate. They have argued that only atheists are qualified to define atheism. And I'll tell you, I started out skeptical but eventually I was convinced by the arguments.

The same is true about defining "religion."

Some of the most famous religious leaders or theologians from modern history define religion or being "religious" in ways that don't do Harris argument much of a service. I've heard Tillich's name mentioned here a few times, and he has the famous quotation that says, "being religious means asking passionately the questions of the meaning of existence and being willing to receive genuine answers, even when those answers hurt." Such a definition most likely irritates some of the anti-religion extremists around here (please note, I mean exactly what I say by that, I am not lumping all secular non-believing people in to that group) but it is protected by the same argument atheists use when it comes to defining atheism. You have to accept the reality that for some people, this is what being "religious" means - and there is nothing in the definition that stands in necessary contradiction to reason and science.

Harris writes the following:

"To win this war of ideas, scientists and other rational people will need to find new ways of talking about ethics and spiritual experience. The distinction between science and religion is not a matter of excluding our ethical intuitions and non-ordinary states of consciousness from our conversation about the world; it is a matter of our being rigorous about what is reasonable to conclude on their basis. We must find ways of meeting our emotional needs that do not require the abject embrace of the preposterous. We must learn to invoke the power of ritual and to mark those transitions in every human life that demand profundity — birth, marriage, death, etc. — without lying to ourselves about the nature of reality."

When Harris states that the issue is not about excluding ethical intuitions and non-ordinary states of consciousness from our conversation about the world, he limits what can be meant by "religion" in the context which he is writing. By saying the issue is not about these things, he makes room for people for whom "religion" does not mean "Christianity" or "Islam" or some other organized authoritarian hierarchical institution. He makes room for people who understand being "religious" to mean a certain kind of poetic language expression about a complicated experiential reality. He makes room for people who understand being "religious" to mean a certain private kind of experientialism that need not stand in contradiction to any rational truth.

The result of this acknowledgment is: Harris is talking about institutional religious dogmatism and the irrationality of fundamentalist fanaticism. I think he wants to be making a broader case than that, but since he never affectively defines "religion" (and arguably can't) and since he makes allowances for certain kinds of experiences that many religious people define as "religion" - he doesn't succeed in doing so.

A few days ago, I tried to flesh out my beliefs on the boards to some non-religious folk and the result was that I was labeled a weak-atheist. That was pretty neat and strange for me as I've never been called that before. But I think it illustrates the complications in trying to talk about "religion" in one catch-all category. I'm still not sure if that label fits, (though I don't mind it) - I just know that I am not a traditional theist in any sense, and that I belong to no religious tradition or institution. But I do have personal spiritual beliefs. And I challenge anyone here to point out a belief that I hold, spiritual or otherwise, that stands in contradiction to science and reason.

I personally believe it is much more effective to focus on the things that we can clearly, concretely prove when it comes to critiques on "religion." That means clearly defining our terms, not making blind generalizations. That means focusing on religious institutions and their authoritarianism, irrational fundamentalism, fanaticism, their aggression and so on. But these things do not exhaust the dimensions or varieties of possible religious experience in human life.

Finally, when Harris says this:

"Only then will the practice of raising our children to believe that they are Christian, Jewish, Muslim, or Hindu be broadly recognized as the ludicrous obscenity that it is."

He really crosses the rhetorical line. If a religious person said that he longed for the day when atheism would be broadly recognized as the ludicrous obscenity that it is (not my position, just making a counter-argument), he/she would be crucified for it, accused of hate speech and all other sorts of things. What's good for the goose is good for the gander.

[hunter]

132. I think you are almost there.

I would disagree with this:

For some people "religion" refers to personal language of symbolism and metaphor - a way of emotionally and poetically describing a world rich with experience and depth. Such interpretive language need not stand in contradiction with reason, logic or science.

Everything that goes on inside your head is a "personal language of symbolism and metaphor" including "reason, logic, or science."

I come to my understanding of this through the field of medicine, where it is often claimed that "the practice of medicine is an art, and not a science." There are fixed and very well researched protocols for dealing with specific medical situations, but in the final analysis every patient's situation is entirely unique. Medical professionals must rely upon their best judgement -- from office workers, to techs, to nurses, to doctors. Situations occur daily in the medical profession that cannot be dealt with in an entirely scientific way. A nurse might notice something looks "funny" about a patient and express his concern to a doctor. A tech might notice something "smells wrong." There's a lot of intuition involved. Patients can often be helped without any physical medicine simply by helping them think of things from a different perspective.

If you explore the "cutting edges" of science, you find exactly the same sorts of processes going on there. Science itself "is an art, not a science."

For this simple reason the ethical footings of any atheist philosophy are no more secure than the ethical footings of any theistic or spiritual philosophy. The processing power of the human mind is simply insufficient to model any significant portion of the Universe. The Universe is vast, and most aspects of it are unseeable by human beings. As a practical matter we must all strive to respect the internal metaphors of others, and to speak carefully when these personal metaphors conflict. If someone sees a spirit in a tree, and you don't, well, you just accept that and move on.

My own personal experiences with conflicting internal metaphors mostly concern the topics of gay rights, environmental issues of the American West, medicine, and K-12 biology education.

Some of my most interesting experiences have involved Native Americans. While working with them my wife and I have noticed that some non-native Americans are immediately shut out of the community and suffer extreme sorts of frustration. Other outsiders have extremely satisfying interactions. The people who get shut out tend to be those with an overly romanticized view of what it means to be Native American, and those who are unable to see beyond their own cultural boundries. I've also spoken with people working with Aboriginal communities in Australia and it seems the situation there is often more extreme than it is here. Life is hell if you are shunned on the Australian Outback. You can't simply drive to Albuquerque every night and get drunk within the safe confines of your own society.

Thanks for the thoughtful post, Exiled in America. It clarified a lot of my own thoughts.

[TreasonousBastard]

135. I did read the article, and...

find it full of the same trivial blather and horseshit I've been hearing for years-- just another simpleminded swipe at religion for the sake of it.

Science and religion are NOT mutually exclusive, and most modern thinkers (yes, even Muslim ones who think back before the Four Doctors when Turks and Arabs WERE Western civilization) see each as having its place.

Science is limited to the observable and measurable, and it knows it. What about the unmeasurable? The unquantifiable? Are we to also have "science" defeat art and philosophy?

Where is science in love and hate? Where is science in the appreciation of riding a good wave or viewing a sunset or the enjoyment of a good meal or good sex? Or the science of a great song? The science of comforting soeone in mourning or other distress?

Where is science dealing with its own ethics? What does science have to say about the use of nuclear weapons or cloning? Or how to allocate scarce transplant organs? Or when is adulthood reached? How does science measure a jury's verdict? Ethics in science, medicine and other such areas is a hot field, and you find a fair amount of religious thought there, but few fundies doing anything but whining and filing lawsuits.

For all of its faults, religion is simply another philosophy to quide us, with a built-in ethic. Sure, we can come up with secular arguments against murder, but why bother when almost all religions have already decided it's a bad idea. Maybe "because God said so" isn't the ultimate answer for moral and ethical questions, but for a lot of people it's a good start. It's a lot easier than teaching Sartre or Kant.

Besides our ability to reason, which isn't always all that hot anyway, we have our emotional and spritual sides, and they have to be answered somewhere.

Apparently unknown to Harris is that he slipped into the God of the Gaps fallacy which has been happily denounced by everyone except a few fundamentalists. There are theologians and religious researchers who realize that increasing physical knowledge about our universe does not reduce God but increases the mystery of God and makes God a greater entity as the universe becomes greater. If you are not religious, you can happily ignore this and it will make no difference to anyone.

They also realize that as our knowledge grows, our knowledge of what is unknowable also grows. This is where we seek not the what and how, but the why that philosphers and theologians attempt to answer. Whether it's God or the FSM, why should anyone really care what the person next door thinks? These are questions for ongoing discussion and examination, and few really expect the "truth" to come out of it. We probably can't handle the truth anyway.

Religion is waning in Japan, Europe, and quite a few other places for various reasons, and it can come and go since God can easily take care of himself without our assistance. However, when assistance for its demise is spoken of, I can't help thinking of Stalin, Hitler, Mao, and a few others in the past who caused a bit more devastation wiping it out than the religions ever caused on their own.