Re: Religion Randomness
Posted: Tue Apr 02, 2024 12:32 pm
That is not dead which can eternal lie, and with strange aeons bring us some web forums whereupon we can gather
https://www.octopusoverlords.com/forum/
https://www.octopusoverlords.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=88779
(Honestly asking)Grifman wrote: ↑Tue Apr 02, 2024 12:13 pmNo, not at all, not even close. I never mentioned death, never alluded to it.Unagi wrote: ↑Mon Apr 01, 2024 4:32 pm Yeah, I truly do not get Grifman's point here.
And I agree with BH, Holman, and GreeGoo's replies. +1 to each.
It certainly does sound as if you (Grifman) are saying he's nearing death, and as he does - he backs away from his Athiest views and starts to make room for a world view that includes an afterlife.
Is that correct?
The point is that all these aspects of cultural Christianity that Dawkins appreciates only exist because some people actually believe and lived out their beliefs as Christians. By his attacks on Christianity he was undermining the very beliefs that gave him what he appreciates as “cultural Christianity”. Hence the cutting off of the very branch he is sitting on.
Pascal lived during a heavily Christian culture era so presumably he discounted other religions, and Christianity is the religion of fire and brimstone. And when is comes to belief, what is to distinguish devout, committed, heart of heart fervent belief from going through the motions. Do we know for a fact that the Pope is not just taking the wager? Pascal's point is you lose nothing by proclaiming you believe, but risk everything by rejecting belief.GreenGoo wrote: ↑Tue Apr 02, 2024 8:28 amRight. But which god is the correct one? You could just be pissing off the true god by believing in the wrong version of him, or even a non-version of him.Jaymann wrote: ↑Mon Apr 01, 2024 4:38 pm Sounds like Pascal's Wager:
If God does not exist, the individual incurs only finite losses, potentially sacrificing certain pleasures and luxuries. However, if God does indeed exist, they stand to gain immeasurably, as represented for example by an eternity in Heaven in Abrahamic tradition, while simultaneously avoiding boundless losses associated with an eternity in Hell.
Plus, if god is god, do you think he's fooled by people hedging their bets? Is god's point of view that as long as people pay lip service, everything is hunkydory? True belief not required?
Pascal's wager is nonsense.
edit: To clarify, I don't doubt there are many people actively using Pascal's wager to save their immortal soul. It won't work.
I believe you are correct. To think otherwise would lead to madness.Holman wrote: ↑Tue Apr 02, 2024 5:18 pm I've seen it pointed out that Pascal's wager is largely misunderstood: rather than claiming to be a logical argument for belief in God, it's actually embedded in a larger argument about the *impossibility* of relying on reason as a basis for belief.
In other words, we (meaning most people who have referenced the wager in the past couple of centuries) took an anecdote and got it precisely backwards.
We're not talking about what you or anyone else wants, we're talking about what Dawkins wants.
You don't need to appreciate the ancient Sumerians to do math, nor do we need to have them around. But if you don't have Christians around, I'd argue that there would at some point be no "Christian culture" that Dawkins belatedly seems to appreciate.We have math because of Sumerians. Does that mean we need to appreciate their polytheistic religion? Do we need to be thankful that Athens invented democracy?
Irrelevant, since we are talking about what Dawkins wants, not what "society" wants.Society is full of good and bad things. Some of which come from Christianity. Some don't.
Dawkins hasn't just been criticizing Christianity, he's been wanting to kill it off for years.It's ok to criticize something despite enjoying some of the benefits that thing provides. Everyone hates the government, but...government.
I couldn't let this kind of misinformation pass, though it is common in many atheist circles. I don't know how many Christian denominations there are, but you totally misunderstand what denominationalism is about. Most of the denominations differ over issues of varying importance, some major, many minor, but the vast majority recognize each other, and their members, as fellow Christians. Almost none of them regard their positions on these differences as infallible, and very very few would say that if you don't believe at they do (compared with other denominations), that you are going to hell, except for some extreme fundamentalist groups. I have Presbyterian, Methodist, Baptist, Lutherans, Episcopalians, Catholics,and other varieties in my family and among my friends, and nobody thinks the others going to hell. So you are just totally wrong about this.GreenGoo wrote: ↑Tue Apr 02, 2024 12:14 pm There are over 45,000 Christian denominations alone. Most of which preach hell for not following god their way. Even *if* Christianity is correct and we ignore Judaism, Islam and Hinduism (these are just the big boys, don't forget about all the rest. I hear Odin is *very* spiteful), you still only have a 1 in 45,000 chance to bet correctly.
I'm not talking about what people think. I'm talking about what their religion says. It's not misinformation, it's just that people don't understand all the details of their own religions or have studied their religious texts. That said, there are more than a few religions that don't have any afterlife punishment. Unfortunately they are not popular in North America.Grifman wrote: ↑Tue Apr 02, 2024 8:34 pmI couldn't let this kind of misinformation pass, though it is common in many atheist circles. I don't know how many Christian denominations there are, but you totally misunderstand what denominationalism is about. Most of the denominations differ over issues of varying importance, some major, many minor, but the vast majority recognize each other, and their members, as fellow Christians. Almost none of them regard their positions on these differences as infallible, and very very few would say that if you don't believe at they do (compared with other denominations), that you are going to hell, except for some extreme fundamentalist groups. I have Presbyterian, Methodist, Baptist, Lutherans, Episcopalians, Catholics,and other varieties in my family and among my friends, and nobody thinks the others going to hell. So you are just totally wrong about this.GreenGoo wrote: ↑Tue Apr 02, 2024 12:14 pm There are over 45,000 Christian denominations alone. Most of which preach hell for not following god their way. Even *if* Christianity is correct and we ignore Judaism, Islam and Hinduism (these are just the big boys, don't forget about all the rest. I hear Odin is *very* spiteful), you still only have a 1 in 45,000 chance to bet correctly.
If you say so.
American anti-slavery abolitionism was in large part a Christian movement. The Civil Rights movement depended on churches as a source of leadership and organizing. Even European socialism (the northern kind, not the Bolsheviks) had some foundation in Christian organizations and Christian Democratic political parties.GreenGoo wrote: ↑Wed Apr 03, 2024 9:12 amIf you say so.
I'd argue that the benefits of Christian society have nothing at all to do with the Christian religion and are the evolution of society that may or may not have arrived at the same position today without Christianity. We'll never know. What we do know is that Christianity had to be brought kicking and screaming into the modern age against its will.
I agree with this. I was raised Catholic and Episcopalians and Methodists are pretty chill. Lutherans are pretty close too. After that, it diverges pretty rapidly.Holman wrote: ↑Wed Apr 03, 2024 9:03 am The dividing line tended to be that some (not all) Protestant-derived churches considered Catholics to be insufficiently Christian (something something Popery bad). But I can guarantee you that there has never been an Episcopalian who believed that Methodists were bound for Hell simply by virtue of attending the wrong church.
Right. Exactly. There's a big difference between brotherhood and just being polite about their heretical nature.
As a former Asatruarman I can confirm this, wholeheartedly. If you're hedging your bets with potential deities being real, Odin is one that you don't want to fuck with. (Continuing as if he were real) Those who worship that particular pantheon and have some actual study to back up their practice will tell you that you include Odin in your rites, but you don't dedicate yourself to him unless you're well aware of what you're getting into. He's a dangerous god to follow, sort of like jumping into a tornado to dry off.
Even though you're not speaking to me, you might be surprised what kind of questions can cause someone to question, and later turn away from their religion. It was largely non-directed comments like this one (and largely comments right here on OO, often on completely different topics) that helped me to realize that I didn't really believe what I believed I believed. Disbelief was the unbelievable result.GreenGoo wrote: ↑Wed Apr 03, 2024 10:02 am edit: Ok, I'm a bit too far down the rabbit hole. There's zero chance I'm going to make anyone question their religion, and I've been through enough of these conversations (or witnessed them) to know that barring new evidence, my mind is pretty hard set against organized religion.
Let's agree to disagree and move on. I do apologize for being critical of your (anyone here) belief system. That was never my intent to direct this at anyone specifically.
This has resulted in a formal schism. Methodists accepting queer clergy retain the name "United Methodist Church," while congregations rejecting it have now given themselves the name "Global Methodist Church."hepcat wrote: ↑Wed May 01, 2024 5:05 pm Looks like the Methodist church (in which I was baptized and attended services for years when I was younger) finally opened the doors to LGBQT clergy.
Good on them, I say.
Sounds like the Quiverfull movement, which is creepy because these days it often goes hand in hand with Christian Nationalism.