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Mr. Spock
Skeptic Friend
USA
99 Posts |
 Posted - 05/22/2002 : 04:20:03 [Permalink]
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"It is morally as bad not to care whether a thing is true or not, so long as it makes you feel good, as it is not to care how you got your money as long as you have got it."
--Edmund Way Teale
One of my main problems with religion, or any "feelgood" philosophy, is that once the dogma is internalized, one ceases to be a free, thinking individual and becomes an automaton whose attitudes, beliefs and feelings are shaped by an outside source. (I recall the episode of Star Trek where everyone walks around with a vacant gleam in their eyes mumbling "peace and tranquility").
The response that religion gets people through tough times begs the question of whether religion presents the best and only method. The answer is NO. The religious solution is essentially one of abdication--hand your brain over to Jesus, and you will be just fine. The fact is that stronger people can and do get through difficult times without religion. If fact, many find that rational, humanized attempts to overcome their problems reveal the woeful inadequacies of the fairy-tale solutions offered by religion. (Consider how many holocaust survivors became non-believers).
Lars'statement about alcohol and drug use hits home. I was an alcohol abuser for 11 years, and only sought help after continued health problems. I was the bane of my outpatient detox group, because I simply wouldn't heed their pleas to find Jesus and join AA. I steadfastly refused to bow to any imaginary higher power, stating that I'd rather continue drinking than exchange one crutch and dependency for another.
In fact, I did neither. Drawing on the rationality and sobriety of a non-theistic and skeptical mindset (which, since I see the "well, that's YOUR religion, then" response coming, is decidedly non-religious) I have been sober for two years. In the meantime, I have been in contact with many in the group. Most who went "with the program" have had multiple relapses. One is dead (One of AA's dirty little secrets is that sponsors are encouraged to promote relapse anxiety. The idea behind this is that no one will truly find their resolve until they have hit bottom, which, to be sure, is just a tactic to get people more dependent on the group. When someone actually dies as a result of relapsing, they moan about how awful the "disease" is and pray to their higher power).
The religious "solution" to life's tribulations is disabling and dehumanizing, and the fact that I may be in the minority does not mean that I have not chosen the better path. Unlike Boris, I too still have my balls; I refuse to "sell my soul" to any institution or ideology, even if it claims to offer easy, comforting answers.
"The amount of noise which anyone can bear stands in inverse proportion to his mental capacity." --Schopenhauer |
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Tim
SFN Regular
USA
775 Posts |
Posted - 05/22/2002 : 05:13:03 [Permalink]
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Slater, you brought up a couple of interesting and salient points, but I must still disagree on a couple.
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That is where the equivocation comes about, as the word can have contradictory meanings. It isn't possible to do science with the religious definition of belief.
I don't feel that the word 'belief' has contradictory meanings. I feel that the meaning remains the same, even though the validity of a particular belief may come into question, and this is where science and religion begin to move in different directions.
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It is being said that both science and religion require belief. This seems to be purposely muddling the meanings of the word in order to equate superstition with science.
I understand your sentiments here, and I sympathize with your frustration with the tactic. However, inferring that religion and science are the same, simply because a belief is required is, to me, like asserting that baseball and football are the same games, simply because each requires a ball.
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Credulity is the foundation on which religion is built.
Well spoken!
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The first will save you from harm; the second will make you subservient to the shaman
While this is true, I feel these beliefs find there origin in the same place. It makes little difference whether the threat is real or imagined. The fears of a 'true believer' in the supernatural are just as real as the fears of impending danger in a pure survival scenario.
I agree that the purpose of religion in the civilized world is control. After all, if I were the leader of a large group of people, I'm sure that I would relish the benefits and cost effectiveness of religion, instead of human security. However, I am not convinced that this was the original purpose of most religions. There was a time before true science that people needed to explain those things that frightened them. Attributing these things to the supernatural was easy. Then, the leaders discovered the benefits of the control aspects.
Of course, that is just speculation, and probably always will be.
Mr. Spock, you are so right. I don't understand why people are so convinced that they must put all their energy into a second crutch, when they would probably be much better off putting that same energy into themselves, and just stop the abusive behavior.
"The Constitution ..., is a marvelous document for self-government by Christian people. But the minute you turn the document into the hands of non-Christian and atheistic people they can use it to destroy the very foundation of our society." P. Robertson
Edited by - tim on 05/22/2002 05:15:11 |
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Gorgo
SFN Die Hard
USA
5310 Posts |
Posted - 05/22/2002 : 06:17:07 [Permalink]
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Well said, Spock ,and much appreciated.
"Not one human life should be expended in this reckless violence called a war against terrorism." - Howard Zinn
Edited by - gorgo on 05/22/2002 12:54:05 |
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PhDreamer
SFN Regular
USA
925 Posts |
Posted - 05/22/2002 : 12:48:12 [Permalink]
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Spamorama,
The problem I have with your position is that it tells only part of the story. If we just needed religion to bolster the psyches of chronic alcohol abusers, it would probably be a very socially useful tool. But religion, belief, faith all promote dogmatic thinking. In fact they require such even to hold a concept of a loving, transcendent creator. Why should the scientific community be battling against the promotion of million-times refuted dogmatic creationism as an alternative to scientific evolution in the 21st century? Because dogmatism doesn't restrict itself to personal issues. Additionally, while spiritual self-importance might give a reprieve from depression, wouldn't actual self-reliance be that much better?
Generally speaking, the errors in religion are dangerous; those in philosophy only ridiculous.
-D. Hume |
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Slater
SFN Regular
USA
1668 Posts |
Posted - 05/22/2002 : 13:49:10 [Permalink]
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Oddly enough all the members of AA are religious.
What if they weren't? What if there was nothing for them to hope for? No reason to be a better person?…
A self-proclaimed expert on this subject is Cliff Walker, the editor at www.positiveatheism.org. According to the studies he quotes (ad nauseam) the recover rates for AA members are exactly the same as those of people who do not join support groups at all.
There are no Atheists convicted of capital offences in the US at this time.
How many became religious after they were sentenced to life? Is this just a case of hope for the hopeless?
Ya know, although I've met a number of people who abandoned religion after traumatic events I've never met a soul who stopped being an Atheist because of one. I tend to think that "no Atheists in fox holes" is nothing but an urban myth.
For all I know it could be because Atheists are smarter and get away Scott free after committing capital offences.
If so, this statistic doesn't seem applicable. A better statistic might be, what was the religious/athiest ratio of the people when they committed the crimes?
We could leave a questionnaire at every 7/11 for hold up men to fill out.
On Market Street here in San Francisco all of the homeless who are screamers and are carrying around strange signage are talking about Jesus
I'll note the exception, but this is not a rule.
Well mental illness isn't the rule. But the assertion was that religiosity some how kept you from becoming mentally sick. This is demonstrably not the case. How many nut cases have you seen carrying signs that said, "Don't repent, you've nothing to be sorry for!! The end is NOT coming"?
The recent spate of infanticides that have been in the news all involve very religious mothers.
Again, a notable exception, but not a rule. If this happened outside of an isolated pocket of influence, and over the whole spectrum of very religious mothers I might concede a correlation.
Now you are picking and choosing religions that are good and ones that aren't. The polls you are talking about didn't do that, but made blanket claims of the benefits of religion.
Yet infanticide always seems to be tired to a mental illness that places an over importance on religion. Even Media was a high priestess of Hecate.
I am just saying that for some people, it is a system that has undeniable merit.
I believe the merit is called the placebo effect.
I am a parent, and I am not sure if you have children, but my friends parents turned to religion after the horrific loss, so that they could believe that their children were in a better place.
I have two grown children, a boy who is a cop with the NYPD and a girl who was in the WTC when it was hit. They are both fine. When the time comes that they aren't if I have to turn to fantasy to comfort myself it will literally mean that I have lost touch with reality. Then I would not only have lost my children but my mind as well.
Although this is an extreme example, there are many, (like AA followers) that need religion, and for whom it serves a solid purpose.
No one "needs" religion. It does the AA people no good at all.
When Atheists suffer tragedies they weather them or they don't the same as religious people.
Since religion is the opiate of the people the next time you have an impacted wisdom tooth extracted try a couple of Hail Marys.
I said mental health, not physical. In most studies religion kicks science's butt when it comes to helping people through hard times, or in turning their lives around, by providing support (even if imagined) and a reason to go on.
And how do they do these studies?
'Mr Johnson we are going to fire you from your job. We'd like you not to believe in god, then we'll ask you some questions. After that we'll wait a day. Then we'd like you to believe in God and we'll ask you the same questions.'
Most people would say that life is about feeling good too, not just making sure that we are right all of the time.
There is a strange lack of courage being shown here. Why would you possibly need a lie to feel good? Because that's what we're talking about here--lies.
Gee, I'm not worried if this airplane goes down. I have a parachute so I'm happy. Don't tell me this backpack is empty because then I won't feel good!
There is no harm in a belief system that allows joe citizen to feel happier in his day to day. If you think there is harm in a good person with a "nice" belief system, what would you say it is? That the good person is being lied to. That they are being controlled by fraud. That they aren't in touch with reality.
Maybe the down and out need religion, and the rich and well educated don't.
Dust off your good book. Check out which condition it promotes. Being poor, subservient and uneducated gets all the kodos. Following orders and not thinking for yourself is the highest goal you can achieve.
Intelligence, education, self-reliance, wealth are all disdained.
It's small wonder that most of the population of Europe became Serfs under Christianity.
Just because the well educated get their faith from statistical analysis does not irradicate the fact that "faith in god", in many cases, does far more good than harm.
I've heard the same promotion made for acupuncture. The only reason the poor think that they need religion is that they are told from the minute that they are born that they do.
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My business is to teach my aspirations to conform themselves to fact, not to try and make facts harmonize with my aspirations. ---Thomas Henry Huxley, 1860 |
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Slater
SFN Regular
USA
1668 Posts |
Posted - 05/22/2002 : 13:51:34 [Permalink]
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I don't feel that the word 'belief' has contradictory meanings. I feel that the meaning remains the same, even though the validity of a particular belief may come into question...
I still disagree. When you talked about it in the "science" sense (tea kettle) you put "belief" after observation. However in the religious sense no observation is made nor is one required.
The Xians make a very big distinction about this difference in the fable of the "doubting Thomas." Saint Thomas is told an outlandish story about Jesus' resurrection. He doesn't believe, he wants to perform basic scientific tests to ascertain the validity of the bizarre claims his friends have made. He is severely chastised because he didn't believe. The fact that he came to the same conclusion as his buds had after testing didn't matter, he was not a believer.
However, inferring that religion and science are the same, simply because a belief is required is, to me, like asserting that baseball and football are the same games, simply because each requires a ball.
And yet that was what was being done. They were both ways of looking at the world and they both required belief. I disagree on both counts.
It makes little difference whether the threat is real or imagined.
I think it makes all the difference in the world. It's the difference between truth and a lie.
The fears of a 'true believer' in the supernatural are just as real as the fears of impending danger in a pure survival scenario.
Only one is reacting to an actual threat and the other is being victimized by a charlatan.
However, I am not convinced that this was the original purpose of most religions.
Did you read the thread we had going a few weeks back about beta male chimps and their use of display induced fear to enhance their group standing as the first use of religion?
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My business is to teach my aspirations to conform themselves to fact, not to try and make facts harmonize with my aspirations. ---Thomas Henry Huxley, 1860
Edited by - slater on 05/22/2002 13:57:51 |
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Snake
SFN Addict
USA
2511 Posts |
Posted - 06/23/2002 : 01:35:57 [Permalink]
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quote:
How do you stand on the relationship between science and religion?
I used to think, How could a scientist believe there's a god?.
But now I can see how a man of science could or might wonder, How DID the world begin?.
Like a pendlum or an hour glass, knowledge shifts. In simplistic terms, early man thought only gods created what was around him. As time went on more and more things were explained by science and knowledge/expierence. There is much we still don't know, may never know but what if the sand shifts back to the other side? And scientist do find out what or who created everything! The pendlum will have swung back. Full circle! We knew nothing, then we will know everything.
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*Carabao forever.
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Blessed are they who can laugh at themselves for they shall never cease
to be amused. |
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