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Post by Deleted on Apr 7, 2017 20:01:15 GMT
People having 'faith' or believing 'there must be something else/after', are different to religions. They're both shit, the only difference is one of them was/is used to excert power over people, and the other is used 'cos people don't like to admit they're not the oh so important thing they like to think they are, and at some point in time you'll be thought about for the last time ever, and basically might aswell never have existed to begin with. No-one gives a shit about a fly, or a worm, or a tree, but I'm different, I'm special... Apparently. Do worms go and seek their makers? do they have a conscience , a thought of right and wrong? Do they invent things or domesticate other animals? do they keep pets build brick houses?
Do they watch football with hat on and sing Delilah?....I know they might be Chelsea fans.
So maybe you're a worm =) ...
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Post by Pretty Little Boother on Apr 7, 2017 23:59:22 GMT
I'm personally of the "you die, you're soil" variety, but to draw equivalencies between us and worms is bizarre in my thinking. Even if we didn't exist, a hierarchy of creatures would exist. We rape this fucking food chain like it's a little bitch, and the closest to us in terms of intelligence is less intelligent than a five year old human. Let's face it, five year old kids are stupid as shit.
2edgy4me types blast out "we're a cancer to the earth, the earth would be better without us". What's the alternative? Living every day as prey for something else? Freezing to death in our own shit? Damn right we're better than other creatures by any objective measure.
It doesn't mean we're "important" to any realistic level, but comparitively, we destroy any other life form, figuratively and literally, and that is all the proof you need of our superiority.
That doesn't necessarily link to the original question about religion, but assuming we're clever enough to invent rules to follow religion, or clever enough to reject religion, we're clever enough to accept our own place as masters of the world. By any measure.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 8, 2017 0:08:53 GMT
I like Buddhism and Paganism. Hindu's are generally pretty chill and nice grounded people.
The rest can take a hike. Especially money grabbers, brainwashing cults, death cults, paedophile cults, alien worshipping cults, extremist cults, and the like.
The best type of religion is the one nobody else knows about. In other words - keep your beliefs to yourself.
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Post by bathstoke on Apr 8, 2017 4:47:44 GMT
I like Buddhism and Paganism. Hindu's are generally chilli chicken and rice people. Mmm, Paratha
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Post by JoeinOz on Apr 8, 2017 4:50:04 GMT
Religious beliefs still exist throughout the world? Because it helps people to come to terms with their own mortality.
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Post by woodstein on Apr 8, 2017 7:57:56 GMT
The religions that get religion a bad name (!) are the ones who dictate what people shouldn't eat or do or are offended by what other people do with their lives.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 8, 2017 9:42:53 GMT
I like Buddhism and Paganism. Hindu's are generally chilli chicken and rice people. Mmm, Paratha But you need a little sauce
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Post by RichieBarkerOut! on Apr 8, 2017 9:59:51 GMT
I'm agnostic but I've heard a professor of clinical psychology explain religion, and specifically Christianity, in a way that really resonated with me. The stories in the bible are not supposed to be taken as literal truths, religous truth is not scientific truth. Scientific truth tells you what things are but genuine relgious truth tells you how you should act. Religious writings in the deepest sense relate to a mode of being which has meaning, they're meta-true. If you take the most true things about your own life and then take the most true things about 10 other peoples lives and then you amalgamate them into a single figure, a literary hero. Then you take a 1,000 literary heroes and extract from them what makes the most heroic person, that is a religious deity. It's the collective imagination attempting to build an exemplary drama that everyone can act out, behavioural truths which appear everywhere, stories which can be passed down through the generations. Stories and myths, like comic book heroes are very prominent and popular in our culture for a reason, examples of good and bad, of chaos and order like Batman and the Joker, the Harry Potter stories etc. The statement that the Bible should not be taken literately is a modern one, if that statement had been said by a religious scholar 500 years ago, then the scholar would have come to a very nasty end. The rise of science and it's ability to explain how the world works, has being beating religion with a stick and it will continue to do so. Why should the modern interpretation of the Bible carry more weight than the interpretation that has been used well over a thousand years? The answer is that it does not stand up to scrutiny anymore, so the Church has to put spin on it.
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Post by harryburrows on Apr 8, 2017 10:05:07 GMT
I'm agnostic but I've heard a professor of clinical psychology explain religion, and specifically Christianity, in a way that really resonated with me. The stories in the bible are not supposed to be taken as literal truths, religous truth is not scientific truth. Scientific truth tells you what things are but genuine relgious truth tells you how you should act. Religious writings in the deepest sense relate to a mode of being which has meaning, they're meta-true. If you take the most true things about your own life and then take the most true things about 10 other peoples lives and then you amalgamate them into a single figure, a literary hero. Then you take a 1,000 literary heroes and extract from them what makes the most heroic person, that is a religious deity. It's the collective imagination attempting to build an exemplary drama that everyone can act out, behavioural truths which appear everywhere, stories which can be passed down through the generations. Stories and myths, like comic book heroes are very prominent and popular in our culture for a reason, examples of good and bad, of chaos and order like Batman and the Joker, the Harry Potter stories etc. The statement that the Bible should not be taken literately is a modern one, if that statement had been said by a religious scholar 500 years ago, then the scholar would have come to a very nasty end. The rise of science and it's ability to explain how the world works, has being beating religion with a stick and it will continue to do so. Why should the modern interpretation of the Bible carry more weight than the interpretation that has been used well over a thousand years? The answer is that it does not stand up to scrutiny anymore, so the Church has to put spin on it. They just show you their palm and say Faith End of discussion
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Post by bathstoke on Apr 8, 2017 10:20:05 GMT
I'm agnostic but I've heard a professor of clinical psychology explain religion, and specifically Christianity, in a way that really resonated with me. The stories in the bible are not supposed to be taken as literal truths, religous truth is not scientific truth. Scientific truth tells you what things are but genuine relgious truth tells you how you should act. Religious writings in the deepest sense relate to a mode of being which has meaning, they're meta-true. If you take the most true things about your own life and then take the most true things about 10 other peoples lives and then you amalgamate them into a single figure, a literary hero. Then you take a 1,000 literary heroes and extract from them what makes the most heroic person, that is a religious deity. It's the collective imagination attempting to build an exemplary drama that everyone can act out, behavioural truths which appear everywhere, stories which can be passed down through the generations. Stories and myths, like comic book heroes are very prominent and popular in our culture for a reason, examples of good and bad, of chaos and order like Batman and the Joker, the Harry Potter stories etc. The statement that the Bible should not be taken literately is a modern one, if that statement had been said by a religious scholar 500 years ago, then the scholar would have come to a very nasty end. The rise of science and it's ability to explain how the world works, has being beating religion with a stick and it will continue to do so. Why should the modern interpretation of the Bible carry more weight than the interpretation that has been used well over a thousand years? The answer is that it does not stand up to scrutiny anymore, so the Church has to put spin on it. What were the literacy rates 500yrs ago. People didn't know what was in the Bible back then. Even when King James had it translated into English, most folk couldn't read.
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Post by Frogger Theft Auto on Apr 9, 2017 9:59:23 GMT
I'm agnostic but I've heard a professor of clinical psychology explain religion, and specifically Christianity, in a way that really resonated with me. The stories in the bible are not supposed to be taken as literal truths, religous truth is not scientific truth. Scientific truth tells you what things are but genuine relgious truth tells you how you should act. Religious writings in the deepest sense relate to a mode of being which has meaning, they're meta-true. If you take the most true things about your own life and then take the most true things about 10 other peoples lives and then you amalgamate them into a single figure, a literary hero. Then you take a 1,000 literary heroes and extract from them what makes the most heroic person, that is a religious deity. It's the collective imagination attempting to build an exemplary drama that everyone can act out, behavioural truths which appear everywhere, stories which can be passed down through the generations. Stories and myths, like comic book heroes are very prominent and popular in our culture for a reason, examples of good and bad, of chaos and order like Batman and the Joker, the Harry Potter stories etc. The statement that the Bible should not be taken literately is a modern one, if that statement had been said by a religious scholar 500 years ago, then the scholar would have come to a very nasty end. The rise of science and it's ability to explain how the world works, has being beating religion with a stick and it will continue to do so. Why should the modern interpretation of the Bible carry more weight than the interpretation that has been used well over a thousand years? The answer is that it does not stand up to scrutiny anymore, so the Church has to put spin on it. Yeah, exactly this. The people that wrote the bible had such a primitive view of the world, writing about things like stars as little lights that could drop out of the sky. You can see why they thought that they were the centre of everything and how they'd come to the conclusion that an imaginary man in the sky had made them and was controlling things because the sky is so mysterious and it's the simplest, most basic explanation. I wouldn't use what they wrote down as anything other than a historic text to see what people used to think though, they were clearly clueless.
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Post by estrangedsonoffaye on Apr 9, 2017 15:48:43 GMT
Scientist thought the world was flat and then curved. The ceiling in the Sistine Chapel, the one Michelangelo painted is shaped like the top of a sea chest because that is what scientists thought the world was shaped like.
If you want to listen to the things they tell you are true then that is your religion. Until someone (not Stephen I'm always right Hawkins) can SHOW me how big the universe is and how it came into being then I'll believe in some supreme being or beings have created the ZOO we live in. What name we give to that being is irrelevant it is just someone/something that is beyond our comprehension a man with a fluffy white beard is the face we all wish it were, if you like our dream God. Remember at the edge of the map it reads "Here Be Monsters" But every generation is driven by something inside to "Boldly Go Where No Man Has Gone Before" to seek our origins and to seek out other beings no matter what dangers that may entail we are driven to do it. Or we could just all die rot into the ground and become worm fodder with no reason or purpose and if that is the truth then most people can not deal with it. The difference is, Science looks for the answers and keeps looking for them. Religion tells us to be happy with the world, without a knowledge of how it works. Throw into the mix, religion actively suppressed scientific discovery for the best part of a millennium, and science is rapidly unraveling the mysteries of the universe. Look at the Hubble space telescope pictures, that's evidence alone for how big the universe is, look at red-shift and the expanding universe.
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Post by estrangedsonoffaye on Apr 9, 2017 15:50:10 GMT
I'm agnostic but I've heard a professor of clinical psychology explain religion, and specifically Christianity, in a way that really resonated with me. The stories in the bible are not supposed to be taken as literal truths, religous truth is not scientific truth. Scientific truth tells you what things are but genuine relgious truth tells you how you should act. Religious writings in the deepest sense relate to a mode of being which has meaning, they're meta-true. If you take the most true things about your own life and then take the most true things about 10 other peoples lives and then you amalgamate them into a single figure, a literary hero. Then you take a 1,000 literary heroes and extract from them what makes the most heroic person, that is a religious deity. It's the collective imagination attempting to build an exemplary drama that everyone can act out, behavioural truths which appear everywhere, stories which can be passed down through the generations. Stories and myths, like comic book heroes are very prominent and popular in our culture for a reason, examples of good and bad, of chaos and order like Batman and the Joker, the Harry Potter stories etc. Excellent post. I'm not very religious but married a Catholic. I attended church with an open mind and enjoyed it. The vast majority of activities were focused on the community as a whole and not just church members. Church fete's, sponsored cycle rides, assisting the elderly etc, etc. The church was the common link but there was never any bible bashing. It was more trying to advocate understanding, love and support in the here and now (albeit influenced from a particular view of a faith) rather than conversion from and criticism of, any other belief. With a little bit of language update the Ten Commandments are decent guidelines for modern living. That's essentially humanism, do as to others as you would have done to yourself, without the supernatural bollocks.
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Post by rogerjonesisgod on Apr 9, 2017 16:33:26 GMT
Excellent post. I'm not very religious but married a Catholic. I attended church with an open mind and enjoyed it. The vast majority of activities were focused on the community as a whole and not just church members. Church fete's, sponsored cycle rides, assisting the elderly etc, etc. The church was the common link but there was never any bible bashing. It was more trying to advocate understanding, love and support in the here and now (albeit influenced from a particular view of a faith) rather than conversion from and criticism of, any other belief. With a little bit of language update the Ten Commandments are decent guidelines for modern living. That's essentially humanism, do as to others as you would have done to yourself, without the supernatural bollocks. The initial level could be humanism yes, then it depends on your depth of belief as to how much of the "supernatural bollocks" you believe
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Post by estrangedsonoffaye on Apr 9, 2017 16:44:29 GMT
That's essentially humanism, do as to others as you would have done to yourself, without the supernatural bollocks. The initial level could be humanism yes, then it depends on your depth of belief as to how much of the "supernatural bollocks" you believe My main issue with religion, is how it can influence legislation, I've got no objection to the church community doing as you describe, I have an issue with places reserve for bishops in the House of Lords, faith schools and blasphemy laws.
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fig
Lads'n'Dads
Posts: 55
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Post by fig on Apr 11, 2017 20:53:32 GMT
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Post by PotterLog on Apr 13, 2017 19:08:43 GMT
Simply put, if you think that "religion" is a tangible, concrete thing which has to justify its own existence, or is something that can be banned, you're a fucking idiot. "Religion" is a spectrum of investitures in theories to explain what cannot be explained. In doing so, it alleviates otherwise potentially crippling existential nihilism that would swamp a huge percentage of the world's population. "Comfort" is too simple a phrasing; if you swept from under the feet of billions the idea that there is an inherent meaning to existence; global society would collapse in on itself. As well as this, it provides a structural narrative to life. It removes the fear of chaos and chance being the overriding forces of nature, and allows many to develop a sense of beginning, time, end and totality; as opposed to just having this blob of life which means fuck all. Intrinsically linked to this is the development of morality. This is not to say you can't be moral without being religious; but if, as you imply, there is no higher power, then all morality is ambiguous and subjective; what you feel is right, I may feel is wrong. An over-arching guideline system based on Christianity has founded the West's system of law, order and justice over the course of millennia; so it's impossible to argue that religion hasn't been for ultimately the good of society as a whole. It encourages charity, education, and the closest achievable actions to altruism as is really possible. Again, this is possible without religion, but its influence ultimately puts it in credit in terms of posititive contribution to the world. I'm not sure from which angle your criticism is launched so I'm a little reluctant to second-guess where you're coming from; but if you're wheeling out the eye-rollingly vacuous and ill-considered garbage of "religion causes wars hurr durr lol ban religion and war will stop" that's so tediously in vogue at the moment, you're peddling a reductive myth that ignores the entire nature and history of mankind up until this point. People have always fought wars over everything, from berries and nuts to animal skin to sex and caves and frigging insults and football and race and basically anything that someone could be jealous of, or anything that is different and to be afraid of. It's the bastardisation of religion that is the issue, when people use it is an excuse to be a violent dick, but anyone can be a violent dick over anything. It's also the bastardised version of it which is the exploitative, controlling force that so many people are against; but then again, anything can be manipulated into scaring people into doing your bidding. Man's nature. I've given a list of reasons defending it, but ultimately I can sum it up by saying "The justification for religion's existence is that people have the right to choose to believe in it". Anyone who would infringe on people's rights to think what they wish to think is an authoritarian fucking shitwipe and the lowest form of scum on the planet. Sugar-coating it Boother. Why does religion take credit for the morals, charity and altruism (fairly debatable claims to begin with but I'll leave that aside for now), but is absolved of any responsibility for the violence it often explicitly commands because "people can be violent dicks over anything"? You're essentially saying that religion is capable of inspiring people to do good things but not bad things. Makes no sense.
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Post by maninasuitcase on Apr 13, 2017 19:41:38 GMT
First four line summarise it nicely for me.
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Post by dutchstokie on Apr 13, 2017 23:37:33 GMT
"Imagine all the people, living life in peace"
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