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[Owlbread]

Dogmatic assertions of axioms counts as constructive?

We created God and religion ourselves out of our inability to comprehend absolute power or things being left entirely to chance and coincidence, originally growing from a need to understand the world around us. Even if we are kings we still have to have this concept that not everything is within our control - atheists like me rely on the idea of nature and the world around us. It's really hard to imagine yourself as the closest thing to a god that actually exists. It's just the way we've evolved.

I am certain, deep in my gut, that this is just bullshit, that's why you're going to spend another 200 pages debating over the philosophical minutae. It's... just false. It's hard to explain. It's like when you look at the ontological argument for the existence of god and you can follow that pattern to will all sorts of stuff into existence - the god of trampolines, for instance. You come up with all these problems and weird stuff because it's just wrong right at the core, like a rotten 2x4.

[10ebbor10]

It's hard to explain because you don't understand, and you don't understand because you don't want to listen, because you already made up your mind.

I'll just post this thing again:

It's a common mistake that people assume that science and religion are incompatible, that they're succesive and mutually exclusive points in a search for knowledge, and that one can not have one without the other. The truth is that science and religion don't aim to answer the same questions*.

*Unless you're a fundamentalist, of course.

[Owlbread]

It's hard to explain because you don't understand, and you don't understand because you don't want to listen, because you already made up your mind.

I'll just post this thing again:

It's a common mistake that people assume that science and religion are incompatible, that they're succesive and mutually exclusive points in a search for knowledge, and that one can not have one without the other. The truth is that science and religion don't aim to answer the same questions*.

*Unless you're a fundamentalist, of course.

But I do want to listen. I do want you to show me evidence for the existence of God, especially evidence for the existence of an afterlife - because I sure as hell do not want to die. I fear death terribly because I feel right in my bones that when I die I am going to rot in the ground, switched off forever like a broken light bulb. I'm not a happy atheist, I'm actually very scared.

But I haven't said that science and religion are incompatible, I've said that I don't believe in God because it's something we made up.

[10ebbor10]

Wrong questions, I'm afraid. Can't help you with those.

[Owlbread]

Wrong questions, I'm afraid. Can't help you with those.

Nobody can.

[10ebbor10]

Wrong questions, I'm afraid. Can't help you with those.

Nobody can.

Some people might claim they can, but it's unlikely they're right.

Good thing those aren't the question ((modern)) religion tries to answer.

[Descan]

Then what questions does modern religion try to answer?

[10ebbor10]

It tries to provide a system of morals, a way of life based on it's holy books, often with varying degrees of succes and useability depending on intrepretations.

[Leafsnail]

So you're saying it doesn't actually make any claims about whether any gods exist?

[GlyphGryph]

Some religions seem to be like that, but most western religions spend quite a bit of time going on about how if you don't do what they say you'll get a BAD AFTERLIFE and if you do you'll achieve a GOOD AFTERLIFE.

[10ebbor10]

Some religions seem to be like that, but most western religions spend quite a bit of time going on about how if you don't do what they say you'll get a BAD AFTERLIFE and if you do you'll achieve a GOOD AFTERLIFE.

Methaphors, often. Christianity even goes as far as saying that doing good in order to get you into heaven won't get you there.

[GlyphGryph]

You are correct, "doing good" is rarely one of the things they require. This doesn't change the fact that they threaten you with a bad afterlife if you don't do what they say, it just means they aren't using that particular carrot/stick combo to enforce good behavior.

[Leafsnail]

So you wouldn't disagree with the statement "no god exists" because the god in Christianity is metaphorical?  Because if it's just a system of morals and way of life then it isn't making any claims about how the universe is.

[10ebbor10]

So you wouldn't disagree with the statement "no god exists" because the god in Christianity is metaphorical?  Because if it's just a system of morals and way of life then it isn't making any claims about how the universe is.

In the context you're stating that question (Ie, God as a might being that  smites people with lightning, and intervenes and stuff), I completely agree with it.

[Leafsnail]

Let's take god to be "any kind of supreme intelligence".  Doesn't have to be interventive.