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[Spartan-67]

I realized that several of you are some flavor, but I've been arguing As if you were Christian, as it is one of the largest religions.

Going to bed, don't expect to come back to this topic later, was fun talking with you all.

[Shambling Zombie]

I'm an atheist. That's how I roll.

[TherosPherae]

True, I have been Talking as if you all were Christian, if you have other beliefs please say.

Actually, I am pretty sure most people here are some flavor of atheist.

I'm not. I'm Christian, and I practice being as neutral as I possibly can, because I know that going around screaming "OMG JESUS ROXORS" isn't going to help anyone; it's just gonna piss people off and get me a faceful of some vile secretion.

Been fun, Spartan. Sort of.

[Strife26]

*pokes thread with very long pole*



Remember kids, you'll never have a good discussion when you start with outright hostility.

[Simmura McCrea]

I might regret this post but oh well.

Going back to page 2 (IIRC) where Cript was talking about how religion teaches good morals and everyone shot him down, it seems to me that religion does teach good morals. Go look at any given major religion's holy book, and you'll see something along the lines of "Don't steal, don't kill". That's good morals, right? Yes, there's the whole "Thou shalt have no god but me" crap (yes, that's christianity, I got almost zero education on other religions in school and don't really give a fuck about religion enough to research any others (I'm firmly atheist, by the way and have been since about age 8 (yay for brackets))) that leads to all sort of nastiness (the crusades, for example, although it could be argued they were simply greed with religion used as an excuse), but the good morals are still there.

Running away now. (Brackets!)

[Blargityblarg]

Religion does teach good morals, but the question is whether they're hard enough to figure out that the thinking you saved yourself cancels out the restrictions that invariably come with a religion.

[scriver]

Those morals are taught by society in general as well. Hell, I'd say that it's society, that is other people, and not religion, is the only thing that teaches them. Almost.

*pokes thread with very long pole*



Remember kids, you'll never have a good discussion when you start with outright hostility.

Hehe, yeah, that's basically what the thread so far has either been about, or proof of

[ed boy]

But as I already pointed out religion, like all major institutions, resists change. This is not a good thing, but it happens and you should not blame it on religion.

I'm going to contest this point with you - that resistance to change is a bad thing.

I do not deny that there are situations in which it is bad, but I also propose that there are many situations in which it is good, and thus describing the quality of resisting change as bad is inaccurate.

By resisting changes, one can observe which ones are improvements and which are not.

[Cthulhu]

As for the question he asked when he was trying to divert attention away from the lack of known scientific facts, sort of.  Literal omnipotence would render a deity illogical and outside of rational discussion (How do you discuss and categorize a being that can change fundamental constants like pi?).

As for omniscience, I've never really seen the existential dilemma people have when they think a being could know what they do before they do it.  If Morpheus knew beforehand with 100% certainty what pill Neo would take, but didn't actively influence his decision, how does that make Neo's choice not his own?

[Glowcat]

As for omniscience, I've never really seen the existential dilemma people have when they think a being could know what they do before they do it.  If Morpheus knew beforehand with 100% certainty what pill Neo would take, but didn't actively influence his decision, how does that make Neo's choice not his own?

Because combined with Omnipotence and creation of the Universe it's implied that Neo's choices and the circumstances that led him there were determined entirely by the Omniscient being.

It also brings some interesting questions as to how the being makes its decisions if it already knows everything and is supposed to be the original cause that leads to all other causes. How does god know what god will do?

[Siquo]

Local theist, reprezent, yo!



But for now I'm content seeing Spartan be slaughtered by his own arguments

[Phmcw]

Religion does teach good morals, but the question is whether they're hard enough to figure out that the thinking you saved yourself cancels out the restrictions that invariably come with a religion.

Religion THAT SURVIVE, teach arguably good moral. More or less.
I don't think that "kill your enemies, die a warrior and feast and fight for eternity in Valhalla" count as good morals. Nor does the order of the sun temple. Nor does Rael, nor does...

Religion is, after a while, an established social structure, and usually, those have some merits. But believing in god don't intrinsically teach a good ethic. I even think that in fact abandoning rational though and joining have several adverse effect : 1° god is absolute, so it's very easy to rationalize any exaction against the enemies of god 2° Religion are established structure based on belief, and so usually reject any critical thoughts 3° by being resistant to change and based on tradition, they reject new ethics and keep archaic belief (just think of how many religion are misogynist).

So no, religion doesn't teach good ethic. 

[Africa]

"Religion" doesn't teach good morals. Some religions teach good morals. Other religions teach despicable morals. Most teach some of both. It's incidental to religion in any case and shouldn't be used as an argument for or against the value of religion as a concept.

[Criptfeind]

About good morals: I said that it strengthens moral values, ie, it is used as a tool by society to teach them. Once again, it is not the only tool, and it is not the best tool in all situations, but it is a tool that is used.

To Africa: Well... Maybe. It depends obviously. Some of the old religions had some radical stuff, but the newer ones also have radical stuff that is largely ignored by it's practitioners. And of course morals change over time so when a religion was made

kill your enemies, die a warrior and feast and fight for eternity in Valhalla

Was a good moral value. Now it is not, and no one practices that religion anymore (seriously that is). It did not adapt to the changing times so it died.

[Phmcw]

About good morals: I said that it strengthens moral values, ie, it is used as a tool by society to teach them. Once again, it is not the only tool, and it is not the best tool in all situations, but it is a tool that is used.

Yes, and it can be used to defend any value, good or bad, as opposed to argumentation who fail at defending bad value, by definition (or should I say "are less efficient", given that someone persuasive can defend a bad position, even though, by definition, a good argumentation can dismiss it's position.)

So yes it's a tool, but not one worth defending.

kill your enemies, die a warrior and feast and fight for eternity in Valhalla Was a good moral value.

How was it a good moral value? I mean it doesn't completely goes over my head that viking society had it's golden age, but to call these value "good"...