"with no way to verify what is right and what is wrong?"

I believe there are plenty of ways to verify that a higher power exists. you just don't like them.

'bout time this gets closed already.

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Religion =/= Humans. Conquests of land have caused men to kill each other since as far back as we can remember. Some sides are against stemcell research and other things because they view it as we are going too fast into the unknown, others dont mind it at all. Im all for scientific progress but keep in mind that with every break through in science we just get better weapons to kill each other with. What resources? I dont for a minute think I am weak, if you think you are weak fragile and cant do anything without help from God I think you are wrong. That would be like a child clinging to their parent for their entire life. If there is a God, (I believe there is one but hell I could be wrong) I doubt he wants to clinging to his damn leg 24/7 asking him for help flushing your toilet, taking out the trash, telling you what movie to watch. Again, you follow something blindly you are a damn fool and give anything you come in contact with a bad name. What is right and wrong? Well that's up for every indiviudal to decided. I think abortion is fine under certain conditions, I think stemcell research and the HGP are awesome advances in science.

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His point is a lot of the reasons humans are so fond of destroying each other can be traced back to religion. Would there be conflict in Israel/Palestine now if there was no such things as Jews or Muslims, just people?

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Yes there would be, the conflict doesnt just center around religion. It centers around the fact that the UN gave the Jews a chunk of Palestine country to start their own.

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it goes back to hitler & the germans trying to eliminate jews based on their religion, and USA & UK picked the land at israel because of religious history (and because middle easterners were easier to push around back then). it does all come back to religion. but who knows, if there weren't religion, people would find some other excuse to be retarded

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Hitler from what ive read and researched killed jews not based on their religion but more based on that he saw them as a corruption in his Germany. He saw that they were not German and yet had power and money over rightful Germans.

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Yeah hitler liked Nietzsche a lot.

/classic anti-nietzsche argument

sure hitler targeted many minority groups using many criteria, but religion was one of the critieria he used.

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Nazism was tied very closely with mysticism. The reasons for the Holocaust weren't really similar to the overwhelming hate all of the monotheistic religions hold for each other. Hitler targeted the Jews for socio economic reasons as well.

huh?




-Religion =/= Humans? I understand what you're saying, but I'm talking about religion's effect on humans. I don't know why you would seperate human's from their religious beliefs. Without humans religion wouldn't exist.
-Sure people have had wars and conflicts that aren't based on religious disagreements, but those conflicts have real sources, like land, money, resources, etc. Thus they can actually be resolved. Since religion is a belief with no real source, wars never lead to a resolution, thus the fighting continues to this day. Neither side can reason with the other side.
-What resources? come on...do you not realize the amount of wealth the church (to use a Western example) has amassed over he last 2000 or so years? That money represents work and human effort. What a waste I say.
-what is right or wrong? I'm referring to religious people being unable to prove anything. When you have a world full of people who all think they are right and everyone else is wrong, but can't verify anything, then you have a problem.

Exactly

If you are right, then you would perhaps be the most important person in human history.

Well if the only way you're going to believe something is if you can touch it or see it, then you're pretty fucking ignorant.

You know how many people on this planet are religious?

I've read enough stuff and talked to enough people to be able to realize that there's something higher at work in this world, and there are plenty of people that agree with me. The fact that you won't believe something unless it's in your hands is your own problem.

denchi, you shouldn't use "everyone else is doing it" for proof god exists. that's the worst possible excuse.

proof doesn't have to be an eyewitness account. just some sort of verifiable and testable data to raise our confidence levels. any notion has an associated confidence level. for me, there being a god is at around 0.000000000000001% about 1/1quadrillion chance. for instance, my confidence level that aliens will someday contact humans is at about 0.5%, or that man evolved from a common ancestor as the chimpanzee is at about 99.999999%. the confidence that these estimates are within 1 significant digit of the actual value is at about 95%.

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I understand that there are things that are real that we cannot touch or see. Things like microorganism, chemical reactions, stars a million light years away, memories, human emotions like love, etc. But you know what, we can study the sources of these things. We know the human brain is the source of our emotions, we know that microorganism exist because we use microscopes to see them.

I'm all for trying to verify that a higher power exists, but I've never seen any indication other than people saying "I just know it to be true." How? "Well I know it in my heart." or "what do you think we came from, monkies?"

I feel really disconnected from the mainstream because I don't believe in things like magic/voodoo/religion/spirits/fortune-tellers/etc. Things that have no real source to verify the truthfulness. I would put the tooth-fairy and santa claus in the same category. Just beliefs with no real basis in reality. I know 90% of the world does not agree with me, but I don't consider that as proof that I'm wrong or they are right.

I have no quarrel with people who believe in religion, or magic, or astrology, etc, I just think those kind of beliefs hold humanity back, instead of pushing us foward. I also think that as the world becomes more scientifically enlightened the scales will start to tip away from religion. 200 years ago, religious people would've hanged you for saying you don't believe in god, but nowadays a significant portion of society is questioning their religious belief. It won't happen in my lifetime, but one day religious belief will be reserved for the poor and uneducated (that's not an insult, just what I believe about the distant future).

Give me some evidence, then. Science gives me all the evidence I need. Evidence that can be plugged into an equation and proved logically. Give me some evidence of God.

The fact that throughouht all of human history there has been an idea of "good." The man who sacrifices himself for the good of others has always been held in higher light. Why? There's no scientific explanation. If there is a man who is stronger than everyone else, he should be able to exert his power over other people, right? Science says so, natural selection. The stronger animals will thrive.

But for some reason our human ideals are always held under a different light. Why is that? Why has this idea of "good" mattered so much in human affairs? And where does it come from?

A man who saves himself and runs away in battle is a coward, a man who stands his ground is brave. the answers to why we hold things to certain standards is the reason why I believe there to be a god, or a higher power.

Wow, that's the most bullshitty, philosophy-major answer I've heard in a long time. You should have just told me off with the "well you just have to have faith" response.

K, well then leave the thinking up to people who can do it.

That's an incredibly ironic statement considering the last few posts in this thread.

If you can't even follow basic concepts like the ones I posted above (trust me, they are basic), and if you think it's "Philosophy bullshit." Then you've just commited yourself to a lifetime to ignorance. so congratulations, and I hope you continue to be a proud member of America's problem.

I didn't say I didn't understand your post, fratboy. I think that it was bullshit. You were bullshitting. I asked you to provide me some empircal evidence to substantiate religion and instead you posted a philosophical (not empircal) and vague arguement as to why man believes in God.

Every person belonging to a religious organization in this country is "part of the problem". I'm not being ignorant towards anything. Every religious person, whether they be zealous evangelicals or moderate, churchgoing individuals are perpetuating this boorish contentment with a lack of progress within society.

And I'm telling you you're stupid if you're only going to believe things that can be proven Empirically

natural selection would say if it benefits the organism to be benevolent, then the benevolent ones will succeed, but if it doesn't benefit the organism to be benevolent, then it won't be a factor in its success. further, if it is a benefit to the species (ex. ants sacrificing themselves to make a water bridge), that means the ancestors of those ants survived because of their inclination to do so. clearly humans experience many situations where the most selfish (self-rewarding) action is the one that seems the most selfless.

and you gotta keep in mind, in lower organisms, chemical processes are dominant over the higher brain centers. they probably don't think about it at all (just do it). even in humans you can see the dominance of chemical processes over higher brain centers, like involuntary muscles or hormones or forming a scab for instance. to top it off, the higher brain centers are run by chemical reactions as well.

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