Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Ok. I did. He said not to believe a word you say.

Guess that settles that one.

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

methinks Cyrien is making fun of me.

/me whacks Cyrien.

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

Not if they are claiming it is the God of any particular arbitrary religion, as all religions are just inventions of man.

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

that's an arbitrary statement.

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

Umm... sure. What is arbitrary about it?

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

you have arbitrarly declared all religeons inventions of man. have you undertaken a rigorous study of all religeons and asked God?

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

Yes. I have undergone a rigorous study of all the major religions in any event. I doubt it would be physically possible to gain even a basic understanding of ALL of them. To many small ones.
Based on my study of the major religions and their existing texts I have found that almost anything can be justified using religion, even things that are apparantly contradictory based on the interpretation given to what was written. This is only compounded as problem with ancient religions as they tend to use dead Languages in their original forms. Languages that few people speak and even then not as a basic language. Thus everything within them is not only subject to interpretation but also translation. Double whammy. As a general rule I am undecided on the issue of is their a God. I am quite decided however in my belief that organized religions are the earliest forms of government and means of limiting citizenry to acceptable rules of behavior often in the absence of strong central authority with other backing, that have grown out of control and taken on a life of their own once other authority did arise.

I also looked up arbitrary.

ar·bi·trar·y
adj.
1. Determined by chance, whim, or impulse, and not by necessity, reason, or principle: stopped at the first motel we passed, an arbitrary choice.

2. Based on or subject to individual judgment or preference: The diet imposes overall calorie limits, but daily menus are arbitrary.

3. Established by a court or judge rather than by a specific law or statute: an arbitrary penalty.

4. Not limited by law; despotic: the arbitrary rule of a dictator.


Based on definition 2 it seems that all statements could be considered arbitrary.

PS: I wasn't making fun of you. I asked God and this voice in my head answered. And told me that it disagreed with you. I can only assume that the voice was God. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

There is nothing arbitrary about my "declaration". You seem to have missed this post...

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">This is how religions have evolved over the millennia. It does not take a rigorous study of every single religion to realize this. Also, it is rather difficult to ask anything of a fictional character. It is of course possible that there is some sort of supernatural force (not necessarily likely, but possible). In any case, it is certainly not "God", or the deity of any other religion. The possibility of one religion being right and the other 1000s of them that have existed over the years (and that still exist) being wrong is so absurdly small that it can safely be ignored. Even if you want to go by weight of numbers, Christianity would come out wrong, as some 2.5-3 billion people on this planet are either Buddhists or Hindis, with Christians coming in at a measly 500 or 600 million. So why does "God" not speak to all those people, just a few in the West?

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

Plus what Cyrien said. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

This thread has grown far too fast for posting in it to be a good idea. Nonetheless.

Is the same God talking to you that talked to me and Muhammad and Orpheus and Joeseph Smith? There are good reasons for doubting whatever God is saying to all these people. If He's talking to any of them at all He's still got some explaining to do.

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Well you may be right but I only made the comment I did because It's always bothered me that some people seem to think a belief in God is required before one can have moral values and to know what is right and wrong. (and no I'm not it anyway accusing you of thinking or saying this but I have heard if often enough)

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I'm not blaming God for any personal tragedy. I'm just saying He's a Jerk, which, I suppose, circularly, is His God-given right. But just because He is who He is, it doesn't follow that I have to pledge my soul to a Mass-Murdering Psychopath.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Well, He could sure drop some bigger hints.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">He was strangely silent.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Hearing God once or twice is probably ok. Anymore than that, and I urge you to get a psychiatric evaluation. Hearing voices is a likely sign of schizophrenia, and it is treatable in some (or maybe most) cases.

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">On what basis do you make this claim?

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

Why did this thread degenerate into a religion thread? This is very frustrating people. God is not happy here http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/rolleyes.gif

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Cause we havn't had enough religous threads here http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/rolleyes.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/rolleyes.gif

[ November 07, 2003, 03:20: Message edited by: DavidG ]

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Not all of them. Buddhism is one good example.

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

brain hurts. burp.

how do i know i'm not just hearing a crazy voice? well, crazy voices don't make sense.

[ November 07, 2003, 03:33: Message edited by: narf poit chez BOOM ]

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">It often requires declared ground rules that people actually follow to keep a discussion of philosophy from turning into one of ethics, and to keep a discussion of ethics from turning into a discussion of religion. Such ground rules weren't present.

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">It often requires declared ground rules that people actually follow to keep a discussion of philosophy from turning into one of ethics, and to keep a discussion of ethics from turning into a discussion of religion. Such ground rules weren't present. </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">... and a lot of people derive their world-philosphy from their religion...

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Since everyone is picking on Narf and that is so boring, let me play Devil's advocate and revisit a point Jack Simth, I.F. and I have tangled with before.

You state that science deals with only that which can be proven. That is not quite true. Some of the things that science relies on cannot be proven, such as for example, that the rules of logic that we employ (i.e. "classical logic") is "true", that solipsism is false or that there is no Cartesian "deceiving demon", that causality can ever be proven to be truly present as Locke questioned etc.

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">This is how religions have evolved over the millennia. It does not take a rigorous study of every single religion to realize this. Also, it is rather difficult to ask anything of a fictional character. It is of course possible that there is some sort of supernatural force (not necessarily likely, but possible). In any case, it is certainly not "God", or the deity of any other religion. The possibility of one religion being right and the other 1000s of them that have existed over the years (and that still exist) being wrong is so absurdly small that it can safely be ignored. Even if you want to go by weight of numbers, Christianity would come out wrong, as some 2.5-3 billion people on this planet are either Buddhists or Hindis, with Christians coming in at a measly 500 or 600 million. So why does "God" not speak to all those people, just a few in the West? </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">1) Lots of assertions here, little proof. What is the evidence that primitive man "invented" religion?

2) What is so absurd about one religon being true and all the others false? The Christian doctrine of human depravity (the idea that human nature has become corrupt and therefore hostile to the idea of God) is a rational explanation for the diversity of religions, from a monotheistic POV.

3) Truth is not determined by numbers of claimants, but whether a truth claim corresponds to reality.

4) The West has a decidedly atheistic bent nowadays. If your neighbor went around denying that you exist, would you be really that enthused to talk to him? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Ah yes, the famous Gould evasion of the issue, "non-overlapping magisteria" was how he put it I believe.

Yet there are many good objections to this view. For example, if the view of science and physicalism is correct, then humans, including their thoughts, opinions, beliefs, emotions etc. are either physical or supervenient on the physical, and this cannot help but overlap into the whys.

On the other hand, organized religion justifies its "whys" based on its "hows". How many people would be willing to accept the "whys" taught by religion if its "hows" were acknowledged to be wrong?

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

New philosophy of mine. No matter how a topic begins, it will always end in a reglious discussion.

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

An on-topic remark then http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Favourite motto: Just do it !

Unfortunately, too often this turn in to: Why the f.. did I do that.
20 odd years of applying Just-do-it to my life has meant quite a few visits to the doctors office for treatment for bruises and broken bones (used to be into extreme sports) as well as some very unnecessary antibiotic cures and too many hangovers to mention.

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">That is not true. The majority of people with (less severe cases of) schitzophrenia hear perfectly normal sounding voices that make good sense.

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

My nephew has in the past taken medications that caused him to hear voices. ADHD and Bipolar. One of the medicines they first tried had this side affect.

His paternal grandmother thought it was the voice of the devil and decided to take matters into her own hands. He no longer see's her but he did change medications for the ADHD and bipolar and it stopped.

From what he has told me the voices made a great deal of sense and it often involved instructions on what to do. He says he argued with the voices and is quite happy to have them gone.

PS: My mother is a councilor to help deal with a variety of issues and I can inform you that most voices people here are quite sensible and take on some quality of the persons personality taken to an extreme. Babbling or nonsensical voices are quite rare.

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

A couple of the early symptoms of adult schizophrenia are delusions of incredible insight and personal empowerment. They take a lot of different forms, but all lead to very 'inconsistent' behavior, which is dangerous.

Insight always makes sense, that's what it's about. Even more dangerous is that personal empowerment and impossible insight feel really, really good. People take street drugs and prescription anti-depressants just to get a fraction of this experience.

If you had to chose between believing you were gifted and super-capable and believing that you were unstable and no longer able to care for yourself, which would you choose? Which would you want to be true?

Personally, I'd wait until the evidence against me was undeniable. I couldn't just give up. We would regard that as strength in many other situations, which just makes it more dangerous.

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Invented, created, concocted, came up with, thought up, dreamed up, use whatever term you want. Good evidence is the fact that noone begins their life with any set religious views; everyone has to be spoon fed them to have them. So, the first people must not have had religious views, and they developed over time. Organized religions developed as a means to control people, just like organized governments. The fact that Judaism developed amidst a polytheistic culture, and later Christianity developed from it, with Islam sort of branching off somewhere afterwars, is good evidence that religions evolve. It is a pretty safe assertation that they all had to evolve from somewhere... and "the word of God" is not a good point, as EVERY non-animistic religion (with some form of deity...) can say that (not God, but whatever deity(ies) they worship).

There is a wealth of study and evidence out there about the evolution of religion, starting from the primitive to the modern. I am sure google will turn up some useful links. I just do not have hte time at present to wade through them all... Just make sure to use the site:.edu tag in your searches (assuming I remembered that correctly... check the advanced search formatting help page) so that you can restrict sites to being on .edu domains, thus eliminating the bulk of garbage sites (garbage for any sort of intellectual purposes...). http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif Of course, there are garbage sites on .edu domains, but at least you start off on better footing with university-owned web space... and they tend to have much better documentation.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">That requires assuming that Christianity is correct... the fact is that pretty much all religions have the exact same claims of divine revelation and all that stuff, and so all have the truth. But how can you pick which one has the real truth? Quite simply, you can not. Any arguments you could come up with to justify your choice apply equally to many other religions as well.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Exactly. That sentence or two was not part of my argument, just an absurd answer to any possible absurd claims along the lines of "but everyone around me believes this..." and such. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif Though, I can see where your apparent confusion on my post came from... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Sure I would! That would be one interesting conversation. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif The west has a decidedly atheistic bent nowadays because atheism is the next step in religious evolution...

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

I have heard people make interesting claims about the growth of atheism, it is not as big as you think. Check out these numbers from the CIA World Factbook.

<a href="http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/us.html" target="_blank">U.S.A.

Religions: Protestant 56%, Roman Catholic 28%, Jewish 2%, other 4%, none 10% (1989) </a>

<a href="http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/uk.html" target="_blank">U.K.

Anglican and Roman Catholic 40 million, Muslim 1.5 million, Presbyterian 800,000, Methodist 760,000, Sikh 500,000, Hindu 500,000, Jewish 350,000

(Total 60,094,648)</a>

<a href="http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/gm.html" target="_blank">Germany

Protestant 34%, Roman Catholic 34%, Muslim 3.7%, unaffiliated or other 28.3% </a>

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

The "WTF am I doing?" question is by all means one of the staple self questions of man kind.

"I just asked my self that about five minutes ago. WTF am I doing here still? I mean WTF am I doing?"

"I have spent an ungodly amount of time in this bar and for what? I don't know perhaps to be a part of something that other people enjoy? Maybe to share in a common place where people of like intrests hang out? I don't really know why I hang around, I simply do. However, if the time comes to move on, I will do so without looking back, because I know that this great social monster will continue to live on long after my interest in this place has gone."

Another one would be: "one should not be where one is not wanted unless it is where you want to be."
"Never take a personal attack personal until you have had a few hours to think about it."
"Once those who you know think lowly of you, there is no point in knowning them at all."
"Follow the money."
"Not all rumors are rumors, not all facts are facts, however a rumors and facts often lead to logical conclusions that are as much a rumor as they are a fact."
"Never shop while your hungry."

And finally

"Treat others as you would have them treat you."

"If there was an simely face expression for 'Read my expression' I would post it here now for amused I am not, but confused I am."

[ November 07, 2003, 13:31: Message edited by: Atrocities ]

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

Debating about religion is highly over rated IMHO. But believe what you want, tis the only true freedom any of us truly have.

[ November 08, 2003, 00:59: Message edited by: Atrocities ]

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Curious, according to that page there are no atheists in my country, or they must be included in the "other".
It's interesting to see in numbers what I see that most people is Catholic but only step into a church for weddings.
It's also curious that the practicing % is not mentioned in the countries you quoted. Does that mean that all people mentioned actively practice their religions?
Would it be too wild to extrapolate this "less than 20% practicing" ratio to other religions and other countries.

[ November 08, 2003, 02:45: Message edited by: Andres ]

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Taking knowledge about how our thought processes work (for example) and extrapolating that into an explanation for spirituality is still an extrapolation, which (as I said) is apt to fail. There are many people who will do it regardless, but I think it's ill-advised.

For the second part, that's the very reason why Christianity has taken such a beating in Western society. Their 'hows' have consistently been proven wrong, starting with Copernicus. They should drop them altogether and stick to the 'whys'. The Catholic Church, incidentally, tends to evade certain scientific questions with religious implications. For example, "Will sentient aliens have souls like we do ?" "Um, let's wait until we know if there are sentient aliens first." The anti-evolutionists, on the other hand, are just setting themselves up for a fall.

To sum it up: just because many people will get their science and religion mixed up doesn't mean that they should. And science is a poor teacher of moral values anyway.

Edit - this is from further back in the topic, but it merits an answer.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">For the record Narf, I don't think you are 'imposing' your views on anyone. You definitely have them and you defend them whenever necessary, yet you do not criticize anyone who disagrees with you (and you keep your good humor too). I admire your behavior.

[ November 08, 2003, 13:29: Message edited by: Erax ]

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Well, I also know few babies that start life with a conscious knowledge of mathematics or history either http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/tongue.gif - the fact that something is *learned* does not make it false.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">That religion has been used in such fashion is not in dispute. What I dispute is the assertion that that is religion's foundational and only use.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Well, I fall back on what I originally said - if religion has any relation to reality, then some religious system must be closer to that reality, because just about every possible option has been set out by the various religions, and by sheer logic they cannot all be equally right/wrong.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">And of course, higher education on religion is totally unbiased. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/tongue.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/rolleyes.gif Spare me.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">

Whether .edu, .org., or .nuts, the same rule applies... caveat emptor.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">

It does. But my point is that there are logical/reasonable explanations *within religious systems* for the things you use to denounce religion in general. The question of the viability of religion must be answered on the basis of the validity of their truth claims. The number of such truth claims just makes the task less easy.


<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">

Only if one takes the assumption that all religious claims are of an ethereal/subjective/detached from reality nature. That is patently not so. All three of the monotheistic religions make very dogmatic assertions about religious events in actual history. I think you may be generalizing things too much.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Devolution, you mean? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/rolleyes.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/tongue.gif

The problem with atheism is that, if the premises of atheism are true and taken to their logical conclusions, you are left with nihilism. I don't much like Nietzsche and Foucault as persons, but I admire the consistency and forthrightness in their writings. They were atheists who took atheism seriously. And you can see where it led them...

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Well, I also know few babies that start life with a conscious knowledge of mathematics or history either http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/tongue.gif - the fact that something is *learned* does not make it false.
</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Mathematics and history? Not really a good comparison. If mom and Dad taught you < insert historical or mathematical fact here > and then you found out a hundred other cultures disagreed with the alledged fact would you not begin to suspect mom and dad were wrong?

[ November 08, 2003, 23:43: Message edited by: DavidG ]

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

FYI - don't try to login to this board while it's displayed in a frame - it won't work. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/confused.gif

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Depends on the circumstances. If say, 100 years or so, many other cultures thought the world was flat, would that make my belief it was round invalid? No, because good observations and proofs exist for its being round - and I would feel obligated to share that information. Again, it's *evidence*, not nose-counting, that is the determining factor.

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">if you want to protest to the modern science ideas and conclusions - insert your Christian/Muslim belives here - you should also give up on internet and the very fact I can communicate to you thanks to these Boards http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif that only exist due to the indifatigable progress of physics and mathematics you apparently question. (sorry if I misunderstood you - not for the first time http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif )

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I say it again.

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">That would depend on what ideas and conclusions you are protesting - e.g.: if you don't believe electronics work, you are being silly; If you don't believe in modern Big Bang theory, you can be quite cognizant on it.

For example, If all the mass in the current universe was once pressed into a ball smaller than the black hole thought to be at the center of our galaxy, then the universe shouldn't have ever gone bang - the escape velocity from a black hole (by definition) is in excess of c, which is currently thought to be the speed limit. Any such theory would need to propose one of a number of things to get around this:
1) Modern physical law (or some portion thereof) did not apply at the time
- in which case, the theory needs to also explain where modern physical law came from, why we can't seem to change it, et cetera; besides, such altering of the laws of the universe isn't exactly something that has been observed by what the scientific community would recognize as a reliable source; it requires much speculation based on assumptions - a leap of faith.
2) An as-yet unrecognized force to overpower the super-gravity at such an event, such as "dark energy"
- "dark energy" is a cop-out; it's an unobserved something (reason for the "dark" in the name) thrown in as a correction factor to fix the problem; it's only thought to exist because the universe hasn't collapsed in on itself over the timeframe the universe is thought to have been around. This energy is unobserved; it is required to make certain models work, so it is assumed. Few suggest that there may be a more fundamental flaw in the model. Such a force is also an act of faith.
3) Hesienburg uncertainty allowed things to pop out
- while hypothetically possible, modern QM theory suggests that the probability of at least one particle jumping out of a black hole in a given timeframe is inversly proportional to some power (4, I think it was - I don't recall) of the black hole's mass; more massive -> lower probability. In order to get most the particles in the universe to jump out of the black hole at roughly the same time requires an event of truly negligible probability (if they don't come out at about the same time, all one would get is a bunch of flying particles spread out over zillions of years, too far apart to have a meaningful probability of interacting - no bang, no galaxies, no stars, not even hydrogen). Again, this requires a considerable leap of faith.
4) reserved for future expansion - I'm not all knowing, as far as I know.

There are other severe difficulties with Big Bang theories - current models predict equal amounts of matter and anti-matter, which would quickly annhiliate each other; yet we seem to be made of matter, our galaxy seems to be made of matter, and astronomers can't seem to find any evidence of any anti-matter galaxies to balance us out, to name one.

Of course, now someone is likely to make a faith statment about science, which is likely to go something like "give them time, they will answer all objections" or some such.

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">if you want to protest to the modern science ideas and conclusions - insert your Christian/Muslim belives here - you should also give up on internet and the very fact I can communicate to you thanks to these Boards http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif that only exist due to the indifatigable progress of physics and mathematics you apparently question. (sorry if I misunderstood you - not for the first time http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif ) </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Wooah I was not questioning science or math in any way. I was questioning the comparison between learning math and history and learning a religion. Everyone learns the same math and history (and I mean the basic facts here). If I found out that that 75%, 80 90%? of the world learned a different history (and again I'm talking basic facts here like WW2 ended in 1935) I think I'd begin to question what I learned.

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Isn't that the way physics works? The theoretician makes some theory which has some unobservable element. Then the applied physicists design experiments to attempt to observe those elements thus proving the theory.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Thus implying there may be no better theory. if like religion a large majority had different theories then you would have to question it much more.

[ November 09, 2003, 13:15: Message edited by: DavidG ]

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

Real World Philospohy & Relgion

I thought this was an interesting read.

==========================================
God hurts, God scars, God wounds and mars
Any heart not tough nor strong enough
To take a lot of pain, take a lot of pain
God is like a cloud holds a lot of rain
God hurts, ooh, ooh, God hurts

I’m young I know but even so
I know a thing or two I learnt from you
I really learnt a lot, really learnt a lot
God is like a stove burns you when it’s hot
God hurts, mmm, mmm, God hurts

Some fools dream of happiness
Blissfulness, togetherness
Some fools fool themselves I guess
But they’re not fooling me

I know it isn’t true, know it isn’t true
God is just a lie made to make you blue
God hurts, ooh, ooh, God hurts
============================================

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

Stop messing with the classics, Atrocities http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

It's: Love hurts http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Well, Freud got something right in that religion can be used for substantiating our desires (his mistake was reducing religion to only that). I tend to be a pretty rational and logical person (sometimes to a fault), but on many issues I'm sure we've all noticed that people aren't totally rational. One of my favorite quotes from Nietzche goes something like "If you were to prove God to me, I would believe in Him all the less." Hardly sounds like a detached observer to me. In conservative Christian circles today there is an arugment over whether God knows the future. A main proponent of the position that God does not, bases his drive for that position on his not wanting to blame God for his brother's death in a motorcycle accident. Again, hardly a detached starting point. Any number of reasons could be given for why people hold to wrong beliefs, but they do - and religion hardly has the corner on this market...

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">That's because science has a great track record at solving problems. You call it a "faith statement", I call it betting with the odds on favorite.

Of course, the statement should have a conditional in there, like, "...they will LIKELY answer all objections, or provide a new model that does."

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I did not mess with it, I found it. ALong with a lot of other modified love songs that replaces one or two key words with the word GOD. I think I have stumbled along the key to how all of those religious bands make their music now.

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Depends on the circumstances. If say, 100 years or so, many other cultures thought the world was flat, would that make my belief it was round invalid? No, because good observations and proofs exist for its being round - and I would feel obligated to share that information. Again, it's *evidence*, not nose-counting, that is the determining factor. </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">You seem to be implying that there is 'good observations and proofs' for whatever particular religion you believe. So why have so many people got it wrong?

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

They had that on South Park 2 weeks ago... Cartman formed a christian rock band and just copied a bunch of love songs, inserting God or Jesus. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Really? Perhaps this site had something to do with that. I will see if I can find it again and provide a link.

Re: Real World Philospohy
 

Well South Park is a show of political satire. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif