Real World Philospohy

[General Woundwort]

Originally posted by Imperator Fyron:
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.

Well, I also know few babies that start life with a conscious knowledge of mathematics or history either - the fact that something is *learned* does not make it false.

Organized religions developed as a means to control people, just like organized governments.

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.

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).

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.

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...).

And of course, higher education on religion is totally unbiased. Spare me.

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.

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

That requires assuming that Christianity is correct...

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.

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.

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.

Sure I would! That would be one interesting conversation. The west has a decidedly atheistic bent nowadays because atheism is the next step in religious evolution...

Devolution, you mean?

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...