How do you respect somebody elses religion?

[blackllotus]

Originally posted by: The Green Bean
Personally, as much as I hate Bush and his policies I feel much more safer with a christian in power than an Darwinist Atheist like Nebor and Hitler. I would even feel safer if Jews or even Hindus were in power than Atheists. I feel Atheists are a danger to society; they will lead society into a world where there is no right and wrong. As atheist morals move away from those defined by religion the world will move into a phase of racial or Darwinist superacism. Has any atheist in power done any good to the world? We have had Darwanists like Hitler, communists like Stalin and Mao, amoralists like the Mongols... Does anybody deny the fact that those morals that are considered "modernized" are a mere deviation from christianity? If it wasn't for christianity western civilization even if technological advanced would have been little more than barbarism.

Originally posted by: The Green Bean
This thread is a new height of ignorance and stupidity.

The irony...

The idea that most of our morals come from religion is not just stupid, it's young-earth-creationism class stupid. Do you honestly think a book is the only way to establish that murder, rape, robbery, etc... are wrong? Ever heard of the Golden Rule, "treat others as you would like to be treated."? How do you counter the idea that murder and the like has to be considered immoral for a society to properly function? Why have we evolved the ability to feel guilt?

 

[The Green Bean]

Originally posted by: blackllotus
The idea that most of our morals come from religion is not just stupid, it's young-earth-creationism class stupid. Do you honestly think a book is the only way to establish that murder, rape, robbery, etc... are wrong? Ever heard of the Golden Rule, "treat others as you would like to be treated."? How do you counter the idea that murder and the like has to be considered immoral for a society to properly function? Why have we evolved the ability to feel guilt?

Ask a barbarian if he feels the same guilt. You can give a barbarian society a million years but it will not progress to anything near the society we have today.

 

[The Green Bean]

Originally posted by: 0roo0roo
http://www.iheu.org/node/1541
Man-made human rights are incompatible with Islam.

fixed

 

[Bowfinger]

Originally posted by: The Green Bean

Originally posted by: blackllotus
The idea that most of our morals come from religion is not just stupid, it's young-earth-creationism class stupid. Do you honestly think a book is the only way to establish that murder, rape, robbery, etc... are wrong? Ever heard of the Golden Rule, "treat others as you would like to be treated."? How do you counter the idea that murder and the like has to be considered immoral for a society to properly function? Why have we evolved the ability to feel guilt?

Ask a barbarian if he feels the same guilt. You can give a barbarian society a million years but it will not progress to anything near the society we have today.

That's simply not true. The "society we have today" did, in fact, evolve from a barbarian society, and it did it in a small fraction of one million years.

 

[The Green Bean]

edit

 

[Moonbeam]

It should be easy to respect other people's religion if you remember that we were all created in the image of God or we created God in our image and you can't begin to tell the difference.

 

[colonel]

wait a minute... who created religion.. religion is a man thing... the way to God is open

 

[blackllotus]

Originally posted by: The Green Bean

Originally posted by: blackllotus
The idea that most of our morals come from religion is not just stupid, it's young-earth-creationism class stupid. Do you honestly think a book is the only way to establish that murder, rape, robbery, etc... are wrong? Ever heard of the Golden Rule, "treat others as you would like to be treated."? How do you counter the idea that murder and the like has to be considered immoral for a society to properly function? Why have we evolved the ability to feel guilt?

Ask a barbarian if he feels the same guilt. You can give a barbarian society a million years but it will not progress to anything near the society we have today.

Wrong and also irrelevant. Do you have anything to back up your initial assertion that atheists are inherently immoral?

 

[The Green Bean]

Originally posted by: blackllotus

Originally posted by: The Green Bean

Originally posted by: blackllotus
The idea that most of our morals come from religion is not just stupid, it's young-earth-creationism class stupid. Do you honestly think a book is the only way to establish that murder, rape, robbery, etc... are wrong? Ever heard of the Golden Rule, "treat others as you would like to be treated."? How do you counter the idea that murder and the like has to be considered immoral for a society to properly function? Why have we evolved the ability to feel guilt?

Ask a barbarian if he feels the same guilt. You can give a barbarian society a million years but it will not progress to anything near the society we have today.

Wrong and also irrelevant. Do you have anything to back up your initial assertion that atheists are inherently immoral?

Remove the influence of religion and you have an immoral/amoral society.

 

[Vic]

Originally posted by: The Green Bean

Originally posted by: blackllotus

Originally posted by: The Green Bean

Originally posted by: blackllotus
The idea that most of our morals come from religion is not just stupid, it's young-earth-creationism class stupid. Do you honestly think a book is the only way to establish that murder, rape, robbery, etc... are wrong? Ever heard of the Golden Rule, "treat others as you would like to be treated."? How do you counter the idea that murder and the like has to be considered immoral for a society to properly function? Why have we evolved the ability to feel guilt?

Ask a barbarian if he feels the same guilt. You can give a barbarian society a million years but it will not progress to anything near the society we have today.

Wrong and also irrelevant. Do you have anything to back up your initial assertion that atheists are inherently immoral?

Remove the influence of religion and you have an immoral/amoral society.

Then how did that influence and morality begin in the first place?

Here we have an example of other side trying to have it both ways.

 

[jackschmittusa]

The Green Bean

Remove the influence of religion and you have an immoral/amoral society.

Yeah right!

Religion has always been about fair play, tolerance, level playing fields, equality, etc..

Know any more jokes?

 

[DangerAardvark]

Originally posted by: The Green Bean
This thread is a new height of ignorance and stupidity.

Personally, as much as I hate Bush and his policies I feel much more safer with a christian in power than an Darwinist Atheist like Nebor and Hitler. I would even feel safer if Jews or even Hindus were in power than Atheists. I feel Atheists are a danger to society; they will lead society into a world where there is no right and wrong. As atheist morals move away from those defined by religion the world will move into a phase of racial or Darwinist superacism. Has any atheist in power done any good to the world? We have had Darwanists like Hitler, communists like Stalin and Mao, amoralists like the Mongols... Does anybody deny the fact that those morals that are considered "modernized" are a mere deviation from christianity? If it wasn't for christianity western civilization even if technological advanced would have been little more than barbarism.

Wow. That's the most moronic thing I've read all week. And I've read several of Pabster's posts. You have a ridiculously poor grasp of both history and evolution. At no point in that rambling, abortion of a paragraph did you say anything with any intellectual merit whatsoever. Epic fail.

 

[Vic]

Originally posted by: jackschmittusa
The Green Bean

Remove the influence of religion and you have an immoral/amoral society.

Yeah right!

Religion has always been about fair play, tolerance, level playing fields, equality, etc..

Know any more jokes?

Well, technically, such things are their ideal. Virtually all religions hold some version of the Golden Rule as their highest law. They just fall short of their ideal in reality like everything else.

His argument though was that this ideal depends on religion for its existence, which is somewhat silly. Even the most "literal" follower would have to admit that religion is a human creation.

 

[The Green Bean]

Originally posted by: jackschmittusa
The Green Bean

Remove the influence of religion and you have an immoral/amoral society.

Yeah right!

Religion has always been about fair play, tolerance, level playing fields, equality, etc..

Know any more jokes?

Where did the concepts of "fair play, tolerance, level playing fields, equality, etc.." come from? Most of those would work against your theories of Darwanism and evolution.

 

[Stoneburner]

Green bean, you may have it backwards you know. Fair play tolerance and equality? The problem isn't a mere chicken and egg problem either. Besides the fact religion may be a codification of existing values, religions have existed rather amorally for centuries. You consider the 2nd to 4th crusades moral?

Further undermining your simplification is the example of slavery. While some religious christians now say "us christians were always against slavery!" the truth is, the abolitionist were a fringe group of christian fundamentalists that were considered nutjobs by mainstream christians. Mainstream christians used the bible to JUSTIFY slavery. So not only do christians and muslims consider each other infidels, subgroups within those divisions hate each other. You can call people ignorant and stupid all you want, but you shouldn't compound the irony with such a blanket assumption without any basis. What religion served as the moral underpinnings of greek philosophy, which is the most influential in terms of modern american political structures? Zeus went around impregnating random animals... is that the progentitor of western civilization?

 

[Rastus]

Seperating philosophy from myth seems to me to be what we need to do. Just because the ancient texts have a lot of dubious stuff in them doesn't mean we can't get some good out of them.

After all, even the most diehard modern western athiest will probably think "Thou shall not steal" is a pretty good rule to live by. But he doesn't have to believe it was delivered on a stone tablet by a burning bush on a mountain.

 

[jackschmittusa]

The Green Bean

Where did the concepts of "fair play, tolerance, level playing fields, equality, etc.." come from? Most of those would work against your theories of Darwanism and evolution.

Oh! So you do know another joke. lol

Evolution has nothing to do with the human values previously mentioned. A grade-schooler can understand that.

So, you think they came from religion? I'm guessing that you are a Christian, so I'll mention a couple Christian examples of such values.

The many Inquisitions in Europe amounted to informing people: "It has come to our attention that, even though you are a Christian, your believer index has fallen short of the expected norm, resulting in a re-classification of yourself as a heretic. As such a substandard Christian, you can expect to be arrested, have all of your property confiscated by the Church, tortured, and possibly killed. Death may possibly be avoided by identifying other substandard Christians whose property we might also confiscate. This is of course, God's will.".

The Crusades were a fabricated claim to lands that the claimers had never laid eyes on. But God mandated that the Christian soldiers march off to those lands and kill and expel those people who practiced an obviously defective religion. If you do not subscribe to the "correct" religion, you have no rights.

From the earliest explorations of the New World by Christian European countries, the policy was to steal the precious metals of the inhabitants with a clear conscience. Afterward, the priests who had come along would frequently offer the initial survivors the choice of converting to Christianity or death.

The pro-slavery faction in this country was adamant that the Bible condoned, or at least permitted slavery. These same fervent Christians were also quick to explain that it was especially OK to enslave dark-skinned people as they were inferior editions of humans. After all, Jesus was a blond-haired, blue-eyed, white guy. You could see that in all of the pictures.

Try explaining how moral Manifest Destiny was to the Native Americans. It boiled down to the assertion that those damned, heathen Indians were not using the land as we knew God had intended. It was therefor the god-given right, perhaps duty, of the Christian white man to use deadly force to remove them from their ancestral lands and exercise God's will over them.

So, it looks like your idea that religion is the root of such values as fairness and equality is "shot to Hell", so to speak.

 

[Vic]

Originally posted by: Rastus
Seperating philosophy from myth seems to me to be what we need to do. Just because the ancient texts have a lot of dubious stuff in them doesn't mean we can't get some good out of them.

After all, even the most diehard modern western athiest will probably think "Thou shall not steal" is a pretty good rule to live by. But he doesn't have to believe it was delivered on a stone tablet by a burning bush on a mountain.

Hey, you! None of that logic here! We gotta throw the baby out with the bathwater so that everyone knows we're right! 😉

 

[poohbear]

Remove the influence of religion and you have an immoral/amoral society.

japan isnt relgious at all, but they're very moral. I had a guy chase me 2 blocks in december because i gave him the equivalent of $2 extra on the bill @ a restaurant. And that's right in the heart of the "big decadent" city of tokyo. tokyo has one the lowest crime rates in the world and they dont live in fear of hell or any such consequence.

sure they might say their budhist when asked, but most of them are clueless about even the most basic tenets of budhism.

oh, i had jehovah witnesses come to my door (for the 3rd time) asking me if i was happy. my jaw hit the floor to find that they've also come to japan. lol seems u can't escape those guys anywhere!

 

[teclis1023]

Originally posted by: Stoneburner
I find it rather amusing how some people sidestep the question of whether or not somebody not of their own religion is an idiot. Some people say "we all pray to the same god in the end!"... which ignores all polytheistic religions. Others say "as long as you are a good person, it doesn't matter what religion you are." Unfortunately, that isn't the rule with christianity and islam, possibly with judaism either.

This thread refers mainly to the abrahamic religions, judaism, christianity, and islam. I'll throw those zoroastrians in for good measure, they're about the biggest trouble makers imaginable. Let's take judaism first, jews have a presumption that they are the "chosen people" whereas all goyim are hellbound children. Then we have Christianity.... most branches of which assume non christians or non baptised peoples go to hell also. Twenty years or so ago, our president had a conversation with his mother about this very topic and argued that if you weren't a christian you were guaranteed hell. Im sure it was an intellectually fulfilling conversation, it's a shame it wasn't recorded. Finally, we have muslims who essentially assume you can be killed for not being a muslim.

So tell me.. when the fundamental tenets of your religion tell you to dismiss or kill everybody not of your religion, how can you possibly have "respect" for these others? Do you reinterpret your religion for your own convenience, or perhaps for your own guilty conscience?


This is a rather troubling question for myself, since I am not a jew, christian, or muslim. The teachings of these religions, the literature at the core of these faiths, range from smug self satisfaction to Mein Kampf levels of paranoia and distrust.

It's obvious from your post that you have a limited understanding of these religions. You've got it wrong on all accounts...try doing some research or taking a class.

Sure we can discuss the atheist position, or a secular moralist position, but if you are a devout believer of christianity, islam, or judaism, you consider the other two plus every other religion wrong. That could be fine but... being wrong in this case means damnation or something else unpleasant.

Again, try learning about the things you talk about.

I'm not going to get into it here on these boards, it's just not worth my time when there are literally THOUSANDS of resources available in your local Barnes and Noble.

 

[spittledip]

What I find interesting is that this question is asked in this forum. Most people that post in the Politics section (and others) obviously have little respect for anyone else's views. People trash each other over inconsequential matters- matters that they have absolutely no control in- all just beliefs. Then a question like this is asked. It seems like it is human nature to be disrespectful of others and their beliefs if they differ from one's own. Here is my source: http://forums.anandtech.com/default.aspx?NoCookies=yes

Read it and find out just how much people respect each other and their beliefs... 😛

 

[piasabird]

There is a difference between religion and religious teachings and the violent act of murder. Men who do things that we might consider wrong, evil, or bad such as blowing up women and children are using religion as an excuse to commit illegal acts. What people do is not necessarily what they profess to believe.

This is why America broke off from its European heritage. We wanted a society where everyone is free to choose to belong to any religion or any belief system, or lack therof, that they choose to believe in. We chose to be a land of freedom ruled by the courts, and our laws and not by religion or monarchs.

Part of this freedom is to allow all the right to have their religion of choice. So this means you can not force people to not believe in God or a religion. We are free, and we will fight for this freedom whether it be from people inside or outside of our country. This is what the constitution of the United States Says. If you do not belive in it, you do not believe in the constitution, and you do not believe in freedom.

 

[Moonbeam]

Originally posted by: spittledip
What I find interesting is that this question is asked in this forum. Most people that post in the Politics section (and others) obviously have little respect for anyone else's views. People trash each other over inconsequential matters- matters that they have absolutely no control in- all just beliefs. Then a question like this is asked. It seems like it is human nature to be disrespectful of others and their beliefs if they differ from one's own. Here is my source: http://forums.anandtech.com/default.aspx?NoCookies=yes

Read it and find out just how much people respect each other and their beliefs... 😛

People have been trashed since the day they were born. The resulting self hate and the unbearable pain it created have made people profoundly defensive. Just as happened to them they now attack anything that moves, even if it doesn't. Big fat massively insensitive egos are a cover for massive feelings of inferiority. This could all be overcome with modesty. None of you are as inferior as me so lighten up.

 

[JohnOfSheffield]

Originally posted by: The Green Bean

Originally posted by: jackschmittusa
The Green Bean

Remove the influence of religion and you have an immoral/amoral society.

Yeah right!

Religion has always been about fair play, tolerance, level playing fields, equality, etc..

Know any more jokes?

Where did the concepts of "fair play, tolerance, level playing fields, equality, etc.." come from? Most of those would work against your theories of Darwanism and evolution.

First of all, realise that Darwinian theories is a path of nature that may or may not come to pass, forced social Darwinism (as in Hitler) has nothing to do with Darwinian theories.

Evolution isn't HIS theory, evolution occurs, that much is a fact, there is no denying that, the scientific theory is there to describe HOW it occurs, not to prove THAT it occurs, that is already well established. Same goes for gravity, we know it's there but the theory of gravity aims to explain how gravity works.

Morality can be a good or bad thing, empaty is a good thing and that is not a social construct, you're born with that and it's what makes you understand the golden rule, it's there because it's evolutionary beneficial to the species of man. If you hurt i can understand your feelings without even having been subjected to the situation that made you hurt, it doesn't matter if i'm religious or not.

I'm kinda reminded about the three men of indostan when i read this thread, i'll see if i can find the story later.

 

[JohnOfSheffield]

Originally posted by: Rastus
Seperating philosophy from myth seems to me to be what we need to do. Just because the ancient texts have a lot of dubious stuff in them doesn't mean we can't get some good out of them.

After all, even the most diehard modern western athiest will probably think "Thou shall not steal" is a pretty good rule to live by. But he doesn't have to believe it was delivered on a stone tablet by a burning bush on a mountain.

Well, see, empathy does that for us, we don't need to be told not to steal because we have empathy, we know that stealing is wrong because we can feel for others who have had something stolen from them, we can empathise with them.

IOW, if no one ever told you that it's wrong to steal, you'd still know it was wrong.