Believing in Beliefs; Religion - Atheism - Science

So anyone who doesn't make a lifestyle of "The make believe word of God", btw that's your idea of "God" is a militant atheist?
Please validate that point

Why oh why isn't this topic in a closed forum?
Ah, I get it, somehow, someone expects me to pay 10% of my wealth to make religion go away...

 

^ just an observation - not challenging your beliefs, so why the attack?

 

Right on 'Q' for PriQ are you paying attention? This is but a 'mild' example of militant atheism. First notice the misrepresentation of what Chuck said "So anyone" meaning all. He's taken a broad paint brush and included every atheist which is clearly not what Chuck said or meant. Followed by "The make believe word of God" ah yes the pretentious mocking tone as if this ever convinced anyone to change their mind. Like I said this is a 'mild' version stay tuned! op2: The following posts shall escalate. :thumb:

p.s. Ursle, he can't validate that point it's your's not his.

 

Sometimes it's the process of politics. The use of these political policies is to gain power.

 

I will group the loud people on forums in the same category as the children on youtube saying something which isn't completely thought through, and be happy that it stays on the forums and doesn't reach the general public.

My immediate thought when the public figures were mentioned was the same as yours, but then it hits me that while people like Dawkins et.al. might agree that the world would be better without religion/races/sexes/whatever, they still do not recommend it because of the process which inadvertently would have to be there before this new world order of hubris. That is. They don't want this to happen for the exact same reason as the religious people!

Unfortunately this leads me back to my first question: Who are these militant and public atheists who want this new religiously cleansed world?

 

I don't understand the point of your question. Are you asking to ascertain identities, asking to dispute the point made or asking to affirm the point made? In either case the thread this post is in may have an answer for you . . .

http://priuschat.com/forums/freds-house-pancakes/96815-goodbye-religion-4.html#post1374960

 

Richard Dawkins has signed this > UK petition against religious upbringing - Telic Thoughts

It's so easy to find examples like this - why does this seem so hard to find?

 

If the worst the forefront of militant atheist do is sign petitions against indoctrination, then I don't see the big deal. I completely disagree with Dawkins because I value your freedom as a parent higher than the right of a child not to be pushed in a specific direction, be it political mindset, religion or preference of certain products. My point that I tried to convey in my previous posts is that it comes down to the difference between the goal and the transition towards that goal. It makes sense that if everyone had the same ideas and ideals, the world would be a conflict-free and incredibly boring place to be. But both sides (both atheists and religious people) agree that any transition towards such a goal would only result in disaster. If you try to force your ideal on people, they will revolt. It's human nature.

 

Too many people are revolting enough as it is.

 

Dawkins is against any sort of indoctrination, as explained in this quote:

Here is a link to the full article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/20/science/20dawkins.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&smid=fb-nytimes

Tom

 

I doubt he has any problems with teaching in schools of his flavor of Darwinian Evolution: "nothing created everything."

 

Or rather, "complexity comes from slow evolutionary refinement of simplicity. Complexity doesn't come from nothing."

[ETA: It should be noted that Dawkins is an evolutionary biologist. His speculations on the origins of the Universe, are not within his field, and he would never claim that they should be given the same weight as those things which are.]

 

Apparently the part about 'before 16' missed your notice.

 

^ nope - I saw that, we obviously have different opinions.

Laws of that nature as PriQ alluded to are too intrusive into a family...what else would Big Brother tell the parents what to do? Corporal punishment? The kind of sex allowed in a home has been a recent topic, etc, etc.

 

Yes. And it is my moral conviction that there should be a point where Governments should make laws about what corporal punishment is permitted. The idea that a parent is allowed to beat a child to death is evil. Somewhere on the spectrum from a mild tap, to beating to death, there is a point when intervention is morally required. We may disagree about where that point is, and the process of societal morals may find a compromise spot, but I see no reason to tolerate someone who thinks there is no such point.

Please remember that this was YOUR analogy.

 

Likewise with indoctrination. I think we all understand the distinction between education and indoctrination. The problem comes when we try to agree upon the exact line.

Participating in a society requires some trade-off of personal liberties for the good of the whole. Some are pretty obvious. For example, I can't use my building as a crack house, even though I own the building. This infringes on my rights as a property owner and interferes with my personal freedom. Regardless, our society as a whole has decided that in this case my personal rights are less important than the safety of the community.

It gets trickier as we move away from the edges. Let's say I want to open a private school that "teaches" young girls to be prostitutes. I don't think any of us would have a problem condemning that on face value. It's a bad idea through and through.

How about a madrasah teaching Muslim children to hate western infidels? This one is trickier, because now we are talking about a recognized religion, although not one of *our* religions. We don't want to infringe on religious beliefs and practices, but what if they are cranking out class after class of young terrorists? Certainly that would be worse than my crack house. Is this education, or indoctrination?

The line gets even fuzzier when we move to mainstream western religions. When does religious education become dangerous indoctrination? At what point do the needs of society trump individual rights? These are not easy questions, and there are no easy one-size-fits-all answers. If there were, we wouldn't have devoted pages and pages to these debates.

Are parents allowed to cause permanent physical damage to their children? No, we have moved beyond that as a society. Are parents allowed to cause permanent psychological damage to their children? Apparently yes. None of us want the state telling us what we can and cannot do with our children. But likewise none of us want to see our neighbors' children abused. Is it morally correct to respect the rights of our neighbors to abuse their children while ignoring the rights of the children and society? And what, exactly, do we define as abuse?

Individual rights are great things, and deserve to be protected and cherished. However, it is dangerous to believe that individual rights trump all, including the individual rights of others and the needs of society as a whole.

Tom

 

You are mixing atheism with the Big Bang theory while mixing evolution into it.

Atheists don't (typically) claim to know the answer to everything.

Unfortunately "God did it" followed by "You don't have to worry (think)" makes perfect sense to all too many.

 

Theism: The belief that the Universe is too complicated to have come about by natural means, so there needs to be something even more complicated first.