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| Re: nonsense about atheism (241881) | |||
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Re: nonsense about atheism |
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Posted by soton si on Tue Aug 28 15:09:02 2007, in response to Re: nonsense about atheism, posted by RonInBayside on Tue Aug 28 13:59:11 2007. If you were secure you wouldn't need to test it at all."I don't need to test it, but if I thought it was a house of cards, then surely I wouldn't be putting it through robust debate? "Advocating for religious proselytizing in public school is part of forcing your religion down other people's throats." When have I advocated that - I'm advocating teaching something that is true. Surely teaching evolution is religious proselytizing, forcing them to abandon their religious views if they are a creationist, yet you seem to be advocating that, even though I can't see a difference - they are both facts, just rely on different types of evidence. "That is the definbition of a madrassa. It is exactly the same as someone telling you "If you do as Mohammed you will not perish eternally." There is no difference between the two. I public school, this would amount to SHDM (Same harassment, different mythology)." Except that one isn't a mythology, only you call it one. I bring you back to English Language - there is a 'mythology' that the Scottish play is a study on the nature of human evil and there is one where the Scottish play was a way to make money and get the King's favour. Yet you seem perfectly happy to let children study English Lit "as it's constitutional", even though they will be forced to conform to the first 'myth', or get bad marks. The Constitution of the US makes no difference as to the morality of imposing 'myths' on people. You see, by your own reasoning (which is a 'myth' you want to enforce on people, first of all me) that there is no difference between saying "Islam is right" and "the founding fathers were good people". However you'll happily let the latter be taught in schools. You have double standards. "Same for Ann Rice. The creatures in her novels must, therefore, be real." The genres are different, as you say. Ann Rice is fiction. The New Testament is non-fiction persuasive writing. "Actually, the opposite is true. There's some doubt in some historical circles whether Jesus of Nazareth was even a real person, and not some made-up character. However, more likely than not he did exist." Increasingly small circles, who are considered by the mainstream to have prejudiced against the texts, due to their religious significance. In the 50s it was lots, however, just as 150 years ago people thought the atom was the smallest particle, scholarship moves on. The current view is that he did exist, was killed and that the tomb was empty in the morning of that Easter day, with his followers soon afterwards spreading the message that he had risen from the dead. That is modern scholarship, which treats the New Testament like any other source - examining the bias, reliability and so on of the source. "No, he wrote as an advocate, an advertiser, for his chosen religion." Indeed, just as history books through the ages try to persuade you that these things happened. We can't see if the pilgrim fathers came on the Mayflower from Plymouth (well initially Southampton), but we go and look at the history books, that persuade you, through evidence of eyewitness testimonies and so on that they did. This is no different from Luke's approach, other than the events that Luke describes have religious importance. He wrote it to say "these things really happened, it's actually the Jews that are lying, not Paul who they've arrested and sent to you for supposedly doing". He wrote it very much in the style of Greek History books, with the prosecution able to cross reference the witnesses, the vast majority of whom were still alive. Paul was found not guilty (though couldn't be freed due to a legal oddity that because he appealed to Caesar, he had to go to Rome). Are you saying that lawyers and historians never tell the truth? "No, they reject the mythology presented as if it were evidence." Though you reject them as myths based on the evidence of another myth - that things that can't be proven by science are myths. This is exactly what I thought, and have said, you'd do - because of your faith in that statement being true, you reject the evidence. "Religion doesn't require physical proof;" It doesn't indeed - a great many are despite of the physical proof. "in fact physical proof is irrelevant." why is it irrelevant? surely if the religion is true, they would be physical proof to help justify the truth of such a thing. It's irrelevant because you don't want it to be relevant, as it would undermine your argument, as you have none. "There is no objectivity in religion," Evidence? Islam, Judaism, Atheism, Christianity all hold their religion to be objectively true, as do many others. You have decided that there is no objectivity in religion because your religion demands that there isn't. You have a go at me for stating my beliefs as fact, and then do it yourself. "though religious imperative can motivate people, like Charles Darwin, to explore the beauty of the world and describe it, or Bach, to write music." Indeed "But in the end, religion serves the people who create it and subscribe to it," tell that to Paul - an impoverished, abused, tortured person who gave up his rich life having religion serve him with wealth, respect and so on because he changed his religion. Tell that to the thousands who subscribe to Islam across North Africa, the Middle East and South Asia, who have nothing but oppression (in the main) because of it. "and people have created and subscribed to many religions." indeed they have, however, that is irrelevant to truth claims - just as lots of people do believe it doesn't make it more true, and just because few believe it doesn't mean it's not true. |
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