Religion V: Utopianism, Fundamentalism, Apothesis

[Jo498]

Which "race of people" subjugated do you have in mind? the Classical Romans? The (northern) European pagans? I do not think that such a position fits with our knowledge of the history of late Antiquity/Dark ages. (And they are not one "race" in any meaningful sense either)

Only tangentially related. but is it also a myth, coined by 18th and 19th century "enlightened rationalists" that the knowledge of the ancient world was squandered through the fanatism of Christians and Muslims. It was squandered because the Western Roman Empire fell apart and what was conserved of that knowledge was conserved by Christians, Jews and Muslims.

This blog by an atheist historian is a very good source for debunking many of those myths often still frequent in popular history as well as TV

http://armariummagnus.blogspot.de/2009/05/agora-and-hypatia-hollywood-strikes.html

[Castel]

Which "race of people" subjugated do you have in mind? the Classical Romans? The (northern) European pagans? I do not think that such a position fits with our knowledge of the history of late Antiquity/Dark ages. (And they are not one "race" in any meaningful sense either)

Only tangentially related. but is it also a myth, coined by 18th and 19th century "enlightened rationalists" that the knowledge of the ancient world was squandered through the fanatism of Christians and Muslims. It was squandered because the Western Roman Empire fell apart and what was conserved of that knowledge was conserved by Christians, Jews and Muslims.

This blog by an atheist historian is a very good source for debunking many of those myths often still frequent in popular history as well as TV

http://armariummagnus.blogspot.de/2009/05/agora-and-hypatia-hollywood-strikes.html

As someone who has little stake in this fight: What do you think of the claim that the Christians (in the "West") definitely went out of their way to preserve philosophers that resonated with them but were a bit... cavalier with others?

[Jo498]

That's basically what I used to be taught about Epicurus (and probably also the older Atomists).

(And of course this is also hinted at in the plot of "The name of the Rose", only it was a book by the otherwise revered Philosopher.)

After reading O'Neill's scathing review of "The Swerve" (at his blog linked above) I have my doubts. I simply do not know about Epicurus but in the case of Lucretius' De rerum natura it seems to be the case that catholic monks apparently took some pains to preserve it despite of its atheism. As I said I simply do not know enough about the actual history of preservation of the ancient writings and it should be noted that e.g. the writings of the Stoics that tought stuff that resonated well with some early christian thinkers are not well preserved either.

Of course as someone with a great love for Classical History and Philosophy I deplore anything that was lost but it really seems to me now that the cause was the general crumbling of classical civilization and that despite some fanaticism we have to be grateful to Christians and Muslims of that time for preserving so much at all.

A lot of this might be just bad luck and statistics. (Neo)platonism and Aristotelianism/Academicism were dominant in Antiquity long before the rise of Christianity and the Fall of the Western Empire.

And quite frankly, probably for a reason. I might misjudge Epicurus (because so much got lost) but Aristotelianism and Platonism had extremely good arguments against e.g. atomicism which was of course completely speculative back then. There is still often a very "whiggish" history taught about the "foresights" of ancient atomicism. Because today we are all atomists. But with empirical evidence and not "pure" at all. Even 17th century corpuscularian natural philosophy was influenced by the focus of Platonism on a mathematically ordered universe (if not outright Theist) and nowadays we still need fields and could not do anything without a continuum at least as mathematical fiction. So modern atomism has many sources and it is simply preposturous to claim that Demokritos or Lucretius were "more scientific" or more rational *in their day* than their Aristotelian or Platonist contemporaries.

(The "Scientific Revolution" in the Renaissance is maybe even more distorted than the end of Antiquity and the "Dark ages", O'Neill's blog has a little on this one as well

http://armariummagnus.blogspot.de/2009/10/gods-philosophers-how-medieval-world.html

but probably the most interesting about 15th-17th century is "Renaissance Mathematicus" https://thonyc.wordpress.com/)

History is extremely messy, including the history of ideas and history of science. Whiggish distortion and simplification of history is very common and has been for centuries, and of course especially with loaded topics like the influence of religions or a particular one.

[Sci-2]

not worthwhile to get too exercised over the lack of empirical support for some theist propositions. i have no empirical evidence that the future will be like the past as regards physics and whatnot, but rely instead on the fallacy identified by hume that in the past the future had always been like the past, and so therefore one believes that in the future the future will always be like the past. also contra hume, and as a marxist, i believe that we can know causality and identify determinations of effects. there's no reason in the world to believe this stuff, however, other than aesthetic convenience. similarly, i believe without any evidence whatsoever that the phenomenological basis of my perceptions is consistent with extended physical space. i believe further that extended physical space exists, despite the acknowledged problem of my perceptions having no obvious connection to same, supra. i believe that the perceptions are caused by the external world and not descartes' 'evil genius' or dream vision. i believe without evidence in one problem quine identified, i.e., the analytic/synthetic distinction. i assume without anything at all that other minds exist, that i can know them, and understand them, and vice versa. all derridean posturing aside i believe without any possible evidence at all that our common languages together are significant and that we can make manifest our intentions through them--even while understanding that there is no way to falsify this belief, as the tests must occur through the same linguistic apparatus to be falsified.

my head is accordingly shot through with unsubstantiated and unsubstantiatable propositions, and we haven't even got to politics or economics yet. considering all that, how is it that i with a clear conscience can call a religious person out on the carpet for want of an empirical basis in the relatively trifling belief that after death something happens to an animus that is no more or less verifiable than a corpus?

This is what I would've said....Sometimes I wonder if you're just a more evolved version of me, time traveled back to the past to teach me/you.

[Jo498]

As for religiously inspired atrocities there have been of course too many of them but the claim that the worst or most atrocities were committed in the name of some religion does not hold water.

Matthew White lists the 20 worst slaughters in human history

http://necrometrics.com/pre1700a.htm#20worst

Of these top 20 only two seem to have an aspect of religious conquest, namely Timur's (Tamerlaine) conquests because he was an islamic conqueror, and the 30 year's war.

But clearly both were not as obviously religiously motivated as e.g. the Crusades. Timur simply was a fierce oriental conqueror like Djengis Khan earlier or lots of others, only he happened to be both very "successful" and a muslim. In the 30 year's war catholic France took part on the Protestant side contra the Holy Roman Empire.

[Sci-2]

This is what I would've said....Sometimes I wonder if you're just a more evolved version of me, time traveled back to the past to teach me/you.

Just an addendum to my fan-boying about your account of causality/empiricism, I'll recall a previously mentioned fascinating talk by the atheist neuroscientist Tallis - The Strange Idea what happens has to be made to happen.

Matthew White lists the 20 worst slaughters in human history

http://necrometrics.com/pre1700a.htm#20worst

Of these top 20 only two seem to have an aspect of religious conquest, namely Timur's (Tamerlaine) conquests because he was an islamic conqueror, and the 30 year's war.

But clearly both were not as obviously religiously motivated as e.g. the Crusades. Timur simply was a fierce oriental conqueror like Djengis Khan earlier or lots of others, only he happened to be both very "successful" and a muslim. In the 30 year's war catholic France took part on the Protestant side contra the Holy Roman Empire.

Thanks for this - interesting rebuttal...I do think there is a reasonable argument that faith in untested claims has led or could lead to an incredible amount of suffering, though as Solo notes that wouldn't be limited to religious claims. Nonetheless it seems to me that an assessment could be made by examining various crimes related to religion and in which religion galvanized people to do violence. The initial motivations may not be based in religion but there remains an argument - one that has to be proven of course - that without religion certain conflicts would not induce the same amount of suffering.

=-=-=

Catholicism and The Colbert Report: An Interview with the Colbert Chaplain

Becky Garrison interviews The Colbert Report's Chaplain, James Martin, SJ.

When asked for your favorite clip, why did you cite your conversation with Colbert regarding Glenn Beck’s critique of “social justice?”

Because it was so much fun. As I recall, Glenn Beck had said that any Catholic who belonged to a church that preached social justice should leave. Which is insane. Because the Catholic Church has preached social justice universally since at least the late 19th century. More to the point, Jesus tells us that the litmus test for admission to heaven will be how we take care of the poor, the “least of these,” as he calls them. And we help the poor not only through charity, but by asking questions about the structures that keep them poor. As the great Brazilian Archbishop Dom Helder Camara once said, “When I feed the poor they call me a saint. When I ask why they are poor, they call me a communist.”

[sologdin]

?top 20 only two seem to have an aspect of religious conquest,

defective list omits crypto-monophysites justinian & theodora, whom procopius blames for killing a myriad myriad of myriads, which i reckon as one trillion murders.

[Castel]

As for religiously inspired atrocities there have been of course too many of them but the claim that the worst or most atrocities were committed in the name of some religion does not hold water.

Matthew White lists the 20 worst slaughters in human history

http://necrometrics.com/pre1700a.htm#20worst

Of these top 20 only two seem to have an aspect of religious conquest, namely Timur's (Tamerlaine) conquests because he was an islamic conqueror, and the 30 year's war.

But clearly both were not as obviously religiously motivated as e.g. the Crusades. Timur simply was a fierce oriental conqueror like Djengis Khan earlier or lots of others, only he happened to be both very "successful" and a muslim. In the 30 year's war catholic France took part on the Protestant side contra the Holy Roman Empire.

I feel like these lists are good for refuting redditors on r/atheism making the broadest of claims but I have to wonder how useful they are otherwise..

I mean, can you really compare things like WW2 with things for other periods? What about the relative power of religion at the time, the populations and so on?

[Jo498]

White has more lists on his website, also with sources. Justinian or other struggles with Arians and other early haeresies as well as the oriental Crusades and the ones against the Kathars/Albigenses etc. were pretty bad but not top 20 (several 100000 or low millions body count, I think)

http://necrometrics.com/romestat.htm

Obviously many numbers in antique sources are vastly exaggerated, White tries to arrive at reasonable numbers. There are also some rebuttals in the web of Pinker's book when he tries to put the slaughters in proportion to the world population of the respective time.

I do not think that body counts are good arguments for either side. Human history is cruel and religions and ideologies have their share of guilt. But the cavalier attitude that leads to repeating some canards of 19th century anti-catholics, like millions of burned witches or purposeful destruction or neglect of pagan science certainly does not help.

Of course, the power of religion that lead to something like the Crusades is very strange for us and therefore scary. (This strangeness shows even in an adaption like Bakker's "Crusade".) But there were also cruel wars within Christendom in the middle ages (Read Tuchman's A distant mirror, if you haven't. It's great and gruesomely entertaining.)

And we really have no reason to be smug about this stuff. Within my lifetime (since early 1970s) there were no less than 6 wars/massacres with death tolls > 1 Million: Afghanistan, Vietnam, Cambodia, Rwanda/Burundi, Congo, Sudan. And quite a few with several 100000. Only a few of them mainly religiously motivated.

It's mainly that idiotic smugness that is so irritating about remarks that religion would be the source of all evil. We have all this stuff going on around us and pretend it's a few fanatical djihadists when this is obviously not the case (None of the Gulf wars was really based on religion). Instead of comparing body counts with medieval Crusades with Stalin we should maybe think about what's wrong with us modern secular liberals here and now.

http://necrometrics.com/20c1m.htm

[Matrim Fox Cauthon]

And what seems to cause many others to fall into ruin. Abrahamic religions and those that follow them have brought about more atrocities than anything else in human history.

Any evidence for your assertion? Or is that a dogmatic truth that you hold to be self-evident without any actual evidence?

Of course, because the native Europeans were more than happy to abandon their silly old customs in favour of Christianity.

The native Europeans were more often then not converted by native Europeans. The Franks and the Saxons anyone? Many of the early converts to Christianity were even Greco-Roman Europeans. There were also many willing converts to Christianity from the pagan faiths. Why? It became an increasingly politically sound move. Christian conversion often came after the fact of military defeat of foreign pagan powers, but it was not often the cause of such conflicts. A lot of the religious conflict between paganism and Christianity happened within the respective cultural spheres of native Europeans. We see this, for example, with good historical evidence in the case of the Anglo-Saxons whose various kings went back and forth on the matter.

I've read/listened numerous interviews with her, and it is quite clear she does not actually have anything of much worth to say, as in, nothing that followers of Abrahamic religions have not been regurgitating over and over for years. I also remember reading a few of her older books a few years ago when I was still impressionable and in quite a religious community, and they did not really hold much weight either, and so if that is any indication of the quality of this product, I can not say I wish to waste any amount of money on her.

It is quite easily to claim that your religion is not as harmful as it is made out to be, and even more so when the books and knowledge of the cultures they have intellectually oppressed have been destroyed.

Of course economics, resources, land, etc are all very prominent driving points for conflict and war. Yet it is very absurd to reject the idea that the complete eradication of an entire continent's religious beliefs and, to an extent culture, was not because of religious reasons. An entire race of people were subjugated and oppressed for centuries because of religion. There is no toleration for dissonant voices in the midst of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam.

That's just stupid to assert and blatantly untrue.

[Magnar of Skagos]

Any evidence for your assertion? Or is that a dogmatic truth that you hold to be self-evident without any actual evidence?

The native Europeans were more often then not converted by native Europeans. The Franks and the Saxons anyone? Many of the early converts to Christianity were even Greco-Roman Europeans. There were also many willing converts to Christianity from the pagan faiths. Why? It became an increasingly politically sound move. Christian conversion often came after the fact of military defeat of foreign pagan powers, but it was not often the cause of such conflicts. A lot of the religious conflict between paganism and Christianity happened within the respective cultural spheres of native Europeans. We see this, for example, with good historical evidence in the case of the Anglo-Saxons whose various kings went back and forth on the matter.

That's just stupid to assert and blatantly untrue.

Oh boy.

While yes, I do believe you raise valid points, I fear you are leaving a lot of general things out.

-Yes, native Europeans were more often than not converted by other native Europeans, and those Europeans were converted by other Europeans, and those by other Europeans, and so on, until those Europeans were converted by Middle-Easterners.

-Yes, many early Christians from Europe were Greco-Roman. This is due in fact because of the close proximity of these locations to the Middle-East, and because of the large number of Christian groups living in the Roman Empire. A great surge in the rise of Christianity came from the Roman Emperor Constantine who proclaimed Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire. All those subjects from the various provinces in the empire were then forced to adopt the state religion, and the spread of this faith ultimately outward from there.

-Yes, there were many willing converts from the Pagan faiths. Kings, nobles, ambitious princes, etc. All people persuaded into adopting Christianity in exchange for wealth, power, military support, and so on. These leaders in turn forced their subjects to adopt their new religion as well, as was the price of their deals. It was a politically sound move for the few rulers there were, not for the many thousands of peasants and common Europeans. What would they gain?

-History is a messy business, and the process of the Christianization of Europe was extremely slow, and inevitably there are those who will go "back and forth" so to say. I believe this also offers some support to my stance. Converting to Christianity in most cases resulted in many advantages, yet why were many hesitant to accept it? Perhaps they were happy with their own beliefs, and didn't see why they or their people should accept a new god.

With your messages, it is clear you are focusing more on the effects Christianity had on the nobility of Europe. Perhaps I should have made myself more clear. The main thing my posts were intended to be concerned with were the lives of general native Europeans, the vast, vast, majority of which would not have been too fond of this new Middle-Eastern religion. Many Christian holidays, such as Christmas, are ultimately derived from Pagan holidays. Why would this be the case if Europeans would have welcomed Christianity? Frankly, because it is easier to convert entire groups of people into your religion if it more closely resembles their own.

And I completely disagree. I do not think it is blatantly untrue. How could it be? Dissonant voices result in less people accepting the ruling religion, and the less people that accept the ruling religion, the less power the Pope or whoever is in control has. There are more dissonant voices in this day and age than there ever was before, and it just so happens the Papacy holds very little power in relation to previous years. It isn't a coincidence.

Christianity is, in its very essence, the justification of authority for those in charge. This is why there were witch burnings and book burnings, and trials such as the one of Galileo Galilei, and those scientists, astronomers, and philosophers that predated and succeeded him, who were punished for their thoughts, or who even published their work posthumously so as to avoid persecution. There is, of course, much more freedom of thought these days. This is only because there have been centuries of extreme slow progress, and even that was a very bumpy road. In fact the Renaissance, which kindled the rise of our own modern world, allowed a relatively significant advancement of society precisely because it's thinkers began to look elsewhere for answers. (However the faith still held significant power and influence) Instead of to Christianity, they began looking at humanism, and to an extent, some of the remnants of paganism that were not not destroyed.

I really do think the Abrahamic religions have done more harm than good in the world today, mostly in part due to the flawed belief system that is held by the majority of people alive today and throughout history. This is not to say every follower of these faiths is some monster, but I have witnessed many of the negative aspects of these religions as well, things that people would not normally do under any other circumstances. My family has been swindled out of thousands of dollars from my church, I have seen numerous cases of division Christianity has caused between people. Even in terms of charity. The church my school board was affiliated with refused to send perishable foods and things like that to third world countries because they could not hold sermons with the native population.

I do not think any of the Abramahic religions have resulted in much positivity in the world, but fortunately this is a day and age where it is (slowly) on the decline.

[Wise Fool]

And I completely disagree. I do not think it is blatantly untrue. How could it be? Dissonant voices result in less people accepting the ruling religion, and the less people that accept the ruling religion, the less power the Pope or whoever is in control has. There are more dissonant voices in this day and age than there ever was before, and it just so happens the Papacy holds very little power in relation to previous years. It isn't a coincidence.

Your claim was that "there is no tolerance for dissonant voices in the midst of Christianity, Judaism and Islam," and your argument to support this is... that there are more dissonant voices in Christianity than ever before?

Yeah that makes sense. I love the dismissive "Pope or whoever is in control." Tell me, who's the Jewish Pope Or Whoever Is In Control, and ruthlessly squashes 'dissonant voices?' Or maybe there's a lot of dissonant voices in Judaism as well. Because maybe your claim was full of shit and all you really want to do is preach about the wickedness of religion.

[Magnar of Skagos]

Your claim was that "there is no tolerance for dissonant voices in the midst of Christianity, Judaism and Islam," and your argument to support this is... that there are more dissonant voices in Christianity than ever before?

Yeah that makes sense. I love the dismissive "Pope or whoever is in control." Tell me, who's the Jewish Pope Or Whoever Is In Control, and ruthlessly squashes 'dissonant voices?' Or maybe there's a lot of dissonant voices in Judaism as well. Because maybe your claim was full of shit and all you really want to do is preach about the wickedness of religion.

The claim was not that there are no dissonant voices, the claim is that dissonant voices are not tolerated, because they ultimately undermine the religion. What world do you live in where fundamentalists enjoy people speaking out against their religion? The time period in which I am speaking of was run by fundamentalist Christians.

In medieval times, the Pope was in charge, in centuries earlier it was kings, priests, etc. Those are the "whoever else was in charge."

The argument was that the West has a much better society than ever before precisely because of the amount of dissonant voices being heard. I think it is no coincidence that more secular nations experience much better qualities of life, in nearly every regard, compared to those with a much more influential religious body.

I'm not preaching the "wickedness of religion." Religion is fine for the most part, though I see little positivity coming from the Abrahamic ones. Countries with these religions that are highly ingrained in their politics tend not to be very pleasant places. My argument is about the negative cultural impact Christianity has had on European society throughout history. It certainly did not bring a golden age, did it?

[Sci-2]

And we really have no reason to be smug about this stuff. Within my lifetime (since early 1970s) there were no less than 6 wars/massacres with death tolls > 1 Million: Afghanistan, Vietnam, Cambodia, Rwanda/Burundi, Congo, Sudan. And quite a few with several 100000. Only a few of them mainly religiously motivated.

It's mainly that idiotic smugness that is so irritating about remarks that religion would be the source of all evil. We have all this stuff going on around us and pretend it's a few fanatical djihadists when this is obviously not the case (None of the Gulf wars was really based on religion). Instead of comparing body counts with medieval Crusades with Stalin we should maybe think about what's wrong with us modern secular liberals here and now.

http://necrometrics.com/20c1m.htm

I'd agree that trying to point to religion as the sole source of problems is bad, and that strategies of the atheist cults led by Dawkins and the like are ill considered and hyperbolic, but at the same I don't think the issues religions do pose are comparable to any wrong by "modern secular liberals".

For example, I can't imagine a secular liberal detonating a nuclear weapon to make their point.

[Wise Fool]

The claim was not that there are no dissonant voices, the claim is that dissonant voices are not tolerated, because they ultimately undermine the religion. What world do you live in where fundamentalists enjoy people speaking out against their religion? The time period in which I am speaking of was run by fundamentalist Christians.

I assumed because you used the present-tense in "there is no tolerance," that you were speaking of times up to and including now. My bad, I guess.

I'm not preaching the "wickedness of religion." Religion is fine for the most part, though I see little positivity coming from the Abrahamic ones. Countries with these religions that are highly ingrained in their politics tend not to be very pleasant places. I am talking about the negative cultural impact Christianity has had on European society throughout history. It certainly did not bring a golden age, did it?

Nine times out of ten when someone talks about the "Abrahamic" religions, they're just trying to sound more erudite when taking a steaming shit on religion. And you absolutely are doing this.

I really do think the Abrahamic religions have done more harm than good in the world today, mostly in part due to the flawed belief system that is held by the majority of people alive today and throughout history.

This means of course that your belief (or lack thereof) is not "flawed," and that the "majority of people alive" have flawed beliefs compared to you. You're special, is your argument; you're better and you're superior and we should listen to what you have to say.

This is not to say every follower of these faiths is some monster, but I have witnessed many of the negative aspects of these religions as well, things that people would not normally do under any other circumstances. My family has been swindled out of thousands of dollars from my church,

And here we get to the core of your argument. A church was bad to you and this is your response. If a church swindled me out of money I suppose I would react similarly. As it stands, I only get swindled out of thousands of dollars by my union, by the local and federal governments, by my employer and by health care and insurance providers: so I'd question this "people would not normally do" claim. You think the church swindling was beyond the pale, but it's the norm for any group of people; and far from being unique or even really related to religious theories.

I do not think any of the Abramahic religions have resulted in much positivity in the world, but fortunately this is a day and age where it is (slowly) on the decline.

Also, who are you to decide how much "positivity in the world" is caused by "Abrahamic" religions? How in the world could you possibly even quantify this? It's just more fluff around the edges of your inherently personal position which forms the basis of this sermon of yours.

It's a classic sermon though, you'll find plenty of followers of the Religion Sucks religion on this forum.

[Magnar of Skagos]

I assumed because you used the present-tense in "there is no tolerance," that you were speaking of times up to and including now. My bad, I guess.

Nine times out of ten when someone talks about the "Abrahamic" religions, they're just trying to sound more erudite when taking a steaming shit on religion. And you absolutely are doing this.

I really do think the Abrahamic religions have done more harm than good in the world today, mostly in part due to the flawed belief system that is held by the majority of people alive today and throughout history.

This means of course that your belief (or lack thereof) is not "flawed," and that the "majority of people alive" have flawed beliefs compared to you. You're special, is your argument; you're better and you're superior and we should listen to what you have to say.

This is not to say every follower of these faiths is some monster, but I have witnessed many of the negative aspects of these religions as well, things that people would not normally do under any other circumstances. My family has been swindled out of thousands of dollars from my church,

And here we get to the core of your argument. A church was bad to you and this is your response. If a church swindled me out of money I suppose I would react similarly. As it stands, I only get swindled out of thousands of dollars by my union, by the local and federal governments, by my employer and by health care and insurance providers: so I'd question this "people would not normally do" claim. You think the church swindling was beyond the pale, but it's the norm for any group of people; and far from being unique or even really related to religious theories.

I do not think any of the Abramahic religions have resulted in much positivity in the world, but fortunately this is a day and age where it is (slowly) on the decline.

Also, who are you to decide how much "positivity in the world" is caused by "Abrahamic" religions? How in the world could you possibly even quantify this? It's just more fluff around the edges of your inherently personal position which forms the basis of this sermon of yours.

It's a classic sermon though, you'll find plenty of followers of the Religion Sucks religion on this forum.

Everybody thinks their belief system is superior to others, or why would they think it? I do not think my own belief system is "flawless" but I would think most people would agree that the preservation and value of culture is a good thing.

I would also like to know where this even arose? And I'd like to ask how it is you think lacking the belief in a god is flawed? Any sort of mysticism I hold is strictly a spiritual view of nature and mankind's relationship with it.

I also happen to think evidence is much more compelling than the notion that your god is real because you happened to be brought up by parents who happened to be born in a part of the world that happened to hold that religion at the time. But this really is a pointless argument that strays from my main point.

No, it is not the core of my argument. I'm not really effected by it, as it was my grandparents who were swindled out of money, though it does help to paint a poor picture of these people who portray themselves morally superior godly people. Which they most certainly do.

Countries highly under the influence of Abrahamic religions tend to have a very oppressed populace. Apostasy, blasphemy, civil rights, and things of that nature. None of that sounds positive to me. Now, not all secular nations are perfect, not by a long shot, but I think the greatest reason Western societies are progressing is because we are straying from this strict adherence to religious doctrine we held in previous centuries. How prevalent would most of the issues effecting religious countries be, if said countries did not base a good portion of their laws on religious teachings? What reason would there be to hate homosexuals besides Christianity, or Islam, or Judaism. There are numerous accounts of homosexuality in Pagan Europe. It was not really that much of an issue back then. Barring a few exceptions, the only significant group of people that are against homosexuality in the West are people that still cling to their religious beliefs. Though they tend to forget eating shrimp and mixing fabrics is also a sin, but they like those two things so they're okay. :dunno:

Like I've been saying before, none of this really has to do with my point, which is that European culture flourished before the introduction of Christianity, and that the continent was at its weakest under its influence. I've yet to hear any positive changes the Christianization of Europe brought...

[sologdin]

any positive changes the Christianization of Europe brought...

fair to associate christianity with the abolition of human sacrifice, surely?

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Aerion,

Everybody thinks their belief system is superior to others, or why would they think it?

I don't think my belief system is superior and I have no desire to impose my beliefs on others. I believe what I believe because it works for me not because it gives me some false sense of superiority.

[Magnar of Skagos]

It has been well established that this human sacrifice was in fact the execution of criminals. The only mention of human sacrifice I have heard is from some the accounts of Christian monks who also mention 7 foot tall Norse raiders who worship a devil they've never even heard of. It's the same reason they burned witches. They burned witchs because they were suspected of practicing Pagansim, which those who recorded the events called Satanist activities.

It's liking accept that one guy is an asshole because the guy that killed him said he was.

Ser Scot, "superior" as in holds the most weight, makes the most sense. You hold your beliefs because they make sense to you, whereas others don't. I hold my beliefs because they make more sense to me than others. Apologies, perhaps superior wasn't the right word I should have used, so my bad.

[Wise Fool]

Everybody thinks their belief system is superior to others, or why would they think it? I do not think my own belief system is "flawless" but I would think most people would agree that the preservation and value of culture is a good thing.

I believe what I believe because I believe it, not because I believe it's the superior form of belief. You're projecting here. The arrogance is veritably palpable.

Sure, most people would in fact agree "preservation and value of culture is a good thing..." except you, where that culture includes religions you happen to dislike.

I would also like to know where this even arose? And I'd like to ask how it is you think lacking the belief in a god is flawed? Any sort of mysticism I hold is strictly a spiritual view of nature and mankind's relationship with it.

I did not say that lacking a belief in god is flawed. "Flawed belief system" is the phrase you used to describe what a majority of people in the world think.

I also happen to think evidence is much more compelling than the notion that your god is real because you happened to be brought up by parents who happened to be born in a part of the world that happened to hold that religion at the time. But this really is a pointless argument that strays from my main point.

No, it is not the core of my argument. I'm not really effected by it, as it was my grandparents who were swindled out of money, though it does help to paint a poor picture of these people who portray themselves morally superior godly people. Which they most certainly do.

They're not the only ones. You're doing a fine job of demonstrating that you don't need religion, let alone 'Abrahamic' one, to believe in one's own superiority.

What reason would there be to hate homosexuals besides Christianity, or Islam, or Judaism. There are numerous accounts of homosexuality in Pagan Europe. It was not really that much of an issue back then. Barring a few exceptions, the only significant group of people that are against homosexuality in the West are people that still cling to their religious beliefs. Though they tend to forget eating shrimp and mixing fabrics is also a sin, but they like those two things so they're okay.

People like what they like, and fear and hate that which is different. That's always how it's been. The fact that people do not, in fact, throw fits about eating shrimp or mixing fabrics the way they do about homosexuality shows that homophobia does not stem from some adherence to religious principle (or else they would). Bigotry needs no excuse, but people will offer excuses, and it's a fool who thinks the excuses are actual reasons.

Countries highly under the influence of Abrahamic religions tend to have a very oppressed populace. Apostasy, blasphemy, civil rights, and things of that nature. None of that sounds positive to me. Now, not all secular nations are perfect, not by a long shot, but I think the greatest reason Western societies are progressing is because we are straying from this strict adherence to religious doctrine we held in previous centuries.

I'm not getting into the secular vs state-religion argument, because that's a no-brainer. But you're talking about much more; you're saying the entire religion has more negative than positives, and that in general religious beliefs are flawed (compared to your own belief, of course) and cause most problems in the world. No?