[kenberg]

I had not really thought about bosons, Higgs or otherwise, for the last fifty years. Who would have thought that a religious thread on a bridge site would have re-kindled my interest? It's a miracle!

[mike777]

Fwiw the Higgs Boson may lead to transporters if you need one possible benefit to mankind.

Beam me up Scotty

[Codo]

Vampyr, on 2014-March-05, 03:09, said:

Well, Christianity (to give the most common example in Europe) with its patriarchy could be a contributing factor. Your hero Paul was a fanatical misogynist, and all Christian sects consider women to be second-class citizens (obviously some more than others). Many hundreds of years of culture have created a worldview which devalues women, so some nasty and violent people consider them legitimate targets for abuse.

Also just in general, mean people pick on those who are smaller or weaker than themselves.

It is allways funny to see your and Mikes opinions aboput religions. Well at least it would be funny if it would not be so sad....

Maybe you should take some time and learn about "all Christian sects" before you make such false statements.
The equality in Europe is much more a geographical issue then one of beliving or a religion. The basically lutherian states in Scandinavia had been first in equality. The first big orginazation in Germany with a proportion of female leaders had been the lutherian church. Does it mean that in Christianity equity is no problem any more? Of course not. But your statement is simply false.

But who cares about facts if he can bash christians. If religious fanatics would make such false statements as you do, you would know why they are so. Which excuse do you have?
Why do you think that moderates are not capable to overthink their believes? Why do you think that you are? Is there any fact to back your opinion up?
Or, hm, just maybe: There is no big difference between fanatic atheists,and fanatic theists? Maybe, just mabye the line is between the moderates andthe fanatics?

Well at least this is my believe- between others.

[Winstonm]

Codo, on 2014-April-10, 10:11, said:

It is allways funny to see your and Mikes opinions aboput religions. Well at least it would be funny if it would not be so sad....

Maybe you should take some time and learn about "all Christian sects" before you make such false statements.
The equality in Europe is much more a geographical issue then one of beliving or a religion. The basically lutherian states in Scandinavia had been first in equality. The first big orginazation in Germany with a proportion of female leaders had been the lutherian church. Does it mean that in Christianity equity is no problem any more? Of course not. But your statement is simply false.

But who cares about facts if he can bash christians. If religious fanatics would make such false statements as you do, you would know why they are so. Which excuse do you have?
Why do you think that moderates are not capable to overthink their believes? Why do you think that you are? Is there any fact to back your opinion up?
Or, hm, just maybe: There is no big difference between fanatic atheists,and fanatic theists? Maybe, just mabye the line is between the moderates andthe fanatics?

Well at least this is my believe- between others.

The basic consensus of Christianity is that its truth is derived from the same source: a specific book. After that, all forms of Christianity are simply variations of interpretations of those words.

It doesn't really matter that some or even all the Lutherans in Europe now find fault with the misogynist views encouraged by their own holy book. That only shows the secular intrusion into bastions of religion brought about by the cognitive dissonance that occurs when fable keeps smacking headlong into increasing knowledge.

Here is the key issue: if the vast majority of the world rejected supernatural beliefs and adopted an evidence-based system of forming worldviews then fanatic Muslims, Christians, Jews, etc would all feel the weight of peer pressure to "stop being silly".

But because you continue to "be silly", you can only do what everyone else does, condemn actions taken, but you cannot chastise any fanatic for the core problem that is at the heart of fantasism: they are "being silly", too.

[mikeh]

Codo, on 2014-April-10, 10:11, said:

It is allways funny to see your and Mikes opinions aboput religions. Well at least it would be funny if it would not be so sad....

Maybe you should take some time and learn about "all Christian sects" before you make such false statements.
The equality in Europe is much more a geographical issue then one of beliving or a religion. The basically lutherian states in Scandinavia had been first in equality. The first big orginazation in Germany with a proportion of female leaders had been the lutherian church. Does it mean that in Christianity equity is no problem any more? Of course not. But your statement is simply false.

But who cares about facts if he can bash christians. If religious fanatics would make such false statements as you do, you would know why they are so. Which excuse do you have?
Why do you think that moderates are not capable to overthink their believes? Why do you think that you are? Is there any fact to back your opinion up?
Or, hm, just maybe: There is no big difference between fanatic atheists,and fanatic theists? Maybe, just mabye the line is between the moderates andthe fanatics?

Well at least this is my believe- between others.

You seem to lack basic reading comprehension skills, or (and this is more likely, given that you are clearly intelligent) you are unable to see past your own prejudices.

Of course any informed person knows very well that there are numerous sects within Xianity, as there are in all major religions. Indeed, some versions of Xianity do treat people fairly, and without prejudice based on gender or colour of skin, etc. Good for them, but as Winston points out they have had to rationalize away many of the teachings of the bible in order to do this.

Indeed, without fail, no mainstream Xian sect reads the bible at face value...even those who claim that the bible is the inerrant word of god. All Xians rationalize, and pick and choose which parts to accept as fact, which as metaphor or analogy, and so on. None seem to see the absurdity that is apparent to non-believers of the choices made, and the incredible self-deception that has to be perpetrated to swallow all this.

It is that aspect of moderate Xianity that acts as a cover or shield for fundies. The vast majority of humans believe in magic and superstition, but they don't see 'their' beliefs in that light, even tho most of them would cheerfully use such language to describe the religions of the ancient greeks, or romans, or Persians, etc.

If, as Winston says, the great majority of humans saw that all religious faith was silly, then the fundies would stand out and be embarrassed, isolated, maybe jailed if they acted out as their books tell them they must.

You say I am bashing all xianians. I say that I am asserting that ALL religious belief is silly...ALL of it is utterly disconnected from any empirical evidence and is based on REQUIRING the shutting down of that most precious human trait: the ability to think critically. Moderates of all religions evidently DO have the ability to think critically, since they accept evidence-based reasoning in much of their lives, but none of them can see into or past the blind spot implanted by religious belief.

To use your language, it would be funny if it were not so sad.

[Trinidad]

mikeh, on 2014-April-10, 18:28, said:

You say I am bashing all xianians. I say that I am asserting that ALL religious belief is silly...ALL of it is utterly disconnected from any empirical evidence and is based on REQUIRING the shutting down of that most precious human trait: the ability to think critically. Moderates of all religions evidently DO have the ability to think critically, since they accept evidence-based reasoning in much of their lives, but none of them can see into or past the blind spot implanted by religious belief.

To use your language, it would be funny if it were not so sad.

I don't disagree with you, but why is it your (or my) concern that other people voluntarily shut down their ability to think critically?

If they want to do that why don't you let them?

Moderate religious people probably think that you and I have shut down the -in their eyes- most precious human trait: the ability to believe in ____ (fill in the blank) without the need for evidence.

So, moderate religious people let me shut down in myself what they value most. So, why wouldn't I allow them to shut down in themselves what I value most? Why would it be my business/problem?

Rik

[mikeh]

Trinidad, on 2014-April-12, 15:56, said:

I don't disagree with you, but why is it your (or my) concern that other people voluntarily shut down their ability to think critically?

If they want to do that why don't you let them?

Moderate religious people probably think that you and I have shut down the -in their eyes- most precious human trait: the ability to believe in ____ (fill in the blank) without the need for evidence.

So, moderate religious people let me shut down in myself what they value most. So, why wouldn't I allow them to shut down in themselves what I value most? Why would it be my business/problem?

Rik

I suppose one could argue why one cares about anything that anyone else does, that doesn't measurably impact one's life. I suppose some religionists think that that is the end result of being an atheist anyway

I don't much mind how individuals live their lives, and generally speaking I believe in a live and let live attitude towards personal lifestyles and beliefs, so long as the lifestyle and belief system don't subject non-competent people (children, senile, disabled, etc) to suffering....and I'd extend that to some degree to animals, depending on which species we are discussing.

However, I like to think that ultimately humanity should survive as long as possible, and should (in doing so) strive to attain maximal enjoyment for a maximal proportion of humanity, with the caveat that one shouldn't attain maximal enjoyment at the cost of imposing suffering on a minority..

To get to that state of affairs, humanity is going to have to change its way of behaving, not only towards each other but also towards the planet, and all that the planet supports.

To achieve that will require something more than prayer, or a belief that some fantasy god will intervene to save us, or that it doesn't matter what hell we create on earth because most of us deserve nothing better, and/or the righteous will be saved in some imaginary afterlife.

To maximize the chances of humanity flourishing in the long term requires understanding the universe as it is, not as we would like it to be. It requires assessing evidence and making decisions based on evidence, even when that evidence suggests that long-cherished religious beliefs are not merely false but actively harmful (as in the Xian imperative, no longer followed by many sects but still there to propagate and to avoid birth control).

Making decisions based on how the world is, rather than how our religious leaders tell us it is, requires critical thinking.

We don't need everyone to be a critical thinker: most people will be followers, not leaders, but we need leaders who do think critically, and we need the general population able to understand the difference between the fantasists who preach religious belief as 'the explanation' that underlies the world and the realists who base their decisions on what is really going on.

Religion is a force for evil now. It wasn't always so. When we, as a species, lacked the ability to explore beyond our senses, religion gave us an order in our lives...an element of predictability and stability. In some cultures at some times it even fostered attitudes conducive to learning how the world functioned.....early islam, and to some degree even the Xian church are examples.

However, as secular learning began revealing the basic flaws in all religions, all religions became and remain anti-science: even the ones that claim that they are not are in actuality.....they may promote some aspects of enquiry, but there is always a cordoned off area into which humans are prohibited to enter...the area that shows that there is no need nor justification for any organized religious establishment, and indeed no reason to posit an imaginary god. To the limited extent that a church makes an accommodation with modern science, it is almost always a rearguard action, and often distorts the science. See, for example, the way the RC church treats evolutionary theory...including the absurd notion that somehow a human fetus is 'ensouled' at the moment of conception.

Individual moderates aren't the problem. Moderates, collectively, due to the size of the churches to which they belong, and the positions taken by the leaders of those churches, are....and making things worse is that the moderate, by validating the underlying beliefs of the fundies, afford shelter and assistance to the fundies even as they claim otherwise (and mean it when they do so...I wouldn't accuse any moderate of my acquaintance of hypocrisy...merely of having an amazingly large blind spot).

[Vampyr]

mikeh, on 2014-April-12, 16:39, said:

actively harmful (as in the Xian imperative, no longer followed by many sects but still there to propagate and to avoid birth control).

A lot of people do still follow this ... Hasidism. Jews, Mormons and the American Quicerful movement. There is a family in Arkansas who will double the population of that state in about four generations if they continue as they have started.

Also, when resources are scarce, we have a biological imperative to produce as many offspring as possible, in the hope that some will survive. This is what is happening in many underdeveloped countries, as opposed to other countries that go by the policy that they can devote more resources to fewer children, thus slowing overpopulation while also serving self-interest.

[Vampyr]

And Trinidad

The future of our race and many other species and the planet' biosphere in general is in more danger if a majority of the population still engages in magical thinking. I don't know if the continuation of our race is a good thing, but I think that the preservation of a planet that hosts a great variety of would be oak good thing. I would be sad if the last gasp of humanity completely destroys the planet Earth and all possibility if life on it, but I am pretty sure that that is what is going to happen.

[Trinidad]

Mike,

The discussion is about religious moderates.

Do you seriously consider people who don't use birth control -for religious reasons- to be moderate?!?

Rik

[nige1]

Vampyr, on 2014-April-12, 18:22, said:

And Trinidad
The future of our race and many other species and the planet' biosphere in general is in more danger if a majority of the population still engages in magical thinking. I don't know if the continuation of our race is a good thing, but I think that the preservation of a planet that hosts a great variety of would be oak good thing. I would be sad if the last gasp of humanity completely destroys the planet Earth and all possibility if life on it, but I am pretty sure that that is what is going to happen.

I agree with Vampyr that it would be a good thing if the human race and the planet survive for a bit longer. Just like religious belief and many of our other beliefs, however, that belief is demonstrable by neither logic nor science.

[mike777]

This belief in the humans does sound like a religion or at the very least a selfish gene.

At the very least can we accept that humans may survive even if the planet does not.

In any event evolution marches on to the next.

None of this sounds moderate.

I certainly don't see anything wrong with bending the universe, our environment to our will, rather than accepting it as it is. Mankind is fully nature.

If mankind has some basic need to believe in something greater than itself as an evolutionary advantage, great. If it is a fatal flaw it will either breed out or die out and the selfish gene will move on.

And of course Mother Nature can always throw a giant rock at us in the next few years and move on to the whatever next phase.

[mikeh]

Trinidad, on 2014-April-12, 18:39, said:

Mike,

The discussion is about religious moderates.

Do you seriously consider people who don't use birth control -for religious reasons- to be moderate?!?

Rik

Do you seriously consider the vast majority of Christians to be fundies? What about the biggest Xian church of all: the roman catholics?

As it happens, the RC doctrine is against birth control, and the church boasts 1 billion members. Do you hold that the RC church is an extremist organization?

Sure, we know that many catholics, especially in the West, don't obey the church on this, but that doesn't invalidate the argument, since most do, and the only reasons for the non-compliant not being excommunicated would seem to be money and power (and the turning of a blind eye by priests).

Meanwhile, you seem to have fallen into a classic 'no true scotsman' fallacy...you favour or approve of a mild, tepid form of belief, and therefore anyone who holds to a more rigid form can't be moderate. BS: a moderate represents the middle of the spectrum. Lutherans, for example, aren't 'moderate'...they are extremists, but extremists at the end of the spectrum closest to secular thinkers rather than fundies. The moderate Xian holds to a lot of bizarre rituals and beliefs. For instance, look at the role of women in the great middle of the Christian spectrum.

[mikeh]

nige1, on 2014-April-12, 18:50, said:

I agree with Vampyr that it would be a good thing if the human race and the planet survive for a bit longer. Just like religious belief and many of our other beliefs, however, that belief is demonstrable by neither logic nor science.

Nonsense.

The universe holds, as far as we can determine, no opinion about humans surviving. However, humans have evolved with a strong desire to procreate and to perpetuate the species. A desire to see humans continue into the future is a clearly adaptive feature. All life that has evolved any form of intelligence seems to use that intelligence to further their procreation.

Therefore for a human to hold a belief that it is a 'good thing' for humanity to survive is nothing but natural and, across the species as a whole, leaving aberrant individuals to one side, inevitable. It is important to understand that when an atheist or a secularist asserts that it is a good thing for humanity to flourish, that comes with no suggestion that this is 'objectively' valid to any thing or entity other than humans (and probably, dogs )

It is, of course, typical of a religious believer to try to assert, usually without explanatory information, that opinions held by atheists are equivalent to religious belief. I am sure that helps the religious believer continue to ignore his or her cognitive blindspot, but it is sad to see intelligent people so crippled by their indoctrination that they can't even see how their thinking is distorted. Religious people see themselves as so central to the universe that the entire universe was created 13.8 billion years ago just in order that we could seek salvation.....it took roughly 13.799 billion years to get to bothering with jesus, and there sure seems to be a lot of extraneous stuff out there, if we are the main point of all of this, lol.

I think it would be good for humanity to flourish, but it is definitely arguable that it is against the interests of most of all other life forms on the earth for us to remain around much longer.....from the point of view of most 'wild' species, the best thing that could happen would be for humanity to quickly succumb to a deadly virus

Godbots, unless they are praying for the end times, would generally disagree (as would I), but perhaps for the main reason that they see humans (or their flavour of human) as special.

[mike777]

Is the universe deterministic, humans?

For sake of discussion assume yes.

If other please state your assumptions.

My guess is many posters assume humans=supernatural and/or non deterministic

At the very least humans are natural and want to attempt to bend the environment and universe to sapian will and evolution.

[mikeh]

mike777, on 2014-April-12, 22:20, said:

Is the universe deterministic, humans?

For sake of discussion assume yes.

If other please state your assumptions.

My guess is many posters assume humans=supernatural and/or non deterministic

At the very least humans are natural and want to attempt to bend the environment and universe to sapian will and evolution.

what do you mean by 'deterministic'? As far as we can so far determine, there is a very significant element of randomness in the universe, but that may be an artefact of our so-far incomplete understanding

[mike777]

I accept posters belief they live in a random world.
I don't accept posters and their loved ones act as if the world and their future is random.

[Trinidad]

mikeh, on 2014-April-12, 21:49, said:

Do you seriously consider the vast majority of Christians to be fundies? What about the biggest Xian church of all: the roman catholics?

As it happens, the RC doctrine is against birth control, and the church boasts 1 billion members. Do you hold that the RC church is an extremist organization?

Sure, we know that many catholics, especially in the West, don't obey the church on this, but that doesn't invalidate the argument, since most do, and the only reasons for the non-compliant not being excommunicated would seem to be money and power (and the turning of a blind eye by priests).

Meanwhile, you seem to have fallen into a classic 'no true scotsman' fallacy...you favour or approve of a mild, tepid form of belief, and therefore anyone who holds to a more rigid form can't be moderate. BS: a moderate represents the middle of the spectrum. Lutherans, for example, aren't 'moderate'...they are extremists, but extremists at the end of the spectrum closest to secular thinkers rather than fundies. The moderate Xian holds to a lot of bizarre rituals and beliefs. For instance, look at the role of women in the great middle of the Christian spectrum.

I think (I may be wrong, but I don't think so) that your ideas on the RC church and birth control are not reflecting reality.

The comparison
On RC doctrine
Mike:
The RC doctrine is against birth control.

Rik:
The RC doctrine is against birth control, but it is under discussion. (And eradicating birth control doesn't seem to be a top priority for Pope Frances.)

On following the doctrine
Mike:
Sure, we know that many catholics, especially in the West, don't obey the church on this, but that doesn't invalidate the argument, since most do.

Rik:
The majority of catholics in the world don't obey the church on this (as well as many other doctrines from Rome), especially in the West, where practically none of them do.

I live in a hardcore Roman Catholic part in Western Europe. I will illustrate just how RC this part is: Though it should be clear that I am far from Roman Catholic, my children go to an RC school... because practically all schools are RC. My kids are the only ones in their class who haven't done their holy communion. I would call that pretty darn Roman Catholic.

In this pretty darn Roman Catholic area, from what I see, families here have 0-3 children. In the very few families with 4 ... the youngest two are twins. There is one notable exception: one of the local doctors has quite a few kids (I lost count)... but they are protestant.

At the same time, couples (married, as well as unmarried living together) are postponing having children to a later age.

I can see a few possible explanations for this:

• All these couples abstain. (LOL)
  
• All these couples pray to God that she doesn't get pregnant, and God is answering their prayers. (I don't think you are a follower of this one.)
  
• All these couples use birth control.

Where 100 years ago, it was completely normal to have families with 8 children, 50 years ago birth control was almost universally accepted in the West, including most RC areas, particularly the economically prosperous ones. Most people here of my age (I am closing in on 50) have 1 or 2 siblings.

To check my personal observations, I looked at the data from the national statistics bureau (CBS) and calculated the fractions of households with 0, 1, 2, and 3 or more children for Noord-Brabant (NB), the Roman Catholic part of the country where I live, to Zuid-Holland (ZH), the urbanized, secular part of the country, with cities like Rotterdam and The Hague.

These are the stats:
       NB     ZH
0     52.13   52.32
1     27.04   26.59
2     9.05   9.90
3(+)  11.78   11.20

I think you will agree that the Roman Catholic church has no significant influence on the size of the households, in this particular part of the world.

So, I think that you don't have your facts straight. You are presenting mainstream Roman Catholicism as liberal extremist Roman Catholicism and hardcore conservative Roman Catholicism, as if it were the mainstream.

So much about Europe. Let's turn to Africa... Do you really think that families in Africa have so many children because of the Roman Catholic church? You are giving the RC church way too much credit. In reality, the reason why in Africa birth rates are high has very little to do with the RC church. It has everything to do with social-economic structures: Children are the retirement plan. When decent pensions become universally available in Africa then birth rates will decrease, whatever the RC church says.

Concluding, there are quite a few things that you can hold against the RC church. But seeking the cause for the world's overpopulation in the ideas of a few popes in Rome on the subject of birth control is simply incorrect. When you seek the cause there, you are violating Occam's razor. The simple (and therefore better) explanation is: "It's the economy, stupid!"

Rik

[Vampyr]

nige1, on 2014-April-12, 18:50, said:

I agree with Vampyr that it would be a good thing if the human race and the planet survive for a bit longer. Just like religious belief and many of our other beliefs, however, that belief is demonstrable by neither logic nor science.

What I said was that I don't know whether it is a good thing.

[kenberg]

Rik,

I think I generally agree. Not entirely, but generally. My knowledge of history is spotty. I think it was not all that long ago that in some western countries it was illegal to sell condoms. When I was an adolescent they were well hidden, and it was not unheard of that a young person would be subjected to some questions by the druggist before the purchase could be completed. But that was, I think, more a mater of people "knowing what's right", not necessarily backed by any reference to religion, RC or otherwise. It was really a bit weird. As a 14 year old, I had no trouble buying cigarettes even though it was actually against the law. When I was older, 17 or 18, it was much more of a challenge to buy condoms. This was in the 1950s. Exactly why a society would be permissive about a 14 year old buying cigs but rigid about an 18 year old buying condoms would make an interesting sociological paper.But I am not so sure it was primarily religious in nature.