(September 16, 2011 at 5:35 pm)Rhythm Wrote: Humans can be many things with no conditioning whatsoever. Kind is one of them. It is in our nature. I'm not misunderstanding anything here, I'm calling you out on a desperate attempt to assert the superiority of what you just so happen to believe. It's empty, absurd, and for whatever reason you seem to absolutely require for this to be true. It's bullshit, start to finish, and you probably know that. If you want to blather on about how the faithful (of any stripe) are superior in any way to the unwashed, just go back to your church. They serve bigotry warm, on tap, and on demand. That you named your thread "Evil Atheists" and continue to stumble around searching for ways to explain that we have no basis for morality, all the while claiming that the thread isn't about faith of any stripe is pathetic. You're a liar.

(September 16, 2011 at 5:51 pm)Rhythm Wrote: You seem to be ignoring the fact that most societies did not, in fact, survive. Most times, some other "theistic society" had a hand in their demise. Guess it doesn't always work out after all eh? Just how far back do you think religion extends into the record? Guess you don't mind worshiping booby dolls as long as it works right? Satanists are theists too btw (though I'm sure some would disagree). We don't have any evidence of "theistic" systems of morality beyond the neolithic, which leaves us with about 95% of our time here unaccounted for, and in fact we have plenty of evidence for animism in it's place.

"Value of religion
Organized religion emerged as a means of providing social and economic stability to large populations through the following ways:

Organized religion served to Justify the central authority, which in turn possessed the right to collect taxes in return for providing social and security services to the state. The empires of Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia were theocracies, with chiefs, kings and emperors playing dual roles of political and spiritual leaders.[9] Virtually all state societies and chiefdoms around the world have similar political structures where political authority is justified by divine sanction.

Organized religion emerged as means of maintaining peace between unrelated individuals. Bands and tribes consist of small number of related individuals. However states and nations are composed of thousands or millions of unrelated individuals. Jared Diamond argues that organized religion served to provide a bond between unrelated individuals who would otherwise be more prone to enmity. He argues that the leading cause of death among hunter gatherer societies is murder."

Control, short and sweet.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_religions

(September 16, 2011 at 7:02 pm)Shell B Wrote: How come all Christians here make blanket statements about atheists? Read the whole thread, Stat W. I didn't bring it up at all and I am an atheist. Can't really argue your way out of this one, so you might as well retract your incorrect statement, for once.

(September 16, 2011 at 7:08 pm)Statler Waldorf Wrote: I didn't get that far, I read the first few pages and got bored because nobody was even addressing the OP, what page did you start posting?

(September 16, 2011 at 7:14 pm)Rhythm Wrote: Add that to the list of things you didn't get far in. Physics, Geology, Biology, Archaeology, Ethics. It's a hell of a pattern.

(September 16, 2011 at 7:14 pm)Shell B Wrote: Must have been just before the time you decided you wouldn't read the whole thread, but would comment on the behavior in the entirety of the thread, despite not having read it.