(October 19, 2012 at 6:55 pm)Reasonable_Jeff Wrote: To think that you're life is more valuable than an ant would just to be guilty of speciesism. If there is no objective being to give your life value, then it has no objective value. Any value that you would perceive your life to have would be just an self-deception.

Wrong again! When I taste a new dish and declare it excellent I am in no way deceiving myself. I really like it. My subjective approval is an objective fact known only to me.

(October 19, 2012 at 6:55 pm)Reasonable_Jeff Wrote: Moreover, the OP quoted Dawkins saying that there exists no good, no evil.

AND ALL OF YOU AGREE WITH THIS?!?!?!?!?!

Probably. Leastwise I agree with it.

(October 19, 2012 at 6:55 pm)Reasonable_Jeff Wrote: On atheism, you have no grounds to say that this is wrong.[/b] Life simply is....you can do what you wish with it. There's nothing wrong with using other humans for science experiments against their will and at the cost of their lives.

Sure there is. We don't like it, wouldn't want them done on us and therefore are not going to permit it in a society that reflects our wishes. No god required. No objective moral meter readings required. Just us stringing your ass up if you bring that sick shit around our neighborhood.

(October 19, 2012 at 6:55 pm)Reasonable_Jeff Wrote: If there is no God, life came from nothing and ends in nothing. Not only do our individual lives end in death, the universe itself will end in a heat death and will go back to being what it was in the beginning...nothing.

Correct. So what?

(October 19, 2012 at 6:55 pm)Reasonable_Jeff Wrote: Nothing before the Big Bang, nothing afterwards....

Let's not go there. No one really knows that.

(October 19, 2012 at 6:55 pm)Reasonable_Jeff Wrote: If there is no God what value could your life possible have?

That's for me to decide. We're up for this. Afterall, we invented god, why shouldn't we be able to whip up a nice batch of meaning?

This is a difficult topic for me. I think perhaps it's true value needs a designer/creator/eternal source, but there is nothing wrong with acting in hope there is a higher value to us, even if it we are not sure there is value.

In other words, living according to hoped fantasy, is perhaps our last hope, if there is no way to know we have value.

We can hope we do have a soul and act is we are the same person.

There is nothing wrong with hope. We can hope we do have an objective value were are not aware of.

We can act according to that hoped fantasy. And there would be nothing wrong with that.

(October 28, 2012 at 6:38 pm)MysticKnight Wrote: This is a difficult topic for me. I think perhaps it's true value needs a designer/creator/eternal source, but there is nothing wrong with acting in hope there is a higher value to us, even if it we are not sure there is value.

In other words, living according to hoped fantasy, is perhaps our last hope, if there is no way to know we have value.

We can hope we do have a soul and act is we are the same person.

There is nothing wrong with hope. We can hope we do have an objective value were are not aware of.

We can act according to that hoped fantasy. And there would be nothing wrong with that.

Firstly, you are right in that it is acceptable to have hope in objective value. But, two things come to mind. First, why is it objective if a creator bestows it? If I create a piece of artwork that is awful and I do not value it but someone else thinks it is good, then its value is subjective. Just because something has subjective value does not mean that it does not have value. For instance, is gold valuabe? Monetarily, it would be in most places, but someone could disagree. For example, if you were starving in the desert, which would you rather have, a basket of fruit, or some gold? Human life is of the ultimate value because it is our very existence, so naturally we will attribute value to it. Saying that your own life is valuable is no more delusional than saying that gold is valuable, noting that life is immensely more valuable than gold.

We have properly basic beliefs that we are of value. I value of my nephew. But it seems if we were objective totaly, we would love everyone as much as we love ourselves. But we don't. We value ourselves more, simply, because we want to. If we get a family, kids, wife, etc, we will value them as well. We value our parents more then other parents. Purely objectively, why we should value our own existence, more then others?

Think about sports. What drives competition. Is a battle between people. They both want to win. And they feel sad when they lose.

Yes, we subjectively value different people, and it means something to us. We value our kids more then other kids. Etc...

All of is unjustified from analytical reasoning perspective. But belief in a eternal source makes you trust your instinct.

The Quran begins with the making you attribute all praise to God. That gives you a foundational belief of praise. Then you acknowledge are going to objectively judged. That makes you belief if you an objective value based on the praise or condemnable actions you go through. Then it asks for guidance. This gives hope that you will be guided in direction in the right way.

The next Surah states in the Quran there is no doubt a guidance. This how Quran begins. It appeals to the basic human hopes of direction and of believe in objective value.

But while you care about yourself, others are apathetic towards you. Children in Africa are ignored in favor of pleasures and enjoyment of the selfs rather then self-sacrifice.

In words of a famous song "they say love is the answer, but look how they cheat us".

Why do we need a "higher purpose" for life to be meaningful? Why can't we make our own meaning?

(October 28, 2012 at 10:04 pm)Utracia Wrote: Why do we need a "higher purpose" for life to be meaningful? Why can't we make our own meaning?

Well you can decide to live for whatever reason you want. In this sense you can have your own purpose. But I don't even know what is meant by meaningful. There is all sorts of emotional driven motivations to live. Yeah you can love life.

But tyrants love life too. And they aren't will to give up their power all for the sake of the meaning they make for themselves.

Is the meaning they make for themselves truly meaningful? Is that their purpose? In one sense yes, but theists are grounded to say that is not the true purpose.

In other words, if I make it my purpose to make people sad for example, it doesn't really mean that is meaningful if I make my purpose to live.

If I live to be "cool" as can be, to be "wild", doesn't mean that is the meaning of why I'm here.

Yes even Theists believe everyone can have their own meaning in that sense, but all that meaning is unjustified...

You can believe you purpose here to convince everyone you are god like some delusional people do. It doesn't make there true meaning.

In this sense, without belief in a cosmological meaning, we can act to make ourselves feel better.

Perhaps evolution favored the idea of us coming up with myths to explain our purpose for being here, because those semi-humans are the ones that lived in harmony.

With higher intelligence, pure instinct is not enough to drive us, we needed the sense of purpose.

Also, with a cosmological judge, we feel there is an objective perception of who we are. In fact, we constantly assume there is an objective judgement possible to who we are. And if we didn't we wouldn't even partially judge people.

So this concept of judging people, judging beauty, was needed in evolution, but is it with any justification?

Do we even know ourselves let alone anyone else truly?

It seems the Ultimate Judge/Perceiver concept is also so foundational in society.

The belief in judgement after death is pretty much universal in cultures/religions.

But this all assuming their is an objective judgement of who were are.

Try as we might, we can't but help judge people and judge ourselves.

The concept of "praise" we take for granted. But is it even possible without an objective praiser? And who is that objective praiser....look at people, they praise one person that is condemned by others.

They praise on thing, and others condemn it. We are confused people.

Perhaps why Islam might win the hearts of humanity and be the universal authority in the future, is that it provides guidance in all aspects of life. In the case of Christians and Jews, it seems they want to ignore the old teachings to the Isrealites. They don't want to apply the laws and punishments.

In other words, the society is not looking to God to guide them that much, instead, they just want to believe in Jesus and do as they please.

Islam brings God into all aspects of life.

Sure you can make your own meaning and purpose, but people feel the need for religion for an objective meaning.

Of course, they are deluding themselves like we all are.

Semi-humans living in harmony probably has a hefty amount of myth to it amigo. Evolution appears to have favored a creature capable of explaining things (whether or not those explanations were accurate seems to have been of secondary importance, lol).

(October 28, 2012 at 10:33 pm)Rhythm Wrote: Semi-humans living in harmony probably has a hefty amount of myth to it amigo. Evolution appears to have favored a creature capable of explaining things (whether or not those explanations were accurate seems to have been of secondary importance, lol).

It favored intelligence, but perhaps more, in favored "art" type beauty culture perception and gullibility and inclination to trust authority and believe in the myths/religion/explanation of the group you live with.

Honestly, the most seemingly intelligent debater I came across on internet forums was Jebreil on Shiachat. He is so eloquent and brilliant.

But he is deluded and incline to believe in religion, despite, the proofs I showed him of Islam being wrong.

This tells me, we hold on to beliefs of the family we grow up with, so hard. Evolution may have favored people who didn't rebel against their family traditions and way.

Perhaps there is a reason Atheists are hated so much by religious people. It's because they don't have any myths they live by. They are so different then to the rest of humanity.

It seems it's part of our nature to believe in myths. And when we don't we feel an empty void. That empty void we try to fill with other things, but at the end, it's an empty void.

There is a lot of Atheist converts to religions, that were Atheists for a great time of their life. There is something here in our humanity to believe in religion.

Religion is so illogical and irrational to put our trust in, but it convinces us so strongly still.

Why would evolution favor us knowing the truth instead of a happy delusion?

Nature favors nothing. Either it is survivable or not.

(October 28, 2012 at 10:46 pm)IATIA Wrote: Nature favors nothing. Either it is survivable or not.

Did Socrates survive and have children? Or was he killed. I know we don't know if Socrates even lived at all, but I hope you get my point