"How Can I Be Happy?" - Humanism Refuted

[mralstoner]

This is a "refutation" of Stephen Fry's video How Can I Be Happy?

It can be summed up as: humanism is difficult and messy, therefore God!

It's quite funny to watch. It's a well-produced video, with serious narration, but awful arguments.

"How Can I Be Happy?" - Humanism Refuted

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5p-5ctVSVPA

[Napoléon]

Couldn't watch further than a minute, the amount of fail was already too much.

[LostLocke]

Couldn't watch further than a minute, the amount of fail was already too much.

I couldn't get that far. Maybe :46 or so.

I wonder if people, like Fry, who draw a nuclear reactor exhaust stack as part of the 'problem' with the world even realize that's not pollution or chemicals or scary radioactive clouds billowing, but nothing more than water vapor....

[abaris]

:49, that's how far I got. The deforrestation part and humanists advocating it.

If the rest is as ignorant, it's not even funny.

[mralstoner]

:49, that's how far I got. The deforrestation part and humanists advocating it.

If the rest is as ignorant, it's not even funny.

I rolled my eyes at the deforestation too. The rest of the video is more intelligent than this, but still awful arguments.

[Chad32]

Objective right and wrong can be reached, even if morality is subjective. Yes the bible does have clear views of what it deems right and wrong. You are allowed to own people. You are allowed to commit mass murder of non christians. Jesus commands you to love your neighbor as yourself, but also hate yourself. Above anything else you are commanded to love god, and good or bad actions take a back seat to that.

I don't think religion is being abused when people use it to justify violence, since it promotes violence. Even Jesus said it would be better to drown people than to allow them to lead someone away from christianity.

Are there some flaws with humanism? Yes. There are flaws with everything. Even as a christian nation we have admitted there are flaws in the bible, because we have criminalized things that the bible approves of.

[Esquilax]

Objective right and wrong can be reached, even if morality is subjective. Yes the bible does have clear views of what it deems right and wrong. You are allowed to own people. You are allowed to commit mass murder of non christians. Jesus commands you to love your neighbor as yourself, but also hate yourself. Above anything else you are commanded to love god, and good or bad actions take a back seat to that.

And notably, which these "objective morality" fuckers never seem to get, when they're slinging mud at everyone else, is that those commands are exactly as subjective as what they're denigrating, because god is a subject too. Where did these supposed "objective morals" come from? Oh, god's mind? Would that be the same place that it's wrong for morals to come from when a humanist does it?

At least the humanists fucking think about their moral decisions before they make them. Truthfully the theist starts out on the same level as the atheist, and then purposely lowers themselves by refusing to think through their morality first.

[Chad32]

If morality comes from god, it's as subjective as anything else. That's pretty much the definition of subjective.

[FatAndFaithless]

That's the whole Euthyphro dilemma, a nice point to bring up with folks who say morality comes from God.

[JonDarbyXIII]

When talking about objective morality, I have heard a lot of theists quickly throw out the concept of "Well, is rape wrong?" The problem is--why is rape wrong?

That's the whole Euthyphro dilemma, a nice point to bring up with folks who say morality comes from God.

But it even goes a little bit beyond that. More than just 'where do the morals come from' the question is 'why are morals the way they are'. If the theist has any reasoning behind why rape is wrong, then it quickly becomes evident that we don't need God to mandate that. Rape is wrong because [insert any of a number of logical reasons] not "just cuz god said.[/quote]"