(November 21, 2010 at 11:30 pm)DANSURP Wrote: I mean that what holds people back from doing horrible things like murder besides the law is fear of being punished in the afterlife. I should have phrased it as if the world had no religion or belief in anything after death rather than true atheist. Though it would be one in the same. If everyone truly believed that once you are dead, you cease to exist in any form forever, they would risk doing alot more in life.
Unless you know of any case where a religion has brought with it a sudden and permanent drop in crime and wrongdoing, I see that as a pretty weak argument. As for the law, you seem to dismiss that rather lightly; codes of law going back 4000 years have prohibitions against murder, rape, theft. It's ubiquitous among human societies. This doesn't have to do so much with religion, or fear of punishment in an afterlife (an aspect many religions don't have) as the fact that any society that allowed these things wouldn't continue to exist for very long.
Would you kill somebody if you knew you could get away with it?
