RE: WLC: "You can't prove the negative"
February 21, 2022 at 9:53 am
(This post was last modified: February 21, 2022 at 10:01 am by The Grand Nudger.)
(February 20, 2022 at 10:50 am)polymath257 Wrote: If God is yet another abstraction, a metaphor for what we idealize, then I have few problems with theism (I might suggest other values, but that isn't as central to the question). Such metaphors are useful for structuring a culture and are a wonderful basis for humor. But most believers don't believe just that. They believe in a separately existing conscious entity that was involved in the formation of the world around us. That is the notion that I find rather silly.
That's exactly what gods are, and it's the singular problem with theistic religions. Not that it's silly, but that creating a religion out of idealized human agency imports the very specific problems of human agency.
People have taboos. People have shitlists. People exact revenge. People are transactional. Conveniently, theistic gods service this collection of bias in every example thusfar. Who knows, maybe the next revelation will fix god, but I doubt it. I suppose actual people would check off all those boxes anyway, no matter what their religion is organized around....but when a religion centers a personal and intervening god, those broadly objectionable human traits go from vice to virtue.
I am the Infantry. I am my country’s strength in war, her deterrent in peace. I am the heart of the fight… wherever, whenever. I carry America’s faith and honor against her enemies. I am the Queen of Battle. I am what my country expects me to be, the best trained Soldier in the world. In the race for victory, I am swift, determined, and courageous, armed with a fierce will to win. Never will I fail my country’s trust. Always I fight on…through the foe, to the objective, to triumph overall. If necessary, I will fight to my death. By my steadfast courage, I have won more than 200 years of freedom. I yield not to weakness, to hunger, to cowardice, to fatigue, to superior odds, For I am mentally tough, physically strong, and morally straight. I forsake not, my country, my mission, my comrades, my sacred duty. I am relentless. I am always there, now and forever. I AM THE INFANTRY! FOLLOW ME!
