RE: Reflecting on Atheism.
November 11, 2013 at 10:51 pm
(This post was last modified: November 11, 2013 at 11:55 pm by arvind13.)
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I'm sorry, but I'm really having a hard time understanding what it is you're trying to say without thinking that you are crazy.
Perhaps you could just write out your conclusion in one sentence. What are you trying to say?
Nothing is making sense to me because Christianity isn't even the oldest religion. Hell, Greek mythology predates Christianity. Socrates, as portrayed by Plato predates Jesus by about 400 years. Read The Apology. St. Augustine practically plagiarized the entire thing when incorporating it into The Bible.
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It sounds crazy because I'm questioning the entire paradigm which has informed anthropological/historical/archaeological scholarship for the past 400 years.
You and another member mention that Greek religion, sumerian religion, Egyptian religion etc etc predate Christianity. I'm not questioning the fact that Greeks, Egyptians had their practices and traditions and stories and that it predates Christianity. What I'm questioning is what makes those vedic, Greek, Sumerian practices into religious practices. That is where I'm coming from.
Yes, Archeologists discovered sumerian relics and buildings and statues and evidence of rituals. What makes these into religious phenomena?
and no, I'm not here to push some agenda. I'm just an anthropology student wanting to have a good intellectual discussion, critical discussion. and the latest research is challenging all the accepted ideas and theories in the field.
I'll use an example from philosophy of science. hopefully it makes it clearer.
It is meant to draw attention to the nature of modern scholarship in anthropology and social sciences in general. One simply assumes that all one has to do is `write down’ what one has `observed’ for it to count as 'neutral' observation or neutral `ethnography’, and so on. These assumptions literally belong to the `stone age’ of human knowledge: one’s observation is deeply saturated with theories, ideologies and prjeudices. There is no `neutral’ or `pure’ observation: either good theories guide one’s observation or bad ones do.
Observational terms and statements are already informed by specific background theories; no theory-neutral observational language is to be found. So there is no such thing as neutral unbiased observations. All observations and descriptions of 'facts' are guided by some background framework or 'theory'.
In the case of disciplines like religious studies, history, and anthropology; these disciplines unknowingly function within the framework of Christian theology.
over the centuries, this background framework has shaped the natural-language use in European vernaculars where these discuss religion and human nature.
I'm sorry, but I'm really having a hard time understanding what it is you're trying to say without thinking that you are crazy.
Perhaps you could just write out your conclusion in one sentence. What are you trying to say?
Nothing is making sense to me because Christianity isn't even the oldest religion. Hell, Greek mythology predates Christianity. Socrates, as portrayed by Plato predates Jesus by about 400 years. Read The Apology. St. Augustine practically plagiarized the entire thing when incorporating it into The Bible.
[/quote]
It sounds crazy because I'm questioning the entire paradigm which has informed anthropological/historical/archaeological scholarship for the past 400 years.
You and another member mention that Greek religion, sumerian religion, Egyptian religion etc etc predate Christianity. I'm not questioning the fact that Greeks, Egyptians had their practices and traditions and stories and that it predates Christianity. What I'm questioning is what makes those vedic, Greek, Sumerian practices into religious practices. That is where I'm coming from.
Yes, Archeologists discovered sumerian relics and buildings and statues and evidence of rituals. What makes these into religious phenomena?
and no, I'm not here to push some agenda. I'm just an anthropology student wanting to have a good intellectual discussion, critical discussion. and the latest research is challenging all the accepted ideas and theories in the field.
I'll use an example from philosophy of science. hopefully it makes it clearer.
It is meant to draw attention to the nature of modern scholarship in anthropology and social sciences in general. One simply assumes that all one has to do is `write down’ what one has `observed’ for it to count as 'neutral' observation or neutral `ethnography’, and so on. These assumptions literally belong to the `stone age’ of human knowledge: one’s observation is deeply saturated with theories, ideologies and prjeudices. There is no `neutral’ or `pure’ observation: either good theories guide one’s observation or bad ones do.
Observational terms and statements are already informed by specific background theories; no theory-neutral observational language is to be found. So there is no such thing as neutral unbiased observations. All observations and descriptions of 'facts' are guided by some background framework or 'theory'.
In the case of disciplines like religious studies, history, and anthropology; these disciplines unknowingly function within the framework of Christian theology.
over the centuries, this background framework has shaped the natural-language use in European vernaculars where these discuss religion and human nature.
