RE: A world without Christianity
January 14, 2015 at 1:59 pm
(This post was last modified: January 14, 2015 at 2:00 pm by Esquilax.)
I guess my main problem with what you're saying, Grasshopper (did you pick your name just so that every sentence that ends in it would automatically be read in a stereotypical asian accent? 
) is that you're conflating, baselessly, things that originated from christians as things that originated from christianity. I don't think there's any reason to do that, but I understand totally why you do; christianity has a habit of attempting to claim exclusive ownership over the best parts of human nature, and pretending that they come from the religion, rather than the people in them.
But why do you think, say, that the spread of literacy would be stoppered if there was no bible to be the book at the forefront of it? Why attribute the spread of literacy to the book, rather than the people printing and reading it? That's rather like attributing the rise of the automobile industry to cars, as though cars are some naturally occurring resource and not something that human beings make for a reason. The bible, by dint of the narrative concerning its origin and content, might have been the book most urgently propagated, and I can see why those who buy into its divine claims would want those words spread, but it was people doing the spreading. We understand the value of literacy, it doesn't inherently need some additional value stapled onto it to have utility.
Your point about universities is... equally shaky, since christianity has been responsible for the elimination of as many houses of knowledge as it has been their establishment. Let's not forget that it was an emperor looking to impose christian dominance over other points of view who shut down Plato's Academy, after all. "Founded by christians," is not the same thing as "foundation solely attributed to christianity," as well; the unifying thing that all university founders everywhere have had is that they were human beings, so I'm interested as to why you're arbitrarily locking your attributions to the christian religion when there's a much more widespread common denominator that even non-christians share.
In fact, that last point kinda applies to all your arguments here. Without the needless presupposition that christianity was the cause of all these things you list, and not human nature, your argument ceases to be at all meaningful or pressing. What's also strange is that the most likely alternative to christianity disappearing never even seemed to occur to you, which is that the majority of the things you say would never have happened... would still happen, just under the name of a different god, whose religion got to flourish when the suppressive force of early christianity disappeared.
) is that you're conflating, baselessly, things that originated from christians as things that originated from christianity. I don't think there's any reason to do that, but I understand totally why you do; christianity has a habit of attempting to claim exclusive ownership over the best parts of human nature, and pretending that they come from the religion, rather than the people in them. But why do you think, say, that the spread of literacy would be stoppered if there was no bible to be the book at the forefront of it? Why attribute the spread of literacy to the book, rather than the people printing and reading it? That's rather like attributing the rise of the automobile industry to cars, as though cars are some naturally occurring resource and not something that human beings make for a reason. The bible, by dint of the narrative concerning its origin and content, might have been the book most urgently propagated, and I can see why those who buy into its divine claims would want those words spread, but it was people doing the spreading. We understand the value of literacy, it doesn't inherently need some additional value stapled onto it to have utility.
Your point about universities is... equally shaky, since christianity has been responsible for the elimination of as many houses of knowledge as it has been their establishment. Let's not forget that it was an emperor looking to impose christian dominance over other points of view who shut down Plato's Academy, after all. "Founded by christians," is not the same thing as "foundation solely attributed to christianity," as well; the unifying thing that all university founders everywhere have had is that they were human beings, so I'm interested as to why you're arbitrarily locking your attributions to the christian religion when there's a much more widespread common denominator that even non-christians share.
In fact, that last point kinda applies to all your arguments here. Without the needless presupposition that christianity was the cause of all these things you list, and not human nature, your argument ceases to be at all meaningful or pressing. What's also strange is that the most likely alternative to christianity disappearing never even seemed to occur to you, which is that the majority of the things you say would never have happened... would still happen, just under the name of a different god, whose religion got to flourish when the suppressive force of early christianity disappeared.
"YOU take the hard look in the mirror. You are everything that is wrong with this world. The only thing important to you, is you." - ronedee
Want to see more of my writing? Check out my (safe for work!) site, Unprotected Sects!
Want to see more of my writing? Check out my (safe for work!) site, Unprotected Sects!
