(May 14, 2015 at 2:17 pm)Stimbo Wrote: I want to know what smoking weed and gambling have to do with being an atheist specifically.I think it has to do with the concept of absolute moral/ethical values, at least for humans (god-sanctioned actions can run afoul of those values and still be "good"). Human society does a reasonably good job of getting us to realize that certain actions are awful most of the time, and religion might tighten the screws on that by going further on many points. So while people in general will consider rape and murder to be terrible, the religious person may consider getting drunk to be just as bad, at least in terms of the final outcome. If your religion preaches that god will punish those who smoke weed with the same severity he will punish serial killers, then your attitude will adjust to match: smoking weed is treated with utmost negativity.
Remove that influence, and rape and murder are no less horrifying to the average person, but smoking weed may require a good deal more study before we label it a hanging offense.
"Well, evolution is a theory. It is also a fact. And facts and theories are different things, not rungs in a hierarchy of increasing certainty. Facts are the world's data. Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts. Facts don't go away when scientists debate rival theories to explain them. Einstein's theory of gravitation replaced Newton's in this century, but apples didn't suspend themselves in midair, pending the outcome. And humans evolved from ape- like ancestors whether they did so by Darwin's proposed mechanism or by some other yet to be discovered."
-Stephen Jay Gould
-Stephen Jay Gould
