I love religion!

[Zagreus]

Hey, accept my apologies for being away for a while; been caught up with other stuff. This will be a brief initial response to get myself back in the discussion, though I’m enjoying reading the one that’s ensued. I have to catch up from where I left off, so to an earlier PR comment.

Well, I think they're fascinating too, on prima facie, but on closer inspection a lot less fascinating than the stances about reality being produced by science. What's most fascinating about religious stances is why they are adhered to. The psychology of religion if you will. From that POV these religious stances are interesting. But with respect to content they do not come close to scientific findings. How to compare naive cosmogony with modern cosmology? How to judge the shallowness of a master slave relation with profound insight how nature is build from symmetry principles? How to compare bible inconsistency with math, it simply is no match. Yet they are portrayed by theists as competing methods for finding truth. Since you're so eager to look beyond your own perspective , have you tried the naturalistic perspective? Then please do elaborate on your delicate and balanced POV on the holographic principle versus the "god did it"?

There is nothing here I can disagree with, Purple. I haven’t said I regard religion as better than science, nor have I said I find the former more interesting; I simply said I find religion fascinating. This thread was not intended as an attack on the validity of science. You said it exactly when you said it is interesting why these religious ideas are adhered to. That’s partly why I enjoy the subject, but there’s also the fact that it’s a branch of philosophy. The last bit seems a bit gauntlet thrown down, and I’d have to look into the topics you say to comment. However, I’m not saying that by simply looking at something from another point of view means I think it’s valid. I enjoy reading creationists try to argue their view, but that does not mean I will humour them in a discussion; I enjoy trying to get my head around their way of thinking, regardless of how much I’ll disagree. Is that clearer now?

Some atheist writing I have read simply dismisses religion as silly ideas, and that’s where I get that view of other atheists from. I can quote examples from this very forum if you want, where comments are made that religious ideas are simply bull shit, or some such.

Be my guest to organize a contest of silly quotes and prove that there are plenty around! But please don't suppose you're building an argument against atheism with it, in the best possible case you could only build an argument against atheists with it.

I simply meant I’ve seen people make ignorant dismissive comments. Saying something like “Oh, not this shit again” when presented with a theological idea is hardly a worthy reply. I am not trying to build an argument against atheism, seeing as I’m an atheist; I just think people dismiss the subject too easily, without necessarily understanding the ideas. I see adults on forums say things that children I used to teach say on the subject, which does not suggest t me a deep level of understanding.

There is a patronising tone in some atheists’ language towards believers’ ideas, like people with faith are childish and they should grow out of their ideas. That is what I object to. I’m not saying it’s necessarily people here, but it’s something I have seen.

Come of it, there's no monopoly on patronizing. A comparison of patronizing tones does not build into an argument against atheism, only into an argument against certain atheists and theists.

Agreed. My gripe is with certain atheists, and theists. It wasn’t an argument against atheism, it was a comment about atheists who don’t know what they’re talking about.

The former constitutes no one coherent idea but a plethora of ever shifting ideas ranging from the extreme naive to the multi-layered multi-colored oecumenal variant of religious humanism. Since I value free thought I value the right to belief. I will never attack that right. What I do attack is religious claims being made here out in the open.

When you say it like that, how can you not find it interesting?!?

Because I simply did not say that.

What? I quoted you, so you said it?!? I meant you said it so eloquently how could one not like the sound of the subject you described. This is a minor point, but I meant it a compliment, which I think you missed.

I find the atheists who are most confrontational towards religion tend to be the ones who were raised religiously. That speaks volumes I would say.

Well maybe if you supply some statistics on this we could decide if your hunge has some meat to the bone. Personally I haven't come across groups of atheists going door to door to confront our theistic fellow human being with the good message of ablolishment of slavery to gods.

Ok, hand up here. I don’t have stats, but it’s through experience of many atheists I’ve spoken to, either on forums, friends, acquaintances, parents of kids I taught, the kids themselves, and so on, that I make that assumption. Atheists may not go door to door, but many I’ve spoken to can be quite evangelical in their beliefs.

I highly value Richard Dawkins' opinion about the epistemolological aspects of religion and I think the accusation that his critique is shallow and without indepth knowledge of theological grounds is a shallow attempt to dismiss his critique by avoiding the content of the matter. It is a reference to some still deeper grounds, it's the mystical card being played. If there are any straight answers they should be given, if there are non they shouldn't been feigned.

From what I’ve seen Dawkins is a very good biologist, and I won’t argue with him there. However, he attacks literalist religion, nothing more, and is very rude in basically saying religious people are superstitious and should grow up.

The majority of the world population of abrahamic theists abides to literalist interpretation in some form. It is indeed very rude to simply deny these theists their belief by implying that surely no sane believer has any literalism left. Dawkins' head on attack of literalism is more sincere than your attempt to cloak literalism with non-literalism.

I’d have to disagree with you here about your interpretation of my views, and I hope the above makes this clearer. I am not cloaking anything, and as I have repeatedly said, my interest is not in the views of the literalists. Many religious people may well believe a literalist view. Many people also follow football and get really upset when their country loses at a sporting game. I don’t care about their views either.

I will go into more detail if you wish (indeed I’d enjoy it, as I’ve been trying to run these ides past people for a while.) Some of Dawkins’ ideas on the formulation of religion as a social construct I think are not too far off, but there’s a lot he misses. His dismissal of polytheism in The God Delusion just got to me, as he didn’t even deal with it in the way psychology does. He just assumes if there’s no God in the Abrahamic sense then the polytheistic religions are wrong. Hinduism is vastly more complex than that, seeing as it looks like a polytheistic faith, but is actually monotheistic. That’s where I’m coming from saying he doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Brahman is not the same theological concept that Yahweh or Allah is.

Complexity is no replacement for substance. And the alleged complexity of Hinduism cannot make up for christian literalism. I do acknowledge however that Dawkins primarily attacks the god concept of abrahamic belief.

Still missing what I’m saying. The complexity could be to do with intellectual ideas, and in that case they have as much worth as most of western philosophy, which largely comes down to semantics anyway.

[Zagreus]

In reply to your earlier question.

I grew up in a totally secular household. My parents were neither pro or anti-religion…

This makes sense too, as you seem to not show an empathy for religious ideas, in that you cannot even take their views seriously, and don’t really understand them. I was not inferring you had been abused, but just trying to get a background on your views. Your comments sound like me when I was 15, so I was just trying to work out why you were making those comments.

My disrespect for Religion is purely intellectual.

Your comments do not exactly demonstrate this as being fact.

And just because someone is a philosopher doesn't mean they are automatically right.

I have never tried to say that.

You can only judge religion by peoples actions.

But yet you ignore the good things from religion and only focus on the negative, so you are not judging it fairly. Martin Luther King was inspired by religion, as well as many other people who have done philanthropic actions.

It is a purely human thing, it is not

something in and of itself. Geography on the other hand is, take away people

and geography will still exist.

Apart from the correction below your original post, this is to miss the point of my comment and focus on the specific. Maths is not something in and of itself either, but you aren’t grasping my view of religion.

You are right in one respect though, Religion as a major factor in human

development does deserve serious study and understanding.

Just like War.

That doesn't mean I need to accord it some sort of reverence or think it's a good thing.

I’ve never said YOU have to do anything, I simply said I find religion fascinating. I also find war interesting, but I don’t necessarily accord either with an ethical judgment as a stereotype. We agree it is a major factor, I just like to try to understand it, rather than simply dismiss it.

[Edwardo Piet]

Zagreus, I think perhaps you would benefit from the book: Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon - by Daniel Dennett which I am currently reading myself and so far, I have thoroughly enjoyed it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breaking_th...Phenomenon

EvF

[Zagreus]

Zagreus, I think perhaps you would benefit from the book: Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon - by Daniel Dennett which I am currently reading myself and so far, I have thoroughly enjoyed it.

Nice one, thanks. I just read the wiki page and it sounds exactly the type of thing I'm into. I'll try to pick up a copy as soon as I can.

If you're interested in origins of religion from an anthropological / archaeological view I can recommend a couple of books that the tutor of a stone age archaeology course I'm currently doing has suggested. I've not read them yet, but apparently they deal with the early social developments of humans.

[David Henson]

I'm an atheist who is fascinated by religion, and I am also very keen to empathise with religious views, and regard them with much value. Someone like Dawkins attacks faith at a literalist base value, and it come across, to me, that he has no imagination and doesn't actually know what he's talking about regarding the complexities of religious belief.

Dawkins is a good scientist, a poor intellectual and isn't very informed on the God and Bible of which he speaks. He has, in my opinion, an agenda for a sort of scientific dogma not unlike the narrow minded religious efforts in the past that have failed. That isn't to say that he is uninformed when it comes to religion but I suspect that he is just that. Hitchens, on the other hand is a somewhat more astute intellectual and has a considerable knowledge of religion. The problem with Hitchens is that is is only more informed on the Bible from a religious perspective. He is the one that I can relate to the most, not because of his knowledge of religion, which is far superior to my own, but because of his hatred for religion, which I also share. Religion is far more damaging to the search for accurate truth of the Bible than any of those types of pundits could ever possibly be, but their primary objective is not of the Bible as much as it is religion.

To understand many people's religious ideas it is vital to at least see things from their perspective, in order to understand the idea; almost like 'extreme philosophy' whereby you have to get your head totally around something that makes no sense to you.

To me religion makes sense. I get it, and I think I get people's irreligious ideas as well; that makes sense as well. I think it is important to realize what religious means to the individual person, though. The religious, the social, the political etc. can be an intensely personal thing. To me, religion implies organization rather than theology or theism.

All religion has an intrinsic value; by this I don't mean the herd mentality of simple dogmatic religion, but that religion itself is a necessary part of our nature. Simply put it cannot be separated from our species, when regarded from any perspective, be that anthropological, historical, social, psychological, archaeological, etc.

Historically speaking I suppose that is true, but that could possibly change.

So, as the title says, I love religion, and think that many (maybe most) atheists don't know what they are talking about when criticising the ideas.

May I ask why on Earth you of all people would "love religion?"

[Zen Badger]

In reply to your earlier question.

I grew up in a totally secular household. My parents were neither pro or anti-religion…

This makes sense too, as you seem to not show an empathy for religious ideas, in that you cannot even take their views seriously, and don’t really understand them. I was not inferring you had been abused, but just trying to get a background on your views. Your comments sound like me when I was 15, so I was just trying to work out why you were making those comments.

My disrespect for Religion is purely intellectual.

Your comments do not exactly demonstrate this as being fact.

And just because someone is a philosopher doesn't mean they are automatically right.

I have never tried to say that.

You can only judge religion by peoples actions.

But yet you ignore the good things from religion and only focus on the negative, so you are not judging it fairly. Martin Luther King was inspired by religion, as well as many other people who have done philanthropic actions.

It is a purely human thing, it is not

something in and of itself. Geography on the other hand is, take away people

and geography will still exist.

Apart from the correction below your original post, this is to miss the point of my comment and focus on the specific. Maths is not something in and of itself either, but you aren’t grasping my view of religion.

You are right in one respect though, Religion as a major factor in human

development does deserve serious study and understanding.

Just like War.

That doesn't mean I need to accord it some sort of reverence or think it's a good thing.

I’ve never said YOU have to do anything, I simply said I find religion fascinating. I also find war interesting, but I don’t necessarily accord either with an ethical judgment as a stereotype. We agree it is a major factor, I just like to try to understand it, rather than simply dismiss it.

Why do you think that because I don't respect religion I don't understand it?

It's because I understand it that causes me to disrespect it.

I find War(as a human institution) fascinating and have many books on it.

That doesn't mean I wish to be a soldier.

But I'm amused by your inference that because we don't like religion and dismiss it

that we don't know anything about it.

[Zagreus]

You bring up empirical evidence yourself as an acceptable alternative but non-empirical deductional proof is valid also in debate. Still you put the words in the mouth of the atheist that all evidence must be empirical.

I disagree here if we are trying to prove existence. Deductional proof does not validate the existence of a deity. You can logically prove things by definition, but that does not mean they exist. It can work in debate if it’s theoretical, but not in physical reality.

Hmmm. In fact with this stance I think you have a more restrictive approach than I have. You're assuming a dichotomy between that what exists and that what can be thought. And most of us accept this dicotomy as truth. I accept it myself as the most probable model of reality but leave open the possibility that some evidence in the future might lead to other conclusions. Like in The Matrix we cannot be 100% of such a dichotomy. I leave open the possibility that deductive reasoning some time in the future might lead us to conclude that something necessarily exists. IMO however it is not possible to conclude conclusively from deductional proof that things in reality either exists or don't exist. BTW, this touches on a subject that interests me much, the relation between mathematics and reality.

No, I’m not assuming that dichotomy. What I mean is that you can’t define something into existence, in the same way you can’t define it into non-existence. For example, I have seen it argued many times that if God is all loving and all knowing, then why does He allow evil. This then leads into semantic tricks, flaws, and so on. However, the fact that people define ‘God’ one way, and then others find contradictions does not then necessitate that a deity does not exist. Off the top of my head, it’s kind of like me asserting that black holes are pink, and because there are no pink black holes, then they don’t exist. Crap example I know, but you see what I mean? A deity could exist regardless of people’s ideas that it has to be omnibenevolent. That sort of thing is fine when dealing with literalist interpretations of religious ideas, but I don’t feel is satisfactory in the broader sense.

The bit you said after I am in agreement with. I mean, it was (as far as I know) deductively worked out that black holes should exist, or that there is a tenth (now ninth I guess, poor old Pluto) planet which is causing gravitational pull on other things of mass. Maths isn’t my strong point sadly, but I’d be interested to hear your ideas on the relation of mathematics and reality, so much so I think it’ll like a bit with the next bit.

In trying to see "things from another point of view in order to examine your own" you stretch yourself beyond the boundary of logic and forget that both theists and atheists implicitly or explicitly accept the rules of informal logic in which circular reasoning is fallacious when engaging in debate. This is necessary to be able to communicate. If a theist or atheist chooses to accept what is considered illogic such as the circular reasoning in your examples all gates to hell are open for we should accept on word alone all assertions being made. There is no halfway into the realm of illogic. Once you let in illogic all argument disintegrates.

Hmmm, not quite, but I agree with you. Thing is, once you get really into theological ideas you inevitably get into symbolic and codified language. Many religious ideas aren’t quite ‘illogical’ if you see them from their point of view; i.e. Qur’an is proof of God’s existence. I am going beyond my logic, but I can still try to see other’s views. Once you go into the philosophical ideas deeply, they create their own logic rather than working by simplistic means. The Qabalah could be an example of this.

Circular arguments should be dismissed now though, that was more a dig at those who use them, as opposed to a serious attempt to justify them.

Firstly, using symbols and codified language as in theology or popular bible interpretation is not necessarily the same as using logic but can easily amount to a case of mimicking logic. The popular bible interpretation you can find in church on sunday is too loosely defined to constitute anything that comes near logic. The shift in some churches from literal to metaphorical interpretation testifies about that fact. The range of 3000+ christian denominations testifies about that fact.

---

What I meant by symbols and codified language was that there are specific ideas related to words being used, and that they refer to quite abstract ideas that are not immediately comprehensible by normal usage of language. To relate to your interest in mathematics; if we had a conversation about advanced mathematics I would get lost very quickly, you would have to explain various phrases to me, and I’d have to understand their definition, context, etc. in order that we had a meaningful discussion. Once you get into abstract mathematics it becomes purely logical and you are dealing with ideas the average person does not understand the intricacies of. I could not hold an equal discussion about quantum physics with a physics graduate, that’s just the nature of it.

Now, regarding theology, the word ‘god’ has a lot of baggage and people bring with them their own preconceptions, some of which may or may not be entirely accurate. I have seen people in discussions simply lump the Muslim concept of Allah and the Hindu concept of Brahman together, and then dismiss them both as the same thing. This comparison just is not accurate, and it’s like comparing Zeus with the Tao, when they are totally different ideas.

Comparing popular Bible study with abstract theology is like me comparing the times tables with Lefschetz hyperplane theorem.

Secondly, since it's basis is strictly dogmatic all of theology is special pleading, the logic of it is not attached to reality by means of critical examination of the validity in reality of premises from which argument departed. Sure you can have all kinds of logic in that way, as you can have all kinds of academic math that probably will never have an application in reality. That logic is airborn, it has no roots in reality. The thing is that all conclusions arrived at from such air suspended logic are totally irrelevant yet they are claimed to be extremely important. Sure, I can follow the reasoning of airborn god concepts and I may even wonder about the splendour of human imagination, I may even agree with moral conclusions arrived at in this way, but at the end of the day it amounts to speculation and fabulation. And that seems a pretty miserable basis for all things important in this life to me.

So the real challenge is not about being able to see the 'logic' of the believer but about the rooting of that in reality and about the best method to arrive at meaningful conclusions about reality.

I totally agree. In the same way that some of the academic math will have no application to reality, nor does my interest in theology. As I’ve said, personally I think of it as a branch of philosophy, and at the end of the day, a lot philosophy has no application to reality either.

My interest is not in trying to find some sort of spiritual truth, but is just a general interest in our species, its history and its ideas. I see what you are saying, but religious ideas do have an impact on reality, as people act on them. It is reality for them, whether or not it is for me also.

---

Why do you think that because I don't respect religion I don't understand it?

I'm going by the information you give me, which so far has been that religion doesn't let you wank, all religious people believe in a Santa in the sky, and Buddhism isn't a religion. Not really showing an in depth understanding of the ins and outs of theology are you?

It's because I understand it that causes me to disrespect it.

I can understand that would lead you to disagree with religious ideas and / or religion, but the childish disrespectful comments you make are the sort of thing that even the 12 year olds I used to teach didn’t make. If your comments were disrespectful in a witty way, then that would be interesting, and there are loads of comedians who do just this. I have not seen anything insightful from your posts so far, so I have to assume you don’t really know much about it other than your biased presumptions.

I find War(as a human institution) fascinating and have many books on it.

That doesn't mean I wish to be a soldier.

*Bangs head on keyboard*

THAT’S WHAT I’VE BEEN SAYING FOR THE LAST FEW PAGES!!!!

Just because I find religious ideas interesting, that does not mean I have to agree with them or be religious myself.

If war is a mutual interest between us then please allow me to use it to demonstrate a point.

If I simply said to you “I think war is gay and Hitler wanted to go to war as he didn’t like Jews as he thought they all masturbate at pictures of banks” would you think I was showing an understanding of the subject of WW2?

That’s how you are coming across to me on the subject of religion.

But I'm amused by your inference that because we don't like religion and dismiss it

that we don't know anything about it.

Hang on a sec, it’s only you that I’ve said doesn’t understand it. There’s no ‘we’ here, unless you’re referring to yourself in the Royal plural. Quite a few other people’s responses have been interesting, showing different understandings of the subject, and there have been some book recommendations.
In my experience, some atheists do just dismiss religion without really going into the subject and knowing that much about it. Others, however, like myself or some others on this forum, seem to know a fair bit about the subject, and have based their atheism on that.

Whilst the title of this thread was meant a little tongue in cheek, I didn’t imagine it to be the equivalent of turning up at a Klan rally and saying “actually, I think blacks are alright.” Sorry to disappoint, but I know full well there are many atheists who are interested and knowledgeable in the subject. I was just interested to see other people’s views on the matter, whether they took a dislike to religion or an interest in the subject, that’s all. I haven’t inferred anything about all atheists, in the same way I wouldn't lump all theists together either.

[Purple Rabbit]

Hmmm. In fact with this stance I think you have a more restrictive approach than I have. You're assuming a dichotomy between that what exists and that what can be thought. And most of us accept this dicotomy as truth. I accept it myself as the most probable model of reality but leave open the possibility that some evidence in the future might lead to other conclusions. Like in The Matrix we cannot be 100% of such a dichotomy. I leave open the possibility that deductive reasoning some time in the future might lead us to conclude that something necessarily exists. IMO however it is not possible to conclude conclusively from deductional proof that things in reality either exists or don't exist. BTW, this touches on a subject that interests me much, the relation between mathematics and reality.

No, I’m not assuming that dichotomy. What I mean is that you can’t define something into existence, in the same way you can’t define it into non-existence. For example, I have seen it argued many times that if God is all loving and all knowing, then why does He allow evil. This then leads into semantic tricks, flaws, and so on. However, the fact that people define ‘God’ one way, and then others find contradictions does not then necessitate that a deity does not exist. Off the top of my head, it’s kind of like me asserting that black holes are pink, and because there are no pink black holes, then they don’t exist. Crap example I know, but you see what I mean? A deity could exist regardless of people’s ideas that it has to be omnibenevolent. That sort of thing is fine when dealing with literalist interpretations of religious ideas, but I don’t feel is satisfactory in the broader sense.

I see what you mean. The thing is that the word "god" as a container for every possible and impossible god concept and a particular well defined "god" often switch role in debate. If you have shown the illogic of the latter there is always the hideout of the former. That's why any debate on god should start with a complete definition.

The bit you said after I am in agreement with. I mean, it was (as far as I know) deductively worked out that black holes should exist, or that there is a tenth (now ninth I guess, poor old Pluto) planet which is causing gravitational pull on other things of mass. Maths isn’t my strong point sadly, but I’d be interested to hear your ideas on the relation of mathematics and reality, so much so I think it’ll like a bit with the next bit.

...

What I meant by symbols and codified language was that there are specific ideas related to words being used, and that they refer to quite abstract ideas that are not immediately comprehensible by normal usage of language. To relate to your interest in mathematics; if we had a conversation about advanced mathematics I would get lost very quickly, you would have to explain various phrases to me, and I’d have to understand their definition, context, etc. in order that we had a meaningful discussion. Once you get into abstract mathematics it becomes purely logical and you are dealing with ideas the average person does not understand the intricacies of. I could not hold an equal discussion about quantum physics with a physics graduate, that’s just the nature of it.

Now, regarding theology, the word ‘god’ has a lot of baggage and people bring with them their own preconceptions, some of which may or may not be entirely accurate. I have seen people in discussions simply lump the Muslim concept of Allah and the Hindu concept of Brahman together, and then dismiss them both as the same thing. This comparison just is not accurate, and it’s like comparing Zeus with the Tao, when they are totally different ideas.

Comparing popular Bible study with abstract theology is like me comparing the times tables with Lefschetz hyperplane theorem.

I think you're referring to Lifschitz there. The point is that all the codification and symbol manipulation activity in the case of religion has been done without the reality check of empirical evidence. In most cases it simply has been done to arrive at a preset conclusion called dogma. Theology is the one discipline at universities that indeed glorifies dogmatic thinking as a sound intellectual activity about reality. It is all special pleading. No matter how intricate and sophisticated the result may appear. In mathematics on the other hand assumptions are not intentionally made to reflect anything about reality. Its application to reality is part of the scientific method and is only granted when it demonstrably helps to build a better model of reality with which it is possible to better explain, predict and detail.

Also what you're saying about popular bible study means that the biggest scam on earth walks free without interference of so called serious theology. That is telling. Theology is not concerned with the best possible truth but only with the biggest possible herd of followers.

My interest is not in trying to find some sort of spiritual truth, but is just a general interest in our species, its history and its ideas. I see what you are saying, but religious ideas do have an impact on reality, as people act on them. It is reality for them, whether or not it is for me also.

I agree religion is an interesting subject since it motivates people to act in certain ways. In that respect the religious ideas their origin and interprtation are both interesting and relevant.