Why I think atheists should not reject all religious text.

[Losty]

I'm giving you enough credit to assume you(and most atheists) are smart enough to filter out anything that's not helpful.

People like you are precisely the reason I hate that we can't give people negative rep here. This isn't kindergarten t-ball, and you don't deserve a trophy and a pat on the back for being a condescending douchebag.

[LostLocke]

Either you're not being honest or you should read a lot more of the bible. But considering that the most popular verses tend to be about treating people with kindness and love, I have a hard time believing you've no knowledge of them.

That's what we call cherry picking.
The most popular verses are popular because they're the ones people can actually tolerate.
They pick out the 'love thy neighbor' and 'feed the hungry' ones while ignoring the 'treat your slaves this way' and 'beat your children to death' ones.

[Minimalist]

They pick out the 'love thy neighbor' and 'feed the hungry' ones while ignoring

"Love the neighbor pre-dates xtianity by at least 6 centuries. And "feed the hungry" doesn't survive congressional republicunts who want to slash food stamps.

Their hypocrisy overwhelms whatever accidental good they might do.

[Cato]

Thou deletest ye olde dotte in the end of the url, and thou shaltst find sillyness.

Thanks for pointing out the period. Always good to learn something useful. You were also right about the content of the site.

[boothj1985]

I wonder if anyone has looked into the possible problem of the repel-effect in which a person who doesn't want to follow false teachings accidentally becomes contrary to many good teachings that are contained within the religious text of a religion.

What are "good teachings"? How does one determine what is good and bad? Think about it for a bit!

Religion claims ALL of it's teachings are good, but we all know that is not the case. But how do we, or you, know that? All of us, including you, use our own judgement and morality to determine what is good, from our perspective. What this means is, if we have to decide on things by ourselves, even if we are presented with a "good teaching", if we cannot agree with it, we will discard it as bad, and similarly if we can find a bad teaching beneficial, we might end up seeing it as a good teaching.

So what happens when you try to find "good teachings" from a book filled with bad ones? You'll end up eventually mistaking some good teachings as bad and bad ones as good. And since the percentage of bad teachings is much higher than good ones, the probability of mistaking a bad teaching as good is also quite high. So why take that chance, when you don't even need those ideas in the first place? After all, in your everyday life you'd always rely on your own knowledge and moral compass rather than what a religious book might have to say about that situation.


Now, there's another thing you need to understand, atheists are NOT trying to become an authority on morality, nor are they trying to lead the flock. Actually, atheism has nothing to do with morality, it's just a neutral position for a particular type of claim. Atheists also do not hold any responsibility towards teaching religious people how to cherry-pick their own books, or need to compromise on their beliefs just to get along with someone.

Actually morality is a sort of science. A limited science, as is all science since your effect on others could be extended out to possible aliens out in the universe or every insect and even bacteria but just like physics, the idea is to understand what is necessary to accomplish things that help most people, like detecting the path of possible threatening asteroids in space, which doesn't require the complete understanding of dark matter/energy. As far as atheists being a non-factor in the realm of ethics I must disagree because simply existing in the same physical world with other beings who experience pain and joy just like you means you are responsible for the effect your actions have on others. Morality can be foggy but with research and trial/error we can come to greater understanding. What is the end goal? From a humanist perspective, the goal is to decide what is the best way to live to benefit all people. I'm not quite of that view because I feel that all beings(humans and animals) should be considered relative to the capacity to feel they have which is most likely correlated with the number of neurons they have.

[LastPoet]

You don't know what science is.

[Jackalope]

Speaking only to the xtian bible at the moment - as literature, it has value.

Once you pick out the kernels of corn from the atrocious shit, I find that a) they aren't original, b) not a single one of them isn't pretty obvious, and c) not a one requires a divine force.

I don't need it as a roadmap for life - I managed to figure that shit out without it.

[abaris]

I feel that all beings(humans and animals) should be considered relative to the capacity to feel they have which is most likely correlated with the number of neurons they have.

Most likely correlated based on what?

Have you even bothered to look at recent behavioral expirements with animals? They're freely available on the internet.

And, quite frankly, I'm starting to have my doubts about you being an agnostic atheist. First you're coming up with an apologist website of the first order to underline some lofty claim about the holy books having some moral values. And now we're down to pseudo science.

[Aoi Magi]

Actually morality is a sort of science.

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A limited science, as is all science since your effect on others could be extended out to possible aliens out in the universe or every insect and even bacteria but just like physics, the idea is to understand what is necessary to accomplish things that help most people, like detecting the path of possible threatening asteroids in space, which doesn't require the complete understanding of dark matter/energy. As far as atheists being a non-factor in the realm of ethics I must disagree because simply existing in the same physical world with other beings who experience pain and joy just like you means you are responsible for the effect your actions have on others. Morality can be foggy but with research and trial/error we can come to greater understanding. What is the end goal? From a humanist perspective, the goal is to decide what is the best way to live to benefit all people. I'm not quite of that view because I feel that all beings(humans and animals) should be considered relative to the capacity to feel they have which is most likely correlated with the number of neurons they have.

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I demand a giant facepalm icon for these situations.

[boothj1985]

OK, so that's the conclusion of the text quoted.


In German we have word for that: "secondary virtues". Meaning, focussing on things that aren't really important and have next to no impact on society. These secondary virtues are a great tool to keep people towing the line. Don't do this or that and most of all obey.

Small wonder that the article also points out, that atheists as well as liberals don't want to obey authority. They on the other hand, speaking as christians, think obeying to be a virtue. It's literally the line of thinking that led us into two world wars.

That makes a lot of sense. I think that atheists-and some liberal Christians-view certain issues as morally neutral. Looking at photos of consenting adults who want to take sexually suggestive photos or videos is morally neutral to me, for example, but to some Christians it is a black/white moral issue.

Christians-at least here in the southern US- are the ones that reject their own bible. The book is supposed to be their holy text and yet many have not read it or cherry pick which rules to follow. There is no direct rule against abortion, for example but there are multiple verses in both the Old and New Testament about god's anger when the poor are not helped. Yet many Christians want laws against abortion but believe that helping the poor should be voluntary.

The thing is if we know that most believers will rationalize, ignore, etc the bad parts of the bible you can only address them on their terms. Only if they see you acknowledging the good morals of their faith they will be hard pressed to question the assumption that atheists main motivation for not believing is to have no accountability. How is profanity or adult films/images an issue? It's very nuanced and dependent on many factors such as the impressionability of the individual or people who they effect, the state of affairs in their society, etc. but basically what's the danger is that people can be subconsciously driven to engage in riskier behaviors that can involve stds, unplanned pregnancy, or harassment and certain language often involves references to noxious things and can subconsciously drive a person to not be as sanitary or careful in their dealings with others. This is part speculation and part based on information but it is understandable nevertheless. The misuse of religion in supporting bad laws and discrimination are definitely an issue to be addressed but unless their are some people who are "big" enough to overlook the many flaws of the religious doctrines, there can be no progress. The biggest problem are the ones who know it's a sham and are just using it for personal profit, in which case you have to just try and expose them since they likely have no sense of shame.

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I feel that all beings(humans and animals) should be considered relative to the capacity to feel they have which is most likely correlated with the number of neurons they have.

Most likely correlated based on what?

Have you even bothered to look at recent behavioral expirements with animals? They're freely available on the internet.

And, quite frankly, I'm starting to have my doubts about you being an agnostic atheist. First you're coming up with an apologist website of the first order to underline some lofty claim about the holy books having some moral values. And now we're down to pseudo science.

I've read many dubious scientific articles that get so caught up in details and technicalities that they seem to miss some obvious logic issues. As far as determining a being's level of consciousness based on what we see, I think the same issue of personification that makes religion have so much weight comes into play. Seeing an insect run for its life doesn't mean it is experiencing the same level of fear a human does when they're running for their life. Think of color-depth for instance. The more colors an image is made up of like 8-bit vs 24-bit has a big impact on how realistic and vivid the image appears. The image may have the same basic appearance and describe the same thing but it's accuracy is based on the quantity of information used to express it.