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RE: Why Do People Need Religion?
November 7, 2015 at 10:31 pm
(November 5, 2015 at 11:05 pm)Rebel Wrote: What is it with human's obstinate reliance on religion, in one form or another, be it tossing virgins into volcanoes in far more primitive days, or symbolically drinking the blood of some cosmic zombie in the hopes of everlasting life?
I would like to think that as we continue to become enlightened to more practical information and reasoning, we would become less sensitized to religious indoctrination. Yet it seems that religion has begun to strengthen it's stranglehold on mankind, causing the incitement of radicalism and the banging of war drums.
Since my conversion from christianity to atheism, I've considered religion the most nefarious practical joke mankind has ever perpetrated upon itself. Even more so than the GotP. And I wonder, why, exactly?
I believe there are various reasons, from mere survival to the desire of immortality. Or perhaps to wield fear-based power over the masses.
But, all the reasons seem archaic by modern standards. So, why does religion endure beyond cultural indoctrination?
Fear. Fear will keep religion alive forever. As an Atheist I like to fantasize about a world with no religion, but that's all it is, a fantasy. So long as humans are too immature to accept and face their own mortality, and accept responsibility for their own actions, religion will be right there with a tailor made crutch.
I personally find this depressing, but however unpleasant it may be, I must myself face reality.
I reject your reality and substitute my own!
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RE: Why Do People Need Religion?
November 7, 2015 at 10:36 pm
People do not need religion. It would be simple to acknowledge one's god (if one were so inclined to that delusion) without subscribing to any religion, but that would not allow control over other lives. Religion needs people.
You make people miserable and there's nothing they can do about it, just like god.
-- Homer Simpson
God has no place within these walls, just as facts have no place within organized religion.
-- Superintendent Chalmers
Science is like a blabbermouth who ruins a movie by telling you how it ends. There are some things we don't want to know. Important things.
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Once something's been approved by the government, it's no longer immoral.
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RE: Why Do People Need Religion?
November 21, 2015 at 5:18 pm
Because humans fear the unknown. Oblivion as it pertains to our conciousness is very hard for people to accept. The masterminds who invented the various religions of the world took advantage of this with the intent to manipulate people. Believing one can live on forever in a paridise after death allows the scared and naive among us to face death without freaking out.
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RE: Why Do People Need Religion?
November 21, 2015 at 5:29 pm
To make themselves feel good when they don't have the ability to find it any other way. They become superior, part of a tribe, and in the end believe that they get the ultimate reward that outsiders don't get or deserve. Nice delusion ain't it.
Being told you're delusional does not necessarily mean you're mental.
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RE: Why Do People Need Religion?
November 21, 2015 at 6:44 pm
(This post was last modified: November 21, 2015 at 6:46 pm by bennyboy.)
Unlike most here, I don't think fear is the main reason for religion. I think it is an attempt to anthropomorphize the unknowable. If fear was the main reason for religion, God would have been a cuddly puppy, or a really nice Grammy-gram-- not a fire-breathing city destroyer.
You have to be dense to think that "God is an almighty god who will burn you in hellfire for eternity" is an attempt to alleviate fear. Rather, there is our tendency to pretend we understand that which we don't understand, and this is a human trait, not only of religion. Science does this, too, in a different way-- it slaps numbers onto things (statistics in QM for example) and relaxes now that it "knows" how things work.
I'd say it's more a matter of pride-- we see OURSELVES as Gods, and are annoyed by the very many mysteries around us. And by de-mystifying them with the right narratives, we get to stick our heads in the sand and feel that, after all, we are the center of it all. In my opinion, that's why God is a cruel, sadistic fuck-- because that's what the culture that invented God was. By making God in their image, they announced, "We are perfect."
