1. Hinduism and Buddhism offer much more sophisticated worldviews (or philosophies) and I see nothing wrong with these religions.

Comment #99038 by viswanathan on December 15, 2007 at 9:59 am

"Hinduism and Buddhism offer much more sophisticated worldviews (or philosophies) and I see nothing wrong with these religions."
My present comment is only about the allusion that the worldviews of Hinduism and Buddhism are identical or at least compatible with each other. This, I feel, is a major error.
The most authentic and most revered scriptures of Hinduism are the Vedas, also known as 'shruthi's ('revealed texts').
Much of the bulk of Vedas is concerned with sacrificial rites (yajna) where various objects (including ceremonially killed animals) were offered to sacrificial fire for pleasing Vedic godheads. For those unfamiliar with Vedic sacrificial rites, photographs in this page would be useful:
http://www.ignca.nic.in/asp/all.asp?projectid=agni
According to the ancient Indian law giver, Manu (some time between 200 BC and 200 CE) ; "..He, the Lord, ….from fire, wind, and the sun he drew forth the threefold eternal Veda, called Rik, Yagus, and Saman" . Manu declared that any person of high caste who treats Vedas with contempt "must be cast out by the virtuous, as an atheist and a scorner of the Veda". He further insisted that Vedas should not be recited in the presence of Shudras ('impure' people of 'low' caste). Women were also excluded from the study of Vedas.
In some 20 centuries that followed, Hindus' reverence towards Vedas has only deepened. Words of Vivekananda (1863-1902), the 19th century champion of Hinduism, would attest this: " You will remember that in India these Vedas are regarded in a much higher light than even the Christians regard their bible. Your idea of revelation is that a man is inspired by god; but in India the idea is that things exist because they are in the Vedas. In and through the Vedas the whole creation has come. All that is called knowledge is in the Vedas. Every word is sacred and eternal, eternal as the soul, without beginning and without end. The whole of creator's mind is in this book, as it were".

More modern praises for Vedas are appropriately 'sophisticated'. Examples:

"Vedas are the most ancient literary works on Earth, at the same time with the profoundest and widest scope. They cover all fields of knowledge, material and spiritual. The real treasures of the East weren't jewels, spices or exotic perfumes - but the amazing treasure house of sacred and universal knowledge. This knowledge, increasingly validated by modern science, is now being embraced by leading corporations, professionals and leaders around the world. Our recent scientific and technological efforts can only to some extent approach the ancient Vedic material advancement while the Vedic spirituality is much more elevated than anything we can find in the West." http://www.veda.harekrsna.cz/index.htm

"Reading the Vedic Literature in sequence is the procedure to spontaneously train the brain physiology and the whole physiology of speech to function in the most orderly way so that every thought, speech and action is spontaneously promoted in the evolutionary direction of Natural Law, and thereby spontaneously enjoys full support of the evolutionary quality of intelligence that upholds order and evolution in the entire universe." http://is1.mum.edu/vedicreserve/index.htm

However, ancient India was also home to many other philosophies that shared one common feature: Non-acceptance of the authority of Vedas, and opposition to the ritualism based on sacrifices to the gods of vedic pantheon .Buddhism was one of such philosophies. The thoughts of Nagasena, from the questions of king milinda- a Buddhist text (circa 100BCE ) – truly states the Buddhist attitude towards Vedas: "So the teacher made the boy repeat the hymns, urging him to get them by heart. And young Nâgasena, after one repetition of them, had learnt the three Vedas by heart, could intone them correctly, had understood their meaning, could fix the right place of each particular verse…….…. And he reviewed what he had learnt throughout from beginning to end, and found no value in it anywhere at all. And he exclaimed in bitterness of soul: 'Empty forsooth are these Vedas, and as chaff. There is in them neither reality, nor worth, nor essential truth!'…"