51. I believe that there is no God.

Comment #200309 by theIdiot on June 27, 2008 at 9:34 am

Ah, steveyboy, I'm surprised you don't see the comedy in your own post.

So are you saying if I relied on my conscious it would lead me to choose love over hatred?

Does my conscious have a transcendent moral framework, different than my own? Does it compel me to love and hate, what I don't feel compelled to love and hate already?

If I am to reject the silly voice of the fairy in the sky, why not reject the voice of the fairy in my head as well.

Rational decisions are not necessarily moral at all, and moral decisions are not necessarily rational. In fact rationality can do away with morality with ease.

So you're saying that Atheist who supported Hitler had an easier time getting over their jewish prejudices than their Christian counterparts? Are you saying that Godless nations such as France, are less hostile and have an easier time integrating into their society muslim immigrants, than the US, who sees itself as dominantly christian?

Are you saying that Hindu Indians, who have no religious basis for an opposition towards homosexuality, have an easier time getting over this prejudice than American Christians? Are you saying they are less hostile towards gay men, than Americans, since they have no religious basis for their prejudice?

It seems you don't have much of a clue as to the nature of prejudice now do you? I doubt you formed your earlier view from research, or learning, but more or less from self promotion.

52. I believe that there is no God.

Comment #200260 by theIdiot on June 27, 2008 at 7:40 am

What we have here, is YOU rejecting Atran because he doesn't conform to your preconceived conclusion. You claim he rejects other valid data, yet I don't recall a single individual from Beyond Belief (let's not forget Dawkins, and Harris were in attendance as well), who presented Atran with data to reject. He rejected there dimwitted intuition, but not their data, particularly after he was bold enough to claim they had none.

But let's put you to the test, please provide us with scientific research, and studies on the matter of what religion can and cannot do. Please show me the scientific data that leads us to believe the religion locks in behaviors, such as hatred? Or will you have the balls to admit the truth, that you just made that part up? That you pulled it out your ass? Own up to it fool!

Your post is one of the more comical one's that I've read on the magical powers of atheism. Of how the disbelievers fairy dust, recreates the world in care bear love, dislodging all the hatred in the world, through a belief in Godlessness. Please teach me, how as a believer I would be led to love more, if i turned to disbelief?

And let me teach you and your fellow dimwits something, if you claim that religious dogma locks in negative behaviors such as hatred, better so than irreligion, the same would be true of positive behaviors such as love, this is what logically follows. The same way if anyone is to claim this as true: "but for good men to do evil, that takes religion, than it logically follows that this is also true "but for evil men to do good, that takes religion." Now, I don't agree with either of these views, I just wanted to reveal the silliness of those who do.

None of these conclusion are satisfying, and it treat religion as if it's something mutually exclusive, and a stimuli, rather than an expression of ones social context. Religion is how one interprets what stimulates him, it an as expression. Religion doesn't teach me to hate or love, it provides me a language to express my hatred or love. Strangely one finds this oddity in the unbelievers argument, that it's nature that leads us to compassionate behavior, not one's religious upbringing, yet for some reason they work in reverse when in comes to hatred. They are quick to provide the evolutionary explanation for why we love, yet they seem miserably clueless as to why we hate.

"EDIT Are you suggesting that Muslims would show as little compassion for girls and women if they were atheist?"

Ah silly man, do you think such practices were foreign to pre-islam Saudi Arabia, where the pagan religions that dominated had no bearing on morality at all? Religion wasn't the source of the patriarchal structure of the pre-Islam Saudi Arabia, nor is it the source of it post-Islam. Judging that this structure is all most universal for all civilizations at one point in time, a learned perspective involves far more than religious scapegoating. A social context doesn't emerge out of religion, religion emerges out of it's social context.

And relativist might argue with you, that your notion of a lack of compassion here, is the product of western arrogance and ignorance. A society might view the notion of an individual taking in a child of family who couldn't afford to take care of her, in a marriage contract that postpones sex until she is of an appropriate age, to be an act of compassion. In fact, I'd even argue that most individuals who support such acts, see it as such.

But hey, who the fuck are you to tell a Saudi what you think is right or wrong, to impose your western morality on him?

53. I believe that there is no God.

Comment #198934 by theIdiot on June 24, 2008 at 7:28 pm

Ah, phil rimmer, another dope, it should have been apparent to the average reader, that I'm not referring to god existing, yahweh, or whatever else. I could have wrote a belief in God does not hold back individuals from loving, I just didn't think readers here would have been too dimwitted to figure out that is what exactly what I implied.

Judging that Scott Atran, is the anthropologist working with the state department in studying suicide terrorist, brief the National Security Council, and is involved in conflict negotiations with the middle east, I'd argue he sure knows more of what he's talking about, than dopes who take their notion of understanding of the religious mind from the uniformed pens of the Sam Harrises and Richard Dawkins of the world.

One should actually read and watch Scott Atran at Beyond Belief, with Sam Harris and company, where he rips into them for their dribble.

54. I believe that there is no God.

Comment #198543 by theIdiot on June 24, 2008 at 8:33 am

Hey dip shit Allan, did you read a defense for the afterlife in my post? Arguing with me an irrelevant point isn't going to get you too far. But out of boredom I'm going to discuss it anyway.

I would like you to find one believer who claims that afterlife belief negates a need for justice, compassion, concern for the poor, in fact wasn't the Rich Man's torment exactly because of his unconcern for the suffering Lazarus? Judging that preparation for the afterlife involves living a life of good in the here and now, kind of defeats your point doesn't it?

Now, I'm not arguing my fellow dip-shits that afterlife belief produces better individuals, than disbelief does. Or that an afterlife believe yields with it a power to make us more loving individuals, the point which our fellow morons miss is that disbelief does not either.

And for advocate of rationalism, we can reasonably support many of our decisions, even that nasty ones, by it. There's reasonable justifications for the Iraq war, and even rationalist such as Christopher Hitchens is a mouthpiece for it. There was rational justification for Nazism, eugenics, communism, the atomic bomb.

Compassion is rarely advocated my rationalistic justification. We can feed the poor in order that they work better for us, without any compassion or love for them what so over. My love for the poor and suffering humanity, needs no rational justification for it. Rationalism can just as well be indifference, in fact this is basis for Hobbesian politics.

Religious individuals need God's Justification to commit those dangerous acts they desire to do, God cannot be ignored for them, non-religious individuals can and have called for similar actions but they don't need to claim that God justifies them as well, their justification suffices.

To confront the stupidity of individuals who think religious belief is dangerous to life and limb, based on their dimwitted intuition, rather than hard science, I turn to Anthropologist (and atheist mind you) Scott Atran:

"The speculations I heard in the conference, about what religion can or cannot do and what the motives or consequences of religious belief are, have been almost entirely supported by the smallest of data sets, usually a N of 1" the speculator himself or herself " and only on the basis of that person's selectively uninformed opinion. Imagine if you tried to do science this way, you'd be met with embarrassment and bewilderment, not lauded or applauded.

Of course, if it can be proven that religious beliefs are particularly dangerous to life and limb " at least any more dangerous than a belief in the cleansing power of "democracy" " attempts at (say) de-Islamicization might be as important as de-Nazification. Yet there is no such proof, and in the absence of any proof, or even compelling data of any sort. In fact, those of us doing actual empirical research in this area have uncovered evidence to the contrary of what was claimed. Jeremy Ginges, a psychologist at the New School, finds that belief in God does not promote violence, combative martyrdom or almost anything else the "God delusion" was blamed for at the conference."

55. I believe that there is no God.

Comment #198518 by theIdiot on June 24, 2008 at 7:42 am

I've always found individuals who write such articles, and those who fawn over it to be the biggest dopes.

"No God means the possibility of less suffering in the future."

Here we have the biggest dipshits mouthing off religious nonsense, about the magical power of disbelief. With the belief that disbelief is the path yielding to more compassion for humanity. But for every one who can say "this is the only life we got, and we got to care more", you'll get those who proclaim that "life is short, so we should just party hard", which means little care for much at all. Indifference can be quite comforting in a cruel and irreparable world.

Compassion does not hinge on belief or disbelief, morons, it's hinges on human nature, where compassion is easily forgone for other competing desires, like economic stability. "Life is short" does not trounce our competing desires, that resort in human indifference, as much as preachers of the secular myth pronounce otherwise. Loving other might just as well be an unnecessarily, and detrimental luxury.

God does not hold back individuals from loving, human natures holds them back. We love as much as monkeys love other monkeys, and bears love other bears, and occasionally a bear will eat his own cub.

And next time someone wants to pass this vile rubbish, this dimwitted secular myth, as scientific, or informed, pass me the bucket so I can vomit.