A question for all religious believers -- why is your religion more true than any other?

[muhammad_isa]

No, it is not. You could just as easily say "I would be good without hope of eternal reward or threat of eternal punishment because that is who I am -- my religion has nothing to do with it."

..but why would I need to say that?
You imply that believers might only be "good" because they are forced to.. as if "humanists"
can somehow be more "good".

We are all subject to temptation .. and the hope in, and fear of G-d, is a bonus .. not a hindrance!

 

[Evangelicalhumanist]

..but why would I need to say that?
You imply that believers might only be "good" because they are forced to.. as if "humanists"
can somehow be more "good".

We are all subject to temptation .. and the hope in, and fear of G-d, is a bonus .. not a hindrance!

That is NOT what I said at all -- you are reading that into my words, because it is not there. Read the words, not your own opinions.

 

[Tinkerpeach]

It does seem to me that all of the religious people I know accept that their creed, their religion's essential beliefs, are correct, while all others -- because they obviously don't agree with the central tenets of their sect, must be somehow lacking.

As a non-believer in any religion, I am curious how it is, what evidence, what logic, leads you to suppose that your particular religion/denomination/sect got it right, while the others did not.

This thread is meant to be a great opportunity for believers of all kinds to engage -- to write apologetics in defense of their beliefs. I'm hoping to see significant essays!

Jesus was the only one that has been proven to exist.

He was written about by historians who were not religious at all and outside of religious text.

Now you could argue that He was simply a man but top historians don’t waste time with people that have no impact.

 

[muhammad_isa]

Jesus was the only one that has been proven to exist..

Uhhh .. no.
I reckon that there are significant historical records of Muhammad, peace be with him, also.

 

[Tinkerpeach]

Uhhh .. no.
I reckon that there are significant historical records of Muhammad, peace be with him, also.

I am not aware of any

 

[MikeF]

Having read Fleck's book, I'd say he's not using the term "thought collective" as though to become a member you must join a club or church. In the foreword to Fleck's book Thomas Kuhn says:

These and many other phrases in the book indicate that the effects of participation in a thought collective are somehow categorical or a priori. What the thought collective supplies its members is somehow like the Kantian categories, prerequisite to any thought at all.​

​

Fleck, Ludwik, Genesis and Development of a Scientific Fact. Kindle Edition.​

In this sense, an atheist doesn't necessarily have to be taught that there's no God, as a sort of initiation into that thought-collective. It's probably most often the default, or a priori, idea in their brain, or mind, and thus comes prepackaged in an epistemological sense. For these kinds of in-born atheists, the idea of God is something that would have to be proven to them beyond a shadow of a doubt and to such an extent that they might be willing to forego their in-born, default belief (there is no God), in order to join a new and initially absurd thought-collective (theists).

So "thought-collective's" are just categories of those who share the same belief regardless of how they arrived at that belief. So if two individuals arrive at a belief wholly independently in time and space, neither aware of the other and their beliefs, and no other person with whom these individuals interacted shared such a belief, it can be said that these two individuals are both within the same "thought-collective"?

If so, I see no value in even coining the term. I'm failing to see the point.

Your statement is fascinating in that it points to the the fact that there's a real sense in which atheism is, or should be, the default status of every natural born brain. In the intro to Jeff Hawkins' recent book, One Thousand Brains, Richard Dawkins points out that the "reptile brain," the original animal brain prior to the evolution of the huge cerebral cortex in human mammals, atheism was universal. There was nothing like belief in a God until the evolution of modern man. In this sense, atheism is natural. It's the default epistemological status of every creature that's ever existed up until very recently in cosmic time such that today's atheist are part of an enormous thought-collective made up of the lions share of all thought that has ever occurred.

There is no such thing as atheism without theism. I'm not seeing the fascinating part.

Fleck says that the thought-style of the default thought-collective, ". . . almost always exerts an absolutely compulsive force upon thinking . . . with which it is not possible to be at variance" (Ludwik Fleck, Genesis and Development of a Scientific Fact, p. 41).

This sounds like a description of confirmation bias. This does not really address how one comes to hold a particular belief, just that once held, it can be hard to let it go.

Nevertheless, your statement is more valuable in its justification of what was said earlier: that atheism isn't considered a thought-collective that requires serious thought since it's the default style of thinking by no fault of the atheist. In this sense theism is newfangled in that though it makes up a large percentage of human thinking today, even having overtaking atheism for a spell, in cosmic time it's a thought-collective whose existence is like a mere twinkling of an eye. The Bible even states that New Testament theists will disappear just as quickly as they appeared, that is to say in the twinkling of an eye (1 Cor. 15:52).

John

Of course there are some theist who would argue that there was never such a time, or rather, in terms of the universe, maybe 5 days in which there were no theists and cosmic time amounts to only about 7 thousand years.

 

[John D. Brey]

So "thought-collective's" are just categories of those who share the same belief regardless of how they arrived at that belief. So if two individuals arrive at a belief wholly independently in time and space, neither aware of the other and their beliefs, and no other person with whom these individuals interacted shared such a belief, it can be said that these two individuals are both within the same "thought-collective"? . . . If so, I see no value in even coining the term. I'm failing to see the point.

I would say one point would be examining what occurs when members of a particular thought-collective encounter members of a different thought-collective. Or else when the ingrained predispositions of a thought-collective come under the microscope for examination and come up wanting, after which, the nature of the thought-collective's blind-spot can cause members to deny their own lyin eyes. In the foreword to Fleck's book, Thomas Kuhn says:

Put briefly, a thought collective seems to function as an individual mind writ large because many people possess it (or are possessed by it). To explain its apparent legislative authority, Fleck therefore repeatedly resorts to terms borrowed from discourse about individuals. Sometimes he writes of the “tenacity of closed systems of opinion” (chap. 2, sec. 3; italics mine). Elsewhere he accounts for this tenacity in terms, for example, of “trust in the initiated, their dependence upon public opinion, intellectual solidarity” (chap. 4, sec. 3). Responding to these forces, the members of a successful thought collective come to participate in what Fleck sometimes describes as “a kind of harmony of illusions” (chap. 2, sec. 3).​

​

Fleck, Ludwik. Genesis and Development of a Scientific Fact. Kindle Edition.​

It's the inability of members of a thought-collective to appreciate the subjective nature of their belief that they have the Truth that's kind of the point; wondering, or trying to discover, if it's possible to discard with predispositions that are based on belief in a worldview despite the fact that objective facts often seem to obliterate many of the sacred cows of a given worldview or thought-collective. Fleck says:

What we are faced with here is not so much simple passivity or mistrust of new ideas as an active approach which can be divided into several stages. (1) A contradiction to the system appears unthinkable. (2) What does not fit into the system remains unseen; (3) alternatively, if it is noticed, either it is kept secret, or (4) laborious efforts are made to explain an exception in terms that do not contradict the system. (5) Despite the legitimate claims of contradictory views, one tends to see, describe, or even illustrate those circumstances which corroborate current views and thereby give them substance.​

​

Fleck, Ludwik. Genesis and Development of a Scientific Fact (p. 27). Kindle Edition.​

​

It's not merely simpletons bamboozled by the mystical powers of the thought-collective they're part of. A nearly perfect example of the force of a thought-collective on even a genius-caliber brain is found in the quotation from Sir Karl Popper below:

I share with the materialists or physicalists not only the emphasis on material objects as the paradigms of reality, but also the evolutionary hypothesis. But our ways seem to part when evolution produces minds, and human language. And they part even more widely when human minds produce stories, explanatory myths, tools and works of art and of science. All this, so it seems, has evolved without any violation of the laws of physics. But with life, even with low forms of life, problem-solving enters the universe; and with the higher form, purposes and aims, consciously pursued. We can only wonder that matter can thus transcend itself, by producing mind, purpose, and a world of the products of the human mind.​

​

Karl Popper, The Self and Its Brain, p. 11.​

Popper is fully aware (see his 3 world's argument) that that the human mind transcends the laws of physics such that it can't be subsumed within the worldview of a NeoDarwinian, or scientific-materialist's thought-collective. Nevertheless, although Popper knows better than most, and proves more effectively than most, that the human mind can't be placed within the constraints of the materialist's thought-collective, still, since Popper is part of that thought-collective, he must use Fleck's 5th point in order to try to find those facts that corroborate the legitimacy of the thought-collective he's a part of even though he knows that that thought-collective is patently wrong concerning the most important aspect of its foundation.

Another perfect example is the great Jewish scholar Ibn Ezra. He initially claimed he wouldn't allow Jewish traditional understandings of the Hebrew text of the Tanakh (the Jewish thought-collective) to influence his exegesis and interpretation of the sacred text but would rely solely on the science of exegesis and the guidance of God alone to find the literal meaning of the text.

But then he came upon Christian exegesis that took passages like Psalms 2:6 and showed that if exegeted literally, using only the science of exegesis, without bias or the predisposition of a Jewish thought-collective's imposition, this verse (like many others) justified Christian theology and caused serious problems for the Jewish thought-collective. Faced with this reality, Ibn Ezra, like Popper after him, fell back on Fleck's 5th point of a thought-collective such that he decided later in life that the traditional Jewish interpretation must be what guides an exegete and not science or God.



John

 

[MikeF]

I would say one point would be examining what occurs when members of a particular thought-collective encounter members of a different thought-collective. Or else when the ingrained predispositions of a thought-collective come under the microscope for examination and come up wanting, after which, the nature of the thought-collective's blind-spot can cause members to deny their own lyin eyes. In the foreword to Fleck's book, Thomas Kuhn says:

Well, I'm in no mood to read the referenced works, to follow their arguments to understand this construct being referred to as a "thought-collective". I will say again, however, that what seems to be described seems, in your presentation, no different than the concept of confirmation bias, biases which can be held by one or shared among multiple individuals.

Your pressing on with the use of this term when we are not sharing a clear understanding of what this term is meant to represent, nor agreement that it is accurately representing what it is purported to represent, creates barrier in this conversation which can lead to our talking past each other.

It's the inability of members of a thought-collective to appreciate the subjective nature of their belief that they have the Truth that's kind of the point; wondering, or trying to discover, if it's possible to discard with predispositions that are based on belief in a worldview despite the fact that objective facts often seem to obliterate many of the sacred cows of a given worldview or thought-collective. Fleck says:

What we are faced with here is not so much simple passivity or mistrust of new ideas as an active approach which can be divided into several stages. (1) A contradiction to the system appears unthinkable. (2) What does not fit into the system remains unseen; (3) alternatively, if it is noticed, either it is kept secret, or (4) laborious efforts are made to explain an exception in terms that do not contradict the system. (5) Despite the legitimate claims of contradictory views, one tends to see, describe, or even illustrate those circumstances which corroborate current views and thereby give them substance.​

​

Fleck, Ludwik. Genesis and Development of a Scientific Fact (p. 27). Kindle Edition.​

​

Again, seems to outline confirmation bias, with a "thought-collective" simply a way to refer to those individuals who share a particular bias or set of biases. But I disagree that rationalizing bias occurs in stages, rather, all forms of rationalization are brought to bear as needed.
Does a belief shared serve to reinforce the belief? Certainly. The more widely shared, the greater the reinforcement. But this is simply one more rationalization strategy.

It's not merely simpletons bamboozled by the mystical powers of the thought-collective they're part of. A nearly perfect example of the force of a thought-collective on even a genius caliber brain is found in the quotation from Sir Karl Popper below:

I share with the materialists or physicalists not only the emphasis on material objects as the paradigms of reality, but also the evolutionary hypothesis. But our ways seem to part when evolution produces minds, and human language. And they part even more widely when human minds produce stories, explanatory myths, tools and works of art and of science. All this, so it seems, has evolved without any violation of the laws of physics. But with life, even with low forms of life, problem-solving enters the universe; and with the higher form, purposes and aims, consciously pursued. We can only wonder that matter can thus transcend itself, by producing mind, purpose, and a world of the products of the human mind.​

​

Karl Popper, The Self and Its Brain, p. 11.​

Popper is fully aware (see his 3 world's argument) that that the human mind transcends the laws of physics such that it can't be subsumed within the worldview of a NeoDarwinian, or scientific-materialist's thought-collective. Nevertheless, although Popper knows better than most, and proves more effectively than most, that the human mind can't be placed within the constraints of the materialist's thought-collective, still, since Popper is part of that thought-collective, he must use Fleck's 5th point in order to try to find those facts that corroborate the legitimacy of the thought-collective he's a part of even though he knows that that thought-collective is patently wrong concerning the most important aspect of its foundation.

Another perfect example is the great Jewish scholar Ibn Ezra. He initially claimed he wouldn't allow Jewish traditional understandings of the Hebrew text of the Tanakh (the Jewish thought-collective) to influence his exegesis and interpretation of the sacred text but would rely solely on the science of exegesis and the guidance of God alone to find the literal meaning of the text.

But then he came upon Christian exegesis that took passages like Psalms 2:6 and showed that if exegeted literally, using only the science of exegesis, without bias or the predisposition of a Jewish thought-collective's imposition, justified Christian theology and caused serious problems for the Jewish thought-collective. Faced with this reality, Ibn Ezra, like Popper after him, fell back on Fleck's 5th point of a thought-collective such that he decided later in life that the tradition Jewish interpretation must be what guides an exegete and not science or God.

John

I think this idea of a "thought-collective" is too simplistic a notion to fully explain confirmation bias, the formation and value assigned to beliefs is more complicated than that.

I also see a lot of biased opinion expressed by you here ... in my opinion.

 

[Soandso]

I am not aware of any

Plus there is Buddha, Joseph Smith, Baha Allah, the Volsungs, etc etc. It's really not that unique or special for religious figures and founders to be shown to exist as historical people

 

[John D. Brey]

Well, I'm in no mood to read the referenced works, to follow their arguments to understand this construct being referred to as a "thought-collective". I will say again, however, that what seems to be described seems, in your presentation, no different than the concept of confirmation bias, biases which can be held by one or shared among multiple individuals.

You say tomato, I say tamato. . . When I say "thought-collective" just think "confirmation bias."

Your pressing on with the use of this term when we are not sharing a clear understanding of what this term is meant to represent, nor agreement that it is accurately representing what it is purported to represent, creates barrier in this conversation which can lead to our talking past each other.

I hope you'll accept my apology. I talk past people a lot. Not just to be rude (which it is in most cases), but because I often mix genuine dialogue with more soliloquistic individual examination, observation, and documentation.

Again, seems to outline confirmation bias, with a "thought-collective" simply a way to refer to those individuals who share a particular bias or set of biases. But I disagree that rationalizing bias occurs in stages, rather, all forms of rationalization are brought to bear as needed.
Does a belief shared serve to reinforce the belief? Certainly. The more widely shared, the greater the reinforcement. But this is simply one more rationalization strategy.

If rationalization-stategizing is all that exists when it comes to ideological comparison, then who wants to play that game? It's just a tit-for-tat. My belief is that not all ideology is fatally infected with subjective rationalizing, confirmation bias, and clique-orientation.



John

 

[Muffled]

How do you get it then?

I believe I get it straight from God.

 

[MikeF]

You say tomato, I say tamato. . . When I say "thought-collective" just think "confirmation bias."

That's great. Gives a point of consensus from which to refer and build from.

I hope you'll accept my apology. I talk past people a lot. Not just to be rude (which it is in most cases), but because I often mix genuine dialogue with more soliloquistic individual examination, observation, and documentation.

Consider me forewarned. I will work through whatever you present to find the new points being added to the discussion.

If rationalization-stategizing is all that exists when it comes to ideological comparison, then who wants to play that game? It's just a tit-for-tat. My belief is that not all ideology is fatally infected with subjective rationalizing, confirmation bias, and clique-orientation.

John

Indeed. Which leaves us with the very real problem of how do we make the distinction.

 

[Muffled]

God has many Messengers. All religion is Truth. They all proclaim and testify and praise God and pray to Him. Religion is Religion is inspired by God. The Quran is from God. Mohammad is certainly a True Messenger of God. The Quran did not come from a human.

The Quran is the Highest Divine Scripture in all human history.

I believe the book is closed. There is no more word from God for Muslims.

 

[Muffled]

I believe that was probably true until the Revelation of Baha'u'llah.

I believe neither is. I believe it is the NT that elevates the Divine to His highest state of grace.

 

[Muffled]

I don't believe my faith is better then any others. I don't believe in one spiritual, note I say spiritual and not religious, truth above all others. There's many paths a person can take throughout their life. Why some people hafta stamp their feet like children and try to bully others into their path is, quite frankly beyond me? Its annoying and pointless.

I believe there is only one way to inherit eternal life.

 

[Trailblazer]

I believe neither is. I believe it is the NT that elevates the Divine to His highest state of grace.

I believe that the NT does not hold a candle to the Writings of Baha'u'llah.
The NT is the writings of men who never even knew Jesus whereas Baha'u'llah received a direct revelation from God which He wrote down.

 

[Link]

It does seem to me that all of the religious people I know accept that their creed, their religion's essential beliefs, are correct, while all others -- because they obviously don't agree with the central tenets of their sect, must be somehow lacking.

As a non-believer in any religion, I am curious how it is, what evidence, what logic, leads you to suppose that your particular religion/denomination/sect got it right, while the others did not.

This thread is meant to be a great opportunity for believers of all kinds to engage -- to write apologetics in defense of their beliefs. I'm hoping to see significant essays!

Salam

I've shown a lot of different reasons through out the years. I will focus on one.

Consistency.

The religion I believe is the only one that can be consistent throughout time. Sure, some rituals change form, some laws change, but I'm talking about the foundational structure is always the same.

Sunnis believe Ibrahim (a) had successors in his offspring but stop the notion with Mohammad (s). 7ver Ismailis make their own wisdom of number, but inconsistent with the successors of Musa (a) number per Quran.

Than you have current day Ismaili Agha Khan followers, and their leader doesn't perform miracles in public.

I see consistency in my religion. The Imams (a) didn't make excuses for not performing miracles in public but rather performed them.

There is of course some change. In the past, the successors to founders would still receive and channel scripture (and it would add to the "scripture" to be followed), this stopped with Mohammad (s) but for good reasons. The reasons is because day of judgment is coming, and the world is coming to an end, and so to safeguard the final revelation and heighten it's prestige, all Muslims accept it (generally) and there is no dispute about it's content. While if Ali (a) and Hassan (a) received Surahs to add to the Quran and Muslim scripture, and people rejected them, then people would be less prone to accept that Quran is masterpiece that cannot be brought the like of.

It's also that Quran was built dynamically and the Quran of Ali (a) has the order of the verses revealed. This would be hard to study in form of a book, but with a program, we can see how Quran dynamically was built over the twenty three years.

I see that Quran is saying the creed of Ibrahim, Nuh, Musa to Isa, all the same, and that the concept of a chosen family is consistent through out time. A long with that consistency is the number of successors to the founder.

And this is what I expect of God. Not to favor one generation over another in the sense he gives some people one type of religion and another generation a whole different religion.

Per hadiths and per Quran I believe, God doesn't send a person as a lone wolf. He is always verified by others, including a holy woman such as Sarah (a) with Abraham (a) and Mariam (a) with Musa (a).

 

[☆Dreamwind☆]

I believe there is only one way to inherit eternal life.

Believe it for you if you like. You are not everyone else

 

[ElishaElijah]

I guess you have the wrong audience for that kind of question. Anyone who would defend their religion as the only Truth™ is gone or banned.
Such behaviour is even banned by the rules, so some might think their religion is the only true™ one, but don't dare state so openly.
Those people exist, just open up YouTube and look for the apologists. The Hamists would say that you can't be a Christian if you don't believe in the literal interpretation of Genesis. They're just not here.

Jesus Christ is the only One who lived a perfect life, performed miracles, healed people, raised people from the dead, rose from the dead and ascended into Heaven, follow Him.
Every other person fell short, died and in the grave.
The other thing is that if Jesus Christ shared the Truth like he did when He walked the earth He would’ve been warned and banned on here. IMO gotta add that, lol

 

[The Hammer]

I believe I get it straight from God.

You get it directly from the Gods too? Awesome!