Is religion inferior to logic ?

[F1fan]

..not if it is the parents wishes.

Then the parents want puppets.

 

[F1fan]

Yep, and none of these are being taught in our schools.

I don't know what kids are being taught in schools, but I never learned about the Enlightenment and social contract theory until I read about it on my own. Do you think conservatives wnat children to learn about this? Or critical thinking skills? Do you want children learning how to question whether a God exists?

None of our politicians have ever heard of them, or if they have, they certainly never speak of the ethical imperatives these people studied and debated. What percentage of the average citizenry do you think have any idea at all who any of those people are or what any of those people contributed to the human discussion on ethics? How many famous celebrities that we watch and admire routinely just because they entertain us know of or will ever even mention any of them?

Religion sure as hell doesn't teach it. You wrote "Currently our culture and society offers no means besides religion for understanding, discussing, debating, and evaluating our ethical imperatives." In what way does any religion teach this? It doesn't. Only very smart kids in expensive schools will ever hear about advanced ideas. Otherwise you get religion served up to you on a plate, and you'd better believe or else. Chrisianity offers disagreemenet among its sects, but where is the discussion? Our society is built on conformity, and that is driven by the norms of religion. School, government, the rat race, etc. is all about following the norms and keeping your mouth shut. Despite your politics being left wing your other attitudes are very right wing.

The only place any of the ethical ideals those people studied will EVER be uttered in public will be buried in some religious sermon given in some church some Sunday. And it will have almost no effect at all on anyone in the face of the 24-7 commercial advertising that we are all constantly subjected to by our capitalist overlords.

What ideals are only the product of religion? I can say there's nothing I can learn from Jesus because my own moral sense is pretty much the same, naturally. I hear nothing new. But if citizens in societies are told they can't think for themselves and have to listen to religion then they will never try, and then rely on the local religion, even if it tells them they need to hijack a plane and fly it into a building.

 

[Aupmanyav]

Indoctrination?
Are these children who receive religious education imbeciles, or drugged/hypnotised?

Yeah, they turn into that. That is the main reason for backwardness of Muslim community in India - madarsas. Like homeopathy, that denies proper education to children.

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=madarsa+teacher+beating+student

 

[F1fan]

Of course. Believers have no need to develop a strong or well thought out internalized moral system. Then have a deontological set of external crutches to lean on. It's no wonder they're so morally unstable.

Non-believers are self-motivated. Believers are motivated by a divine carrot and stick; by reward and punishment. This translates to a pre-conditional, Kohlberg level one level of development, typical of very young children.

Levels of Developing Morality in Kohlberg's Theories

Kohlberg's theory of moral development seeks to explain how children form moral reasoning. According to Kohlberg's theory, moral development occurs in six stages.

www.verywellmind.com

It's no wonder so many religious find it difficult to imagine moral behavior without God.

The irony is that while the religious are followers to some moral guide they still choose who they follow. I suspect their choice is more about finding a sect that mirrors their views than sincere seeking of an absolute truth.

 

[Aupmanyav]

Would you be intimidated by a visit from God?
After all, when one thinks one has God's blessings, one can justify anything.
When one is capable of creating a heavenly state for themselves and others, the journey will be well worth it to get to that level.
The best is yet to come.
That's what I see. It's very clear!!

I don't think so. Is God like a 'Predator'? In that case, I would be certainly be intimidated.
Thinks! How does that help?
If we have to create our heavenly state, then what is the need of a God?
How long have we to wait? A hundred years, a millennium, a million years?
I do not see anything clear in what you say.

 

[F1fan]

You still do not Understand. It isn't up to anyone. It will always be your choice what you seek. You want evidence? The evidence stares you in the face. Look around you.

The evidence has no indication of gods. Or any supernatural.

For some reason you want God not to exist. Great, then do not seek God. What do you seek? Do you seek to be right? Do you seek to prove others wrong?

What God exists? I notice you avoid showing us. What's the problem if the "evidence stares us in the face"? It's so obvious but you can't point it out?

I wonder about something. I have said that no religion really understands God at all.

Odd since gods are what religions rely on for their legitimacy.

When I speak of God you always point back to the religions we both agree do not understand. This holds very little water.

Then how did you come up with your idea of God, on your own, without any influence from religions?

One who seeks asks many many questions. Perhaps you should question yourself to Discover what is it that you really seek.

Facts are real answers, not the imaginary.

 

[Aupmanyav]

It’s a ship without a captain, compass, or a rudder. And no one on board is even discussing how or where it needs to go.

Society goes by its needs. The needs direct the society to change, not religion. Religion is a road block. For example, women's rights, acceptance of LGBTQ.

 

[Valjean]

Zero effect on the public.


Valjean said:

Valjean said:
Haven't people been bemoaning the moral decay of society for several millennia? Haven't many wars been motivated and encouraged by religion? Hasn't religion been responsible for much human misery and crimes against humanity?
Haven't people been bemoaning the moral decay of society for several millennia? Haven't many wars been motivated and encouraged by religion? Hasn't religion been responsible for much human misery and crimes against humanity?

PureX: "No."

“The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers.” -- Socrates.​

“What is happening to our young people? They disrespect their elders. They disobey their parents. They ignore the laws. They riot in the streets inflamed with wild notions. Their morals are decaying. What is to become of them?” --Plato.

​

So far we’re so lost that we can’t even see the need. Yet …

Walmart stores are being closed in cities all across the country because people are simply walking into them and stealing whatever they want.

Even the giant corporate thieves of Walmart can’t cope with the blatant lawlessness that‘s been happening in our cities. Does that sound normal to you? We have homeless camps popping up on city streets all across the country populated by drugged out zombies. Does that sound normal to you? We have working families living in cars and camper vans all across the country because they can’t afford housing even with a full time job. Does that sound normal to you?

Greed, selfishness and willful stupidity are running rampant in our business, government, churches, and in the streets because we have become a nation with no sense of shame, honor, respect, or responsibility toward each other. We have no ethical imperatives beyond our own base selfishness. And I have never witnessed anything like it in my 65 years living here.

Do you attribute this to decreased religiosity, or politics?

 

[Valjean]

And it has very clearly failed to do so.

Just look at some of the fundamentalist sites. They disparage science, encourage parents to keep their children out of school and home-school them. They discourage parents from sending their children to college, lest they be corrupted by the liberal ideas of satanic professors.
Just read some of the posters here on RF.

 

[Valjean]

You still do not Understand. It isn't up to anyone. It will always be your choice what you seek. You want evidence? The evidence stares you in the face. Look around you.

Believers keep saying this, endlessly, but they rarely cite any evidence, and when they do it's either not real evidence, or is flawed.
Again, what is this evidence staring us in the face which we cannot see?

For some reason you want God not to exist. Great, then do not seek God. What do you seek? Do you seek to be right? Do you seek to prove others wrong?

Asking for evidence and pointing out its lack does not translate to wanting God not to exist. It' just a request for evidence.

One who seeks asks many many questions. Perhaps you should question yourself to Discover what is it that you really seek.

What makes you think he's seeking anything?

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

But science doesn't even claim to do these things. It knows its limitations. It stays in its lane -- which is more than can be said of religion.

Yes, but how do you do, what science can't do?

You want to sell me that I have to stop being religious, use science, and don't claim objective authority. Okay, then explain to me, how to do the parts of being human, that science can't do.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Just look at some of the fundamentalist sites. They disparage science, encourage parents to keep their children out of school and home-school them. They discourage parents from sending their children to college, lest they be corrupted by the liberal ideas of satanic professors.
Just read some of the posters here on RF.

Yes, you keep telling us, what not to do. What are we supposed to do instead?

 

[Valjean]

Yes, but how do you do, what science can't do?

You want to sell me that I have to stop being religious, use science, and don't claim objective authority. Okay, then explain to me, how to do the parts of being human, that science can't do.

I make my own, personal decisions concerning values, purpose and morality, without religious input.
For practical decisions, not made on auto-pilot, I rely on rational analysis of available facts.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

I make my own, personal decisions concerning values, purpose and morality, without religious input.
For practical decisions, not made on auto-pilot, I rely on rational analysis of available facts.

So how do you do morality in effect and not just these word I rely on rational analysis of available facts? I want you to unpack it and explain to me how it is actually done.

 

[MikeF]

No. For one thing religion does not stop anyone from learning about other ideas.

This statement would be laughably naive if I felt you truly believed it. I would agree that, in considering the category of belief sets we label Religion, the requirement to prevent the learning of other ideas is not a necessary feature to qualify the belief set as a religious one. What is naive about your statement is that although such a feature is not a requirement for the class Religion, it is a dominant feature of those beliefs.

Now, in considering societies obligations to its citizens, is it your position that society or government should subsidize and even promote the indoctrination of children into a narrow set of beliefs that has within the core tenets of those beliefs to both create an emotional dependency on the belief set, and to explicitly prohibit the consideration of beliefs outside of the belief set? This is the purpose of religious schooling. To actively shield children from beliefs outside of the one belief set, and maintain that shield for as long as possible, through undergraduate college at the very least.

If you truly believed that we should encourage the widest array of beliefs as a means of enabling possibility, such self-perpetuating and isolating belief systems in one and only one belief set would seem antithetical to that goal, and anathema to you.

And for another, no child can or should have a multitude of meta-ideas (like theism) dumped on them. It would be too confusing and they lack the life experience to reasonably assess them.

What? Really? We can expose them to the meta-idea of political systems but we cannot expose them to the meta-idea of different religions? I hate to break it to you, but the cat is already out of the bag in public schools. Exposure to ancient belief systems starts quite early in elementary school. Did you never have to make an Egyptian pyramid out of sugar cubes, or some similar activity? In the unit on Ancient Egypt, was their religion not discussed?

Plus you have made an excellent point for my side of the argument against indoctrinating children in dependency forming belief systems, “they lack the life experience to reasonably assess them.”

Religion will still be taught at home and in the church so nothing is lost by eliminating religious schools in that regard. But in terms of public policy, it would seem in societies interest that *every* child gets a well rounded education.

 

[MikeF]

Currently our culture and society offers no means besides religion for understanding, discussing, debating, and evaluating our ethical imperatives. This makes religion an extremely important part of any child's education. Especially in a historical, comparative context. Our 'secular' schools are failing us by not teaching kids the history and comparisons of religion. Especially as it regards forming and protecting our ethical imperatives.

But religious moral and ethical systems are not the only such systems. Plus, if your goal truly is to expose children to the wide variety of moral and ethical systems in a historical *and* comparitive context, it is not the purpose of a religious school. A religious school is indoctrinating their children in the one true moral and ethical system, which in a modern era may no longer be either moral or ethical. No emphasis on comparing and constrasting different systems.

If you want better ethics studies in public schools, then great, lets work on that. But allowing religious schools does not meet your stated objective above.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

This statement would be laughably naive if I felt you truly believed it. I would agree that, in considering the category of belief sets we label Religion, the requirement to prevent the learning of other ideas is not a necessary feature to qualify the belief set as a religious one. What is naive about your statement is that although such a feature is not a requirement for the class Religion, it is a dominant feature of those beliefs.

Now, in considering societies obligations to its citizens, is it your position that society or government should subsidize and even promote the indoctrination of children into a narrow set of beliefs that has within the core tenets of those beliefs to both create an emotional dependency on the belief set, and to explicitly prohibit the consideration of beliefs outside of the belief set? This is the purpose of religious schooling. To actively shield children from beliefs outside of the one belief set, and maintain that shield for as long as possible, through undergraduate college at the very least.

If you truly believed that we should encourage the widest array of beliefs as a means of enabling possibility, such self-perpetuating and isolating belief systems in one and only one belief set would seem antithetical to that goal, and anathema to you.



What? Really? We can expose them to the meta-idea of political systems but we cannot expose them to the meta-idea of different religions? I hate to break it to you, but the cat is already out of the bag in public schools. Exposure to ancient belief systems starts quite early in elementary school. Did you never have to make an Egyptian pyramid out of sugar cubes, or some similar activity? In the unit on Ancient Egypt, was their religion not discussed?

Plus you have made an excellent point for my side of the argument against indoctrinating children in dependency forming belief systems, “they lack the life experience to reasonably assess them.”

Religion will still be taught at home and in the church so nothing is lost by eliminating religious schools in that regard. But in terms of public policy, it would seem in societies interest that *every* child gets a well rounded education.

Well, what about the meta-ideas of science? Or the meta-ideas of reality? Or the meta-ideas of logic?

If you want them to be exposed to the class of meta-ideas then do it for all meta-ideas or you are using a double standard.

 

[MikeF]

I make my own, personal decisions concerning values, purpose and morality, without religious input.
For practical decisions, not made on auto-pilot, I rely on rational analysis of available facts.

I would add that politics is then required to reconsile, compromise, and form consensus among our many individual moral positions derived as you describe above. We are not all going to reach the same conclusions so we must manage that in a way that permits us to funtion well as a society.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

I would add that politics is then required to reconsile, compromise, and form consensus among our many individual moral positions derived as you describe above. We are not all going to reach the same conclusions so we must manage that in a way that permits us to funtion well as a society.

Yeah, but that is not science as per objective observation and formal logic. That belongs to if you want to make it science sociology and psychology, and that can't be done only with your version of science.

 

[Audie]

I don't know what kids are being taught in schools, but I never learned about the Enlightenment and social contract theory until I read about it on my own. Do you think conservatives wnat children to learn about this? Or critical thinking skills? Do you want children learning how to question whether a God exists?

Religion sure as hell doesn't teach it. You wrote "Currently our culture and society offers no means besides religion for understanding, discussing, debating, and evaluating our ethical imperatives." In what way does any religion teach this? It doesn't. Only very smart kids in expensive schools will ever hear about advanced ideas. Otherwise you get religion served up to you on a plate, and you'd better believe or else. Chrisianity offers disagreemenet among its sects, but where is the discussion? Our society is built on conformity, and that is driven by the norms of religion. School, government, the rat race, etc. is all about following the norms and keeping your mouth shut. Despite your politics being left wing your other attitudes are very right wing.

What ideals are only the product of religion? I can say there's nothing I can learn from Jesus because my own moral sense is pretty much the same, naturally. I hear nothing new. But if citizens in societies are told they can't think for themselves and have to listen to religion then they will never try, and then rely on the local religion, even if it tells them they need to hijack a plane and fly it into a building.

When I was in the USA I was invited to attend
churches.

I'd thought they would be doing some sort of
challenging or thought provoking in matters of
ethics and morality. Things like that.

What a disappointment and waste of time it
always turned out to be.