UnChristian - What A New Generation Really Thinks About Christianity

[Twig pentagram]

They appear to be some weird offshoot of Islam. Atheists by definition? Possibly. But still superstitous and far from naturalistic or skeptical.

I know many of them and none of them are superstitious or far from naturalistic. They just speak in code so when most people hear them talking they think that they are saying something that they're not. God, earth and a bunch of other words has a different meaning to them. They speak there own language.

 

[jmvizanko]

So you are skeptical of objectivity?

What are you referring to by objectivity?

 

[jmvizanko]

I know many of them and none of them are superstitious or far from naturalistic. They just speak in code so when most people hear them talking they think that they are saying something that they're not. God, earth and a bunch of other words has a different meaning to them. They speak there own language.

Well perhaps I'd have to meet one or a few. Because the desciptions I browsed didn't exactly give a coherent picture of what they are.

 

[sandandfoam]

What are you referring to by objectivity?

The belief that reality is mind independent.

 

[jmvizanko]

The belief that reality is mind independent.

Well I do think that the only thing anyone can know with 100% absolution is that one's experience of reality exists. After that one has working assumptions, since hard solipsism is just a dead end, even if it a possibilty. So what I believe is based on the assumption that the physical universe exists even if I didn't. Not sure if that answered your question though.

 

[sandandfoam]

Well I do think that the only thing anyone can know with 100% absolution is that one's experience of reality exists.

I agree with you on this.
Given that and your earlier statement that you think it's a good idea to live and let live why not allow others their 'ancient cryptic metaphysical poems'?
Tolerance should extend beyond those who share ones views should it not?

 

[jmvizanko]

I agree with you on this.
Given that and your earlier statement that you think it's a good idea to live and let live why not allow others their 'ancient cryptic metaphysical poems'?
Tolerance should extend beyond those who share ones views should it not?

Like I said above: "As long as people keep their beliefs to themself, I don't care what they believe. But I still consider it a good thing that someday we may have more scientists and tolerant people because Christianity is being abandoned."

 

[Shadow Wolf]

Like I just said above, I have never met an atheist that had any of these cons. Have you?

Let's see, I know an atheist who is extremely homophobic. A few that are prone to resorting to violence. Excessive drunkenness, hard drug use that leads to violence, gang involvement, treating women like property, racism, and murders I have seen coming from atheist, agnostics, or were not motivated by religion. A couple years ago a girl was gunned down by a hit man. It wasn't because of a religious disagreement, but because one of her friends owed the wrong guy money for drugs, and she happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time with the wrong crowd. And wars that have been fought for territory, resources, and political/rebellious coups are also the cons of religion without religion. We humans are a very violent species, and some of us are very territorial. We fight over possessions, mates, disagreements, and everything else including God. I used to work with a Marine who joined just to kill people and have a legitimate method of taking out his rage out on other people.
If you think about it, 9/11 wasn't caused by religion. In a nutshell it happened because of foreign policy and religion just happened to be the easiest way to convince people to carry out the attacks. Had they not been religious would we still have been attacked? Probably. Would it have been a suicidal mission? Doubtfully.

 

[sojourner]

Sure. But they wouldn't exist if they didn't have the bible to justify their beliefs. I don't know any atheists that have any problem with science or gays etc...

I don't think the attitudes found are unjustified. I have met many intelligent and great Christians. But I think there are greater numbers that hold some of the aforementioned viewpoints than you are recognizing, at least in the US. And that is why I think Christianity is an entirely unnecessary evil.

Well, there's no accounting for taste.

 

[Smoke]

Perhaps there is much more hope for this uniquely and unfortunately religious modern country than I thought there was. We apparently just need to let the older generations die out.

It's rather cold comfort, though, to imagine that the world will be a better place when my generation is dead.
Quicker results would be nice.

 

[Smoke]

I don't think modernists who believe they know the truth are any different than ancients who believed they knew the truth.

People who think they know The Truth are always foolish and dangerous. Socrates was on to something when he said "One who knows that he does not know , is a truly wise man." (Although he may have overstated it.)

 

[no-body]

This is just my theory but I think people say they're Christian now as more of a traditional thing. They're more like Deist-lite with a mishmash of new age believes. Of course anything to counter fundamentalism is a good thing, so they can call themselves whatever they want. I don't think this story means anything, religion isn't going away, it's only going to evolve. Also give it a couple more decades and you might see a full swing back, people are very influenced by the age they live in.

 

[jmvizanko]

This is just my theory but I think people say they're Christian now as more of a traditional thing. They're more like Deist-lite with a mishmash of new age believes. Of course anything to counter fundamentalism is a good thing, so they can call themselves whatever they want. I don't think this story means anything, religion isn't going away, it's only going to evolve. Also give it a couple more decades and you might see a full swing back, people are very influenced by the age they live in.

I don't think they are that influenced by the age they are in, as an age is defined by its contents, unless you are just talking about arbitrary periods of time. And in my opinion, as the world globalizes its information more, the particular beliefs of this or that arbitrary geographical group lose to a greater consideration of all of them. In the most industrially and technologically advanced nations, ignoring the US, atheism is predominant. Perhaps the US is just slowly catching up.

 

[jmvizanko]

People who think they know The Truth are always foolish and dangerous. Socrates was on to something when he said "One who knows that he does not know , is a truly wise man." (Although he may have overstated it.)

And that is what I was trying to say in response to the claim that atheists are just as guilty of thinking they have the truth. In my experience, most atheists hold the opinion that they don't have any absolute truth. They yield their beliefs to the observable and the testable, which is the exact opposite of just blindly thinking one has the truth.

 

[jmvizanko]

Well, there's no accounting for taste.

Not entirely sure what you meant by this. Could you be more specific?

 

[jmvizanko]

Let's see, I know an atheist who is extremely homophobic. A few that are prone to resorting to violence. Excessive drunkenness, hard drug use that leads to violence, gang involvement, treating women like property, racism, and murders I have seen coming from atheist, agnostics, or were not motivated by religion. A couple years ago a girl was gunned down by a hit man. It wasn't because of a religious disagreement, but because one of her friends owed the wrong guy money for drugs, and she happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time with the wrong crowd. And wars that have been fought for territory, resources, and political/rebellious coups are also the cons of religion without religion. We humans are a very violent species, and some of us are very territorial. We fight over possessions, mates, disagreements, and everything else including God. I used to work with a Marine who joined just to kill people and have a legitimate method of taking out his rage out on other people.
If you think about it, 9/11 wasn't caused by religion. In a nutshell it happened because of foreign policy and religion just happened to be the easiest way to convince people to carry out the attacks. Had they not been religious would we still have been attacked? Probably. Would it have been a suicidal mission? Doubtfully.

Well I wasn't trying to say you won't find any bad atheists, and I think good and bad people can be found in any religion.

But I have never seen any good, or even any period, secular arguments for things like why science is untrustable or flat out wrong, or why homosexuality is evil, etc. And in my experience, only the faithful to this or that holy book hold such views.

Perhaps i haven't met an accurate cross section of atheists? Because most I have had dialogue with stand for live and let live, and are fans of science.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

But I have never seen any good, or even any period, secular arguments for things like why science is untrustable or flat out wrong, or why homosexuality is evil, etc. And in my experience, only the faithful to this or that holy book hold such views.

The science being untrustworthy isn't an issue of religious pros or cons. Plenty of religious people trust science.
It's just that when you say "well religion causes people to do good but you don't need it to be good so it doesn't count, but religion causes people to do bad" is logically flawed. People do good with and without religion. People do bad with and without religion.
And when you think about, religion is more of a tool to get people to carry out the cons. 9/11 for example. The terrorist were Islam true. The promise of a guaranteed entry to Paradise probably got them to do it. But was it the religion that caused it, or a planned attack in retaliation of foreign policy. People even tried to use religion to justify invading Iraq, even though we know that simply wasn't the case.

 

[jmvizanko]

The science being untrustworthy isn't an issue of religious pros or cons. Plenty of religious people trust science. It's just that when you say "well religion causes people to do good but you don't need it to be good so it doesn't count, but religion causes people to do bad" is logically flawed. People do good with and without religion. People do bad with and without religion.

But certain bad ideologies seem to stem only from religion. I don't see atheism leading to homophobia or antiscience. Even if you had the same number of people raping and murdering if there was no religion, and a look at some of the more atheistic countries possibly suggests that you would have less of that as well, you would have hardly any homophobia or aversion to science.

And when you think about, religion is more of a tool to get people to carry out the cons. 9/11 for example. The terrorist were Islam true. The promise of a guaranteed entry to Paradise probably got them to do it. But was it the religion that caused it, or a planned attack in retaliation of foreign policy.

I honestly don't know enough about 9/11, but Wikipedia seems to indicate that you may be onto something about that specific instance of terrorism:

"On December 27, 2001, a second bin Laden video was released. In the video, he states, 'Terrorism against America deserves to be praised because it was a response to injustice, aimed at forcing America to stop its support for Israel, which kills our people,' but he stopped short of admitting responsibility for the attacks."

Of course, its not like we can trust that what the man said actually tells the truth, although you would think somebody that obviously does not care about the repercussions, and who planned and was proud of the damn thing, would want to tell us why he did it.

But I am not even addressing terrorism as one of the major cons. My major problems with religion are the ones that are more mainstream than that of the extremists, namely intolerance to differing lifestyles and sets of morality, and aversion to science.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

But certain bad ideologies seem to stem only from religion. I don't see atheism leading to homophobia or antiscience.

Homophobia doesn't exclusively come exclusively from religion. The Japanese were looking for oil which lead to the Pearl Harbor attacks. The greed of bandits was a serious problem for traveling merchants (or just travelers in general) of old. Alot of bad has been done in the name of religion. I won't deny that. But we as a species have proven time and time again we don't need religion to fight. Sometimes it's a drink, a mate, rumors, trash talking, race, or just being different.

I honestly don't know enough about 9/11, but Wikipedia seems to indicate that you may be onto something about that specific instance of terrorism:

Here is the essay wrote by Serj Tankian (System of a Down's lead singer), who is from Lebanon so he does have more experience and knowledge of this than what most Americans would know of, especially the immediate impacts of such policies.
Understanding Oil - Armeniapedia.org

 

[jmvizanko]

Homophobia doesn't exclusively come exclusively from religion. The Japanese were looking for oil which lead to the Pearl Harbor attacks. The greed of bandits was a serious problem for traveling merchants (or just travelers in general) of old. Alot of bad has been done in the name of religion. I won't deny that. But we as a species have proven time and time again we don't need religion to fight. Sometimes it's a drink, a mate, rumors, trash talking, race, or just being different.

I guess we just disagree. I am not arguing with the fact that we fight without religion. But I just don't think the irreligious have nearly the tendencies or arguments for the specific bad ideologies I am specifically addressing.