Just finished this Wow, you'd have to be a real idiot to question Atheism

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Anonymous Sun May 4 22:25:31 2014 No.4854381 [DELETED]

Just finished this

Wow, you'd have to be a real idiot to question Atheism

>>	Anonymous Sun May 4 22:28:01 2014 No.4854392 >>4854381 If by atheist you mean the position that rejects all major religions, then yeah, we know

>>	Anonymous Sun May 4 22:28:37 2014 No.4854394 >questioning anything

>>	Anonymous Sun May 4 22:30:25 2014 No.4854405 >>4854381 >mother i posted the troll again

Anonymous Sun May 4 22:33:01 2014 No.4854413

>>4854392
Christianity, in fairness to it, is the greatest mindfuck of a religion there ever was. It can be quite a chore for your garden variety solipsist to abstain. It really covered all its bases. That's why you get reports of people like James Joyce weeping upon reading the Sermon on the Mount (the section that went out to the real intellectuals).

>>	Anonymous Sun May 4 22:34:49 2014 No.4854419 >>4854413 I have to fuel myself with anger to withstand the Sermon on the Mount to be honest, and even then I can't help but appreciate it

>>	Anonymous Sun May 4 22:35:50 2014 No.4854421 But of course you get the hur durr atheists

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 00:01:43 2014 No.4854676 >>4854381 >mom, mom! get the camera! I'm trolling on 4chan!

Anonymous Mon May 5 00:12:46 2014 No.4854711

>“With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.”
--Archbishop of Canterbury

>“One of the great achievements of science has been, if not to make it impossible for intelligent people to be religious, then at least to make it possible for them not to be religious. We should not retreat from this accomplishment.”
--St. Thomas Aquinas

>“I'm offended by the kind of smarmy religiosity that's all around us, perhaps more in America than in Europe, and not really that harmful because it's not really that intense or even that serious, but just... you know after a while you get tired of hearing clergymen giving the invocation at various public celebrations and you feel, haven't we outgrown all this? Do we have to listen to this?”
--Pope Benedict XVI

Anonymous Mon May 5 00:13:44 2014 No.4854717

Do those Atheist books like God Delusion actually have meaningful content? Lets take Orwell's non-fiction for instance, how does it compare to that?

I've always had the impression that they're nothing more than book formats of the type of Atheist harangues you find on the internet. Stuff like "there is no proof of God ... Christianity caused crusades ... religion blinded humans world for five billion years and if not for it we would have colonised space and whatnot."

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 00:17:26 2014 No.4854728 >Atheists cannot objectively prove that Dawkins exists.

Anonymous Mon May 5 00:18:15 2014 No.4854730

>>4854717
The god delusion just restates arguments that dwindle god back into his cave, as "that thing you can't disprove so ill still believe in him nanana" kind of argument

But it cogently establishes why believing evangelical Christianity is dumb, and why recognizing any part of religion besides tradition as "real" is dumb. Like people who genuinely think god is in the room and whatnot

Anonymous Mon May 5 00:18:55 2014 No.4854733

You don't have to be an idiot, you just gotta have a lot of wishful thinking going on in your mind. Even great scientists are like that once in a while (specially when it has to do with their favorite hypothesis).

As for The God Delusion, I think it's a good book, but not much else. You'll find better stuff in Bertrand Russell and Michael Martin. Also, Dawkins often gets too - understandably, I know - irritated with religious people and thus is annoying to read.

Anyway, you should read The Greatest Show on Earth and The Ancestor's Tale now, if you haven't yet read them. Those are very good books.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 00:18:58 2014 No.4854734 >>4854728 Of course not, objectivity does not exist.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 00:24:21 2014 No.4854753 >>4854734 The tree still makes noise faggot

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 00:48:43 2014 No.4854830 >>4854381 >not questioning everything >not imbibing everything and achieving memetic purity though promiscuity

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 00:52:43 2014 No.4854840 File: 59 KB, 1440x900, 1387673028036.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>4854753 you're talkin bout trees he's talking bout objects whada bing boom bapadam i don't know what thread this is poos on floor

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 00:53:55 2014 No.4854842 >>4854381 You'd have to be a real idiot to misunderstand Aquinas' five ways as badly as Dawkins.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 00:55:18 2014 No.4854845 >>4854711 >Steven Weinburg The proboscis portends

Anonymous Mon May 5 00:56:24 2014 No.4854847

>>4854730
so stuff I'm already aware of/could come to on my own initiative

it would be worth reading if it went into the psychology of delusions, explained how schizophrenics might believe god is speaking to them, and stuff

i don't like a lot of the atheist stuff because they take certain insane people and mistake them as plain idiots. tbh i think most atheists are idiots. makes sense: most people are idiots, and atheists are only distinguishable by their fedoras

Anonymous Mon May 5 01:07:39 2014 No.4854871

Dawkins could have wrote a logical, fair, and accessible book that caused a big impact and changed a lot of people's naive opinions.

Instead he wrote a logical but polemic and inflammatory book that by its very tone inherently turns people off and makes them think atheists are dicks, so that the only ones who actually read it all the way through are just people reaffirming their beliefs anyway.

This is why Richard Dawkins sucks.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 01:22:13 2014 No.4854905 File: 48 KB, 401x600, 401px-God_is_not_great[1].jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] Haven't read TGD, but I've read this and would recommend it.

Anonymous Mon May 5 01:37:57 2014 No.4854940

>>4854871
I think you are underestimating the impact Dawkins had on schoolchildren around the western speaking world.

I was sent to a strict catholic school and had Jesus piped into my head every day. Our school had it's own priest, we were forced to go to confession, had regular mass, and were taught that the bible is objective fact. Mostly due to the internet I had my doubts about religion, but I felt like absolute shit for years while I was trapped in that place between theology and atheology: I was simultaneously doubting my religion while believing I was facing the prospect of eternal damnation in a lake of fire for doing so. This was only made worse by my heavily religious teachers, who obviously reinforced the religion and tried to scrub my mind of evil atheist thoughts.

I finally stumbled on the God delusion and it felt like a huge weight had been lifted. That book couldn't have reached me at a better time. Halfway though reading I it I both stopped being scared, and realized "Oh, my teachers are lying". Dawkins didn't give me objective proof for the non-existence of God, and carefully clarified why we can't, but revealed that there was a growing mass of people who were removing the shackles of Christianity. I didn't try to rebel or anything at school, but had a sly grin on my face the next time I was threatened with hell for not singing in mass.

I will always be grateful for this books.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 01:44:20 2014 No.4854964 File: 16 KB, 400x284, pope-dawkins[1].jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>4854940 Praise be unto ye, O Science, for guiding us benighted ones to the Rational through your servant, the Great Dawkins. Amen.

Anonymous Mon May 5 01:44:52 2014 No.4854966

>>4854940
Yeah, I'm sure it's helpful for the "fence-sitters" or those questioning their beliefs, but the title alone is enough to make any devout person give it a pass.
Same reason why an atheist might be reluctant to read a book like "Proof of Heaven" or something.

Anonymous Mon May 5 01:51:19 2014 No.4854982

>>4854966
>Yeah, I'm sure it's helpful for the "fence-sitters"
But those under 18 are predominately fence-sitters, and quite a few more are easily swayed. Once someone reaches 30 or so, it's a lot harder for them to give up their religion as they have invested so much time and effort into it. Dawkins opens up a second path for those youths raised in religious environments, and the popularity and controversy surrounding the book meant that most kids my age were curious about. It had a noticeable impact in my school, and many kids turned away from theism. If they didn't have access to this book a lot of them would still be religious today.

Anonymous Mon May 5 01:55:15 2014 No.4855000

>>4854964
Our Dawkins, Who art in Oxford
Hallowed be Thy Name;
Thy scientific method come,
Thy experiments will be done,
at home as it is in labs.
Give us this day our empiricism,
and forgive us our sophistry,
as we forgive those who soph against us;
and lead us not into self-flagellation,
but deliver us from theology. Amen.

Anonymous Mon May 5 01:58:35 2014 No.4855013

>>4855000
Your prayer would be better with:

Our Dawkins, Who art in Oxford
Hallowed be Thy Name;
Thy scientific method come,
Thy experiments will be done,
at home as it is in labs.
Give us this day our daily empiricism,
and forgive us our inquiry,
as we forgive those who inquire against us;
and lead us not into philosophy,
but deliver us from theology. Amen.

Anonymous Mon May 5 02:00:06 2014 No.4855019
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There's really so many problems about this book it's not really worth complaining about. I feel a little bad for people who were seriously convinced by a guy who misunderstands Christianity as much as Dawkins did. Dawkins has the same ideas regarding God as crazy fundies do. So maybe it's a good read if you're a fundie who thinks the earth is flat, but hardly damning otherwise.

I don't really agree entirely with Eagleton on some of what he says, but he offers a good critique of Dawkin's book. I've got the idea that OP's just posting for funsies though, but it really is worth a read if you're interested.
http://www.lrb.co.uk/v28/n20/terry-eagleton/lunging-flailing-mispunching

Anonymous Mon May 5 02:02:46 2014 No.4855021

>>4854982
I dunno, I went to Catholic School myself and there were plenty of people there who just blindly accepted.

I'd say the propensity was about 70/30 actually, with the major form of dissent being more against outmoded traditions or bigoted viewpoints rather than against the concept of God itself or the divinity of Jesus.
Most people came out "progressive" Christians who might have had modern ideas about religion and the teachings of Christ and such, but who never second-guessed the fundamental tenants of Christianity.

Anonymous Mon May 5 02:17:37 2014 No.4855057

>>4855021
Similar to you, I went to a catholic high school.

Out of the ~100 students in my year level, only about 5 or 6 of us were atheist/ agnostic. It's what you get in a rural town with almost 10 churches and a lot of wogs.

My peers would just blindly accept whatever their parents believed. I didn't really mind that for the fact that everyone in my town has strong ties to their families and traditions.

I'm not a fuckwit fedora or anything, but I have to admit it was hard not to giggle sometimes when people at my school would look me dead in the eye and tell me to go to confession for things I had (apparently) done on the weekend and such.

My girlfriend identifies as a Christian and it does not affect me in any way.

>Most people came out "progressive" Christians who might have had modern ideas about religion and the teachings of Christ and such, but who never second-guessed the fundamental tenants of Christianity.
We had compulsory Religious Education classes and this is pretty much what we were all taught/ guided to be.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 02:21:53 2014 No.4855075 >>4854840 not him he means the 'if a tree falls in a forest...'

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 02:22:55 2014 No.4855080 >>4854728 >Objectivists cannot atheistically prove that Ayn Rand exists

Anonymous Mon May 5 02:26:10 2014 No.4855087

>>4855013
Our Dawkins, Who art in Oxford
Hallowed be Thy Name;
Thy scientific method come,
Thy experiments will be done,
at home as they are in labs.
Give us this day our daily empiricism,
and forgive us our inquiry,
as we forgive those who blindly believe;
Lead us not into theology,
so deliver us from sophistry. Amen.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 02:34:35 2014 No.4855113 >>4855087 >>4855013 >>4855000 >Our Hitchens, who art in Heaven.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 02:37:39 2014 No.4855119 File: 49 KB, 468x394, article-1192777-05476934000005DC-929_468x394.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>4855113 You asked?

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 04:32:14 2014 No.4855302 >>4854728 >Atheists cannot objectively prove that Dawkins exists. The question is "do you believe in the existence of Dawkins?" If the answer is YES, then it's dogmatic faith.

Anonymous Mon May 5 04:42:39 2014 No.4855337

>>4854381
It's a terrible book. There's literally nothing in it that hadn't already been written down countless number of times before, except perhaps that it has reached a new level of smugness never seen before. It's both an incredible simplification of atheist philosophy AND religious theology. If anything, it's pushed back the cause of atheism 50 years.

The fact that it resonates most strongly with teenagers and people from-formerly fundamentalist-Christian-background-now-militant-atheist says a lot.

It's a simple book for simple atheists.

Also the atheism part is just a ruse. It's merely an attempt by Dawkins to push his (controversial amongst scientists) brand of Neo-Darwinist ideology of adaptionalism and scientism and imply anybody who disagrees is a stupid christfag. He's ramming in his ideology through the back door.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 04:49:43 2014 No.4855353 >>4855337 Oh boy, what's his Neo-Darwinist ideology then? Is it just as xenophobic as Darwinism?

Anonymous Mon May 5 04:54:35 2014 No.4855368

>>4855353
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/1997/jun/12/darwinian-fundamentalism/

There's an argument amongst biologist to what extent adaptation had a part in evolution. It's rather ideological, but Darwkins belongs to the 'extreme' part where adaptation is 100% responsible for everything, and not only that, but natural selection is general is applicable to EVERYTHING not just biology.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 04:58:45 2014 No.4855372 >>4855368 That sounds terrible. Thanks for the info.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 05:05:46 2014 No.4855384 Anyone else remember way before fedora's and r/atheism, when /lit/ didn't bandwaggon anti-atheism, and the majority liked Dawkins? >>/lit/thread/S450763

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 05:14:48 2014 No.4855395 >>4855384 People are waking up to the motives of Dawkins and what happens when smug atheism goes out of control.

Anonymous Mon May 5 05:24:03 2014 No.4855413

>>4855395
>what happens when smug atheism goes out of control.

Priests stop mouthfucking children, millions are saved from the fear of damnation, the celestial mind-reading big brother stops becoming a threat, governments make rational policies based on empiricism?

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 05:26:27 2014 No.4855420 これはベイトです。

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 05:27:38 2014 No.4855425 File: 90 KB, 480x480, 1390029727329.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>4855413 >governments >rational policies

Anonymous Mon May 5 05:34:58 2014 No.4855450

>>4855413
>Priests stop mouthfucking children
Implying religion is why pedophiles exist.
>millions are saved from the fear of damnation
If you're scared of damnation you're not a good believer of a religion. Only irrational atheists who are still scared of hell for some reason have need for fear that.
>the celestial mind-reading big brother stops becoming a threat
..Which the transhumanists are trying to replace with an all-seeing all-knowing singularity AI
> governments make rational policies based on empiricism
top kek, all those policies of the god-less soviet russia sure were rational!

Anonymous Mon May 5 05:49:48 2014 No.4855485

Didn't Stirner proved Atheism is just another form of believing God? Atheism turns from God to Man, so now he doesn't belong to an entity but belongs to himself, which he self he raises above himself, making it too, like a God. So he tries to be Man, belongs to Man race, rather than to the other, alien to himself, entity.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 05:51:40 2014 No.4855488 >>4855485 >Didn't Stirner prove A philosopher has never 'proven' anything. Ever.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 05:53:31 2014 No.4855490 >>4855413 It's like I'm actually in 1800

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 05:59:02 2014 No.4855499 File: 929 KB, 800x1145, congress.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] This is what religion does to your congress. And people pretend like it's not a big deal and religion is no biggie at all. >yfw only 1 atheist in all of US congress

Anonymous Mon May 5 06:04:31 2014 No.4855506

>>4855499

>Religion having anything to do with climate disinfo

Climate change became politicized because hydrocarbon companies poured money into campaigns against it.

Politicians make lame appeals to religion to appeal to the unwashed masses. That doesn't implicate religion itself in climate change denialism.

Anonymous Mon May 5 06:07:07 2014 No.4855510

>>4855488
Same would go in science. Philosophers contemplate in the basis of theory, like Darwin criticizes Christianity, it's base of thought believed by most to be undeniable, unshakable set of rules, with aim to free itself from it into new set of rules; scientists too, base themselves on a set of rules, like Einsteins theory of reality , which gets doubted more and more, and might as well be crumbled down like Christianity.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 06:12:40 2014 No.4855518 >>4855510 Except of course that science actually provides evidence for their claims, and religion and philosophy don't

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 06:13:48 2014 No.4855519 >>4855499 That's what Protestantism does. America is a lesson to whst happens when people delegate interpreting the Christian texts to individuals, without authority.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 06:15:59 2014 No.4855524 >>4854940 This is satire ,right? Noone can be this edgy and retarded? Guess you are an american then.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 06:18:06 2014 No.4855527 >>4855519 Fucking protestants actually trying to take the religion seriously, missing the entire point. I'm not sarcastic.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 06:18:21 2014 No.4855528 >>4855519 And medieval times are a lesson when you leave Catholics in control of a society

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 06:18:46 2014 No.4855529 I'm a total pleb and I usually read low tier crap that's just entertaining to me, but I always rather liked Hitchens, don't know why.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 06:19:37 2014 No.4855531 File: 120 KB, 227x222, that hat.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>4854381 More like Richard Dorkins

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 06:20:26 2014 No.4855535 >>4855529 >I'm a total pleb and I usually read low tier crap that's just entertaining to me No wonder you are an atheist.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 06:26:30 2014 No.4855551 >>4855535 If you want to point me in the direction of something better I'd be happy to try it.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 06:27:16 2014 No.4855554 >>4855551 Start with the greeks.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 06:31:10 2014 No.4855561 >>4855554 Sure.

Anonymous Mon May 5 06:33:14 2014 No.4855567

>>4855518
Same basis, even science starts to dwell into the metaphysical with its search of the bodily structures in cosmos. A dark matter only exists and is thought to be corporeal in a theory; God is thought to be corporeal in the theory of Christianity.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 06:41:38 2014 No.4855585 >>4855499 >Paul Broun (Chairman for the US Committee on Science and Technology) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rikEWuBrkHc proof that America is fucked.

Anonymous Mon May 5 06:45:13 2014 No.4855600

>>4855585
>>Paul Broun (Chairman for the US Committee on Science and Technology)

"God's word is true. I've come to understand that. All that stuff I was taught about evolution and embryology and the Big Bang Theory, all that is lies straight from the pit of Hell. And it's lies to try to keep me and all the folks who were taught that from understanding that they need a savior. You see, there are a lot of scientific data that I've found out as a scientist that actually show that this is really a young Earth. I don't believe that the Earth's but about 9,000 years old. I believe it was created in six days as we know them. That's what the Bible says.

And what I've come to learn is that it's the manufacturer's handbook, is what I call it. It teaches us how to run our lives individually, how to run our families, how to run our churches. But it teaches us how to run all of public policy and everything in society. And that's the reason as your congressman I hold the Holy Bible as being the major directions to me of how I vote in Washington, D.C., and I'll continue to do that."

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 06:48:03 2014 No.4855609 Agnosticism is honestly the only empirical, logical choice. Not "hmm there might be a god but i dont know if i believe in him"'; agnosticism is the lack of acknowledging something as true or untrue until you have evidence.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 06:52:57 2014 No.4855617 >>4855609 >using logic to live your life OK

Anonymous Mon May 5 06:55:52 2014 No.4855628

>>4855600
The reason why there are so many politicians entangled up with biblical literalism is because it's a political phenomenon. It's a good way to make sheeple, the kind of people politicians like.

Biblical literalism wasn't even popular 2000 years ago.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 06:59:21 2014 No.4855640 >>4854711 nice b8 m8

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 07:01:02 2014 No.4855646 >>4855609 But the structures that support that 'evidence' are as faulty and questionable as the concept of god in the first place. Why don't you agnostics follow your line of thinking to its logical conclusion and just be epistemological nihilists?

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 07:01:22 2014 No.4855647 >>4855019 well said

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 07:04:57 2014 No.4855652 >>4855609 Agnosticism is logical in the same sense solipsism is. It's just further skepticism. Not that there's anything wrong with that, it just won't get you anywhere and highlights the problem of being 'logical'.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 07:26:07 2014 No.4855700 >evolution >random mutations happen >random >random >random that's as good as saying 'we don't know what causes the mutations' pathetic

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 07:27:19 2014 No.4855705 >>4855700 wow

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 07:30:23 2014 No.4855717 Hands up who would entrust his health to prays before medicine??? .... Science 1 - Religion 0

Anonymous Mon May 5 07:32:59 2014 No.4855727
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Wow, you'd have to be a real idiot to question whether early Christians were forced to re-imagine Jesus after his death negated his apocalypticist message regarding the coming of a secular son of man

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 07:34:44 2014 No.4855732 >>4855727 >ehrman topkek m8 his books are useful for understanding the process of textual criticism but beyond that it's about putting a square peg in a round hole

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 07:37:23 2014 No.4855736 how does anyone still bite at this??

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 07:39:00 2014 No.4855739 File: 7 KB, 236x285, 1310418566400.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>4855717 >yfw medicine works because god allows it

Anonymous Mon May 5 07:41:07 2014 No.4855747

>>4855736
my least favorite threads on 4chan:

Circumcised vs uncircumcised
Brit vs US
Atheist vs Deist, with both mocking agnostic, along with any discussion of hitchens or dawkins
Die hard communists vs anyone
/pol/ infodumps

>>4855739
>The word of god is communicated to man through science
>doctors and scientists, especially physicists are the new high priests

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 07:44:30 2014 No.4855756 >>4855736 because a lot of people agree with him? and they cheer when someone thinks like them?

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 07:47:51 2014 No.4855768 >>4855756 Except there is no point, because the only people who are converted by Atheist lit like this are on-the-fence agnostics anyways. Its preaching to the choir, with a couple people who show up on sundays thrown in.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 08:03:57 2014 No.4855798 What's the point of this book when Nietzsche exists, and he's 100000x more intelligent than Dawkins and 10000x less smug.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 08:05:43 2014 No.4855804 >>4855747 >implying I'm not a cirumcised British man willing to stand up for my Deus Lenin. Damn Jews.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 08:09:46 2014 No.4855814 >>4855798 MUFUCKIN THIS!

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 08:09:55 2014 No.4855815 >>4855804 Hello, I am an uncircumcised American who's parents made the choice due to the apostle Paul's stance or circumcision. Also I am black. Can we be friends?

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 08:12:25 2014 No.4855820 >>4855815 Of course, what do you think we are; 4chan posters? laugh track

Anonymous Mon May 5 08:15:23 2014 No.4855826

>>4855798
Nietzsche was pretty fucking smug, dude.

'It is difficult to be understood, especially when one thinks and lives gangasrotogati among those only who think and live otherwise - namely, kurmagati, or at best ''froglike,'' mandeikagati (I do everything to be ''difficultly understood'' myself!) - and one should be heartily grateful for the good will to some refinement of interpretation. As regards ''the good friends,'' however, who are always too easy-going, and think that as friends they have a right to ease, one does well at the very first to grant them a play-ground and romping-place for misunderstanding - one can thus laugh still; or get rid of them altogether, these good friends - and laugh then also!'

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 08:23:15 2014 No.4855839 >>4855826 Wow this shit is unreadable.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 08:24:21 2014 No.4855843 >>4855839 Basically, he uses massive, never used words, to make people think they understand him, but in reality don't, so he can laugh at them.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 08:27:55 2014 No.4855847 >>4855839 >muh i should be able to read everything with no effort cause i'm a stupid faggot

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 09:01:51 2014 No.4855916 >>4855826 >Nietzsche was smug in his other works, therefore he MUST be smug in his writings on religion!

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 09:08:33 2014 No.4855925 >Anyone that questions my point of view is an idiot Wow you seem to have gotten a lot out of that book

Anonymous Mon May 5 09:09:09 2014 No.4855927

>>4855916
That was not in the post I replied to.
>What's the point of this book when Nietzsche exists, and he's 100000x more intelligent than Dawkins and 10000x less smug.

Nietzsche is less smug according to this post. He is still smug according to mine. What does religion have to do with this?

Anonymous Mon May 5 09:13:55 2014 No.4855932
File: 679 KB, 1656x2550, faith.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]

Read this.
I understand why you americans turn to atheism. Your christians are totally batshit insane cultists. Here in Europe being religious christian means you show up for mass once in a while.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 09:15:50 2014 No.4855937 File: 1.45 MB, 320x180, 1371030647749.gif [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >according to /lit/ Dawkins is better than Blaise Pascal.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 09:16:13 2014 No.4855939 >>4855925 Not really surprising, given that that is basically Dawkins' world view.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 09:33:19 2014 No.4855971 >>4855927 >Nietzsche is less smug according to this post Nietzsche can be a little smug here and there, but Dawkins is the king of smug.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 09:37:27 2014 No.4855982 >>4855932 >Here in Europe being religious christian means you show up for mass once in a while. Yes we all know that secularism has bastardized your believers into becoming lackadaisical fakes. This is nothing new.

Anonymous Mon May 5 09:43:03 2014 No.4855990

>>4855057
>>4855021
>>4854940
Freethought is a false god. Nobody can feed off of doubt, they would die. Most skeptics are people who are very sure in their dogmas, but will condescend to hear another's "point of view" now and then just to smugly confirm themselves as freethinkers. Actual skepticism is unbearable; it's a fatal hunger in the soul.

Read The Gospels again. Consider what Christ's crucifixion actually means. If you can't see that Jesus Christ is the Son of God then I think you are wilfully blind. If Jesus Christ is not God then Pilate is right and there is no such thing as truth. if you reject Christ you reject everything.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 09:45:42 2014 No.4855998 >>4855982 I'm sorry we don't circumsize our kids, don't homeschool them and let them watch devil box.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 09:49:15 2014 No.4856005 >>4855998 >devil box. The Electric Kike.

Anonymous Mon May 5 09:52:59 2014 No.4856012

>>4854842
I don't know, I think he points out the debatable leaps in logic there. They do have a feel of "Point 1, Point 2, Point 3........ therefore, God" where the acceptance of a God doesn't feel properly arrived at.

Where specifically do you think he misunderstands them?

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 09:55:12 2014 No.4856022 >>4855932 surely if you can see that there's a progression from "Wacky Religious Beliefs" to "Lax Religious Beliefs", doesn't it seem obvious that progression further moves into no religious beliefs at all?

Anonymous Mon May 5 10:03:16 2014 No.4856048
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>>4856022
>progression further moves into no religious beliefs at all?

Religions and cults are natural products of human consciousness. Some religions die out and others are created. It's natural process. Humanity simply can't exist without believing in something because there's no bigger fear than fear of unknown. That's what militant atheists don't understand or ignore like Dawkins to make money off gullible fools.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 10:06:39 2014 No.4856061 >>4856048 Believing in naturalism is far simpler and less demanding than Christianity.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 10:11:08 2014 No.4856077 File: 72 KB, 613x577, master.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>4856061 Eating rats and scraps from trashbins is also less demanding than being functional member of the society.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 10:20:11 2014 No.4856101 >>4856077 I doubt this

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 10:28:41 2014 No.4856121 File: 24 KB, 390x304, laughing.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>4856077 In that case, 84% of our prison population is comprised of your "functional members of society."

>>	onionring !Rrxa7zePwI Mon May 5 10:39:18 2014 No.4856142 always very very puzzled by this, why do people act like dawkins or atheism is new? is it an american thing? you'd think it's as basic as the addition table.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 10:43:22 2014 No.4856155 >Atheism threads >guaranteed replies Good work, OP

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 10:44:08 2014 No.4856158 >>4856142 I wish every board had /int/ flags and single thread trip codes. I sit down at 7am east coast time to go on my favorite boards and see 4 hours of australians calling each other americans

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 10:47:07 2014 No.4856166 >>4856142 Because pop atheism is new. Atheism for the masses. Dumber and more audacious than ever.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 10:48:14 2014 No.4856173 >>4856166 >Says a christian pats head

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 10:49:44 2014 No.4856178 >>4854381 >le epic doge meme >>>/reddit/

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 10:50:57 2014 No.4856181 File: 17 KB, 227x239, image.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>4856178

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 10:54:36 2014 No.4856190 >>4856173 le epic xD I'm merely disgusted at how atheism is now politically (and scientism) based rather than philosophically based, despite y'know this ACTUALLY BEING A PHILOSOPHICAL INQUIRY. I'm a mad philosopher, not a mad Christian (hah!).

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 11:42:23 2014 No.4856345 >>4855488 You again? Try Russell, Frege, Carnap, Montague, Kripke, Williamson.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 11:48:51 2014 No.4856361 >>4856190 Dude, philosophy is dead.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 11:50:31 2014 No.4856362 File: 1.28 MB, 1132x552, 1364858855923.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>4856345

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 11:54:46 2014 No.4856369 >verificationism

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 11:58:56 2014 No.4856381 >>4856361 NOT DEAD YET NOT DEAD YET

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 12:01:36 2014 No.4856388 >>4856369 I can never see a probably with it. It's the easiest way to avoid people fooling you.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 13:15:49 2014 No.4856586 >>4856345 Why are you dropping the names of mathematicians? Logic is a field of math and those people have math degrees.

Anonymous Mon May 5 13:19:43 2014 No.4856602

>>4854905
I've read both, though both are great books, I feel Hitchens comes out on top.

Dawkins' viewpoint is predominantly scientific, understandably. However Hitchens goes through a spectrum of when presenting his arguement, political, scientific, morality as well as the burdens of religion and its moral consequences while giving examples. I would agree with you with recommending Hitchens to whet the appetite on the subject.

Its kinda weird, some authors have different tones towards atheism. The tone of their argument reflect on how hard they cane the theist position, even when arguing a similar point.

When I used to be religious, had I read Hitchens or watched him argue, I would have likely clung to religion in denial and the psychological fear of being eternally punished.

However authors and educators like Carl Sagan and Bill Nye also play an important role in this transition (as it did for me) by initially opening up the idea that it's ok to ask questions, then you sort of move up the ladder, towards Dawkins, Sam Harris, Daniel Dennet, Hitchens.

(I know I may have missed a few great authors, but this is such a broad and interesting topic)

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 13:21:45 2014 No.4856608 >>4856586 >Philosophers cannot also know mathematics Did you just kill your own argument for that guy you fucking dipshit?

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 13:23:37 2014 No.4856614 >>4856608 These people had math degrees and did math research. Of course they are mathematicians. No, a philosopher cannot do the same because he doesn't know the math.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 13:24:48 2014 No.4856616 >>4854381 this thread is not valid copypasta reported

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 13:28:31 2014 No.4856619 >>4856614 No woman has ever proved anything. hint: Don't give examples 'cause I'll just say they're mathematicians, not women. And they can't be women because women can't know math.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 13:29:41 2014 No.4856622 >>4856614 Is Williamson's recent book, Modal Logic as Metaphysics a work of philosophy? Does he prove anything in it?

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 13:32:26 2014 No.4856628 >>4856061 >easier >less demanding Peace ain't easy.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 13:38:41 2014 No.4856648 >>4856619 Don't be silly. >>4856622 >metaphysics >proof These two words are opposites. Just because you abuse notation of logic when talking about your baseless beliefs, that doesn't make them logical.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 13:39:58 2014 No.4856656 >>4855528 You get thousands of universities, hospitals, and people preserving ancient literary works?

>>	onionring !Rrxa7zePwI Mon May 5 13:45:48 2014 No.4856671 oh boy here we go again

Anonymous Mon May 5 13:47:24 2014 No.4856677

>>4856648
Not sillier than your claim that no mathematicians are philosophers and that no philosophers have proved anything.

And so are you saying that Williamson isn't a mathematician after all, and that he doesn't prove anything in that book? I'd appreciate a yes or no answer to this, rather than more bullshitting.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 13:51:35 2014 No.4856695 >>4856677 Mentioning that a mathematician can also do philosophy is like mentioning that a professional sportsman can also tie his shoes.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 13:54:25 2014 No.4856705 >>4856695 So, just to be clear, >>4855488 >A philosopher has never 'proven' anything. Ever. is false? Just as false as the claim that a professional sportsman has never tied his shoes?

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 13:58:33 2014 No.4856720 >>4856705 You're funny. You're arguing like one of those creationists who shout the names of a few cherry picked examples of scientists who were also christians. As if this somehow made their religious beliefs less ridiculous.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 13:59:23 2014 No.4856722 File: 184 KB, 615x375, laughter-615.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>4856602 >up the ladder, towards Dawkins, Sam Harris, Daniel Dennet, Hitchens >up the ladder

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 13:59:48 2014 No.4856723 >>4854940 >catholic school >literallist >needing someone to guide your thoughts >not being religious How's life in the US these days, son?

Anonymous Mon May 5 14:01:59 2014 No.4856729

>>4855113
Hail Hitchens, Full of journalism
Blessed are you among writers
and blessed is the fruit of thy pen, "The Missionary Position"

Holy Hitchens, Father of Science
Help us grasp the world with euphoria,
us uneuphorics,
now and at the hour of our sudden non-existence

Wissenshaft

Anonymous Mon May 5 14:02:13 2014 No.4856732

>>4856720
Well, if some moron were to claim that there has never been a scientist that has been a Christian (in order to discredit Christianity), I think giving a list of obvious counterexamples would be a perfectly fine argumentative strategy.

Way to avoid admitting you're wrong, though.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 14:07:05 2014 No.4856750 >>4856732 Is moving the goal posts another trick you learned in your philosophy 101 class?

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 14:08:07 2014 No.4856753 >>4856722 Whats wrong with Sam Harris and Hitchens? I've never seen decent criticism of them both.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 14:09:51 2014 No.4856761 >>4856753 >I've never seen decent criticism of them both. You've lived a sheltered life.

Anonymous Mon May 5 14:18:17 2014 No.4856776

>>4856750
Learned it well enough to recognize that that's what you're trying to do.

Let's review.

Someone, perhaps you, claims that no philosopher has ever proved anything.
I think this is an obviously false claim, it is my goal to refute it. So I post several counterexamples.
You reply that they are mathematicians, and claim that a "philosopher cannot do the same because he doesn't know the math". I ask about a specific case, which is clearly the work of a philosopher and clearly has proofs. Then you seem to concede that mathematicians can be philosophers (and presumably that some philosophers have proved things) with your (ridiculous) sportsman analogy. I ask to confirm that my modest original goal has been achieved, and you accuse me of doing something akin to what creationists do. I point out this style of argument is valid given the circumstances, and you accuse me of moving the goal posts.

My original goal: establish the obvious--that some philosophers have proved things.
This was accomplished satisfactorily, as far as I can tell, yet you squirm to try to change the subject, so as to not admit that you made a false claim and to distract from the fact that you have done so.

>>	onionring !Rrxa7zePwI Mon May 5 14:19:25 2014 No.4856781 see kids, this is why you need philosophy. 170+ iq and still worship hitchens's pop books.

Anonymous Mon May 5 14:19:26 2014 No.4856782

>>4856602
>by initially opening up the idea that it's ok to ask questions
I don't want to sound like I'm going out of my way to make an argument here, but you realize that Christianity is fundamentally based around asking questions, right?

From the link here above: >>4855019
>For mainstream Christianity, reason, argument and honest doubt have always played an integral role in belief.
I mean, this is stuff that's even brought up via Aquinas and other theologians and apologetics writers, the point of the former being to question and apply reason to discover the truth, and the latter being to question to answer doubts people have regarding Christianity.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 14:20:15 2014 No.4856786 >>4856761 And I'm still not seeing any.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 14:20:21 2014 No.4856787 >>4855990 I'm a Gnostic, I believe Jesus was sent as an agent of the Pleromatic realm to save us from the false god Yaldabaoth depicted throughout the Old Testament. Come at me.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 14:21:46 2014 No.4856791 File: 47 KB, 327x256, 1355605128021.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>4856781

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 14:24:49 2014 No.4856806 >>4855531 #fucking rekt

Anonymous Mon May 5 14:25:18 2014 No.4856810

>>4856753
There's no cogent response to hitchens or Harris because there can't be. Harris argues for no free will on a very solid background, and without free will the floor of all Christian belief falls. Hitchens recognized the dubious nature and wishy washy snakelike patterns of all religious faiths. The only religious reply to hitchens is denial.

Christians are the masters of saying "we don't believe that" to a moral atheist and saying "we believe that" to their congregation and friends.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 14:26:31 2014 No.4856816 >>4855617 I don't, I'm saying that it's more logical than atheism, which people put on the pedestal as the most logical choice. >>4855652 >>4855646 No, I agree that logic only goes so far, I'm just saying that atheism is illogical.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 14:28:21 2014 No.4856822 >>4855652 >solipsism Well, part of agnosticism is just completely ignoring worthless questions that have no way of being proven right or wrong. It's not about trying to find truth in areas where there is clearly no capacity to find it.

Anonymous Mon May 5 14:32:58 2014 No.4856839

>>4856816
If the choices are believing in a God who changes the physical world sometimes when you pray and there being no gods, then the atheist choice is far more sensible. Any position more pro-god than agnosticism or a feeling of appreciation toward what's greater than thyself is about as religious as you can sanely be in this world

Anonymous Mon May 5 14:34:15 2014 No.4856846
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>>4856810
>Hitchens recognized the dubious nature and wishy washy snakelike patterns of all religious faiths. The only religious reply to hitchens is denial.

"Hitchens contends that organised religion is "violent, irrational, intolerant, allied to racism, tribalism, and bigotry, invested in ignorance and hostile to free inquiry, contemptuous of women and coercive toward children" and sectarian, and that accordingly it "ought to have a great deal on its conscience."Hitchens contends that organised religion is "violent, irrational, intolerant, allied to racism, tribalism, and bigotry, invested in ignorance and hostile to free inquiry, contemptuous of women and coercive toward children" and sectarian, and that accordingly it "ought to have a great deal on its conscience.""

I'd say there is a great deal of debatable things here. Not simply something you can only turn away with denial.

Anonymous Mon May 5 14:35:13 2014 No.4856855
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>>4856786
Not him, and I haven't read much of Hitchens, but Harris is just a utilitarian and his ethics fall flat for the same reason utilitarian ethics do, briefly, that we cannot know reliably the outcome of any situation in the long-term or whether it would benefit humanity or not. He doesn't solve the is-ought problem in ethics, and doesn't seem to solve any problem in them at all.

From what I've read of Hitchens, he makes the same mistakes that writers like Dawkins make, which is arguing against an over-simplified version of religion that ignores its main arguments or distorts them, or avoids entirely dealing with any strong ones. He also claims, against the consensus of just about every major historian and the field of history in general, that Jesus did not exist or that there is no evidence that he did. Most of his arguments are well suited for the young-earth Fundamentalism that's only come around in the past century or so, but not otherwise.

You can probably find better responses and rebuttals to them through Google though.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 14:36:33 2014 No.4856862 >>4856855 Thank you, anonymous poster.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 14:38:00 2014 No.4856866 >>4856846 >double paste Fuck

Anonymous Mon May 5 14:38:10 2014 No.4856867

>>4856846
Your interpretation of hitchens is dubious. Hitchens is referring exactly to the mainstream organized religions, meaning Protestantism, Catholicism, Islam, any of the eastern religions, and forth. He doesn't give a shit about your made-up self-described palatable interpretation of the bible and neither does anyone else.

Anonymous Mon May 5 14:38:59 2014 No.4856872

>>4856839
It's not about choices of what to believe in manufactured issues, or the *search* for truth, just about knowing how to recognize it when it's there. Any number of questions can be asked about any subject, with plenty of cases for each side, but it's almost purely rhetorical. One thing can appear to be far more likely than another, and I can appreciate that, but I cannot ultimately say that there is no god.

So yes, I think the entire debate over whether or not there's an intelligent creator is just one of an infinite number of moot questions without answers, and the fact that there's terminology about every side of the spectrum in belief of it is lame. I agree that there not being an intelligent creator appears to be more likely than there being one, but I won't even think about trying to pass it off as a truth or fact.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 14:39:41 2014 No.4856878 >>4856867 >Your interpretation of hitchens is dubious. My interpretation? I just copy/pasted what God Is Not Great is about from its wiki page.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 14:39:42 2014 No.4856877 >>4856855 Harris is just Nietzsche with better science and faulty morals/ethics. Combine the two and you get a better agnostic/immoralist approach to understanding

Anonymous Mon May 5 14:41:58 2014 No.4856889

>>4856855
>From what I've read of Hitchens, he makes the same mistakes that writers like Dawkins make, which is arguing against an over-simplified version of religion that ignores its main arguments or distorts them

Where is there ever an argument distorted?

Anonymous Mon May 5 14:43:31 2014 No.4856898

>>4856878
You're reading between the lines and understanding it how you want to understand it so its easier to dismiss him. Your self-created rational interpretation of the bible is irrelevant. Religion is fucking dangerous in the hands of the stupid and the insane, and how it effects the common man, which is where the problem lies.

Christianity is good because it can be interpreted only holds true if all the interpreters are already rational, sane people. The problem is that most aren't.

Anonymous Mon May 5 14:44:48 2014 No.4856904

>>4856855

His main contention with regards to Jesus is that, like with Sokrates, his existence is pretty much irrelevant, what matters is his teachings which he sees as being immoral. And assuming that Jesus was real, was borne of a virgin, was crucified and was resurrected STILL doesn't mean that any of his teachings were any more valid than those of Sokrates' - a man who was not divine.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 14:45:24 2014 No.4856907 >>4856872 I work with schizophrenic people and I can promise you that convictions to the truth are the most dangerous ideas out there. No, fostering doubt is far more beneficial to everyone

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 14:45:43 2014 No.4856909 >>4856898 >Your self-created rational interpretation of the bible is irrelevant. I have never read the Bible. I have read the Catechism.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 14:45:57 2014 No.4856911 >>4856877 What? Isn't Harris a straightforward moral realist utilitarian? How is that even in the ballpark of Nietzsche?

Anonymous Mon May 5 14:49:56 2014 No.4856924

>>4855932

That book is insane.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MoTt0-IAbY8&list=PL0-LSnSBNIncKfFDrz7TrKmtAAUjC7rkZ&index=2

This guy does a great job at showing how absolutely stupid this book is.

I'm tempted to say that if you read this book and found it compelling, you are an uncritical doofus, because you have to be in order to find it compelling.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 14:50:03 2014 No.4856925 >>4856911 Not at all, Nietzsche is the antithesis, he recognizes that without god, what is good is power and strength and the will to take. He doesn't pander to petty morals and set up shitty arguments to defend them, he calls it as it is without god.

Anonymous Mon May 5 14:50:50 2014 No.4856928

>>4855368
>adaptation is 100% responsible for everything,
Pff, wasn't this been totally disproved?
>natural selection is general is applicable to EVERYTHING not just biology.
Well, now I don't get why this is harder to believe than the first. This makes sense.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 14:51:50 2014 No.4856931 >>4856925 Right, so how is that anything like Harris? PS: what's his argument for the thesis that what is good is power and strength and the will to take? I bet it's shitty.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 14:57:55 2014 No.4856948 >>4856810 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8vYq6Xm2To&feature=related

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 14:58:13 2014 No.4856949 >>4856925 I've never read Nietzsche but how the hell could anyone believe that and write that and not feel pretty bad about the state of things?

Anonymous Mon May 5 14:58:49 2014 No.4856950

>>4856931
His views on the ascetic, appreciation of science and looking to psychology/neurology to explain beliefs and motives, their position on the purpose of the soul and mysticism.

I'm sure you wouldn't even understand nietzsche if you read his works. Read the genealogy of morals if you want to understand his view on morality.

Essentially, traits that the weak underclasses develop to survive (kindness, meekness, turning the other cheek) are pathetic on their face, and it's a perversion of what's viscerally true to say those are moral. And this can be evidenced by where and how all the morals of the bible and else were formed, essentially the Jews developed these slave morals when they were oppressed and that carried to Christianity more generally

Which is a wholly atheistic conception of morals, but his work is very solid philology so good luck arguing against it without spending a year doing research for the dissertation

Anonymous Mon May 5 15:01:59 2014 No.4856966

>>4856949
Because I saw the writing on the wall and began pursuing the truth. Feeling a certain way about the world is just a physiological response, getting more sunlight, eating nutritious food, drinking water instead of shit, eating less sugar, and interacting with humans on an intimate level fixes the emotions, not what concept you hold of the world.

What you will have to accept though is that the deck is stacked massively against you, so you will need to strengthen your mind, body, and spirit p fight it, which is where most people bitch out because they're too weak. That's okay, I'll be pursuing my master morality.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 15:05:23 2014 No.4856978 >>4856950 And how is this not just a childlike pursuit for power?

Anonymous Mon May 5 15:08:11 2014 No.4856989

>>4856978
It is if you have a worldview that's perverted, which is the Christian world view. You've trained your mind for years to think counter intuitively. Nietzsche thinks intuitively.

Protip: his method takes you to happiness, like a cold Coca-Cola. Christianity gives you a warm diet coke and says "now make sense of it". When studying how I study, you view Christianity as a cog in the grand scheme of things and a place where truth may be, when you're a Christian you view it as Truth and everything else is a cog in the machine of lies. It's perverted to an extreme.

Anonymous Mon May 5 15:09:54 2014 No.4856999

>>4856948
Can science tell us what's right from wrong? Not exactly, it tells us probable truths, and those probable truths go against our ethical principles so we adapt. Adaption is the key of a good ethical system. Christianity doesn't adapt unless it's forced to, and I'd bet you can clearly demonstrate this

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 15:10:19 2014 No.4857000 >>4856989 >It is if you have a worldview that's perverted, which is the Christian world view. You've trained your mind for years to think counter intuitively. Nietzsche thinks intuitively. How are we sure it's not the opposite way around?

Anonymous Mon May 5 15:11:47 2014 No.4857007

>>4856950
Yeah, you and Freddy are too smart for me. What you describe sounds like one massive genetic fallacy, though. Do you think you could give a reasonably clear statement of a main thesis of his and provide a sound argument for it?

(I think I'll research something worthwhile for my dissertation, and not bother with this garbage)

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 15:13:19 2014 No.4857012 >>4856999 But what could science tell us that goes against an ethical principle of mine like 'It's wrong to cause needless suffering'?

Anonymous Mon May 5 15:13:24 2014 No.4857013

>>4857000
I don't know, and Nietzsche recognized too that slave morality is very useful and he wouldn't be able to live the life he did without it. So it's paradoxical. I'm not telling you how to live, I'm telling you how I live, and if you're going to turn the other cheek while I slap you, then that's okay. You can store your treasures in heaven and I'll have them on earth. That's fine. I accept that.

Why you would turn in what's certain for what's uncertain is another thing altogether, though.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 15:14:29 2014 No.4857017 >>4857013 >I don't know

Anonymous Mon May 5 15:16:39 2014 No.4857023

>>4857007
No, I can't, because I can't speak to the topic better than Nietzsche does. If you choose to remain ignorant, then choose that way. But I think your obsession with meekness and self-containing morals is pathetic, I laugh at you and I'd spit on you if you were down. Metaphorically, of course.

>>4857012
"It is wrong to cause needless suffering" is simply a moral value, science can just tell us how to apply this moral value. So, if science can show us that gingers do in fact have souls and do have feelings, then we admit that it must be immoral to cause them suffering. That is why science is useful to morals, but science doesn't create the morals itself.

Of course, I bound between rejecting morals as farce anyway and some utilitarian approach, I just act moral because it's ingrained in me to seek approval and being moral gains me approval. Not, though, because I feel any pressing self-causation to be moral because some force I dub "God" makes me feel that way.

Anonymous Mon May 5 15:17:40 2014 No.4857027

>>4857017
Yes, now you get it. I don't know, you don't know, no one knows, and having the conviction that you do know is what is dangerous in this world, not that you believe a lie. The dangers of religion lie in people's convictions to it's truth, not in the beliefs themselves

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 15:21:16 2014 No.4857038 >>4857023 Sounds like a shitty way to live to me, but whatever. Helping people makes my life (and their lives) go better in the here and now, bub--I'm not awaiting any afterlife. Read Aristotle or something.

Anonymous Mon May 5 15:28:23 2014 No.4857069

>>4857038
I have a career in working with the developmentally disabled and I also do volunteer work with the same. It is incredibly stressful but also deeply rewarding on an emotional level. I don't have to pretend that I'm doing something "moral" or approach my choices with mysticism to find meaning in them, or to enjoy the emotions, or to live a life that others approve of. Nor do I reject entirely every idea of submissive morals, but I think it's simply dangerous to place meekness as a virtue when being strong and defeating bad things by force is clearly the superior way.

But you see, this is the problem with most Christians: they never seem to comprehend the schism between their own morals and the Bible's. Fundamentally, all people's morals come from bouncing theorhetical and a posteriori events off of their ingrained moral intuition (psychopaths do not have this intuition) and judging what should be done from this. The Bible is filled with completely ludicrous ethics, stuff we could all agree that if those ethics are taken literally, it would be bad if a good for society is social cohesion and happiness, such as killing witches and making it a sin to mix cloth types. So you already use your own moral intuition, all the time, for everything, including the Bible. So if you reject outright parts of the Bible that are pretty much direct ethics, why should at least not doubt most of the Bible? If you doubt the Bible, then you have to consider it's antithesis. If you consider it's antithesis, you realize life is really fucking hard, complex, confusing, and there are no straight answers.

And then you're left to where a person like I am, where I simply use my time to try and bring myself and others happiness while also striving to understand and to teach. Jesus has been an inspiration in my life, but it's ludicrous on its face to be as presumptuous to call Christianity or the Bible "truth".

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 15:36:03 2014 No.4857101 >>4856723 Its the worst...

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 15:42:19 2014 No.4857124 >>4856723 >>needing someone to guide your thoughts >>not being religious But these come hand in hand. How would they not?

Anonymous Mon May 5 15:50:29 2014 No.4857157

>>4857124
This is rather true; I mean, the purpose of all organized religion is to build up conviction in the flock. This conviction is useful, dangerous, and powerful.

Religion attempts to establish what is true and then challenges you to prove it wrong. The problem is, religion takes over people's lives so powerfully that they begin to reject all else, even some of the religious in this thread haven't FULLY doubted, and that's in part because religion discourages doubting in the key areas but encourages it in the trivialities. But this conviction is exactly what sets religion apart as a dangerous system

I'm involved in the lives of enough religious people to know that it's not exactly an uncommon trend for pastors to exploit the money the flock donates to their gain, either, but i don't want to generalize. I'm just noticing that a flock of convicted people are easy to exploit and religion fails to control it's leaders

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 15:53:47 2014 No.4857161 >>4857069 >I have a career in working with the developmentally disabled Translation: "I'm a regular poster on /lit/"

Anonymous Mon May 5 16:01:24 2014 No.4857194

>>4857161
I will admit this: being a behavior specialist makes it easy for me to deal with Internet debates, because I've developed skills in identifying and disarming ego defenses and at ignoring ego attacks.

Working with challenging people is an eye opener, though. It's changed my political views to a strange amalgamation of both right and left win views, and makes me consider morality much differently.

Anonymous Mon May 5 16:01:58 2014 No.4857196

>>4857157
The money exploitation is definitely an issue, especially in Protestantism. Seeing the spending The Vatican does I'd say a more centralized body is more fitting for this system but whether this exploitation is big or small, do you think having the flock built up under a single system is more helpful or destructive to society?

Anonymous Mon May 5 16:10:39 2014 No.4857237

>>4857196
That's hard to say. Currently one of the best-run charities that were set up by moral leaders is the one set up by Bill Gates, an atheist. I would say there is probably far too many people in the church leadership that recognize the absurdity of much of the bible, so they preach what they are not feeling. This gives them a liar's guilt which can manifest in misappropriated church funds.

There's evidence of abuse in the Vatican, too.

It's important I'd think to put people who really do have an obsession with truth into these moral positions. Dawkins, as misguided as he is, at least seems devoted to the truth, and he runs a very clear and honest charity so take that for what you will

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 16:17:57 2014 No.4857265 >>4857237 >I would say there is probably far too many people in the church leadership that recognize the absurdity of much of the bible Seems like you're not an expert of the clergy nor the bible.

Anonymous Mon May 5 16:21:01 2014 No.4857275

>>4857237
By the way, I'm not pulling the "church leaders don't believe" thing out of my ass, Harris mentions in one of his talks this organization that is meant to connect with pastors who don't believe, and they verify credentials discreetly to protect them and they have found that no small portion of these leaders have serious doubts about the faith. I think it was something like 4,000 pastors had been identified and confirmed.

Read a psychology textbook if you want to see what pathological, continued lying does to a person. Lies are immensely stressful, even white ones, and speaking lies (not absolute lies, i mean lies relative to the speakers thoughts) in front of people every week has to be distressing. So it's no wonder that many pastors turn to prostitutes and drugs to keep them straight.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 16:23:08 2014 No.4857282 >>4857265 It seems you haven't put much effort into the issue. Where religion actually happens there is many disgusting things, if only you would learn to smell the rot. God truly is dead.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 16:26:17 2014 No.4857291 >>4857194 i wonder if you believe your own bullshit

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 16:27:46 2014 No.4857297 >>4857291 Is it bullshit? Where did I go wrong?

Anonymous Mon May 5 16:32:06 2014 No.4857315

>>4857275
>By the way, I'm not pulling the "church leaders don't believe" thing out of my ass, Harris mentions in one of his talks this organization that is meant to connect with pastors who don't believe, and they verify credentials discreetly to protect them and they have found that no small portion of these leaders have serious doubts about the faith. I think it was something like 4,000 pastors had been identified and confirmed.

That figure is meaningless without a number of the number of priests. You need a percentage to make the claim have any meaning.

>Read a psychology textbook if you want to see what pathological, continued lying does to a person. Lies are immensely stressful, even white ones, and speaking lies (not absolute lies, i mean lies relative to the speakers thoughts) in front of people every week has to be distressing. So it's no wonder that many pastors turn to prostitutes and drugs to keep them straight.

This is just conjecture.

>>4857282
>It seems you haven't put much effort into the issue. Where religion actually happens there is many disgusting things, if only you would learn to smell the rot.

There are disgusting things everywhere in institutions with power. You singling out religion shows a bias against it.

Anonymous Mon May 5 16:42:10 2014 No.4857357

>>4857315
>You need a percentage to make the claim have any meaning.
We can speculate, surely? No more than two pastors per church, multiplied by the amount of churches... And the sample size isn't randomly selected, we have no way of knowing how many pastors don't believe. The point is, no, religious leaders are not these pious infallible men, they are often doubting Thomases but they know they can't express that doubt

How can I be biased when the discussion is ABOUT religion? I despise /r/atheism too, how about an anecdote? I went on there a week ago and saw a headline about bullying gays, so I asked the begged question: is bullying wrong? Well, all they did was bully my non-rhetorical inquiry, dodged all analysis of moral thought and called me a psychopath for not just blindly accepting that bullying is bad. So no, I'm not biased, you're just digging.

Prove it's conjecture, don't accuse without evidence.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 16:45:36 2014 No.4857371 >>4857357 how you saying he dont accuse without evidence but you not looking up the statistictics. simple google priest, you fucking. speculate my you dodge question my ass what the fucking idiot did you having write

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 16:50:11 2014 No.4857388 >>4857371 Because he didn't ask for the evidence. I have the right to assume all premises until challenged, no? So do you actually want said evidence or are you just trying to "win"?

Anonymous Mon May 5 16:53:40 2014 No.4857397

>>4857357
>We can speculate, surely?
We could, but we'd get no where. 4000 priests in America entirely is nothing. 4000 priests of many of the major denominations is nothing. 4000 of 6000 tests priests is very much something. We don't know for sure and guessing gets us no where.

>How can I be biased when the discussion is ABOUT religion?

You say where there is religion, there are disgusting things, but if there are disgusting things elsewhere then saying there are disgusting things when religion is around is a moot point. You're clearly saying that about religion to put it specifically down and give it a special treatment.

>Prove it's conjecture, don't accuse without evidence.

Your logic is speculation on the percentage of priests who understand they are lying deliberately and from there saying that the psychological effects from lying is why they get in so much trouble.

The percentage is obviously speculation from something you read before, the psychological effects of lying are fact, and the point that that is what gets them into trouble has plenty more variables at play and the idea that it's the lying is simply a guess, thus it's conjecture.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 16:58:19 2014 No.4857414 >>4857397 "simply a guess based on incomplete information" I should say.

Anonymous Mon May 5 17:02:59 2014 No.4857426

>>4854381
God is everything and nothing at once. The concept of God is more-so a metaphysical force that we prescribe to rationalize the unexplainable in life. Though I have not read any of his works, I respect Dawkins for his arguments against institutionalized religion, because the individuals running the church are often corrupt and crooked, abusing or exploiting the faithful to their own benefit. The message of religion is lost in unchecked power, a dogmatic hierarchy. Every organized faith is guilty of this to some extent.

>>4854940
>Dawkins didn't give me objective proof for the non-existence of God, and carefully clarified why we can't, but revealed that there was a growing mass of people who were removing the shackles of Christianity. I didn't try to rebel or anything at school, but had a sly grin on my face the next time I was threatened with hell for not singing in mass.

Anonymous Mon May 5 17:03:35 2014 No.4857428

>>4857397
>We could, but we'd get no where. 4000 priests in America entirely is nothing. 4000 priests of many of the major denominations is nothing. 4000 of 6000 tests priests is very much something. We don't know for sure and guessing gets us no where.

Okay, a few problems bud:
>4000 priests in America entirely is nothing. 4000 priests of many of the major denominations is nothing.
This is exactly as speculative as I was being. Since you want exacts, find the exacts. I wasn't giving a proof.

>4000 of 6000 tests priests is very much something. We don't know for sure and guessing gets us no where.
4000 pastors that were NOT randomly sampled, meaning that you're right, it is hard to determine exactly how many pastors have doubts, but the point is it's at LEAST 4000, and those are the ones who sought out and found the site. It could be more than half that doubt, who knows. But you're evading the point, because the point wasn't to establish absolutes, it was to establish that there is a trend..

>You say where there is religion, there are disgusting things, but if there are disgusting things elsewhere then saying there are disgusting things when religion is around is a moot point. You're clearly saying that about religion to put it specifically down and give it a special treatment.
I'm putting religion down specifically because religion is specifically more dangerous because it encourages conviction.

>Your logic is speculation on the percentage of priests who understand they are lying deliberately and from there saying that the psychological effects from lying is why they get in so much trouble.
You're generalizing my point because doing so suits you. Don't be dense. I'm only giving conjecture on why even religious leadership is a foul game, not just being part of the flock.

>The percentage is obviously speculation from something you read before, the psychological effects of lying are fact
Really? They're "fact"? Well since you know they're fact, tell them to me, I'm curious. Because I've only read convincing arguments, never "facts".

>and the point that that is what gets them into trouble has plenty more variables at play and the idea that it's the lying is simply a guess, thus it's conjecture.
Oh right, Satan was tempting them, my misunderstanding.

>>	None !!5gKyFantaEM Mon May 5 17:09:24 2014 No.4857455 File: 42 KB, 575x942, jpgjpg.1.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] posting the superior atheist's bible.

Anonymous Mon May 5 17:12:13 2014 No.4857465

>>4857428
>This is exactly as speculative as I was being. Since you want exacts, find the exacts. I wasn't giving a proof.
You were making an argument and using it to back it up. You folding on the legitimacy of your defense helps you not one bit.

>I'm putting religion down specifically because religion is specifically more dangerous because it encourages conviction.

Conviction gets people motivated. Making a group docile does little for the group. It's still up for debate the strengths and weaknesses of Christian religious life. I agree the dogmatism is an issue with it.

>You're generalizing my point because doing so suits you. Don't be dense.

I'm sorry then. Could you explain your argument better then?

>Really? They're "fact"? Well since you know they're fact, tell them to me, I'm curious. Because I've only read convincing arguments, never "facts".

I was giving your psychological textbooks the benefit of the doubt, but if you want to argue against your own defense I'd have to point you towards those textbooks you referenced. I'm sorry.

>Oh right, Satan was tempting them, my misunderstanding.

The anger and bias is palpable here. Do watch yourself. I want to have a nice debate with you.

Anonymous Mon May 5 17:40:48 2014 No.4857557

>>4857069
>Nor do I reject entirely every idea of submissive morals,
Pathetic!
> but I think it's simply dangerous to place meekness as a virtue when being strong and defeating bad things by force is clearly the superior way.
I never said meekness is a virtue, and I'm all for getting rid of bad stuff, by force if necessary. But this means that I believe some stuff is bad and ought to be gotten rid of, even if it happens to be something promoted by those in power. So clearly good != what the powerful desire/promote. It's also not the case that (a virtuous kind of) strength can only be shown in a manly-man punching people style. It takes quite a bit of strength to do what you believe is right, whether or not it makes you or others uncomfortable, and even if it isn't going to maximize certain things that are seen as indicators of success (money, fame, etc.). Doing what you can to prevent the harms to innocents that most of us are complicit in (e.g., causing great suffering to animals, to people who are severely impoverished and are kept there because of unfair international monetary policy, among other reasons, and to people of future generations in poor countries who are going to be fucked by climate change) takes a lot of strength. And most of us (including myself) are meek in this respect. But this kind of meekness is not a virtue, and this kind of strength is.
>Bible stuff
Yeah, I've disbelieved Christianity since I understood what it was. And while some of the moral stuff that's promoted in the Bible is good, a lot of it is utter garbage, and that I have to use my judgement to tell which parts are which, so it's pretty useless as a guide. I don't consider it at all in my moral decision-making. I don't see why I should have to consider its antithesis, though, if that's supposed to be some crude "Power, strength, cruelty: good" view. That's just as crazy as a Biblical literalist ethics.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 17:42:43 2014 No.4857571 >>4857557 >I don't see why I should have to consider its antithesis, though, if that's supposed to be some crude "Power, strength, cruelty: good" view. That's just as crazy as a Biblical literalist ethics. Considering doesn't mean accepting.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 17:45:29 2014 No.4857580 >>4857557 >>4857571 I mean, being opposed to slave morality doesn't mean "be a fucking psychopath", it means accomplish yourself, but don't limit your goals because of morals.

Anonymous Mon May 5 17:46:35 2014 No.4857586

>>4857571
Okay, well I've considered it briefly and it seems insane and obviously wrong (like various views in the Bible or other holy texts, or like Kant's views on lying), so now I'm going to stop considering it until someone gives me a good reason (one better than "because Nietzsche says so") to reconsider it.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 17:46:42 2014 No.4857587 >>4857580 Which is overly individualistic and ends up disjointing the collective.

Anonymous Mon May 5 17:46:57 2014 No.4857588

>>4857465
You don't even know how to have a debate because it takes multiple posts to figure out what you mean. Plus, you carefully danced around the multiple devastating points I made and cling to the few small parts you could actually pick at. That's not debating, that's you bickering over nonsense.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 17:48:26 2014 No.4857592 >>4857580 Okay, well one of my primary goals is to be a moral person (and that should be a goal of any non-psychopathic person, I think).

Anonymous Mon May 5 17:48:34 2014 No.4857594

>>4857587
Well you can either be a slave or a master, right? Maybe I'll never be on top but I'll knock a few people down to make room for myself. Who cares?

Again, I'm not saying I'm going to work actively against the interest of society; you seem to equate ideas that aren't the same. Being ruthless and working against society are different concepts entirely.

Anonymous Mon May 5 17:49:09 2014 No.4857597
File: 368 KB, 737x962, Stigmata_St_Padre_Pio.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]

>>4856889
He never deals with the argument from simultaneous causes or any strong argument for Christianity or God given by theologians, and only deals with a simplified version of the argument from design, which is in itself a simplification of the teleological argument.

He claims that there has never been any reliable or verified evidence for miracles, despite the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe being verified by a biophysicist and NASA consultant, among other miracles. Regardless of whether they are or are not "true", miracles such as that one present a strong case when they are verified, and to claim that they are simply wrong a priori without looking into them is an error. He also says that no miracles have happened since cameras have existed, which is blatantly false, considering that we have photographic evidence of, among other things, the Stigmata of Padre Pio. You can disagree with whether it's miraculous or not, although it was investigated by numerous physicians and even x-rays were taken, but to say that this was never claimed to be a miracle or was never photographed is blatantly false.

It's a little disappointing, he doesn't seem to present any strong argument against Christianity at all.

>>4856862
You're welcome, anonymous poster.

Anonymous Mon May 5 17:50:06 2014 No.4857600

>>4857592
Then you accept your position in society as a slave. You are despicable. So I don't really care what you want or your goals, because they are intrinsically ones that make you submissive. If I encounter you in the real world, my thoughts are how you can be best used to achieve my goals.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 17:50:30 2014 No.4857602 >>4857594 Not him, but what? Don't be a slave, but don't be a master either. Life isn't zero-sum.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 17:51:08 2014 No.4857605 >>4857597 Don't appeal to the authority of "a biophysicist" and "a NASA consultant". Those positions don't preclude error.

WOLFSHIEM !!tuOwy1ct2dy Mon May 5 17:51:33 2014 No.4857606
File: 9 KB, 250x250, 1368931887652.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]

>>4857594
>Who cares?

>>4857588
>You don't even know how to have a debate because it takes multiple posts to figure out what you mean.
>saying this when you're clearly being wrecked

Get on the ball today, /lit/. fuck.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 17:52:10 2014 No.4857609 >>4857602 Instead, make up a fairy tale land where you ignore power structures altogether!

Anonymous Mon May 5 17:52:27 2014 No.4857610

>>4857600
Nice argument, psychopath.

Why again do you accept this view? Do you really find it intuitive? Or did it take some brilliant argument on Nietzsche's part? If the former, you probably are a psychopath. If the latter, you're probably just confused. Please post or direct me to the argument (page numbers).

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 17:52:29 2014 No.4857611 File: 22 KB, 400x299, 1352993005966.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>4857605 You're right, they don't, but it does mean that you cannot dismiss it as an unverified miracle or an unreliable source as Hitchens does. Did you even read my post?

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 17:53:12 2014 No.4857613 >>4857606 Have you even read the thread?

>>	WOLFSHIEM !!tuOwy1ct2dy Mon May 5 17:54:28 2014 No.4857618 >>4857613 Diligently.

Anonymous Mon May 5 17:59:32 2014 No.4857637

>>4857618
Then you're just stupid.

>>4857610
What you're asking is akin to saying "Why don't you just summarize all of genetics in one post. Go ahead." The onus is on you to do the research and find out what he thinks, and claiming your ignorance of Nietzsche means you can ignore him gives you any ground in the argument is silly.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 18:02:43 2014 No.4857644 >>4857597 >A cloak with a painting on it. >Proof of a Miracle. No sir. No it isn't.

>>	WOLFSHIEM !!tuOwy1ct2dy Mon May 5 18:05:17 2014 No.4857654 File: 492 KB, 1224x552, 36567.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>4857644 Read his post again.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 18:06:39 2014 No.4857657 >>4857644 he wasn't saying it was proof, but rather showing that hitchens' claim that their haven't been 'reliable' evidence isn't a claim that was researched by Hitch but rather something he would dismiss outright because of Hitch's worldview

Anonymous Mon May 5 18:12:32 2014 No.4857669

>>4857637
My ignorance of Nietzche doesn't give many any ground in an argument--that's not what I was claiming. Rather, I don't need to seriously consider radically implausible views until some actual argument has been offered (it doesn't have to be the whole thing in all its detailed, and I'm sure, rigorous glory), or at least a sketch of one. I can't just say the timecube guy proved that God exists, and that anyone who thinks otherwise is a slave to capitalism, and when you demand some reason to think this, I just say "Go read all the timecube guy's stuff--but you probably won't understand it anyway, since your just a corporate slave atheist--the onus is on you, not me".

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 18:21:33 2014 No.4857692 Haven't you heard? God's Not Dead! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=90PWFEeRApA

Anonymous Mon May 5 18:22:35 2014 No.4857696

>>4857669
I can't sum up Nietzsche's views. Start with existentialism in the 19th century, the Greeks, and Kant.

My point is that you've dichotomized your sense of morals because you believe that the world just crumbles and chaos happens without religion. I'm telling you that's nonsense. People have a built-in moral intuition. I'm not going to radically violate people's rights because I'm not a psychopath, I still care and seek that social approval that most do because it's a compulsion for neurotypical people. The point is that there isn't limits because there is no convincing reason for me to be meek--does that mean I'm always going to be assertive? No, sometimes I'll be in a position where I'll have to be meek, and that's just going to be rationalized by the slave morality side of me because I do NOT have that much power.

Nietzsche is good to read because he gives a very rational explanations of where Christian morals came from and why. It's a very cogent point; and it lies in the fact that religion is expressed by the people who made it, so in the OT when the Jews were slaved, you see moral preachings toward being meek, when you see the Jews being powerful and slaughtering, you see moral preachings towards being powerful. Master and slave morals are just morals that reflect this dichotomization of justifications--the people who are weak justify their weakness as a good and criticize the strong for their strengths.

Nietzsche said the objective goods are strength, beauty, the will and power to lead. You don't have to be a sadistic tyrant to be a master. This is a very general explanation and in no way fully encapsulates the entirety of Nietzsche's work, but that should help you get a rough idea of where he's arguing from.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 18:25:47 2014 No.4857702 >>4857692 GAWD'S NOT DEAD HE'S SURELY ALIIIVE What delicious pasta.

Anonymous Mon May 5 18:29:42 2014 No.4857717

>>4857696
Dude, I'm an atheist. I don't think the world crumbles without religion (it'd probably be better off without it, though it's hard to know), and I don't think there's any less justification for living morally if there isn't a god. If you've read the Greeks (or Kant) that shouldn't be too hard to comprehend.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 18:30:43 2014 No.4857720 >>4857702 WHY DO YOU HATE GOD?

Anonymous Mon May 5 18:35:31 2014 No.4857734

>>4857717
Then you desperately need to read existentialist lit and Nietzsche. I used to be in the same boat.

I would say my ultimate point is that you can't ever get a concrete "this action is moral" or "this action is immoral" because all actions need to be judged by the collective human conscious. Ethics change, and Christianity simply posits ethics, "metaphorical" or not, that clearly violate contemporary moral principles.

I mean, even "murder" is defined as egregious killing, but who's to define what that is? Ultimately, the judgment is not objective, it's derived from human consciousness. I don't see then why I should govern myself by any principles; I simply need to act in a way that the public would find palatable, and then I'm living a life that's moral.

There's no point in asserting any moral unless you can explain your underlying philosophy of morals: if you don't know any try Kant or some utilitarian arguments. Generally "Cause no unnecessary suffering" ones are accepted.

Anonymous Mon May 5 18:51:36 2014 No.4857775

>>4857734
Nope, I had my existentialist crisis when I was 14 and then I realized that it wouldn't have made any difference if there were a creator god dictating stuff. If something isn't right or good to begin with, nobody's saying so could make it so (not even a super-duper god thing). It was around the same time that I realized that the fact that I will die and that one day everyone will be dead and there will be nothing living in the universe didn't make one bit of difference to whether what I do now matters. Why would something's not mattering to anything in the future mean that it doesn't matter now, objectively? Why would eternality make valuable things that would not be valuable if merely temporary? No reason. The felt need for a godlike lawgiver or the making of an eternal difference for morality is an illusion.
Instead, certain things just are valuable, and they matter, here and now. I have the chance to help someone, I do so, that matters. I harm someone, that matters, even if nobody ever finds out, and even if I forget about it. God or no God, collective judgement or no collective judgement. Something's being bad (e.g., because it causes unnecessary suffering) gives you a reason not to do it, just like something's being bad for you (e.g., because it fucks up your life plan and destroys projects of yours that you value) gives you a reason not to do it. There's nothing more mysterious about the former kind of reason-giving than there is about the latter, and there's no reason to think the latter kinds of reason are always stronger than the former.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 18:56:08 2014 No.4857793 >>4857775 It sounds like you overemphasize how much suffering you're able to cause. But okay.

Anonymous Mon May 5 19:00:39 2014 No.4857807

>>4857793
I don't think it needs overestimation. I can cause harm, and I can refuse to help. It doesn't have to be huge amounts to matter. That said, I think it's not hard to do quite a lot of good in the world (and so it's easy to forgo doing a lot of good that could have been done). See, e.g.,
http://www.givewell.org/charities/top-charities
and
http://www.givingwhatwecan.org/
$100 that I don't need goes much farther in the third world than it does here, and over my life I can give lots of $100s.

Anonymous Mon May 5 19:11:29 2014 No.4857843

>>4855019

That review entirely misses the point of the book though - Dawkins clearly states that the aim of the book is to tackle the concepts of religion which most people encounter in their every day life and at multiple stages throughout the book he acknowledges that there are deeper and more intellectual theistic positions. It's a book for people who aren't familiar with in depth theology or philosophy, there's no point in him discussing Aquinas in depth because 90% of the book's target audience will never have heard of Aquinas.

I just don't think it's valid to criticize it for not being an in depth theological discussion on academic theology - it's a book targeted at as wide an audience as possible and it never claims to be anything else.

>>	Anonymous Mon May 5 20:34:09 2014 No.4858093 >>4855998 >I'm sorry we don't circumsize our kids, don't homeschool them and let them watch devil box. Even your believers are placing less importance in tradition. Good luck with Islam. You'll need it.

Anonymous Mon May 5 23:55:08 2014 No.4858728
File: 105 KB, 451x593, Defensa_de_la_eucaristia.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]

>>4857692
>>4857702
>>4857720
>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=90PWFEeRApA
1:23 seconds: "Hey Scotty! Jesus, man!"
>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t29K8HN79Jg

MIND. BLOWN.

>>	Anonymous Tue May 6 05:00:27 2014 No.4859346 These edgy "I'm a master xD" nihilists are a laugh. Way to mock religious people, you're the same fucking thing.

>>	Anonymous Tue May 6 05:16:10 2014 No.4859397 File: 58 KB, 700x669, colonel sanders.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] Came into this thread expecting a bunch of religious crusaders yelling EDGY XD at everything. On the whole it's a poor showing.

>>	Anonymous Tue May 6 05:22:42 2014 No.4859420 Theology discussion belongs on >>>/x/

Anonymous Tue May 6 05:47:00 2014 No.4859505

>>4855368
Gould was a marxist prissy little faggot fuccboi. I don't even have to prove this statement. Jay wanted the D in his big fat ass and when scorned, began an irrational crusade against god king Dick Dawk.

Also, darwinian 'fundamentalism' implies that if humans are free from selective pressures, then our behaviors also must be. Gould's multi-level selection implies we're in a state of constant competition regardless. It implies some form of sick social darwinism. A warning to supporters.

Anonymous Tue May 6 06:59:00 2014 No.4859678

>>4859505
The point is not that Gould is right. The point is that Dawkins is trying to stuff down peoples throats a scientific ideology that is still internally controversial (as Gould's opposition shows), fooling people into thinking it is an inherent part of "atheism" (it's not), and call anybody who disagrees a religious faggot.

Anonymous Tue May 6 13:51:23 2014 No.4860528

>>4856722
Well, you can have a bit of a giggle if you wish, but those were the only few books I had access to at the time and didn't know how to get started any other way, being a migrant with this sudden wealth of information. That said, I came from a community where questioning religion would have had me disowned and ostracised (which would equally be suicidal since its the only community you can have some form of relation to), had I my curiosity flourished in a country where the religion is law I cant imagine what the zealots would have done to me and my family.

But yes.. I consider that, in my own way "moving up the ladder"

>>4856782
>I don't want to sound like I'm going out of my way to make an argument here, but you realize that Christianity is fundamentally based around asking questions, right?

You aren't, Ill try to answer both your points, if I can. (and I'd like to highlight that I made no mention of any specific reference to Christianity in my previous comment, I find your assumption quite interesting)

Yes, you may argue that Christianity encourages to asks questions, I assure you I was told the same thing regarding Islam, however this differs from criticism, and they aren't treated equally.

I can treat the Abrahamic religious texts as pieces of literature, sure. But I will not pin my morals to them, nor should I expect to me punished for not doing so. That, personally was my freedom, my paradigm shift.

Nor should I subscribe to the idea that god created the vastness of the universe, yet cares for the affairs of individual humans after intervening 2000yrs ago. After cycles of callous death and destruction of biological life on Earth beforehand.

It is quite a jump to move from Deism to Theism. Aquinas himself couldn't reconcile the two.

Case in point regarding "questions": I remember asking the shiekh when I was a boy, that if alien life existed in far away stars would they pray 'east' towards east mecca?

I was disciplined for disrespect, for sarcasm (which I didn't know about then). for which I thought was a perfectly simple question.

Many years later I read of Giodarno Bruno and hand a humorous moment of nostalgia.

It is good to ask questions, yes. With the assumption that nothing is sacred, with answers that cannot be questioned.

>>	Anonymous Tue May 6 13:57:05 2014 No.4860552 >>4856750 Yeah, I thought you'd run away and not reply. I was hoping you wouldn't keep posting the same shit in other threads, though. >>4856776

>>	Anonymous Tue May 6 13:58:22 2014 No.4860560 >>4860528 >'east' towards east mecca? أنت من وين؟

>>	Anonymous Tue May 6 14:00:38 2014 No.4860579 >>4860528 >with answers that cannot be questioned withOUT answers that cannot be questioned sorry, typo

>>	Anonymous Tue May 6 16:07:45 2014 No.4861027 >>4854381 ah the beauty of these two statements, is that they can be taken as completely unrelated.

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/lit/ - Literature