Comments on: When is an Idea Ridiculous?

By: Eznight

Eznight — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 22:37:00 +0000

The last part of your 2nd footnote is equally wrong since one of the 10 commandments clearly states “thou shalt not murder.”

By: Eznight

Eznight — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 18:22:00 +0000

Your 2nd note at the bottom is self defeating. Since it is obvious that you do not believe that God exist than how could He kill millions of people? On the other hand if God really does not exist then mankind must have killed all of those people. So this begs the question of why are you so big on humanity, having the answers to the worlds problems, when humanity supposedly manufactured the God that you deny?

By: Eznight

Eznight — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 18:18:00 +0000

You seem to really like to setup strawmen and then debunk them. Your second paragraph, again, shows a cursory study of religion and God since the evidence for the Creator God of the Bible is overwhelming. And your statement that “these ideas have a negative effect on society” needs to be clarified since atheism has had a terrible history of carnage; so perhaps you are referring to the ideas of atheism.

However, you may be surprised to know that I agree with you that some ideas can be ridiculous and this is precisely why I follow the Christian world-view due to the elucidated evidence regarding its truth claims.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 22 Nov 2010 20:53:00 +0000

Very well laid out. The false dichotomy between moderate and extreme religion is too often used to justify all religion. I usually point the “moderates” to this little gem:

http://blog.blazingangles.net/whatsthis/2007/09/imagine-santa.html

By: James_Smith

James_Smith — Sat, 15 May 2010 22:59:53 +0000

One of the things I believe that apparently you do not is that "exact same" is a redundancy and an example of very poor English that has no place in an article that is supposed to be literate and logical. But a lot of people believe that good grammar is a sign of being a scientific "egghead" that doesn't know the bible is the inviolate, infallible word of god.

I also believe that poor use of the language diminishes credibility. But maybe that's just me. Still, it's a good thing for you that you're not applying to me for a job. (sarcasm icon here)

By: James_Smith

James_Smith — Sat, 15 May 2010 17:59:53 +0000

By: Mark Gamache

Mark Gamache — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 22:58:21 +0000

I agree 100%. Allowing moderates to go unchecked in order to humor them is wrong because it has a net negative affect on the world at large. I won't rehash all the little negative effects of the moderate believer on rational society, as I'm sure the comment tool would explode. =) Gotta get a little ridicule in.

Further, these moderates continue to indoctrinate their children in their silly beliefs. Moderates tend to tell their children that "our book" is the true, infallible word of god, just like extremists do. While most moderates believe this, they don't follow it, they use buffet style religion and pick what they do an don't believe , despite the texts detailed list on do's and don'ts for every aspect of life. The outcome for children is usually bad in one of two way:

1. The kids "buy" the story and become extremists. Yes, if followed to the letter, most religions are extreme.

2. The kids are mystified by the dichotomy of what the parents say is true and how they live their lives. The kids lose respect for the parents and all they are taught by the parents. If they are lying about this, why not that.

These are just two option, and in the real world there are all shades of gray, but these are common outcomes.

Extremists are crazy and moderates don't really believe their religion enough to practice it as intended. Let's get the moderates some scratch and sniff, choose your own religion Bibles/Quran/Book of Mormon/Whatever with perforated pages so they can have a book that they can follow completely.

So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth. Rev 3:16

IMO, many moderates are such due to inertia and if they had the guts to question their world view would become atheists. The rest just use their religion as backing for their sexist, homophobic, racist beliefs.

As it is writtine in accordance with prophecy,

Mark G

By: CarlM

CarlM — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 01:00:20 +0000

Daniel, I once saw a person with a sign around his neck that said "ELVIS LIVES". I felt no need to tell him that I didn't share his belief. So if this is the standard, then there's no need for me to tell religious people that I don't share their beliefs either.

Yeah, I know you're not going to be happy with that answer. How can I believe in science and allow others to have views that don't take scientific evidence into account? Don't get me wrong. I would fight to keep things like creationism or "intelligent design" out of public school science classes (simply because they aren't science), and I would prefer that people would accept scientific evidence (and I would note that most mainstream religions accept science .. that they didn't in the past is irrelevant). But, though you've certainly done your share of evangelizing, I don't share your belief that religion is bad. In fact, I believe that as a whole, religion brings more good into the world than bad. That is, religion is, in my opinion, a net PLUS. If someone is motivated by his or her religion to do good works .. to help build houses for the poor .. or whatever .. why would I want to separate them from their beliefs? (I'm not saying that people can't be motivated to do good by things other than religion .. I'm saying that MANY people ARE motivated to do good by their religion.)

---

So, you can triple dog dare me (a LOL to cooperati), but I actually have a logical reason NOT to separate good people from their belief systems.

By: cooperati

cooperati — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 09:54:52 +0000

"The real question is why you are not willing to call these beliefs what they are--absurd--in an open fashion."

Dude, double dog dare him. Oh, triple dog dare him!

-=T=-

By: Daniel Miessler

Daniel Miessler — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 06:31:48 +0000

Forget about "the entirety of religion". It's easier to be more simple. No belief in things that don't have evidence. Buddhists widely believe in reincarnation, which is not based in science. As such, I reject it. But as for a way of living, or as a philosophy, I think Buddhism has many merits.

The key distinction between Buddhism and Christianity is that Buddhism contains fewer encroachments into the world of science. If you've read any of the Dalai Lama's teachings on the matter you'll see that he's very pro-science. So there's a big difference between that and a religion (Christianity) that has fought science at every single turn, and only surrenders to it when the battle has already been lost in the public's eye due to overwhelming evidence.

By: Daniel Miessler

Daniel Miessler — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 06:25:52 +0000

> Where you and I seem to differ is in our interpretation of that statement. I take it at face value, and you seem to interpret it as "Anyone making outrageous claims without evidence should be told that their claims are equivalent to someone claiming that they have a leprechaun in their pocket and that their mere holding of these absurd beliefs constitutes a danger to the human race."

I don't think you are taking it at face value. Or, at the very least, you're not honoring the idea. You've defended these absurd beliefs at every turn under the auspices of them being harmless. The dangerousness of a given absurd belief is separate from whether or not it can be dismissed out of hand, and my first claim is that we should be willing to do just that based on the nature of the claim.

You're right that the other portion of the argument (and possibly the more important part) is the very question of the dangerousness of the belief, but again--that's separate.

The real question is why you are not willing to call these beliefs what they are--absurd--in an open fashion. I doubt you'd be so reticent to dismiss a belief in a living Elvis or in the virgin birth of Mithra, so why give special treatment to an equally silly belief?

I believe the answer is that you're answering to political correctness above all else, and that's what I'm objecting to with respect to the "rejecting claims that lack evidence" portion of the discussion.

For the "harm" portion...well, that's a separate discussion that I've thus far been cumbersome with handling. I am working on fixing that soon.

By: CarlM

CarlM — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 03:11:08 +0000

Daniel,

This isn't the core of our disagreement. The core of our disagreement is that you believe that religion (in and of itself) is harmful, and I do not share this belief. Actually, I agree with the statement that "Outrageous claims made without evidence can be dismissed without evidence." Where you and I seem to differ is in our interpretation of that statement. I take it at face value, and you seem to interpret it as "Anyone making outrageous claims without evidence should be told that their claims are equivalent to someone claiming that they have a leprechaun in their pocket and that their mere holding of these absurd beliefs constitutes a danger to the human race."

By: Daniel Miessler

Daniel Miessler — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 02:49:59 +0000

> Attack actions that deserve attack, and attack beliefs (like the set of beliefs that stem from the belief in a young Earth) against which you have direct evidence (not because you find them absurd).

This is where we clearly disagree.

We don't only reject claims that we have direct evidence against. This is because 99.99999% of all absurd claims fall into this category.

This is the entire point of Russell's teapot and the Invisible Pink Unicorn. They are invented to poke fun at the notion that you need direct evidence to disprove the outrageous, when you don't.

"Outrageous claims made without evidence can be dismissed without evidence."

This is the very core of our disagreement, and the point (and title) of this post.

By: ax0n

ax0n — Sat, 06 Jun 2009 23:01:12 +0000

Some of your points are valid, but here you're basically setting up a straw-man argument. You've thrown together a mashup of vague Christian-esque concepts (most of which the majority of Christians would rephrase for you) and come up with a clever way to dismiss not only those misguided concepts, but the entirety of religion as a justification for Athiesm. Congratulations. Can we dismiss Buddhism next? I'd love to see the rant on that one. Those darned Buddhists, always raising a ruckus.

By: CarlM

CarlM — Sat, 06 Jun 2009 22:57:28 +0000

I'll reply to cooperati to keep this (same thought) in the same thread. I'll second what he just wrote and add that, Daniel, you yourself point out that moderates and extremists have the same basic core beliefs (or at least widely overlapping core beliefs) .. the difference is on how they choose to ACT on them.

This seems to imply that the beliefs aren't the cause of the action. In any case, in a free society such as ours strives to be, we have (as a society) accepted that beliefs (however absurd) are not to be punished while certain actions are. This is what I (and others) have been trying to tell you. Attack actions that deserve attack, and attack beliefs (like the set of beliefs that stem from the belief in a young Earth) against which you have direct evidence (not because you find them absurd).

By: cooperati

cooperati — Sat, 06 Jun 2009 21:41:21 +0000

You forgot a few, where the atheist heard from both atheists and agnostics that also make the claim that religion is harmless, even if it is ridiculous.

It is the belief that religion is inherently dangerous that is being refuted and challenged.

Better to ask, "When is religion dangerous?"

-=T=-