[Gem Windcaster]

kud13;281797 said:

Still, D man, I fail to see why you single out religion as a single "main factor" in explaining violence. the way I see it, any type of ideology that suggests an "Us vs. them" division b/w humans can be used to lead to war. Nationalism, communism, etc are no exceptions. These things are totally natural.

Thanks for your input kud13 - you have the knowledge and insight to explain what I felt was right, but didn't seem to get across. *lifts glass to knowledge*

[Cold Iron]

D Man;281868 said:

Do you think the quotes werent real, or that the speeches were made by actors? I qualified it to all hell and back because of its use of editing and propogandist nature: apparently youre immune to qualifications of a point though: you take everyone as a literalist. Or just however you want to (see your presentation of your favourite selective reading of the study posted).

I saw you qualify it. You still posted it. You were trying to make a point and you thought that video would support your point, else you wouldn't have posted it. I said nothing about it not being real. The reason I feel I've wasted my time is that there is no point arguing against someone's emotions. If you feel that religion is wrong, then to you it's wrong and there's nothing I can do about it until you feel something different. That video had nothing to do with an intellectual position or argument so if that is the position you are arguing from, then it is no wonder you have heard nothing that myself, goas or gem has said.

[D Man]

Cold Iron;282115 said:

I saw you qualify it. You still posted it. You were trying to make a point and you thought that video would support your point, else you wouldn't have posted it. I said nothing about it not being real. The reason I feel I've wasted my time is that there is no point arguing against someone's emotions. If you feel that religion is wrong, then to you it's wrong and there's nothing I can do about it until you feel something different. That video had nothing to do with an intellectual position or argument so if that is the position you are arguing from, then it is no wonder you have heard nothing that myself, goas or gem has said.

I'm seeing a lot of preocupation with that vid, and no addressing of anything in it or my points. In addition, my initial point of 'atheists dont go round doing violence (various forms of oppression were in there too, that no one has picked up on at all) in athiesms name, where religious people can and do' still stands.

Seems to me, given your total lack of reference to anyting but internal dialogue, that youre the one having the emotional reaction. I've posted an empirical study, scriptiral pasages, religious figures speaking, cited real-world events, and encoutered some interesting but unrefferenced ideas, cherry picking, linguistic games, strawmen and apologism.

P.S. kuds post is an exception: he at least analysed the data at face value, before then infering his own conclusions on top of the studies.

[Cold Iron]

And just for the record, the strawman you are claiming everyone has been building for you is due to the fact that for you to be making such sweeping statements as religion facilitates violence, you must be missing the complexity of the situation. My disagreement can be demonstrated (once again) with this quote:

D Man;281755 said:

People can be violent. I'm talking about on of the motivators. Religion is one of them.

Religion is not a motivator to violence because (and I repeat) religion has it's own real-world and wholly secular causes. That the madman with the machete doesn't know this is immaterial. There is a natural competitive drive in all species of animal and all cultures. The belief of an individual that the command to kill all non-believers comes from god does not change the fact that it comes from somewhere. There is a reason that the violent scriptures exist, and it is not god, but man. You think religion facilitates the spread of violent ideas? Big deal. That's about as intuitive as saying water facilitates the spread of fish.

Religions reflect our nature. They cause nothing. That I may do something "because of my religion" does not mean that religion actually caused me to do it, only that it is how I rationalised it in my consciousness. The real reason is related to the desired outcome. If the desired outcome is nothing more than the will to go to heaven in the afterlife, then you should examine what this desire symbolises in this life. In a manner somewhat similar to interpreting dreams, emotional symbols have real tangible meanings. Now, as you've said, I'm nothing more than an armchair psychologist (if that), but I would be willing so suggest something along the lines of fear of the physical pain associated with starvation or lack of basic requirements to be a possible base cause of wanting a happy afterlife. Death carries with it a plethora of associated imagery and invoked emotions, fear being a strong one. However, in my armchair, I think that fear of the unknown is insignificant when compared with fear of the known. We have all felt the pain of illness or injury, and the utter helplessness and insecurity that comes with it. To put a long and complicated thought process into a paragraph, this fear of pain can result in desire for hope in the end to this pain, which can then lead to actions associated with an attempt to minimise, avoid or otherwise mitigate the pain. This may involve taking shit from other people or, if you don't like that one, killing your enemy before he kills you.

But as farming kicked in and communities grew, a system grew with it to avoid you taking shit from your neighbour, to the benefit of all. So take shit from the people over there (who likely worship a different god, or the same god under a different name) and the survival it will help enable is something like heaven, because we may not know what happens after death, but we can see and experience what can happen during death, and if we hope for heaven (or the end to the pain) afterwards, we can associate anything that helps us avoid the same pain in this life with avoiding it afterwards. These kinds of co-associations happen all the time as the human brain works by pattern recognition, strengthening neural pathways that are associated (think word association games). So if we associate survival in this life with heaven in the afterlife you can see how easily we can get to killing your enemy as leading to heaven.

And if you think all of this is a bronze age throw back, consider this: through political manipulation and military bullying, the US led west is literally killing middle eastern people, through poverty. Yes they may not have the same levels of poverty as Africa, but there is poverty everywhere, and it kills people everywhere, and the more we take from the middle east, the more poverty we create. If heaven is a metaphor or a neural association for happiness in this life, then it's no great leap to see how Muslims may think that killing Americans will lead them to heaven.

Persia, Arabia, Mesopotamia have all been great empires in the past and wealthy countries more recently. And before you argue that most suicide bombers are middle class, it is the middle class who have the time to rail at injustice that they see in their home, the poor simply don't have time to stop long enough to do anything about it.

[Mentalist]

well said CI

As for "Inferring my own conclusions" as D. MAn put it: I hope you are referring to the part that you later quoted and not this

Quote

So, essentially, exposure to violent media, or ideas that violence is justified, increases the likelyhood of potential violence. Very insightful. Now we know that religiopus scripture as "media" is no exception. Note that it's not necessarily the cause, just that it helps.

Because all that was, was paraphrasing the introduction and discussion sections of the article you provided, coupled with some of my backgrund knowledge (that came from learning about agression specifically, as in reading a textbook chapter on it, that's filled with examples of studies illustrating my point)

Now, for the last part of my post. Yes. I do not undrstand why religion is different. the study demonstrated, that as long as there's a belief that violence (the word "war" was a mistake) is justified, its likelyhood increases. That is a scientific fact. The precise reason (God says so, my mom says so, the General secretary of CPSU said so), does not really mater. If there is such belief, the likelyhood increases.

As for the "natural" bit, which you consider my own inference. Let me give you an example.
As most people of the Western World, I am sure you are familiar witht he following
http://www.loyno.edu.../GoldenRule.jpg

In case you are not, it is a postr that compares various religions and finds that many of them carry an ethical premise, that in Christian tradition is referred to as "The Golden Rule". This precept ("Do unto others as you would have them do unto you") is a summary of a group relationship pattern commonly known as "Reciprocity", and it is found not only in humans, but in many animal species as well (If you need references, I'll give them to you, I don't want to look through last semester's notes just now)
The most widely accepted explanation for such behaviour among animals is that it is mutually benefial for survival and it has evolutionary basis, which is what I meant by "natural", btw. Which would explain why it is present among human being as well. And this essentially evolutionary social adaptation is considered to be one of the cornerstones of most religions. This is my evidence for the fact that religion reflects the human conditon, and not the other way around. This was the one example I could think of off the top of my head, if you need more, let me know.

[D Man]

Cold Iron;282157 said:

And just for the record, the strawman you are claiming everyone has been building for you is due to the fact that for you to be making such sweeping statements as religion facilitates violence, you must be missing the complexity of the situation. My disagreement can be demonstrated (once again) with this quote:



Religion is not a motivator to violence because (and I repeat) religion has it's own real-world and wholly secular causes. That the madman with the machete doesn't know this is immaterial. There is a natural competitive drive in all species of animal and all cultures. The belief of an individual that the command to kill all non-believers comes from god does not change the fact that it comes from somewhere. There is a reason that the violent scriptures exist, and it is not god, but man. You think religion facilitates the spread of violent ideas? Big deal. That's about as intuitive as saying water facilitates the spread of fish.

Religions reflect our nature. They cause nothing. That I may do something "because of my religion" does not mean that religion actually caused me to do it, only that it is how I rationalised it in my consciousness. The real reason is related to the desired outcome. If the desired outcome is nothing more than the will to go to heaven in the afterlife, then you should examine what this desire symbolises in this life. In a manner somewhat similar to interpreting dreams, emotional symbols have real tangible meanings. Now, as you've said, I'm nothing more than an armchair psychologist (if that), but I would be willing so suggest something along the lines of fear of the physical pain associated with starvation or lack of basic requirements to be a possible base cause of wanting a happy afterlife. Death carries with it a plethora of associated imagery and invoked emotions, fear being a strong one. However, in my armchair, I think that fear of the unknown is insignificant when compared with fear of the known. We have all felt the pain of illness or injury, and the utter helplessness and insecurity that comes with it. To put a long and complicated thought process into a paragraph, this fear of pain can result in desire for hope in the end to this pain, which can then lead to actions associated with an attempt to minimise, avoid or otherwise mitigate the pain. This may involve taking shit from other people or, if you don't like that one, killing your enemy before he kills you.

But as farming kicked in and communities grew, a system grew with it to avoid you taking shit from your neighbour, to the benefit of all. So take shit from the people over there (who likely worship a different god, or the same god under a different name) and the survival it will help enable is something like heaven, because we may not know what happens after death, but we can see and experience what can happen during death, and if we hope for heaven (or the end to the pain) afterwards, we can associate anything that helps us avoid the same pain in this life with avoiding it afterwards. These kinds of co-associations happen all the time as the human brain works by pattern recognition, strengthening neural pathways that are associated (think word association games). So if we associate survival in this life with heaven in the afterlife you can see how easily we can get to killing your enemy as leading to heaven.

And if you think all of this is a bronze age throw back, consider this: through political manipulation and military bullying, the US led west is literally killing middle eastern people, through poverty. Yes they may not have the same levels of poverty as Africa, but there is poverty everywhere, and it kills people everywhere, and the more we take from the middle east, the more poverty we create. If heaven is a metaphor or a neural association for happiness in this life, then it's no great leap to see how Muslims may think that killing Americans will lead them to heaven.

Persia, Arabia, Mesopotamia have all been great empires in the past and wealthy countries more recently. And before you argue that most suicide bombers are middle class, it is the middle class who have the time to rail at injustice that they see in their home, the poor simply don't have time to stop long enough to do anything about it.

Once again, one HELL (no pun) of a lot of conjecture that has no consideration for a lot of very important factors.

First, youre over-simplifying human nature. If any given religion reflected the entirety of who we are, we would all be compelled to be religious. Some of us dont find resonance in any of them (that we dont find more agreeable versions of elsewhere, for various reasons: for me its mainly the dogmatic nature of it: that it isnt subject to criticism and revision, its not a living body of thought and human endeavour: its a set concrete precepts and instructions, a closed loop that the only flexibility or room for ideas in is in interpretation). Moreover, different religions have different trends in belief and espouse veyr different values. Each of them is indeed rooted in some aspect of our nature, but to think that any one person is so simple as to 'be violent so they use religion for it', to paraphrase you, is facile.

We have certian basic characteristics that find resonance in various different things. We all have the capacity to be violent, compassionate, horny, funny, so on, so forth. The ideas that we expose ourselves too, or that we are exposed to serve to form our judgement of further ideas, and to, of course, affect how we live and what we do.

You suggest that religion is a face for human action that wouldve happened anyway, given the same person and the same environment. Wrong. For four reasons.

1: A person doesnt join a religion on the merit that they see in its entire text. They see a part that they like, something that resonates with them and they accept, and throw themselves into the rest of it. I've seen it happen with both my eyes. (Over time, but not much of it). For them to have fully assimilated a scripture and satisfied themselves that it reflects their nature is impossible, due to the length of the scriptures and their often conflicting natures. So its not, and cant be, a total reflection. Hoevever, once the foot is in the door and they believe the text to be divinely inspired they give the text the power over them to change their nature further, and its very possible for someone to drift a long way from the personality they once had. They no longer see themselves reflected in the text, but rather they come to reflect the text: they in fact strive for it. Its an example and instruction to them.

This can have good results, and bad.

2: Youre not factoring in being rasied with the religion. A child thats indoctrinated with a scripture, any interpretation or set of inpterpretations thereof, comes to reflect that in their nature. It can form an underpinning for a personality. A very powefull underpinning at that. In this case, no oportunity is given to for the person to judge the degree to which they sympathise with the message: 11 times out of 12 (the number of kids raised in a religion that stay with the religion) there is insufficient cognitive bias for the person to be dissatisfied with the religion, and they stay with it. Here the religion played the formative role in the persons judgement of the merit of ideas encountered in the future, and formed a large part of that persons personality. They developed as a person alongside learing the religion.

3: Environment: breiefly. Collective unconscious, quite simply. The values and mindsets of previous generations inform the next. Iconographies and moral trends are passed down. Religions form a huge part of this because of their dogmatic, closed-loop, no-more-input-accepted nature. They dont change often, especially considering how many people they claim as members. Thus religions inform the politics, society at large, laws and so on. Even in secular countries (which were almost all previously christian) we can see that in the morals of the people.

4: Mythology-specifics. Are you suggesting its part of our nature to not want to depict a particular person, and in fact think that anyone that depicts the person should be killed? Where is that written in our DNA? Where is the bronze-age-society, post-agricultural revolution for that? Or that the Virgin Mary ascended bodily to heaven? A relection of our nature? Or that homosexuality is evil? Part of our nature too? The trinity; are we programmed to formulate incomprehenible mumbo jumbo about 3 things being 1, and yet 1 being 3, but all being seperate, but all the same?

Not all these are motivators to violence, of course (the subjects of much dissagreement, but as far as I know, specifically only the image of muhammed has made anyone froth lethally at the mouth). But niether are any of them (and hundreds, if not thousands more besides) anything but the whim of the writer of the text. Like any authors, they wrote what they pleased, and hundreds and thousands of years later, its believed as literally real and inviolable. Its like people in 4000AD thinking Lord of the Rings literally real and getting potentially lethally uptity about what shade of grey gandalfs cloak should be.

In the broadest possible terms, youre right: the motivation to be religious in some sense, and perhaps some of the broader themes (supreme being, life after death, duality of human nature (body and soul)) are reflections of parts of us.

However, and and every specific story can only be said with any confidence at all to be a reflection of the mind of the author or authors. Both their nature and their imagination.

The ballance of all the components of mind is different for each and every human alive, and there are changing trends in it too (back to the moral zytegyst), as we come up with new ideas, interact with broader groups, do very different work, live radically different lives compared to previous generations, let alone poeple from 4000 years ago.

To suggest that any person would behave in exactly the same way without the path of influences, and yes, Gem, if youre reading, decisions, that they have been exposed to and made is frankly silly. It severley underestimates the placticity of human perception and human nature.

[D Man]

kud13;282162 said:

well said CI

As for "Inferring my own conclusions" as D. MAn put it: I hope you are referring to the part that you later quoted and not this



Because all that was, was paraphrasing the introduction and discussion sections of the article you provided, coupled with some of my backgrund knowledge (that came from learning about agression specifically, as in reading a textbook chapter on it, that's filled with examples of studies illustrating my point)

Now, for the last part of my post. Yes. I do not undrstand why religion is different. the study demonstrated, that as long as there's a belief that violence (the word "war" was a mistake) is justified, its likelyhood increases. That is a scientific fact. The precise reason (God says so, my mom says so, the General secretary of CPSU said so), does not really mater. If there is such belief, the likelyhood increases. .

True enough, I think, in a general sense. But all of what I've said about the differences with relgion stands. The fact that its an authority commanding has been quite a them of my posts. Its the reasons a religious person can become violent (some obscure offence because of the passing down as supreme authority what some author thought on whim should have the death penalty, or some supernatural concoction plucked out of his intuition about when life starts and where the mind comes from and goes to), and the disparity between the infraction that provokes it and the response is key to the difference in practice, in the real world. Plus, of course, that most other forms of authority to violence are subject to real-world validation (even if trial by fire, like 'look what happened to germany!) and dont usually act at the level of the individual: you need to already be in an army, a government and so on. You arent just going to pick up Mein Kampf and start killing jews (actually, I dont know if that instruction is even in there, but you get the idea: the political system has to be in place, the various non-implicit consequences as a result of predication on the prejudices of the time (catholic prejudices, I might add) and so on: a person cant do it on their own, or in a small group).

And it doesnt address my original point. Nothing so far has.

I'm not gonna quote myself again. If you dont know what the point was, you shouldnt be arguing

[Cold Iron]

D Man;282168 said:

Once again, one HELL (no pun) of a lot of conjecture that has no consideration for a lot of very important factors.

Once again, the factors you think I'm not considering are either invalid or irrelevant.

D Man;282168 said:

First, youre over-simplifying human nature. If any given religion reflected the entirety of who we are, we would all be compelled to be religious.

Strawman. I didn't say entirety.

D Man;282168 said:

Some of us dont find resonance in any of them (that we dont find more agreeable versions of elsewhere, for various reasons: for me its mainly the dogmatic nature of it: that it isnt subject to criticism and revision, its not a living body of thought and human endeavour: its a set concrete precepts and instructions, a closed loop that the only flexibility or room for ideas in is in interpretation).

You have a very different concept of religion to me. I have seen religions change in my lifetime. They are subject to constant criticism and revision and they are a perfect examples of living bodies of thought and human endeavour. There are hundreds of different variations of all the major religions, with every small community, indeed every person, expressing their faith in their own individual way, reflecting their own individual personality. That the scriptures are written does not prevent or even obstruct this individuality of expression. I'll tell you why:

Humans can only understand things in relative terms. That is, they relate everything to an experience that they themselves have had. Everything. When you read about something that you have nothing within your experience to relate it to, you are unable to understand it. The thought process is a process of conceptualising. If you haven't experienced it, you can't conceptualise it, and thus can't understand it. So every belief, every interpretation, scriptural or otherwise is filtered by each individuals experience.

Some of the most powerful experiences are emotional empathy with those we rely on. Anger for a past transgression can be passed down generation after generation this way. When we hear about this transgression, we do not understand it in the way that the people who experienced it did, what we understand instead is the anger that we experienced through empathy with the anger of the person who is telling us about it. We then relate this to other things that make us angry. In this way we think we understand the nature of the transgression but it is an illusion, we are, as you are wont to say, painting it with our own brush.

So when I read Deuteronomy my reaction is different from when you read it. Regardless of dogma or indoctrination.

D Man;282168 said:

Moreover, different religions have different trends in belief and espouse veyr different values. Each of them is indeed rooted in some aspect of our nature, but to think that any one person is so simple as to 'be violent so they use religion for it', to paraphrase you, is facile.

Strawman.

D Man;282168 said:

We have certian basic characteristics that find resonance in various different things. We all have the capacity to be violent, compassionate, horny, funny, so on, so forth. The ideas that we expose ourselves too, or that we are exposed to serve to form our judgement of further ideas, and to, of course, affect how we live and what we do.

Yes. Religion reflects this. It has a thousand faces.

D Man;282168 said:

You suggest that religion is a face for human action that wouldve happened anyway, given the same person and the same environment. Wrong. For four reasons.

1: A person doesnt join a religion on the merit that they see in its entire text. They see a part that they like, something that resonates with them and they accept, and throw themselves into the rest of it. I've seen it happen with both my eyes. (Over time, but not much of it). For them to have fully assimilated a scripture and satisfied themselves that it reflects their nature is impossible, due to the length of the scriptures and their often conflicting natures. So its not, and cant be, a total reflection. Hoevever, once the foot is in the door and they believe the text to be divinely inspired they give the text the power over them to change their nature further, and its very possible for someone to drift a long way from the personality they once had. They no longer see themselves reflected in the text, but rather they come to reflect the text: they in fact strive for it. Its an example and instruction to them.

This can have good results, and bad.

This remains a reflection of themselves. As I explained above.

D Man;282168 said:

2: Youre not factoring in being rasied with the religion. A child thats indoctrinated with a scripture, any interpretation or set of inpterpretations thereof, comes to reflect that in their nature. It can form an underpinning for a personality. A very powefull underpinning at that. In this case, no oportunity is given to for the person to judge the degree to which they sympathise with the message: 11 times out of 12 (the number of kids raised in a religion that stay with the religion) there is insufficient cognitive bias for the person to be dissatisfied with the religion, and they stay with it. Here the religion played the formative role in the persons judgement of the merit of ideas encountered in the future, and formed a large part of that persons personality. They developed as a person alongside learing the religion.

Again, explained above.

D Man;282168 said:

3: Environment: breiefly. Collective unconscious, quite simply. The values and mindsets of previous generations inform the next. Iconographies and moral trends are passed down. Religions form a huge part of this because of their dogmatic, closed-loop, no-more-input-accepted nature. They dont change often, especially considering how many people they claim as members. Thus religions inform the politics, society at large, laws and so on. Even in secular countries (which were almost all previously christian) we can see that in the morals of the people.

Again, addressed above, if you don't see how I am happy to explain further.

D Man;282168 said:

4: Mythology-specifics. Are you suggesting its part of our nature to not want to depict a particular person, and in fact think that anyone that depicts the person should be killed? Where is that written in our DNA? Where is the bronze-age-society, post-agricultural revolution for that? Or that the Virgin Mary ascended bodily to heaven? A relection of our nature? Or that homosexuality is evil? Part of our nature too? The trinity; are we programmed to formulate incomprehenible mumbo jumbo about 3 things being 1, and yet 1 being 3, but all being seperate, but all the same?

All of these are results of human nature yes. Anything that you fail to understand is due only to a lack of experience to relate it to.

D Man;282168 said:

Not all these are motivators to violence, of course (the subjects of much dissagreement, but as far as I know, specifically only the image of muhammed has made anyone froth lethally at the mouth). But niether are any of them (and hundreds, if not thousands more besides) anything but the whim of the writer of the text.

No. I can write something on a whim. It won't catch on unless it resonates with my fellow man.

D Man;282168 said:

Like any authors, they wrote what they pleased, and hundreds and thousands of years later, its believed as literally real and inviolable. Its like people in 4000AD thinking Lord of the Rings literally real and getting potentially lethally uptity about what shade of grey gandalfs cloak should be.

Yes, this is the nature of myth. You are already experiencing the story differently from Tolkein's contemporaries. If the story remains for thousands of years it will be because of it's reflections of our nature and those who argue about the colour of Gandalf's cloak will be doing so because to them (as indeed to us or JRRT), the colour of Gandalf's cloak is a symbol, with meanings that when explored can reveal hidden aspects of our nature.

D Man;282168 said:

In the broadest possible terms, youre right: the motivation to be religious in some sense, and perhaps some of the broader themes (supreme being, life after death, duality of human nature (body and soul)) are reflections of parts of us.

However, and and every specific story can only be said with any confidence at all to be a reflection of the mind of the author or authors. Both their nature and their imagination.

You're forgetting the mind of the reader.

D Man;282168 said:

The ballance of all the components of mind is different for each and every human alive, and there are changing trends in it too (back to the moral zytegyst), as we come up with new ideas, interact with broader groups, do very different work, live radically different lives compared to previous generations, let alone poeple from 4000 years ago.

Yes, and this alters religion drastically. Or have you seen someone get stoned (with stones) lately? (And that was even worse than your last 2 attempts at zeitgeist.) You seem to be stuck on the misconception that because scripture is set, religions must always be a throwback to the time when the scripture was written. Surely I don't need to go into a list of how things have changed to show that you are wrong? ETA: Not to mention the fact that the bible (the example I know most about) is made up of many books, written at different times in different languages, has undergone centuries of revision and alteration (including councils of church leaders, gathered for this express purpose), was not available in a common tongue until the 15th century and since then is still under constant revision and re-translations from various original texts. In fact you'd be hard pressed to find any 2 bibles that are the same unless they came off the same press.

D Man;282168 said:

To suggest that any person would behave in exactly the same way without the path of influences, and yes, Gem, if youre reading, decisions, that they have been exposed to and made is frankly silly. It severley underestimates the placticity of human perception and human nature.

Strawman. There is no value in a religionless hypothetical because religion is a reflection of our nature. Take away or change religion and you change our nature and remove all relevance to this conversation.

[D Man]

No, youre forgetting the mind of the reader.

The rest I may or may not get to later. Most of it is paper thin and shallow, or simple ad-hoc declaration from how you see it, once again.

I'm starting to think youre only in this for ego and argument for arguments sake. The pathetic comment you left in my rep certainly doenst refelct the image of reasonable-CI that likes to be wrong that you try to project. (And is very consistent with the blinkered cherry-picking and manipulation of my points, rather than addressing them, that I've seen you do here). Its my turn to be dissapointed, it would seem.

Its unlikely I'll respond further, especially as there is so little worth responding to in your last post, and this farce is taking too much of my time.

More importantly, still no one has addressed, let alone countered, my original point.

[Cold Iron]

I'm sorry you feel that way. I think your point has been addressed time and time again and you have ignored it.

Also the rep comment was tongue in cheek and supposed to be somewhat of a truce attempt because the argument need not get personal.

I feel it is you who doesn't bother to address my arguments, instead you throw a blanket accusation over them like "they're paper thin and shallow". I have gone to great length to address any and all of your arguments within any reasonable expectation and I'd kindly ask you to point out which ones I have neglected to address, through cherry-picking, manipulation or otherwise.

Don't make this a waste of both our time's.

[Shinrei]

Thought this was interesting and relevant. He appears to make the same points as you D-Man.
-----------------------------------

Religion and Violence

by James Hitchcock
March 6, 2002

Religious believers are accustomed to being accused as perpetrators of intolerance and violence, and there is enough truth to such charges to take them to heart. At the same time it should be recognized that what is called religious strife is usually only partly that. The "religious wars" of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were at least as much about politics, with, for example, Catholic France supporting German Protestants in order to weaken the Catholic German emperor. Today it would be extremely simplistic to think that religion is all that fuels the strife in Northern Ireland or the Near East.

However, religion does posses a peculiar potentiality for "extremism", because it has to do with extreme things. We might manage to compromise a boundary dispute, for example, but how can we compromise the will of God?

Critics cluck their tongues and note the contradiction whereby religion, which is supposed to be based on love, has the potential to turn into strife and hatred. The critics do not note the close parallel to the family, where love can so easily turn into hate.

But the dangers of strife and fanaticism come from the very nature of religion itself, which deals with ultimate things. In a sense people ought to be more ready to fight over religious dogma than over disputed territory, because religious dogma has to do with the highest and most important truths. (It requires some kind of divine revelation to teach us that we should not kill one another over religious dogma.)

The terrorism which manifested itself on September 11 has of course started a whole new round of alarmed warnings about the dangers of religious fanaticism, with some secularists professing to see no significant difference between Osama Bin Laden on the one hand and Jerry Falwell and the pro-life movement on the other. Thus, we are warned, the extirpation of all forms of religious intensity is what we must do to achieve social peace. In this secularist world, saying that one disapproves of homosexuality, for example, is equated with bombing the World Trade Center.

We can all agree on the need to end the kind of religion which does issue in violence and hatred. But, as the secularists point out, all real religion has that potential, in the same way that deep love between a man and a woman has the potential of leading to murderous jealousy. Thus many secularists in effect now call for an end to religion completely, something they have been predicting for a long time but which so far has not happened.

Why is there religion at all, of any kind? Ultimately the only satisfactory answer is that it enlightens people about the meaning of life, of how they should live their lives. Religion is what gives meaning to human existence. Therefore, it follows, to abandon religion would mean abandoning all hope of meaning, to which the secularist nods and says, "precisely!" The secularist position, which has a long history, is that the religious search for meaning is an illusion but that, even when successful, is a bad thing, because human beings should not be encouraged to think about ultimate realities.

American Pragmatism is perhaps the clearest example of this. It argues that we can choose moral positions, and orient ourselves in life, not by asking what is true or false but simply on the basis of what seems to work. We might claim, for example, that all human beings have worth and dignity but, if someone asks why this is so, we are not required to answer. It just is.

Although they seldom admit it, these secularists really are calling upon the human race to amputate itself spiritually, to suppress, quite consciously, the religious hungers which have been part of human existence since the beginning of time. They call on us deliberately to wall ourselves up within the empirical limits of our world and resolutely to ignore everything which does not fit. Whatever else might be said about such a view of existence, it is immeasurably drabber and shallower than what human beings have thought was real for these thousands of years.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
James Hitchcock, professor of history at St. Louis University, writes and lectures on contemporary Church matters.

[drinksinbars]

very good peiece of writing, shin.

some good points in there and a lot to think about.

[D Man]

Interesting article.

I think he has a usefull take on the mind of the fundamentalist. If you refuse to listen to me about it, cos you think I have some emotionally motivated agenda to attack religion en masse, then listen to him: a student of christianity, talk about some of his fellow believers.

Theres also a very interesting debate on youtube you can look up if so inclined (I'm on lunch break at work at the moment, so I cant go on the following): if you search google video for "Al sharpton Christopher hitchens" you'll find a few debates. One outside thats irritating point-scoring, and one in a hall, with a chair and time alotments in which they make articulated cases. The central theme is not religious violence, but it crops up. Both argue well, so make up your own minds about it (of you watch it).

I dont agree with him that religion is required for, or even exists because it provides answers. At best its answers are fancifull guesses that have been passed down as fact, and the fulfilments and sembelences of personal meaning and purpose it offers seem like pacebos "Why this, why that, how come": "Its gods will, because St Dickhead said so", or some obfuscating intra-mythological flight of fancy-come-decreed facts of reality.

*Edit And I VERY strongly dissagree that a mythology-less existance is 'drab'. Real investigation has led to a far more profound and beautifull understanding of nature, the existential dimensions of interpersonal relationships are changed not one jot by taking myth out of it (our capacities for love and compassion are in no way diminished by knowing it doesnt come from god, and the sensation of such things is in no way changed by understanding a physical or social cause), and the numinous has absolutely no requirement for the supernatural*

Theres some sociological wisdom in there, but its nothing that cant be found without the mythical baggage elsewhere. It can be much more usefull, too. I know people that have had some fairly serious problems in life: some have turned to god, and their faith puts a band aid on it and becomes an emotional crutch: something they need to believe to stay level. An emotional dependency. Some have turned to psychology and understanding neurochemistry (as best they can) and envirnmental triggers, ascociations and so on, and they have addressed the root cause of their problems and gotten better without the need for continual strengthening of a faith-crutch.

CI: if thats how you meant the comment, then fine, I accept that. It came accross, though, given context, what you said promted the +rep and texts tone-lessness, as condesending and egocentric and indicative of fundamental unreasonableness.

I dont think theres any value in this discussion, as it stands, as I think much the same about your points as you do of mine (have been addressed and youre willfully incomprehending, or ignoring, very important aspects. In particular, since you asked, I dont think you've made any effort to consider the mindset and body of influences of a literal believer). We've been going round in circles for a while now, and if you think that the few thousand words (at a guess) that I've put into this have been just blanket dismissals with no argument, then your capacity to pick veiws that best suits you strongly discourages me from engaging any further.

And my fundamental point still stands: we all agree that there are lots of reasons to be violent (I'm still suprised anyone thought that I said relgion is the only cause of violence!), but that atheism, if its a cause of anything at all (which, given that its a body of thought that implicitly contains no reference to a figure or body of authority, and no instruction on how to live or behave, I seriously doubt) is a far inferior cause of violence to religion (and my original point included various forms of oppression and some mythology+dogma based medically oriented harm it causes/allows/says isnt important compared to the soul and the afterlife).

[Cold Iron]

I'm pretty happy to wrap up the conversation too as far as our parts in it are concerned, or at least to the extent to which we have been involved. I agree that we've both said all that needs to be said and that we are unlikely to get any closer to an agreement.

Just want to make a few final comments (not trying to get the last word in or anything ). Firstly, I have addressed the mindset and body of influences of a literal believer:

Here:

Cold Iron;271631 said:

I do not attribute the religion of the 9/11 attackers as a cause of their attack. I attribute it as a factor only in so far as it is a cultural aspect of the time and place in which they lived. Even were they to have been recorded saying "I go to do this for my god and my religion" on tape before they did it, I would still not say religion was the cause or even a cause.

If the 9/11 attackers think they did it for god, does this mean that god is actually responsible? An atheist such as yourself would say "of course not, god is not real, it was the man who did it, not god". To then turn around and say "it was the religion who did it, not the man" is to contradict your own logic.

Here:

Cold Iron;272174 said:

D Man, you seem to be missing my point that concious intent does not necessarily reflect true intent. I'm not saying religion has no impact on people, just that it is not a true causal relationship. When I say that religion is not a creative or active force I mean that it is not independantly creative or active. It does not do anything at all. I'm not making a chicken or egg argument, I'm simply saying that an institution cannot be blamed for it's attributes, it did not choose or encourage them, it was assigned them.

Here:

Cold Iron;279939 said:

Keep up, I went through this already, whatever is going through the mind of your average grunt is irrelevant. Remember two things I've already said:
-Conscious intent can have nothing to do with actual intent
-Cultural identity can outlive it's relevance to actual things

Here:

Cold Iron;282157 said:

Religion is not a motivator to violence because (and I repeat) religion has it's own real-world and wholly secular causes. That the madman with the machete doesn't know this is immaterial. There is a natural competitive drive in all species of animal and all cultures. The belief of an individual that the command to kill all non-believers comes from god does not change the fact that it comes from somewhere. There is a reason that the violent scriptures exist, and it is not god, but man. You think religion facilitates the spread of violent ideas? Big deal. That's about as intuitive as saying water facilitates the spread of fish.

Religions reflect our nature. They cause nothing. That I may do something "because of my religion" does not mean that religion actually caused me to do it, only that it is how I rationalised it in my consciousness. The real reason is related to the desired outcome. If the desired outcome is nothing more than the will to go to heaven in the afterlife, then you should examine what this desire symbolises in this life.

And here:

Cold Iron;282201 said:

Humans can only understand things in relative terms. That is, they relate everything to an experience that they themselves have had. Everything. When you read about something that you have nothing within your experience to relate it to, you are unable to understand it. The thought process is a process of conceptualising. If you haven't experienced it, you can't conceptualise it, and thus can't understand it. So every belief, every interpretation, scriptural or otherwise is filtered by each individuals experience.

Now, I may be wrong and that would be fine. But the fact that instead of addressing and arguing against these points you have ignored them, dismissed them, pretended they weren't there and accused me of not addressing you tends to indicate a mental block. Do you or do you not understand how conscious intent can have nothing to do with underlying root cause and do you or do you not understand how this nullifies the relevance of your literal believer argument?

Secondly,

D Man;282790 said:

I dont agree with him that religion is required for, or even exists because it provides answers. At best its answers are fancifull guesses that have been passed down as fact, and the fulfilments and sembelences of personal meaning and purpose it offers seem like pacebos "Why this, why that, how come": "Its gods will, because St Dickhead said so", or some obfuscating intra-mythological flight of fancy-come-decreed facts of reality.

This is a childish position that indicates you have not investigated religion at all.

Thirdly,

D Man;282790 said:

Theres some sociological wisdom in there, but its nothing that cant be found without the mythical baggage elsewhere. It can be much more usefull, too. I know people that have had some fairly serious problems in life: some have turned to god, and their faith puts a band aid on it and becomes an emotional crutch: something they need to believe to stay level. An emotional dependency. Some have turned to psychology and understanding neurochemistry (as best they can) and envirnmental triggers, ascociations and so on, and they have addressed the root cause of their problems and gotten better without the need for continual strengthening of a faith-crutch.

That you acknowledge the fact that people exist who rely on religion just amplifies the disrespect you are showing to these people. Faced with this audacity, any religious person has the right to be insulted. That you don't understand why people's religious beliefs are respected is a failing in you, not society. You misunderstand and misrepresent the nature of religion, and then accuse those who benefit from it of not only having a problem, but also failing to understand and address it's cause? How offensive. Perhaps, like we have observed happening many times in this discussion alone, you are projecting your own problems and feelings of inadequacy. Intolerance, ignorance and insecurity often go together.

[Gem Windcaster]

Hey D Man, you should be careful being so intellectually rigid - it's a sure path to fanaticism. Your anti-religious stance might be mistaken for sect like behavior.

(ok, maybe not, but the thought made me chuckle.)


I am well aware of the failures of religious people in this world. That has never been an issue for me. It is when the failings of all people is credited to religious thought as a whole I have a problem.

As I have noted earlier - this discussion is basically about a philosophical difference in regard to human choices and the human mind. I realize people have different views on this, and as a religious person I am accustomed to it (people having different views).

In my opinion I have grown a lot more tolerant with my religion than I would have without it.

I am not refuting the fact that bad people uses religion as an excuse for violence, but I want people to admit that you're just as likely to be less violent as a religious person than a violent one.

if you can't see this, then I feel honestly sorry for you.

Other than that, I have nothing more to say and I'll leave you guys to your own fanaticism.

[D Man]

OK, CI, I addressed those points. I forget where and cant be bothered looking, but it went, in summary, because I'm getting bored and experience tells me you cling to what you already think too much to really consider these in a short timescale:

Originally Posted by Cold Iron
I do not attribute the religion of the 9/11 attackers as a cause of their attack. I attribute it as a factor only in so far as it is a cultural aspect of the time and place in which they lived. Even were they to have been recorded saying "I go to do this for my god and my religion" on tape before they did it, I would still not say religion was the cause or even a cause.

If the 9/11 attackers think they did it for god, does this mean that god is actually responsible? An atheist such as yourself would say "of course not, god is not real, it was the man who did it, not god". To then turn around and say "it was the religion who did it, not the man" is to contradict your own logic.

----

Youre arguing for an objective real world cause, and I've said time and again that youre at least on the right track for that cause/those causes. But your reasoning is egocentric: it assumes that all see things as you do, and doesnt take into account that our actions are couched in our perception of reality and ours alone. There being many "ours" (I dont think theres any need to say theres one per person, but there may be if you get nuanced and accurate enough about it) and a fundementalists includes being motivated by scripture as literally true, and god and his rules as real and absolute. It matters not a jot what the root cause of religion in general is to a literalist (well, it does matter to them, but they think its handed down word-by-word from the designer of the universe)

Originally Posted by Cold Iron
D Man, you seem to be missing my point that concious intent does not necessarily reflect true intent. I'm not saying religion has no impact on people, just that it is not a true causal relationship. When I say that religion is not a creative or active force I mean that it is not independantly creative or active. It does not do anything at all. I'm not making a chicken or egg argument, I'm simply saying that an institution cannot be blamed for it's attributes, it did not choose or encourage them, it was assigned them.

----

Youre gonna have to elaborate, if you want to, on the concious intent =/= true intent AND show that your assumption/get out clause here that it ALWAYS doesnt equate in religious action applies. I have a feeling youre going to have a very hard time demonstrating this, because I have a feeling you've taken an aspect of psychology that is real, but is a marginal operator, and blanketed accross this entire issue to try and explain every religious action away. To assume that a fundamentalists concsious and true intent dont match in a blanket sense accross all religious action is a pretty huge insult to religious people (I at least credit them with knowing what they're doing and why) and a vast presumption from you to know that that is whats going on.

Plus, how convenient that no one but you can peer into the sub-conscious of a fundamentalists and see a miss-match with what they say they are doing, even to the point that you can correct them on what they say they do what they do for!!!! Impressive. Can you teach me how?

The idea that an institution cannot be blamed for its attributes is something I've countered repeatedly, and it has been acknowledged by others in this discussion: ideas form the basis of actions. Institutions are an organised body to preserve a set of ideas and convert them into action and real-world changes. Government, in general, and each particular one, scientific institutions, religious, humanist, charities, the KKK, whatever you like: all of them exist to preserve and actualise ideas. Its absurd, frankly, to say that institutions do nothing. They form a body of people with shared belief, and typically a central authority, that can better organise information of interest to the members, coordinate action and proselytise. The broad strokes of what I said earlier about the alteration of a persons beliefs to match the authority applies to all of them to a degree, but religion is the only one I know of that actively indoctrinates.

Originally Posted by Cold Iron
Keep up, I went through this already, whatever is going through the mind of your average grunt is irrelevant. Remember two things I've already said:
-Conscious intent can have nothing to do with actual intent
-Cultural identity can outlive it's relevance to actual things

-----

Something else this discussion has made evident, and I'm certain its something we agree on: repeating your argument doesnt make it more compelling.

Originally Posted by Cold Iron
Religion is not a motivator to violence because (and I repeat) religion has it's own real-world and wholly secular causes. That the madman with the machete doesn't know this is immaterial.
-----

The rest is just blurb to try and imprint this point, and I prefer to address points than misleading analogies.

The refutation is simple: Subjective reality informs actions. Not objective reality. You seem to be having a lot of trouble with this; you make some interesting points (interesting for various reasons, mind ) but you dont demonstrate any comprehension of that. People dont act on historical facts nor the minutia of politcal discourse, nor the anthropolgical orgins of their biological compulsions and psychological inclinations: they act on what they think they know. No one is an exception to this, but, in the case of literalists, includes every single statement, the flights of fancy of bronze age, iron age and medeival the authors, being the word of the one true god. In some ways they werent so different to us and what they say can be usefull, but by fuck they loved their brutality.

Some of whats currently believed as absolute fact was even just made up by someone close to the church: for example, it was aquinas that, in the 12th century and the prodigious knowledge of biology he no doubt had (he actually resented the existance of any book other than the bible, saying "I am a man of one book") decreed, for no other reason than it seemed right to him, that the core of a human being was contained in semen, and that the soul enters the body at the moment of conception. Que anti-condom mandates facilitating the spread of AIDs and fundamentalists killing abortion doctors.

Originally Posted by Cold Iron
Humans can only understand things in relative terms. That is, they relate everything to an experience that they themselves have had. Everything. When you read about something that you have nothing within your experience to relate it to, you are unable to understand it. The thought process is a process of conceptualising. If you haven't experienced it, you can't conceptualise it, and thus can't understand it. So every belief, every interpretation, scriptural or otherwise is filtered by each individuals experience.

-----

This is hardly relevant and quite untrue. It may serve as a good springboard for understanding subjective reality for you: since by your own argument in here you understand by reference (not true, or at least it doesnt have to be), and this is connected to subjective reality (though its not implicit with it).

Its not true because we, in fact, use base apriori reasoning reasoning devices that are wired into us in different ways, building constucts of perception from them around any object: is, isnt, equals, greater, less, times, divide, sum, subtract, because, therefore, inside, outside, above, below and so on and so forth, with reference, not to previous understandings, but to any given object and its observed/percieved behaviour (be it a falling stone or a character in a story).

If you were right then we would never actually learn anything, since we are born with no knowledge: we have nothing to reference to. We dont reference, we interelate using the connective and logical mechanisms of thought.

And if you were right, the entirety of modern physics would never have been concieved or comprehended. Its built from the same logical operators, but written as maths, and they utterly defy reference to anything else and they uterly defy conceptualisation (only innacurate cartoon images are possible, aways with the caveats 'its sort of like' or 'it may be usefull to think of this' or something of that ilk, because its not really like anything we know: yet we know what it is.

OK, I'm done. I was just irked that you thought that I hadnt addressed those points. I simply didnt quote them and take them one at a time (the points I've made above should look familiar: perhaps you didnt know what they were in reference to in the original posts?). I addressed them. No doubt you dont agree with what I've said (I spotted a pattern, see ) but it irritated me that you said I didnt take it on.

[D Man]

Gem Windcaster;283123 said:

I am not refuting the fact that bad people uses religion as an excuse for violence, but I want people to admit that you're just as likely to be less violent as a religious person than a violent one.

if you can't see this, then I feel honestly sorry for you.

Other than that, I have nothing more to say and I'll leave you guys to your own fanaticism.

I'll admit that with a huge smile on my face. Very true. Never said otherwise.

Actually, my boss made an interesting point thats very pertinent to the core of why religious folk can be very violent as well:

He was going to go to discussions on buddhism. Hes a very, very rational guy, extremely intelligent and not credulous in the least. I asked him 'why; you starting to believe in an eternal soul?' he said 'No, but....' and I dont remember his exact words but the jist was that if you preferentially read the positive morals in a religion, in a religion purely because they're an obvious repository and source for such ruminations, while having your own innate morality, that it would bring to the fore of your thoughts the various moral ideas that have been scribed through the millenia and you can, through the positive feedback (hes an engineer) resonance between your own morality and the encouragement of coresponding thoughts, bring the corresponding moral actions more to the fore. (He's a great bloke, by the way, lovely fella, he doesnt, it seems to me, need to be nicer; but apparently hes a good enough bloke that he thinks hes still not good enough).

And its all true. I agree with him.

The thing is, it works the other way round too

[Gem Windcaster]

Well, seriously dude, if you agree with what I am saying, then I honestly don't understand your issue. So what if some people choose violence because of religion (which I still think is because they were prone to violence in the first place), any reason for becoming violent is bad, it's not like anyone notices any difference between getting killed by a fanatic and a regular murderer. If you're dead you're dead. So, what's your point? People are different, and we all have different reasons for what we do. I seriously don't get the religion bashing at all.

It seems to me you're a thinker and you wonder a lot about these issues. But you, like any religious person, has to live with the fact that people you respect and admire have a different view of live and universe. People have to make their own choices in life. And we all have to take the consequences for it.
***
Btw, I didn't get anything of the passage about your friend - seriously, I have reread it several times, and I still don't get what you're saying. :confused:

[D Man]

Well, frankly Gem, I cant be bothered explaining it again.

This has gone on so long that everyone seems to have forgotten what my original point was (none of what you said has anything to do with it, btw). Even back when it stared, it pleased people far more to make a strawman of it, trying to say that I'm saying religion is the only cause of violence or some such idiocy.

Its strange that people are calling me religious and saying I'm out to attack it when this entire exchange is based on a few words of a one-scentance comment that was a response to a frankly bizarre attack on atheism (only atheists proselytise?!?!?!?!) that got picked up on by apologists and attacked, and since I have shown reasons (being the appropriate word, I havent simply said "I think this and I'm entitled to: its my opinion and all opinions are equal" or any garbage like that: I've respected rational arguments (I answered them, after all) and used rational arguments, whether you understand or agree with them or not).

Rational defense of a position, that was in itself a response to something of an attack =/= proselytising or religion bashing.

I'm perfectly happy to defend any position I hold, but dont go saying I'm on some sort of attacking mission when I'm just answering criticisms :hand:

P.S. Youre contradicting yourself. You cant on the one hand state that religion has made you a more tolerant person, then on the other say that any negative effects are because the person had those characteristics to that degree to begin with.

Can ANYONE tell me what I actually originally said?

Anybody?

[Gem Windcaster]

D Man;283421 said:

Well, frankly Gem, I cant be bothered explaining it again.

Well, bother, I'll just have to interpret your previous words then. Like I've been doing all along.

Quote

This has gone on so long that everyone seems to have forgotten what my original point was (none of what you said has anything to do with it, btw). Even back when it stared, it pleased people far more to make a strawman of it, trying to say that I'm saying religion is the only cause of violence or some such idiocy.

No, friend, this is how ti goes: I read something you wrote - I disagreed with your statements - you tell me I have ignored your original point - maybe it wasn't your original point I had a problem with? Go figure.

Quote

Its strange that people are calling me religious and saying I'm out to attack it when this entire exchange is based on a few words of a one-scentance comment that was a response to a frankly bizarre attack on atheism (only atheists proselytise?!?!?!?!) that got picked up on by apologists and attacked, and since I have shown reasons (being the appropriate word, I havent simply said "I think this and I'm entitled to: its my opinion and all opinions are equal" or any garbage like that: I've respected rational arguments (I answered them, after all) and used rational arguments, whether you understand or agree with them or not).

As long as you interpret them as rational, right? Thing is, if you want a discussion, you have to be prepared to take responsibility for your words. And you have to be prepared that people will disagree with anything you say. Including a by-the-way statement that has nothing to do with the original point, if that's what people disagrees with. And nobody said you weren't entitled to your opinion, we just had a different one.

Quote

Rational defense of a position, that was in itself a response to something of an attack =/= proselytising or religion bashing.

I'm perfectly happy to defend any position I hold, but dont go saying I'm on some sort of attacking mission when I'm just answering criticisms :hand:

No, you're not on an attacking mission, but you're still 'bashing' religion to some extent. And so far, you haven't actually answered any criticism, you have happily jumped around it. I don't blame you though. It's some pretty tough statements you've come to 'defend'.

Quote

P.S. Youre contradicting yourself. You cant on the one hand state that religion has made you a more tolerant person, then on the other say that any negative effects are because the person had those characteristics to that degree to begin with.

How is that contradicting? And how would they not have those characteristics? And how on earth would that mean I am being intolerant - I am inclined to say that it's the opposite in fact.

Quote

Can ANYONE tell me what I actually originally said?

Anybody?

What has your 'original' point has got to do with anything?
I am sure you've got lots and lots of good points about a lot of stuff - I am just reacting on the stuff that I disagree with.



We're not supposed to say what you meant initially, you are.