Doubting the existence of a Christian God makes you cool. Talk about blind conformity. Kind of like tattoos being taboo sometime ago now, your considered weird if you DON'T have a tat.
I get what Tac's saying, it's a full time job to filter out the fashion/fad from the reality of being a human sometimes. As I'm not a person that's a slave to fashion/fads, I get to sit back and watch the show......silly freakin' humans.
I'll believe in a "new age of reason" when I see it! Wherever I look right now, I see more of an "age of Jay Walking All-Stars", who take ignorance to whole new levels of "wha' the?"-ness. That trend toward "reason" is more of a herd mentality of hipsters following the cool new trend in "what every cool person thinks"... Edit: This video works for this thread as well as my "published research" thread...
I will say this, the moral teachings of the bible are very valuable. Thomas Jefferson had the right idea. Removed all the fairy tale stuff, and kept the core values: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jefferson_Bible I think you could probably get people to rally around this concept. "We believe is Jesus's teachings and are willing to tithe to fund good works, and attend services to learn them. But we reject the bronze age ignorance and superstition." If everybody would answer honestly I think you'd find a lot of people still attend church out of tradition, obligation, or "just in case". It's a social thing for many.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secular_humanism While I disagree with many of their tactics and obviously some of the ridiculous notions they espouse, the church(es) have installed common and semi-universal morals in a formerly amoral population. That said, I believe that blindly dismissing any sort of higher power be it God, a god, or super duper string theory tying everything together is just as silly as blindly believing in a god.
But the one's who quote this article will be the "don't believe" blind conformity crowd. There is no idea, be it so sensible, or ludicrous, that our polyconformist society will not form a blindly conformist group of idealogues to mindlessly spout talking points in support of...
Definitely. It's just important to separate openness to evidence of some sort of higher power from organized religious dogma based on superstition and ignorance. I'm personally open to anything, and thanks to string/membrane theory I think pretty much anything is possible. But until there is any measurable evidence I'm just going to try to be a good person, sleep in on Sundays, and invest my time and money elsewhere.
Yes, the whole stoning homosexuals and submitting to slavery if you are slave are great moral teachings. There is a lot of fucked up shit in the bible that people pick and choose.
... me? *In news tonight, a minor earthquake shook the US, as hundreds of T3D readers fell out of their chairs laughing!*
Because Americans are well versed and raised in the teachings of the Koran. Did you know that the Koran grows out of Judeo-Christian beliefs? Hell, Jesus is a revered prophet _in_ Islam. But it's cool bro, Muslims are clearly out to get 'Merica or something like that I guess.
I for one (outside the US) find it fascinating; how much of a big deal religion appears to play in the lives of Americans. Also think it is kind of scary; how much involvement religion appears to play in your politics. Sure we have religious folk here, but isn't really such a big deal.
I dunno, I think the Koran is even more backward than the bible. As far as I know there aren't any guidelines in the bible on when it's appropriate to rape somebody.
My hope is for more people to turn to critical thinking and less superstition. Remember believing in supernatural beings with magical powers with no proof of their existence is conformity.
It's true that I interpreted this a bit. But how does one man "drive out" people in the temple without the use of violence against them? He instigated a riot, pure and simple.
What joke? If you think about it Jeeesus did use violence. Why is that so hard to believe? Maybe this will help?
