Are you religious?

[Cuddles]

@ScouseD...since you ask politely, I will do the polite thing and reply. I don't KNOW if Zeus exists. I believe he doesn't but should my last catnap involve waking up in the Elysian fields, I'll be sure to mention your name as a loyal supporter! As you appositely put it, I am a theist and my god of choice is the big beardy fellow on a cloud. I might be wrong but I find it suits me very well to be one of his myriads of followers.

[ScouseD]

@ScouseD...since you ask politely, I will do the polite thing and reply. I don't KNOW if Zeus exists. I believe he doesn't but should my last catnap involve waking up in the Elysian fields, I'll be sure to mention your name as a loyal supporter! As you appositely put it, I am a theist and my god of choice is the big beardy fellow on a cloud. I might be wrong but I find it suits me very well to be one of his myriads of followers.

There’s nothing whatsoever to fault with that, and if in the unlikely event you do bump into any god please do pass my name on as someone that has a few ideas.

Each to their own as long as it doesn’t harm anyone else.

[Higgs_bosun]

Scouse, another excellent attempt to penetrate the thick layers of delusion... but we have been through this many times before and as you say, we are eventually accused of having closed minds!...Lacking blind faith is our fault because we apply reason and demand some (any) form of 'evidence' to believe in things. This is the way mind cults respond... only they have the right delusion. It would be ok to say that they are welcome to it except that the hypnotic grip of religion on the human race has invaded every facet of our lives and it can destroy us.

There is little point in asking the obvious questions that will expose the delusion because they are blind to them. The fool dressed as Napoleon really believes in his heart that he is Bonaparte and there is nothing else to do.

It's a mental condition based on superstitions and primitive dogma that runs through history like a plague... it spreads in exactly the same way. The psychological tricks that will enslave victims are well understood... Catch em young, wire them up and bingo...another clone. That the demographics will determine which virus they are affected by is one of the points that they ignore and fail to address. Allow me to demonstrate:

Cogi... you are beginning to drift away from me pal but I'm trying to help you...honest.

Please answer these simple questions:

Do agree that if you had been born in an Islamic state, to an Islamic family and attended the full on Islamic indoctrination that you would probably not be a christian?

If not, why not?

Other christians are welcome to join in....

If yes why?

[StickyEnd]

If someone asserts something as fact, for example the earth is flat or there is a God, and then proceeds to offer "evidence", then their hypothesis is proven. Until somebody provides an alternative hypothesis which they prove. Or can disprove their evidence.

Your "evidence" that religion is made-up is I am afraid merely hearsay and as such not really admissible. Unless you have an affy-davy from some bloke called Paul, in which he admits how he and eleven mates went on the razz in Jerusalem in 0AD and thought it might be funny to "make-up" a religion??

While I think that religious claims are just made up, I believe it happened in a far more complex way than in that scenario.

They probably began in the distant past, way before people had an ability to write. God or a god would be used as an explanation for observed phenomena and that tradition be passed on from generation to generation. Slowly becoming more elaborate, formal and ritualised. As writing developed then they could become even more formal and authoritative.

That is the World the disciples would be born into.

Now If that is correct, it should make some predictions.

Got to go, off to work.

[Higgs_bosun]

If someone asserts something as fact, for example the earth is flat or there is a God, and then proceeds to offer "evidence", then their hypothesis is proven. Until somebody provides an alternative hypothesis which they prove. Or can disprove their evidence.

Your "evidence" that religion is made-up is I am afraid merely hearsay and as such not really admissible. Unless you have an affy-davy from some bloke called Paul, in which he admits how he and eleven mates went on the razz in Jerusalem in 0AD and thought it might be funny to "make-up" a religion??

Ok, there is no god and that's a fact...the evidence is that gravity and all laws of physics are without minds. Minds are of living matter and require brains. Gods of religion are attributed with having personalities, intelligence, love and other characteristics that are part of evolution. Therefore a supernatural entity such as a god thing cannot exist. There Cuddles...please present the alternative hypothesis.

And religion is made up... that's a fact. The work of scholars today have found evidence to prove errors, omissions and contradictions in the bible and quran that can only amount to fabrication. This is not hearsay...do the research.

[Higgs_bosun]

I'm not so sure that implication is logically valid:

a. Having no proof of non-existence does not constitute an existence theorem. (I have no proof the IPU does not exist therefore it does)

b. Believing x exists also does not constitute an existence theorem. (I believe Russell's Teapot exists therefore it does)

c. You're not comparing like with like. The origins of the belief in the Roman/Greek deities cannot be attributed (or, at least, not at the moment) to a group of named individuals (with reasonable evidence to support their existence) who claim to have seen those deities. Christianity, OTOH, can be so attributed. Hence, it has a better evidential basis - at least we've got some idea who the bloke was down which pub. As Cuddles says, if you can find evidence that Paul, Peter, etc didn't exist you undermine the evidence (and hence Christianity) and if you find Paul's missing Epistle in which he regrets having started it all one night after a few bevvies, even better.

Flawed reasoning...

a. If everything exists so does the evidence that there is no god....

b. The teapot cannot exist in a meaningful way without evidence...it remains only imaginary and not worthy of worship...just like gods.

c. There are all kind of religions and cults that claim divine revelation.... Recently Mr & Mrs Smith were abducted by aliens and have provided sworn statements endorsed by doctors. This is therefore good evidence that aliens are visiting Earth and poking around peoples private parts...returning to their planet to say over a pint of plutonium...sniff this finger if you doubt the existence of life on Earth.

[Higgs_bosun]

And why not, indeed! Heisenberg had to ask his mum to get a note from Himmler's mum to tell the other Germans to stop being nasty to him for believing in Jewish Physics, no matter how much evidence and mathematical reasoning he had. Still, I think from previous discussion on this point, you may be right.

A monstrous collections of non sequiturs...not worth breaking down unless you need help spotting them...of course

[detmold_padbrat]

An awful lot of the atheist argument on here centres around the word "delusion"

is it because it forms the thrust of Dawkins book "the god delusion" ??

I am not content with the word, it throws responsibility upon the individual (the deluded individual)

consider a conjourer... he is a skilled magician and can dupe pretty much everyone, consistently into the belief that he does the impossible in the physical world. We take a backwards leap of faith, and know not to trust our eyes (unlike small children, we know not to trust this 1 instance of our senses being decieved, becuae we have years more experience in the world).. if we are tricked, then the point is we are ALL tricked (just most know not to "believe" in the reality of what they have seen) and we are all tricked in a consistent fashion. This is because we are all equipped with the same senses of which we percieve reality, and the same cognitive apparatus through which we process it.

However,it may well be the case that religious belief materially alters the brain. Just as in the same way excersize alters muscle by its repetition of load.Is such an individual "deluded" or materially different ? do the insane just perceive reality from an alternate angle ? there is no such thing as normality.

Not enough credence is given to the subjective within the atheist argument.. reality is the interface between subject and object.

[BillBailiwick]

Religion was invented to keep the working class in there place.

...except, the working class was invented by Marx, and back in the ancient days the slave-types weren't even allowed to take part.

There are much better ways of controlling the poor/disenfranchised than religion, definitely.

[Excognito]

A monstrous collections of non sequiturs...not worth breaking down unless you need help spotting them...of course

That's jolly kind of you, Higgsy. But, in the first instance, I think I shall ask somebody who comprehends English, reasons logically and knows what a non sequitur is.

If all else fails, I shall certainly keep you in mind - you never know, the Universe might just randomly put the correct answer into your head.