Interesting. I had no idea people had such a lowly opinion of religion.
Not of religion, of religious people. Example, the Native Americans had a perfectly good culture and religion before 1492. The arogant Europeans came over, decided by their apparent lack of fashion that they were idiots and needed saving, by being force fed Christianity. It was the Crusades all over again, and that was just with the invention of decent boats.
Give it another hundred years, science will advance, religion won't (can't, all written down in really old books), and our great grandchildren will see what happens.
for me personally it's both - religion was used before we had a government with law and science to explain phenomenon, it's time awe as a people stop believing that 2000 year old fairy tales are true.
Not of religion, of religious people. Example, the Native Americans had a perfectly good culture and religion before 1492. The arogant Europeans came over, decided by their apparent lack of fashion that they were idiots and needed saving, by being force fed Christianity. It was the Crusades all over again, and that was just with the invention of decent boats.
Interesting posts Don, I liked the sentient ant concept but it's a mixed bag. Ants are very good on group survival but light on individualism. We could use a culture of caring about the group's well being but we somehow need to encourage individual thinking too.
You're sure right about religious people giving religion a bad name. All those years of mixing in politics brought out the worst in the Church. Politicians loved having the weight of Mother Church behind their whims.
I read Michener's "Hawaii" as a kid and was still naive enough to be a bit shocked at how the missionaries forced a religion with a twisted sense of sexuality on a loving culture with a fine sense of loving, sharing sexuality.
People don't want "believers" forcing anything on them. Not revenuers, snake handlers or the Walmart greeter insisting you need a cart.
Science will triumph but not because those who most need to understand it will come to grasp facts. It's nearing 100 years since the Monkey Trial and many chimps never got the memo.
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I'll believe corporations are persons when Texas executes one.: LBJ's Ghost
for me personally it's both - religion was used before we had a government with law and science to explain phenomenon, it's time awe as a people stop believing that 2000 year old fairy tales are true.
Fantastic image Redjeep. It says it all. I got to the sick woman in bed and and felt the rage that hits me each time I see that infant with an untreated growth over her eye.
Quote:
By the time she was six months old, a growth had taken over Alanya Wyland's face, and threatened to push her eyeball out of its socket. Her parents, Timothy and Rebecca Wyland, did not do what most people would have: take her to the hospital. Instead, they "anointed her with oils and laid down hands." According to the New York Times and the AP, the state of Oregon, where they live, is now prosecuting the Wylands for first-degree criminal mistreatment.
The Wylands, who belong to the Followers of Christ Church, do not believe in practicing medicine. The question is whether they are entitled to total religious freedom, even if their belief, as Timothy Wyland told a prosecutor, that "sometimes God heals, and sometimes God lets children die," leads them to withhold potentially life-saving medical care.
Alanya was taken from her parents, and lived in foster care for two months while she was treated. She was found to have a hemangioma, a benign tumor that can cause blindness. She is the most recent in a series of children and teenagers who have been brought to the state's attention because their parents are members of the Followers of Christ Church.
In 1998, local media reported that of the 78 children buried in the church cemetery, a shocking 21 could have been saved if they had received any medical attention. At the time, state prosecutors said that they could not intervene because Oregon laws provided protections for parents whose religious beliefs prevented them from seeking medical care for their children. Later, after this protection was repealed, the father of a two-year-old was sentenced to 60 days in prison when the little girl died of pneumonia.
You guys don't think throwing a few extreme cases out there is a bit immature as an argument?
what's extreme, everyone's opinion is different, to many people other religions often appear absurd. yes we (from a north american perspective) view letting someone die from lack of medicine to be wrong but what about other things like not having condoms/birth control be used...circumcision... complete banning of nudity, blue laws where we can't sell cars on sunday are all absurd just as we as a society see veils or female circumcision as evil.... It all depends on the perspective.
you may not see religion as harmful but the core of any religion is to follow specific beliefs someone else dictates to them, that alone is VERY dangerous as it teaches people not to think for themselves, not to question, to not think critically because "god has it all planned out" and out of that line of thinking horrible, horrible human rights abuses take place but we don't notice it because we are blinded by religion.
whenever something bad happens from a religious perspective the excuse is that was just a few of them, it's like a drug user saying I use drugs responsibly, I won't overdose like those people did I won't let it control me, religions aren't dangerous..... and they think they are having a good life but in reality they are controlled by it
I don't know if they offer this in High Schools anymore but back in the early 1970's there were anthropology classes offered in high schools here. Three anthorpology classes offered. One was physical anthropology, another was cultural anthropology, and the third offered after completing cultural anthro was Theology.
Physical anthro was, in simplified terms, evolution. Cultural anthro was basically the study of past and present cultures and their sub cultures (not typical history). In the theology class all past and present religions and philosophys were studied. These were 2 semester classes each.
Biology, physiology I, and physiology II, were more like chemstry and physics. Data here is a bit more imperical.
Which reminds me somewhat of geomotery where there is a proof for a therom.
back in the early 1970's there were anthropology classes offered in high schools here. Three anthorpology classes offered. One was physical anthropology, another was cultural anthropology, and the third offered after completing cultural anthro was Theology.
That's very impressive. I hold strong beliefs that we desperately need to learn both from History & prior cultures. We keep reinventing the wheel rather that gain insights & move on.
The bad part is we still think in terms of "us & them" about too much around us. Our perspective is too often tribal even on a nation state level. It shouldn't be a contest of "ISMS", arbitrary geographical boundaries and unrelated factors like color, sex, age or choice of beer.
We are a diverse collection of people more alike than not and stuck on this small blue rock together for our foreseeable future.
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I'll believe corporations are persons when Texas executes one.: LBJ's Ghost
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