Dawkin's God Delusion

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Originally Posted by jebus

...calling people's beliefs nonsense... and stating that calling your child catholic, muslim etc. is child abuse... comes across as very harsh and insulting...

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I believe in democracy, free healthcare and strong labour laws. I believe in causality, gravity and that Tony MacDonnell is a 9'7" Taiwanese thermostat control assembly. If you question any of that, I can defend it (well, except for maybe causality - quantum mechanics wrecks my head), and I can choose to be insulted, but I'd be insulted more if you weren't allowed state your opinion. Why do so many people want to treat religion differently?

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Originally Posted by jebus

Fair enough, but calling people's beliefs nonsense, which he does here, and stating that calling your child catholic, muslim etc. is child abuse (even if I agree with the point he is trying to make) comes across as very harsh and insulting, and is what Lord Winston was getting at when he said that tone does science more damage then good

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How often are Hari Chrisnas, Mormons, Church of Jesus Christ, Scientology, etc dismissed by Catholics as nonsense? Pretty regularly I would say.
Richard Dawkins and plenty more including myself see Christianity, Hinduism, Islam as equally ridiculous and have every right to question it. If someone comes up with scientific proof for the existence of a God I'll put my hand up and admit I'm wrong but until then I will believe that people who believe in a god have nonsensical believes and I'm quiet happy to say so.

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Originally Posted by John83

I believe in democracy, free healthcare and strong labour laws. I believe in causality, gravity and that Tony MacDonnell is a 9'7" Taiwanese thermostat control assembly. If you question any of that, I can defend it (well, except for maybe causality - quantum mechanics wrecks my head), and I can choose to be insulted, but I'd be insulted more if you weren't allowed state your opinion. Why do so many people want to treat religion differently?

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As in what way? Dawkins can say what he wants, I couldn't care less, my main issue with him is the language he sometimes uses. I mean saying that calling your child a catholic (so does that mean bringing a child up catholic?) is child abuse is a very harsh statement to make, and many could find it very, very insulting (basically he's just called my parents, and many other parents child abusers). Whilst I agree with his point that a child should be brought up to learn about all religions, and atheism too, I don't think catholics who bring up their children in the catholic faith, or atheists that bring their kids up to be atheists are child abusers (think of what that term actually means)

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Originally Posted by finlma

How often are Hari Chrisnas, Mormons, Church of Jesus Christ, Scientology, etc dismissed by Catholics as nonsense? Pretty regularly I would say.
Richard Dawkins and plenty more including myself see Christianity, Hinduism, Islam as equally ridiculous and have every right to question it. If someone comes up with scientific proof for the existence of a God I'll put my hand up and admit I'm wrong but until then I will believe that people who believe in a god have nonsensical believes and I'm quiet happy to say so.

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There's a nice quote that sums your opinion there up in a neat way:
"I contend that we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours." -- Stephen Roberts

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Originally Posted by finlma

How often are Hari Chrisnas, Mormons, Church of Jesus Christ, Scientology, etc dismissed by Catholics as nonsense? Pretty regularly I would say.

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Oh pull your head out of your ass would you, I've never once heard a priest or a nun call people with any faith nonsense, so don't go throwing your insults at those people and then pretend that thats religious peoples viewpoint.

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Originally Posted by finlma

Richard Dawkins and plenty more including myself see Christianity, Hinduism, Islam as equally ridiculous and have every right to question it. If someone comes up with scientific proof for the existence of a God I'll put my hand up and admit I'm wrong but until then I will believe that people who believe in a god have nonsensical believes and I'm quiet happy to say so.

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See above for what I'm actually on about here, but all I'll say is that perhaps you should be more tolerant? Nonsensical beliefs they may or may not be, but is there much need for you or anyone else to get so worked up about it?

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Originally Posted by jebus

See above for what I'm actually on about here, but all I'll say is that perhaps you should be more tolerant? Nonsensical beliefs they may or may not be, but is there much need for you or anyone else to get so worked up about it?

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Sure, if there are people trying to get it taught as science, definitely.

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Originally Posted by jebus

I don't think catholics who bring up their children in the catholic faith, or atheists that bring their kids up to be atheists are child abusers (think of what that term actually means)

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the term is a combination of 2 words. abuse, which we see at football matches quite often, is a broad word. it can be psychological abuse, like calling pat fenlon an angry midget. it can be physical abuse, or sexual abuse - the terms i'm assuming your outrage is directed at. so we'll go ahead and say that giving your child zero choice in the beliefs they are supposed to adhere to, and threatening them with a loss of love and eternal hellfire if they don't - that'll probably fit under psychological abuse.

"child" psychological abuse, clearly, just infers its directed at a child. its quite a mouthful to be using three or four times in a conversation. perhaps dawkins just assumed people would have the intelligence to understand his meaning, rather than taking the definition of child abuse from the sunday world.

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Originally Posted by jebus

Oh pull your head out of your ass would you, I've never once heard a priest or a nun call people with any faith nonsense, so don't go throwing your insults at those people and then pretend that thats religious peoples viewpoint.

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of course you haven't, who would pull that fragile thread in ireland today? on the other hand, in less enlightened places, people are still be killed for converting to one sect or another, or discriminating against them because a guy with the same colour skin wrote a book hundreds of years ago.

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Originally Posted by John83

Sure, if there are people trying to get it taught as science, definitely.

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I assume you're talking about creationism being taught in American schools? Well first off I don't think its okay to take the fundamentalists of religion and use it in any discussion with someone who isn't a fundamentalist, why should I have to answer for their...nonsense :eek:

Secondly I think kids should be taught about creationism, not as science, I agree with you there, but then again see my point above as to why I shouldn't have to answer for things I don't personally believe in

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Originally Posted by GavinZac

the term is a combination of 2 words. abuse, which we see at football matches quite often, is a broad word. it can be psychological abuse, like calling pat fenlon an angry midget. it can be physical abuse, or sexual abuse - the terms i'm assuming your outrage is directed at. so we'll go ahead and say that giving your child zero choice in the beliefs they are supposed to adhere to, and threatening them with a loss of love and eternal hellfire if they don't - that'll probably fit under psychological abuse.

"child" psychological abuse, clearly, just infers its directed at a child. its quite a mouthful to be using three or four times in a conversation. perhaps dawkins just assumed people would have the intelligence to understand his meaning, rather than taking the definition of child abuse from the sunday world.

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:rolleyes:

anyway saying "don't teach children that that is your religion, that's child abuse" is still a very harsh term to use, only fools would argue otherwise (I give you the above)

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Originally Posted by GavinZac

of course you haven't, who would pull that fragile thread in ireland today? on the other hand, in less enlightened places, people are still be killed for converting to one sect or another, or discriminating against them because a guy with the same colour skin wrote a book hundreds of years ago.

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Whats that got to do with my point about never hearing a nun or a priest say that people's faith is nonsense? And whats people using a book like the Bible to discriminate against someone else got to do with this?

Maybe when the Bibles were wrote they thought that people would have the intelligence to see the deeper meaning in the stories? Or that people would have enough sense not to quote passages that were relevant to that society hundreds years of years later? Be it in favour of the message, or just some bright spark thinking he can argue about religion by referencing the Old Testament, something which most of us have already discussed at great length, and discounted some pages ago

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Originally Posted by jebus

...I don't think its okay to take the fundamentalists of religion and use it in any discussion with someone who isn't a fundamentalist, why should I have to answer for their...nonsense

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Reasonable.

However, organised religion (specifically Catholicism) has and continues to have a substantial impact on everyone. Consider the law in this country as it relates or related to issues such as marriage and divorce, abortion, contraception, gay rights, etc, the widespread link between religious institutions and eduction and the significance of the power of the church in the widespread clerical conspiracy to hide child molesters. Mainstream religion has had an immense impact on the law and society and therefore has to be open to criticism from secular as well as internal avenues to allow a common morality to be enshrined in the legal system, which is sort of happening at a glacially slow pace because of the difficulty in criticising someone's opinion on a subject which has an associated religious doctrine.

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Originally Posted by jebus

:rolleyes:

anyway saying "don't teach children that that is your religion, that's child abuse" is still a very harsh term to use, only fools would argue otherwise (I give you the above)

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Once again, you disagree with me and have no counter argument, so you resort to insults. I'd say something about the Limerick mentality but I'm afraid :eek:

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Whats that got to do with my point about never hearing a nun or a priest say that people's faith is nonsense? And whats people using a book like the Bible to discriminate against someone else got to do with this?

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It has got everything to do with it. I mean, for crying out loud the very declaration that one is a christian in the nicean creed is saying that every other belief system is not just false but an affront to an angry jealous god. only, its so embedded in your head, you think its normal. meanwhile, muslims call christians the great satan, but thats different. thats not us.

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Maybe when the Bibles were wrote they thought that people would have the intelligence to see the deeper meaning in the stories? Or that people would have enough sense not to quote passages that were relevant to that society hundreds years of years later? Be it in favour of the message, or just some bright spark thinking he can argue about religion by referencing the Old Testament, something which most of us have already discussed at great length, and discounted some pages ago

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Its quite possible to convey the deeper meanings and the message without believing one particularly hairy chap could do magic. Buddhism does it admirably. and as someone said, if the only reason you're sticking to behaving well is the big surveillance camera in the sky, you probably shouldn't be allowed to tell people what to do.
That leads me, helpfully, to another far less controversial but no less thought provoking Dawkins book, The Selfish Gene. In it, it describes the origins of behaviour - the built in characteristics of animals that make them do seemingly altruistic things like feed the weak or respect other animal's territory. I guess my point is that we had morals before someone took various assorted fairy tales from around the middle east, and told them to a bunch of goat herders in the levant to make them pay tithes. And we'll have morals after people stop believing this crap and realise how much more wonderous it is that virtually everything makes sense, without the need for magic to bind the blindspots.

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Originally Posted by John83

Reasonable.

However, organised religion (specifically Catholicism) has and continues to have a substantial impact on everyone. Consider the law in this country as it relates or related to issues such as marriage and divorce, abortion, contraception, gay rights, etc, the widespread link between religious institutions and eduction and the significance of the power of the church in the widespread clerical conspiracy to hide child molesters. Mainstream religion has had an immense impact on the law and society and therefore has to be open to criticism from secular as well as internal avenues to allow a common morality to be enshrined in the legal system, which is sort of happening at a glacially slow pace because of the difficulty in criticising someone's opinion on a subject which has an associated religious doctrine.

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Oh I realise all that, personally I would keep religion out of the law system altogether, well obviously murder, robbery etc. as laid out in the ten commandments stand up today in concurance with the law. But in regards to abortion, divorce, contraception I would keep religion out of it, for the record I am pro-choice, and agree with divorce and the use of contraception. That said I don't think religion can be held accountable for peoples backward attitude to gay rights. Sure most religious people are against it, but so are the majority of people as far as I can see, and I know just as many religious people (myself included) who focus more on the equality message of the New Testament than the bile that often comes from the Vatican

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Originally Posted by GavinZac

Once again, you disagree with me and have no counter argument, so you resort to insults. I'd say something about the Limerick mentality but I'm afraid :eek:

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If you make a decent point, then I'll give you a counter argument, until then you'll get insults. I'll give you the discussion between myself and John at the moment as a proper point and counter-point discussion

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Originally Posted by GavinZac

It has got everything to do with it. I mean, for crying out loud the very declaration that one is a christian in the nicean creed is saying that every other belief system is not just false but an affront to an angry jealous god. only, its so embedded in your head, you think its normal. meanwhile, muslims call christians the great satan, but thats different. thats not us.

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Wow, I must tell that to all the Christians that have moved on from the centuries old belief that if you're not with us, you're against us attitude :rolleyes: next

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Originally Posted by jebus

If you make a decent point, then I'll give you a counter argument, until then you'll get insults. I'll give you the discussion between myself and John at the moment as a proper point and counter-point discussion

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did you just not comprehend what i said? you don't think threatening kids to do as you say with scary magic is psychological abuse?

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Wow, I must tell that to all the Christians that have moved on from the centuries old belief that if you're not with us, you're against us attitude :rolleyes: next

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so the nicean creed they recited in confirmation, that was just a formaility and the truth is closer to pantheism or agnosticism? why are they christians then?

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Originally Posted by GavinZac

did you just not comprehend what i said? you don't think threatening kids to do as you say with scary magic is psychological abuse?

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No I didn't get that from

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Originally Posted by GavinZac

Once again, you disagree with me and have no counter argument, so you resort to insults. I'd say something about the Limerick mentality but I'm afraid :eek:

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As for your original point, I'll ask again what that has to do with me contending that Dawkins using the term 'child abuse' in relation to teaching your children your beliefs is very harsh, and could be seen as insulting? Even if you take scary magic as child abuse, what has that got to do with my point about Dawkins use of language? You know, how this round of the discussion came about? The one that you have interjected yourself into and have so far made no attempt to actually participate? The one where you are just trying to turn the whole thing around into something that has been discussed over the last 15 pages?

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Originally Posted by GavinZac

so the nicean creed they recited in confirmation, that was just a formaility and the truth is closer to pantheism or agnosticism? why are they christians then?

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I've explained my viewpoint on Christianity as a whole in this thread, if you care to look for it, it's close to pantheism in fairness (although it was called a mix of Buddhism and Jedism a few pages ago, which in fairness I liked), but I'm not going to go through that for probably the third time in this thread, and I've explained a few posts ago that I'm not going to be held accountable for other people's beliefs, no matter how much you try and force me to

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Originally Posted by jebus

Oh pull your head out of your ass would you, I've never once heard a priest or a nun call people with any faith nonsense, so don't go throwing your insults at those people and then pretend that thats religious peoples viewpoint.

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I didn't once say priests or nuns. I said Catholics in general. You or whoever else is Catholic. Priests and nuns are generally PC but they have to believe that all other faiths are nonsense, the Bible teaches that.

The word abuse has bad connotations when it comes to children but to teach something to a child as the truth without a single shred of evidence is wrong, very wrong.

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Originally Posted by jebus

As for your original point, I'll ask again what that has to do with me contending that Dawkins using the term 'child abuse' in relation to teaching your children your beliefs is very harsh, and could be seen as insulting? Even if you take scary magic as child abuse, what has that got to do with my point about Dawkins use of language? You know, how this round of the discussion came about? The one that you have interjected yourself into and have so far made no attempt to actually participate? The one where you are just trying to turn the whole thing around into something that has been discussed over the last 15 pages?

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its not insulting, its not only his opinion but his "use of language" (god forbid he omit the word psychological and assume people understand he's not calling every catholic parent a pederast) if perfectly valid. i object to your blatant ignorance and hence had the temerity to post a response to something you said, you know, on a forum.

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I've explained my viewpoint on Christianity as a whole in this thread, if you care to look for it, it's close to pantheism in fairness (although it was called a mix of Buddhism and Jedism a few pages ago, which in fairness I liked), but I'm not going to go through that for probably the third time in this thread, and I've explained a few posts ago that I'm not going to be held accountable for other people's beliefs, no matter how much you try and force me to

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and yet you're defending those beliefs :confused: why would you argue something and then when presented with a counter point just say "oh, well, i dont have to explain myself, i dont actually believe it".

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Originally Posted by finlma

The word abuse has bad connotations when it comes to children but to teach something to a child as the truth without a single shred of evidence is wrong, very wrong.

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I'd be more of the view that it is...right. In that religion teaches good lessons, as a part of the repository for parents to delve into. Once the child matures a little you can tell them the truth, a lot like Santa really:)

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Originally Posted by GavinZac

its not insulting, its not only his opinion but his "use of language" (god forbid he omit the word psychological and assume people understand he's not calling every catholic parent a pederast) if perfectly valid. i object to your blatant ignorance and hence had the temerity to post a response to something you said, you know, on a forum.

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Then why go on about magic tricks as child abuse? That has nothing to do with Dawkins use of language, thats just you trying to pretend you're superior to religious people again. Plus the use of the word psychologically (by the way, I'm pretty sure everyone realised that that was what Dawkins meant, no-one thought he was talking about physically molesting a child here) wouldn't take from the harshness of his use of the term 'child abuse'. In any context its a harsh and insulting phrase to use for people who...well aren't child abusers. And blatant ignorance? Ignorance of what here Gavin? That you're still smarting from the pasting you took off 5 of us in the last thread? I'm not ignorant of that at all, and I realise thats why you are trying to twist this discussion to suit your own needs

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Originally Posted by GavinZac

and yet you're defending those beliefs :confused: why would you argue something and then when presented with a counter point just say "oh, well, i dont have to explain myself, i dont actually believe it".

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I'm defending peoples right to have an opinion on this that you don't, I'm defending people not being referred to as idiotic simply because they believe something that you don't. Oh and thats the last of this off topic back and forth between us as far as I'm concerned

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Originally Posted by kingdom hoop

I'd be more of the view that it is...right. In that religion teaches good lessons, as a part of the repository for parents to delve into. Once the child matures a little you can tell them the truth, a lot like Santa really:)

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The problem is, everyone stops believing in santa, and everyone realises eventually that Beauty and the Beast is just a tale of equality. With religion there are still people killing each other over which particular santa they prefer and until recently, people on this island killing each other over the equivalent of what the reindeer's names were.