A lot of people point at the good things people do and call that God's work and point at the bad things and call those the things committed by people only. I submit that it is the people who are capable of both good and bad. Any good that people do through religion, what little there is in my opinion, is work of the goodness in people themselves. They're not giving themselves enough credit.
It's true that people almost invariably come up with some sort of higher power to explain the unexplained, but that's exactly why they invent it. That's just one of the coping mechanisms humans have for dealing with things they don't understand. That and it's often a method of control for those in power. So I would say it is a "common fault", but it's hardly necessary. One needs to only look at the stars on a clear night sky to know there are things bigger and more amazing than us.
For the record, I may be an atheist but I'm not tryng to say "absolutely no God at all for sure," but I'm a skeptic and I don't believe in things unless I see evidence. To me the concept of God and the concept of the Flying Spaghetti Monster are synonymous. The lack of ability to blatantly disprove something that's already vaguely defined isn't proof of existance in my book.
Avoir réponse à toutwahcrysobMarch 3 2007, 21:59:37 UTC
You seem to be defending a person's right to believe in science and God. Personally, I feel that the right to believe in God and science is what needs to be defended. Seems to me that scientists are never going around telling people that God and science aren't compatible, but religious people seem to be telling me that they aren't all the time.
God and science are perfectly compatible. Science doesn't really care about God, because you can't disprove God, so why worry about it? The day that hard evidence surfaces that can be used to prove or disprove the existence of a higher power, is the day that scientists will actually come out and say God doesn't exist.
People seem to misread science disproving aspects of the Bible as science trying to disprove God. The Bible was written by men, who are fallible, and frankly, religion used to change with the times, there's no reason it can't still do that.
Take intelligent design for example. It's a perfectly acceptable theological idea that meshes belief in a higher power with the theory of evolution (deists have been doing it for a long time now). That's great, it's a much more enlightened belief than straight creationism and I think it's wonderful. I don't believe it for a second, because I'm a secular atheist, but if I were still religious, I would be down with it. But it's a perfect example of how one can adapt one's religion to keep up with science.
As far as I know, people always come up with some sort of higher power to help them define the world around them. The universe is big, confusing and far more complex than most humans can comprehend, and since the dawn of time mankind has tried to make sense of it.
There's a basic evolution to belief systems, it goes animism, polytheism, monotheism and then, arguably, atheism, but that's a long way off. Animism provides that pretty much everything has some form of spirit self and that by communicating with and, more importantly, placating those spirits, you can influence the world. Placate the elk spirits and there will be elk around to hunt. Fail to do so, and the herds will vanish. It gives humanity the ability to control what it doesn't understand which is worth a lot.
Polytheism removes spirit selves from most things and instead attaches various aspects of the universe (fertility, weather, war) to different spiritual figures, call them deities, saints, Loa, whatever you want. These figures are placated in order to keep things going well, you pray and sacrifice to the mother goddess for bountiful harvests. Fail to, and the fields lay barren.
This is where myths come into play, stories concerning the spirit figures which act as a sort of primitive science in order to explain the workings of the universe. Etiological myths in particular, which explain how something came to be, are used to define the world. They explain why spiders spin webs, or why that rock jutting out of the bay looks so much like a ship.
Monotheism comes next and refines the system even more, attributing more or less everything to a single spirit figure (calling Christianity, especially Catholicism, a monotheistic religion is, in my opinion, really stretching the definition). The essential gist of a monotheistic faith is that the god created the universe and set things in motion, then stepped back and let humans do their own thing. This involvement varies depending on which faith you're talking about, but in general humans are left to do things on their own volition (unless you go with predestination, which means a whole different argument that makes me froth at the mouth), making us, essential, responsible for our own lives and salvation.
Monotheistic faiths have less etiological myths and more social and ritual myths, stories used to explain not why something exists, but why something is done. They are used to explain why one should trust in God and do as he commands, or why one takes Communion. Monotheistic religions tend to put less emphasis on understanding the world around humanity, and more on simply existing within that world.
It's true that people almost invariably come up with some sort of higher power to explain the unexplained, but that's exactly why they invent it. That's just one of the coping mechanisms humans have for dealing with things they don't understand. That and it's often a method of control for those in power. So I would say it is a "common fault", but it's hardly necessary. One needs to only look at the stars on a clear night sky to know there are things bigger and more amazing than us.
For the record, I may be an atheist but I'm not tryng to say "absolutely no God at all for sure," but I'm a skeptic and I don't believe in things unless I see evidence. To me the concept of God and the concept of the Flying Spaghetti Monster are synonymous. The lack of ability to blatantly disprove something that's already vaguely defined isn't proof of existance in my book.
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God and science are perfectly compatible. Science doesn't really care about God, because you can't disprove God, so why worry about it? The day that hard evidence surfaces that can be used to prove or disprove the existence of a higher power, is the day that scientists will actually come out and say God doesn't exist.
People seem to misread science disproving aspects of the Bible as science trying to disprove God. The Bible was written by men, who are fallible, and frankly, religion used to change with the times, there's no reason it can't still do that.
Take intelligent design for example. It's a perfectly acceptable theological idea that meshes belief in a higher power with the theory of evolution (deists have been doing it for a long time now). That's great, it's a much more enlightened belief than straight creationism and I think it's wonderful. I don't believe it for a second, because I'm a secular atheist, but if I were still religious, I would be down with it. But it's a perfect example of how one can adapt one's religion to keep up with science.
As far as I know, people always come up with some sort of higher power to help them define the world around them. The universe is big, confusing and far more complex than most humans can comprehend, and since the dawn of time mankind has tried to make sense of it.
There's a basic evolution to belief systems, it goes animism, polytheism, monotheism and then, arguably, atheism, but that's a long way off. Animism provides that pretty much everything has some form of spirit self and that by communicating with and, more importantly, placating those spirits, you can influence the world. Placate the elk spirits and there will be elk around to hunt. Fail to do so, and the herds will vanish. It gives humanity the ability to control what it doesn't understand which is worth a lot.
Polytheism removes spirit selves from most things and instead attaches various aspects of the universe (fertility, weather, war) to different spiritual figures, call them deities, saints, Loa, whatever you want. These figures are placated in order to keep things going well, you pray and sacrifice to the mother goddess for bountiful harvests. Fail to, and the fields lay barren.
This is where myths come into play, stories concerning the spirit figures which act as a sort of primitive science in order to explain the workings of the universe. Etiological myths in particular, which explain how something came to be, are used to define the world. They explain why spiders spin webs, or why that rock jutting out of the bay looks so much like a ship.
Monotheism comes next and refines the system even more, attributing more or less everything to a single spirit figure (calling Christianity, especially Catholicism, a monotheistic religion is, in my opinion, really stretching the definition). The essential gist of a monotheistic faith is that the god created the universe and set things in motion, then stepped back and let humans do their own thing. This involvement varies depending on which faith you're talking about, but in general humans are left to do things on their own volition (unless you go with predestination, which means a whole different argument that makes me froth at the mouth), making us, essential, responsible for our own lives and salvation.
Monotheistic faiths have less etiological myths and more social and ritual myths, stories used to explain not why something exists, but why something is done. They are used to explain why one should trust in God and do as he commands, or why one takes Communion. Monotheistic religions tend to put less emphasis on understanding the world around humanity, and more on simply existing within that world.
Continued below.
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