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Demarcation against Religion
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Demarcation against Religion

thewatcher
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Posted 06/30/09 - 02:46 PM:	#21
wuliheron wrote: As you so clearly pointed out, correlation is not causation. Are religions actually helping people overall, or are their charitable works merely bandaids that are applied to serious wounds that religions themselves inflict? For example, many religions today apply political pressure to fight some of the proven practices of family planning clinics such as informing people of the options for abortion, the use of condums, etc. It is therefore quite reasonable to assume that many of the STDs and abused children found amoung religious believers are caused by their religious beliefs. The question then arises as to whether the positive acts of religions outweight their negative ones. Absurd. Opposing certain (morally questionable) solutions to extant problems (and, in fact, working to provide alternative ones) is not the same as causing the problems themselves. wuliheron wrote: You use generalizations to argue against my use of generalizations. Again, go figure. I made my case quite clearly. There is empirical evidence that religion is loosing its influence and followers among the worlds' thriving democracies. Despite their lack of religious dedication these democracies have lower homocide rates, lower abortion rates, lower rates of STDs, and cheaper and more effective healthcare systems than the most religious of the world's successful democracies, the USA. If that is too general for you, please explain how you would like me to be more specific. This gets us right back to correlations and causation. wuliheron wrote: It is not my place to prove the effectiveness of religions, anymore than it is my responsibility to prove that little green men landed in New Mexico in the 1950s. It is up to the religions to do so themselves. What I believe I have established is that despite the timeless efforts of religions to create a better society there is absolutely no evidence that they have managed to do so and quite of bit of evidence that the most successful societies in the world today (as measured by the standards of the religious themselves!) virtually dispense with religion altogether. Of course the impetus is on you to declare that religion has been actively harmful and you have, as of yet, failed to do so. Likewise, the impetus is on you to disprove the value of the institutions I have referred to. What's more, secular science and progressive political movements (both of which are still at work in the countries you mention) are intellectual achievements that are shot through with Christian thought and, in no small part, the product of Christian efforts. Therefore, such successes as you do point to on the secular end of things are still the result of religion. wuliheron wrote: Ok, so now the religious advocate resorts to personal attacks. My eyes have been openned to the healing power of religion and universal love! Spare me the victim routine. I made no attack, merely an observation. Your attacks against religion rely upon only the most bizarre and extreme mishmash of religious positions. You dont attack any particular religion, nor do you bring any substantive criticisms against religion in general. In point of fact, you have brought very little in the way of substantive argument to the table since this debate began. In spite of this, I have persisted in this discussion in the hopes that you would reveal some deeper position beneath all of the fluff. Please tell me I have not been waiting in vain.

wuliheron
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Posted 06/30/09 - 03:09 PM:	#22
thewatcher wrote: Absurd. Opposing certain (morally questionable) solutions to extant problems (and, in fact, working to provide alternative ones) is not the same as causing the problems themselves. Fine, call it "compounding" or "contributing" to social problems if you prefer. At any rate, all I said was that we cannot tell how much religions might contribute to such problems. thewatcher wrote: Of course the impetus is on you to declare that religion has been actively harmful and you have, as of yet, failed to do so. Likewise, the impetus is on you to disprove the value of the institutions I have referred to. What's more, secular science and progressive political movements (both of which are still at work in the countries you mention) are intellectual achievements that are shot through with Christian thought and, in no small part, the product of Christian efforts. Therefore, such successes as you do point to on the secular end of things are still the result of religion. I am not the one claiming I have the solution to all of life's problems. It is the religions making this claim and I say put up or shut up. Prove your worth or go look for another job where you can do some good for society. Your organization may have been useful in the past, but in the modern world you adapt to the rapid changes or go belly up. These less religious societies have proven their adaptation to less organized religion is more flexible and works. The same kind of successful adoption of more flexible organization can be seen in countless institutions throughout the developed world. It might be that in another fify years or whatever it might prove useful to revert to the less flexible organized religions. These kinds of ebs and flows can also be seen in economies and the natural world itself. thewatcher wrote: Spare me the victim routine. I made no attack, merely an observation. Your attacks against religion rely upon only the most bizarre and extreme mishmash of religious positions. You dont attack any particular religion, nor do you bring any substantive criticisms against religion in general. In point of fact, you have brought very little in the way of substantive argument to the table since this debate began. In spite of this, I have persisted in this discussion in the hopes that you would reveal some deeper position beneath all of the fluff. Please tell me I have not been waiting in vain. OK, then what did you mean exactly by calling my views "skewed"? What do you find "insubstantial" about the significantly lower rates of homocide, STDs, and healthcare problems in the more secular world? I cannot tell you whether you have been wasting your time or not. That is something you will have to decide for yourself. Personally, I have no interest in changing anyone else's views in this subject or any other one I post to. What I get from such discussions is, if nothing else, I learn how to sharpen my arguments and discover mistakes in my own thinking. Personal growth is what it is all about for me and if by some chance I manage to help someone else in the process so much the better.

thewatcher
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Posted 06/30/09 - 03:35 PM:	#23
wuliheron wrote: Fine, call it "compounding" or "contributing" to social problems if you prefer. At any rate, all I said was that we cannot tell how much religions might contribute to such problems. Or, indeed, that they contribute at all. Which is, of course, precisely the problem with your reasoning. wuliheron wrote: I am not the one claiming I have the solution to all of life's problems. It is the religions making this claim and I say put up or shut up. Prove your worth or go look for another job where you can do some good for society. Your organization may have been useful in the past, but in the modern world you adapt to the rapid changes or go belly up. These less religious societies have proven their adaptation to less organized religion is more flexible and works. The same kind of successful adoption of more flexible organization can be seen in countless institutions throughout the developed world. It might be that in another fify years or whatever it might prove useful to revert to the less flexible organized religions. These kinds of ebs and flows can also be seen in economies and the natural world itself. On the contrary, you have made positive claims and failed utterly to back them up. Hence our current impasse. You see, your assertion that irreligious (sic) societies are doing better than religious ones is only meaningful if religion in fact causes more problems than it solves. In the absence of the demonstration of such, I can merely counter thusly: If the countries you mention are doing so well WITHOUT religious populations, how much better off would they be doing WITH religious populations! Imagine if the "secular" citizens of, say, France possessed, in addition to their extensive welfare system, the spirit of Christian charity that would motivate them to give more extensively (as extensively as, say, Americans?) to the private charities in their countries? As for your persistent reference to the "solution to all of life's problems" we have not even touched upon the broader impact of religion. It may be that it can solve all of life's problems, but not in the sort of way you are looking for. wuliheron wrote: OK, then what did you mean exactly by calling my views "skewed"? What do you find "insubstantial" about the significantly lower rates of homocide, STDs, and healthcare problems in the more secular world? Your views are "skewed." To be "skewed" is to be askew, that is, to be off-center. You are not looking at some median expression of religiosity as your paradigm, but rather to the fringes of religious expression (eg the dinosaur bones example). And your example is insubstantial in that you have failed to establish a connection between these things (lower homicides, stds and so on) and the religioisity or irreligiosity (sic) of the country in question.

wuliheron
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Posted 06/30/09 - 05:52 PM:	#24
thewatcher wrote: On the contrary, you have made positive claims and failed utterly to back them up. Hence our current impasse. You see, your assertion that irreligious (sic) societies are doing better than religious ones is only meaningful if religion in fact causes more problems than it solves. In the absence of the demonstration of such, I can merely counter thusly: If the countries you mention are doing so well WITHOUT religious populations, how much better off would they be doing WITH religious populations! Imagine if the "secular" citizens of, say, France possessed, in addition to their extensive welfare system, the spirit of Christian charity that would motivate them to give more extensively (as extensively as, say, Americans?) to the private charities in their countries? It does not matter either way. If it is not clear to you whether religion contributes to the problems of societies it is still clear that the less religious societies are doing better than the the more religious ones. Religion has had eons to prove its worth, yet secular societies are a new phenomenon and are currently doing better than their religious cousins. I say again, put up or shut up. I don't want a politician's promises, I want to see results otherwise I will not support religion. If you can prove a particular religion or religions in general can achieve better results than more secular societies I will be happy to jump on the bandwagon. thewatcher wrote: As for your persistent reference to the "solution to all of life's problems" we have not even touched upon the broader impact of religion. It may be that it can solve all of life's problems, but not in the sort of way you are looking for. Your views are "skewed." To be "skewed" is to be askew, that is, to be off-center. You are not looking at some median expression of religiosity as your paradigm, but rather to the fringes of religious expression (eg the dinosaur bones example). And your example is insubstantial in that you have failed to establish a connection between these things (lower homicides, stds and so on) and the religioisity or irreligiosity (sic) of the country in question. To insist that the available evidence must be wrong and speculate about how much better things would be under different circumstances is the very personification of bias. On the other hand, my example of dinosaur bones is anything but biased. The Koran insists it is God's will that we kill anyone that does not follow the Koran, the Bible insists that anyone who is not Christian is undesirable and going to hell, the Catholic Church insists that the Pope is infallable, and the Jews believe they are God's chosen people. The bible says the earth was created in six days, people used to live to be many hundreds of years old, giants inhabited the earth, and all witches should be burned at the stake. In light of such commonplace outrageous claims my post about religious views of dinosaur bones being placed in the earth by the Devil is anything but extreme or out of place. I really do not mean to criticize religion, these are just the facts as I am aware of them and I certainly do not claim infallability like the Pope.

Aetixintro
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Posted 06/30/09 - 09:53 PM:	#25
Are we drifting off from the point here, people? This thread is not about religion as per se. Do you bother to explain yourselves in relation to OP? I like you to relate to posts #1, #3, and #6. No offense!
Efficacy of "for since it is at present manifest to me that even bodies are not properly known by the senses nor by the faculty of imagination, but by the understanding alone" - Descartes, Meditation II I'm always wanting more, Anything I haven't got, Everything, I want it all, I just can't stop - The Cure, Want

wuliheron
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Posted 07/01/09 - 03:35 AM:	#26
Sorry, but you are the one who brought up the topic of religion. What did you expect?

Aetixintro
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Posted 07/01/09 - 04:44 AM:	#27
This is a philosophy forum. Is this the Philosophy of Religion section? When I mention "religion", it's in a context, namely "the demarcation against religion". There is an implicit "from the view of science" in it. I haven't meant to be rude. I just want to keep "philosophy of religion" to the "philosophy of religion" and also, of course, "philosophy of science" to the "philosophy of science". The theme I bring up is very traditional. I've read quite some where the philosophers manage to mention "religion" without going through the whole ordeal of what is essentially "philosophy of religion". I can hardly believe all of what is in this thread goes into philosophy of science. I sense the discussion is veering off its right track and I believe I'm in my right to issue it!
Efficacy of "for since it is at present manifest to me that even bodies are not properly known by the senses nor by the faculty of imagination, but by the understanding alone" - Descartes, Meditation II I'm always wanting more, Anything I haven't got, Everything, I want it all, I just can't stop - The Cure, Want

thewatcher
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Posted 07/01/09 - 10:02 AM:	#28
wuliheron wrote: If it is not clear to you whether religion contributes to the problems of societies it is still clear that the less religious societies are doing better than the the more religious ones. Religion has had eons to prove its worth, yet secular societies are a new phenomenon and are currently doing better than their religious cousins. I say again, put up or shut up. I don't want a politician's promises, I want to see results otherwise I will not support religion. If you can prove a particular religion or religions in general can achieve better results than more secular societies I will be happy to jump on the bandwagon. And I have already demonstrated such. Would you like to live in a world without hospitals, orphanages, universities and countless charities? These institutions are religious in origin. Would you like to live in a world without modern medicine or science? These things are a consequence of intellectual developments that are a direct consequence of religion. In a word, without religion, none of the things you appreciate (even in your so-called secular societies) would exist. Religion has been "putting up" for thousands of years. What exactly do its opponents have to offer? You have failed to demonstrate that any of the problems you point to are worsened by religion, let alone caused by it. You have failed to demonstrate that the success of supposedly non-religious societies (of course, we have already seen that these societies benefit from and are shaped by religious ideas, institutions and figures) relative to religious ones has any connection to religiosity whatsoever. wuliheron wrote: To insist that the available evidence must be wrong and speculate about how much better things would be under different circumstances is the very personification of bias. I am not insisting that the available evidence is wrong. Rather, I am suggesting that the evidence does not suggest the sort of things you are drawing from it. wuliheron wrote: On the other hand, my example of dinosaur bones is anything but biased. The Koran insists it is God's will that we kill anyone that does not follow the Koran, the Bible insists that anyone who is not Christian is undesirable and going to hell, the Catholic Church insists that the Pope is infallable, and the Jews believe they are God's chosen people. The bible says the earth was created in six days, people used to live to be many hundreds of years old, giants inhabited the earth, and all witches should be burned at the stake. In light of such commonplace outrageous claims my post about religious views of dinosaur bones being placed in the earth by the Devil is anything but extreme or out of place. The dinosaur example is a minority position within certain Protestant sects so, even assuming that this is, for some reason a bad position to hold (and, once again, you have never demonstrated this) it is still far from an exemplar of religious behavior or sentiment. The Koran insists no such thing. If you actually read the book in question in something resembling a hermeneutically sensitive way, you will see that the "violent" parts of that work are, in fact, cultural responses to the early persecution of Islam by various non-Muslim groups. In other words, Muslim communities evolved, early on, means of defending themselves by force of arms. This is not, however, license for indiscrimant violence (despite the various misreadings that suggest otherwise). On the contrary, at the first oppurtunity, even during those rare times of conflict, the Muslim is called upon to abandon the lesser Jihad (ie, the defensive war for survival against persection) and take up once again the greater Jihad (the internal spiritual struggle to lead a righteous and virtuous life). Various facets of Christian scripture demand similar hermeneutic sensitivity. Many mainstream Christian demoninations do now regard portions of Scripture as having their origins in the folk/tribal mythologies of ancient Israel (the flood myth is common in the Near East, for instance). This does not, however, take away from the fact that scripture does contain innerrant spiritual and moral truths that can be of great benefit to believers. This is the Catholic position. Likewise, Papal infallibility is commonly misunderstood (as you so excellently demonstrate). It is not Catholic dogma that the Pope is never wrong about anything. Rather, the Pope is infallible with respect to matters of Catholic dogma, when he speaks with the authority of the Church and the Magisterium. Specifically, the Pope is infallible when he makes a statement Ex Cathedra (latin for From the Chair). VERY few such statements have been made in the history of the Church, and ALL of them have been made in the context of clarifying points of Catholic dogma. Surely it is nothing strange for a religious to expound upon and clarify the teachings of his own faith! wuliheron wrote: I really do not mean to criticize religion, these are just the facts as I am aware of them and I certainly do not claim infallability like the Pope. You are ot presenting facts, you are presenting your interpretations of them and, less forgivably, failing utterly to draw convincing connections between the facts (even assuming they are true) and your interpretations.

thewatcher
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Posted 07/01/09 - 10:06 AM:	#29
Aetixintro wrote: This is a philosophy forum. Is this the Philosophy of Religion section? When I mention "religion", it's in a context, namely "the demarcation against religion". There is an implicit "from the view of science" in it. I haven't meant to be rude. I just want to keep "philosophy of religion" to the "philosophy of religion" and also, of course, "philosophy of science" to the "philosophy of science". The theme I bring up is very traditional. I've read quite some where the philosophers manage to mention "religion" without going through the whole ordeal of what is essentially "philosophy of religion". I can hardly believe all of what is in this thread goes into philosophy of science. I sense the discussion is veering off its right track and I believe I'm in my right to issue it! Are we so terribly off track? W and I are merely discussing the bearing of religion upon social problems. If you are inclined to view such problems scientifically, then the explanatory power of religion is very much at issue in that discussion.

wuliheron
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Posted 07/01/09 - 10:06 AM:	#30
I don't believe for a moment that you are even seriously fooling yourself. You didn't just mention the "demarcation against religion" as if asking for a dictionary definition. You proposed that science would eventually usurp religion! Again, what kind of response did you expect? Did you really think those of us who might be attached to religion would stay in their own little corner on the religious message board and you would be showered with praise and aggreement from everyone else? Get real dude.

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