Humanists of the world gather up!

It seems that Immanuel Kant is one of the authors...

I think that really, the 10 commandments are the part of the Western culture in their form now, because of the importance of Bible as a culture text.

Everything was added upon that, it seems. We really derive from three basic value systems - the Old Testament (Ten Commandments as the principle, the rest of the laws of Torah don't apply to Christians it seems), the Seven Blessings and Commandments of Love (love God above all and the man next to you the same as you love yourself), add to it the whole Greek-Roman principle system, with the illegality of suicide (Judaeic-Catholic value system rejected suicide as a defiance of God - rejecting His gift, which was life) and homosexuality (something religious systems tend not to cope well with, quite not in tune with the second commandment, if you ask me).

What we live in today is a mix between Christianity, Hellenistic philosophy and French Revolution with Romantic additions. And post-war crisis.

I'm sure it was me who said that, not PawelStroinski!

Yes. We are egotistical, but the belief in the after life is a vain and presumptuous one. Enjoy life as it is I say, enjoy it as much as possible (staying within those moral guidelines so eloquently expressed above).



'It must be hell not being allowed to cheat on your wife, murder your peers or envy your friends'? So you're saying that religion is the only thing that can teach us that adultery and murder is wrong? That without religion, we would run around as homicidal maniacs who would cheat on their wives at any chance? A little faithless of human decency I'd say. And even if you're saying that religion isn't the only way of teaching this, are you also saying that without it it is more likely? Are you saying atheism grants the atheist the right to do such things? I can't say I'm entirely sure what you're insinuating here...

(Yet again, this is a defense of religion as a moral value system, not of any truths about the cosmos it can teach, which it so clearly professes to do.)

Added to note:

Pawel's biggest turn-on subjects:

1) Brian Tyler
2) Religion

Looking forward to the rest

Pawel gets turned on by Brian Tyler? Sure, I knew Brian was considered hot...

I'm still not sure what you were insinuating? But in response to this statement, it still seems a little vague for me. In what way and how does it make my previous statement obsolete? Which statement does it make obsolete?

I still stand by my quotation from Hitchen's book. It perfectly sums up what I'm trying to get at. Read it again if it helps you to understand where I'm coming from. I also still stand by what I think about belief in an afterlife, at least one that desensitizes and confuses our sense of morals in this life.



Exactly! Because 2000 years ago we knew almost diddley squat about the true nature of the universe. So how can you trust anything the bible has to say on matters of such profoundity? If this was the case, surely its sense of morality is too outdated?

And how were they based on the bible? (Non-rhetorical question.) Why would the fact that laws based around (apparently not directly taken) the bible make it any more true? (I know this isn't what you were getting at, but it's a point worth mentioning.)

I've yet to see any argument from a theist that gives me any good reason to adhere to their belief system. I return to my original point, that being the problem I have with faith itself - it professes to know what it simply cannot. The nature of a belief system (what a religion has to have for it to be a religion) proposes that every one else is wrong but those that agree to it. (Tell me I'm wrong? Please, I actually want to be wrong on this one!) Atheism does not in anyway assume that every one is wrong but them. But the believer, the faithful, then argues that their religion serves a greater purpose rather than simply teaching truths of the world. Fine. But THIS is what I find highly self-defeatist to the very nature of religiosity itself, and I am constantly in awe and bewilderment that this is the continuing argument they put forward to the non-believer.

On a more personal note, if I were to believe what the bible tells me, I'd find less beauty in the world than I do now (which is a lot by the way). Perhaps in that sense I am a pantheist, much like Einstein. (Note I am NOT relying on his reputation as a genius to in anyway justify my own points.)

I must digress, I'm off to get wasted!

I'm not entirely sure what we're discussing here.
Is it moral values and their prevalence throughout history and cultures?
Belief systems that oppressively dictate human action without the option of criticism or adaptation?
The existence of God?

While obviously these issues are (hopelessly) intertwined, it's not quite clear what the focus of the debate is, which makes for difficult participation.

I wanted to make it about oppressive (or not) belief systems (or rather are the systems oppressive in and of themselves or rather some people are), but it went all over the way as Bob said.

The problem is that we try to discuss something impossible to discuss too - the existence of God Himself. No matter what we state here we either believe in His existence or not. Medieval philosophy tried to solve the problem in a "scientific way" (the same scientific way made us live in the year 2008 rather than 2014/2015), but I wouldn't discuss existence of God, for the sake of being unable to prove anything.

Hitchens is right about the assertion/dismission. It's your free choice what you choose.

I think the existence of God is an impossible discussion, since ultimately, there is no real proof indeed, and it comes down to 'faith'. There's no beginning to that, and I don't think that's what we're talking about either. What's more on discussion is the way people react to religion and how they use it, as opposed to coming at it from a divine point of view or the religion in itself.



Which I defended by saying it's the chore of religion that delivers the good, and it's the way people misuse religion that causes the bad. In a nutshell.

What do you mean by misuse? Do you deny that the Bible has some verses that has caused alot of suffering throughout history (i.e. "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live")? Why is the responsibility always put solely on men, instead of the religion, when the fundament itself has so obviously harmful verses? If a religion has harmful elements isn't it important to recognize them, instead of keep making excuses?

Peter

We have an agreement!

That is a healthy approach that I can only support.

Peter

Blasphemer!!!!! Goldsmith is the path to Hell fire!

Play "Once upon a time in the west" 3 times daily and whistle the tune to "The good, the bad and the ugly" before you go to bed, and you might be granted access to the great Morricone collection in the sky.

Peter

Again, agreed. And also with something that I think Bob said earlier. Bible was written in a specific cultural and historical context. Many of the most controversial and most misinterpreted fragments (that's a theory of mine though) might have been written just to make the people feel better - please remember a big chunk of the Bible was written when Israel was enslaved by the Babilonians, so they tried to do everything to maintain the culture. The whole anthropological concept of The Other may be of use here, but I'm not so good in it, to use it in a very conscious way.

We tend to see medieval people generally as stupid idiots, which is a large simplification. Maybe all the Biblical misinterpretations were to ground the cultural basis, for lack of better word. Christianity was the foundation and with Latin built universality of the Medieval world. It has been naive, but please remember than one of the biggest Enlightement rationalists - Francoise Maria Arouet aka Voltaire - was really strongly believing in the existence of witches.

I also recommend you all reading Praise of a Folly by Erasmus of Rotterdam. He shows that many of the stupid misinterpretations was about scholastics - the philosophical method - going seriously awry. Amazing work in itself, BTW.

You misunderstand, dear boy.
I meant that these three issues (Moral values and their prevalence throughout history and cultures,
belief systems that oppressively dictate human action without the option of criticism or adaptation and the existence of God) are almost impossible to discuss separately and apart from each other. Hence them being hopelessly intertwined.