Religion = insanity?

@Didymos Thomas,

Doobah47, you say that the idea of truth is a delusion of grandeur. Then just what exactly are you defending here? You seem to be (passionately?) convinced that your worldview is right and that all "religious" people are wrong. Think about it.

I understand that this conversation seems to have gone off course, but I think it was doomed to that because of the way you started out. Maybe a better way to say what you want would be to say "passion = insanity"? That's not to say that I'd agree with that 100%, but at least it would be a reasonable discussion, and I'd be willing to discuss my opinions about it a bit if you'd like.

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@NeitherExtreme,

Quote:

Nope, only me trying to make conversation about your claims, give my thoughts, and you trying your best to completely ignore them. You've done a wonderful job ignoring them, by the way. In the meantime, your comments have turned from extreme, to silly. Have fun playing with yourself. I think that sort of activity is defined as masturbation.

You seem to have a problem with me...

For God's sake I am actually a religious person, I believe in religion.

Not once did I say anything about being right, and it was nameless who said 'insanity' was a legal term; so in fact it looks like didymos who hasn't been reading the thread.

**** this for a kettle of fish, you can be an ignoramus if you want.

And for the record I see no one trying to refute or even converse with the topic of this thread; didymos and nameless have simply hijacked it and started talking about the overworked topic of convictions of belief.

I'm sure that nameless is convinced his name is nameless, that's a belief so what's the point in arguing over pithy little things like "is it faith or institution that is illogical", why not argue with my line: "it is the institution that is illogical"? Seems like you can't comprehend what I'm saying / read between the lines / talk about anything objective without it being spelled out in a 'philosophical' lexus with quotes to assure you that you know what I'm talking about.

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@Doobah47,

Doobah47 wrote:

I'm sure that nameless is convinced his name is nameless, that's a belief ...

Hey, if you got a problem with me, stand up like a man and give it your best shot rather than sitting in a safe shaddow casting mumbly aspersions.
I'm not 'convinced' of anything, ever, and I have no beliefs.
There you go, real clear, real simple, for those who are a bit 'slow' and/or give a sh!t.

Now, off with you.

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@boagie,

People who follow the religious stringent guidelines for living a productive fruitful life usually end up stuggling with a myriad of emotional and mental conflictions, which can lead to a parlous imbalance in their inward and external veiw of the world. They sedulously endeavour to accomplish perfection, and so therfore, impose unnatural laws upon their assumed sinful nature, in an attempt to cleanse all that which they have been led to believe - as being bad and un-holy. In addition, they suppress inextricable qualities those of which they concider to be the dark influence of a satanic force, decieving themselves into believing that they have been healed by the grace of God. It is this pretence that they hide in, which promotes an emotional and mental imbalance, where they then begin to judge and condemn themselves and the world around them, which eventually leads to bordrline insanity and sadly some fall right off the edge like lemmings.

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@soullight,

Quote:

You seem to have a problem with me...

For God's sake I am actually a religious person, I believe in religion.

Not once did I say anything about being right, and it was nameless who said 'insanity' was a legal term; so in fact it looks like didymos who hasn't been reading the thread.

You can be religious and be mistaken. I have no problem with you only with some of your claims.

Further, nothing I have said has anything to do with insanity as a legal term. Anything at all.

My points have been simple, brother. You made this claim:

Quote:

That is why one cannot have a 'rational'/'logical' discussion with a 'believer' on the subject of his 'beliefs'.

And my response was this:

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If belief is necessarily non-rational/non-logical. I agree that there are many cases of belief being as you say, even cases of serious thinkers claiming this sort of belief is proper.

But I do not think you can show that all belief is necessarily non-rational/non-logical. No matter how many examples you give to show non-rational/non-logical belief, none of them will give any support to your claim.

The problem is that you have not shown that belief is necessarily non-logical/non-rational. * You have presented arguments, and I think I have addressed those arguments. If there is something I missed, point it out - I will be far from offended.

Quote:

And for the record I see no one trying to refute or even converse with the topic of this thread; didymos and nameless have simply hijacked it and started talking about the overworked topic of convictions of belief.

I'm sorry you think so, but I would recommend rereading my claims if you think I've hijacked the thread. I did not begin by posting some ramblings unrelated to the topic - my contributions have been direct responses to claims already posted in the thread. If responding directly to the claims of the thread starter is thread hijacking, I'm a moose.

Quote:

that's a belief so what's the point in arguing over pithy little things like "is it faith or institution that is illogical", why not argue with my line: "it is the institution that is illogical"? Seems like you can't comprehend what I'm saying / read between the lines / talk about anything objective without it being spelled out in a 'philosophical' lexus with quotes to assure you that you know what I'm talking about.

I'm sorry if clarity is too much to ask. This is a philosophy forum, after all. Discussion is severely crippled when people do not make themselves clear - and especially crippled if people are ambiguous and then expect others to read their minds.

Yep, I quote you and respond directly to those claims I quote. You do not have to follow my style, you do not have to use any sort of jargon (I use almost no philosophical jargon). What would be nice is if you tried to be clear in what you say, instead of being purposively unclear. The prime example is the initial claim "Religion=insanity" which you had to clarify to "'Belief' = non-rational/non-logical".

In the meantime, I've directly addressed your claim (even the revised claim). I would love responses to my concerns, but it's whatever. If you prefer to call be an ignoramus that's your business.

soullight - While you may aptly describe a portion, maybe a large portion, maybe even a majority, of the religious population with your words, I do not see your point. At best you have shown that religion can be abused, just like any other human relationship. What you have not shown is that religion necessarily leads to the sort of life you describe.

Thoreau was no lemming. So that's at least one counter-example.

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@Didymos Thomas,

A large majority of adherents of religion are conditioned to follow a particular pattern of living in order to live in Gods Grace. When these individuals struggle to subdue the nature of sin within themselves, they often feel an abject detachment from God, and sometimes enter into an emotional apocolypse where all what they see is only a dark gloom. They become restless, irritable, and carry an inordinate consternation, concerning their loss of Gods closeness. The mask of peace and serenity is ripped away, and then they are left to face their broken limping soul.

When one weaves him or herself to be super righteous or super spiritual, castigating against the lifestyles of non - believers and also working to reduce the significants of belief systems, belonging to other religious movements or people with no faith, is a sure sign that something is inherently wrong. These pilgrims of the living word proclaim to be living in the truth, yet their lives fail to reflect that beauty and so consequently end up becoming religious fruit nuts to hide their self made lie.

I know that their are many monks who have retreated from the mainstream form of religion to dedicate their lives to the mystical methods of meditative contemplation, this is a different branch all together in my opinion that is in stark contrast to the average Joe blogs who attends a mass every sunday. And I would most certainly agree with you that those guys were definatly not lemmings.

1 Reply

@soullight,

Soullight - I think, once again, you have aptly described a portion of the religious population. The problem is that this description is a generalization and does not seem to be representative of the whole. So, you are right to warn of the dangers of misguided religion and the misguided spiritual life. The average Joe may be more susceptible to being spiritually mislead in the ways you describe, but even among average Joes the generalization does not seem to hold. I think it is much more common for the average Joe to attend mass on Sunday and not take any of it very seriously in the first place.

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@Didymos Thomas,

Their are very few people within the secular religious sunday communions who posses any real depth or understanding in relation to human nature. They are taught to surrender themselves to the word of God and impose their beliefs on the lives of others. When you present questions that undermine what they believe they grow very defensive and even hostile in some cases. Their great if only want to talk about God and their particular flavour of church, but I find that they are very limited in their perspective of the world.

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@soullight,

Quote:

Their are very few people within the secular religious sunday communions who posses any real depth or understanding in relation to human nature. They are taught to surrender themselves to the word of God and impose their beliefs on the lives of others.

I'm guessing secular was not quite the word you were looking for?

Quote:

When you present questions that undermine what they believe they grow very defensive and even hostile in some cases. Their great if only want to talk about God and their particular flavour of church, but I find that they are very limited in their perspective of the world.

A terrible shame, but once again I have to wonder if these words are representative of the whole religious community, or representative of some within that community.

I could go on for days about the horrors of government, but I would not go so far as to suggest we eliminate government. For all the negatives we can consider, there are positive aspects of government that make government a worthwhile endeavor. For all the negatives of religion, there also seems to be enough positive aspects to make religion worthwhile, at least for some of us.

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@Doobah47,

Doobah47 do you beleive in existence of God ?
if you do and dont beleive in religion what makes you think that God create human and left alone
if no you dont beleive in existence of God and you are the one of the people who beleive in science you should know that science is buit in belief of ordierliness

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@cloverleaf,

Cool your jets, folks. Get back on topic and stop the trolling/flaming remarks now.
No more talk of verbal masturbation or other such nonsense, and keep it philosophical or the thread dies.
Debate in the spirit of the text, not the semantics. Nitpick at your own risk, I'm not pleased with the way this thread is going.
That is all.

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@Aristoddler,

Paganism is obviously very illogical. Why believe in many gods when 1 will suffice, perhaps too much for some people.
Christianity uses the cross as its symbol. I've been told by many that it was derived from the Ankh symbol, which is rather heathen in my opinion. Are the symbols for judaism and islam also heathen?
If so then why would they denounce paganism through jihads and religious oppression, seems hypocritical to me, just goes to show you how immoral religions tends to be. Sad

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@Doobah47,

Obviously!
Just as belief is a form of lunacy.
Look at the butchery going on in 'his name'!
Humans are defect creatures, in the image of a 'god', also defect.

One of the sober inquirers in this matter of 'religion' and its destructiveness, has been philosopher J. Krishnamurti.
For 70 years he has pointed it out to the listenerss around the world, but apparently, most prefer to -not- hear.

Regards,
jbji
Info:
www.kfa.org

New website on J. Krishnamurti's teaching:
http://www.beyondthemind.net/krishnamurti-index.html

Discussion:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/J-Krishnamurti_andLife/

1 Reply

@jbji,

A couple things, first(and this has nothing to do with the thread as far as I can tell), it kinda bugged me but if you plug in 2z=x and w=1 that equation works out fine. Wink

Now, since we have thus far failed to define what is meant by god, it cannot be determined whether god is a delusion or not. I can certainly come up with a god, say the god of gaps for instance, whom does not contradict anything whatsoever. Thus this god is not within the domain of influence of the property of delusion by definition. Which god, then, are we talking about. By the content of the thread, we seem to be speaking of a normative version of the fundamentalist christian diety, a creator who made the earth 6,000 years ago and dropped water upon us from a canopy to flood the earth. A god who talks to people and smites, but later changes his(this god is typically personified) mind and preaches love as a man who is but isn't god and the holy spirit.

If one takes a fundamentalist, we often do find delusion. That facts contradict falsity and falsity contradicts itself in these people is proven on a case by case basis. For instance, Bertrand Russell cites the example of a nun who puts a sheet over her bath to avoid exposing herself to god, forgetting that this god is supposed to be seeing through the walls/cieling and yet somehow the thin piece of cloth would suffice to elude from his gaze the nun's nude form. The examples are abundant and do indeed count for a percentage of the religious. It is conversly true that there is a good portion of the non-relgious population who are simply too dim witted to see where their contradictions lie and live unwittingly in muddled confusion. I think religion does not help these people and indeed it might even be fair to suggest that it exacerbates the situation. It might even be the case that otherwise reasonable peopel are made unreasonable by religion in the same sense they are made unreasonable by appeal to emotion. There are simply a good number of people who are dunces, and a good many more who are saps. That sitll does not address those who are neither yet still find value in religion, but as we have admitted, these people are not the problem.

Is it not reasonable, then, that we explore what makes many people so succeptible to self contradiction? Why is it that so many people hold so strongly to their dogmas in the face of glareing contradiction? I would conjuecture that they have no other means of copeing than by adopting the set of dogmas presented to them, and it is quite an undertaking to re-evaluate your stance when you have such a vested interest in staying the same.

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@Zetetic11235,

The Didymos defense - otherwise known as the problem of induction, followed by a speculative separation of 'good' religion from 'bad' religion. Addressed by Boagie in post #13:

Quote:

It would seem you wish to consider yourself non-inclusive in the term and/or institution of Christianity. That would be nice work if you can get it. People are not to generalize about the generalization of which Christianity is, so what are we then to do with ourselves, to speak of Christianities abuse of power and is intended abuse is to be considered taboo? No either you are or you are not, if you are, speakout against that is done in the name of Christianity.

But used again by Didymous in post #17:

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However, if I am right then belief does not necessarily make someone opposed to information in conflict with already established beliefs.

and again in post #20:

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You are making a huge generalization that you cannot possibly prove.

and again in post #25:

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The problem is that you have not shown that belief is necessarily non-logical/non-rational.

twice:

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What you have not shown is that religion necessarily leads to the sort of life you describe.

and then in post #27:

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soullight - I think, once again, you have aptly described a portion of the religious population. The problem is that this description is a generalization and does not seem to be representative of the whole.

and in post #29:

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but once again I have to wonder if these words are representative of the whole religious community, or representative of some within that community.

Indeed, in almost every post by the author.

Quote:

I'm sorry if clarity is too much to ask. This is a philosophy forum, after all. Discussion is severely crippled when people do not make themselves clear...

And it's not just this thread - but any thread (not every thread) Didymos takes a dislike to, which is to say any thread (not every thread) critical of religion. (not all religion!)

This to me is indicative of the intellectual dishonesty of the religious - (not all the religious!) this unreasonable demand for clarity - an ostensibly good thing used ruinously and abusively to defeat reason. And I think it fits very well any reasonable defintion of insanity.

Another thread ruined by Didymos - in the name of Bod the Creator!
All hail Bod! All hail Didymos! All hail the problem of induction! Amen.

iconoclast.

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@iconoclast,

Religion is only insanity when it involves blind devotion. Religion is harmless otherwise. It can promote positive thinking and well being, relieve anxiety and dread, and promote self-knowledge. The problem arises when people just go through the rituals without understanding and connecting to the ritual activity. A religious experience should be deeply personal, but by following with blind devotion it becomes very impersonal, and when many people do this, very dangerous.

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@Theaetetus,

:)For those who wish to understand mythology

Welcome to the Joseph Campbell Foundation Website

A ritual is a myth enacted.:detective:

YouTube - Sam Harris: lecture on religious faith - Part 01

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@boagie,

In my honest opinion, it is not the masturbation that is the problem, in fact it is the poo and the urea that do most damage to society.

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@Doobah47,

Would anybody care to engage in the ideas of cult practices (such as free-love/segregation/drugs) with regard to the notion of core religion and their activites?

I'd say that for alot of 'lay' people, the debate exists along the lines of validity, logic and moral neccessity; but in my view beyond these superficial expectations of religion's merit there lies a far deeper issue of human rights and the corruption of democratic and free rights to decide one's own fate or purpose. Many religions are designed to create spiritual/physical locations for the rejection of central trade/industry demands, yet for so many religion actually invokes an entrance to the central demands from a uniform perspective/ability. This invokes slavery, and makes me wonder whether there is abuse and a notion of 'Role-playing-game' at the heart of many religions.

For me life is not a game, but I believe that for many there is a game and it is played in an entirely prejudiced and derogatory fashion - peadophilia, prostitution and plaigarism practiced by an elite who manage to justify abuses and divert activism with mind control techniques, in order to achieve their own aims and pleasures.

Totally unfair, and entirely disgusting.

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@Doobah47,

I disagree with the premise that religion is inherently flawed and/or negative.

Religion, like philosophy, is a institution that exists only in people's mind. All the ritual and such is still just the implementation of an idea.

It is how people apply it that can be problematic, but the same is true for everything.

Take drugs for instance: pot, booze, acid, coke, caffine, etc, are neutral entities. They are not inherently good or evil. They are just things.

Some people can use drugs in moderation and have no problem. Other people cannot and become addicts. So would it be logical to blame the drug for the person's addiction? -- Of course not. Did the alcohol jump into the person's mouth and force them to swallow it? No. Did the cocaine run up the person's neck and dive into their nose against their will? No.

The person who chooses to use a drug is responsible for their own usage. They may become addicted to medicate stress, emotional turmoil, or other problems, but the drug itself is not responsible for how the person uses it. It is not alive; it cannot think or act.

The same is true of religion. Religion is just a thing; a mental construct. It is the people that use it who are responsible for their actions; not the religion itself.

If a mentally-unstable person takes a drug and then freaks out, it's not the drug's fault. If a mentally-unstable person takes a harmful stance based on their interpretation of religion, it is not the religion's fault. -- It's the same thing.

A knife is a tool. In the hands of a stable person it remains a tool. In the hands of a psychotic person, it becomes a weapon. If a psychotic person uses a knife to kill someone, do we blame the knife? Of course not. Therefore it is illogical to blame religion, itself, for the actions of those who harm others using it as a justification.

Finally, there are hundreds of millions of people who follow various religions who are mostly moderates. The media frequently points out the extremists because that's what sells. The vast majority of religious followers in the world are not extremists. In Christianity, for example, fundamentalists only make up about 2% of all Christians in the world. The same is true of Islam.

Making hasty generalizations about religion is neither rational nor logical.

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Religion = insanity?

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