What good does religion offer the world today?

@maxdancona,

Again, I'm stipulating that the exception to the rule is rare. For the most part, your statement seems accurate to me.

But if someone is not looking for meaning in life and makes no claims about either that or any other metaphysical notion, how can that person be said to have beliefs, religious or otherwise?

Let me cut to the chase, though. This is what I'm currently experimenting with: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/pyrrho/

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@TheCobbler,

There is reason for some to believe that the worlds political elements will tire of a meddling priesthood and move to curtail religion. Good discussion here:
http://able2know.org/topic/50801-1

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@FBM,

Quote:

But if someone is not looking for meaning in life and makes no claims about either that or any other metaphysical notion, how can that person be said to have beliefs, religious or otherwise?

I agree that is true, FBM. I think that most of us would consider this person's lack of "religious" beliefs to be dysfunctional. Every society (including ours) has a set of social beliefs that are deeply ingrained. Our modern Western society puts a very high value on equality and on the sanctity of all human lives (other human societies have thrived without these beliefs). In modern America we consider that people who reject these beliefs to have a disorder... some of them we call psychopaths.

Human beings evolved to be social creatures, and our propensity to have faith in basic principals that define how we relate to the world is ingrained in our genetics. It is part of human nature and it is essential for how most of us interact with each other and with the world at large.

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@maxdancona,

Mmm. Valuing human life is not synomymous with nor exclusive to religious beliefs. Look at how many people have been killed in the name of this or that religious belief. Too many value the belief over the person, actually.

Compassion and even altruism have been shown to be perfectly mundane aspects of natural selection. Religion is a later add-on. To believe that positive human values come only from religion seems to be itself a religious belief.

Incidentally, S. Korea is about 50% atheist. By your estimation, do half of all Koreans have a mental disorder? Perhaps even psychopathic?

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Another answer: those who heal from trauma best almost always heal with a strong spiritual element, and religion supplies this.

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@FBM,

Your South Korea comment misses the point. I am not talking about a belief in God, I am talking about a belief in something that isn't proven. You can be an Atheist and have beliefs in things that aren't proven and must be accepted on faith (as they aren't based on any intrinsic truth).

Most South Koreans hold to the core religious beliefs of their society. They believe the sanctity of human life and freedom and respect for society. It is the very few that reject these beliefs that are considered psychopaths.

There is no reason to believe that human life has any intrinsic value. Therefore, the belief that human life is "sacred" is a religious belief (and one that many atheists hold).

How do you differentiate between "positive" and "negative" human values?

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@maxdancona,

Quote:

How do you differentiate between "positive" and "negative" human values?

Helpful/not helpful...works/does not work

Religion can be very helpful.

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@hawkeye10,

hawkeye10 wrote:

Another answer: those who heal from trauma best almost always heal with a strong spiritual element, and religion supplies this.

Where do you come up with this stuff?

Cite your sources for that.

If that were the case, countries that are largely atheist, people would not heal well from trauma. Tell that to Switzerland, Denmark, Belgium etc.

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@maxdancona,

Quote:

I think that most of us would consider this person's lack of "religious" beliefs to be dysfunctional.

I see the scare quotes, but you're equivocating when you later substitute 'social' beliefs and treat them as if they were identical. I can't see any justification for that. Social beliefs do not require supernatural explanations; religious beliefs do. That's why they're described as faith-based. Social beliefs are functional as heuristics to navigate through life. Necessary or not, it helps to behave as though you believed they were true, regardless of whether or not you actually share that belief.

Quote:

How do you differentiate between "positive" and "negative" human values?

I tentatively accept the standard differentiation found in the society I grew up in. I do not declare that they are intrinsic or even necessarily true. On pragmatic terms, I treat positive values as those that are beneficial to self and/or others, negative values as those that are destructive towards self and/or others. I treat them as such in order to navigate successfully in society. I have no beliefs about them nor make any other metaphysical claims regarding values.

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@FBM,

They are not scare quotes. They are my acknowledgement that I am defining the word "religious" as a set of beliefs that are accepted by faith and can not be proven. The quotes simply indicate that my definition of religious may differ from other people's definition (although I will argue that other definitions may be referring to the same phenomenon).

Quote:

Social beliefs do not require supernatural explanations

Let's explore this. Modern Western societies talk about "human rights". We have the idea that human beings have intrinsic rights.

Explain to me where "human rights" come from? How is the belief in human rights (which is fundamental to modern society) different than any other supernatural belief?

Human rights are not based on any scientific principle or natural phenomenon. They are, by definition, supernatural.

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@chai2,

Quote:

Where do you come up with this stuff?

Cite your sources for that.

Personal experience of living with traumatized people, working with traumatized people, and conversing with others who help traumatized people.

However, I have no need or desire to convince you.

Quote:

If that were the case, countries that are largely atheist, people would not heal well from trauma. Tell that to Switzerland, Denmark, Belgium etc.

No, because the spiritual life does not need to be supplied by religion, though it can be, which is thus a benefit of religion as the question was originally posed. People can heal from trauma through a spiritual life gained by gardening for instance, which I have witnessed, My wife has healed though BDSM (deviant sex)...just to name two non religious sources for a spiritual inner life.

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@maxdancona,

What is supernatural about the existence of human rights? "We hold these truths to be self-evident..." is not the same statement that "These truths are eternal and intrinsic." The former is a position statement that can be verified. The latter is a metaphysical statement that probably can't. The concept of human rights is based on the human values we discussed previously, for which there is a mundane, scientific explanation.

I'm afraid I can't accept your definition of religious beliefs, then, and I doubt many others do, either. Religions are based on supernatural claims. Beliefs that have nothing to do with supernatural claims are significantly distinct.

Quote:

Religious belief is the belief in the reality of the mythological, supernatural, or spiritual aspects of a religion. Religious belief is distinct from religious practice or religious behaviours with some believers not practicing religion and some practitioners not believing religion.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religious_belief

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@FBM,

Quote:

What is supernatural about the existence of human rights?

There is no scientific explanation for why humans have intrinsic rights. This is the definition of "supernatural".

You believe that humans have intrinsic rights, yet you can't explain to me in any scientific way why humans have rights or where these rights come from. There is no reason that a creature that evolved from primates (after a relatively short few billion years of evolution from the first protein strands in primordial muck) would have any intrinsic rights. The entire human race could be snuffed out at any time in an instant.. there is no reason to believe that this would be of any consequence to anyone in the Universe. How can we have any rights?

Believing in human rights is a supernatural claim.

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@hawkeye10,

hawkeye10 wrote:

Personal experience of living with traumatized people, working with traumatized people, and conversing with others who help traumatized people.

Oh, so your limited personal experience, as above, enables you to determine that the entire world heals from trauma better when involved in religion.

I see.

I can see where you say you have no need to convince me, because as usual, you're talking out your ass.

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@maxdancona,

maxdancona wrote:

Quote:
What is supernatural about the existence of human rights?

There is no scientific explanation for why humans have intrinsic rights. This is the definition of "supernatural".

There is a scientific explanation for why humans believe that humans have intrinsic rights. What those rights are, and the fact that they're considered to be inviolable (which they obviously aren't) is a question of ethics, cultural identity, cultural history, etc, not supernaturalism. People of the full range of religions and superstitions may believe in human rights, despite disagreeing fervently, even violently on the supernatural.

Quote:

You believe that humans have intrinsic rights...

I do? That's news to me. Where did I say that?

Quote:

Believing in human rights is a supernatural claim.

It's a metaphysical position statement on preferred values, viz, that these rights should never be infringed. Not the same as a supernatural claim.

Metaphysics is neither religion nor supernatural: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metaphysics

Quote:

Metaphysics is a traditional branch of philosophy concerned with explaining the fundamental nature of being and the world that encompasses it,[1] although the term is not easily defined.[2] Traditionally, metaphysics attempts to answer two basic questions in the broadest possible terms:[3]
What is ultimately there?
What is it like?
A person who studies metaphysics is called a metaphysicist[4] or a metaphysician.[5] The metaphysician attempts to clarify the fundamental notions by which people understand the world, e.g., existence, objects and their properties, space and time, cause and effect, and possibility. A central branch of metaphysics is ontology, the investigation into the basic categories of being and how they relate to each other. Another central branch of metaphysics is cosmology, the study of the origin, fundamental structure, nature, and dynamics of the universe. Some include Epistemology as another central focus of metaphysics, but this can be questioned.

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@chai2,

Plus, you said directly in your post that "religion supplies this".

Then you start your crawfishing.

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FBM, we make a pretty good tag team, don't you think?

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@chai2,

I think so. Very Happy

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@chai2,

Quote:

Oh, so your limited personal experience, as above, enables you to determine that the entire world heals from trauma better when involved in religion.

Right, 30 years of personal involvement in this subject have left me very sure about some things. I dont fully understand this, but I know a lot more than almost everyone else.

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@argome321,

Quote:

I'm a non-believer and I don't need religion to be a good person.

Or be so humble.

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What good does religion offer the world today?

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