Why aren’t they all just considered ridiculous?

Would it constrain or change your words if you had to look someone in the eyes and say 'your imaginary god/friend is hogwash, just like the tooth fairy and Santa'?

As you can easily guess, I ask because I don't think it would be as easy in person - and I think if that's true, then it begs other questions about what the ridiculing person is doing, and why.

Is your feeling that it's right to ridicule religions at all limited by the setting? I mean to say, I think there are things that are acceptable in a cyber forum that might seem otherwise face-to-face.

Given the near universality of religion in human culture and the remarkable commonality of the moral values articulated by the most prominent religions, noted above, one could make a serious case suggesting that one who summarily rejected the possibility of enduring value in any of them was himself a bit out of tune with the reality of human experience.

This is not to suggest there are no contradictions in these faiths or the absence of worse contradictions in the manner in which those in power have used religion for their own purposes. Instead I am considering the evident human appetite for the spiritual values common to these religions and the likelihood that there may be some transcendent meaning involved.

In real life, no i would not barge into someone's imaginary friend superstition classroom to point out to them that that is what it is. By the same token, if some joker shows up on my doorstep or accosts me in public (and both of those circumstances are sufficiently common that i speak from a long experience), they have created the situation, and needn't whine if they don't like being told that their imaginary friend superstition is a superstition.

In real life, no i would not barge into someone's religion class to point out to them that I believe that I think that their beliefs are superstition. By the same token, if someone shows up on my doorstep or accosts me in public (and both of those circumstances are sufficiently common that i speak from a long experience), they have created the situation, and needn't whine if they don't like being told that their beliefs, IMO, are superstition.

My case is somewhat the inverse of Joe Nation's. I have occasional
conversations about religion with those who do not believe in God but
know that I do. I can't think of any instance when someone directed
animosity or ridicule towards me personally. Of course these are generally
people I know in a wider context and there's a measure of pre-existing
mutual respect.

And, of course, they knew me to be crazy, eccentric, and ridiculous long
before they knew my beliefs.

I don't go looking for fights to pick about religion, but if such are forced on me, i will use every weapon at my disposal, and i will hope to draw blood.

George wrote:

...And, of course, they knew me to be crazy, eccentric, and ridiculous long
before they knew my beliefs.

Or, alternatively, they came to the conclusion that you are crazy, eccentric and ridiculous upon learning your beliefs...

...So . . . tell us George . . . are you an evangelist?

In the first place, one of the aspects of universality in the three Abrahamic religions which is both express in scripture and implicit in their histories is that it is a holy act to slaughter the infidel. . .

Setanta wrote:

In the first place, one of the aspects of universality in the three Abrahamic religions which is both express in scripture and implicit in their histories is that it is a holy act to slaughter the infidel. . .

I can understand why you would believe this, viewing the religions as a more or less distant observer, and particularly because the clergymen of Christendom have earned their bread by perpetrating it.

In reality, the perception is a straw man.

What I am discussing is how phrases are couched on A2K. I think that referring to an "imaginary friend superstition" is belittling to another member, and is not calculated to elicit meaningful debate.[/b]

As soon as you say that referring to someone's imaginary friend superstition as an imaginary friend superstition is belittling, you have placed yourself squarely in the camp of those who perceive any criticism of what they believe as a personal attack. Certainly referring to an imaginary friend superstition as an imaginary friend superstition is not intended to elicit "meaningful debate"--there is no meaningful debate possible in such a circumstance unless one accepts a priori that the imaginary friend in fact does exist, and is therefore not imaginary--in which case there would be no point in debate. Do you think through the implications of what you are writing before you post it?

Anyone whose beliefs cannot stand up to ridicule adheres to beliefs which are not worth holding. If the ridicule does not phase them, then their "faith" at least has the value of unassailable conviction. People who piss and moan about personal attack and claim that criticism of their imaginary friend superstition belittles them cannot have a very well-founded belief, at least if they insist that no one can question it, criticize it or laugh it to scorn.

Quote:

Quote:

I don't go looking for fights to pick about religion, but if such are forced on me, i will use every weapon at my disposal, and i will hope to draw blood.

Why? Who gives a ****? If the person starting the discussion is a robot like believer, having a discussion with him to attempt to change him, IMO, is just a form of mental masturbation. I would not even waste my time with someone like that.

Nor do i--so if they force their horseshit on me, i strike back with sufficient mental force to convince them that it were unwise to continue to attempt to torment me with their delusions. Keep in mind that i refer to a discussion which i neither sought nor intend to suffer.

Quote:

If the person is intelligent and sincere, not antagonizing the person will allow him to absorb more of your thoughts than if he is forced into a defensive mode. The point is, what exactly do you want to get out of the conversation? Conversion? Understanding? Some kind of satisfaction?

You're attempting to twist what i've written. I have carefully pointed out that i don't discuss religion in public, and that if is forced upon me, i consider the gloves to be off. If someone is genuinely intelligent and sincere, and they want to discuss religion with me, i will tell them no, and they will desist. If the persist when i've told them no, then i have no reason to consider the intelligent, and what you might be pleased to call their "sincerity" i would consider the unwavering adherence to their goofy creed to a point at which they cannot accept no for an answer. As i don't intend to have such a conversation in the first place, i don't intend to get anything out of it.

I intend to be left alone.

I have not at any time said anything other than that in real life, i won't discuss religion with people. Keep your high school sneers to yourself.

neologist wrote:

Setanta wrote:

In the first place, one of the aspects of universality in the three Abrahamic religions which is both express in scripture and implicit in their histories is that it is a holy act to slaughter the infidel. . .

I can understand why you would believe this, viewing the religions as a more or less distant observer, and particularly because the clergymen of Christendom have earned their bread by perpetrating it.

In reality, the perception is a straw man.

No, it is not. Both the Jews and the Christians accept the scriptural authority of what is known as the "Old Testament," in which your boy God calls upon his adherents to slaughter men, women and children. Your mental gymnastics to attempt to claim that the text does not mean what it patently says, or that it is now somehow void in those sections the content of which is embarrassing to a religion which now bills itself as loving, are entertaining, but not convincing.

I know of at least one instance in which the Quran, referring to the faithful being attacked by infidels, authorizes the slaughter, with "extreme prejudice," of said putative enemies.

Don't accuse me of erecting a strawman because you have your own favorite interpretations, and choose to acknowledge the force and authority of some passages of scripture, but not others.

I am not parroting anything which the clergy have told me. You don't need a weatherman to tell you which way the wind is blowing. The vicious character of the injunctions of the Old Testament are self-evident, and no dancing on your part will change that fact.

Your claim is based upon your personal exegesis, which is not either contextual nor obvious. Your claim that there is a "reason" to justify that viciousness does not alter the point i was making in responding to George. His was still an argumentum ad populum, and one which, if it were valid, were just as valid in authorizing inhumane enormities.

That there appears to be a human appetite for spiritualism in some form is not evidence that there is some transcendent meaning involved. Tens of millions of people, perhaps hundreds of millions of people, in North America want to believe that there is a high probability that they will win big in any one of the dozens of legal lotteries available to them. That does not alter that the odds against them winning are tens of millions to one--that does not alter that they are foolishly wasting their money if the basis to which one refers is mathematical probability.

You have made no case for any validity for religion, you have simply outlined the case for recognizing that people frequently feel better deluding themselves about their insignificance in the cosmos.