Religion In A Nutshell

Well, now that Trump is President it IS the ASSHOLE nation.

Lurker wrote:

to be fair that's not true....
the US is often referred to as an asshole nation

Now that's funny!

North Korea

64.3% atheist

Nuff said

PMSL

North Korea is proof of nothing but totalitarianism.

smelly-bandit wrote:North Korea

64.3% atheist

Nuff said

meh atheists are often ignorant
look at thorin

Eilzel wrote:PMSL

North Korea is proof of nothing but totalitarianism.

An atheist totalitarianism

veya_victaous wrote:

smelly-bandit wrote:North Korea

64.3% atheist

Nuff said

meh atheists are often ignorant  
look at thorin

Or yourself

smelly-bandit wrote:

Eilzel wrote:PMSL

North Korea is proof of nothing but totalitarianism.

An atheist totalitarianism

You are rather missing the point there. I don't think the vast majority of North Koreans even get a say in who their worship. They'd probably be Buddhist given a chance. And really, worshiping a 'dear leader' is no better than any other religion.

Look at Czech and Scandinavian countries to see how huge atheistic populations affect a country.

Eilzel wrote:

smelly-bandit wrote:

An atheist totalitarianism

You are rather missing the point there. I don't think the vast majority of North Koreans even get a say in who their worship. They'd probably be Buddhist given a chance. And really, worshiping a 'dear leader' is no better than any other religion.

Look at Czech and Scandinavian countries to see how huge atheistic populations affect a country.

Anyone seen the goalposts??

They seem to have moved.

The Scandinavian countries?? You mean like Sweden which is known due to its Muslim immigration rape epidemic??

Very nice atheist country.

But the you would prefer to live in 100% Catholic Vatican city over 64.3 % atheist north Korea

Not goalposting moving, just common sense.

Eilzel wrote:Not goalposting moving, just common sense.

you would still prefer Vatican city over north korea, and you would most certainly prefer life in bible belt of America over the very death you would get in the qur'an killing fields of Saudi Arabia

though you rage against them all given a choice??

you'd choose religion over atheism and Christianity over Islam

I'd choose Czech or a Scandinavian country over them. This is a retarded argument anyway. Carry on without me.

Eilzel wrote:I'd choose Czech or a Scandinavian country over them. This is a retarded argument anyway. Carry on without me.

you annoyed because i just point out that the one country that is overwhelmingly atheist is also north korea??

smelly-bandit wrote:

Eilzel wrote:I'd choose Czech or a Scandinavian country over them. This is a retarded argument anyway. Carry on without me.

you annoyed because i just point out that the one country that is overwhelmingly atheist is also north korea??

What is the state religion of North Korea?

smelly-bandit wrote:

Eilzel wrote:Not goalposting moving, just common sense.

you would still prefer Vatican city over north korea, and you would most certainly prefer life in bible belt of America over the very death you would get in the qur'an killing fields of Saudi Arabia

though you rage against them all given a choice??

you'd choose religion over atheism and Christianity over Islam

Odd, when 53% of people have no religion in the UK.

Why can he not live here, as you do?

smelly-bandit wrote:

veya_victaous wrote:

smelly-bandit wrote:North Korea

64.3% atheist

Nuff said

meh atheists are often ignorant  
look at thorin

Or yourself

I'm not Atheist

In fact I have argued with the atheists on this site more than anyone else.

If your not an Atheist, what religion are you? You can't be Christian going by your comment earlier !

nicko wrote:If your not an Atheist,   what religion are you?   You can't be Christian going by your comment earlier !

Well the Eygptian name of his God is "Ra"
The Greek version is called "Apollo Helios"
The Sumerian version was "Shamash"
Where as the Australian version is called "Fosters"

Or xxxx !

veya_victaous wrote:

smelly-bandit wrote:

Or yourself

I'm not Atheist

In fact I have argued with the atheists on this site more than anyone else.

I was meaning the ignorant part.

nicko wrote:If your not an Atheist,   what religion are you?   You can't be Christian going by your comment earlier !

polytheist agnostic
which means,
I don't know if there is a god, but if there is a god I am sure there are many gods.

but for shits and giggles, I am willing to say rainbow serpent and plenty of the old gods..... and 'sun/stars' as literal gods that just needed to be redefined as such (since they are literally responsible for the energy that sustains all life forms we know exist)

veya_victaous wrote:

Yes, how can "not-that-thing" equal "that-thing"?

Is amoral, in fact a morality?

Lurker wrote:

veya_victaous wrote:

Yes, how can "not-that-thing" equal "that-thing"?

Cause Both are faith based propositions, making a statement on an aspect of the universe that there is not enough evidence to create facts.
Atheism is a definitive theological position. Just like any other religion.

@quill
Yes it is. Much like it is impossible to 'do nothing'.
Indifference is still an position/opinion.
Amorality is the equivalent of selecting all 5 in a rate from one to 10 where one equals 'strongly against' and 10 equals 'Strongly for' with equal value differentials in between.

veya wrote:Yes it is. Much like it is impossible to 'do nothing'.
Indifference is still an position/opinion.
Amorality is the equivalent of selecting all 5 in a rate from one to 10 where one equals 'strongly against' and 10 equals 'Strongly for' with equal value differentials in between.

I think this confuses 'vacancy' with 'substance'.  In math, we often confuse '0' with a value number, eg, like '3' or '5'.  It is a place holder, to be sure; but it is contradictory to say '0' is a value.

Similarly, a-moralism, a-sexuality, or a-theology, are denoting a mode, but specifying the absence of content.  We may have a teacup, but it is a-tea...that is to say, empty of tea.  It is a mode, but has no content.  Otherwise, we are caught saying, here is a cup of tea, but without tea.

Original Quill wrote:Is amoral, in fact a morality?

everything is relative quill

Original Quill wrote:

veya wrote:Yes it is. Much like it is impossible to 'do nothing'.
Indifference is still an position/opinion.
Amorality is the equivalent of selecting all 5 in a rate from one to 10 where one equals 'strongly against' and 10 equals 'Strongly for' with equal value differentials in between.

I think this confuses 'vacancy' with 'substance'.  In math, we often confuse '0' with a value number, eg, like '3' or '5'.  It is a place holder, to be sure; but it is contradictory to say '0' is a value.

Similarly, a-moralism, a-sexuality, or a-theology, are denoting a mode, but specifying the absence of content.  We may have a teacup, but it is a-tea...that is to say, empty of tea.  It is a mode, but has no content.  Otherwise, we are caught saying, here is a cup of tea, but without tea.

zero is a value
the number line does not start at zero.
zero is the middle point.

Zero is not "nothing", zero is also not the absence of value, zero is a value. You can say that you have 3 objects (apples, bananas, cars, etc...), but you can never have 3. 3 is a concept that does not "exist" in reality. It is simply a language used to describe dimensions of real objects.
https://www.quora.com/If-zero-represents-absence-of-any-value-then-why-does-1-represent-having-less-than-nothing

an 'empty' tea cup is still full of air even in space it is contains a vacuum.

to expand on amoral as a position on scale
amoral means indifferent to murder (for example) it is a 5 on the scale of completely against or completely for,
one could find Murder completely wrong and then it is a 1 but you could find murder a positive action and thus rate it 10.

Myth:
Atheism is just another religion.
 
Response:
For some strange reason, many people keep getting the idea that atheism is itself some sort of religion. Maybe it is because these people are so caught up in their own religious beliefs that they cannot imagine any person living without religion of some sort. Maybe it is due to some persistent misunderstanding of what atheism is. And maybe they just don't care that what they are saying really doesn't make any sense.


Here is an email which I received and which I thought would be useful to dissect, considering how many common mistakes it makes:

Dear Sir,
I am afraid I will have to kindly decline your offer to rewrite my post. I stand by my original contention; atheism is a religion. Whether it fits technically with the semantics or not is not a concern of mine; the practical definition of religion is what matters to me, not the letter of the law. And the practical definition, distasteful though it may be to those who disdain religion in all its forms, is that the very thing most atheists hate is what they have become: a religion, with clearly defined rules, eschatology and a philosophy by which to live. Religion is a means of understanding our existence. Atheism fits that bill. Religion is a philosophy of life. So is atheism. Religions has its leaders, the preachers of its tenets. So does atheism (Nietzsche, Feuerbach, Lenin, Marx). Religion has its faithful believers, who guard the orthodoxy of the faith. So does atheism. And religion is a matter of faith, not certainty. Your own faithful say that, as that is what I was referring to in my posting. Welcome to the religious world!

 
Please forgive my contentious tone. However, I would very much like to bring some (albeit not all as that is not possible) to the realization that all religions set themselves apart from the crowd; they are the pure, the faithful, all others are just "religion." Here again, atheism fits the bill.
That's the whole letter in one shot.


Let us now examine it piece by piece so that we can get a better sense of just what lies behind it all...

Whether it fits technically with the semantics or not is not a concern of mine;

In other words, he doesn't care if he misuses language to fit his purposes? This is a very sadly common attitude, but at least he is honest enough to admit it - others making the same claims are less forthright. Whether or not atheism fits technically with the semantics of "religion" should be a concern of his, if he has any interest in an honest dialogue.

...the very thing most atheists hate is what they have become: a religion, with clearly defined rules, eschatology and a philosophy by which to live. Religion is a means of understanding our existence.

Does atheism have anything approaching "clearly defined rules?" Not in the least. There is only one "rule," and that is the rule of the - not having any belief in any . Other than that, a person can do and believe absolutely anything beyond gods and still fit the definition. Quite the opposite of how "rules" are treated in a religion. This is one area where a misunderstanding of what atheism is probably comes into play.


Does atheism have an "eschatology?
Eschatology is a "belief about the end of the world or the last things." Now, I'm sure that many atheists have some sort of beliefs about how the world might end, but those beliefs sure aren't clearly defined or uniform among all of us. In fact, any beliefs about the end of the world are accidental - that is to say, they are not a necessary part of atheism. There is absolutely, positively nothing inherent in the disbelief in gods that leads one to any particular opinions about the end of the world (including having any such opinions at all). Quite the opposite of how 'eschatology' is treated in a religion.
Does atheism contain "...a philosophy by which to live?" Atheists certainly have philosophies by which they live. A popular philosophy might be Secular Humanism. Another might be objectivism.


Still another could be some form of Buddhism. There is not, however, a clearly defined philosophy common to all or even most atheists. In fact, there is nothing inherent in the disbelief in god(s) which leads a person to even have a philosophy of life (although a person without such a philosophy might be a bit strange). Quite the opposite of how 'philosophy of life' is treated in a religion.

Religion is a means of understanding our existence. Atheism fits that bill.

And how, exactly, does atheism provide a means for "understanding our existence"? Other than gods, there's a lot of room for differences among atheists as to what they think about existence. Although someone's understanding of their existence might incorporate atheism in some manner, their atheism is not itself the means to understanding.


The belief in an objectively existing world is a common assumption, too - but the people who share it don't belong to a common religion, now do they? Besides, since many atheists don't believe that gods "exist" and, hence, aren't a part of "existence", that disbelief doesn't have to be seen as understanding "existence". I don't believe in the Tooth Fairy, and that disbelief isn't a means of understanding our existence, doesn't have an eschatology, and certainly has no clearly defined rules.

Religion is a philosophy of life. So is atheism.

Atheism is a disbelief, not a philosophy. My disbelief in the Tooth Fairy is not a philosophy of life - is it for anyone else? Furthermore, a philosophy of life is not necessarily a religion and it doesn't necessitate that a religious belief exists in the person with the philosophy. There are, after all, all sorts of secular philosophies of life, none of which are religions.

Religions has its leaders, the preachers of its tenets. So does atheism (Nietzsche, Feuerbach, Lenin, Marx).

All of those philosophers disagreed in many ways - thus supporting my contention that atheism, as such, does not have any set of "clearly defined rules" and is not a single religion.
Many atheists, in fact, have no interest in those authors. If the writer of the original letter knew anything about those authors at all, then they would know this - which means that they either had no real understanding of what they were saying, or did and are being deliberately deceitful.


The Democratic Party, the United Way, and a UCLA all have had their leaders. Are they religions? Of course not. Anyone who suggests such a thing would be immediately recognized as a loon, but somehow people imagine that it is respectable to do the same with atheism.

Religion has its faithful believers, who guard the orthodoxy of the faith. So does atheism.

What possible orthodoxy is there for anyone to guard? There are those who attempt to guard the orthodoxy of belief in the Democratic Party - is that a religion, too? At least political parties have some semblance of "orthodox beliefs" which are worth guarding against the gradual shifts of culture.

And religion is a matter of faith, not certainty. Your own faithful say that, as that is what I was referring to in my posting.

Just because religion necessitates the existence of faith does not mean that the existence of faith (in whatever form) necessitates the existence of religion. I have "faith" in my wife's love for me - is that a religion? Of course not. The connection between religion and faith only goes in one direction, not both. Faith has multiple meanings - not all of which are exactly the same. The sort of faith to which I refer to here and which one might consider common among atheists is that of simple confidence based upon past experience. Moreover, that faith is not limitless - it should only go as far as evidence warrants. In religion, however, faith means a great deal more - it is, in fact, essentially a belief without or in spite of evidence.

Welcome to the religious world! Please forgive my contentious tone. However, I would very much like to bring some (albeit not all as that is not possible) to the realization that all religions set themselves apart from the crowd; they are the pure, the faithful, all others are just "religion." Here again, atheism fits the bill.

Huh? This makes no sense. Just because atheists see themselves "apart from the crowd," this makes atheism a religion? Absurd.
At every point in the above letter, there is an attempt to show places where religions and atheism have something in common. I've either pointed out that there isn't anything in common - that the alleged commonality is shared by other organizations or beliefs that clearly aren't religions - or, finally, that the alleged commonality isn't a necessary part of atheism.


Another, deeper flaw in the latter is that the author managed to pick things that aren't even necessary to religion, never mind atheism. A religion doesn't have to have leaders, an eschatology, defenders, etc. to be a religion. Just because something does have those things doesn't mean that it is a religion.
Perhaps it would also help to examine what a religion is. The Encyclopedia of Philosophy, in its article on Religion, lists some characteristics of religions. The more markers that are present in a belief system, the more "religious like" it is. Because it allows for broader grey areas in the concept of religion, I prefer this over more simplistic definitions we can find in basic dictionaries.


Read the list and see how atheism fares:


[*]Belief in supernatural beings (gods).


[*]A distinction between sacred and profane objects.


[*]Ritual acts focused on sacred objects.


[*]A moral code believed to be sanctioned by the gods.


[*]Characteristically religious feelings (awe, sense of mystery, sense of guilt, adoration), which tend to be aroused in the presence of sacred objects and during the practice of ritual, and which are connected in idea with the gods.


[*]Prayer and other forms of communication with gods.


[*]A world view, or a general picture of the world as a whole and the place of the individual therein. This picture contains some specification of an overall purpose or point of the world and an indication of how the individual fits into it.


[*]A more or less total organization of one's life based on the world view.


[*]A social group bound together by the above.


[/list]
This should make it obvious that any attempt to claim that atheism is a religion requires a radical ad hoc redefinition in what "being a religion" is supposed to mean, resulting in a radically equivocal use of the new term. If atheism is a religion, then just what isn't a religion?


In addition, it should be noted that theism itself does not qualify as a religion based upon the above - and for most of the same reasons that atheism does not qualify. When you stop to think about it, theism - the mere belief in god(s) - does not automatically entail almost any of the beliefs or practices listed in either the above letter or the above definition. In order to have a religion, you need quite a bit more than either simple belief or disbelief. This fact is clearly reflected in the real world, because we find theism which exists outside of religion and religion which exists without theism.




https://www.thoughtco.com/atheism-myths-is-atheism-a-religion-3863701

Finally
"Atheism the easiest religion to troll"

Atheists Using patheos.com to defend Atheism is like a Christian defending their faith using the bible.

So the site wackadoodle could not counter a single point

That was soo easy

Didge wrote:So the site wackadoodle could not counter a single point

That was soo easy

well actually I should have been more accurate NEW ATHIESM like you follow is a religion since it is beliefs not founded in scientific methodology but instead founded on reciting other peoples opinions of philosophic theology.

Atheism in general is a possible positon but it can only accurately be held as a hypothesis, no more 'true' than suggesting the sun 'could be' a god and indeed is a much harder thing to prove something 'is' (as Atheism is a finite theological statement) than to show something 'could be'.

Ultimately it comes back to what Quill said "Is Zero a value", to the layman it may be seen as the absence of value but to the Scientifically minded it is most definitely a value and a very major and important value with significant ramifications(more so than any other number)

PMSL

A hypothesis?

Non belief?

Its gets wackier and dumber your claims.

Atheism is not a religion.

You do realize that all people are atheists in regards to other religions.

Though in my case and others, I have no religion or belief in any God

Exactly!!!!!!

SEXY MAMA wrote:Exactly!!!!!!

Yep.

This is great. I beg you to listen - it's simply hilariously brilliant.
(Ben found it and I'm taking the credit for posting it)

eddie wrote:

Should not the caption to that iconic picture of Napoleon Bonoparte read: "I feel a right tit."?>

The religious wars in history were purely to satisfy humans' burning need to conquer new territories.

Muslim Moors conquered and ruled the south west mediteranean coast for centuries. And the Christian Crusaders did their share of warmongering too.  It suited everyone to use religion as an excuse.