Is religion harmful?

[Subfallen]

Thought experiment on source of meaning...

We are allowed to split the universe into two separate timelines and watch a young woman fresh out of college live two different lives.

In the first, she will be preached the Gospel, and then blinded and locked in a suitcase-sized cell for the rest of her life. An intravenous drip for nutrients and a automated colostomy bag will be her only interface to the world.

In the second, she will never hear the Gospel, but will be happily married, have two well-adjusted children, and---marvel of marvels---find a cure for AIDS.

Which timeline will provide a more meaningful life? Show your work and justify your answer for full credit.

[Taraz]

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Hitler functioned. Cockroaches function. Unless you withdraw completely from making moral and logical judgments you have to think past that. Otherwise you are left with pragmatism, which is what I've said many times before is the only logical conclusion to non-theism.

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I'm not very familiar with pragmatism, maybe I would agree with its tenets.

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If you deny that there is ultimate purpose and meaning to or in or for the universe you can't save meaning for anything within the universe. Yes, you can maintain your life has meaning for you. And so we have 6 billion different concepts of meaning.

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I really don't see that big of a problem with that. Of course everyone doesn't have the same concept of meaning because we communicate and share our ideas. But as it stands we definitely have thousands of concepts of meaning in this world already.

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And how can you have significant communication on any important level with anyone else? The only way is to ignore your basic concept of meaninglessness and act as if there actually is purpose.

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You have significant communication by learning someone else's concept of meaning. This isn't hard to do because we have language and we all agree to use certain symbols. I really don't see a conflict here.

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Though I seriously doubt evolution it doesn't preclude design.

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I would be fine with design if the design were evolution. I don't think that there is much good evidence for this, but I don't discount it as a possibility.

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If evolution is true and is elegant then it was designed.

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Not necessarily. One reason why evolution is so elegant is that it is all that there could be. The only species that we see are the only ones that could have lived given their environment.

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Yes, and that's good. But you can't justify that significance in an ultimately meaningless universe.

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I don't see why I need to justify the meaning I see in life to anybody or anything else. I can share my views and others are free to accept or reject them. I will freely admit that what is significant to me might be meaningless to others. I would like to think that others agree with what I find significant however.

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A logical reason for acting morally is because it would be better to live in a society where people behave morally instead of one where people do not behave morally.


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Of course it is, but why should you go along with it?

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Because if you don't go along with it you are working to destroy this society. By acting counter to society's morality you are changing society's morality. If I want the moral code to stand, I abide by it's laws.

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You may not formulate it that way but your beliefs about these things are strong in the sense that they make a fundamental difference in how you live.

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Example? It doesn't necessarily have to be my life, but what is an example of a difference it would potentially make.

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Why shouldn't I lie, steal and murder? Those actions may well be better for me in certain situations.

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I don't believe that lying, stealing, and murdering are always wrong. If a Nazi officer asks me if I'm hiding any Jews, I will always say that I'm not. If my family is being held hostage unless I steal a dollar from McDonald's I will steal that dollar. If a shooter is on a killing spree, I feel justified in killing him.

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They may disagree but they haven't shown how to avoid nihilism on an atheistic worldview.


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Atheism is compatible with nihilism. But atheism is also compatible with relativism, pragmatism, objectivism, etc. Atheism doesn't lead to any view on morality, but it is compatible with many of them. If you are an atheist, you don't get your morals from atheism, they come from somewhere else. In fact, I could be an atheist and subscribe to the morality laid out in the Bible if I so felt.

[NotReady]

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But as it stands we definitely have thousands of concepts of meaning in this world already.


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I think we've about exhausted this topic. In previous threads on this forum I have reached a point where someone asks "Why does there have to be absolute morality" or "Why does the universe have to have an ultimate meaning or purpose?"

Two of the apologists that influenced me the most dealt with this problem in one paragraph each. If someone asks that kind of question there's not much left to say. My argument is built on explaining why only a Christian worldview is rational and makes sense of the universe. If you reject the need for rationality, ultimate truth, meaning, purpose, then nothing I have to say will have any relevance to you.

The history of philosophy and theology is the search for truth, meaning and purpose. You are basically saying such things don't exist or that they don't matter. I have no real response to that position except to assert there is ultimate truth, meaning and purpose and they do matter.

[Taraz]

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But as it stands we definitely have thousands of concepts of meaning in this world already.


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I think we've about exhausted this topic. In previous threads on this forum I have reached a point where someone asks "Why does there have to be absolute morality" or "Why does the universe have to have an ultimate meaning or purpose?"

Two of the apologists that influenced me the most dealt with this problem in one paragraph each. If someone asks that kind of question there's not much left to say. My argument is built on explaining why only a Christian worldview is rational and makes sense of the universe. If you reject the need for rationality, ultimate truth, meaning, purpose, then nothing I have to say will have any relevance to you.

The history of philosophy and theology is the search for truth, meaning and purpose. You are basically saying such things don't exist or that they don't matter. I have no real response to that position except to assert there is ultimate truth, meaning and purpose and they do matter.

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There may be absolute truth, absolute meaning, and absolute purpose in life. I allow for that possibility. But, if these things exist, it is absolutely impossible for any of us to know them fully. The best we can do is make a good faith effort to produce some truth, meaning, and purpose. Perhaps we are all striving for the same thing, perhaps not. Maybe logic and science are simply yearnings for understanding God, but we can never know this God and we shouldn't claim to. We make our own meaning because that is all we can do.

My ultimate point is that we should act with humility and always assume that we probably have it wrong. Always keep searching and realize that what is good enough for you is not good enough for all.

[NotReady]

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but we can never know this God and we shouldn't claim to.


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Do you see that this is a sweeping statement about ultimate truth and that it denies the possibility of God communicating to us? I know people here think I'm arrogant, that I pretend to know it all. If you read my posts closely I think you will find I never claim to know anything but what I've been taught, by other theologians, and especially by what God says in His Word. The Bible either is or isn't God's Word. If it is then what it says matters.

[Subfallen]

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Thought experiment on source of meaning...

We are allowed to split the universe into two separate timelines and watch a young woman fresh out of college live two different lives.

In the first, she will be preached the Gospel, and then blinded and locked in a suitcase-sized cell for the rest of her life. An intravenous drip for nutrients and a automated colostomy bag will be her only interface to the world.

In the second, she will never hear the Gospel, but will be happily married, have two well-adjusted children, and---marvel of marvels---find a cure for AIDS.

Which timeline will provide a more meaningful life? Show your work and justify your answer for full credit.

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And...? Since you're the one all about absolute meaning, you should have the most compelling answer to this dilemma, no?

[Taraz]

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but we can never know this God and we shouldn't claim to.


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Do you see that this is a sweeping statement about ultimate truth and that it denies the possibility of God communicating to us? I know people here think I'm arrogant, that I pretend to know it all. If you read my posts closely I think you will find I never claim to know anything but what I've been taught, by other theologians, and especially by what God says in His Word. The Bible either is or isn't God's Word. If it is then what it says matters.

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It denies the possibility of God communicating to us perfectly. I believe all would agree to that. The Bible may be the perfect word of God but humans have been trying to decipher it's meaning for thousands of years. We are still struggling to understand what it is really saying. Perhaps God gives us hints along the way, but what are we to do in the mean time but to try our best and come up with what we can?

[NotReady]

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Perhaps God gives us hints along the way, but what are we to do in the mean time but to try our best and come up with what we can?


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I don't think it's hard to understand:

"Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved".

Of course, there are passages in the Bible and concepts as well that are hard to understand. But I think the central message about God, us, sin and salvation is clear enough - even the famous divide between Catholic and Protestant over justification and salvation is more semantics than substance. Peter said "There are some things in Paul that are hard to understand" but there is clarity on the most important issues.

[Taraz]

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I don't think it's hard to understand:

"Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved".

Of course, there are passages in the Bible and concepts as well that are hard to understand. But I think the central message about God, us, sin and salvation is clear enough - even the famous divide between Catholic and Protestant over justification and salvation is more semantics than substance. Peter said "There are some things in Paul that are hard to understand" but there is clarity on the most important issues.

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But even that phrase itself is open to a myriad of interpretations. Believe he died for your sins? Believe in his message and his teachings? Believe that he was a precursor to Muhammad? I assure you that many have read the Bible with utmost sincerity and have come to a different conclusion than you and many other Christians have.

And clearly you believe the semantics to be of tantamount importance.

[NotReady]

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And clearly you believe the semantics to be of tantamount importance.


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I asked someone else once to do something, which he couldn't. See if you can:

Write a propositional statement that no one can mis-interpret.

What about this one:

Don't eat the fruit.