Digital Bits Skeptic

25 Comments

1. Critical Critique:

   Thank you for publishing my article and for paying me accordingly, DB Skeptic. Just wanted to leave a note to say that you’ve not seen the last of me yet.

   About the article, I think a lot of people have already wrote about how frustrated they feel about religion everywhere on the internet. So, in the future, I plan to write more educational stuffs that people of religion can digest without feeling insulted.

   Will be sending you another article to you by today or latest tomorrow.

   Talk to you later,
   Nick
   Critical Critique

   4 March 2008, 6:14 pm

2. DB Skeptic:

   Thanks for writing your article! The point of this site is to get others involved, so your contribution to the world of critical thinking and skepticism is greatly appreciated.
   4 March 2008, 8:41 pm

3. Aaron:

   Hey Nick, I enjoyed the argument presented in the video. That was pretty much the same one I used in college at the Christian University I attended. I argued that if those whom I love so much are going to hell what is the point of me going to heaven? Then I went a step further to say that if God really would hand out eternal punishment to a 14 year old girl who aborted her baby and then died of heroin overdose, then please let me go to hell in her place, because if you ask me, she had just lived through 14 years of hell on earth, and after such suffering deserves an eternity of bliss more than anyone. However, I am not a philosopher. And I must admit, the video along with my argument is more of an appeal to emotion than to any sort of sound argument. I also think the rest of the argument provided, namely the chart, is itself a clear example of the very scapegoatism that we blame on religious folks that commit the horrific acts that we humans are capable of. The idea that humans would not have any problems presented in the chart if religion were out of the equation is simply naive and ignorant. If religion is simply a human creation gone amok, then the results of this creation rest squarely on humans as well, rather than the institutions. I’m not saying that religious institutions are not guilty, but they are certainly not to the root of the problem. I think your overall argument is really based on an overly narrow understanding of religion, and is more than anything else a response to evangelical Christianity, and a misinformed one at that.

   PS. None of the questions or arguments you presented here have touched on the question of god. I would love to read more of you you think about that.

   -Aaron

   4 March 2008, 10:35 pm

4. Critical Critique:

   Thank you for your comment, DB Skeptic. And yours too, Aaron.

   I’ve spend time studying religion and the supernatural for more than 20 years of life, but when I say something against it, people say I’ve not studied enough. But if say something to support it, they say I’m on the right track. So, I think it’s more of a preference to an individuals likings to either agree or disagree to what is presented. Perhaps there’s some truth in what you’ve said. Nevertheless, without religion, we’ll have one less problem in the world. And a big one too.

   The question or argument about the existence of a God(s) has as much credibility as with a flying spaghetti monster.

   Thanks,
   Nick
   Critical Critique

   5 March 2008, 6:01 am

5. Aaron:

   Nick, I did not mean to imply that you are not educated or well studied, and I sincerely apologize if it sounded that way. I simply meant to say that an extreme claim such as: Religion directly causes soil erosion and all the evils in between, is ignorant and naive. Point being, the argument is naive, not you. I would venture to say that the reasoning used in that chart is akin to blaming all the world’s ills on one group, hence the scapegoating I mentioned. Whenever this has occurred in history it has not ended well. At least it triggers a warning in my brain as it hearkens back to such examples as antisemitism throughout Europe in the last few thousand years, specifically, the 1930’s and 40’s. Let’s be realistic, religion has a part in every culture, both negative and positive aspects come from it, just like many other aspects of society. The real issue is not one of God or spirituality, but rather a defense, often necessary, put up by a new and growing number of proclaimed atheists in the developed western world. The world is uncomfortable with the idea of someone not believing in God. In return this minority fires back that they have the only truth and anyone who believes otherwise is a fool, at least that is what I gather from Richard Dawkins. I think the best argument one can make on either side is similar to how you summed it up… it depends on one’s personality. Blaise Pascal said that it is just as absurd to believe in God as it is not to. I came to that same conclusion on my own before reading that. And from that point, whatever I decide to believe is based on a combination of my subjective interpretation of reality, assumed facts, and those around me.

   Richard Dawkins’ god parody of the Spaghetti Monster that you refer to is a developed form of Bertrand Russell’s Teapot analogy. Neither one of them really gets to the root of the question of God. There is a longing for understanding and truth among humanity. Strip away the dogma and tradition that surround each religion and most of the time you will find the basic questions of life and meaning. Science can answer some of them, but not all. God is really “defined”, for lack of a better word, as the essence of the unknown. The big bang theory, and I am no creationist by any means, is simply the “Sunday school answer” among scientists and atheists. In other words it sounds just as ridiculous to me as my 7th grade Sunday school teacher telling me that God created the world in seven days. If one is to explain a beginning of an entire universe they must at the very least admit to the fact that their explanation will sound silly and mythical and maybe borderline mad, whether based on science or religion. That is the fun of being human. We tell stories.

   Lastly, governments are historically notorious for starting wars, which probably cause the same flow of problems as presented in the chart. Other than a few anarchists I do not hear the cry for complete eradication of government.

   PS. I thought it was funny that the chart ends with “Species extinction and overwhelming human suffering.” Unless one actually believes in hell then suffering would most likely be over once the species is extinct.

   5 March 2008, 11:58 pm

6. Critical Critique:

   

   6 March 2008, 12:34 am

7. KStone:

   Yes, there are many consequences of religious beliefs. But so too are there many rewards. Upholding ethics is, for example, a direct benefit. So too is the hope religion provides the faithful who might otherwise fall prey to depression.

   The main point is to remain positive in a largely negative world. That’s not easy to do. Religion fortifies that sense by sustaining a purpose for people they wouldn’t have from any other source.

   6 March 2008, 4:23 pm

8. Aaron:

   “Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.”
   — Albert Einstein

   7 March 2008, 3:18 am

9. Critical Critique:

   “It was, of course, a lie what you read about my religious convictions, a lie which is being systematically repeated. I do not believe in a personal God and I have never denied this but have expressed it clearly. If something is in me which can be called religious, then it is the unbounded admiration for the structure of the world so far as our Science can reveal it.”

   ~ Albert Einstein 1954, from Albert Einstein: The Human Side, edited by Helen Dukas and Banesh Hoffman, Princeton University Press

   7 March 2008, 6:26 am

10. Dan:

    Note: Einstein said that he had “religious convictions” so to speak. What he was addressing was the lie that his religious convictions were in a personal god. He did, however, have a sense of reverence for the unknown, and it seems that he equated a very undefined sense of the word “God” to that unknown. He believed that a more universal religion would be necessary in the future, and also he held Buddhism in high esteem. From all that he said about religion and science, it appears that he had a real appreciation for the mystical, (in a quantum physics sort of way), and the convergence of that mystical experience with the findings of science. Not believing in a persnoal god definitely had nothing in common with the notion that religion and spiritually are evil or should be eradicated.

    7 March 2008, 3:43 pm

11. Critical Critique:

    Religion and spirituality is a matter of preference based on emotion-driven thinking, not evidence to an absolute truth. My opinion is that such beliefs causes more harm than good in the long run…

    “It seems to me that the idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I cannot take seriously. I also cannot imagine some will or goal outside the human sphere… Science has been charged with undermining morality, but the charge is unjust. A man’s ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death.”

    ~ Albert Einstein, “Religion and Science” New York Times Magazine, 9 November 1930

    7 March 2008, 5:46 pm

12. Aaron:

    It seems we are all in agreement about Einstein’s convictions. He did not believe in a personal god. I used that quote about science and religion for two reasons. 1. simply because you quoted him to support your initial argument, though the argument and the quote are unrelated; and 2. to show that while he did not believe in any sort of god in the traditional sense, he certainly did not seem to regard religion as the incarnation of evil in the world. With that said I would like to throw in one more thing quote that will put all other things into perspective.

    “Any man who can drive safely while kissing a pretty girl is simply not giving the kiss the attention it deserves.” -Albert Einstein

    8 March 2008, 2:49 am

13. Critical Critique:

    Albert Einstein quotes were brought in for reasons to protect its original meanings. However, like every other quote, scripture verses, text excerpts etc., people can interpret it in any way they want to support their case. So, quoting Einstein by either party and putting words in his mouth, not knowing what the man really meant when he said these things, including the fact that we can no longer ask him about it, is not going to help solve the problems religion brings into this world.

    Moreover, it doesn’t really matter what this man or that man said. What REALLY matters is whether people can think and weight for themselves the good and bad religion has brought to this world. There’s a long history and plenty of evidence for it. Do the research for yourself. There’s no need to listen to others, and that includes me.

    While many still see religion as a good thing, I can only see it as a cunningly designed manipulative system in order to control people by offering fantastic promises and creating delusional experiences which then damages an individuals mental growth and physical wellbeing, and when exposed long enough, even to the point of no return.

    8 March 2008, 7:03 am

14. Dave:

    Imagine a young man in jail sentence to death row. He has lost it all, his family hates him, he’s guilty as ever, he hates himself, his death is inevitable.

    Now imagine a priest comes in, speaks to him and gives him a bible.

    If in his last time of his life on this planet he is happy because of belief in God when otherwise he would have been completely apathetic and possibly suicidal, who are we to judge religion as being good or bad for an individuals life?

    Religion is a personal choice, as is smoking, and just as you wouldn’t try to dissuade a random person walking passed you smoking from their choice to smoke, and just as to do so would be futile anyway, as is the same for Anti-theists to do unto creationists.

    8 March 2008, 1:20 pm

15. Critical Critique:

    Yes, like religion, some people will continue smoking even after they are made aware of the dangerous consequences. After all, it makes them feel good. This is also may be the last thing someone would want before he or she is sentenced to death in jail. Another smoker offers it to him/her and this makes them both fly into la-la land.

    Some don’t care if people keep smoking and live their lives in their la-la land while making others secondary smokers in the process. But some of us do care. We can’t force people to change if they don’t want to, but we can make all relevant information available for them to make a choice. By doing so, some will indeed quit smoking, and some will probably not.

    Either way, some will continue providing information to support it while others to reject it. That is the way of the world. We must still do what we think is right, but not through faith-based living and emotion-driven thinking, rather through evidence-based inquiry and critical thinking.

    8 March 2008, 2:00 pm

16. Aaron:

    Oddly enough Nick, you argue that “faith-based living and emotion driven thinking” are to be discredited, and I agree as much as possible, but the entire argument in your article is “emotion based” with faulty assumptions, ie… religious differences automatically result in war. There are also countless examples of religious difference resulting in dialogue, and a willingness to work together and learn from others. You cap it off with an emotionally charged video, which I again, happen to like and agree with, but it is not fair to say you are using non-emotional, “evidence-based inquiry and critical thinking” when in fact you are appealing to emotion.

    Furthermore, to say that all folks who subscribe to some sort of “faith-based living” live in a “la-la land”, if I am reading the comparison correctly, is quite simply a leap of faith, pun intended :-). I think history, and specifically recent history, provides abundant examples of extraordinary human beings doing amazing things from various walks of life and faiths, and who are driven by the universal truths and expectations found within the confines of their religious beliefs but shared by most. Sorry for that really long run-on sentence. To name a few such people here we go: Mother Theresa, Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Albert Schweitzer, The Dalai Lama, all of the Buddhist monks resisting an authoritarian military regime in Myanmar, Oscar Romero, Leo Tolstoy, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Desmond Tutu, and Queen Noor of Jordan.

    My friends, who are also big Dawkins Disciples, which you seem to fall into, based on what i have read of your argument and quoting him without siting him, respond to the above list people by saying “they are the exceptions.” I presume that to be your ensuing response. Therefore, I would like to point out ahead of time, that the assertion being impressed by you and fellow Dawkinites, is that ALL religion, and faith-based living is wrong, evil, and blind, and in need of being replaced by pure reason and science. Since you attempt such an all encompassing stance, all one has to do is provide even one exception to counter it. I have done that, and I had more than one example.

    I am quite excited that there is a new and energized generation of atheists in the world ready to stand up to religious folks who would claim that one must believe in God to do good, and be good. I look forward to what this group has to offer and prove to the world about the goodness in humanity. However, Richard Dawkins, and those who make claims to have a monopoly on truth, whether they are religious, scientists, or whatever, will always fall short of grasping the complex web of relationships and differences between various people, and thus likely never take part in the positive changes that our world needs to see despite whatever good intentions they may have.

    In response to the insinuation that if I only research the subject I will see the light of truth, I would like to point out that I have done so. I still hold to the fact that if we take religion out of the equation of human history we still have the exact same problems we have faced all along. We have a deep psychological need to belong. Historically, religion has served as a source of legitimacy, for power, war, etc, but it was not necessarily the cause. What may prove to be more effective in the quest for peace is a deeper search into sociology and psychology, and attempt to understand why we use God and religion and any other pseudo just cause to fight for resources, land, money, power, influence, and all of that. Science while helping humanity so much, has conversely been used for some horrible misdeeds as well; Hiroshima and Nagasaki come to mind. Science has also provided the means for unprecedented warfare and destruction. I suppose I could take the stance that all science is evil and the root of all human suffering and therefore should be extinguished. But I prefer to step back and try to understand that the true responsibility of our predicament rest on us as a whole and me as individual for the decisions I make in my on little sphere of influence.

    Finally to demonstrate what I am saying I would like to use the example of three incredible men with very different beliefs who worked together for a common good. Albert Einstein, Albert Schweitzer, and Bertrand Russell, all worked diligently to prevent further development and testing of nuclear weapons. Russel was an out-spoken atheist and critic of Christianity, Einstein… was a deist at most, but mostly ambiguous as we discovered from our previous sparring, and Schweitzer was definitely at the very least a deist and if not a Christian he was heavily influenced by the teachings of Jesus.

    I have already gone on too long. Thank you Nick for putting up such a noteworthy and admirable stance. I am enjoying this exchange.

    One last thing, I really think you might enjoy reading Albert Camus, especially the Myth of Sisyphus. I think that book is one of the most convincing and enjoyable philosophical arguments for atheism.

    8 March 2008, 10:37 pm

17. Critical Critique:

    Yes, Aaron. When something is done differently from the norm, it may seem odd but not necessarily wrong. Faith based living and emotion-driven thinking is accepting something without evidence or proof of a claim. I’m talking about people in general and how they accept religion, superstition and other strange beliefs based on that. This not the same with how people present their work. Work or presentation and the video in this article may have emotions of passion but what I’m talking about is to infom people to not to believe something with it. I’m not telling people to cease their emotion completely. I’m advising people to use critical thinking and evidence-based inquiry before accepting any type of claim.

    I don’t think I’ve made faulty assumptions, I’m seeing this happen and so is the rest of the world. The war in religious differences has already begun in the hearts of most people before the physical one happens. It’s like a ticking time bomb waiting to explode. It’s just a matter of time. The countless examples of religious difference resulting in dialogs, and a willingness to work together and learn from others is a struggle within the religious institution to keep the time bomb stable from exploding. That’s all. There WILL come a point when it WILL still blow up in your face! It’s inevitable unless people can tell each other that my religion and your religion is one and the same. It is also the one and same God but just with different laws for race or nation. Well, obviously that’s not happen and it would be a clear lie to suddenly to say that, and there will definitely be another war for saying that. LOL! ;-D

    People are good because they are good. Religion didn’t make them good. They will be good anyway without religion. That’s their natural choice to be good. They only compliment a particular religion for their goodness and their nature to abide to it.

    I’m not a Richard Dawkins disciple. I have my own thoughts and he has his. Science keeps it real, religion provides an opium to escape the real.

    Most people think they already have the answer or a conclusion to something because that’s how their minds were trained to think in the brainwash process during their early childhood by their parents who were brainwashed by their parents who again were brainwashed by their parents and so on. But this is not the right approach to conclude a certain truth. You can’t start with an answer or a conclusion, and work backwards to find facts and evidence to support it. By doing so, you put yourself in a deluded position in the sense that you’ll only be interested in evidence, if there were any, that confirms to what you already absorbed into your believe system. So, you start picking and choosing what supports your absorbed believes while rejecting the rest. If something supports your absorbed believes, you’ll be quick to accept it even though if might be possibly wrong or misinformed or misinterpreted. And if something doesn’t support your existing absorbed believes, you probably reject it out of hand.

    Deist believe in a God but reject dogmas received through so-called revelations which is actually nothing but psychological delusion or even made up claims for personal agenda. Deist would not go for war if someone said that they are wrong to believe in a God. Deism is not a religion but rather a philosophical point of view, just like Atheism, Agnosticism etc. is. There are no weird laws, rules and regulation that get you killed, chopped or stoned. There’s nothing sensitive to it and nothing to get offended by it enough to start a war. Deism is a personal view that there is a God. Theism is a personal view that there is a God too. The only problem with theism and other form of religious believe is, it conforms to some strange claims of some individual who said “God told me so, and you should follow it!” or “I saw this and that happen, it’s true and you must believe it!” Endless so-called revelations and stories are used to get new recruits because people believe and response to such things.

    Below is an excerpt from the “Age of Reason”. This is the writings of a Deist, Thomas Paine.

    “EVERY national church or religion has established itself by pretending some special mission from God, communicated to certain individuals. The Jews have their Moses; the Christians their Jesus Christ, their apostles and saints; and the Turks their Muhammad; as if the way to God was not open to every man alike.

    Each of those churches shows certain books, which they call revelation, or the Word of God. The Jews say that their Word of God was given by God to Moses face to face; the Christians say, that their Word of God came by divine inspiration; and the Turks say, that their Word of God (the Quran) was brought by an angel from heaven. Each of those churches accuses the other of unbelief; and, for my own part, I disbelieve them all.

    As it is necessary to affix right ideas to words, I will, before I proceed further into the subject, offer some observations on the word ‘revelation.’ Revelation when applied to religion, means something communicated immediately from God to man.

    No one will deny or dispute the power of the Almighty to make such a communication if he pleases. But admitting, for the sake of a case, that something has been revealed to a certain person, and not revealed to any other person, it is revelation to that person only. When he tells it to a second person, a second to a third, a third to a fourth, and so on, it ceases to be a revelation to all those persons. It is revelation to the first person only, and hearsay to every other, and, consequently, they are not obliged to believe it.

    It is a contradiction in terms and ideas to call anything a revelation that comes to us at second hand, either verbally or in writing. Revelation is necessarily limited to the first communication. After this, it is only an account of something which that person says was a revelation made to him; and though he may find himself obliged to believe it, it cannot be incumbent on me to believe it in the same manner, for it was not a revelation made to me, and I have only his word for it that it was made to him.

    When Moses told the children of Israel that he received the two tables of the commandments from the hand of God, they were not obliged to believe him, because they had no other authority for it than his telling them so; and I have no other authority for it than some historian telling me so, the commandments carrying no internal evidence of divinity with them. They contain some good moral precepts such as any man qualified to be a lawgiver or a legislator could produce himself, without having recourse to supernatural intervention. [NOTE: It is, however, necessary to except the declamation which says that God 'visits the sins of the fathers upon the children'. This is contrary to every principle of moral justice.--Author.]

    When I am told that the Quran was written in Heaven, and brought to Muhammad by an angel, the account comes to near the same kind of hearsay evidence and second hand authority as the former. I did not see the angel myself, and therefore I have a right not to believe it.

    When also I am told that a woman, called the Virgin Mary, said, or gave out, that she was with child without any cohabitation with a man, and that her betrothed husband, Joseph, said that an angel told him so, I have a right to believe them or not: such a circumstance required a much stronger evidence than their bare word for it: but we have not even this; for neither Joseph nor Mary wrote any such matter themselves. It is only reported by others that they said so. It is hearsay upon hearsay, and I do not chose to rest my belief upon such evidence.

    It is, however, not difficult to account for the credit that was given to the story of Jesus Christ being the Son of God. He was born when the heathen mythology had still some fashion and repute in the world, and that mythology had prepared the people for the belief of such a story. Almost all the extraordinary men that lived under the heathen mythology were reputed to be the sons of some of their gods. It was not a new thing at that time to believe a man to have been celestially begotten; the intercourse of gods with women was then a matter of familiar opinion. Their Jupiter, according to their accounts, had cohabited with hundreds; the story therefore had nothing in it either new, wonderful, or obscene; it was conformable to the opinions that then prevailed among the people called Gentiles, or mythologists, and it was those people only that believed it. The Jews, who had kept strictly to the belief of one God, and no more, and who had always rejected the heathen mythology, never credited the story.

    It is curious to observe how the theory of what is called the Christian Church, sprung out of the tail of the heathen mythology. A direct incorporation took place in the first instance, by making the reputed founder to be celestially begotten. The trinity of gods that then followed was no other than a reduction of the former plurality, which was about twenty or thirty thousand. The statue of Mary succeeded the statue of Diana of Ephesus. The deification of heroes changed into the canonization of saints. The Mythologists had gods for everything; the Christian Mythologists had saints for everything. The church became as crowded with the one, as the pantheon had been with the other; and Rome was the place of both. The Christian theory is little else than the idolatry of the ancient mythologists, accommodated to the purposes of power and revenue; and it yet remains to reason and philosophy to abolish the amphibious fraud…

    9 March 2008, 5:22 am

18. Aaron:

    Unfortunately, I don’t have time for the full response that I would like to give. The faulty assumptions are all over the chart you provided, which I have addressed. The primary one is that you say religion the CAUSE of those problems. I maintain that religion, at it’s worst which is quite often I admit, serves as a source of legitimacy because no one likes to think that they are fighting and killing over selfish motives such as obtaining oil for example. But this means that religion is a RESULT of the problem rather than a CAUSE.

    Religion probably exists because 1. People feel a need to belong, they probably always will. And 2. Religion is one way to belong. Other such systems of belonging incur conflict as well as stability the same way religion does. We tend to group together in the ways that best protect our interests. Again, the herd instinct is not the fault of religion but rather one of the causes of religion. Since it is quite apparent that families will fight other families, ethnic groups will fight other ethnic groups, communities will fight other communities, nations will fight other nations, etc… when faced with the need to secure land, resources, money, power, influence, oil, or any of the things that we feel we need to survive. The big key to solving these issues is then to understand the full effects of the herd instinct and what we can do to lessen the need to fight other groups over scarce resources. In other words we need a sense of community that is global, and a more responsible use and distribution of such land and resources. I can agree with you that religion and tradition can, and quite often do stand in the way of achieving this aim. But I would also like to point out the teachings of Christ do address the question of “who is my neighbor” and goes a step further by commanding his followers to “love thy enemies.” As far as I can tell, the concept of non-violent resistance has come to us through religious and spiritual believers due to their spiritual convictions.

    Furthermore, I am still firmly convinced that people can and do have mystical experiences or conversion experiences which drive them to live out their faith. Mother Theresa is the prime example here. Her divine mystical experience at an early age was so powerful that she spent the rest of her life working with people in conditions that even the most hardened development/aide workers would cringe over. She even continued her life of service and faith through many years of doubt concerning the very deity she was serving. She compared this doubt to Jesus crying out to God and asking why he had been abandoned. William Wilberforce is another example of someone who changed dramatically for the better after a conversion/mystical experience, and thus championed greatly the movement of human rights.

    Lastly, in response to your statement, “People are good because they are good. Religion didn’t make them good. They will be good anyway without religion. That’s their natural choice to be good. They only compliment a particular religion for their goodness and their nature to abide to it.”…

    I can just as easily say, “People are bad because they are bad, Religion didn’t make them bad. They will be bad anyway without religion. That’s their natural choice to be bad. They only mar a particular religion for their badness and their selfish nature.”

    “To really want the truth, to long for it desperately, is to reject every formulation and theory and dogma and opinion right up to the time you see and touch and unite with the Being or Thing itself!”

    -David James Duncan

    “We shouldn’t pretend to understand the world only by intellect. We apprehend it just as much by feeling. Therefore, the judgment of the intellect is, at best, only half of truth… and must, if it be honest, come to an understanding of its own inadequacy.”

    -Carl Jung

    “I have my own idea about art, and it is this: What most people regard as fantastic and lacking in universality, I hold to be the inmost essence of truth. Arid observation of everyday trivialities I have long since ceased to regard as realism…”

    -Fyodor Dostoyevsky

    10 March 2008, 1:56 am

19. Critical Critique:

    I’ve been working on a second edition of this article. The feedbacks and comments given in this post and from others has made it possible for me to re-write the second addition. I hope it has evolved to be a better edition than this one… You can read it here at this link:

    http://www.criticalcritique.com/2008/03/religion-is-path-to-hell-on-earth_20.html

    Thanks,
    Nick
    CC

    2 April 2008, 8:35 pm

20. P Thomas:

    According to Adolph Hitler the Jews - and their materialistic political masters the Communists - were responsible for all the world’s ills. In fact taking your chart it can be applied to any regime including those inspired by atheistic regimes such as the Soviet Union, Pol Pot’s Cambodia and the existing government of North Korea. Of course, if you wish to stretch incredulity to breaking point, you could argue that all these atheistic regimes were inverted religious regimes but it seems odd that your ability to condemn rests, not on reason but on frustration which you then assert others would feel if they had your insight. I’m sure you’ll understand if I regard your particular hang ups as unhelpful to a proper analysis of what should be a serious metaphysical debate. If brainwashing were the cause of religious belief then each family would be historically united in common belief. I always thought the reason why we had a brain was to question not just what others believe but what we believe. Atheists have, quite rightly, be accused of having the same human characteristics as religious fundamentalists - certainty, disdain for alternative views and a tendency to intolerance of those who disagree with them. From my viewpoint that hardly adds up to a rational approach to religion, science, or anything else. The only way to understand how others see us is to understand how they think. On that point you have yet to reach first base. It’s human beings who cause problems in the world, not religion and those who use religious language more often than not are following a political agenda.

    5 June 2008, 11:47 am

21. http://critical-critique.blogspot.com:

    Please view the article update at the link provided above, right before your comment.

    Thanks,
    Nick

    6 June 2008, 5:11 am

22. John:

    I’m sick and tired of seeing the same simplistic assumptions being made by supposedly enlightened, neutral observers. Your graph dosn’t make sense from the very start - how do religious differences automatically lead to intolerance/war etc? What that amounts to is saying people can’t have different views on the world - which is the very kind of predjudice I’m sure you imagine religious people necessarily hold. It’s very fashionable to blame everything on religion these days, but a little independant thinking should reveal a few gaps in the logic of that. All major religions for the most part encourage good behaviour from human beings and denounce the bad. Of course, people do kill in the name of religion: when people are committed to a group which they see as oppossed to another group, often they will be prepared to go to all sorts of lengths for it. In parts of the world people will kill in the name of their local football team, in spite of the fact that a football team does not itself have anything to do with violence. See where I’m going with this?
    People will of course bring up things like the Spanish Inquisition. It’s interesting to note that far more people were murdered “in the name of Reason” during the French revolution, or in the name of state atheism in the Soviet Union.
    Intolerance is not synonymous with religion, on the contrary religion has been the most vocal force in history supporting tolerance.

    Another point I’d like to make is that you don’t have to be gullible or stupid to be religious. The story of the Bible, the Koran etc is plausibe, if you allow that certain things about the universe cannot be observed or confirmed - hardly illogical. A rationalist like Dawkins will say you can only believe what you can confirm, anything else is a delusion. The problem with believing only what you can confirm is that you cannot in fact confirm anything. Take the tree falling in the woods. We determine reality by the senses and through memory - neither of which we can say with certainty are accurate. Furthermore, the picture we are starting to get from quantum physics is that the universe as we conceive it does not actualy exist (incidentaly, something the eastern religions have been saying for thousands of years).

    Religion is basicly comprised of a)moral laws and b)traditions. The moral laws are useful to society, the traditions may be non-sensical but are harmless.

    26 June 2008, 11:39 am

23. Nick:

    Like it was said before, please view the article update at the link provided above, four comments above. I hope other new readers will read the update too before commenting so mindlessly like what I’ve seen so far.

    Thanks,
    Nick

    27 June 2008, 8:15 am

24. Science, Reason & Rationality:

    Anyways, here’s this article’s second edition update link again:

    http://critical-critique.blogspot.com/2008/03/religion-is-path-to-hell-on-earth_20.html

    Thanks,
    Nick

    27 July 2008, 5:11 am

25. Aaron:

    In response to John: I agree with you that Nick’s argument, concerning the chart at least, is flawed. The main problem with Nick’s chart is that it/he insists that religion is the root cause of the problems mentioned, however I maintain that religion is basically a result of human tendencies, and it is these tendencies, with or without religion, that lead to many of these problems. If you removed religion, these human tendencies still remain. We must understand our development, evolution, psychology, instincts for survival, and just the basic reason we do things to really improve our situation. To say religion causes the problems without asking why we have religion in the first place really solves nothing.

    However, the assertions you presented in your argument are at best, problematic as well.

    1. You say you are “sick and tired of seeing the same simplistic assumptions being made by supposedly enlightened, neutral observers.” :

    Nick does not claim to be an enlightened, neutral observer. In fact, by the very title he puts his views and opinions right out in the open and is very clear about his objective. He very quickly claims to be an enlightened biased observer.

    2. You say “It’s very fashionable to blame everything on religion these days…” :

    Statistically, however, this is not true. Some 80 - 85 percent of the world’s population claims some sort of religious affiliation. And over 50 percent of the world’s population is of the Judeo-Christian / Muslim belief in an omnipotent, omniscient, personal and loving God. Given this information, it can hardly be said that it is “fashionable to blame everything on religion these days.” Nick is actually taking a pretty bold and brave stance and if you noticed has no support in the comments that surround his article. This at least deserves some respect. He sees a problem with religion and he is voicing it, though admittedly with a slight penchant for the melodramatic.

    3. You say “Of course, people do kill in the name of religion: when people are committed to a group which they see as opposed to another group, often they will be prepared to go to all sorts of lengths for it. In parts of the world people will kill in the name of their local football team, in spite of the fact that a football team does not itself have anything to do with violence. See where I’m going with this?” :

    There’s a significant difference between the occasional sports related killing compared to that of the all too well known religiously charged wars, genocides, ethnic cleansings, and whatnot. Football produces the occasional drunk fight between opposing fans at times leading to a fatality. Football, however does not have sacred texts chronicling instances of God commanding “his people” to kill an opposing group of people who inhabit a land which he has decided to hand over to his elect group. Furthermore, religion, unlike football, in nearly all circumstances is started by some sort of personal and divine revelation which is only known to the one person having the revelation and requires, in essence, blind faith by the adherents of that religion… you can see the danger in this which is what I think Nick is talking about in his chart. Football is tangible, it requires no faith, which coincidentally is responsible for far fewer deaths than religion as well. The deaths in football as I mentioned are generally caused by occasional drunken brawls, while religion has on many occasions encouraged its followers to seek out those of other religions to harm or kill them and has been used to legitimize and fuel wars.

    4. You say “People will of course bring up things like the Spanish Inquisition. It’s interesting to note that far more people were murdered “in the name of Reason” during the French revolution, or in the name of state atheism in the Soviet Union. :

    First of all I don’t know that we can really dig up the numbers and statistics to really back this claim. Religion has had a much longer life span the the Soviet Union and given the total death toll caused by ALL religions it may be more than that of the Soviet Union. Also, to use the argument that while the Spanish Inquisition was bad, but that the French Revolution and Soviet Union were worse is not exactly an argument in favor of the good and advantageous aspects of religion. It’s like saying, using the Soviet Union again… “People will of course bring up things like Nazi concentration camps. It’s interesting to note that far more people were murdered in the name of state atheism in the Soviet Union.” Please forgive the use of such a potent and disgusting example but what I am trying to show is that just because the death and suffering toll under one circumstance is higher than the other does not make the one with less death and suffering morally good or acceptable.

    5. You say “Another point I’d like to make is that you don’t have to be gullible or stupid to be religious. The story of the Bible, the Koran etc is plausible, if you allow that certain things about the universe cannot be observed or confirmed - hardly illogical.” :

    I am not very familiar with the Koran, however, the Bible from what I know is comprised of many stories and many of which are not plausible at all given the things about the universe that we can and do observe and which are confirmed. In fact, many of my fellow Christians hold that faith is belief in the implausible or impossible, which is admittedly quite illogical. However, I agree with you that you don’t have to be gullible or stupid to be religious, but this of course requires the need to define the term “religious”, which is a task we can leave for another time.

    6. You say “Religion is basically comprised of a)moral laws and b)traditions. The moral laws are useful to society, the traditions may be non-nonsensical but are harmless.” :

    Religion is primarily comprised of personal/individual revelation, then as it becomes more accepted and established it focuses more on the practical issues of moral laws and traditions. Furthermore, if you actually read the sacred texts of many religions you will find many moral laws and traditions that are conveniently ignored by its followers due to their inapplicability in today’s society. For example, in Exodus, the second book of the Bible God revealed to Moses, and only Moses, that anyone found breaking the Sabbath should be put to death. And to follow up this command to make the point more potent, there is even an example of a man who simply collected firewood on the Sabbath who was subsequently stoned to death. Luckily, despite being one of God’s strict commands, we continue to disobey this order. But this is far from harmless. Also, many people in the Southern United States used the Bible, both old and new testaments to justify slavery. Also, most religions continue to hold on to teachings about how women should be treated which is in most cases sub-human and usually like some sort of farm animal to be used simply for the utilitarian purposes of the patriarch. Also, there are issues of sexuality, most notably, the traditions handed down that cause fear and hatred toward homosexuality. Also, there are countless instances of groups or sects interpreting prophecies to mean that Jesus is coming back and so they sell all possessions and wait for the second coming. This very idea of the second coming has caused many people to have no cares for pressing global and environmental issues due to their fatalistic paradigm that the earth and this life do not matter because Jesus is coming back by (insert date of many false predictions though the current popular one is December 2012). There are religions that tell people they need to have many children for God, which after a certain point is horrible for the health of the woman and also puts an impossible strain on the earth. There are religions with traditions and rules about medicine and so called faith healing. A child with, say for example Diabetes, is only prayed for but is given no medical attention and dies. This is certainly harmful to that child who did not choose the religion of his or her parents but nevertheless faced the consequences of the traditions and rules.
    In short, some traditions are harmless but some are quite harmful. The issue is up for debate and worth discussion. Thank you Nick for bringing these issues up, I have appreciated your thoughts and input and enjoyed sparring back and forth with you though it has been awhile since I have been able to.

    “If we are to understand another’s belief, then we must also understand the deficiencies and inadequacies of our own.”
    The Varieties of Scientific Experience
    -Carl Sagan

    18 August 2008, 1:11 pm

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