Religion, why do you believe?

[poolerboy]

Zeus, according to the sources, was a being who was quite visible, quite material, not only part of creation but able to mate with human women. There was no claim ever put forth that he created anything other than his own offspring.

That isn't the point. The point is that you can ascribe anything to anything using his logic. I could, at least in some level, understand why someone could ascribe the complexity of the universe to the product of a magnificent agency. It is quite a leap to then think that that's why Jesus is Christ.

Before the objections start, I'll point out that the former hypothesis, relating beauty and God, is actually more reasonable than the second: in our experience, the presence of beauty quite often points to the action of a 'beautifier' (in honesty, in our experience, when walls fall down it isn't totally uncommon for someone to have pushed them, either).

Beauty is the way you interpret what you see in nature, not because it's necessarily objectively so. Moreover, I see you're alluding to the teleological argument (argument from design). We know complexity doesn't imply design from numerous examples that we can observe. Snowflakes, for one, are formed from natural processes. If all things require a designer, would God? The believer would obviously protest to such a question. This argument also rests on an argument from ignorance. Suppose that we were both Aztecs looking up at the sky and you point to the sun and say, "You see that firey ball in the sky? That's a fat man ablaze floating in the sky." I, being unconvinced, reply that it seems unlikely that it's the case. You then say, "Oh? Then what's your explanation?" If I don't have one would your argument win by default? That's an argument from ignorance.

Here's an example of why I believe, as a Catholic:

If you're convinced of the truth claims of your religion based on a religious portrait that didn't fall over then nearly anything was going to convince you: surviving a car crash, finding money on the sidewalk, being cured of lukemia, etc. After the Tsunami in 2004 Star Jones thanked God that the thing didn't strike when she was there just weeks prior. The Tsunami killed ~160,000 people. Was this Him blessing or an oversight? Or, perchance, a coincidence that happened to go in her favor? You're more than welcome to be convinced on the basis of coincidences. Just realize that to an outsider if a negative outcome occurs, this would in all fairness have to be evidence to the contrary.

Man will always have a very deep seated need for Religion, it is something that none of us can shake off.

And yet Denmark, rated the country with the happiest people in the world, is predominantly irreligious as well as non-theistic. Your assertion is an example of a belief in belief.

 

[Nishin]

Man will always have a very deep seated need for Religion, it is something that none of us can shake off. Man has had the need from the very beginning of the dawn of time.

MikeyLove... this is not to gang up on you after someone else already quoted you on that... but you really shouldn't state things as factual when they are far from being true... I personally have no need for Religion, never have, and I'm sure many other people, present and past, do not feel such need either ...

I'm actually confused, if not offended, as to why you (or anybody by that matter) would claim such thing for it seems to imply that, at best, you claim to know things about myself and others that we do not... or that , at worst, people who do not feel such need would be abnormal human beings ...

 

[hotatlboi]

No illogic involved -- you're comparing two different things, and in ignorance, too.

On the contrary, there's some pretty horrid logic involved. Nothing in creation on a basic level proves the bible is true in its claims of the divine. That's basically what he was saying.

Zeus, according to the sources, was a being who was quite visible, quite material, not only part of creation but able to mate with human women. There was no claim ever put forth that he created anything other than his own offspring.

Fine, if not Zeus, substitute any of the myriad of other gods who people/sources did claim created the universe. What basic element of creation points to Christ of the bible as the creator and not one of them?

 

[AsianDream]

Fine, if not Zeus, substitute any of the myriad of other gods who people/sources did claim created the universe. What basic element of creation points to Christ of the bible as the creator and not one of them?

To my mind the fact that there are a wide variety of different religions is a reasonable indication that maybe none of them are true.

If one religion was correct then all the others would be false. So the probability for any one religion is that it will not be the "one true faith" -

It is a reasonable step from this fact to the conclusion that none of them are

 

[Spensed]

^ But that isn't "a reasonable step".

Often there are a number of competing scientific theories before one of them, or a combination of aspect of some of them, is verified as the true one.

Also one has the symbolic, figurative or metaphysical dimension or whatever one wants to call it. Some religions do resonate with concepts (like love they neighbor) that may well have some underlying universal foundation of some kind. So what is true is not necessarily answered only on a factually verifiable basis.

I'm not saying you're wrong in your conclusion, just that it isn't a reasonable deduction from the fact that there are a variety of religions.

 

[hotatlboi]

Often there are a number of competing scientific theories before one of them, or a combination of aspect of some of them, is verified as the true one.

That only works in science because scientific theories are falsifiable, so incorrect ones can be disproved and discarded.

Religion is rarely if ever falsifiable. It makes claims that simply cannot be tested by any means that we have. So incorrect religions can never be disproved.

 

[Looking4Fun2009]

I don't really have a religion, but, I define myself as spiritual, it's just how I feel, like I don't know whether there is a Higher Power or Powers out there, part of me likes to think so, but, another part admits I just don't know, but, I do like drawing from different religions and beliefs, like Buddhism, Taoism and many other religions (I want to learn more about Hinduism, especially its rich history of Yoga) to create my own personal spirituality, kind of like what SMG said she did (I don't do it 'cause of her, though).

Anyway, I'm not sure if that made any sense or what, but, it's just how I feel.

 

[Kyanimal]

As I've mentioned before, and I'm sure many are tired of me saying it, I'm a Preacher's Kid. Methodist father, Quaker grandfather, also a minister, as were my great grandparents, along with my uncles and cousins. I'm the "Black Sheep" of my branch of the Family. I didn't go into "The Church" as my profession.

I have, however, studied most of the Religions prevalent on our Planet. And, I've come to the following conclusions ...

Yes! There is, indeed, a "Higher Power"! Not, necessarily, a "Good Guy in the Sky", or even an overall Creator, but, rather, a general Spirituality that is bigger than any one of Us.

We are ALL Spiritual beings experiencing a temporary physical existence.

Each one of Us is a Unique part of a much larger picture.

Spirituality, and/or Sentience, is not confined to Human Beings.

"God" is the essence of ALL Life.

We are the stewards of our Planet.

We should Value, and Respect, ALL that is around, and is a part, of Us.

We are Responsible for how we Think, and, therefore, what we Say/Do, or Don't Say/Do, accordingly.

Our LIFE is Ours to Live as we see fit.

Of course ... no matter what ...

Keep smilin'!!
Chaz

 

[AsianDream]

^ But that isn't "a reasonable step".

Often there are a number of competing scientific theories before one of them, or a combination of aspect of some of them, is verified as the true one.

Spensed - a valid point and maybe I overstated the case.

However the difference with scientific theories is that eventually one of them is backed up by the weight of evidence and then becomes the accepted answer.

It is interesting that in science - those that postulate an un-proven hypothesys can be as evangelical in promoting this as any religious believer . Also interesting that some (like Darwin) reached conclusions they really didn't want to believe - but were forced to do so by the evidence.

The difficulty with religion is that there are a number of competing ideas - with no evidential proof for any of them - other than the "Faith" of those that believe in them.

Also there does unfortunately seem to be an inverse relationship between the reasonableness of an idea (at least to an outsider) and the strength of the faith that believers have in this.

Whilst I have no doubt of the sincerity of the "Peoples Temple Agricultural Project" (Jonestown) I can see no rational basis for their ideas and extreme actions. On a lesser scale I find the ideas of the "Latter Day Saint movement" (Mormons) hard to comprehend on a rational basis - as indeed are those of almost all other major religions.

What does fascinate me with religion - is where do otherwise quite rational people get the idea that they are absolutely right and have the ultimate truth?

I would stress that I think people should be able to believe whatever they want - no matter how irrational it may seem to others. Where I have severe reservations about religion is when they try to force these ideas on others.

At one end of the scale this is the Islamic theocracy of Iran executing 4,000 people (and counting) for being Gay - while at the other end covers "born again" USA republicans - where they seek to impose policies on others based on their religious ideas.

 

[poolerboy]

Also relevant to point out...

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NPqerbz8KDc"]The problem with anecdotes[/ame]

 

[bankside]

Man will always have a very deep seated need for Religion, it is something that none of us can shake off. Man has had the need from the very beginning of the dawn of time.

The most obvious rejoinder to your outlandish claim is that man has not existed from the very beginning of the dawn of time.

He has existed for but a fraction of a second of the duration of the universe so far. And as his forebears crawled out of the sludge on their flippers, or more recently as they scuttled to safety through the forest on their paws, what need had they for religion? None! When exactly did this need begin?

I can pose that question rhetorically and be satisfied with it, but I would suggest an answer: It was only once the first priest was in need of a job that man was taught to need religion.

 

[bankside]

No illogic involved -- you're comparing two different things, and in ignorance, too.

Zeus, according to the sources, was a being who was quite visible, quite material, not only part of creation but able to mate with human women. There was no claim ever put forth that he created anything other than his own offspring.

As to the beauty of the universe, putting forth a Creator as the cause is not unreasonable, though neither is it any more reasonable than the hypothesis that the universe seems beautiful because seeing it as beautiful is somehow a survival trait. The difference between those two is that one bears examination in the realm of evidence, while the other bears examination only in the realm of thought.

It's rather like the walls of Jericho, which fell down: proposing the hypothesis "God did it" is reasonable, as is "there was an earthquake" -- though the astute will note that these two are not mutually exclusive (neither are the two above).


Before the objections start, I'll point out that the former hypothesis, relating beauty and God, is actually more reasonable than the second: in our experience, the presence of beauty quite often points to the action of a 'beautifier' (in honesty, in our experience, when walls fall down it isn't totally uncommon for someone to have pushed them, either).

Kulindahr, you are playing games. Zeus was never, in any source, offered as a historical figure. Even if he were, however, if you want myths about tangible divinity, you only have to look to the idea of the trinity to find some very firm claims for material and visible personages. If Jesus can be born into the world in Christian myths, so can all the Greek Gods in their myths. There is no differentiation on that count as you have claimed, except perhaps that Jesus was taken to be more material than Zeus.

But more than just challenging the specifics of this post, I need to step back a bit, because the way you have answered says a lot.

I recall once asking you why you held to Christianity instead of another religion, and your claim was that it made more sense.

I had no reason to doubt your account of your own decision-making process. From it I inferred that you had considered a wide variety of religious and philosophical perspectives, perhaps some in greater depth than others, but that you had given some due consideration to the others and had found them wanting.

Yet in your reply here, you seem so dismissive of the very proper question asked of a believer; "Why this particular belief, when the things you hold to be hallmarks of truth are evident in so many other myths?" I can't help but think the question itself seems impertinent to you at best, a waste of time, or not just "in ignorance" but just ignorant. Roundly unobservant. Etc.

But if you had conducted the kind of survey of different religions that I inferred from your reply to my earlier question, I think you would have a different approach. I think you would have maybe considered questions like that personally, or you would have met people of sincere disposition who had any number of questions like that. What I find notable is not just that you don't seem to answer the question convincingly, but you seem willing to brush it aside as a triviality. The question seems alien to you rather than a really good point worth pondering.

If I'm right about this then I would say that rather than deciding on the merits of Christianity compared with other possibilities, it is a position you have leapt to rather than travelled to. The terrain around Christianity where non-adherents sit seems remarkably unfamiliar to you, and I don't see how you could have passed through it.

 

[AsianDream]

Here's an example of why I believe, as a Catholic:

I had an incredible experience during after the Earthquake of 1989 that ran from the santa cruz mountains to San Francisco and beyond; Yes, I was in the midst the earthquake on a bus on the way home from work, but more to the point; I got home and went to my room (remember that the quake registered 7.1 in San Francisco) and saw that my picture of the Immaculate Heart of Mary was still on the wall by a colored thumb tack, and a Sacred Heart statue was still standing on the very weak small table with a thin slab of Marble, and very weak legs which wobled like it would fall apart. The statue was in the exact place as it was before I went to work that morning. And yet, My Grandmother's nick-nacks fell off the fireplace mantle which was solidly in the wall. I asked my Grandmother if she had touched my picture and statue, and she said No, then I told her why I asked. We both believed that God, through his sacred Heart and the Immaculate Heart of his Mother had been watching over us. This is part of Why I believe in the core teachings of the Catholic Church, which can never be changed by anyone, Not even Pope Benedict XVI can change it.

There is one word for your experience - LUCK

I've met a guy that survived a three storey fall and also read of someone who broke their neck and died falling out of bed.

In both these cases it wasn't divine intervention - just pure chance - how they happened to land.

So the poor guy that lived after the three storey fall - and had to wait before he got to heaven was just unlucky while the person that got to heaven real quick falling out of bed was just very lucky.

As an Athiest I'd take a different view on which of them was the most lucky.

One thing that makes me suspicious - is that if Heaven was so great - why are most religious people just as reluctant as the rest of us to get there? (discounting Islamic suicide bombers eager for their 40 virgins).

 

[Spensed]

What does fascinate me with religion - is where do otherwise quite rational people get the idea that they are absolutely right and have the ultimate truth?

You can see that on these threads from both pro-religious and anti-religious folk alike.

Zealots often need the enthusiasm and determination of their cause to sustain their own beliefs.

For others, their convictions work, on some level for them, so they make the sanctimonious and mistaken assumption that it must be the same for everyone else.

The one aspect that I don't think non-believers give sufficient weight to is the poetic or metaphysical "truth" of religious belief.

Concepts like the function of divine grace or like forgiveness or the choice between love and hate do reflect a body of thought and belief that may have more to it than meets the scientific eye.

I'm not saying that makes religion true or even necessary, but it does warrant inquiry and not simply keeping the door slammed against everything religion has to offer.

 

[poolerboy]

I'm not saying that makes religion true or even necessary, but it does warrant inquiry and not simply keeping the door slammed against everything religion has to offer.

That's the problem though -- there is no real inquiry. Religion expresses everything into terms of belief, faith, and absolutes (e.g. "good" vs. "evil"), without need for reason or even understanding. Religion puts reality, morality, love, happiness and desire in a supernatural realm inaccessible to the mind of man. How can humans ever achieve peace when their religious scripts has their god condoning war and violence, while man must accept the superstitious belief that their unknowable god does this for mysterious reasons, forever beyond the comprehension of man? How can you understand the physics of the universe if you believe that an unfathomable supernatural agent created everything just a few thousand years ago? How can you live a full happy life if your religion denies the nature of sex, desire, and mind? How can you have workable government if you believe laws derive from an incomprehensible super-being? How can you have the future of the planet or your grand children if you believe that supernatural predestination will end the world? No one here is holding religion as being disastrous across the board. The problem at the root of many religions, however, is that it promotes a methodology to approaching the nature of reality that is problematic: faith -- the very antithesis to inquiry and freethought. At its most benign level it can present itself as a mental obstruction and at its worst can inform actions in the most horrid way imaginable. We can all learn from religions without needing to take anything on faith. If you want to jump on the faith wagon, that's your priviledge. But you'd be asking far to much for us to take it seriously.

 

[Spensed]

^ I don't "jump on the faith wagon" and nor am I suggesting that anyone else does so.

Your summary proves the previous point that each side only sees the other through the prism of their own preconceptions and prejudices. To dismiss religion just because of the element of faith or the shortcomings of particular religions is myopic.

Although religion isn't scientifically verifiable, it's consequences haven't just been the negatives on your shopping list. It has advanced education and even science at times when no one else was doing so in an organized way. It has helped to provide a framework of social compassion. It has motivated and provided both spiritual and physical comfort for many people. It has sponsored great art and architecture, etc., etc.

My point is that, in some respects, religion can be like any great poetry or imaginative writing. Whether you like it or not, it does have a strong impact on many people and it does contain, sometimes relatively consistent, principles that may, or may not, have some ultimate value.

 

[Nishin]

^^ these are extremely interesting questionings indeed... yet we do have religious scientists, non-religion-based governments/judiciary systems (although in countries that used to be religion-driven), religious people who are perfectly balanced sexuality-wise... my guess is that just as much as religion is a very influential force in our world there still are counter-powers or natural inclinations within people to be able to overcome such mental blinkers... that's the complexity of the human psyche.

 

[Kulindahr]

Kulindahr, you are playing games. Zeus was never, in any source, offered as a historical figure. Even if he were, however, if you want myths about tangible divinity, you only have to look to the idea of the trinity to find some very firm claims for material and visible personages. If Jesus can be born into the world in Christian myths, so can all the Greek Gods in their myths. There is no differentiation on that count as you have claimed, except perhaps that Jesus was taken to be more material than Zeus.

But more than just challenging the specifics of this post, I need to step back a bit, because the way you have answered says a lot.

I recall once asking you why you held to Christianity instead of another religion, and your claim was that it made more sense.

I had no reason to doubt your account of your own decision-making process. From it I inferred that you had considered a wide variety of religious and philosophical perspectives, perhaps some in greater depth than others, but that you had given some due consideration to the others and had found them wanting.

Yet in your reply here, you seem so dismissive of the very proper question asked of a believer; "Why this particular belief, when the things you hold to be hallmarks of truth are evident in so many other myths?" I can't help but think the question itself seems impertinent to you at best, a waste of time, or not just "in ignorance" but just ignorant. Roundly unobservant. Etc.

But if you had conducted the kind of survey of different religions that I inferred from your reply to my earlier question, I think you would have a different approach. I think you would have maybe considered questions like that personally, or you would have met people of sincere disposition who had any number of questions like that. What I find notable is not just that you don't seem to answer the question convincingly, but you seem willing to brush it aside as a triviality. The question seems alien to you rather than a really good point worth pondering.

If I'm right about this then I would say that rather than deciding on the merits of Christianity compared with other possibilities, it is a position you have leapt to rather than travelled to. The terrain around Christianity where non-adherents sit seems remarkably unfamiliar to you, and I don't see how you could have passed through it.

Zeus doesn't inhabit any terrain anywhere near Christianity.
Zeus was held to be a material being, just another part of the universe. That puts him out of the running for consideration right there. Yes, Jesus was born into the universe, but the Greek gods were born in the universe, from it and part of it. Even the so-called primordial figures are part and parcel of a material universe.

Yet Zeus was not accessible -- he didn't really care about anyone or anything, he was just there. To him, humans were toys, or irritants, but not of importance either way. (That, again, removes him from consideration.)

You concede that these tales are myth -- fables would be a better term. Indeed, no matter what you do with them, they remain myth, a bunch of stories about a bunch of folks no one would really want to live anywhere near.

The whole point of Christianity is that myth became reality. If all the Greek figures were meant to be were stories to make people go "WTF?", then there's no comparison -- they're so different that rather than being neighbors, they're in entirely different terrain altogether. To have any standing as worth comparing to Christianity, there'd have to be a claim not only that they were real, but that they were actually running the whole show, indeed that they'd started it, and that they were around to show an interest of sort sort (even throwing parties) in their critters.

To claim any comparison here would be like observing that both my porch and the Queen Elizabeth II have railings -- a point to which the best response is, "So what?"

So, yes, I gave consideration to the Greek mythos, and found it without substance: it's either, on the one hand, merely tales not meant to be taken seriously, or, on the other, a set of tales that even if real shouldn't be taken seriously.

 

[Kulindahr]

There is one word for your experience - LUCK

I've met a guy that survived a three storey fall and also read of someone who broke their neck and died falling out of bed.

In both these cases it wasn't divine intervention - just pure chance - how they happened to land.

Unfortunately, given the two hypotheses... in this situation there's no way to tell the difference.
And that's the trouble with staking one's belief on such things as what household items didn't fall over during an earthquake. I could posit the equally plausible notion that the statues of the Virgin Mary didn't fall because the Mary cult is born of the Devil, and demons intervened to keep the images standing so people would continue to be blinded, and there would be no way to distinguish between that and pure luck, either.

So the poor guy that lived after the three storey fall - and had to wait before he got to heaven was just unlucky while the person that got to heaven real quick falling out of bed was just very lucky.

As an Athiest I'd take a different view on which of them was the most lucky.

One thing that makes me suspicious - is that if Heaven was so great - why are most religious people just as reluctant as the rest of us to get there? (discounting Islamic suicide bombers eager for their 40 virgins).

There are days when I'd wonder which was the most lucky -- indeed, considering the way it appears this world is going, with increasing authoritarianism on the march not just in the U.S., I often feel like consoling new parents for their tragedy.

As for getting to heaven, remember that there is true beauty in this world, as well, and that to a certain extent what and who you are there will depend on what you were here -- so living long may be a good idea from more than one perspective. It would only be if you thought this world totally sucked that you'd think getting to heaven more quickly would be awesome (and there have been sects which believed that).

 

[Kulindahr]

That's the problem though -- there is no real inquiry. Religion expresses everything into terms of belief, faith, and absolutes (e.g. "good" vs. "evil"), without need for reason or even understanding.

I always find it odd when I see Christians who are firmly convinced that it's possible to go without sinning. It's pretty clear in the Bible that this world is so messed up that it's a quite sound and reasonable, if not inescapable, conclusion that there will be many, many times where there just is no right thing to do, indeed that for much of life the choice isn't between sinning and not sinning, but between one sin or another (or others).
Those who find in Christianity a black-vs-white motif for their own lives are shallow thinkers: the only black-vs-white the Bible offers is God/white vs everything-else/black. For the business of mucking about in Creation, it's black vs shades-of-gray.