Why are JUBbers so prejudiced against the religious/religion in general?

[bort138]

Lucky spoke earlier in the thread about the kinds of circumstances people might find themselves in life where having faith in the idea of something better than the life you're stuck in can be a powerfully important thing. And the entire thread completely ignored it or threw a tomato at it and went back to bickering about other things. People were not apparently interested in why anyone would ever be motivated to want or need faith or find use for it.

So it doesn't matter whether beliefs are true as long as they are comforting?

 

[xbuzzerx]

So it doesn't matter whether beliefs are true as long as they are comforting?

Does any cancer patient know for sure that they are going to recover? Can they prove it?

 

[MakeDigitalLove]

So it doesn't matter whether beliefs are true as long as they are comforting?

Why is that a problem for you?

 

[palbert]

Have we had Word Counts and Word Clouds in this thread yet?

 

[bort138]

There is a difference between thinking positively about a specific outcome or event and belief that a specific thing exists in the first place.

 

[palbert]

Carry on

 

[bort138]

Why is that a problem for you?

It would be very comforting for me to convince myself that I would live forever and no one close to me will ever die but I would prefer to accept reality and deal with it. I actually care whether my beliefs are actually true.

 

[MakeDigitalLove]

Well to the people who are religious, their beliefs are reality and I don't see how that has any bearing on you. You care about your beliefs being true but you also care that others do to, that seems to be the your issue.

 

[bort138]

Beliefs do not exist in a vacuum. When people believe in a god that has declared homosexuality an abomination it DOES actually affect me and my rights.

 

[xbuzzerx]

There is a difference between thinking positively about a specific outcome or event and belief that a specific thing exists in the first place.

Not when anticipating any sort of positive outcome goes against established facts or evidence, no, it's not any different. There is no logical reason for someone in a hopelessly poor neighborhood with no jobs to believe that their life is going to get better soon. If they get up every morning and live their lives as though there's a chance for that happening one day, it's faith. It's not logic.

Lucky brought up the way that Christianity took root among African Americans whom, as livelong chattel in slavery, had little or no realistic expectation of any good coming out of this life, so instead they placed faith in the next one.

If you still can't process why this is important for some people, it's only because you have never been in the kind of situation to give you the frame of reference to understand why it would ever be important for anyone.

 

[bort138]

Not when anticipating any sort of positive outcome goes against established facts or evidence, no, it's not any different. There is no logical reason for someone in a hopelessly poor neighborhood with no jobs to believe that their life is going to get better soon. If they get up every morning and live their lives as though there's a chance for that happening one day, it's faith. It's not logic.

Lucky brought up the way that Christianity took root among African Americans whom, as livelong chattel in slavery, had little or no realistic expectation of any good coming out of this life, so instead they placed faith in the next one.

If you still can't process why this is important for some people, it's only because you have never been in the kind of situation to give you the frame of reference to understand why it would ever be important for anyone.

It is completely different. You're equivocating the word faith. Confidence in an outcome based on previous outcomes or confidence in things that can be verified to exist is completely different. You as may be saying that the sun rising tomorrow or trusting that my friend will be on time and existence of god are both comparable faith positions.

Giving up on this life and anticipating that the next one, which may not even exist, sounds like a great way to maintain the status quo and squandering the only life you know you have.

 

[LuckysRevenge]

It is completely different. You're equivocating the word faith. Confidence in an outcome based on previous outcomes or confidence in things that can be verified to exist is completely different. You as may be saying that the sun rising tomorrow or trusting that my friend will be on time and existence of god are both comparable faith positions.

Giving up on this life and anticipating that the next one, which may not even exist, sounds like a great way to maintain the status quo and squandering the only life you know you have.

OR having faith in something positive happening despite all evidence pointing to the reality that it won't can save a life and change the world.

Faith that there is something to believe in besides a cruel and hateful world.

It doesn't have to be faith in the afterlife. Actually I wasn't referring to that.

Those slaves were able to persevere because they put their faith in something greater than mankind. Mankind that bought, sold, tortured, raped them and then found that all acceptable.

 

[xbuzzerx]

It is completely different. You're equivocating the word faith. Confidence in an outcome based on previous outcomes

You apparently didn't read my post, where I clearly said there are situations where having a positive outlook on your current or future situation requires you to do it in spite of previous outcomes. You make it sound as though the only time people ever think positive is when there's a greater than 50.0% chance based on previous statistics of the same circumstances for them to expect positive outcomes. That's not the way it works.

 

[blackbeltninja]

I agree. I do not support religious-based state policy or law in any way and have voted my entire life against the political factions that would like to do so here. But, to be brief, someone who thinks faith is wrong because it lacks evidence simply doesn't understand what faith is. If you had faith in something because it had been proven to you it wouldn't be faith at all.

Agreed. I understand the concept of faith, and the caveats which must apply by definition, perfectly.

I also understand it is perfectly wrong to run a society on a faith not everyone buys into, and that an easy catch-all to achieve any number of desired ends is to spin them into the teachings of a faith.

-d-

 

[xbuzzerx]

Agreed. I understand the concept of faith, and the caveats which must apply by definition, perfectly.

I also understand it is perfectly wrong to run a society on a faith not everyone buys into, and that an easy catch-all to achieve any number of desired ends is to spin them into the teachings of a faith.

-d-

Christians always amaze me when they want or support something like religion or Christian-based teachings in public schools, and then when you ask them if students will also study Native cosmology and Hinduism, they look at you agog as if having utterly no clue why you'd even ask such a question.

 

[blackbeltninja]

^Religious freedom for everyone, provided they're the same religion?

-d-

 

[xbuzzerx]

^Religious freedom for everyone, provided they're the same religion?

-d-

It was a massive irony to me when Christians are always talking about a (largely fictional) huge effort to 'ban' or 'oppress' Christian faith but then got on board behind state initiatives to "ban" Muslim teachings or policy influence (mostly in states where no such prospect was ever remotely realistic in the first place.) So yes, they do definitely regard their own religion as a special category not subject to the usual restrictions we should place on religion, or at least their actions seem to indicate that.

 

[bort138]

You apparently didn't read my post, where I clearly said there are situations where having a positive outlook on your current or future situation requires you to do it in spite of previous outcomes. You make it sound as though the only time people ever think positive is when there's a greater than 50.0% chance based on previous statistics of the same circumstances for them to expect positive outcomes. That's not the way it works.

You apparently didn't read my post where I said you're equivocating the word faith. Having a positive outlook and faith are not tge same thing so you can stop making that point.

 

[xbuzzerx]

You apparently didn't read my post where I said you're equivocating the word faith. Having a positive outlook and faith are not tge same thing so you can stop making that point.

They are the same thing when there isn't a logical reason or statistical basis for your positive outlook. x2.

 

[pat grimshaw]

^
You obviously didn't look at all those videos of Christians being beheaded on Youtube