Which part of the God Delusion did you find most offensive? (beliefs, experience)

[lilithu]

Originally Posted by logician

Getting testy in your old age? I can refute any argument you make for the existence of some god.

The thing is, I don't make arguments for the existence of God. I believe in God, but I don't try to convince others to believe in God. Whereas you approach every statement about God as an argument for God, and then do your tedious "there is no God" thing.

Originally Posted by logician

There is no heaven or hell, fortunately, so supposed gods like you believe in cannot torture people for eternity.

THIS is a perfect example. I don't believe in heaven and hell either, except for what we create here on earth. But you can't be bothered to pay attention to the context of the argument. You see the words heaven and hell and your automatic response is "there is no heaven or hell."

Really,

[mball1297]

Originally Posted by Jay

And you clearly have a problem.

Science and religion are both human endeavors and both suffer from the association. So, for example, we've 'Social Darwinism' evolve to justify the violence, coercion and bigotry of the 19th and 20th century.

At the same time, we've also seen religion in the vanguard of the Abolitionist, Peace, Humanist, and Civil Rights movements.

Your bigoted view is adolescent and superficial. Perhaps your head will be clearer after some sleep.

Why would you say that anything other than religion justifies things like violence, coercion and bigotry. Science doesn't justify anything, it describes and explains it. It says "this is what happened, and these are possible causes", whereas religion says "this is right and this is wrong, it was ok to do this because of this".

Again, no one ever said that good things don't come from religion too, but that's not the question here.

[mball1297]

Originally Posted by Jay

Or perhaps not.

Or perhaps you can't see it.

[BalanceFx]

Originally Posted by logician

Getting testy in your old age? I can refute any argument you make for the existence of
some god.

Well we can explain the evolution of our solar system, planet, life on our planet and even the evoution of species... (More or less) However all signs point that all galaxies are red shifted indicating they are moving away from us. Now recently there has been some debate about how fast they are moving away but they are moving away.

This has led us again to the belief that the universe we know and exist in had a beginning in time. That is at one point all the galaxies were together. The Pangea theory of the universe or the Big Bang. hehe.

Ok so if an argument were made for a god it would be for one that started that chain reaction that created our universe and the fundamental laws we must live by. The four forces, Basic atomical structure etc etc.

Whats interesting is people at one time believed the universe to be endless and now they are leaning towards the universe is not flat it is round theory. That is that the universe has boundaries because space time curves in on itself thus if you were to travel far enough in one direction you would eventually get to the same spot you began at.

We as creatures bound by such space can't escape that space to see what's outside of it.

In terms of philosphy I have heard it summed up as... You once believed the earth the center of everything, and then the sun... Soon the center of our galaxy was the center of everything and now the universe. What vanity you must have as humans to assume this universe is the only one?

Funny and rhetorical since we can't answer it and it plays with the meaning of what we call the universe. The same person also said, "Scientists always talk of theories that are completely accurate but become fatally flawed with errors when used on a macro or micro scale without realizing that the theory is flawwed the whole way through it justs the error is so small when normally considered." I forgot who said it.

Dawkins argument is things in our universe are the way they are because if they were not we would not be here. Quite logical really. That guy is pretty cool hehe.

But the multiple universe theory implies that there were lots of failed universes and ours is probably one of those failures as the universe will eventually contract back in on itself. Or maybe it wont... One theory is the galaxies will keep moving away until whatever force blew them apart is expended and then gravity will pull everything back together... and then boom again... hehe. Its equally probable though that we dont have enough data and all the galaxies are in fact spinning around something larger:

Earth Rotates at the equator at 1000 miles per hour
Earth Rotates the sun at 67,000 miles per hour.
Sol (the sun) rotates the center of the galaxy at 486,000 miles per hour.
The galaxy is moving (Possibly and probably rotating) at 300,000 miles per hour.

We sitting still are moving as a sum of those numbers. Or 854,000 Miles per hour.

The speed of light moves at 670,616,629.2 miles per hour.

We know that if we were to send stuff at speeds approaching light the objects on board would experience time in a slower fashion. Past the speed of light nothing happens for said object. You can experience the same effect by cooling an object to absolute 0.

Why Absolute 0? Why is the Speed of Light the Speed of Light? Etc etc... An argument for god could be made that something set all these factors just as an equal argument could be made that these numbers are what they are because they could be nothing else.

[lilithu]

Originally Posted by mball1297

Again, no one ever said that good things don't come from religion too, but that's not the question here.

Yes, it is. If the thread starts off with someone like Dawkins, who clearly does not see anything good about religion, and then people argue about whether they agree with Dawkins, then that's where the line is drawn.

If people want to discuss some of the aspects of some of the Abrahamic traditions that they feel is dangerously susceptible to abuse, then they should start a thread about the specific issues, instead of starting with a thread about a guy that attacks religion in total and then saying "That's not what I meant."

[Heneni]

Why should anyone be offended by a delusion? If you get offended by god, it means you believe he exists. If you get offended by people, you are normal. Offense is given and taken daily, and nearly every post you read or write might cause it. Offense can only happen if your ego is hurt. Christians and non-christians alike struggle with the ego. The problem is when offense is taken when none was intended. And how do we cope with the offense of god? We call him a delusion. To save the ego, we would rather deny he exists than ask ourselves why we would be offended by what we would like to be a puff of smoke.

And if we get offended by christians, we would like to cope with that by believing that god does not exist. But then you would have to deny the existance of anything else that causes offense, to have any credebility.

Heneni

[mball1297]

Originally Posted by lilithu

Yes, it is. If the thread starts off with someone like Dawkins, who clearly does not see anything good about religion, and then people argue about whether they agree with Dawkins, then that's where the line is drawn.

If people want to discuss some of the aspects of some of the Abrahamic traditions that they feel is dangerously susceptible to abuse, then they should start a thread about the specific issues, instead of starting with a thread about a guy that attacks religion in total and then saying "That's not what I meant."

The way I see it, I can partly agree with Dawkins. He has a point, even if he doesn't take everything into consideration. I agreed with him with the stipulation that I think there are some problems with the way he presents it, and that I don't think all religion should be banned, which was not specifically said in the quote that started all of this, at least not the part that I responded to. I know that he promotes the idea that all religion should be banned, but that's not what I was agreeing with, and so, for my argument, the point that religion does some good in the world is irrelevant.