Bigotry as practice

[firedragon]

You didn't though.
You picked out one sentence, completely ignored his points and failed to address the content of his post.

So, whats your point? Are cavalry to someone else or do you have a point?

 

[firedragon]

Whaaa?

No problem Skeptic Thinker. So you came to the defence of your fellow.

Can you give any evidence to the statement "For good people to do evil things, it takes religion."?

If you dont have any research based, hypothesis quantified statistical evidence, this is just a faith statement.

Please go ahead.

 

[PruePhillip]

Doesn't that tell you something? It tells you that there is no way of knowing that either city was called by either name ever, or that any city was called by either of those names. Why point to any ruins and say that it was described in the Bible?

You know the story. Abraham came out of Sumer originally and settled in Canaan. His nephew
settled in the Jordan Valley and eventually married and lived in Sodom. Two men came to
take him out of the city. Lot's family went to a city outside the blast zone. His wife was returning
to Sodom when it was struck and she was 'turned to a pillar of salt.' The shock blast coated
the valley with vaporized or melted salt to a 25 km radius. Happened at night. Abraham was on
the lee side of a mountain range. In the moring he ventured to a vantage point and saw the
whole valley was like the smoke of a furnace.
Is this a myth, or the world's only eye witness account of cities destroy by cometary air blast?

Whatever, the skeptics have retreated - 'Sodom and Gomorra' is something which happened.
Vaporized by 2,000 C heat and blasted with 1,000 kph shock wave.

 

[Truthseeker]

We have seen this claim made by several people, but their "evidence" amounts to nothing more than assertion and belief.
Ironically, to insist that such things do constitute actual evidence is a clear sign of a lack of critical thinking.

There is literally zero evidence that Husayn-Ali was a messenger from god, not least because there is zero evidence that said god exists in the first place. (When I say "evidence", I am referring to information that can be independently verified as accurate, not just something you really want to be true)

Have you looked at the evidence yourself? The evidence is His verses in part. You need a spiritual susceptibility to recognize Him through His verses, if not, you're out of luck.

O people, if ye deny these verses, by what proof have ye believed in God? Produce it, O assemblage of false ones.

Nay, by the One in Whose hand is my soul, they are not, and never shall be able to do this, even should they combine to assist one another.

(Bahá’í Prayers)
www.bahai.org/r/174210857

 

[Truthseeker]

Science doesn't deal with "the truth". It isn't even a scientific concept. We deal with best explanations based on available evidence.
Claims of "truth" are both incoherent and divisive because they tend to be based on subjective belief rather than evidence.

Seek the truth. We can never attain it.

 

[Truthseeker]

There are many theists who get science right. That is they follow science first and adjust the religious belief to the knowledge that science reports.

That's right.

The problem is theists who reject science because they hold a religious belief that they assume is superior, even though they can't demonstrate that is the case.

That's right, too.

 

[Truthseeker]

I've been told that that evidence is his life and his words. For either of those to be evidence of a superhuman entity, they need to contain superhuman words and deeds, something that human beings just can't do on their own. Nothing else would be evidence that this was not just a human being being human. And neither of those rise to that level. To say they do is a leap of faith based on the will that they be what the faith-based thinker wants them to be. And so he sees what he wants to see.

Have you looked at all the evidence? Consider this passage also:

O people, if ye deny these verses, by what proof have ye believed in God? Produce it, O assemblage of false ones.

Nay, by the One in Whose hand is my soul, they are not, and never shall be able to do this, even should they combine to assist one another.

(Bahá’í Prayers)
www.bahai.org/r/174210857

The words are the proof, even by themselves, but you need a certain spiritual susceptibility to them. If not, you're out of luck.

 

[Truthseeker]

Since the 1940's scientists began to consider the ethics of what they discovered about the universe. This came directly out of the development of nuclear weapons and power. They were concerned about how their discoveries would be used by nations led by unstable leadership. There was quite a bit of concern about trump at the end of his term as president. Scientists are most certainly humanists, and not necessarily driven by any sort of religious belief or preference. They want their discoveries used to improve life on the planet and not be used to destroy or harm. Let's note there have been unethical scientists, and unethical governments, who have used discoveries against people of the world.

I'm not saying that only theists are ethical. There is a spiritual dimension to all men. All reflect the attributes of God to some extent. Indeed, sometimes theists are unethical. Look at how religious believers in the modern world sometimes are antagonistic to each other.

 

[Hanne]

"What god says".

we believe that everything God says is great - and some Christians follow His guidance, others don't. Alas.

 

[Link]

The problem with bigotry is that there is only one who is perfect (and that is the bigot...in his own opinion).

So, if the well known bigot, Adolph Hitler, had managed to eliminate all of the Jews, who would be next? Surely the dark haired people (Italians and Japanese....his Axis allies). After all, Hitler's idea was blond haired people. The world would then be missing the Japanese and Italians. Then who would Hitler turn to with his bigotry? Eventually, the German people, themselves, would be subjected to scrutiny....who was more pure than whom....and that would lead to the elimination of absolutely everyone except for the executioner.

The world would be a kinder place if there were not bigots. If we accept that others have their reasons for their beliefs, all could get along.

The Christian bible teaches us to get along. Yet, there were many times throughout history in which Christians were intolerant. We must learn from these instances to get closer to God's ideal.

A person can write "don't be mean to each other" and say if the whole world followed it, it would be a better place. Trust me, it won't make a better place.

Evil is to be repelled by evil like it in some situations and some situations by a good instead. It depends the circumstances.

Reality is if you let evil people do what they want, no good would remain for believers.

 

[Link]

Bear in mind that Link considers groups like Hezbollah to be proud and noble heroes, doing god's work.

You guys equating them to terrorists you create like ISIS shows that you all truly deserve hell.

 

[Link]

In condemning oppressors, do you oppress?

In general, you can't fight a monster without becoming one.

It's those who ignore oppressors and let them do what they want, that are partners in crime of the oppressors. It's those condemning them and trying to put a halt to them and only them, that have a chance of entering paradise.

 

[Link]

Someone asked "What about polytheism" and you said "most of it is about polytheism, particularly it focuses mostly on it's rival religion which that of the debauched Satanism type in which sexual deviance is praised and you have soothsayers and spiritual guides."

In other words, anyone who believes in polytheism is wrong, and only you are right? Do wrong people deserve to die or be tortured? Should a loving God allow their eternal torture?

The people who are wrong choose to ignore God's guidance for their whims. People who refuse to answer to God's call, deserve hell, because they chose darkness over light, blindness over sight, and choose to follow ignorance and conjecture over God's path of enlightenment and insights.

Those who don't enter by God door, where did they go and what life did they choose?

They sought to attach themselves to leaders and guides without proof over the chosen leaders by God that have proofs for their authority and only they have proof of authority.

They preferred the lower world over the sky that is adorned with lanterns for those who look. They sought their lower desires over opening their mystical eyes and seeing the family of the reminder in the sky/heaven connected to this world.

Why did they do so? It was evil the choice and there is no justification, it was an act of hate towards God and his light, and it will not be forgiven. Hell will be their forever home.

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

You know the story. Abraham came out of Sumer originally and settled in Canaan. His nephew settled in the Jordan Valley and eventually married and lived in Sodom. Two men came to take him out of the city. Lot's family went to a city outside the blast zone. His wife was returning to Sodom when it was struck and she was 'turned to a pillar of salt.' The shock blast coated the valley with vaporized or melted salt to a 25 km radius. Happened at night. Abraham was on the lee side of a mountain range. In the morning he ventured to a vantage point and saw the whole valley was like the smoke of a furnace. Is this a myth, or the world's only eye witness account of cities destroy by cometary air blast?

Your claims are not evidence for a God. Of course people witnessing such an event, assuming it occurred, are going to ascribe it to the wrath of God. Why should we believe their interpretation? Was the cometary impact of Jupiter also the wrath of God visited on the cloud people of that planet? I'm guessing that if there was primitive intelligent life there, they'd come to the same conclusion.

Whatever, the skeptics have retreated - 'Sodom and Gomorra' is something which happened. Vaporized by 2,000 C heat and blasted with 1,000 kph shock wave.

Why would that matter even if true? Do you consider it evidence that a deity exists? I don't.

Have you looked at all the evidence?

All I see is the words of a human being. There is no evidence of a deity in them, nothing there that is superhuman.

Consider this passage also: O people, if ye deny these verses, by what proof have ye believed in God? Produce it, O assemblage of false ones. Nay, by the One in Whose hand is my soul, they are not, and never shall be able to do this, even should they combine to assist one another.

You couldn't have written that? I could:

O people, for it is impossible to know the mind of God or refute his wisdom, nay, even if a thousand men were to try for a thousand years.​

Do you see a deity there? If not, why do you offer the words you did as evidence of one? My response to those words was about the same as yours would be expected to be to my version - I'm expected to see that as evidence of a deity? Sorry, but that's ordinary writing. Imagine people trying to convince you that I was a messenger of God using words like those. I can write more if you like:

Speak with wisdom and choose each word with care, for each word is like an invisible spirit, its kiss persisting long after its utterance. Go out and speak words of peace that you may enlighten the world and be a beacon of God. There is no greater bliss than to wear the face of God as one serves his brother in pious observation. Like a seed in fertile soil, your faithfulness will bloom in the expanse of the soul and radiate onto the world.​

Can you explain why you consider the words that you do evidence that their author was a messenger from God, but not those I wrote? I don't think you can. I'll bet if you put the words you posted and mine side by side and asked people which were written by a man pretending to speak for a God, and which are evidence for a God, it would be about 50-50, even with Baha'i.

The words are the proof, even by themselves, but you need a certain spiritual susceptibility to them.

Spiritual susceptibility must mean what I would call disabling the critical thinking apparatus. Yes, I know. There is no way to get to the conclusion that a deity exists except by faith, and faith simply isn't a path to truth. By faith, I can declare whatever I like and call it the truth, including the exact opposite of what you believe. I'm an atheist based on reason, but I could be one based on faith as well. Unexamined thought can go wherever the imagination takes it and be believed if one has "spiritual susceptibility." Not a virtue doing that..

 

[KWED]

we believe that everything God says is great - and some Christians follow His guidance, others don't. Alas.

Everything in the Bible, or just the bits you agree with?

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

... I'm an atheist based on reason, but I could be one based on faith as well. Unexamined thought can go wherever the imagination takes it and be believed if one has "spiritual susceptibility." Not a virtue doing that..

So you have solved Agrippa's Trilemma and the problem of epistemological solipsism? If yes, then please explain.

 

[KWED]

You guys equating them to terrorists you create like ISIS shows that you all truly deserve hell.

Any group that deliberately targets innocent civilians in the name of advancing a political or religious agenda are terrorists, regardless of who they are or where they come from.
You think that because you support a terrorist group, they are therefore not terrorists. That kind of naive thinking is what terrorist groups rely on.
You are as responsible for the deaths caused by those groups as the people pulling the trigger or detonating the bomb.

Maybe you are an inherently evil person and would support terrorism without the religious connection, but I will give you the benefit and assume, in Weinberg's classic words "to get good people to do evil takes religion" (or similar ideology).

 

[firedragon]

So you have solved Agrippa's Trilemma and the problem of epistemological solipsism? If yes, then please explain.

Who solved them? None of these are to be solved. Or I don't understand what you are saying.

 

[SkepticThinker]

So, whats your point? Are cavalry to someone else or do you have a point?

My point is that you aren't getting others' points because you are focusing in on specific sentences, instead of the entirety of the post. Then you're claiming that you don't understand their point and asking clarification questions that the poster has already answered, but you missed, because you honed in on one particular sentence.
Nobody is going to come to any understandings if we all just talk past each other like that.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Any group that deliberately targets innocent civilians in the name of advancing a political or religious agenda are terrorists, regardless of who they are or where they come from.
You think that because you support a terrorist group, they are therefore not terrorists. That kind of naive thinking is what terrorist groups rely on.
You are as responsible for the deaths caused by those groups as the people pulling the trigger or detonating the bomb.

Maybe you are an inherently evil person and would support terrorism without the religious connection, but I will give you the benefit and assume, in Weinberg's classic words "to get good people to do evil takes religion" (or similar ideology).

That would make some of the acts of the US and Uk during WWII terroristic acts,