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In an article titled "Is There a God?" commissioned, but never published, by Illustrated magazine in 1952, Russell wrote:
If I were to suggest that between the Earth and Mars there is a china teapot revolving about the sun in an elliptical orbit, nobody would be able to disprove my assertion provided I were careful to add that the teapot is too small to be revealed even by our most powerful telescopes. But if I were to go on to say that, since my assertion cannot be disproved, it is an intolerable presumption on the part of human reason to doubt it, I should rightly be thought to be talking nonsense. If, however, the existence of such a teapot were affirmed in ancient books, taught as the sacred truth every Sunday, and instilled into the minds of children at school, hesitation to believe in its existence would become a mark of eccentricity and entitle the doubter to the attentions of the psychiatrist in an enlightened age or of the Inquisitor in an earlier time.
Originally posted by awake_and_aware
Although i do believe all mono-theistic religions promote exclusivity and discrimination, especially the abrahamic religions; i believe there are fundamental differences between Christianity and Islam in terms of their severity of harm. I believe there are many contrasts between moral and ethical philosophy; Especially compared with the moral and ethical values of your average "vague faith" Christian.
The Koran discriminates against non-believers. Genocide and violence can be easily justified by abiding the scriptures of "God". It's evident that Islamic bombers act under concepts of Jihad and Matyrdom, i guess this ideology could be used to achieve a political or personal agenda through violence, but ultimately - they DO truly believe in the reward of paradise. ...But that's typical religion; false hope and blind fear.
I believe the Koran to be very sinister and wicked, more totalitarian than the bible and many other doctrines; it's essense is motivated by conversion, submission and expansion. Again, especially aggressive in comparison to the majority of religions.
This is the reason i am an Gnostic Atheist in regards to a descriptive effort by man in regards to God, but an Agnostic Atheist in regards to a creator/source, i definetly don't believe "faith" (belief without evidence) to be a virtue.
How did you arrive at Atheism? Or like many others did you just gradually outgrow the dogma similar to beginning to doubt Santa claus? What's your fundamental reasoning for being an Atheist?
Apologies if you have another position like Pantheism or Deism, i wouldn't have any concerns anyway as they are non-dogmatic
PS. Maybe you'd like to read some of my threads; i always appreciate criticise or advice.
If you take a look at www.evilbible.com... I think that you will find that all the genocidal quotations of the Koran, the justifications for slavery and Holy War against the devotees of competing deities, etc., are also present in the Bible.
This web site is designed to spread the vicious truth about the Bible. For far too long priests and preachers have completely ignored the vicious criminal acts that the Bible promotes.
EvilBible.com is a non-profit web site which was developed to promote atheism by revealing the wicked truth about the Bible and religion.
Originally posted by Seed76
Seriously??? You do know that, the alleged site is promoting Atheism and then claims to spread the truth???
This web site is designed to spread the vicious truth about the Bible. For far too long priests and preachers have completely ignored the vicious criminal acts that the Bible promotes.
EvilBible.com is a non-profit web site which was developed to promote atheism by revealing the wicked truth about the Bible and religion.
Originally posted by SmedleyBurlap
It seems dishonest to me when someone focuses all of their criticism on Islam and covers for it by saying "Oh but all faiths are bad. Except that Christianity is benign." Either stand by your anti-Theism and criticise both religions for their genocidaires, or admit that you're a closeted Christian!
And yet, all of those bad things are prevalent in Western society as well. They're just hidden and sanitized, so that the public doesn't recognize them as crimes. Consider the sex industry; most prostitutes are little more than chattel slaves, but the common liberal myth is that they are free labourers and that their profession deserves respect! The conservative position is no better - they volunteer to be prostitutes and are wholly responsible for anything bad that happens to them and, because prostitution is sinful, they deserve to be treated like slaves.
I always feel a sigh of relief when I am back in Europe
Yes I think that the author of the site "is" attempting to explain the "vicious" truth about the Bible; the fact that the author is an atheist is irrelevant as far as I am concerned.
Even an agnostic humanist who does not take any position on the philosophical question of whether the Creator exists or whether She does not exist, could not fail to recognise that the psychotic anthropomorphic (a human projection) tribal deity of the ancient Bronze Age Israelites can be accurately defined, as RIchard Dawkins states, as "arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully.
If a Biblical fanatic disputes this definition of the savage Israelite deity, it is simply further evidence of the "Joshua Syndrome (see the OP)" and the dangers of religious fanaticism.
While it is unsurpising that an ancient tribe of relatively primitive, savage, illiterate and superstitious blood sacrifice cultists would have such a genocidal warrior tribal deity, it is also remarkable that many modern, educated, scientific persons in the 21st century would also accept such a definition;
Western civlization rests upon the achievements of far more ancient societies. Long before the Greeks or Romans, the peoples of the ancient NearEast had learned to domesticate animals, grow crops,and produce useful articles of pottery and metal.
The ancient Mesoptamians and Egyptians developed writing, mathematics, and sophisticated methods of engineering while contributing a rich variety of legal,scientific, and religious ideas to those who would come after them.
The Phoenicians invented the alphabet andfacilitated cultural borrowing by trading throughout the known world, and ancient Israel gave birth to religious concepts that form the basis of modern Judaism,Christianity, and Islam.
however this can be explained by memetic transference and a lifetime of religious hypnosis and indoctrination.
Originally posted by SmedleyBurlap
reply to post by Lucifer777
And yet, all of those bad things are prevalent in Western society as well. They're just hidden and sanitized, so that the public doesn't recognize them as crimes. Consider the sex industry; most prostitutes are little more than chattel slaves, but the common liberal myth is that they are free labourers and that their profession deserves respect! The conservative position is no better - they volunteer to be prostitutes and are wholly responsible for anything bad that happens to them and, because prostitution is sinful, they deserve to be treated like slaves.
I always feel a sigh of relief when I am back in Europe
tbh I am a 'cultural supremacist' too, but I understand that it's only because I favour the cultural forms that I grew up in. Nevertheless I can come to understand and appreciate cultural forms that I find repellant - and find something admirable and respectable in it, even if I dislike it.
In my opinion, the Enlightenment wasn't really anything novel. It retained most of the structure of the Christian civilization and metaphysics and ethics and so on, but regrounded them in a secular foundation. As a revolutionary wave, it was too diverse to say that it had any particular direction or goals. However, it did generally succeed in overthrowing the tyranny of God and liberating the Intelligensia of Europe, if nobody else. I still think that the enlightenment's successors in the present day are by and large following in the shadow of Christianity, though. I do not believe that it was a new beginning for culture.
Biblical Law enthusiasts are well received and unpleasantly popular in Israel and the United States, and probably in other countries as well.
It's a latent social movement that has been dormant for some time and is gradually waking up again, as the historical circumstances which make a theocratic revolution possible are coming again. Remember that a mere century before the American Revolution began, the Puritanical forebears of Americanism staged a theocratic revolution in England.
Europe appears to be much more 'enlightened' (modernized) than the Muslim world, where there is a small number of educated elites and a very large number of conservative peasants. However, I think that this too is a matter of optics. The West only appears to be more modernized. I do not believe that the majority of Americans or Europeans are any more civilized than the majority of Muslims. They're all bigots and ignoramuses because they're all peasants, no matter what the present political myth of equality says. If they are not peasants in terms of wealth, they are absolutely impoverished spiritually and intellectually. God, how I loathe the masses.
I definitely agree with you about the perception of Biblical nutjobs. The recurring theme in this post is that Christians have consistently hidden and obscured their true views from the liberals among them (like taqiyyah in Shi'a Islam, how ironic). They are able to sanitize their rhetoric so that it does not seem incendiary. Their real triumph is in the control of language, not media or information. They don't even need resources to control language - it's all a matter of choosing one's words wisely, so that those not in the know do not understand the hidden message that is meant for your armies of sleeper agents (Christians).
Continental Europe may be different from America and Israel thanks to decades of atheist revolutions, but the UK is just as bad as the Jan Kees.
Originally posted by Seed76
reply to post by Lucifer777
Yes I think that the author of the site "is" attempting to explain the "vicious" truth about the Bible; the fact that the author is an atheist is irrelevant as far as I am concerned.
However is not irrelevant that the author of the site claims that "...was developed to promote atheism...". Does atheism really needs to be promoted?
Have you ever pondered the question : why does a smart guy like Richard Dawkins regularly give atheists a bad name by putting his foot in his mouth with his inane and ridiculous pronouncements about God and religion?
So basically according to your definition i am a "Biblical" Fanatic and having the "Joshua Sydrome" because i believe in God???
Don´t you know that fighting against or even discussing about a non-existent being are the symptoms of mental illness? or you feel justified on bashing God and labeling those who believe in something that you don´t believe that exists?
The remarkable is that the educated scientific person of the 21st century, is willingly forgetting that upon the "so called" relative "Primitive" "Savage" "Illiterate" cultures our "so called" Great-Western civilisation rest upon.
however this can be explained by memetic transference and a lifetime of religious hypnosis and indoctrination.
Can be really explained, when reffering to Christianity & Islam as a 'virulent memeplex' and that atheism is the 'cure.'?? A very "rational" approach.
Peace
Originally posted by Sahabi
And I can't tell you how many times I forcefully shut off my logic and moral compass of Love in the name of Faith, and simply submitted to religious doctrine. When things didn't feel right, I told myself to just obey and trust religion. When I found things in the religious texts that made no logical sense, I told myself to not doubt and believed I just didn't reach a high enough understanding yet. Excuses and forceful suppression of logic and love were common characteristics of my time as a religious adherent.
Now, what has fully driven me away from both Islam and Christianity is this firm realization of Truth:
A Loving, Almighty God would never tell us to murder in His name, in absolutely no capacity or justification.
Originally posted by inforeal
reply to post by Lucifer777
Is the slavery or colonialism, and the absolute destruction of millions of people and destruction of cultures by white European Christians on practically ALL non-white people since Columbus’s 1492 voyage, count in your genocidal map?
How does that fit in.?
Does that count Lucifer?
BTW Lucifer I commend you for joining the Hate Islam club with the bigot “Awake and Aware” who I have refuted many times and pointed out his errors and falsehoods.
BTW many philosophers from the west respect Islam particularly it’s mystical content that exists in Sufism.
Did you know that Lucifer?
The author of www.evilbible.com... is clearly an atheist;
he does not "need" to promote atheism to attack the Bible, but it is his choice to do so;
it does not make any difference to me whether he is an atheist or merely an opponent of the anthropomorphic (a human projection) deity of the Bible;
his criticisms are anyway based on numerous Biblical texts which I think almost any modern, educated, scientific, ethical person would be offended by.
That you are "not" offended by such texts says a great deal about you..
"Inane" means "stupid, irrelevant." I don't find Dawkin's attacks on the ancient biblical deity to be either stupid and irrelevant.
I have read his "God Delusion" and I consider it to be one of the most important works in the history of "Philosophy of Religion;" I entirely suspect that in the future world it will be mandatory reading for all students as an introduction to the study of religion.
Abuse and contradiction are anyway poor substitutes for intelligent argument. Any football hooligan or a drunk at a bus stop can shower a philosopher wth abuse and contradiction; you will need to do much better than that to refute the genius of Richard Dawkins.
With regards to whether such a sadistic deity exists or not, then yes I do believe that this Biblical deity exists as a concept in the minds of Biblical fanatics; it is a natural consequence of defining a deity in such genocidal, sadistic, psychopathic terms that the religious fanatic will seek to emulate such qualities, thus I am ultimately judging the religious fanatics and the the god which exists as a concept in their mind. This sadistic god does not speak to me or address me in any way, and I am thus limited to "bashing" the fanatics who claim to represent Her,
I submit only to the highest authority of human reason (i.e., my own and that of others who can explain themselves in a rational way);
I sit in judgement (my personal subjective discernment of good and evil) on the living and the dead, and I judge your dead god as a psychopath;
whereas you seem to be unable to think for yourself and are dependent on the ramblings of ancient religious fanatics for your discernment of good and evil.
I am not an atheist, but I find that I have a great deal in common with atheists since they are able to think for themselves and respect no higher authority than human reason, human intution and science.
Yes, according to the modern moral Zeitgeist of humanists, Christianity are virulent memetic diseases; atheism is a cure,
but so also is humanism, which requires neither a theistic nor atheistic approach;
you merely have to be able to think for yourself.
Coming from a person who defends the Biblical deity "peace" is entirely innapropriate and merely a term of Orwellian Newspeak;
there is nothing "peaceful" about the Biblical deity, unless you define peace as the state that exists after the genocide of all non believers.
Originally posted by Seed76His criticisms are based on his own interpretation, and nothing more.
That you are "not" offended by such texts says a great deal about you..
Yeah, it does says a great deal about me.
"Inane" means "stupid, irrelevant." I don't find Dawkin's attacks on the ancient biblical deity to be either stupid and irrelevant.
Then why is he fighting and attacking a Deity, that he does not believe at first place?
I have read his "God Delusion" and I consider it to be one of the most important works in the history of "Philosophy of Religion;" I entirely suspect that in the future world it will be mandatory reading for all students as an introduction to the study of religion.
The future world my friend, will be one big global prison. Where "Faith" "Hope" and "Belief" will be obselete, if humanity does not change it´s course of self-destruction.
Abuse and contradiction are anyway poor substitutes for intelligent argument. Any football hooligan or a drunk at a bus stop can shower a philosopher wth abuse and contradiction; you will need to do much better than that to refute the genius of Richard Dawkins.
It´s a fine line between "genius" and "insanity". And to pick a fight against or even discussing about a non-existent being are the symptoms of mental illness.
With regards to whether such a sadistic deity exists or not, then yes I do believe that this Biblical deity exists as a concept in the minds of Biblical fanatics; it is a natural consequence of defining a deity in such genocidal, sadistic, psychopathic terms that the religious fanatic will seek to emulate such qualities, thus I am ultimately judging the religious fanatics and the the god which exists as a concept in their mind. This sadistic god does not speak to me or address me in any way, and I am thus limited to "bashing" the fanatics who claim to represent Her,
Do you really think that by criticizing a God belief (i.e. theism) that you are somehow, aiding in the destruction of religion and leading an optimistic future?
I submit only to the highest authority of human reason (i.e., my own and that of others who can explain themselves in a rational way);
Yeap, as i submit to the highest authority of all which is called "Love".
whereas you seem to be unable to think for yourself and are dependent on the ramblings of ancient religious fanatics for your discernment of good and evil........I am not an atheist, but I find that I have a great deal in common with atheists since they are able to think for themselves and respect no higher authority than human reason, human intution and science.
Yeap, and we poor delusional Christians cannot think for our selfs, just because we believe in a God
you merely have to be able to think for yourself.
I do actually.
So, how can you contend that no war/genocide in history has ever been created by non-belief.??
Peace