What stops a Christian from killing people secretly?

[Humpty]

They all say that without fear of God, they would have no moral compass, right? But they have the opportunity to repent for their sins and go to heaven anyway. They can just ask for forgiveness.

OH WAIT THAT IS WHAT THEY DO!

timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/u … 571206.ece

[ochaye]

@Humpty

They all say that without fear of God, they would have no moral compass, right?

Not right. They say that everyone is subject to condemnation because we all ignore our inbuilt moral compass.

The compass points are called nerve endings, btw.

“I feel, therefore I am,” is not good logic, but it’s better than Descartes’.

[Humpty]

@ochaye

Not right.

you clearly haven’t been reading the thread that this is a parody of.
you probably haven’t talked to many christians at all, in fact.
i hear that shit all the time.

“HOW CAN YOU BE MORAL IF YOU DON’T FEAR GOD?”

[statiktech]

@ochaye

Not right. They say that everyone is subject to condemnation because we all ignore our inbuilt moral compass.

And, yet, they also say we ignore that compass by design. So, as Humpty said, the fear of God would serve to ‘realign’ that compass.

The compass points are called nerve endings, btw.

Explain how “Thou shalt not steal” or “[…]bear false witness” affects nerve endings. The pain/pleasure principle is not sufficient grounds for a moral system. Nerve endings are more along the lines of sensors than compass “points”. All they point to is that something is affecting your physical apparatus. Nerves are amoral in operation.

“I feel, therefore I am,” is not good logic, but it’s better than Descartes’.

If this were the case, Christian ideology would be more in the way of hedonism.

[statiktech]

@Humpty

“HOW CAN YOU BE MORAL IF YOU DON’T FEAR GOD?”

You just can’t. If you don’t fear God, you don’t understand …anything. I mean, c’mon.

[cheegster]

I’d like to see the actual study really. This bit is the crux of it:

“In general, higher rates of belief in and worship of a creator correlate with higher rates of homicide, juvenile and early adult mortality, STD infection rates, teen pregnancy and abortion in the prosperous democracies"

The only thingthat surprises me is the STD’s and pregnancy. Obviously it just suggests that their promiscuity is less safeguarded, but the fact that they are so promiscuous in the first place is what surprises me.

Also, why are the English so much more secular than those in the USA? I would imagine there are multiple reasons but I have never thought about it too much anthropologically.

[cheegster]

@statiktech

@Humpty

“HOW CAN YOU BE MORAL IF YOU DON’T FEAR GOD?”

You just can’t. If you don’t fear God, you don’t understand …anything. I mean, c’mon.

Excellent. Although I have to say I only recognise three of those by face, perhaps I am unfamiliar with the ugly faces of the rest of them.

[ochaye]

@Humpty

@ochaye

Not right.

you clearly haven’t been reading the thread that this is a parody of.

Probably not. Can you please let people know when a thread is a parody of another one, so we don’t waste time with sensible comments like mine?

you probably haven’t talked to many christians at all, in fact.

I don’t suppose you’ve talked to any.

i hear that shit all the time.

Don’t live in the USA, then. Give yourself some sort of a chance.

[phyllo]

Einstein was an atheist? Since when?

I want to know how God created this world. I’m not interested in this or that phenomenon, in the spectrum of this or that element. I want to know His thoughts, the rest are details.

Einstein 1955

[ochaye]

@statiktech

@ochaye

Not right. They say that everyone is subject to condemnation because we all ignore our inbuilt moral compass.

And, yet, they also say we ignore that compass by design.

Wrong again.

[Humpty]

@ochaye

@Humpty

@ochaye

Not right.

you clearly haven’t been reading the thread that this is a parody of.

Probably not. Can you please let people know when a thread is a parody of another one, so we don’t waste time with sensible comments like mine?

the title made it pretty obvious…there’s an active thread with a very similar title.

you probably haven’t talked to many christians at all, in fact.

I don’t suppose you’ve talked to any.

i hear that shit all the time.

Don’t live in the USA, then. Give yourself some sort of a chance.

i don’t know what you’re talking about. sounds like an attempt to be condescending, comes across as gibberish.

[phyllo]

I’d like to see the actual study really.

You asked for it.
moses.creighton.edu/JRS/2005/2005-11.html

[cheegster]

@phyllo

I’d like to see the actual study really.

You asked for it.
moses.creighton.edu/JRS/2005/2005-11.html

Ah! Many thanks.

[statiktech]

@phyllo

Einstein was an atheist? Since when?

I want to know how God created this world. I’m not interested in this or that phenomenon, in the spectrum of this or that element. I want to know His thoughts, the rest are details.

Einstein 1955

Not self proclaimed. I think he just never claimed to have sufficient data upon which to base a belief either way–

[size=95]

@Einstein

You may call me an agnostic… I do not share the crusading spirit of the professional atheist whose fervor is mostly due to a painful act of liberation from the fetters of religious indoctrination received in youth. I prefer an attitude of humility corresponding to the weakness of our intellectual understanding of nature and of our own being.

@Einstein

It seems to me that the idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I cannot take seriously. I feel also not able to imagine some will or goal outside the human sphere. My views are near those of Spinoza: admiration for the beauty of and belief in the logical simplicity of the order which we can grasp humbly and only imperfectly. I believe that we have to content ourselves with our imperfect knowledge and understanding and treat values and moral obligations as a purely human problem—the most important of all human problems.

[/size]

What I read from this is that he was essentially a humanist, but didn’t dismiss the idea of God outright.

@ochaye

Wrong again.

Informative. Thanks to your divine insight, I now understand all that is God.

[phyllo]

This probably sums up Einstein’s belief:

Scientific research is based on the assumption that all events, including the actions of mankind, are determined by the laws of nature. Therefore, a research scientist will hardly be inclined to believe that events could be influenced by a prayer, that is, by a wish addressed to a supernatural Being. However, we have to admit that our actual knowledge of these laws is only an incomplete piece of work (unvollkommenes Stückwerk), so that ultimately the belief in the existence of fundamental all-embracing laws also rests on a sort of faith. All the same, this faith has been largely justified by the success of science. On the other hand, however, every one who is seriously engaged in the pursuit of science becomes convinced that the laws of nature manifest the existence of a spirit vastly superior to that of men, and one in the face of which we with our modest powers must feel humble. The pursuit of science leads therefore to a religious feeling of a special kind, which differs essentially from the religiosity of more naive people.

* 24 January 1936 letter in response to a sixth-grader (Phyllis Wright) asking whether scientists pray, and if so, what they pray for

Einstein on atheists:

I was barked at by numerous dogs who are earning their food guarding ignorance and superstition for the benefit of those who profit from it. Then there are the fanatical atheists whose intolerance is of the same kind as the intolerance of the religious fanatics and comes from the same source. They are like slaves who are still feeling the weight of their chains which they have thrown off after hard struggle. They are creatures who—in their grudge against the traditional “opium for the people”—cannot bear the music of the spheres. The Wonder of nature does not become smaller because one cannot measure it by the standards of human moral and human aims.

* From a 7 August 1941 letter discussing responses to his essay "Science and Religion" (1941)

[phyllo]

Lincoln was an atheist?

In regard to this Great Book, I have but to say, it is the best gift God has given to man. All the good the Saviour gave to the world was communicated through this book.

* Words on being presented with a Bible, reported in the Washington Daily Morning Chronicle (8 September 1864)

We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of Heaven. We have been preserved, these many years, in peace and prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth and power, as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace, and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us; and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us!

* Upon proclaiming a National Fast Day (30 March 1863)

[ochaye]

@Humpty

@ochaye

Probably not. Can you please let people know when a thread is a parody of another one, so we don’t waste time with sensible comments like mine?

the title made it pretty obvious…there’s an active thread with a very similar title.

Which one is that?

[phyllo]

@ochaye

@Humpty

@ochaye

Probably not. Can you please let people know when a thread is a parody of another one, so we don’t waste time with sensible comments like mine?

the title made it pretty obvious…there’s an active thread with a very similar title.

Which one is that?

It’s in ‘Hall of Questions’ along with another parody thread titled ‘What stops theists from killing people openly?’. Ho hum.

[ochaye]

@phyllo

@ochaye

@Humpty

the title made it pretty obvious…there’s an active thread with a very similar title.

Which one is that?

It’s in ‘Hall of Questions’

Ah. No wonder.

Thanks.

[Oughtist]

herptheheld wrote:
I have come to the opinion that religious belief is not a determinant factor in the question of whether a person finds themself in the position of killing another. Indeed, I now believe that religious belief is very much a secondary factor on the broader spectrum of issues. Things are much more complicated than I previously believed. I credit ILP directly for having influenced my change in perspective.

Way to go herp! I knew you had it in ya!!