Burgers?

[P3nT4gR4m]

Can't disagree in principle but in practice some beliefs are viral.

The idea of not being allowed to transmit a belief is odious; it is just that nobody should be able to FORCE the idea.

The organised religions, the political power structure deity-systems, work a method of implanting the equivalent of a mental back door in the believers. Irrational orders "Backed by God" must be obeyed. It's a critical thought exploit and it's inserted on purpose, with malice aforethought, for reasons that have nothing to do with belief or spirituality.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

This is making me wonder if there's a current graph or chart of the various defensive treaties currently in place.

The other side is, who knows what small war or event will drag in everyone else? I doubt many soldiers understood why they were in a trench because a foreign archduke was shot, for example. The modern equivalents abound.

That war was on rails for a century.  Arguably since 1610.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Why is it so important to believe in people with superpowers, marching around the planet, zapping people with lazor vision or turning them into newts and shit? This is the bit I just can't fathom. Why is it so important to so many people that, rather than just saying "okay it's a bunch of crap" and drop it, they have to "reinterpret"

Like how come saying "Okay we know Jesus didn't walk on water like it explicitly states in the book but now we believe he maybe stood in a puddle or something and that's what it means", is somehow valid or useful?

I'm really not trying to be inflammatory here, I just can't wrap my head around the value that a lot of people seem to place in this stuff.

Why does what other people believe matter so much to you? Isn't there some point where you go "oh, well, it isn't any of my business unless it affects me"?

In general terms, I suppose it doesn't.  In very specific, political, shapers-of-public-policy terms, it very much does.

For example, Todd Akin: Denies Evolutionary theory, man-made climate change, and Biology (he's the "legitimate rape" guy), and he served on the Congressional Comittee of Science, Space, and Technology.  And he's not the only loon on that committee.  There's also Rep. Paul Broun, R-Ga., who said:  "All that stuff I was taught about evolution and embryology and the Big Bang Theory, all that is lies straight from the pit of Hell, and it's lies to try to keep me and all the folks who were taught that from understanding that they need a savior."

It's when their anti-rational and non-reality-based ideas and beliefs affect me, is when it starts mattering to me.

Right, when policy-makers start trying to apply their dogmas to public policy, that's a problem. Regardless of whether the dogma is religious or ideological.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

But when we start getting into "I don't understand how those people can believe in those things" we're wandering, in my opinion, into a territory that's awfully familiar, and awfully sticky. What people do with their beliefs, IMO, has a lot in common with what people do with their digestive systems or their genitals; don't try to impose it on anyone unwilling, and it's none of my business.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I'd guess it to be partly an ego thing. It's difficult to admit you are totally wrong about something, it's much more palatable to think that you were mostly right, just slightly off on a few things.

Again, I may be being somewhat harsh here but I've associated organised religion with stunted science so that idea clearly needs revising in some regards.

I've recommended it before, but I recommend Sapolsky's take on why humans believe in spiritual things. If you're genuinely interested, that is.

I must have missed the recommendation. I'm still working through Sapolsky whenever I get spare time and that sounds like it well worth a look at. Book or lecture?

There's his infamous Christmas lecture, which I can't find online anywhere, this lecture: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4WwAQqWUkpI and also an essay called "Circling the blanket for God" in his book "The Trouble with Testosterone".

[Junkenstein]

I'll move the book up the list.

As for the video, it was the one I thought. I'm pretty fucked so I'll try and think of something to say about that tomorrow.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Why is it so important to believe in people with superpowers, marching around the planet, zapping people with lazor vision or turning them into newts and shit? This is the bit I just can't fathom. Why is it so important to so many people that, rather than just saying "okay it's a bunch of crap" and drop it, they have to "reinterpret"

Like how come saying "Okay we know Jesus didn't walk on water like it explicitly states in the book but now we believe he maybe stood in a puddle or something and that's what it means", is somehow valid or useful?

I'm really not trying to be inflammatory here, I just can't wrap my head around the value that a lot of people seem to place in this stuff.

Why does what other people believe matter so much to you? Isn't there some point where you go "oh, well, it isn't any of my business unless it affects me"?

In general terms, I suppose it doesn't.  In very specific, political, shapers-of-public-policy terms, it very much does.

For example, Todd Akin: Denies Evolutionary theory, man-made climate change, and Biology (he's the "legitimate rape" guy), and he served on the Congressional Comittee of Science, Space, and Technology.  And he's not the only loon on that committee.  There's also Rep. Paul Broun, R-Ga., who said:  "All that stuff I was taught about evolution and embryology and the Big Bang Theory, all that is lies straight from the pit of Hell, and it's lies to try to keep me and all the folks who were taught that from understanding that they need a savior."

It's when their anti-rational and non-reality-based ideas and beliefs affect me, is when it starts mattering to me.

Sort of half this and half because it really, genuinely disturbs me. I was bombarded with this crap as a child, a lot of people went out their way to convince a young, highly impressionable child that the bible (ie - the holy miracle penned directly by the hand of gandalf the omniscient) was a real thing.

It messed up my head. It was like giant puddle of mental AIDS that took absolutely fucking ages to get rid of. It wasn't just me this was done to. It was all the kids at my school and all the adults that had been there before me. It was most of a race. A fucking race of homo sapiens! I live in a country that still describes itself as "Christian" Not "Buffy Fans" or "Trekkies" but some kind of throwback ancient forerunner where fandom requires you to actually believe in the vampires.

It's fucking pathetic. It annoys the shit out of me.

How aware are you of the degree to which your traumatic experience prevents you from thinking or talking about religion and religious people rationally?

It's not an uncommon response to trauma; for example, some women who have been abused distrust all men and consider them inherently rapists, or that some gays who have been abused distrust all straight people and feel that they are justified in hating them, as a whole. However, it's also not very productive or prosocial, and you might be served best by trying to dismantle that particular block.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

You and Twid have never tried to convince me. The majority of theists I encountered growing up did. They did so with the sanction of the government and the education system. I also feel the need to make a distinction between people who believe in some form of creator or deity or intelligence behind the universe and the ones that piss me off, the one's who adhere to the bible explanation. No one ever told me to explore the possibility of there being some kind of intelligent creator, no. They told me his name, a bunch of stuff he did and said and a bunch of crap about some white guy who walked on water.

And they told me it like it was some kind of fact.

And in conversations like this one, you still continually enter the same bad feedback loop of insisting that the vast majority of religious systems and religious people match that image you have in your head, and then when people produce evidence that counters your preconceived notions, you say "well I didn't mean YOU" and keep on doing it, while insisting you're not.

I suggest that you have a bit of bad archival that could stand attending to.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I'll move the book up the list.

As for the video, it was the one I thought. I'm pretty fucked so I'll try and think of something to say about that tomorrow.

Sapolsky's great, partly because while he's a total atheist, he also seeks the reasons and value in behavior he sees as irrational, rather than just dismissing it, and manages to be irreverent (about all things, not just things he doesn't believe) while rarely being offensive. I have seen him manage to be offensive, once.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Yes, this is what I was talking about. The pursuit of scientific inquiry was considered one of the most God-glorifying pursuits, because what more noble subject is there for man than to study the Creation of God?

I'm not really sure what happened after that, or why for some reason most Born-Agains hate science.

For people like Twid and I, it still is the ultimate holy work.  Figuring out God's rulebook, so to speak.

And there was always an anti-science crowd.  In the time period we're talking about, it was mostly in England.

Count me in. I'm convinced it's somewhere spread over Heavy Metal albums.

Or <ahem> ICP.

[hooplala]

On the subject of personally imposing your view on someone else... I've had it explained to me thusly: imagine a train barreling down on someone sitting on the tracks with their back turned, and headphones on. Would you try to save them? Or, think to yourself "Well, that's their personal choice."  Because the thing is, to someone who truly believes, Hell IS that train. How can they not try to save you?

That outlook makes sense to me, and has given me a broader view of why religious types might try to sway me. And, to be honest, I now appreciate the gesture.

[Salty]

On the subject of personally imposing your view on someone else... I've had it explained to me thusly: imagine a train barreling down on someone sitting on the tracks with their back turned, and headphones on. Would you try to save them? Or, think to yourself "Well, that's their personal choice."  Because the thing is, to someone who truly believes, Hell IS that train. How can they not try to save you?

That outlook makes sense to me, and has given me a broader view of why religious types might try to sway me. And, to be honest, I now appreciate the gesture.

While I can also appreciate the gesture, having gone through a thorough brain washing aimed at convincing me hell is something to fear and base my actions off..,

The same could be said of relieving the people who believe that of the burdon of their horribly misplaced fear.

[Salty]

Put another way:

What if there are no tracks to begin with?

[hooplala]

Hey I'm not saying they're right!

[Salty]

Hey I'm not saying they're right!