<p>@ikillers</p>
<p>i was lost after the first couple responses, and only comeback to see if there are like 1-2 sentence answers for me to understand instead of…whatever it is now lol.</p>
<p>
qft .</p>
<p>
[quote=gotakun]
Like I already said, every person interprets the text differently, so it’s not so easy just to “write off” people because they don’t practice the way you do. They are technically just as Christian as you are. [/gotakun]</p>
<p>Sorry I didn’t mean that it’s easy for me to write them off. I don’t. Just coming from your perspective, it’s easy to see hypocritical people and think that religion is the problem when it’s not. I know they are just as Christian as I am, and who am I to say they’re not more Christian than I am? We’re all sinners.</p>
<p>@manayy
Yah it’s become a bit more than a yes or no thread lol.</p>
<p>Gotakun -</p>
<p>You have just contributed one of the most poorly argued posts in this entire thread. Bravo.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>By “have read” the Bible, I mean have read and understood most of it - not thumbed through some pages to feel holier than thou. I’ll take my money even against yours that if you randomly select a million Christians, most of them would not even be able to recite the ten commandents, let alone the Book of Job or the beatitudes.</p></li>
<li><p>I didn’t address you by name (I assume it was you maybe) because I didn’t feel like pouring over the pages of threads to find who originally made that comment. You still have ample space to reply.</p></li>
<li><p>It has already been argued repeatedly that religion can exist without trampling on the rights of others. But everything just goes in one ear out the other with you, gotakun. And, if you were the person who originally made that comment (and actually now I don’t think it was you after all) the person said they didn’t want people to believe falsehoods for its own sake; NOT anything to do with “oppressed liberty or rights.” By the way, how are you being oppressed by religion right now? I guess a fat suburban kid has to complain about something…</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Most religious people are suburban WASPs who, like most of this country, don’t even give a damn about politics or some mystical agenda to force you to God.</p>
<p>It’s not about rights - simply, you just LOVE to argue with religious people. The same way you love to argue with me, another atheist. You make your idiotic, poorly-reasoned arguments to inflame others and it finally gets you attention. </p>
<ol>
<li>You quoted specific pieces of a coherent, well-reasoned paragraph of my text and what was your argument? What did years of college teach you to argue? “I applaud your ignorance.”</li>
</ol>
<p>You should be a lawyer, Gotakun. “You’re honor, that guy is WRONG because he JUST IS - I’m not going to explain why. Why not? Because he’s right and I can’t argue to save my life.”</p>
<ol>
<li>I said gay people make some religious people uncomfortable. This was neither an attack on homosexuals nor an assertion on who is to blame or why. My meaning was as basic as the statement. Stairs and ladders and spiders make some people uncomfortable too — this doesn’t mean the items are evil or their actions should be reprimanded.</li>
</ol>
<p>I was saying gay people make some persons feel uncomfortable (like a ladder does) and thus these people direct anger at them. And yes, it is obvious how people can feel uncomfortable around gay guys (unreasonably) - not because of the damn Bible - but because they have ridiculous notions that this guy is going to hit on them, flirt with them, emasculate them, and so forth. This is so obvious it shouldn’t have to be stated, but you are only concerned with advancing any contrary argument, no matter how ridiculous.</p>
<p>Finally, look at how huffy you got that religion increases happiness. It doesn’t matter that it’s true — this has “upset” your belief system so much (that religion is an unrelenting, complete evil) - that you struggle to explain it away.</p>
<p>Of course the happiness is not from the most “noble” of sources — that is why I compared it to weed earlier - happiness based on delusion (though this flew over the head of 90% of the people here).</p>
<p>Why are they happy? Oh, I don’t know. Their life has a purpose. They have more community and social relationships. Failure and heart break can be explained as God’s plan. There is actually a place of all-encompassing love and ultimate happiness that occurs when you leave earth because you get to live forever in a joy land and never just rot in the ground. Oh, that might be why.</p>
<p>You are just as entrenched in your mindset and ridiculous beliefs as any fanatical Christian. Continue parroting the “generic thoughtless atheist” views without listening to one word anyone else is saying and yelling “Wrong!” at everybody. You don’t care about truth or fairness - you just care about thinking yourself intelligent and superior and “winning” the argument.</p>
<p>Imagine yourself a hell and then go there, buddy.</p>
<p>Oh, I just get so giddy when Spider Man addresses me personally :).
Thank you; you are too kind.
I said a “significant” amount of them do. When I use the word “significant,” it’s intentional. I didn’t imply “most” or even “a large number,” just enough to be significant. It was my mistake for saying “do,” because I meant that they would proclaim to actively read the bible, whatever that means to them (one page per day? passage per day? per week?).
Why defend myself when I didn’t even make the original statement?
Really? You think I’m fat? 
Anyway, anti-homosexual sentiment and general sexual conservatism are both big restrictions on my happiness. You are right that the American culture has adopted both and that prejudice exists outside of religion, but there is no legitimate justification for it outside of religion, which is what’s important. As of now, and feel free to dispute this, I believe it is solely the fault of religion that gay marriage is still outlawed in most of the United States. I could relate religion to several problems, but I would want to write proofs for them that are longer than most people care to read in this thread.
This is not a concern of mine. Why is it of any significance that they are WASPs?
The only person I LOVE to argue with is you, cutie :). I’m more than willing to back up my logic on any arguments I make, so I don’t understand where you’re coming from.
Loltroll. I pity you if you thought that was well-reasoned. It wasn’t even worth rebutting. The unspoken assumption you made was that people who kill in the name of religion are natural killers who would find any reason to kill even as atheists. It’s completely unfounded and illogical.
I’m sorry you have such a big ego?
There are rational and irrational fears. Being afraid of ladders is rational, of homosexuality, irrational. People are uncomfortable around gays because they have a conditioned aversion to them, plain and simple. The conditioning is a cultural phenomenon that would be much easier to combat without religion perpetuating it.
I really don’t understand what you’re trying to prove… I take the argument that religion increases happiness more serious than any other because it is legitimate and true. It’s the biggest obstacle when trying to convince people that the world would be better off without religion. For this reason, it needs to be analyzed from an objective, atheist perspective so I can construct an example of how the same (or better) increase in happiness can be achieved in religion’s absence.
I can speculate just the same as you, but a thorough, scientific analysis would be much more helpful.
Right… Okay, buddy :). I visited almost every source that Christians have linked to in this thread just to confirm that they truly did not disprove my arguments. If I inappropriately dismissed their arguments, it was probably because I had seen them many times before. In that respect, I supposed I am selfish. I crave stimulating arguments that challenge me and give me a chance to add a new rebuttal to my arsenal. Obviously, my ultimate goal isn’t to convince the people in this thread of anything. I’m here to better refine my arguments to present them in the most convincing manner possible to my audience in the future.
You’re just too much fun, buddy.</p>
<p>You need an objective, scientific analysis to tell why people are happy with religion?</p>
<p>Yes, because there are so many possibilities. Just some examples that have already been posted:
With the results, I would take the most statistically significant factors and apply them in realistic examples where the same (or greater) happiness is achieved without all of the delusions. peter</em>parker is very right to equate religion with drugs, as they are both examples of artificial happiness (among several other similarities). If you just take it away without providing some kind of replacement, there is going to be a void in people’s lives. In both cases, there will always be people who are too lazy to change their lives to obtain happiness in a legitimate way, but no one feels sorry for the meth addict who just can’t find happiness without being high. No one would defend his habit just because it motivated him to do great things for the world. (I say “no one,” but I’m sure some people would…)</p>
<p>What’s the difference between “artificial” and “real” happiness?</p>
<p>Conduct a survey/poll on CC of the religious (if any remain, heh) and work from there. It could be somewhat of a community project. 
The more I think about it, the more I think you’re going to get very sparse results, as if God is really omnipresent, there are an infinite ways that religion could make you happy. Still, some may or may not stand out.</p>
<p>I watched “The Atheism Tapes” last night. Well, okay, I watched the first episode. It’s kind of like this thread, or rather, the various atheist logic, presented in a clear, easy-to-understand format from one person (not many yelling at each other…).</p>
<p>Definitely a recommended watch/listen over something like Zeitgeist or the like.</p>
<p>EDIT: Artificial happiness is artificial because you rely on something artificial to make you happy…you know, that’s a good question. I always took it to meant the happiness from drugs, because they make you happy about something you wouldn’t normally be happy about. Perhaps as religion can condition you to be happy about something humans normally wouldn’t be.</p>
<p>There is no such thing as “artificial” happiness. He used the wrong term.</p>
<p>
The point I was making is that they aren’t necessarily hypocrites if their interpretation of their religion validates their behavior. I still want to stress that this isn’t relevant, because I’m not trying to be deceptive and include outliers in my argument. My list of detriments didn’t include murder for a reason.
NonAntiAnarchist is probably right. It isn’t the correct term, but the intended definition should (hopefully) be obvious. I’m glad this was addressed, because I see that I need to either use a new term or justify my current one…
I don’t think I’m qualified yet to design a respectable experiment… I’ll give it some thought :). Also, CC is definitely not a representative population of religious people in general and isn’t even set up for polls… Hm… Thanks for the suggestion :). We’ll see…</p>
<p>All of you shut up and watch this video. NOW. >:P
[Dan</a> Gilbert asks, Why are we happy? | Video on TED.com](<a href=“http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_gilbert_asks_why_are_we_happy.html]Dan”>http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_gilbert_asks_why_are_we_happy.html)</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Even though I knew this to be true, a broad smile crept across my face when I read it. For some reason, it’s oddly funny to think about. </p>
<p>Can you really not make polls on CC? Well, darn…:|</p>
<p>
Funny… He suggests that people at the top of the economy want everyone to strive only for natural happiness (by his definition, which is different than the one I would have implied earlier). I had previously argued the opposite, that they want people to be happy with mediocrity, with being poor, with working difficult jobs for low pay, to accomplish the very same thing (ensure a smooth-running economy). He uses the extreme example of monks; the opposite example would be people who are never happy at the bottom, which are the people who are motivated to climb the economic ladder. IMO, my argument has more supporting evidence.</p>
<p>After watching the video, even if I accept his conclusion, what good does it do anybody? By the same logic, there is no reason not to prescribe anti-depressants to everyone in the world and convince them that they can be happy even in the worst situation. By his argument, there is no reason to want to improve the world at all. I’d rather work within the traditions of this culture than try to convince everyone to reject material possessions because “happiness can be synthesized.”</p>
<p>I just finished watching this guys interview with Playwright Arthur Miller, and I gotta say, it was the most interesting discussion I’ve seen so far. Even as an Atheist, Miller admits to hoping for some kind of continuation of human conscientiousness after death, because for him, and I’m guessing many others, an abrupt and absolute end to our conscientious is unthinkable. I guess because we simply don’t want to believe like that (some, not all). However, he disagrees with the notion that someday, in some life-after-death resumed conscientious state, we may once again continue/resume relationships with people we had in our former state. </p>
<p>This provides interesting insight for the case of religious draw (for me). Just thought I’d share. :P</p>
<p>EDIT: That video is hilarious. Interesting stuff.</p>
<p>There may be consciousness after death (because science has not been able to touch consciousness).</p>
<p>However, things like memory, and sensory perception, will be gone. Hence, I’m having a hard time imagining what such an existence would be like, if it even exists.</p>
<p>However, some potential good news is (maybe) is that if there is somehow a possibility of continued existence in any form whatsoever - and who knows what rules govern consciousness - they may be “recycled” after all in some fashion ala reincarnation of some sort - that any period of nonexistence would be impercetible and flash by in an instant, in less than a nanosecond.</p>
<p>Even if one had to wait a trillion millenia, or ten hundred trillion, with the infinite possibilities of the universe, and outside the universe, literally anything imaginable, it may just be possible, even if it is the smallest chance imaginable, to exist once again. And really, the time would pass by instantaneously.</p>
<p>However, it’s quite possible that your consciouness may never rise again. Who knows. It sounds frightening every now and then, but I guess once you do die, you wouldn’t care either way.</p>
<p>Psalm 14:1 The fool says in his heart, There is no God. God is so dang smart.</p>
<p>It sounds frightening all the time. Just thinking about it…I know it is the most frightening thing I could possibly imagine. But yes, I suppose I wouldn’t care if I can’t think about it, but I’m not yet dead and hopefully have many years left to live.</p>
<p>…<em>Invests in cryotechnology with high hopes</em>.</p>
<p>“Psalm 14:1 The fool says in his heart, There is no God. God is so dang smart.”</p>
<p>lol… TrueLove you should just periodically post psalms or bible verses or religious quotes. Just to keep things balanced :)</p>