People who believe in god are broken

[iNow]

And I agree that their rationality is flawed, but you were talking about mental illness.

Yes, I was, and you seem to be, as well... Except, you're applying the mental illness label using a double standard.

 

Let me ask... Would you say the same thing (that it's probably not a mental illness) if the person believed in the existence of leprechauns? I suspect not. I suspect you'd probably say, "that's a really strange belief, and of course it's quite possible that it's the result of some mental illness." Someone who actively believes in leprechauns almost certainly has a mental illness. Same for any of the countless other types of obvious fictions out there. My core point is that belief in god(s) is really no different, even though it tends to enjoy more societal acceptance and tends to be treated as if it should be immune from criticism.

 

People with religious belief can, by and large, function in the real world on a daily basis.

So can alcoholics, but the fact that they can generally function in the real world on a daily basis doesn't mean they're no longer able to be accurately described using the term "alcoholic."

 

Belief in God doesn't stop Francis Collins from doing whatever it is he does, or great past presidents from doing whatever they did.

What's your point? I never argued that it did.

 

The types of examples you keep using represent people whom are so functionally impaired that they can't get things done in the real world on a daily basis. They have to be locked up and cared for.

I'm trying to make it as obvious as possible because for some reason you seem to keep missing my point, hence my simplified examples.

[Iggy]

Let me ask... Would you say the same thing (that it's probably not a mental illness) if the person believed in the existence of leprechauns?

I think I'd have to otherwise I'd be calling a third of the people in Ireland mental.

 

Someone who actively believes in leprechauns almost certainly has a mental illness.

Belief that nose hair fuels one's vehicle is certainly a sign of mental illness.

Belief in god or leprechauns or big foot or whatever, is not.

 

I'm giving you a reason to distinguish the two. The former prevents a person from accomplishing daily tasks -- a detriment to their worldview. It is false and it gets in the way. Usually not so with the latter.

 

Alcoholism isn't a belief.

[iNow]

Belief that nose hair fuels one's vehicle is certainly a sign of mental illness.

Belief in god or leprechauns or big foot or whatever, is not.

 

I'm giving you a reason to distinguish the two. The former prevents a person from accomplishing daily tasks -- a detriment to their worldview. It is false and it gets in the way. Usually not so with the latter.

Except when it is false and does get in the way, like all of the documented cases of children dying from very easily treatable illnesses because the parents refused treatment on religious grounds. There are countless other examples that you'd have to brush aside to maintain such a position, this was just the first that came immediately to mind.

[Moontanman]

There are also degrees of faith and belief, if iNow told me he saw a shooting stat last night I'd believe him, if he said he saw a bolide I might question him a bit about it but I wasn't there he was and in the grand scheme of things it makes little difference if he is telling the truth or not. But if he told me he saw an alien space craft and these aliens told him to go out and change the world to their tastes and that i had to believe or the aliens were gonna get me I'd want a few photos at least...

[Iggy]

Except when it is false and does get in the way, like all of the documented cases of children dying from very easily treatable illnesses because the parents refused treatment on religious grounds. There are countless other examples that you'd have to brush aside to maintain such a position, this was just the first that came immediately to mind.

Exactly. Belief in faith healing when their is an alternative is insane. It is functionally destructive... just like honor killings being insane.

[Greg H.]

There are also degrees of faith and belief, if iNow told me he saw a shooting stat last night I'd believe him, if he said he saw a bolide I might question him a bit about it but I wasn't there he was and in the grand scheme of things it makes little difference if he is telling the truth or not. But if he told me he saw an alien space craft and these aliens told him to go out and change the world to their tastes and that i had to believe or the aliens were gonna get me I'd want a few photos at least...

That leads me to add a new factor to my Skepticism equation. Call it the "Outlandishness" factor.

[Iggy]

There are also degrees of faith and belief, if iNow told me he saw a shooting stat last night I'd believe him, if he said he saw a bolide I might question him a bit about it but I wasn't there he was and in the grand scheme of things it makes little difference if he is telling the truth or not. But if he told me he saw an alien space craft and these aliens told him to go out and change the world to their tastes and that i had to believe or the aliens were gonna get me I'd want a few photos at least...

 

Very true.

[John Cuthber]

Exactly. Belief in faith healing when their is an alternative is insane. It is functionally destructive... just like honor killings being insane.

But all religious faith is destructive because it stops people doing better. It tells them not to ask question (generally on pain of everlasting torture).

It lets them justify war and torture and slavery.

 

It's a "double think" that the world would be better off without.

Shucks! even if people just spent an hour on Sunday picking litter, rather than going to church it would be a better world (and they might just learn not to drop it in the first place).

 

I realise this sounds like a thin end of the wedge argument- but remember the thick end is plain to see.

If you tell people (from a young age) that a man died 2000 years ago having been born the son of a virgin through the action of a God who created the universe then you teach them to believe things that are not true. (and that's still the case, even if He was born 2000 years ago...)

 

If you teach people to believe things just because someone tells them to believe it (and even though it makes no sense) then you are setting them up as sitting ducks for exploitation.

 

 

You agree that you would want pictures before you accepted that iNow had seen a UFO. All a UFO need is a species a bit like us (possibly prepared by the same God if He exists) with better technology and a lot of time.

That's very improbable because of the size of the universe- but not actually impossible. It's not outside the laws of physics as we know them

 

But you seem prepared to believe in God even though He is intrinsically vastly less likely, not to mention logically self conteradictory.

 

Do you not see the doublethink there?

[Iggy]

But you seem prepared to believe in God even though He is intrinsically vastly less likely, not to mention logically self conteradictory.

 

Do you not see the doublethink there?

 

Are you talking to me?

 

I am in no way prepared to believe in God. Neither am I willing to say that all religious faith is destructive. I've been to Bali too.

 

I wonder if anyone gets that reference.

[John Cuthber]

OK Sorry, got muddled there.

Do you accept that the people who believe in God are leaving themselves and their children open to exploitation?

If they are then there's not much difference between them and the poor soul who thinks he can run a car on nose hair.

[Iggy]

OK Sorry, got muddled there.

Do you accept that the people who believe in God are leaving themselves and their children open to exploitation?

Some religious people actively exploit their own children. Some are blinded to their exploitation because they trust religious institutions. Others protect their children very well while bringing them up in an environment of healthy mentors. Others stone their children in the name of honor, and others love their children to the grave because the baby Jesus told them to forgive... you know.

 

If they are then there's not much difference between them and the poor soul who thinks he can run a car on nose hair.

I just can't paint it with that broad a brush

[John Cuthber]

But the brush really is that broad- religious faith drives out rationality and we are where we are today because we can think.

You are possibly implying a false dichotomy. It's perfectly possible (and indeed overwhelmingly likely) that they love their kids whether they are religious or not.

However teaching them that dogma is better than understanding and logic handicaps them profoundly.

[SamBridge]

Wow I can't believe this topic is still going on.

Ok here's how it is:

People who believe in god aren't broken and anyone has the capacity to believe something that's not true. But as mentioned before, choosing a life of pure belief leaves you open to be wrong about many things, some things which you may not want to be wrong about, some things which you may not want to even question, or somethings you have spent your life living by for so long that you've become accustomed to them. No one is inferior one way or the other, it just depends on what lifestyle you are most connected to, what events in your life you need to explain the most, how you cope with various losses and how you are able to provide yourself with emotional stability or if you need something else to do that for you.

 

Objectively I still can't rule it out either way. Just when I thought I had decided god couldn't exist again, I find myself thinking that there could be a being of pure consciousness who doesn't have to be super-natural in any way, it's just that the universe could essentially be their "playground", that perhaps the boundaries of it's consciousness have extended beyond any localized form and for whatever reason it decided to mess with Earth. It reminds me of those "Q" beings from Star Trek.

Edited August 19, 2013 by SamBridge

[Iggy]

But the brush really is that broad- religious faith drives out rationality and we are where we are today because we can think.

Anything with a brain thinks, and most of it isn't rationality. You started that sentence with rationality and ended on thinking... I seriously doubt most thoughts in the animal kingdom are rational.

 

Humans have faith and emotion and things like that because it is useful. Those things got us here too. I'm not sure I'd want to meet a purely coldly rational creature. I'm not sure such a creature could even function without help.

 

You are possibly implying a false dichotomy. It's perfectly possible (and indeed overwhelmingly likely) that they love their kids whether they are religious or not.

No, I didn't give a dichotomy, false or otherwise.

 

My point would be that religion can make people behave better or worse, but so can a lot of other things. You are the one saying that religious belief is always destructive.

 

You said, nigh two posts ago, "but all religious faith is destructive because...". You gave kids as your primary example. Now you say "they love their kids whether they are religious or not".

 

I'm saying that religion can help a person love their kid, and that is ok by me.

[iNow]

It being "okay by you" doesn't in any way change the validity of calling it broken, though.

Edited August 20, 2013 by iNow

[Iggy]

It being "okay by you" doesn't in any way change the validity of calling it broken, though.

Separate issues. But, if I'm being flippant... did you independently verify your partner's fidelity today?

 

If not then you're taking your relationship on faith, and that really is broken because it isn't rational. Faith isn't rational and as such it is broken and you should really know better.

 

You see where I'm coming from despite the vulgar example.

Edited August 20, 2013 by Iggy

[iNow]

Separate issues. But, if I'm being flippant... did you independently verify your partner's fidelity today?

 

If not then you're taking your relationship on faith, and that really is broken because it isn't rational. Faith isn't rational and as such it is broken and you should really know better.

We've had this discussion about a hundred times here at SFN already. When you say I must have "faith" that my spouse is not cuckolding me, what you really mean is "trust." I have trust, and provisional trust at that, and I can further take steps to verify if my trust is well-placed and deserved. It's falsifiable. I don't believe absolutely on the basis of faith that my wife is not cheating. I do not maintain that belief even in the face of contradictory evidence. They are not equivalent in the way you are trying to suggest.

 

The faith you mention in context of spousal fidelity is not the same type of faith involved when discussing belief in Thor Zeus Apollo Ba'al Poseidon Krishna Aerdrie Faenya Allah Yahweh any of the countless ridiculous god concepts out there. One is a conclusion derived on nothing more than wish-thinking... pretending to know something that cannot be known... the other is a provisional trust that is subject to change in the face of evidence... trust about something that is subject to empirical test and falsification. Do you see the difference? It's an important one.

 

Me having "faith" that you tend to sleep every night for at least a few hours or require food and water to survive is not equivalent to having "faith" that a magical cloud surfing sky dictator who convicts us of thought crimes and who cares whether or not we wear clothes of different fibers or eat fish on Fridays actually exists in anything more than human fiction and imagination.

 

Here's how I've argued similar points previously a little over a year ago in this very thread. It seems to fit here:

 

we both agree that some things are much more certain and/or likely than others, do we not?

 

For example, don't we both agree that the idea that we exist on an oblate spheroid that's called earth is more likely than the idea that the farts of pink unicorns cause erections in leprechauns? I should hope so... And then ask yourself... How do we make this determination of likelihood? We use shared standards and definitions of evidence. We apply reason, logic, and rationality to experiences we have, and based on those we form a consensus that some things are so well supported as to be taken as given or treated as known, wherein other things are not well supported and are based on wish thinking alone or treated as speculative or as yet not demonstrated to be factual.

 

The argument here is that god is one of those things lacking in adequate evidence, and hence it is disingenuous to suggest it's on par with the cosmic inflation model or to conflate that belief with something so mundane as the idea that the sun will rise again tomorrow.

 

I challenge directly what theists continue to cite as "evidence" for their god, as when scrutinized it quickly becomes clear that it's nothing more than faith and nonsequitur associations between what they see in the natural world and what they believe about god(s). The equivalent would be citing the existence of thunder to support an assertion that Thor exists, and it's a profoundly laughable position for theists to suggest this type of association validly serves as "evidence."

 

If not broken, it's at least quite childish, silly, and wildly inconsistent with their approach to practically everything else they think and experience.

And here again a few months before that:

 

The nature of the evidence must scale with the claim.

 

If you make a mundane claim, then relatively mundane evidence will generally suffice, and sometimes even no evidence at all will be required in some instances (if I say my dog just walked into the other room, you probably wouldn't ask me to prove it and would generally accept my word that it happened as sufficient). However, if I said my dog just turned into a 90 foot purple dragon with dvds as scales and native american arrowheads as teeth... and started spraying the Schrodinger equation all over my walls using a combination of macaroni and cheese and liquified coal sludge, that claim is a bit more extraordinary and you'd likely ask for more extraordinary evidence.

 

So, if you make an extraordinary claim, you need extraordinary evidence to support it. The evidence must scale with the claim.

 

I'm of the camp that the claim of gods existence is a rather extraordinary one, and that a fictional book filled with internal contradictions from two thousand years ago or personal faith and wish thinking alone hardly satisfies the extraordinary burden of proof that accompanies such a claim.

[John Cuthber]

Separate issues. But, if I'm being flippant... did you independently verify your partner's fidelity today?

 

If not then you're taking your relationship on faith, and that really is broken because it isn't rational. Faith isn't rational and as such it is broken and you should really know better.

 

You see where I'm coming from despite the vulgar example.

No. I'm basing a relationship on evidence.

I know that she's generally honest.

So it's reasonable for me to continue to trust her.

If I find otherwise I will change my outlook.

 

Whereas, if I do the comparison with God, He lets me down at every opportunity. His book is full of contradictions.

He never answers my prayers (or anyone else's) and the daft ****wit left the serpent in the Garden of Eden.

 

And yet, people expect me to accept his "love" as a matter of faith.

How is that anything but broken?

 

 

Equally importantly re

"I'm saying that religion can help a person love their kid... "

Anyone who needs religion to love their children is more broken than the guy trying to run his car on nose hair.

 

EDIT to add

Here we go again

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-23729684

 

Still broken.

Edited August 20, 2013 by John Cuthber

[Iggy]

We've had this discussion about a hundred times here at SFN already. When you say I must have "faith" that my spouse is not cuckolding me, what you really mean is "trust." I have trust, and provisional trust at that, and I can further take steps to verify if my trust is well-placed and deserved. It's falsifiable. I don't believe absolutely on the basis of faith that my wife is not cheating. I do not maintain that belief even in the face of contradictory evidence. They are not equivalent in the way you are trying to suggest.

 

The faith you mention in context of spousal fidelity is not the same type of faith involved when discussing belief in Thor Zeus Apollo Ba'al Poseidon Krishna Aerdrie Faenya Allah Yahweh any of the countless ridiculous god concepts out there. One is a conclusion derived on nothing more than wish-thinking... pretending to know something that cannot be known... the other is a provisional trust that is subject to change in the face of evidence... trust about something that is subject to empirical test and falsification. Do you see the difference? It's an important one.

 

Me having "faith" that you tend to sleep every night for at least a few hours or require food and water to survive is not equivalent to having "faith" that a magical cloud surfing sky dictator who convicts us of thought crimes and who cares whether or not we wear clothes of different fibers or eat fish on Fridays actually exists in anything more than human fiction and imagination.

 

Here's how I've argued similar points previously a little over a year ago in this very thread. It seems to fit here:

 

 

And here again a few months before that:

I'm ok with the word trust. You trust that your partner's fidelity exists today even though you didn't independently verify it, and have no way to prove it exists.

 

I'm not saying it is equivalent to trust in God. You are probably just used to having that discussion, so you thought you'd do it again or something.

 

The point is that we trust things that we don't verify, and believe things that we don't know. And, those are sometimes very good traits, so they are stricken from the 'is it broken' discussion.

 

Next you have to grant that when a person says "I saw Jesus", they are telling the truth, in the sense that they aren't lying. Can you do that?

Edited August 20, 2013 by Iggy

[Moontanman]

I'm ok with the word trust. You trust that your partner's fidelity exists today even though you didn't independently verify it, and have no way to prove it exists.

 

I'm not saying it is equivalent to trust in God. You are probably just used to having that discussion, so you thought you'd do it again or something.

 

The point is that we trust things that we don't verify, and believe things that we don't know. And, those are sometimes very good traits, so they are stricken from the 'is it broken' discussion.

 

Next you have to grant that when a person says "I saw Jesus", they are telling the truth, in the sense that they aren't lying. Can you do that?

 

 

If they had video I might consider it...

[Iggy]

 

 

If they had video I might consider it...

 

I'm not asking you to believe that you saw Jesus.

 

When Jules says, "I felt the hand of God. God got involved", do you axiomatically believe that is a lie?

[Moontanman]

"Two men say they're Jesus, one must be wrong..." Dire Straights...

 

I'm not asking you to believe that you saw Jesus.

 

When Jules says, "I felt the hand of God. God got involved", do you axiomatically believe that is a lie?

I

Yes or he is delusional...

If I were to say aliens came into my bedroom last night and preformed an anal probe, am I lying or delusional or do aliens appear and preform anal probes? Which is more likely?

[Iggy]

"Two men say they're Jesus, one must be wrong..." Dire Straights...

I

Yes or he is delusional...

If I were to say aliens came into my bedroom last night and preformed an anal probe, am I lying or delusional or do aliens appear and preform anal probes? Which is more likely?

 

That is a good comparison because when the crazy wave of alien abductees hit, psychologists roundly decided that it didn't, in and of itself, make a person delusional. The mental wards would have been filled to the brim.

 

But, just so I understand... all those religious people who say they have a relationship with god are all either delusional or lying. That is your explanation?

[Moontanman]

 

That is a good comparison because when the crazy wave of alien abductees hit, psychologists roundly decided that it didn't, in and of itself, make a person delusional. The mental wards would have been filled to the brim.

 

But, just so I understand... all those religious people who say they have a relationship with god are all either delusional or lying. That is your explanation?

 

 

I would be willing to bet the farm on it... You do make a good point about delusional not being equal to crazy, a great many delusional people who are obviously delusional can and do manage to operate successfully in our society, in fact convincing others that your delusion is real has made a great many people fabulously wealthy but they are still delusional...

Edited August 20, 2013 by Moontanman

[Iggy]

 

 

I would be willing to bet the farm on it...

 

They couldn't simply be mistaken? Really?