On How Religion Cheapens Life

[Lao Tse]

Was that the grape flavored Kool-Aid? I always liked the grape.

Your obsession with applying labels to every idea you don't like is pretty amusing. With all those "-ists" and "-isms" I'll bet you wear out the I and S keys really quickly.

Yes, materialism does indeed force one to reexamine the concepts of slavery and social stratification . . . provided one has a modicum of intellectual honesty and, ah, gumption.

I actually pay attention to what words mean. they all mean something specific. Only idiots decry the concept of labels.

 

[OrnotBitwise]

I actually pay attention to what words mean. they all mean something specific. Only idiots decry the concept of labels.

Right. Like "society" for example?

 

[Lao Tse]

Right. Like "society" for example?

I understand what society is. I just object to it being given status as something other than the accumulated actions, thoughts, values, and agreed upon behavioral codes of individuals.

 

[IHateGovernment]

I think the name of this thread is ironic coming from a nihilist who would say life has no inherent meaning and thus no inherent value which cannot be cheapened.

 

[Lao Tse]

I think the name of this thread is ironic coming from a nihilist who would say life has no inherent meaning and thus no inherent value which cannot be cheapened.

You don't understand what nihilism is, he believes life has no INNATE meaning. Duh. get a clue.

 

[OrnotBitwise]

I understand what society is. I just object to it being given status as something other than the the accumulated actions, thoughts, values, and agreed upon behavioral codes of individuals.

Object all you like. You can object to the sky being blue, for all I care. The fact remains that it is more as you would certainly know if you were at all educated.

Here's an interesting choice of phrase: "agreed upon behavioral codes." It's clumsy but we can work with it. Now, just how are these codes of behavior agreed upon, do you suppose?

 

[OrnotBitwise]

I think the name of this thread is ironic coming from a nihilist who would say life has no inherent meaning and thus no inherent value which cannot be cheapened.

Inherent meaning and value are not the only possible kinds of meaning and value.

But I'll leave the rest to AOI: I'm curious as to how he's going to respond.

 

[Lao Tse]

Object all you like. You can object to the sky being blue, for all I care. The fact remains that it is more as you would certainly know if you were at all educated.

Here's an interesting choice of phrase: "agreed upon behavioral codes." It's clumsy but we can work with it. Now, just how are these codes of behavior agreed upon, do you suppose?

No. You posit it as more so you can give it RIGHTS which you will then use the curtail the freedoms of real actual people, individuals.

 

[OrnotBitwise]

No. You posit it as more so you can give it RIGHTS which you will then use the curtail the freedoms of real actual people, individuals.

That's simply the easiest way to talk about it. Society doesn't literally have rights in the same sense that individuals have rights; surely you understand that much. It's a label of convenience that happens to correspond to something more-or-less useful.

Quarks don't really spin, and they certainly don't have color or flavor in the sense we're used to thinking about such qualities. We have to label those attributes they do have with something, though, and those are easy to remember. Scientists can't really "see" sub-atomic particles in the literal sense, though they use that phrase all the time. It's suggestive of what they actually do, and it's far less clumsy than the more exact phrasing would be.

Society doesn't really have rights, in the literal sense. That's just a shorthand notation for "the rights of everybody else who doesn't engage in the subject behavior" in most cases.

 

[Lao Tse]

That's simply the easiest way to talk about it. Society doesn't literally have rights in the same sense that individuals have rights; surely you understand that much. It's a label of convenience that happens to correspond to something more-or-less useful.

Quarks don't really spin, and they certainly don't have color or flavor in the sense we're used to thinking about such qualities. We have to label those attributes they do have with something, though, and those are easy to remember. Scientists can't really "see" sub-atomic particles in the literal sense, though they use that phrase all the time. It's suggestive of what they actually do, and it's far less clumsy than the more exact phrasing would be.

Society doesn't really have rights, in the literal sense. That's just a shorthand notation for "the rights of everybody else who doesn't engage in the subject behavior" in most cases.

But then with this mental place holder, you begin to ascribe to it rights you would never ascribe to an individual, and thus, the system becomes unbalanced, as unscrupulous leaders use the RIGHTS OF SOCIETY to take more and more from actual people. You or your ilk.

And I thought you hated labels. LOL.

 

[OrnotBitwise]

But then with this mental place holder, you begin to ascribe to it rights you would never ascribe to an individual, and thus, the system becomes unbalanced, as unscrupulous leaders use the RIGHTS OF SOCIETY to take more and more from actual people. You or your ilk.

And I thought you hated labels. LOL.

I don't hate labels at all. It's a sign of an insecure and juvenile mind, however, to overuse labels and to treat them as if they're meaning were self-evident and adamantine.

Pray tell us just what rights you believe I ascribe to society that I would never ascribe to an individual?

 

[Lao Tse]

I don't hate labels at all. It's a sign of an insecure and juvenile mind, however, to overuse labels and to treat them as if they're meaning were self-evident and adamantine.

No. You just need a dictionary. And you need to quit trying to insert additional meanings into words at runtime to buttress what argument you're making at the time. The dictionary is not JIT.

Pray tell us just what rights you believe I ascribe to society that I would never ascribe to an individual?

To seize all guns for himself from the rest of the populace?

 

[OrnotBitwise]

No. You just need a dictionary. And you need to quit trying to insert additional meanings into words at runtime to buttress what argument you're making at the time. The dictionary is not JIT.


To seize all guns for himself from the rest of the populace?

No, I simply don't insist that words have only one meaning. Unlike some.

I ascribe to any individual the right to prevent another from misusing firearms. When you're talking about groups of individuals then statistical reality begins to intrude itself . . . unless you're an idiot, of course.

 

[Lao Tse]

No, I simply don't insist that words have only one meaning. Unlike some.

Words can have many meanings, but only one at a time, in a discussion. unless of course, the topic of discussion is the various meanings, which is so often the case with language manglers like yourself. It's annoying.

I ascribe to any individual the right to prevent another from misusing firearms. When you're talking about groups of individuals then statistical reality begins to intrude itself . . . unless you're an idiot, of course.

SO you espouse mandatory firearms accuracy and safety training for all?

 

[doniston]

It is often commented on that atheists claim that if religion was eliminated that peace would ensue. Few atheists claim this, but there is truth in it, although not in the obvious sense.

If religion was eliminated, wars would still exist, based on other factors such as greed etc.

But it is the belief in the afterlife, and the belief in an innate meaning to existence provided by a god that allow this.

When you accept that existence has no innate meaning, that meaning is a human creation, the dynamic of how you see life and existence changes. You realise that as a human creation, meaning is only found in other humans, that they are the source of your meaning. It makes it incredibly hard to rationally justify killing your sources of meaning, which makes war, for example, extremely hard to justify.

When you believe in 'justice in the afterlife', or even that existence exists beyond the short glimpse we experience, you cheapen that short glimpse.

It is not that religion causes war, though it does, it is the perspective it gives to life, the cheapening effect it has, that makes war far easier than it should be.

If you actually mean "makes it boring" I would agree.

 

[Lao Tse]

So to clarify, while Anyoldiron doesn't espouse that eliminating religion would bring world peace, he does think it's true. LOL. Way to distance yourself from the herd, sonny-boy!

 

[uscitizen]

Anyold is just trying to get away from your nohide buddies
Are they anything like skinless weiners ?

 

[Agnosticus_Caesar]

Funny...I look at various religions, and I find that those who tend to be most vocal, also seem to be least reverent. Those who wave the banner, and scream the mantra, almost always fail to get the point.

 

[AnyOldIron]

Now as for the nihilists... Stalin, Mao, Lenin... All of these were nihilists, placing value without belief of instrinsic value. They too committed atrocities in the name of nihilism. One only has to look into history to find that humans can find reason for atrocities in religion as well as in nihilism. It seems to be the nature of humans to be constantly battling those who would deem their values so superior that they must thrust them on others by force.

I'm not sure Lenin, Stalin or Mao could be described as nihilists. They may have espoused atheistic views but that doesn't make them true nihilists, nor that their actions were motivated by nihilism.

If anything, their actions were motivated by an enhanced sense of positive freedom, as you said, that they knew what was best and worked on the basis that the ends justify the means, that it is morally justified to sacrifice people for the 'greater good' if needed. It wasn't a belief in a lack of innate value that caused this, it was a belief in the value of their own judgement, as you mentioned.

Nihilism makes it very hard to justify killing. It states that because meaning and value aren't innate and only sourced from other humans, killing those sources of meaning and value would be like someone cutting off their own air supply....

 

[AnyOldIron]

Actually, it's the nihilists who question the innate value of life, and their justification of barbarity by explaining it as "part of evolution and therefore inevitable", who devalue life and justify barbarity.

Can you demonstrate that there is an innate value to life? Where does that derive from?

Nihilists justify 'barbarity' by explaining it as "part of evolution and therefore inevitable"? what nihilists claim this?

You are creating strawmen again....