US ambassador killed over a film

[Jester]

Well, you don't tend to re-read and meditate over your freshmen physics texts -- unless you are a freshman in physics -- and then it's not a matter of desire, but more one of practical hate. People don't tend to gather every Sunday in large groups to hear a credentialed local expert talk about Heisenberg's Uncertainty principle.

Okay, so it's like sports? Or music? Entertainment rather than work? (For what it's worth, I gather together with my academic tribe all the time to hear credentialed experts. Pretty sure Physicists do the same.)

The issue [with Judaism] was that it was exclusive. You needed to be born into it.

I think the issue was that it was a tribal religion practiced by nobody particularly important in a not-terribly-prosperous part of the world wedged in between much more powerful empires.

What makes morality false?

Nothing. But religious education throughout the ages has made factual claims as well as moral ones. Almost all of those are demonstrably wrong.

Partly, that is true. Religion often provides context for each persons existence, but moreover I think it provides comfort in the face of adversity. The more a person suffers, the more they need comfort, be it from society, or beyond. What all modern religions have in common is their message of compassion. When someone is entirely alone, then, they are still not alone. You may see that as placebo, but you cannot dispute the results. I see that there is a need. We are still greedy, murderous barbarians at heart. Anything that unites us toward a interconnected compassionate society is a good thing.

Is there actually any evidence that atheists and agnostics deal with adversity one whit less well than religious believers? I hear this argument all the time, but I don't understand what the empirical basis is. Sure, there's loads of anecdata about nonbelievers who find god in times of adversity, or believers who find comfort in their belief. But there is an equally large mountain of anecdata of believers who lost their faith because their god(s) was cruel or powerless to help them in their time of suffering.

Nevertheless, since comfort has absolutely nothing to do with veracity, does it not seem troubling that these comforting beliefs are justified as true on the basis that they are comforting? How many wrong things could you justify believing on that basis?

... and, what has the other side produced in this regard? Secular humanism? How's that working?

Um, fantastically?

The most atheistic countries in the world are the ones with the highest incomes, the highest education rates, the highest life expectancy, the lowest crime rates, the highest reported degrees of trust and happiness, and so on. The least atheistic countries are poor, miserable and oppressive.



Looks like a pretty phenomenal track record to me. What's the contrary argument? That you don't personally find it satisfying?

-Jester