Atheism Is Not A Religion!!!

[asaratis]

Partially correct. Indeed you didn't say that God is not supernatural. You said He would be man-made, if He exists. Man cannot create a supernatural thing. Therefore by your own statement, God is not supernatural (if He exists). I am not here to explain logic to you. Take some lessons.

I did not say He would be man made, I posited that He could be, and then concluded that He would be natural if this were true. That is called logic, which is why only idiots try to cite logic as proof of their intelligence.

Begging your esteemed pardon, you said:

Did I say that? Why, no, I did not. I said that, given the above, if God exists, and He was created by man, He would be natural. If you need someone to parse that for you I suggest you ask an English teacher at your elementary school, I am not here to explain simple grammar to idiots.

We seem to be muddled with differing connotations of words. You have apparently adopted an errant definition of natural. Perhaps you also do not understand the commonly accepted definition of logic.

You mistakenly equate man made and natural. As explained before, natural things are those that would occur or exist in nature absent the presence of man. Anything produced by mankind (other than itself and its bodily remains) would not fall in that category. You said ^^^^if God exists, and He was created by man (i.e. man made), He would be natural. He cannot be both. We simply disagree on your all encompassing definition of natural. By your errant way of thinking, the USS Enterprise was made by nature. (Please don't regurgitate your simplistic argument that because man is part of nature, all things made by man are natural.) Please review the definition of natural. [Writings in brackets [...] below are mine.]

Natural - Definition and More from the Free Merriam-Webster Dictionary
1nat·u·ral
adjective \ˈna-chə-rəl, ˈnach-rəl\
: existing in nature and not made or caused by people : coming from nature [This includes your silly plastic rocks.]

: not having any extra substances or chemicals added : not containing anything artificial

: usual or expected


If you cannot fathom that one, try to grasp this one:

Natural Define Natural at Dictionary.com
adjective
1.
existing in or formed by nature (opposed to artificial ): [...as opposed to a man made bridge]
a natural bridge.
2.
based on the state of things in nature; constituted by nature:
Growth is a natural process.
3.
of or pertaining to nature or the universe:
natural beauty.
4.
of, pertaining to, or occupied with the study of natural science:
conducting natural experiments.
5.
in a state of nature; uncultivated, as land.
6.
growing spontaneously, without being planted or tended by human hand, as vegetation. [A silk flower is not natural. It is artificial....man made.]....[Corn growing in neat rows in an irrigated field is NOT natural.]

7. having undergone little or no processing and containing no chemical additives:


Augmenting that, you might try to understand what artificial means:

artificial

[ahr-tuh-fish-uh l]

• Synonyms
• Examples
• Word Origin

adjective
1.
made by human skill; produced by humans (opposed to natural ): [Note<<<<opposed to natural]
artificial flowers.
2.
imitation; simulated; sham:
artificial vanilla flavoring.
3.
lacking naturalness or spontaneity; forced; contrived; feigned:
an artificial smile.
4.
full of affectation; affected; stilted:
artificial manners; artificial speech.
5.
made without regard to the particular needs of a situation, person, etc.; imposed arbitrarily; unnatural:
artificial rules for dormitory residents.
6.
Biology. based on arbitrary, superficial characteristics rather than natural, organic relationships:
an artificial system of classification.
7.
Jewelry. manufactured to resemble a natural gem, in chemical composition or appearance.
Compare assembled, imitation (def 11), synthetic (def 6).

So if God was created by man, He would NOT be natural.

In any further discussion here or elsewhere on USMB you should differentiate between natural and man made things.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

Begging your esteemed pardon, you said:

Did I say that? Why, no, I did not. I said that, given the above, if God exists, and He was created by man, He would be natural. If you need someone to parse that for you I suggest you ask an English teacher at your elementary school, I am not here to explain simple grammar to idiots.

Damn, I remembered what I said.

Thanks for verifying that my memory still works right.

We seem to be muddled with differing connotations of words. You have apparently adopted an errant definition of natural. Perhaps you also do not understand the commonly accepted definition of logic.

You mistakenly equate man made and natural. As explained before, natural things are those that would occur or exist in nature absent the presence of man. Anything produced by mankind (other than itself and its bodily remains) would not fall in that category. You said ^^^^if God exists, and He was created by man (i.e. man made), He would be natural. He cannot be both. We simply disagree on your all encompassing definition of natural. By your errant way of thinking, the USS Enterprise was made by nature. (Please don't regurgitate your simplistic argument that because man is part of nature, all things made by man are natural.) Please review the definition of natural. [Writings in brackets [...] below are mine.]

Natural - Definition and More from the Free Merriam-Webster Dictionary
1nat·u·ral
adjective \ˈna-chə-rəl, ˈnach-rəl\
: existing in nature and not made or caused by people : coming from nature [This includes your silly plastic rocks.]

: not having any extra substances or chemicals added : not containing anything artificial

: usual or expected


If you cannot fathom that one, try to grasp this one:

Natural Define Natural at Dictionary.com
adjective
1.
existing in or formed by nature (opposed to artificial ): [...as opposed to a man made bridge]
a natural bridge.
2.
based on the state of things in nature; constituted by nature:
Growth is a natural process.
3.
of or pertaining to nature or the universe:
natural beauty.
4.
of, pertaining to, or occupied with the study of natural science:
conducting natural experiments.
5.
in a state of nature; uncultivated, as land.
6.
growing spontaneously, without being planted or tended by human hand, as vegetation. [A silk flower is not natural. It is artificial....man made.]....[Corn growing in neat rows in an irrigated field is NOT natural.]

7. having undergone little or no processing and containing no chemical additives:


Augmenting that, you might try to understand what artificial means:

artificial

[ahr-tuh-fish-uh l]

• Synonyms
• Examples
• Word Origin

adjective
1.
made by human skill; produced by humans (opposed to natural ): [Note<<<<opposed to natural]
artificial flowers.
2.
imitation; simulated; sham:
artificial vanilla flavoring.
3.
lacking naturalness or spontaneity; forced; contrived; feigned:
an artificial smile.
4.
full of affectation; affected; stilted:
artificial manners; artificial speech.
5.
made without regard to the particular needs of a situation, person, etc.; imposed arbitrarily; unnatural:
artificial rules for dormitory residents.
6.
Biology. based on arbitrary, superficial characteristics rather than natural, organic relationships:
an artificial system of classification.
7.
Jewelry. manufactured to resemble a natural gem, in chemical composition or appearance.
Compare assembled, imitation (def 11), synthetic (def 6).

So if God was created by man, He would NOT be natural.

In any further discussion here or elsewhere on USMB you should differentiate between natural and man made things.

I am not muddling anything, I am rejecting the outdated, and ridiculously arrogant, notion that man is somehow able to make unnatural things. Man is a part of nature, despite the outdated philosophy that we control it through our superior intellect.

I realize that some people are insecure, and need to cling to the notion that they are special in some way, but I see no need to feed into their lack of self respect by pretending they have a point.

Feel free to continue to post dictionary definitions if you feel a need to promote yourself above nature, just remember that those definitions are archaic and that, one day, everyone will come to realize that anything that the only things that are not part of nature are things that come from outside the universe.

Given the above, would you care to explain how a God created by man, that actually exists, would come from outside the universe? The only way I could see that working is if man were somehow able to work outside of the natural laws that the universe are governed by. That would make man, by definition, supernatural, and is the only logical way you can conclude that God is not natural if the conditions I laid out are true.

 

[Pogo]

Pays to increase your vocabulary.

It's a big word. You're welcome.

I guess you missed the part where I said single person.

Why am I not surprised?

Or, even more likely, you just cannot fucking read.

From your link, oh he who is always wrong.

that one —used as subject or direct object or indirect object of a verb or object of a preposition usually in reference to a lifeless thing

Not at all -- in fact I'm about to copy it since it would still be present if you didn't keep editing the quotes out in a feeble attempt to run away from your own words. So here it is:

Why "He"?
Who is the "She" that makes "him" a "He"?

Because English doesn't have gender neutral pronouns that can be used to refer to a single person, and my regular practice of using they and ignoring numbers would confuse the idiots, like you, that don't understand the basics of English grammar, oh he who thinks he is smarter than the average ant.

So not only are you giving "God" a penis --- sorry, I guess that's "Penis" -- but you're implying "God" is a person.
I wasn't going to bother drawing attention to that; I figured the genderical quicksand was enough. But now you have.

It's like a cat toy with this one.

 

[Pogo]

Atheism is not a religion. That is definitional fact.

Yet, according to the Supreme Court, and US tax law, atheism actually is a religion.

Yet we're not writing law here so that's irrelevant. Legally, you can define a human being as three-fifths of a person, so .... so much for legal technicalities to hide behind.

Too bad.

 

[Pogo]

I am starting to believe there may actually be a Church of the Composition Fallacy.
Apparently it does not include Confession. But it has a nice creation myth. In the River DeNial.

Aprently you cannnot read, what a surprise.

In order for you to make the argument that I am using a composition fallacy you would have to show that I claimed that atheism is a religion because some people treat it as one.

And speak of the devil, as in the one in the details, that's exactly what you did in the post immediately after my noting the fallacy, as well as before it:

To wit, the post prior:

The christians' need to peg atheism as a religion is the reason this thread has gone on so long, despite it being semantically unjustified.

I have no need to peg anything.

I do, however, enjoy pointing out to idiots when they are wrong, which is why the fact that churches like the one in the link below are ignored by religious zealots. The question now is, are you a religious zealot that will deny facts in order to maintain the fiction that atheism is cannot be a religion?

Home First Church of Atheism

And the post after:

What do they minister? They don't have a specific doctrine, and those so-called churches are really nothing more than community centers.

That was funny.

Newsflash, the fact that you deliberately chose to ignore reality is not proof that something does not exist.

This is the doctrine of an atheist church.

“Nothing exists besides natural phenomena. Thought is merely a function of those natural phenomena. Death is complete, and irreversible. We have faith solely in humankind, nature, and the facts of science.”
​

FAQ First Church of Atheism

Damn, they even mention faith, what a surprise.

By the way, this also proves that Dawkins was right when he said that atheist that absolutely reject the existence of God do exist, and that everyone who claimed they do not is an idiot.

Oops.

Since my only point in this thread is that you are wrong when you claim it is cannot be a religion because you do not see it as one you would be the person that is actually guilty of using a composition fallacy.

Then again, you are always wrong, so you should be used to finding out, once again, that you are totally screwed up.

Your only point here appears to be ad hominem scattershot in a hopeless quest for self-esteem. Apparently you don't recognize a Composition Fallacy even while employing it:

The second type of fallacy of Composition is committed when it is concluded that what is true of the parts of a whole must be true of the whole without there being adequate justification for the claim. More formally, the line of "reasoning" would be as follows:​

1. 
   
2. The parts of the whole X have characteristics A, B, C, etc.
   
3. Therefore the whole X must have characteristics A, B, C.

That this sort of reasoning is fallacious because it cannot be inferred that simply because the parts of a complex whole have (or lack) certain properties that the whole that they are parts of has those properties. This is especially clear in math: The numbers 1 and 3 are both odd. 1 and 3 are parts of 4. Therefore, the number 4 is odd.(Nizkor, op.cit.)
​

"Atheism is a religion because here are some atheists calling themselves a 'church'.

And this fallacy has been called out before here already.
I don't think you're up to this level of debate.

 

[sealybobo]

Atheism is not a religion. That is definitional fact.

Yet, according to the Supreme Court, and US tax law, atheism actually is a religion.

200 years ago, according to the surpreme court, slavery was moral.

Since when does the Supreme court write dictionaries? Do they decide on every other word you use? No. They are not Miriam-Webster, and this constitues an appeal to improper authority, since their reasons for defining atheism "as a religion" are not purely of a semantic (or logical) consideration. So, who cares what the Supreme thinks about the definition this single word? Not to mention their reasons for considering atheism a religion are political and economic, and an appeal to the consequences of calling it so (the political ease of throwing this segment of the population into a concise group for consensus purposes, rather than creating a whole new desriptor that no one else belongs to except atheists- which would cost money) rather than be a purely apt description of the word.

What a hilarious cop-out to even try to appeal to the Supreme Court for the definition of the word that has no operational power within the context of LEGAL preceding in any possible court case. The weakness of your attempt belies your motives behind trying to define a segment of the population you disagree with: the need to make them seem as arbitrary as you. And pointing to ONE part of a dictionary definition that states "strong atheism" (the belief that there is no god) is simply cherry picking, when the definition before it defines atheism as "the disbelief in a god," which is simply, a lack of belief, and a lack of belief can not possibly constitute a religion.

Worse for you, and as someone has very aptly pointed out already, THEISM itself can not even be called a religion, as it denotes too little information for the word to be categorized in this way. If this is true, then on the flip side, atheism logically can not be called a religion either.

From so many angles, you lose this battle: semantically, legally, counterfactually...

I doubt the atheists here will read this in its entirety...or if they do, will dismiss it based upon its source.

Is Atheism a religion - creation.com
Atheism is the belief that there is no god. According to the Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

“Atheism is the position that affirms the non-existence of God. It proposes positive disbelief rather than mere suspension of belief.”1
Buddhism is atheistic in the sense of denying that there is any overarching deity such as the Creator-God of the Bible. Atheism in the western sense excludes Buddhism, and adherents claim that it is not a religion. One Atheist said:

“Calling Atheism a religion is like calling bald a hair colour”2
However, atheists make such claims so Atheism can avoid legal imperatives placed on religions in many countries, and can avoid some of the ideological hang-ups people have about ‘religion’. It also creates a false dichotomy between science (which they claim must be naturalistic and secular) and religion.

Atheism3 will be defined in the contemporary western sense: not just the lack of belief in a god, but the assertion about the non-existence of any gods, spirits, or divine or supernatural beings. Atheists in this sense are metaphysical naturalists, and as will be shown, they DO follow a religion.

................

Atheists often claim that their belief is not a religion. This allows them to propagate their beliefs in settings where other religions are banned, but this should not be so.

Contemporary Western Atheism unquestionably has six of the seven dimensions of religion set forth by Smart, and the remaining dimension, ritual, has also started to develop. Thus it’s fallacious to assert, “Calling Atheism a religion is like calling bald a hair colour”. Perhaps a better analogy would be calling a shaved head a ‘hairstyle’. Other than the denial of the divine, there is little difference between Atheism and other worldviews typically labelled as religions.

The dichotomy that Atheists try to create between science and religion is false. The conflict is between interpretations of science coming from different religious worldviews.

Atheism shouldn’t be taught or enforced in settings where other religions are banned and shouldn’t be favoured by laws which imply a religiously neutral government.​

You're cutting and pasting from one of the most notorious, agenda driven Christian ministries. These loons announce their bias and have no interest in truth or objectivity.

What a laughable joke.

I rest my case!

Funny (even laughable) that dismiss this because of the source.

I doubt the atheists here will read this in its entirety...or if they do, will dismiss it based upon its source.

Here's a question for you...and others that deny Atheism is a religion: Why does it bother you that Atheism is considered by many to be a religion? Nobody is calling any individual atheist a religious person. Nobody is forced to practice a religion.

I wish it was so I could go to services and get the tax write offs.

It probably upsets some of us because it is simply not true.

1. Atheism takes faith / is a religion.
   Calling atheism a religion is like calling bald a hair color, or not collecting stamps a hobby.
   
   Atheism is simply a lack of belief in a god or gods, nothing more. It is the default position of doubt, uncertainty and skepticism one may have regarding claims made by theists. Just as it takes no faith to lack belief or remain uncertain concerning any other imaginable claim, it takes none to doubt the existence of a god or gods.
   
   Atheism has no sacred texts, objects, places or times, no rituals or creation stories, no positive beliefs, central tenants, modes of worship or supernatural claims, no implicit or derived moral codes, philosophies or world views and no central organization or church. It fulfills none of the criteria that define a religion. http://wiki.ironchariots.org/index.php?title=Atheism_is_a_religion
   
   “To say that atheism requires faith is as dim-witted as saying that disbelief in pixies or leprechauns takes faith. Even if Einstein himself told me there was an elf on my shoulder, I would still ask for proof and I wouldn’t be wrong to ask.” – Geoff Mather
   
   
   
   

 

[emilynghiem]

Hi Pogo: I think the next big stage is agreeing what is a Political Religion, and how do we deal with that?
If our govt is supposed to "separate" and not impose religion through govt, what about Constitutionalist beliefs?
What about belief that health care is a right, Prochoice or prolife should be the default position taken by govt, etc?

I have more success explaining to prolife people that prolife views can exist within a prochoice context,
because that's already happening. All my prolife friends would not do a single thing towards the choice of abortion,
and yet this is all by free choice and none of that is required or dictated by law. So i can argue that all the goals
of the prolife movement can be achieved while the laws are prochoice. We can still get rid of the causes of abortion
and not have to make abortion illegal to do it. The prolife already prove that by free choice, you can be educated enough to choose not to have sex, not to get pregnant and not to have an abortion. you don't have to be forced by law to choose that.

I have ZERO success explaining to prochoice people about free market health care as a choice.

So the problem is people's political BELIEFS.

If these are not going to change, and why SHOULD govt be abused to force a different belief on people than what they naturally believe; why not decide the system for DEALING with clashing political beliefs?

if prolife or Constitutionalism is a political belief that inherently involves participation and policy of govt,
how do we deal with that? if liberal views of prochoice, anti death penalty, prolegalization and singlepayer health
care are a political belief, how can this be exercised freely WITHOUT imposing a national religion on others?

Atheism is not a religion. That is definitional fact.

Yet, according to the Supreme Court, and US tax law, atheism actually is a religion.

Yet we're not writing law here so that's irrelevant. Legally, you can define a human being as three-fifths of a person, so .... so much for legal technicalities to hide behind.

Too bad.

 

[Pogo]

Hi Emily

I'm still going to insist that "politics" and "religion" have nothing to do with each other and that conflating them only serves to muddy the waters as long as we grope for definitions of either.

To oversimplify to a nice sound bite: Politics addresses the machinations of the world; Religion addresses the machinations of the otherworld.
Ideally never the twain shall meet.

 

[emilynghiem]

You can do even better sealybobo. nonprofits and churches require a bunch of filing and admin/legal work.

If you set up a DBA business under your name, you can deduct business expenses 100%.

So if you have a web or media consulting business, anything you spend to advertise counts as a 100% deduction.

I had a friend who ran her "nonprofit school" this way, as a business DBA under her name.
So there was no filing, only money paid in and out. No employees, only consultants who counted as expenses paid out.

Some of the top millionaires who retired off their real estate investments as a business
also deduct all kinds of costs using the tax laws. See example: Lifestyles Unlimited - The education and mentor group for real estate investors
Ex: if a property is bought under its value using one loan, then afterwards the property is assessed at its normal value and a higher second loan is obtained against that higher value, then when the second loan (counted as a debt) is used to pay off the first loan (counted as debt), the "difference" in cash isn't counted as income but debt, so there are no taxes on it.
The founder of the network in Houston that teaches this used this method to buy a 4 or 5 million dollar home for
under value, something like 3.5 I think. So when he got the bigger loan to refinance 6 months later, he paid off the first loan and pocketed 500,000 in cash tax free. He didn't need to borrow this money, he has 10 million in the bank. He uses credit to finance property because the difference counts as debt not income. So he makes more money off borrowing, even including interest and the business costs, taxes, fees and other expenses. He calculates all this in advance before he prices or pays.

Yet, according to the Supreme Court, and US tax law, atheism actually is a religion.

200 years ago, according to the surpreme court, slavery was moral.

Since when does the Supreme court write dictionaries? Do they decide on every other word you use? No. They are not Miriam-Webster, and this constitues an appeal to improper authority, since their reasons for defining atheism "as a religion" are not purely of a semantic (or logical) consideration. So, who cares what the Supreme thinks about the definition this single word? Not to mention their reasons for considering atheism a religion are political and economic, and an appeal to the consequences of calling it so (the political ease of throwing this segment of the population into a concise group for consensus purposes, rather than creating a whole new desriptor that no one else belongs to except atheists- which would cost money) rather than be a purely apt description of the word.

What a hilarious cop-out to even try to appeal to the Supreme Court for the definition of the word that has no operational power within the context of LEGAL preceding in any possible court case. The weakness of your attempt belies your motives behind trying to define a segment of the population you disagree with: the need to make them seem as arbitrary as you. And pointing to ONE part of a dictionary definition that states "strong atheism" (the belief that there is no god) is simply cherry picking, when the definition before it defines atheism as "the disbelief in a god," which is simply, a lack of belief, and a lack of belief can not possibly constitute a religion.

Worse for you, and as someone has very aptly pointed out already, THEISM itself can not even be called a religion, as it denotes too little information for the word to be categorized in this way. If this is true, then on the flip side, atheism logically can not be called a religion either.

From so many angles, you lose this battle: semantically, legally, counterfactually...

I doubt the atheists here will read this in its entirety...or if they do, will dismiss it based upon its source.

Is Atheism a religion - creation.com
Atheism is the belief that there is no god. According to the Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

“Atheism is the position that affirms the non-existence of God. It proposes positive disbelief rather than mere suspension of belief.”1
Buddhism is atheistic in the sense of denying that there is any overarching deity such as the Creator-God of the Bible. Atheism in the western sense excludes Buddhism, and adherents claim that it is not a religion. One Atheist said:

“Calling Atheism a religion is like calling bald a hair colour”2
However, atheists make such claims so Atheism can avoid legal imperatives placed on religions in many countries, and can avoid some of the ideological hang-ups people have about ‘religion’. It also creates a false dichotomy between science (which they claim must be naturalistic and secular) and religion.

Atheism3 will be defined in the contemporary western sense: not just the lack of belief in a god, but the assertion about the non-existence of any gods, spirits, or divine or supernatural beings. Atheists in this sense are metaphysical naturalists, and as will be shown, they DO follow a religion.

................

Atheists often claim that their belief is not a religion. This allows them to propagate their beliefs in settings where other religions are banned, but this should not be so.

Contemporary Western Atheism unquestionably has six of the seven dimensions of religion set forth by Smart, and the remaining dimension, ritual, has also started to develop. Thus it’s fallacious to assert, “Calling Atheism a religion is like calling bald a hair colour”. Perhaps a better analogy would be calling a shaved head a ‘hairstyle’. Other than the denial of the divine, there is little difference between Atheism and other worldviews typically labelled as religions.

The dichotomy that Atheists try to create between science and religion is false. The conflict is between interpretations of science coming from different religious worldviews.

Atheism shouldn’t be taught or enforced in settings where other religions are banned and shouldn’t be favoured by laws which imply a religiously neutral government.​

You're cutting and pasting from one of the most notorious, agenda driven Christian ministries. These loons announce their bias and have no interest in truth or objectivity.

What a laughable joke.

I rest my case!

Funny (even laughable) that dismiss this because of the source.

I doubt the atheists here will read this in its entirety...or if they do, will dismiss it based upon its source.

Here's a question for you...and others that deny Atheism is a religion: Why does it bother you that Atheism is considered by many to be a religion? Nobody is calling any individual atheist a religious person. Nobody is forced to practice a religion.

I wish it was so I could go to services and get the tax write offs.

It probably upsets some of us because it is simply not true.

1. Atheism takes faith / is a religion.
   Calling atheism a religion is like calling bald a hair color, or not collecting stamps a hobby.
   
   Atheism is simply a lack of belief in a god or gods, nothing more. It is the default position of doubt, uncertainty and skepticism one may have regarding claims made by theists. Just as it takes no faith to lack belief or remain uncertain concerning any other imaginable claim, it takes none to doubt the existence of a god or gods.
   
   Atheism has no sacred texts, objects, places or times, no rituals or creation stories, no positive beliefs, central tenants, modes of worship or supernatural claims, no implicit or derived moral codes, philosophies or world views and no central organization or church. It fulfills none of the criteria that define a religion.
   
   “To say that atheism requires faith is as dim-witted as saying that disbelief in pixies or leprechauns takes faith. Even if Einstein himself told me there was an elf on my shoulder, I would still ask for proof and I wouldn’t be wrong to ask.” – Geoff Mather
   
   
   

 

[emilynghiem]

Hi Emily

I'm still going to insist that "politics" and "religion" have nothing to do with each other and that conflating them only serves to muddy the waters as long as we grope for definitions of either.

To oversimplify to a nice sound bite: Politics addresses the machinations of the world; Religion addresses the machinations of the otherworld.
Ideally never the twain shall meet.

OKAY then I would REALLY Say we need to be discussing political beliefs then.
Since that's what applies to the real world.

What I find is key, is if people believe in Retributive Justice or Restorative Justice.

How we relate and whether we can work together is most determined by that,
and what people/groups you can or cannot forgive and work with.

Once you align on where you can relate, everything else can work out and follow from there.

People with different views of Justice will fight and impose on each other.
So that is the key question, and the key to the answer is to what degree we are willing to forgive,
and what things can we not forgive but will project blame and demand punishment instead of correction and prevention.

 

[Pogo]

Hi Emily

I'm still going to insist that "politics" and "religion" have nothing to do with each other and that conflating them only serves to muddy the waters as long as we grope for definitions of either.

To oversimplify to a nice sound bite: Politics addresses the machinations of the world; Religion addresses the machinations of the otherworld.
Ideally never the twain shall meet.

OKAY then I would REALLY Say we need to be discussing political beliefs then.
Since that's what applies to the real world.

What I find is key, is if people believe in Retributive Justice or Restorative Justice.

How we relate and whether we can work together is most determined by that,
and what people/groups you can or cannot forgive and work with.

Once you align on where you can relate, everything else can work out and follow from there.

People with different views of Justice will fight and impose on each other.
So that is the key question, and the key to the answer is to what degree we are willing to forgive,
and what things can we not forgive but will project blame and demand punishment instead of correction and prevention.

Emily I know you mean well and have positive intentions but if I may say, you're a bit obsessed when you try to shunt every topic back into the politics of government and healthcare.

Sorry but this simply is not a political thread but a philosophical one on the aspects of religion and religious philosophies. That's a personal and individual field of thought, not a public or government-structure one. You seem to be trying to mix apples and oranges.

 

[sealybobo]

Hi Emily

I'm still going to insist that "politics" and "religion" have nothing to do with each other and that conflating them only serves to muddy the waters as long as we grope for definitions of either.

To oversimplify to a nice sound bite: Politics addresses the machinations of the world; Religion addresses the machinations of the otherworld.
Ideally never the twain shall meet.

I think they do have a lot to do with each other especially since the GOP started using god as a wedge issue to divide poor and middle class voters.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

Not at all -- in fact I'm about to copy it since it would still be present if you didn't keep editing the quotes out in a feeble attempt to run away from your own words. So here it is:


So not only are you giving "God" a penis --- sorry, I guess that's "Penis" -- but you're implying "God" is a person.
I wasn't going to bother drawing attention to that; I figured the genderical quicksand was enough. But now you have.

It's like a cat toy with this one.

No, I am saying that God, if He, She, or whatever gender that being is, is alive, which is why the pronoun it is inappropriate, and indicates why I emphasized that portion of the definition of it..

But keep showing us how stupid you are by insisting that I am saying something else. oh he who is always wrong.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

Yet we're not writing law here so that's irrelevant. Legally, you can define a human being as three-fifths of a person, so .... so much for legal technicalities to hide behind.

Too bad.

Wow, another idiot that thinks the fact that slaves were actually counted for establishing the number of representatives proves that they were less than human. The funny part of this is that it was the people that were, allegedly, opposed to slavery that insisted that they shouldn't count at all. (My guess is you would have been right there with those assholes.) If you don't believe me, read some history.

That said, the mere fact that you do not regard atheism as a religion in no way obligates other atheists to have the same belief, but feel free to keep claiming that me pointing out that some atheists insist on that designation proves I am delusional.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

And speak of the devil, as in the one in the details, that's exactly what you did in the post immediately after my noting the fallacy, as well as before it:

To wit, the post prior:

Sigh, I almost feel sorry for you.

Almost.

I have no need to peg anything.

I do, however, enjoy pointing out to idiots when they are wrong, which is why the fact that churches like the one in the link below are ignored by religious zealots. The question now is, are you a religious zealot that will deny facts in order to maintain the fiction that atheism is cannot be a religion?

Home First Church of Atheism

Can you point out where I said that atheism is always a religion in that post?

And the post after:

That was funny.

Newsflash, the fact that you deliberately chose to ignore reality is not proof that something does not exist.

This is the doctrine of an atheist church.

“Nothing exists besides natural phenomena. Thought is merely a function of those natural phenomena. Death is complete, and irreversible. We have faith solely in humankind, nature, and the facts of science.”
​

FAQ First Church of Atheism

Damn, they even mention faith, what a surprise.

By the way, this also proves that Dawkins was right when he said that atheist that absolutely reject the existence of God do exist, and that everyone who claimed they do not is an idiot.

Or that one?

Can you explain me not saying something proves I said it?

Didn't think so.

Oops.

Don't worry about it, like I said before, you are always wrong, so another example of it, even when you go out of your way to provide it, is not going to upset anyone who knows you.

Your only point here appears to be ad hominem scattershot in a hopeless quest for self-esteem. Apparently you don't recognize a Composition Fallacy even while employing it.

The second type of fallacy of Composition is committed when it is concluded that what is true of the parts of a whole must be true of the whole without there being adequate justification for the claim. More formally, the line of "reasoning" would be as follows:​

1. 
   
2. The parts of the whole X have characteristics A, B, C, etc.
3. Therefore the whole X must have characteristics A, B, C.

That this sort of reasoning is fallacious because it cannot be inferred that simply because the parts of a complex whole have (or lack) certain properties that the whole that they are parts of has those properties. This is especially clear in math: The numbers 1 and 3 are both odd. 1 and 3 are parts of 4. Therefore, the number 4 is odd.(Nizkor, op.cit.)
​

"Atheism is a religion because here are some atheists calling themselves a 'church'.

No, the fact that some atheists regard it as religion proves that it can be. That is not me saying that, because some people view it as a religion, everyone does.

On the other hand, you are the one insisting that, since you say it is not, that proves that everyone who calls themselves an atheist has to agree with you.

Which actually sounds like a composition fallacy to your keepers?

And this fallacy has been called out before here already.
I don't think you're up to this level of debate.

You are right, I do have trouble not using words that I know you do not understand, like it. But what can I say, I enjoy mocking you, so I am willing to put some effort into it.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

I wish it was so I could go to services and get the tax write offs.

You can, I even posted a link to the church to make it easier for you.

You, however, prefer to insist that your personal ignorance trumps reality.

 

[Pogo]

Hi Emily

I'm still going to insist that "politics" and "religion" have nothing to do with each other and that conflating them only serves to muddy the waters as long as we grope for definitions of either.

To oversimplify to a nice sound bite: Politics addresses the machinations of the world; Religion addresses the machinations of the otherworld.
Ideally never the twain shall meet.

I think they do have a lot to do with each other especially since the GOP started using god as a wedge issue to divide poor and middle class voters.

Ah but that's a false relationship -- a misuse by one of the other as a tool. Anyone with half a brain should have seen/should see right through that false relationship.

It has no validity in a nation founded on the denial of the power of the First Estate, i.e. the divorce of church from state. It's naught but demagoguery and as such, dishonest. That's what I meant by "ideally".

 

[asaratis]

Begging your esteemed pardon, you said:

Did I say that? Why, no, I did not. I said that, given the above, if God exists, and He was created by man, He would be natural. If you need someone to parse that for you I suggest you ask an English teacher at your elementary school, I am not here to explain simple grammar to idiots.

Damn, I remembered what I said.

Thanks for verifying that my memory still works right.

We seem to be muddled with differing connotations of words. You have apparently adopted an errant definition of natural. Perhaps you also do not understand the commonly accepted definition of logic.

You mistakenly equate man made and natural. As explained before, natural things are those that would occur or exist in nature absent the presence of man. Anything produced by mankind (other than itself and its bodily remains) would not fall in that category. You said ^^^^if God exists, and He was created by man (i.e. man made), He would be natural. He cannot be both. We simply disagree on your all encompassing definition of natural. By your errant way of thinking, the USS Enterprise was made by nature. (Please don't regurgitate your simplistic argument that because man is part of nature, all things made by man are natural.) Please review the definition of natural. [Writings in brackets [...] below are mine.]

Natural - Definition and More from the Free Merriam-Webster Dictionary
1nat·u·ral
adjective \ˈna-chə-rəl, ˈnach-rəl\
: existing in nature and not made or caused by people : coming from nature [This includes your silly plastic rocks.]

: not having any extra substances or chemicals added : not containing anything artificial

: usual or expected


If you cannot fathom that one, try to grasp this one:

Natural Define Natural at Dictionary.com
adjective
1.
existing in or formed by nature (opposed to artificial ): [...as opposed to a man made bridge]
a natural bridge.
2.
based on the state of things in nature; constituted by nature:
Growth is a natural process.
3.
of or pertaining to nature or the universe:
natural beauty.
4.
of, pertaining to, or occupied with the study of natural science:
conducting natural experiments.
5.
in a state of nature; uncultivated, as land.
6.
growing spontaneously, without being planted or tended by human hand, as vegetation. [A silk flower is not natural. It is artificial....man made.]....[Corn growing in neat rows in an irrigated field is NOT natural.]

7. having undergone little or no processing and containing no chemical additives:


Augmenting that, you might try to understand what artificial means:

artificial

[ahr-tuh-fish-uh l]

• Synonyms
• Examples
• Word Origin

adjective
1.
made by human skill; produced by humans (opposed to natural ): [Note<<<<opposed to natural]
artificial flowers.
2.
imitation; simulated; sham:
artificial vanilla flavoring.
3.
lacking naturalness or spontaneity; forced; contrived; feigned:
an artificial smile.
4.
full of affectation; affected; stilted:
artificial manners; artificial speech.
5.
made without regard to the particular needs of a situation, person, etc.; imposed arbitrarily; unnatural:
artificial rules for dormitory residents.
6.
Biology. based on arbitrary, superficial characteristics rather than natural, organic relationships:
an artificial system of classification.
7.
Jewelry. manufactured to resemble a natural gem, in chemical composition or appearance.
Compare assembled, imitation (def 11), synthetic (def 6).

So if God was created by man, He would NOT be natural.

In any further discussion here or elsewhere on USMB you should differentiate between natural and man made things.

I am not muddling anything, I am rejecting the outdated, and ridiculously arrogant, notion that man is somehow able to make unnatural things. Man is a part of nature, despite the outdated philosophy that we control it through our superior intellect.

I realize that some people are insecure, and need to cling to the notion that they are special in some way, but I see no need to feed into their lack of self respect by pretending they have a point.

Feel free to continue to post dictionary definitions if you feel a need to promote yourself above nature, just remember that those definitions are archaic and that, one day, everyone will come to realize that anything that the only things that are not part of nature are things that come from outside the universe.

Given the above, would you care to explain how a God created by man, that actually exists, would come from outside the universe? The only way I could see that working is if man were somehow able to work outside of the natural laws that the universe are governed by. That would make man, by definition, supernatural, and is the only logical way you can conclude that God is not natural if the conditions I laid out are true.

You are a sick puppy. You continue to deny the dictionary definition of natural just to save face and appear to be intellectual.

I never claimed that we are not part of nature. I never claimed that we control nature. We survive by adapting to it. We make the things we need from it, like bridges, silk flowers, plastic. aircraft carriers, ad infinitum. The things we make are not considered to be naturally occurring things. The are artificial things.

God necessarily came from outside the universe. Something outside of the universe had to set it all in motion...with the big bang. That something was God. God lit the fuse....then watched as nature formed all of the natural things in the universe....over billions and billions of years (our constructed metric) time...including mankind by way of evolution.

I'm done with you.

 

[asaratis]

......<snip>

I wish it was so I could go to services and get the tax write offs.

It probably upsets some of us because it is simply not true.

1. Atheism takes faith / is a religion.
   Calling atheism a religion is like calling bald a hair color, or not collecting stamps a hobby.
   
   Atheism is simply a lack of belief in a god or gods, nothing more. It is the default position of doubt, uncertainty and skepticism one may have regarding claims made by theists. Just as it takes no faith to lack belief or remain uncertain concerning any other imaginable claim, it takes none to doubt the existence of a god or gods.
   
   Atheism has no sacred texts, objects, places or times, no rituals or creation stories, no positive beliefs, central tenants, modes of worship or supernatural claims, no implicit or derived moral codes, philosophies or world views and no central organization or church. It fulfills none of the criteria that define a religion.
   
   “To say that atheism requires faith is as dim-witted as saying that disbelief in pixies or leprechauns takes faith. Even if Einstein himself told me there was an elf on my shoulder, I would still ask for proof and I wouldn’t be wrong to ask.” – Geoff Mather

Atheism is not the lack of belief in a god or gods. That would be Agnosticism which is not a religion.

Atheism is the belief that a god or gods do not exist. That belief is held on faith as it cannot be proved. That faith is the doctrine of Atheism. Atheism is a religion....a religion without a god.

 

[Carla_Danger]

Atheism is not a religion. That is definitional fact.

Yet, according to the Supreme Court, and US tax law, atheism actually is a religion.

Yet we're not writing law here so that's irrelevant. Legally, you can define a human being as three-fifths of a person, so .... so much for legal technicalities to hide behind.

Too bad.

Good point.