The Root Of All Evil?

Is faith a virus that hinders an objective search for truth?

whether it is based on religion, greed, or even science hinders objectivity.

I've known athiests who are just as ignorant as I am :-P

It's a pity that this tired old fallacy keeps getting recycled.

All of our thought processes must begin with assumptions that cannot be proven. This is as true in science as it is in any other subject area. Basing your thoughts on unprovable assumptions is an exercise of faith. That does not preclude the assumptions from looking reasonable to our minds.

N. Ireland in "The God Delusion". He allows that the basis of the conflict between the two groups are not theological in nature, but that without religion to artificially separate group from group there would have been no conflict.

Dan

way for the people of N. Ireland to identify each other, but if the difference had not existed - either due to the people having the same religion or none at all, the dispute would still occur, just using different labels.

Dawkins ignores the numerous conflicts that have taken place that do not involve religion, where purely secular dividing lines are drawn. For every Crusades there is a World War.

Only I and II so far. But I see your point.

Instead of that sort of bean counting, why not ask this question:
The WW (both), and all the Crusades, and The Troubles, and the Balkans, all involved mostly or exclusively "Christian" religions. Why was there no organized effort on their part to stand up against these slaughters?
Just the opposite happened, in fact.

And Dawkins must be held accountable: He says everything is man-made and improving via evolution. That includes religion (I say on his behalf). Does Dawkins Almighty have a plan? a clue? Ask him.

up against these slaughters?

By "their part" I'm assuming that you are referring to established Christian religions, and, more specifically, their governing bodies (Vatican, etc.). If my assumption is wrong, please let me know.

I'm sure there were efforts made by Christians around the world in each of these conflicts, despite the silence by the Vatican. One could say that the participation by the US, a nation founded on Christian values and still predominantly Christian, with other nations counts as "organized effort." Despite the inaction by the Vatican, the altruistic principles spread by the Christian religions and others were responsible for ending or mitigating the conflicts.

The Vatican unfortunately has to fight in the arena of global politics to survive (sometimes literally - WW2), and has been guilty of inaction because of the inherent weakness in Man. Just like any social construct, organized religion can become corrupted and driven to acts of evil or cowardice. That does not mean, though, that the true principles set forth by the religion are less valid or responsible for the violence.

(Modified a/r to bring the teaching forward 2000 years.)
"The [popes and the archbishops] have seated themselves in the seat of [Jesus]. Therefore all the things they tell YOU, do and observe, but do not do according to their deeds, for they say but do not perform. They bind up heavy loads and put them upon the shoulders of men, but they themselves are not willing to budge them with their finger. All the works they do they do to be viewed by men; for they broaden the [albs and the amices] that they wear as safeguards, and enlarge the fringes of their garments. They like the most prominent place at evening meals and the front seats in the [churches], and the greetings in the marketplaces and to be called [Most Reverend] by men"
"Be on the watch for the false prophets that come to YOU in sheep's covering, but inside they are ravenous wolves. By their fruits YOU will recognize them. Never do people gather grapes from thorns or figs from thistles, do they? Likewise every good tree produces fine fruit, but every rotten tree produces worthless fruit; a good tree cannot bear worthless fruit, neither can a rotten tree produce fine fruit. Every tree not producing fine fruit gets cut down and thrown into the fire. Really, then, by their fruits YOU will recognize those [men]."
"No house servant can be a slave to two masters; for, either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will stick to the one and despise the other."
"Jesus answered: "My kingdom is no part of this world.""

"responsible for ending or mitigating the conflicts"
WWI ended when the Entente ran out of cannon fodder. WWII ended the same way in Europe, with a whimper, and with a bang in the East.

And Steven and I want to know why you mention the silence of only the Vatican. The combatants in the Wars: England (Anglican), US (various mainstream Protestant), Germany (Catholic and Lutheran), Austria (ditto), other Central Powers (Catholic), Italy (Catholic by law) ...
The chaplains corps in all those countries were organized to do just the opposite, as I said: not to hinder but to further their respective countries' war aims.

From a prominent Lutheran:
Martin Niem

stop the Axis? Was there a more Christian way to end the war? To stand aside while others are tortured, enslaved, and killed is unexcuseable.

As for the Axis powers, as I stated before, religious organizations, including those within the military, are corruptable. In my opinion, those that supported the Axis war effort effectively turned their backs on Christianity.

As for Niemoller, there have also been Christian churches who have stood for peace and against violence. Just as, I'm sure, there were Jehovah's Witnesses who turned their backs on their religious beliefs.

Don't get involved in them.

Re-read the scriptures in my post and see if you can apply any of them to the question of a Christian going to war with his fellow Christian for any reason.

others to be tortured and killed? That was the reality before Allied counterattacks in WW2 and would have continued had the Allies no acted.

I'm bound to follow the orders of my leader. He tells me to be no part of the world's struggles to improve itself by its own methods (John 17:16), and to tell others about his father's kingdom, the only one that has the power, the ability, and the desire to end these problems permanently. (Mt 6:9)
He also prophesied that we would be hated just because we do these 'unworldly' things. (John 17:14)

You, on the other hand, look to the present system to solve these problems. They did not go away after WWII. On the contrary, they increased in places like the Soviet system, Africa, the Middle East. They continue down to this day in Zimbabwe, China, the Sudan, Iraq, Colombia, and other places either under the nose of the "Christian" US or with its tacit permission.

There are some who say otherwise.


http://www.columbia.edu/cu/augustine/arch/pius12.txt

http://www.ad2000.com.au/articles/1999/oct1999p7_294.html

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/pius.html

http://users.binary.net/polycarp/piusxii.html

http://www.catholicleague.org/pius/truth.htm

"The New York Times editorial (December 25, 1942) was specific: "The voice of Pius XII is a lonely voice in the silence and darkness enveloping Europe this Christmas...He is about the only ruler left on the Continent of Europe who dares to raise his voice at all." The Pope?s Christmas message was also interpreted in the Gestapo report: "in a manner never known before...the Pope has repudiated the National Socialist New European Order [Nazism]."

Many will say...and Pius would probably agree...that he still didn't do enough.

"Everything is man-made and improving via evolution." Where'd you see that?

I don't think he said it and I don't think he'd agree with it.

Dan

in Dawkins' mouth. And by "everything" I meant man's world systems, not the universe itself. I should have made the distinction.

We started in the Soup (say Dawkins and his kind) and we've crawled up from there to mass transit, antibiotics, stored knowledge, etc. There certainly wasn't any God to do this for us. Rather, "God" is a virus, on a par with the Spanish Flu. [x] If we could inoculate against God (I should have added on Dawkins' behalf) then evolution would guarantee our continued improvement. Or perhaps not so gradual; Dawkins and I (superior intellects both) recognize that there is some sort of geometric increase in knowledge, because of our ability to store knowledge and pass it on. [y] We're only a century past Henry Ford, and now I read that college students are building maglev systems as class projects. No God involved.

Actually, if you want a quote, I have one that's not so optimistic as I made him out to be:
"In a universe of blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people are going to get hurt, other people are going to get lucky, and you won't find any rhyme or reason in it, nor any justice."

I hope you and I and Dawkins agree that justice is a good thing, and I hope we agree that there is at least some justice in the world. (Put Darfur aside for the moment.) But Dawkins admits his system can't account for its existence. Yet you and he reject mine, which accounts for and explains and raises legitimate hope for justice? That isn't ... just!

I got lots more Dawkins; doubt you'll like any of it.

Footnotes, from Watchtower publications. Look out! Perhaps we misquoted:
[x] "Is religion best understood as an infectious disease of the mind?"
[y] When asked whether humans have traits that distinguish them from animals, [Dawkins] acknowledged that man has, indeed, unique qualities. After mentioning "the ability to plan ahead using conscious, imagined foresight," Dawkins added, "Short-term benefit has always been the only thing that counts in evolution; long-term benefit has never counted. It has never been possible for something to evolve in spite of being bad for the immediate short-term good of the individual. For the first time ever, it's possible for at least some people to say, 'Forget about the fact that you can make a short-term profit by chopping down this forest; what about the long-term benefit?' Now I think that's genuinely new and unique."

that you misunderstood. You're confusing god and religion, for one, and I don't think Dawkins would have appreciated your interpretation of his views. Guarantee is a strong word. And I'm not sure how the second note supports the statements you made. But we'll set all that to the side.

Regarding the quote you've selected I'm not sure of your objection to it. Many tragedies of nature's blind fury and blind mutation come to the good and the bad. No one finds any justice in it. Some hope that there is a plan, at least. None claim to have sufficient information on any such plans to explain it or even delineate it. Their claim that there is a plan/guide/reason is sufficient to them. The description of this situation is neither optimistic nor pessimistic, it is just a description.

As to justice in the world, do you refer to formalized systems of justice or to something else?

Dan

i think Darfur i am



.,

time travel stories usually involve the hero(ine) going back as a knight or wealthy person, using modern knowledge of, say, medicine to work wonders. Not so, says Bester. For fiction to be at all grounded, the real-life odds would have to be observed. Great majority of people in 1400s Europe were peasants with short, miserable life spans. (Think Monty Python and the Holy Grail.) Our hero would likely be the same. Work his way up the social ladder by modern "magic"? Nope- most likely burned at the stake for sorcery.

My point? We're the product of our times. Being in the forest, we never correctly identify the trees; our descendants' historians do that, long after our ashes have cooled off.

Do you really suppose you would be the only one in your village to resist external pressures when Peter the Hermit came 'round? Would you have the knowledge of the bible to resist the internal pressure of passing up what everyone knew to be a Get Out of Hell Free card?

The odds: A month later you would be in Marseilles with the rest of your peers, stabbing Jews and looting their shops.

The bible spans all of human experience, so its serious students get a chance to be the exceptions. That's what Niem

I would gladly choose that the conflicts attributable to religious group friction would not have taken place even given that the secular conflicts would still have occurred. I did not mean to place myself in the timeframe of such events.

Did you mean to say, perhaps, that being among and obscured by the trees we cannot determine the extent of the forest? Deriving your statement from the old saw of not seeing the forest for the trees, it would seem. If we cannot identify the trees while we are in the forest, we cannot hold the forest or the trees responsible, only our botany skills.


Dan

You, and me-without-the-bible, both in Marseilles etc.

In terms of the analogy, I'm saying exactly that we can't identify the trees we stand next to, nor the extent of the forest. That goes beyond excusable ignorance, because we're carrying a botanical text but don't bother to read it.

If there is a useful overview of man, it would have to come from someone ... over us. I think. Am I right? I came across Churchill's 4-vol. A History of the English-Speaking Peoples in a thrift shop and snapped it up. An amazing document, an amazing mind; taught me lots about what really went on at Runnymede and other noteworthy places. The thousands massacred at Gallipoli could have wished for such discernment and clear view of consequences in their leader.

unless my wife is with me. Never travel without a trained naturalist. On the other hand, I guess I'm not clear on what point you're making with forests and trees.

And in your last post you correctly identified history as the vantage point from which to judge our actions.

Dan