the2real4mafol said: richardhutnik said: Ji99saw said: nuckles87 said: Religion, in the long run, does not help or hurt society. Religion is not the only thing that keeps us moral, but if it didn't exist I'm sure people who use it to spread hatred and bigotry would just find something else. Ji99saw said: OT- Religion built almost all the foundations we have today. Law,Order, Justice, Love, Right and Wrong. If it were not for some type of religion we would be mostly feral and kill each other over territory and resources (more than we already do) and it would be complete chaos.   Religion did not build any of that, humanity did. Humanity cannot EXIST without some version of these values. Those things have all existed for as long as humanity has existed. Religion is,  at best, merely a manifestation of these believes that links them to thiestic myths. What??  That's utterly ridiculous give me one example of this in a previous or modern society with no roots to any religion Communist nations pretty much are like this.  Of course, when a communist nation ends up working, it takes on religious trappings. Communist countries still have a religion, it's not the traditional religion anymore though but the state and the leader become the religion through rediculous propaganda

But, the society attempting to be build is devoid of any theistic religion.  Ok, if the argument is that it is impossible to be able to have a society that doesn't have religion or religious trappings, even if non-theistic, I think that is something I would agree with there.  It seens the human mind longs for religious trappings, and will create more if needed.  You can see in the likes of Scientology, and even doing Festivus, people want ritual and tradition.

richardhutnik said: Ji99saw said: richardhutnik said: Ji99saw said: nuckles87 said: Religion, in the long run, does not help or hurt society. Religion is not the only thing that keeps us moral, but if it didn't exist I'm sure people who use it to spread hatred and bigotry would just find something else. Ji99saw said: OT- Religion built almost all the foundations we have today. Law,Order, Justice, Love, Right and Wrong. If it were not for some type of religion we would be mostly feral and kill each other over territory and resources (more than we already do) and it would be complete chaos.   Religion did not build any of that, humanity did. Humanity cannot EXIST without some version of these values. Those things have all existed for as long as humanity has existed. Religion is,  at best, merely a manifestation of these believes that links them to thiestic myths. What??  That's utterly ridiculous give me one example of this in a previous or modern society with no roots to any religion Communist nations pretty much are like this.  Of course, when a communist nation ends up working, it takes on religious trappings. Like this? Last time I checked we were a Republic, and we are pretty rooted in Christianity as society, hell the Pledge of Allegiance has the quote "Our nation under god". Do you even know what communism is? Like I said relgion is one of the most fundamentally important things in human history. Communist nations build their own religious ceremonies, rituals and traditions, around the nations themselves, and the slogans of Communism, to bind people together.  It is a secular religion.  They are modern societies attempted to be built without God stuff.  By the measures of this thread, religion refers to God stuff.  Speaking by those narrow defintions, I was pointing out what you wrote is not correct.  In a VERY general sense, you would be correct. On all this, I have to wonder what is intrinsic in the word "God" such that it both doesn't exist and produces something seen as a great evil in this thread like this.  God is supposed to both not exist AND also be very evil.  That is interesting to me how that happens.

They are still fundamentally based off religion, what I wrote is completely accurate and you have yet to give me one modern example of this in any society

Ji99saw said: richardhutnik said: Ji99saw said: richardhutnik said: Ji99saw said: nuckles87 said: Religion, in the long run, does not help or hurt society. Religion is not the only thing that keeps us moral, but if it didn't exist I'm sure people who use it to spread hatred and bigotry would just find something else. Ji99saw said: OT- Religion built almost all the foundations we have today. Law,Order, Justice, Love, Right and Wrong. If it were not for some type of religion we would be mostly feral and kill each other over territory and resources (more than we already do) and it would be complete chaos.   Religion did not build any of that, humanity did. Humanity cannot EXIST without some version of these values. Those things have all existed for as long as humanity has existed. Religion is,  at best, merely a manifestation of these believes that links them to thiestic myths. What??  That's utterly ridiculous give me one example of this in a previous or modern society with no roots to any religion Communist nations pretty much are like this.  Of course, when a communist nation ends up working, it takes on religious trappings. Like this? Last time I checked we were a Republic, and we are pretty rooted in Christianity as society, hell the Pledge of Allegiance has the quote "Our nation under god". Do you even know what communism is? Like I said relgion is one of the most fundamentally important things in human history. Communist nations build their own religious ceremonies, rituals and traditions, around the nations themselves, and the slogans of Communism, to bind people together.  It is a secular religion.  They are modern societies attempted to be built without God stuff.  By the measures of this thread, religion refers to God stuff.  Speaking by those narrow defintions, I was pointing out what you wrote is not correct.  In a VERY general sense, you would be correct. On all this, I have to wonder what is intrinsic in the word "God" such that it both doesn't exist and produces something seen as a great evil in this thread like this.  God is supposed to both not exist AND also be very evil.  That is interesting to me how that happens. They are still fundamentally based off religion, what I wrote is completely accurate and you have yet to give me one modern example of this in any society

The thing here is, that I would be arguing your point in this thread, the way you had, based on what you said.  However, this thread had been framing religion connected with God, to which I was trying to disagree with that.  It seems impossible to get rid of the religious impulse, because people like religion collectively.

Jay520 said: Ji99saw said: I hate when people discuss religion on this VGC, it's cringe worthy to read some of the comments from the some comments from people that swear there more intelligent than others because they "don't believe in any thing but themselves" and yet fail to realize how important religion is on a fundamental level. It's sad to see people fumble in ignorance. OT- Religion built almost all the foundations we have today. Law,Order, Justice, Love, Right and Wrong. If it were not for some type of religion we would be mostly feral and kill each other over territory and resources (more than we already do) and it would be complete chaos. You might have a point if you were referring to more ancient civilizations...maybe. But this thread is talking about modern society where religion is no longer necessary for structure, so you don't really have a long to stand on here. Especially considering many modern civilizations do just well without a strong emphasis on religion. Religious benefits today are not substantial.

If you are acknowledging the fact that Religion  shaped society and human history today then how can the absence of it completely not have harmful effect. The origins,lessons and teachings of religions have to be reinforced and taught  forever or they will be forgotten and the moral ground that modern society stands upon will collapse. It's like riding a bike and forgetting how to walk, or learning multiplication but forgetting addition.By the way name one modern civilization that does not have a strong religious emphasis.

This thread's name appears to be more flame bait than actual legitimate question.

Ignoring that, I would argue that it easily does. Even if one were to completely dismiss the idea of God in general, some (not all, unfortunately) of the people who do believe in a religion are likely to try to follow whatever commandments are listed as guiding principles for said religion. Generally these commandments are things such as "do not steal," "do not lie," "honor your father and mother," and other things that involve admirable behavior towards their fellow person. I would call that beneficial. Heck, if every person in the world subscribed to the latter six of the ten commandments, we'd all be in a much safer place.

That said, there are unfortunately those people who use religion to justify actions that are incredibly harmful towards other. I suppose you can ask the question as to whether the nutjobs who use religion to justify acts of terrorism outweigh the benefits of those who follow morals advocated in their religion, but to be perfectly honest, I think that the people who are out to terrorize/commit atrocities are going to do so regardless of religion or not. I think the Crusaders would have been more than willing to find another excuse to retake land from Muslims regardless of whether it was their holy land or not. Osama Bin Ladin was likely upset enough at the US for their actions in the 1990s to attack the WTC regardless of whether he believed in killing "infidels" or not. Religion is just the first easy excuse that they could find. They'd come up with another one even if it didn't exist.

Ji99saw said: If you are acknowledging the fact that Religion  shaped society and human history today then how can the absence of it completely not have harmful effect. The origins,lessons and teachings of religions have to be reinforced and taught  forever or they will be forgotten and the moral ground that modern society stands upon will collapse. It's like riding a bike and forgetting how to walk, or learning multiplication but forgetting addition.By the way name one modern civilization that does not have a strong religious emphasis.

Religious was pretty ubiquitous in ancient cultures because they didn't understand things so they wanted some way to explain things that they didn't understand, so just about every society has been pretty steeped in religious.  That goes for all of them though to the ones that laid the ground work for the societies we have today to the ones that really have no part in our current moral structure like the Mayans and their human sacrifice or smaller tribes that ate people.  Sure you can't come up with a society that flourished without religion, but I doubt you could come up with an example of a society that died without religion either.  Simple fact is that every ancient society was steeped in religion.

 

Also you're basically looking at a bunch of societies that had a religion ond a moral structure and assuming that religion came first, but I think you'd have a tough time proving that.  Sure religion and moral structure are almost inextricably linked in ancient societies, but that doesn't mean that without religion there would be no moral structure, you're seeing a corellation and assuming a causation.  

 

OT: y'know religion has been around for so long that I just don't think we can possibly know whether or not it's a necessity for a successful society, but I'd be interested in trying.  

 

Almost forgot but a disclaimer should be here.  I am not an anthropologist and therefore I might be mistaken about there being no known ancient societies that weren't steeped in religion.  If that's not the case I'd be interested in hearing about it.  

Ji99saw said: Jay520 said: Ji99saw said: I hate when people discuss religion on this VGC, it's cringe worthy to read some of the comments from the some comments from people that swear there more intelligent than others because they "don't believe in any thing but themselves" and yet fail to realize how important religion is on a fundamental level. It's sad to see people fumble in ignorance. OT- Religion built almost all the foundations we have today. Law,Order, Justice, Love, Right and Wrong. If it were not for some type of religion we would be mostly feral and kill each other over territory and resources (more than we already do) and it would be complete chaos. You might have a point if you were referring to more ancient civilizations...maybe. But this thread is talking about modern society where religion is no longer necessary for structure, so you don't really have a long to stand on here. Especially considering many modern civilizations do just well without a strong emphasis on religion. Religious benefits today are not substantial. If you are acknowledging the fact that Religion  shaped society and human history today then how can the absence of it completely not have harmful effect. The origins,lessons and teachings of religions have to be reinforced and taught  forever or they will be forgotten and the moral ground that modern society stands upon will collapse. It's like riding a bike and forgetting how to walk, or learning multiplication but forgetting addition.By the way name one modern civilization that does not have a strong religious emphasis.

Just like living in trees may have helped us in the past, but aren't quite useful today. Plenty of activities were very helpful in the past for ancient civilizations, but are not today because they have been replaced by better alternatives. In this case, the biggest benefits of religion - keeping society under control - is replaced with laws & rules which aren't necessarily meant to follow religion, but to help society as best it can, in most developed countries at least. As people change, we also improve the systems and activities we have, discarding the old and replacing it with the new. This is well known; something that may have been beneficial in the past doesn't need to be used forever.

its also generally well known that the most religious countries tend to be poor and the most atheistic countries with low emphasis on religion tend to be wealthier. Search religiousity and wealth.

Jay520 said: its also generally well known that the most religious countries tend to be poor and the most atheistic countries tend to be wealthier. Search religiousity and wealth.

But that's probably just because as countries get wealthier they have more money for scientific endeavors and then become more atheistic isn't it?

Torillian said: Jay520 said: its also generally well known that the most religious countries tend to be poor and the most atheistic countries tend to be wealthier. Search religiousity and wealth. But that's probably just because as countries get wealthier they have more money for scientific endeavors and then become more atheistic isn't it?

I'm not trying to say that atheism has a positive affect on society. But that should be evidence that as emphasis of religion decreases, there is no harmful effect.

nuckles87 said: Ji99saw said: nuckles87 said: Religion, in the long run, does not help or hurt society. Religion is not the only thing that keeps us moral, but if it didn't exist I'm sure people who use it to spread hatred and bigotry would just find something else. Ji99saw said: OT- Religion built almost all the foundations we have today. Law,Order, Justice, Love, Right and Wrong. If it were not for some type of religion we would be mostly feral and kill each other over territory and resources (more than we already do) and it would be complete chaos. Religion did not build any of that, humanity did. Humanity cannot EXIST without some version of these values. Those things have all existed for as long as humanity has existed. Religion is,  at best, merely a manifestation of these believes that links them to thiestic myths. What??  That's utterly ridiculous give me one example of this in a previous or modern society with no roots to any religion Chimpanzees. They have communities with laws based on hierarchy, they mate often in order to strengthen bonds between indivduals (love), and while I am unaware of any studies showing that chimpanzees have a concept of "right and wrong" (which, by the way, you do not need religion to have a concept for), studies have shown that wild chimps are capable of altruistic and charitable behavior, in other words "doing something good for someone else's benefit". But that's not really the point. Fact of the matter is, religion is old, and we don't have any sort of written records that go back to before religion existed. At least, religion as we know it today. My point is, humanity has always needed those things in order to survive. Your society does not need to be religious in order to have these values, and there are PLENTY of examples of religious societies killing each other over territory. The very existense of humanity depends on the existence of the "community". Alone we are weak, feeble creatures, but as a bonded community we are strong, and that is the only reason why we are still around. Law and order within a community kept it from falling apart, by giving guidance to indivduals and helping them settle disputes that could otherwise cause people to leave the community. Love is a basic human emotion that everyone with typical brain chemistry is capable of experiencing and has no root in religion (otherwise, homosexuality would not be a thing). Right and wrong is something every human had to understand in order to be able to interact with other humans within their community. These things you talk about are not things that exist purely because of religion. They exist because they are inherit to being human. Without them, humanity would not even exist.

Really Chimpanzees, this is not even worth a rebuttal but I'll humor you lol

1. They have no laws or hierarchy the strongest rules because there is a higher chance of survival (simple)

2. They mate to continue the longevity of their species (not love)

3. Religion is old? So is every other thing we know math, science, values,morals, the wheel. Should not use them because they're old also?

4. When did I say that religious society don't go to war or fight for resources? That came from nowhere but it would be far worse without morals

5. Our very existence is owed to our intelligence, ability to reason, and the concept of abstract thought and use of tools. Even dodo birds had communities look what happened to their existence

6. Yes because every religion that has ever existed disagreed with homosexuality (tell that to the ancient Greeks)

7. Absurd, right and wrong is an abstract thought that stems from many religions. If someone was to kill 200 people why is it Wrong? without the moral guidance that originated from religion it's not wrong because he can simply that I was increasing his chances of survival. (right or wrong)

8. Your last sentence is exactly my point " Without them, humanity would not even exist." That is why every single ancient and modern society have religion and we come to full circle. Simply put No religion= No society

9. Just give me on society ancient or modern with no religion because they do not exists if religion is not involved.