The Ghost of RubangB said:
Kasz216 said:
The Ghost of RubangB said:
ManusJustus said:
Religion had a lot of uses in the past. How else could you convince a bunch of primitive cave men not to kill, rape, and steal from each other without telling them that a magical being would punish them (or in the case of Jesus and the Pharoahs, that they were god)?
As humans understand our universe more and more, we realize that even though we dont have all the answers that those answers have a scientific explanation and not a magical one.
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You tell them that a physical being would punish them. It's called the police, or court, or a militia, or a tribunal, or whatever you want. We still have a bunch of primitive cave men roaming our streets murdering and raping, and we lock them up. And they're not atheists.
The % of atheists in the prison population is smaller than the % of atheists out on the streets. In fact, there are more Scientologists in prison than atheists in prison, even though atheists outnumber Scientologists out on the streets. Religion can do good (like give me Al Green), but there are some problems that arise when you convince the majority of people that there is an invisible magical law that is more important than the laws of the community that they vote on, especially when the law of G-d can forgive every sin ever.
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Hard to say on that one. I think a lot of people who say they believe in god are really just atheists who don't have the balls to say they're atheists... either to themselves or others.
How else can you explain so many people doing so much bad shit when they're supposed to believe that they're being watched 24/7 santa claus style but instead of a lump of coal your going to get an enternity of eternal punishment.
I mean, sure you got some people who delude themselves into thinking they're doing gods work, like the crazy evangelicals on TV who get the poor to give them there money.
But, with all the other people... I mean... what the heck? I mean, even christianity gets you only out of bad shit if you really make a change. It's not like you can just accept jesus and go all GTA on the town and then still be fine.
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Yeah I think there are more atheists than we know because they're not willing to admit it.
But do you think that the chunk of the population that are atheists in disguise is exact same chunk of the population that believe in eternal damnation but still commit rape and murder? You're willing to blame the majority of those crimes on us nonbelievin' folk?
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They either largely don't believe or they're amazingly stupid... who the heck comits a crime when they KNOW they'll get caught... and the punnishment will far outshine any reward.
Keep in mind i've already discounted the super delusional "God wants me to steal from the poor!" types.
I don't think it's the exact chunk though no.
I think a much larger chunk of people are atheists who can't admit it.
Personally, i blame churches. Churches make it way to damn easy to make people feel like they're part of a religion. Hey spend 2 hours a week at church and bam your saved... or even once a christmas it's all good.
Things would be a lot better if there was no organized religion, and instead at a certain age you just read every religious book, and books that argue against the existence of god and figure it out your own self.
Of course, i'm biased... since that's how i was raised.
