But God doesn't define good. You must back that statement up if you wish for it to gain traction.
But God doesn't define good. You must back that statement up if you wish for it to gain traction.
A man said to the universe:
"Sir, I exist!"
"However," replied the universe,
"The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation."
-- Stephen Crane
One must define morality before it's source can be determined. Good luck with that.
Exile
Let's apply this argument to sanity.Quote by: Judicator
"What might appear to be insane acts of God are in fact sane."
Is God, then, sane? It's obvious that an insane person might not realize they are insane, and might even define themselves as being "sane" but does that mean they are? Do the words "sane" or "moral" even mean anything when they are allowed to be defined ad hoc by the arbitrary desires of anyone, god or man?
god is morality and atheism lack morality. well, they do have morals but very little.
i have been looking at people like a scientists studying monkeys in the wild (i don't know what so important about these scientists though). the facts are there but it takes a good aye to be able to distinguish the true believers from the fakers who try to use god as a free get-out-of-jail card, for example. or like those that believe that god helps them kill ahem!!! Hitler.
by looking at the moralities of both true believers and atheists people, i came to the conclusion that atheist people lack morality.
i had a personal close acquaintance who is an atheist. this guy is not bad per se but he is not also good. or should i say, he is capable to do more bad than good. for example, he would sleep with any females who would undress in front of him. that in itself does not sound bad, i mean what guy wouldn't? the bad thing about that is that he would do that even when he had a GF. him knowing that i knew he had a GF, he would call me for us to go "talk" to females at the mall. he was also a regular to those "massage" places. going to these places in itself is not too immoral, a guy with lady problems would say. but this guy kept on doing it even after he got married and had kids. he also kept "talking" to old "female friends" after his marriage. this guy was in his own little "moral" world.
on the other hand, i know guys who are devoted believers. never did i ever hear them say lets go do some drugs, or go fuck some females. they have stable (well stable enough) GFs. i know that they won't cheat on them because it goes against their beliefs. they try to stay way from such people.
of course now with all this technology with cell phones with cams and the internet with web cams, kids are more promiscuous. having kids at ages 12-16 with no job, living with mom, and parents lacking morality to teach their kids any better. and the cycle continues. i don't even know if todays kids have morals. the majority of the kids and adults who have no morals are the non-believers though.
people try to find excuses to get away with lacking morality.
moreover, just because you didn't follow your dads rules and went out to a party where you got drunk and killed someone by accident does not make it his fault. your dad can only guide you and it is up to you to make your own decisions. god has no control over your actions. he is just the creator who gave us knowledge to be able to protect our selves in this world and walk freely.
that's not to say that he does not guide us. to be more clear, the "messengers" guide us. there are good and bad messengers though.
the good ones want to help humanity. they want to show us the way with morals and with science. you can call this messengers, a form of quantum jumping :).
the bad ones want us to kill ourselves walk a blind path so we cease to exist.
anyway, i doubt god means no love. i also doubt that atheists have more morals than true believers. of course, i accept that there are a lot of religion freaks that make all religion, as a whole, look bad. or fake believes like lady ga ga who say they are believes just because they wear a jesus necklace.
What a lazy argument. I've met more "non-believers" who have better morals than the so-called "believers". Most of the religious people I've encountered invoke some sort of higher power as their source of moral guidance. Agnostics I've met use common sense and rational judgment for moral guidance.
How much of the prison population is Christian? 75%
How much of the prison population is agnostic/atheist? 0.2%
"The place of the worst barbarism is that modern forest that makes use of us, this forest of chimneys and bayonets, machines and weapons, of strange inanimate beasts that feed on human flesh"
Keeping in mind that the majority of Americans self-identify as Christian, please explain the success of the gambling, pornography and prostitution industries in this country. If these industries were dependent solely on the financial gain from non-believers they'd have all gone bust decades ago. Most of their income comes from these supposedly "moral" Christians.on the other hand, i know guys who are devoted believers. never did i ever hear them say lets go do some drugs, or go fuck some females. they have stable (well stable enough) GFs. i know that they won't cheat on them because it goes against their beliefs. they try to stay way from such people.
Morals are rules of conduct in society. Theists have them and atheists have them. The religious in general are no more or less moral than non-believers in general. The propensity to act morally is based more on the individual character of the person than the source of their moral code.
The Forum Rules
Too often we enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.
[John F. Kennedy]
The principal value of debate lies in the development of logical thought processes, and the ability to articulate your positions publicly.
[Senator Dick Clark of Iowa]
The presence of those seeking the truth is infinitely to be preferred to the presence of those who think they've found it.
[Terry Pratchett]
So he's dishonest. Plenty of religious people are too. Or let's see, how many Republican Christians have been caught in scandals having affairs, sometimes gay ones? And you can't say "those aren't real Christians" because I could easily say that your close acquaintance wasn't a "real atheist" and then we're back to square one, arguing over which is better.
I'm an atheist. I had/ve (i.e. "it's complicated") a stable girlfriend for some months who I would never have dreamed of cheating on. In fact, now that "it's complicated" I still wouldn't dream of cheating. Believing in God or not has very little to do with honesty, in relationships or otherwise. Religious people may claim to have a "reason" to be "good" but non-religious people have their reasons too. In my case, love was good enough. Who needs God to tell you to be faithful?
As for substance abuse, I suppose the worst I've done is smoked. I quit, although occasionally I'll enjoy a cigar. I tried drinking a bit and loved it, but I don't do that either (I'm not old enough to do it legally, and I don't want to turn alcoholic either). I'm staying away from drugs, although I'm fully in favor of legalizing marijuana. Once again, I don't need God in order to be temperate and not abuse substances - I'm smart enough to see the problems they cause and avoid them on my own. Other people may not be so smart, which is one of the reasons religion continues to exist and is even successful in some cases.
I dare to differ. People's propensity to act normally is largely based on their parents. I have recent history as a adolescent teen and hell even Aristotle to back me up on that one. Where did baby boomer parents largely get their moral frameworks? Religious, and in many cases Christian, parents. Our recent desire to rebel against establish authority for no reason is the another factor for acting immorally. People don't just act morally out of nowhere.
No offense, but do you know what's even lazier? The bolded part of your quote is. I would come to expect Volconvo folk, which by the way are very intelligent for the most part, to know elementary statistics.
Can you clarify what you mean by "God doesn't define good"?
This would be the case if God had the property of saneness. The concepts of sanity and goodness would have to be coherent to be a property of something.
No, we act morally because of our history, which predates religion by a long ways. Do you really think in the hundreds of thousands of years of history, we only learned not to kill each other after people who believed in magic started telling us not to? You think we couldn't figure that out on our own, without a magical person telling us what to do?
I would be careful of referring to the "desire to rebel" as being "recent." Rebellion and rebelliousness is an essential part of human nature, and has been with us as long as obedience and morality have been.
Where's the statistical error? Perhaps the other 24.8% are Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, etc. Just because the percentage given doesn't add up to 100% doesn't mean the statistics are wrong. It just means he has chosen to omit the other categories, as they are not relevant to a discussion that is primarily concerning Christianity. I would like to see the source for this figure, but other than that there is no obvious statistical error.
Might last a little while. Never run up against Steven Pinker's The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature? http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ffp0622.pdf
Well over 50% of Human Nature is pure inheritance. Twin studies, twins separated at birth, base the conclusion. Pinker finds more influential than parental contributions are those from peers.
Aristotle? Have you no respect for contemporary insight?I have recent history as a adolescent teen and hell even Aristotle to back me up on that one.
"When kids go to school at the age of 6, there's an empty bucket there. Someone, by the time they're 18, will fill that bucket. Is it going to be a parent? Is it going to be a good educator? Or is it going to be some other scum out there?" ~ Arnold SchwartzeneggerPure luck I'd say for the teens. What teen considers morality for morality's sake? Damn few I've known. Repercussions and hormonal desires regulate pretty good. Later, when confronted with making their own way, the hard reality of self reliance is shockingly different for those ill prepared for it in their formative years. The schemas of the successful child, conditioned and hardwired for their success in those early childhood years, often are not those that give success in the adult world. And then they are very hard to change and can only be adapted to if problems arise and finding within themselves the basis for their adult problems. Generally, indulgent parents will raise an adult that considers him/herself entitled. Nothing worse than a whining 26 year old.Where did baby boomer parents largely get their moral frameworks? Religious, and in many cases Christian, parents. Our recent desire to rebel against establish authority for no reason is the another factor for acting immorally. People don't just act morally out of nowhere.Schemas & Domains
If the terrain and the map do not agree, follow the terrain.
When motherhood becomes the fruit of a deep yearning, not the result of ignorance or accident, its children will become a new race.
It's simple. God is capable of being immoral, if he exists at all. God does not bear the standard of morality.Can you clarify what you mean by "God doesn't define good"?
A man said to the universe:
"Sir, I exist!"
"However," replied the universe,
"The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation."
-- Stephen Crane
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