Maybe you should ask the question: Would the world be a better place with or without God?
Please give some examples of how the world today would be different, without God.
Would the world be a better place without Atheism/Religious-ism?
by AK - Jeff 98 Replies latest jw friends
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leavingwt
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dandingus
The world would be a better place without superstition, ignorance, and fear.
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Deputy Dog
LeavingWT
Please give some examples of how the world today would be different, without God.
That's your job.
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PSacramento
Atheism teaches NOTHING. It is a stance regarding the claim that a god(s) exist. Nothing is ever done in the name of atheism.
Atheism is not evolution and evolution is not atheism.I don't recall say it did.
Most religions (especially christianity and islam) do not have morality, they have obedience to authority as a substitute for morality.
I disagree, but if you want to view it that way, that's fine.
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PSacramento
Please give some examples of how the world today would be different, without God.
Youmean without teachings about God?
Without God there would have been no Universe.
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I quit!
"I really don't know how much simpler to put it as you obviously could not comprehend what I was saying. Atheism will never be the cause of any action (good or bad) by a person. It's not impossible for an atheist to cause harm to someone else, what I'm saying is that atheism will never be the cause of such action unlike religion."
The same can be said about a belief in a higher power. A belief in God doesn't cause problems in the world but the bagage that a person or group attaches to that belief is what causes problems. I think the same could be said about atheism. Atheism isn't a problem in itself but what someone attaches to atheism could a major problem for mankind such as a attaching a distain for religious people and belief that the world would somehow be transformed into a Disneyland without them.
Wobble, I agree that being shouted at by someone wanting you to prove something that there is no way of proving isn't very nice or useful. I know a lot of religious people do this. On the other hand a lot of atheist do the same thing wanting people to accept what they believe which is also unprovable
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cognizant dissident
but I also do see all the good and bad atheism has done, how its views of "survial of the fittest" and "natural selection" can be "perverted" and have been by some.
PSacramento: You did say Atheism has a view of survival of the fittest and natural selection. Those are not atheist views. You did say those views have caused bad in the world (how could they do that if they were not taught). So, in fact, you did say Atheism teaches something (a viewpoint that has caused bad in the world).
However, you are incorrect as those are views of evolutionists, not atheists (they are not necessarily one in the same). A view is something we observe. Evolutionists did not teach survival of the fittest and natural selection as a moral code of behaviour. They observed this behaviour as already existing in the plant kingdom, and the animal kingdom (including the human animal kingdoms). The observations of these facts of existence carry with them no judgement of right or wrong, good or bad, they just are, they just exist, and to deny that they do is delusion. Atheists couldn't be the cause of them since those conditions have existed all through recorded history before atheism was even a word much less before anyone dared to admit they were one.
I'm not saving belief in God or religion caused those conditions either. I believe the religious stories were attempts to explain the world as we saw it. The facts are that animals have ripped each other apart for food and resources since time began, (including humans) and intelligent humans have tried to make themselves feel better about that fact by saying the victims deserved it because they were bad or had angered God. Or, don't worry about it because the people who are dominant, greedy and murderous are bad and God will kill them all eventually and give all the good victims back what they have lost and then some! Similiar explanations for random acts of destruction by natural forces.
Are these stories emotionally comforting to humans in their losses? Yes. It is understandable that they were made up in a time of limited knowledge of the natural world and its forces. They were the best explanations of the time. Are they factual? No evidence whatsoever. As more understanding is developed through human evolution of intelligence, then the stories do not hold up under scrutiny.
When human intelligence develops to the point where almost all can see that we are interconnected and share the same fate on this planet, so it is more helpful to work together collectively and cooperatively as opposed to competitively, then we may see a decrease in the amount of greed, dominance and violence on this planet.
Does atheism prevent this evolution from happening? I don't see how. Does religion prevent this evolution from happening? To the extent that religious belief teaches an "us versus them mentality" or that some humans are superior and deserve to live and have more while others are inferior and deserve to have less or die, then yes, religion does prevent good and cause harm. To the extent that religious belief teaches us to ascend beyond our animal natures and pursue the collective good (and by collective, I mean global collective), then that religion could be said to be making the world a better place. I just personally do not know of any religion that does not have some element of dominance and control attached to it.
Do we need belief in God or religion to pursue this agenda. No. Do we need to be atheists to pursue it? No. That's why I said in my earlier posts that belief in God and religion were somewhat irrelevant to the world being a better place. What we do need is a collective will to make the world a better place and an ability to suppress our animal instincts for dominance and power over others to achieve the collective good.
Questions for theists: Do animals have emotions. Can your pets be happy, depressed, enjoy their food, sex, experience pain? Does almost every single animal form from insect to human hunt and kill each other for food or, for the few vegetarian animals out there, be hunted and killed for food in a ferocious, painful, bloody quest for survival? If humans have reached this state through sin and fall from grace, how have the other billions of species on this planet also come to be in this state? Why would God change the innately peaceful natures of billions of species, all of whom are unaware of man's stories and reasonings, due to the fall from grace of one man and woman? (I'm using the Christian story here, but one could substitute the religious story of their choosing and ask similar questions as they all have similar themes).
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ZeusRocks
The same can be said about a belief in a higher power.
Honestly, how hard is it to comprehend. Our actions are guided by belief. Non-belief has no action attached to it.
I agree with CD in that god and religion are completely irrelevant in making the world a better place. A high percentage of the most peaceful countries in the world have the lowest percentage of religious followers.
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OnTheWayOut
I Quit: And atheism is a faith just like any religious faith because none of us really knows if there is something going on beyond what we can see and comprehend during our brief life spans on this planet.