Do believers and unbelievers benefit from each other?

by Narkissos 26 Replies latest jw friends

  • LittleToe
    LittleToe

    Kinda embarrassed to posting on this thread now, but I do have a "believer's" perspective.

    I've found that the secular perspective has been very helpful. I actually see a synergy between the imagination of the believer and the hard rationalism of the skeptic. Ideas are foisted and either knocked down or proven. Scientific method requires those that present a challenging concept to consider.

    You're not going to tell me that there aren't continued studies on mystical subjects. Hence if science ever gets to prove even a portion of that which believers hold dear, then I believe (there we go again ) that the human race will be benefitted. The only sadness I have is that there are vociferous "dismissers" in both camps.

    The results are unlikely to use the terminology of the mystic, but the cause and effect will likely have an explanation. I offer, as an example, accupuncture...

  • jgnat
    jgnat

    Absolutely. A good debater spends a great deal of time studying and understanding her opponent. To get "in the head" of someone who has completely different views, means I also develop an understanding, even an affinity for those views. It also prevents me from stumbling in to philosophical traps. I see them coming. Debating with athiests/agnostics has tempered my views, especially of the Bible. I think many Christians make the mistake of deifying that book. Is our faith dependent on the infallibility of that collection of books? Then I maintain our "faith" is on shaky ground. I echo Narkissos:

    If on the other hand I meet a believer whose belief system has developed gradually and who has seriously considered a number of "options" then even if we are in disagreement I do enjoy having discussions with the person.

    Dogmatic athiests are just as annoying as raving evangelists.

    By the way, I am not sure I like the believer/unbeliever polarity. We all believe something. Would a true "unbeliever" (does not believe in anything) be able to get dressed in the morning or eat his cornflakes? Perhaps jeans are no longer jeans, perhaps cornflakes are not meant to be eaten.

  • LittleToe
    LittleToe

    Jgnat:

    I think many Christians make the mistake of deifying that book. Is our faith dependent on the infallibility of that collection of books? Then I maintain our "faith" is on shaky ground.

    I had a similar discussion with a Christian friend recently. They found it difficult to understand that faith is something you have in God, not in a book.

    Dogmatic athiests are just as annoying as raving evangelists.

    Oops. I resemble that comment strongly!!!
    LOL

  • jgnat
    jgnat

    LOLOL Little Toe! Unless you have white spittle flapping out the sides of your mouth, I don't count you as a completely raving mad evangelist.

    I have promised myself once I have slain the Watchtower "Lion", I will take some time to tangle with a few athiest "Bears". Right now I need all my mental energy to exorcise the WTBTS from my life.

  • czarofmischief
    czarofmischief

    Things that I have learned over the past few years is a) I believe in God. and b) people don't have to believe in God to be good people. For instance, both radical communists and primitive Christians do not believe in private property. The first because property is too important to keep to oneself, and the second because property simply isn't as important as heavenly salvation. But they arrive at the same conclusion.

    One thing that I think BOTH camps, particularly in the USA, would benefit from is learning how to phrase arguments in the OTHER camp's language. For instance, the largely secular left insists on universal health care as being a fundamental human right. In a larger sense, they are correct - but if they learned to phrase such a concept in religious / Christian language they would probably actually GET universal health care in the US. "Jesus cured everybody, we should try to do the same..." "Jesus put people before money, we should do the same." While the right's existing leadership might not be swayed, the actual Christian movement behind them probably WOULD. Most Christians are not hypocritical about their beliefs, although some of their practices and current customs can be construed as confused.

    The Christian right tends to oppose abortion, but the religious / ethical argumentation has been tried and has failed. What they could try is to argue that abortion represents a drain on a community's financial viability; by removing society's most precious resource: the human mind. The "culture of life" argument is a powerful one as well, if it is backed up by the social programs needed to create such an environment.

    The same conclusions - it is just different ways of saying it. Yes, I think we benefit; although according to my understanding everyone becomes a believer sooner or later...

    CZAR

  • frankiespeakin
    frankiespeakin

    Dam double post.

  • frankiespeakin
    frankiespeakin

    Cz,

    The Christian right tends to oppose abortion, but the religious / ethical argumentation has been tried and has failed. What they could try is to argue that abortion represents a drain on a community's financial viability; by removing society's most precious resource: the human mind. The "culture of life" argument is a powerful one as well, if it is backed up by the social programs needed to create such an environment.

    What about the population explosion,,that seems to be "very deadly" to the survival of our species. The problem is we have too many minds on this planet already. Human sentiment has to changed if we our to survive as a species.

    May be that's what will happen???,,not through any effort on our part but just a natural event in which the mind become totally honest and really begins to live in the present,,when it sees the futaility of seeking just the "I's" interest and so gives up and in giving up the "I"xperiences something more intense than the greatest sexual climax you ever had. ((They say sexual climax is at it peak a almost total forgeting of one's self and the world around him)),,not a bad way for the "I" to go if you ask me.

  • Preston
    Preston

    Any high-demand or high-control group benefits from an internal belief that there is a threat on the outside, be it demons, the devil, non-believers, the government. It creates a strong element of fear and cohesion within the group. Likewise, an belief system benefits non-believers, particularly in the creation of comedic material and web sites such as this one that beneft those who have been thrust to the outside...

  • Pole
    Pole

    Czar,

    You've raised an interesting issue. I think there is a problem with every ideology which is meant to be universally accepted by a large group of people with little or no room for variation from one individual to another. Oftentimes seemingly opposite ideologies only differ in terms of their propaganda language.

    Many right-wing "christian" parties in Europe are strongly against abortion, which is supported by the left wingers. But when it comes to death penalty it is the socialists who are much more in favour of "life-protection" than the coservatives. So who's more pro-life?

    Basically every mass-ideology has to cater for both the sane and the insane needs of its supporters.

    Most ideologies are an art of finding the most intricate and non-sensical common denominators which could be accepted by a possible large group of people who are too lazy or too stipd to think for themselves. As such they're doomed to failure they take their ready-made ideologies seriously.

    Pole

  • czarofmischief
    czarofmischief
    What about the population explosion,,that seems to be "very deadly" to the survival of our species. The problem is we have too many minds on this planet already. Human sentiment has to changed if we our to survive as a species.

    Bullshit. There's enough food to feed everyone, there's enough money for basic healthcare, and the more people we have, the more wealth generators we have. There is an anti-human propoganda campaign being waged by certain elites who want the human race to suffer a cataclysmic population implosion. Their preferred methods of removing "surplus" humanity are hinted at in their "green" ideologies as being mass starvation, plagues, or natural disasters being posited as "Mother Earth's Revenge" as though the planet itself had a mind or a pile of dirt could somehow object to pieces of it being pulled up and burned for heat.

    And then who, pray tell, decides who lives and who dies? Our survival as a species has ALWAYS relied upon steady population growth - sometimes it needs to be reined in, but not that often when you look at history. And when we fill this planet, there are others to go to. But these certain anti-human elites and intellectuals want to exterminate humans or render their populations vulnerable to the same agonies that rabbits, dolphins, or termites suffer. Disease, predators, and starvation. It's disgusting and stupid and short-sighted.

    As for your "loss of the ego" theory, why don't you go first? Right now! Show us the way, oh Messiah of Death - tape it and put it on the internet. Send it to the Darwin Awards. "When Green Ideology Arrives At Its Natural Conclusion." Your last minute struggle to retain your individuality should highlight the fundamental flaw in your theory -whether created or evolved, individual sapience is the path that this universe directs all life and all effort. Group think is disastrous for the individual and the species.

    If I seem rather vehement, its because I have spent far more time than productive arguing with "Green Anarchist" morons in my town; who simplisticly state that we need to reduce population - the morons fail to see that democracy and wealth production tend to create their own natural brakes on population growth - individualism, indolence, homosexuality, etc.

    And the thing is, even non-believers in a traditional Christian sense have an intuitive loathing for the anti-human propaganda being spewed from Green "thinkers". It's bullshit, and nonsense, and is dangerous; since it is often coopted into fascist movements.

    CZAR

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