The naivety and arrogance of this post is somewhat breathtaking. Religion is (or can be) primarily a set of practices and attitudes, not a collection of propositions, and is perfectly compatible with rationality. In any case, it is one of those things that humans do and efforts to get rid of it would seem doomed, as can be readily seen by the way people here (atheists, transhumanists, rationalists, etc) all create pseudo-religions to replace the ones they reject. Religion is a universal part of human nature; you can’t be a good reasoner without understanding how humans work; so you must at least understand what religion is. You can start here
Religion, as practiced today, is most commonly a collection of propositions, entirely incompatible with rationality.
If religion fills certain needs (and in fact I won’t argue that it does) we will find more constructive ways to fill those needs without lying to people.
If you really think that religion isn’t about god, then honestly, I don’t think we disagree that much—I don’t know why you’re starting out with insults flying.
I think you are mistaking ambition and the spirit of betterment for “naivety and arrogance.”
You say “it is one of those things that humans do and efforts to get rid of it would seem doomed,” but that was once applicable to slavery. It may be difficult, quixotic, and almost comically ambitious. But the only thing that would make it “doomed” would be an attitude that says it must be.
MBlume’s comment below summarizes nicely how we as a society might go about that (as does this whole thread).
Incidentally, I don’t think this comment is really so bad; it’s within reasonable argument, if only it didn’t come blasting out of the gates with insults.
The naivety and arrogance of this post is somewhat breathtaking. Religion is (or can be) primarily a set of practices and attitudes, not a collection of propositions, and is perfectly compatible with rationality. In any case, it is one of those things that humans do and efforts to get rid of it would seem doomed, as can be readily seen by the way people here (atheists, transhumanists, rationalists, etc) all create pseudo-religions to replace the ones they reject. Religion is a universal part of human nature; you can’t be a good reasoner without understanding how humans work; so you must at least understand what religion is. You can start here
Religion, as practiced today, is most commonly a collection of propositions, entirely incompatible with rationality.
If religion fills certain needs (and in fact I won’t argue that it does) we will find more constructive ways to fill those needs without lying to people.
If you really think that religion isn’t about god, then honestly, I don’t think we disagree that much—I don’t know why you’re starting out with insults flying.
I think you are mistaking ambition and the spirit of betterment for “naivety and arrogance.”
You say “it is one of those things that humans do and efforts to get rid of it would seem doomed,” but that was once applicable to slavery. It may be difficult, quixotic, and almost comically ambitious. But the only thing that would make it “doomed” would be an attitude that says it must be.
MBlume’s comment below summarizes nicely how we as a society might go about that (as does this whole thread).
Incidentally, I don’t think this comment is really so bad; it’s within reasonable argument, if only it didn’t come blasting out of the gates with insults.