The Cosmos

[sealybobo]

Watch the Backbone of Night if you want to see the whole episode where Sagan explains how the mystics (religions) stifled science for over 1000 years.

 

[sealybobo]

Anyone who believes in God needs to watch the Cosmos. Watch the new one with Neil Degrasse Tyson and the old one with Carl Sagan. Once you learn the history of man, science and religion you will realize god(s) were made up long before we decided to just go with one god. Religious ignorance has held us back thousands of years. Religious people love to brag that it was on their watch that we came up with cures and that it was religious people who got us on the moon. They expose their ignorance to the fact that many of the scientists were/are atheists. They try to ignore the history of how many scientists were put to death for heresy by the churches for things that turned out to be correct. But today the church doesn't get so upset if you suggest the earth isn't the center of the universe or that the sun revolves around the earth because churches change with the times. They've learned not to fight science and instead ignore your anti scientific history and embrace science. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.

300 years before Christ, Aristarchus of Samos discovered the earth was not the center of the universe. But it wasn't until the year 1500 of our lord that someone dared suggest it again. Who squashed this fact for 1800 years? Religion.

Think about instead of the 50 year cold war and all the other wars we fought if we would have put the time and energy into colonizing Mars. Take all the nukes we have built since the 1950's and tell me how much money that is. Human beings are stupid. One way to tell how dumb someone is, ask them if they believe in god.

Pythagoras refuted geocentrism in the 6th Century BC. He was a religious freak and a priest. Aristarchus of Samos studied at the Lyceum (dedicated to the god Apollo). Francis Bacon is said to have invented the scientific method. He was a priest. Copernicus was a Polish priest. Mendels was a priest, and the father of genetics (and a major influence on Darwin). You might say that Dostoyevsky (Jesus freak) is the father of modern psychology (if you read Crime and Punishment). Pascal (Jesus freak) was a mathematical genius and the father of computing. At least 35 craters on the moon are named after Jesuits, all of whom made significant contributions to science. Lemaitre was a priest who first proposed the Big Bang theory. The list goes on and on.

Not sure how you figure that the Cold War can be blamed on religion, or that nukes are a religious invention. It's true that Niels Bohr was an early nuclear physicist. If you read his stuff, or Einstein's, you get the sense that scientific breakthroughs often comes as a result of inspiration, or some sort of epiphany. It's often similar to an experience of the sacred. Einstein's revelation about the theory of relativity sounds like a mystical experience, as he describes it.

The practices of religion serve to break down mental pre-conceptions and constructs, filters and biases, and to enable the practitioner to see with fresh eyes.

Religion is not the cause of war. It can be used as a tool of exploitation, for political ends, just as patriotism or humanism can. Today's wars are sold to the public by appealing to secular humanism. If the entire world were atheistic, the incidences of war would not diminish by one scintilla.

And I think it's helpful to understand that the TV show Cosmos plays very loosely and creatively with history, to the point of willful deceit in my opinion.

• "The fact that religions through the ages have spoken in images, parables, and paradoxes means simply that there are no other ways of grasping the reality to which they refer. But that does not mean that it is not a genuine reality." - Niels Bohr

The cosmos even admits that Giordano Bruno believed in god too. But the church burned him because he believed the universe was bigger than the church believed. The cosmos also explained how Newton thought he could figure out hidden messages in the bible. Nothing ever came from it.

Plato decided to hide math and science from the masses. He didn't think they could handle it. He's connected with christianity.

And we know that many of the discoveries you think someone discovered in 1500ad was actually discovered and lost 1000 years earlier.

Don't forget that until America most countries church and state were one and the same.

I don't put all the blame for wars on religion but they sure don't do much to stop them. You think atheist liberals would war more than conservative theists? I doubt that very much. We'd rather spend the money on science and poverty. Instead of stealing Iraq's oil let's figure out how to harness photosynthesis

Giordano Bruno was a Dominican friar. He was clergy, a part of a Church brotherhood. He had many clashes with his Church superiors and fellow brothers, who he publicly chided as idiots. And, yes, the Church burned him at the stake. Of course, burning someone to death sounds outrageous to us because it is, indeed, outrageous. I try to put outrageous historical acts into context, though. In Bruno's time, local lords were hanging people or putting people in the stocks for the crime of vagrancy (without a trial). Women were drowned during Bruno's time for adultery, by secular authorities.

A common misunderstanding of today is that the Medieval Church was scouring the countryside burning laymen at the stake. While the Church was a moral authority of the time, they had little sway over the punishments of laypeople. What the Medieval Inquisition did was punish its own clergy in some very high profile cases which are retold again and again by historians. The Spanish Inquisition and others were completely taken over by secular authorities.

"Throughout the Inquisition's history, it was rivaled by local ecclesiastical and secular jurisdictions. No matter how determined, no pope succeeded in establishing complete control over the prosecution of heresy. Medieval kings, princes, bishops, and civil authorities all had a role in prosecuting heresy, except where they individually opposed the practice. The practice reached its apex in the second half of the 13th century. During this period, the tribunals were almost entirely free from any authority, including that of the pope. Therefore, it was almost impossible to eradicate abuse.[4]
In southern Europe, Church-run courts existed in the kingdom of Aragon during the medieval period, but not elsewhere in the Iberian peninsula or some other kingdoms, including England In Scandinavian kingdoms it had hardly any impact." -wikipedia

What Cosmos does in its cartoons is that it portrays Bruno as a mild mannered scientist. He was neither mild mannered, nor what we would consider an actual scientist. He was not a "martyr for science". He was a friar who was executed for his theological beliefs on pantheism and other 'heresies'. The Church at the time had no official position on heliocentrism, and Bruno's scientific beliefs were not even brought up at his trial. Cosmos comes out in its debut episode and spins a fantastical yarn that has to be regarded as intentionally deceptive.

"Pope Clement VII (r. 1523–1534) had reacted favorably to a talk about Copernicus's theories, rewarding the speaker with a rare manuscript. There is no indication of how Pope Paul III, to whom On the Revolutions was dedicated reacted; however, a trusted advisor, Bartolomeo Spina of Pisa (1474–1546) intended to condemn it but fell ill and died before his plan was carried out (see Rosen, 1975). Thus, in 1600 there was no official Catholic position on the Copernican system, and it was certainly not a heresy. When Giordano Bruno (1548–1600) was burned at the stake as a heretic, it had nothing to do with his writings in support of Copernican cosmology, and this is clearly shown in Finocchiaro's reconstruction of the accusations against Bruno (see also Blumenberg's part 3, chapter 5, titled “Not a Martyr for Copernicanism: Giordano Bruno”)."
Nicolaus Copernicus Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

Niel deGrasse Tyson has been caught in other fabrications, and his loyal followers have been hypocritically erasing evidence of that from his wiki pages.
Neil deGrasse Tyson falls from grace over quote fabrication scandal - Houston science news Examiner.com
Tyson is a serial religion basher, and he uses fabrications to build his arguments.

Sealybobo, you're the perfect candidate to be a deGrasse Tyson acolyte. You say that Plato hid math and scientific knowledge from the masses and then you immediately connect Plato to Christianity. That might even be too far an intellectual stretch for the Tyson cult. The continuity between Greek and Christian concepts has nothing to do with any policy on sharing math and science with people, obviously. You'd have to be blinded by some sort of anti-Christian agenda to make that claim.

The original Cosmos had to have very few edits after all these years, including this. Do you refute Sagan's stories too?

Athens, in the time of Plato and Aristotle had a vast slave population. All of that brave Athenian talk about democracy applied only to a privileged few. Plato and Aristotle were comfortable in a slave society.
Their way dominated for over 20 centuries. In the recognition that the cosmos is knowable, that there is a mathematical underpinning to nature, they greatly advanced the cause of science. But in the suppression of disquieting facts and that science should be kept for a small elite , the distaste for experiment, the embrace of mysticism, the easy acceptance of slave societies, their influence has significantly set back the human endeavor.

The books of the lonian scientists are entirely lost. We rediscovered them in the middle east many years later from another great man who said "don't put your trust in the writings of the ancients". That was 1000 years ago. I forgot his name.

This knowledge was suppressed by the Greeks. Ridiculed and forgotten by the Platonists and by the Christians who adopted much of the philosophy of Plato.

Finally, the Western world reawakened. Experiment and open inquiry slowly became respectable once again. The enlightenment period. Forgotten books and fragments were read once more. Leonardo and Copernicus and Columbus were inspired by the lonian tradition.

The idea that the earth was just a planet and that we're citizens of the universe was rejected and forgotten.
This idea was first argued by Aristarchus 2300 years ago. He held that the Earth moves around the sun. He correctly located our place in the solar system. For his trouble, he was accused of heresy. Plato's way ruled. Science lost, religion won. And we all lost.

 

[Treeshepherd]

They explain in the old Cosmos how Plato is connected to Christianity. I'll try to find it.

Democritus was a great man back in ancient Greece. He believed that the prevailing religions of his time were evil and that neither souls nor immortal gods existed. There is no evidence that Democritus was persecuted for his beliefs. But then again, he came from Abdera, a very liberal open society where you could think what you want. However, in his time the brief tradition of tolerance for unconventional views was beginning to erode.
For instance, the prevailing belief was that the moon and the sun were gods. Another contemporary of Democritus, named Anaxagoras, taught that the moon was a place made of ordinary matter and that the sun was a red-hot stone far away in the sky. For this, Anaxagoras was condemned convicted and imprisoned for impiety a religious crime. People began to be persecuted for their ideas. A portrait of Democritus is now .
on the Greek 1 00-drachma note but his ideas were suppressed and his influence on history made minor.
The mystics were beginning to win. Pythagoras who lived here on Samos in the 6th century BC.
this small Greek Orthodox shrine was erected on his front porch. There's a continuity of tradition from Pythagoras to Christianity. Plato was a follower of Pythagoras.

Plato believed that ideas were far more real than the natural world. He advised the astronomers not to waste their time observing stars and planets. It was better, he believed, just to think about them. Plato expressed hostility to observation and experiment. He taught contempt for the real world and disdain for the practical application of scientific knowledge. Plato's followers succeeded in extinguishing the light .
of science and experiment that had been kindled by Democritus Plato's unease with the world as revealed by our senses was to dominate and stifle Western philosophy. Even as late as 1600 .

It wasn't until the 1600's we rediscovered what Plato hid from the masses. He didn't want the masses having the truth. The facts. Science. Because science makes people question the church. That's science 101. Question authority. Don't put your trust in the writings of the ancients. They say miracles occurred? That's not enough for science. Not after peer review. I seriously question the writings of the ancients.

The continuity between Greek thought (Pythagorus and Plato), the Roman world and eventually Christian writers like Paul of Tarsus have nothing to do with opposition to science.

Pythagoras's religious and scientific views were, in his opinion, inseparably interconnected. Pythagoras was rather inclusive in his teaching, even allowing female members in his order. Of course, you had to obey the rules of the order to be a member. Pythagoras' meeting places were burned because he became a threat to the political order of the day.

Plato believed that society was best served by a meritocratic system, as opposed to a democratic system. If he were alive today, he would say that politicians should have to pass an intellectual test to gain their position, as opposed to winning a popularity contest. That's a political philosophy and has nothing to do with your science vs religion false dichotomy.

"[Anaxagoras' scientific] speculations made him vulnerable in Athens to a charge of impiety. Diogenes Laertius reports the story that he was prosecuted by Cleon for impiety, but Plutarch says that Pericles sent his former tutor, Anaxagoras, to Lampsacus for his own safety after the Athenians began to blame him for the Peloponnesian war."
There is always a political motive to sham trials. The Peloponnesian War was a struggle over political power like all wars, but I'm sure if you bend your thoughts severely enough you can conclude that the war was caused by religion. "The real cause I consider to be the one which was formally most kept out of sight. The growth of the power of Athens, and the alarm which this inspired in Lacedaemon, made war inevitable."- Thucydides

It's interesting that you mention Anaxagoras, who believed in a sort of intelligent design underpinning the universe. This he called nous. He claimed that "nous (intellect or mind) was the motive cause of the cosmos."
Anaxagoras Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
"Nous then is not only first cause, it also, one might say, is the preserver of order in the cosmos, as it maintains the rotations that govern all the natural processes. Anaxagoras does not explain how these processes work, or how nous can affect the ingredients."

Any theories about nous are metaphysical and totally outside the purview of scientific questioning. Anaxagoras is an example of a creationist whose metaphysical ideas do not interfere with his scientific observations.

 

[Treeshepherd]

Anyone who believes in God needs to watch the Cosmos. Watch the new one with Neil Degrasse Tyson and the old one with Carl Sagan. Once you learn the history of man, science and religion you will realize god(s) were made up long before we decided to just go with one god. Religious ignorance has held us back thousands of years. Religious people love to brag that it was on their watch that we came up with cures and that it was religious people who got us on the moon. They expose their ignorance to the fact that many of the scientists were/are atheists. They try to ignore the history of how many scientists were put to death for heresy by the churches for things that turned out to be correct. But today the church doesn't get so upset if you suggest the earth isn't the center of the universe or that the sun revolves around the earth because churches change with the times. They've learned not to fight science and instead ignore your anti scientific history and embrace science. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.

300 years before Christ, Aristarchus of Samos discovered the earth was not the center of the universe. But it wasn't until the year 1500 of our lord that someone dared suggest it again. Who squashed this fact for 1800 years? Religion.

Think about instead of the 50 year cold war and all the other wars we fought if we would have put the time and energy into colonizing Mars. Take all the nukes we have built since the 1950's and tell me how much money that is. Human beings are stupid. One way to tell how dumb someone is, ask them if they believe in god.

Pythagoras refuted geocentrism in the 6th Century BC. He was a religious freak and a priest. Aristarchus of Samos studied at the Lyceum (dedicated to the god Apollo). Francis Bacon is said to have invented the scientific method. He was a priest. Copernicus was a Polish priest. Mendels was a priest, and the father of genetics (and a major influence on Darwin). You might say that Dostoyevsky (Jesus freak) is the father of modern psychology (if you read Crime and Punishment). Pascal (Jesus freak) was a mathematical genius and the father of computing. At least 35 craters on the moon are named after Jesuits, all of whom made significant contributions to science. Lemaitre was a priest who first proposed the Big Bang theory. The list goes on and on.

Not sure how you figure that the Cold War can be blamed on religion, or that nukes are a religious invention. It's true that Niels Bohr was an early nuclear physicist. If you read his stuff, or Einstein's, you get the sense that scientific breakthroughs often comes as a result of inspiration, or some sort of epiphany. It's often similar to an experience of the sacred. Einstein's revelation about the theory of relativity sounds like a mystical experience, as he describes it.

The practices of religion serve to break down mental pre-conceptions and constructs, filters and biases, and to enable the practitioner to see with fresh eyes.

Religion is not the cause of war. It can be used as a tool of exploitation, for political ends, just as patriotism or humanism can. Today's wars are sold to the public by appealing to secular humanism. If the entire world were atheistic, the incidences of war would not diminish by one scintilla.

And I think it's helpful to understand that the TV show Cosmos plays very loosely and creatively with history, to the point of willful deceit in my opinion.

• "The fact that religions through the ages have spoken in images, parables, and paradoxes means simply that there are no other ways of grasping the reality to which they refer. But that does not mean that it is not a genuine reality." - Niels Bohr

The cosmos even admits that Giordano Bruno believed in god too. But the church burned him because he believed the universe was bigger than the church believed. The cosmos also explained how Newton thought he could figure out hidden messages in the bible. Nothing ever came from it.

Plato decided to hide math and science from the masses. He didn't think they could handle it. He's connected with christianity.

And we know that many of the discoveries you think someone discovered in 1500ad was actually discovered and lost 1000 years earlier.

Don't forget that until America most countries church and state were one and the same.

I don't put all the blame for wars on religion but they sure don't do much to stop them. You think atheist liberals would war more than conservative theists? I doubt that very much. We'd rather spend the money on science and poverty. Instead of stealing Iraq's oil let's figure out how to harness photosynthesis

Giordano Bruno was a Dominican friar. He was clergy, a part of a Church brotherhood. He had many clashes with his Church superiors and fellow brothers, who he publicly chided as idiots. And, yes, the Church burned him at the stake. Of course, burning someone to death sounds outrageous to us because it is, indeed, outrageous. I try to put outrageous historical acts into context, though. In Bruno's time, local lords were hanging people or putting people in the stocks for the crime of vagrancy (without a trial). Women were drowned during Bruno's time for adultery, by secular authorities.

A common misunderstanding of today is that the Medieval Church was scouring the countryside burning laymen at the stake. While the Church was a moral authority of the time, they had little sway over the punishments of laypeople. What the Medieval Inquisition did was punish its own clergy in some very high profile cases which are retold again and again by historians. The Spanish Inquisition and others were completely taken over by secular authorities.

"Throughout the Inquisition's history, it was rivaled by local ecclesiastical and secular jurisdictions. No matter how determined, no pope succeeded in establishing complete control over the prosecution of heresy. Medieval kings, princes, bishops, and civil authorities all had a role in prosecuting heresy, except where they individually opposed the practice. The practice reached its apex in the second half of the 13th century. During this period, the tribunals were almost entirely free from any authority, including that of the pope. Therefore, it was almost impossible to eradicate abuse.[4]
In southern Europe, Church-run courts existed in the kingdom of Aragon during the medieval period, but not elsewhere in the Iberian peninsula or some other kingdoms, including England In Scandinavian kingdoms it had hardly any impact." -wikipedia

What Cosmos does in its cartoons is that it portrays Bruno as a mild mannered scientist. He was neither mild mannered, nor what we would consider an actual scientist. He was not a "martyr for science". He was a friar who was executed for his theological beliefs on pantheism and other 'heresies'. The Church at the time had no official position on heliocentrism, and Bruno's scientific beliefs were not even brought up at his trial. Cosmos comes out in its debut episode and spins a fantastical yarn that has to be regarded as intentionally deceptive.

"Pope Clement VII (r. 1523–1534) had reacted favorably to a talk about Copernicus's theories, rewarding the speaker with a rare manuscript. There is no indication of how Pope Paul III, to whom On the Revolutions was dedicated reacted; however, a trusted advisor, Bartolomeo Spina of Pisa (1474–1546) intended to condemn it but fell ill and died before his plan was carried out (see Rosen, 1975). Thus, in 1600 there was no official Catholic position on the Copernican system, and it was certainly not a heresy. When Giordano Bruno (1548–1600) was burned at the stake as a heretic, it had nothing to do with his writings in support of Copernican cosmology, and this is clearly shown in Finocchiaro's reconstruction of the accusations against Bruno (see also Blumenberg's part 3, chapter 5, titled “Not a Martyr for Copernicanism: Giordano Bruno”)."
Nicolaus Copernicus Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

Niel deGrasse Tyson has been caught in other fabrications, and his loyal followers have been hypocritically erasing evidence of that from his wiki pages.
Neil deGrasse Tyson falls from grace over quote fabrication scandal - Houston science news Examiner.com
Tyson is a serial religion basher, and he uses fabrications to build his arguments.

Sealybobo, you're the perfect candidate to be a deGrasse Tyson acolyte. You say that Plato hid math and scientific knowledge from the masses and then you immediately connect Plato to Christianity. That might even be too far an intellectual stretch for the Tyson cult. The continuity between Greek and Christian concepts has nothing to do with any policy on sharing math and science with people, obviously. You'd have to be blinded by some sort of anti-Christian agenda to make that claim.

The original Cosmos had to have very few edits after all these years, including this. Do you refute Sagan's stories too?

Athens, in the time of Plato and Aristotle had a vast slave population. All of that brave Athenian talk about democracy applied only to a privileged few. Plato and Aristotle were comfortable in a slave society.
Their way dominated for over 20 centuries. In the recognition that the cosmos is knowable, that there is a mathematical underpinning to nature, they greatly advanced the cause of science. But in the suppression of disquieting facts and that science should be kept for a small elite , the distaste for experiment, the embrace of mysticism, the easy acceptance of slave societies, their influence has significantly set back the human endeavor.

The books of the lonian scientists are entirely lost. We rediscovered them in the middle east many years later from another great man who said "don't put your trust in the writings of the ancients". That was 1000 years ago. I forgot his name.

This knowledge was suppressed by the Greeks. Ridiculed and forgotten by the Platonists and by the Christians who adopted much of the philosophy of Plato.

Finally, the Western world reawakened. Experiment and open inquiry slowly became respectable once again. The enlightenment period. Forgotten books and fragments were read once more. Leonardo and Copernicus and Columbus were inspired by the lonian tradition.

The idea that the earth was just a planet and that we're citizens of the universe was rejected and forgotten.
This idea was first argued by Aristarchus 2300 years ago. He held that the Earth moves around the sun. He correctly located our place in the solar system. For his trouble, he was accused of heresy. Plato's way ruled. Science lost, religion won. And we all lost.

I saw Carl Sagan speak at UCSC when I was in High School. I like him. I just think he's off base when he bashes religion.

I'm glad you mentioned slavery, as the abolitionist movement was Christian in character. Sojourner Truth, Henry Ward Beecher, Harriet Beecher Stowe, John Brown, etc.. Super-ultra Jesus Freaks.

Frederick Douglass was an ordained minister at the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, and he rightly pointed out the hypocrisy of many so-called 'Christian' slave owners. He wrote in his Narrative of the Life of an American Slave, "I love the pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ: I therefore hate the corrupt, slaveholding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of this land. Indeed, I can see no reason, but the most deceitful one, for calling the religion of this land Christianity. I look upon it as the climax of all misnomers, the boldest of all frauds, and the grossest of all libels…"

Today we like to call MLK by the title 'Doctor', or 'Civil Rights Leader' King. In the media or in public school, he is rarely referred to as a reverend. His doctorates were in theology. His speeches derive their power from the Bible.

 

[sealybobo]

They explain in the old Cosmos how Plato is connected to Christianity. I'll try to find it.

Democritus was a great man back in ancient Greece. He believed that the prevailing religions of his time were evil and that neither souls nor immortal gods existed. There is no evidence that Democritus was persecuted for his beliefs. But then again, he came from Abdera, a very liberal open society where you could think what you want. However, in his time the brief tradition of tolerance for unconventional views was beginning to erode.
For instance, the prevailing belief was that the moon and the sun were gods. Another contemporary of Democritus, named Anaxagoras, taught that the moon was a place made of ordinary matter and that the sun was a red-hot stone far away in the sky. For this, Anaxagoras was condemned convicted and imprisoned for impiety a religious crime. People began to be persecuted for their ideas. A portrait of Democritus is now .
on the Greek 1 00-drachma note but his ideas were suppressed and his influence on history made minor.
The mystics were beginning to win. Pythagoras who lived here on Samos in the 6th century BC.
this small Greek Orthodox shrine was erected on his front porch. There's a continuity of tradition from Pythagoras to Christianity. Plato was a follower of Pythagoras.

Plato believed that ideas were far more real than the natural world. He advised the astronomers not to waste their time observing stars and planets. It was better, he believed, just to think about them. Plato expressed hostility to observation and experiment. He taught contempt for the real world and disdain for the practical application of scientific knowledge. Plato's followers succeeded in extinguishing the light .
of science and experiment that had been kindled by Democritus Plato's unease with the world as revealed by our senses was to dominate and stifle Western philosophy. Even as late as 1600 .

It wasn't until the 1600's we rediscovered what Plato hid from the masses. He didn't want the masses having the truth. The facts. Science. Because science makes people question the church. That's science 101. Question authority. Don't put your trust in the writings of the ancients. They say miracles occurred? That's not enough for science. Not after peer review. I seriously question the writings of the ancients.

The continuity between Greek thought (Pythagorus and Plato), the Roman world and eventually Christian writers like Paul of Tarsus have nothing to do with opposition to science.

Pythagoras's religious and scientific views were, in his opinion, inseparably interconnected. Pythagoras was rather inclusive in his teaching, even allowing female members in his order. Of course, you had to obey the rules of the order to be a member. Pythagoras' meeting places were burned because he became a threat to the political order of the day.

Plato believed that society was best served by a meritocratic system, as opposed to a democratic system. If he were alive today, he would say that politicians should have to pass an intellectual test to gain their position, as opposed to winning a popularity contest. That's a political philosophy and has nothing to do with your science vs religion false dichotomy.

"[Anaxagoras' scientific] speculations made him vulnerable in Athens to a charge of impiety. Diogenes Laertius reports the story that he was prosecuted by Cleon for impiety, but Plutarch says that Pericles sent his former tutor, Anaxagoras, to Lampsacus for his own safety after the Athenians began to blame him for the Peloponnesian war."
There is always a political motive to sham trials. The Peloponnesian War was a struggle over political power like all wars, but I'm sure if you bend your thoughts severely enough you can conclude that the war was caused by religion. "The real cause I consider to be the one which was formally most kept out of sight. The growth of the power of Athens, and the alarm which this inspired in Lacedaemon, made war inevitable."- Thucydides

It's interesting that you mention Anaxagoras, who believed in a sort of intelligent design underpinning the universe. This he called nous. He claimed that "nous (intellect or mind) was the motive cause of the cosmos."
Anaxagoras Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
"Nous then is not only first cause, it also, one might say, is the preserver of order in the cosmos, as it maintains the rotations that govern all the natural processes. Anaxagoras does not explain how these processes work, or how nous can affect the ingredients."

Any theories about nous are metaphysical and totally outside the purview of scientific questioning. Anaxagoras is an example of a creationist whose metaphysical ideas do not interfere with his scientific observations.

What makes the cosmos do what it does? Gravity.

 

[sealybobo]

They explain in the old Cosmos how Plato is connected to Christianity. I'll try to find it.

Democritus was a great man back in ancient Greece. He believed that the prevailing religions of his time were evil and that neither souls nor immortal gods existed. There is no evidence that Democritus was persecuted for his beliefs. But then again, he came from Abdera, a very liberal open society where you could think what you want. However, in his time the brief tradition of tolerance for unconventional views was beginning to erode.
For instance, the prevailing belief was that the moon and the sun were gods. Another contemporary of Democritus, named Anaxagoras, taught that the moon was a place made of ordinary matter and that the sun was a red-hot stone far away in the sky. For this, Anaxagoras was condemned convicted and imprisoned for impiety a religious crime. People began to be persecuted for their ideas. A portrait of Democritus is now .
on the Greek 1 00-drachma note but his ideas were suppressed and his influence on history made minor.
The mystics were beginning to win. Pythagoras who lived here on Samos in the 6th century BC.
this small Greek Orthodox shrine was erected on his front porch. There's a continuity of tradition from Pythagoras to Christianity. Plato was a follower of Pythagoras.

Plato believed that ideas were far more real than the natural world. He advised the astronomers not to waste their time observing stars and planets. It was better, he believed, just to think about them. Plato expressed hostility to observation and experiment. He taught contempt for the real world and disdain for the practical application of scientific knowledge. Plato's followers succeeded in extinguishing the light .
of science and experiment that had been kindled by Democritus Plato's unease with the world as revealed by our senses was to dominate and stifle Western philosophy. Even as late as 1600 .

It wasn't until the 1600's we rediscovered what Plato hid from the masses. He didn't want the masses having the truth. The facts. Science. Because science makes people question the church. That's science 101. Question authority. Don't put your trust in the writings of the ancients. They say miracles occurred? That's not enough for science. Not after peer review. I seriously question the writings of the ancients.

The continuity between Greek thought (Pythagorus and Plato), the Roman world and eventually Christian writers like Paul of Tarsus have nothing to do with opposition to science.

Pythagoras's religious and scientific views were, in his opinion, inseparably interconnected. Pythagoras was rather inclusive in his teaching, even allowing female members in his order. Of course, you had to obey the rules of the order to be a member. Pythagoras' meeting places were burned because he became a threat to the political order of the day.

Plato believed that society was best served by a meritocratic system, as opposed to a democratic system. If he were alive today, he would say that politicians should have to pass an intellectual test to gain their position, as opposed to winning a popularity contest. That's a political philosophy and has nothing to do with your science vs religion false dichotomy.

"[Anaxagoras' scientific] speculations made him vulnerable in Athens to a charge of impiety. Diogenes Laertius reports the story that he was prosecuted by Cleon for impiety, but Plutarch says that Pericles sent his former tutor, Anaxagoras, to Lampsacus for his own safety after the Athenians began to blame him for the Peloponnesian war."
There is always a political motive to sham trials. The Peloponnesian War was a struggle over political power like all wars, but I'm sure if you bend your thoughts severely enough you can conclude that the war was caused by religion. "The real cause I consider to be the one which was formally most kept out of sight. The growth of the power of Athens, and the alarm which this inspired in Lacedaemon, made war inevitable."- Thucydides

It's interesting that you mention Anaxagoras, who believed in a sort of intelligent design underpinning the universe. This he called nous. He claimed that "nous (intellect or mind) was the motive cause of the cosmos."
Anaxagoras Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
"Nous then is not only first cause, it also, one might say, is the preserver of order in the cosmos, as it maintains the rotations that govern all the natural processes. Anaxagoras does not explain how these processes work, or how nous can affect the ingredients."

Any theories about nous are metaphysical and totally outside the purview of scientific questioning. Anaxagoras is an example of a creationist whose metaphysical ideas do not interfere with his scientific observations.

Don't forget back then there was no separation of church and state. So the church was playing politics and going to war and keeping the people down and turning a blind eye to slavery.

 

[Treeshepherd]

Don't forget back then there was no separation of church and state. So the church was playing politics and going to war and keeping the people down and turning a blind eye to slavery.

Churches don't have armies, with a couple of historical exceptions. Monarchs, chiefs and presidents go to war.

The separation of church and state is a metaphorical description that takes on different meanings depending on the country and time in question.

In ancient Greece, there was no comprehensive blanketing religious authority.There were a variety of cults.
Some cults eventually developed hierarchical priesthoods that controlled access to sacrifices, but "early on at least every adult (or every adult male) was considered eligible to perform sacrifices to the gods. This might occur in the home or it might occur publicly in a temple. Priests often attended sacrifices but their presence was by no means required."

In Medieval times, Popes were often ignored by monarchs and lesser royal rulers.

History is replete with autocrats who bent religion to their interests of maintaining power. Politics corrupts religion. It's more accurate to phrase it that way than to say that religion corrupts politics.

 

[sealybobo]

Anyone who believes in God needs to watch the Cosmos. Watch the new one with Neil Degrasse Tyson and the old one with Carl Sagan. Once you learn the history of man, science and religion you will realize god(s) were made up long before we decided to just go with one god. Religious ignorance has held us back thousands of years. Religious people love to brag that it was on their watch that we came up with cures and that it was religious people who got us on the moon. They expose their ignorance to the fact that many of the scientists were/are atheists. They try to ignore the history of how many scientists were put to death for heresy by the churches for things that turned out to be correct. But today the church doesn't get so upset if you suggest the earth isn't the center of the universe or that the sun revolves around the earth because churches change with the times. They've learned not to fight science and instead ignore your anti scientific history and embrace science. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.

300 years before Christ, Aristarchus of Samos discovered the earth was not the center of the universe. But it wasn't until the year 1500 of our lord that someone dared suggest it again. Who squashed this fact for 1800 years? Religion.

Think about instead of the 50 year cold war and all the other wars we fought if we would have put the time and energy into colonizing Mars. Take all the nukes we have built since the 1950's and tell me how much money that is. Human beings are stupid. One way to tell how dumb someone is, ask them if they believe in god.

Pythagoras refuted geocentrism in the 6th Century BC. He was a religious freak and a priest. Aristarchus of Samos studied at the Lyceum (dedicated to the god Apollo). Francis Bacon is said to have invented the scientific method. He was a priest. Copernicus was a Polish priest. Mendels was a priest, and the father of genetics (and a major influence on Darwin). You might say that Dostoyevsky (Jesus freak) is the father of modern psychology (if you read Crime and Punishment). Pascal (Jesus freak) was a mathematical genius and the father of computing. At least 35 craters on the moon are named after Jesuits, all of whom made significant contributions to science. Lemaitre was a priest who first proposed the Big Bang theory. The list goes on and on.

Not sure how you figure that the Cold War can be blamed on religion, or that nukes are a religious invention. It's true that Niels Bohr was an early nuclear physicist. If you read his stuff, or Einstein's, you get the sense that scientific breakthroughs often comes as a result of inspiration, or some sort of epiphany. It's often similar to an experience of the sacred. Einstein's revelation about the theory of relativity sounds like a mystical experience, as he describes it.

The practices of religion serve to break down mental pre-conceptions and constructs, filters and biases, and to enable the practitioner to see with fresh eyes.

Religion is not the cause of war. It can be used as a tool of exploitation, for political ends, just as patriotism or humanism can. Today's wars are sold to the public by appealing to secular humanism. If the entire world were atheistic, the incidences of war would not diminish by one scintilla.

And I think it's helpful to understand that the TV show Cosmos plays very loosely and creatively with history, to the point of willful deceit in my opinion.

• "The fact that religions through the ages have spoken in images, parables, and paradoxes means simply that there are no other ways of grasping the reality to which they refer. But that does not mean that it is not a genuine reality." - Niels Bohr

The cosmos even admits that Giordano Bruno believed in god too. But the church burned him because he believed the universe was bigger than the church believed. The cosmos also explained how Newton thought he could figure out hidden messages in the bible. Nothing ever came from it.

Plato decided to hide math and science from the masses. He didn't think they could handle it. He's connected with christianity.

And we know that many of the discoveries you think someone discovered in 1500ad was actually discovered and lost 1000 years earlier.

Don't forget that until America most countries church and state were one and the same.

I don't put all the blame for wars on religion but they sure don't do much to stop them. You think atheist liberals would war more than conservative theists? I doubt that very much. We'd rather spend the money on science and poverty. Instead of stealing Iraq's oil let's figure out how to harness photosynthesis

Giordano Bruno was a Dominican friar. He was clergy, a part of a Church brotherhood. He had many clashes with his Church superiors and fellow brothers, who he publicly chided as idiots. And, yes, the Church burned him at the stake. Of course, burning someone to death sounds outrageous to us because it is, indeed, outrageous. I try to put outrageous historical acts into context, though. In Bruno's time, local lords were hanging people or putting people in the stocks for the crime of vagrancy (without a trial). Women were drowned during Bruno's time for adultery, by secular authorities.

A common misunderstanding of today is that the Medieval Church was scouring the countryside burning laymen at the stake. While the Church was a moral authority of the time, they had little sway over the punishments of laypeople. What the Medieval Inquisition did was punish its own clergy in some very high profile cases which are retold again and again by historians. The Spanish Inquisition and others were completely taken over by secular authorities.

"Throughout the Inquisition's history, it was rivaled by local ecclesiastical and secular jurisdictions. No matter how determined, no pope succeeded in establishing complete control over the prosecution of heresy. Medieval kings, princes, bishops, and civil authorities all had a role in prosecuting heresy, except where they individually opposed the practice. The practice reached its apex in the second half of the 13th century. During this period, the tribunals were almost entirely free from any authority, including that of the pope. Therefore, it was almost impossible to eradicate abuse.[4]
In southern Europe, Church-run courts existed in the kingdom of Aragon during the medieval period, but not elsewhere in the Iberian peninsula or some other kingdoms, including England In Scandinavian kingdoms it had hardly any impact." -wikipedia

What Cosmos does in its cartoons is that it portrays Bruno as a mild mannered scientist. He was neither mild mannered, nor what we would consider an actual scientist. He was not a "martyr for science". He was a friar who was executed for his theological beliefs on pantheism and other 'heresies'. The Church at the time had no official position on heliocentrism, and Bruno's scientific beliefs were not even brought up at his trial. Cosmos comes out in its debut episode and spins a fantastical yarn that has to be regarded as intentionally deceptive.

"Pope Clement VII (r. 1523–1534) had reacted favorably to a talk about Copernicus's theories, rewarding the speaker with a rare manuscript. There is no indication of how Pope Paul III, to whom On the Revolutions was dedicated reacted; however, a trusted advisor, Bartolomeo Spina of Pisa (1474–1546) intended to condemn it but fell ill and died before his plan was carried out (see Rosen, 1975). Thus, in 1600 there was no official Catholic position on the Copernican system, and it was certainly not a heresy. When Giordano Bruno (1548–1600) was burned at the stake as a heretic, it had nothing to do with his writings in support of Copernican cosmology, and this is clearly shown in Finocchiaro's reconstruction of the accusations against Bruno (see also Blumenberg's part 3, chapter 5, titled “Not a Martyr for Copernicanism: Giordano Bruno”)."
Nicolaus Copernicus Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

Niel deGrasse Tyson has been caught in other fabrications, and his loyal followers have been hypocritically erasing evidence of that from his wiki pages.
Neil deGrasse Tyson falls from grace over quote fabrication scandal - Houston science news Examiner.com
Tyson is a serial religion basher, and he uses fabrications to build his arguments.

Sealybobo, you're the perfect candidate to be a deGrasse Tyson acolyte. You say that Plato hid math and scientific knowledge from the masses and then you immediately connect Plato to Christianity. That might even be too far an intellectual stretch for the Tyson cult. The continuity between Greek and Christian concepts has nothing to do with any policy on sharing math and science with people, obviously. You'd have to be blinded by some sort of anti-Christian agenda to make that claim.

The original Cosmos had to have very few edits after all these years, including this. Do you refute Sagan's stories too?

Athens, in the time of Plato and Aristotle had a vast slave population. All of that brave Athenian talk about democracy applied only to a privileged few. Plato and Aristotle were comfortable in a slave society.
Their way dominated for over 20 centuries. In the recognition that the cosmos is knowable, that there is a mathematical underpinning to nature, they greatly advanced the cause of science. But in the suppression of disquieting facts and that science should be kept for a small elite , the distaste for experiment, the embrace of mysticism, the easy acceptance of slave societies, their influence has significantly set back the human endeavor.

The books of the lonian scientists are entirely lost. We rediscovered them in the middle east many years later from another great man who said "don't put your trust in the writings of the ancients". That was 1000 years ago. I forgot his name.

This knowledge was suppressed by the Greeks. Ridiculed and forgotten by the Platonists and by the Christians who adopted much of the philosophy of Plato.

Finally, the Western world reawakened. Experiment and open inquiry slowly became respectable once again. The enlightenment period. Forgotten books and fragments were read once more. Leonardo and Copernicus and Columbus were inspired by the lonian tradition.

The idea that the earth was just a planet and that we're citizens of the universe was rejected and forgotten.
This idea was first argued by Aristarchus 2300 years ago. He held that the Earth moves around the sun. He correctly located our place in the solar system. For his trouble, he was accused of heresy. Plato's way ruled. Science lost, religion won. And we all lost.

I saw Carl Sagan speak at UCSC when I was in High School. I like him. I just think he's off base when he bashes religion.

I'm glad you mentioned slavery, as the abolitionist movement was Christian in character. Sojourner Truth, Henry Ward Beecher, Harriet Beecher Stowe, John Brown, etc.. Super-ultra Jesus Freaks.

Frederick Douglass was an ordained minister at the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, and he rightly pointed out the hypocrisy of many so-called 'Christian' slave owners. He wrote in his Narrative of the Life of an American Slave, "I love the pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ: I therefore hate the corrupt, slaveholding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of this land. Indeed, I can see no reason, but the most deceitful one, for calling the religion of this land Christianity. I look upon it as the climax of all misnomers, the boldest of all frauds, and the grossest of all libels…"

Today we like to call MLK by the title 'Doctor', or 'Civil Rights Leader' King. In the media or in public school, he is rarely referred to as a reverend. His doctorates were in theology. His speeches derive their power from the Bible.

Ghandi said he liked Christ. Its christians he had a problem

Don't forget back then there was no separation of church and state. So the church was playing politics and going to war and keeping the people down and turning a blind eye to slavery.

Churches don't have armies, with a couple of historical exceptions. Monarchs, chiefs and presidents go to war.

The separation of church and state is a metaphorical description that takes on different meanings depending on the country and time in question.

In ancient Greece, there was no comprehensive blanketing religious authority.There were a variety of cults.
Some cults eventually developed hierarchical priesthoods that controlled access to sacrifices, but "early on at least every adult (or every adult male) was considered eligible to perform sacrifices to the gods. This might occur in the home or it might occur publicly in a temple. Priests often attended sacrifices but their presence was by no means required."

In Medieval times, Popes were often ignored by monarchs and lesser royal rulers.

History is replete with autocrats who bent religion to their interests of maintaining power. Politics corrupts religion. It's more accurate to phrase it that way than to say that religion corrupts politics.

It seems like religion is evolving. Christianity is definitely the best of all the ones that came before or after. I think we went astray when people started claiming god talked to them.

Abraham Adam and eve Noah Moses Mohammad Joseph smith.

What about the king James version? Church was the state and the state was the church. Kings and pharaoh's were divine

 

[Abishai100]

Hubris Iconography

If religion is based on sentiment rather than logic, where do we get horror film avatars such as Leatherface (a chainsaw-wielding cannibal) that capture human fascination with chaos? Chaos is, after all, an intellectual concept and not a sentimental one.

On the other hand, if science is based on logic and not speculation, where do we get movies like "Pi: Faith in Chaos" (1998) which celebrate human fascination with scientific imagination? Scientific imagination (i.e., science-fiction) is, after all, the stuff of condoned play and not obligatory ethics.

It seems that science and religion somehow temper each other, which is why philosophy is so important, since it juggles both spiritualism (i.e., metaphysics) and analytics (i.e., reductionism).

I like the American comic book icon Superman (DC Comics) who represents social fascination with both transcendentalism (i.e., daydreams) and sociology (i.e., humanism).





Superman - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia

 

[Treeshepherd]

What about the king James version? Church was the state and the state was the church. Kings and pharaoh's were divine

Well, you have varying degrees of religious practices being influenced by historical monarchs. The high priests of Egypt were appointed by the pharaohs (often his relatives). If the pharaoh's priests didn't go along with the program, they were sacked.

But, was ancient Egypt opposed to the development of science? That's the main topic of this thread. They developed writing. Scribes were valued members of society. They developed irrigation and architectural techniques. They developed advanced mathematics for the time. Why would the Pharaoh oppose scientific advancements?

And furthermore, why would the Pharaoh go to war for religious purposes? War is expensive. Ship building costs gold. Soldiers need to be fed. If there is no economic benefit to invade another country, war becomes totally self-destructive.

Even if you look at the Crusades, and all the atrocities that were committed over religious differences, there was an basic economic motive. Without that economic motive, the Crusades would have never happened. Yes, the Pope whipped common people up into a frenzy. But the kings and dukes and the Holy Roman Emperor raised armies because they saw an economic opportunity. The Holy Land was a gateway to the East, the Silk Road, and the Italian peninsula was the shipping center of the Mediterranean. Egypt was a gateway into the continent of Africa. It just didn't work out, in the end. Richard the Lionhearted nearly bankrupted England with his crusading failures.

So, in conclusion, I don't deny the use of religion as a tool of propaganda. And practically every politician in history has a cosmological perspective, so the separation of church and state is just a metaphorical phrase. JFK was a Catholic, for example, and that was the foundation of his education in ethics.

My position is twofold. 1. Religion and science are compatible. 2. War is primarily motivated by political expediency, fear, and a hunger for resources.

"[John] Kerry told the Senate Foreign Relations committee: "I think we all agree that this discussion must conclude with a bipartisan vote that makes clear that this is not one party's fight against ISIL (IS), but rather that it reflects our unified determination to degrade and ultimately defeat ISIL."
"Our coalition partners need to know it. The men and women of our armed forces need to know it. And ISIL's cadres of killers, rapists, and bigots need to understand it."" - December 2014

 

[sealybobo]

Hubris Iconography

If religion is based on sentiment rather than logic, where do we get horror film avatars such as Leatherface (a chainsaw-wielding cannibal) that capture human fascination with chaos? Chaos is, after all, an intellectual concept and not a sentimental one.

On the other hand, if science is based on logic and not speculation, where do we get movies like "Pi: Faith in Chaos" (1998) which celebrate human fascination with scientific imagination? Scientific imagination (i.e., science-fiction) is, after all, the stuff of condoned play and not obligatory ethics.

It seems that science and religion somehow temper each other, which is why philosophy is so important, since it juggles both spiritualism (i.e., metaphysics) and analytics (i.e., reductionism).

I like the American comic book icon Superman (DC Comics) who represents social fascination with both transcendentalism (i.e., daydreams) and sociology (i.e., humanism).





Superman - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia


View attachment 36386

When I watched a show on ancient Greek gods I noticed the similarities between them and our modern day superheros. Most of the hero's back then were either gods or demi gods. One hero, I believe it was Jason or the guy who killed Medusa was 100% mortal. He reminded me of batman. They appeal to us because they're just like us

 

[indiajo]

It seems like religion is evolving. Christianity is definitely the best of all the ones that came before or after.

I disagree. Maybe because I lived quite a long time in India.
Hinduism is a far more humanitarian religion.
Besides the really bizarre world of uncountable gods it developed around 5000 years ago as creation myth of India. Not the cosmos, not the earth, just India.
So it is absolutely ethnic, not at all missionary, and has a much higher developed spirituality than the three desert religions from the Middle East. This is prett much hidden by the sensation media who mostly report about crazy rituals like the bathing in the Ganges at Varanasi where dead corpses are floating by.

You must know, that the only religion that shredded all the gods, Buddhism, evolved from Hinduism.
Buddha, or with his earthly name Siddhartha Gautama, was originally Hindu, born in Nepal around 500 B.C. as son of a rich noble family.

By the way, the Buddhists you may have seen walking around in the US trying to collect money in their funny yellow wraps are no real Buddhists. They are mostly idiots and parasites, real Buddhists don't try to missionize people either.

I had a private audience with the Swami of the biggest Hindu congregetion, and also a long afternoon with a Buddhist monk in Srinagar in Kashmir. Though I am an atheist to the bone, the insights were interesting.
O.k., the Hindu philosophy is quite confusing, because it seems that they do not really believe in gods.
Except the dumb ones. It is more metaphysical, they use the gods like a pergola to trail their spiritual thoughts around some imaginable entities.
Buddhists are much closer to our modern science than you can imagine. Basically they say in pholosophical terms the same thing as Carl Sagan does. We are stardust, and we return to stardust and finally disappear in the eternal Nirwana, where our universe will disappear too as far as we know today.
They see the life we have here on earth as the precious thing it is, which should be used the best way possible by, interestingly, the golden rule of Immanuel Kant if you boil it down to the essentials.
As any religion, they have developed a whole bunch of fancy habits, but these are merely more than the mental stairs to help you step by step to find your satori (enlightenment).

Nothing for me, as I said I am an atheist, plus engineer, which leads me to simply acccept my end as some diluted subatomic particles in the vast cosmos. But for someone who needs a bit soul food and mental caressing, Buddhism is something I would have no problem to accept.

 

[sealybobo]

It seems like religion is evolving. Christianity is definitely the best of all the ones that came before or after.

I disagree. Maybe because I lived quite a long time in India.
Hinduism is a far more humanitarian religion.
Besides the really bizarre world of uncountable gods it developed around 5000 years ago as creation myth of India. Not the cosmos, not the earth, just India.
So it is absolutely ethnic, not at all missionary, and has a much higher developed spirituality than the three desert religions from the Middle East. This is prett much hidden by the sensation media who mostly report about crazy rituals like the bathing in the Ganges at Varanasi where dead corpses are floating by.

You must know, that the only religion that shredded all the gods, Buddhism, evolved from Hinduism.
Buddha, or with his earthly name Siddhartha Gautama, was originally Hindu, born in Nepal around 500 B.C. as son of a rich noble family.

By the way, the Buddhists you may have seen walking around in the US trying to collect money in their funny yellow wraps are no real Buddhists. They are mostly idiots and parasites, real Buddhists don't try to missionize people either.

I had a private audience with the Swami of the biggest Hindu congregetion, and also a long afternoon with a Buddhist monk in Srinagar in Kashmir. Though I am an atheist to the bone, the insights were interesting.
O.k., the Hindu philosophy is quite confusing, because it seems that they do not really believe in gods.
Except the dumb ones. It is more metaphysical, they use the gods like a pergola to trail their spiritual thoughts around some imaginable entities.
Buddhists are much closer to our modern science than you can imagine. Basically they say in pholosophical terms the same thing as Carl Sagan does. We are stardust, and we return to stardust and finally disappear in the eternal Nirwana, where our universe will disappear too as far as we know today.
They see the life we have here on earth as the precious thing it is, which should be used the best way possible by, interestingly, the golden rule of Immanuel Kant if you boil it down to the essentials.
As any religion, they have developed a whole bunch of fancy habits, but these are merely more than the mental stairs to help you step by step to find your satori (enlightenment).

Nothing for me, as I said I am an atheist, plus engineer, which leads me to simply acccept my end as some diluted subatomic particles in the vast cosmos. But for someone who needs a bit soul food and mental caressing, Buddhism is something I would have no problem to accept.

I wasn't considering Buddhist or Hindu when I said christianity was the best of all the religions. I meant the ones that believe in gods.

 

[indiajo]

I wasn't considering Buddhist or Hindu when I said christianity was the best of all the religions. I meant the ones that believe in gods.

Ah, you meant just the three from the desert?

 

[sealybobo]

I wasn't considering Buddhist or Hindu when I said christianity was the best of all the religions. I meant the ones that believe in gods.

Ah, you meant just the three from the desert?

Pretty much. It amazes me what a wild and unbelievable story each of them has concocted or that those stories are still believed by so many people. All the stuff the Mormons say. And for a Jew or Christian to make fun of a Mormon when their bibles have such wild stories too? The 3 desert stories were clearly written by ancient superstitious primitive men hundreds and even thousands of years ago.

But the stuff Buddhists and Hindu's say still hold weight today. I don't buy into either 100% but neither of them are saying a god came and told them so they at least aren't starting off the conversation with a lie I need to believe before we can even move forward.

I remember as a little child questioning my aunt who was telling me all the bible stories were literal stories. Turning 5 loaves of bread and 3 fish into enough for 5000 for example. Even my young immature mind couldn't just accept that on faith. Even young me doubted that and needed proof.

And anything I don't believe in the Hindu or Buddhist religions, doesn't mean I go to hell, right? So your religion doesn't make me defensive at all.

This is what Christians don't get. Their organized religion is not good for people. Its a lie. They use this lie to manipulate them. It is also used to divide us, for example against Muslims. See how we got into this trouble? The Muslims were picking on the Jews in Israel and wanted the Jews wiped off the face of the earth and now us Christians come running for Gihad. They're all nuts.

Hitler may have been an atheist but atheist are not evil. At least me and my friends aren't.

Wow! I just googled this:

1. Buddhism is a religion to about 300 million people around the world. The word comes from 'budhi', 'to awaken'. It has its origins about 2,500 years ago when Siddhartha Gotama, known as the Buddha, was himself awakened (enlightened) at the age of 35.

That is right around the age when I realized Christianity was bullshit. Or should I say, all organized religions.

 

[sealybobo]

Anyone who believes in God needs to watch the Cosmos. Watch the new one with Neil Degrasse Tyson and the old one with Carl Sagan. Once you learn the history of man, science and religion you will realize god(s) were made up long before we decided to just go with one god. Religious ignorance has held us back thousands of years. Religious people love to brag that it was on their watch that we came up with cures and that it was religious people who got us on the moon. They expose their ignorance to the fact that many of the scientists were/are atheists. They try to ignore the history of how many scientists were put to death for heresy by the churches for things that turned out to be correct. But today the church doesn't get so upset if you suggest the earth isn't the center of the universe or that the sun revolves around the earth because churches change with the times. They've learned not to fight science and instead ignore your anti scientific history and embrace science. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.

300 years before Christ, Aristarchus of Samos discovered the earth was not the center of the universe. But it wasn't until the year 1500 of our lord that someone dared suggest it again. Who squashed this fact for 1800 years? Religion.

Think about instead of the 50 year cold war and all the other wars we fought if we would have put the time and energy into colonizing Mars. Take all the nukes we have built since the 1950's and tell me how much money that is. Human beings are stupid. One way to tell how dumb someone is, ask them if they believe in god.

the more i listen to these so called know it all in astro this and physist that. oops on the spelling, I'm more and more convinced they are all just as lost in the dark and guessing at answers then any and all religions. Some their theories, and most if not all are only theories, are far fetched. For all we know the last answer will hopefully never be answered. string theory, don't know gravity, don't know black holes then. If I told you something you had no way of proving yourself, would you take my word for it? then why take theirs? lol faith in your fellow man?

Why have more faith in modern day science than in the ancients? Because science admits it doesn't know everything, has a really great process for finding out the truth, has figured out every cure and every invention we have and has proven religion wrong time and time again.

Theists like science as long as it doesn't conflict with their beliefs.

Creation science is a branch of creationism that attempts to provide scientific support for the Genesis creation narrative in the Book of Genesis and disprove or reinterpret the scientific facts, theories and scientific paradigms about the history of the Earth, cosmology and biological evolution.

The overwhelming consensus of the scientific community is that creation science is a religious, not a scientific view, and that creation science does not qualify as science because it lacks empirical support, supplies no tentative hypotheses, and resolves to describe natural history in terms of scientifically untestable supernatural causes. Creation science has been characterized as a pseudo scientific attempt to map the Bible into scientific facts. According to a popular introductory philosophy of science text, "virtually all professional biologists regard creation science as a sham.

To me it is just obvious that the 3 main religions plus Mormonism are all made up. And if anything is going to get the human race out of our solar system before the sun expires, it's science not religion that's going to do it. Our species can live forever. You however can't, no matter how much you want it to be true. And maybe its true. As a scientist I will admit that we will just never know. But as a logical adult I see the Jewish, Christian & Muslim religions are made made. And so if we made up this god, maybe he doesn't even exist at all. What evidence do I have? None? Then I remain skeptical. Another reason it is obvious your religions are cults is that they wrote that good deeds don't matter as much as blind faith in the ancient stories. So the requirement to go to heaven in your minds is gullability? That's the one thing god cares about? Not if you are a good person? Wake up people.

 

[indiajo]

I wasn't considering Buddhist or Hindu when I said christianity was the best of all the religions. I meant the ones that believe in gods.

Ah, you meant just the three from the desert?

Pretty much. It amazes me what a wild and unbelievable story each of them has concocted or that those stories are still believed by so many people. All the stuff the Mormons say. And for a Jew or Christian to make fun of a Mormon when their bibles have such wild stories too? The 3 desert stories were clearly written by ancient superstitious primitive men hundreds and even thousands of years ago.

But the stuff Buddhists and Hindu's say still hold weight today. I don't buy into either 100% but neither of them are saying a god came and told them so they at least aren't starting off the conversation with a lie I need to believe before we can even move forward.

I remember as a little child questioning my aunt who was telling me all the bible stories were literal stories. Turning 5 loaves of bread and 3 fish into enough for 5000 for example. Even my young immature mind couldn't just accept that on faith. Even young me doubted that and needed proof.

And anything I don't believe in the Hindu or Buddhist religions, doesn't mean I go to hell, right? So your religion doesn't make me defensive at all.

This is what Christians don't get. Their organized religion is not good for people. Its a lie. They use this lie to manipulate them. It is also used to divide us, for example against Muslims. See how we got into this trouble? The Muslims were picking on the Jews in Israel and wanted the Jews wiped off the face of the earth and now us Christians come running for Gihad. They're all nuts.

Hitler may have been an atheist but atheist are not evil. At least me and my friends aren't.

Wow! I just googled this:

1. Buddhism is a religion to about 300 million people around the world. The word comes from 'budhi', 'to awaken'. It has its origins about 2,500 years ago when Siddhartha Gotama, known as the Buddha, was himself awakened (enlightened) at the age of 35.

That is right around the age when I realized Christianity was bullshit. Or should I say, all organized religions.

Well, in Europe the Catholic and Protestant church, we have only this two, are presently busy as hell to appease to Islam. They are whining for dialog and give away the aquired reformed values easyhearted. Which I consider also spineless and disgusting.
There is no dialog with Islam. Don's be confused by a few moderate or playing moderate Muslims.
Islam is at the height of its power, as the Catholic church was a few hundred years ago.
They are putting their foot in every slightly open door and will not retreat if not forced to.

As the majority of Christians since the crusades until the reformaton beginning in the 18th century was not violent and just wanted to live their more or less misreable lifes, the majority of Muslims are like that.
But their masters and whips are not, as it was the case with Christianity. They are a few hundred years late, as it was the case with their founder, but they are the breeding ground that drives their world conquering plans.
And this plans are real, they do not even try to hide it. They derive them from the Quran and the Hadiths, and they shout it out openly.

Our people are lulled into cohersion and dimmhitude by delusional politians and media, but the situation is already worse as it was 1683 at the gates of vienna, because millions are inside our countries and start the usual procedure of special rights, beginning with halal food in canteens and not stopping with sharia courts already existing in Britain.

Observe it. Brussels, the capital of Belgium, will have a Muslim majority around 2020.
Be aware, that is 5 years from now, we are not talking about some fiction, its simple demography and bitter reality. Keep an eye on Brussels and what will happen there.
What makes it worse, this are mostly Arabs and North Africans from Tunesia, Maroc, Algerie, Palestinians, Turkey and so on who have absolutely nothng to do with western culture. They hate it and want to abolish it, except the social benefits they draw out of the country.

Learn from history. Every country that allowed or forced a Muslim majority went down the drain.
Or they live from our money because they sit on oil fields.
Except Malaysia, that is rope balancing with an autocratic regime to keep the roughly 50% unbelievers working, although they have significantly less rights as citizens as the Muslims.
I was working there, I know what I am talking about.

The danger are not the Muslim terrorists. Or their non existing military strenght. Or ISIS or other bloodthirsty idiots.
The true danger is the infiltration, accompanied by the ongoing appeasment of our glorious leaders and the all understanding do-gooders. This is undermining our fredom in consequent tiny steps.
Like the frog you put in a kettle and slowly heating up the water.

Your moderate Muslim will not stop that. He is part of the Ummah and will obey.
Otherwise Allah will pour liquid lead down his throat for eternity. If his fellow Muslims did not cut it of before that.