Its not just a fringe of religious that attempt to thrust their views on the nonreligious and often succeed.

Any steps to allow dignity in death are opposed vehemently by the religious and so is a womans right to do as she wishes with her body.

The views for and against assisted suicide are not purely down to religious belief.

There is not a queue outside the door of Digitas made up of aethiest CERN researchers and rocket scientists.

The fact that abortion is illegal in just 26 countries and the majority of humanity believes in some form of god would suggest that mainstream religion can live in harmony with non religion.

Polarizing it and thinking you can convert believers is utterly futile.

Yep. There it is. Religion. Still busy poisoning everything…

Yep. There it is. Trolling. Still boring everyone…

A early man ideology to suppress and appease the masses in a time with primitive technology and scientific development. Seems we don’t evolve much at a all . After 2000 years lots are still relying on a novel for everyday consolation.

A early man ideology to suppress and appease the masses in a time with primitive technology and scientific development. Seems we don’t evolve much at a all . After 2000 years lots are still relying on a novel for everyday consolation.

Give yourself a pat on the back and a gold star for being clever. Well done you.

athgray,
“pat on the back and a gold star”

Implying others are childish for dissing his imaginary fwend.

Sweeeeeeet 🤗

Maybe we need a new slogan to bring it back to basics.

ATHEISM. Existence matters.

The problem is Jim its you on the doorstep. I have no doubt in my mind that God does not exist, but have you really written that post thinking you have converted anyone?

I’ve no interest in converting anyone. I just have an overwhelming feeling to express my incredulity.

I wouldn’t say God is malevolent, just an underachiever.
Woody Allen

Has the OP lit a firework again and then failed to get away in time?

Just woppit doing the usual woppiting, as he periodically does. This time followed by an injudicious email, possibly brought on by an over-refreshing lunch.

The school should have simply staged Charlie and the Chocolate Factory or James and the Giant Peach, not Darwin and his Crazy Theory!

A early man ideology to suppress and appease the masses in a time with primitive technology and scientific development. Seems we don’t evolve much at a all . After 2000 years lots are still relying on a novel for everyday consolation.

Is it a stretch to suggest somewhere in the region of 70-80% of the Earth population have unprovable beliefs based on religion?

We are in all likelihood friends, family and colleagues of people who think god exists. If these people feel that belief helps them through their daily lives then so be it, and hence religion must have some worth. These can be individuals that are surgeons conducting open heart surgery, or engineers developing the next generation of electric cars, or receptionists at an abortion clinic.

The school should have simply staged Charlie and the Chocolate Factory or James and the Giant Peach, not Darwin and his Crazy Theory!

From the sound of the article is seems in all likelihood that the school could and should have still had a play about Darwin.

We are in all likelihood friends, family and colleagues of people who think god exists. If these people feel that belief helps them through their daily lives then so be it, and hence religion must have some worth.

All good for you lot, just please lets keep it out of politics, law making, education and judging of people.
It’s part of why there is a drive for people not to tick the CofE box by default on the census to get a better idea of who is actually religious and those that are not.

All good for you lot, just please lets keep it out of politics, law making, education and judging of people.

So how does it work to exclude religion from political debate when legislating for same sex marriage??

Do we believe in equality?
Yes
Good lets treat everyone equally

Do you have religious beliefs that you feel stop you treating everyone equally? Your Problem get over it.

Sorry but not got much time for that sort of objection.

A couple of people now have said that “evolution is just a theory.” If this is you, you need to go and google “scientific theory” before typing further, as you’re simply demonstrating your own ignorance.

“Theory” in scientific terms has a different meaning from that in general parlance. You might watch a film and have a theory about who the killer is; this is essentially a guess, that doesn’t mean that evolution is a guess.

In science, this would be a hypothesis. Someone has an idea, that idea then gets tested. Either evidence supports this hypothesis or disproves it. Over time, as more and more experiments are conducted and more and more evidence is discovered, the more robust hypotheses become accepted as a theory. Eventually it becomes, effectively, fact, only it’s still referred to as a theory because science isn’t arrogant enough to state 100% that something is definitely, unequivocally true. There’s always a chance that something might still pop up which contradicts a widely-held theory or offer a better explanation than the one we have.

The Theory of Relativity is a good example here. Science has spent a century trying to disprove it, without success. It is a demonstrable fact. Yet it’s still “only a theory,” and this is fortunate because we now know that it breaks at the quantum level.

The Theory of Evolution is one of the most robust theories we have. We can actually observe it in action, there’s a real concern currently about the over-use of antibiotics accelerating bacteria into evolving into resistant strains.

Sorry but not got much time for that sort of objection.

I think perhaps I’d give concession for religion to be involved in that debate if the argument was whether or not to make same-sex marriage mandatory for all, which you’d think was the argument from the way some people react to it.

if the argument was whether or not to make same-sex marriage mandatory for all, which you’d think was the argument from the way some people react to it.

While simultaneously being a gateway to much much worse, I’m sure plenty of people are fighting the urge to marry their dogs at the moment

Because people who believe in organised religion are much more willing to put the beliefs others have imposed on them before their own life experience.

There’s no evidence that same sex marriage causes any harm whatsoever. Deciding to oppose it for religious reasons in an abjugation of personal responsibility.
It says that you value the opinions of others over the evidence in front of your eyes.

I agree that this is a trait common to politics as well as religion – see anti semitism in the Labour party, racism and hatred of the poor and disabled endemic within the Tory party etc.

Many people buy into an ideology wholesale, without examining the finer points on an individual basis.

It seems to be a fundamental human trait, but that doesn’t mean it should be encouraged, in fact quite the opposite.

From a couple of pages back,

And the argument that ‘well if God exists then who created God?’ (i.e he can’t exist as no one could create him) holds no water since scientist would have us believe that the universe created itself randomly out of nothing, a question Dawkins failed to answer in debate

Aside from the fact that you’ve got this backwards, which I’ll get to in a minute, the wooly thinking here is the notion that Dawkins has to answer that question. The universe does not require our understanding, and whilst science strives to find answers, “we don’t know” is a perfectly acceptable answer to a big question.

Religion gets a foothold here because it can provide an answer without requiring a shred of proof, it can just make up any old story and no-one can disprove it. (Except when it can and then we see a lot of revisionism and back-pedalling, something something allegory something.)

For the “something from nothing” argument, this is the reason why “god did it” is a pretty unsatisfactory answer. We argue that the universe cannot always have existed or appeared from nowhere, therefore there must be a creator. But this just displaces the problem, we then ask “where did god come from?” and are told that he’s always existed or appeared from nowhere.

In any case, current popular scientific theory (ooh, there’s that word again) is not that the universe was created out of nothing, but rather a super-dense ball of something, so your original premise is (probably) wrong. (Where did that something come from? We don’t know. And it’s OK that we don’t know, we don’t need to fill in the gaps with supernatural fantasy.)

Keep it coming guys.

This all evidence to support my postulated hypothesis that “lots of people  on the Internet are dicks about things they don’t understand “

There is little evidence to contradict this hypothesis thus far.

I think I might have a theory on my hands.

And the argument that ‘well if My God exists then who created My God?’

When you go back to it and look critically if all these people around the world have their gods who created everything then it’s either a whole Mr Benn dressing up game or a heap of sub contractors taking charge, so in any given place Your God could end up being nothing more than the David Brent of the deity world 🙂

This all evidence to support my postulated hypothesis that “lots of people on the Internet are dicks about things they don’t understand “

What like science?

As I said above you are welcome to your beliefs just keep them out of my life. The number of times I’ve missed the supermarket on a Sunday……

There’s no evidence that same sex marriage causes any harm whatsoever. Deciding to oppose it for religious reasons in an abjugation of personal responsibility.

Indeed.

This is one of the issues I have personally with organised religion. Certainly with Christianity, the bible is translated from a dead language, has different interpretations depending on who translated it (and can we trust the people translating not to have had their own agendas?) and is made up from a number of texts from different sources which often wildly contradict each other. (Case in point, in the original text “homosexual man” and “male prostitute” is the same word. How we choose to translate that tells very different stories.)

Whilst the book / religion itself may well be well-meaning as a whole (today), this ambiguity means that whatever world views someone might hold, positive or negative, there’s probably a passage somewhere in the bible which they can cite to ‘support’ their opinion. Whilst I don’t doubt that it can be used for good, it can also be used as a tool to empower bigots. (And yes, we’re back to that ‘vocal minority’ argument I’m sure. But still.)

We know that gay marriage is a sin because it says so in the bible. Except, it doesn’t, unless you’re employing some very disingenuous interpretations of what’s actually written.

What we really need is The Bible 2.0. Rip out all the bits that are incompatible with the modern world, the slave-beating and the pseudoscience, and make it clear which bits are supposed to be factual and which are allegorical. You’d have a best-seller on your hands, and it’d stop all these hoary old debates. The believers can get on with their believing, and the atheists can indulge in a bit of bum fun or have an abortion without some random stranger telling them they can’t because a 1500 year old bit of parchment says it’s wrong.

Do we believe in equality?
Yes
Good lets treat everyone equally

Do you have religious beliefs that you feel stop you treating everyone equally? Your Problem get over it.

Sorry but not got much time for that sort of objection.

Not many would object to that mike, however people do have prejudice based on their religion and prejudice for a variety of reasons and they bring them to bear on life and politics.

I would suggest that we all have something in out lives that keep us balanced, reasoned, and tolerant and for millions on the planet their belief in god is that thing. It certainly does not make them homophobic or racist. I know terrible acts are committed by people of religious belief. We have also seen atrocities committed against religion by societies without strong religious belief. If politicians can gain balance, reason and tolerance through a belief in god then of course they should bring their religion to the table.

Incidentally, on the subject of same-sex, er, sex and the bible, I looked into this a little while back. Rather than repeating myself, you can read what I wrote here if you’re interested:

If politicians can gain balance, reason and tolerance through a belief in god then of course they should bring their religion to the table.

If politicians can’t gain balance, reason and tolerance without a belief in god then they shouldn’t be allowed to be politicians. Or for that matter, members of society.

The notion that without god we’d all be amoral rapists, thieves and murders is an absolutely terrifying concept to me. If that’s actually true for some folk then it’s a bloody good job that they’ve found religion instead.

I’m sure plenty of people are fighting the urge to marry their dogs at the moment

Ha ha ha that’s crazy (how does he read my mind?)

Cougar, I worded my point badly. I don’t think people are only good because of religion. I meant that a belief system may be something that helps them perhaps to relieve stress battle depression, suppress anger or make them better in the same way a hobby might.

Athgrey
You miss the point. Both of those things are where the religious attempt to impose their beliefs on others
On dignity in dying the medical profession splits on religious affiliation and reproductive rights are continually under attack from the religious

Have your religion if you want. Do not attempt to deny me my rights because of your belifs

Athgrey
You miss the point. Both of those things are where the religious attempt to impose their beliefs on others
On dignity in dying the medical profession splits on religious affiliation and reproductive rights are continually under attack from the religious

Have your religion if you want. Do not attempt to deny me my rights because of your belifs

No, your cack handed polarisation is missing the point tj. You talk as if it is religious people against non religious. That is silly. Yes there will be people of religious belief against assisted suicide and abortion. There will be non religious people in the same position.

How many people with a belief in God share a prayer with a loved one before they say goodbye in Switzerland?

How many women have relied on their faith to see them through the traumatic situation of having an abortion?

It is not a case of religion against the rest.

I have no belief in a god and agree that the people you describe should not hold away over policy however there is no need to tar everyone with the same brush.

@athgray Ah ok, fair enough. That makes more sense (and is somewhat less scary…!)

I’ve seen that argument before is all, so I perhaps jumped to conclusions. It’s been argued that we need religion to give us morality. This may have actually been true a couple of millennia ago, but society has evolved (ho ho!) and I’d like to think that most people in the developed world know that it’s unacceptable to be a bit murdery without needing a book to tell them so.

You talk as if it is religious people against non religious. That is silly.

I don’t think that’s what TJ means. Rather, it’s the notion that (some) religious people want to dictate what others should do (religious and irreligious alike) because they believe their religion says so which he is objecting to. I think. It isn’t – and shouldn’t be – a case of us vs them.

Yes there will be people of religious belief against assisted suicide and abortion. There will be non religious people in the same position.

Whilst almost certainly true, it would be interesting to put some stats behind that. I’d wager that there’s a strong correlation between the two.

Whilst almost certainly true, it would be interesting to put some stats behind that. I’d wager that there’s a strong correlation between the two.

I think think the arguments for and against assisted dying are far more nuanced than being based on religion.

I have heard views of politicians that are wary due to the potential for abuse due to the often vulnerable nature of those involved.

I was really referring to the abortion side of it, but yeah, that’s a good point.

Even if your a non believer…religion can once in a while have heartwarming positives

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/uk-england-cornwall-47176939

Oddly when you leave this mortal coil the majority seem to be sent off with some kind of religious ceremony..and are remembered somehow ( maybe the memory thing is a human conditioning)

Even if your a non believer…religion can once in a while have heartwarming positives

Or people being good people, happened to be in a church.

Oddly when you leave this mortal coil the majority seem to be sent off with some kind of religious ceremony

Personally I’d like to head off in a flaming long boat into the sea, while people finish the contents of my drinks cupboard. Any mention of religion, next place etc will be left at the door.

Athgrey
Dignity in dying does not equal doctor assisted suicide and the vast majority of those against it are religious even if they cite other reasons

The vast majority of religious doctors oppose dignity in dying and the vast majority of those who support it are secular

Oddly when you leave this mortal coil the majority seem to be sent off with some kind of religious ceremony

When my dad died a couple of years ago, the funeral involved some bloke in a frock (who had never met him) waxing lyrical about him. It’s a laudable sentiment and all, but I didn’t recognise the man he was supposed to be talking about at all. I found the whole thing a bit surreal TBH. When I go I think I’d want any tributes to be paid by people who actually knew me.

once in a while have heartwarming positives

Or people being good people, happened to be in a church

Well what else were they in the church for a spot of molesting..ffs

When I go I think I’d want any tributes to be paid by people who actually knew me

And maybe you will, however not everyone has that last request do they will it be a religious ceremony or down the the pub where the people you knew say the nice things?

Oddly when you leave this mortal coil the majority seem to be sent off with some kind of religious ceremony…

For most people that’s custom and habit, not religious belief, though. Non religious alternatives are readily available (civil and humanist) and they are not wildly unusual these days. The last funeral I attended was a humanist ceremony.

And maybe you will, however not everyone has that last request do they will it be a religious ceremony or down the the pub where the people you knew say the nice things?

Choice is good, mmkay.

For most people that’s custom and habit, not religious belief, though.

Indeed. Certainly was in my dad’s case, the only place he ever worshipped at served pints.