Hi, Its Felepeno with another interesting discussion topic, Im here to talk about religion. Now me being an athiest i am going to be a bit bias *cough* A LOT *cough*.

Now i am going to just say i do not really mind about religion but i hate it when people try and shove their beliefs down everyone's throat. I believe that God is non-existent and science proves most of that. Evolution, cells, and why we are here. Science can support every question that "God" can throw at us, Now i know what religion is. If you ever went to geography class or science, You will have learned that religion is something people "back in the day" made up because they didn't have anything else to believe, EX:


"Oh look its lightning! IT WAS STRUCK BY A GOD!"

Now i don't want this to be an argument like the gun discussion was, I just want a debate, What is your intake on Religion.

Religion, in itself, is in my opinion pretty much what everyone makes it out to be; though we should first define religion.

It is a group of institutions, a set of ceremonial or ritualistic practices, and a code of observances and performances having a sacerdotal or sacramental character. (Make note that under this definition that atheism or agnosticism does not count as a religion, simply belief sets)

This is what I want to see being talked about in this thread, not whether a deity exists or not. This is not a theological debate, and this is not for bashing religion mind whomever wants to participate. You're free to talk about specific religions instead of the idea of a religion in general, just be sure to keep it within the broader picture we're painting.

So back to me saying my opinion on religion. Yes, religion comforts people in the face of the unknown of death. Yes, religion answers questions that there can never be a certain answer to (though, so does atheism). Religion does praise a God (or gods if you want to talk about polytheism) that may or may not exist. It already presupposes that there is a god, that there are souls, and many other things. And the point of religion is to, if these things do exist, to make them matter. To elevate one's soul above the secular soul to reach a level of existence that is better in some way.

About the questions of whether or not there is a god, whether or not there is a soul, is an entirely different can of worms. Just to say my part, I'll briefly talk about the nature of such knowledge about these subjects. Science in its nature is episteme. It is unarguable, universal knowledge. Scientific fact cannot be disputed. Knowledge about God and the soul is doxa. That means it is common belief or opinion. The highest knowledge that there is about God and the soul comes through order of metaphysical philosophy, arguments and logical inferences that seek out the truth about these metaphysical things; except this still falls under doxa. Though these is a problem for those saying that science is superior to religious belief.

Science's place of business is in the natural world. Their business is investigative, and relies on experimental and empirical evidence. There are no such evidences for or against the metaphysical questions that religion asks. As such, inferences and arguments that philosophy provides is the most knowledge we can rely on for or against metaphysical subjects. Let's not use science to argue belief, except where belief goes out of its way to try and explain natural phenomenon otherwise seen to be metaphysical phenomenon.

I myself and non-religious, not because I think it's stupid but since I don't really care about it.

If people want to put their faith and trust in someone/something then by all means let them do as they please. If it turns out to be good for them fine. If not, so be it. I do respect other peoples religion to a certain point though.
The point is that religion just isn't for me. I could care less about it for myself. I'm alive and i'm going to live that life.

As I have stated many times in the past, I believe organized religion is the bane of humanity.

I cba to relist all of my reasons, so, i'll just link the post of my views. I do not want any replies regarding my beliefs, as, I am here simply to state them, not argue them.

http://forum.toribash.com/showpost.p...4&postcount=11
http://forum.toribash.com/showpost.p...4&postcount=25

Religion was needed to actually be able to make laws and organize humanity. We don't need it anymore. Now it's fucking everything over.

The majority of religions asks you to kill others over the stupidest of reasons, such as Christianity, Mormonism, Islam, Judaism (I'm not sure about this one), etc. etc.

Just like certain religions can help construct a person positively, the majority collapse and turn hateful. For example: Westboro Baptist Church, that video with those Muslims stoning those Christians, Honor killings, Atheists getting attacked, Abortion doctors being shot down, Religious hate crime, suicide bombings, 9/11, etc.


Anyways, I stand at Anti-theism and Apathism.

I'm Catholic, but what I hate more then anything is a religious nut who goes around doing nothing but spreading the word of God. Tbh I could give two shits less what you believe. I'm friends with atheists, satanic worshipers, and plenty of other people that (mainly) christians would have a fucking hissy fit over. My point for this is. Worship who you want. Just don't shove it down someone elses throat hoping that they will see your logic. Because in the end it makes an ass out of you and me.

Well that is just the dumbest things i have heard. Religion doesn't tell you to kill people, corrupt leaders do.

If that were the case, every member of all those religions would be in all out war with one another. Wait for my following note.


The majority of religious followers don't do such things. The average member of a religion is a normal person, such as the average atheist. The problem are the extreme wings.

I don't mean to enforce my opinion or anything like that. The OP called for a debate, so I want to see the support of the position you share, shooter.

http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/dt/13.html

http://www.godlikeproductions.com/fo...age1705153/pg1

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/unreaso...child-killing/

http://www.godlikeproductions.com/fo...sage553954/pg1

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/in...9100838AAC9a2A

http://www.atheistrev.com/2005/03/bi...s-to-kill.html
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Don't worry, I completely understand that you are defending your point. Anyways, I do understand there is a difference between an radicals and non-radicals. I believe that there needs to be some sort of something that needs to be done to control them. (I'm not sure if this is drifting away from the main focus of the thread or not)

I don't think God is real due to the lack of evidence supporting for him and the strong amount of evidence to support the big bang theory.

Plus, I don't think that the Earth is as young as the Christians believe. The evidence to support the fact that this Earth is much older than 6000 years old is also there.

I also don't think that Jesus was ever real.

The Bible was also translated many times. They translate from the original, translate from the translated, translate from the next translated, translate from the next translate, etc. With the number of times it was translated, there must be at least SOME translation errors, considering the fact that they didn't have any of the modern technology to fix such errors. It's kind of like one really big game of telephone. No one can even FIND the original anymore, making it impossible to know if the original text is anywhere close to what modern Bibles say today.

Yeah, I kind of rushed through this argument. I have more on the matter, but I'm not feeling all too good right now, so I'm just going to post this.

NOTE: I did NOT use these sources in my un-converting process. I used more liable sources, but those I cannot find.

Well since there is seperation of church and state, and i was to kill you because you are atheist, i could not get arested becasue it is my religion? Is that what you are trying to say in these links. The only people that actually kill for religious reasons are the so called terrorist, and I do not believe they only do it for religious reasons.