Like Buridans ass between two identical stacks of hay.

Bertrand Russell, The Analysis of Mind, stating:

There is no logical impossibility in the hypothesis that the world sprang into being five minutes ago, exactly as it then was, with a population that "remembered" a wholly unreal past. There is no logically necessary connection between events at different times; therefore nothing that is happening now or will happen in the future can disprove the hypothesis that the world began five minutes ago.


There, the start of something called faith and belief.

Like Dawkins, Condell resembles the child whose parents betrayed all faith in themselves, by some hideous, negligent act. It is like saying if someone could show me the evidence that humanity is capable of the ultimate in wisdom, then I would have faith that we can get ourselves out of every fucking mess we've created for this planet. Unlike Condell, I'm not going to wait for that kind of evidence. We've gotta have faith in oursleves and each other or we may as well bring on annihalation sooner than later. Oh and if that faith extends to a power greater than yourself, then more power to ya ( statistics say you probably had the kind of parents a child could have faith in and that you'll be happier, healthier and live longer too)

What you describe isn't faith. A child who believes in the goodness of his or her parents, due to what "kind" of parents they are, has had a chain of evidence to follow. "Faith in ourselves and each other" doesn't actually mean anything in particular.

I do think he gets a little unkind at the end (Sure it's mean to laugh at someone's toupee! What happened to enlightened self-interest?), but he's essentially on the ball here.

Yes it does... Something terribly particular.
Perhaps it should be worded a little differently...
I don't think a child has evidence...
he has contact and emotion and experience of love or whatever.
But does a child rationaly come to a conclusion.. "well a) they feed me b) they play with me c)they say they love me
I will conclude that they do, in fact, love me..."
I think not.

There, the start of something called faith and belief.

Russels 5-minute creationism can also be seen as a critique of the defense of irrational faith based on consistency and logical principles, as opposed to positive evidence, ie: evidence that positively suggests that the world is 5 minutes old. Argument from consistency and logic alone is not enough. Russels point is that we can make up anything we wish ,and still be both consistent and logical, he makes the same argument with the celestial teapot, Nobody can disprove a teapot orbiting Jupiter because we dont have telescopes good enough, space is too big etc, but because of the sheer lack of positive evidence, its not to be considered a valuable suggestion.

Likewise, Young Earth Creationists can perfectly well manage to stay consistent, God buried fossils to test our faiths, remember?

If I invent a reality where God only cares about me, and he grants me the right to kill anyone I want, steal shit and generally be a complete asshole, there is nothing inconsistent about that reality, and the logic is flawless, after all, its just Gods will, right? But there is no evidence! Evidence is key, its the only thing that we can really trust, the only thing worth trusting, even if the world is 5 minutes old, if we are ever going to figure it out, evidence will get us there, not a random, consistent thought.

Russels point is that we can make up anything we wish ,and still be both consistent and logical...

well, it might be his point, but firstly he isn't the creator of this example, and secondly.. I don't care how he uses it.

The point I was trying to make is that we, as humans, make concessions, accepting certain things as fixed which are not, and everyone does it.

People actually BELIEVE (as in right now) that the world isn't 5 minutes old. That's the point. This belief makes it possible for people
not to go insane and start shouting on the street. We all have beliefs and have to have beliefs about the world and the nature of things.

People are not in the constant state of evidence, but it can be said that people are in a constant state of belief.
There is no reason to believe that the earth won't magically disappear beneath your feat, but you do...

I'm not attacking science nor rational thought but people who
don't understand the place of belief in the human brain, mind, soul or whatever... are inviting a state of constant psychosis.

Well, yes, we all need to believe things this and that, we all make some assumptions, but we make them based on evidence, thats the point, there is always the possibility that the world isnt really real etc, but because of the lack of evidence for this, and evidence to the contrary, we make certain assumptions about life. I'll call this "reasonable to believe" If those assumptions include stuff that there is absolutely NO basis in fact or positive evidence, I'd call it "faith"

Say what you want about God, but I have yet to see a positive evidence for god, or much less that any of the fables in the "holy" books are true. I'm all ears if anyone have any that cant be easily rebutted with some common sense.

Belief in God/bible etc is therefore, until the contrary is demonstrated, "Faith" by my definition of the word And it is this kind of faith, blind faith, that Condell criticizes. ie: not "faith" in good deeds, family, friends,music and human compassion and so on, things that are actually readily apparant to any human, and requires no supernatural assumption.

" things that are actually readily apparant to any human, and requires no supernatural assumption."


I'm not sure that these things are apparent...

I myself believe that there could be no evidence of God or anything like God... so I reject automatically all those Intelligent designers...
I also have real problems with the idea of supernatural.
It seems to me that it implies a rigid and fixed idea of what nature IS. Not that I believe in ghosts or vampires or anything like that, but the very idea presupposes something with which I am not entirely comfortable...
For the hindu religion the soul aws a natural phenomenon, for the christians it is not.


AS for faith - people who believe in God and practice religion have, I suppose, some existential reason for believing. It's not a measurable phenomenon to begin with.

Atheists dig their own graves being obnoxious like Condell. I'm willing to bet there hasn't been a single convert to atheism from all of the "athesifts" here.

Religion and science are both powerful forces and both are used for good and evil.

Whether you believe or not, religion is here to stay.

So is ignorance and self-delusion. But that shouldn't stop people from trying to rid themselves of all three.

Everytime I hear someone say that 'religion is here to stay, live with it', it merely serves to reinforce my conviction to do everything I can to help eradicate it.

QM - yeah, atheists dig their own graves.
How?


The audacity to call a religion self delusion.


Most people have a religion, be it christianity, a kind of cosmic idea of evolution (which in my idea is ten times worse than christianity) or a kind of panhumanist 'look at us', we are Man.
At least some of the christianw KNOW what they believe in.


http://unqualified-reservations.blogspot.com/2007/07/universalism-postwar-progressivism-as.html

I recently got a chance to talk to a creationist about the subject and I was really amazed by his beliefs. I couldn't care less what his faith tells him to do because it doesn't in itself harm anyone to think like that. What really riled me was his understanding of scientific theories and methods. He claimed to have done extenisve research into both sides of the argument, however it was clear from his understanding that he had only ever read the creationist literiture on science.

In the end that is my problem with creationism, its all propoganda against science rather than trying to stick to their own faith. They went wrong when they tried to challenge scientists on their home ground. If they had stuck with the "God did it" line, no one would be able to construct arguments against them on logical grounds. They'd only be vulnrable to philsophical arguments, but instead they opened up a front that they could never win without making up downright lies about the opposite view.

For example: he honestly believed that the theory of the big bang involved a hydrogen atom appearing out of nowhere and dividing through a mitosis-like process. This is plainly ridculous to anyone with even a basic understanding of how atoms work, so no wonder he considered the theory to require as much faith as creation or ID.

I could right an essay just listing all the factual errors he made. Not assumptions or theoretical errors but actual facts that he got wrong. Many of them fundamental to understanding the scientific method.

I can only assume this misinformation is written, specifically to provide extra arguments against scientific theories where they cannot find flaws in the logic of the original model. A straw man fallacy on massive scales.

I thought this video was very well-done, as are most of Condell's videos. I think that he is right in that religion should be ridiculed, but only in the same sense that one would ridicule someone who believes in fairies or leprechauns. Faith in a supernatural being, and faith in general, requires belief without reason or evidence. Not only that, but, as Condell pointed out, religion causes people to act out on these faiths. Thus, this type of behaviour is certainly one that does not deserve any respect.

Dawkins' point has more to do, not with the fact that it SHOULD be ridiculed (although he and I certainly think it should be), but that it shouldn't be EXEMPT from ridicule, which it has been in the past. Where you just don't talk about religion for fear of offending someone.

Well, too damn bad! You don't have a right to not be offended by discussions, and especially in the case of religion, where ancient viewpoints find their ways into public policy, it absolutely needs to be discussed and, in my antitheist opinion, dissected and revealed for what it really is, and if it proves to have merit, then so be it! I'll be happy to change my tune. But so far, no theist has ever given me any real tangible evidence to make me want to delude myself into belief, because there just isn't any.

I was trying to argue my points to a friend of mine, who is a very intelligent person, and was actually kind of stunned by his reaction to my points, and by his stubbornness about the whole issue. He would usually harp on the same few fallacies in logic, or confuse moral zeitgeist with belief in God, and would just seem to get upset when I pointed them out. It showed me how ingrained that stuff is in people, and how nearly impossible the task of trying to reeducate people is. But I suppose atheists like me feel the same need to proselytize as the religious do. The difference being that we are only trying to feed people facts and not myths, because those facts are far more beautiful and compelling to us.

Anyway, thanks for my first top 15 post. Hopefully next time it won't be such an obvious one.

"moral zeitgeist?"

I always had a problem with anglosaxons using german words.
But, go on...

Zeitgeist means - spirit of the age -
So do you believe in ghosts?

I find it very interesting that this video is not only popular, but voted up as well done. If a representative of any faith were to make a similar video dismissing atheism as absurd, ridiculous, or laughable, atheists would label them "narrow-minded" and fuss about how unfair religion is to atheists. But Condell is allowed to bash faith as though you'd have to be a child to believe in any god, and is applauded like he's proven something. Amazing.
He states that "believing a thing, no matter how strongly, doesn't necessarily make it real." I would add that not believing a thing, no matter how strongly, does not make it not true (yeah, I know, double negative). I realize that he would like to see proof that a god exists before he believes in it-- and yes, there are arguments on both sides as to what constitutes proof. But I accept certain scientific theories without seeing proof: I can't see a Higgs boson, but it remains the most plausible explanation.
For many people, that's what faith represents: the best answer to the questions that they are asking.
And Mr. Condell should note, just like the high school students I work with, that shouting does make you any more correct.

"I can't see a Higgs boson, but it remains the most plausible explanation."

Here is the difference between this situation, and the belief in a God.

You're right that sometimes people have to 'accept' very complex theories as the best current answers to questions that they can't understand. However, - and this is an important 'however' - if you *did* want to understand more about a Higgs boson, all you'd need to do is phone/email a few people and read some books and reports. Every scientific experiment is repeatable, so you'd be able to verify it for yourself as well.

You can't ask God if he's there, and get a real answer. There is nothing to prove that he's there.

You make the point that non-belief doesn't proof anything. You are certainly right. The real reason for non-belief *is* the lack of proof in the first place. The reason that I and others are atheist is because there's no reason to belief in God without proof, just as there is no reason to believe in fairies without proof.

If you choose not to believe in the Higgs boson, you are free to challenge its existence with a reasoned, objective, contrary or complementary proposition. If your theory is verifiably more correct (and yes, there are degrees), eventually scientific consensus will favor your interpretation.

Faith precludes questioning; to suggest it is the 'best answer' would be like saying that the the best question is the one that is never posed. It is a nonargument, it is intellectually lazy, it encourages ignorance in the place of curiosity and an attempt to truly understand. Videos like this may win no converts, but to be honest, if someone's used to employing an intellectual shortcut to make himself feel good about the world, then his ignorance addiction is probably unbreakable by any means. It's the people who genuinely wonder, who are serious about learning, that this video is directed towards.

callistan-- you make a few decent points.
I'm not sure I see the difference between a number of "believers" I know who take a preacher's word as gospel (no pun intended) and a number of internet atheists who worship Dawkins' and Condell's words as gospel. Please explain how watching this video to develop a worldview is less "intellectually lazy" than studying various scriptures/teachings to develop your own world view.

A excellent critic of faith...in the middle age.


Now please give me someone who make observation about more recent problem.

bhyphenlow. you should go look up the word "worship" as it does not apply to how you are using it.
Every Christian I've ever met take their preachers word for fact and do no reasearch into their outrageous clams.
Heck, the preachers don't even have the confidence to tell their congregation the truth about who wrote the bible (they don't know)...most learn this in seminary. this book list should help you understand beter.
http://www.archetype-productions.com/nfo/religion/my-books-list-4chris.doc
studying various scriptures/teachings to develop your own world view IS lazy if you do not research who wrote them, how the messages were translated into other langauges and then edited and how they've changed the meaning through subsequent editions, langauges and versions.
it's a moving target to base ones worldview on.

This could have been a good video and he could have made a very good point, but he blew it. He basically starts off calmly enough... Saying that he would respect religion if it didn't try to intrude upon everyone. It was going really good at that point. Then partway through he became suddenly immature, stopped trying to make points, and started being insulting. His point may have been that people don't owe religion respect, and whether or not that is true you never come off looking good when being an ass while criticizing someone/thing.

The biggest problem with many anti-religion arguments is that they hinge on whether or not religion is "true", and not whether it is "good". (Many, not all.)
It doesn't matter if religion is truth. Or rather, it only matters if religion is truth...if religion IS truth.
If it isn't truth, then it only matters whether or not it is good. And I submit that the rites and practices of many religious doctrines are, in fact, very effective mechanisms for leading a satisfying, productive life, regardless of whether or not you even believe the underlying theology. A couple of examples:
Prayer - it doesn't matter whether or not the reply comes from "God", but the act of silent reflection (or meditation), and the associated act of prioritizing needs and desires, allows an individual to actualize their goals while gaining insight into troubling issues that a person may already know the correct answer to "deep down".
Praise - Giving thanks allows a person to focus on the positive aspects of their life.
Worship and fellowship - Giving individuals a common reason to come together and form friendships and communities of mutual support.
Repentance - Asking for forgiveness of transgressions allows an individual to assess their adherence to their own moral code, recognize shortcomings, and encourage self-improvement.

Admittedly, there are some convincing arguments against the "goodness" of religion (The Crusades being the standard example, along with the underlying issue of intolerance), but on an individual level...well, I think the reason the meme has persisted is because it really is effective.

"Please explain how watching this video to develop a worldview is less "intellectually lazy" than studying various scriptures/teachings to develop your own world view."

I honestly don't think that this video could turn anyone into an atheist, nor would immediately change anyone's world view. The best way to develop a world view is to think very, very carefully about it an do lots of research. Also, from what I've seen, the best world views should probably be subject to change. As you gain better and more info about the world, your view of it should change accordingly. If your world view is static regardless of newly gained info, then it's probably not a very good one.

Anyways, it's 'intellectually un-lazy' if you watch this video, and then do some research and critical thinking. So, it'd be 'intellectually un-lazy' if people who listen to preachers did some research and critical thinking.

I also don't understand this claim of atheists worshipping Dawkins' or Condell's words as gospel. Anyone who does that is on the level of someone who takes a preacher's words as gospel. Anyone's claims deserve to researched and criticized.

Thanks, Ed, for good points again. I agree that you can be lazy or unlazy on either side of things. I also agree, to an extent, that a worldview should be subject to change. Your comments make posts like this worthwhile and prompt genuine contemplation.

unlazy is double plus good.

Bluecliff - Seriously? Actually a large part of the English language comes from German as well as a bunch of other sources. You would probably somehow be pissed off at my use of the word "schadenfreude" then. But they are both words used in the English language.

From dictionary.com:
zietgeist
-noun, German
the spirit of the time; general trend of thought or feeling characteristic of a particular period of time.

From me:
As in, shit that was deemed okay at one time, isn't necessarily cool now (such as slavery).

bhyphenlow - the difference is also that scientific principles are observable, testable, refutable, admittedly by people much smarter than me and I do have to take their words for it. Conversely, God cannot be proven aside from some fairly cheesy "miracles" and some faces burnt into toast (a cheesy sandwich, in fact).

We don't take Dawkins and Condell (and Hitchens) as gospel, but they do bring up excellent, well thought out, well researched points and have managed to explain how we feel about these things a lot more eloquently than most of us would have been able to, or have had time to on our own. So for that, they have my thanks, and I can only try to continue to explain their points, which I agree with, to others. Unfortunately it usually ends up being single topic discussions like those on the Sift that don't cover the whole subject well enough.


Reverend Ted - You insinuate that all of those things cannot be done without the supervision of the clergy or God. I submit that all of those things can and should be secular in nature, without the need for mythology involved. And yes, the morality preached in religion is HIGHLY dubious. So if all of those things, including having moral guidelines, can be done secularly and without God, then what use is God? In the mind of an atheist, He just gets in the way of the beauty of reality. That's what we try (admittedly sometimes poorly) to convey.

Prayer - it doesn't matter whether or not the reply comes from "God", but the act of silent reflection (or meditation), and the associated act of prioritizing needs and desires, allows an individual to actualize their goals while gaining insight into troubling issues that a person may already know the correct answer to "deep down".

Another method would be just to think about the problem at hand, and find out that deep down answer ie: "What is really the right thing to do here?"

Praise - Giving thanks allows a person to focus on the positive aspects of their life.

Credit where its due. If I happen to do something good, I deserve the thanks, the same goes for anyone else.

Worship and fellowship - Giving individuals a common reason to come together and form friendships and communities of mutual support.
Well. This one might be true..

Repentance - Asking for forgiveness of transgressions allows an individual to assess their adherence to their own moral code, recognize shortcomings, and encourage self-improvement.

Alternatively, you could be a real person and apologize to whoever deserves it. Again credit where its due.

All these points seems to me to be more or less moot, easily replaced by a secular humanistic stance, and even if it wasnt, Who the hell wants to live a LIE?? doesnt it matter that something really is true??!! Doesnt it matter that because these false convictions are upheld as a great virtue, and that children are taught to believe without , or despite of all evidence, this creates the very breeding grounds for extremism and literal interpretation

If you ask a moderate, he wont actually possess ANY of the Christian beliefs or values, but by repeating the mantras the "I'm a Christian" and "Being a Christian is a Good Thing" then people who actually do have Christian "values", and who actually believe the bible is no ordinary book, which again, logically leads them to thinking they should actually believe the stuff thats in there.(As opposed to what liberal moderates do) These people are given a free ride.. no beliefs challenged, you cant really go to these people and say "Ok, dude, you are now pulling your moral views out of an iron-age mythical story about an undead jew, please come back to 2007..", simply because by claiming to be a Christian, you are saying you buy into the same nonsense story, but you really dont.

God is not a moderate. Read the bible. If you have thoughts like "I dont REALLY think atheists and agnostics are going to burn in hell forever and ever", then it goes without saying: You did NOT get that idea from the bible, OK? The same can be said about almost any modern, moral statement: Free speech, womens rights, abolishing of slavery, racial equality, You name it, NONE of these have their origin in the bible, You may be able to cook up a verse or two in support of them, but its not ideas that came from that book. Period.

I'm going to paste in a post I made in another Sift today for time purposes, but it kind of touches on some of the points BRM and I have made in response to Reverend Ted. The original post was a response to someone else at http://www.videosift.com/video/This-Atheists-10-Commandments

-------------------------------
Well, actually there's all sorts of direct examples of, and rules for, slavery, selling ones daughters, racism and genocide all over the Old Testament. And the Koran, well... 72 Virgins (actually a mistranslation of 72 white grapes) are given to suicide bombers in Heaven. And yes, circumcision for both males and especially girls, is mutilation and child abuse, plain and simple.

The point of this post is exactly the point of an argument I had with a friend recently, which boils down to the concept that you cannot have a set morality without religion, which is, frankly, a load of crap. So really, if you can have it without religion and God, then what is religion and God for? Because the morality is really the only useful thing in religion, but it does a piss poor job of actually demonstrating or teaching morality itself. 2 Of the original 10 commandments are wasted on a demand to not warship any other Gods or idols, 1 on not taking His name in vain and yet another on never working on Sunday (under pain of stoning to death). How does that have anything to do with morality? That's merely subjugation to the church. Meanwhile Moses leaves a bloody trail of genocidal destruction in his wake.

The point is, if you are looking for a set of moral teachings, there really isn't any religion that does the job properly. Luckily, we as a species for the most part know that we need each other in order to get by, so we're generally good to each other. But we don't need God.
--------------------------------

So all of that getting together and forming "friendships and communities of mutual support" might be good, as BRM has said, until of course, they start bombing abortion clinics, yelling that "God hates fags" at funerals, sewing up womens genitalia to assure their virginity, killing women for the crime of being raped, killing Jews for being Jews, killing Muslims for being Muslims, killing Christians for being Christians, killing Hindus for being Hindus, killing each other for not worshiping the same God the same way! (That last one was kind of redundant since Judaism, Christianity, and Islam are all based on the same God)

why is this video worthy of respect?

reality fascists annoy me. downvote.

don't tell me i'm mentally ill, don't tell me i am sick, don't assume anything about me, you patronising, knowitall, condescending cunt.

I'm on my way to work, but I thought I'd pop a couple notes in. (Only time enough for the first part of BRM's response.)
You insinuate that all of those things cannot be done without the supervision of the clergy or God.
I didn't suggest that at all - quite the opposite, in fact - I'm simply saying that the rites and rituals themselves are perfectly valid behaviors even without God. The fact that a given religion compiles them together into a unified set of doctrines simply makes it convenient.
Regarding your response to "Prayer" - that's exactly what I'm suggesting.
And regarding "Forgiveness" - apologizing to the offended party would be part of "the right thing to do" (not suggesting that shouldn't be done, but the "Asking Forgiveness" was more geared toward the introspective aspects of self-improvement.

@ReverendTed:

It seems to me that the main theme in your arguments is something along the lines of, "Religion can lead to a good lifestyle." Now, here, I would actually agree. Used in the best way, religion can lead to a good lifestyle. Unfortunately, the problem is, A)It doesn't always and B)There are more efficient ways to achieve this.

Point A should be obvious. Any misused teachings are pretty bad. Point B is arguably more important, though. What I mean by this, is that these rites and rituals work without God. You have said this yourself. So, if they work without God, why use them with God? Isn't it better to live a life based more in 'truth'?

You say that religion compiles good behaviours for convenience. Yes, it does. The only problem is, is that there are plenty of other non-factual, no-so-good things in there too. Which leads to the question: "How do you pick and choose the good things from the Bible?" The thing is, the answer to this is almost always subjective. So really, you're just customizing your beliefs/morals/rituals from a large pool. But if you look at it this way, you may as well not use the Bible, and pick from an even larger pool, right?

So, I suppose my whole argument here has a sort of "Occam's Razor" feel to it. However, another important point is one that BicycleRepairMan brought up: Who wants to live a lie?

This is why I (And any reasonable person) should value the truth. If we constantly live in delusion, and far from reality, than it's difficult to accomplish much. This is why I think that everyone would be happier if they were free to question and examine everything around them. However, this brings up a disturbing point: Are there people who actually do want to live a lie? Who take comfort in not having to contemplate anything? This, I don't know. But if there are, it makes me wonder if they quite literally can't handle the truth, for they might find it too unstable.

Anyways, /rant for me I guess.

Honestly, despite my opinions on this particular video, this has been some of the more thoughtful discussion that I've seen on Videosift. I would love to continue the discussion with any who are interested, but I don't always have the time to check back in (I've made the effort over the last few days). I'll try to stay on top of things, but feel free to profile reply to me if you want to make sure I get a message.

He seems like a nice guy.

This is crap. I'd downvote but I don't do that.

And no, I'm not a "religious" person, or a conservative. In fact, I'm more middlin' or even left.

I think the new "aggresive atheism" or whatever you want to call it, is just as bad as religious intolerance. It's religion intolerance. It's not better, just different. You're being just as bad as those you hate. Congrats.

One of the important things to remember about Pat is that he's a comedian. You shouldn't expect him to maintain a "professional" image in his videos as you might expect from someone like Dawkins.

I happen to think Pat is great. He makes no excuses for himself. I find his material to be funny, occasionally hilarious, and he makes his audience think about some fairly important topics in the process.

I was raised Catholic. I once made the statement, partially in jest, that the good thing about Catholicism is that it creates so many Atheists. The point being that Catholicism is so oppressive and so offensive, that it's hard to imagine someone not rebelling against it. Had I been raised under a less draconian belief system, perhaps I wouldn't have been motivated to seek out my own answers.

I actually believe very much that discouraging free thought was a significant goal in the original formation of organized religion. If you can control the thoughts of a population, then you can control their actions. In the centuries that have past I believe that this control mindset has been lost in some cases, but I still see the reverberations in many religious organizations.

One of the most unfortunate parts of religious belief, in my opinion, is how it affects children before they are really old enough to question what they are being told or to have their own ideas. Even as a young child I felt it was wrong to make the decision for another person. You may say that this is not unique to religious belief and you'd be right, but again we go back to the control aspect. If I have children, I will go out of my way to encourage them to find their own answers and have their own ideas. I realize that it's unavoidable that my own beliefs will influence theirs, but I will do what I can to minimize that. Raising them as freethinkers also means that they will be free to believe whatever makes sense to them, even if it's Catholicism. I do not feel that the inverse is true.

As for the "new, aggressive atheism", yes, it does step over the line sometimes. As serious as I am in my beliefs and as much as I despise religious beliefs, I try to stay reasonable. I do not attack religious individuals, verbally or otherwise, unless they assault me first. Any lashing-out that I do partake in is usually directed towards religion as a whole and not an individual.

But religion, especially Christianity, has been on the offensive for the last 15-20 years. Atheists are "nazis", "communists", "without morals" and, of course, we shouldn't be considered citizens according to George Bush MkI. Christianity has apparently grown tired of simply oppressing its own and now seeks to oppress everyone. Some of us are tired of it.

Most traditional churches here in Australia are struggling to get a congregation together. Not a very oppressive force, to my mind. When the Jehovas Witnesses come to my door I tell them to leave, just as I do the cable network salesperson-although mildly annoying, it's hardly oppressive. If you are an atheist feeling oppressed by religious communities, you are paying far too much attention to other people's business.

If you are an atheist feeling oppressed by religious communities, you are paying far too much attention to other people's business.

I happen to live in a similar place, and I'm glad thats the case.

But, I am also a world citizen, and religion is poisoning this world, there are millions of children, who are raised and labelled a particular religion every day, and because we have stood idly by and just smiled for so long, they arent gonna stop, non-believers need to speak up, if for no other reason than to show we exists, and we are not monsters. many people who are raised [insert your religion] are never shown the alternatives, they are never encouraged to think for themselves, and sometimes even willingly deceived, just to prevent them from being "lured by the devil" etc.

We feel the need to speak up, voice our concerns, and rock the boat a little. I know I wont convert people into my world view, I just want to spark some thoughts, thats all.

I believe the entire human race will benefit from an honest quest for truth, and morality, and the only way to get there, is by understanding the world better. Things like racism, just to take an example, become meaningless, not because some holy book says it should be, but because we understand we are all mammal primates with different skin pigments living on the same cooling surface of a rock, separated by a difference in DNA so small it cant even possibly count. This knowledge allows us to assess, with confidence, that we, all humans, should be considered equals. Compare that to the time when Europeans thought all blacks lived near the edge of the flat earth, and that somehow this pigment deviation meant all the difference in the world..

People who say science has nothing to do with morals or values, could not be more wrong. What we know about the world, directly affects our attitude towards it.

Jesus never saw the world map. Think about that for 2 seconds.

LOL - nice. Bet the bible thumpers dig this. :-)

>> "I think the new "aggresive atheism" or whatever you want to call it, is just as bad as religious intolerance. It's religion intolerance. It's not better, just different. You're being just as bad as those you hate. Congrats"

Sorry if we're not sucking up to authority hard enough for you. Why don't we all just get along, give abstinence education a chance, accept that we have to unconditionally support Israel or Jesus won't come back, make it impossible for non-ideologues to hold public office, and generally contribute to the fucked-up status quo?

Ruffling a few feathers is obviously the real crime.

how the messages were translated into other langauges and then edited and how they've changed the meaning through subsequent editions, langauges and versions.

Quite the contrary, one of the few strong points of the current bible, particularly the New Testament gospels and letters, is that it is approximately 98% identical in meaning to the earliest available greek manuscripts which date to the late 1st century.

Whether the scripture is true or not is another question, but at least the translation of the material and the =meaning= of the words has remained nearly 100% true to the earliest texts.

callistan, you are seriously confusing "religion" with "crazy americans".

This guy is just as smarmy and condescending as Dawkins. I'd love to be an atheist, but they all seem like such smug arseholes on youtube, it's offputting, and their arguments never include answers that are important to me.

NOBODY HAS THE FINAL ANSWER. IF THEY DID, WE WOULD ALL AGREE ON IT, JUST AS WE ALL AGREED THAT THE EARTH IS ROUND AFTER SOME DUDE SAILED ROUND IT.

until you have a final answer, fuck off with your insults

You people were probably around in 1910 saying there was no such thing as quantum mechanics, seeing as Newton had so obviously proven the rational and predictable forces of gravity. God does not play dice, eh?

@MINK:

I don't think that it's wise to assume that people will always unconditionally agree on the right answer. Not only is this not always the case, but this also implies that something is only right when people do agree on it, which isn't true.

Also, your example is false. People were quite sure that the Earth was round long before the technology existed to sail around the Earth.

I think the reasons that atheists would stand up to religion, are probably as following:

1) Atheists don't see religion as deserving of the amount of power/respect that it currently has. This is because religion is A)Factually incorrect in many areas and B)Based on faith, unchanging to reason. Now, of course I understand that many religious people are not quite as described. However, many religious establishments are as described.

2)Atheists [probably, I know I do] feel that they are indeed almost certainly correct, and very, very close to a 'final answer', at least regarding the existence of God. More importantly, this claim can be backed up by proof and reason, as can be shown in any detailed argument.

I think the reason that callistan thinks that religion deserves to be challenged and criticized, is simply because everything deserves that. Why should religion be able to bypass all scientific scrutiny when science itself cannot? What gives religion that special right?

Also, I'm not sure what you mean, MINK, when you say to hold off on insults. I don't think that it's necessary to feel insulted when someone criticizes your beliefs. For, were they true, they would stand up to a criticism, no matter how strong. Just as I am not offended when someone proclaims that God exists, I expect that people will not be offended when I proclaim that he doesn't.

people couldn't deny the roundness of the world if they could sail round it. that's like a turning point in the credibility of the theory. that turning point happened a long time after other proofs but i guess unless atheists see a "round the world boat" kind of proof, they won't believe in god... so, there ya go.

and about the insult thing, i am just recommending he isn't so insulting, he might have my attention more instead of preaching negativity to the choir.

this wasn't tagged comedy. maybe i would have had a different reaction.

i don't personally believe in the god you are all attacking so i am probably classifiable as an atheist anyway... but i still get angry when science, by definition incomplete, gets cocky about its ability to explain EVERYTHING.

I could say... show me proof that science will one day explain everything, and i will stop believing in God, who i consider to be evident all around me and deep inside me.

or rather i will use the excuse that the science will get so advanced that it will resemble God, so i was kinda right all along. like even if love is just chemicals in my brain, it's still love, and it's still freaking amazing chemicals, so awesome, i would describe it as godly.

laugh if you will but you can't show me proof that science is everything, so by your own scientific standards, i consider the matter still open to experiment and questioning, and i reserve the right to defend either side if attacked.

what i find interesting is that so much of the time people really seem to talk past each other on these issues and don't always realise they aren't talking about the same things. i'm not sure if i can contribute to this conversation in a meaningful way but i would like to try. i haven't read every single post with careful eye so forgive me if i repeat too much of what has already been said, however i don't hear anyone addressing the topic that condell is incorrect on a number of points. he perhaps should look up the definition of faith again or think it through again. faith is not the suspension of disbelief or whatever he called it. perhaps some people call the suspension of reasoned faculties faith but they are not correct. faith should be well reasoned and though through very carefully. every belief a person holds should be weighed in light of evidence and there is no way around this. condell believes many things about life, himself, and the universe that he cannot prove but believes them anyway in light of his weighing of the evidence. he cannot prove he is not the only intelligent life form there is but there is good evidence this is not true. he cannot prove he is not a brain in a vat but it is not convenient to believe that and so most of us do not. everyone has basic beliefs and assumptions about life that are unavoidable. in short, we all have a "faith" and this is a plain fact. he happens to have faith in the human mind, human reasoning capability, and a whole host of other basic assumptions that no one can prove or disprove but perhaps seem likely based on experience... but in the end there is nothing that can ultimately validate those experiences... we just have to take a leap of faith at some point... everyone does it... totally unavoidable. there are some things that cannot be scientifically measured. there is a limit to science that people like dawkins can't seem to accept. science can not tells humans what is right and what is wrong. in an atheist world view there is no reason whatsoever to believe that there is anything wrong with taking an axe to condell's head yet i'm sure he believes very firmly that this would in fact be wrong. plato asked, "what is the good?" this is a good question and one that cannot be answered logically in an atheist framework because it all will boil down to opinion, power or preference. bertrand russell put forward the idea that you can understand right from wrong based on feeling. just like you determine colour with your eye so too you determine right from wrong based on feeling. this is silly but exactly the kind of nonsense the atheist is reduced to because without something outside the human system providing a moral frame work there is no foundation for morality.
practicality has nothing to do with it. what matters is what is true. someone earlier brought up the point that no matter what good things you think religion might bring you it doesn't matter if it is false. he is completely correct... and this is also true of atheism. despite what benefits one might think it could bring what matters if it is true. i find it incredible that dawkins cannot seem to understand that atheism is completely unprovable by any means. it might be valid for him to say he thinks it is more reasonable to believe atheism is true based on the evidence but ultimately that leaves in the same position as the well reasoned person of religious conviction arguing the same point from the other side.
i find it so sad that there are those who cannot seem to understand that science tells us zero about the existence or non-existence of God.
so of course religion and religious beliefs should be subject to careful evaluation for every person... and using reason, logic, philosophy and the like should all be employed... however, again, science is not the tool for that. those that think it is should reexamine the limitations of science. it is merely a tool to construct models to make predictions about the world. it cannot tell us right from wrong (in the moral sense) and it cannot tell us what is really real... what each person believes is really real is merely a leap of faith.

@nedtheundead:

You're using a different definition of faith. There isn't really a right or wrong definition. It's kind of like the scientific 'theory' and general 'theory.' The faith that Condell refers to is the faith "Belief without evidence."

"he cannot prove he is not the only intelligent life form there is but there is good evidence this is not true." - nedtheundead

This quotation from you isn't an example of faith, at least in the sense that Condell is using it in. Once there's good evidence to support it, then it's not really faith, right?

@MINK:
"I could say... show me proof that science will one day explain everything, and i will stop believing in God, who i consider to be evident all around me and deep inside me."

Almost. But science doesn't have to prove *everything*; no one is claiming that it does. It just has to prove the specifics to your statement. Also, your statement has a somewhat logical flaw with the wording that you used. To parallel, I could say:

"Show me that science can disprove elves, and then I'll stop believing in them, whom I consider to be evident all around me and deep inside me."

Clearly this is absurd. It's logically impossible to absolutely disprove something, cause it might exist somewhere, or be invisible, etc. A better wording for your claim, to make it logically sound, would be (And this fits elves and God):

"I believe the existence of [something] to be evident, so I will continue this belief until it is either directly contradicted, or the reasons for my belief are shown to be faulty."

I think this type of belief in anything is safer and more accurate than a belief that requires a (logically impossible) disproof to change into disbelief.

However, to be the safest, it's probably better to precede the 'believing' condition I made with a 'non-believing' condition:

"I won't believe that [something] exists/is true until it is directly proven, and/or the reasons for believing it are true."

Anyways, that's what I think, at least.

Ok, I hate double posting, but after re-reading nedtheundead's post, I can't not respond.

@nedtheundead:

1. Please space out posts, I almost died reading that.

2. I'm not sure you understand the atheist world view. To put it simply, there isn't one, because you can't really coordinate the lack of something. Thus, atheists must construct moral values on their own. One simply has to hope that killing someone with an axe is not found by others to be morally right.

3. Perhaps you've never taken a psychology course. The human mind is regularly and carefully studied by scientists throughout the world. These are not 'assumptions', but rather they are scientific discoveries.

4. You find it incredible that Dawkins cannot understand that atheism is unprovable. I find it incredible that you would jump to this conclusion, without considering that you may simply not understand why it may be provable. Think about it this way: Even if you believe in a God, you must realize that that makes you atheist to every other God (Zeus, FSM, etc.). Simply understand that atheists are atheist about your God for similar reasons that you are atheist about others.

5. You claim that science is not a tool of reason or logic. I simply claim, "WTF!?" If you understand anything about the scientific method, then you will realize that you are very, very wrong. I can not even begin to fathom how you would arrive at the conclusion that science does not employ reason or logic. I cannot fathom, also, how you state that science makes models and predictions about the world, without employing the use of logic and reason! How, exactly, do you think scientific research is conducted? Guesswork?

And finally, your final quotation that absolutely stuns me.

"what each person believes is really real is merely a leap of faith."

So, does this imply that if I tell you a container is filled with pure oxygen gas, rather than verify it, you'd rather 'take a leap of faith'? I have difficulty believing these words from someone who also stated:

"what matters is what is true."

I was originally just going to leave this a no-vote, but changing to down-vote because I really don't think this video deserves such promotion. As I said earlier, Condell had the chance to be the better man and be respectful, thus deserving of our respect, but instead decided to act like a child and hypocritically slam Christianity after complaining that Christianity didn't respect him.

That is not the way to get ahead in my book.

[url=http://imageshack.us][img=http://img235.imageshack.us/img235/7868/xtianjpgse7.jpg][/url]
Shot at 2007-07-27

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Shot at 2007-07-27

"im willing to give you the repect while i can keep a straight face thinking about it", "which should be about half a second".

lol !

persephone said:

If you are an atheist feeling oppressed by religious communities, you are paying far too much attention to other people's business.

in an atheist world view there is no reason whatsoever to believe that there is anything wrong with taking an axe to condell's head yet i'm sure he believes very firmly that this would in fact be wrong.

I've never heard of the JWs trying to pass laws against birthday parties or blood transfusions. They keep it "all in the family".

While this is a good thing per se, its also sad that children (Their children, but its still children) DIE because of this ridiculous dogma, and yes, there are some things that are just clearly ridiculous and should be considered a crime in some instances. If a 4 year old boy has been in a car accident, and will die if not given blood, and the parents deny the doctors to do their job, I think that should be considered murder.

This is yet another reason to speak up, and demand reason over faith.

The "Fundamentalist atheists" argument. Here is a excerpt from The God Delusion:

But my belief in evolution is not fundamentalism, and it is not faith, because I know what it would take to change my mind, and I would gladly do so if the necessary evidence were forthcoming.

It does happen. I have previously told the story of a respected elder statesman of the Zoology Department at Oxford when I was an undergraduate. For years he had passionately believed, and taught, that the Golgi Apparatus (a microscopic feature of the interior of cells) was not real: an artifact, an illusion. Every Monday afternoon it was the custom for the whole department to listen to a research talk by a visiting lecturer. One Monday, the visitor was an American cell biologist who presented completely convincing evidence that the Golgi Apparatus was real. At the end of the lecture, the old man strode to the front of the hall, shook the American by the hand and said--with passion--"My dear fellow, I wish to thank you. I have been wrong these fifteen years." We clapped our hands red. No fundamentalist would ever say that. In practice, not all scientists would. But all scientists pay lip service to it as an ideal--unlike, say, politicians who would probably condemn it as flip-flopping. The memory of the incident I have described still brings a lump to my throat.

Another point, is that when we go on with these so called "offensive" or vicious attacks at religion, such as calling God a "delusion", we really are just attacking ideas, not people. One could for instance say that anyone who still denies the Golgi Apparatus, or is an avid supporter of the now defunct theory of group selection, has fallen victim to a delusion,

Scientific theories are constantly victims of such attacks; "Thats just stupid" "Show me the evidence!" etc, infact thats why they are scientific at all, because they WITHSTAND these attacks.

but i still get angry when science, by definition incomplete, gets cocky about its ability to explain EVERYTHING.'

You keep forgetting that we supporters of the scientific method have a secret weapon, three words that we use when our current knowledge fails to explain something: WE DON'T KNOW!

Its also interesting how you use "by definition incomplete" which suggests that religion perhaps is, or atleast it claims to be "by definition complete"

If I told you the answer to it all was "42" and thats that, that would also be a complete answer, by definition, but does that make it a good one? A true one? No.

For all intents and purposes, the God hypothesis is debunked, we all know it, it doesn't stand up to even a little scrutiny, it only lives because people really wants it to live, there is real arguments left on the god-side of things, And this is probably why it needs the gigantic tripple kevlar armor we call religion and faith, so that nothing can ever be allowed to penetrate and hit god directly.. Guess that would be just unfair.

While it is technically impossible to disprove, just like the tooth fairy, I think its safe to say that its an insult to our intelligence when people are killed over which god is the right one, or how the right god likes to be pleased and worshiped, which is every single day.

There are a lot of sad things that happen to children and adults throughout the world. It is oversimplification to say that this or any other conflict is purely the result of religious dogma. The root of all evil, so to speak.

How about corrupt govts, inhumane cultural practices, racist beliefs, long histories of conflict based on land ownership disputes, cultural beliefs like you'll be cured of AIDS if you sleep with a virgin, classist views, egotistical behaviour, addictive behaviour, domestic violence?

These conflicts come from plain ol' dysfunction and man's inhumanity to man, which every single person on this planet is capable of, regardless of whether they believe in dogma or not.

Verbal abuse stemming from feelings of intellectual superiority is a form of inhumanity to man. Are you free from this one?

people just use god to fill in the blank answer they dont have, even if they say the believe in "god", often they've no idea what their god is (i.e:"i believe there's some type of force that built everything", well what the fu** is that meant to mean ?). To be honest, is there an answer ? - yes. will we understand it ? prolly not. There's more important things in life to worry about.

until someone can define what a god is, atheism makes as much sense as religion.

as BicycleRepairMan said, the answer can be 42, or 12. or whatever you want. Knowing the answer doesn't mean youll understand it.

my 2 cents

i've got a video of how religion brought people together in defiance of oppression and raised a nation's spirits enough to regain independence without a bloody war.

anyone believe it exists?

It is oversimplification to say that this or any other conflict is purely the result of religious dogma. The root of all evil, so to speak.

So, because its only responsible for like half of all the misery in this world, its wrong to point it out? Nobody is sayin every murder or crime is done in the name of, or because of religion, you are the one doing the simplification there.

I believe a single life, or twin tower, or country, taken away by religion is one to many, and there happens to be many of them. Two wrongs dont make a right. There isnt a single "good deed" out there, done or said by the religious, that could not be "justified" using secular motives alone. No superstition required. conversely, there happens to be alot of crimes out there done, and opinions held, by the religious, you would have a very hard time justifying, without having some extremely wierd opinions on how the world works.

In fact, with the mind and will of God conveniently contained in a single little black book, it is hard, if not impossible to imagine a crime so absurd or horrific that it could not be justified with the help of some obscure, self-contradicting scripture, in this way, God really does perform miracles with our minds.

i've got a video of how religion brought people together in defiance of oppression and raised a nation's spirits enough to regain independence without a bloody war.

anyone believe it exists?

Well, this is a video posting site.. And not that I dont trust you, but I've made a habit of being skeptical of the existance of things before I see any evidence.. I think thats the only reasonable position..

Does this mystery video also provide evidence that the doctrine of the religion in question is true?

>> ^BicycleRepairMan:
i've got a video of how religion brought people together in defiance of oppression and raised a nation's spirits enough to regain independence without a bloody war.
anyone believe it exists?
Well, this is a video posting site.. And not that I dont trust you, but I've made a habit of being skeptical of the existance of things before I see any evidence.. I think thats the only reasonable position..
Does this mystery video also provide evidence that the doctrine of the religion in question is true?


I figured Mink is talking about Poland.

*religion
*talks
*british

Adding video to channels (British, Religion, Talks) - requested by EDD.

*quality

Boosting this quality contribution up in the Hot Listing - declared quality by gwiz665.

Tags for this video have been changed from 'pat, condell, atheism, religion' to 'pat condell, atheism, religion, faith, respect, beatdown, impure thought' - edited by gwiz665

Boy, this brings me back...

>> ^quantumushroom:
Atheists dig their own graves being obnoxious like Condell. I'm willing to bet there hasn't been a single convert to atheism from all of the "athesifts" here.
Religion and science are both powerful forces and both are used for good and evil.
Whether you believe or not, religion is here to stay.



utter nonsense, open your mind some time.

As an atheist myself, I agree with everything the guy says. However satisfying it may be for us to hear a guy sticking it to believers, I do not think it's very useful in the grand scheme of things. Most of these videos are just preaching to the choir (if you pardon the religious metaphor ).

Atheists enjoy these videos because it reinforces their positions with better eloquence than most could manage themselves, and believers are going to get riled up and call him infidel, godless or whatever religious put-down they prefer. Calling someone an idiot or unworthy of respect is not the way to make them adhere to your point of view.

If the goal of these videos is to de-convert religious people, or to make them 'see the light' (hehe), it can only fail.

Still, I like those videos, keep 'em coming.. but lets not delude ourselves about their intended audience and the social impact they intend to have.