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Scott Adams Suggests Bill Gates For President
gerrysteele writes to point out a recent post to the Dilbert blog, in which Scott Adams discusses the atheist ascendancy in America and rationalizes the need for an atheist leader. From the article: "Ask a deeply religious Christian if he'd rather live next to a bearded Muslim that may or may not be plotting a terror attack, or an atheist that may or may not show him how to set up a wireless network in his house. On the scale of prejudice, atheists don't seem so bad lately. I think that in an election cycle or two you will see an atheist business leader emerge as a legitimate candidate for president. And his name will be Bill Gates."
On the child molestor odds:
Have you heard the stories about some Catholic priests? Or the activities of some cults? Or Michael Jackson? Hardly a scientific study, but arguably in the public mind child abuse is more likely with those who have a strong belief (however bizarre in Jackson's case...).
Irrespective of whether Adams is right or not:
Suggesting that the US electorate is more willing to vote for an atheist than a member of a religion that is (however unfairly) associated with the current war in Iraq, 9/11, etc, seems to me an entirely reasonable thing to suggest.
Why is suggesting an atheist president so stupid? Have I missed something? It seems to me Adams is simply hopeful that there might be a president who bases his decisions on facts and thinking, rather than an unaccountable belief system within a framework no one can quite agree on anyway. And again, it seems a reasonable proposition for a debate that the electorate might go for a well respected (outside of the tech community!), successful, famously philanthropic atheist before a Muslim, even if it is only for all the wrong reasons.
What does religion have anything to do with setting up a wireless network?!
I am a Christian. I work with a Muslim and a Hindu. Any of the three of us will help you set up your wireless network. None of us are planning on blowing anything up, save maybe lightbulbs in our microwave ovens.
The masses are the crack whores of religion.
Good luck with that. There is no such thing as news that is not biased. If you think you know of any, then it just proves that they are either good at hiding their bias, or they happen to have precisely the same bias you already have.
I think this says far more about the lack of morality of the person making this statement than it does about the morality of athiests - they are obviously only held in check by their fear of divine retribution and are incredulous that anybody who is not so constrained would act in a moral manner because they themselves wouldn't if they thought they could get away with it.
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That aside, in my opinion, the atheist moral issue is more of a concern because it allows the scope of human stupidity larger reign. Regardless of whether a person thinks there is a God or not, there is a certain amount of respect to be paid to moral laws that are 8-10K years old. Humanity has learned certain lessons in the past and we need to heed those lessons. Example, even my atheist friends agree, If humanity would be more careful with its sexuality, (be more picky with partners, or abstain to a bonding relationship), we would be able to make STDs a very manageable problem. Many major religions have included abstinence in their moral law.
Now from a Theological standpoint, a Christian should not fear breaking the law because God will smite them. The proper fear comes from the human consequences. Eat Pork in 1500BC and you will have issues, weave different kinds of thread, you will have issues, or the bigger laws, Covet and you will pay $5K for a PS3.
The advantage that a Theistic group has, is it can enforce moral law without explaining it all. But if you delve into each Law it usually has a good, nontheistic, reason for it. The whole Wrath of God idea, just makes it easy to enforce. Whereas an atheist has to rely on his/her own discipline to maintain a moral law. Good luck controlling mass stupidity that way :)
CS: It is all sink or swim...oh and did I mention there are sharks in that water?
Considering that I've been told by more than one Christian (true story here) that atheists do not have the capacity for morality
I've heard that one too. Always really creeped me out.
Why? Because you can infer from that statement that the only reason they are moral is because they believe there is an invisible man watching their every move who will drop them in a boiling lake of sulfur if they misbehave. So the other side of that coin is that they would be completely amoral if The Big Guy wasn't watching them. If religion suddenly went away today, first thing these people would do is go berserk and give in to their every urge - since there would be no reason not to.
Maybe religion isn't such a bad idea after all.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
A person who followed Biblical laws to the letter (i.e. kill your disobedient children, kill homosexuals, kill nonbelievers, etc) would be headed straight for prison in a modern, secular society.
Funny. Even when Israel was an independant state, the Talmudic death penalty was rarely enforced. And as soon as Jesus of Nazareth started saying "Let he who is without sin cast the first stone", well, the modern sense of compassion and mercy became law.
(And I'd be interested to hear your quotes for any one of those things, btw -- I'm pretty sure that you had be worse than "abomination" to merit the death penalty, and that's all that homosexuality was classified as. No worse than a menstrating woman going to temple.)
How many of the Ten Commandments are actually laws in any modern society? Two, maybe three? God is only 25% correct?
Taking the Roman Catholic Version:
1: "Thou shalt have no other gods before Me." Democratic socieites prohibit the enforcement of a state religion, meaning that Christians are not forced to have any other gods. Plus, there are still several American communities where not going to church will get you ostracised.
2: "Do not take the name of the Lord in vain." Nope, no legal effect.
3: "Observe the sabbath and keep it holy": I just had a weekend, as did some 80% of my countrymen. Those of us who worked on that day chose to work it, and their employers have a legally-mandated fiscal incentive to give them at least one day in seven off.
4: "Honor thy father and thy mother": Elder law requires us to take care of our parents, either directly or through paying taxes. And parents have standing to file an array of cases relating to their children and grandchildren that ordinary folk have to fight tooth and nail for.
5: Murder. (Yep, all kinds of laws against that.)
6: No Adultury (It's a crime in NY, and either a crime or a cause for divorce elsewhere.)
7: Do not steal (Yep.)
8: Do not bear false witness (ever hear of perjury? Libel?)
9: "Do not covet your neighbor's wife" -- actually, more than a few states still have laws against interfering with someone's marriage.
10: Don't covet anything else (nope, no legal effect.)
So, on a modest view, 8/10 commandments are still legally enforced at least somewhere in America. If you want to be more strict, 6/10 are core principles of a modern democratic society. And either way you splice it, the other 2 or 4 are seen as "very good ideas."