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Global Christianity and the Rise of the Cellphone
Hugh Pickens writes "Alan Jacobs writes in the Atlantic about Every Tribe Every Nation, an organization whose mission is to produce and disseminate Bibles in readable mobile-ready texts for hundreds of languages including Norsk, Potawatomie, Bahasa Indonesia, and Hawai'i Pidgin as the old missionary impulse is being turned towards some extremely difficult technical challenges. The Bible is a large, complicated text containing three quarters of a million words and the typesetting is quite complex because of the wide range of literature types found in scripture and the need for several types of note. 'For all the issues that are still to be solved, ETEN is trying to do things that the world's biggest tech companies haven't cracked yet, such as rendering minority languages correctly on mobile devices,' says Mark Howe. 'There's a unity among Bible translators and publishers that stands in stark contrast to the fractured, fratricidal smartphone industry.' But once these technical challenges are met, it won't be only Bibles only that people can get on their mobile devices, but whole new textual worlds."
True but at least it gives them the drive to solve a knotty problem.
The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination
- Douglas Adams
Porn and religion, both a drain on society, but leaders in advancing technology to bring content to the masses.
Well, yes. but I do not think that is actually a good thing, all things considered. For example, the crusades required a lot of drive but are among the most evil human undertakings ever.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
I wonder how short a religious text could theoretically be, while still sustainably self-replicating between hosts. (i.e. religious believers). Much of the bible is akin to junk DNA.
Bible translation is usually the one taking the big step of documenting a new language and defining a character set for it. So really, this isn't new.
Crowd: OMG 4000 dudes 7 loaves 2 fish
Jesus: Lotsa food now LOL
Crowd: WTFBBQ!
Blah. Even though there is no god, etc., the Bible is still one of the most important texts if you want to understand Western culture and philosophy. Refusing to learn about ideas because they are wrong is simply a more vain and self-glorifying form of anti-intellectualism.
"There's a unity among Bible translators and publishers that stands in stark contrast to the fractured, fratricidal smartphone industry."
Which is really and odd statement considering how many different versions their are, sure one might be able to say what 60-80% are version X, but still major fractions happen over the translations.
You have 5 Moderator Points!
Which Helpless Linux zealot/MS basher do you want to mod down today?
We all know LaTeX allows you to focus on the content and magically comes up with beautiful layouts. I mean the single best page layouts are always in the looks-the-same LaTeX format! And it's so intuitive to use!
putting a book into the local language and sending an army to kill people - quite a comparison.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
Karen Armstrong in one of her TED talks put forth an idea that all religions should concentrate on the Golden Rule - the rule that Confucius created 3,000 years ago. Compassion. Orthopraxy as opposed to orthodoxy.
We should all act like a compassionate person instead of worrying about how others believe and if they believe "correctly" - which is lost on pretty much every practitioner of the religions of Abraham: Judaism, Christianity, Islam.
As opposed to the Muslims who conquered Palestine, North Africa, Iberia, Persia, Mesopotamia and southeastern Europe?
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
How will we ever conquer those mindless savages from across the galaxy?
#naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
The intention of the project has little to do with what's in the bible (except, of course, the thing about turning all nations into Jesus' disciples). As for readability, that's your opinion, and you've already established the fact that you're anti-intellectual, and therefore by your own intent an idiot. It really isn't that challenging to read. Also, it's a compendium of various texts, not an "effort to write a book".
There's a unity among Bible translators and publishers that stands in stark contrast to the fractured, fratricidal smartphone industry.
Also, alas, in stark contrast to the fractured and occasionally literally fratricidal world of their theological paymasters.
so anything with religious motivation is bad no matter what they do?
that seems as narrow and short sighted as the other way of taking it.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
You would thing that people would be able do away with these historic and completely ridiculous ideas by now. Instead they are still stuck in the dark ages, but now with shiny new technology. Really sad.
What's sad is that Christians have something you will never have. Christians have something to look forward to. They do not fear death and instead, welcome it. They know what life is all about and never spend a moment wondering what is next or what the point is. Their only concern is how to be the best human being possible to ensure a pleasureable eternity after death. They look forward to meeting friends and family and feel their presense throughout life. Their only fear is that they may not be good enough to enter paradise so they spend their lives trying to do good things for their fellow man and being honorable, honest people throughout their life. Material possessions mean nothing more than what they can be used for to better the lives of others, although the Bible is full of stories about people who did great things with nothing.
On the other hand no matter how much money you make how successful you are in life, you will die and that will be the end of it for you. You will go through life wondering what the point of it all is and why it's all worth it. When you lose loved ones, they are gone forever and you know that you will never be able to spend time with them again. No matter how hard you work, how many possessions you acquire, or accomplishments you achieve, you will end up being a bloated, rotting carcus, just like everyone else, and nothing more. The final chapter of your life involves is about compost.
Even if Christians are wrong, so what? Sure, they'll end up as worm food just like you, but in the mean time, they achieve an inner peace that you will never know and spend their lives trying to better humanity. What's the harm in that? Even after reading an article about Christians pushing tech that will benefit everyone, all you can do is insult them.
The sad part is not only that you will never know these things, but also that you are bitter against those that do.
(Of course, I'm talking about true Christians here, not the negative stereotype you've formed in your head from that one TV preacher you saw on Sunday morning saw after an all night bender, or the horrible stories you heard the news. I'm talking about people like Tim Tebow's parents who give their lives to serve others.)
There is no "I disagree" mod for a reason. Flamebait, Troll, and Overrated are not substitutes.
Well, yes. but I do not think that is actually a good thing, all things considered. For example, the crusades required a lot of drive but are among the most evil human undertakings ever.
You mean the same Crusades where a group of people tried to regain access to the Holy Land after it was cut off? What do you think the Muslims would do if Israel cut off access to the "Dome of the Rock"? Would you blame them? When they attack Israel, would you call it "among the most evil human undertakings ever"?
From the wiki page on Crusades:
The Crusades were a series of religious expeditionary wars blessed by the Pope and the Catholic Church, with the main goal of restoring Christian access to the holy places in and near Jerusalem. The Crusades were originally launched in response to a call from the leaders of the Byzantine Empire for help to fight the expansion into Anatolia of Muslim Seljuk Turks who had cut off access to Jerusalem.
There is no "I disagree" mod for a reason. Flamebait, Troll, and Overrated are not substitutes.
Umm what? The the most evil undertaking ever? I am sorry that is complete and utter BS. There have been far more evil deeds done. I will grant you the Crusades were not very 'Christian' but they were no more evil than any other way. Also its worth pointing out that popular idea the Christian powers started it is wrong, Islam had been spread to those areas mostly by force years before, if anything the Crusades were a counter attack.
Do you think war for the cause of national security is necessarily evil?
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
the effort to bring better and more convenient communications to people everywhere, particularly in obscure languages that might otherwise die off - although we are losing languages on a regular basis.
I am saddened to hear that all this effort is being directed merely to bring a monotheistic religion like Christianity - likely the cause of more human misery than any other individual concept in history - to an ever widening audience. Its like building a tool to spread ignorance...
"The first time I got drunk, I got married. The second time I bought a chimpanzee, after that I stayed sober" Arian Seid
What a sad life you must lead if you truly believe that a man cannot find his own purpose and happiness.
The King James? The Eastern Orthodox? The Coptic? Hebrew? Syriac? Which apocrypha will be in or out? Will they charge extra for those? Get back to me on that, willya?
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
In a sense, yes. If you are logically minded, you know that from false premises, one can prove anything. Someone who is driven to do stuff for bad reasons can do good an evil.
But you have no guarantee. So in some sense, it would be better if there were no drive: that way, you needn't worry that next time, instead of typesetting, it'll be bombs.
No excuses from me; just counteracting the mass fallacy that only the Crusaders were Teh Evil and that the Muslims were a bunch of Little Miss Innocents.
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
And the Caliphate armies pushed into central France before being pushed back by Charles Martel.
Anyway, of course it justifies the Crusades. What powerful civilization doesn't try to conquer back what was taken from it?
Just don't think there was anything Christ-like about the Christians.
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
I always find this particular statement perplexing. Apparently it's the Atheists who fear death, yet it's the Christian (amongst others) who need to make up stories about an ever lasting afterlife to make themselves feel better about the fact that people die. Why would you pretend that people "live on" if you're not afraid of death?
No. Why do you believe that I would? Why do you even think that I spend any significant life pondering such philosophical questions? There is no point to life. Life just is. Now that's a concept that Christians do find scary!
Yes, and? Fairy tales about them living up in the clouds might make you feel better, but it doesn't change anything: people die.
What's sad is that Christians have something you will never have. Christians have something to look forward to. They do not fear death and instead, welcome it. They know what life is all about and never spend a moment wondering what is next or what the point is. Their only concern is how to be the best human being possible to ensure a pleasureable eternity after death. They look forward to meeting friends and family and feel their presense throughout life. Their only fear is that they may not be good enough to enter paradise so they spend their lives trying to do good things for their fellow man and being honorable, honest people throughout their life. Material possessions mean nothing more than what they can be used for to better the lives of others, although the Bible is full of stories about people who did great things with nothing.
Oh come on! That's what it says in the marketing material, but in truth most Christians do fear death. They live lives full of guilt, uncertainty and self-hatred and direct that outwardly in an effort to make everybody else feel as shitty as they do.
On the other hand no matter how much money you make how successful you are in life, you will die and that will be the end of it for you. You will go through life wondering what the point of it all is and why it's all worth it. When you lose loved ones, they are gone forever and you know that you will never be able to spend time with them again. No matter how hard you work, how many possessions you acquire, or accomplishments you achieve, you will end up being a bloated, rotting carcus, just like everyone else, and nothing more. The final chapter of your life involves is about compost.
Again, a load of evangelical crap. As an enlightened rational actor in society, you realise that your legacy is what you do with your time, so you try to make the world a better place for the next generation. Yeah, when you are die that's it, but at least you can die happy knowing you did your best, unafraid of the judgement of Gods.
Bible translators have also given us XeTeX, which is now an important part of the TeX ecosystem. And a bunch of useful (and good looking!) fonts: http://scripts.sil.org/cms/scripts/page.php?site_id=nrsi&id=FontDownloads
Their only concern is how to be the best human being possible to ensure a pleasureable eternity after death.
I've met a lot of "Christians" over they years whose only concern was being seen to be conforming to their social group's (church friends) idea of "good" (i.e. dogmatic, small-minded, selfish and ignorant) in order to be accepted by that social group, many of whom were labouring under the misapprehension that what they were doing was Christian.
You won't catch me spending eternity in the company of these people.
Stick Men
I find it ridiculous that the "scientific" or perhaps even self-proclaimed "enlightened" mindset on Christianity is that it all boils down to the crusades. It is no different than saying since Hitler or Stalin were atheists that all atheism boils down to genocide and will for all time. (I know this is a repost... didn't realize I wasn't logged in)
- it is insulting that you think (against evidence, I might add) that atheists cannot have peace of mind. After all, Buddhism is an atheist philosophy, and peace of mind is their trademark.
- It is insulting that you think people do good things just because they are afraid of the great CCTV in the sky. People do good things for their own sake.
- It is insulting that you believe one cannot have any other hope in life than the afterlife. I am a scientist, and my research will live after me, so will my memory in my friends' minds. A writer's books will survive him. And artist's works. The good you do while alive. If you need materially motivated pretexts to do good, there it is.
You should live your life to the fullest, in awe of the universe, precisely because you will return to dust and nothingness. But knowing, because of the immense privilege we have of living now, that we exist because a generation of stars formed, aged and went nova so we could exist as carbon-based lifeforms. We exist because every single one of our ancestors, for four billion years, did no fail to reproduce. We stand half-way to the death of our star, and the beings which will see it die will be as far from us that we are from the first unicellular organism.
You, on the other hand revel in bronze age mythology.
I'll spare you comments about the "no true Scotsman" fallacy you committed in your last paragraph.
You would thing that people would be able do away with these historic and completely ridiculous ideas by now. Instead they are still stuck in the dark ages, but now with shiny new technology. Really sad.
"Historic and completely ridiculous ideas", are you sure ? Do you mean that it is ridiculous to be surprised or even "enlightened" by the fact that there is something (i.e. the universe, and you, consciously speaking about the fact that you exist in a universe that exists, unexpectedly or not), instead of nothing (i.e. a situation that would have been far more probable, at least to me) ?
They do not fear death and instead, welcome it.
On the contrary, they're scared as hell (pun intended). They fear death so much that they invented heaven.
You will go through life wondering what the point of it all is
Nope, why wonder about such a question? Why should there be a point? And more importantly, why would you rather believe an invented one than accepting it's about as silly as wondering about the smell of an inch?
Even after reading an article about Christians pushing tech that will benefit everyone, all you can do is insult them.
The reason xians are being mocked and insulted here is that they're not doing it for the benefit of everyone, but to shove their propaganda down our throats.
You mean the same Crusades where a group of people tried to regain access to the Holy Land after it was cut off? What do you think the Muslims would do if Israel cut off access to the "Dome of the Rock"? Would you blame them? When they attack Israel, would you call it "among the most evil human undertakings ever"?
Shit like this is just adding weight to the argument that religion is bad. Fighting over something with mumbo-jumbo significance is crazy.
You would think that something the size of the Salvation Army would help form your opinion of a group more so than Mark in accounting.
Oh, it has. The Salvation Army shows me that Christians think it's okay to spread hate about a specific group of God-created individuals (ie., gays and women who would dare to make their own perfectly legal decisions regarding reproductive health) if you help a group of homeless people who think similarly to you (or are at least willing to go through the motions for a hot meal).
Sorry, I'm pretty sure Jesus said "Love thy neighbor," not "Love thy neighbor unless he's a fag or uses contraceptives." I'll start taking it seriously when you do.
What's sad is that Christians have something you will never have.
No, what's sad is Christians who are so deluded by their faith that they cannot imagine what life would be like without it, and so they make up stories about how horrible life must be in order to convince themselves that they made the right choice.
The truth is that I know I have to treasure what I have right now, because eventually I won't be here any more. I have to do my best to leave the world a better place than when I entered it, and I will (hopefully) live on by being fondly remembered for the impact I had on the world and people around me. I don't have to fear not being good enough to enter any "paradise" because I know that's just a fable, and I can do more than my life than spend it trying to appease some invisible omnipotent friend.
I'm not bitter at the ideal, "true" Christian who acts like you described. They sound like nice people. I'm bitter at the real kinds of Christians who actually exist -- the ones who use technology to spread their doctrine of fear and ignorance, tell nonbelievers how horrible they are, and try to use the government to enforce laws that are solely based on their ancient religious texts.
Karma: Terrifying (mostly affected by atrocities you've committed)
When all is done, they'll have made one book accessible to the tiny number of people who are literate only in these minority languages.
If instead they taught people to read a major language they'd be opened to a whole world of ideas.
As opposed to the Muslims who conquered Palestine, North Africa, Iberia, Persia, Mesopotamia and southeastern Europe?
The Muslim Empire was successful in part because they were more tolerant than the rulers they replaced. The Jews in Spain had more rights under Muslim rule than under the Visigoths.
The existence of gods is undecidable. Therefore using it to justify anything is dodgy. Note that using the non-existence of gods is just as dodgy.
You should justify your actions by some reason wholly outside the realm of theogonies. And therefore religion is useless to guide human actions.
I further claim it is harmful. Because it uses an undecidable (and unlikely) premise which is not necessarily shared by all the recipients of the actions.
Exactly - wow, another radicalised agnostic! I thought I was the only one!
You can't prove it either way. You've just got to wait until the ride stops, and see what happens.
It's entirely possible to "give [one's life] to serve others" without perpetuating a dangerous culture. The problem with even the type of Christians you cite is that after adhering to their worldview, they can't be happy with simply having it as their own meaning in life. They actively use it as a weapon against anyone they deem as "different". It's the single most convenient way to justify conflict or discrimination ever invented by man.
I'm sure you'll dismiss this charge as "not what the overall organization is about", but before you do so, I encourage you to consider that a movement is no more than the sum of its parts, regardless of its stated objectives. There's a larger percentage than you're apparently comfortable with acknowledging who would gladly trade someone else's freedom for preservation of their own moral comfort and/or superiority.
This is nothing more than self-righteous fanaticism. Anyone working to perpetuate the organization without understanding that this is what it enables and produces is dangerously naive. That includes you.
The Crusades were certainly done by organised groups of christians acting in the name of christianity.
Yes. That's why there is a difference between religion / politics (humans trying to take control over other humans, using one of the most subtle kind of manipulation) and faith / spirituality (higher-order ideas that free the human from his unnecessary lower-level problems, and allows achieving meaningfulness, enlightenment, love and peace, at least at personal level, which is a good start, I believe). Humans often tend to pervert good things (whatever the good thing is) in order to achieve domination over others.
For example, the crusades required a lot of drive but are among the most evil human undertakings ever.
You must be smoking some serious stuff. The Crusades? That amateurish, badly organized and to a significant degree self-destructive (Constantinople, 1204) movement that in 200 years managed to pull of a few years total of violent fighting (if at all) and a few conquered cities (many of them just bought off rather then won by siege)?
After learning a bit about crusades, I came to the conclusion that the only dark spot in the crusading movement was the sack of Jerusalem with the concomitant bloodshed; the rest of the crusading event being little more than a farce.
Now, had you mentioned the Muslim conquest of India, that would have been a different thing. With a single expedition, Mahmoud of Ghazni enclaved half a million Indians, leaving tens of thousands dead. That was just a single incident during the centuries of the conflict at the western borders of India. As far as I know, the total death toll during the 1400 years of Muslims attacking Hindus from the west is not far from reaching the insane mark of 100,000,000 deaths. And you talk about the Crusades? Wow. Just...wow.
"Among the most evil undertakings?" No, not even close. Regarding the number of lives destroyed, the crusades pale in comparison even when compared to such seemingly mundane things as car accidents caused by drunks, lenient subprime mortgage policies and IRS tax forms.
Ezekiel 23:20
Hello Godwin.
Or more like a belief in a slightly different superstition. You can spot the people who really believe in atheism and want to evangelise it as much as possible.
No, atheism isn't a a belief, it's the lack of one. And atheists who spend time trying to convince others are few and far between. Most are just not concerned with what others believe at all. Of all the atheists I know, and that's quite a lot, I'm the one most likely to join in an argument about it. But that's more that I like an argument. There are no group meetings. There's nothing to join.
Those with religion like to imagine atheism is just another religion. I'm not sure whether it's a desire to drag everyone down to their own level, or because they habitually make tenuous connections, and something ending in "ism" sounds like it might be a religion.
Here's a great way to troll atheists - get them to try to prove that Richard Dawkins exists.
You've never trolled an atheist with that in your life. It doesn't even start to have the makings of a workable troll theme.
The problems come when some Christians decide that the 'souls' of people are more important then their 'worldly' well being. And it strangely very rarely applies to their own personal well being.
For example the Church in my country is very active in collecting donations from the faithful. After every mass a person will go among the people with a collection plate, while the priest preaches about the importance of charity or something similar. Many poor people, that can barely survive on what they have still give money, since NOT giving is seen as a sin (at least by the priests). Meanwhile the Church has enough money that their leaders live in castles and mansions.
Another example is Africa and AIDS. There is nothing wrong with preaching abstinence. What is wrong is preaching that condoms are wrong, even in cases where one person is infected. But why bother with people's health? If they die, they'll go to heaven. Why try to make their earthly lives better or longer?
But I prefer to call myself an atheist. Because I lead my life as though no gods existed, as opposed to leading my life as though they might exist. So from the point of view of an external observer, I am not affected by the existence of gods, and therefore I am not and indication of their existence, nor of belief in their existence.
The idea is that to me, something exists if it is observed to have an effect on the universe. Since the effects beliefs in deities cannot be observed from my actions, I am, for the observer, an atheist. Does it make sense?
Humans are nothing more than a species of animal. Many animals are territorial, and those that are fight their own species for those territories. And those that are also social, fight together for their territories.
This isn't anything to do with a tendency for humans to pervert anything. It's just a behaviour strategy that's brought success to particular genes in DNA.
Nation states, racial differences, religion and sports, provide the human species with groups to identify with in order to pursue these instinctive territorial battles.
I've read Slashdot for a few years now, and every once in a while I see articles posted that directly or indirectly refer to Christianity. And every single time, it ends up being a sounding board for the Slashdot "community" to boast about how proudly atheistic they are and criticize the few Christians Slashdotters that give their point of view. I'm a devout Christian, and I can't quite fully express how saddened I am to see some of these comments. For someone to mock my faith, a faith that I've seen work miracles in people's lives and help them go from a place of pain and destruction to a place of life and peace, is something that literally makes me shake with sadness. Were the Crusades not very Christian-like at times? You betcha. Modern Christians don't condone many of the acts that were committed "in the name of" Christianity hundreds of years ago. If you see anyone killing someone else in the name of Christ, they're not true Christ-followers. So do NOT lump us all together. It's like blaming the existence of nuclear weapons on every physicist that ever lived. It's not a fair accusation. (I know somebody's going to comment on that statement and bash it somehow - so go right ahead, prove to yourself that you're not reading this comment for your own benefit, but rather just to find ways to knock down a Christian). Secondly, some of you have made comments about how the Bible doesn't apply to modern day or that it's too cryptic for us (or even its original authors) to understand. Is this difficult to understand? "Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." (Matthew 6:34) Does this next verse have no applicability to the present day? "Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor, doing honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone in need." (Ephesians 4:28) Or just read the book of Proverbs (which is even in the Old Testament) and you'll find a slew of practical advice for living a better, more fulfilling life. Sure, a lot of the Bible is a historical record of the Jewish and Christian people living in the Middle East for a period of a few thousand years, and not every law in Leviticus applies to us today. But the Bible isn't a story, it's a living history, and real churches are not museums for the saints, but hospitals for the sick. Before you make comments on the Bible, make sure you've read it; you don't lend youself much credibility by scoffing at it without having actually explored it. I wasn't always a Christian, and I explored other religious texts before settling on the Bible. The conclusion I came to was that it offers something that no other 'religion' offered. Rather than having to 'change' before we can become 'right' with God, we become right with God (through simply asking for it) and letting God's love change us. Have you ever felt that life is more than just about technology, physics, inventions, etc? Don't you ever get tired of reading news articles every day about the current size of transistors, Apple's patent wars, or funding for space programs? I sure do. If that's all that life is about, then that's pretty scary. I have to believe that life is about helping people in a real and tangible way, TODAY; building up others in our community who aren't as fortunate as us, and not just speculating about how we can make cooler stuff out of silicon. Seriously - many of us live in cities where people are outside, homeless, starving, and dying every day, and yet you feel comfortable sitting back with your $4.50 Lattes and criticizing Christianity, the single largest organization today that is trying to help the real problems of real people at this very minute. If that's the kind of community that Slashdot is, then I'm done. I'd rather go make a difference in this world than read about occasionally interesting tech news.
From what I've seen I'd say the unity among Bible translators is probably similar to that among scientists. There aren't a lot of people who are qualified to do a first-rate job of it, and they're very intelligent, and thus they tend to realize that they don't always have all the answers.
Now, unity among denominations and churches is an entirely different matter. It takes a far different skillset to get people to pay to listen to you go on for an hour about whatever you're feeling concerned about. The people in power here tend to be much more political and ideological, and they tend not to be so humble about the limits of their knowledge (if they were humble they wouldn't sound so convincing behind a pulplit and people wouldn't pay to listen to them).
Of course, some of this depends on what you call a Bible translation. Anybody can grab their denomination's favorite existing English translation and modernize the words or do a literal translation into another language they happen to know, and thus the general sense of academic liberalism doesn't apply. By translation I am referring more to creating a rendition of the text of the Bible that conveys in the best way possible the intended meaning of the original authors. That requires strong knowledge of the original languages, good historical context, good language skills in the target language, and strong skills in textual criticism (trying to figure out what the original authors wrote in the first place, translations aside).
I've never been approached by Christians pushing religion, but I encounter anti-thiests pushing bigotry and anti-religion on a weekly basis on the internet (between facebook and this/other sites).
If you are from the USA, you are heavily sheltered. They come to my house. They bother my children in public. They infest the local schools. If you haven't had SOMEONE pushing Christianity on you, then you are either a Christian who is already in the club, or you are part of a vanishingly small group of people.
All that is necessary for the triumph of good is that evil men do nothing.
"Of course, I'm talking about true Christians here,"
The only true christians are the fundementals as they follow the bible to the letter and don't try to spin out the "shit". The "true christians you want are the ones that are on their way to being secular as they've dismissed the bad stuff of the old testament
"The hands that help are better far than lips that pray." - Robert Ingersoll (1833-1899)
What do you think the Muslims would do if Israel cut off access to the "Dome of the Rock"? Would you blame them? When they attack Israel, would you call it "among the most evil human undertakings ever"?
Yes, I'd blame them. That's a perfect example of the harmful influence of religion. If it weren't for ridiculous superstitions that scrap of desert would be as worthless as any other scrap of desert. If you're willing to kill people because of ancient mythology, then absolutely I'm willing to call it evil. Most evil ever? Depends on the scale of the atrocity.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
The crusades were in their own way an example of the "good" in Christianity. A thousand years prior, Roman culture would have just plundered the Middle East for mercantilist gain, and felt no real need for an excuse. Christians felt like they needed an excuse, because Latin Christianity in the person of St. Augustine had stated very clear rules for when a Christian could morally participate in a war (the so-called "Just War Theory") and "plunder" wasn't on the list. Also, you seem to be proceeding on the assumption that Islam posed no real threat to Europe, and that a "flanking campaign" was illegitimate. The reality, if you go back and read the writings of people like Bernard of Clairvaux, is that they (a) felt that by attacking the Byzantines, the Muslims had attacked them (b) were acutely conscious of the fact that Byzantium might fall and that they would then have no buffer from the Saracens and (c) they were scared to death of Muslim aggression because Muslims had already conquered chunks of formerly "Christian" territory (i.e. Spain.)
The whole crusades as a criticism of Christianity thing simply doesn't hold up to much scrutiny, but that doesn't stop devotees by proxy of Bertrand Russell from repeating it to the point of nausea. What I wish such people would do is actually learn some real history and stop flapping their gums until they do.
Sources: Ph.D. in New Testament and early Christianity, active interest in subsequent church history.
"He who would learn astronomy, and other recondite arts, let him go elsewhere. " -- John Calvin, commenting on Genesis 1
Well, anti-thiests, those that believe there is no god, not those that don't have a belief that there is a god
That's atheism and agnosticism. Atheism isn't short for anti-theism. "a" as a prefix means without. So atheism is "without a belief in god(s)", not "opposed to the belief in gods".
The distinction between atheists and agnostics is very fine. The atheist says "I have no belief in the flying spaghetti monster" and the agnostic says "it's not possible to now for certain whether there is a flying spaghetti monster". Both think people who run their lives based on a belief that there is a flying spaghetti monster are pretty stupid. Either may also be actively opposed to flying spaghetti monsterism because of the bad effect it has on society, but that's not implied in either of the terms "atheist' or "agnostic".
I've never been approached by Christians pushing religion
Where do you live? Have you never passed a church with an evangelical poster outside it?
Are you a Christian? If so how did that come about? The most common method is parents pushing it on their children, indoctrination usually starting in the first few days of life with a "baptism" ceremony, claiming the person for christianity before the person is even able to think for themselves.
Very often its pushed in schools, on TV, on the radio. Atheism doesn't tend to have schools or TV channels and radio stations and programs. (Perhaps there's the odd exception to prove the rule.)
Superstition kills and maims opposing cultures. It's quite a weapon.
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."
"Don't do unto others as you would not have them do unto you."
"Help people find their way" vs. "Just leave people alone to find their own way" is a gigantic tar-baby of a philosophical discussion all by itself.
I was raised in a Catholic household, and went to Catholic school growing up, so I know the comfort and sense of community that religion can bring, it can be a powerful and spiritual feeling. That being said, if you look into the history of Christianity, it is extremely hard to accept that there is anything 'divine' or 'real' about it. The creation myths are rooted in Abrahamic tradition, the Holy days (Easter, Christmas) are rooted in pagan traditions... Jesus wasn't even considered a deity until 300 years after his death at the council of Nicaea.
I agree with you that Religion can bring a serious sense of comfort to people, I have witnessed my devoutly religious Irish family members get through the death of a loved one with remarkable strength, because they actually believe that their loved ones are floating in heaven with the angels. Although this comfort is nice in a way, it is firmly rooted in delusion, and that's where the problem lies.
If some group of people have wacky believes, but those believes give those people comfort and they're not hurting anyone, then I can't really object... I believe they should have the freedom to believe what they want. Now when your cult (Christianity) is so big that it actually does hurt other people, with outdated ideas about contraception, homosexuals, morality etc, then I do have a problem with it. Christian theology DOES influence non-Christians, whether you'd like to admit that or not.
So to you, and other religious folks out there... please feel free to believe whatever you want, but please respect that many of us see your beliefs as man-made delusion, and want no part of it influencing our laws or way of life in any way. As a former Christian, what worries me most about religious people is the break down in critical thinking and acceptance of "faith" with no proof. Religion doesn't teach you to think, it teaches you to follow... it always has and always will.
Yes, for its time the Kingdom of Granada was a success. Arts and sciences were encouraged, the status of women was relatively high (a Jewish prayer book with feminine pronouns was discovered there some years ago), and the Muslim rulers tolerated (rather than encouraged) other religions. But I suggest it was a relatively small beacon of light in a dark world, more like Switzerland than part of an empire.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
So if you take the false premise that God does not exist, you can prove anything?
Bear in mind that the theists are just as strong in their beliefs as the atheists, but neither can prove their belief either way and must rely on faith.
The idea that atheists have some sort of "faith" or "belief" that there is no God is a divide by zero function.
What is that with so many fundamentalists? A lack of belief in something does not mean belief in something. Who gets down on their knees every day and prays to "no god" that they profess to not believe in? Who builds a house of worship where people go to have a ceremony every week to something that they believe that they don't believe in?
Imagine someone standing on a street corner, handing out pamphlets that say that there is no God. So they convince someone that there isn't. So the convertor now asks the convert to pray with him.......... to what?
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
To know where a lot of western civilization ideas come from? To compare and challenge what a lot of "christian" preachers and politicians claim that it says? A lot of the junk conservative politicians tell "christian" masses in the US would go nowhere if those same masses had good understanding of the Bible. There's lot of interesting stuff in there. In the book of Samuel, you can find a passage where a nation which had laws, judges and teachers (and a God), gets tired of it and wants something more fun; they go like "oh the nations around us have powerful kings, it would be so cool to have one", and they get told "look, if you get a king, he will take your sons and daughters as servants for himself, he will send them to fight useless wars, etc..." And the nation tells the prophet "whatever, we want a king". A few pages later things get awry for them. There's lot of stuff like that, politics, ideology, morality, economics... And just like the above example, a lot of stuff to confront "manifest destiny" "it's God will that we rule by the sword" politics.
Atheism in a nutshell.
Thanks.
I'll spare you comments about the "no true Scotsman" fallacy you committed in your last paragraph.
Scotsman: Someone from Scotland.
Christian: Someone who follows Jesus, or closer to the original ethymology, a little Christ.
So there's no fallacy there. Being a christian is not being part of a club or being born in a christian family or something like that. Just like being a pacifist. You wouldnt claim that saying that someone who carpet bombs people is not a true pacifist is a "no true Scotsman" fallacy. Same deal here.
You talk like to blind person stating that since the colour red cannot be seen, it has no meaning.
You can demonstrate to a blind person that a certain wavelength of light, measurable by scientific equipment, can be filtered and that it has different effects upon both manmade and biological sensors. Thus even a blind person can understand and verify the existence of the color red, even if they may not understand the ramifications of how it is perceived by others.
Going back to Kung fu-tse would be a step backwards, one that the neocons like - which is why they claim to support "compassionate Conservatism" and oppose what they call "socialism", which involves the New Testament demand to love your neighbour.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
Quick comment. If it wasn't for the Protestant Christian missionary zeal for having people "read the bible", we wouldn't have the literacy rates that we maintain today. Hawaii went from a land without a written language to a literacy rate of 80% in 40 years after the missionaries devised(literacy in either newly created Hawaiin or English). Literacy is a valuable skill for any society that is being exported at an exponential rate by people for FREE because of their religious beliefs. This isn't just handing out some loaves of bread to starving people, rather it is a dramatic and rapid modernization of a country.
I used to be an Atheist who maintained that religion was misguided. I am still an Atheist, but I don't discourage religion anymore. I would suggest a book like "The Evolution of God" to explain my viewpoint. Basically, religion has always existed and will probably always exist. It is a corollary of the existence of society, and it constantly evolves. Just like anything that 'evolves', it isn't always 'good'. Sometimes the result is downright evil(Jihadists).
Anyway, while I can fully understand your desire to dismiss these missionaries as misguided idiots...I wish you would remember that some very bright people have been religious. It isn't a case of them being uneducated or of a lower mental acuity than you. Their religion stumbles forward and sometimes does some great good, and at other times some great evil. It is just a component of the existence of society, like technology. Industrialization was wonderful, but it also destroyed the environment. People who hold the Industrial Revolution as "purely evil" are just as misguided as those who hold these religious missionaries as people who have "historic and completely ridiculous ideas".
If the Christian who believes in God and tries to live a moral life acting in kindness towards his neighbours is wrong, when he dies he finds he goes nowhere after death but has lived a good moral life while here on earth.
And if he's spent a large proportion of his life trying to convert people? Or if he's lived a less moral life due to his religion, for example by participating in a holy war, or by helping spread AIDS by preaching against the use of condoms in Africa?
If the atheist is wrong, though he may have lived a moral life, he will still have to stand before God and explain his unbelief.
And this belief is entirely possible to justify rationally. If God does exist and is not capable of being swayed by rational argument, then you're fucked anyway. If God doesn't exist, then it doesn't matter. If God does exist and is rational, then he will accept that atheism is a rational position. You act as if the only two choices Christianity and atheism. This is the flaw in Pascal's wager. There are at more than two religions that say that you will go to some form of hell if you don't belong to them. Each one has exactly the same amount of verifiable evidence for them (i.e. none). If one is true and you believe the wrong one, you go to hell. If one is true and you don't believe either, you still go to hell. You maybe gain slightly on the odds, but some religions (including the abrahamic religions) regard worshiping a false god as being worse than worshiping no god, so even that's a bit of a stretch.
If a Christian dies and discovers that the Valkyries come to take dead people off to feast with Odin, do you really think that the fact that he believed in an omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient deity will be something the Valkyrie will care about?
As for proof... look around at nature. Can you honestly believe it was all an accident? A random chance due to some atoms rattling around until they got in the right order?
The only kind of person who can't believe this is someone who has absolutely no concept of how big the universe is and how long it took. It took billions of years for life to form on this planet. This galaxy contains about 300 billion stars, of which several billion (extrapolating from our current observations) are likely to have planets sufficiently like ours that conditions similar to those where life arose here will occur. There are about 170 billion galaxies in the observable universe (probably more outside of this sphere), and it's entirely possible that there are other universes. Do you really think it unlikely that given about 10 billion years on around a quintillion stars, it is unlikely for complex life to evolve even once? Keep in mind the anthropic principle (in summary, emergent life will always observe its surroundings to be suitable for life because otherwise life would not have emerged). If there is a 0.000000000000000001 probability of life like ours (i.e. DNA based) emerging on a planet like ours somewhere in the universe each year, then you'd expect it to be happening on a very regular basis.
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Wrong. That would be nihilism. You will not find many nihilists, they tend to suicide early on. However, thanks for bringing it up, what you just said is the BIG LIE perpetrated by religion, namely that without it there is nothing. As an atheist, let me assure you that is far from the truth. Ethics are still something that requires a lot of contemplation. Joy of life is to be had. Goals can be set and reached and insights can be gained. Actually, being an atheist is a bit like being a believer, but with less limits and without some stupid fairy-tales to self-indoctrinate yourself with.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
No, a "Christian" is one who self-identifies as believing in Christ. They typically also claim to follow sets of (selected) teachings. But there is no test of behaviour other than belief in Christ to be Christian. Therefore, claiming a Christian which is also a violent arsehole is not a real Christian is committing the "no true Scotsman" fallacy.
If anyone not following all precepts of their faith is not of their faith, let me tell you this: there are no believers.
Yes, but to an atheist, you can show him a mainliner opium addict being cured of his addiction, but it makes no difference. You can show him a person who was cured of one leg being shorter than another, but he remains blind. You can show him a person who was healed of rage, but the atheist denies it.
It takes faith to be an atheist.
My father was an agnostic physicist, until one of his friends' leg was cured (2nd case above), and the wife of another departmental physicist was healed of MS paralysis. After that, he had to pick between "agnostic" and "agnostic, but believes). He documented everything, but in the end became "agnostic but believes." After 50-odd years of mostly being agnostic-atheist, he's now a Christian, praise God. We'd been praying for him.
His atheist friends ignored it.
That's the difference between an atheist and an agnostic. For the atheist, it is an article of faith that there must be no other god, for the atheist himself wants to be that god, and in the end, all that denies him is a threat to his existence.
That is, until perchance he recognizes that fact, repents his illogical stance, and realizes that there *is* a God, and comes to know that God.
Thank you, I actually think I'd prefer the dark ages to a Nazi prison, a Hutu-Tutsi extermination campaign, a UN-enforced peace with all the weapons reduction on one side, Leninist/Stalinist communist rule, and whatever our own atheists want to force us into here and now, today.
Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
Rape, are you sure? Read again. They were banned of any sexual relations with the people that was there.
Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man. - Numbers 31:17-18
Unless you think the taking virgin slaves for concubines is somehow consensual sex, then, yes, that's rape.
And does it says that anyone can claim to have heard God? It doesn't set any tests to any so called "prophet"? Nor penalties? And does Jesus and his disciples leave *any* room for anyone to do such a thing ever again?
I have no clue what you are talking about here. Please clarify.
It's true that you don't need to read what someone claims is source material for their ideas in order to accept or reject them, but you do need to if you are to engage in intelligent discussion. I don't think there's much of a chance for democracies without that.
I concede the point, if it is put this way: when faced with a monolithic, religious cultural force like Christianity, it is prudent to know their source books in order to attack them more successfully.
All that is necessary for the triumph of good is that evil men do nothing.
As a person that can read Biblical Greek, I would say less than 1%. The 400-year-old English is more likely to get in your way than the translation.
Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
Unless you think the taking virgin slaves for concubines is somehow consensual sex, then, yes, that's rape.
(altough people choosing who they marry is something historically uncommon). good point.
And does it says that anyone can claim to have heard God? It doesn't set any tests to any so called "prophet"? Nor penalties? And does Jesus and his disciples leave *any* room for anyone to do such a thing ever again?
I have no clue what you are talking about here. Please clarify.
It means that the Bible does establish tests for anyone claiming to be a prophet and bringing "new word of God" . Tests such as "does 100% of what he predicts become true", "does he glorify God" etc... and the penalty in OT times was stoning. (Yeah, Harold Camping had it good, if he had lived at 1000 bc he would have been more careful with his "end of the world next week" junk). In new testament times (present) there is no room for "new revelation". All the important stuff to be revealed before the second coming is revealed, and what we dont know, well too bad. The new testament establishes what Christians are to do, and how we are to do it. We are told to carry the word of His kingdom to the last reaches of the earth. But we are told how to do it and how not to do it. "for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh ", "love thy enemies", "love thy neighbor", and all that. There's no room for shortcuts like "well, if we support bombing this or that country that could pave the road for this or that" nor anything like that.
I concede the point, if it is put this way: when faced with a monolithic, religious cultural force like Christianity, it is prudent to know their source books in order to attack them more successfully.
Monolithic? Really? The diversity of ideas and thoughts in Christianity is huge. Right wing, left wing (really really left wing, like liberation theology), hierarchical structures, democratic structures, anarchic structures, etc...
If God would have wanted that speakers of Potawotomie, Norwegian, Indonesian or Hawaiian Pidgin, He would have used their languages. The message of the Bible is reserved to speakers of Ancient Hebrew, Aramaic and some parts are for Koine Greek speakers.
The rest of you are not invited. Party crashers!
__
Men with no respect for life must never be allowed to control the ultimate instruments of death.
GW Bu
But it matters now.
Singularity: a belief in the "God" idea with the "demiurge" relation inverted.
Apart from the fact that you've confused nihilism with atheism, you've also managed to confuse "life" with "being alive".
There is no purpose to you or I being here. None at all. No higher being doing it for a reason. No reason at all. Biologically, life just is. Why do you find that so scary?
Yes, but to an atheist, you can show him a mainliner opium addict being cured of his addiction, but it makes no difference. You can show him a person who was cured of one leg being shorter than another, but he remains blind. You can show him a person who was healed of rage, but the atheist denies it.
Maybe you misunderstand my example. I showed that even a blind person can perceive a wavelength of light using equipment, and observe effects of that wavelength of light, experimenting to perceive differences of that wavelength from others.
What you've mentioned is observing results, which one can tie through experimentation, perhaps, to belief, but not to that actual existence of any god. Can you, through experimentation show that belief in a particular god (as opposed to one of many religions) has positive effects? Can you demonstrate that the god of that religion exists? Can you show scientifically that the effects are derived from the god through hypothesis and experimentation?
It takes faith to be an atheist.
Not really. The null hypothesis cannot be proved. A scientist or logical person does not just believe everything by default. Do you believe there are tiny goblins in your ears that hide if anyone looks? Do you not believe that because you have faith, or do you have another reason?
That's the difference between an atheist and an agnostic. For the atheist, it is an article of faith that there must be no other god, for the atheist himself wants to be that god, and in the end, all that denies him is a threat to his existence.
I could just as easily redefine a christian as, "someone who has an article of faith that not only is there a god, but his name is 'Jeebus' and he will give us dinosaurs some day". Thus you are not a christian. If you insist on redefining generic words it is impossible to have a rational discourse. An atheist is a person who has no belief in a god. That is all.
Until someone documents scientific evidence of a god, belief in a god is not rational. That's fine and we all believe irrational things, but don't deceive yourself about it or try to paint others with a desperate equivocation. And before you try to cite anecdotes as evidence, I mean real, scientific experimentation that would disprove the hypothesis, and is repeatable and stands up to methodological and logical scrutiny. Please apply some logical rigor here.
It is when the "bad things" are in response to a Muslim invasion.
The Muslims conquered most of the Xian world including the religion's most important holy sites.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
So what you're advocating is that we live like hypocrite cowards in case the Christian god actually exists and is a shitty little bully how condemns good people just because they didn't believe in him?
Fuck that shit.
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Umm, no.
Every reformed addict has something that stops them using. Ain't it ain't no evil sky goblin.
They stop because they want to (or sometimes because they're forced to). What the hell does any God have to do with it? I don't require faith to believe that God didn't do it, I actually have faith in humanity and science to cure illness, to save trapped people, to help them recover after being trapped in the wilderness, to have search and rescue squads.
If anything, God causes cancer in people, causes car crashes and fires and flood. Then it's up to us, the human race, to try and help others. We've got this nasty, sadistic, foul bastard of a God inflicting cruelty on us all. Thank g.. uh, us, for the science and progress to minimise his inhuman destruction. I hate your nasty God.
But what about the Fourth Crusade when the Byzantines themselves were attacked and Constantinople - the richest city in Christendom - was sacked, looted and raped by the western Crusaders? It was so awful, shameful and painful that 800 years later Pope John Paul II thought it necessary to apologize for it. There was nothing "good" about that one.
As opposed to the Muslims who conquered Palestine, North Africa, Iberia, Persia, Mesopotamia and southeastern Europe?
The Muslim Empire was successful in part because they were more tolerant than the rulers they replaced. The Jews in Spain had more rights under Muslim rule than under the Visigoths.
Spain was the exception to the rule, and the fabled tolerance there has been exaggerated. Tolerance as a conquered people is a relative thing.. Islamic armies rather ruthlessly killed off competing faiths and languages wherever they went. Do you think the reason North Africa is Arabic-speaking and Muslim today is because the Caliphate said "pretty-please"? North Africa was a center of Christian thought and culture for centuries... St. Thomas Aquinas was North African, and most of North Africa spoke Coptic or Berber... before the followers of Mohammad moved in. With the exception of the Indian Ocean-Western Pacific Muslim civilizations (such as present day Malaysia), virtually everywhere Islam spread it did so by the sword. The South Asian Muslims were the only large groups that actually converted voluntarily, because of cultural contacts via trade routes from Arab merchants. Turkey, southeastern Europe, Central Asia, and North Africa were all conquered.
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
Every piece of evidence implies god does not exist - so therefore he doesn't.
Name one such piece of evidence ? One.
Right, they really wanted to go and defend Byzantium. That's why during the First Crusade, the crusaders first action was to massacre the Jews in Germany. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Crusade#Attacks_on_Jews_in_the_Rhineland.
No, he admitted that the point to his life (all of ours, really) is to contribute to the propagation of his species. Why is that so hard for you to accept?
Why does there even need to be a point? Am I allowed to decide my own purpose rather than having one forced on me?
Karma: Terrifying (mostly affected by atrocities you've committed)