Why don't you believe?

I always felt great need to believe and it was this strong need to do so that put my reason on guard, unwilling to substitute with wishful thinking what rather happens to be an incomprehensible reality.

 

Is anyone here NOT the same person?

 

Got any magic beans to sell me?

And I'm not talking about Mexican magicians either.

 

You never know.

 

The religious impulse at work!

 

True, I don't. However, I personally don't believe that religion is the thing preventing people from being considerate of others. So I don't believe that removing it would make much difference.

 

I meant being religious can take up a lot of peoples time
(going to church for several hours, being taught it at bible class, praying five times a day etc etc etc.)
Some religions it is almost an hourly consideration to what you can and can't do.
It is sometimes too self-involving.
Removing religion would then free up peoples time.

 

Yeah, but then they could get into more trouble! Without religion, think of the amount of free time I'd have on my hands, and what I might get into!

 

If you are a good person...good things.
If you are a bad person...well, you'll not have a religion to blame your bad deeds on.

 

Ahhhh... To play Xbox, you mean? Yes, I guess that would be a good thing.

 

Does anyone benefit in this situation, apart from the religion that he's distanced from?

 

As long as you play with somebody else.

It obviously depends what the bad deed was.
If it was murder...then the family wouldn't have to listen to a pile of BS.
I'm sure that would be a huge benefit.

 

Compared to, say, the murder not happening in the first place, it doesn't seem that huge.

 

Nobody can prevent all murder.
But, personally, If someone close to me had been murdered, and some one was blaming religion for "making them do it"...I'd feel no "closure".
I'd feel it was an excuse.

 

Do you not think that, in the absence of religion, the scoundrels of the world would find something else to blame their behaviour on?

Assuming, of course, that religion DOESN'T make people murder.

 

One crux at a time.

Well it doesn't. But if it did it wouldn't because it wouldn't be there to blame. Mmmm, yes, that is logical I think.

 

I suggest an alternative - just accept that these things will exist and concentrate on punishing those who use them to do shitty things.

Well, to be honest, I've never been clear on how religion disappears in such a way that it wouldn't immediately reappear, for all the same reasons that it appeared in the first place and continued to reappear over and over again afterwards.

 

I don't want an alternative.

I'm wishful thinking here.

I take it you are a religious person?

 

I know you don't. But you may change your mind when your "crux" shows up further down the list.

Regardless of the practicalities that might be involved in "getting rid" of religion, people should be able to believe what they want, and fuck it, they should be able to form silly little groups around those beliefs if they want. If people in those groups commit crimes, they should be punished for doing it. Could I give a rat's arse if someone kills me because God told them to? Would it be somehow more acceptable to me or to my family if they had to admit they actually just did it for a laugh, or because they were bored, or because they wanted my mobile phone, or whatever? Would it bollocks!

Point being, any religion is just one ideology. All ideologies are based on some assertion of the unprovable. Sometimes it's "common sense" - all men are created equal, e.g. - but it's still unprovable and in some cases it's very much disprovable. Really, getting rid of one and saying "we'll worry about the others later" is nonsensical. There's as many ideologies as there are grains of sand, and one of them, my dear Watson, is one that says "ideologies are bad and should be got rid of so that peace will happen". Again, unprovable, but seen by many as worth pursuing either to see if it's right, or to insist that it's right.

My proposal is, let these ideologies exist (because they will anyway) and never let them be a defense against any kind of crime.

No, not at all. Wasn't baptised, raised by a lapsed/small-C catholic and an atheist, grew up and realised that I wasn't as utterly convinced of both the non-existence of God as other atheists.

Basically I can't reconcile the absence of belief in a god with the willingness to bend over for just about any other ideology that offers to give you a lot of easy answers just because they lack an obvious supernatural component. In what I tentatively call a rational state of mind, I see smart people raising smart people, stupid people raising stupid people, assholes raising assholes, and ideologies, religious or otherwise, being used to reinforce that. If we're just looking for someone to blame for murder, religion is standing in a pool of blood. If we care about prevention, we might want to do some forensics.

 

Do you mean that I have or may have a "crux."
I would perhaps use as an excuse? I guess so.

Well, perhaps it is of miniscule benefit as far as getting rid of religion so it was not used as an excuse.

It would probably be a lot more honest.
It's a personal thing though...I don't want it to be used as an excuse.
The problem is, some people would be using religion to help them understand the crime.
So they would perhaps understand the person might have done it because of some religious reason.
Perhaps the devil told them to do it!
It would only be of benefit to a few people like myself.

My initial point was about saving time...lets remember that.