Comment

Comment by Ben Anderson on December 16, 2012 at 3:35pm

I like what everyone is saying here, but talking on the phone to my mother last night about this topic she raised a vital point. She thinks in the end that the Judao Theists will just say that most of the bible may not be true and they just use it as a guide for their morals. This is a very clever way of getting around a lot of the questions that are raised by smart people. Dogmatic shape shifting moral superiors.......

Comment by Sentient Biped on December 11, 2012 at 12:08pm

Ted, what you love to imagine would be a great future indeed.

Comment by Ted Foureagles on December 11, 2012 at 10:01am

Dogmatic pseudo-philosophies (right now, primarily the Abrahamic religions) necessarily evolve into a "god of the gaps" as knowledge increases.  In such a situation they are like a powerful animal cornered that naturally falls back on its main strength.  And that, at this particular moment in human history, seems to be coercion by brute force rather than reasoned argument.  In that way and by some standards they can be said to be regressing.  By other standards they might be seen as returning to "original" principals.  If science and reason keep pushing them into a continually narrowing corner, well then those are the things to attack.

I love to imagine (without much corroborating evidence) that in a few generations our species will look back on our condition as we do that of the European dark ages -- as ruled by bloody tribes obsessed with superstition and bound by ignorance.  It could well go the other way if the cornered animal succeeds in striking out in desperation as when Islam effectively turned back on itself and crippled its nascent move toward rationalism.

 

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Comment by Alan Perlman on December 10, 2012 at 8:53pm

Why does religion persist? - a question every atheist must struggle with.  Suggested answers: (1) parents get first shot at programming kids; (2) orthodox of all faiths have high birth rates; (3) MUCH more money is behind religion in the US (vast array of religious TV channels); (4) while there can be no official state religion, the US govt. is not prohobited from acting AS IF there were a state religion, which it does.  Until there's a critical mass of openly secular politicians, nothing will change.

Comment by Ben Anderson on December 9, 2012 at 5:18pm

I find it funny how the religious scriptures are the only piece of evidence and faith based material that Christianity has, and that they have been written and re-written many times and manipulated to satisfy many different religious figures and as you said Future........it is now locked in not to be changed....

Comment by Future on December 9, 2012 at 10:50am

With respect to Christianity, the various religion labels under it's umbrella are stifled from meaningful change because of the ridiculous claim of infallibility of the doctrine they all share. The religions whose basic doctrine is the Bible really screwed the pooch with the claims of infallibility, omniscience, omnipotence, eternal, omnipresence, etc. These lofty precepts leave little wiggle room for explanations when science and logic advance human intellect, and will eventually lead to a full collapse of these religions.

It is pretty funny how that claim of Biblical infallibility is so outrageously inaccurate when it's history is studied. It was formed by committee, with each piece copied who knows how many times by scribes who would shamelessly alter the original to meet their desires. A committee of men voted on what to include in the canon over several generations, and what to not include. Bart Ehrman and others have discovered that there are more errors, omissions and additions when compared to the oldest known original versions of scripture in their untranslated foreign counterparts than there are words in the Bible. All of that alteration occurred prior to the advent of the printing press, word processor, Internet, etc. Now these religions are fucked, because the script is set in stone, with no possibility of changing it to make it more compatible with the times. I found this YouTube clip of Joe the Plumber to be an interesting example on just how gullible the modern day Christian is. In it, Joe lays praise on the solid and unchanging nature of the original word of God.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrFKl9Da0jw&feature=youtube_gdat...

Comment by Loren Miller on December 9, 2012 at 9:38am

To one degree or another, religion has styled itself as absolute, the truth complete within itself and neither needing nor desirous of change.  Yet, as the others here have observed, it HAS changed, I suspect less because it wanted to than because it HAD to, because the realities which arose out of man's growth, learning, and development made a lie of the supposedly adamantine assertions made by assorted representatives of assorted churches.  When one considers that the vast majority of assertions and dogma which religions base themselves on have NO foundation in verifiable fact, that these supposedly immovable objects DO eventually move is not surprising, any more than it's surprising that they fight against the agents which ultimately move them.

When religions no longer represent themselves as absolute, I suspect they will no longer be religions.

Comment by Sentient Biped on December 9, 2012 at 8:59am

Certainly progress has changed the human experience.  To different extents, in different places.  Same for religion.

The demagogues around the world haven't changed their lust for power, and their willingly  led throngs haven't changed a lot either.  I don't know what will happen with that.

There are luddites and reactionaries everywhere, in religion as well as technology.  Part of the human fear of change, especially when not everyone benefits from change, and some are hurt by it.

I think there is a rocky road ahead for many.  And better life for many, too.

Comment by James Kz on December 9, 2012 at 8:34am

Little of that technology and science has penetrated this part of Nebraska. (No button pushing to cook - we turn knobs. Our streets are dirt. We have no cellular service, and our telephones still have dials. We only got emergency 911 calling last year.)

You must live in a first world part of the country. :)

Has religion evolved? That depends on what you mean by evolved. Christianity is certainly not the same critter it was in the II Century, or the Middle Ages, or the Protestant Reformation, or XIX Dominionism. So, if evolution is defined as adaption to a changing environment, then yes it has evolved.

That is not to say it keeps up with science. Or that its morality or dogma is any better than it used to be.