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Thread: Religion should be systematically, peacefully, and totally eradicated over the next 100 years (commentary) [Copperknickers II vs. Sicknero]

  1. #21
    Copperknickers II's Avatar quaeri, si sapis
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    Default Re: Religion should be systematically, peacefully, and totally eradicated over the next 100 years (commentary) [Copperknickers II vs. Sicknero]

    Quote Originally Posted by RubiconDecision View Post
    In philosophy or debate one must define a term. Your definition of religion is invalid. All religion is not X.
    I've defined the term several times. I don't know if you've noticed that I have posted my argument in the main thread. This is supposed to be a commentary on that afterall. It makes very clear my definition of the term.

    Some would argue that some forms of Buddhism are atheistic and hence you'd actually be disallowing atheists who happen to practice that form of spirituality from their beliefs. What??? Why would you do so?
    Its still a religion. It is still a spiritual philosophy with organised institutions, precepts and texts which are at odds with scientific knowledge.

    By your definition Religion i.e. All of it is more intolerant than atheism and this cannot ever be proven as true.

    If you're going to make generalizations I cannot see how you can debate successfully.
    I was only responding to a generalisation: that anything that inhibits or impairs people's freedom of religion is automatically intolerant. I believe that taking away for good the ability to abuse the influence given by religious institutions and organised religious systems is the greater good, i.e. it prevents more harm than it causes.

    Your argument seems to be that because I am attacking freedom of religion, I am a bigot. That is not true. The definition of being a bigot is viewing people with hatred or fear for no logical reason other than their membership of a particular viewpoint. That whole idea is based on the fact that tolerance and freedom are paramount. Well, I don't think they are, and I have already demonstrated that you don't either, as you agree that is is right to suppress certain organisations and viewpoints if their actions can be shown to produce harm to society, such as Neo-Nazis, Drug cartels, etc.

    The comparison between religion and drugs is a good one: most people who take drugs are perfectly normal people. Most of them cause no harm to the rest of society. However, the basis of the drug trade is that most drug takers think it is acceptable to transport illegal drugs which they know fund other more serious crime into the country. There is nothing morally wrong with the act of using illegal drugs. What is wrong, is that by your purchase of them, you are buying into the wider drug world which legitimises and facilitates things that are harmful. The solution is easy: allow people to cultivate and use drugs on a small scale, but cut off the head of the illegal cartels which supply them. That way, the harm is neutralised, yet people can still carry on with small scale personal use. The war on extremist fundamentalists is the same as the drug war: we can continue using our ineffective legal system to remove them when they get violent, or we can just sweep away the entire system of religion which protects them, and leave them naked and exposed for what the are.
    Like any analogy, its not perfect, but the point stands.

    original challenege is enormously broad. If I can demonstrate one sect of one religion is not intolerant, or if I can demonstrate that one person who believes in one sect of one religion is tolerant than if defeats your analysis.
    See above: no it doesn't. Demonstrating that most marijuana smokers and cocaine snorters are normal teens and young adults who are otherwise perfectly law abiding doesn't exuse the harms of their dealers and organised mafias that supply them. Because marijuana smokers and cocaine users are the reason that drug cartels exist.

    If a religious group is not breaking the law, then by what authority would a community abolish its practices?
    If a majority of lawmakers were to agree with my argument, then there would be a mandate for the law to change. The law is only what the majority think it should be.

    You do realize that despite any negative connotations to religious organizations, they do perform necessary charitable roles within communities, and as such those roles will then have to be either neglected or done by the state.
    Why can't they just carry on doing them for purely charitable reasons rather than religious ones?

    Since the adherants of a belief system are within a community since they are welcomed and tolerated by it, they generate tax revenues for that community. Abolish their belief system or disallow them to exist within a community, and they'll relocate to another community that does tolerate them. As a huge majority of people belong to religious institutions, you'd cripple many communities' ability to function.
    This is an international forum, so the field of discussion for this motion is the entire world. There would be nowhere to hide. Besides, religious institutions collapse on a regular basis: the Christian institutions in the Roman empire were abolished by the emperor Julian, and then the Pagan ones were abolished by the emperor Justinian, and communities weren't crippled. They just reorganised along different lines.
    A new mobile phone tower went up in a town in the USA, and the local newspaper asked a number of people what they thought of it. Some said they noticed their cellphone reception was better. Some said they noticed the tower was affecting their health.

    A local administrator was asked to comment. He nodded sagely, and said simply: "Wow. And think about how much more pronounced these effects will be once the tower is actually operational."

  2. #22

    Default Re: Religion should be systematically, peacefully, and totally eradicated over the next 100 years (commentary) [Copperknickers II vs. Sicknero]

    This is the commentary so I'll give some commentary: your posts are poppycock. They are ill-formed unachievable ideas that cannot be enforced or even are wanted. They are not debatable as they are so badly misshappen as not to be a debate. They are intolerant since you presume that you have some insight into what others should do since "religion" is the problem. Oh brother.

    You may think that those who affiliate themselves with a religion are analgous to drug addicts. It's an old idea. Karl Marx sure though so. So what? And then what happens? So if people don't want to change, then they should be forced to change by a government because despite not breaking the law it offends your sensibilities? Not the government after all, which in the USA is a republic and empowered by the people, but YOU. That sounds like a monarchy. That sounds like you are the arbiter of not only your community but the world. What kind of reason is being demonstrated by that kind of post? It sure isn't making me see your point one whit.

    I take that back, it's not a monarchy it's pure despotism.

  3. #23
    Nesimî's Avatar Protector Domesticus
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    Default Re: Religion should be systematically, peacefully, and totally eradicated over the next 100 years (commentary) [Copperknickers II vs. Sicknero]

    What happens when religion does not comply?
    shum

  4. #24
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    Default Re: Religion should be systematically, peacefully, and totally eradicated over the next 100 years (commentary) [Copperknickers II vs. Sicknero]

    Quote Originally Posted by Copperknickers II View Post
    A minor part of religion? They are the whole reason that religions exist.
    If you could prove that we'd have a discussion. Until then it's just someone grinding an axe over politics infused with theology. We all agree that religion should be separated from the state. What you seem to want is far worse, for the state to interfere with religion.

    Name one religion that exists without an institution. Even shamanic tribal religions have priests. Religion without an institution is just a philosophical ideology. Religion is inherently political, and is very much intended to be. As I said in the main thread, I admit we can't eradicate the idea of spirituality and personal belief, but we can eradicate religion as understood in a meaninful sense. Which is convenient, because that meaningful sense (i.e. of an organised institution) is where the majority of the harms come from.
    Institutions of religious nature evolve from peoples' beliefs, not the other way around.

    I see. So if it does bad things, its a political institution and not a religious one?
    When it engages in political action it is a political entity. It doesn't matter if it's good or bad.

    Although you have stumbled across the main problem of religion: religion is whatever its followers want it to be, whether they want it to be charitable and benevolent, or cruel and militant.
    What does that fact change about human nature? Nothing.

    My view is that we can have charitable and benevolent organisations without religion, indeed it would greatly improve their work because they wouldn't have to constantly disassociate themselves from other believers of their religion.
    What are you talking about, I've volunteered for plenty of religious charities and there was never a problem. We have secular charities and they can join in too, also they can have religious charities which we can join in too. This is not a problem, by and large. There is a problem (I understand) that there are some extremist charities who only help those of their religion, and that is truly despicable, but you'll find these organisations are small, disreputable and more often than not corrupt. The problem of their selective "charity" is just a symptom of something more than their superficial religion.

    You cannot compare freeing people from religion to making people slaves, in fact they are polar opposites.
    It is forcing people to comply to your personal wishes, both. You're not proposing to freeing people from religion, you're proposing to control minds.

    It is not an extreme ideology to believe that organised religion should not exist,
    Eh, yeah it is.
    The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are so certain of themselves, but wiser people are full of doubts.
    -Betrand Russell

  5. #25

    Default Re: Religion should be systematically, peacefully, and totally eradicated over the next 100 years (commentary) [Copperknickers II vs. Sicknero]

    A real debate about a narrow field of inquiry and commentary can be an illuminating thing. One hopes that's the goal instead of the same tired arguments and jabs. No one is arguing that religious institutions haven't committed heinous acts in history. No one is arguing that there shouldn't be a clear seperation of church and state. No one is saying that atheists (I prefer rationalists) have ideas and insight that could make for better communities. Your challenge is WAY TOO BROAD, dude.

  6. #26
    Copperknickers II's Avatar quaeri, si sapis
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    Default Re: Religion should be systematically, peacefully, and totally eradicated over the next 100 years (commentary) [Copperknickers II vs. Sicknero]

    Quote Originally Posted by RubiconDecision View Post
    This is the commentary so I'll give some commentary: your posts are poppycock. They are ill-formed unachievable ideas that cannot be enforced or even are wanted.
    None of that is relevent. This is a theoretical debate, it isn't actually going to happen.

    They are intolerant since you presume that you have some insight into what others should do.
    So does everybody in every debate ever, in a hypothetical situation. You're doing it right now yourself: what gives you the right to say what people should or shouldn't do, when I don't have said right?

    You may think that those who affiliate themselves with a religion are analgous to drug addicts. It's an old idea. Karl Marx sure though so.
    That is NOT what I was saying. Where did I use the word 'addicts' pray tell? Please do not put words into my mouth.

    So what? And then what happens? So if people don't want to change, then they should be forced to change by a government because despite not breaking the law it offends your sensibilities?
    Where exactly do you think law comes from? Do you think it arrived on UFOs from Venus? This debate has nothing to do with what the law currently is, it is about changing the law. Debates happen in parliament every week about things politicians think are wrong that are not against the law, in fact that's the whole purpose of legislatory debate: to change the law according to what is right and wrong in the light of new evidence/more powerful persuasion.

    Not the government after all, which in the USA is a republic and empowered by the people, but YOU. That sounds like a monarchy. That sounds like you are the arbiter of not only your community but the world.
    OK. I am now leaving this thread, and will return if and when you have read the Wikipedia article entitled 'parliament'. When you have done so, this discussion can continue. Until then, I refuse to talk to someone who holds the belief that putting forward an opinion automatically makes you into some kind of autocratic tyrant, a position based on about 10 separate logical leaps into the realm of hypotheticality, each of them more far fetched than the last, most of them missing from your argument, and all of them beyond my comprehension.

    Quote Originally Posted by Himster View Post
    We all agree that religion should be separated from the state. What you seem to want is far worse, for the state to interfere with religion.
    What is it that makes religion so sacrosanct (etymological pun not intended)? The state freely interferes with political institutions, with social matters, with business, so why not with religion?

    Institutions of religious nature evolve from peoples' beliefs, not the other way around.
    Originally, yes, but most major religions are governed by centralised institutions that dictate matters of policy and belief.

    What are you talking about, I've volunteered for plenty of religious charities and there was never a problem. We have secular charities and they can join in too, also they can have religious charities which we can join in too.
    That misses the main point of my argument: religion is not necessary for charity, as most charitable organisations are non-religious, and the lack of religion would have no effect on charity.

    It is forcing people to comply to your personal wishes, both. You're not proposing to freeing people from religion, you're proposing to control minds.
    In what way? I'm freeing people from having their minds controlled. At most, I'm subsituting one method of control for another, more preferable and tolerant, method.
    A new mobile phone tower went up in a town in the USA, and the local newspaper asked a number of people what they thought of it. Some said they noticed their cellphone reception was better. Some said they noticed the tower was affecting their health.

    A local administrator was asked to comment. He nodded sagely, and said simply: "Wow. And think about how much more pronounced these effects will be once the tower is actually operational."

  7. #27

    Default Re: Religion should be systematically, peacefully, and totally eradicated over the next 100 years (commentary) [Copperknickers II vs. Sicknero]

    Your position of eradication is a completely extremist position. Despotic is precisely the manner of imposing will on the majority based upon the decisions of one person. Those who posed eradication of practically anything in history have been among the worst abusers of the political process, and in ways that defy reason. No thank you. Your position will never be supported by good critical thinkers as a desirable outcome that could be effected through intellectual discourse.

  8. #28
    Copperknickers II's Avatar quaeri, si sapis
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    Default Re: Religion should be systematically, peacefully, and totally eradicated over the next 100 years (commentary) [Copperknickers II vs. Sicknero]

    Quote Originally Posted by RubiconDecision View Post
    Your position of eradication is a completely extremist position. Despotic is precisely the manner of imposing will on the majority based upon the decisions of one person. Those who posed eradication of practically anything in history have been among the worst abusers of the political process, and in ways that defy reason. No thank you. Your position will never be supported by good critical thinkers as a desirable outcome that could be effected through intellectual discourse.
    You still haven't read it have you. I can only assume you are trolling, because its impossible that you could be accusing someone of being a despot for arguing a motion. That is how government works: somebody proposes a motion, and others debate it, and then a decision is made by vote. Is David Cameron a despot? Barack Obama? Both of them have fought for beliefs they themselves held that the majority of people disagreed with. Look at Obamacare: Obama proposed an idea he wanted to enforce in legislation that had huge opposition. Eventually, through concessions and work, he convinced enough people to support it. Please tell me: how, in your head, does democratic government work? How do laws get decided on, if not by debates on motions like this?

    And incidentally, my position is supported by far better than you or I: Professor Richard Dawkins, leading Communist thinkers like Lenin and Marx, Professor Steven Pinker, Bertrand Russell. Are they all insane extremists as well?
    A new mobile phone tower went up in a town in the USA, and the local newspaper asked a number of people what they thought of it. Some said they noticed their cellphone reception was better. Some said they noticed the tower was affecting their health.

    A local administrator was asked to comment. He nodded sagely, and said simply: "Wow. And think about how much more pronounced these effects will be once the tower is actually operational."

  9. #29

    Default Re: Religion should be systematically, peacefully, and totally eradicated over the next 100 years (commentary) [Copperknickers II vs. Sicknero]

    Quote Originally Posted by Copperknickers II View Post

    And incidentally, my position is supported by far better than you or I: Professor Richard Dawkins, leading Communist thinkers like Lenin and Marx, Professor Steven Pinker, Bertrand Russell. Are they all extremists as well?
    Yes. Richard Dawkins is a biologist, whose ideas on the abolition of religion have no inherent merit because it's not his speciality, and Marxist-Leninists are generally seen as extremists. I don't think Marx supported the forceful abolition of religion, he thought it would naturally be abolished by communism due to there being no need for it, not sure though.
    You still haven't read it have you. I can only assume you are trolling, because its impossible that you could be accusing someone of being a despot for arguing a motion. That is how government works: somebody proposes a motion, and others debate it, and then a decision is made by vote. Is David Cameron a despot? Barack Obama? Both of them have fought for beliefs they themselves held that the majority of people disagreed with. Look at Obamacare: Obama proposed an idea he wanted to enforce in legislation that had huge opposition. Eventually, through concessions and work, he convinced enough people to support it. Please tell me: how, in your head, does democratic government work? How do laws get decided on, if not by debates on motions like this?
    Democracy is rule of the majority, not tyranny of the majority. People have rights and democratic governments have constitutions to prevent tyranny of the majority. There are things the majority cannot abolish in our current democratic states, like freedom of speech and freedom of religion. Abolishing religion would essentially take away some of those rights for religious people and set a dangerous precedent. Democracy is not despotic, unless it treads on the rights of the minority and people in general. Abolition of religion would tread on those rights and therefore would be despotic.
    Last edited by NotYetRegistered; March 01, 2014 at 06:05 AM.
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  10. #30

    Default Re: Religion should be systematically, peacefully, and totally eradicated over the next 100 years (commentary) [Copperknickers II vs. Sicknero]

    Quote Originally Posted by Copperknickers II View Post
    You still haven't read it have you. I can only assume you are trolling, because its impossible that you could be accusing someone of being a despot for arguing a motion. That is how government works: somebody proposes a motion, and others debate it, and then a decision is made by vote. Is David Cameron a despot? Barack Obama? Both of them have fought for beliefs they themselves held that the majority of people disagreed with. Look at Obamacare: Obama proposed an idea he wanted to enforce in legislation that had huge opposition. Eventually, through concessions and work, he convinced enough people to support it. Please tell me: how, in your head, does democratic government work? How do laws get decided on, if not by debates on motions like this?

    And incidentally, my position is supported by far better than you or I: Professor Richard Dawkins, leading Communist thinkers like Lenin and Marx, Professor Steven Pinker, Bertrand Russell. Are they all insane extremists as well?
    So much for leaving, alas it is short-lived. But then leaving would be rather strange since you brought up this whole mishapped excuse for a debate.
    Quote Originally Posted by NotYetRegistered View Post
    Yes. Richard Dawkins is a biologist, whose ideas on the abolition of religion have no inherent merit because it's not his speciality, and Marxist-Leninists are generally seen as extremists. I don't think Marx supported the forceful abolition of religion, he thought it would naturally be abolished by communism due to there being no need for it, not sure though.Democracy is rule of the majority, not tyranny of the majority. People have rights and democratic governments have constitutions to prevent tyranny of the majority. There are things the majority cannot abolish in our current democratic states, like freedom of speech and freedom of religion. Abolishing religion would essentially take away some of those rights for religious people and set a dangerous precedent. Democracy is not despotic, unless it treads on the rights of the minority and people in general. Abolition of religion would tread on those rights and therefore would be despotic.
    Kudos. I can't say it better than this.

    In the republic I live in, as well as the republics around the world, the power comes from the People and is lent to the government. So here the government could not and should not ever be talking about the eradication of the inner thoughts and beliefs of the citizenry...especially when those ideas are not unlawful. It would be a huge abuse of the power of the legislature to make laws, for the executive to carry out the law, and to the judiciary to ensure the constitutionality of the law in ways that meddled with the foundation of natural rights. It is the basis of our entire system of government in the USA, and what's more it evolved from natural rights philosophers from the UK. I would think you would know this.

    The People decide their fate, not politicians. Not only that, but natural law gives us certain rights by God, even if you don't believe in God, and hence they cannot ever be taken away. Freedom of religion or choosing not to believe is one of those rights.

    "We have solved, by fair experiment, the great and interesting question whether freedom of religion is compatible with order in government and obedience to the laws. And we have experienced the quiet as well as the comfort which results from leaving every one to profess freely and openly those principles of religion which are the inductions of his own reason and the serious convictions of his own inquiries." --Thomas Jefferson: Reply to Virginia Baptists, 1808. ME 16:320

    "The constitutional freedom of religion [is] the most inalienable and sacred of all human rights." --Thomas Jefferson: Virginia Board of Visitors Minutes, 1819. ME 19:416
    "Among the most inestimable of our blessings, also, is that... of liberty to worship our Creator in the way we think most agreeable to His will; a liberty deemed in other countries incompatible with good government and yet proved by our experience to be its best support." --Thomas Jefferson: Reply to John Thomas et al., 1807. ME 16:291
    "In our early struggles for liberty, religious freedom could not fail to become a primary object." --Thomas Jefferson to Baltimore Baptists, 1808. ME 16:317
    "Religion, as well as reason, confirms the soundness of those principles on which our government has been founded and its rights asserted." --Thomas Jefferson to P. H. Wendover, 1815. ME 14:283
    http://famguardian.org/Subjects/Poli...n/jeff1650.htm

    One can choose not to believe. One can petition the legislature to revoke tax abatements on religious groups. One can attempt to prove the illegality of some form of worship, but good luck doing that. Over and over the judiciary has ruled in favor of the freedom of religion, and even if that failed, then the right to free expression or free speech would preclude the eradication of religion. What's more such a rule of eradication of religion would break the natural right of the people to freely assemble. It would break the basic human right of owning property, for all of these institutions of worship own property as well.
    Last edited by RubiconDecision; March 01, 2014 at 07:46 AM. Reason: formatting to the same font size

  11. #31
    Copperknickers II's Avatar quaeri, si sapis
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    Default Re: Religion should be systematically, peacefully, and totally eradicated over the next 100 years (commentary) [Copperknickers II vs. Sicknero]

    Quote Originally Posted by NotYetRegistered View Post
    Yes. Richard Dawkins is a biologist, whose ideas on the abolition of religion have no inherent merit because it's not his speciality,
    Not his speciality? He has spent the past ten years campaigning against religion, and he was Oxford's Professor for Public Understanding of Science. Nobody in the world is better qualified to address the issue of religion in a scientific society.

    Democracy is rule of the majority, not tyranny of the majority. People have rights and democratic governments have constitutions to prevent tyranny of the majority. There are things the majority cannot abolish in our current democratic states, like freedom of speech and freedom of religion.
    They very much can, and they do. Freedom of speech does not exist in America or in the UK: whenever it clashes with national security and the maintenance of the rule of law and an ordered society, it is suppressed. Why do you think schools in the UK are not allowed to teach religion on par with evolution. Yes, abolition of religion is a more extreme step, but looking into a future where most people in Northern Europe will no longer be practicing followers of any religion, I can see my motion having full democratic support, with only a few extremist nutters disagreeing. In 100 years time, the abolition of religion will be no more extreme an idea than the abolition of the monarchy or the creation of a devolved English parliament, because nobody will care about the traditions of the past any more.
    A new mobile phone tower went up in a town in the USA, and the local newspaper asked a number of people what they thought of it. Some said they noticed their cellphone reception was better. Some said they noticed the tower was affecting their health.

    A local administrator was asked to comment. He nodded sagely, and said simply: "Wow. And think about how much more pronounced these effects will be once the tower is actually operational."

  12. #32

    Default Re: Religion should be systematically, peacefully, and totally eradicated over the next 100 years (commentary) [Copperknickers II vs. Sicknero]

    Yeah who cares that the abolition of religion would also mean breaking fundamental natural rights. Screw em because the abolition of religion would be so much better than those pesky rights which interfere with your plans. What pure facism, and even I who have criticized others who enable terrorists or even pedophiles to speak publicly about their belief system would never entirely forbid them to speak at all. If you're an avowed atheist who wishes for the dissolution of all religious institutions, I would think that the public expression of various forms of spirituality would result in the public realizing the falseness of them. That you'd desire to expose religious practices so they could see the true benefits of atheism.

    The opposite is true. How many new adherents to Islam are there? How many former Christians have flirted with Buddhism?

    If you abolish religious institutions do you really think they'll go away? Christianity flourishes in places where it is banned.

    How'd you like to be the law enforcement officer arresting those publicly practicing religion? What a noble human being that would be that would serve the Law but utterly fail the Law at the most basic level there is.

    Your ideas are nauseating because there is no benefit to thought police.

    Your ideas are truly doublespeak, for while you pretend that this is some how an enlightened way of thinking, in actually is the least enlightened idea I've ever heard on the forums. Enlightenment is about an individual coming to new ideas based upon reason and not force.
    Last edited by RubiconDecision; March 02, 2014 at 06:29 AM.

  13. #33

    Default Re: Religion should be systematically, peacefully, and totally eradicated over the next 100 years (commentary) [Copperknickers II vs. Sicknero]

    Not his speciality? He has spent the past ten years campaigning against religion, and he was Oxford's Professor for Public Understanding of Science. Nobody in the world is better qualified to address the issue of religion in a scientific society.
    Still doesn't make him a specialist on the abolishment of religion. Honestly only historians or sociologists could make a good proper judgement about that.

    They very much can, and they do. Freedom of speech does not exist in America or in the UK: whenever it clashes with national security and the maintenance of the rule of law and an ordered society, it is suppressed.
    Well obviously for it to be surpressed means it has to exist in the first place. They can temporarily surpress these rights for the common good but they cannot abolish them. The very first amendment of the US constitution guarantees free speech and the UK signed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which also guarantees it.

    Why do you think schools in the UK are not allowed to teach religion on par with evolution.
    Because it's not factual. The purpose of schools is not for people to espouse their beliefs but to teach facts.

    Yes, abolition of religion is a more extreme step, but looking into a future where most people in Northern Europe will no longer be practicing followers of any religion, I can see my motion having full democratic support, with only a few extremist nutters disagreeing.
    No, not really. You would essentially have to destroy the modern western constitutions and the rights of citizens, as we know it and impose thoughtcrime.

    In 100 years time, the abolition of religion will be no more extreme an idea than the abolition of the monarchy or the creation of a devolved English parliament, because nobody will care about the traditions of the past any more.
    Yes, it will be. This is fundamentally about destroying people's rights.
    Last edited by NotYetRegistered; March 02, 2014 at 10:36 AM.
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  14. #34

    Default Re: Religion should be systematically, peacefully, and totally eradicated over the next 100 years (commentary) [Copperknickers II vs. Sicknero]

    Don't confuse him with reason and rational debate. Apparently radical absolutely extreme atheism trumps natural rights. It's more important than anything. Wait, isn't that kind of thinking a perverse form of religion? If so, it must be eradicated.

  15. #35
    Copperknickers II's Avatar quaeri, si sapis
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    Default Re: Religion should be systematically, peacefully, and totally eradicated over the next 100 years (commentary) [Copperknickers II vs. Sicknero]

    Quote Originally Posted by RubiconDecision View Post
    Yeah who cares that the abolition of religion would also mean breaking fundamental natural rights. Screw em because the abolition of religion would be so much better than those pesky rights which interfere with your plans.
    As I have said three times now, fundamental natural rights are routinely broken as part of the legal system. You have yet to come up with an answer as to why it is OK to silence, imprison, even kill people, if you do it within the law, yet it wouldn't be OK to impose restrictions on religious organisations, if there was sufficient popular support to enact such a piece of legislation.

    What pure facism, and even I who have criticized others who enable terrorists or even pedophiles to speak publicly about their belief system would never entirely forbid them to speak at all.
    And where did I say they wouldn't be allowed to speak out? I said they wouldn't be allowed to have organised institutions, that's all.

    If you abolish religious institutions do you really think they'll go away? Christianity flourishes in places where it is banned.
    I don't think they'll dissappear completely, but I think the harm they are capable of doing will be greatly reduced if they don't have any recognition.

    How'd you like to be the law enforcement officer arresting those publicly practicing religion? What a noble human being that would be that would serve the Law but utterly fail the Law at the most basic level there is.
    As I said, the law is only the opinion of the majority. It so happens that right now the majority thinks, wrongly, that minorities deserve unlimited rights even when they are harming the majority. They deserve some rights, of course, but to my mind allowing religion in a majority non-religious society is not equality or protection, its special treatment.

    Quote Originally Posted by NotYetRegistered View Post
    Still doesn't make him a specialist on the abolishment of religion. Honestly only historians or sociologists could make a good proper judgement about that.
    ........ I literally read that sentence about five times over, because I couldn't actually believe that I wasn't misreading it, and you did actually claim that the person who pioneered memetics and revolutionised evolutionary psychology is not a specialist on sociology. Do you actually know who Richard Dawkins is? He is first and foremost a sociobiologist, sociobiology being arguably the most important part of sociology in that it is the only branch to properly take into account neuroethology. Take a look at recent trends in economics, in particular the work of Daniel Kahneman, to see how just how important it is.
    A new mobile phone tower went up in a town in the USA, and the local newspaper asked a number of people what they thought of it. Some said they noticed their cellphone reception was better. Some said they noticed the tower was affecting their health.

    A local administrator was asked to comment. He nodded sagely, and said simply: "Wow. And think about how much more pronounced these effects will be once the tower is actually operational."

  16. #36

    Default Re: Religion should be systematically, peacefully, and totally eradicated over the next 100 years (commentary) [Copperknickers II vs. Sicknero]

    hold on, will edit in the morning
    Quote Originally Posted by Saint Nicholas View Post
    May I suggest ya'll get back on topic. Talk about Napoleon's ethnicity in another thread, this thread is about a leashed penis...
    Quote Originally Posted by Someone
    Life is routine, punctuated by excitement.





  17. #37

    Default Re: Religion should be systematically, peacefully, and totally eradicated over the next 100 years (commentary) [Copperknickers II vs. Sicknero]

    If you think the law is the opinion of the majority, then you don't understand politics very well. Try again. Legislators are forced to make concessions to minority opinion to gain enough of a majority to get legislation i.e. the law passed. And if the majority would ever vote on such a thing, then throughout history there have always been more legislators who would vote in favor of freedom of religion, speech, assembly because all three are basic natural rights that cannot be done away with. As I pointed out, my eradication of religious institutions you'd be breaking all three.

    A natural right is inherent and inalienable. You can't remove it in a republic or democracy. Do you know this or not? Laws flow from natural rights. They may place limits on the expression of natural rights or they may decide the government need not protect a group's natural rights, but they have no power to remove natural rights. Maybe some remedial reading on this subject should be undertaken before you decide to debate it. You have the cart lightyears before the horse.

    The most amusing aspect of this debacle is that atheists have been in the minority, and only due to the benevolence of theists have they been supported. Don't you get that? So you think that there would be some time in the future that all atheists would be in the majority and supersede this historical group from which assistance came from. Wow, talk about being a sore loser and forgetting that fact.

    I know, you think that all religious institutions are out to get atheists and therefore they need to be eradicated. Time has proven the opposite. The fact that you can choose to not believe demonstrates this. Do you lose your job today because you don't believe? Do you have restrictions on marrying because you don't believe? Do you have limits on traveling? On buying a firearm? On anything?

    Take the changes in marriage laws in the USA. They're changing in part because people who happen to be religious like me, don't hate homosexuals and think there's not an issue with them marrying. It's happening because there are more politically active homosexuals. It's happening because there are more atheists who don't care if they marry because scriptural restriction don't matter. Imagine if after we helped that legislation passed they tried to eradicate religion. It's precisely what you're proposing and in the same way.

    I guess all spiritual people should be the enemies of atheists by what you're saying. Because while I don't care if you don't believe, you wish to eradicate what I believe. That makes you an enemy of me, while I foolishly debate you. Weird no? What's the source of this hatred on your part?
    Last edited by RubiconDecision; March 02, 2014 at 05:15 PM.

  18. #38
    Copperknickers II's Avatar quaeri, si sapis
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    Default Re: Religion should be systematically, peacefully, and totally eradicated over the next 100 years (commentary) [Copperknickers II vs. Sicknero]

    Quote Originally Posted by RubiconDecision View Post
    If you think the law is the opinion of the majority, then you don't understand politics very well. Try again. Legislators are forced to make concessions to minority opinion to gain enough of a majority to get legislation i.e. the law passed.
    They are forced to make concessions to minority opinions when there is a conflict between roughly equal numbers of people, e.g. the moderate right wing Tories trying to appease extreme anti-immigrant right-wingers because that's the only way they can defeat the left-wingers who have no problem with immigrants. Overall, they are still just looking for a majority.

    And if the majority would ever vote on such a thing, then throughout history there have always been more legislators who would vote in favor of freedom of religion, speech, assembly because all three are basic natural rights that cannot be done away with. As I pointed out, my eradication of religious institutions you'd be breaking all three.
    I'll deal with the howling inaccuracy of that in a second.

    A natural right is inherent and inalienable. You can't remove it in a republic or democracy. Do you know this or not? Laws flow from natural rights. They may place limits on the expression of natural rights or they may decide the government need not protect a group's natural rights, but they have no power to remove natural rights.
    And what difference does that make? It still doesn't explain why suppression of religious organisations is wrong when state-sponsored execution is fine, even though both are in direct contradiction of people's rights. I don't care whether I'm placing limits on the expression of natural rights or plain ignoring them (and let's be honest, 'placing limits on their expression'? What's the difference in practice between 'limiting their expression' and just ignoring them?).

    The most amusing aspect of this debacle is that atheists have been in the minority, and only due to the benevolence of theists have they been supported. Don't you get that? So you think that there would be some time in the future that all atheists would be in the majority and supersede this historical group from which assistance came from. Wow, talk about being a sore loser and forgetting that fact.
    Due to the benevolence of theists? To this day, people are at serious risk of violence and even death in many parts of the world for being Atheists. They are even more persecuted in the USA than gays and transexuals. Indeed your statement makes no sense: 'supporting us'? Why would we need 'assistance'? The only thing we need assistance for is fighting against the Theists that persecute us.

    I know, you think that all religious institutions are out to get atheists and therefore they need to be eradicated. Time has proven the opposite. The fact that you can choose to not believe demonstrates this.
    We're going to do an experiment now, but be warned, there is a likelihood you will literally explode when the stupidity of your own statement becomes apparent to you. Here goes: we're going to replace the Atheists in your argument with women:

    The most amusing aspect of this debacle is that women have been suppressed, and only due to the benevolence of men have they been supported against this suppression. Don't you get that? So you think that there will be some time in the future that all women will be superior and supersede the historical group from which assistance came? Wow, talk about being a sore loser and forgetting that fact.

    I know, you think that all men are out to get women and therefore the tide needs to be turned. Time has proven the opposite. The fact that you have more rights as a woman now demonstrates how men have been supporting feminism the whole time.


    Because while I don't care if you don't believe, you wish to eradicate what I believe. That makes you an enemy of me, while I foolishly debate you. Weird no? What's the source of this hatred on your part?
    The source of opposition to religion is thousands of years of bloodshed and hatred. We just want our planet to be peaceful.

    Last edited by Darth Red; March 03, 2014 at 10:53 AM.
    A new mobile phone tower went up in a town in the USA, and the local newspaper asked a number of people what they thought of it. Some said they noticed their cellphone reception was better. Some said they noticed the tower was affecting their health.

    A local administrator was asked to comment. He nodded sagely, and said simply: "Wow. And think about how much more pronounced these effects will be once the tower is actually operational."

  19. #39
    Himster's Avatar Praeses
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    Default Re: Religion should be systematically, peacefully, and totally eradicated over the next 100 years (commentary) [Copperknickers II vs. Sicknero]

    In what way? I'm freeing people from having their minds controlled. At most, I'm subsituting one method of control for another, more preferable and tolerant, method.
    There's a book you've probably read but should re-read: Animal Farm.

    Some people like to be "mind-controlled" as we atheists like to call it, but are we so much better than they are? It's up to them to whom they'd prefer to delegate their moral/spiritual responsibility, to take away an individual's right to choose on such a foundational issue is an anathema.
    The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are so certain of themselves, but wiser people are full of doubts.
    -Betrand Russell

  20. #40

    Default Re: Religion should be systematically, peacefully, and totally eradicated over the next 100 years (commentary) [Copperknickers II vs. Sicknero]

    One cannot have a debate with posts that are riddled with complete fallacies and appeals to violence to overthrown institutions and thoughts. I should have known. This has been enlightening about atheism, I'll grant you that. It explains at least one other atheist on the board.

    In spirituality and philosophy, one can make the case that individuals don't live in the same reality. Clearly you're not living in my reality at all. I can't even comment further without breaking TOS even though I am sorely tempted.

    I guess some atheists are my enemies after all.
    Last edited by RubiconDecision; March 03, 2014 at 08:48 AM.

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