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What should replace religion in a post-religious society? ("atheism & the city" blog)

#11
Secular Sanity Offline
Why do we have to replace it? We practiced bloodletting for over 2000 years but we eventually abandoned it because it didn’t work.
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#12
Syne Offline
All evidence of correlated longer lifespans and reported happiness to the contrary.
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#13
confused2 Offline
Things I've noticed about (local) christians:-
1/Unconditional group hug
2/Good deeds are rewarded in heaven - I'm not suggesting the doer thinks they will get to sit closer to god (or Jesus) - it's just a thing they do - there's less counting of the cost - it goes on the account.

Things I've noticed about secular people:-
1/Any kind of hug is very conditional
2/A good deed costs whatever it costs
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#14
C C Offline
Possibly it's a futile question to ask, if grounded in the conviction that post-religion is possible.

What is religion?: There is no common definition of religion that scholars agree on. [...] Various definitions of religion have been proposed, but they are either too broad and include things that are not religions or they are too narrow and do not include things that are religions. Religion is the final structuring commitment of an individual.

There are many narrow definitions of religion. Some may think that religion is a belief in God (or gods), but this is not true. Many Eastern religions have members who are atheists. Buddha did not believe that there were any gods at all. Nonetheless, he and his followers are very religious. Their lack of belief in God (or gods) does not make them any less religious than Christians or Muslims. Others may believe that religion is a belief in sacred texts. While it is true that many religious have or use sacred texts, many others do not. Tribal religions, for example, hand down their traditions orally. Still others may believe that religion is a system of worship. While many religions do worship God, many others do not worship anyone.

There are also many broad definitions. Some believe that religion is ones belief about the meaning of life. But someone might share these beliefs while belonging to different religions. [...] Another definition claims that religion is the experience of the sacred. Not only do some very religious believers have no experience of sacred things, but some non-religious believers do!

[...this...] definition of religion does not have either of these problems. Commitments can be temporary or lifelong, deep or shallow. One might be committed to helping the environment, and display that with the specific commitment of recycling. One might also have beliefs and practices that arise because of our commitments. [...] Not all structuring commitments are equal. Some structuring commitments can structure others. A final structuring commitment is one that is not structured by any commitment whatsoever. It is the highest commitment that one could possibly have.


The controversial, modern etymological theories that wrestle around religio meaning things like "to re-bind" or "to re-connect" and so-forth, are noise long after the fact. Origin-wise, it's the Romans who discovered the need of an umbrella concept and introduced its function: "Religio among the Romans was not based on "faith", but on knowledge, including and especially correct practice." --religio

Roots of Religion. . . To return to the word “religion,” it is a curious fact that, although all the ancestors of today’s Europeans had (like the ancestors of all the world’s inhabitants) what we would call religions, no ancient Indo-European language had a specific word for religion, Latin having been the first — which is why the great majority of modern European languages have some version of religio as their term for it. Probably this was because, precisely since religion was everywhere in the ancient world and no activity was divorced from it, it never struck anyone as a distinct aspect of life calling for a name of its own. There were names for specific gods, ceremonies, rituals, forms of worship, cults, sects, etc., because all these were discrete things; religion itself was the unnamed totality of them all, the forest that couldn’t be seen for all its trees.

It took the Romans, who in conquering the world were forced to become its first anthropologists, to realize that behind all this multifariousness was something about which it was possible to generalize. From its original meaning of “punctilious respect for the sacred,” religio came to denote any comprehensive human system of organizing and expressing such respect.


Historically, the Roman source seems to minimally pertain to apprehension of a program, reverence of or fealty to its features, and correct practice of it. Signifying membership in slash alignment with the thought-orientations of a cultural group, movement, or even ethno-national identity. (Thereby providing another channel for integration of a population, if the propaganda and punishments of the ruling state weren't sufficient.)

Globally, if Rome's empire had reached that far, even they might have had to agree that gods and supernatural affairs are not a necessary ingredient of local systemic practices and customs. From both today and the future's perspective, UFO cults also nullified "religion" requiring occult agencies (if not imaginary space aliens). The beliefs or expectations of futurism and transhumanism add the final kabosh with common religious staple like "life after death" and deities (archailects) being realized by technological means -- with even infomorphs mimicking spirits, demons, angels, etc.

However, if supernatural aspects are insisted upon, then distinctions like "parareligion" can come into play for secular or naturalistic versions. (Wiktionary; Catholic Dictionary; Wordnik; A Dictionary of Sociology)

~
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#15
Syne Offline
I would hazard that most atheists are more of the Sam Harris variety when it comes to religions like Buddhism. Compared to other religions, especially ones prevalent in their own culture, they are, at the worst, indifferent to Buddhism. The lack of belief in a god or gods is actually a commonality with atheists. This would seem to be why there is a distinction between atheist and anti-religious.

That does bring up the question of whether post-religious would be considered synonymous with post-theist. Since things like church attendance seems independent of belief in a god or higher power, even to the point of some who claim to be atheists also reporting belief in a god, I would highly doubt that they are.
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#16
Secular Sanity Offline
(Dec 8, 2018 01:03 AM)confused2 Wrote: Things I've noticed about (local) christians:-
1/Unconditional group hug
2/Good deeds are rewarded in heaven - I'm not suggesting the doer thinks they will get to sit closer to god (or Jesus) - it's just a thing they do - there's less counting of the cost - it goes on the account.

Things I've noticed about secular people:-
1/Any kind of hug is very conditional
2/A good deed costs whatever it costs

Unconditional love is not necessarily a good thing. 

"Should love be thrown away at the drop of a hat? No. It’s something that’s worth preserving. You should not, however, trap yourself just because you think love has to be eternal. This gives you the freedom to love people but to still expect effort from them. It helps you from being trapped by tradition and allows you the chance to be a better person. The more you realize that love is conditional, the more you will be able to see how conditional love is the best thing that could happen to you. Conditional love can last – but it’s built on a foundation or realism, not fantasy."

There's No Such Thing as Unconditional Love

(Dec 7, 2018 10:09 PM)Syne Wrote: All evidence of correlated longer lifespans and reported happiness to the contrary.

Do they live longer?

Do Religious People Live Longer?
A Study Says Religious People Live Longer (But there’s a Lot of Fine Print)

I don’t know but even bloodletting was thought to have a placebo effect. They thought it was better to do any treatment rather than nothing at all.  Even today we see a lot pseudoscience being offered as integrative cancer therapies.

Tell me what you think about the ethics that revolve around the placebo effect. Does deception have to play a role? And the financial gains? Should people profit from it? There are some conditions in which a placebo can produce results even when people know they are taking a placebo. What’s so wrong about tapping into the human potential through honesty and integrity?

"I am who am"or "I will be what I will be" or even "I create whatever I create". "I am Alpha and Omega" the beginning and the ending, which is, and which was, and which is to come." The past, the present, and the future; we are all of these things. What’s so wrong about teaching people to believe in themselves and to discover their full potential without the lies and deceit?

It doesn’t seem like you even believe in the Abrahamic religions. How do you justify supporting them if you don’t believe in them? The placebo effect, is that it?  Dodgy
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#17
Syne Offline
(Dec 8, 2018 05:44 PM)Secular Sanity Wrote:
(Dec 8, 2018 01:03 AM)confused2 Wrote: Things I've noticed about (local) christians:-
1/Unconditional group hug
2/Good deeds are rewarded in heaven - I'm not suggesting the doer thinks they will get to sit closer to god (or Jesus) - it's just a thing they do - there's less counting of the cost - it goes on the account.

Things I've noticed about secular people:-
1/Any kind of hug is very conditional
2/A good deed costs whatever it costs

Unconditional love is not necessarily a good thing. 

"Should love be thrown away at the drop of a hat? No. It’s something that’s worth preserving. You should not, however, trap yourself just because you think love has to be eternal. This gives you the freedom to love people but to still expect effort from them. It helps you from being trapped by tradition and allows you the chance to be a better person. The more you realize that love is conditional, the more you will be able to see how conditional love is the best thing that could happen to you. Conditional love can last – but it’s built on a foundation or realism, not fantasy."

There's No Such Thing as Unconditional Love
group hug
an instance of three or more people embracing one another simultaneously, typically to provide support or express solidarity

I don't know if that's what he meant, but unconditional support or solidarity is different from unconditional love.
Quote:
(Dec 7, 2018 10:09 PM)Syne Wrote: All evidence of correlated longer lifespans and reported happiness to the contrary.

Do they live longer?

Do Religious People Live Longer?
A Study Says Religious People Live Longer (But there’s a Lot of Fine Print)
Why, are you willing to accept that "good health inspire[s] religious involvement"? - https://www.skeptical-science.com/people...ve-longer/
Healthy habits in general tend to include a healthy moral mentality? That study says exactly what I did, that longevity is "correlated" with religion. And you ignored the happiness correlation, which itself could have positive health benefits.

Quote:I don’t know but even bloodletting was thought to have a placebo effect. They thought it was better to do any treatment rather than nothing at all.  Even today we see a lot pseudoscience being offered as integrative cancer therapies.
What may be "thought" to help doesn't mean anything without any correlated benefit. Do you understand the difference there? O_o

Quote:Tell me what you think about the ethics that revolve around the placebo effect. Does deception have to play a role? And the financial gains? Should people profit from it? There are some conditions in which a placebo can produce results even when people know they are taking a placebo. What’s so wrong about tapping into the human potential through honesty and integrity?
A placebo can work even when you know it’s a placebo
Nothing wrong with open-label placebos, if they work.

Is lying, itself, unethical? If you ask how I'm doing and I respond with an unthinking "fine", does that have moral repercussions? I highly doubt it. Lying isn't even in the Ten Commandments. It would actually be more unethical to be honest if knowingly lying could help someone without further moral repercussions. And everyone has a right to be compensated for their work.

Quote:"I am who am"or "I will be what I will be" or even "I create whatever I create". "I am Alpha and Omega" the beginning and the ending, which is, and which was, and which is to come." The past, the present, and the future; we are all of these things. What’s so wrong about teaching people to believe in themselves and to discover their full potential without the lies and deceit?
Just because you think they're lies doesn't mean they actually are.

People left to their own potential, without any moderating external force or teachings, tend to be pointless hedonists. "You stick electrodes in a rat's brain, give him an orgasm button and he'll push that thing 'till he starves to death." - TBBT

Objectivity is largely learned, and early interaction with models of objective thinking can actually help one better estimate their own potential, in relation to and with consideration of the world and others.

Quote:It doesn’t seem like you even believe in the Abrahamic religions. How do you justify supporting them if you don’t believe in them? The placebo effect, is that it?  Dodgy
And? How many times do I have to say that I don't claim to be a Christian? O_o

I can support anything that has an overwhelmingly positive effect on society. You, personally, feeling it is not positive has more to do with your subjective experience than any objective view.
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