There’s something wrong with outright rejecting objective reality to believe in the fantastical. Doesn’t lend itself well to rational thinking voters, exactly does it?
You mean like running a campaign based on genocide, war hawking, and enabling corporate abuses as a democratic candidate? Yeah i was pretty baffled by that too.
Kinda depends on their exact beliefs. Cuckoos aside, a lot of non-extremist religious folks have views that are reasonably compatible with reality, or at least not mutually exclusive.
A belief in an invisible wizard in the sky that grant wishes and subject you to eternal torture if you don’t both believe in him and love him is incompatible with reality
It’s just as compatible as imagination and fairy tails as long as you don’t force your beliefs on others, or make decisions that impact others based on those beliefs.
As long as they aren’t believing every small thing that happens is due to the actions of said sky wizard, I’m not seeing the incompatibility. Also, I’m agnostic, so if you’re trying to get a raise out of me don’t bother.
No, that’s what some people think religion is. You’re describing a subset of Christianity, which is in itself a subset of religions. Just because it may apply to a large number of Americans doesn’t make it the norm everywhere.
You just said that’s not religion, then you told me it is religion. It can’t be both.
No wonder you’re agnostic.
It sounds to me like you’re trying to excuse the mystical and magical beliefs in fairytales of some people just because they don’t happen to be Christians.
It’s all ancient mythology made up thousands of years ago. There’s no fact or science in it because it isn’t real.
But, if you wanna try to prove any of your magical, mystical beliefs, go ahead. people I’ve been trying for thousands of years and no one has been able to do it.
But, if you wanna try to prove any of your magical, mystical beliefs, go ahead
What magical mystical beliefs? You just pointed out I’m agnostic. By definition, I’m the one waiting for proof.
It’s all ancient mythology made up thousands of years ago. There’s no fact or science in it because it isn’t real.
Nobody in this thread claimed it’s real. The only claim was that they’re not necessarily mutually exclusive with reality. Buddhism for example believes in reincarnation of souls. Good luck proving a negative with that one.
Honestly, militant atheists like you give the rest of us nonbelievers a bad look. You’re like that one vegan who keeps calling everybody Hitler.
Personally, I put that kind of woo-woo in the same bucket as religion. It’s all belief in made up nonsense that is indicative of a lack of critical thinking.
What if I told you the problems only materialize when people tell other people what, and what not to believe?
Pure belief and spirituality (when you remove the need for compliance and/or judgement of others) is critical for healthy evolution of humanity through personal growth.
What if I told you the problems only materialize when people tell other people what, and what not to believe?
I disagree. The problems materialise whenever a person enters the real world and their beliefs affect how they act.
For example, a religious doctor choosing not to administer birth control, or not to perform abortions. That’s a real-world problem caused by religious people’s own beliefs impacting how they personally choose to act, and having a negative effect on society at large.
Pure belief and spirituality is critical for healthy evolution of humanity through personal growth.
Was. If you said was critical, I would agree with you. But certainly not is. We have no use for woo-woo and belief in nonsensical claims today.
the solution isn’t telling people what not to believe
Absolutely correct. However, I think far too often in society we err too far on the side of respecting religion. As some examples:
Religious institutions or individuals should not be permitted to discriminate on the basis of either religion or religious belief. A sexist teacher can’t choose to not teach women. A racist bus driver can’t say “no black people on my bus”. A religious doctor, or any doctor at a religiously-affiliated hospital, should not be allowed to refuse to provide certain procedures because of their religion.
Religions should not receive special taxation status.
Religious rituals like prayers should not be involved in any civil procedure like the opening of parliaments and city councils.
The only time religion should ever be involved in actual Monday-to-Friday schools should be as part of dispassionate academic discussion of theology, not from the perspective of evangelising.
Oh I have friends in that group too. The problem is, I wouldn’t trust any of them to do logic and reasoning. They’re great people, but they couldn’t reason their way out of a wet paper bag. Just two days ago, a group of us were on the subway. Person A commented they admired the balance of person B who was standing without any handholds. Person B started explaining how they had been training their chi, and focused their energy into their feet, since they were young.
they couldn’t reason their way out of a wet paper bag.
neither can you apparently. you’re confusing reasoning with jargon. they just speak a different dialect.
‘focus energy in your feet’ is tell you to ground yourself, loosen your knees and tighten the core. chi describes focusing your mental attention on something. any person who has snowboarded/skateboarded would understand exactly what that person is saying if they bothered to listen and put the terms into context.
do you consider ‘sound healing’ bogus? what if I told you your cells have receptors that can detect sound vibrations (your ears work right? but its more than that individual cells can too.)? which cause neural impulses which can impact large areas of the brain and body directly and indirectly.
your problem is you dont stop to listen and understand what these people are saying and you just dismiss it because they settled on using a different way of speaking and describing concepts that are nontraditional in western societies.
I had a friend who believed in that. She tried to explain to my then GF how her having a symmetrical face means she’s definitely a Libra.
Now, I loved her to bits but my ex-partner did not have a symmetrical face. Few people have. But apparently the way stars aligned on her birthday meant she must have one, so that friend insisted on it.
This isn’t reason or just a different jargon. This is woo-woo. Sitting down everyday, trying to manifest a leading role in a famous TV show but doing nothing else to get this because “manifestation will do its thing” isn’t jargon.
That friend was someone I got along with.
Because she did not try to convince me that vaccines are evil and instead I should just do a spirit cleanse. Like others tried to. This “jargon” is accompanied by fundamentally different ideas about how and why things happen and can lead to anti-scientism.
Lastly, yes, I consider sound healing bogus. The idea that frequencies alone can heal serious injuries is dumb. The difference between acknowledging that vibrations picked up by the brain can assist in a healing process and the idea that this can somehow replace any other treatment is fundamentally unreasonable.
Thank you for explaining a conversation that I had to me, based on the few words I shared here. 🙄 They also literally used Naruto as an example of how chi works, FYI.
you just dismiss it because they settled on using a different way of speaking and describing concepts that are nontraditional in western societies.
That’s funny, I was under the impression I grew up as a Chinese in an Asian society. Guess I was mistaken.
Nothing’s wrong with religion. I don’t believe that Buddhists automatically make an objectively worse choice than atheists.
There’s something wrong with outright rejecting objective reality to believe in the fantastical. Doesn’t lend itself well to rational thinking voters, exactly does it?
You mean like running a campaign based on genocide, war hawking, and enabling corporate abuses as a democratic candidate? Yeah i was pretty baffled by that too.
Kinda depends on their exact beliefs. Cuckoos aside, a lot of non-extremist religious folks have views that are reasonably compatible with reality, or at least not mutually exclusive.
A belief in an invisible wizard in the sky that grant wishes and subject you to eternal torture if you don’t both believe in him and love him is incompatible with reality
It’s just as compatible as imagination and fairy tails as long as you don’t force your beliefs on others, or make decisions that impact others based on those beliefs.
Imagination and fairytales are recognized as not being real. The same can’t be said for religion.
As long as they aren’t believing every small thing that happens is due to the actions of said sky wizard, I’m not seeing the incompatibility. Also, I’m agnostic, so if you’re trying to get a raise out of me don’t bother.
That’s what religion is.
As for trying to get a rise out of you, your agnostic. How can I offend you when you don’t even know what you believe?
No, that’s what some people think religion is. You’re describing a subset of Christianity, which is in itself a subset of religions. Just because it may apply to a large number of Americans doesn’t make it the norm everywhere.
You just said that’s not religion, then you told me it is religion. It can’t be both.
No wonder you’re agnostic.
It sounds to me like you’re trying to excuse the mystical and magical beliefs in fairytales of some people just because they don’t happen to be Christians.
It’s all ancient mythology made up thousands of years ago. There’s no fact or science in it because it isn’t real.
But, if you wanna try to prove any of your magical, mystical beliefs, go ahead. people I’ve been trying for thousands of years and no one has been able to do it.
What magical mystical beliefs? You just pointed out I’m agnostic. By definition, I’m the one waiting for proof.
Nobody in this thread claimed it’s real. The only claim was that they’re not necessarily mutually exclusive with reality. Buddhism for example believes in reincarnation of souls. Good luck proving a negative with that one.
Honestly, militant atheists like you give the rest of us nonbelievers a bad look. You’re like that one vegan who keeps calling everybody Hitler.
Crystal healers, OTOH…
Personally, I put that kind of woo-woo in the same bucket as religion. It’s all belief in made up nonsense that is indicative of a lack of critical thinking.
What if I told you the problems only materialize when people tell other people what, and what not to believe?
Pure belief and spirituality (when you remove the need for compliance and/or judgement of others) is critical for healthy evolution of humanity through personal growth.
I disagree. The problems materialise whenever a person enters the real world and their beliefs affect how they act.
For example, a religious doctor choosing not to administer birth control, or not to perform abortions. That’s a real-world problem caused by religious people’s own beliefs impacting how they personally choose to act, and having a negative effect on society at large.
Was. If you said was critical, I would agree with you. But certainly not is. We have no use for woo-woo and belief in nonsensical claims today.
Very valid point.
Though I’m pretty sure the solution isn’t telling people what not to believe.
Absolutely correct. However, I think far too often in society we err too far on the side of respecting religion. As some examples:
Etc.
Clutches crystals really firmly and sends evil thoughts your way
You do have a point.
How is a prayer to a bodhisattva for good health not the same as sleeping next to a mineral for good health?
Christianity is not the same thing as religion.
You may have missed the edit I did. I made it more clear that I was using Buddhism as the counter-example.
There are more counter-examples (paganism is another) than examples.
Fun fact: a lot of the crystal healers i interact with are solid people.
Nutty sure but most of them are all about emotional wellness and support and very few are okay with trump or republicans.
It always amuses me when the people who think they’re rational and shit on the mystic groups miss out on wonderful friends and allies.
Kind of like the 2019 campaign when everone shit on Marianne Williamson.
Oh I have friends in that group too. The problem is, I wouldn’t trust any of them to do logic and reasoning. They’re great people, but they couldn’t reason their way out of a wet paper bag. Just two days ago, a group of us were on the subway. Person A commented they admired the balance of person B who was standing without any handholds. Person B started explaining how they had been training their chi, and focused their energy into their feet, since they were young.
neither can you apparently. you’re confusing reasoning with jargon. they just speak a different dialect.
‘focus energy in your feet’ is tell you to ground yourself, loosen your knees and tighten the core. chi describes focusing your mental attention on something. any person who has snowboarded/skateboarded would understand exactly what that person is saying if they bothered to listen and put the terms into context.
do you consider ‘sound healing’ bogus? what if I told you your cells have receptors that can detect sound vibrations (your ears work right? but its more than that individual cells can too.)? which cause neural impulses which can impact large areas of the brain and body directly and indirectly.
your problem is you dont stop to listen and understand what these people are saying and you just dismiss it because they settled on using a different way of speaking and describing concepts that are nontraditional in western societies.
I had a friend who believed in that. She tried to explain to my then GF how her having a symmetrical face means she’s definitely a Libra.
Now, I loved her to bits but my ex-partner did not have a symmetrical face. Few people have. But apparently the way stars aligned on her birthday meant she must have one, so that friend insisted on it.
This isn’t reason or just a different jargon. This is woo-woo. Sitting down everyday, trying to manifest a leading role in a famous TV show but doing nothing else to get this because “manifestation will do its thing” isn’t jargon.
That friend was someone I got along with. Because she did not try to convince me that vaccines are evil and instead I should just do a spirit cleanse. Like others tried to. This “jargon” is accompanied by fundamentally different ideas about how and why things happen and can lead to anti-scientism.
Lastly, yes, I consider sound healing bogus. The idea that frequencies alone can heal serious injuries is dumb. The difference between acknowledging that vibrations picked up by the brain can assist in a healing process and the idea that this can somehow replace any other treatment is fundamentally unreasonable.
Thank you for explaining a conversation that I had to me, based on the few words I shared here. 🙄 They also literally used Naruto as an example of how chi works, FYI.
That’s funny, I was under the impression I grew up as a Chinese in an Asian society. Guess I was mistaken.
And the problem with using a shared cultural reference is? 😂
Fucker we use water pipes to explain current and other concepts in high energy physics.
You need to get over yourself.