Would no religion really benefit anyone?

Sure there are religious wackos, terrorists, god driven mass murderers, and delusional religious freaks.  I'm not talking about those.  I'm talking about the everyday citizen of any given country who happens to believe in their god.  They have some faith, some hope that believing in this god will benefit them later, regardless of whether or not this is a valid belief.  Like believing that "if you're good this year, Santa will bring you more presents" or "if you tip the waitress you'll have good karma brought to you" or "if you work really hard for the company, you'll have an excellent retirement package  and won't get laid off."  In other words, hope is the driving factor behind many of our actions.  To eliminate religion would eliminate people's day to day hope. 

Even if their beleifs are "scienticifally incorrect," think of all the people in the US that cling to God to get through their own lives.  Look at black churches that have joyous singing and dancing.  The Bible typically refers to its followers as sheep, and that's what they are.  But isn't it better than being convinced that there is no god?  To actually KNOW or have it forced upon them that no god can possibly exist?  You'd have people with no hope, purpose, or reason to differentiate right from wrong.  Sure, some people can act morally on their own, but others can't.  They need a reason to not steal or kill or cheat on their wives, and with no moral or spiritual "penalty," what do people have to lose?  Do you really want a completely atheist society?  Religion makes an excellent behavior control system, just like government laws, accepted behaviors, popular beliefs and opinions, TV advertisements, and political statements from our current political leader.  The validity of these systems may be wrong in some instances, but at least they offer some kind of order.   

>>80

I wouldn't call Japan a psychologically healthy society. In addition, the more peaceful countries are mostly those that are ethnically uniform and have a fairly even distribution of resources. When these criteria aren't met, inequality and conflict arise and things get harder. That's when people really turn towards religion. The poor whites say, these rich liberals are sinners. The poor blacks say, these white people are the devils. Being "god's children" is enpowering to them. If they get everything they needed then they won't care about god. The whole thing is ironic because god is supposedly omnipotent AND loving. Why would you lack anything you needed if he was both and you believed in him?

About the urban poor, they yell about bitches and crack and wear a platinum crucifix. I think thats just a poor implementation of religion.

"poor implementation of religion" is redundant.

the enlightenment came and went

This is a step-by-step deconstruction of the first two posts' arguments.

Even if their beleifs are "scienticifally incorrect," think of all the people in the US that cling to God to get through their own lives.
>>Is false hope a good reason to live? Sounds like 'ignorance is bliss' to me. When you use religion as a reason for anything, whether it be being a good person or simply living, you are corrupting the motivation behind your actions. After all, the 9/11 terrorists didn’t see themselves as evil in the eyes of their religion; but, if they had used rational and ethical thought, thousands would not have died. From a relative moral point, they were good people; however, anyone with the least sense of ethics can condemn their actions.<< 
Look at black churches that have joyous singing and dancing.  The Bible typically refers to its followers as sheep, and that's what they are.  But isn't it better than being convinced that there is no god?
>>Depends. Would you like to live with your parents for your entire life? Maybe. But most wouldn't. Having a god is like having a parent you can listen to only when you WANT to. Realizing there is no god is a very liberating force; just like a man out of college, you find a world that is, as moot says of 4chan, of your own making. You suffer the consequences of your failures, but can fully celebrate your successes without attributing them to an extraplanar being.<<
To actually KNOW or have it forced upon them that no god can possibly exist?  You'd have people with no hope, purpose, or reason to differentiate right from wrong.  Sure, some people can act morally on their own, but others can't.  They need a reason to not steal or kill or cheat on their wives, and with no moral or spiritual "penalty," what do people have to lose?
>>Well, this is the same thing from before. Do people really need to be tricked into obeying ethics? No. Absolutely not. Just because God doesn’t say “Don’t run red lights,” would you do it? Religion can and has been in the past replaced with a sense of ethics and societal trust.<<
“Do you really want a completely atheist society?  Religion makes an excellent behavior control system, just like government laws, accepted behaviors, popular beliefs and opinions, TV advertisements, and political statements from our current political leader.  The validity of these systems may be wrong in some instances, but at least they offer some kind of order.”
>>This is a particularly amusing angle from, I can only assume, a theist. The idea that religion is useful as a controlling force has existed since Roman times, and we all know how successful Rome’s civil rights record was. When religion is used to control the people, it removes their humanity and reduces them to essentially slaves. And, if you suppose ignorance is a decent tradeoff for stability, let me recommend a book to you: 1984 by George Orwell.
As far as completely atheistic societies go, there haven’t been many. People have a hard time leaving religion behind voluntarily, and state-enforced atheism is impotent. Although many associate authoritarian communism with state atheism, the connection is insoluble. Marx saw religion as the support of the aristocracy/bourgeoisie, and that its removal would be one of the major forces of liberation. It never fails to amaze me, though, how often people will gladly wear the yoke and pull for the priest, content in the labor of Sisyphus.<<

“Also, religion can add emotional and psychological support to those having a hard time in life.  Without that, some may be able to find a sense of hope on their own.”
>>I’m going to assume you meant ‘without that, some may not be able’, because that’s more germane to your argument. While it is true that religion may help people recover from things such as drug abuse, alcoholism, family problems, etc., there are plenty of alternative, secular solutions to such problems. Why have a priest vaguely familiar with you and your problem giving you advice, as opposed to a psychiatrist or a counselor trained and experienced with people? Besides, religion can often do more harm than good to its partakers (Waco, TX, the numerous ‘faith healing’ attempts no one hears about because they failed), as well as have no effect at all (i.e. the baptist church-going gang members at my school)<<

“Religion is also used in taking up people's free time.  People need to dedicate themselves to something, whether its sports or school or a career or sitting and watching TV for the rest of their lives.  With no religion, you've just given millions of people the opportunity to find something else to do, no matter how pointless.”
>>This is really amusing to read; it’s not really a valid point, and seems to hurt your argument. So… wait, spending your time in useless prayer is somehow better than enjoying the company of family and friends, working at a job, helping others, making something of your life? That makes a lot of sense.<<

“Someone once said that humans are infinitely bored.  Yet some people have nothing better to do than dedicate themselves to religion.  Once they have nothing to do, with no hope of an afterlife to cling to, what then?  Would they just sit and rot with no purpose?”
>>Some indeed may; that ideology is called nihilism. But others, such as existentialists, see the one life they have as valuable, and strive to enjoy it to the fullest extent possible. Besides, if you have an infinite, perfect afterlife to anticipate, what’s the purpose of staying on Earth? You should just bite the bullet now. Btw, the idea of suicide as a sin appears nowhere in the Bible; it comes from St. Augustine’s City of God.<<

>>84

good points. i also, would like to hope that all people are capable of thinking about things for themselves and acting rationally, despite their best efforts to convince me otherwise.

i dont know though. i often feel that, because i know i am capable of great things, i will be inadaquite if i do not achieve them. in order to be happy, i think, i have to spend most of my time working hard towards some goal. i suppose that religion provides a way to be contented while not working quite so hard. if you're really happy, does it really matter if what you belive in is true? of course you dont need to be religious to be content, and even if i did belive in god i would probably still feel inadequite...

>>53
Anthropogenic global warming is mostly dangerous because of natural disasters (storms, droughts, rising sea levels, etc.).

There are somewhat larger problems of the same kind of a less tractable nature having to do with solar cycles (ice age cycles) and steady increases in the luminosity of the sun over time (expected to raise the mean surface temperature of the earth to 100C and above in the distant future, though long before it goes nova, and far less is required to wipe out life on earth).

Does anthropogenic global warming even exist, or is it like the spurious "hole in the ozone layer" that always appears in winter at the poles, because ozone is unstable and breaks down into ordinary oxygen in the absence of ultraviolet light from the sun?  It seems to me that environmentalist controversies are 99% politics, 1% science.

It probably depends on how you define religion. Most organized religion is pretty badly flawed in my view, but personal religious beliefs aren't necessarily a bad thing. Though it's popular to dismiss religion and philosophy as bullshit or intellectual masturbation, science has a great deal of limitations and cannot be used by itself.

For one, science can tell us many things, but it cannot tell us what is morality or happiness. It is also very deterministic and regards humanity as nothing more than chemical reactions without free will. It is religion and philosophy that tempers this anti-human viewpoint and without them, science wouldn't have a point since it can only describe, not recommend. It doesn't provide goals or meaning.

>For one, science can tell us many things, but it cannot tell us what is morality or happiness.

I think the've done MRIs and some kinda electrical and chemical readings of the brain and found out what happiness is.

let me ask one thing
if you cant proof that god exists or not.

then can you proof that god is not a horrible space monster that invades earth zillion years ago?

>>88
You don't understand what science is or what it is for.  Science isn't FOR meaning.  Science tells you how, not why.  Science isn't FOR morality.  Science is mathematical models of reality within boundary conditions set by empirical testing.  Period.  Full stop.

Saying that "science has a great deal of limitations [sic]" because it contains no morality is like saying there's no point to calculus because it can't tell you whether to have cake for dessert or pie.

Morality and ethics belong to philosophy.  Philosophy and science are unrelated, unconnected disciplines.  Do not confuse one for the other.

Play Xenogears. The answer is in the game.

I think science is the new religion. Majority of the people still do not really want to think for themselves, they're content if you just say that some Doctor Science Professor said that this is like this and that's that. The whys are not all that important, they just want simple explanations on what and how. Some pseudoscientific circles use this gullibility and blind belief in authorities to their advantage. All they have to say to back up their claims is "hundreds of scientist agree that" and "there are studies that show this". Whether or not these scientists and studies actually exist is not important. Nobody bothers to check.

In this light it's not all that strange that people were okay with the explanation "it's God" for so long. It can be little purple men as long as they can get the damn machine to play those adult videos.

That's a failure of the educational system, I believe.  The purpose of education is not only to teach facts (though that is part of it), but also to teach the people to think.

>>91

I was mainly addressing the frequent claim that science alone is enough. I see people regularly dismiss philosophy as useless and saying that only science has a point. What I really meant to say is that science is incomplete without philosophy.

>>95
I think what you mean to say is that someone's worldview is not complete with only science.  Science IS complete with just science - it's not trying to be anything else.  Science is no more incomplete without philosophy than baking is incomplete without cobbling.

Perhaps that's true, but some philosophy of science is in order too. For example, you and I may know that correlation is not necessarily causation, inherent limitations on what science can prove (can it prove?), theory vs law, that science has nothing to say about God, etc.

Some people don't. This all directly descends from the scientific method, but is non-obvious. The philosophy aspect may be necessary for no other reason than to understand science's relationship with the rest of the world.

ay caramba

>>98

Let it die.

Holy shit.

>>1
People who need such a control system aren't worth having around...

PS, 101get

102GGGGET

103GET THIS IS ORIGINAL RIGHT?

People who actually bother to follow the religions would realize that every religion promotes good behaiviours and the importance of knowledge.

Without it, without them the human race would be nowhere, sex greed and lust would just end up making people lazy. notice whats happened to society now that the importance of religion is downplayed?

>>104
Read the rest of the thread you idiot. I'm an athiest and I don't do any of those things. I isn't because I don't want to go to hell, it is because I don't want to go to jail.

People don't need religion to realize that you shouldn't kill/hurt people.

>>105
People might not need religion specificly, but they do need a philosophy (which is for all intents and purposes, a religion) to tell them to not "do bad things".

Otherwise, why shouldn't I just go ignore the needs of everyone else? As it is I don't give a damn about the homeless and poor. If I had no reason for restraint, trust me when I tell you I wouldn't. Because if I had no reason for restraint, I would have blown the heads off of half the people in my school back in the days of high school. Oh how I wanted to.

>>105

but those laws were originally based off of the laws you get in religious scriptures. only now people are starting to think that we dont need all of them. just think about it for a moment.

and sorry for not reading the whole thread, but the XXXGET bits just made me read the start & the end.

>>104, 105
You're both wrong, in my opinion.

1. A universal good doesn't exist.
2. The idea that the human race have evolved beyond survival of the fittest is a myth. Someone who holds this belief doesn't understand evolution.
3. Your view of the world has been determined by those around you. Not everyone is like us. There are different classes. We are plebs. We are manipulated by those who fight for their family's long-term survival. The idea that the human race is fighting for each other is wrong. You only need to get a job to experience the smallest taste of how earning money involves fierce competition. At the very top it is completely ruthless.

I have been pretty much stating my views without giving you reasons to believe it, but if you seriously consider and research what I've said I think you'll find it correct. It is the only theory of how the world works that I know of that doesn't have gaping holes in it.

I believe the key is to start from evolution and develop your view from there, rather than developing your view from your perception of politics.

WOO HOO ! IM BUMPING THE OLDEST THREAD ON /sci/ !!

Strangely enough, most of these bumped threads are mine.  I guess I'm the most interesting topic starter on this board.  Which makes this a pretty sad place actually.

>>107
The fact that this went three years without refuting is a sad reflection on the state of /sci/ throughout its history.

No, we were just too uppity to dignify the thread with a response