I read Sam Harris's book The End Of Faith and was very impressed by his arguments. I recommend the book who heartedly. Here are some quotes by Sam Harris on wikiquote. "It is rather more noble to help people purely out of concern for their suffering than it is to help them because you think the Creator of the Universe wants you to do it, or will reward you for doing it, or will punish you for not doing it. The problem with this linkage between religion and morality is that it gives people bad reasons to help other human beings when good reasons are available." "Let’s just grant the possibility that there is a Creator God, who’s omniscient, who occasionally authors books. And he’s gonna give us a book – the most useful book. He’s a loving God, he’s a compassionate God, and he’s gonna give us a guide to life. He’s got a scribe, the scribe’s gonna write it down. What’s gonna be in that book? I mean just think of how good a book would be if it were authored by an omniscient deity. I mean, there is not a single line in the Bible or the Koran that could not have been authored by a first century person. There is not one reference to anything – there are pages and pages about how to sacrifice animals, and keep slaves, and who to kill and why. There’s nothing about electricity, there’s nothing about DNA, there’s nothing about infectious disease, the principles of infectious disease. There’s nothing particularly useful, and there’s a lot of iron age barbarism in there, and superstition. This is not a candidate book." https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Sam_Harris
Presupposes what he would do if he were God....once again a demonstration that as much as atheists complain about religious people trying to force their beliefs onto others, they turn around and try to do the exact same thing....
Meh, many of the Christians I know I would imagine would say that they help others out of love for others rather than some celestial reward. I know more than one Christian who views much of the Bible as metaphor rather than literally.
Do those people who view the bible as a metaphor also believe the bible was written (or inspired) by god? Why would god inspire a book of metaphors and not make that perfectly clear? There is so much text within the bible that provides nothing of value even when taken in metaphor form. Descriptions on who to rape/kill/enslave (often vivid and distinct) cannot possibly be interpreted as metaphors.. and even if attempted WTF kind of metaphors are those? It seems to me that Christians using this excuse know how flawed the bible is and how clearly it is not divinely inspired, yet they cling to this somewhat weak excuse of "Oh its not big deal, just a metaphor".
I am betting that they would say that the Bible was at least in part inspired by God. Why you asking me as I am not a spokesperson for any theological intangible. Personally I think the Bible is the word of man and man's interpretation of God. I doubt there is a single word of God in the Bible... but I am open to the possibility that I am wrong. And there is also much in the Bible that is sound like "let he whom is without sin cast the first stone". I am not a Christian but this does not keep me from seeing the good in the Bible as well as the bad. Says who and by what authority? "Seems" implies assumption and assumption is not synonymous with fact. How one judges others says more about the one doing the judging than the one being judged.
In the first quotation, the author uses the terms "bad reasons" and "good reasons". Those are ambiguous terms and subsequently have little meaning to the reality of all living people, as each person determines what is 'good' or 'bad'; the author is not a person who can determine for others what is good or bad.
Intellectually speaking, what I see is that, it was recognized that the natural human weakness for gods could not be overcome. People believed in various gods which they found spelled out in the myths, which every nation had. So, in order to eliminate these ideas of different gods, the common sense of explaining that Reality is the ONLY god was poised to those who already had some other. But of course, no one heard this, or cared to hear it. Telling the such a common sense thing had no effect on the believers who heard this. And hardly anyone in the community even listened in the first place. So a religion was started, and a bible was written which offered people a god just as they demanded. But that God was never named beyond using the four initials of his supposed name, YHVH. These four letters, however, really were a coded message. They could demonstrate that the 4 letters had 12 different permutations. They can be rotated into 12 different combinations. The 3 letters, Y, H, and V, also can be combined into seven different combinations, too. So, what this Bible did was use these 22 combinations, both as a loci memory device and an organizer for ideas written inside the text: For example: Lineage through Cain, in the land of Nod: HH- Adam (Gen 4:17) HV- Cain VH- Enoch HY- Irad YH- Mahujael YV- methusael VY- Lamech Grandsons of Adam through Cain: H-Tubalcain, son of Zillah (Gen 4:19-) V-Jubal, son of Aah Y-Jabal, son of Adah Sons of Adam . "Gen. 4:25 And Adam knew his wife again; and she bare a son, and called his name Seth: For God, said she, hath appointed me another seed instead of Abel, whom Cain slew." 1) YHVH-Seth (Gen 5) 2) VHYH-Enos 3) HVHY-Cainan 4) HYHV-Mahalaleel 5) HHYV-Jared 6) HHVY-Enoch 7) VYHH-Methuselah YVHH-Lamech 9) YHHV-Noah 10) VHHY-Shem 11) HYVH-Ham 12) HVYH-Japeth End of Chapter 5, all the progeny of Adam and Eve is detailed above, then came the great flood,... ... and, these fellows also used this organizational method of 22 items so that the hand could be used as a place to hold the 12 units on the fingers, and the seven items in the palm of the hand. That, then, would allow the priests to use their hands as an loci memory device: The punch line here is that another prophet must come. He explains that he is Truth, the way and the life for men to lead, because his father is Reality. Now we have a religion which tells people that truth is the way men can find Reality, and, then, sanely, they are to live there,... in a kingdom of sane people.
In reality, it won't matter what motivates you to help the needed. With good or bad reasons leading you to be merciful, as long as the one in needs receives help, that is what it counts. So, this criticism on the bible is peanuts. Think about it. The bible is about moral, besides of being the greatest and best ancient history book. What can you learn about helping the needed when you learn about electricity, DNA and infectious diseases? Do the teachers in universities tell you to use that knowledge to help people in their suffering? Are you serious? Show me the technical and science books suggesting students to use that technology for helping people to overcome their suffering. In my opinion, Sam Harris smokes too much weed or he is just an idiot. He is trying to mix oil and water.
If Jehova God really wanted to impress future generations he should have had his prophets prophesy the following: The sun is a star. The earth is round not flat. The moon reflects light from the sun. There are several more "undiscovered" continents on planet earth that you know nothing about, to wit: North & South America, Australia, and Antarctica. People get sick not from demons but from microscopic germs. There is a mould called penicillin that is useful in combating many kinds of bacterial infections. Anal sex does not cause earthquakes. Plate tectonics and the friction of two large land mass cause earth quakes. You can not stop a volcano from erupting by dropping a beautiful virgin down into it. Jews are all right; therefore don't persecute them. Watch out for a scumbag named Adolf Hitler. Don't ever invade Iraq. Etc.
I like Harris and have listened to most of his talks on you tube. But Harris is also a philosophical materialist. Whereas, I am not, so while I can agree with him somewhat on his anti religious ideas, when it comes to consciousness, he believes in the assumption of materialism. And that of course dictates his views. On the other hand, I agree with Tom Campbell and other physicists, that Consciousness is fundamental, not matter. Which means the material universe is a manifestation of Consciousness. I would love to see a debate between him and some physicists like Campbell, who would question his assumption of materialism. Afterall, all of Harris's beliefs are firmly grounded in the assumption of materialism. And if materialism is not actually True, then much of Harris's other beliefs crumble around his feet. Of course so far we cannot prove which is factual in regards to the contrary assumptions. But even that fact will not shake Harris in his materialistic world view.
Um, God is the reason for everything, so naturally we are going to do things solely to please Him. There may be other reasons, but the reason to do as God wills is enough. Lol, why should there be anything about DNA in these books? They are not science books.
I'm an Atheist and have a small account, due to my disability income its gift money for holidays and the like with KIVA using this pot of money I give out loans to the poor which they usually so far pay back the interest going to the charity and I relend the money. Doing this farmers grow more crops, microbusinesses get money, families can buy a clean water pump or extra stores for a small shop. One took the loans from us which were several to buy more woodworking tools and apprentices young men in Kenya in Woodworking and Carpentry. I would argue this is helping them far more than prayer or giving money to some religious group it meets real needs overseen by partners and banks which provide for those who can't normally get credit. So I do help the poor where I can and for my income pretty well considering I'm also poor. My empathy as a human being sys I should help those worse off than even me. Your Bible as a moral book fails even if folk tales and stories about morality, it promotes murder and rape and slavery and so where are these high morals. Little Red Riding Hood has more morality she was kind and took care of her grandmother and was brave facing down the big bad wolf its more than you can say for Lot he offered his own virgin daughter for the mob to rape and committed incest after and god had no issue to since the evil daughters didn't get punished.
You're an atheist because you have a lot of pride and your life is comfortable for you enough to never need to think about God. That will soon change. Your life will be turned upside down and on its head. When that happens, you'll be a firm believer. Heck, for the limited time you'll have, you may even become more religious than some of the people here.
That truly is the most egotistical, degrading, judgmental, and un-christlike statement I have ever read on these forums. Thanks for affirming atheism!
You sound jealous. Hey, continue to be an atheist. Most atheists have their heads in the clouds anyway. If anything is to happen, atheists are usually the last ones to know.
You don't even know what "heaven" is. This is why I say your head is in the clouds. There are 4 types of heaven in the bible. There's the sky above our heads. Outer Space is considered the "heavens". The third heaven is where God's throne resides. The fourth heaven is called the Kingdom of Heaven. That is a time period which is on earth.
Isn't it funny that Christians get up on a high horse and wish evil (*)(*)(*)(*) on atheists to somehow prove the existence of god?
Are you sure that all Christians do what you are suggesting? Your comment is one which is all inclusive.
Actually it is quite pathetic. And did you see his response? Religious fundamentalism is a disease, too bad as a society we don't pay any attention to it until someone goes off the deep end.
