Are we regressing?

Religions with an emphasis on dieties you cannot sense, and an afterlife that represents a complete divorce from the concrete, was evidence of the capacity of people to engage in abstract thought. Insofar as this is consistent and widespread enough to turn into traditional burial practices throughout a society it is an advanced stage in intellectual growth as a species. So is the capacity to give and communicate meaning through symbols( art and hierogryphics) , the ability to draw a map in the dirt, or do simple math etc.

We no longer draw maps with a stick. We interpret a screen with moving dots on Mapquest instead. And we no longer use hierogryphics. We have an alphabet based on sound rather than sight symbots. That's not because we couldn't do it the 'old way'. There are tons of ways we prove that we handle and exploit abstract thought as a species. Losing faith in religion or and afterlife as an answer to questions, says absolutely nothing about us as a species losing our ability to think and understand those concepts.

 

Your post's ideas were variously irrelevant, inapplicable, uninformed, or just wrong, as in your paragraph about doctors always being willing to explain things to patients, when asked.

Unwarrantedly broad, over-generalization. I could refute your contentions, in spades, just from my own, personal experience.

IOW, there is absolutely no more significant proof in this theory, than in the theory of God. It is a silly argument to say that, well, everyone should just understand, when a theoretical physician states something as a fact, that it cannot be verified. The exact same caveat, would apply to anyone's spiritual assertions, portrayed as fact.

Your arguments, are of one-way streets.

 

What does that have to do with leaving tools for the dead, to help them in the afterlife?

 

leaving 'tools for the dead for the afterlife' only represents an advancement in humanity because of the mental gymnastics involved in understanding 1. the distinction between mortality and immortality 2. Having enough imagination to invent an afterlife to conquer its permanence. That's all some pretty advanced abstract thinking that no other species can do, but its not the only test of those same mental gymnastics. We are not regressing mentally because we may no longer believe in an afterlife. We would be regressing if we no longer understood the concepts involved or could imagine an afterlife.

 

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I do agree with some of the things you say but overall rather than being all closed-minded as you say I am, I have literally said that it would be good to see some open-mindedness from the Christian side of things. Despite your criticisms of the medical field and its safety standards you have provided numerous examples of how science can and does change over time to fit new evidence into its picture of reality. Does that mean we should find no value in the methods of science? Let each person decide for themselves. You seem to want to drag science down to the level of blind faith; I will leave it to you to analyze why that feels good to you.

You have also made a lot of statements about how science is presented, like how the big bang was taught in school. I remember being taught alternate theories along with the Big Bang and one only has to type the phrase into bing, click on the first link and sure enough, three paragraphs in they are talking about alternate theories. https://www.space.com/25126-big-bang-theory.html

 

Regardless of how religious they were in their personal life (and many were not), they still advocated for a secular GOVERNMENT.

 

Pardon me for interjecting here, but your post brought to mind a passage from Boris Pasternak's Doctor Zhivago. In this scene, which is not in David Lean's film (like much of the book and its central theme), Yuri Zhivago's uncle Nikolai, a writer who renounced his vows as a priest, is talking to one of his friends:

"What you don't understand is that it is possible to be an atheist, it is possible not to know if God exists or why He should, and yet to believe that man does not live in a state of nature but in history, and that history as we know it began with Christ, it was founded by Him on the Gospels. Now what is history? Its beginning is that of the systematic work devoted to the solution of the enigma of death, so that death may eventually be overcome. This why people write symphonies, and why they discover mathematical infinity and electromagnetic waves. Now, you can't advance in this direction without a certain upsurge of spirit. You can't make such discoveries without spiritual equipment, and for this, everything necessary has been given us in the Gospels. What is it? Firstly, the love of one's neighbor - the supreme form of living energy. Once it fills the heart of man it has to overflow and spend itself. And secondly, the two concepts which are the main part of the make-up of modern man - without them he is inconceivable - the ideas of free personality and of life regarded as sacrifice. Mind you, this is all new. There was no history in this sense in the classical world. There you had the blood and beastliness and cruelty and pock-marked Caligulas untouched by the suspicion that any man who enslaves others is inevitably second-rate. There you had the boastful and dead eternity of bronze monuments and marble columns. It was not until after the coming of Christ that time and man could breathe freely. It was not until after Him that men began to live in their posterity and ceased to die in ditches like dogs - instead they died at home, in history, at the height of the work they devoted to the conquest of death, being themselves dedicated to this aim."

 

Not actually the point I was making. Considering everything they created was based on God-given rights, there WAS an element of religion involved - they had the wisdom to avoid giving organized religion a SAY in how government was run, I'll concede that point.

 

But that was the point made by the post you were responding to.

So we can agree their goal was to create a secular government. Which is what you had responded to and called incorrect.

 

Which is why I responded to it.

Never min. This is useless. We're going around in circles.

 

...to guard, uphold, and ensure our God given rights.

 

Within a secular government. And the Declaration of Independence is not actually a founding document. Our Constitution mentions nothing of God-given rights and even forbids religious tests and contradicts the 10 Commandments by allowing freedom of religion and even blasphemy. And even the DoI talks about the "God of Nature." Our government went on to deny that it was, in any way, a Christian nation.

 

Jesus talked about god given DUTIES.

He didn't talk about god given rights.

I really don't know where this "god given rights" idea comes from.

 

No, burying the dead is not religion. Its a display of respect to the ones who pass away.

I was watching that show until they had repeated themselves 5 times, and I turned it off. It was interesting at first.

 

Sure, but they did more than that. What is the belief in an afterlife?

 

The Declaration of Independence actually is one of the Founding Documents, and for good reason: its famed and oft-quoted Preamble lays out the principles our nation and government are founded on, the ideals and aspirations of our people and the social contract between we the people and our government.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

The other Founding Documents are the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, and the list has been expanded to include the Federalist Papers, the Articles of Confederation and host of other documents, such as the Suffolk Resolves, but generally the list is confined to the DOI, COTUS and BOR.

All true, but if I recall correctly the DOI refers to "Nature's God".

I'm unaware of our government making any such denial, and I've read many a quote from our government's leaders, from John Adams to Harry Truman (at least), stating that our government is based, in large part, on Judeo-Christian philosophy, ethics and law.

This isn't to say that our government is a Judea-Christian theocracy - clearly it is not. It is, as you correctly pointed out a secular government, and by extension a pluralistic government.

Finally, there is a huge difference between what constitutes a government and what constitutes a nation. A nation is more than its government, and whether we choose to admit or acknowledge it, we are in many respects a Christian nation.

 

I have no idea, where you derive your bolded interpretation, above. You really should explain, such a derogatory sounding judgement. Maybe highlight the specific words in my post which, in your mind, evidence the attitude, at which you level your accusation?

In your last post, in fact, you made a claim about what my view supposedly was, and I asked you to provide my quote, upon which it was based-- I notice you have not backed up that last charge (but instead have issued a new one, which again seems pulled from out of thin air). Therefore, I would appreciate, if you are going to postulate feelings or positions for me, which I haven't voiced, in something close to a verbatim fashion, that you do provide my quote(s). Otherwise, if a claim strikes me as pure nonsense, it is pointless for me to reply to it-- other than to ask you to please support your characterization, or else knock it off.

If that's all one need do, to understand any topic-- why do we still have school?

Yours is a ridiculous suggestion, first, because how is a person supposed to know which things they had been taught, incompletely? The other option, would be to look up every subject, one had ever learned about-- which, in case it's not clear, is not a realistic approach, either.

How is any religious devotee, supposed to apply "science," to test his beliefs??
Seriously, D.R.I.-- your comments are no less than bizarre. Have I, perhaps, misinterpreted your comments, at least in this segment? Notice what I did with your quote, so that you can see from where I took my impression, which would make it simpler for you to correct it, if I were mistaken. Isn't that convenient?


*Also, compare my mentioning your closed-minded attitude, to the way you have been throwing dubious assessments, my way. Notice that I explain, exactly why I use the term.

DEFinning said: ↑
This is, of course, a ridiculous comparison, because science covers things that can be studied, and religion, things that can't be. So your "wish," really translates to your desire for religion to not exist, and for all people's beliefs to be based on scientific evidence. I must say, that is very closed-minded of you.
<End Quote>


And, in fact, I think you still exaggerate what I'd said, by describing me as having said that you were "all closed-minded," when, in truth, I only singled out one specific attitude, which seemed closed-minded. Is it possible you are overly sensitive, to any criticism, which might lead you to try to respond to those perceived slights, tit for tat?

 

That passage is worth mulling over and, though Nikolai and I are not saying the same thing, the comparison is an interesting one, moreso because of the variations between the two; I can see why you would connect them.

 

I have Christian views of afterlife.

What more did they do?

 

may have been trying to prepare their buried dead for a potential afterlife by burying them with objects that were only useful to the living. In one case, buried with a stone tool placed in his hand.

 

When I die I want my record collection and my guitars buried with me when I die but I don’t believe I will be using them.