All religions are dangerous?

[_dartagnan]

The affirmative position is that all religious belief is dangerous.

You haven't even begun to substantiate this. All you have done is provide a few historical anecdotes where religion and violence are related in some way. But you don't even have the background to speak on history in an informative manner. You merely parrot your favorite anti-religion websites and take their assertions for granted. Truth via assertion, that's essentially what you're doing.

Now back your assertion up with evidence.

Thesis: Religious belief is dangerous.
Evidence: Religion has at times been instrumental in human violence.
Rebuttal: Humans act violently anyway. Religion can be used as an excuse, but that doesn't make it dangerous. Would you rather walk down a dark alley at night among Jewish rabbis or atheists?

At this point JAK shifts his ground and says "danger" doesn't have to refer to physical violence, even though that was the foundation of his argument for "dangerous." So now that he is backtracking, in what sense is "dangerous" now considered dangerous? JAK is still trying to spin his way out of this because he knows that he cannot invent some sense of danger that doesn't already apply to humans anyway. This proves his entire argument is based on bigotry. He is applying the fear factor vby trying to scare people away from religion in calling it "dangerous." It is truth via assertion. When it is dissected and analyzed for reasonable evidence, you see it for the nonsense that it really is.

Thesis: Black skin is dangerous.
Evidence: Black skinned people are the most violent in America.
Rebuttal: Economic/cultural factors couldn't be at play here?

JAK's logical response?
"Where black skinned people roam, danger prevails.”

[_huckelberry]

This is also a non sequitur.

Dangerous activity due to belief is independent of the truthfulness of that belief.

Not only do I think this is completely wrong, it doesn't even seem to understand my point. Our actions are necessarily tethered to our beliefs. When we form a desire about how the world should be and act upon it, we must inform our action with our best understanding of the world. Since our best understanding of the world is properly informed by the use of reason, abandoning it makes it riskier that we will behave in ways contrary to what we desire. Further, when we spend time and effort believing in things that are unjustified, due to our mental resources being finite, we waste energy that could be spent bettering our understanding.

See W.K. Clifford's Ethics of Belief. You don't have to buy his deontology or more narrow evidentialism to see the broader point. Of course, you could accept the point that unjustified belief is risky without abandoning religion. You just have to argue that religious belief isn't unjustified. Huck above is attempting to argue he is justified as using belief in God as a valid "working hypothesis." It's just that I think such efforts are terribly, unforgivably flawed.

Allusion, to my understanding i have made no attempt to justify my faith in God in my comments above. Instead I have observed that faith works together with reason in the process of understanding the world. I have observed that faith both can and should do this. In that way I have agreed with your comments about the importance of reason and the danger of closing ones eyes to it.

I am not sure what you mean by unjustified, and unforgivably,as if I was concerned with your forgiveness. I believe because God called me and I find that call one of the most interesting things about life. I cannot be absolutely sure that call was not an effect of my own psyche. I understand that is a t possibility but from an objective God or from a dimension of my own awaremenss it remains a puzzling and interesting aspect of my life. I have no inclination to give up such an important dimension of the interest of life merely to enter some sort of a forgivable state.

Perhaps there is some awareness that reason grants that I have closed my eyes to? I don't think so but ? I have spent well over a decade as an atheist. What did I miss that I could not keep a hold of this enlightenment? I was familiar with the arguments you have presented over the past couple of years. You are able to present them well but still they are hardly news.

I would guess that from your point of view your arguments do not need to be new. They justify your view.

[Guest]

All religions are dangerous. They seek to destroy the intellect replacing it with dogma not derived from reason and evidence.

That was your assertion.

My rebuttal. Shintoism has no formal dogma.

[_John Larsen]

All religions are dangerous. They seek to destroy the intellect replacing it with dogma not derived from reason and evidence.

That was your assertion.

My rebuttal. Shintoism has no dogma.

Shinto was the state religion of Japan prior to the end of WWII. Its tenants contributed directly to the rise of Japanese imperialism and the atrocities committed by the Japanese state prior and during the war.

You will have to find a better example.

[_Moniker]

All religions are dangerous. They seek to destroy the intellect replacing it with dogma not derived from reason and evidence.

That was your assertion.

My rebuttal. Shintoism has no dogma.

Shinto was the state religion of Japan prior to the end of WWII. Its tenants contributed directly to the rise of Japanese imperialism and the atrocities committed by the Japanese state prior and during the war.

You will have to find a better example.

No, I don't. The assertion was that DOGMA replaced reason and evidence. There is no formal dogma to Shintoism! The STATE (Emperor ) used Shintoism to unify the nation. When those on this thread are mixing together politics and religion they seem to ignore the politics. Why?

[_EAllusion]

Allusion, to my understanding I have made no attempt to justify my faith in God in my comments above. Instead I have observed that faith works together with reason in the process of understanding the world. I have observed that faith both can and should do this. In that way I have agreed with your comments about the importance of reason and the danger of closing ones eyes to it.

I am not sure what you mean by unjustified, and unforgivably,as if I was concerned with your forgiveness. I believe because God called me and I find that call one of the most interesting things about life. I cannot be absolutely sure that call was not an effect of my own psyche. I understand that is a t possibility but from an objective God or from a dimension of my own awaremenss it remains a puzzling and interesting aspect of my life. I have no inclination to give up such an important dimension of the interest of life merely to enter some sort of a forgivable state.

Perhaps there is some awareness that reason grants that I have closed my eyes to? I don't think so but ? I have spent well over a decade as an atheist. What did I miss that I could not keep a hold of this enlightenment? I was familiar with the arguments you have presented over the past couple of years. You are able to present them well but still they are hardly news.

I would guess that from your point of view your arguments do not need to be new. They justify your view.

I don't think you attempted to justify your faith, however you did give some indication about how you would go about doing so, by likening God to a working hypothesis to explain [x]. I used the term "unforgiveably" recognizing that ideas can have flaws without needed to be scrapped altogether. "The God hypothesis" is not such an approach. Hence it is "unforgiveably" flawed. I think for purposes of this discussion we can bracket whether your faith is a justified thing. All we really need to establish is that holding beliefs in an unsound way is a dangerous activity. From there, it is a short jump to understanding why someone might see religion as dangerous. Why? Because religion or at least the parts that make it necessarily religion like belief in diety, involves unjustified thinking. Kevin called my basic bullet point listing of why unjustified thinking is dangerous "non-sequiter" but then again he has been saying that a lot. Perhaps it's his new phrase after using the term "placebo effect" to explain all manner of things, including stuff that has nothing to do with it. You seemed to agree with the idea, just disputing my conclusions about the justification of your faith. I simply pointed out I find your justification(s) wanting.

[_John Larsen]

All religions are dangerous. They seek to destroy the intellect replacing it with dogma not derived from reason and evidence.

That was your assertion.

My rebuttal. Shintoism has no dogma.

Shinto was the state religion of Japan prior to the end of WWII. Its tenants contributed directly to the rise of Japanese imperialism and the atrocities committed by the Japanese state prior and during the war.

You will have to find a better example.

No, I don't. The assertion was that DOGMA replaced reason and evidence. There is no formal dogma to Shintoism! The STATE (Emperor ) used Shintoism to unify the nation. When those on this thread are mixing together politics and religion they seem to ignore the politics. Why?

I am making no such destination. I am taking religion as a whole. Shinto had a role therefore it is cuplable. What Shinto says it does and doesn't do is irrelevant. What it does and doesn't do is key.

[_Moniker]

Shinto was the state religion of Japan prior to the end of WWII.

This is incorrect, by the way. Shintoism was only the state religion of Japan when it was enforced by the state. Buddhism was also practiced (often times Japanese interspersed these two) before it was made the national religion.

[_Moniker]

All religions are dangerous. They seek to destroy the intellect replacing it with dogma not derived from reason and evidence.

That was your assertion.

My rebuttal. Shintoism has no dogma.

Shinto was the state religion of Japan prior to the end of WWII. Its tenants contributed directly to the rise of Japanese imperialism and the atrocities committed by the Japanese state prior and during the war.

You will have to find a better example.

No, I don't. The assertion was that DOGMA replaced reason and evidence. There is no formal dogma to Shintoism! The STATE (Emperor ) used Shintoism to unify the nation. When those on this thread are mixing together politics and religion they seem to ignore the politics. Why?

I am making no such destination. I am taking religion as a whole. Shinto had a role therefore it is cuplable. What Shinto says it does and doesn't do is irrelevant. What it does and doesn't do is key.

I was replying to JAK's assertion. Not yours. But let's go with it.

What precisely did Shintoism do, then? Or was it that state that did something, John?

What today does Shintoism do? Shintoism reveres nature, does not teach in an afterlife, seeks to honor ancestors, and an emphasis on cleanliness (I blame this with my emphasis on cleanliness:) -- these are a bad thing? Dangerous? Is Japan dangerous? Shintoism is ingrained within the Japanese culture! You can NOT separate the two. Today, is Japan dangerous? Is anyone going to make the argument that the Japanese are less educated than their Western counterparts?

OR is it like the Amish? They're DIFFERENT from us so by God let's cram some Western atheism down their throats?

[_huckelberry]

Allusion, you said "holding beliefs in an unsound way is danerous"

On the face of it I agree. But then maybe we have different ideas of what an unsound way is. If you mean suppressing reason and ignoring evidence then I would agree. If you meant separating faith from real world experience I agree. However if you mean believing nothing untill it becomes proven then I will decline to follow. That smacks too much of a hypercaution squelching the fun of life in service of paranoia.