All religions are dangerous?

[_marg]

Since most religions deal in some way with the supernatural, then of course 'religious dogma' is pretty strongly tied with the supernatural.
But that's because you've included the word religion - NOT dogma.

If you want to talk about supernatural beliefs, then just say supernatural beliefs. Trying to equate supernatural beliefs with 'dogma' as if they are the same thing - clearly muddies the waters in my opinion.

We are in this thread talking about religious dogma. That dogma exists outside of religion is irrelevant. Beliefs in the supernatural outside religion is irrelevant to the main thesis by JAK. That people can be poor critical thinkers, accept claims absent evidence outside religion is irrelevant to the thesis.. And we are not talking in this thread of theism versus atheism. There is no belief system of atheists for which we can say anything about. The only thing we know of atheists is that on the one topic of gods, whatever that god belief entails, all atheists reject the claim. By reject I don' t mean they make a claim ..that those various gods don't exist, rather they don't accept that they do exist.

[_Ren]

We are in this thread talking about religious dogma.

I know the focus is religious dogma marg.
The ONLY reason I bring up non-religious dogma is to try and work out what the hell we mean by dogma.

Let me try it this way. Take these two phrases:

A: Religious 'set of beliefs'.
B: Religious 'dogma'.

Does phrase A mean the same thing as phrase B? In all contexts? Yes or no?
If they don't mean the same thing in all contexts, then what is the difference?

We generally use the word 'dogmatic' to mean something like being stubborn about our beliefs. Not being willing to challenge them against counter-evidence. If the two phrases above don't mean anything different, then why do we use the word 'dogmatic' in the way we do?

I'm sorry if I am sounding impatient, but I just don't understand this dancing around the word 'dogma'. I've never related to it the way some of you seem to...

[_marg]

As far as religions that don't emphasise the supernatural, certain forms of Buddhism come to mind. But of course - in general - religion is associated with the supernatural. I'm not denying that and as far as I can see, no-one else is.

What are you trying to get at?

As far as Buddhism goes according to the def'n I gave previously Buddhism falls within the def'n ..as there is a mythological supernatural story of Buddha's birth which has evolved. You see RoP religions develop/evolve over time. And main characters in them typically take on supernatural qualities. It is pretty much a defining characteristic of all religions that some supernatural element is involved. If there isn't some sort of supernatural mythological story we end up with a communication system which is philosophical. And many argue such systems are not religious. Personally I don't know much about particulars of various religions. Whatever religion you were going to tell me I was going to look into to see if it was regarded as a religion and why.

The thing is RoP JAK brought up the word "religion" and said that they seek to promote claims absent evidence. Did you ask JAK what his definition of religion is? Do you think he was referring to a philosophical communication system which promotes only rational, non supernatural explanation of the universe? I certainly didn't. He used the word "dogma". In my (uneducated) opinion that word has evolved. I think there is a essence in the meaning of "dogma" as it relates to religion which is applicable to all uses of it. And then I think there are more technical restrictive uses which are implied by the context in which the word is used. So if one is talking about dogma of Catholicism which claim that their dogma is authoritative then the word "dogma" in the context of words talking about that Catholicism would be a particular restrictive/technical interpretation. If we are talking about all religions in the world then a broader scope of meaning would be more applicable and only the essence of the word in which it could apply to all religions should be assumed. (this will probably be my last post for tonight)

[_marg]

Last post tonight

Let me try it this way. Take these two phrases:

A: Religious 'set of beliefs'.
B: Religious 'dogma'.

Does phrase A mean the same thing as phrase B? In all contexts? Yes or no?
If they don't mean the same thing in all contexts, then what is the difference?

I think dogma is beliefs/teachings communicated to be accepted even though no proof is given, nor intended to ever be given . I think a religious set of beliefs may have evidence. i.e. "J.Smith used a seer stone to dictate to a scribe the Book of Mormon". But frankly I have a hard time coming up with religious beliefs for which evidence is given and the supernatural isn't involved (and that is why i asked if you had any examples.) I don't have a religious mindset, nor a great deal of knowledge on religions.

We generally use the word 'dogmatic' to mean something like being stubborn about our beliefs. Not being willing to challenge them against counter-evidence. If the two phrases above don't mean anything different, then why do we use the word 'dogmatic' in the way we do?

Because words evolve. Dogmatic came after created use of "dogma" which originally applied to religion. Dogmatic outside religion has a different context.. In our culture in the english language more often than not we think of "dogma" in the context of authoritative religions such as Catholicism, which in that context is slow to change and one reason is that it is not reliant upon evidence.

I'm sorry if I am sounding impatient, but I just don't understand this dancing around the word 'dogma'. I've never related to it the way some of you seem to...

I've never given the word "dogma" much thought. And I feel I have a better appreciation of that word at this point than previously. JAK's statement was brought to this thread by Kevin, who I gather must have disagreed with it. But no one asked JAK what he meant by the word "religion". The entire focus was on discrediting his thesis. Assumptions were incorrectly made that he was referring to God beliefs essentially and comparing theism with atheism. Assumptions were made he was talking about all religious individuals and that all religious individuals must be poor critical thinkers about everything they think about. And that was a misinterpretation. Instead of people in this thread being interesting in an intellectually honest discussion, they were focussing on nit picking, attacking JAK's integrity, continually misrepresenting his words and the actually argument/thesis itself. I asked him about how he was using the word "dogma" and he gave a def'n from an American dictionary which was more inclusive than how you are interpreting dogma to mean. You are using a technical restrictive use of it that applies to western authoritarian religions. Unless JAK accepts that definition as part of his thesis you can't force it onto him. In an intellectually honest discussion you first find out what the person means.

(And by the way the way I just want to say one thing here for those who have referred to JAK as plagiarizing (not you). Plagiarizing is someone who fraudulently submits work not their own. When one presents factual information from established encyclopedias, common factual available knowledge to all, and it's obvious that it is not meant to be one's own creative work, that is not plagiarzing. It is not important on message boards to cite the source of factual information as if any questions the facts they can then ask) I hope people here understand the difference between factual commonly available information versus expressing one's own opinions.)

[_Ren]

marg,

As far as Buddhism and the supernatural, I'm sure what you are saying is perfectly fair. I'm just gonna link here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_in_Buddhism

and quote this section:

Buddhism is a way of life which does not hinge upon the concept of a Creator God but depends upon the practice of the Eightfold Path which includes contemplation. In Theravada and Mahayana Buddhism, however, veneration and worship of all Buddhas, as the transmitters and embodiments of Dharma and its blessings, is highly significant and is seen as extremely important for spiritual development. While Buddhism does not deny the existence of supernatural beings (e.g., the devas, of which many are discussed in Buddhist scripture, and indeed the Buddhas themselves, whose powers are of a supernatural calibre), it does not ascribe power, in the typical Western sense, for creation, salvation or judgment to the "gods". They are regarded as having the power to affect worldly events and so some Buddhist schools associate with them via ritual. All unenlightened supernatural beings are caught in samsara, the ongoing cycle of death and subsequent rebirth.

I'm sure it's fair to say all forms of Buddhism have 'some' element of supernatural belief 'somewhere' in there -I agree. I could go into how I personally see quite a distinction in the way Buddhism approaches this 'very light' supernatural element, and how the way of life is FAR more central than any supernatural claims - but I'm not really that interested in doing that.

...the reason is that the technicality of whether all religious have 'some form' of 'supernatural' beliefs as their distinguishing feature has never had anything to do (for me) with the discussion of what the term 'religious dogma' actually means. Although I can respect that it appears to have been relavent to you...

I'm quite happy to go forward with the idea of religion being where all religions have at least 'some' element of the supernatural in their concepts. I've got no problem with moving forward with that agreement...

Did you ask JAK what his definition of religion is?

Look - I've been doing nothing else in several posts but trying to tie down exactly what the words involved in this discussion actually mean. When I make posts like 'Let's define what religion actually is...' - that means: 'Reply and tell me what you think'.

That is exactly what I have been doing for the past few posts. I've said very clearly: "OK - forget what I think it means. You tell me specifically what you mean.."

In my (uneducated) opinion that word has evolved.

Yes. I'm sure a lot of this confusion is about the evolution of words, and people seeing different things in the same word.

I think dogma is beliefs/teachings communicated to be accepted even though no proof is given, nor intended to ever be given .

Right. Well, lets first of all acknowledge that the definition you just gave doesn't exist in the list of definitions that Jersey Girl referenced when talking to Moniker.
I don't mean that as an accusation. The definition you used CAN be found under the WordNet section on that same web definition reference. i.e.:

dogma

noun
1. a religious doctrine that is proclaimed as true without proof
2. a doctrine or code of beliefs accepted as authoritative; "he believed all the Marxist dogma"

I accept your use of it is a valid definition. But it goes to demonstrate even more clearly how much confusion there is flying around this entire debate about this damn word.

Which is why I said earlier:

"Where reason and evidence are turned aside in favor of dogma and claim absent evidence, danger prevails.”

...might want to get reworded to...

"Where reason and evidence are turned aside in favor of beliefs that are absent evidence, danger prevails.”

Would you agree? If dogma is taken by both you and JAK to mean beliefs without evidence, why not just remove the word 'dogma' from the thesis and save ourselves another 10 pages of head-banging?! I'm sure I could have made more effort to find out exactly what JAK meant by 'dogma'. I think ALL sides could have been a bit more interested in what the other side meant with the words they were using.
But now that we see the clear problem, can we not agree that - the way JAK and yourself are using it - it would be clearer to just take the darn word out of the equation, and just say 'beliefs without decent evidence'? Because THAT would be clearer to everybody - and could have made half the pages in this thread disappear instantly!

In the interests of clear communication, can we ditch the word 'dogma', and just say 'beliefs without any / sufficient / decent evidence'?
Please?


As far as how this thread got 'personal', I've carefully looked over the thread - right from the start. And I've got my OWN opinion on WHO turned things 'personal' between two of the people involved in this. And I'll happily go a few rounds with anybody over that. (I'm not saying all blame overall is only on one side...)
But I'm not interested in derailing the thread over it either. Maybe we should have an entirely new thread to try and dis-tangle 'blame' in this one - I have no idea. But I certainly don't want to keep looking back in this thread. I either wanna move forward with the discussion, or lets pick up the ball and go home.

[_Moniker]

Marg already said dogma in Christianity is a belief in Christ.

Just a quick note. What I said was according to Prof. Oden an accepted def'n of religion is that all religions must have supernatural beings as part of the mythology or communication system. Shintoism fits within that definition. If all religions have supernatural being mythology then at a minimum all religions communicate dogma of supernatural being mythology. I don't think the word "dogma" entails that all who participate in that communication system/religious group believe all the stories relating to the supernatural beings. Dogma in religion is not restricted to only the supernatural. I don't think the word "dogma" relating to religion entails all participants of a system must believe it all. I don't think that is an essence in the meaning of the word "dogma".

Hi, Marg. Did you read into my "Christianity is a belief in Christ" remark that I thought a Christian must believe the entire kit-n-kaboode? You earlier mentioned a core concept. I thought we'd agreed earlier on. Can you be a Christian and not believe in Christ? That's a pretty simple question that I've asked multiple times and no one wants to answer. You were the first to ask it.

There has been talk of essentials, core, etc... Even JAK supplied his source (wiki) in his last post that pretty much reiterated what I thought we'd pretty much all agreed on. I've never suggested that those in a religion MUST accept everything -- yet, there ARE certain "core" essential beliefs in MOST religions that define the religion.

Marg wrote earlier in the thread. I saved the quote and if need be I'll go through and find the post.

I.e. if the core feature of Christian is Christ and that Christ is divine then is someone doesn't believe Christ existed and/or they don't believe that Christ was divine could they possible be considered Christian even if they claimed to be Christian and liked what they viewed as a mythical character in the N.T.

We've gone back and forth with "core". Earlier there was an emphasis on the Japanese being the descendent's of Kami and that this was a "core" or essential. I explained how this can be dismissed and is not essential. If we want to think of dogma as being "essential" or "core" elements of the religion that MUST be believed I think they're pretty easy to come up with in MOST religions. This is lacking in Shintoism.

In most religions there is something you MUST believe. One deity usually. That Shinto has no omnipotent being, has mythology that is not essential (can be replaced or intertwined with other mythology) makes it lack anything one MUST believe in to be a practitioner.

[_Moniker]

(And by the way the way I just want to say one thing here for those who have referred to JAK as plagiarizing (not you). Plagiarizing is someone who fraudulently submits work not their own. When one presents factual information from established encyclopedias, common factual available knowledge to all, and it's obvious that it is not meant to be one's own creative work, that is not plagiarizing. It is not important on message boards to cite the source of factual information as if any questions the facts they can then ask) I hope people here understand the difference between factual commonly available information versus expressing one's own opinions.)

Marg, the information was not factual. I refuted it before I noticed that it wasn't his own work. Only after he called me "disingenuous", questioned whether I am "truthful", and said I "insult my own intelligence" did I use the world plagiarism. There is such a thing as web plagiarism, and I've repeatedly said I don't care where it came from, I did care that it wasn't factual and my first response to it was to correct the information. Also how were we to know that it was not meant to be his own creative work? There is no doubt I would fail a course if I used words straight from an encyclopedia and didn't credit the source -- no doubt at all!

It is not common knowledge as he was stating something that most everyone else on this thread didn't know -- and was in fact incorrect in a few instances. If he said "George Bush is blah blah blah" that would be common knowledge. He was inserting new information into this thread that was not known as "common knowledge" by those participating in this thread. That it can be found in a variety of places does not make it common knowledge. He took more than one paragraph and it was pretty much word for word and does not fit that it was common knowledge unless those reading this thread already were well versed in Shintoism -- and if they were well versed they would have seen that it was indeed not factual.

http://www.indiana.edu/~wts/pamphlets/plagiarism.shtml

http://www.plagiarism.org/learning_cent ... arism.html

To even copy from an online encyclopedia or other hard encyclopedia (did JAK sit in front of his computer with his encyclopedia open and transcribe the page? -- Why?) is plagiarism.

Yet, he didn't just present the facts, it was pretty much a word for word copy -- that is plagiarism. If he had read the entry (from wherever it came from) and used his own words that is not plagiarism. I don't care that he did it. I was being retaliatory in nature after he especially said I was "ignorant". With the multiple insults JAK threw at me I still refrained from calling him names that insulted his intelligence.

I asked him to cite his source. That is all at first. That is not out of bounds. Then he came back in with a few responses that were over the top. Yet, no one apparently cares that this man must resort to the things he's said to me. I wonder why that is? Seriously! :)

[_Ren]

Alright - I said I wasn't gonna get into 'looking back' on this thread.
I lied. (Although I still think we should be splitting this off, but anyway).

First off:

Only after he called me "disingenuous", questioned whether I am "truthful", and said I "insult my own intelligence"...

To see all that, go directly to this post:
http://mormondiscussions.com/discuss/vi ... 530#127530
It's all there - in black and white. That post is out of order. It wasn't deserved, and I'll go twelve rounds with anybody who disagrees.


Secondly marg, there is nothing wrong with stating common knowledge 'in your own words'. But when you are using words directly from a source other than yourself, you should make that clear. With a 'quote', or some other indication.
Who cares what you call it? Isn't that just how it is? I've never dreamed of doing anything else...

[_marg]

This is one night I'm having difficulty sleeping but I certainly am not going to reply to a whole post and get too involved. I see Moniker has posted but I'm just not going to get involved right now.

Would you agree? If dogma is taken by both you and JAK to mean beliefs without evidence, why not just remove the word 'dogma' from the thesis and save ourselves another 10 pages of head-banging?!

I see a difference between dogma and claim absent evidence, they can be the same but not necessarily. And particularly in the context of JAK's statement I assume he meant a difference. A person who makes a claim absent evidence may eventually plan to present evidence or may think there is evidence, it is important to the claim but hasn't determined or found it yet. The person or group doesn't necessarily think evidence is not relevant or important to the claim. Dogma is according to JAK's def'n usually authoritative but not always, it is a teaching claimed, but there is no concern for evidence or intent to ever supply evidence. It is just put out there, that's it, end of discussion because evidence is not relevant or considered important to the claim.

[_marg]

Secondly marg, there is nothing wrong with stating common knowledge 'in your own words'. But when you are using words directly from a source other than yourself, you should make that clear. With a 'quote', or some other indication.
Who cares what you call it? Isn't that just how it is? I've never dreamed of doing anything else...

And I'd never dream in a discussion on a message board of telling someone they plagiarized simply because they didn't cite where the factual information came from. As I said to plagiarize involves fraud, a deliberate disingenuous attempt to pass off the words one writes as one's own. It is an attack on a person's integrity. Note the word disingenuous. There is good reason why professional writers should cite, good reason why students in essays should cite. Because in cases such as these they are getting credit and or getting paid for work assumed their own. On message boards in discussion the focus should be on substance not credit, no one is getting paid. Had JAK presented an opinion, his own creative work and it was someone else's then I'd think that was disingenuous. But it is of no value or importance to have common knowledge from encyclopedia's cited on MB's. You need appreciate the big picture and why/reasons for doing things.