religious knowledge (of Dart)

[_Tarski]

I have heard many instances of knowledge that religion is supposed to supply us with including what rituals we should perform, that there are devils and angels and the reality of certain miraculous events.

But, somehow I don't think this is what Dart has in mind.
So my question is this:
What information, knowledge or facts about the world is available by specifical religious means that is not available to the nonreligious and is not accounted for without religious or supernatural assumptions.

In short, what is the content and how shall it be separated, in a principled way, from other religious claims which Dart perhaps doubts (like demon possession, Kolob, Heavenly Mother, etc.)
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[_Some Schmo]

I know there’s a god. I don’t know how I know, I can’t prove that I know, but I know. It must drive you crazy that I know and that others can know without knowing how they know, can’t show you how I know but I know that I know. You just don’t know how I know and you’ll never know; this much I know.

I say these things in the name of cheese and rice, amen.

[_Chap]

Mr Schmo sets us all right, says Aunt Betsey.

[_dartagnan]

I was hoping to have a serious, perhaps celestial discussion, mainly because I knew it would get polluted with the usual sideshow antics. But here goes...

This might come as a disappointment, but I do not have any religious claims to make aside from my belief that a God exists. Why should I feel obligated to go beyond the evidence? I've said this on other occassions, and it seems to frustrate many an atheist. I'm not sure why. Maybe it is because they had certain straw men set in their minds, and my lack of relgious convictions took the wind out of their sails. I've never once tried to convert anyone here to any particular religion, quite simply because I myself don't belong to one.

What information, knowledge or facts about the world is available by specifical religious means that is not available to the nonreligious and is not accounted for without religious or supernatural assumptions.

Well, I am not sure what you mean by religious "means." I'm not particularly religious. I don't attend a Church. I don't read scriptures. I don't even pray anymore, really. But wil try to touch on some of the things that has convinced me God exists.

I do believe a God has been providing "revelation" to humans throughout history. By revelation I mean knowledge of his/her/its existence and a sense of purpose in the world. Religious people tend to cling to religon becase it makes them happier. And generally speaking, they are happier because of it. The problem is that with religion comes the negatives of any organized system of belief; authority, dogma, ritual, social outcasting, loyalty, obligation, blind devotion, degrees of control, etc.

I think I understand scriptures well enough to accept them for what they are. None of them are infallible. The people who wrote these books were just men trying to make sense of their own religious experiences in print. Most of the content is fluffy literature written for purposes that have nothing to do with our times. I believe the existence of modern religions is the natural result of humans trying to make sense of God's existence in a systematic manner over the course of several thousand years. It could be that one of them is true and the rest false, but I think it more likely that all of them have truths and all of them also have falsehoods and none of them is the "one" true Church. The one thing they have in common is the premise that got them started to begin with; a knowledge that something greater than themselves exists and it/he/she is responsible for our present reality.

As far as what religion gives us that atheism can't, well that would be coming off as presumptuous so I prefer to just look at history to note what it has given us that atheism didn't. It is easy to say moral systems can exist without religon, but the simple fact is most of our modern moral principles derive from ancient religion. I've heard some atheist refer to the Greeks who had their own system similar to Utilitarianism, but in Greek culture humans were not equal and it was considered moral for men to sexually molest boys who they would repay with intellectual wisdom. It is hard to see how the universal standard today, that all human life is sacred and created equal, could have been implemented without a religious basis. There is certainly no reason to think science could have given us this moral principle. In fact science gave us Darwinism and Eugenics which tells us we are not equal. It tells us we're nothing special at all. We're just animals who evolved a different way. Our sense of purpose and sense of morality is just a delusion we created for ourselves. Even our consciousness is a delusion. Survival of the fittest. Eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die. You get the point. I find atheism to be a miserable alternative, and my interactions with atheists have done nothing to change that perception. Not because I am fearful of a nonexistent hell or look forward to rewards, but because I cannot ignore my own religious experiences and blow them off as delusion. And then there is also the matter of teleological evidence that no atheist has been able to address. Dawkins tried, but failed miserably. How does science explain the common values of the universal constants? Why are they as they are? How did religion know the answers to these questions thousands of years before science figured them out? The earth turns out to be central to the universe after all, the universe turns out to have been created after all, etc. These ancient writers were clearly correct on these issues, so I can only explain it as evidence that they also received revelation from God. These arguments proved persuasive to many atheists, including one career atheist Antony Flew. So it is simply false to assume religous people are always religious based on "unjustified belief." There are reasons, even if you don't accept them.

I'm reluctant to get into the morality argument that you raised becase it always gets misunderstood, but I think a decent case can be made. Why do humans act altruistically? The act flies in the face of Darwinism. There is simply no evolutionary advantage or benefit to its practice, and yet we do so because we have a very different sense of morality than the rest of creation. Where does it come from? Is it one of the poorly understood laws of the universe like gravity?

In short, what is the content and how shall it be separated, in a principled way, from other religious claims which Dart perhaps doubts (like demon possession, Kolob, Heavenly Mother, etc.)

In short, science tells us what things are, and how they operate, whereas religion expains why they are. Not so much in scientific explanations but in manner that makes sense to most humans and provides them with a sense of happiness.

The content you refer to, well that varies in degree with each person, according to his or her religious experiences. Again, if you're expecting me to offer a systematic religion according to Kevin, well you're going to be disappointed. For me it is enough to know God exists and to know I am a unique and central species in his/her/its creation. But I am just starting this journey, so I suspect there will be more to come.

[_Chap]

It seems that dartagnan is reluctant to enunciate any religious propositions, except perhaps for the following.

(a) There is an entity that dartagnan calls "God". The only specification given for the nature of this entity is that " it/he/she is responsible for our present reality".

(b) This entity has, during the period for which we have some historical information, been trying to tell the human race "of his/her/its existence and [to give them] a sense of purpose in the world".

(c) Morality is derivative from the religions based on claims for the existence of one or more of the entities referred to in (a) (we might call them "theistic" religions; there are others of course), to whose alleged revelations dartagnan refers in (b). We would not have morality without them.

(d) The argument from design is part of the case for belief in the entity referred to in (a).

How does religion differ from and (it is claimed) complement science?

In short, science tells us what things are, and how they operate, whereas religion expains why they are. Not so much in scientific explanations but in manner that makes sense to most humans and provides them with a sense of happiness.

Have I got that more or less right?

There is one bit of dartagnan's writing that I cannot seem to grasp the sense of:

How does science explain the common values of the universal constants? Why are they as they are? How did religion know the answers to these questions thousands of years before science figured them out? The earth turns out to be central to the universe after all, the universe turns out to have been created after all, etc. These ancient writers were clearly correct on these issues, so I can only explain it as evidence that they also received revelation from God.

Is he saying here that "ancient writers' explained the values of universal constants (of physics, presumably - things like Planck's constant, the value of the universal gravitational constant, and so on) thousands of years ago? Since dartagnan plainly cannot be claiming that (e.g.) Plato had a discussion of the value of e/m in the Timaeus, what does he mean?

[Edited to add:] And what about those "ancient writers" who gave an account of the universe as not being created? Don't they count in determining whether revelation on that point was or was not given?

[_Some Schmo]

How does science explain the common values of the universal constants? Why are they as they are? How did religion know the answers to these questions thousands of years before science figured them out? The earth turns out to be central to the universe after all, the universe turns out to have been created after all, etc. These ancient writers were clearly correct on these issues, so I can only explain it as evidence that they also received revelation from God.

Is he saying here that "ancient writers' explained the values of universal constants (of physics, presumably - things like Planck's constant, the value of the universal gravitational constant, and so on) thousands of years ago? Since dartagnan plainly cannot be claiming that (e.g.) Plato had a discussion of the value of e/m in the Timaeus, what does he mean?

Yeah, that's more than a bit absurd. Religion knew, for instance, that the nature of gravity was such that things with mass, given the correct distance and speed, would rotate around other things with mass? Funny, given they thought the Earth was stationary, that the sun was doing to rotating, and that all the planets were also rotating around the Earth in little spirals.

And this idea that the Earth is central to the universe? I just about fell off my chair laughing at that one. I'd love to know how that one was proven (given it's not even true. The Earth is rotating around a star which is on one of the outermost spirals of the Milky Way. It's not even in the center of its galaxy, let alone the universe). What are you... a Neanderthal?

And then he drops the bomb of all bombs, which is that, "the universe turns out to have been created after all" and "These ancient writers were clearly correct on these issues..." Um... no, they clearly didn't know what the hell they were talking about, as dart clearly doesn't.

Circular reasoning, anyone?

[_Chap]

Here's another bit of dartagnan from the old thread, which should perhaps be added to the evidence given here about his religious position:

... we know from science that these laws [of science] were written by a law giver.

I can't remember being taught the truth of that proposition when I studied science. Different syllabus from dartagnan's, no doubt.

[_EAllusion]

It varies a lot, but Greek thought is probably best associated with virtue ethics, not utilitarianism. Thomas Aquinas was a virtue ethicist as a consequence of his efforts to understand Christian thought in terms of Aristotelian philosophy.

[_Calculus Crusader]

... we know from science that these laws [of science] were written by a law giver.

I can't remember being taught the truth of that proposition when I studied science. Different syllabus from dartagnan's, no doubt.

Kevin stands in good company with his statement. The majority of truly great scientists would agree with him.

[_JohnStuartMill]

It varies a lot, but Greek thought is probably best associated with virtue ethics, not utilitarianism. Thomas Aquinas was a virtue ethicist as a consequence of his efforts to understand Christian thought in terms of Aristotelian philosophy.

You gotta remember that Greek thought was pretty diverse, too. Epicureanism isn't a far cry from utilitarianism, for example.