Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Tusitala · 06-11-2002, 02:28 PM

Let's pretend for a moment!

What sort of a world would we have? Would it be better or worse?

How did humanity get along without it?

The bible seems to have governance over so many peoples' lives; is my life worthless without it? NO!!

It always pissed me off when one society saw fit to impose their GOD values on another society that was functioning well enough without needing to be 'saved'.

Xians, Moslems etc. do not hold the mortgage on morality. Extreme altruism and selfishness (read good and evil) have always existed. The majority of humanity continues to be somewhere in the middle - shall we call it sociably conscious?

When we exhibit an act of selfishness (sin),we may feel guilty. Religions prey upon these guilty feelings. Heaven is a pretend afterlife because none of us want to die; and we can put up with all the shitty things life can throw at us if someone promises us we'll get to go to 'Heaven'.
Religions recognise human frailty and offer to wipe the slate clean - if we do some sort of penance. Heaven is the carrot and hell is the stick.

In my view, teaching what makes us tick as human beings is far more important than learning to quote passages from a document written by some men that may or may not be moralistic in nature.

There you have it......end of rant.

Cheers,
Tusi

Born Free · 06-11-2002, 02:34 PM

And a damned good rant it was too!!

Perchance · 06-11-2002, 02:52 PM

To be picky...

Why is selfishness a sin? Or are you borrowing religious language because you're talking about religious concepts?

Or by "selfish" do you mean not just self-interested behavior, but self-interested behavior that actively harms or is at the expense of someone else?

Just wondering.

-Perchance.

Methos · 06-11-2002, 03:14 PM

If the Bible never existed, then Xianity would never have existed. If Xianity never existed, then it would never have wiped out the pagan religions of the Roman Empire. Quite possibly Mithraism would have emerged as a dominant religion in the region and eventually the world. People might be selling merchandise that says WWMD? = What Would Mithras Do? Or, some other pagan mystery religion would have taken root with the general public.

Eric

AdamWho · 06-11-2002, 03:28 PM

All the same things would have happened becuase people would still be people.

Tusitala · 06-11-2002, 03:40 PM

Perchance:

Quote:

Or by "selfish" do you mean not just self-interested behavior, but self-interested behavior that actively harms or is at the expense of someone else?

Yeah, I guess I meant it in that sense - i.e. detrimental to other members of society. A criminal would be an example of an extreme selfish individual.

Tusi

ashibaka · 06-11-2002, 04:36 PM

To answer your question, I will quote from the holy writ called Cosmos.

Quote:

Accurate numbers are difficult to estimate, but it seems probable that the Library [of Alexandria] contained half a million volumes, each a handwritten papyrus scroll. What happened to all those books? The classical civilization that created them disintegrated, and the library itself was deliberately destroyed. Only a small fraction of its works survived, along with few pathetic scattered fragments. And how tantalizing those bits and pieces are! We know, for example, that there was on the library shelves a book by the astronomer Aristarchus of Samos, who argued that the Earth is one of the planets, which like them orbits the Sun, and that the stars are enormously far away. Each of these conclusions is entirely correct, but we had to wait nearly two thousand years for their rediscovery.If we multiply by a hundred thousand our sense of loss for this work of Aristarchus, we begin to appreciate the grandeur of the achievement of classical civilization and the tragedy of its destruction.

Sagan elaborates on this somewhere else, but I couldn't find the exact passage.

lpetrich · 06-11-2002, 05:09 PM

As to what would have happened if the Abrahamic religions had never existed, I think that the religious pluralism of the Roman Empire would have continued, without some supposed One True Faith emerging and trying to destroy all the others.

Religious pluralism has existed for centuries in India, China, and Japan, and it had existed for centuries in the Mediterranean Basin before the Christian takeover, as it might be called.

To be sure, most of these places had had official state religions and ideologies, but these had never excluded others, and these were often open-ended. Worshipping the official gods of the Roman Empire never excluded the worship of other deities.

I'm sure that life would be a lot easier for us skeptics and agnostics and atheists, at least if one judges from the skepticism that people sometimes freely expressed in the Greco-Roman world. And also India and China.

Thor Q. Mada · 06-11-2002, 05:28 PM

If those backward idiotic Abrahamic religions wouldn't have existed the world would have been a better place. Science would have been far more advanced and the Roman empire wouldn't have collapse so early.
But the best system doesn't always win.
I still fail to see the attraction of a ridgid one god system as compared to the multi cultural, multi religious Roman system of let it be.
These zealots had nothing to offer but misery. (and still don't).
OK, the Roman empire wasn't exactly a kindergarden neither, but still.
And yes, somebody wrote that people will be people, but everything would have been better than the mess we are in now.

Perchance · 06-12-2002, 06:13 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Tusitala:
<strong>Perchance:

Yeah, I guess I meant it in that sense - i.e. detrimental to other members of society. A criminal would be an example of an extreme selfish individual.

Tusi</strong>

I see.

But, here comes another question (and you knew there would be one

).

Why use the word "sin" if it is a crime? "Sin" seems to imply that there is some kind of higher power or higher principle in the world whose rules the sinner is knowingly violating. It has darker and deeper connotations than crime.

Do you think there are objective moral laws that anyone can obey or violate, just not divinely inspired ones? Or is it possible to "sin" against humanity?

-Perchance.

06-11-2002, 02:28 PM	#1
Tusitala Regular Member Join Date: Oct 2001 Location: Tauranga, New Zealand Posts: 156	What would have happened if the Bible never existed? Let's pretend for a moment! What sort of a world would we have? Would it be better or worse? How did humanity get along without it? The bible seems to have governance over so many peoples' lives; is my life worthless without it? NO!! It always pissed me off when one society saw fit to impose their GOD values on another society that was functioning well enough without needing to be 'saved'. Xians, Moslems etc. do not hold the mortgage on morality. Extreme altruism and selfishness (read good and evil) have always existed. The majority of humanity continues to be somewhere in the middle - shall we call it sociably conscious? When we exhibit an act of selfishness (sin),we may feel guilty. Religions prey upon these guilty feelings. Heaven is a pretend afterlife because none of us want to die; and we can put up with all the shitty things life can throw at us if someone promises us we'll get to go to 'Heaven'. Religions recognise human frailty and offer to wipe the slate clean - if we do some sort of penance. Heaven is the carrot and hell is the stick. In my view, teaching what makes us tick as human beings is far more important than learning to quote passages from a document written by some men that may or may not be moralistic in nature. There you have it......end of rant. Cheers, Tusi

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06-11-2002, 02:34 PM	#2
Born Free Veteran Member Join Date: Jun 2001 Location: Scotland Posts: 4,177	And a damned good rant it was too!!

06-11-2002, 02:52 PM	#3
Perchance Veteran Member Join Date: May 2002 Location: Kentucky Posts: 1,059	To be picky... Why is selfishness a sin? Or are you borrowing religious language because you're talking about religious concepts? Or by "selfish" do you mean not just self-interested behavior, but self-interested behavior that actively harms or is at the expense of someone else? Just wondering. -Perchance.

06-11-2002, 03:14 PM	#4
Methos Junior Member Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: Southern California Posts: 45	If the Bible never existed, then Xianity would never have existed. If Xianity never existed, then it would never have wiped out the pagan religions of the Roman Empire. Quite possibly Mithraism would have emerged as a dominant religion in the region and eventually the world. People might be selling merchandise that says WWMD? = What Would Mithras Do? Or, some other pagan mystery religion would have taken root with the general public. Eric

06-11-2002, 03:28 PM	#5
AdamWho Contributor Join Date: May 2001 Location: San Jose, CA Posts: 13,389	All the same things would have happened becuase people would still be people.

06-11-2002, 05:09 PM	#8
lpetrich Contributor Join Date: Jul 2000 Location: Lebanon, OR, USA Posts: 16,829	As to what would have happened if the Abrahamic religions had never existed, I think that the religious pluralism of the Roman Empire would have continued, without some supposed One True Faith emerging and trying to destroy all the others. Religious pluralism has existed for centuries in India, China, and Japan, and it had existed for centuries in the Mediterranean Basin before the Christian takeover, as it might be called. To be sure, most of these places had had official state religions and ideologies, but these had never excluded others, and these were often open-ended. Worshipping the official gods of the Roman Empire never excluded the worship of other deities. I'm sure that life would be a lot easier for us skeptics and agnostics and atheists, at least if one judges from the skepticism that people sometimes freely expressed in the Greco-Roman world. And also India and China.

06-11-2002, 05:28 PM	#9
Thor Q. Mada Veteran Member Join Date: Sep 2001 Location: Asia Posts: 3,558	If those backward idiotic Abrahamic religions wouldn't have existed the world would have been a better place. Science would have been far more advanced and the Roman empire wouldn't have collapse so early. But the best system doesn't always win. I still fail to see the attraction of a ridgid one god system as compared to the multi cultural, multi religious Roman system of let it be. These zealots had nothing to offer but misery. (and still don't). OK, the Roman empire wasn't exactly a kindergarden neither, but still. And yes, somebody wrote that people will be people, but everything would have been better than the mess we are in now.

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