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Atheist claims science more dangerous than religion

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posted on Apr, 13 2012 @ 05:22 PM
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Religion wants things to stay the same. Science wants things to change. There's only a problem when religious types get their mitts on a tool or weapon created by science and use it to try and bend other people to their will. "Science" may create a bomb to find out how explosives work, but it's not going to be motivated to drop it on anybody.



posted on Apr, 13 2012 @ 05:22 PM
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lol

Knowledge is power. Science is not in itself dangerous. The idea of using science for nefarious reasons is.

People are dangerous.

Religion is another story entirely. It requires you to believe in something, without any proof of existance and then live your life according to those principles. Which were put in place 3000 plus years ago, ( for mainstream religions) and have no actual value in a 21st century society.

Organized religion that is. Personal religion never hurt anybody.

In any case I'd rather put my faith in science and the discoveries of the future than a single parent who writes books from the sky.

~Tenth



posted on Apr, 13 2012 @ 05:27 PM
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Originally posted by randomname
if you claim religion is for the week-minded, then atheism is for cowards.

it takes a strong mind and will to stand with God in this world. the complete opposite of a week mind. many, many people fail everyday at this.

but to run away and hide amongst the enemies of God so they leave you alone is the definition of week mindedness not to mention cowardness.

science proves God existence every day. just look at a strand of dna, or the laws of physics, or the universe, and say with a straight face it was all random or chaotic.
.
if anything, this world proves nothing happens by itself out of the blue. and since we, humans did not create the universe, or gravity, or mass, or energy, someone did.

we call that person God. and God spoke to man in its infancy and thru out our existence, guiding us.

we call those experiences religion.



Please accept my apology. I meant weak-minded, not the week-minded. Forgiven?



posted on Apr, 13 2012 @ 05:33 PM
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Originally posted by satron
reply to post by snowspirit
 


What if we get hit by a kill shot from an asteroid. Mankind's fault because they sinned?


No one's fault. Just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

It would be good if science could get us out of that situation, maybe someday it will.
Both good and bad come from both science and religion.



posted on Apr, 13 2012 @ 05:47 PM
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I said only recently something very similar.

In terms of sheer numbers of deaths religion and science are at the very least equal, if not science winning for numbers of persons killed because of it.

My thinking on the topic is this; religion is a beautiful thing, with excellent moral codes when understood properly and in proper context. Men for millennium have been twisting religion in effort to control men for their objectives of power and wealth.

Science can also be a wonderful tool when understood properly and used according to its proper context. Men here also, have been using the advances of science to obtain their objectives of power and wealth.


The two common here, and the thing that kills people, is men misusing something for their objectives of power and wealth.

Take away our concept of power and wealth, and you have a peaceful world.

The only group of humans on this earth who ever successfully lived with one another without the concept of power and wealth were Native Americans, they lived as a community in the best of Islamic values, how they lived as a community is how we are taught to live one with another. Wealth should mean nothing, material goods should mean nothing outside of necessity, community should mean a great deal, and the common good is everyone's needs cared for and everyone works toward that common good. Once that is cared for you have the time for some nice things, but a more down to earth natural type of enjoyment. Not pumping your bodies full of toxins but enjoying life itself through art, through nature, through family.

They way I see it, if they could do it, live without materialism or a desire for power and control, devoid of need of accumulative wealth, with care for others of their community, then why cant we? This is what we are taught, this is how we are taught to live among one another in our religions.. and this mentality is the only thing that will save us from us.

It is not science, it is not religion, it is us. It was this day religion was trying to warn us of, and warned us how to avoid. It is we who never once listened.

Until we loose this incessant need for power and wealth, we will kill each other off, and forsaking religion is not going to stop it, neither will forsaking science.

It has always been us.



edit on 13-4-2012 by Jameela because: (no reason given)



posted on Apr, 13 2012 @ 05:59 PM
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reply to post by jiggerj
 


I addressed the scenario of global catastrophe in a part of my post that you did not quote. Yes it is a possibility. But it remains to be seen, so up until now, the premise is unsupported.

Or you can also say, the premise is ill defined. How exactly do you define "dangerous"?.If by dangerous you mean life threatening, I would say the opposite it true.



posted on Apr, 13 2012 @ 05:59 PM
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Originally posted by Jameela
You must have read what I wrote elsewhere on this forum

The only group of humans on this earth who ever successfully lived with one another without the concept of power and wealth were Native Americans,
edit on 13-4-2012 by Jameela because: (no reason given)


Nope, never read what you wrote elsewhere. As for the Indians I had to do a quick google, for surely, being human these numerous tribes had to have warred with one another. Seems you are right! So, what the hell is wrong with us???????

Star for that!



posted on Apr, 13 2012 @ 06:01 PM
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Originally posted by -PLB-
reply to post by jiggerj
 


I addressed the scenario of global catastrophe in a part of my post that you did not quote. Yes it is a possibility.


Didn't quote you. I've had these thoughts for some time. You know what they say, great doomsayers think alike.



posted on Apr, 13 2012 @ 06:05 PM
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Originally posted by jiggerj

Originally posted by Jameela
You must have read what I wrote elsewhere on this forum

The only group of humans on this earth who ever successfully lived with one another without the concept of power and wealth were Native Americans,
edit on 13-4-2012 by Jameela because: (no reason given)

Nope, never read what you wrote elsewhere. As for the Indians I had to do a quick google, for surely, being human these numerous tribes had to have warred with one another.

One of the reasons Europeans were able to so quickly take over the Americas is that the Native American tribes were at constant war with each other, killing and torturing each other like nobody's business. Please don't get the impression that the Native Americans were all peaceful, nature-loving hippie types. They killed with the best of them. It's just that they never advanced technologically enough to progress beyond spears and arrows. If they had, they would have been slaughtering each other with even more gusto.



posted on Apr, 13 2012 @ 06:15 PM
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Originally posted by Blue Shift

Originally posted by jiggerj

Originally posted by Jameela
You must have read what I wrote elsewhere on this forum

The only group of humans on this earth who ever successfully lived with one another without the concept of power and wealth were Native Americans,
edit on 13-4-2012 by Jameela because: (no reason given)

Nope, never read what you wrote elsewhere. As for the Indians I had to do a quick google, for surely, being human these numerous tribes had to have warred with one another.

One of the reasons Europeans were able to so quickly take over the Americas is that the Native American tribes were at constant war with each other, killing and torturing each other like nobody's business. Please don't get the impression that the Native Americans were all peaceful, nature-loving hippie types. They killed with the best of them. It's just that they never advanced technologically enough to progress beyond spears and arrows. If they had, they would have been slaughtering each other with even more gusto.


If I had known this would come up I would have saved the link claiming that the indians lived in peace with one another. I'll see if I can find it. Of course I can't! D__mit!
edit on 4/13/2012 by jiggerj because: (no reason given)



posted on Apr, 13 2012 @ 06:21 PM
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reply to post by jiggerj
 


Native American tribes did war with one another, but not for the reasons we go to war today.

What is wrong with us? I have no idea!

But again, get rid of power and wealth, and you have a peaceful world. Its a huge mindset to change, and one so ingrained in all people that it would, perhaps, take something major to change the incorrect mindset. But it can be done, we just need to wake up.



posted on Apr, 13 2012 @ 06:23 PM
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Wow nice I never really thought about this. Maybe the fact that science and all its glorious power is controlled by religious leaders? Nah religion is used as a tool by most leaders.Hmmmm, I think if the church didnt suppress science we wouldnt be overwhelmed with it like we are now and maybe be a little more mature in the application of it.



posted on Apr, 13 2012 @ 06:27 PM
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reply to post by freewestray
 


Yes and there is a difference also in the quality of the deaths. Religions even when it does not kill, causes suffering and division...



posted on Apr, 13 2012 @ 09:29 PM
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reply to post by jiggerj
 


Land as a shared resource

At the simplest level of personal property, American Indians owned what they made with their own two hands. But unlike Europeans, they did not accumulate goods, and they freely shared tools and other useful possessions with friends and family who needed them.1 Other goods, such as beads and trinkets, might serve as displays of a person’s rank or prowess, but they too were frequently traded or given away. While Indians had a definite concept of personal property, then, they tended not to be as “possessive” about their possessions as Europeans.

Land rights were more complicated. A family might “own” the land on which its house stood, and women “owned” the land they farmed. But homes, agricultural fields, and villages moved frequently, and so land was only “owned” as long as it was being used.

Villages collectively had rights to large territories that they used for hunting, fishing, and gathering of food, medicinal herbs, and raw materials for building or tools. Those rights shifted depending on the use and the people using it. For most purposes, all of the people in a village shared the use of its land. Among different villages, agreements about land use had to be made or defended. A village might claim exclusive hunting rights in a given territory, for example, but people from many villages might share the use of a single river for fishing. What villages claimed was, as historian William Cronon writes, “not the land but the things that were on the land during the various seasons of the year.

Land as property


European ideas about land and property differed from those of Indians in two important ways. First, under European law, land was a commodity that could be bought and sold, and individuals who “owned” a tract of land had, for the most part, exclusive rights to its use. Second, ownership was determined by formal means, recognized by deeds and contracts and enforced by courts of law. Faced with the casual, shifting, and complex arrangements of America’s native peoples, Europeans took several approaches to obtaining land.

Of course, King Charles II initially granted the entire territory of “Carolana” to the eight Lords Proprietors, who were then free to dispense with it as they saw fit. Prior to that, Amadas and Barlowe had claimed the Outer Banks in the name of Queen Elizabeth and Sir Walter Raleigh. The English justified those claims, first, on the grounds that Charles, being a Christian monarch, had authority over a continent of heathen peoples.

They also argued, more specifically, that the Indians had failed to heed God’s command in Genesis to “subdue” the land. In Europe, hunting was the sport of the wealthy, not a key source of food, and so to the European eye, the vast hunting grounds on which the Indians relied appeared uninhabited and “unimproved.” The Indians, in other words, weren’t using the land; therefore it was up for grabs.

Interestingly, despite these arguments, the English frequently purchased land from Indians rather than seizing it outright, and colonial law recognized Indian ownership of land. But the land deals and the courts that enforced them worked by European standards of land ownership that the Indians didn’t share.

When they purchased land from Indians, Europeans understood the deal as a full transfer of rights. A man who purchased a tract of land was understood to have the right to use it for any purpose, sell it to whom he wished, and to forbid trespassers. Indians, by contrast, did not typically see themselves as signing away all rights to land. They may, for example, have understood a land sale to mean that the colonists could live on land in a native village’s territory, but that all would continue to share hunting rights.

www.learnnc.org...

As far as taking captives from other tribes it was to replace deaths that had occurred, to replenish the numbers in the tribe affected, these people were called slaves, but usually were adopted into the tribe, and treated the same as any one else within the tribe.. there was a period of assimilating into the tribe, but after that they were simply a member.

wars or raids on other tribes were sometimes for much needed horses, or food in times when food was scarce, it was a tradition also to raid neighboring villages, it appears they thought it was some fun to see if they could not get a horse or something. these traditions did not start until after the introduction of the horse, which completely changed the north American Native way of life, when it went from what appears to be cities and farming to a more nomadic way of life.

They were not always nomads, it is thought that when the horse was introduced by the Spanish disease from this contact killed millions of Native American Indians. But some say that it was not this contact which caused the disease which killed so many. It was this loss of life, coupled with the horse, that changed much for the Native American way of life in North America.

This is how I have been taught in University History classes. There are many books to read, en.wikipedia.org...:_New_Revelations_of_the_Americas_Before_Columbus and "Indian Givers" although both those books deal with Native Americans throughout the entire Americas, some estimate there was up to 100 million Native Americans before contact with Europeans, they lived in cities and had a thriving culture... disease killed them first, then Europeans, then more disease, then almost extinction, but it is cool to learn, because they had communal ideals, and were devoid of a materialistic nature.

They were not as evil and warring as many would like to make them out to be either, even when they changed to a more nomadic existence after the horse culture emerged.




edit on 13-4-2012 by Jameela because: (no reason given)

edit on 13-4-2012 by Jameela because: (no reason given)



posted on Apr, 13 2012 @ 09:43 PM
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reply to post by Jameela
 




In terms of sheer numbers of deaths religion and science are at the very least equal, if not science winning for numbers of persons killed because of it.


Can you give us your reasoning behind your statement? At least some links?

Science and technology has started in what? 1700's 1800's?

How many people have been killed in the name of gods before then?

If science has killed a lot of people, you can bet on the ideologies and beliefs of people behind it.


Science is just a neutral thing. The paradoxical thing is with some people believing so hard in religion using science to further their beliefs or ideologies even though it's the very thing that they are so against.



posted on Apr, 13 2012 @ 10:15 PM
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Originally posted by Deaf Alien

Science is just a neutral thing. The paradoxical thing is with some people believing so hard in religion using science to further their beliefs or ideologies even though it's the very thing that they are so against.


I question in somewhat "modern" society - - when the separation of religion and science began. And I know today we do have scientists who are also religious.

Have not scientists been also mostly religious in previous generations? As blasphemy could be a sentence of death - - - I don't imagine many of a scientific nature - - denied God.

Seems to me - - the Atheist Scientist is relatively new.

As an Atheist myself - - I would prefer all/any research is free of religious restriction. AND government is 100% religious free.

I have no problem what someone does on a personal level.


edit on 13-4-2012 by Annee because: (no reason given)



posted on Apr, 14 2012 @ 03:20 AM
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Originally posted by Annee
Seems to me - - the Atheist Scientist is relatively new.


I doubt this. There just isn't much of a historical record as it used to be unhealthy to pronounce that you're an atheist, or even to show doubt in certain established aspects of religion. A wise scientist would pretend to believe.



posted on Apr, 14 2012 @ 03:24 AM
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The argument "religion kills" is rather weak in my opinion. At most, religion is used as an excuse, but in almost every single case of war there is another obvious reason people kill people, like land, money, honor, despair, fun. Religion is just used to get away with it.



posted on Apr, 14 2012 @ 07:26 AM
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Originally posted by -PLB-

Originally posted by Annee
Seems to me - - the Atheist Scientist is relatively new.


I doubt this. There just isn't much of a historical record as it used to be unhealthy to pronounce that you're an atheist, or even to show doubt in certain established aspects of religion. A wise scientist would pretend to believe.


Yeah, I am under the impression that the church of a few centuries ago wielded a lot of power. There were probably a lot of people back then that were afraid to admit they questioned the existence of a god.



posted on Apr, 14 2012 @ 07:31 AM
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reply to post by jiggerj
 


Great thread, OP. I am atheist myself but I was thinking about the same thing. I was about to post a thread on the subject but you beat me to it.
Thumbs up!




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