On 27 Jan 2009 at 12:00, [email protected] wrote: > Mr. Poloukhine said:...If it [theism] becomes vestigal, or > irrelevant, it no longer matters if you get rid of it or not, so why > bother. > > > dmb says:With all due respect, sir, have you read a newspaper > > lately? Theism is relevant to the extent that child rape by priests > > is a world wide epidemic, to the extent that it is the force behind > > Islamic terrorism, to the extent that it cultivates > > anti-intellectual, anti-scientific, other-worldly and authoritarian > > attitudes. It is the force behind a whole host of other serious > > social problems like prejudice and, for millions, the retardation > > of individual spiritual development. I mean, as a practical matter > > theism has become very destructive. That's why we should bother with > > it, why it is an actual cause for concern.
Not sure why you chose such a tone, it doesn't help make your point in anyway. But to what might call a point in your post; you are comingling the meaning of theism with that of organized religion, fanaticism, authoritarianism and anti- intellectualism. Theism is simply "the belief in a god or gods." "Theism" neither pre-ordains any belief or action beyond the belief in a god, nor does it require any other certain POV outside that simple belief. All of what you decry as "theism" are outside theism, added onto it in no less fashion than they are also added to a whole host of other beliefs. The probability a theist will be a child molester is quite likely to be just as high as an atheist being one. The same can be said about someone being a fascist, or a lunatic, or a racist, or an anti-intellectual, or an authoritarian. The only thing we can be certain a theist is NOT is an atheist. Adding to this confusion you also make unfound associative inferences. A priest does not molest a child because he believes in a god; he does so because he has a perversion that afflicts humans regardless of their stance on whether or not a god exists. The Islamofascist does not blow himself up in the name of Allah simply because he believes in a god called Allah, but because he is a fanatic, because he believes he knows what that god wants better than others. That the vast majority of priests are not child molesters, or the vast majority of Muslims are not fascist terrorists pretty clearly makes this point. The trouble in what you decry is not *theism*, its just plain human depravity and *social* retardation. All this in your post only reinforces my original point; attacking theism as the source of such societal ills ignores their societal sources AND destroys a source of Quality on which society relies as its evolutionary pre-cursor. It is twice wrong; eliminate theism and you will be left without its Quality and still have human depravity and social retardation. Better IMO to put our intellects to better use; to craft a society where theism has a healthy place, where it can continue to underpin society's evolution with neither hindrance to its own MoQ evolution within that hierarchical role nor with detriment to society's Dynamic evolution. Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
