Comment on Check mate, atheists.

gedaliyah@lemmy.world ⁨17⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

• Bytemeister@lemmy.world ⁨16⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

  Science flies you to the moon. Religion flies you into buildings.

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  • YeahIgotskills2@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    “God Speed, John Glen”

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  • gedaliyah@lemmy.world ⁨16⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    Why make an ideological argument against ideologies?

    Science also led to eugenics and atom bombs. Religion also builds food pantries, wells, and hospitals. It is not about the tool but how we choose to use it.

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    • Bytemeister@lemmy.world ⁨14⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      eugenics

      Not science.

      atom bombs

      No argument here. Science was also used to develop airplanes and buildings. You can create with the knowledge earned from science, but religion (can) give the justification to misuse those creations.

      t is not about the tool but how we choose to use it.

      Well said.

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    • Lemminary@lemmy.world ⁨8⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      Science did not lead to eugenics. People used a young science as an excuse to advance their ideals by willingly misinterpreting genetics. Also, atom bombs are arguably more technology than science, and technology is rather neutral with its purpose.

      Religion also builds food pantries, wells, and hospitals.

      Do they, though? A woman called churches for baby formula and the majority of churches weren’t very cooperative. Also, even if the religious build churches, who’s to say they won’t follow some insane creed like Mother Teresa did, who willingly let people suffer because she believed that suffering led people to God? Not to mention that a lot of religious ideas tend to make people worse off, like denying blood transfusions with Jehovah’s Witnesses, or so many other topics that leave people out of proper care like objecting to abortions, prioritizing faith healing, historical opposition to preventative medicine like vaccines, IVF, etc. More often than not, religion seems to get in the way of major health interests.

      What religion does do is build community, and communities come together to provide for necessities like community wells, but even an absolutely secular community would build a well. I think it’s a little undeserving to give so much credit to religion.

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      • gedaliyah@lemmy.world ⁨8⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

        Science doesn’t take anecdotes.

        Most food pantries and beds for the homeless in the USA are faith based. Here are the scientific papers that show it.

        A descriptive analysis of food pantries in twelve American states: hours of operation, faith-based affiliation, and location

        Assessing the Faith-Based Response to Homelessness in America: Findings from Eleven Cities

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  • Nalivai@lemmy.world ⁨8⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    Well, the main reason for that big plain-into-building debacle was US going to the middle east to do some bombing, and the main reason for that is economical (well, and racist, but that’s a given). The only religious part there was people doing suicide bombing instead of shooting rockets.

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  • wizardbeard@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨16⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    Credit where it’s due, science built the plane.

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• HazardousBanjo@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

  I disagree.

  Money and nations are well understood to be merely human made systems. They exist within the realm of human control to some degree, and therefore immediately invite open discussions and criticism.

  God, in the eyes of those that believe in him, is the ultimate force of the universe of whom all existence and morality hinges upon. Unlike the other things you mentioned, there is fundamentally zero negotiations, criticisms, objections nor doubt’s that can be had against God.

  It is significantly harder to convince someone that their perfect being of a God is evil and than it is that money or nations are tools of evil.

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• Oppopity@lemmy.ml ⁨9⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

  It’s not a red herring. Religious people don’t treat god like some social concept that doesn’t physically exist but still plays a role in how we interact in our society. They claim their god literally exists.

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  • gedaliyah@lemmy.world ⁨8⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    People claim money actually exists, too. It’s not an inherent property of human existence. It’s just an organizing principle that helps us coordinate resources.

    It would be stupid if the main argument we had about money was whether on not it “exists.” By “stupid” I mean that it is counterproductive to the goals of bettering humanity. We don’t get anywhere with that discussion. Instead, we talk about how we should use use money as a tool to better organize our society. We talk about equity and advancement and poverty.

    It’s the same with religion. It’s been well studied that religion offers social benefits:

    Association between spirituality/religiousness and quality of life 2021

    Assessing the Faith-Based Response to Homelessness in America Image

    63.2% food pantries are identified as being faith-based food pantries

    With this being Lemmy, I don’t have to highlight the negative consequences of religion.

    The point is that we should be advancing beyond the kindergarten level discussion about what’s real and what’s make-believe. Intelligent people should instead be engaging on how we can ensure religious beliefs are fostering social trust, or how to recognize and combat religious extremism.

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    • uienia@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      Those “social benefits” are band-aids needed because of a non-functioning government solution like a non-fath based welfare state. The reason you don’t see them as much in functioning countries, is because they are needed much less.

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    • Oppopity@lemmy.ml ⁨5⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      But people don’t just argue that spirituality itself is a useful tool. They straight up say their religion is true. Those are not the same things.

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• CheesyFox@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨5⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

  Neither money nor states are dogmatic in their nature. They exist under some basis, that can be verified, and that defines their properties. Gods have arbitrary abilities that cannot be verified.

  The only benefits of a religion are being a part of community and coping with reality. The first is not unique to religion, the second is delusional and leads to lots of misjudgement, harms one’s ability to percieve and analyze the objective reality. In other words, even the benefits are quite controversial in their usefulness here.

  By the way, if you think about this, religion as a coping mechanism is as widespread only because it have been a substitute for more healthy alternatives for literal milleniums.

  Religion should be a thing of past, but alas, magical thinking is still strong in modern society. To get rid of religions, first and foremost we should teach people about common logic fallacies and manipulations, so they would detect and avoid them more easily

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• Lemminary@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

  How is it stupid if religious people really do argue that their god as an entity is real? I don’t think the comic tries to dispute that the concept of gods aren’t.

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