So Boerd

To Lund ap Lunds

Good good. I will review what we have so far, and see if I can't spot any loopholes.

Atheism 2.0 - Atheism using Religions perks.

Of course it isn't wrong. I believe it to be incorrect, but not wrong.

But for example, stoning adulterers may have been the good thing to do at the time because contraception didn't exist, so they might bring a child in to bad circumstances that may cause it to learn immoral behaviors. I don't know. It isn't my job to guess the mind of God.

Atheism 2.0 - Atheism using Religions perks.

I would concur to decrying stoning adulterers as immoral if it was made today. But they stopped being the rule 2000 years ago. I don't have enough information to be able to make a moral judgment at the time they were enacted. What the acceptance of a higher power does is create an afterlife which must be factored in to our utilitarian views.

ISIS in Iraq

Eithet way, I refuse to help a pro-Iran shill. He's picked his friends. See ya, Maliki!

Atheism 2.0 - Atheism using Religions perks.

Of course we should be empathetic. I am just saying faith in a higher power should not be discouraged.

ISIS in Iraq

My point is, if they won't even try to handle their own problems, we shouldn't either. 25,000 soldiers should have been able to handle 800 terrorists.

Atheism 2.0 - Atheism using Religions perks.

HeySeuss said
So I have to pretend that it's true; there's a big father in the sky enforcing the law in order to answer the question?No thanks. I'm going to point out that absent the certainty that there is divine retribution, placing faith in it as a means of stabilizing society is definitely like sailing in a leaky vessel. I suppose if you're arguing that it's cool to gull people into believing there is a great father in the sky thundering down on wrongdoers for political purposes, I certainly agree -- though I find the practice dishonest. Of course, I'm also not in politics.

Or you tell them that they won't be punished if no one sees them. Sailing in a vessel with no bottom. Every moral argument or instruction you would otherwise give is the same: Behavior X hurts others, causes Y societal malady, etc. You are just adding incentive.

No society which has categorically rejected a higher power has been the better for it. Not revolutionary France, not Russia, not China, not North Korea, not Cambodia, not Vietnam. Not a single one, for how many trials? Talk about being unscientific, why would we try it again?

Atheism 2.0 - Atheism using Religions perks.

That wasn't what I asked. Take the best moral system you can imagine, and attach divine retribution. Is it the worse for it?

Colonial Powers NRP (Reboot/New Thread)

May consider it worth you time tp bump initial support. Too much player specialization can be a bad thing.

Atheism 2.0 - Atheism using Religions perks.

HeySeuss said
I'm not sure the threat of divine retribution is much more of an adequate mechanism for morality than secular mechanisms anyway -- Boko Haram, FLDS and so many others manage to justify their depredations against their fellow human beings and lawyer away any psychological issues they might have with the course of action they're taking by figuring that it okay according to scripture. Hell, in the Jewish community (so this is closer to home for me) there are people that think it's okay to defraud gentiles because it's not prohibited in the Talmud, whereas fraud against fellow Jews is specifically prohibited in the same. White supremacists tend to make a lot out of this, but the reality is that some fanatical communities consider fraud fine, so long as you aren't defrauding within the Tribe. And not a night's loss of sleep is given with the faithful involved.So I don't see religion as entirely a mechanism of prohibiting certain acts by dint of proclamation -- I see that sword cutting both ways. There's all sorts of exhortations to do shit in certain circumstances and people willing to play word-games and essentially cleave it as finely as they can. Sure, that gets done in secular law, but that's the point -- write away with the best intention, but someone's gonna fuck with you using the loopholes.

What I am saying is, take two completely identical hypothetical moral systems, one with divine retribution, one without. I don't see any harm in having divine retribution promised. You lose nothing (people kill for religion and irreligion) and may stand to gain as a society.