Please, support the notion of Satan and demons if you want to claim Christianity is not a lie. That is how you use the word "lie". The word "myth" might be a better word. The Bible is a mythology that should not be taken literally. — Athena

First, if addressing me please do not confuse me with someone else. Second. I have never claimed either Christianity or the Bible is either a lie or true. Third, a lie is a judgment made about a certain kind of proposition. I am unaware that either the Bible or Christianity in whole or any part is the kind of proposition that might properly be called a lie.

It's not logically contradictory to say that ideas might have their own existence; independent of the material.I don't personally believe they do, but I can at least acknowledge that the question is not logically contradictory or empirically decidable, which has been my point all along.

If God were immaterial we would not now of Gods existence because God would be completely undetectable. — praxis

Janus: That's merely an assumption, not a logical truth or an empirically decidable claim. — Janus

It is logical to conclude that nothing (no material existence) is undetectable because nothing can't produce sound waves, reflect light, etc. Also, if it's not an empirically decidable claim then it is irrefutable. — praxis

isn't that is why God is an object of faith? Understanding always has a bedrock — Merkwurdichliebe

Yes, Praxis, it is irrefutable, as is its negation. So that is why religious beliefs are a matter of faith, not of logic or empirical investigation.

What is faith though? Faith when given as a reason for believing in something is an empty placeholder for an actual reason. If the person actually had a reason they would just state that reason but they don’t so they say “faith”.
Also, to say something is not a matter of logic or imperial investigation is to admit it is firmly in the realm of fantasy. If someone said they believed in square circles on ”faith” that clear breach of logic puts the notion into fantasy. Things have to make sense, otherwise no one knows what they are talking about and neither do they. It is by definition nonsense.

What is faith though? Faith when given as a reason for believing in something is an empty placeholder for an actual reason. If the person actually had a reason they would just state that reason but they don’t so they say “faith” — DingoJones

Indeed so. Faith is more of an excuse you give for believing when you have no good reasons. And the problem is faith has no quality control. You might well have faith in the inferiority of certain cultures or in Islamic fundamentalism. Faith is a chaotic mess.

Now when a theist says, by way of riposte - 'but atheists have faith in all kinds of things, like that planes will fly' - this is not faith. This is a 'reasonable confidence based on empirical evidence' that planes do fly, that there is physics behind them, there are engineers and mechanics and people who are trained to fly them. Unlike God, a plane can be demonstrated and in almost all cases they will fly safely. But, naturally, no one can have absolute certainty in anything.

:100:

I like the way you put that, no quality control. The worst ideas are equally valid.
“Faith” is also used as an expression to say one has reasonable confidence in something and that gets mixed together in theist counter argument.

The other problem with faith is that the single suspension of reason weakens the persons defences against other bad ideas. Once you convince someone fantasy is real its easier to convince them other fantasies are real as well. I had a friend who grew up religious and believed strongly in god and when the internet conspiracy theories started getting stronger I had to watch him succumb to each one until he thought the earth was flat and no longer believed in space. His father was a pastor, he had been trained his whole life to swallow those conspiracy theories. Thats why rather than the simple illogic of faith that might make it a sort of quaint banality like astrology I think faith is an evil for exactly that attack it makes on the faithfuls faculties of reason.
And while Im ranting you wanna know what else drives me nuts? The way the faithful try and disassociate with the other faithful, like the suicide bomber or the zealot who beats each of his kids and himself for original sin are not using the exact same reason. When you choose to indulge yourself with “faith” you are choosing to grant equal footing to all faith based acts. If the defence of your belief is the same as the defence of the belief women should be slaves or someone should drag their kid up a mountain to sacrifice to god then your defence of your belief is garbage. The bar for believing in things has to be higher than that.

End rant.

I get this, although tbf faith is the refusal to countenance the possibility that you may be mistaken in your beliefs; it doesn't obviously lead to the adoption of new beliefs.

I think the ill here is not faith but unjustifiable belief. That, I think, is what makes it trivial for an intelligent person to adopt stupid beliefs.

Why is Naomi Wolf spouting anti-vax nonsense? Because she's spent a lifetime with beliefs that can't be reconciled with facts. She wrote a non-fiction book that was notoriously factually incorrect. People with unjustifiable beliefs have to learn contempt for facts, and this contempt leaves them wide open.

First, if addressing me please do not confuse me with someone else. Second. I have never claimed either Christianity or the Bible is either a lie or true. Third, a lie is a judgment made about a certain kind of proposition. I am unaware that either the Bible or Christianity in whole or any part is the kind of proposition that might properly be called a lie. — tim wood

Plain and simple why is "Belief in god is necessary for being good" a true statement?

That would be the most obvious lie of Christianity and if there is no reason for believing in Satan and demons that would be another lie in the Bible and Christianity. Deifying Jesus, calling him a God, and tieing him to the God in the Garden of Eden, and Satan, is believing in supernatural powers, and the belief that these supernatural powers affect our lives is another lie. This is about believing in the supernatural and being superstitious or not.

I want to add, this an open discussion and I attempt to be inclusive. It is not a private discussion between 2 people. Sticking the points being made will make this a better process.

Well, they have to though, don't they? Otherwise the God they worship would be jealous, despotic and bloodthirsty.

Christians, on the other hand, may more easily be literal in their interpretation of the New Testament, but if they are they show themselves to be jealous, despotic and bloodthirsty. The Old Testament God, interpreted literally, is one actual Christians understand quite well. — Ciceronianus the White

What might be very important to this belief system is the belief in God and inheritance. This was not a problem when they were nomadic sheepherders but it became a problem when they settled and became farmers. At this point, the line of inheritance is even more important. This is the problem in Isreal today. There is no justification for Israel without the belief that a God gave land to a set of people, and that this land, including slaves, is rightfully owned through a line of inheritance. Before this, linage established the individual's place in society, not merit hiring. They fought a war with the Greeks because the Greeks had conquered the territory and were assigning jobs by merit instead of lineage.

We might ask why was it ever necessary to sacrifice animals, and how did a person come to holding the position of the official over the sacrifice and why was the temple essential to the sacrificing. There are Zionist Christians and Jews and this is a serious international problem. What we believe really matters.

Plain and simple why is "Belief in god is necessary for being good" a true statement? — Athena

I never said I thought it was. What I am most often on about is distinguishing between what is claimed as belief and what is claimed as ordinary fact. Some people - a lot of people - claim as ordinary fact what can only be believed. And some of those claim to be Christians. But Christians take some care about this. Their creed is, "We believe..," and they understand in any case that an existing God would be necessarily a god limited n ways that the god of Christian belief cannot be.

But certainly such beliefs have utility. Not always for the best, but that not for lack of trying.

And what lie is there in Christianity or the Bible? I'm defending neither, but you call lie without exhibiting it. To my way of thinking a lie is a particular kind of thing, which neither Christianity nor the Bible is.

What I meant was that the practice of writing down laws said to have been given by God goes back to Hammurabi (1792 - 1750 BC ) and before:

“Hammurabi is best known for having issued the Code of Hammurabi, which he claimed to have received from Shamash, the Babylonian god of justice.”

Hammurabi – Wikipedia

The Judeans were taken into Babylonian captivity in 597 -581 BC, i.e., many centuries after the Code of Hammurabi.

But I agree that the idea of a loving God in the modern sense is a recent reinterpretation. The original idea was that God is to us like a father. He creates us, supports and protects us, feeds us, and expects "love" i.e., obedience in return.

God was like the pater familias in Greek and Roman society hence he was referred to as "Father" (Zeus Pateras) in the same way children out of respect always addressed their parent as "father", not by his proper name. — Apollodorus

There is a huge issue with the written word. What Hammusrabl did, did not affect the Celts who were resistant to the written word. Celts and others rejected writing in favor of memorization and passing on stories orally. I forget the whole argument about how writing changed the human psyche, but the change is huge! Our brains function totally differently when we use pictures to cue our memory or rely on "the written word", which can then become THE AUTHORITY. Protestants took this to an extreme. They decided each one of us can be an authority on God's word, and they made the Bible the authority of His word. Totally different from the Catholics who decided trained priest can be authorities on God's word, but not the lay folk. For a Catholic, the pope has authority and power, not the common man and that would be much closer to Judaism and the rabbi by inheritance who interprets the word of God.

Making the individual the authority on God's word set fire to witch-hunting. Ignorant people thinking they are authorities of spiritual truth became a superstitious nightmare and I am not sure how far from this we are today?

Om, om, we have with us ideas of the power of sound and using the vibration of sound to heighten our spiritual connection. We have Quakers who believe God speaks to everyone. Or the Buddist who gets in touch with spirituality by going within. This denies the authority of the written word and belongs in this discussion. What is the source of your spiritual experience? How do you connect with it?

Jews were known for their spells and they show up in Egyptian burials. Our word "spell" comes from the belief that words can have magical power. Do we believe this when we argue "Belief in god is necessary for being good"? Excuse me- how familiar are we with this faith in the word?

If it is false it is a lie.

You are playing a good game of cat and mouse. Do you believe the Bible is God's word or a nice mythology but truth as a person of science understands truth?

You are playing a good game of cat and mouse. Do you believe the Bible is God's word or a nice mythology but truth as a person of science understands truth? — Athena

What I believe or aver is irrelevant. You have called lie. If the Bible is a lie, it should not be too difficult for you to cite the parts that are lies. It seems to me you have no clarity about beliefs and what they are, seemingly dividing the world into matters of science or lies. But it just plain is not that simple. And statements can be false all day long without being lies.

Do some people lie? Do they lie about religion? Of course they do, maybe a lot of people. But that's them, not (usually) their beliefs.

Or another way. You call lie. Is that because you believe it as a matter of belief? Or because you know it as a matter of fact?

We might ask why was it ever necessary to sacrifice animals, and how did a person come to holding the position of the official over the sacrifice and why was the temple essential to the sacrificing. — Athena

I'm reading a book on divination in antiquity, Divination and Human Nature, by Peter Struck, which considers the views of ancient philosophers regarding that practice. From what I gather so far, philosophers didn't necessarily dispute its efficacy, but rather sought to explain why it was effective. Divination didn't necessarily involve sacrifice, though the study of livers was thought to be significant in determining what was to take place.

The Roman Emperor as Pontifex Maximus performed sacrifices as part of the Roman state religion. There's frieze of Marcus Aurelius doing so that's well known. Sacrifice seems to have been a fairly universal religious practice.

What Hammusrabl did, did not affect the Celts who were resistant to the written word. Celts and others rejected writing in favor of memorization and passing on stories orally. — Athena

Correct. But even in those cultures where spiritual wisdom and laws were transmitted orally, the knowledge in question was accessible to a limited number of people, such as the priestly class. It was not available to all and sundry.

Do we believe this when we argue "Belief in god is necessary for being good"? — Athena

Not necessarily. I suppose different people are good for different reasons. Some are good because they allow their innate goodness to manifest itself; some are good because they acknowledge the importance of following laws, human or divine; and others are good because they fear punishment in this life or the next.

Things have to make sense, otherwise no one knows what they are talking about and neither do they. — DingoJones

But faith only matters when things don't make sense. Think about how faith commonly comes into play when a person experiences a great misfortune or tragedy, something that cannot be explained (e.g. my baby died of cancer). This is because faith is a subjective condition, similar to love. It only exists in direct relation to the individual - qua. the way the individual relates directly to his own life/existence.

Faith is inexplicable because it is not an object, nor an object of knowledge, and it cannot be translated into objective terms without negating its essence. Any talk or explanation of faith is mere hypothesis and speculation, and a regress into understanding and reason, all one can do is point in its approximate direction. In the end, for the subject, the assumption of faith is as undeniable as the assumption of love.

Love isnt that analogous, love can be investigated and explained. Emotions are intangible sure but that doesnt mean they are as mysterious as you would have me believe.
I know it does little to dull the harshness of what I say to say I mean no offense but your description sounds more analogous to delusion.
You’ve at best described the placeholder word I referenced. “Faith” is indescribable and mysterious and subjective and beyond reason and understanding…well such a diluted word has no real meaning but to hold a place for the good reason (faith is not a good reason to believe in anything at all) that the persons just doesnt have.
And of course none of that matters since regardless of how you describe faith my point still stands: its a garbage reason to believe anything, as was cleverly put by someone else as faith having “no quality control”. You can use it to defend any belief, even awful ones. Thats how feeble faith is as a metric fir believing in anything.

don't worry, you aren't harsh, and what you say is not offensive, we are only philosophizing.

You’ve at best described the placeholder word I referenced. “Faith” is indescribable and mysterious and subjective and beyond reason and understanding…well such a diluted word has no real meaning but to hold a place for the good reason (faith is not a good reason to believe in anything at all) that the persons just doesnt have. — DingoJones

Yes. You are very rational in saying faith holds the place of good reason. In my opinion, the word love holds the place for an unintelligible condition that is inexplicable, most analogously to how faith holds the place for any condition that is beyond understanding. We can analyze the meaning of the words, but we can never access the actuality of living under such a condition, except subjectively. Perhaps all subjectivity is delusional, yet love and faith are not important to the subject because of how they can be understood, but for their actuality. I guarantee that people will kill for love much faster than they will kill for faith if given the opportunity.

And of course none of that matters since regardless of how you describe faith my point still stands: its a garbage reason to believe anything, as was cleverly put by someone else as faith having “no quality control”. You can use it to defend any belief, even awful ones. Thats how feeble faith is as a metric fir believing in anything. — DingoJones

"No quality control." Now that is the greatest description of faith ive ever heard. Faith is also not quantitative, and for that reason, it is immune from all metrics that might validate any reason for any position. In fact, faith is solely concerned with the qualitative because the actuality of faith qualitatively changes the individual who believes by removing the concern for quality control which makes for "no quality control". Faith is extremely fatalistic and paradoxical despite the moral obligation to observe the demands of ones faith, and the demands of one's faith can often be radical and illogical, which can be of great offense to those of us trying to make sense of things.

Yes. You are very rational in saying faith holds the place of good reason. In my opinion, the word love holds the place for an unintelligible condition that is inexplicable, most analogously to how faith holds the place for any condition that is beyond understanding. We can analyze the meaning of the words, but we can never access the actuality of living under such a condition, except subjectively. Perhaps all subjectivity is delusional, yet love and faith are not important to the subject because of how they can be understood, but for their actuality. I guarantee that people will kill for love much faster than they will kill for faith if given the opportunity. — Merkwurdichliebe

I didnt say it holds the place of good reason. I said its a placeholder word for the good reason the person just doesn’t have. Meaning, they do not have a good reason and so they say “faith” instead of a good reason.
You actually didnt address my points at all with that.

"No quality control." Now that is the greatest description of faith ive ever heard. Faith is also not quantitative, and for that reason, it is immune from all metrics that might validate any reason for any position. In fact, faith is solely concerned with the qualitative because the actuality of faith qualitatively changes the individual who believes by removing the concern for quality control which makes for "no quality control". Faith is extremely fatalistic and paradoxical despite the moral obligation to observe the demands of ones faith, and the demands of one's faith can often be radical and illogical, which can be of great offense to those of us trying to make sense of things. — Merkwurdichliebe

Again you miss the point. Not having quality control is a criticism of “faith” for the reasons described but you seem to have ignored that and instead once again resort to describing faith.
Please address my points.

What I believe or aver is irrelevant. You have called lie. If the Bible is a lie, it should not be too difficult for you to cite the parts that are lies. It seems to me you have no clarity about beliefs and what they are, seemingly dividing the world into matters of science or lies. But it just plain is not that simple. And statements can be false all day long without being lies.

Do some people lie? Do they lie about religion? Of course they do, maybe a lot of people. But that's them, not (usually) their beliefs.

Or another way. You call lie. Is that because you believe it as a matter of belief? Or because you know it as a matter of fact? — tim wood

Five Biblical stories are Sumerian stories of multiple gods. It was a goddess who made a man and woman of mud and breathed life into them so they could help a river stay in its banks. One of the goddesses involved was Ninti. Her name translates as both "the lady of the rib" and "the lady who makes live". This play on words does not work in Hebrew so we get Eve a woman made of the man's rib. In cuneiform, the words Eden (Uncultivated plane) and Adam (settlement on the plain) appear. The people who carry this story came from Ur a Sumerian city and they were led by Abraham. It is obvious they researched the Sumerian archives and plagiarized the Sumerian story.

Science tells us humans evolved from the same line as the apes. That is the story I believe and that makes the Biblical story of creation false. Without the Biblical story, there is no need to be saved and I think all our reasoning is greatly improved by science. We were not made special by a God but we are animals.

What do you believe the facts are? If you do not clearly answer that question this is the last time I will acknowledge your posts in this thread.

Not necessarily. I suppose different people are good for different reasons. Some are good because they allow their innate goodness to manifest itself; some are good because they acknowledge the importance of following laws, human or divine; and others are good because they fear punishment in this life or the next. — Apollodorus

I find that agreeable.

But even in those cultures where spiritual wisdom and laws were transmitted orally, the knowledge in question was accessible to a limited number of people, such as the priestly class. It was not available to all and sundry. — Apollodorus

I agree with this too but want to say all people have a mythology about creation with stories that tell them how to behave. They were first told around campfires and they were passed on verbally from one generation to the next. The goal of mythology is to transition youth into adults knowing the tribe's values and stories that unite them. I know of no reason why we should believe one story is more true than another. Philosophers such as Confucius have done the same with reason and without relying on supernatural beings. Why should we judge the Bible as better than the philosophers who laid out the laws (science) a society needs?

I believe the facts are as you state them. But wrt religion and beliefs based in, well, beliefs, where does that get you? Nor can you discount beliefs entirely, because a close look at (your) life will reveal that about 99.9% of it is lived out on the basis of beliefs.

You believe, for example, your car is in the garage. And as you learn every morning, it is. But until verified, it's a belief. Of course the particular beliefs in question here are never verified, and what I cannot "get" is that those same believers fail to understand that they cannot be verified. Because verification would destroy the basis for the belief.

So it stands only as belief. It is then for the rest of us to understand that beliefs have utility, and to understand the possibilities of that utility. Which usually isn't too much of a problem except with religion, and religious nuts on both sides of the question who are hung up on what in essence are irrelevancies.

I'm reading a book on divination in antiquity, Divination and Human Nature, by Peter Struck, which considers the views of ancient philosophers regarding that practice. From what I gather so far, philosophers didn't necessarily dispute its efficacy, but rather sought to explain why it was effective. Divination didn't necessarily involve sacrifice, though the study of livers was thought to be significant in determining what was to take place.

The Roman Emperor as Pontifex Maximus performed sacrifices as part of the Roman state religion. There's frieze of Marcus Aurelius doing so that's well known. Sacrifice seems to have been a fairly universal religious practice. — Ciceronianus the White

That looks like a very interesting book! I love to examine why people believe what they believe. Where and why did the idea originate and where did it travel and how did it blend with the beliefs of others? If is easy to imagine how hunters came to sacrificing imaging a power greater than their own and yes the practice seems to have been pretty universal. I can not imagine how a person would rationalize what the Hebrews were doing was different from what everyone else was doing and only the Hebrew's sacrifices are about a true god. Then the Christian claim that another diety eliminates the need to make sacrifices. :chin:

You believe, for example, your car is in the garage. And as you learn every morning, it is. But until verified, it's a belief. Of course the particular beliefs in question here are never verified, and what I cannot "get" is that those same believers fail to understand that they cannot be verified. Because verification would destroy the basis for the belief. — tim wood

What you need to "get" is that believers don't see you (or any critical person, whether theist or atheist) as someone with whom to discuss their beliefs. It seems that to them, it's a bit like discussing one's underwear with strangers in the street. Not something a decent person would do.

But this actually supports the view that the richer you are, the more you believe in material possessions and less in God. Or as the Bible puts it, you can't serve two masters, you must choose between God and Mammon (Money). The rich tend to choose the latter and Banno's article seems to confirm this. — Apollodorus

The countries listed earlier in the graph that are both high in God belief and high in poverty are mostly countries that have a history of colonial exploitation and/or a climate and natural environment poorly suitable for advanced agriculture and industry.

It yet needs to be established that God belief causes or significantly contributes to poverty (and low education). But notably, God belief was typical for colonial exploiters.

I agree with this too but want to say all people have a mythology about creation with stories that tell them how to behave. They were first told around campfires and they were passed on verbally from one generation to the next. The goal of mythology is to transition youth into adults knowing the tribe's values and stories that unite them. I know of no reason why we should believe one story is more true than another. Philosophers such as Confucius have done the same with reason and without relying on supernatural beings. Why should we judge the Bible as better than the philosophers who laid out the laws (science) a society needs? — Athena

I believe that myths can be beautiful and powerful in their simplicity, in the way they convey important truths in metaphorical imagery, and in the way they appeal to our reason, our imagination, and our emotions. They explain and make sense of the world and of human life, they endow everything with meaning and purpose, and they tell us how to conduct ourselves and live our lives in a way that is meaningful and just. Myths and folk stories connect us with the unique history of our people, with what is most valuable in our cultural life, with what is good, beautiful and true in our society. They can be an irreplaceable friend and guide. Even the myths of the Bible can be beautiful and of value when properly understood and applied in our daily lives.

There is beauty, goodness and truth in every story. There is no reason to believe one story is more true than another. But at the end of the day, we choose which story appeals to us most and which seems to have the greatest value to us as an individual and to our nation or race at large. Even what science tells us is just a story, one way of looking at things or of interpreting reality among many. Truth is inexhaustible, no myth or story, be it scientific, religious or otherwise, can ever tell the whole story of humanity, of the universe, of reality and of truth itself.

So, yes. The story of the Bible is not necessarily better than the story of Greek mythology or the story of the philosophers. In essence, they all share common values. Murder, theft, adultery, perjury, etc. were not crimes only in the Law of Moses. They were crimes in Greek, Roman and other cultures, too, and rightly so. But that's where our laws come from, from the myths and stories the wise men and women of old told us to teach us how to live rightly. And it isn't just our laws that come from the history conveyed down the generations through myths. There are other valuable bits of knowledge that are good, beautiful, and true, that can enrich our moral, intellectual and spiritual life and help us turn our gaze toward something higher.

All that is required is to take what is good and discard what is less good or harmful. And this is what we have a reasoning mind for.

And this is bad?
— baker

Why would you conclude that? — Banno

It's a question, intended to make you state your case regarding the connection between God belief and poverty.

What you need to "get" is that believers don't see you (or any critical person, whether theist or atheist) as someone with whom to discuss their beliefs. — baker

If only they would comport themselves so that I could properly regard their business as their business. But the problem is they make their business my business - and do not seem to realize that's a mistake.

Edit:

Not something a decent person would do. — baker

I missed this. You're quite right, imo.

What you need to "get" is that believers don't see you (or any critical person, whether theist or atheist) as someone with whom to discuss their beliefs. It seems that to them, it's a bit like discussing one's underwear with strangers in the street. Not something a decent person would do. — baker

Don't know about @tim wood specifically, but otherwise I beg to differ.
There are preachers, proselytizers, priests, imams, pujas (and indoctrinators) just about everywhere doing their thing. Often enough they refuse to carry their onus probandi, heck, at times they insist what your epistemic standards have to be. Then they have their faiths interfere in other people's lives, politics, etc.
But, never mind this comment if you're having a 1-1 chat with @tim wood, nothing to see here. :)

You just reminded me about a Christian preacher a few weeks ago who was lambasting Moslems for praying openly and outside, when God wants your faith to be private. I had to ask him: And what are _you_ doing? He said that was different.

He went on to ask me if I took comfort from the fact that Hitler was burning in Hell for all eternity. He almost fell off his box when I said no. I'm not sure which interpretation of 'no' stunned him, but I think it was the idea that I might derive no pleasure from someone being tortured for eternity for their crimes.

Anyway, tl;dr version: even those who say religion is a private matter get in your face about it.