Sam Harris Secular Fundamentalism

Sam Harris Secular Fundamentalism

from bigthink.com

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Education

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• Sam
• Harris
• Secular
• Fundamentalism
• Religion
• Atheism

[luvdomus]

@1776iscoming I doubt that you were any better at thinking before age 21 than you are now, nor did your personality change when you "became a Christian."  You simply learned a new set of mind-games to play, games that are well-known and tiresome to those who understand the psychology of the religious "convert."

[pwnUgood]

@tapasoflife QUOTE: "atheists follow nothing but their own personal thoughts."

That's a lie. In general, atheists are guided by reason, compassion, curiosity, and a quest for truth. They are much less ego-centric and self-aggrandizing than "Born-Again" cultists, who twist religion and holy writ in order to justify petty, prideful pursuit of ideological goals. Consequently atheists are better balanced as human beings than neurotic fanatics haunted by supernatural "spirits."

[cyberprunes]

@bushfingers That's an interesting point. I would refute your claim by pointing out that modern Christians aren't blamed for those events. The Christians at the time are absolutely responsible and they were utilizing the same moral framework espoused in the bible. This must cause one to think about the nature of such morality and conclude that an interpretation of the bible in the absence of modern sensibilities causes one to justify immorality in the name of God and deem such actions moral!

[corrugated]

@nett103: yes. though there are complete frauds out there, more than not, a good tarot reading is possible

[tapasoflife]

@bushfingers to call out the fallacies in another person's thoughts is not suppression, that is the best example of free speech and thought one can come up with.

suppression is censorship...suppression is not being able to talk/think in the first place...

just because your ideas about a god do not have any weight beyond your own words and you don't like that other people call you on that, it doesn't mean that you can falsely claim that you weren't free to speak your mind

[tapasoflife]

@bushfingers atheists follow nothing but their own personal thoughts.

Christian's follow a book that explicitly states "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live" -Exodus 22:18. Sure, the bible also contradicts itself and says "thou shalt not kill"...but aren't both those versus equally biblical?

The Salem trials were based on the same bible you base your life on. But I don't base my life on Stalin's ideas...I base them on MY personal thoughts about the kind of world I want to live in.

[worktosser]

Changing the world, one thumbs up at a time. If Sam ran for president, I would vote for him - twice.

[bushfingers]

@pwnUgood Christianity (or religion) transmits a moral framework, just as a book transmits an author’s thoughts, views etc.

Whatever the source, there is a moral system associated with Christianity and it now forms the backdrop to our many of our modern western moral sensibilities

[bushfingers]

@pwnUgood That's not true. If atheists want to point out that theism leads to terrible outcomes, then theists can do the same for atheism. You say most atheists aren't communists. Well most Christians aren't members of the Inquisition or of one of the courts relating to the Salem Witch Trials.

If you want Christians to be held responsible for the inquisition and the witch trials (and based on your previous comments this is clearly true), then atheists are responsible for Stalinism.

[pwnUgood]

@bushfingers Right wing christians are constantly trying to absolve themselves of guilt by making a tally of Stalin's victims.  The trouble with that is, most atheists aren't Communists.

[pwnUgood]

@bushfingers Morals do not come from Christianity any more than knowledge comes from books-- knowledge is put into books by humans based on their thoughts and experiences, and morality is put into Christianity by the same process. Religion can be a means of communicating morality or immorality, just as books may communicate knowledge or foolishness. The gods are reflections of ourselves.