The underlying metaphysics for most of the weestern world is implicitly derived from a christian worldview.

He obviously didn't mean that there was NO scientific progress.

why did he say that multiple times then?

was he overexagerating that just like everything else he said?

But the foundations of most of our legal system for example come from Roman and Greek civilizations.

That said, christianity has done great harm in the past, especially to scientific pursuits.

I said metaphysics, not laws.

I am not saying that christianity is all bad, I'm just saying there are better alternatives

I was talking to @Belisarius

I'm not sure there are.

i hope it does not appear as though i am arguing for how great christianity is. i'm only talking about this video and how wrong this idiot is.

this video is inflammatory cancer

So is 90% of youtube.

^

I dont want to talk about the guy or the video, just about the notion that christianity, especially in contact with governement, can cause tremendous harm.

> can

anything can cause tremendous harm

You are pulling a piece of shit out of a pile of shit and saying 'look how shitty this one piece of shit is".

WILL

is it the idea, or the people

?

What do you mean?

is it impossible for a society run by christians to be succesful and progressive?

No. Not at all.

Not impossible, but inprobable

Unless they are orthodox.

but you said "WILL" @P14

Then it becomes very difficult.

Yes, most of the time

I dont want to play a word game

i think it is important for people to be clear, otherwise others will take it the wrong way

Yes, but I was not unclear, I just used coloquial language

Anyways, this shouldnt be the topic

i am confident that modern day christians who are not autistic are perfectly normal and uncorrupted human beings with flaws and good parts just like everyone else.

What do you think about the stat that shows that there are more atheists in science than theists?

This is something I have spent a great deal of time on, I've come to the conclusion that the supernatural elements of religion are really the embodiment of ideals, and can be recognized as such. The traditions and ethic that comes from christianity in particular are undeniably useful to a society, and there's nothing wrong with using the scientific method to identify that which makes society prosper, and adopting them. Regardless of the superstitions and nonsense at the core.

@P14 those are true, what do you think the meaning for that is?

The fact is, that christianity seems to work.

^

For the vast majority of people at least. And it works for those who don't want to expend the effort that I have trying to understand it all.

I would say that people who study science come to the conclusion that there is no god. I would also say, that atheists are more likely to become scientists.

It's because an empirical outlook naturally leads to athiesm.

Due to the lack of evidence for god.

Would you prefer a pagan, atheist, or christian society? Or a mixture of any of the three?

Christian, hands down.

@P14 how would a climatologist find proof that god doesn't exist from their work?

It's not clear at this point that an athiest society would be stable for any significant period of time.

Well, I would quote Rin on that one:
"It's because an empirical outlook naturally leads to athiesm.
"

What christianity does that makes it so effective, is that it tempers human's natural tendency towards tribalism.

I would say a combintion of paganism and atheism is the best.
That way you stay with the natural and psychological truth.

i think it works the same way that men and women find different jobs more appealing then others, atheists and christians are interested in different things as well. i would assume that most scientists were atheist BEFORE going into their respective fields.

Athiesm doesn't do that by it's nature.

Does what?

OH

But why would you really temper your tendency towards tribalism?

Actually atheists are the least tribal

That's not how it works though, those who are empirical and evidence based are that way usually llong before college. That mindset lends itself to both athiesm and scientific careers.

^

VC?

Yeah

You aren'ty understanding what I'm saying, Athiests are human, and therefore are just as tribal as everyone else.

that would be better

Just look at how easily the athiesm movement was destroyed by tribal division when the SJWs infiltrated it. The notion that they are somehow less tribal by nature is absurd.

Gotta pick up kids from school, back in a bit.

have to make a phone call back in 2 minutes.

kk

only reason i can think of for atheists being the least tribal is that most are left-leaning

and therefore all about that equality

Going left is really just reorganizing the tribes. If anything I would argue they are more tribal, not less. Modern Christianity is unique in the way it satiates the tribal instinct without being destructive.

Well, here we are again. Atheism clearly isn‘t a belief system and we all seem to agree that some kind of belief system is necessary. My initial thought was that they are less tribal, because they don‘t have a religion to look at as their tribe, but again. Atheism is not a belief system, it matters what people adopt instead of the belief in god and then we can look if they are more or less tribal.

Also we would habe to take a look at what tribalism really means.
I personally don‘t think tribalism is of great importance in this debate. The important thing about religion is mindset. And I would again point out that christians have a rather weak mindset generally speaking. This is not based on religious text or church doctrine and history, but rather on how christians behave today.

Yeah, this is basically my point. It's not entirely clear that a "athiest" society that didn't adopt a different belief system would be stable at all. The question is does the substituted belief system inherently require some sort of metaphysical or supernatural foundation to be effective in that role. I'm not sure it doesn't.

Exactly, if we can have a belief system, that doesn‘t need to lie to it‘s believers, that would be great.
If we look at the debate between Christianity vs Nordic Paganism, I would say we are mainly talking about testosterone. Christianity keeps testosterone in check, while Paganism let‘s it reign free. At least this holds true in the general interpretations. A thing right in the middle would be great, but I don’t think we have found that yet.

This also shows that science and religion are mostly conflicting.

I never said they didn't conflict. I just said that it doesn't take away from the fact that it's the backbone of western society.

Yeah, the others said that though.

Oh.

The problem is that religion is not sustainable in the long term, because people will see through the lies

I don't necessarily think of them as lies.

Well, but people do

That‘s what matters

To be sure, there are liars in the ranks, but the belief system itself is sincere.

And has a "truth" of it's own kind.

What I‘m saying is that people naturally drive towards atheism, because it makes more sense.

Atheism has increased rapidly since the scientific revolution.

I don't think so. It's far from the obvious for most people. At least in the US.

Well look at Europe

Actualy I think athiesm recently declined here.

What?

Don't quote me on that, I seem to remember seeing something recently.

Oh, atheists dont get a lot of kids?

That may be

No, just the pecentage of people that self identify on census and surveys and such.

Hmm

Maybe it was just a certain age group.

Or demographic.

Maybe because of the immigrants

There are a lot of credulous people out there.

And even with all the progress that been made in science, the vast majority of Americans are still religious.