Somewhere like GA,TX, or OK... not surprising. Of course, legality is not morality. Sometimes the two coincide, but that depends on which set of morals is applied.
I think the simplest way to look at all of this is that some people believe in gods because they want to. They don't care if it's rational. There's no evidence to support the existence of the supernatural, but that just doesn't matter to everyone.
That's why there's usually no point in presenting a rational argument against an irrational belief. Very few people can let their rational thought processes overwhelm a deep-seated emotional desire.
I believe that's why we see some very intelligent people who are superstitious in spite of themselves. We humans are able to compartmentalize our thinking. The critical standards of evidence that we'll happily apply to real-world experiences fall apart when held up to our personal belief systems.
In our normal day-to-day lives, we wouldn't dream of accepting extraordinary claims without extraordinary evidence. However, when it comes to what happens to us after we're dead, all too many of us are willing to conveniently abandon rational thought for the sake of the comforting thought of life after death.
Jeff, I have negative feelings towards all religion because superstition has wrought havoc upon humanity's rational thinking processes for thousands of years.
I'm not quite saying that theism is a matter of human ignorance, I was saying that the realm of gods is "that -which-we-do-not-understand". Why does the thunder come? The gods. Why don't the crops grow? The gods. Where do we go when we die? The gods. As our knowledge expands, the realm of the gods shrinks.
We would be scornful of those who would suggest that invisible floating energy spheres encompass the entire earth. We would laugh at the notion that transparent magic beings hitch rides on our shoulders and direct our actions. My feelings towards religions based in superstition are exactly the same.
"People who believe in something that can neither be proven or disproven and which has enough evidence to make it reasonable are not ignorant."
That's true, but religion doesn't fall into that category. There's no reliable evidence for the existence of anything supernatural. Some may feel that there is, but those people probably have different standards for evaluating evidence. In my experience, most well-educated, intelligent people have no belief in anything supernatural.
Stop talking about "proof", theists. Proofs only exist in mathematics. There is no absolute proof when discussing natural (or supernatural) matters. We can only ask for evidence.
The existence of god(s) is not a question for science because it is not falsifiable. That means, is there a set of conditions that would show that the supernatural does not exist? No, because gods have always occupied the unknown... squirreled away in the depths of human ignorance.
Popular misconception, Blacknimbus. Atheism in its purest form isn't a faith-based perspective. It is simply lack of belief in a god or gods. Faith is belief (that is, accepting something as true or real) without evidence. It's up to theists (people who believe in a god or gods) to provide evidence for the existence of the supernatural. With no such evidence available, it's perfectly rational to assume that there's no such thing as supernatural dieties.
Somewhere like GA,TX, or OK... not surprising. Of course, legality is not morality. Sometimes the two coincide, but that depends on which set of morals is applied.
That's why there's usually no point in presenting a rational argument against an irrational belief. Very few people can let their rational thought processes overwhelm a deep-seated emotional desire.
I believe that's why we see some very intelligent people who are superstitious in spite of themselves. We humans are able to compartmentalize our thinking. The critical standards of evidence that we'll happily apply to real-world experiences fall apart when held up to our personal belief systems.
In our normal day-to-day lives, we wouldn't dream of accepting extraordinary claims without extraordinary evidence. However, when it comes to what happens to us after we're dead, all too many of us are willing to conveniently abandon rational thought for the sake of the comforting thought of life after death.
I'm not quite saying that theism is a matter of human ignorance, I was saying that the realm of gods is "that -which-we-do-not-understand". Why does the thunder come? The gods. Why don't the crops grow? The gods. Where do we go when we die? The gods. As our knowledge expands, the realm of the gods shrinks.
We would be scornful of those who would suggest that invisible floating energy spheres encompass the entire earth. We would laugh at the notion that transparent magic beings hitch rides on our shoulders and direct our actions. My feelings towards religions based in superstition are exactly the same.
"People who believe in something that can neither be proven or disproven and which has enough evidence to make it reasonable are not ignorant."
That's true, but religion doesn't fall into that category. There's no reliable evidence for the existence of anything supernatural. Some may feel that there is, but those people probably have different standards for evaluating evidence. In my experience, most well-educated, intelligent people have no belief in anything supernatural.
The existence of god(s) is not a question for science because it is not falsifiable. That means, is there a set of conditions that would show that the supernatural does not exist? No, because gods have always occupied the unknown... squirreled away in the depths of human ignorance.