The End of Faith, for readers late to the party

[Interbane]

What are we to make of the Jew on Jew violence? Was it religious or political?

That's a false dilemma. It's usually a mixture of both, but in many cases it's one religion versus another. Where political reasons may be the impetus, the state religion exonerates the war as morally okay. From the link you posted, it seems the case was only political.

[DWill]

What emerges is a portrait of a people unconcerned and even incurious about questions of faith, God and life's meaning.
Do you ever wonder whether you might feel, I don't know, understimulated in such an environment? The contentment part sounds good, but it's possible that being incurious about life's meaning wouldn't be such a positive thing. I don't know, of course, never having even visited these countries. But of course we need to receive everything with some degree of skepticism, and I'd just like to get a better sense of what life is like in these countries that are agnostic/atheist and content. I wouldn't like it if it meant that people didn't think much.

[geo]

What emerges is a portrait of a people unconcerned and even incurious about questions of faith, God and life's meaning.
Do you ever wonder whether you might feel, I don't know, understimulated in such an environment? The contentment part sounds good, but it's possible that being incurious about life's meaning wouldn't be such a positive thing. I don't know, of course, never having even visited these countries. But of course we need to receive everything with some degree of skepticism, and I'd just like to get a better sense of what life is like in these countries that are agnostic/atheist and content. I wouldn't like it if it meant that people didn't think much.

I don't get the idea the Swedes don't think. They just don't think about God and faith and life's meaning, whatever that is. I don't think about life's meaning either. Isn't life's meaning just hubris that comes from our imagined place in the cosmos? I think we're just improbable life forms that evolved from simpler life forms. Why do we need meaning beyond that? That's not to say we don't feel awe and wonder at the sheer beauty and majesty of the world. It's good to be alive, isn't it?

[DWill]

Not saying Swedes don't think, just wondering what may be the reality beyond the statistics reported. Would it meet our preconceptions about the improvements wrought by the diminution of religion? Maybe it would, hard to say without experience. "Meaning of life" is vague and I like to avoid it, but it's not at all hubristic the way the phrase is used. It's separate from the fact that our species was not in any sense "chosen." We still search for meaning by our natures, which will bear on important decisions we make about how to live.

[stahrwe]

What are we to make of the Jew on Jew violence? Was it religious or political?

That's a false dilemma. It's usually a mixture of both, but in many cases it's one religion versus another. Where political reasons may be the impetus, the state religion exonerates the war as morally okay. From the link you posted, it seems the case was only political.

You are way off. Try again. Clue is that it has nothing to do with either politics or religion.

[Interbane]

Stahrwe:

Clue is that it has nothing to do with either politics or religion.

So it was a false dilemma? I don't know enough about the war you mentioned to take a guess. I was only throwing you a bone by saying that it didn't appear to be religion that was the impetus. My guess would still be political, with the limited information you posted. This sounds political: "This incident during Tabernacles was a major factor leading up to the Judean Civil War by igniting popular opponents of Jannaeus."

Did Harris mention this war and attribute it to religion?

[stahrwe]

Stahrwe:

Clue is that it has nothing to do with either politics or religion.

So it was a false dilemma? I don't know enough about the war you mentioned to take a guess. I was only throwing you a bone by saying that it didn't appear to be religion that was the impetus. My guess would still be political, with the limited information you posted. This sounds political: "This incident during Tabernacles was a major factor leading up to the Judean Civil War by igniting popular opponents of Jannaeus."

Did Harris mention this war and attribute it to religion?

The key to the cause of the Jewish civil war is the reason for every other war that has ever happened. I believe SH does believe that the underlying cause of conflict is religion does he not?

[DWill]

The key to the cause of the Jewish civil war is the reason for every other war that has ever happened. I believe SH does believe that the underlying cause of conflict is religion does he not?

You should read the book, but there is this: "Religious unreason should acquire an even greater stigma in our discourse, given that it remains among the principal causes of armed conflict in our world" (77).

[Chris OConnor]

Are you guys going to keep the discussion restricted to this one thread? You're free to do as you like, but you might pull some new participants into the discussion if you create some new threads with exciting titles. As you know new threads will go to the top of the forum and will push the older posts down.

[stahrwe]

By the bottom of page 12, which is really the second page of the book, well, chapter one at least, SH has already blamed religion for homocide bombers and established that homo sapien on homo sapien violence is the result of religion, specifically, what is in the books of the major religions and it is God's fault.

One wonders what is left for SH to say in the remaining 200 pages.

Except for one thing; in the next month tens of millions of dollars in the US will go to feeding the poor, escalating around Christmas time as generous people around the world reach into their pockes to pay for food, clothing, shelter and presents for those who cannot afford Christmas. While the homocide bomber's act will make newspapers and broadcasts, the $500 that BT collects for CCH will go unnoticed and likely unreported by the world. Why, because it is so ordinary, so mundane, so expected, so unremarkable. But to me it is remarkable! I am used to giving money to such drives through the church I attend. And collecting and distributing food, but to contribute to the cause sponsored by a group of atheists certainly should make a newspaper somewhere. Not that I don't consider atheists to be caring or generous people but the idea of supporting Christmas is probably a bit unsettling. It is a testimony to your spirits that you feel that helping unfortunate kids have a nice Christmas is worth the paradox.

On the other hand, SH seems to miss this again. I have been a persistant advocate that if one is going to criticize the bad caused by religion one must also trumpet the good.

In your world view, at some point humans became what we are today and one of your ancestors, 10,000 years ago walked over to his neighbors cave and bashed his brains out for the freshly killed mastadon. There was no religion involved and I believe that I can make a case that almost every war since then has been motivated by non-religious reasons.

Going back to the Jewish civil war, they were the same race of people, who worshipped the same God and used the same Holy writing but 50,000 people died because someone threw a lemon at Alexander Jannes. Was that a religious problem? No, it was the same as every motice. "I want something you have"