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How the Internet Is Taking Away America’s Religion

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Re: How the Internet Is Taking Away America’s Religion

#51

Post by joeclark77 »

notastartup wrote: post #33

I remember reading a piece about how Catholic church is trying to ban people from using condom and thought it was pretty ridiculous that they were against safety. A fellow Android developer was catholic and started a long rant about how condoms promote infidelity and adultery -_- and he literally sat in front of the screen for hours writing a huge rebuttal to what I have said. Another time I advised him against purch…

So... did he make money on the mutual funds? If so, joke's on you, right? Evidence and hard facts seem to support his position on the other issue, now, don't they?

Re: How the Internet Is Taking Away America’s Religion

#52

Post by joeclark77 »

mullingitover wrote: post #21
Alex3917 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree, though I wouldn't be surprised if it were true right now. The Internet is undoubtedly the greatest tool that has ever been created for spreading religion, but in the short term it probably just magnifies whatever the larger social/religious fads are, e.g. new atheism.

It's also the greatest tool that has ever been created for destroying superstition and myth. We're in the golden age of critical thinking, something that is very destructive to religious belief.

   > We're in the golden age of critical thinking
That's a hoot! There hasn't been as much tribalism and sloganeering in US politics as there is now since before the Civil War. Children graduating high school these days are barely literate and absolutely incapable of identifying a logical syllogism or evaluating an argument. Jon Stewart's joke news show is most of the country's prime source of information and analysis. Maybe there's a fantastic revolution of "critical thinking" happening in the third world somewhere, but certainly not in the US or western Europe.

Re: How the Internet Is Taking Away America’s Religion

#53

Post by afhdshufdufdo »

danbruc wrote: post #42
afhdshufdufdo wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm critical of atheism, because it is itself a religious belief and those that believe and evangelize it refuse to recognize it as a religion in and of itself. I live in the U.S. where the country was built by those that wanted freedom of religion.

Atheism is a belief but not a religious belief.

Religion is defined as, 'The belief in and worship of a superhuman controlling power, especially a personal God or gods.'

Notice the word "especially". Scientology is based on the idea of what some might call aliens having superhuman powers. In atheism, a number of superhuman powers, i.e. things that humans cannot do, are ascribed to science- even though there is nothing that disallows that God could be involved in everything from the big bang to evolution, somehow the Big Bang and Evolution take on a life of their own, without full understanding of them.

Darwin takes the place of a prophet, although Darwin himself was not an atheist [1] and said, "Science has nothing to do with Christ, except insofar as the habit of scientific research makes a man cautious in admitting evidence."

Faith and science can co-exist, but atheism has a belief that they can't. They put up billboards, organize, take donations, have musical rallies at military bases with atheist songs, and pass out literature like evangelical religions. And they are as intolerant and unaccepting as well. I find them quite obnoxious, but atheism is a religion, therefore according to our freedom of religion, it must be allowed, but it should be allowed along with the free practice of any other religion in any place, at any time, in any public place.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religious_views_of_Charles_Darw...

Re: How the Internet Is Taking Away America’s Religion

#55

Post by daveqr »

Retric wrote: post #43
baldfat wrote: post #41

Myth: Less people go to church now then in the past. Really weak since more people go to church now then they did in 1994! :) The numbers show that more people attend church percentage wise then ever in history of America. Don't even look at World Wide church attendance because it might make your mind explode on how much Christianity has grown. It is always shocking how people report the death of religion without the…

Your ignoring population growth. As there is around 50 million more people in the us now than there was in 1994. "In 1990, 20.4% of the population attended an Orthodox Christian church on any given weekend. In 2000, that percentage dropped to 18.7% and to 17.7% by 2004. Olson explains that while church attendance numbers have stayed about the same from 1990 to 2004, the U.S. population has grown by 18.1% — more than…

"The numbers show that more people attend church percentage wise then ever in history of America."

Re: How the Internet Is Taking Away America’s Religion

#56

Post by Retric »

daveqr wrote: post #55
Retric wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your ignoring population growth. As there is around 50 million more people in the us now than there was in 1994. "In 1990, 20.4% of the population attended an Orthodox Christian church on any given weekend. In 2000, that percentage dropped to 18.7% and to 17.7% by 2004. Olson explains that while church attendance numbers have stayed about the same from 1990 to 2004, the U.S. population has grown by 18.1% — more than…

"The numbers show that more people attend church percentage wise then ever in history of America."

More people lie about attending church which is the only way you can get the 40% figgure. But actual attendance has not been keeping up with population growth.

"Q: How many people go to church each Sunday? A: For years, the Gallup Research Organization has come up with a consistent figure — 40 percent of all Americans, or roughly 118 million people, who said they attended worship on the previous weekend. Recently, sociologists of religion have questioned that figure, saying Americans tend to exaggerate how often they attend. By actually counting the number of people who showed up at representative sample of churches, two researchers, Kirk Hadaway and Penny Marler found that only 20.4 percent of the population, or half the Gallup figure, attended church each weekend. As added proof for the accuracy of this smaller percentage of churchgoers, if 20.4% of Americans (approximately 63 million in 2010) attended the nation's 350,000 congregations weekly then the average attendance would be 180 people per congregation which is almost exactly the figure that numerous research studies have found."

Re: How the Internet Is Taking Away America’s Religion

#57

Post by gonvaled »

danbruc wrote: post #42
afhdshufdufdo wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm critical of atheism, because it is itself a religious belief and those that believe and evangelize it refuse to recognize it as a religion in and of itself. I live in the U.S. where the country was built by those that wanted freedom of religion.

Atheism is a belief but not a religious belief.

Atheism is not a belief: it is a non-belief.

Re: How the Internet Is Taking Away America’s Religion

#58

Post by baldfat »

jamesaguilar wrote: post #49
baldfat wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> something that is very destructive to religious belief I think history's greatest logical thinkers would beg to differ with you. The history books are always trying to be rewritten by someone BUT religious thought has driven this critical thinking and logic for millennial. Also explain why more people are Christians now then ever? Percentage and Numbers???

Because there are more people now than ever. Are you trying to make a parody?

Read the word percentage

Re: How the Internet Is Taking Away America’s Religion

#59

Post by afhdshufdufdo »

joeclark77 wrote: post #52
mullingitover wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also the greatest tool that has ever been created for destroying superstition and myth. We're in the golden age of critical thinking, something that is very destructive to religious belief.

> We're in the golden age of critical thinking That's a hoot! There hasn't been as much tribalism and sloganeering in US politics as there is now since before the Civil War. Children graduating high school these days are barely literate and absolutely incapable of identifying a logical syllogism or evaluating an argument. Jon Stewart's joke news show is most of the country's prime source of information and analysis.…

+10000000. I totally agree with you. But, I don't know what to do about it. We've tried public and private schools, but I think a lot of the problem is our culture. Hard work and studying are not rewarded; group mind-think and standardization have taken the place of a good combination of rote memory learning and essay writing/debating.

What if we were to establish schools the same way they existed in the 1800s with the same rigor? Small, mixed classes, all in a single room, hopefully taught by the very well-educated.

Re: How the Internet Is Taking Away America’s Religion

#60

Post by gonvaled »

afhdshufdufdo wrote: post #53
danbruc wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Atheism is a belief but not a religious belief.

Religion is defined as, 'The belief in and worship of a superhuman controlling power, especially a personal God or gods.' Notice the word "especially". Scientology is based on the idea of what some might call aliens having superhuman powers. In atheism, a number of superhuman powers, i.e. things that humans cannot do, are ascribed to science- even though there is nothing that disallows that God could be involved in e…

"Faith and science can co-exist, but atheism has a belief that they can't."

Of course they can co-exist, and atheism has nothing to say against religion: religion, by definition, is non-falsifiable, so atheism can not negate it.

Atheism is, nevertheless, very sceptical about the actual existence of a supreme being. It can't prove its non-existence, but still considers it as veeeery improbable. As "there are a million reasons which explain why we believe in god which are much more probable than the fact that god exists".

So yes, you can accept science and religion, but accepting the later can not be based on reason (because there is no logical method to disprove the existence of god)

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