Nice to see O'Bama working on getting rid of midnight Bush rules

[kandrathe]

I'll address the earlier stuff tomorrow after I've contemplated on it a bit. But this latter part I can discuss off the top of my head.

Do you not think people believed in a literal flood at the time the Bible was written? Do you believe that the enlightened writers had a series of elaborate metaphors in mind, and every generation since has simply mistaken them for a factual description of events?

Some people are literalistic, yes. They also believe the world is a few thousand years old. We both know this is not an enlightened way of reading the text, which would be imperative for those who are truly seeking truth, rather than any answer.

This is just the latest adaptation of the god of the gaps: we didn't really mean that thing that you tested and found to be wrong. What we really meant was this other thing, a metaphorical thing that you can't test.

For example, "The Catholic Church" and their dogma have been proven wrong many, many times over the centuries and given time they adapt to the changes revealed by science.

That's because science has a method for going forward, and religion has a method for going in circles.

... from your perspective. I'm more of a philosopher than scientist, so I value more than empirical knowledge.

Explain then how the least religious societies in the world also number amongst the least violent, and vice versa. Is that just a historical aberation?

You mean like Stalin and his purges? You mean like the Khmer Rouge?

Are the Swedes hanging on to their orderly society by some unusual magic?

Yes, homogeneity. Immigration is upsetting their utopia.

Are the janjaweed in Sudan simply missing the bit in their religion where it's supposed to provide the ethical glue that stops them from indiscriminately killing people?

There are some articles I've read that equate these violent offshoots of Islam akin to destructive cults, just like Aum Shinrikyo. In this regard, OBL is just a crazy cult leader.

That wasn't Karl Marx. That was Jesse Ventura. Karl Marx said religion was the opium of the masses.

Well, sort of, he was paraphrasing Marx. I found the actual Marx quote, "Religion is a crutch for those who are too weak to face life alone."

"Let them keep their fairy tales. Don't tell them it isn't real, they might start crying." This is treating people like children. Nobody is forcing irreligion on believers, their crutches are safe if they really want to keep them. The trend towards irreligion seems clear enough to me; let people choose for themselves, and they will slowly drift away from religion as it becomes increasingly anachronistic.

Unless you live in those places where religion is highly regulated (persecuted) by the state. The highest populations of atheists are in China, other communist Asian states and the former Soviet Union. Consequently, places where religion is highly discouraged. In Europe, only France jumps out as the aberration having more than 30% of the population being atheist. I would not say I treat people like children. More that I would allow people to define their own world view, as long as it is compatible with civil society. As my Buddhist friends would say quoting Lao Tzu, “There are many paths to enlightenment. Be sure to take one with a heart.”