Schroedinger said:
I ordered Breaking the Spell
Dan Dennett is pretty amazing, one of my favourites
Stevo. said:
Here's a question for all us veterans of this thread. Why do we bother trying to explain such complex ideas to children who are without a doubt unable to comprehend such things?
For the most part... people just don't explain to them 'such complex ideas' ?
politik said:
Of note, was his conversion was based on finding the bible to be historically verifiable, which is interesting.
Many religious texts have a good level of historicity, why does he choose christianity? I mean... How much have we learnt from the writings of the anicent egyptians, but surely we don't believe in Amon Ra?
It's pretty awesome that you're doing this Alan, engaging with different people etc. It'd be cool if you could at usyd who denies physicalism perhaps, if u want a particularly interesting argument.
Iron said:
All men need something greater than themselves to look up to and worship. They must be able to touch the divine here on earth.
An ideal world? A construct of 'goodness' that could be achieved? A belief in the 'human spirit'? I think we can have such beliefs without any sort of diety for sure...
Iron said:
I think this God debate has been a bad excuse to claim that there is nothing greater than ourselves and our own interest.
Well technically, you could say "I think this God debate has been a bad excuse to claim that there's
nothing greater than collecting stamps", since it's true that many atheists have put forward the idea that there is no inate greater value in doing X over Y, they are all equal...
Iron said:
Can you at least admit that it's a shame, ill accept this, that it's a shame that there is no greater truth beyond the individual?
It is a shame and hopefully one which philosophy/neuroscience will get us that much closer to dealing with... though they do seem to form a bit of a strange loop (philosophy to justify our understanding of external observations, neuroscience to understand our internal workings).