Phi for All

I haven't stereotyped any believers, unless by mistake. My gripe is with the premise of the Abrahamic religions, and I realize there are those who benefit from the spirit of the teachings, but I also realize folks like that (your friends and spouse who aren't natural persecutors) would most likely gravitate to something less rooted in sin, judgement, and penitence. I think all those folks would be more with less religion.

It is a bit of a paradox. The only group of folks I find intolerable are those that can't tolerate whole groups of people. But I don't need to set up your oppressive hierarchy. I don't need to ban religions entirely. That's just more straw. I want to remove the toxic influence of the Abrahamic religions from our governance. Do I need to ban them to do that, or can I just enforce what the US Constitution says about separating church from state? I don't need to remove the churches as long as I can get the transparency I need to keep them from molesting children, again a crime we already have provisions for. I don't need to ban the teachings as long as those who use it for violence can be dealt with by the law, which has been difficult in the past. I don't need to emulate these religions with an oppressive hierarchy. Instead, I'd really like to move forward with some relief for all the people Jesus is supposedly weeping for, and maybe work on alleviation of suffering instead of embracing it as part of our sinful heritage. I'd like to remove the oppressive hierarchies Judaism and Islam inflict on those outside their faiths, too. I should be able to do that again by simply enforcing existing laws against the promotion of human suffering. Keep your religion, but stop using it as a shield to keep harming others. It's tiring trying to see the trees through the forest of strawmen, but ultimately I think it's time to admit we have shackles on all of us, put there by the Abrahamic religions, and kept in place with our own minds thousands of years after the original con was engineered. It's embarrassing, I know, but we should be smart enough to rise above it. Science can show us we should just bookmark this fiasco and move ahead with educating ourselves in the natural world.

No offense, but this has already been done by targeting the Abrahamic religions, and the practices you mention aren't really applicable to a thread about god. Defending spirituality in this instance gives a lot of leverage to the Bible thumpers and the SoMuchHolierThanThou folks. Thanks, but no thanks. Of course it's not hardwired. The tendency to explain the unseen may have started in superstition, but we don't have to continue to placate the ignorant in this regard. We are distinct among species in our reasoning power, and for too long the Abrahamic religions have been the law of the land despite all the problems they've created. We've let those in power decide how to interpret the word of imaginary beings, and then lie to us about how it's necessary in order to understand oneself. Our desire to be part of something larger is mostly snuffed by the Abrahamic religions. They've taught us that only a few can be right, the rest wrong, and the last thing you should do is find empathy and common ground with such heathens. We may find small groups, but we'll never unite as a species if Judaism, Christianity, and Islam have their way. I, for one, am terrified that we're exploring space without being united as a planet, and these religions couldn't care less, since they all seem to give up on Earth in favor of their heavens. Ack! Sorry, choking from all the straw!

This falls flat right out of the gate. Energy is a property of a thing, not a thing itself. This has been demonstrated countless times. Can you support the concept of "pure energy"? How much would fit in a gallon jug?

I was making the distinction @dimreepr mentions. I may be wrong, but Utopia always seemed focused on being the best place for everybody, like there's one size that can fit all. I think of "Heaven on Earth" as a place where the opportunities for prosperity are supported so each person can find their own ideals. Abrahamic religions don't even come close to that concept. Also, I'm willing to support my assertions to the best of my abilities, but please understand I'm not talking about the "guaranteed success" of them. It does occur to me that if something fails to do what it's supposed to do after thousands of years, throwing it out seems valid. Maybe we take the halo off the baby and then throw out the bathwater? I get that you're OK with only half of them being applicable to everyone. I hope you still feel that way when they figure out how to monitor how covetous you are. I'm done tolerating such bullshit. Just because those religions provided a way for conquerors to subjugate and oppress doesn't mean we need to keep allowing them to interpret their god's will any way they please. This is today, and we should be using our brains instead of this stupid faith in ancient religions. Stuck with it in our DNA? Citation, please. I think this behavior is exactly the kind of thing that can be overcome with intelligence. Better education, more emphasis on science and less on beliefs from the Bronze and Iron Ages. But it will be difficult because there are many who think like you do, and believe it's inevitable that we'll always think only like other animals.

! Moderator Note I'm OK with leaving it here, but it's probably more of a Psychology topic. I've removed the link to the YT channel because we'd be flooded if we allowed folks to promote them, but fortunately the OP has enough information for a discussion.

Paul wrote several letters to various churches at the time, and those ended up as books in the Bible. Galatians, Corinthians 1&2, Ephesians, Romans, etc, all pretty much start with "To the churches of X..." And some of what Paul wrote was about the importance of going to church: A few more gems: More vertical morality, misogyny, and fear for profit. I think science can show that the Abrahamic religions are holding us back big time.

Not a canonical practice that I know of, but there are many verses in the Bible stressing the importance of going to church for various reasons, and there are also many verses condemning those who seek to pollute the Word by worshipping false gods and ideas. The fact that there are other verses that claim we're all the same and the god loves us all equally means these religions are attracting both good and evil people, and giving them all ways to justify all their actions.

Most of what makes the Abrahamic religions horrible is the vertical morality they push on everyone. It implies there is a hierarchy of moral character that must be earned in artificial, hypocritical ways (attending church takes precedent over kindness to someone of another faith, for instance). It's difficult for humans to stand together when some of them want to be elevated above the rest. In my opinion, the key to a modern human society is a focus on helping each other rather than on helping ourselves, something religion only claims to be interested in. We've been fooled into thinking rugged individualism is the epitome of human behavior, but it's only made us weak and isolated, perfect prey for those who want to control us. I think calling it Utopia is misguided. If we can have a society where we don't stupidly ignore the worst pressures and stresses so an elite can have more than others, it's not going to be perfect for everyone, but hopefully it can have far fewer people barely clinging to their existence and also far fewer people buying shadow yachts with servants and toys trailing the main yacht. I think removing the concept that there are people who are more worthy than you will have a dramatic effect on our humanity. If the only help we can expect is from each other, I think others will have much more value. I also think bad human nature will no longer have a pious place to hide. Really? The first four are about their god being jealous. The fifth assumes your parents knew exactly what they were doing, and helps set up the vertical morality the church wants. The rest all focus on negative aspects of our existence, rather than a more positive, uplifting, I don't know... spiritual stance. We're commanded not to kill instead of being commanded to honor life. We're commanded not to steal rather than being commanded to respect the property of others. Modern psychology has a LOT to say about focusing on the negative, none of it good. And for a list of things our very souls rely on, it has no nuance for situations where we might need to kill in self-defense, or end a life for medical reasons, or help a woman leave a dangerous husband. Lies have been judged to save lives in certain circumstances, but they're all against the Commandments. But those specific tribal practices are just as vertically arranged as Christianity. They're looking for authoritarian leaders because in general they don't know what the hell they're doing. If we can promote the idea that nobody is better than anyone else and therefore we need to help each other, I think we can eventually remove this idea that we all need to look out for #1 because nobody else will.

I do. I think religion is the single most dangerous, evil, superstitious, dehumanizing practice we have ever allowed to be perpetrated on decent humans, and I think the vertical morality it engenders has held us back for millenia. I would argue that the Abrahamic religions alone have stunted our growth as moral intellectuals, and that without them we'd have a much firmer grasp of the importance of this very thin band of atmosphere that holds every bit of life we know about.

Perhaps mar_mar doesn't understand that we can take apart the eye of an animal and compare it with other eyes we've taken apart, including human eyes. Perhaps they think it's too far a leap to find the same rods and cones and then test to see if that animal can distinguish the same colors we do. Perhaps they've never seen any of the excellent nature shows that allow us to observe how important color is in the animal world. It's a given that they haven't studied enough evolution to understand how eyes developed among the various species. I also think they believe humans are unique rather than distinctive on this planet, most probably because of some religious contamination.

OK, you really don't understand science. Perhaps study and come back, but you're just wasting time with this garbage, mostly yours. Such a shame!

Nobody is criticizing YOU, it's your idea that people have problems with. We told you exactly what was wrong with the idea, but you either didn't like the criticism or didn't understand it. It's not about banning you. We're here to have meaningful discussions about science. What you're arguing isn't science, and we tried to help you see that. It's very obvious that animals can distinguish colors, and there is a LOT of documentation about it. But here comes YOU, saying they can't, and we know they can. Is that arrogant? I don't think so. I think you're wrong, I think we've shown that, and again you either don't like what you're hearing or you don't understand what you're hearing. Also, you didn't seem to understand that Guardian article you linked to. It doesn't support your claims. You didn't want to support an assertion you made on a science forum? Then don't make them in the first place. Boy, talk about arrogant.

This is not exactly true, is it? You talked about it for several pages, couldn't support it, made up some weird semantic reasons, wasted a LOT of time for many people, and so ultimately your other thread was closed, and you were told not to bring it up again BECAUSE IT'S A WASTE OF TIME!

Is "old world", defined in this way, something others have used or did you make it up? Either way, I don't think it's a good term. We already use it to mean "traditional", and it can also imply that a world is well established or hasn't changed fundamentally in a long time. I also object to using "old" as a synonym for "used up and long ago depleted" for personal reasons.

It still seems like you're thinking this would all be a slide backwards, but there's no reason why we have to go back to using fire when we still have modern energy sources. We wouldn't be using less of Earth's resources necessarily, but the resources could be used MUCH more efficiently. It doesn't necessarily use more resources to distribute food where it's needed rather than letting it rot on a dock. There are tons of things we do wrong in modern agriculture, imo. I think monocrop yields blind us to the concerns about crop rotation, overuse of pesticides and fertilizers, and overall quality of the food we grow. I'd love to see the US in particular adopt more indigenous practices, such as food forests where multiple layers of crops protect each other from pests, naturally fertilize the ground and keep it full of nutrients, and give depth and sophistication to the taste of the foods we eat. And none of this means we have to take a single step backwards.

I think if the second sentence above were to happen, it might help with the first sentence above. You probably think of "tribal way of living" as a bad thing; I see it as a way for humans to work together for their own ends, to be able to realize 100% of their work efforts, rather than working to make others wealthy. One of our biggest problems today is we think rugged individualism is attractive, when we really need to pull together and stop isolating ourselves in small family units. The resources aren't being depleted so much as they're being hoarded by the wealthy, who recognize that we're stronger in numbers.

! Moderator Note You were warned about hijacking other people's threads with this inanity. If it continues, your account will be banned. You couldn't support this garbage in its own thread, so please stop messing up the work of others!

Apparently, a mordant is used to fix dyes, and too much heat can break down the mordant and release the dyes. Anything that isn't white should probably be washed in cold.

Here's a Venn diagram explaining why Marjorie Taylor Greene's book isn't selling well:

! Moderator Note Too many people put too much time into trying to help you see your error, so we won't be deleting all that work. But I can certainly close this. Don't bring this idea up again in other threads.

! Moderator Note Perhaps you need to take a break and review? Back off the personal attacks? Answer clarifying questions so a reasonable conversation can happen?

Fortunately, you admitted to it very recently: It has been obvious and it's time to stop it. It boils down to "Why does mistermack get to make assertions, refuse to back them up, and later claim they're just his opinion and conjecture?" You should know by now how sloppy gets jumped on here. I don't think we're asking too much of you.

The way discussion works here is you should be able to cough up the evidence that supports any stance you assert if someone questions it. Now that you've questioned my stance, I'm prepared to defend the assertion I made. This is what you fail to do often enough that it's been a problem. You adamantly refuse to support some of the stuff you claim, and it gets pointed out on the regular. You claim it's your opinion, yet you refuse to state it that way. You seem to want a way to make your assertions without earning the right. My assertion was "If religious faith disappeared, the rest of us could progress and create heaven here on Earth." Organized Christians in the US are preparing to take steps to remove our current democracy, supporting Christian Nationalism through Project 2025. Some believe their religious goals can only be achieved by the destruction of human society and Armageddon. Religious faith seems to be undermining democracy in most areas. They object to science, to progress, to healthcare, birth control, and social spending. They insist on tiered morality with their god and them at the top and the rest of us somewhere below them. Without their obvious blockades the rest of us could create a remarkable society where it actually looked like people cared for all other people. All you have to do is ask me to support my stances. If I posted it here, I'm willing to defend it. And you can make damn sure that if I offer my opinion, it's going to sound like one. It'll be something inconsequential, like "Man, I think metallic lime green is the most obnoxious color on the planet!"

I can provide my evidence on request, and I knew I could BEFORE I posted. I didn't make this statement blindly, IOW.