Judaism, Christianity and Islam are forms of socially sanctioned lunacy, their fundamental tenents and rituals irrational, archaic and more importantly when it comes to matters of humanity’s long-term survival, mutually incompatible. This is not so much an argument as an assertion, for which no evidence is given whatsoever. It also happens to be a very poorly worded run-on sentence; as the Prince of that particular grammatical error, I know it when I see it.There are names for people who have beliefs for which there is no rational justification. When their beliefs are extremely common, we call them ‘religious’; otherwise, they are likely to be called ‘mad,’ ‘psychotic’ or ‘delusional.’Please, for the sake of this piece, define what "rational argument" is, because that is a loaded term, with no settled, general understanding. ‘’ To cite but one example: ‘’Jesus Christ—who, as it turns out, was born of a virgin, cheated death and rose bodily into the heavens—can now be eaten in the form of a cracker. A few Latin words spoken over your favorite Burgundy, and you can drink his blood as well. Is there any doubt that a lone subscriber to these beliefs would be considered mad?’’As this describes several variegated strands of Christian belief, some of which despise each other, considering the holders of opposed viewpoints to live in gross error, I'm not sure how one can understand the statement with any coherence. Even five minutes of study of the history of Christian thought would lead one to understand that, by tossing together various opposing strands of the tradition, violence is done to any serious, thoughtful consideration of the issue. Of course, the person who composed this sentence in all probability is both ignorant and mean, so there you go. The danger of religious faith is that it allows otherwise normal human beings to reap the fruits of madness and consider them holy.’’Another possible danger of religious faith is that they may well justify horrors in the name of God. Or they may insist that human beings are better off living together even with all their differences than belittling the views of other who happen to think and live differently than they do. I guess I thought that was what liberalism was all about. Boy, was I wrong!
Criticizing a person’s faith is currently taboo in every corner of our culture.Really. I thought it was pretty common practice, but what do I know? I'm an insane person, after all . . . On this subject, liberals and conservatives have reached a rare consensus: religious beliefs are simply beyond the scope of rational discourse.There's that word again, "rational". This particular liberal believes not only that certain understandings of "rational discourse" are so limiting they should be dispensed with; on the other hand, an expanded notion of "rational discourse" most certainly includes a discussion of religious belief. There is a distinction between the privatizing of religious belief, and walling it off from someone's truncated ideas of what constitutes "rational discourse". Criticizing a person’s ideas about God and the afterlife is thought to be impolitic in a way that criticizing his ideas about physics or history is not.’’Historians question each other's ideas of history all the time. Physics is kept alive by questioning pretty much everything in physics. Or did you not know that?
A zippered-lip policy would be fine, a pleasant display of the neighborly tolerance that we consider part of an advanced democracy, if not for the mortal perils inherent in strong religious faith. I suppose we are going to have examples given of these mortal perils?The terrorists who flew jet planes into the World Trade Center believed in the holiness of their cause.Ah, here we go. Therefore, all relgion spawns terrorism What a shockingly clear display of logic. The Christian apocalypticists who are willing to risk a nuclear conflagration in the Middle East for the sake of expediting the second coming of Christ believe in the holiness of their cause. Such fundamentalists are not misinterpreting their religious texts or ideals. They are not defaming or distorting their faith. To the contrary, they are taking their religion seriously, attending to the holy texts on which their faith is built. Unhappily for international community, the Good Books that undergird the world’s major religions are extraordinary anthologies of violence and vengeance, celestial decrees that infidels must die.This is a wonderful demonstration of the intellectual closeness of fundamentalist Christianity to a blinkered view of modernist rationalism. Both accept certain interpretations of religious texts as normative, claiming others as nonsensical, irrational, and otherwise erroneous. Who knew that rationalists were closet fundamentalists?
In the 21st century when swords have been beaten into megaton bombs, the persistence of ancient, blood-washed theisms that emphasize their singular righteousness and their superiority over competing faiths poses a genuine threat to the future of humanity, if not the biosphere: ‘’We can no longer ignore the fact that billions of our neighbors believe in the metaphysics of martyrdom, or in the literal truth of the book of Revelation,’’ he writes, ‘’because our neighbors are now armed with chemical, biological and nuclear weapons.’’This is one of those further plagiarized texts, with the "he" in the quoted section not identified. It happens t be torture apologist Sam Harris.
I have a particular ire for religious moderates, those who ‘’have taken the apparent high road of pluralism, asserting the equal validity of all faiths’’ and who ‘’imagine that the path to peace will be paved once each of us has learned to respect the unjustified beliefs of others.’’This is the morally dubious and intellectually vacuous assertion that those whose views we care not to understand are inherently wrong. Again, the quote is loaded, with the word "unjustified" being used without definition. Religious moderates are the ones who thwart all efforts to criticize religious literalism.Actually, I criticize it all the time. So do most religious liberals of whom I am aware. Perhaps someone would be so kind as to point me in the general direction of a non-fundamentalist who demands that fundies not be criticized? By preaching tolerance, they become intolerant of any rational discussion of religion and ‘’betray faith and reason equally.’’I am no fan of "tolerance", much preferring an open-ended pluralism that recognizes the real differences as legitimate, but still worthy of criticism and rejection. This is a straw argument here, based on absolutely no real examples.
The human need for a mystical dimension to life like mysticism and other forms of knowledge, can be approached rationally and explored with the tools of modern neuroscience, without recourse to superstition and credulity.Except in the case of Sam Harris who defends reincarnation, infantile glossolalia, and ESP.
At this time Islam is the reigning threat to humankind.Actually, American imperialism is the reigning threat to humankind, or had no one noticed that? Much like a gruesome, Inquisition-style Christianity of the 13th century only leads us to believe not all cultures are at the same stage of moral development,’’ I couldn’t help but think of Ann Coulter’s morally developed suggestion that we invade Muslim countries, kill their leaders and convert their citizens to Christianity.Except you would have us invade other countries kill their leaders, and convert them to rationalism, rather than, perhaps, learning to live with differences, and finding other ways of settling disputes and managing conflict.
I will say this of Faith: it has been the foundation of every religion, every cult, every sect, every religious terrorist organization that desired to gain advocates whose will greatly exceeded their intelligence. When a religion asks that its followers believe all that it declares, and to do so without evidence, it speaks volumes of the intent and meaning of that religion. These churches, temples and mosques, they will keep their followers in the shadows of millennium past. Evolution is still howled as the great enemy of faith. It simply has the greatest following of scientists and evidence. It's not scientifically that any religion has ever tried to debunk Evolution. They brought forth no evidence. They claimed no new discoveries. Their only tactic was to point to tattered and very old scriptues -- to flip through the pages, and read the rancid words, almost as if they were pure gold. Faith does not require investigation, or evidence, or demonstration, or observation, or logical deductions. It simply requires that a person believe, in spite of what evidence may say: it requires that a person blindfolds themselves when demonstration is shown, to use earplugs when anyone speaks of logic, and to turn away at every reason for them to believe what Faith tells them is wrong. Those cults and sects which have utilized violence for the realization of their apocalyptic future -- they required nothing but the willpower and a great deal of Faith.This entire paragraph is a host of sentence fragments, run-ons, misspellings, all evidence of a hurried individual not concerned with the structure of presentation. It asserts without evidence; it uses all sorts of loaded and laden vocabulary without definition. It is so full of ignorance, stupidity, condescension, and hatred, it is best left to stand on its own as a monument to the failures of such a "critique" as this.
Overall, this has been a stomach churning exercise for me. There are far better ways for me to spend my time and intellectual energy than tending to the ravings of an ignorant lunatic. At least, however, I have taken a good, careful look at this passage, so now I never have to do so again.
