Can we agree on this? Biggest problem in the world today.

[BubbleGumSnareDrum]

That's because your ignorance is affirmed by the media dangling extremists in your face.

Hey, I got an idea! Let's take the violent and loud minority of a religious group and assume that everyone who has a faith affiliated with that general religion is EXACTLY the same! That makes sense, right? Let's also assume that anyone who DOES believe is automatically an uneducated moron who isn't fit for any sort of leadership, political career, or celebrity status (For some reason).

I can't decide what bugs me more: Elitist anti-theists who can't simply let people believe what they want even if they disagree (And yeah, you can disagree without being a jerk-off), or elitist anti-theists who obviously know very little any faith, but just assume they do because they watched some interview on Youtube with Dawkins who is under this hilarious delusion that if religion suddenly ceased to exist, that all the world's problems would be solved.

Yeah, hate-speech is a great way to show how bad religion is. Way to take the high-road.

And pardon me if I am coming off a bit harsh, but I've seen too much if this crap lately. People have a right to believe what they want. And please, I know that there are people who shove religion down the throats of others. I'm not saying they are right, but I AM saying that the right response isn't a hypocritical one.

I'm not going to respond to any quotes here, as I don't want to derail the thread any more. You want to talk more about it or whatever? PM me.

As someone who was raised Christian and has not limited himself from reading any religious texts I can say with absolute honesty that even non-violent religious people are still, you know, impeding human progress simply by believing in something so obviously untrue and ridiculous.

But that's just me.

 

[Valiance]

Theres too many men~
Too many people~
Making too many problems~

 

[Cpt_Oblivious]

Religion. We'd know a great deal more about everything if we had no religion holding us back. I don't mean morals saying "this is wrong" but the religious nuts who say "it's against God's will". If there is a God then it wouldn't have made us able to do this stuff if we weren't supposed to.

It's also a major cause of war, as any flick through a history of conflict will tell you.

Edit: If there's a god(s) then they're a kid and we're a worm farm. They took an interest at the start but now we get on with our lives and they'll have a look every so often but just leave us to see what we'll do really.

Just to clarify what I'm on about really.

 

[Archaon6044]

they will, but as you say, only for a short time.

rather sadisticly, i am quite interested in seeing what happens when America falls off its perch. i know the world economy will drop staight down the drain, and float away down the sewers, and that all sorts of other shit will go wrong, but i just want to see what happens to the patriotism, and the national superioroty complex when the country falls on its arse.

 

[cuddly_tomato]

As someone who was raised Christian and has not limited himself from reading any religious texts I can say with absolute honesty that even non-violent religious people are still, you know, impeding human progress simply by believing in something so obviously untrue and ridiculous.

But that's just me.

I'd love to know how you come to such a conclusion, given that most people on this planet have been and continue to be religious, and nations which adopt atheism (not secularism) as their state religion tend to collapse and actually go a bit backward (Soviet Union, Cambodia, Maos China).

It's also a major cause of war, as any flick through a history of conflict will tell you.

Absolutely agree. Stop flicking, and start reading however, and you see that religion itself has nothing to do with the various wars people have faught with each other.

 

[TwistedEllipses]

Is it a modern day Roman Empire? I'd disagree with that.

Too right, there's pretty much nothing in common. It's not even an empire (unless Hawaii counts?)...

Biggest problem - climate change?

 

[Slinkey]

The biggest problem are religious people, countries based on religion!
Don't get me wrong, I am a Christian, but politics and religion do not go well together.

 

[Cpt_Oblivious]

It's also a major cause of war, as any flick through a history of conflict will tell you.

Absolutely agree. Stop flicking, and start reading however, and you see that religion itself has nothing to do with the various wars people have faught with each other.

Well then it's an excuse.

"We want your land!"
"Can't have it, it's mine"
"God says we should have it and we must take it by force if needed!"

and so on with pretty much anything else you can disagree about.

 

[BubbleGumSnareDrum]

I'd love to know how you come to such a conclusion, given that most people on this planet have been and continue to be religious, and nations which adopt atheism (not secularism) as their state religion tend to collapse and actually go a bit backward (Soviet Union, Cambodia, Maos China).

Maybe it's because most people are also idiots?

 

[Cpt_Oblivious]

I'd love to know how you come to such a conclusion, given that most people on this planet have been and continue to be religious, and nations which adopt atheism (not secularism) as their state religion tend to collapse and actually go a bit backward (Soviet Union, Cambodia, Maos China).

Maybe it's because most people are also idiots?

Don't adopt Atheism as a religion. Just don't give the religious people any power. If they hadn't been given that at any point they'd probably have been locked up long ago.

Just ignore the big questions religion "answers" for a while and concentrate on stuff that can help us find out and is manageable at this time.

All the non-religious people are just too scared to go up to all the religions and say "Can we have our planet back?"

 

[ChocoFace]

Is it a modern day Roman Empire? I'd disagree with that.

As would I.

I also agree, at least the roman empire were competent.

were they? if i'm not mistaken, they expanded their territories so much and took in so many new citizens, that many people weren't loyal to the empire at all. Also the proletarians.
Oh and don't forget generals hiring mercenaries(as most people were too poor to buy their own military equipment), resulting in civil wars and all that.

I'm not gonna name the positive sides, i trust you know them.

 

[literallyanythingelse]

Too many children.

No, really. Think about it.
Children are filthy, loud, and obnoxious little snots.
When they grow up, they become filthy, loud, and obnoxious adults.
Or sometimes, politicians.
Or soldiers.
Or terrorists.
Or rapists.
Or regular people who just contribute to making everything worse.

Instead of blaming "people," I blame "children."
It makes me sound like a mean old man and damnit, I like that.

Oh definitely, definitely. I think the main problem is that we have already passed the tipping point of global warming, in that even if we totally stop pumping carbon dioxide out today (which we won't) the earth will still warm by several degrees over the next 100 years, turning the equatorial regions into deserts and totally overcrowding the rest of the world (due to migration away from the equator). Which will be mostly submerged due to icecaps melting, etc. Therefore, we need less people to fit on this smaller landmass of the future, therefore children are evil. Noice.

 

[Eldritch Warlord]

Is it a modern day Roman Empire? I'd disagree with that.

As would I.

I also agree, at least the roman empire were competent.

yeah, the romans did some good aswell.

I'm going to have to break up this little "hmm, yes. The US does suck, things in the past were so much better" line of thought.

The Romans weren't all good, for one thing no invention came out of Rome. In fact immediately after the collapse of the empire (like when former citizens found themselves ruled by Germanic invaders) the stirrup and heavy plow were invented and more efficient iron smelting furnaces were introduced. Right after because the Roman Empire actively suppressed invention, to them the only good ways to make things better was to have more or bigger (preferably both).

In contrast the US economy is practically invention driven.

Now that I think about it aside from both being affluent and powerful European societies the US and Rome have almost nothing in common.

Anyway, problems. Overpopulation, we solve that an there are no problems. Sadly about the only way to directly solve that problem is to have an East Asian, and Indian Sub-continental coalition go conquer Africa then fight a war with each other over how to divide it then have a UN coalition intervene (violently) to help them play nice. That being unlikely we are forced to overcome shortages of food, water, space, energy, civilian infrastructure, and skilled professionals.

 

[Cowabungaa]

Greed, obviously, it really rottens everything and caused or had a hand in well...maybe all the problems in the world, especially the one's in third world country's.

I'd love to know how you come to such a conclusion, given that most people on this planet have been and continue to be religious, and nations which adopt atheism (not secularism) as their state religion tend to collapse and actually go a bit backward (Soviet Union, Cambodia, Maos China).

Kinda hard because atheism isn't a religion. It's not organised by any means. I also won't blame atheism for the fact that those countries went backwards, I'de blaim the FAIL basics of there economic system for that. It's not because of the lack of religion that North Korea is starving to death, it's because they don't have any food (duh )

 

[JMeganSnow]

Irrationalism.

 

[cuddly_tomato]

It's also a major cause of war, as any flick through a history of conflict will tell you.

Absolutely agree. Stop flicking, and start reading however, and you see that religion itself has nothing to do with the various wars people have faught with each other.

Well then it's an excuse.

"We want your land!"
"Can't have it, it's mine"
"God says we should have it and we must take it by force if needed!"

and so on with pretty much anything else you can disagree about.

Yep. Thing is though, anything will be used as an excuse by a sociopathic despot. Take away religion, and they will find their excuse in something else.

I'd love to know how you come to such a conclusion, given that most people on this planet have been and continue to be religious, and nations which adopt atheism (not secularism) as their state religion tend to collapse and actually go a bit backward (Soviet Union, Cambodia, Maos China).

Maybe it's because most people are also idiots?

Possibly... As atheists are so fond of requesting from theists, where is your proof?

Let us use the scientific method.

1. Due to the fact that world has yet to see an atheist state last beyond 50 years, and given that such states have been horribly oppressive to its citizens, we can formulate a theory that governments founded on atheism have always failed up until this point.

2. Some stuff here about faith being "poison", and Issac Newton, Descartes, Freeman Dyson, and Francis Collins all be stupid.

3. Yeah, and Richard the Third and Saladin and crusades and 1157 and stuff.

4. Therefore religion is bad and is responsible for alllllll of lifes problems. And atheist societies would provably work much better.

No.

The real problem in the world today, the big challenge that causes war and people to fight each other, is intolerance, hatred and bigotry. It is the Muslim who will not make peace with the Jew, the Turk who will not talk with the Greek, the Christian who will not talk with the Pagan... but it is also the atheist who will not talk with the theist. In condemning everyone else you have a beef with and blaming the worlds problems on them, your behaviour matches exactly that which you claim you want to remove from the world.

Oh how ironic is the path of the fundamentalist atheist... =p

 

[Metonym]

Although our european elites will very much like to see a federalistic super power here in the old world.

Of course US is the greatest super power with no comparison in history. the Roman empire was at the time the greatest and most efficient SP with a well thought out strategy and mechanism for administration (that eventually rotted from inside) as well as military power. US have mobile bases and platforms for projecting a global power or "presence" at sea, air, land and Oh don´t forget the inclinations of doing so in space. Star Wars Fo real.

This paired with other geopolitically man made conflicts and "situations". Proliferation of WMD´s as a consquense of the volatile situation in middle east and other remnants of various imperial "projects" or intervention sites, fueled by arms trade and the neo colonial MO that is de rigeur in international affairs. An integral and a very informative part of these imperial ambitions is a blatant policy spearheaded and consistency in international policies by US to undermine the NPT, and ingnoring international law and pursuing unilateralism, that itself is surely a threat to world peace. This is the rationale of an SP and of course it has many precedents and embryos in history, but now it´s on a much grander scale. Did I mention Guantanamo and the history of Latin america is very instructive. Compare that to what the Old world´s european countries did to Africa and other parts of the colonial spectra.

Add to that the fundamentalism both inside US and outside and various more or less religious groups with a politcal agenda and recruitment from groups with actually legitimate grievances as well as utter psychopaths and paid mercenaries into militarized sects. Sure you could blame religion but the people that are "so called" tied up in religious structures are not "blind" they have full responsibilty for their actions and policy. Politcal actions and individual action can be masked by religion but not justified by it. Sure you could try to blame indoctrination but you can never swear yourself free from responsibility; this by the same way that the supreme crime at the Nuremberg trials could not be justified by an "world view" or just following orders.

Greed and elites with contempt for democracy is the bane of our so called "civilisation"
Some of them are not even aware of what they are doing some are but they don´t care.
Consumerism by indoctrination.

 

[Nomad]

I'd love to know how you come to such a conclusion, given that most people on this planet have been and continue to be religious, and nations which adopt atheism (not secularism) as their state religion tend to collapse and actually go a bit backward (Soviet Union, Cambodia, Maos China).

Haha, what? You're not really blaming the 'failure' of those countries on atheism, are you? Atheism was a minor afterthought more than anything else in the grand scheme of their ideologies. The reason for their problems was a whole other can of worms. Their view on religion had little to no effect, other than the oppression it sometimes led to with their zero-tolerance policies. A better way is to declare the nation free of a state religion, and let each person choose his or her own salvation, so to speak. Discourage religion through information, not through oppression. And a hell of a lot of countries are doing just that as we speak. Countries with an officially secular or atheist policy on religion, meaning no religion sanctioned by the state, include among (lots of) others Australia, Canada, Sweden, Germany and France. Are these countries failures as well, in your eyes? And I know, you specifically said "not secularism", but you can't really do that. Secularism is essentially atheism through persuation rather than through oppression.