The worst idea Mankind ever had?

[cuddly_tomato]

war and religion... they kind of go together dont they.....

[CITATION NEEDED]

I can't see that personally. I can see intolerance, hatred, and the inability to allow people to exist if they have a different culture go hand in hand with war, but that doesn't apply to religion.

It does apply to some of the atheists in this thread though...

I'd have to say it was religion.

Do you ever stop and think where we would be as a species if it weren't for religion...either scientifically or culturally?

In a utopia. The like of which Chairman Mao or Stalin or Pol Pot created. Truly wonderful atheist societies.

Anyway.... Worst idea humans ever had is that they are not responsible for environmental destruction, global warming, ozone layer depletion, and the consequences of that have been increased energy consumption.

 

[Baby Tea]

SNIP!

Ahh, good to see you're still fighting the good fight, CT!

On topic: I'd say Alcohol.

I believe Homer Simpson said it best;

"Ahh, beer. The cause of and solution to all of life's problems."

Indeed.

 

[Arsen]

To shoot Archduke Ferdidnand.
The single shot which caused an entire century of human catastrophes.

 

[The Man With the Soap]

Religion and You!

 

[Melancholy_Ocelot]

Granted, there are some crazies that don't use religion as their torch. However they are immensely overshadowed by those who use mysticism to control and frighten the masses.

My citations include: the 200 years of medieval crusades including the children's crusades, The Spanish Inquisition (which incidentally nobody expects), the condemning of scientific discovery during the dark ages and the Salem Witch hunts.

The Westboro Baptist Chruch, which can be broadened to then hideous amounts of intolerance emanating from the entire bible belt.

The modern day fundamentalists who denounce medicines putting their health and the lives of their children at risk.

And the zealotis muslims who I won't even get into.



Face it, religion has hurt humanity more than it has helped.

 

[gigastrike]

"I hate you!"
"I hate you too!"
"Let's get all our friends together and fight each other!"
"Yeah!"

 

[Cheesebob]

lolcats and /b/

oh and terrorism

 

[cuddly_tomato]

Granted, there are some crazies that don't use religion as their torch. However they are immensely overshadowed by those who use mysticism to control and frighten the masses.

Yes. Stalin was a mere blip in world history. And Chairman Mao? He did virtually nothing. His enlightened atheism allowed him to rule his country so well that he only wiped out 40 million people (more than every single religious conflict combined many times over [http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/atrox.htm], but why should we let fact get in the way of tearing down religions?)

My citations include: the 200 years of medieval crusades including the children's crusades, The Spanish Inquisition (which incidentally nobody expects), the condemning of scientific discovery during the dark ages and the Salem Witch hunts.

Yeah. Those barmy priests with their ridiculous theories. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georges_Lema%C3%AEtre]

Also the fact that all of the countries of the world which have had state atheism [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_atheism] are so successful speaks volumes about the damage religion does.

The Westboro Baptist Chruch, which can be broadened to then hideous amounts of intolerance emanating from the entire bible belt.

Extremists are not representitive of religious people. And you can easily get fundamentalist atheists [http://www.atheists.net/] who are equally intolerant and bigoted. But you are being that right now.

The modern day fundamentalists who denounce medicines putting their health and the lives of their children at risk.

You have a point there.

It is terrible that we have these mad religious people supporting the right to choose abortion [http://www.rcrc.org/about/index.cfm], good thing the atheist pro-lifers [http://www.godlessprolifers.org/home.html] are fighting the good fight.

And the zealotis muslims who I won't even get into.

Modern Islam is shaped by events in Israel, Palestine, and in hotspots like Iraq and Afghanistan. They have concluded the west has it in for them, and thus fight it. Have you turned on anything except for Fox News lately?

Face it, religion has hurt humanity more than it has helped.

Nope. Bigotry has. Bigotry such as that I quoted in a fairly recent post. Bigotry can be against race, skin colour. It can be against culture and nationality. It can be against gender or sexual orientation. It can also be against religious belief. Same shit, different people. There is no place for bigots and hate-mongers in the world today.

 

[The_Prophet]

I think it's the most colossally stupid thing we, as a race, have ever done.

No offense, but this is one of the most stupid things I have heard. Did you hear about history?
Yeah, you did?
Well then you should know that we (humans) have a beloved tendancy to destroy everything around us.

 

[Kellerb]

we may as well invent gunpowder, surely no-ones stupid to use it badly?

cough.

 

[Abedeus]

Face it, religion has hurt humanity more than it has helped.

If not for religion and our Pope, Poland would still be a post-communistic hell without democracy and with a lot of terrorism coming from our "leaders".

 

[Whiskyjakk]

Those little squares of cheese in plastic wrappers. Probably the most atrocious thing among many that Macdonalds and its kin have brought to the world.

 

[Sewblon]

The voluntary human extinction movement. Humans are natural components of the earth to, and the environment is right outside where its always been.

 

[The Giggling Pin]

Mankind has done so many terrible things but a few stick out in my mind:

The creation of Liverpool is a terrible thing
Mars Duo replacing the King Size Mars Bars
Marathon being renamed as Snickers
The "Modern" Olympics
Trainer Socks
Socks with individual toes
Hentai
Fallout 3
Cheese with apricot in
Mechanically reclaimed meat
Super Tenants

I know that these things all seem trivial compared to the possible threat of an alien invasion caused by sending a probe with our address on it saying "Come say hi and have your fill of our women!" But my life would be so much happier without these things.....Bloody trainer socks.

 

[The_Prophet]

Sorry, I have to do this. Are you 8!? Are you from this world!? Do you have any understanding of the technology behind all that!? WHAT WERE YOU THINKING when you said it was the worst idea ever!? You sir, are an idiot.

 

[ke7eha]

We put the instructions on how to find earth in there.

You're referring to the Golden Record on the Voyager probes. They did somethign similar on the Pioneer probes launched in a similar time frame. These missions were launched in the 1970s, and are currently outside of out solar system in deep space.

If you don't know, the technology for decoding and viewing the golden record is very specific to earth in the 1970s. If I didn't have some general idea of how to read back the data encoded on it, I would have no clue where to even begin. Yes, I know there are 'instructions' on how to decode it with the record, but they are harder to understand than the typical Ikea manual. Besides, the pictures and audio that they included on the record are rather benign.

First off, voyager is small, lightweight, off in the middle of nowhere, and only has a low powered (couldn't even be as much as 420 W, on average) and narrow radio beam.

I agree, finding ANY deep space probe sent by earth is a total shot in the dark. I don't know how much power the RTGs provide anymore, but I doubt that it is that much power.

Truth is, Voyager was a significant step forward in terms of planetary science. It is entirely laughable that you think that we'd be directing a group of hostile aliens toward the earth that weren't already in the direct vicinity of the system. If anything, global radio broadcasts leaking into deep space is going to be the evidence for our civilization, not some slow moving space probe.

 

[EchetusXe]

Politics. I say this because the Mayor of my city got arrested on corruption charges today lol.

Nothing as bad as the Governor of Illinois, but yeah.

 

[cuddly_tomato]

Aliens may find that satellite eventually but why would they would not necessarily be more advanced than us by then. The real worst idea mankind ever had was Scientology.

Oh come on. Without Scientology the Southpark episode "Trapped in the Closet" would never have been made. Nor would Battlefield Earth, which was so bad it was good.

 

[Captain Blackout]

Climbing down out of the trees. By. Far.

I don't have time now so I will be back later to slap the "all religion is bad" crap all to hell.

All of you do the planet a favor. Go live in a tree house. I'm building mine as we speak.

 

[thefrizzlefry]

Nuclear Weapons, emo, and Twilight.