Religious Belief :Rational or Irrational? - Page 2

Originally posted by: raksha.l

Hi Everyone,

The majority of the population of the world is at least nominally committed to some religion or another. And despite the perception in some parts of the Western world that religious belief is in terminal decline, or that economic and social development go hand in hand with secularisation, there are many parts of the world where fundamentalist religious belief is firmly entrenched (including arguably the most 'developed' nation on earth, the USA).

TRUE, but to a very little extent as compared to outside world

Religious belief, it seems, refuses to go away. Some people might think that religion is not an appropriate topic for debate – perhaps because it is too personal, too sacred, or outside the realms of rational debate.

Actually if all the debators and the readers are well versed in what their religion says and what the other religion says, they can, but most of the times they are not. And people become to uptight when talking religion, so maintain sanity, I agree religous debate should be out of realm

For the rest of us, however, there is a fascinating and lively debate to be had. There are many different dimensions to debates about religion.

Bring it on😉

To start with there is the philosophical question of how plausible belief in God is.

Well I beleive in one, but he just sits there in rock or metal inspiring me, I still have to go about doing things I have to, he does not tell me what to do/or how to do😆, so more of a cheerleader I guess, without the pom-poms😭

Then there are social, moral, and political questions about the effects of religious belief on individuals and communities both in the present and historically.

Religion as we know it(as far as I know) has been based upon a principle of a man, He told his disciples to wrote some text, Some stuff got added😉 or lost on translation. Now we have this text, the man and the disciples were no doubt great human beings and I really applaud their thought process, but they all were humans

Now in the 21st century, all these texts written centuries ago become deciding factor in what we should or should not do, Now granted these folks were genuises, they did not know what even electricity was, life has changed yaar, we should only give these books values upto a point

That is moral policing at best

1.Has religious belief, on balance, been a force for good or for harm in the world?

Frankly the beleifs come from the scriptures and were written with best intent, but we have had lot many morons who have taken it out of context and have created harm

2.Are religious beliefs rational or irrational???

If kept to self, rational, if imposed on others irrational

Cheers, (On the rocks please😉)
Raksha 😊

Originally posted by: egghatcher

scientific rationale also works in a narrow connotation of empirical truth with trial and error and justification . Quark theory wont hold up universally for example

Leading medical community members dont bat an eyelid to extol the vitue of meditation and spiritual means when all else fails based again upon empirical instances of amazing success in recovery .... I have to fall back on what i always maintained against the phalanx of plagiarising going on in the world and point to the fact that we do not use almost 90 % of our mental capacity in our entire life time BUT ... something within us goads us on when all else fails .... that something to me is the urge to dig into our unused faculty and tap it to find solutions as we go along on our journey of some 80-90 years in this world..That begins with unknown ,,, then dawns ,,, then becomes apparent .. such is spirituality indeed ..

i liked the way u expressed it here...

Originally posted by: chatbuster

i liked the way u expressed it here...

😛

Originally posted by: raksha.l

1.Has religious belief, on balance, been a force for good or for harm in the world?

Religion is man-made. Man has made scriptures and uses them to control people or lay down the law.

The problem is that even though our laws and legal systems change, religious laws do not undergo much metamorphosis. People still continue to follow old (and sometimes outdated) rituals which would have been applicable in the 14th century, but do not apply to people today!

Clinging on to old beliefs and trying to impose them on new generations where ideologies and morals change is what causes a lot of problems.

I think Deepak posted a quote where one speaker rightly mentioned that most major religions are androcentric.

Why otherwise do most MAJOR religions (with a few rare exceptions) disallow women from becoming priests?

Overall, MOST fights happen in the name of religion and in the name of God. So, I think it causes more harm than good.

2.Are religious beliefs rational or irrational???

They were developed by rational people to govern the masses.

But, it is irrational to think that ancient customs can apply to a changing world.

E.g. in Saudi Arabia, women can't drive; in a court of law, they are still thought of as irrational and emotional. All of this is based on ancient customs (not all of them are even religious, but religious fanatics say it is against Islam!)

Gay marriages were thought of as a crime in Christianity before recent laws.

Till today Zoroastrians disallow religious conversion, which is why their numbers are dwindling.

So many religions have superstitions and rituals which impose a guilt factor on people. There are people who believe that if you don't pray, God will punish you. But, if you kill someone who questions religion, God will love you. 🤢

Originally posted by: raksha.l

1.Has religious belief, on balance, been a force for good or for harm in the world?

actually religious belief is a force of good. it's just that some people make it bad or make it to seem bad. another thing which made religion looks bad or harm to the world is because people from one religious group do not want to tolerate people from other religious groups. for example the partition of India was because people in those times cannot tolerate the other party, the hindus disturbed the muslim when they were praying and the muslim killed cows which are sacred to the hindus. this is still happening now, many people cannot tolerate other religious groups especially those which seem to be threatening to them and this cause many controversies and blood shed. usually this violence also happens because of misinterpretation of a person about their religious beliefs and they influenced other people and caused many violence.

2.Are religious beliefs rational or irrational???

well religous beliefs are irrational, it is emotional and subjective. if you use rational thinking to explain about religious beliefs then you would not be able to come up with a conclusion. you cannot trust a religion without feelings cause experiencing religion is supposed to be feeling it, embracing it being comfortable with it, which one person can trust and have faith about but other person might have trust and have faith about for other religion. many of the doctrines of religion are also irrational and cannot be explained rationally. for example the christian people, if they were to think rationally in their religious faith then they would not be able to explain how a virgin gave birth to Jesus. the Hindus won't be able to explain how is everybody part of brahma and this all is being illusions and only when we become one with brahma will we find true things which are not illusions. the buddhist won't be able to explain the existence of nirvana where it is not a heaven but a place where a person stops reincarnating and the place where suffering ends and many other things.
Cheers,
Raksha 😊

Originally posted by: jagdu

Good or bad, more for India than the world?

Somehow as far as religion is concerned, one gets the impression that people from the north simply don't have the fervour of those in the south. No doubt, there is no question that there is no comparison of religious belief between people, but just look at the level of awareness, practice and application.

It has not helped in uniting our country.

Most of the people in the north are not even aware of the great temples in the south. They are common in every street in chennai. The common people, before they go to work, bow before god on the streets.