Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Albatross wrote:True - but you said 'supported', that's all. Hell, America traded with Nazi Germany, while we're keeping score!
But the Good Old British Empire did some pretty Bad gak, too - don't beat yourselves up, it comes with the territory!

Don't forget we both went to war alongside Stalin.

He's probably #1 on the worst dictators list. We did have a good reason for that one, though.

Well played.

Orkeosaurus wrote:

Albatross wrote:True - but you said 'supported', that's all. Hell, America traded with Nazi Germany, while we're keeping score!
But the Good Old British Empire did some pretty Bad gak, too - don't beat yourselves up, it comes with the territory!

Don't forget we both went to war alongside Stalin.

He's probably #1 on the worst dictators list. We did have a good reason for that one, though.

Actually #1 is Mao Zedong, though china will glare at you reaaaallly hard when you note that more died under his regime then under any other single humans in history.

Well, Mao is responsible for the most deaths, but Stalin is probably the most intentional deaths.

I suppose both would be a contender.

dogma wrote:Not the unknowable. By rendering God down into physical principles they are simply saying that we can't possess knowledge of him without fantastic inventions like particle accelerators, radio telescopes, etc.

And when you reach that point then God is just another cog in the machine, and not really God at all. They avoid this by putting that level of knowledge at a level so high that we can't even see it from here, but the problem remains the same.

Its a scale game. As analogy: I know my hand is made up of atoms, but I don't directly 'sense' the atoms anymore than I 'sense' Zeus. The fact that the atomic model has predictive power simply constrains the number of potential romantic 'senses' I can generate.

We know that space contains stars, planets, moons, quasars, and many other celestial objects. We know what most of these things are, and even how some of them are formed. But people still look at the sky on a starry night and derive inspiration from the view, even (especially?) people who work on cosmological physics every day. Knowledge of a thing does not eliminate the wonder, or majesty of it. If it did none of the world's theologians would be theists.

We add romance to all kinds of purely material things. But seeing a beautiful, material thing and finding inspiration is very different to actually worshipping it.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Frazzled wrote:Venezuela is having water rationing because their government controlled economy is so craptacular. They've closed down all the media except for one station at last report. They've seized everything and run it into the ground. The whole country is like a great big bag of Fail.

Yeah, life in Venezuala only just got bad.

Thing is, Chavez is bad and he's getting worse. He's the kind of guy who tends to come to power in countries with poor democratic institutions and gross inequalities between the rich and the poor. Predictably he started with some needed and welcome reform, and has since fallen into excess and generaly fail.

And in turn, predictably, the left wing warhorses came along to defend him and pretend things are getting better. And the rightwing warhorses came along to condemn him and ignore the reality that the previous right wing governments were just as bad. So they bash heads against each other over the same old ideology wars, and sometimes it gets so ridiculous that a coup is organised, a new government comes to power and the warhorses start arguing over the new government.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

ShumaGorath wrote:Actually #1 is Mao Zedong, though china will glare at you reaaaallly hard when you note that more died under his regime then under any other single humans in history.

Which brings us back to the problem with using bodycounts as a measure of the evil of a regime. Ultimately it ends up saying the most 'evil' regimes were big countries that had bad agricultural policy.

sebster wrote:
And when you reach that point then God is just another cog in the machine, and not really God at all. They avoid this by putting that level of knowledge at a level so high that we can't even see it from here, but the problem remains the same.

The cog analogy misses the inherent uncertainty of the 'machine' that is the universe. Sure, we could scientifically prove the existence of a God/god in the most general sense (a supreme/ultimate being/reality), but it does not follow from that we can have any more knowledge of the thing than we do of, say, an electron. We could understand the equations which model its behavior, and that would constrain the number of possible views with respect to it, but its unlikely that we could ever possess sufficient information to truly predict how it would behave in any single instance.

Either way it doesn't matter. The whole game is speculative as any iteration of humanity advanced enough to prove the existence of 'metaphysical' being would have long ago mapped its own consciousness and, in doing so, fundamentally altered its nature such that the term 'humanity' would most likely be inappropriate.

sebster wrote:
We add romance to all kinds of purely material things. But seeing a beautiful, material thing and finding inspiration is very different to actually worshipping it.

The difference isn't any more significant than repetition. If in any given series of doubtful moments you go outside at night and gaze at the sky, then, for all intents and purposes, you are engaging in worship of whatever thing the night sky represents to you.

Before I contribute anything worthwhile, I just want to say.

@halonachos: I loled.

Organised Religion is evil! If you want to believe in a deity, thats just fine. But any organised Religion is just an organised mind control device. Just look at what the Catholic church has been up to in Ireland.. :S

mattyrm wrote:Organised Religion is evil! If you want to believe in a deity, thats just fine. But any organised Religion is just an organised mind control device. Just look at what the Catholic church has been up to in Ireland.. :S

Oh, you're new here. Please read Rule #1 and think twice before making a sweeping assumption about religion.

Also, I don't recall any organised mind control devices starting fundraisers for sick kids or providing food for the homeless. Does this make Obama 'mind controlled'? Does this make any average churchgoer 'mind controlled'?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Oh dear, even your sig is asking for trouble.

mattyrm wrote:Organised Religion is evil! If you want to believe in a deity, thats just fine. But any organised Religion is just an organised mind control device. Just look at what the Catholic church has been up to in Ireland.. :S

This is borderline trolling. Please read the posting guidelines ASAP. Out and out attacks and sweeping statements on common organisations including ( but not limited to religions) are not allowed on this forum.

Thank you.

Also, I don't recall any organised mind control devices starting fundraisers for sick kids or providing food for the homeless. Does this make Obama 'mind controlled'? Does this make any average churchgoer 'mind controlled'?

It's arguable, yes. Plus, The Church hasn't historically been all about helping the vulnerable - that's more the religion than the organisation. The Catholic Church HAS been the perpetrator of some despicable acts (see Spanish Inquisition, The Crusades, discouraging the use of birth-control in AIDS ravaged countries...) - just because that's hard to swallow for some people, doesn't mean the rest of us shouldn't mention it.

Albatross wrote:
It's arguable, yes. Plus, The Church hasn't historically been all about helping the vulnerable - that's more the religion than the organisation. The Catholic Church HAS been the perpetrator of some despicable acts (see Spanish Inquisition, The Crusades, discouraging the use of birth-control in AIDS ravaged countries...) - just because that's hard to swallow for some people, doesn't mean the rest of us shouldn't mention it.

It really isn't. Unless you're going to consider any group to be a form of mind control, and therefore evil, due to the influence it exerts on the individual mind. At which point you're essentially saying that socialization if evil, and that we should all sit in holes forever.

I was going to make a joke about "Rage mode" here, but as that would only prompt a torrent of abuse and offed some people. I won't.

Instead, I will try to redeem myself in your eyes after my utterly foolish post earlier. So, here goes:

Organised religion is not evil. It is no more evil than organised sport, or organised competition, or anything else to which peoples attentions are drawn. The problem arises when sacrosanction comes into being-the treating of one above all others. THIS is where conflict arises. THIS is why people fight and die. THIS is where evil is born.

I have often been referred to as evil. Heck, Churchmen have told me to my face I am evil. And, I have laghed. I laughed because I know they are right. Evil is the one you least expect. And I am nothing. Therefore I am not suspected. And this is why, even though I do not nessercarily agree with any major organised religions, I believe that on their own they are not evil.

Looking over it now, I see this post was a bit of a waste of your time-I apologise for that. It didn't really accomplish anything. Maybe, it wasn't supposed to.

It really isn't. Unless you're going to consider any group to be a form of mind control, and therefore evil, due to the influence it exerts on the individual mind. At which point you're essentially saying that socialization if evil, and that we should all sit in holes forever.

Is THAT why I have no friends?
Seriously though, I didn't mean that I considered it to be mind-control, therefore evil. I do consider some of the actions and attitudes of organised religion to be 'evil', but that has nothing to do with mind-control. Culturally speaking, yes - any aparatus by which humans are grouped together by a hegemonic ideological system, which determines patterns of behaviour and thought - could be loosely termed 'mind-control'. But of course you're correct, that's not necessarily evil - it refers to many (if not all) cultural groups.
Two different points, which looked like the same point. Ah, the internet....

Bloody hell i only just got here and i already got a telling off.. After the thread asked a rather broad and general question, i was merely thinking "evil.... hmm..." and my mind was drawn along the lines of people forcing their children to become whatever they are even though they are too young to decide, snake oil televevangelists stealing money from the poor and credulous, denying minors blood transfusions, irrational loathing of homosexuals, both Male and Female circumcision, The Spanish Inquistion, Crusades, suicide bombs and generally 2000 years of bigotry and dark age superstition. Its not like i singled anyone out. gak, im against everything thats not rational. And that includes the toothfairy, horoscopes and palm reading! How can you be singling out a "minority" if your braodbrush answer to a broadbrush question includes about 90% of the population of the world!?

I think male circumcision has as much to do with (pseudo)science as it does religion.

And it wasn't like there was scientific thought and religious thought during the Dark Ages, they were intertwined. Spirits made you sick, because what else could it be?

Plus, young children are always taught things before they have the ability to critically consider and possibly disbelieve them. So long as they can go back and retroactively examine what they were taught I don't really see that as a negative.

mattyrm wrote:Bloody hell i only just got here and i already got a telling off.. After the thread asked a rather broad and general question, i was merely thinking "evil.... hmm..." and my mind was drawn along the lines of people forcing their children to become whatever they are even though they are too young to decide, snake oil televevangelists stealing money from the poor and credulous, denying minors blood transfusions, irrational loathing of homosexuals, both Male and Female circumcision, The Spanish Inquistion, Crusades, suicide bombs and generally 2000 years of bigotry and dark age superstition. Its not like i singled anyone out. gak, im against everything thats not rational. And that includes the toothfairy, horoscopes and palm reading! How can you be singling out a "minority" if your braodbrush answer to a broadbrush question includes about 90% of the population of the world!?

Yes, it's very easy to take two thousand years of human history and grab everything religion has done wrong. It's just as easy to make sweeping generalizations about secularism, The Nazis, Stalin, African Slavery, Native Culling in north america and south america, it's just too easy. Religion as a concept is hardly the fault of everything you stated, most of those events did and do exist due to a plethora of social and economic issues besides merely religious thought. But hey, instead of tackling the actual issues by being a troll who throws everything into the god box why don't you try actually piecing apart those individual issues to find the core elements that caused them. Until you do that you're just being a tool.

1. Circumcision predates monotheism.
2. Televangelists don't do anything ShamWoW didn't do.
3. Who is denying minors blood transfusions? Certainly none of the 2000+ hospitals in america with religious funding or foundership.
4. As a distinct minority that experiences a lifestyle patently different from the majority population of the world homosexuality will always (and have always) been stigmatized. It's human psychology. Keep in mind though, during greek times such things were commonplace and the polytheistic tradition was strong then.
5. The spanish Inquisition was used as much to dismantle enemies of the state as it was to make sure people were up to speed on their godstuff. It was a tool of an incredibly harsh regime, saying that it was simply a direct effect of the religious influence is not much different than saying that the Nazi Secret Police we're a direct effect of state secularism. Who killed more people?
6. Suicide terrorism is a relatively new occurrence brought largely by the easy access of bombs, however it's not so much different than japanese tactics used during world war two or really any one of a thousand desperate suicide attacks throughout history. Blaming religion for the concept of desperation based guerilla tactics is foolhardy in the extreme.

ShumaGorath wrote:2. Televangelists don't do anything ShamWoW didn't do.

Obviously, as ShamWoW does everything.

You know the Germans always make good stuff.

Orkeosaurus wrote:

ShumaGorath wrote:2. Televangelists don't do anything ShamWoW didn't do.

Obviously, as ShamWoW does everything.

You know the Germans always make good stuff.

No. No, no no. You're treading a dangerous line here, Orkeo... I've seen too much of that... obscenity on satellite TV!

@Shuma - the point wasn't that 'religion' is the most evil thing ever conceived - your reaction is a little OTT, truth be told. The point was that 'organised religion' is an example of something that could be considered subjectively as 'evil', due to certain actions and attitudes. The organisations ARE made up of humans, after all.
And to say that 'X' is not evil because 'Y' is MORE evil is a pretty facile argument.

Albatross wrote:@Shuma - the point wasn't that 'religion' is the most evil thing ever conceived - your reaction is a little OTT, truth be told. The point was that 'organised religion' is an example of something that could be considered subjectively as 'evil', due to certain actions and attitudes. The organisations ARE made up of humans, after all.
And to say that 'X' is not evil because 'Y' is MORE evil is a pretty facile argument.

I don't think we read the same post.

Organised Religion is evil! If you want to believe in a deity, thats just fine. But any organised Religion is just an organised mind control device. Just look at what the Catholic church has been up to in Ireland.. :S

This isn't actually that controversial - I've seen many christians (including some on this very site) who feel similarly about organised religion. Nowhere here is the statement 'Religion is the most evil thing ever, worse than the Nazis and The Jonas Brothers put together!!!!1!!!' made. That's all I'm saying.

i was merely thinking "evil.... hmm..." and my mind was drawn along the lines of people forcing their children to become whatever they are even though they are too young to decide, snake oil televevangelists stealing money from the poor and credulous, denying minors blood transfusions, irrational loathing of homosexuals, both Male and Female circumcision, The Spanish Inquistion, Crusades, suicide bombs and generally 2000 years of bigotry and dark age superstition.

Yep, all good examples of 'evil' - of course, there's worse stuff (catholic church covering up child abuse anyone?) out there, I accept that. Being smacked with a baseball-bat is bad - a gunshot wound to the stomach is probably worse... that doesn't make the baseball bat option 'good'.

The problem wasn't the use of specific examples. It was the use of specific examples to induce a conclusion which was clearly meant to indict religion as a whole. I mean, he did try to insert a little bit of differentiation about organized religion, but that isn't a phrase which has any real meaning. All religion is organized. If its not organized, even if the organization is simply internal with respect to a single person, it isn't a religion.

If that's how you take it to mean, that's up to you.
But it's perfectly legitimate to consider all religion 'evil', in any case.

Sure, as long as 'evil' simply means 'things I don't like'. But that isn't, and never has been, the purpose of the word.

Random answer to a random question:
Once again, evil is that which is injurious or harmful. Pretty much everything man touches has a modicum of evil in it.

"The road to hell is paved with good intentions".

When harm is caused, there is evil. Simply that. There is no judgement involved.

Wars are evil, but sometimes the alternative is a more devastating evil.

A doctor, cuts open a child's skull with a saw and scoops out half her brain leaving her partially paralyzed on one side of her body. Pretty evil. Consider however, that the child was having seizures which were killing her over time. Alive disabled or dead, which is a worse state?

Depends on your perspective really.

>nurgle<

We got to page five before someone claimed religion is evil. I believe that's one of our best results.

sebster wrote:We got to page five before someone claimed religion is evil. I believe that's one of our best results.

My subtle inclusion of Richard Dawkins has allowed my master plan to work almost flawlessly. My master plan has something in it's teeth... but... it is otherwise flawless.

I like the way this worked out though everybody, keep it up.

I think "evil" is a psychosocial concept that varies from individual to individual.

psy⋅cho⋅so⋅cial –adjective
of or pertaining to the interaction between social and psychological factors.

On the topic of organized religion, I am VERY jaded. Looking up that definition, I am reminded of these lyrics:

Psychosocial - Slipknot

"I did my time and I want out
So effusive - Fade - It doesn't cut
The soul is not so vibrant
The reckoning - The sickening
Packaging subversion
Pseudo sacrosanct perversion"

My personal translation:
I did my time and I wanted out
I am very jaded - Separate myself from it - It can't, my family...
This conflict is tearing me apart
The decision the clergy made - I cannot tolerate it
Your decision was made with doctrine
You said you were speaking the word of God, what happened after that was not for the best...

I would like to make it clear, my beef is with a man. I am not intolerant to religion, I just hate that one melon-fether...
Some may know what I am referring to, some might not. If you want further explanation of my poetry, PM me. I am not going to pollute this thread with my dead memories.

Hurm... I got all again... I should lighten the mood...



Automatically Appended Next Post:

Wrexasaur wrote:

sebster wrote:We got to page five before someone claimed religion is evil. I believe that's one of our best results.

My subtle inclusion of Richard Dawkins has allowed my master plan to work almost flawlessly. My master plan has something in it's teeth... but... it is otherwise flawless.

I like the way this worked out though everybody, keep it up.

Good... Good...

dogma wrote: It was the use of specific examples to induce a conclusion which was clearly meant to indict religion as a whole.

Indeed. This was more or less the thinking* of the mods.

Bloody hell i only just got here and i already got a telling off

You'll know not to do it again then.



*Read as : drunken prayers to magic 8 ball.