I fail to see how that does not apply equally to atheist advocacy pieces such as this video. My original argument (above) was regarding the INTENT of this guy in doing this vid. Was it shadenfrued, prosoletyzing, money, attention, or what? How is he any different than the religions he is attacking? Not very much from what I can see. If it is argued that 'religion causes influences people to behave poorly' then it is perfectly valid criticism to examine how this guy's atheism is influencing HIM to behave poorly. Therefore your argument that it is an 'ad hominem' attack to examine THIS guy's behavior, but it is merely 'inductive reasoning' to examine how religion influences people negatively must be rejected as specious and biased.

But you aren't just inquiring into a possible link between atheism and poor behavior. In your original comment, the logical work done by your analysis of his motives was to justify your dismissal of his position. That is blatantly fallacious.

In contrast, most atheists distinguish between why they reject religious truth claims, and why they may or may not think religion to be harmful. This distinction must be kept in mind by all involved in the discussion to avoid misinterpretation of opposing views or accidentally presenting a fallacious argument.

It must be kept in mind by all parties that a particular religion could be true, yet have negative social consequences if believed. Likewise, atheism could be true, yet have negative social consequences.

To mix the lines of argument together, as you have done here (and as all too many theists and atheists do), is to become prey to fallacious and distorted thinking.



Since the entirety of your set of accusations against churches 'charity for conversion' has been admitted to be wholly anecdotal it cannot be discussed rationally. I can't discuss Muslim practices as I've not witnessed them. Nor Bhuddist or Hindu.

All I'm trying to point out is that Christian charity is not an unmitigated good. Pressure to convert is one aspect. Another might be the attempts by Christian aid organizations--not merely Roman Catholic organizations--to limit the use of condoms in Africa.

The problem I have with faith, most religions for that matter, is that the stupidest people seem to be attracted to it.

I'd argue that what you are seeing is not a factor of the religion, but a factor of projecting the behavior of a radical minority onto the innocent majority. Those who have 'religion' are a far larger group than the 'non-religion' folks. There's literally billions more of them. So it is easy to cherry-pick the fringe kooks and portray them as the majority. But while there are a large number, the kooks are a statistical outlier compared to the far huger group of normal, quiet, everyday people of faith who aren't anywhere near as controversial (and therefore get no attention).

Imagine that there were 5 billion atheists and only a few hundred thousand theists on the planet. How hard would it be to could come up with videos of kooky atheist behavior? Not very. That's not because atheism 'made' people stupid. It would be because so many stupid people were atheists. See?

Getting a bit tired of persistent attempts to say atheists are on level ground with theists when it comes to debate. It sounds noble, but it just simply isn't true. The burden of proof is quite the load to carry.

'Debate' about what? You'll have to be more specific. Your statement only has potential validity if you specify your topic.

Since the argument goes to the desirability of religion (whether or not it is a negative influence), rather than the truth claims of religion, it is perfectly valid to talk about ways in which members of that religion may or may not be influenced to behave well or poorly.

I fail to see how that does not apply equally to atheist advocacy pieces such as this video. My original argument (above) was regarding the INTENT of this guy in doing this vid. Was it shadenfrued, prosoletyzing, money, attention, or what? How is he any different than the religions he is attacking? Not very much from what I can see. If it is argued that 'religion causes influences people to behave poorly' then it is perfectly valid criticism to examine how this guy's atheism is influencing HIM to behave poorly. Therefore your argument that it is an 'ad hominem' attack to examine THIS guy's behavior, but it is merely 'inductive reasoning' to examine how religion influences people negatively must be rejected as specious and biased.

Charities

Since the entirety of your set of accusations against churches 'charity for conversion' has been admitted to be wholly anecdotal it cannot be discussed rationally. I can't discuss Muslim practices as I've not witnessed them. Nor Bhuddist or Hindu.

I get that this guy is doing satire, but there's a line between satire and a pure straw man--and NonStampCollector took a flying leap over that line in this video.

In the first place, any halfway competent theist using those arguments will of course make it clear that these argument do not necessarily support any one religion over the others. This is how Aquinas used similar arguments in the 13th century, and it's how theistic thinkers deploy them today. They are only intended to weaken the atheist position generally. NonStampCollector doesn't even attempt to address them on this level.

In the second place, it's asinine to assume that every religion is the same--either with regard to how well they are supported by the cosmological, teleological and moral arguments, or how much or little they incline their followers to religious violence. As it happens, the Hindu has a much better case than the Christian or Muslim for saying that these arguments support his religion. Brahma, unlike the God of Abraham, does not have a seemingly petty concern with particular tribes of humans or become angry or feel wronged because of sin. Brahma is described as illimitable, all-embracing. Brahma is a more cosmic God, better supported by the discovery of the age and vast distances of the universe.

Other Gods or divine realities so supported include Plato's Form of the Good, the Logos of the Stoics, the God of Leibniz or Spinoza, and even the God of A. N. Whitehead (co-author of the Principia Mathematica with acclaimed atheist Bertrand Russel) and Charles Hartshorne.

Tendencies toward violence differ considerably between religions. The Hindu and the worshiper of Amun have no reason to get into a fight about religion. Hinduism is not a single religion, but thousands of intertwined religions which have co-existed peacefully for thousands of years. A plurality of religious beliefs and practices--including atheism--has long been not fought by Hindus, but embraced. Only when aggressive evangelistic monotheisms actively attack Hinduism does anything like an instinct to violence come into play--and even then it tends to arise mainly in extreme circumstances. (As in Orissa in 2008, when the assassination of a Hindu leader by Christian Maoist extremists sparked a riot and violence by members of both religions, or the year before, in 20007, when Christians deliberately provoked Hindus by .) Likewise, there is no reason anyone would go to war over Amun. It would not be appropriate to describe the religions of Egypt as tolerant--the word implies a perception of annoyance or burden in allowing others to co-exist, when co-existence was assumed as a daily fact of life. In fact, the priests of Amun welcomed Zeus-worshiping Greeks to the oracle of Amun at Siwa, which once declared Alexander the Great to be the son of Amun.

But, of course, NonStampCollector doesn't actually know any of this. He just assumes, like nearly all the New Atheists, that all the other religions in the world are more or less just like the ones he's most familiar with. Makes it easier that way; you don't have to do as much studying or thinking.

This video has been declared a duplicate; transferring votes to the original video and killing this dupe - dupeof declared by EDD.

*dupeof=http://www.videosift.com/video/How-to-convert-from-Hindu-to-Christianity

I believe this is le dupe.

http://www.videosift.com/video/How-to-convert-from-Hindu-to-Christianity

let it be known that on the OP's youtube page,"YouLoveMolly", this video is titled "Converting an indian to christianity - don't let the devil win"

bahahahahahahah despite there being something seriously wrong with this picture, Saraa handled herself very well. "Look guys, I'm Hindu."


"but, its the right way though.. like, isn't it?" -Rachel @ 4:26


I wish we could see a copy of the unedited version...!

with love,
turbojoe

"I can talk to you but I don't think we can be, like, friends."
"Well, nice to meet you."

Awesome! And the whole argument about Asia...mind blowing. The ignorance of those christian girls is indescribable.

I do really hope there are more of these. That Hindu girl kicks ass.

This video has been declared a duplicate; transferring votes to the original video and killing this dupe - dupeof declared by EDD.

*dupeof=http://www.videosift.com/video/How-to-convert-from-Hindu-to-Christianity

>> ^dirtythirtyix:
This is brilliant comedy. I'm impressed.


To preserve my faith in humanity, I'm just going to operate on the assumption that this is a masterstroke of satire and parody.

and there we have it folks!
sucking the smart out of my country one ill-informed person at a time.
"you're not hindu..you just THINK you are"
"india is african isnt it? how can you be asian?where are your pointy eyes?"
"i know its not your fault you are hindu but i dont know if i can be friends with you"

this was painful to watch and i feel i am dumber for doing so......
what a sad ,sad commentary.

siaiaia (or whatever your name is), you are in dire need of an education in both religion and epistemology. Not all knowledge is scientific knowledge. One can have historical knowledge, knowledge of art theory, the knowledge of the human condition which has informed so many poets and novelists, musicology... The list goes on and on. Which is to say that there is no reason why one should expect that a religious truth (if such a beast exists) should be classified as scientific.

Furthermore, your understanding of religions as primarily sets of doctrines--systems beliefs--is profoundly inadequate. Let's ignore the Eastern religions, for all of which that's not clearly not true, and look at an example from Western history. In the first century BCE, Roman orator and philosopher Marcus Tullius Cicero wrote a book entitled De Natura Deorum, or On the Nature of the Gods. In it, he portrays a fictional but plausible conversation between himself, a Stoic philosopher, and an Epicurean philosopher. Throughout the dialogue, it becomes starkly clear that, though all three follow the Roman religion, they can barely find a single belief about the gods that they hold in common. This detachment of doctrine and religion--of dogma and religious practice--was the norm throughout the ancient Mediterranean world.

Only with the rise of Christianity does anything like your criticism of religion become even coherent, let alone plausible.




With regards to the palestinian bomber - why did the IRA not do suicide bombing?? Eh? Because the palestinian bomber believes he is doing something in the name of God, and doing a righteous thing before he dies.

Or maybe because it's one of the few acts that a Palestinian can take with any effectiveness against Israeli oppression.

Suicide bombing was not invented by Muslims, but by Hindu Tamils. And not for religious reasons--both murder and suicide are strongly enjoined every Hindu tradition I'm familiar with. The problem was that one group--the native Sinhalese (primarily Buddhist--a pacifistic religion)--was oppressing the Tamil minority. They invented the suicide bomb as a technique by which a minority could strike at a militarily powerful oppressor.

There are strong parallels between the Palestinians and the Tamils. In both cases, the rulers speak a different language than the oppressed minority, having a different culture right down to religion. In both cases, the majority overwhelmingly outguns the minority. In both cases, oppression of the minority is acceptable to the populace of the majority group.

It is unsurprising, then, that the Palestinians should have adopted the suicide bomb--no matter what their religion. There was a complex set of circumstances replicated in both circumstances which produced the kind of attitude which gives rise to a suicide bomber.



This does not, of course, apply to the 9/11 hijackers, the Taliban, or a number of other groups. Nonetheless, I think my point is clear: fixating on a single aspect of a society, like religion, to explain complex social phenomena is a huge mistake.

There is a saying, that Im too slack to google who said:
me thinks it was some big player in the hindu catalouge - a prince maybe...and well I fear I may be mixing hindu with buddist...but anyway

A religous leader said something like,

[Raaagh sic]
"Religion is like a canoe, once you have crossed the river, it would be fool to continue carrying the canoe"


I always loved that.

And I love this for the same reasons: all that "lotus", "harvest" stuff just confuses the issue. What the deep thinkers 3500 years ago ended upon has a wonderful sentiment,
'Though i observe humans and their scale and scope, I have to admit there are other scales and scopes. The only consistency I really observe is cycles, and...if I completely release myself from my surroundings I can imagine (whilst failing to comprehend) cycles, with scope, and scale, in the infinite'.

That I think, is where the humility comes in.

In reply to this comment by ponceleon:
I'm jewish by birth and embarrassed to be one.

I always think its crazy that Judaism = Race & Religion.
You can quit being a Muslim, a Christian, a Hindu, .etc.
But, you cant quit being a Jew.

Sorry I was trying to post this to your comment on the video and posted to your profile by mistake.