It seems to me that Dawkins main problem is that he seems to make sweeping statements that Religion is evil and dangerous and a bad thing- despite the fact that there are many many religious communities which are pretty much pacifist and far more concerned with charity and helping fellow worse off human beings.

 

 

 

There are obviously extremists which cause a lot of problems in the world, but there's plenty of religious based charities which do a lot of good in the world.

 

Sure extremists are quite clearly dangerous, but he's made comments tarring everyone with the same brush which seem to me prejudice rather than any sort of reasoned argument.

 

 

 

Maybe he understands evolution and has good academic qualifications, but he doesn't seem to understand some of the people he's criticising at all.

 

 

 

It is quite possible to state beliefs about something (including atheist beliefs) in a respectful way to those who disagree with you.

 

- The bus messages seem fine to me, some of the statements Dawkins has made in the past are not. - I don't think his aggressive stance on things has helped anything, just like extremist followers of a religion don't actually help the standing of their own religion in the world.

 

 

 

I find some of his statements quite hypocriticial. He complains that people have negative attitude towards atheists, while not being respectful of those with religious opinions.

 

 

 

It does seem to me in certain demographics in certain parts of the world the tide is almost turning the other way in other regards of intolerance of beliefs.

 

In that amongst groups of young people in certain Western countries it's not uncommon now for certain people to talk loudly about how they are atheists and what a load of rubbish religious people are while people who do follow religions sit there almost embarrassed to say well actually I believe in God.

I thought everyone in London hated bendy-busses and Boris was getting rid of them anyway?

I love it. We need more of those signs.

I thought everyone in London hated bendy-busses and Boris was getting rid of them anyway?

 

You make a great point, but I don't think it's possible for Boris to eliminate them entirely quicker than someone putting up an ad. But then again, it is Boris we're talking about.

 

 

 

I am a Christian, and I don't mind this idea, they have just as much right to advertise lack of religion as those who advertise religion.

I'm a Christian, but honestly I don't care if buses have signs like this. Anyone who converts religions because the bus said so is an idiot. Now if it's accompanied by anti-god protests then I'd be concerned, but the freedom to practice religion isn't just in the US, so I can't really do anything about it. Oh well. I'm not going to let bus ads interfere with my faith. Of course some people will be offended, that's perfectly natural. These bus ads are basically saying every belief in a god is wrong. As for me? I'm gonna get on with my life. Not that the people offended are wrong, because I am annoyed by this as well, it's just that I know that fighting it is a hopeless case. It's just bring a bad name to theistic religions when we protest.

 

 

 

In my opinion, that is the perfect reply. I'm a Christian but like many other people have said, atheists should be able to put up messages too. I'm not exactly supporting it, but I'm not against it.

 

Yea, if you stop following a religion just because of an ad, then your faith is really, really weak. Just like how no one will be converted by Christian or Islam ads.

 

As for the debate going on, all I have to say is what I've said so many times before (Actually, I'll say two things):

 

1. There is no scientific theory (Yea, I'm even going to count theories - Not just 100% facts) that states "There is no God." Likewise, nowhere in the Bible does it say "EVOLUTION FAILS!" Sure, scientific theories and religious texts tend to contradict each other once in a while, but if you look at it a certain way, and don't take everything literally, science and faith can co-exist.

 

2. You can't prove the Bible true or false. There is plenty of evidence for it, plenty against it.

Actually, my interpretation of this verse:

 

 

 

 

 

John 1:1-8 (New International Version)

 

New International Version (NIV)

 

Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

John 1

 

The Word Became Flesh

 

1In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2He was with God in the beginning.

 

3Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4In him was life, and that life was the light of men. 5The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood[a] it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Verse 3, in 1 Chapter of John. I think, for me at least that says the evolution can't exist along with the Bible.

 

 

 

Also, my mom told me about this book - I'm quite interested in it, and want to go buy it and read it - apparently it's called "Mathematics is God Being Silent" or something about that, how like there are to many coincdences or something for God not to exist.

how like there are to many coincdences or something for God not to exist.

 

 

 

What does this even mean?

Actually, my interpretation of this verse:

 

but if you look at it a certain way...science and faith can co-exist.

 

 

;)

 

Believe what you want - I don't mind.

Just more atheists who need to inflate their ego's and feel good about themselves. This stuff get's old really fast.

Just more atheists who need to inflate their ego's and feel good about themselves. This stuff get's old really fast.

 

I love it. You whine about Atheists not giving to charity, then when they do, it's just "inflating their ego".

What a fun idea. It would certainly bring a smile to my face to see one of those ads on a bus.

 

 

 

Sly, I really don't have the patience for a debate with you, given the way you've patronised Ginger over the last five pages. So all i'll say is that generalising and reducing Richard Dawkin's arguments against religion to "you're an idiot if you believe in God" is as ridiculous and misrepresentative of his arguments as you claim he is of Christian's. Ironically, a Bible passage about specks of dust in eyes springs to mind here. Don't be hypocritical.

how like there are to many coincdences or something for God not to exist.

 

 

 

What does this even mean?

 

 

 

 

 

I don't know, I've not read the book yet, lol. :lol: But I'd be guessing that it meant with the titlt of the earth, or something like that.

 

 

 

 

 

And to Penguin, science AND faith can co-exist, just not the whole of it. Just like some algerbra and geometry can "co-exist"( can't think of a better word, maybe apply) but not all of algerbra is used in geometry and vice verse.

 

I gtg work now, I'll check back when I'm done.

Speaking of God, what's Obama's religion?

 

And to Penguin, science AND faith can co-exist, just not the whole of it. Just like some algerbra and geometry can "co-exist"( can't think of a better word, maybe apply) but not all of algerbra is used in geometry and vice verse.

 

 

Got you there, that's basically what I meant.

 

 

 

Speaking of God, what's Obama's religion?

 

(I can't tell if you're being serious...)

 

And to Penguin, science AND faith can co-exist, just not the whole of it. Just like some algerbra and geometry can "co-exist"( can't think of a better word, maybe apply) but not all of algerbra is used in geometry and vice verse.

 

 

Got you there, that's basically what I meant.

 

 

 

Speaking of God, what's Obama's religion?

 

(I can't tell if you're being serious...)

 

All I know is from this wiki quote

 

Obama is a Christian whose religious views have evolved in his adult life. In The Audacity of Hope, Obama writes that he "was not raised in a religious household." He describes his mother, raised by non-religious parents (whom Obama has specified elsewhere as "non-practicing Methodists and Baptists") to be detached from religion, yet "in many ways the most spiritually awakened person that I have ever known." He describes his Kenyan father as "raised a Muslim", but a "confirmed atheist" by the time his parents met, and his Indonesian stepfather as "a man who saw religion as not particularly useful." In the book, Obama explains how, through working with black churches as a community organizer while in his twenties, he came to understand "the power of the African-American religious tradition to spur social change

 

 

 

Doesn't really tell you based on his family's background

^^ You probably don't want to know. For a guy who talks about the politics of division he practices a religion of division.

 

 

 

Just more atheists who need to inflate their ego's and feel good about themselves. This stuff get's old really fast.

 

I love it. You whine about Atheists not giving to charity, then when they do, it's just "inflating their ego".

 

 

 

Putting ads on buses is giving to charity?

Sly, I really don't have the patience for a debate with you, given the way you've patronised Ginger over the last five pages. So all i'll say is that generalising and reducing Richard Dawkin's arguments against religion to "you're an idiot if you believe in God" is as ridiculous and misrepresentative of his arguments as you claim he is of Christian's. Ironically, a Bible passage about specks of dust in eyes springs to mind here. Don't be hypocritical.

 

 

 

*Clears his throat*

 

 

 

To describe religions as mind viruses is sometimes interpreted as contemptuous or even hostile. It is both. I am often asked why I am so hostile to organized religion.

 

 

 

http://www.positiveatheism.org/hist/quotes/dawkins.htm

 

 

 

I think that just about wraps that case up, wouldn't you say? Come one, now. Why the hell am I, the non-atheist, listening to more of what RD says than you? Either you're really not listening to the things he says/things he writes or you're just willfully ignoring them.

 

 

 

I like the guy who called RD a real life troll who gets paid to mess with theists.

I'll believe in God when I see Him, and am right of mind. I will never believe in Christiantity, Catholicism, or any other religion. I do love what religion can do for people. A god may exist, it seems like the most logical possibility to me. I mean really, what's more logical than something that, if it exists, denies logic. God is illogical in that, from my understanding, He is the Creator of everything. If He Created everything, then He must have created himself. If we go by logic, than it is impossible for anything to created by itself. If we assume that God does exist, then logic may be circumvented, and so it is possible for God to exist. Assumptions can make all the difference in understanding the way a theist or atheist thinks

 

 

 

To be in-topic, I think that a better message would have just been "Don't worry, be happy", but that's a bit cliche nowadays. Atleast the message was "God doesn't exist". I think that the best message would have been "Leave Creation and Evolution up to the scientists and theologists..." which is what I think we should do.

 

 

 

Then again, I don't really care what you decide to talk about, as long as it doesn't turn into something that will make me hate this forum. AKA flame war/a shallow "debate".

lol @ the whole "encouraging people to think for themselves" line. If you're into the whole "thinking for yourselves" thing, then why are you still using arguments some Greek guys (Mainly Lucretius and Democritus) thought up over 2,000 years ago? #-o

 

 

 

D'oh!

 

 

 

As Richard Dawkins says: "This campaign to put alternative slogans on London buses will make people think - and thinking is anathema to religion."

 

 

 

And this is why I stand by comment that Richard Dawkins is an idiot. A monkey makes more sense than he does.

 

 

 

My theory is you only think he's an idiot as you have a very differing opinion. I doubt he would be professor at Oxford, a member of the RLS or sold 1.5 Mil books in 20 languages if he was an idiot :lol:

 

 

 

I seriously doubt though that a monkey could create well built argument on whether god is real or not.

Saying that "thinking is anathema to religion" is a pretty huge blanket statement and a rather ignorant one. It doesn't take someone of the obvious brilliance of Dawkins to say that, nor to realize that it is simply untrue.

 

 

 

The context he uses it in is also rather funny. An ad on a bus is going to stay in someone's head for more than three seconds? Forget "making people think" and then, because of the obvious corollary, reject religion. The ad will never accomplish that simply because it will be invisible, and easily dismissed when noticed. Even religious nuts who do take issue over it are on principle not going to convert.

The ad will never accomplish that simply because it will be invisible, and easily dismissed when noticed.

 

 

 

Doesn't this topic alone and all of these people posting on it disprove this statement? ;)

 

 

 

I do agree with you though on how it's not going to change peoples' minds who are already made up.

My theory is you only think he's an idiot as you have a very differing opinion. I doubt he would be professor at Oxford, a member of the RLS or sold 1.5 Mil books in 20 languages if he was an idiot :lol:

 

 

 

OR it could be the fact that he's a pretentious douche.

 

 

 

I don't think people are idiots just because I disagree with them. IF that were the case, then I must sure do believe there are a lot of idiots running around on these forums.

 

 

 

Really, it doesn't matter how many books you've sold or what honorary statuses you hold when you make such comments as "thinking is anathema to religion" and religion to 'mind viruses'. Are you telling me if I sold 1.5M books and held an honorary status at Oxford that the statement "Atheism is tantamount to communism" would be any more true? I'm thinking... Not.

 

 

 

Srsly. Some of you guys amuse me. Hell, the guy has even admitted that he holds religion in contempt and looks down upon those who follow a certain religious faith (Especially, the Abrahamic religions). Meh... On a related but slightly dissimilar note, what do you think of these quotes by RD?

 

 

 

Yes, testosterone-sodden young men too unattractive to get a woman in this world might be desperate enough to go for 72 private virgins in the next.

 

 

 

And

 

 

 

My last vestige of "hands off religion" respect disappeared in the smoke and choking dust of September 11th 2001, followed by the "National Day of Prayer," when prelates and pastors did their tremulous Martin Luther King impersonations and urged people of mutually incompatible faiths to hold hands, united in homage to the very force that caused the problem in the first place.

 

 

 

I seriously doubt though that a monkey could create well built argument on whether god is real or not.

 

 

 

Dawkins has done neither of those. I said that a monkey makes more sense than RD, which it does.

Speaking of God, what's Obama's religion?

 

 

 

 

 

It's some Black Liberation Theology, or something along the lines. Basically, White Christians are liars, and Black Christians are the real ones. Something like that, I forget. But he says he's "Christian," though he isn't really.

Speaking of God, what's Obama's religion?

 

He's a Muslim obviously?

edit: ^^ That would probably be better.

 

 

 

Speaking of God, what's Obama's religion?

 

 

 

 

 

It's some Black Liberation Theology, or something along the lines. Basically, White Christians are liars, and Black Christians are the real ones. Something like that, I forget. But he says he's "Christian," though he isn't really.

 

 

 

 

 

It's a little worse than that. It says that if God is not on the side of black people trying to kill white people than black people must kill God. It's not a bible based theology but a Marxist based theology. And Obama picked the Marquee church of it.