After finishing this and "Letter to a Christian Nation" by Sam Harris, I am trying to think of ways to confront this "delusion". I agree that belief in God, in all its forms, is harmful to us. Where do we start to fix it? I know the public educational system is failing our students by allowing them to graduate without understanding the scientific method and the difference between fact and fantasy. So we have to get on school boards and elect people who are against vouchers for religious schools. What else can we do?

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Colbert, in case you hadn't noticed, is a COMEDIAN.

You're having us on, right? Enjoy the furor - but I think it's a joke.

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That's what the atheists dont get while they are busy explaining their antitheism, a position well worth taking and I am glad there are those who do take it. Their arguements are right of course, god doesn't exist per se in the 3 dimensional observable universe.

The other position is also right, god totally exists. If god didn't exist, how could you explain all the literature from people trying to describe or define god? That is evidence right there.

I can tell you what god is because I experienced god, it is a religious experience. That is why there is all the arguing about if god is real or not and what god is. I experienced god but can't provide any evidence. You just have to take my word on it.

If I were an atheist and wanted to really find out what god is, I would read religious literature about various people's enlightenment experiences. I suspect most atheists are actually antireligionists. Religion has been pretty nasty, being against it is a perfectly natural reaction. Many religions have worked hard to earn their bad reputations. I appreciate those willing to speak up against them.

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This was funny but just adds to the usual divisiveness so prevalent in our society now. This is a very complex philosophical question. There are truths on both sides. Also, faith comes into it, along with our prejudices.

I recommend reading philosopher Ken Wilber's books if you have an open mind, and are willing to.....change?
He is the only writer I've read that, looks at as many sides to everything as he can, presents it and still respects everyone.

He argues different philosophies, sure... but he's done more for my thinking than any of the hundreds and hundreds of other books i read.

He also has some great websites. Google him!

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His schtick is getting really old. OK, it was funny in moderation on the Daily Show when he would try to zing people, and act like an overconfident jerk in interviews, but it is stale and unfunny and just awkward. It was a waste of Dawkins' talent.

Dawkins' line is good that most people don't believe in Thor, Poseidon, etc. He just believes in one less god than most people.

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I've heard some of the most vile crap from religious people getting excited over somebody's misery due being due to so called non belief. I have nothing against the humble disbeliever or believer but Colbert's joke about Dawkins going to hell seems to sum up a lot of stuff I hear from religious people. I really hope they NEVER get a taste of their own medicine because pain and misery suck belief or no belief. Religion at some point in time went from helping the wounded and miserable alter their reality to a game of who's better and if that's the case (which is seems to be in most of the world) I say do away with the whole thing.

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I thought the interview was great - Colbert was funny, I've seen a lot of Dawkins' stuff, and I've never seen him as strikingly pleased to be there.

And while Colbert kept to his usual, "playing ignorance" routine - which is great - he allowed Dawkins plenty of time to elaborate - it was beautiful hear Dawkins get his fair share of time on a National and very popular TV show.

As we can plainly see, atheists DO have a sense of humor.

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I love the sciences. My schooling and career reflects this. However, I believe that God does exist and disagree with the concept of evolution and hence, the primordial soup theory. Two men named Oparin and Haldane came up with this theory known as the primordial soup theory that postulates life began in a pond or ocean as a result of the combination of chemicals present in the earth’s early atmosphere (primarily water, and hydrogen) and some form of energy to make amino acids, the building blocks of proteins, which would then evolve into all the species-this leads you to Darwin’s evolution theory.

The problem with both of these theories is that there is always some unexplained force or set of principles that magically set in motion these series of ordered reactions and formations. We all know from general chemistry that X + Y = Z. You not only need the right molecule or compound, but the right amount and conditions (temperature, pH, etc.) to form a completely different, yet stable compound. One major problem with the primordial soup theory is that chemicals from the atmosphere must be precisely hit by energy (that apparently came out of nowhere), to assemble highly structured proteins. The chemicals present in earth’s primitive atmosphere alone could not generate an abundance of amino acids needed to form one protein. However, a study adding methane and ammonia (not present in earth’s early atmosphere) generated a significant amount of amino acids.

Evolution theorizes that a simple single-celled microorganism through “degrees of change” over billions of years produced what is now the complex human being. First of all, I don’t consider even a single-celled microorganism to be “simple”; it is still in fact intelligently designed, after all it has DNA. I am also not the descendent of an ape. I can go to the zoo to see one and don’t need to claim having one in my ancestral line. Anyway, the problem with this theory is that it does violate the 2nd law of thermodynamics which states that a system becomes less and less organized over time; this would mean that proteins cannot be generated spontaneously and would require a pre-established set of principles or complex body to ensure all the above reactions and formations take place properly and evolve. Therefore, both theories are missing the main ingredient, a creative, orderly body to ensure all these things take place. Maybe the Big Bang did happen. If it did an organized complex body, such as God caused it to happen. This is what I believe. Notice I did not argue this using the faith principle, but science itself.

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This is the book I have been waiting for. All of my beliefs are vindicated by this book. Man's sickness of faith must end before the earth is destroyed by it. I was asked by a Baptist minister in my hometown once how I knew that there was no God and I asked him the question that proved there couldn't be a god to me. The question was " If a god exists, wouldn't it want everyone to know which religion was right so that nobody would get killed over it" which was followed by the statement "and if it does exist and doesn't clear up this problem it doesn't deserve any devotion anyway". That is where I stand, If God doesn't have enough compassion to stop the hate and killing then we should banish his memory even if he does exist. God is a piss-poor explanation for the universe as well.

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The use of thermodynamics in biology has a long history rich in confusion — Harold J. Morowitz

RisaRN and other creationists have been misrepresenting The Second Law for years, and I hope the linked article can help shed some light.

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Science is destroying our world, not religion.

Just look at the 50+ toxic chemicals that were'nt on the planet 30 years ago. Giving us cancer, killing trees, posioning our food, etc. I'd rather have weeds on my lawn and take time to cook my true organic meals, thank you.
Look at big pharma and what they "invent." Destroying us.
Look at HIV and others. They came from a pharma lab...
Yet our government protects them.

That "mad scientist" we used to see in the movies is very real today (only he owns a comb, made of gold).

Yes, many wars and many lives have been lost for the sake of religion, but religion is mand-made. Besides, every war for the past 100 years or more has been over money and power.

So when you're confornted by an extreme Christian or an extreme Muslim or an extreme Jew or an extreme atheist, just know that they DO NOT represent their religion very well and are really lost souls who never diffused their childhood anger.

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Why do believers in god not accept that god created evolution? Why do scientists not accept that some universal force created evolution? Why are these 2 concepts so non-compatible to these folks?

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Ok let admit that God doesn't exist,
So everything we know has have to always existed in some form or another for ever?
Or is there something else than God that started the process? No beginning then. No origin ?
I have only have a degree in chemistry . In chemistry, every action is a consequence of another action... it can be random, but it needs something else than itself to react and evolve in to something else.

This is interesting philosophy not sciences IMO

Phil

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Ultimately, I think the problem is that there are two spheres that should co-exist, but not interfere with one another.

Religion can be good for society if it helps inform our normative decisions- on how we should be as people, to one another. Science is good for society if it helps gives a more sophisticated descriptive understanding of the world.

I think what some religious people fear is that the scientific explanation of the world will imply our normative decisions.

Colbert said something like, "well if we're descended from apes, then should we just fornicate..." which echoes the sentiment of many who don't support the theory of evolution. This is scientism... probably related to capitalism. That we can find truth and value from the market, which we assume to be objective.

Other writers will point to biology as a lens to understand and even justify human behavior. Some question, for instance, the ideal of monogamy by observing the sexual behavior of bonobo monkeys. Others point to evolutionary reasons for why men and women may seek different traits in their mates. One can understand how a religious social conservative would find this alarming.

Indeed, just because we have not observed democracy among animals doesn't mean we has people shouldn't pursue it as an ideal.

My point is, some people think that science leads to understanding which leads to morality and ethics.

And no good scientist will make that claim. A scientist will say science leads to understanding. People must make the choices about morality and ethics.

For some reason we've fogotten that.

Science and religion can cohabitate: if I want to know where this rock comes from, I read a text on paleontology or geology. I don't read Genesis. If I want to know how we should treat the poor, I don't read a book on biology; I read The Sermon on the Mount, or the Koran, or Buddhist sutras, etc.

Science may blur the lines between people and the natural world, but that doesn't mean we should give up our ideals and ethics.

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Dont people get irritated with all the connotations put on words and ideas? Especially if a healthy discussion cant take place because of hang-ups from experiences that make impressions into the memory of said word or concept. I think of the nature, its codes and see a common thread... Its a sweater we all wear!

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... when it come to science and religion. In fact, the science of religion is known in India as yoga. The instructions for understanding and experiencing God are to make your body and mind absolutely still. Once you are able to do this, you will not be separate from anything else, and so you will no longer feel pain, hunger, attachment, desire, etc. Just pure existence, which, according to people who have experienced it (check out the works of the relatively modern Sri Ramakrishna, Swami Vivekananda and Ramana Maharshi) consists of absolute love and bliss. And it may come as something of a surprise, but their findings and teachings agree with Buddha, Jesus and Jewish mystical traditions like the Kabbalah. When it comes right down to it, lots and lots of people even in just the last 2,000 years have had these experiences. They have taught what they learned and many of them have been worshipped as gods themselves by millions of people all over the world for thousands of years. People who claim that nobody knows whether or not God exists are speaking from profound ignorance. But don't just take the word of sages and enlightened persons- find out for yourself. According to those in a position to know, figuring this out is why we are here, why the universe exists at all.
It does make it difficult that the world is full of things and they seem so real, but everyone has the capacity to find out the truth if they have the will to do it. Religious institutions seek to hide this obvious fact because how could they stay in business if everyone knew that his/her own body and mind were the only things anyone needs to know God firsthand? I was raised with a religious education and no one who ever taught me knew this. No one can find God because everyone is looking in the wrong directon: for a Santa Claus-like character with a long white beard, who waves his hand and here we are. He definitely doesn't exist. But you exist, and you cannot prove that you do not. Even in deep sleep, unaware of everything else, you are still aware of your continuous existence. Otherwise you couldn't say "I slept well." So what is the basis for that existence?
As far as "Why dioesn't someone show up and tell us what to believe?", there are many beliefs to suit many temperaments. And temperament is also subject to the evolutionary process. We have to proceed from brutality to compassion. The brutality of fanatics doesn't stem from religious beliefs, but from material convictions. That's why violent fanatics come from every religious tradition. People who inflict pain on others in the name of God serve nothing more than their own bloodthirstiness, no matter what any religious text may claim. Bibles are written by men. God has no hands, or need for words.
If scientific proof consists of rigorous experimentation that always leads to the same conclusion, then the yogis and sages of ancient India first proved the existence of God about 6,000 years ago, and their conclusions have continued to be verified by uncounted numbers of mystics, sages and modern yogis from every tradtion, including the shamanic and animistic traditions of America, Africa and Asia, up until the present day. But how could we possibly expect Richard Dawkins to know that?

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There are two types of humans on this Earth, Thinkers and Believers. I know this seems simplistic and general, but one has to start SOMEWHERE. The Believers outnumber the Thinkers by a huge margin-especially in areas of the world considered "backward", or Third World. The believers in the Third World, are, in large part, illiterate, comparatively ignorant, and therefore more highly succeptible to the blandishments of various charlatans. Significantly, "advanced" countries throughout the world have more Thinkers (with the sad exception of our own) than in the past. This can be attributed to better education which tends to dispell the fear and ignorance upon which all theistic psuedo philosophies feed and exploit. That being said, know this: The Thinkers are the ones responsible for the elimination of polio, smallpox ,and the "childhood" diseases so recently taken for granted, and which were too often, disabling, or even fatal.We landed on the moon, revealed the wonders of the universe through the Hubble telescope and the giant interferometers, both visual and radio frequency here on earth. The cheap, super-accurate LCD watch you're wearing is a product of Thinkers with their oft-proven Scientific Method. Every human action benefiting the human condition is the product of Thinkers. So, what benefits have Believers brought to us? War, torture, pestilence, ignorance, and intolerance. All this because of belief systems with no more grounding in reality or validity than Bugs Bunny. Guess whose side I'm on?

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There persists a misconception that faith begins where facts end. For those inclined to scientism, this makes the religious out to be fools.

A line I heard in college resonates with me still:
"The fundamental religious question is not about God or metaphysics; these are properly understood as attempts at an answer. The question itself is simply this: Is human life meaningful or absurd?"

Meaning is outside the bounds of science, and yet is of the most profound significance to the human person. God is just one expression - among many, although perhaps with the largest compass - of the affirmation that human life is indeed meaningful.

Science concerns itself with matters of necessity; religion, with questions of being - being as choice, as affirmation and identity, not of fact.

There is no conflict between science and faith. They find their unity in the person: science connects the dots; faith sees a picture.

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The best quote I've heard to sum up both sides comes from a non-believer: "I don't have the gift of faith myself but I admire those who do."

To believe or not is mostly the product of your upbringing (you tend to follow the beliefs of your parents), though some of us do change on occasion according to our needs.

I'm a non-believer myself and I certainly don't want faith forced on me or my life choices, but I submit to the fact that there are those who believe--many more if we have faith in the statistics--and are happy in their belief.

Curb your dogma: good advice for both sides.

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explaining the religious instinct.

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