Cycling UK Forum

kwackers wrote:Children are the main reason religion propagates has it does. The indoctrination of young minds - only one religion should/could be correct and yet most children 'choose' their parents religions...

They still have to choose whether to accept it or not.

Hector's House wrote:

kwackers wrote:Children are the main reason religion propagates has it does. The indoctrination of young minds - only one religion should/could be correct and yet most children 'choose' their parents religions...

They still have to choose whether to accept it or not.

Choose implies choice, most don't and children by their very nature look to their parents for guidance.

By the time they're able to make that choice it's often too late.

kwackers wrote:By the time they're able to make that choice it's often too late.

Too late for what? Most people believe all sorts of nonsense - going to work every day makes you happy, consumpton is its own reward, the myth of progress and so on. Your's sounds like the currently popular tyranny of empiricism. Binary mischief.

I'm a relativist and proud of it.

PW wrote: The sooner it is stamped out worldwide the better.

and that can never happen. The root of religion stems from the uncertainty of afterlife and the hope of happiness therin. In the same way we go to bed at night, or sing auld lang syne on dec 31st and hope for a good/better day/year in the future, humankind also hankers after continued happiness after our three score plus 10. Most of us dont want to admit its all going to end in nothingness some day, so we hope and prepare for the next and better stage. But, as we dont know what will await us, we adopt what our elders tell us and what fits our society. So the christian could well have been a muslim/budhist had he been brought up somewhere else.

Ah but I think this http://forum.ctc.org.uk/viewtopic.php?t=21519 is much more worthy of debate a) there are more 'tangibles' to engage with, b) I dont believe a war has been started or prolonged by the absence or surplus of the issues discussed and c) in the grand scheme of things 'life is too short'...............

glueman wrote:

kwackers wrote:By the time they're able to make that choice it's often too late.

Too late for what? Most people believe all sorts of nonsense - going to work every day makes you happy, consumpton is its own reward, the myth of progress and so on. Your's sounds like the currently popular tyranny of empiricism. Binary mischief.

I'm a relativist and proud of it.

Too late to change their mind - at least for most...

Excess baggage. The real reason for two panniers, one for all the useful stuff, one for all the crap you just think you need.

kwackers wrote:

Hector's House wrote:

kwackers wrote:Children are the main reason religion propagates has it does. The indoctrination of young minds - only one religion should/could be correct and yet most children 'choose' their parents religions...

They still have to choose whether to accept it or not.

Choose implies choice, most don't and children by their very nature look to their parents for guidance.

By the time they're able to make that choice it's often too late.

My father then was not very good. I took the opposite view to what he told me

pigman wrote:... we hope and prepare for the next and better stage ...

Most of us probably don't - at least not in the UK. Some stuff here.

I've never understood humanism. If someone knows life is essentially meaningless, why ascribe an Abrahamic value system to it? If you can do literally anything without consequence for your karma, why worry about social philanthropism?

It seems to fill the place religion occupies without the God but with values like religious ones. It also seems popular with scientists who surely ought to be problem solving not dealing in abstraction?

glueman wrote:I've never understood humanism ...

Me neither, though I haven't tried very hard. I'm not much into -isms. It was really the 'surveys and statistics' that caught my eye.

I do think there is something to be said for Lent (compared to Christmas), even from a non-religious point of view. Abstinence from something of no real value and which one can do without seems a worthwhile thing - just for the sake of it. I'm not sure why this seems do, but it does.

From the website of the British Humanist Association:

Humanists...
...are atheists and agnostics who make sense of the world using reason, experience and shared human values. We take responsibility for our actions and base our ethics on the goals of human welfare, happiness and fulfillment. We seek to make the best of the one life we have by creating meaning and purpose for ourselves, individually and together.

Looks quite clear to me.

glueman wrote:I've never understood humanism. If someone knows life is essentially meaningless, why ascribe an Abrahamic value system to it? If you can do literally anything without consequence for your karma, why worry about social philanthropism?

Humanism makes good sense to me...
Social philanthopism simply tweeks the bits that make us feel good. I feel much better doing something for someone else than I do when I do it for myself. Of course you can argue that by definition it's a selfish action, but imo that just makes it a win win situation.

It seems to fill the place religion occupies without the God but with values like religious ones. It also seems popular with scientists who surely ought to be problem solving not dealing in abstraction?

I think it's the other way round, religion occupies the space and for no apparent reason chucks a god object into the equation. The 'values' are basic human responses and don't require religion to explain them, humanism simply acknowleges those values.

kwackers wrote:... Humanism makes good sense ...

Perhaps that's why there isn't much to understand. They're mostly a pressure group, probably.

I am entirely without religious belief or affiliation.

My understanding of Humanism might be summarised as 'Life is not a rehearsal for something better later. Altruism is important for its own sake, rather than as a way of building up celestial brownie points.'

patricktaylor wrote:

kwackers wrote:... Humanism makes good sense ...

Perhaps that's why there isn't much to understand. They're mostly a pressure group, probably.

Why does there have to be much to understand?

As for a pressure group - why? I know lots of people who are humanists, but they don't advertise the fact, they just get on with their lives. There's no hidden agenda (other than wanting people to get on), no knocking on doors, no begging for cash. Just a group of like minded people doing their thing...

I think the religious amongst us could learn something from them.