in Hindu india and nepal millions of poor children beg on the streets, are exploited as servents and for sex. same goes for Buddhist sri lanka. Terrorism and begging is the norm in that land. Buddhist Thailand , laos, Burma, vitnam has thousnads of girls who work in Brothals to earn a living in islamic countries most people starve, women are oppressed and terroism is the way of life Christian philipines , latin america is filled with people who beg for a living Athiest china, north korea are oppressive regimes Atheist singapore is another police state Christian america still executes criminals, while crime is increasing and so is poverty since religion and Atheism both have failed us in which direction can we turn now?
Philosophy - 8 Answers
Random Answers, Critics, Comments, Opinions :
1 :
I like this answer to your boldfaced question. It was written by an atheist. "Faith, as such, is extremely detrimental to human life: it is the negation of reason. But you must remember that religion is an early form of philosophy, that the first attempts to explain the universe, to give a coherent frame of reference to man’s life and a code of moral values, were made by religion, before men graduated or developed enough to have philosophy. And, as philosophies, some religions have very valuable moral points. They may have a good influence or proper principles to inculcate, but in a very contradictory context and, on a very—how should I say it?—dangerous or malevolent base: on the ground of faith." “Playboy’s Interview with Ayn Rand,†March 1964.
2 :
The problems on this planet at the moment (and only a complete fool would deny that they exist) are in essence, contractions before the birth of a new phase in both human history and evolution. The truth of the matter is that this has very little to do with both revealed religion and atheism, the process does not care what views people hold. Both of these are over-simplistic and rather ignorant views of reality both of which many humans are moving away from and instead are turning towards a very personalized, almost mystical, spirituality. The "evil" behavior of some is ultimately an evolutionary sociobiologcial process. The fact that we are increasingly appalled by such behavior is testament to *our* evolution (consider that 150 years ago people were gathering on streets to watch a hanging and you will see how far we have come) and eventually all will catch up to this mentality.
3 :
You have blanketed a large area here. Addressing the aspect of personal choices however, when it comes to personal behavior, perhaps religion or Atheism should be replaced with integrity and character. It is the lack of the later, on a large scale, that degrades a society.
4 :
Belief or non-belief isn't what's causing the problems. The problem is us, humanity. WE are making the decisions which are causing a worse world. WE are the ones who leave girls no other option than to work in brothels and WE are the ones executing criminals. There is no magical solution that cures everything. We just have to try and live our lives in the best possible way, striving to help other wherever we can.
5 :
There exists in this world both good and bad, and extremes of each. Unfortunately, there will be no easy solution to this problem, as long as people can think and behave differently from each other. There will always be poor people , there will always be people who want to take the "easy way out", there will always be people killing other people. With religion to instill moral values, people feel shame for what they have done and may repent, while without a religion of some sort, there would be no need. With religion, it is up to the individual to control his/her impulsive beaviour, while under atheism, the state dictates control over most aspects of life. I imagine atheistic states to be as colonies of ants, while countries in which God is worshipped in some form to be more like winged insects. Each ant works very hard to survive, as do the winged creatures. But those with wings are free to fly as they do their work, whereas the ants cannot, because they don't have the equipment. The "gift" having some form of religion is the gift of wings.
6 :
singapores awesome though its really well set up. the proplem is the idea of better, many people are happier under religion but people are uslually "better" people when atheist so whats more important.
7 :
I think you're blaming a lot of things on religion/atheism that have nothing to do with them. Most of the problems you cite have much, much more to do with a country's government and/or economic system. BTW, a couple corrections. First, the crime rate in the US has been going down since around the mid-90's or so. Second, my wife is from Sri Lanka, and we have a number of friends from there. I can tell you with some authority that terrorism, begging, and child sex are NOT the norms there. Has religion made the world a better place? I would argue not. It was religion that has given us the Crusades, the Inquisition, Jihads, and planes being flown into buildings, and which to this day is still the main opposition to rational thought and scientific achievement. Still, even I as an atheist would have a hard time laying the blame on religion for a lot of the stuff you've written above. As for atheism, again, I don't think you can blame it for the actions of governments. Secular humanism, if anything, teaches respect for human rights and is quite opposed to dictatorships. Atheism, at its core, is simply a lack of belief in the supernatural. It says nothing about what form of government (other than theocracy) or what economic system one should have.
8 :
The issues you mentioned are SOCIAL issues, not religious.
Read more discussions :
