anti-semite?

[mensbattleplan]

I'm curious of everyone's opinion on this thought.

SOME atheist are very intolerant of religious people and called them idiots, bigots, liars, corrupt, etc. (ie. Jake at thegoodatheist dot com). Can one assume that if someone believes this about all religious people this would include all Jews? A jew is a race of people but they are also a religious people by origin.

Is it not a stretch to believe that if someone says all religious people are idiots that the person is antisemite?

[JustJim]

I'm curious of everyone's opinion on this thought.

SOME atheist are very intolerant of religious people and called them idiots, bigots, liars, corrupt, etc. (ie. Jake at thegoodatheist dot com). Can one assume that if someone believes this about all religious people this would include all Jews? A jew is a race of people but they are also a religious people by origin.

Is it not a stretch to believe that if someone says all religious people are idiots that the person is antisemite?

Personally, I think the greater stretch would be the assumption that because someone is ethnically/culturally Jewish, they are therefore also religiously Jewish -- a non sequitur, equivalent to assuming that because someone is Italian, they must be Roman Catholic, or assuming that because someone is Italian, they must have Mafia connections.

People who claim that all religious people are idiots demonstrate their own idiocy by making such a claim. Some of the most intelligent, articulate, educated people among us are (and have always been) religious. Some of the most ignorant, inarticulate, uneducated people are non-religious.

Belief or non-belief in god(s), which is the only legitimate distinction between theism and atheism, neither determines nor is determined by one's intelligence.

Bigotry, hatred, and prejudice toward groups of people based on their religion, ethnicity, race, color, creed, age, gender, sexual orientation, disability, marital status, IQ, financial status, hair style, music preferences, or any number of other arbitrarily chosen characteristics are what make the bigot the real "idiot"....

On the other hand...

I personally don't think it is necessarily either bigotry or idiocy to believe, and respectfully express the belief, that it is not totally rational to believe in the existence and ever-interacting presence of various echelons of invisible, undetectable, unverifiable, unobservable beings - all around us all the time - who can see, hear, feel and otherwise sense us and often even 'read our minds', while we have no way at all to reciprocate any sensation or other detection of them, all without any verifiable, testable evidence to support beliefs in such beings other than personal 'experiences' or 'feelings' or simply taking believers' word for it....

But that's just my opinion. I could be wrong. That would not be the first time. I used to believe in such beings myself....



Jim

EDIT: Woops... I just noticed this is in the "Christians" section, and I'm not one (at least not at the moment). I was going to delete the post, but changed my mind when I realized the OP doesn't really belong in this section either.... Ignore what I wrote if you want...

[mitchellmckain]

I certainly don't think it matters. Bigotry is bigotry. The lesson of the holocaust is not just about what people might do to the Jews, but about what people might do to any group they despise, whether Jew, Moslem, Atheist or Homosexual. So whether it includes the Jews or not, whether it is technically anti-semitism or not, it is still exactly the SAME thing. The point is to protect both the diversity of human genetics AND the diversity of human thought.

[mensbattleplan]

People who claim that all religious people are idiots demonstrate their own idiocy by making such a claim.

Thank you! This guy at thegoodatheist dot com bashes religious people everyday. He is so hateful and intolerant that I feel sorry for him. I have been talking with him for a while privately on email and openly through comments on his posts and I am getting tired of it. But I want to stay on the site because I feel like someone should stand up to him so that others won't drink his kool-aid.

You can go to the site and see how I have been defending Christians. I hope I've been nice about it.

I personally don't think it is necessarily either bigotry or idiocy to believe, and respectfully express the belief, that it is not totally rational to believe

No, it's not bigotry or idiocy to believe that believing in God is irrational. Most atheists are nice and respectful.

...all without any verifiable, testable evidence to support beliefs in such beings other than personal 'experiences' or 'feelings' or simply taking believers' word for it....

What's wrong with believing because of personal experiences? How many beliefs do we sign up for because of personal experiences? I believe if I put my hand on something hot that it will hurt. Some people don't have nerves and can't feel hot. I believe that it's hard to be a parent. Some people don't have children. I believe that 2 +2 = 4 because I experienced someone teaching me math.

It's hard to ignore God when He keeps drawing you closer to Him everyday. I've seen people healed, felt the power of God move through me when a Spirit filled man touched me, and I've encountered miracles in my own life that could not be coincidences.

[mitchellmckain]

I certainly don't think it matters. Bigotry is bigotry. The lesson of the holocaust is not just about what people might do to the Jews, but about what people might do to any group they despise, whether Jew, Moslem, Atheist or Homosexual. So whether it includes the Jews or not, whether it is technically anti-semitism or not, it is still exactly the SAME thing. The point is to protect both the diversity of human genetics AND the diversity of human thought.

And to protect these from the excesses that have occured by BOTH theist AND atheist. Any pretence of superiority by any group in the face of the evidence of history is just plain absurd!

[JustJim]

What's wrong with believing because of personal experiences? How many beliefs do we sign up for because of personal experiences? I believe if I put my hand on something hot that it will hurt. Some people don't have nerves and can't feel hot. I believe that it's hard to be a parent. Some people don't have children. I believe that 2 +2 = 4 because I experienced someone teaching me math.

There's nothing "wrong" with believing because of personal experiences. Problems might arise, though, when a belief is based solely on personal experience, with nothing else to corroborate or further support the belief. Each of the examples you mention (feeling hot things without nerves, beliefs about parenting without having children, 2 + 2 = 4) can easily be corroborated by other observations and testing. For example, you can verify that 2 + 2 = 4 by counting objects. You can verify that parenting is difficult by carefully defining terms and establishing questions, and then interviewing thousands of parents about their real world experiences in parenting (or by having a couple kids and raising them... but I don't recommend that method). Whether an object is "hot" or not can be physically measured with various instruments, and would be determined by how you define what "hot" means.

When a person believes something is "real" only because of their personal experience, with no corroborating "evidence", then their belief is only "real" to them. No one else can verify the basis of their belief. That doesn't mean it's wrong, of course. It only means it can't be verified.

You might, for example, believe you experienced the presence of a leprechaun in your garden one afternoon in the summer when you were outside weeding. You believe you heard it or saw it or even talked with it. But how would you go about convincing others that there is a leprechaun in your garden? If your leprechaun, for some unknown reason, chooses not to reveal itself to your neighbor, how can you get your neighbor to believe there is a leprechaun in your garden, rather than that you are out of your mind? For those who can't see/hear/touch your leprechaun, and see no indications in your garden of things that are best explained by the presence of a leprechaun over other explanations, how could they conclude that your belief is fully rational instead of that you've drawn the wrong conclusions from what you believe you experienced? Yes, there may in fact be a leprechaun in your garden, just as you believe you've experienced it, but there are other possibilities that you might not want to ignore.

It's hard to ignore God when He keeps drawing you closer to Him everyday. I've seen people healed, felt the power of God move through me when a Spirit filled man touched me, and I've encountered miracles in my own life that could not be coincidences.

Remember how you said at the beginning of your post how you believe that 2 + 2 = 4 because you experienced someone teaching you math? Maybe you can apply the same reasoning to your experiences with what you believe was God. Perhaps someone "taught" you your concepts, beliefs, and ideas about your God - and, via the magic of confirmation bias, you've interpreted things you've seen and experienced within that framework. In doing so, what you've experienced and observed "fit" what you've been taught. And so, you experience them, and accept them, as real and true - even though there are other possible explanations besides God - many of which CAN be tested/verified - to explain what you've experienced. Don't forget to seriously consider and evaluate those other possibilities before you commit to one over the others. Also, I don't think it's probably ever really a good idea to completely "make up your mind". I think you need to always remain open to new information that becomes available, as well as to new ways of interpreting and understanding old information.

Welcome to the forum! You're gonna like this place....

Jim

[mensbattleplan]

You can verify that parenting is difficult by carefully defining terms and establishing questions, and then interviewing thousands of parents about their real world experiences in parenting

Or I could read testimonies of hundreds of thousands of people that have the same experiences of healing, demonic encounters, spiritual revival that manifests in a complete 180 in their desire for drugs and anger.

What would take for you to believe? What if you were picked up, you flew through the air thousands of miles to a mountaintop in Israel, a bright light appeared and then a huge booming voice said "Why don't you believe in me?" That would be a single event and it would be your own personal experience that couldn't be verified. Would you believe then?