May 26 2006
A Systematic Way To Get Rid Of Religion
A serious, yet hilarious controversial (to some) post by Scott Adams: Could Science Eliminate Religion?
As readers of my blog know, I believe that given the right conditions, anyone can be made to believe any damned thing. That’s why there are so many different religions.
I wonder if a team of well-funded atheists could devise a legal and ethical method of reducing people’s religious faith.
The first thing I would test is context. If you expose highly religious people to the history of other religions, they will make the connection that prophets come and go all the time. And it would be obvious that (other) people are easily fooled. At first, the believer would think he was lucky that all those others got fooled and he didn’t, because his prophet is real. But this is just the start of the process.
I wonder if a team of well-funded atheists could devise a legal and ethical method of reducing people’s religious faith.
The first thing I would test is context. If you expose highly religious people to the history of other religions, they will make the connection that prophets come and go all the time. And it would be obvious that (other) people are easily fooled. At first, the believer would think he was lucky that all those others got fooled and he didn’t, because his prophet is real. But this is just the start of the process.
And the pièce de résistance:
Eventually you could create a book that is the sum of the best methods. Then all we need to do is air drop about a billion of them on the Middle East, close all of our embassies, pull out and wait a generation.
The book would immediately be banned by the authorities, but that would make them all the more popular with the young.
The book would immediately be banned by the authorities, but that would make them all the more popular with the young.
It’s worked for others.
Update (Feb 21, 2008): The above link no longer works. Bummer.
I think you’re just trying to make friends with J-Walk.
Very nice. Keep the truth going. I know I will.
I HATE GOD WITH A PASSION .I WAS BORN ATHEIST AND RAISED ATHIEST AND I WILL STAY ATHEIST. AND DAM PROUD OF IT TOO. ONLY IDIOTS BELEVE IN GOD. ITS STUPID AND IT ONLY SHOWS HOW DERANGED THEY ARE. THEY ALL HAVE A MENTAL PROBLEM AND THEY ARE ALL TOO WILLING TO PUT IT UP FOR SHOW TO THE REST OF US SANE PEOPLE. I DONT WANT TO BE AROUND THAT JUNK. THEY ARE SOME VERY SICK PEOPLE AND THEY BELONG LOCKED UP AWAY FROM US NORMAL PEOPLE. I AM FROM HOLLAND MICHIGAN. THE LAND OF THE TULIPS.
Haha. That’s on par with:
Both are just as scary.
Now if someone would speak up about writing stupid messages in ALL CAPS, well, maybe then there will be hope for our children.
Thank you Jody for pointing out how blind faith can be just as dangerous as religion even if the person is atheist. There have probably been many attempts to remove religion from society (kings rulers etc probably found a need), the most current have been under communist societies. There is however only one way that I have found to remove religion from society, its called education. I was not born into a atheist or religious household, my parents never told me about religion or what an atheist was, I learned about the church as I went to school at the same time I was learning about math and science and starting to question my world. I am now a very firm atheist, I do not believe in god, I find no need to. Also I feel allowing a ‘creator’ to take credit for all of our great accomplishments and most devastating horrors takes away from being human and what we are; individuals in a society. This is my proposal for a systematic way to remove religion:
1)Raise the level of education all over the world and continue to do that for many generations.
2)Get rid of religion in the United States, this is most important because the rest of the developed world can not mock the developing nations and their faith as long as the Americans are a bunch of bible carrying and preaching Christians.
3)See pt. 1.
Thanks for reading.
The article in this post is gone. The link links to nothing.
I think I told you this before Jody, my daughter who goes to a catholic public school(cause the class sizes are smaller) has commented at supper that when she is at school she believes in god but not when she is at home with dad…..oh yeah…therapy will be needed.
Oliver, you are going to shame me into presenting in a proper and articulate way on this blog..
Imagine this:
You’re walking through the woods with a companion and you both come upon a house, well stocked with food, fuel, and everything else you need to live comfortably.
Your companion tries to convince you that the house and contents formed themselves, by accident. You start to think they are crazy, because you know there is evidence that an intelligent mind that prepared these things. They could never have come about by accident.
Scientists are amazed that even the smallest living one-celled creatures, have amazingly complex systems, so intricate that if any part doesn’t function properly, it couldn’t function properly (if it survives at all). Far more complex than anything man-made.
So when the atheist comes along and insists that the 200-million plus (estimated) number of living things came about by chance, (and by accident they also formed both male and female versions so as to reproduce replicas of themselves), you have to wonder how sound such reasoning is.
As Hebrews 3:4 says “every house is constructed by someone, but he that constructed all things is God.”
Here are some common reasons people cling to atheism, despite all evidence to the contrary:
1) They’ve been turned off by hypocrisy in religion.
Understandable. Remember that religionists killed the historical person Christ, for exposing them.
2) If there is no God, then there is no right and no wrong. One is then free of any moral restraint other than what they themselves decide is “right” or “wrong.” They can live anyway they want, without pang of conscience?
(If that’s so true, why such a high suicide rate among homosexuals? Could it be that their god-given conscience condemns them? “Gay” used to be defined as happiness, right? So why does such a lifestyle make such a large % of them unhappy?)
3) They don’t know the answer to the question: “Why does God allow suffering/wickedness?”
(The answer is available, and has to do with the issue of universal sovereignty. If God had destroyed the Edenic rebels instantly, there would have been the question of whether rebellion against God’s standards was truly be a better way to go. Thousands of years of human history has proven that it’s not. Once that issue has been settled, he will rid the earth of badness.)