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25th December 2018, 12:19 PM | #121 |
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This is an interesting point. I think we often do call people in love "mad" because their behaviour is often unreasonable. I think in many cases, most actually, the two are the same and relatively benign. I think one difference is that religion, or love of god, is almost never unrequited whereas human love often is which can lead to some pretty extreme behaviour.
People will do really unreasonable things to show their love for god or other humans. They will often obsess, they will seek out ways to show their devotion, etc. For the vast majority it is no big deal in either case but for some it leads to really strange, even insane, behaviour including stalking, violence, even murder. Religion isn't the only behaviour humans have that is part of mental illness, it is one of many. Anything that has us obsessing or thinking irrationally to an onlooker would fall into the category. I think your point is a very valid one. |
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25th December 2018, 12:21 PM | #122 |
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25th December 2018, 12:41 PM | #123 |
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25th December 2018, 01:28 PM | #124 |
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The difference is society doesn't make excuses and apologetics for crazy that isn't religious.
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25th December 2018, 01:35 PM | #125 |
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25th December 2018, 01:57 PM | #126 |
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Larger numbers in societies make excuses and apologetics for religions because larger numbers in societies are religious (at least have been). Every crazy has it's believers that make excuses and apologetics however.
What I don’t understand is why some claiming to be atheists make special pleading excuses and apologetics for theism that it should be treated as a special kind of crazy that deserves different/better treatment than other crazies. |
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25th December 2018, 03:52 PM | #127 |
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25th December 2018, 03:55 PM | #128 |
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25th December 2018, 04:36 PM | #129 |
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I didn't say they were. I use “mentally unhealthy” as being the unhealthy use of an otherwise healthy brain, not necessarily a medically unhealthy brain. I've never said "medically unhealthy". The unhealthy use of a healthy brain usually results in unhealthy actions and consequences.
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25th December 2018, 04:38 PM | #130 |
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25th December 2018, 04:40 PM | #131 |
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25th December 2018, 05:06 PM | #132 |
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25th December 2018, 05:11 PM | #133 |
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From the Thomas Jefferson Foundation:
Quote:
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25th December 2018, 05:41 PM | #134 |
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25th December 2018, 05:47 PM | #135 |
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25th December 2018, 06:36 PM | #136 |
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25th December 2018, 07:04 PM | #137 |
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You answered your own question.
Because people who think the baby Jeebus is really concerned with how consenting adults rub their genital together is a thing. People demanding that schools teach that the Earth was poofed into existence thousands of years after the Ancient Sumerians invented beer, glue, and sex toys is a thing. The basis for our foreign policy in Israel being based on it having to the play the Alderaan role in some Left Behind fan fiction is a thing. They have the numbers to get into positions of power and get support. The crazy guy yelling a pigeons in the park doesn't. "Religions isn't the only crazy" is missing the point. It's the crazy with power behind it. |
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25th December 2018, 07:53 PM | #138 |
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I'm not talking about atheists that hide their atheism or lie that they're theists to gain political or other positions of power. I'm talking about people like some atheists on this forum that argue atheists should treat theists with more "reverence" than believers of other crazy beliefs. They claim atheists must be "nice" to theists that tell us we're damaged goods, worthless, evil sinners, lesser humans that deserve to be tortured for eternity with much wailing and gnashing of teeth.
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26th December 2018, 12:34 AM | #139 |
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26th December 2018, 08:12 AM | #140 |
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26th December 2018, 08:28 AM | #141 |
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I think the fact that someone believes something weird doesn't make him mentally ill. I suppose you have to refer to a complete clinical profile to do so. If a person believes in the existence of fairies, but the rest of his behaviour is what we would all call normal, I don't see that he is "mad" or anything like that.
If it's just about laughing a little at someone, it's something else. It just depends on whether the thing is funny. By using extreme comparisons we end up wasting the meaning of words. |
26th December 2018, 11:23 AM | #142 |
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I would agree. Much of the weirdness comes from ignorance. People simply don't know, or haven't thought about, why they believe what they believe. Add to that the fact that most people are indoctrinated with their religion when they are children and just get used to the weirdness over time.
However, Ken Ham would be one person I would think is mentally ill along with every other believer who has tried to explain away the contradictions between the bible and the scientific evidence. So somewhere between people who haven't thought about their beliefs and Ken Ham, there is a line dividing the ignorant from the crazy. Where exactly isn't all that important but I think it is very easy for people to cross that line in one direction, not so much in the other. Crazy people don't know they are crazy. |
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26th December 2018, 11:26 AM | #143 |
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Penn Jillette was speaking of alien abduction enthusiast at a convention when he said it, but I think it applies here.
Quote:
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27th December 2018, 12:15 AM | #144 |
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I would say that Ken Ham is a fanatic as many others that believe the unbelievable. Whether mentally ill or not, I don't know. But not every religious man is a fanatic.
What worries me is that I don't know any religious man that be able to make fun of his god. This is worryng. |
27th December 2018, 12:51 AM | #145 |
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30th December 2018, 08:01 AM | #146 |
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30th December 2018, 08:39 AM | #147 |
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We have quite a few members here (including myself) who were at one time in their lives Theists.
Were any of you certifiably insane at that time? (Yes. I realize that you were wise enough to eventually overcome it, and that you weren't of the sad sort that would drink the kool-ade.) |
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30th December 2018, 01:01 PM | #148 |
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I feel like we've been over this many times, but the criteria is the evidence of being afflicted by delusion. That and possibly the embellishment of believing in something, when all the evidence points against the belief. As has been said by others, many times, if one person has a personal delusion we lock him up. (Well maybe if self harm or harm to others results from it.) If many share a delusion that's organised religion and gets a free pass. The suggestion that religious belief is a form of madness, has been made by some of our modern atheist champions, and the parallel that the condition spreads like a virus, by some also. |
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30th December 2018, 01:14 PM | #149 |
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I was only afflicted until the age of 16, but yes, I think I may have been nuts for a while. It certainly caused me a lot of grief. As with so many other things it is a matter of degree. Few would argue that those who self flagellate, and/or get themselves nailed to crosses, are in full possession of their minds, but what of those that say a few rosaries as penance? A matter of degree. A bit nuts, or plain bonkers. |
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30th December 2018, 04:12 PM | #150 |
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"At the Supreme Court level where we work, 90 percent of any decision is emotional. The rational part of us supplies the reasons for supporting our predilections." Justice William O. Douglas "Humans aren't rational creatures but rationalizing creatures." Author Unknown |
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30th December 2018, 10:33 PM | #151 |
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Such penetrating perception Apathia. That you could glean this from my sparse writings is impressive. We are talking about the nuttiness of religion specifically however.
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30th December 2018, 10:37 PM | #152 |
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Teachers tend to think they know everything . . .
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30th December 2018, 11:13 PM | #153 |
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"At the Supreme Court level where we work, 90 percent of any decision is emotional. The rational part of us supplies the reasons for supporting our predilections." Justice William O. Douglas "Humans aren't rational creatures but rationalizing creatures." Author Unknown |
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30th December 2018, 11:22 PM | #154 |
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"At the Supreme Court level where we work, 90 percent of any decision is emotional. The rational part of us supplies the reasons for supporting our predilections." Justice William O. Douglas "Humans aren't rational creatures but rationalizing creatures." Author Unknown |
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30th December 2018, 11:23 PM | #155 |
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31st December 2018, 12:03 AM | #156 |
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You added nothing to that conversation, Barbara. |
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31st December 2018, 12:26 AM | #157 |
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If I, as a non-believer, resided in a violently religious area that demanded total adherence to whatever god was worshipped there, and was confronted with some vigilante mob to question my loyalty to the same, would I be crazy to say I was not a believer?
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31st December 2018, 12:27 AM | #158 |
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31st December 2018, 12:28 AM | #159 |
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Then it seems to me that the world is full of madmen who believe in a thousand illusory fantasies. Negationists, racists, Stalinists, neofascists, trumpists and a lot of "ists". Whichever one of you has no false illusions... may throw the first stone. Even the belief that oneself is free of false illusions is a dellusion. Schopenhauer included.
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1st January 2019, 12:54 PM | #160 |
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