Has atheism made the world a better place?

[Celritannia]

When you have better education, access to science, medicine, and welfare, you stop believing in things that don;t exist because it is humanity that helps other humans, not the supernatural.
So better education means better reasoning, which leads to questioning things, and then removing religion as a necessity.

The most religious countries tend to be the poorest and use religion as a psychological escape and coping mechanism.
I provided evidence of this to you in the Christian thread and you refused to accept it, so to save both of us some time, don;t respond as you prefer to deny the evidence.'

No you didn't, stop lying. You drew a conclusion that the authors of the evidence you provided didn't make and then proceeded to parrot "its a fact get over it". You're a liar.

https://news.gallup.com/poll/142727/rel ... tions.aspx

One theory is that religion plays a more functional role in the world's poorest countries, helping many residents cope with a daily struggle to provide for themselves and their families. A previous Gallup analysis supports this idea, revealing that the relationship between religiosity and emotional well-being is stronger among poor countries than among those in the developed world.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/do-countr ... -1.1310451

Gregory Paul doesn't think it can. After constructing a "Successful Societies Scale" that compared 25 socioeconomic indicators against statistics on religious belief and practice in 17 developed nations, the Baltimore-based paleontologist concluded in a 2009 study that "religion is most able to thrive in seriously dysfunctional societies."

Paul, who is a freelance researcher not affiliated with any institution, compiled data on everything from homicide rates and income inequality to infant mortality and teenage pregnancies and found that the societies that scored the best on socioeconomic indicators were also the most secular.

[Celritannia]

https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog ... -the-nones

Very selective quoting.

"Much research indicates that religious people as a group tend to have better mental health than the "nones" as a group. This is manifest in various indicators, including lower rates of depression, anxiety, suicide, self-harm, and substance use among the religious."

Atheists have better mental health than other people in the "nones" group but they tend to still have worse mental health than people who identify with a religion. You're continuing to be very dishonest.

Again, no, the evidence has placed atheist on par with religious people for overall happiness, if you actually read the articles.
Nones are agnostics and non-aligned religious folks according to the article. They do not include Atheists.

[Chessmistress]

Atheism is the default state of humanity. It can't have made the world a better place because that just doesn't make sense, it's how the world always was until we invented gods.

^Example of the mentality that lead to atheism forced by the state^


Atheism is a personal choice, just like religion.

[Atkemri]

Secularism has, but not atheism. I´m religious myself, but secularism is probably the best way to run a government when it comes to religion. Theocracies are generally corrupt, human rights nightmares and the majority of countries with enforced atheism aren´t much better.

[Panslav]

Religion puts unnecessary restrictions on people. That's already enough for it to be detrimental.

[Celritannia]

When you have better education, access to science, medicine, and welfare, you stop believing in things that don;t exist because it is humanity that helps other humans, not the supernatural.
So better education means better reasoning, which leads to questioning things, and then removing religion as a necessity.

Anyway I'll actually respond to your actual "argument" if it can be called that.
The Church has provided education, medicine and welfare since it was founded, and between the fall of Rome and the enlightenment era was the largest patron of the sciences in the entire world. In fact science historians, contrary to whatever your middle school history class says, have long held that without the Church modern science would not be as far advanced as it is today.

So you are ignoring the discoveries of other societies like India, China, and Mesoamerica?

The church only provided those things if the people they were helping were Christian, otherwise they would not.

But many societies around the world help their people with education, medicine, and welfare without the need of Christianity as well.

[Atkemri]

Religion puts unnecessary restrictions on people. That's already enough for it to be detrimental.

So do certain laws. There is nothing wrong with restrictions, especially when their status as unnecesary is subjective

[Eglaecia]

Secularism has, but not atheism. I´m religious myself, but secularism is probably the best way to run a government when it comes to religion. Theocracies are generally corrupt, human rights nightmares and the majority of countries with enforced atheism aren´t much better.

There are middle ways between theocracy and secularism.

Again, no, the evidence has placed atheist on par with religious people for overall happiness, if you actually read the articles.
Nones are agnostics and non-aligned religious folks according to the article. They do not include Atheists.

You're just lying at this point.

"(e.g., agnostics, lapsed, unaffiliated, weak atheists, strong atheists)"

That's how the article describes it.

[Aureumterra]

Anyway I'll actually respond to your actual "argument" if it can be called that.
The Church has provided education, medicine and welfare since it was founded, and between the fall of Rome and the enlightenment era was the largest patron of the sciences in the entire world. In fact science historians, contrary to whatever your middle school history class says, have long held that without the Church modern science would not be as far advanced as it is today.

So you are ignoring the discoveries of other far more ancient societies like India and China?

Both of which were governed by religious law to some degree, China with the mandate of Heaven and India with the Brahmin caste

[Panslav]

When you have better education, access to science, medicine, and welfare, you stop believing in things that don;t exist because it is humanity that helps other humans, not the supernatural.
So better education means better reasoning, which leads to questioning things, and then removing religion as a necessity.

Anyway I'll actually respond to your actual "argument" if it can be called that.
The Church has provided education, medicine and welfare since it was founded, and between the fall of Rome and the enlightenment era was the largest patron of the sciences in the entire world. In fact science historians, contrary to whatever your middle school history class says, have long held that without the Church modern science would not be as far advanced as it is today.

Doubt that. Church was detrimental to scientific progress. The most useful thing it did was keeping records, but then, Muslim scholars did it better.

[Heloin]

Secularism has, but not atheism. I´m religious myself, but secularism is probably the best way to run a government when it comes to religion. Theocracies are generally corrupt, human rights nightmares and the majority of countries with enforced atheism aren´t much better.

There are middle ways between theocracy and secularism.

And they're all bad.

[Celritannia]

Secularism has, but not atheism. I´m religious myself, but secularism is probably the best way to run a government when it comes to religion. Theocracies are generally corrupt, human rights nightmares and the majority of countries with enforced atheism aren´t much better.

There are middle ways between theocracy and secularism.

Again, no, the evidence has placed atheist on par with religious people for overall happiness, if you actually read the articles.
Nones are agnostics and non-aligned religious folks according to the article. They do not include Atheists.

You're just lying at this point.

"(e.g., agnostics, lapsed, unaffiliated, weak atheists, strong atheists)"

That's how the article describes it.

However, emerging evidence suggests that convinced atheists may derive consolation from a certainty of belief in their own solidly-held worldview, leading to similar mental health to the highly-religious.

Atheists having similar mental health to the highly religious.

[Celritannia]

So you are ignoring the discoveries of other far more ancient societies like India and China?

Both of which were governed by religious law to some degree, China with the mandate of Heaven and India with the Brahmin caste

True, but were more tolerant of other religions.

But my point is, Christianity is not solely responsible for science, medicine, and welfare.

[Panslav]

Secularism has, but not atheism. I´m religious myself, but secularism is probably the best way to run a government when it comes to religion. Theocracies are generally corrupt, human rights nightmares and the majority of countries with enforced atheism aren´t much better.

There are middle ways between theocracy and secularism.

You mean caliphate?

[Eglaecia]

Anyway I'll actually respond to your actual "argument" if it can be called that.
The Church has provided education, medicine and welfare since it was founded, and between the fall of Rome and the enlightenment era was the largest patron of the sciences in the entire world. In fact science historians, contrary to whatever your middle school history class says, have long held that without the Church modern science would not be as far advanced as it is today.

So you are ignoring the discoveries of other societies like India, China, and Mesoamerica?

Yeah that's right mate. Pointing out that the Church was the largest patron of science means I disregard everyone else.

The church only provided those things if the people they were helping were Christian, otherwise they would not.

Unfounded claim.

But many societies around the world help their people with education, medicine, and welfare without the need of Christianity as well.

I never said otherwise.

[Celritannia]

When you have better education, access to science, medicine, and welfare, you stop believing in things that don;t exist because it is humanity that helps other humans, not the supernatural.
So better education means better reasoning, which leads to questioning things, and then removing religion as a necessity.

The most religious countries tend to be the poorest and use religion as a psychological escape and coping mechanism.
I provided evidence of this to you in the Christian thread and you refused to accept it, so to save both of us some time, don;t respond as you prefer to deny the evidence.'

Which is why Maryland is 69% Christian, 8% some other faith, and 23% Nonreligious.

While less than 10% of the states residents failed to pass high school, and around 45% have an associate's degree if not higher.

The US is a special case, but the more religious the state, the less rights it has fro certain groups, such as LGBT people, abortion rights etc.

[Lower Nubia]

You know when you ask a Christian what denomination they are, and they go: "I'm non-denominational" and you know that that is just another denomination, they just won't admit it. It's the same for atheism, it is another ideology. An ideology which has not been a state position until recently (not the same as secularism, which evolves from ideologies that emphasise freedom of religion) and the world hasn't gotten better from that. So It's either utterly neutral, or negative to the planet, not necessarily to individuals.

[Satuga]

I’m bad at math, so somebody correct me if I’m wrong, but since Pi is 3.14 blah blah blah, doesn’t mean that The value of pi, regardless of how many digits it has, is smaller than four and bigger than three? Wouldn’t that make it not infinite?

You would be right, that's why I said mathematically negligible. It's only decimal infinite not actually infinite. Kinda like how rounding up a small decimal gives you the right answer.

[Panslav]

Which is why Maryland is 69% Christian, 8% some other faith, and 23% Nonreligious.

While less than 10% of the states residents failed to pass high school, and around 45% have an associate's degree if not higher.

The US is a special case, but the more religious the state, the less rights it has fro certain groups, such as LGBT people, abortion rights etc.

About US and religion:

Flat Eathers, anti-vaxxers, should I even go on?

[Eglaecia]

There are middle ways between theocracy and secularism.

You mean caliphate?

A caliphate is a theocracy.

Both of which were governed by religious law to some degree, China with the mandate of Heaven and India with the Brahmin caste

True, but were more tolerant of other religions.

But my point is, Christianity is not solely responsible for science, medicine, and welfare.

Which no one claimed. You just have a bad habit of purposely misrepresenting everything people say to make a point.

There are middle ways between theocracy and secularism.

And they're all bad.

How so?

Anyway I'll actually respond to your actual "argument" if it can be called that.
The Church has provided education, medicine and welfare since it was founded, and between the fall of Rome and the enlightenment era was the largest patron of the sciences in the entire world. In fact science historians, contrary to whatever your middle school history class says, have long held that without the Church modern science would not be as far advanced as it is today.

Doubt that. Church was detrimental to scientific progress. The most useful thing it did was keeping records, but then, Muslim scholars did it better.

Doubt all you want, science historians who know far more than you are the ones who say otherwise. In a video lecture that I regret not saving but is thankfully attested to by Wikipedia citations, the renowned science historian Ronald Numbers stated quite succinctly that the idea the Church repressed sciences is nothing more than a myth that is unsupported by the available research.

[Eglaecia]

Which is why Maryland is 69% Christian, 8% some other faith, and 23% Nonreligious.

While less than 10% of the states residents failed to pass high school, and around 45% have an associate's degree if not higher.

The US is a special case, but the more religious the state, the less rights it has fro certain groups, such as LGBT people, abortion rights etc.

Wow these less religious states sound really cool.

[Celritannia]

So you are ignoring the discoveries of other societies like India, China, and Mesoamerica?

Yeah that's right mate. Pointing out that the Church was the largest patron of science means I disregard everyone else.

The church only provided those things if the people they were helping were Christian, otherwise they would not.

Unfounded claim.

But many societies around the world help their people with education, medicine, and welfare without the need of Christianity as well.

I never said otherwise.

1. be more specific next time.
But no, the Church was not always the largest patron of the sciences, they condemned anyone that went against their authority, even if the science was true.

2. The Medieval inquisitions is a good example:

The Medieval Inquisition officially started in 1231, when Pope Gregory IX appointed the first inquisitors to serve as papal agents to remove heresy. Heretics were seen as a menace to the Church and the first group dealt with by the inquisitors were the Cathars of southern France.

3. Then don't say it was solely Christianity then.

[Celritannia]

The US is a special case, but the more religious the state, the less rights it has fro certain groups, such as LGBT people, abortion rights etc.

Wow these less religious states sound really cool.

Did you not read correctly? I said the more religious the state, the less rights they have for LGBT groups and those who want abortions/women's rights.

[Panslav]

You mean caliphate?

A caliphate is a theocracy.

Caliphate is a theocracy, yet ruled secularly.

[Minimark]

the hatred of logic had made it a worse one, whatever anyone believes or doesn't.

Very true. When the church endorses logic, we get many beautiful things (scientific method, the big bang theory etc.) but when they don't you get Jailileo.

I am religious because I believe that the world must have come from some diety at some point, but believe science should try to trace it as far back as possible.