Godless Apostate

[afc wimbledon]

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

Racial restrictions aren't a thing for any religion anymore (except for Hinduism, I suppose). Christianity has seen dramatic growth in Africa, with the Christian population on the continent expected to double by 2050 from 500 million to over 1 billion. Sub-Saharan Africa is expected to be 60% Christian by 2050.

https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tan...s-and-muslims/

Christianity, especially Protestantism, are regarded in sub-Saharan Africa and other regions in the developing world as the religion of the educated and prosperous.

https://www.economist.com/the-econom...veloping-world

Judaism, Zoroastrianism are because of the difficulty of joining the faith effectively racially 'pure' whether that is inadvertent or intentional is debatable

[Cheese]

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

Giving the generation-over-generation decline of religiosity in the West, people typically seem to manage the transition without psychological issues. Maybe the bitterness and resentment expressed by activist atheists comes out of their own family experiences? Because most of us manage to be irreligious without hostility and anger toward the religious.

Maybe in another century we will see less of a problem, but I think it is still pretty raw. We are still in the infancy stage of breaking the religious bonds.



https://www.exmormon.org/phorum/list.php?2


https://exmuslims.org/


https://www.reddit.com/r/exbaptist/c...2r/ex_baptist/


https://exchristianscience.com/


https://www.reddit.com/r/exjw/


https://www.reddit.com/r/exchristian/

[MoneyGuy]

This has become my new favourite thread.

[Cheese]

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

Racial restrictions aren't a thing for any religion anymore (except for Hinduism, I suppose). Christianity has seen dramatic growth in Africa, with the Christian population on the continent expected to double by 2050 from 500 million to over 1 billion. Sub-Saharan Africa is expected to be 60% Christian by 2050.

Although Christianity, couched as it was in western civilisation, brought some relief to Africa in freeing it from some of its woes (albeit, in some cases, only partially - e.g. Africa's belief in witchcraft), there are certain areas in which the religion did serious harm to the African way of life. Notwithstanding missionaries' claims that they were concerned to protect indigenous peoples and their interests, the fact remains that some missionaries at least sought to advance the interests and culture of their colonial masters. Mtuze (2003:2) rightly asserts: "The study shows very clearly that the missionaries, consciously or unconsciously, had a double agenda in that they were also de facto agents of the colonial powers who subjugated the propagation of the Word to cultural and political imperialism." For this reason, much of Africa's ways of life were frowned upon, if not totally demonised. Pityana (1999:137) attests to this: "Christianity declared some African practices pagan and the church was a pervasive influence on family practices." This caused led to a serious identity crisis for many Africans, a crisis that resulted in African self-hatred and self-denigration. The nineteenth century was therefore noted for the emergence and gradual increase of conflict between the two cultures (Mtuze 2003:8).


In later years, black Africans managed to salvage, at massive cost (including death), their self-respect, self-love and pride in their blackness, largely thanks to the Black Consciousness Movement in South Africa and elsewhere in Africa. Partially as a result of this, Africans in South Africa consciously chose and used African, rather than Christian, names (Pityana 1999:138).


Another level at which the impact of Christianity proved to be detrimental was its undermining of women's roles in religious leadership (Miles 2009:1). This happened when Christian assemblies were shifted by Constantine from homes to the basilica, buildings modelled on Roman courthouse (Miles 2009:5). Gaitskell (1983) notes that the missionaries' preferred a model of the family that was as follows: "male breadwinner, dependent housekeeping wife and mother, dependent school-going children". As a result, "this was the family model which female missionaries considered the Christian ideal in the early twentieth century and which they tried to inculcate among the women and girls of the urban black churches ..." (Gaitskell 1983:241). Women were socialised to accept that "a woman who took on the masculine role of participation in public life was considered to have renounced the feminine virtues of silence, reticence, modesty and most significantly, chastity" (Miles 2009:6). Such socialisation drove women to passivity and quiescence in congregational worship, thus perpetuating discrimination against women in the Christian church. It is true to say that, today, women's place in the church remains a contentious issue.

In South Africa, racial discrimination started - appallingly - in the church itself. In the nineteenth century, certain white Dutch Reformed members' discriminatory behaviour and the Dutch Reformed Church's decision, in 1857, to introduce separate Eucharist services severely compromised African human dignity (Cilliers 2013:1). This decision was founded on the demeaning misconception, held by some white missionaries and their masters, that Africans were either sub-human or less than human. Mtuze (2003:1) confirms: "The blatant denial of African religion was coupled with an attitude evinced by some of the colonizers and missionaries that the people they found in Africa and in South Africa in particular were not actually people. They were either subhuman or animals."



http://www.scielo.org.za/scielo.php?...92013000200016

[CliffFletcher]

I'm an atheist, so I don't really have a dog in the hunt of what religion Africans adopt or don't adopt. But they are adopting Christianity (and Protestantism in particular) in large numbers, so it's worth considering reason why. I don't think we can blame colonialism for that in 2019.

The Economist article is behind a paywall, but the gist of it (which I've seen substantiated in other articles as well) is women in the developing world like Protestantism because the men tend to reduce their drinking and use of prostitutes. The Protestants in the developing world also tend to be more literate and affluent. If people see families in the community who are more stable, virtuous, and affluent, they'll want to sign up too.

Which is interesting, because historically post-Roman Empire Christianity spread in Europe in much the same way, with women in places like Scandinavia as early adopters in their societies because Christianity offered a more appealing ethos to them than the heroic pagan culture where men killed one another all the time and kept multiple wives.

The atrocities of the past aren't very important to most people in the developing world. They're busy getting on with their lives and doing what they think will make those lives better in the future. If that means adopting Protestantism, or Mormonism, or Buddhism, why should we care?

[GGG]

Religion does exist for evolutionary reasons. So seeing the things that Cliff describes above provides a plausible explanation for why religion is so wide spread.

[stone hands]

I tend to think it exists because the idea of dying and ceasing to exist is too big a pill to swallow for most people, so existing in perpetuity sounds pretty great. Doesn’t really have to be more complicated than that

[photon]

Sean Carroll's latest podcast has some interesting stuff about simulation theory (sorry still stuck on that).

https://www.preposterousuniverse.com...he-multiverse/

[Textcritic]

Originally Posted by stone hands

I tend to think it exists because the idea of dying and ceasing to exist is too big a pill to swallow for most people, so existing in perpetuity sounds pretty great. Doesn’t really have to be more complicated than that

Except that it does, since the afterlife is not an idea that was shared by all primitive religions.

[Cheese]

Originally Posted by photon

Sean Carroll's latest podcast has some interesting stuff about simulation theory (sorry still stuck on that).

https://www.preposterousuniverse.com...he-multiverse/

I just can't wrap my head around this theory. I mean if we are just part of a program, when did it begin? With the dinosaurs? earlier? If yes, then why were they killed off by asteroid?
Why start a simulation in ancient ages, why not in some futuristic age where there is more understanding of the universe. I mean, if whoever created this simulation is that smart they could have booted our existence at any age or time.
I guess I'm just to old to want to wrap my head around this theory, it just seems like something that only could be dreamed up by someone who was raised playing video games?

[jayswin]

Originally Posted by photon

Sean Carroll's latest podcast has some interesting stuff about simulation theory (sorry still stuck on that).

https://www.preposterousuniverse.com...he-multiverse/

Oh man, thanks. Love that stuff, so much fun to think about.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by Cheese

I just can't wrap my head around this theory. I mean if we are just part of a program, when did it begin? With the dinosaurs? earlier? If yes, then why were they killed off by asteroid?
Why start a simulation in ancient ages, why not in some futuristic age where there is more understanding of the universe. I mean, if whoever created this simulation is that smart they could have booted our existence at any age or time.
I guess I'm just to old to want to wrap my head around this theory, it just seems like something that only could be dreamed up by someone who was raised playing video games?

One reason would be ease of programming.

If you had to program each thing you can’t do it really. Even procedura generation would be challenging to create the variety. Instead if you programmed a bunch of relatively simple rules to govern the universe and watch it develop. The actual time that takes in the real world would only be limited by processing speed.

Though it’s really no different than believing in a Deist God with a bit of a 747 problem thrown in.

[photon]

Originally Posted by Cheese

I just can't wrap my head around this theory. I mean if we are just part of a program, when did it begin? With the dinosaurs? earlier? If yes, then why were they killed off by asteroid?
Why start a simulation in ancient ages, why not in some futuristic age where there is more understanding of the universe. I mean, if whoever created this simulation is that smart they could have booted our existence at any age or time.
I guess I'm just to old to want to wrap my head around this theory, it just seems like something that only could be dreamed up by someone who was raised playing video games?

As mentioned it could be that the simulation started with a small set of primary parameters and was just allowed to run for billions of "years".

Or could be that the simulation actually reflects the history of the simulators' universe and they're recreating for some kind of research.

That's the thing, without any other knowledge about the simulators everything works as an explanation, which means nothing does, which is why I don't like it

But it led to one of my favorite XKCD comics (incoming super nerdy comic)

Spoiler!

[afc wimbledon]

Originally Posted by GGG

Religion does exist for evolutionary reasons. So seeing the things that Cliff describes above provides a plausible explanation for why religion is so wide spread.

I always liked the Bicameraliasm theory, that some time as man evolved and our brains expanded we came to a point where we could hear voices in our heads but hadn't the ability to process them as our own, so essentially the whole of the human race was suffering from schizophrenia and attributed the voices to spirits gods etc

[edslunch]

There’s a huge leap between being processing power and consciousness, even simulated consciousness. Simulation theory is based on a pretty shaky premise

[afc wimbledon]

Originally Posted by edslunch

There’s a huge leap between being processing power and consciousness, even simulated consciousness. Simulation theory is based on a pretty shaky premise

That never stopped religion

[Snuffleupagus]

If our lives live in a program it seriously needs a very good anti-virus

[afc wimbledon]

Originally Posted by Snuffleupagus

If our lives live in a program it seriously needs a very good anti-virus

Yes and the porn component of my sub routine leaves something to be desired at best

[GGG]

Originally Posted by afc wimbledon

I always liked the Bicameraliasm theory, that some time as man evolved and our brains expanded we came to a point where we could hear voices in our heads but hadn't the ability to process them as our own, so essentially the whole of the human race was suffering from schizophrenia and attributed the voices to spirits gods etc

This assumes that a cat doesn’t have at cat voice in its head. West worlds first season at a great take on Bicameralism.

[TorqueDog]

Originally Posted by GGG

This assumes that a cat doesn’t have at cat voice in its head. West worlds first season at a great take on Bicameralism.

I operate under the assumption that my cat's voice in his own head is Stewie from Family Guy. "Ah yes, the human is distributing our meals and DOG, DON'T TOUCH MY THINGS."