Former Atheist Tried to kill his father; says Jesus saved him

Originally posted by Adam_PoE
Because that is exactly what an unstable person needs, a set of delusional beliefs to act on.

personally, I have nothing against trans.

but isn't it hypocritical and biased that you hold this standard for religious people and not trans? I know you're part of the community and my comment is coming from a non-religious person.

mutilating your body because you have a belief you were born the wrong gender...that's a set of delusional beliefs to act on.

soo.

can you see how biased and hypocritical you are being?

Delusion:

an idiosyncratic belief or impression that is firmly maintained despite being contradicted by what is generally accepted as reality or rational argument, typically a symptom of mental disorder.

And here is from page 12 of the Drag Queens reading to kids thread in general discussion. Your response is under mike browns question

Originally posted by mike brown
Well... Tbh I don't really believe that trans people are "born in the wrong body" either. I think there's probably something wrong with their brain/mind
We just don't know how to fix that part so people opt to change their body instead.

I do not think mental health professionals or transgender people necessarily disagree. However, we are limited to the tools we have. We cannot change the minds of people who are transgender, but we can change their bodies. So we do what we can to bring them more in alignment to ease their dysphoria. I do not think anyone is operating with the belief that cosmetic procedures are literally changing the biological sex of a person. They are making them more comfortable in the vehicles they have to navigate the world in, so they do not harm themselves.

So....for transgenders you believe it's the best thing to let unstable people act on their delusional beliefs by maiming their bodies
but when it comes to religion you say no?

Originally posted by Raisen
personally, I have nothing against trans.

but isn't it hypocritical and biased that you hold this standard for religious people and not trans? I know you're part of the community and my comment is coming from a non-religious person.

mutilating your body because you have a belief you were born the wrong gender...that's a set of delusional beliefs to act on.

soo.

can you see how biased and hypocritical you are being?

. . .

So....for transgenders you believe it's the best thing to let unstable people act on their delusional beliefs by maiming their bodies but when it comes to religion you say no?

The difference is that according to mental health experts, transgender people are not delusional. We can view brain scans of transgender people and see that their brains resemble those of the gender with which they identify and not their biological sex. Their gender is not a "belief" any more than yours is.

Originally posted by Adam_PoE
Because that is exactly what an unstable person needs, a set of delusional beliefs to act on.

Why are atheists (I'm an atheist) so gung-ho about stamping out every religion above every other consideration. It's an insanely dogmatic approach and really closely resembles the character of the religions that Atheism is meant to replace.

Originally posted by mike brown
If it works, then why the **** not? Don't you prefer the Christian version of this guy to what he was before?

Why are atheists (I'm an atheist) so gung-ho about stamping out every religion above every other consideration. It's an insanely dogmatic approach and really closely resembles the character of the religions that Atheism is meant to replace.

The way you say "stamp out religion above every other consideration" is perhaps a little exaggerated, because to me the real harm comes from dogma. We should want dogmas stamped out because it takes certain dogmas of religion for otherwise good people to do evil. There aren't a lot of genuinely "bad people," but there are a lot of bad ideas that are contagious (just think of how ISIS gets recruits).

I'll reiterate part of what I said previously in this thread...

"...it's entirely possible that belief in unsubstantiated religion could help some otherwise psychopath be more moral, but the truth is that people generally do not need such unsubstantiated beliefs to be moral. And to imply otherwise is... intellectually dishonest."

The reason most of the Conservative Christian folks all around me (I live in the Bible belt) are generally moral people is not because they believe certain things from Christianity. They're generally moral because we evolved to be that way. And somehow that general sense of morality gets wrongly attributed to religion.

Who is morally superior, the person who doesn't steal, rape, murder etc because of delusional fear of punishment and hope for reward, or the person who avoids those things from a more inward and practical mindset having no belief of punishment or reward? The latter is more at peace, more grounded, more genuinely moral in my opinion.

Originally posted by mike brown
If it works, then why the **** not? Don't you prefer the Christian version of this guy to what he was before?

Why are atheists (I'm an atheist) so gung-ho about stamping out every religion above every other consideration. It's an insanely dogmatic approach and really closely resembles the character of the religions that Atheism is meant to replace.

Because it only works until it does not. If he only does the right thing for fear of punishment, what happens when he stops being afraid? He and society would be far better if he learned an internal sense of self-regulation. Otherwise, he is relying on external factors to keep him in check, instead of himself.

Why the fck is this guy not behind bars, this is a living breathing psychopath. I made it 11:24 in and almost because it made me sick.

Originally posted by Adam_PoE
Because it only works until it does not. If he only does the right thing for fear of punishment, what happens when he stops being afraid? He and society would be far better if he learned an internal sense of self-regulation. Otherwise, he is relying on external factors to keep him in check, instead of himself.

"If he only does the right thing for fear of punishment..."

That's not the path Christ walked.

Originally posted by mike brown
yes but we don't exactly know how to make that happen, do we? So once again.. for pragmatic purposes... Why reject a sub optimal solution because an optimal solution is not available?

Why is it not available?

Maybe he should seek therapy and medication to get on the right track instead of delusional notions that could slip out from underneath him at any time like a trap door.

Originally posted by shiv
"If he only does the right thing for fear of punishment..."

That's not the path Christ walked.

That may be debatable, but that's certainly the rules of the game many modern Christians are playing by; or even worse, you can sin, sin, sin, then just accept Jesus and you're forgiven straight to heaven.

What kind of morality is that? A relative one, that's what.

Forgive us our sins As We forgive those who sin against us.

I don't go to church often, but when I do one of my favorite parts is:

Peace be with you!

And everyone says:

And Also With You!

Peace be with you Patient Leach.

Originally posted by shiv
Peace be with you Patient Leech.

Fixed. And also with you!

Originally posted by Patient_Leech
Why is it not available?

Maybe he should seek therapy and medication to get on the right track instead of delusional notions that could slip out from underneath him at any time like a trap door.

I don't see why you would be so worried about the factual basis of his spiritual beliefs if they are causing him to behave in a more productive manner than he used to. This is where the dogmatic anti religion sentiments start to rear their ugly head.

It's similar to how religious people can sometimes cope with death better based on an after life and atheists will just say yes but they're delusional. Who honestly cares if they are delusional about something like that if it makes then happier or more content in their lives.

Originally posted by mike brown
That's purely hypothetical to assume he would get better results from therapy or meds, or that he's even receptive to or interested in such a path. Where as we know for a fact his conversion seems to be helping. Plus they're not mutually exclusive.

I don't see why you would be so worried about the factual basis of his spiritual beliefs if they are causing him to behave in a more productive manner than he used to. This is where the dogmatic anti religion sentiments start to rear their ugly head.

It's similar to how religious people can sometimes cope with death better based on an after life and atheists will just say yes but they're delusional. Who honestly cares if they are delusional about something like that if it makes then happier or more content in their lives.

Because this... (copying and pasting what I said previously)...

"...it's entirely possible that belief in unsubstantiated religion could help some otherwise psychopath be more moral, but the truth is that people generally do not need such unsubstantiated beliefs to be moral. And to imply otherwise is quite frankly ... intellectually dishonest."

And in regard to this...

Originally posted by mike brown
I don't see why you would be so worried about the factual basis of his spiritual beliefs if they are causing him to behave in a more productive manner

Because as humans we have to collaborate and live in a shared reality.

Originally posted by Patient_Leech
Because this... (copying and pasting what I said previously)...

"...it's entirely possible that belief in unsubstantiated religion could help some otherwise psychopath be more moral, but the truth is that people generally do not need such unsubstantiated beliefs to be moral. And to imply otherwise is quite frankly ... intellectually dishonest."

And in regard to this...

Because as humans we have to collaborate and live in a shared reality.

Originally posted by mike brown
People will always believe different things about the nature of reality. I'm more of a pragmatist, here. If what you believe doesn't adversely affect other people then I couldn't care less for the most part.

That's just it. Weird dogmas effect everyone's reality in weird and unexpected ways. It's difficult to predict. The big (seemingly innocent) example is the dogma that "souls" live in stem cells. But it's holding back potentially beneficial treatments for myriad medical conditions. No one has every isolated this "soul," but it's "believed" strongly, so yeah, it affects our shared reality.

Sure, this psychopath who is moral one day because of his beliefs might find something else to believe the next day to make him start dissecting children. Who the fu#k knows?

So why not agree on a shared reality to make collaboration smooth and not divisive and potentially dangerous holy books?

It doesn't seem to me to be a reasonable expectation that we can collectively "agree" on a shared reality. It's certainly not my choice what someone else believes. Problematic results can come about from virtually any belief, regardless of whether it's true or not. You can look at the race and IQ stats and use that to justify white nationalism for example.

In this case the results appear to be positive and your rationale for disliking it is that hypothetically it could turn negative?? That doesn't sound very reasonable to me.

Originally posted by mike brown
It doesn't seem to me to be a reasonable expectation that we can collectively "agree" on a shared reality.

I don't necessarily disagree. At least in practice it seems damn near impossible. But it need not be very complicated: if there's not a good reason to believe something... don't.

Originally posted by mike brown
In this case the results appear to be positive and your rationale for disliking it is that hypothetically it could turn negative?? That doesn't sound very reasonable to me.

Well the problem is that if you're making shit up in the first place it's a potentially volatile situation. It can change and change for no good reason.

Whereas if you set out to stick to a shared reality things may change, but not without good reason. Doesn't that seem more reliable and safer?

Originally posted by mike brown
That's purely hypothetical to assume he would get better results from therapy or meds, or that he's even receptive to or interested in such a path. Where as we know for a fact his conversion seems to be helping. Plus they're not mutually exclusive.

Sorry, back to this, but this is a very odd thing to say given all that we know now about modern medicine and mental health. In the medical field they don't prescribe [insert delusional religious belief] for patients. Just saying.

Irony: arguing about the importance of operating under a shared reality. 😕 😂

Originally posted by Patient_Leech

Who is morally superior, the person who doesn't steal, rape, murder etc because of delusional fear of punishment and hope for reward, or the person who avoids those things from a more inward and practical mindset having no belief of punishment or reward?

If this dude is truly a psychopath like you seem to believe, then there is no known cure for psychopathy. There is no known way to give empathy to someone who has none. As far as we know I believe, the only way to get them to act right is through rewarding them for good behavior, with which Heaven is the ultimate example of such. It wouldn't be my first choice and I think other forms of positive reinforcement could work with greater success, but I do not get the hate you seem to have for this man overcoming his own evil nature however he could.

Who is morally superior? The man who cares about moral superiority instead of benefits or the man who doesn't?