I would like to point out, you have just put down how I feel mostly about the matter, I just fail at english ¬_¬Geo Da Sponge said:You seem to have confused 'belief' with 'likelihood'. Saying you believe in something 100% is a figure of speech. With belief you either believe or you don't, or you don't believe either way. The chances of something happening are completely unrelated to whether or not you believe in them. You can't 'believe' something is 50% likely, presenting the probability is a form of analysis and as such has absolutely nothing to do with belief. You can think something is 50% likely, but you can't have 50% belief.Conor147 said:
In the case of believing in aliens, people's belief is completely removed from any analysis of what planets are inhabitable and so on. Another example, the chance of me rolling a one on a six sided die is one in six, but that doesn't mean I believe in that one 16.6667%. In any case, analysing the probability of a God is impossible, as we have absolutely no concept of how often a God exists in a universe.
Well it seems we actually agree mostly. I just felt that while an agnostic would not object to the underlying belief of a religious person, they would be just as likely to object to their actions. It ceases to be a matter of belief when it comes to their actions.CrimsonBlack said:I was using an extreme example in the vein of Bonhoeffer (EDIT: I actually meant Niemoeller). You can replace Vice and Virtue Squad with American Theodicy if you like. And yes, I object strongly to religious violence such as female genital mutilation, beatings, or honour killings. I object strongly to any kind of horrible unsubstantiated moral code which is allowed to continue under the guise of cultural relativism (in the UK, no less!). I strongly object to any religion which intends to foist, through subtle means or otherwise, their opinions and way of life on me. It amazes me that anyone would want that. That's why if you're not religious you should tick the "no religion" box.
I meant exactly what I wrote, it requires no rewording - which was that, in my experience, agnostics are less likely to get riled up about religious issues. Atheists and theists have conviction of their (non)belief and thus are more likely to fight for them. I'm not saying agnostics wouldn't or don't care. I just don't want to end up living in a state where I am (viciously) sanctioned for doing what comes naturally to me (I'm bisexual, and have had sex outside marriage).
You can believe in elements of a religion though, that's something that needs to be considered. STILL not a percentage but you can believe in bits of a religion, like taking all the "LET HE CAST THE STONE IF HE IS FREE OF SIN" phrases to heart and following them but thinking that gays are monsters is ridiculous. However again that's just an opinion, scrutinise as you will...
