How can you be so nice & caring & helping others so much if you don't believe in god? This has been asked of me many times & again recently. I usually don't give a good answer. How would they react if asked "How can you be so nice if you believe in god?". < >
Simple. Philosophy developed as a complement to religion, not a replacement for it, precisely because they dealt with different conceptions and applications of ethics. Religion deals with the relationship between man and the sacred, and with theism at play it deals with how people relate to a deity or deities. Religious ethics are the standards of behaviour of people towards sacred things. Philosophical ethics, however, are about how people relate to one another, and attempts to ascertain a moral code for individuals in their behaviour towards other individuals and towards society at large. You can be good towards your fellow man and a disrespectful cunt towards the gods; the reverse is also true. I strive to be good in both areas, but hey, I'm only human.
Because I'm not stuck at the moral development stage of a toddler and don't do "good" things just because I think there's something in it for me, like going to Heaven when I die. Likewise, I don't go around raping and murdering, not because of a fear of punishment in Hell, but because they're simply not nice things to do.
When criminals claim to be atheist, atheism is blamed for their bad deeds. The vast majority of criminals claim to be theist but theism is not blamed for their bad deeds. .
then we should just blame the criminals for their crime, not their beliefs. they chose to act on their beliefs, unless you believe they have no free will
they have used their free will to act on their beliefs, that makes THEM accountable. do you not believe in the free will of others?
. I was recently praised by a group of people for a good deed. I like to say I appreciate all the kind words but I can't help wondering how it would be if they knew I am atheist. .
From Conversation With The Devil. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! I used to practice Nichiren (don't really keep up these days, but that doesn't matter), and a devout Christian friend was contemplating vandalism as revenge on his neighbor for some stupid thing. I shamed him with Buddha, not Jesus, and he was in awe. Said I was a better Christian than he was...
