Quote:
Originally Posted by Patriam1066
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You know why it says don't eat pork? Because pork production isn't suited to the Middle East. So the Jews passed an edict and said god will punish you, so that people wouldn't waste resources on pigs. That's why cows are sacred in Hinduism... because cattle are necessary to work the monsoon drenched soil in India...
Again, you guys are missing the intellect of your ancestors. You think the Romans and Egyptians and Jews were just some bums who couldn't explain shit so they sat down one day and made up a myth to corroborate their poor udnerstanding of their environment?
As far as the thinking critically part... I addressed this earlier. Protestant culture was founded upon literacy and critical thinking. Admittedly, this is because they wanted their followers to reject Catholicism. Nonetheless, it worked out... Ask America, Sweden, Canada, NZ, Aus, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Estonia, the Netherlands, Switzerland... etc etc
Protestantism was a religious creed that emphasized critical thinking and individualism. As to what it is now, that's a differetn debate
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I agree with all of that as well, and it's good to see someone who can focus on the good aspects of religion that are actually worth paying attention to.
It's very much a part of our cultural and intellectual history. It was our first attempt at literature, our first attempt at cosmology, at philosophy, at morality, at an understanding of our place in the universe and so forth. But because it was our first attempt, it was also our worst. It's how we tried to rationalize the world when we didn't know anything. For example, we didn't know we lived on a spherical planet, and we didn't know our planet revolved around the sun. We didn't know that there were microorganisms that explained disease; we thought diseases came from curses, or witches, or demons.
We now have better explanations for all of these things. Yet we still dwell, and in some countries and societies not just dwell, but live under a totalitarian regime that forbids us to even think about the progress that's been made, or denies us the knowledge that these advances have in fact occurred. Although once it probably once was an aid to our survival, is has become a great peril to our continued ability to live as a civilized people.