The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

[St. Clown]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

31 of 32. It definitely makes sense that atheists do better on this quiz - many religious folks only know their own.

I scored the same. A lucky guess with regards to the First Great Awakening, and another for Maimonides saved me there, but I fat-fingered the wrong button on Jesus's birthplace. So I should've been more like 30 of 32, going strictly upon what info I actually know.

 

[leswp1]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

31 of 32. It definitely makes sense that atheists do better on this quiz - many religious folks only know their own.

THe great awakening stumped me and I messed up Job for some reason. Yay for being brought up by a comparative religion parent

 

[MinnesotaNorthStar]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

I scored the same. A lucky guess with regards to the First Great Awakening, and another for Maimonides saved me there, but I fat-fingered the wrong button on Jesus's birthplace. So I should've been more like 30 of 32, going strictly upon what info I actually know.

30 of 32. Didn't know Maimonides, and guessed wrong on Indonesia.

 

[5mn_Major]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

By saying 'are you smarter than an atheist?'...do they mean, are you ready to fall for wasting 10 minutes on a memory quiz?

 

[St. Clown]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

By saying 'are you smarter than an atheist?'...do they mean, are you ready to fall for wasting 10 minutes on a memory quiz?

Failed the test, did you?

Really, other than essay exams used to evaluate reasoning and understanding of content, aren't all multiple choice test really just memory quizzes?

 

[5mn_Major]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

Really, other than essay exams used to evaluate reasoning and understanding of content, aren't all multiple choice test really just memory quizzes?

This one is. And assuming that that means smart is a big part of why our schools fail.

IMO this is often the crux of matters like religion. I went from a one dimension outlook as a child (God exists) to a two dimension outlook. That is to say, I reached a conclusion that religion made no sense when I got out of college. I just looked at it as though...oh God doesn't exist, so faith is meaningless. Its just that simple. That's where most stop. But its not that simple. There is enormous power in the Word which makes it more than a simple belief statement. And whether that is personal power or global power, the tangible results are quite pervasive whether its discussed on a USCHO thread daily or not. Hence folks need to look beyond two dimensions to see the third.

Smart is more than just the ability to recite memorized facts. There's a parallel here with faith.

 

[Kepler]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

By saying 'are you smarter than an atheist?'...do they mean, are you ready to fall for wasting 10 minutes on a memory quiz?

It's a dumb name, even though it's a reference to the inane (and depressing) TV show, since a test of knowledge doesn't test intelligence, it tests education and retention. Disappointing for the Christian Science Monitor, which doesn't usually dumb down to that level.

 

[joecct]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

32 of 32.

Average user scores an 84.

More important religious quiz.

Ditto on Religion. And I screwed up (shoot me) on Ed Kranepool.

 

[Kepler]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

This one is. And assuming that that means smart is a big part of why our schools fail.

IMO this is often the crux of matters like religion. I went from a one dimension outlook as a child (God exists) to a two dimension outlook. That is to say, I reached a conclusion that religion made no sense when I got out of college. I just looked at it as though...oh God doesn't exist, so faith is meaningless. Its just that simple. That's where most stop. But its not that simple. There is enormous power in the Word which makes it more than a simple belief statement. And whether that is personal power or global power, the tangible results are quite pervasive whether its discussed on a USCHO thread daily or not. Hence folks need to look beyond two dimensions to see the third.

Your distinction between "dimensions" of thinking is a good one. For almost anything there is a naive understanding that is absolute, then a simple reaction against it, then a less naive but still simplistic understanding that is shades of grey, and then an infinitude of higher level understandings which add more and more "dimensions." Hence Bohr's paradox that "the opposite of a great truth is another great truth."

Personally, I would rather spend the day discussing religion with a believer who has contemplated questions of faith in multiple dimensions than a non-believer who has only thought of them as one- or two-dimensional. Naive belief is fine -- it is, after all, what the Church Fathers recommend as the perfection of faith not contaminated by reason -- but it ends by answering questions. It is often more fulfilling to pose questions and roll them over in our minds, and discuss them with other minds.

Tolstoy covers all of this admirably in his Confession, which I recommend to everyone, believer or not. There is so much in it that is profound and true and human that reductionist questions of the "factual" truth of religion are relegated to their proper importance, which is to say, none at all.

 

[Kepler]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

Ditto on Religion. And I screwed up (shoot me) on Ed Kranepool.

That's unforgivable.

I blew the HRs in a month. I vacillated on a 50/50 and went the wrong way.

I also blew the winning pitcher in game 7, but on that one I am unashamed.

 

[LynahFan]

That's unforgivable.

I blew the HRs in a month. I vacillated on a 50/50 and went the wrong way.

I also blew the winning pitcher in game 7, but on that one I am unashamed.

I got 4, 1.5 better than should be expected for someone with absolutely no knowledge of the Mets. Does that make me smarter than a Yankees fan?

 

[leswp1]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

Your distinction between "dimensions" of thinking is a good one. For almost anything there is a naive understanding that is absolute, then a simple reaction against it, then a less naive but still simplistic understanding that is shades of grey, and then an infinitude of higher level understandings which add more and more "dimensions." Hence Bohr's paradox that "the opposite of a great truth is another great truth."

Personally, I would rather spend the day discussing religion with a believer who has contemplated questions of faith in multiple dimensions than a non-believer who has only thought of them as one- or two-dimensional. Naive belief is fine -- it is, after all, what the Church Fathers recommend as the perfection of faith not contaminated by reason -- but it ends by answering questions. It is often more fulfilling to pose questions and roll them over in our minds, and discuss them with other minds.

Tolstoy covers all of this admirably in his Confession, which I recommend to everyone, believer or not. There is so much in it that is profound and true and human that reductionist questions of the "factual" truth of religion are relegated to their proper importance, which is to say, none at all.

This. Blind faith is less inspiring than faith that comes after questioning.

 

[joecct]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

Bad Catholic Music

 

[FadeToBlack&Gold]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

Call me young, but Catholic music is not bad. Then again, we were blessed with a priest who had a fantastic singing voice - every Mass was a High Mass.

 

[joecct]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

Call me young, but Catholic music is not bad. Then again, we were blessed with a priest who had a fantastic singing voice - every Mass was a High Mass.

The stuff we sing now in Mass is no where what I sung in the choir back in 1965. The crap started around 1968/69. It was gawdawful.

 

[leswp1]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

My uncle has his Doctorate in organ and played many years for a church with a robust musical program. Then they got a new Minister and he was miserable. Music was simple, boring and people in the music program had a mass exodus. So frustrating for him. He had built up an amazing program with beautiful music

 

[unofan]

Call me young, but Catholic music is not bad. Then again, we were blessed with a priest who had a fantastic singing voice - every Mass was a High Mass.

Catholic music is bad when it's new age crap. Especially during Xmas and Easter seasons when there's boatloads of traditional go-to songs. If I go to Christmas mass and don't hear Joy to the World , I'm not going back to that church.

 

[busterman62]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

Catholic music is bad when it's new age crap. Especially during Xmas and Easter seasons when there's boatloads of traditional go-to songs. If I go to Christmas mass and don't hear Joy to the World , I'm not going back to that church.

Cantique de Noel
Veni, Veni, Emmanuel

 

[joecct]

Cantique de Noel
Veni, Veni, Emmanuel

The Great O's.

 

[St. Clown]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

Catholic music is bad when it's new age crap. Especially during Xmas and Easter seasons when there's boatloads of traditional go-to songs. If I go to Christmas mass and don't hear Joy to the World , I'm not going back to that church.

Every traditional Christmas song was new at some point in time. You can bet that when White Christmas was released, there were three or four other Christmas albums released that were completely unimpressive.