The Debilitating Effect of Ideological Belief

[Diogenes]

Whether religious or otherwise, whether theist or atheist, arguing from the point of view of any ideology other than the pursuit of truth and knowledge can lead one to false beliefs. A recent example came to mind from another forum where an atheist posted a meme trying to debunk the story of Samson killing a lion because "Lions don't live in deserts."




1st,
This meme falsely assumes Palestine/the Levant is entirely desert.
2d, Lions lived in the area as late as the 10th Century.

The Asiatic lion used to occur in Arabia, Palestine, Mesopotamia and Baluchistan. In South Caucasia (present day Armenia, Georgia, and Azerbaijan), it was known since the Holocene, and became extinct in the 10th century. Until the middle of the 19th century, it survived in regions adjoining Mesopotamia and Syria, and was still sighted in the upper reaches of the Euphrates River in the early 1870s. By the late 19th century, the Asiatic lion had become extinct in Saudi Arabia and Turkey. The last known lion in Iraq was killed on the lower Tigris in 1918.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asiatic_lion
[footnotes redacted]

Rather than looking simply to support one's beliefs, shouldn't we be more interested in truth?

[Adonai Yahweh]

This meme falsely assumes Palestine/the Levant is entirely desert.

Memes are designed to be humorous or satirical, and they may not be intended to be taken seriously. It is not a source of information its a source of entertainment

Like we all know who this tiger meme represents

or this one

Lions lived in the area as late as the 10th Century.

The Asiatic lion used to occur in Arabia, Palestine, Mesopotamia and Baluchistan. In South Caucasia (present day Armenia, Georgia, and Azerbaijan), it was known since the Holocene, and became extinct in the 10th century. Until the middle of the 19th century, it survived in regions adjoining Mesopotamia and Syria, and was still sighted in the upper reaches of the Euphrates River in the early 1870s. By the late 19th century, the Asiatic lion had become extinct in Saudi Arabia and Turkey. The last known lion in Iraq was killed on the lower Tigris in 1918.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asiatic_lion

Wikipedia is not an accurate source of information because anybody can edit the articles and the information is not peer-reviewed . You should provide a better source of information

[JoeyKnothead]

This meme falsely assumes Palestine/the Levant is entirely desert.

Memes are designed to be humorous or satirical, and they may not be intended to be taken seriously. It is not a source of information its a source of entertainment

Like we all know who this tiger meme represents

or this one

Lions lived in the area as late as the 10th Century.

The Asiatic lion used to occur in Arabia, Palestine, Mesopotamia and Baluchistan. In South Caucasia (present day Armenia, Georgia, and Azerbaijan), it was known since the Holocene, and became extinct in the 10th century. Until the middle of the 19th century, it survived in regions adjoining Mesopotamia and Syria, and was still sighted in the upper reaches of the Euphrates River in the early 1870s. By the late 19th century, the Asiatic lion had become extinct in Saudi Arabia and Turkey. The last known lion in Iraq was killed on the lower Tigris in 1918.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asiatic_lion

Wikipedia is not an accurate source of information because anybody can edit the articles and the information is not peer-reviewed . You should provide a better source of information

Don't nobody tell ol' Adonai there about P. atrox.

[Purple Knight]

Whether religious or otherwise, whether theist or atheist, arguing from the point of view of any ideology other than the pursuit of truth and knowledge can lead one to false beliefs.

I agree and I do see the point. Ideology is dangerous for more than one reason, and I wonder if all the ills attributed to religion actually belong at the feet of ideology.

There is an overlap, but let me demonstrate:

Let's say I believe Mother Goose is real. I believe those fables happened. Red Riding Hood is real, the wolf is real, thy cut the grandmother out of the wolf and she was still alive, is a fact. That's a religion.

But so what? If I take a moral from the tale, I don't need the tale. Let's say I take the moral of Red Riding Hood to be: Chew your food. Chew your food because if your food is still alive, people will cut you open. So maybe chew a little better and nobody gains by cutting you open, so maybe they won't. I don't need Red Riding Hood for that.

Now, if Christians believe their God is real and punishes what he sees as evil, and they should heed this god to avoid being punished, this has got nothing to do with morality and they're just scared. That's not bad. That's not immoral. People are scared every day and you're not supposed to fight off a mugger. You're just supposed to let him have your stuff.

If Christians believe their God is real, and we should listen to him because he has some special moral authority, well, in a way they're still just scared. If the moral authority is inside God, and would make moral, any horrid commandment this god made, that's just scared with extra steps, and that authority would disappear if this being did not exist.

Now, if there's something about the tenets of the religion that are moral and righteous, then you don't need the religion. You can strip it down to the ideology, and it's now about what you ought to do, purely out of morality. The rest was just unnecessary fluff. This is the part that's dangerous because if you believe you know, absolutely, what is right and what is wrong, you can do terrible things to people. It's not because of "God says," - it's because of, "I should."