Kirks Championships : Boxing Prediction League : 2018

@kirk

I did that quiz.

Couldn't answer: the one with sign, duct, tract etc and the two anagram ones.

Got every question I anseanswcorrect though.

 

lepinthehood single handedly making British Boxing a powerhouse again

 

Heh.

 

Sure, I'm open to talking about religion. I wouldn't claim to be any kind of expert since I don't know as much about it as say literature, film, or even boxing but the subject does fascinate me. Even though about 87 percent of this country is nominally Christian only about 20 percent go to church every week. I'd fit into the other 67 percent who are either "unchurched" or who rarely go. My experience is that I pray frequently, read my Bible from time to time, went to youth group/bible study a little as a lad, and I took some Eastern and Western religion classes in college. I don't even wear my cross often because I'm a bit of a dirtbag and don't want to bring shame upon the religion when I'm out in the world. I know people who take this stuff very seriously, but I'm more of a dilettante. I admire people with the discipline and self-control to really live the Christian life, just as I admire those boxers who are in the gym grinding it out every day trying to get better; but that's not the kind of boxing fan or Christian I am. I've been an atheist, an agnostic, and currently I'm a believer who struggles daily with the doubts and questions all believers must have.

When it comes to Judaism, Christianity, and Islam I'm a fan. I think most religion is a healthy expression of human spirituality and that's why although I lean Christian I'm actually something of a pluralist. Buddhism, Confucianism, Hinduism, Jainism; I think they are all trying to describe the same thing from different perspectives. There is an old story about blind men touching an elephant. One touches the tail and thinks it's a rope. Another touches the side and thinks it's a wall. One touches a leg and thinks it's a pillar and another misses the elephant entirely and thinks there's nothing there.

I know that sometimes religious practice can turn malignant and be counter productive as you say, but I think that the majority is healthy and helpful. It's a bit like how most people are sane and some people are insane, some people are healthy, but they can get sick. Some are bad, but most are good. It's not all one thing or another. Religious institutions exist to help people prosper but they are only ever as good as the men who make up the institutions. However, the downsides are so minor while the upsides are so great that it results in a net positive for humanity. I don't think that such large portions of mankind's wealth and labor for thousands of years in every society would be devoted to an institution that didn't have unimaginable utility for society. Useful structures are preserved over time and unhelpful structures rapidly decline into oblivion. That's why I prefer the older proven religions, but maintain some skepticism and misgivings about newer ones.

Our brains are designed to think religiously. It can't be helped. We aren't born clean slates. We have instincts, biological hardware and "magical thinking" is installed on every model. Even babies who aren't exposed to any religion will think teleologically, ascribe meaning and intention to non-living objects, believe in spirits or monsters, etc. Religious thinking either evolved with the human race because there was a survival advantage to that kind of mindset, or it was a governor placed on top of an earlier structure to control our irrational thoughts. Without the structure of systematic thought and action men adopt some very strange and irrational ideas. In the countries with the least religious belief the belief in immortality, the evil eye, good luck charms, aliens, ghosts, psychics, and palmistry are the highest. Undirected minds run amok. They invent weird idiosyncratic religions that make no sense. The more religious a population is the less they believe in these supernatural things. Religion organizes that thinking, systematizes it, and directs it down either harmless or socially positive directions. There are one or two percent of people who's brains don't think this way, and they were evolved to question and challenge religion. They evolved to keep the system healthy by constantly inspecting it and attacking it's weakest spots, like a pack of wolves will pick off the weak and sick from a herd of deer. That's why I think atheists evolved. Their job is to point out corruption and breakdowns in the system, so that it can maintain and improve itself, to better carry out it's necessary functions.

That should do for a brief description of my beliefs. Your thoughts?

 

Very well thought out nd nicely written. I do agree with most you said about how religion help shape our humanity and probably help our human kind progress until present time.
Our mind indeed evolved to believe in something, but I do think it is part of the brain evolution to help giving answer to so many mysteries, uncertainties, insecurities, darkness, fear and death from early thinking days.
I'm not sure how relevant it is from now on and to the future, I have not put much thought into that so I'll let Kirk and others response.
Two things are certain for me though is that the 3 big western religions you mentioned started in a small tribe in the Middle East and so many nonsensical and incorrect things are written in their holy books.
These 2 things are enough for me to denounce it.
I can be spiritual but cannot bring my self to have faith in something that I believe is not the truth.

 

All I have to contribute

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Where do you find all these crap

 

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Sure as usual you make some good points mate but I just put it up for a laugh as many friends I know including from both side of the gun debate were laughing and I figured it would get a few laughs in here.
I'm not even a huge fan of his apart from his Ali G character and the occasional funny bit he does