Swedishguy
Deity
Have you met anyone named Torgny Henriksson?
In your opinion, are religions doomed to disapear in the future or will always be part of mankind?
Have you met anyone named Torgny Henriksson?
Hiya Plotinus!
I've got a question for you. After having read your OP, I wonder: how can someone who is atheist have the patience to study a religion? For someone of your beliefs (or lack thereof), is that analagous to studying, say, the works of Tolkien? I find that most atheists have a severe lack of patience for anything religious. What is it that gives you the focus enough to study something you don't believe in, to the point of getting a PhD in that profession?
I see. He's an atheist that has studied theology out of curiosity.If I have, he didn't tell me his name!
In your opinion, are religions doomed to disapear in the future or will always be part of mankind?
They've never shown the slightest sign of disappearing in the past, so I can't imagine any reason to suppose that they ever will.
I don't understand, what's the difference?I didn't say I was an atheist in the OP, only that I'm not religious, which is not the same thing. Although I've said before here that I'm an atheist, though perhaps not a complete dyed-in-the-wool one.
I'd say that's a fair bet, but I also experience this hostility here in OT.Most atheists in my experience aren't particularly bothered about religion one way or another. I suspect that your location in the US may colour your experiences, since it seems to me that these things are so polarised there: the fact that religious people actually outnumber everyone else must create something of a siege mentality.
I see, that's very interesting. Thank you.Sometimes it's a bit Tolkienesque, but I'd say it's more like studying law, with a similar attraction. The law is an incredibly intricate and enormous body of material, all consistent with itself, but ultimately totally arbitrary and made up. There's an intellectual satisfaction to establishing whether (say) a certain lawsuit is likely to succeed, on the basis of the laws involved, precedent, and so on. I think that's quite similar to establishing whether (say) a certain theologian holds a certain heretical belief. Whether you personally think the belief is heretical or not is neither here nor there.
As I suggested in the OP, it's no different from studying any other belief system. No-one thinks that experts on Plato get annoyed because they are not themselves Platonists. And there can't be many Cartesians around today, but people still study Descartes. What's the difference?
My PhD is going to be in philosophy, by the way. Maybe I should have stuck with theology, but my Greek isn't good enough!
I'm beginning to sense a theme in some of your TV habits.And have you ever seen the show Wonderfalls?
Do you think the Bible is consistent? Why are certain books not included?
I'm going to turn this on its head.
What is, in your opinion, the least consistent religious sect that you have studied?
More of a cult but probably Scientology. Sect probably the Shakers.
I was talking about consistency, not insanity. The two are not necessarily correlated.
What would you have to take in University to become a Theologian and how much does it pay?
You don't have to be a theologian to answer that one. You just have to have a basic grasp of mathematics (as relates to demographics).
Any group of people who glorifies childrearing (Christianity and Islam come to mind) will almost certainly perpetuate compared to those groups that don't place children high on the ultimate priority list.
I had wondered how Christianity is still considered to hold one out of three people in the world fifty years after the first time this statistic was claimed in books I have read. I couldn't grasp how this was possible when I have witnessed a wholesale exodus away from the Christian faith among people in my generation, and a massive growth of the Islamic faith as a percentage of the total population worldwide... until I read about demographic statistics that noted that birthrates for Christians and Muslims are quite higher than non-christians/non-muslims in the US and certain other places.
Love your children and have babies, and your beliefs will perpetuate throughout the population in the long term over those worldviews that don't place children as high on the priority list. I mean the looong term, not just a few generations. I was raised catholic and I can't believe I never saw it before. It makes perfect sense to me, at least mathematically.
Which leads me to the question:
Theologian, is mathematics used to guide the ability to discern trends in theology or is it mostly philosophical argument stuff?
My question wasn't clear, sorry. I meant, religions disapeared throughout the course of history, people were converted to Christianity, Muslim, Judaism and so forth.
I don't have any numbers at hand but you will agree that the Greek Gods aren't that much popular by today.
So could you imagine that certain religion disapear in this millenium?
Another question, you probably heard about this one. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/2218456.stm Poor example though, what are the standards for someone's religion to be officially recognized?
What is your speciality, and what have you studied outside of it? For example, is it mostly mainstream Christianity, do you know anything about "fringe" Christian groups, etc.?
And have you ever seen the show Wonderfalls?
I don't understand, what's the difference?
What sort of job can this land you?
Do you think the Bible is consistent? Why are certain books not included?
I've heard the Orthodox Bible has the most "stuff" in it. Is it true ?
I'm going to turn this on its head.
What is, in your opinion, the least consistent religious sect that you have studied?
Great work so far, Plotinus!
As the resident monist and New Thought believer here, I would like to ask:
Has your study of theology centered mainly in Western thought, such as Christianity, or to what level have you explored Eastern though as well?
What is your opinion of people like Thomas Troward, Ernest Holmes, or Joseph Campbell, who tried to synthesize Western and Eastern thinking?
Besides Greek, did you have to study Latin?To study it at a master's or PhD level you would normally need a language or two, normally Greek. But my Greek is very bad because I'm hopeless at languages.