TexasScientist said:
Oldbear83 said:
TexasScientist said:
Oldbear83 said:
TexasScientist said:
Oldbear83 said:
TexasScientist said:
Oldbear83 said:
TexasScientist said:
Oldbear83 said:
TexasScientist: 'I don't think Christians in the ancient world were anymore compassionate than those of today"
Were that true, Christianity would never have seen the surge in popularity it had during the first two centuries of its existence, despite intense Roman persecution.
What do you believe led to Christianity's fast growth, if not for its charity and compassion?
It gave hope of an afterlife in paradise, and Paul's version promoted it to be available to the gentiles. BTW the intensity of Roman persecution is questionable. I never said the concept of compassion had nothing to do with Christian growth.
You wrote that ancient Christians were no more compassionate than those of today.
That aligns with claiming compassion had no part in Christianity's appeal.
So you believe Christians are less compassionate today, and therefore less appealing?
Nope, I was simply working off your words and implied argument.
Now as then, there are fakers and hypocrites who claim to love Christ but do not live as believers, and there are others who believe and try to live as Christ taught.
One important difference between Science and Faith, is that living in Faith accepts we will fail and fall from time to time, so success is judged over a much longer time frame and a literally ancient promise from God, while Science is always changing, discarding failures as worthless and cheering those who win.
So the Christian carries compassion with him, not in the belief he is good but because we all are in need of that compassion, and we need compassion in order to get up when we fall, and to help our brothers get up when they fall.
Science gives you the ability to determine what causes harm and is harmful. Compassion comes from humanism's application of that knowledge.
Your senses show you the harm and common sense its proximate cause. Humanism is merely the tool used by atheists to steal credit from those who actually do things to help, and apply it to those whose efforts are limited to just talking.
Religion is all talk. Science is the tool that allows you to understand the senses and to evaluate harm. Common sense arguments have often been undone by scientific research.
< chuckles >
Actually, it's Science that is talk-talk-talk. Talk about what is seen in nature, talk about what you want to change, talk about why your experiment worked or not ...
Science is oblivious to its own harm (CFCs, etc) until common sense forces them to make changes.
Chuckles. Science is an inanimate tool. People us science to ask questions, test ideas through experiment and repetition, and to falsify ideas, all in the pursuit of knowledge. It's how people apply science that has an impact upon them and their surroundings. Common sense said the sun orbits the earth.
Science can be as bigoted and cultish as any human activity. It's the shame of Lord Kelvin openly mocking Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar on the floor of the Royal Science Academy, when Kelvin was wrong and Chandrasekhar was right.
It's the arrogance of demanding Consensus when the crowd is wrong.
The work of Alexander Gordon of Aberdeen was ignored for decades and countless women dies in childbirth because Gordon's discovery that those deaths were the preventable result of infectious processes was rejected.
It's the bigotry of Science in general ignoring the work of Semmelweiss regarding sanitary techniques to eliminate puerperal fever in hospitals, because Semmelweiss was a jew.
It was Science that discovered Asbestos resisted fire, and rushed to put that chemical in paint and clothing, And resisting the evidence of Asbestos poisoning for decades.
It was Science that banned Saccharin, when in fact it posed no actual risk of cancer, and it was Science which signed off on Vaping as a healthy alternative to smoking, before there was any useful data on the long-term effects of vaping.
Science has been abused by its fanatics as much or more than any political or religious group. But the lab coat cultists are among the least to admit their arrogance or bias.
