So I have kind of been on a religious tangent over the last week or so, I recently found /r/atheism on www.reddit.com and I've just been pouring over the posts, watching astrophysicist lectures on youtube, and going over the bible. I literally spent two hours the other night watching two lectures/Q&A things done by Neil Degrasse Tyson. I took an intro course in anthropology last semester and it has basically reinforced a lot of the things I've been thinking/feeling for YEARS. If you are my friend on facebook, you might also be aware that I spent 1/2 a day debating god and the purpose/usefulness of religion. Although the people I was debating with were more or less in agreement with me, so that took all the fun out of it. I was disappointed that some of my more religiously inclined friends/family didn't get involved and I'm curious why. I thought my friend count might go down after it, but surprisingly I didn't lose a single one.
My original post was this:
It seems more likely to me that religion has evolved alongside man as an explanation to the unknowable.
We KNOW that anatomically modern humans existed 160,000 years ago. They LOOKED LIKE US. Not hairy cavemen monkey things.
We KNOW behaviorally modern humans created art, tools, dyed their clothing, traveled vast distances to barter and trade 40,000 years ago. We can presume.. they looked up at the moon, sun, and stars and asked what they were.
It seems more likely to me that those same humans passed down by oral tradition which stemmed from their unknowable, we did this for at least 35,000 years and then we started writing it down. As we have become more aware of our surroundings both microscopic and cosmic our religions have changed and evolved and have given way before the known.
Religion seems to me, to be a philosophy of willful ignorance. "That is to far beyond my ability to comprehend, so it must be God and I will not try to understand"
Once upon a time we attributed the rise of storms and earthquakes to vengeful spirits and jealous gods. Today we know what causes them and as such they no longer reside it the realm of the divine.
I feel that if ALL people could grasp the relatively monumental (compared to our lives, and even recorded history) amount of time human beings existed before EVERY RELIGION THAT EXISTS TODAY came about, we could move past this debate over whether or not a Monotheistic god exists and try to answer some of the REAL questions that matter in our universe.
And now to the real reason I am here today. Last week a California court over turned a gay marriage ban. My question is:
Is there an argument against gay marriage that does not stem from religion?
Why can't a gay/lesbian couple get married? I know Christians who are in favor of equal rights for everyone, but I also know some who are adamantly anti-gay and honestly, I used to be as well. Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich are all against gay marriage.
I remember as a child, of maybe 13 or so, I was at Disney World and had been standing in line for what felt like an eternity to ride Space Mountain. The two dudes in front of me started making out. I felt disgusted. I thought it was wrong, I had been indoctrinated to think that and so I gave up my spot in line and left. In the almost 2 decades that have past since then I've come to realize how dense I was then. I've had some very close, and very gay friends. I've served in Iraq with gay soldiers. I don't understand how the government can continue to oppress any group of people who are in pursuit of their happiness which does not infringe on any one else's rights. It seems absolutely ridiculous to me today.
I would be tremendously glad if any of you reading this could respond with your ideas, oppositions, comments, or whatever!
