Is There Any Difference Between Sexual Lust and Religious 'Lust?'

Discuss philosophical questions regarding theism (and atheism), and discuss religion as it relates to philosophy. This includes any philosophical discussions that happen to be about god, gods, or a 'higher power' or the belief of them. This also generally includes philosophical topics about organized or ritualistic mysticism or about organized, common or ritualistic beliefs in the existence of supernatural phenomenon.
Alias
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Re: Is There Any Difference Between Sexual Lust and Religious 'Lust?'

Post by Alias »

Spectrum wrote: May 30th, 2018, 2:13 am If you understand how the brain works, you could have been 'charitable'.
I do and I was somewhat charitable as regards brain function. What I can't give any leeway to is misuse of words.
Sexual desire is not comparable to religious awe or zeal. The latter is simply not "lust".

The procreative drive does originate in the most primitive, oldest part of the brain, and when filtered through the later-evolved upper regions of the human brain, can turn into some very imaginative compulsions and obsessions. At the point of obsessive repetition, the attempts to satisfy an unconventional sexual desire, it can come to resemble the rituals of religious zeal. You may be tempted by this superficial similarity to use the word broadly - but the wider you spread a word, the less meaning it has. Having diluted it, you can no longer apply literally.

By the time this point of convergent behaviour is reached, you're a long, long way up the brain-structure from reptiles.
You can trace basic survival impulses all the way back to protozoa and brainless plant-life; can trace sexual impulses back as far as insects and fish, and structured social interaction back to birds and ancient mammals, which strongly suggests that new impulses arise with newly-evolved capabilities, in higher levels of the developing brain. There is no hint of anything like superstitious awe prior to humans - and it comes fairly late in human social evolution.

I think it's unsound to attribute the expression of a late-invented desire to some much earlier drive, in the absence of any previous forms or manifestations of that same impulse. At the very least, it's an imaginative stretch.
The impulses of the various primal drives operate independently.
Exactly!
When these impulses are triggered originally at the basement they are further filtered by the limbic [emotions, etc] and then the higher cortical cortex [reason, rationality, impulse controls, etc.].
One hopes - though this doesn't always happen with aggression or hunger or sexual drive.
And when they arise on the first or second floor or in the attic, they're still filtered before turning into action.
And that's where you find the commonality you observe - in their refined expression.
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Re: Is There Any Difference Between Sexual Lust and Religious 'Lust?'

Post by Karpel Tunnel »

One ironic thing about this thread is how much religion has set out to suppress primal drives including lust. It's not a reptilian brain or even limbic system thing, in the main, though it certainly can find 'allies' in those parts of the brain, so to speak.
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Re: Is There Any Difference Between Sexual Lust and Religious 'Lust?'

Post by Alias »

Karpel Tunnel wrote: May 30th, 2018, 4:02 pm One ironic thing about this thread is how much religion has set out to suppress primal drives including lust. It's not a reptilian brain or even limbic system thing, in the main, though it certainly can find 'allies' in those parts of the brain, so to speak.
The young (Abrahamic - Judaism, Christianity and Islam) generally has been set against animal impulses - to vilify anything primal and carnal and thus promote guilt when the normal human being experiences those urges and emotions that have been arbitrarily designated as sinful. Guilt and self-loathing are great tools for manipulating people.
On the flip-side, the zealous and creative religionist can sublimate carnal drives, or drive them into different channels and put them in the service of his faith. Thus: martyrdom, self-flagellation and corporal punishment of children; renunciation, fasting, the mortification of flesh... and the odd crusade or jihad for venting collective steam.
But older, less crazy-making religions tended to acknowledge man's animal nature, and even celebrate many of its aspects.
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Re: Is There Any Difference Between Sexual Lust and Religious 'Lust?'

Post by Karpel Tunnel »

Alias wrote: May 30th, 2018, 6:53 pm But older, less crazy-making religions tended to acknowledge man's animal nature, and even celebrate many of its aspects.
Or you could say humans' full nature, without pathologizing, at least by comparison, so much of what we are.
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Re: Is There Any Difference Between Sexual Lust and Religious 'Lust?'

Post by Spectrum »

Alias wrote: May 30th, 2018, 11:06 am I think it's unsound to attribute the expression of a late-invented desire to some much earlier drive, in the absence of any previous forms or manifestations of that same impulse. At the very least, it's an imaginative stretch.
I believe you have a big gap of knowledge in this area.

The religious drive is not a late-invented desire.

Judaism, Christianity and Islam can be traced back to 3000+ years but long before that there were primitive religions traceable to 10,000 years ago and more 'primal religion' to 300,000 years ago or even the day human beings emerged.
Paleolithic religions are a set of spiritual beliefs thought to have appeared during the Paleolithic time period. Religious behaviour is thought[by whom?] to have emerged by the Upper Paleolithic, before 30,000 years ago at the latest,[1] but behavioral patterns such as burial rites that one might characterize as religious — or as ancestral to religious behaviour — reach back into the Middle Paleolithic, as early as 300,000 years ago, coinciding with the first appearance of Homo neanderthalensis and possibly Homo naledi. It is speculated that religious behaviour may combine (for example) ritual, spirituality, mythology and magical thinking or animism — aspects that may have had separate histories of development during the Middle Paleolithic ..
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paleolithic_religion
The above primal religious drive is thus very basic and not much different from the sex and other primal drives. Note
It is speculated that religious behaviour may combine (for example) ritual, spirituality, mythology and magical thinking or animism — aspects that may have had separate histories of development during the Middle Paleolithic before combining into "religion proper" of behavioral modernity.
-wiki
As I had argued in term of 'lust' between sex and religion they are comparable in term of their consequences. In fact religion is far worse in terms of the consequences of their primal driven lust resulting in millions of mass killing and genocides in contrast to rapes, mass rapes and sex related killings.

It critical to call a spade a spade so that we can identify the critical root causes and resolve all issues of religion at its primal level.
Not-a-theist. Religion is a critical necessity for humanity now, but not the FUTURE.
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Re: Is There Any Difference Between Sexual Lust and Religious 'Lust?'

Post by Karpel Tunnel »

Spectrum wrote: May 31st, 2018, 12:03 am The religious drive is not a late-invented desire.
In EVOLUTIONARY TERMS it is a very late phenomenon, as far as we know. No other animals, as far as we know have religions. You are trying to make religion equivalent to lust, which animals seem very much to have. It is absolutely late in the game as far as your thread title and arguments. A religion like Islam requires conceptions that no animals, as far as we, know is remotely capable of having, and it is those conceptions that lead to violence. Afterlife, God's injunctions, how to identify those who can be treated badly based on their ontological beliefs and practices, etc.
It critical to call a spade a spade so that we can identify the critical root causes and resolve all issues of religion at its primal level.
A spade is a spade. Religious participation and lust share almost no qualities. Lust arose in animals long before humans. Lust has physiological signs not present in almost every religious practice. Lust is in fact judged restrained and controlled in most religions and seen in the religions, most of the major, current ones, as antithetical to religion.

The critical root causes of all facets of society and human life can been connected to primal drives. We got but the one brain in each of our heads and our motivations tend to combine striving for basic needs and emotional connection. So everything can be reduced to primal drives as root causes, which are sublimated or participate directly in everything.

Even your motivation to attack theists with questionable arguments no doubt comes from primal drives to increase the safety of those you care about, to dominate the ideas of others, to express the anger you feel at injustice and aggressive acts, and so on.

Everything can be reduced to primal drives as root motivators. The question is if we learn anything about the end product by doing this. And we do not.

And calling it lust is just silly.
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Re: Is There Any Difference Between Sexual Lust and Religious 'Lust?'

Post by Alias »

Spectrum wrote: May 31st, 2018, 12:03 am Judaism, Christianity and Islam can be traced back to 3000+ years but long before that there were primitive religions traceable to 10,000 years ago and more 'primal religion' to 300,000 years ago ...
"....Paleolithic religions are a set of spiritual beliefs thought to have appeared during the Paleolithic time period. Religious behaviour is thought[by whom?] to have emerged by the Upper Paleolithic, before 30,000 years ago at the latest,
Even 300,000 years ago, on the scale of evolution is very, very late. You attributed this impulse to the 'reptilian' brain which arose over 300,000,000 years ago - that is, a million times older than even the tenuous guess of the oldest possible religious-like behaviour.
"[1] but behavioral patterns such as burial rites that one might characterize as religious — or as ancestral to religious behaviour — reach back into the Middle Paleolithic, as early as 300,000 years ago
That one might characterize as religious.... or as simple respect for one's elders, affection for one's kin?
or even the day human beings emerged.
I've never seen even a fantastically stretched interpretation of religion in other apes.
And that's already a long way from lizards.
The above primal religious drive is thus very basic and not much different from the sex and other primal drives.
Who said it was a drive? Some evidence has been found of communities of early humans burying their dead and gathering in some favoured locations, where they later built stone calendars - which might mean they did something on special days.
These are social activities, not primal ones.
Now, if we had evidence that every type of early human worshipped the same kind of tree in the same way, or built the same shaped cairn on top of the same sacred mountain, or some such universal practice that every member of the species follows, the same way that every member of the species seeks food, shelter and mates, even when separated from his or her tribe, we could say with confidence that it was a primal drive. But since both the prehistoric, historically documented and current examples of such practices vary from community to community, and are readily altered by an individual's immersion in a different community, it seems to me more reasonable to consider them cultural.
As I had argued in term of 'lust' between sex and religion they are comparable in term of their consequences.
Sex: you get pleasure and little people
Religion: you get guilt and celibate clerics
In fact religion is far worse in terms of the consequences of their primal driven lust resulting in millions of mass killing and genocides in contrast to rapes, mass rapes and sex related killings.
There is nothing reptilian or primal about that. That's just mass insanity - a characteristic of overpopulation in unnatural environments.
It critical to call a spade a spade ...
Yeah, but when you go around calling trowels, spatulas, paint-scrapers, candy scoops and coal-shovels "spade", nobody can make sense of your communication - or dig a decent hole.
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Re: Is There Any Difference Between Sexual Lust and Religious 'Lust?'

Post by Spectrum »

Karpel Tunnel wrote: May 31st, 2018, 5:37 am
Spectrum wrote: May 31st, 2018, 12:03 am The religious drive is not a late-invented desire.
In EVOLUTIONARY TERMS it is a very late phenomenon, as far as we know. No other animals, as far as we know have religions. You are trying to make religion equivalent to lust, which animals seem very much to have. It is absolutely late in the game as far as your thread title and arguments. A religion like Islam requires conceptions that no animals, as far as we, know is remotely capable of having, and it is those conceptions that lead to violence. Afterlife, God's injunctions, how to identify those who can be treated badly based on their ontological beliefs and practices, etc.

A spade is a spade. Religious participation and lust share almost no qualities. Lust arose in animals long before humans. Lust has physiological signs not present in almost every religious practice. Lust is in fact judged restrained and controlled in most religions and seen in the religions, most of the major, current ones, as antithetical to religion.
Again yours is a straw man.
Note my definition of 'lust' I provided earlier and this lust is not applicable and the same as the instincts in animals. So it very wrong to bring in animals for comparison.

What I am comparing is the lust in relation to sex which is one group of the various primal drives of the same level or lower.
In this case we have 'lust' for hunger/food [gluttony], water, security, existential elements, fight or flight, freeze, etc.

This is the lust re existential elements [certainty of mortality] that is the proximate root that set off the drive for 'religiosity' at every level.
There are many levels of religiosity from the Paleolithic religions, 300,000 years ago to the highest via reason, i.e. the idea of the ontological God. So it is obvious the religious people 300,000 do not have the slightest clue of the ontological God or organized religions we have today.
The point is all religions and theism can be traced to its proximate root at the existential levels which is almost the same with the sex, food, etc. drives. I claim the existential-religio drive is much 'lower' than the sex, food drives.

Therefore it is not wrong for me to equate the religiosity drive, i.e. lust with the lust for food and sex.
It critical to call a spade a spade so that we can identify the critical root causes and resolve all issues of religion at its primal level.
A spade is a spade. Religious participation and lust share almost no qualities. Lust arose in animals long before humans. Lust has physiological signs not present in almost every religious practice. Lust is in fact judged restrained and controlled in most religions and seen in the religions, most of the major, current ones, as antithetical to religion.

The critical root causes of all facets of society and human life can been connected to primal drives. We got but the one brain in each of our heads and our motivations tend to combine striving for basic needs and emotional connection. So everything can be reduced to primal drives as root causes, which are sublimated or participate directly in everything.

Even your motivation to attack theists with questionable arguments no doubt comes from primal drives to increase the safety of those you care about, to dominate the ideas of others, to express the anger you feel at injustice and aggressive acts, and so on.

Everything can be reduced to primal drives as root motivators. The question is if we learn anything about the end product by doing this. And we do not.

And calling it lust is just silly.
I have argued my critique of evil prone theists and evil laden religions is driven by empathy and compassion which are a later evolved functions than the primal drives re sex, food, existential-religiosity.

Not everything can be reduced significantly to primal drives as root causes. The emotions [limbic] and human reason [neo-cortical] are very distinct functions in the brain. [there are paths to reconcile them, but that is not the point for this case].

My point is of linking religion and theism to its primal drives, i.e. 'lust' has significant utility.
At present there is this stupid view that ALL religions are peaceful, therefore Islam as a religion is peaceful. This bad logical view hinder humanity from tracing religious-based evil to its root cause.

The default of any problem-solving technique is attending to the critical proximate or ultimate causes.
Your denial [due to ignorance] that religions and theism are not driven by lust [as with sex, hunger, etc.] at the primal level will not enable humanity to resolve the specific problem of religious-based evils and terrors from the level of its proximate root causes.
This is why this statistics is continuing to rise
Image
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Re: Is There Any Difference Between Sexual Lust and Religious 'Lust?'

Post by Alias »

Spectrum wrote: June 1st, 2018, 1:01 am Therefore it is not wrong for me to equate the religiosity drive, i.e. lust with the lust for food and sex.
Not wrong - merely inaccurate and misleading.

[/quote]
At present there is this stupid view that ALL religions are peaceful, therefore Islam as a religion is peaceful. [/quote]
I don't think this view it very wide-spread, or influential.
Very little can be said of "all religions"; even the most basic definition has some exception in its tenets or practice.
This bad logical view hinder humanity from tracing religious-based evil to its root cause.
There is a lot bad logic around, and not only this subject.
When you talked about proto-religion before, you must have been aware of how little the reverence for ancestors, or belief in nature-spirits, or mushroom-fuelled dream-quests have in common with vengeful, aggressive gods; how unlikely animism is to lead to such concerted action as waging war on a civilization on the other side of an ocean.
If these be drives, they are quite different ones!

Suppose people are reluctant to trace evil to any of its causes? Suppose they're not at all willing to confront their own delusions, their own prejudices, their own vices?
Suppose - this is a long-shot - they would rather blame the recent acts of Muslim terrorists on the inherent violence of their religion than on the imperialist atrocities that have formed the current crop of young Muslims? Suppose they're happy to ignore the centuries in which no obviously faith-driven aggression took place, and prefer to concentrate on the 'holy' wars? Suppose they don't look behind the so-called holy wars for possible alternate motives, like consolidating political power, or acquiring other peoples' land and resources?
The default of any problem-solving technique is attending to the critical proximate or ultimate causes.
One at a time, step by step. And the key word is "causes" - there is usually more than one.
Your denial [due to ignorance] that religions and theism are not driven by lust [as with sex, hunger, etc.] at the primal level will not enable humanity to resolve the specific problem of religious-based evils and terrors from the level of its proximate root causes.
Where is the motivation for the people who have the power to resolve anything to resolve anything?
The rest of us - the powerless - are just howling at the moon, no matter how we go about trying to figure things out.
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Re: Is There Any Difference Between Sexual Lust and Religious 'Lust?'

Post by Spectrum »

Alias wrote: May 31st, 2018, 12:29 pm
Spectrum wrote: May 31st, 2018, 12:03 am Judaism, Christianity and Islam can be traced back to 3000+ years but long before that there were primitive religions traceable to 10,000 years ago and more 'primal religion' to 300,000 years ago ...
"....Paleolithic religions are a set of spiritual beliefs thought to have appeared during the Paleolithic time period. Religious behaviour is thought[by whom?] to have emerged by the Upper Paleolithic, before 30,000 years ago at the latest,
Even 300,000 years ago, on the scale of evolution is very, very late. You attributed this impulse to the 'reptilian' brain which arose over 300,000,000 years ago - that is, a million times older than even the tenuous guess of the oldest possible religious-like behaviour.
When you so on such a defensive stance, your thinking will be blinded, so I anticipate your kind of narrow thinking above.

The basic mechanisms human inherited from the reptiles [> 300 million], e.g. survival instincts are still active in the human brain [6 million?] and as such they will definitely influence the human brain towards religious activities since Paleolithic to modern religions.
"[1] but behavioral patterns such as burial rites that one might characterize as religious — or as ancestral to religious behaviour — reach back into the Middle Paleolithic, as early as 300,000 years ago
That one might characterize as religious.... or as simple respect for one's elders, affection for one's kin?
Where did you get this idea from?
Even at late as 3000 years ago when the pyramids were built [with or without religious elements] the critical concern what of the afterlife and mortality which is the critical element in ALL religions [without exceptions].
or even the day human beings emerged.
I've never seen even a fantastically stretched interpretation of religion in other apes.
And that's already a long way from lizards.
I have never stated apes and reptiles are involved in religion.
What I am saying is the the same primal drives, i.e. lust from existential elements are modified in humans as fundamental religious drives.
The above primal religious drive is thus very basic and not much different from the sex and other primal drives.
Who said it was a drive? Some evidence has been found of communities of early humans burying their dead and gathering in some favoured locations, where they later built stone calendars - which might mean they did something on special days.
These are social activities, not primal ones.
The primary reason of burying their death in this case is related to the idea of the afterlife which the most critical of the major religions.
Now, if we had evidence that every type of early human worshipped the same kind of tree in the same way, or built the same shaped cairn on top of the same sacred mountain, or some such universal practice that every member of the species follows, the same way that every member of the species seeks food, shelter and mates, even when separated from his or her tribe, we could say with confidence that it was a primal drive. But since both the prehistoric, historically documented and current examples of such practices vary from community to community, and are readily altered by an individual's immersion in a different community, it seems to me more reasonable to consider them cultural.
Don't you think it is essential to trace the root causes of why cultural elements arise.
Though cultural can be linked to religion, they are distinctively different as we can have cultural which are religious linked and secular linked.
As I had argued in term of 'lust' between sex and religion they are comparable in term of their consequences.
Sex: you get pleasure and little people
Religion: you get guilt and celibate clerics
I did say ALL consequences but those that are pertinent to the related issues I have raised, i.e. evil acts and violence, so
Sex: you get rapes and murder
Religion: you get killings, murder, genocides.
In fact religion is far worse in terms of the consequences of their primal driven lust resulting in millions of mass killing and genocides in contrast to rapes, mass rapes and sex related killings.
There is nothing reptilian or primal about that. That's just mass insanity - a characteristic of overpopulation in unnatural environments.
Note I have proven the direct link between religion [Islam] with evil and violence. The genocides of the Yazidis, Amenians are directly linked to the verses in the Quran, i.e. the core of Islam.
If there is no Islam there will be no specific genocides of the Yazidis, Amenians, the mass kidnapped and rapes by Boko Haram and elsewhere linked directly to Islam.

There are non-religious related genocides which must be addressed but that is besides the point re this 'Philosophy of Religion, Theism and Mythology' forum.
It critical to call a spade a spade ...
Yeah, but when you go around calling trowels, spatulas, paint-scrapers, candy scoops and coal-shovels "spade", nobody can make sense of your communication - or dig a decent hole.
Your above is a strawman.
I am not comparing religion with sex activities at the sense-perceptual levels but at the deeper levels of the brain.
Note the visual [eyes] and auditory [ears] systems are totally different perceptively but both are sense organs and system.
The religio drive below the surface of the brain/mind share the same level with sex, food, security, breathing, water, as basic primal drives. I can understand why you disagree, it is because you are not researching deep and wide enough.
Not-a-theist. Religion is a critical necessity for humanity now, but not the FUTURE.
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Re: Is There Any Difference Between Sexual Lust and Religious 'Lust?'

Post by Alias »

Spectrum wrote: June 1st, 2018, 1:40 am The basic mechanisms human inherited from the reptiles [> 300 million], e.g. survival instincts are still active in the human brain [6 million?] and as such they will definitely influence the human brain towards religious activities since Paleolithic to modern religions.
Also horticulture, astronomy, racing-car design and body-piercing. But you didn't make this about all the outcomes of a will to live - you made a particular connection between two specific motivators: one primordial and universal, one peculiar to human civilization. I don't think you've made a convincing case for that connection.
[That one might characterize as religious.... or as simple respect for one's elders, affection for one's kin?]
Where did you get this idea from?
From my own experience of kin-affinity. My respect for them, even in death; my feeling of grief upon their loss; my desire to make an affectionate parting gesture. I think those feelings are rather common in people, whether pagan or Catholic, Hindu or atheist. I find it reasonable to suppose that people felt much the same way 30,000 years ago.
So, where did the archeologists get the notion that burial might be characterized as religious? Probably from their own experience.
Even at late as 3000 years ago when the pyramids were built [with or without religious elements] the critical concern what of the afterlife
The Egyptian belief-system is well recorded. No speculation required. But you're still sliding up and down the time-scale as if a couple of zeros made no difference. They did! 3000 BC is so recent as to make no discernible evolutionary change between then and now. The pyramids don't need any imagination to interpret. Some of the older burial mounds and caves of primitive cultures are more mysterious, and what we know of the practices of nomadic hunter-gatherers is very sketchy, mostly speculation.
What I am saying is the the same primal drives, i.e. lust from existential elements are modified in humans as fundamental religious drives.
I know what you're saying. But I think you've stretched the analogy so thin as to become meaningless.
The primary reason of burying their death in this case is related to the idea of the afterlife which the most critical of the major religions.
We bury our dead pets under the cedar trees along the back fence, dogs wrapped in their blanket with their favourite toy, cats wrapped in a sheet, and pile rocks on top of the grave, so that no scavenger will dig up the remains. This insures them no afterlife, in which we don't believe, and does them no good at all. We do it out of sentiment. If an archeologist thousands of years from now digs them up, he's welcome to conjecture that my clan worshipped dogs and ritually sacrificed cats to our canine deities - but he'll be wrong.
I did say ALL consequences but those that are pertinent to the related issues I have raised, i.e. evil acts and violence, so
Sex: you get rapes and murder
Religion: you get killings, murder, genocides.
Pertinent, as selected for your thesis.
Might there be reasons for killing, murder and genocide that are not religious?
If there is no Islam there will be no specific genocides
Riiiiight.... No Ukrainians were harmed in Stalin's purges. Alexander the Great didn't raze Tyre.... I don't believe that.
I'm not sure the Israelites really massacred everyone in Jericho, quite a long time before Islam was invented; I'm pretty sure Jehovah didn't really tell them to do it, and I'm guessing their real motive was to claim some fertile land.
There are non-religious related genocides which must be addressed but that is besides the point re this 'Philosophy of Religion, Theism and Mythology' forum.
And their motivations don't go back to the lizards? Of course they do! All aggression does.
Maybe not so much to the sex-drive, though, as to to the territorial imperative... which you can link to sex, if you want to.
But what, exactly, will that clarify?
I can understand why you disagree, it is because you are not researching deep and wide enough.
Ah. I knew there must be a reason, other than reason.
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Re: Is There Any Difference Between Sexual Lust and Religious 'Lust?'

Post by Spectrum »

Alias wrote: June 1st, 2018, 9:49 am
If there is no Islam there will be no specific genocides
Riiiiight.... No Ukrainians were harmed in Stalin's purges. Alexander the Great didn't raze Tyre.... I don't believe that.
I'm not sure the Israelites really massacred everyone in Jericho, quite a long time before Islam was invented; I'm pretty sure Jehovah didn't really tell them to do it, and I'm guessing their real motive was to claim some fertile land.
I noted most of your response are like the above where you do not account for the complete point, or deliberately delete or ignore the relevant context.

Note my complete point;
Note I have proven the direct link between religion [Islam] with evil and violence. The genocides of the Yazidis, Amenians are directly linked to the verses in the Quran, i.e. the core of Islam.
If there is no Islam there will be no specific genocides of the Yazidis, Amenians, the mass kidnapped and rapes by Boko Haram and elsewhere linked directly to Islam.
The above is a self-contained conclusion, i.e. if no X, then no Y.
This meant if no Islam, then no Islamic related genocide [as the example given].

It is a fallacy to bring in Stalin, Alexander, and any thing else not related to Islam or religion.

I sort of anticipate you are likely to slip, that is why I made the following additional point;
There are non-religious related genocides which must be addressed but that is besides the point re this 'Philosophy of Religion, Theism and Mythology' forum
Despite me stating non-religious issues are off point in this case, you still want to make a meal out of it.

Point is you are highly charged merely to be defensive for that sake and not addressing the point thoroughly.

I suggest you take a pause, few breaths read again before responding.
Not-a-theist. Religion is a critical necessity for humanity now, but not the FUTURE.
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Re: Is There Any Difference Between Sexual Lust and Religious 'Lust?'

Post by Spectrum »

Alias wrote: June 1st, 2018, 9:49 am
Spectrum wrote: June 1st, 2018, 1:40 am The basic mechanisms human inherited from the reptiles [> 300 million], e.g. survival instincts are still active in the human brain [6 million?] and as such they will definitely influence the human brain towards religious activities since Paleolithic to modern religions.
Also horticulture, astronomy, racing-car design and body-piercing. But you didn't make this about all the outcomes of a will to live - you made a particular connection between two specific motivators: one primordial and universal, one peculiar to human civilization. I don't think you've made a convincing case for that connection.
Survival instinct = will-to-live which is the ultimate drive and cause. I mentioned reptiles as a convenience but this will-to-live is actually traceable to the first one-cell living thing.
This survival instinct is fundamental to all living things but it is topped up with varying sub-drives during the different phases of evolution up to the present.
The continual topping up on the survival instinct give rise [seeding] to the religio sub-drive during the emergence of human being from Paleolithic to modern religions.

My point is the religious drive is not a modern thing that emerged since 3000 years ago.
The religio drive was already there [with the sex, food, security, other instinctual drives] when human beings first emerged along with evolutionary forces.

Therefore when discussing religions especially the evil and violence acts, we must correlate religious drive with the sexual lust and other instinctual lusts [as defined above]. This is evident by the similar evil consequences of both the sexual and religious drives.
[That one might characterize as religious.... or as simple respect for one's elders, affection for one's kin?]
Where did you get this idea from?
From my own experience of kin-affinity. My respect for them, even in death; my feeling of grief upon their loss; my desire to make an affectionate parting gesture. I think those feelings are rather common in people, whether pagan or Catholic, Hindu or atheist. I find it reasonable to suppose that people felt much the same way 30,000 years ago.
So, where did the archeologists get the notion that burial might be characterized as religious? Probably from their own experience.[/quote]Note even elephants has a sense of kinship for their dead, so yes that is a common thing with higher animals and humans.

If you read the article, the burial aspect is placed in a trend within a historical context, note,
It is speculated that religious behaviour may combine (for example) ritual, spirituality, mythology and magical thinking or animism — aspects that may have had separate histories of development during the Middle Paleolithic before combining into "religion proper" of behavioral modernity.
Even today, burial is a significant aspect of religion but note I am not saying all burials are related to religion. Islam do not permit cremation because they expect Muslims to go to heaven intact physically.
Not-a-theist. Religion is a critical necessity for humanity now, but not the FUTURE.
Alias
Posts: 3119
Joined: November 26th, 2011, 8:10 pm
Favorite Philosopher: Terry Pratchett

Re: Is There Any Difference Between Sexual Lust and Religious 'Lust?'

Post by Alias »

Spectrum wrote: June 1st, 2018, 9:54 pm Note my complete point;
Note I have proven the direct link between religion [Islam] with evil and violence. The genocides of the Yazidis, Amenians are directly linked to the verses in the Quran, i.e. the core of Islam.
Noted. You've made a link between one specific group of Muslims and one particular series of violent acts. That doesn't link religion in general to violence - or genocide - in general.

If there is no Serbia, there are no Ahatovići massacre, Bijeljina massacre, Doboj massacre,Foča massacre.
If there is no Khmer Rouge, there is no Cambodian genocide.
If there were no United States, there would be no Fort Dearborn Massacre, Pigeon Roost Massacre, River Raisin Massacre, Fort Mims Massacre.
If there were no Hutu, there would be no Rwandan genocide.
The above is a self-contained conclusion, i.e. if no X, then no Y.
Entirely self-contained. Insular, even.
Despite me stating non-religious issues are off point in this case, you still want to make a meal out of it.
That's because you don't have the unilateral privilege of declaring 'off limits' whatever contradicts your thesis.
Killing one another is something humans do, and have done for a long time, under many flags.
It is not a result of religion; it is not caused by the religious impulse. It's far more primal than religion or political ideology.
Those flags and slogans and icons are merely excuses for doing the worst things we want to do.
It is a fallacy to bring in Stalin, Alexander, and any thing else not related to Islam or religion
Of course it is.
I was taken in by the sex-religion connection and didn't immediately realize that they were just a cover for Islamophobia.
Point is you are highly charged merely to be defensive for that sake and not addressing the point thoroughly.
The only thing I appreciate more than an uninformed analysis of my motives is an unqualified assessment of my intellectual capabilities.
You have provided generously on both counts.
I suggest you take a pause, few breaths read again before responding.
Most considerate, but I don't think that will be necessary.
Spectrum
Posts: 5161
Joined: December 21st, 2010, 1:25 am
Favorite Philosopher: Eclectic -Various

Re: Is There Any Difference Between Sexual Lust and Religious 'Lust?'

Post by Spectrum »

Alias wrote: June 1st, 2018, 11:27 pm
Spectrum wrote: June 1st, 2018, 9:54 pm Note my complete point;
Note I have proven the direct link between religion [Islam] with evil and violence. The genocides of the Yazidis, Amenians are directly linked to the verses in the Quran, i.e. the core of Islam.
Noted. You've made a link between one specific group of Muslims and one particular series of violent acts. That doesn't link religion in general to violence - or genocide - in general.
I have never linked religion-in-general to violence and other evils. I have always claimed religions like Buddhism, Jainism. Taoism are not evil at all. Christianity and Hinduism has some elements of evil but not significant.

Note my usual thesis;
  • 1. DNA wise all humans has the potential for evil and say 20% are unfortunately born with an active evil tendency- the Evil Prone.
    2. Evil elements in media or wherever will trigger those within the 20% evil prone to commit evil acts.
    3. Any religion that has leading evil elements will catalyze their evil prone believers to commit evil acts.
    4. Islam has loads of evil laden element in its core text, i.e. the Quran.
    5. Islam [major part] is an inherently evil and malignant religion
There are all sorts of evils i.e. secular and religious based which must be addressed by humanity but to topic in this forum we are dealing with only religious related evils and its link to basic instincts.
Not-a-theist. Religion is a critical necessity for humanity now, but not the FUTURE.
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