We shall destroy it, or it shall destroy us. For that reason, when debating, when the subject comes up that certain beliefs are innately good for humans to retain by virtue of that they make us happier, I do not dignify it with a response. I argue coldly and without consideration of whose happiness I wreck. It is the only way to argue. Irrational beliefs must be burned to the ground, regardless of how good they make us feel. Do you recall, I wonder, that quote from Martin Luther?

To be a Christian one must pluck the eye out of reason, reason must be blind, deluded, destroyed. Reason...never comes to the aid of spiritual things. 

 I think...the first part of the quote is accurate, but if we are speaking of what is good for humanity, then I think my modification makes it more accurate:

For the continuity of civilization, one must pluck the eye out of unreason. Irrationality must be burned down, destroyed, eradicated. Irrationality...never comes to the aid of humanity.

I think the evolution of the brain will continue to produce more rational thinking and problem solving and replace the need for religion and a belief in invisible gods. The evolution of reason has been going on for centuries but in the age of advanced communication and especially the invention of the internet, the pace has greatly excellerated.

If it wasn't for the internet, I would still believe that an invisible god could read my thoughts and answer ( or not answer ) my prayers. Thanks to the advancement of modern technology, the wealth of information on the internet, and the influence of critical and rational thinking by others, I can now see the absurdity of that belief.

The advancement of science, technology, and rational thinking will eventually be the death of most religion. My guess is that by the end of this century in the United States, people who still hold onto religious beliefs and ancient myths will be a small minority.

I don't agree, I take the more pessemistic view that religion will be around for a long time yet, another 2000 years easily if mankind lasts that long.  After all there have been people who clearly saw the follies of religion and argued about its uselessness for at LEAST 2000 years if not longer - just look at Hypatia for one prime example. 

It's for this reason that I disagree with Kelly in her blog post about mankind not needing fairy tales.  Despite the many posts I made in that thread, none of them said this though.  Why?  Because it was derailed by theists WAY too quickly, I never got my chance to post my reply that was on topic to the OP.

The way I see it, even if an opportunity arose where we could start a society somewhere else and completely remove any mention of any gods or even fairy tales from the society from the word go (including general swearing), deistic and then theistic beliefs would find their way back within a few generations.  All that's needed is an area where a person or people lack understanding, and a little imagination which is something mankind has.  It wouldn't be any religions we know of today though.  It would be something competely new, but religion none the less. 

While many individuals have no need for fairy tales, there's still too many that do.  I don't see this as being something that can be weeded out of society.

 All that being said,  it's still a fight that is well worth fighting.  Without resistance and constant pressure we'd face another dark ages.  The fact that mankind is continually progressing rather than hitting a brick wall as happened in the dark ages is proof that we've been winning, but there's still a long way to go.

Agreed. 

I don't know if RRS will succeed.  Edison didn't know if he would succeed at inventing the light bulb.  Einstein didn't know if he would succeed at discovering a coherent and accurate model of relativity.  The suffragists didn't know if they would succeed at gaining equal rights under the law. 

People on the underground railroad didn't know if they'd be arrested or not, but they still did what they knew was right.

  destiny ?  , fuck worrying about that

, how about NOW,

 destiny will be what is,  I live now

, I am what I AM ,  NOW  

In a sense, groups like RRS, Atheists United, etc., and individuals like Dennett, Harris and Dawkins, have already succeeded. They have brought us out of scattered and atomized apathy, if only to admit to ourselves how we view the world. Each of us is slightly emboldened by our awareness of each other; people we have yet to know about will be emboldened by learning of any of us. Just seeing Harris and Dawkins in mainstream interviews is what prompted me to do serious research into the nature of belief, and where I stood with it. We, by being honest, are actively validating the proposition that atheism is a viable and healthy alternative to piety.

As for the question of whether religion will disappear: no. I'm not even comfortable in thinking in such absolutes, even if it's about something I thoroughly dislike. My hope, and what I do interpret from my observations, is that a trend will grow toward a general fatigue and disinterest in absolutes and extremism, and cult figures and nationalism, in tribal lizard-brain ideology. That the religion of Karl Marx, the opium of a helpless and resigned people, will vanish as a troubling symptom from an increasingly healthy, practical and humane society.

I think that the actions of the RRS and other activist groups are already making a difference, but I don't think that spiritual thought will ever go away.

Religious practices based on dogma and revealed religion will---must---go away, I think. If we don't do away with it now (in a nonviolent and civil fashion, of course), then it's not even close to unthinkable that it will do away with us eventually (in a violent and completely uncivil fashion, of course).

It's possible to have secular spirituality, uncontaminated by the mind-warping bullshit that comes with religious dogma. All religions have spirituality because spirituality is very arguably an innately human quality. The problem is that all the religions think they have a monopoly on that quality, just like most of them think they have a monopoly on morals and general goodness.

Religion and spirituality don't have to go away. It's just the current, unreasonable form of religious practice that needs to go away. I agree with what the RRS has said before in that it will probably be accomplished through some kind of ridicule.

Racism still exists today, but it's kept contained by the fact that most of us realize that it's an unreasonable, ignorant, and harmful worldview. We now see racism as contemptible, a bullshit understanding of reality, an antiquated view of the true nature of people that deserves to be ridiculed and scorned.

Revealed religions and their fundamentalist followers should meet the same fate. Obviously religion of some kind will always exist, but hopefully we can force into a container like we did with racism.

I think it can be accomplished because people are reasonable. I believe that everyone is born with enough rationality to reject religion.

If I tell you that there is an invisible serum on your nightstand that, once drank, can make you fly, you will be skeptical.

If I tell you there is a cosmic zombie that wants you to communicate with him telepathically to be forgiven for being related to two nudists who ate magic figs and talked to a snake, you would probably be skeptical.

It's the indoctrination that puts up the roadblock.

One big challenge will obviously be saving future children from being indoctrinated---and in that I can only hope that atheism will become popular enough that it will have more appeal so that Youth Ministers can't prey on them as easily as they have been doing.

Schools will let Youth organizations like Campus Life come into the school and pitch their Jesus spiel to kids as long as the Youth program doesn't associate itself with the school in any way.

Wouldn't it be interesting if there was some kind of atheism program that did the same thing? That would be fucking beautiful.

Another challenge will be educating people. Teach them what evolution really says. Teach them what Physics really says. Teach them the history of world religions. We obviously won't be able to keep all of God's precious gaps filled in, so that presents a problem.

I'm only pessimistic about this in the sense that I want it all to be accomplished NOW. I'm pessimistic about the present.

I'm hopeful for the future. =) 

Now that I have an understanding of the word "laud" 

Never, never, never give up. - Winston Churchill

That is how I live my life whether it is at work, home or continuing the fight to bring exposure to religions' many crazy beliefs and the infiltration of those beliefs into our lives...think separation of state...my inability to attend a chamber of commerce meeting this month without the mention of "ash wednesday"...

Who really knows if all of our efforts will ever end theism. What is important is that the focus doesn't shift to 'can we do it'? but maintains an even, straight course to what in our minds eye is reaching that goal. Without all of us exposing all the BS that is theism, without us having those tough conversations with our family and friends without all of US keeping a united front with other atheists our "dream" or "goal" has NO hope of being  achieved.

-Renee 

I'm am cynical enough to think that violence will become part of the discourse at some point. Which of course goes against some of the most important underpinnings of atheism.

This remains to be seen. While it is arguably true that secular ideas have not exploited human weakness, we can't really make any claims that it won't happen. Our data set includes only our history and as of the present, there are very few data points that don't include theism.  I tend to believe that as soon as somebody finds a way to expliot people using (or shall I say abusing?) atheism, they will attempt it.

And I hope you get a million to listen to reason and rationalism. I hope your great grandchildren would inherit a world free of theocratic dogmatism or dogma of any sort. There are far too many individuals who live with fear and ignorance and are so easily ensnared by religion. And despite the best efforts of RRS, they'll forever remain blinded by their faiths.

I think it's amazing that RRS has reached out to so many and I would never advocate any secular group to halt their efforts. In that regard, I completely agree that RRS has succeeded. Keep up the good work!

Yet on a global scale, I don't see humanity becoming sane in the future. Our innate tendencies towards fear, tribalism, xenophobia and hero worship are directly at odds with rational thought and thus are prone to dogmatism. If I can be convinced that ignorance and stupidity can be truly socially engineered away on massive scale, I'll definitely renounce my pessimism.

You know when I was an intern I saw a guy in the ER who had shoved a light bulb up his ass. The light bulb had shattered and tore his innards. He was convinced by his friends that this was a cool way to derive sexual pleasure. Now unless you can come up with a better analogy, IMO the light bulb represents religion and well over 90% of the earth's population want to shove it up their ass in spite of centuries of rational thought.

I'm afraid that I have to disagree with you.

 Thanks.

1. It can happen, we're just extremely far from it.  But simply take Norway and imagine following their lead around the world.  It can happen. 

2. You're better off keeping your pessimism on this one.  But you can at least try while being pessimistic.

The optimist says "the glass is half full," the pessimist says "the glass is half empty," the Rational Response Squad member says "that glass is bigger than it needs to be."

Well I know my life is good. But this world is pretty fucked up. Darfur, Nigeria, Kosovo, Iraq, and many other places are totally wigged out. I have trouble deciding just how "far" we've really come. Sure, I step out of my heated house, drive through the winter weather in comfort, enter my heated office, blah blah, but is it better or just different than living as a subsistence farmer?

Whoa. RRS is an interesting place with an intruiging mission, but aren't you overstating its contribution to society just a littlle? Those fucking nutcases from Scientology have more influence than RRS. Not that you guys should stop or anything.

Contribution was a poor choice of words. I stand corrected.