Bible thumper with anti-gay logic. Help me out here, guys.

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Originally Posted by TimeDragon97

I don't really think Siddhartha Gautama was crazy.

Most of characters in the Bible would be thrown into mental institutions for schizophrenia. Abram/Abraham, for example, heard voices in his head which nearly drove him to kill his own son.

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I don't think he was real, but depending on whose account of him you believe it could go either way. Some say that he talked to deities of sorts and some say he ate poisonous mushrooms that he knew would kill him in order to be polite or to pass on some kind of teaching.

If you two don't think he was crazy though, why aren't you doing the same? He was definitely at least a little crazy when he was being an ascetic, the story goes that he almost starved himself to death and then realized that that was not the way to live.

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Originally Posted by StonedApe

I don't think he was real, but depending on whose account of him you believe it could go either way. Some say that he talked to deities of sorts and some say he ate poisonous mushrooms that he knew would kill him in order to be polite or to pass on some kind of teaching.

If you two don't think he was crazy though, why aren't you doing the same? He was definitely at least a little crazy when he was being an ascetic, the story goes that he almost starved himself to death and then realized that that was not the way to live.

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I don't know a lot about his life or if he was a real person, but the description "abandoned his comfortable aristocratic existence" doesn't sound crazy to me. That doesn't mean I'd want to do it, but it's not really crazy.

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Originally Posted by Woodstock

I don't know a lot about his life or if he was a real person, but the description "abandoned his comfortable aristocratic existence" doesn't sound crazy to me. That doesn't mean I'd want to do it, but it's not really crazy.

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He did more than abandon a comfortable life, he supposedly decided to do the opposite, live in total poverty. Less than poverty, asceticism, basically turning the body into an enemy. then he goes and finds the middle way and abandons the extremes. It sounds like it was made up. If he was a real person his story seems exaggerated.

The story of his life after he starts teaching is very well documented. The culture was literate, and they wrote down everything he did all day long. There is next to zero chance the man did not exist.

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Originally Posted by sloth

I'm saying that this man has made the argument that is within the quotes there, and I am asking for your opinions on it. I have been combating this guy's bad logic for days, and I would love some insight.

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There actually wasn't a single logical deduction in there, just a bunch of baseless, unsupported and mostly irrelevant assertions. Show him the following graph:

http://i53.tinypic.com/2rogumr.jpg

Really, though, you're going to have to make some counter claims if you want to get anywhere. Just saying "Nuh-uh, prove it!" at every turn isn't going to get anywhere and you're just going to come off as not having anything real to say.

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Originally Posted by Woodstock

What's the point of arguing with him? Nothing is going to change.

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Nothing is going to change if nothing is ever argued. People can and do change their minds.

And honestly, quoting disagreeable Bible verses is probably not going to do much good. You will always be "taking it out of context" or the phrase will be "subject to interpretation" or it will simply "not apply to today's society" or a thousand and one other excuses to weasel away from behaving in a consistent and intellectually honest fashion.

SPOILER WARNING: TANGENTIAL RAMBLING

Spoiler for Arguing against "religious" claims:

Christians do not give any more of a shit about what the Bible actually says than any atheist. Finding this or that Bible quote that could be seen to support what they're saying is just a way for the religious person to ascribe divine origin to their assertions. Psychologically it is a way for them to defer the source of the assertion to a god, which has the benefit of elevating the authority of the [supposed] claimant to that of a supreme and holy source which couldn't possibly be wrong (after all, he makes all the rules.) In their mind it removes the responsibility of supporting their claims -- now you're arguing with god and in order to do that, you have to disprove the whole religion. But that's a ridiculous task and attempting to do it will just make you look like some kind of close minded bigot trying to force your beliefs down everyone's throat.

This is why quoting the Bible is of no use. He already knows what it says, it says everything he's saying and you have to kill god in order to prove otherwise. Really the supposition that any given belief is a "religious" belief is an inherently dishonest rhetorical strategy.

I know it will not convince him, but here is why I posted all the APA articles,,, he says gay=crazy,,, yet the actual diagnostic manual for mental illness say that is bullshit. You have a clear upper hand if he would care.

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Originally Posted by sivason

The story of his life after he starts teaching is very well documented. The culture was literate, and they wrote down everything he did all day long. There is next to zero chance the man did not exist.

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The history of Indian gurus is questionable. It seems to me that his life was very exaggerated in order to make a point. It doesn't really matter either way. I'm just very skeptical of religious movements. The more I learn about mythology the more it makes sense for these people to be made up. He could have been real, but the myth of him has had a different impact than I think he intended. Creating a religion, a movement, a worldview is quite a different thing from awakening.

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Originally Posted by StonedApe

The history of Indian gurus is questionable. It seems to me that his life was very exaggerated in order to make a point. It doesn't really matter either way. I'm just very skeptical of religious movements. The more I learn about mythology the more it makes sense for these people to be made up. He could have been real, but the myth of him has had a different impact than I think he intended. Creating a religion, a movement, a worldview is quite a different thing from awakening.

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Good point. He did exist, but what kind of alterations have been made to the story? To my understanding, he told his followers that he must not be worshipped and not to form a religion around one man. they waited until the day he died, and proceeded to completely ignore that request. They began trying to solidify and establish a religion on the same day he died.