Topic: Why society needs belief in an afterlife

[The God Delusion]

Does anyone have any counter arguments: http://whitecrowbooks.com/staffordbetty/entry/why_society_needs_belief_in_an_afterlife/

To put it simply, if a society stops believing in an afterlife where its members are held accountable before God (or Higher Power) for what they do, they will tend to drift from the moral and cultural norms that are crucial to its existence.  As Ivan said in Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov, “If God does not exist, then everything is permitted.”  This drift, I believe, is occurring right now in our own country, especially among our youth.

It is not fashionable to say this, but every society needs absolutes.  Nazi Germany didn’t have any.  It was prepared to violate its treaty obligations if they became inconvenient.  And they did.  It was Himmler who asked the question, “What, after all, compels us to keep our promises?”  The answer was, Nothing.

[AxeGrrl]

It was Himmler who asked the question, “What, after all, compels us to keep our promises?”  The answer was, Nothing.

Well, didn't the Nazis who were Christians and the Christians who supported and helped the Nazis have 'God' to compel them?

Yeah, that helped.  C'mon.

This is the oldest and most vacuous argument in the book. Even WITH a 'belief in a higher power', people do evil things.  So, what's the compelling argument for belief then?

[worldslaziestbusker]

Does anyone have any counter arguments:

To put it simply, if a society stops believing in an afterlife where its members are held accountable before God (or Higher Power) for what they do, they will tend to drift from the moral and cultural norms that are crucial to its existence.

Norway.
Denmark.
The increase in enfranchisement and equality that have come with each decrease in religious interference in politics in Australia.

As Ivan said in Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov, “If God does not exist, then everything is permitted.”

I've read Dostoevsky, and couldn't find this quote.  Can you cite the page?

This drift, I believe, is occurring right now in our own country, especially among our youth.

Positive claim.  Evidence or GTFO.

It is not fashionable to say this, but every society needs absolutes. Nazi Germany didn’t have any.

Nazi Germany had absolutes regarding racial and cultural purity, and the certainty with which those certainties were pursued/enforced caused problems. 
 

It was prepared to violate its treaty obligations if they became inconvenient. And they did.

Many nations do this, and it makes me wonder why they bother signing treaties, but Nazi Germany was not unique in this.  Either way, this doesn't make a good example of a nation (complete with absolutes) being bad in the absence of belief in an afterlife.  That Germany under the National Socialists (they never referred to themselves as Nazis, as it was a derogatory term, an abbreviated form of the name Ignatius, a childrens' character of limited intelligence) was not actually a nation lacking belief in an afterlife seems to have slipped the attention of the author, who has attempted a sleight of brain by using this example.


Did you really need help with this, or were you just making conversation?

[ting-bu-dong]

The Himmler quote brings up mostly religious sites in the first few pages of search results. The assertion that Nazi Germany was an atheist regime is outright false, for which there are multiple lines of evidence, beginning with small things like 'Gott mit uns' belt buckles and ending with guidelines for book burnings which include both books promoting materialism and evolution and those which criticise Christianity.

The idea that society falls apart without religion is also false, as evidence by the hellholes that are Western Europe, Scandinavia, and most other developed countries other than the US. Indicators of societal health generally negatively correlate with religiosity and faith. Not sure which studies do the best job of showing this, but this is a start. Which is not a surprise given the amount of time and effort religions tend to put into impeding medical and social progress, such as opposition to the HPV vaccine, safe and legal abortion, sex education, and many more.

[klintistvud]

If there is an afterlife, you need to believe in/(hope for) a specific kind of one. The one that rewards for what you or society think is good behavior. So apparently it doesn't matter what you believe in, as long as consequences of that belief are desired by those who propose "the need for belief in an afterlife". 

Why do we need that kind of belief? If all that matters are consequences, we could just as easily be blindly followers of utilitarianism or whatever ethical system someone proposes as long as what has been fed to us is accepted without questioning.

[jmars]

As Ivan said in Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov, “If God does not exist, then everything is permitted.”

I've read Dostoevsky, and couldn't find this quote.  Can you cite the page?

He didn't say it actually.

http://www.infidels.org/kiosk/article42.html

[Johnny Slick]

Even if it was said in some other novel, quoting stuff like that is *really* suspicious. It's like quoting Shakespeare as saying "Let's kill all the lawyers", which is something a *character* said in Henry VI. This in turn is like saying that the guy who wrote the screenplay to Schindler's List wrote that Jews are evil or whatever because he made the Ralph Fiennes character say it. Narrative fiction has characters say all kinds of things that the author does not agree with.

[Ravenhull]

You mean like how some folks use a Voldermort quote to malign JKRowling and her creation?

Overall, it's just another case of them claiming that you can only be moral if DOYC* looking over your shoulder.

*Diety Of Your Choice

[DeepGlue]

This argument also assumes that humans have a natural inclination to behave badly towards each other and that the only way to overcome this is for them to believe in a higher power. Pretty insulting on both counts.

[Chew]

It is not fashionable to say this, but every society needs absolutes.  Nazi Germany didn’t have any.

Tell that to the German Evangelical Church.

[random poet]

I'm not sure how many times we need to debunk the "no morals without god" argument, but apparently it will always be n+1.

[jack wooster]

Just look at the crime stats in very religious country versus non religious, no 'afterlife premium' shows.

[Angra Mainyu]

This argument also assumes that humans have a natural inclination to behave badly towards each other and that the only way to overcome this is for them to believe in a higher power. Pretty insulting on both counts.

QFT.

Since humans evolved from other social animals over millions of years - long before there was any belief in afterlife punishments -, it's very odd to think that human society would fall apart without them - not to mention that there are examples of human societies mostly without such beliefs, and which do not fall apart as a result...

[Fulcrum]

This requires an impressive ignorance of history, considering how many conflicts and one-sided genocides have occurred at the behest of , or sponsored by religion.
What society needs is more self-awareness and empathy.

[jack wooster]

What society needs is more self-awareness and empathy.

This is the real point, ignored by the morals from God idea.