Debate: Noah's Ark, Jonah and the Whale, Adam and Eve....Do you believe in fairy tales?
Side: No, it should not be believed

At least religion offers moral guidelinesI don't really see crude coercion as moral guidelines. We also don't do those things because their bad things to do, if religion didn't tell us not to commit those acts where would we learn it from?Religion didn't come up with the idea that killing is bad, society did. And then society came up with religion. It should be pretty obvious that for any society to function well there cannot be indiscriminate rape, theft, murder, and such. I think you'll find the teachings of Jesus, such as "Do unto others as you would have do unto you", don't threaten people with eternal damnation.Comparatively Jesus was a much better kind of guy than god is, but he was the one who pushed the idea of eternal damnation in the first place. Understandable, as he was trying to civilize a bunch of savages, but still his message wasn't all light and love and forgiveness; he had a dark side. Would you rather sit next to someone on the bus who's thinking "the only thing stopping me mugging you is the lawI don't think the atheist ideology has a lot of concern for the law. If an atheist is or isn't mugging you it probably doesn't have a whole lot to do with his atheism. So I don't think your example works, here. But if it did, I would rather have someone withhold a mugging for the sake of the law (because that's actually based on something real) and not for the sake of religious law. That's ridiculous, you're saying religion intentionally caused "separation, segregation, competition and division" because it makes people think something else to other people?Yes I am. I think. I don't really understand the bit about thinking something to others. Likewise I could say atheism causes separation, segregation, competition and division" for the same reasons.Atheism is the default state of being. Religion was created and imposed and used for discrimination, whereas a lack of religion has existed since the dawn of man. In fact atheists are worse because they feel a moral right to insult people with religious beliefs because they are "curing" them of "stupidity".I can't speak for all atheists and all religions, but generally I give as much respect to someone/something as it does to me. Religions like Christianity and Islam do not respect me, in fact they make a point of insulting people like me, so I should not be required to respect them. I feel a moral right to insult someone who insults me, yes, and i think this is more valid than a religious person claiming the moral right to insult someone because a book written by some long-dead desert nomads tells them they have that right. how do you know it was the whole population "working together" and not some megalomaniac of a dictator who saw himself as God?Because god responded to this "insult" by destroying our language, shattering and fragmenting it so that it would be next to impossible for people to work together. If people hadn't been working together, making people unable to communicate with one another would have been a pretty useless response on gods part. But also, it's in the Bible: "1 And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech. 2 And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there. 3 And they said one to another, Go to, let us make brick, and burn them thoroughly. And they had brick for stone, and slime had they for morter. 4 And they said, Go to, let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth."Either way, the real moral lesson of the Tower of Babel is dont idolise yourself.What? The Tower of Babel was constructed for the purpose of uniting and empowering humanity, as well as to scope out Heaven. God saw what was going on, and was afraid of what they might have achieved, working together as they were. According to Genisis, he said: "5 And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded. 6 And the Lord said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do. 7 Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech. 8 So the Lord scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off to build the city."Dick move, man! This might have been about teaching humility the same way a mob boss beating the shit out of one of his thugs is about teaching humility, but I don't see how working together for the greater good is "idolizing" ourselves, and I don't see why God felt the need to be such a prick about it. The Great Flood says, only good people deserve to live (to put it bluntly).And if you followed that moral model you would quickly find yourself in prison for life without the chance for parole. Which was kind of my point. I think it's more of don't make people into slaves.A fair point, but my own point about how god went about getting what he wanted in this regard goes undisputed; suffering, violence, and threats are god's tools of the trade. If god made us in his image, that might explain why we're such a violent species; if we made god in our image, which i think is more likely, that explains why he is burdened with all of our fatal flaws as humans; pride, anger, cruelty, and violence. It all makes sense, when you think about it. God is such a savage, violent entity because he was created by uncivilized barbarians.