Health and Religion

[CoinCube]

Leftists attack Attorney General Barr for denouncing ‘militant secularists’ in Notre Dame speech
https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/leftists-attack-attorney-general-barr-for-denouncing-militant-secularists-in-notre-dame-speech

October 16, 2019 (LifeSiteNews) – U.S. Attorney General William Barr delivered forceful remarks at the University of Notre Dame on Friday regarding the defense of religious liberty against “militant secularists,” for which a chorus of left-wing media voices have denounced him.

“From the Founding Era onward, there was strong consensus about the centrality of religious liberty in the United States,” Barr said in his speech. “The imperative of protecting religious freedom was not just a nod in the direction of piety. It reflects the Framers’ belief that religion was indispensable to sustaining our free system of government.”

“By and large, the Founding generation’s view of human nature was drawn from the Classical Christian tradition,” he explained. “These practical Statesmen understood that individuals, while having the potential for great good, also had the capacity for great evil. Men are subject to powerful passions and appetites, and, if unrestrained, are capable of ruthlessly riding roughshod over their neighbors and the community at large.”

“No society can exist without some means for restraining individual rapacity,” Barr continued, with the Founders’ chosen means being a “social order” whose values “flow from a transcendent Supreme Being,” rather than the “coercive power of government.”

He argued that those values helped America to become an unparalleled force for liberty and human progress, but are now at risk from the “steady erosion of our traditional Judeo-Christian moral system and a comprehensive effort to drive it from the public square” by “militant secularists.”

“By any honest assessment, the consequences of this moral upheaval have been grim,” Barr lamented. “Virtually every measure of social pathology” – out-of-wedlock births, substance abuse, depression and mental illness, suicide, and more – “continues to gain ground.”
The secularization of America “is not decay; it is organized destruction,” Barr charged. “Secularists, and their allies among the ‘progressives,’ have marshalled all the force of mass communications, popular culture, the entertainment industry, and academia in an unremitting assault on religion and traditional values. These instruments are used not only to affirmatively promote secular orthodoxy, but also drown out and silence opposing voices, and to attack viciously and hold up to ridicule any dissenters.”

This, in turn, has transformed the state from safeguarding liberty to “mitigate the social costs of personal misconduct and irresponsibility,” he said. “So the reaction to growing illegitimacy is not sexual responsibility, but abortion. The reaction to drug addiction is safe injection sites. The solution to the breakdown of the family is for the State to set itself up as the ersatz husband for single mothers and the ersatz father to their children.”

Despite this grim picture, Barr told the audience there is “hope for moral renewal in our country,” but it will take challenging work, and concerned Americans “cannot sit back and just hope the pendulum is going to swing back toward sanity.”
...

William Barr Speech
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=cySSyFSaGzg

[steve88]

I have recently adopted a beliefs and psychology from the Hindu faith. It has helped me a great deal understand why bad things happen to good people. The law of karma has given me see a different perspective on life. I also think traditional therapy like CBT and other western mental health techniques can also make people much happier. I was told I would face a 6 month wait on the Irish national health service to see a counsellor but ended up using an online therapist with this company: https://anamcaratherapy.com/. it is sad to have to pay privately for good mental health care, the government should do better.

[CoinCube]

Pew: U.S. Christian Population in Freefall, 12% Drop in Ten Years
https://www.breitbart.com/faith/2019/10/18/pew-u-s-christian-population-in-freefall-12-drop-in-ten-years/

Christianity in the United States is declining at an unprecedented rate, a new study by the Pew Research Council revealed Thursday, and the percentage of Christians in the country has hit an all-time low.

In just ten years the percentage of U.S. adults that identify as Christians dropped by a remarkable 12 percent, Pew found, from to 77 percent to just 65 percent, the lowest point in the nation’s 243-year history.

Protestantism and Catholicism have both suffered significant losses, with the number of Protestants dropping from 51 percent in 2009 to just 43 percent today, while the number of Catholics has fallen from nearly a quarter of the population (23 percent) to just one-in-five (20 percent) since 2009.

During the same period, the number of religious “nones” — those who self-identify as atheist, agnostic, or “nothing in particular” — has shot up by a stunning 17 percent and this group now makes up more than a quarter of the population (26 percent).

The number of atheists in the country has doubled since 2009, from just 2 percent of the population to the current 4 percent. Agnostics now make up 5 percent of the adult population, up from just 3 percent in 2009, while those who describe their religion as “nothing in particular” has leapt from 12 percent to 17 percent in this ten-year period.

In absolute terms, the number of religiously unaffiliated adults in the U.S. has grown by almost 30 million since 2009.

The increase of the religiously unaffiliated has been most acute among young adults, resulting in a markedly less religious generation. Fewer than half of Millennials (49 percent) describe themselves as Christians, while four-in-ten identify as religious “nones” and another ten percent identify with non-Christian faiths.

Along with the trend toward religious disaffiliation, a similar trend away from religious practice has also emerged over the past decade, Pew found. The number of regular worship attenders (who say they attend religious services at least once or twice a month) dropped by 7 percentage points since 2009, offset by a comparable rise in the number who now say they attend religious services less often (if at all).

Whereas in 2009 regular worship attenders outnumbered those who attend services only occasionally (or not at all) by a margin of 52 percent to 47 percent, today those figures are reversed, Pew discovered. Now a majority of Americans say they attend religious services a few times a year or less (54 percent) while 45 percent say they attend at least once a month.

[iamsheikhadil]

I have recently adopted a beliefs and psychology from the Hindu faith. It has helped me a great deal understand why bad things happen to good people. The law of karma has given me see a different perspective on life. I also think traditional therapy like CBT and other western mental health techniques can also make people much happier. I was told I would face a 6 month wait on the Irish national health service to see a counsellor but ended up using an online therapist with this company: https://anamcaratherapy.com/. it is sad to have to pay privately for good mental health care, the government should do better.

As an agnostic I would say that it is easier for me to accept things as they are rather than trying to find a philosophical reason behind every cause. But when I am depressed I search for the reason and actually I believe that things might have a cause because nothing can be in action without a cause. The the philosophy of karma is actually indeed very soothing towards stress and it feels like every pain is a way to wipe the past sins and to be free from a stain in the loop of space time.

[BADecker]

I have recently adopted a beliefs and psychology from the Hindu faith. It has helped me a great deal understand why bad things happen to good people. The law of karma has given me see a different perspective on life. I also think traditional therapy like CBT and other western mental health techniques can also make people much happier. I was told I would face a 6 month wait on the Irish national health service to see a counsellor but ended up using an online therapist with this company: https://anamcaratherapy.com/. it is sad to have to pay privately for good mental health care, the government should do better.

As an agnostic I would say that it is easier for me to accept things as they are rather than trying to find a philosophical reason behind every cause. But when I am depressed I search for the reason and actually I believe that things might have a cause because nothing can be in action without a cause. The the philosophy of karma is actually indeed very soothing towards stress and it feels like every pain is a way to wipe the past sins and to be free from a stain in the loop of space time.

An important note here is this. Thinking and understanding about things doesn't make them happen. The construct of the universe and the physical laws thereof, make even deep thinking something that doesn't easily cause changes in the physical universe. The changes only come about when the thinking is dedicated thinking, and the thinker gets to work.

[CoinCube]

Happy Sabbath Everyone

Go Light Your World - Kathy Troccoli
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2igaRoH2ZnY

[Astargath]

I have recently adopted a beliefs and psychology from the Hindu faith. It has helped me a great deal understand why bad things happen to good people. The law of karma has given me see a different perspective on life. I also think traditional therapy like CBT and other western mental health techniques can also make people much happier. I was told I would face a 6 month wait on the Irish national health service to see a counsellor but ended up using an online therapist with this company: https://anamcaratherapy.com/. it is sad to have to pay privately for good mental health care, the government should do better.

As an agnostic I would say that it is easier for me to accept things as they are rather than trying to find a philosophical reason behind every cause. But when I am depressed I search for the reason and actually I believe that things might have a cause because nothing can be in action without a cause. The the philosophy of karma is actually indeed very soothing towards stress and it feels like every pain is a way to wipe the past sins and to be free from a stain in the loop of space time.

''because nothing can be in action without a cause'' No one knows this and there are no experiments possible to prove it right now. Physicists, for instance, do think true randomness exists as predicting when a radioactive atom will radioact is impossible. Perhaps because we don't know how or because true randomness exists.

[BADecker]

I have recently adopted a beliefs and psychology from the Hindu faith. It has helped me a great deal understand why bad things happen to good people. The law of karma has given me see a different perspective on life. I also think traditional therapy like CBT and other western mental health techniques can also make people much happier. I was told I would face a 6 month wait on the Irish national health service to see a counsellor but ended up using an online therapist with this company: https://anamcaratherapy.com/. it is sad to have to pay privately for good mental health care, the government should do better.

As an agnostic I would say that it is easier for me to accept things as they are rather than trying to find a philosophical reason behind every cause. But when I am depressed I search for the reason and actually I believe that things might have a cause because nothing can be in action without a cause. The the philosophy of karma is actually indeed very soothing towards stress and it feels like every pain is a way to wipe the past sins and to be free from a stain in the loop of space time.

''because nothing can be in action without a cause'' No one knows this and there are no experiments possible to prove it right now. Physicists, for instance, do think true randomness exists as predicting when a radioactive atom will radioact is impossible. Perhaps because we don't know how or because true randomness exists.

All that is, is scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity. You don't need radiation to think that pure random might exist. All you need is to watch the way a leaf blows in the breeze on a warm summer day. You have no idea where the molecules of air that hit the leaf are coming from, or where they are going. It seems like pure random.

The difference between the physics of the twisting, blown leaf, and atomic radiation are, we understand the principles of the physics of the leaf a whole lot more than we understand nuclear physics.

Science probably will never understand the physics of the radioactive atom until they understand that the nothingness of empty space is filled with a material that is entirely different than matter... matter which is essentially energy with complex activities going on between the parts, all held in place by the "material" of empty space.

[Astargath]

I have recently adopted a beliefs and psychology from the Hindu faith. It has helped me a great deal understand why bad things happen to good people. The law of karma has given me see a different perspective on life. I also think traditional therapy like CBT and other western mental health techniques can also make people much happier. I was told I would face a 6 month wait on the Irish national health service to see a counsellor but ended up using an online therapist with this company: https://anamcaratherapy.com/. it is sad to have to pay privately for good mental health care, the government should do better.

As an agnostic I would say that it is easier for me to accept things as they are rather than trying to find a philosophical reason behind every cause. But when I am depressed I search for the reason and actually I believe that things might have a cause because nothing can be in action without a cause. The the philosophy of karma is actually indeed very soothing towards stress and it feels like every pain is a way to wipe the past sins and to be free from a stain in the loop of space time.

''because nothing can be in action without a cause'' No one knows this and there are no experiments possible to prove it right now. Physicists, for instance, do think true randomness exists as predicting when a radioactive atom will radioact is impossible. Perhaps because we don't know how or because true randomness exists.

All that is, is scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity. You don't need radiation to think that pure random might exist. All you need is to watch the way a leaf blows in the breeze on a warm summer day. You have no idea where the molecules of air that hit the leaf are coming from, or where they are going. It seems like pure random.

The difference between the physics of the twisting, blown leaf, and atomic radiation are, we understand the principles of the physics of the leaf a whole lot more than we understand nuclear physics.

Science probably will never understand the physics of the radioactive atom until they understand that the nothingness of empty space is filled with a material that is entirely different than matter... matter which is essentially energy with complex activities going on between the parts, all held in place by the "material" of empty space.

''All that is, is scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity.'' That's a baseless assertion, unfortunately, you cannot prove that.

[af_newbie]

I have recently adopted a beliefs and psychology from the Hindu faith. It has helped me a great deal understand why bad things happen to good people. The law of karma has given me see a different perspective on life. I also think traditional therapy like CBT and other western mental health techniques can also make people much happier. I was told I would face a 6 month wait on the Irish national health service to see a counsellor but ended up using an online therapist with this company: https://anamcaratherapy.com/. it is sad to have to pay privately for good mental health care, the government should do better.

As an agnostic I would say that it is easier for me to accept things as they are rather than trying to find a philosophical reason behind every cause. But when I am depressed I search for the reason and actually I believe that things might have a cause because nothing can be in action without a cause. The the philosophy of karma is actually indeed very soothing towards stress and it feels like every pain is a way to wipe the past sins and to be free from a stain in the loop of space time.

''because nothing can be in action without a cause'' No one knows this and there are no experiments possible to prove it right now. Physicists, for instance, do think true randomness exists as predicting when a radioactive atom will radioact is impossible. Perhaps because we don't know how or because true randomness exists.

All that is, is scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity. You don't need radiation to think that pure random might exist. All you need is to watch the way a leaf blows in the breeze on a warm summer day. You have no idea where the molecules of air that hit the leaf are coming from, or where they are going. It seems like pure random.

The difference between the physics of the twisting, blown leaf, and atomic radiation are, we understand the principles of the physics of the leaf a whole lot more than we understand nuclear physics.

Science probably will never understand the physics of the radioactive atom until they understand that the nothingness of empty space is filled with a material that is entirely different than matter... matter which is essentially energy with complex activities going on between the parts, all held in place by the "material" of empty space.

At the macro level universe appears to be governed by the cause and effect.

However, at a very fundamental level, it is non-deterministic.  The underlying quantum mechanisms might be emergent in nature and non-deterministic.

In other words, stuff happens and no one can predict the outcome.

People are actively working on uncovering that veil.  What happens below Planck's time and length?  How the laws of nature, gravity came about?  What and how many other dimensions are out there?  What and how many other universes are out there?  What is the nature of the substrate that causes the universes to form?  Right now, it looks like we are stuck on the 4D brane.

Read some more on it, very interesting stuff.  It will open your mind.

As for "science probably will never understand the physics", remember what Philipp von Jolly said to Max Plank in 1878: "in this field (Physics), almost everything is already discovered, and all that remains is to fill a few unimportant holes."   Maybe another Plank or Einstein has not been born yet or maybe he or she is playing is some sandbox right now.  Never say never.

It does not matter what people believe, what Thor, Zeus, Jesus, Yahweh, and Allah (aka people) want. 

Science will progress.  Religion will not.

[BADecker]

All that is, is scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity. You don't need radiation to think that pure random might exist. All you need is to watch the way a leaf blows in the breeze on a warm summer day. You have no idea where the molecules of air that hit the leaf are coming from, or where they are going. It seems like pure random.

The difference between the physics of the twisting, blown leaf, and atomic radiation are, we understand the principles of the physics of the leaf a whole lot more than we understand nuclear physics.

Science probably will never understand the physics of the radioactive atom until they understand that the nothingness of empty space is filled with a material that is entirely different than matter... matter which is essentially energy with complex activities going on between the parts, all held in place by the "material" of empty space.

''All that is, is scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity.'' That's a baseless assertion, unfortunately, you cannot prove that.

You need to keep up with science. All you need to do is Google "refurbishing CERN." Scientists themselves are showing you that they don't know enough about radioactivity. Nobody has to prove it to know it.

[Astargath]

All that is, is scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity. You don't need radiation to think that pure random might exist. All you need is to watch the way a leaf blows in the breeze on a warm summer day. You have no idea where the molecules of air that hit the leaf are coming from, or where they are going. It seems like pure random.

The difference between the physics of the twisting, blown leaf, and atomic radiation are, we understand the principles of the physics of the leaf a whole lot more than we understand nuclear physics.

Science probably will never understand the physics of the radioactive atom until they understand that the nothingness of empty space is filled with a material that is entirely different than matter... matter which is essentially energy with complex activities going on between the parts, all held in place by the "material" of empty space.

''All that is, is scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity.'' That's a baseless assertion, unfortunately, you cannot prove that.

You need to keep up with science. All you need to do is Google "refurbishing CERN." Scientists themselves are showing you that they don't know enough about radioactivity. Nobody has to prove it to know it.

Fallacy, scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity doesn't automatically mean, true randomness doesn't exist. As far as we can tell, it does, right now.

[CoinCube]

Fallacy, scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity doesn't automatically mean, true randomness doesn't exist. As far as we can tell, it does, right now.

It means that science cannot currently or likely ever answer the question. Whether you choose to believe randomness exists or not is ultimately not a scientific question.

Is the universe a perfect order of God or chaos?

The leaf floating in the wind was a good example. We now more or less understand the forces involved and if we really wanted to could at least in theory someday develop a computer program coupled with a way of measuring all of the wind currents in a given area and understand exactly how and why the leaf was moving the way it was maybe even predict its future movement in advance.

We cannot currently predict the exact time a particular radioactive atom will rip itself apart. Is this an example like the leaf where improved understandings of the motions of protons and neutrons and their interactions with surrounding fields and other atoms would change things or is it forever outside of our knowledge and hence "random"?

You can argue it either way but it's not a scientific argument.

Science will progress.  Religion will not.

Science will march forward but what it will march into will be determined by the religion of the scientists and society at large. Science is just accumulated practical experience and knowledge. Ultimately it is power, power over ourselves, our fellow man, and the natural world.

It is the way we use and deploy that power which will determine if we progress into a better future or build something nightmarish.

[BADecker]

All that is, is scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity. You don't need radiation to think that pure random might exist. All you need is to watch the way a leaf blows in the breeze on a warm summer day. You have no idea where the molecules of air that hit the leaf are coming from, or where they are going. It seems like pure random.

The difference between the physics of the twisting, blown leaf, and atomic radiation are, we understand the principles of the physics of the leaf a whole lot more than we understand nuclear physics.

Science probably will never understand the physics of the radioactive atom until they understand that the nothingness of empty space is filled with a material that is entirely different than matter... matter which is essentially energy with complex activities going on between the parts, all held in place by the "material" of empty space.

''All that is, is scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity.'' That's a baseless assertion, unfortunately, you cannot prove that.

You need to keep up with science. All you need to do is Google "refurbishing CERN." Scientists themselves are showing you that they don't know enough about radioactivity. Nobody has to prove it to know it.

Fallacy, scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity doesn't automatically mean, true randomness doesn't exist. As far as we can tell, it does, right now.

But you seem to think that not knowing enough about radioactivity means they know everything about radioactivity. Why? Because you are using it as an example that pure random DOES exist.

[af_newbie]

Fallacy, scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity doesn't automatically mean, true randomness doesn't exist. As far as we can tell, it does, right now.

It means that science cannot currently or likely ever answer the question. Whether you choose to believe randomness exists or not is ultimately not a scientific question.

Is the universe a perfect order of God or chaos?

The leaf floating in the wind was a good example. We now more or less understand the forces involved and if we really wanted to could at least in theory someday develop a computer program coupled with a way of measuring all of the wind currents in a given area and understand exactly how and why the leaf was moving the way it was maybe even predict its future movement in advance.

We cannot currently predict the exact time a particular radioactive atom will rip itself apart. Is this an example like the leaf where improved understandings of the motions of protons and neutrons and their interactions with surrounding fields and other atoms would change things or is it forever outside of our knowledge and hence "random"?

You can argue it either way but it's not a scientific argument.

Science will progress.  Religion will not.

Science will march forward but what it will march into will be determined by the religion of the scientists and society at large. Science is just accumulated practical experience and knowledge. Ultimately it is power, power over ourselves, our fellow man, and the natural world.

It is the way we use and deploy that power which will determine if we progress into a better future or build something nightmarish.

We will progress despite religion slowing us down.

Religions will be completely obsolete in 100 years, and people who will still suffer from these delusions will be diagnosed and properly treated.

[Astargath]

All that is, is scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity. You don't need radiation to think that pure random might exist. All you need is to watch the way a leaf blows in the breeze on a warm summer day. You have no idea where the molecules of air that hit the leaf are coming from, or where they are going. It seems like pure random.

The difference between the physics of the twisting, blown leaf, and atomic radiation are, we understand the principles of the physics of the leaf a whole lot more than we understand nuclear physics.

Science probably will never understand the physics of the radioactive atom until they understand that the nothingness of empty space is filled with a material that is entirely different than matter... matter which is essentially energy with complex activities going on between the parts, all held in place by the "material" of empty space.

''All that is, is scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity.'' That's a baseless assertion, unfortunately, you cannot prove that.

You need to keep up with science. All you need to do is Google "refurbishing CERN." Scientists themselves are showing you that they don't know enough about radioactivity. Nobody has to prove it to know it.

Fallacy, scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity doesn't automatically mean, true randomness doesn't exist. As far as we can tell, it does, right now.

But you seem to think that not knowing enough about radioactivity means they know everything about radioactivity. Why? Because you are using it as an example that pure random DOES exist.

According to our current understanding, yes, true randomness does exist. If we adopt your philosophy of only trusting things that we know for sure, as in 100% factual, then we wouldn't trust anything.

[BADecker]

All that is, is scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity. You don't need radiation to think that pure random might exist. All you need is to watch the way a leaf blows in the breeze on a warm summer day. You have no idea where the molecules of air that hit the leaf are coming from, or where they are going. It seems like pure random.

The difference between the physics of the twisting, blown leaf, and atomic radiation are, we understand the principles of the physics of the leaf a whole lot more than we understand nuclear physics.

Science probably will never understand the physics of the radioactive atom until they understand that the nothingness of empty space is filled with a material that is entirely different than matter... matter which is essentially energy with complex activities going on between the parts, all held in place by the "material" of empty space.

''All that is, is scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity.'' That's a baseless assertion, unfortunately, you cannot prove that.

You need to keep up with science. All you need to do is Google "refurbishing CERN." Scientists themselves are showing you that they don't know enough about radioactivity. Nobody has to prove it to know it.

Fallacy, scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity doesn't automatically mean, true randomness doesn't exist. As far as we can tell, it does, right now.

But you seem to think that not knowing enough about radioactivity means they know everything about radioactivity. Why? Because you are using it as an example that pure random DOES exist.

According to our current understanding, yes, true randomness does exist. If we adopt your philosophy of only trusting things that we know for sure, as in 100% factual, then we wouldn't trust anything.

According to our current understanding, there is doubt. It's a possibility only. But the multitudes of observable C&E facts of billions of people daily, completely destroys the idea of pure random, scientifically. Even science knows that they are at a point of odds where pure random doesn't exist... by the odds.

It's like, "I know I just might win that lottery... because somebody has to win." But in pure random, nobody knows that there will ever be a winner.

[CoinCube]

We will progress despite religion slowing us down.

Religions will be completely obsolete in 100 years, and people who will still suffer from these delusions will be diagnosed and properly treated.

Sounds like you envision a future world where the Marxist or a variant thereof take over. The only way to implement such "diagnosis and treatment" is via an all powerful state that forced it upon the religious. I imagine entire cities such as those of those of the Amish would need to be taken into police custody and "properly treated".

Such a future is very possible I will give you that.

[Astargath]

All that is, is scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity. You don't need radiation to think that pure random might exist. All you need is to watch the way a leaf blows in the breeze on a warm summer day. You have no idea where the molecules of air that hit the leaf are coming from, or where they are going. It seems like pure random.

The difference between the physics of the twisting, blown leaf, and atomic radiation are, we understand the principles of the physics of the leaf a whole lot more than we understand nuclear physics.

Science probably will never understand the physics of the radioactive atom until they understand that the nothingness of empty space is filled with a material that is entirely different than matter... matter which is essentially energy with complex activities going on between the parts, all held in place by the "material" of empty space.

''All that is, is scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity.'' That's a baseless assertion, unfortunately, you cannot prove that.

You need to keep up with science. All you need to do is Google "refurbishing CERN." Scientists themselves are showing you that they don't know enough about radioactivity. Nobody has to prove it to know it.

Fallacy, scientists not knowing enough about radioactivity doesn't automatically mean, true randomness doesn't exist. As far as we can tell, it does, right now.

But you seem to think that not knowing enough about radioactivity means they know everything about radioactivity. Why? Because you are using it as an example that pure random DOES exist.

According to our current understanding, yes, true randomness does exist. If we adopt your philosophy of only trusting things that we know for sure, as in 100% factual, then we wouldn't trust anything.

According to our current understanding, there is doubt. It's a possibility only. But the multitudes of observable C&E facts of billions of people daily, completely destroys the idea of pure random, scientifically. Even science knows that they are at a point of odds where pure random doesn't exist... by the odds.

It's like, "I know I just might win that lottery... because somebody has to win." But in pure random, nobody knows that there will ever be a winner.

We have discussed this extensively, the ''odds'' are not in your favor. How many things do you know that have a cause for sure? How many things are in the universe? Why do you think those are great odds? Just because some things have causes it doesn't mean others don't and in the atom level, it seems that they don't.

[af_newbie]

We will progress despite religion slowing us down.

Religions will be completely obsolete in 100 years, and people who will still suffer from these delusions will be diagnosed and properly treated.

Sounds like you envision a future world where the Marxist or a variant thereof take over. The only way to implement such "diagnosis and treatment" is via an all powerful state that forced it upon the religious. I imagine entire cities such as those of those of the Amish would need to be taken into police custody and "properly treated".

Such a future is very possible I will give you that.

In the future, the religious people will be the Amish of today.

How many Amish are working at IBM or Apple?  How many are professors at universities and colleges?  How many are politicians working in Washington?  How many Amish people work at NASA?

Religious people might continue to subsist in some small, closed communities.  Religions, however, will lose all the influence they have today as more people actually read the holy scriptures after they graduate from high-school.

Secular education will eradicate religions.   Religions will be studied in Anthropology, Psychology, or History classes.

Nobody will be doing anything by force.  Why would anyone want to do it?  These people need help, not to be prosecuted.

Mental illness is a serious issue.  When someone sees or hears things (God), or thinks the universe was created in 6 days by an invisible spirit they need immediate medical attention.

Why are you trivializing this?