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the evolutionary advantage of religion

  • #21
Is it the same with cats and other "pets"?
 
  • #22
Is it the same with cats and other "pets"?


No, cats are cleaner than dogs to my knowledge. But dogs and puppies are more loveable. :D

Islam teaches us to be kind to animals. There's a story of the Prophet Muhammad (SAW) that a cat was sleeping on his robes, and he cut out a hole in his robes around the cat so he could get up without waking the cat.

There's another story about a man who was traveling, and when he saw a thirsty dog, he filled his shoe with water and gave it to the dog to drink. Muhammad (SAW) said this man was granted Paradise for his good deed.
 
  • #23
Not to change the subject, but does SAW refer to respecting Muhammad? (SAW)

-Ben
 
  • #24
Not to change the subject, but does SAW refer to respecting Muhammad? (SAW)

-Ben


Yes. It's the Arabic abreviation for "Peace be upon Him".

We hold the Prophet Muhammad (SAW) and all other Prophets like Jesus, Moses, Noah, Abraham, etc in high regard, so we use the term (SAW) or (PBUH) after saying or writing their name.
 
  • #25
Ahmad,
you said in an earlier post
>>>>>Pigs don't have a throat to slit, so that's another reason why we don't eat them.<<<<
I beg to differ with you. I am a long time farmer's daughter and my father slit many a pig thoat when I was growing up on eclectic farm,( milking cows, pigs, chickens and an occasional duck, grain crops, oats, wheat hay, )
I agree with them wallowing in their own filth and having parasites. trichinosis is one that they are famous for.
LMO
 
  • #26
A lot of anthropologists have written about how religion/superstition can benefit society. The underlying premise is that if having religion/superstition didn't provide an advantage, humans wouldn't have them.

It is possible for such an idea to exist and perpetuate while not conferring any advantage. Ideas/thoughts/beliefs/etc have their own discreet evolutionary unit dubbed a "meme". A meme is basically the thought equivalent of a gene. And in the same way that some DNA has become parasitic in nature (i.e. viruses) some memes have the ability to become parasitic and thereby remain in existence, self-perpetuating but conferring nothing beneficial to the "host".
 
  • #27
Islam teaches us to be kind to animals. There's a story of the Prophet Muhammad (SAW) that a cat was sleeping on his robes, and he cut out a hole in his robes around the cat so he could get up without waking the cat.

There's another story about a man who was traveling, and when he saw a thirsty dog, he filled his shoe with water and gave it to the dog to drink. Muhammad (SAW) said this man was granted Paradise for his good deed.

Excellent.

What about halal though? That doesn't exactly fit in with this paragraph?
 
  • #28
Pigs don't have a throat to slit, so that's another reason why we don't eat them.

no offence but beef cattle's throats arent slit in order to kill them....a bolt is fired into the brain(or if your on the farm a 22 is usually used).....you have any clue how dangerous it is to try to slit the throat of an 800-1200 pound year old cow while it is hanging upside down?.....its so dangerous as to be stupid....same with a hog or most anything over about 50 pounds.......i wouldnt attempt it on the 100 pound speed goats i hunt let alone a hog or beef.........
 
  • #29
The phrase, "evolutionary advantage of religion" is kinda peculiar I think and opens the mind to some different kind of ideas.

But I'd like to see/read some articles on something like, "the religious advantage of the theory of evolution". I bet some people have never thought of Mr. Darwin like that before...
 
  • #30
Ahmad,
you said in an earlier post
>>>>>Pigs don't have a throat to slit, so that's another reason why we don't eat them.<<<<
I beg to differ with you. I am a long time farmer's daughter and my father slit many a pig thoat when I was growing up on eclectic farm,( milking cows, pigs, chickens and an occasional duck, grain crops, oats, wheat hay, )
I agree with them wallowing in their own filth and having parasites. trichinosis is one that they are famous for.
LMO


Well someone told me about pigs not having throats to slit. But even still, they are filthy animals.

Someone told me that if you take fresh pig meat and pour Coka-Cola on it, you'll see all sorts of worms and parasites start crawling out of it.

Excellent.

What about halal though? That doesn't exactly fit in with this paragraph?


'Halaal' means allowable. For example, sea-food is "halaal", yet pig meat is "haraam".

no offence but beef cattle's throats arent slit in order to kill them....a bolt is fired into the brain(or if your on the farm a 22 is usually used).....you have any clue how dangerous it is to try to slit the throat of an 800-1200 pound year old cow while it is hanging upside down?.....its so dangerous as to be stupid....same with a hog or most anything over about 50 pounds.......i wouldnt attempt it on the 100 pound speed goats i hunt let alone a hog or beef.........



To tell the truth, Muslims are not allowed to eat meat that hasn't been killed in the correct Islamic way. So I'm honestly not allowed to go to McDonalds and order a burger because that beef wasn't killed in the correct Islamic way.

I won't lie, I occasionally eat beef and chicken that hasn't been killed Islamically.

(please don't tell anyone :eek: )
 
  • #31
Someone told me that if you take fresh pig meat and pour Coka-Cola on it, you'll see all sorts of worms and parasites start crawling out of it.
100% false.

For example, sea-food is "halaal"
Unless you're (hanafi?) shia and only think shrimp and fish with scales are ok...

So I'm honestly not allowed to go to McDonalds and order a burger because that beef wasn't killed in the correct Islamic way.
For some reason, there actually are McDonald's with halal meat, and I think a few have 100% halal menus. The funny thing about halal meat, is that most of it....isn't. As rattler said, you can't hang a cow upside down, etc. Even some halal meat plants have admitted to not saying "bismallah" (spelling?) before killing every single animal, and most halal meat plants use machines to do the killing. Lots of places have been found to not be clean enough, etc, etc. I think this is the story I watched: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txoxtcvehCA
Then there's the whole 'is kosher halal'? Debate, etc, etc.

Of course there are multitudes of Muslims that disagree with each other on pretty much every aspect of what I just said. Very ironic for a religion that claims to know absolutely everything, and demands that it is undebateable :poke:.

Anyway, relating this to the topic, I've never seen any proof to show that kosher or halal products are any cleaner or more healthful, as compared to non-kosher/halal products. Europe has always been largely pagan and later christian, and Europe has more often than not been the most powerful/advanced region on the planet (for the past ~2000 years. PS: I'm not saying Europe was powerful because of religion). You've got the Greeks, Romans, Russians, Austrians, English, Prussia, USA (largely Euro settlers), etc, etc, etc, as compared to the Turks and Persians. The Mongols made very quick work of the Turks, and the Mongols would be included in people that never had strict dietary restrictions. So, not only did those not adhering to such totalitarian restrictions not weaken and/or die, but they have more often than not been the strongest on the planet since about 100AD.
And bonus points to the Teutons for inventing beer in 800BC.
 
  • #32
Sure religion can infer an advantage, you kill the non-believers, hence the only ones left are believers... or liars. That's been happening for millenia.

It's only been in the last few hundred years that people and scientists who don't believe have been able to speak their minds, in the old days... Let's just say there were no good old days for non-believers thanks to the kind and loving hands of "god's army".
 
  • #33
most any land critter over bout 50 pounds is hung upside down and bled....i do it to deer, speed goats, elk ect but dont bother with critters such as fish, birds, rabbits ect....most all beef pork, mutton ect is hung and bled AFTER the critter is dead......pork isnt any more dangerous than chicken or ground beef purchased from a large chain store....infact wild shot rabbits hold more issues than normal pork due to parasites and disease if your not careful in cleaning the animal and meat preperation.....in fact i wont consider eating them till we have had several hard frosts as the disease transfered via fleas is pretty high....
 
  • #34
But I'd like to see/read some articles on something like, "the religious advantage of the theory of evolution".

I can't see how the scientific theory of evolution can be a strict advantage for religions. One could say that it can be beneficial by weeding out what some find to be the undeniable, factually incorrect parts of religious texts and in the process giving birth to certain sects which now accept evolutionary theory and consider something like genesis to be just a metaphor.

On the other hand, the theory weakens most other religions that give an account of creation and that is why so many religious people refuse to accept the theory and actively attempt to refute it.

In the long run I suppose evolutionary theory could seem to be beneficial to the survival of Christianity, but Christianity is notorious for change (historically speaking). I think its mostly Christianity's ability/willingness to change over periods of time that insure its survival so the theory of evolution really doesn't play a part in this religion, save for any amendments to the understanding of creation it may account for.


Now that I re-read your post, I'm not sure If I understood it correctly. Did I address it or mistake it for something else?
 
  • #35
If I were to look for an advantage to kosher & halal, it would be that strict observance requires knowing the source of the meat and knowledge that the animal was healthy which, back in the days before refrigeration and government certification, might have saved some lives.

For Kosher and Halal, cattle really are killed by having their throat slit. The way it was described to me (the squeamish should skip ahead) was that the animal has a rope around its muzzle and the end of the rope is run through a ring on the floor and the head is pulled to the floor and any sayings are said and then the throat is slit and it bleeds to death. That obviously doesn't fit the disassembly line approach of the US's meat industry, but that's what's done on a local level. If kosher, the meat also has to be kashered, which means to salt and soak it to remove as much blood as possible. We used to buy kosher chickens at the Jewish market in town because the meat seemed better than what we could get elsewhere. Now that I'm a vegetarian, it isn't an issue anymore. I don't know if halal has a similar step and, if Ahmad is still following this, please let me know.

Ahmad's mention of of occasionally eating non-halal reminds me of when I went to grad school at 23 and I met another new grad student who was a Pakistani. For the first week or so he struggled to find something he liked in the cafeteria. That's hard enough for those of us born here, so imagine if you're from somewhere else. Then he discovered hotdogs and began eating them twice a day. One day he started telling us about how difficult it was to be Muslim in Maine, because he couldn't eat pork. The rest of us started looking back and forth at each other and I finally mumbled something about hot dogs having pork in them. He had this look of shock, started to put it down and then went ahead and finished it off, saying he had to eat something.

As for what Rattler said about rabbits, I never hunted them but that's what rabbit hunters have told me and that they make sure to cook them thoroughly and cleanup extra well after preparing them. I'll stick with my veggies, grains and this awesome bottle of beer that's next to me. It isn't kosher and it certainly isn't halal but, at 9.8% alcohol, I know it contains no parasites.
 
  • #36
If I were to look for an advantage to kosher & halal, it would be that strict observance requires knowing the source of the meat and knowledge that the animal was healthy which, back in the days before refrigeration and government certification, might have saved some lives.

actually Bruce that does make alot of sense......as for the beer......there are no known diseases, microbes ect(other than yeast) that can survive in beer :grin:
 
  • #37
In his earlier years my dad was a butcher, before he became a farmer. I think he actually did more like a kosher kill without the rabbi being there. the were a lot of folk of the jewish faith who lived in the town where he learned to be a butcher.
he alos killed chickens by sltting there throats and letting all the blood drain out before he left them go flopping all over the yard. he usually did tisi after dark, guess wehn all the milking and other chores were done. it was gr8 sport as a child to go find the chickens using a flashlight.

We had to get our fun whereever we could.LOL
 
  • #38
there are no known diseases, microbes ect(other than yeast) that can survive in beer :grin:

Actually, there are. A whole slew of them. :-D

That is the great thing about microbes, no matter the conditions there is going to be something that lives in them.

You do not have to stop drinking your beer for fear of getting sick though, the little beasties that can/do grow in beer are non-pathogenic :boogie:
 
  • #39
your right Pyro.....thats what i ment......
 
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