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11 Responses to “TED Talk”
The topic was obviously well thought out and researched. The points where you referenced to studies for evidence were particularly effective.
Everything was well ordered and made sense.
It would probably help if the laptop was at a 90 degree angle so the camera was pointing directly at your face instead of up at you.
Toren’s comment part two (sorry).
I think religion is worth believing in.
I think its a positive aspect in many peoples life and has many benefits. While there is descrimination, people will always find something to descriminate about and religion is just another defining feature. Same with the holy wars. I think they’re just a disguised reason to go out and kill people. If you look at the way the events started, the preacher or head religious person in charge says “god says to kill the other guys!” and then they all rush off and do it. In god’s name. I don’t think thats relgions fault.
I was very interested to hear about the effect of meditation. I had actually thought about that before and hypothesized that part of the brain shuts down when you are very idle for long periods, which is kind of what actually happens. I wonder if other mental phenomena can be simply explained aswell.
I would agree with Toren on the part where he talks about how people use religion to start wars. If religion was done properly, people would be loving, kind, and open, not protesting against military funerals or gay rights. I believe that the idea of religion is an extremely good one; it’s just that in real life, people use religion for their own purposes. They use it to accomplish a task for their own goal, which definitely is not what religion is supposed to be about. So, as Toren said above, if religion wasn’t here, people would find another way to get what they want, whether it be money or power or mass genocide.
Now, onto the part about the God Helmet:
Although the helmet mimics what the feeling of prayer or meditation can do, it doesn’t necessarily mean that the feeling of God’s presence is fake. The helmet is merely another source of the same feeling, and so does not have a direct correlation with what causes people to feel God through prayer/meditation. Sort of like how a fire and a heat lamp both give out warmth, but they’re not related to each other in any other way. Personally, I feel that it’s God that gives us these experiences, but that’s my opinion, and it obviously can’t be confirmed.
I also agree with Toren on the wars sparked by religion. What Jonathan (right?) and I must make clear is that many of the leaders in those wars who claim that it is for God are to blame. Many members of the clergy in various religions have been corrupt and rash. They do not have a spiritual base but rather a mind filled with corrupt thoughts and greed. There are always bad apples among clergy, a bad image is created because of them. People see the negatives of something more prominently than the positives. It’s not that the religion caused wars it’s the way certain people perceived the religion that causes them. As of now if you think about it, anything a decent amount of the population votes as acceptable goes. I think religion helps set morally right rules and guidelines for us to follow.
-Derek
I agree with Toren, I think that the whole topic is interesting, but also very well thought, planned, and scripted out. I think that the performance was great, though as Toren did point out the camera angle was a bit weird. However, it was clear, though you could’ve potentially slowed down your talking just a tad. I also thought since you were dealing with a more sensitive topic that you handled it surprisingly well, and it was offensive or anything, plus I found the whole think quite intriguing, and your speech was quite in sync with the video.
In reply to Toren, Jonathan and Derek
The basic morals of religion may be positive however I believe that religion can promote blind following and that is what is dangerous. It focuses on something so deep, so crucial, so necessary to people that many are not willing to question it. It is the feeling of being a part of something that makes religion so great, but also so deadly. It can make mass manipulation much easier that say trying to use wealth or power because it truly convinces people that what they are doing is morally right. Perhaps society could not function without religion. I can only imagine how amazing It must be to believe in something more than just what we can see. So although perhaps it is better to believe in religion, I still think it is a very unfortunate necessity.
~Jen S
I definetly agree with Jonathan and Toren in that religion isn’t at fault for war, it’s the people that twist it and turn it into a “god wants us to kill the other guys” type of thing. I agree with Jonathan, if religion was done properly everything would be happy. I also found the meditation information very interesting, just to see that religion had a impact on the way people thought. I’m not religion myself, I don’t believe in god, but at the same time I don’t not believe in god. I do have to say that I envy the people that do have a strong religious belief, I wish I would be able to have that, because the people that I do know that have this belief seem so happy and I see the effect that believing in something can do in a positive way. I really liked you closing statment, ‘is it better to believe in a happy lie? or a depressing truth?’ First I dont think that religion is all about believing in a happy life, I think its about learning how ot live a happy life. I also dont believe that the everyday truth is depressing, its just another version of belief. Happy and sad. Overal I loved you video, I lovd the information and it seemed like you really took an interest to your topic. Awesome job!
First of all, your last line was incredibly powerful. Breathtaking.
I’ve found that this is a debate that has filled many hours for me.
On the positive effects of religion, I sometimes find it strange how religion has the power to bring people out of the depths of suffering, sadness, and poverty. Would you not spend every moment questioning why God, or why the world, has brought whatever pains you upon you? Though on the other side, how could you go on unless you were convinced there was a plan for you-that there was something beyond the suffering you were enduring?
You say that believing in religion, each which comes with its own set of moral standards, can help people behave better. I often find that whether or not you’re religious has no correlation with how you behave. How many rude, hurtful people have crosses around their neck?
As you pointed out in your above comment, religion can also promote “blind following”, where people can’t explain what they’re doing, and I too think that is a tad creepy.
In terms of war, I’ve always found it strange how people can so easily refer to the asterisk beside the rule in their holy book (“Thou shall not kill…except”). This takes the debate down the lane of, “if religion didn’t exist, something else would be used to shoulder the blame of horrible events.”
In the end, I think it comes down to the fact that a belief that things can get better can save a life, and that using your own mind to make decisions is the healthiest way to go. Whether religion can help people overcome their problems and be used in a way that can help people make choices, that is a question I still don’t have the answer to.
Awesome talk, Jen! You managed to navigate an extremely sensitive topic without being offensive.
I found the fact that some people may be more genetically open to sensing the presence of God than others extremely interesting. My grandmother is quite religious and tried to raise my mom under the same beliefs as her. My mom, however, decided she did not agree with the same beliefs. Growing up, my mom was forced to go to church, although she did not agree with what was being said.
It’s an interesting thought that instead of just rebelling against what my grandma wanted my mom to do (which I had always thought), the reason my mom refused to participate in any religious events with my grandmother could be because she’s just less genetically inclined towards that kind of thing.
Very provoking talk. Very well done!
OH YOU GUYS AND YOUR COMMENTS.
*cough*
Anyways,To start: Jen, you are a very cool person. I really liked your script, all though the camera angle was a bit funky. Also? Just….whoa. I’ve already told you my mind was blown by this stuff, right?
Yeah.
So. The rest of you guys.
I’m going to have to agree with Jen here. It may be true that there are the ‘bad apples’ among the clergy that give things a bad reputation…but they got followers somehow, right? And as we’re assuming that not all the followers are horrible awful people who endorse random hatred and war, and yet they somehow ended up acting like they did…I don’t know. It means that the whole blind faith thing (and that’s part of the definition of faith, right? To believe in something, no matter what the evidence suggests?) can pretty easily lead to Bad Things.
The belief that there’s something else up there that has some idea of what it’s doing is definitely appealing, but I don’t think that means we have to not be allowed to have differing opinions from what the supposed higher power (or people representing it) does.
Well I had a really lovely comment and then my computer screwed up the coding. So here we go again.
I really liked what Zoe said “It may be true that there are the ‘bad apples’ among the clergy that give things a bad reputation…but they got followers somehow, right? I think that this is really interesting because the crusades were basically followers following the “Word of God” blindly. The people who were leading the crusades were always under “God’s Rule” and were holy people.
On to the god helmet. I really think that the fact that epilepsy may have had a part in religion is amazing. I think that this has strucl something that will stir up my mind for quite some time. I also found it interesting that the people tested during prayer had different effects that may result in the reason for feeling as though they had an out-of-body experience.
Really thought provoking. Nice job.
– Kelsey