If we have rid ourselves of all suffering, there will be nothing to attach to, and we will go into Nirvana at death, which is the ultimate goal of a Buddhist. Part II: Comparison of Buddhism with a Christian Worldview 1. Origin - Because Christians live by the Bible, the question of origin can be found in Genesis 1:1, where it states that God created the heavens and the earth. Buddhists believe that the world just keeps destroying itself and reproducing itself. 2.
Hick argues that if God had created humanity in his presence then the gap between God and humanity would be so small that it would limit our freedom. Hick calls this knowledge gap between God and humanity ‘The Epistemic Distance’. Hick further explains that if we were created too close to God in terms of knowledge, we would be overwhelmed by him and would worship him for the wrong reasons. Humans are not born
An Nguyen History 103 Theme paper 2 5/12/2009 Religion and Politics in Ancient Laws Throughout the ages of history, code laws were created to keep peace for civilizations. These codes were made with the purpose of attaching the so called “human laws” as close to “heaven laws” as possible no matter which civilization or which religion. Therefore, I want to show the attachment of the political and religious interpretation of the laws by examining the Hammurabi codes and Justinian codes and using the common phenomena method. According to Mesopotamia carvings, the king is commonly the biggest figure in any scene that includes him. So there is no denial to the fact that kings were indeed the figure of God.
In David Lane’s, "A Neuro-evolutionary Argument for Vegetarianism,” he outlines two main argument against the killing and consumption of animals. Lane supports his argument through the materialistic perspective. Unlike other vegetarian arguments that rely on a spiritual premise for its support – I.E Animals have souls, the notion of the materialistic perspective is that only the physical realm exists in issues such as vegetarianism. Lane's first argument is that every animal with a functioning central nervous system has the capacity to feel pain and suffering. Lane bases this claim on factual evidence, the science of neuroanatomy, which indicates how pain is produced.
However, creationism says that the world and living things was created by God. Creationism refuses the idea of evolution and it causes some arguments about whether evolution should be taught in schools or not. Evolution should be taught in schools so that students can gain different points of view about human nature. Creationists believe that creationism explains the existence of God. They do not believe that species change into totally different and separate animals through evolution, as sacred books mention about existence of God and they contains strict rules.
These are mainly Roman Catholics and they disagree because they say that ‘life being at the moment of conception’ (page102) so if the embryos are used then it is like killing a baby which is banned by the Bible and the church. Even though Roman Catholics disagree with embryo use, they agree with the same things that the liberal Protestants agree with about genetic engineering. Also, some Christians are against genetic engineering completely. This is because they say that God made us how we are so we are in no place to interfere with Gods will. They also believe that genetic modification is almost like playing Gods role, which is seen as disrespectful to God.
He points out that there are many physiological traits that separate humans, these traits can be used to justify human discrimination. Since as a society we consider these physical differences a mute point for equality amongst each other, Singer infers that physiological differences cannot be used as a property of any kind of discrimination, that equality is a moral idea; therefore animals should be given the same rights as humans. The situation Singer finds himself in is that speciesism is the cultural norm existent in modern society and in his opinion, contemporary philosophers are failing to make the connection that speciesism justifies human discrimination. He even goes as far to compare the discourse of speciesism to that of former slave owners. Utilitarianism is the main idea that he uses to oppose the idea of specism.
Western Civilization: Ideas, Politics, and Society, Volume II, 9th Edition. Wadsworth Publishing). Darwin’s theory of evolution has also challenged the fundamental beliefs of the Christian faith by denouncing the idea that man was created in the image of God’s
Both systems are human-centric, humans are valued more over animals. Mill, a utilitarian, promotes making moral decisions while considering higher and lower pleasures and Mill would say that animals cannot experience higher pleasures which means that human pleasures should be regarded over animal pleasures when making decisions to bring about happiness. Within Christian ethics, humans are seen as more of an importance over animals, as it states in the Bible ‘So God created humankind in his own image…and God said to them… “have dominion over every living creature”…’ (Genesis 1). An example that supports this similarity of the two is the argument whether animal testing is allowable, in this situation a Utilitarian using Mills approach would come to the conclusion that animal testing should be carried out because it results in a greater happiness as it can be used to develop new medicines which benefit the majority of people, and this happiness would be considered a higher pleasure which the animals can never experience anyway. A Christian would too, come to the same decision, as God created humankind
“Darwinism undermines both the idea that man is made in the image of God and the idea that man is a uniquely rational being” (Rachels, 1990). If man does not gain morality from a divine source then it must come from a different source, looking to evolution and other species, glimpses of moral behavior may be recognized. Research conducted at Emory University shows that chimpanzees and other apes are capable of altruism, sympathy, moral disapproval, sharing and even notions of fairness (Wade, 2007). These animals develop social and moral codes of conduct when living in groups, individuals, however, typically develop primitive moral reasoning at a highly reduced capacity. Humans, being highly social animals, develop morality and social codes of conduct at a rapid pace by necessity of being social animals.