how bad is it?

if you are given a choice to

eradicate religions

or

eradicate HIV
eradicate cancers
eradicate wars
eradicate famine
eradicate poverty
eradicate unattractive women
eradicate bad beats

etc. etc.

how high up is religion on your "things i would like to go away" list?

My list:

Cancers
Wars
Famine
HIV
Religion

The others not mentioned:

Poverty: Does not compute. Getting rid of "poverty" would also get rid of capitalism and the desire to be ambitious in your life's work. Suggesting such a thing would require that everyone had equal belongings.

Bad beats: Necessary to keep fish at the poker tables.

Unattractive Women: Relative.

Obviously if it's an either/or choice, all the other things go away before religion.

eradicate HIV
eradicate Cancers

dont eradicate anything else

"Poverty" is not equivalent to "inequality", although you might get that impression from reading press releases from left wing lobby groups.

Poverty
Cancer
War
Famine
Religion
Bad beats
Unattractive women

Famine
War
Poverty
HIV
Cancer
Religion
Unattractive women

Keep the bad beats, because the game would be dull as all hell without them, frankly. Also, gl defining 'bad beat' to mutual satisfaction.

If it's an all-or-nothing scenario, then, sure, ditch religion if there's no option to eliminate the 'worst' of it.

Poverty and unattractive women are interesting. I don't agree with the poster above who said this would necessitate getting rid of capitalism - is poverty a fundamental requirement of capitalism? I don't think it would require total equality of material wealth - absolute versus relative poverty, etc. Like with attractive women - eradicate the 'unattractive' ones, are all the ones left equally attractive? No, they're just all above a certain bar. Though based on how much more harshly I judge the attractiveness of women in films/TV, since the standard is so much higher, I think our expectations would tend to rise in line with the 'bar'.

Hey guys,

Poverty is a relative term. If we got rid of poverty (don't even know what that would consist of), the next group of the poorest in the world would now become the new "poverty".

Nah. I think we can reach a point at which everyone has their basic needs met. In the US, people are getting looser and looser with the term "poverty," so that now it almost seems to mean "can't afford the latest XBox." Of course, in the US it's also getting harder and harder to afford things like housing and minimal standards of medical care. Furthermore, our standards of mental and emotional health are so low people in the future will view us as barbarians. It's a hard line to draw.

Still, in much of the world clean food and water, antibiotics, and homes. I'd say when more or less everyone can stay healthy until old age (at that point the **** may hit the fan, it's a more serious problem than many give it credit for), then we've eliminated poverty.

I don't think either of them are relative.

Anyhow, ugly people aren't the problem. People who judge ugly people are the problem. I'd rather get rid of the beautiful people, frankly.

Commy bastard

I concur.

Oh God don't eradicate them. That would probably also eradicate my chance of losing my virginity.

As for the others, my list is:

Cancer

(Whatever, everything else is trivial by comparison.)

I'd guess most who posted here haven't had cancer, or have experienced a loved one who died from it. It's sucks beyond words can describe. I'd much rather be poor, be HIV+, and be drafted to fight a war than get cancer.

I didn't mean they were 'relative' except in the sense that X can be 'less wealthy than' or 'less attractive than' Y.

Who's judging? The OP could have worded it better, 'eradicate ugliness' I suppose. Would you then rather eradicate beauty?

if we eradicate cancer, hiv, starvation, war, murder, diabetes, psychosis, drug addictions, the hole in the ozone layer, bigotry, global warming etc... then what are we going to let people die of and at what age??

what kind of effect would a completely healthy, and undying population have on our resources? ahh.. i got it! let's eradicate all depletion of resources and then we can live in a completely different world than what we have.. so much so that the question makes no sense at all.

religion tops my list.

i think you'd find our technology increasing several orders faster now that we have that out of the way...and very soon, many other problems would fade/be solved.

if religion was wiped out in Jesus time, we would have had the internet in the 1300s (idiot theists, dont ask for a source)

i've noticed that your posts are ripe with caustic bitterness, and usually done so with wild hyperbole. very little substance.. just single-minded contempt that clearly clouds your rationale.

religion > hiv and cancer on the evil continuum! lol.

Not to mention that while all the other things are avoidable, and if you managed to live indefinitely, cancer is the (unavoidable) thing that will eventually get ya.

Really? Which would you rather your girlfriend confessed she'd been secretly doing for the last 6 months - going to church, or living with HIV?

the church one

dunno how thats relevant tho

edit: the question was about the entire world. what is best for an individual has little to do with what is best for the entire world.

also, if you eradicate HIV, thats it.

but if you eradicate religion, you have a much better chance of quickly eradicating many things: cancer, HIV, wars, famine...all, imo, would be solved quicker.

ok, my rationality is clouded. thats super easy to just say. but how about you point out my errors. where is the cloudiness?

im not saying religion is more evil than cancer. my choice of eradication is based on what the world would then become if we eradicated religion.

you then have a world where people aren't wasting their time praying, going to church, fighting science, etc etc etc etc.

a world in which people have to make it the best we can, because we have no illusions about a fairytale god and an afterlife. in this world i think Science would advance by leaps and bounds and HIV, Cancer, everything would be quickly eradicated.

Well it illustrates pretty clearly that in the short term at the very least the negative impact of one is far more serious than the other. Even the (near) inarguably bad effects of religion (terrorism, child abuse scandals etc) tend to be mediated by some other factor (geopolitics, bureacracy). Diseases are just diseases. I don't think anyone ever increased their level of happiness by contracting HIV - or, if they did, I doubt that even in their increased state of happiness, they'd refuse a cure were one available.

Seems to me also that if war, famine and poverty alone were eradicated, religion would probably begin to decline anyway. Even if not, some of its negative effects would be stopped (counting terrorism as a form of 'war').

maybe i read OP wrong. i thought the question was, if we could eradicate one thing, which would it be. or, which is highest on your list.

if we could eradicate all problems, well duh, ill take that over eradicating religion.

edit: you are correct about it being better in the short term though. im willing to grant that.

!!!!!!!!

how can you be happy in a thread where many people are saying the world will be a better place without you?