Sorry for the big, disjointed post, but I feel it's only fair to try a point by point approach

Quote Originally Posted by Vi-Zer0Skill View Post
I think she is getting at the same thing I'm getting at, which is that it seems that a lot of people these days seem comfortable putting a price on the lives of people they don't know and like.
These days? More like all days. Besides, the only actual documented modern societies that have a reduced level of suffering from the historical and global norm are less religious ones. That's not entirely causative, as there are many reasons, but it is one.

where she and I disagree is whether substituting religion for scientific theory would fully address that and other examples of the problem of over materialism.
The jury is in on this. Because religion is fundamentally based in make-believe, it is wholly malleable, and that malleability sees to it fully capitalizing on its bad side from time to time.

I'm not certain that organized religion is any better but your categorization of Christianity and religion in general wuf is inaccurate and personally insulting(as a christian). Not all religions encourage more negative human behaviors than positive ones, such as mine obv (Methodist, not Creationist. internet: I'm being sarcastic here).
This is somewhat of a misconception. Some religions do not appear problematic in certain ways, but there is actually no evidence that any are truly devoid of the same problems. In pockets, momentarily, some appear to be, but again, because they're based in irrationality, their potential of change is as much as it gets, and you end up seeing some of the most honorable of religions turn evil under different circumstances (think: Samurai Bushido gone horribly wrong in WW2 POW treatment).

Religion, all religion, is a fundamental problem of humanity because it teaches us that being wrong is okay, and making decisions based on ignorance, intuition, and emotion is okay. There are many pockets where religion has a good appearance, but don't ignore the ways in which those very religions impose great evils indirectly, or even go noticeably wrong. One example of "good" xtianity being indirectly inhumane is in its inadvertent utility for bigotry and projected suffering as seen from the Religious Right and hordes of devastating, misery-causing policies they support.

Also, religions aren't what makes people good, people are what make people good. Religion is just an excuse and meeting grounds for a couple certain kinds of goodness

the bigger question is what do we as individuals think is best for humanity? scientific progress, with the unforeseeable implications on human behavior, or happiness? In some instances happiness and progress are mutually exclusive.
Man you don't wanna know what I think. Because mass extinction is the only answer. The rules of human biology and resource scarcity determine the only end of mass suffering is mass extinction, and all the evidence suggests that technological progress naturally creates more inadvertent suffering

On a philosophical level, however, the solution is the scientific method. It is, after all, the one and only tried and true method of knowledge that humans have ever known

For the Creationists a moment of choice arises when it comes to the theory of evolution. Some people are talking about the Singularity, a moment in the future where artificial intelligence will exceed the power of our brains. At that point AI will be able to replicate any human behaviors, perhaps excluding emotions and complex abstractions re: religion and philosophy. That may sound fantastic since we wouldn't have to work anymore, but obviously this will create a major change in human purpose. How will humanity respond to this change? It's possible that a life where the primary activities are socializing and philosophizing would be worse than a life balanced with more suffering, depending on whose eyes you're looking through. Perhaps people not being 'distracted' by 'ordinary' pursuits such as a job would shift towards behaviors that actually make them feel worse, like watching television or excessive masturbation (lol).
FWIW, this future is extremely unlikely. We don't know exactly what to expect, but we can be all but assured that strong AI will have emotions and consciousness just as we do. By far, the most likely scenario is gradual hybridization (we're already stone-aged hybrids today), and eventual species alteration.

Also, not sure what you mean by your comment on a moment of choice for creationists. There's isn't "choice". You can choose to acknowledge gravity or not; likewise, you can choose to acknowledge evolution or not

her observation about the state of American society is accurate, and yea I agree it's not relevant to whether the theory of evolution should be accepted. But that's because we're not Creationists, which you'd realize if you had a better understanding of how she comes to her position rather than just refuting her because she believes in what appears to most people as a kind of crackpot/backwards religion.
Well, if you look at who makes the statement of American society accurate, I think you'll be surprised its those pointing the fingers. There are extremely strong statistics showing that societal problems are more the responsibility of the religious than non-religious.

I don't understand what you are trying to say in the rest of your paragraph, FWIW