How many here are atheists?

[Caleb]

 

That's a bit of a straw man. I don't say to abandon reason, simply to put reason in its perspective. Hey, I'm probably the most arrogant person on this forum. I automatically assume that I'm smarter than everyone I meet. But that's all meaningless. It doesn't matter how intelligent you are, what you know is a fraction of nothing, because ultimately you are a mammal living on a rock that goes around an unimportant star, in a tiny galaxy in a remote part of a universe that we can't even figure out what it is doing, let alone why.

Back to perspective, and seeing our reason for what it is. We have experiences. These come before reason, and then we apply our reason to try to make sense of our experience.

So what I'm suggesting to you is not to put a box around what is possible, and so limit your experience. Because as soon as you think you know, you find out how much you really don't. So many people that I have met and talked to have limited themselves, based on what they tell themselves is possible or not possible. "Prove it!" they shout. Then when someone says, "well, you'll have to do this to see the proof," they say, "I have no reason to try that, until you prove it." You denouce the proof before you have any evidence one way or the other. It's like the man who doubts that there are stars refusing to look up.

[dalebert]

OK, what do I need to try.

[Vitruvian]

Veering back to epistemology:

Caleb, since you have refused to provide a definition of God, perhaps you can describe--assuming for the sake of argument that God does exist--how a godless universe would differ from our own.

[Caleb]

OK, what do I need to try.

I don't know. For me it was bending over a toilet, vomiting my guts out, being unable to eat anything, at the complete point of despair where I saw no point to existence, nor any meaning or purpose in life.

Your mileage may vary.

[kola]

Caleb says So what I'm suggesting to you is not to put a box around what is possible, and so limit your experience.

Bingo!

"the box".

the perfect way to surpress the imagination and limit the living spirit.

and by doing so it "controls the situation" in order to support the black and white world while missing the array of colors all around the universe.

"the box"...ahh yes ..which keeps things neatly in order where everything can be seen and smelled and touched and therefore can be explained and "proven".

the "safety box" might be a better term...which shelters the most mightiest powers.

and yet they are forbidden to ever empty the box or look outside it.

ahh yesss...the box.....

THE BOX!!!!

THE BOXXXX!!!!!

and when you expire, they can bury you in that very same cozy littel black box..

THE BOX SHALL EAT YOU ALIVE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

KOla  

[Caleb]

Veering back to epistemology:

Caleb, since you have refused to provide a definition of God, perhaps you can describe--assuming for the sake of argument that God does exist--how a godless universe would differ from our own.

In what universe is that epistemology?

Still, I'll answer the question. I think the question is meaningless. A godless universe wouldn't exist at all.

[Vitruvian]

Veering back to epistemology:

Caleb, since you have refused to provide a definition of God, perhaps you can describe--assuming for the sake of argument that God does exist--how a godless universe would differ from our own.

In what universe is that epistemology?

My question is a variant of "How would we humans know whether God exists?": if one could take a snapshot of two universes, one in which God exists, and one in which God does not exist, and contrast them, how would they differ?

A godless universe wouldn't exist at all.

How very convenient for you.

[dalebert]

I don't know. For me it was bending over a toilet, vomiting my guts out, being unable to eat anything, at the complete point of despair where I saw no point to existence, nor any meaning or purpose in life.

So I have to reach a point of desperation, craving meaning and purpose, before I can be receptive to God? What if I'm basically content with the direction of my life and not experiencing anything so desperate as that? Am I doomed to remain apart from God and suffer whatever repercussions that entails?

Actually, I don't think there's any point in answering that Caleb. It seems you've given up on the notion that anything useful about your god can be conveyed from one person to another. Therefore it's a crap shoot whether any particular person will experience what they need to experience to achieve that faith and discussion is pointless.

Here's a great thread on the subject. I actually am only five pages in but I intend to read the rest. I've not normally taken much interest in such subjects lately but this thread is just so damned entertaining that I got caught up in it. I was laughing my ass off reading this.

http://anti-state.com/forum/index.php?board=3;action=display;threadid=20595

[Puke]

[Caleb]

So I have to reach a point of desperation, craving meaning and purpose, before I can be receptive to God? What if I'm basically content with the direction of my life and not experiencing anything so desperate as that? Am I doomed to remain apart from God and suffer whatever repercussions that entails?

Not necessarily. I just think that any person, to be receptive, must give up his emotional attachment to the concept that he does know, or can know, everything about the world by reasoning it out. What repurcussions? When did I threaten you with repurcussions?

Actually, I don't think there's any point in answering that Caleb. It seems you've given up on the notion that anything useful about your god can be conveyed from one person to another. Therefore it's a crap shoot whether any particular person will experience what they need to experience to achieve that faith and discussion is pointless.

Yes. Good. I'm not trying to convince you.   

Mainly I just get annoyed by the smug superiority complex that many atheists seem to enjoy. Not you, so much, in particular, but others, who prance around making statements that question the intelligence of people who believe in a God. It makes me roll my eyes. Especially since I know that I am ten times smarter than them. 

[Vitruvian]

Mainly I just get annoyed by the smug superiority complex that many atheists seem to enjoy. Not you, so much, in particular, but others, who prance around making statements that question the intelligence of people who believe in a God.

Would you not openly question the intelligence of an adult who maintained a belief in Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, or the Easter Bunny?

[dalebert]

What repurcussions? When did I threaten you with repurcussions?

The reason I bring that up is because it brings us back to belief in God having some useful value or meaning in our lives. I mentioned earlier either gaining some benefit from belief OR suffering some sort of repercussions for lack of belief. Either could be looked at as a repercussion though, the repercussion being that I miss out on some kind of benefit because I do not believe. You certainly seem to think that the belief has had an impact on your life.

It's not that I don't believe in God for a lack of evidence. It's that any view of God I've been given strikes me as logically inconsistent. Just as one example on topic, right off the bat I cannot bring myself to believe in a God that rewards us in some way for belief in him or punishes us for the lack thereof because why is it being so dodgy, shifty, and sneaky? There are numerous contrived and elaborate explanations for his shiftiness by people who seem desperate to believe but Occam's Razor says he does not exist. This strikes me as an overwhelming likelihood that THAT God in fact does not exist.

There are other inconsistencies that would need to be addressed depending on one's definition of God, like that it cannot be both omniscient and omnipotent at the same time. Inevitably God seems to either fall into one of two categories. Either a Zeus sort of being who could just be a really powerful alien who's abilities appear to be magic to us (Stargate anyone?), in which case the term "God" doesn't even apply, or else God gets abstracted away into meaninglessness as being outside of or completely one with the universe and it does not, or even can not really DO anything of its own volition. It has no will of its own. It's more something like the force in Star Wars. If I had to guess, since you won't explain, that's what I would guess is more in line with your beliefs. At least that would explain why it does not reveal itself to us, because it can't. That view of God is far from omnipotent.

Then again, if that's what you mean by God, then you're really just talking about some intrinsic nature to the universe. I agree that we probably have barely grasped a tiny fraction of what we can know about the universe, but then what? That's so abstracted that it's a stretch to even call it "God". And Hell, WHAT are we calling "God"? The universe? At that level it stops having any practical meaning. Is this what I'm supposed to have faith in? That I don't know all the inner workings of the universe. *shrug* OK.

This is why I ask people what THEY mean by the term "god" before I will say whether I believe it's even possible because I have yet to hear a logically consistent definition of something worthy of the term "God".

[Kat Kanning]

The reason I bring that up is because it brings us back to belief in God having some useful value or meaning in our lives.

I can see the value that Russell gets out of it.  He has said that he thinks God will take care of him, it's all in his hands.  So I never see him worry.  I just can't bring myself to believe the supernatural stuff.  There seems to be a lot in what Jesus said and did that's useful, though.

[Jacobus]

I have yet to hear a logically consistent definition of something worthy of the term "God".

Maybe someone can start a thread so we can nail down the definition of "God", just like we nailed down the definitions of "freedom" and "initiation of force".

[Kat Kanning]

Hey, we could do the word "the" while we're at it...like Clinton.