My spirit is troubled..

[Seifer]

You again base your decision on the existence of God, or any deity for that matter, on personal, selfish ideals.

The point I was trying to make was that a world with a god and a world without a god looks exactly the same. People may feel warm and fuzzy when they look up at the sky, but that doesn't necessarily mean they're talking to anyone but themselves.

And please don't sit there and act pious. You and I both know every religious person on the planet asks God for things. Whether it's guidance, mercy, or for some sort of blessing, people pray to their god for more reasons than to simply ask how his/her day is going.

I don't care if that's "not what it's all about", people ask God for blessings.

[crashhelmet]

The point I was trying to make was that a world with a god and a world without a god looks exactly the same. People may feel warm and fuzzy when they look up at the sky, but that doesn't necessarily mean they're talking to anyone but themselves.

And please don't sit there and act pious. You and I both know every religious person on the planet asks God for things. Whether it's guidance, mercy, or for some sort of blessing, people pray to their god for more reasons than to simply ask how his/her day is going.

I don't care if that's "not what it's all about", people ask God for blessings.

There's a vast difference between asking for blessings and refusing to believe because you don't receive them or things didn't go the way you wanted.

[Seifer]

There's a vast difference between asking for blessings and refusing to believe because you don't receive them or things didn't go the way you wanted.

When did I ever bring up that argument? My reasons for being an atheist have nothing to do with "being mad I didn't get what I wanted." It's not like God is Santa Clause and I'm pissed I didn't get the bicycle I wanted on Christmas Day.

[crashhelmet]

When did I ever bring up that argument? My reasons for being an atheist have nothing to do with "being mad I didn't get what I wanted." It's not like God is Santa Clause and I'm pissed I didn't get the bicycle I wanted on Christmas Day.

Your very first post in this thread:

I felt the same way you did when I was in high school. I am now an atheist.

The way I see it, it all boils down to this:

If God guides everything (but doesn't know how everything will turn out), gives everyone complete freedom, and also allows both good and bad things to happen to us (because God can't control it), then why even believe in a God? What I've listed above all boils down to random chance, which is just that: chance. It has nothing to do with God or any other mythical being "helping" us along in life. You could literally apply those aspects to anything - the "universe", God, the all-knowing space dragon, etc.

If everything God does simply boils down to chance, what's the point? I came to the final conclusion that there is none. It's simply a desperate attempt to hang onto faith when there is absolutely no reason or evidence to do so.

And parts of your reply to me calling you out on it

The existence of a god doesn't justify anything, and a god who advocates murder wouldn't be worth praising, anyway.

...SNIP...

Yep, that's a just and loving God. Why do people worship him again? Oh yeah, because he'll throw you in a fiery pit for all of eternity if you don't. Totally fair!

You try and justify it with scientific logic, common sense, and others that can be acceptable, but you keep reverting to the underlying tone of "It doesn't benefit me or mesh with what I think is right or wrong, so I don't believe."

[Rageaholic]

You try and justify it with scientific logic, common sense, and others that can be acceptable, but you keep reverting to the underlying tone of "It doesn't benefit me or mesh with what I think is right or wrong, so I don't believe."

Even if that's true, how is it a bad thing? If something doesn't effect you, than whether you believe in or not doesn't matter.

[Seifer]

Your very first post in this thread:

Please point out in my post where I said, "I DIDN'T GET WHAT I WANTED, SO I STOPPED BELIEVING IN GOD."

I stopped believing in God because I came to the realization that I was making up all sorts of excuses to keep believing. There's no evidence of God? "It's because God purposely doesn't show himself!" I don't know how the universe works, and it seems super complicated to me? "God must have created it! How else could it be so complicated and still work!?"

It was ridiculous, and I got tired of running around in circles trying to justify my own belief to myself.

And parts of your reply to me calling you out on it

The existence of a god doesn't justify anything, and a god who advocates murder wouldn't be worth praising, anyway.

Nice way to take everything out of context. Since you're forgetting, here's the entire conversation:

Was 9/11 God's fault or those responsible that were supposed to be preventing something like that from happening? Does the existence of God suddenly justify and excuse their failures?

Here was my response:

9/11 was the fault of everyone who participated. The existence of a god doesn't justify anything, and a god who advocates murder wouldn't be worth praising, anyway.

That last sentence was in reference to your comment of "God's existence suddenly justifying their failure in murdering thousands of people." AGAIN, the existence of a god doesn't justify anything, and a god who advocates murder wouldn't be worth praising, anyway. You know, because he advocates murder.

Yep, that's a just and loving God. Why do people worship him again? Oh yeah, because he'll throw you in a fiery pit for all of eternity if you don't. Totally fair!

...and? How does that equal, "I DIDN'T GET WHAT I WANTED"?

Once again, here's that entire conversation in context:

What's forgotten is the concept of original sin. Original sin isn't that Eve ate the apple and convinced Adam to do the same, therefore we are being punished by God. Original sin is about the loss of innocence that came about when Adam and Eve disobeyed God, then tried to hide their disobedience from Him. Because they lost their innocence, the consequences of their decision lies with everyone.

So God created Satan (even though he knew Satan would be an evil douchebag), then created Adam and Eve and made them completely naive, innocent, and dumber than a bag of hammers. God then allows Satan to meander up to his newest and dumbest creations, whisper sweet lies into their ears, and then punishes the idiots for falling for it? Then he has the nerve to punish humanity for all eternity? If God is all knowing, he knew what would happen all along, and didn't seem to care until it did.

Yep, that's a just and loving God. Why do people worship him again? Oh yeah, because he'll throw you in a fiery pit for all of eternity if you don't. Totally fair!

My point in that conversation was, AGAIN, that people have to make up excuses to justify their belief in a god that does things ass-backwards. The story of Adam and Eve doesn't make any sense? It makes God look like a giant douchebag who not only created a being of unconditional evil, but then let it corrupt the naive, stupid, and innocent beings he made?

"OH WELL, YOU SEE, THAT STORY ISN'T MEANT TO BE TAKEN LITERALLY. IT'S SUPPOSED TO TEACH YOU A MORAL. THAT MORAL IS TO NOT GO AGAINST GOD, NO MATTER WHAT. EVEN IF HE SETS YOU UP TO FAIL, IT'S NOT GOD'S FAULT YOU FAILED. IT'S YOURS. THAT'S BECAUSE PEOPLE ARE AWFUL, HORRIBLE CREATURES WITHOUT GOD TO PUSH US IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION."

Do you see how STUPID that argument is? It gives me a headache listening to that shit. To see people trying so hard to justify their love for this being that doesn't seem to give a shit about them is mind-blowing. "Nothing is God's fault, it's ours! Humans are horrible, disgusting creatures who deserve punishment! We deserve hell, but God's so awesome, he decided he'd give us a chance to prove our worth!"

Christianity and all it's sister religions are a masochist's dream. It's all about being a low, despicable creature - undeserving of anything and everything. But then God swoops in to save the day, but only if people continue to twist themselves into knots trying to live up to this unfair level of perfection.

The reason I don't accept the claim of a God is because I don't see any possible reason to do so. It's not because, "I PRAYED TO GOD ONCE AND DIDN'T GET MY BICYCLE", it's because there is NO EVIDENCE A GOD EXISTS. There was no reason for me to continue justifying my belief when I could see that it was unjustifiable.

You try and justify it with scientific logic, common sense, and others that can be acceptable, but you keep reverting to the underlying tone of "It doesn't benefit me or mesh with what I think is right or wrong, so I don't believe."

Again, you are completely misinterpreting what I said. Where did I say, "I don't believe in God because I'm not getting what I want?" This entire thread, I've been trying to make the simple point that anything attributed to a god could just as easily be attributed to chance. There is no evidence for a god, but people try to justify their beliefs until they turn blue in the face.

As I said in my original post, I used to be like that. I was desperate to believe, even though I knew, deep down, that there was no actual reason for me to believe besides this ingrained fear of what would happen to me if I don't. Seriously, the moment I thought to myself, "God just might not exist", I was overtaken by fear - fear that I would be struck down any moment for losing my faith over a lack of evidence. That's what religion does to people - it makes them afraid to question.

When I wasn't immediately struck by lightning, I continued to look into other explanations for how the world worked. It eventually led me to my position today.

[Panacea]

It is a placebo effect. It's the very definition of a placebo effect. They are in a better mental state because, as Seifer was saying, they believe they have someone or something "in their corner" so to speak.

When we test for the placebo effect, we test the treatment in the test group and give a placebo to the control group. In the case I'm discussing, everyone gets the medical treatment. Those with spiritual faith do better getting the same medical treatment that those who do not have a strong spiritual faith have. That's not the placebo effect because no placebo is being given. Both groups get treated, but one group does better than the other.

Lately more and more drug studies are showing medications to have no better effect in the test group than in the control group. For some reason, the placebo effect is becoming more prominent, making it more difficult to show whether or not medications are actually effective. Some physicians are starting to take another look at the placebo effect, to look at it as more than "just in your head.' There's something about the so called placebo effect that may, in fact, be very real. Research into that area is just starting, and we still don't know very much yet. But chalking the benefits of faith as an adjunct (never a replacement) for standard medical therapies to it being all in their heads just doesn't fit the science that has already been done.

Other religious faiths outside of the Abrahamic are very unlikely to be shoving a pamphlet in your hand

You have heard of the Hare Krishna's, haven't you?

That is an incredibly narrow viewpoint and shows a lack of understanding of atheism outside of a couple vocal militants. You're speaking of them in the same narrow view that militant atheists speak of you.

I've been speaking of militant atheists. I realize that not all atheists are that way.

Agreed. As I was saying, there's a very visible and very vocal chunk of "Christians" in the US who are actively trying to impose their beliefs on everyone else. It's creating a backlash thats growing in volume the more ridiculous the bullshit gets. Especially lately with said "Christians" acting like they're somehow being victimized by not being allowed to shove their beliefs on everyone else.

Can't argue with this. It's true. But not all Christians are that way, any more than all atheists are militant.

In Canada, its deemed offensive to push your religion onto anyone else, regardless of what your religion is. Especially when it comes to politics. Your ass will get voted out of office so fast it will make your head spin if you try to preach in politics up here >.>

Hopefully the US will come to its senses on that issue. I don't care for the mixing of religion and politics, myself.

It's when, for example, someone tells me that God is this or that or did this or that in reference to a measurable event that already had an explaination. Then tries to use a 2000 year old novel as factual proof of it. -.-

This is partly why I keep saying that interpreting the Bible literally is risky. It's thousands of years of oral traditions that were written down; stories that were told in parable format so people could understand the underlying message.

I have said before: the Bible isn't history, and it isn't science. It's theology. You have to view it within the context of the time it was written, with the underlying message in mind. Not every Christian views the Bible as history or science; many do NOT take it literally but get drowned out by the vocal fundamentalists.

Religion has long been a form of social engineering. Both for good and bad. Back in the days before cops, it really helped to have social controls that relied on an all seeing, all knowing invisible force. -.-

There's something to this statement. However, it doesn't always work out that way; which is why many religious faiths break down into a variety of sects.

The modern problem with religion is almost exclusively due to some people not evolving the social considerations of religion to modern times. Religion *must* evolve with humanity, not try to drag it backwards. Otherwise the conflict will continue as technology progresses forward.

I absolutely agree on this.

I think you've met precious few atheists considering the way you keep describing them. Nevermind the fact that any ridicule or alleged disruption pulled off by an atheist is outweighed 1000 fold by the ridicule and disruption they visit on atheists and others.

On the contrary; I've met many. Some are very close friends. Some are militant, some are not.

I don't think it's any more right for a religious fundamentalist to attack atheists than it is for (militant) atheists to attack the religious. Both are entitled to their view points; I simply think that both sides spend more time attacking than discussing.

My apologies, your handle is rather gender neutral.

No worries; I just thought I'd made my gender clear over the years I've been posting here and on CS. But then again; I sometimes get confused by some members who are in same sex relationships when they refer to their wives (which makes me think them male when they're not). That's not a complaint, btw. We need to come up with a way to clarify the English language to accommodate same sex relationships while making the actual gender of the speaker clear.

You have, so far in this thread, essentially spoken for God and his behaviour as if your interpretation of his existence is correct. You have argued God's existence as a matter of fact and put the burden on the rest of us for not being able to hear his voice. You have put forth the existence of angels as fact. You have essentially ruled your beliefs off limits by classifying them as supernatural and declaring science isn't allowed in that domain. You've made false equavalancies such as comparing god to exoplanets or the god particle. Two things of which were theorhetically possible according to existing science and in the case of exoplanets, pretty much a given fact even before we could detect them. Simply based on the scientific facts we already had.

<sigh>. No. This is not what I am doing. I've said time and again that I realize that I cannot scientifically prove the existence of God, and that I am not actually trying to prove his existence to you or anyone else at all. Rather, I am trying to give insight on why I believe what I believe, and why other people believe it as well. I also have objected to oversimplified, or incorrect interpretations of Scripture that have been cherry picked to paint Christianity in the worst light possible, while ignoring everything else.

I didn't compare God to exoplanets or the god particle. What I said was, that neither was conceived of by science for many years, and both existed beyond the ability of science to prove. That didn't make them less real.

Science can't answer every question. There are many questions that mankind asks that science can't investigate, because we can neither observe or experiment. What is human consciousness? We can scan brains and measure the electrical activity it generates, but those measurements don't explain what consciousness actually is, or if it can exist in other animals. There's some indication it may, but we really don't know.

You even argued over how you think religions began, and we're completely wrong I might add. Seifer was totally correct there. We began attributing the supernatural to phenomena we did not understand at the time. After we evolved the capacity for social understanding. When the human brain evolved to the point where we could imagine the feelings and thoughts of others, we likewise became capable of concieving of supernatural beings. Because we now had the ability to concieve of thoughts and emotions existing without direct evidence. We began attributing that to events we could not understand. Hence the vast abundance of natural gods in the history of religion. Even the Christian God is still in part an amalgamation of stories of earlier more elemental gods. Natural events no one understood at the time are attributed to him: Floods, plagues, the burning of Sodom and Gomorrah, etc.

We'll just have to disagree on that one. I certainly don't view the Bible as history (as I've said many times) but I do believe that Man has interacted with the spiritual on many levels over time, and continues to do so.

So you'll forgive me if I'm dubious of your claims of a scientific approach or your argument that your profession is somehow evidence. -.-

You missed the point again. I'm not trying to scientifically prove the existence of God, and I've always said I can't do so. However, my beliefs on religion have nothing to do with my professional practices; you can't claim that I am blind to science when I use it every day, simply because I accept something using evidence other than the scientific method, because the scientific method is not the only means of answering questions.

Newton was basically a heretic. He thought worshipping god was a sin. Denied the exsistence of the holy trinity and thought Jesus had hidden the truth in secret code in the scriptures. Galileo was ironically responsible for contributing to the seperation of religion, philosophy and science. Willingly I might add. Decartes was more a deist, and was constantly accused of being an atheist in his time.

All of which is besides the point: they were men of science, to contributed great things to our understanding of the physical world . . . and they were also men of great faith. That faith does not have to conform to mine to make my point valid.

Collins was an atheist until his parents died ( triggering the "No atheists in foxholes" effect if you will ). He's a bit of an interesting case as he's done a lot of work trying to reconcile the two, though I'm not sure he's had much luck and he still holds some backwards religious views.

I don't agree with Collins from a religious perspective, and you can't reconcile the Bible with science because it is not a science text (Collins has tried and failed to do this). But he is a good modern example of a scientist whose work will have profound effects on the future of medicine who is also a man of faith.

As you have shown a complete misunderstanding of what I said.

Examples, please.

The only thing I said on Islam was that it was not as big on proletyzing as Christianity. That is true. A simple headcount will tell you that.

I disagree. Just because a faith doesn't win as many converts doesn't mean it's not aggressively proselytizing.

As for being the fastest growing religion, by what measure? Percentage? Absolute numbers? Conversions? Being born into it? Not even the Pew Research Center was able to gather enough reliable data on the subject.

Granted, the evidence is conflicting. Point conceded.

Did you miss the part where I said I was Buddhist before? -.-

I had forgotten it, quite frankly.

But that's simply not how the universe works. You cannot have cause without effect. Even the temporary suspension of a natural law creates an effect through the absence of that law. If you turn water into wine, you have added matter to the universe in the form of the additional ingredients required to turn water into wine. You have added matter that does not have any causality. Violating one of the most fundemental laws of physics.

Hence, the definition of a miracle.

You have most definately caused an effect and that is the core problem with any claim of divine intervention. You're trying to have your cake and eat it too. You want the effect of intervention, yet say intervention can have no effect.

Excuse me, where did I say this?