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The Atheists Mantra; Why is the thought of no afterlife scary
Topic Started: Sep 28 2005, 10:24 AM (1,297 Views)
captain_proton_au
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A Robot in Disguise

Not important eh?, Ok then , maybe I'll ask Santa
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Dandandat
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Time to put something here
who
Oct 4 2005, 12:29 PM
These are some of my religious beliefs based on reading and direct experience. God is not in the middle but above. God is the creator and created us. Because of free will we can choose against God. We have the power of God and have chosen to create an insane world. It is not a pass for God but recognizing our responsibility.

Ok, that I can understand. But then I have to ask, if we have “free will” and if we can chose the bad things in life, are we also choosing the good things when we do good? If because of this “free will”, given to us by god, aren’t we at the ultimate point of choosing and there for creating good or bad? (which then answers the question first put to us in this thread of why a person is good vs bad, and why an atheist can chose to be good for goodness sakes) – If all things bad come form our bad choices, does not all things good come form our good choices? If so isn’t god, although our initial creator, removed form the processes and all is upon our own shoulders? If so why warship god, even if he does exist when it is us, through our free will, that is setting the cores of our lives?


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I respect your position as an atheist as I was there once. It did not last long as it was illogical. There is no proof that God does not exist. Although very spiritual, I remained an agnostic for some time.
The way you use it here the question of logic is irrelevant, it is just as illogical to believe in something that you can not prove, god can not be proven (hence this thread and many like it).

What this point fails to release is that many atheists aren’t those who “believe” god does not exist, and there for believe in something that can not be proven (the absence of god), an illogical stance. For many its much more basic, they simply do not “believe” anything at all. They do not believe there is a god (illogical because god’s existence is not proven) and they do not believe there is not a god (illogical because god’s absence is not proven), they simply do not “believe”. To them god simply does not exist because the thought of god is so unimportant that it is meaningless.
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captain_proton_au
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A Robot in Disguise

I'm one that believes he doesnt, well no supreme being in the form most seem him anyway, with a clipboard taking notes of everything we do.

But I also cannot believe in a supreme being, as for him to be supreme, he'd have to be better than me, which means he has more of a right to exist. It is this thought that I take most offense with
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Fesarius
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Admiral
It is unchallenging to be an atheist. Since I like to be challenged, I cannot practice atheism, except that I am (as I have said on other occasions) a Thor-atheist, since I do not believe in Thor.

BTW, I won't be responding to (nor defending) the above claim for various reasons. :lol:
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who
Have light saber. Will travel.
Dandandat
Oct 4 2005, 11:52 AM
...I have to ask, if we have “free will” and if we can chose the bad things in life, are we also choosing the good things when we do good? If because of this “free will”, given to us by god, aren’t we at the ultimate point of choosing and there for creating good or bad? (which then answers the question first put to us in this thread of why a person is good vs bad, and why an atheist can chose to be good for goodness sakes) – If all things bad come form our bad choices, does not all things good come form our good choices? If so isn’t god, although our initial creator, removed form the processes and all is upon our own shoulders? If so why warship god, even if he does exist when it is us, through our free will, that is setting the cores of our lives?


This is a bit long and I do not quite understand all you are saying. In a topic like this perhaps it would be better to break it down into smaller bits? If you are asking if we can create good or bad then I agree with this. I do not understand what you are saying after this. Without God all morals are relative and each person defines what is good or bad.

I agree that all that is bad comes from our bad choices. All good comes from when we choose to be in alignment with God. God is our creator and continues to sustain us. God is not removed except from our awareness if we choose to do so. God deserves our worship. In the Bible, in the context of Genesis, we fell asleep. We are now having this dream that seems so real. We need to awaken from the dream and realize our true identity.

Let me try to create a metaphor. We are in WWII on the side of the good. We are a gunner on a small ship. The ship supports us. We can choose to shoot at the right targets or against ourselves. Without the ship we have no gun, are not a gunner, and would sink into the ocean and die. As a metaphor this is a poor representation of reality but points to it.


Quote:
 
The way you use it here the question of logic is irrelevant, it is just as illogical to believe in something that you can not prove, god can not be proven (hence this thread and many like it).

What this point fails to release is that many atheists aren’t those who “believe” god does not exist, and there for believe in something that can not be proven (the absence of god), an illogical stance. For many its much more basic, they simply do not “believe” anything at all. They do not believe there is a god (illogical because god’s existence is not proven) and they do not believe there is not a god (illogical because god’s absence is not proven), they simply do not “believe”. To them god simply does not exist because the thought of god is so unimportant that it is meaningless.


Words are symbols for concepts. For the sake of argument, can we assume that the word "atheist" stands for someone who believes God does not exist? Also, that the word "agnostic" stands for someone who does not have a belief one way or the other about the existence of God?

With these definitions I consider the position of the atheist to be illogical. One has no basis for this belief. The only logical position for someone who does not believe in God is to be an agnostic.

Some believe in God for different reasons. My basis for belief comes from the direct experience of God. I have had numerous experiences that some might call mystical. These were not drug induced. Some might argue that they might be caused from some chemical state in the brain. Some might argue that I am insane. I have considered these possibilities. Everything that we think we know comes from our reading and other various perceptions. I find these mystical experiences much more real than my ordinary perceptions.
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who
Have light saber. Will travel.
captain_proton_au
Oct 4 2005, 11:45 AM
Not important eh?, Ok then , maybe I'll ask Santa

I will use another metaphor. Let us take a parent. They have a child asleep who appears to be having a nightmare. The parent is more concerned with waking the child from the nightmare into their loving arms than the specific details of the nightmare.
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who
Have light saber. Will travel.
captain_proton_au
Oct 4 2005, 12:06 PM
I'm one that believes he doesnt, well no supreme being in the form most seem him anyway, with a clipboard taking notes of everything we do.

But I also cannot believe in a supreme being, as for him to be supreme, he'd have to be better than me, which means he has more of a right to exist. It is this thought that I take most offense with

I do not believe these things either. I do believe that we are one with God but the Creator is greater.
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Dandandat
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Time to put something here
who
Oct 4 2005, 02:18 PM
Words are symbols for concepts. For the sake of argument, can we assume that the word "atheist" stands for someone who believes God does not exist? Also, that the word "agnostic" stands for someone who does not have a belief one way or the other about the existence of God?


We could, but then that would be a pore definition for the words. For the first word you cut out half of its meaning and the second you give it a meaning unlike its true meaning. But we could.


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With these definitions I consider the position of the atheist to be illogical. One has no basis for this belief. The only logical position for someone who does not believe in God is to be an agnostic.
Under those definitions you would be correct, your atheist is just as illogical (because gods nonexistence is unproven) as being a theist (because goes existence is unproven). The only thing that I can see to help your atheist is that it is illogical to believe that a negative can be proven, if god really didn’t exist it would be impossible to prove he didn’t exist, so then your atheist is stuck no matter what he does.

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Some believe in God for different reasons. My basis for belief comes from the direct experience of God. I have had numerous experiences that some might call mystical. These were not drug induced. Some might argue that they might be caused from some chemical state in the brain. Some might argue that I am insane. I have considered these possibilities. Everything that we think we know comes from our reading and other various perceptions. I find these mystical experiences much more real than my ordinary perceptions. 
Ok :)


Quote:
 
This is a bit long and I do not quite understand all you are saying. In a topic like this perhaps it would be better to break it down into smaller bits? If you are asking if we can create good or bad then I agree with this. I do not understand what you are saying after this. Without God all morals are relative and each person defines what is good or bad.

I agree that all that is bad comes from our bad choices. All good comes from when we choose to be in alignment with God. God is our creator and continues to sustain us. God is not removed except from our awareness if we choose to do so. God deserves our worship. In the Bible, in the context of Genesis, we fell asleep. We are now having this dream that seems so real. We need to awaken from the dream and realize our true identity.

Let me try to create a metaphor. We are in WWII on the side of the good. We are a gunner on a small ship. The ship supports us. We can choose to shoot at the right targets or against ourselves. Without the ship we have no gun, are not a gunner, and would sink into the ocean and die. As a metaphor this is a poor representation of reality but points to it.


I'm sorry let me try to say it again.

You said that the bad things in life happen because we make them happen. So, on the flip side the good things in life happen because we make them happen, whether you want to say this is because we choose to be more in line with god is fine, but it still comes about because we choose to be more in line with god.

You said god is not to blame for the bad things because our free will allowed us to create the bad things. If that’s true, I postulate that god is not to be honored for the good things that happen because our free will allowed us to create the good things (this is true even if the good things happen because we are more in line with god, because we still made it happen. God didn’t make us more in line with god, we made our selves more in line with god).

If god is not to be blamed for our bad choices, and he is not be honored for our own good choices, then I do not see the importance of believing (or even disbelieving) in god. If there is no importance in god then he might as well not exist.

Now there is a component I left out that gives god importance, and that is he may have created everything, but I can make this fit by saying “oh well what’s done is done” and the importance once again drops. For example a guy leaves his specimen at a fertility clinic, and a woman uses it to get pregnant. Now that man was responsible for the creation of the new child’s life, is that child obligate to feel anything for the father? I say no.

Furthering the analogy, the child may find the best good in life when it becomes more in line with its nonexistent father, (maybe because they are both genetically predisposed to liking something), does that mean the child should look up to that father? I say no.



In your WWII metaphor, the ship and the gun are tangible. If god where as tangible it would be illogical to disbelieve in him. But he isn’t even close to that tangible, for many it is unconvincing that god is our boat in the middle of the sea giving us the means to protect our selves form evil. It is all well and good for you to believe this to be true, but that is your own personal assessment formed by your own subjective interpretations of the world. They can not be debated because they mean something for you that is totally different to someone one else. Then it all comes back to the original, simple and life long debate of “do you believe or don’t you?”


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I will use another metaphor. Let us take a parent. They have a child asleep who appears to be having a nightmare. The parent is more concerned with waking the child from the nightmare into their loving arms than the specific details of the nightmare.
Well when god wakes me from this nightmare and takes me into his loving arms - I will be inclined to believe in him. Until then the nightmare he has not awaken me from is immensely more important because I must deal with it, in the here and now. Since he is not doing anything about it, him sitting over my bed is unimportant to the point that he might as well not even be there.
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psyfi
psyfi
Dandandat
Oct 4 2005, 10:36 AM
psyfi
Oct 4 2005, 10:56 AM
While having nothing absolute to hang one's hat on value-wise is somewhat of a problem regarding atheism,



I don't understand this, why is this a problem? Why does your god's "absolute" have to affect an atheist’s sense of "absolute"? Atheists have their "absolutes" that they live by, they may be different form yours and they may come form a different place, but they are there. Maybe I am misunderstanding your point could you elaborate further.


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I think the bigger problem is that when you do not believe in God, you do not expect or look for or try to find out how to have miracles.
Where you see this a a problem, I see it as a liberation. I do not wait or look for miracles to happen, I take it upon my self to do things I want or need to do.

Dan, the idea that one person has their absolutes and another person has his absolutes doesn’t make logical sense. Something is absolute, or it isn’t.

Regarding miracles, the kind I am talking about require God in the mix. What miracle would you personally do to heal a woman in a hospital dying of bone cancer with only two weeks to live? With Pharaoh at one side and the Red Sea at your back, what great feat would you do to save Moses and crew?





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Dandandat
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psyfi
Oct 4 2005, 04:32 PM
Dan, the idea that one person has their absolutes and another person has his absolutes doesn’t make logical sense. Something is absolute, or it isn’t.

Fine if you say so, then isn't it an argent assumption to believe yours are the correct ones?


Quote:
 
Regarding miracles, the kind I am talking about require God in the mix. What miracle would you personally do to heal a woman in a hospital dying of bone cancer with only two weeks to live?  With Pharaoh at one side and the Red Sea at your back, what great feat would you do to save Moses and crew?
I wouldn't expect those at all, and I will have to find a new solution or accept reality as it is. Hundreds of believers die every day in the hospital due to cancer, where is their miracle?
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psyfi
psyfi
Dandandat
Oct 4 2005, 03:40 PM
psyfi
Oct 4 2005, 04:32 PM
Dan, the idea that one person has their absolutes and another person has his absolutes doesn’t make logical sense. Something is absolute, or it isn’t.

Fine if you say so, then isn't it an argent assumption to believe yours are the correct ones?


Quote:
 
Regarding miracles, the kind I am talking about require God in the mix. What miracle would you personally do to heal a woman in a hospital dying of bone cancer with only two weeks to live?  With Pharaoh at one side and the Red Sea at your back, what great feat would you do to save Moses and crew?
I wouldn't expect those at all, and I will have to find a new solution or accept reality as it is. Hundreds of believers die every day in the hospital due to cancer, where is their miracle?

No, my beliefs are irrelevant in this matter. It would only be important for one to discover what the absolute truth is and go from there.

Re miracles, you make my original point when you say I wouldn't expect those at all. You are right that hundreds of believers die each day. However, hundreds live each day as a result of miracles. As to why some live and some die, I think that miracles are multiply determined which is to say that many factors have to fall into place in order for that shift to the miraculous level where we draw down God Power so big, so potent that it transcends natural laws. If it were easy, it wouldn't be what we mean by 'miracle.'






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who
Have light saber. Will travel.
Dandandat
Oct 4 2005, 02:05 PM
who
Oct 4 2005, 02:18 PM
Words are symbols for concepts. For the sake of argument, can we assume that the word "atheist" stands for someone who believes God does not exist? Also, that the word "agnostic" stands for someone who does not have a belief one way or the other about the existence of God?

We could, but then that would be a pore definition for the words. For the first word you cut out half of its meaning and the second you give it a meaning unlike its true meaning. But we could.

From the dictionary:

atheist

: one who believes that there is no deity


agnostic

: one who is not committed to believing in either the existence or the nonexistence of God or a god
: a person unwilling to commit to an opinion about something


I am low on enegy now. Will respond to the rest as soon as I can.
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Dandandat
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Time to put something here
who
Oct 4 2005, 06:30 PM
Dandandat
Oct 4 2005, 02:05 PM
who
Oct 4 2005, 02:18 PM
Words are symbols for concepts. For the sake of argument, can we assume that the word "atheist" stands for someone who believes God does not exist? Also, that the word "agnostic" stands for someone who does not have a belief one way or the other about the existence of God?

We could, but then that would be a pore definition for the words. For the first word you cut out half of its meaning and the second you give it a meaning unlike its true meaning. But we could.

From the dictionary:

atheist

: one who believes that there is no deity


agnostic

: one who is not committed to believing in either the existence or the nonexistence of God or a god
: a person unwilling to commit to an opinion about something


I am low on enegy now. Will respond to the rest as soon as I can.

I do not believe that is a correct definition of the word atheist, I believe this is a more complete one:

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Atheism, in its broadest sense, is characterized by an absence of belief in the existence of gods, thus contrasting with theism. This definition includes both those who assert that there are no gods and those who have no beliefs at all regarding the existence of gods. However, narrower definitions often only qualify the former as atheism, the latter falling under the more general term nontheism.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atheist
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who
Have light saber. Will travel.
^^^ Dan, as I said, words are just symbols for concepts. Most words have several definitions. I do not think we can logically discuss something unless we agree with the meaning of the words we are using. I am suggesting the narrower definition of atheism and using agnostic for someone who has no beliefs regarding God. I think this is more precise. Is this acceptable to you for the purpose of this discussion?
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Franko
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Well, this discussion livened up.


I think sometimes that we must make a distinction between God and Religion.

It seems to me that some people interpret God naturalistically, or intuitively, however guided (or misguided) by religious concepts, theology, or writings (scripture). Then there are those who I've noticed seem to percieve God as almost a "construct" of their cumulative religious indoctrination.


I'm just wondering how well some believers would fair if living in the Middle Ages where the persecution of innocent people was a regular tool of power by the authority driven Church/State continuum. Nobody's ever been burned at the stake for not believing in gravity; whilst the atrocity index for "those who believe differently than we about God" is quite extensive. I don't see a whole lot of difference between the Holy Inquisition and modern day Islamic suicide bombers.

I think what I'm trying to say is that we can learn a lot about ourselves and the dynamics of faith and belief (or the negation of such) by observing and accepting the fact that humans have the capacity to corrupt just about anything. I'm not sure that I'd be completely comfortable in a totally atheistically driven culture as well as a theocratic one. I think that the healthiest balance is when freedom of individual conscience and belief is protected within a democratic context as we now have in our modern society.

I'm not particularily afraid of atheists, Christians, Moslems or Moonies as long as my rights to personal belief are respected and free from persecution by the State. There's that word again. The State. Our true enemy.


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