It's obviously pointless trying to convince believers that god doesn't exist and that he does to atheist.

It's also obvious that our beleifs come from what we are presented with. 100 years ago a child growing up in a catholic family would never have decided to be a buddist. now we have more choices but why do people choose to beleive even with the choice of being an atheist?

are you afraid of god? do you owe him something? would you be a 'bad' person if you didn't beleive in god?

this goes for all religions, except buddists who don't beleive in god anyway

If you think buddhism is the only atheist religion, you are quite ignorant.

He's quite right, trying to convince someone not to believe, or to believe, is quite pointless. Well, over the internet it is. I believe in God simply because I do. I need no other reason. I believe what is written in the Bible is true. I believe that Christ died on the Cross to save me from my sins. Do I need a reason to believe it? No. I believe it because I do. It pisses me off when people say "Oh, well, yea, it didn't happen like that. God doesn't exist!" You believe what you want to believe, and I'll believe what I want to believe. You don't wanna believe what I believe? Then don't. I don't wanna believe what you believe? I won't. I was talking with a good friend on the phone a few nights ago about the end of the world, and she decided she was gonna become more religious. Is that her choice? Yes, it is. Did I make her? No. I believe that my actions and my beliefs through expressing them to her made her decide "Oh, wow, that's how it's gonna happen." Whether you believe in Jesus, or God, or Buddha, or Allah, or whoever, it doesn't matter. What does matter is that YOU believe it. I, personally, respect everyone in spite of their beliefs. Why can't you all just be the same way? It really irks me to see everyone trying to say "Oh, God doesn't exist" with a whole bunch of reasons why, and everyone simply responds "Yes, He does, because the Bible told me so." How around 65 people, spanning over 10,000 years can all write about a similar thing, all inspired by the same Being, can be FICTION, I'll never know. That's it for today, thanks for listening/reading.

Peace,

The Student

quote:He's quite right, trying to convince someone not to believe, or to believe, is quite pointless.

No, but arguing in a situation where your unformed and probably uninformed opinion won't affect anything in order to identify the opinion you truly believe isn't pointless (I'm talking about why I'm posting here by the way, not insulting you).

quote:I believe in God simply because I do.

If I said that I am wasting my time worshiping a deformed fish simply 'because I was', you'd think I was insane, yet it's far more likely that the Ugly Fish is our creator. I mean, we have photographic evidence that he exists.

quote:I believe what is written in the Bible is true. I believe that Christ died on the Cross to save me from my sins. Do I need a reason to believe it?

Yes, you need to justify yourself to yourself at least, or you entire life is led for somthing you may not truly believe, just want to believe. You can't just believe things blindly, that's called idiocy.

quote:I, personally, respect everyone in spite of their beliefs.

I respect everyone that I believe deserves respect, but that can change drastically when I find out that they unthinkingly believe somthing (which I believe is true of all religious people to some extent, because I (currently) believe that logical thought will always lead to atheism).

quote:It really irks me to see everyone trying to say "Oh, God doesn't exist" with a whole bunch of reasons why, and everyone simply responds "Yes, He does, because the Bible told me so." How around 65 people, spanning over 10,000 years can all write about a similar thing, all inspired by the same Being, can be FICTION, I'll never know.

Generally, actually, people either shut up when I give my arguments about religion, or argue in some way (usually quite well... I'm not being conceited here). 65 people writing over 10,000 years inspired by the same being couldn't be fiction couldn't be wrong, but 2,000 years of myths based on previous myths and acted on by a few "prophets", whose actions were written down and exaggerated for PR purposes, followed by a few letters by some romans is not nessecarily a 100% reliable source to base your life on.

[This message has been edited by sp0rkius (edited 04-28-2004).]

I believe in the creator, because i'm one.

Ok I don't know what I am myself, but here's why at least many people believe in whatever god it is they believe in.

Religion works. Someone who reads their bible and prays regularely somehow... Gets closer with their god. When they're close to their god things seem to go well and a lot of things are good. Not everything, but it seems that religion works for the most part. Also religious book preach a lot of stuff that's like insanely wise and good.

Hmm, some of you atheist dudes should try pursuing some religion just for the crap of it. Go to church or some meetings whatever, try reading some of the bible or something. Maybe you'll see what I once saw, you really feel that... That there's something to it. I don't know if that feeling is all in your head, it might be, but it's pretty damn convincing, cos it seems like god is showing himself to you over and over again.

Something else that did it for me when I was a christian, was other people... Like when you see these insanely smart and wise people who are so incredibly convinced of this god, it's hard not to feel a certain respect for their belief...

I NEED HELP!

Why believe? Because to do otherwise would mean blinding myself to the facts.

Iv'e said it before and I'll keep on saying it until someone can destroy it, or till people get sick of asking.

There's a historical event that just refuses to be explained away. That a man named Yeshua, lived, claimed to be the Jewish Messiah, was put to death and died. Shortly after his tomb was found to be empty and a rapidly increasing number of people, first in that same city, were proclaiming that he had overcome death and that they had seen him alive again. Of these same people many would go onto die for what they proclaimed, that Yeshua was God among us.

Destroy a historical resurrection and you destroy christianity.

"And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith." - Paul (1 Cor 15:14) cAD55. Who left not only his respected position and privilige to proclaim this, but died for it.

What I wonder though, is if Jesus did raise from the dead, does even something that fucking weird imply a god exists? It certainly makes the possibility rise, since it's not too often an atrophied and dead body is revived (happens so damned rarely, and most of the time the person is so severely brain damaged that it would have been better they died). If one were revived and in health, that would amaze the hell out of me...but I still don't know if I'd believe a god exists because of it.

A bit irrelevant but there was this this atheist scientist from some east european country who was in some big ol' accident and supposedly died, then just woke up 3 days after being in the mortuary... While he had been dead though, he was a ghost or something, or so he said... And when he came back to life he could tell his best friend or something that his son was going to have a messed up foot or something, and when he was born there was something wrong with it...

Uhm, ok this was a bit incoherent, but I saw it some time ago on discovery science...

Anyways that guy went to become a methodist priest, whatever that is...

Isn't it half-ironic that discovery science has so much stuff about the supernatural...?

To be honest it would drive many people nuts. *cough*

This is kind of like what dr_rock meantioned about a child growning up Catholic -choosing Buddhism, it wasn't quite a hundred years ago, and she probably wasn't Catholic, but it's close enough.

It is the experience of a lady, growing up in an Eastern European country during the second world war. In a particulary traumatic experience as the town was being bombed she ran to a park, not realy knowing where she was going as she was realy upset. She got inside to see this huge Buddha sitting in Lotus Posture, I'm not to clear on the deatils but she kind of took shelter under Him. She wasn't scared by this huge vision but imediately felt great effection and was very comfortated by it.

What is strange is that she says she had never even known anything about Buddhism at all before this, which is not suprising given the time, place and her age, about 12 or younger I think. If it was Christ or something then it would be a little less peculiour, or more easily explainable. But why Buddha? Even if she had seen a statue or something and couldn't remember even later in her life, she obviously didn't have any great or even small knowledge of Buddhism, if she had encountered it would maybe even been seen as barbaric/unholy. Considering that this maybe a hallucination bought on because of the truamatic experience why would her mind have chosen this image as a comforting one? Perhaps precisly because it was far removed from her 'normal' life. I don't know enough about the mind to theorise adiquately but I find it interesting.

Later on in her life she was in India and her Guru remarked to her about this very incident even though she had not meantioned it. (To anybody at all if my memory is correct.)

If you take this to be some what factual, then our religious opinions can possibly come from outside of our direct environment.

AKA by supernatural means or simply born of our own brains, not directly realated to eduactional or cultural environments.

The lady in question, didn't consider herself a Buddhist at the time, nor anymore Buddhist than Hindu (as her Guru was [born into]) later in life. Obviously at the time she didn't have any idea who Buddha, or what Buddhism was.

I do beleive you are right that our beleifs come from the information we receive, whatever that is. This is at least true for myself. I have likened it to what some people say about love, they're whole lives were leading to and laying the foundations of, or for, union with they're loved one. It simply feels, with heart and mind that it's right. I don't adhere to any specif religion, I don't know if God exists beyond my own mind, but I do practice and try to follow the teachings of a specif yoga.

quote:Originally posted by Hexadecimal:

If you think buddhism is the only atheist religion, you are quite ignorant.

I never said that, I only mentioned buddism because a lot of people here confuse it with a religion, in the sense of belief in one or more gods. Buddism is more of a philosophy than a religion. oh and Hex you are quite stupid.



[edit] this topic was intended for personal accounts/reasons, or to give specific examples not to flame others because of their opinions

[This message has been edited by dr_rock (edited 04-29-2004).]

quote:Originally posted by Discipulus:

I believe what is written in the Bible is true. I believe that Christ died on the Cross to save me from my sins. Do I need a reason to believe it? No. I believe it because I do.

If you believe something for no reason, then you are a douche and a pushover, in my opinion. You should at least have something to back up your beliefs, especially since they define your entire existance.

I don't think anyone rising from the dead naturally = God. If anything it = necromancy.

If someone said "I am God, and i'm going to prove it by being killed and coming to life again 3 days later" and actually did, it would be pretty convincing evidence.

The thing that counts is that Yeshua, and those that proclaimed it based, his entire claim to be the Son of God on that one thing alone.

From the way he died, a little sleep in a cold cave was not going to make him get better, let alone impress anyone that he had taken on death and defeated it.

this goes for all religions, except buddists who don't beleive in god anyway

Dr. Rock, do you know what an inference is? When you say all religions, that means all religions; when you except Buddhism due to it's atheistic nature, and only Buddhism, one could easily infer that you were truly ignorant enough to believe Buddhism is the only godless religion.

So fuck you. Clarify your posts if you don't want people to misunderstand them.

quote:Originally posted by dr_rock:

It's obviously pointless trying to convince believers that god doesn't exist and that he does to atheist.

Atheism is the standard, religions are what came along and changed it. allow me to illustrate my point further:

In Scotland there is a deep lake called Loch Ness. Many people in Scotland-almost certainly the majority-believe that the lake is like other lochs in the country. Their beliefs about the lake are what we might call normal. But that is not to say they have no particular beliefs. It's just that the beliefs they have are so ordinary that they do not require elucidation. They believe that the lake is a natural phenomenon of a certain size, that certain fish live in it, and so on.

However, some people believe that the loch contains a strange creature, known as the Loch Ness Monster. Many claim to have seen it, although no firm evidence of its existence has ever been presented. So far our story is a simple fact. Now imagine how the story could develop

The number of believers in the monster starts to grow. Soon, a word is coined to describe them: they are part-mockingly called 'Nessies'....However, the number of Nessies continues to increase and the name ceases to become a joke. Despite the fact that the evidence for the monster's existence is still lacking, soon being a Nessie is the norm and it is the people previously thought of as normal who are in the minority. They soon get their own name, 'Anessies'-those who don't believe in the monster.

Is it true to say that the beliefs of Anessies are parasitic on those of the Nessies? That can't be true, because the Anessies' beliefs predate those of the Nessies. The key point is not one of chronology however. The key is that the Anessies would believe exactly the same as they do now even if the Nessies had never existed. What the rise of the Nessies did was to give a name to a set of beliefs that had always existed but which was considered so unexceptional that it required no special label.

The moral of the story should be clear. Atheists subscribe to a certain world view that includes numerous beliefs about the world and what is in it. Theists say that there is something else that also exists-God. If theists did not exist, atheists still would, but perhaps there would be no special name for them. But since theism has become so dominant in our world, with so many people believing in God or gods, atheism has come to be defined in contrast to theism. That makes it no more parasitic on religion than the beliefs of the Anessies are parasitic on those of the Nessies.

The absurdity of saying that atheism is parasitic on religious belief is perhaps made most clear by considering what would happen if everyone ceased to believe in God. If atheism were parasitic on religion, then surely it could not exist without religion. But in this imagined scenario, what we would have would not be the end of atheism but its triumph. Atheism no more needs religion than atheists do.

quote:Originally posted by ilbastardoh:

I believe in the creator, because i'm one.

hey bastardoh... nice. on the same page, bro.

Dark_Magneto = smart

i dont know if i misunderstood magnetos post but... there hasnt been a civilisation yet unearthed that hasnt had some kind of supernatural basis for a religion. its only very recent that atheism is prevalent.

/\ You're right. The lowest common denominator of all civilizations, stretching back to the first civilizations ever discovered, is some form of suprahuman worship.

As to the original question... I don't think people believe in something (for the example in question, Catholic Christianity) simply because they haven't experienced anything else. My father was raised Protestant, but he has studied and dabbled in astrology and the Zodiac, Scandinavian paganism, and Wicca. At this point in his life, as he has done for the past seven years, rests on Christianity.

My younger sister has travelled just about the same path, and rests on the same conclusion of Christianity.

My older brother was raised in the same environment as my sister and I have, and he rests on globalist Buddhism as his religion.

I have formed an eclectic mix of Norse paganism, Hermeticism, Hinduism, Buddhism, and archetypal psychology.

Therefore, it's not about a lack of choices, but a personal validity in one of those choices, whether it's Christianity, atheism, or some other system of belief.

Then again, it's possible that it's about a lack of consciousness concerning choice, as many of us still remain in a zombie mentality, completely unconscious in our daily lives, acting out of reflex and not out of will.

Depends on the person, I suppose.

SST

quote:Originally posted by nevermind:

i dont know if i misunderstood magnetos post but... there hasnt been a civilisation yet unearthed that hasnt had some kind of supernatural basis for a religion. its only very recent that atheism is prevalent.

Atheism has always been around, although it didn't always have a name.

Nowadays several people are having to assert their atheism in the sea of fundamentalist belief structures so that they have a voice.

quote:Originally posted by Discipulus:

I believe in God simply because I do. I need no other reason.

Other people have already said this, but I think it really needs to be emphasized - people can believe anything. If all you have to back yourself up is belief, you've got nothing.

For example, I know you don't believe in evolution.

Wouldn't it be rather ridiculous for me to say that I believe in evolution because I do and I have no other reason?

Or that because I believe it, it is TRUE?

quote:Whether you believe in Jesus, or God, or Buddha, or Allah, or whoever, it doesn't matter.

They can't all be true, and it's possible that none of them are.

To just assume that whatever you believe is correct is mind-boggling.

there is no concrete truth, only versions

therefore that statement is false

Watch the sun rising over Halfdome, and try to go away without a feeling of awe.

What you do with that feeling, whether going to church or sacrificing a goat on a mountaintop (hmmm...) is really your own business.

One thing i dont understand is how people can believe in these 'messiahs' just because other people believe in them. If some guy now went around turning water into wine and 'curing' (you must have seen or at least heard of those 'Miracle' tv shows in which the host goes around healing people*cough cough American TV cough cough*) people claiming to be the messiah you'd think he was being sacriligeous and he'd get locked up. Hypocritical?

I wonder if we raised a generation of humans completely separated from outside influence, what they'd believe. Would they be atheist or theist?

I wonder if primates believe in God.

quote:Originally posted by inquisitor_11:

Why believe? Because to do otherwise would mean blinding myself to the facts.

Iv'e said it before and I'll keep on saying it until someone can destroy it, or till people get sick of asking.

There's a historical event that just refuses to be explained away. That a man named Yeshua, lived, claimed to be the Jewish Messiah, was put to death and died. Shortly after his tomb was found to be empty and a rapidly increasing number of people, first in that same city, were proclaiming that he had overcome death and that they had seen him alive again. Of these same people many would go onto die for what they proclaimed, that Yeshua was God among us.

Destroy a historical resurrection and you destroy christianity.

"And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith." - Paul (1 Cor 15:14) cAD55. Who left not only his respected position and privilige to proclaim this, but died for it.

Numbers 23:19

I dunno what this has got to do with anything, but it kinda does I guess...

Just this other night I was browsing the totse forums and it was about the usual atheism vs. theism crap, and reading that kinda stuff always brings a lot of doubts to mind...

Then I dc'd, went out into the kitchen and looked outside up at the moon... And I thought "Look god dude, I can't help but believe in you for some reason and you know it... But it would be so much easier if you could just do some little thing right now to prove your existense..."

So after that I thought like hey what if God would have done something, what would change? What would happen if I went and posted about it on totse? And then all of a sudden I could just hear a BOO!

It was my little brother standing in the kitchen door with a big smile on his face, probably cos he scared the crap out of me, it was like 5 am...

So of course I started thinking, could that have been...? Nah, no way, funny coincidence...

So yeah, either that was a coincidence, or it was gods way of saying look dude, it doesn't matter what I do, I show you miracles all the time, ultimately you're just gonna have to believe and have faith...

Yeah it did really happen btw...

is the "you loose 21 grams when you die" thing wrong or right?

The 21 gram experiment actually took place, but (as Snopes says here (http://www.snopes.com/religion/soulweight.asp))

"It would take a great deal of credulity to conclude that MacDougall's experiments demonstrated anything about post-mortem weight loss, much less the quantifiable existence of the human soul. For one thing, his results were far from consistent, varying widely across his half-dozen test cases"

Oh, and if the best God can do to prove his existence is get your little brother to spook you, that's pretty fucking weak.

quote:Originally posted by Hexadecimal:

this goes for all religions, except buddists who don't beleive in god anyway

Dr. Rock, do you know what an inference is? When you say all religions, that means all religions; when you except Buddhism due to it's atheistic nature, and only Buddhism, one could easily infer that you were truly ignorant enough to believe Buddhism is the only godless religion.

So fuck you. Clarify your posts if you don't want people to misunderstand them.





religion is the beleif in supernatural powers that control mankind, so buddism is not a religion, mas i said before i mentionned it because many people considere it a religion, their are no godless religions

and no you can't fuck me, go fuck your mum, thats what i do

(I used to be Buddhist, by the way...I like to think I know atleast a wee little bit about a religion I partook in.)

Buddhism teaches about the spirit of nature, reincarnation, karma, and all that good 'ol governing of mankind.

Buddhism is an atheist religion.

Edit:

"and no you can't fuck me, go fuck your mum, thats what i do"

If you don't know the implications of 'fuck you', I shall tell you. Just as with the phrases 'curse you' and 'damn you', 'fuck you' is a shortned form of 'God ______ you'. Fuck, when used in 'Fuck you!', means the exact same thing as in 'God damn you!'. You are wishing ill happenings upon the person, not requesting sexual favors.

[This message has been edited by Hexadecimal (edited 05-04-2004).]

Numbers 23:19?

[This message has been edited by inquisitor_11 (edited 05-04-2004).]

I'm trying to see 23:19's correlation to the post. Perhaps a wee bit of explanation as to your implications?

quote:Originally posted by Dark_Magneto:

Atheism has always been around, although it didn't always have a name.



(i am not flaming Dark Magneto or anyone else)

so here is another blind-faith example...Dark Mag. says that atheism has always been around. to date, we cant travel backwards in time ,that i am aware of, to interview the very first people. so for the sake of argument, let us concider that the biblical account is true. if it is true then everyone on the planet would not only know that there is a God, but they would also know God. and if this were true then Dark Mag's statement would be false.

Let's go alittle farther. If said account is true, then nothing else truely matters.

If it is false, then Nothing matters at all.

If there is no God, then there truly is no reason for this thread or these debates, because there would be no reason for existance. existance would be simply as important as nonexistance.

God's Word is the REASON i believe, period. Blind faith does not mean (to me atleast) that i never question my beliefs. Or that i never wonder if my belief is the correct one. or even along the correct line. But i do find it quite odd that people will believe in extra-terrestrials, bigfoot, loch ness monster etc., without 'hard, scientific proof'. but demand proof of God before they believe in Him.

Jesus said to go and make disciples of all nations. This is why i am putting my 2 cents in. But if there is no God, then nothing really matters. And that would even mean that if the big bang really happened and evolution were true, that knowledge still would not make a bit of difference as to the importance of anything. And if that is true, then what is the purpose of the atheists arguements?

I haven't read anything in this post i am just answering the question.

I believe that god exisites because of Life. The fact that Life occurs in the universe is proof enough that a being of great power is watching us. I am not saying that he/she/it intervines with life but it does influnces as little as possible. Also when ever he "Influnces" the unvirse he does it so minorly that it just causes intresting things to happen. I am accuseing god of being a no good fucking voyar. He created life just to watch it for shits'an'giggles.

quote:

If you don't know the implications of 'fuck you', I shall tell you. Just as with the phrases 'curse you' and 'damn you', 'fuck you' is a shortned form of 'God ______ you'. Fuck, when used in 'Fuck you!', means the exact same thing as in 'God damn you!'.

[This message has been edited by Hexadecimal (edited 05-04-2004).][/B]

God can't fuck me either!!!

anyway why do you believe /not believe in god?

quote:Originally posted by BlackMage:

I haven't read anything in this post i am just answering the question.



well done, at last someone who knows how to stay on topic

xtreem5150ahm, Pascal's Wager is intellectual cowardice, and won't get anyone into heaven (at least, not speaking in the context of the Christian God).

Yea but when Pascal was writting it it wasn't a "intellectual suicide" thing. Rather he came to the conclusion that you can't prove/disprove God's existence through reasoning- the same conclusion that MGCBTSOOYG seems to have reached. In some ways he was ahead of his time in this area. The "wager" was Pascal's response to the problem.

quote:Originally posted by xtreem5150ahm:

If there is no God, then there truly is no reason for this thread or these debates, because there would be no reason for existance. existance would be simply as important as nonexistance.



Lets say, hypothetically for a moment that we came into being through purely naturalistic means and there is no such thing as god/gods/godesses or anything supernatural for that matter.

How does the addition of a supernatural entity with comic-book-like superpowers do anything to change that?

Either your life has meaning irrespective of unknown variables, or it doesn't have any meaning of all.

God or no God, your life will have as much meaning as you assign it. Any meaning of life will be had while you are living it and is not dependent on scenarios that only apply after the life is said and done with.

quote:

God's Word is the REASON i believe, period.



Actually, your belief that the Bible is the word of God handed down through man is the reason you believe.

Why the omnipotent creator of all that is decided to choose his fallible creations to pass on his word, which he knew would become corrupted and altered over time is highly questionable, to say the least.

quote:Originally posted by ashesofzen:

xtreem5150ahm, Pascal's Wager is intellectual cowardice, and won't get anyone into heaven (at least, not speaking in the context of the Christian God).



I dont know who or what "Pascal's Wager" is, excuse my ignorance.

i was not stating the path to heaven, only the futility of these arguements if there is no God.

To begin with, you wrote that "atheism has always been around". i think i have shown how you might be wrong if the biblical account is true, and that unless there is a way to go back in time to view or interview the 1st people, it would be blind faith to just believe what you stated as "fact".

quote:Originally posted by Dark_Magneto:



[QUOTE][b]

Either your life has meaning irrespective of unknown variables, or it doesn't have any meaning of all.

No. If there is no God, then there is no afterlife. If there is no afterlife ( ie heaven/hell) then all that happens is we live and die, end of story. To change what forest gump said, meaning is as meaning is assigned. But from an eternal perspective, if there is no God, what we assign as important is eternally unimportant.... i say again: existance would be simply as important as nonexistance.

quote:

God or no God, your life will have as much meaning as you assign it. Any meaning of life will be had while you are living it and is not dependent on scenarios that only apply after the life is said and done with.



I think I got this quote/unquote thing right this time..if not, sorry for the mess

quote:Originally posted by xtreem5150ahm:

To begin with, you wrote that "atheism has always been around". i think i have shown how you might be wrong if the biblical account is true, and that unless there is a way to go back in time to view or interview the 1st people, it would be blind faith to just believe what you stated as "fact".



Fortunately there are absolutely no valid reasons to think that the biblical creation account is true.

quote:

No. If there is no God, then there is no afterlife.



Non sequitur. There can be an afterlife even if supernatural deities don't exist. Think outside the box.

quote:

If there is no afterlife ( ie heaven/hell) then all that happens is we live and die, end of story.



Ok. So how does that make your life meaningless right here, right now.

Does your life have any meaning to you right now? If it doesn;t then your life is meaningless right now no matter what.

If your life has meaning to you right now, then it has meaning.

Now lets flash forward to the day you die. Let's say that all religions were just shams and there really is no such thing as the afterlife.

How does that fact take away the meaning you had in your life which you had while you were telling me your lfie had meaning?

What, does it magically go back in time somehow and strip away your meaning in your life which you had when you were alive and telling me your life had meaning?

That's equivalent to saying that there is no point in drinking soda if there is no aftertaste.

Of course there is a point to drinking soda! You enjoy the soda while you are drinking it! That's the whole point!

And that is what life is like. If your life has meaning for you, then it does period; right here, right now, no matter what; and nothing can change that.

quote:

But from an eternal perspective, if there is no God, what we assign as important is eternally unimportant....



Everything is eternally worthless. The breakfast you ate this morning, the movie you watched last year, and everything past, present, and future.

Just because something is limited in duration does not mean that it has no use or is without value.

Eternity and infinity are incoherent concepts which lack any frame of reference or base of comparison. They are theoretical constructs which have no actual manifestations. Show me "an infinity" or "an eternity". You can't. They are the product of the human imagination and show no signs of actually being applicable in reality.

quote:

i say again: existance would be simply as important as nonexistance.



According to who? My life is important, despite the fact that it is limited in duration.

Everyone has to die sooner or later. Does that fact make all lives that were, life that is, and lives that will come absolutely worthess in your eyes?

I share Lovecraft's sentiments:

"It is easy to remove the mind from harping on the lost illusion of immortality. The disciplined intellect fears nothing and craves no sugar-plum at the day's end, but is content to accept life and serve society as best it may. Personally I would not care for immortality in the least. There is nothing better than oblivion, since in oblivion there is no wish unfulfilled. We had it before we were born, yet did not complain. Shall we whine because we know it will return? It is Elysium enough for me, at any rate."

- H. P. Lovecraft

quote:Originally posted by Dark_Magneto:

Ok. So how does that make your life meaningless right here, right now.

i have already explained that: Without God, meaning is only assigned by ourselves. my life has meaning right here right now because i believe that God exists and that His Son died for our sins. No matter what you say, I am not the one who assigned that meaning.

quote:Now lets flash forward to the day you die. Let's say that all religions were just shams and there really is no such thing as the afterlife.

How does that fact take away the meaning you had in your life which you had while you were telling me your lfie had meaning?

if there is no afterlife then the meaning was never there, it was only defined (or assigned). if there is no afterlife, the taste of soda (your example), ceases the moment you cease.assuming that there is no one else with the knowledge of your tasting experience. If the legacy of the soda taste and the memory of the taste cease to exist, then the meaning assigned to the taste has also ceased to exist. If I say that I have tasted the love of God, and He existed only in my imagination, then that love only has meaning until the legacy of what i said ceases to exist. and also the meaning and purpose of love is meaningless. "we love Him because He first loved us."

quote:

I share Lovecraft's sentiments:

...We had it before we were born, yet did not complain. Shall we whine because we know it will return? It is Elysium enough for me, at any rate."[/i]

- H. P. Lovecraft

So according to Lovecraft, there is a "beforelife" but no "afterlife" and that he has assigned the meaning of paradise in his "knowledge" that there is no afterlife.

the websters unabridged dictionary defines Elysium as 1. the abode of the blessed after death. 2. any similarly concieved abode or state of the dead. 3. any place or state of perfect happiness; paradise. 4. an area in the northern hemisphere of Mars...

A couple of last words of famous people:

Anne Boleyn.." O God, have pity on my soul. O God, have pity on my soul."

Socrates.. " All of the wisdom of this world is but a tiny raft upon which we must set sail when we leave this earth. If only there was a firmer foundation upon which to sail, perhaps some divine word."

Sigmund Frued.. " The meager satisfaction that man can extract from reality leaves him starving."

Voltaire.. " I am abandoned by God and man! I will give you half of what I am worth if you will give me six months' life. Then I shall go to hell; and you will go with me. O Christ! O Jesus Christ!" (The talented French writer once said of Jesus, "Curse the wretch! Every sensible man, every honorable man, must hold the Christian sect in horror...Christianity is the most ridiculous, the most absurd and bloody religion that has ever infected the world")

He also boasted, "In 20 years Christianity will be no more. My single hand shall destroy the edifice it took 12 apostles to rear." his house was later used by the geneva bible society to print bibles.

Napoleon.."I marvel that where the ambitious dreams of myself and of Alexander and of Caesar should have vanished into thin air, a Judean peasant--Jesus-- should be able to stretch his hand across centuries, and control the destinies of men and nations."

Grotius.."I have lived my life in a laborious doing of nothing."

James Dean.."My fun days are over."



one last one...Lew Wallace author of Ben

Hur..."thy will be done."

What ,Dark_Magneto, will be be your last thoughts...

God Bless You, john schricker (xtreme5150ahm)

Well if your life doesn't have meaning based on the intangible object thrice removed from reality you place it in and you just cease to exist after you die, then it really didn't make a difference.

It didn't make a difference because you thought your life had meaning and lived your life as if it did. If there is no way to distinguish between apparent meaning in life and actual meaning, then what is the difference? None as far as you are concerned.

If you feel your life doesn't have any meaning then you're already dead.

Meaning in life is not dependent on a supernatural entity. It is whatever we make of it. Sure it may be finite, like all things, but that doesn't diminish it.

So, Zeal's lies when they, "A diamond lasts forever."? I knew those bastards had a scam going http://www.totse.com/bbs/smile.gif (http://www.totse.com/bbs/smile.gif)

The main error appears to be presupposing that limited duration somehow makes life "meaningless." But this is a self-evidently dubious argument. We generally attribute the most meaning to rare (and hence valuable) things; an infinite amount of gold or lifespan, on the other hand, would likely cheapen and ultimately destroy the very reasons we value them in the first place.

maybe this will clearify...

imagine you are sleeping next to your wife(significant other). you wake up enough that your in the realm of wake/sleep. you reach over to touch your wife. you assign a meaning to that touch... 'honey i love you, i'm right here'. later you realize that your touch missed its mark and you are holding pillow/blanket. that 'touch' is now meaningless.

this is same same as life if there is no God. While you/legacy are alive, meaning is assigned. as soon as life/legacy ceases, so does its meaning.

1 Corinthians 15 - 2. By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain.

while i was in the army, some friends were having a (drunken) discusion as to if they believed and why. one (Tony) stated that he believed "just in case".

i've heard this a few times from others and i have always felt that this reason of belief was very wrong. it misses the whole point. However, in light of I Cor 15:2, its sort of the mirror image.

I believe because i believe. And if i am wrong, then my belief was in vain, and what I assigned to have meaning would be meaningless. And that belief did not hurt me (or hopefully anyone else). I have not gambled (because it would be meaningless) and have lost nothing.

Now i said that i dont think Tony's reason was right, but if you look at the reverse of that, and dont believe and are wrong then you have gambled and lost everything. I emphasize..THIS IS THE WRONG REASON TO BELIEVE! just food for thought.

You have repeatedly implied (throughout this conversation) that I feel that my life has no meaning. It DOES have meaning because i am a sower/serf/servant of the Living God, through the freewill that He gave me.

I recently read Mere Christianity by CS Lewis...he proposed the idea that free will does not exist in one sense of the word; we do not choose as we go. Rather, it was more along the lines of this: before we were born, we were partially of God, and shared a bit of his omniscience. We knew every choice we would make in the future and at the very moment we chose our fate of heaven or hell, whatever the fuck you want to call it. Life, what comes after the fact, is simply to experience and understand why we chose what we did.

Now, the basis of that (life is to experience what has already been decided), contradicts not in the least in the belief that free will is no longer around; our fate is 100% sealed in the sense that we can avoid nothing and all our decisions have already been determined by cause and effect. However, we still haven't experienced the outcome of those decisions; life has meaning whether an afterlife exists or not so long as you view it as an experience of understanding rather than a means to an end. I'm here to understand why my fate is what it is, not to reach paradise nor to fall into a pit of fire. I exist simply to understand; there is no reward for understanding, and no penalty for not finding understanding...atleast if looking at it from an atheistic viewpoint, which I happen to hold.

Now, looking at it from a Christian viewpoint, one cannot escape the fact, not the thought, but the fact that we are controlled by laws and no longer have free will. However, this does not change the freedom to understand something; I believe that we understand our illusory choices with a certain bit of freedom. Back to the Christian perspective though, would it not make sense that it is those who understand their choices fully and see their faults, and wish to remedy them who would be worthy of heaven rather than those who ignore the reason behind their choices and thrive in the sanctuary of blaming it on physical laws? I don't know how well I am at adopting viewpoints that mostly contradict my own and slightly agree, but I hope I have led someone to understand a bit better that life would have purpose, though a limited one, independent of a pre-life, or afterlife, or even a higher plane of existence.

hMMM...ABOUT THE WHOLE GOD THING. hAVE YOU PEEPS EVER HEARD OF SOMEONE WHO DOESNT BELIEVE IN GOD BUT DOES BELIEVE IN A HIGHER BEING? tHAT IS SIMPLY A CLOSET ATHEIST. lIKE A STRAIGHT GUY SAYING I DONT SUCK DICK BUT I LIKE TO BEAT MY SUASAGE LIKE A ONE EYED STEP CHILD TO PICS OF NAKED MEN. iF YOU BELIEVE IN A HIGHER BEING, WHY NOT CALL IT "GOD" WHO CARES IF THE NAME'S WRONG. STILL A HIGHER BEING IN THE END. -DEVOUT ATHEIST

hMMM ABOUT THE WHOLE GOD THING. hAVE YOU PEEPS EVER HEARD SOMEONE SAY THEY DONT BELIEVE IN GOD BUT THEY DO BELIEVE IN A HIGHER BEING? tHIS IS SIMPLY A CLOSET ATHEIST. lIKE A GUY SAYING HE ISNT GAY BUT BEATS HIS SAUSAGE LIKE A ONE EYED STEP CHILD TO PICS OF NAKED GUYS. iF YOU BELIEVE IN A HIGHER BEING WHY NOT GIVE IT A NAME. gOD SEEMS PRETTY POPULAR THESE DAYS. -dEVOUT aTHEIST

My eyes are bleeding.

Jesus wasn't resurected, he was alive the whole time. You might give a higher being the name of god, but then don't get it confused with the bible. When people say they don't believe in god they mean the bible. I higher being just means something might have created the universe.

That would be why I am agnostic.

I personally believe in no god because I see religion a way for people to explain what they don’t know. For example, how man came to be, since no one can figure out how the hell we were “born” we decided to say that a higher being created us. I also find it a way for people to help them cope with death. If you are told after death you will go to heaven, (if you are good) then death suddenly doesn’t seem like such a bad thing. I do realize this is all one religion but there are may other religions who think along the same lines, almost all.

I also see it as a way to give people a false sense of power, that they can use to contact to dead, ask for things, or some other great things depending on your religion.

f~m

You don't have to stick to the christian/muslim god... I just asked 'why do you believe...?'

and stop flaming each other! mind you my thread as got 50+ replies http://www.totse.com/bbs/biggrin.gif (http://www.totse.com/bbs/biggrin.gif)

beleiving in beings which can do more than humans doesn't make you a non-atheist! some people try to explain beleifs in gods around the world to visits from aliens... these people don't beleive in all powerful beings, but do beleive in powerful beings, who could for instance...

-cure diseases which humans at the time could not, like leprosy (which we can cure now)

-modify organisms to change their characteristics (which we can do now with genetic engineering)

- start/ influance life on a planet (we could easily send life to another planet, in years to come we could make sure it can thrive there too)

- destroy entire cities in minutes (well america is good at this)

Hex- what did you think of Mere Christianity (Dont worry this isnt some sort of leading question...)?

I thought it was written very well. In all honesty, I'd say the only part I outright disagree with was absolute morality. I find morals to be extremely subjective, but I can't blame Lewis; communication didn't allow discoveries of cannibalistic tribes and that sort to spread quickly. As far as he knew, the social morals that existed across the modernized world were all that existed, and they were rather uniform. He made the proper conclusion from the evidence available in his time, though it is provable as wrong.

Sorry if this sounds like a *knee-jerk* 'must defend christian author' response... but I'm pretty sure Lewis would have known of cannablistic tribes etc. considering he lived until the 1970's.

He wrote the book some time before then, and it wasn't edited after its publication in book form. It still smacked of being influenced only by western society.

<petty argument>

True, but he was a Prof., and a member of the Church of England during "the great missionary age" when he wrote it.I can remember a quote that was something like 'we should not suppose that the modern savage is anything like the savage of old (or smthn along those lines- talking about ethics or morals or something)'.

Your'e still right about it being centered in western society though.

</petty argument>

How petty I have become....lol

Meh, I don't mind the occasional petty flux.

damn newbies starting a new thread exactly like one already running!!!