Is Atheism a crutch for people who donât understand the complexity of God?
- Thread starter sho-tim
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Yes, there is some correlation between voluntarily welcoming the truth and understanding the truth.
The truth is welcomed or not. After it is welcomed it is accepted, or not. The truth does not defend itself, nor force itself upon the unwilling mind. "The universe" is the manifestation of an unwilling mind, hypothetically speaking. It is the idea that there is another will besides the one will shared by the Father and the Son. Unwelcome, the truth is not found in "the universe", such that "the universe" can masquerade, unmolested, as if it were Reality. The reasonable mind would not dismiss Reality for lack of evidence, given that it does not defend itself, make threats, or attack. Given these attributes, there can be no evidence of truth in "the universe" unless it is first made welcome. It is not "man" that must cooperate. His very appearance is the symbol of an unwilling mind. Rather, it is the mind that makes "the universe" which must cooperate unequivocally with the truth in order to be "saved" from confusing unreality with Reality. Each "man" shares in this confusion, inasmuch as each man symbolizes an aspect of the mind that makes "the universe", and can trace his genesis back to the one mind that makes "the universe", being that mind possessed by what it made: the ego. The reason the mind "must" cooperate is because unreality is opposite and anti-thetical to the truth of Reality, and there is no possible way to mix or marry the two, or combine them. "The universe" and Reality go in opposite directions, and every decision you make goes in one of two directions. There is no neutrality in this matter. So yes, it is a "must", but it is not forced upon any seemingly individual mind. Such minds thread their way through time until they see the futility of fantasy, and choose to wake up from what amounts to a nightmarish hallucination. In that case, the Truth is always there to guide the confused mind back to sanity, back to Reality, back home.
"The universe" is not our Father's will. Never was, never will be. Billions of seeming years make no difference. If truth has not forced its hand by now, it will never force its hand. It will be welcomed completely by the whole world, given enough time, simply because it is more attractive. The truth has been welcome, and the light of dawn is rising in the mind that made the darkness, one "man" at a time. Amen.
Jesus
jonbig4,
you are being nonsensical. Sure, you can invent any fantasy possible - and you can hold a world view as warped as you just want. As long as you don't force that on someone else - and especially someone that will affect me - then you can keep your nonsensical beliefs. I was not trying to convince you of anything - I was trying to show how you are beyond reasoning, or your lack of knowledge, which you present in support of your views.
Of course, you twist the fact that you were responding to Jayford, as representing something where you were asking me... that is all consistent with your wild flailing and not being able to build any argumentative structure - but rather just skip around and claim "your questions are not answered" because you say everything I answer is not relevant.
I have always claimed that there are no universally absolutes... and you can do a search on my posts about absolutes to see my position on this, as I have already debated this in many contexts.
I do enjoy jabbing your brain, and that is fun, I admit. The good thing about you is that you are growing into critical thinking - and that is important. I will never put you on ignore unless you become nagging or abusive, which I have a pretty high tolerance for accepting.
So, there - I understand your viewpoint, and I suggest you continue on your intellectual journey. The future is bright for all of us. Stay in school and finish your studies - it is still important for your status in society, and as "professional capital" that you can use later - in stead of "intellectual worth". There is value in that, seeing things through.
That is the best intellectual post I've ever read on EliteTrader in the context of religion, and you have gained some respect from me with this - unlike your other posts in debates we have had earlier. It is clear that you have a deeper understanding of the philosophical aspects of Abrahamic religion, unlike most other people.
I am very happy in discussing the philosophical aspects of religion - which I also find very interesting. I am not religious and will never be religious - but I respect anyone who has the intellectual capability of understanding the philosophy of religion - and being able to reason and deduct with their minds, which you clearly have. That goes beyond simple intellect, but broadens into reasoning and being able to adapt to input. Kudos.
There is no way I would be able to disprove a philosophical stance on religion, but I can hold a systemic view on religion and how it affects individuals and society.
As for individuals - I see it as a help for people who need a quick, simple, "profound" answer and reverberating "reason" for their actions and choices. When it starts affecting, shaping, forming society; I see the corruption it imposes on social structures - mostly people who abuse their authority and oppress/suppress others. We share the same viewpoint that this is "wrong" (in my view a self-destructing systemic bias), in your view a "sin". The reason for this is the same for both of us - seeing the benefit and goal of a harmonic, sustainable environment and society.
The core problem I see in the Abrahamic religions is the corruption by the enforcement of a "universal absolute" - and this is true for other philosophies as well, as it tempts corruptible individuals to abuse this view and try to force alignment of everyone in society to resonate and enforce/promote themselves for personal gain and greed. This is of course a "sin" according to Abrahamic religion. My view is that this "sin" is possible because of the insistence of the "absolutes", and that without this absolute - the corruption would not be possible, there would be no "righteous foundation" for anyone to falsely claim they were doing the "right thing". Without the "universal absolute" - we get back to the democratic consensus and integrity, respect inherent in trustworthy social structures - and that is incorruptible because it will immediately be detected as systemic bias, personal greed - and thus corrected by society.
Well, it is a complicated metaphysical debate - but it is the core of my philosophical stance on society. I respect individual religious views, and see it as helpful for many in their lives - inner strength, motivation, happiness etc - but I strongly reject the inherent corruption when the religion is set in motion outside of individuality... The fallacy of humankind you may see it as - I strive to correct the fundamental problem by showing how the religious system is corruptible - but I am not seeking the destruction of religion - just the correct application and context of religion - as something individual and strictly personal. As you said - the "truth" (faith) - is voluntarily - and should stay that way, not be allowed to corrupt social structures - which would be a "sin" in your view and systemic bias/unsustainable in my view.
Thus our views are fairly isomorphic at this level.
Quote from Gringinho:
jonbig4,
you are being nonsensical. Sure, you can invent any fantasy possible - and you can hold a world view as warped as you just want. As long as you don't force that on someone else - and especially someone that will affect me - then you can keep your nonsensical beliefs. I was not trying to convince you of anything - I was trying to show how you are beyond reasoning, or your lack of knowledge, which you present in support of your views.
Of course, you twist the fact that you were responding to Jayford, as representing something where you were asking me... that is all consistent with your wild flailing and not being able to build any argumentative structure - but rather just skip around and claim "your questions are not answered" because you say everything I answer is not relevant.
I have always claimed that there are no universally absolutes... and you can do a search on my posts about absolutes to see my position on this, as I have already debated this in many contexts.
I do enjoy jabbing your brain, and that is fun, I admit. The good thing about you is that you are growing into critical thinking - and that is important. I will never put you on ignore unless you become nagging or abusive, which I have a pretty high tolerance for accepting.
So, there - I understand your viewpoint, and I suggest you continue on your intellectual journey. The future is bright for all of us. Stay in school and finish your studies - it is still important for your status in society, and as "professional capital" that you can use later - in stead of "intellectual worth". There is value in that, seeing things through.
Well that's one way to attempt to cop-out of a real answer. There is no point in addressing a lt of the nonsense you just posted, as dogmatic as you are its akin to telling a christian that jesus was fallible. The truth is Gring I was where you are now a few years ago, so I know exactly how you feel. You will soon realize what I have come to realize, that human beings are born with an innate desire to believe. Science cannot answer any of the really interesting questions, and doesnt seem to e getting any closer. We are gaining a better understanding of our world no question. You know that what must up must come down, but even a chile can stump all the minds that ever lived by simply asking "why?". It's not nonsensical to ask why, yet science has no answer for why. Religion seems so flawed, yet is as good as anything else and therefor really can't be ridiculed. When you ridicule beliefs that you don't hold personally, you are only showing how truly dogmatic you are about your own beliefs. Make no mistake, thats exactly what they are. I used to marvel at baptists and their belief that they were "right" and everyone else is wrong. I've since seen the exact same behavior in just about every other belief out there, especially evolution. This conversation what we have just had i have had many times in my life with all kinds of people and they basically are all the same. We all cling to our beliefs, its human nature. Everyone usually picks a side as you have, and defends it to the death. Go look at our posts to each other. Its obvious you cant give me the answers I need because no one can, its not just you. Like I said in the beginning, we will only go in circles and get no where. No where is there a better example than in your posts, which got nowhere.
You seem like a smart guy, your biggest weakness is that you think you already possess an understanding of things that have puzzled everyone since the beginning of time. Socrates said, " I know only that I know nothing", I suggest you really examine yourself if you dare, you will find you, like everyone else, are what you behold, especially in regards to those crazy christians (or evolutionists or muslims etc). No offense, but you really did demonstrate a lack of understanding of even some basic epistemic principals. You may not like what I just said, but I promise if you dig deep enough into yourself and why you believe what you believe you will find, at their core, the same human adherence to a set of reasons that may or may not be correct. I'm sure there are subjects in which your knowledge far surpasses my own, but in all honesty, this isn't one of them and I encourage you to begin your development, eventually hopefully sooner rather than later you will come to similar conclusions, unless of course you let your dogma get the best of you.
I guess my question would be if God created everything.....then where did God come from?......I guess my problem has always been the argument that "God just is"......I do believe that there is a "God" I'm just not sure what the form of "God" is. For all we know, we're in a giant fish bowl in some snotty alien kids bedroom....or the planets are some sort of cells in a gigantic creature....who knows.
I don't think the beginning of life was accidental, who knows if something or someone billions of years ago set things in motion that started life.
I don't think the beginning of life was accidental, who knows if something or someone billions of years ago set things in motion that started life.
