Do you believe in God?

Griffith said:

I like Ignosticism, but personally I'm more fond of Apatheism. Mostly because I have my doubts that the question of God is even deserving any thought beyond that required to dismiss it as insignificant. My reasoning is probably somewhat similar to yours only I adopt more of a phenomenological approach. It is apparently impossible to have an experience of God, and with no experience there is no justification. There are things like sensed presence experiences (which I have had myself), but simply having the experience of "a presence" in no way implies that it is God, it requires a form of conceptual elaboration (which generally signifies delusion or bias) to reach that conclusion. In terms of mystic experience elaboration is pretty much the death sentence of reason, diverging from bare experience and trying to connect the dots via some self-created concept is pretty much where every mystic goes wrong... mystic experience in and of itself can be incredibly invaluable so long as we don't make the mistake of adding our own BS to it. Bare experience never lies (specifically that we are experiencing said experience), but our interpretation of experience is open to all kinds of delusion. Viewing it in these terms clarified the human tendency to create God where there apparently is none, sort of similar to how those witnessing an illusion in the case of stage magic may assume that it was real magic. We feel the need to insert our own meanings into our experience when really bare experience is self-sufficient and incapable of lying when on its own.

As for this thread in general, I'm quite into religion and metaphysics and all of that stuff. I self-identify as a mystic and with phenomenological psychology, so I'm not exactly subject to the same biases as those who rely strictly on things like empiricism or naturalism, which a lot of people seem to see as a kind of kookiness but I think it just requires a particular kind of finesse that most people are understandably unwilling to cultivate. But after a lot of reflection I find all god-concepts to be entirely unnecessary and likely pure elaboration. Pretty much from the age of twelve or so (when I first broke away from Christianity, the religion of my parents) I experimented with every kind of religion or philosophy that I could think of... Gnosticism, Luciferianism, Neo Paganism, Platonism, Neo Shamanism, Discordianism, etc, etc. Before becoming an Apatheist I was essentially a Panentheist or basically a Western equivalent of a Brahmanist. But then I realized that I was basically identifying with something that was purely conceptual in nature and it was actually only serving to widen the gulf between me and 'unconditioned' experience. So now I'm something of an Apatheist with Buddhist aspirations and philosophically I think I've finally found my niche.
 
Aazealh said:

How is that a contradiction? My point is only that no experience of God is possible therefore is there any reason that we should even be thinking about it? Epistemologically speaking experience is the only thing that we can have absolute certainty in.
 

Aazealh

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umop_3pisdn said:
How is that a contradiction? My point is only that no experience of God is possible therefore is there any reason that we should even be thinking about it? Epistemologically speaking experience is the only thing that we can have absolute certainty in.

The contradiction lies in the fact that you obviously spent/are spending a lot of time thinking about it.
 
Aazealh said:
The contradiction lies in the fact that you obviously spent/are spending a lot of time thinking about it.

That doesn't contradict what I said, my phrasing was vague, I said "beyond that required to dismiss it as being insignificant", which may be a lot of thought or it may be little :p Again, I was vague, I meant dismiss in more of a 'felt' way, as in that it actually forms ones perspective rather than as a purely intellectual exercise. It generally requires more thought to have something enter one's actual world-view in a significant way since that involves how one attends to ongoing experience and ime required an almost total elimination of doubt.
 

Walter

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umop_3pisdn said:
I said "beyond that required to dismiss it as being insignificant", which may be a lot of thought or it may be little :p Again, I was vague, I meant dismiss in more of a 'felt' way
If there's no god, you just wasted some precious time here on this rock pondering whether you should be wasting it on pondering god's existence.

Great discussion! :void:
 
Walter said:
If there's no god, you just wasted some precious time here on this rock pondering whether you should be wasting it on pondering god's existence.

Hahaha, it's true, but for me at least it was one of those things where once it was raised to my attention I couldn't actually put it to rest without actually... putting it to rest (in my own mind at least). I'm also one of those kooky types that actually enjoys metaphysical contemplation, so if nothing else I'll just chalk it up to profound boredom.
 
I was raised as a very, very moderate Catholic. As a boy we occasionally went to church. Normally if I made a face to not go that would be enough to get me out of it.

Then I was sent to Catholic school and then a Catholic, all boys, college preparatory high school. :magni:

It goes without saying I had to take mandatory religion classes for well over a decade. I think all religions are manipulative. There are good things done in religion's name as well as bad. Long story short, I believe in morality, not a god. Did religion help teach me my morals? To an extent I suppose. I think someone with a sound conscious doesn't need to pray to a god to have a great set of morals.

At this point in my life I consider myself an agnostic, borderline atheist and feel, personally, I'm better off as such.

Everyone is entitled to their beliefs, as I want to be entitled to mine.
 
Even though I am half Muslim I do have some believe in God, but religion is indeed a confusing and really over-dragged thing to dwell on that its almost impossible to believe at all if there even is a god. Despite what has been said to people over and over again and so many things we've seen regarding is there a god or not, I'm getting to the point where I wont be convinced he exists until I see a shred of proof of his existence.
 
X

Xem

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Skullgrin140 said:
I'm getting to the point where I wont be convinced he exists until I see a shred of proof of his existence.

It'll never happen, faith always boils down to a gut feeling or instinct.

Unless you hear voices and hallucinate and stuff like that, then you might see some proof.
 

Aazealh

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Skullgrin140 said:
Even though I am half Muslim I do have some believe in God, but religion is indeed a confusing and really over-dragged thing

That sentence in itself is pretty confusing to me. First off I'm not sure how one can be "half-Muslim," and second if you do have some belief in God, it wouldn't be in spite of being "half-Muslim" (what your use of "though" implies) but because of it.
 

Viral Harvest

Every Knee Bent Too Shall Break
Living in direct and bitter opposition against things like Pascal's wager is the kind of liberating and jaded grumpiness I've been searching my whole life for. :troll:
 

DarkDragoon

Kuro no mahoutsukai
I was raised Christian by a very zealous, Christian father. He is the kind of man who blindly and completely follows religion in the most over-the-top ways possible to make up for all of his faults in life. He's is also one of the completely narrow-minded, judgmental Christians who think they are better than everyone else and treat religion more as some sort of competition than a spiritual lifestyle, all the while being a complete hypocrite. You know, the stereotypical Christian that makes the rest of the world hate Christians. That is my father. Needless to say, once I was old enough to have my own thoughts on the matter, his example taught me to be exactly the opposite of that.

I believe in the possibility of God. I believe in the possibility of heaven. I also believe that if either do exist, they are most likely far different from what people assume they are. The thing that bugs me the most about religion is how everyone claims to know everything about everything, beyond a shadow of a doubt. Things that no one knows and no one is supposed to know. Why do people feel like they need to know everything that is real and everything that is false about spirituality and the afterlife? Even if they do exist, there is no conceivable way we could know anything specific about any of it, and claiming to is just stupid. I suppose I am anti-organized religion, I don't think that it has a place in today's world. It just causes more harm than good and causes people to close themselves off from learning anything else, which I think is detrimental in modern times. I think spirituality is very important to a lot of people, but I think it is also very personal and has no place behind a microphone.

So I believe in the possibility of God, and I strongly believe in the possibility of some sort of afterlife and spirituality. But I don't claim to know anything for sure and can't stand when other people do. What theological group does that put me in?
 

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
DarkDragoon said:
So I believe in the possibility of God, and I strongly believe in the possibility of some sort of afterlife and spirituality. But I don't claim to know anything for sure and can't stand when other people do. What theological group does that put me in?

Bitterly agnostic, with agnostic theist leanings. :griffnotevil:
 
Of course I believe in myself. :serpico:

Skullgrin140 said:
I'm getting to the point where I wont be convinced he exists until I see a shred of proof of his existence.
The answer is most likely found in death. Unfortunately, you won't be coming back to tell anybody.
 

Lithrael

Remember, always hold your apple tight
Groovy Metal Fist said:
I thought secular people were around 10% of the population, but the rate is much higher in this thread. Why is that?

10%? Maybe you're thinking of the numbers for the States. Secular folks are WAY more than 10% of the population in most of Europe. Also I would have to say most posting members of SK qualify as some type of geeky person, and geeky populations have a higher rate of being secular as well.

I am under the impression that most Europeans look at the USA weird for being so whackadoodle about its religiosity.
 

Aazealh

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Groovy Metal Fist said:
I thought secular people were around 10% of the population, but the rate is much higher in this thread. Why is that?

The rate is much higher among industrialized nations than in developing countries.

Lithrael said:
I am under the impression that most Europeans look at the USA weird for being so whackadoodle about its religiosity.

I guess that's the polite way of saying it. :iva:
 

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
Yeah, we're pretty much an international fucking embarrassment in this regard. Though, in our defense, most of people here that self-identify as religious are total phonies that don't give a practical fuck about their purported beliefs. It's our saving grace. :ganishka:
 

Aazealh

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Griffith said:
Though, in our defense, most of people here that self-identify as religious are total phonies that don't give a practical fuck about their purported beliefs.

That's the worst part, in a way. Nothing worse in my opinion than insincere believers.
 

Lithrael

Remember, always hold your apple tight
I don't know. There's the folks that don't want anyone to see gays kissing, but don't actually want them to die, and then there's the folks that will beat the holy shit out of gays in the church parking lot. What bothers me is that the first group doesn't want to admit that the second group is still very much Christian and that the dark side of Good Old American Christianity hasn't climbed that many rungs above those Islamic types that are still into honor killings. They want their religion to get credit for all the fuzzy God-Loves-You stuff but they don't want it to get any credit for the, you know, evil shit. I don't mind Christians saying the Westboro type guys don't 'really count' but there's a lot of kids out there in America who are depressed as all hell cause God isn't speaking to them the way everyone they know tells them God will if only they were really being good enough, and I hardly ever see Christians that want to own up to that. So I guess, yeah, I would be happier if I saw more of them walk the walk, and work to bring their religion the rest of the way into the current century. Or alternately just quit paying so much attention to it. It should be a mantelpiece thing, or it should be important enough to you that you fight the darkness in it. You can't say it's so dear to your heart that you want all your politicians to at least say they are good Christians, but you don't really care that others are spreading hate in its name. You can't have it both ways.

Plus it's just weird when people are being all Yay God at you and you can only imagine the looks of horror on their faces if only you let them know the nice young woman they are talking to doesn't actually believe in God and isn't unhappy because of that. It's weird knowing how many people will just snap judge you on that. It's weird having to feel out a person to even guess whether they would still be cool with you if they knew. It's weird as HELL knowing so many people you know THINK EVOLUTION IS JUST A CONSPIRACY AGAINST CHRISTIANITY, WTF. It's just WEIRD. WEIRD WEIRD WEIRD. Extra-heads weird. I mean, at least I can understand people intentionally not thinking about uncomfortable doctrinal shit that's just in the Bible, but what is wrong with you that you have to deny the mountains of evidence that point towards evolution?

It's also weird knowing that they'd respond to a comment like that by claiming how I'm no less judgmental. But it's a legit fear thing. They're not going to get ostracized for their beliefs. They're just not. Not here. They're everywhere. They won't let me buy beer on Sunday. What am I going to do to them? What can I do? I can say WTF. That's about it.
 
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