athiests -> how'd you become one?

[*Thee J Sharp*]

I'm one meself. there are tons of reasons I'm athiest but I won't list them because I want to see how you all got there. from what I've seen so far, athiest peeps all seem to be athiest for about the same or similare reasons. faith in imaginairy things that comformists shuv down your throat is evil, strong beliefs in only what is physically real, it's a social conformist trick... etc, etc...
do share.

JLSX

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AIM: THEEJSHARP
Previously known as/ referred to as: Jeremy, hellraiser, "squire", the bluebomber, sharp, "raverboy", spike,"that blue haired sk8er", TheeJSharp, and "SOME STUPID NEWBIE". (those are just the ones I liked)
"cats got 9 lives and they allways land on their feet. wouldn't you be curious?" -me
"TRIP LIKE I DO" -the Crystal Method / "MEOW" -The prodigy
in the words of the great music gods themselves: "THERE IS HOPE!" -the Crystal Method

[This message has been edited by SHARP-X (edited 02-14-2001).]

[eeyore0508]

i'm atheist because i want to understand the world and how it works, not simply be given an easy answer to satisfy my curiosity.

religion is just a self-replicating idea, look at what it tells you.

to be a good person you must:
"believe in god"
"honor your parents"
"teach your children to believe in god"

i only recently found that there is a term for a self replicating idea, a meme

<font face="Arial, Helvetica" size="2">Richard Dawkins's term for an idea considered as a replicator, especially with the connotation that memes parasitise people into propagating them much as viruses do.

Memes can be considered the unit of cultural evolution. Ideas can evolve in a way analogous to biological evolution. Some ideas survive better than others; ideas can mutate through, for example, misunderstandings; and two ideas can recombine to produce a new idea involving elements of each parent idea.

The term is used especially in the phrase "meme complex" denoting a group of mutually supporting memes that form an organised belief system, such as a religion. However, "meme" is often misused to mean "meme complex".

Use of the term connotes acceptance of the idea that in humans (and presumably other tool- and language-using sophonts) cultural evolution by selection of adaptive ideas has become more important than biological evolution by selection of hereditary traits. Hackers find this idea congenial for tolerably obvious reasons.</font>

a site that i've found with many excellent articles about many religion and faith related issues is http://www.infidels.org/library/index.html


chris

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"One can't complain. I have my friends. Somebody spoke to me only yesterday."

"When stuck in the river, it is best to dive and swim to the bank yourself before someone drops a large stone on your chest in an attempt to hoosh you there."
~~~~~~~~&gt;&gt;
AIM: iEatGlassShards | ICQ: 10961541 | Northwest Raver Personals (http://www15.brinkster.com/nwrave) | Buy my soul!! (http://www.soulxchange.com/soulStats.asp?id=2226)

[Soy*Spice]

i became one by going to church every freakin sunday for 14 years....

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:...become the change you wish to see in the world...:-ghandi

[*Thee J Sharp*]

big fawkin word. great point made...
sorry if I was rude to you in the past, chris. I look up to ya.

only 2 posts and so far my theory on us being athiests for the same reasons is still true...

NEXT? images/smilies/wink.gif

[This message has been edited by SHARP-X (edited 02-13-2001).]

[Steve-O]

well....it started at church! as i was sitting in there and listening to people sing there hyms...i realized something it sounds like chanting! not exactly..but somewhat. communion(sp) time!! you drink wine or grape juice, whatever...to represent the blood of christ? dont satanist drink the blood of a goat to represent the blood of lucifer? okay. and stanists say theres no god...hello?!?!?!? where did lucifer come from? uhm...god's right hand man right? thats what i thought! religion also has one flaw...theres loop holes. thousands of years skipped...what happened there?

okay..think about this...
there are numerous galaxies out there, with numerious planets...with numerious atmospheres...which means...there may be life out there...maybe not like us...but life..in some form or another. so if theres life on one...there may be life on another, and so on...point being.....to think that they believe in the same god...gods..that we do...is outragous!

and think about this....
for god to say let there be light....something was in the way. to have darkness..you need light...darkness is lights shadow...something had to have been there than right??

okay...im tired and just rambling...if you really want to talk about this...e-mail me...cause i love talking about this stuff. well, you wanted to know what makes me a non believer...so theres some of my reasonings or whatever. im going to bed.

*~*Steve-O*~*




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*~*KaOt!C KrEw*~*
Steve-O, Onestarr, Lynzi, FunkEbeats, Mikey81, MurphShady
learn it, love it

Steve-O@nwtekno.org
AOL: theundercovers

[*Thee J Sharp*]

I've thought about theese things since I was 5, when I first realized the possbility of no heaven I broke into tears... lol... same as when I discovered our world is polluted and dieing.

[Trixie]

my dream is that i'll read a post about atheism and not hear about years of horrible church, or how complete stupid the idea of believing in god is.

believing in god, for many like myself, is not a childish decision, so it hurts when people act like i am closeminded because i believe in god.

and if years of being forced to go to church caused you to become an atheist, why? why not just realize that organized religion isn't the end-all be-all of faith and that many people have faith in something more w/out going to church ever.....

and why do people assume that believing in god means that those believers are all believing in the same god?

see my post in the "god" thread, myself and other people wrote very refreshing takes on belief and faith.

i do respect your opinions, i just hope you don't condemn people who do believe.

trixie

ps. did you do a search before posting this? because i do believe that there has already been several posts about atheism.

[*PolishPornStar*]

hmm...well...im not an atheist...i do believe in god but im not really fond of church and the whole shoving faith down your throut idea that the whole church practices. faith shouldnt be someone elses perception but your owns....and im not trying to preach here that what you guys believe is wrong because i totally understand and accept your beliefs...i myself used to practice wicca and i still do in moderate practices.

[Godlike]

I gave the finger to catholicism in 7th grade when i realized that being a reasonably nice person has nothing to do with what direction you cast your affections.. I'd rather cast it sideways instead of up since people have provided more in the way of hope and reasons than anything did from above..

My years in a catholic school sucked and i'm not saying that just to annoy trixie darling. I was lead to believe so many things that are obviously not true, but were conveniently placed to make an impresionable young kid go 'wow'.
Sure there are some good ideas about being nice to one another, but those can be learned w/out having to believe.


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It is by caffeine alone I set my mind in motion.
It is by the Beans of Java that thoughts acquire speed,
the hands acquire shaking, the shaking becomes a warning.
It is by caffeine alone I set my mind in motion.

[Enkidu Kind]

Religion is one of those things that is best left to a person to discover themselves. I will not force church down my children's throats the way it was forced down mine. Not only was I forced to endure a Catholic mass almost every Sunday for 18 years, I was forced to go to special religious classes every Tuesday night until I was 14.

These classes didn't focus on being kind to your fellow man, or learning how to help those in need. They focused on exploiting the guilt of children. All they did for eight years is teach me that God was disappointed in me, and that I had to toil and suffer to get him to love me. When we said prayers, they were coached. One time I prayed, giving thanks for the candy I had received for Halloween, and the instructor made me say a new prayer because mine was too shallow and stupid.

Thus, it's amazing that I'm a spiritual person at all. I believe in God, and I believe in the Jesus story too, but I don't follow the story letter for letter. My beliefs are kinda duct-taped together from all forms of faith. I think every kind of religion in the world holds merit. In a universe as complex as ours, as humans, we don't have the whole story. I don't care what the most learned theologist or the 290 IQ quantum-physicist says. But seeing all the beauty (and ugliness) around me and the complexity of life, I believe that a higher power is out there. To me, it's like, "How could there not be?"

But to all the athiests out there, here's a fun one for you. When humans became intelligent enough to comprehend their own impending death, they panicked. They created "God" and the concept of "life after death" to deal with the thought of being gone forever once they died. The human spirit has a sense of eternality to it. I feel it, yo. So something had to be done. Thus "God" was created. Oddly enough, though, this is where many of my thoughts on spirituality begin. That's a whole other thread though. Too little server space too. images/smilies/smile.gif

images/smilies/smile.gif Enkidu images/smilies/smile.gif

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--The below statement is true---
--The above statement is false--

[This message has been edited by Enkidu kind (edited 02-13-2001).]

[oldneoschoolbopper]

Well, I took into considoration the facts....yes proven evidence there is a God.......wait there is none images/smilies/frown.gif

-Tony
~ISO~

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"AlRigHt PaRTnEr...kEeP oN RoLLiN BAbY...yOu KnOw WhaT It Is"
AOL IM: LilCuteWhtBoy
Picture @:http://profiles.yahoo.com/tonysfester

[Super_Joe]

I believe I'm Ahtieist because I have a very opend mind about REALITY and the TRUTH and all that kind of stuff.......

I guess what I'm trying to say is that is has to be in you from the get go.... I never really believed in something untill I looked deeper than just what the surface showed me, then I questiond it and if it made scence then it waz kool images/smilies/smile.gif if not then fuk it lol

Peace Out

Super Joe

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Move outta my way E-Tard!!!! I feel lyke danceN!!!!!!! %80 Jaded/%20 Anti-Positive
and %110 SUPER JOE!!!!
FEW PPL HAVE INDIVIDUAL STYLE.....MOST DON'T....
WHY B NORMAL?????

[AthenA]

hmmmm...I'm atheist for too simple reasons: 1) I can live with myself and my life under the realization that it is entirely possible that this (life) is all a scientific coincidence, and no one will be there when I die, and...
2) A few thousand years ago, EVERYONE believed in a system with several gods. In school kids are taught about mythology and laugh at it's silly stories. Who says that a few thousand years from now civilization will not look back on our form of religion and laugh? What makes a single god any better of more feasible as several gods?

Religion was created by people who could not live their lives without and easy explaination for everything, and the comfort of "knowing" that there is something after this life. They need a reason to be good, yet more people have been killed in the name of God than all the crime that's ever been committed. Religion just doesn't make sense.

[burnt_idol]

im an atheist because i dont have any imaginary friends.

[sin]

<font face="Arial, Helvetica" size="2">Originally posted by Trixie:
my dream is that i'll read a post about atheism and not hear about years of horrible church, or how complete stupid the idea of believing in god is.
</font>
Well here ya go!
I never really went to church, other than like once a year with my grandparents when I was little. I have nothing against the belief in god if that's what satisfies a certain need for you. Personally it doesn't do it for me.
I disagree with the statement SHARP-X made that faith is evil. Perhaps the way some religions are organized make it evil, but faith itself isn't. Everyone should have faith in something.
I fall in to the belief in whats physically real column I spose. I've always been geared that way though. If I can't see it, hear it, taste it, smell it it don't exist sorta thing.
Of course, I could be wrong, but so could christianity. Guess no one knows for sure til they die. If I'm wrong, oh well, at least I lived my life well even if I didn't believe in god, but what would happen to a christian person who died if they were wrong? How would they cope?

[Blueskies007]

I dont believe in God because I have no evidence that has lead me to believe... science can explain how we came to be on this earth... some supernatural belief cant....but hey if i'm wrong i'll see you all in HELL~!
Kathleen

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"... and in your place, an empty space..."

"..look at the stars see how they shine for you, with all the things you do...."
AIM: powrpuf007

[chemical_burn]

Athiests are just people who are too afraid to be Nihlists.

[jungleYAY]

I don't know if there is a god, and I'm not going to pretend I do...ah...agnosticism...or maybe I'm just indecisive..

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C is for cookie, that's good enough for me...I &lt;3 cookie monster!
AIM:jungleYAY
p.s.-I'm a chick

[This message has been edited by jungleYAY (edited 02-13-2001).]

[This message has been edited by jungleYAY (edited 02-13-2001).]

[razer]

as much as possible, i try not to classify myself.

Godlike has quite a familiar ring in his story, and it's one of the best examples of acceptance and understanding. the first step toward being open-minded is realization.

hypocrisy, greed and corruption for the most part. leaders of nations have used religion as a tool of control over their populace for ages. many who have beliefs can be over-zealous, almost to the point of being fanatical. this blinds them to reality, much as science does to our culture today.

there are those who look for a stable platform to stand on in their lives. this world is chock full of uncertainty and danger. for some, religion is a bastion of solace, barring the cold winds of despair with the comaraderie of like minds and good hearts. to others, it might be a few friends and some beer. it could even be a stuffed animal. would you condemn an inanimate object to persecution because someone uses it as a point of hope and comfort?

some don't need religion as a stronghold for protection. sometimes they look back and consider it wrong.

the rest are still looking for something, even if they've already found it.

i am one of the above, but i'm not quite sure which just yet.

[iLUVdigweed]

<font face="Arial, Helvetica" size="2">Originally posted by chemical_burn:
Athiests are just people who are too afraid to be Nihlists.</font>


Didnt you ever watch the Big Lebowski?? " Dont worry Donny, theyre just a bunch of Nihilists, they cant do anything to us..."

-Darren

[chemical_burn]

Digweed: I dunno what that has to do with it but yah I have seen the movie.

[Gerhalt]

<font face="Arial, Helvetica" size="2">im an atheist because i dont have any imaginary friends.</font>

Word. Though, I prefer to say "because I live in reality" for my short answer.

[*Thee J Sharp*]

<font face="Arial, Helvetica" size="2">Originally posted by Enkidu kind:
When humans became intelligent enough to comprehend their own impending death, they panicked. They created "God" and the concept of "life after death" to deal with the thought of being gone forever once they died. The human spirit has a sense of eternality to it.
</font>
this is one great reason I'm athiest. but because everone craves hope now and then I still try to go into denial and say there is an afterlife... there verry well may be. but honestly... that's just wishfull thinking.
JLSX
btw, this is probly one of the few threads where everyone had somthing intellegent and relevant to say. cept for darren. lol

[starseed]

well, i'm not an atheist, but i'll tell you why i stopped believing in god. consider this carefully:

god is guilty of several of the seven deadly sins. if you can find mataphorical relationships to the ones i missed, help me out.

1:sloth: [not there yet]

2:gluttony: [not there yet]

3 images/smilies/tongue.gifride: got made man in his image. why? so we could reproduce, and be fruitful, and worship him for eternity. that takes a powerful ego, does it not?

4:wrath: how may times has god slaughtered masses of people? the old testament is constantly refering to how god was ANGRY, and struck down from the heavens upon...etc

5:envy: from the first commandment, out of something i read a long time ago, but it made an impression: "i am a jealous god, and you shall have no other gods beside me."

6:lust: [not there yet]

7:greed: money is meaningless to god, but what does god want? the hearts and souls of mankind. the bible teaches men to convert the "heathens."

any others i missed?

[antiplur superstar]

how'd you become one?

simple you choose to believe one set of unfounded beliefs over an other . . . .. it’s no that hard. From what I have seen this thread is an excellent example of this.

i'm atheist because i want to understand the world and how it works, not simply be given an easy answer to satisfy my curiosity.

Why are the two mutually exclusive? What is it about absolute truth that would negate the existence of a god(s)/deity(s)/higher power*? * for the purpose of this post the word “god” will also reference all of these three and any other combination I have forgotten.
i only recently found that there is a term for a self replicating idea, a meme
This as well is nothing but a theory, an idea which hasn’t been satisfactorily proven wrong and is simply the most likely explanation. Theories do not dispel truth; they dispel likely ideas. Theories aren’t wildly different from beliefs or faith.
i became one by going to church every freakin sunday for 14 years....

You didn’t like church so you have renounced the possibility that god exists? One set of unfounded beliefs over an other . . . . . .

well....it started at church! as i was sitting in there and listening to people sing there hyms...i realized something it sounds like chanting! not exactly..but somewhat. communion(sp) time!! you drink wine or grape juice, whatever...to represent the blood of christ? dont satanist drink the blood of a goat to represent the blood of lucifer? okay. and stanists say theres no god...hello?!?!?!? where did lucifer come from? uhm...god's right hand man right? thats what i thought! religion also has one flaw...theres loop holes. thousands of years skipped...what happened there?

Steve-O, you have revealed your self to be a complete and utter idiot who has no problem commenting on that which you have absolutely no knowledge. I am only responding to you to call out your ignorance and to make sure other ppl see it as so. I wouldn’t want anyone to think you are a reputable source in these matters . . . .

Though the observation of the hymns seeming like chanting is mildly interesting you failed to give any relevance to this observation

(for the purpose of this argument Satanism refers to the church of Satan founded by Anton LaVey. . . the other versions of organized Satanism are nothing short of sad in comparison)
SATANISTS DO NOT DRINK GOATS’ BLOOD!!! Satanism is an Atheistic religion. Guess what that means. NO GODS. NO DEVILS. NO DIETIES. Terms like Satan, Lucifer, are used as symbols. Satan was the accuser. Lucifer is the bearer of light. These are symbols not entities. Satanists do not drinks goats blood. This goes against their tenants, which is not to hurt any animal except for hunger or protection. SATANISTS DO NOT SACRAFICE ANIMALS!!! Steve-O you know not of what you speak. You words reek of vile ignorance and unfounded prejudice. Next time please take the time to find out about that which you condemn.

Religion has loop holes??? I don’t deny this. But what are these lost centuries you speak of? But atheism has loop holes to. After all it is only a belief.

so if theres life on one...there may be life on another, and so on...point being.....to think that they believe in the same god...gods..that we do...is outragous!

This is an irrelevant point. Just b/c life forms in another part of the known universe will very likely believe in a different god or a different model of absolute truth, this in no way a step in the direction of disproving the existence of god.

darkness is lights shadow

Light does not have a shadow. Only objects can cast shadows by blocking light. Darkness is the absence of light. Light can be absent by something blocking it OR by having nothing in existence to emit light. I fail to see the relevance of this argument. Where are you trying to go? Elaborate.

okay...im tired and just rambling

Rambling being the operative word.

well, you wanted to know what makes me a non believer...so theres some of my reasonings or whatever.

So far you have only shown us misinformation and specious logic.

my dream is that i'll read a post about atheism and not hear about years of horrible church, or how complete stupid the idea of believing in god is.

keep dreaming girl. I have yet to see any evidence of any intelligent opinions on atheism coming any time soon. I hope by the time I get to the end of this thread I will be proven wrong.

I gave the finger to catholicism in 7th grade when i realized that being a reasonably nice person has nothing to do with what direction you cast your affections.

Hmm . . . I am confused as too what you are trying to say here . . . Please elaborate.

I was lead to believe so many things that are obviously not true

Examples please . . . just because you believe they are obviously not make it true. Please elaborate.

Sure there are some good ideas about being nice to one another, but those can be learned w/out having to believe.

Though I fully agree with you in this aspect, why does this have to do with disproving the existence of god?

Enkidu kind: your disgust with the religion seems to have to do with the ppl who taught you and for fellow members. True the followers maybe vile, but why does this necessarily mean the religion its self is vile? Why does this mean that the dogma of the religion is untrue?

Well, I took into considoration the facts....yes proven evidence there is a God.......wait there is none

Because something hasn’t been proven doesn’t therefore mean it is disproved. There was a prehistoric fish that all the learned PhD’s in the field had believed were long extinct. But one day up it popped in some body of water. In all those yrs when there was no proof of its existence was it non-existents???? Of course not, that would be silly. A thing’s existence is not dependent on our ability to prove it exists. Your point is moot.

I believe I'm Ahtieist because I have a very opend mind about REALITY and the TRUTH and all that kind of stuff.......

What does being open minded have to do with being an atheist? How is being so willing to deny such a huge range of possibility being open minded?

I never really believed in something untill I looked deeper than just what the surface showed me, then I questiond it and if it made scence then it waz kool if not then fuk it lol

What criteria do you use to determine whether something is worth believing???

1) I can live with myself and my life under the realization that it is entirely possible that this (life) is all a scientific coincidence, and no one will be there when I die

Just b/c you can accept this doesn’t mean it is true.

2) A few thousand years ago, EVERYONE believed in a system with several gods. In school kids are taught about mythology and laugh at it's silly stories. Who says that a few thousand years from now civilization will not look back on our form of religion and laugh? What makes a single god any better of more feasible as several gods?

Why is it that just b/c attitudes about god changes over the yrs it necessarily means that god its self either in a form we do conceive, have conceived, will conceive, or we can never hope to conceive doesn’t exist?
Religion was created by people who could not live their lives without and easy explaination for everything, and the comfort of "knowing" that there is something after this life. They need a reason to be good, yet more people have been killed in the name of God than all the crime that's ever been committed. Religion just doesn't make sense.
This in it’s self is a belief. Beliefs are in their nature un-proven and most likely will never be proven. Believing in this is no different then believing in a risen dead man.
im an atheist because i dont have any imaginary friends.

This has been by far the best answer . . . You get a Koodo. images/smilies/biggrin.gif

I disagree with the statement SHARP-X made that faith is evil.

werd . . . what he and other atheists fail to realize is that the belief that god doesn’t exist is just as big a leap of faith as is the belief that god does exist. I feel more atheist should realize this and should be more humble about their beliefs

I fall in to the belief in whats physically real column I spose. I've always been geared that way though. If I can't see it, hear it, taste it, smell it it don't exist sorta thing.

You said the magic word *belief*. *applauds wildly* You get a Koodo.

Of course, I could be wrong, but so could christianity. Guess no one knows for sure til they die.

You see? You see? This is what I mean, humble. *more Koodos*

For the Devil worshipers...I just think thats hella funny. They dress in all in black(don't ya get hot?) and they got tons of peircings, wear too much make-up. and have cats named Satan or Lucifer.

*smacks 666 around a bit* Here’s another one that knows not of what he speaks but still has no problem commenting and spreading misinformation.

Astrogirl also get’s a koodo for the magic word. images/smilies/biggrin.gif

science can explain how we came to be on this earth...

not true. They can give us the most likely explanation given all the evidence at hand. They can’t accurately explain any thing.

I don't know if there is a god, and I'm not going to pretend I do...ah...agnosticism...or maybe I'm just indecisive.

I’d say this one of the most enlightened opinions so far.

I would respond to razor but I think I’ve already replied to most of it in some way or an other all ready. . . .

this is one great reason I'm athiest. but because everone craves hope now and then I still try to go into denial and say there is an afterlife... there verry well may be. but honestly... that's just wishfull thinking.

So? Just b/c an afterlife my be desirable doesn’t mean it isn’t true. Besides, tales of the after life weren’t always peaches and roses. In an early Mesopotamian society their religion depicted an after life of unimaginable unending torture regardless of how you behaved in you living yrs. An afterlife wasn’t always something looked forward to but it was non the less believed.

well, i'm not an atheist, but i'll tell you why i stopped believing in god. consider this carefully:
god is guilty of several of the seven deadly sins. if you can find mataphorical relationships to the ones i missed, help me out.
I failed to see how god being fallible or not benevolent some how negates his experience.

I have yet to see any evidence of any intelligent opinions on atheism coming any time soon. I hope by the time I get to the end of this thread I will be proven wrong.

I am happy that there are a few ppl here who proved me wrong but not many.

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Gen Appithy "the jEster"
antiplur: Antipathy to the Naiveté and Total Idiocy of Peace Love Unity and Respect
All That Glitters Is Cold.
And the world spreads its legs For another fuckin' star! 'Cause I AM the all-American Antiplur. I was made in America, and America hates ME for what I am. I am YOUR shit. You should be ashamed of what you have eaten.
The time has come it is quite clear Our Antiplur Is almost here &gt;=]
ICQ: 54326826 AIM: antiplur SS Y!M: antiplur_superstar

[SiX6SickS]

Well I went to church for many years and played with my hotwheels on the floor while my dad slept and my sister watched both of us. I hate the kids there and hated the grown up there. Everyone gave me a reason for something, god did this, god died cuz of that. WHat the fuck are they thinking? You can go through this world by beleiving in something. If you can commit a crime and tell them God told you to do it, or God wouldn't think it was a sin. The only thing you should beleive is being thrown in Jail! For the Devil worshipers...I just think thats hella funny. They dress in all in black(don't ya get hot?) and they got tons of peircings, wear too much make-up. and have cats named Satan or Lucifer.
I don't beleive in anything cuz it'll get me no where and just a waist of sleeping time to go to Church on sunday.
So yeah I think I said everything I wanted to.

[Steve-O]

Trixie---just so ya know.....i never went to church...i just went with my grandma one year on christmas eve. So me being an athiest has nothing to do with bad church years or horrible christian school days images/smilies/biggrin.gif Also, im not saying people are close minded...but i am saying that believing that everything on every single planet in this universe worships the same God...is hard to believe. and AthenA made a very good point about mythology. so, im just lettin you know...that i dont think you are close minded images/smilies/biggrin.gif i love you Trixie! *mauh*

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*~*KaOt!C KrEw*~*
Steve-O, Onestarr, Lynzi, FunkEbeats, Mikey81, MurphShady
learn it, love it

Steve-O@nwtekno.org
AOL: theundercovers

[pizzazz]

I am not an atheist. I believe in god, but i don't believe in really anything that the bible or torah Qoran has to offer. I have too many doubts and too many irrelevent questions that i feel i need to answer, so i have decided to be confused, and deal with the fact that many of the things i believe contradict the others. The one beleif i do have that i can't seem to let go (wether it be faith or just something i am used to) is my belief in a higher power, and secondary powers. It's quite complicated, but i have my own religion. Belief doesn't have to fall into one category or sect. It is what you want it to be. Well, those are my thoughts...
*muah,
*~AstroGirl

[Steve-O]

Like i said in my post...i was very tired, so most of the points i was tryin to hit..missed by 50 yards. and to clear it up.....i dont believe in anything....we live...why cant people except this...does there have to be some sort of belief or religion to fall back on. I know that religion & beliefs are a security blanket for some people, and thats fine. I was just spouting off some reasons that i have heard and talked about with other people...obviously i could have elaberated a bit more to make them more clear..so, antiplur superstar...if you would like to e-mail me or IM me to talk about this stuff, i would enjoy that...so i can show you that im not ignorent..just a rambler w/ sleep dep. So, sorry if i offended anyone. I just dont want you all thinking i am ignorent, cause truely im not, just bad at relaying things that i have heard and thought about images/smilies/smile.gif

*~*Steve-O*~*

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*~*KaOt!C KrEw*~*
Steve-O, Onestarr, Lynzi, FunkEbeats, Mikey81, MurphShady
learn it, love it

Steve-O@nwtekno.org
AOL: theundercovers

[antiplur superstar]

I just dont want you all thinking i am ignorent

I don't think you are ignorant, just ill informed as far as satanism is concerned. images/smilies/biggrin.gif

Glad to see you made a good choice. images/smilies/wink.gif

I'll admit some of what I said was ill phrased.

okay...im tired and just rambling

Rambling being the operative word.

you have revealed your self to be a complete and utter idiot

yeah that was a li'l bit of a low blow . . . some of your choices may have been ill advised but that doesn't make you a "complete and utter idiot."

images/smilies/biggrin.gif



[This message has been edited by antiplur superstar (edited 02-14-2001).]

[ST!X]

*gives Jester a PLUR potion*
here ya go! images/smilies/biggrin.gif
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on a serious note...
WHy is "faith" evil?
Is it "evil" in hold faith in oneself?
in hope?
in love?
in friendship?
etc, etc, etc,....

the word "faith" alone is not evil, without any sort of faith, we would just throw down and give up


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ST!X
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AIM Twilight Ronin

[HexRei]

VE ARE NIHILISTS! VE BELIEVE IN NUSSINK!

[Suthsayer]

Well, people usually become athiests when they realize they've been lied too. But hopefully eventually they find their own truth. IE: I am a wiccan. *shrugs*

[Trixie]

*hugs javier*

thank YOU!

*laughs at peter*

thank YOU!


trixie

[antiplur superstar]

faith in imaginairy things that comformists shuv down your throat is evil, strong beliefs in only what is physically real, it's a social conformist trick... etc, etc...
do share.

Even Atheists have faith for the simple reason that they believe in things which are not and cannot be proven. You have faith that there is no god. Nothing on this world will ever prove that there is no god.

as for the existence of God, i find it useless to debate this with religious folk because the discussion keeps going in a circle... every valid point made on the questioning side is met with "well its just what i believe" or "well i don't know much about that scientific or philosophi-whatever bullshit, but this is what i know" it goes nowhere. (images/smilies/Forum12/HTML/005133.html)

That is from a different thread . . . that’s why it’s hyper linked. This is a problem I have with many atheists; they get all high and mighty about there beliefs. At least when a religious person gets backed into a corner they have no problem in saying, well this what I believe . .. I have faith that what I think is right is right. But when an Atheist gets backed into a corner they don’t. They feel that they are backed up by irrefutable scientific evidence. They feel that their convictions are back up by sound reasoning. What they fail to realize is that any conviction on the nature of god, reality, absolute truth are nothing more then belief and faith. This is what I have been trying to point out in both threads.

You have a belief and faith that there is a god, fine. You have faith and a belief that there isn’t a god, fine. But remember one of the important natures of belief and faith is that they are unproven and mostly likely can never be.

So you feel deep down in your soul that your god Is the one true god, wonderful. But remember just because you feel it’s true doesn’t make it true.

SO you feel you have all the scientific evidence you could ever need to disprove the existence of god, wonderful. But remember science is built up of theories and theories are nothing more than the most likely explanation. They aren’t truth. And your beliefs are built on a shaky house of cards. Just because science says it’s so doesn’t make it true.


Food for Thought

[This message has been edited by antiplur superstar (edited 02-14-2001).]

[HexRei]

First off, let me say that I am agnostic. Not the kind that is constantly wondering about the existence of a higher being; the kind that doesn't really care all that much.

The mistake that most rabid atheists make is trying to disprove the existence of god through science. Science does not disprove things. Science proves things, very particular things, under very particular sets of circumstances.
In order to disprove the existence of something, you'd have to be able to study the entire universe at a time, at the subatomic level. Not something most (read: any) scientists are or ever will be capable of.
How do you know god isn't in China? How do you know god isn't standing right behind you? How do you know god isn't over in the next galaxy? And how the fuck can you disprove the existence of an immaterial being that transcends physicality? You don't.

Most atheists seem to mix up disproving portions of the bible (something that I fully believe has already been done) with disproving god, which is silly. How does god have anything to do with the bible?

[HexRei]

And Antiplur, I think you're wrong about one thing. When something has been measured thoroughly, adhering to the spirit and letter of the scientific method, that is the best form of proof available. What science says is true. What scientists say is not necessarily true.

[starseed]

hrmmm...
hexrei: i don't agree:
"What science says is true."
science only tells us what we are pretty sure is true; things we call fact are only facts because we have not yet seen anything that goes against them. and actually, my first post wasn't really even the most prominant reason that i'm not christian. the real reason is simply the fact that i was never comfortable with christianity. that was just something i noticed. if there is one known as "God" then it's not his fault that silly humans can't write shit down correctly. but being pagan seems to satisfy me, and isn't that what religion is all about? finding something that satisfies you on a spiritual level where other things have failed?

[HexRei]

Exactly. And part of good science is to include the fact that the data you have collected could be incorrect, and to include all the data and not just the data that leads to your desired conclusion.

It's the fault of scientists that misconstrue scientifically determined hypotheses by representing it as proven fact.

Of course, an exception to this would be mathematics, where things actually can be proven. But I don't like math that much.

[sortof]

today at texaco... i was buying my stuff... and this guy comes up to me.. and says.. "satan" and then he says "satan loves you" and then he started scaring me and he bought beer. heh.

[antiplur superstar]

Peter I'll repeat what I have said b/f either in this thread or the god thread I can't remember . . . Scientic theories are the most likely theory given all the available information and have yet to be disproven by anouther more likely theory. Scientic theories are not truth.

[AthenA]

Everything is subject to interpretation. Scientific fact is NOT the truth. I do agree with you there. Scientific fact is not the truth because truth does not exist. Some ancient Asian civilations believed that nothing exists outside the mind. Just because you can touch something, does not mean it is there. We have no way of proving otherwise, which means that we have no way of proving truth. How can something be true if it doesn't exist? I do not necessarily believe that is the case, but since we cannot prove that, we cannot prove anything else either. On a different level, let's say that truth exists. Even if it did, it doesn't. The word 'truth' in and of itself has a different meaning to everyone, no matter how closely related they are. Since truth is essentially the proof of an absolute, and truth itself is not absolute, it does not exist. Many people who posted misclassify themselves. Most are not Atheist. Atheist is defined as "one who denies the existance of a god and rejects all religious faith and practice". The appropriate term for many people who posted is "unbeliever". This is someone who expresses "a loss or lack of religious faith without suggesting a substitute for it." That refers to those of you who stated that you attended church for X-amount of years and decided not to believe in it because of that. I must say, I am glad to experience fairly intelligent discourse about religion without anyone jumping all over anyone else because of discrepancy in belief.

[This message has been edited by AthenA (edited 02-15-2001).]

[HexRei]

Antiplur, i think we're talking about different things here. You're talking about theories, I'm talking about raw scientific data.
Theories are just that, theories. They are inherently fallible because they depend on the scientist to extrapolate the meaning of data to justify the theory.

The data itself, however, when collected in the proper manner, is about as true as anything can be proven to be.

If you can offer a more reliable method of gathering data, by all means, please do tell.

And Athena, I've taken Philosophy, I understand the fact that we don't have any proof that our senses are infallible and thus we can't necessarily trust them, etc, but that's a rather futile argument because the only logical end is that everything becomes pointless because our senses are all we have to rely on.

[This message has been edited by HexRei (edited 02-15-2001).]

[antiplur superstar]

Peter what you are talking about I would call scientific Laws. In fact that's what scientist call them as well. They are observations. You throw a ball up it falls down. Laws say nothing about why some thing happens. The why would be the attempt of discovering truth. BUt even or obsevations and messurements are scewed, because you can not observe something with out affecting it. BUt that's a whole 'nouther ball game that's not worth getting into.

[*Thee J Sharp*]

*BUMP-da-BUMp-BUMP*

[AthenA]

HexRei...I do understand this...and it is ALL POINTLESS. So why argue? People should just enjoy their lives, and leave it at that. When it comes right down to it, no one is right. People trip way too hard about trivial issues. images/smilies/wink.gif

[Ducke]

first of all I wouldn call myself a aethiest I just don't believe in god or religion. i've never believed in god even since I was a little kid. I guess my mind is too logical in the sense that if there is no evidence of any sort to prove that its there I can't recognize that its there. With religion i believe that a set of beliefs, virtues, morals, values should not be written in a book or preached to you by a person that knows these beliefs. values come from how you were raised (in most situations. Personally i have SITUATIONAL ETHICS (i.e. I will never kill another person, unless my life or antohers life is at risk...)

[Jazzie]

my parents are scientists and engineers, I was raised one. lol
jazzie