Theism vs Atheism

[AndyH]

On the other hand, if this present life is all that we have, and all of humanity completely ceases to exist at some future time, then life is really an exercise in futility. Everything we work for will one day disappear. I personally found it very difficult to be content with that notion.

I am quite comfortable that after I die - there will be nothing left of me. And that some time in the future - is it quite possible that humanity will cease to exist as well.

But does that make life an exercise in futility? Perhaps. But Darwinism has instilled in us the will to live - so live we will.

One of the beautiful things about sand-painting Buddhist mandalas is the reminder that nothing is permanent - it's all about change. Change is not futility - it gives us the gift that every second can be a new beginning and a new chance to 'get it right' or make another choice or evolve from a new perspective.

 

[klapauzius]

I would ask, what does it mean to be truly "happy"? Yes, one can certainly achieve temporal happiness without turning to God. Further, one can work intelligently and make substantial contributions to society without turning to God. On the other hand, if this present life is all that we have, and all of humanity completely ceases to exist at some future time, then life is really an exercise in futility. Everything we work for will one day disappear. I personally found it very difficult to be content with that notion. Perhaps many who seem to be "happy" in this life are willfully ignoring their eternal destiny. I would find that very hard to do, and at the same time, I find great joy in knowing that our existence was planned outside of space and time by a highly intelligent Creator. No, that joy does not always translate into temporal happiness, but I find that to be secondary.

Just because our finiteness sometimes gets at us, it is still a fact. It seems like fear of death is the strongest motivation to believe?
You are right, life is an exercise in futility, if you see it on a long time scale, e.g. like a million years. So what? We can still enjoy while we are here? Would it be less futile if there was God with great plans around? Just think this through: The average lifespan of a human being is ~ 70 years. That is nothing compared to eternity, i.e. 70/infinity=0 if you want a mathematical proof.
If there was an afterlife and a god, everything you do right now would be even more futile, because you have a gazillion years and more in the afterlife to do something else and nothing what you did in your life would matter an eternity from now.

As for "enlightenment, reason, and progress", yes, those are wonderful things. In fact, believing that the universe is ordered and that it is designed for our learning can tend to motivate discovery. As such, my understanding is that the Judeo-Christian worldview played a significant role in jumpstarting the West's scientific and technological development over the last few hundred years. That's not to say certain elements within the Church didn't resist progress for political reasons.

You are mistaken. The church hindered research (most prominent example: Galileo) all throughout history. It did not jump start science at all...Religion and critical thinking are mutually exclusive, as you can easily see from history. The church always persecuted critical thinkers in the past and continues to do so...and with good reason as this is simply self-preservation for them.

Also, I would have to say that the God of the Bible differs greatly in terms of character and nature from the deities described by all other "holy" books. For me, comparing nominally Christian countries with Muslim countries is like comparing apples and oranges. Interestingly, from what I have been reading, increasing numbers of Iranians have been turning to Christ, having grown fed up with the way the local brand of Islam is forced down their throats.

Did you read the bible thoroughly? The God of the bible seems to be as bloodthirsty and psychopathic as that of the Qumran or other holy books. As a world religion Christianity seems to hold pretty stable at about 1/3, probably mostly through population growth, not conversion. The fact that we are NOT all Christians should tell you a lot about how
"real" this religion really is....

Yes, in a variety of ways. Ever hear of the Protestant work ethic? Besides receiving comfort in difficult circumstances, many of the world's poor have been greatly blessed in physical, tangible ways by Christian ministries such as WorldVision.

By the same token, we could use catholic work ethic (to get the idea, compare the economy of any South American country with a non-catholic European or North American country, e.g. on a per capita basis)....
Incidentally, except for the US, all the protestant countries are among the LEAST religious...think about that!

Cultural changes take generations to fully manifest themselves, whether for good or for bad. Check back in another few generations. Of course, by then, Western Europe could be majority Muslim.

Nope, this can happen in just one generation. Have you been around in the 60s?

If anything, that helps validate the position taken in Scripture that all of humanity has been given some innate sense of morality. Unfortunately, you can't take it for granted that cultures will live by those morals/ethics. Even if Christianity is merely echoing what is innate, it can steer cultures in the right direction.

Yes, but that does not prove that religion is required to have ethics. It is not. Therefore, Christianity is not needed to steer cultures in the right direction. Philanthropy and humanism are!

Again, seeking truth through reason need not be mutually exclusive with having faith. The problem with reason alone is that it relies on our human experience, which is necessarily very limited in scope. We can use reason to examine our faith, as well as to learn whatever we can within the scope of our experience.

Yes they are! You cannot be religious if you apply reason, because you would encounter too many contradictions. And yes, human experience is the ONLY thing we have. There is nothing else. However, dont confuse this with the experience we have as a civilization,as a species, which is vastly more than what a single human being can ever accomplish.

 

[abasile]

Just because our finiteness sometimes gets at us, it is still a fact. It seems like fear of death is the strongest motivation to believe?

Acknowledging our mortality probably is the single largest motivating factor in terms of pursuing God. We are wired to desire eternal life.

You are right, life is an exercise in futility, if you see it on a long time scale, e.g. like a million years. So what? We can still enjoy while we are here? Would it be less futile if there was God with great plans around? Just think this through: The average lifespan of a human being is ~ 70 years. That is nothing compared to eternity, i.e. 70/infinity=0 if you want a mathematical proof. If there was an afterlife and a god, everything you do right now would be even more futile, because you have a gazillion years and more in the afterlife to do something else and nothing what you did in your life would matter an eternity from now.

Yes, many of us are blessed with the ability to enjoy life here and now, and we should. We are also able to have our lives count for eternity, first by giving ourselves to the lordship and saving grace of Christ, and then encouraging others to do the same. Here on earth, we have the ability to choose to sin or not, and is in our human nature to fall short. Entering into eternal life with Jesus involves giving Him permission to not only forgive our sins (He gave His life on the cross to demonstrate full payment for the penalty of our sins which is spiritual death, eternal separation from the goodness of God), but to ultimately take away our sinful nature. We simply cannot live with God eternally if it is at all in our nature to oppose Him. Life on earth is essentially the "proving ground" where everyone gets to decide how to spend eternity.

The church hindered research (most prominent example: Galileo) all throughout history. It did not jump start science at all...Religion and critical thinking are mutually exclusive, as you can easily see from history. The church always persecuted critical thinkers in the past and continues to do so...and with good reason as this is simply self-preservation for them.

While I strongly disagree that faith and critical thinking are necessarily mutually exclusive, I will agree that the church has unfortunately often hindered scientific progress, typically for either political reasons or to protect someone's overly narrow interpretation of truth. At this time, there continue to be significant elements within the church that feel threatened by modern science, understandable if one feels that the only valid interpretation of the Bible is that the earth was created 6000 years ago.

On the other hand, the Christian worldview has long supported the notion that the universe is ordered, predictable, and can be meaningfully studied. We sort of take this notion for granted now, but this was not always so. I will go a step further and say that it appears we live at an optimal time and place to study the history and development of the universe. It is actually possible to "see" back in time to not long after the Big Bang, in a relative sense. Our location provides reasonably clear viewing, it is still early enough in the history of the universe to see close to the beginning, and yet, human life could not have existed much earlier in time due to the conditions needed to support it. It strongly appears that, not only was our existence carefully planned (the anthropic principle), we were also meant to be able to study our universe. Thinking Christians do not run from science; rather, they embrace it with awe and wonder.

Did you read the bible thoroughly? The God of the bible seems to be as bloodthirsty and psychopathic as that of the Qumran or other holy books.

Yes, every time I read the Bible cover to cover, I start all over again. Admittedly there was substantial bloodshed, sanctioned by God, in establishing and maintaining the nation of Israel. While many see this as justifiable, other Jews and Christians struggle with it. Either way, though, it seems quite clear from Scripture that it is not God's plan to use bloodshed as a means to spread the faith throughout the earth. The Quran seems to paint a different picture.

As a world religion Christianity seems to hold pretty stable at about 1/3, probably mostly through population growth, not conversion. The fact that we are NOT all Christians should tell you a lot about how "real" this religion really is....

The number of people who believe something does not change the truth of the matter. Actually, conversions have continued to be a significant part of the growth of Christianity, whereas for comparison, Islamic growth is far more driven by high birth rates.

Cultural changes take generations to fully manifest themselves, whether for good or for bad. Check back in another few generations. Of course, by then, Western Europe could be majority Muslim.

Nope, this can happen in just one generation. Have you been around in the 60s?

I'm too young to have been around in the 60s. Yes, great changes occurred then. But it's not just a matter of the adults affected at the time of change. It's a matter of those adults having children and raising them in a manner significantly different from how they themselves were raised. Then those children grow to adulthood with different values and priorities. It really does take at least a few generations to see the full effect.

If anything, that helps validate the position taken in Scripture that all of humanity has been given some innate sense of morality. Unfortunately, you can't take it for granted that cultures will live by those morals/ethics. Even if Christianity is merely echoing what is innate, it can steer cultures in the right direction.

Yes, but that does not prove that religion is required to have ethics. It is not. Therefore, Christianity is not needed to steer cultures in the right direction. Philanthropy and humanism are!

I don't think it's any coincidence that, of the developed nations, the United States is one of the most giving.

You cannot be religious if you apply reason, because you would encounter too many contradictions.

I don't see it that way. Many apparent contradictions go away as one's understanding becomes deeper.

 

[klapauzius]

Life on earth is essentially the "proving ground" where everyone gets to decide how to spend eternity

I promise I wont take this discussion that much further...My advice would be: Dont believe, but check and double check your assumptions vs. the hard facts. There is only truth in numbers and logic, which contradict a lot of what you wrote here. But I would like to explore this statement above a bit more:

Lets say a human lives 80 years, that is ~ 2.5 Gs or about 2 500 000 000 seconds. Lets say 'eternity' is at least as long as the life of the current universe, maybe 20 Gy or 20 000 000 000 years (of course its "eternal", but our minds are not wired well to handle that concept, being finite and all..). So 'eternity' is at least 250 million times longer than the life of an individual human (presently that is). Or in other words, a mans life in relationship to eternity (the life of the universe) is the same as 10s to a mans life.

Sure, you can do life changing things in 10s. But for ordinary people, in 10s mostly banal things happen. If you compare the amount of relevant 10s periods in human life to the banal ones, you find that life is mostly banal. For everyone.

Just imagine, your life would be judged, for eternity, based on what you did while you read this post? Or while you took a sip of your coffee this morning. Or listening to the nice start up jingle of your LEAF. What have you proved to God in those 10 seconds???

That must be one silly deity, to decide on your eternal destiny, based on that.
Logic of course would demand, that your statement is just wrong, because eternity is, well eternal, hence the time spent on the "proving ground" is zero...and therefore there is nothing to prove and the question remains: Who came up with this idea in the first place...

This is just one of the many discrepancies you encounter, if you think ALL the religions through thoroughly. In the end, none of them makes sense, and that is why we probably should drop ALL of them, however benevolent they might appear at first. A world governed and guided by nonsense cannot be the best of all possible worlds.

 

[abasile]

I promise I wont take this discussion that much further...

Thank you for the discussion. Although my responses have sometimes been slow in coming, I've appreciated the opportunity to exchange views in a respectful manner.

Lets say a human lives 80 years, that is ~ 2.5 Gs or about 2 500 000 000 seconds. Lets say 'eternity' is at least as long as the life of the current universe, maybe 20 Gy or 20 000 000 000 years (of course its "eternal", but our minds are not wired well to handle that concept, being finite and all..). So 'eternity' is at least 250 million times longer than the life of an individual human (presently that is). Or in other words, a mans life in relationship to eternity (the life of the universe) is the same as 10s to a mans life.

In eternity with God, I truly do not know how we will experience time. Perhaps we will eventually transition to existing outside of time. Perhaps we will be allowed to experience the passage of time at different rates of speed, allowing us for example to easily observe the evolution of entire galaxies. I don't know. But you are certainly correct that a human lifespan, or any amount of time for that matter, is practically nothing compared to eternity.

Just imagine, your life would be judged, for eternity, based on what you did while you read this post? Or while you took a sip of your coffee this morning. Or listening to the nice start up jingle of your LEAF. What have you proved to God in those 10 seconds???

That must be one silly deity, to decide on your eternal destiny, based on that.

In the Christian worldview, life on earth ultimately boils down to making just one choice. That is, we can choose Jesus as Lord, God, and Savior, or not. In order for God to be just, which Christians believe Him to be, He has to give everyone an opportunity to make that choice. For some people, such as the severely mentally handicapped or those who never adequately know of Jesus, that opportunity to choose might have to be presented outside normal, human means, perhaps supernaturally at the time of death. But in all cases, even in this relatively short life, we do believe that God gives everyone a fully adequate opportunity to make that choice. 80 years (plus or minus) is enough. That sure is a lot more time than we have to choose a spouse, for instance.

 

[evnow]

Not all religions and ideologies are equivalent. Equating Bush with Ahmedinejad, or Christian fundamentalism with militant Islam, is crazy. While going to war in Iraq turned out to be a costly mistake, I don't really think we fought it for "religious" reasons. With or without religion, you will get crazy people in power, i.e., Stalin, Kim Jeong Il, etc., etc.

Yes - you do get crazy dictators, one way or another. But you get crazy electred reps only because of religion ;-)

Oh yes, Bush and Ahmedinejad are quite the equivalent. Just that Ahmedinejad doesn't have anough resources to cause greate harm to millions of people like Bush had - and did.

As to weather Iraq had any "religious" reasons behind it - you need to look more closely at the mental makeup of Bush and how "good vs evil" manichean dualistic religious dogma played its part. Interestingly Ahmedinejad also believes in similar concepts, but with a shiite twist - after prophet Mani was Persian.

http://www.amazon.com/Tragic-Legacy-Mentality-Destroyed-Presidency/dp/0307354199

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/09/evangelical-desires-for-rapture-and.html

 

[klapauzius]

I must say it is pretty amazing...I wonder if the average auto forum leads to such discussions

 

[abasile]

Oh yes, Bush and Ahmedinejad are quite the equivalent. Just that Ahmedinejad doesn't have anough resources to cause greate harm to millions of people like Bush had - and did.

Ahmadinejad had, and continues to possess, the stated desire to annihilate an entire nation (Israel). Bush's goal (however ill-conceived) was regime change. I don't call that equivalent.

As to weather Iraq had any "religious" reasons behind it - you need to look more closely at the mental makeup of Bush and how "good vs evil" manichean dualistic religious dogma played its part. Interestingly Ahmedinejad also believes in similar concepts, but with a shiite twist - after prophet Mani was Persian.

http://www.amazon.com/Tragic-Legacy-Mentality-Destroyed-Presidency/dp/0307354199

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/09/evangelical-desires-for-rapture-and.html

Interesting links, and that "prophet" Mani was Persian. I guess I've long assumed that the primary motivation in deposing Saddam was for the sake of long-term stability in the Middle East, thereby protecting our oil interests. The "good versus evil" aspect seemed to me more like a way to gain support from the public, as it obviously is naïve to put foreign policy in such dualistic, black-and-white terms in most cases (WWII for instance being an exception). The Left has long argued that Bush himself is that naïve. I don't know. Besides the truly great presidents, we've had a number of naïve presidents, of all political persuasions.

I will have to agree that particular religious viewpoints and ideologies have caused many problems in the world. In fairness, the Godless ideology of Communism has caused immense suffering as well.

However, rather than simplistically and categorically blaming "religion", or Christianity in particular, for the world's problems, it is best to focus blame on the specific lines of thinking that are problematic. For instance, it is clear from Scripture that Christians should not attempt to hasten the Rapture by preemptive military action. It is also heretical to believe that we can trash the earth since it isn't our final home. It is wrong to believe that military conquest should be used to spread a faith or ideology to new areas. While advocating the elimination of religion will lead to polarization, diplomatically confronting individual areas of wrong thinking can be productive.

I must say it is pretty amazing...I wonder if the average auto forum leads to such discussions

Discussions might be more commonly along the lines of "my exhaust is louder than your exhaust". :lol:

 

[klapauzius]

The recent news... I could not refrain from putting this link here:

http://news.yahoo.com/austrian-pastafarian-dons-colander-drivers-licence-184034626.html

Can we do that here in the US ?

 

[DaveEV]

Ran across this article on the LATimes.com today:

Science and religion: God didn't make man; man made gods

In recent years scientists specializing in the mind have begun to unravel religion's "DNA."

 

[abasile]

The better we understand human psychology and neurology, the more we will uncover the underpinnings of religion.

In other words, we are "wired" for "religious" experiences. It is true that, almost universally, human cultures have a proclivity to worship God or gods. However, I do believe that God works primarily within the confines of the natural order that He has created. Why wouldn't God wire us to seek Him?

It is conceivable that St. Paul's dramatic conversion on the road to Damascus was, in reality, a seizure caused by temporal lobe epilepsy.

:lol: There are some experiences that can undoubtedly be explained by seizures or other factors. But why an encounter with Jesus? Paul was militantly opposed to those who acknowledged Jesus as Messiah and God. Also, the book of Acts describes other "coincidental" events following Paul's blinding encounter with Jesus. Are we hypothesizing that there are purely naturalistic explanations for those as well?

I do from time to time hear stories of individuals in relatively isolated (or restricted) parts of the world encountering Jesus for the first time through visions. Of course, such reports can be difficult to prove or falsify, much less reproduce. Still, for a person in a repressive Muslim nation to see a vision and suddenly become a Christian is no small thing.

You can call me deluded. But it seems to me there is more to reality than commonly meets the eye. And no, I haven't had any visions or deep "religious experiences" personally.

 

[GregH]

Wow! How did I miss this topic all these weeks? Too busy playing with the CAN bus and trying to deep discharge my pack I guess.. Certainly wouldn't have expected this thread on an EV list..

FWIW, theism (believing) and atheism (not believing) are different from gnosticism (knowing) and agnosticism (not knowing).. Usually "knowing" that there IS a god or gods would seem to gnostic (as a group of early christians called themselves).. I'm not sure there is a term for the negative.. Ie knowing there are no gods.

Regardless of if you believe or not, I would hope everyone is agnostic..

If anyone out there is interested in religion as a topic, I'd like to recommend a book.
"The Evolution of GOD" by Robert Wright. Unlike many of the other "atheist" books (Dawkins, Hitchins, Harris etc) this book takes a purely historical look at the whole concept of gods dating from early tribal cultures through early Jewish polytheism on to Yaweah monotheism... A lot of the book deals with Jesus the man and his likely aspirations from a historical context and more importantly the work of his disciples (mostly Paul) who invented the salvation story to sell Christianity to the Romans (Jesus' enemies as a messiah). The book also covers Mohamed and the evolution of Islam (for which there is much more documentation than for Judaism or Christianity) I found it a fascinating read.. It explains a lot!

 

[klapauzius]

I do from time to time hear stories of individuals in relatively isolated (or restricted) parts of the world encountering Jesus for the first time through visions. Of course, such reports can be difficult to prove or falsify, much less reproduce. Still, for a person in a repressive Muslim nation to see a vision and suddenly become a Christian is no small thing.

You can call me deluded. But it seems to me there is more to reality than commonly meets the eye. And no, I haven't had any visions or deep "religious experiences" personally.

What about Christians converting to Islam? It happens too.

 

[AndyH]

What about Christians converting to Islam? It happens too.

Absolutely!

As does breaking free of ancient dogma and getting back to the same type of direct connection the Masters were trying to communicate. :lol:

It's fun to watch the engineers try to explain the world from their perspective, and the psychologists or religionists trying to 'fight' for the view of the elephant from their castle window.

 

[klapauzius]

What about Christians converting to Islam? It happens too.

Absolutely!

As does breaking free of ancient dogma and getting back to the same type of direct connection the Masters were trying to communicate. :lol:

It's fun to watch the engineers try to explain the world from their perspective, and the psychologists or religionists trying to 'fight' for the view of the elephant from their castle window.

Masters???

 

[AndyH]

What about Christians converting to Islam? It happens too.

Absolutely!

As does breaking free of ancient dogma and getting back to the same type of direct connection the Masters were trying to communicate. :lol:

It's fun to watch the engineers try to explain the world from their perspective, and the psychologists or religionists trying to 'fight' for the view of the elephant from their castle window.

Masters???

Does "teachers" work better?

 

[klapauzius]

Does "teachers" work better?

Could you define in the context of this thread, what a 'teacher/Master' is???

 

[abasile]

If anyone out there is interested in religion as a topic, I'd like to recommend a book.
"The Evolution of GOD" by Robert Wright. Unlike many of the other "atheist" books (Dawkins, Hitchins, Harris etc) this book takes a purely historical look at the whole concept of gods dating from early tribal cultures through early Jewish polytheism on to Yaweah monotheism... A lot of the book deals with Jesus the man and his likely aspirations from a historical context and more importantly the work of his disciples (mostly Paul) who invented the salvation story to sell Christianity to the Romans (Jesus' enemies as a messiah). The book also covers Mohamed and the evolution of Islam (for which there is much more documentation than for Judaism or Christianity) I found it a fascinating read.. It explains a lot!

I haven't read the book. However, I would have to disagree that the "salvation story" was merely an invention following Jesus' time on earth. The Old Testament (a.k.a. Hebrew Bible) seems to clearly, prophetically anticipate the Messiah and ultimately all the nations of the earth seeing the Light of God. The book of Daniel, specifically Chapter 9, seems to predict hundreds of years ahead of time the specific year when the Messiah ("anointed one") would be "cut off and have nothing", which we understand to be the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.

What about Christians converting to Islam? It happens too.

It certainly does. Islam can provide a great deal of structure and that appeals to many people. Folks have all sorts of reasons for changing religions or worldviews. And not every so-called vision is necessarily from God. Still, I have found it interesting that folks with little or no prior knowledge of the biblical Jesus could see visions and suddenly become Christians in spite of the great potential for intense persecution.

It's fun to watch the engineers try to explain the world from their perspective, and the psychologists or religionists trying to 'fight' for the view of the elephant from their castle window.

One thing that is clear is that we cannot know everything, and that the God of the Bible is far beyond full human comprehension. However, if we believe that the Bible is God's inspired revelation to humankind, and that Jesus is God in human flesh, it is tough to simultaneously believe in the teachings of another faith that is contradictory. For instance, while the Bible makes it clear that Jesus was crucified, the Quran asserts that he never was. Those are very specific truth claims that cannot both be correct. To take a universalist sort of approach, you have to "water down" the teachings of each faith. Effectively, that entails creating a new religion. That's not my chosen path. But I absolutely believe in freedom of choice here.

 

[AndyH]

Does "teachers" work better?

Could you define in the context of this thread, what a 'teacher/Master' is???

The Christ and Buddha for example. Some suggest they came to teach humanity and/or help humanity reach a new point in their development. As if they were the exemplars that opened a new door to humanity.

If one looks at it from a chakra perspective, Siddhartha Gautama helped humanity open the heart (corresponds with the 4th chakra, love, sacrament of marriage, and 6th sefirot on the tree of life) while Jesus helped open the crown chakra (oneness, sacrament of extreme unction, 1st sefirot - divine energy) - the direct connection with God. The chakra system, sacriments, tree of life, and other systems fit nicely together.

Jesus was born into the a northern Essene family - they were considered a somewhat fringe sect or cult by mainstream Judaism. They are strict vegetarian and known as the healers. It appears that Jesus traveled widely - including to India to study Buddhism (missing from the cannon but in Indian texts). I've read one work that suggests that what became the catholic (universal) church came as a result of Paul selling out the other other disciples and Jesus in order to gain power with Rome - so the early church may have veered off-course from the start. (No, didn't get that in catechism. ) Too much political intrigue and manipulation on the 'religion' side of things apparently.

No disrespect intended to any in any way. I simply find organized religion to be a shoe a bit on the tight side. God is available for direct contact - no interpreters necessary. We apparently have to remember how to listen, though.

God be with you. Assalamu Alaikum. Shalom. Namaste

 

[klapauzius]

The Christ and Buddha for example. Some suggest they came to teach humanity and/or help humanity reach a new point in their development. As if they were the exemplars that opened a new door to humanity.

I see...for a moment there I was worried about aliens