Fair enough. I didn’t get the idea that the point of the article was to change anyone’s mind. He shared his story simply to offer something to consider.
Repentence like Christianity has many forms. I’ve never been a fan of the “we’re just lowly humans and totally unworthy” concept. My own conversion was a simple prayer “God if you’re really there I’d like to know” Over the next few weeks things began to make sense and my life began to change. I don’t remember any time where I recognized my sin and officially repented. It was more like I realized what had been there all along and knew I was lovingly invited to join if.
No doubt. Spiritual growth means letting go of certain things and leaving them behind when the spirit calls us to. Phrased like that, would you consider it repentence?
A personal choice. Others in discussions do consider me Christian simply because I speak with reverence about Jesus and often use scriptural references. You however are not speaking of several major differences in the basic tenents {which is why I made my choice} You are speaking of an interpretation of one tenent.
You’ll have to explain that to me. If you leave old behavior patterns behind for more positive ones it doesn’t nessecarily indicate deep remorse, but it seems to fit the definition of repentence.
Sure. but this example has nothing to do with the article. He had several deep spiritual experiences and his behavior changed because of them. He was not forced to do better. He chose to based on those experiences. To me that qualifies as repepntence.
nods * I see what you’re saying. I don’t want to make any sort of critisism of anyone else’s personal spiritual beliefs and values, nor am I in a position to make definitive pronouncements on Christian doctrine. However, speaking from a complete ignorance of your innermost feelings and going only by what you’ve said here, I still feel tempted to speculate that this may have been one of the reasons why Christianity didn’t work for you - and, if Mr Wright’s views are similar, to speculate that it may not work for him, either.
Again, I would emphasise that I do not believe that Christianity is the only “right” path, and only hope that everyone can find the path that’s best for them. Please accept my sincerest apologies if anything I’ve said is at all offensive.
Nothing to apologize for. I appreciate your input. I’m glad to see that as a Christian you leave room for others to choose their own path. IMHO it is an importent element missing from many who see their way as the only way and seem to assume that their interpretation of God’s will is complete and correct.
I meant no criticsm. I only wanted to point out that repentence can sometimes be more or less subtle and still just as sincere. It’s a big wonderful and varied world. I am no longer a Christian because I sincerely believe several of the major tenets of Christianity are simply untrue and focusing the attention of the spiritual seeker in the wrong direction. Since it has been a sincere and honorable part of my my own path I honor others right to follow that path. I also see from folks like yourself and others that Christianity is changeing. The spirit is moving in peoples hearts and minds and I see a less narrow minded portion of Christianity growing.
This sums up my issue with most of the atheist debates I have seen proposed on this board. People stuck on the semantics, and unable to get past them. To take a smaller chunk on, I’ll talk about Karma rather than God. What always gives me a chuckle is when someone says, “I don’t believe in Karma”. Karma is a very real thing. It is a word from another language that most people using it do not understand, but it is describing a very real thing. It’s not simply the cosmos getting revenge for being bad, it’s more like the cycle of reaction to stimulus without being causal to the reaction. A cycle of karma is like this, if someone beats me up, I get angry and stay angry and then I go beat someone up, and then that person goes and beats someone up, and that person goes and steals from the sister of the person who beat me up.
Karma talks about the cycles that exist in our world. Like if we are all on a boat, and you keep shaking it, then everyone has to live on a shakey boat, and you have to deal with people’s reactions to your shaking of the boat, and the action/reaction that it causes based on the situation on the boat. Now everyone is pissed at you for shaking the boat, but you stopped shaking it a long time ago, but everyone still finds you irritable because you wouldn’t stop shaking the boat before, so now your life on the boat is defined by your action of shaking that boat, until someone becomes proactive and attempts to halt that cycle of karma. It can be you apologizing for shaking the boat and annoying everyone, or it can be someone on the boat deciding that it’s more irritating that everyone is mad at you for shaking the boat, than it was for you to shake the boat.
So Karma most definitely exists, as it is a word describing a particular thing. Claiming it doesn’t exist is like saying “Red” doesn’t exist, or “Thought” doesn’t exist. The word was developed to describe an experience that DOES in fact exist. Yet many people will tell you that they don’t believe in Karma. This is based upon a mistranslation by many people before the word got to them, it is based upon ignorance of the meaning of the term karma, but karma in and of itself exists, because it is just a word attempting to describe an effect that happens in this world.
Now, this is the same impulse that has people attacking other people’s metaphors. They are making NO attempt to understand what someone is talking about and simply denying it. This is not an action that a thinking person engages in, and when they do it is in their best interest to set that habit aside. However, too many atheists are enamoured with the idea of being a thinking person, and they are more interested in presenting the IMAGE of being a skeptic, rather than actually adhering to the very strict code of conduct that the true skeptic adheres to. A true skeptic would allow for the idea that there is some discrepancy in the language that is causing a misunderstanding, and would not simply dismiss another’s experience as a “hallucination”.
So what I am being irritated by is a group of people claiming they are skeptics, who are doing little more than saying, “I do not believe that what this word I do not understand is trying to describe exists.”, which is about as profoundly ignorant as anyone could possibly be.
Der Trihs You think I’m hallucinating, I think you’re blind. We are at an impasse. The one thing that we both agree upon is that I see things that you do not.
While I think you make a valid point I don’t agree with your take on Karma or that people are consistantly disagreeing with a word they don’t understand. I take exception to your blanket insult of “profoundly ignorant”. You seem to reserve the right to define words in your own unique way and then argue from your own definition. While you may amuse yourself with this tactic, it’s not very helpful in a debate thread. In a debate thread participants have some obligation to explain their definition and also to understand the definition of those they disagree with. Certain terms are more difficult to define and we see that often on the SDMB. If you can’t agree fine, then agree to disagree respectfully.and stop wasting posts on word games.
“Red” does not exist as an independent entity - there are only objects that most people will describe as “red” under appropriate lighting conditions. “Thought” does not exist as an independent entity - it’s just a word people use to describe the activity of their brains. “Karma” does not exist as an independent entity - it’s just a word some people use to describe their belief that the world is somehow fair, despite all the evidence to the contrary.
To be accurate, atheists hold many concepts of god, since atheists, far more than most believers, need to try to understand the particular version of god we don’t believe in. By “hold” I assume you mean try to understand, not believe in (as in we hold these truths to be self evident.)
mswas is not the only theist who asserts that his God covers all - it’s just that his god is so out there that it is more evident.
If you’re referring to Persinger, most of his subjects reported extremely vague sensations while under transcranial magnetic stimulation or no sensations at all. He certainly never “readily produced” profound religious experiences on demand by any stretch of the imagination. Indeed, Persinger himself denies ever having had any religious or mystical sensations while under transcranial magnetic stimulation.
I’ve read Phantoms in the Brain. Ramachandran clearly states that he’s open to the possibility that religious experience may have caused the unusual brain states associated with some illnesses, rather than vice-versa.
Exactly my point that’s not what Karma means. I am not making up my own definitions of words, I am attacking misuses of them. So while people might find my word games annoying, I am equally annoyed by the bias that people apply to words that I don’t find justified.
Karma is not a punishment system it is action/reaction. It is the fact that you can’t shit in your kitchen without being affected by shitting in your kitchen. Even if your wife cleans it up for you, you still have to deal with how she reacts to the fact that you shit in the kitchen.
Ending the cycle of karma refers to ending the cycle of reaction. If you are reacting you don’t have power over your situation. That’s why we want to take a proactive approach to things. It’s like the difference between the lay person who gets punched and starts flailing about and the martial artist who reacts thoughtfully even though he’s been punched, and the martial artist who never got punched at all because he was in complete and total control the entire time and wouldn’t let himself be put into a situation where he would get punched.
I have yet to meet an atheist who understands God. If I do, it will be a profound experience for me. And I think that it is profoundly ignorant to deny the existance of something that you don’t know what it is. “That thing I don’t understand, I don’t believe in it.” What is more ignorant than that? That is pretty much the epitome of ignorance.
I do not think I am redefining words, I am trying to cut away some of the bias applied to them. As Voyager pointed out the common western misconception about karma. I am perfectly willing and open to the idea that there is more about karma than I understand and if you can enligthen me to that, wondeful, but Voyager used the word incorrectly. It has nothing at all to do with punishing the bad people. In fact the eastern idea of “Good and bad” people is not the same as the very Christian idea that Genghis Khan was a bad person that Voyager put forth. I have yet to see any evidence that Genghis Khan was any worse a person than anyone else. He was good to his people, he spared villages that joined him, and then gave them the rights of membership in the empire, and he slaughtered mercilessly those who opposed him. This illustrates perfectly my problem with the atheist quandary, because he is unwilling to believe in the force of karma based upon a misconception of it’s definition, but he is perfectly willing to believe in the existance of “Good and Bad” people. I have never been an ‘atheist’ per se, but I was a Nihilist for quite a few years, and when I was a nihilist I did not believe in Good or Bad people at all. What determines Good and Bad other than social edicts? Why would Genghis Khan be subject to the dictates of a modern American conception of what makes a person good or bad? He believes that Genghis Khan was a bad person, but he does not believe in Karma because someone told him it was cosmic punishment, and Genghis Khan was not punished by the cosmos.
You are correct though, I need to tailor my speech to my audience better, something I have been working on with these very threads. However, there are certain terms with implied perjoratives, like the way many of the atheists here use the word ‘religion’ that I think must be addressed and dismissed before true communication can occur. Like the definition of ‘Magic’ that seems to be “Incorrect superstition.” Those sort of self-serving terms make it difficult for atheists and theists to have a reasonable discourse as atheists seem to have defined many of these terms in ways that support their bias. I simply want to level the playing field and show atheists where they are turning atheism into a sacred cow, engaging in the same behaviors they accuse theists of engaging in.
And if a certain mindset is profoundly ignorant, calling it such, is not an insult. If someone doesn’t know what it is exactly that they don’t believe in, then they are profoundly ignorant to deny it’s existance. I do not believe in the bearded man in the sky either, but yet I do not come to the conclusion that there is no God, because that is not what God is.
Voyager If there is no such thing as God, then how do you determine your measure by which all human beings should be judged in order to determine who deserves to be punished? I do believe in God, and I do not believe such a universal measure exists. I believe in a sort of moralistic structural integrity, where the personality will fall apart if the corruption destroys that structural integrity. I find the concept of Good and Evil as some sort of absolute extremely unsatisfying.
If anything then, you have just established why it’s important to use words according to their common meanings — rather than just make up your own meanings as desired. The word “god”, for example, probably needs particular care in any debate you have over religious beliefs, whether with atheists or anyone else. If you really feel a need to re-define a word to make your point, you can probably instead look around and find that someone else has already coined a word for the concept you have in mind. Philosophers and theists have been having at this stuff for a very very long time.
As to “karma”: a person saying they don’t believe in karma is probably not claiming that people are never affected by their own actions, either directly or indirectly. Obviously that does happen often — though not inevitably. We’re not living in a Seinfeld episode.
So is karma really a useful concept? Does it describe anything that really exists in the world? I won’t say, “I don’t believe in karma”, since I think that would irritate you, but I don’t see what exactly what I’d be believing in if I did.
Well, metaphors can be tricky things. They’re difficult to get right. Usually someone is only trying to highlight one particular aspect of something (“Life is a box of chocolates”), without intending to involve all the other qualities (life comes packaged in cardboard, and is made of dextrose, milk fat, cocoa butter, and partially hydrogenated oils; and the best life of all comes from Switzerland). I’ll agree it’s tiresome when people take your metaphor somewhere it wasn’t meant to go.
I don’t have a solution. Metaphors are very prone to misunderstanding, and unnecessarily complicating the discussion. Regrettable, but there it is. Perhaps it’s better to avoid them.
Sure. A True Skeptic — while adhering to The Code, and even while speaking with his palm resting on James Randi’s Flim Flam — should concede that human language is an imperfect medium of communication (though it’s all we have), and that Mr. Wright might not have been relating his experiences as clearly as he could. Perhaps there’s been a misunderstanding or two, in what he’s going on about.
Nevertheless, a skeptic probably isn’t going to concede that Mr. Wright has provided us with anything like a convincing show of evidence for Christianity — which was the crux (ha!) of the matter, wasn’t it? If an explanation for his words is still demanded, then a hallucination, or fraud, or wishful thinking are the more likely possibilities. Probably better though if we, skeptics and all, just punted the question. Who knows what’s going on in Mr. Wright’s head? He himself doesn’t seem to be of much help.
No one ever says anything like that, because it’s absurd. Obviously when people use a word with confidence, they believe they’re using it correctly, and that their utterance reflects what they’re thinking. I’ll agree that there might be ignorance involved (ignorance of a word’s meaning, either in the speaker or the listener), but is it really profound ignorance? It’s possible after all that the speaker’s beliefs are in fact correct; they’re just expressing themselves improperly.
It might be frustrating when this happens, but a worthwhile thing to do is point out that the misused word does not mean what the person thinks it means. If done politely, and with some references, this can lead to a healthy and rewarding conversation. Or a fist fight, depending. No guarantees, you know.
I disagree with the conception of God that atheists on this board propose. I disagree that it is the way it is usually used. I disagree that it is in any way accurate. In fact I think they don’t know what they are talking about, but would like to think that they do.
Just as you pointed out. You do not understand the word Karma, so refuting it would be IGNORANT on your part. Refuting something you cannot understand is IGNORANCE.
Not everyone uses the words the way people here on the straight dope use words. For instance, Dictionary.com is probably the most widely used dictionary EVER created. Why? Because it’s DICTIONARY.com and when people want to look up a word that’s what they are going to type into their web browser. And yet, you will find people on the Straight Dope who will claim that Dictionary.com is not a very good dictionary, even though it is the one that so many people are using for their definitions.
So I do not think I am cleverly redefining words, I think I am proposing alternate interpretations for those words, and in some cases, such as Karma, pointing out when the word is being used completely wrong. Karma is a word from another language that has a stable meaning in that language. It is NOT an English word, and thus the English colloquial usage OF that word is possibly INCORRECT. The question would be do the Indians use it the way that Voyager used it, and I am going to go ahead and say that, no, they do not.
In John C. Wright’s case, if there is no evidence to support his claims, what evidence is there to support that it’s a delusion? Why is it ok to assume a delusion but not ok to assume that he is correct?
I think that oftentimes people loosen their standards for objectivity when the status quo will not be offended, in this case there is a certain academic status quo, so if your loosend objectivity fits within the bias structure of the community, then you get away with it, if not, then you don’t.
Why are theists held to a higher standard of rigor than atheists?
About metaphors. If you stop using metaphors then you are stuck in a rigid mindset that has predefined terms, and you cannot move outside of those predefined limits, so in fact it is NOT desirable to stop using metaphors as that eliminates nuance. This was what Orwell tried to point out with Newspeak.
What I am against is the Academic doublespeak where people are not BEING skeptics but rather trying very hard to PLAY skeptics. If they want to BE skeptics, then they can hold themselves to that high ideal, and i’ll applaud them for it, but I am not going to accept the word being bandied back and forth in the way most Born Again Christians mouth the word Jesus in every other sentence. Quite simply the word skepticism is being used as a false idol on this board, and I like to point that out, because I absolutely LOATHE false idols, and take every opportunity that I can to shit all over them. If one real skeptic emerges from the aftermath, then that real skeptic can take up the torch and take all the fake skeptics and whip them into shape, but as yet I haven’t seen anyone step up to do that, all I’ve seen is me being held to a higher standard of rigor than the atheists want to apply to themselves, and that’s not cool.
Excuse me? What the hell are you talking about? Is this supposed to make sense, or have any validity? Not only will you not meet an atheist who understands God I seriously doubt you will meet any believer who understands God. You might meet people who claim to, or just people who say they believe in God and others who don’t. The vast differences in people’s concepts of God easily shows we don’t understand, we’re still trying to fugure things out. Atheists aren’t saying “that thing we don’t understand ,we don’t believe in it” They;re saying we don’t believe in god[s] period. Now, I would say that they are rejecting certain concepts of Gof that they are familiar with. In many aspects of that rejection I agree with the atheists. The difference is that they rejected all concepts of God both known and unknown while I chose to redefine my concept.
This is not the subject of this thread so let’s leave it alone.
If what you’re engaging is is an attempt at “true communication” I fail to recognize it. I know that some atheists can exhibit the same kind of zealoous, narrow minded prejudice that religious fundies do. Welcome to humanity.
Again. This makes no sense. It is the perogative of the individual to judge their own objective and subjective experience and decide what that means for them. IMHO the point you’re trying to make is just plain ole wrong.
Just as it would be profoundly ignorant to affirm it’s existence: as silly as claiming to believe in square circles without knowing what one looks like.
But then, you are confusing terminology here yourself. It makes PERFECT sense to not believe in something you can’t understand. Understanding is, for most rational people, a prior and necessary step before belief. The reason I can safely say that I dont’ believe in God is that I am describing my mental state: no belief that correlates with any concept of God I’ve ever heard so far, and since I’m not yet aware of all and any other concepts, no belief in them yet either (in fact, no conception of them yet all: an even higher barrier to belief than simple incomprehension).
But you apparently HAVE come to the conclusion that there is no reason to believe that THAT particular God exists. Me too! Also, every other conception of God I’ve ever heard of. How about you? What conception of God do you hold? I guarantee that I’ve either 1) heard of it, and don’t believe in it or 2) not yet heard of it, and so can’t yet believe in it since I’ve never even thought about it yet. Feel free to fill me in on it though.
As it happens, not everyone, not even a majority of English speaking people, have ready access to web browsers, let alone use dictionary.com exclusively.
While it’s true that dictionaries are simply records of common usage (and any good dictionary will say so right at the front… and I can’t seem to easily find it on dictionary.com, hmmmm…) and that, in that sense, definitions are more a matter of majority rule than strict standards, in reality, the issues aren’t so simple. Word meanings shift over time, with no good demarcation from one meaning to the next. Word meanings can differ regionally. And they can differ based on technical usage.
Also, as is the case with dictionary.com the dictionary can simply be lousy at recording what the common usages are. Even if dictionary.com was the most widely used English-speaker dictionary (it’s certainly NOT considered among the best), given that most English SPEAKERS and not even most English writers rarely crack open a dictionary to check their usages, I would say that dictionaries are either good ro bad guides to definition usage. Mere popularity of one dictionary or another cannot establish it’s quality as a catelouge of actual, in-the-field usage. Personally I would trust the OED far more than anything cheaply available on the internet.
Apos You are not the type of atheist going out and telling theists that they are delusional or hallucinating, at least not when it’s passed my notice.
I maintain that knowing God must be relational and not just definitional. Therefore having heard a “definition” of God does not mean you know God. This is the disconnect that theists have with atheists.
Der Trihs This would be true if you were not making a positive assertion that we were having a delusion, or hallucinating. I cannot FORCE you to have an experience, therefore there is no way for me to relate God to you in any meaningful way as long as you are unwilling to give it the benefit of the doubt. This goes much deeper than merely SAYING you will give it the benefit of the doubt. However, it is the height of ignorance for you to claim that I am delusional or hallucinating merely because you have never had the experience.
cosmosdan There is a lot to understand, that’s why I find it intellectually dishonest to summarily dismiss something because there isn’t a simple one paragraph definition for God that the atheist can prove or disprove.
You dismiss my argument about Karma but it illustrates the point perfectly, it was the perfect example of someone disbelieving in something when they had no clue what they were talking about.
I disagree that ANY atheist knows what God is. I simply do not think that atheism is a stance that is worthy of respect. The people are worthy of respect as people, they can be very intelligent people, but this is one place where there is something fundamental missing. You cannot know God and remain an atheist, it’s an oxymoron. An atheist by definition is someone that does not know God. It is NOT an equally valid position. Mind you, I don’t think there is any reason to “punish” someone for being wrong, but they are wrong.
God may not be able to be proven using the tools of analysis they use and the information available to us at this time, but I am SKEPTICAL that there is this minority of intellectual elites that know the true answer who are outnumbered 20-1 by the rest of humanity.
I know God, I have experienced God, I continue to experience God all the time, Ain Sof (Never Ceasing), it is no more a delusion or a hallucination than was being born, growing up or eating the Enchilada I had for dinner. And it is NOT just filling some emptiness some void, it is something that IS there connected to everything affecting everything. If they understood God AT ALL, they would not be atheists.
The most profound thing that these threads have been teaching me is why Mystics generally keep their traps shut around people who don’t know.
No. By definition an atheist is someone who doesn’t BELIEVE in God. If we’re right and God really doesn’t exist then YOU don’t know him either. But I would hardly call you an atheist.
Is there any other topic where “cuz I say so” is considered a valid argument?
Yes, it keeps them from being called on their bullshit.