I’m not sure’ truth"even applies , but as far as objective evidence that can be shared by everyone , sure, they are the same.
That said, the IPU only addresses one aspect of god belief which is, the lack of objective evidence that can be demonstrated to anyone. It demonstrates quite well that the argument “You can’t prove God doesn’t exist” is a fallacy and is no valid reason to believe.
God belief, religion and spirituality encompass much more than that, and people have very personal reasons for believing that have nothing to do with objective evidence.
In no other societal institution is “love” made out to be as big a deal as it is in church. I remember as a kid hearing over and over that Jesus loves me and not believing it because I couldn’t feel it. Everyone else around me seemed to easily feel it, but not me.
I excelled in school. I was a “good” kid at home. I didn’t get in any trouble with the law. In all other respects of my life, I was a solid citizen.
But in church, I felt like an absolute failure simply because I couldn’t appreciate Jesus’s love. Which meant I couldn’t make myself love him. Or God. Those are requirements for being a Christian in most denominations.
Do I have personal problems? Sure. But not “deep” ones, and it’s kind of insulting for you to say this. “Love” is not something that always wraps one up in warm fuzzy feelings. If a stranger on the street told me he loves me, I would be majorly creeped out. Tell me Jesus loves me, and I’m supposed to be happy and overjoyed? Hmm. I think being creeped out is a good reaction to have.
That’s the thing, though. A lot of “nice ladies” teach Jesus loves you. But ask them the “right” questions, and they will be quick to tell you all the kinds of people Jesus doesn’t like. It seems that your brief foray into church didn’t expose you to people like this, which is totally fine and believable. But I assure you there are plenty of normal, regular, everyday, “nice”, people who believe in hell just as sure as they believe in a loving Jesus. It’s just they wait for the right moment to spring this information on you.
I’m sure most of the people sitting in prison right now believe in some form of hell. Either they’e worked it out in their head that they’ve been forgiven. Or they feel that Jesus understood why they had to do what they had to do. Martin Luther King might have fashioned himself to be a modern-day David. He earned himself some extra nookie.
Yes, you are right. But this is much more about you, right? It’s about religion and its harm on believers in general. Most believers spend much of their time, energy, and money on religious activities. If religion is non-productive at best, then believers hurt themselves by engaging in wasteful activity. Perhaps the reason the two of us aren’t believers is because we found better things to do with our resources.
There are many believers who think they aren’t harmed. But if you looked at their family dynamics, their finances, and their personalities, you’d find all kinds of problems that are the direct result of their religious devotion. I’m not sure your limited experience with organized religion sheds much light on their situation.
Refresh your memory with the bible, and it including people worshiping and praying to the golden calf which got Jehovah in a hissy fit. So Jehovah instructs Moses to go down and murder thousands that were worshiping and praying to the golden calf.
Cattle are quite sacred to Hindu’s, as well as to other religions, but not sure on many praying to it, although many do think they have souls, as do other animals.
When I get time, I may share my experience with the church I was raised in. I have some good memories of the people there, but parts of my church experience did have a serious nocebo effect on me.
YoungKusher, you may want to take a break and read about animism. Not to be TOO snarky, but I have to question just how well you understand the topic at hand given that you possess such a gaping hole in your knowledge.
My Mom went from being a smoker to a marathon runner, she’s much happier, and she is way less of a bitch.
Explain how it’s unhealthy please. What evidence do you have?
[/QUOTE]
Most of the rest of your post has been responded to well enough - I want to deal with this statement.
Obviously, stopping smoking and being less of a bitch are positive - giving all the credit to “an invisble sky being” is the part that, in the long run, is unhealthy, as she iss denying herself the real reason she quit smoking and got healther - that she decided to.
Just like the guy in the wheelchair that is rehabbing from a broken leg - eventually he has to get out of the wheelchair and learn to walk on his own.
Secondly - if she truly believes the ‘sky god’ can heal her anytime she really wants it - how disappointed is she going to be when something happens that can’t be so easily* dealt with? While her ‘faith’ may give her some comfort in the early days of the problem, as it progresses, she will then feel a loss and anger at this “invisible sky god” for forsaking her - or if she loses a friend - or if some other friend of hers can’t quit smoking with the help of this same sky god…
This is why these delusions are unhealthy - because they give credit to the wrong ‘thing’.
Your mom should be commended for the positive changes in her life that she accomplished - time to throw off the crutches and accomplish even more.
*not saying quitting smoking is easy, just saying that compared to whatever she may face next
Again - the ‘true’ agnostic has no opinion on the matter one way or the other - agnostic literally meaning “without knowledge” - the other two categories are those that are falling on one side of the fence or the other, and saying that the lack of knowledge is a reason for it.
Theist/Atheist - believe/don’t believe and the knowledge has nothing to do with it.
They are helpful becuase the majority of people that say “agnostic” don’t truly mean “no opinion” - they use the term in one of the two subcategories.
‘truth’ in this context simply means verifiable fact - not some nebulous ‘truth’.
I didn’t make up the definitions/groupings - in my earlier response in this thread I pointed to the wiki articles describing them.
For the multitude of people that can balance faith/reality this isn’t an issue - maybe your mom is one of those, maybe she isn’t.
Its especially unhealthy when they forget reality and go only for ‘faith based’ services (forgoing doctors, etc in favor of “god will heal me if we pray”).
In either case - giving up recognition of your own personal strengths in favor of “invisible sky god helping you” is never a healthy thing.
Over the holidays, I praised my mother for losing weight and getting in shape. She’s always been a big woman, and it seems like she’s finally found the right combination that works for her. Her energy and self-esteem have both been astronomical lately.
She wouldn’t take any credit. No, it’s all “Jesus.” When I asked her why Jesus hadn’t helped her before, she blamed herself for not being in the right spiritual mindset.
As you say, this kind of thinking is setting her up for a major psychological crisis if she were to ever fall off the wagon (which is quite probable). It also encourages her to give the wrong advice to others trying to lose weight (e.g., “get right with God”) rather than those strategies she’s adopted that have actually done the trick.
It also espouses helplessness. “God has helped me lose weight because this is his will for me. Thus, if you’re fat and you’ve tried everything, there must be a reason. Don’t fight. Just accept.” My mother is smart enough not to say something like this out loud (in front of me), but I wouldn’t put it past her to think like this.
It’s unhealthy, even if it gives an individual short-term (or even sustained) benefits in “positive thinking” because every decision we make, whether impulsive or deliberated over is done so based off our core philosophies.
If that philosophy is a fiction, contrived by someone else’s means for an infinitely far end, then this shapes the course of their own life and the lives affected on scales infinitesimal and grand alike.
We don’t have enough collective fingers on hands for lives lost or wars waged in the name of God(s).
I never said it was. I don’t believe it is. It doesn’t fit the standard definition; in fact, it falls short of the definition on a couple different grounds.
Instead of insulting me, or engaging in rhetorical laughter, you might do better to try to address the actual points in debate that have been raised. Claiming victory by “You haven’t read the thread” or “Ha ha that’s funny” are techniques not held in great respect here.
The existence of recent religions such as Mormonism or Christian Science serve to remove at least one of your objections to the metaphorical validity of the IPU. The existence of odd anthropomorphic deities serves to remove another.
You need to make your point, rather than just issue snark.
I’d guess that you’ve never been involved in scientific discussions in a grad school or high level research center. Trust me, they are full of sarcastic jabs. (These usually don’t get published, but I’ve been on some panels … ) So I appreciate your point, but just like here jabs at an argument (not at a person) are appropriate. The response is to demolish the argument behind the jab. Or jab back better.
I was nitpicking about the mercury. Certain foods are indeed more dangerous. I’ve seen arguments against the proposition that the prohibition against pork had anything to do with trichinosis, but it is popular that forbidding people from eating shrimp led to better health. No God necessary. My point was that if a God was behind these rules, he could have done a much better job with them.
I did miss that. Another interesting argument, but it still doesn’t work. What you are describing is in a sense a wave function of the event, in that there is a probability that it will be resolved one way or another. But - it will collapse into the actual event. If God is omniscient, he must know if Schrodinger’s Cat is alive or dead. Since God can produce nearly infinite actions, in your example he knows nothing. And pre-ordained is incompatible with omnipotent.
You have God changing his mind. That is compatible with omnipotence, but not omniscience.
Another good try, but Goid’s omniscience still holds at time t = - infinity, so if what you say is true there can never be a time where God was truly omniscient.
Or SDB would vanish in a puff of illogic. You see my argument depends on infinities. A finite though powerful God, like Zeus or Wotan, has not problem with this. Only bi-omni gods. You see it is easy to state something, but hard for it to exist. I can write that a magician summons a demon by inscribing a four-sided triangle on the floor - but woe to the illustrator of that story.
Not really. I understand I made a broad statement that surely has something to prove it wrong, but I guarantee you that a vast majority of ‘believers’ do not pray to and have a spiritual relationship with a deity that is not at least humanoid.
My apologies for being condescending, but I’m sure you can understand how frustrating it is to have somebody take a comment out of context that has many implied boundaries that were set in other posts. I just wish that person would have read all of the comments before strawmanning my point. It was very clear that they must not have been reading much in this thread because I mentioned in several different posts that I am agnostic, and here they are talking about my ‘religion’. To me, it was either a snide remark, or a lack of understanding on their part.
You should do stand-up…
This statement is subjective at best. I doubt there would be any significant difference between the family dynamic of believers and the family dynamic of non-believers. Problems with any family dynamic can most certainly be explained with other means. Such as: alcoholism, abusiveness, genetics, etc. etc.
I was wondering when somebody would refer to the golden calf. Same as I said up-post. People don’t maintain a spiritual relationship or pray to a golden calf anywhere near the way they do to God, if at all for that matter. So this is a moot point. Not to mention the fact that we are talking about modern beliefs.
I’m sure your a reasonable person, I indeed get a little too condescending with some of my comments, but this is not relevant to my point. (refer to other parts of this post)
She’s 46 now, not that that’s old, but what is there to be gained if she ‘realizes’ this, and what is there that is so unhealthy about maintaining this belief for the rest of her life?
This seems to be noting a certain mental weakness you’re attributing to believers. It sounds like an inherent problem, not one that will be better if a person is a believer or not.
Your notion of how much faith she puts into ‘healing’ is just guess-work. She made a deal with God, and he backed up his end of the deal to ascertain her belief.(in her mind) Why would she expect him to grant every single wish? If somebody does believe that, then I can understand how that might be unhealthy, and how a person would become embittered over time. The thing is, what your saying has to do with people using god in a way that he is not meant to be used for. Most Christians I know, don’t feel anything like the way you have described.
Sure, but most Christians don’t believe that God is a genie who grants all of their wishes and makes their friends never die. If they do, that is a flaw in their own understanding, and probably a flaw with their psyche in general.
That’s a good thought, but I don’t think she uses God as a crutch for anything. If a person is in need of purpose that is meaningful in the most profound way, why not let them have God as their purpose? If you don’t, it could result in them being more pessimistic, more listless, and just more blah in general. ESPECIALLY when you’re asking someone who was once not a believer(my mom), then became a believer, to go back to being a non-believer. If you succeed, you might just be left with a shell of the person who once was, after all of the psychological stresses a mind would have to go though to do that.
To her, God is simply a complement to her strengths.
I see you still haven’t read the other portions of the thread. Ganesha was already used as an example by Quicksilver many many posts ago. Ganesha is humanoid, sentient, and obviously capable of understanding human issues. What properties does a unicorn have that make it rationally capable, on a philosophical level, of having a relationship with a human being? NOTHING. You obviously don’t have a firm understanding of what my argument is at all. I have already basically agreed with the thought exercise that the IPU is meant to provide. My beef has been with post #12, how it sarcastically uses it to belittle a person of faith, and with the fact that an IPU is an inherently stupid analogy becaus it does not possess the same qualities(or spiritual evidence) that God has.
If you already read all of the posts, why would you talk about MY religion when I said several times I am agnostic. Are you now saying that you were in fact insulting me by purposely strawmanning me?
My apologies for being so abrasive, but can you understand my frustration with your approach? You are not the first person to type a long reason why a point of mine, taken out of context so not actually my point, is ‘wrong’. It’s very annoying to have to cater to your lack of understanding, when all of the evidence that I’m not wrong is right in front of you.
How so? All of those deity’s possess humanoid forms. And there is really only one aspect of my argument, you just divided it.
Sorry if I find it annoyingly redundant to answer questions that you can make sense of by reading the other posts. I understand the discussion has evolved and my point is now in need of a make-over.
Okay, the IPU is a logic exercise designed to show believers why there is just as much objective evidence for an IPU as there is for their God. Right?
I first took my stance from responding to these posts:
Replace Tree with IPU.
Except believers obviously don’t use objective evidence to justify their belief(to themselves). They use their deep spiritual relationship with God, whom has no more definition than a humanoid being that is all-powerful. How is anyone in this day and age, no matter how old you have to say the IPU is, supposed to pray to and try and expect a unicorn to show them solutions to their problems? God has no form more than being humanoid, and for most Christians has no form at all.
Here is the actual definition of what Ganesha looks like as it is translated into English.
You will probably have more questions, but I’m rushing the end of this and will have to answer in later posts.
Not sure how you would know that if you’ve never met one personally. I never have, but have watched some PBS shows, and Hindu’s seem to have a strong reverence to a lot of animals, including rats. Gandhi had a very strong reverence for cows.
I don’t recall the discussion being limited to modern beliefs until just now, but you’re aware of Christianity’s early beginnings? Onolatry is the worship of a donkey. Christians were being accused of this as well as Jews. And it’s unclear how widespread this was, but others ridiculed believers with it. I believe the earliest known drawing of Jesus is with the head of a donkey in the form of a caricature. There are a few earlier church fathers writing about the donkey head diety with a human body. Tertullian responds to the criticism on several occasions, here is one such time:
And when both fighters think they are going to win? Just threw that one in for some levity.
Interesting… This helps put into context a slander that Isaac Asimov (I believe) reported on. When Pompey the Great shoved his way into the Temple at Jerusalem, and gazed upon the Holy of Holies, some said that it contained the head (or skull) of a donkey.
I hadn’t known this was a more systematic and commonplace slur against the two faiths.
[QUOTE=Mathew 17:20]
He replied, “Because you have so little faith. Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”
[/QUOTE]
[QUOTE=John 15:7]
If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.
[/QUOTE]
So - its right in the handbook that “god is a genie” and all you have to do is have a little faith.
Now - beyond that - you keep using your mother as an example - which is making this thread just a bit to personal for you. This thread is not really about debating the pros/cons for a single individual - its about the more general notion of 'Faith, Religion… denial" - so - as I said in my followup post - for those that are able to maintain a balance between faith and reality - its not a problem - but there are plenty of examples that go the other way - that cannot keep that balance.
As for “death” - it is the hope of seeing friends and family or fear of hell in the afterlife that is the ‘selling’ point of Christianity - it alone is enough to cause people to make really poor decisions -
But make no mistake - it is a delusion, it is unhealthy (how unhealthy is an individual thing) and it could very well have long term negative affects.
If you encourage the delusion (“in her mind” - which implies you don’t believe), then you’re not really helping her - you’re simply enabling her.
I have a friend who identifies as an atheist and is downright hostile about organized religion but, thinks there may be ghosts in his house. Clearly he entertains the idea of some afterlife.
IMO we all have a belief system and some part of it is built on faith in the sense that we accept things that we haven’t personally tested. The questions, is there something after this life, does existance have a purpose other than survival and creating the next generation.
IMO I think the IPU does address one aspect of belief. That is that “You can’t prove God doesn’t exist” is , by itself, a fallacy and failed argument for belief. The problem is that I can’t think of anyone who would claim
" I believe in God because you can’t prove he dopesn’t exist"
As you point out , there are many reasons for belief. I’d guess that indoctrination is high on the list, but for many their personal spiritual experiences lead hem to maintain belief. I’m a former Christian who has had some of those profound experiences , but my questioning has brought me to understand that they may have an explanation that is not other worldly. I reject a lot of the aspects and teachings of religion but accpet that it may be the right vehicle for some people and can lead to both positive and negative results. I tend to address the person and the specific belief rather than a blanket dissing.
You assert that god’s mind is beyond human understanding, as are his powers. But you continue to anthropomophize your idea of god while hand-waving away all the other ideas as not being worthy by flatly stating that “obviously” a hybrid looking deity is capable of relating to humans while a unicorn cannot possibly - because that would be phylosophically irrational. Finally, you state with absolute certainty that you have knowledge of the “qualities” of your idea of god.
You have no evidence that supports any of your closely held convictions but you dismiss out hand or take offense at those that inconveniently call them into question. That’s a hard position to defend.
But, because I’m a nice guy, I can help you with that. When in situations such as this, simply say, “I believe what I believe because I believe it.” It’s solipsistic and it won’t win any debates but it certainly serves to support your personal epistemological framework from further challenge.
Well, your posts are proving to be excellent material.
I think, YoungKusher, most confusion here stems from that while you, fervently claim to be agnostic, you still are only agnostic about a certain explicit deity. Namely the Christian God.
That is the image you keep holding in a special regard, and hold up as what ‘believers’ believe, while dismissing any other God ideas out of hand.
You are basically doing the same special pleading as the Christian believer.
I worship a tree… ‘Ridiculous!’
Replace the word ‘tree’ with Yaweh…‘What! How dare you compare my God with other gods!’
Basically that is all that it is. Comparing two gods with each other. You are the one *taking *offense. The question itself is not offensive, it is simply “Why should I believe in this god and not this one?”
