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Heroes Community > Other Side of the Monitor > Thread: Questions about religion
Thread: Questions about religion This thread is 100 pages long: 1 10 20 30 40 50 60 ... 69 70 71 72 73 ... 80 90 100 · «PREV / NEXT»
artu
artu


Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
posted July 10, 2013 08:45 PM
Edited by artu at 20:47, 10 Jul 2013.

Quote:
I don't think it matters at this point, since a lot a behaviour patterns are still based on religion, but in another 50 years or so it might become relevant.


On the contrary, especially in the West, even religious people's behaviour patterns are quite secularized. Put aside illegal things with actual punishment like theft or murder, how many people do you know that dont have sex without marriage, that dont put money on banks and use interest, that treat non-religous people like hell material, that actually believe a contemporary miracle when they are told one? A solid example, how many Catholics do you think, actually believe that the Pope is really infallible?

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JollyJoker
JollyJoker


Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
posted July 10, 2013 09:49 PM

That's not what I mean.
A lot of people are, for example, not religious, but still homophobe - which, in my opinion, is a heritage of the Bible.

It takes a while until a society, after shedding certain understandings really loses all prejudice.
Think about the US and the end of slavery in 1865. Now, abolishing slavery on one hand - probably polling in, hey, a majority isn't viewing blacks as slaves - and treating blacks as equal as a matter of fact, 100 years seemed just enough zo loudly proclaim that behaviour patterns were still the same as ...

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bloodsucker
bloodsucker


Legendary Hero
posted July 10, 2013 10:13 PM
Edited by bloodsucker at 22:35, 10 Jul 2013.

Mats, those snows

Atheists compose a tiny fraction of all the people who have ever lived and is even now in world-wide decline. - Elodin

It's true, people tend to have a tiny little hope that what their senses are transmiting to them is not true. Why?

Let's assume this is true:

There is no AFHTERLIFE -> so no reason for been afraid of eternal damnation. So, get what you can right now

There is no JUGDE -> so do every thing you want you want, if you can.

There is no PROPOSE -> so you're life will end as started, MEANINGLESS

Do I have to explain you why this ideas are unberable for the most of us?

Human beeings need their bondaries so they forged them in the shape of gods - so they don't have to acknowledge they will fall in to oblivum.
To have a ruler who can keep order even when no one else is seeing, to have a sense of Good and Bad. To add meaning to their lifes...

But now science looking to the question other way.

Problem is: the probability of you being there to read this and I being here to wrote it is way to small to happen by chance (this sounds like a bad tease).

It's  mathemathicaly impossible that all the implications of macrofisics on microfisics, microfisics in quimic, quimic in biology and so on..., to create the world we know, had happen by chance.

The problem with this assumption is that all those religions mean nothing to the point.

The one who is closer is Budaism and only in the sense that they have a panteistic aprouch to the mather.

Because if there has to be a propose for SOMETHING in the universe, there must be a propose to EVERYTHING in the universe, since the virus to the galaxies - to your smallest actions.
So, no free will.

And why do you think this 'propose' will value your life more then my dog's life? I don't.
So, probably there was no propose to an aftherlife.

Why should this propose to harm himself as a punishement for failure and reward himself for success if both failure and success have a propose. So, no right and wrong, what ever you do is Ok.

Finally science is beating religion.
Not by proving God doesn't exist, but by implaing that if he exists he can't 'care', because all is equal.

Again you can do all that you want and all that you do is meaningless (is what you would have done anyway, like in the grec tragedies).

It's probable that religion as we know it can survive this? Yes.

Why?
People usually prefer to live in a fictionnary world (I know I do, mine is H3WoG, to be me is to be God himself, ruler of all land), where there is good and evil and we are the good guys.
This believes had proved to be a valuable surviving weapon (like fishes, icthiosaurus and dolphins shape...)so we will probably just adapt it, that as nothing to do with THE TRUTH, is just a surviving strategy and yet it is also THE TRUTH cause it serves the PROPOSE of surviving, wich on the other hand as no PROPOSE or MEANING.

Does this matter?

NO!!! Not at all!

But it's better digested with music...


http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=2YW7u_BsGF8&feature=endscreen












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artu
artu


Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
posted July 10, 2013 10:32 PM

Quote:
Atheists compose a tiny fraction of all the people who have ever lived and is even now in world-wide decline. - Elodin

It's true, people tend to have a tiny little hope that what their senses are transmiting to them is not true. Why?

Let's assume this is true:

There is no AFHTERLIFE -> so no reason for been afraid of eternal damnation. So, get what you can right now

There is no JUGDE -> so do every thing you want you want, if you can.

There is no PROPOSE -> so you're life will end as started, MEANINGLESS

Do I have to explain you why this ideas are unberable for the most of us?


Not to mention, all of that has been discussed and replied in the previous pages and Elodin was proven wrong about atheism declining with statistics, there is no religion that 51 percent of the world population agree to, since they all treat each other as heresy and are not accumulative, numbers are never your friend. Even if they were your friend, this would be the most shallow way to look at things, if you need immortality for a purpose or are unaware of the evolutional roots of morality in group animals, that is simply your problem. And explaining how there is a God because we NEED him for this or that is actually a very atheistic stance, even if it's taken unintentionally.

Quote:
It's  mathemathicaly impossible that all the implications of macrofisics on microfisics, microfisics in quimic, quimic in biology and so on..., to create the world we know, had happen by chance.



No, it's not. Almost none of the physicists or biologists claim such a thing and they know better than you.

Quote:

Because if there has to be a propose for SOMETHING in the universe, there must be a propose to EVERYTHING in the universe, since the virus to the galaxies - to your smallest actions.
So, no free will.

And why do you think this 'propose' will value your life more then my dog's life? I don't.
So, probably there was no propose to an aftherlife.

Why should this propose to harm himself as a punishement for failure and reward himself for success if both failure and success have a propose. So, no right and wrong, what ever you do is Ok.

Finally science is beating religion.
Not by proving God doesn't exist, but by implaing that if he exists he can't 'care', because all is equal.


That would be philosophy not science.

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Elodin
Elodin


Promising
Legendary Hero
Free Thinker
posted July 10, 2013 11:00 PM
Edited by Elodin at 23:36, 10 Jul 2013.

Quote:
That's not what I mean.
A lot of people are, for example, not religious, but still homophobe - which, in my opinion, is a heritage of the Bible.



In my opinion "homophobe" is merely a hate word used to paint someone negatively who does not agree with the LGBT "you must bless everything we do or you are a bigot" agenda.

Again, no culture has ever put gay sex on par with marriage.


Quote:

On the contrary, especially in the West, even religious people's behaviour patterns are quite secularized. Put aside illegal things with actual punishment like theft or murder, how many people do you know that dont have sex without marriage, that dont put money on banks and use interest, that treat non-religous people like hell material, that actually believe a contemporary miracle when they are told one? A solid example, how many Catholics do you think, actually believe that the Pope is really infallible?



You have really bizarre views about religion and religious people.

Oh, lots of people still believe in miracles. Of course atheists are not open to miracles so they can't expect one.  And they'll tend to hang out with like minded people, so....

Closed mouths don't get fed and closed eyes don't see.

Even the ultra-liberal Huffy Puffy Post comments on it:

{Edit: Link added}
Clicky
Quote:

Yet it is not just people in the first century who have believed in miracles. Various polls peg U.S. belief in miracles at roughly 80 percent. One survey suggested that 73 percent of U.S. physicians believe in miracles, and 55 percent claim to have personally witnessed treatment results they consider miraculous.

Even more striking than the number of people who believe in miracles is the number who claim to have witnessed or experienced them. For example, a 2006 Pew Forum survey studied charismatic and Pentecostal Christians in 10 countries. From these 10 countries alone, the number of charismatic Christians who claim to have witnessed or experienced divine healing comes out to roughly 200 million people. This estimate was not, however, the most surprising finding of the survey. The same survey showed that more than one-third of Christians in these same countries who do not claim to be charismatic or Pentecostal report witnessing or experiencing divine healing.

And the reports in these countries appear to be merely the tip of the iceberg. The survey did not include China, where one report from the China Christian Council over a decade ago attributed roughly half of all new Christian conversions to "faith healing experiences." Another report from a different source in China suggested an even higher figure. Clearly many people around the world experience what they consider miracles, sometimes in life-changing ways.

Most stunning to me on a personal level were sincere eyewitness claims from people that I or my wife have long known and trusted, including everything from cures of blindness to restoration from apparent death. Sometimes the witnesses include doctors. In one case, the eyewitness was my mother-in-law, who reported that my sister-in-law was not breathing for three hours. During prayer, without available medical resources, my sister-in-law revived, and had fully recovered, without brain damage, by the next day. Similar reports, again sometimes from people I know or have interviewed personally, appear widely in Africa, Asia, Latin America and sometimes even North America. Many of these reports come from highly educated professionals.
.....

However miracles are defined, Hume's argument against them, which provides the traditional basis for skepticism about them, is now problematic. Hume questioned the possibility of having adequate testimony to affirm miracles, since virtually uniform human experience ruled them out. Today, however, when hundreds of millions of people from diverse cultures claim to have experienced miracles, it seems hardly courteous to presuppose a "uniform" human experience on the subject. If any of these experiences constituted a genuine miracle, Hume's argument against miracles, which in some circles has hardened into an uncontested consensus, would fail. Whatever one thinks about miracles, the long-held argument against them needs to be rethought.

While not everyone will agree regarding the causes of healing experiences, everyone must agree that they often do not happen. Sickness and injustice remain in the world. In the Gospels, miracles did not replace the kingdom that Jesus announced. Nevertheless, they were signs of hope to promise and invite us to work for a better future. This focus suggests the writers' conviction that God cares about people and about their suffering, and welcomes us to care about these also.


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bloodsucker
bloodsucker


Legendary Hero
posted July 10, 2013 11:06 PM

Quote:
It's  mathemathicaly impossible that all the implications of macrofisics on microfisics, microfisics in quimic, quimic in biology and so on..., to create the world we know, had happen by chance.


No, it's not. Almost none of the physicists or biologists claim such a thing and they know better than you.



Well, I read it in a fiction book called "A Formula de Deus" from a portuguese journalist, it was the permisse of the book.

I supose I could verify the sources but would be harder then learn something by reading ERM Help and Discussion, so if you don't mind...

And yes, I supose I could be considered an atheist.
Twenty years ago I awsered this to a theacher: I'm not an atheist but only because the question (is there a hyer power?) stoped making sense along time ago...

On the other hand, sorry I gave the idea I tought man should find no values.
All universal human values had proved to be valuable and certainly we have evolve a lot in that sense. I only don't find the hand of God there, I find our own hand. Tainted with blood? Yes. Allmost inexorably finding a way? No doubt.

But maybe some philosiphical ant can see things diferently...

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Elodin
Elodin


Promising
Legendary Hero
Free Thinker
posted July 10, 2013 11:32 PM
Edited by Elodin at 23:41, 10 Jul 2013.

Quote:
Atheists compose a tiny fraction of all the people who have ever lived and is even now in world-wide decline. - Elodin

It's true, people tend to have a tiny little hope that what their senses are transmiting to them is not true. Why?



I don't have senses transmitting things to me that I hope are not true. Well, sometimes my senses tell me, "Hey, you're getting fat!" and I don't want to believe it but I go on a diet cause  I know the scales don't lie.

I don't deny the material or the spiritual and experience both. Thus my perspective of and experience of the universe is more well-rounded than an atheistic world view/experience.

Quote:

Human beeings need their bondaries so they forged them in the shape of gods - so they don't have to acknowledge they will fall in to oblivum.



I follow the truth wheresoever it leads me.

I do agree that some folks made up their own gods though, one of those gods being "there is no god but me!" But I worship the one true God.


Quote:

Because if there has to be a propose for SOMETHING in the universe, there must be a propose to EVERYTHING in the universe, since the virus to the galaxies - to your smallest actions.
So, no free will.



Nah, God having a purpose for existence does not mean everything has to follow God's purpose. And if you spill your soft drink odds are God did not have some grand design behind you spilling it, you were just clumsy.


Quote:

And why do you think this 'propose' will value your life more then my dog's life? I don't.



Because God made man "in his image." Beings capable of fellowshipping with him, unlike lower life forms. I am a child of the living God and fellowship with him.

Quote:

Finally science is beating religion.
Not by proving God doesn't exist, but by implaing that if he exists he can't 'care', because all is equal.



Nope, science has established nothing that implies God can't care.

Quote:

Why?
People usually prefer to live in a fictionnary world



By people, you mean specific people, like you? I want the truth, myself and have been walking that path for well over 40 years.  My earliest memories are gazing into the skies wondering about God. So that is probably where I should count as the beginning of my spiritual journey.

I've always hungered for knowledge and read lots of books in my grammer school library, high school library, and many in the city public library.

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artu
artu


Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
posted July 10, 2013 11:50 PM

Quote:

You have really bizarre views about religion and religious people.

Oh, lots of people still believe in miracles. Of course atheists are not open to miracles so they can't expect one.  And they'll tend to hang out with like minded people, so....

Closed mouths don't get fed and closed eyes don't see.


What bizarre view? All those things are valid examples. Sex without wedlock is a serious sin according to religion and if people who identify themselves as religious still do it, it means their behavior on the subject is no longer motivated by their faith. How is that my bizarre view? It's a very direct conclusion. How is the infallibility of the Pope MY idea when the Roman Catholic Church claims it?

And excuse me but I really don't want to explain to you why there are no miracles or how Santa Claus does not climb down the chimney.. Let me just say this, when I mean miracle, I mean miracle, not hopeless patient somehow getting better. There are still a lot we don't know about human body. However, tell a few friends or neighbors of yours that you lost your leg in a car accident, you prayed to the Lord and one morning you find your leg grew back and see how many of them will believe you. Or let me ask another thing, your daughter comes up to you, says she's pregnant and swears she had no intercourse, is there any chance you will believe her?

"Closed mouths don't get fed and closed eyes don't see" is not what it is, "if you constantly hold a hammer you start to see everything as nails" if you're eager to explain things in miraculous ways, you will do so with things that can even be explained in other ways. Just like people who believe in horoscopes explaining every behavior by your sign and giving a blue screen when you tell them you lied about your sign.

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bloodsucker
bloodsucker


Legendary Hero
posted July 10, 2013 11:56 PM
Edited by bloodsucker at 00:03, 11 Jul 2013.

I don't have senses transmitting things to me that I hope are not true.


I understand. Wait until the day you have your father lying in your hands weighting 50 pounds...

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Elodin
Elodin


Promising
Legendary Hero
Free Thinker
posted July 11, 2013 12:18 AM

Quote:
Quote:

You have really bizarre views about religion and religious people.

Oh, lots of people still believe in miracles. Of course atheists are not open to miracles so they can't expect one.  And they'll tend to hang out with like minded people, so....

Closed mouths don't get fed and closed eyes don't see.


What bizarre view? All those things are valid examples. Sex without wedlock is a serious sin according to religion and if people who identify themselves as religious still do it, it means their behavior on the subject is no longer motivated by their faith. How is that my bizarre view? It's a very direct conclusion. How is the infallibility of the Pope MY idea when the Roman Catholic Church claims it?



Yeah, SOME people who don't believe in sex outside of marriage do it anyways, and SOME Catholics don't believe in the infallibility of their pope.

You also said, "that dont put money on banks and use interest, that treat non-religous people like hell material, that actually believe a contemporary miracle when they are told one?"

I'm not sure how you concluded that putting money in the bank or drawing interest is against religion. You also made the blanket claim that religious people are supposed to treat non-religious people like hell material which is flat out false. And the surveys prove your claim that most religious people do not believe in miracles is wrong.

Quote:

And excuse me but I really don't want to explain to you why there are no miracles or how Santa Claus does not climb down the chimney..



So, you don't believe in God, therefore he does not exist. You don't believe in miracles therefore there are none. Sure....

Quote:

"Closed mouths don't get fed and closed eyes don't see" is not what it is, "if you constantly hold a hammer you start to see everything as nails" if you're eager to explain things in miraculous ways, you will do so with things that can even be explained in other ways. Just like people who believe in horoscopes explaining every behavior by your sign and giving a blue screen when you tell them you lied about your sign.


If you committed to "God does not exist and there are no miracles" your viewpoint will allow you to see none.

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Elodin
Elodin


Promising
Legendary Hero
Free Thinker
posted July 11, 2013 12:22 AM

Quote:
I don't have senses transmitting things to me that I hope are not true.


I understand. Wait until the day you have your father lying in your hands weighting 50 pounds...


My mother is in the final stages of Alzheimer. She can't feed herself, she can't walk, she can't speak. She makes sounds but they are gibberish and there is no indication she recognizes anyone. Now she spends most of her time sleeping.

I don't deny facts even when they are facts I don't like. Truth is truth. I'll take the truth ove a lie any day.

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Hobbit
Hobbit


Supreme Hero
posted July 11, 2013 12:26 AM
Edited by Hobbit at 00:38, 11 Jul 2013.

Quote:
I don't deny the material or the spiritual and experience both. Thus my perspective of and experience of the universe is more well-rounded than an atheistic world view/experience.

Is spiritual experience objective or subjective? If it's objective, then faith and religion would also be objective, therefore there should be just one religion, one God and one morality (which, by the way, isn't really a morality, but you know what I mean). It isn't like that, however, so I assume that the spiritual experience is rather subjective.

But then how can you prove that an atheistic world view is less well-rounded than yours if it's only because of some feelings that aren't even measurable? It's like saying some people have better perspective of the universe because they've bought a boat instead of an airplane, or that soldiers who have their arms chopped off have a better view on the world than people with healthy arms. We can't really compare that.

Furthermore, if this spiritual experience is subjective, how can you say that atheists have none of that (and I guess that's what you wanted to say)? After all, spiritual things are not only related to God - I knew some people who were convinced there's no God, yet somehow they weren't so sure about afterlife. The word "atheist" means "person who doesn't believe in god", not "person who doesn't believe in anything spiritual". Technically many buddhists are atheists.

Please, explain me how spiritual experience of the world could be objective or how any subjective experience could be measured as "more well-rounded".

Quote:
Yeah, SOME people who don't believe in sex outside of marriage do it anyways, and SOME Catholics don't believe in the infallibility of their pope.

In Poland these "SOME people" are actually majority - there are around 90% Poles in age 18-30 consider themselves as Catholics yet over 70% had sex outside of marriage.
____________
Horn of the
Abyss on AcidCave

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artu
artu


Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
posted July 11, 2013 12:46 AM
Edited by artu at 00:57, 11 Jul 2013.

Quote:
You also said, "that dont put money on banks and use interest, that treat non-religous people like hell material, that actually believe a contemporary miracle when they are told one?"

I'm not sure how you concluded that putting money in the bank or drawing interest is against religion. You also made the blanket claim that religious people are supposed to treat non-religious people like hell material which is flat out false. And the surveys prove your claim that most religious people do not believe in miracles is wrong.


They were examples from more than one religion, using interest (getting money without actually doing something to earn it) is a sin in Islam, but maybe I should have been clearer on that. And since this is about recent secularized behavior just compare how non-religious people were treated 1000 or even 300 years ago, (which was actually more consistent with the faith itself considering they are seen as people deserving eternal damnation).

About miracles, nice editing! You left out all the questions, ignored my elaboration and throw in a:
Quote:
So, you don't believe in God, therefore he does not exist. You don't believe in miracles therefore there are none. Sure....

and the manipulation is done. Sick people healing is not a miracle, people who don't pray sometimes beat off the odds too. When you call that a miracle it's just an expression or you are misguided. Red Sea dividing into two is a miracle, Moses turning his staff into a snake is a miracle, Virgin Birth is a miracle, Muhammed riding a winged horse to the sky is a miracle. A leg growing back is a miracle.

You also happen to always dodge the question how all religions have believers still witnessing "miracles" if only one religion can be the true faith? Let me tell you how, all those miracles are either a hoax or they are rare occasions called miracles as a figure of speech or perceived in wishful thinking.

Your deliberate logical fallacy of "So, you don't believe in God, therefore he does not exist." when it was explained to you how and why atheism is not that a hundred times is also noted. As long as you deliberately ignore such explanations you will be considered an immoral person who is trying to cheat and doing  that while preaching some so-called righteousness. This will ALWAYS be emphasized if you insist on ignoring explanations.

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bloodsucker
bloodsucker


Legendary Hero
posted July 11, 2013 01:10 AM

Not by proving God doesn't exist, but by implaing that if he exists he can't 'care', because all is equal.


I have to agree, there is no way I can assume this from 'universe as to have a propose', is just I can't even start to imagine such an introsive bigot as all theistic religions God to be the origin of all universe.

I supose someone can still have such an hy image of himself to think that his specie is better then all forms of life in all planets of the universe and he is made at God's image even if we are much more similar to a gorilla then a gorilla is to a spider.

I can't. Is just a matter of perspective.

And yet, I started my intrussion in this pages with just this simple phrase:

"There can be a day when the courage of men fails, but this is not that day. This day we fight."

You can give the world a meaning...


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bloodsucker
bloodsucker


Legendary Hero
posted July 11, 2013 01:56 AM

Quote:
Quote:
I don't have senses transmitting things to me that I hope are not true.


I understand. Wait until the day you have your father lying in your hands weighting 50 pounds...


My mother is in the final stages of Alzheimer. She can't feed herself, she can't walk, she can't speak. She makes sounds but they are gibberish and there is no indication she recognizes anyone. Now she spends most of her time sleeping.

I don't deny facts even when they are facts I don't like. Truth is truth. I'll take the truth ove a lie any day.


My mother also died with Alzheimer I know exactly what you're facing. I usually would say I know what you 'fell' but the problem is, I don't.

Or I don't understand what you mean or you didn't understood what I meant or... Well, you are made of God's Like Material.

When those things happened I didn't wanted a lye, I simply wanted that wasn't happening.


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Elodin
Elodin


Promising
Legendary Hero
Free Thinker
posted July 11, 2013 02:02 AM
Edited by Elodin at 02:04, 11 Jul 2013.

@Hobbit
Quote:
Quote:
I don't deny the material or the spiritual and experience both. Thus my perspective of and experience of the universe is more well-rounded than an atheistic world view/experience.

Is spiritual experience objective or subjective?



That depends on the experience. There is no way you can know what a person sees if he has a private vision unless you are granted to also see it.

Quote:

If it's objective, then faith and religion would also be objective, therefore there should be just one religion, one God and one morality (which, by the way, isn't really a morality, but you know what I mean). It isn't like that, however, so I assume that the spiritual experience is rather subjective.



You assume everyone is open to the truth and everyone seeks the truth with their whole heart. This is not a true assumption.  

Further if I am capable of understanding something it does not mean that someone else is also capable of grasping it. We learn line up line, precept upon precept, here a little, and there a little.  When we come to understand a truth but do not live it not only does that truth begin to slip away but other truths begin to be taken as well.

Misunderstandings can also affect our ability to understand other things. We tend to see through glasses of our own making.

And some people are deluded into false beliefs for various other reasons.

Quote:

But then how can you prove that an atheistic world view is less well-rounded than yours if it's only because of some feelings that aren't even measurable? It's like saying some people have better perspective of the universe because they've bought a boat instead of an airplane, or that soldiers who have their arms chopped off have a better view on the world than people with healthy arms. We can't really compare that.



No, it is not like that at all. If God exists and wants to have a father relationship with us and I embrace that relationship and you deny that relationship we are obviously going to have different experiences in the universe. Mine will be fuller and richer and yours will be lacking.

Quote:

Furthermore, if this spiritual experience is subjective, how can you say that atheists have none of that (and I guess that's what you wanted to say)?



I know of no atheists who claim to have encounters with God. Perhaps you can point some out.

Quote:

The word "atheist" means "person who doesn't believe in god", not "person who doesn't believe in anything spiritual".



The vast majority of atheists are materialists who deny that God exists and deny anything but the material world exists. When I say atheist that is usually the brand of atheism I am speaking of. Sometimes I remember to say "materialistic atheist" and sometimes not.
____________
Revelation

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bloodsucker
bloodsucker


Legendary Hero
posted July 11, 2013 02:27 AM

We tend to see through glasses of our own making.

Strangely, you were tring to make a point about the oposite with me.
Because that's what I said - you try to see what you want to believe in.

I was even softer then you, I was saying in extreme conditions we tend to 'see' what we believe/want to believe.

You denied me reason with some argument I'm unhable to decodify, now you say 'we tend to' do it at any moment.

Not that I desagree but you are probably to hard on our hability to recognize reality.

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artu
artu


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My BS sensor is tingling again
posted July 11, 2013 11:00 AM
Edited by artu at 11:02, 11 Jul 2013.

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Is spiritual experience objective or subjective?

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That depends on the experience. There is no way you can know what a person sees if he has a private vision unless you are granted to also see it.


If no one else can see it, it will be considered subjective. The whole essence of objectivity is that the same thing can be observed or measured by other people. You can't say it's objective even if it's only his eyes because he sees it: Our five senses, just like our mind, can be deceived. If it's not open for other people to test, the notion of objectivity don't exist to begin with.

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You assume everyone is open to the truth and everyone seeks the truth with their whole heart. This is not a true assumption.
 

What Hobbit meant was, YOU don't have the privilege to decide what shall pass as searching for the truth and what shall not. I might add, you especially don't when what you mean by truth is some local custom that is childishly anthropomorphic and assumes a 13 billion year old universe is created for a 200.000 years old specie, oops, sorry, some members of that specie who happen to be born in the last few thousand years in some regions of the world.

A few months ago there was this thread here about a man who allegedly didn't eat for 20 years dedicating himself to one of the Hindu Goddesses, nobody here, who read that article went "well, this must be obviously the truth then, this miracle obviously proves it." But I'm sure, some already Hindu guy who happens to live in the same area thinks, how can they still not see the truth! As Dawkins pointed out, we are all atheists when it comes to other people's religion, the atheist just goes one step further and apply this to the  God(s) of his own culture. What's ironic is that, this is how you seek the truth, by maintaining distance and looking at things from a perspective. When you talk of your religion with such certainty it immediately reminds me of some Muslims here who say "but how can people not want Sharia law, it's the law of the God!"

@mvass

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I'm no Christian, as everyone here knows well, but it's not a No True Scotsman argument. When someone like Elodin says "Christian", they don't mean "person who self-identifies as a Christian", they mean "someone who believes in and follows the teachings of Christ". Therefore, it's not at all fallacious to say that Christians don't murder, because if someone murders, they aren't following the teachings of Christ, and are therefore not Christian. It's only a No True Scotsman if the definition keeps changing, which is not the case here.


That's one dimensional thinking, people who believe things dont always act according to their beliefs. They lose control, they become emotional, they become desperate, they go berserk, they rationalize the situation (read Crime and Punishment by Dostoyevsky and see how Raskalnikov kills two women to do good). Christianity forbids to kill and Christians can't (not mustn't) kill are very different arguments.

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Elodin
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posted July 11, 2013 01:17 PM

Quote:

Quote:
You assume everyone is open to the truth and everyone seeks the truth with their whole heart. This is not a true assumption.
 

What Hobbit meant was, YOU don't have the privilege to decide what shall pass as searching for the truth and what shall not.  I might add, you especially don't when what you mean by truth is some local custom that is childishly anthropomorphic and assumes a 13 billion year old universe is created for a 200.000 years old specie, oops, sorry, some members of that specie who happen to be born in the last few thousand years in some regions of the world.



YOU don't have the privilege to decide what shall pass as the truth and you constantly berate, belittle, insult, and bash religion and religious people as though you were truth incarnate.

No, MY RELIGION IS NOT CHILDISH and I take offense to you calling it such.

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When you talk of your religion with such certainty it immediately reminds me of some Muslims here who say "but how can people not want Sharia law, it's the law of the God!"



You talk of my religion with great certainty and yet condemn me for saying what I believe. I have experienced God. It is impossible for you to experience "not God" or "not Jesus."

What I find so amusing is anti-theism's blind faith that there is no god and their round the clock preaching while they bash theists and bash any expression of theism. As a Christian I DO have evidence my God exists, whether it is evidence any non-theist accepts or not. Non-theists do not have, and cannot have any evidence for their faith that God does not exist.

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Quote:
I'm no Christian, as everyone here knows well, but it's not a No True Scotsman argument. When someone like Elodin says "Christian", they don't mean "person who self-identifies as a Christian", they mean "someone who believes in and follows the teachings of Christ". Therefore, it's not at all fallacious to say that Christians don't murder, because if someone murders, they aren't following the teachings of Christ, and are therefore not Christian. It's only a No True Scotsman if the definition keeps changing, which is not the case here.


That's one dimensional thinking, people who believe things dont always act according to their beliefs. They lose control, they become emotional, they become desperate, they go berserk, they rationalize the situation (read Crime and Punishment by Dostoyevsky and see how Raskalnikov kills two women to do good). Christianity forbids to kill and Christians can't (not mustn't) kill are very different arguments.


The New Testament defines who is and who is not a Christian, not you. It explicitly states that no one who murders or hates knows God, as I've quoted numerous times.  

Jesus talked a number of times about people who mouth the words, "Lord, Lord" but who do not follow his teachings and said he does not know them (has no relationship with them) and that they will be cast into hell.

Some people who make the claim to be Christian but who are not are self-deluded and actually think they are, while they continue to live a sinful life. Others willfully make the claim falsely for nefarious purposes. False brethren/prophets who seek to prey on the sheep.

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Mat 7:21  Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.
Mat 7:22  Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?
Mat 7:23  And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.


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artu
artu


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My BS sensor is tingling again
posted July 11, 2013 01:57 PM

Quote:
YOU don't have the privilege to decide what shall pass as the truth and you constantly berate, belittle, insult, and bash religion and religious people as though you were truth incarnate.

No, MY RELIGION IS NOT CHILDISH and I take offense to you calling it such.


First things first, by now you should be at least guessing that my intention is not to offend, however religious people and non-religious people have a very different standard of what counts as offensive. If in such a huge universe and such great length of time, a belief is based on a God who puts some humans above everything else and spends his time watching things such as if they had sex out of wedlock or not, that level of anthropomorphical egocentric behavior  can only be described with the word CHILDISH to me. I'm sorry, it's not deep, it's not sophisticated, it's actually quite primitive. Religious people, especially if they spent their life over the religion, may find that perspective very disturbing. Yet, there is no other way to explain it especially if someone puts on a and lectures us on how that belief is obviously the truth, and how we can't see because as Jesus said some people are just blind to the truth.

And I am not truth incarnate, nobody knows the absolute truth but we may know what the truth is NOT. I know such a primitive concept is NOT the truth, that it's so far from it with 99.9999999 percent certainty.

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As a Christian I DO have evidence my God exists, whether it is evidence any non-theist accepts or not. Non-theists do not have, and cannot have any evidence for their faith that God does not exist.


No you don't. It's that simple. If you did your faith would be common knowledge, if not scientific knowledge. You are just unaware of the meaning of the word evidence. Not to mention it is impossible to have evidence of something's non-existence unless you are omnipresent and omniscient. Burden of proof is upon existence of things (yet another simple rule you keep dodging daily in the OSM).

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The New Testament defines who is and who is not a Christian, not you. It explicitly states that no one who murders or hates knows God, as I've quoted numerous times


You again miss the point. Murdering is not necessarily a characteristic, it's sometimes an unexpected situation. People who read and understand the New Testament may not be able to practice that belief in every single situation. People are not perfect. You yourself may go berserk some day, let's say a serial killer butchered your family, you after some time (so it's not self-defense) caught him personally, lost control and killed him in anger. Does that mean you never understood the NT to begin with?



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