Your religious views

[jeffro1080]

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Your attitude is condescending, hostile and entirely uncalled for.

Shame on you.

not sure if serious....

 

[AceXIII]

I always wonder why people say "I don't mean to offend, but...", then proceed to offend. 🙄

Because there are points I wanted to make and I'm aware some people might be sensitive to the subject. I didn't choose to include those points in an active effort to offend anyone, but rather for the sake of argument. My opinions are my own and there are a number of people who I'm sure will agree, but likely a greater number of people who won't. All I would like is to have my thoughts taken into consideration but by no means allow them influence you negatively.

 

[bookfreak89]

Because there are points I wanted to make and I'm aware some people might be sensitive to the subject. I didn't choose to include those points in an active effort to offend anyone, but rather for the sake of argument. My opinions are my own and there are a number of people who I'm sure will agree, but likely a greater number of people who won't. All I would like is to have my thoughts taken into consideration but by no means allow them influence you negatively.

My point is that there will be people who will be offended regardless of any efforts to lessen the damage. My point wasn't really the material of the post, more the "don't want to offend, but.." business. Trivial matters, really.

 

[UbuntuGM]

Whoa. Everybody calm down and listen to the song Chicago by Sufjan Stevens. Granted he is Christian, but the song is not meant to bias. "All things go. All things grow."

 

[VikingLegacy]

baleeted

 

[gettheleadout]

Nah, atheism means literally "without theism." Anyone who is not a theist, meaning a person who actively believes in a god, is an atheist. Most people who call themselves "agnostic" are actually agnostic atheists. (A)theism is a belief claim while (a)gnosticism is a knowledge claim. If you call yourself an agnostic, you're claiming that you don't know for certain whether or not there is a god, but you aren't saying what you believe.

For example, an agnostic atheist does not hold a belief in a god and does not claim to know for sure whether a god exists or not, while an agnostic theist is a person who believes in god but does not claim to know for sure that one exists.

I won't claim to speak for him, but I'd imagine Dawkins would call himself an agnostic atheist.

I feel like this categorization makes things clearer:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_and_positive_atheism

Dawkins would be a weak, explicit atheist, sound right?

 

[RadioCure]

I feel like this categorization makes things clearer:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_and_positive_atheism

Dawkins would be a weak, explicit atheist, sound right?

Yea that's probably a little more accurate because it describes his consideration of theism and subsequent rejection of it, though he still falls under "agnostic atheist" if we limit ourselves to those terms.

I generally hate the semantic debates regarding these labels, but it matters when people start saying "atheists are ridiculous; it's much smarter to be agnostic."

 

[RadioCure]

....

read my original post carefully and figure why it doesn't make sense for you to do a google search and attempt to teach me the etymology of agnosticism.

Which post was your original? I was just responding to your question of whether someone's claim that they are not 100% sure makes them "an agnostic." Sorry if that was a response to something else and I missed what you were actually saying.

 

[Rollo]

Sure, but then it's fair to have "faith" in anything. The only difference in faith in today's god versus faith in any other superstition is popularity. The idea of god was such a pleasant meme at the time of it's concoction - it was able to so well fill in a number of gaps in human knowledge and provide comforting answers to some otherwise disturbing questions (death, etc.). Not that these types of beliefs weren't already around in different forms, such as smaller tribal/regional belief systems, but what the more modern idea of god is able to do is to appeal to the masses - people from different backgrounds all across the planet. Just because it's more popular than other beliefs does not lend to it's credibility since, like you said, faith is abstract.

In any case, we were never talking about proving faith, we were talking about proof in god, something that many people claim actually exists and has physically interacted with this world. In that, there is no proof, no evidence, not even a hint of truth outside of human writing, stories, and faith.

Religion is the only instance I can think of where proof is put forward as faith, and it is the only case that can get away with it. I doubt there are many, if any at all really, people who put faith forward as their argument against god. They present facts that have been uncovered over time through science, history, and experience. Thinking along those lines, we honestly may never be able to disprove every single iteration of god. What we can do, and have done, is disprove a decent portion of the history presented in religious texts, which in turn has done some damage to their credibility. At some point, a person with even the highest faith, and even a hint of reason, would have to begin to question what was actually going on. It seems to me that what it means to have faith today is to ignore the reality that progression has pointed us towards, to be blind to the beauty and elegance of the world as it truly formed, and to commit a substantial amount of time and effort maintaining these dated convictions by making excuses for the gaps in science.

I don't mean to offend any one here as I'm sure you are all intelligent and have your own reasons for believing the way you do, but I strongly feel there are better ways to bring meaning and comfort to our lives. I guess my true gripes are with organized religion. In a perfect world, I think everyone should be raised educated on all theological matters and have the freedom to choose to believe in whatever suits them. Sadly, this is not what happens.

I'll leave you with this quote, again, not to offend, but I think it hits upon the idea that religion, especially today, is largely a human social phenomenon. Because if it were not so popular, well...

"When one person suffers from a delusion it is called insanity. When many people suffer from a delusion it is called religion."

Don't worry, you don't offend me. You can speak your mind all you want. After all, you sound like a very bright young man. You're exploring your beliefs and the world around you and people within it. That is wonderful!