Hands up if you are an atheist - Page 3

Right

U know, lately I have also turned away from religion. I mean, it is just meant to help u get through life, not life it self.

God has got nothing to do with religion. Don't judge the existence of God on the basis of relgion or views of any people, discover for urself.
I am slowly realizing through meditation that there is no God, as everything is God.

well agnostic means you dont believe god can be defined. agnostics are against organized religion athiests just straight believe there is no god . *raises hand*

How can you say there is no God if you don't know what God is?

I havent met a single believer who could give a definition of God which didn't involve vague wishy-washy crap.

In my more pessimist moments I think they have no f*cking clue what they believe.

They don't have a clue, all they know is for their belief to be valid, they have to believe, not that they even have to know what they believe in, just generalize peace and happiness as a belief then hold it dear when you march to war, it doesn't make sense, that's why its blind faith.

Hey leftwood,

I just wanted to be straightforward and say, this is just ridiculous:

quote:

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I'm agnostic, to claim to know something does or doesn't exist tends to equal ignorance of ingnorance which often leads to arrogance or complacency, where as agnostics know they are ignorant, or that they cannot yet know, in case ignorance is too harsh a term for your liking.

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Here's the definition for agnostic:

"One who professes ignorance, or denies that we have any knowledge."

So, how can you know that you cannot know? How can you know something and yet claim to be ignorant of everything?

In actuality as well, I can't say I'm an agnostic but that it is what most closely resembles what I consistently think and feel.

Any information I place a statement of possible knowledge is generally either an assumption (with full awareness that I could be wrong, because I really can't know) a referencing to someones claim or something of that nature.

I simply come from a very basic frame of mind that cringes whenever anyone says the "know" something, even myself. Because instantly I think, well, from where did you obtain this knowledge, what legitamacy is there to the source and the information, how much is just influenced and assumed hearsay etc etc. Because whenever I've bothered to ask those questions we usually come to find they don't know either, some accept this, and some feel they need to believe they know things.

When it comes to how stupid and contradictory it sounds when someone says they know they don't know, well, its frustrating for me too, this kind of uncertainty in life can be stifling and such contradiction infuriating. The paradox as decius mentioned is what that phrase is, and it simply states what he said, basicalling saying that as far as I know I don't know everything, and with my understandings thus far, I may actually even know anything, but I really don't know.

I only "know" of the most consistent realities presented to me, before, after, and during all direct and inderect influence by all factors in and or out of existance, and all of this as percieved by me, whatever me is.

yes, the moment you think you have it all figured out is the moment in which you are furthest from the truth. (and would be blind to it as well, even if it plucked out your "open" eyes.)

A shitty situation when you are on the toilet and truth is toilet paper.

lmao that's a "lefty" scenario?

Yes, so called 'religious' people don't know what the shit their talkin about when they say we beleive in God. What really irritates me is that they try to impose their views on everyone.
I also find it funny that people give God a 'human like' appearance, someone who feels, judges, punishes rewards... which is bull.
To put it simply, God is an experiance, period.

btw, everyone who hasn't experianced God is ignostic(don't take the term literally). You can't be an athiest, because as I said, you can't say there is no God if you don't know what God is.

For those of you who feel you have "experienced" god, was he gentle?

Sorry, what I meant to say was, take a religious reutrality pill for a sec and think back to your experience. Then, think of the word euphoria, and any type of experiences you've had that warrant the term, be they natural or drug induced states. Then compare, don't expect them to be exactly the same, especially when comparing a drug related situation to a natural one.

If you didn't notice any similarities I'm curious to hear your stories of god experiences, otherwise, you probably need to get a grip on the most consitently presented form of reality at hand, and realize your "special" experience is nothing more than a chemical release in the brain. Most likely from an environment that is capable of producing a sense of euphoria but is no more special than any other extreme rush of pleasure.

You see, church and worship are obsessive and superstitious practices that can have physical effects. They are a common form of release. A place of gathering like minds to comfort and reinforce eachother's "beliefs" as realities, and that alone is pleasurable. Feelings of safety and security, during a moment when the outside world either doesn't matter or can possibly take on a possitive light from a place of support, or cast into a darkness that you feel sheltered from. Include this with any music and or chanting, possibly some strong speakers speaking of firm beliefs in good and righteouness, and you have yourself a glorified cult gathering. But one that can produce euphoric experiences, then when you associate that feeling with an interaction with god, then it simply hightens. So because people feel good about something, they believe in it. This is not a reasonable or rational thing to do. Drugs make people FEEL good too, but they don't quite the same possitive response as religion, even though drugs as actually probably a more practiced means of obtaining euphoria.

this post of yours has rather funny timing leftwood.

just last night i had a very elaborate discussion with a friend of mine about god and how people experience it. he got in to something that i really like. i am not sure if this type of theory has ever been produced anywhere but it probably has.

basically, there are three instances or types of scenarios where people actually feel the presence of god (we'll just say a "higher being" so as not to scare away the skeptics).

it is not the actual event that triggers this "higher being" feeling, but rather the three emotions that are produced. they are as follows:

1. Terror
2. Pain
3. Happiness

think about these three feelings. then ask yourself, have you ever felt an extreme (and i mean very extreme) form of any of these three emotions? if so, you have probably felt as if some sort of entity was "watching over" you at the time.

it is very hard to explain my personal experience with death. but after having this discussion with my friend something dawned on me. after i flatlined and saw my body laying on the operating table i jolted upward faster than you can even imagine and then... stillness. next came tunnel vision, which coincided with a previously indescribable feeling. but after this conversation and much thought i realized that the feeling i had was a combination of extreme Terror, Pain and Happiness.

i saw the end of this tunnel for less than in instant and then had the notion that it simply was not my time to go to this "place" i was heading toward. i jolted backward and down much MUCH faster than when i had been jolted upward. then i woke up in my hospital bedroom three days later.

you can still say its chemicals, but im confident that if anyone felt what i felt they would never under any circumstance (no matter how much of a skeptic before) doubt that it was something on a higher plane of exsistence.