Why do/don't you believe in God?

Really? I play RPG's when I'm bored.



On a serious note though, I don't mind discussions. It just that these kinds of discussions (where one new page of essay posts was added between every visit of the site) tend to take a few ages to get through. Last time I had to stop visiting the site just so I could have my life back, and I wasn't even participating in the discussions back then!

Anyway, move along pepole, nothing to see here.

Übereil

That's like asking me why I don't believe my bedroom is filled with elusive invisible naked slavegirls. No matter how nice it would be to believe in them, they're just not there.

Yeesh said:

That's like asking me why I don't believe my bedroom is filled with elusive invisible naked slavegirls. No matter how nice it would be to believe in them, they're just not there.

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That particular point of view has undoubtedly been expressed many times and many ways throughout human history. For instance, some folks surely said something exactly like that about the possible existance of undiscovered continents, atoms and germs.

Then there are folks who, though willing to concede that having happened in the past, draw the line there. Their confidence in what is generally considered scientific fact today seems to convince them that those kinds of mistakes are no longer possible, somehow.

Myself, I assume there's plenty yet to be discovered. Call me crazy, but that seems smart to me.

Pladio said:

Rithrandil describes his belief system in a similar fashion. For him, something that is tangible, can be proven, can be seen, can be touched is much more probably than something that doesn't have any of the above-mentioned characteristics.
As such, believing in the basis of science which has given him most of his luxuries and his knowledge is also more probable than believing in something as intangible as a super-being.

In this sense, Rithrandil describes that he deems it much less probable for a God or Gods to exist and thus does not believe in any at the moment. If the moment came where something could be proven about a super-being, he would then re-evaluate his position.

And that's how I understand Rith is thinking.

If I'm wrong in any way, for any of you, tell me. Then maybe I'll get it

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Yes. You put it better than I did. If something came along that showed evidence of their being a god/gods/whatever I would re-evaluate. I'm an atheist based on current evidence. But since that evidence is lacking I believe there is no god. I readily admit that human understand is imperfect and minuscule compared to the wonders of the universe, but I believe the scientific method has proven itself to be the best way to view the universe, etc etc etc.

Squeek said:

That particular point of view has undoubtedly been expressed many times and many ways throughout human history. For instance, some folks surely said something exactly like that about the possible existance of undiscovered continents, atoms and germs.

Then there are the folks who are willing to concede that happening in the past but draw the line there, confident in what is generally considered scientific fact today.

Myself, I assume there's plenty yet to be discovered. Call me crazy, but that seems smart to me.

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And I think a scientist would completely agree with you. But the thing is - based on the evidence those people had at the time, their assumptions were perfectly valid. Incorrect, as it turns out, but valid. Science has the awesome ability to prove itself wrong and question what comes before.

Rithrandil said:

But the thing is - based on the evidence those people had at the time, their assumptions were perfectly valid. Incorrect, as it turns out, but valid.

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Valid and wrong by a mile. Isn't science wonderful?

Squeek said:

Valid and wrong by a mile. Isn't science wonderful?

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Yes, actually, because it self-corrects and updates itself to incorporate new knowledge. Religion does not do this, as a comparison.

Well, you can go ahead and defend religion too, if you want. I'm just getting a good laugh at the expense of science at the moment.

Well, I guess 1/2 is good odds for me

Occam's razor concerns a similar problem: for any two valid explanations, the simpler one is generally preferable. If a tree lies on the street, it is more sensible to assume that it was felled by a storm than that it was ripped out by an elusive forest dwelling cyclops who placed it there for grins and giggles.

Applied to science and religion, God can be described by lots of variables, most of which are completely unknown, and there are no experiments to constrain them. A complete description of reality based on the concept of God would be complicated indeed. Science does not have these problems, it clearly provides the simpler, more elegant explanations.

For different theories in science, the more elegant one is usually preferred, but as soon as there is data invalidating any theory, it is either adjusted or thrown out of the window altogether. If a simple theory has to be exchanged for a more complicated one, though, usually it turns out that the simple one is still a good approximation of reality.

Now any good scientist knows that it is impossible to arrive at absolute truth by observing nature, and there is always a chance that contradicting data comes along, but if you know that a theory stands on solid ground and is not invalidated by a single observation, it makes perfect sense to use this theory, even if it is only an approximation of reality. It is logical to assume that a theory is correct in order to solve a problem or make a prediction, even though you keep an open mind.

Just to give an example, even today scientists are working on experiments to discern whether gravitational mass (that pulls massive objects together) and inertial mass (that resists acceleration of massive objects) are really equal. This is necessary work, and if they are not equal, Einstein's theory of general relativity would be invalidated. But this theory made lots of predictions and is beautifully confirmed by many different experiments. It is applied in astronomy as well as satellite navigation, and there would be little point in having engineers and scientists run around in circles explaiming that they really know nothing at all with complete certainty. For practical purposes, scientific theories are assumed to be true.

I guess when someone says that he is agnostic in theory but atheist in practice, it is very similar, and makes perfect sense to me.

I am a Buddhist. As such the belief in a traditional God, the unmoved mover, the all powerful being, is antithetical to the Buddhist view of the cosmos. This is due to some of the tenants of Buddhism such as the law of causation. Which in it's most elemental interpretation simply means that all things that come into existence must have a cause. Since the traditional God can have no cause, he has always existed, he cannot actually exist. Also anything that comes into existence will one day cease to exist, so here again the traditional God cannot be, since he, by definition, cannot cease to exist.

Howsoever all beings, according to Buddha, possess Buddha nature, but this is not God as most would describe him. The fact that all beings possess this nature though does not mean that they are aware of it, in fact, also according to Buddha, all beings are deluded. Suffering from this delusion we wander along unfruitful paths, and even the most enlightened amongst us labor under false beliefs. The beliefs of an ego, a person, a being, and a life. As such we commit various evils in our delusion and the veil that hides our original nature, buddha nature, becomes darker and thicker all the while concealing the truth even more.

That is a fairly basic understanding but I was just trying to get across the central points of Buddhist philosophy.

Religion is needed for control people, i dont belive in god, there is not god, is just a invention of the humanity for control.

The people need to belive in something, so they can explain what the science cant explain and for not feel alone.
________
Glass Bubblers

Ubereil said:

This guy says it funnier than I ever could. The important bit:



Apart from the "really tried" part this is pretty much my view on the Christian (and Muslim and the Judaic) God. For the really tried part it was rather me somewhat interestingly wondering if there was one. Never got a hint that there was, so I figured there wasn't.

Übereil

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The only problem is that George Carlin is (rather was LOL) incredibly unfunny. Bill Hicks is funnier and even he wasn't that great. Actually, come to think of it stand up comedians in general aren't that funny. Basically, they stand there pretending they're clever. ever notice how the audience always seems to be sweating? It's because they're so nervous they can't help but laugh at the lame jokes "HAHA the guy said that the lady had the turn signal on for a long time while driving. OMG I CAN RELATE!" No. And when they talk politics, I mean really, like anyone is going to decide important life decisions on a 5 minute comedy routine. Actually, they do which is probably sad.

LOL FIRE

I wonder if you watched the video.

Übereil

I guess I am one of the theoretical agnostics/practical atheists due to "absence of positive observations". I've admittedly not looked very hard though

coyote said:

For different theories in science, the more elegant one is usually preferred, but as soon as there is data invalidating any theory, it is either adjusted or thrown out of the window altogether. If a simple theory has to be exchanged for a more complicated one, though, usually it turns out that the simple one is still a good approximation of reality.

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Yep, the invalidated theories often hold for special cases, and that the more accurate models become available as we are able to make better measurements. Newtonian mechanics are for instance perfectly usable for the scale of many everyday problems, even if the model breaks down at extreme scales. Heck, even the flat earth theory is approximately correct if you consider a small enough area Discarding a theory might not be such a big qualitative step as it sounds...

Turok said:

The people need to belive in something, so they can explain what the science cant explain and for not feel alone.

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Religion has always been there before science entered the picture. Science is really something orthogonal of religion and there must be a distinction between taking something on faith vs tangible fact-based reasoning.