The Rise of Irrelevance: Religion vs. Implicit Morality

[Agnos]

So you weren't being sarcastic. You lied. Is that sin?

[shield772]

Quote by: Agnos So you weren't being sarcastic. You lied. Is that sin?

well yes it is, but I didn't lie, I believe you have misunderstood me.

[Agnos]

Oh, like I am not going to respond? I see. And how does one respond to blind faith and the threat of an eternity of torment?

[shield772]

I am not thretening anyone with anything I want to make that perfectly clear, I am not the one condeming you to eternal torment, you are by rejecting God. It's all on you and that saddens me, I (and the voices in my head) like the majority of the people here.

[Agnos]

What motivates you to accept God?

[shield772]

I see his wonders, I feel the presence of the Holy Spirit in me, and he talks to me, I know he exists, just as I know you exist.

[Lullaby Chainer]

Quote by: shield772 I see his wonders, I feel the presence of the Holy Spirit in me, and he talks to me, I know he exists, just as I know you exist.

Not to derail this topic but..

Is it really my fault that I can't find this elusive god of yours? I'm threatened to go to the hell of other religions too. There is so much conflict and differing religions, all telling me I'm going to suffer for eternity if I don't believe in their god in favor of another.

For years, I prayed with an open heart every night. Trying to feel anything at all. Any sign, or inspiration. He gave me nothing. To me, believing in God would be a cold lie. I cannot change that, and I have tried. I have gone to church, and I have listened closely to my heart, my prayers, and arguments of others. Nothing.

If God wants me to suffer for all of eternity for this horrible crime of mine, then so be it.

[Fonceai]

SOME people who choose to believe in God aren't doing it as an excuse, or do to ignorance, or to fill the gaps, or to hide.

They are fully capable and intelligent people who have faith in both science and God.

I'm sorry, but it always irks me to read these sweeping generalizations about people who believe in God when, as someone who believes that some kind of God exists, I am hardly the type of person some of you have described.

As long as you keep thinking that ALL people that believe in God have the same traits, you will be missing out on the larger point.

Instead of generalizing all people who believe in God, evaluate each of them as you see fit, but do so on an individual basis.

The second someone assigns relevance to anything, it shows that it exists for them.

The second someone says something is irrelevant, it shows that it exists for them.

When someone is indifferent about something, that is the truest form of non-existence.

[Agnos]

Quote by: shield772 I see his wonders, I feel the presence of the Holy Spirit in me, and he talks to me, I know he exists, just as I know you exist.

You don't know God exists just as you know I exist. That's a completely different 'know', and you know it. You know I exist on the basis that I interact with you in the real world, while on the other hand, you know God exists completely on the basis of faith, and faith alone.

And what motivates you to accept God couldn't possibly be that you do not want to go to hell, could it? No, ofcourse not.

Quote by: Fonceai The second someone assigns relevance to anything, it shows that it exists for them. The second someone says something is irrelevant, it shows that it exists for them. When someone is indifferent about something, that is the truest form of non-existence.

That is why I was very careful to say "The notion/concept of God." And I still stand by that. The notion of God definetly exists for me, and I assume for most everyone else as well, and I still contend that that notion is irrelevant. Furthermore, your use of the word indifferent is no more effective in saying that something does not exist as the word irrelevance is. To say someone is indifferent is simply to say that person does not care either way. Moreover, I never once suggested that God does not exist. An agnostic doesn't do that. In fact, I never suggested that anything doesn't exist.

I must believe that the first portion of your post is in response to CoffeeSaint's earlier post.

[Fonceai]

Yes, it was Agnos.

The concept about relevance is that when someone cares, it's relevant.

Otherwise, if they just don't care either way, that's the only real form of a person deeming it irrelevant. If it were relevant, they would care one way or the other.

[Agnos]

You haven't convinced me. Expand upon it a bit more, if you would. Perhaps an excerpt from whatever dictionary you are referring to might be in order.

[Fonceai]

It's not so much a dictionary as it is deduction.

You can easily demonstrate this mathematically.

The variable R is the amount of relevance you assign to something.

Relevance is an absolute value quantity. It's lowest value is 0. For our purposes, it ranges from 0 <= R <= 1.

At R=1 you consider it completely relevant.
At R=0 you consider it completely irrelevant.

If you don't bother giving something any relevance at all, if you are indifferent, then R does not have a value.

In programming terms, this is called declaring a variable. If you declare R as an integer, you are saying that R exists and that it has a value of some kind. But you've given it existence.

If you never declare R, then it does not exist.

That's indifference. Not assigning any value at all.

---

Ironically, you are doing it right now by reading this perspective on the concept.

If you think it's complete bullshit and irrelevant, you are still acknowledging its existence. You are just deciding it's relevance.

Same as if you agree completely.

If you read it and don't give an eff what I'm saying, if you don't acknowledge it at all because you just don't care, that is the only true way of denying it's existence.

(Of course, that's silly. Because I have presented it then it must exist, even if in my head.)

[Agnos]

Heh. You're a funny guy.

[Fonceai]

Why's that?

My Sociology and Psychology professors were big on the mathematical approach to concepts, and I happened to really like it.

But does it make any kind of sense? Or am I just funny and you're not really going to respond?

[Agnos]

Just funny.

[shield772]

God does interact with me in the real world, just like I interact with you, I do not see you, I have not met you, there are many things about your existence that are a mystery to me. But I have faith that you exist.

[Agnos]

I won't insist on pointing out how ridiculously absurd your comments are, but I will say the following. You failed to mention how God interacts with you. How does God interact with you? Does he talk to you? Does he respond to your posts on an internet forum?

[shield772]

He speaks to me mostly in dreams, when my mind and soul are most open to him. Sometimes though there isn't time for that so I hear his voice giving me warnings.

[Agnos]

And how are you able to distinguish God from your own mind?

[samsara15]

The question should not be why anyone is an atheist. The question should be why someone can believe in a deity, with so little evidence, based on some old books which are filled with myths and distorted history.