• You are currently viewing our forum as a guest, which gives you limited access to view most discussions and access our other features. By joining our free community, you will have access to additional post topics, communicate privately with other members (PM), view blogs, respond to polls, upload content, and access many other special features. Registration is fast, simple and absolutely free, so please join our community today! Just click here to register. You should turn your Ad Blocker off for this site or certain features may not work properly. If you have any problems with the registration process or your account login, please contact us by clicking here.

Does The Thought of God Not Existing Terrify You?

serenesam

Permabanned
Joined
May 19, 2013
Messages
454
MBTI Type
INTJ
I'll start with myself. Yes it does. As a human being part of the human species, I can tell what human beings may be capable of and as knowledge and intellect increases, there is this potentiality of humans ending up destroying or decimating themselves along with other lifeforms on this planet. As Michel de Montaigne once said “I have never seen a greater monster or miracle in the world than myself.”

Now going into crazy territory of life after death and the assumption that a soul exists, I think even such an afterlife can be quite "not as heavenly as one might have assumed when one was alive in the physical corporeal form." Who knows what the political system is on The Other Side or the Afterlife whether it be communism, socialism, libertarianism, anarchism, dictatorship, monarchy, capitalism, anarchosynicalism, anarchocapitalism, fiscal conservatism, some kind of tyrannical or non-tyrannical system, etc. It could very well be heaven or hell or consists of some degree of both the good and the bad.
 

prplchknz

Well-known member
Joined
Jun 11, 2007
Messages
34,397
MBTI Type
yupp
no I mean what does it matter if god exists or not? in the large scheme of things we've made progress regardless. sure will probably end up fucking ourselves in the ass, but that doesn't disprove the existance of god nor the existance of god
 

Totenkindly

@.~*virinaĉo*~.@
Joined
Apr 19, 2007
Messages
50,187
MBTI Type
BELF
Enneagram
594
Instinctual Variant
sx/sp
No, it doesn't scare me, but that's because I already don't assume that God exists.

So I'm not sure why the afterlife matters in lieu of that. Either there is no afterlife, or the afterlife wouldn't be any different than the current way of things and I'd just adapt to it like I have adapted to this life. I suppose one could be feel at a disadvantage with no "eternal justice" to reward good behavior or promise that "God" would right wrongs and even scores, but... that's not a lot different than now.
 

zago

New member
Joined
Jun 25, 2008
Messages
1,162
MBTI Type
INTP
Yes, that thought does disturb me at least. If you ask me, this place needs a god. I'm not one of those atheists who is glad to be an atheist and wouldn't have it any other way. I wish there were a god. I wish there were justice. Things aren't right in this world. I want god like I want the police department, like I want great doctors, like I want anyone who helps make the world a safer and happier place. Because I believe in a world that is BETTER. Some people don't think life could be interesting or worthwhile if everything were good and perfect. I beg to differ. Life becomes more meaningful, more interesting when there are fewer problems. If a better world doesn't motivate you, what does? Why live at all? This is all coming to a point and that point is the end of death, disease and suffering. It's funny, the very same people who rally behind those pink cancer awareness ribbons have probably never even asked themselves what a cure for cancer, and all disease, would mean. We are striving to defeat death. And yet, something tells me that many of those same people would, once they actually thought about it, have a problem with that simply because they have never even imagined a world without death--thinking it was inevitable, they accepted it and began to rationalize it, attempting to see it in a positive light.

I ramble. Point is, since God doesn't exist, we have to do this work ourselves. It means what we do MATTERS. There is a RIGHT AND WRONG. We are responsible for ourselves, and there are some terrible things we could be capable of. So yes, the thought of a godless universe HORRIFIES me, and that is why I find everything so important. There's no one looking out for us. We have been through some dark fucking times. We've burned people, butchered them, starved them by the million, riddled them with poisons and bullets, incinerated them... We have to believe that we will rise above our past, we have to believe that we will rise above our Darwinian programming, otherwise we might as well not live. BELIEVE IN SOMETHING. I wouldn't say that if I didn't think a bunch of people on this forum need to hear it. And make sure that something is REAL.

We enjoy these freedoms and luxuries today because people saw the dark place this Earth has been and they decided they'd rather fight and risk death than continue to live in it unchanged. I saw Braveheart on TV last night, a good example of this. That guy didn't give a fuck to live no life where he was dominated by a bunch of psychopaths. And he didn't. Other heroes don't either. Martin Luther King. Nelson Mandela. Etc. The list goes on, and these are the people we have to thank. These people believed in a better world. It's not subjective, no more than medicinal health is subjective. Wake up.
 

Alea_iacta_est

New member
Joined
Dec 3, 2013
Messages
1,834
I'm not afraid of the thought that God doesn't exist, but I am afraid of the thought that there is nothing after death but the dark abyss that is non-existence. I don't want to perish from this place, I like it.
 
W

WhoCares

Guest
Doesnt frighten me a all. I'd rather this place was existential chaos than some form of training school where we have to prove ourselves and our worthiness. It goes without saying that based on present performance I would fail miserably. Better to just be heading toward an abyss than be judged.
 

Such Irony

Honor Thy Inferior
Joined
Jul 23, 2010
Messages
5,059
MBTI Type
INtp
Enneagram
5w6
Instinctual Variant
sp/so
I'm not afraid of the thought that God doesn't exist, but I am afraid of the thought that there is nothing after death but the dark abyss that is non-existence. I don't want to perish from this place, I like it.

My thoughts exactly.
 

Mole

Permabanned
Joined
Mar 20, 2008
Messages
20,284
The Death of God

Really, really, really!

God is dead, the book is dead, the author is dead, privacy is dead, the individual is dead, even newspapers are dying.

What does this tell us?

Everywhere we look, we see death, yet everywhere around us the world has never been more alive.

We can have a marvellous forensic autopsie of the body of God, to find what killed God. Who killed God, would be a marvellous name for a thriller.

The prime suspect, indeed, the prime scapegoat, is Charles Darwin.

But he is innocent, my Lord, it wasn't Charles who killed God, rather God was dragged down and throttled by the death of print.
 

OrangeAppled

Sugar Hiccup
Joined
Mar 20, 2009
Messages
7,626
MBTI Type
INFP
Enneagram
4w5
Instinctual Variant
sp/sx
No, it doesn't frighten me, and I do believe in God, and that he is a personal god also (as in, not an abstract force). Some ideas of different gods frighten me. The kind who demand BLOOD or who have to be appeased, etc. I don't believe in hellfire either nor an afterlife in the manner most do. I find NOT believing in hellfire very comforting. But I don't believe this is "all there is". I think that thought might be scary, as life is so short. And I have certainly made decisions and spent time on things directly related to my beliefs, which then brings up the question: would I have done differently and would I be happier for it? But when I ponder that, I do not believe I'd be happier. I think I'd just be unhappy about different things. I suspect I'd be searching for meaning in areas not as satisfying to me.
 

RaptorWizard

Permabanned
Joined
Mar 19, 2012
Messages
5,895
MBTI Type
INTJ
Enneagram
5w6
Instinctual Variant
sx/so
No, because he needs to be replaced anyway.

It's like he puts us into a box and dangles down some strings in an elaborate web where we can only pick between choices A-B-C and such.

Somehow we need to find out how to blast the top off, and then grab choices outside the system.
 

OrangeAppled

Sugar Hiccup
Joined
Mar 20, 2009
Messages
7,626
MBTI Type
INFP
Enneagram
4w5
Instinctual Variant
sp/sx
So you have a personal belief in God, a kind of cafeteria belief, where you choose what to believe and what not to believe - kind of safe petit bourgeois God, a God that sells.

Nope, that's not it. Nice of you to condescendingly tell me what I believe with very little info from ME about it.
 

Alea_iacta_est

New member
Joined
Dec 3, 2013
Messages
1,834
So you have a personal belief in God, a kind of cafeteria belief, where you choose what to believe and what not to believe - kind of safe petit bourgeois God, a God that sells.

Isn't Spirituality a cafeteria in of itself though? You have the people that pick only their favorite items, the people that pick the items that others have convinced them are good, and the people that pick the items that their parents/role-models/friends pick.
 

Mole

Permabanned
Joined
Mar 20, 2008
Messages
20,284
Isn't Spirituality a cafeteria in of itself though? You have the people that pick only their favorite items, the people that pick the items that others have convinced them are good, and the people that pick the items that their parents/role-models/friends pick.

Actually religion is revealed by God.

Religion is not for us to pick and choose.

For instance, God revealed the Ten Commandments on Mount Sinai, and it would be blasphemous to choose which commandments we were to obey.

The Christians have the Apostles' Creed, an expression of faith, so it would also be blasphemnous to pick and choose which parts of the Creed to believe.

Muslims believe the Koran is the literal words of Allah. And to pick and choose which words are Allah's is blasphemy.

So we take Revelation as revealed truth or we reject all of it.

Religion is not like a supermarket or a smörgåsbord.
 
Top