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Religious\Spiritual Beliefs

Your belief?

  • Christianity

    Votes: 21 36.8%
  • Judaism

    Votes: 2 3.5%
  • Islam

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Buddhism

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Hinduism

    Votes: 1 1.8%
  • Agnosticism

    Votes: 12 21.1%
  • Atheism

    Votes: 13 22.8%
  • Unitarian-Universalism

    Votes: 3 5.3%
  • Paganism\Wiccanism

    Votes: 1 1.8%
  • Shamanism

    Votes: 1 1.8%
  • Satanism

    Votes: 3 5.3%

  • Total voters
    57

Qre:us

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Heh. That's a new take on it. I've never heard that response. Care to expand?

I ask because, answering this always makes me feel vulnerable. So, to get a response that is the antithesis of what I felt while putting it out there, intrigues me.



What if God is this super smart clockmaker who built everything and just sort of lets it run, occasionally tinkering/fixing stuff. But you never get to see him when you die, you just exist and then die and that's it. But maybe when you die, he like absorbs your consciousness (maybe you were just borrowing a piece of his consciousness and when you die he gets it back) and by absorbing everything you saw/thought/experienced he gains a richer appreciation/knowledge of the subtleties of his creation? We're like cosmic reporters for this big, cigar chomping editor in the sky. :D Does that count as a promise of immortality?

I've heard variations of this. Sub in consciousness for soul. Then, your soul still lives on. Your life, your experiences live on, even after you die. As if, otherwise, living, is worthless, unless it can be preserved beyond one's death.

You see, we all do have the potential to live on. Not through god, or anything beyond, but through us, each other.

If I lead an examined life, looking at how I make an impact, how I create the ripple effects, doing what I believe in/things that ring true for me, I can aim to direct myself in a way, where, how I live on, were the best parts of me. Through those impacted by the ripples of me.

I firmly believe that we have to answer to ourselves and each other. Nothing beyond.
 

Forever_Jung

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Heh. That's a new take on it. I've never heard that response. Care to expand?

I don't care to expand too much, it just sounds like a gutsy way to approach life. It smacks of conviction. I like it.

I ask because, answering this always makes me feel vulnerable. So, to get a response that is the antithesis of what I felt while putting it out there, intrigues me.

Why? Do people usually shoot you down or something?:unsure:

I've heard variations of this. Sub in consciousness for soul. Then, your soul still lives on. Your life, your experiences live on, even after you die. As if, otherwise, living, is worthless, unless it can be preserved beyond one's death.

You see, we all do have the potential to live on. Not through god, or anything beyond, but through us, each other.

If I lead an examined life, looking at how I make an impact, how I create the ripple effects, doing what I believe in/things that ring true for me, I can aim to direct myself in a way, where, how I live on, were the best parts of me. Through those impacted by the ripples of me.

I firmly believe that we have to answer to ourselves and each other. Nothing beyond.

Aw, but what happens when all the humans die? Our whole project is lost :( You're no fun!
 

/DG/

silentigata ano (profile)
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Also, how does that feel, to believe that? Does it kind of suck? I don't mean that in a disrespectful way. And obviously I'm not using that as an argument to prove you wrong (because I assume you don't equate truth with feeling good), I'm just curious if you have a hard time feeling whole and motivated with this worldview. I'm not sure (I don't know you and haven't lived out your beliefs), but it sounds like it would be a bit depressing sometimes. But I guess your motivation/needs are probably a lot of different than mine. Do you ever accidentally catch yourself projecting meaning where there is none?

I am not Magic Poriferan, but I wanted to answer this because I share his beliefs that he has mentioned in this thread. Everyone is different...and my answers could be different than his.

No...the lack of purpose in life is not depressing in the slightest. How could it be? I'm here to have fun and make the most of it. No outside force is dictating the choices I should make in life. I am free to do what I want. What do you believe about purpose?

Now, do you want to know what is depressing when you don't subscribe to a religion? The fact that when we die, we're just gone forever. Now, many atheists try to put a spin on this and think of it in a good way. We may be gone, but our atoms will continue to exist in the universe. In that way, we continue to "live." This doesn't comfort me like it does many others. I'll acknowledge that there is this depressing side, but fortunately you get used to it and try not to think about it.

You mentioned earlier that you didn't feel much of a connection with church at a young age...I definitely didn't either and I think most don't. It's funny...I always tried to do well in school, but when it came to catechism, I would have done rather poorly if it was graded. If someone were to argue with me about my beliefs, they could bring this up and say that I just didn't try hard enough to be a Christian. However, my reasoning for being an atheist lies purely in logic, not in feelings. It has nothing to do with the people who say they "turned away from God" because they were "angry" at him. For whatever reason, people like to do this. Atheism is not a pessimistic view by any means. It just is.
 
S

Stansmith

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Agnostic. Family is catholic, although only a few of them seem to be strict about it.
 

Forever_Jung

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I am not Magic Poriferan, but I wanted to answer this because I share his beliefs that he has mentioned in this thread. Everyone is different...and my answers could be different than his.

For sure, I'm listening :)

No...the lack of purpose in life is not depressing in the slightest. How could it be? I'm here to have fun and make the most of it. No outside force is dictating the choices I should make in life. I am free to do what I want. What do you believe about purpose?

I find doing what you want is fun for a while (and definitely necessary sometimes), but it is responsibility that makes life meaningful. I often wonder what I SHOULD do, and WHY should I do it? So to believe that there IS meaning in the world (maybe not a traditionally religious meaning), and that I have some sort of objective reason to lead a meaningful life is motivating. Maybe it's not true, but that's what I find appealing about the idea that it is. I don't know if I explained that properly, but there you have it.

Now, do you want to know what is depressing when you don't subscribe to a religion? The fact that when we die, we're just gone forever. Now, many atheists try to put a spin on this and think of it in a good way. We may be gone, but our atoms will continue to exist in the universe. In that way, we continue to "live." This doesn't comfort me like it does many others. I'll acknowledge that there is this depressing side, but fortunately you get used to it and try not to think about it.

I appreciate your candor, I find a surprising number of atheists deny feeling this way, and it surprises me. Death is not that easy to contend with, after all. I mean it's okay if they actually don't mind, more power to them, but I do wonder if they're just being stubborn.

You mentioned earlier that you didn't feel much of a connection with church at a young age...I definitely didn't either and I think most don't. It's funny...I always tried to do well in school, but when it came to catechism, I would have done rather poorly if it was graded. If someone were to argue with me about my beliefs, they could bring this up and say that I just didn't try hard enough to be a Christian. However, my reasoning for being an atheist lies purely in logic, not in feelings. It has nothing to do with the people who say they "turned away from God" because they were "angry" at him. For whatever reason, people like to do this. Atheism is not a pessimistic view by any means. It just is.

Sure, I don't think that atheists are pessimists, but I do think their worldview has implications that depress me. To you guys, it's just reality, it's not pessimism. You're not gonna warp what your take on reality just so you feel better. :shrug: I always thought the angry atheist thing was a stupid attempt to discredit an atheistic worldview, by painting non-believers as moody adolescents.

George Harrison was fond of saying that if you haven't had a religious experience you shouldn't just will yourself to become a believer. I think, more specifically he said:

"It's better to be an outspoken atheist, than a religious hypocrite."

I think most atheists are just trying to live honestly, and I admire that. :)
 

Ene

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It is difficult to sum up one's spiritual beliefs in an internet post. Still, I find myself responding to this post. Why? I don't know. I guess I just want to put my two cents worth in, because somebody opened the forum and I thought maybe they'd like to know.

I am Native American. Spirituality isn't something you can sum up or argue on a random internet post, at least not in my opinion. No matter how I would try to express my beliefs, short of a novel length monologue, it would still not come out "right" in a way that would cause people to understand. Sacred things would end up being sold as souvenirs and our ceremonies would end up looking like some kind of New Age knock off.

To us, spirituality isn't something you can measure or quantify. It's a life way. I'm from a culture that believes the spirit worlds and natural world exists right alongside each other. We believe in what can only be described as other dimensions and that one can't go from this dimension into the spirit dimension while inhabiting a flesh body. Having said that, I, like many (not all) Cherokee people, am also a follower of Jesus.
 

yeghor

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But not against the combined powers of irreligion!

 

Magic Poriferan

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Sure it does, just most people don't define their beliefs by saying you don't believe in a bunch of stuff and then saying: whatever's left is what I believe. You just didn't offer any positive belief. I suppose that's appropriate given the nature of your beliefs (now that I know them).

The reason I gave that response is because people often ask me that question, and I think it's strange that religious ideas are so pinpointed. There are so many things in the universe, but the question hinges specifically on whether or not I say I believe in a god or spiritual forces. The way reality works is, as far as I can see, very complex and unintuitive, so it is hard to give a positive belief that is actually satisfactory in their scope. I believe in the laws of physics, you could say that. I wouldn't be inaccurate, just incomplete.

You seem pretty smart, so I feel like you would know better than me--does that count as nihilism? It seems to.

I decided to look up nihilism. One definition is the absence of belief in a greater purpose, so by that, I would be a nihilist. Regarding moral nihilism, I find my position much harder to explain. While morality is the experience of an individual, there are many individuals, and they are real, and they express their morality, and their minds are rooted in physical stuffs, so in a sense there is an objective existence to morality, but not in the way most people mean objective morality.

I avoid the word nihilist because it has many erroneous associations and negative connotations.

Also, how does that feel, to believe that? Does it kind of suck? I don't mean that in a disrespectful way. And obviously I'm not using that as an argument to prove you wrong (because I assume you don't equate truth with feeling good), I'm just curious if you have a hard time feeling whole and motivated with this worldview. I'm not sure (I don't know you and haven't lived out your beliefs), but it sounds like it would be a bit depressing sometimes. But I guess your motivation/needs are probably a lot of different than mine. Do you ever accidentally catch yourself projecting meaning where there is none?

I am a depressive and anxious individual, but I cannot directly attribute that to my beliefs for many reasons. When I think about it, I find the alternatives would not make me happier. As has been pointed out for as long as the term existentialism has been around, the existence of God would not actually answer any fundamentally existential questions, it would just add one more inconclusive step. There's also the afterlife problem. I am a coward toward mortality, and I find oblivion terrifying, but I've given an afterlife many thought experiments and I've found that no matter what it is always disturbing. So it really makes no difference.

There is a kind of concrete accessibility that is actually nice about my beliefs. I find it deeply unfortunate that the devoutly religious often seems to waste their entire lives away for an imaginary life that will never come. Wanting happiness, avoiding sorrow, and knowing that there are billions of others (far more than billions if we count other species) who have the same experience and whom's experience I can influence, is the best motivation I can think of.

There's an old thought from Plato, which is that even if there were a god, it still wouldn't make sense to do what he says if he does not give a good reason, and if he gives a good reason, then he is merely an unnecessary middleman and we should act on the basis of the good reason, not god's will. Basically, the presence of god would not make the above cease to be my motivation.

I think I've projected meaning onto things that didn't have meaning. I think virtually every human being has done that. It seems to be a kind of cognitive bias and I suspect it actually plays a part in why religion ever came into existence.

Do you think people who believe to be a little silly, then? I'm not trying to bait you or anything, I'm just curious. If you think it'd be better not to answer that, I totally understand.

I don't know about the specific word to use. I can say that I think the belief is unnecessary, less accurate than other beliefs which should be easily available at this day and age, and that with the advancement of civilization there seems to be an according decline in religiousity.
 

Mole

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It is difficult to sum up one's spiritual beliefs in an internet post. Still, I find myself responding to this post. Why? I don't know. I guess I just want to put my two cents worth in, because somebody opened the forum and I thought maybe they'd like to know.

I am Native American. Spirituality isn't something you can sum up or argue on a random internet post, at least not in my opinion. No matter how I would try to express my beliefs, short of a novel length monologue, it would still not come out "right" in a way that would cause people to understand. Sacred things would end up being sold as souvenirs and our ceremonies would end up looking like some kind of New Age knock off.

To us, spirituality isn't something you can measure or quantify. It's a life way. I'm from a culture that believes the spirit worlds and natural world exists right alongside each other. We believe in what can only be described as other dimensions and that one can't go from this dimension into the spirit dimension while inhabiting a flesh body. Having said that, I, like many (not all) Cherokee people, am also a follower of Jesus.

The Cherokee did not give us the Enlightenment.

The Enlightenment was given to us by the Europeans of the 17th and 18th centuries.

And the Enlightenment gave us the values of freedom and equality, evidence and reason.

The Enlightenment gave us the modern world of modern medicine, modern economics, modern science, liberal democracy, universal literacy, and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

The Enlightenment was the first to abolish slavery in the history of the world on 27 March, 1807.
The Enlightenment emancipated women for the first time in history in 1900.
And the Enlightenment is, as I write, bringing child sexual abusing institutions before Judicial Enquiries for the first time in history.

The Enlightenment gave us universal literacy for the first time in history.

By contrast the Cherokee oppressed women and children and other tribes.
The Cherokee tribe were illiterate.
The Cherokee were ignorant of evidence based medicine, modern science, modern economics, and liberal democracy, and Universal Human Rights.

And today it is the New Age Movement that romanticises the Cherokee, and betrays the Cherokee at the deepest level.
 

Ene

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[MENTION=3325]Mole[/MENTION] just a reminder, I won't engage you. Your efforts to evoke a reaction beyond this reminder are futile.
 

lowtech redneck

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For others, I only see religion as having a utility that could presumably be achieved by alternatives to religion, so it is not a necessary means to anything for anyone.

Why do you believe that all people would be happier without a belief in eternal consciousness and free will (as there are currently no non-religious alternatives to these wants, and its extremely unlikely any will exist in the future)?

As for the OP, I'm agnostic, but I believe that the existence of religion (not necessarily all religions) is a net utilitarian benefit in terms of aggregate human happiness, simply because of the aforementioned factors. I think that modern irreligion has more to do with the difficulty in maintaining faith in the supernatural without a societal 'sacred canopy' or a lifetime of mental habituation than with contentment within the parameters of a wholly secular worldview.
 

Qlip

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The Cherokee did not give us the Enlightenment.

The Enlightenment was given to us by the Europeans of the 17th and 18th centuries.

And the Enlightenment gave us the values of freedom and equality, evidence and reason.

The Enlightenment gave us the modern world of modern medicine, modern economics, modern science, liberal democracy, universal literacy, and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

The Enlightenment was the first to abolish slavery in the history of the world on 27 March, 1807.
The Enlightenment emancipated women for the first time in history in 1900.
And the Enlightenment is, as I write, bringing child sexual abusing institutions before Judicial Enquiries for the first time in history.

The Enlightenment gave us universal literacy for the first time in history.

By contrast the Cherokee oppressed women and children and other tribes.
The Cherokee tribe were illiterate.
The Cherokee were ignorant of evidence based medicine, modern science, modern economics, and liberal democracy, and Universal Human Rights.

And today it is the New Age Movement that romanticises the Cherokee, and betrays the Cherokee at the deepest level.

I finally get you, Mole. You're a British Colonialist from the late 1800's. Classification achieved.
 

Mole

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Vous est Formidable

[MENTION=3325]Mole[/MENTION] just a reminder, I won't engage you. Your efforts to evoke a reaction beyond this reminder are futile.

Yes, I remember, we are not engaged. And all my efforts only remind me resistence is futile.

I can see how easy it is to fall under your spell.

Your spell is invoked by the recalling of memory, a tried and true trance induction. Then, like a trance meister, you lock me into your spell with the hypnotic suggestion that resistence is futile.

Formidable.
 

Ene

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Yes, I remember, we are not engaged. And all my efforts only remind me resistence is futile.

I can see how easy it is to fall under your spell.

Your spell is invoked by the recalling of memory, a tried and true trance induction. Then, like a trance meister, you lock me into your spell with the hypnotic suggestion that resistence is futile.

Formidable.

Indeed. ;)
 

Mole

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I finally get you, Mole. You're a British Colonialist from the late 1800's. Classification achieved.

It's true, you committed symbolic patricide of King George III, believing you could free yourself from your filial duties, leading you to a disasterous Civil War, naricissism and paranoia, armed to the teeth against each other.

Whereas the future King George VII is visiting us today with his parents, Prince William and Duchess Kate.

We are dazzled by the freshness of new life in baby George, whereas you not only wear the mark of the patricide, but also the mark of Cain from the Civil War.

It is a Shakespearean tale: on one side, patricide, fratricide, paranoia and guilt, out damned spot; and on the other side, the miracle of new life, triumphing over bloody murder.
 

Qlip

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It's true, you committed symbolic patricide on King George III, believing you could free yourself from your filial duties, leading you to a disasterous Civil War, naricissism and paranoia, armed to the teeth against each other.

Whereas the future King George VII is visiting us to day with his parents, Prince William and Duchess Kate.

We are dazzled by the freshness of new life in baby George, whereas you not only wear the mark of the patricide, but also the mark of Cain from the Civil War.

It is a Shakespearean tale, on one side, patricide, fratricide, paranoia and guilt, out damned spot, and on the other side, the miracle of new life, triumphing over bloody murder.

So, did you Rip Van Winkle it to the 21st century, or did you build a time machine using Issac Newton's calculous and galvanometric principals?

I like my mythology better than yours.
 
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