Figuring Out Religion

[Xan]

I'm far beyond either athiesm or religion.

Truly, we are in the presence of greatness!  This man, MG, has ascended beyond anything we can imagine.  Discussing the God of the universe is pedestrian, banal, boring to him.  We can only hope he'll tell us what brand of toothpaste to use, or what "supplements" to take in just the right order, so that we can optimize our lives.

[Mountaineer]

Seriously, Mountaineer, how much of your particular religious branch is predicated on getting others to see your version of "God" and "saving themselves"?  Do you get a dopamine boost when that happens?

BTW, don't mistake me for an athiest.  I'm far beyond either athiesm or religion.  I'm only restrained out of respect.

1.  Predicated?  None.  That is God's work. 
2.  Boost?  No, because that is between the person and God - not up to me, God's work.
3.  Far beyond?  Impossible, unless you are proclaiming to be God. 
4.  Respect?  For what?  What dictionary do you use? 

Actually, I'm quite surprised you ask those type of questions after reading previous posts of believers.  You need to supplement your supplements with some back-thread reading for your personal enlightenment and enjoyment!     

There is apparently still time for you to repent and call on the God of mercy (at least there was time as of your last post). 

... Mountaineer

[Greg]

I'm far beyond either athiesm or religion.  I'm only restrained out of respect.

I'm curious... What does this mean exactly?

When I first read it, I thought about this episode with Bender:

http://theinfosphere.org/Overclockwise

"Bender evolves into a godlike being after vastly increasing his processing power."

[ZedThou]

I used to think that this forum was a place where most other members were like-minded rational souls. But wow, this thread has been eye-opening and very disappointing. There are some posters here who are unhinged, and who have completely lost touch with objective reality.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and there is zero evidence for supernatural influence in this world. None at all.

[MachineGhost]

Oh man, all of you people crack me up!!!       

BTW, Mountaineer, I never followed the thread from the beginning but joined about halfway of the way through.  Now at 247 pages long, I can't possibly remember everything that's been said since I joined.  Unlike your fine self, sir, religion is not my Be All End All guide to life so I don't obsess over it all that much.  So forgive me for being forgetful yet curious.

[Tortoise]

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and there is zero evidence for supernatural influence in this world. None at all.

Why does your hand move when you will it to move? Something non-physical (your thought) is influencing something physical (your hand) to move.

In other words, when you will your hand to move and it moves, you are exercising a limited form of "supernatural influence" over your physical body.

[Mountaineer]

Oh man, all of you people crack me up!!!       

BTW, Mountaineer, I never followed the thread from the beginning but joined about halfway of the way through.  Now at 247 pages long, I can't possibly remember everything that's been said since I joined.  Unlike your fine self, sir, religion is not my Be All End All guide to life so I don't obsess over it all that much.  So forgive me for being forgetful yet curious.

You are forgiven.  The supernatural thoughts flowing from my brain through my fingers to cyberspace to your eyes say so.   

... Mountaineer

[gizmo_rat]

In other words, when you will your hand to move and it moves, you are exercising a limited form of "supernatural influence" over your physical body.

Worse than that, something else wills your hand to move about 1/2 second before you do.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroscience_of_free_will

[jafs]

Interesting thread.

It's clear that believers have a self-reinforcing set of circular logic that sustains their beliefs, and that no challenges from outside that circle would be effective at challenging them.  Sometimes even challenges from inside the circle (ie. Bible passages) don't work at all.

But, it's also clear (to me) that religion isn't so much of a set of "extraordinary claims" requiring "extraordinary proof" as it is simply a set of beliefs that people adopt.  And, a lot of the time, specific beliefs aren't even the reason that people go to church or stay in one.

I majored in religious studies, and seriously considered the ministry a few times, so I'm not at all hostile to religion, and think that people have the right to believe as they like, and that religious beliefs often serve people well in a number of ways.  My only suggestion is that both believers and non-believers just look at it that way, rather than arguing about the "truth content" or lack thereof of religious belief.

If you don't find a certain religion compelling, then that's fine.

[Greg]

Interesting thread.

It's clear that believers have a self-reinforcing set of circular logic that sustains their beliefs, and that no challenges from outside that circle would be effective at challenging them.  Sometimes even challenges from inside the circle (ie. Bible passages) don't work at all.

But, it's also clear (to me) that religion isn't so much of a set of "extraordinary claims" requiring "extraordinary proof" as it is simply a set of beliefs that people adopt.  And, a lot of the time, specific beliefs aren't even the reason that people go to church or stay in one.

I majored in religious studies, and seriously considered the ministry a few times, so I'm not at all hostile to religion, and think that people have the right to believe as they like, and that religious beliefs often serve people well in a number of ways.  My only suggestion is that both believers and non-believers just look at it that way, rather than arguing about the "truth content" or lack thereof of religious belief.

If you don't find a certain religion compelling, then that's fine.

That's actually one of the reasons to your point about circular logic that I've been looking for more information outside of the religious book's passages. Just because it is in a book doesn't mean it is true, otherwise a lot of religions would be true and have conflicting information in them.

I also think that much like in the political thread, religion is not something a lot of people really delve deeply into and try to figure out what is correct and I think that is a shame. Like the political thread, they talk about how people don't actually read up on all of the issues, honestly listen to the points of presidential candidates, and make informed opinions, they just go for the most part with the tribalism drumbeat as Moda has suggested.

I feel like most people end up going with their religion they grow up with and don't have the willpower or interest to venture outside of it to see if it is correct or not. I would also state that the people on this forum aren't normal people so the willpower is certainly there, we just all lead to different conclusions based on the premises we all have in the beginning.

[jafs]

I agree with most of that.

Certainly that's one of the fundamental questions - why believe the Bible rather than some other religious texts?

But I think that the nature of religious belief is outside of what can be "proven" or "correct" or "true" - it's just a choice to believe certain things, given scant/unclear/contradictory evidence.  As such, it's more a matter of will than intellect.

[Xan]

I used to think that this forum was a place where most other members were like-minded rational souls. But wow, this thread has been eye-opening and very disappointing. There are some posters here who are unhinged, and who have completely lost touch with objective reality.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and there is zero evidence for supernatural influence in this world. None at all.

I'm willing to bet that you believe firmly in many things which are unprovable by that standard.

[MachineGhost]

But I think that the nature of religious belief is outside of what can be "proven" or "correct" or "true" - it's just a choice to believe certain things, given scant/unclear/contradictory evidence.  As such, it's more a matter of will than intellect.

A matter of will?  I don't know about that.  Is religion a natural path of least resistance or is it taught and reinforced like racism?  It's fine to fob off faith as the nature of subjective beliefs, but True Believers claim the extraordinary about their religion.  The burden of proof then resides on their shoulders.

What I find so annoying about religion is that it's an artifice mental construct to explain the "magic" of objective reality before there was science.  I have yet to see come across any evidence that convinces me that this or that religion has any explanation or relevance to the hidden order of the universe rather than to an anthropomorphic fairy tale.  Science is a thinking process for verifiying whether or not "evidence" may indeed be true.  Unfortunately, the dearth of corroborating evidence for religion is why it continues to lose adherents.  Why would I want to believe in anything that has a preponderence of evidence of not being true?  I prefer to apply Best Practices to my life whereever possible, not Bullshit.

[Fred]

If you don't find a certain religion compelling, then that's fine.

Fine with me too until the religion gets so compelling for the true believer that they insist that everyone else has to believe it too. Re: current events in Santa Barbara.

And though I'm speaking of Islam here, Christianity has not always been guiltless in this area as there were times when professing unbelief or even beliefs deemed to be heretical could get you tortured and killed. Even now I believe there is a coercive element to the religion that is not much different than Islam even though Christians won't acknowledge it. We all rightly abhor the violence visited on the infidels in Santa Barbara but most Christians believe that their God has something even worse in store for those who reject their beliefs and they have made this an integral part of their religion.

I also think that much like in the political thread, religion is not something a lot of people really delve deeply into and try to figure out what is correct and I think that is a shame.

It's been my experience that most atheists know more about Christianity than most Christians do, which is why they reject it and why I ultimately found their arguments more compelling than those of Christians.

[jafs]

It's definitely a matter of will - it's a choice to believe certain things.

As is your choice not to believe them.

Both of which are fine with me.

But I think this insistence that people "prove" their religious beliefs is off-base.  They don't have to do anything of the sort - they have a Constitutionally protected right to their religious beliefs/practices. 

[Xan]

It's definitely a matter of will - it's a choice to believe certain things.

As is your choice not to believe them.

Are you sure about that?  As an unbeliever, could you, tomorrow, decide to believe?  Or would you only be pretending?

I don't think we can choose what we believe at all.  We can be convinced one way or another.  Our minds can change.  But I don't think it's possible to make a choice and then suddenly believe something other than what you believed a moment before.

[jafs]

It is a choice, whether or not somebody's aware of that.

And, it may be based on various things, some of which are conscious and others unconscious.  But ultimately faith is a choice - that doesn't mean it's a random capricious one.

People don't really understand that at times, and just think that what they believe is simple "truth".  But the reality is that it's a belief system, and they're choosing that particular one.

Which do you prefer, that you have the right to choose to believe as you do, and not have to defend it, or that you're making an "extraordinary claim" that requires "extraordinary proof"?

I'm not sure that your characterization of me as an "unbeliever" is accurate.

[Xan]

It is a choice, whether or not somebody's aware of that.

And, it may be based on various things, some of which are conscious and others unconscious.  But ultimately faith is a choice.

People don't really understand that at times, and just think that what they believe is simple "truth".

I'm not following.  And I'm not just talking about religious faith: I'm talking about any kind of belief.  I think it's a lot more likely that the truth is the inverse of what you're saying.  It SEEMS like a choice, but it really isn't.  You can't choose what you believe about anything.  You can't choose your preferences.  You could wake up one morning and decide to *do* something different, but you can't wake up and actually change what you believe.

It's possible that what you believe can change, but as a result of choice?  I don't see it.

[jafs]

I don't know how to be clearer.

Religious doctrine generally deals with things that are ultimately "unknowable", and thus a matter of belief.  Which set of beliefs people pick is a choice.

One can choose to believe in Christianity, or Judaism, or Hinduism, or Buddhism, etc.

For example, I believe that human beings are basically good - I'm not naive, and I see that people do many bad things.  But, I feel that I'm basically good, and that my nature can't be different from other humans, if there's such a thing as human nature.  So, I choose to believe that people are basically good.

Other people believe that humans are basically bad, and they're choosing to believe that.

Many people may not be aware that they're choosing their belief systems, but it seems to me that's exactly what they're doing.  Not only that, they defend and protect them from threats, internal or external.  You can see that easily in this thread, where many people offer challenges from outside the system, all of which are parried or explained away, even though none of that satisfies the challengers, who feel that their questions haven't been adequately answered.

[Fred]

I don't completely disagree with that statement.  But I've also found that Christians tend to understand atheism better than atheists do.  Atheists spend too little time figuring out how to really live and think consistently with their worldview.  They seem to be mostly against something (religion), but don't seem to understand the implications of their beliefs.

Having been a long-time Christian (25+ years and an ordained preacher for a short while) I claim an exemption from not understanding the Christian worldview as well as atheists do.

I don't see what you are saying about the more outspoken atheists like Christopher Hitchens, Sam Harris, and Richard Dawkins, not being able to "live consistently with their worldviews". I've listened to them all in debates and it seems to me that they do quite well in managing to feel their way in the world without religion. What is it that you think they don't understand about the implications of their beliefs?

[Pointedstick]

But jafs, could you choose, right now, to believe that humans are basically bad? Surely you could change what you say and write, but could you choose to believe differently? If your answer is yes, I invite you to try it!

This line of inquiry is interesting to me, because I think I'm with the believers on this. We don't choose what we believe; we just kind of find that we believe it because of our experiences, temperaments, etc. The people on this forum who have fallen away from Christianity didn't choose to stop believing in Christ; they simply found that their belief had crumbled all on its own because of the things that were going on in their lives and brains.

[jafs]

Since it's a choice, I could choose to believe that there is no human nature, or that people are born basically bad.

But there are reasons I don't make those choices, and there are reasons that others make different choices than I do.

I'm not saying it's a capricious choice - people have reasons for what they believe.  And they have reasons for changing their beliefs as well.

[Pointedstick]

Try to do it! I bet it's harder than it sounds.

I'll try:
I believe that voluntary interactions are better than forced ones. I could say otherwise. "It's better to force people and be forced yourself to do things than it is to be persuaded." I can say and write that that till the cows come home, but I can't believe it! I'm trying to, but I can't do it. I'm not choosing to fail at this task; I really can't believe otherwise.

[Libertarian666]

Try to do it! I bet it's harder than it sounds.

I have changed my belief on a number of topics.

All it takes is for me to be convinced that my previous belief was less true to reality than another belief, to which I then switched.

I don't see why this is hard.

[Pointedstick]

Becoming convinced of a different belief is a totally different ball game than choosing to change your beliefs. What you choose to do is to seek out other people, perspectives, and sources of information, and it's exposure to those things that change your beliefs.

The difference is subtle, but important.