I'm starting to doubt my lack of belief

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You kill me, AG. A "mind virus"??? This is too much!! !

OK, if that is so, then you also have to allow for at least the possibility that you yourself might have been infected. Generally speaking, most people live in relatively good physical health. I, for one, am terribly prone to colds but am otherwise generally above-average as far as health is concerned. The average person has the usual run of aches and pains, but is ordinarily relatively high functioning as far as health is concerned.

If we're using health and communicable disease as a model for belief vs. lack of, it seems to me the average person holds something in faith. Even ancient cultures tended to hold their own leaders among the gods and worshiped them as such--whether that was a true religion or not is not the point, but rather that most people throughout time and even today seem to have some conviction that there is some being SOMEWHERE worthy of faith and reverence. There is within us some desire for hope in the hereafter, that all things will work out for the best in the end, that we do not simply march on into oblivion. I mean, seriously, Buddhism in comparison is, to my knowledge, the most atheistic religion in the world, and yet it does not hold that death right now is not the end of the story. My mind doesn't really allow me to understand nirvana other than its similarity with the break from the "sorrowful circle of life" of Greek pantheism. The fact that it advocates death and hope of rebirth in not unlike the Christian principal of the resurrection, though the similarities end there. If they can perceive this, and if most of the rest of the world can perceive that there is Something, even if they don't quite understand it, then perhaps it is YOU who are infected by this "mind-virus," not me nor anyone else who holds to some kind of faith in a deity or a spiritual existence.

Those of us who claim to be "spiritual" and not "religious" at least are open to the possibility that there exists something greater than ourselves. If you pity me, it is because I am pitiable. I am a sad person. It thus deeply saddens me, in an otherwise happy and peaceful existence, that your mind has gone on to be so distressed for so long as to prohibit you from believing very much if anything at all. Perhaps you'll wake up one day and realize that there is nothing wrong in at least contemplating the possibility that there is Something of a spiritual nature to this world. Perhaps you can allow it to make sense to yourself. Perhaps your conclusions may eventually lead you in the direction that it is the God-nature you're really seeking. And perhaps everything else will make as much sense to you as it does me. You seem to be adept at rationalizing the rest of the world in some kind of naturalistic Godless way, yet you are unable to explain or allow for certain other things such as a near-universal reliance on faith of unseen things. I would think such mental acuity as you claim to have by denigrating my intelligence would have allowed you to consider such things. As it is, such apparent acuity has strict limits. Perhaps one day you may break free from such bonds.

Until then, I'm very sorry about your lack of vision.

It is nice rhetoric. Whatever it is that you have, it seems apparent that it is detrimental to you as a person on some level given your continuous dishonesty and BS.


It is possible, but I doubt it is likely in comparison. I've changed stances on things too many times for me to take the matter seriously, and I read too many different sources to think that I am just entirely closed off. I mean, just this Saturday, I bought a book by Jurgen Moltmann, a prominent Christian theologian. How often do you buy books by atheists? How often do you read blogs by atheists?


It isn't a model so much as rhetoric based upon the idea of memes. I mean, really, if you wanted to talk about this as a literal model, I'd have to ask Orwell on the matter because he knows more about epidemiology than I do.


The basic problem is that you talk about perception without a credible mechanism. The fact is that this kind of similarity can exist without an actual perception, such as with a genetic predisposition, and I would hold that the latter is more likely the case given that there are too many differences and discrepancies to really consider this a perception. I mean, for one, whether a person thinks they go to heaven or hell seems more of a matter of their emotional state, which is against what we would perceive if this was just a perception. Secondly, there is too little agreement to say that a perception is taking place, as when most things are perceived we can double-check them, but on this issue, no double-checking does or really can occur, which seems questionable in just a matter of a real perception. Thirdly, cases in which the mind is deceiving us, even massively can and do occur already, and as such we lose nothing in coherency to suppose that another deception exists. I would even say that elements very central to religion, such as our perception of psychological unity, our perception of a libertarian free will, and other things have essentially been shown to be based upon psychological deceptions. Fourthly, a theistic hypothesis makes too little sense of the world for a large slew of reasons, including the existence of evil, but also given all of the scientific facts, as a pinnacle of existence that comes 14 billion years after the beginning of the universe seems like a lot of needless patience. Fifthly, what is the perceptual mechanism? If there is new information entering the brain/mind, there has to be a mechanism, and frankly, I've never heard of one nor can I think of one that really makes sense.

I mean, you can say "How could all of these people be wrong!?" but, for so many millenia, human beings have practiced the most dubious sorts of superstitions that I would have to argue that we have good grounds for saying that they could be wrong, and are not endowed with a special insight into reality. Magic does not exist, and so many of the rituals taken are downright pointless that it makes little sense.

Even further, why would a mind virus correlate with higher IQ and congregate in places with high analytical ability, such as philosophy departments? That also does not make sense.


No, you are closed-minded to the possibility that there isn't magic in the universe. You continually deny that this is a matter of truth, and continually assert your closed-mindedness(faith), so this isn't "openness" at all. Anybody can see this. Even if I am a motivated skeptic, I am certainly more willing to be honest than a person who won't even admit to the possibility of having to admit they are wrong.


I've contemplated it for years. I've written long essays about this. I've read a number of theological writings, and tend to read something theistic every day or so.


It wouldn't matter if this was what I am seeking. I am also seeking the truth, and it wouldn't matter how much I want something I know to be untrue, so long as I was thinking about the matter of truth and concerned about it, the cognitive dissonance would eat at me.


It makes sense to you because you don't really know anything. You are basically a stooge in a ghetto filled with lies. You can make sense of anything if you don't care about reality.


You mean that I think that such a view makes the most sense of reality, and I do think it does. I have gone above rationalizing, as I am semi-serious as a thinker rather than an outright liar, and you have gone below rationalizing, as the garbage that comes out of your mouth is not even acceptable as an honest answer.

AngelRho, here's the problem:
1) As Orwell pointed out, in the west, a lot of people are only nominal believers and don't really have this deep faith.
2) I've already explained the matter as a matter of cognitive defects given that I perceived it as the only reasonable answer.
3) You might be referring the transcendental argument for God, but the problem is that this won't be a problem for me. I've actually argued against a minor apologist of note on the transcendental argument for God. The man was a slippery bastard. Even further, I know of a philosopher who argued against the same apologist, and can easily cite many of that philosopher's arguments to save time.


Trust me, you are the one with the lack of vision. Your entire argument that I "lack vision" is more because I disagree with you stridently and feel rather aggravated by the excuses given in an argument, than it is that I necessarily lack vision. That, in and of itself, is more of a sign that you lack vision than that I lack it.

Very sad. Such blustery opposition only reminds me of the sad position of a person who truly and adamantly does not want any kind of God to exist.

You're a nutjob.

Why would you WANT a god to exist?
Remember, you know exactly what the world is like today. And you want to know that a being exists, that had the power to do otherwise, but chose not to.
If he could not have done otherwise, the being would possess no free will, and that is a weak god to say the least, it's just a theistic spin on determinism.

You're cheering for something awful nice <sorry, vain attempt at sarcasm>, ain't ya? or something awful weak.

Is that a good way that you would like to propose as a truth seeker? By wanting God to exist? If you go by that, we do have a problem, a cognitive bias problem.

You are missing the point as it seems that you have ignored this wether that was conveniently or not:


Anyway, from my perspective, AG seems an intellectual thinker, and he often rationalizes issues offering critical thinking, I of course would disagree with some things as you are, but that does nothing, if you have not been able to succesfully refute his points at all, and your defense seem ilogical and absurd (such as the Dawkins comment), then you have a problem, I think if this were an important decision making debate or a court you would have failed long ago. In such cases I believe the best advise to give is to avoid participating like others here prefer to, if someone does not wish his cognitive bias to be disturbed, the best thing is to never have engaged in discussions of this matter at all. I have to say however, that both of your participation in these type of discussions have been entertaining.


well, I'm not good at arguments and many times I become mentally lazy, I will quote other users responses:


It means that believing in something beyond we can perceive, such as mysticism, spiritual and religious beliefs, the reason is often emotive and is very tied with psychology and cognitive biases, in other words it is or it becomes wishful thinking.


You said "want" and that is tied with wishful thinking and is subjective.


Sad indeed but I believe for different reasons.

I think you make a good point but are oversimplifying it more than I'm comfortable with, so I'll just add a few comments here. I think that most people do operate on some degree of faith, but it's not a huge compenent to their life. All sorts of things we do are based on faith because we need it to function in the absence of complete understanding and complete information. I think profound religious faith is far more rare and is what you are calling "faith." Many people who appear to be nominal also have a deeper faith than it first appears. They may only have nominal ties to organized religion but have a deeper faith in their God that plays a big part in their life. I have many family members like this. They don't feel a need to broadcast their faith in obnoxious ways, they show it by their lives and will talk when appropriate. They don't attend a lot of religious services (my family is mixed Jewish and various forms of Christian, and one Zen Daoist), but they do consider themselves part of an organized faith. They think for themselves and don't buy into everything they are told they are supposed to, but pray frequently and are deeply moral and have a profound sense of God in their lives.

Some people operate much of the time with no apparent regard to faith or God, but will turn that way when they have major life events.

OK...with all due respect to you guys, AR and AG, you have gotten to the point where you are acting like exact mirrors of each other and neither of you are advancing your causes.

Maybe it helps that as a moderate who has been flamed by BOTH sides in many venues, I can step outside of this and see the parallels.

I don't know about anyone else, but the instant the insults start flying, I quit paying attention to ALL of what's being said. How am I to trust "logic" from anyone if they can't keep their emotions out of it?

Not really, I am still more reasonable, despite any of my overblown propaganda.


Don't trust "logic" from a person. Trust yourself to analyze logic. Logic is meant to be something that each person can analyze on their own according to the structure of it, without regard for any emotion.

Even further, people can't remove themselves and their emotions from their logic anyway, as logic is just a basic element of human cognitive processing.

Is it just me or is the "I'm a centrist, therefore I am pragmatic/objective/have closer access to reality" mantra rather trite? Moderates have come up with few solutions to this double-dip recession and I don't see the virtue in treating the golden mean as an absolute.

I find it rather silly. In fact, I am STRIDENTLY opposed to it, given that God is clearly dead. We just need to bury the corpse before it stinks too much. Heck, it stinks too much as is!

Last edited by Awesomelyglorious on 01 Jun 2010, 11:05 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Everytime you do that bolded caplock underline thing with the word "STRIDENT" you should hyperlink back to the thread.

I'm thinking of holding a final vote of the top 4 members on Wensday. The vote would last a week (it would be a fixed poll, I'd measure the results at 8:00 PM Central Canada time on Wensday to make the final, super-duper poll).

By the way, the "Commission to awesomize Awesomelyglorious" needs to step up its attacks on Sand. Every since the Dent vote collapsed, his supporters have gone to Sand rather than you.

Psalm 94:9

He who planted the ear, does he not hear?

He who formed the eye, does he not see?

I don't think the vote has even changed ever since I started the entire campaign.

What is the sound of one mouth yawning?

See, I can write koans too.

Providential character is not scientifically measurable.
Neither are the characteristics of patience or Agape Love.

Matthew 5:44-45
44 But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.

Even if I could "tally up" all the ways that God provides for me each day (which I can't do...) I have, by my own attitude proven that I "deserve" zero.

And yet, he causes the sun to rise anew.