Pursuit of the truth and/or ‘warm fuzzies’
It’s very easy to mistake my wanting to talk about religion as much as I do for someone that simply wants to argue or prove someone wrong. I don’t blame anyone for thinking that since the world is polluted with people that want nothing more than to cause chaos and/or make themselves feel better at others’ expense.
Well, I’m not going to lie and say I don’t enjoy a good clean debate, but the main reason I enjoy religious discussion is because of my curiosity for the truth in the matter. I’d have to be a fool to think I could actually reach the absolute truth, but I figure as long as I’m here, why not find out what I can and get as close to it as possible.
This brings me to the issue of people that pursue religious truth versus the folks that believe in god simply because it gives them the ‘warm fuzzies’.
I doubt you’ll ever find anyone that actually admits to believing in god just for the ‘warm fuzzies’ because in order to get those fuzzies, you have to convince yourself that what you’re feeling is really god. Instead, I think these people come in the form of “What I believe doesn’t hurt anybody, so why do you have a problem with it?”. Well, I don’t necessarily have a ‘problem’ with the folks that believe things and keep it to themselves, but as I said in another post, I don’t think people that believe in things with no evidence should be praised or given any more respect than someone that doesn’t. If we’re going to be in the business of believing any old thing as long as it doesn’t harm anyone, then why do we eventually tell kids that there is no Santa? Or why do we look at the people that say they’re Elvis or claim to be abducted by aliens like they’re insane? They’re not hurting anyone, right?
I just figure if you believe in god because you’ve searched and that’s what you’ve found to be true, then why would you be reluctant to talk about it any further? If your goal is to know the truth about whether or not there is a god, then I would expect people to continue the search since the jury is still out on the subject.
Don’t get me wrong, if you’ve searched and you’ve found that god is real, then that’s all well and good. I think it’s completely reasonable to adopt a tentative stance on the issue based on what you’ve come across so far in your life, but how can you suggest that you’re after the truth if you continue to deflect new information as it’s presented? If you claim that god created the earth 6,000 years ago based on what you read in a book, and we’ve done our own conclusive testing to determine that it’s actually much older, how can you still claim to be in pursuit of the truth?
I think what people really mean when they say they seek the truth is that they are in pursuit of what gives them ‘warm fuzzies’.
This is what leads me to think that people simply believe in god because it makes them feel good, and not because there is any other compelling rational reason to do so. If there were a rational reason to believe in god, no one would put up a fight when asked for their reason. They’d be more than happy to give it. If someone asks me why I ‘believe’ in gravity, I need to do nothing else than jump up in the air to demonstrate why I ‘believe’ in a force that holds things to the ground. I put the word ‘believe’ in quotes because people seem to throw the term around as if it’s cool or virtuous to believe in things. When I use the word for my purposes, it’s to describe something I trust to be the truth based on specific evidence. Belief in the religious sense seems to be the things people trust to be the truth based on no evidence at all, or exclusively based on what others have told them.
If I’m missing some gray area here, please let me know, but it just seems to be an ‘either/or’ situation: Either you want to know the truth about the existence of god, or you want to find the religion that makes you feel the best and will help you cope with life on earth the best.
For some odd reason, people think there are no ‘warm fuzzies’ to be had by facing reality. Actually it’s not an odd reason at all: Churches benefit by scaring people into thinking non-belief is a scary and hellish existence since they won’t be able to take your money that way.
It would seem pretty counter-intuitive to consult a Christian about life as a non-believer, but people do it every Sunday. They listen to their pastor ramble on about homosexuals rather than talking to actual gay people about them and their lives. They listen to their ministers about how immoral and miserable non-believers are rather than witnessing the lives of non-believers to see that they act in accordance with Christian-like morals–only non-believers came to their morals based on rational thought and not an ancient book–and in many cases, non-believers are found to adhere to the tenets of Christianity moreso than Christians.
‘Warm fuzzies’ can be had from listening to the right music or spending time with loved ones, and none of that has anything to do with a god. In fact, I’d go as far as to say that life becomes even more ‘warm fuzzy’ to a non-believer that is able to cherish each person and event in their life to the fullest since they are aware that this may be the only chance they get. I always wondered how you could truly appreciate anyone as a believer when you know you’re just going to see them in heaven for all eternity. How could you appreciate your time on earth when you believe that this life is merely a stepping stone to the next?
I’m getting ahead of myself since I plan on writing more about the issue of valuing life as an atheist versus that of a theist. For now, I just want to make the point that as long as there’s no conclusive evidence either way for the existence of god, the only rational thing to do if you have any interest in the discussion–and apparently 90% of the people on this planet do–is to remain open to new information as it comes. Otherwise, if you take an interest in the subject of god and you’re in that ‘my belief doesn’t hurt anyone’ realm, then it’s blatantly obvious that you’re not interested in the truth but just that you’ve found something that makes you feel good and that’s all that matters.
Well, it seems to me that an entire segment of our population right now is trying to fight for their right to get married, which wouldn’t hurt anyone either. Why is there such an upheaval among Christians to deny someone their right to do something that causes no harm to anyone, but at the same time establish an entire belief system on the idea that a belief that causes no harm is OK?
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I don't have anything to contribute to the current dialogue….but WHERE did you get that ABSOLUTELY PRECIOUS picture of the little kitty?????????????????????
OMG!!!! as precious as life itself…..
ps. there's nothing wrong in believing in something just because it gives you the warm fuzzies….
warm fuzzies are not something you talk about, but just EXPERIENCE (like god, or higher consciousness, or the supreme being, or the matrix, or whatever you call the power greater than yourself…)
The kitty wandered onto my computer and I couldn't turn it away, so I put it on my post. : )
If you believe in some concept that is imaginary (or is only 'real' in your own mind), then you're being dishonest to yourself. You're convincing yourself that something is real only because you want to feel good. Sure, you might feel good, but in the end it's dishonest. I just don't happen to think this is a good way to govern ourselves where we justify doing certain dishonest things just because they make us feel good.
Justifying irrational belief leads to division along irrational lines. Someone is on this side justifying their belief in a god that does so and so, and over there you have the people that have a god that does something something contrary to the others' god. Now we've created a division all based on something that is a figment of people's imaginations.
How can you be the judge of whether or not someone's experience or feelings are imaginary or not? Not everyone reacts emotionally or physically the exact same way to various stimuli and experiences. Sure there are some very basic examples you can give for both ends of the spectrum but once again it is not always black and white.
By definition, anything that is imaginary is "not real". Real things manifest themselves and we're able to experience some sort of sensory evidence of them whether directly or indirectly.
As Matt Dillahunty explained: "That which does not manifest is indistinguishable from that which does not exist" or something to that effect.
Sure, we react to things differently when it comes to heat, or how spicy a food is, but there is no gray area when it comes to the EXISTENCE of the sun or a jalapeno pepper.
Yeah but just because you can't see something doesn't mean it doesn't exist. People didn't know about bacteria and viruses back in the day because they couldn't see them at that time. All I am saying is that it is possible for something to exist that we may not have the technology to see yet.
I understand what you mean, and I think this has everything to do with the concept of our shared reality. Reality isn't some fixed thing that never changes. It just has to do with the things we know to be verifiable and as close to the truth for us as possible. While we may not know the absolute truth, we are able to figure out what things are at least "more true" than others.
In the case of bacteria back in the day, the closest they were able to come to the truth was to explain away disease through demon possession. Of course with our advancing technology, we can improve on that hypothesis by finding out that there are actually bacteria and viruses that cause disease. I'm near certain that we'll improve on that knowledge in the near future as well.
As my dad likes to say, it's a work in progress. As long as we all realize that nothing is certain and set in stone, it'll all make sense. But our reality exists only as the things we can know and verify as real.
It is one thing to suggest that what someone is feeling or experiencing may be due to any number of possibilities or just one truth(when capable). It is another thing to claim that what they feel or experience is being dishonest or delusional when neither you nor the person has any evidence to prove either stance. It just seems futile to argue some things when we don't have the capability to prove them either way.
When someone has a feeling or experience, it is up to THEM to demonstrate that it is real, otherwise how are we to distinguish who's telling the truth and who isn't? They demonstrate that it's real by showing some sort of manifestation of their experience.
Of course, that's not to say that what they experience definitely isn't real, but it just means there's no rational reason to believe that they are being honest with us if they don't have any way to demonstrate that their experience is real. Sadly, the only way we can deal with our reality is through sensory evidence, and if you're unable to present any, there's no point in even entertaining the idea or experience as truth. After all, if it doesn't manifest in our world, what's the point in even worrying about it anyway?
I'm not sure if honesty has anything to do with truth, or reality. It seems to me like it has more to do with subjective belief. For example, if you honestly believe that the Yankees aren't going to win the World Series, and you say to your friend "The Yankees aren't going to win the World Series," you're not being dishonest just because you can't demonstrate the truth of your statement. But if you actually think the Yankees are going to win the World Series and you say they aren't, that seems dishonest. Either way, honesty seems like it depends on whether you're saying something you believe to be true. You can make a wrong statement without being dishonest.
Where I get confused is how you're defining truth and reality. The bacteria example is interesting – if something has to manifest to our senses to exist, that means bacteria only became "real" when we invented the microscope to see it. But does that mean bacteria wasn't real before we invented the microscope? That doesn't really make sense either. Just because something isn't real doesn't mean it's automatically imaginary. There has to be at least a third category called "don't know yet." Maybe a fourth, called "will probably never know."
A thousand years ago, bacteria wasn't imaginary, but it wasn't quite "real" yet either, if the requirement for being real is that it manifest to our senses. Maybe the existence of God is the same way. Some people believe in it, some people don't, but the absence of proof doesn't make it automatically imaginary. We just can't sense him… yet. Maybe if we invent a REALLY good microscope.
I think I had something more sensible to say when I started writing this. Now, it just sounds like I'm saying that the existence of God is like the result of a future baseball game… that'll probably never actually get played. Actually, I guess that is what I'm saying.
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Yo Hagana….to your first paragraph: To play off of your analogy of the Yankees and the World Series, it would be the equivalent of someone simply believing that the Yankees would win the WS without researching the chances the Yankees really have of winning it. It could be that the Yankees are made up of little league 5-year-olds and they're playing against actual major league players…..anyone that believes that the yankees would have a chance at that point would be being dishonest with themselves when they know full well that they would get their brains beat in. They can't possibly think that the Yankees have a chance, but they are trying to convince themselves that they do because it makes them feel good. See the parallel I'm trying to draw?
To your second: I realize that there exists the "reality" that we CAN know and the "absolute reality" that actually IS. When people had no clue about bacteria thousands of years ago, their collective reality was whatever best answer they could come up with at the time, and people I guess agreed that demon posession was the best explanation for sickness. As our understanding of our world changes, our reality changes, since our reality is nothing more than our best understanding of the world we live in.
And no, just because something doesn't readily manifest doesn't mean it doesn't exist in "absolute reality". The perfect example of this is the concept of god. God does not manifest in our "collective reality", so it's not even worth entertaining since how else would you even remotely know about such a thing unless it actually did manifest itself anyway?
The bacteria example isn't the same as the god hypothesis since no one brought up the existence of a bacteria or virus as a possibility. What would have driven someone to make such a claim back then? How could someone come up with the idea of a virus if they didn't have any manifestation of it? Maybe they had some obscure guess that resembled a virus, but until we're able to verify that one actually exists, there's no point in entering it into our reality as if it DOES exist. Sure, I'm all for the exploration to find more answers, but we can only deal with what we DO know. It wouldn't have made any sense for people back then to deal with bacteria as if it were real when they had no evidence for its existence. Everything they would have come up with would have been a total guess if not for any manifestation? Same with god right now…..everything we claim to know about god is a total guess, and it doesn't do us any good since everyone has different guesses……let's hold off on acting like god is a reality until we find some sort of manifestation.
Hope I gave you enough ammo to clear things up or respond back.
If the Yankees represent God, there's no proof one way or the other what that team's going to look like yet. And yeah, if you somehow knew the Yankees would field a bunch of 5-year olds and you said they were going to win, you'd be dishonest, or at least crazy. But in this analogy, remember that Christians think that God/the Yankees are going to be all-powerful, so they're being very honest when they say they think the Yankees are going to win. As atheists, we're of the belief that the Yankees aren't even going to show up. But to say that the Yankees are definitely going to a bunch of 5-year olds is like saying God is going turn out to be real, but that he's going to be a feeble, meek being that's going to drown in the deep end of the pool.
The bacteria example isn't a perfect analogy, but it's close. I just looked up bacteria on wikipedia – it was first proposed in 1546 that epidemics were caused by transferable seedlike entities. Someone else finally proved that bacteria were real in 1905, and went on to cure cholera and tuberculosis. In between those 300 years, you can't really say it wouldn' have made any sense for people to think bacteria might be real. If you thought bacteria might exist, you'd probably make out with less sick people and live a longer, healthier life.
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First paragraph: I think in the Yankees/WS analogy, that God is actually the World Series winner since that's the unknown…..and the teams represent our various "guesses" as to what god could be. In that case, belief in a team of 5-year-olds would be dishonest just as belief in a book that is contrary to what we know of in our world. In our world, there's nothing that would suggest that 5-year-olds stand any chance against grown major league players just as there's nothing in our world that suggests that people are able to walk on water and become resurrected from the dead. Hence the dishonesty.
Regarding the bacteria: Claiming that small seedlike entities caused disease isn't an extraordinary claim and while we can't automatically accept that as our truth just based on that claim, I have no problem with accepting that as a possibility because it's at least reasonable given what we DO know. It wouldn't be unreasonable to suggest that small particles that we can't see cause disease. That wouldn't be a dishonest position to explore since nothing serves to contradict that idea.
I think the bacteria example is similar to the position of deists that believe a god created the universe that no longer interferes with things. It's an unverifiable claim right now, but at least it's not dishonest. It's completely different than actually claiming something CONTRARY to what we actually know, like that god helped you find your keys.
Why do you insist upon saying that the jury is still out on theism, and by that i mean a belief in a "God", whether that "God" be Christian, Muslim, Jew, Hindu, etc? There are so many ways to proof the non-existance of a "God" that can't and doesn't give a flying fuck about people and their lives on this Earth. You are either being dishonest or you really don't have a clue yourself. If you don't have a clue, then stop criticizing others who also don't have a clue. If you feel comfortable in your belief as an 'atheist', then stand firm in your belief and counter the absurd agruments that theists put forth, without leaving space that there may be something that we don't know about this thing called 'life' that may include the possibility of a "god".
What you need to understand is that more than 99% of the people on this planet believe in some sort of 'god'. You are not going to change their mind through this website. And more importantly, you are not going to change the minds of your family and friends (Jeff being one) through your attempted discourse on the matter. Try to find peace in your understanding and belief in your personal mental analysis of the information you have processed. Live your life like you have a firm grip on at least what doesn't make sense, even if you don't know what does make sense. By continuing to eliminate the falsehoods, you will get closer to the truth you seek. That is the best you can hope for, with the exception, as Kenny Rogers says in "The Gambler", 'is to die in your sleep'.
My goodness…such fury!
I guess we should sit down and I can explain to you that there's no way to absolutely disprove someone's concept of god. We can explain how illogical, contradictory or possibly immoral it is, but there's no way to say with 100% certainty that there is no god. Do I believe there is one? No, I don't. But that is completely separate from my understanding that it's entirely possible for a god to exist that we have no way of knowing about. The same goes for whether or not we live in "The Matrix". I can say that there's no rational reason to believe that we live in the Matrix, but that doesn't mean we can absolutely say that it doesn't exist. The only thing we can be near 100% certain with is that we exist…everything else is just our best estimate based on what we're aware of at the moment.
I think the percentage of people that believe in a god is closer to 80-90% worldwide, but anyway, my objective with this website is simply to provide a countering viewpoint on topics that have historically been one-sided. I don't write with the intent to change the minds of everyone in that 90%, but to hopefully provide a new viewpoint to people in a world where ideas like those presented on my site are fairly hard to come by.
Let me ask you something though: How do you think I came to understand the world as I have? Of course a large chunk of it has come from my own ideas and interpretation of the things I've experienced, but it also has everything to do with the exchange of information from other people. I read other information about religion or race, and my own understanding of them is changed by it. It's through this exchange of information that made me who I am, and I think it's only fair to continue the sharing of information with others, which is what I am doing with this site.
It's so easy to just say shut up and sit down, but if everyone with something to say was muzzled, I think we'd be in an even worse state right now. The internet has allowed me to connect to people around the world and I have visitors from other countries daily on this site. You can't discount the positive impact that one person can have on the lives of other people, and while I realize from the get-go that I'm not going to change the entire world, but if I can reach even one person and allow them to see things from a different perspective, then I think that's more than worth the effort.
I think we’re basically arguing over what it means to be dishonest.
If I’m understanding you correctly, you’re saying that dishonesty is believing or claiming something that’s contrary to what we all know. My problem with that is that we don’t all know the same things. To me, being dishonest is saying or claiming something contrary to what you believe.
Let’s say a kid thinks Santa Claus is real, and tells his friend Santa Claus is coming to town. To me, that’s not dishonest, even if “we all” know Santa Claus isn’t real.
Now let’s say that kid grows up and keeps believing in Santa Claus, even though Santa Claus never shows up. But now, everyone thinks he’s crazy, or stupid, so he starts saying “Santa Claus isn’t real” even though he secretly believes Santa’s coming. To me, that’s dishonest, even if he’s now claiming something “we all” know.
So I think as long as you’re saying what you really believe , you’re being honest. I agree that Christians are a little unreasonable, but I don’t think it’s fair to say they’re being dishonest.
Now I’m an atheist, so when I went to church a few months ago, and told people I believed in God, THAT was dishonest.
You’re right that we don’t all know the same things, but you’d be hard pressed to find someone in this country that believes our planet is flat (I’m sure there are plenty of these people, but I don’t know any), yet the Bible actually says it is, and yet they still believe that the Bible is the inerrant word of God. That’s the dishonesty I’m talking about. When you’re PRESENTED with evidence that the earth is spherical and you continue to try and justify the Bible as if it doesn’t say you can see all the kingdoms of the world from a mountain, then that’s being dishonest.
I agree that the kid that thinks Santa is real isn’t dishonest. I also agree that an adult that believes in Santa or an adult that DOES, but claims not to, are both dishonest.
I don’t agree that as long as you’re saying what you believe that you’re being dishonest. We know certain things about our world now that contradict with the stories of the Bible, but they have convinced themselves that the bible is the truth DESPITE our knowledge that we can’t walk on water or resurrect from the dead. That’s the kind of dishonesty I’m talking about.