Posted: Mar 07, 2012 9:10 am
DefineGod wrote:Define pray.
Like i said, I'm very pragmatic. So to me, praying is the action of speaking to an entity, asking him/her/it something. Food, love, money, anything. Or thanking him for what he/she/it supposedly provided you. Is that what you do in your "meditations" ?
DefineGod wrote:
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/spinoza/#GodNat[/url] Under the section 2.1 God and Nature, there is a section on how belief in miracles is more likely ignorance of cause. A more consistent view of God would claim that "miracles" or exceptions to laws is less, rather than more, congruent to an omnipresent being.
I was more speaking about Christian miracles, like the virgin birth, Jesus' resurrection, the flood, etc.
DefineGod wrote:
What do you mean by believe in the Bible? Are you trying to ask me if I take literalistic interpretation? I have spend some time with Genesis. Its fun stuff when you look at it through my lens.
{Hey self!, who you calling crazy! }
yes, it's what i meant
All christians and catholics on this planet have different percentage of literalistic interpretation of the bible. What's your percentage ? From what i read from you so far I don't think you believe it's entirely true. So what do you think is true in the bible ?DefineGod wrote:
I am wrong. I don't mean to imply atheism is set of of beliefs, practices or actions. What I should have said is: atheism is an abstract term used to describe what someone is not. I should have gone on to say, that everyone behaves. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Applied_behavior_analysis#Behavior Using the dead man's test, atheism is not behavior. Since as you magnanimously granted my use of the word "faith" (without necessarily accepting its meaning of course) I can only hope you will extend this to my question. What do atheists have faith in?
Aggie already answered that question, so I'll just quote her :
Agrippina wrote:
Trying to get atheists to agree to a set system would be the same as trying to standardize the behavior of cats.
DefineGod wrote:
This is a very good point! Why is it important at all? I live my life, you live yours. You find comfort in religion, I find it the opium of the masses. There are so many sides to this question. I don't want to limit this as a "What's the meaning of life?" type question. As a pragmatic man, would you build your own car? of course not! Why build my own religion when there are so many good ones to choose from? (I drive a biodiesel Mercedes, because I like the smell of popcorn.) I see the importance of your question. I understand symbols to exist all around us. I simply choose God as the one I "worship" (read-respect)
Ok, fair enough, but that doesn't really answer my question. If god is just a symbol, why do you worship him ?