Registered: Sep 2000
Location: Playa d'en London
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GOD / religion / meaning of life?

Where is God?

Does he exist within another dimension? Is he around us, within us? How did he *create* matter, when matter can neither be created nor destroyed? If God does exist on the other side of the universe, how does he look at what we do every minute of our lives? Does he have astonishingly good eyesight and the ability to turn back time so he can check up on every bushman in Africa and every Indian in Peru? Or does he delegate this duty to his spirit guardians who secretly live on earth?

Am I getting ridiculous enough for you yet?

Because that's what organised religion asks us to believe, even if we opt not to believe in Creationism.

There is no reason whatsoever for God to need to exist. At least in the form we (human race) perceive him in. Other than the "he does because we say so" logic from religions all over the world.

The concept of God came about when people thought we were the centre of the universe. We had to find a meaning to everything that occurred.

(I would talk about the ‘gods of eden’ angle regarding alien intervention at this point but I think I’ve bored to many people in the past with my conspiracy theories on the brotherhood of the snake...)

Faith.

After all, what are those speckly things in the sky at night that blink at you?

What is that thunderous roar from the clouds whenever it rains?

We *now* know all this stuff, but 100,000, 50,000 20,000, & even 2000 years ago we had no idea. People use to (most still do) believe that we're basically the centre of the universe.

We are not the centre of the universe (obviously) and its probable that hundreds of thousands of civilisations came and went in our solar system and others, (and in other galaxies) before we blossomed on planet earth.

But despite this scepticism some people like to believe there is a higher being. In fact, even I believe that something/someone must have created creation. Something triggered the big bang. But its intentions were not to cater for us and us alone – and whatever it is, it is not as simplistic of a ‘being’ to grasp as the religions of this world make it out to be. It isn’t a bloke with a white beard. He didn’t make us in his image.

Religion is a device to control the masses. A direction. But just because 100 million people pray at night to a ‘god’ doesn’t make it divine and true. What of the religions that have long since died? If a God is worshipped and the race that worship him then ceases to exist, so does that god. Some god.

Of course, I’m aware of the argument that if there is a god there’s only ONE and every race/creed on earth simply has a different way of perceiving him and worshipping him

Bollocks.

Compare Christianity with Islam.

What ever ‘it’ is. Whatever ‘god’ is...the magnitude of understanding its very existence, its very being would be (is) impossible for the human mind to comprehend. Could you explain what existed before time its self? What existed before the beginning of existence? Is there such a thing as a beginning? What is nothingness? Is there something that designed the universe? Is there a masterplan?

People can say, "just because evolution happened & we now have proof the big bang occurred, doesn't mean God couldn't have instigated the big bang"... but even ignoring the creationistic side of the argument, the existence of a god goes totally against the laws of physics & chemistry. But then so what? Maybe the laws of physics and chemistry are god’s laws. But the underlying point is that we have a limited perception of the universe and everything in it. And this is simply because we see it through our eyes.

Ok. I feel I’m on the road to contradiction. I best sum up:

Just because we cannot see something or understand something, doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. In other words:

Mr X: Prove God exists.
Mr Y: Prove he doesn’t.

The same argument can be made for almost anything that is unexplainable regarding the universe and time.

Religion is a means of making the very existence of life and death easier for people to accept. It is flawed and does nothing to help us understand the meaning of life. We trust in faith, but faith gives us no answers.

You could put any theory forward and claim it to be the truth. Just get enough people to * believe* in it.

I don’t know. Maybe ‘god’ IS the universe and everything in it, including us.

Maybe religion isn’t a bad thing. Faith can’t be bad, can it? Hope is good…Actually, fuck that. How many wars spawn from religious disputes? Man has fought each other since day one over religion. It’s been the one constant since the beginning. We are destructive. And with all the devastation, what does your beloved god do?

He sprinkles sugar on his popcorn, sits back, watches...and does fuck all.


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I'm not dumb. I just have a command of thoroughly useless information.
- Calvin (and Hobbes)

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Registered: Jul 2000
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42

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sp00ky
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Disclaimer
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I am not expecting to change anything by this post other than awareness. Please do not take anything I say as fact, I am only relaying opinon of limited sources, who themselves know nothing and thus should also be ignored as heresay and could never be admissable in a court of law.

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thank you for stating your IQ but its not relevant to the topic.

quote:

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Originally posted by Spooky:
42

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quote:

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Originally posted by urbanjunkie:
thank you for stating your IQ but its not relevant to the topic.

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ooo you bitch. I would have replied properly, but I can't beb bothered at the moment coz I am working on the mother of allposts on a similar subject at home.

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sp00ky
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Disclaimer
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I am not expecting to change anything by this post other than awareness. Please do not take anything I say as fact, I am only relaying opinon of limited sources, who themselves know nothing and thus should also be ignored as heresay and could never be admissable in a court of law.

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oh great. heres me trying to start up a serious topic for discussion (one that doesnt involve farting or dildos) and eveyone blanks it out. i bet your topic gets 10,000 replies or something.


damn you sp00ky damn you to hell !!


(ps. i like the farting and dildo threads)

quote:

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Originally posted by Spooky:
ooo you bitch. I would have replied properly, but I can't beb bothered at the moment coz I am working on the mother of allposts on a similar subject at home.

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Good post. The lack of replies is more indicitive of a lack of attention span on behalf of most of our members versus quality of post, methinks. This would have made a terrific User Update though.

I kept finding points I was going to quote and disagree with, but you kept going backwards on them.

In the end, I guess I agree with most everything you said, though I am not quite sure what your final conclusion was.

In regards to this though.

Maybe religion isn’t a bad thing. Faith can’t be bad, can it? Hope is good…Actually, fuck that. How many wars spawn from religious disputes? Man has fought each other since day one over religion. It’s been the one constant since the beginning. We are destructive. And with all the devastation, what does your beloved god do?

You have to weigh that with one thing:

How many people have gotten meaning from religion? How many people were given a sense of purpose, of relief, of hope, from their idea of religion? How many people have seen their quality of life raised because of religion? How many lives have been made worth living, or at least MORE worth living, because of the comfort of religion?

That's pretty hard to weigh, to be sure, but it certainly bears consideration.

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This is probably because as much as I believe in something, I always try arguing for the other side to test how strong my argument is.

In this case, the fact that I lack a true conclusion would indicate that I still have some soul searching to do. My conclusion is probably based around the fact that I believe that maybe there is a divine god of sorts – but are interpretations of him/it/her/whatever are not correct. And mankind’s view of its self is profoundly selfish.

Also I hate the fact that I’m forever getting into arguments with religious people who are quite comfortable in dismissing possible alien civilisations in other parts of the solar system and that we were probably not the first intelligent life to exist in this universe – but they are quite happy to place their faith in the concept of an all-mighty god snapping his fingers and creating everything for their benefit.

Maybe our interpretations on faith, god and the universe will evolve in generations to come. And our understanding of the universe will be more precise and dare I say…. scientific.

Also:

You highlighted something I completely chose to ignore - ‘meaning of religion’ – and I agree with you. I was blind to the positives and just concentrated on the negatives.

quote:

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Originally posted by Paint CHiPs:


I kept finding points I was going to quote and disagree with, but you kept going backwards on them.

In the end, I guess I agree with most everything you said, though I am not quite sure what your final conclusion was.

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quote:

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Also I hate the fact that I’m forever getting into arguments with religious people who are quite comfortable in dismissing possible alien civilisations in other parts of the solar system

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quote:

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Originally posted by urbanjunkie:
This is probably because as much as I believe in something, I always try arguing for the other side to test how strong my argument is.

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quote:

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Originally posted by urbanjunkie:
Mr X: Prove God exists.
Mr Y: Prove he doesn’t.

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I don't claim a god belief, someone else does.

The onus is quite clearly on them to prove his existance.

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A closed mouth gathers no feet.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Paint CHiPs:


Has religion been a help or a hindrance to our civilization?

And why.

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any way you choose to look at it, religion has helped our civilization. if you believe in something, it gives you confidence and encourages you to go on. the suicide rate for nihilists is very high. and religion is one of the major factors that caused our country to come into being in the first place- our ancestors fled to this place to avoid religious persecution.

and even if you DON'T believe in god, the fact that religion exists gives you something to compete against. if it wasn't for skeptics, we wouldn't have science.


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Don't walk on the edge of the cliff, jump! Who knows, you just might fly. And if you don't fly, make lots of noise on the way down... MTC

[This message has been edited by morgana (edited 04-18-2001).]

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More killing has been done in the name of god (or as a direct result of a differing of faiths) than for any other reason.

If everyone on earth either shared the same religion or had no religion, much suffering and deaths would never have happened.

Notwithstanding the above, I'm not doubting it's value in other areas to people.

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quote:

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Originally posted by morgana:

any way you choose to look at it, religion has helped our civilization. if you believe in something, it gives you confidence and encourages you to go on. the suicide rate for nihilists is very high.
But you should probably factor in the possibility that in a society without religion, people might actually build self-reliance and not need the crutch of religion. As it is, from birth society a religious society tries to convince people that they need to rely on God for whatever. All you hear is "God loves you, god has a plan, god will make things turn out right..." to the point where some people actually start expecting God to do everything for them, and so they don't develop the self-reliance to get along in the world. When God lets them down, they're so crushed they're convinced that there is nothing, and kill themselves. (Blah.. i don't know shit, I'm just rambling...)

and religion is one of the major factors that caused our country to come into being in the first place- our ancestors fled to this place to avoid religious persecution.
Yup. Religious persecution. That's a good thing, right? Perhaps if we hadn't been so wrapped up in the need for religion, we might've focused on improving our lives instead of squabbling over who's right about what'll happen after we die.

and even if you DON'T believe in god, the fact that religion exists gives you something to compete against. if it wasn't for skeptics, we wouldn't have science.
Yeah, and for ages, religion was persecuting scientists as "heretics", greatly delaying the progression of human knowledge and setting science back quite a bit. Consider how far scientists might have gone by now if they didn't have religious people killing them for challenging their precious beliefs.

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Umm.. I'm just playing devil's advocate here. I'm not entirely sure I agree with everything, but I felt the need to ramble.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Roshigoth:
Umm.. I'm just playing devil's advocate here. I'm not entirely sure I agree with everything, but I felt the need to ramble.

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Thanks. Mostly, I lost track of what I was saying, so I figured I'd cover my ass.

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James Madison, who took a leading role in shaping The United States Constitution, wrote as follows:

"What influence in fact have Christian ecclesiastical establishments had on civil society? In many instances they have been upholding the thrones of political tyranny. In no instance have they been seen as the guardians of the liberties of the people. Rulers who wished to subvert the public liberty have found in the clergy convenient auxiliaries. A just government, instituted to secure and perpetuate liberty, does not need the clergy."

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Susan B. Anthony wrote: (And I love this one!)

"I was born a heretic. I always distrust people who know so much about what God wants them to do to their fellows."

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I am mori-mans mate and I have a theory on life. God and the Universe. If you imagine the Universe and everything in existence as an orange and understand that we are just a tiny part of that orange just as we are a tiny part of everything in existence. Then you have to appreciate that we being only a tiny part of the whole do not have the ability to understand what makes up and what thw whole really is 1.e the whole orange and the whole of existence. All we can do is believe that we are part of somthing much greater than us and appreciate that everyone around us is just as much a part of that great thing in which we believe as each other, Call it God Allah or whatever. Believe is more special tham knowledge thiers nothing special about knowing somthing for a fact, there is somthing special about beliving in somthing for which you have no empirical evidence. Therefore the answer is to stop questioning you are to insignificant to be able to find the answers, just believe and respect the whole and everyone who is a part of it.

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oh for fucks sake

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quote:

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Originally posted by mori-man:
I am mori-mans mate...

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quote:

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Originally posted by mori-man:
If you imagine the Universe and everything in existence as an orange...

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however, i disagree on some aspects (sorry its mori-man back again, she insisted on posting something, her name is pippa and she is from the north (near liverpool) this is what english teachers are like here.

all science is belief, nothing can be emopirically proved, all is the notion of somebody who has set experiments which prove the notion, no matter how much people protest their indifference its impossible to realise.

And all that has been proved to have been fact through time, has not been proved to the origin, ie gravity yes it has pulling power, but from whence did it come, we have onlt observed it in a planets lifetime in our section of the universe.

now my head hurts




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oh for fucks sake

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