Why do you believe, what you believe?

[Aksannyi]

I believe in God and you might be able to consider me moderately religious, but it really doesn't have much affect on my political beliefs. For example, I am mostly against abortion (while understanding why it needs to be kept legal) but my beliefs stem from the fact that I'm a mother and I'm very sensitive. Simply put: it hurts my heart to think about a life not given the chance to grow. It has nothing to do with what God has to say.

If anything, I really hate the way God has become represented in politics. I would probably be considered more conservative than anything else, but I do not like feeling like a part of an organization which, at the extreme, uses God to justify any amount of bigotry and stupidity. (Let's teach abstinence instead of birth control, let's keep the gays from marrying, as examples of bigotry and stupidity.)

[Dolmen]

I do not adhere to the concept of religion, and feel all religions are the equivalent of fairy tales. Politically I'm definitely more fiscally Republican, as I believe social issues have zero place in politics.

[Kuya]

Social issues have zero place in politics?

[Tagus]

German Lutheran here... I think I'm starting to realize that I believe in the philosophical concepts of religion, i.e. that we should all be nice to each other, but the actual heaven/hell/God/Devil concept is only conceivably acceptable in an allusionary (to quote a definition of the word allusionary - a circumstance where the subject finds himself in the presence of something entirely beyond his grasp. I would add that if the word “transcendent” has any meaning it is here — it designates the absolute, unbridgeable chasm yawning between the subject and being, insofar as being evades every attempt to pin it down) and therefore argueably "fairy tale" sense.

Politik-wise, who f'ing knows, we're all fucked. That's pretty much my view.

[Conrad]

I do not adhere to the concept of religion, and feel all religions are the equivalent of fairy tales. Politically I'm definitely more fiscally Republican, as I believe social issues have zero place in politics.

Er...

[Nevex]

I'll never understand all this hatred towards religion. Unless you're unlucky enough to live in one of those countries where you don't get to choose, nobody is forcing you to believe in anything.
Religion has and will always be the ultimate tool to keep the masses in check. Despite all the negative things associated to it, its good qualities cannot be understated (inbefore "what good qualities?").

[Kuya]

This thread is amazing.

[kuronosan]

I'll never understand all this hatred towards religion. Unless you're unlucky enough to live in one of those countries where you don't get to choose, nobody is forcing you to believe in anything.
Religion has and will always be the ultimate tool to keep the masses in check. Despite all the negative things associated to it, its good qualities cannot be understated (inbefore "what good qualities?").

Nobody really questions the good qualities of any religion. The problem is that people don't focus on the tenants which make a religion 'good'. They focus on what makes everyone else's wrong.

[Atreides]

I think you can divide every human in the world into 1 of 2 groups: those that view compassion as a strength, and those that view it as a weakness.

Our goal as a society should be to alleviate suffering, to let it continue or actively cause it is to squander one of humanity's defining characteristics, whether it comes from god or evolution is irrelevant.

[Uzor]

I believe what I believe because of my past experiences and what I consider myself to know. Based on this, I've made my own opinions on various matters (such as religion and politics).

Religion for example. I do not consider myself an atheist, but yet I do not believe in any god (nor am I a Buddhist). Why? Because in my opinion, Atheism by itself is a religion too. Atheism is, by its definition, the belief that there is no God(s). I can't in good will say there is no God, because I simply don't know if there is a god or not as it is impossible to scientifically prove there is no god, just as how one can't scientifically prove there is no god. To me, saying God doesn't exist would make me a hypocrite, because I can't prove whether he exists or not. And if something can't be proven, you can't claim it to be true. For the same reason, I refuse to devote myself to a deity that I can't prove exists. As such, I don't consider myself belonging to any religion (including Atheism). This doesn't mean I'm "unsure" whether or not God exists, I just don't have proof whether he does or not, and until I have proof of either, I don't care. There's evidence supporting the evolution theory, so at the very least he didn't create us 10000 years ago.

My values, opinions and morals, as I stated before, are based on what I consider myself to know with certainty, my previous experiences, and how I was raised. My parents taught me that violence is wrong, for example. It is important to ask yourself what knowledge is, though. A lot of "knowledge" you learn are things other people teach, such as your teacher. This knowledge is, in turn, taught that person by something else. Just because you learn something, doesn't necessarily mean it is true. If your parents teach you God exist, does that mean that knowledge is, beyond a shadow of a doubt, true? Just because I consider myself to know something, does not make conflicting knowledge from someone else is wrong, for all I know I may be wrong and misinformed. I always question what I consider myself to know, and as such can evolve my opinions and moral values - or completely change them based on new information. I love learning new things and analyzing every possible aspect of a theory or information in order to see whether it can be true or not, as what you're taught or learn is rarely the entire truth.

As you can see, I don't consider the human brain to be very reliable, as we almost always assume what we know and what we think is the entire truth - which is far from accurate. There's as many truths as people involved in a story, and there's as many opinions as there are people on earth, neither is more correct than the other. We often assume what we experience is true, but just because I see the grass as one shade of green doesn't mean everyone else see it in the exact same shade, so I can't in good conscious claim I am more correct.

Edit: I find the concept of knowledge to be intriguing. Exactly who decides, and what is, knowledge? Is the skill of how to survive in a forest or how to mix the best drinks any more (or less) important than history or math?

[vadre]

I had this discussion about Atheism with some roomies a while back and I fail to see how it's a religion. The chain of thought saying simply 'believing' in something makes it a religion doesn't make sense in itself, you wouldn't say there's a religion of Santa because kids believe in it, would you?
People seem to have the wrong idea about it, I wouldn't say as an Atheist I focus on the fact there is no god, I simply feel there's an absense of a higher power. It's not a belief so much as taking what we see around us to be fact. Furthermore, I fail to see how not thinking there's a god makes you a hypocrite? In a similar vein, how is being religious hypocritical?

How I view atheism crudely is, for example when looking at the universe, you might have matter, or no matter. You don't have to believe in the 'no matter' because there's nothing to believe in. It's just an empty space.

Saying that, I WISH I believed in a god or something because it would make the reality of life a bit easier on the brain, but it just seems too crazy to believe.

[Matricide]

Because it makes sense to me and I tend to be a logical and calculated person.

Short and sweet?

[Uzor]

Its hypocritical to me, because I live by the philosophy that I do not assume something to be true without evidence or experiences to support it. If I say there is a God, it would be hypocritical of me, because I don't have any evidence or experience to support it. If I say there is no God, it would be hypocritical of me because I don't have any evidence to support it (while I could argue to have experience with it). I'm not saying its hypocritical to believe in God, I'm saying it would be hypocritical of me to say one or the other. Personally I don't understand how people can believe in a God since there's no evidence to support their existance, but that's just my own opinion, and I could say the same about people who believe there is no God, but I have an easier time understanding that as I lack experience of any influence of a God in my life. That is not to say that my own opinion is correct - and to be entirely honest I do understand HOW people can believe in a God, I just fail to grasp the concept of why they choose to believe in something without any evidence to support it. It would be like believing in Santa Clause at the age of 40, when there's no evidence to support his existence. But to each their own.

My question is, though, how can you know for a fact that there is no God? Take a table for example. You might see the table as a green square, but is it always a green square under all circumstances? Does all life experience it as a green square? If an ant walk on the side of the table, he would experience it as a line rather than a square, and one could argue whether or not ants can experience green. Can you really say that what you experience to be fact is fact for everyone, and is what you believe yourself to know always true?

Earth is another example, we perceive it to be flat, but viewed at a greater distance its suddenly not flat anymore. So you experience it being flat, but you have evidence to the contrary. If you haven't personally seen it be round, can you really trust second-hand experience of it being round, as for all you know, that person could be lying to you. There's a lot of situations where experience and evidence don't necessarily agree, but you still assume one or the other to be true. This does not mean that it is the whole truth, or that its even true at all, as you trust the other person knows what they're talking about.

[Kerberoz]

My question is, though, how can you know for a fact that there is no God? Take a table for example. You might see the table as a green square, but is it always a green square under all circumstances? Does all life experience it as a green square? If an ant walk on the side of the table, he would experience it as a line rather than a square, and one could argue whether or not ants can experience green. Can you really say that what you experience to be fact is fact for everyone, and is what you believe yourself to know always true?

Also, I don't believe that morality (or free will) exists, and because of that, I don't waste time thinking about it. I can't prove that any decision I make wasn't predetermined by the chaotic system governing the physics that make up my brain.

[Tagus]

The biggest problem, is that people think it matters what they think.

[Uzor]

Also, I don't believe that morality (or free will) exists, and because of that, I don't waste time thinking about it. I can't prove that any decision I make wasn't predetermined by the chaotic system governing the physics that make up my brain.

Interestingly enough, imagining the future supposedly activates the same parts of the brain as remembering the past. Does that mean you remember what will happen?

[Kuya]

No

[Acturus]

I think you can divide every human in the world into 1 of 2 groups: those that view compassion as a strength, and those that view it as a weakness.

There are three types of people in this world, those who can count, and those who can't.

[Tsuko_Asura]

I'll never understand all this hatred towards religion. Unless you're unlucky enough to live in one of those countries where you don't get to choose, nobody is forcing you to believe in anything.
Religion has and will always be the ultimate tool to keep the masses in check. Despite all the negative things associated to it, its good qualities cannot be understated (inbefore "what good qualities?").

u serious bro?

No, but really, I'm hardly one of the anti-religion activists on this forum(while still being anti-religion, mind you), but this is ludicrous. If religion keeps anyone in check, its because religion itself put them in a position where they needed to be kept in check. To use an outlandish(and non-literal) example, religion is like a highly-addictive drug: you didn't need it to begin with, but it was brought into your life regardless. Now that you have it, you don't know how to function without it.

[Penthesilea]

god damn I can't stand Kuya's sexuality/gender discourse. Who cares who fucks what, as long as both whats want whatever the fuck they're doing? Sexuality/gender whatever shit doesn't matter to me, it shouldn't matter to anyone else either.