Religion question?

estebanrey said:
the question to whether you actively believe or not in God is a binary choice, you have to answer yes or no
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estebanrey said:
Q) Does god exist
Here you can either say yes, no or I don't know.
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Damn and all this time I thought binary was base 2...

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estebanrey said:
ubersonic said:
I don't believe in a god
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Then you are an atheist.
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Congratulations! you can quote part of something completely out of context!

What I said was "I don't believe in a god but neither do I believe the is no god so I'm not religious or an atheist." >.>

For reference I'm agnostic.
 
ubersonic said:
Congratulations! you can quote part of something completely out of context!

What I said was "I don't believe in a god but neither do I believe the is no god so I'm not religious or an atheist." >.>

For reference I'm agnostic.
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I'd ask the same question as above, are you agnostic about fairies or is this exclusively about deities?
 
Angilion said:
A lovely non-sequitor..
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Well we are never going to get a perfect example are we with something like this. Including your adaption.

Now how about you go ahead and answer my question? You know the big one you are ducking. How do you demonstrate and prove the world is anything but a figment of your imagination.
 
fluffmct said:
I know we've talked about religion before but I still struggle with your position here. If we were to discuss the existence of fairies, would you still sit on the fence? Genuinely curious and not trying to be obtuse by the way
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Well the difference between the concept of God and that of Fairies is that the Fairies (as in the ones at the bottom of your Garden) are well defined and therefore we can be more specific in how we attribute truth values to them...for example, it is a relatively easy thing to demonstrate that modern ideas of Faires (as in the bottom of the garden variety) are derived not from any specific religious claims or concepts, but to Medieval, Shakespearean and Victorian folk-tales....Broadly however we do not really know the origin of such concepts, but there are quite a few and not all of which are supernatural or related to Deities (pagan or otherwise). Mythologies such as the Tuatha Dé Danann for example could be defined in either supernatural or natural terms depending on how you want to perceive it.

In all cases, I am open to discuss various positions and hypotheses without feeling I have to necessitate an ultimate truth value to them in any definitive way.
 
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ubersonic said:
Damn and all this time I thought binary was base 2...
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:D

He's trinary. A yes/no three way decision and trying to force opinions about it onto people :D

The most damning thing about atheists is they are as guilty of forcing their position onto people as religious folks are.
 
Castiel said:
Well the difference between the concept of God and that of Fairies is that the Fairies (as in the ones at the bottom of your Garden) are well defined and therefore we can be more specific in how we attribute truth values to them...for example, it is a relatively easy thing to demonstrate that modern ideas of Faires (as in the bottom of the garden variety) are derived not from any specific religious claims or concepts, but to Medieval, Shakespearean and Victorian folk-tales....Broadly however we do not really know the origin of such concepts, but there are quite a few and not all of which are supernatural or related to Deities (pagan or otherwise). Mythologies such as the Tuatha Dé Danann for example could be defined in either supernatural or natural terms depending on how you want to perceive it.

In all cases, I am open to discuss various positions and hypotheses without feeling I have to necessitate an ultimate truth value to them in any definitive way.
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I'm not sure that I agree that fairies are well defined, but it's an arbritrary example and I think you can see where I'm going with it without me having to spell it out.

My point was exactly that we don't have to conclude an ultimate truth value, but a practical truth value - by that I mean we take a binary decision on it so that we can have conversations and live our lives (much like my example earlier with the sunrise). If we question things to the extent of never asserting any practical truth (and no one ever does) then we can't possibly function and if we do debate any ultimate truth on any subject then we assume practical truths as a common ground.
 
fluffmct said:
Ridiculous statement. Atheism doesn't have anything to do with how people express their opinions/beliefs
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Nor does religion.

That doesn't change anything though, they're as guilty as each other. That doesn't mean they all do, I know some very reasonable religious folk.
 
fluffmct said:
I'm not sure that I agree that fairies are well defined, but it's an arbritrary example and I think you can see where I'm going with it without me having to spell it out.
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The oft used example in these kind of discussions are, as are Unicorns and so on.....I mentioned the Tuatha to show that it isn't as simple as judging one concept against another.

fluffmct said:
My point was exactly that we don't have to conclude an ultimate truth value, but a practical truth value - by that I mean we take a binary decision on it so that we can have conversations and live our lives (much like my example earlier with the sunrise). If we question things to the extent of never asserting any practical truth (and no one ever does) then we can't possibly function and if we do debate any ultimate truth on any subject then we assume practical truths as a common ground.
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Whether you believe or disbelieve in any particular God or even adjudge the concept itself to have any meaning at all makes no difference to the practical way you live your life (as in everything there are exceptions).

It is largely a philosophical question that needs no practical value attributed to it. For example I can easily say that I do not accept the premise that God is a Human personification as that which Michaelangelo painted for example (and I can offer a range of complex reasoning why I hold that opinion), without that impacting on the overall neutral position that "God exists or not" that is inherent in agnosticism. The same way I can dispute the existence of tinkerbell in my rosebushes without that impacting or defining a position on every aspect of Fairies or the Folklore they are derived from.

To make another example....If we take the Norse God Thor, I can say I do not believe in Thor without that meaning I do not believe in the existence of God(s), it simply means that for whatever reasoning I supply, I feel that the way that the God concept is defined as Thor (or the Norse Pantheon collectively) is erroneous. That doesn't mean God doesn't exist (or does for that matter) in my world-view, neither does it imply that I have expressed any practical (or ultimate) position on whether God exists. It only means that I do not accept that particular expression or definition of the concept. (I would supply reasoning why this was the case to support such a position)
 
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It's very easy to be an atheist, in practice and argument. It's very difficult to believe in well anything not explained by science, despite its very recent appearance. Science is just how stuff works. It's as though thousands of years of belief has just been wiped. I guess that's Darwins fault, due to Origins stark opposition to The Bible, which isn't a literal text anyway.
 
Gilly said:
Nor does religion.

That doesn't change anything though, they're as guilty as each other. That doesn't mean they all do, I know some very reasonable religious folk.
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Yea?

I can't say I've ever seen an athiest preaching in the street, unlike the christian moron I see shouting in town all the time.
 
Gilly said:
Nor does religion.

That doesn't change anything though, they're as guilty as each other. That doesn't mean they all do, I know some very reasonable religious folk.
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Did I say religion does or that you don't know reasonable religious folk? I was pointing out how ridiculous your statement was.
 
Castiel said:
To make another example....If we take the Norse God Thor, I can say I do not believe in Thor without that meaning I do not believe in the existence of God(s), it simply means that for whatever reasoning I supply, I feel that the way that the God concept is defined as Thor (or the Norse Pantheon collectively) is erroneous. That doesn't mean God doesn't exist (or does for that matter) in my world-view, neither does it imply that I have expressed any practical (or ultimate) position on whether God exists. It only means that I do not accept that particular expression or definition of the concept. (I would supply reasoning why this was the case to support such a position)
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That's a better way of explaining it than you have done previously. I'm not a fan of labels anyway but I do tend to associate with atheist just because it cuts most conversations on the topic shorter, and as you know the whole subject can get very muddy. It's not a great term and, despite what Gilly said, it has absolutely no bearing on anything else I think or believe.
 
fluffmct said:
Did I say religion does or that you don't know reasonable religious folk? I was pointing out how ridiculous your statement was.
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No, you didn't, but you made a statement unrelated to my point that I countered by mentioning religion and reasonable people. How have you missed that?
 
MeatSack said:
It's very easy to be an atheist, in practice and argument. It's very difficult to believe in well anything not explained by science, despite its very recent appearance. Science is just how stuff works. It's as though thousands of years of belief has just been wiped. I guess that's Darwins fault, due to Origins stark opposition to The Bible, which isn't a literal text anyway.
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Apologies for multiple posts but I just saw this and wasn't sure how to go back and edit for multi-quote.

I don't think you're doing yourself any favours with this reasoning; if I said that it's difficult to be racist in this day and age, does that make my argument stronger? We use science (and I'm assuming you mean critical thinking, reason and logic within this) to determine every truth in life because it is the only model we have. I have no problem with people believing whatever they want but when it encroaches or my life in a negative way then I have to question whether I accept that and whether those people should be justifying what they believe
 
fluffmct said:
That's a better way of explaining it than you have done previously. I'm not a fan of labels anyway but I do tend to associate with atheist just because it cuts most conversations on the topic shorter, and as you know the whole subject can get very muddy. It's not a great term and, despite what Gilly said, it has absolutely no bearing on anything else I think or believe.
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I try to address stated positions such as atheism etc.. from the context in which they are either used or what type of position the person(s) who call themselves an atheist (or other term) are trying to convey.

As I said earlier, the terms have a broad spectrum of definitions and it is better to deal with what the person is saying in context than get all tied up in the semantics of terms and their attribution.
 
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