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Originally Posted by drkpower  But you, I and everyone else bases their lives on unprovable feelings; love, instinct...... We cannot prove how these feelings are created. There is no scientific paper that tells me why I love someone. But I get married, have children and would lay my lfe down for these people I love. Should I abandon this belief because I cannot show you how it occurred and cannot independently verify its existence? |
"Love" and "Hate" and "greed" and "jealousy" etc. exist; we just can't ultimately define them scientifically. I didn't say "scientific evidence" though. I would take any evidence: let's say "historical evidence". You have historical evidence for "love". You have lots of evidence that your "love" exists. Think about it: how do you know that your wife loves you? Answer that question: there's your evidence.
Religion isn't an "emotion" though. It is a straightforward claim (or set of claim). It's a claim to know the mind of God. It's a claim that you know what God wants. It's a claim that you can speak to God.
Your "love" is an emotion. Now, if you said something like "my wife and I have an ultimate love and that love has lead us to understand many things about how the universe works", then it becomes like religion. Before that it is just a personal feeling, and it exists if you say so (and, to be honest, it generally doesn't matter to me or anyone else if it doesn't exist).
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So your certainty as to the non-existence of God or on the fact that others base their lives on such a belief is hypocritical.
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Saying that people base their lives on not believing something is like saying that "not collecting stamps" is a hobby. I don't go around looking for scientific explanations for everything (no-one does, we don't have the time). I couldn't build a car, or a computer, or put together a mobile phone, but I do trust in all these technologies (to the extent that I don't even consider that trust mostly). If I wanted to find out about them I could, of course, as other people do know about the science behind these things.
SO, why do I drive a car, or use a phone, or expect my computer to work every time I turn it on? Because I have lots of evidence that this is what happens, and that generally cars go, phones make calls, and computers work. It isn't scientific evidence, but it is evidence nonetheless. It isn't hypocrisy to not have scientific evidence for everything, it's simple pragmatism.
I don't have the same level of evidence for religion. People say God is good, all-powerful and all-knowing. Well, I look at the world and I see that that simply doesn't seem to be true. People say God created man. But, man, though he has the most advance brain that we know, is just an animal and was created by an evolutionary process. I've read the bible and it is full of inconsistencies. I see that people generally believe according to where they grow up and I see that "belief" has more to do with location than truth. I see thousands of religions. I have witnessed how cults can form quickly. I see how people can believe irrational things, and how they love conspiracies more than the truth. Prayer doesn't work. People say that they get healed but it's always internal healing (no regrowth of limbs for example). Really sh*tty things happen to good people. I could go on and on and on, but it seems clear to me from what I know that Christianity is no more true than Islam or Judaism or for that matter Scientology or Astrology.
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If they do not affect you, you shouldnt feel the need to demean them. If they do affect you, you have every right to criticise and even demean. But you choose to demean them all.
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Sorry, demean who? I think the belief that the Earth is flat is a silly belief. I think the belief that Astrology is true is a silly belief. I think the belief that God sent a son to Earth to save us from...well...er...Him is a silly belief. I don't go around seeking out people who believe these things, and I don't start conversations about these things when I do. However, if someone says that they believe that "condoms are evil" or that "homosexuality is immoral" or "Jesus died for my sins" I will, of course, correct them, and in the course of that correction point out that the general belief (knowing God's mind) is silly.
We can do that tomorrow. Most people would send their kids to non-religous schools if they were available and local. Just leave a few religous schools for those who really want to educate their children in that way.[/QUOTE]
4th April 2009
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