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Schultzz
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Atheism is more than not believing in God, it is the result of spiritual sickness.
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Just as theism is the result of intellectual sickness?
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Schultzz
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I am sure the ‘isms’ are part of the sickness. They are the symptoms. I do not know what intellectual sickness is. I believe a little knowledge can be dangerous, but real spiritual sickness cannot be helped by being intellectual.
It has to do with being honest with yourself. Not cash drawer honesty, but intrinsic honesty.
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Pax
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The most intelligent, assertive, and well educated are eminently successful and there is no need to list any of them by name. Simply look at the wealthy self made millionaires and you will find many examples. It could be easily argued that these successful people only engage in cooperation when it serves their purposes. They “use” and “game” your system of cooperation. The more subtle they are in doing so, the more successful they are.
I’ve known many gifted salesman. For them, it is all about the sale. They do not care about the customer, they care about the sale. They use whatever techniques are in their repetoire, and then some, to close the deal. They love making the deal…the harder the sell the more they like it. This is not cooperation; this is a challenge to be met and conquered.
Persuasion is frequently more important than cooperation. Those that are gifted at persuasion lead, make more money, influence people, get what they want, do what they want, and engage in cooperation and defection as it suits their own goals.
A person that is an atheist has no reason to follow any particular set of moral or ethical standards. They can pretty much do what they wish, if they have the necessary intelligence and talent do their own thing. The trick to cheating, defecting, and going against the grain is based in ability. Psychopaths are great examples of this. Many are never caught, and those that do get caught often roam free for extraordinary periods of time.
Cooperation is only for those that need it. Those that really don’t need it still use it when it is to their advantage. If the cooperation helps someone else, it is merely incidental to the situation. My point on this is self evident. Look at the rich and successful versus everyone else. Even if you took all of the wealth in the world and distributed it evenly among every adult world wide, the wealth would quickly move into the hands of a relatively few. This doesn’t happen because of cooperation. It is the result of competition which is frequently quite fierce and combative.
I see no reason why an atheist should follow any rules other than doing so when it ultimately serves his best interest. When breaking the rules serves the atheist’s self interest, then there is no reason not to break them. The only thing the atheist must do is be smart and weigh all of the possible outcomes to be certain that he/she maximizes their gains and minimizes the losses.
Unless you recognize a Supreme Being there is little reason to keep the rules except when it suits your purposes.
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I am honest with myself. If you were similarly honest with yourself, you would see that I do not believe because there has been nothing believable about your god presented to me.
Every one needed cooperation to get there. No man is an island.
I think this is how you see yourself if you were an atheist. If that is the case, then please, go on believing. I am an atheist and if you looked at my life you would find that I am somewhere in the mid-90[sup]th[/sup] percentile for intelligence. I don’t cheat. Plenty of theists do though. I just yesterday witnessed someone being caught trying to mislead a gov’t funder to the tune of 40000 bucks. He is a youth minister.
If you think all atheists are cheaters, you are so far from right you aren’t even wrong. Do you dare to look up the numbers of prison inmates by religious affiliation and see which group has the largest membership among criminals? I would bet that it is not ‘atheists’. My guess is one of the abrahamic faiths.
Again, you might be like the atheist you described, but I personally have found plenty of reason to be a cooperator instead of a defector.
Oh, and did you watch the video? Or just dismiss the idea because of my sloppy description?
Again, this seems to be how you would behave if you did not believe in a god.
It does not describe me, or any other atheist I know.
Are you sure you aren’t thinking of apatheists?
You say ‘recognize’ as if there were something to see. I know that there are many faiths available. How do you know you picked the right one?
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Schultzz
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I hope you do not think that I am trying to insult you because I am not but you did not understand what I said about being honest with yourself. You may be intelligent but I think you are NOT an atheist. Perhaps more an Agnostic looking for proof to be something else. Why on earth would you hang around here as you do knowing that you must “defend” your belief. The spirituality I am speaking of has nothing to do with religion. You have very little self-esteem therefore your ego is severly out of proportion to your self-esteem, - another sign of spiritual malady. Also, you seem to have a preoccupation with the expression “theist”. It is my opinion that you are losing your grip on what you think you believe you are. I am glad you hang around here. Keep coming back.I am honest with myself. If you were similarly honest with yourself, you would see that I do not believe because there has been nothing believable about your god presented to me.
Every one needed cooperation to get there. No man is an island.
I think this is how you see yourself if you were an atheist. If that is the case, then please, go on believing. I am an atheist and if you looked at my life you would find that I am somewhere in the mid-90[sup]th[/sup] percentile for intelligence. I don’t cheat. Plenty of theists do though. I just yesterday witnessed someone being caught trying to mislead a gov’t funder to the tune of 40000 bucks. He is a youth minister.
If you think all atheists are cheaters, you are so far from right you aren’t even wrong. Do you dare to look up the numbers of prison inmates by religious affiliation and see which group has the largest membership among criminals? I would bet that it is not ‘atheists’. My guess is one of the abrahamic faiths.
Again, you might be like the atheist you described, but I personally have found plenty of reason to be a cooperator instead of a defector.
Oh, and did you watch the video? Or just dismiss the idea because of my sloppy description?
Again, this seems to be how you would behave if you did not believe in a god.
It does not describe me, or any other atheist I know.
Are you sure you aren’t thinking of apatheists?
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Let’s see if you have stopped being insulting…
What could this be other than a personal attack?
Keep coming back if you can learn to stop being insulting just for the sake of it.
By the way, you are incorrect about my self-esteem. Why not try sticking to things that exist outside your imagination?
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Let’s review, shall we?
You said…
Now, unless you have evidence to support your assertions, they are whole cloth fabrications and can only be meant to insult.
I am not blind, and suggesting that I am blind to what you are saying suggests that I can’t read, or you can’t write what you mean. I favour the latter, since I have very good reason to believe that I can read.
Do you have evidence to present that I have very little self-esteem? If not, stop lying about me.
Do you have evidence that my ego is severly (is that even a word?) out of proportion to my self-esteem? If not, more lies and your credibility is plummeting.
Why not try speaking of things which have a life outside of your imagination? Then we can **both **understand you.
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1234
Guest
Well, most people allege that they are religious, which includes the sales people, the wealthy (some of them), politicians, who both lie and become wealthy–many people. There are very few rich and successful atheists who are ‘out’. If believing in a supreme being worked to promote ethics, we’d be living in a very ethical world! ALL of our politicians allege that they believe in a deity, and some of them really do, such as Mitt Romney, who is a Mormon. The vast majority of the peoples of the world are religious and many of them are very religious! Yet the world is a lousy place. Religion often leads to immorality and at best, does not appear to be a disincentive to evil, at least not for most persons.
Your definition of atheist is incorrect. An atheist does not believe in a deity. That is all. You assert that an atheist is amoral. I assert that there are strong moral and ethical standards for good conduct that don’t depend on belief in a deity. Cooperation is essential to success in any society. Upholding the social contract is the basis for civil behavior and when this breaks down, everyone suffers, including the wealthy. It’s getting harder and harder to cheat all the time, witness Gov. Spitzer in NY. For those successful cheaters in our society, you can bet that many of them are religious. One can use belief in a deity to justify any evil. It doesn’t serve anyone’s purpose to be known as an atheist.
You sound very cynical and embittered.
Psychopaths have a fundamental flaw in their psychological makeup when recognizes no other authority but themselves. Belief in a deity would not help them.
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…er…it was my firm impression that the RCC believes, in the doctrine of the transubstantiation, that the wafer* truly *becomes the flesh and blood of Christ. Not that it’s really f&b, that if it were tested, we’d have Christ’s DNA (that would be interesting…) but that the f&b is truly and really present, ie that it’s NOT just symbolic, as you said above. It’s a ‘mystery’…
…a lot of blood has been shed over this doctrine, this and ‘filioque’…
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I just found a great question in a signature on another board.
I don’t know just where it comes from, but…
I don’t know just where it comes from, but…
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I have always wondered why your god had to have the big dramatic story about hanging himself on a cross and having himself killed so that he could amend a rule that he himself made.
It always seemed like a lot of trouble that a truly omnipotent being would not have to go through. (forgetting for the moment how ridiculous the resurrection story is when held up against facts)
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NaturalEnquirer
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He didn’t change any rule. That is the entire point. Further, I don’t think it’s fair to say he “made” the rule, any more than he made his attributes of omnipotence and omniscience and so forth. The rules are outgrowths of God’s nature. I could be wrong about that, the theological waters get a little deep for me.
You have not supported your “ridiculous” assertion at all, as far as I can remember. You’ve demanded evidence, and you’ve received it, and you’ve not found it compelling. That’s fine. But it’s not the same thing as finding that the evidence actually supports the opposite case.
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Of course it is ridiculous to think that a human died for three days, then became alive again.He didn’t change any rule. That is the entire point. Further, I don’t think it’s fair to say he “made” the rule, any more than he made his attributes of omnipotence and omniscience and so forth. The rules are outgrowths of God’s nature. I could be wrong about that, the theological waters get a little deep for me.
You have not supported your “ridiculous” assertion at all, as far as I can remember. You’ve demanded evidence, and you’ve received it, and you’ve not found it compelling. That’s fine. But it’s not the same thing as finding that the evidence actually supports the opposite case.
The part that makes me laugh the most is that if he didn’t do it to himself, he is not omnipotent, and if he did do it to himself, it is far from the noble act that it is described as.
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NaturalEnquirer
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It would only be ridiculous if we assume, prima facia, that miracles are impossible. Better minds than you or I have tried and failed at that, for many years now.
I didn’t follow the second paragraph at all. If you would like to discuss it, could you rephrase it? If you just want your chuckle, then I guess you’re all set.
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It’s simple, really. If he is all-powerful AND all knowing, then he planned it that way. He made a laughably bad drama whose sole purpose was to do something that (if he is all-powerful) he could have done as easily without the drama.It would only be ridiculous if we assume, prima facia, that miracles are impossible. Better minds than you or I have tried and failed at that, for many years now.
I didn’t follow the second paragraph at all. If you would like to discuss it, could you rephrase it? If you just want your chuckle, then I guess you’re all set.
The answer that fits best is that miracles are impossible. If you know of one that will stand up to testing AND indicates your god specifically, I would look into it.
There are no miracles - there is no intervening god. Assuming there is without a proper level of evidence just seems mad to me.
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