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Religion is a kind of placebo that “works” for some people. But be aware of the dangers. Powerful, mind-altering *ideas* can be as dangerous as powerful mind-altering *drugs*.
My father went off the deep end with religion and it caused him to do some pretty crazy stuff (like quitting his job when he had a large family to support). He managed to draw my mother into his delusion, thanks to a coincidence in dates between a major event in my father’s life and an early traumatic event in her life. My father is now well beyond the “event horizon” of fundamentalist Christianity, and there’s no chance that he’ll ever escape.
Wow thanks. I've been saying point of no return wrong all these years.
God wants you to be happy joyous and free too. But theres that little problem of your free will.
How could it be "free" if it is neither "free" in the beginning, nor "free" in the middle, nor "free" in the end?
1. Forced to have free-will, unlike the supposedly lucky angels that stayed in heaven (even though they have "free will" they aren't "freely" "tested" on Earth). So it is not "free" in the beginning, but "forced."
2. If you can be "influenced" then you are not "free". Perhaps partially free or somewhat independent, maybe; able to hold some rather equal choices sometimes, sure. Not just plainly "free."
3. If there is a stipulation for the consequences, then it is not "free" in the end.
Last edited by LuminousTruth; 04-03-2018 at 06:48 PM..
I might have been autistic, I was diagnosed severely depressed but I was not aware.
The psychiatrist said I had been depressed since childhood so had no other reference point. I could have been diagnosed with many ailments because I was all over the place.
Bottom line is, once I began to allow for the existence of God I began to recover.
In a matter of days I became aware I was reacting to the world differently, the formless fear that shaped my state of being dissolved .
The doctor wasas stunned as I was, he let me wean myself off meds, I've never been the same since and I can't say I'm normal because I don't know what normal is, plus anyone experiencing direct conscious contact with what religions call God will never be normal.
The doctor is Padraic Burns. He's associated with BU Medical center in Boston.
Its been over 15 yrs now, I conclude I experienced a major neuro rearrangement, a rewiring that restored sanity.
A good psychiatrist can tell someone how sick they are and track progress but they don't have any power . Anti fepressents were ok but I didn't want to live half assed staring off into space drooling when people were talking to me. But many...most will accept that vs change. A sick mind fights to stay sick.
Did you become religious without a social circle? Some people just need the social circle to help end a depression.
But I've also heard that "supernatural ideations" can alleviate depression in many people genetically predisposed to have their existential dreads (conscious and unconscious) alleviated by supernatural ideations. They aren't necessarily unhealthy, although they can be mutually exclusive between each other and most times internally self-contradictory (not that one would need to be digging deep and questioning them).
That's my own personal experience and why I departed from atheism.
That's what I consistently see atheists do so its a very common slip of the mind.
Follow the bouncing ball.
1 ask for evidence.
2 complain the evidence is not proof.
There's the lie.
No, that's your strawman and misrepresentation.
Atheists:
Ask for evidence.
Consider the evidence.
Find it isn't good enough.
Consider the claim not verified.
Theist:
get frustrated that their "evidence" is not considered compelling - heck, They believe with no evidence at all. Indeed when atheists produce evidence - for example, that the universe is Not Ordered/Designed, the Bible is Not reliable, Evolution debunks the Genesis story, they can reject that evidence altogether.
Do you see how you are screwing the actuality up through Faith -based bias?
Did you become religious without a social circle? Some people just need the social circle to help end a depression.
But I've also heard that "supernatural ideations" can alleviate depression in many people genetically predisposed to have their existential dreads (conscious and unconscious) alleviated by supernatural ideations. They aren't necessarily unhealthy, although they can be mutually exclusive between each other and most times internally self-contradictory (not that one would need to be digging deep and questioning them).
I think he's the poster that talks about AA. I'd be interested in what was going on with him too especially if he stopped drinking around that time because, wowza the journey back from the dark side of the moon can get weird. The "supernatural" was coming at me strong that first year. I found a natural explanation so it wasn't supernatural after all. I also wasn't in a face to face group setting where I was being steered toward a conclusion either. My online support system included a nice mix of Jesus freaks, mystics and atheists.
1. Given the evidences of your past posts, it is far more likely that you just made up this claim to prove a point.
2. Your claim contradicts the evidences for my faith. So then it becomes a battle of positions based on evidence. Currently, the combined weight of evidence heavily favors Christianity.
3. While I would keep open the possibility that your claim is really true, I would need supporting evidences to accept the claim at face value. Sorta a middle ground when people make extraordinary claims. I don't automatically think they are lying like atheists do, but I don't automatically accept it either. A baseless claim needs some supporting evidence. For example, just because you may say there is a flying spaghetti monster doesn't count as evidence because it is just a baseless statement. I would need at least some other point of evidence to support such a position.
Your post is brilliant.
Or it would be if intended as very dry humour.
In fact it is more likely intended seriously.
Of course you must be making an ironic point in "Doubting" the anecdotal claim. The funny thing is that you are quite right to do so - and that's why we are quite right to doubt claims of visions, divine revelations and angels rescuing people from car crashes.
I agree your point about rival claims of various religions. I might even agree that there is more going for Christianity than for some other religions. But you are wrong because two claims , one with not enough valid evidence to be credible and the other with no evidence (1) worth a damn means that Neither are believable. It does no allow you to claim that the less silly claim must be true.
(1) the FSM was a spoof intended to show up baseless faith -claims and to talk about "atheist lies" means the point has completely gone over your head but you are doing a bit of unworthy but far from unfamiliar well -poisoning.
Last edited by TRANSPONDER; 04-03-2018 at 07:39 PM..
Some country as to be number 1. And once again, correlation does not mean causation.
#1 in rape because someone raped by 4 people is counted as rape 4 times in Sweden, unlike in other countries, where it is counted as rape once.
Your stupid argument as been explained so many times over the last 5 years, it takes a special kind of person to make the same stupid argument yet again.
If you want a correlation...Sweden, once the byword for sexual liberation, not long since took steps to make professional sex illegal. Others again point up a correlation between immigration and rapes. Picking on atheism (which was in place when Sweden wasn't no 1 in rapes and suicides) is spotlighting evident bias and poor reasoning.
Ok, glad to see atheists accept the existence of free will again, for a few yrs they argued it was a delusion. Which was a delusion
It is a delusion. You want to argue it out? Let me save you some trouble.
It is bound up with human decisions and thinking.
That is all in the mind. It does not exist in physics or chemistry or the life of stars.
It is a delusion. It does not exist.
And yet, like other human products of the mind, like art or writing or ethics, they do exist as human concepts.
What makes you see it as a Thing that we get or we don't like a disease or a bolt of lightning in the back of the neck is that you believe in a God that makes Life -meaning or Morality or Free will like beating it out on an anvil and then shoving it down our throats.
I think Troutdude is a polytheist or pantheist or something like that.
Irreligious Theist.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Freak80
Religion is a kind of placebo that “works” for some people. But be aware of the dangers. Powerful, mind-altering *ideas* can be as dangerous as powerful mind-altering *drugs*.
My father went off the deep end with religion and it caused him to do some pretty crazy stuff (like quitting his job when he had a large family to support). He managed to draw my mother into his delusion, thanks to a coincidence in dates between a major event in my father’s life and an early traumatic event in her life. My father is now well beyond the “event horizon” of fundamentalist Christianity, and there’s no chance that he’ll ever escape.
Yes. Of course I am glad that Jonesey is no linger drooling in a hospital bed and is drooling on the boards instead, but while religion is like an addictive drug used to combat a disease, the danger is that, having effected the cure one is now sick with addiction.
Atheist autism or Religious lunacy. I don't know which is worse.
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Let me save you some trouble.
