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But the difference is whether the effect on your own person is your own doing or someone else's....I do hope you can see the difference between consequences of our own actions in a world that just acts naturally, and of our own actions in a set of rules and demands imposed by an Intelligence that has its own agenda.
the agenda that is imposed on me (and only on people of my religion, never on anyone else anywhere else ever) is the peace, harmony, joy, and well-being of all life in all worlds. when i follow the instructions I have this in my life. when I don't follow the instructions, the opposite occurs. nature (along with everything else) is part of God.
the agenda that is imposed on me (and only on people of my religion, never on anyone else anywhere else ever) is the peace, harmony, joy, and well-being of all life in all worlds. when i follow the instructions I have this in my life. when I don't follow the instructions, the opposite occurs. nature (along with everything else) is part of God.
Very well. I have no problem with that, though I see no reason to use the term God. I prefer "nature". Lees liable to be misleading.
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Originally Posted by mordant
I think that here in "Christendom", many pantheists (or just theists who pick up on some pantheistic notions) are heavily influenced by Christian thought in various ways, which tends to leak back into their views. So sometimes we get a sort of hybrid or "mashup" of Christian and pantheist notions. Strictly speaking, pantheism doesn't have a god-concept anything like Christianity so any similar notions being advanced by an avowed pantheist are probably a custom brew of their own design -- or in some cases simply an ill-considered mish-mash) rather than actual pantheism.
Come to think of it, the same could be said for the New Age movement or panentheism or paganism because there isn't a dominant centralized definer of orthodoxy in those kinds of movements. The Abrahamic faiths and to a lesser extent some Eastern religions are far more institutionalized and established, for all their fragmentation. It can be hard to pin down anything to be truly "pantheist thought" or dogma.
Ok. As I don't have a serious beef with 'atheist churches' (unless they have ministers who bash atheism), but I see no need for it for myself, I need no deistic mishmash. Unless some good evidence convinces me. But even then it would be like knowing there were Black holes. It wouldn't make any difference to my life.
I need no deistic mishmash. Unless some good evidence convinces me. But even then it would be like knowing there were Black holes. It wouldn't make any difference to my life.
You seem to be singing the same song wallflash is stuck on. What practical consequence is there from the existence of God? There is ultimately only one. The existence of God establishes our purpose for existing and if we do not seek to determine what that is we most likely will fail at it. That is certain to have some negative consequences for us. The real problem is determining what we should use to find our purpose. Sam Harris says science and I am inclined to agree with him.
You seem to be singing the same song wallflash is stuck on. What practical consequence is there from the existence of God? There is ultimately only one. The existence of God establishes our purpose for existing and if we do not seek to determine what that is we most likely will fail at it. That is certain to have some negative consequences for us. The real problem is determining what we should use to find our purpose. Sam Harris says science and I am inclined to agree with him.
Not quite. You are assuming a plan. If not, then a god is irrelevant to how humans came about. What's it going to be - I/D or evolution?
You seem to be singing the same song wallflash is stuck on. What practical consequence is there from the existence of God? There is ultimately only one. The existence of God establishes our purpose for existing and if we do not seek to determine what that is we most likely will fail at it. That is certain to have some negative consequences for us. The real problem is determining what we should use to find our purpose. Sam Harris says science and I am inclined to agree with him.
The question of 'what is our purpose for existing' can be asked whether you have a god or not because you still ultimately don't have an answer. This god has this way of being elusively uncontactable, invisible, mysterious and unhelpfully unable to communicate the answers to any questions. Funny that.
But it is an interesting question. We all have our own purpose - as individuals, we set our own purpose if we are fortunate enough to be in a position to do that.
Collectively if you ask what is the purpose of humans being here, then you have to ask the same about everything. What was the purpose of dinosaurs existing for 230 million years when we have only been here 200,000? Even if you decide that humanity has a purpose (scientific endeavour, - oh if only that were true about most of America ) ultimately it wont matter because even if we got a grip on climate change, it wont stop humanity becoming extinct in less than a billion years when the sun fries the planet.
So maybe we have to accept there is no collective purpose and that it is enough to just exist, savour the moment and be glad to be alive?
The question of 'what is our purpose for existing' can be asked whether you have a god or not because you still ultimately don't have an answer. This god has this way of being elusively uncontactable, invisible, mysterious and unhelpfully unable to communicate the answers to any questions. Funny that.
But it is an interesting question. We all have our own purpose - as individuals, we set our own purpose if we are fortunate enough to be in a position to do that.
Collectively if you ask what is the purpose of humans being here, then you have to ask the same about everything. What was the purpose of dinosaurs existing for 230 million years when we have only been here 200,000? Even if you decide that humanity has a purpose (scientific endeavour, - oh if only that were true about most of America ) ultimately it wont matter because even if we got a grip on climate change, it wont stop humanity becoming extinct in less than a billion years when the sun fries the planet. So maybe we have to accept there is no collective purpose and that it is enough to just exist, savour the moment and be glad to be alive?
Even though I do think there is a collective purpose (that I cannot possibly understand), I could live with that!
As an atheist I don't believe in the concept of sin.
I just believe that people should respect one another, be nice to one another and not hurt one another or other animals.
The Golden Rule basically.
As long as people live by this I'm basically good with how people live their lives.
I can't remember the thread or the poster now but I noted the other day an atheist using the term 'sin' as though it were a thing, presumably a remnant from a past history as a Christian.
I'm interested to know if other religions other than Christianity hold with the concept of sin?
For once I didn't find wikipedia particularly helpful on the subject. It's a bit vague from the perspective of religions other than Christianity: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sin
Please no meanness / prosthelytzing or lecturing me or anyone else that they are going to hell for being an atheist in this thread. That's so missing the point.
Otherwise please contribute from an educational perspective. Thanks.
Sin? One would think that guilt, rules, and perfection are ideas highlighted in all religions and cultures.
You seem to be singing the same song wallflash is stuck on. What practical consequence is there from the existence of God? There is ultimately only one. The existence of God establishes our purpose for existing and if we do not seek to determine what that is we most likely will fail at it. That is certain to have some negative consequences for us. The real problem is determining what we should use to find our purpose. Sam Harris says science and I am inclined to agree with him.
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Originally Posted by Cruithne
The question of 'what is our purpose for existing' can be asked whether you have a god or not because you still ultimately don't have an answer. This god has this way of being elusively uncontactable, invisible, mysterious and unhelpfully unable to communicate the answers to any questions. Funny that.
Yeah. A womb existence is like that you can't contact the parent directly. Good to see you posting more often Cruithne.
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But it is an interesting question. We all have our own purpose - as individuals, we set our own purpose if we are fortunate enough to be in a position to do that.
Yes. It is sort of like a prosecutor's lesser included offense. It is something that we must decide for ourselves but it is part of the overall purpose for our species which we also have to try and discern.
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Collectively if you ask what is the purpose of humans being here, then you have to ask the same about everything. What was the purpose of dinosaurs existing for 230 million years when we have only been here 200,000?
Well, I suppose if we believe that the Dinosaurs were conscious as we are (not mere animal awareness) that would be true. It takes a human-like consciousness even to consider such issues.
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Even if you decide that humanity has a purpose (scientific endeavour, - oh if only that were true about most of America ) ultimately it wont matter because even if we got a grip on climate change, it wont stop humanity becoming extinct in less than a billion years when the sun fries the planet.
So maybe we have to accept there is no collective purpose and that it is enough to just exist, savour the moment and be glad to be alive?
That presupposes that this earthly existence is anything other than a production factory for our real existence. It is our real existence that will be unaffected by the demise of the earth.
"Evolution" only describes process when "random" comes into question.
Not quite."Unplanned" does as well. Random or the familiar "By Chance" can give the false impression that there are no known and predictable processes involved. There are, in physics, cosmology and evolution.
That itself can be misrepresented as 'Ok, so predict what cats will evolve into". Of course we can't do that, but we can predict how the known processes will push along any changes that happen.
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) ultimately it wont matter because even if we got a grip on climate change, it wont stop humanity becoming extinct in less than a billion years when the sun fries the planet.
Good to see you posting more often Cruithne.
Of course we can't do that, but we can predict how the known processes will push along any changes that happen.
