Open Minded Agnostic Atheist

[Blues Man]

You can't be an agnostic atheist.

I would say you are an agnostic secularist

• Atheist - There is no god.
• Nihilistic - Life has no meaning.
• Secular - Lack of religion.
• Agnostic - There may or may not be a god, but open to know more.
• Gnostic - Belief that the God (or gods) we worship are in fact evil tricksters and that a secret knowledge is preventing us from the true God.
• Animistic - Belief that all things contain spirits.
• Deist - There is a God who created life, but just watches and does not intervene.
• Theist - Belief in a higher power and at least one god.
• Polytheist - Belief in more than one god.
• Monotheist -believing in a single God - ie. Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.
• Apostate - A person who leaves a religion.
• Misotheist - A person that hates God or the Gods.
• Dustheism - Belief that God or the Gods are not totally good.
• Macioism - Belief that God is a Demiurge and wrathful, malicious evil creator. Similar to Gnostic.
• Euthesim - Belief in a totally good God.

What do you mean life has meaning? What is the meaning? What is our purpose? I think we could master the universe if we weren’t so primitive. Still warring with each other rather than working as one planet to get to mars and mine the meteor belt. Then build a ship the size of a planet that can also survive interstellar travel. Then we might have a purpose.

If we stay on this Rock eventually we will die of some natural cause. The planet will still have other creatures who survive this mass global extinction but even they too will die when the water goes or the sun burns out. If we go with the planet, what was our purpose?

We are a way for the universe to know itself. Amazing.

There is no purpose to life.

And if the universe is trying to know itself through humans it could do better since we only have an understanding of about 5% of it.

Sure there is... to become the best version of yourself and to pass it on. There's your meaning.

Simply put, evolution is when anything moves from a less advanced state to a more advanced state; a less complex state to a more complex state. Since the beginning of time matter has evolved and will continue to do so. Your purpose, your meaning in life is to evolve in consciousness and pass it on to the next generation.

That's your meaning.

You have no business telling my what mine is.

 

[Grumblenuts]

Quoting zaangalewa here:

Noah saved all life - and only the people, who did not like to survive and continued to be a threat for the survival per se died out. The alternative would had been: A dead planet without any life.

Okay, presuming this actual history for a moment.. Have you met any people in real life "who did not like to survive"? Some fish, for just one obvious example, would obviously survive such a massive flood. Do you really think fish don't count as "life"? Where's all this "Love" and "spirit" demonstrated for plants such as algae and seaweed? Not worthy of this God's or Noah's consideration? It's all really just about us in the final analysis? Apparently only we could be expected to read and write after all, right? A tiny fraction of us in fact back then. Do fables like this never strike you as incredibly convenient for the powers distributing it? Potentially lucrative? Manipulative? Manufactured from whole cloth mainly just to increase one's power or clan size?

 

[Grumblenuts]

How does anyone study supernatural events?

There is nothing supernatural about the written word (scripture).

In an earlier post you clearly reject the idea of an angry God, a God who pounces on you for not doing this, that, or the other, a God who rejects you for being a nice person. What I find odd about this is that apparently you can comprehend such a God and also have no trouble believing people worship such a God.

I continue to recommend, first seek God. This results in the awe of knowing that God is love, apparently well hidden Bible verses. With the certainty of knowing God's love, the Bible presents itself quite differently. The themes, the lessons, and the context the original authors presented come into light.

Reading the Bible with no understanding of God's love is like reading the Bible in darkness.

{Now be nice. Just respond with something positive, Grumble.. Oh, okay, okay, here..}
Patronizing you've definitely got honed down to a fine art.

 

[Meriweather]

The ''written word'' consists of an assembly of many, largely unknown authors who wrote of supernatural events.

Correct.

 

[Hollie]

The ''written word'' consists of an assembly of many, largely unknown authors who wrote of supernatural events.

Correct.

So I suppose that implies there are lots of books I should worship.

 

[Meriweather]

The Hebrew portion of the Bible in particular depicts a viciously angry, vindictive god who is only marginally less angry in Christian theology. A ''god of love'' who behaves as is delineated in the Bible is an utter contradiction.

Yes, as utter contradiction, which takes us to story constructs. These accounts are not news accounts--they were all written well after the fact. It strikes me that God seems part of the setting rather than an actual character.

 

[Meriweather]

So I suppose that implies there are lots of books I should worship.

Well, I wasn't implying that, but I take it that is what you infer? Has anyone you know ever made it into print? If so, did you admire what was written about them, or is it the actual person that is admired?

 

[ding]

You can't be an agnostic atheist.

I would say you are an agnostic secularist

• Atheist - There is no god.
• Nihilistic - Life has no meaning.
• Secular - Lack of religion.
• Agnostic - There may or may not be a god, but open to know more.
• Gnostic - Belief that the God (or gods) we worship are in fact evil tricksters and that a secret knowledge is preventing us from the true God.
• Animistic - Belief that all things contain spirits.
• Deist - There is a God who created life, but just watches and does not intervene.
• Theist - Belief in a higher power and at least one god.
• Polytheist - Belief in more than one god.
• Monotheist -believing in a single God - ie. Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.
• Apostate - A person who leaves a religion.
• Misotheist - A person that hates God or the Gods.
• Dustheism - Belief that God or the Gods are not totally good.
• Macioism - Belief that God is a Demiurge and wrathful, malicious evil creator. Similar to Gnostic.
• Euthesim - Belief in a totally good God.

What do you mean life has meaning? What is the meaning? What is our purpose? I think we could master the universe if we weren’t so primitive. Still warring with each other rather than working as one planet to get to mars and mine the meteor belt. Then build a ship the size of a planet that can also survive interstellar travel. Then we might have a purpose.

If we stay on this Rock eventually we will die of some natural cause. The planet will still have other creatures who survive this mass global extinction but even they too will die when the water goes or the sun burns out. If we go with the planet, what was our purpose?

We are a way for the universe to know itself. Amazing.

There is no purpose to life.

And if the universe is trying to know itself through humans it could do better since we only have an understanding of about 5% of it.

Sure there is... to become the best version of yourself and to pass it on. There's your meaning.

Simply put, evolution is when anything moves from a less advanced state to a more advanced state; a less complex state to a more complex state. Since the beginning of time matter has evolved and will continue to do so. Your purpose, your meaning in life is to evolve in consciousness and pass it on to the next generation.

That's your meaning.

You have no business telling my what mine is.

According to you, you don’t have one, right?

But according to Darwin the meaning of life is to pass down functional advantage to the next generation.

 

[ding]

How does anyone study supernatural events?

There is nothing supernatural about the written word (scripture).

In an earlier post you clearly reject the idea of an angry God, a God who pounces on you for not doing this, that, or the other, a God who rejects you for being a nice person. What I find odd about this is that apparently you can comprehend such a God and also have no trouble believing people worship such a God.

I continue to recommend, first seek God. This results in the awe of knowing that God is love, apparently well hidden Bible verses. With the certainty of knowing God's love, the Bible presents itself quite differently. The themes, the lessons, and the context the original authors presented come into light.

Reading the Bible with no understanding of God's love is like reading the Bible in darkness.

{Now be nice. Just respond with something positive, Grumble.. Oh, okay, okay, here..}
Patronizing you've definitely got honed down to a fine art.

I don’t believe you tried very hard at all to be nice.

 

[Grumblenuts]

How's this then:

first seek God. This results in the awe of knowing that God is love, apparently well hidden Bible verses. With the certainty of knowing God's love, the Bible presents itself quite differently. The themes, the lessons, and the context the original authors presented come into light.

First you find God..
Then you get the Awe..
The Certainty..
And the Love..
Then you get the Themes, Lessens, Context..
And thus,.. finally,.. the Light!

 

[Andylusion]

Gravity can't be explained scientifically.

Of course it can:

A warping of space caused by mass within that space.

Explained. What sort of explanation are you looking for?

Why does that happen?

Gravity mysteries: What is gravity?

The Newtonian idea of gravity was nice and simple, then Einstein turned things upside down, and even that isn't the end of the story

www.newscientist.com

We don't know. Again you are describing what happens, not explaining why it happens.

 

[Blues Man]

You can't be an agnostic atheist.

I would say you are an agnostic secularist

• Atheist - There is no god.
• Nihilistic - Life has no meaning.
• Secular - Lack of religion.
• Agnostic - There may or may not be a god, but open to know more.
• Gnostic - Belief that the God (or gods) we worship are in fact evil tricksters and that a secret knowledge is preventing us from the true God.
• Animistic - Belief that all things contain spirits.
• Deist - There is a God who created life, but just watches and does not intervene.
• Theist - Belief in a higher power and at least one god.
• Polytheist - Belief in more than one god.
• Monotheist -believing in a single God - ie. Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.
• Apostate - A person who leaves a religion.
• Misotheist - A person that hates God or the Gods.
• Dustheism - Belief that God or the Gods are not totally good.
• Macioism - Belief that God is a Demiurge and wrathful, malicious evil creator. Similar to Gnostic.
• Euthesim - Belief in a totally good God.

What do you mean life has meaning? What is the meaning? What is our purpose? I think we could master the universe if we weren’t so primitive. Still warring with each other rather than working as one planet to get to mars and mine the meteor belt. Then build a ship the size of a planet that can also survive interstellar travel. Then we might have a purpose.

If we stay on this Rock eventually we will die of some natural cause. The planet will still have other creatures who survive this mass global extinction but even they too will die when the water goes or the sun burns out. If we go with the planet, what was our purpose?

We are a way for the universe to know itself. Amazing.

There is no purpose to life.

And if the universe is trying to know itself through humans it could do better since we only have an understanding of about 5% of it.

Sure there is... to become the best version of yourself and to pass it on. There's your meaning.

Simply put, evolution is when anything moves from a less advanced state to a more advanced state; a less complex state to a more complex state. Since the beginning of time matter has evolved and will continue to do so. Your purpose, your meaning in life is to evolve in consciousness and pass it on to the next generation.

That's your meaning.

You have no business telling my what mine is.

According to you, you don’t have one, right?

But according to Darwin the meaning of life is to pass down functional advantage to the next generation.

No not really

I know that what I do here while I'm alive will have little effect in the grand scheme of things.

And again that's Darwin and he has no more right to tell me what my purpose is than you do.

The human race has been here for but a blink in cosmological time and less than a minute in the earth's geological time.

We will be gone in but another few blinks of time as far as the cosmos is concerned.

Nothing anyone has ever done or will ever do will matter.

 

[Hollie]

The Hebrew portion of the Bible in particular depicts a viciously angry, vindictive god who is only marginally less angry in Christian theology. A ''god of love'' who behaves as is delineated in the Bible is an utter contradiction.

Yes, as utter contradiction, which takes us to story constructs. These accounts are not news accounts--they were all written well after the fact. It strikes me that God seems part of the setting rather than an actual character.

Yes, accounts written hundreds of years after alleged events. Generations of re-telling would suggest that tales are changed and embellished.

People believe that Robin Hood was a real person.

 

[Hollie]

So I suppose that implies there are lots of books I should worship.

Well, I wasn't implying that, but I take it that is what you infer? Has anyone you know ever made it into print? If so, did you admire what was written about them, or is it the actual person that is admired?

I think Robin Hood was a person to be admired. I guess I can ignore the reality of Robin Hood being fictional and worship him anyway.

 

[Grumblenuts]

Definition of worship
(Entry 1 of 2)
transitive verb
1: to honor or show reverence for as a divine being or supernatural power
2: to regard with great or extravagant respect, honor, or devotion
//a celebrity worshipped by her fans
intransitive verb
: to perform or take part in worship or an act of worship

{I gather Hollie means the second variety - and not the first}

 

[Meriweather]

{Now be nice. Just respond with something positive, Grumble.. Oh, okay, okay, here..}
Patronizing you've definitely got honed down to a fine art.

Ah, someone who can read others through a computer screen! Alas, I do not have that talent, so I my take is that, like me, people are simply trying to have a discussion. However, I am sorry you find me so off-putting is this setting when all I am doing is enjoying all the various perspectives and sharing my own. Sharing...remember how every day someone was called on to share something with the class?

 

[Meriweather]

I don’t believe you tried very hard at all to be nice.

He said he was, so I take him at his word.

 

[Meriweather]

First you find God..
Then you get the Awe..
The Certainty..
And the Love..
Then you get the Themes, Lessens, Context..
And thus,.. finally,.. the Light!

The first four are melded into an instant. Then comes the curiosity of why Biblical accounts don't shine with this quite major aspect of God. Then comes the years of study and research trying to satisfy that curiosity which means studying language, culture, history, which is a hobby--fascinating, but none-the-less a hobby. Rabbis and those who grew up speaking Hebrew often have an entirely different perspective when reading the Hebrew account than we get from reading the account in 21st century English. The difference between the two are can sometimes be compared to day and night.

 

[Meriweather]

Yes, accounts written hundreds of years after alleged events. Generations of re-telling would suggest that tales are changed and embellished.

People believe that Robin Hood was a real person.

Exactly! Ask the average person what they really know about Robin Hood and they will respond that he robbed the rich and gave to the poor. They may or may not know whether he was an actual person, or simply a story woven around an event of two. What people best remember is the theme--robbing the rich to give to the poor. What are the themes remembered from Biblical stories--and are they the same themes that presented themselves to the original author and audience?

 

[Meriweather]

I think Robin Hood was a person to be admired. I guess I can ignore the reality of Robin Hood being fictional and worship him anyway.

Or...we could take away the lesson and see if we can apply it to our own lives.