Zan Zu from Eridu's Journal: I've got my first freak.

I just noticed I've got my frist freak (a guy who classifies me as his foe), and I started wondering why, because I try not to piss off people.

It was quite obvious this guy was into religion. I only discussed a religious topic once on /. because someone was trying to produce philosophical proof of the existence of God. It started out with the cosmological argument (First Cause) and drifted towards the argument from design. I falsified his arguments in reasonable terms and stopped the discussion when he seemed to move towards the ontological argument (I don't like stupid tautologies).

Eversince the enlightment, philosophy has had an antropocentric view of God and favours the agnostic standpoint. The only way you can squeeze some glimpse of God into purely rational thinking is by pointing out the direct, personal religious/spiritual experiences people sometimes have. These however are neither sensorial nor intellectual and therefore are outside of the scope of philosophy. If you want to take this road you have to cooperate with the human sciences to prove the ultimate reality of these experiences.

This road however isn't very promising either, because you start out on the pretext that these experiences are not sensorial, and you run into the philosophical paradox called the "Cartesian theatre" as soon as you propose spiritual experiences are sensorial: if the metaphysical causes sensorial experiences, the metaphysical must have physical properties, there must be a physical connection or link to the metaphysical. Such a connection has ofcouse never been found, finding one would mean finding a source of magic.

I think it's sad taking this agnostic standpoint makes one a religious person's foe, especially because I'm not at all adversive towards religion and spirituality. I only think our beliefs should hold up to our intellectual standards. As such, I must accept one neither can prove nor disprove God's existence philosophically or scientifically. If God exists, He must operate in other realms, beyond the touchable and thinkable. In other words I can accept existentialism, but I can certainly not accept fundamentalism and its ugly child creationism.

What amazes me here, is how this particular guy keeps up his balancing act. He's obviously very intelligent but at the same time has this very short temper. Hey, wise man, if you read this: I bet you're running gematria software on your box, perhaps even stuff you've written yourself. Maybe it was a bit premature putting me on your shitlist?

Religion

[Zirnike]

I think the problem is that most people don't seem able to apply logic to their own religion. Most people I talk to end up being violently opposed to logic, in fact, on that topic. (of course, if you start talking about someone else's religion, a lot of the time logic comes right back).

My one freak is actually there for the same reason, BTW, so I've thought about it for a while.

A 'real life' friend of mine (whom I've know for 20 years... I'm 28) and I will get into a religious argument every once in

Re:Religion

[Zan Zu from Eridu]

Basically, he ends up not being able to support his decision logically, and gives up (often saying 'I'll pray for you').

Yes, but that's why it's a religion, not a science; religion will ever by faith-based. The problem is what certain religions would like you to believe; in our day and age it comes down to suspension of disbelief, because most dogma and doctrine is scientifically (or philosphically) flawed. That's what I call the "balancing act", from their arguments and actions it's obvious some believer

Re:Religion

[Zirnike]

"You can only prove certain statements about God are meaningless"

Ah, but the point of the AFE is that those statements you can prove meaningless are the very ones that define the Christian god. To be the Christian god, the god MUST BE benevolent and omnipotant. Because those are what you have proven incorrect, then any god that exists must have different characteristics.

And by standard Christian doctrine, human morals are derived from god. God's morals, therefore, mirror ours because that's how our m

Re:Religion

[Zan Zu from Eridu]

Ah, but the point of the AFE is that those statements you can prove meaningless are the very ones that define the Christian god. To be the Christian god, the god MUST BE benevolent and omnipotant.

This is the crucial point in any agnostic debate: you cannot define God. Definitions of God become meaningless because they contain absolutisms. Every absolutism can be rendered meaningless by showing the absolutism isn't absolute (like the "Goodness" in God's omnibenevolence).

The only thing you can say with c

Re:Religion

[Zirnike]

Hrm... Basically, you're saying that if god exists, he can't be defined. I would say that if god can't be defined, then he cannot exist. We can even define 'nothing' (Nothing (n.) - What you would be looking at if this definition was not here)

I would say that god had to be grasped intellectually for his existance, as well, for the same kind of reason. Humans are capable of dealing with things so abstract it is not possible to show them in reality (please hand me i oranges.). I find no evidence to sup

Re:Religion

[Zan Zu from Eridu]

Hrm... Basically, you're saying that if god exists, he can't be defined.

You reverse the implication here. Agnosticism says you have to define something before you can reason about it. Since you cannot define what God is, you cannot reason about him.

The fundamental difference between agnosticism and atheism is that atheism takes theology seriously and tries to refute it, while agnosticism denies theology alltogether because it is meaningless. Therefore, even what an atheist says about God is meaningless