Maybe the males wear kimonos too, and that's why the females have to make babies without them.
What do athiests think happened 2009 years ago?
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Maybe the males wear kimonos too, and that's why the females have to make babies without them.
The atheists and those who are of other faiths I know never have told me that they don't think Jesus was born and lived. The atheists don't believe in any God, and those of other faiths believe that God's (or the name they give to the Almighty's) message has been revealed to humans in other ways.
StrictlyAvg
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A man (maybe a composite of several men - history is a not conclusive on the detail), possibly called Jesus - though this wouldn't have been a common name from Hebrew or Arabic, who was resident in the Middle East, protested against an occupying superpower of European origin. With both a political and theological basis to his ideas, antipathy to the Roman ways brought much support. Powerful civilisation or not what relevance did Rome's political aims have in the Palestinian region? And the predominating religions had been organised and established in that region almost universally for millenia, unlike tribal northern Europe's disparate bunch of feuding mini-kingdoms and religions.
The protest upset the superpower who considered "him" what we would call today a terrorist and a rabble rouser, hence his eventual execution; but his ideas and ability to organise people made enough sense to win over a significant section of the established order. They rescinded propagation of the previous Rome-led belief in a plethora of gods that was itself partly swept up from the power struggle with Greece and, over a period of decades, established a belief system that was adaptable enough to gain shaky control for the now huge empire - even sweeping up various northern european pagan rituals into the new religion to convince enough of the tribal leaders to conform to the political control from Rome. By the time the empire imploded the belief system had enough weight to continue under its own momentum.
As far as I can work out from what I've read over the years, that's roughly how it went and where some of the European sects of Christianity have sprung up from - e.g. it is commonly accepted that Christmas itself is more likely to be based on the winter festivals in place at the turn of the shortest day than any birthdate of JC.
Today, the superpowers and religions have evolved but the struggles for supremacy go on much the same. The Middle East is not the trading hub it once was between Europe and the Far East. Middle Eastern oil is what our society needs for this short period in history from the region but it has also brought about the change that has drastically reduced the trading dependence on them directly, due to the transport improvements. It's still an important strategic area for goods transport though said goods don't actually stop there any more.
Interesting that the occupying superpower that originally gave rise to state sponsored Christianity gradually collapsed as it overstretched itself with military commitments in far away corners from its hub.
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Mr. Snakey
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- LMX,
i'm guessing you do not know what agnosticism really is
it's not a religious declaration. no one can just be "agnostic." you are either an agnostic atheist or theist or non-agnostic atheist or theist.
D_Gunther Snotpole
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I suppose I could call myself an 'agnostic atheist.'
But why couldn't one say that god-talk is meaningless, there is no proof either way on the question of whether 'god' exists ... and therefore be an agnostic in a purer sense -- one who makes no claim to know, and has no real leanings either way?
<"What is that guy staring up at?"
:wink::biggrin1:
rawbone8
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Speaking of seating arrangements: How many fences can fit on the head of an agnostic pin?
D_Gunther Snotpole
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- LMX,
well anyone can be an agnostic in that sense
but when it comes to what you believe, there is no middle ground. if you have doubts about god's existence, then you are at least a weak atheist.
LMX, you seem to assume an eccentric interpretation of the terms 'agnostic' and 'atheist'. An agnostic is, in the strictest sense, one who professes not to know, or more broadly, one who holds no opinion as to the existence of God; an atheist is one who believes that God does not exist. As far as I know, these are the most widely accepted interpretations of the terms. To say that someone is an "agnostic theist" or "agnostic atheist," as you do, is senseless. A theist believes that God exists; an atheist believes that God does not exist; an agnostic believes neither proposition; no one, therefore, can fall under more than one of these classifications at the same time.
- LMX,
How is it senseless?
Agnosticism only addresses the question of "Can we know if God exists?"
Atheism or theism answers the question "Does God exist?"
You are putting agnosticism in the same arena as atheism and theism, and that is not what agnosticism is.
You can be agnostic and think that we have no way of knowing if God exists while at the same time believing that he doesn't.
Agnosticism only addresses the question of "Can we know if God exists?"
Atheism or theism answers the question "Does God exist?"
You are putting agnosticism in the same arena as atheism and theism, and that is not what agnosticism is.
You can be agnostic and think that we have no way of knowing if God exists while at the same time believing that he doesn't.
D_Gunther Snotpole
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Well, you didn't leave room for that possibility.
Can you not have a hunch that god exists, yet have some doubt about it?
Then, you are arguably more a believer than an atheist.
You could set up an entire continuum along an axis defined by how strong one's belief or doubt was. But having some doubt wouldn't necessarily place you closer to the atheist end than, say, in the middle ... or even closer to the believer's end.
I don't know if it's quite senseless.
Bertrand Russell, for example, said that he was agnostic in the metaphysical sense, because he really could not claim to know whether god exists ... but atheistic psychologically, since his inner sense of certainly was all on the side of the impossibility of god existing.
But he could not ground this hunch in anything he regarded as absolute proof.
Hence, at the end of the day, agnostic.
joejack
Cherished Member
- LMX,
blehhhhhh, i really don't like getting in arguments over semantics.
and i really quite despise philosophy even though i think philosophically all the time.
if someone asks me what my religion is or whatever, i'm going to keep saying agnostic atheist or weak atheist because i think that best defines me. i do not think we can know if God exists, but i do not believe he does. i would still be accurate by saying that i'm just an "atheist," but i like saying agnostic atheist because people ask how that can be, and i get a better chance to explain myself. i do not deny that God could exist. and plus, religious people do not react as negatively to the word "agnostic" as they do to "atheist." lol
and i really quite despise philosophy even though i think philosophically all the time.
if someone asks me what my religion is or whatever, i'm going to keep saying agnostic atheist or weak atheist because i think that best defines me. i do not think we can know if God exists, but i do not believe he does. i would still be accurate by saying that i'm just an "atheist," but i like saying agnostic atheist because people ask how that can be, and i get a better chance to explain myself. i do not deny that God could exist. and plus, religious people do not react as negatively to the word "agnostic" as they do to "atheist." lol
AquaEyes11010
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1) God arose as the most logical explanation for things otherwise unexplainable by people. If there always was a god, then for the first few billion years, this planet did not have beings capable of acknowledging its existence. If despite this, there always was and is a god, and if the "end of days" is truly at hand, then life on this planet was more than 99% wasted by being filled with things that weren't able to comprehend a god.
2) As our knowledge has grown and compounded upon itself, we are becoming ever less in need of a god to explain things. Complexity has resulted from small accumulations of changes to simplicity. If life needs a creator to explain its complexity, then that creator must by definition be even more complex, thus requiring an even more complex creator, ad infinitum.
3) Because humans are (presumably) unique on this planet in being aware of our own mortality, the promise of a continuing life after death is a great selling point for acquiring members to "clubs with rules" (aka religions). It's hard to trump someone who can convince you that while you're poor and miserable now, keeping "in line" with the rules will grant you rewards after your death. It's also a great way to maintain class divisions.
4) The strictly fundamentally religious often eschew information or lifestyles born of science which contradict religious teachings. In the USA, there have been attacks on teaching evolution in public schools. Be very wary of any mindset that praises ignorance -- knowledge is a light in the dark. The battle between Socialism and Capitalism was based largely on the premise in Socialism that for it to truly work, there must be no Capitalism anywhere else, i.e. no alternative.
2) As our knowledge has grown and compounded upon itself, we are becoming ever less in need of a god to explain things. Complexity has resulted from small accumulations of changes to simplicity. If life needs a creator to explain its complexity, then that creator must by definition be even more complex, thus requiring an even more complex creator, ad infinitum.
3) Because humans are (presumably) unique on this planet in being aware of our own mortality, the promise of a continuing life after death is a great selling point for acquiring members to "clubs with rules" (aka religions). It's hard to trump someone who can convince you that while you're poor and miserable now, keeping "in line" with the rules will grant you rewards after your death. It's also a great way to maintain class divisions.
4) The strictly fundamentally religious often eschew information or lifestyles born of science which contradict religious teachings. In the USA, there have been attacks on teaching evolution in public schools. Be very wary of any mindset that praises ignorance -- knowledge is a light in the dark. The battle between Socialism and Capitalism was based largely on the premise in Socialism that for it to truly work, there must be no Capitalism anywhere else, i.e. no alternative.
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