(October 9, 2014 at 6:43 am)Riketto Wrote: There is no way that God would reveals to people that believe that he does not exist so you will not perceive him ever.In that sense, god is like everything else that does not exist-- he will never reveal himself, and I will never perceive him.
However, I would point out that I was a theist for some 30+ years, and god never revealed himself during this time either. Usually when I point this out, someone explains that I need to do more than believe. And if I point out that I did more than just believe, they say that I needed to do something else. And if I tell them I did something else, they keep moving god further and further out of reach.
So we eventually reach the point where it becomes clear that what they are trying to tell me is that I cannot believe in god until I believe in god. Which is a very round-about way to explain the obvious.
Quote:The best way to go at your stage is to take it easy and believe that the unbelievable is sometime possible.We all have things that we believe, and that we do not believe. At least some of them are beliefs that we did not hold at some point, or doubts that we overcame at some point. Everyone is capable of changing beliefs. My lack of belief in god is not due to my unwillingness to change my beliefs: that is how I became an atheist in the first place, after all. My lack of belief is based on a distinct lack of god in any place, physical or otherwise, where I searched.
"Well, evolution is a theory. It is also a fact. And facts and theories are different things, not rungs in a hierarchy of increasing certainty. Facts are the world's data. Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts. Facts don't go away when scientists debate rival theories to explain them. Einstein's theory of gravitation replaced Newton's in this century, but apples didn't suspend themselves in midair, pending the outcome. And humans evolved from ape- like ancestors whether they did so by Darwin's proposed mechanism or by some other yet to be discovered."
-Stephen Jay Gould
-Stephen Jay Gould