(August 5, 2018 at 6:18 am)AtlasS33 Wrote: The amount of reaction to religion is evidence in itself that the concept of God existed, will exist no matter what.
People always seek God. And God's presence is felt no matter what.

People seek other kinds of drugs, too.

Quote:Why do you want to know if God exists or not?

You probably cannot comprehend this, Atlas, but I never think about fucking god unless someone comes along and says "god can do this" or "god can do that."  I don't give a shit about god.  I care about people who are so deluded as to think that there is one and they have to cede their humanity and grovel to this vision they have of a vain, petty, unjust, tyrant.

So I guess my question back to you is, "why do you have such a low opinion of yourself?"

God thought is a mental spanner. It's a side effect of mental mechanisms geared toward our existence as a social species. Like the side effects of helpful medicines, it's likely something we will never be able to entirely eliminate. That doesn't make it, or them, desirable.

"When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things."

(August 5, 2018 at 6:18 am)AtlasS33 Wrote: I wanted to share my views on the human need regarding the pursuit of religious knowledge. In other words I am reflecting on the "why" in this context; asking: "why are you chasing the idea of the existence of a God?"

"What's in it for you", is another question so interrelated with the "why"; actually answering the "what" would automatically mean that the why is answered.

Why do you want to know if God exists or not? what made you feel alerted and feel the urge to chase such a terminology, validating if it was right or wrong?

We humans never give something any long-term attention (the idea of God is present since the dawn of time) until it makes a huge impact on our existence, for example I don't notice the "absence of winged unicorns" because simply: "winged unicorns have no effect on my life".

God -on the other hand- is given all this positive and negative attention; literally we can say that the concept of God is innate capacity in any society. Religion existed with humanity since the first recorded days of history, why didn't the idea die out?

Yes; it has a huge impact that cannot be ignored, no matter what.

The amount of reaction to religion is evidence in itself that the concept of God existed, will exist no matter what.
People always seek God. And God's presence is felt no matter what.

For me the idea of God is secondary or even tertiary. 
I am more interested in human psychology.
especially the idea of someone stabbing or piercing women and infants because of a purported God's command.
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just got a message from my female friend who is asking me where we meet... 
I wanted to write something else God-related, but I forgot what and I can't be half-arsed to think about it NOW.

(August 5, 2018 at 6:18 am)AtlasS33 Wrote: I wanted to share my views on the human need regarding the pursuit of religious knowledge.

And straight out of the gate you start with a generalisation. There is no human need to pursue religious knowledge, whatever that is.

Or have you made a complete ball of presenting this quirey of yours?

Naturally I believe the OP has a point. Do we have any clear evidence to point to the concept of God being totally limited to filling in the gaps of our knowledge?

And I am still not convinced that spirituality survives through indoctrination alone. I know of many people who become spiritual as adults who never grew up in a religious home.

(August 6, 2018 at 7:15 pm)JairCrawford Wrote: Naturally I believe the OP has a point. Do we have any clear evidence to point to the concept of God being totally limited to filling in the gaps of our knowledge?

The inability of theists to agree on even the most basic qualities is good evidence that it does not relate to a single, real entity. It's never been demonstrated that any of these versions do anything at all outside the mind of the theist. They generally do everything you'd expect, such as agreeing with them on every subject, and sharing their knowledge.

Quote:And I am still not convinced that spirituality  survives through indoctrination alone. I know of many people who become spiritual as adults who never grew up in a religious home.

Specific religions survive mostly through indoctrination. "Spirituality" can also mean virtually anything, and I agree, superstitious thinking can develop in adults.

(August 7, 2018 at 12:42 am)robvalue Wrote:

(August 6, 2018 at 7:15 pm)JairCrawford Wrote: Naturally I believe the OP has a point. Do we have any clear evidence to point to the concept of God being totally limited to filling in the gaps of our knowledge?

The inability of theists to agree on even the most basic qualities is good evidence that it does not relate to a single, real entity. It's never been demonstrated that any of these versions do anything at all outside the mind of the theist. They generally do everything you'd expect, such as agreeing with them on every subject, and sharing their knowledge.

I'm not inclined to agree that this is a substantial issue. We have concepts without clear delineation that are nonetheless valid concepts, nobody complains that chairs don't exist because there is no all encompassing definition for what a chair is. We acknowledge the fallacy of the beard, that sometimes there aren't clearly definable distinctions without throwing up our hands and claiming that therefore all things belong in the same category. The concept of a beard doesn't become invalid simply because there is no clear dividing point. Language is by its nature slippery and trades on ambiguity for its power. That there is no clear and unambiguous definition of God even if true is a question of epistemology, not of whether such an ill-defined entity does or does not exist.

(August 7, 2018 at 12:42 am)robvalue Wrote:

(August 6, 2018 at 7:15 pm)JairCrawford Wrote: And I am still not convinced that spirituality  survives through indoctrination alone. I know of many people who become spiritual as adults who never grew up in a religious home.

Specific religions survive mostly through indoctrination. "Spirituality" can also mean virtually anything, and I agree, superstitious thinking can develop in adults.

Specific religions, doctrinally, sure. But the concepts on which religions are based? No. It's been determined that children spontaneously invent the concept of God. And the qualitative nature of having spiritual experiences is a basic fact of our psychology. Our minds have the basic tools and experiences and intuitions to come up with religion on their own. Indoctrination is, if anything, simply encouraging and giving shape to natural impulses. If it were true that religion were solely the result of indoctrination (and I realize you're not claiming this), then one would have to ask how it got started in the first place. Religion may be a bundle of falsehoods, but I think it's wholly natural.

The concepts upon which religions are based -are- the specific doctrinal claims, not some vague spirit-this spirit-that.  In any case, self-indoctrination isn't a mysterious or unknown quantity..so asking how religions get started if religion is a case of indoctrination (as opposed to our innate tendency towards magical thought) poses no problem whatsoever. Case in point...spreading a religion is one of the most effective tools of self indoctrination. Sinking a persons credibility of interaction into the ideology and providing opportunity for them to repeat, reaffirm, and rework their arguments with others to be more internally persuasive to themselves.

Faith seeks confirmation, and strengthens itself (internally and externally) through communal assent.

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Side note....the broad strokes of why religious movements follow a historic trend of interaction presents itself above as well.  Why it begins as a bunch of crackpots pleading for acceptance within the majority as an equally legitimate viewpoint..the need of assent, affirmation, or toleration...then becoming aggressive in it's outreach, and finally attempting to silence or delegitimize any remaining (or newly formed) dissent.  

The OP is a textbook example.

(August 7, 2018 at 8:47 am)Khemikal Wrote: The concepts upon which religions are based -are- the specific doctrinal claims, not some vague spirit-this spirit-that.  In any case, self-indoctrination isn't a mysterious or unknown quantity..so asking how religions get started if religion is a case of indoctrination (as opposed to our innate tendency towards magical thought) poses no problem whatsoever.  Case in point...spreading a religion is one of the most effective tools of self indoctrination.  Sinking a persons credibility of interaction into the ideology and providing opportunity for them to repeat, reaffirm, and rework their arguments with others to be more internally persuasive to themselves.

Faith seeks confirmation, and strengthens itself (internally and externally) through communal assent.

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Side note....the broad strokes of why religious movements follow a historic trend of interaction presents itself above as well.  Why it begins as a bunch of crackpots pleading for acceptance within the majority as an equally legitimate viewpoint..the need of assent, affirmation, or toleration...then becoming aggressive in it's outreach, and finally attempting to silence or delegitimize any remaining (or newly formed) dissent.  

The OP is a textbook example.

Given that the God helmet provokes spiritual experiences by physical manipulation of the brain without reference to doctrine, I'm not sure you're right here. Your claim seems to trend toward something like the Sapir-Whorf theory of language for spiritual experiences. At best, your contention is an unproven assertion. Given that children appear to spontaneously invent the concept of God, I think you've failed to explain even the given counter-example. Additionally, I think there's a clear distinction between a concept and a doctrine. A doctrine is a belief about the concept. I'm not sure the idea that the two are the same even makes sense. At minimum, I'd like to know more about what you mean by this. Hopefully you're not claiming that without a specific doctrine one is incapable of having a loose and amorphous concept of a thing.