Secular Humanism scares theists because it's doing everything religions claim to be doing for humanity without the superfluous claim of a deity directing these actions.

(November 26, 2013 at 5:35 pm)BadWriterSparty Wrote: Secular Humanism scares theists because it's doing everything religions failed to do for humanity without the superfluous claim of a deity directing these actions.

*Fixed that for you

(November 26, 2013 at 5:29 pm)thesummerqueen Wrote: Beauty isn't an 'invention' - it's a perception. We find things beautiful because they incite a deep wonder and curiosity inside us.

A perception of something that isn't there IN REALITY, but exists only in our minds.
"We find things beautiful because they incite a deep wonder and curiosity inside us"
and becuase it suggests there is something more than meets the eye that transcends pure MATERIAL. My happy ass will gladly move along when you can tell me how beauty can exist in the effect, without existing in a first-cause.

God exists as a perception to me, as I see beauty in the universe; it incites wonder and a deeper urning to explore it. The beauty I see in my infant daughter transcends the shallow explaination of evolved instinct, and points in the direction of a transcendent being of infinite beauty in the first-cause, from which beauty in the effect is perceived.
If that is a conversational abomination to you, grow some thicker skin, or get on a forum that will only reinforce the ideas what you want to hear.

(November 26, 2013 at 6:46 pm)FiniteImmortal Wrote:

(November 26, 2013 at 5:29 pm)thesummerqueen Wrote: Beauty isn't an 'invention' - it's a perception. We find things beautiful because they incite a deep wonder and curiosity inside us.

A perception of something that isn't there IN REALITY, but exists only in our minds.
"We find things beautiful because they incite a deep wonder and curiosity inside us"
and becuase it suggests there is something more than meets the eye that transcends pure MATERIAL. My happy ass will gladly move along when you can tell me how beauty can exist in the effect, without existing in a first-cause.

God exists as a perception to me, as I see beauty in the universe; it incites wonder and a deeper urning to explore it. The beauty I see in my infant daughter transcends the shallow explaination of evolved instinct, and points in the direction of a transcendent being of infinite beauty in the first-cause, from which beauty in the effect is perceived.
If that is a conversational abomination to you, grow some thicker skin, or get on a forum that will only reinforce the ideas what you want to hear.

You clearly have a much higher opinion of yourself than we do

(November 26, 2013 at 6:50 pm)Optimistic Mysanthrope Wrote:

(November 26, 2013 at 6:46 pm)FiniteImmortal Wrote: A perception of something that isn't there IN REALITY, but exists only in our minds.
"We find things beautiful because they incite a deep wonder and curiosity inside us"
and becuase it suggests there is something more than meets the eye that transcends pure MATERIAL. My happy ass will gladly move along when you can tell me how beauty can exist in the effect, without existing in a first-cause.

God exists as a perception to me, as I see beauty in the universe; it incites wonder and a deeper urning to explore it. The beauty I see in my infant daughter transcends the shallow explaination of evolved instinct, and points in the direction of a transcendent being of infinite beauty in the first-cause, from which beauty in the effect is perceived.
If that is a conversational abomination to you, grow some thicker skin, or get on a forum that will only reinforce the ideas what you want to hear.

You clearly have a much higher opinion of yourself than we do

Your opinion of someone who articulates an opposing view is irrelevant. Do you have a counter-point? Or is the laughing emoticon the only easy response? I have given a reasonable response as to why I believe beauty is actually real, and not a mere construct. Just as intelligence is real, not just a construct of over-active brains.

You atheists' continual finger pointing, name calling, vulgarity, and group bulling hold no weight here... It is but merely a distracting technique that only works with your fellow kudos-giving support group.

It's not that you have an opposing view that I laugh at, it's crap like this:

Quote:If that is a conversational abomination to you, grow some thicker skin, or get on a forum that will only reinforce the ideas what you want to hear.

I don't see your views as a "conversational abomination", I see them as the puerile musings of a self-aggrandising, pretentious tit. Now maybe that's an unfair assessment but given your phrasing, that's how you come across.

(November 26, 2013 at 7:34 pm)Optimistic Mysanthrope Wrote: It's not that you have an opposing view that I laugh at, it's crap like this:

Quote:If that is a conversational abomination to you, grow some thicker skin, or get on a forum that will only reinforce the ideas what you want to hear.

I don't see your views as a "conversational abomination", I see them as the puerile musings of a self-aggrandising, pretentious tit. Now maybe that's an unfair assessment but given your phrasing, that's how you come across.

How could suggesting love exists absolutely as well as beauty, as a phenomenon we can interact with based on it having existed before we got here more pretentious than saying love and beauty are an artificial construct arrived at as a byproduct of the over-braining of humans?

To me, the definition of SELF-AGRANDIZEMENT is seating your self at the throne of the universe. Did you cause yourself to exist? If so, then I will but bow down and worship at the feet of your magestic splendor. We have been given this life by no merits of our own, understanding that is humility, the opposite of self-aggrandizement or self-worship (humanism).

(November 26, 2013 at 8:00 pm)FiniteImmortal Wrote: How could suggesting love exists absolutely as well as beauty, as a phenomenon we can interact with based on it having existed before we got here more pretentious than saying love and beauty are an artificial construct arrived at as a byproduct of the over-braining of humans?

To me, the definition of SELF-AGRANDIZEMENT is seating your self at the throne of the universe. Did you cause yourself to exist? If so, then I will but bow down and worship at the feet of your magestic splendor. We have been given this life by no merits of our own, understanding that is humility, the opposite of self-aggrandizement or self-worship (humanism).

So many illogical inconsistencies is making my brain hurt.

(November 26, 2013 at 6:46 pm)FiniteImmortal Wrote: A perception of something that isn't there IN REALITY, but exists only in our minds.

Oh...so we exist in the Matrix? Things don't actually exist?

Did you give up on the comfort thing?

(November 26, 2013 at 6:46 pm)FiniteImmortal Wrote: and becuase it suggests there is something more than meets the eye that transcends pure MATERIAL. My happy ass will gladly move along when you can tell me how beauty can exist in the effect, without existing in a first-cause.

I didn't say beauty was A Thing. I said beauty was a perception.

(November 26, 2013 at 6:46 pm)FiniteImmortal Wrote: God exists as a perception to me, as I see beauty in the universe; it incites wonder and a deeper urning to explore it. The beauty I see in my infant daughter transcends the shallow explaination of evolved instinct, and points in the direction of a transcendent being of infinite beauty in the first-cause, from which beauty in the effect is perceived.
If that is a conversational abomination to you, grow some thicker skin, or get on a forum that will only reinforce the ideas what you want to hear.

Aw, I wasn't 'hurt' by it, merely disgusted. [pats head] Yes, I see - you love your daughter, therefore god..because no one ever loved their spawn before.

(November 26, 2013 at 8:11 pm)thesummerqueen Wrote:

(November 26, 2013 at 6:46 pm)FiniteImmortal Wrote: A perception of something that isn't there IN REALITY, but exists only in our minds.

Oh...so we exist in the Matrix? Things don't actually exist?

Did you give up on the comfort thing?

(November 26, 2013 at 6:46 pm)FiniteImmortal Wrote: and becuase it suggests there is something more than meets the eye that transcends pure MATERIAL. My happy ass will gladly move along when you can tell me how beauty can exist in the effect, without existing in a first-cause.

I didn't say beauty was A Thing. I said beauty was a perception.

(November 26, 2013 at 6:46 pm)FiniteImmortal Wrote: God exists as a perception to me, as I see beauty in the universe; it incites wonder and a deeper urning to explore it. The beauty I see in my infant daughter transcends the shallow explaination of evolved instinct, and points in the direction of a transcendent being of infinite beauty in the first-cause, from which beauty in the effect is perceived.
If that is a conversational abomination to you, grow some thicker skin, or get on a forum that will only reinforce the ideas what you want to hear.

Aw, I wasn't 'hurt' by it, merely disgusted. [pats head] Yes, I see - you love your daughter, therefore god..because no one ever loved their spawn before.

I never said you need to acknowledge God in order to love. I don't need to acknowledge gravity to fall. If I acknowledge gravity and proceed to study it though, I'm a better suitor for employment at NASA then a child who doesn't understand why, though accepts the fact than when you drop a baseball it goes down.

What I'm saying is you have no epistemological basis for love, other than you merely do it. I don't need to look directly at the sun to be able to acknowledge that by it, I am able to look at anything at all.