(September 20, 2014 at 3:44 pm)C4RM5 Wrote: I don't really have an arguement other than these believe has changed my life, so in your sense I don't believe based on evidence.

There's no "in a sense" about it: you believe because you want to believe, and all your pretense to evidence is just a smokescreen to lend legitimacy to the fact that you really believe because it feels good.

I hate to tell you, though, but how a belief makes you personally feel doesn't impact its truth value, nor does the impact it has had on your life. A successful conman doesn't suddenly have all his cons rendered truthful exchanges just because the effects of them positively impacted his life. Lies and falsehoods can do plenty of good for one's personal motivation, but they don't become true because of that.

And I think you'll find it's terribly easy to keep the positive changes, and shuck the untruths. There is nothing in those tales of magic that's actually doing anything for you.

(September 20, 2014 at 3:44 pm)C4RM5 Wrote:

(September 20, 2014 at 3:42 pm)whateverist Wrote: Well, it may be true from his point of view. Compared to those he mixes with among 'the flock', perhaps he really is the questioning one. Maybe he gets some heat for being such a rebel.

Is that true, C4RM5? Are you constantly goading your peers to think more than they're accustomed to do?

No, I'm not a rebel, I am quite a quiet person so I sit and listen for questions I had being answered. Any way, I go to a Bible class in my church and generally what is being talked about is explained in such away that I don't have any questions.

Is that the outcome you were looking for? Assuaging your doubts/questions?

But, if that's true, in what sense did you think you are a 'skeptic'?

(September 20, 2014 at 4:46 pm)whateverist Wrote:

(September 20, 2014 at 3:44 pm)C4RM5 Wrote: No, I'm not a rebel, I am quite a quiet person so I sit and listen for questions I had being answered. Any way, I go to a Bible class in my church and generally what is being talked about is explained in such away that I don't have any questions.

Is that the outcome you were looking for? Assuaging your doubts/questions?

But, if that's true, in what sense did you think you are a 'skeptic'?

As in I think about questions but I never ask about them. Unless it is really on my nerves.

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(September 20, 2014 at 4:26 pm)Esquilax Wrote:

(September 20, 2014 at 3:44 pm)C4RM5 Wrote: I don't really have an arguement other than these believe has changed my life, so in your sense I don't believe based on evidence.

There's no "in a sense" about it: you believe because you want to believe, and all your pretense to evidence is just a smokescreen to lend legitimacy to the fact that you really believe because it feels good.

I hate to tell you, though, but how a belief makes you personally feel doesn't impact its truth value, nor does the impact it has had on your life. A successful conman doesn't suddenly have all his cons rendered truthful exchanges just because the effects of them positively impacted his life. Lies and falsehoods can do plenty of good for one's personal motivation, but they don't become true because of that.

And I think you'll find it's terribly easy to keep the positive changes, and shuck the untruths. There is nothing in those tales of magic that's actually doing anything for you.

Can we not just have a mutual agreement. You have your beliefs and I have mine.

We could, if one of us wasn't positing their beliefs as truth without evidence to justify that.

(September 20, 2014 at 4:58 pm)Stimbo Wrote: We could, if one of us wasn't positing their beliefs as truth without evidence to justify that.

I have never said this is the truth, all I have said is that this is my believe.

(September 20, 2014 at 4:47 pm)C4RM5 Wrote: Can we not just have a mutual agreement. You have your beliefs and I have mine.

Which is very convenient ground for the person who both has the unjustified beliefs in the exchange and enjoys a level of legitimacy and cultural support from them that is directly reversed for the other party. It means you get to run off having done no work and still retaining a position of greater power and reward.

As it happens, I fully acknowledge your right to hold to your own beliefs. That doesn't absolve those beliefs of criticism, however.

(September 20, 2014 at 5:06 pm)Esquilax Wrote:

(September 20, 2014 at 4:47 pm)C4RM5 Wrote: Can we not just have a mutual agreement. You have your beliefs and I have mine.

Which is very convenient ground for the person who both has the unjustified beliefs in the exchange and enjoys a level of legitimacy and cultural support from them that is directly reversed for the other party. It means you get to run off having done no work and still retaining a position of greater power and reward.

As it happens, I fully acknowledge your right to hold to your own beliefs. That doesn't absolve those beliefs of criticism, however.

I hope I haven't been criticising, all I did on this thread was to say there would be nothing to stop me from believing in God.

(September 20, 2014 at 5:01 pm)C4RM5 Wrote: I have never said this is the truth, all I have said is that this is my believe.

You believe in the reality of Jesus as an historical figure, yes?

(September 20, 2014 at 5:13 pm)Stimbo Wrote:

(September 20, 2014 at 5:01 pm)C4RM5 Wrote: I have never said this is the truth, all I have said is that this is my believe.

You believe in the reality of Jesus as an historical figure, yes?

Correct

(September 20, 2014 at 5:11 pm)C4RM5 Wrote: I hope I haven't been criticising, all I did on this thread was to say there would be nothing to stop me from believing in God.

I've been criticizing, and I'll continue to do so. You have come into a debate space here, maybe you should have come prepared for that. Not that I actually understand why you'd come here in the first place, if you won't even entertain the idea of being wrong; it can't be to expand your own horizons and if you're here to convince others then that presupposition of yours is going to be absolute poison to those efforts.