(April 15, 2015 at 9:02 am)thesummerqueen Wrote: The caveat to this is that "god helps those who help themselves."

Why....it's almost as if there is no god, isn't it?

(April 15, 2015 at 12:28 pm)robvalue Wrote: Watch: wow, I really can't imagine how that must feel. It must be so weird! I do understand how stressful that must be though, trying to interpret random stuff as having meaning. So did you really believe you were getting messages?

Oh yeah, I thought I was getting messages all the time, but I was never certain what the messages meant, and I was never certain if the messages were truths from the Holy Spirit or tricks from Satan.

Here's a fairly typical example: I might be walking and notice a couple of twigs on the sidewalk that roughly form a cross. Then I would wonder what that meant. Was God shaking his finger at me, because I was walking to McDonald's to get a coke on a day when I was supposed to be fasting?

Of course, my Christian adventure began with psychosis, so I was getting all kinds of messages at that time. Ironically, when I started recovering from psychosis, I was afraid I had done something to upset God, because I was no longer getting as many weird experiences. So I became even more extreme in my efforts as a Christian. I prayed and knelt for hours every day. Finally I decided that Satan might be the good guy and God might be the bad guy - after all why did God want his followers to be cannibals?

You missed out on a lot of fun by never being a Christian

(April 15, 2015 at 8:58 am)robvalue Wrote: This is something that has intrigued me for a while, ever since I heard it. "Most of the time, theists live like atheists." I think it's true. When it comes to general mundane decision making and survival, that is what they do. And when they stray significantly from what atheists do, it works out badly for them. This is what I wanted to examine further.

Some easy examples:

An atheist looks both ways before crossing the street.
A theist thinks, "God is looking after me. But best be on the safe side...", looks both ways before crossing the street. Thinks, "God got me across the street."
A theist thinks, "God is looking after me. I don't need to look." Theist walks out into the road without looking. Theist gets hit by a car. 

An atheist goes to the doctor when they are ill. Gets better.
A theist thinks, "God is looking after me. But best be on the safe side...", and goes to the doctor when they are ill, and prays. Gets better. Thinks, "God made me better."
A theist thinks, "God is looking after me. I don't need to go to the doctor." Theist prays. Theist gets very ill.

And so on. What the theist is doing, minus irrelevancies like praying and attributing things to god, is exactly the same. When it isn't, they come off worse.

This is open to anyone to discuss, and to think of any more interesting examples of when theists behave like atheists, or times they differ and how that works out for them. My point is that basically theists are acting like they don't believe god is looking after them, betraying their professed beliefs.

Your last point first:
When I was a theist, I always viewed 'bad things happening' as not a big deal.  Because in the big picture, you get eternal salvation.  Intentions were the primary focus.  Not looking both ways because I wanted God to know I trusted him to keep me safe was dumb, because I didn't view God as particularly invested in whether or not I got hit by a car.   I thought of those things in the "Give to Caeser what is Caesers" classification.   "I laid down the stuff I want you to do, the rest is up to you." with things like not walking into traffic fitting under 'the rest.' 

The earlier point:
I think we see a lot of overlap, because evolution has left us with a lot of the same desires.  

I imagine  you take "Pray to God instead of going to the doctor" lady, remove her religion, and she's some anti-vaxx holistic medicine wacko in California.  What's driving them isn't the religion, it's some weird defective brain impulse.

Just like a theist thanks God when they beat cancer, and an atheist thanks science.  Both are really just happy not to be dead.  The base feelings are the same, it's just they express them in a different context.

Another example, if you remove the context, it's often tough to tell many Atheists and Puritans apart the way they judge people.  It's the same propping oneself up, and dehumanizing the other based on what you believe.  For whatever reason, that seems to be a very big part of human nature.  

Atheist: No ones' watching and what's the harm anyway?
Theist: It will distance me from the things I most value.

(April 16, 2015 at 9:39 am)Mezmo! Wrote: Atheist: No ones' watching and what's the harm anyway?
Theist: It will distance me from the things I most value.

Are you trying to pull an xkcd 774 on us?

(April 16, 2015 at 9:39 am)Mezmo! Wrote: Atheist: No ones' watching and what's the harm anyway?
Theist: It will distance me from the things I most value.

(April 16, 2015 at 9:39 am)Mezmo! Wrote: Atheist: No ones' watching and what's the harm anyway?
Theist: It will distance me from the things I most value.

What is this supposed to mean please? 

Are you saying some theists put value on not doing certain things even if they cause no harm?

This is an interesting thread and something I never thought about before.

Thank you

I hadn't thought about it much either until I heard it relatively recently, and it kind of stunned me.

(April 16, 2015 at 9:55 am)robvalue Wrote:

(April 16, 2015 at 9:39 am)Mezmo! Wrote: Atheist: No ones' watching and what's the harm anyway?
Theist: It will distance me from the things I most value.

What is this supposed to mean please? 

Are you saying some theists put value on not doing certain things even if they cause no harm?

All people naturally tend to rationalize small compromises of conscience. For example, if a teller rings up the wrong price for a small item like a pair of socks and not correcting the total. Or taking the unused shampoos or soaps from the hotel room. Or letting one’s gaze linger on some exposed cleavage. If people evaluate their actions according to the most common secular value systems, it is fairly easy to justify such actions: Wal-Mart can absorb the cost of the teller’s mistake; the maids would throw out the soaps anyway, it’s okay to just look, etc. Thus in absence of moral absolutes a person’s character is susceptible to slow corrosion. Eventually, people start to compromise on bigger issues like murdering unborn babies. This kind of corruption is also possible in more abstract theistic moral systems wherein one hopes to gain the mercy and favor of God/gods by having a positive balance in the ledger of good versus bad deeds. Christian morality is a little bit different because it is based on a personal relationship with our Lord and Savior. Such constant communion drives believers to think and act in ways that will bring closer union with the Lord. That is why David said, “Against Thee alone have I sinned.”