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RE: Albert Einstein the Agnostic
January 26, 2016 at 2:25 am
(This post was last modified: January 26, 2016 at 2:27 am by Heat.)
(January 26, 2016 at 2:16 am)robvalue Wrote: Indeed, hence people's love of quote mining him.
I think I'd describe him as something of a pantheist, but in an extremely abstract way so as to be pretty much indistinguishable from an atheist. I would say that the flip-flopping of his quotes may indicate that in his personal life he actually did go back and forth on the subject of god, being a hard-theist devoted to his beliefs one day, and then downcasting the concept of god existing the other. I think he's too smart to not realize that what he was saying was contradictory of other things he's said, so a pretty logical explanation is that he must have actually believed what he was saying in all those instances, and in turn, struggled with his beliefs quite a bit.
Which is better:
To die with ignorance, or to live with intelligence?
Truth doesn't accommodate to personal opinions.
The choice is yours.
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There is God and there is man, it's only a matter of who created whom
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The more questions you ask, the more you realize that disagreement is inevitable, and communication of this disagreement, irrelevant.
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RE: Albert Einstein the Agnostic
January 26, 2016 at 2:32 am
That sounds entirely plausible. For someone struggling with their beliefs, I can totally see that happening.
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RE: Albert Einstein the Agnostic
February 23, 2016 at 12:16 am
(January 24, 2016 at 8:04 pm)BrianSoddingBoru4 Wrote: (January 24, 2016 at 8:00 pm)MattB Wrote: I don't disagree with atheism either. Don't like fundies though. I have a problem with the man-made religions.
As if there are any other kind...
Boru
Not that I found so far.
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RE: Albert Einstein the Agnostic
February 23, 2016 at 1:13 am
Some people use 'agnostic' because 'atheist' too confrontational.
Confrontational is a good thing though, because we need to be confrontational. So long as we live in a society where children are taught from a young age that you can trust a 2000 year old book over ever changing science, confrontation is needed. So long as religious leaders push to deny rights to gays and lesbians, confrontation is needed.
I'd say most atheists could easily classify themselves as 'agnostic'. Sure, there's some jerks out there who call themselves Atheists. Stack them up against the jerks who call themselves Christians, and see which group is worse.
The whole tone of Church teaching in regard to woman is, to the last degree, contemptuous and degrading. - Elizabeth Cady Stanton
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RE: Albert Einstein the Agnostic
February 23, 2016 at 5:23 am
(January 26, 2016 at 2:05 am)Heat Wrote: Albert Einstein is tough to decipher.
Seriously, look at his quotes on the subject of God.
He has tons of quotes that would lead to him being a Theist, and others leading to him being an Atheist.
The ones where he states not to believe in a personal god are unambiguous. The others are just him using the word God in lieu of origin of order in natural laws or something.
The fool hath said in his heart, There is a God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that doeth good.
Psalm 14, KJV revised edition
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RE: Albert Einstein the Agnostic
February 23, 2016 at 11:14 am
(January 24, 2016 at 4:02 pm)MattB Wrote: Found this quote on a blog and not sure what to make of it.
I have repeatedly said that in my opinion the idea of a personal God
is a childlike one. You may call me an agnostic, but I do not share
the crusading spirit of the professional atheist whose fervor is
mostly due to a painful act of liberation from the fetters of
religious indoctrination received in youth. I prefer an attitude of
humility corresponding to the weakness of our intellectual
understanding of nature and our own being.
Sincerely Yours,
Albert Einstein
Einstein is dead. If he were alive today, what would he think now?
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RE: Albert Einstein the Agnostic
February 23, 2016 at 11:15 am
(January 26, 2016 at 2:16 am)robvalue Wrote: Indeed, hence people's love of quote mining him.
I think I'd describe him as something of a pantheist, but in an extremely abstract way so as to be pretty much indistinguishable from an atheist.
Which Dawkins describes in The God Delusion as being sexed-up atheism.
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RE: Albert Einstein the Agnostic
February 23, 2016 at 11:21 am
(This post was last modified: February 23, 2016 at 11:24 am by Alex K.)
(February 23, 2016 at 11:14 am)Jehanne Wrote: (January 24, 2016 at 4:02 pm)MattB Wrote: Found this quote on a blog and not sure what to make of it.
I have repeatedly said that in my opinion the idea of a personal God
is a childlike one. You may call me an agnostic, but I do not share
the crusading spirit of the professional atheist whose fervor is
mostly due to a painful act of liberation from the fetters of
religious indoctrination received in youth. I prefer an attitude of
humility corresponding to the weakness of our intellectual
understanding of nature and our own being.
Sincerely Yours,
Albert Einstein
Einstein is dead. If he were alive today, what would he think now?
"Can you please stop putting that picture of me sticking out my tongue on t-shirts? Also, what's a t-shirt? Dude those interferometers you have there are the shit! Also, why does everyone still care about my religious beliefs?!"
The fool hath said in his heart, There is a God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that doeth good.
Psalm 14, KJV revised edition
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RE: Albert Einstein the Agnostic
February 23, 2016 at 11:27 am
(February 23, 2016 at 11:21 am)Alex K Wrote: (February 23, 2016 at 11:14 am)Jehanne Wrote: Einstein is dead. If he were alive today, what would he think now?
"Can you please stop putting that picture of me sticking out my tongue on t-shirts? Also, what's a t-shirt? Dude those interferometers you have there are the shit! Also, why does everyone still care about my religious beliefs?!"
Imagine he were still alive. Do you think physics would be different/more advanced right now because of his continuous work on it? Or do you think the advancement of physics has little to do with certain individual minds in particular and more with emerging technologies and the resulting opportunities that allow it to move forward?
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RE: Albert Einstein the Agnostic
February 23, 2016 at 11:29 am
(This post was last modified: February 23, 2016 at 11:36 am by Alex K.)
He stopped making important lasting contributions long before he died, because he got obsessed with his unified theory and not liking quantum mechanics, and ran down a dead end.
That being said who knows when we would have gotten general relativity without him. Hard to say!
The fool hath said in his heart, There is a God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that doeth good.
Psalm 14, KJV revised edition
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