Most personally convincing reasons you don't believe.

[dom.donald]

How about him telling me "the girl your in love with.. You will have one chance with her, and you will pass it up, and what's more you will know this is your only chance and you will pass it up anyway." A year later this very thing happened. She broke up with her BF and approached me, but I was exhausted from work, and she wanted to go out on a Sunday night. I told her I was tired, but I was going to go. She said we can just go out friday. Then I told her about this very 'angel experience' and what he said, and was worried this was my 'one chance.' She said don't worry about it go and get some rest. Come Friday she had gotten back together with that guy (she married)
He also told me I would have a second chance latter but that it would not count as i would be dating my future wife at that point.
A year after that she came to me after my first date with me wife and told me she was done with him again, and this time I got to tell her no.

You do know what a self fulfilling prophesy is, do you not?

The self-fulfilling prophecy is, in the beginning, a false definition of the situation evoking a new behavior which makes the original false conception come true. This specious validity of the self-fulfilling prophecy perpetuates a reign of error. For the prophet will cite the actual course of events as proof that he was right from the very beginning.

yup, I can't *possibly* imagine why a girl would decide against going out with you after you'd told her you feared it was your "one chance"... no possible natural explanation for that is there?

Anyway, my reason for not believing in God, is because I was never brought up to believe such things. Therefore the idea of claiming the contents of a particular extremely boring and ridiculously fantastical book are divine and True, just seemed preposterous. Since then I have done copious amounts of reading and research, and determined that I am simply not capable (i.e. gullible enough) to "open my mind and let Him in". I have no need to do it. It serves no purpose for me. Why would i purposefully disconnect myself from reality? It's like a mental illness.

[Drich]

Okay Drich, you win. Enjoy it and commence strutting. I have no specific citations to offer you. The best I can do is point you towards the main book I learnt all of this from and which the closest thing I've got to a Bible... the book that changed my life: Computational Explorations In Cognitive Neuroscience

Then book chapter and verse in your 'bible' please and a link to it.

But to truly understand what I'm talking about you'd pretty much have to read the whole thing and actually take it in. So the best I can offer is an attempt at a summary and this post from another thread -

If that's the case then wouldn't your/one's extrapolation Completely depend on a 'bias' to come to the specific conclusion you did? Otherwise one could point to a chapter or even a few paragraphs that a given precept being discussed hinges on... If however one has to read a whole book or have specialized training that underscores just one aspect of a person's psyche, then isn't that special 'training' No different than what you are attributing to the followers of God? (A brainwashing that has one seeing God in everything, or in your case see 'bias' in everything not in your training?)
So then what's the difference between what you are doing and what you claim Christians are doing? How is your 'brainwashing' better than any other brand?

http://atheistforums.org/thread-40435-po...pid1193511 - explains pretty well the neural network dynamics I'm talking about here. It's not about bias specifically but it is covered and that's what I mean by bias in this context... the biasing effect specific to bidirectional neural networks like the Cerebral Cortex and which is at the core of its functioning. But if my word is worthless then obviously you don't have to read it, but it's there if you want to.

sorry the link does not work.
It redirects me to a google search which takes me to the AF.org main page.
And your right. your 'interpretation/brainwashing' is what is in question here, so you can 'peacock' all you like with what you think you know, but again unless you can cite something to support what you have said it is all meaningless.
I am just holding you to the same standards you all hold me. If you can't produce ANYTHING that supports your position then your words are truly meaningless. They simply become the 'flourish' of a proud, but clueless individual who's words only have meaning to those with their or revers their very specific brand of brainwashing... Otherwise that type of person could indeed produce source material when asked for the very purpose of being scrutinized by others.

The fact that you can only point to your own personal biased writings and thoughts literally scream of all the thing you claim Christians do. So then the question becomes why is what is good for the goose not good for the gander? Why are you allowed bias in what you believe, but condemn it everywhere else unless it is first filtered through your specific brand of bias?

And yes of course I'm affected by bias, everybody is...

see the last question

it's core to how the brain functions. Wherever there is strong emotion there is bias. I'm biased against Christianity as a whole and certain individual Christians, including you, to the extent that they anger me. And that anger and bias in turn leads to douchebaggery. You're a douche, I'm a douche and as long as we both see each other that way neither of us is going to convince the other of anything because there is too much bias involved.

So it is your belief that even in your angered state that you can correctly identify bias, without any guidlines/source material that holds you accountable from moving the goal posts in your christian bias witch hunt?

[Drich]

Two things.. One not my method Christ Himself puts it out there.

If you say so.  Looks like christ was wrong then, huh?

Two it did work, but not as expected so people quit and did not "Knock" past the point of abandoning their old faith.

The tool's explanation for why the magic doesn't work.  Again, people have tried your method, it didn't work.  Perhaps something else is required.  If your overall claim is true (god is real, jesus is real, you had a genuine experience of the divine), that simply -has- to be the case.  You believe that you had this very real experience  because you "A/S/K"ed...but this is simple misattribution.  That would be the exceedingly generous explanation for this problem.  I do not grant the exceedingly generous explanation, in your case.

Again, no they have not Tried the method Christ ascribes in Luke 11.

The process starts with the abandonment of your previous beliefs. God destroys your bad 'faith' your broken understanding of Him. and gives you the opportunity to start over IF and only if you can push past the idea that your first effort (what God took away/showed you was false which causes your dissbelief/atheism) counts for anything. If you truly seek the truth then one automatically never stops questioning Never stops seeking. They Knock until they found what it is they are looking for.

That is why You stopped. You found a convincing reason Not to believe. That is what you wanted. That is the 'bias' you choose to view the world. Which again is fine, but don't pretend for a minute that your excuse for your current unbelief is the complete truth.

You may have found that your version of God did not exist, fine I concur as I read how shocked and appalled you are when you judge the contrast between what you believed and How God describes Himself. But that's where you stop.
You see a disparraging difference between your version of the Christian God and what I have told you the bible actually says, and you still lazily dismiss them as the same deity. Pretending your initial dismissal counts because your version and the bible's version share the same name and title.

I can promise you, that you nor anyone else here has A/S/K after the God of the bible. Agaiin your efforts could only center around what you thought you knew of God.

The God of the bible answered your prayer and obliterated your faith in your false deity, and gave you an oppertunity to seek Him out. You didn't. You stopped as you found what you were truly looking for. Not God but freedom to indulge in your sin.

So then at what point are you claiming to have followed A/S/K as outlined in Luke 11? when you petitioned a version of a god that you and I both know does not exist?

reset the logic and try again. If I can poke holes through your 'sound' reasoning, then do you really think you will skirt accountability "because we all tried 'your' method and nothing happened?"

[FatAndFaithless]

I can promise you, that you nor anyone else here has A/S/K after the God of the bible.

And there's your daily does of "Drich knows your own mind and life experiences better than you do."

[Drich]

got a mirror?

No, if you want to find God look in the mirror yourself. The only place god/s/God/deities exist are in the minds of the people who wish they were true. They are a reflection of your own desires, insecurities, fears and narcissism. We have long given up on the idea of Santa for adults and being threatened with coal in our stockings. You've god a pet god claim, so what, so do other people with other god claims, get in line, take a number.

Your a moron. If this were true then why do religions ever die?

Again people are not as stupid as you need them to be for your justification to work. History has panned out that with in one or two generations of a soceity falling that supports a deity, belief in the deity itself ceases. Why? because the soceity (Rome Greece Egypt) full filled the promises of their Gods. When soceity died, so too did the gods.

Now just imagine what that fact says about a God who's claims society can not recreate. Namely a personal direct line to the Deity Himself. No prophets, not Priests or any type of intermediaries of any Kind. Just the believer (every believer) and God, Something no other religion in the History of man has ever offered.

Now in the light of the religious history of man, where man promptly abandons religions that do not full fill it's promises, why then do you think Christianity has been active so long and in such great numbers?

[Drich]

Welcome to AF.ORG Noob, you should really post your first post in the welcome/introduction thread. That said AF.ORG  differs from AF.Com (where you apparently came from) because members here discuss why they do not believe in God regularly and even start threads with this title so that they may share how and why they do not believe in God. What's even more funny is that long time members here are so disconnected from this fact that they will make the claim they do not do this here WHILE POSTING IN A THREAD DEDICATED TO "DISCUSSING THE REALITY OF GOD"

They are started for the benefit of the theists to give us a toy to play with.

I have been here longer than you.

You obviously have the same problem as most theists here in that you do not read stuff outside of your little world of delusion.

I know you have been longer that is why I wrote what I did (now in the bold type). Because despite your claim to the contrary you do indeed start threads concerning the existence of God and you do indeed go around in circles patting each other on the back about what you 'dont' believe. Despite the reason you do this you made the claim you do not. I thought it ironically funny that you were making this counter claim in one of the very thread literally dedicated to this very pursuit, and did not even seem to be aware of it!

Much like how your last comment rings of great irony as you do not seem to even read whole posts addressed to you or great and long time member/hollow tree stump. let alone anything outside your specific wheel house.

[The Grand Nudger]

Again, no they have not Tried the method Christ ascribes in Luke 11.

They would know, better than you, what they did and didn;t do.  I don't care that your need to believe in it prevents you from extending common courtesy, and I don;t care how many times you claim that everyone who didn't hear god is a liar.  

The process starts 

-snipped-...because who cares at this point...?

That is why You stopped. You found a convincing reason Not to believe. That is what you wanted. That is the 'bias' you choose to view the world. Which again is fine, but don't pretend for a minute that your excuse for your current unbelief is the complete truth.

I never started, Drich.  Jesus christ, get that through your dense head.  Never been a believer.  

You may have found that your version of God did not exist, fine I concur as I read how shocked and appalled you are when you judge the contrast between what you believed and How God describes Himself. But that's where you stop.
You see a disparraging difference between your version of the Christian God and what I have told you the bible actually says, and you still lazily dismiss them as the same deity. Pretending your initial dismissal counts because your version and the bible's version share the same name and title.

....................................see above.  

I can promise you, that you nor anyone else here has A/S/K after the God of the bible. Agaiin your efforts could only center around what you thought you knew of God.

Your promises mean absolutely nothing to me.  

The God of the bible answered your prayer and obliterated your faith in your false deity, and gave you an oppertunity to seek Him out. You didn't. You stopped as you found what you were truly looking for. Not God but freedom to indulge in your sin.

What faith?  WTF are you -babbling- about? Who do you think you're speaking to? Do you find it even remotely worrying that you have to imagine things about both god and other people in order to rationalize your faith?

So then at what point are you claiming to have followed A/S/K as outlined in Luke 11? when you petitioned a version of a god that you and I both know does not exist?

reset the logic and try again. If I can poke holes through your 'sound' reasoning, then do you really think you will skirt accountability "because we all tried 'your' method and nothing happened?"

I never made that claim, never would make that claim, and don't give a shit about finding the christian god.  Just like I've told you, countless times. It should be a crime for you to even use the word logic in conversation.

[robvalue]

If I wanted to find the Christian god, it would be to tell it to get its shit together and stop being such a prick.

Or possibly, to wake it up.

[The Grand Nudger]

Or, inform it that someone is dragging it's name through the mud........

[robvalue]

"You fucker! I've only been asleep for 5 God-minutes. You what? They've written what about me? Give me that thing..."