Open discussion of the Christian Why We're Here thread

[Silver]

No, I don't have to accept anything I don't want to accept.

I always have to repeat this: I am a militant atheist, unlike the other mellow atheists on the forum, and of course I tend to rally against religion harder than most of them.

[Catholic_Lady]

No, I don't have to accept anything I don't want to accept.

I always have to repeat this: I am a militant atheist, unlike the other mellow atheists on the forum, and of course I tend to rally against religion harder than most of them.

That is fine. Just know that by doing so, you're not really any different from the type of religious folks who rally against views they oppose.

You kinda just made my point actually lol.

[The Grand Nudger]

-and when sharia law comes because the evil muslim immigrants outbreed the natives..I'll be there to support these christian dominionists 1st and 14th amendment rights, even though they don;t think there is (and/or should be) such a thing.  Even though they think we should be accommodating, lest we become hypocrites..somehow. 

.................

[brewer]

People's values are going to influence how they vote, no matter who they are. There are always going to be people with different values from yourself who will vote differently from you. That's just a fact of life, better to accept it and try to be understanding of the opposing view points.

Neo said "society". A lot of societies actions/activities exist outside of politics.

[Neo-Scholastic]

Is that what hope is all about? Hoping that we go on forever and ever?

Not necessarily. A temporary life can have value so long as that value endures. What people do not seem to understand that meaning, purpose, and significance all relate to something's "aboutness". Does someone's life point towards anything other than his or her own personal and proximate desires, something beyond themselves?

It is very difficult to justify that any purely physical being or system is about anything. They just do what they do. Just stating the obvious, that you personally have goals and purposes, doesn't in itself prove that the very ability to have intentions is based in one's physicality. Sure you can live and enjoy life, have things you want to do, and provide for the happiness and prosperity of future generations. That's all good, but what's it all "about". The eternal question is not how or what; but rather, why.

[The Grand Nudger]

Why must value endure?  Are you aware of the phrase "sell it or smell it"?  A pint of strawberries is very valuable, for a limited time.  That value is lost after a fairly short period..much shorter than the period of any human life..but the pint of rotted stems having lost it;s value today doesn;t mean it never had value.

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Sure you can live and enjoy life, have things you want to do, and provide for the happiness and prosperity of future generations. That's all good, but what's it all "about".

-and just to state the obvious..maybe it;s about that...?  What;s the problem?

[I_am_not_mafia]

Sure you can live and enjoy life, have things you want to do, and provide for the happiness and prosperity of future generations. That's all good, but what's it all "about". The eternal question is not how or what; but rather, why.

Why? That's easy. It's to maximise entropy. It's a consequence of the expanding universe. There's no meaning to it. It's just a process.

[Amarok]

Why questions are irrelevant. All that matters is how.

Value has no value to the dead . Value only has value to the living . Both while your alive and the people that will follow you . And even if what you did will not endure a generation .A just cause even a failed one is worth pursuing.And even as heat death consumes the universe for a time one small planet in one minor galaxy things were made better for a it's people .

An after life renders any accomplishment in life meaningless . What does a good deed matter in a perfect world .

[The Grand Nudger]

Yeah, I never get the heat death thing.  Seems totally left field.  Earth will be gone before that, but..even so, that doesn;t change the fact that while there was a human race, and an earth, and a universe..I did good things.  I just don;t get what that sort of incredible longshot negativity has to do with my life today, in the here and now.

[Angrboda]

Indeed.

Regarding how we only have the one life to live, it should be lived to its fullest.  Not squandered to a primitive mythology that irrationally demands only living a certain way for the supposed hope of an existence after death.

Some of us believe the Christian life is better both personally and for society. YMMV

And I believe that when ice cream sales increase, so do accidental drownings. I'm not, however, inclined to boycott the sale of ice cream therewith.

Do you feel that you fully understand the nature of meaning sufficient to make the claims you are making? I'm skeptical. What makes something meaningful, according to you?

(And no, I don't find the answer "God" to be sufficient.)