Igm

http://utah.indymedia.org/print.php?id=6601

What else is there to say?

 

An interesting perspective.

Human beings have manipulated others by playing on their desire to
find purpose/meaning, throughout human history.

Occams position.. One he has always held. Is that the gods
described by religion were never anything but fiction.
You see.. he started reading history very early on. And history
teaches many VITAL truths about humans and there motivations
and methods.

The greatest manipulators of all...knew the human truth.

"The greater the lie, the more likely it will be believed."
[adolf hitler]

Occam

 

I hope you didn't believe that statement. That's right up there with "You can't bullshit a bullshitter."

 

Hahaha. The person who wrote that is so full of shit. People who don't believe in God have there heads in the sand cuz of fear. A bunch of large flightless birds...

 

Why?

 

Kharakov...

Please, which god do you mean..?
There are so many described by humans.

Occam never said he did'nt believe in a god..

He said he didnt believe in the
RELIGIOUS DESCRIPTION OF A GOD

They are not the same thing.

Occam

 

Kharakov.

Occam believes that history has proved this statement correct in quite a few instances.

Ever heard of 'Arbeit Macht Frie' ?
[written over a gate]
Those who told this lie planned it as a lie.
So many 'would/could' not believe it held anything but truth.

Or how about..."The triumph of soviet communism"
Proclaimed by Soviet leaders who knew that had sweet FA chance of tiumphing over anything. Even as far back as the 70's.
Yet hundreds of millions believed them.

And also occam has seen it in action in real life.

Occam

 

Arbeit Macht Frei ... work is freedom?

Yeah that doesn't make sense. =P

 

The only one you can truthfully call God. The maker of all.

Whelp, as one who isn't really into the whole "church" thing....

 

And you really believe that people believed it after having worked? Come on now...

Hahaha. I don't know anyone who actually believed that, and I know quite a few former USSR (from various states) citizens who knew that it was total bullshit all along.

Than again, if you have never experienced anything that would cause you to believe something other than the lie- you would believe the lie. There are atheists after all- but they are a small portion of the population- so by far I think you could say that a lie isn't going to fly.

Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) was being a fool when he said "A lie well told is nie immortal." The lie will only last as long as evidence backs it up. Now if God backs up your lies- they are the truth. Which is the reason Scarface was right.

I will go on to say Lies are pain killers for the poor and downtrodden. I prefer money, but another lie will suffice to satisfy my desire for power.

Italicised portion is a lie.... or is it?

 

Lack of understanding. You need to be drawn into taking the first step to understanding God. If you don't understand God, God's power will sadden you and make you feel like God is alone- that you are nothing and God is alone. Of course, if God can make you, this is total bullshit, but the first time you experienced God (life), you didn't understand this. The only reason God made people is to alleviate God's lonliness.

Part of getting to know God is God showing you how lonely God was before God created companions (us). God's lonliness was terrible and can be a terrible thing to confront the first time God shows you- but this is how God conveys how much God wants and loves you.

Of course, God beat's his dog's, isn't that great of a master, unless you kiss God's ass. I would prefer it if God took a female form (a few really hot ones) and waited on me hand and foot. Blow Jobs ....

 

I agree with Kharakov that the author is, as he put it, full of shit, or at least full of himself. I never take people too seriously who capitalise the word "truth." Of course, someone who does capitalise "truth" could still be right, but it's just one of those little warning signs. When I see "Truth," a red flag goes up. But I'm not going to get all defensive like Kharakov because I don't particularily believe in God. I just don't think that religion is a disease or abnormality of any kind. The article that I am going to criticise is second-rate philosophy and the kind of "journalism" I've come to expect from the independent media. You can see the Nietzsche in the author. But of course I don't buy into Nietzsche, so I'm going to have a lot of fun with this.

The author writes that the need to believe in a higher power is both evolutionary and a malformation. This is clearly a contradiction. First, if we go along with the Darwinian survival of the fittest theory of evolution, I can't see what relgious belief has to do with survival. Second, if religion is in fact somehow a result of evolution, implanted in our brains after millions of years of successful breeding, then it is obvious that the trait has been beneficial to human society. The humans who lacked this trait died off. So, biologically speaking, religious belief must be desirable. The author clearly did not think this out all the way through, not to mention that I've never heard of any actual scientific findings linking faith to biology. But let's move on.

The author has a very low opinion of humanity in general. I do not understand what he is comparing humanity in relation to. The human race is far from perfect of course, but we are the greatest species on this planet when compared to every other creature on this planet. The author is comparing humanity to no standard but his own, which is over-inflated and unrealistic.

I take issue with the ideas that all myths are necessarily approved by social leaders and that all sane men will avoid death at all costs, but these issues are really just trivial.

What is critical to the author's argument is that, without belief in God, human society would grind to a halt because people would be afraid to leave their homes for fear of death. The author makes this idea sound a lot more convincing, but that's basically what it boils down to. The idea is, of course, ridiculous. I'll use myself as a case-in-point example. I do not believe in God or an afterlife but I still lead a very productive life and I don't really think about death all that often. If I were a psychologist, I'd say that the author is projecting his own fear of death on to the general population (which he clearly does not think too highly of) to quell his own fears... superiority complex... Freud this, Oedypus that. But then again I'm not a psychologist.

His history of the USSR is inaccurate. Brutal, mind-bending atheists do not suit his purposes, so he calls them "pseudo-atheists". The idea that the USSR did not actively oppose religion is, of course, false. The "in God we truth" thing on American money is so insignificant that I'm surprised at myself for even bringing it up, but the author naturally did because there is precious little evidence of religious persecution in the States. Pledge of Allegiance, etc. Quit wasting my time.

The author's comments on American government are undemocratic and disturbing. But you can't expect someone who hates the human race so much to be a fan of democracy. Freedom of religion is out for him too. So I guess that means freedom of assembly, speech, and probably a few other things I haven't thought of yet are gone.

Anyway, I think that's enough for now. I just did this on the fly, so let me know if I missed anything. But I do sympathize with the author... slightly. If I lived in Utah, I'd be pissed off too. :$

 

How does the second quote explain the first?

 

Hicky

Those were the words written over the gates of auschwitz

Occam

 

Kharakov

How could they believe it.'after'..?.they were dead.
And why were they dead.
Beause they believed it.

Occam

 

Kharakov

Occam can truthfully call nothing god.
Yet does not deny such a thing may exist.

Many humans say god is this or that.
Yet all of them , including you. Back these words with nothing
but more words.

Can you back your opinion about god with something other
than the desire to believe it is truth?
With something more than words backed only by other words
designed to provide a ficticious premise to a faith, that supports
a belief about a possible omnipotent entity that has no
observed existance.

Occam cannot lie to himself...
Thus he is an agnostic.
Reason allows him no other path.

Occam

 

well I personally loved the article. I'm not going to debate about it though.

More than anything, this guy obviously has two things goin' on:
lots of time on his hands
and a whole lot of insight.

 

It doesn't adequately explain the first quote. Sorry. I would have to sum up many years of thought with many branches to even begin to explain the irrational fear of God that lies in the heart of every non believer (ostriches, each and every one).

Basically, God has hidden God's existence from non believers because of their extreme fear.

This extreme fear is based upon a lack of understanding of the relationship of the individual to God. The little worldly fears and pains are there to distract the individual from their fear of God until they are ready to confront their fear, get over it, and begin a new stage in their relationship with God.

Little worldly fears, pains, and pleasures are the sand that non believers have their heads stuck in to avoid their fear of God. Believe it or not, you knew God existed at some point in your life, became afraid of God because you were trying to understand God and didn't quite get it, and you needed to have other fears to distract you from your original captivating fear. Eventually you will come around, confront your original fear, realize it is foolish, step beyond it and be ready to move on to the next level of existence. Until you confront your original fear of God and realize it is irrational you will be caught up in Samsara, Maya, The World, Satan's World (where all the pain, suffering, and minor pleasures exist to distract you from your true fear that you need to confront in small doses until you finally overcome it). Of course, God is never gonna make the cure for fear (this world, or how many worlds you need to suffer through before you overcome your fear) as good as the life after the cure- just so you want to get better and have a meaningful relationship with God. After all, God is an attention whore, and definitely wants all of us to know that God is the one who hooked us up, but knows that people will lie about where stuff came from if they still fear God.

 

I like that about you.

That's all I offer you on the forums. I can tell you of my experiences, but again, you need to have experiences of your own to understand God, words do not suffice to describe the color red to one who has not seen it.

That's a loaded question. Anyway, when did you stop beating your wife?

Loading your question with the word opinion doesn't make the question easy to answer. Answering the question with facts will make it look like I acknowledge that the facts are merely opinions, which they aren't. If you rephrase the question I might be able to answer it.

You see, I have seen evidence of God's existence. You only have to ask for it, and when you see it, believe in it instead of explaining it away (trampling it in the dirt). God won't throw pearls to pigs who will trample them in the dirt.

You can and you do. In fact, the statement "I cannot lie to myself" is a lie. If you don't acknowledge this simple fact, you will always bamboozle yourself with your own bullshit.

Reason allows far more than the path of the agnostic. You can either know or remain ignorant. There is a God. The answers are right in front of you.

 

yuck, that was one of the most poorly written bits of drivel i've read in awhile.

hilarious, commonsense... i agree.
after all his capitalizations of
Truth, Forbidden Truth, Death,
plus non-capitalization of countries' names,
he dares to complain about the capital "G" given to the word god!
what a knob.
i got a laugh out of it, but would never pawn it off as being either intelligent
or well-written.


peace