|
|
|
tra3847
New Member
USA
2 Posts |
 Posted - 03/04/2002 : 20:41:10 [Permalink]
|
[font=Comic Sans MS][/font=Comic Sans MS] I flat out just tell them No. I don't give them try to tell me I'm going to hell or for them to try to convert me. I just walk away.
|
 |
|
|
filthy
SFN Die Hard
USA
14408 Posts |
Posted - 03/05/2002 : 20:05:19 [Permalink]
|
These days, I haughtly inform them that I an an ordained minister and the pastor of the Church of the Dessicated Cockroach (services held at the biker bar every Saturday night, guests with money welcome).
I don't understand why this puts them off.
f
"Don't tell me your doubts; I've got enough doubts of my own. Tell me something you BELIEVE in!"
Brother Dave Gardner |
|
|
|
Mr. Spock
Skeptic Friend
USA
99 Posts |
Posted - 03/16/2002 : 17:40:46 [Permalink]
|
I voted "agnostic and get a blank stare," but some of the other options may be more amusing, at the very least.
I remember that, back in the 80's when fundamentalists first started procaiming "secular humanism" as a religion all its own, Frank Zappa filed papers to codify such a religion, named C.A.S.H., or the church of American secular humanism, which among its doctrines included the "doctrine of involuntary induction--whether they liked it or not." 
"Great things are not accomplished by those who yeild to trends and fads and popular opinion." --Charles Kuralt |
|
|
|
Wolfgang_faust
Skeptic Friend
USA
59 Posts |
Posted - 04/09/2002 : 13:34:14 [Permalink]
|
I like to respond, "Are you kidding, who would believe in something like that" then I laugh real loud. Ah, christains always good for a laugh.
Add value to every day, Sharpen your skills, your understanding |
|
|
|
ConsequentAtheist
SFN Regular
641 Posts |
Posted - 05/01/2002 : 13:25:01 [Permalink]
|
I usually respond with a simple "no", but I was recently made aware of the following quote: "I contend that we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours." (Stephen Roberts) I really like it.
|
|
|
|
welshdean
Skeptic Friend
United Kingdom
172 Posts |
Posted - 09/18/2002 : 02:19:54 [Permalink]
|
My usual answer wasn't there either; "I'm afraid my parents decided to baptise me as a Roman Catholic, so...... no!
My new response will now be "YES, absolutely, and magnetology, uri gellar, fairies, divining, and all the new age shit that demands belive without evidence! How 'bout you?
I believe in nothing; only my scepticism kept me from being an atheist.
Edited by - welshdean on 09/18/2002 02:30:22 |
|
|
|
ljbrs
SFN Regular
USA
842 Posts |
Posted - 09/28/2002 : 17:33:04 [Permalink]
|
quote:
I believe in nothing; only my scepticism kept me from being an atheist.
Same here. Only I believe that whatever exists exists. In this way I avoid the topic altogether. Religious fanatics can be absolutely vindictive.
I do not think that religion is ever going to go away. Opposing somebody's fondest beliefs can be dangerous for one's health (and safety). Some people need to believe in anything other than themselves. Religion fills that irrational need.
ljbrs 
"Nothing is more damaging to a new truth than an old error." Goethe |
|
|
|
Deborah
Skeptic Friend
USA
113 Posts |
Posted - 10/27/2002 : 10:25:48 [Permalink]
|
Where is the atheist option damnit! In lieu of that, I decided that my cat is as close to a God as I'll ever know. Does God Purr? Hmmm.
"I no longer need to punish, deceive or compromise myself. Unless, of course, I want to stay employed."
|
|
|
|
Deborah
Skeptic Friend
USA
113 Posts |
Posted - 10/27/2002 : 10:29:56 [Permalink]
|
quote:
I usually respond with a simple "no", but I was recently made aware of the following quote: "I contend that we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours." (Stephen Roberts) I really like it.
That is worthy of repeating
"I no longer need to punish, deceive or compromise myself. Unless, of course, I want to stay employed."
|
|
|
|
Radar
New Member
United Kingdom
20 Posts |
Posted - 02/21/2003 : 08:26:57 [Permalink]
|
option 5 with a twist.
Does my answer effect your chances at survival?
When they reply what or pardon etc. I explain with a glare and a smile(unnerving) if they ask me that question again my handbag will connect to their body up-teem times. That always ensures a retreat |
Tact is the ability to tell a man he has an open mind when he has a hole in his head.
I spy with my little eye a UFO, Unattached fit object. |
|
|
|
Computer Org
Skeptic Friend
392 Posts |
Posted - 02/22/2003 : 07:30:04 [Permalink]
|
First I chose #1, "Which god?"; but then I found the last choice "YES!" and so I didn't even vote (--even though I guessed that the last choice meant "Yes, I believe in the One, Total, Supreme God, God of gods").
Ah, ha!
So how can someone raised a Catholic (with 8 years in Catholic school--and 8 years of religion classes), someone whose first real reading-book was "Children's Bible Stories", and so forth, even consider voting #1: "Which god?".
I took Typing rather than Biology in 10th grade and so was never exposed to the standard dogmatic "truths" about the biological sciences (--most all of said "truths" having vanished since then; usurped by ever-more comprehensive knowledge as discovered by research).
I learned the generalized principle from St. Paul, though, when he wrote something like "Can the arm act differently than the body?".
We know that a cell is alive; it is a LifeForm. We even know that two entities of roughly the same structure and size (--the great family of bacteria and the similarly huge family of mitochondria--), both much smaller than the cell, are also "LifeForms"; are alive.
(The mitochondria are much like Papa who used to order up the coal and, as needed, shovel it into the furnace. Mitochondria are, IMO, the Papa, the "head of household", for the cellular "house"  ) (This is, however, perhaps, a minority opinion.)
The finger is made up of cells. The hand contains the fingers and the fingers do what the hand intends. (No quibbling about the brain: All of this was true long before the CentralNervSystem ever existed!) The hand is a part of the arm. The arm is a part of the body. The body is a part of the family; the family, of the family-group. The family-group is a part of the town; the town, of the county. The counties make up the Nation-State.
The believers in "One God" believe that God is everywhere. I believe that God is not only everywhere but is everything.
Are there lesser gods? Why not? The One God would also emcompass all of the lesser gods. So there it is.
Much more: The human society is a part of the local ecology, which includes the bird societies, the tree groupings, the weeds, the butterflies, etc.---ad nausium. Onward, ever more encompassing to the continent. Even more encompassing to the Planet. Even more encompassing to the stellar system; to the galaxy; to the galactic group.
Ever, ever onward; ever more encompassing until all is encompassed: God.
|
Do thou amend thy face, and I'll amend my life. --Falstaff |
|
|
|
squab
New Member
2 Posts |
Posted - 08/24/2003 : 22:53:04 [Permalink]
|
| this question must be rephrased to be answered honestly by one such as i: "do you beleive in faith?" |
|
|
|
Arcanix_X
New Member
USA
39 Posts |
Posted - 10/11/2003 : 19:21:01 [Permalink]
|
Why would I believe in a god that asks me to believe and not research? Or in a god that asks tooth for a tooth, eye for an eye?
The answer is verry simple - there is no god. Why? Well just think of this - time is infinite - it dose not start here and end here. Now if there was a god, when did he show up? You can't say he was from the begening because there is no begening. Thus you have to admit to one of two hypothesis: 1. God was created by other gods just as they were created before in an infinite chain of creation, or 2. If he just sprung up from infinity, how come we wouldn't have the same chances of appearin out of infinity??? The truth is painful but it is the truth! |
|
|
|
Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26022 Posts |
Posted - 10/12/2003 : 10:34:14 [Permalink]
|
Welcome to the boards, Arcanix_X.
I'm no fan of God, but unfortunately, your 'truth' appears to be based upon a faulty premise and a false dichotomy.
The faulty premise is that time is infinite. The Big Bang is hypothesized to have created space and time. Even if that hypothesis is wrong, it is impossible for us to measure anything which might have gone on before the Big Bang, so for all intents and purposes, time does indeed begin there.
The false dichotomy is that you are ignoring a third, and very popular choice among apologists: that God is, and always has been. Nothing 'created' Him, nor did He just spring up out of nowhere. He has always existed. Your two hypotheses attempt to put short-sighted human limits on the ineffable, and thus fail to be convincing as the only two possible choices.
Attempting to disprove the existence of God through these kinds of logical arguments is, in reality, about as silly as attempting to prove that God exists using nothing but quotes from the Bible. The assumptions necessary in either case are simply and, in my opinion, justly dismissed as inadequate by those holding opposing beliefs.
About the best argument relies on lack of evidence, instead. The only pro-God evidence that anyone has is the Bible (or similar stories for other religions), and its shortcomings as evidence are quite obvious. Since many people who believe in the Bible criticize "belief in" evolution based on a perceived lack of evidence (however wrong), it is both just and reasonable to proclaim that there is no evidence to support a belief in God.
Of course, this argument does not (and can not) conclude that God doesn't exist, only that there is no solid support whatsoever for a conclusion that God does exist. Simply put, the "God Hypothesis" is both unnecessary to explain what we see, and not supported by what we see. For some, that is evidence enough that God doesn't exist. Others, like myself, who are willing to agree that God would, indeed, be ineffable, cannot eliminate the possibility, however small, that God might exist, and yet also be absolutely meaningless in the day-to-day lives of the inhabitants of Earth, at the very least. |
- Dave W. (Private Msg, EMail)
Evidently, I rock!
Why not question something for a change?
Visit Dave's Psoriasis Info, too. |
|
|
|
bloodpet
New Member
Philippines
1 Post |
Posted - 10/12/2003 : 12:46:47 [Permalink]
|
If asked that, i'd say: "Ofcourse not."
and wait for the "Why not?" that'd come from them. |
|
|
 |
|
|
|
Topic Locked
