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wu_chan

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Oct 06, 2009 16:39

I spent last weekend at a yoga retreat (for which I actually get college credit!) that takes place at St. Gertrude's monastery, and although my yoga teacher is very open (she's actually a UU minister) and makes sure for her part that people of all religious beliefs feel welcome in her classes, I still struggle. Firstly, the way Meredith teaches ( Read more... )

Comments 12

veggie October 7 2009, 00:57:57 UTC

that is literally my exact religious viewpoint. i don't think about heaven and hell. my mom asked me what i think happens when we die, and i was like, "does it matter?" then she told me i was going to hell for not having faith and i was like ...k i think you missed the point

i just try to live my life without disrupting anyone else's life. i try to be a good person, and if there's a god then i hope that's good enough for him/her/it. if not, i'll be hanging out with like 99.9% of everyone in hell.

and i'm okay with that.

wu_chan October 7 2009, 03:59:11 UTC

Hahahaa, right? If God is actually going to punish everyone who lives a good life but doesn't worship the right version of him, then he's a selfish prick and I don't want to go to Heaven anyway.

mini_mina October 7 2009, 02:49:57 UTC

Mine too, I always get...not annoyed..but hesitant to answer the religion questions.

It's like people think you cannot be a good person BECAUSE YOU WANT TO BE A GOOD PERSON, not because you are god-fearing. It is hard to explain to someone that you do the most good you can for the benefit of not only yourself but those around you, and in the same breath say you don't really care about whether or not there is a God. They get this funny look on their face. Then when they call you and atheist you sound like a jack ass when you say "no no ..it is not that I don't believe in god...it's that I don't even care if there is one.."

I hear ya.

Go damien and his google-fu

lostsatellite October 7 2009, 03:00:04 UTC

I had never heard of the term Apatheist before now...interesting!...for me, it incorporates too much of the word "apathy", which is something I don't associate with you at all...I realize it's meant to be applied toward the concept of belief in God, but I also imagine some people seeing that for the first time and thinking it means worshiping apathy, or some such nonsense...

at any rate, how you expressed your belief above is something I really dig (and I dig the way you expressed it)...

I wish I could come up with a better affirmation than "dig" :)

wu_chan October 7 2009, 03:55:43 UTC

Thanks, I get what you're saying. It could sound less like "The question of whether there is a god is not relevant to my life" and more like "I just don't give a shit," which isn't true. I actually feel pretty strongly about my belief that there is no reason for me to care. :)

You'll like this story. In the carpool on the way up to the retreat I had the following conversation...

Girl: Blah blah, were you raised Catholic?
Me: Not really. My mom is Catholic, but my dad is... Well, my dad's a pragmatist.
Girl: Sorry, I don't really know my denominations.
Me: No, it's not a... it just means that he... nevermind.

lostsatellite October 7 2009, 03:56:34 UTC

haha, that's cute :)

fredgoat October 7 2009, 04:08:41 UTC

I had that same hesitation. Apparently you can also refer to us as pragmatic/practical atheists, although at that point the name doesn't really explain anything :(

I always loved the argument that, "You should believe in God because if you don't, then God, in a fit of childishly arbitrary divine rage, will send you to hell where you'll experience excruciating torture, forever." I always wanted to say, "Don't worry, I'm one step ahead of you. You see, I worship Cthulhu, who is even /more/ arbitrarily, insanely cruel. He frightens me into submission FAR more than your god POSSIBLY could." But that would be cosmicism, and frankly I /still/ don't give a shit.

Thread 6

hookahjake October 9 2009, 07:45:22 UTC

Ah, you're so close to non-cognitive atheism! Soon, you too will know what it is to make the fundamentalists run screaming to the hills. Come, let me show you the power of the theological non-cognitive argument:

"God" is an incoherent term

wu_chan October 9 2009, 08:33:48 UTC

We actually looked at and dismissed "Ignosticism" which the article you linked to says theological noncognitivism is "sometimes considered to be synonymous with". I am a little confused though -- how exactly do "Some thinkers propose it as a way to prove the nonexistence of anything named 'God'." Is that just a rhetorical trick? There can be no God until you define God? Or are they actually trying to prove atheism? Because the latter doesn't make sense to me. The whole concept sounds more like noncognitive agnosticism that noncognitive atheism, to me.

Which is actually something I could get behind, if I felt more strongly about it. The issue of definition isn't my primary problem, though. Even if we could define God and then start making arguments about his existence based on that, I still wouldn't care. Even if he does exist, it doesn't really affect me, does it? It doesn't affect me until the moment you can prove firstly that God does exist and secondly that he wants me to worship him. And even then I might not, for the ( ... )

hookahjake October 11 2009, 05:53:12 UTC

In summary, before we can ask whether something exists we have to have a positive definition for it. That is, any existent must have certain attributes as opposed to defining something by what it doesn't have. Since all "supernatural" concepts (such as omni-benevolence accompanied by omni-potency) are inter-contradictory (as in the problem of evil raised by Epicurus) all that remains is what they are not (observable). Any such concept is thus no different from the concept of nothing at all, therefore supernatural gods are synonymous with "nothing ( ... )