Well, evidence is subjective and interpreted by the observer, I'm sure there are some people who could have my life experiences and attribute some of them to a god if they wanted to believe in one badly enough. You would attribute them to Jesus, @soulsurvivor would attribute them to Sathya Sai...
I would like to pose a question for theists, namely: what is God's top priority? I cannot prove that no god exists, but there are many types of gods that I can prove do not exist.
I know that an omnipotent god whose top priority is preventing rape and murder cannot exist.
I know that an...
My experience with cops has been very limited, but the few times I have had to interact with cops, they have always tried to trap me into admitting I did something illegal (which I didn't). One time I was pulled over supposedly because my license plate illumination light wasn't working, and as...
Yes, different people have different standards of evidence that it would take to convince them of the existence of a god, I agree. Raising someone from the dead in Jesus' name would be enough to convince me (or get me close to certainty), as would many other things, but I haven't seen those...
None of these premises are even clear or make any sense, and no evidence is provided that any of them are true, so how can anyone determine if it's a sound argument?
I gave my opinion that a random stranger's random blog post about a supposed miracle that supposedly happened decades earlier that has absolutely zero evidence for it outside of that blog post is hard to believe and sounds made up, and you're saying I'm being disrespectful? You're entitled to...
Thanks for the reply. I don't doubt your experiences were 100% real to you and genuine, but they don't convince me that the Christian god exists, just as @soulsurvivor 's experiences don't convince me that Sathya Sai Baba was a divine being or interacting with any god/gods, even though I also...
I think it's the hope and sense of security that belief in God provides that will prevent it from ever going away completely. Of course that doesn't mean the belief is true. I'm not convinced that anyone knows God or gods exist.
My guess would be because of fear of death, fear of the unknown, and the fact that there are still some big mysteries of the universe that haven't been solved and may never be solved.
I'm not looking for certainty, in fact, I think finding certainty is impossible for nearly everything, not just the existence of God. Looking for certainty in everything will only result in failure and lead to an unhappy life full of constant anxiety. That doesn't mean that thinking about things...
Lol, Jordan Peterson never makes any sense. He talks in long, incoherent, illogical, rambling sentences and is seemingly incapable of making a logical point or answering questions directly. He also pretends to be a self-help guru and role model but apparently doesn't have enough self-control to...
Of course you do, your previous posts indicated that very clearly and obviously. You have a deep-rooted need for absolute certainty and constant reassurance about everything and you turned to a manmade religion to fill that need. That is my opinion. Make of it what you will.
I'm at work now so can't address everything here yet or respond in detail. However, one thing I noticed is that it seems that, based on the way you said you phrased your prayer, that your mind was absolutely set on attributing whatever was about to happen to you to God no matter what. Even if no...
I appreciate the response, because I am also an obsessive overthinker. I'm not a professional but it sounds like you may quite possibly have some degree of OCD. I only say this because I have similar tendencies but I am working on developing cognitive and behavioral practices to stop this and it...
I don't think it's necessarily just through our nature that we interpret experience, as that would imply that we can't change how we interpret our experience. Ideally, we should be interpreting it using good, sound reasoning and critical thinking.
Sorry I haven't been ignoring you, just been very busy these last couple of days. Well, making this thread was one step in the process. I have given it a lot of thought and will continue to. I agree with others, I can tell that you are definitely genuine and not making these experiences up. But...
Well, we know that the placebo effect can be effective at curing subjective sensations of pain so I don't think we can rule out that conclusion. It's likely what Sam Harris would conclude although I do think he (and myself as well) are more open minded than most atheists. It just strikes me as...
What interactions have you had with Sathya Sai Baba? Did you meet him in person or have visions or dreams of him? With all due respect, you do realize that Sam Harris very clearly does not believe that this guy is a divine being and is making fun of him in this video, right?