Not sure if I qualify as atheist anymore

[jonathan180iq]

Well, it looks like the scale from atheism to theism has proved meaningless to me. I've been something of a atheist mystic anyway so perhaps such a shift is logical. I tend not to give too much credence to what I've experienced myself, since the mind is vast and most have no idea what it contains. Deception and self-deception seems common enough when states of consciousness are explored. Lies I don't particularly care for, comforting or otherwise.

So did I arrive at a belief in the gods? Not really, but perhaps more open to the possibility of some weirdness existing that's not having directly observable physical effects on the universe.

Doubting your atheism is the first step to strengthening your atheism!!

If you didn't harshly question your conclusions, you'd be a religionist. So I applaud you for doing so. But I think that there's a big difference between admitting that there are things that we don't know (and may never know) about existence and filling in the gaps in our knowledge with stories of powerful space wizards, as if that's somehow the most logical response to gaps in knowledge... You know what I'm saying?

I think you may have back-doored your way into a "God of the Gaps" argument. It's like saying: " I admit that I don't know everything. Therefore there could be a god..." It's still faulty logic, not matter which side of the coin you started on.

There could be a giant Unicorn that simply imagines our existence into being every morning when we wake up... I mean, we don't know everything. So in a sense it's possible. But it's far from being the most likely answer, right? The same is true of god.

 

[Sunstone]

"The Weirdness" strikes me as a much better name for deity than "God". I'm also fond of "The Cosmic Joker", but that might just be a personal preference. I think I'll start using "The Weirdness".

 

[Geoff-Allen]

"The Weirdness" strikes me as a much better name for deity than "God". I'm also fond of "The Cosmic Joker", but that might just be a personal preference. I think I'll start using "The Weirdness".

“God is a comedian playing to an audience that is too afraid to laugh.”

~ Voltaire

 

[picnic]

So did I arrive at a belief in the gods? Not really, but perhaps more open to the possibility of some weirdness existing that's not having directly observable physical effects on the universe.

How is it possible for something to exist without having directly observable physical effects?

Hmmm. O.k. obviously it can exist, but how is its existence relevant to humans? If it is relevant to humans, can't we test for its existence somehow? I would like to believe in the possibility of weirdness, but why can't we ever seem to pin it down scientifically?

 

[Sunstone]

How is it possible for something to exist without having directly observable physical effects?

Hmmm. O.k. obviously it can exist, but how is its existence relevant to humans? If it is relevant to humans, can't we test for its existence somehow? I would like to believe in the possibility of weirdness, but why can't we ever seem to pin it down scientifically?

There's always the possibility that certain kinds of mystical experiences are caused by the Cosmic Weirdness, but there seems to be no certainty that is the case.

 

[Sunstone]

Well, it looks like the scale from atheism to theism has proved meaningless to me. I've been something of a atheist mystic anyway so perhaps such a shift is logical. I tend not to give too much credence to what I've experienced myself, since the mind is vast and most have no idea what it contains. Deception and self-deception seems common enough when states of consciousness are explored. Lies I don't particularly care for, comforting or otherwise.

So did I arrive at a belief in the gods? Not really, but perhaps more open to the possibility of some weirdness existing that's not having directly observable physical effects on the universe.

I tend to think of myself as an "agnostic atheist", an "agnostic agnostic", an "apatheist", and as "nothing in particular at all", depending on which day of the week it is, or my mood. The point being, I don't really see much point firmly latching onto a term for my beliefs -- as if beliefs should always be such inflexible things.

I prefer relatively inflexible beliefs when dealing with how to balance my checkbook, but not when dealing with things were inflexible beliefs seem to be unnecessary.

 

[Geoff-Allen]

Osho has some interesting thoughts about laughter and the 'seriousness' of most religions ...

https://www.google.com.au/search?so...hter&gs_l=hp..0.41l780.0.0.0.4553...........0.

Have a good one!