Best. Comment. YET.
If there is such a thing as the Houston Oilers, we may not be able to travel in time but clearly can communicate between alternate timelines.
Well we haven’t ruled out simulation theory yet so it’s possible that whatever programmed it is/are god(s)
/jk /snark /maybe not
As for me, all I really know is that without a rational explanation, there is no real answer. So mostly I don’t dwell on it much.
I love religious people that treat others with kindness and grace, as I will willingly love anyone who does so. I think, for the most part, people don’t behave with grace when driven by fear, they behave with grace when they’ve been taught and have accepted that they should treat one another as equals without prejudice, and if those lessons come from a bible or a manuscript or are passed down through generations orally, or even just present in the everyday behavior of the people that raised them, then that was the right way to learn.
I know that this occurs on a curve and isn’t a dichotomous process where you either follow the golden rule or you don’t, I know that shades of difference, generally propagated through those who seek to coerce through fear or shame, means that many people behave with grace towards only certain others. But god is not what stands in the way of us overcoming- religion is not what prevents us from treating everyone with grace. We are. When we are no longer afraid of each other, we can love each other.
And it starts by getting rid of the fascists 
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=BcxIMvI8qBs
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All I know is: if he does exist, he’s a bastard and can go to hell.
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This has always been my thinking.
If something intelligent enough to create me with will exists, it must by definition be more intelligent than me. At the very least it would realize my disbelief is rational, or could be expected even if it didnt like it, and would give me a chance upon meeting to admit I was wrong.
The judgy bullshit accompanying religions since time began, its the creation of man, I suspect- not gods.
Honestly Id like to think if a god exists, its like The Dude. Just unassuming and laid back.
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You can create meaning.
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So…god defined as the object of worship? Well, I guess if you don’t require that object to be real, then worship is all that’s required. But some cultures worship their deceased ancestors, so I don’t think being worshiped makes a god a god.
I’m agnostic about “Higher Powers” unknown to us humans. I’m absolutely an atheist when it comes to the assorted deities and magical thinking that other humans have dreamed up. Since that’s what the vast majority of people mean by God(s), I am atheist by their reckoning.
Mind you I have no problem at all with people believing in things that aren’t real as long as they don’t use it as motive for antisocial behavior, and am in fact quite glad those who use it as motive for prosocial behavior believe as they do. But I also take my right to bluntly say they are wrong very seriously, because in most lands for most of human history doing so was a quick way to get yourself executed. I don’t want to return to that status quo, and am well aware of the bubble of freedom to openly disbelieve that I was fortunate to be born into.
I am, however, not a militant atheist, and consider militant atheists to be jerks about religion.
Some do. Some don’t. That’s the difference between a religion and just being a skeptic or a nonbeliever, there are no rules. I don’t really speculate on what such a Higher Power might be like as I thinks it’s sophistry. But I acknowledge that I can’t rule out a Higher Power. For myself it’s as simple as a statement of I don’t know.
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And yet, people who do prosocial ethical things because of their religion are still better than atheists who do evil things. The simple fact is that belief in religion or other magical thinking doesn’t make you good or evil.
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I respectfully disagree. There is no god. Ergo, whatever one chooses to do is motivated by the same thing as atheists, their own thoughts and emotions and the worldly events that influence them. That those thoughts and those influences are almost certainly in error about reality does not make ethical behavior unethical. There is no divine leash because there is no divine. People are responsible for their behavior whether they acknowledge it or not. And as the song says, if you choose not to decide you still have made a choice.
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This is something I disagree with Hawking about. It would not merely be like indigenous tribes encountering the Europeans only more so. It would be like the germs encountering the Europeans only more so. The odds that aliens are near enough to us in both space and time is astronomically smaller than the odds that they are distant in both. If any survived long enough to reach us, their civilization would probably be at least millions of years older than ours at the time of contact. Human civilization is about twelve thousand years at the longest estimate.
Which doesn’t mean they wouldn’t be a danger to us. It just means there’s nothing we could possibly hope to do about it. They might be able to mitigate the danger. Or they might not and know it and therefore don’t make contact. We’d have no way of knowing. Luckily the odds are not in favor of interstellar civilizations lasting long enough to bump into each other, and even if there are, the current outlook for our own longevity is pretty grim.
There are many examples of mathematical truths that have no physical significance. Infinity may or may not be one of them. However, Georg Cantor, the father of set theory, famously choose to use the term transfinite numbers, that is numbers that are not finite but are not infinite. He reserved the word infinity for god.
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That only holds if creation requires understanding.
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We are actually in agreement. People choose to use religious belief as an excuse for behaving badly, or humbly give him props for acting beneficially (sometimes). Moral behavior is still one’s own choice.
Despite the claims of certain believers, morality has nothing to do with religious rules and its arbitrary authority. If anything it is used to justify clearly immoral behavior and simply enforce control.
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Nobody does pro social and ethical things because of their religion.
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I disagree. Plenty of people are motivated to acts of good by their organized belief in the unreal, and many by their personal solitary belief in the unreal. You can argue that they’d do it anyway, but there’s no way to know since those beliefs are part of who they are.
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I’m comfortable saying the same thing.
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Bless your heart, too.
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