Had to be done.
I don't believe in a deity.
I still don't believe in a deity.
Had to be done.
The agnostic kind. There are some Gnostic atheists around but I don't know many.
Gnostic atheists as in they reject the material world?...or Agnostic atheists as in they "still don't believe in a deity"?
You know that we are living in a material world.Originally Posted by DanielLaRusso
Gnostic atheists as in they reject the material world?...or Agnostic atheists as in they "still don't believe in a deity"?
Hey! I was going to start the Buddhism thread!
I find the probability of the existence of any supernatural deities to be exceedingly low; their presence is not necessary or evidenced in our universe as we are beginning understand it. Furthermore, I think it's nigh impossible that those deities, if any exist, are in any way anthropomorphic or delineated in archaic holy books.
Interesting statement. I have hope that something is out there after this life, and that some form of higher power exists, but honestly that is a function of my belief structure over the past four decades. But a basic look at evolution would shows me too much random chance to believe that the current homo sapiens are the peak of the evolutionary chain, and in fact given a few changes over the last few millions of years we would look entirely different. Multiply these factors across the estimated billion or more habitable planets in the known universe, and the likelihood that similar life forms evolved is vanishingly small.
The thought that homo sapiens are the highest form of life in existence made great sense in a time when most people never travelled more than a few miles from the place of their birth, their interactions were mostly with people to whom they were related within several generations, and the world consisted of everything they could see within a few days journey, and a benevolent creator lived just beyond the clouds.
But now that we know something of the magnitude of the universe, it is harder to recognize the place in which an all powerful creator could fit in, and indeed it is hard to see a need.
My wife used to quote this line from Usual Suspects: "The greatest lie the devil ever told was that he doesn't exist." Well in my current belief system I think that could be updated a bit: "The greatest lie that God ever told is that he does exist. "
I am a miserable failure as an atheist.
"It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
--Antoine de Saint-Exupery
"Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold."
--Yeats
“True, we [lawyers] build no bridges. We raise no towers. We construct no engines. We paint no pictures - unless as amateurs for our own principal amusement. There is little of all that we do which the eye of man can see. But we smooth out difficulties; we relieve stress; we correct mistakes; we take up other men's burdens and by our efforts we make possible the peaceful life of men in a peaceful state.”
--John W. Davis, founder of Davis Polk & Wardwell
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