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Poll

Pick the one that is the closest to the meme that first comes into your mind when you think of the concept.  God is ...

Love
- 6 (10.7%)
Power
- 4 (7.1%)
Nature
- 14 (25%)
Safety
- 1 (1.8%)
Mystery
- 4 (7.1%)
Ancestry
- 0 (0%)
Civilization
- 0 (0%)
Superstition
- 15 (26.8%)
Josh's Dad
- 2 (3.6%)
/dev/null
- 10 (17.9%)

Total Members Voted: 32


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Author Topic: God is _____  (Read 9931 times)

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Sam Gunn (since nobody got Admiral Naismith)

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Re: God is _____
« Reply #30 on: October 06, 2009, 04:49:42 AM »
Quote from: Alex  Libman on October 06, 2009, 04:01:33 AM
In hindsight, I really don't like all this animosity toward God.  Having grown out of simplistic atheism, it now seems very shallow and juvenile.

God is an ancient personification of natural force, which in modern understanding can be can be broken down into universal, planetary, chemical, organic, biological, and cultural aspects of evolution, the latter of which can include theories on matters such as law, economics, and politics.


Stop copying me.
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mikehz

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Re: God is _____
« Reply #31 on: October 06, 2009, 12:37:07 PM »
Quote
"God is a concept, by which we measure our pain."

John Lennon.
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"Force always attracts men of low morality." Albert Einstein

Harry Tuttle

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Re: God is _____
« Reply #32 on: October 06, 2009, 02:04:47 PM »
Quote from: Alex Libman on April 28, 2008, 10:45:09 PM
Because that fiction (which was pretty well-written by the standards of its time, actually) sold over 5+ billion copies in 2,400+ languages, popularizing the idea of God over many centuries.  Some of its intended sequels and fan fiction (Koran, Book of Mormon, etc) also dominate the list of most influential books of all time.

By that measure, it won't be too long before the Da Vinci code is accepted truth. Wait, I bet Harry Potter will become the new bible within my lifetime. Sorry, no more time to chat. I have to pack for my pilgrimage to Hogwarts.
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Alex Libman 15

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Re: God is _____
« Reply #33 on: October 06, 2009, 02:29:34 PM »
Quote from: anarchir on October 06, 2009, 04:22:50 AM
God is a gap concept. We do not know how something works or what it is so we assign god to it. Then, we do not know why some things happen to us so to hopefully enable emotional stability we invent a god.

I'm not arguing that religion isn't a fiction, I'm arguing that it has its place in the culture we're all a part of.  Human civilization is a chicken-and-an-egg paradox, and it's an objective historical fact that religious faith filled the gap, allowing social order to be enforced before it could be scientifically understood - and it's not really understood to this day.


Quote from: Admiral Naismith on October 06, 2009, 04:49:42 AM
Stop copying me.

Huh?  When did you ever say anything coherent on this issue?  I've written bits about religious functionalism in my emerging philosophy of "evolutionary pragmatism" for a long time now...


Quote from: mikehz on October 06, 2009, 12:37:07 PM
"God is a concept, by which we measure our pain."

I like that idea, since for many atheists the concept of God suddenly resurfaces when they're experiencing a heart attack, or something similar, and for some hypochondriac atheists the slightest panic can lead to "oh God, oh God, oh God", even if it's not out loud, as it most often isn't - that feeling of complete and total helplessness and the impossibility of reason in light of mortal terror.  Well, whatever that concept was when you were having a heart attack, "real" or not, still exists when your heart is beating normally.


Quote from: Harry Tuttle on October 06, 2009, 02:04:47 PM
By that measure, it won't be too long before the Da Vinci code is accepted truth. Wait, I bet Harry Potter will become the new bible within my lifetime. Sorry, no more time to chat. I have to pack for my pilgrimage to Hogwarts.

The mind-share of those books is minuscule compared to the major religions, and taken far less seriously, and is guaranteed to pass soon enough.  In evolutionary pragmatism, the competitive advantage of a trait validates its desirability: we have two arms and two legs because that design has stood the test of time.  Pragmatic thinking can lead people to make themselves aware of those much smaller and weaker cultural trends that you've mentioned, like if you're trying to impress your would-be mother-in-law and she's a zealous Dan Brown fanatic, but the relevance of religion remains tremendous.  Secular cultures haven't even learned to breed sustainably yet!
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Changed My Mind

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Re: God is _____
« Reply #34 on: October 06, 2009, 02:43:35 PM »
...jim croce.
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mikehz

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Re: God is _____
« Reply #35 on: October 06, 2009, 06:28:14 PM »
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"Force always attracts men of low morality." Albert Einstein

AL the Inconspicuous

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Re: God is _____
« Reply #36 on: October 19, 2009, 10:00:16 PM »
Quote from: the Rubberband Man on October 06, 2009, 02:43:35 PM
...jim croce.

Your idea of God is a guitar-playing Joo?!



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Changed My Mind

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Re: God is _____
« Reply #37 on: October 20, 2009, 07:00:32 AM »
of course it's not an idea.  He is god.
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AL the Inconspicuous

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Re: God is _____
« Reply #38 on: October 20, 2009, 08:58:22 AM »
You non-Muslims are all polytheists, atheists included!  Someone might be a prophet from God (for fun and profit), but no one can be God!  God is a metaphor, dumbass!
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BobRobertson

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Re: God is _____
« Reply #39 on: October 20, 2009, 11:40:45 AM »
Quote from: Taors on April 21, 2008, 01:27:20 AM
Our postman is an old woman...

Well yeah, he is now...
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"I regret that I am now to die in the belief that the useless sacrifice of themselves by the generation of 1776 to acquire self-government and happiness to their country is to be thrown away by the unwise and unworthy passions of their sons, and that my only consolation is to be that I live not to weep over it."
-- Thomas Jefferson, April 26th 1820

AL the Inconspicuous

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Re: God is _____
« Reply #40 on: October 24, 2009, 02:18:13 PM »
[youtube=425,350]ylAsZQyOBMk[/youtube]

 :)
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BobRobertson

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Re: God is _____
« Reply #41 on: October 25, 2009, 03:31:05 PM »
Quote from: Alex Libman 15 on October 06, 2009, 04:01:33 AM
In hindsight, I really don't like all this animosity toward God. 

The animosity is towards what people do because of religion, or in the name of their god.

There is no animosity toward any "god", since an atheist cannot be angry at something which they believe does not exist.
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"I regret that I am now to die in the belief that the useless sacrifice of themselves by the generation of 1776 to acquire self-government and happiness to their country is to be thrown away by the unwise and unworthy passions of their sons, and that my only consolation is to be that I live not to weep over it."
-- Thomas Jefferson, April 26th 1820

AL the Inconspicuous

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Re: God is _____
« Reply #42 on: October 25, 2009, 11:17:31 PM »
You can feel animosity towards a concept, which is what I was sensing here (including in some instances from myself - yeah, I'm full of contradictions on this matter).

Or is comparing something to a blurry micropenis (I'm Russian) somehow a good thing?  :roll:

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AL the Inconspicuous

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Re: God is _____
« Reply #43 on: October 29, 2009, 12:11:40 AM »
[youtube=425,350]s_E4haW1upw[/youtube]

 :D
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Sam Gunn (since nobody got Admiral Naismith)

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Re: God is _____
« Reply #44 on: October 29, 2009, 12:42:16 AM »
That's hilarious.
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"Do not throw rocks at people with guns." —Hastings' Third Law
"Income tax returns are the most imaginative fiction being written today." —Herman Wouk 

"If you want total security, go to prison. There you're fed, clothed, given medical care and so on. The only thing lacking... is freedom." - Dwight D. Eisenhower
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