Atheist 1 - Christian guy 0

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Originally Posted by AJ Camacho

So if he's real, then who's his god?

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Well I believe that man's demons reside inside, I would have to say that God does as well. He is we, we are he. In otherwords we are a part of him, as he is the whole of us. And hey, I'm just a man. Nobody says I know all. Just my opinion. Opinions are like assholes, everyone has one. and some stink more than others ;) If you strive to do what's right he will test you, if you skate through life not trying. Where is the need to test? As you have already failed... I have related every decision in my life to "is it right or wrong" and have always let that be my guide through life! I hope that more see things as I do, but that is up to them. It is my whole hearted belief, that we are here as a lifelong test, to evolve and become more like God. The problem is all the temptations and distractions that life hits us with. Has slowed our evolution to a crawl for thousands of years...

Huh?

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Originally Posted by AJ Camacho

Huh?

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+1

Religious threads are a dangerous thing.

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I personally am not religious, I believe in science. But to me its not so hard to believe that there may be a higher presence that Science has yet found the math to detect?

From my understanding, correct me if I'm wrong, every culture in the world as far back as we can find has had some sort of afterlife belief system. Perhaps we use this as a safety mechanism to help our brain cope with death, or perhaps it's something more.

I think the problem arises when you start using morality as a way to enforce a belief system. Times change and cultures differ. Whats right for me and you is heinous to someone else.

It's in human nature to want to fit in and to discourage difference at the same time. Many religions use this all the time to gain grounds.

I just think that the "near death" experience that has been witnessed via hallucinogenic rituals and/or actual near death experiences has given people anecdotal evidence to believe in the after life. Now we know that those experience's are not actually death but "near death". Back then people just thought you were dead.

I remember science being able to prove our souls exist. I can't remember the study though. If your soul is "you" and is comprised of 100% energy, than we never die according to Newtons Law. We will just change form or transfer our energy... This collective of our energy/souls would be what I call God. Now don't get me wrong, science has not proven what happens to the soul after death, just that it leaves the body. The rest is an off the top of my head conclusion.

AJ, there are some horror stories from "back in the day". Too many documented burials, where peeps where buried alive. The whole reason for wakes etc...

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Originally Posted by Bill Keeling

I remember science being able to prove our souls exist. I can't remember the study though. If your soul is "you" and is comprised of 100% energy, than we never die according to Newtons Law. We will just change form or transfer our energy... This collective of our energy/souls would be what I call God. Now don't get me wrong, science has not proven what happens to the soul after death, just that it leaves the body. The rest is an off the top of my head conclusion.

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I don't know, it could all operate similar to a battery powered flash drive. Your consciousness could be a fully fleshed out entity but then when the power goes out, the grid fails, and the data just gets lost. I mean what kind of energy is it that we are talking about? Is the energy in your brain just the element which turns neuron receptors on or off and your identity is just an expression of the current on/off states of those receptors?

In terms of brain injury due to unconsciousness, the power was off long enough to corrupt the data, essentially changing your consciousness forever. Permanent brain injury was always a detail that challenged any notion I had of what constitutes the identity of one's consciousness or soul.

For a delicate subject like religion I'm pretty impressed by the way everybody reacting :) gotta love a bunch of people able to discuss a topic without trying to fight each other on the interweb!
I'm in love with this forum! :) we all got our opinions but we still all get along :)

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Originally Posted by AJ Camacho

I don't know, it could all operate similar to a battery powered flash drive. Your consciousness could be a fully fleshed out entity but then when the power goes out, the grid fails, and the data just gets lost. I mean what kind of energy is it that we are talking about? Is the energy in your brain just the element which turns neuron receptors on or off and your identity is just an expression of the current on/off states of those receptors?

In terms of brain injury due to unconsciousness, the power was off long enough to corrupt the data, essentially changing your consciousness forever. Permanent brain injury was always a detail that challenged any notion I had of what constitutes the identity of one's consciousness or soul.

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Im glad you mentioned this. I mean say I had some kind of brain damage or memory loss. wouldn't that completely change who i am? Personality and everything would be different. Like you said my data would be deleted and once again haven to be wrote starting from scratch. life is fucked up.

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Originally Posted by Don Blankenship

Im glad you mentioned this. I mean say I had some kind of brain damage or memory loss. wouldn't that completely change who i am? Personality and everything would be different. Like you said my data would be deleted and once again haven to be wrote starting from scratch. life is fucked up.

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Definitely some scary stuff. My nephew had some serious brain trauma and the family still doesn't know what sort of personality has unfolded since it takes time to see how these things will flesh out. He seems okay, but another friend of mine came out of a coma with short term memory loss, mood swings, and the inability to know when something was inappropriate to say. Totally happier dude overall, but not the same guy.

Even as an atheist I still held out belief that there had to be an afterlife just off of the tenuous presumption that the nature of all memories is in hindsight, which implies that in the future that there would have to be some storage medium for all of that data. As if your "soul" existed in a cloud server connecting with your consciousness and body on earth.

It was a silly rationalization though, since clearly my computer can operate without a cloud server and just because I can access information now doesn't mean that it won't crash tomorrow, losing all of my data.