How can sensible, educated people be religious?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I always wonder about people that believe that their god is so good, has created this loving world just for us, etc. I would love to take a survey of religious and non religious people and ask how THEY would have designed a world/people if they were god. would it look anything like this? Would it be on a rock that inherently contains features that will occasionally kill thousands or more, inhabited by beings that have such a drive for survival as to be cruel to one another and to other creatures on this planet, where 99.99% of species have already become extinct? I could go on, but I think you get my drift. Would this be anything like what a loving god would create? I'm an imperfect human and I can think of millions of better ways to design a world and beautiful creatures to inhabit it.

+1 too. This has been raised a number of times in these threads, and the believers never directly address the point.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Short answer to your question:
Because sensible educated people know enough to realize what they don’t know and what cannot be explained through rational thought and reason. One of these is how to explain how order can come from chaos and nothingness. Educated reasonable people will concede that it cannot and does not.
And so therefor science has not found a rational explanation for the intricacies and order of the universe simply coming from nothing.
The created suggests that there must be a creator. And that is what we call God.
In the beginning, there was God.

I think you are the same poster who tried this same false reasoning in another thread. As debunked previously, sensible educated people know that science has ideas for the intricacies of the universe. Your inability to understand does not make your argument correct.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Short answer to your question:
Because sensible educated people know enough to realize what they don’t know and what cannot be explained through rational thought and reason. One of these is how to explain how order can come from chaos and nothingness. Educated reasonable people will concede that it cannot and does not.
And so therefor science has not found a rational explanation for the intricacies and order of the universe simply coming from nothing.
The created suggests that there must be a creator. And that is what we call God.
In the beginning, there was God.

I think you are the same poster who tried this same false reasoning in another thread. As debunked previously, sensible educated people know that science has ideas for the intricacies of the universe. Your inability to understand does not make your argument correct.

Sensitive, educated people who want to believe in a benign supernatural being who will take care of them for eternity will believe in such a being and will attribute their belief to their sensitive, educated nature. That's my take on it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How can people who understand basic science also believe that there is a god in heaven protecting them and that they will live there forever after they die here on earth?

Never underestimate power of conditioning for first two decades of your life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How can people who understand basic science also believe that there is a god in heaven protecting them and that they will live there forever after they die here on earth?

Never underestimate power of conditioning for first two decades of your life.

Amen

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I always wonder about people that believe that their god is so good, has created this loving world just for us, etc. I would love to take a survey of religious and non religious people and ask how THEY would have designed a world/people if they were god. would it look anything like this? Would it be on a rock that inherently contains features that will occasionally kill thousands or more, inhabited by beings that have such a drive for survival as to be cruel to one another and to other creatures on this planet, where 99.99% of species have already become extinct? I could go on, but I think you get my drift. Would this be anything like what a loving god would create? I'm an imperfect human and I can think of millions of better ways to design a world and beautiful creatures to inhabit it.

This is a naive take. Humans have indeed had their own visions of utopia and have tried to act on it and it has always turned into a nightmare. See communism as one example, which is actually quite nice in theory if you read Karl Marx.

So I guess the answer is, I am not God. You are not God. By definition, our minds cannot comprehend God's plan. Your mistake is the age old mistake of trying to fit God into your own brain, to judge God by human experience and intellect.

While on this earth, God only reveals to us what is necessary for our salvation. We have enough capacity to develope a relationship with God and to walk with him through this life. He shows us that he loves us and that we can trust him absolutely through the life and death of Jesus. Everything else, he promises we can see clearly in heaven.

The age old mistake is to say this is not enough. I must be fully told of your plans God, and it must all make sense to me in my human judgment. That was Adam's original sin, eating that fruit of knowledge. Again you might totally disagree but how do you not see that conceptually it would be ridiculous if we can understand and dissect God's plan? Surely such a being would not be worthy of being God.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I always wonder about people that believe that their god is so good, has created this loving world just for us, etc. I would love to take a survey of religious and non religious people and ask how THEY would have designed a world/people if they were god. would it look anything like this? Would it be on a rock that inherently contains features that will occasionally kill thousands or more, inhabited by beings that have such a drive for survival as to be cruel to one another and to other creatures on this planet, where 99.99% of species have already become extinct? I could go on, but I think you get my drift. Would this be anything like what a loving god would create? I'm an imperfect human and I can think of millions of better ways to design a world and beautiful creatures to inhabit it.

+1 too. This has been raised a number of times in these threads, and the believers never directly address the point.

May be that they don't address this point because it stumps them. It's easy for them to overlook unpleasantries. They just block out anything that doesn't fit into their worldview, which is shared by many, so it seems more likely, even though the concept of eternal life is ridiculous.

People do this kind of stuff all the time, very frequently in choosing a mate. Everyone but them see why the match won't work. And eventually, maybe they see it too, after much suffering.

In the case of religion, there may be little suffering and lots of benefits (e.g., fitting in, socializing) and then it's just lights out. No eternal reward, but no punishment either.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I always wonder about people that believe that their god is so good, has created this loving world just for us, etc. I would love to take a survey of religious and non religious people and ask how THEY would have designed a world/people if they were god. would it look anything like this? Would it be on a rock that inherently contains features that will occasionally kill thousands or more, inhabited by beings that have such a drive for survival as to be cruel to one another and to other creatures on this planet, where 99.99% of species have already become extinct? I could go on, but I think you get my drift. Would this be anything like what a loving god would create? I'm an imperfect human and I can think of millions of better ways to design a world and beautiful creatures to inhabit it.

This is a naive take. Humans have indeed had their own visions of utopia and have tried to act on it and it has always turned into a nightmare. See communism as one example, which is actually quite nice in theory if you read Karl Marx.

So I guess the answer is, I am not God. You are not God. By definition, our minds cannot comprehend God's plan. Your mistake is the age old mistake of trying to fit God into your own brain, to judge God by human experience and intellect.

While on this earth, God only reveals to us what is necessary for our salvation. We have enough capacity to develope a relationship with God and to walk with him through this life. He shows us that he loves us and that we can trust him absolutely through the life and death of Jesus. Everything else, he promises we can see clearly in heaven.

The age old mistake is to say this is not enough. I must be fully told of your plans God, and it must all make sense to me in my human judgment. That was Adam's original sin, eating that fruit of knowledge. Again you might totally disagree but how do you not see that conceptually it would be ridiculous if we can understand and dissect God's plan? Surely such a being would not be worthy of being God.

How did you learn so much about what God wants for us? How do you know it's accurate and is from a reliable source?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I always wonder about people that believe that their god is so good, has created this loving world just for us, etc. I would love to take a survey of religious and non religious people and ask how THEY would have designed a world/people if they were god. would it look anything like this? Would it be on a rock that inherently contains features that will occasionally kill thousands or more, inhabited by beings that have such a drive for survival as to be cruel to one another and to other creatures on this planet, where 99.99% of species have already become extinct? I could go on, but I think you get my drift. Would this be anything like what a loving god would create? I'm an imperfect human and I can think of millions of better ways to design a world and beautiful creatures to inhabit it.

This is a naive take. Humans have indeed had their own visions of utopia and have tried to act on it and it has always turned into a nightmare. See communism as one example, which is actually quite nice in theory if you read Karl Marx.

So I guess the answer is, I am not God. You are not God. By definition, our minds cannot comprehend God's plan. Your mistake is the age old mistake of trying to fit God into your own brain, to judge God by human experience and intellect.

While on this earth, God only reveals to us what is necessary for our salvation. We have enough capacity to develope a relationship with God and to walk with him through this life. He shows us that he loves us and that we can trust him absolutely through the life and death of Jesus. Everything else, he promises we can see clearly in heaven.

The age old mistake is to say this is not enough. I must be fully told of your plans God, and it must all make sense to me in my human judgment. That was Adam's original sin, eating that fruit of knowledge. Again you might totally disagree but how do you not see that conceptually it would be ridiculous if we can understand and dissect God's plan? Surely such a being would not be worthy of being God.

How did you learn so much about what God wants for us? How do you know it's accurate and is from a reliable source?

I think everything I said is a combo of logic (that God by definition is greater than our minds since he is the creator), introspection (that the God of Christianity through the figure of Jesus tells the most compelling story of God's love for us among the religions I have studied), and basic Christian theology (original sin, us seeing clearly in heaven).

Answering the original question about why God's plan seems so dumb only requires logic though.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I always wonder about people that believe that their god is so good, has created this loving world just for us, etc. I would love to take a survey of religious and non religious people and ask how THEY would have designed a world/people if they were god. would it look anything like this? Would it be on a rock that inherently contains features that will occasionally kill thousands or more, inhabited by beings that have such a drive for survival as to be cruel to one another and to other creatures on this planet, where 99.99% of species have already become extinct? I could go on, but I think you get my drift. Would this be anything like what a loving god would create? I'm an imperfect human and I can think of millions of better ways to design a world and beautiful creatures to inhabit it.

This is a naive take. Humans have indeed had their own visions of utopia and have tried to act on it and it has always turned into a nightmare. See communism as one example, which is actually quite nice in theory if you read Karl Marx.

So I guess the answer is, I am not God. You are not God. By definition, our minds cannot comprehend God's plan. Your mistake is the age old mistake of trying to fit God into your own brain, to judge God by human experience and intellect.

While on this earth, God only reveals to us what is necessary for our salvation. We have enough capacity to develope a relationship with God and to walk with him through this life. He shows us that he loves us and that we can trust him absolutely through the life and death of Jesus. Everything else, he promises we can see clearly in heaven.

The age old mistake is to say this is not enough. I must be fully told of your plans God, and it must all make sense to me in my human judgment. That was Adam's original sin, eating that fruit of knowledge. Again you might totally disagree but how do you not see that conceptually it would be ridiculous if we can understand and dissect God's plan? Surely such a being would not be worthy of being God.

How did you learn so much about what God wants for us? How do you know it's accurate and is from a reliable source?

I think everything I said is a combo of logic (that God by definition is greater than our minds since he is the creator), introspection (that the God of Christianity through the figure of Jesus tells the most compelling story of God's love for us among the religions I have studied), and basic Christian theology (original sin, us seeing clearly in heaven).

Answering the original question about why God's plan seems so dumb only requires logic though.

DP - I think PP's main question, and certainly mine, is: How do you know it's accurate and is from a reliable source?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Short answer to your question:
Because sensible educated people know enough to realize what they don’t know and what cannot be explained through rational thought and reason. One of these is how to explain how order can come from chaos and nothingness. Educated reasonable people will concede that it cannot and does not.
And so therefor science has not found a rational explanation for the intricacies and order of the universe simply coming from nothing.
The created suggests that there must be a creator. And that is what we call God.
In the beginning, there was God.

+1 IMO, it's arrogant to think that humans can know everything. I don't think we can, though I love scifi movies that attempt to do that.

It's a bit of a philosophical question, as well. IMO, religion and philosophy are intertwined - the meaning of life, the question of an afterlife.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I always wonder about people that believe that their god is so good, has created this loving world just for us, etc. I would love to take a survey of religious and non religious people and ask how THEY would have designed a world/people if they were god. would it look anything like this? Would it be on a rock that inherently contains features that will occasionally kill thousands or more, inhabited by beings that have such a drive for survival as to be cruel to one another and to other creatures on this planet, where 99.99% of species have already become extinct? I could go on, but I think you get my drift. Would this be anything like what a loving god would create? I'm an imperfect human and I can think of millions of better ways to design a world and beautiful creatures to inhabit it.

This is a naive take. Humans have indeed had their own visions of utopia and have tried to act on it and it has always turned into a nightmare. See communism as one example, which is actually quite nice in theory if you read Karl Marx.

So I guess the answer is, I am not God. You are not God. By definition, our minds cannot comprehend God's plan. Your mistake is the age old mistake of trying to fit God into your own brain, to judge God by human experience and intellect.

While on this earth, God only reveals to us what is necessary for our salvation. We have enough capacity to develope a relationship with God and to walk with him through this life. He shows us that he loves us and that we can trust him absolutely through the life and death of Jesus. Everything else, he promises we can see clearly in heaven.

The age old mistake is to say this is not enough. I must be fully told of your plans God, and it must all make sense to me in my human judgment. That was Adam's original sin, eating that fruit of knowledge. Again you might totally disagree but how do you not see that conceptually it would be ridiculous if we can understand and dissect God's plan? Surely such a being would not be worthy of being God.

Thought stopping cliche. To be expected.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Very intelligent people think about what's outside our universe, and the possibility of some other world, quantum physics, and theories of consciousness.

Even Einstein believed in some form of a god.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-god-quantum-mechanics-and-consciousness-have-in-common/

DP - I went down a rabbit hole to read through some of links included in the article. I see now why you may hold some of the views you do. However, I view it all as trivial bullsh*t philosophizing, trying to ascribe meaning to something. It's a very anthropomorphic view of reality. The world just "is". There is no purpose.

That's one philosophical - nihilistic - viewpoint.

But, some intelligent people like Einstein do believe in a form of a god, or at least some other higher power. Or they are agnostics because the existence of a god probably can never be proven.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Very intelligent people think about what's outside our universe, and the possibility of some other world, quantum physics, and theories of consciousness.

Even Einstein believed in some form of a god.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-god-quantum-mechanics-and-consciousness-have-in-common/

DP - I went down a rabbit hole to read through some of links included in the article. I see now why you may hold some of the views you do. However, I view it all as trivial bullsh*t philosophizing, trying to ascribe meaning to something. It's a very anthropomorphic view of reality. The world just "is". There is no purpose.

That's one philosophical - nihilistic - viewpoint.

But, some intelligent people like Einstein do believe in a form of a god, or at least some other higher power. Or they are agnostics because the existence of a god probably can never be proven.

The existence of fairies can never be proven. But only small children believe in them.

Einstein didn't beleivein God. DOn't say such foolish things.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Very intelligent people think about what's outside our universe, and the possibility of some other world, quantum physics, and theories of consciousness.

Even Einstein believed in some form of a god.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-god-quantum-mechanics-and-consciousness-have-in-common/

DP - I went down a rabbit hole to read through some of links included in the article. I see now why you may hold some of the views you do. However, I view it all as trivial bullsh*t philosophizing, trying to ascribe meaning to something. It's a very anthropomorphic view of reality. The world just "is". There is no purpose.

That's one philosophical - nihilistic - viewpoint.

But, some intelligent people like Einstein do believe in a form of a god, or at least some other higher power. Or they are agnostics because the existence of a god probably can never be proven.

The existence of fairies can never be proven. But only small children believe in them.

Einstein didn't beleivein God. DOn't say such foolish things.

Einstein believed in a god, or some other higher power -- not necessarily the Christian God (I find interesting that you capitalized the word).

Who knows, maybe fairies do exist in the form of angels. One calls them angles; the other fairies.