We are just monkeys in clothes and with cars and buildings. So our arrogance means that we have to say 'I couldnt possibly just be a carbon based biological lifeform that lives about 100 years and then dies. I must be something more important than that. So yeah there are great mystical afterlife afterdeath places where everything is magical.'

There is no life after death. There is just death.

And atheism isnt a religion. It's just the absence of belief in fairy tales and imaginary beings. Which has another name for it:

Sanity.

easel wrote on Dec 13^th, 2008 at 7:01pm:


Easel, Are you saying here that you know that he doesn't know?
Go on. That's arrogance, because you don't know.

Maybe he does know. Can you look inside his head? You don't know Calanen. Neither do I. Maybe it's a form of revealed atheism.

A lot of Muslims claim to know too. Do they have an exclusive angle on the truth? Substitute Christians, Jews, Buddhists .....

I prefer to give somebody the benefit of the doubt if they think they know. I tend to think it's the know by default in this case though.

Quote:


Do you know what delusion is? A false belief. It's how psychiatrists determine whether you are sane or not.

You don't KNOW that the one true god is not Papa Smurf who lives on the Dark Side of Pluto. Because, you've never been to Pluto. Or the Dark Side.

It's still a safe bet though, that there is no Papa Smurf God on the Dark Side of Pluto. Even if you haven't been there to check.

And isn't it more arrogant to believe in something, when you don't know? I am only saying I believe in what I know. You are saying, that because we dont know we should believe in it. That's more arrogant in my view.

So anyway, one time I did something without anticipating the consequences of my actions and it wrecked this other person. I had no regrets for what I did just that I felt bad about the end result.

I was crying daily for a good while.

I decided to pray, asking for forgiveness, whilst in tears, for what happened, thinking 'out loud' (how do you describe prayer?) that I didn't feel bad for what I did, only what happened.

I got this sensation, my body froze up and I couldn't move, and I had this feeling, about 10cm or so thick, in a bar, going up and down my body, quickly, probably 10-20 times in about 1 second, then I felt this 'ball', made of the same energy bouncing around inside my chest cavity.

Now I don't know what this was, but in my opinion, having experienced it, it was more than sheer coincidence.

easel wrote on Dec 13^th, 2008 at 10:13pm:

Guilt reaction?

easel wrote on Dec 13^th, 2008 at 10:13pm:


Easel,

From what I've seen from your posts, you're not perfect - nobody is, but you're basically a good compassionate person. I don't want to try to take away from you or devalue what you believe in. Everybody believes in something. Even though I might sound like a robot sometimes, I have love and compassion. I'm human just like you and I love my wife my family and friends above everything else. I also love people of all colours and religions.

You have your religion. It's part of your personal 'paradigm'. You have integrated that into the way that you think and live. I would no more try to take that away from you than steal your wallet.

All I'm trying to say here is that we have no idea what experiences other people have.  

Everybody believes something. We have to. It comes with the baggage of being human. We're not digital computers. The best thing we can do is respect each other.

Go in peace.

It is a couple with the guy having their little girl on his knee.
She has on a bonnet type hat.
Jesus' hair is just background foliage.

It is just a matter of perception, some will look at the photo and just see the family, others will see jesus.

Was it just a family photo with a coincidental jesus effect?
Or was the hand of god at work here?