Happy New Year Muso.

Oh I've done all that before. So, if you both exist, I defy Allah to lower his mighty foot from the clouds and squish me, and Jehovah to smite me beyond recognition with his terrible Bronze Age wrath.

I think I'll stick to Religious Naturalism. Deism as it's practiced, tends to have too much Christian baggage.

The universe is an amazing place, and I don't have to use words like "God" to appreciate just how amazing it is. But I really don't have any hangups about anybody who thinks deeply about the "meaning of life" and much of the good things and wisdom that come from even the traditional religions can be expressed in an entirely naturalistic way.  That applies even if they decide to believe in a personal god. Good luck to them.

So, even though I can see how people tend to twist the intended meaning of traditional religions and use them as an excuse for their own innate malevolence, I tend to think that such people would do that, regardless of religion or world view. They are obsessed with hate and jealousy and the core of it all is self hate. Such people have major problems to deal with. Some will never change. 

So the fact that I distance myself from simplistic anti-theistic views is not a just matter of pedantics. It's central to where I stand. I just see too much hate in some anti-theists,

Atheism is not a religion - it's a denial of religion.

Religion is dangerous - it threatens to destroy our world.

Soren wrote on Jan 1^st, 2013 at 11:51am:


God bless you, sir, but as you can see, I'm doing a fine job of converting them all to Carl Sagan's version of Deism. 

muso wrote on Jan 1^st, 2013 at 12:23pm:


In my case, it's probably preaching to the converted (or un-converted) a bit, however, it does fire the interest buds to focus more on what and who interests me instead of that which doesn't.

Yes, there are so many amazing things to be absorbed by in the real world without needing to create a fictional world.

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To an extent it may be so that people would think and act the same with or without their religion. But if that were entirely true, then there would be no reason to discuss anything and I don't believe that to be the case.
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Seeing that I don't even believe that Jesus existed, I wouldn't be interested in Christian Deism either.

Sappho said: Quote:


Which can only mean that no human has ever heard the voice of God so there's no point bothering about it until we can look outside of our universe.

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Hmm.. I'm having a re-think about this deism thing 
It seems a bit silly to be talking to something you know is not listening.

A good ol' march on the streets like the one for Jill Meagher, or for a union issue (which seems to be more for prayer than anything else these days) will do me.
At least there is a chance there that something practical will eventuate.


No, I was thinking more in terms of the universe shall be understood through critical thinking, etc etc.

Amadd wrote on Jan 1^st, 2013 at 3:22pm:


You have obviously never recited something out loud.  Read something silently and then read it out loud. 

Try this and tell me there's no difference:

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/171647


Or try this.

Poetry was first song. It's body is your breath.  Who's listening? - a minor concern. You are listening. With all your ears. Listen.

Cool out to the real self....yeah! 


Gotta be free.