Food for thought for Christians

[Walt Zingmatilder]

On zero evidence (alleged personal experience doesn't cut the Colman's) he thinks every non-theist is a (I quote) "God-dodger" because he claims that he once was.

It's something we all need to reflect on folks.

[jeremyp]

It's something we all need to reflect on folks.

No it really isn't. You lied. Everybody else knows it. No reflection required.

[ProfessorDavey]

It's something we all need to reflect on folks.

Why - you can just as easily be accused of being a god dodger in respect of all but one purported deity. Why are you dodging all of those other gods that people currently or once used to believe in with just as much fervour as you do now for your own purported god.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Shakes,

On zero evidence (alleged personal experience doesn't cut the Colman's) he thinks every non-theist is a (I quote) "God-dodger" because he claims that he once was.

It's a fantastic piece of stupidity and/or dishonesty isn't it, this "god-doging" ludicrousness. Just lie and lie and lie about the arguments you don't like, make no argument of any kind for the god of your choice, then accuse the people you've lied about of dodging this supposed god of yours. 

Trolling par excellence, truly.

[Étienne d'Angleterre]

Shakes,

It's a fantastic piece of stupidity and/or dishonesty isn't it, this "god-doging" ludicrousness. Just lie and lie and lie about the arguments you don't like, make no argument of any kind for the god of your choice, then accuse the people you've lied about of dodging this supposed god of yours. 

Trolling par excellence, truly.

It is amazing considering I have specifically asked him about his experiences. Wouldn't it be exciting to discover a whole new aspect to reality. Sadly I fear the wait goes on....

[Étienne d'Angleterre]

So personal experience is no guide to objective truth then.

Bump.

So how do we distinguish between mutually exclusive personal experience?

[bluehillside Retd.]

Stephen,

Bump.

So how do we distinguish between mutually exclusive personal experience?

Ordinarily of course by determining which is the more logically coherent and robust. Trollboy though rejects all that by just lying about the arguments he doesn't like and by asserting as objectively true instead whatever happens to feel right to him.

Sadly, bump as you might he'll never offer a method of his own as someone with even a shred of self-awareness and decency would.

[Khatru]

Certainly.
My experience starts with Sagans Cosmos and particular his idea of a cosmic community.
Very shortly after this I was given CS Lewis mere Christianity and recognised that the cosmic enthusiasm mediated through watching Sagan was a sense of the numinous.
Lewis also talks about God.God of course was for nutters and weak people or was it? That was something I had picked up unquestioningly picked up from my secular humanist roots.
God was now part of the numinous and something tied up to the Cosmos. Further reading of Lewis about God being in the dock. Awareness that God is also involved in morality. Phrase which chimes ! If you put God in the dock you find its you in the dock.
The Bible previously an old book strangely begins to become comprehensible.
Augustine's experience read, ringing words....make me a Christian but not yet.
Huge interest in what actually is the truth...Ringing words Pontius Pilate on truth.
Realisation that there is something behind Lewises and Christian writings.

Reading the bible. words that ring. Follow me and and behold I stand at the door freeze when realise that is true. Walk around in a focus on this which dissociates me from surroundings. Get a mental image of eating a pudding with no flavour as a metaphor for rejecting Christ.
Tell Jesus to take it all. Dissociation vanishes and feel great joy.

Great start with Carl Sagan's "Cosmos".  Very few TV documentaries have impacted on me the way that series did and as much as I admire Neil Degrasse Tyson, his remake wasn't. patch on the original.

The rest of your experience is clearly deeply personal to you and if you genuinely believe you're in contact with the supreme cosmic mega being then good luck to you. 

All I can say is that you musn't take it personally when we are sceptical and I daresay if you'd been born in Saudi Arabia you'd quite likely have the same connection to Islam.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Great start with Carl Sagan's "Cosmos".  Very few TV documentaries have impacted on me the way that series did and as much as I admire Neil Degrasse Tyson, his remake wasn't. patch on the original.

The rest of your experience is clearly deeply personal to you and if you genuinely believe you're in contact with the supreme cosmic mega being then good luck to you. 

All I can say is that you musn't take it personally when we are sceptical and I daresay if you'd been born in Saudi Arabia you'd quite likely have the same connection to Islam.

A fair and decent post.

I'm not sure about your point about Saudi Arabia though since secular humanism was the environmental faith position where I came from.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Bump.

So how do we distinguish between mutually exclusive personal experience?

Well both your friend and I claim experience of God.
I have said that there cannot really be an experience of "no Jesus"
This is why I tried earlier to distinguish between a divine revelation to an individual and adherence to the faith of ones fathers.

I suggest in this case you need to investigate how your friend holds faith in an as yet unreleased messiah.

Unfortunately I would move that people of other faiths have been moved on through the appalling behaviour of the antitheists around here.

[ProfessorDavey]

I'm not sure about your point about Saudi Arabia though since secular humanism was the environmental faith position where I came from.

Really - so when and where were you born then Vlad.

When I was born, in the mid 1960s in England there was a default societal assumption that there was a god and that that god was a christian god. It ran through most of culture and society in which I grew up - most notably within schooling, which was without doubt biased towards a clearly christian viewpoint even though every school I went to was non faith. We had hymns and prayers, services in the local cathedral. RE which focussed mostly on christianity with 'other' religions described just as that, 'other'. I don't believe that my schooling ever made it clear that people called atheists even existed, nor was the notion of humanism mentioned or discussed, likewise secularism.

So I've no idea when and where you were born - perhaps you'd enlighten us please.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Really - so when and where were you born then Vlad.

When I was born, in the mid 1960s in England there was a default societal assumption that there was a god and that that god was a christian god. It ran through most of culture and society in which I grew up - most notably within schooling, which was without doubt biased towards a clearly christian viewpoint even though every school I went to was non faith. We had hymns and prayers, services in the local cathedral. RE which focussed mostly on christianity with 'other' religions described just as that, 'other'. I don't believe that my schooling ever made it clear that people called atheists even existed, nor was the notion of humanism mentioned or discussed, likewise secularism.

So I've no idea when and where you were born - perhaps you'd enlighten us please.

Scotland late fifties moved to England late fifties. A new town. Most people secular humanist very few church goers. Most people thought church goers oddballs.

[jeremyp]

Scotland late fifties moved to England late fifties. A new town. Most people secular humanist very few church goers. Most people thought church goers oddballs.

In the 50's and 60's? Bullshit

[Leonard James]

In the 50's and 60's? Bullshit

I think he means HIS 50s and 60s ... not the 1950s and 1960s.

[Étienne d'Angleterre]

I suggest in this case you need to investigate how your friend holds faith in an as yet unreleased messiah.

Through his personal experience of God.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Len,

I think he means HIS 50s and 60s ... not the 1950s and 1960s.

Surely he means the 1750s & 60s?

Wouldn't it be nice if Trollboy finally said something like, "OK, I know I have to lie and lie and lie to build the fortress of mendacity behind which I can just assert my un-defined, an-argued and un-evidenced personal beliefs as if they were true for the rest of you too, but hey as the intellectual cupboard for my faith is utterly bare that's all that's left to me"?

Fat chance eh?

[Leonard James]

Len,

Surely he means the 1750s & 60s?

Wouldn't it be nice if Trollboy finally said something like, "OK, I know I have to lie and lie and lie to build the fortress of mendacity behind which I can just assert my un-defined, an-argued and un-evidenced personal beliefs as if they were true for the rest of you too, but hey as the intellectual cupboard for my faith is utterly bare that's all that's left to me"?

Fat chance eh?

I don't think he really believes or understands half the stuff he writes, he just chunters along stringing pseudo-intellectual words together in the hope that we will all be impressed.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Incidentally Stephen not only will Trollboy never propose a method to distinguish his claims from just guessing (or indeed from different faith claims entirely) but he'll also never even tell you why he won't propose such a method.

Believe me, I've tried - dozens of times. 

[Étienne d'Angleterre]

Through his personal experience of God.

Bump

[Leonard James]

Bump

The other day upon the stair,
He met a God who wasn't there.
He wasn't there again today
He wishes now he'd run away.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Len,

I don't think he really believes or understands half the stuff he writes, he just chunters along stringing pseudo-intellectual words together in the hope that we will all be impressed.

Oh I can guarantee that he doesn't understand it for the good reason that for the most part there's nothing to understand. The wreckage of syntax and references to authors he's neither read nor understood mean that his posts are just a mess. It's a mistake to think that because he (mis)uses long words there must be an intellect at work nonetheless - essentially he has the reasoning ability of a four-year-old, and the petulance of one too.   

[Leonard James]

Len,

Oh I can guarantee that he doesn't understand it for the good reason that for the most part there's nothing to understand. The wreckage of syntax and references to authors he's neither read nor understood mean that his posts are just a mess. It's a mistake to think that because he (mis)uses long words there must be an intellect at work nonetheless - essentially he has the reasoning ability of a four-year-old, and the petulance of one too.

However, we have to hand it to him, he's managed to keep us all feeding him, which is all he set out to do. 

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Incidentally Stephen not only will Trollboy never propose a method to distinguish his claims from just guessing (or indeed from different faith claims entirely) but he'll also never even tell you why he wont propose such a method.

Believe me, I've tried - dozens of times.

A troll boy is a type of hat......hillsides.

[Leonard James]

A troll boy is a type of hat......hillsides.

And Jonique Anoo is a kind of prat.

[ProfessorDavey]

Scotland late fifties moved to England late fifties. A new town. Most people secular humanist very few church goers. Most people thought church goers oddballs.

I would imagine in the late 50s and early 60s a vanishingly small percentage of the population would even have a clue what humanism was, nor secularism, let alone being nailed to the mast secular humanists.

Frankly the notion that when growing up you'd have had a clue that the people living in your area were secular humanists (which remember doesn't come with obvious outward signs such as going to church) is laughable. Vlad you really are full of sh**e.