The Atheist - Agnostic - Non religious thread

We all have been here long enough to know that hypertext is part of Ivan's PA DNA. In fact, he used to be blue about it. It's like asking Slart to stop posting cartoons, MoM posting videos or me saying nonsense. 

Dean wrote: If you don't ask you don't get. However, I am aware of the futility of asking and it is a labour that approaches Sisyphean proportions, but gosh, someone needs to say it and one day the message might just get through before we sink under the weight of the boulder of hypertext that comes crashing down upon us just because 60 posts ago some poor sap foolishly posted: 50 posts ago another fool posted:  And this brings us to the collaboration between the Catholic Church and....  .

I liked this thread better when we were all just talking about how God didn't exist and how that's kinda alright. 

In other news, the Rapture did not occur again for a record 2013th straight year. God had no comment.

Edited by The Dark Elf - February 03 2014 at 19:58

Dean wrote: The T wrote: Dean wrote: If you don't ask you don't get. However, I am aware of the futility of asking and it is a labour that approaches Sisyphean proportions, but gosh, someone needs to say it and one day the message might just get through before we sink under the weight of the boulder of hypertext that comes crashing down upon us just because 60 posts ago some poor sap foolishly posted: 50 posts ago another fool posted:  And this brings us to the collaboration between the Catholic Church and....  . Corrected  No, not really.

I'm an agnostic and don't believe in a soul or any kind of life after death. Death is what it is, the end of life. It is the fear of death and denial of death that gets a lot of people into some pretty big trouble, it seems.
        What i do believe in is the human "will to live", illuminated by Arthur Schoepenhauer. The will permits us to continue, but doesn't necessarily feed on fear or denial of death, really.


Edited by presdoug - February 03 2014 at 20:41

Dayvenkirq wrote: Besides, what kind of an intelligent supreme being would want to live a meaningless, fruitless, boring existence, making people just to send their souls to hell?

If there is "life after death",  I would imagine we take many of our beliefs and preconceptions with us.   Which is to say religious people would perceive a religious experience, and non-religious folks would not.   In the mind of the disbeliever, it's all just science anyway, isn't it?   The light, the long tunnel, the dead relatives, the next plain of reality--  just a physics lesson, really.   If there is an 'afterlife', I would suspect it to be just as difficult and challenging as this one, and that the great mysteries of the universe continue on, unimpressed by our newly freed souls.

Dude, I'm postulating a notion, not a belief.   Don't be so defensive.

Atavachron wrote: If there is "life after death",  I would imagine we take many of our beliefs and preconceptions with us.   Which is to say religious people would perceive a religious experience, and non-religious folks would not.   In the mind of the disbeliever, it's all just science anyway, isn't it?   The light, the long tunnel, the dead relatives, the next plain of reality--  just a physics lesson, really.   If there is an 'afterlife', I would suspect it to be just as difficult and challenging as this one, and that the great mysteries of the universe continue on, unimpressed by our newly freed souls*.

Very perceptive post, which explains why no amount of spiritual epiphany or transcendental enlightenment provided by a God would convince someone like my late Uncle Peter that the music he heard from his radio wasn't played by tiny little men inside it. *Wish I'd written that