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Scrambled Password Bogus Email
17:22 / 29.11.06
Diverse as these statements are at first sight, all agree in announcing an experience of the class which fifty years ago would have been called supernatural, to-day may be called spiritual, and fifty years hence will have a proper name based on an understanding of the phenomenon which occurred.

Uh-huh. And he said this...when? In the 20's or 30's?

And? What is the proper name and understanding of the phenomenon?

Why do you ascribe more belief to the words of Aleister Crowley than (say) Sri Aurobindo (author of the words I transcribed) or, for that matter, Jesus or Buddha?
 
 
Scrambled Password Bogus Email
17:29 / 29.11.06
Those words sound remarkably close to the general feeling around at that time that 'any doy now' we would have a Grand unified Theory for Everything, that the Universe was just a decade or so away from being completely wrapped up as a short book of mathematical theories and axioms and that Man would finally see the Hidden Blueprint of all...it hasn't exactly happened though. In fact, the more we've discovered, the deeper the Mystery.

Divine is just a word. God is just a word. Spirit also.

This just goes round and round. Either you've experienced something which can be usefully described as Divine, or not. But it doesn't lead anywhere for people who choose to use that description to be told "You are deluded", just as it helps nobody for those who haven't to be told by those who have "You are blind/ignorant".

Now what?
 
 
Scrambled Password Bogus Email
17:35 / 29.11.06
I've an idea!

Ev - it might be really useful if you could, broadly and as succinctly or in detail as you like, describe how, as an atheist, you interact with Western magic, and its reliance on the Kaballah and the Tree of Life and how all of this makes contextual sense in the absence of the philosophy on which it is founded?
 
 
EvskiG
17:43 / 29.11.06
Why do you ascribe more belief to the words of Aleister Crowley than (say) Sri Aurobindo (author of the words I transcribed) or, for that matter, Jesus or Buddha?

I don't necessarily ascribe any more "belief" to Crowley than any of the others. However, what he says in the excerpt I quoted above seems to closely track my own thoughts on the subject. What's more, it actually seems to contribute to the discussion we're having.

And? What is the proper name and understanding of the phenomenon?

Danged if I know. I've been trying to understand it for a while now.

Why do you think it needs a proper name?

Either you've experienced something which can be usefully described as Divine, or not. But it doesn't lead anywhere for people who choose to use that description to be told "You are deluded", just as it helps nobody for those who haven't to be told by those who have "You are blind/ignorant".

Well, I suspect I've experienced what could be described as Divine, but I'm not sure that it USEFULLY can be described as Divine. In fact, I'd say that, given people's preconceptions about God, it actually might be counterproductive to call it the Divine.

Why do you think it's useful to call it Divine?
 
 
Scrambled Password Bogus Email
17:51 / 29.11.06
Danged if I know. I've been trying to understand it for a while now.

Why do you think it needs a proper name?

Err...I don't. Aleister Crowley, according to your quote, does. And you, by extension, since your thinking is close to his, presumably do as well...otherwise, why did you quote it here?
 
 
EvskiG
18:01 / 29.11.06
it might be really useful if you could, broadly and as succinctly or in detail as you like, describe how, as an atheist, you interact with Western magic, and its reliance on the Kaballah and the Tree of Life and how all of this makes contextual sense in the absence of the philosophy on which it is founded?

Actually, I find that my atheism -- and the research I've done from time to time on the sources of Western religion and magic -- makes it a bit more difficult to use many of magic's traditional tools. If the Kabbalistic Cross uses crap pidgin Hebrew, it's hard to take seriously. And if I realize that Yahweh isn't sui generis, but was simply one deity from the Canaanite pantheon whose followers eventually gained supremacy over their rivals, it makes it difficult to intone Yod-Heh-Vav-Heh without giggling.

Even so, Western magic provides lots of useful tools (which is just how I see them, as tools, not holy writ). As Crowley notes, the Tree of Life makes for a nifty mental filing cabinet for organizing magical experience. The LBRP is a great way to focus and clear the mind through movement, intense visualization, and vibration of nifty-sounding names. Many of Crowley's own exercises (e.g., Liber Jugorum) require nothing in the way of belief. (As Crowley himself repeatedly notes.)

Looking at Eastern techniques, zazen meditation -- coming from Zen Buddhism -- doesn't require belief in deities. And I see yoga (my personal favorite) as a variety of physical, mental, and behavioral methods for "ceasing fluctuations of consciousness."

Does that answer your question?
 
 
Scrambled Password Bogus Email
18:03 / 29.11.06
What you seem to be saying is : Experiences, described for many thousands of years, of non-separation, of dissolution of subject-object, of dissolution of observer-observed, of Union into an integrated One, of meeting with entities which apparently have independent and autonomous existence and bring teaching and wisdom to those they encounter, of being in the presence of while at the same time being a part of something which is vast beyond imagination and the creative source of all being, are not and have nothing to with God.

This is unsophisticcated and a bit backwards. There is a better explanantion, I just don't know what it is. But one day, I'm sure somebody will.

Is this wrong? Can you clarify what you mean, if that's wide of the mark?
 
 
EvskiG
18:08 / 29.11.06
Why do you think it needs a proper name?

Err...I don't. Aleister Crowley, according to your quote, does. And you, by extension, since your thinking is close to his, presumably do as well...otherwise, why did you quote it here?

Now your snarkiness is getting in the way of a proper discussion.

Crowley didn't think it NEEDS a proper name. In the context of a much broader discussion (the full quote I cited above, plus much more), he merely predicted (incorrectly) that it would have one.

You seemed to take the fact that it hasn't yet acquired one as some sort of flaw in Crowley's general argument -- or mine.
 
 
Unconditional Love
18:09 / 29.11.06
Apologies i was referring to ask a question in this delusion, ie the method of words, is to recieve an answer that is also delusion. I ment not to imply you were deluded, but that any question asked here will not recieve a truth as an answer, except of course in the stupid magick questions thread where everything is true.

How words get all muddled.

Now about this cliff, and my subjective steps that lead me to its objective bottom, The idea of subjective and objective cliffs that are constant and continuous is making me chuckle, only in language could they possibly exsist.

At what exact point does cliff begin and sea begin, the parts of cliff taken by the sea are they still cliff, do all aspects of cliffness have continuous constant value. Or does cliffness become recatagorised to create a sense of difference in the phenomena that was once cliff.
 
 
EvskiG
18:14 / 29.11.06
What you seem to be saying is : Experiences, described for many thousands of years, of non-separation, of dissolution of subject-object, of dissolution of observer-observed, of Union into an integrated One, of meeting with entities which apparently have independent and autonomous existence and bring teaching and wisdom to those they encounter, of being in the presence of while at the same time being a part of something which is vast beyond imagination and the creative source of all being, are not and have nothing to with God.

No.

What I'm saying is:

Experiences, described for many thousands of years, of non-separation, of dissolution of subject-object, of dissolution of observer-observed, of Union into an integrated One, of meeting with entities which apparently have independent and autonomous existence and bring what people purport to be teaching and wisdom to those they encounter, of being in the presence of while at the same time being a part of something which seems to be vast beyond imagination and which some people describe as the creative source of all being

should be investigated to determine what, if anything, these experiences mean.

We should not prejudge them as necessarily being related to "God," which, of course, can mean dramatically different things to different people in different times and places.
 
 
Scrambled Password Bogus Email
18:15 / 29.11.06
Looking at Eastern techniques, zazen meditation -- coming from Zen Buddhism -- doesn't require belief in deities. And I see yoga (my personal favorite) as a variety of physical, mental, and behavioral methods for "ceasing fluctuations of consciousness."

Does that answer your question?

Which one? That you mention Zen Buddhism and Yoga in the same breath, noting that one does not require a belief in deities (though the tradition from which it stems is rich in them, they are simply not accorded the same rank as in Western trads being 'victims' of karma as much as pretans and animals) while the other, although not requiring a belief in deities, clearly comes from one of the most deity rich traditions on Earth (barring perhaps Yoruba and similar African trads which also have (or had) hundreds upon hundreds) doesn't really clear anything up for me except that you like to pic 'n' mix traditions and ignore the stuff that's all a bit silly and backwards to your sophisticated Western intellect.

It sounds a bit like, from your description, spiritual cultural tourism. I don;t know though, it wasn't very detailed...how, for clarity, do you see the LBRP as 'effective'? What do you suppose is happening when you wave your arms around and vibrate god names and such like, in the absence of any belief in the god or gods or angels or Divine Beings you are calling?
 
 
Scrambled Password Bogus Email
18:22 / 29.11.06
Now your snarkiness is getting in the way of a proper discussion.

Crowley didn't think it NEEDS a proper name. In the context of a much broader discussion (the full quote I cited above, plus much more), he merely predicted (incorrectly) that it would have one.

You seemed to take the fact that it hasn't yet acquired one as some sort of flaw in Crowley's general argument -- or mine.

Man...am I particularly thick skinned? Don't you live in NYC? How is that 'snarky' for goodness sake?

If that was snark, then your question to me was far worse, having just quoted a man saying that in 50 years we'd all know how silly the brown folks and our ancestors were for their backwards 'beliefs', and have 'a name and proper desscription' for those experiences, and then asking me why I think it needs a name?

And, yes, i do think that quoting it in response to Sri Aurobindas letters concering agnosticism as it relates to Western intellectual primacy, when clearly it's predictions have not come true, is a flaw in it's argumentative merit. It smells like the anthropological model of the era, and the scientific hubris of the time.
 
 
some guy
18:23 / 29.11.06
Divine is just a word. God is just a word. Spirit also.

That's one way of looking at it. Another is that they describe things that many people believe exist and others do not - like fish and unicorns. So it's helpful to nail down definitions and proceed from there.

Either you've experienced something which can be usefully described as Divine, or not.

What is the utility in describing something as divine?

it might be really useful if you could, broadly and as succinctly or in detail as you like, describe how, as an atheist, you interact with Western magic, and its reliance on the Kaballah and the Tree of Life and how all of this makes contextual sense in the absence of the philosophy on which it is founded?

As an atheist I have no problem working with metaphor. In my opinion magic is essentially a form of pre-modern psychology for self-improvement anyway so there's no conflict whatsoever.
 
 
some guy
18:25 / 29.11.06
At what exact point does cliff begin and sea begin, the parts of cliff taken by the sea are they still cliff, do all aspects of cliffness have continuous constant value. Or does cliffness become recatagorised to create a sense of difference in the phenomena that was once cliff.

However we answer this, I'm sure none of us are expecting you to voluntarily step off the observation deck of the Empire State Building any time soon.
 
 
Unconditional Love
18:30 / 29.11.06
I'm through i think, a cliff is more scenic, than i skyscraper, time to metaphorically throw myself off one.
 
 
Scrambled Password Bogus Email
18:33 / 29.11.06
should be investigated to determine what, if anything, these experiences mean.

Eh. Eh heh.

Isn't that what yogis and shamans and spiritual seekers from the dawn of our species have been doing, though?

Isn't that where all the notions of God or Gods actually come from?

And, forgive me if I'm jumping ahead here, but isn't that where all notions of God, Gods and the Divine have come from?

What you seem to be saying is that after meeting the Divine beings and learning of the Oneness of all Existence, shamans, yogis and seekers throughout time were altogether to hasty in positing the notion that God is all there is, that separate existence is an illusion, the Self is a delusion and that we are all connected because everything is Energy.

They should have sat on the fence stroking their chins and, i dunno, discussing the possibilities and seeing what intellectual floss they could spin? Or what?

Once you're in there, and the big Blue Buggers are pointing their scary multi limbed appendages at you and telling you to lid=sten closely and watch, it ain't so easy to insist that they 'hang on a sec' while you doubt their veracity or reality or wonder if you might have wigged out. Too late.

I'm trying not to take the piss, but you're kindof giving it away.
 
 
some guy
18:41 / 29.11.06
What you seem to be saying is that after meeting the Divine beings and learning of the Oneness of all Existence, shamans, yogis and seekers throughout time were altogether to hasty in positing the notion that God is all there is, that separate existence is an illusion, the Self is a delusion and that we are all connected because everything is Energy.

They might first have taken the time to discover whether their experiences were any more "real" than the voice a psychotic hears, images seen during an acid trip, or the celestial spheres. The ongoing lack of objective support for the claim suggests that people are far likelier to be interpreting internal subjective experiences via various culturally specific lenses (angelic visitation morphing into UFO abduction and so on) than noting independent objective events.
 
 
Scrambled Password Bogus Email
18:46 / 29.11.06
'Objective' support? 'Independent objective events?' Independent of what?

Do try to keep up.

Oh no! I'm being rude again.

*sigh*

Some people J N A D, as my already sorely missed friend would say.
 
 
Scrambled Password Bogus Email
18:51 / 29.11.06
They might first have taken the time to discover whether their experiences were any more "real" than the voice a psychotic hears, images seen during an acid trip, or the celestial spheres.

Yeah, the backwards, foreign fools! If only they'd been / were as smart as who cares! Then the world would make sense!
 
 
some guy
19:04 / 29.11.06
Objective' support? 'Independent objective events?' Independent of what?

Do try to keep up.

Oh no! I'm being rude again.

I don't mind if you're rude. I also don't think it's unreasonable to consider that someone claiming the literal existence of divinity might have the onus to demonstrate that this is indeed the case. I'm sure we can all agree on a variety of what I'll call "independent objective events" such as Bill Clinton becoming President of the United States of America in January 1993. So what separates a "fact" like that from the "fact" of the literal existence of divinity? Why should we make allowances for the latter claim that we wouldn't make for claims of leprechaun sightings, for example?

Yeah, the backwards, foreign fools! If only they'd been / were as smart as who cares! Then the world would make sense!

Is this really what you think I was saying, or do you just not want to explain why we should recognize a difference between one claim lacking objective evidence and another?
 
 
EvskiG
19:09 / 29.11.06
Decay:

You're being rude. Again.

You're also trying to insinuate that my attitude is racist. (E.g.: "[H]ow silly the brown folks . . . were," "you like to . . . ignore the stuff that's all a bit silly and backwards to your sophisticated Western intellect.")

That's a cheesy rhetorical tactic. Again.

If it isn't already clear, like who cares, I think that both Eastern and Western esoteric techniques provide essentially psychological methods for self-improvement.

Naturally, I pick and choose from them as I feel appropriate -- just as, for that matter, almost any devotee of any religion picks and chooses from its tenets.

(Even fundamentalist Christians usually don't worry about wearing garments made out of more than one kind of fiber.)

It sounds a bit like, from your description, spiritual cultural tourism.

Sure -- in the same way that, say, Thelema is spiritual cultural tourism by mixing and matching from Golden Dawn techniques, yoga, Christian meditation, and much more.

Or the same way that the Golden Dawn itself was spiritual cultural tourism by borrowing from Egyptian, Rosicrucian, and dozens of other sources.

how, for clarity, do you see the LBRP as 'effective'? What do you suppose is happening when you wave your arms around and vibrate god names and such like, in the absence of any belief in the god or gods or angels or Divine Beings you are calling?

I'm focusing and quieting my mind and improving my powers of visualization and imagination. Regular practice also focuses the will. In addition, the mere fact that gods don't exist doesn't mean that visualizing and calling on them doesn't have an effect. For example, it may help me to aspire to the better aspects of my self, or to certain specific aspects of my conscious or unconscious self.

What you seem to be saying is that after meeting the Divine beings and learning of the Oneness of all Existence, shamans, yogis and seekers throughout time were altogether to hasty in positing the notion that God is all there is, that separate existence is an illusion, the Self is a delusion and that we are all connected because everything is Energy.

No. What I'm saying is that after having certain extraordinary experiences "shamans, yogis and seekers" may have been overly hasty to the extent that they postulated that these experiences were attributable to "God," whatever that is.

Once you're in there, and the big Blue Buggers are pointing their scary multi limbed appendages at you and telling you to lid=sten closely and watch, it ain't so easy to insist that they 'hang on a sec' while you doubt their veracity or reality or wonder if you might have wigged out. Too late.

I know the drill.

I've seen glowing golden scarabs crawling up the wall. I've seen elves dancing around out of the corner of my eye. I've had a green goddess look at me with amusement. I've even been hospitalized after an intense magical experience. (Ended up with asthma I'd never had before.)

I still doubt their veracity or reality.

Go figure.
 
 
Unconditional Love
19:34 / 29.11.06
I have yet to hit the ground, what is the essence of president that it has fact. what gives a person presidentness, how do you measure president? its surely a qualitative term rather than a quantative measurement of fact.
 
 
Unconditional Love
19:43 / 29.11.06
Heres one for you 3 members of one side of my family have all experienced the phenomena of a serpent in near death experience type circumstance, the serpent communicated to me, and basically offered me choices, this also happened to my father and my aunt all in different time periods and places and all at different ages of life, but in circumstances that brought us all close to death.

In all circumstances all of our behaviours have changed to more healthy fulfilling ways of life, changing behaviours that were very detrimental to all of us.

These hallucinations have had very profound life altering effects, extending life in 3 cases by being striking enough to have real impact on 3 peoples behaviour all within the same family.

Why would 3 related people all experience a similar hallucination of the same creature?
 
 
Unconditional Love
19:50 / 29.11.06
Could it be that spiritual experiences are qualitative experiences rather than quantative experiences, that they are subjective and personal, and lead to a sense of personal faith when experienced reinforced by a profound change in lifestyle and perception.
 
 
some guy
20:12 / 29.11.06
I have yet to hit the ground

Let's try an experiment whereby you video yourself leaping from a surface 30 feet above the ground. We'll make predictions about whether you will "fall to the ground" and "injure your body" and then compare those predictions with the file you upload to YouTube.

what is the essence of president that it has fact. what gives a person presidentness, how do you measure president? its surely a qualitative term rather than a quantative measurement of fact.

Do you deny that Bill Clinton once held the office of the President of the United States? That's the problem with these solipsitic and effervescent propositions. They always fall down when it comes to specifics.

Why would 3 related people all experience a similar hallucination of the same creature?

The serpent is a common image and employed as metaphor in a number of traditions. The sharing of the first experience (or indeed awareness of any similar experience) could inform the internal processes of the latter experiences. More than one psychotic has claimed to receive instructions from the devil. Does this necessarily mean that the devil exists as a literal being and that it is in fact telling people what to do? How do these experiences fare in relation to our experiences of hammers or orange juice?

Could it be that spiritual experiences are qualitative experiences rather than quantative experiences, that they are subjective and personal, and lead to a sense of personal faith when experienced reinforced by a profound change in lifestyle and perception.

I'm sure this is the case for many people. That doesn't mean the experience itself occured precisely as perceived and interpreted or that any "entities" encountered exist as literal beings in the "objective" universe.
 
 
Scrambled Password Bogus Email
21:33 / 29.11.06
You're being rude. Again.

My bad. Sorry. I did say as much, myself. Genuine apology.

You're also trying to insinuate that my attitude is racist. (E.g.: "[H]ow silly the brown folks . . . were," "you like to . . . ignore the stuff that's all a bit silly and backwards to your sophisticated Western intellect.")

That's a cheesy rhetorical tactic. Again.

This thread seems to be rife with them. I'm not insinuating your attitude is racist, I'm pointing out that yogis and shamans, who absolutely have a different experience of reality (or at least the means and practical route to a different experience of reality and subsequent description therof) and take on their experience than you, are typically not of Western origin, are brown of skin, and, by your standards, wrong, deluded and/or backwards. You and who cares both cast the experience and world view of a large swathe of the world's spiritual practicing population as if they have 'rushed' into conclusions that 'they should' have taken more time to consider (from your framework and cultural background) before they established their descriptions of reality. It's not racist, but it's pretty arrogant, and suggests that the Western intellectual approach is more valid and has more primacy in spiritual matters than other approaches.


I find this intriguing. As if they missed something that you see, even after thousands of years of their practice, you, and who cares, have a handle on their experience that they lack. Or have I misconstrued your assertions about what 'they should' do with their experience?

I'd say that describing how 'everybpdy' picks and chooses from the tenets of their religion to justify your disparaging attitude towrds and denial of the fundamental aspects of hinduism and the practices that have evolved out of it, and then using as example the fact that Christians wear clothes with more than one type of fiber is a 'cheesy rhetorical tactic' as well. There is, I'm sure you'll agree, a difference?

If it isn't already clear, like who cares, I think that both Eastern and Western esoteric techniques provide essentially psychological methods for self-improvement.

I see. What does that mean? That you believe there is a mind, and a self, for sure, which is interesting given your assertion that you have spent twenty years exploring zazen meditation, which denies both.

Could you explain what 'psychological' means in this context? And what or who the self that is improved is?

Or is this way off topic?

Or, even, just a bit pointless and boring. I feel a bit pooped from all this to and fro, I'm sure you must to. It's certainly very invigorating tossing the ideations around like this, but I still don't see, ultimately, what the point of it all is, as I said in my very first post. I'm not interested in changing 'your mind' and I don't get the impression you wish to change mine either. Are we just killing time here or what?
 
 
some guy
21:47 / 29.11.06
You and who cares both cast the experience and world view of a large swathe of the world's spiritual practicing population as if they have 'rushed' into conclusions that 'they should' have taken more time to consider (from your framework and cultural background) before they established their descriptions of reality.

...which frankly isn't that different than noting that the heavens are not full of celestial spheres or that carrots are "real" whilst unicorns are "fantasy." On what basis do we give validation to the idea that Vodoun is true on a literal level but not leprechauns? Surely you must have some threshold in mind.

It's not racist, but it's pretty arrogant, and suggests that the Western intellectual approach is more valid and has more primacy in spiritual matters than other approaches.

Nonsense. It doesn't speak to spiritual matters at all beyond the question of whether divinity literally exists or is merely a concept some people find useful for subjective reasons. Would you say Christians are "arrogant" for dismissing the literal existence of the Greek pantheon?
 
 
some guy
21:53 / 29.11.06
I find this intriguing. As if they missed something that you see, even after thousands of years of their practice, you, and who cares, have a handle on their experience that they lack. Or have I misconstrued your assertions about what 'they should' do with their experience?

Is anyone saying they should do anything? I think you're conflating two different discussions into something messy and rather inaccurate. I'm quite happy for people to pursue their myriad spiritual paths even if I don't believe that Thor exists as an independent being on a literal level.

If it isn't already clear, like who cares, I think that both Eastern and Western esoteric techniques provide essentially psychological methods for self-improvement.
I see. What does that mean?

It means it's all in our heads, but that doesn't mean it's not useful. Again, you seem to be confusing lack of belief in divinity (however we're defining it today) with a condemnation of the subjective utility of metaphor and other concepts (see math). There's no reason to do that.
 
 
Unconditional Love
08:38 / 30.11.06
Atheism, science, religion and god are all qualitative experiences, you cant quantify what it means to be an atheist through exact measurement using maths, its a subjective view point held be a person capable of comprehending what it means, meaning again being about quality rather than quantity.

All perception is subjective including those instruments crafted by human hands that have a predilection towards providing human focused measurements, ie the abstract systems employed by human beings, humanocentric you might say.

My main problem with both athiesm and religions is when they become fundamentalist in there view points, ie my way is the only possible right way to concieve, for example the fear of being seen as mad which you invoke on a couple of occasions is approximate to a christian society labelling somebody a witch, and carries with it the same social stigma.

For me my main concern is freedom, freedom of choice in the matter of how i structure my own mind according to my precepts and beliefs, no matter how they may be in opposition or sympathy to majority conditioning and education. A society without that freedom has become deluded by its own conditioning to the structures it uses to function. That i should forsake my personal freedom for somebody elses theory or belief, very much opens up the vistas of reactive violence for me. Its a form of abuse to imply that those that dont think or act according the backbone of educational conditioning are somehow outside or mad by comparison by experiencing something that does not fit into current held social constructs.

Freedom is of great import to any society imo and to every individual, telling people how to think between the dichotomy of religion and atheism as i was educated and then not offering full education in other world systems of belief is the greatest travesty that is commited to a young mind, removing the conceptions of other ways and modalitys of being and the freedom to choose what and how they may wish to approach life.

Atheism, agnosticism and theism are not the only choices, but they often can seem to be, depending on the conditioning recieved from the respective culture. Curiosity becomes promoted within certain fields and frowned upon in others, often using the tactics of fear to repress any desire to explore those areas any further. The main fear invoked by athiesm is that of insanity.
 
 
Quantum
09:06 / 30.11.06
 
 
Quantum
09:20 / 30.11.06
Atheism isn't a position. It's simply the lack of theistic faith. One can build positions around that central point, including "denial" and rest of it. I think we're coming up against the tendency to frame atheism from a theistic vantage point again. who cares

It's because the whole debate is framed from a theistic perspective, because historically almost everyone believed in a god or gods. The 'a' in atheism is a giveaway, if it were all framed from an atheist perspective the terms would be 'materialist', 'amaterialist' and 'agnostic' or summink, framing the default position as a belief in a world without gods. Atheism *is* a position.

I don't see how we can possibly say "atheist" doesn't describe my nephew unless we're creating a new definition that means something beyond "lacking belief in divinity." In which case I'd like a term for that, please.

"a·the·ist (ā'thē-ĭst) n. One who disbelieves or denies the existence of God or gods."
If we took "lacking belief in divinity" as the definition, that would mean that foetuses, animals, rocks, hammers and lightning would all be atheists. The weather lacks a belief in divinity, but I wouldn't say it was an atheist. Disbelieving or denying the proposition 'God exists' makes you an atheist, if you've never heard of the idea then you would have no reason to deny it, and so the label wouldn't really apply.
 
 
Unconditional Love
09:28 / 30.11.06
Oh and ridicule and humiliation, Your freedom is not important just subscribe to my thought constructs. Now shut the fuck up and do as your told, i know better than you....

I know better than you is the first line of abuse that ever issues forth from a social system or individual that wishes to exercise power over another through use of thought, along with i can teach you the right way and just do as your told and listen.

Kill them all.
 
 
Evil Scientist
09:39 / 30.11.06
That i should forsake my personal freedom for somebody elses theory or belief, very much opens up the vistas of reactive violence for me

Out of interest, does this mean that your belief system is entirely self-created and uses no beliefs or theories from other people? That would be very impressive (and also next to impossible unless you'd been living in a Gansfeld tank since birth).

Its a form of abuse to imply that those that dont think or act according the backbone of educational conditioning are somehow outside or mad by comparison by experiencing something that does not fit into current held social constructs.

It should be pointed out here that none of the atheists contributing to this thread have implied anything of the kind.

Atheism, agnosticism and theism are not the only choices, but they often can seem to be, depending on the conditioning recieved from the respective culture.

Other choices would be? Those three are extremely broad umbrella terms and pretty much every form of human belief system currently known of fits under one heading or another. Pardon my reductivism.
 
 
Quantum
09:48 / 30.11.06
Let's distinguish between strong and weak atheism for clarity;

Strong atheism is the belief that deities do not exist. Weak atheism is the category including everyone who is neither a theist nor a strong atheist.
Strong atheists are necessarily explicit atheists: they consciously reject theism. Weak atheists, however can be either explicit or implicit atheists. Implicit atheists don't have theistic beliefs, but they have not consciously rejected those beliefs (possibly because they haven't heard of them). Some people consider infants to be implicit atheists (and therefore weak atheists); others maintain that to be considered any kind of an atheist, one must must be old enough, (and otherwise have the mental capacity) to be able to believe or disbelieve in gods if the idea of gods should be presented. (wikipedia)
 
 
Unconditional Love
10:29 / 30.11.06
No high, it means i have the freedom of choice to choose the thought constructs i employ within myself, its that freedom i find to be important.

I would ask you to perhaps consider conditional reality posited by buddhism, and also consider how english language conceptuality converts other cultural dispositions in accord to its own values. Western value structures get applied to the mythologies and histories of other cultures forgoing there ability to self define, and presnting the largely scientific approach to other cultures as the authoriative approach. How a culture wishes to present itself, is largely denied until western scientific validation gives it its validity, take the notion of chi for example, proven to exsist by chinese scientists to some degree, yet denied by western scientists, the cultural values of chi are less important to western notions than chinese notions of cosmology, animatism, or emanationism dont require the above mentioned trinity as reference. (Father theism, son atheism and holy ghost agnosticism.)
 
  

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