Faith and believe in God are powerful tools that enable you to do that which you could not do by yourself! The belief in a higher power enables one to go beyond your own limitations and do things you thought impossible. Conversely, if you have no belief in your higher power you cut yourself off from that inner resource, even if you believe in YOURSELF you will be more successful than if you don't, which should be obvious, hence the importance in belief! It opens the door to YOUR inner power! But you must have faith in it and practice it!
"Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.” Matt 17:20 ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <no_re...@yahoogroups.com> wrote : ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <steve.sundur@...> wrote : Probably not what you are looking for, but what I've observed from the atheists, at least on this forum is that they are more comfortable keeping the discussion on highly abstract issues. Issues that can't really be resolved one way or the other, or at least kept on a bit of solid ground. For example, does the belief in atheism necessitate the tabla rasa theory that we are born with a "blank slate"? Do the atheists believe that when we die, it all goes to black. Good questions, speaking entirely for myself - as atheists (as far as I know) aren't a gang with a set of instructions about what threshold of beliefs you need to reach before being a member - it's more about just not having a belief that there has ever been any sort of creator and relying instead on both uncertainty where necessary and confidence where appropriate. Everything is subject to review as more information comes to light, including whether or not there is any sort of god. But nobody actually knows whether there is one and given the apparent lack of necessity and amount of better explanations for god's traditional roles I know where I'd place my money. I like the idea of life after death though, it'd be cool to wake up in heaven or on the next stage of the computer game we all might be playing. I also like the idea of reincarnation be nice to know I may in some way get another go at this.But looking at what we know about animals and brains and evolution I'd have to say it isn't very likely. In fact, if I was a gambling man, I'd say the odds weren't worth much of a stake. But there might be something we don't know of course. It's a case of finding out later with that one but don't hold your breath. You can always say, "we have no evidence.....', but I'd like to know if it's what they "believe". I ask that because there are many instances that would contradict these two assumptions. And sometimes when pressed, you will hear the atheist reply with, "there is so much we don't know about genetics", or "there is so much we don't know about how the brain works", which sounds a lot like, "God works in mysterious way". Now , the "God works in mysterious ways" doesn't do it for me either, but neither does the genetics things, or the brain thing, at least as it is often used here. Often just a lame default, I think,. I would say that the progress that has been made in studying consciousness in a short time has been rather impressive. Given the power of the scientific method to get to the bottom of things I would expect to get a working model of consciousness and self awareness very soon. We know where thoughts occur, what part of the brain needs to be active in order for consciousness to function (and how to knock it out), if it's possible to do it then we will. Unquestionably. The brain is after all another physical structure..... .....Unless there is something really unusual going on. You have to look at it from an evolutionists perspective, there haven't always been brains and you can trace their growth from early on in history, it shouldn't be too hard to build a graph showing which animal has which level of awareness. We seem to be the only one with the ability to sit back and think about it. That's the only difference I can see with us: we have a metaphorical inner life and can make up abstract ideas like afterlife's. How we got that adaptation is a mystery but maybe not such a big one. And of course, having an explanation of the consciousness "hard" problem doesn't mean we are going to be able to easily fit it to our own experience. And I expect there will be a lot of people who refuse to even try. So it isn't really lame, just a statement that there are still mysteries. And mysteries that I refuse to fill with woo woo. So, that would be my take on the issue. ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <turquoiseb@...> wrote : Sometimes I look at the way that believers react to the word "atheist" -- spitting it out as if it were an epithet -- and find it a curious reaction. I mean, with the exception of a vocal few who make their livings by poking theists just to watch them react, I don't see most everyday atheists (and I know quite a few, living where I live) reacting to believers in the same fashion. Unless the believers are trying to sell the atheists their beliefs, that is. Then all bets are off and the atheists can react to the proselytizing believers however they wish. Anyway, it's like the believers perceive the atheists as a *threat*, and as if by believing what they do and <spit> daring to say it aloud or write it somewhere they are trying to *take* something from them. I don't get this. *What*, after all, could an atheist "take" from a believer in God? They've got all they need by believing that there is someone/something IN CHARGE, and that there is a PLAN for all of this, right? So why are they so antagonistic towards a few vocal atheists speaking their minds and suggesting that no one is in charge and that there is no plan? To help me understand this, I'm asking the believers in God here to speak up and tell me what the BENEFITS of such a belief are. Such that you would miss them and feel something had been taken from you if you no longer believed? What would such BENEFITS be? Surely you can name a few.
