The Dilemma of the Believer

Well, you specified agnostics and atheists, and the possibility that such a person would attribute a transcendent experience, or an epiphany to the presence of a deity are so negligible as to be for all intents and purposes impossible. It is important to any dialogue between believers and disbelievers that the believers understand that. Furthermore, the response you ask about in your hypothetical--spreading the news, combating the falseness of unbelief--are ideas peculiar to some religious confessions, such as Christianity and Islam, but not to all religious confessions. An animist wouldn't give a rat's ass if you believe the sun is a god, or that the pure avatar of Lion is a god. Their response would very likely be to think to themselves "poor fool." Your assumptions are not simply theistic, the are very particularly Christian. Read Fresco's comment again. His point is that your outlook is a product of a specific experience of Christianity, and not even a universal Christian perspective.

1 Reply

@Setanta,

Setanta wrote:

Well, you specified agnostics and atheists, and the possibility that such a person would attribute a transcendent experience, or an epiphany to the presence of a deity are so negligible as to be for all intents and purposes impossible. It is important to any dialogue between believers and disbelievers that the believers understand that. Furthermore, the response you ask about in your hypothetical--spreading the news, combating the falseness of unbelief--are ideas peculiar to some religious confessions, such as Christianity and Islam, but not to all religious confessions. An animist wouldn't give a rat's ass if you believe the sun is a god, or that the pure avatar of Lion is a god. Their response would very likely be to think to themselves "poor fool." Your assumptions are not simply theistic, the are very particularly Christian. Read Fresco's comment again. His point is that your outlook is a product of a specific experience of Christianity, and not even a universal Christian perspective.

I concede that in order to discuss my hypothetical in terms of answering my question requires a concession that I have a particular Judeo-Christian bias. I also concede that those of other religious mindsets wouldn't necessarily give "a rat's ass" about my particular idea of this dilemma.

But I invite everyone who doesn't consider my idea as total "drivel" to continue discussing it.

1 Reply

@snood,

snood wrote:

do I now (after the visitation in my hypothetical) fashion the rest of my life as an acknowledgement of the magnitude of the visit (spreading the news, battling the falsehood of unbelief, endeavoring to seek the lasting meaning of the visit...)?

interesting thread.

I have tried to respond a few times already based on my previous status as a believer in a Christian god. Kept getting stuck, but bottom line - I didn't talk about my religious belief IRL (unless pressed very hard, and then minimally) and wouldn't start now.

However, when it comes to your description of acknowledgment of the visit, I feel that I need to respond as your desciption of the options for acknowledgment seem to come from a specific angle of Christianity.

I was taught that how you live is how you acknowledge the visit - not in talking / spreading the news / battling unbelief etc. It relates to the type of non-evangelical church I preferred to attend, and the temples I occasionally like to attend now.

The spreading the news/battling unbelief approach seems to suggest that it could only be a Christian god that is speaking to someone and that that person is following a particular type of Christian route to responding to the visit.

______

What would I do in response to a visit from a god? live a good life and stay stumm about the visit.

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@ehBeth,

ehBeth wrote:

snood wrote:
do I now (after the visitation in my hypothetical) fashion the rest of my life as an acknowledgement of the magnitude of the visit (spreading the news, battling the falsehood of unbelief, endeavoring to seek the lasting meaning of the visit...)?

interesting thread.

I have tried to respond a few times already based on my previous status as a believer in a Christian god. Kept getting stuck, but bottom line - I didn't talk about my religious belief IRL (unless pressed very hard, and then minimally) and wouldn't start now.

However, when it comes to your description of acknowledgment of the visit, I feel that I need to respond as your desciption of the options for acknowledgment seem to come from a specific angle of Christianity.

I was taught that how you live is how you acknowledge the visit - not in talking / spreading the news / battling unbelief etc. It relates to the type of non-evangelical church I preferred to attend, and the temples I occasionally like to attend now.

The spreading the news/battling unbelief approach seems to suggest that it could only be a Christian god that is speaking to someone and that that person is following a particular type of Christian route to responding to the visit.

______

What would I do in response to a visit from a god? live a good life and stay stumm about the visit.

I really really like that. In response to the visit just try to live a good life. Outstanding. I guess the only reason that wasn't the answer so obvious to me as to negate the need to think about it any further is taking into consideration the human weakness that wouldn't be able to contain wanting to talk about such a not-average occurance. Thank you, ehBeth.

1 Reply

@snood,

Nice set of straw men there, you just can't abandon your personal hostility, can you? Why don't you just call me a backwoods cracker again to be honest about it? I did not call your hypothetical drivel. I did not say that anyone would not give a rat's ass about your hypothetical. I said that some people who believe in a god or in gods aren't interested in spreading the good news or combating the "falseness of unbelief," and wouldn't give a rat's ass if you understand their world view.

The point which you continue to avoid is that your hypothetical is flawed precisely because those who do not believe are highly unlikely to respond to a transcendent experience, or what one might call an epiphany by assuming that they had been in the presence of a god, or of what you see as the deity. Therefore, your hypothetical is highly improvable, verging on the impossible.

Don't give up your hostility, though, it seems to be very important to you.

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Snood wrote:

A dilemma is simply a situation in which a person has to make a difficult decision between two or more alternatives.

Not really. A dilemma has two alternatives:

Online Etymology dictionary wrote:

dilemma (n.) 1520s, from L.L. dilemma, from Gk. dilemma "double proposition," a technical term in rhetoric, from di- "two" + lemma "premise, anything received or taken," from root of lambanein "to take" (see analemma). It should be used only of situations where someone is forced to choose between two alternatives, both unfavorable to him.

1 Reply

@snood,

snood wrote:

I guess the only reason that wasn't the answer so obvious to me as to negate the need to think about it any further is taking into consideration the human weakness that wouldn't be able to contain wanting to talk about such a not-average occurance.

I refer you back to JPB's responses which included the following,

JPB wrote:

If you were in India and said you had been in the presence of God you probably would receive a smile and slight bow while the person you said it to was thinking, "We're all in the presence of God and with practice you'll repeat your experience many times over."

I think your dilemma is only a dilemma in the construct of your own belief.

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@ehBeth,

I agree with all you said there, have similar perspective.
Will add that after nearly fifty years of not being a believer, I fit into Set's take on the unlikelyhood of my taking some experience as a transcendent visit.

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@timur,

The Online Etymology Dictionary, as quoted by timur, wrote:

[The word "dilemma"] should be used only of situations where someone is forced to choose between two alternatives, both unfavorable to him.

That's a good way to structure it, although I wouldn't get too hung up on the number of alternatives. It seems clear to me what alternatives Snood is envisioning. He has listed them in his initial post:

Snood wrote:

Do you feel compelled to share it with others? Do you hide it away deep in your heart as your special secret - a gift meant only for you? Do you begin to defend against those who actively denounce belief and believers as fantasy and charlatans?

The part I don't understand is why all these alternatives seem unfavorable to Snood. The opposite seems true to me: they are all just fine.

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This will sound - probably - disrespectful and trite, especially my first example, but I'm serious.

Here's Mary Blige and Mick Jagger singing together recently: that made me happy, even brought a slight tear. Sort of a visit.* Driving through the redwood forest with one of my favorite classical cd's on, a bit loud, is my idea of transcendent. The second makes me feel physically connected with nature in general and humans in particular, at the same time. These are, of course, just feelings, but a kind of brain and body joy in both cases.

* insert music video that takes you on a spin
This is the Blige/Jagger six minutes, which of course you may just hate:
http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2012/12/10/mary_j_blige_and_the_rolling_stones_sing_gimme_shelter_watch_video.html

1 Reply

@ossobuco,

Not disrespectful. And I don't think I'd call anything trite that someone else finds transcendent.

1 Reply

@snood,

Thanks for replying that way.
I used to drive from the Eureka/Arcata area in California (about 80 miles from the Oregon border) down through the extensive forest area, a big part of it redwoods, eventually ending in Sonoma country and heading south. Those forest drives were some of my happiest moments ever. Drives that made sense out of opera's drama, and every one of the dozens of times, cds on or not, beautiful.

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While I have little time for Faith for faith's sake or most religious practice, I believe things are not so obvious as they appear.

A major argument against a god is that there is no empirical evidence for it. But the skeptic has a devout article of faith like anyone else: that is to say, that human beings occupy the highest point in observation and interpretation in the Universe. They forget they are brute animals whom, like the ant, have powers of perception which may be limited to that which Evolution deemed appropriate to their species. Pretty good jump in job-promotion for the monkey, isn’t it? Scientific data is broadcast willy-nilly like confetti by quantum particles and they are hit by them more by luck than judgment and Heisenberg’s Law doesn’t exactly help, either. Their eyes and instruments are contaminated by the very laws they seek to investigate. They claim to see true data but it is all an interpretation of an effect rather than a view of the intrinsic cause. So all such “truth” is subjective rather than objective. Claiming to be God’s Gift (if I may use that phrase – considering they have no souls) to Truth may be misguided and parochial arrogance.

This view may work fine for the material world within Science’s strict remit: after all we can all truly see a wheel turning without knowing much about engines. But it tells them nothing about the prime engine. If that is true, then the God-manifestation debate takes on a new dimension which needs to be addressed.

I'll post more if there is any interest. In addition to the ant metaphor, I will also mention the bikini. Don't ask.

1 Reply

@Horselord,

Horselord wrote:

A major argument against a god is that there is no empirical evidence for it.

And a lesser argument is that many atheists don't feel the need for a god to live happy.

1 Reply

@timur,

Quote:

Quote:
Re: Horselord (Post 5275420)
Horselord wrote:
A major argument against a god is that there is no empirical evidence for it.

And a lesser argument is that many atheists don't feel the need for a god to live happy.

Actually, the only two arguments I ever hear from atheists are variations on the two themes mentioned in the last two posts:

Theists have not produced a god for inspection (there is no empirical evidence for a god), and...

...there is no need for a god (no need for a god to explain existence or any facet of it.)

Neither of those are actually evidence that there are no gods.

No one has produced any empirical evidence of life forms from any planet circling the nearest three stars to Sol...and there is absolutely no need for any life forms to exist on any of those planets...

...but that is not evidence that there are no life forms there.

The best that can be said is: We do not know if there are any life forms there.

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Why ought a person give consideration to a concept that has very obviously been brought up out of, lacking any facts, imagination?

1 Reply

@edgarblythe,

Quote:

Why ought a person give consideration to a concept that has very obviously been brought up out of, lacking any facts, imagination?

There are as many "facts" available to "imagine" a concept like "there is a god"...as there are "facts" available to "imagine" a concept like "there are no gods."

"Facts" about the REALITY are hard to come by. Almost all the "facts" being used by science at this time may be just an illusion.

So it does no harm to give the notion that a god may exist consideration.

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I was once in the position of non belief. If I had the supernatural experience of which you speak, it would have scared the c___p out of me; but would not have caused me to believe. What influenced me was failure to disprove the message presented by a human I met; by accident, I think.

And, yes, now I feel obliged to let others in on what I discovered.

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An atheist doesn't need to "prove" that there is no god. An atheist does not need to provide any evidence that there is no god. The proposition that gods exist is advanced by those who therefore assume the burden of proof. Frank finds it convenient to suggest that most atheists are explicit atheists, insisting that there is no god, and therefore assuming a burden of proof. Frank assumes that because it's convenient for his smug and silly epistemological position. My experience of atheists is that far and away, they are implicit atheists of "don't know, don't care, ain't important" school of thought. I've met a handful of explicit atheists in my life, i've met literally hundreds, and possibly thousands of implicit atheists. (I say possibly thousands because of the many hundreds of people i've met who complain about organized religion, but with whom i've not discussed whether or not there is a god--i don't bring it up because it doesn't interest me, and if they don't, then there it lies.) Frank's assumptions and contentions regarding atheists are merely convenient to the superior position he claims for himself, a position which exists only in his own mind.

EDIT: Addendum--there is almost no way at all to determine how many atheists there are in the world, let alone distinguish between explicit and implicit atheists. Loud-mouthed, militant, explicit atheists only seem to predominate on the squeaky wheel principle, and are alleged by those who want to shout back, touting the excellence of their own understanding.

1 Reply

@neologist,

Quote:

I was once in the position of non belief. If I had the supernatural experience of which you speak, it would have scared the c___p out of me; but would not have caused me to believe. What influenced me was failure to disprove the message presented by a human I met; by accident, I think.

And, yes, now I feel obliged to let others in on what I discovered.

You discovered something????

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The Dilemma of the Believer

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