Elysian Shadows

We're pretty much all, aren't we? Not.

Blow me.

I try not to think about religion too much

what does agnostic mean?

John Carmack is my god.


Aka I'm Atheist.

I believe that man can stand for Love ONLY without the fear (of supreme sanctifier in this case). Fear leads to the dark side.. Remember what happened to Anakin.?

I'm not saying "you should not believe in God". What I say is: If you believe in God only in fear of consequences, then thou art screwed..

I've heard people say that one's probably the same religion as one's family. I find this extremely dumb. My grandfather and uncle are both Nazarene Christian (I think that's what it's called) pastors, and yet I'm an atheist. Some people just say dumb things sometimes.

seeing as how i now know waht agnostic means i changed my mind from other (still like ham sammich though) to agnostic...

The Ham knows all. Thou must bow to the all Powerful SAMMACH!
I overall just dont really care. If there is a god woot gewd for you the athiests were just proven wright, if there is no got woo good for you the non-athiests were proven wrong. It dosnt effect my life either way.

So what do peoples' upbringings look like?

My biological dad is mormon, and my mother is an atheist, though they divorced before I was even a year old.

My stepdad believes that aliens mutated monkey DNA so that we could investigate the surface of the earth because the aliens can't breathe oxygen. We won't be allowed to travel through space until we get rid of all greed. Otherwise, the aliens will "continue" to suppress us. :P

Lo and behold, I've always been an atheist. My mom never told me what I could or could not believe, and she told me they'd love me no matter what I'd believe. Pretty much the only exposure I recall is just her teaching my sister and I about evolution when we were homeschooled. (Yes, homeschooled atheists. Most homeschoolers meet kids at church, we had essentially no outlet for socialization. Homeschooler classes for things the moms can't teach were full of fundamentalist christian kids who would judge us with no real reason to back it up).

The only way I can even conceptualize the existence of a god is to think about how I create software, and yet I am not software, I am something outside of it. Still, though, it doesn't seem likely to me that one would exist. And if a god does exist, then it's certainly not any god of any religion.
Maybe the founding fathers had it closest-- deism. A creator god, but that's all. He has no concern in our daily lives, he just creates the structure of life and laws of physics.

Ha! Lets not get into upbringings, as I sure as hell had a very, very dysfunctional one . Although, I probably wouldn't be a programmer now if it didn't happen that way. Mostly because I need to be alone, and I find comfort in solitude, so a happy upbringing would have probably resulted in me being much more social and I'd be into something like... oh, I don't know, say sports? Hell no, fuck that. I can never see myself as anything aside from a programmer. Well, maybe a professional artist who does programming as a hobby, but thats a BIG maybe.

Aside from the above tangent, I think people are born leaning either on atheism or theism (from a biological standpoint). Upbringings, then, would dictate if you become one or the other, depending on experience and how you consequently see the world. i.e., in the case of innocent children dying, for instance:

On one side: God exists. The reason for innocent children dying can be explained through the Holy text; God has a plan for all of us.

On the other: how can god exist, if millions of innocent children die everyday for no goddamn reason, fuck that whole notion of: "god has a plan for all of us." There is no excuse for innocent children dying period; if there is a god that is.

What about agnostics, like me? :)

MarauderIIC wrote:What about agnostics, like me?

Answer these questions truthfuly:
* Do you believe in God, why or why not?
* Do you believe in leprechauns, why or why not?

The only difference is the stakes are higher.

JS Lemming wrote:

MarauderIIC wrote:What about agnostics, like me? :)

Answer these questions truthfuly:
* Do you believe in God, why or why not?
* Do you believe in leprechauns, why or why not?

The only difference is the stakes are higher.

* Sometimes. The fact that lots of other people in lots of different cultures do in lots of different ways has influenced this.
* No. There aren't any major religions based on leprechauns, and I don't believe in them enough to start one.