<p>I apologize if this is a touchy subject, but the most important topics in life are the ones that spark controversy. I cannot understand why people believe in a higher power and it's been puzzling me for a while. I'm hoping some of you can answer this in a logical fashion. Please do not mention anything about the Bible because that weakens your claim.</p>
<p>Maybe some people feel like there is nothing else to truly believe in and they find comfort worshiping something that is “above” them.</p>
<p>I simply believe that in order for the world to be as it is, God must exist</p>
<p>Everything is too logical for it to have randomly come together</p>
<p>[british female voice] Flame thread activated. [/voice]</p>
<p>My bet is that by this time tomorrow, this thread will turn into a giant flame war, provided the thread hasn’t yet been deleted.</p>
<p>OP, some people just believe. That’s the way it is.</p>
<p>I would hope that the other thread sapped the will from any religion based flaming</p>
<p>To directly address your question of “why”, I think for most people, including me, God gives us hope. In other words, belief/trust in Him allows the idea that nothing can go wrong because He’s in control, which creates optimism. More strongly, we also believe in Him because we see the effects He has on other believers. We see His actions, such as changing people’s lives, bringing contentness, etc.</p>
<p>This (the metacognitive overview) is as logical as it might get, because oftentimes faith does not depend on or require logic. The consequences from believing are that people end up with hope that they would not have had if they didn’t believe. Since believing is free (or relatively costless in most countries), it’s logical to do it if it’s beneficial. If belief in God provides hope, why not take it?</p>
<p>And it’s offensive to say mentioning the Bible weakens a claim. You could have put it in more neutral terms by saying “Please do not mention anything about the Bible because I don’t trust it, so it would keep me from understanding your explanation.”</p>
<p>Your original post makes little sense to me.</p>
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I don’t understand why you don’t believe in a higher power. It really does puzzle me. </p>
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Religion typically isn’t logical. (Christianity: Virgin Mary has a baby… o.O)</p>
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Urr… No… That’s kind of why I believe in God. The Bible is my number one resource for my religion. I understand it as the most true thing to ever be written. How does this weaken my ‘argument’? (Which by the way… I won’t argue whether or not God exists or not… because I know he does. And you know he doesn’t. It’s pretty pointless.)</p>
<p>Anyhow… I don’t find this controversial… I just find it dull, boring, and stupid. You either believe or you don’t… I don’t find either to be logical at all, mainly because religion isn’t really logical.</p>
<p>I will not participate in this thread. It makes me angry when people cannot understand why others believe in a supreme being, and I’m not likely to change any opinions. I will merely become angry. So I am not participating in this discussion.</p>
<p>The same science that says that it is near impossible for complete disorder to become completly orderly without a massive amount of energy is the same one that says a complex structure such as a cell (let alone a multiple cell organism) can form from an explosion of matter. The chances that such an event would occur spontaneously is near zero. Same thing with evolution. Plus, there can be no guerantees that what evidence we do find of evolution is accurate. Sure evolution can and has occured on a smaller scale, but there isn’t enough evidence that evolution occured on a massive scale in which could form every living being in our universe. Random mutations have occured, so why should some bone found in the ground immedietly be determined to be of some intermediete species? There has to be some form of creator who could create everything that makes up our universe; otherwise, you are leaving a whole lot to an infinatly small chance that the molecules formed the way they did.</p>
<p>@ AU Girl I recently read some article by NY Times… the president of American Atheists: “I gave a Bible to my daughter. That’s how you make atheists.” lol</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/28/us/28religion.html[/url]”>http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/28/us/28religion.html</a></p>
<p>This isn’t the result I hoped it would be. This just proves my point.
It would be nice if a moderator could delete this thread.</p>
<p>That’s lovely… but I’ve actually been to Israel (twice) and Egypt and Jordan… and that place is absolutely magical.</p>
<p>A Bible is my only actual truth in life. =)</p>
<p>My best friend is agnostic.</p>
<p>I understand agnostics wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyy more than atheists. Atheists make no sense to me. =/</p>
<p>It proves your point? What? That God isn’t real? That religious people are idiots? I don’t understand.</p>
<p>And exactly what point is that?</p>
<p>I’m sorry, OP, but nothing has ever been proven to the general population in terms of whether or not there is a supreme being. Please explain yourself.</p>
<p>In early times, many people believed in deities because it was their substitute for science and explanation. They weren’t intellectually advanced enough to know what we know today, why it rains, what shape the Earth is, etc. So, because it is humanly natural, they conjured up some explanation of natural occurrences, some completely insane. Most included stories of gods, how they related to mankind. </p>
<p>Also, the universe seems too complex and weird for people to think it was created naturally, so they think a god was responsible. </p>
<p>Another obvious reason is because they grew up that way. Even if you wouldn’t believe in any religion naturally, you can still grow up to a religious family and they teach you their religion and expect you to follow it. Some people depart from their origins, but most stick with it.</p>
<p>It gives people purpose, who think there is something more to just living and dying. They think that there is something greater then them out there controlling everything.</p>
<p>Many people are afraid of death, hence some kind of ‘better place’: heaven, an afterlife.</p>
<p>People have a weird occurrence, like a miracle, or fell some sensation that makes them think a god is responsible. </p>
<p>Religious places such as churches, synagogues, temples, mosques, etc. tend to try and seduce you with religion during times of adversity and hardship. So you are easily persuaded by religion when you are going through rough times and your emotions aren’t stable. </p>
<p>Some are not independent, and can’t handle their own life, so they like being told what to do.</p>
<p>None of these apply to me. Both of my parents are atheists, and I don’t really care what happens after death.
I also was not indoctrinated - I don’t belong to any religion. I think it’s an oversimplification of the non-religious to assume that people who believe in God had it forced upon them, just as it’s an oversimplification for me to think that an atheist won’t believe anything he or she doesn’t see with his or her own eyes.</p>
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<p>I think you have it backwards. The universe is too simple for me to think it to have been formed from atoms flying helter skelter around outer space after the big bang.</p>
<p>Anyway, I think the major issue that has led to all of these threads is an artificial dichotomy between the rational intelligentsia and the uneducated and indoctrinated religious masses. While many people do blindly follow whatever their reactionary pastors say, I hope that there are a number like myself that came to their beliefs authentically.</p>
<p>I also understand agnostics more than atheists. I have a good friend who is REALLY atheist who thinks that a higher being CAN NOT exist. He says that science proves it impossible. I myself am about half way between agnostic and apatheist. For me, I’m truly unsure if a higher being exists or not. I want to believe there is, but sometimes, I just say, where’s the hard evidence? And the fact of the matter is, no one will ever know FOR CERTAIN, thats why a religion is about faith. But being a very logical person myself, it’s hard for me to completly give myself to religion. But also, i’m somewhat apatheist (a subdivision of agnosticism in which the person doesn’t really care too much about whether or not god exists and doesn’t think it is worth arguing about). I mean honestly, I think that’s it’s very stupid that people have fought wars for religion, there’s no reason why people should die because of something that <em>possibly</em> might not even be true. Please don’t lash out at me for this, but to me, it’s sorta like starting a war because someone said that the tooth fairy doesn’t exist and that all people who believe in the tooth fairy are idiots. Again, don’t lash out at me for my post, it’s just what <em>I</em> think. Really, to me, there are 2 possibilities for this. 1. God(s) don’t exist and the universe just so happened to form out of sheer chance. The bible and torah and Quran and any other religious scripture is a man made product. But no harm was done from believing in god. 2.God(s) do exist and they being omnipotent, omnibenevolent, yada yada yada, forgive all those who didn’t believe in them but were still good people. Either way, it shouldn’t really hurt you to believe or believe as long as you’re a good person.
I kind of follow this type of belief: Not In My Power—if god/s want people to believe in them, they need only to demonstrate their existence. There is nothing humans can do to prove the existence of a god, and gods are the only force that can prove their existence, therefore the choice of human faith lies not on the shoulders of humans, but god;</p>
<p>I smell a flame war…</p>
<p>How about you people stop posting things like “Flame war ahead” and “I’m not participating” even when you obviously just did? Seriously…the point of your post is…? To predict a flame war? Why thank you Nostradamus.</p>
<p>Getting back to the topic…</p>
<p>I think people believe in a higher power because they were simply raised that way, or because they need a source of optimism. I am an agnostic, but until now (age 17), I thought I was Christian. It could just be that people never question or think about the things that they believe in and continue to believe what they were taught as they grew up. Or, people might find life hard, and that belief in an omnipotent being who cares, loves, and looks after you makes you get through the day and encourages you. Others might see not believing in a superior power as being arrogant, but I don’t know much about this so I leave it at that.</p>
<p>Because He’s awesome.</p>
<p>/end thread</p>