conversations with god: read it?
 

My g/f is listening to this book in the car. Pretty interesting, especially concerning heaven and hell.

http://www.amazon.com/Conversations-God-Uncommon-Dialogue-Book/dp/0399142789

I guess the accident put the fear of God into her...

Haven't read that one. I have begun to delve deeper into this mystery of why people believe in things like gods, though. I am currently reading Michael Shermer's "How We Believe". Very interesting. The whole phenomenon of belief is very complex.

Hopefully your girlfriend finds things in that book that reinforce her beliefs.

Mike

once had a friend who was very into that stuff, wouldn't pass an opportunity to try and get me to read it, to the point where despite my "don't want it" she mailed me a copy...

i read 5 pages while taking a crap, then considered wiping my ass with it , but stopped when i figured the paper was to soft , and i felt it wasn't manly to use soft paper...

Just what the world needs - more delusional nutcases thinking "their version" of fictitious divinity is the correct one and everyone else is wrong. Yep. History has proven that to be very successful and condusive to peace and harmony among mankind.

Try "Why people believe weird things" by Michael Shermer and "The Demon-Haunted World" by Carl Sagan.

The book is actually quite interesting in the it flies in direct opposition to most organized religions. And it has some different ways of thinking about why bad things happen, and how you might approach your life.

The g/f isn't particularly Christian (lapsed Catholic, now Buddhist). But she is quite spiritual and reads constantly, always open to new ways of looking at the world outside as well as inside.

Mike, if you are into thinking about belief systems, give this one a read. It talks about why and how organized religions have gotten so far off track.

And some of you guys may actually want to open your mind sometime. I'm tellin' ya, Shakespeare was right:

"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophies"

"The Demon Haunted World" is one of my favorites. I also recommend "Billions and Billions" (which he started before his death - typically considered to be Sagan's last work). Not quite as direct a rebuttal of religion, myth, etc., but the subject does come up, along with a lot of other "big picture" perspective issues.

Religion has ALWAYS existed to manipulate and control. This is no different - it's just being manipulated in order to sell books.

Do atheist start wars?

Maybe a history buff will chime in.

commies are like anti religion and sjit...Stalin sure as hell was no angel, neither were his buddies... chairman Mao, or Pol Pot...

I believe that to be very true, but does not fully explain why it is so universally practiced, for so long. I think the reason the folks keep it is because it is a mechanism to calm fear of mortality. That is assuming that it is not based on fact of course.

I've read both of these. Both are excellent. "Billions and Billions" was much better than I expected - it actually changed my views on a couple of subjects.

IMO, "The Demon Haunted World" should be required reading for high school kids. It's that good.

The deeper one delves into why people believe things and the history of religions (Karen Armstrong's "The History of God" is another good one), the more incredibly interesting this whole phenomenon of belief becomes.

This "Conversations.." book might be good. I have a Richard Feynman book lined up after the Shermer book, but I might need to check into this...

Mike

I think it goes much deeper than this. Studies have shown that the "tendency to believe" is approximately 50% genetic. The rest is a mix of environment, level of education, etc.

One thing is for sure - religion has been around (in one form or 100,000 or so) for the past 10k years. It's not going anywhere.

Mike

Sagan isn't necessarily against religion and actually dances around the subject somewhat. His main point seems to be using powers of critical thinking to guide you rather than superstition and hearsay. In other words - don't believe something is true just because someone tells you it is true.

While not explicitly applying this admonishment to religion, it's pretty obvious that the shoe fits. He uses an analogy of of having an invisible flying dragon in his garage that no one can prove doesn't exist in the same manner that people have created god - a supernatural being that no one can prove doesn't exist. For every reason one thinks up to prove that his dragon doesn't exist, there is a parallel with god.

Mike

To answer you question in a different way, the Michael Shermer book I am reading ("How We Believe") deals with this question directly. It's not a simple answer, needless to say.

Mike

I haven't read any of the books listed so far -- but I'll check them out on my next trip to B&N since I have a discount coupon.

Not to beat a dead horse, but many of the reviews regarding "Conversations with God" keep beating on this idea of "Why do bad things happen if there is a God". If I walk up to a TV reporter (or for that matter IROC) and start beating the crap out of him -- why is that God's fault. Is it God's obligation to stop me from doing a something stupid? Even if the bad event is natural or random why is that God's "fault". I don't understand how that is God's explicit will any more then it's his hand causing a compulsive gambler to win big on a trip to Vegas. Neither event says anything specific about God's will, any more then a random ice crystal will tell you about why the Titanic sank.

Well, I'm still reading the book, but basically there are a lot of reasons why people believe things and many of them have nothing to do with whether or not the particular thing they believe in is true. That's the interesting part. Why do people believe in things for which there is no evidence? Why are 9/11 conspiracy theories believed by so many people (36% in a recent poll). Why do people think the moon landings were faked? Why do people believe in Scientology?

One thing I am learning is that people believe in god for reasons that transcend logic. And I don't mean that in a bad way, necessarily. But what it does mean is that trying to appeal to their rationale side to *prove* that their belief is flawed is futile. Pick any religious thread on PPOT as evidence.

When polled, most people claim belief in god for what they feel are rational, logical reasons (the design of the world around us, etc), but when they are asked why *other* people believe, the response is typically that other people believe for emotional reasons (comfort, meaning in life, etc.). Interesting.

Mike

I'll post this yet again:

Religion meets a number of basic human needs. Until humans get these needs met in other ways, religion will never go away. It meets these needs so well that believers are utterly convinced that god exists. The bible must be true, otherwise how could it meet my needs so well? Here’s a short list of some of the needs I’ve identified that are met by religion. I see some of these needs in myself, but I don’t meet them via religion. If you are honest with yourself, you will see some in yourself and you
should recognize those that are met via religion. The list is not complete, and every individual has their own set, with their own priorities. In no particular order:

1) Something to explain the unexplainable
2) The need to know that death is not the end
3) Something to absolve guilt, e.g. forgiveness from your “sins”
4) The need to belong to a group
5) The need to feel superior to others
6) The need for unconditional love
7) An absolute authority for morals
8) Direction on how to live your life

You're bringing up a phenomenon known in philosophical circles as "God of the Gaps". I really suggest Googling this phrase - there is a tremendous amount of material written on the subject. FWIW I'm a huge believer in this phenomenon and believe that one day we WILL understand many of the things that are currently "mysteries" to us - creating (in the minds of some) a necessity for divinity.

It wasn't all that long ago that notions of understanding the sun or the wind or eclipses or tidal waves or rain without resorting to "gods" would have been considered absurd. In this same manner, I believe that the things many currently consider "unsolvable" problems (without involving a god or gods in the explainations) will similarly be solved. Things like proof of the existence or lack of existence of an afterlife, why the Virgin Mary appears as a salt stain on the underside of a highway overpass (or in grilled cheese sandwiches, if you prefer), the origin of the universe (what caused the "Big Bang"), the nature of time and matter, evidence of man's global-scale impact on the environment (global climate change), stronger proof of evolution (fossil record, etc.)

The mechanisms of their solving and understanding probably are either unconventional or beyond our ability to conceive at present, so the weak-minded dismiss them as "impossibilities" and quickly resort to mythology.

God? Religion? I submit simple control, power, secular agendas and a smattering of trying to infuse some nobility into the notion of human existence as reasons. A recipe for some wonderful stories - and some terrible deeds.

I think it is because so many people attribute good things that happen to "god's will". There's no logic that indicates that it shouldn't work both ways. If god is not responsible when bad things happen to people, then he is not responsible when good things happen, either. So, what is he responsible for? What is the goal of prayer?

Why does god only answer prayers for which there is a statistical chance that the outcome would have occurred anyway? Why does god cure someone's cancer, but not a severed spinal cord? Or an amputated limb? Why does prayer never result in something occurring that we know to be impossible?

Mike