Perspectives.

Philosophy Forums Religion and Spirituality
1

I’ve hit on this thought before. And I’m sure I’m not the first. But when dealing with religious vs. atheistic or even agnostic thought. It seems that it’s mostly a perspective thing.

For example I’ll take the story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. Most of this doesn’t seem believable, especially not by the atheist. But if you look at it from a Christian perspective, you say this, “Well, it doesn’t seem possible because we have never experienced it and it could very well be possibly, and I believe it was a true story.”

What has been done here? It’s been defended, but it’s looked for a way out.

No I do not blame that kind of answer to the question of do you believe the story. Because there isn’t a good answer. There’s the simple let me show you why I believe it and why it isn’t impossible.

A Christian believes the story, an Atheist doesn’t.

And I believe this is why it’s mainly the glasses you wear.

I’m just throwing out some thoughts here. But I know this from experience. I can get into a mood over a course of time and exclude what doesn’t seem actual to what could be possible.

And why I’m thinking of this. I will say the reason many skeptics and atheists have a hard time believing religious beliefs is because they have flaws. Granted, possibly the belief doesn’t have flaws, but the representation from the masses, different belief systems contradict others and contradict reality many times. Quite possibly genesis was not meant to be taken literally, but because the church does and this seems to contradict reality, many atheists and skeptics won’t believe. I believe the fact that a belief system has flaws is the main reason it’s unbelievable.

And the reason Atheism is so easy to believe is because there really aren’t any flaws. I’m simply saying in the atheistic perspective, everything will make sense, it has to, because every belief is based off science and the reality as we know now.

I hope this is a start of a good dicussion on perspectives. But I seriously believe most of it is how you look at it. From what point you come from, from what glasses you look through.

2

Well, no. If you’re the type of Christian who actually believes the story of Adam and Eve, then the way your thinking really goes is:

“If I don’t believe this then God will send me to Hell, so I have to believe it, because if I do believe it then He’ll send me to Heaven. So I have to find reasons to make it seem possible.”

Without that carrot and stick, nobody would believe a cockamamie story like that one, interpreted literally. I mean, really! A woman made out of a man’s rib? A stupid prohibition against eating a piece of fruit with no explanations given? A talking snake?

And where did Cain’s wife come from?

The reason people who don’t take the threat of Hell seriously don’t believe this story is not because “we’ve never experienced it,” but because we know perfectly well that things like that don’t happen, because it’s too obviously a primitive myth very much like other myths from other cultures, and because parts of it don’t even make sense as fairy-tale. I mean, where DID Cain’s wife come from?

The story of the Fall is actually rather profound if you regard it as myth, with the Knowledge of Good and Evil causing a fall from ignorant innocence. You can see it as the beginning of civilization: man’s intellect pushing him out of the garden life our foraging/hunting forbears enjoyed, living off what the land freely provided, without formal government or organized religion, and into the realm of farming, government, religion, war, slavery, and trade. Or you can dig even deeper and see it as the rise of humanity itself, with intellect that did not allow our species to live according to its instincts, but insisted on creating an artificial world.

But as literal story? It’s pure poppycock. And that’s why some people don’t believe it. Your attempt to put belief and disbelief in this story on an equal footing and imply that both sides have reason just won’t hold up here.

3

Not quite on your first point. You see the Christian believes in God, get saved, so they wont go to hell. Then they ‘defend’ everything else not because of fear of hell but because they want to defend their belief. And once they’ve held onto the belief in God long enough anything can be defended, and it can. But some things ‘seem’ more actual than others, thats the point.

Cains wife? Probably the only explanation would be his sister. That adam and eve had a daughter later on.

Fact is to have a valid critique you must be critiquing a valid text. Is it a real authentic text? You don’t believe the story is true so why ask the question?

It’s possible snakes could talk. He was a snake with legs at the time. It would be a possession by Satan, so this highly evolutionized snake may have had a talking ability. Or possibly the snake spoke through the mind, like Christians believe temptation does. Furthermore the story may have not meant to be taken literally.

See what I’ve done? I’ve defended, I’ve given possibilities and an argument off of the unknown, and in the unknown you can find possibilities that don’t totally refute their possibilities. This is what I’m discussion.

I can say this with atheism. All these credible people who have seen Ghosts, UFOs, and other things are just being fooled by their mind? Even though 3 or 4 people see them at once? Science does not have a full explanation for all of these. But using science to disprove anomalous things are in deed closely related to the point I’m discussing with religious beliefs.

When we don’t have the answer, we give a theory.

4

Doesn’t matter. Most of them, most fundamentalists anyway, have such a fragile commitment to their belief in God that it’s all bound up with belief in things like the Adam and Eve story. So the fear is that if they stop believing in the Adam and Eve story, they’ll stop believing in God, and then God will send them to Hell.

No mention of that, and incest was a taboo among the early Hebrews just as it has been in every society.

If the text is sufficiently invalid that the story changes in the real one to something that isn’t poppycock, then the real text has a story totally different from the one fundamentalist Christians believe. The story, as we’re given it, is poppycock. Messed-up translations can account for differences in details, but the nonsense in this story is fundamental.

No, it’s not. Snakes don’t have either the brainpower or the vocal ability to talk. Actually, there’s only one species with both.

Yeah, you’ve offered ridiculous, pretzel-contorted excuses to try to hang onto a story that’s pure poppycock. And the reason you do that, is because you’re afraid if you don’t, you’ll stop believing in God and He’ll send you to Hell.

Nobody can think clearly faced with a threat like that.

Ghosts and UFOs have far more going for them than the Adam and Eve story. I doubt any atheist is going to deny the possibility that there is life on other planets for instance.

No, the Adam and Eve story is a myth, not a theory. If it were a theory it would be falsifiable and usable to make predictions.

5

Well then that is a mental error for someone. Not all believe this. In fact many don’t. As I said it’s not that they don’t believe, but they doubt it. They doubt it but they believe it happened because of a majority of other things, so they can do what they must to keep believing. They don’t force themselves to believe in something they don’t believe in out of fear. If they believe in God, they probably believe in adam and eve, if anything like I said they will doubt the story, but will still believe it. Not out of fear, but out of their belief in God. Which the belief in God ‘could’ be out of fear over sometime, but if someone truly doesn’t believe in God they won’t be afraid of hell.

Incest was condoned later, but not early on. My gosh it was the only way to procreate. Back then it didn’t have results like today either. We’re talking early early on.

Thanks for taking me out of context. I only said it was possible. Satan was a Serpent with legs in the bible, or he possessed this serpent. Maybe this snake was highly evolved and had vocal cords, then God used natural selection over time and the legs dropped as well as vocal cords. If you can find a gap, it can be used. I’m sure I can think of something else. But I’m not sure why you’re arguing here. I think you’re missing the point! Lol

Haha, it would be foolish to stop believing in God over the story of Adam and Eve. So I really don’t care if I believe it or not, God could have nothing to do with the story.

Well of course, but Ghosts? Aren’t they supernatural? I think many believe there is some type of energy or supernatural thing that goes on with the universe. But this is very close to a belief in a God, and when you believe in that which seems impossible, that there is an afterlife apart from the material body, most atheists deny this. UFOs maybe not so much.

I guess us philosophers have a hard time comprehending one another. You obviously can’t comprehend me. But no I never said the story of Adam and Eve was a theory, but it can be defended by theories. That’s the point of this dicussion. Not your typical argument over stories in the bible, you miss the point.

6

Of course. I would say that most Christians, in fact, don’t believe the Adam and Eve tale as a literal story. It makes perfect sense as a myth, though.

There’s actually nothing in the story to equate the serpent with Satan. Actually, there’s nothing in the Bible from that time period to identify as Satan at all. As far as I know, the first mention of Satan is in the Book of Job, and there he’s a prosecuting attorney (which is what the name literally means), not a Spirit of Evil or rebel angel.

I completely agree. But then, I also think it’s foolish to stop believing in God upon rejecting the Bible, Christian doctrine, or any other bits of Christian belief. A lot of Christians are more insecure than that, though.

Not necessarily. They could be phenomena produced in the minds of people at a location where some heinous event has occurred, like a murder or suicide, where the psychic effect of that event is associated with the location where it occurred and triggers emotional and pseudo-sensory reactions in the minds of sensitive people.

Honestly I don’t think so. A theory, again, has to be falsifiable. So a theory to account for the story of Adam and Even in Genesis would need to be falsifiable.

That kind of reminds me. There is no evidence of high intelligence in any reptilian species, suggesting that reptiles could ever have had the power of speech. Dinosaurs, perhaps. (If it hadn’t been for the big asteroid that hit the earth 65 million years ago, it might today be populated by intelligent dinosaurs with feathers.) Reptiles, no.

Snakes occupy such a very different niche from humans that it is really, really improbable that a species with the characteristics of either one could evolve from the other. Natural selection tends to concentrate what a species has going for it under conditions of survival pressure. Humans depend for survival on high intelligence, tool use and tool-making, and social interaction and cooperation. We’re better at all three of these than Homo erectus, which is our most recent ancestor on the hominid line. If we become extinct, our descendants will either be nonexistent, or else a new species with similarly concentrated abilities – smarter, better at technology, and better socialized than we are. Same logic would apply to an intelligent reptile back in the early days of humanity. It could not devolve into a snake, which uses a completely different survival strategy.

On the other hand, if you look at the primitive myths told in oral traditions of precivilized peoples, you’ll find they often have talking animals in them, like the Coyote legends of some Native American tribes. To me, the serpent in the Adam and Eve story looks like that. Do we really need to look any further to account for it?

7

I don’t think most fundamentalists fear going to hell if they don’t believe in the extreme everything is literal interpretation of Adam and Eve.

I think it’s a very low priority in the belief hierarchy they have.

8

You have stumbled onto one of the fundamental truths of being human. You are now ahead of the pack.

Perhaps there is hope for you yet.

9

12.31.06.1821

I must say, I am impressed once more…

Really Club, what was it that has pulled you away from the herd?

10

Navigator, you still miss the point of my post. I’m discussing defenses. Defensive theories. That we all use! We use them when we don’t understand. Quite possibly these can cause all sorts of confusion. But for one man he will give crazy theories to defend genesis, theories which can’t be shown impossible. It’s this way with many beliefs. And I’m saying that while you are in these beliefs you don’t look at certain things the same, you can defend them, but you don’t look at what seems impossible the same because of the perspective in which you look. In this way almost everything can be defended, and I truly believe, I may be wrong but I truly believe most of this is all about what we want to believe. From being all scientific atheists to religionists, heck they all have some missing links, but we try to fill the gaps with theories and answers when we could all be wrong. But from within these beliefs they all seem right.

If I want to be Christian it starts seeming true, and everything that’s shaky seems thrown aside and defended by a certain, “well… it may be possible”

This is the same with Atheism for me, everything atheism lacks for what many people want seems to have this same defense. Atheism can’t totally be sure there isn’t anything supernatural about this world, that no type of supernatural deity exists.

Because something can’t be disproven it’s possible, and because something can’t be proven it’s impossible. And it seems these beliefs can change into ‘seems’ that become big influences into our beliefs.

You know I’m really jumping out on a limb here, but I simply believe that we choose whether we want to believe in a higher power or not and we construct the rest from there. But I could be wrong, but I assure you I’d could find some theory, some belief to defend it if I wanted to defend that idea, even if it only makes sense to me.

Anyway I’m tired, it’s late, and I have no idea what else Im going to say so I better quit now.

Thanks Sage. I don’t know. I consider myself agnostic. I’m not sure whether a deity exists. I cannot do so solely on the basis of what my religion has represented God to be. But the idea of Salvation. The idea that one has to believe people don’t believe in God because they want to disobey and live for themselves as my cousin put it(he’s a major in history of ideas at a theogical seminary). He has much knowledge, but a simple thing I’m starting to understand is many many many great men are smart, have knowledge, but very few can actually think. They’ll give you a textbook answer, but they don’t understand what you’re trying to say. I mean I have tried arguing with people that people who are decieved in science will go to hell? People who truly sincerely can’t believe and won’t do so out of the basis for eternal insurance like many others? That some monks will go to hell because they picked the wrong belief system? That it would be better to live a typical american saved life? That’s somehow honorable?

I’m sure though someone could argue and give a defense for their beliefs after these questions, and whether or not I accepted them they would, and my arguments would not matter to them.

11

01.03.07.1824

Interesting thoughts Club, especially the end where you poke your stick at the concept that to be religious is to be virtuous and honorable. How simple the world would be if it were so. Your cousin’s opinion though, I thought of that as being somewhat close-minded in a certain perspective per say. The reason for that is, while I’m sure there are people out there who deliberately desire to disobey and be selfish little assholes, the vast majority of people who are agnostics and atheists are likely concerned not with disobeying and living for themselves, but merely obeying other laws and living for others. What I mean by that is, I for example feel that as I do not devote my life to a deity of sorts, I instead devote it to the people in my life, the benefit of the collective whole, and the furtherance of a better society. We could call it “disobeying”, but in reality, we’re simply changing lanes, choosing to obey laws or creeds that sound more credible and have a function in our daily lives. I wonder if your cousin has ever considered that, or has he been merely taught to believe what he told you?

12

What I meant with the honorable thing was that I’ve had Christians tell me before that it only takes the grain of a mustard seed, you should believe. But I want to live an honorable life, don’t you? The typical christian hypocritical lifestyle that many americans live should not be praised versus monks who devote themselves day and night. If the two were to go to heaven, God would condomn the monk? “You devoted most of your life to a false belief, whereas this Christian only believed a tiny bit and screwed me over the rest of the time, but the Christian stays, you go monk” says God. If there was a God who was just, I don’t see that being said, but maybe I could be wrong. But this isn’t a reason for why I’m agnostic, but why it’s pathetic and trashy to be a grain of a mustard seed Christian who dont’ devote themselves to what they should really do.

At one time in my life Christianity seemed so flawless. For some reason it did. And I think you can get this way not by being closed-minded, but being too open-minded. Does that make sense? When you defend your belief with every open opportunity because of other beliefs you hold. Truthfully though, if I wanted to be Christian, I’d just start telling myself God exists, go to church more, read the bible, and before you know it I’d be a Christian again defending every attack and never once seeing the flaws. I could make myself belief, or I can make myself be unsure by not doing those things.

And I tried to distance myself from Christianity to see if something still stayed, nothing really did except the fear of being wrong and I still belief that Christianity is great as a humanism as long as it stays logical, and as far as I know it will because Christianity keeps looking for a way to stay.

13

No dont think my cousins ever considered that. You see his father, my uncle, is a Professor of Theology. He’s written at least one book I know of, and he’s found many times on the internet, Ken Keathley. My uncle has always had the attitude that he knows more than you when you discuss things with him. And he probably does have more knowledge than probably anyone on this site. His biggest problem is he can’t understand trains of thought, and he wont consider them. If you ask him a question, he’ll give you a textbook answer.

14

While this may be true for the Genesis story, the bible does explicitly link the serpent with satan.

Revelation 20
1And I saw an angel coming down out of heaven, having the key to the Abyss and holding in his hand a great chain. 2He seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil, or Satan, and bound him for a thousand years.

15

01.04.07.1825

Yes. I was once the same way when I was real young; going to “Sunday School” and “Bible Class” where you were practically fed cherry-picked passages, or even re-worded versions of famous bible stories that children could understand, and was told what the “proper” interpretation to those passages and stories were.
Indeed, when you believe something so much that you don’t care if it seems false, you’re willing to come up with whatever interpretation possible that will make it look like truth. Eventually though at one point when I was becoming really interested in the theology of it all, I started asking questions that I got unsatisfactory answers to. One thing led to another, and before I knew it, I was looking into other religions. Of course, now it’s so simple; as if it were once a revelation that came to me, that religious belief is based on the mind playing tricks on itself.

Life, and the questions that arise in it, are more interesting when you think outside of the man-made box. Your cousin probably never thought of it in that light, because he’s following the same path his father took. Having intelligence and knowledge is one thing, but having wisdom is something that requires giving an answer outside of a textbook; outside of the box.

Of course, we as humans continue to think inside a box; it’s just that we keep striving to think outside of a smaller box and into a larger one, hoping to one day think outside of that final box. This analogy serves the purpose of atheism by stating that while we don’t know all the facts, we will someday. However, if we were to restate this more agnostically, all I would need to do is replace the ‘hoping to one day think outside of that final box’ with ‘never to think outside of a final box, as we will one day hit our limits (which we might have already done) to thinking outside of the current box we’re in’.