Any Athiest LSD Users?

That's sort of true, and is part of the concept - that's what the little circles represent. It is said that every yang is in yin, and every yin is in yang. The example given is that even at night, there are stars.

I associate your good/evil thing more with Buddhism, namely that even in Hell, you can make/find compassion, and make Hell a better place. And conversely, even when you think you are doing well and being happy, you can make Hell for other people, and thus for yourself.

 

i think oblivion is a choice, and the opposite of oblivion is infinite manifestation

Manifestation is independent of observation and awareness, but solely dependent on vibration and frequency, given a locality's ability to vessel the huge amounts of energy contained at the subatomic level

That energy is present in all consciousness, from dogs to bats to even republicans, and it is only a matter of wearing a path around the density of matter while living to preceed godheadedness

The idea of a sentient omnipotent being with freewill is idiotic, but there is a connectedness that borders on sentience

Why not just take acid and practice dying? Or ether. Pretend it's the big one, just before you pass out

 

er.....what?

 

well people always say ... "the road to hell is paved with good intentions."

and yeah, i know times i thought i was helping someone or being good to them, it made things worse for them. and i've had the same experience before with people that have tried to help me.

most of the time in life you can never know what the outcome will be of your actions. maybe you can see the immediate outcome, but not the residual outcome that affects the many people around what you can see.

I love that "even republicans" statement.

 

There are many more paths then just the fun trippers and the spiritual trippers. Lsd can be used for serious philospohical and theoretical thinking. What people call god is a very inaccurate description of the workings of universe so inaccurate as to be untrue. Complete and total atheist, here.

 

Atheism (as I understand it) doesn't just mean you don't believe in religion, it means you don't believe, period. You accept that everything is as it is for a reason which can be explained through science, and there is no higher purpose for anything, the universe just exists and that's all there is to it.

This imo just cannot be. The universe can't come out of nothing. There must have first been a something, and that something in turn cannot have come from nothing. Even with regards to what I said previously about the need to accept true infinity to understand the concept of universe(s) and whatever existence they are contained/created within, it still doesn't explain how any of anything got there in the first place. I just cannot accept that everything has either a) existed for an infinitely long period of time or b) somehow manifested itself, by itself, a finite period of time ago. A fire cannot start without some form of spark, and that spark has to come from somewhere.

 

The most common defintion of an athiest, is someone that doesn't believe in god or gods. In atheistic thought there is no doctrine, ideology or set of beliefs. It doesn't necessarily have to do with science, either. Some religions could be considered atheistic (or maybe non-theist), such as in some forms of buddhism. The lack of a god or gods doesn't necessarily preclude spiritual experiences or even religious experiences.

 

I'd just like to say that I had fun reading all of your theories.

 

hahahahahahaha

 

Be careful with how you word what you're saying - atheism means "without theism" and that doess not imply that there is no doctrine, set of beliefs, etc; it means that there is no religious doctrine, no set of beliefs about a God or gods and so on. You're right, it has nothing to do with science - it simply means that you do not have religious inclinations. I know many theists who completely support science and the idea of evolution, and people who are atheists who believe that evolution is not a complete idea.

Hemi - I suggest you do some reading about quantum mechanics and the string theory concept of the creation event. Our understanding is still far from being complete but it does offer a glimpse at the path that is the opposite of saying "God created everything." Even understanding some basic concepts of cosmology, such as the different epochs of the universe, can offer you a way to understand how things possibly could have existed in a state that is very, very different from what we experience today. Along those lines, what we are looking for is called the Grand Unified Theory, which seeks to expand on certain ideas that we have already proved - that the four forcces were once on force and that at that point in time, there was simply energy. We have already proved that certain forces were as one many billions of years in the past, and from what I understand some of these forces would have separated within minutes of the creation event (Big Bang is no longer a totally accepted idea, as it implies an explosion type event which is somewhat inaccurate).

When all was one, what conditions set off this first period of inflation? This is the question we have not yet been able to answer, but we are able to look back at when and how the various forces separated, and as our understanding of these forces increases we are beginning to get a vague picture of what happened. I don't remember exactly how one theory goes, but I do suggest reading two of Brian Greene's books - _The Elegant Universe_ and _Fabric of the Cosmos_. Greene is one of the physicists working on the various string theories, and he is one of those rare people who can function on such a level so as to defy comprehension, but he is also able to explain these things to the layman. Interesting, but hard, read if you are interested.

You're right, you can't have something from nothing, but what if what you percieve as having been "nothing" is actually "something" and you simply don't understand what it was? My question to you, Hemisphere, is if God created the universe (or if anything created the universe) where did it exist before it created the universe? If you say that it existed outside of this one in a larger universe, then where did that universe come from? And what created THAT universe? Do you see where this is going?

It is my opinion that we are seeking answers to questions that are far above our heads...there was an article I read maybe two weeks ago about LSD being a popular drug among (some) engineers and computer scientists, maybe we need to give these quantum physics/string theorists/M-theorists some LSD and get them all together and who knows? Maybe they'll figure out everything.

 

Exactly. Thats why I play it safe and stick to being agnostic. It's just as foolish to 'know' there is not a god as to 'know' there is. Let us all admit we have no fucking clue.

 

I wouldn't necessarily say it's foolish, I mean we all make assumptions about things we're not sure of, and if it doesn't have any real implications in your life, then it doesn't really matter what you believe. For example, if I believe that to become a member of my church you must rape three women, then that's negative and thus foolish to believe, but I see religion as sort of something to hold onto when times are rough, or when you yourself cannot (or don't want to) explain the world to yourself. If you can understand things and be a moral person without a relgious framework, then that's fine. If you want to believe in God and Jesus Christ and heaven and hell as a way to define your life, that's cool too.

My view is that we're all striving towards similar things in life, and that at the end of the line, we all reach some form of eternity. Whether it be Heaven, Nirvana, Hell, Nature, rotting away and all of you atoms returning to the earth, thus creating a cycle, it's all the same. We all struggle with the concept of death, so who cares what you believe happens, so long as you have an idea of what happens?

I see myself as being a person who fits the literal definition of "atheist" - without theism. When asked about it I'll share my ideas, but I don't generally think about God and Jesus and such things; I don't even usually think about whether or not a god could exist as is described in various religious text. I'm agnostic in that I believe if you want to argue the existence of a God, you're being foolish because by many definitions God is unknowable, unprovable, etc. I'm an atheistic agnostic.

However, I do know some people who are fairly religious, I'll be seeing one of them tonight, and I have a feeling conversation might get steered in the direction.

 

i think it comes down to, not "is there a god or isn't there?", but chaos vs. design... and what you have experienced and how you have percieved those experiences is what decides which you believe.

 

I feel the same way. Its always made sense that when we die we go to where we were before we were born..

 

yep...And some decide to see this with a spiritual perspective.

Its just a perspective on reality.

I dont think spirituality evades the fatality that you will lose everyhting you have ever gathered in your life, when you die. Some religions do though.

 

I am an atheist in my world-view and LSD has made that view less shaky and then more so. During my first small dose of acid I learned that the universe does not require a creator because it could be most logical to view every pattern in space-time as cyclical, everything will come around again given time. So there is no beginning and no end to anything. But then why do patterns change and not go for the smallest loop which would be self referential and thus void? Why are some cycles bigger than others(is that so)? Why do some cycles seem to end and start up later again(maybe this is just an expression of complexity/bigger loop=only one big loop?)? Maybe some more 'cid will help me resolve these problems. </end_acid_ramblings_deposit>

Anyways LSD seems to have transformed me from a strong atheist to a weak atheist. I am no longer emotively anti-theism.

 

im going to read the bulk of this thread later but id like to say that i have taken psychs a handful of times now, and none of my experiences inferred any great consciousness or intentionality above our own.

the most 'spiritual' phenomenom occured when i felt in harmony with my friend's mind on my first acid trip. but later i found many other explainations for this than a metaphysical connection.

i spend most of my psychedelic trips focussing on the new ways of experiencing the world. none of it seems to open me up to any extra information or sense-type from the world. i am still informed purely by light in my eyes and smells in my nose, etc. but the experiences they invoke are different. is the LSD state some sort of divine method of decoding the general information that hits us every day? or does LSD open us up to new or extra or different information all together?

i suggest the former, and that the spiritual element to psychedelic trips involve parts of the brain that deal with new or unexplainable information. these parts inherently relate to spirituality, because spirituality seems to link explicably to events or sensations that are not explained by basic knowlege of teh world, or logical reasons, and thus inspire higher levels of explaination involving concepts that must be abstractly reasoned with.

 

after reading the thread, i have a very interesting (i think) question to ask you all. i think this question makes a very important distinction amongst your views.

Do you think that conscoiusness, the human mind, or any other sort of consciousness, can be explained by physical phenomenom?

or do you think that consciousness is something that is metaphysical and transcends the physical reality?

ill make a poll

 

I'm atheist and always tripping.
End of.

 

An atheist isn't going to see more because he/she has already convinced themselves that their isn't any more.

Holding onto their doubt, no matter what.