self righteous atheists....

No, now that I think of it. There's a hole in my resume

Why do you ask? You're lucky you're pretty. I rather not argue.

 

Because there is really no practical reason to go to a funeral.

I said spiritual. I didn't say religious

 

this is one of the most absurd claims i've ever heard.

hopefully scientists wouldn't be so prone to shutting out options without any valid reason, but dawkins has. he is among the most prominent atheists in the world, and has said on more than one occasion that the idea of there being a god is absolutely ridiculous, that god (or gods) is a fiction, that the mere concept of god is detrimental to humanity and holds us back from reaching our full potential, and that nobody should believe in god. he flatly denies not only the existence of god, but the possibility of the existence of god.

he is an evolutionary biologist. he has, on the record, stated that the one remotely possible scenario in which the ecosystem on earth would be "designed" by and intelligent force is if millions and millions of years ago extraterrestrials planted life on our planet, but that there is no way god(s) may come into it.

dawkins is definitely an atheist no matter how you look at it. and you can be an atheist and scientist at the same time, just like you can have a belief in some form of spirituality and be a scientist at the same time.

you must be joking around and i just didn't catch on till the end of this thing, yeah?

 

This spiritual vs. religious thing sounds like a wishy-washy fail to me, sorry.

If you're going to be spiritual, then I say at least go to Church and kneel on a pew laden with uncooked corn and pray to the lawd.

 

I'm not a religious person

We are human and we have emotions and sometimes it's nice to think there's something else out there (especially as you get older).

I just did some fantastic wikipedia'ing:

Spirituality

"While the words religion and spirituality are often incorrectly used interchangeably, an important distinction exists between spirituality in religion and spirituality as opposed to religion. In recent years, spirituality as opposed to religion often carries connotations of a believer having a faith more personal, less dogmatic, more open to new ideas and myriad influences, and more pluralistic than the doctrinal/dogmatic faiths of mature religions"

"...spirituality based on spiritual practice rather than belief, with the aim simply of developing inner peace, is another option."

I thought you considered yourself open-minded?

 

Every mind has a ceiling. Your lucky to even reach it, and then if you do, what you make of anything beyond it is a guess. So, yes, every opinion is annoying. Except mine.

 

it is. the claim that there is an important difference is, to me, a flimsy one. religion is such a vague term when taken out of the context of the three major monotheistic traditions of the west (islam, christianity, judaism) yet nobody would deny that sikhism, the various faces of hinduism, shintoism, the various schools and sects of buddhism, hundreds (if not thousands) of indigenous shamanic traditions, the various sorts of daoism, jainism, zoroastrianism, arguably confucianism, and a multitude of other sets of beliefs are "religions." yet the major points of faith (theism, afterlife/transmigration/etc., scripture), the organization, and the most fundamental principles of these religions are so different from each other that there really is not a very good working definition of what causes a "spiritual path" or set of "spiritual ideas/concepts/beliefs" to become a full-fledged religion. for instance, in china the religious life of the people has traditionally been dominated by local popular religion (common gods, beliefs and practices generally restricted to china, not very organized or set in stone), various types of daoism, buddhism, and confucianism. as i understand it, if you go to china and ask people "what is your religion?" they won't really have an answer for you...unless you are a monk or some other form of clergyman, or unless you're christian or muslim or something, you generally do not have one religion to belong to. you may hold beliefs central to buddhism, daoism and confucianism simultaneously, and may make offerings at a buddhist temple one day and at a daoist temple another day.

christianity is obviously a religion, yet there are christians without organization, without churches, without hymnals. they may meet at private homes, without a clergy, without a minister, to gather and worship god and try to follow the teachings of christ. without all the expected trappings of an organized religion, is this variety of christianity no longer religious in nature?

the distinction between "religious" and "spiritual" is thus so flimsy that the often cited distinction between the two is pretty much invalid as far as i'm aware. in general, the individuals who make such claims simply want to distance themselves from being perceived as orthodox, dogmatic, strict, uptight, scheduled, traditional, ritualistic, etc. these are understandably things some would shy away from, but i don't think using the word "spiritual" is really a very good way to make that distinction. this is strictly personal bias, though. it's understandable, i just don't agree that there is a major difference.

 

tl;dr

 

posted while i was writing my last post. this is not entirely faulty, but it is misleading.

first, wikipedia is good in a pinch for many things, but it is far from definitive and is often, in fact, incorrect. the simple fact of the matter is that "mature religions" which have existed for hundreds, often thousands, of years already are all very different from one another. many are really not so strictly dogmatic, most are intensely personal, and many actually are open to changing with the times and developing new ideas. beyond these aspects, the defining characteristics of what makes something a "religion" seem to be extremely elastic, often blurring the line between what is and is not a religion, or who is or is not a religious follower. because we cannot pin down what religion is, it is very difficult also to say what it is not

wikipedia be damned, i still say the distinction is moot and is generally selfserving in an attempt to distance one from "organised religion" (but specifically christianity, judaism and islam)

 

Here's an advice for you: speak for yourself!

I'm old and crummy and I have emotions. But I don't think deluding myself about something out there is comforting at all.

But because I'm open minded, if the thought brings you comfort we can still talk.

 

about 200 years after he died a woman came along and corrected his maths, he had a bit of the correlation between gravity and inertia wrong, it was close, but not spot on.

 

There's definitely a difference between spiritual and religious. It's obvious, "wishy-washy fail"? Quite tolerent of you.

 

I feel it's wishy-washy. How tolerant are you?

 

The word "fantastic" was supposed to carry a bit of sarcasm

I'm a university student, and I used to think exactly the same things as what you and ... Cherea?.. Are saying. It's completely understandable.

But do you really live 100% of your life in a "non-believers" kind of mind?

Oh, the university student bit was mentioned because I had a lecture on Science vs Religion, and my lecturer took us all the way through the hazy bits and the bits that stand out of both. In the end, he came to the conclusion we all have two modes of thought. Practical, and spiritual. This doesn't mean you have to be religious! It just means... If you write a poem you're not going to write it with formal, technical terms. You're going to use that kind of flowery, poetic language that doesn't really make sense in any other context.

Do you get what I'm trying to say in the slightest (even if you don't agree)?

 

Why call it spiritual then? Call it by its name. It's poetic, leisurely, whatever. That's why it's wishy-washy to me. Spiritual sounds like a cute word devoid of content for people in liberal circles to feel good about themselves.

 

Thanks for an advice, nicest thing i've gotten all day

Neither do I. I don't believe in hell, heaven, reincarnation, ghosts, other realms.. God.

:smilielol5: Well... Aren't you just lovely.

 

Thank you ♥

 

Yeah, I don't get it. If you write a beautiful poem with all them metaphors and all that, it doesn't mean you're oh so spiritual. You're creative, inventive, not necessarily spiritual.


Sorry, I just really hate the word 'spirituality'

 

I agree with you there. Often I've noticed people using the label 'spiritual' as apologetic in a way.

"No, I'm not religious, but I'm still a good person. I'm spiritual."

I don't think I need to apologize for not believing, that's the only sense I feel self righteous now.

I hope at least. :biggrin:

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Émilie_du_Châtelet

Messed up the time frame, messed up the bit of maths she corrected

but here is the woman, who corrected newton's maths

sorry, hadn't actually read about her in the past few years and she hadn't seemed worth remembering.