Probably applicable re most believers but not necessarily for all. Some folks reason their way into believing in God, etc. just as some reason their way into believing in the validity of political or economic concepts. The notion that belief is always based solely on needs-driven faith doesn't stand up to intelligent scrutiny.
Hugh Ross become a Christian over it. I believe Paul Davies is in the agnostic/deist bandwidth and he created a recent controversy over this issue. It's not as obvious as some people like to make it out...
The notion of belief in the absence of empirical validation does not stand up to such scrutiny either. And I refer to specific empirical validation rather than the product of dots strained out of proportion in a misguided effort to connect them ("the sky is blue, so there must be a God").
The Archemedian objective POV is unachievable by any mind. All observations are subjective. The best we can hope for is a strong correspondence between the world and our experience of the world; that this correspondence is achievable is evidenced in the success of science and technology and some other disciplines. The further we get away from numbers-definable observations the less confidence we can have in the correspondence between the world and our mind-maps of the world. One thing you can know exists is your own conscious experience; this includes illusory experience because in the case of illusion the illusion is your experience.
It's difficult to know where to even begin. You call it egomaniacal to believe in God's word? I suppose that determining your own rules for life is considered 'humble'. Not fully appreciating the life we have here on earth? Yeah, those commandments prohibiting murder, adultery, etc, really screw up the party, don't they? Control people politically? I suppose that is why the federal register, (codifying legislation), goes up dramatically more when the left is in power. I guess you just don't see the left wanting to control people, even though a child could see that a leftist gov't seeks to control far more of a person's life than a conservative gov't. It's just that those much lesser things that conservatives want to control comprise such a large part of the liberal life. Like abortion controls screwing up the liberal desire to have uninhibited sex with anything walking.
Are you suggesting that the only route to truth is empirical validation? If so, which use of "empirical" are you using - empirical in the scientific sense ( test of theoretical prediction - observation ) or the philosophical sense ( based simply on observation )?
Existence is consciousness, physicists are slowly realizing what occultists have always known All is mind, pure living mind, the universe is an expression of that one mind's self awareness Some call it god
We are so far apart, I don't even know where to begin. Let's start with your reference to "God's word." On whose say-so? Did you hear it? If not, and until then, it's just another case of he said He said. If you need someone to tell you how to live properly, then you have not yet grown up. If you need a book to be your moral compass, then you are a sociopath. I know religious people who are spending far too much of their time in pious worship, filling their minds and lives with the notion of a hereafter that no one in history has ever been able to validate, waiting for something...better. Time that could be far better spent either enjoying their own lives or helping others. If you don't also see the use of religion as a political device, then you are ignorant of history. Have a nice day.