More stufusion. Those with a God complex think they are God, which of course those believers in God don't experience...they believe God exists and that they are not God. I guess your brand of stufusion happens when someone like you becomes obsessed with someone else, they then ignore the behavior in one person they are intellectually in bed with and then project onto the object of their enmity...
rcanfiel having a discussion regarding God is like G.W. Bush having a discussion about rocket science.
The Prof trying to figure out what a discussion is, is like a bacteria trying to mate with the Matterhorn
I seem to come across a number of "trading mentors" who claim to be religious... What does the bible say about snakeoil salesman ? Will they burn in Hell ?
The examples in real life (not in theory) of people convincing themselves of things are too numerous to mention. I don't know about convincing themselves of things that they 'know are not true', although this also happens, there is no doubt in my mind. We are not talking about 2 + 2 = 5, we are talking situations far less black and white than that. My comment was in response to someone who said 'we can't choose to believe things'. People choose to believe things every day. This idea is abhorrent to those of faith because it suggests that their belief in God, which they feel isn't a choice, might in fact be a choice. Of course, belief in God may not be a choice, in the sense that early programming might make it a fait accompli. However, there are clearly people who choose, on a sub-conscious level, to believe in God. The alternatives are simply too terrible to ponder. This is a faith-based belief, as there is no evidence for it.
Something you might want to consider is that the alternative to Heaven is Hell; in Hell you would be required to bow to an even less reasonable deity - and they have their ways down there to persuade you to comply ( Hell currently managed by former Gestapo agents ). I accept your understanding of yourself as you present it, but suspect that perhaps the supposition behind your thinking is that the Christian version of the afterlife is improbable ( those famous atheist inklings and all.. ). ________ In neither of the cases you present is there necessarily a [ii]choice to believe[/i] made. The belief may simply appear independently of any choice-making faculty. Choice involves weighing alternatives in the balance and making a selection. An act or decision based solely on impulse is not a choice; it's an act that occurs in the absence of the operation of choice. But let's consider the alternative - that in both cases there is a choice-facilitating link between desire and belief; that link would probably be rationalization. In the wife's case she rationalizes that there are factors in play that may cause him to change. In the guy in the bar's case he probably rationaizes that because she glanced his way it's a sign of interest or that maybe he really is irresistibly handsome after all. If not these rationalizations then some others. Except in the case of lunatics, idiots, or the pathologically immature the direct jump from desire to belief is improbable because there's a qualitative difference between desire and belief that requires an intervening link - there's a place in the mind where the two are coupled by means of a third factor. The insightful individual would be aware of the need to believe and would be unlikely to allow this need to result in a self-serving belief unless it could be justified by a process of reasonable consideration.
No, you will have to track 'em down and burn 'em yourself... if you have any more really difficult theological questions just ask anybody...
1) Some Deists may experience lapses in logic but not all. We should focus on the essentials of the debate independent of the fallibility of those involved in the debate. 2) It is interesting that modern believers feel a need to legitimize their beliefs by way of science, given that science has no way of addressing the issues involved. This is evidence of the disproportionate status science has achieved in our value system due to its enormous success in providing us with ways to deal with the physical world. I say disproportionate because material success is overrated as a means to satisfaction and the scientific method is overrated as a means to truth. 3) Yes, the "It is so because you can't prove it isn't so." argument is worthless, but "It may be so because it can't be be proved that it isn't so." merits consideration, especially if it's intelligently placed in context. 4) Good one. Of course, if you start with erroneous premises you can build as mighty a tower of logic as you wish on those premises only to see it all crumble eventulally. It's amazing, though, how long it can take for edifices of reason built on bogus premises to collapse, especially in the fields of politics, religion, and economics. 5) When we're outside the realm of pure science the results of experiments can often be easily rigged. 6) True, faith comes in there sooner or later, but I believe it's not impossible to reason your way into religion. It depends on what premises you start with, and how well you can maintain the integrity of the logic built on those premises. 7) We know from history that faith and science can inhabit the same mind. Newton was obsessed with alchemy and a determination to develop a new religion no less mystical than the Christianity of his times. I don't believe that logic can't be applied to religion; again, the validity of the results of your reasoning depend on the validity of your premises. 8) I doubt that an argument for God can be construed from scientific methodology but I don't think that an argument for God need necessarily be scientifically supportable to be plausible. Believers in science as the sole logical route to truth overlook the fact that logic is not only a prerequisite for philosophy, it's even one of the main branches of philosophy. It may be a personal bias, but I'd say many of the greatest Men of Reason have been philosophers rather than scientists. Theosophy is philosophy. Science is excellent as a way to hack through an endless jungle of challenges from the physical world, but as a means to an overview of the means and meaning of being it's probably useless. 9) I'd say it's the the best thing we've got for addressing certain issues; we're in agreemant that science is a wonderful means of asserting our will on our quality of life. I think what we need now, though, is an updating of philosophy so that we have some sort of ability to place ourselves and our science in context before the relentless development of science and technology overwhelms every dimension of our human existence.
I say that we can't simply choose our beliefs. There must be some intervening process between need and belief - such as rationalization. We can't just say to ourselves " Gee, I'm horny therefore the girl at the bar is in love with me.". Here I am supposing that choice is conscious and that the "we" we're dealing with are reasonable persons with at least a minimal degree of insight into their beliefs. Idiots and madmen may jump directly from need to belief, but this is not a choosing of belief since there's no process of selection involved. In any case, how idiots and madmen come to their beliefs shouldn't be our concern because, as I'm sure we all agree, there are no idiots or madmen involved in this discussion. I retire for the night.