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Ask HN: When and why did you start believing in God?

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Re: Ask HN: When and why did you start believing in God?

#81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is "God did it" a better answer than "it just happened" ? If you prefer the "God did it" you then have to account for where God came from and end up with a set of answers that could just as easily be applied to the universe itself. Believe what you want, but this isn't some kind of gotcha.

what’s the difference between “god did it” and “it just happened”? you’re just hand waving over the question of “how did it just happen?”. matter just magically appeared?

You’re just hand waving over the question of “How did god just happen?” God just magically appeared?

See? It's a crap argument.

Re: Ask HN: When and why did you start believing in God?

#82
post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah it’s funny to compare yourself now when you touched some real thinkers and real wisdom and years ago when you thought charlatans like Dawkins were worth trusting :)

Sure is! It's a bit cringe to think about myself from back then. We got pretty heavily downvoted here, lol. Really, I don't understand why.

Because modern so called atheists is a popular religious cult of its own, they tend to cancel anyone challenging it, because of lack of better arguments.

Re: Ask HN: When and why did you start believing in God?

#83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do see, mostly from Americans, self introductions of the form "I'm so and so... and I love Jesus" in contexts that have nothing to do with religion. I've never had anyone bring up their atheism or agnosticism in that way in a non-religious context.

I've lived/traveled all over the Bible belt and I can't remember that ever happening even once. I'm sure it does happen but never seen it.

Have you ever encountered the atheist version IRL? Not just in internet bickering?

Maybe it was regional - I wouldn't know which region they were from off the cuff.

My family is mostly C of E and I don't recall any of them ever bringing up religious topics with third parties unprompted, so it did strike me as pretty weird.

Re: Ask HN: When and why did you start believing in God?

#84

I don't subscribe to God. Humans have been inventing gods since the beginning of time as a way to control/exploit the masses or soothe the over active mind. There are thousands of dead religions, but this round of current popular religions has hit the nail on the head... right? A truly powerful and kind super being would not allow child abuse, cancer, famine, or rape to happen. Even if there is a god, I don't want to…

Good story mate but next time try and read the subject of the thread before you waffle on with your own blog post none of us subscribe to.

Re: Ask HN: When and why did you start believing in God?

#85

Don't know if I believe in God in the typical sense of the word (specifically the traditional idea of omnipotence), but I do think it's quite logical to assume there is some form of higher power. The idea that human beings are the end-all to reality, the highest form of consciousness and most powerful being, just seems hopelessly self-centered to me. When did this happen? Probably in college when I studied philosophy…

> The idea that human beings are the end-all to reality, the highest form of consciousness and most powerful being, just seems hopelessly self-centered to me.

I don't understand how this needs to be connected to the idea of God. Couldn't one believe that there are alien life forms with more power and higher consciousness without believing in God?

In contrast, the Christian followers of God believe he made us (humans) in his image and sent his son explicitly to save us (humans). Isn't that a more self-centered view?

Re: Ask HN: When and why did you start believing in God?

#86

Don't know if I believe in God in the typical sense of the word (specifically the traditional idea of omnipotence), but I do think it's quite logical to assume there is some form of higher power. The idea that human beings are the end-all to reality, the highest form of consciousness and most powerful being, just seems hopelessly self-centered to me. When did this happen? Probably in college when I studied philosophy…

> The idea that human beings are the end-all to reality, the highest form of consciousness and most powerful being, just seems hopelessly self-centered to me. I don't understand how this needs to be connected to the idea of God. Couldn't one believe that there are alien life forms with more power and higher consciousness without believing in God? In contrast, the Christian followers of God believe he made us (humans)…

Why does it need to be a competition? I think both "typical materialist atheism" and traditional Christianity are self-centered views of the universe. Hence my comment. Modern atheist movements/positions in the West are themselves heavily in debt to Christian metaphysics and psychology in the first place, so it is not really surprising that they have similar structures.

And the idea isn't so much about aliens, more powerful beings in the universe, etc. rather that (I think) we can't understand or know a lot of fundamental things about reality; therefore, it seems logical to me that there is some higher form of intelligence or creative being beyond human understanding. Otherwise it implies that humans are the end-all, which I think is self-centered.

Re: Ask HN: When and why did you start believing in God?

#87
Obvs the first thing is that everyone interprets the word "God" differently. But for myself I'd say I believe that there is

1. a universal consciousness,

2. an energy that works through everything, and

3. that we can tap into both.

Been a slow journey from atheism to this, but mainly based on reading countless first-hand descriptions of enlightenment, mostly related to Kundalini experiences and psychedelic-induced. Reported experiences often fall into such similar categories, sometimes with the same symbology it's either something weirdly evolved in us (for no evolutionary advantage I can see), or some people gain access to deeper levels of reality.

Personal experiences for me that tipped it were:

1. My own Kundalini experiences (not the full-blown transcendental kind yet, but energy surges, meditation phenomena)

2. Receiving remote shaktipat, where energy was projected into me. One of the most surprising was when I was just lying down and a woman 10 miles away sent energy to me for half an hour. It was unmistakable, and wasn't possible she had subconsciously influenced me as she barely spoke to me until after the practice apart from telling me to lie down and relax.

Also, I recently worked out how to 'drop my mind' like Zen practioners talk about. Realised that's the core of concentration-style meditation. Good feelings start to arise on their own.

It's a personal journey (and ultimately the only one that counts), and the mind gets in the way, but each to their own.

Re: Ask HN: When and why did you start believing in God?

#88
I'm agnostic, mostly. I'm not sure what my actual experience was, but I was given a choice, made said choice, and life pretty much went on.

However, tangentially, and related to this discussion, Peter Girnus (a satire account from Twitter) makes what I believe is a quite strong argument for having time away from instant gratification (especially that from AI), and letting yourself sit with problems, and in that space you might find the spark from God.

https://x.com/gothburz/status/2059621427561521251

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