none of the above

Hey, Mike! You registered! Let's get fightin' again! As for belief in God. I used to. Don't anymore. Even when I did, it was in a general creation force, not in a man with a long white beard, anything comparable to the Judeo-Christian GOD, or really anything we could comprehend.There was no personal tragedy that blunted my faith, or anything like that. I just realized that the only reason I believed in God was that I had been taught to do so. The society I live in works from the assumption that there is a God, and that belief gets passed on as an obvious fact, even if it's never vocalized as such. (Although it often is.)When I began thinking about the world without working from any preassumed assumptions, I was unable to arrive at the existence of God on my own. Not because of the suffering of the world, or any other argument against God. Just because I don't see anything to support the idea. On top of that, why argue against the idea if the idea hasn't even been defined? What exactly is this "God" thing people keep referring to, anyway?------------------
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Dan Carroll

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hi Dan, good to hear my sparring partner is still hangin' around ,by the way i was never brainwashed or anything like that, i am not religious really , it just makes sense to me i guess.however i am against people who think by wearing a collar they are somehow more righteouss than the rest of us.and point the finger saying 'your going to hell'.

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Well... I agree with you on the finger pointing. No matter one's beliefs, there's never any call to be a jerk about them.But brainwashing isn't exactly the idea I was going for... there was never a person who tied me up, spun a spiral pattern in front of my eyes, and programmed to me to drop to my knees and pray when I see the queen of hearts.It's more... how can I put this? Our culture works from the basic assumption that Germany exists. I have never been to Germany. But I have seen pictures of Germany, I have met people who have been to Germany, and I have been to other cultures which corraborate Germany's existence.Perhaps most importantly, anyone telling me of a place called Germany can pull out a map, point to it, explain what Germany is, and where it is located. If I want, I can go there and check for myself.The idea of Germany can be presented, and backed up.But it would probably not occur to me to question whether or not Germany is there even if I had never seen pictures, spoken to people who had been there, etc. I've heard of this place countless times since my birth, and have always worked under the assumption that it exists. Why would it even occur to me to question it?God was much the same way. I lived from birth in a culture that worked from the assumption that something called "God" exists. And it wasn't something I ever really bothered to question.When I did, the God idea didn't hold up.I'm sorry if this is a little convoluted. ("What's he babbling about Germany for?") It's a hard idea to express.------------------
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Dan Carroll

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I was thinking about this the other night, and I think you have to define what God is.

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But how can you do that when, almost by definition, God has to be outside the sphere of human understanding?

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I think there is no way you can convincingly argue for either existence or non-existence

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I used to think this. I eventually decided that it was silly. (No offense intended.) You don't have to argue for the non-existence of God, any more than you have to argue for the non-existence of Batman.I don't see Batman anywhere. You want to say he's there, give me some reason to think he might be.If you can't, I'm going to continue working under the assumption that Batman is not there.------------------
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Dan Carroll