Rosie Cotton writes:
Just so you know, I believe in aliens. Not Martians, there is no proof of that and I doubt there ever will be, but I do believe that there are other races of people out there in our universe, maybe even galaxy, but solar system? I don't really think so, because we haven't found any trace of them.
Well, obviously, this is a bit different. Do I believe in aliens? no, but neither do I disbelieve. I can't say that aliens do not exist in perfect honesty, becuase I really have no idea one way or the other. Yes, aliens might exist, and maybe that's an interesting topic to have a casual conversation or even a friendly debate over, but ultimately, that doesn't matter to me, because that has no bearing on my salvation. The aliens are not the ones who will come down and save me; they will not take me up to heaven, they will not provide salvation for me, and they have no direct influence over the spiritual realm in a way that strongly affects me (no, I do not include exclusively spiritual beings within my definition of aliens). Go ahead, believe in aliens. I'll disagree with you, but with no ultimate basis for that.
Rosie Cotton writes:
I don't think that you have to accept my experience, but someday you may just experience that as well, so be warned.
Well, I think in this case, the best way of convincing the thinkers (scientific and hardcore philosophical types) is not through personal experiences, not even their own. One of my closer friends, a very strong Christian, is a very science and logic oriented thinker (I actually have quite a few friends who are into math or science-- only a few of my close friends are not really that interested in those two fields). He, to my knowledge, does not really judge ultimately by his own personal experience, but by what he knows, by what he accepts as truth as revealed to him by scripture.
Even though I am a sciencey person, I base a good part of my belief on my emotions and my experiences (I'm a bit weird-- In addition to being really good at science, I also write poetry, philosophise on both lower and higher levels, and participate in sports, so I bring experiences from all sorts of different ways of thinking into my beliefs and my arguments), but that is something that I often find myself questioning, because I don't trust the human mind in the least bit, but at the same time, as an emotional person, I cannot have faith without the personal experiences that I have had.
Rosie Cotton writes:
My quote of the definition of Faith, is taken directly on a scripture that the form of Christianity that I am uses, that others don't.
Out of curiosity, what particular scripture/book did that come from? Evem though I don't peronally like using any resources outside the standard, 66-book (If there's a technical name for it, I'd like to know it) Christian scriptures, just because that's the only think I can trust as an ultimate, unfallable authority (don't argue against that point- thats my own personal belief, and that is not the topic for this thread).
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Well, that's probably just about as much of my rambling as you want to hear in one serving, so digest that, and there will be more later.
This message has been edited by Xenocrates, 12-08-2004 12:44 AM
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