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[Glowcat]

1.) IF (P) something does not exist THEN (Q)it will not interact with our universe

2.) A hypothetical paralell universe that does not interact with our universe will by definition (Q)not interact with our universe

3.) Said hypothetical paralell universe that (Q) does not interact with our universe (P)does not/cannot exist

His argument may be better described as:
If we cannot observe something, Then we cannot knowingly interact with it.
If we cannot knowingly interact with something, Then it effectively doesn't exist (as far as we know)

Look at my face. This is my not caring face.

But I can't see your face...

Point taken though.

[G-Flex]

Now, your are distinguished the terminology will, and then can you tell me each of their roles and function? As why should there be so many kind of differences? And what's the purpose of dividing people into groups, so they can paint different name tags on their T-shirt?

We need to divide people into groups, not as a prescriptive measure but as a descriptive one. I say that someone is "atheist" instead of "theist" for the same reason that I say a chair is red instead of orange, or a stool instead of a loveseat.

The distinctions are useful because they represent different types of belief (or lack thereof, as the case may be).

Sure, you spend time, money and effort in pursuing some sort of spirtitual life, but it doesn't have to be so. After all, say you are in your deathbed, or sitting in row 12b on a plane on a plane nose-diving toward a fiery crash on a mountainside, your odds work in your favor if you just say "Oh Lord forgive this worthless sinner!" or whatever. Worst case, you die and are just dead. Best case, you go to heaven! Having not played the game in this circumstance removes any chance of going to heaven. Here, you are dead, or go dead and go to hell.

The fact that you're saying this betrays a total misunderstanding of anything I've said on the topic.

The worst case scenario is not necessarily Hell (or nonexistence), the best case scenario is not necessarily Heaven, and who's to say that the best-case scenario of being an atheist isn't Heaven? What sense does that make? For all I know, there's a god up there who wants me to be an atheist, and appreciates my acknowledgment of the fact that his existence can't be proven.

The worst/best case scenario of believing in the Judeo-Christian God is the same as the worst/best case scenario for believing in nothing; in either case, I could think of an extremely positive or negative hypothetical scenario post-death.

Also, just because there are infinite possibilities for a deity, you have to make the assumption that the more popular ones are closer to the truth.

Why? This doesn't follow whatsoever. Why should I believe that a god is more probable simply because more people believe in him? Hell, why should I assume that the true metaphysical nature of the universe even involves something I would consider a "god"?

[Hiiri]

Fundies say the darnest things.

I thought text wall will help to slow down the increment rate of this thread, clearly I was wrong

Oops, how silly of me. 

People really don't like to read here. And introducing new working concept didn't help either. People like to debate on the philosophical level instead of observing the real effect of religions. You might think people are having them, because they WORK/have-function in human society.

I don't think reading is a problem for people here. Considering it's dwarf fortress sub-forum.

Religion is just a such topic, that you can spend reading long walls of text. And reading some more. And more. Then one day you'll realize that you'll never get that time back again.

[counting]

Sure, you spend time, money and effort in pursuing some sort of spirtitual life, but it doesn't have to be so. After all, say you are in your deathbed, or sitting in row 12b on a plane on a plane nose-diving toward a fiery crash on a mountainside, your odds work in your favor if you just say "Oh Lord forgive this worthless sinner!" or whatever. Worst case, you die and are just dead. Best case, you go to heaven! Having not played the game in this circumstance removes any chance of going to heaven. Here, you are dead, or go dead and go to hell.

The game works, because while death is certain, any promise of an afterlife is not. I put my bets on the Abrahamic religions because for one, it involves an angry vengeful god that sends people to hell for not believing in him. Secondly, its rather trivial to cheat the system and not put too much time or effort into it, you don't really have to go to church or buy books or anything, just ask for forgiveness sometime before you die and commit some sin.

Also, just because there are infinite possibilities for a deity, you have to make the assumption that the more popular ones are closer to the truth. A petty vengeful god will make himself known, like the god in the Bible. So one tends to favor his odds toward the god written on millions of books and such and not so much the purple fire-breathing fish.

If you play your odds and go with the Abrahamic god, your best case scenario is heaven, and if you are wrong, well, you lose anyways. You are a left-handed Mexican accountant, tough luck, but at least you went out like a champ, playing the odds.

So in a sense it's a way of cheating into heaven. (Religious freaks will hate you forever). But people keep forget there are "infinite" number of religions, which include one of the kind - Buddhism, which promises to save us all, no matter what you say, what you do, it's just the matter of time, everyone will accept the truth, there is no soul need to be saved in the first place (And people don't think about the concept of soul very often, and it's very likely a concept constructed later than actual thing.) You use the assumption that we 'DO' have soul by default, which is an believes too. And it's not the only way in human society to perceive the 'spiritual aspect' of human. We as Chinese even till day, some still believe that we have 7 'souls'(魂) 6 'ghosts'(魄) (only lose translation, there are no western concepts actually represent them), or 3 souls 7 ghosts in every one of us, and each one of them can separate from your body at any time, and they can be captured by others too. And YOU are the combination of them all, if you lose some, you lose part of yourself, you lose all you die, and they can be destroyed or reintegrated into new self. Or create new one when giving birth to new life, or created by deities, or evolved from lower life forms. (Yes, animals, plants, even inanimate objects). So you don't have to be afraid of death at all. (Or perhaps you should), there is always a chance, that the same combinations of (3,7) (7,6) will gathering back to becomes you again, giving enough time in the universe. And it perfectly explains the mental illness why someone sees not to be himself, or some one has low IQ, they don't need to be cursed, or control by demons, they just poor people who lost part of themselves, and we should help them, how sweet it is.

[Bohandas]

So no, a agnostic is not a atheist. (Which happens to be why we have two words.)

Spoiler: Let Me Try To Make This Clear For The Last Time (click to show/hide)

They aren't on the same axis.

No, the CORRECT version of that chart would be a triangle whith one point labeled "athiest" one point labeled "theist" and the third point labeled. "Agnostic" is no more the opposite of "Gnostic" than "Indifference" is the opposite of "Difference", a "Device" the opposite of a "Vice", or the Macedonian general "Antipater" the opposite of fatherhood

[counting]

We need to divide people into groups, not as a prescriptive measure but as a descriptive one. I say that someone is "atheist" instead of "theist" for the same reason that I say a chair is red instead of orange, or a stool instead of a loveseat.

The distinctions are useful because they represent different types of belief (or lack thereof, as the case may be).

To what end I may asked? More debates? You are still trying to explain the terminology. Not the real functions in discussion. Such as we can distinguish white horse and black horse, so we can breed a new race of Pegasus. Or I want chocolate instead of candy bar, because it's Valentine's day.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

So no, a agnostic is not a atheist. (Which happens to be why we have two words.)

Spoiler: Let Me Try To Make This Clear For The Last Time (click to show/hide)

They aren't on the same axis.

No, the CORRECT version of that chart would be a triangle whith one point labeled "athiest" one point labeled "theist" and the third point labeled. "Agnostic" is no more the opposite of "Gnostic" than "Indifference" is the opposite of "Difference", a "Device" the opposite of a "Vice", or the Macedonian general "Antipater" the opposite of fatherhood

I linked a previous thread about religion to this one a page or two back. Go to it and search for posts by a user named Farmerbob and start reading from there if you want to see this debate as it happened before. I advise this because I'm way too tired at this hour to write up a refutation to that point again.

[counting]

Fundies say the darnest things.

I thought text wall will help to slow down the increment rate of this thread, clearly I was wrong

Oops, how silly of me. 

People really don't like to read here. And introducing new working concept didn't help either. People like to debate on the philosophical level instead of observing the real effect of religions. You might think people are having them, because they WORK/have-function in human society.

I don't think reading is a problem for people here. Considering it's dwarf fortress sub-forum.

Religion is just a such topic, that you can spend reading long walls of text. And reading some more. And more. Then one day you'll realize that you'll never get that time back again.

Oh, those good days in Minecraft, we digging we digging, we get more diamond and more diamond, until the day you find a creeper behind you, and you are wondering why I spend so many time 

[G-Flex]

We need to divide people into groups, not as a prescriptive measure but as a descriptive one. I say that someone is "atheist" instead of "theist" for the same reason that I say a chair is red instead of orange, or a stool instead of a loveseat.

The distinctions are useful because they represent different types of belief (or lack thereof, as the case may be).

To what end I may asked? More debates? You are still trying to explain the terminology. Not the real functions in discussion. Such as we can distinguish white horse and black horse, so we can breed a new race of Pegasus. Or I want chocolate instead of candy bar, because it's Valentine's day.

The function is to actually properly distinguish between irreligious people who assert that there is no god, and irreligious people who do not. It is also to show that "atheists" as a group can fall into either category in order to prevent people from thinking otherwise. This is an important distinction in this debate.

[counting]

So no, a agnostic is not a atheist. (Which happens to be why we have two words.)

Spoiler: Let Me Try To Make This Clear For The Last Time (click to show/hide)

They aren't on the same axis.

No, the CORRECT version of that chart would be a triangle whith one point labeled "athiest" one point labeled "theist" and the third point labeled. "Agnostic" is no more the opposite of "Gnostic" than "Indifference" is the opposite of "Difference", a "Device" the opposite of a "Vice", or the Macedonian general "Antipater" the opposite of fatherhood

I linked a previous thread about religion to this one a page or two back. Go to it and search for posts by a user named Farmerbob and start reading from there if you want to see this debate as it happened before. I advise this because I'm way too tired at this hour to write up a refutation to that point again.

I'll head back to my economic suggestion thread, if you are interested in reading text wall, or little story I wrote to promote the awareness of economics in our DF society, welcome to join the cult.

Zenist - religion is not about GOD, economics is not about money, those basic element is only an illusion, existed only for you to ask more questions.

[Bohandas]

We as Chinese even till day, some still believe that we have 7 'souls'(魂) 6 'ghosts'(魄) (only lose translation, there are no western concepts actually represent them), or 3 souls 7 ghosts in every one of us, and each one of them can separate from your body at any time, and they can be captured by others too.

Can you write out the chinese words phonetically? Some people may be familiar with them from reading asian literature.

[Glowcat]

We as Chinese even till day, some still believe that we have 7 'souls'(魂) 6 'ghosts'(魄) (only lose translation, there are no western concepts actually represent them), or 3 souls 7 ghosts in every one of us, and each one of them can separate from your body at any time, and they can be captured by others too.

Can you write out the chinese words phonetically? Some people may be familiar with them from reading asian literature.

The best he can do is a form of pinyin, though I dunno how he'd make the tones.

[Blargityblarg]

I think convention says to, if you don't have the right symbols installed, put a number next to each word to symbolise the tone; for example, wo3 bu4 zhi1 dao4 (I don't know).

[Bohandas]

So no, a agnostic is not a atheist. (Which happens to be why we have two words.)

Spoiler: Let Me Try To Make This Clear For The Last Time (click to show/hide)

They aren't on the same axis.

No, the CORRECT version of that chart would be a triangle whith one point labeled "athiest" one point labeled "theist" and the third point labeled. "Agnostic" is no more the opposite of "Gnostic" than "Indifference" is the opposite of "Difference", a "Device" the opposite of a "Vice", or the Macedonian general "Antipater" the opposite of fatherhood

I linked a previous thread about religion to this one a page or two back. Go to it and search for posts by a user named Farmerbob and start reading from there if you want to see this debate as it happened before. I advise this because I'm way too tired at this hour to write up a refutation to that point again.

In regard to the posted chart, does the thread in question make it clear what you (or whoever made the chart) think the word "Gnostic" means (and if so, can you point me to that part of the discussion), because from the context I can tell that it is being misused.

[counting]

We as Chinese even till day, some still believe that we have 7 'souls'(魂) 6 'ghosts'(魄) (only lose translation, there are no western concepts actually represent them), or 3 souls 7 ghosts in every one of us, and each one of them can separate from your body at any time, and they can be captured by others too.

Can you write out the chinese words phonetically? Some people may be familiar with them from reading asian literature.

I got your messages, and can't resist the urge to explaining things (It's not the dao 道), in pinyin "hún" 魂, (not the same as Attila the Hun, there is no matching phones), and 'pò' 魄. (Again not the same to po)

It's very hard to explain it, and can't even pronounce it using English, (why I left them as Chinese characters in the previous post), the meaning always lost in translations. Another hard explaining terms is 'xian' 仙, they are spirit like, but not as souls, not deities (maybe partially), not even hun or po. More like a stage between human and god, a little like angels, but not in the formal "ranks" of the deities, you can call them 'lost deities' or 'roaming deities' or 'free deities'. People still believes in their power, and sometimes they can join the rank, become official gods. A good way to describe them is that they like a superhuman heroes in comic, but with all the powers, and NONE of the responsibilities. So cool, right?