If seeing is believing

[NeoHeathen]

ok guys, lets be hypothetical for a moment. If somebody were to perform a miracle right before your eyes and they were a christian and claimed that it was the power of the Holy Spirit at work, would you reconsider your views? Or if a good friend of yours came to you and said they had a spiritual experience from God would you reconsider your views? I hear all the time about how there is "no evidence" but if some sort of evidence came forward in a supernatural form, be it vision, real life miracle or anything else supernatural, would you  rethink things?  So please give me some feedback on how you would react and wether it would be life changing for you.

1. You mean like a magician style miracle? Then wherever they claim to get their "power" from would be irrelevant, I would rather try to figure out the secrete to their trick.

2. No, I hear of so called spiritual experiences all the time from Christians as well as spiritual experiences from non-Christians. It's all in the head and self motivated.

There are so many contradictory experiences that come from various religions that would lead one to ask, "why are people from so many different world views experiencing this?", the obvious conclusion is that it's nothing more than mind tricks.

[LoneMateria]

The problem with some people is that when a true is expressed they have a big problem in digestin it. I don't study psychol;ogy anymore as I don't particular care for any sort of so called education but I do know a great deal about amny things that people in this forum will never even imagine. There are tricks and there is magic and there no tricks and there is no magic. If one can tell the different between what is and what is not, one is in a more open mind to view, critized and anilyze withough any interferences from any sorts of beliefs -- atheist and theist or any other. Its unfortunate that some of you don't exposed yourself to knowing something about that something in order to give a better opinion. Illusions can come in many forms which is also a part of magic and tricks. If you don't trust your self or your senses or can be easily fool, well thats you.................................................................

Am I the only one thinking maybe his account somehow got jacked?  If you really believe this hvargas then your critical thinking skills have epically failed you.  You  need to go back to school and not drop out this time because the material is too hard.  Learn more about the human brain and mind and learn how easy it is for it to be tricked.  And while you are at it please spell check your post.  You look like a retard when you are trying to show how superior you are and can't spell simple words.

[wjennings1977]

It is funny how the same things happen to both theists and
atheists, and the interpretation is the only thing that seperates
us on this level.  I mean, seriously, we are all people, and we all
experience the same things.

[Ellavemia]

People have been performing miracles since the beginning of recorded time, either with fraudulent religious motives or as entertainers. I have seen David Blaine float. Criss Angel has walked on water, Ernest Angley has faith-healed about a million people in return for donations, and apparently Jose Luis de Jesus Miranda is the current incarnate of Jesus Christ. None of these acts matter because they are illusions or frauds mixed with the occasional coincidence. Seeing is not always believing when you have the rationality to realize that what you see isn't always what it seems.

[hvargas]

Due to my limits of time in the library, I must read and respond while thinking how to expressed my thoughts and be understood within the limits of less than 45 minutes. My spelling at times seems bad but thats o'k by me. On the other hand you beleive in the so called Eduacational System. You do not get " EDUCATION " in school what you received is " INSTRUCTIONS " . Instructions on how to do such and such and if you graps it then you stand a better chance at scoring well in the exam when it is given. Once you had finished all of your instructional training then you stand a better chance at earning so much money. If you do not go through the process of RE-INSTRUCTING (and a step higher), RE-EDUCATING yourself than  you will be left with a lot of garbage in your brain. There is no such thing as EDUCATION in school. Education you receive from your PARENTS if they are smart enough to regconized it. I had done all sorts of jobs, from washing dishes to general manager and on the way I had found that a University degree does not make an individual a so called PROFESSIONAL. In conversations with many of this so called highly educated people, I had uncovered that they tend to be more ignorant than when they begun their so called education. My son I educated and he graduated as a system engineer. I prepared him and today he thanks me cause he managed to go through all his math beyond CALCULES, if I misspelled it you can correct it. I will tell you a bit about myself, today I work as a MOVER, that is I moved people from place to place. I sleep in a train cause I don't have an a place to live here in the U.S. I owned a house with my wife and children in the dominican republic. We are still building it, a two story home and we are almost done with it. I'm their sole provider even though I had assisted my wife as well as preparing herself with various professional skills. Today she owns a Salon in D.R. I still don't care for the so called Educational systems and I'm extremely glad that I don't have a college degree. I don't have to thank anyone for my knowlege.

[Squid]

So, for those of us who are wasting our time with "instructions", exactly how do we "re-educate" ourselves and how do we go about acquiring this knowledge?

[Whitney]

My college was part "instructions" and part learn on your own.  

Do you think your son would know squat about engineering if he hadn't gone through the instructional part of school?

The knowledge we have today is gained from standing on the shoulders of wise wo/men who came before us.

ps:  you should care about spelling; especially since you can include a spell checker on your browser (how do you think I avoid most of my typos?) If I was going to have someone move my stuff I might not hire them if they have a lot of spelling errors on their contract forms.

[LoneMateria]

I was actually going to start reading hvargas's post.  However after reading two sentences I could see that it was pointless then Whit and Squid confirmed it.  Hvargas I understand you are not very educated and you think that not going to college is a great decision, and it really explains a lot about you.  I really wish the government would spend more money on education so we have less people with your mentality.  Calcules is actually spelled calculus ... maybe that is how you pronounce it ... but that is not how it is spelled.  Like Whit pointed out you can have Spell Check by default into any competent browser (poor IE is not included).  Now that i'm done being a complete ass i'm going to step back for a second and be a every day honest ass to you.

Why don't I care what you say hvargas?  Because you pride yourself on being uneducated.  Why is it that I probably won't seriously respond to any of your posts?  Because no one listens to uneducated people as sources of authority on any subject.  I think it has something to do with them being wrong a disproportional number of times.  Am I saying I'm some genius because I have some formal education?  No, far from it.  I'm smart in my field of study (in this case Computer Programming) and I know i'm not smart in every area.  Some people like to think they are smarter in everything then educated people, but though it is hilarious it is delusional and a sign of mental instability.  Seriously you are trying to act superior to people from a library computer living in a train with your family.  I don't know whether to laugh or cry for you.

Whit sorry for being such an ass to this person but when someone is either this delusional or this big of a liar (not saying he is but i'm entertaining the possibility due to absurdity) I really am at a loss of kind words to say.  Sometimes people need to point out when someone is so egregiously delusional and accept there is probably nothing we will say that will change their mind and we should say what we really feel about it since it will be ignored anyway.  Who knows someone else might benefit from reading this.

[Davin]

@OP: Seeing alone should not be believing, however if you could show that you perform this "miracle" whenever you wanted so that others could test and verify that it is really a miracle. If that were possible then I would at least believe that this thing is currently unexplained but real. However it would take a lot more than that to show that the power comes from a god, a way to verify that is to show that anyone who claims to have the power of that god in them to be able to perform the same miracle as well as people without the power of that god not being able to perform the miracle. I.E.: a hurricane wipes out 10,000 people and no Christian dies (or at least significantly more Christians survive consistently through several disasters). So no and yes.

For the second thing: testimony alone is not worth anything to me. Not even from scientists who know what they're talking about. In he case of scientists, it takes more than just them saying so, they need to explain it, demonstrate it and show that it can be independently verified. So definitely not.

But if you could provide demonstrable and independently verifiable evidence, that would help. Because if there were good evidence for a god I would believe in the god. I'm not attached to my beliefs, in that I would drop anything I take for truth if someone could provide sufficient evidence that what I thought was real is wrong.

[karadan]

It is funny how the same things happen to both theists and
atheists, and the interpretation is the only thing that seperates
us on this level.  I mean, seriously, we are all people, and we all
experience the same things.

Nice.  

[hvargas]

First step in Re-Educating yourself is to asked yourself various questions: Who is wise ? When you locate him/her, what makes them wise ? If you anylized them deeply you will find that so and so is not WISE. Aristotle was said to be a wise men as well as a philosopher. He lasted till the late 19th. centruy. Throw everything out and start all over asking the right questions and most all giving yourself the answers and not from someone else. I attended varoius colleges, major in psychology with a minor in history. Later I included teaching as a major. Don't mis-understand my point when regard to EDUCATION. Some may think highly of it cause they may feel that it had molded them into the perosn that they are today. There are many things that are wrong with school and thy don't produce " GOOD INDIVIDUALS ". I did all of my schooling here in the U.S., I hav more than 18 years of it under my belt but one day I woke up and suddenly realized that I had a lot of garbage in my brain. I started re-reading most of the materials that I had study but with another point of referrence. When you start school as a child you are tauch to be PAITRIOTIC, you are presented with the founding fathers of your nation and you learned the traditions. History is presented to you in disguise and wise men are also presented in the same manner. As you get older you learned to respond according to what you had been feat but most important as an adult you respond to POLITICAL and SOCIAL conditions according to what the various MEDIAS presents you with. They know how to arouse you to swim one way or the other, you become control but think not. Once you get rid of what has been placed in your brain you can then see through the cracks immediately. No one can fool you. There are no GREAT NATIONS and just cause you have all these technical gagets it does not make any one nation great. I was telling a co-worker who is a thiest, you are a life and as a living existence you are a part of existence, no one has the right to disturb your life or molest it. You don't have to begged anyone on your knees and all must respect you as you must respect all other life/existences. This is you right as a living being. There are those who VIOLATE LIFE as well as controlling it. Its a little difficult to try and explained it cause everyone has its own point of views and most won't want to do away with what they had live so closely with for so many decades. With what will they replace it with? My co-workers say " you don't eat meat, don't do drugs, don't drink not even beer and you are faithfull to your wife, you are the real christian " . " Yet you say you don't believe in GOD but believe in EXISTENCES ". I tell them, the problem is that you all are a product of SOCIETY and feel that to live life you must do what everyone else is doing. I further tell them that " TO BE A GOOD PERSON YOU DON"T HAVE TO BELIEVE IN ANYTHING BUT ONCE YOU DO, YOU CEASE BEING A GOOD PERSON ". Remember you define good for you. How you are tauch to lie, " the phone rings, honey answer that and tell him/her that I'm not here " . This is something that most children are tauch early on or something like it. My children learned the world views and they learned my views, they attended and one is still attending a christian private school. I have no problem with that cause they will have to deal with the world as it is but along the way they will recalled my teachings cause its all TRUE. BE YOUR OWN MAKER AND NOT A REFLECTION OF SOMEONE ELSE OR A COPY.

[elliebean]

At the risk of straying too far off topic, assuming anything much worth discussing remains of it;

Hvargas, please explain precisely what you mean by this statement, in as few words as you can manage, with special attention to the highlighted portion:

TO BE A GOOD PERSON YOU DON"T HAVE TO BELIEVE IN ANYTHING BUT ONCE YOU DO, YOU CEASE BEING A GOOD PERSON

You've said this once before and, as I remember one or two of us took exception to it in its former context. In its present context it seems slightly more innocuous, but I really hope to understand where you're coming from before entering another discussion with you about it or simply writing you off as a nutter.


Thanks.

[hvargas]

There are words that I write all the times and see over and over in my readings. At times I mis-spelled them and at other times they come clear as water. I don't give much thought to it and no I don't hold much pride but I do for myself. Unlike some that think that others are the one to say what you are, like don't complement yourself, thats for others to say. My wife does not live with me here in the U.S., at this time here I'm alone though I have two brothers, one in Los Angeles and the other in Oregon. If you do not trust youeself or your senses it does not mean that my senses are untrustworthy. If I witness something that I can't explain, I discard it or store it as a point of referrence or until such a time that it may recurred again. I do know things that can't be put into words but thats for me to know and no one elses. The point is at what point do you place your senses when face with something that questions " If seeing is believing " . There are many things that can happen and that can be made to happen for which you will not have the chance of seeing it being repeated. In your life and in the life of everyone reading this post a couple of things will occurred that will leave each and everyone of you wondering and with no explanations. At that time you can choose to denied what had happen or to accept it as some true and not an illusion. Then you will tried to locate this post.

[hvargas]

a little story to illustrate: this person is approach by another, the first person claims not to believe in God. Up to that day he/she was a good person but was convince by the second person to become a believer. As a believer it choose a faith and its faith it considered to be THE TRUE FAITH THAT ALL SHOULD FOLLOW. It critized and pointed to all the ills of the other faith and what those people practice. It thought itself being right and others wrong even though they too believe. This is in the way of religion. In the way of POLITICS: Each person wants his/hers party to be the winner and each want to present the other as the NO GOOD for the country. In the FAMILY: Though, they love one another they hurt one another cause of their different in areas of NEEDS AND WANTS. OUR beliefs systems causes us to be other than good and along those beliefs systems with define GOOD. Many people want to be good but find themselves in conflict with their NEEDS AND WANTS which conflicts with the NEEDS AND WANTS of others. If you discard all of your beliefs that are in conflict then you can managed to get closer to being a GOOD PERSON. This is not a religion or a philosophy or a way of life, this is just being you as the one that was borned before the world place all this destructive characteristics in you. I hope that this may give you some understanding of what I mean by it.

[i_am_i]

TO BE A GOOD PERSON YOU DON"T HAVE TO BELIEVE IN ANYTHING BUT ONCE YOU DO, YOU CEASE BEING A GOOD PERSON.

Actually I can see some truth in that statement.