From: bobbe@vice.ICO.TEK.COM (Robert Beauchaine)
Newsgroups: alt.atheism
Subject: Re: Believers: What Would Make You Not Believe In GOD?
Date: 13 Jan 93 00:35:32 GMT
Organization: Tektronix, Inc., Beaverton,  OR.


In article <11JAN199315111090@utarlg.uta.edu] b645zaw@utarlg.uta.edu (Stephen Tice) writes:
]In article <11097@vice.ICO.TEK.COM], 
]bobbe@vice.ICO.TEK.COM (Robert Beauchaine) writes...
]
]]I assume you haven't seen my posts regarding this very issue, so
]]I'll be gentle.  Please explain to me how anyone can *choose* to
]]believe something that makes absolutely no sense to them?  I can't,
]]and I've tried.
]
]I'm still catching up. But I have read the FAQ. Sorry about the 
]chose/choose. 
]
]I believe you mean to ask your question honestly. I choose not to now.
]
]You may be trying to catch me in some verbal tangle, as evidenced by
]your focus on spelling. Or you might be trying to destroy my credibility
]by referring back to postings in which you've examined all the nuances
]to the exquisite degree. And you might just be a devil, or given to the
]devil to worry me with unanswerable questions, and take up my time when
]I could be off working on personal communicators, which each of us could
]wear all the time and stay online in real time, and become a "super-team," 
]a greater entity beyond anything ever seen on earth before.
]

  I've tried several times now to glean some information from this
  paragraph.  What are you trying to say?  I'll put the obligatory
  "bugger off" here just in case I was supposed to be offended.

]You likely want people to doubt God. Since you just feel numb to things 
]like faith, everyone else must be fooling themselves. 


  Now I am offended.  You little arrogant, self righteous twit.  I
  don't care what you think of god, imagined or actual.  I do care
  that you feel both compelled to and capable of telling me how I
  think.  You're carrying on wonderfully in the very same fashion
  that this post was addressing:  the presumption that you can speak
  for my motivations and beliefs.

Like how everyone
]says they aren't "stimulated" by the same sex, other sex, animals, cars,
]leather, silk, porn and erotica, food, vibrators, danger, earthy smells,
]death -- but they all are. They all lie about being exclusively homosexual, 
]or heterosexual. Everybody responds to all kinds of stimulation. Unless
]maybe they have brain damage or nerve damage. Everybody knows they can 
]be aroused by strong stimuli -- look at the perfumes, and shows like 
]"cats", and all the blood and gore horror flicks. There are no such 
]thing as monosexuals (homo or hetero) and their is no such thing as God.
]It's absolutely true -- THERE IS NOT SUCH THING AS GOD. And there's is
]no reason to think there is anything beyond. And you BOB want me to know
]that, cause it's obvious, If I just admit it. Actually you couldn't 
]give a shit. Who cares? There is nothing that shows anyone really cares.
]Least of all some mental delusion. Besides, anything could happen, we
]just don't know -- tomorrow could bring some torment for all of us 
]beyond anything that has ever been imagined. There is no way to know
]it's not so....
]

  I didn't trim the above so everyone could relish your little rant
  in it's entirity.  

  Did it have anything to do with my question, even in some small
  and oblique manner?  Or were you just rabidly foaming at the
  chops, your sexual hangups blinding you to both reason and good
  grammar?

]But I choose to think, that you actually meant to ask, "how to choose
]to believe" in all honesty. There's no reason to think you're not at
]least courteous. And why would you bother with discussing such matters
]otherwise, if you are actually convinced that there is no GOD?

  Then why did you act like such an ass above?  

]And If you really get your kicks out of screwing with people's minds
]then you could do that elsewhere than in alt.atheism. Which is afterall
]a place each of us come to willingly. Even if only to hone our logic or
]rhetorical skills. Easier that speculation is just to ask you. Why
]trouble though, I'll just take you at your word. 

  Well, a.a old timers, let's hear it.  Do I get my kicks out of
  screwing with other people's minds?  

  What has become quite evident is that my question didn't even
  rattle a neuron of recognition in passing.  Or if it did, there
  was some serious breakdown between what you intended to say and
  the rubbish you spewed into this post.

]
]I believe you have a hard time distinguishing between "choosing"
]and "believing." They both seem like acts of will, right?? And an
]act of will is an act of will no matter what you call it. So 
]choosing to believe is believing in belief. Which is irrational?
]Even if it is funny.

  No, that's just the point.  I don't believe that people can choose
  to believe.  I'm of the opinion that my personal wiring, combined
  with my lifetime of experience, determines those concepts that my 
  brain will find "acceptable".  I also think that there are
  classes of ideas that I could not force myself to believe.  If you
  can tell me how to overcome this "limitation", I hope to hear
  from you.
]
]Gee, Bob isn't just zen doing adequate rather than all this self
]flagellation? Choose to believe or just believe. Either works if that's
]what you do. Believing in GOD is easier though. Cause all you have to do
]is -ask- for help. Which you've already done.
]
]Ok. Ok. This is preachy. "Self-certainty" is preachy.

  No, this wasn't even preachy.  It was rude.

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\ 

Bob Beauchaine bobbe@vice.ICO.TEK.COM 

"Look, I tried the cat experiment.  On the third trial, the cat was
dead.  On each of the subsequent 413 trials, it remained dead.  Am I
doing something wrong?"
			James Nicoll

Q.  How many Heisenbergs does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A.  If you know the number, you don't know where the light bulb is!