<<But not to evade the question entirely, I do have a
response -- if we eventually find evidence of a god,
evidence of a nature which makes god's existence
fairly certain (say as certain as gravity, for example)
I think we'll be in for a shock -- because if anything
is certain, I think that we can be very certain God
will be nothing like we imagined.>>
This really rings true with me. This is why things like Pascal's wager, and
the consequences of being "wrong" just don't phase me in the least. I agree
that if there really is anything remotely like "God" it will be nothing like
we imagined. I think that is all the more why I embrace the word "atheist"
(with the agnostic qualifier of course). I wouldn't even think the word
"God", with the understandings associated with it, would come even close to
any possible version of reality. I can't go wrong by turning down the word
"God".
<<If God really is the tyrant of the Bible, we're all in deep shit -- I fear
this more than anything else.>>
If this were the case, once I became aware of it, sending me to hell
would be a mere afterthought, perhaps even comic relief, on top of the
unbearable agony the mere knowlege would cause. Really if you think about it,
this is exactly the opposite effect that many fundamentalist think these ideas
have. I have nothing to lose by non-belief. Belief or non-belief is
unbearable either way if there is a tyrant God. And everything to gain, even
non-belief of a real tyrant God at least buys me a little deluded comfort
until the knowlege hits home.
<<-- Joan Osborne
said:
"would you want to see, if seeing meant that you would
have to believe in things like heaven and in Jesus and
the saints and all the prophets"???
What if God was one of us?>>
I must confess that song holds some fascination for me even as (or maybe
especially as) an atheist.
I find myself wanting to add in more lyrics.
What if God was one of us?
What if God was all of us?
What if all of us was one of us?
-Jake