@rygD Do you have a link to this chart? I'm rather curious to see it.
It is from a book (forgot which), but I will take a look. You probably need it in context to fully understand it. It has an x,y layout with each quadrant labeled. (Just a warning, the author was writing generally on a topic you probably wouldn't approve of, and more specifically, a segment of that which I am almost positive you would have a problem with. I will just leave these words here for you: demons, goetia, necromancy.)
There probably are some religions that actively do not believe in gods and yet try to answer questions about existence, those would be atheistic religions (i.e. non theism). Though I cannot name one.
This should give you some of the more well known and accepted ones.
Thus I use the term atheism to describe non-practice. The lack of belief in gods, the lack of performing rituals, gatherings and the lack of studying the questions about existence. It is just not a thing, there is no active component to atheism. It sounds to me like you imagine a form of atheist practice. Is that true? If so, how do you view that?
What you describe here is irreligion. Although I disagree with a lot of it, check
this out for the opposite side of it from you. Unlike others here, I am trying to convert you. Actually, I am not giving you a choice. I guess you should be more careful where you wander into. I will send you a list of religions you now belong to and relevant information as soon as I decide which ones.
For the record, I personally know a fairly faithful Catholic (the christian variety, although I also suspect she is addicted to cats) that doesn't do any of the churchy stuff (and vocally disapproves of many of my studies) and at least a few atheists that do rituals and ceremonies (far from only being a part of religion...think graduation, starting to build or opening a new building, etc.), discuss ontology, and are in other ways active atheists, in this case promoting or discussing atheism or their beliefs or the problem with believing differently. One was mentioned in this thread recently. I know of MANY others that admit they are religious, but don't give any other external indicators, and atheists that defy your description. Not trying to attack you or tell you that you are wrong, just explaining that your explanation doesn't really prove Orr or disprove anything. On that note, you are at least a Discordian, now. Hail Eris! (I can direct you to many atheist discordians if you want. You should feel right at home, but you won't. They will make sure of that.
)
The reason for me to participate in this discussion is because I want to understand the viewpoints of theistic people more. I have been raised without a religion, I have never held a belief and I have an absolute inability to understand why other people can. It seems almost like they see another dimension in which they can reason which is completely missing for me. Like those videos that project 4D shapes in motion on the 3D space, sometimes something weird suddenly pops out, which is hard to understand if you do not see that 4th dimension.
Well, shit. I probably fucked things up for both of us. I play for both teams, and some others, sometimes at the same time. I have found the best way to understand why people believe what they do is to walk in their shoes. That applies for many other things that are best experienced. Just make sure the cops don't see you take their shoes. No need to even try starting off with belief. Try out some of the practices. Do you meditate?
I fully agree with you. By the way, if I do come across like that then please call me out on it as I want to be more sensitive to such concerns. I really struggle mentally with religious thought as I just fail to grasp it and that lack of understanding may at times come across a bit harsh, though I do my best not to.
Well, religious people are idiots. So are nonreligious people, but we have already been through this. There is no hope!
Funnily enough, if it was a simulation then the programmer would essentially be the god of the religions. Naturally whatever questions one may seek to answer would recursively propagate all the way back up to the real (non-simulated) world, so in that sense it does not really answer anything either. In that way it is closely related to the "if god created the world then who created god" argument.
Not necessarily. Sure, I may worship the sun because it created our planet and solar system and sustains life on the planet, but few others outright worship the sun, eben if some actively theistic religious types do through veiled forms of it (or borrow practices and holidays from those they conquered to assist with conversion, then made one of those days and some of those practices their most important, despite warnings against doing this from their own predecessors in their religious tradition...I speak primarily of Christmas, buy Easter also fits, and I can probably find examples from other Abrahamic religions with a little effort). But what about all the people with no direct ties to solar veneration? Sure, the nonbelievers are exempt due to their lack of faith. I know full well that the sun isn't the center of the universe, and isn't solely responsible for everything on our planet, and didn't create itself unassisted. So I could worship the universe, but that only solves some of the problems. The thing is, though, not all religions depend on an almighty creator entity. Hell, some, within the same construct, might have a series of creation myths. Look at one of my favorites, in ancient Greece. Since that was really a whole, somewhat related, group of stories, and I like Hesiod, in Theogeny he tells, if I am not confusing myself, of one primordial creation, and then eventually Zeus takes over and destroys it all, then makes it all again. (I feel like I may be inserting stuff from the mystery religions, particularly Orphism, however that also has some pretty interesting stuff. I will continue in case I am not mixing things up.) Really, though, none of that matters. Hesiod is fun because we have so much on this topic from him, however his interpretation is only one, and was not universally (in that "society") accepted. He did, however, say everything came from nothing, and out of the night/darkness, and a bunch of other stuff he personified. (Make sure you remember that, because Eris is the firstborn daughter of Night/Nyx...but which Eris? See the beginning of Hesiod's Works and Days to see what I am talking about. You don't really need to remember that.) I don't think anyone would ask where the primal empty chaos came from. For the people in a simulation to either worship whatever started the simulation, or made the computer, our whatever else, they would need to be aware of it. Without any indicators, why wouldn't they believe Hesiod instead of that they are a simulation, or worship the Wind-fish, or that everything they know is a product of their own mind. Technically, they don't need to worship anything, and they really don't even need creation myths, to be religious. But that doesn't mean that they couldn't be part of a game that I am playing. So what is their god? I dunno. Money? Yeah, maybe they are Ferengi. To them all that other stuff would just get in the way...if they knew about it, which they don't. The sun will still probably rise tomorrow.
