If you call yourself a true Atheist..... then you would not mind taking the "Cyrus test" that I personally did back in 1990? I was going through a philosophical crisis at that time when I found out that my mentor Evangelist Garner Ted Armstrong had been terribly INCORRECT on his teaching about Soul Sleep........ the idea of our being totally unconscious in the grave until some sort of resurrection. I had been an Atheist from around eight years of age until thirteen (1972 to 1973), when I began to listen to Garner Ted. He did a pretty good job of showing that traditional Darwinian Evolutionary Theory was mathematically just about impossible. But when I first began to read near death experience accounts..... especially the few rather negative ones... .I went into something of a philosophical / theological crisis and I realized that I no longer fitted in with the Worldwide Church of God and I actually got angry with Rabbi Yeshua - Jesus on some of his statements regarding "many called, few chosen, a broad way leading to destruction and many there be who go in thereat and a narrow way leading to life and few finding it"...... that combined with evidence for rather negative afterlife realms..... and I was wondering how the Christian Bible could be MUCH WORSE NEWS!!!! So.... here is what you do..... go to a private place.... maybe even your car...... personally I like our basement.... raise your right hand up in the air and paraphrase your impression of Isaiah chapter forty five..... when YHWH claims to have taken Gentile King Cyrus by the right hand....... pray and ask for YHWH and / or Messiah Yeshua - Jesus or the G-d of Abraham, (whoever you feel more comfortable with), to take you by the right hand as they claimed to have done for ancient Gentile King Cyrus of Persia who ruled over and gave freedom of religion to all 127 provinces of the Medo - Persian Empire and who decreed that the Temple of King Solomon should be rebuilt. I would combine this with some logic about how you are worried about your kids or grandchildren and the neighbours kids or your students....... and ask to be given something really important for the children who are growing up now because it is fairly obvious that however climate change does work out the next generations are in a lot of trouble! Ask to be taken by the right hand and be guided to information and understanding that could really help the next generations to be safer and hopefully for some of the most likely massive soon coming problems to be addressed by wise leadership in all major aspects of our government, educational systems, arts and entertainment, medicine, industry and yes..... philosophy / spirituality. After I prayed that way back in 1990 it was as if all my major questions and disappointments were soon answered..... but it was very much step by step by step over these last thirty years.
Here was one of my own major problems with the ideas of the Christian Bible that I feel I was led to as an answer to many of my own issues and questions. https://www.near-death.com/experiences/gay/christian-andreason.html#a04h I now have seen powerful evidence that we are living in a multiverse..... time is not confined to being one straight line but instead branches and looks more like the limbs and / or roots of a tree..... and yes... eventually everybody is led to a heavenly higher vibrational thought and behaviour pattern... so that we can fit in in the higher vibrational "heavenly" realms of the afterlife.
Would praying to the Easter Bunny work? How about Winnie the Pooh? Or Darth Vader? You really don't understand what an atheist is, do you? Why would an atheist pray to a deity that we don't believe exists? Are you aware that praying has been scientifically demonstrated to have zero effect? No, you haven't. Evidence? Nonsense.
So you are scared to try this???????? Interesting!!!!!!!! Would you be interested in my explanation for the following rather bold statement that was made by a near death experiencer? Or would you like to explain a simple way to pay off the national debt of the USA or Canada?
I doubt there are many atheists or agnostics who call themselves 'real atheist', whatever that is. Many Christians identify themselves as christians because it is central to who they are. I don't believe in Gods but that is not central to who I am. That particular belief is not really that important to me. My lack of belief in Gods seems to be more important to you than to me, which seems odd. I tend to believe things supported by evidence, if there is no evidence for something it is not really worth spending time pondering it. Almost everything you have written has been unevidenced belief. IMO that's fine, believe whatever you want as long as your beliefs don't hurt anyone.
C'mon Dennis, you can do better than that. Capitalist spirituality? Pray and the National debt will magically disappear? I posted this before but to date it is the most penetrating critique of religion still. Warning crude language.
Why is that every time someone provides an argument against your beliefs you decide it's because they're scared? Not really, given that every "explanation" you've provided so far has been utter drivel. Just like this.
One truly impressive Theoretical Physicist that I met on another forum made the following assertion that sounded logical to me.
I think that you are labelling all of this evidence "utter drivel" because you are scared of the implications of what this all means? At first I was rather scared of this myself..... to a degree I still am. https://www.near-death.com/psychology/triggers.html The fact that there are many ways to access whatever it is that seems to be connected to the right temporal lobe of the human brain does not necessarily debunk what these people are seeing but... could in fact turn out to be verification for a common experience that may be a valid brush with higher invisible dimensions as explained by String Theory?
So who actually is this theoretical physicist? He's not very well versed on what atheism actually is, nor - apparently - aware of the huge difference between atheism and agnosticism. He also doesn't seem particularly clever when it comes to the difference between theory and fact., among other things. Far from being a "truly impressive Theoretical Physicist" he comes across as yet another keyboard wannabe.
ANd back to the "scared" excuse again. No, I'm labelling it drivel for one reason: it's drivel. More drivel.
You might want to do some research on the quality of the memories experienced by people who have a near death experience? https://www.cell.com/trends/cognitive-sciences/fulltext/S1364-6613(19)30312-2 Obviously now that we humans have developed computer memories and DVD technology...... we should be able to wrap our minds around what may be happening in those Life Reviews of NDE fame?
Oh great - an unsourced quote. And, somehow, you've decided that this guy is a "truly impressive Theoretical Physicist"?
Why would a paragraph from this website article seem to you to be an "unsourced quote?" https://www.cell.com/trends/cognitive-sciences/fulltext/S1364-6613(19)30312-2 Near-Death Experience as a Probe to Explore (Disconnected) Consciousness Charlotte Martial Héléna Cassol Steven Laureys Olivia Gosseries Open AccessPublished:January 22, 2020DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2019.12.010
Try again. My unsourced quote remark refers to the quote from AboveAlpha - his name is even given in the quoted text from your post #13.Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
My apologies... I thought that you meant the other quotation......sorry! I read a lot of his writings Theoretical Physics and he impressed me as being quite capable of publishing a book on Multiverse Theory along with several of his colleagues from M.I.T., but... he did not give his name at that forum.
Some members here have graduated from grade school, and are no longer motivated by threats of "scaredy-cat". In the eyes of grown ups, such childish tactics reduce the poster's credibility to zero. This is a board for grown ups. Make grown up arguments.