Fear of a godless world

[hiyymer]

The marvel I contemplated was rather more marvellous though than if it had all been made by magic.

What you experienced is not out there. It's all in your head. Your brain created it. The trees out there aren't green. The sky out there is not blue. It's not the universe. It's how your brain represents the universe in your consciousness. It IS "magic".

[Thinking Aloud]

I was out walking the pooches this morning. I drove a couple of miles to a golf club which has a public footpath which goes right round it. It is a beautiful walk which takes about an hour. When I got there it was absolutely bucketing down with rain, but within two minutes the clouds blew away and there was bright blue sky and a lovely windy, quite warm autumn day to be had.

I set off on the walk and felt absolutely great. I found myself appreciating the wonder and beauty of the universe and the simple fact that it should all come together at that moment for one small conscious entity to wonder at the trees, leaves, sky and at itself and its ability to appreciate this. It was a stunning hour. Raindrops gleamed in bright sunshine. Autumn leaves blew past and the sun was warm on my face.

Every day (mostly) I take my ride up through the country lanes to the stone circle. It's a 7-odd mile round trip, and every so often, as I slog uphill between the fields, I get this feeling of being totally alone. Just me, pedalling furiously for no reason in particular, aiming for the top of the hill in order to come back down again. I imagine zooming out from this tiny bundle of cells that is me, isolated on its orbiting rock in the vastness of the cosmos...

Wow.

[Rum]

The marvel I contemplated was rather more marvellous though than if it had all been made by magic.

What you experienced is not out there. It's all in your head. Your brain created it. The trees out there aren't green. The sky out there is not blue. It's not the universe. It's how your brain represents the universe in your consciousness. It IS "magic".

Yes, I know that. Part of the wonder of it.

[JimC]

Death...

Death, and the fearful rejection of it, is the alpha and the omega of religion.

All the rest is ornament...

[Robert_S]

Death...

Death, and the fearful rejection of it, is the alpha and the omega of religion.

All the rest is ornament...

Hasn't Judaism been without an afterlife for the most part?

I know I had pretty much given up hope on an afterlife before I gave up on the idea that there was a god of some sort.

[stripes4]

What? Are you guys saying there's no god??? Waaahhhhhh!!! . I wanna go HEAVEN!!!!

[Deep Sea Isopod]

What? Are you guys saying there's no god??? Waaahhhhhh!!! . I wanna go HEAVEN!!!!

I wanna go to Devon!

[mistermack]

Every day (mostly) I take my ride up through the country lanes to the stone circle. It's a 7-odd mile round trip, and every so often, as I slog uphill between the fields, I get this feeling of being totally alone. Just me, pedalling furiously for no reason in particular, aiming for the top of the hill in order to come back down again. I imagine zooming out from this tiny bundle of cells that is me, isolated on its orbiting rock in the vastness of the cosmos...

Wow.

Sounds nice. Got a photo? I was wondering where that is.

[FBM]

Religion, I think, was designed to protect the existence of the illusory eternal, unchanging self. The real god is the self.

[Thinking Aloud]

Every day (mostly) I take my ride up through the country lanes to the stone circle. It's a 7-odd mile round trip, and every so often, as I slog uphill between the fields, I get this feeling of being totally alone. Just me, pedalling furiously for no reason in particular, aiming for the top of the hill in order to come back down again. I imagine zooming out from this tiny bundle of cells that is me, isolated on its orbiting rock in the vastness of the cosmos...

Wow.

Sounds nice. Got a photo? I was wondering where that is.

See: http://rationalia.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=18897

[DRSB]

For many, religion means primarily a community, sometimes even a replacement for meaningful relationships, they cling to it in order to belong. Many are just born into such a community and never mature enough to outgrow them.

[Tero]

Simple folks are sheep, they need guidance. You need to be dictator and tell them what to believe.

[mistermack]

See: http://rationalia.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=18897

Thanks. I like those pics. Some good stuff.
Stone circles do have a weird atmosphere. Much more than a church. I can respect religion historically, those people had no choice but to speculate.
Everything was a mystery, they didn't have our advantage of the big mysteries having rational explanations.
It's frustrating. You can touch the same stones that they touched, but you can't get any clue of what they were, or what for.

[Santa_Claus]

Stone circles........................You can touch the same stones that they touched, but you can't get any clue of what they were, or what for.

But I think it pretty safe to hazard a guess that the stone circles involved a fella in a funny hat saying that building them would help make / keep the bogey man happy.

[mistermack]

But I think it pretty safe to hazard a guess that the stone circles involved a fella in a funny hat saying that building them would help make / keep the bogey man happy.

Yeh, but when you have no idea what makes babies get sick and die, or what the sun and moon are, or why there are seasons, then bogey men would seem extremely real.
It's easy to look at ancient civilizations as superstitious idiots, but they didn't have any better answers. Compared to todays religious fundamentalists, they were actually quite rational.