[Overthinker]

I'm was just wondering what the ENTJ thinks about religion. This was an interesting thread I came across in the ENTP forum. Do you practice religion? Do you like/dislike religion?

[Overthinker]

Here's what I posted in the ENTP forum.

I'm agnostic, because there is no 100% way of knowing for sure. I think believing in a God vs being atheist both take huge leaps of faith.There is just not enough evidence to be completely sure. No matter how good the argument is, you still have no idea at the end of the day. Having studied a LOT of biology during my first two years of undergrad, I must admit..I'm more on the creationist side in the creationism vs evolution debate, but I do believe humans evolved and adapted over time. The intricacies of our planet and its inhabitants are amazing. Human physiology is amazing. If all of this happened randomly...well, boy are we lucky. The book of Genesis seems highly unlikely, but the big-bang takes just as big of a leap of faith. No matter how accurate science is today, for anyone to have incredibly strong convictions about speculations of a big bang that happened 14 billion years ago seems a little outrageous to me. I just don't believe that the earth is less than 6000 years old. On a side note, I definitely hope there is a god so that everyone is not let down. I was born into a really religious family. I even have uncles who are pastors. I've always felt like somewhat the "religious blacksheep" because other than my dad, I'm really the only one who challenges my family's beliefs. All humans have to have their physiologic/mental/spiritual needs filled. Was the human spiritual craving (that exists till this day) put there by a creator? Or is it just a remnant instinct that we've inherited from our primitive ancestors? Arguing against creationism can even be viewed as an attempt for an individual to fill their spiritual needs. These needs will be met one way or another. Even us discussing this issue in a forum kind of fills this spiritual void in a sense. Another argument: Are we all even just bacteria? Strains of bacteria are constantly evolving and growing resistant to our antibiotics. It's very likely, but that argument puts human dignity as stake, and makes people feel insecure.

I've always gotten a weird vibe from extremely religious people. Whenever they start up with their holier than though jargon, I cannot help but think about all of the patients I've met during my psych nursing clinical rotation. A lot of them seriously thought they were either God or Satan. It shows that even an unhealthy mind/ our primitive instinct have some kind of yearning for a being that's greater than us. It helps us feel secure.

I do believe that organized religions have been corrupted. They have been used as a way to manipulate people to keep our society in order. Some people say that religion is the #1 cause of war/death in the past. That's a false argument: atheistic communism is. It's human nature to harm one another and do bad things to each other(especially when threatened), and its sad that something that was intended to be good for the human race was taken to the extreme and was responsible for the deaths of so many. I know my arguments seem all over the place, but that's just it: I don't have an argument! I'm agnostic. I analyze arguments and take them for just what they are. Arguments. Nobody knows shit.

[Vanitas]

God and ENTJ

I'll reply later, but that's a previous discussion about beliefs and ENTJ.

[openedskittles]

I believe in God but not religion. I would consider myself somewhat of a deist.

The problem with popular religions is that it's impossible to justify one without justifying more and they conflict with each other and are tainted by feelers and human nature.

The problem with atheism is that there is clearly good reason for God to exist. I know atheists who simply say "Big Bang" as if it solves God. There are so many obvious arguments against this, but the problem these scientific atheists totally overlook is that no matter how much new evidence you have, there has to be something at the origin. If you say "What created the universe?" can be answered by "The Big Bang" then you have solved nothing, you have merely changed the question to "What created The Big Bang?"

[heballas]

I believe in God but not religion. I would consider myself somewhat of a deist.

The problem with popular religions is that it's impossible to justify one without justifying more and they conflict with each other and are tainted by feelers and human nature.

The problem with atheism is that there is clearly good reason for God to exist. I know atheists who simply say "Big Bang" as if it solves God. There are so many obvious arguments against this, but the problem these scientific atheists totally overlook is that no matter how much new evidence you have, there has to be something at the origin. If you say "What created the universe?" can be answered by "The Big Bang" then you have solved nothing, you have merely changed the question to "What created The Big Bang?"

I believe exactly the same thing! I'm glad I meet someone who does!

[Capiteux]

I fall into the god but not religion catagory too. Here is as far as I can get: If I were to see an empty room with one door, and I watched that door to verify that nothing entered it, and then looked in the room and saw a beautiful grandfather clock, I could not comprehend that it just "materialized". So how could the universe, something so much more complex than this "just appear"? I have to think something created it - "god"

I kind of like the more eastern approach in that all there is is god and we are just her individual points of awareness experiencing........

[FiNe SiTe]

The problem with atheism is that there is clearly good reason for God to exist. I know atheists who simply say "Big Bang" as if it solves God. There are so many obvious arguments against this, but the problem these scientific atheists totally overlook is that no matter how much new evidence you have, there has to be something at the origin. If you say "What created the universe?" can be answered by "The Big Bang" then you have solved nothing, you have merely changed the question to "What created The Big Bang?"

Excatly!!!!!!!

[Lucretius]

I believe in God but not religion. I would consider myself somewhat of a deist.

The problem with popular religions is that it's impossible to justify one without justifying more and they conflict with each other and are tainted by feelers and human nature.

The problem with atheism is that there is clearly good reason for God to exist. I know atheists who simply say "Big Bang" as if it solves God. There are so many obvious arguments against this, but the problem these scientific atheists totally overlook is that no matter how much new evidence you have, there has to be something at the origin. If you say "What created the universe?" can be answered by "The Big Bang" then you have solved nothing, you have merely changed the question to "What created The Big Bang?"

The Big Bang is the origin of the universe as we know it, but the first law of thermodynamics would indicate that the energy composing the universe has probably always existed (or may perhaps be atemporal in its most basic form.)
Also, invoking a God does not solve your problem at all if you're afraid of regression, because then one could just as easily ask "what created God?"

[RomanticRealist]

I'm an atheist, secular humanist and an anti-theist in the Hitchens manner.

[RomanticRealist]

I believe in God but not religion. I would consider myself somewhat of a deist.

The problem with popular religions is that it's impossible to justify one without justifying more and they conflict with each other and are tainted by feelers and human nature.

The problem with atheism is that there is clearly good reason for God to exist. I know atheists who simply say "Big Bang" as if it solves God. There are so many obvious arguments against this, but the problem these scientific atheists totally overlook is that no matter how much new evidence you have, there has to be something at the origin. If you say "What created the universe?" can be answered by "The Big Bang" then you have solved nothing, you have merely changed the question to "What created The Big Bang?"

Then I ask you, what created God? If you say that God is the first cause, then why can't you just skip a step and say that the Big Bang is the first cause? Furthermore, I see no evidence or reason to believe in a God, I accept that we do not know what created the universe, but I see no need to say that God did it. There's a giant leap in saying that we do not know something to that we believe something to be true, especially when there's no evidence to back up the said belief. I'm sorry if I appear to be rather headstrong and confrontational in my approach in asking these questions. I'm really not trying to be dismissive but rather that I see no way to tip toe around it.

With all that said, I do see value in the (or your) deist or pantheist position, far more than a theistic position. It is certainly a much more enlightened position to be, because frankly the idea of an omnipotent being (theistic view) who charges you of thought crime and deals infinite punishments, for finite crimes while awards slavery of endless praise to be the most frightening thing to ever be conceptualized.