Some Notes About Me

[ironhorse]

After writing a few drafts, I’ve decided just to scratch them all and just write my story here in one sitting, no editing, and no revisions.

Right after high school and into my early twenties I went through a period where I questioned my Christian faith and took a skeptical look at the claims of Christianity.

Questioning was something I had been taught to do by my parents. When I was about five I remember eating my spinach one night and thinking it is really true spinach can me you strong like Popeye? Right after supper I ran outside and tried to pull a pine tree out by its roots.

Needless to say, but that pine tree did not move. That event and others along the way kept enforcing this trait. One recent issue is being told that 97% of all scientists agree that global warming threatens the planet. John Kerry preaches this as Gospel truth and Obama tells me I’m a flat earthier if I deny it. Really? I thought and then took some time to find out.

 

A little more on my upbringing:

My father was a Baptist pastor and also a college professor. He taught psychology. He was not a “KJV Only” Bible thumper. He attended and graduated from the most liberal seminary in the region. He studied higher criticism of the scriptures and also textual criticism. Here the goal is to determine the original form of a text from among the manuscripts.

 

I mentioned this to help you understand that when I say read many of my father’s religious books in his library, they were not just books written by Billy Sunday, John R. Rice or Oliver B. Greene.

Even before my teen years when I was old enough to read some of these criticisms of the scriptures and the difficult verses,  I had read the horrific, stories of mayhem and killing. The Old Testament was where I read most in Bible when I was 9-12 years old. I like reading the stories of the wars and destruction. It amused me that when we were in Sunday School the story of David and Goliath they usually left out the part about David immediately cut off Goliath’s head and putting it on a stick.

 

My mother and father were both intensive readers and loved to discuss ideas. They did so quote often from my earliest memories with their friends who often gathered after church or classes.  I grew up hearing parts of these discussions.  Sometimes I would just sit by and listen.

My parent’s library covered a wide range of topics but I guess a little over half of them were on religion. The rest were science, math, psychology, history and some fiction. There was a very old copy of Darwin's Origin of the Species that had belonged to my grandmother. It might have been a first edition. I can't remember.

I grew up and encouraged to read anything I wanted. At 12 years of age I naturally grab the three books on sex and the Kinsey Report.
The most important thing my parents taught me was no matter who said it or who wrote it was okay to question it. It was okay to be skeptical. I remember my father telling me to never be afraid to questions on why you believe something and read everything you can of the opposing viewpoints.

Concerning my conversion:
I was never told by my parents I was a Christian because they were believers. I was taught that a person had to make their own decision about accepting Christ or not accepting. I did so one Sunday night. I was twelve.

Once I hit 13 and had my license to drive, my first car a Volkswagen Beetle, it was off to the world. I started working part time after school. During my last two years of high school for the next several years I stopped attending church. My parents occasionally told me they missed me at church but never scolded me for not attending.

My first year out of high school a friend helped me build a log cabin  deep in the woods near a creek on some property my father owned.  We used stones for the foundation, scrap wood for the flooring, framing and doors. Tin roof from an old barn topped it off.

It became a place for my friends on weekends during my years in college. After spending time in town we would meet at the cabin and spend the rest of the weekend there Saturday night and Sundays.
We kept a fire pit outside and spent a lot of time talking around the fire.

One of my friends in college met an atheist. His name was Rob and he was the first atheist I had ever met in person.  I knew of Carl Sagan from seeing him on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson and also Madalyn Murray O'Hair. My father had actually agreed on the Supreme Court’s ruling banning prayer in public schools. It was not a ban on individual prayer but on a state sponsored prayer.
Rob soon joined in on our fire pit conversions.

To him “the Big Bang” started it and evolution was the natural progression into life and what we see now. He said it had been proven by science.  His position that science and were evolution a proven fact beyond any doubt. His was civil about our conversation. Most of us were Christians. One guy believed we had been planted by aliens and spun his ideas about that and multiple universes.  I read his copy of “Chariots of the Gods”.

So for Rob, death was just that, death. We all go back like we were before we were born: nothingness. My mind reeled that idea over more than a few times. If true, it was not a happy thought. What puzzled me was how Rob said he accepted it but said it didn’t bother him.

So in the midst of this I turned inward and asked myself what is really the truth? I was willing to change my belief one way or another if I found something that made more sense to me than Christianity.
Is there a God? This was the most important question to answer. If I can prove or believe there is evidence that God does not exists, then why bother with anything else about religion. I knew from what I had read and from discussing this with Rob, that there was not a definitive answer. To him the evidence he saw and the messy world of religions were enough for him to choose atheism.

 
Although the Dawkin’s Scale was decades away, I can see now that Roy was a number 6 on the scale and  I was a 2 on the scale.

 

So, I was pondering do we live in an eternal existing universe or did the Big Bang happen? Matter had to come from somewhere, so I went with the Big Bang idea. What astronomers had observed seemed to prove this idea.

Looking at it and thinking about what I see and knew of the world, I just could not accept that of this was a by chance, all random. Life on earth is just too complex to have all come from warm spot in some ancient ocean billions of years ago.

This was the crux of the issue for me. Even though I had read those lavishly illustrated books on evolution in elementary school and latter in high school, I just did not buy into the idea that all of this just evolved from lower life forms. Where, if it happened or is happening, where are the transitional species? If evolution occurred over unknown millions of years there should be tons of the transitional or intermediate forms of life. We should see them now I reasoned.

I agreed with Rob that both plants and animals can change to adapt to a given environment, but that was not evolution. That was not life coming from non-life. I rejected evolution as a fact.
I watched Carl Sagan’s Cosmos when it aired. Was the cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever will be?

To me, the answer was no.

So next was God:

Once I finally decide to believe there is a God, the question of what kind of God (or how many) to believe was the next question. I found my mind just could not go with the Deists on a creator god setting the motions of the universe and then retreating, having no further interaction with the created universe or the beings within it. If that is God, he is a cruel one. 

This is one of the reasons I dismissed other religions. I could not see the universe with millions of gods (as many religions believe) or the one impersonal god of Islam. Almost all religions have some elements of truth. I saw George Harrison on TV talking about how there are many paths to God. The reason Harrison rejected Christianity was he just could not accept a teaching that Jesus claimed to be the only way to God.

Islam seemed especially distasteful. It was geared for a purely male centered religion based on good works and following the rules. Don’t fret so much about praying to God above just bow and direct your prayers toward Mecca. Have your way with women, restrictions to keep them in check, don’t eat pork or drink alcohol. Follow the rules and when you get to heaven you can have buckets of wine, food and a harem filled with women.

Polytheism with multiple (or countless gods), endless chants, beads, gurus, candles and rules to follow were way too much for me to make any sense of. A God I believe would make knowing him a lot easier. I also did not see many positive benefits it had on countries where it was a prominent belief.
I understood that many religions contained elements of truth but I could not accept all of them or any one of them as the truth.

If there was a God, there was only one God. So I decided to believe God was real.
I knew that Christianity was so much simpler than other religious systems.

So, for me, I was back to square one.

 

Note: During this time I did not judge the Bible or Christianity by abusive churches or crazy false teachers. My father taught me well on this one. I remember once when he heard a preacher on the radio say you could not be saved unless you believed in the virgin birth of Christ you could not be saved, he exploded. “What a lie!” he said. He was also quick to point out the lies of so called faith healers. A friend of his whose daughter was crippled had spent their life savings chasing Oral Roberts around the country. She was never healed and died in her early thirties.

The Bible and the Christian faith:

First, my critical look at the Bible was not my attempt to debunk every verse or the try to square every angle. I knew it was, in places, a messy story to fully understand. I knew all the controversial or difficult passages. I also knew there were explanations, some good, and some bad, to get through those bumps.

Second, I did not view every word and sentence as a quote from God.
It was very unlike the Book of Mormon (the Golden Plates from the angel Moroni or the Quran claiming to be verbally revealed by God to Muhammad through the angel Gabriel.

The Bible claimed to be inspired by God. It did claim, in some verses, to contain direct quotes from God but it also had a lot of other stuff.

So, I asked myself. Is it true or was it all made up of myths, bits of history, fictional stories and with Jesus, a giant hoax?

If it was a conspiracy, it was a good one. Text spanning centuries, all threaded with a simple message.
Sure, at times reading it is messy, but what struck me as genuine was the simple message (or theme) of God speaking to us.

Getting down basics, it can’t get any simpler than John 3:16.
So to me, it was where else to go?

Keep banging my head against the wall with countless arguments or thinking I should be able to get all the ducks in a row and KNOW everything about God? Seeking rock solid evidence before I accepted it as truth?

I was under no delusion that I could know everything.

So I maintained my Christian faith. I believe.

Since then I have tried to learn more and will continue to do the same.

For me, it’s a wonderful mysterious journey.

[sdelsolray]

Thank you for your skeptical appraisal story.  It explains much.

[duderonomy]

Well, Ironhorse, you came through with something. I take back half of all the bad stuff I've said about you.  

 

I'm sure you'll get a lot of flak and questions. I hope you come around and talk about them.

 

Not to pick a nit, but how did you get your licence to drive at 13?

[ironhorse]

Well, Ironhorse, you came through with something. I take back half of all the bad stuff I've said about you.  

 

I'm sure you'll get a lot of flak and questions. I hope you come around and talk about them.

 

Not to pick a nit, but how did you get your licence to drive at 13?

 

At the time in my state you could get a restricted licenses (daytime only) at age 13. This was also the time when 16 year olds were allowed to drive public school buses.  

[rjn]

Of course Christianity made more sense to you, you were raised as one, whether you acknowledge that or not. Why is hinduism less probable according to you? Just asking.

[ironhorse]

Of course Christianity made more sense to you, you were raised as one, whether you acknowledge that or not. Why is hinduism less probable according to you? Just asking.

 

No, I was not raised a Christian. I was raised by Christian parents. I did acknowledge that and I think you missed what I said about what they taught me. 

 

 

This is what I said about Hinduism : Polytheism with multiple (or countless gods), endless chants, beads, gurus, candles and rules to follow were way too much for me to make any sense of. A God I believe would make knowing him a lot easier. I also did not see many positive benefits it had on countries where it was a prominent belief.

[Brother Jeff]

Very interesting, Ironhorse. Thanks for sharing!

 

I too have had what I think is a very interesting religious journey. Rather than me typing it all out again here you can read about it at this link if you want to:

 

http://smokeyinthebox.com/journey-christianity-atheism/

 

I have a strong interest in Hinduism and Eastern religion generally. If I had to choose a religion to convert to again, it would likely be Hinduism. It is a complex religion, but there is a lot that is positive in it. I'm currently working my way through this book on Hinduism. I have the printed book, but you can download the PDF version for free.

 

http://www.hinduismtoday.com/modules/wfdownloads/viewcat.php?cid=2

 

At the moment, though, I remain an atheist, and that is because I just don't see any evidence at all that a god of any kind actually exists. I would love to believe, but I just don't see any evidence to justify that belief. However, that said, I am a huge fan of Eknath Easwaran and his 8-Point spiritual program. You can check that out here:

 

http://www.easwaran.org/the-eight-point-program.html

 

It's possible to follow Easwaran's program without sacrificing your brain at the altar of religion.

 

As for evolution, it is a fact that all life that has ever existed on this planet, in all of its marvelous complexity, evolved from simpler forms. I'm no expert on evolutionary theory, but I can suggest a book called "Why Evolution is True" by Jerry Coyne. You can get it here:

 

http://www.amazon.com/Why-Evolution-True-Jerry-Coyne/dp/146923307X

 

Bless the Lard, Brother! Glory!

[rjn]

Your parents seem to have been pretty open minded, so good for you, really. I still don't believe for a second that you were not biased in favour of Christianity. It's not a personal remark against you IH, it's just the way I think things like these work.

[pratt]

"I agreed with Rob that both plants and animals can change to adapt to a given environment, but that was not evolution. That was not life coming from non-life. I rejected evolution as a fact.

I watched Carl Sagan’s Cosmos when it aired. Was the cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever will be?

To me, the answer was no."

 

reject evolution because cannot explain life coming from non-lfe?

 

cosmos is all that is, ever was or ever will be, the answer is no?

 

i still cannot get over the talking snake n ass

[bornagainathiest]

Thank you for this Ironhorse...

 

...but could I please ask you to share with us the skeptical appraisal of your faith that you claim  you took years over?

 

Thank you,

 

BAA.

[bornagainathiest]

For those unfamiliar with the origin of our many requests to see Ironhorse's skeptical appraisal of his Christian faith, this is where it all started.

 

http://www.ex-christian.net/topic/70082-baptists/page-3#.Vx3NAvkrJD9

 

In post # 58 he claims that he didn't decide to become a Baptist on the basis of a conscious skeptical appraisal of the internal logic of only the Baptist beliefs of his parents.

 

Yet in post # 76 he claims to have spent several years skeptically appraising God, the Bible and the Christian faith.

 

So, we cannot ask him to show us his skeptical appraisal of the internal logic of his parents Baptist beliefs - because he didn't make one.

 

This leaves us with three questions.

 

Why can't he show us the skeptical appraisal of God, the Bible and Christian faith that he claims he took years over?

 

Which came first, his decision to become a baptist like his parents or his multi-year skeptical appraisal of God, the Bible and the Christian faith?

 

Which ever order they came in, once he'd performed that multi-year appraisal, why did he choose to remain a Baptist Christian?

 

 

 

[bornagainathiest]

I am somewhat envious of sdelsolray's ability to say and mean a great deal in a very few words.  

When he wrote, "Thank you for your skeptical appraisal story.  It explains much"  he didn't describe what that 'much' was.  But since I reckon that I'm on the same wavelength as sdelsolray and I can also see 'much' that Ironhorse's story explains,  I will list some points below.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ironhorse wrote...

So, I was pondering do we live in an eternal existing universe or did the Big Bang happen? Matter had to come from somewhere, so I went with the Big Bang idea. 1. What astronomers had observed seemed to prove this idea. 2.

Looking at it and thinking about what I see and knew of the world, I just could not accept that of this was a by chance, all random.  Life on earth is just too complex to have all come from warm spot in some ancient ocean billions of years ago. 3.

This was the crux of the issue for me. Even though I had read those lavishly illustrated books on evolution in elementary school and latter in high school, I just did not buy into the idea that all of this just evolved from lower life forms.  4.  Where, if it happened or is happening, where are the transitional species?   5.  If evolution occurred over unknown millions of years there should be tons of the transitional or intermediate forms of life. We should see them now I reasoned.

I agreed with Rob that both plants and animals can change to adapt to a given environment, but that was not evolution.  That was not life coming from non-life.  6.  I rejected evolution as a fact.
I watched Carl Sagan’s Cosmos when it aired. Was the cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever will be?

To me, the answer was no.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

1.  

Matter has to come from somewhere according to the principles of classical (physics) cause-and-effect.   But in quantum physics, strictly deterministic cause-and-effect does not apply and quantum mechanics (QM) is key to a proper understanding of Big Bang cosmology and the Inflationary model of the early universe.  Therefore, if Ironhorse went with the Big Bang because it appeared to offer a cause for the universe, then he did so on a false basis.  The classical physics of general relativity (GR) on it's own cannot be used to invoke the principle of cause-and-effect to bring about the Big Bang.  GR must be used in conjunction with QM to successfully explain the mechanism of Inflation that is integral to Big Bang cosmology.  

 

2.

Physics does not prove ideas.  The sciences that investigate the natural universe do not attempt to 'prove' anything about it.  They simply offer the best explanation of it according to the current evidence.  Ironhorse has often displayed a very poor grasp of science's purpose and remit.

 

3.

This is a textbook example of the informal logical fallacy of an argument from ignorance.   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_ignorance

 

4.

Ironhorse practiced the selective dismissal and acceptance of scientific data and evidence known as 'cherry picking'.  He accepting the physics of the Big Bang, because it appeared to give him the necessary beginning of the universe, which he could square with the Creation narrative in the book of Genesis.  But he rejected Evolutionary science, because if humans evolved and were not created by God, then there was no historical Eden, no original sin and therefore no need for a redeemer (Jesus Christ) from that sin.  This selective approach to science shows that he was picking and choosing only those parts of it that agreed with his already established Christian faith.  His motivation for doing this was not to search out the truth but to preserve the belief system he had already decided was the truth.  

 

5.  

Where are the transitional species that are evidence of evolution, Ironhorse?  Here... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_transitional_fossils

His claims about being diligent in searching out the truth must be qualified with the evidence that he did not and has not done so.  What is much more evident is that he either never adequately searched or that he stopped searching once he became a committed Christian and then only sought out scientific and historical evidence that confirmed his religious beliefs, ignoring or dismissing everything else. 

 

6.

Life coming from non-life is not Evolution, it is Abiogenesis.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abiogenesis

This is a common point of confusion among Christians.  Evolution deals only with the changes life undergoes as it seeks to best adapt to changes in it's environment.  Abiogenesis is the change of non-living material into living material by natural (not supernatural) means.  Once again we can see that even though Ironhorse claims to be a seeker of the truth and a diligent reader, his understanding of science is woefully inadequate.

 

Thanks,

 

BAA.

[TheRedneckProfessor]

At first blush, I feel the need to point out, Ironhorse, that you did NOT reject evolution because you couldn't accept the idea that life came from non-life.  Evolution has nothing to say on the subject of where life began, how it came to this planet, or why it happened.  The branch of science which deals with the origins of life is called Abiogenesis.  Evolution simply explains how selective pressures in the environment lead to speciation by favoring genetic enhancements that are beneficial to those members of a species who have them.

 

"I agreed with Rob that both plants and animals can change to adapt to a given environment, but that was not evolution"  (emphasis mine).

 

This is, in fact, evolution, which you are confusing with abiogeneis.  Some theists make this mistake because they simply do not know better; they've done no research, no skeptical appraisal.  Other theists make this "mistake" intentionally, because they choose to be disingenuous and dishonest with what the evidence actually supports.

 

Which are you?

[TheRedneckProfessor]

For the lurkers and those interested:

 

http://bioinfo.med.utoronto.ca/Evolution_by_Accident/Evolution_and_Abiogenesis.html

 

http://thinkingthroughchristianity.com/2011/01/evolution-vs-abiogenesis-know-the-difference.html

[bornagainathiest]

 

Getting down basics, it can’t get any simpler than John 3:16.   

So to me, it was where else to go?  

Keep banging my head against the wall with countless arguments or thinking I should be able to get all the ducks in a row and KNOW everything about God? Seeking rock solid evidence before I accepted it as truth?

I was under no delusion that I could know everything.

So I maintained my Christian faith. I believe.

Since then I have tried to learn more and will continue to do the same.

For me, it’s a wonderful mysterious journey.

 

The decision Ironhorse made HERE and the false premise upon which he made it should not go un-examined by us.

.

.

.

He maintained his Christian faith because he couldn't know e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g about God and the Bible.

 

He tied the rejection of his Christian to an impossible condition - knowing everything about God and the Bible.

 

Surely he must have known beforehand that he could never know everything about God and the Bible?

.

.

.

So, either this was a knowing and deliberate ploy on his part to keep his belief system intact, or...

 

...he genuinely believed that the only condition he should reject his faith on is one of complete knowledge of God and the Bible.

 

If it's the former, then something's definitely rotten in the state of Ironhorse-land.

 

If it's the latter, then this is a sad indictment of his thinking.

[rjn]

BAA and RedneckProf, I have a noob question regarding abiogenesis. Evolution is an ever ongoing process, but how come new parallel evolutions and (shadow-?) biospheres do not occur? Why can't abiogenesis happen again and again? Maybe it does and I'm simply ignorant of the facts?

[sdelsolray]

BAA and RedneckProf, I have a noob question regarding abiogenesis. Evolution is an ever ongoing process, but how come new parallel evolutions and (shadow-?) biospheres do not occur? Why can't abiogenesis happen again and again? Maybe it does and I'm simply ignorant of the facts?

 

Mostly because now there is free oxygen in the atmosphere and oceans.  There are other reasons, but start with that.

[Bhim]

 

Of course Christianity made more sense to you, you were raised as one, whether you acknowledge that or not. Why is hinduism less probable according to you? Just asking.

 

No, I was not raised a Christian. I was raised by Christian parents. I did acknowledge that and I think you missed what I said about what they taught me. 

 

 

This is what I said about Hinduism : Polytheism with multiple (or countless gods), endless chants, beads, gurus, candles and rules to follow were way too much for me to make any sense of. A God I believe would make knowing him a lot easier. I also did not see many positive benefits it had on countries where it was a prominent belief.

 

 

Leaving aside the polytheism comment here...

 

I'm of course not going to argue this, because it makes no sense to argue against someone's personal experience. Your personal response to Hinduism is, simply, what it is.  Now as you say, it's true that there are seemingly endless chants, gurus, candles, and a lot of rules (though I've never seen any beads). However as someone who is uniquely qualified to judge the relative merits of Hinduism and Christianity, I will offer my own experience here, and say that making sense of rules is a welcome respite from wondering who is and isn't going to eternal conscious torment in hell. The problem with evangelical Christianity is that it is too simple. A popular version of Occam's Razor states "everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler." In my estimation and experience, Evangelical Christianity simplifies God to the point of confusion. One is left wondering whether he is emphasizing grace over law, justice over mercy, divine transcendence over immanence. Complex philosophical questions are cast as false dichotomies, leaving me with no answers whatsoever. And the cross of Christ, which is said to dispel this confusion and unify competing moral absolutes, only poisons morality by introducing the evil notion of eternal conscious torment for non-Christians.

 

I have personally found that it is far easier to understand God if you ignore this evil, vile Jesus, who presumes to send people to an invented hell for failing to worship God as he prescribes.

[TheRedneckProfessor]

BAA and RedneckProf, I have a noob question regarding abiogenesis. Evolution is an ever ongoing process, but how come new parallel evolutions and (shadow-?) biospheres do not occur? Why can't abiogenesis happen again and again? Maybe it does and I'm simply ignorant of the facts?

Oxygen is part of the equation, as sdelsolray notes.  Another facet, or possibility, is competition.  A prototype organism will consume nutrients from the environment better than a non-existent organism.  A developed organism will consume better still than would the prototype.  Resultantly, once abiogenesis occurred, evolution became a, sort of, one way street, wherein developed organisms continued to develop, becoming better at consumption than less developed counterparts, and ensuring that newer proto-organisms had little, if anything, left over for their own consumption.  It is possible, then, that multiple abiogeneses occurred, but, if that were the case, then, apparently, the one strain of life we observe today originated with the fittest, most well-adapted organisms stemming from one particular abiogenesis occurrence. 

[rjn]

I don't think IH really know what hinduism is either. His assessment sounds very much like the typical western caricature, full of misconceptions. Hinduism is an umbrella term for several more or less related (but not necessarily mutually exclusive) traditions. Some, such as ISKCON are as far as I know strictly monotheistic, with God (Krishna) as a personal entity.

 

Panentheism or monism seems to be one of the few uniting features in the plurality of traditions. Hey, some Hindus worship Jesus!

[Jeff]

No, I was not raised a Christian. I was raised by Christian parents....

This is nothing other than word play and wishful thinking on your part.

You were reared Christian.

[rjn]

 

No, I was not raised a Christian. I was raised by Christian parents....

This is nothing other than word play and wishful thinking on your part.

You were reared Christian.

Thank you. This is what I meant.

[disillusioned]

No disrespect IH, but the only argument you presented boils down to "I don't know how this happened, therefore God did it". This is classic God of the gaps.

 

Also, there is a huge gaping chasm between deism and theism which I don't think you treated with anything approaching enough rigor.

 

And then there is the fact that your entire story is predicated on faith. I have absolutely no problem with you believing anything that you want to. But "I chose to believe" is not an argument, nor is it a critical appraisal. I didn't choose to stop believing Christianity. I looked at it critically from the point of view of faith, and, against my will, found it to be lacking. I didn't have to choose to not be a Christian; I just found out that I wasn't one anymore. Many here can say the same. I understand that you have faith. I understand what it means and what it is like. If it makes you happy, then have at it. But don't let's pretend like this is a reasoned position that you are taking. It isn't.

[ironhorse]

So to me, it was where else to go?

Keep banging my head against the wall with countless arguments or thinking I should be able to get all the ducks in a row and KNOW everything about God? Seeking rock solid evidence before I accepted it as truth?

I was under no delusion that I could know everything.
So I maintained my Christian faith. I believe.

Since then I have tried to learn more and will continue to do the same.

For me, it’s a wonderful mysterious journey.

 

Richard Dawkins’ Belief Scale Scoring Rubric

 

1.Strong Theist: I do not question the existence of God, I KNOW he exists.
2.De-facto Theist: I cannot know for certain but I strongly believe in God and I live my life on the assumption that he is there.
3.Weak Theist: I am very uncertain, but I am inclined to believe in God.
4.Pure Agnostic: God’s existence and non-existence are exactly equiprobable.
5.Weak Atheist: I do not know whether God exists but I’m inclined to be skeptical.
6.De-facto Atheist: I cannot know for certain but I think God is very improbable and I live my life under the assumption that he is not there.
7.Strong Atheist: I am 100% sure that there is no God.

 

As I said before, I’m number 2 on the scale. I can’t prove by science that God exists. So, yes my belief is based not only what I see as evidence but the bottom line is that it is faith.

I don’t KNOW everything. Tell me who does?

 

Good reading on this topic from NPR:

 

Where Did Life Come From? The Mind? The Universe? Can We Even Know?
http://www.npr.org/sections/13.7/2013/03/20/174729853/where-did-life-come-from-the-mind-the-universe-can-we-even-know

[florduh]

If one is unable to live with the fact that he will never have all the answers, making up an answer will have to do. It most likely won't be a RIGHT answer, but it will have to do.

 

I have realized that science, though sometimes slow and sometimes wrong, uses the facts available to understand reality and has made great, proven progress we benefit from every day. I also realized that any answers coming from religion are only, can be only, blind guesses since observable evidence doesn't need to come into play.