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From: rlr@pyuxn.UUCP (Rich Rosen)
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: Religious Test
Message-ID: <382@pyuxn.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 14-Dec-83 11:30:28 EST
Article-I.D.: pyuxn.382
Posted: Wed Dec 14 11:30:28 1983
Date-Received: Fri, 16-Dec-83 02:12:57 EST
References: <673@ssc-vax.UUCP>
Organization: Bell Labs, Piscataway
Lines: 55

First, a bit of fun...

	I would like to conduct another experiment which, I think, will prove
of equivalent usefulness to ssc-vax!david's previous article. Please respond
to the following questions:

>> "If I proved that Ubizmo was the Megalithic Holy Supreme Glop, would you
	consider Him?"    <<
>> "If I proved the Book of Ubizmo to be a reliable document, would you believe 
	it?" <<

	Try very hard to objectively step back and examine the thoughts in your
head.  *IF* someone could actually prove it, would you readily accept it?  Or
does the statement invoke a violent negative reaction of the genus "I already
know that Jesus is the Son of God and/or other proven truths so take your
blasphemous horsehockey elsewhere"?

	POSITIVE:  If you are agreeable to the statements, then we need more of
your type on the net.  You are probably willing to agree to go along with any
type of religious thinking, without cluttering your mind with facts and
evidence.

	NEGATIVE:  If, however, your response was an emotional, violent, NO!,
you will spend the rest of your eternal life in Kargomungo, the resting place
(according to the Book of Ubizmo) for heathens, homosexuals, haranguers, and
harmonica players.

Now to dispense with david's mode of argument, and on to answering the
questions he puts forth.  I will not argue about the "proveability" of
religious doctrines.  They probably are unproveable, but so what?  I don't
think that most of what all of us believe in (not just religion-wise) is
*totally* proveable.  Usually, though, we have reasons for believing the
things we believe in based on evidence.  No matter.  Through a leap of 
logic on david's part, he seems to think that because (in his hypothetical
argument) he has proven that Jesus is the Son of God, and that the Bible
is God's word and a reliable document, he (and apparently I) should now
accept God/Jesus/Ubizmo as the guiding force/controller/master/dictator in 
his (and my and your) life.  I fail to see the reason for this.  Apparently,
david feels that such a leap should be automatic and obvious.  This is where
the so-called humanist camp and the so-called religionist (autocratic
religionist) camp differ.  From my viewpoint, I have no reason to believe in
a god or any non-physicalist entity ("mind","soul","essence","life-force")
since I see no evidence for things beyond the physical.  There are unexplained
things, but I don't automatically jump and say "therefore there must be
something outside of our physical universe" because this is so.  If david
should succeed in proving the existence of a god and/or that it/he/she wrote
the Bible and had a son and gave out cigars, why should I be affected?  Why
should it change my life?  Yes, solid proof would alter my perceptions of the
physical world, but why should I change the way I behave?  Now if you proved
that gravity did not exist, or perhaps that life was just an illusion and
relality was a virtual chocolate truffle, that might change how I live, but
just proving that there's a god?  Sure, if you PROVED it I'd believe it, but
so what?  Sorry that I didn't fit neatly into one of your categories.
-- 
					Rich Rosen    pyuxn!rlr