ilzolende comments on Welcome to Less Wrong! (7th thread, December 2014) - Less Wrong

16 Post author: Gondolinian 15 December 2014 02:57AM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Comments (635)

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: ilzolende 02 February 2015 05:44:20AM *  0 points [-]

"Pantheism is the belief that the universe (or nature as the totality of everything) is identical with divinity, or that everything composes an all-encompassing, immanent God. Pantheists thus do not believe in a distinct personal or anthropomorphic god" (Wikipedia).

That matches to my interpretation of your stated beliefs.

I believe that God exists as the Universe working within itself... and that as each of us live, we each experience God.

Most of the atheism stuff on this site has more to do with a god that is a discrete being with supernatural capabilities than the thing you describe. However, if the main reason that you're not an atheist is that you have trouble picturing a godless universe, and you change beliefs based on what you learn and hear about the world (good work, by the way), chances are good that you'll end up being an atheist if you spend enough time on this site. ;)

If you actually want to clarify your beliefs, it could help to imagine some different worlds and see whether they count as having God in them or not, in order to consider what constitutes the absence of God. If there's no scenario that counts as God not existing, then I'm not sure what your belief that "God exists" is supposed to represent, and what information about the world someone could derive from that belief, given that it was true.

Thanks so much for the data about party affiliation!

Also, if you count subconscious desires to act in one's own interest as "ulterior motives", you may like what Robin Hanson on Overcoming Bias has to say about signaling.