Hello everyone,
First, I must say that for the most part of the time, i am fairly well but my problem can be a source of anxiety, source that is not welcome das i have already an anxiety disorder.
So, rationally, i consider myself an atheist. Though, i was educated as a christian, i never was very, very convinced by the religion. Funny thing, when i did the "confirmation?", i rose up me head, hoping to see the Holy Spirit, but obviously nothing happened. Since i was very young, i had an inquisitive mind and was passionate about sciences.
I came close to metaphysical naturalism early but since a few years, it's like something is broken in this brain of mind. I doubt evolution evn if rationally it makes sense and i can see microevolution's happening, i doubt the law of disintegration and even if i do not accept creationism or any other theistic ideology, it is very disturbing.
Anyone here has a clever solution to "heal" my mind? It would be so kind of you.
P.S: i already know of talksorigins.org and infidels.org
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Often the trick to this is to try and prove exactly what it is you believe. Stop trying to disprove it. Make an honest effort to write down exactly what you believe, Get it out in the open. Not some vague BS but exactly what you think you believe. GET IT OUT. It will not survive exposure to the sunlight. Be honest with yourself and just say it the way it is. Put it out there. Don't worry about being wrong. Take what you think you believe and EXPOSE IT.
I will try this, thanks. It will take time but it is worth it i guess.
First, i am aware of all evidence from astronomy, biology, geology and physics in general. At the same time, i wish that i had some entity who would be there for me whatever the situation. I say that i don't know what it would be like, but it would not be something surnatural, or magic.
I don't say anything more that could be put in the categorie "vague BS"
Not what it is not. What it is. Keep digging. It is not flowers, ocean, doors, chairs, wind, consciousness etc.... etc..... etc.....
What you said it.... "It's vague." So something vague is causing you all your problems? Does that make any sense at all? Think again - What is it. Ask yourself before you fall asleep at night and in the morning pay attention to the first thing that pops into your head.
Keep asking, what do you really believe?. How badly do you want to find out? I promise you that whatever it is, it is not going to survive in the open.
Was it Mr Feynman who said that if you can't explain it simply with you own words, you don't understand it?
And how will you understand it and how badly do you want to understand it? You are at a point of choice. You can spend the time and effort to find out. You can make yourself work and ask the hard questions. You can choose not to work which is really a choice to continue with things the way they are. You can just leave it to the future and do nothing which is really a choice to just let things continue. When the frustration of letting things continue as they are gets painful enough, you will simply be forced to change.
It is very important for me to understand, it basically an existential questions. When i was in therapy with psychologists, it was very easy for thoughts and emotions to get out of my mouth. I will ask the hard questions, and first you have to find them. Don't worry i'm not the type of guy to shy away from immediate introspection.
If you or anyone want to dump things here feel free to do it.
First question: Do i believe i have a place in the grand scheme of the Universe?... ehhh No!
No. It is not existential. It is YOU. It does not matter if thoughts or emotions come out of your mouth. You don't have to find them. You don't have to find anything. They are right there holding you back. If they were not here you would not be engaged in this conversation. They find you and you are asserting that you can not find them. This makes no sense. They are here with you now.
"Do you have a place in the grand scheme of the universe."
1. What makes you think there is a grand scheme?
2. Why would you ask such a question?
3. You are having a nice dinner with a pretty woman. It's a five star restaurant. Perhaps you have ordered steak or a big crisp green salad with bits of shiny red tomatoes in it, perhaps there is a beer in a pilsner glass, sparkling golden cool or a glass of deep red or white wine by the plate. The lights are low and she is smiling. You catch a glimpse of an earring and it flashes for a moment. What in the hell does having a place in the grand scheme of the universe have to do with anything? Take a breath!!! You are here NOW. That is not a real question. It effects nothing. It is as unknowable as the number of grains of sand making up the planet.
You can not answer this question YES or NO. You do not have enough evidence either way. Are you simply avoiding the obvious? "I have no idea," Is it just "not knowing" that seems depressing? It is actually liberating because the journey of exploring is amazing. Is it just creating magical unsolvable problems for yourself that keeps you from living? Sorry but your question is a dumb question. It obviously has no power over you at all. You can not assume the universe has a grand scheme.
You can not assume it does not have a grand scheme. It's actually a very boring question that leads to nothing. Try Again!
Yes, in the end, We, I do not know. The part with a grand scheme was ironical and honestly, i don't care either way. It is late by night in the Indian ocean, i will post another anwser, probably tomorrow.
I care but I don't care. There will always be another tomorrow. And miles to go before I sleep. And miles to go before I sleep.
Another good trick I did was waste 30 years trying to prove the Bible right. Only to prove it to be the book of lies that it is. I have never been anything other than an atheist my whole life, excepting those ten years I pretended. And I only did that make them stop beating the shit of me for asking questions they could not answer.
Anxiety Disorder. I don't know. I still suffer Social Anxiety Disorder as part of my PTSD. Since I ain't solved my problem, can't help you much.
rmfr
Yes this book is full of lies, i am not saying i believe any of the religions or any new age bullshit. In pratice, i live my life as an atheist.
I'm sorry you have this disorder and PTSD. I hope you will get well one day but whatever help you can send me, no matter how small, is welcomed.
As for me, i am on Clomipramine, 100 mg per day.
Clomipramine. Have no idea what that is. Could look it up, but if I ain't on it, I don't need to know. Me. Let's see if I can remember it all. Gabapentin - nerve pain (we finally got a dosage that seems to be working, however, still cannot just stand); Naprosene (extra potent Aleve) - for joint pain and works great as long as I do not forget a dose. Prilosec - GERD. Flurazepam - for sleep if needed. Ondansetron - nasea when needed for migraine (like right now as I type). Amitriptyline - when needed for migraine (like right now as I type). Clonazepam - sedative (in addition to flurazepam) for severe migraines (still thinking about taking this and the flurazepam right now as I type). Zoloft - anti-depressant. And they are thinking of an additional anti-depressant.
As for the PTSD, it ain't never going away. All I can is what I have done. Learn to live with it. PTSD, if you ask Cognostic, can have the combined effects of:
Major Depressive Disorder
Major Manic Disorder
(these two could hypothetically be combined into Bipolar; however, they quite different than Bipolar)
Social Anxiety Disorder
Schizophrenia Disorder, sometimes Schizophrenic Delusion Disorder
Dissociative Disorder (not quite like the DID one) usually combines with Schizophrenia to create a mental fugue where the sufferer is reliving a past event as if suffering a somnambulance disorder. However, the sufferer is completely awake.
And all of the above can drive a person into Substance Abuse Disorder.
It ain't been easy dealing with this PTSD, which I just recently learned is actually the Complex version of it. The Complex version, as I describe it, is like having a big bully that constantly terrorizes you and you CANNOT get from it.
In learning to live with this disorder, I have found that learning everything I can about it, and constantly updating every few years. In "KNOWING" the enemy I am facing makes it easier to deal with that enemy. And yes, when it comes to anything, I face off against as if it is an enemy (excepting that which you know is not like a wife and daughters). Me dad taught me that everything in life is an enemy and you would do well learn all you can about those enemies. And to clarify, this does not mean to face off against everything with a kill or be killed attitude, it just means that life is an enemy you wrestle with all your life. Make sense?
Good luck with the anxiety. Perhaps if you learn all you can about it, it might help.
rmfr
Clomipramine is a anti-depressant. I'm getting used to my anxiety disorder, i also have intrusive thoughts, which do not concern anything religious.
If you can live with what you have relatively well, and you have loving people with you ( and also us), i think it's not so bad. Again, i am not in your mind so it is pure conjecture.
Talyyn: "If you can live with what you have relatively well, and you have loving people with you ( and also us), i think it's not so bad. Again, i am not in your mind so it is pure conjecture."
Yeah but it was very rough road the first ten years. Well, I shouldn't say "road" because there weren't any. That first ten years was like hiking across Mustafar (Star Wars: Episode III: Revenge of the Sith). And in actuality, only in the last five years has it really smoothed out to a road. Now about all I have is the occassion pot-hole.
The middle ten years (6-15) of the last 20, were what helped the most. I was back in college. The one place I feel the most comfortable. The knowledge I learned in thos ten years, especially the psychology knowledge, was worth more to me than the degrees I earned. The psychology courses I took allowed me to study further into PTSD and understand what enemy I am still facing to this day. However, having an understanding of one's enemy does not mean the enemy cannot still get to me. Getting to the point I am at, my enemies, PTSD and Adult ADHD, have that uncanny method of just picking at me little by little until it has built to major depression. Then the depression leads to the nightmares, the suicidal thoughts. Then sometimes there are the megalomaniacal thoughts that the entire human species, including myself, should be eradicated from the face of the Earth.
Yeah, babbling and ranting again. Although the road for me has smoothed significantly, it is not without its pot-holes...
rmfr
P.S. — LOVE the new avatar. Reminds me of the hilarious movie "Evolution"
Just curious:
Does your skepticism of the law of disintegration come from its probabilistic nature?
Not really, i'm very comfortable with this. It is not even the fact that for some radioisotopes the half-life is very long, no, in fact, it is probably the concept of uniformity and the initial conditions of the rocks which are tested.
Just as i was typing, i thought that this could very well be tested with astronomical observations of supernovae remmants.
Sounds like you have a problem with radiometric dating, not the law of disintegration per se. Is that an accurate description?
I could say it is that. Also there is too the frate of formation of sediment layer. I know that if there is some natural catastrophe, this rate can be change for exemple but most of the time we have evidence of that.
I don't really get what you are referring too.
Well, let me put this way. When you look at a cliff from a canyon, you see layers. I was talking about the time it would take for a layer of a particular sediment to grow to a specific thickness.
But the rate a layer of sediment grows is not just a function of time. I'm sorry, I can't seem to get what you are saying.
Oh!... so can you explain to me what you know about that? It may help me to explain what i am trying to say?
Edit
Well I'm no expert, and we have a geologist here on the forums. But I'll offer this:
If you had a tank of water in a lab, and inserted dirt at a constant rate; then the rate of accumulation on the bottom of the tank MIGHT be a function of just time. In any more complicated situation, it will not be a function of just time.
Although I do not remember all the factors, basically, there are a million and one factors that determine a million and one methods for sedimentation. As Nyar showed above, sedimentation is NOT static of over time, and then is also dependent which form(s) of sedimentation occur at a given locale. Types of sedimentation: oceanic, pelagic (freshwater bodies), fluvial, aeolian.
One could look at the Grand Canyon, seeing one layer that is one meter thick that took only a million years to form and another layer just above that, one meter thick, and it may have taken 10 million years to form.
It is a very, very complex subject.
rmfr
@Talyyn
It is good you mention that, while your problem can be a source of anxiety, to also realize it is two separate issues that must be tackled, your anxiety, and your problem. While solving your problem may help with your anxiety, you should also work to try and minimize and solve as best you can your anxiety.
First we all suffer from some anxiety, it is natural to have some anxiety, it is another feature of the brain to get us to focus on stuff that we might otherwise not focus on, and for most of humanity needing to be anxious about the lion that may eat you or your family is a real anxiety that we should have, or we may more likely get eaten.
Like so many other things, it is about balance, you are going to have some anxiety, but you also need to be able to manage it, and direct it to be useful to you. Some anxiety before a big test is a good thing, gets you to study more even if you are tired and bored. Too much anxiety before a big test is a bad thing as you can "freeze up" or not get a good night sleep before the test etc. I personally control my anxiety through logic, I suppress the emotional brain when I realize I am anxious and I examine it as logically as I can. I ask my self well, what CAN I do about the problem that makes me anxious?
For instance right now I have higher then usual levels of anxiety concerning the outcome of elections today, so what can I do about it? Well I can make sure I vote, and that my friends and family votes, I am going to give a ride to a friend today that does not have a working car at the moment to get to the voting booth. Even if they may vote differently then me on some issues, I feel the more people that vote instead of not voting the more likely special interest groups and "dark money" does not rule the day the more likely there is of a better outcome. I am doing what I can about it, and then I tell myself I done what is reasonably enough about the situation, I did what I could and I am going to relax on what I do not have control over.
Even though I have little to no actual religion exposure like that, I think I too, especially at that age would of looked around to see if I could see the holy spirit. Only natural, so much talk about this god figure, but never any actual appearances to our senses, I would be like all those hours of church and talk, where is the "meat?"
What part of evolution do you doubt? Or is it the whole thing? If you got more specific perhaps myself and others can help you with the doubts. I had to look up "the law of of disintegration."
Google results spit back a bunch of stuff about the law of radioactive disintegration, and then 3rd link or so down a link to "law of disintegration from Deidre Madison an author and spiritual life coach. With a headline that reads: "LAWS TO SHIFT FROM 3D-5D UNIVERSAL LIVING
The Universal Laws and Conditions of Third Dimension Living: How to Shift Consciously from 3D - 5D Universal Living"
And immediately credibility alarm bells start going off in my head. A quick search and the word "god" is used 49 times on that first page. Yeah you SHOULD doubt the law of disintegration it does not appear to be widely accepted or well supported law at all.
I need to know more of what needs to be "healed" before I could even begin to try to offer a solution, and while I may be able to offer some tidbit, some magic wave of the wand solution of words of wisdom that will solve all of this for you is rather unlikely.
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▮ I am an atheist that always likes a good debate. ▮
▮ Please include @LogicFTW in responses directed to me. ▮
▮ Useful list on forum usage. A.R. Member since 2016. ▮
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When i said the law of disintegration, i was talking about the lrelation between the numbers of initial nucleus with time, current number of nucleus and the constant of disintegration.
For evolution, sometimes, it is like i can't fathom the changes that can happen with time, i do not doubt the mechanisms themselves. Or i doubt that geological layers form at the rate we think they do.
Thanks for taking the tim to help me, we can put the middle fingers at all those theists that say we have no morals.
@Talyyn
Okay I think you are actually talking about Radioactive law of Disintegration, and perhaps have it a bit mixed up in your head. As a few youtube videos and blogs talk about simply law of disintegration, that tries to gain validity with the established radioactive law of disintegration. If you want to discuss radioactive law of disintegration, let me know and I can type up my unprofessional thoughts on that one.
That is understandable, the time scales are enormous, we humans have a hard time considering lengths of time we can not possibly relate to. The largest measure of time we can relate to at all accurately is the length of our life so far. So if you are 30 years old, time spans of 100 years is very hard to relate to, never mind 100's of millions of years. Geological layers is a visual representation of this enormous length of time. You can go to grand canyon national park, look out at the canyon walls and see geological layers in visual form. The time scales it represents is hard to wrap your mind around. Perhaps consider that if one "geological" layer represents 10 million years and is ~10 meters thick (for sake of easy math) That is 1 meter per million years, 1 millimeter for 1000 years, or
about the thickness of your average human hair for an average human lifespan today. Layer deposit starts making a lot more sense if all it has to average is the thickness of one hair strand over your entire lifetime.
Changes that happens over time is hard to fathom, hopefully the above helps some.
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▮ I am an atheist that always likes a good debate. ▮
▮ Please include @LogicFTW in responses directed to me. ▮
▮ Useful list on forum usage. A.R. Member since 2016. ▮
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@ LogicFTW
“I feel the more people that vote instead of not voting the more likely special interest groups and "dark money" does not rule the day the more likely there is of a better outcome.”
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If you are in a different country, ignore all the below. However, I have to completely disagree with you on the voting thing. This is mostly meant for Americans who have been deluded about the "voting" thing.
Here in America, your voting really does no good. It is a complete illusion the Religious Absolutists, who have taken control of the political offices in this country, have created to make you think have a say in anything. It is NEVER the vote of the people that elects politicians, bond issues, etc. It is an elitist group, The Electorate, that truly decides ALL voting issues. All the popular vote does is give The Electorate (those whose votes actually do the electing) an idea of what the people (at least those who do vote) may actually want. However, The Electorate need NEVER side with the people. Look at how presidents that have been elected, yet they also lost the popular vote, sometimes by a large margin. Trump is just the latest example. In the State of North Carolina, the State Electorate has been voting against the people about 1 in 3 times. And this has been increasing as the "nones" increase in numbers and the religious are decreasing, thus losing some of their powerful strangle hold they have enjoyed in North Carolina. This is also largely due to the fact that a lot of Northerners who are "Nones" are also moving to the Southern Baptist Bible Belt region of Georgia and North Carolina. The second and third biggest states in population within the Bible Belt, respectively, and the eighth and ninth in the whole USA. Those "Nones" northerners are tempering North Carolina down, but there are pockets where the Baptists still hold complete power.
And here is a good question. Here in America, it is only about 20% of the eligible people who do vote. Thus, how can you say that that 20% is actually voting for whole? How can you say that that 20% is actually voting for what ALL the people want? The hypothesis I have is that the greater majority of people in America are actually smart enough to know that their vote is as worthless as the brown logs everyone drops in the toilet. I have known that it is NOT the popular vote that elects anything since high school before I was of voting age. I learned in high school that it is actually The Electorate, sometimes called Electoral College(s), that actually does the voting that counts. Reiteration, the popular vote does nothing but give The Electorate an idea of what the people MAY want. If The Electorate has already decided the issue, then your vote counts for NOTHING.
I do not vote because my vote counts for nothing. The Electorate, especially in the last 20 years has simply laughed at the people and done whatsoever they desired. Trust me. I have downloaded the data for virtually every election from 1992 to 1998, then from 2004 to 2012. About 35 to 40% of elections, especially on the State level, the issue was voted for AGAINST the popular vote. And in presidential elections, Bill Clinton lost the popular vote in his second candidacy. George Bush Junior lost the popular vote his second time. Even Barack Obama lost the popular vote his second time. At least that is what the date I downloaded indicated. So you who do vote and create these god damned problems expect me to believe that my vote counts when the evidence says it does not? George Carlin summed it up perfectly:
And as George said, since I do not vote, I absolutely have every right to complain about the shitty mess you assholes have created by voting those assholes into office, especially when they fuck everything up. You who do vote are the ones who ain’t got nothing to complain about. Sooo… Shut the fuck up!
Sorry for the rant, but you who think your vote matters in America, well, wake up and smell the roses of reality.
rmfr
So, in America you have to get rid of the electoral college. We do not have that in France but still, voting are always rigged.
The Electoral college would probably not be so bad if we could eliminate the Gerrymandering. States are divided up into districts based on political affiliation.; (manipulate the boundaries of (an electoral constituency) so as to favor one party or class.) This is what really kills the electoral process in my opinion.
I fully agree that the Electoral College is a problem. At the same time, I can't imagine a one person one vote, count them all system. The states have individual power in America and I want them to keep that and oppose the Federal Government. That helps with the balance of Power. So, states giving their votes to a candidate and having an internal vote is attractive to me. At the same time there is a whole lot of crazy crap that goes on at the state level to render votes non-countable. So... I guess we agree, there is a whole lot of "rigging" that goes on in any election.
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