Could the belief in god considered a mental illness ?

originally posted by: ClovenSky
a reply to: rom12345

What about the massive amount of guilt each and every man created religion causes? Not wearing a burka being a female in public....Going to Hell. Pleasured yourself recently....going to hell. Respected a contract with a joium ... going to hell. So many BS laws that have nothing, absolutely nothing to do with leading a virtuous life.

I wonder how many other mental illnesses are directly caused by religion. You know, man made control mechanisms that don't reflect reality in the slightest. You believe because you can't witness most of the cause and effect the man created texts espouse. You hold tightly onto that belief while reality tells you a completely different story. Cognitive dissonance anyone?

Yes, you have understood my thread the way I wanted it to be understood. Everything that comes out of our brain is a fiction, just a human made fiction, and there is no way around it. Religion is a special kind of fiction because it's a fiction that is supposed to give meaning to all our other fictions. Believing in god is to believe that our fictions have a meaning outside of our brain, that the universe understands our fictions, that god may even have the same kind of fictions inside his mind. "God has a plan for us all", "I am being tested", etc..

God, if something like that exists, is not a biped that exists inside space and time, a creature that walks in 3d space. It is said that god created us in his image, but truly it is the other way around, we have created god in our image, just to give meaning to our fictions.

Just like colors don't really exist outside of our human brains, and sound, and smells... Our brain is full of fictions.

originally posted by: rom12345
a reply to: Jay-morris
You must know a great deal, to deduce that I know little.
In your post you appear to have a theory of my mind, and the validity of my opinion.
If you are interested in the topic, start with NPD, the BPD, and then work through all the clusters.
Keep a bible handy to find the parallels.
Until then, your expertness in my non expertness in not up for debate.

I cannot read your mind. I simply asked you for evidence, and you could not give me any. Why do I have to keep a fairy tale book handy? That's not evidence.

a reply to: gosseyn
Colors do exist outside our brains, in the form of light frequency, which is an apt analogy.
It could be argued that our entire conscious experience is a flawed hallucination.
Perhaps the finest of these is that of God. If we could prove the non existence of God, we would also in a way prove that we do not exists.
But we know we do.
Many people have a beef with God, and so exhaust their powers of deduction to prove he is not real.
In my view, this is not needed.
We should not seek to blame God for the gift of physics.
In this world you can only very seldom think/pray your way out of blunt force trauma.
Much of the suffering, people seek to blame God for, it the product of "Man" in a fallen state.
God is not in the business of preventing it, in fact, I believe the plan to be, that we though our own will, refrain from causing suffering. Which is a very big ask, when we often are unaware of consequences of our actions.

Those who do not hold God above their own reason frankly scare the hell out of me.

If we concede that our brains are indeed full of fiction, what do we do with that ?

We could certainly produce a nihilistic philosophy, but some prefer to have faith.
Real or not, having faith that there is meaning, is what brings hope, which produces the stability of mind to not either commit atrocity or suicide.

a reply to: rom12345

Those who do not hold God above their own reason frankly scare the hell out of me.

Why? How many religions are out there? Each one, the believer swears theirs is the true religion. How do you know your religion is the right one? How do you know you are not following the wrong God, and will go to hell for that. Yes you will say "I know my God is the true God" but they all say that!

Religion has pretty much been around since we have. Way longer than Christianity or Islam. It's logical primitive people would look to a higher being. So many things they did not understand in the world. That's all religion is. There is not God. There is no heaven and hell. All stories made up to explain why we are here, and also to control people.

That being said, I do not believe it's a mental illness. Just our nature to believe there is more to this.

a reply to: Jay-morris
Don't expect to know God, just follow the commandments and introspect on the teachings.
Don't confuse the voice of Man, with the voice of God.
Many just wars have been fought to uphold the principles of peace.

originally posted by: rom12345
a reply to: gosseyn
Colors do exist outside our brains, in the form of light frequency, which is an apt analogy.
It could be argued that our entire conscious experience is a flawed hallucination.
Perhaps the finest of these is that of God. If we could prove the non existence of God, we would also in a way prove that we do not exists.
But we know we do.
Many people have a beef with God, and so exhaust their powers of deduction to prove he is not real.
In my view, this is not needed.
We should not seek to blame God for the gift of physics.
In this world you can only very seldom think/pray your way out of blunt force trauma.
Much of the suffering, people seek to blame God for, it the product of "Man" in a fallen state.
God is not in the business of preventing it, in fact, I believe the plan to be, that we though our own will, refrain from causing suffering. Which is a very big ask, when we often are unaware of consequences of our actions.

Those who do not hold God above their own reason frankly scare the hell out of me.

If we concede that our brains are indeed full of fiction, what do we do with that ?

We could certainly produce a nihilistic philosophy, but some prefer to have faith.
Real or not, having faith that there is meaning, is what brings hope, which produces the stability of mind to not either commit atrocity or suicide.

No, colors don't exist outside of our brain.

A 700nm wavelength does not equal red. The red experience only exists inside of our brain. Just like coffee doesn't "smell coffee". There is no intrinsic "red quality" to a 700nm photon wavelength, it's only inside our brain, it is the way our brain translates reality. We are able to tell if the eyes of a dog or a cat are able to catch this or that wavelength, but we have no way of knowing if they experience "red" with a 700nm wavelength just like the majority of humans. In fact, science is unable to tell us what is exactly happening when we experience the red or the yellow color, or a smell, or a sound, it is even literally called The hard problem of consciousness.

originally posted by: rom12345
a reply to: Jay-morris
Don't expect to know God, just follow the commandments and introspect on the teachings.
Don't confuse the voice of Man, with the voice of God.
Many just wars have been fought to uphold the principles of peace.

But God also commanded the deaths of innocent men, women and children in the bible. What do you think about that?

Now therefore, kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman who has known man intimately. But all the girls who have not known man intimately, spare for yourselves. Numbers 31:17-18

Samuel 15:3: "This is what the Lord Almighty says ... 'Now go and strike Amalek and devote to destruction all that they have. Do not spare them, but kill both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey.' "

Murder, rape, pillage, plunder, slavery, and child abuse can not be justified by saying that some god says it’s OK. If you are happy worshiping a God like that, then that's ok, as long as you do not hurt anyone, it's up to you.

You saying, and I quote "Those who do not hold God above their own reason frankly scare the hell out of me." I feel the same about people who follow these religions.

i realise i am ate to this thread but - hear goes my opinion on the matter :

belief in " god // gods " in of itself - is not a " mental illness "

absolute adherence to religious dogmas - is a mental illness .

YMMV .

originally posted by: gosseyn

No, colors don't exist outside of our brain.

Technically they do exist outside our brain. Unless there's some quantum weirdness going on where it only actualizes once observed, which I would be open to believing if there was some evidence this was the case (this would be hard to prove). What is really amazing is that all the color we see around us, in mostly everything we observe, especially in nature, exists on a narrow spectrum of about 400nanometers (.0000004 meters). The electromagnetic spectrum is theoretically infinitely large, which indicates how much more there is than the thin 400nm visible spectrum that we essentially base our whole life around.

originally posted by: cooperton

originally posted by: gosseyn

No, colors don't exist outside of our brain.

Technically they do exist outside our brain. Unless there's some quantum weirdness going on where it only actualizes once observed, which I would be open to believing if there was some evidence this was the case (this would be hard to prove). What is really amazing is that all the color we see around us, in mostly everything we observe, especially in nature, exists on a narrow spectrum of about 400nanometers (.0000004 meters). The electromagnetic spectrum is theoretically infinitely large, which indicates how much more there is than the thin 400nm visible spectrum that we essentially base our whole life around.

There is no intrinsic color property attached to this or that wavelength, it is just the way our brain translates this or that wavelength. We have no idea how other creatures with eyes and brains translate the same wavelength. Just like the weight of an object is not an intrinsic property of that object, but it depends on gravity.

Which means that if evolution had chosen another path, we could be listening to light waves and seeing sound waves. And in fact, some people have what is called Synesthesia, which enables them to see sound and to hear light among other things. Our brain translates reality.

It seems people in general have a hard time understanding this concept.

a reply to: gosseyn

Russians scientists have discovered that dogs have dichrome vision , between yellow and blue

they see everything in a spectrum from deep blue through to bright yellow

before we thought they only differentiated shape and movement via brightness

turns out they see blue and yellow like those with colour blindness.

For smells I think I remember reading an article that states the brain remembers the molecular shape of the smell and then puts that back together for you in your brain at the quantum level .


Thanks for the links to hard problems of the mind

originally posted by: sapien82
a reply to: gosseyn

Russians scientists have discovered that dogs have dichrome vision , between yellow and blue

they see everything in a spectrum from deep blue through to bright yellow

before we thought they only differentiated shape and movement via brightness

turns out they see blue and yellow like those with colour blindness.

For smells I think I remember reading an article that states the brain remembers the molecular shape of the smell and then puts that back together for you in your brain at the quantum level .


Thanks for the links to hard problems of the mind

You see, that's the problem of consciousness, there is no way to know what that creature experiences, in this case a dog. All we are able to tell is that if their eyes are able to catch this or that wavelength, but we truly have no idea of how their brain translates that. We don't know if they experience red, yellow or blue or some other colors humans have never even experienced. And there are animals that can catch many other wavelengths, that must correspond to many more colors than humans can experience, colors we might never experience, like this shrimp.

a reply to: cooperton

You know, I am really beginning to appreciate Jesus. Who that 'person/deity/myth/legend/whatever' was at heart was a wonderful example of a soul appreciating this life while maintaining honor and nobility. I don't really care if they were real or not at this point. It is just sad to see such a beautiful figure/creation turned into a tool of slavery. Jesus never claimed he was god:

www.npr.org...

You do find Jesus calling himself God in the Gospel of John, or the last Gospel. Jesus says things like, "Before Abraham was, I am." And, "I and the Father are one," and, "If you've seen me, you've seen the Father." These are all statements you find only in the Gospel of John, and that's striking because we have earlier gospels and we have the writings of Paul, and in none of them is there any indication that Jesus said such things. ...

On how Roman emperors were called "God" .......

'Ggod is in all of us'

a reply to: gosseyn

Hell yes brother. If we create our own interpretation of this reality, each and every single one of us, why not make is something glorious and wonderful? Why not make it something that actually reflects the cause and effect or as I like to believe..the karma of this reality.

Why not be noble and just because you are sharing this reality with fellow soul travelers that are just trying to figure stuff out like the rest of us? Being good because it is the right thing to do over being good because some angry god demands it seems like a better route to take. As someone pointed out before, look at all of the blood religion has on it's hands. The ultimate sacrilege against this reality, the interference of the free will of another soul.

WE could change this reality and it wouldn't even take the majority. We could prize soul connections over the material. We could covet honesty and self pride over screwing over others for more money. Self pride....self pride in being noble. Self pride in not selling out at any costs, because staining the soul is the worse thing you could do in this reality.

Truth of this reality. Nobility of purpose and thought. Honor of actions and word. All the things organized religion is not.

a reply to: rom12345

What about your interpretation of agnostics? They don't deny god. They just deny that knowledge is possible while existing here in this reality.

a reply to: ClovenSky
I think being agnostic is an honest position. It is not far off, to actually believing.
I would encourage agnostics to have faith.

a reply to: rom12345

Some would twist that and say they have the greatest faith of all. For they feel and acknowledge the spirit in each and everyone of us while knowing this reality is meant to be a mystery. It is what makes it great. Then it is easy to filter out the dis-truth....anyone claiming to have knowledge of what is beyond the veil.

originally posted by: gosseyn

There is no intrinsic color property attached to this or that wavelength, it is just the way our brain translates this or that wavelength. We have no idea how other creatures with eyes and brains translate the same wavelength. Just like the weight of an object is not an intrinsic property of that object, but it depends on gravity.

Yeah, for example People with color-blindness see things differently because they have 2 instead of the 3 necessary photopigments to perceive the full visible spectrum. Yet mostly all humans (those that aren't color blind) are tuned to this very precise colored system. It is like we are tuned to a particular TV channel which we all share. Someone may have the TV settings changed so it displays differently (i.e. color-blindness) but the actual broadcast is still going in regular color.

Which means that if evolution had chosen another path, we could be listening to light waves and seeing sound waves.

Evolution making the human retina would be equivalent to a gorilla inventing a camera. It is way too complex to have been generated without intelligence. Your thread about consciousness being the most fundamental facet of reality seems very likely to be true, but evolution is antithetical to that notion.

And in fact, some people have what is called Synesthesia, which enables them to see sound and to hear light among other things. Our brain translates reality.

The immense neural networks in our brains could be able to cross reference information from the various sensory organs even to the degree that they overlap in such a way as exhibited in synesthesia.

a reply to: Raggedyman

Yea my bad about that, did jump the gun there. I do somewhat agree with him, but to put it simply no one should vote for anyone just because of religion, race, or even just by what they say like promises or lowering taxes. Usually most voters would vote for someone they would relate rather then how will they or couldn't handle their platform really.

Alas though, easier said then done due to given to circumstances of elections an where, but that's Demagoguery for you.

Maybe I should of asked this instead, wouldn't having a Church in State be akin to communism or facism?

a reply to: Specimen88



People are for the most part pretty dumb individually, smarter in groups if lead well.
Hitler knew how to get a crowd on side, like a TV evangelist.

A state church, it will never work, Constantine proved that.