Quote from: Astargath on November 15, 2017, 11:29:31 PM

Quote from: CoinCube on November 15, 2017, 10:08:20 PM

Quote from: aesma on November 15, 2017, 06:25:54 PM

The Christian religion talks about Man having free will. I think nihilism is exactly that : life has no purpose, be free to do whatever you want with it. Seems much more healthy than following all kinds of ridiculous religious rules, but that's just me.

I think even religious people should hope they're wrong, because none of them really manages to follow the rules, so if there is an heaven and a hell, the first one must be empty and the second one overcrowded.

Quote from: Lynchfondu on November 11, 2017, 12:11:46 AM

Soren Kierkegaard, a famous 19th century existentialist philosopher, noted quite logically that religious people simply lived better lives, and whether or not there heaven or hell existed or not did not outweigh the cons of not believing in God.

His logic was simple, which he coined "the leap of faith:"

1. Believe in God, die, nothing happens.

2. Don't believe in God, die, nothing happens.
OR
1. Believe in God, die, go to heaven.

2. Don't believe in God, die, bathe in a lake of fire.

I actually wish I could be religious, but sadly, I'm a helpless empiricist. I know too much!

That's a retelling of the much more famous (and 2 centuries older) wager from Pascal : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal%27s_Wager

Aesma I respect your position here as it was very similar to my own beliefs not all that long ago.

Here is some food for thought:

Regarding the lake of fire:

Not everyone who believes in God believes in eternal punishment and damnation. Many Jews for example believe that hell is a very painful but temporary process. A purification process to remove falsehood and evil.

See: Do Jews Believe in Hell?
http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/1594422/jewish/Do-Jews-Believe-in-Hell.htm

Since you are an empiricist here is my empirical argument in favour of religion.

1) Belief in God is logical in that the belief is internally consistent and cannot be falsified. This conclusion can be derived in numerous ways one of which is via the application of incompleteness theorem.
See: The #1 Mathematical Discovery of the 20th Century

2) All knowledge ultimately traces back to assumed axioms. Without knowledge, scientific enquiry including empiric enquiry is meaningless and we cant analyse the world around us.

3) Our fundamental metaphysical first axioms are therefore a critical step in the formation of a sound empirical model of the universe and our place within it.
See: Metaphysical Attitudes

4) Human progress and civilisation requires the growth of knowledge and is ultimately cooperation dependent. Our first premises and axioms directly impact the degree of cooperation that the system can support.
See: Superrationality and the Infinite

5) Competing first axioms such as nihilism may grant "freedom" to do whatever you want but for humanity as a whole this is an illusion and such axioms reduce overall freedom.
See: Freedom and God

6) Thus the first axiom of God is not only largely responsible for the progress we have made so far it in all is likely necessary for continued progress.
See: Religion and Progress
and
See: Faith and Future

7) Finally and least important accepting the first axiom of God appears to be correlated with good health.
See: Health and Religion

8 ) For these reason accepting the first axiom of God is a superior choice for the empiricist then accepting the first axiom of nihilism or refusing to define ones metaphysics.

Don't listen to him. He probably started believing in god because his family told to not because of the reasons mentioned above. He searched for those reasons because he had doubts about his beliefs and now claims that belief in god is the best choice. I already showed him it's not but you can't reason with these people.

Don't worry about me, I like to argue but there is no way to convince me with words.

Now if I could meet God, then maybe I'd believe in him/it.