In my last job interview I got asked by the President of the company, "How are you with God?"
I didn't respond because I was caught off guard. There were 6 other people in the interview, besides the President who was asking most of the questions.
I never imagined anybody would ask me that question in a job interview. Before I could respond he said, "I don't care if you're atheist or Buddhist or whatever, it's just that some times people get offended by hearing the word, god, in the workplace and I don't want you to be offended, you know, if you end up working here."
So I said, "Well it says 'In God We Trust' on every dollar bill in my wallet. If you can't trust in God, well, then what can you trust in?"
They all laughed and the President said, "Well, we've had people who worked here in the past who got offended by it and I just don't want that to be a problem with you."
I said, "Well did they take their pay in US dollars?
He said, "Why yes they did."
I said, "Well they couldn't have been too offended by the word, God, or they would have demanded their pay in Cuban Pesos, right?"
They all laughed and gave me the job, without ever having to tell them how I was with God.
I guess if I really wanted to answer the question, I would say, "Well, I believe in Einstein's god, only one which does play dice with the universe, only the dice are loaded, in favor of matter forming out of energy slowed down and energy forming out of mater, sped up, including us, sitting here having this conversation, otherwise we wouldn't exist, and neither would anything else for that matter."
Since I got the job I do hear the word, 'god' every now and then, but it doesn't bother me. The people I work for all belong to a church, which is owned by the people who own my company. I designed the church and school that they all go to.
They own 4 churches, 3 schools and 2 businesses, one of which is the one I work for. The founder was a hippie in the 60's who was raising his family on the beach in Hawaii and decided that was no way to raise a family and moved to where we live now and started 2 companies and a church. That grew and now it's a lot bigger and he goes to Maui every year and takes 200 of his closest friends and family. Fortunately I'm included. We drink wine, play music and watch humpback whales breach in front of a volcano at Sunset.
It's not bad and I really don't think that all Christians are stupid, delusional sheeple, not the ones I work with and work for. They accept science and use it to make the world a better, more beautiful place. They're just really big on traditional, nuclear families and still about as patriarchal as they come.
My wife is just the opposite, she's an atheist feminist, so it rubs her the wrong way, but she deals with it.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/21/2020 12:03AM by schrodingerscat.

I put my trust in Sam Harris and Jenna Bush Jager--just like you do!

"My wife is just the opposite, she's an atheist feminist" ... I like her already.

So the point of your post is that if you start your own churches, schools (Christian?), and businesses (Christian?) you can take 200 of your buddies to Maui every year on a junket funded by whom? 501(3)(c) funds? Are these tax-free dollars? Most importantly, is there an open bar?

Beth Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> So the point of your post is that if you start
> your own churches, schools (Christian?), and
> businesses (Christian?) you can take 200 of your
> buddies to Maui every year on a junket funded by
> whom? 501(3)(c) funds? Are these tax-free dollars?
> Most importantly, is there an open bar?
Its BYOB, but the BBQ is open.

"Well, we've had people who worked here in the past who got offended by it and I just don't want that to be a problem with you."

Who was that? The cleaning people? People so far down their food chain that they don't know the president and him "owning" churches?

LOL!

Thanks for your biographical snap. You put your god where your wallet is. Makes sense why you are the way you are.

Most atheists likely trust in their own intellect. Their own ability to reason out the mysteries in the heavens.

What "mysteries" ?

But SC is a pantheist. Sort of like Druidism Lite.

I suggest that atheists generally do not accept the mind as a source for truth (Rationalism). Rather they generally pursue evidence (Empiricism).

dogbloggernli Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> But SC is a pantheist. Sort of like Druidism Lite.
Sort of like Einstein, Stephen Hawking and Kaku, all of whom defined the god (little g) I turn to in my time of greatest need, when my power has been exhausted.
It goes by many names, providence is one I use.
Or Logos, divine reason,
Or Tao, eternal mystery,
Lambda = dark matter + dark energy
Einstein's "greatest blunder"
Turns out to be his greatest insight.
https://www.space.com/9593-einstein-biggest-blunder-turns.html



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 09/22/2020 12:46AM by schrodingerscat.

God defined as a talking point, as a metaphor for a mainstream audience. Quote a peer reviewed paper of theirs that use the same language in the same way.

If they had meant it factually, they would have backed it with evidence for the claim. Which they do not provide.

So you're misreading metaphoric analogy as fact which they didn't actually assert (except perhaps Einstein and only as a personal view, not fact). They understand the meaninglessness of a claim without supporting facts. It is, after all, the whole basis of their actual work.

So unsubstantiated opinion and metaphor is what you turn to for comfort. That is your source of meaning?

Or a string of false equivalencies?

Because there isn't evidence for your making them equal either.

This is why I said you demonstrated your fantasies for us regularly.

As opposed to what? Swallowing Bronze Age mythology whole, with hardly a burp?

Yes, human cultures as far back as recorded history goes believed the universe is controlled by laws which are comprehensible. Knowing when the sun moved north or south, and when the seasons changed turned out to be extremely useful knowledge in an agricultural society.

I trust me..and my immediate family. That's about it.

All gods are equally real. Which god do you think I should "trust in" ?

Dave the Atheist Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> All gods are equally real. Which god do you think
> I should "trust in" ?

The God Particle

And what demonstrable, actionable result derives from your trust in the god particle.

You mean besides pride of dubious accomplishment?

So ultimately, you sold out for the paycheck. Why didn't you go into your spiel about god is nature and rattle off your hero scientists and authors? Oh yeah, because you needed the job.

How convenient.

How about he only believes in a Particle of God?

"If you can't trust in God, well, then what can you trust in?"

I'm guessing the God Particles in money is what he was talking about.

Yep. There must be just enough god particles that rubbed off on the money to make him believe in the mighty dollar....nature doesn't pay the bills you know? And Einstein, NdGT, and Harris all took the money too!

That must explain whey money has "In God We Trust" on it. ;-/

I'd say there's a particle of truth in that statement :)

Oh God have the dollars in my pocket!
Oh God have the dollars in my pocket!
Oh God have the dollars in my pocket!






















That'll due.

If I had an interviewer ask me my feelings about god, I'd run screaming from the place.
Besides the very asking of the question being illegal, I'm afraid I distrust anyone who espouses a belief in god, whether it's how einstein defined it or not.

The only thing I trust in these days is yet another post from you bringing this up AGAIN.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/22/2020 11:30AM by oxymormon.

I would think it's not illegal to ask in a group
iterview about how a person is with God, as long as there is no expectation that anyone will answer the question (a rhetorical question), although I would see the question as a warning that the workplace might be full of just a few too many religious nuts, to suit my comfort level.

I get offended if people speak about religion at all, if the tone is psychologically unhealthy. If they speak of having or needing faith at appropriate times, it's good. If someone speaks of activities taking place at their church, that is appropriate. If people routinely speak as though they just spoke to God or Jesus yesterday like they speak to you or me, to me that is a danger sign. It says either that "I hear the voices of others in my head", or if not, it says "I want to hear the voices of others in my head". Either way, it's not good. On the other hand, if someone uses their belief in God to privately strengthen their own lives, I am with them. I might not know who they are if they don't talk about it. But that's okay. I don't need to know who they are.

When it comes to who I trust, it's the people who haven't let me down in the past and who candidly (when they think no one notices) treat others (not just me but others) the same way I would want to be treated. Patterns are patterns. When someone screws you over it's rarely personal. It's about who they are and not about who you are.

I trust in my ability to think things through and then act in what I percieve to be my best interest.
There are those who disagree with me and that is all right. They are equally entitled to their own opinions, no matter how wrong they are.
And of course being as pure and holy as I humbly am my opinion is the one that is right (I learned this from listening to the GA's.)
So let us not war because we think differently. Let us accept that each of us may believe as we see fit.
Oh my gosh!! amen amen amen



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/22/2020 12:43PM by thedesertrat1.

Trusting in God is exactly the same as trusting in luck. Claiming to trust something doesn't mean it's working. Claiming to believe something doesn't even prove that you believe it - it just proves what you want people to think of you.

I've known some Big Foot believers. What do they want me to think of them?

I’m seventy. It’s taken some bad experiences to teach me, but I have come to the personal credo - “Trust No One”.

csuprovograd Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I’m seventy. It’s taken some bad experiences
> to teach me, but I have come to the personal credo
> - “Trust No One”.

I trust nature,
to strike a balance,
because it always has,
at least over the past 13.8 Billion years of Universe's existence, which is long enough for me to draw the conclusion that nature is benevolent, in that it makes life not just possible, but probable.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/24/2020 09:35PM by schrodingerscat.

schrodingerscat Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I trust nature,
> to strike a balance,
> because it always has,
> at least over the past 13.8 Billion years of
> Universe's existence, which is long enough for me
> to draw the conclusion that nature is benevolent,
> in that it makes life not just possible, but
> probable.

This sentence makes zero sense to me. I trust it makes sense to others.

Elder Berry Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> schrodingerscat Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > I trust nature,
> > to strike a balance,
> > because it always has,
> > at least over the past 13.8 Billion years of
> > Universe's existence, which is long enough for
> me
> > to draw the conclusion that nature is
> benevolent,
> > in that it makes life not just possible, but
> > probable.
>
> This sentence makes zero sense to me. I trust it
> makes sense to others.


I trust you to make sense out of nonsense. Don't let me down!

Ok, I will try. It took nature billions of yearly cycles of a sun before it was a sun for matter and energy to find compassion for itself?

"According to Baba, each soul pursues conscious divinity by evolving, that is, experiencing itself in a succession of imagined forms through seven "kingdoms" of stone/metal, vegetable, worm, fish, bird, animal, and human.[99] The soul identifies itself with each successive form, becoming thus tied to illusion. During this evolution of forms, the power of thought increases, until in human form thought becomes infinite. Although in human form, the soul is capable of conscious divinity, all the impressions that it has gathered during evolution are illusory ones that create a barrier against the soul knowing itself. For this barrier to be overcome, further births in human form are needed in a process known as reincarnation.[100]
The soul will reach a stage where its previously gathered impressions grow thin or weak enough that it enters a final stage called involution. This stage also requires a series of human births, during which the soul begins an inner journey, by which it realizes its true identity as God. Baba breaks this inner journey of Realization into seven stages he called "planes." The process culminates, at the seventh plane, with God-realization, at which the goal of life for the soul is reached.[101]"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meher_Baba#God_Speaks

Elder Berry Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> schrodingerscat Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > I trust nature,
> > to strike a balance,
> > because it always has,
> > at least over the past 13.8 Billion years of
> > Universe's existence, which is long enough for
> me
> > to draw the conclusion that nature is
> benevolent,
> > in that it makes life not just possible, but
> > probable.
>
> This sentence makes zero sense to me. I trust it
> makes sense to others.

How is it not obvious to you that since life exists, the universe tends towards life?

Because I don't know the mysteries of The Universe. Because I particularly and individually exist doesn't mean I was supposed to.

Because actual evidence doesn't support the claim.

> How is it not obvious
> to you that since life
> exists, the universe
> tends towards life?


Your need to be in possession of "Truth" is quite palpable.

You seem to see "Life" as a conscious construct of, maybe, the god particle, or the Tao, whatever; and that having created "Life", the universe seeks to coddle, protect and promote it.

It's like you take the entire thing personally, as if Life exists so that you could exist, and thus Life ends up blessing itself.

Maybe we all owe you, because we get to come along on your ride?

schrodingerscat Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> "Well did they take their pay in US dollars?

I took my pay in auto-deposit. Same thing with my Social Security. And online bill paying, and credit/debit cards and such. The electrons zooming between financial institution computers don't have anything written on them.

olderelder Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The electrons zooming
> between financial institution computers don't have
> anything written on them.

They are writing in binary. Not much different in use than marks on clay tablets.

I trust my gut. It's never failed me.

+schrodingerscat:
Wait, aren’t you this lady?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gl7CjDfSM9I
Bethany Kay

Did you leave the job?
If you want a job in the USA, I think the safest bet is to pretend that you are a christian. If they are atheists, I think atheists are fine with other religions.
I’m an atheist and I do understand that in the workplace, in order for things to go smoothly, you have to leave religion out of the conversation.

My honest answer would be, I don’t understand the question.
How are you with someone? What does that mean? Are you asking me if we are good friends? Which god are you talking about?

If you are talking about the jewish god, I don’t agree with his actions. I don’t agree with killing billions of innocent people and creatures with a global flood and all then rest of the violence, the raping of unmarried woman, probably age 12 and under, the genocides, the misogyny, the careless behavior, the none sense.

How do you feel about killing your son (Abraham was going to kill his son without telling his son) or going on a genocidal rampage or giving away your daughters to be raped by a mob?

~~~~iceman9090

No I didn't leave the job. Still on it.
Why would I leave?
Im not offended by hearing or seeing the word God. I think of it as short for, Good.
I never had any desire to be Anti-mormon or atheist. I didnt want to identify myself with a label I rejected. I wanted to be able to answer people in the affirmative. I also adopted Einstein's cosmology, which includes a god, who plays dice with the universe, only the dice are loaded. We live in a probabalistic universe, which probably tends towards both chaos and cosmos, death and life. Energy and matter.
All are one.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/24/2020 10:47PM by schrodingerscat.

Yet "Nature" is benevolent. Right.

There's more. It has agency and acts with volition, intention and will.

It's benevolent even though SC thinks nature released covid as to redress our affronts against it and has so posted.

Its benevoent even though the vast majority of it will kill us. NdGT has spoken on this very issue against SCs stance specifically.

dogblogger Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> There's more. It has agency and acts with
> volition, intention and will.
>
> It's benevolent even though SC thinks nature
> released covid as to redress our affronts against
> it and has so posted.
>
> Its benevoent even though the vast majority of it
> will kill us. NdGT has spoken on this very issue
> against SCs stance specifically.

I've heard NdGT's explanation and I disagree with him. He says that when he hears people talk about God, they usually talk about this benevolent creator, but when he looks around all he sees is death and destruction.

In saying that he overlooks the fact that despite all the death and destruction dished out by Mother Nature over the past 3.7 Billion years, life persists and has persisted. The fact that life has continued over the past 3.7 Billion years should be all the evidence anybody needs to conclude that on balance, nature is benevolent, otherwise life would have never existed.

Elder Berry Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Yet "Nature" is benevolent. Right.

Right, if by "benevolent" you mean, it is marked by or disposed to doing good, as in creating and sustaining life.
Otherwise, if it tended towards destruction and chaos, we wouldn't exist and neither would anything else for that matter.

schrodingerscat Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Right, if by "benevolent" you mean, it is marked
> by or disposed to doing good, as in creating and
> sustaining life.

How can something we don't understand (The Universe) and according to you and your little Spinozian god "do good?"

Creating and sustaining life is neither "good" nor "bad." Is this life with a big 'L?"

We live in a developed bubble. We don't see the creature we eat slaughtered. We don't work to find food. We don't live with little or no knowledge of the good of hygiene. You take your modern perspective on life and apply it to all of ontological history and pronounce benevolence on the whole of what you see in creation. Arguing with a god is exhausting.

Elder Berry Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> schrodingerscat Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > Right, if by "benevolent" you mean, it is
> marked
> > by or disposed to doing good, as in creating
> and
> > sustaining life.
>
> How can something we don't understand (The
> Universe) and according to you and your little
> Spinozian god "do good?"
>
> Creating and sustaining life is neither "good" nor
> "bad." Is this life with a big 'L?"

I guess that's where we will have to agree to disagree. I believe that which creates and sustains life is good. You believe it is neither good nor bad, it just IS, with no value judgement.

> We live in a developed bubble. We don't see the
> creature we eat slaughtered. We don't work to find
> food. We don't live with little or no knowledge of
> the good of hygiene. You take your modern
> perspective on life and apply it to all of
> ontological history and pronounce benevolence on
> the whole of what you see in creation. Arguing
> with a god is exhausting.

Yeah, I can see how arguing that life is not good must be exhausting.

"I guess that's where we will have to agree to disagree."

We will.

"I believe that which creates and sustains life is good."

This is a blanket statement. It needs qualifications or it is meaningless to most people. Like a party boy saying, "yeah, life is good!"

What creates and sustains life? You jump from particles to 13 billion years of existence. In the past you've vaguely referenced Mother Nature. And more recently your God/god is on your dollar bills and you have like the old 90s song one hand in your pocket and the other one...

"You believe it is neither good nor bad, it just IS, with no value judgement."

I do.

> You take your modern
> perspective on life and apply it to all of
> ontological history and pronounce benevolence on
> the whole of what you see in creation. Arguing
> with a god is exhausting.

"Yeah, I can see how arguing that life is not good must be exhausting."

Was I? I thought I believed...er,..um,..oh yeah, "You believe it is neither good nor bad, it just IS, with no value judgement."



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/25/2020 05:01PM by Elder Berry.

Rationality

How does one "trust in" a god ?

Ask Job.

Given the record ghawd has compiled, he is definitely on my personal 'no fly' list.

Dave the Atheist Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> How does one "trust in" a god ?

Ask the people who decided to put that in our US Motto and on every US dollar bill or coin you've ever seen.

Tell us about the history of that horrible "motto" on paper currency.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/25/2020 05:12PM by Dave the Atheist.

Dave the Atheist Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Tell us about the history of that horrible "motto"
> on paper currency.
I know, Red Scare, McCartheyism, 1954, yyada, yada, yada.
I preferred "E Pluribus Unim" Out of Many One" myself.
I don't believe in the same Santa Claus for adults God as my neighbors, co workers, or friends or family. But I do have to work with them and to do that I have to find common ground with them. I find that common ground in the realization that we are already one, whether we like it or not. We are all humans living an extremely tenuous existence because the first species to develop nukes is probably the last species.
This cycle could have repeated itself over and over again in our heliosphere.
The good news is we have exhibited increadible restraint in the past 70yrs since we ended WW2 with the biggest bang this planet has ever seen. With the Doomsday clock sitting on 2 seconds to midnight, how much faith do you have that the 10.Nuclear Countries (that we know of) are led by men of the greatest restraint and character the world has ever known?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/25/2020 08:13PM by schrodingerscat.

I trust in nothing more than I trust in something. With nothing I know where it stands or doesn't stand. With something, who knows?
So I guess I do trust in god.

I see a gap in your logic and there is nothing in it.

> They ... gave me the job, without ever having to tell them how I was with God. >

You told them exactly how you were with God/ the company/ life: What was that money comment all about?