Bushbasher/Adam

You both seem concerned, and rightly so, to preserve objectivity as a key attribute of knowledge particularly in relation to scientific knowledge.
Firstly I need to say, although I think you have both tacitly acknowledged it, that objectivity is not inconsistent with narrative. Narrative relates to the structure of knowledge and the way it is shared.
‘Objective knowledge’ is that knowledge which is independent of the attributes of its author. In science failure to maintain objectivity leads to hypotheses that are dependent on the beliefs, emotions, superstitions etc of the author. Such hypotheses are unrepeatable except by those who share the beliefs, emotions and superstitions of the author. They tend not to be useful in scientific terms. Creation science is a case in point being dependent on the beliefs and superstitions of its authors. It lacks objectivity.
Knowledge of God, on the other hand, can never be objective. God is not an ‘object’ that can be studied. To give the atheists their due it is must be said that God does not exist to science since she does not meet any of the criteria of objectively knowable things. Atheism is not only possible but absolutely necessary to the scientific endeavour.
The spiritual enterprise, however,is not limited to knowledge of objects. At the heart of ‘Spiritual knowledge’ is the universal experience of being known in subject to subject relationships. Objectifying these relationships does little to increase our ‘spiritual knowledge’. These relationships create us as human beings. We are not friends until we are befriended, we are not lovers until we are loved. We are not faithful until another puts their faith in us.
Spiritual knowledge is not a subject-predicate kind of knowledge. It is who I am. Who I am in relation to every person I meet, friends, lovers, acquaintances, enemies. It is also who I am in relation to the God who, in knowing every part of me, ‘creates’ me. Not everyone ‘thinks’ about life this way, thank God. You don’t have to. Plenty of people live rich and fulfilling lives without ‘thinking’ like me.
Have a good life!

You write very well, Waterboy. You come across as a reasonable, -and well reasoned- individual.
However...
Since this thread is about atheism, by a nominal Christian, I feel constrained to put in a small mention of the golden rule, or ethic of reciprocity.
I've always thought the most civilized -and under stressed- facet of Christianity was this 'pro-active' attitude.
You don't have to wait to be befriended, to be a friend to others.You don't have to wait to be loved, in order to love others, and you can very certainly be faithful, even to someone who has no faith in you.
Just a quibble. Cheers, Grim.

Thank you Grim

What you say is true. It wasnt my intention to reject initiative.
Our first experience of love is to be loved by our mother (father, family and so on). So I would say that love begins with the experience of being loved.
My point, of course, was that God, being pure subject, cannot be known objectively. Indeed it is reasonable to say that God does not exist (as something objectively knowable).
I speak of friendship and love only as examples of how we are formed out of the subject to subject relationships we participate in and that 'knowledge' of God is knowledge of this type, that being known by God we are 'created' into something more than the sum of our physical parts.

Thank you for prompting me to clarify this. I hope it is clearer now.

Dear Waterboy,

Thank you for such a level-headed response. Not much I can disagree with there.

Dare I say that if all Theists were like you, religion wouldn’t be a problem.

In my last post I said that there is more than one reality. This of course, begs for much elaboration.

Adam D:
< Reality is the state of the world as it really is, not what we want it to be. …Anyone who invents their own alternate reality could be described as delusional.>

Delusional? There’s that word again! Waterboy has explained that we come to know ourselves and the world both objectively and subjectively. The reality we perceive subjectively sometimes seems at odds with the reality we perceive objectively. That does not mean that one of them is necessarily “untrue”, although errors of perception and judgement do occur in both. To not live in both of these worlds concurrently is a pathological condition.

Bushbasher:
<… a number of people, including me, have replied to your posts in what at least appears to me a sincere manner, inviting dialogue. as far i can tell, you haven't even acknowledged any of these posts.>

If I have seemed rude please forgive me; it was not my intention. But I actually noticed no such invitation. Had I anything to say in return at the time I certainly would have said it.

Pericles:
I wrote that “the word ‘god’ in itself can mean different things to different people.”

< Pure sophistry. I mean exactly what you mean by the word. It is the image of God that you have in your head, in whatever form that may take, that I don't believe in. If you didn't posit the existence of a God in the first place, I would not have to disbelieve in it.>

People have various images of God and some people hold a number of images concurrently. In fact I don’t think I have what could be called an “image” of God at all, but rather a strong, insistent awareness that can only be suggested (usually unsatisfactorily) in ever-changing metaphors, music, and relationships. I know many people are in the same position. The word “God” is purely a convenient label for what we experience subjectively. The word has no objective referent.

Daviy,
Are you suggesting that the writings of Peter the Believer are a fair representative of Christian thought today? You also seem to put a lot of weight on a 19th Century papal decree. I would suggest to you that not many Christians (except maybe some Catholics) care too much about 19th Century papal decrees. Christianity is a lot different to what you allege or envisage.

However, you do seem to show a lot of respect for Jesus and his teachings. One day you might further understand why countless millions of others do also.