Faithful TBM to doubter in 6 hours on ex-Mormon Reddit

[KevinSim]

This question is irrelevant to my point, which was that assuming one's conclusion as a starting postion is a strategy that defeats the purpose of thinking logically.

Marcus, are you saying that I have ever assumed my conclusion as a starting position?

[drumdude]

It’s a valid point. You can easily deconstruct anything. But constructing something of value is hard.

It’s a leap of un-faith to deconstruct your beliefs. I don’t blame anyone for avoiding it. But during that free fall, you may discover something better than Mormonism on the other side.

[KevinSim]

Now you come up with the nonsensical suggestion that I might believe that the thing you call "non-determinism" might "cause a planet or a moon to materialize out of nothing". It would clearly be a waste of time for me to continue to reply to you as if we were in a serious discussion.

Chap, why do you think my suggestion was nonsensical, and why do you think it would be a waste of time to continue to reply? Are you unable to explain how the universe is non-deterministic? If not, then please explain. If so, then doesn't that make my point?

[Marcus]

This question is irrelevant to my point, which was that assuming one's conclusion as a starting postion is a strategy that defeats the purpose of thinking logically.

Marcus, are you saying that I have ever assumed my conclusion as a starting position?

i was observing that you said it:

...I'm simply not the kind of person that would seriously consider a universe without God in charge of it.

[Marcus]

wow, what an unnecessary escalation.

Marcus, why do you think it was unnecessary?

Because you made an unnecessarily overarching and insupportable statement about the behavior of a large group of diverse people, on the basis of a single attribute they have in common, which is not necessarily related to the attribute you assumed for all. You are welcome to explain why you engaged in such stereotyping in response to IHAQ's comment:

I’m pretty sure there are plenty of optimistic atheists.

I'm not sure there are any conscientious ones who have thoroughly thought things through.

[KevinSim]

Was what I experienced the Holy Spirit? I have guessed it was

So you are still not entirely convinced?

I am convinced the answer came from God. What I was trying to say was that I don't consider myself an expert on what communication is and isn't a result of the Holy Spirit.

How do you know God answers prayers? Perhaps God is like a wildlife cameraman who observes but never intervenes.

Along with other Latter-day Saints I occasionally get up in Fast and Testimony Meeting in my ward of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and declare I know that it's true. I don't mean that I have a line-by-line proof that God is not the Deist God (who is like the mentioned wildlife cameraman); rather I mean that I have a hunch that observing but not intervening would not be conscientiously pure enough to enable God to persist through the eternities. Someone who had the type of conscience that would let Her/Him live that long simply would not choose to observe but not intervene.
All that said, what exactly would be the point of believing in a deity that observed but didn't intervene? I see no difference between such a deity and no deity at all.

[KevinSim]

And if your religion acts the way Mormonism has, your feelings need to give way to facts.

Drumdude, I don't use my feelings to find a romantic partner or a good restaurant. But to say what you call facts should take precedence over what I feel God has told me personally strikes me as essentially not really believing in God. It's believing that God may have existed in the lives of Biblical characters, but God doesn't exist in the here and now. I am not that type of theist.

[drumdude]

And if your religion acts the way Mormonism has, your feelings need to give way to facts.

Drumdude, I don't use my feelings to find a romantic partner or a good restaurant. But to say what you call facts should take precedence over what I feel God has told me personally strikes me as essentially not really believing in God. It's believing that God may have existed in the lives of Biblical characters, but God doesn't exist in the here and now. I am not that type of theist.

What I was going for was a comparison between human relationships and the one you appear to have with God. If your wife tells you she is not cheating on you, but you see her having sex with another man through a window, you can continue to believe in your wife if you choose. The God of Mormonism is much like the cheating wife - they say one thing but reality is actually another. That is what I mean by facts versus feelings.

[KevinSim]

Unfortunately the correction was in a form that KevinSim did not recognise as such, and so not only did he not even consider the possibility that he had received a correction - it went completely over his head as if it had not been a message of any sort.

Malkie, I have been living my life on pins and needles waiting for word like this for over 45 years. Can you tell me what God told me and how you know it was God telling me?

[malkie]

Unfortunately the correction was in a form that KevinSim did not recognise as such, and so not only did he not even consider the possibility that he had received a correction - it went completely over his head as if it had not been a message of any sort.

Malkie, I have been living my life on pins and needles waiting for word like this for over 45 years. Can you tell me what God told me and how you know it was God telling me?

First, let's start with the complete quote:

DT, KevinSim may actually have received, from God, a correction to his assumption. Unfortunately the correction was in a form that KevinSim did not recognise as such, and so not only did he not even consider the possibility that he had received a correction - it went completely over his head as if it had not been a message of any sort.

What I was noting, in reply to doubtingthomas, was that (assuming for the sake of argument that your God exists) there is a possibility that you, KevinSim, do not have an infallible means of knowing when you have received a communication from that God.

So when you say:

I kept that promise, and so far He hasn't corrected my assumption that that sensation was His answer.

that may only mean that you failed to recognise a communication/correction, and so are unaware that God did actually correct your assumption. In fact, I could say that you are only assuming that God hasn't corrected your assumption.

It seems to me that your entire belief system boils down to a structure of assumption within assumption within assumption, with no way of validating the core assumption(s) that the complete system is built on.

Going back to part of your to-and-fro with Doc:

You’re answering questions with questions in order to avoid answering questions. That’s not good-faith behavior. It’s evasive and dishonest.

Doc, why do you think it's dishonest? Is it more dishonest than the implication that I need to answer those questions to have a good faith discussion? You want an answer to your question? Fine. I'm not ready to examine and deconstruct LDS truth claims. I honestly don't see the point in such an analysis, and until someone shows me what the point is, I don't intend to head in that direction.

The point of such an analysis is simple: you go back, layer by layer, to your base assumption(s), and examine their foundations at each stage to assure yourself that there is no reasonable alternative.

I think it may be fair to say, in general, that an atheist may come not to accept the existence of god(s) because they can readily conceive of a system of beliefs that does not require god(s), a system that has an explanatory power superior to the religious one in that the beliefs at each stage are built on natural explanations - no supernatural powers or entities are required.

Note that I'm not saying that I can prove that no god created the universe, and all that is in it, only that I find that goddidit adds no value at any point.

In the end, in answer to your question to me, "Can you tell me what God told me and how you know it was God telling me?", I not only cannot tell you what and how, I have no reason to think that there is a "what", and so the "how" is moot.

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minor edit for clarity
further edit to correct a typo that changed the meaning of a statement - thanks to KevinSim for pointing it out