/ducks away from Ivy’s layman broom!

I don’t think fear is the main aggregate or primus motor of religion, but it surely can be. I think modern individualism has distorted or hidden away the (to my mind true) perspective of human nature qua group creatures.

On the other hand I do support you regarding some of fear’s more devastating sides… Like Frank Herbert said in Dune: Fear is the mind killer.
I’ve had experiences solely created on fear (sleeplessness and alcohol just don’t mix:). I think being hungry and tired after midnight can create all sorts of illusions of sound and perception.
This doesn’t make them less real. It’s their domain of reality that differs.

There is done serious science on UFO abductions as well as succubus demons within psychology and sleep study today. Seriously. Just have a look around.

Anyway, I don’t believe in organized religion either, although I’m not too sure whether or not I believe in god(s). But lately, it’s not a big deal for me. A more pressing question to me would probably be “do I exist” or “what do I mean by existing/being“? A very egoistical concern, to be certain.

With regard to good and evil, though, as Nietzsche writes in Beyond Good and Evil, “one may doubt, first, whether there are any opposites at all, and secondly whether these popular valuations and opposite values on which the metaphysicians put their seal are not perhaps merely foreground estimates.” Basically, that the ideas of good and evil and the values that surround them are also (possibly) human definitions. He goes on to say perhaps it is “evil” that actually has the higher value, or maybe even that good and evil are one and the same.

Of course, there are “good” and “bad” things in the world. But I don’t think they’re “good” intrinsically. They’re “good” because we categorize them as “good”.

I know that paranormal can be explained by science…someday. Everybody knows that what cannot be explained now will be explained later. But that’s not the point I’m making. In my lifetime, if no progress in parapsychology is made, people and I will continue to hold the primal human fear of the unknown towards all things unexplained. Fear and its effects are very well documented for thousands of years. Fear of the unknown leads people is terrifying for human beings because we rely on information to act. And as John Locke says, humans live for happiness, and one of the foundations of happiness is security. Fear of the unknown is a type of insecurity. Since religion has been claiming that they understand the paranormal and they have had the solutions for thousands of years, a lot of people flock to religion.

This entry isn’t about being philosophically correct. This entry documents what I FEEL towards the paranormal because there is no other explanation available IN THE PRESENT. I couldn’t care less if the mystery is solved 80 years from now. I would be dead by then, and it would hold no meaning to me because I lived my entire life with fear of the paranormal. It doesn’t solve my problem, so there’s no point assuming it.

Besides, dogmatically believing that parapsychology can explain the entire branch of the paranormal isn’t wise. There must be a reason why it cannot be proven for hundreds of years. I cannot shake off the possibility that there may never be answer. Looking at the latest trends in research, it seems that more and more universities are closing down their departments of the occult and parapsychology. With so much less resources dedicated to parapsychology, our chance at understanding the unknown has dropped even more. There needs to be a source for our confidence in science. Where there is none, confidence is replaced with denial.

1) Logic is not the same as sense nor reason. It is simply a tool to see whether different parts and levels of argumentation stick together and is/not valid according to certain axiomatic principles. Even though it is very useful, it is very handy to point out inconsistency for example, it is not better than the facts you put in it. Think of it as an algorithm for checking your Expression Of Facts/Statements/Etc. Which leads us to my second point:

2) Science is not static. Paranormal simply means inexplainable with the current base of knowledge (or ‘outside the norm’ which suits Einstein very well). So I beg to differ; ONLY science can explain the paranormal.
I’m not thinking about big, dusty books here either (and you’re intelligent enough to already know this). I’m talking about you and me: creators, critics and inventors of science.

I’m not trying to step down your experience. Heck, I had a near-death experience last year when I was almost beaten to death (it all went very well but it might just as well have gone the other way). But it still doesn’t principally exist in a realm outside science. If it does practically, science today is not wide or specific enough and will be mended so science tomorrow can.

Logically I don’t believe in a lot of stuff, but then there’s the part of me that goes, what if? I hate being alone in my apartment or house/basement, I always convince myself there’s ghosts even though I don’t believe in them, lol. fear’s weird. humans are interesting creatures

i don’t believe in any religion that sends unbelievers to hell. i don’t believe in any religion that says one can only communicate through … i.e. a priest … etc etc. but I do believe that there’s a divine power … rather than being.

And for someone like me, suffering can only be alleviated by the actions of man. Someone with a heart big enough, a wallet big enough and a lifespan long enough to make changes.

Even for Christians, there is a saying “God helps those who help themselves”. God can’t personally hand out food to starving children. It’s the people, like you and me, who will. God or the Idea of God plays the role of educating people to become more compassionate like us so that we will carry out the duties necessary to alleviate pain and suffering – be it our own or our neighbors’.

Believing is one thing. Materializing a belief is another. And for some people like me, we skip that step of believing and materialize compassion because it is in our conscience, embedded in our souls, that being kind is good for everyone. I have no need for affirmation that my conscience is correct. And I have the utmost self-discipline to carry out my beliefs.

So I hope you don’t confuse agnostic theists with mean jerks who have no care for others. To us, compassion and has nothing to do with God, it has something to do with being able to smile and pat ourselves in the back at the end of the day. Long story short: we do good because it makes us happy.

I believe in Ghosts and Demons, and for all of that, I do think that most of the religion is man made, but a lot of things if you look at it “logically” it does work and make sense. I’m not going to sit here and defend why there is sin in this world. A testimony to that is the flaws of humanity, and though some argue that God is created by humans to be something perfect, why is it so hard to believe that maybe there was someone perfect that created humans?

Compassion is the hardest thing to understand and grasp and people fail to realize that though there’s suffering, there’s still hope and life. We look at the other side of the world and see that there’s hardships, deaths, and pain everywhere. But we cannot see that these people who endured this also found God, hope, and a savior.

This is a definite hard platform to stand on, but I respect your views.