I have no doubt you can be happy and not believe in God. But I don’t believe you can attribute any meaningful purpose to it.
Which is not to say there is a qualitative difference between that sort of happiness and mine, or that I am any happier than others, or that we can even say “happiness is good” with any deeper significance than “a full stomach is good.”
[2014-01-01]
c0
Sometimes we lose interest in youthful pursuits because we are getting older and our bodies just don’t respond the same way anymore. Sometimes we lose interest because youthful pursuits are pretty lame.
More often the latter.
[2014-01-07]
c0
Re: Meaningful purpose for happiness (or anything) - Yes, and our fundamental need for 'meaning' means that there must be a 'meaning' of the type for which we long. Otherwise, we're talking about hunger in a world without food, or thirst in a world without water. The idea is ridiculous. Hunger for food serves a vital purpose - and so does our hunger for meaning.
ReplyDeleteBut in the end, a full stomach is a full stomach, yes? And if you filled up on hot dogs and I filled up on pizza, are we not both just as full and happy?
Delete--c0
Well - not really - because our spiritual stomachs know the difference between the actual meaning/food that we hunger for and the imaginary replacements we try to substitute!
DeleteI think our heads do, but our stomachs don't. That is why IMHO some can be filled with cult nonsense, some of it very dangerous, and not detect the difference.
Delete--c0