Buddy said:
"...why you all up in my bidness?" :)
Hahaha!!! That's given me two hunned, fiddy belly laughs since I read it today
I don't get asked that question a lot but on the few occasions I have been asked, I've replied "Of course!" with a look of surprise on my face implying "you don't?" I will usually follow up with the "but I don't believe in the old guy in the sky story" and I talk about something along the lines of what Perceval said above:
Perceval said:
You could say you adhere to the theory of 'rational design' which posits that everything in the universe is imbued with an intelligence of its own and the sum of all those parts are what you would describe as "god", although that's just a word for it, any many others could be used and would perhaps be more appropriate.
Of course, that doesn't answer the question of "who created it", but if the answer to that is "no one, it always was and always will be", then it's kind of a moot point, or, that is one of the great mysteries of life, but we don't need to know who (if anyone) created the living system to study it and understand that it operates under its own steam, so to speak. The main point here is that the evidence does not suggest that any force or power is directing life etc, but rather that it is an inherently intelligence and self-sustaining system.
If they are not familiar with the ideas we share here I will also say that I think that there are other levels of consciousness "between" us and "god" and that we can only really have a very simplistic understanding based on our current level.
In the context of when I've been asked, the questioners have usually seemed sincere and curious and the context of the question was when I was talking about how most religions are corrupt and they have done a good job of making either blind believers or atheists who have simply rejected an impostor biblical god and have gone and thrown the baby out with the bathwater. So as others have suggested above, context is important. If you think that they're just fishing or trying to peg you, you can either say yes or no; I don't think it makes much difference. If you think they're being sincere, then there's plenty to talk/think about :)
And now that I've written all of that above, I just remembered a recent occasion when I
was asked by someone who was insincere (I would add that in his own mind there was probably no one more sincere than he). The reason I didn't think of it at first was because there was no direct "do you believe in god?" question but in retrospect it amounted to that. Unfortunately, there were another two people who were interested and one of them had asked about some of my posts on Facebook related to the Cass material. The other two were a married couple I hadn't met before. The husband was basically a know-it-all and his wife also seemed very interested. However, when the conversation started to turn "metaphysical" he literally shifted in his seat towards me and announced how we were about to have a great argument. I told him I wasn't interested in an argument or debate, but rather dialogue and learning. He agreed completely with me and then started to show what a great scientific and academic mind he had whilst his wife made apologetic faces to me. So, I let him "win" his argument and changed the subject. It was easy really! ;D
P.S. It kind of reminded me of the criticisms made of the French this year on the forum. Where mealtimes can turn into big debates where the aim is to just argue and win. Did I understand that correctly? Because I have seen people literally swell up on occasion here at the prospect of a debate. I so hated debates back in school. I couldn't articulate it then but now that I've learned about discussion, dialogue, learning and sharing info... well it all makes sense!
