Agree or disagree?

(or do we have to define "God" for this one too? )

i really dont know

THe poll isn't exhaustive, and may present a false dichotomy. We may have an innate tendency to believe, which doesn't imply we would be born believing.

The ability to believe is innate, but what you believe is learned. Some things easliy are believed and others more difficult.

As A child you are VERY MEEK, meaning receptive to believe anything, as the years go by dissapointments and lies and others things build up and believing becomes more difficult for some than others depending on what the subject is about.

Either way you can ALWAYS change your believing, its a free will choice, believe it or not...........

Belief in something bigger than self is a natural conclusion as you grow and see the greatness and vastness and details of creation, some reject this as from God but nevertheless they know it did not come from them. There are some who will never believe even though its their choice and they can if they want.

Some rationalize it away as the big bang or evolution and accidental, those in my opinion think very low of themselves in the grand scheme of things, they think they are not worthy enough to have all this created for them.........

Excellent. I wish he was here to tell me what else I really believe in, because that would be handy stuff to know.

you wouldn't believe if a man was raised from the dead, let alone God if He personally told you!

Interesting. Carry on. You must know other things about Tex, that he himself doesnt know.

Do you know anything about me that I dont know? I'd imagine you do. So please, share!

[ ] innate
[ ] learned
[x] some combination of both

False dichotomy ftl.

No clue please share?

I think that all people believe in God, or have a desire to seek God, at some point in their life, if not throughout their entire life. But many people have learned to suppress it.

In terms of Id, Ego, and Super-ego: the Id holds this belief of God or desire of knowing God. As the Ego and Super-ego develop, the Id's natural belief/desire is suppressed. The Id's need to satisfy its other selfish desires give extra strength to the Ego and Super-ego to readily suppress it.

This is simply a theory of mine. Not scientifically proven, not sure if Scripture talks about innate belief in God.

But the question of innate belief does not even matter. God has revealed His eternal power and divine nature to all man, through His other creations and through His Word. But many people have chosen to ignore Him, even in the Old Testament when He revealed Himself in many other supernatural ways.

This is what the Bible says (Romans 1:20-25)

Most of you will laugh at this. Some of you will become angry with it. I expect nothing less than that.

But I hope that inside the heart of even one non-believer, this truth shines its light.

I thought about this beforehand, and decided against "combination of both" as an option.

Here's why (to address you and Steve in the same post):

Imagine a child was born and separated from the civilized world. Would they arrive at the "God" conclusion on their own? I think this results in a clear yes/no answer, and not a false dichotomy.

(BTW, forget the God thing. I don't even know if this child would even develop a "consiousness" or sense of "self-awareness" unless they started interacting with other cultured humans/animals)

Well, herein lies the rub; it's not clear to me either that the child would develop many things we regard as normal, to the point where I'd say the question is uninteresting in practical terms (it is interesting, but not in an RGT context, IMO).

That one certaintly true of me as well.
If he personally showed me his Frankenstein skills, I would be alot more impressed.

Clearly "God" has to be defined. There are far too many of them.

This... Its somewhat innate because people all over the world developed religion, nearly all areas, and ones that weren't in communication with one another. This would indicate that primitives instinctively explain things they can't with "gods". Its also somewhat learned because of the various cultures' agreed upon set of beliefs are passed down within that culture further along the road in the timeline. Its most certainly a combination of both.

Instilled is the word you are looking for.

I can see how theists without imagination (contradiction in terms?) might identify their belief as innate in themselves. I'm sure they can quite truthfully say that they cannot recall a time when they didn't have belief. I'd point to the fact that young children are very impressionable and that many religions have a "get to them while they're young" recruitment policy. Nobody wants to accept that they have been influenced to such an extent, so this is understandably dismissed. To generalise that everybody has this innate belief takes more than just a lack of imagination, it's just plain dumb.

I am an atheist and I literally cannot fathom how one could be a theist. Believe me, I am at least as incredulous as you when you can't fathom how I couldn't believe. I don't go on to conclude that you're fighting against a latent tendancy towards atheism, though.

Its easy to conclude from the types of statements atheists make.

For example they like to say God doesn't exist then they precede to say the God of the bible is a "monster". Then they precede to demonstrate their lack of biblical knowledge and they refuse to be corrected when it should be obvious they lack belief so there's quite possibly a biblical or spiritual error they are making.

These monster statements sound like either a "shock tactic" to try to take belief from Christians or a reinforcement of the atheists own unbelief. Either way its paradoxical to say you don't believe a God then say God is a monster. Its a borderline hate crime if you ask me. Its like walking up to a guy on the street and insulting his mother without even knowing his mother. Its both an irrational statement, action and attitude.

Most of us call beings that murder hundreds of thousands of people - "monsters". In addition I would say that those who DON'T consider such beings monsters have rather low moral values.

There is no paradox in forming an opinion on fictional characters. Im sure you do it every time you watch a move or read a book.

Statements like this are exactly why no-one ever asks you.

See another paradoxical statement.

Either he exists or he doesn't. If he doesn't then there's no need for the statement above.

Then you jump to ad hominem.

Some superior logic there.

Grow up. Realize that some people are different from you and can just do things that you can't.

See batair's post above.

Yes being without a comeback is to be dreaded on here.....Quite a boogeyman really.....

Fail.

[ ] innate
[ ] learned
[ ] some combination of both

None of the above. Believe is taught.