Quote:
Originally Posted by TexArcher
I'm curious as to how many of these things theists believe in. Please state your religious affiliation and answer Y/N. Explanations for why you answer Y or N would be great if you feel like it.
Do you believe in...
1. Horoscopes/astrology
2. Palm reading/Tarot card reading
3. Other forms of divination of the future -- I Ching, etc.
4. Voodoo/curses
5. Amulets/crystals with the power to protect or heal
6. Ghosts
7. Vampires
8. Werewolves
9. Zombies
10. Loch Ness Monster
11. Big Foot
12. Yeti
13. Chupa Cabra
14. UFO sightings
15. Alien abductions of humans
I am a theist and am Catholic although I do not believe that any religion (Catholicism included) is exclusively correct. I am comfortable with the tenets of Catholicism and familiar with the rituals.
1. No. The predictive value does not seem to exist as far as I can tell and the mechanism of action as explained by proponents is not valid. I have not been able to devise a valid explanation. My opinion would best be described as active disbelief.
2. No. See 1.
3. Overly broad. I am not aware of the details of any other system but am in general not a believer in any others.
4. This is very broad. Voodoo specifically I would say no to a magical effect but the concept of a curse and the psychological effect of a curse would need some thought.
5. No. I am pretty strong in physical chemistry and chemical physics so the detailed nature of crystals is well known to me. This would be active disbelief.
6. I have never seen one or any convincing evidence that they exist. On the other hand, this might be a phenomenon that would be difficult to detect. Call me agnostic on the issue but highly skeptical of any specific claim.
7. Not sure why this is different than the pegasus. I was not aware that anyone actually believed that vampires were real. No, active disbelief. Although I read somewhere that there is a psychological abnormality in which people believe they need blood to live, so there is that qualifier.
8. No, see 7 minus the psych comment.
9. See 8.
10. No, active disbelief. Although there may well be animal species still undiscovered, a creature of the size of Nessie in that body of water could not remain undetected. It would leave partially eaten carcasses, it would die and sometimes bloat and float to the surface, etc. You would need a stable population to procreate. Just not possible.
11. No, active disbelief. After all these years someone would have shot one, even if by accident.
12. See 11.
13. Had to look that one up. I do not know much beyond the wiki entry but people may have found strangely mutilated corpses. There may be a number of causes but for an undiscovered species my answer to 11 is probably best.
14. Certainly there have been sightings of flying objects that are unidentified. The whole alien explanation seems somewhat unlikely but not impossible at some level. Agnostic in general but highly skeptical of any specific claim of an encounter.
15. Again, highly unlikely. Aliens could snatch someone but if they were hiding then why put them back? If they were not hiding then why avoid us at all. Just grab someone off a NYC street in front of everyone. This falls just short of active disbelief.
To answer the unasked question, I was waiting for a phone call and had some time to kill.