Belief-O-Matic -- A personality quiz about your religious and spiritual beliefs

[justin]

Re: Belief-O-Matic -- A personality quiz about your religious and spiritual beli

Oh god.

 

[HFWR]

Yes?

 

[Alex]

Re: Belief-O-Matic -- A personality quiz about your religious and spiritual beli

As you mentioned here...
here...
here...
here...
here...
here...
here...
and here...

whoa!! hahaha

....heres a question for our religion basher: Who is more irrational? A man who believes in a God he can't see, or a man who is offended by a God he doesn't believe in?

 

[REWahoo]

Re: Belief-O-Matic -- A personality quiz about your religious and spiritual beli

....heres a question for our religion basher: Who is more irrational? A man who believes in a God he can't see, or a man who is offended by a God he doesn't believe in?

Just to be sure we set the record straight, my post was directed at the repetitive redundancy of the theme rather than the substance of the subject matter.

 

[Scrooge]

Re: Belief-O-Matic -- A personality quiz about your religious and spiritual beli

Maybe it's causal.  By diverting 10% extra into our portfolios by not tithing, we're able to FIRE.  The god-fearing folks are still working and a-tithing away?   

It's hard to tell how representative these forums' contributors are of the "early retirees" set. Once a certain critical mass of like minded active community members is reached, potential otherwise eligible contributors who do not feel that they fit in may be increasingly likely to move on in search of greener pastures. Or at least avoid topics where they would expect to be in the minority.

There have been quite a few studies of conformist behavior in humans, but I don't know if any have been internet-specific. In my experience, it doesn't take much -- roughly a 60-40 ratio -- for the "minority" participants of an Internet board/forum to become reluctant to speak up when they expect to be outnumbered. I guess they just don't like to admit that they are in the minority, no matter how inconsequential it may be. Weak, pathetic creatures!

Having said that, I am sure that the quiz was in error when it identified me as a closet Mormon. It must have used a wrong session id or something!  

 

[Alex]

Re: Belief-O-Matic -- A personality quiz about your religious and spiritual beli

Just to be sure we set the record straight, my post was directed at the repetitive redundancy of the theme rather than the substance of the subject matter.

Ok. Since we are on the record - For the record- I am not affiliated with any religion or church. I have not been in a church for the purposes of worship in decades (weddings, funerals,baptisms, etc are not worship ...)

 

[Nords]

It's hard to tell how representative these forums' contributors are of the "early retirees" set. Once a certain critical mass of like minded active community members is reached, potential otherwise eligible contributors who do not feel that they fit in may be increasingly likely to move on in search of greener pastures. Or at least avoid topics where they would expect to be in the minority.
There have been quite a few studies of conformist behavior in humans, but I don't know if any have been internet-specific. In my experience, it doesn't take much -- roughly a 60-40 ratio -- for the "minority" participants of an Internet board/forum to become reluctant to speak up when they expect to be outnumbered. I guess they just don't like to admit that they are in the minority, no matter how inconsequential it may be. Weak, pathetic creatures!
Having said that, I am sure that the quiz was in error when it identified me as a closet Mormon. It must have used a wrong session id or something!

Other than Greaney's & Raddr's boards, I'm not aware of any other ER forums. (NFB is gone and IMO MF is no longer an ER forum.) So the three boards appear to be pretty representative of the ERs with opinions to express.

I don't think the "minorities" feel reluctant-- only apathetic. Or maybe they're just trying to find something else to do all day...

 

[sgeeeee]

Re: Belief-O-Matic -- A personality quiz about your religious and spiritual beli

It's hard to tell how representative these forums' contributors are of the "early retirees" set. Once a certain critical mass of like minded active community members is reached, potential otherwise eligible contributors who do not feel that they fit in may be increasingly likely to move on in search of greener pastures. Or at least avoid topics where they would expect to be in the minority. . . .

I have to agree. Although my values seem to match up fairly well with the mainstream on this board, I've figured out that if I post on certain topics, I better be ready to take a lot of grief. Sometimes (after enough wine) I go ahead and take on the grief. And I don't hesitate to spread it around once I've been sh#t on. But increasingly, I choose to avoid the piling on effect for certain topics. During the past year or so I've watched a number of posters (who I thought were interesting) face fairly harsh criticism for something they felt strongly about and eventually disappear. Others fit right in and are then forgiven for the same opinions. Discussion boards tend to get cliquish. This one is no exception.

 

[flipstress]

Here are my results, whether or not they fit in with this forum or not:
1.  Unitarian Universalism (100%) 
2.  Liberal Quakers (92%) 
3.  Mainline to Liberal Christian Protestants (89%) 
4.  Neo-Pagan (89%) 

It's hard for me to get spiritual; I don't do much to develop along those lines.  There was a time about 10 years or so when I was heartbroken and was devoted more to finding some comfort and meaning in life.  I read a bit about Buddhism, tried going to different churches (Unitarian, Unity, Catholic).  Then I settled on a Catholic church and joined the choir but stopped when I realized I was more excited about the singing than actually following the rules.  Now, I'm just busy with the day-to-day grind.

I was raised Catholic so I still have the image of God the Father and Jesus, the Son.  I don't know why I easily forget about the Holy Spirit--maybe because He/It has no bodily image in my mind.  The Father is always a Zeus-like image, and Jesus is well, the sweet-faced one with long hair parted in the middle, a moustache and beard, and beautiful slightly-sad eyes. 

I was pulled into Buddhism for a while, and to this day, I try to meditate once every six months or so, but I still find myself saying a prayer to God as habit after 12 years in Catholic grade school and high school.

It sounds bad but exploring matters of the spirit is one of the things I hope to do in ER.  Something tells me if I'm not doing it now, I probably won't then, either.  Really, if one believes that spiritual stuff is the most important thing, one would be devoting one's time to it now instead of some far-off future.  So maybe I'm fooling myself that I am more spritual than  I am    But then again, maybe I really CAN devote more time when retired to this. Hmmm...may be a topic for another thread...

 

[Scrooge]

Other than Greaney's & Raddr's boards, I'm not aware of any other ER forums.  (NFB is gone and IMO MF is no longer an ER forum.)  So the three boards appear to be pretty representative of the ERs with opinions to express.

I would add one caveat: "ERs with opinions to express on Internet discussion boards". I work in the IT world and even here there is a clear divide between those who use Internet forums/boards/newsgroups/etc and those who don't. To some extent it's generational with people under 40-45 considerably more likely to get involved.

 

[MJ]

Re: Belief-O-Matic -- A personality quiz about your religious and spiritual beli

Then I settled on a Catholic church and joined the choir but stopped when I realized I was more excited about the singing than actually following the rules.

As a young teenager, I used to go to Temple. Although I didn't realize it then, I went to hang out with my cousin and go over to my Aunt's house for a typical Saturday Jewish traditional meal. I really miss the great cholent my Aunt made. I don't miss going to Temple.

 

[flipstress]

vagabond,
A lot of my good childhood memories about going to church, too, are wrapped up with the other things that happened after church, like Sunday lunch out or department-store shopping. 

Most times, we would just buy popcorn to eat and goldfish for pets (yes!) in the church courtyard afterwards, before heading home.

I did like the rituals, too, like the kneeling and standing, the sound of the bells, the prayers and hymns, the sight of the cup and Host...

 

[Gumby]

..

 

[Fireup2020]

This was interesting...shall we resurrect this thread for the newcomers? Stumbled across it as a referral at the bottom of the page (many older posts are interesting!)

So much for being raised Roman Catholic!

1. Orthodox Judaism (100%) 2. Sikhism (92%)
Go figure!

 

[bots2019]

Good revival fireup,

Looks like they're pretty much right on for me...

1. Mainline to Liberal Christian Protestants (100%) 2. Orthodox Quaker (88%) 3. Liberal Quakers (83%) 4. Mainline to Conservative Christian/Protestant (72%)

 

[Martha]

As you can see, dangerous territory.

Me, I think Einstein articulated my beliefs well:

My views are near to those of Spinoza: admiration for the beauty of and belief in the logical simplicity of the order and harmony which we can grasp humbly and only imperfectly. I believe that we have to content ourselves with our imperfect knowledge and understanding and treat values and moral obligations as a purely human problem — the most important of all human problems.

 

[cantlogin]

I'm with you on that Martha.

 

[lazygood4nothinbum]

oh my god, i'm a liberal quaker too. i don't even know what the hell a quaker is. i actually did have instant oatmeal last night for dinner. and i love the wild quaker parrots we have flying around. so maybe i am a quaker after all. wouldn't you like to be a quaker too?

um, i think this thing is a qurock.

ok, well, just maybe i stand corrected. not such a qurock afterall.

just retook the test thinking that my answers would depend on my mood at the time. yet i'm still a liberal quaker. but just as interesting to see what we are is to see what we are not. how about listing your top & bottom 5 or 10.

the top 10:
1. Liberal Quakers (100%) 2. Unitarian Universalism (99%) 3. Neo-Pagan (93%) 4. Secular Humanism (91%) 5. New Age (88%) 6. Mainline to Liberal Christian Protestants (84%) 7. Mahayana Buddhism (80%) 8. Taoism (80%) 9. Theravada Buddhism (76%) 10. Reform Judaism (67%)

the bottom 10:
17. Sikhism (55%) 18. Christian Science (Church of Christ, Scientist) (50%) 19. Hinduism (36%) 20. Orthodox Judaism (33%) 21. Mainline to Conservative Christian/Protestant (28%) 22. Islam (28%) 23. Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) (26%) 24. Seventh Day Adventist (24%) 25. Eastern Orthodox (15%) 26. Roman Catholic (15%) 27. Jehovah's Witness (13%)

ps, martha, love that einstein quote. what an eloquent man.

 

[cantlogin]

It looks like they don't even admit to the possibility that an atheist exists.

 

[Martha]

It looks like they don't even admit to the possibility that an atheist exists.

Secular humanist or nontheist.

 

[Eyerishgold]

The religion I was born into is Catholicism. That being said, according to the quiz and my beliefs, Roman Catholic ranked #26 out of 27 possible religions. I find it amusing that I was born and raised Catholic and my belief system turned out to be SO different from what Catholics believe.

I've never heard of Unitarian Universalism but they were my number one match.

 

[travelover]

...............I've never heard of Unitarian Universalism but they were my number one match.

I was born into the UU church, but most members are "converts" who frequently say, "I've been a UU for a long time, I just didn't know it".

 

[cantlogin]

Secular humanist or nontheist.

I understood that, but since this is all about labels I'm amused that they are afraid of mentioning the term that is most commonly used to describe that orientation.

I'm just sayin'.

 

[dumpster56]

Unitarian, Liberal quaker, Neo Pagan.. humm

 

[kumquat]

About what I'd expect.

Top 3
1. Nontheist (100%) 2. Secular Humanism (97%) 3. Theravada Buddhism

Bottom 3
25. Jehovah's Witness (5%) 26. New Thought (5%) 27. Scientology (5%)