I belive in a god. His name is Master Tang.

In all seriousness though, I don't necessarily believe in a god as in one being who controls everything, but I do believe in a higher being of an unknown form. I sure as hell believe in life after death (there is NO way that clairvoyant could have known the things she knew if she couldn't actually communicate with my dead relatives).

A bold topic you've brought up here Ian.

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"Bull-shit, mister Han Man!"

Well, its been a topic of great interest to me for some time now. Maybe I should have stated my own views on the topic to encourage more responses from others, but I didn't want to present any bias to the topic in doing that. Also, any posts in the forums seem to be links, so maybe some actual discussion in the forums would be a good thing. 

Thank you Jimmy for contributing, but I do want to see more people posting their views on the topic. This isn't something that I started to make personal attacks on people, just to get some more ideas on it. I'm more interested in the why question most of all.

Anyway, time for my views. I don't mean to offend anyone with what I say or any of the analogies/arguments I may use. 

I think that it is highly unlikely that there is a god/s / higher power out there. It is the same sort of skepticism that I think everyone would have about an invisible flying teapot that cannot be detected by any means that also orbits the sun. We cannot disprove the idea of a god (or the lovely teapot for that matter), but lack of evidence for something, doesn't mean that it gives the idea any more credibility. 

Feel free to attack my views (a few punches or even an inside jump kick).

    Seeing is believing.

    I don't see it, I don't believe it.

We can't see air, yet I'm pretty sure we all believe that it exists. 

Bold & controversial topic Ian, good stuff!

To firstly answer the question: "Not really." But call me an agnostic. I don't follow a faith, but I wouldn't be closed to the idea of the possibility of a creator.

However for me, rather than debating that point, I take the diplomatic approach of - if it works for people, then I don't mind it so much (as long as they don't get extreme, of course). Everyone has a belief structure of some sort, whether that is scientific or religious. My belief structure is more scientific, evidence based, but like a true scientific belief, if new evidence suggests to me that there is a strong reason to believe that there is a higher being, then I'll re-evaluate my position.

Whoah... I read that like 4 times before I gave up trying to understand it. Small country town high-school has failed me yet again (although I always love the use of the phrase "failing most admirably... hehe)

I agree that it is important that each individual should come up with their own beliefs based on their life experiences, rather than somebody else's. The one point where I believe religion generally fails is that they feel that they MUST have a god-figure at the head of their belief structure or else nobody would take them seriously. I think if religions were to do the opposite and try to come across as a way of life rather than an order of god, people would be much more inclined to join them, even those who have no beliefs in a god.

Take Christianity for example, the bible and Jesus: If you were to take away the myth and the magic from his story, it would make so much more sense. This is my theory on Jesus: Jesus was a guy who knew a peaceful way of life. He wanted to make the world a more peaceful place by spreading that way of life to everyone else. Unfortunately however, the people he spread his teachings to spread the word to others, feeling that they needed to exaggerate his achievements, praising him as a miracle worker so the people would support him. This is where he was cut down because the Romans of course didn't like the idea of the people worshipping a god other than their own so they had him killed. The apostles promised him they would spread his teachings for generations to come, so they wrote the gospels. Whilst writing the gospels, they thought "Hey, this thing's gonna be passed on for thousands of generations. People aren't gonna be interested in some guy who helped people and then got executed." "I know! Let's make him a superhero! That'll make everyone believe us! We'll call him the son of God!" "Yeah! Oh, and don't tell her, but let's make Mary out to be a tramp. People won't believe us if we give equality to women." "Good idea." "What's going on?" "Oh hey Mary! We were just talking about going on a little pilgrimage. We'll be back in a few years." "Can I come?" "No, it's kind of a 'find your manhood' thing. You know how it is." "Oh, okay. Well don't go writing the gospels without me okay?" "Of course not! No we wouldn't do that! We'll write it when we get back." "Okay, that sounds cool. Take care!" ".........Hehe, I told her we'd wait til we got back. Let's split up so it'll be harder for her to track us." "Did you guys say something?" "No, nothing."... ... ... ... ... ... You get the picture.

Anyway, my point is, never take a religion's belief structure word for word, because it's HIGHLY likely that there's been a "chinese whispers" thing going on over those many many centuries. 

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"Bull-shit, mister Han Man!"