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Originally Posted by HPLovecraft

Yes, yes, and yes, and this is the reason why I consider myself ignostic.

The departure in the major religions from the idea of an anthropomorphic God has rendered him (it? whatever) as nothing but, in philosophical terms, an intentional object. A concept, not a thing. This strengthens a religion from some forms of criticism, but weakens it in practice at the same time, in my opinion, but I won't go into that here. Basically, when someone asks "do you believe in God?" my first response shouldn't be yes or no, but "tell me what you conceive God to be, and then I will tell you whether I believe in that conception or not." The original question, by itself, is meaningless. This is as important for the atheist to understand as it is for the religious.

Thanks for that, that's a really insightful post.