Hassan_Abdillah

I would've appreciated it more if you actually asked me straight up to tell you about myself rather than being a stalker.

Meh, I take that back. I'm a stalker myself at times.

So about myself you ask? Well I'm Hassan, Hassan Abdillah. That roughly translates as "Hassan the slave of God". I'm a passionate Muslim, and a passionate debater. And a passionate (budding) scientist. And a passionate writer. And a passionate lots of other things. I'm a man of varied interests. But my primary interest is religion. I take the issue of "purpose" very seriously.

Just to write a few words about how I contrast my views against the "prevalent" trend:

I am aware that the dominant theme in today's net-lectual culture is, for the most part, agnosticism. Every so often we hear people saying things like all religions are flawed (on the basis of, of course, the fallacy of sweeping generalization. Just because the religion you claim to know about appears flawed to you, doesn't mean all religions have to follow suit) or that this universe has no objective purpose (this is what we call a "claim to knowledge", and a claim to knowledge needs to be backed up by evidence), and so on. On the face of it, it seems like individuals these days are rejecting the notion of religion(s) on the basis of valid intellectual arguments. But I contend that this is far from the truth. Once you scratch this superficial surface and go a bit deeper, you would almost always find that behind these reasons, there are actually emotions, which guide and motivate the formation of such (apparently) intellectual justifications. Examples would include fear of consequences (i.e. what if this religion thing were true? I better not think about it. Meh all religions are stupid), apathy (I have no idea why, but it's actually considered "cool" these days to display apathy towards the major problems of life), laziness, arrogance and so on. This is of no surprise really. The human mind is 5% ration and 95% emotion, as Freud showed.

Will Durant illustrates my thoughts beautifully in the following words:

"Philosophy begins when one learns to doubt- particularly to doubt one's cherished beliefs, one's dogmas, and one's axioms. Who knows how these beliefs became certainties with us, and whether some secret wish did not furtively beget them, clothing desire in the dress of thought? There is no real philosophy until the mind turns around and questions itself. "Gnothi Seauton"- said Socrates, know thyself."

As regards the negative generalizations against religious beliefs, I, on rational grounds, find them to be unfair. Going into much detail on this topic is not my intention, at least not here. But don't mind if I drag Bertrand Russel in here to share a quote which sums up the thoughts on the top of my head about this:

"It would be perfectly possible to be a complete and absolute Rationalist in the true sense of the term and yet accept this or that dogma. The question is how to arrive at your opinions and not what your opinions are. The thing in which we believe is the supremacy of reason. If reason should lead you to orthodox conclusions, well and good; you are still a Rationalist."

So yeah, I think I would stop here. But for any further information/discussion/whatever, you are more than welcome to knock me any way you want, with the exception of the particularly painful ones.

The Religion of Islaam
Theology
Philosophy
Polemics
Science (especially Biology)
Pokemon (games, not anime or manga)
Poetry
Humor
Cooking

Meh that would be it.