I once thought so; now, not so much. One man's 'pedantic and cynical' can be another man's 'liberating'. "Random and meaningless' also implies 'no hidden masters'.
I'm not a theist by any stretch of the imagination, but by the same token, I don't assume to know too much about how the world works. What I do know is that our subconscious is far more complex than the average person likes to believe. To imply (as the other user did) that one cannot make a mental connection of which one is initially (consciously) unaware is to deny fact in favor of a version of nihilism that I personally find distasteful. It's such an easy thing to say, by the same token. It's equally as unsubtle and uninteresting as saying God's plan controls all. That's what I mean by pedantic an cynical. One can believe one has providence over oneself while still permitting that the universe may be more complex than meets the eye.
Our brains, our consciousness, memory, learning, thinking - all these things are far more complex than we know. As a species, our perception of the world is limited by our senses. If we had access to more senses, our beliefs would change with our new perceptions of the world. Other species have abilities that seem magical. The Arctic Tern can travel from the Arctic to the Antarctic without a map. A Chinook salmon can return from her Pacific travels to the river where she was born. I'm pretty sure that our brains do more than we can explain. All the time.What I do know is that our subconscious is far more complex than the average person likes to believe.
briandmyers would like to believe his chess experience was more than coincidence. Of course, there's no way to prove it, yet.