NationStates Jolt Archive

First of all, I am a Creationist, so I believe that God (in my case, the Judeo/Christian God) created the universe and all living things. There are many things I do not understand in the world. For example, how can there be Dinosaur fossils dating back before the time of humans when the Bible says that God created Man first? I dont know. I just do not understand. I have no explanation, and I do not know who, or what, I believe. I guess you could say I believe God created Man first and that Dinosaurs or other pre-historic fossils exist also. I also do not know what I think of Evolution. In my mind, Evolution does not contradict Creation, but the Creation contradicts the other theories that propose life began from chemicals coming together, chemicals reacting, carbon semi life forms appearing, proto cells appearing, etc. I believe God created Man, but I neither believe nor disbelieve in Evolution. I think Creationism and Evolution can work together, and some type of Evolution may take place in the creatures that God created.


But the true reason I am a Creationist is that I cannot, will not, believe that life came from nothing. There must have been some higher power that created life, and the universe, from nothing. Nothing. I cannot believe the theory that life began when certain chemicals (carbon, nitrogen, etc.) came together, reacted, and somehow formed some type of proto-cell or life from. I cannot believe that.

I believe that God created Man and all the living and nonliving things in the universe, and my belief will not change.

Because you cannot understand Scientific principle..

Some people won't even bend that far.

"So, could God creating everything... could that be perceived as the Big Bang, (Or, as I call it, the Gigantic Space Kablooey)?"
"No. God went *Click*"

I can see your arguements as valid, and I respect them. But, I must add that if God created us in His image, why would we need to evolve? Wouldn't we be as best suited for whatever it is we were put here for in the same bodies as Adam and Eve, or whoever the first ones were?

First of all, I am a Creationist, so I believe that God (in my case, the Judeo/Christian God) created the universe and all living things. There are many things I do not understand in the world. For example, how can there be Dinosaur fossils dating back before the time of humans when the Bible says that God created Man first? I dont know. I just do not understand. I have no explanation, and I do not know who, or what, I believe. I guess you could say I believe God created Man first and that Dinosaurs or other pre-historic fossils exist also. I also do not know what I think of Evolution. In my mind, Evolution does not contradict Creation, but the Creation contradicts the other theories that propose life began from chemicals coming together, chemicals reacting, carbon semi life forms appearing, proto cells appearing, etc. I believe God created Man, but I neither believe nor disbelieve in Evolution. I think Creationism and Evolution can work together, and some type of Evolution may take place in the creatures that God created.



I'm a Christian and have read Genesis 1-20 many times over but I don't remember any part that says "And so the Lord created man in his own image and then put the finishing touch on earth with the dinosaur". Dinosaur, the word anyway, is never mentioned in the Bible. There are several creatures mentioned that creationists believe are dinosaurs but they is no proof because even the notes at the bottom of page say it may have been a hippo or a elephant.

But the true reason I am a Creationist is that I cannot, will not, believe that life came from nothing. There must have been some higher power that created life, and the universe, from nothing. Nothing. I cannot believe the theory that life began when certain chemicals (carbon, nitrogen, etc.) came together, reacted, and somehow formed some type of proto-cell or life from. I cannot believe that.

I believe that God created Man and all the living and nonliving things in the universe, and my belief will not change.




Well each to his own.

Because you cannot understand Scientific principle..

Precisely. When you really open your eyes you realize that science and religion have absolutely nothing to do with one another.

you are also making the mistake a scientist wouldn't make...in believing everything you read! :)

Precisely. When you really open your eyes you realize that science and religion have absolutely nothing to do with one another.

oops sorry...i wouldn't agree.

From a psychological point of view religion offers a lot...solves many of the knotty problems or at least offers some comfort; death, being poor, incurably sick etc etc

Of course, whether you view psychology as a science is another thing altogether and would merit its own thread :)

Precisely. When you really open your eyes you realize that science and religion have absolutely nothing to do with one another.


No kidding? You wouldn't lie to me? ;)

I'm a Christian and have read Genesis 1-20 many times over but I don't remember any part that says "And so the Lord created man in his own image and then put the finishing touch on earth with the dinosaur". Dinosaur, the word anyway, is never mentioned in the Bible. There are several creatures mentioned that creationists believe are dinosaurs but they is no proof because even the notes at the bottom of page say it may have been a hippo or a elephant.







Yes, I know, but that is why I said, I truly do not understand many things in this world.

Because you are a shithead, that's why.

im an atheist
but i dont see any reason why the god you believe in couldnt have placed fossils all over the earth for reasons that he has kept from you. its not like EVERYTHING is in the bible, just the stuff that seemed important to write down and keep through the ages.

Because you are a shithead, that's why.
Geee, thank you for your deep thought.

well it said god created animals not fossils and leaving parts out is lieing and since god cant lie then he didnt place fossils places

But the true reason I am a Creationist is that I cannot, will not, believe that life came from nothing. There must have been some higher power that created life, and the universe, from nothing. Nothing. I cannot believe the theory that life began when certain chemicals (carbon, nitrogen, etc.) came together, reacted, and somehow formed some type of proto-cell or life from. I cannot believe that.

I believe that God created Man and all the living and nonliving things in the universe, and my belief will not change.

Well, if your belief won't change, I don't see much point in debating this, but...:

The Christian version of creation lends it self quite well to the ex nihilo version of creation that you object to. That is, if the universe existed prior to God's arrival, then s/he didn't really create anything as much as put already existing elements together; God is more an author in this case than a creator. But this begs the question of where these materials came from. Have they always existed? If so, then the universe must always have existed, and the things in it. Why not then simply surmise that life has always existed? Another option would be, God created the elements as well, which means that he must have done so out of nothing -- precisely the point you object (and then dis-object) to. But to be able to create something out of nothing -- to will matter into existence -- that is something immensely powerful. Certainly much more powerful than the universe God created. So, following this line of logic, God requires even more explanation in terms of his/her creation than the universe does. If the universe cannot come from nothing, then God can't either.

This is usually where faith comes in. I, for one, have faith that the universe has always been. It's simpler; you don't have to explain the existence of God and also don't have to explain why God and gods behave like petulant brats in many religions. The concept of nothing is far more comforting to me than the idea of creation.

Yes. It says God created the Earth.
Aren't those fossils a PART of the Earth? Aren't they biological matter? So, how is that leaving anything out? They didn't list EVERYTHING he created.

wait wait wait wait wait

the ONLY reason you are a creationist is because yo ucannot believe everything came from nothing

let me point out a LITTLE fact for you

CREATIONISM ESPOUSES EVERYTHING CAME FROM JACK SHIT. god, some nameless, shapeless, fathomless entity said poof and everything was created from nothing

science states everything came from something because something cannot be created from nothing.
2nd law of thermodynamics people..

Geee, thank you for your deep thought.

Generally I actually try to debate intelligently, but Susa is too thick-skulled for me to bother.

I'm a Creationist, too. I'm an ex-Darwinist, born-again Christian.

The problem I have is, if at first there was nothing, than what was God? If Nothing was what was there, than how could a being, no matter how supreme, exist?

Generally I actually try to debate intelligently, but Susa is too thick-skulled for me to bother.

That still doesn't give you the right to flame, though.

the universe didnt always exist only god did, it said int eh begining god created the heavens and the earth, space is liek the 6th or 7th heaven right?


ooo and fossils are only part of the earth when the animal they belon to die and since god created man first then the animals couldnt have died yet

science states everything came from something because something cannot be created from nothing.
2nd law of thermodynamics people..

First, actually.

My metaphysics leave no room for evolution since it is based on the principle of "to be is to be perceived" but I don't believe in a god, either. I tend to believe there is no begining or end to the universe.

well it said god created animals not fossils and leaving parts out is lieing and since god cant lie then he didnt place fossils places
there are many thousands of things that exist that are left out of the bible. its not lying. there is just only so much that can fit.

That still doesn't give you the right to flame, though.

Usually I would agree with you. I adopt a certain "Fuck you" policy when dealing with really, really exceptionally stupid people though.

First, actually.

My metaphysics leave no room for evolution since it is based on the principle of "to be is to be perceived" but I don't believe in a god, either. I tend to believe there is no begining or end to the universe.
ah yes your right excuse me, i havnt had a good creationsits-dont-know-what-they-are-talknig-about debate in a while

I think I found a good copout from this debate, really. If you ever get tired of debating, just decide you're a subjective idealist.

Generally I actually try to debate intelligently, but Susa is too thick-skulled for me to bother.
The title of the thread was certainly enough reason for you to avoid it. As for intelligent debate, I've seen no sign of it from you in this topic. You started out flaming and have done nothing else since.

I don't subscribe to _Susa_'s beliefs, but he's entitled to hold them. How does that hurt anyone?

in my case, the Judeo/Christian God)


I think my biggest confusion is why nobody ever calls it the "Christo-Islamic God" ....

First of all, I am a Creationist, so I believe that God (in my case, the Judeo/Christian God) created the universe and all living things.

Ok...

There are many things I do not understand in the world. For example, how can there be Dinosaur fossils dating back before the time of humans when the Bible says that God created Man first? I dont know.

Ummm.... Now, I'm not Christian, I'm atheist. But at least I've read the Bible... which apparently you have not. Genesis says that God created humans LAST, on the 6th day. (Hence the name of one of Schwarzenegger's worst films, about human cloning.)

Now, I suppose you're just going along with the other Creationists, who do have a problem with dinosaur fossils... but it's not that they precede human beings. Rather, it is that they are apparently older than the world itself. That's right. Your strict literalists figures that the world was created by God in year "zero" of the traditional Hebrew calendar. Without taking the trouble now to track down the exact date, I believe it is around 5,000 B.C. But fossils are millions of years old!! Clearly, science must be wrong... or God is trying to test us. Right?!

I also do not know what I think of Evolution. In my mind, Evolution does not contradict Creation, but the Creation contradicts the other theories that propose life began from chemicals coming together, chemicals reacting, carbon semi life forms appearing, proto cells appearing, etc. I believe God created Man, but I neither believe nor disbelieve in Evolution. I think Creationism and Evolution can work together, and some type of Evolution may take place in the creatures that God created.

Sure, why not? That's at least the view of the more sensible Creationists. But on the other hand, isn't Evolution the evil theory that Creationists hat most? Your notion that "God created the Universe... and then everything else might have happened the way scientists think"... well, it's just not that controversial. I expect that there are plenty of scientists who would say something similar.

Of course, if you can accept that evolutionary theory does not contradict Creationism, then you must not feel to strongly about the whole "7 days of Creation" thing... and if that's the case, what's so hard to believe about the dinosaurs? After all, isn't a thousand years but a day in the eye of the Lord, or something like that? Hmm??

But the true reason I am a Creationist is that I cannot, will not, believe that life came from nothing.

OK. But, I think you'd be surprised how many perfectly respectable scientists think the same thing... "Sure," they say, "We can't figure out how the process got started either! So, it's just as well to say 'God did it' (although we'd like to know exactly what he did).... Oh, and after that, we're pretty sure we know how 'life' progressed into 'complex life'." So again, what's so controversial about this?

I cannot believe the theory that life began when certain chemicals (carbon, nitrogen, etc.) came together, reacted, and somehow formed some type of proto-cell or life from. I cannot believe that.

Okay... I'm sure the world will keep spinning anyway.

I believe that God created Man and all the living and nonliving things in the universe, and my belief will not change.

All right. Like I said, I'm atheist... so obviously I don't agree with you. But why do you "Creationists" insist on making such a big deal out of it? I mean, maybe the ones who don't believe in evolution at least have an excuse to get themselves worked into a frenzy... but do you really feel like you have to make this profession of faith? Do you think anyone really cares??

I'm a creationist. I'm also non-religious. Did I mention I have no problems believing in evolution?

Have fun figuring that one out ;)

I think it's obvious that it's supposed to be a story. I think it's overall a good story in many ways, but not something to be taken literally.

I think my biggest confusion is why nobody ever calls it the "Christo-Islamic God" ....I do not worship Allah. That name is never mentioned in the Bible as the name of God, so I do not extend it to Christo-Islamic.

I think it's obvious that it's supposed to be a story.

Thin plot line, flat characters, pacing is all over the place, and the central theme becomes muddied by irrational rambling.

If it were a paper for a literature class, it would get a C+ at best.

I do not worship Allah. That name is never mentioned in the Bible as the name of God, so I do not extend it to Christo-Islamic.

Just what do you think the old Hebrew word for "God" is? It's "El'h" ... pronounced "el-eh" or, after 2000 years of language intermingling, pronounced "a-lah".

"Allah" is not the name of God, it is like saying "God". "God" is not the name of God in the Bible either, yet you still say you believe in "God".

Here's the problem, though. Christians and Muslims have something in common ... Jesus! Christians believe Jesus to be the embodiment of God become flesh and saviour of the world and Muslims recognize and revere Jesus as a great prophet.

Jews do neither and give very little, if none at all, thought to Jesus.

Hence, it really makes more sense to call it the "Christo-Islamic God".

_Susa_, I congratulate you.

You are of a dying breed, and that is the levelheaded Conservative Christian. You've been replaced by the likes of Rush Limbaugh and Bill O'Reilly, in the manner that The Levelheaded Liberal has been replaced by Al Franken and Michael Moore.

I salute you and respect your views

First of all, I am a Creationist, so I believe that God (in my case, the Judeo/Christian God) created the universe and all living things. There are many things I do not understand in the world. For example, how can there be Dinosaur fossils dating back before the time of humans when the Bible says that God created Man first? I dont know. I just do not understand. I have no explanation, and I do not know who, or what, I believe. I guess you could say I believe God created Man first and that Dinosaurs or other pre-historic fossils exist also. I also do not know what I think of Evolution. In my mind, Evolution does not contradict Creation, but the Creation contradicts the other theories that propose life began from chemicals coming together, chemicals reacting, carbon semi life forms appearing, proto cells appearing, etc. I believe God created Man, but I neither believe nor disbelieve in Evolution. I think Creationism and Evolution can work together, and some type of Evolution may take place in the creatures that God created.


But the true reason I am a Creationist is that I cannot, will not, believe that life came from nothing. There must have been some higher power that created life, and the universe, from nothing. Nothing. I cannot believe the theory that life began when certain chemicals (carbon, nitrogen, etc.) came together, reacted, and somehow formed some type of proto-cell or life from. I cannot believe that.

I believe that God created Man and all the living and nonliving things in the universe, and my belief will not change.
'Synthetic Life' (http://www.evilbible.com/Synthetic%20Life.htm) proof life can have formed from base chemicals and non-living materials.

Because you are a shithead, that's why.
Flaming other posters isn't allowed. Knock it off.

Unfree People
Forum Moderator

First of all, I am a Creationist, so I believe that God (in my case, the Judeo/Christian God) created the universe and all living things. There are many things I do not understand in the world. For example, how can there be Dinosaur fossils dating back before the time of humans when the Bible says that God created Man first? I dont know. I just do not understand. I have no explanation, and I do not know who, or what, I believe. I guess you could say I believe God created Man first and that Dinosaurs or other pre-historic fossils exist also. I also do not know what I think of Evolution. In my mind, Evolution does not contradict Creation, but the Creation contradicts the other theories that propose life began from chemicals coming together, chemicals reacting, carbon semi life forms appearing, proto cells appearing, etc. I believe God created Man, but I neither believe nor disbelieve in Evolution. I think Creationism and Evolution can work together, and some type of Evolution may take place in the creatures that God created.


But the true reason I am a Creationist is that I cannot, will not, believe that life came from nothing. There must have been some higher power that created life, and the universe, from nothing. Nothing. I cannot believe the theory that life began when certain chemicals (carbon, nitrogen, etc.) came together, reacted, and somehow formed some type of proto-cell or life from. I cannot believe that.

I believe that God created Man and all the living and nonliving things in the universe, and my belief will not change. Well, if you want to do further reading into the theory of scientific creationism, there is material out there.

For example:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1880582244/102-4294738-0467350?v=glance

First of all, I am a Creationist, so I believe that God (in my case, the Judeo/Christian God) created the universe and all living things.

Cool, me too, although I am not a Creationist in the sense that you are referring to.

There are many things I do not understand in the world. For example, how can there be Dinosaur fossils dating back before the time of humans when the Bible says that God created Man first?

Well, reread Genesis. In the first (priestly) creation story, God created humankind absolutely last, just before God rested. So it makes sense that there are Dinosaur fossils dating back before the time of humans (unless, of course, you take the whole 7 days thing literally).

Now, in the next creation story, God creates Adam before all the animals, so yeah - it doesn't jive with the dinosaur bones. So I guess you have to conclude that we are living in the first Universe.


I guess you could say I believe God created Man first and that Dinosaurs or other pre-historic fossils exist also.

Hey, like I said, just go with the priestly creation story (and ignore the whole literal 7 days thing) and you've got it made!

Or, you could realize that the whole point of the creation *story* is simply to point out how great God is that God could make the Universe.

But the true reason I am a Creationist is that I cannot, will not, believe that life came from nothing. There must have been some higher power that created life, and the universe, from nothing. Nothing. I cannot believe the theory that life began when certain chemicals (carbon, nitrogen, etc.) came together, reacted, and somehow formed some type of proto-cell or life from. I cannot believe that.

Can you believe that God brought all the chemicals together in such a way that God knew they would form a proto-cell? Or that God created the Universe with all the right probabilities so that a proto-cell would be formed?

I believe that God created Man and all the living and nonliving things in the universe, and my belief will not change.

Cool beans.

Well, if you want to do further reading into the theory of scientific creationism, there is material out there.

For example:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1880582244/102-4294738-0467350?v=glance

That drivel is not science. They may call it evidence if they like, but not science. Science must abide by the scientific principle - which means you don't start with your conclusions.

That drivel is not science. They may call it evidence if they like, but not science. Science must abide by the scientific principle - which means you don't start with your conclusions.

Creationism and Evolution both start with the conclusion

Creationism and Evolution both start with the conclusion

No, they don't.

Science does not start with a conclusion at all, it is trying to figure out what happened. A particular scientist may have an idea of what happened, but is not stuck to that idea. She constructs an experiment that could either support (although not prove) or disprove her hypothesis. If the data disproves the hypothesis, it is thrown out. If the data supports the hypothesis, further experiments are carried out.

Creationism starts with the conclusion "The Bible is absolutely positively true" (except for the fact that it has creation twice, which they ignore) and sets out to find evidence to prove that they are right, only examining the evidence that they think helps them. This is not science, as it does not follow the scientific method.

Who cares, your ass is stuck here like the rest of us. If you don't like it, go find a tall building to jump from and spare the rest of us.

wait wait wait wait wait

the ONLY reason you are a creationist is because yo ucannot believe everything came from nothing

let me point out a LITTLE fact for you

CREATIONISM ESPOUSES EVERYTHING CAME FROM JACK SHIT. god, some nameless, shapeless, fathomless entity said poof and everything was created from nothing

science states everything came from something because something cannot be created from nothing.
2nd law of thermodynamics people..

Just for scientific precision, you mean the 1st Law

Because you cannot understand Scientific principle..

I personally know a number of christian scientists who accept creation theory. One has a PHD in micro-biology from Yale, and another has a bachelors degree in chemistry. I myself am an amateur sociologist/historian after studying both in University in Australia.

Science and faith are intertwined. You excercise faith when you choose to accept another's scientific findings, and you use science as a foundation upon with faith in God is based.

To ridicule someones PROCESS simply because they come to a different conclusion is stupid, ignorant and closed minded. Theists and deists reach these conclusions about God based on the information they have at their disposal. The agnostic does the same. The atheist on the other hand, in asserting "there is no God" directly ignores or overrides the firsthand experience of the majority of people who have ever existed - that they have known God in some way or another.

Doesn't sound very scientific to me.

So in short, keep an open mind and keep presumptions and ridicule to yourself. Many of us here love knowledge, love science and love God.

Science gives the how, religion gives the who, love gives the why.

Bye.

Yorick

I personally know a number of christian scientists who accept creation theory. One has a PHD in micro-biology from Yale, and another has a bachelors degree in chemistry. I myself am an amateur sociologist/historian after studying both in University in Australia.

If by "creation theory," you mean "God created everything somehow or other," I believe you. If you mean "God created everything exactly as it says in the Bible and in both ways that it says God did it," then anyone who says that should definitely not have a degree in biology.

To ridicule someones PROCESS simply because they come to a different conclusion is stupid, ignorant and closed minded.

Creationists' methods are not ridiculed because they came to a different conclusion. They are ridiculed because they claim to be science without following the scientific method, which is inherently a contradiction in terms.

So in short, keep an open mind and keep presumptions and ridicule to yourself. Many of us here love knowledge, love science and love God.

*raises hand* Ooh ooh! Me me!!

Science gives the how, religion gives the who, love gives the why.

Sounds about right to me.

I personally know a number of christian scientists who accept creation theory. One has a PHD in micro-biology from Yale, and another has a bachelors degree in chemistry. I myself am an amateur sociologist/historian after studying both in University in Australia.

Science and faith are intertwined. You excercise faith when you choose to accept another scientific findings, and you use science as a foundation upon with faith in God is based.

To ridicule someones PROCESS simply because they come to a different conclusion is stupid, ignorant and closed minded. Theists and deists reach these conclusions about God based on the information they have at their disposal. The agnostic does the same. The atheist on the other hand, in asserting "there is no God" directly ignores or overrides the firsthand experience of the majority of people who have ever existed - that they have know God in some way or another.

Doesn't sound very scientific to me.

So in short, keep an open mind and keep presumptions and ridicule to yourself. Many of us here love knowledge, love science and love God.

Science gives the how, religion gives the who, love gives the why.

Bye.

Yorick

How are atheists non-scientific? They do not ignore or override the firsthand experience of the majority of people; it's more that there are so many conflicting experiences that an objective, scientific judgement on God or faith cannot be made. Plus science relies on controlled, provable experiments. Faith cannot be proven, nor can miracles, or any other occurrances of faith. Thus, it is scientific, in a sense, not to believe in God. Mind you, there's no way of really disproving "God" exists, but there's no way of proving it either. Many people, thus, accept that there is no God, since no proof will ever be obtained. And as to your example of the Yale micro-biologist, that doesn't really show much, if anything. There is obviously going to be an eclectic selection of faiths, religions, and ideologies within the intelligentsia, just as well as there is an eclectic selection of faiths, religions, and ideologies among everyone else.

I think my biggest confusion is why nobody ever calls it the "Christo-Islamic God" ....

Because Christianity accepts the Torah word for word and incorporates it into the bible, as the first five books. Christianity agrees with Judaism entirely. We simply believe the Jewish messiah is Yeshua, whereas those we call "Jews" today are descended from those Jews who over the years have not accepted this. The Jews who have so, became firstly the original church, and to this day, become part of the body of Christ to this day when they accept Yeshua as messiah.

The Qu'ran on the other hand makes "corrections" to theology found in the bible - both old and new testaments. It presents a different picture of the God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob.

In fact there you have it:

The Judeo-Christian Yahweh, is the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
The Islamic Allah, is the God of Abraham and Ishmael.

;) Cheers

Yorick

No, they don't.

Science does not start with a conclusion at all, it is trying to figure out what happened. A particular scientist may have an idea of what happened, but is not stuck to that idea. She constructs an experiment that could either support (although not prove) or disprove her hypothesis. If the data disproves the hypothesis, it is thrown out. If the data supports the hypothesis, further experiments are carried out.


They don't have a choice here. Paleo is different than physics. They have the end result, us, and are trying to explain how we got here. To start from the beginning would be to create a single cell organism in the lab and watch it for a billion years.


Creationism starts with the conclusion "The Bible is absolutely positively true" (except for the fact that it has creation twice, which they ignore) and sets out to find evidence to prove that they are right, only examining the evidence that they think helps them. This is not science, as it does not follow the scientific method.

Both parties are guilty of discarding information that damages thier case. Paleontologists are notorious for fudging data. They have a preconcieved notion of how things should be, and make sure their research reflects that. If it doesn't, they move on, because failures don't get published.

wait wait wait wait wait

the ONLY reason you are a creationist is because yo ucannot believe everything came from nothing

let me point out a LITTLE fact for you

CREATIONISM ESPOUSES EVERYTHING CAME FROM JACK SHIT. god, some nameless, shapeless, fathomless entity said poof and everything was created from nothing

science states everything came from something because something cannot be created from nothing.
2nd law of thermodynamics people..

Why is that so hard to believe? Everything could have plopped into being 2 seconds ago, and all memory is implanted. How would you know any different? Try being a little creative and lateral in your thinking. Open your mind. Anything is possible.

Additionally try creating yourself. You can turn a blank canvas into something that transmits another time and place into another humans head. Not fully "from nothing" but still creating something that was not there before. Music recordings I what I deal with daily. I'm constantly making something that never existed. Dreaming and seeing it become reality.

The creator awareness could do whatever he wanted to do. I believe he keeps electrons moving to this day. Holds every atom together with force of will. How about that?

So yeah, it's not a stretch to conceive that the omnipresent awareness that blinked and saw eternity spoke and light came into being. God just "is".

And you either know him or you don't.

One more thing:

FAITH, to work requires the existence of doubt or it is not faith. So for everyone demanding proof it's futile. It's like trust. Do you value people trusting you? It requires doubt. If someone proves beyond doubt you are trustworthy, they no longer trust you.

I personally do not believe in the traditional creation theory at all. I think it is bull. Why? Because there is no reason for me to believe something with no evidence supporting it just because some book says so. I do believe in God however. I accept the Big Bang theory, and perhaps this God character had some hand in that. I believe that though it took billions of years to evolve, that the original spark of life that distinguished the living primordial goo from the previous non-living primordial goo was the work of God. I believe the earth is an experiment of sorts for God. I do not believe that this God interferes much, I think for the most part he/she just watches the world and takes note of developments.
I accept the theory of evolution. Why? Because there is a mountain of evidence and you can literally see it happening. Anyone who understands genetics should be able to understand evolution by natural selection.
Anyone who knows basic pre-calculus can understand how carbon-dating works, and therefore realize that the Earth is much older than book that so many treat as if it's infallibe, the bible, says.
Holding on to the creation myth when there's such a huge library of actual EVIDENCE against it and none supporting it is simply irrational.

How are atheists non-scientific? They do not ignore or override the firsthand experience of the majority of people; it's more that there are so many conflicting experiences that an objective, scientific judgement on God or faith cannot be made. Plus science relies on controlled, provable experiments. Faith cannot be proven, nor can miracles, or any other occurrances of faith. Thus, it is scientific, in a sense, not to believe in God. Mind you, there's no way of really disproving "God" exists, but there's no way of proving it either. Many people, thus, accept that there is no God, since no proof will ever be obtained. And as to your example of the Yale micro-biologist, that doesn't really show much, if anything. There is obviously going to be an eclectic selection of faiths, religions, and ideologies within the intelligentsia, just as well as there is an eclectic selection of faiths, religions, and ideologies among everyone else.

You can never prove anything doesn't exist. However, you can however, with pragmatic certainty, be sure of what you experience - given that the only knowable absolute truth is self existence.

So for an atheist to try and tell another person what their experience is, is really really dumb in my opinion.

"I do not know God" is better than "there is no God"
For when I say "I know God" it doesn't claim that you DO know God, or that you are deluded. Whereas, "there is no God" directly overrides the experienced reality of theists. It's simply not an intelligent position to disregard the majority of human experiences. Even if it were a minority.

In any case, the reality is GOD EXISTS. The manner, or shape of who or what God is, is what is up for debate. We could not be discussing something that doesn't exist. ;)

Why is that so hard to believe? Everything could have plopped into being 2 seconds ago, and all memory is implanted. How would you know any different? Try being a little creative and lateral in your thinking. Open your mind. Anything is possible.

Additionally try creating yourself. You can turn a blank canvas into something that transmits another time and place into another humans head. Not fully "from nothing" but still creating something that was not there before. Music recordings I what I deal with daily. I'm constantly making something that never existed. Dreaming and seeing it become reality.

The creator awareness could do whatever he wanted to do. I believe he keeps electrons moving to this day. Holds every atom together with force of will. How about that?

So yeah, it's not a stretch to conceive that the omnipresent awareness that blinked and saw eternity spoke and light came into being. God just "is".

And you either know him or you don't.

One more thing:

FAITH, to work requires the existence of doubt or it is not faith. So for everyone demanding proof it's futile. It's like trust. Do you value people trusting you? It requires doubt. If someone proves beyond doubt you are trustworthy, they no longer trust you.


It is difficult to believe that because if it did happen, it only happened once, without any proof, and will never happen again. The 1st Law of Thermodynamics, however, is applicable in every closed system (including the universe) and has always been applicable. It has happened time and time and time again. That makes it readily belieavable. It's not about creative thinking, it's about proof. You believe in creativity, and I believe in proof.

Thinking about things is not "creating" something from nothing.

As for the electron thing, that's an interesting thought, but science shows that it's electromagnetic forces, strong forces, and nuclear forces that keep atoms intact. You believe God is the true reason this occurs, athiests believe that science is the most logical explanation.

Plus, in the end everything boils down to this: do you believe that unexplainably the matter of the universe just existed, and the time before the Big Bang is unknown and unexplainable, or do you believe that a god whose origin we cannot explain created everything?

They don't have a choice here. Paleo is different than physics. They have the end result, us, and are trying to explain how we got here. To start from the beginning would be to create a single cell organism in the lab and watch it for a billion years.

That is still not starting with a conclusion, because the idea is not to prove that we are here. They basically say - "I wonder where we came from, maybe we came from "X"-man whose skull we found. Let's see what the evidence says." Now, if all the current evidence points to the idea that we came from "X"-man, then that will be the prevailing theory. However, if most of the evidnece points to the idea that "X"-man was a separate species altogether, *that* will be the prevailing theory. The point is that the scientist does not say "I know for a fact because God said so that we came from "X"-man and therefore I will find evidence to prove it to all of these blasphemers who say we didn't!"

Both parties are guilty of discarding information that damages thier case.

Most scientists aren't out to "make a case" (at least until they have been in research for many, many years. They are trying to explain something. Their conclusions come from the data they collect, not the other way around.

If a scientist is found to be simply discarding data, he is reprimanded and never gets published again. If a Creationist discards data, well - that's just faith and obviously nothing can possibly ever go against their preconceived conclusion so it's ok.

Paleontologists are notorious for fudging data.

And, as I said, those that do and are found out are edged out of their profession and never published again.

They have a preconcieved notion of how things should be, and make sure their research reflects that. If it doesn't, they move on, because failures don't get published.

You have a misunderstanding of science. "Failures" don't happen - because the point is not to prove something. The point is to come up with a valid explanation. I think that certain forces will make bone marrow cells differentiate into smooth muscle. If I apply the forces and they show no signs of differentiation, that is not a failure - it is a demonstration that those forces are not what works. If I make up data to make it look like they differentiated, I have committed and unethical act and I won't get my degree (or get published, or get a job for that matter).

A scientist *may* only concentrate on what has been done before because it seems to back up a case they made previously. However, these are not the scientists who push things forward and end up on the cutting edge of anything.

If by "creation theory," you mean "God created everything somehow or other," I believe you. If you mean "God created everything exactly as it says in the Bible and in both ways that it says God did it," then anyone who says that should definitely not have a degree in biology.

I honestly doesn't have a hard time with that concept.

I've found the bible to be true in it's life counselling recommendations: It works. As a historical work it is unparalelled. the most verified work in existence, full of cross referencing and honest records, to the point of self shaming on the part of the historians.

Factor in the fastidious concern with detail (temple measurements and lineages) and the thousands upon thousands of archaelogical findings that support biblical history, and we have a very solid work.

Let's also add in that every culture has a creation myth, and even that the HISTORY of Sumeria had a creation and flood story remarkably similar to Geneisis and the picture gets fuller.

I don't believe in the necessity of age in creation. We weren't there. All we see is the result. We can surmise and hypothesise about how long it took, but we can never know. Just because soil erosion takes a certain time NOW doesn't mean it always has.

We only know what we have, and what we have is the result, not the process.

So, in light of that, I choose to accept the parts of the bible that are difficult to accept. If I approach he bible and only accept what I believed before I read it, what is the point of reading it at all? It hasn't challenged me, and I haven't changed. Simply because something is hard to believe, doesn't make it untrue! It simply means my mind hasn't had the experiences to have reached that conclusion yet.

I have no problem with evolution. If that's how it happened, that's how it happened. But I don't have the faith to accept the speculations of scientists on the matter, so until a proven alternative comes up, I'll believe it happened as it says it happened in the bible. Why not? We've seen no reproduceable mutation. Micro evolution exists, yeah sure, but I haven't seen or heard enough evidence to make me believe in macroevolution.

So spare the insults guys. Faith works both ways. I am agnostic about alien life, evolution, the big bang and many other speculations passed off as fact by funding-hungry scientists needing grant justification. You guys have your faith in those guys, I have my faith in the historical accuracy of the Torah/Bible writers, who actually list the descendents, father to son, from Adam to Jesus.

Why not?

You can never prove anything doesn't exist. However, you can however, with pragmatic certainty, be sure of what you experience - given that the only knowable absolute truth is self existence.

So for an atheist to try and tell another person what their experience is, is really really dumb in my opinion.

"I do not know God" is better than "there is no God"
For when I say "I know God" it doesn't claim that you DO know God, or that you are deluded. Whereas, "there is no God" directly overrides the experienced reality of theists. It's simply not an intelligent position to disregard the majority of human experiences. Even if it were a minority.

In any case, the reality is GOD EXISTS. The manner, or shape of who or what God is, is what is up for debate. We could not be discussing something that doesn't exist. ;)

Their experience? What do you mean by that? An experience not filled with any sight, feeling, or love for god is still an experience. And, just like you have a right to speak of your experience with god, and atheist has the right to explain his experience without god.

As for your argument for GOD does exist, that is one weak logical argument. People on this forum argue about countries invading countries all the time, yet, these countries, invasions, and wars don't exist in any other form than thought. It is called a thought experiment. An argument about god is a thought experiment. Your logic is circular logic, and in no way hold up to any scrutiny. According to your argument, there is no way to argue against God, doing so automatically proves there's a God; that's preposterous.

The only knowable absolute truth is not self existence. If science can fail to be true according to your arguments, so can existence.

As for your rant against how it's stupid to say there is no God, you're wrong. It is easier to explain that you don't feel something because it's not there than because because you don't feel it. Example: I can argue that there is an invisible dragon leaving in your basement, and you can say I'm insane. Of course, there is a possibility that there is an invisible dragon in your living room, but the easiest solution is that there is no dragon.

As to your statements that a majority of people have seen god, again, I recite that there is so much contradictory statements, that it is ludicrous to argue on one God, and it is impossible for you to say that most people in the world's history have experienced faith. True, many people are religious, but how many have truly experienced "God." What does that even mean? How do you define it, especially in a quantatative, scientific manner? How are their experiences objective in any way? Many miracles, near death experiences, and miracle like phenomenons can be explained through scientific hypothesis. Plus, a lot of people are atheists; it is not a small minority. It might be a small minority in the United States, Australia, and other Western nations, but that doesn't make it so world wide.

Anyways, I'm tired of ranting, but calling atheists stupid is as stupid as calling Christians, Muslims, or Buddhists stupid for believing in God. There are arguments for both sides.

I honestly doesn't have a hard time with that concept.

You don't have a hard time believing that God simultaneously made human beings after all the animals and before all the animals?

I've found the bible to be true in it's life counselling recommendations: It works.

Most of them, yes. The stuff on how to treat your slaves, no - since there shouldn't be slaves. The ways to treat women - no.

As a historical work it is unparalelled. the most verified work in existence, full of cross referencing and honest records, to the point of self shaming on the part of the historians.

Of course, you do have to ignore the parts where it contradicts itself. Like how Christ was born under two different kings, creation happened in two different orders, that sort of thing.

Let's also add in that every culture has a creation myth, and even that the HISTORY of Sumeria had a creation and flood story remarkably similar to Geneisis and the picture gets fuller.

Still doesn't explain the fact that the Bible has *two* creation stories.

We only know what we have, and what we have is the result, not the process.

I agree. We can try and figure out the process, but we can never really know for certain.

Simply because something is hard to believe, doesn't make it untrue! It simply means my mind hasn't had the experiences to have reached that conclusion yet.

And if the something is hard to believe because it is in direct opposition?

I have no problem with evolution. If that's how it happened, that's how it happened. But I don't have the faith to accept the speculations of scientists on the matter, so until a proven alternative comes up, I'll believe it happened as it says it happened in the bible. Why not?

Fine, which of the two stories do you choose to accept?

I have my faith in the historical accuracy of the Torah/Bible writers, who actually list the descendents, father to son, from Adam to Jesus.

Why not?

Twice, with a different lineage.

Don't get me wrong, I find a lot of good in the Bible. But claiming that you can take the entire thing as literal is just deluding yourself and ignoring the parts you want to ignore anyways.

It is difficult to believe that because if it did happen, it only happened once, without any proof, and will never happen again. The 1st Law of Thermodynamics, however, is applicable in every closed system (including the universe) and has always been applicable. It has happened time and time and time again. That makes it readily belieavable. It's not about creative thinking, it's about proof. You believe in creativity, and I believe in proof.

Thinking about things is not "creating" something from nothing.

As for the electron thing, that's an interesting thought, but science shows that it's electromagnetic forces, strong forces, and nuclear forces that keep atoms intact. You believe God is the true reason this occurs, athiests believe that science is the most logical explanation.

Plus, in the end everything boils down to this: do you believe that unexplainably the matter of the universe just existed, and the time before the Big Bang is unknown and unexplainable, or do you believe that a god whose origin we cannot explain created everything?
The God I believe in has no origin. He just "is". You need to ask the right question to get the right answer.

Just because you can't explain something doesn't mean it doesn't exist. Human discovery makes a mockery of that. We're constantly discovering things we previously couldn't explain. We're constantly finding smaller and smaller particles. String theory for example. What if God really is omnipresent and in 4000 years we will actually see him?

The unknown. You always need to leave room for the unknown. That is true wisdom - knowing you actually know very little.

You seem to love proof, yet the only proof you could ever have is witnessing the event itself. You seem to forget all you have is the RESULT.

It's like analysing a car accident or a murder. Yeah, you can deduce. You can surmise and hypothesise, but unless you have an EYEWITNESS ACCOUNT, you don't get the full picture.

I'd love it if you started adhering to your purported love of proof, and stopped deifying speculations.

Cheers

Yorick

Some very minor, albeit obscure notes when regarding Creationism. I warn you, these are things that *aren't* found in the standard Christian Holy Bible nowadays, because most'll look so deeply onto the New Testament and whatnot that they forget that the Old Testament is a much better read. Even better are books *not* in the Bible (Council of Necine). This includes incredible Jewish Tomes of Mysticism that are intensely related and really show some clarity into the works of Genesis.

First and foremost, it can be Interred that God, (though YHWH would be shorter), only actually has one power: To split his essence, fracturing it to create other beings.

The first thing El Elyah created was the most beautiful object in existence. Its name was Lucifel, the Angel of Light. Lucifel was the Head of the Angelic Order of creation. It was Lucifer which allowed creation to happen and take place. It was he that created existence on behalf of his master, God. However, Lucifel was proud, for he realized that it would be God whom took credit for his work. Most know the story of Lucifel's fall in his trial for the Throne, and becoming Lucifer, so I won't really get into it (Unless there's some idiots who think that Satan and Lucifer are the same being, then I get to bitchsmack you). With Lucifer's abandonment of Heaven, the Order of Creation was destroyed along with his powers of it.

To explain Dinosaurs, one only needs to look towards Leviathan. Leviathan was a monster that even God himself feared. He was a giant lizard (hint), but could change his form into a huge whale (Whom swallowed uhh...what's his name?), and is credited as also being a gigantic serpantine dragon. Leviathan is credited to being the one to offspring the Dinosaurs as its children, but were struck down. Leviathan currently holds Princedom in Hell along with Lucifer, Satan, and Belial. It is also cited in Revelations, where Leviathan will meet his end, much like Samael and Abaddon, in the Pit of Fire & Sulfur in the Void after the 1000 Year Kingdom of Neo-Christ.

Lessee...

Oooh, for Evolution, the base of all life sprung from what is commonly referred to as "The Primordial Ooze."

There's more to Genesis than 7 passages. A lot can happen in a day. Don't ignore the Jewish Stuff. Christ believed it all, why shouldn't you seek it out?

Some very minor, albeit obscure notes when regarding Creationism. I warn you, these are things that *aren't* found in the standard Christian Holy Bible nowadays, because most'll look so deeply onto the New Testament and whatnot that they forget that the Old Testament is a much better read. Even better are books *not* in the Bible (Council of Necine). This includes incredible Jewish Tomes of Mysticism that are intensely related and really show some clarity into the works of Genesis.

First and foremost, it can be Interred that God, (though YHWH would be shorter), only actually has one power: To split his essence, fracturing it to create other beings.

The first thing El Elyah created was the most beautiful object in existence. Its name was Lucifel, the Angel of Light. Lucifel was the Head of the Angelic Order of creation. It was Lucifer which allowed creation to happen and take place. It was he that created existence on behalf of his master, God. However, Lucifel was proud, for he realized that it would be God whom took credit for his work. Most know the story of Lucifel's fall in his trial for the Throne, and becoming Lucifer, so I won't really get into it (Unless there's some idiots who think that Satan and Lucifer are the same being, then I get to bitchsmack you). With Lucifer's abandonment of Heaven, the Order of Creation was destroyed along with his powers of it.

To explain Dinosaurs, one only needs to look towards Leviathan. Leviathan was a monster that even God himself feared. He was a giant lizard (hint), but could change his form into a huge whale (Whom swallowed uhh...what's his name?), and is credited as also being a gigantic serpantine dragon. Leviathan is credited to being the one to offspring the Dinosaurs as its children, but were struck down. Leviathan currently holds Princedom in Hell along with Lucifer, Satan, and Belial. It is also cited in Revelations, where Leviathan will meet his end, much like Samael and Abaddon, in the Pit of Fire & Sulfur in the Void after the 1000 Year Kingdom of Neo-Christ.

Lessee...

Oooh, for Evolution, the base of all life sprung from what is commonly referred to as "The Primordial Ooze."

There's more to Genesis than 7 passages. A lot can happen in a day. Don't ignore the Jewish Stuff. Christ believed it all, why shouldn't you seek it out?

That's very interesting. A good Wiccan friend of mine hinted at that "version"
of God, for lack of a better term. She thought that God would always be a partial being because he split himself into smaller parts in the name of creation. Perhaps she got that viewpoint from a similar source... *strokes non-existant beard*

BTW, what the hell's a High Orc? A really tall Orc with proper grammar and lighter skin?

Seriously, I hold both beliefs - one for my secular, sense-based worldview, and one for my spirituality. That is, Creationism makes sense in the moral sphere, but not in the empirical world, in which I apply evolutionary principles.

I think science has been mostly disasterous when applied to social concerns. But science is a very effective tool for establishing a model by which empirical phenomenon can be predicted and understood. For those reasons I suspect the whole idea of a separation of church and state originally came from - that people have the right to harbour their own spiritual beliefs, but not to enshrine them as the law of the land, which was to be subject to Reason exclusively.

Thus, I do not think of dinosaur bones as relics of an ancient war between fallen angels and the Almighty, at least on an empirical level. But I understand the spiritual reality of such a metaphor.

The God I believe in has no origin. He just "is". You need to ask the right question to get the right answer.

Just because you can't explain something doesn't mean it doesn't exist. Human discovery makes a mockery of that. We're constantly discovering things we previously couldn't explain. We're constantly finding smaller and smaller particles. String theory for example. What if God really is omnipresent and in 4000 years we will actually see him?

The unknown. You always need to leave room for the unknown. That is true wisdom - knowing you actually know very little.

You seem to love proof, yet the only proof you could ever have is witnessing the event itself. You seem to forget all you have is the RESULT.

It's like analysing a car accident or a murder. Yeah, you can deduce. You can surmise and hypothesise, but unless you have an EYEWITNESS ACCOUNT, you don't get the full picture.

I'd love it if you started adhering to your purported love of proof, and stopped deifying speculations.

Cheers

Yorick

An eye witness account is not the only type of proof; in fact that is the worst type of evidence in a trail because it is usually the most susceptible to inaccuracies. In a scientific sense, proof is all around us. Just as an example, let's take carbon dating. Every experiment with carbon-14, shows that it decays at a rate that would give it a half-life of about 5700 years. Then, using this measurement and knowledge, and knowing how much original carbon-14 was in an original piece we can calculate how old something is. Now, is this 100% undeniable proof of the age of the piece tested? No; is it still proof in the sense that it shows within reason that something is right? Yes.

True, it's a deduction, but it's such an accurate deduction, that it is a proof. I mean, according to your definition, DNA isn't really evidence in court, because it wasn't an eye-witness, and there's still a 0.00001% chance that the DNA test is wrong. Your definition of proof is too inclusive. There is ton of proof for every scientific theory, but there is very little proof of God existing. I agree with you that this doesn't mean God doesn't exist, but it also doesn't mean that I should spend my time worshiping one. And how would I know which one is the true or right god?

Again, I believe that it is easier to explain something that you can't see, taste, feel, know, or prove as not being there. You disagree. But please, don't be so ignorant as to call my opinion worthless or stupid.

Thus, I do not think of dinosaur bones as relics of an ancient war between fallen angels and the Almighty, at least on an empirical level. But I understand the spiritual reality of such a metaphor.

Who said anything about Nephilim? Enochian Apocrypha happened after Mankind had already grew into fruition.

Perhaps it was by order of God to be a task set for Abaddon, the Angel of Destruction, to wipe out the children of Leviathan.

Abaddon is crazy enough to use a meteor.

Helps explain why God locked him up in the void for millenia until The Tribulation.

Not a bad theory for something I just thought of, if I do say so myself.

---

Also: The Basis of Science is to prove itself wrong.

Religion seems to take the quick and easy approach to this.

Their experience? What do you mean by that? An experience not filled with any sight, feeling, or love for god is still an experience. And, just like you have a right to speak of your experience with god, and atheist has the right to explain his experience without god.
If a person says they have never experienced God, I can't and won't argue with them. How would I know what they've experienced. When they say "there is no God" they are however, suggesting that my experience of God is invalid.

Not very clever.

As for your argument for GOD does exist, that is one weak logical argument. People on this forum argue about countries invading countries all the time, yet, these countries, invasions, and wars don't exist in any other form than thought. It is called a thought experiment. An argument about god is a thought experiment. Your logic is circular logic, and in no way hold up to any scrutiny. According to your argument, there is no way to argue against God, doing so automatically proves there's a God; that's preposterous.
No, it's called logic. You cannot argue God doesn't exist, because you can't argue about something that doesn't exist.

If for example, there was a corner or dimension of this unthinkably large universe, where human imagination was physical reality, then God would exist.

If my reality is the only reality and you are a figment of my imagination, than God exists.

There are so many scenarios. You just need to approach the problem laterally.



The only knowable absolute truth is not self existence. If science can fail to be true according to your arguments, so can existence. Heard of Descartes? Look him up. Self awareness is the only absolute truth knowable friend. Have a think about it for a while.

As for your rant against how it's stupid to say there is no God, you're wrong. It is easier to explain that you don't feel something because it's not there than because because you don't feel it. Example: I can argue that there is an invisible dragon leaving in your basement, and you can say I'm insane. Of course, there is a possibility that there is an invisible dragon in your living room, but the easiest solution is that there is no dragon.
I can go and check the basement for myself and find the statement untrue, because of the stated physical dimensional nature of a dragon and the specific locale given in the statement.

My statments about God are that he resides in me, he is omnipresent and he is love. He interracts with me. For you to disprove that, you have to override my experienced interractions, physical sensations of his presence, and the cause and effect experiments with following his words and guidance and emotional prodding. In short a lifetime of self analysis and experimentation.

Listen. I do not give my life to something willy nilly. Faith is constantly reassessed. It grows. it is constantly tested. It is an engaging, challenging thought rpovoking and explorative process. You would need to go through every experience of my life an accurately show contrary effects for starters.

In short you cannot. You can chose to ignore God, you can choose to run away, argue, hate, or reject him. Or you can love, fear, follow and obey him. You cannot and never will disprove him.


As to your statements that a majority of people have seen god, again, I recite that there is so much contradictory statements, that it is ludicrous to argue on one God, and it is impossible for you to say that most people in the world's history have experienced faith. True, many people are religious, but how many have truly experienced "God." What does that even mean? How do you define it, especially in a quantatative, scientific manner? How are their experiences objective in any way? Many miracles, near death experiences, and miracle like phenomenons can be explained through scientific hypothesis. Plus, a lot of people are atheists; it is not a small minority. It might be a small minority in the United States, Australia, and other Western nations, but that doesn't make it so world wide.

How do you make sense of billions of people suggesting their father is the best father in the world? Does the contradiction make each statement false? Or is it a statement of experiencial perception?

The majority of humans that have ever existed, be they Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims, Christians, or whatever, have an experience of God. That experience entirely depends on their perspective. Christians have the Holy Spirit in them, and have a revelation of God being love, so will have a different perspective to a Hindu, who may perceive all as being God.

But both are still valid experiences of God.

The fact is, the majority of humans now, and who've ever been have this. Athesim is a minority.

But don't take my word for it. Check the demographics youself. Do a google search.


Anyways, I'm tired of ranting, but calling atheists stupid is as stupid as calling Christians, Muslims, or Buddhists stupid for believing in God. There are arguments for both sides.

Atheism is stupid because it overrides and devalidates others experiences. It is therefore foolish.

Agnoisticism is far better. Far wiser. I respect agnostics, for they have the courage to exist in unbelief. Not needing to disprove anything to make themselves feel better. Not attempting to deride the theist as "deluded". It allows for others experiences that are different from theirs in their assessment of reality.

That shows wisdom.

The God I believe in has no origin. He just "is". You need to ask the right question to get the right answer.

Then why can't life simply "be"? The need to assert that life, because it is so complex, needs to have been created by something even more complex yet not created, doesn't really make sense. Either complex life needs to be created or it doesn't. If we need to be created, then by your own argument so does whoever created us -- indeed, God requires creation all the more.

Just because you can't explain something doesn't mean it doesn't exist. Human discovery makes a mockery of that. We're constantly discovering things we previously couldn't explain. We're constantly finding smaller and smaller particles. String theory for example. What if God really is omnipresent and in 4000 years we will actually see him?

String theory is a theory -- no one has actually seen the strings. On the other hand, many theists do claim to have seen God/s or at least to have on hand a user's manual for life. Your "what if" question, while certainly valid, certainly doesn't demonstrate anything one way or the other. What if we figure out in 4000 years that our universe is nothing but the atomic nucleus of the fingernail of some larger entity? What if we discover that no other life exists in the universe? What if what if what if?

The unknown. You always need to leave room for the unknown. That is true wisdom - knowing you actually know very little.

Yes, but so many theists claim that they have wisdom -- that they know God exists with nothing at all by way of direct proof.

You seem to love proof, yet the only proof you could ever have is witnessing the event itself. You seem to forget all you have is the RESULT.

It's like analysing a car accident or a murder. Yeah, you can deduce. You can surmise and hypothesise, but unless you have an EYEWITNESS ACCOUNT, you don't get the full picture.

I'd love it if you started adhering to your purported love of proof, and stopped deifying speculations.

Yes, deifying is best left for deities I suppose. Which of course rarely if ever get beyond the speculation phase. At least many scientists can come up with verifiable material results. Few, if any, theists can claim that.

Atheism is stupid because it overrides and devalidates others experiences. It is therefore foolish.

Agnoisticism is far better. Far wiser. I respect agnostics, for they have the courage to exist in unbelief. Not needing to disprove anything to make themselves feel better. Not attempting to deride the theist as "deluded". It allows for others experiences that are different from theirs in their assessment of reality.

That shows wisdom.

It also allows you to read scripture with a light heart and unbiased perception. If you enjoy that sort of thing, you can make arguments that can't be argued against (see above) because people just don't know these things.

Then why can't life simply "be"? The need to assert that life, because it is so complex, needs to have been created by something even more complex yet not created, doesn't really make sense. Either complex life needs to be created or it doesn't. If we need to be created, then by your own argument so does whoever created us -- indeed, God requires creation all the more.
Well it can just "be".

However, I have experience of an awareness that identifies itself as the creator of life, and based on a life of testing, have chosen to believe him.

Our life has an origin though. There was a time when you and I were not. In fact all individual life has a point of origin, which leads us to the question of what birthed the original lifeform.

Given pragmatic certainty, that is one reason for why physical life forms cannot just "be".





String theory is a theory -- no one has actually seen the strings. On the other hand, many theists do claim to have seen God/s or at least to have on hand a user's manual for life. Your "what if" question, while certainly valid, certainly doesn't demonstrate anything one way or the other. What if we figure out in 4000 years that our universe is nothing but the atomic nucleus of the fingernail of some larger entity? What if we discover that no other life exists in the universe? What if what if what if?
I repeat, disproving somethings existence is nigh impossible. Discovery is very possible.



Yes, but so many theists claim that they have wisdom -- that they know God exists with nothing at all by way of direct proof.

Can you prove someone loves you? Does the lack of proof mean love doesn't exist? Can you prove you trust someone? Does the lack of proof mean your trust doesn't exist?

If your life was all about proof, you wouldn't get in a car. Wouldn't get on a plane. You excercise faith every day. Don't give me the necessity of proof garbage. It's a copout pure and simple.

If you have a relationship with a partner, you learn pretty quickly someones PERCEIVED reality is actually often more important than what really happened.



Yes, deifying is best left for deities I suppose. Which of course rarely if ever get beyond the speculation phase. At least many scientists can come up with verifiable material results. Few, if any, theists can claim that.

Oh no. Deification occurs all the time. That's the beauty of deifying God. Nothing else, no person, ambition, object or desire can ever own you.

It also allows you to read scripture with a light heart and unbiased perception. If you enjoy that sort of thing, you can make arguments that can't be argued against (see above) because people just don't know these things.

And what exactly is unbiased objective perspective. Have you the secret? You would be the first human ever to do so. One cannot remove oneself. You are the product of your environment. Bias is what you have simply by living. ;)

Cheers though. If you're agnostic you have my respect. :)

i have grown up a non-believer (cant think of the name right now) but i am also open to all religeons, one thing i have to ask is..do gods have gods, what i mean is, for example the ancient egyptions believed in and worshipped many gods but can any of you enlighten me to the fact of do those however many gods, have gods of their own?

An eye witness account is not the only type of proof; in fact that is the worst type of evidence in a trail because it is usually the most susceptible to inaccuracies. In a scientific sense, proof is all around us. Just as an example, let's take carbon dating. Every experiment with carbon-14, shows that it decays at a rate that would give it a half-life of about 5700 years. Then, using this measurement and knowledge, and knowing how much original carbon-14 was in an original piece we can calculate how old something is. Now, is this 100% undeniable proof of the age of the piece tested? No; is it still proof in the sense that it shows within reason that something is right? Yes.

True, it's a deduction, but it's such an accurate deduction, that it is a proof. I mean, according to your definition, DNA isn't really evidence in court, because it wasn't an eye-witness, and there's still a 0.00001% chance that the DNA test is wrong. Your definition of proof is too inclusive. There is ton of proof for every scientific theory, but there is very little proof of God existing. I agree with you that this doesn't mean God doesn't exist, but it also doesn't mean that I should spend my time worshiping one. And how would I know which one is the true or right god?

Again, I believe that it is easier to explain something that you can't see, taste, feel, know, or prove as not being there. You disagree. But please, don't be so ignorant as to call my opinion worthless or stupid.

If you weren't there it's an educated guess made from viewing the RESULT. So no it's not proof. If you're taking other scientists findings, then you're engaging faith and trust, in accepting their statements. So no that's not proof either.

I don't believe you respect proof, or you wouldn't be claiming to have it.

Sorry. ;)

Yorick

But please, don't be so ignorant as to call my opinion worthless or stupid.
Not so comfortable with the shoe on the other foot is it? ;)

If a person says they have never experienced God, I can't and won't argue with them. How would I know what they've experienced. When they say "there is no God" they are however, suggesting that my experience of God is invalid.

Not very clever.


No, it's called logic. You cannot argue God doesn't exist, because you can't argue about something that doesn't exist.

If for example, there was a corner or dimension of this unthinkably large universe, where human imagination was physical reality, then God would exist.

If my reality is the only reality and you are a figment of my imagination, than God exists.

There are so many scenarios. You just need to approach the problem laterally.



Heard of Descartes? Look him up. Self awareness is the only absolute truth knowable friend. Have a think about it for a while.


I can go and check the basement for myself and find the statement untrue, because of the stated physical dimensional nature of a dragon and the specific locale given in the statement.

My statments about God are that he resides in me, he is omnipresent and he is love. He interracts with me. For you to disprove that, you have to override my experienced interractions, physical sensations of his presence, and the cause and effect experiments with following his words and guidance and emotional prodding. In short a lifetime of self analysis and experimentation.

Listen. I do not give my life to something willy nilly. Faith is constantly reassessed. It grows. it is constantly tested. It is an engaging, challenging thought rpovoking and explorative process. You would need to go through every experience of my life an accurately show contrary effects for starters.

In short you cannot. You can chose to ignore God, you can choose to run away, argue, hate, or reject him. Or you can love, fear, follow and obey him. You cannot and never will disprove him.




How do you make sense of billions of people suggesting their father is the best father in the world? Does the contradiction make each statement false? Or is it a statement of experiencial perception?

The majority of humans that have ever existed, be they Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims, Christians, or whatever, have an experience of God. That experience entirely depends on their perspective. Christians have the Holy Spirit in them, and have a revelation of God being love, so will have a different perspective to a Hindu, who may perceive all as being God.

But both are still valid experiences of God.

The fact is, the majority of humans now, and who've ever been have this. Athesim is a minority.

But don't take my word for it. Check the demographics youself. Do a google search.



Atheism is stupid because it overrides and devalidates others experiences. It is therefore foolish.

Agnoisticism is far better. Far wiser. I respect agnostics, for they have the courage to exist in unbelief. Not needing to disprove anything to make themselves feel better. Not attempting to deride the theist as "deluded". It allows for others experiences that are different from theirs in their assessment of reality.

That shows wisdom.

Again, it is not my logic that is wrong, it's yours. Your statements are a rather vague definition of God. Moreover, I think they're a definition set by Descartes (correct me if I'm wrong), who is a philosopher, not a god.

As for your Decartes statement: OH MY GOD, you just listed one philosopher that lived about 400 years ago that argued one point about self-existence. You must be right! Please, for every philosophical argument there is a counter-argument. Best part about it? Neither one can be concluded to be right or wrong. It's philosophy not science. Philosophers argue with each other all the time. So, no, if you can argue that science, and everything else isn't a truth, you can argue that self-existence isn't a truth either (I'm not going to get into that, cause honestly, I don't have the ability to argue that well enough, nor am I just going to copy and past 14 pages from some other philosopher; I guess Berkeley would probably argue against Descartes, he always does).

As for the dragon: Ok, it's an invisible, magic, non-smelling, intangible dragon, that exists everywhere and nowhere. Again, is it possible? Yeah; probable? No.

You're statement about the God inside of you: if that's how you describe god, then you're right, there is a god, and I cannot say that "god" doesn't exist. But that's just semantics. That's not the God I'm talking about; I'm talking about the all-knowing god that is everywhere, and exists for us all.
Plus, you're argument can be reversed. No god exists for me, but you're saying that a god exists; now you're invading my personal beliefs. Still, I won't argue that if you have an inner feeling tha connects you with a god, not necessarily the all knowing god that is everywhere (remember, I am a part of everwhere), then god, in a sense, exists. This, however, is an argument about definition then. And our argument for the last hour has been a waste of our time.

Again, your definition of having an experience with god is weak. Going to church, being religious, abiding by the rules of your religion do not mean you've had an experience with god. By that definition, I've had an experience with god because I went to church most of my young life, and I once believed that there was a god. But I know I've never had an experience with god. I never felt god, or happiness in my heart because I worshipped. Just because someone worships doesn't mean they've had an experience with god.

As for atheists overriding your beliefs, how is that so? I'm an atheist, and I respect your religious beliefs (given, that might not be true of every atheist). If you want to believe in god, go ahead. But in my heart, and in my brian, I know there is no god, just like in your heart you know there is a god. I'm not discounting your beliefs and facts, I just don't believe they amount to enough to make me believe.

An eye witness account is not the only type of proof; in fact that is the worst type of evidence in a trail because it is usually the most susceptible to inaccuracies. In a scientific sense, proof is all around us. Just as an example, let's take carbon dating. Every experiment with carbon-14, shows that it decays at a rate that would give it a half-life of about 5700 years. Then, using this measurement and knowledge, and knowing how much original carbon-14 was in an original piece we can calculate how old something is. Now, is this 100% undeniable proof of the age of the piece tested? No; is it still proof in the sense that it shows within reason that something is right? Yes.

True, it's a deduction, but it's such an accurate deduction, that it is a proof. I mean, according to your definition, DNA isn't really evidence in court, because it wasn't an eye-witness, and there's still a 0.00001% chance that the DNA test is wrong. Your definition of proof is too inclusive. There is ton of proof for every scientific theory, but there is very little proof of God existing. I agree with you that this doesn't mean God doesn't exist, but it also doesn't mean that I should spend my time worshiping one. And how would I know which one is the true or right god?

Again, I believe that it is easier to explain something that you can't see, taste, feel, know, or prove as not being there. You disagree. But please, don't be so ignorant as to call my opinion worthless or stupid.
I apreciate what you are saying but....
DNA evidence is not proof. It only shows that DNA from a subject was dedected as being present. There could be an infinite number of ways that DNA got there. The problem with DNA evidence is a. Test are not always performed correctly b. Collection of samples can be performed in some pretty dubious ways c. cross contamination is possible etc etc. So all DNA evidence can proove (with the current system ) is that there was collect from point A some material that matches the accused and has a 65 million to one chance of matching some one else.
Carbon dating. Makes many assumptions, so making a number of assumptions causes the chance of inaccuracy to grow exponentialy. We assume the decay rate is contstant and not affected by other factor, we assume we have calculated the decay rate correctly, we assume the amount of C14 that was in the original sample (something we cannot know without testing the original sample at the time). So the test is pretty accurate as far as we know but has been known to throw up so anomolies. Evidence it is proof it is not.
But I agree with the eye witness problem, we are all the victims of our perception (rather than senses) and can experience the same thing but come away with very different experiences.
So I'll just sit on the fence again and prod at either side of this argument.

If you weren't there it's an educated guess made from viewing the RESULT. So no it's not proof. If you're taking other scientists findings, then you're engaging faith and trust, in accepting their statements. So no that's not proof either.

I don't believe you respect proof, or you wouldn't be claiming to have it.

Sorry. ;)

Yorick

Here's my definition of proof:

the cogency of evidence that compels acceptance by the mind of a truth or a fact

When a bunch of evidence (defined as an outward sign) shows enough to logically make an assertion, that is proof. Science has tons of evidence or indications that make an assertion logical. This is proof. So, an eye witness account is not the only type of proof in the world.

i have grown up a non-believer (cant think of the name right now) but i am also open to all religeons, one thing i have to ask is..do gods have gods, what i mean is, for example the ancient egyptions believed in and worshipped many gods but can any of you enlighten me to the fact of do those however many gods, have gods of their own?


Because the Egyptians had Thoth
and Thoth fucking kicks some Diety Ass

And what exactly is unbiased objective perspective. Have you the secret? You would be the first human ever to do so. One cannot remove oneself. You are the product of your environment. Bias is what you have simply by living. ;)

Cheers though. If you're agnostic you have my respect. :)

Unbiased to the fact that if I start reading, I'm not in this mindset of "This is truth" or "This is Bullshit"

I take it as it is.

I apreciate what you are saying but....
DNA evidence is not proof. It only shows that DNA from a subject was dedected as being present. There could be an infinite number of ways that DNA got there. The problem with DNA evidence is a. Test are not always performed correctly b. Collection of samples can be performed in some pretty dubious ways c. cross contamination is possible etc etc. So all DNA evidence can proove (with the current system ) is that there was collect from point A some material that matches the accused and has a 65 million to one chance of matching some one else.
Carbon dating. Makes many assumptions, so making a number of assumptions causes the chance of inaccuracy to grow exponentialy. We assume the decay rate is contstant and not affected by other factor, we assume we have calculated the decay rate correctly, we assume the amount of C14 that was in the original sample (something we cannot know without testing the original sample at the time). So the test is pretty accurate as far as we know but has been known to throw up so anomolies. Evidence it is proof it is not.
But I agree with the eye witness problem, we are all the victims of our perception (rather than senses) and can experience the same thing but come away with very different experiences.
So I'll just sit on the fence again and prod at either side of this argument.

Ok, maybe my definition wasn't that great; but when a certain amount of evidence begins to be collected indicating one path, than it can be considered proof. It isn't 100%, but very few things really are 100%. Still, when enough evidence begins to show a logical clear path to a conclusion, that is indeed proof.

So with the carbon-14 dating a fossil (for example): there's the carbon-14 test, there's the amount of soil, type of soil, and shape of soil that covered the fossil, there are similar fossils dated at around the same time period, there are bones of what appear to be less evolved species that are dated (carbon and soil) as being a couple hundred thousand years before the fossil, and there are fossils of what appear to be more evolved species that are dated as being a couple thousand years older than the fossil. Then we find similar dates for animal fossils that appear to have been digested by the original fossil animal, etc., etc. True there are assumptions, but the evidence clearly points towards a logical explanation (this is proof). Plus, my example is one of the shakiest of scientific methods (carbon-14 dating, soil dating).

Ok, maybe my definition wasn't that great; but when a certain amount of evidence begins to be collected indicating one path, than it can be considered proof. It isn't 100%, but very few things really are 100%. Still, when enough evidence begins to show a logical clear path to a conclusion, that is indeed proof.
Sort of agree, but you must always acknowledge that you could be wrong and that .0000001% might turn out to be true.

one thing i dont understand is, theres so much scientific proof of evolution and yet its refused flatly by some people. what proof is there that the world was, as the bible says, created. the bible is one but with nothing else to back it up, it cant really stand for much.

another thing is, how do we know that a higher being didnt create the earth in the first place and evolution continued from there. for all we know the universe could be a mould covered sandwhich in the damp, dark corner of a celestial bedroom

Again, it is not my logic that is wrong, it's yours. Your statements are a rather vague definition of God. Moreover, I think they're a definition set by Descartes (correct me if I'm wrong), who is a philosopher, not a god.

As for your Decartes statement: OH MY GOD, you just listed one philosopher that lived about 400 years ago that argued one point about self-existence. You must be right! Please, for every philosophical argument there is a counter-argument. Best part about it? Neither one can be concluded to be right or wrong. It's philosophy not science. Philosophers argue with each other all the time. So, no, if you can argue that science, and everything else isn't a truth, you can argue that self-existence isn't a truth either (I'm not going to get into that, cause honestly, I don't have the ability to argue that well enough, nor am I just going to copy and past 14 pages from some other philosopher; I guess Berkeley would probably argue against Descartes, he always does).
Descarte may have been a famous declarer of that truth, but he is by no means the only human to have reached the conclusion.

Your self awareness proves itself. It's inescabable.

As for the dragon: Ok, it's an invisible, magic, non-smelling, intangible dragon, that exists everywhere and nowhere. Again, is it possible? Yeah; probable? No.If you really believed it, then SOMETHING freaked you out. I could disagree with your perception of what freaked you out, but could not suggest nothing was going on in your brain.

You're statement about the God inside of you: if that's how you describe god, then you're right, there is a god, and I cannot say that "god" doesn't exist. But that's just semantics. That's not the God I'm talking about; I'm talking about the all-knowing god that is everywhere, and exists for us all.
Plus, you're argument can be reversed. No god exists for me, but you're saying that a god exists; now you're invading my personal beliefs. Still, I won't argue that if you have an inner feeling tha connects you with a god, not necessarily the all knowing god that is everywhere (remember, I am a part of everwhere), then god, in a sense, exists. This, however, is an argument about definition then. And our argument for the last hour has been a waste of our time.
We're talking about the same God. Omnipresent. Loves everyone. I'm just talking about my experience of him, which is personal. In my experience the whole thing works because God doesn't force himself on anyone. He allows you to reject him and live your life without desiring experience of him. He is a gentleman that waits for you to ask him into your life, before he steps in.

You could quite easily live your life with no knowledge of God I suppose. It all depends on what you want. I searched for him, and I found him.



Again, your definition of having an experience with god is weak. Going to church, being religious, abiding by the rules of your religion do not mean you've had an experience with god. By that definition, I've had an experience with god because I went to church most of my young life, and I once believed that there was a god. But I know I've never had an experience with god. I never felt god, or happiness in my heart because I worshipped. Just because someone worships doesn't mean they've had an experience with god.


I agree. You can go to church and have no experience of God. A churchgoer and a Christian are two different things, and one can be either or both.
I know people who "worked for God" who didn't know God personally. There is a difference.


As for atheists overriding your beliefs, how is that so? I'm an atheist, and I respect your religious beliefs (given, that might not be true of every atheist). If you want to believe in god, go ahead. But in my heart, and in my brian, I know there is no god, just like in your heart you know there is a god. I'm not discounting your beliefs and facts, I just don't believe they amount to enough to make me believe.

Not believing could be agnosticism. Atheism, or to be precise, the declaration that "there is no God" is the viewpoint I am taking issue with.

"I don't know God", "I have no experience of God", or even "I don't believe in God" is better than "I believe there is no God."

You see the difference? One is a statement of a position of nonexperience, while the other is applying ones own experience to be universal.

"Imagine the ego of the human race, to consider themselves so grand, as to warrant a creator worthy of praise." -Robert Brunswick Jr.

And that's that. :D

Unbiased to the fact that if I start reading, I'm not in this mindset of "This is truth" or "This is Bullshit"

I take it as it is.

As do I. I simply believed the bible to be true after reading it.

"Imagine the ego of the human race, to consider themselves so grand, as to warrant a creator worthy of praise." -Robert Brunswick Jr.

And that's that. :D

That's actually close to the money.

When you choose to love God and accept that he loves you, your self esteem increases, but so does your humility. More of both, not one outweighing the other.

one thing i dont understand is, theres so much scientific proof of evolution and yet its refused flatly by some people. what proof is there that the world was, as the bible says, created. the bible is one but with nothing else to back it up, it cant really stand for much.

another thing is, how do we know that a higher being didnt create the earth in the first place and evolution continued from there. for all we know the universe could be a mould covered sandwhich in the damp, dark corner of a celestial bedroom

Have a read over the last few pages Reubina

Here's my definition of proof:

the cogency of evidence that compels acceptance by the mind of a truth or a fact

When a bunch of evidence (defined as an outward sign) shows enough to logically make an assertion, that is proof. Science has tons of evidence or indications that make an assertion logical. This is proof. So, an eye witness account is not the only type of proof in the world.

Of the origins of life. You have no poof of the big bang, or evolution, only educated guesses based on the RESULT.

Look at astronomers. We'll see a newspaper suggesting a new planet has been found that may support life.

Then we read the article, and find all that was discovered was a wobble while viewing a star. The assumptious leap from a wobbling star to life on a planet is mind boggling. Oh it may all be logical, but it doesn't stop the speculatory nature of the assertion!!!

I need proof. I do believe I am more cynical and sceptical than you are. I just put my faith into an area that I have scrutinised and constantly evaluated firsthand: Gods impact on my life.

Like C.S.Lewis, I am held "kicking and screaming" in the body of Christ. ;)

edit: well not really, but if I can emphasise the nature of constant self evaluation and the way that faith is tested and grows, I will. "Kicking and screaming" is not an accurate analogy for something that gives me incredible peace, meaning, joy and hope.

Ah well.

Goodnight from me for now.

Yorick

As do I. I simply believed the bible to be true after reading it.You cannot judge the authenticity of a book without comparing it to other sources. You can show its faultiness by finding contradictions within itself, but to prove its accurateness you must refer to outside information.

Descarte may have been a famous declarer of that truth, but he is by no means the only human to have reached the conclusion.

Your self awareness proves itself. It's inescabable.

If you really believed it, then SOMETHING freaked you out. I could disagree with your perception of what freaked you out, but could not suggest nothing was going on in your brain.


We're talking about the same God. Omnipresent. Loves everyone. I'm just talking about my experience of him, which is personal. In my experience the whole thing works because God doesn't force himself on anyone. He allows you to reject him and live your life without desiring experience of him. He is a gentleman that waits for you to ask him into your life, before he steps in.

You could quite easily live your life with no knowledge of God I suppose. It all depends on what you want. I searched for him, and I found him.




I agree. You can go to church and have no experience of God. A churchgoer and a Christian are two different things, and one can be either or both.
I know people who "worked for God" who didn't know God personally. There is a difference.



Not believing could be agnosticism. Atheism, or to be precise, the declaration that "there is no God" is the viewpoint I am taking issue with.

"I don't know God", "I have no experience of God", or even "I don't believe in God" is better than "I believe there is no God."

You see the difference? One is a statement of a position of nonexperience, while the other is applying ones own experience to be universal.


Self-awarness doesn't prove itself. One can always argue, that if self-awarness doesn't exist, you can't define it, and what you think is self-awarness isn't.

Anyways... I don't really see what the difference is here between your position and mine. I haven't felt god, and as such I don't believe god exists. Of course, that is indeed rather arrogant, because I assume I'm right and everyone else is wrong. But at the same time, you believe god exists. This is also, arrogant, because it assumes you're right, and I'm wrong. True, atheists are a minority, but by no chance does this mean they're wrong (nor does it mean you're wrong).

Still, for me, it all comes down to the fact that I haven't seen enough proof that there is a god, and I can't just believe it for believing it. I know a lot of people say they've had experiences with god, but how do I know they're right, or that it was god? I can't. You said you've found god, but how can I possibly know that? You're feelings and knowledge are your own personal feelings and knowledge, and there is no way for me to ascertain their accuracy, realism, or merit. I just can't.

So yes, I'll agree with you, atheism does appear to be arrogant; but at the same time I disagree that its stupid. I'm not the type of person to readily believe what someone else says. People say stupid, ignorant, hateful things many times, and many time people are wrong. Unless I experience something personally or unless something is proven to me beyond a reasonable doubt I can't really believe in it.

As do I. I simply believed the bible to be true after reading it.

i did try this approach, i grew up in an athiest family with heavily religeous relatives so i am quite open to the idea of a god. i went to church for the better part of a year and to be honest i did believe the majority of what i was told about god. the only thing changed between now and then is, at some point during my whole church-going experience something changed inside me, i didnt know what it was and i still dont.

i have to say though when i did first start i did feel i spose a sort of, spiritual change in me

You cannot judge the authenticity of a book without comparing it to other sources. You can show its faultiness by finding contradictions within itself, but to prove its accurateness you must refer to outside information.

Yes... and your point is? I own the Qu'ran, and the Bible/Torah, and have read Buddhist/Hindu texts, and humanistic material. What is your point?

That's actually close to the money.

When you choose to love God and accept that he loves you, your self esteem increases, but so does your humility. More of both, not one outweighing the other.

you make it sound kinda... err, bipolar.:confused:

i did try this approach, i grew up in an athiest family with heavily religeous relatives so i am quite open to the idea of a god. i went to church for the better part of a year and to be honest i did believe the majority of what i was told about god. the only thing changed between now and then is, at some point during my whole church-going experience something changed inside me, i didnt know what it was and i still dont.

i have to say though when i did first start i did feel i spose a sort of, spiritual change in me

Happy searching. :) The journey is fun.

i did try this approach, i grew up in an athiest family with heavily religeous relatives so i am quite open to the idea of a god. i went to church for the better part of a year and to be honest i did believe the majority of what i was told about god. the only thing changed between now and then is, at some point during my whole church-going experience something changed inside me, i didnt know what it was and i still dont.

i have to say though when i did first start i did feel i spose a sort of, spiritual change in me

Good for you. That shows open-mindedness.

you make it sound kinda... err, bipolar.:confused:

Nope.

Liken it to music. When your hearing gets better, you hear more distinction in the music. You might hear the drums clearer and more distinctly than before. But that's not at the expense of everything else. You actually here EVERYTHING clearer.

Or like, when you travel, and the world gets biggera and smaller at the same time. Bigger because you appreciate the distance and hugeness more, but smaller, because you see the similarities, and it;s all more accessible.

It's called "parallel truth".

It's an eastern way of thinking, as opposed to western consequencially preclusive thought. Humility and self esteem are not opposties. They are resultant from a perception of oneself in the scheme of things. Ones perception is what gets clearer, hence both get stronger.

Of the origins of life. You have no poof of the big bang, or evolution, only educated guesses based on the RESULT.

Look at astronomers. We'll see a newspaper suggesting a new planet has been found that may support life.

Then we read the article, and find all that was discovered was a wobble while viewing a star. The assumptious leap from a wobbling star to life on a planet is mind boggling. Oh it may all be logical, but it doesn't stop the speculatory nature of the assertion!!!

I need proof. I do believe I am more cynical and sceptical than you are. I just put my faith into an area that I have scrutinised and constantly evaluated firsthand: Gods impact on my life.

Like C.S.Lewis, I am held "kicking and screaming" in the body of Christ. ;)

edit: well not really, but if I can emphasise the nature of constant self evaluation and the way that faith is tested and grows, I will. "Kicking and screaming" is not an accurate analogy for something that gives me incredible peace, meaning, joy and hope.

Ah well.

Goodnight from me for now.

Yorick

But again, there is tons of evidence that indicate the Big Bang existed. True, astronomy is a new, young science that doesn't really have the technology to do an amazing job, but astronomy is not the same as astrophysics. There are red shifts, microwave cooling, time dialation, isotropy... all of this evidence indicates that the Big Bang is a good model. Given, the Big Bang isn't a certified theory, but it is a reasonable model with a plethora of evidence to back it up. Can it be proved beyond a doubt that the Big Bang is correct? No, but again, it is logical, and if any new model or theory arises, it will probably contain a decent amount from the Big Bant. Modern scientific models and theories are rarely completely destroyed once they are in place; instead they are added to and fixed, until the model we have becomes a theory with enough evidence to be proved beyond most doubt. The problem with astronomy is technological, not scientific; astrophysics doesn't suffer from the same problem to the same extent.

Self-awarness doesn't prove itself. One can always argue, that if self-awarness doesn't exist, you can't define it, and what you think is self-awarness isn't.
If you think and are aware of thinking, you are self aware. If you think, you exist. As an awareness. Hence Descartes "I think, therefore I am".


Anyways... I don't really see what the difference is here between your position and mine. I haven't felt god, and as such I don't believe god exists. Of course, that is indeed rather arrogant, because I assume I'm right and everyone else is wrong. But at the same time, you believe god exists. This is also, arrogant, because it assumes you're right, and I'm wrong.
No. My position assumes we're both right - that I know God and that you don't. That I have an experience of God and that you don't.

Your assertion declares mine to be delusional or false. I am not, in my assertion suggesting you really do know God, but are lying, or deluded am I? I believe you genuinely don't know God, or else you'd be saying otherwise right?


True, atheists are a minority, but by no chance does this mean they're wrong (nor does it mean you're wrong).
I pointed out, that the athiestic assertion discounts the experiencial assertions of the majority of humans who have existed. Hence the foolishness of such a position. That's all.


Still, for me, it all comes down to the fact that I haven't seen enough proof that there is a god, and I can't just believe it for believing it. I know a lot of people say they've had experiences with god, but how do I know they're right, or that it was god? I can't. You said you've found god, but how can I possibly know that? You're feelings and knowledge are your own personal feelings and knowledge, and there is no way for me to ascertain their accuracy, realism, or merit. I just can't.
Yes. Faith is what's required. The choice to believe. That's what makes it faith. It all starts working once you make the choice. Otherwise it wouldn't be faith. ;)

But I do know, that God loves you. :) At least in my experience, he urged me to express to you his love for you. :) :) Ain't it great. :D


So yes, I'll agree with you, atheism does appear to be arrogant; but at the same time I disagree that its stupid. I'm not the type of person to readily believe what someone else says. People say stupid, ignorant, hateful things many times, and many time people are wrong. Unless I experience something personally or unless something is proven to me beyond a reasonable doubt I can't really believe in it.

Fair enough. :)

My hero is Thomas. He doubted, but Jesus met him where he was at. The result was Thomas was the first apostle to call Jesus "God" (not just the son of God). Doubt results in stronger faith. An honest search results in stronger held conviction.

Be safe. I'll be praying that no matter what you choose you find happiness and contentment. God bless you.

Yorick

But again, there is tons of evidence that indicate the Big Bang existed. True, astronomy is a new, young science that doesn't really have the technology to do an amazing job, but astronomy is not the same as astrophysics. There are red shifts, microwave cooling, time dialation, isotropy... all of this evidence indicates that the Big Bang is a good model. Given, the Big Bang isn't a certified theory, but it is a reasonable model with a plethora of evidence to back it up. Can it be proved beyond a doubt that the Big Bang is correct? No, but again, it is logical, and if any new model or theory arises, it will probably contain a decent amount from the Big Bant. Modern scientific models and theories are rarely completely destroyed once they are in place; instead they are added to and fixed, until the model we have becomes a theory with enough evidence to be proved beyond most doubt. The problem with astronomy is technological, not scientific; astrophysics doesn't suffer from the same problem to the same extent.

Doesn't change the fact that all the "evidence" is speculations on the result that we are left with, not firsthand observation of the event itself.

Remember, in a true scientific experiment, you need to disprove counter theories. Run the experiment in opposite, or without key components. To be sure 1+1=2 you need to prove that 3+1 and 4+7 don't equal 2.

To find a single cause for the fall of Rome, one needs to recreate the fall without the other possible contributive elements.

What you're presenting is all speculation on the RESULT my friend. Not proof. ;)

If you think and are aware of thinking, you are self aware. If you think, you exist. As an awareness. Hence Descartes "I think, therefore I am".



No. My position assumes we're both right - that I know God and that you don't. That I have an experience of God and that you don't.

Your assertion declares mine to be delusional or false. I am not, in my assertion suggesting you really do know God, but are lying, or deluded am I? I believe you genuinely don't know God, or else you'd be saying otherwise right?


I pointed out, that the athiestic assertion discounts the experiencial assertions of the majority of humans who have existed. Hence the foolishness of such a position. That's all.


Yes. Faith is what's required. The choice to believe. That's what makes it faith. It all starts working once you make the choice. Otherwise it wouldn't be faith. ;)

But I do know, that God loves you. :) At least in my experience, he urged me to express to you his love for you. :) :) Ain't it great. :D



Fair enough. :)

My hero is Thomas. He doubted, but Jesus met him where he was at. The result was Thomas was the first apostle to call Jesus "God" (not just the son of God). Doubt results in stronger faith. An honest search results in stronger held conviction.

Be safe. I'll be praying that no matter what you choose you find happiness and contentment. God bless you.

Yorick

But what is thinking and how do you know you're doing it? This argument can go on for ages.

Wow... did we finally agree at the end? Who says arguments can't be productive?

Doesn't change the fact that all the "evidence" is speculations on the result that we are left with, not firsthand observation of the event itself.

Remember, in a true scientific experiment, you need to disprove counter theories. Run the experiment in opposite, or without key components. To be sure 1+1=2 you need to prove that 3+1 and 4+7 don't equal 2.

To find a single cause for the fall of Rome, one needs to recreate the fall without the other possible contributive elements.

What you're presenting is all speculation on the RESULT my friend. Not proof. ;)

Again, I'm not using the scientific or mathematical definition of proof. I'm using the layman's term for proof.

As for your 1+1=2 analogy, that's false. Bertrand Russell proved that 1+1=2 and that was good enough. You don't have to go proving every other possibility is wrong; that is one way of proving something, but it's ineffective. It's usually simpler to show that if 1+1!=2 then the result you get is wrong. But that's only math; rarely do scientists go into labs trying to disprove something.

If you have enough speculation, enough evidence, you have proof. Again, you'll never have proof in the scientific sense (that's why very few things in science are laws), but you will have

cogency of evidence that compels acceptance by the mind of a truth.

All the Big Bang evidence compels us to accept the Big Bang as truth.

Have a read over the last few pages Reubina


i might do that. are there any in particular?

Yes... and your point is? I own the Qu'ran, and the Bible/Torah, and have read Buddhist/Hindu texts, and humanistic material. What is your point???? How can you then claim the Bible to be error-free truth?

??? How can you then claim the Bible to be error-free truth?

thats a good question, saying this as an unbiased as i can be. how can you prove science to be completely true, the majority of it is theorys when talking about how the galaxy has formed am i right?

Your self awareness proves itself. It's inescabable.
Self awareness is not proof of anything beyond your own existence, and proof to no one beyond yourself.


No. My position assumes we're both right - that I know God and that you don't. That I have an experience of God and that you don't.
No position assumes your interpretation of your experiance is right and by implication that you are right. Everyone's position assumes exactly the same thing.

I pointed out, that the athiestic assertion discounts the experiencial assertions of the majority of humans who have existed. Hence the foolishness of such a position. That's all.
Columbus's assertion that the world was round (as opposed to flat) discounted the experiencial assertions of the majority of humans that existed within his own and many other cultures to name just one time someone took a 'foolish position'...

To be sure 1+1=2 you need to prove that 3+1 and 4+7 don't equal 2.
No, to be sure that only 1 + 1 = 2 would need to prove that other things dont equal 1 + 1. To prove that 3 + 1 does not equal 2, proves nothing at all about 1 + 1. Evidently 2 X 1 also = 2, as does .5 + 1.5...

What you're presenting is all speculation on the RESULT my friend. Not proof.
As is anyone premising 'self experiance'. Your interpretation is a result of your experiance, not the experiance itself.

First of all, I am a Creationist, so I believe that God (in my case, the Judeo/Christian God) created the universe and all living things. There are many things I do not understand in the world. For example, how can there be Dinosaur fossils dating back before the time of humans when the Bible says that God created Man first? I dont know. I just do not understand. I have no explanation, and I do not know who, or what, I believe. I guess you could say I believe God created Man first and that Dinosaurs or other pre-historic fossils exist also. I also do not know what I think of Evolution. In my mind, Evolution does not contradict Creation, but the Creation contradicts the other theories that propose life began from chemicals coming together, chemicals reacting, carbon semi life forms appearing, proto cells appearing, etc. I believe God created Man, but I neither believe nor disbelieve in Evolution. I think Creationism and Evolution can work together, and some type of Evolution may take place in the creatures that God created.


But the true reason I am a Creationist is that I cannot, will not, believe that life came from nothing. There must have been some higher power that created life, and the universe, from nothing. Nothing. I cannot believe the theory that life began when certain chemicals (carbon, nitrogen, etc.) came together, reacted, and somehow formed some type of proto-cell or life from. I cannot believe that.

I believe that God created Man and all the living and nonliving things in the universe, and my belief will not change.

ARGUMENT FROM CREATION
(1) If evolution is false, then creationism is true, and therefore God exists.
(2) Evolution can't be true, since I lack the mental capacity to understand it; moreover, to accept its truth would cause me to be uncomfortable.
(3) Therefore, Creation is true.
(4) Therefore, God exists.

how boring. how can you possibly have any respect for yourself, if you base your entire life-philosophy on nothing more than your own ignorance and fear? if you base your outlook on the worst characteristics of your being, how can your life be anything other than a disappointment?

Ignorance is bliss (growing up in this world, I can see why)
Some people find comfort in religion. I'm not one of them, but you shouldn't mock them for it.

If a person says they have never experienced God, I can't and won't argue with them. How would I know what they've experienced. When they say "there is no God" they are however, suggesting that my experience of God is invalid.Ok, yes. I do think you experience of God is invalid. I'll got to why below.

No, it's called logic. You cannot argue God doesn't exist, because you can't argue about something that doesn't exist.
Meh? By this logic the only things I could argue don't exist are things that do in fact exist.

If for example, there was a corner or dimension of this unthinkably large universe, where human imagination was physical reality, then God would exist.

If my reality is the only reality and you are a figment of my imagination, than God exists.
Ok...

There are so many scenarios. You just need to approach the problem laterally. There are many scenarios. And no consensus on how to choose between them, or even decide likelyhoods. With the more exotic ones, I'd have a hard time deciding exactly what corresponds to reality. Heck some branches of theoretical physics are something like that, only with far fewer (and interconvertable) scenarios.

Heard of Descartes? Look him up. Self awareness is the only absolute truth knowable friend. Have a think about it for a while.
Been a while since I read him. And self-awareness is not reliable either. I forget what he defined "absolute truth" or "knowable" as. They're probably Capitalized Essances (to steal Douglas Hofstader's phrasing) that are ultimately not definable.

My statments about God are that he resides in me, he is omnipresent and he is love. He interracts with me. For you to disprove that, you have to override my experienced interractions, physical sensations of his presence, and the cause and effect experiments with following his words and guidance and emotional prodding. In short a lifetime of self analysis and experimentation.Oh, I don't expect to prove the nonexistance of God, even to my own satisfaction.

How do you make sense of billions of people suggesting their father is the best father in the world? Does the contradiction make each statement false? Or is it a statement of experiencial perception?
Honestly, I don't have a good explanation. But people also experience becoming zombies. Or psychic abilites, some of which can be ruled out experimentally. Or alien abductions. If it weren't for the sheer variety of supernatural experiences, and the culturally-specific nature of them, I would probably take them seriously. And I acknowledge that my own perceptions are also subject to error.

The majority of humans that have ever existed, be they Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims, Christians, or whatever, have an experience of God.Gods. For all time popularity I think the polytheists have the majority.

The fact is, the majority of humans now, and who've ever been have this. Athesim is a minority.Atheism is a minority, yes.

Atheism is stupid because it overrides and devalidates others experiences. It is therefore foolish.

Agnoisticism is far better. Far wiser. I respect agnostics, for they have the courage to exist in unbelief. Not needing to disprove anything to make themselves feel better. Not attempting to deride the theist as "deluded". It allows for others experiences that are different from theirs in their assessment of reality.I do not have contempt for believers, though it may sound like it. We "merely" have a disagreement on the nature of reality. Although I do have sacred cows of my own: evolution for one. The fossil record is silent on mechanism, but it is very clear on the broad outlines of the history of life on this planet.

'Synthetic Life' (http://www.evilbible.com/Synthetic%20Life.htm) proof life can have formed from base chemicals and non-living materials.
Have you ever taken Biology in any level of school? Well, if you have not, let me explain.

The following research report in the highly respected peer-reviewed journal Science details the de novo creation of a complete functional virus from synthetic chemicals
A virus is nonliving. A virus is DNA surrounded by a Protein coat. I know my science. Nothing living has been created.

_Susa_, I congratulate you.

You are of a dying breed, and that is the levelheaded Conservative Christian. You've been replaced by the likes of Rush Limbaugh and Bill O'Reilly, in the manner that The Levelheaded Liberal has been replaced by Al Franken and Michael Moore.

I salute you and respect your views
Thank you.

I believe in a mix between creation and evolution because each one has too many question marks for me to believe either outright.

Well it can just "be".

However, I have experience of an awareness that identifies itself as the creator of life, and based on a life of testing, have chosen to believe him.

You leap from an awareness -- a personal sensation -- to the certainty that that awareness is a definite part of everyone's universe, whether they believe it or not. You say "based on a life of testing, [I] have chosen to believe him" -- this implies that you already accepted "him" before the testing. That is, your sensation of God identifying himself as the Creator of Life was already valid for you as a verifiable phenomenon. With all respect, I wonder how much testing was really necessary, if you'd already accepted the proposition before testing it.

Our life has an origin though. There was a time when you and I were not. In fact all individual life has a point of origin, which leads us to the question of what birthed the original lifeform.

Given pragmatic certainty, that is one reason for why physical life forms cannot just "be".

Well, then I suppose we will just have to ask the question of what birthed the birther of the original lifeform, won't we? Given pragmatic certainty, that birther cannot just "be."


Can you prove someone loves you? Does the lack of proof mean love doesn't exist? Can you prove you trust someone? Does the lack of proof mean your trust doesn't exist?

I think I can prove someone loves me, yes. My girlfriend tells me she loves me, and I see the deep, wonderful affection in her eyes. Then I get mushy. And she gets mushy. Could she be faking this emotion? Sure. But I don't see any reason to. Similarly, I can easily prove I trust someone by actually trusting them, by putting my faith in them. Here's the difference you seem to be missing, though: These are actual people I am interacting with, gleaning evidence. You cannot say the same; your experience is entirely internal, despite the fact others share a similar experience. I don't know that my love for my girlfriend is the same as her love for me, but that is fine -- I know we share a similar experience based in our physical-world interactions. I do not deny, and honestly don't mean to demean, your internal experiences of God. I accept them, and am glad you embrace them. But if you want to debate that your experience means something for me, well, then here we are. :)

If your life was all about proof, you wouldn't get in a car. Wouldn't get on a plane. You excercise faith every day. Don't give me the necessity of proof garbage. It's a copout pure and simple.

If you have a relationship with a partner, you learn pretty quickly someones PERCEIVED reality is actually often more important than what really happened.

I don't remember ever saying else. But please note the above reply -- all of your examples deal with physical phenomena -- getting in cars, planes, et cetera all involve actions that we can see others doing and surviving. I don't deny that you have the phenomenon of religious experience, but I do disagree that you can have any certainty as to that experience demonstrating that God exists. Schizophrenics experience all sorts of phenomena that most people deny the validity of.


Oh no. Deification occurs all the time. That's the beauty of deifying God. Nothing else, no person, ambition, object or desire can ever own you.

I really have no idea what you mean here.

I honestly doesn't have a hard time with that concept.

I've found the bible to be true in it's life counselling recommendations: It works. As a historical work it is unparalelled. the most verified work in existence, full of cross referencing and honest records, to the point of self shaming on the part of the historians.

Unfortunately, this isn't true. The Bible is rife with internal contradictions. Genesis tells two incompatible stories of creation. 2 Kings 24:13-17 says that at least 10,000 people were taken to Babylon in the first deportation, with the rest of Judah taken about ten years later. Jeremiah 52:28-30 says a total of 4,600 persons were taken over three deportations. The Gospels of Matthew and Luke tell divergent stories of Jesus' birth, as well. Luke has Joseph and Mary living in Nazareth, then concocts an impossible story to get them to Bethlehem for the birth (no record of Luke's Roman census exists; if Augustus had issued such an order, it would not have included the Levant, which was ruled by the Herodians at the time and as such the people of that area did not pay taxes to Rome; and a census is designed to see where people are, not where they're born, so it would not have been on occasion for Joseph to saddle up his very pregnant wife for a mule ride). Luke also omits any mention of the Flight into Egypt. John's chronology of Jesus's life doesn't harmonize well with the other Gospels: He places Jesus chucking the money lenders out of the Temple at the beginning of his ministry, which lasts three years. The other Gospels present the riot at the Temple as the point at which the Pharisees set in motion their plot to kill Jesus. John presents Jesus as an outlaw arrested by a Roman cohort, which numbered 100 soldiers, who then for some reason take him to two Jewish high priests (but not to the Sanhedren); the other Gospels present the arrest as a Jewish matter then passed off on the Romans.

The fate of Judas Iscariot also cannot be reconciled: In Matthew 27:3-10, he returns the money given him for betraying Jesus, then hangs himself in shame. In Acts 1:16-19, Peter tells the other disciples that Judas kept the money, bought a plot of land with it and died in an accident. If you'd like more Biblical discrepancies, let me know, or you can track down a copy of Robin Lane Fox's The Unauthorized Version: Truth and Fiction in the Bible.

Factor in the fastidious concern with detail (temple measurements and lineages) and the thousands upon thousands of archaelogical findings that support biblical history, and we have a very solid work.

Again, sorry. One example of a fudged lineage would be the one Matthew presents to tie Jesus to David and Abraham; he omits the kings between Joram and Uzziah, and mentions Jeconiah twice. Adding up the reigns of the kings in the Old Testament reveals that the years of those reigns have probably been massaged, and in any event historians have had tremendous difficulty reconciling them with other records. If we go by Biblical chronology, Joshua should have stormed Jericho around 1200 BCE. However, an Egyptian record mentions defeating Israel (the nation, not an area) about that time, so Joshua must have been there before then. Again, this isn't to doubt that the tribes that eventually aligned themselves as Israel sacked Jericho, just that the Bible's story of it isn't necessarily accurate.

And this might be a quibble, of course, but the prophecy at Isaiah 7:14 says the young woman's son will be named Immanuel... which Jesus quite obviously wasn't. (I say young woman because the Hebrew word could mean that or virgin; it was translated into the Greek as virgin, which is how it has come down to us.

Let's also add in that every culture has a creation myth, and even that the HISTORY of Sumeria had a creation and flood story remarkably similar to Geneisis and the picture gets fuller.

So why not believe the versions in the history of Sumeria? They're not identical. In any event, admitting that they exist and have some validity should serve to diminish the claims to unique accuracy Christians want to give to the Bible. Other nations had stories of babies being stowed away in reed baskets and found by royalty. Heck, the Bible uses it twice. And I don't know of anyone who doubts that a flood took place; the story of Noah collecting a pair of every animal into an ark the size of which was far too small to hold that many animals is where people start to seriously quibble.

So, in light of that, I choose to accept the parts of the bible that are difficult to accept. If I approach he bible and only accept what I believed before I read it, what is the point of reading it at all? It hasn't challenged me, and I haven't changed. Simply because something is hard to believe, doesn't make it untrue! It simply means my mind hasn't had the experiences to have reached that conclusion yet.

I have no problem with evolution. If that's how it happened, that's how it happened. But I don't have the faith to accept the speculations of scientists on the matter, so until a proven alternative comes up, I'll believe it happened as it says it happened in the bible. Why not?

Because the Bible is contradictory and makes biological statements that aren't true are two good reasons not to, I'd think.

So spare the insults guys. Faith works both ways. I am agnostic about alien life, evolution, the big bang and many other speculations passed off as fact by funding-hungry scientists needing grant justification. You guys have your faith in those guys, I have my faith in the historical accuracy of the Torah/Bible writers, who actually list the descendents, father to son, from Adam to Jesus.

While I hope that I have not insulted you, I would also point out (again) that the writers of the Bible got lots wrong, including their lists of lineages. But if it works for you, then that's cool. And I would be lying if I said I didn't envy you in some way; as (I think) Pier Paolo Pasolini once said, "I am not a believer, but I am nostalgiac for a time when belief was possible." But (referring to the other exchanges we've had) I have never had the religious feeling you have had, the personal sensation that God exists and is speaking to you. Frankly, whenever I ponder on the possibility of God... well, it strikes me as kind of pointless. I don't see any need to explain the existence of the universe, and certainly don't have an experience that would suggest the existence of God.

ok.

This scares me.

Precisely. When you really open your eyes you realize that science and religion have absolutely nothing to do with one another.

And this is what was believed in the medival stage of life. Science was looked at as if it was an evil, the devils religion. So many people had died without knowing why, even the people they would call devout, and should go to heaven. Those people died of scientific causes, such as the Bubonic Plague.

So much science has given us has rectified everything they thought wrong. Medicines have been developed to cure illnesses such as those in the Medival era, and people live longer, often with much happier lives.

Einstein has once said (paraphrasing) that religion without science is baseless, and science without religion is stupid. I believe in this idea, because so much in science can explain how things might have happened, how the Big Bang theory could be the Creation belief in depth. The Bible never gave reason for what happened, just gave something to believe. It was to give a good idea how to live a good life, to show morality at its best (and worst).

Unfortunately, this isn't true. The Bible is rife with internal contradictions. Genesis tells two incompatible stories of creation. 2 Kings 24:13-17 says that at least 10,000 people were taken to Babylon in the first deportation, with the rest of Judah taken about ten years later. Jeremiah 52:28-30 says a total of 4,600 persons were taken over three deportations. The Gospels of Matthew and Luke tell divergent stories of Jesus' birth, as well. Luke has Joseph and Mary living in Nazareth, then concocts an impossible story to get them to Bethlehem for the birth (no record of Luke's Roman census exists; if Augustus had issued such an order, it would not have included the Levant, which was ruled by the Herodians at the time and as such the people of that area did not pay taxes to Rome; and a census is designed to see where people are, not where they're born, so it would not have been on occasion for Joseph to saddle up his very pregnant wife for a mule ride). Luke also omits any mention of the Flight into Egypt. John's chronology of Jesus's life doesn't harmonize well with the other Gospels: He places Jesus chucking the money lenders out of the Temple at the beginning of his ministry, which lasts three years. The other Gospels present the riot at the Temple as the point at which the Pharisees set in motion their plot to kill Jesus. John presents Jesus as an outlaw arrested by a Roman cohort, which numbered 100 soldiers, who then for some reason take him to two Jewish high priests (but not to the Sanhedren); the other Gospels present the arrest as a Jewish matter then passed off on the Romans.

The fate of Judas Iscariot also cannot be reconciled: In Matthew 27:3-10, he returns the money given him for betraying Jesus, then hangs himself in shame. In Acts 1:16-19, Peter tells the other disciples that Judas kept the money, bought a plot of land with it and died in an accident. If you'd like more Biblical discrepancies, let me know, or you can track down a copy of Robin Lane Fox's The Unauthorized Version: Truth and Fiction in the Bible.

Again, sorry. One example of a fudged lineage would be the one Matthew presents to tie Jesus to David and Abraham; he omits the kings between Joram and Uzziah, and mentions Jeconiah twice. Adding up the reigns of the kings in the Old Testament reveals that the years of those reigns have probably been massaged, and in any event historians have had tremendous difficulty reconciling them with other records. If we go by Biblical chronology, Joshua should have stormed Jericho around 1200 BCE. However, an Egyptian record mentions defeating Israel (the nation, not an area) about that time, so Joshua must have been there before then. Again, this isn't to doubt that the tribes that eventually aligned themselves as Israel sacked Jericho, just that the Bible's story of it isn't necessarily accurate.


I would assume that you just got all of this crap from someone else who does not know what they are talking about. Genesis gives one and only one account of creation. Second you have to know that Isreal split into Israel and Judah for about 200 years. Judah was conquered by Babalon while the assyrians conquered israel. The rest of the arguments were full of crap

I would assume that you just got all of this crap from someone else who does not know what they are talking about. Genesis gives one and only one account of creation. Second you have to know that Isreal split into Israel and Judah for about 200 years. Judah was conquered by Babalon while the assyrians conquered israel. The rest of the arguments were full of crapWell, all of this crap is straight out of the Bible, which you have obviously never read.

thats a good question, saying this as an unbiased as i can be. how can you prove science to be completely true, the majority of it is theorys when talking about how the galaxy has formed am i right?This is not about any galaxies. This is about the plain fact that the biblical account does in fact match historical findings but it completely fails to match the religious set-up of the Middle-East all through the 6th to 2nd Millenium BC.

I would assume that you just got all of this crap from someone else who does not know what they are talking about. Genesis gives one and only one account of creation.

Well, actually if you read Genesis, you find two rather different stories of creation. In the first story, Gn 1:1-2:4a, God passes over the formless void of the world and creates, in order:
1. light (day, and thus night);
2. the firmament (the sky);
3. the Mediterranean (all of the waters coming together into one body) and thus land;
4. vegetation;
5. the sun and moon (on the 4th day, although he has already created light... also, Gn 1:14-18 says the sun is to govern days and years, as well as festivals, leaving one to wonder how to interpret the length of the first 3 days);
6. birds, which come forth out of the waters; the birds are told to be fruitful and multiply;
7. land animals, which come forth out of the earth
8. humans (God here speaks in the plural -- "Let us make man in our own image" [Gn 1:26] and creates woman simultaneously -- "God created man in the image of himself, in the image of God he created him, male and female he created them" [Gn 1:27]). Humans are to be the masters of all the animals, but whether this means to be a terror to them, as God says we should be (for some reason) after the flood, or to be their stewards is a matter of some debate. However, at Gn 1:29, God says humans are to live off of seed-bearing plants and fruits -- not animals.
After this, God rests. So, humans are created last -- on the 6th day, and only after everything else has been created.

In Gn 2:4b-25, a new story begins. In this one, the earth already exists but is barren. God sends water, and then creates a single man from the soil (the first story does not provide any information about human's material; the second story makes no mention of God creating humans in his/their image). Then, he creates the Garden of Eden and places man there, telling him again to eat only the fruits and vegetables -- no meat exists yet. The man protests he needs someone to help him, so God creates the animals, and leaves the man to name them. When the man protests they are not enough, God creates a woman out of one of the man's ribs. Man is thus created 2nd, if one takes into consideration water, before vegetation, other animals and woman. A different order to creation, and different details about why things were created and an interesting elision in whether or not man looks like God.

Second you have to know that Isreal split into Israel and Judah for about 200 years. Judah was conquered by Babalon while the assyrians conquered israel. The rest of the arguments were full of crap

I know quite well about the split. Both Kings and Jeremiah are quite clearly talking about Judah. And if you feel the rest of my arguments are full of crap, please provide details. You might note that I have provided plenty.

Unfortunately, this isn't true. The Bible is rife with internal contradictions.
Not that I've seen. You may be confusing differing perspectives as contradictions, when in actuality they just show a truer picture.

Genesis tells two incompatible stories of creation.
Eh? No it doesn't.


2 Kings 24:13-17 says that at least 10,000 people were taken to Babylon in the first deportation, with the rest of Judah taken about ten years later.

What is the problem with that? It describes all Jerusalem being sent into exile. Why is that contradictory to the rest of Judah exiled later on? How is that contradictory? Seems like a plausible sequence of events.


Jeremiah 52:28-30 says a total of 4,600 persons were taken over three deportations.
That number is believed to be adult males. Almost half of the 10,000

The Gospels of Matthew and Luke tell divergent stories of Jesus' birth, as well. Luke has Joseph and Mary living in Nazareth, then concocts an impossible story to get them to Bethlehem for the birth (no record of Luke's Roman census exists; if Augustus had issued such an order, it would not have included the Levant, which was ruled by the Herodians at the time and as such the people of that area did not pay taxes to Rome; and a census is designed to see where people are, not where they're born, so it would not have been on occasion for Joseph to saddle up his very pregnant wife for a mule ride). Luke also omits any mention of the Flight into Egypt. John's chronology of Jesus's life doesn't harmonize well with the other Gospels: He places Jesus chucking the money lenders out of the Temple at the beginning of his ministry, which lasts three years. The other Gospels present the riot at the Temple as the point at which the Pharisees set in motion their plot to kill Jesus. John presents Jesus as an outlaw arrested by a Roman cohort, which numbered 100 soldiers, who then for some reason take him to two Jewish high priests (but not to the Sanhedren); the other Gospels present the arrest as a Jewish matter then passed off on the Romans.

No you're way off beam. They're not inconsistencies. They're all parts of the same story. Only by reading all of them do you get the complete picture. The reason all for are included is because they all illuminate something.
John doesn't write the birth at all, but focuses on Jesus divinity and his role as creator of the universe.


The fate of Judas Iscariot also cannot be reconciled: In Matthew 27:3-10, he returns the money given him for betraying Jesus, then hangs himself in shame. In Acts 1:16-19, Peter tells the other disciples that Judas kept the money, bought a plot of land with it and died in an accident. If you'd like more Biblical discrepancies, let me know, or you can track down a copy of Robin Lane Fox's The Unauthorized Version: Truth and Fiction in the Bible.

Again, more facts show a fuller story. The field of blood was purchased with the money Judas received - technically his since the Priests couldn't return it. The field was the place he died, and also became a graveyard, hence the name.

Here's more:
http://www.tektonics.org/judasdeath.html




Again, sorry. One example of a fudged lineage would be the one Matthew presents to tie Jesus to David and Abraham; he omits the kings between Joram and Uzziah, and mentions Jeconiah twice. Adding up the reigns of the kings in the Old Testament reveals that the years of those reigns have probably been massaged, and in any event historians have had tremendous difficulty reconciling them with other records. If we go by Biblical chronology, Joshua should have stormed Jericho around 1200 BCE. However, an Egyptian record mentions defeating Israel (the nation, not an area) about that time, so Joshua must have been there before then. Again, this isn't to doubt that the tribes that eventually aligned themselves as Israel sacked Jericho, just that the Bible's story of it isn't necessarily accurate.

Or that the Egyptian account isn't accurate.

Prehistoric dating was hardly an exact science. Jesus was actually born 6BC despite AD supposedly meant to start at his birth. That's why we use "circa".


And this might be a quibble, of course, but the prophecy at Isaiah 7:14 says the young woman's son will be named Immanuel... which Jesus quite obviously wasn't. (I say young woman because the Hebrew word could mean that or virgin; it was translated into the Greek as virgin, which is how it has come down to us.
We do call Jesus "Immanuel". It means "God with us". That is how we perceive him. That's foretelling how he would be perceived.



So why not believe the versions in the history of Sumeria? They're not identical. In any event, admitting that they exist and have some validity should serve to diminish the claims to unique accuracy Christians want to give to the Bible. Other nations had stories of babies being stowed away in reed baskets and found by royalty. Heck, the Bible uses it twice. And I don't know of anyone who doubts that a flood took place; the story of Noah collecting a pair of every animal into an ark the size of which was far too small to hold that many animals is where people start to seriously quibble.
Sumeria has a fall of man, like the Eden story, a creation and a flood.



While I hope that I have not insulted you, I would also point out (again) that the writers of the Bible got lots wrong, including their lists of lineages. But if it works for you, then that's cool. And I would be lying if I said I didn't envy you in some way; as (I think) Pier Paolo Pasolini once said, "I am not a believer, but I am nostalgiac for a time when belief was possible." But (referring to the other exchanges we've had) I have never had the religious feeling you have had, the personal sensation that God exists and is speaking to you. Frankly, whenever I ponder on the possibility of God... well, it strikes me as kind of pointless. I don't see any need to explain the existence of the universe, and certainly don't have an experience that would suggest the existence of God.

Well, vive le difference. I don't see errors, I see variant parts of a bigger picture. Pieces of a puzzle you need to examine to see how it all fits.

Do you read one newspaper article to get a handle on an event or do you find, when you read others writing, different people emphasise different parts of the story?

Same principle.

As for God, for me, knowing God has given my life meaning. It has answered the question "why am I here". I am not alone in the universe. Nothing "owns" me, not money, ambition, career or any other dependency. It gives me purpose, inspiration and has given me people, loving people in my life. Knowing God has led me from one side of the world to the other, given me tools for perceptional choices that mean I see everything as "good". That I see order in disorder. Reason for randomness. Positive in the negatives.

Why would I throw all that away? I have such delight and joy worshipping God. It affects how I see a sunset or a leaf. Granted you may be joyous and not know God, but I have all this BECAUSE I know God.

You leap from an awareness -- a personal sensation -- to the certainty that that awareness is a definite part of everyone's universe, whether they believe it or not. You say "based on a life of testing, [I] have chosen to believe him" -- this implies that you already accepted "him" before the testing. That is, your sensation of God identifying himself as the Creator of Life was already valid for you as a verifiable phenomenon. With all respect, I wonder how much testing was really necessary, if you'd already accepted the proposition before testing it.

It's testing after acceptance, because it doesn't work unless you accept first. That is FAITH. Love is the same. Unless you choose love, you don;t feel it. Trust also. Trust is given. You have to give trust for it to exist.

You really need to look at love when looking at a Christians beliefs, because
a. We believe that God is love
b. We believe we are in relationship with God, not following a religion.

So like any relationship, there has to be a choice at the onset to engage, or there is no relationship.

God is a gentleman. He allows you to reject him. If he removed that choice, by making it unquestionably true that he exists, it's not a true choice on our part. I prefer it this way. The search, the discovery. It gives what is gained more worth. Not everyone believes. It's more precious.



Well, then I suppose we will just have to ask the question of what birthed the birther of the original lifeform, won't we? Given pragmatic certainty, that birther cannot just "be."
Ah, yes... because it is not a physical lifeform, and because he says he just "is". The difficulty in comprehending his eternality is part of the reasoning for his existence. ie. It's why we didn't create the concept of an eternal God. We cannot comprehend that.

The nature of an eternal awareness is no beginning and no end. Outside time. He just "is". Does absolute time has an origin? Do you find it difficult to accept that absolute time just "is"?

Same with God. Don't ry and limit him to human characteristics. You're talking about the awareness that holds the universe together. There is no limiting God.




I think I can prove someone loves me, yes. My girlfriend tells me she loves me, and I see the deep, wonderful affection in her eyes. Then I get mushy. And she gets mushy. Could she be faking this emotion? Sure.
You're clutching at straws. You can't prove it. You choose to trust that she does, therefore the relationship exists. Check any relational book. Any psychology of relationships. You can't prove love. You can't prove you love, or are loved. You trust and are trusted. Therein lies the value.


But I don't see any reason to. Similarly, I can easily prove I trust someone by actually trusting them, by putting my faith in them. Oh... and the proof is....?


Here's the difference you seem to be missing, though: These are actual people I am interacting with, gleaning evidence. You cannot say the same; your experience is entirely internal, despite the fact others share a similar experience. The effects on my life are physical. The effects on others life are physical. Healing, freedom from addictions, character development. The change in a person that accepts God is astounding to say the least, and a commonality found amongs pretty much all who accept him.


I don't know that my love for my girlfriend is the same as her love for me, but that is fine -- I know we share a similar experience based in our physical-world interactions. Your experiences are totally different. You have no idea what it's like to have a relationship with you, only she does. Therein lies another truth. We can learn about ourselves through seeing things through our partners eyes. They know parts of us we never can.


I do not deny, and honestly don't mean to demean, your internal experiences of God. I accept them, and am glad you embrace them. But if you want to debate that your experience means something for me, well, then here we are. :)
Indeed.

And I know God loves you.... and that I'd better get offline before my fiancee kicks my arse!!! ;) :D Be safe friend. Whether you believe in him or not, I hope the Holy Spirit gives you an incredible sense of joy and peace tonight.

All the best.

Yorick

Genesis tells two incompatible stories of creation.

Eh? No it doesn't.

Oh yes it does. The actions of God and the order of creation are entirely different in the two creation stories told in Gn 1:1-2:4a and 2:4b-25. I've listed this discrepancies in an earlier post, so I will direct you there. Or you can read the two stories for yourself and note the contradictions. This is not a case of different perspectives on the same concrete event: They provide contradictory details that cannot be reconciled.

2 Kings 24:13-17 says that at least 10,000 people were taken to Babylon in the first deportation, with the rest of Judah taken about ten years later.

What is the problem with that? It describes all Jerusalem being sent into exile. Why is that contradictory to the rest of Judah exiled later on? How is that contradictory? Seems like a plausible sequence of events.

Don't get ahead of yourself....

Jeremiah 52:28-30 says a total of 4,600 persons were taken over three deportations.

That number is believed to be adult males. Almost half of the 10,000.

Except Kings quite clearly states that 10,000 Judaeans were sent to Babylon in the first deportation around 597 BCE and the rest about ten years later in one deportation (a total of two). Jeremiah lists 4,600 persons taken over three deportations, with different totals. The difference between 10,000 persons being taken at once, followed by a second deportation of the rest of the city, and 4,600 being taken over a period of ten years in three separate deportations is quite significant. 2 Kings 25:11 states "Nebuzaradan, commander of the guard, deported the remainder of the population left in the city [Jerusalem], the deserters who had gone over to the king of Babylon, and the rest of the common people." Jeremiah says thant Nebuzaradan deported 745 Judaeans, which would mean that, by your reckoning, only 1500 people remained in Jerusalem after the first sacking. But why would the writer of 2 Kings double the entire number sent -- why mention the women and children when other scribes didn't -- and place that in a single deportation, then add another deportation of even more people? Furthermore, at 25:21 2 Kings has "Thus Judah was deported from its country." The book then states that some people were left, but after 7 months, "all the people, high and low, with the military leaders, set off and went to Egypt, being afraid of the Chaldeaens" (2 K 25:26). Yet no mention of this flight is made in Jeremiah. Two different accounts, with different details and emphases. We can quite easily find human reasons for this... but then that makes the Bible less than the inspired, unerring Word(s) of God.

The Gospels of Matthew and Luke tell divergent stories of Jesus' birth, as well. Luke has Joseph and Mary living in Nazareth, then concocts an impossible story to get them to Bethlehem for the birth (no record of Luke's Roman census exists; if Augustus had issued such an order, it would not have included the Levant, which was ruled by the Herodians at the time and as such the people of that area did not pay taxes to Rome; and a census is designed to see where people are, not where they're born, so it would not have been on occasion for Joseph to saddle up his very pregnant wife for a mule ride). Luke also omits any mention of the Flight into Egypt. John's chronology of Jesus's life doesn't harmonize well with the other Gospels: He places Jesus chucking the money lenders out of the Temple at the beginning of his ministry, which lasts three years. The other Gospels present the riot at the Temple as the point at which the Pharisees set in motion their plot to kill Jesus. John presents Jesus as an outlaw arrested by a Roman cohort, which numbered 100 soldiers, who then for some reason take him to two Jewish high priests (but not to the Sanhedren); the other Gospels present the arrest as a Jewish matter then passed off on the Romans.

No you're way off beam. They're not inconsistencies. They're all parts of the same story. Only by reading all of them do you get the complete picture. The reason all for are included is because they all illuminate something. John doesn't write the birth at all, but focuses on Jesus divinity and his role as creator of the universe.

Can you explain why they are not inconsistencies? How does one get a full picture from details that cannot be harmonized? Luke says that Joseph, Mary and Jesus go back to Nazareth after the birth; he makes no mention of the Slaughter of the Innocents or the Flight into Egypt, which are both extremely important events in Matthew. Matthew makes no mention of Joseph and Mary having traveled from Nazareth to Bethlehem, nor of a Roman census (which is not historical in any event). John dilates Jesus's ministry, placing climactic events of the synoptic Gospels at the beginning. (He also hints Jesus might have been older than the usually accepted mid-30s at the time of the crucifixion.) They are separate nativity stories and cannot be reconciled. If Herod is King, as both Gospels assert, then Luke's other historical referent, Quirinus' governership in Judea, is impossible because Herod died about 4 BCE and Quirinius didn't become governor until 6 CE. If Luke's story is accurate, then the Flight into Egypt isn't; if Matthew's story is accurate, then any claim Luke might make to veracity collapses (Quirinius did order a census but this was well after Herod, and it still wouldn't have required Joseph and Mary to go to Bethlehem, since they lived in Nazareth). Jesus was known to come from Nazareth; Luke most likely relied on a story that explained why the Messiah, who was to supposed to have come from Bethlehem, hadn't. Matthew avoids the issue by stating that the family moved to Nazareth after the exile in Egypt. Can we think of doctrinal reasons for this? Sure. But the fact remains that, as history (in the modern sense, in the unflinchingly accurate sense you ascribed to it earlier) it fails.

Again, more facts show a fuller story. The field of blood was purchased with the money Judas received - technically his since the Priests couldn't return it. The field was the place he died, and also became a graveyard, hence the name.

Here's more:
http://www.tektonics.org/judasdeath.html

Sorry, not buying it (heh heh). Acts 1:18 clearly says, " 'As you know, he [Judas] bought a plot of land with the money he was paid for his crime. He fell headlong and burst open, and all his entrails poured out.' " If Peter meant that the Pharisees, who according to the Bible opposed the Jesus Movement and tried to stamp it out, bought it, then why not mention that--that the High Priests bought the field in Judas's name, using Judas's blood money? It would certainly go to demonstrating that the Priests were venal and not the true representatives of God's will. The Tektonics arguments from linguistic analysis are all well and good, but they ignore the central issue that the stories are different, period. And, by the way, they also cast doubt on the Bible being the unerring Word(s) of God, if things can be so easily mistranscribed. ;)

Or that the Egyptian account isn't accurate.

Given that it is one of the few extra-Biblical references to Israel, you might not want to cast it out so cavalierly.

Prehistoric dating was hardly an exact science. Jesus was actually born 6BC despite AD supposedly meant to start at his birth. That's why we use "circa".

Quite true. Except you said the Bible was quite verifiable because of its insistence on exact recording of lineages. So prehistoric dating must be accurate. Or do you mean the problems occurred due to changing calendars?

We do call Jesus "Immanuel". It means "God with us". That is how we perceive him. That's foretelling how he would be perceived.

Except Isaiah 7:14 says "The young woman is with child and she will give birth to a son whom she will call Immanuel." It's his name, not a secondary appellation. The verse is also divorced from its original context -- which is not messianic in the sense we know it now.

Sumeria has a fall of man, like the Eden story, a creation and a flood.

Yes, it does. Which does not do much for the uniqueness of the Bible, now does it?

Well, vive le difference. I don't see errors, I see variant parts of a bigger picture. Pieces of a puzzle you need to examine to see how it all fits.

Except the parts do not and cannot fit. These aren't simple variations, they are discrepancies in accounts you want to call complete and accurate. If you want to accept them as variants on the same story, fine. But you can't claim they are both entirely historically accurate.

Do you read one newspaper article to get a handle on an event or do you find, when you read others writing, different people emphasise different parts of the story? Same principle.

Oh, now it is not. If I have two or more separate versions of an event, I recognize them as multiple versions, and if I were writing a history of the event, I would present them as multiple versions. I would not present them as the unerring word of their authors.

As for God, for me, knowing God has given my life meaning. It has answered the question "why am I here". I am not alone in the universe. Nothing "owns" me, not money, ambition, career or any other dependency. It gives me purpose, inspiration and has given me people, loving people in my life. Knowing God has led me from one side of the world to the other, given me tools for perceptional choices that mean I see everything as "good". That I see order in disorder. Reason for randomness. Positive in the negatives.

Why would I throw all that away? I have such delight and joy worshipping God. It affects how I see a sunset or a leaf. Granted you may be joyous and not know God, but I have all this BECAUSE I know God.

Well, here we are then. I find myself in a pretty similar place without God, without needing to worship something else to get to it. Indeed, I don't worship anything -- I am not "owned" by anything because I choose not to be, as much as we can choose such. You seem to have decided you are not "owned" by becoming "owned" by God. Again, I don't mean to belittle your experience, because it is obviously important to you and I do respect that. The preceding paragraph is meant only to explain how I see our differences regarding similar desires and attitudes about life.

It's testing after acceptance, because it doesn't work unless you accept first. That is FAITH. Love is the same. Unless you choose love, you don;t feel it. Trust also. Trust is given. You have to give trust for it to exist.

Well, yes and no. I would suggest that accepting the love and trust of the person in front of you is of a different, more readily verifiable order than accepting the existence of a deity not immediately apparent in the physical world.

You really need to look at love when looking at a Christians beliefs, because
a. We believe that God is love
b. We believe we are in relationship with God, not following a religion.

Speaking for all Christians, are you? Some are quite beholden to the more religion-based aspects of Christianity. Or would say that following the religion is an inherent part of being in a relationship with God. Thus the insistence on following certain parts of Leviticus, attending church, etc.

God is a gentleman. He allows you to reject him.

I almost might believe you, except for that nasty going-to-hell-ig-you-don't-accept-God business.

Ah, yes... because it is not a physical lifeform, and because he says he just "is". The difficulty in comprehending his eternality is part of the reasoning for his existence. ie. It's why we didn't create the concept of an eternal God. We cannot comprehend that.

1.) You haven't provided any compelling reason for for God to be a non-physical lifeform. Other than the problem that God is simply an extra causal factor in an attempt to stop the causal chain. God really isn't all that different than the Hindu turtle.

2.) But humans did create the concept of an eternal God. Or am I mistaken in my belief that you worship an eternal God?

The nature of an eternal awareness is no beginning and no end. Outside time. He just "is". Does absolute time has an origin? Do you find it difficult to accept that absolute time just "is"?

Same with God. Don't ry and limit him to human characteristics. You're talking about the awareness that holds the universe together. There is no limiting God.

Sure, I accept that time is eternal, in the sense that the universe, to my mind, has always existed. And as such, I don't need to introduce God to explain anything. You're the one with the problems accepting the eternality of time.

I think I can prove someone loves me, yes. My girlfriend tells me she loves me, and I see the deep, wonderful affection in her eyes. Then I get mushy. And she gets mushy. Could she be faking this emotion? Sure.

You're clutching at straws. You can't prove it. You choose to trust that she does, therefore the relationship exists. Check any relational book. Any psychology of relationships. You can't prove love. You can't prove you love, or are loved. You trust and are trusted. Therein lies the value.

Yes, I agree, but I'm not clutching at straws. This is the problem with your approach to my arguments: You seem to assume that I deny your personal experience that God exists. I don't; I disagree that it means what you say it does, but I do not deny that you feel it. But nor are we really comparing equivalent concepts: I am talking about emotional connections between people in the physical world; you are talking about your feeling of connection to something outside of this universe. You and I can each look at his loved one and "feel" it is returned by seeing the look in her eyes (you wrote fiancee, not fiance... although perhaps I should not assume you are male). Others can look at her and look at us and see the connection. No one can look at God, because s/he is not here to be looked at.

Oh... and the proof is....?

That I feel trust towards them. Again, you're asking about a personal experience, which I have never challenged. If you were to ask me if that trust were founded, or if the persons trusted me, then that would be more difficult to prove. But I can prove that I trust persons by trusting them. Just as you can prove you feel the existence of God by feeling it.

The effects on my life are physical. The effects on others life are physical. Healing, freedom from addictions, character development. The change in a person that accepts God is astounding to say the least, and a commonality found amongs pretty much all who accept him.

People heal without God (it's called medicine); I have never had an addiction (with the possible exception of chocolate frozen yogurt, but I'm pretty sure the proprieter of the local Penguin is spiking it with heroin), and I have quite a good character, thank you very much. Yes, people who have had problems in their lives display a striking change when they accept God. But that's usually because they need to display a striking change. And some people manage to display striking changes without God. Neither proves or disproves God one way or the other, though.

And I know God loves you.... and that I'd better get offline before my fiancee kicks my arse!!! ;) :D Be safe friend. Whether you believe in him or not, I hope the Holy Spirit gives you an incredible sense of joy and peace tonight.

You might be surprised to know that this was not offensive to me! I appreciate your good will, and accept it in the spirit in which you give it. I don't accept the Holy Spirit, but acknowledge that your acceptance of it informs your offering of the blessing. I return the sentiment in as spiritual a manner as you can accept from an atheist.

Best,

Mookie

First of all, I am a Creationist, so I believe that God (in my case, the Judeo/Christian God) created the universe and all living things. There are many things I do not understand in the world. For example, how can there be Dinosaur fossils dating back before the time of humans when the Bible says that God created Man first? I dont know. I just do not understand. I have no explanation, and I do not know who, or what, I believe. I guess you could say I believe God created Man first and that Dinosaurs or other pre-historic fossils exist also. I also do not know what I think of Evolution. In my mind, Evolution does not contradict Creation, but the Creation contradicts the other theories that propose life began from chemicals coming together, chemicals reacting, carbon semi life forms appearing, proto cells appearing, etc. I believe God created Man, but I neither believe nor disbelieve in Evolution. I think Creationism and Evolution can work together, and some type of Evolution may take place in the creatures that God created.


But the true reason I am a Creationist is that I cannot, will not, believe that life came from nothing. There must have been some higher power that created life, and the universe, from nothing. Nothing. I cannot believe the theory that life began when certain chemicals (carbon, nitrogen, etc.) came together, reacted, and somehow formed some type of proto-cell or life from. I cannot believe that.

I believe that God created Man and all the living and nonliving things in the universe, and my belief will not change.

Um, if you read the Bible correctly, God created man on the sixth day, well after he created dinosaurs. ;)

I consider myself a believer in Creationism and Evolution. I believe God kickstarted evolution.

Well, yes and no. I would suggest that accepting the love and trust of the person in front of you is of a different, more readily verifiable order than accepting the existence of a deity not immediately apparent in the physical world.

The physical world is to me a manifestation of Gods love for me. Simply being alive and able to experience the myriad emotions on this rollercoaster is evidence. Life itself. I view each experience and each day as a gift of love from my God.


Speaking for all Christians, are you? Some are quite beholden to the more religion-based aspects of Christianity. Or would say that following the religion is an inherent part of being in a relationship with God. Thus the insistence on following certain parts of Leviticus, attending church, etc. Speaking about the stated and written beliefs of all the major denominations. Jesus' Grace removes religious law adherance obligation, whether individual practitioners are aware of it or not.

Christianity is a relationship. Some get bogged down in religion of course. Just as some relationships get mired in stale repetative familiarity. To fully understand Christianity one must look at relationships. Walking with Jesus actually gives you relationship skills.



I almost might believe you, except for that nasty going-to-hell-ig-you-don't-accept-God business.
Then don't believe in hell. Really simple. It's called "annhialationism". It's the Christian biblical interpretation that those that reject God cease to exist as an awareness. We can go into detail if you like, but it centres around:

1.The Jews had no knowledge of an afterlife outside the vague "sheol", and this was the worldview Jesus was addressing.
2.Jesus said he came to offer life, not "a better eternal life"
3.The bible says the wages of sin are death.
4.Revelation describes the state of being cast into the fire (that burns eternally) as "the second death".
5.I think therefore I am. Awareness is life. Existence. An eternal hell would still be "life" and not death - albeit hellish.... ;)
6.If God created life and enables continued existence by force of will, how can you continue to exist if you are eternally seperated from him? Without God there is no life or existence, so without God you cease to exist.
7.The metaphor used is fire. What does fire do? It destroys and consumes. The fire may burn eternally, but it's not a given that you do.
8.The "punishment" is eternal. It has eternal consequences - ie, you won;t be reborn in 7 million years. That is not the same as being perpetually punished eternally ie. eternal agony.
9.It gives a viable choice and seems more in character with the biblical God of love I know and love.



1.) You haven't provided any compelling reason for for God to be a non-physical lifeform. Other than the problem that God is simply an extra causal factor in an attempt to stop the causal chain. God really isn't all that different than the Hindu turtle.
??? It's up to each human to find a compelling reason for themself. I cannot spoonfeed you faith.


2.) But humans did create the concept of an eternal God. Or am I mistaken in my belief that you worship an eternal God?
Did we create gravity and magnetic attraction or was it discovered and given descriptive language?

The fact is eternality is outside our individual experience. We can talk about it, but cannot comprehend it. Peoples inability to accept a being without origin or creation point, is the proof that people didn't invent the concept, it was discovered and revealed. God only reveals parts himself. God is completely uncomprehendable. Which makes knowing him and being loved by him all the more miraculous.



Sure, I accept that time is eternal, in the sense that the universe, to my mind, has always existed. And as such, I don't need to introduce God to explain anything. You're the one with the problems accepting the eternality of time.
My point was, you accept that one element of existence - time: sequential moments - can simply "be" without needing an origin. Why not God? What if absolute time were an aspect of God for example? It's a simple matter of perception. Do not limit God to a created thing. I do not perceive him as a created thing. If anything, I would consider him starting time, by engaging in sequential thought - if ever there was a time when God did not think. I consider God to be outside every restriction perceptable.

That means being omnipotent and yet being able to make a rock so heavy he cannot life. I see him as being able to exist in parallel circumstances that we humans may find difficult to grasp. (Like the Trinity for example) In fact I see it as necessity. Why should God be limited to human understanding, when his very nature is beyond human understanding?





Yes, I agree, but I'm not clutching at straws. This is the problem with your approach to my arguments: You seem to assume that I deny your personal experience that God exists. I don't; I disagree that it means what you say it does, but I do not deny that you feel it. But nor are we really comparing equivalent concepts: I am talking about emotional connections between people in the physical world; you are talking about your feeling of connection to something outside of this universe. You and I can each look at his loved one and "feel" it is returned by seeing the look in her eyes (you wrote fiancee, not fiance... although perhaps I should not assume you are male). Others can look at her and look at us and see the connection. No one can look at God, because s/he is not here to be looked at.
Not in the manner you're speaking, no. But then you don't expect to taste sound do you? Appreciate things in the manner in which you are designed to appreciate them. God's love is all around you. The effect of God is all around you. You don't see the wind, you feel it. You don't see God, you feel him.



That I feel trust towards them. Again, you're asking about a personal experience, which I have never challenged. If you were to ask me if that trust were founded, or if the persons trusted me, then that would be more difficult to prove. But I can prove that I trust persons by trusting them. Just as you can prove you feel the existence of God by feeling it.
Prove to self, not to another. The only "proof" is you testimony. Just as my proof of God is my testimony.



People heal without God (it's called medicine); I have never had an addiction (with the possible exception of chocolate frozen yogurt, but I'm pretty sure the proprieter of the local Penguin is spiking it with heroin), and I have quite a good character, thank you very much. Yes, people who have had problems in their lives display a striking change when they accept God. But that's usually because they need to display a striking change. And some people manage to display striking changes without God. Neither proves or disproves God one way or the other, though.

Jesus came to heal the sick. The remarkable lifechange of those who find God IS an indicator of his existence, regardless of whether those that reject God are "together" or not. Commonality.

The existence of healthy people, doesn't negate medicines healing power, nor Gods.

In any case the link between mental and physical health is well documented.

*whistles*
*nonchalantly slides a link (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/logic-inductive/) into the thread.*
*taps Haloe on the shoulder.*

First of all, I am a Creationist, so I believe that God (in my case, the Judeo/Christian God) created the universe and all living things. There are many things I do not understand in the world. For example, how can there be Dinosaur fossils dating back before the time of humans when the Bible says that God created Man first? I dont know. I just do not understand. I have no explanation, and I do not know who, or what, I believe. I guess you could say I believe God created Man first and that Dinosaurs or other pre-historic fossils exist also. I also do not know what I think of Evolution. In my mind, Evolution does not contradict Creation, but the Creation contradicts the other theories that propose life began from chemicals coming together, chemicals reacting, carbon semi life forms appearing, proto cells appearing, etc. I believe God created Man, but I neither believe nor disbelieve in Evolution. I think Creationism and Evolution can work together, and some type of Evolution may take place in the creatures that God created.


But the true reason I am a Creationist is that I cannot, will not, believe that life came from nothing. There must have been some higher power that created life, and the universe, from nothing. Nothing. I cannot believe the theory that life began when certain chemicals (carbon, nitrogen, etc.) came together, reacted, and somehow formed some type of proto-cell or life from. I cannot believe that.

I believe that God created Man and all the living and nonliving things in the universe, and my belief will not change.

Man wasn't created first though was he?
Animals came first, dinosaurs could easily have come into existence before man and the bible would stand true chronologically.
I take Genesis to be an argument FOR evolution. Try explaining to simple farmers the concept of millions of years; far better to go for days instead so they can understand. It's only a matter of how you choose to interpret what is said.

The other suggestion would be to look for mistranslations.
For instance; for a long time the Bible was written in Latin only. Latin lacks a definate in indefinate article. Therefore instead of God creating THE world, he has created A world, but noone can accurately put this across due to language barrier.
And Latin also lacks a single word for 'planet', it is very likely that when they say 'world' they mean 'the world we know', which Vergil in fact does in the Aeneid. 'World' doesn't necessarily mean 'planet' and so you could still take the idea that God created a certain world that existed then as it was. Basically, the dinosaurs had been and gone and man was just evolving at the time. You could take it that just as he destroyed the 'world' in the flood, he also destroyed it before by means of the ice age.

Taking this line of thought, the end of the world has already come; Rome no longer rules, Judea and the 'chosen people' are but a minor faction, war is now fought with fire not rock and the systems of the past are long since dead.

Many worlds have been and gone since Genesis because the world evolved; possibly due to the Will of God but to me more likely due to the Will of Man.

Um, if you read the Bible correctly, God created man on the sixth day, well after he created dinosaurs. ;)

That all depends on which of the two Genesis creation stories you are going by. The Adam and Eve story has God making animals *after* Adam but *before* Eve.

I consider myself a believer in Creationism and Evolution. I believe God kickstarted evolution.

Cool beans, me too.

Genesis gives one and only one account of creation.

Apparently another person that hasn't read Genesis - or, if they have, hasn't actually thought about it.

The physical world is to me a manifestation of Gods love for me. Simply being alive and able to experience the myriad emotions on this rollercoaster is evidence. Life itself. I view each experience and each day as a gift of love from my God.

Fine, but you do recognize why others might not, don't you?

Speaking about the stated and written beliefs of all the major denominations. Jesus' Grace removes religious law adherance obligation, whether individual practitioners are aware of it or not.

Well, you might want to read the New Testament again, after John. Acts and the Letters discuss the controversy about that in some detail. Not everyone agreed Jesus came to free people from Judaic religious precepts. And many people now would agree with you that Jesus's grace removes such obligation... except when it comes to homosexuality (when Jesus's only words on sexual morality were tied to faithfulness in love) and circumcision.

Christianity is a relationship. Some get bogged down in religion of course. Just as some relationships get mired in stale repetative familiarity. To fully understand Christianity one must look at relationships. Walking with Jesus actually gives you relationship skills.

Yes, because no Christian has ever gotten divorced. Unless, of course, you want to imply that they weren't walking with Jesus, which would be awfully smug of you, frankly.

Then don't believe in hell. Really simple. It's called "annhialationism". It's the Christian biblical interpretation that those that reject God cease to exist as an awareness. We can go into detail if you like, but it centres around:

1.The Jews had no knowledge of an afterlife outside the vague "sheol", and this was the worldview Jesus was addressing.
2.Jesus said he came to offer life, not "a better eternal life"
3.The bible says the wages of sin are death.
4.Revelation describes the state of being cast into the fire (that burns eternally) as "the second death".
5.I think therefore I am. Awareness is life. Existence. An eternal hell would still be "life" and not death - albeit hellish.... ;)
6.If God created life and enables continued existence by force of will, how can you continue to exist if you are eternally seperated from him? Without God there is no life or existence, so without God you cease to exist.
7.The metaphor used is fire. What does fire do? It destroys and consumes. The fire may burn eternally, but it's not a given that you do.
8.The "punishment" is eternal. It has eternal consequences - ie, you won;t be reborn in 7 million years. That is not the same as being perpetually punished eternally ie. eternal agony.
9.It gives a viable choice and seems more in character with the biblical God of love I know and love.

Yes, but Hell and concepts of it have been a part of Christianity since at least the acceptance of John of Patmos' Revelation into the canon. And if the fire burns eternally, but I won't, then what's the point of saying it burns eternally? If I'm tossed in and annihilated in a non-punishment (I won't exist to feel its ramifications), then for all intents and purposes, the fire ceases to exist, at least to me. Why would God allow his beloved people to misinterpret his Revelation for thousands of years -- to torment their fellow men? Why would he allow the tormented to be so tormented? That is not a fair, loving test by any standard. And don't give me the line about God being incomprehensible to our puny little human minds: It's bollocks. If God is moral, then s/he has to follow the same moral code set down to us -- otherwise, God could not be the font et origo of morality. Without God's adherence to his/her own moral code, then morality remains arbitrary, and God is only at best morally arbitrary. And that's not an especially good recommendation for the eternal love you ascribe to him/her.

??? It's up to each human to find a compelling reason for themself. I cannot spoonfeed you faith.

Yes, but you're the one defending the idea that the universe needs an extra, non-created Creator. I'm not asking to be spoonfed anything. You're making a statement, I'm asking you to explain why it's necessary. "Well, it's up to you to figure that out" isn't a very good answer.

The fact is eternality is outside our individual experience. We can talk about it, but cannot comprehend it. Peoples inability to accept a being without origin or creation point, is the proof that people didn't invent the concept, it was discovered and revealed. God only reveals parts himself. God is completely uncomprehendable. Which makes knowing him and being loved by him all the more miraculous.

No, that's not proof, and no, believing in God is not especially miraculous, unless you want to void the word of whatever shred of meaning it has. The Onion once printed an article about the "Miracle of Life" happening for about the ten billionth time. The sarcasm, of course, being that something that happens so frequently is not especially miraculous. Many hundreds of millions of people believe in the concept of an eternal creator of some kind, so it's not especially miraculous either. People have believed all sorts of things that have either been proven wrong or have fallen by the wayside -- all those Greeks and Romans with their belief in the Pantheon of Gods, for example, or those with the faith that sprites frolic in the forests. Unless you believe in the existence of Zeus and the sprites, as well, in which case I applaud you for your ecumenicism.

My point was, you accept that one element of existence - time: sequential moments - can simply "be" without needing an origin. Why not God? What if absolute time were an aspect of God for example? It's a simple matter of perception. Do not limit God to a created thing. I do not perceive him as a created thing. If anything, I would consider him starting time, by engaging in sequential thought - if ever there was a time when God did not think. I consider God to be outside every restriction perceptable.

I can accept time. I can accept the eternality of the universe just fine. And as such, the question "Why not God?" has no meaning to me. All I can respond is, "Why God?" And your response keeps falling back on "Because God!" Which may work for you, but it doesn't for me. As it stands, you have introduced something that is a) unnecessary, b) illogical by the standards you set out for introducing God and c) something that cannot be demonstrated to be true until one accepts that it is true first.

That means being omnipotent and yet being able to make a rock so heavy he cannot life. I see him as being able to exist in parallel circumstances that we humans may find difficult to grasp. (Like the Trinity for example) In fact I see it as necessity. Why should God be limited to human understanding, when his very nature is beyond human understanding?

Well, God is the one trying to communicate with limited humans, so maybe it would behoove her/him to do so in ways that make sense to said limited humans. Like, creating a Bible that doesn't contradict itself. Or making her/himself more readily apparent in the world -- as in making a physical appearance on a semi-regular basis as in Genesis. And don't tell me faith is the issue here, that God wants us to believe through faith, because that's putting human limitations on her/him.

And here's an easy way out about the rock bit: God can't do it because it's a meaningless task; in effect, nothing is to be done because God cannot limit him/herself. If you accept the rock task, then you also have to accept the task that God can will her/himself out of existence. Or maybe God fell for this one, and it's why s/he hasn't been seen around of late? ;)

Prove to self, not to another. The only "proof" is you testimony. Just as my proof of God is my testimony.

You still miss the point: I demonstrate my love and my trust through specific actions that go to demonstrating, in effect those actions or emotions. You want your actions to demonstrate something else entirely, that the entity into which you place your faith exists when I can't experience it. Again, I have no doubt that you have faith, because you say you do, just as you should have no doubt that I love and trust my girlfriend. But I can see why you would not want to necessarily accept that as proof that my girlfriend exists -- I might be fantasizing about having a girlfriend. Similarly, your faith does not prove the existence of that which you place the faith in -- you might be fantasizing about the existence of God.

Jesus came to heal the sick. The remarkable lifechange of those who find God IS an indicator of his existence, regardless of whether those that reject God are "together" or not. Commonality.

The existence of healthy people, doesn't negate medicines healing power, nor Gods.

In any case the link between mental and physical health is well documented.

Declamations aren't proof; you seem like a very intelligent man, so you must know this. The New Testament describes Jesus as healing the sick, yes, but that doesn't mean he did -- as my other post has attempted to demonstrate to you, the Bible isn't accurate on many things. My life has changed a lot for reasons that have nothing to do with my belief in God, which should, by your logic, be an indicator of his/her lack of existence. And the link between mental and physical health is indeed fairly well documented, and people might express that mental health, or more accurately, positivity about their overall health, through religion, but that doesn't make that religious belief true in a universal sense. That is, it's true for them (and for you) emotionally, internally, but that doesn't make it true for anyone else per se.

*whistles*
*nonchalantly slides a link (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/logic-inductive/) into the thread.*
*taps Haloe on the shoulder.*

Nothing new here. Your point is.....?

Susa and all other Creationist believers (or religious fanatics for that matter), what would you rather have?

Certanity without proof? Or proof without certanity.

Fine, but you do recognize why others might not, don't you?
That wasn't the issue. You brought up love that's "in your face" so to speak.


Well, you might want to read the New Testament again, after John. Acts and the Letters discuss the controversy about that in some detail. Not everyone agreed Jesus came to free people from Judaic religious precepts. And many people now would agree with you that Jesus's grace removes such obligation... except when it comes to homosexuality (when Jesus's only words on sexual morality were tied to faithfulness in love) and circumcision.

The bible is quite clear on the issue. I've read it again and again. Grace removes you from law. The law shows you a barometre of forgiveness under grace. Paul actually raises the question "should we willingly sin so we receive more grace". he answers 'no' we shouldn't, but not no it wouldn't happen. His addressing the issue shows how grace and God's love works.

As for homosexuality/circumcision why bring that up? I know a fair number of Christian homosexuals, and numbers of uncircumcised christians. What country are you from? Are you certain they are not social problems of your nation?
;)


Yes, because no Christian has ever gotten divorced. Unless, of course, you want to imply that they weren't walking with Jesus, which would be awfully smug of you, frankly.
Actually I am divorced, and was/am very much a Christian. She was as well. Shit happens whether you're saved or unsaved. Thankfully God was with me during the pit and was more than able to endure my rage against him and keep loving me through the worst times.



Yes, but Hell and concepts of it have been a part of Christianity since at least the acceptance of John of Patmos' Revelation into the canon. And if the fire burns eternally, but I won't, then what's the point of saying it burns eternally? If I'm tossed in and annihilated in a non-punishment (I won't exist to feel its ramifications), then for all intents and purposes, the fire ceases to exist, at least to me. Why would God allow his beloved people to misinterpret his Revelation for thousands of years -- to torment their fellow men? Why would he allow the tormented to be so tormented? That is not a fair, loving test by any standard. And don't give me the line about God being incomprehensible to our puny little human minds: It's bollocks. If God is moral, then s/he has to follow the same moral code set down to us -- otherwise, God could not be the font et origo of morality. Without God's adherence to his/her own moral code, then morality remains arbitrary, and God is only at best morally arbitrary. And that's not an especially good recommendation for the eternal love you ascribe to him/her.
First up, I've read Revelation. I actually used Revelation in my reasoning.

Secondly, the Roman Catholic Church added to this, the notion of purgatory.
Misinterpretation is not in alignment with Gods will I believe, but divergence of belief amongst believers IS. Paradox. The divergent beliefs are evidence of relationship. If all christians believed uniformly, it would be a cult. Told what to think.

Basically we have free will. It is the reason for all the maladies of the world, but also all the love. Take your pick. Love requires free will. Love and pain, or numb and controlled.

As for God needing to adhere to his own rules that's just bad theology. The law of Moses was a covenant. An agreement. The laws were given as the human part of the bargain. Gods side was to be our/the Israelites God.
Nowhere did it say God had to follow the rules he put down. It's like saying a painter must wear brown, because he painted all the people in his painting brown. God is outside the artwork.

I do believe God is "good" though. That he is perfect love. That he loves and wants the best for each person - which includes an interesting exploration of life. A "happy life" is impossible without knowing badness. You only know a thing if you know it's opposite. (Hunger/satisfaction, pain/relief, joy/despair, success/failure, love/fear, gain/loss, freedom/restriction etc) Otherwise it just "is".

Why did God allow specifically an interpretation of hell? Who knows. Annhialationism isn't foolproof either. It's the interpretation I choose to believe. I'm simply pointing out, you don;t have to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

"I can't believe in a God that would create billions of people to live in eternal hell" - Good for you. Neither can I. But I believe in God, I just don't believe in hell.

It's meant I have a very robust personal faith. It meant that I had to move away from my fathers theology very early in my life.

Maybe for some it's necessary. Maybe some have no issue with it. Maybe it leads some into Gods kingdom. Who knows. I simply don't believe it, but don;t begrudge those that do.

But if someone uses the fear of hell to manipulate and torture people, they will have to account for their deeds, like we all do.



Yes, but you're the one defending the idea that the universe needs an extra, non-created Creator. I'm not asking to be spoonfed anything. You're making a statement, I'm asking you to explain why it's necessary. "Well, it's up to you to figure that out" isn't a very good answer.

The answer can vary according to your search. It is an answer you need to find yourself. That's the point I'm making.


No, that's not proof, and no, believing in God is not especially miraculous, unless you want to void the word of whatever shred of meaning it has. The Onion once printed an article about the "Miracle of Life" happening for about the ten billionth time. The sarcasm, of course, being that something that happens so frequently is not especially miraculous. Many hundreds of millions of people believe in the concept of an eternal creator of some kind, so it's not especially miraculous either. People have believed all sorts of things that have either been proven wrong or have fallen by the wayside -- all those Greeks and Romans with their belief in the Pantheon of Gods, for example, or those with the faith that sprites frolic in the forests. Unless you believe in the existence of Zeus and the sprites, as well, in which case I applaud you for your ecumenicism.

The Greek pantheon consisted of Gods with human qualities. Zeus was born to Saturn for example. He had a mother and a father, and was just a "beefed up" human. Predating the Gods, the Greeks had personified elements of nature.

Personifying nature, and assigning humanlike personalities superhuman qualities doesn't equate the same thing as an eternal God, omnipresent, eternal, without beginning or end. The Greek gods were based on concepts found in this life. Yahweh is not.


I can accept time. I can accept the eternality of the universe just fine. And as such, the question "Why not God?" has no meaning to me. All I can respond is, "Why God?" And your response keeps falling back on "Because God!" Which may work for you, but it doesn't for me. As it stands, you have introduced something that is
a) unnecessary,
b) illogical by the standards you set out for introducing God and
c) something that cannot be demonstrated to be true until one accepts that it is true first.

Well there it is. True love cannot exist unless you first choose to love. Trust cannot exist unless you choose to give trust. Faith in God doesn't exist unless you choose to believe. You may see it as silly or illogical, but that's the way it works.

I brought up time as an example of something that needs no necessity of origin, in answer to your presumption that God needed an origin. I do not believe he has a beginning. My faith in his being outside time is in fact a rudimentary and fundamental understanding of the nature of God.

I repeat. The only way we have a fair choice to reject him, is by needing to have faith. If proof of God was plainly obvious and faith unnecessary, then we would not have the freedom to reject him in a fair manner. The fact that we choose God, that faith is a mental attribute, is what gives it all value.



Well, God is the one trying to communicate with limited humans, so maybe it would behoove her/him to do so in ways that make sense to said limited humans. Like, creating a Bible that doesn't contradict itself. Or making her/himself more readily apparent in the world -- as in making a physical appearance on a semi-regular basis as in Genesis. And don't tell me faith is the issue here, that God wants us to believe through faith, because that's putting human limitations on her/him.

God speaks to me. Once you choose for him he does start impacting your life to the point that it becomes almost an impossibility to NOT see his hand everywhere, or hear his voice, or feel his guidance and/or love.

The contradictions, are I repeat, nonexistent. You have to take context and the full work into consideration. Plus the value of mutliple descriptions.

Additionally, it's only one way God speaks. We have "logos" the written word, and "rhema" the spoken word. The two need to be in harmony. Otherwise you get nutjobs saying God told them to kill blacks or kill their kids despite the bibles clear contradictions to those courses of action. Similarly, you test the logos, the bible against the spoken word (which includes other believers for example) to check if your interpretation is offbeam.

That's why we do church for example. A thriving church will encourage questioning. Not everything makes sense initially. Yet I have found, even parts of the bible that have initially confused me, have made sense after prayer, soulsearching, and/or discussion or disagreement with others.

If something provokes a search it's good. If it challenges preconceived notions it's good.



And here's an easy way out about the rock bit: God can't do it because it's a meaningless task; in effect, nothing is to be done because God cannot limit him/herself. If you accept the rock task, then you also have to accept the task that God can will her/himself out of existence. Or maybe God fell for this one, and it's why s/he hasn't been seen around of late? ;)
Or you accept that he is bigger than human riddles and human understanding and can create a rock that another part of himself cannot lift. Like Jesus being unable to lift it. Intentional limitation within the artwork, yet he is at the same time existing outside the artwork.

I record music. My voice will get "captured" on CD, so that a listener hears me sing to them. That is me on the CD. It is no-one else. Yet, I am more than the CD. I can exist outside the CD simultaneously with me being on the CD.

Artwork is the key. Within the parametres of my art, my personality is limited. Outside I am beyond my artforms limitations.

Do you understand? We are in the artwork. Jesus was the manifested self limited presence of God here on earth - Immanuel as I call him, or his mother or anyone else who believes him to be "God with us" (in answer to one part of the post I haven't had time to respond to yet)

God is outside the artwork, and so is free from time, space, morality, motion, sequencial thought, sequencial action... anything that defines physical life. Anything we can sense, taste, think. Any "law of the universe" can be broken by God, for he is outside that.

Including human comprehension.

It's almost like he could deliberately reveal seemingly impossible paradoxes about himself to show
a)Human understanding is limited
b)How incomprehensibly powerful God is.





You still miss the point: I demonstrate my love and my trust through specific actions that go to demonstrating, in effect those actions or emotions. You want your actions to demonstrate something else entirely, that the entity into which you place your faith exists when I can't experience it. Again, I have no doubt that you have faith, because you say you do, just as you should have no doubt that I love and trust my girlfriend. But I can see why you would not want to necessarily accept that as proof that my girlfriend exists -- I might be fantasizing about having a girlfriend. Similarly, your faith does not prove the existence of that which you place the faith in -- you might be fantasizing about the existence of God.
Again, you've missed here, that I am pointing out the existence of something that doesn't need the same proof you are requiring. You are treating God as you would a person. Proof of existence demanded. Yet, the nature of the Goid I believe in, is that "GOD IS LOVE". Love itself cannot be proven, only felt. Same with God. Your girlfriend is irrelevent in the equation. I am speaking about LOVE, not her.



Declamations aren't proof; you seem like a very intelligent man, so you must know this. The New Testament describes Jesus as healing the sick, yes, but that doesn't mean he did -- as my other post has attempted to demonstrate to you, the Bible isn't accurate on many things.
I am speaking about God healing people this year. I have been healed a couple of times in radical manner as a result of faith. I walked on an agonisingly sore torn hamstring recently with no pain, an instant... an instant after having a serious faith breakthrough. The hamstring got better. I've torn muscles many times before. That just doesn't happen. We're talking literally one or two steps to massive increases in healing. Three people were with me, and they couldn't believe it.


My life has changed a lot for reasons that have nothing to do with my belief in God, which should, by your logic, be an indicator of his/her lack of existence.
Not at all. You can receive the benefits of something without being aware of it. I believe that the creator enables healing just as he enables life. I believe tha he answers prayers people are unaware they send. I believe he sees, and hears everything, and longs to see each of us simply start talking to him. And if we feel like an idiot, and yet press on and keep talking to him, that shows faith, which he then rewards.

And the link between mental and physical health is indeed fairly well documented, and people might express that mental health, or more accurately, positivity about their overall health, through religion, but that doesn't make that religious belief true in a universal sense. That is, it's true for them (and for you) emotionally, internally, but that doesn't make it true for anyone else per se.
It would make it true for those that claim it to be so. You can't take the subject back, remove their faith and run the sequence again. ALl you have is their testimony, and their knowledge of their health and life before knowing God, or while ignoring God.

Cheers, and thanks for the compliment BTW. Kudos to you too. :)

I did mean to answer another post of yours, but it's late and I'm stuffed. More later.

Yorick.

Susa and all other Creationist believers (or religious fanatics for that matter), what would you rather have?

Certanity without proof? Or proof without certanity.
Would you rather be a respected fool or a derided sage?

Yahweh was part of a pantheon too. That there was only one god came about later; that's what Abraham did.

And the concepts expressed in the Bible (really a small number of the conepts since the Torah wasn't written until the Babylonian Captivity and even the New Testament with Apocrypha leaves out all of the Gnostic texts) are basically universal. They, it, is myth. The writing isn't to tell a good story, its to express the universal in order to reincorporate that universal into invidual lives. Literalising any myth is a dangerous thing, literalising one in translation upon translation upon translation is kind of silly.

Most of this discussion has simply assumed that there is only one God: the judeo/christian/islamic (chronological order) is It. You either believe in him or not. They are but one family--and it sure would be nice if they'd stop fighting like spoiled siblings--of many.

What if you are god? Which was essentially what Jesus was saying and what got him crucified. Atonement through love. At-one-ment with God. Or the Sanskrit, tat tvam asi...thou art that. You are that, and that is god (suchness). You created yourself. You created the universe. You did it, literally. God is in you so you are god...only you don't know it mostly. And to understand that you are god is not the same as to know it.

*The student absorbed the teaching of his master. Walking on the road, he contemplated his nature as god. He soon saw an elephant walking the same road, coming straight towards him. He wondered. If he is god, then he shouldn't have to move out of the way of the elephant. Then again, the elephant is god too. He mused. Lost in thought, he didn't hear the elephant driver shouting at him to get out of the way. At the last possible moment, the elephant slapped the student into the ditch. Shaken, he went back to his master and explained what happened and his question. The master slapped him hard with a sandal and said, "well why didn't you listen to god screaming at you from on top the elephant?"*

OR

After all, it says in the Book that He made us all to be just like Him...so if we're dumb, then God is dumb. (and maybe even a little ugly on the side)

Yahweh was part of a pantheon too. That there was only one god came about later; that's what Abraham did.

And the concepts expressed in the Bible (really a small number of the conepts since the Torah wasn't written until the Babylonian Captivity and even the New Testament with Apocrypha leaves out all of the Gnostic texts) are basically universal. They, it, is myth. The writing isn't to tell a good story, its to express the universal in order to reincorporate that universal into invidual lives. Literalising any myth is a dangerous thing, literalising one in translation upon translation upon translation is kind of silly.

Most of this discussion has simply assumed that there is only one God: the judeo/christian/islamic (chronological order) is It. You either believe in him or not. They are but one family--and it sure would be nice if they'd stop fighting like spoiled siblings--of many.

What if you are god? Which was essentially what Jesus was saying and what got him crucified. Atonement through love. At-one-ment with God. Or the Sanskrit, tat tvam asi...thou art that. You are that, and that is god (suchness). You created yourself. You created the universe. You did it, literally. God is in you so you are god...only you don't know it mostly. And to understand that you are god is not the same as to know it.

*The student absorbed the teaching of his master. Walking on the road, he contemplated his nature as god. He soon saw an elephant walking the same road, coming straight towards him. He wondered. If he is god, then he shouldn't have to move out of the way of the elephant. Then again, the elephant is god too. He mused. Lost in thought, he didn't hear the elephant driver shouting at him to get out of the way. At the last possible moment, the elephant slapped the student into the ditch. Shaken, he went back to his master and explained what happened and his question. The master slapped him hard with a sandal and said, "well why didn't you listen to god screaming at you from on top the elephant?"*

OR

After all, it says in the Book that He made us all to be just like Him...so if we're dumb, then God is dumb. (and maybe even a little ugly on the side)

Firstly you're confusing the Torah with the Talmud. The Torah was written by Moses, as it was a foundational written scripture for Israel and Judah. You're confusing it with the TALMUD, which is believed to have been written as two sections: Mishna and Gemara; while in Babylon.

Secondly Abraham did not create the concept of God. You're not allowing for Job and the uncertain speculation that it's the oldest book in the bible.
Regardless, the Christian belief is not that the faith started with Abraham, but that it started with Adam. Some believe it was Adam who wrote the first few chapters of Genesis.

So you're presenting religious speculation as fact. Yahweh was never part of the Sumerian pantheon.

Secondly, we've been referring to the Judeo-Christian Yahweh, simply because pantheism doesn't hold to a personality creator awareness in the same manner. Brahman for example is a very different, noncognissant entity, even though Brahma/Vishnu/Shiva are.

I'm not sure what you "universal" statement does other than support what I've been saying about collective memory, and God working to relate to all peoples.

As for the gnostics, I reject dualism out of hand, and the notion that the creator is an evil being that Jesus enables us to bypass in reaching the ultimate God. It's no wonder the gnostic texts were left out. Aside from being written later on, they presnet a different religion altogether, just using the name of Jesus for confusing credibility.

It accords to Satan the role of creator. I don't agree. Neither did the bible writers, nor the Jewish writers. Gnosticism is inconsistant with and, revisionist towards both Judaism and Christianity and Islam for that matter.

As for all being God, I view it quite simply.

If God can do anything and everything, if he truly is the supreme creative entity that can create anything, do you believe he CAN create an awareness, that is not HIM?

Not did. Can. Can an omnipotent being create even ONE awareness that is not him?

If he cannot, he is not omnipotent.

Now... if he can, why would he not?
If I am God, I will search myself for that answer........(if I am not God, I will search what I've been given)

The answer is in sex.

If you could either masturbate, or have sex with another person, what would you prefer? Why would you masturbate alone, when you CAN have sex with another person?

If all is God, then me loving God, or loving another, or him loving me is all a bug wank. Loving self.

If God really is seperate from me, and I am seperate from him, then me loving God is like sex.

Which is the greater acheivement? Creating aspects of yourself or creating others to appreciate yourself?

That's why I think pantheism makes God less powerful than he is, and relationships more stale, and gives a sense of ALONENESS. All is me.

Christianity gives companionship.

The other social aspect, as PROVEN in India, is that pantheism leaves no necessity for social work. No need to prove anothers lot in life. They'll get another go. They've deserved their crap. Right? The only seriously sucessful social work in India: Captal of Pantheism; is undertaken by Christian organisations.

So that's it.

Omnipotency vs partial potency
Aloneness vs togetherness
Masturbation vs sex
View on society

All make me believe monthiesm is the answer.

As for using Jesus words... please... don't even TRY to go there. He was speaking into a Jewish worldview that had no knowledge of pantheism. When he used the word "God" to people, he was referencing their understanding of a monotheistic God. Yahweh. You can't take what he was saying and apply an alien context to it! That approach is just plain bad.

Context context context.

I can see your arguements as valid, and I respect them. But, I must add that if God created us in His image, why would we need to evolve? Wouldn't we be as best suited for whatever it is we were put here for in the same bodies as Adam and Eve, or whoever the first ones were?

My belief is that we were created in God's spiritual image, not his physical image (if such a thing is possible).

I really want to keep this simple and non-offensive, but points keep popping into my head. I'm replying to Susa's original message, anyway.

Firstly, I'm not religious, I've 'never' been religious - believe it or not I grew up believing that my generation would be the first generation not to believe in a higher power. I got a hell of a shock.

I did have a 'children's Bible', and I loved the stories in it.. well, except parts of the Old Testament that gave me nightmares :) My dad is an atheist, my mum an agnostic - she felt it was important that I have the knowledge to make my own choice. She was right. And, as an aside, I've found that the one overwhelming factor in someone's choice of religion (or lack thereof) is the religion of their parents. Naturally.

It's not easy to understand how life can occur from inanimate objects. It's completely against common sense and our intuition. But relativity theory and quantum physics are possibly even weirder, and our satellites would wander off and our televisions not work if those theories were wrong.

As a 20 year old atheist I realised I didn't have a clue how life started or evolved or even, really, worked. That seemed a bit stupid of me. So I read - I read everything I could find on organic chemistry, molecular biology, genetics, thermodynamics (especially entropy), evolutionary theory, and so on.

It took me a long time to get to grips with it all. And then one night it all just clicked into place. It's the closest thing I've ever had to a religious experience. I was just mesmerised by it, I don't think I slept for 2 days. When I look at the emergent properties of molecules, and the way the laws physics and chemistry come together to make evolution possible, to me it's not a question of, "How is evolution possible?", so much as, "How could you possibly -not- have evolution?".

But I had to work really, really hard to understand it. How do molecules act in such a way that they're working together? How can they reproduce themselves? How can they 'devise' a genetic code? How can a single-celled creature become a multi-celled one? How can you evolve an eye? And any other question you can ask. I have some of the answers to some of those questions. But to really believe, you have to find them for yourself.

I mean no offense by this, but now, knowing what I know, and looking at the 'stories; of Genesis compared to Evolution, Genesis just doesn't come out looking too favourable.

Maff (really trying to learn to be tolerant of others beliefs) :)

Firstly you're confusing the Torah with the Talmud. The Torah was written by Moses, as it was a foundational written scripture for Israel and Judah. You're confusing it with the TALMUD, which is believed to have been written as two sections: Mishna and Gemara; while in Babylon.

Haloe, I'll answer your other post later (have to run to class), but wanted to ask if Moses wrote the Torah, by which I assume you mean the Pentateuch, does that include Deuteronomy 31-34, where Moses is dying or dead?

I think my biggest confusion is why nobody ever calls it the "Christo-Islamic God" ....

Well, because it's hard to rally people to fight against the other side when you acknowledge the mutual tradition between the two of you. When you've got people like Falwell preaching that "We believe in Jehovah and everything else is a lie," (Jehovah being a bastardized Latinate version of the Hebrew Tetragrammaton), you don't want to allow for the fact that there might just be some common ground there between Muslims and Christians.

People don't like killing people who agree with them. So you've got to find ways to motivate them.

As for the gnostics, I reject dualism out of hand, and the notion that the creator is an evil being that Jesus enables us to bypass in reaching the ultimate God. It's no wonder the gnostic texts were left out. Aside from being written later on, they presnet a different religion altogether, just using the name of Jesus for confusing credibility.

It accords to Satan the role of creator. I don't agree. Neither did the bible writers, nor the Jewish writers. Gnosticism is inconsistant with and, revisionist towards both Judaism and Christianity and Islam for that matter.
This is a curious post. I've been reading your previous posts, and although I don't agree with many of your arguments, they've struck me as thoughtful at least. Suddenly all that goes out of the window.

All the history I've read seems to agree that many of the gnostic texts pre-date the New Testament versions. To pick a random example, Paul Johnson, a Catholic writer with only contempt for gnosticism (he describes it as parasitical on true religion), agrees the Nag Hammadi texts were written before the four gospels.

Not all gnostics are dualists. Not all gnostics believe Satan to be the creator. I suspect that gnostics (with pantheists) would also argue not that their beliefs are incompatible with religions of the book, but rather vice-versa, because the religions of the book are self-limiting.

As for all being God, I view it quite simply.

If God can do anything and everything, if he truly is the supreme creative entity that can create anything, do you believe he CAN create an awareness, that is not HIM?

Not did. Can. Can an omnipotent being create even ONE awareness that is not him?

If he cannot, he is not omnipotent.

Now... if he can, why would he not?
If I am God, I will search myself for that answer........(if I am not God, I will search what I've been given)

Hmm, seems to be you're trying to blind-side the omnipotence/omniscience paradox. By going purely for one side of the attributes of god, you're applying human limits to what is described as an unlimited entity.

The answer is in sex.

If you could either masturbate, or have sex with another person, what would you prefer? Why would you masturbate alone, when you CAN have sex with another person?

If all is God, then me loving God, or loving another, or him loving me is all a bug wank. Loving self.

If God really is seperate from me, and I am seperate from him, then me loving God is like sex.

Which is the greater acheivement? Creating aspects of yourself or creating others to appreciate yourself?

This seems rather childish. Or at least limiting the divine to human forms of relationships. The final statement appears to assign hubris to the creator, which would appear utterly redundant.

The other social aspect, as PROVEN in India, is that pantheism leaves no necessity for social work. No need to prove anothers lot in life. They'll get another go. They've deserved their crap. Right? The only seriously sucessful social work in India: Captal of Pantheism; is undertaken by Christian organisations.

This really is arrant nonsense. Apart from the conflation of reincarnation and pantheism, one word: Ghandi. A couple of others: temples, monasteries, both preforming social functions in a pantheist context. And that's before you get on to secular institutions.

As for using Jesus words... please... don't even TRY to go there. He was speaking into a Jewish worldview that had no knowledge of pantheism. When he used the word "God" to people, he was referencing their understanding of a monotheistic God. Yahweh. You can't take what he was saying and apply an alien context to it! That approach is just plain bad.

Context context context.

Jews at the time of Jesus were ruled by the Romans and neighbours of the Greeks and other pantheistic cultures. They knew pantheism. And I think Paul might have argued that Jesus was speaking beyond the Jewish worldview to Gentiles, too.

PS: Descartes is frightfully old-fashioned. And (though I think it was another poster who referenced him) I seem to recall Bertrand Russell did not completely manage to proove 1+1=2, his proof (as I remember it) ended in a couple of assumptions.

Yes, but so many theists claim that they have wisdom -- that they know God exists with nothing at all by way of direct proof.
Direct proof is exactly what most of them have --experiential proof. It is empirical proof they lack.

Empirical proof is unnecessary.

Direct proof is exactly what most of them have --experiential proof. It is empirical proof they lack.
Empirical proof is unnecessary.What?

I cannot believe the theory that life began when certain chemicals (carbon, nitrogen, etc.) came together, reacted, and somehow formed some type of proto-cell or life from. I cannot believe that.
Why not? Chemical reactions happen all the time, everywhere.

Why not? Chemical reactions happen all the time, everywhere.Exactly. Ther are even amino acids all over the galaxy.

You leap from an awareness -- a personal sensation -- to the certainty that that awareness is a definite part of everyone's universe, whether they believe it or not.
It's not such a leap, is it? We all have the same senses, we all have the same brain chemistry, we all have the same potential to experience the full range of human emotions. With few exceptions, we are all equally human.

It's not such a leap, is it? We all have the same senses, we all have the same brain chemistry, we all have the same potential to experience the full range of human emotions. With few exceptions, we are all equally human.

http://forums2.jolt.co.uk/showpost.php?p=7056384&postcount=373

You had an amazing experience. You and the muslim, you and the buddhist, you and the alien abductee, you and the faith healer,
you and John Edward... ho-hum.
The Muslim, perhaps; the Buddhist, almost certainly; the alien abduction and the John Edward, whomever that is, are not experienced internally; and the faith healer, well, it depends on what you are imagining a faith healer does.

I already mentioned Michael Persinger's research involving mystical experiences.
Which demonstrates what? That religious feeilng can be induced just supports the idea that we are all capable of experiencing it.

I do hope you'll start petitioning the insane asylum to release the man who thinks blue trolls are coming to kill him or who thinks he's Napoleon Bonaparte. After all, we can trust their experiences, right?
No, but then the internal religious experience is not deemed insanity. If it was, all religious folk would be in that asylum, wouldn't they?

The evidence is the same. You're just artibrarily choosing between the ones you like and the ones you don't.

It demonstrates the experience may be merely a product of factors working in the brain that we don't fully understand yet. Purely mental, no supernatural required.

Surely you've heard of waking dreams and sleep paralysis? The latter was responsible for people who had that experience of being visited by Succubi/Incubi and is suspected as the cause of many of these alien abductees' claims.

Are you claiming that by "not experiencing internally" that aliens are actually abducting these people and John Edwards is actually talking to the dead?

I'll admit that John Edwards and the faith healers are red herring, they're just charlatans, but that just proves a different point.

The evidence is the same. You're just artibrarily choosing between the ones you like and the ones you don't.

It demonstrates the experience may be merely a product of factors working in the brain that we don't fully understand yet. Purely mental, no supernatural required.

Surely you've heard of waking dreams and sleep paralysis? The latter was responsible for people who had that experience of being visited by Succubi/Incubi and is suspected as the cause of many of these alien abductees' claims.

Are you claiming that by "not experiencing internally" that aliens are actually abducting these people and John Edwards is actually talking to the dead?

I'll admit that John Edwards and the faith healers are red herring, they're just charlatans, but that just proves a different point.
Now you've got me intrigued. I thought your point was that there was no evidence? How can there be evidence?

The Buddhist goal is to experience Buddha consciousness. This is the realization of the godhood within.

The Muslim, I'm not sure what they claim of god --I've always imagined them much the same as Christianity, since they both put so much credance in their respective prophets.

That the "cause" of alien abductions is suspected means that it has not yet been demonstrated.

"...the experience may be merely a product of factors working in the brain that we don't fully understand yet. Purely mental, no supernatural required." And how do we know no "supernatural" is required if we don't fully understand the processes? Now you are the one making claims of speculation as if they were fact.

Are you claiming that by "not experiencing internally" that aliens are actually abducting these people and John Edwards is actually talking to the dead?
No, I am claiming that the experience of god, as described earlier in this thread by Haloe, was of an internal acknowledgement of god and entirely subjectively experiential. This is not claimed by alien abductees --they profess to have actually been kidnapped and taken aboard ships, etc.

A virus is nonliving. A virus is DNA surrounded by a Protein coat. I know my science. Nothing living has been created.

Oh dear. This could get a bit reductionist. Your definition of a virus is essentially correct. So, despite containing genetic material that allows it to reproduce in an environment appropriate to it a virus is non-living?

And yes, if we both know our biology, we don't have to go into the limitations of the virus and the role played by the host cell.

How are we going to define living, then? If a virus isn't alive, is a bacterium alive? Are yeasts alive? Is mold alive?

Is a tapeworm alive? Is a cuckoo alive?

Was Tom Hanks in Castaway really alive, stranded indefinitely on that island? :)

Maff

Now you've got me intrigued. I thought your point was that there was no evidence? How can there be evidence?


The evidence is the same. Zero equals zero.


The Buddhist goal is to experience Buddha consciousness. This is the realization of the godhood within.

The Muslim, I'm not sure what they claim of god --I've always imagined them much the same as Christianity, since they both put so much credance in their respective prophets.

That the "cause" of alien abductions is suspected means that it has not yet been demonstrated.


Back to my original point. You're just arbitrarily choosing. Either personal experience is acceptable as evidence and you have to petition the release of the man who's obviously been wrongfully committed to the insane asylum or personal experience is not acceptable.


"...the experience may be merely a product of factors working in the brain that we don't fully understand yet. Purely mental, no supernatural required." And how do we know no "supernatural" is required if we don't fully understand the processes? Now you are the one making claims of speculation as if they were fact.


Do you require me to explain the meaning of the word "may"?


Are you claiming that by "not experiencing internally" that aliens are actually abducting these people and John Edwards is actually talking to the dead?
No, I am claiming that the experience of god, as described earlier in this thread by Haloe, was of an internal acknowledgement of god and entirely subjectively experiential. This is not claimed by alien abductees --they profess to have actually been kidnapped and taken aboard ships, etc.

... and it is very likely that the experience is just as internal as the "realization of God." The obvious point I am making here is that your senses can be fooled. Not to mention your brain can play wierd tricks especially when you're in-between awake and asleep like in sleep paralysis.

Why do people not see demons or mystical creatures anymore (or as much as they used to)? It's purely cultural. Early alien abductees' stories varied in the descripton of the aliens the saw, but soon they became consistent as idea of "the grays" became popular culture.

The evidence is the same. Zero equals zero.
The evidence of the Buddhist religion, for example, is in their processes and testamonials. The evidence of the alien abductee is also in their testamonials. The evidence is not the same, though, because of what is being testified about. The Buddhist testifies about the internal experience, something he did --the alien abductee about one that happened to him from without.

Back to my original point. You're just arbitrarily choosing. Either personal experience is acceptable as evidence and you have to petition the release of the man who's obviously been wrongfully committed to the insane asylum or personal experience is not acceptable.
"Personal experience" as you put it is acceptable as evidence of a personal experience. Nothing more was claimed --just that.

You seem to be missing the point... the man who was committed to the asylum is not claiming to have experienced god. People are not "wrongfully committed" to asylums because of delusions --they are committed (or more often commit themselves) with a doctor's recommendation because of diagnosed medical conditions. I don't see doctors locking away religious folk for their "delusions"; they'd have to lock away a few of their own, too.

... and it is very likely that the experience is just as internal as the "realization of God." The obvious point I am making here is that your senses can be fooled. Not to mention your brain can play wierd tricks especially when you're in-between awake and asleep like in sleep paralysis.
We're not talking about input received through the senses, though, from the world outside. We are talking about a subjective experience of "love" that fills a person from within. "Weird tricks" or not, it is still something experienced.

Why do people not see demons or mystical creatures anymore (or as much as they used to)? It's purely cultural. Early alien abductees' stories varied in the descripton of the aliens the saw, but soon they became consistent as idea of "the grays" became popular culture.
Did they used to see demons and mystical creatures? Or did they use metaphors a lot in their speech patterns? That was their culture, alright.

This is a curious post. I've been reading your previous posts, and although I don't agree with many of your arguments, they've struck me as thoughtful at least. Suddenly all that goes out of the window.
Nope. Same level of thought and consideration.

All the history I've read seems to agree that many of the gnostic texts pre-date the New Testament versions. To pick a random example, Paul Johnson, a Catholic writer with only contempt for gnosticism (he describes it as parasitical on true religion), agrees the Nag Hammadi texts were written before the four gospels.
Simply not true. The nag Hammadi manuscripts (Coptic translations) are dated around the 4th century. Pauls letter to the Thessalonians was written crica 50AD for example. Here are more:

Gospel of Mark: +65-70 AD
Gospel of Matthew: +75 AD
Gospel of Luke: +80-90 AD
Gospel of John: +95-100 AD
James: +45-50 AD
Colossians: +60 AD
Corinthians: +57 AD
Ephesians: +65 AD
Hebrews: +60-90 AD
Epistles of John: +90 AD
Jude: +65-100 AD
Epistles of Peter: +64 AD
Philemon: +56 AD
Philippians: +57-62 AD
Romans: +57-58 AD
Galatians: +54-55 AD
Thessalonians: +50 AD
Timothy: +60-100 AD
Titus: +60-100 AD
Revelation: +81-96 AD



Not all gnostics are dualists. Not all gnostics believe Satan to be the creator. I suspect that gnostics (with pantheists) would also argue not that their beliefs are incompatible with religions of the book, but rather vice-versa, because the religions of the book are self-limiting.Not necessarily Satan per se, but an "evil" creator. I paraphrased to highlight the difference.
In any case, the point stands that Gnosticism is not Christianity by any stretch, so it's no suprise the works were ommitted.



Hmm, seems to be you're trying to blind-side the omnipotence/omniscience paradox. By going purely for one side of the attributes of god, you're applying human limits to what is described as an unlimited entity.
Have another read of what I wrote. I'm not sure you understood what I was writing. I believe God to be omnipotent and omniscient. I was simply challenging the pantheists notion of an omnipotent creator. I am not the one limiting God. I am saying he has done the more remarkable feat - creating an eternal life awareness that is not him. The pantheist denys this creative accomplishment.



This seems rather childish. Or at least limiting the divine to human forms of relationships. The final statement appears to assign hubris to the creator, which would appear utterly redundant.
It's an analogy. Crude perhaps, but effectively conveys a comparison.
Under pantheism, all love is masturbation. Under monotheism, all love is sex.
An analogy nothing else. If you are in love under pantheism, you are simply loving yourself. If you love God, you love yourself. Under monotheism, the love that exists is between seperate beings - God, man, and other humans



This really is arrant nonsense. Apart from the conflation of reincarnation and pantheism, one word: Ghandi. A couple of others: temples, monasteries, both preforming social functions in a pantheist context. And that's before you get on to secular institutions. Ghandi actually proves my point!

Ghandi actually followed Jesus teachings, especially on nonviolence. His life was arguably the closest you could get to a Jesus life, without having him inside of you. He rejected Christology, due in part to events in South Africa, but Jesus impact on his life was well stated and documented.

As for the Hindu Gurus, if you call taking a farmers life savings to perform a blessing, we have differing views on "social welfare". Compare Mother Theresa's tireless work in India.



Jews at the time of Jesus were ruled by the Romans and neighbours of the Greeks and other pantheistic cultures. They knew pantheism. And I think Paul might have argued that Jesus was speaking beyond the Jewish worldview to Gentiles, too.
The Greek religion was polythesitic, not pantheistic.

I repeat, the worldview Jesus was speaking was monotheism. Jesus spoke about Yahweh (I AM). The rabbis, the common man, knew of one creator called Yahweh. Jesus called himself Yahweh when he said "before Abraham was I AM". There is nothing in the bible, nor in Jewish documents that prove any assertion that they had any awareness of pantheism.

You can't apply modern morality or modern theology into a historical setting that doesn't have it. It's just bad science. You have to understand the context into which a person speaks.


PS: Descartes is frightfully old-fashioned. And (though I think it was another poster who referenced him) I seem to recall Bertrand Russell did not completely manage to proove 1+1=2, his proof (as I remember it) ended in a couple of assumptions.Your point being? So what if Descartes is "old fashioned" Who gives a toss? "I think therefore I am" is a timeless piece of wisdom that transcends "fashion" and the whims of popular cultures praise. Do you base your beliefs around what is "hip" or what is true? Sheep follow the herd. Mindless clones follow the current flow. If Descartes spoke truth, it holds, and in this case, it holds true.

Well, because it's hard to rally people to fight against the other side when you acknowledge the mutual tradition between the two of you. When you've got people like Falwell preaching that "We believe in Jehovah and everything else is a lie," (Jehovah being a bastardized Latinate version of the Hebrew Tetragrammaton), you don't want to allow for the fact that there might just be some common ground there between Muslims and Christians.

People don't like killing people who agree with them. So you've got to find ways to motivate them.

Back on page 4 I replied with this:


Because Christianity accepts the Torah word for word and incorporates it into the bible, as the first five books. Christianity agrees with Judaism entirely. We simply believe the Jewish messiah is Yeshua, whereas those we call "Jews" today are descended from those Jews who over the years have not accepted this. The Jews who have so, became firstly the original church, and to this day, become part of the body of Christ to this day when they accept Yeshua as messiah.

The Qu'ran on the other hand makes "corrections" to theology found in the bible - both old and new testaments. It presents a different picture of the God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob.

In fact there you have it:

The Judeo-Christian Yahweh, is the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
The Islamic Allah, is the God of Abraham and Ishmael.

Look at that. I used the tetragrammaton. Correctly.
So why quote Falwell when a believer who emphasises the difference has already answered.

I have dated a Muslim girl and am well aware of the similarities between Muslims and Christians. I own a copy of the Qu'ran too. It'd be nice if you'd read and taken into account, A Christians direct response before making assumptions centred around Falwell.

Cheers :)

In any case greed and fear are the motivating forces of war. Just as they were in the crusades - self preservation and control of trade routes - as they are now - self preservation and control of oil routes.

Greed and fear.

Haloe, I'll answer your other post later (have to run to class), but wanted to ask if Moses wrote the Torah, by which I assume you mean the Pentateuch, does that include Deuteronomy 31-34, where Moses is dying or dead?

That would be Joshua's work I believe.

I think people need to consider that maybe God created everything by causing chemicals and other such things to react. Maybe he started the chain of events that eventually led to the evolution of humans? Prehaps he created the universe in such a way (elements, chemical reactions, evolution) knowing that it would give rise to the human race.

I myself beleive it is foolish for one to devote one self to any religion. After all, there is no concrete deffinet proof of anything. I like to keep an open mind. Try observing the world from a neutral stance, and do not let any preconceptions you have from scientific and religious beleifs interfere. You may get some interesting results. What might you think of the world if you were never exposed to the concepts of religion, a God, or even creation?

One final question to ask yourself. Do you beleive in your certain religion (including evolution ) because of how you were brought up or because of some other factor in your life? If you let things like that influence your beleifs then one could say they are really not your beleifs.

I could go on with what I mean, but I prefer to respond to a repley so this doesn't turn into a long winded essay.

QUOTE=Haloe]That wasn't the issue. You brought up love that's "in your face" so to speak.[/QUOTE]

Because you keep attempting to draw analogies between love that is in one's face and a love that is entirely interior. My girlfriend and I might have different experiences of love, but we can point to one another as the object of that love. You can't do so with God.


The bible is quite clear on the issue. I've read it again and again. Grace removes you from law. The law shows you a barometre of forgiveness under grace. Paul actually raises the question "should we willingly sin so we receive more grace". he answers 'no' we shouldn't, but not no it wouldn't happen. His addressing the issue shows how grace and God's love works.

You miss the point. Not everyone in the Bible agrees that Jesus spoke to more than just Jews, or that his arrival removes the need to obey the law. Christianity didn't just pop out wholly formed -- it took centuries to coalesce into an organized religion, with a set of beliefs (or sets of beliefs).

This, of course, raises the issue of how well Jesus fulfilled the Jews' messianic expectations. They were not expecting someone from Nazareth, that seems certain, given the efforts Luke goes to to get Joseph and Mary to Bethlehem for Jesus's birth. They were not expecting someone to preach forgiveness; they were expecting a military leader on the order of David. They were not expecting someone who was the literal scion of God, but someone who carried out his will and lived by his Law; David is referred to as the son or first-born of God at least twice (1 Ch 17:13 and Ps 89:26), and Israel is collectively described as the children of God many times (Ex 4:22, Dt 14:1, Ho 2:1). They were not expecting someone to come and break the Sabbath and make excuses for doing so. This would explain why Judaism has persevered after the arrival and disappearance of Jesus.

As for homosexuality/circumcision why bring that up? I know a fair number of Christian homosexuals, and numbers of uncircumcised christians. What country are you from? Are you certain they are not social problems of your nation?
;)

From the United States. And I too know a fair number of homosexual Christians, but only a few uncircumcised ones. But many people object to homosexuality on grounds that it God has condemned it as an abomination -- that is, for religious/theistic reasons. Living by the law (or the parts that have to do with our naughty bits) is a very important part of being Christian to them: Witness, for example, the turmoil caused within fundamentalist Christian communities over the Jim Bakker/Jimmy Swaggart indiscretions, or the recent attempt to introduce a constitutional amendment denying homosexuals the right to marry. You may not like to claim that part of Christianity -- I know I wouldn't (were I a Christian ;) ) -- but it has been a part of Western Christian life for centuries, if not millenia.


Actually I am divorced, and was/am very much a Christian. She was as well. Shit happens whether you're saved or unsaved. Thankfully God was with me during the pit and was more than able to endure my rage against him and keep loving me through the worst times.

I'm sorry that you have gone through that turmoil, and am glad you had your faith to help you get through it. But that doesn't change my disagreement with you that Christian faith provides people with better relationship skills.

First up, I've read Revelation. I actually used Revelation in my reasoning.

Secondly, the Roman Catholic Church added to this, the notion of purgatory.
Misinterpretation is not in alignment with Gods will I believe, but divergence of belief amongst believers IS. Paradox. The divergent beliefs are evidence of relationship. If all christians believed uniformly, it would be a cult. Told what to think.

I noticed that you used Revelation in your reasoning. But it doesn't change that your interpretation flies against millenia (or at least hundreds of years) of Christian thought. Dante had a very clear idea of Hell and eternal torment for sin in Inferno.

Basically we have free will. It is the reason for all the maladies of the world, but also all the love. Take your pick. Love requires free will. Love and pain, or numb and controlled.

This is another topic, but I don't believe in free will in the sense you do, either.

As for God needing to adhere to his own rules that's just bad theology. The law of Moses was a covenant. An agreement. The laws were given as the human part of the bargain. Gods side was to be our/the Israelites God.
Nowhere did it say God had to follow the rules he put down. It's like saying a painter must wear brown, because he painted all the people in his painting brown. God is outside the artwork.

I do believe God is "good" though. That he is perfect love. That he loves and wants the best for each person - which includes an interesting exploration of life. A "happy life" is impossible without knowing badness. You only know a thing if you know it's opposite. (Hunger/satisfaction, pain/relief, joy/despair, success/failure, love/fear, gain/loss, freedom/restriction etc) Otherwise it just "is".

Why did God allow specifically an interpretation of hell? Who knows. Annhialationism isn't foolproof either. It's the interpretation I choose to believe. I'm simply pointing out, you don;t have to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

No, bad theology is placing God as the origin and guarantor of morality, then excusing him from morality. God describes his commandments in moral terms -- things are abominations and thus to be avoided at all costs; not avoiding them, or breaking these laws, are frequently punishable by death. Humans cannot know these things on their own -- thus the curious Tree of Knowledge in the Garden of Eden -- and when they do gain knowledge of it, they can't handle it. So these precepts seem to come from God as standards of good and evil. Yet why are they standards? Because God says so. But then God violates them. Well, s/he's God. But if that's so, then they're not really moral precepts, but arbitrary orders given by God, and morality is not absolute, or at least standard. So why should humans obey them, particularly the ones about nudity, eating certain animals, etc?

Your argument also presumes that we need to know something to appreciate it. That is, one can live a fairly content life without knowing hell. I don't need to become a heroin addict to decide that my life is better off without having tried heroin. If I haven't starved, that doesn't change my appreciation of being satiated, though it might make be better appreciate the times I have been satiated. To say that we need one extreme to appreciate the other extreme supposes that all experience is extreme, which is not necessarily so.


The Greek pantheon consisted of Gods with human qualities. Zeus was born to Saturn for example. He had a mother and a father, and was just a "beefed up" human. Predating the Gods, the Greeks had personified elements of nature.

Personifying nature, and assigning humanlike personalities superhuman qualities doesn't equate the same thing as an eternal God, omnipresent, eternal, without beginning or end. The Greek gods were based on concepts found in this life. Yahweh is not.

So I guess your Bible does not describe God as being jealous, then, does it? And what is this nonsense about God being love, then? That's a humanlike quality, for sure. In Gn, God can be reasoned with (Abraham persuading God not to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah if even one decent person can be found there) and even overcome (Jacob outwrestles God, who has to resort to a cheap shot to break free). And Ex 4:24-26 makes God seem homicidal -- maybe. No one is really certain what is going on there. But, in any event, the Bible very much ascribes human personality to God.

Well there it is. True love cannot exist unless you first choose to love. Trust cannot exist unless you choose to give trust. Faith in God doesn't exist unless you choose to believe. You may see it as silly or illogical, but that's the way it works.

I would agree with this, but not with the elision at the end. Faith in God requires belief, yes -- and I have never doubted your faith. I have doubted that God exists. And your faith still does not stand as proof that s/he does.

I brought up time as an example of something that needs no necessity of origin, in answer to your presumption that God needed an origin. I do not believe he has a beginning. My faith in his being outside time is in fact a rudimentary and fundamental understanding of the nature of God.

I repeat. The only way we have a fair choice to reject him, is by needing to have faith. If proof of God was plainly obvious and faith unnecessary, then we would not have the freedom to reject him in a fair manner. The fact that we choose God, that faith is a mental attribute, is what gives it all value.

Your faith in God's eternality is a fact in that you have that faith. That is not the same thing as saying that God's eternality is a fact. Nor do I agree that God needs to be mysterious in order to fairly reject him. God could exist, and we all could agree on that, but we could reject him/her all the same -- in the sense of denying that s/he should have any hold on our lives because of creation. That would be the test of free will -- to deny God even after conclusive proof of his/her existence.

God speaks to me. Once you choose for him he does start impacting your life to the point that it becomes almost an impossibility to NOT see his hand everywhere, or hear his voice, or feel his guidance and/or love.

I can't quibble with you here; this is your description of your interior experience, which I have never sought to deny.

The contradictions, are I repeat, nonexistent. You have to take context and the full work into consideration. Plus the value of mutliple descriptions.

I do take into consideration the context of the full work. And the value of multiple descriptions. And the Bible is still full of multiple contradictions, some of which I have enumerated and which you have yet to adequately rebut. Simply declaiming that the contradictions aren't real doesn't demonstrate anything other than your pronouncement that they are not contradictions. In another post, you seem aware that the New Testament books and letters were written well after Jesus died, so you must know that they were written separately, and from different traditions. These traditions had different emphases which explains why the contradictions exist, but it doesn't explain them away. If you want to claim historical perfection for the Bible, then you need to explain why these evident contradictions are in fact not contradictions. Your attempt with the differences in demises for Judas didn't work, but if you have other explanations, then I await them. If you want to accept that the Bible cannot be 100% historically accurate and should not be considered as such, but that the contradictions are not important in a theological light, well, then we're in agreement.

Additionally, it's only one way God speaks. We have "logos" the written word, and "rhema" the spoken word. The two need to be in harmony. Otherwise you get nutjobs saying God told them to kill blacks or kill their kids despite the bibles clear contradictions to those courses of action. Similarly, you test the logos, the bible against the spoken word (which includes other believers for example) to check if your interpretation is offbeam.

And this explains the parts of the Bible which detail God telling the ancient Israelites to kill other peoples (Dt 2-3; Jo 6)?

Or you accept that he is bigger than human riddles and human understanding and can create a rock that another part of himself cannot lift. Like Jesus being unable to lift it. Intentional limitation within the artwork, yet he is at the same time existing outside the artwork.

This is kind of what I was getting at, except for the duality thing. In other words, it's not a meaningful task, because if he can do it, then he can't. The riddle doesn't ask "Can you create a rock so big some part of you can't lift it, but another part of you can," it asks God to create a rock greater than his totality.

I record music. My voice will get "captured" on CD, so that a listener hears me sing to them. That is me on the CD. It is no-one else. Yet, I am more than the CD. I can exist outside the CD simultaneously with me being on the CD.

Artwork is the key. Within the parametres of my art, my personality is limited. Outside I am beyond my artforms limitations.

Do you understand? We are in the artwork. Jesus was the manifested self limited presence of God here on earth - Immanuel as I call him, or his mother or anyone else who believes him to be "God with us" (in answer to one part of the post I haven't had time to respond to yet)

I understand. I don't agree, but I understand. And his mother named him Jesus when the prophecy clearly said his name was to be Immanuel.

God is outside the artwork, and so is free from time, space, morality, motion, sequencial thought, sequencial action... anything that defines physical life. Anything we can sense, taste, think. Any "law of the universe" can be broken by God, for he is outside that.

Including human comprehension.

It's almost like he could deliberately reveal seemingly impossible paradoxes about himself to show
a)Human understanding is limited
b)How incomprehensibly powerful God is.

If God is incomprehensible, why spend so much time trying to make me comprehend that s/ exists? What is the difference between God being incomprehensible and God not existing? If God can break any law of the universe, then he can will her/himself out of existence. If God is everything, then how do you define what God is not -- including lack? If God is then nothing as well as everything, well then what exactly are you describing? Falling back on incomprehensibility might work for you, but it doesn't for me, especially if you're trying to persuade me of God's existence.

Again, you've missed here, that I am pointing out the existence of something that doesn't need the same proof you are requiring. You are treating God as you would a person. Proof of existence demanded. Yet, the nature of the Goid I believe in, is that "GOD IS LOVE". Love itself cannot be proven, only felt. Same with God. Your girlfriend is irrelevent in the equation. I am speaking about LOVE, not her.

Right, except you want to elide the difference between love and God. To equate God and Love is to limit him/her, which you would most likely blanche at. So, loving God is an act separate from God's existence. If I don't believe God exists, I can't much love her/him, but you would not suggest that means God does not exist. God might inform your love, but that doesn't make God that love.

I am speaking about God healing people this year. I have been healed a couple of times in radical manner as a result of faith. I walked on an agonisingly sore torn hamstring recently with no pain, an instant... an instant after having a serious faith breakthrough. The hamstring got better. I've torn muscles many times before. That just doesn't happen. We're talking literally one or two steps to massive increases in healing. Three people were with me, and they couldn't believe it.

OK, you were healed. And your faith had a lot to do with it. Can I explain it? No. But that doesn't make your explanation true in any sense other than it feels true to you -- that is, it doesn't prove God exists.


Not at all. You can receive the benefits of something without being aware of it. I believe that the creator enables healing just as he enables life. I believe tha he answers prayers people are unaware they send. I believe he sees, and hears everything, and longs to see each of us simply start talking to him. And if we feel like an idiot, and yet press on and keep talking to him, that shows faith, which he then rewards.

You said God was proven by the recovery of people who believe in God. Logically speaking, one can just as easily say that God is not proven, or even disproven, by the recovery of those people who do not believe in God, such as me. I see your point: The belief in God is essential to your understanding of healing, because God makes it possible. Fine, that's a belief, but you haven't really provided any reason for me to move beyond recognizing that as your belief -- you haven't provided me a reason to agree that it is conclusive evidence of God's existence.

It would make it true for those that claim it to be so. You can't take the subject back, remove their faith and run the sequence again. ALl you have is their testimony, and their knowledge of their health and life before knowing God, or while ignoring God.

I would say, "All I have is their testimony and their knowledge of their health and life before they believed in God, or while they didn't believe in God." Neither is evidence of God's existence, though.

Cheers, and thanks for the compliment BTW. Kudos to you too. :)

I did mean to answer another post of yours, but it's late and I'm stuffed. More later.

Yorick.

You're welcome, and I look forward to your replies!

Mookie

The ideal situation for this world would be where people don't have to belong to any groups at all. This would in my view reduce conflict drastically as people do no have always try and assert that their view is "correct". I do not believe in god personally but I refuse to be called an Atheist as well, because once again it places me into a defined group ready to be judged by others.

Ultimately, humans will only ever be conflict free when all factors that may lead to discrimination are eliminated.

Nope. Same level of thought and consideration.

I suspect our mental paradigms are too far apart for a sustained discussion. But just so you don't think I'm ignoring your post ....

Simply not true. The nag Hammadi manuscripts (Coptic translations) are dated around the 4th century. Pauls letter to the Thessalonians was written crica 50AD for example. Here are more:

Gospel of Mark: +65-70 AD
Gospel of Matthew: +75 AD
Gospel of Luke: +80-90 AD
Gospel of John: +95-100 AD
James: +45-50 AD
Colossians: +60 AD
Corinthians: +57 AD
Ephesians: +65 AD
Hebrews: +60-90 AD
Epistles of John: +90 AD
Jude: +65-100 AD
Epistles of Peter: +64 AD
Philemon: +56 AD
Philippians: +57-62 AD
Romans: +57-58 AD
Galatians: +54-55 AD
Thessalonians: +50 AD
Timothy: +60-100 AD
Titus: +60-100 AD
Revelation: +81-96 AD

I wouldn't disagree with the early provenance of Paul's writings, but my references, both secular and Christian, have earliest physical documentation and linguistic styles of the Nag Hammadi texts as pre-dating the four New Testament gospels. We must have differing historical sources. The point is a moot one, since the New Testament doesn't claim to be contemporaneous with Jesus.

Not necessarily Satan per se, but an "evil" creator. I paraphrased to highlight the difference.
In any case, the point stands that Gnosticism is not Christianity by any stretch, so it's no suprise the works were ommitted.

Again, gnosticism is a broad church, not least because it embraces all churches. Not all gnostics see/saw the creater as evil. Most that did were using the statement as an analogy for the respective importance of the spirtual/transcendant over the physical.

And we agree in so far as more traditional Christians, usually agnostic in the technical sense (though not in common usage), define themselves apart from gnostics. Christian Gnostics would not.

It becomes self-referential on both sides. Gnostics see a commonality in all religions as a direct consequence of their spiritual viewpoint, whereas one of the major drivers behind the establishment of the 'definitive' canon of the New Testament was precisely to exclude gnostic varients around at the time. So the New Testament Gospels allowed a little bit of wiggle room on interpretation to accommodate differences between Hellenic and Judaic cultures, but very deliberately not enough to accomodate overt gnosticism. And so if you're a Christian 'of the book' (which you seem to be), you are constrained to exclude gnostics from Christianity. (I am not a gnostic BTW.)

Have another read of what I wrote. I'm not sure you understood what I was writing. I believe God to be omnipotent and omniscient. I was simply challenging the pantheists notion of an omnipotent creator. I am not the one limiting God. I am saying he has done the more remarkable feat - creating an eternal life awareness that is not him. The pantheist denys this creative accomplishment.

It's an analogy. Crude perhaps, but effectively conveys a comparison.
Under pantheism, all love is masturbation. Under monotheism, all love is sex.
An analogy nothing else. If you are in love under pantheism, you are simply loving yourself. If you love God, you love yourself. Under monotheism, the love that exists is between seperate beings - God, man, and other humans

What I was trying to say, perhaps badly, was that you were applying your own, human values to God. Not necessarily a bad thing per se. Just about everyone seems to do so. But irrelevant to a view of an unknowable deity unlimited by human conciousness.

Ghandi actually proves my point!

Ghandi actually followed Jesus teachings, especially on nonviolence. His life was arguably the closest you could get to a Jesus life, without having him inside of you. He rejected Christology, due in part to events in South Africa, but Jesus impact on his life was well stated and documented.

As for the Hindu Gurus, if you call taking a farmers life savings to perform a blessing, we have differing views on "social welfare". Compare Mother Theresa's tireless work in India.

Hmm, this is where I take more serious issue with you.

Yes, Ghandi was influenced by Christianity, but he most definately remained a Hindu. I remember a quote of his to the effect that the Bhagavad Gita's (sp?) teachings were the motivation for his life's work. Again, what may be happening here is pantheism's embracing of monotheistic religious in a way not reciprical by conventional monotheistic religions of the book.

Your last paragraph is unworthy of you. Asian temples and monasteries perform a community social work function very close to that traditionally offered by religious institutions (whether Temple, Mosque or Church) in Europe and North Africa.

The Greek religion was polythesitic, not pantheistic.

True in its more familiar, traditional forms. However, mature religions tend to either monotheistic or pantheistic forms, because they're intellectually sustainable. Consequently, around the time of Christ, there was a great cultural pressure around the region to find a resolution to the issue. Monotheism won, arguably because it has better survival characteristics at a time of rapid expansion and conflict between cultures. Hence, and because the early Church adopted a 'scorched earth' policy towards rival documents, little coherent survives of the pantheistic movement. But it would have been known at the time. That's one of the reasons Rome was so vehamently agin it!

I repeat, the worldview Jesus was speaking was monotheism. Jesus spoke about Yahweh (I AM). The rabbis, the common man, knew of one creator called Yahweh. Jesus called himself Yahweh when he said "before Abraham was I AM". There is nothing in the bible, nor in Jewish documents that prove any assertion that they had any awareness of pantheism.

Again, this is so according to the conventional version of the Bible. But it is a tainted historical source in this regard because its compilers deliberately excluded alternative viewpoints. (Which of course, doesn't make it necessarily wrong, simply a self-serving document.)

You can't apply modern morality or modern theology into a historical setting that doesn't have it. It's just bad science. You have to understand the context into which a person speaks.

No disagreement there. That's why I would never use the Bible as a definitive source of ethical guidance.

Your point being? So what if Descartes is "old fashioned" Who gives a toss? "I think therefore I am" is a timeless piece of wisdom that transcends "fashion" and the whims of popular cultures praise. Do you base your beliefs around what is "hip" or what is true? Sheep follow the herd. Mindless clones follow the current flow. If Descartes spoke truth, it holds, and in this case, it holds true.

My point wasn't a serious one. Descartes is good enough for me - I'm not religious enough for Berkely's opposition; just the same as I generally accept 1+1=2 (professionally obliged to, in fact, as a statistician. Work would get horribly confusing otherwise). I generally can't be doing with all the detailed caveats, though I am aware they're out there for both.

In the same spirit, are your clones and sheep different in kind, or simply in timing? Also, not sure which category you're placing me in. Either is good, just so long as I get a turn at the head of the flock or as the DNA donor.

All this talk of 'belief' in this, that, or the other makes me feel I should express my current views. At the moment I believe in nothing. That is I act as if certain things are so/exist, but do not believe that these things are, or are not, actually so. To put it another way, I evaluate ideas and tend to accept those which can explain as many phenomena as simply as possible, but that does not mean I absolutely hold them to be 'true'. For this reason I tend to favour impericism, as it provides the simplest and most coherent explanations.

As far as I can see, not only is the question of how the universe was created rather irrelevant, but it is not answered by religion any more than impericism. If 'God' created the universe, what created God? - One is left with a being of seemingly immense complexity being the first thing to have existed, which seems rather bizarre to me...

*snip*

No, you're just eloquently missing the point. It doesn't matter what they claim to be seeing or feeling. It's just the same, a completely subjective personal experience.

Surely you've not arguing since God belief is popular, we can differentiate between them.

Their personal experience is just as valid as yours and it's obviously they've been wrongly committed.

This appears to have deteriorated from a creation? debate into a debate on the various details of christianity. Now while that could go on forever, reading 6 pages of it makes me go O_O so i think I'll just state my views on the original debate and feel free to tell me if i don't make sense :P

First of all, I am a Creationist, so I believe that God (in my case, the Judeo/Christian God) created the universe and all living things. There are many things I do not understand in the world. For example, how can there be Dinosaur fossils dating back before the time of humans when the Bible says that God created Man first? I dont know. I just do not understand. I have no explanation, and I do not know who, or what, I believe. I guess you could say I believe God created Man first and that Dinosaurs or other pre-historic fossils exist also. I also do not know what I think of Evolution. In my mind, Evolution does not contradict Creation, but the Creation contradicts the other theories that propose life began from chemicals coming together, chemicals reacting, carbon semi life forms appearing, proto cells appearing, etc. I believe God created Man, but I neither believe nor disbelieve in Evolution. I think Creationism and Evolution can work together, and some type of Evolution may take place in the creatures that God created.


But the true reason I am a Creationist is that I cannot, will not, believe that life came from nothing. There must have been some higher power that created life, and the universe, from nothing. Nothing. I cannot believe the theory that life began when certain chemicals (carbon, nitrogen, etc.) came together, reacted, and somehow formed some type of proto-cell or life from. I cannot believe that.

I believe that God created Man and all the living and nonliving things in the universe, and my belief will not change.

This is a belief commonly held by people who refuse to believe that we don't matter. It's like... you know that machine in Hitchhikers Guide To the galaxy that lets you see the whole universe and yourself as a tiny insignificant part of it, and it makes you go mad? Well, refuting creationism is kind of like that.

People want to believe that we are important, that's the reason for the whole "god created man in his own image" thing - we want to think that we are the purpose for all this.

indirectly quoting another book, it is like a puddle thinking "wow, my hole fits me perfectly, it must have been made for the sole purpose of me being in it".

You don't want to believe that everything came from nothing, because that would mean we are a fluke, a coincidence, and an un-important one at that, which obviously goes against several basic self-preservation instincts, because you end up thinking it doesn't matter if you live or die. But even that is a product of evolution - if we didn't have delusions of importance, we wouldn't try so hard to survive, and would probably be extinct. :headbang:

Of course, if I believed in the creation theory it would actually be fairly simple to explain fossils - God would have created them as being billions of years old. That shouldn't be too hard for an all-powerful deity.

See, that's why I think its arrogant to say god created us in his own image. If he is everywhere, how could he be human-shaped? And if he is like a human, surely that means he has human faults, which kinda defeats the purpose?

For that matter, why would he create people with all the faults we have? Only evolution could do that - every single collective human psychological and physical screw-up can be traced back to a probable evolutionary turn we took at some point.

The thing about evolution is that it makes sense. Stuff that works happens more often than stuff that doesn't work (politicians excluded :P). Anything that, in happening, causes itself to happen again, happens a lot. Life evolved is the personification of that - life causes more life through reproduction. So it was bound to happen eventually. And the most adaptive evolutionary trait is intelligence, becuase it means things can adapt to immdiate changes in their environment, so something like us was also bound to happen eventually. (this is also a good argument for aliens :P)

Quite frankly, though, the main reason I don't believe in the judeo-christian version of God is that he is petty. That is it in a nutshell. Not only does he give people arbitrary definitions of good and bad to stick to, but he is petty about things in a way that clearly shows the influence of pantheistic/polytheistic religions - you know, the greek gods were always getting pissed and zapping people, etc. What kind of all-knowing, wise god would give a damn about whether people are gay, or have abortions, or a million little things, like looking back at a burning city, although I suppose that could just be a "obey me" thing - in which case it's even worse - he isnt petty, just a power maniac. Hey, absolute power corrupts absolutely, right?

if there is a God he wouldn't interfere in our lives. After all, if he's everywhere, then according to the laws of physics (which, despite attempts to prove otherwise, do in fact exist) he would have to be everything, so messing us around would be like us changing the shape of our kidney cells! (actually we might be able to do that soon. But the analogy still stands :P)

Wow, this post went waaaay longer than i meant it too. Feel free to argue with me.

All this talk of 'belief' in this, that, or the other makes me feel I should express my current views. At the moment I believe in nothing. That is I act as if certain things are so/exist, but do not believe that these things are, or are not, actually so. To put it another way, I evaluate ideas and tend to accept those which can explain as many phenomena as simply as possible, but that does not mean I absolutely hold them to be 'true'. For this reason I tend to favour impericism, as it provides the simplest and most coherent explanations.

As far as I can see, not only is the question of how the universe was created rather irrelevant, but it is not answered by religion any more than impericism. If 'God' created the universe, what created God? - One is left with a being of seemingly immense complexity being the first thing to have existed, which seems rather bizarre to me...

^ *agrees with all of the above*

It's true. You have to live life from certain working assumptions, eg physics works, nice people exist, etc.

Working assumptions are basically facts with footnotes. And the footnotes say something like "this may or may not be the case, but for all practical and relevant purposes, decisions can be made as if it really is the case."

Wow, this post went waaaay longer than i meant it too. Feel free to argue with me.
Sorry, no can do. Excellent post.

No, you're just eloquently missing the point. It doesn't matter what they claim to be seeing or feeling. It's just the same, a completely subjective personal experience.

Surely you've not arguing since God belief is popular, we can differentiate between them.

Their personal experience is just as valid as yours and it's obviously they've been wrongly committed.
What about them is "just the same"? Help me understand you, here. Perhaps I'm just missing the idea you are trying to put forth.

Popularity has nothing to do with it. It is my belief that health is a requirement to have this experience of god. Good health is in short supply in the modern world.

The people in asylums are not in good health.

I think you are confused about the 'validity' of a personal experience. It is subjectively experienced, therefore can be 'valid' to only one person, the one who experiences it. And to reiterate, it is not the fact that they had a personal experience that got them locked up.

Not to be trite, but I don't understand how it can be claimed that "completely subjective personal experiences" that happen to two different people could ever be "just the same". They are, after all, completely subjective personal experiences that happened to two different people.

The physical world is to me a manifestation of Gods love for me. Simply being alive and able to experience the myriad emotions on this rollercoaster is evidence. Life itself. I view each experience and each day as a gift of love from my God.
That is a very healthy attitude towards god and life. I commend you for it. It is very Buddhist, too: "We are also embodiments of God! To use religious terms, everything created by God is his manifestation. In Buddhist terms, everything in the universe is the manifestation of the Dharma-body, which is the mind and consciousness. Nothing exists outside the mind-consciousness... With a profound understanding of this principle, we reach the state of seeing our True Nature, which also means having no obstruction in understanding all phenomena of the universe. We then reach the state of not encountering any hindrances at all, as auspicious peace and harmony pervade the universe."
(Buddhist Educational Journal (http://www.amtb.org.sg/10/10_3/10_3_1/10_3_1_10/10_3_1_10_64.htm))

"Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind"

-Albert Einstien

"Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind"

-Albert Einstien
He can be wrong you know.

He can be wrong you know.
"It seems to me that the idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I cannot take seriously. I also cannot imagine some will or goal outside the human sphere...Science has been charged with undermining morality, but the charge is unjust. A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death."

he can be very, very right, too :).

"It seems to me that the idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I cannot take seriously. I also cannot imagine some will or goal outside the human sphere...Science has been charged with undermining morality, but the charge is unjust. A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death."

he can be very, very right, too :).
Indeed.

I'm not sure what most people think of the "anthropological concept" of a "personal" god, but by definition it is simply an extension of our perception of god, whatever that is that religious folk perceive (and yes, that could be entirely fantasy, though for me I'm sure it wasn't [this is faith]). Our mental constructs are not "real" in the sense of physically existing. Yet they are very real to us. I too cannot imagine god as a will or plan (that requires consciousness) "outside the human sphere," yet whether it was something that came from within me or without I could never say for sure. The people who externalize it, abstracting the mental construct outside of themselves, have an equally valid viewpoint, to me, as I, who interalizes it (abstracting it within me).

Someone in one of these posts said doubt is inherent in faith. I think that's the idea, of all these threads, that has given me the most cause to pause and ponder.

"Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind"

-Albert Einstien

Wonderful quote.

Hey fundie-fucktards.

How about looking up allegory in the dictionary.

"Creationists" are on all fours with faith healers. Enemies of science are invariably enemies of human progress. "Creationists" are also in the camp of the barbarian anti-stem cell research Taliban.

The lot of them are visigoths and vandals, which is to say they are beneath contempt.

The people in asylums are not in good health.

They are considered not be in good mental health. Why should I consider people whom have these mystic experiences to be any different?


Alternative names Return to top
TLE; Seizure - temporal lobe

Definition Return to top
This type of seizure involves a temporary change in movement, sensation, or autonomic function caused by abnormal electrical activity in the temporal lobe on either one or both sides of the brain.

Causes, incidence, and risk factors Return to top

Temporal lobe seizures originate in the temporal lobe(s) of the brain.A seizure is an episode of abnormal electrical activity in the brain that can involve loss of consciousness or reduction of consciousness and/or involuntary movements and overwhelming sensations.

Temporal lobe seizures can affect people of any age, and can occur as a single episode or can be repeated as part of a chronic condition (See seizure disorder - epilepsy).

Transmission of information from nerve cell to nerve cell occurs by an electrochemical process. This process can be detected as electrical activity by an electroencephalograph (EEG).

Certain patterns of electrical activity can cause seizures, which are episodes when electrical signals spread in abnormal patterns within the brain. Given sufficient circumstances (such as exposure to certain drugs, high fever, or electrical stimulation), anyone can have a seizure.

Specific causes of temporal lobe seizures most commonly include localized areas of damage in the temporal lobe of the brain. This may result in scarring called mesial temporal sclerosis.

Causes can include traumatic injury, infection, damage to a portion of the temporal lobe due to lack of oxygen (ischemia or infarction), brain tumors, genetic syndromes, and discrete lesions of any sort.

As the temporal lobe is involved in processing emotion and sensations, seizures in this area may begin with feelings of fear, feelings of joy (sometimes with religious associations and the sensation of a "presence"), recall of certain music, or smells and other unusual symptoms.

Symptoms Return to top
Aura (preliminary, warning symptoms):

* Abnormal sensations
* Epigastric sensations ("a funny feeling in my gut," "stomach rising," etc.)Hallucinations or illusions (vision, smells, tastes, or other sensory illusions)
* Sensation of deja vu or recalled emotion/memory
* Sudden, intense emotion not related to anything occurring at the time
* Consciousness maintained during the seizure or spell (partial)
* Consciousness reduced or lost during the seizure or spell (partial complex)

Motor/movement disturbances:

* Rhythmic muscle contraction/relaxation (clonic activity) -- rare
o Affecting one side of the body
o Affecting one arm, leg, part of face, or other isolated area

Other focal motor (movement) symptoms:

* Abnormal mouth behaviors
o Lip smacking
o Chewing or swallowing without cause
o Profuse salivation "slobbering"
* Abnormal head movements
o Forced turning of the head
o Forced turning of the eyes
o Usually in the direction opposite of the location of the lesion
* Abnormal movements
o Repetitive movements, such as picking at clothing (automatism)

Focal sensory (sensation) symptoms:

* Abnormal sensations
o Numbness, tingling, crawling sensation, etc.
o Occurring in only one part of the body or spreading
o Preceding motor symptoms
o Sensory hallucinations (visual, hearing, touch, etc.)

Autonomic symptoms:

* Abdominal pain or discomfort
* Nausea
* Sweating
* Flushed face
* Dilated pupils (eyes)
* Rapid heart rate/pulse

Other symptoms:

* Changes in vision, speech, thought, awareness, personality
* Loss of memory (amnesia) regarding events around the seizure (partial complex seizure)


Sound familiar?


I think you are confused about the 'validity' of a personal experience. It is subjectively experienced, therefore can be 'valid' to only one person, the one who experiences it.


It was a two-step argument.

The blue trolls coming to kill the man seem to only valid for him. That sort of terminology sets off the bullshit detector.


And to reiterate, it is not the fact that they had a personal experience that got them locked up.


What is or is not a mental disorder and thus, bad mental health is hardly a black and white issue. For example, homosexuality.


Not to be trite, but I don't understand how it can be claimed that "completely subjective personal experiences" that happen to two different people could ever be "just the same". They are, after all, completely subjective personal experiences that happened to two different people.

I just find it funy the things they claim to experience seem to be demographic as well as largely influenced by their own mind and their beliefs and exceptations.