Subscribe to ListverseYour View: Does God Exist?
- Published March 1, 2008 - 1,568 Comments
We have had many lists that deal with religious topics, and many of our readers have made some amazing intelligent comments. But we have not actually gotten down to the root of things – which is, does God truly exist, and if He does, is there proof for His existence? Remember, keep the comments friendly and use good arguments for your view.
Does God Exist and Can We Prove It Either Way?
My answer is that St Thomas Aquinas gave some very convincing arguments in support of the idea that reason can prove faith. I believe that a greater study of his works, with some of the more modern writers will help each person to draw the appropriate conclusions- but we should give equal time to both sides.
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March 1st, 2008 at 3:00 pm
Oh dear lord, this is going to get heated.
And yes.
March 1st, 2008 at 3:03 pm
This will be an interesting one.
And no, I lost my faith long ago.
March 1st, 2008 at 3:06 pm
3rd
March 1st, 2008 at 3:08 pm
Perhaps for some…
but not for me, I am not really a religious person.
March 1st, 2008 at 3:08 pm
No, can’t say I believe and I thinks it’s a stupid question, but, of course blind faith is proof enough when people are scared of change.
March 1st, 2008 at 3:09 pm
Yes and No.
Ok, that was cheap.
Whatever there is a god or not, I don’t think God(s) will discriminate. I.E. God of Hebrews, Greeks, a limited sector of the world that was fortunate enough to learn of a God’s name/teaching.
You see, I don’t believe in a God that would condemn another half of the world, when that half never even heard of the guy.
So, that’s why I don’t believe in Christianity, Hindu, Islam, Tao….
And dear god, there will be blood in this thread.
But anyway, whether there is a God or not, it should not affect how you threat your fellow human beings.
March 1st, 2008 at 3:10 pm
I don’t believe that God exists.
And Thomas Aquinas’ proofs aren’t very good and are outdated. Richard Dawkins pretty much destroyed them in The God Delusion.
March 1st, 2008 at 3:10 pm
TREAT, I meant TREAT
March 1st, 2008 at 3:18 pm
Yes.
I found faith more than ayear ago.
March 1st, 2008 at 3:18 pm
No, he is just made up in general consciousness to exist. It is an absurd question, really.
March 1st, 2008 at 3:21 pm
Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason, than that of blind-folded fear. – Thomas Jefferson
Atheists often suggest that theirs is the default position, that there is a presumption of atheism. This places the burden of proof on the theist; if the theist is unable to make a persuasive case for the existence of God, then the atheist is justified in his atheism. The case for the presumption of atheism may be made in two ways, one resulting in a presumption of weak atheism, and the other in a presumption of strong atheism.
Arguments for Atheism for much, much more on the various arguments. this is only ONE quote.
Welcome to Iron Chariots, the counter-apologetics wiki. excellent resource for the counter-apologetics including extensive material regarding the existence or non-existence of God
In other words, an apatheist is someone who considers the question of the existence of gods as neither meaningful nor relevant to his or her life; nor perhaps to human affairs. Wikipedia: Apatheism my current public stance
The Black Pages and yes, all this and more comes from an archive of such material i’ve been collecting for a while.
so the short answer is ..no God does not exist. and there have been far better arguments posed in the sources previously cited and more. personally, i don’t need all that but i understand some people do, hence the inclusion.
and yeah J, you did it this time.
March 1st, 2008 at 3:22 pm
I dont think that the ‘popular’ perception of god through numerous faiths exists i.e. a person or idol
March 1st, 2008 at 3:23 pm
Wow, you’ve really opened up the floodgates for this topic J…
March 1st, 2008 at 3:25 pm
I don’t believe in ‘god’ as such, in the sense of god being a big old white guy with a long grey beard, but I do believe in some sort of a higher power. Its hard to explain but this thing I believe in does not have any human characteistics. It is more like a fundamental force in physics – and just holds the world together.
I hope I’m making sense.
There is gonna be some heated debate with this list
March 1st, 2008 at 3:26 pm
i say if you believe he does, then he does. but anyone who says they know for certain is just a liar….no one, anywhere, ever could ever say with certainty one way or another. its all about your beliefs
March 1st, 2008 at 3:28 pm
to mrbizmark
How do you know his name then, smart arse?
March 1st, 2008 at 3:28 pm
I don’t believe there is “a god”, I do believe that there is some supreme being out there, because the universe is too perfect to have been created by a fortunate series of events (one of my friends dad’s thinks that he has a book with math equations that explains everything.) However, if there is a “God” so to speak, I do not believe he cares about us in any way whatsoever. He simply started the universe, then walked away. Our constant praying to “a god” is a waste of time.
March 1st, 2008 at 3:29 pm
Nice to see Cyn come out of hiding:) and no God does not exist. If he does may strike me de……………..
March 1st, 2008 at 3:32 pm
I will say I am noncommitted. Or maybe I should be committed. I am not whole heartedly sure there is a God, but not ruling out the possibility of a higher power. Okay yes the wimpy way out, but I do not have strong convictions either way. I do feel people who have a strong feeling either way are great. And I wonder where they get their unbendable belief. And even thougn I am on the fence I am not easily swayed either way.
March 1st, 2008 at 3:34 pm
Juggz…there’s a difference between hiding and lurking.
cuz i’m always here.
March 1st, 2008 at 3:34 pm
According to quantum mechanics, if you believe in the existence of God in some shape, force or form, then he/she/it exists, and in just the way you perceive. If you don’t, then this conversation is over and you save 10%. You save even more compared to Scientologists.
Perception equals reality and everyone wins.
(Except of course for those who dare oppose the Flying Spaghetti Monster).
Now that wasn’t so hard now, was it?
March 1st, 2008 at 3:35 pm
What I mean is that ‘God’ (or any higher power) is made up by humankind, we think that he exists, but we have no proof that he does or doesn’t, making it an absurd question.
March 1st, 2008 at 3:35 pm
I dont like to believe that theres an unknown third party interfering in my life, its unhealthy.
March 1st, 2008 at 3:36 pm
I believe that God doesn’t exist, and that man created Him in his own image to alleviate the horrifying feeling of insignificance and transience associated with his mortal life in this painfully colossus universe.
The main argument put forward in defence of God’s existence (aside from the completely absurd ontological argument) is the idea that the universe seems to be too perfect to have come about by chance, and thus there must be a designer behind it. But the apparent perfection of the universe can just as easily be explained by the theory of parallel universes (i.e. there are infinite universes running alongside eachother, with different events being played out in each, so that between them all, everything that can possibly happen does happen. In such a case there would inevitably be a universe in which the conditions are just right to engender and sustain the lives we are living right now.) One might posit that there must be a creator behind the ‘multiverse’ of universes, but if God himself doesn’t need to have a cause, why must the multiverse?
Nonetheless, even if I’m wrong and the cause of the perfection of the universe really is God, then I still don’t believe in Him, because any God that allows so much suffering to occur to his creations is not worth believing in, and I’ve done well enough so far without him anyhow. Perhaps a quote by Epicurus will clarify my position:
“Is God willing to end suffering but unable?
Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able but unwilling?
Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing?
Then whence comes suffering?
Is he neither willing nor able?
Then why call him God?”
For those who insist that the suffering is a test for us, please answer me these:
Why kill a newborn baby in order to test those around it? I’m not as omniscient as God is purported to be and I can think of many ways to test people without causng such suffering.
And if God can do anything, then why can’t he conceive of a universe in which suffering is not required in order to test his subjects?
And finally, if God is omniscient, why does he even need to test anything?
March 1st, 2008 at 3:38 pm
w00t for the Antichrist, you win this topic!
March 1st, 2008 at 3:41 pm
and what has he won Bob? why, a one way trip to Hell! *crowd cheers*
March 1st, 2008 at 3:44 pm
Well Im pretty open to the idea of a higher being.
However the idea of the lord or ‘God’ known by it’s many has its flaws and there are many negative thoughts on the topic, if anything more than postive thoughts
There are millions of possibilities of our existence and meaning of life and to say it is the workings of ‘God’ is a little too narrow-minded in my opinion.
March 1st, 2008 at 3:45 pm
I think this topic should be “Is there a higher being (or supernatural force) in the Universe?”
I think the idea of the Judeo-Christian ‘God’ is too narrow of a topic for conversation.
March 1st, 2008 at 3:49 pm
mrbizmark: I never said “judeo Christian” – God is a supernatural force – why must I use politically correct terms to describe Him? You knew what I meant.
March 1st, 2008 at 3:50 pm
Even if there was a God, would he be relevant? He would not be.
Omnipotence and omniscience (both of which are required in order to claim the title “Superior”) rule each other out (if you know everything and anything, you know in advance what what you are going to do, and you can’t change your mind), so a God cannot possibly have both qualities, and thus worshiping such a being seems a bit extravagant.
Furthermore, since there’s so much misery in the world today, as in the past, one would think he’d do something about that. However, it seems He’s more occupied with leaving an imprint of the face of Jebus in loafs of bread and uprooted trees in Kentucky. And given his omnipotence, wouldn’t it be easier to just knock over the tree to reveal such marvel than the much more tedious task of lining up tornadoes? In addition, it seems curious to me that this imprint is instantly recognized by people who have never seen Jebus before. Anyways, in considering His general disinterest in relieving misery, is it because:
-He wants to but he can’t (so He’s not omnipotent)
-He doesn’t want to (so He’s cruel)
-He’s simply not aware of it (so He’s not omniscient)
All in all, still not worthy of dedicating time to.
March 1st, 2008 at 3:53 pm
Antichrist,
you posted your argument as I was typing mine. It’s a good one.
March 1st, 2008 at 3:59 pm
hhmm..wonder where all the religionists are? so far looks like a buncha heathens.
March 1st, 2008 at 4:00 pm
Creosote: Thanks – I love playing Devil’s Advocate lol
March 1st, 2008 at 4:00 pm
*mini applause to Antichrist* Well said.
Does God exist? I’ll go with no. As far as a higher power of some sort, I’ll still say no. Although, like Richard Dawkins correctly noted, even a good scientist always leaves open the possibility for the alternative.
“All thinking men are atheists.”
-Ernest Hemingway
March 1st, 2008 at 4:01 pm
cyn: that was funny. i could hear the crowd-in-a-can cheer.
i’ll be different and get the pot stirred. yes, God exists. he proved it by the creation of the world. he proves it daily in the sustaining of the world. he proved it by appearing to his people many times over hundreds of years. he proved it on a much larger stage by taking the form of a human and walking the earth for approximately 33 years.
to answer the antichrist…(wow, that’s a scary thought) you leave out an option in your argument about evil…God is both able to end evil and powerful enough to do so but has reasons for not doing what you want him to that we do not understand. this isn’t so hard to see in your own life is it? did you want to get a flu shot when you were 2 years old? your parents were both able to end your “suffering” yet they choose to let you go through it for reasons that you could not understand.
there…that ought to get some people heated.
p.s. jayfray…you didn’t answer the question you pose.
jamie: does God exist?
jamie: st. thomas thought so.
come on in, the water’s fine
March 1st, 2008 at 4:03 pm
I don’t believe god exists and have been challenged to prove he doesn’t but I don’t need to prove he does not exist someone needs to prove that he does and no one has done so. The thing is to prove that god exists would be the most disastrous thing that could happen to all religions. Proof of god’s existance would mean that mankind would then have to question which god and what god’s true nature is and all religion would collapse.
March 1st, 2008 at 4:04 pm
rearden: I believe that Aquinas and Augustine were thinking men – they were neither atheists
DiscHuker: hehe
Smarty pants!
March 1st, 2008 at 4:06 pm
If you need proof if there is a God or not…find a baby or small child, look into their eyes and when they smile at you, then you’ll know. Oh, and God has a very good sense of humor, the platypus attests to that.
March 1st, 2008 at 4:07 pm
In addition, if God created everything, he also created knowledge, which means there was a point at which there was no knowledge available, even to God. Besides consider the immense difficulties of requiring knowledge out of scratch.
There’s also the issue that a God would have to know everything about what does NOT exist. But one cannot have knowledge of thing that do not exist.
March 1st, 2008 at 4:07 pm
Yes…no explanation needed
March 1st, 2008 at 4:07 pm
Other, wiser men than me have come up with proofs for the existence of God. If you ask me, I’ll tell you that God exists, no doubt. However, the only definitive way to prove his existence is to conduct a very scientific experiment.
Step 1: Wait for death.
Step 2: Observe data.
Step 3: Draw conclusion.
I hope I’m right about God, but if I’m wrong, and there is no God, dead me won’t care too much. I’d hate to assume there is not God and be wrong, though.
March 1st, 2008 at 4:08 pm
DiscHuker:
“God is both able to end evil and powerful enough to do so but has reasons for not doing what you want him to that we do not understand.”
It’s unfortunate that you think this way. If God existed and had just read what you’d written, he’d know that he could do absolutely anything to you and then justify it by saying that he did it for reasons you don’t understand.
And as for for the flu jab analogy, if my parents were as powerful as God is supposed to be, they wouldn’t have created the flu virus in the first place.
March 1st, 2008 at 4:10 pm
I don’t know if I’m a religionist, but I do believe there’s a God. Proving it is beside the point: it’s not faith if it requires proof. Creosote’s points are all legitimate, but the presumption that there’s only three answers to the question of suffering is inaccurate.
I don’t much care whether someone believes or not. More power to whoever wants to believe whatever they want to believe. That doesn’t make the question either stupid or foolish.
Nor does maintaining one belief make someone scared of change. Religion, like sexuality, is not the sum total or defining trait of a person. Better to look at the whole person before making judgments.
March 1st, 2008 at 4:17 pm
Yes, God exists, and I agree with what DiscHuker said.
March 1st, 2008 at 4:18 pm
i used to be very religious and i just got burnt out on church.
i really think god and all of his rules were meant to just scare people into following rules…
only if some people would just think about being moral…
“people don’t go to church because the believe in god, they believe in god because the go to church” -robbins, anthropologist
March 1st, 2008 at 4:20 pm
jfrater: Sorry. I just normally associate ‘God’ with the God of the Jewish and Christian texts.
March 1st, 2008 at 4:29 pm
It might be good for this discussion to point out that “proof” and “evidence” are two different things.
March 1st, 2008 at 4:32 pm
Book 1, Chapter 1, Stanza 1, “And God said “Let There Be Laws Of Nature” and there Were.” Now close the book you’re done. Now I have to go digging for my Essay on “God”. Thanks Jamie.
March 1st, 2008 at 4:33 pm
If god is omnipotent, could he create a stone so heavy that even he could not lift it?
March 1st, 2008 at 4:39 pm
sorry if this is poorly written, ive never been much of a writer
i think god and religion were invented to scare people into doing what someone else percieves as the right thing to do, not neccessarily because it is right, but because they fear the consequences of their actions. the same way laws are created by man to keep order, so was god, but with larger consequences for what is wrong. religions also serve as a way to explain why things are and how they came to be, as most faiths were created before any scientific explanation was available for natural phenomena.
at the same time i think that maybe there is a higher power, just not one that is all powerful.
i’m still not 100% sure on all of what i think yet, but i’m only a kid, so who says i have to have everything figured out.
March 1st, 2008 at 4:40 pm
visitorq: doesn’t that question completely undo the idea of omnipotence?
March 1st, 2008 at 4:43 pm
visitor q: A fine point. I wish he could. Maybe then we could all get together and throw it on top of him
March 1st, 2008 at 4:43 pm
mattchu: doesn’t that question completely undo the idea of omnipotence?
so then, if omnipotence doesn’t exist, god cannot exist.
March 1st, 2008 at 4:44 pm
Which one?
March 1st, 2008 at 4:51 pm
Wow, 51 comments in and so far, there are no death threats or ALL CAPS!
Typical story here: I grew up believing in (the Christian) god for 16 years. Then I started hating my parents for raising me on a religion that made me hate myself. So, I do not believe any kind of god(s) exists. I’ve accepted the fact that some day I’m going to die, so I don’t need to make up any stories to make death “sweeter”.
Here is a list of gods: http://www.rationalresponders.com/a_big_list_of_gods_but_nowhere_near_all_of_them
The reason why (for example) atheists don’t believe in the Christian god (or any other), is the same exact reason why (most) theists don’t believe in every single of of these gods.
So unless you believe in EVERY SINGLE GOD that people have worshiped, you are, in a way, an atheist to someone else’s god.
March 1st, 2008 at 4:53 pm
Fili: The Vice Of God Is Booming. NOT YELLING!
March 1st, 2008 at 4:56 pm
I believe in God, completely. However, i don’t believe in religion. Religion is something that ‘man’ made to make themselves powerful in the eyes of it’s people. The Catholics understood this back in the old days, they made it like they spoke to God on a regular basis and that the people were to do whatever the preacher says because God told him so. Whatever.
Jesus, I believe is the Son of God, but He never meant for Christianity to come out of his time here on Earth. He was actually against organized religion, really. Just wanted a relationship from us. But, that in my opinion is what the writers of the Bible said. From this statement, I don’t believe in the Bible. To me, it’s a great source of inspiration or stories, but not meant to be taken literally. I mean, “Jonah and the whale”? Based on some truth, sure, but you can’t have blind faith on that.
The Devil…just a boogeyman to keep us in check. Angels in Heaven…warriors for God. Storytelling. Simple.
So, my answer is, I believe in God as the creator of the universe and that He just wants us to live out life and He will do whatever he can to help us but “free will” states that he can’t get involve directly. But as in the “Bible” god, I don’t believe. I don’t believe in the ‘apocalypse” idea, but only that it will be brought on BY US AND NOT GOD HIMSELF. We’ll destroy ourselves.
Cheers, mates. Good subject.
March 1st, 2008 at 4:58 pm
Of course God exists … I spoke with Him this morning .
March 1st, 2008 at 5:01 pm
bwmyers, you spoke TO him this morning. There’s a bit of a difference there…
March 1st, 2008 at 5:03 pm
God is irrelavant.
if it (i am saying IT on purpose since i am not sure a being such as god would have a gender) does exist and he follows a certain religion, whichever one that is, then it is damning a lot of people to hell, or whatever the punishment is, without being fair about it. at one point in time every person on earth followed religions and traditions which did not exist today, or are seen as silly and archaic. i guess religion changes and there is no proof that any single religion could be right just as there is no proof that any single god could exist. religion to me always seemed a whole lot less likely than God ever did.
if it does exist and follows no religion then i am just as safe in not believing in its existance because without religion there is no hell and no need to fear or worship God, since i doubt it cares about prayer or any of that nonsense.
If he does not exist then the universe would a far more beautiful place because of the fact that it was not just conjured up, but built and meticulously created into its current form.
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. -Carl Sagan
March 1st, 2008 at 5:08 pm
thedeafguy: Yeah. What you said.
It’s a much more complex question than it seems on its surface, since belief and nonbelief have more levels than the black-and-white question. Most of us (myself included) are expounding on our “yes and no” answers.
March 1st, 2008 at 5:13 pm
I could go on and on about how Dogma was a good movie with great Ideas, But I won’t. So here is sample of what I Believe:
Big Bang Theory and the First: The Big Bang is commonly believed to be, By scientists, the Creation. A great explosion from a “Singularity” causing all manner of matter to spread throughout the expanse that we now know of as Our Universe. Theoretically, these Singularities can be found in black holes scattered throughout space. If we are to assume that, then it is reasonable, to think that our Current Universe came from a Singularity located in Another Universe. By simple train of thought we can come to the current, science has taken us only so far, conclusion that the same could be said about the “Other” Universe. This cycle may be a neverending circle Or Maybe what we should look for Instead of God is the First Universe. How did It come to be? Was it Actually God? Is it something that will Never be understood?
Why waste so much effort, so much hate, for simple questions. Didn’t God, in all of his wisdom, instill in us a sense of curiosity? Growth Spiritually in my mind is answering questions whether they are your own or not. Is it more of a sin to ask questions or to remain ignorant of each other?
March 1st, 2008 at 5:19 pm
I love how the “AntiChrist,” (a very cunning and mysterious alias) wrote a very simple-minded, weak argument towards atheism and then buttered it up with a bunch of arbitrary vocabulary.
AntiChrist, Get out. Your argument sucks.
First of all, everyone here keeps trying to disprove the notion that God is completely just, and would fix all the problems in the world. This is only some of the views held by popular religions such as Christianity, aside from those religions, there are many religions that believe in a higher power that is not completely just, which is not unfathomable.
Now, to try to debunk this garbage:
>The main argument put forward in defence of God’s existence >(aside from the completely absurd ontological argument) is >the idea that the universe seems to be too perfect to have >come about by chance, and thus there must be a designer >behind it.
… that’s not at all the main argument. I’ve never heard this referred to as the “main” argument. Do you enjoy making stuff up?
>But the apparent perfection of the universe can just as >easily be explained by the theory of parallel universes (i.e. >there are infinite universes running alongside eachother, >with different events being played out in each, so that >between them all, everything that can possibly happen does >happen.
actually that doesn’t explain anything at all, that’s just a random theory out there on the the universe. And even if that is true, who created these “infinite parallel universes?”
The rest of what you typed is utter garbage and I don’t even feel like going into it. Your question, “Why does God need to test us,” from the Catholic point of view would be answered with: God isn’t TESTING us per se, but he gives us free will which allows for US to allow suffering to happen.
I’m assuming you’ve had an angst filled child-hood.
March 1st, 2008 at 5:20 pm
Avi: for once you and I agree.
March 1st, 2008 at 5:23 pm
It seems to me that this debate can’t really go anywhere. The simple reason is that we are pitting people who use reason against those who don’t.
All those who don’t believe in God do so through reason.
All those who believe in God don’t, because one cannot have a faith based on reason (for then it isn’t faith, but conjecture).
Us atheists could provide all the rational arguments in the world, and it wouldn’t convince you hardened religionists of a single thing, because your faith makes you as intransigent as the chairs you sit in right now.
All that our two individual parties can do is laugh at the other for being wrong. But for us athiests, we can at least rejoice in the fact that we bow down to no greater being, and live how WE want, free and fearless.
And if we atheists go to Hell for it, then at least we’ll be in each other’s distinguished company, all happy in the knowledge that we lived and died without fear
March 1st, 2008 at 5:25 pm
This is from what I read in the God Delusion, by Dawkins.
1. God is all-knowing.
2. God is all-powerful.
Conclusion: God is a paradox.
Reasoning: If God is all-knowing, he can look into the future. If God is all-powerfull, he can change the future.
Paradox: God knows he is going to change the future.
So no, I don’t think God exists.
March 1st, 2008 at 5:26 pm
Well i choose to believe that there is a god but Atheists have a MUCH, MUCH better argument and…secretly…I tend to agree with all of it.
Answer: NO
March 1st, 2008 at 5:28 pm
I don’t think so, but there are many “God”s and certain people think certain “God”s exist, me not being one of them.
Also, if someone says, “Jeasus” you say “WHERE?!” and it make’s it funny lol
March 1st, 2008 at 5:29 pm
InfiniteJorge:
Thanks for all the insults. Now, why don’t you actually try to put forward an argument?
March 1st, 2008 at 5:29 pm
RELIGION IS A LIE!!!!!
RELIGION RIPS THE WORLD APART!
DOWN WITH RELIGION FOR IT HAS KILLED INNOCENT CHILDREN!
REMEMBER JONESTOWN! THE CRUSADES! RELIGION IS THE SOURCE OF ALL EVIL AND IT SHOULD BE DESTROYED NOW!
March 1st, 2008 at 5:29 pm
I’m gonna try it out
Jesus!
March 1st, 2008 at 5:31 pm
I do not beleive in god, and i nev er have even as a child. Its good for some people it comforts them, i wish I could have the comfort but i think rationally. St. Thomas Aquinas i do not feel is outdated (however said so above) because if you actually read what the man has to say, he has the best argument for the existence of god I have ever read, the Five Arguments http://members.aol.com/plweiss1/aquinas.htm is the link, its a little shorter then the actual text but you get teh jist. But remember I do not beleive in god, but he gives a pretty damn good argument (he actually thinks rationally!) anyway god was written by people, so why should i beleive some asshole who wrote about how i should follow whatever god says 2000 some odd years ago? religion is an opiate, it is a power tool (hmm constantine and christianity anybody????) and both and ill and cure for society. dont bitch cause someone wants to beleive, i wish i could i beleive and be happy that there was some after-life, but i beleive in eternal nothingness, and i mope around depressed because of it. yay for rationallity!
March 1st, 2008 at 5:33 pm
Yes I do. I’ve seen enough in life to prove to me that there is a God. Not the god that stones disobeying women in The Old Testament, or the god that makes extremist Muslims kill others, or the god that makes the Westboro Baptist Church hate gays. It’s the God that gave us life and freedom and loves equally, the one that some (NOT ALL) atheists ignore, focusing on the gay haters and the old testaments and the extremists.
I see my favorite kind of dog, listen to music, and look at the sunset and see what God has given me, and thank him for it, rather than judging what humans have written and condemning them for human mistakes.
March 1st, 2008 at 5:34 pm
I believe that a substantial number of people on this planet who say they believe in god are just afraid to not believe in god. After all, the idea of eternal non-existence after death is a very difficult concept to wrap your mind around. Furthermore, a superior entity would not create a master plan where physical and mental suffering are so prevalent.
Lastly, who created this superior entity?
March 1st, 2008 at 5:34 pm
you believe what you believe
we all know the truth sooner or later
March 1st, 2008 at 5:36 pm
I also don’t think of it as Atheists have reason while Christians don’t. I think we both have reason, but the atheists don’t have faith. Many of us Christians believe in evolution, but that doesn’t mean we can’t have faith in God.
March 1st, 2008 at 5:38 pm
god doesnt exist, its honestly that simple, there is no proof for him, and it disproves himself and if we were to say the god fo the bible existed, would you really want to worship someone who basically tells you to go out and kill everyone who isnt worshipping him, but only thou shalt not kill applies to worshippers of him?, but the arguement isnt his properness and yes i made up a word, but rather his existence, so unto that i attest, isnt god just using the occums razor philosophy unto life and complicated things?, the inability to accept some things as just are, or as products of our own, or the faults of others?, yes it may seem more complicated, but it is true, i am an atheist, and i have yet to see proof of god, oddly enough proof of ghosts(had the injuries to prove it), but none of which will attest to the existence of god, there is no ultimate controller to everything, there is no creator god, it just kind of is, so deal with it.
March 1st, 2008 at 5:39 pm
Not to stray away from the original question, but for those interested in the evolutionary origins of religion, I highly recommend “Religion Explained” by Pascal Boyer
March 1st, 2008 at 5:41 pm
by the way the proof was claw marks in my back, and as a taxidermist, who deals with pelts that were wrecked by animals, i know the difference between claws and anything else, and it was on my shoulder, and i know what youre thinking but there were no trees by, and no i didnt randomly get itchy and forget about it, i dont have claws sorry:P
March 1st, 2008 at 5:43 pm
JC are you the JC from coast to coast? where have you been?
I would agree with Antichrist, but I still believe theirs a ‘thing’. I say ‘thing’ because I like to believe ‘god’ is just us, humans, putting a name on a unknowable force. Some just like to profit from this, ie religion.
March 1st, 2008 at 5:46 pm
69. The Antichrist:
I don’t need to. All I have to do is forward you to the HUNDREDS of thousands of texts written, by people who aren’t angsty emo losers who turn to atheism. Try putting down your bullet-proof copy of the god-delusion for 2 seconds and actually being open-minded.
March 1st, 2008 at 5:48 pm
Maybe he does. Who’s to say? Maybe Tom Cruise isn’t real…have YOU ever met him? Have you ever met god?
-Andrea Carlena Beauman
March 1st, 2008 at 5:50 pm
If Tom Cruise is that much of a dill-hole, what does that make God?
March 1st, 2008 at 5:50 pm
InfiniteJorge:
If you’d actually bothered to read my original post, instead of merely insulting my opinions like a little child, you’d have seen that it pre-emptively rebutts any of the propositions you made in your attack on me.
For example, you wrote on my presenting of an alternative theory to the apparent design of the universe:
“actually that doesn’t explain anything at all, that’s just a random theory out there on the the universe. And even if that is true, who created these “infinite parallel universes?”
But in my original comment I’d already written the following rebuttal:
“One might posit that there must be a creator behind the ‘multiverse’ of universes, but if God himself doesn’t need to have a cause, why must the multiverse?”
Please read people’s comments properly before presenting your counter-arguments, and don’t use the safety and anonymity of the Internet to hurl insults about people’s childhoods as it only serves to make you look like an idiot, which I’m sure you’re not.
March 1st, 2008 at 5:51 pm
Maybe we should turn to the media to see if god is real!
March 1st, 2008 at 5:51 pm
InfiniteJorge: Please think before you comment. Your response says more about you than it does about atheism.
March 1st, 2008 at 5:52 pm
Nope.
If there was some sort of all powerful, being could wave his hand and create life, and can do anything, why is there disease, war, death, genocide, racism, sexism, all that.
Wtf kind of loving ‘God’ would put his ‘children’ in these kinds of terrible situations?!
March 1st, 2008 at 5:52 pm
I think the answer is unknowable, but I tend towards atheism.
@Bogle McNeep: I use that one, myself. A quote from “The Young Ones”, if I recall correctly. Whether God exists or not, He’s certainly had a powerful effect on humanity.
@The Antichrist: I find it interesting that any attempt to prove or disprove the existence of God almost immediately hinges itself on God’s nature.
Maybe He’s really clever and knowledgeable, but not omniscient. Maybe He’s extremely benevolent, but fallible – we are, it’s claimed, created in His image, after all. Maybe He is so powerful that He can create universes, or maybe only powerful enough to destroy those others that run in parallel.
Any misunderstanding can be explained by positing that, rather than being supernatural, he exists within the natural universe, but is outside our ability to perceive or describe Him adequately. Perhaps the faith that some people claim to have, is actually exactly that ability. Or maybe it’s the lack of it that causes us to conclude that He is omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent, and present throughout eternity. Possibly it’s merely the result of people playing “My God’s bigger than your God.
Also, even if God is all the “omnis” above, He still has choice, and perhaps we can’t understand on what He based those decisions, or what the true outcome of them may be: “He works in mysterious ways, His wonders to perform.”
Oh, and maybe He’s a She, and she lives with a group of similar beings on a mountain in Greece.
Dear God – XTC from “Skylarking (1986)
Lyrics by: Andy Partridge
Dear God,
Hope you got the letter,
And I pray you can make it better down here.
I don’t mean a big reduction in the price of beer,
But all the people that you made in your image,
See them starving on their feet,
cause they don’t get enough to eat …
From God.
I can’t believe in you.
Dear God,
Sorry to disturb you,
But I feel that I should be heard loud and clear.
We all need a big reduction in amount of tears,
And all the people that you made in your image,
See them fighting in the street,
cause they cant make opinions meet …
About God,
I cant believe in you.
Did you make disease, and the diamond blue?
Did you make mankind after we made you?
And the devil too!
Dear God,
Don’t know if you noticed,
But your name is on a lot of quotes in this book.
Us crazy humans wrote it, you should take a look,
And all the people that you made in your image,
Still believing that junk is true.
Well I know it ain’t and so do you …
Dear God,
I can’t believe in …
I don’t believe in …
I won’t believe in heaven and hell.
No saints, no sinners,
No devil as well.
No pearly gates, no thorny crown.
You’re always letting us humans down.
The wars you bring, the babes you drown.
Those lost at sea and never found,
And it’s the same the whole world round.
The hurt I see helps to compound,
That the Father, Son and Holy Ghost,
Is just somebody’s unholy hoax,
And if you’re up there you’ll perceive,
That my hearts here upon my sleeve.
If theres one thing I don’t believe in…
It’s you,
Dear God.
March 1st, 2008 at 5:54 pm
Scar.. I believe the answer is that God Hates Us All – slayer
March 1st, 2008 at 5:58 pm
I believe God exists and i don’t think the concept of God follows the same logic that we do. it’s probably something as confusing as dreams (like you dream of your friend john, and there are two johns in the dream, you know they’re different because you’re talking to one john about the other john, yet you also know they’re the same person…)
we cannot reduce the concept of God to simple mathematical logic that we know, because His intelligence would be far greater than ours. We would be like debating children, and God is like an adult who merely laughs at our ridiculous logic. Simply because we are thinking that we are correct, and are using the appropriate logic, and yet adults know better!
i believe that God is omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent. and anna, i too am confused about that paradox, about God knowing the future, etc. But then i don’t think God follows our concept of time at all!
Yes, I believe in God, but I am not religious. I believe there is a higher power, something that exists with an intelligence which is far greater than ours, or probably like an infinite intelligence.
I would not claim to know God or to understand God, though, because that is like putting the whole universe into one brain.
March 1st, 2008 at 5:58 pm
mine22, Apparently to alot of people I’ve talked to that believe in God that he love’s everyone, therefore does not hate.
Therefore God does not exist or he wouldn’t put us in horrid situations involving disease, death, war etc..
March 1st, 2008 at 5:58 pm
I know I know I don’t add much to the theory of the existents of god, however no one is right and no one is wrong. How are we going to prove or disprove that? Impossible.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:01 pm
I do believe that there is a God. It is said that the universe is God’s creation and I don’t think that organisms could have just developed on Earth after some “Big Bang.” But what bewilders me is from where did God come? How was “The Creator” created? I think that I have far too little intelligence to comprehend such things. It makes my head hurt. As does trying to think of where the universe ends or when time began. Does anyone else feel the same?
March 1st, 2008 at 6:02 pm
Nope!
March 1st, 2008 at 6:02 pm
Audience: “Hey Dr. Frank! how does it feel to have Gods finger in your ass?
Dr. Frankenfurter: “Devine!”
Live performance of the Rocky Horror Picture Show, Audience participation lines.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:03 pm
Scar..: Wtf kind of loving ‘God’ would put his ‘children’ in these kinds of terrible situations?!
God is a sadist. God enjoys watching people suffer. Every time someone dies, god has an orgasm… no I’m just kidding, I don’t want to go to hell
March 1st, 2008 at 6:04 pm
HollyTamale: Bingo!, more or less. Comment 62
March 1st, 2008 at 6:04 pm
Ya the paradox takes a while to wrap your brain around. And some people might not think it’s a paradox. Anyway, I can try to explain it, but it might not make sense
So God can change the future because he can look into the future. But that means that he knows that he is going to change the future.
So it becomes a loop. He knows he’s going to change the future, but so he can change the future again, but then he already knew that. It keeps on going.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:06 pm
it does anna, but the God we are talking about is far more intelligent that us, who has better logic. liek i said, we can’t put the whole universe in our brain.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:07 pm
maybe it would help us all if we define “God”. What is God?!?!?
March 1st, 2008 at 6:09 pm
Twinkle: Right, but from my point of view (I’m an atheist, which you probably already knew), the only person/phenomenon with superious logic than man is Mr. Spock, and he’s fictional.
I do understand where you’re coming from though.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:10 pm
http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=26542&start=120
recursive!.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:15 pm
http://www.ebaumsworld.com/video/watch/3923/ ….. http://www.ebaumsworld.com/video/watch/17547/ ….. This is funny, watch them in order. The proof is in the Bananas!!!
March 1st, 2008 at 6:17 pm
I got it Anna, we all have to suffer because god is stuck in a never ending dimension of time because he tried to change time, and he cant help us now. He doesn’t hate us hes just stuck, because hes a dumb ass, and we are in his image. go figure.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:20 pm
It’s been interesting to read the responses and have the overwhelming trend be one of atheism or agnosticism. It’s also interesting that the majority of the conversation centers around a few subjects: reason vs. faith; the existence of evil and suffering in the world; and God as creator vs. the universe simply coming into being.
There have been plenty of articulate and intelligent people over the past few hundred years that have given eloquent reasons for faith, so I won’t go much further than to say: yes, I do believe that God exists; I am absolutely convinced that He is loving and relevant and active in our world; and I cannot scientifically or objectively give absolute proof for His existence. I suppose that makes me a minority in the conversation…but that’s why we’re having a dialogue.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:21 pm
To 71: WHERE?
March 1st, 2008 at 6:22 pm
Not even a little.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:26 pm
So much for the aliens, ay Jamie?
March 1st, 2008 at 6:26 pm
Crimanon: Thanks for the links, that was hilarious. I always knew bananas were special.
mine22: Haha. Very nice reasoning. You know, I’m not saying God is stupid, just so everyone knows.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:27 pm
As long as I don’t think about it too hard, I believe there is some sort of God. When I try to work out what kind of God that would be, and think about it logically, I just convince myself there isn’t one. I figure I’ll let my ideas about God develop organically, but I wouldn’t rule out the idea of my becoming religious if I was faced with the death of a loved one or something along those lines. I’ve seen atheist friends of mine turn to God in hard times, and I’ve seen religious friends turn away from God.
People believe or don’t believe, but that is pretty fluid. I don’t think I could argue one way or another. I could use logic, but the idea of God isn’t a particularly logical one. If God does exist, “what” or “who” he is, or what he is made of, or how he functions would be well beyond human understanding, so why try?
I’ve officially added nothing to this discussion but “why bother,” haha. i suck.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:32 pm
I’d rather live believing there is a God and come to find out there isn’t one when i die, then to live thinking there isn’t one and come to find out there is one when i die
March 1st, 2008 at 6:35 pm
bluecheese: I think that what you’re describing is Pascal’s Wager and it’s wrong logic IMO.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:35 pm
Nella: That’s a very American stance to have on the matter. Hypothetically, praying while in a large group could also be nothing more than the Mind over Matter/collective thought helping a loved one. Since Science has yet to understand completely how the mind works, it’s feasible.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:38 pm
Anna: I like how they represented God as a Native!
March 1st, 2008 at 6:41 pm
God? Total blasphemy.
And hes also out to collect all your money
March 1st, 2008 at 6:42 pm
In short what I really believe is that god is life therefore we are all still in his image and all that jazz. Makes sense to me and thats all that counts, to me.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:43 pm
Crimanon: Ya that was great! And I love how they described it as “The Atheist’s Nightmare”. I hope I can sleep tonight.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:45 pm
Mine22: To the point and in my mind all that ever really needs to be said…. Just so long as you aren’t forcing it on people. Faith has it’s advantages and has made the weakest Strong.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:46 pm
Another reason I don’t believe in ‘God’ is because- Why some all knowing being create a world and offer rewards for believing him, and punish those who don’t eternally?
It would be so unfair to those in remote country that will never hear about this ‘God’, they would be unfairly punished simply by lack of knowledge, or sources to provide them this knowledge.
What kind of ‘God’ who loves his children, all of them, even if they don’t believe in them, punish them eternally in, as the bible would describe, hell, a burning, miserable place where you live in eternal suffering.
So ‘God’ who loves all his little ‘children’, and does not hate anyone would send people to this place?
Also-
From reading the bible, I read that God created in the garden of eden a tree, that people weren’t supposed to eat from. They did, so the whole world became sinful, and women got cursed with child bearing. Lovely. Why would God put such tree in the acsess of humans in the first place?
March 1st, 2008 at 6:46 pm
Crimanon – Exactly
March 1st, 2008 at 6:46 pm
Atheist: “Oh, my God, quick Hit me with that Bible… Ow… Again… Much better.”
March 1st, 2008 at 6:48 pm
Sorry for all the spelling errors I have trouble typing on my laptop.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:48 pm
Scar – think of it as a story to tell little children, to tell them something you yourself cant explain, something like the birds and the bees.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:49 pm
Scar: It was a test of Man and faith. Clearly Man failed. Why does everybody reference the Old Testament? Even the Vatican considers it “Out dated”.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:49 pm
no ones reading mine
March 1st, 2008 at 6:50 pm
Mine22: they should make a Birds and the bees puzzle… Insert Tab A into Slot B.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:51 pm
No because their are to many contradictions in the bible, far too many fallacies.
Also, if you are truly educated, and would like to think scientifically upon this matter, than you should KNOW that their is no such thing as a God or God.
However, if you have FAITH, then no argument can overcome that personal belief.
Scientifically, like i said, though, it cannot and does not exist.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:52 pm
Crimanon- Why would this ‘God’ create a perfect world in his image, and put a test like this? Does this mean that he wanted to see mankind suffer?
March 1st, 2008 at 6:52 pm
I still don’t get that story, shouldn’t it be the bees and the flowers?
March 1st, 2008 at 6:55 pm
I think people aren’t ready to accept the fact that they don’t know. We can’t possibly know why we’re here and how we got here. People are looking for answers and the “god answer” seems to be easy to swallow. I say we should all accept the fact that we don’t know, stop arguing about things like God and start trying to fix this mess of a world we’re in right now. Obviously this is way too much to ask.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:55 pm
Test of faith young padiwon. Or he wanted to see how bad he Really screwed up, I’m sure that in even Eve there were Toxic plants. Better to kick them out before they did something Really stupid.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:56 pm
after reading a few comments, i noticed that some people used the “problem of suffering” defense to prove that God is non-existent, practically saying no respectable God would allow people to suffer as they do, as a moral assessment one must say that if this world is designed, it is the work of a bumbler or a sadist.
let’s suppose, contrary to the fact, that this world were a paradise from which all possibility of pain and suffering were excluded. the consequences would be very far-reaching. for example no one could ever injure anyone else, the bank safe, robbed of a million dollars, would miraculously become filled with another million dollars; fraud, deceit, conspiracy and treason would somehow leave the fabric of society undamaged. again, no one would be injured by accident: the mountain climber, steeple-jack, or playing child falling from a height would float unharmed to the ground; the reckless driver would never meet with disaster. no dangers at all.
to make possible this continual series of “insanity”, nature would have to work by “special providences” instead of running according to general laws which men must learn to respect on penalty of pain and death. the laws of nature would have to be flexible: sometimes gravity would operate, sometimes not; sometimes an object would be hard and solid, sometimes soft. there could be no sciences ’cause there aint no enduring world structure to investigate.
in eliminating the problems and hardships of an objective environment, with its own laws, life would become like a freaking dream in which, delightfully but aimlessly, we would float and drift at ease. such a world, however well it might promote pleasure, would be very ill adapted for the development of the moral qualities of human personality. in relation to this purpose it would be the worst of all possible worlds, ya dig!
can i get an amen? haha!
March 1st, 2008 at 6:57 pm
Eden, sorry, getting my drink on. And my mind is still on the birds and the…. Bees and the Trees, Ha, I make a funny.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:59 pm
Victoria – An uneducated man, like me, or an intoxicated one, like me, would say that God didn’t write the bible it was man interpreting what god was telling him. my personal option about the bible it was an edited version of an old guy eating mushrooms out in the desert, therefore it was jim Morrison’s book edited by the pope. I should stop now.
March 1st, 2008 at 7:00 pm
Matt: Nothing to strive for then, correct? Stagnation of the mind and the insanity that ensues.
March 1st, 2008 at 7:01 pm
Mine22: AAAAHHHHHh, that was awesome!
March 1st, 2008 at 7:07 pm
Yes, I believe god does exist.
March 1st, 2008 at 7:15 pm
Nope, science completely disproves any idea of there being a god.
March 1st, 2008 at 7:17 pm
Bizzoony: Care to contribute your thoughts?
March 1st, 2008 at 7:20 pm
1) god – as defined as a super-being that somehow cares about what you might think about in a pointy-topped building (prayer in church) is a silly concept.
2) god – as a higher being is plausable. I was plenty high thoughout the 1970’s and very possibily saw god.
3) god – as an excuse to behead, blow up, and otherwise hurt fellow humans? That god exists for sure.
So Jamie, In answer to your question – I suppose it depends on the definition…
March 1st, 2008 at 7:22 pm
Bizzoony: Science hasn’t figured out Humans, How would they disprove god?
March 1st, 2008 at 7:24 pm
i spent 5 years as a park ranger. that job entailed me walking about 4 hours a day through the woods. i have been out in all seasons, all weather, and everything between. spend spring in the woods, and you will be convinced that yes, god does exist. there’s no other way i can rationally explain it. i am a scientist by nature and have struggled with the idea that there is really no rational reasoning behind god. a higher power does not make rational sense. but see the flowers. see the growth where there was dormancy all winter. hear the birds and smell the growth. whatever you call it, god is real.
March 1st, 2008 at 7:38 pm
I love that word ” exist” in the question title. Do we, as humans, have to question existance in order to come to god?no.I dont think it has to be that difficult.
Is this a human thought?yes. Or do dolphins or elephants think of god too?
If they do then where is their proof? If we are the only lives that exist with god than where does that place us?
Does god think we exist?
It’s three words:Does God Exist.
I like that god is still a man (he) to many. Come on ladies! how long has it been sence women’s lib? get on it! –no no no.Just foolin. I like women.
but what I was sayin was that I also like the vengful gods full of fury and stomping thunder.Or a God like a forrest of tangled webs, with thoughts-like-smoke blowing through like time.
Is the proof in the best of human achievment’s?
the soul singer or the great tenor?
To exist. we exist with god? “How dare you place we before god!”
god before i….or is it i before god?
a haunting magnificance.
a dull ho hum-oh shit, I dont have time for religous talk, i gotta catch the bus to go to work.Jeez I hate my job.I have no friends. I took up drugs and cutting myself to feel. I became a shell of myself. The taste of Satan was sweet. Then, I started reading this book and it changed my life completely.
acceptance
denial
truth
trend
root
the inner
the outer
the all knowing
is there a nothing knowing god/ a kinda slacker god.
naw, cause god, by god, is odd and is superduper .
if god exists and is binded by no religion/ no form/ no reasoning/ no rug of solidarity, ect.
if god became a discussion in abstractions.
—
allrite.the above is my whithin the hour of the existance of god and proof of bit.
of the cuff.
stay tuned for part two.
oh god no!
wha? huh?
March 1st, 2008 at 7:40 pm
Sorry its hard for me to read long posts
March 1st, 2008 at 7:43 pm
petey mcgee: you know, the early american landscape painters that painted the american landscapet depicted the proof of the existance of god.
They also made sketches from life and went back to their studios to elaborate the depictiction.
Intersting.
March 1st, 2008 at 7:43 pm
I believe in faith. It appears to be a necessary fact of the human condition. Those who espouse atheism certainly appear to hold their faith in science and rationality as tight to their heart as those that believe in God. Faith is an answer to a question; Why am I here?, What purpose do I serve?, What happens when I die?. Atheists have faith that when they die they will contribute to the carbon chain and become one with the earth. Religious folk believe that when they die, they will become one with god. Everyone needs to believe in something.
I believe that a higher consciousness is possible; When someone close to me dies I have faith that my grief and feelings/thoughts somehow reach them. I have no rational reason for this belief. Simple Faith.
Do I believe in an omnipotent, all-seeing, all-knowing god.
No, nor do I believe Jesus to be the son of god. This does not mean that Jesus did not die for humanity, or for a noble cause. The freedom to believe what you choose is a cornerstone of progressive society. The courage to die rather than forgo your beliefs is worthy of worship. For all the religion-haters out there who only focus on the evils of the church and organized Religion, think for a moment of the accomplishments of organized religion. Where were many of the great minds of the past educated? For goodness sake the great leaps and bounds of modern civilization can be traced back to the printing press and the spread of knowledge. Everyone familiar with Gutenburg? Most of the great art and literature of the world is a direct consequence of faith. Japanese art that venerates Kami, Buddhist architecture, Michaelangelo’s Pieta, The Great Pyramids at Gaza, the lovely dye work and tapestries of the Native Central Americans, The Totem poles of the West coast, The Cool blow paintings of Ayers Rock. All are testaments of faith. Faith that answers the questions, Who am I?, Why am I here? What is my purpose? Where do I fit in?
When I enter a house of worship it is not the presence of God that gives me comfort, but the feeling of connection to the rest of humanity. The universality of the quest. I am part of something greater than myself, part of an amazing journey, a journey shared for thousands of years. All to answer the questions; Who am I? and Why am I here?
March 1st, 2008 at 7:44 pm
What?…
March 1st, 2008 at 7:44 pm
Absolutely.
March 1st, 2008 at 7:47 pm
Mom424:Great post
March 1st, 2008 at 7:48 pm
I don’t know if there is a god either way. Even if there were a god I don’t think that you could prove he/she/it exists until you die and meet them. If I had to believe in a god though, I would like to think that god might have created the universe, but he/she/it doesn’t really play an active role in what happens. Plus if I were to believe in one god than I would have to think that there would have to be more. It doesn’t matter to me either way. The way I figure it is, knowing there is a god doesn’t solve any questions for me…. it solves nothing more than saying the universe just was and will always be… because if there was a god than where did he/she/it come from?
March 1st, 2008 at 7:48 pm
I lean towards Taoism.
While people are argueing all day what to call a “chair” and trying to define the “chair” – I just sit and enjoy it.
March 1st, 2008 at 7:52 pm
viking that was awesome, why explain the beer and just enjoy it.
March 1st, 2008 at 7:58 pm
Yes, no matter what you call god, a higher power exists. I am not religious. Religion just makes people argue….and murder.
What bothers me is that there is so much hate and anger in god’s name. I don’t think god has anything to do with hate and anger, and I’m pretty sure he/she/it doesn’t care what he/she/it is called. I think that God, Ahura Mazda, et cetera are all the same entity. Different cultures will naturally have different takes on how they view this entity. I think we all need to stop bickering about the fine details. The god I believe in loves us, all of us, and isn’t going to get all pissed off if we don’t spell his name right or imagine him with the wrong color eyes.
That’s my take on things anyway. I hope I didn’t offend.
March 1st, 2008 at 7:58 pm
Does A god exist? Yes.
Does any conception of god ever worshiped by man exist? No.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:00 pm
Mine22: To Beer!
Souxieq: The whole point of these is to discuss. Anyone getting mad should just chill and have a beer.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:02 pm
Crimanon; Thanks, I’m actually getting a little weepy thinking about this stuff. Actual tears…I’m gonna go smoke a joint.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:04 pm
Crimanon: Thanks. People just get so worked up.
I’m not worked up, but I’m gonna have a drink anyway.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:04 pm
yes to the almighty joint
god does love us
amen
March 1st, 2008 at 8:05 pm
OH MY GOD!(kind of appropriate isn’t it
) Jamie, this will cause like 123453765844936396 F***ing comments! WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?!? and i say no, there is too many religions like christianity that have the same kind of god, and i think god is just an idea to live a better life that got blown out of proportion.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:06 pm
mom424:you have kids and you smoke weed? cool!
March 1st, 2008 at 8:08 pm
Ahh, the high school mantras are coming back…. “Boooooooong”
March 1st, 2008 at 8:10 pm
Hey What if God smoked Cannabis: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PybtBKSAtLM
March 1st, 2008 at 8:10 pm
so…anyway, back to :
“Does God Exist?”
March 1st, 2008 at 8:10 pm
I often wonder if our usage of the word “um” came from “om”. Anyone know?
March 1st, 2008 at 8:12 pm
“Ohm”, the song of the universe, Yogis and stuff like that.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:12 pm
Souxieq – sounds good, also its Saturday night. so you know.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:12 pm
*Sound sorry
March 1st, 2008 at 8:13 pm
Mom424 smoking a joint – now Mom’s a higher power
March 1st, 2008 at 8:15 pm
Hey, its saturday, smoke all the weed ya like.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:15 pm
mine22: er?
March 1st, 2008 at 8:16 pm
And im expecting the return of Bible Dude pretty soon.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:16 pm
beer
March 1st, 2008 at 8:17 pm
Jamie: Suggestion… Chat room??? maybe some sort or private messaging?
March 1st, 2008 at 8:18 pm
Csimmons; I was cool before you were born. I also believe in the need/want of humanity to catch a buzz. I choose weed as a way to relax. All of you who are offended by the “demon weed” can substitute Martini for joint. But I would be way more wasted from the martini.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:19 pm
Mom… is awesome!
March 1st, 2008 at 8:20 pm
Mom424: I’m allergic. I’m screwed if I ever get glaucoma. Doesn’t offend me though.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:20 pm
Mom424:amen
im going to bed, ill expect my inbox to be bulging tomorrow morning because i asked for follow up comments(hits self in head)so ill be back tomorrow for this argument.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:21 pm
GOD, oh yeah, back to the subject. Loving Being or kid with a magnifying glass???
March 1st, 2008 at 8:24 pm
Matt: I agree whole-heartedly. We have suffering because no one would know happiness if sadness was not present in their lives as well. All sunshine and no rain make a desert.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:25 pm
No one has brought up Intelligent Design either…. Your View Do Aliens/God Exist???
March 1st, 2008 at 8:25 pm
My personal opinion is that I reserve judgment. How can I claim to be so wise as to presume to know the truth. So I live my life the best way I know how, and if there is a God, I hope that he/she will accept that, and if there is no God, then at least I wasn’t wrong either way.
But when it comes down to it, does it really matter if there is a God or not? If we all respected each other and were the best we could be, it wouldn’t matter if there was a God or not.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:28 pm
so someone wrote about the vatican saying that the old testament was outdated?
does that mean that the new testament will be outdated someday?
and no, i don’t believe.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:29 pm
hollytamale – thats a good point.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:30 pm
guess what, im back! my parents decided to let me have my labtop for the night! so i’ll be arguing all night!
crimanon:that is weird, why hasn’t anyone brought that up?
March 1st, 2008 at 8:31 pm
DownHighway: Yes I did and God I hope so.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:33 pm
I feel alone in my small town, only me and this other kid don’t believe in god. the population is mainly baptist, methodist, presbytarians, etc. But my town isn’t judgemental calling me a satanist and crap, so it isn’t that bad.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:35 pm
God is love. Humanity was and is continually given a choice to choose faith or to trust in their own understanding. I’m not perfect, but (pacifist) Christianity is. Petey Mcgee, check out answersingenesis.org for some scientific answers to your questions.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:35 pm
I am looking forward to Bibledude. Is he going to respond to my post? I doubt it, although if he adopted my attitude he would be a much happier person and maybe he could heal. He is a wounded soul.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:35 pm
All do have to say that these schools opting not to carry it are well within rights. It hasn’t become As mainstream as Evo or Create but it should at some point be taught. Aliens are to theoretical for the classrooms. The Uplift Saga makes for a good book series but not as a basis for a Creation trifecta, Yet.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:36 pm
I say that we will never find out until we die.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:37 pm
Mom: Attitude=Stoned?
March 1st, 2008 at 8:39 pm
If there is a God, it is not within the human construct to be able to define it. For a force to be omnipotent and benevolent, to create the universe and produce everything we have known is more than human imagination can fathom. i highly doubt that one such force could be responsible for everything, therefore the possibility of the existence of God seems highly unlikely to me personally. I feel as though those who believe in God follow through blind faith observations of lucky coincidences that have occurred throughout the world. “Medical miracles” and such things are considered God’s work when there is nothing that supports such a claim. I guess i’m just one of those people that require proof to belive. Or maybe even less problems in the world. If God’s so benevolent, whats with all the genocide, hunger, poverty, and killing? Thats my oppinion.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:40 pm
Ha, ha, no, but I’m not all weepy anymore. And I’m serious about Bibledude. Like Jamie said, anyone with that much animosity towards religion must have had a great deal of faith at one time.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:41 pm
Who the hell is Bibledude?!
March 1st, 2008 at 8:44 pm
heres my 2 cents
Do i believe in a all-seeing omnipitent god? No. I don’t believe any religion is truly right, we as humans throughout history have been searching for a higher power(s) and i never understood why. I personally believe we should just live our lives well, “isms” just get in the way of living life to its fullest, like judaism, hinduism, etc. And I don’t think bad of you if you do believe in god or any religion, i just don’t believe myself, i truly lost my faith about 5 years ago(im 13 so it may sound shocking) when i read the bible and saw all the stuff that was in it, which if you truly want to turn into a atheist, just read the bible,some really weird stuff was the fact that it says you can sell your daughter into prostitution, it says some very immoral stuff like that, if you want proof, watch these links
March 1st, 2008 at 8:50 pm
i believe in God and Christ as my savior, i also believe that all churches have taught us to worship the church and not God
March 1st, 2008 at 8:50 pm
subliminaldeath:i agree, we won’t know until we die, and bibledude was a atheist who once was very religious person and commented like hell on the bizarre biblical tales list, just read the thread.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:51 pm
Csimmons: Man wrote the bible. 2000 years ago. Don’t let a man made book confuse you. This is one of my major problems with religion; it turns people into athiests.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:55 pm
Oh yeah!! Now I remember that idiot! Thanks.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:55 pm
souxieg:I believe reason will turn anyone who is in question of their faith into an atheist, not religion, if you truly believe in a religion with pure blind faith, you can’t be.
March 1st, 2008 at 9:04 pm
does it even matter?
will it make one jot of difference to anyones lives if someone shows up one day with irrefutable proof one way or the other? (other than some people feel very smug and the some others are rather anoyed)
March 1st, 2008 at 9:16 pm
Why would inocennt people die?
Why would people starve all over the world?
Why are we so confused to which ‘God’ is the right one?
Why isn’t thier peace in the world?
Why hasn’t god made given us a sign?
March 1st, 2008 at 9:17 pm
The proof will be a blessing for scientists and a test of faith for religions.
March 1st, 2008 at 9:18 pm
Jimmyschaps: Any answers with those questions? Your own opinions maybe?
March 1st, 2008 at 9:18 pm
i dont think god exists.
commentators clique
the raspy voice among sliding doors.
the evening news
back one’s self in a corner and one is bound to believe in a god, in a light. If the pain goes away. But the pain is moot. The wail of existance is thriving without all that.on a biological level with the decay and resurgence.
aw jeez. theres only so far i can go without thinking of god existing in someway.
jeez, my thoughts are scattered.I’m almost out. Can you hook me up Mom?
dont blame me if it dont reach 1000.
It’s allrite:
comming up next:
The Story that will break your back in a crack!
make you feel just reet.
March 1st, 2008 at 9:25 pm
topic Bibledude: I’m really glad I missed all of that, just reading what he posted made my head hurt, did anyone get what he was trying to say?
March 1st, 2008 at 9:26 pm
crimanon:i don’t think anyone did!
March 1st, 2008 at 9:28 pm
the bigger topic is religion as a whole. should thier be religion?
yes and no
Religion gives people hope. In the poorer parts of the world were they have nothing they have stronger religion. When a person has money and doesnt need help from a anonymous source , why bother? Religion also causes wars. If all religions are around to help people and to guide them in life, why would they say the other religions are wrong. Should a religion suggest peace between others? and if they claim thier religion is the only true one and has the only trure god, then souldnt that be so oviuos that all people will follow it? See, the idea of gos, or god originaly started because philosiphers couldn’t explain natural phenomenons. That why thier were originaly so many. Diffrent Gods to explain diffrent thing. Then as people evolved and became smarter they only had one God. Then there was Jesus, sure Jesus existed but was he really the son of God? Many people claim the are God or are related to God, wht made him special. People back then belived whatever they wanted to. They had no knowlage of the world around them, so as apart of human nature , they want to have answers, FAST. They would belive who gave them any answer. Sure Jesus did great things , but does that mean he was the son of God? No, mabye jesus should then serve as a model for how others should treat each other. It has been said he helped whomever needed help, and never cared who you were or were you came from. Shouldn’t we all act the same? Why can’t we all just get along. Not have a religion telling us how to act. Why can’t we, as humans, spread peace? Why cant we just get along….
…And in the end The love you take Is equal tot he love you make. – The Beatles
March 1st, 2008 at 9:31 pm
Yes. God created everything, and evolution is just an continuation and adaptation of what God created. It’s possible to believe in both; it’s not written anywhere that they must be separate schools of thought. Religion is just unexplained science…science that is beyond the comprehension of human understanding.
Unfortunately, humans misrepresent and/or misinterpret God’s intentions (like during the Spanish Inquisition), and bad things result! Then again, Communism (advocated the lack of God) looked great on paper, until it was put into practice, and millions died as well…We’re screwed either way; but me personally, I believe in God, because faith and it’s promise of heaven and everlasting life seems like a better alternative than not having faith and ending up ‘just dead’ in a hole in the ground like my dog is in the backyard. The human soul is too tough for that kind of bleak final ending. That’s all I have to say about that (besides, my beer buzz is starting to wear off)!
March 1st, 2008 at 9:33 pm
this is easy–absolutely noy
March 1st, 2008 at 9:33 pm
I meant *not*
March 1st, 2008 at 9:34 pm
Jimmyschaps: }=====[#religion#]—-*, “Give me my fix”
March 1st, 2008 at 9:43 pm
I believe in God, but I think he is so complex that you and I can’t grasp him. Its like a cat trying to grasp the concept of solar fission, it has no concept of it.
I have heard of a theory that I thought was cool: believe in God, so that if there is one, you are doing what’s right, but if there isn’t one, then it wont matter.
March 1st, 2008 at 9:54 pm
yes, i do believe good does exist
March 1st, 2008 at 9:56 pm
If there is a god and he is omnipotent then he is indifferent. A complete contradiction in itself.
March 1st, 2008 at 9:56 pm
we don’t have enough evidence to prove whether God exists or doesn’t exist. The only thing we can say is “We don’t know.”
March 1st, 2008 at 10:02 pm
Mar: Faith.
March 1st, 2008 at 10:08 pm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligent_design :Long read: Any thoughts??? or are we leaving this out of the subject???
March 1st, 2008 at 10:15 pm
yes
March 1st, 2008 at 10:17 pm
someguy: too touchy for you?
March 1st, 2008 at 10:19 pm
Since the answer to the second question is “no”, the first question cannot be answered at all.
March 1st, 2008 at 10:21 pm
crimanon:well, what do you think of intelligent design?
March 1st, 2008 at 10:41 pm
Csimmons: let me put down my bible, change the channel on the Tv, and wipe my ass with a David Brin Novel. the only thing they did was take the god out of creationism, slip in a midwestern ufo sighting, and say Everyone can stop fighting now. I’ll agree with the last part whole-heartedly. The Rest? Needs work and it Can’t be proven until They/It visit(s). Of all of the perspectives I’ve argued This is the one I know the least about and I was Hoping to lure someone in. I need a better bait. Oh I know…… BOOBS, COMETALKABOUTBOOBSandgodBUTMAINLYBOOBSgod.
March 1st, 2008 at 10:44 pm
okay, whats your favorite kind of boobs?
March 1st, 2008 at 10:47 pm
And my view on creationism is like yours, they took the god out of creationism and said it was a scientific theory, well it isn’t ‘cus it can’t be tested, a huge flaw in their “scientific theory” crap.
March 1st, 2008 at 10:50 pm
Looks like I found this convo a lil late!! Ill tell everybody why I dont think God exists… because science does!
March 1st, 2008 at 10:54 pm
I’ll given them scientific theory, since you don’t need Proof for a theory. But, to try and push it on schools without considering long term effects on families was uncalled for. Flip side, I don’t think a Scientist should be discredited for believing something Different. I’ve met Very prominent scientist who believed Creationism And Religious figures who supported Evolution (hand of God thing). My opinion Is more closely related to the Religious figures. Refer to previous posts. #62 I believe.
March 1st, 2008 at 10:59 pm
Trish: Again I say, Science hasn’t Figured out Humans, What makes you think it can figure out God.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:03 pm
AGNOSTIC FOR LIFE!!!!!!!!
March 1st, 2008 at 11:03 pm
Uhmm. yes.
i believe in a god simply because I don’t want to die and become just a memory. though i have a problem with which god to choose.
let’s say that i firmly believe in my religion (christianity) but what are the odds of my religion being the real one considering the hundreds of other religions?
uhmm one out of hundreds i guess? >_
March 1st, 2008 at 11:04 pm
Its not the “figuring out” that I am looking for. My hang up is the shit that never made it into the bible because the lack of knowledge at the time it was written. Lots of important stuff left out. If God was speaking thru men then wouldnt all the more recent discovies thru science have been told looooooong ago?
March 1st, 2008 at 11:05 pm
God most likely does not exist.
I don’t THINK he does,
but you know,
if he came up to me and said, “Hey, I’m God.” and proved it,
I’d look stupid for saying he wasn’t real.
But I HIGHLY DOUBT his existence.
And notice how I didn’t Capitalize the ‘he’s and the ‘his’, I don’t get the point of that anyway.
And I disagree with all organized religion anyway,
“I perceive ALL organized religion as dangerous, in its power to force people to do unreasonable things, almost giving them permission not to think for themselves.” -Brian May
I think that quote pretty much sums up how I feel about it,
why can’t people think for themselves?
Why do people need a book to tell them what is right and wrong?
March 1st, 2008 at 11:05 pm
Woe be unto him who has forsaken himself for a diluted ghost, only through just living and faith in self will We achieve the End-all-Be-all that is Compassionate Knowledge.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:08 pm
Faith is cool… it makes people do good and just things. On the flip side… Religion is a BIG root behind a lot of evil that I connot accept.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:08 pm
Trish: you missed the “Faith” schtick a couple dozen comments up.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:08 pm
agnostics:atheists without balls(i read that out of Stephen Colbert’s I Am America And So Can You!, so don’t get offended)
March 1st, 2008 at 11:10 pm
It’s the Religious Guidelines and Edicts that are putting us Away. Fuck the Mainstream!
March 1st, 2008 at 11:12 pm
Like I said… just entering the convo. Im trying to catch the hell up. Whats up with the attack! Im guessin you ARE religious… I say guessing because I havent read all comments. Im sure you stated it somewhere.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:13 pm
No attack, just passion, what I believe is pretty unique. when you hit #62 you may understand.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:14 pm
Opening the can of worms much? (lol) I guess it was only a matter of time before this one came about.
I believe in God. It’s really tough for me to put my faith into words though, so that’s all I really can say now. Maybe I’ll add more if I get inspired later!
Great question, Jamie, and I really like your response.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:15 pm
Your passion is fabulous…
March 1st, 2008 at 11:16 pm
March 1st, 2008 at 11:16 pm
Personally I am open to the idea of thier being some kind of higher power, but as far as the traditional way “God” has been depicted over time, especially in Christianity, I do not beleive that being exists. Regardless of what side of the argument that you are on, I think we can all agree that it cannot be proven either way. Any “athiest” who claims that for a fact there is no god is ignorant because there is no way to prove the lack of its existance, and and “christian” who claims that for a fact there is a god is also ignorant (please dont get offended) because it is a faith based statement (which is fine) but it cannot be proven either. I think people just need to be content with the idea that if there is a god or higher power, then what makes us so worthy and capably of understanding it? I mean do you think an ant understands people? Noway…so why should we be able to understand something that is so much bigger and more than us. (Please see my statement for its metaphorical value and dont get offended by taking it literally). Great question though, I just hope poeple can answer respectfully and peacefully.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:18 pm
Maybe I should put science aside for a sec… Why is it better to follow blind faith without questioning all the unanswered? Its not… I just feel more negative comes from religion and its followers. The golden rules seem to be far snazzier
March 1st, 2008 at 11:25 pm
matt: pretty much everyone has been pretty respectful. Elaboration on the parts of some people could be better, “Yes” and “No”s abound.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:25 pm
Why do many refer to “higher power” but rarely can we admit that there is just unexplained all around (that I believe with time will eventually be explainable) waiting to have the answer discovered?
March 1st, 2008 at 11:26 pm
Trish: George Carlins 10 commandments bit is Really good.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:27 pm
The open mind of a True Skeptic! Wonderful!
March 1st, 2008 at 11:28 pm
there really is know need for a god or a higher power, we just need to enjoy our time on earth(or listverse)
and crimanon:i was being serious, whats your favorite kind of boob?
March 1st, 2008 at 11:29 pm
Did anyone see where Jamie went?
March 1st, 2008 at 11:29 pm
can’t you all understand, existence wasn’t caused by implosion but rather creation. No matter which way you look at things something had to be created by something. It makes no difference of which God there is, a cross or a star serve no meaning, we have spawned from this earth and this earth had spawned from something else and something else hath spawned before it. You ask if there is a God? yes, just not what you think it is.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:30 pm
Csim: WTF? that was odd, I didn’t even see it. I love all Squishy bits equally.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:30 pm
i love the history of the world part 1 where Moses brings out the “15″ commandments and goes “I bring you these 15 *drops one slab* 10, 10 Commandments!”
March 1st, 2008 at 11:32 pm
crimanon: i was just joking really, i love big ones though! LOL!
March 1st, 2008 at 11:32 pm
I agree and I thought we were in disagreement ; )
March 1st, 2008 at 11:33 pm
Salavtore: The chicken and the egg. The egg, of course, came first. But, where did the First Egg come from? The question, essentially, of my belief.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:33 pm
I believe God exists. I have Faith. Jesus is my Savior.
But religion is unfortunate. Religion is different than Faith. and Faith isn’t meant to make things easy. It’s meant to make things possible. Therefore I believe that people must make decisions for themselves and act on their beliefs. God’s not here to do it all for you. Free will.
I can’t make an argument for God here. I’m not well versed in the Bible and though I would like to share I’m not really sure how to do that. All I know is that a relationship with God is a very personal thing that has nothing to do with anyone else but you and Him. It’s a choice. And I can’t say that it’s right or wrong to believe in God or ‘a higher power’ or not.
As long as one is happy!
March 1st, 2008 at 11:34 pm
Csim: The Real reason we’re all Sinners! Good Reference.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:36 pm
I want to give Everyone hugs!!!! Understanding people and an open-mindedness that I don’t often find.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:38 pm
People CHOOSE to sin everyday… then excuse it with “we are sinners”, thanks Adam and Eve! Im not buying the “excuse” for peoples crappy decision making.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:40 pm
Kill the world… As long as you repent afterwards. Yea, Doesn’t sound right.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:40 pm
yes, sinning, just call it “bad decision making” or just life, either one.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:42 pm
crimanon: doesn’t sound right to me either
kill all the kids in a city, sent to jail, repents in jail, goes to heaven, not exactly a good heaven.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:43 pm
Angel be beautiful…
God be a useless c***
March 1st, 2008 at 11:45 pm
Ahhhh life… and peoples constant desire to have an explanation for it. I happen to have had too much fun “sinning” and IF there were a god Im pretty sure god would understand. ; )
March 1st, 2008 at 11:45 pm
I believe a higher-power exists. I believe that there are other levels to our world that we do not understand and because of this count them as “idiocy” or “blind faith”. To me the universe seems far too perfect to have simply come about randomly. As for the multi-verse idea… well if you’d rather believe that than that a higher-power created our universe, you have more faith than I do.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:45 pm
I have yet to meet a hardcore materialist who didn’t have severe control issues. Jebus tells me you folks may have been breast fed too long. Or not long enough. Or by a dude. Something. Whatever.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:47 pm
I also believe that any all-knowing God would know enough not to damn a person when he has personally laid their life out for them. “God has a plan for everyone” if God truly had such a plan then he’s basically forcing people into Hell unfairly. If there truly is a God I shudder to think he is so malevolent.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:47 pm
As current beliefs go… if you killed those kids for YOUR god… you get into heaven. Whose with me in sayin id rather be sittin in hell next to a skeptic!
March 1st, 2008 at 11:47 pm
I don’t believe in an afterlife simply because I never experienced a “fore-life”. I don’t remember a damn thing from before I was born, why should there be something after I’m dead?
When I die it will just be nothing.
What does this have to do with God? Well, it seems to me that the only time anyone really has to deal with God is in the “after-life” when they are “judged”. If I do not believe in an “after-life” then I do not believe in God.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:49 pm
Csim: I know of people on deathrow who just want to die, they have Honestly accepted God and Repented. Crying, I know they don’t want to die, but they have done the noble by Voluntarily bowing out of society. These are the guys who have Truly reformed. They are ones worthy of heaven. None of this last minute “Forgive me”. This is another Fundamental of my beliefs. To Truly be forgiven and Owning up for the wrongs you’ve done is to live “Eternal”. A bit of a twist, this can also be achieved by Dying with a clean conscience, little harder.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:50 pm
Perhaps there is no fore-life.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:52 pm
Trish: Can’t agree, clean conscience.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:53 pm
JasonM: Resurrection comes with that little fuzzy area you’re talking about.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:54 pm
Alextenn*, sorry
March 1st, 2008 at 11:55 pm
God exists as a convenient measuring stick in the minds of temporary life forms who use thier own definitions as the basis to judge others upon. He’s only as real as you want him to be.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:56 pm
Funny thought: If religious people didn’t have the threat of Hell and use it so often, how amyn of them would still be religious?
I think the whole “God” thing is just something a powerhungry cultist came up with to exercise control. Of course, I also thought multiplying a fraction by a whole number should have given you a bigger number. I’m not perfect. XD
March 1st, 2008 at 11:57 pm
271. Im confused… “the ones worthy of heaven”? Wouldnt that be those humans who devoted their life to doing good…not those who raped, murdered, molested, etc.?
March 1st, 2008 at 11:58 pm
Mortivore: 2+2=5…Blackhole Mathematics.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:58 pm
My conscience is clean too!
March 1st, 2008 at 11:59 pm
Trish: True Repentance, not just “Holy Shit, I’m sorry, I’m Sorry”.
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:00 am
What if I told you all that God spoke to me today?
I know that He exists and cares for me as one of his children because I hear his voice and see his hand.
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:01 am
Clean Conscience “Clauses”, It makes sense in my head and that part is more of a face to face part of my thought.
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:02 am
Gabriel: You’d be no better than Me.
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:02 am
I understand that… its easy to reach “true repentance” when youve been sittin in the slammer for 60 years with nothin else to do
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:04 am
If god spoke to anybody today Id blame it on Meth
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:06 am
Maybe thats what it takes for some people. For me, My Voice, is nothing more than my evolving beliefs, telling me what I should/shouldn’t do.
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:07 am
It makes me happy that that you recognize that. Sorry for sarcasm
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:09 am
I believe in God. There are too many things that have happened in my life to chalk up to coincidence. For those who require scientific proof for something that in its very essence requires faith, I’m sorry you feel that way. It takes just as much faith to believe there is not a god (yes you have to have faith, because you have no scientific proof to the contrary), or higher power, as it does to believe. Therefore I deem any such arguments on evidence null.
As others have said, you won’t really know until the after-life (if you so believe). However, I disagree with the concept of “well I’d rather be safe than sorry,” to me that is not truly stepping out and believing. There are those who believe in ’some higher power’, those who believe in the Judeo-Christian God, those who believe in Allah, those who believe in the teachings of Budda, along with many other lesser known belief systems – including pastafarianism, and those who believe in no creator.
My point is this, you must have faith for any of these systems. I cannot prove to a steadfast atheist that the Judeo-Christian God I believe in exists, just as the atheist cannot prove to me that He does not exist. I choose to believe based on what I’ve been taught, and what life experiences I have had.
No, I don’t believe in God because I need some realm of comfort, or because I want to have some higher purpose. I’ve actually had some crappy life experiences, and plenty of reasons to stop believing. I choose not to. I believe in God and will continue to do so as long as my mind allows me to.
Anyway I’m done, and if you’ve read all of this, cool!
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:10 am
I have that voice too… I just dont believe God has planted it there. Does that mean the repenting murderer is better off than me? Thats crazy talk no offense
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:10 am
crimanon:who is truly worthy, a person who has lived their life well and never did a damn thing wrong or someone who kills like 100 people and repents in prison, and don’t think i don’t get what you are saying, i get it allright, if you truly repent and cleanse your conscience(harder) then you can go to heaven, but you’d see a lot of killers there too which isn’t an ideal heaven.
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:12 am
if you hear voices telling what to do, what are you smoking?
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:14 am
It could be schizophenia too
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:15 am
im guessing you hear god, or you are on some better stuff than weed. Most likely weed.
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:17 am
Joshua: I guess you wouldn’t like my joke about keeping my bible around “Just in case”
Trish and Csim: Told you, it’s much easier for this part face to face.
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:18 am
No. The answer is No.
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:18 am
So, according to this page I was reading earlier, Man walked with dinosours. It was explained that science is false when thinking dinosours lived 65 million years ago because man has only been around for 6.5 million years. Sucks when sciene discredits the bible and you get some lame explanation like that!
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:20 am
well cromanon, hypothetically, who is more worthy?
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:20 am
Face to face? Why?
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:21 am
296 Why?
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:22 am
sorry, crazy computer… ignore comment301
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:25 am
Csim: cigarettes
Both: It’s like looking, nothing personal, into the eyes of a child to see if they are lying. It’s So much easier to communicate face to face. Only an example, Trish you’re making me paranoid about pissing you off.
Worthy, That’s between you and your Maker. Yea, it was a cop-out, food just showed up.
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:26 am
Crimanon: What? Please be less vague
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:30 am
Sorry to inflict… i dont get pissed off about people that beleve… just thought this was a discussion. I dont think we are much different except you are driven by your beliefs in a god and Im driven by my desire to not step on anybody’s toes
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:31 am
Time to snooze… peace out!
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:33 am
Check out:
“The Lost Tomb of Jesus.”
“Jesus Camp”
“The God Who Wasn’t There”
“The Root of All Evil”
and decide for yourself. Then check out:
“What the Bleep do we Know?” and
“What the Bleep – down the Rabbit hole”
Then review the first four.
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:33 am
Alex: Resurrection?
Trish: Did you read post 62?
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:34 am
crap! its 2:30 A.M. here! Im out! (note to self, clean out inbox tomorrow, and don’t argue with crimanon)
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:36 am
Do you think God knows we are having this discussion?
Yes!: means there is a God and he is currently trying to get us to stop having this discussion
No!1: God is not listening
No!2: God hears us but does not care
No!3: God is deaf
No!4: God enjoys us not knowing exactly who he/she is
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:36 am
I’ve got to move into my new place tomorrow, so I must depart as well. (personal note, Clean out inbox, email Csimmons with “That’s Right!)
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:39 am
Crimanon: If you are saying what I think you are TRYING to say, then simply because Jesus “resurrected” then that means that after-life is possible.
Please respond, and, this time, try to use more than one word.
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:57 am
I think there is a god, or creator, but not in the traditional sense. God can simply be an event that set things in motion. Who knows? God could of meerely been the particles that triggered the big bang and created the universe as we know it…I’m not saying that this creator even has to be a conscious being or entity, just simply a force. Also, I think every organized religion is BS. Religion is nothing but a man-made fantasy, and if I could erase it all with the wave of my hand, I would.
March 2nd, 2008 at 1:09 am
After this I’m done for the night; Alextenn: Jesus was resurrected by a divine hand, ie. God, still endowed with the knowledge prior, Son of God and all; really, how much can you forget in three days? Human Resurrection Without the Divine spark can be equated to hitting the reset button. Whatever character it maybe, doesn’t know what’s going to happen, hence no memory. Fore-life is therefore an unknown. I don’t know what happens after life; I haven’t died. I’m out.
March 2nd, 2008 at 1:18 am
I would say god is an embodiment of faith, unique to each individual (as is their faith and beliefs). Groups may share a common image/notion of God, and may worship together (Muslims, Christians, Jews, etc.) but that does not mean that their version of the all powerful is more correct than any other; if they are even correct at all. As far as proving god’s existence, I would assume the question refers to ‘proving’ in the scientific sense (i.e. through experiments or other observable evidence). If that is the case, then no, God’s existence cannot be proven. All current ‘evidence’ of God’s existence is either personal accounts of thing that have no physical record except in the eyes of the beholder; or mysteries that our level of scientific knowledge has not explained and people have, by default, attributed them to God’s will. For example, thousands of years ago, people thought God’s made it rain, and science has since proven that we can not only explain why it rains, but predict it. As the thoroughness of science grows, the need for religion to explain everyday things shrinks. Religion is forced to move to a moralistic issues as that is the only area science cannot really touch.
March 2nd, 2008 at 1:18 am
I pretty much stopped listening when you said “Jesus was resurrected by a divine hand”
Because, lets be honest, you are just making this up so your church women will have sex with you.
March 2nd, 2008 at 1:20 am
I have always been an atheist – 3rd generation in fact. I will agree that there is no possible way to fully prove or disprove the existence of a god with the scientific method (as it stands, but in a few millenia, who knows?)
For what it’s worth though, the burden of proof does not rest with the skeptic, it rests with the believer. Which means that until the believers have some utterly convincing phyisical evidence of a god’s existence, scientifically, it must be assumed that there is none.
I will say this though: if, in the infinitesimally miniscule chance that some creature exists in a higher state of being than this reality, there has never been and probably will never be a religion that comes even close to having the details right and understanding them.
March 2nd, 2008 at 1:25 am
Alextenn: Then you’re a Fucking Moron, who so far hasn’t read the posts. While you’re up, being as quiet as possible so your parents don’t hear you masturbating, you should take sometime and do what should be done and Read all of the posts.
March 2nd, 2008 at 1:32 am
Believe me GOD does exist.I am not basing this on miracles or any other paranormal events but because of what has captured me most, beauty.I have come across people who clearly show that they are not a product of evolution.I mean they are just too beautiful, evidence that a great artist must have sat down to come up with such masterpieces.definitely you agree with me that they are these people who are above th human expectation of beauty,these people are just one of GOD’s demonstration of power.
March 2nd, 2008 at 1:34 am
I’ve read these posts. Crimanon, you aren’t making any sense. Or at the very least, you have a very poor sense of audience and your tense is all fucked up. All it takes by you is a response that 1) does not simply ignore my question, and 2) does not involve my parents’ interest in my masturbatory endeavors.
March 2nd, 2008 at 1:46 am
Depends on what you mean by God. Not sure I believe there is a “God” in the traditional biblical sense of the Muslim, Hebrew or Christian faiths.
But I do think God exists…in the sense that God is the intelligent creator of the universe and all things. Is God an un-person being living up in clouds with Angels…no.
For me God is the boundless concept of universal and the spirit of which can be seen in every creature, plant, and mound of dirt that we can see and even the ones we can’t.
March 2nd, 2008 at 2:03 am
I just think theres things we just cant comprehend, like how was there nothing and then all of a sudden something, I mean just think about it, there had to be a beginning, but how?
March 2nd, 2008 at 2:03 am
In my opinion, some of these stories in the Bible wear a little thin on me.
Jonah and the Whale?
no way.
Noah’s Ark?
maybe the people had a big flood, but no way it covered the entire Earth.
it just seems too fantastic.
I believe in God, and i think that Jesus was the Son of God, but i take some stories in the Bible with heavy skepticism.
i go to church often, but my belief is running a little low.
i think organized religion is something made up by humanity, and i don’t think someone that goes to church every Sunday is any better than someone who reads the Bible, or who is a good person. If God is there, i’m pretty sure he wouldn’t care where we practiced Christianity, be it at home, in church, or in our everyday lives.
But the whole idea of you not being able to change your mind…. that’s stupid.
I think that there are an infinite number of possible choices that any given person could make about any event in their life, and He knows the outcome(s) of each choice you could make. He doesn’t force you to choose anything. He allows you to make the right decision.
If i’m wrong about him existing, so what.
the worms i’ll be rooming with will care about as much as my dead body.
but i’d rather believe and there not be a God, than not believe and there be a God.
because i’m pretty sure the consequences would be a whole lot worse for that decision.
March 2nd, 2008 at 2:21 am
Almost every single athiest argument i’ve seen so far is based upon inconsistencies in the bible, or something to that effect. seriously guys? If you’re arguing against christian beliefs, or islamic beliefs, or whatever fucking religious belief then you’re arguing that there is a god. because if there isn’t a god, why would you be arguing over him,her,it? I absolutely utterly KNOW god exists. a god exists, gods exist. be it one all powerful being, something within ourselves, or something within every fabric and hole and rip and tear and seam in our universe.
How selfish must you people be to believe that because someone dies in your life, babies go starving, or things go utterly wrong for someone, that god wasn’t there for you, or god wasn’t looking out for you. what the fuck?
Earth can fit inside the giant storm on jupiter, a planet in our solar system.
Earth has an estimated let’s say…. 5 billion people? and it can hold tons more? and people aren’t the only beings and life forces and elements on earth.
You people must be utter pieces of shit to think that humans are superior to anything else by getting angry and upset by something you want to blame on someone else. “I couldnt pay my bills, so i had to prostitute myself to feed my children, it’s gods’ fault.” Holy fucking bullshit. you’re a worthless selfish piece of crap if you think you’re worth more than anyone else. and that god would be doing himself a favor by helping you.
And before we even start on does god exist, how about we start on if we exist?
I’m done. think about yourselves before you think about blaming something for how fucked up your life has turned out to be. i bet you can think of every single thing that has happened has had a cause. why didn’t YOU change that? god had nothing to do with it.
March 2nd, 2008 at 2:33 am
”
You people must be utter pieces of shit to think that humans are superior to anything else ”
That’s what the bible says: God created man out his own image.
God doesn’t exist. In the bible he does all those miracles, but now, when people actually think critically, they’re gone. Why? because he doesn’t exist.
March 2nd, 2008 at 2:50 am
well heres my belief.. i have a hard time believing in just one deity.. either theres none or a pantheon. im just not sure and believe as mortals we shall never know.. and this pantheon is all the gods, just that they take different names. i also believe all the gods did with the creation is create the universe pre big bang.. and heres a few more things… if a god is all powerful what does it matter to it what happens in a back water planet we call home… or hell Nietzsche could be right and god may be dead.. but what ever.. im not sure what to believe and i respect every body else’s beliefs cept scientologists… cause that stuffs just wack. sorry for the comment.. not all of you are bad
March 2nd, 2008 at 2:52 am
I don’t believe in god. To me, the bible will always be a very elaborate peice of fiction. I am pretty firmly set in my atheist ways.
But hey, I guess if I’m wrong, you can find me next to the giant flaming pit of doom.
March 2nd, 2008 at 2:58 am
Sorry I have a few unbearable typos in my comment above. It is quite late.
March 2nd, 2008 at 3:00 am
its sad how many people dont believe in God simply because they’re uneducated about the Bible. Seriously, go to Church, or take a theology class, or -SOMETHING- before you make an intelligent decision.
March 2nd, 2008 at 3:03 am
i believe that god exists….the simple example of this is life…anyone has yet to solve that mistery
March 2nd, 2008 at 3:19 am
Like Trevor,
you say Noah’s Ark is totally unbelievable, which it may be. But you have to THINK about it. This book was written 2000 years ago. And the story of Noah was passed down from generation to generation before it was written down. Its not like Noah wrote an autobiography on what happened.
and like i’ve said in another list, you have to think like someone in those days would. A flood big enough that you never see land, you could assume that “the flood covered the whole earth”. or maybe that part was embellished when it was passed down through oral tradition. and “2 of every animal fit on the ark”. thats totally feasible if you’ve lived in 1 place all your life, and you werent -aware- there were numerous other kinds of animals around
you people are totally lacking the concept of the story. You’re focusing too much on the fact that “Oh this couldnt have possibly happened!” instead of the moral of the story.
March 2nd, 2008 at 3:35 am
to everyone who does not believe
you can try to make up as many “rational” arguments that you want to explain that god “can not” exist.
but, in the end you feel the emptyness inside of you, you try to fill it up with anything, and everything you can(drugs, lust, and the list goes on)
but after the momentary fleshly gain has passed, you still feel that emptyness inside of you, you long for something more.
and the truth is that you can try to fill it with anything you want, but it will always end the same way, until you look to the right place, God is the only answer, you will never know the peace and happyness that i know until you know him.
March 2nd, 2008 at 3:50 am
I remember reading this a while back.
Christianity:
The belief that a cosmic Jewish zombie who was his own father can make you live forever if you symbolically eat his flesh and telepathically tell him you accept him as your master, so he can remove an evil force from your soul that is present in humanity because rib-woman was convinced by a talking snake to eat from a magical tree… Yeah, makes perfect sense.
March 2nd, 2008 at 4:27 am
Bradley, you can’t justify your delusion.
March 2nd, 2008 at 4:49 am
Religion, no but God, I can’t imagine a world without God.
March 2nd, 2008 at 4:52 am
The existence of God is world difference from these religion of man.
March 2nd, 2008 at 5:56 am
I have been an agnostic since two years before that i was kinda like an atheist. What changed my mind was that most atheists(well i certainly did) have an inherent egoistic idea that they are the ones who are in control of their lives not some “god” which uses them as pawns in his great big game of chess.Then i thought we as humans have some limitations to perception of knowledge and things around us, which made me feel that i ought to be more humble(for my own good)and i turned to agnosticism.
March 2nd, 2008 at 6:00 am
Doesn’t matter if you have faith or not, God doesn’t exist either way.
Wake up.
March 2nd, 2008 at 6:03 am
Bradley. I refused to believe a really good man will never go to heaven because he NEVER ever heard of the Bible.
I spent half of my life being educated about the Bible to realize it’s written by MEN.
There may be a God, but it’s certainly none of any major religions.
March 2nd, 2008 at 6:46 am
As an singular entity ? No. As collective energy in the Universe ? Yes.
March 2nd, 2008 at 6:50 am
Some day humans will look back at history of today and laugh at our crazy superstitions. They will describe us as modern primates who started wars in the names of gods.
But do not worry, only a few generations must pass before we free ourselves from these crazy bondages we created for ourselves and finally start reaching our full potential.
March 2nd, 2008 at 6:56 am
146.Mom424: Amazing post, mom. Thanks for that. There will be billions of comments for this one.
March 2nd, 2008 at 6:56 am
i think the objection against belief in God that says we christians just want a “crutch against death” is pretty funny.
i would say the opposite is quite true. the atheist wants to believe that there is no God because then they can do whatever their heart leads them to with no consequences. if God exists and has standards then that would seriously cramp your life style.
i’ll check in later. i’m off to church to worship the creator of all things and redeemer of my soul.
March 2nd, 2008 at 7:36 am
“The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.” – Socrates (470-399 BEC)
SebK
In this post, I will explain my opinions and thoughts on God.
[EDIT by Admin: 10 pages is too much for a comment - please consolidate your views in to a few paragraphs!]
March 2nd, 2008 at 7:42 am
By the way, if you liked/disliked this article I wrote, feel free to comment and tell me what you think on my space: http://s3bk.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!8BE49242B4649C33!1675.entry
March 2nd, 2008 at 7:45 am
Okay, my article is too long, and my link didn’t post well. So here, this is a link to my blogs post on my thoughts and opinions about God and religion: http://tinyurl.com/222nxe
Please tell me what you think.
I am an agnostic. Agnosticism is the position of believing that knowledge of the existence or non-existence of God is impossible. An agnostic thinks it impossible to know the truth in matters such as God and the future life with which Christianity and other religions are concerned; or, if not impossible, at least impossible at the present time. An Agnostic does not accept any `authority’ in the sense in which religious people do. He holds that a man should think out questions of conduct for himself. Of course, he will seek to profit by the wisdom of others, but he will have to select for himself the people he is to consider wise, and he will not regard even what they say as unquestionable. And if there were a God, I think it very unlikely that He would have such an uneasy vanity as to be offended by those who doubt His existence. What kind of evidence could convince me that God exists?
I think that if I heard a voice from the sky predicting all that was going to happen to me during the next twenty-four hours, including events that would have seemed highly improbable, and if all these events then produced to happen, I might perhaps be convinced at least of the existence of some superhuman intelligence. I can imagine other evidence of the same sort which might convince me, but so far as I know, no such evidence exists.
March 2nd, 2008 at 8:04 am
I think the Antichrist hit the nail on the head way back in comment 24.
March 2nd, 2008 at 8:07 am
There’s no conclusive evidence of a God, and no argument conclusive and clever enough to denounce one. Personally, I believe in a creator. Not necessarily a person or spirit. I don’t believe life has a creator, but I think the conscious mind and emotions have some sort of (dare I say it) supernatural origin.
March 2nd, 2008 at 8:11 am
Dan, I agree that there’s no argument of God’s existence. But the lack of proof that God does not exist, does not make him real. So really, how can anyone claim there is God, when there is no evidence he actually exists? There is completely, and I mean COMPLETELY, no evidence of God existence.
March 2nd, 2008 at 8:17 am
I do believe in a God as the Creator, but I don’t believe in all of the Rules the bible tells us and how we must worship him all of the time.
Surprisingly, the Sims were the ones who took me away from worshipping; if my Sims (assuming no one controlled them and had better AI) did nothing but worship me all of the time rather than live their lives and go on their lil’ adventures, that would make for a pretty damned boring game.
I think if there really was a God, he’d want to see how everyone’s life turns out. It would be pretty boring to have created everything and have every single person act the same and just worship him. (“Oh.. another sacrificed Bull.. thanks Jeb,” He says as he tosses it in the closet with the hundreds of millions of other Bull corpses “I’m going to look at the Atheists now as they do not believe in me and try to actually make something out of the life I gave them.”)
March 2nd, 2008 at 8:21 am
God is immaginary and religion is man-made.
March 2nd, 2008 at 8:33 am
sry.dis is not my cup of tea…………
d fact remains that der is no `GOD`.hello….let me remind dat der was no actual god ever in existance………..its cuz first der was no proper sceintefic explanation fer anything unusual at dat time..dats loads of years bfore…………2 get some sense out of d unexplained which is explained 2day……….d ancestors invented GOD .2 get som sense out of it……….
ders enough sin done with d name of god..sacrifises n all dat…..
bad
March 2nd, 2008 at 8:58 am
1st Great winds, storms, lightning, flood, fire, earthquakes; people’s imaginations got to work, there must be something causing these things to happen , something that needs to be placated or worse will happen. SUPERSTITION was born and eventually let there be a GOD and it was created in our own image
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:03 am
yes…god exists. however it is human nature to rationalize.
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:06 am
a dyslectic agnostic insomniac was laying in bed wondering if there was a dog
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:08 am
He does, but he is dead in the hearts of the heard.
His name is abused and distorted which lead to killing his spirit in the hearts of the heard.
“God is dead!God remains dead, and we have killed him!”
Friedrich Nietzsche
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:19 am
yeah..yeah………….
hes supposed 2 b immortal werever he may b……how cum he dies in our heart………..wt on d earth could hav made him if hes made everythin……
common sense is not dat common……..it seems…dawn
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:28 am
I could have an argument over wether or not god exists, but i can’t touch christians or muslims, or whatever the hell you are,they are led by blind faith and i can’t disprove god to them, so there really is no point in arguing.
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:32 am
yep..i hav already given my reason FOR the abbreivated talk ………..in the ten ways to help listverse…………….n yeah csimmons i dont realy care whether you realy argue or not..cuz i dont believe a bit of it,,,,,
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:38 am
neither do I AJ, I just don’t really see a point in arguing to people who are devoted christians.
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:44 am
Read comment 65. That sums it all up.
March 2nd, 2008 at 10:03 am
I don’t know whether God exists or not, but belief in some higher being makes a frigid empty universe seem warmer. It might also play a role in human evolution, helping us to adapt to harsh conditions.
March 2nd, 2008 at 10:30 am
mine22-i should have said that!!!
I actually thought that perhaps they were just all drunk of the sumptuous wines they had in those times??
Yes, and then they all said, “we will cause the biggest world crisis, never ending, just by this one damn story! We shall rule!”
March 2nd, 2008 at 10:32 am
really stirred the pot this time eh Jamie?
March 2nd, 2008 at 10:37 am
Csim: I’m currently tired of being Confused with Actual Christians. Ugh! I argue all sides evenly.
March 2nd, 2008 at 10:52 am
23RedLeader said exactly what I was thinking…EVERYBODY who says god does not exist is basing that on what seems to be rational however back 100s/1,000s of years ago people found it rational that god DOES exist so nothing has really changed except our view on what makes something rational. I mean i’m sure 1,000s of years ago people thoyght it was redicilous (bad spelling I know) that God WOULDN’T exist so who’s to say that in 1000 more years our view of rationality won’t change again and say that God does exist. People base the belief that he doesn’t on the facts that we have however in all truth we can’t PROVE it either way with our current view of rationality! I personally believe he definatly exists! But i’m not going to go around and force that belief on people who disagree because by their logic he doesn’t. It really is THAT SIMPLE!
March 2nd, 2008 at 10:55 am
I also believe that after this list is over you (jfrater) will have to revise the “top 10 commented on lists” list
March 2nd, 2008 at 10:57 am
fishing4monkeys: I think you may be right
March 2nd, 2008 at 11:00 am
We rationalize most things based on the laws of physics and such but the universe is so big who knows…maybe if we had more knowledge about everything the concept of God would be more probable then the concept of evolution…we think we are so advanced and smart but that’s only because we only have ourselves to compare to so it seems that we are the smartest and the most advanced but if we had another civilzation to compe to we might be to them as cavemen are to us…we just don’t know.
March 2nd, 2008 at 11:00 am
Sorry about the long posts I just have alot to say about this topic
March 2nd, 2008 at 11:25 am
I love this!!!! i Love these “your view” things.
And No
he doesn’t
IT’s called science everybody.
Don’t beleive everything your tought!
Young people cannot think for themsleves
So they blindly accept God!
March 2nd, 2008 at 11:41 am
@Thepennymachine
Science and religion can coincide a lot better than people think.
Often (but thankfully not always) people on both sides are just too bigoted to admit that fact. Which is why I can’t stand hardcore religion folks arguing with atheists. Same arguments over and over again. Its just beating a dead horse.
March 2nd, 2008 at 11:43 am
Thepennymachine, maybe it is you who should not believe everything you’re taught. Science has not proven OR disproven the existence of a God, so no “it’s called science” is not a end to the debate.
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:12 pm
First, He finds pride. And He uses the sandpaper of obscurity to remove it ever so gradually.
Then He finds us gripped by fear—dread of our past, anxiety over our present, and terror over what may lie ahead—and He uses the passing of time to remove that fear. We learn that things aren’t out of hand at all; they’re in His hand.
He next encounters the barrier of resentment—the tyranny of bitterness. He breaks down that layer with solitude. In the silence of His presence, we gain a fresh perspective, gradually release our cherished rights, and let go of the expectations that held us hostage.
Finally, He gets down to the basic habits of living, he penetrates our inner person, and there He brings discomfort and hardship to buff away that last layer of resistance. Why? So that He might renovate us at the very core of our being.
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:29 pm
I was always an avid athiest who never gave pause to scream my views at everybody…but once you think about it, you CAN NOT disprove God scientifically. I mean, we don’t even know what lays on the bottom of our oceans and we think we can answer the ultimate question? Then again, we cant prove that there is a God either.
I’ve personally come to believe that there is a God, but that it is nothing but a representation of the creation of the universe. The driving force behind the big bang is STILL a mystery, we have NO CLUE what was before then. Maybe god is simply the force that triggered the big bang, and yet has had no part in the development of the universe since then. Maybe this god, being, or force isn’t even aware of its own existence.
If there is a God though I’m almost CERTAIN that he would not fall within any categories that have been preconceived by man, and by that I mean the major religions of the world. Religions just prey on the weakness of man, simply for POWER. Any religion that dictates what you can, and cannot do should be despised, hell, it should be destroyed. An easy exaple of that is the Catholic church. They say you should be charitable to your fellow man, and that pride is a sin, yet the pope wears crowns of jewels and gold embroided clothing? As Anton LaVey said, following the rules of the church, wearing ANY clothing for ANY purpose other than protection from the elements makes us guilty of PRIDE.
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:31 pm
sdggrant: that is a very wise comment – thanks
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:39 pm
There isn’t a God, and I know this solely for the fact that they have to force it into your head when it’s still soft and you’re still Santa Clause eligible. If they didn’t teach religion until we turned 18, this world would be a much different place because we would never buy into it.
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:52 pm
Personally, I’m a Deist. So yes, I believe that there is some being that created us. Does it necessarily have to be the typically thought Christian God? For me, absolutely not. I also think that most of the ‘gods’ spread around the world have very similar stories surrounding them, and yet everyone is screaming My God is better than yours!
Oh, and can we prove it? Scientifically, I don’t think so. But, to me, just looking at the night sky, a beautiful summer day or a baby’s eyes, I don’t think that all this could happen by accident. I don’t think that randomly just the right particles collided at just the right velocity to create our world on accident.
This is all just my opinion. I’m no theologian or scientist, so this is all just what I believe from what little I know. I don’t expect anyone to agree with me, and I do not try to force my beliefs on anyone. So please, don’t fight with me. Discussion, even argument is welcome. But don’t flame me. I don’t have the patience. Thanks.
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:58 pm
Are you kidding me wetsocks? you believe that just because they have to force “god” into little kids that there isnt one? and who says they have to force it? and i think theyre forcing religion, and a way of life. but i just think it’ll always come down to people believing in something more out there.
March 2nd, 2008 at 1:18 pm
378. Ranger that’s indoctrination. Kids believe ANYTHING their parents tell them. however, with santa clause and Robin Hood the parents tell them it’s a story. however they insist the bible it’s true.
Try convincing a normal adult of religion. 90% it will fail and he’ll laugh at you.
Try convincing a kid, you will succees 90% of the time.
March 2nd, 2008 at 1:20 pm
truth lies in our relationship with our beliefs.
it doesn’t matter what we believe so long as we act with compassion & kindness. if you act with judgment or hate in your heart then you have strayed of the path of truth.
we cannot prove or disprove the existence of God – so either belief is justifiable so long as you act right.
personally, I believe that the underlying essence of humans is that of compassion – our true nature. i believe the original source of this is a higher power.
March 2nd, 2008 at 1:25 pm
What I meant in his death is that God is no longer capable of acting as a source of any moral code or teleology AJ, for instance, compare this era and the eras that have passed, before if someone would speak of such a topic for instance back then in Europe, he\she would be burnt at the stake as a heretic, but as time time passed by, that fear and awe of the diety has shrunck to the point of nothingness, or at least this is how I view it, It doesn’t matter of God is immortal or not.
“God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it?”
– Nietzsche, The Gay Science
That’s why people like Epicurus made such an impact when they
immerged, if his famous statement about the problem of evil came out now, I don’t think it will have the same impact as it did back then.
March 2nd, 2008 at 1:36 pm
If there was a tenet to all monotheistic faiths that it was a sin to anthropomorphise the Universe, think of the power that little paradox would hold; to see all the heads explode….
For me, “god” is “dog” spelled backwards. Dog is my dyslexic deity, who likes to mess with my head.
In other words, no. No god, no master. (Except in Doctor Who)
March 2nd, 2008 at 1:39 pm
Oh! – I forgot to say…Jesus Camp is bar none the SCARIEST movie I have EVER seen… and that’s up against the likes of “saw”.
March 2nd, 2008 at 1:41 pm
I don’t know. Probably not.
March 2nd, 2008 at 1:50 pm
hmm…
here is my opinion:
the whole view of a “christian” god is contradicting.
I guess the whole thing with god is contradicting.
This thing, this mystical force, whatever, is the supposed creator of life. Is he the creator of death? if so, why would he need to create life in the first place? If we live the afterlife after death, why the need for life in the first place?
God gave us free-will, correct? or atleast they say he does.
so why is it, that we can do whatever we want but we still have to believe in him? in the bible it says to live the life you want and think outloud to the world because we have a right to, but then it says “here are the ten commandments, follow them or go to hell” well, okay? what if i feel like wanting my neighbours new car? thats a normal human emotion, isnt it? coveting. we see commercials telling us to buy things and we want it. but apparently thats against God’s law. If its God’s law, wouldnt he make it impossible for us to do those things? I could go up and stab a person to death, and the fact that i can do that proves that God cant exist. because if we arent allowed to kill people, why did he make it possible to do so? why would he make it possible for one man to kill 2,000,000 people? why did he make us so mortal?
another thing.. Free-will means we get to believe what we want, so what happens to all the people who dont believe in him, or believe in other gods? I mean, if god made us in his image.. why the hell would he create people who were already destined for the supposed hell?
If he loves us so much, then why are we doomed to eternal suffering the moment we are born?
there’s no such thing as god, because if a god existed, we wouldnt have free will. we wouldnt have the choice between good and evil. it would be a black and white world, but the world we live in is gray, where pain and suffering cause a higher power to have no room to exist.
March 2nd, 2008 at 1:50 pm
Why do people do this? Atheists pretty much own the internet. I personally do believe in a higher power, 100%, but why post this? Atheists on the internet only do stuff like flame religion. And than they think they’re just fine. When a video of a retarded dumbfuck christian is posted on youtube 999 repliers are atheists. When a christian posts a video in an argumental fashion to the replies, 999 repliers are atheists. And the christians who do reply are, “omfg u n00b g0d existgs fer sur3″. Why can’t we have a religion and get along? Just saying.
March 2nd, 2008 at 1:54 pm
CSimmons: Why do people always say that to me?
Stephen Colbert is not a very nice guy, apparently,
and I disagree anyway,
so :-p.
Agnostics: Open-minded Atheists.
=]
March 2nd, 2008 at 1:57 pm
snowkid32: i understand what you mean.
but what is the reason for religion? religion just causes constrictions. there are rules, and what is the point of rules when we are supposed to have free will?
i think people who have a religion can believe what they want, all the power to them.. i just find it hard to be a part of one when all it does is stop you from thinking your own beliefs.
i dont mean to be disrespectful in any way, i was just voicing my opinions just like you. i think it would be great to have just one solidary belief, but it is simply impossible.
March 2nd, 2008 at 1:57 pm
Snowkid:
Don’t try to make all Atheists look so bad, I consider myself atheist (I’m pretty much Agnostic/Atheist) and when I go on the internet and do things regarding religion,
I try never to attack religious people, I try to understand them.
Which I still don’t.
But, okay, I will admit, that sometimes, being 14 gets to me, and I will make fun of them a *little*.
I try not to argue in stupid online-chat speak though,
becuase seriously, who’s going to listen to me if I sound like an idiot and can’t type?
March 2nd, 2008 at 2:44 pm
No, I don’t believe he exists. In order to think this way, I simply hold him to the same standard that christians hold each other to. They tell me I need to attend church services and pray, i.e. communicate with God. Why? He NEVER communicates with me. I’ve listened for his voice for decades and if he ever talked to me, I’d tell everyone I could. Christians talk about “sins of omission.” i.e. allowing someone to suffer, when you can allivieate said suffering. Why? God ignores suffering of innocents and commits sins of omission hundreds if not thousands of times per day. I could go on from there, but I’ll give someone else a chance.
March 2nd, 2008 at 3:00 pm
No.
March 2nd, 2008 at 3:05 pm
Yes i do believe God exists. I am not going to argue my point. All the posts have very good reasons for believing or not believing. I do feel bad that religion has given so many people a bad taste in their mouth towards God .
March 2nd, 2008 at 3:31 pm
it is an interesting arguement.i would like to know if anyone could direct me to the writings of St Thomas Aquinas
March 2nd, 2008 at 3:37 pm
God was created in man’s image. It (god) is a handy way to explain the unexplainable. Or, as John Lennon put it, God is a concept by which we measure our pain.
March 2nd, 2008 at 3:59 pm
King of the Horizon: here it St Thomas’ Summa Theologica – it is the summary of his philosophical thoughts and is the primary text used for theology and philosophy in seminaries.
http://www.newadvent.org/summa/
It is the entire text – lots of interesting stuff! Enjoy
March 2nd, 2008 at 4:15 pm
There is only one word that can describe this:
CONTROVERSY.
March 2nd, 2008 at 4:31 pm
Here’s my stab at some of the questions raised here. I speak from the Protestant Christian perspective.
Epicurus’s Dilemma, Comment #24
The answer is that God is able to end all suffering but chooses not to. Suffering is created by humans, not God, and the onus is on us to end it. If God were to intervene in our affairs, we would lose our free will. If every time we did something that would cause suffering we were somehow prevented from doing it, there would be no suffering, but there would also be no choice. God wants us to love him, but if we cannot choose to reject him, our love means nothing. Out of choosing to reject God, suffering was brought into the world (Adam and Eve). God is benevolent, just not in the way people expect. By allowing us to cause suffering, God allows us to truly love him as well as letting us control our own lives and have the potential of Heaven. The alternative is that God does not let us control our lives, and we live out our lives having no real control. Suffering does not disprove the existence of a benevolent god.
God is a contradiction because he cannot be both all knowing and all powerful.
The Bible never says that God is all powerful. The Bible clearly states that God cannot sin. God also can’t do things that defy definition such as creating a spherical triangle. Being able to know the future and change the future does not mean that any future changing has or will take place, it just means that it is possible. It’s not a contradiction if God never does any direct changing of the future.
God is unknowable/Organized religion is a lie/There are too many Gods, so there is no way to cover all your bases.
Suppose someone found themselves in a pitch black space with no information about it, or how they got there. If that person simply sat there and said that there was no evidence that there was a way out, we’d think they were stupid. If the person sat there and said that there is probably a way out, but I’ll never be able to find it, that too would be a foolish course of action. If a person searched for a while, but found nothing and gave up, we could sympathize with the person, but they are still making a poor decision.
Consider that we are more or less blind about God. There is nothing to be gained by denying his existence (athiesm; the first person). If you believe God is out there, why not try to reach out to him and find him? You have nothing to lose by taking a stab. And don’t tell me that it is just as likely that God doesn’t want people to believe in him as it is that he does. Whatever you believe about any particular organized religion, it counts as some evidence for its particular god/gods. There is nothing to be gained from not following a religion, so you might as well find the one you feel is most likely to be true with the biggest rewards and follow it. Let us pray.
March 2nd, 2008 at 5:13 pm
God exists in the same way Bigfoot exists, ie doesn’t.
March 2nd, 2008 at 5:16 pm
Kuma:
“God also can’t do things that defy definition such as creating a spherical triangle.”
If God cannot do something, he is bound by physical laws outside his control. What created the laws? Why not worship it? After all, it must be greater than God.
And if you believe nothing created the laws (i.e. they were always there), how can you be so sure? Because there’s no evidence?
But, there’s something else there’s no evidence for…
“There is nothing to be gained by denying his existence”
Amongst the things to be gained by denying God’s existence is freedom.
March 2nd, 2008 at 5:17 pm
Voltaire had it this way: “If God would not exist we would need to invent Him!”
Napoleon had it this way: “Without Him and the Church the poor would just slaughter the rich!”
March 2nd, 2008 at 5:34 pm
I’m not gonna get trangled into everything or argue with someone. I for one beleive in God comepletly – and if someone else dosen’t that’s their own problem. I’m not gonna shove my beleifs down anyone’s throat.
March 2nd, 2008 at 5:34 pm
From a quick glance at a few of the previous posts, it appears that many of the responders claim to be god. They do this by claiming an attribute that can only be ascribed to the supreme being(God). This attribute is omniscience(all knowledge). They in declaring that “there is no God” affirm a negative which is impossible to know unless one is omniscient(all knowing) and thus god them self.
Seeing it is impossible to disprove God, can his existence be proven?
What does the evidence say?
March 2nd, 2008 at 6:03 pm
No way it can be proven with simple logic that even there was a god he probably isn’t any good and he is completely irrational.
March 2nd, 2008 at 6:47 pm
Logic is the most flawless method humans possess of discovering and understanding complex ideas. It has flaws, but none as definite as organized religion.
Check the site; read to believe.
March 2nd, 2008 at 7:09 pm
He most certaintly does! It is the most valuable truth I know. However, never will I impart my religious views to someone else as more logical or plain better, unless of course, I am asked.
March 2nd, 2008 at 7:17 pm
Why does everyone assume or label all faith as “blind”?
March 2nd, 2008 at 7:47 pm
It’s all about Faith. God has a reason for everything. We have millions of unanswered questions about things we feel God should take care of, but the fact of the matter is that God takes care of them according to his will. He has a place in Heaven prepared for you if you accept Him and live for Him. There is proof all around us that He does exist. Biblical scripture proves this.
We should not judge one another, but I KNOW in my heart that He does exist.
March 2nd, 2008 at 7:52 pm
400 comments. Definitely not reading all of those. Personally, I do not believe in a God, but lately I have been questioning my beliefs. There is one core belief that prevents me from believing in God. There is absolutely no proof either way. So people say “But then what created the universe?” and they say “Well something had to. So there is a God.” Except, if the universe needs to have a creator, then God must have a creator. And if God can be “forever”, then the universe can also be forever. So there is no reason to believe that there is one. But lately I have been questioning myself because those religious seem to be better off in terms of luck and how life goes for them. Personally, I find God to be a comforting thought and that is why it is so widespread. But I am more comforted by not being threatened with hell, than with being offered an after life.
To souxieq, people assume all faith is “blind” because there is nothing to base it off of. There is absolutely no proof. Instead, the faithful refuse to look at the facts that disprove God, and they simply continue to believe. They are blind to other evidence, and they have no proof for their own side of the argument. That is why it is called blind faith.
March 2nd, 2008 at 7:54 pm
god is imaginary: you say “Logic is the most flawless method humans possess of discovering and understanding complex ideas”.
you describe the problem inherent in the argument that most atheists produce, i.e. logic is the best way we have of figuring this sort of stuff out. is it possible to conceive of a supreme being that is beyond your capacity to understand.
i hope you don’t think that much of the world is devoted to a supreme being that is definable by what our brains can conceive. that would be sad indeed.
why do i believe in God? because he is nothing like me. if he was, i wouldn’t be interested.
March 2nd, 2008 at 8:26 pm
I think he does, im only a teenager, but i think he does. Im a christian, but im respect people for what they believe. I think it is silly to look down upon people who do not believe in God.
I know its hard to understand things, like Evolution and things, but its just something that people believe. It is hard to tell truth from what you believe in, i stuggle with that all the time. But I think he can try to help.
If people didnt believe in God, what else would they believe in. =]
March 2nd, 2008 at 8:29 pm
As an atheist my answer is no. However, as an atheist I don’t condem or judge those who do believe in a higher power. I was raised a Catholic and went to Catholic school and believed the bullcrap that was drilled into my head from 1st grade till i was in 10th grade. Then I decided to start thinking for myself.
March 2nd, 2008 at 8:38 pm
Dido: You’re doing yourself a disservice by Not read them. You should try it you may; convert to, Ignore any, Laugh about most, And not say what’s already been said numerous times. Please read the posts, we need new insights.
March 2nd, 2008 at 8:41 pm
Dido: I’m sorry that your experiences with the “faithful” have been so negative. I am personally not blind at all. And last time I checked, there were no “facts” that disprove god. So is your assumption that there is no god based on what you would call “blind faith”?
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:05 pm
If the only people in heaven are religious fundamentalists, that doesn’t sound like any heaven I want to go to.
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:14 pm
I don’t understand why people continually blame God for disease and suffering. Most of suffering is created by man, and most diseases have been spread by man. I think people should stop looking to blame God and realize that He has knowledge beyond what we can comprehend, so if He doesn’t stop the suffering that we have created there is obviously a reason there.
I believe in God, for He is the rock that I stand on. My life would be no where without Him and I am completely grateful for Him. My faith is based on what I cannot see but He has made Himself known. Stop looking to disprove Him and you would see what wonderful things He has in store for you. Turn to Him and He will reveal Himself to you in ways you couldn’t imagine. He loves you for He sent His son to become a lowly human man, to come and die a horrible death, so that we can all have a relationship with Him. That is why God is the absolute meaning of Love, in the truest form.
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:16 pm
Believer: For being the “absolute meaning of love” God does murder a lot of people in the bible.
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:18 pm
#404, That site rocks! Ask Jesus how you get to heaven a few times at different intervals, and you never get a straight answer. That guy knows his stuff.
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:22 pm
Anna: The people that He murdered were in the Old Testament, they sinned against God in every complete form of the word. But He also gave us life and in the New Testament He saves us all from a horrible life without Him. For being such a sinner, I’m glad He has spared my life.
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:24 pm
If there is a god, (for the sake of example. I’m still an atheist) it had better be just an allegory, and not some literal sky daddy who watches you like a panopticon singularity.
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:28 pm
What is sin but something that feels good [with the exception of murder]? (Like sex). What is it with the inferiority complex? YOu must go through life thinking you’re nothing but scum of the earth unless you let an institution tell you otherwise? Where did natural intuition go? Inner knowing? Sounds like a herd mentality to me. Group hysteria. Opium.
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:29 pm
Hey everyone! Ask god if he can divide by zero.
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:30 pm
Vodie: You put into words exactly what I was thinking. Thanks.
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:33 pm
Anna: Telepathy is a good thing. ;D
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:41 pm
You two should use that telepathy to find something Productive to say.
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:44 pm
Ok….Time isn’t linear. Is “Productive” a proper noun?
Can YOU divide by zero?
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:47 pm
I just completed a novel about the existence of God. I wrote it because it seemed important that someone write about God as if God mattered not as if man’s interpretation of God is what matters.
In my novel, God says the bible is not My word but the word of men. The cross God calls the ultimate human guilt trip. God also says Churches are not about Me but about human ideas. There is no original sin, that is again a human idea used to control people.
God has never supported the idea of war and says all killings in God’s name are false ideas and murder. God says there is no heaven or hell except what you create in your life. God says most churches have nothing to do with who God is and are in fact just the work of human egos.
The novel will bring freedom to many people as they learn how to related to God directly.
The novel will soon be available at my blog http://www.ExploreLifeBlog.com
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:48 pm
Personally, I try to avoid black holes and anything that negates my current quantum state, so No.
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:59 pm
I do believe God exists. I do believe there have been some well-written apologetics on the existence of God; however, I am not about to recap all of them here. I will say this, the very nature of God or a spiritual world presupposes a faith or hope in something unseen or unprovable. Granted, I believe God came in the form of Jesus Christ, but I cannot prove to anyone, at least in a scientific sense, that He was/is God. I could have witnessed the miracles and resurrection, but this does not necessarily mean I can prove He is/was God. I mean, even people who lived with Him at the time did not believe. To try and prove something that is based on faith or hope, is almost impossible. I can’t prove my parents love me, but I know they do. Sure they have found different ways to express their love, at least in a Western societal sense, but I suppose that could all be elaborate ruse or something to that end. If God can be proven to exist, what business would we have with faith or hope? If the spiritual world can be tested empirically, it would cease to be a spiritual world and that is a contradiction in terms.
To quote G.K. Chesterton, author of Orthodoxy:
“Imagination does not breed insanity. Exactly what does breed insanity is reason. Poets do not go mad; but chess players do…Perhaps the strongest case of all is this: that only one great English poet went mad, Cowper. And he was definitely driven mad by logic, by the ugly and alien logic of predestination. Poetry was not the disease, but the medicine…Poetry is sane because it floats easily in an infinite sea; reason seeks to cross the infinite sea, and so make it finite. The result is mental exhaustion…The poet only asks to get his head into the heavens. It is the logician who seeks to get the heavens into his head. And it is his head that splits…The madman is not the man who has lost his reason. The madman is the man who has lost everything except his reason…Materialists and madmen never have doubts…Mysticism keeps men sane. As long as you have the mystery you have health; when you destroy mystery you create morbidity.”
March 2nd, 2008 at 10:04 pm
I believe in God, but I’ve become disillusioned with the Catholic Church itself(I’m still a Catholic, though) and the concept of church as a whole. I’ve driven by many large, beautiful churches, and even some that had flashing lights advertising what the upcoming Mass would be about, or any upcoming church events. Yes, the money they get during church and through donations truly is going to help the poor and hungry, yessiree.
People corrupt the concept of God for their own ends. I personally believe He’s there, and I believe that heaven is not a particular place; it is an eternity of you at your happiest. Whatever you want, whenever you want, it will be there for you. I’d like that much more than sitting on a cloud with a harp and a halo, personally.
March 2nd, 2008 at 10:06 pm
Joseph Bernard, #425…your book sounds interesting, btw
March 2nd, 2008 at 11:31 pm
Vodie, thanks.
It was a lot of work.
But it is a handy tool and resource for anyone, believer or not.
But those people who simply ignore it and go their whole lives refusing to even SEE the other side, that is what is wrong.
March 2nd, 2008 at 11:59 pm
I think, we all should read Letter to a Christian Nation and all the works of Richard Dawkins.
Then, we can scientifically argue.
March 3rd, 2008 at 12:49 am
yes.
March 3rd, 2008 at 12:56 am
You know it’s actually kind of sad not that so many people disagree but they can’t leave it at that…a disagreement. The comments on here are the most intelligent (except for a few) comments on this subject i’ve ever seen i one place…for once it isn’t just a bunch of:
“this is why god doesn’t exists”
“this is why he does”
“you’r an idiot”
“you’re going to hell”
Yeah…a bunch of that. I’ve read almost all of these comments and as many people have said there is no 100% proof either way that will convince 100% of people one way or the other and most people here seem to uunderstand that. I just think it’s cool, that’s all…anywhere else on the internet and these comments would be full of insults and false facts…
March 3rd, 2008 at 12:59 am
you really have to look at it from a point of fact, evidence and good old common sense.
if existence were a court trial and it had to be proved or dispproved god existed, then, based on my above points, would god be proven to exist or not? like I have said before, athiests use evidence (or lack thereof) and biblical quotes, believers use the “have faith” or “it’s in the bible” card. we all know what would hold up in court.
for any believers read http://www.whydoesgodhateamputees.com/ for more common sensed argument.
summary: people pray a brain tumour to be cured. cancer goe into remission – it was god.
try and get millions or billions of people to pray for god to heal an amputee – we all know it won’t happen. i have to ask how long do we go on before people see reason and logic? unfortunately the have faith rebuttel doesn’t cut it, for the same reason why people who believe in fate get up every day and go to work.
BTW jfrater, unregistered people can use the same username as registered people, should check that out
March 3rd, 2008 at 1:07 am
i agree with Phillies. i believe there is God, someone who we really don’t know, but always there to guide us.
March 3rd, 2008 at 1:16 am
Davo, indeed!
too bad all the delusional theists won’t even take the time to read these…
go to the first link, there are 50 SIMPLE proofs AGAINST the existence of ‘god’ [god is imaginary]
There are also youtube videos to be viewed.
ANY CHRISTIAN OR PERSON OF RELIGION, READ THE 50 SIMPLE PROOFS BEFORE SUBJECTING US TO DEMEANING CRITICISM.
We have taken the time to understand what you are saying, read the bible, gone to church for years; so please be fair and take the time to hear what we have to say. Plus it is a lot less to read.
March 3rd, 2008 at 1:26 am
#426 Joseph Bernard, it would appear to me as if you wrote about a subject you know nothing…or you simply disregard certain things…
You specifically mentioned that “God has never supported the idea of war and says all killings in God’s name are false ideas and murder.”
Yet he is ordering the pogromic destruction of many people.
Have you ever actually… read… the bible?
Look in Leviticus 20 for starters.
Or Exodus 21. Or many other chapters in that sick twisted propagandizing book.
The mindless vengeance of “god” [god is imaginary] is no more than the wanton acts of destruction by primitive men.
March 3rd, 2008 at 1:49 am
God Is Imaginary & Davo:
Neither of you understand the fact that God is not disproven OR proven to be real by MODERN LOGIC. But how is it logic if it is but an extremely tiny bit of information about the universe as a whole? In all truth we basically know nothing about how everything works or where it came from and citing what is currently known as full proof that he isn’t real is just ignorant. I’m not going to shove my belief that god is real down your throat but hy are you? Why does it matter if people disagree with you? You seem really insecure…
March 3rd, 2008 at 1:52 am
God Is Imaginary:
Any by he way your list proves nothing either…it is based on, like I said, the tiny bit of information that e DO have about how everything works and that is nowhere enough information to prove either way…
March 3rd, 2008 at 2:00 am
People cite death and war are God being cruel but if indeed he is real ten it isn’t his doing but mans…WE start wars, We commit murder, WE are responsible…if God is real then that means the bible is truth and Genisis is right man dooming themselves so if he is real then people using death as an excuse are contradictng themselves…God doesn’t make us sin, when a baby is born he/she has never sinned or done wrong but he/she is overwhelmed by genertion after generation of wrongdoing. So if God is real then according to the bible man turned away from HIM and caused his own sufferng yet you make it look like God likes to make people suffer…by your logic, then, man likes to make himself suffer!
March 3rd, 2008 at 2:04 am
Think about this:
You are responsible for a whole civilization. Everyone has turned against you and say you are not real because you don’t do everything they ask…do you start doing everything they ask even though they will just disrespect and turn against you once again and say you never did anything?
March 3rd, 2008 at 2:05 am
I’m normally not a praying man, but if you’re up there, please save me Superman.- Homer Simpson
but seriously
I’ve tried, wanted and needed to believe that someone up there was looking out for me and have had two serious “attempts” at Christianity. Both attempts have left me with less faith than I had before; the Bible is so full of inconsistencies and mistakes that any religion that bases its entire existence on it is doomed (for want of a better word) from the beginning, and the sheer stubbornness I meet in people with belief in the literal interpretation and truth of the Bible astounds me.
I can’t comment on other religions, not having read much of their teachings but a common failing seems to be that they all claim exclusivity; damning followers of other religions no matter how kind, caring, giving or loving or compassionate those people are, while at the same time claiming a loving, forgiving father/mother like god. A lot of this I blame on the religious institutions rather than the religion’s initiator, they have a common goal, to spread their own particular beliefs at the expense of all others.
Whether there is a God I suppose I’m undecided leaning more perhaps to atheism, but, I really want to be wrong. One thing I am settled on in my own mind is that all the religions I’ve come across so far do not represent what I instinctively and naturally believe are the attributes of God.
So I’m going to carry on living my life in the way I do, trying to be kind and gentle, caring and giving because that’s the way I like to be. If I’m wrong and there is a God I hope s/he takes this into account when the time comes. I just can’t imagine a God with the selfish human attributes that s/he is so often given.
March 3rd, 2008 at 2:11 am
Wow…I’ve jumped into this one way too late. Ok…”God” is simply a word used to describe a certain phenomenon (or phenomena) present in the Universe. To say to someone, “There is no God” is basically saying “You can’t call it that.” No one can deny the presence of this thing, a thing that basically remains nameless and without appropriate description. I’m sure those readers who have probed the mysteries of the Universe with some discipline know exactly what I’m talking about. “God” is simply one way of looking at it. Therefore, theists and atheists are BOTH right, they’re just standing at two different points of perspective. This reminds me of a recent epiphany I had. It was regarding the debate of free will vs. predestination. My basic thesis was this: particle vs. wave is to light as free will vs. predestination is to action. I’m not going to get into details here. For those of you who are familiar with the quantum physicists “double slit experiment”, consider how, similarly, observation of past action collapses the apparent randomness of free will into a concrete, linear path one could call “predestined”.
March 3rd, 2008 at 3:30 am
No and no.
March 3rd, 2008 at 4:08 am
Bjorn- Okay, great retort. Very intelligent. *sigh*
March 3rd, 2008 at 4:15 am
It seems to me that too many people, atheists included (ESPECIALLY atheists) buy into this description of God as some white haired, robed guy sitting up in the clouds somewhere. I call this “Christian mythology” in part because it quite accurately describes the Greek and/or Roman depiction of Zeus. This is not what God is. I will not attempt to describe God, instead I will only quote the Tao Te Ching- “The tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao. The name that can be named is not the eternal Name. The unnamable is the eternally real. Naming is the origin of all particular things.” I myself am a Zen student. Zen, and Buddhism in general, are “nontheistic” religions- that is, we don’t worship and kind of God and prefer not to talk about any kind of God. Whether or not God exists is beside the point. The heart of the matter is how you live your life.
March 3rd, 2008 at 6:29 am
a couple of things…
#411 demize: you say “As an atheist my answer is no. However, as an atheist I don’t condem or judge those who do believe in a higher power.” you then say “(i) believed the bullcrap that was drilled into my head from 1st grade till i was in 10th grade. Then I decided to start thinking for myself.” please tell me you see the inconsistencies between your two statements. “i don’t condemn or judge” then “bullcrap” and “start thinking for myself”
#426 joseph bernard: you give such certain answers about what is the true nature of God. how did you arrive at these conclusions? not by reading scripture obviously. so why should we read your book being that it is just your singular interpretation of cosmic realities?
for all the atheists out there, the bible gives you an open door to shut the mouth of all christians. it isn’t just blind faith. scripture says that if you can prove the resurrection of Christ, bodily from the grave, didn’t happen then we are fools to believe it. in the Bible in the book of 1 Corinthians in chapter 15 verse 19 it says “if only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men.”
this verse comes in the context of the chapter while the author Paul is talking about resurrection. the christian hope of bodily rising from the dead to spend eternity with Christ isn’t just a random thought. it is promsied by God and as evidence that he is powerful enough to accomplish this he did it to Christ. Paul is saying that if there is no hope after this life, i.e. heaven, then you shouldn’t argue against us. you should pity us more than anyone else you have ever seen. we have devoted our life to a powerless God who cannot keep his promises if the resurrection isn’t true.
atheists scream for christians to look at the “evidence”. show me this evidence and i will gladly walk to your side.
March 3rd, 2008 at 6:32 am
God – Man’s most peculiar creation.
March 3rd, 2008 at 6:41 am
I have needed to reconcile god with the facts of biology and evolution since Grade 1 or 2. When I was young it was easier. The Bible says god created the earth in 6 days; ok, so 6 days, in God-Time was 6 billion years. No Problem. By Grade 3 I realized the Bible was a series of parables and not the literal truth. Of course as I got older and was exposed to more religions I realized that nothing made my god any better or more believable or more worthy than Buddha, Allah, or Mother Earth. Evil has been perpetrated in the name of all of these different manifestations of God, and Great Good. So although I don’t believe in religion or God in the traditional sense, I have respect for most of those who do. I have a few questions for the Fundamentalists out there (of any religion).
1. Where did you go to school? How can you be educated and not know and believe in evolution? Grade 1 folks.
2. How do you discount the rest of humanity? Buddhists? Taoists? Jewish Folk? Catholics? (ha ha) Aren’t at least some of them worthy of heaven?
OK maybe just two questions.
March 3rd, 2008 at 6:57 am
mom424: to answer your first question, go to the thread about evolution.
as far as #2, this is a basic misunderstanding of Biblical doctrine. you are right in that the Bible says that Buddhists, Taoists, Jews and Catholics are not worthy of heaven. but this is where most people stop. the Bible also says that Christians aren’t worthy of heaven either. none of us are worthy enough to warrant an audience with the Almighty Creator of everything.
i have done nothing to merit the status given me in Christ and anything i receive is based solely on his good pleasure and grace.
part of the problem is that atheists say and believe things like “well, if i was God i would…” or “i wouldn’t do…”. God, as revealed in the Bible, is not like man. of course the typical atheists would do things different. and they would all be incredibly self-serving, just like if i had all the power.
like i said earlier, i believe in God because he is nothing like me.
March 3rd, 2008 at 7:24 am
I like at times to hear the anceint’s word,
And have a care to be most civil.
It’s really kind of such a noble lord
So humanely to gossip with the devil
March 3rd, 2008 at 8:04 am
Has anyone mentioned consciousness? could it be that “the observer” is just a parlor trick on the combined Biological senses? Is that even possible? All of the universe from a singularity doesn’t explain sentience.
March 3rd, 2008 at 8:14 am
Sorry if something like this has been posted up before (I haven’t read through all the comments yet), but I’m noticing a few comments that talk about God damning people to hell or religion as simply “following rules”.
God doesn’t send people to hell simply because they lived a pretty good life, but just didn’t believe in the right stuff. The people who God sends to hell are those who continue to make a concious choice to defy and deny Him. Hell isn’t filled with people who’ve already repented, but God’s just keeping them in for kicks, Hell is filled with people who, for all eternity, want to be the centre of the universe by continuing their rebellion against God.
Just two cents I mostly borrowed from a book, but I completely agree with it.
March 3rd, 2008 at 8:18 am
Your view? This isn’t something one has a “view” about. Anybody who asks that question think they’re standing in the place of God but are actually still in the place of the creature, no matter their good intentions.
March 3rd, 2008 at 8:22 am
There’s also another quote I really like..
“You can’t be mad at God and not believe in him at the same time.”
Bonus points for figuring out where that’s from.
March 3rd, 2008 at 8:42 am
God is real, he loves you and Jesus is the Man. Too many times I have spoken with my pastor and he told me stories of exorcisms he participated in, one in particular, he recieved scratch marks in his arms as he was using Holy Water. Believe what you will, pure evil exists, Satan hates us, and God is the only One Who can defeat pure evil. My pastor also told the story of an atheist to whom he visited on his death bed. He denounced Christ and God all his life. My pastor went there because the family asked him to. The man was an atheist right up to the point he was going to die and then he started screaming for God, there are no atheists on their death bed. I was good friends with a VERY nice lady at church. She was elderly but developed cancer and died. There was a big funeral. Her husband who also was very nice and a friend took it hard and lasted about 2 years after her death. On his death bed, he told his daughter that he just spoke to her mother, her mother asked her father, the dying man WHAT TOOK YOU SO LONG? He told her that he was going to her when he damned well felt like it. This sounded EXACTLY like her. Of course I also believe in ghosts. I went to Gettysburg Military Park with my family and one night we ALL heard ghosts boots on a tower and tapping on the tower. Don’t believe me? I have it on video tape. There is NO WAY there was an outside influence from the way we were positioned. My son and I were separated from my wife and daughter and AT THE SAME TIME we all described what we heard and said the same thing. Finally, my life was not going well. I went back to church, gave generous offering, participated and waited. It took time, 5 months of unemplyoment, but I received an excellent job in the US federal gov’t. My children are healthy and my marriage is 21 years old. Go to church, pray and BELIEVE, what do you have to lose but time and you will have everything to gain. Don’t be taken in by the televangelists, they are quacks.
March 3rd, 2008 at 9:14 am
Lots of comments that I didn’t read.
Yes, without a doubt, 100%, God exists.
March 3rd, 2008 at 9:16 am
Okay let us have a discussion here, not a childish brandishing of nonsensical word-fighting.
fishing4monkeys:
“You seem really insecure…”
VERY INTELLIGENT… props. kudos.
you also say this little guy:
“Neither of you understand the fact that God is not disproven OR proven to be real by MODERN LOGIC. But how is it logic if it is but an extremely tiny bit of information about the universe as a whole? In all truth we basically know nothing about how everything works or where it came from and citing what is currently known as full proof that he isn’t real is just ignorant. I’m not going to shove my belief that god is real down your throat but hy are you? Why does it matter if people disagree with you?”
Logic does not change over time, it is something developed by the laws of how things realate in time. that is another entire discussion, however.
I have a good quote for all you people on here.
“Rational arguments don’t usually work for religious people, otherwise there would be no religious people.” -Dr. House
you clearly say this: “Any by he way your list proves nothing either…it is based on, like I said, the tiny bit of information that e DO have about how everything works and that is nowhere enough information to prove either way…”
yet….did you actually…I dont know… READ my list?
find me ONE flaw in it, just ONE.
did you watch any of my videos?
find me ONE flaw in them, just ONE.
read your bible before asking me questions and condemning my words without proof or rationalization.
March 3rd, 2008 at 9:17 am
Nope, never did, never will.
(And yes, my parents do/did, and went to church, and brought me along, so I wasn’t brought up in a satanist household or something…)
March 3rd, 2008 at 9:19 am
i think it is odd how something can be so obvious and drastically different to two groups of people. i always though everyone believed in god, or a god, just not jesus…
i believe in god, and jesus, and salvation…
if you dont, i respect that because disbelief requires much more faith.
March 3rd, 2008 at 10:01 am
I haven’t the time to read through all these postings. I would just assume that no one has tried to make the argument that the existence of god can be proven or disproven, either way. This would be incredibly foolhardy and it’s for that reason that I have little interest in engaging in this discussion.
I sense, however, by briefly scanning some of the previous posts, that some people have tried to go this very route.
*sigh.*
Let’s dispense with this silliness.
God cannot be disproven by challenging the Bible. (Nor can he be proven by *citing* the Bible). To a fundamentalist, perhaps, but they’re never rational people anyway, fundamentalists. The tack can be taken that the Bible was simply written by humans anyway, and so it cannot be used to justify or deny god’s existence. Or one could take the tack that, like the gods of the East, god’s strange and irrational-seeming actions are merely irrational or strange seeming to US, we puny mortals who only see the tiniest portion in the foreground of god’s great *background*–i.e., death and destruction are sometimes our lot, and we don’t really matter as “individuals” as much as we think—but rather as a whole—”mankind” vs. “me” or “you.” There is some sense to this view; let’s face it, life ain’t pleasant sometimes no matter how you look at it, and we then have to wonder why a nice god would make for us such a crummy existence. And clearly the answer is, there wasn’t much point in making beings who lived only in total happiness. God, for whatever reason, either weaves a vast and complex tapestry, much of it which we can’t even discern…. and/or he made everything and then stepped back and let it go its own way. Either way you look at it, pointing out the weirdness and inconsistencies of god in the Bible doesn’t say much for his existence or non-existence.
All this also, of course, assumes we’re talking about the god of the Bible–i.e., the Judeo-Christian-Islamic god. But we aren’t the only people who wonder about and think about god.
There’s even an old idea that speaks of our relationship to god. It’s this: that stage one of man’s interaction with god was the stage of God the Father. This is the vengeful, often angry god of the Old Testament (in reality he is very much a sky-god along the lines of Zeus and dozens of others–a human-like, emotional god who often seems to act irrationally. A god of war as much as a god of peace. Mankind, in its childhood, needed a stern father figure god, and thus god fit that bill.
Stage Two was the age of God as the Son. In other words, Jesus as an intermediary, but also as a “new facet” of god—god becoming US, becoming human to bring us closer to an equal setting with him. Giving us the chance to become him, in a sense—to emulate Jesus (or Buddha) so that we might expand what we are, in our understanding. Few modern christians as yet buy this—they view Jesus as simply god in another suit. Makes little sense when you consider it—why did god wait to do this, then? And why play it the way he did? Surely there must be more to Jesus than that. Surely we’re meant to “be” him, in a sense–Jesus even says this many times.
Stage Three is supposedly the stage we should be in now, and some of us are–The age of the Holy Ghost–the age of a personal relationship with god, where the church or at least religion in general is no longer necessary (but is in fact detrimental) to our understanding of god and so forth. This is the age of mystery, where we’ve become self-aware enough and Jesus-like enough to grasp that god is a great mystery that we can become a part of.
I’ve always felt there was a lot to say for this idea.
I do not believe in the survival of the ego, after death. In other words I don’t believe that I die and then wake up as a spirit in some country-club/gated community Heaven, and I exist there as essentially the person I am now, but without a body. Neither do I believe in a “personal” god–i.e., a god who is a being himself, a god like another person. Rather, I believe that we are all manifestations of consciousness—as Joseph Campbell said, that we confuse our bodies with what we are–we are the light, not the vehicle the light rides in for a time–i.e, we are the light, not the lightbulb. And at death this light, this consciousness, simply returns to the pool of consciousness that is the universe, is god.
I sense, as a rational being with consciousness, that there is something to the universe beyond what we can see and sense. I don’t believe it is the fairy tale of the Bible, but rather something deeper and more mysterious—that the Bible can give us some insights into it, and into life in general—but that the Bible isn’t the answer. Maybe there *is no answer.*
March 3rd, 2008 at 10:08 am
I’ll let everyone know when I’m dead.
March 3rd, 2008 at 10:12 am
thank you jamie.ill check it after i make me dinner=]
March 3rd, 2008 at 10:23 am
I do believe in god, and I am a scientist. The structure of the universe is too wonderous, too amazing, a work of creation that had to have had a creator(I also believe that evolution does work).
I do believe in god and Jesus Christ is his son.
March 3rd, 2008 at 10:24 am
Supposedly a friend of a friend of mine came up with a mathematical equation that prove God exists…I have not seen it so i can comment on it…next time i see him though…im going to see if he can come up with an equation that proves which God is right…:D
March 3rd, 2008 at 10:32 am
may be you guys can just ask him, just say “God if you exist, prove yourself to me”.
don’t say stuff like “God if you exist, let me win the lottery”
just ask him plain and simple, unless you are scared to know the answer
March 3rd, 2008 at 10:33 am
may be you guys can just ask him, just say “God if you exist, prove yourself to me”.
don’t say stuff like “God if you exist, let me win the lottery”
March 3rd, 2008 at 10:51 am
I’ve actually read *most* of these comments, but i still don’t think he exists. Everybody brings powerful reasons on to what they think of, but i still can’t be persuaded into thinking the wrong thing. I believe in Evolution and stuff like that, and i think that “Life after Death” is ridiculous, im not trying to offend anybody, but come on…..
March 3rd, 2008 at 11:01 am
may be you guys can just ask him, just say “God if you exist, prove yourself to me”.
don’t say stuff like “God if you exist, let me win the lottery”
For starters, you shall not tempt the Lord your God. What you are asking is blasphemy. Besides he has already given us that answer, a billion times over. We, you, choose not to acknowledge it.
Would you ask Donald Trump to see his millions or do you take it for granted that he has millions of dollars and if you do, WHY? You’ve never seen it, have you?
Evolution? Why is it so easy to believe in evolution? How many years were dinosaurs supposed to be related to lizards and now that is WRONG it is birds? Science is so inexact and yet EVERYBODY always quotes it. Tell me, if creation is a crock, how did the writers of the bible know we come from the very earth we walk upon? God created life with a handful of dirt – science has proven we have all the minerals of the earth in our bodies. Did the writers of the Bible have science when they stated this?
It makes me laugh how you atheists will faint at the sight of Barack Hussein Obama and yet, you find it impossible to believe in God.
March 3rd, 2008 at 11:03 am
“exist” wouldn’t be my word of choice.
March 3rd, 2008 at 11:05 am
If you notice most people that say they believe in god, believe for a reason for thier own existence or as a solution to the question where did time begin. It’s never based on any other reasonable explanation. God would not exist for any other reason it seems. I really believe we make up god to answer these inexplicable dilemmas. What if time doesn’t work the way we think, what if time doesn’t require a beginning or an end, what if we are thinking about time in an incorrect paradigm. If you anyone would pick up a book on Egyptian religion you’ll find that the same god and messiahs we adore today, came from Egyptian religions and pagan rituals. The messiah that was crucified in the cross, rose from the dead, healed the sick and performed miracles… yes I’m talking about Horus from Egyptian history. I’m glad people are actually questioning these old stories and thinking for themselves… it will only be a matter of time until we find true answers and real understanding of our world, the universe, time, and physics… and each step will be a step away from our enslavement to the current dark times of occults and religion. Sorry to say… god is only a figment of our current understanding of the world as we know it now.
March 3rd, 2008 at 11:16 am
R Brown : i do believe in God and and i do know that seek him and you shall find him, i am not encourging people to tempt the lord, but your blog is the first i have read that actually boldly states that God exist.
it maybe wrong but i did that so that a believer in God would have the chance to stand up for him.
so far, there are alot of persons who don’t believe.
March 3rd, 2008 at 11:20 am
R Brown: Even the devil Karl Rove is calling the Barack Hussein Obama thing a step to far…and did you even bother to check in on the idol worship some evangelicals give Bush and Reagan? tisk, tisk. And then don’t get me started on the whole Walker-Bush connections to Nazism…I was under the impression the “sins” of the father Do Not fall on the son. As for demanding stuff from “god” like winning the lottery, how is that any different than asking him to change “his” will and sparing your poor dear mother dying from breast cancer?
As for my take on it: something intelligent put us here, that does not mean that they give a damn about us or pay attention to what we do. They might. Hell “god” may even be your new next door neighbor who needed a change of scenery. My impression is that if there is one god and it is the Judeo-Christian impression of a supreme being…why haven’t we as human beings always worshiped one “true” god?
March 3rd, 2008 at 11:24 am
R Brown:
Your posting is so chock-full of nonsense and distortion that I’m tempted to just remind you to take your medication and be done with it.
But screw it, let’s take your rant apart piece by piece. It’s too easy.
Oh, but before that, let’s agree on one thing–yes, god does NOT offer proof of himself. You wanna believe, believe. You don’t wanna believe, then don’t. Free will. Nice deal. I like it.
But… evolution. Clearly, R., you know absolutely ZIP about science. That’s why you people who fall for creationism really need to dig your heads out of your asses and start reading and looking into the facts. Now then… good lord, where do I begin? Well, to start with, A) dinosaurs are viewed and still ARE viewed as REPTILES. Lizards are therefore their relatives. You’re wrong–that view hasn’t changed in the slightest. All reptiles are related. That doesn’t make them the same–simply related. And as I say, this view hasn’t changed. BIRDS, R., are now viewed as the DESCENDANTS of a certain group of dinosaurs. This makes them related also, but in a different sense–lizards are not the *descendants* of dinos, merely their close cousins (as are crocodiles, turtles, etc.)–whereas birds, the evidence now strongly suggests, DID evolve from SOME dinos. Get it? It’s not that hard to understand. WE, in fact, are more distant cousins of reptiles in general—ALL life on earth is in fact “related” to some degree or other. But let’s keep the reptiles-dinos-lizards-birds thing straight, okay?
B) Science only seems inexact because unlike more dogmatic systems like religion, it (science) is always fluid, based on the EVIDENCE we have. A theory or idea in science sometimes starts out sketchy because the evidence only amounts to so much at the time, and experimentation has only gone so far. But as evidence piles up and experimentation increases and broadens, then ideas firm up a bit more. But it is a POSITIVE for science that it is always fluid and open to new ideas–assuming such ideas have STRONGER evidence supporting them than the OLD ideas have. In any case this is not inexactitude but is rather the way, simply, that science works—it questions, investigates, experiments. Dogma does none of this.
C) Your point about the writers of the Bible knowing we came from the earth is nonsensical. All it shows is that we are and always have been smart creatures who often got things right (but not always) in a BROAD sense via our intuition. The idea of an “earth mother” goes WAY back before the Judeo-Christian religion though, R., and in fact you’re making a point for *pagan* faiths here, not for your own. Pre-Christian and even pre-Judaic religions and mythologies often recognized an earth mother, or that we “came from the earth.” Are you therefore validating *them* as well? No, rather, all this says is that we’re smart and we recognize that life is dependent on the earth to a certain extent. It proves nothing about creationism in the slightest.
D) What the hell does Barack Obama have to do with this? Nothing. Yet of course you use his middle name, which suggests you’re one of these right-wing yahoos (the rest of your post confirms it) who thinks it’s cute to play on the fears of the moment and anti-islamism. Fortunately for the rest of us, you and your ilk won’t be running the show in the US much longer, R.—you’ve had your shot with your bullying, ignorant President the last 8 years, and all you and he have done is to show how stupid and ill-equipped Americans can be to understand and deal with the great world as a whole.
Please wake up out of your half-dream state of ignorance and take a look at what the world of science and knowledge has to offer—none of it is a challenge to your religion, unlike what you apparently believe—they’re simply tools that *god* gives us as a gift. If you don’t like these tools then go get a lobotomy to remove the intelligence and curiosity from your brain—clearly you don’t want either one of them anyway.
March 3rd, 2008 at 11:31 am
GingerLee: Because all gods [God is Imaginary] are false.
R Brown: when did they say that lizards and reptiles are not related to dinosaurs? all they modified in the ever expanding evolutionary theory [fact] is that birds are evolved from them AS WELL.
check out the site, it will do all of you some good.
find anything wrong with it; I challenge all of you.
March 3rd, 2008 at 11:47 am
God is Imaginary:
What’s with this weird, oddly personal crusade you seem to be on? It’s as bad as the proselytizing Christian extremists who try to ram the very shit you’re so offended by (and I’m so offended by) into our skulls.
Yeah, I DO find a basic error in your site–I’m meeting your challenge.
What you’re crusading against and railing against is one interpretation (and a shallow one at that) of the god of the Bible. (The shallow interpretation isn’t yours, I should clarify, but rather it belongs to the shallow people who subscribe to the interpretation—but you’re clearly responding with equal shallowness in focusing on that interpretation). All your arguments indicate is that, in the self-contradictory text of the Bible, we have evidence for a skewed and flawed message. Well no shit. Everyone with a brain who doesn’t ignore the uncomfortable questions about the Bible (fundamentalists are the only ones who do this as a rule) knows this. Everything you’re saying is simply a variation on the tired old (and childish) argument of, “if god is so kind and loving, then why does he let awful things happen?” You’re simply presenting it in (slightly) more sophisticated fashion.
It troubles me to take on someone with your view because in a certain sense I don’t disagree with it—you’re calling into question the general assumptions people make based on the text they’re given, and the way in which they fail to question it or investigate it. And this I agree with you on.
But the way you go about it is absurd and over-the-top. It’s bad, and stupid, to ignore and even hate science because you think it challenges your dogma. This is what fundamentalists/creationists do. But it’s equally bad and stupid to dispense with an entire element of the human psyche and overall “persona” (i.e., the spiritual) simply because you don’t like the contradictions and dogmatism of *religion.*
In other words, you’re confusing religion with spirituality. The former is often harmful and troublesome. The latter is something else entirely.
You want to believe there’s no god, that god is imaginary—more power to you. But I do think it’s a sad and limiting basis to face the mystery of life and the universe with, pal. I’ve been there, I should know.
I applaud any attempt to blow the lid off of the biases, dogmas and ignorant bigotries of fundamentalists of ANY religion. But I don’t applaud replacing those dogmas with another.
March 3rd, 2008 at 11:49 am
I think this is an apt summation:
“I contend that we are [all] atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours.”
~ Stephen Roberts
March 3rd, 2008 at 11:50 am
Regarding the problem of evil, and rejecting the biblical God because of suffering, you might like:
Bart’s Problem: why do we suffer?
March 3rd, 2008 at 12:03 pm
@petey (142) says: i spent 5 years as a park ranger. that job entailed me walking about 4 hours a day through the woods. i have been out in all seasons, all weather, and everything between. spend spring in the woods, and you will be convinced that yes, god does exist. there’s no other way i can rationally explain it. i am a scientist by nature and have struggled with the idea that there is really no rational reasoning behind god. a higher power does not make rational sense. but see the flowers. see the growth where there was dormancy all winter. hear the birds and smell the growth. whatever you call it, god is real.
Petey, you echo the scripture, which says:
Romans 1:20-21
For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse, because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened.
March 3rd, 2008 at 12:07 pm
Mike Giggler:
Please stop your comments. I will be praying for you.
March 3rd, 2008 at 12:09 pm
I understand the argument that no evidence exists in the reality of God, but people must also understand that lack of evidence is not evidence to the contrary. I would like to say that I know an absolute answer to this question, but I as well as most others do not. I would like to pose a question about this that can be answered individually, such as why are we here? If someone questions themselves about why we are here they may question where our beginnings and ends are, therefore answering if there is a god on a personal level.
March 3rd, 2008 at 12:14 pm
“HE DOES!! exist”:
see, right there–don’t SAY you will be praying for anybody. That, in itself, is a kind of showing off, the very kind that the Bible speaks out against. If you’re going to pray for someone, then just go and do it, by yourself, in private. Don’t TELL them or SAY to others that you’re going to—there’s no earthly reason to do so except to boast. In essence it is to say, “I am a true believer and I demonstrate I am so by making the statement that I am going to go pray for you–and I further demarcate myself from *you,* a non-believer, and by making this statement that I am going to pray for you, I imply that I am superior to you and that you are flawed and lost.”
Shut up and do it. Don’t say it.
March 3rd, 2008 at 12:16 pm
I do, and I love it!! Hope the rest of you non-believers enjoy an eternity of darkness, pain, and misery.
March 3rd, 2008 at 12:16 pm
And… “Mike Giggler”:
You just need to grow up.
And develop some better humor. ‘Cause you’re not anywhere near as funny as you think you are, dork.
March 3rd, 2008 at 12:17 pm
and DonnaLee:
You’re a perfect example of the kind of religious bigot that is already in a kind of hell all of your own making.
March 3rd, 2008 at 12:17 pm
“I understand the argument that no evidence exists in the reality of God, but people must also understand that lack of evidence is not evidence to the contrary.”
Lack of evidence = no reason to believe in it. I mean, do you believe in Valhalla? There isn’t any evidence for it, but there’s none against it either.
There is no such thing as evidence against something; that cannot exist without an equal lack of evidence for something else. There is no evidence for God, so why would anyone feel the need to go out and try and find evidence that he doesn’t exist?
March 3rd, 2008 at 12:25 pm
“For starters, you shall not tempt the Lord your God. What you are asking is blasphemy. Besides he has already given us that answer, a billion times over. We, you, choose not to acknowledge it.”
How can that be right? God made us and he is omniscient. Therefore, he has known since the beginning of time who is going to believe and who isn’t therefore, he’s always known who he is going to condemn to fry for eternity in Hell.
March 3rd, 2008 at 12:27 pm
I agree with you Chickensoup.
Dave: The best we can say is that the question is invalid. It can’t be answered. Since it can’t be answered the hypothesis is nullified.
Technically there are billions upon billions of unstated hypotheses. Just taking the time to state one does not lend it credibility. Nor does it require proof of it’s non-existence.
An example would be suggesting that there is a constant stream of invisible unicorns from our solar system to the closest other solar system. If we could just locate it, then our interstellar travel options would increase dramatically.
My posing this hypothesis does not in any way require you to furnish proof of it’s lunacy in order to invalidate it.
God is no different.
Most of us are unbelievers because there is no way to prove that there is a God.
March 3rd, 2008 at 12:30 pm
By the way, Randall – excellent response to R Brown.
March 3rd, 2008 at 12:31 pm
how about we just worship a milk jug?
it’ll do the same thing that happens when we worship God,
nothing.
March 3rd, 2008 at 12:40 pm
JFrater: Could we get a little help with this Mike Giggler fool? He is bringing the whole discussion down with him.
March 3rd, 2008 at 12:43 pm
Jamie or Cyn should be along shortly to take care of him.
March 3rd, 2008 at 12:49 pm
Mike Giggler:
The mere number of years under one’s belt does not make one a grown up, butthead.
And admitting to being 43 years old–and acting as you are–only makes you *more* pathetic, not less. Either you still live in your mom’s basement, or if you *are* out on your own and perhaps even married, then your wife was probably hugely desperate.
March 3rd, 2008 at 1:14 pm
wetsocks -
“There isn’t a God, and I know this solely for the fact that they have to force it into your head when it’s still soft and you’re still Santa Clause eligible. If they didn’t teach religion until we turned 18, this world would be a much different place because we would never buy into it.”
Thats a very good point.
March 3rd, 2008 at 1:27 pm
Mike Giggler- I think I speak for all of us when i say SHUT THE HELL UP.
March 3rd, 2008 at 1:32 pm
Mike Giggler, watch this link and pay attention to step 5
http://www.videojug.com/film/how-to-behave-on-an-internet-forum
March 3rd, 2008 at 1:39 pm
“Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.” Ben Franklin
As a scientist, that’s proof enough for me……mmmm……Beeeer.
March 3rd, 2008 at 1:46 pm
look everyone, just ignore the comments of Trolls. They always go somewhere else soon enough. Don’t mention him or his name.
March 3rd, 2008 at 1:48 pm
Don’t Feed the troll(Mike Giggler)!
March 3rd, 2008 at 2:00 pm
God created men to his image : apes. Then, men evolved….but we don’t know what happened to God…XD
March 3rd, 2008 at 2:25 pm
I would like to address one point, the notion that you can neither prove nor disprove the existence of a deity without attacking the bible or the like.
This notion is also related to strong / weak atheism, the above notion only involves strong atheism i.e. evidence must be presented on ANY topic before it can be falsified, if no evidence is put forth, what then are you falsifying? Which brings me to my point, in weak atheism (the proper form, for proper logic) the atheist awaits ‘evidence’ from the deist, THEN (and only then) the atheist will logically dismantle the evidence, the atheist should not attack evidence not provided by the deist (this would be akin to ‘putting words in someone’s mouth’).
Strong atheism is not only elitist, but it fuels creationist arguments of science as a religion or some form of faith.
Weak atheism is the only correct and logical form of atheism. I call it atheism. apatheism is also just another form of weak atheism. Both reject that any credible evidence exists to justify belief. I am incredulous that someone could not give ANY thought at all to the topic.
1. If ‘A’ says x exists; it is impossible to falsify (using any form of logic whatever).
2. If ‘B’ says x exists because of y and z; I can disprove x by either disproving y and or z.
Most people do not attempt to provide evidence; they just say you can’t disprove it. Correct, I can’t disprove it based on no evidence. If that is good enough to believe something, then at what point do you say “no, I need some proof for what you are saying”?
To those that say that disproving x or z does NOT disprove x…yes it does, until x can put forth more evidence to evaluate, this is how scientists work, they publish evidence and make sure all relevant individuals review the work, then scientists attempt to falsify the evidence, if the evidence can not be falsified it eventually becomes stronger and stronger, culminating in a theory / fact. Evidence that is drawn from many different fields all pointing to the same conclusion move through this process faster than do hypotheses that have some conflicting evidence or evidence from homogenous sources.
I am not going to go into all of the basic tenets of logic; which gave rise to the scientific method. But it doesn’t get much more basic than what is above.
I look forward to debating any rational people who feel otherwise, but ignorant, tired creationist mumbo-jumbo will either be sarcastically ridiculed (just for fun) or simply ignored.
March 3rd, 2008 at 2:28 pm
FOR THOSE WHO CHOSE TO QUESTION WHETHER OR NOT MY (OUR) GOD EXIST, WHY DO YOU NOT TRY TO DRAW TO HIM…HE WILL DRAW TO YOU. GOD HAS NO REASON TO HIDE HIMSELF FROM YOU (OR ME) HE HAS NO FEAR OF US, BUT LOVE. I AM NOT HERE TO CONVINCE YOU, OR TO MAKE YOU THINK. I JUST WANT THE NONE BELIEVERS AND DOUBTERS TO UNDERSTAND: THIS RELATIONSHIP IS NOT PARTIAL, ON ANY LEVEL. YOU SEEK HIS FACE AND HE WILL SHOW HIMSELF TO YOU WITH HIS ALL GLORY THAT WILL BE MARVELOUS TO YOUR MIND, BODY AND SOUL. MAY HIS NAME FOREVER BE PRAISED IN JESUS NAME. AMEN AND AMEN.
March 3rd, 2008 at 2:33 pm
A cosmological problem exists for all hypotheses put forth for a god.
5 year old: “mommy, if god created us, who created god?”
Mommy: “blah blah blah, burn in hell, blah blah blah, faith, blah blah blah, god just is.”
5 year old: “That’s dumb.”
March 3rd, 2008 at 2:36 pm
**Yawn**
I guess for me it has always boiled down to a question of faith. People who that say Christians have cooked up some sort of fairy tale in the Bible are doing essentially the same thing themselves – making up something that makes sense to them.
I have a very hard time explaining the Almighty’s role in my life to someone who simply doesn’t want to believe it, who has steeled their intellect to something of their own reasoning. I couldn’t have survived some of the shitty things in my personal life had it not been for the grace of God. It’s on a deeply personal level that I say I believe there is a God and he sent his Son to die in my place. You can’t come to that place intellectually – and that’s where most people get off the boat and point fingers at me. A hard, cold scientific explaination doesn’t explain sacrifice. It’s illogical and mysterious. But to those who believe it, it brings meaning to life itself.
So what’s your faith in? Yourself – whatever peace you’ve made in your own mind to get through the day? There’s a lot of posts out there that support that. Not me. I know first hand what God can do in a person’s life.
March 3rd, 2008 at 2:40 pm
Chosen: Please see comment posting rule #2.
March 3rd, 2008 at 2:52 pm
**double yawn**
Botulism,
The argument from personal testimony? A close cousin of the argument from personal incredulity. Both are extremely narcissistic, believing that somehow their subjective feelings/emotions directly gives insight into the universe, and the fact that they can’t comprehend something makes it false. Both are very ugly, unintentional confessions.
So god is a form of a crutch for your self? Not able to deal with the reality of life (for whatever reason), the idea that god is ‘doing it for a reason’ or ‘I trust god’ sort of thing brings you comfort, so be it.
P.s. do you prefer ‘cane’ or ‘walking-stick’?
March 3rd, 2008 at 2:56 pm
“he who can see the invisible can do the impossible”
March 3rd, 2008 at 2:59 pm
yes, God exists. look at the platypuss. That is a creature that wouldn’t have evolved. it proves God is real and has a sense of humor.
March 3rd, 2008 at 3:10 pm
Nice crutch reference damian, have you scrubbed the 666 tatoo off your head yet? I ’spose a friggen pole will be lodged into my torso on my walk to my car.
And thanks for proving my point. Narcissim comes in many forms, you make up shit to disprove my humble commentary in the proud tone you take. Did you even read my post or did you just want a minute to slander my personal feelings on the subject?
What you call crutch, Christians call faith. My God sacrificed his Son in my place, what has your god done for you?
March 3rd, 2008 at 3:20 pm
Maybe you prefer ’staff’, like your good buddy Moses. Can you turn yours into a snake also?
So hanging your son on a cross to absolve people of sins they didn’t commit is a virtue?
Brilliant!
March 3rd, 2008 at 3:20 pm
Bucslim,
Not to diminish the effect that your belief in god has had on your life. It sounds like a very real effect and for that takeaway, there are some very positive effects to a belief.
However, wouldn’t it be more noble, and wouldn’t you find more self-worth in knowing that you had actually got yourself through the more ’shitty things in your personal life’?
I’m not sure why you would want to hand of credit for your own ability to tap into inner strength and put yourself in a better place. Wouldn’t a truly noble and caring god who’s grace helped you have used his grace to stave off the trouble in the first place?
It’s questions like that, and my desire to see people proud of their own resources and accomplishments that don’t allow me to subscribe to the belief in god.
Unfortunately, many actions of god cannot be attributed to a rational being. And if you then accuse me of not being able to fathom the mind of god, how are you, and any other religous based organization, able to claim to know him?
There is no point in worshipping that which you can never know. You put yourself in as tenuous a position as any unbeliever.
March 3rd, 2008 at 3:29 pm
I believe God exists, but I don’t think you should.
Unless you want to of course, but I don’t know why you would want to do that.
Belief in God requires assumption of all sorts of responsibilities. For example, it becomes your full and exclusive responsibility to care for the least of these. You must stop behaving as if there is no God, and adopt some set of concrete morals, perhaps develop a systematic ethic, which cannot be internally inconsistent. You become liable for an entire array of laws and commandments which may or may not be knowable, and if known may or may not be impossible to keep.
Of course, most people who say they believe in God don’t even acknowledge these responsibilities, and hardly ever meet them. Then they make up some sort of lame excuse like, “I’m not perfect, just forgiven.” Well, what good does believing in God do you then? What good does your belief in God do for me?
No. I believe in God, but I don’t think you should. Not unless you are ready and willing to accept the responsibilities such belief entails. Otherwise, just keep your belief to yourself and do us all a favor.
Nathanael Snow
ndsnow@gmail.com
March 3rd, 2008 at 3:35 pm
Kraeg,
I don’t have any doubt that those rotten experiences have made me a stronger person, more determined and patient. I know I have the ability to help others in similar situations. But I guess the best way to explain it was that God gave me peace and meaning as I went through it.
As to your question on knowing God, that is a sticky situation. I don’t think there is an answer to that question that will give you satisfaction. In a simplistic way, if you’ve never tried an orange, it would be difficult for me to tell you how it tastes.
Look, I’m not trying to proselytize anyone here, just stating my belief in God.
March 3rd, 2008 at 3:40 pm
this is turning into a very depressing thread…
i am curious…for those of you that don’t believe was there a certain event that drove you away?
March 3rd, 2008 at 3:52 pm
Bucslim,
I hope you don’t take any of this as attacking you, but I find addressing some of your points is an easy way to clarify my own lack of a belief.
For fear of repeating myself, I would rather you give yourself credit for finding peace and meaning. You altered your own manner of thinking, you redefined yourself on some level, great or small, in order to overcome something difficult. There is a part of me that is deeply offended that you would deny yourself that credit, and instead try to offer thanks to the god that saw fit to allow you to suffer in the first place.
Regarding your orange analogy – a very specific difference is that you can hold up an orange. There is proof of it’s existence in it’s tangibility. By it’s sight I can correctly or incorrectly guess what it might taste like. By it’s smell, the same. The orange offers me uncontestable proof of it’s existence, even if I haven’t yet tasted it’s juice.
The gods of modern religions saw fit to offer many proofs of existence in previous times. But outside of faith – an internal experience – there is no proof of his existence.
We (as in humans) created god as a way of filling in gaps within our knowledge. Thunder. Rain. Drought. Plague. He conveniently offered explanations for phenomena which our incredibly inquisitive minds sought out. But one by one, we are removing all of those gaps by extending our knowledge. Fortunately for our intellects, we’ll never close all the gaps. The universe is too large. Unfortunately, someone will always be there to discover ‘god’ still hiding in those diminishing spaces.
March 3rd, 2008 at 3:54 pm
correction:
The gods of modern religions saw fit to offer many proofs of existence in previous times. But outside of faith – an internal experience – there is no proof of his existence in modern times. No more divine manifestations. Unless you count toast. God likes manifesting in toast.
March 3rd, 2008 at 3:56 pm
A great question zack.
No there wasn’t any one event that dispelled my belief. I can trace it back to one event that started me questioning others belief in god.
I’d be curious to hear others input on this.
March 3rd, 2008 at 4:03 pm
Kraeg, I would much rather discuss this in a civilized manner like you and I where we can all appreciate each others values. And I wasn’t taking any offence in your questions.
I have those same questions from time to time. I suppose it’s baffling to try to understand something as personal as this is, just as it’s baffling to me to try to understand a life without faith. I just don’t want to be lumped in with the seemingly crazed zealot, I detest defending that.
March 3rd, 2008 at 4:10 pm
Heh – you certainly don’t come across as a zealot, bucslim.
For my part, I had to learn restraint. I spent some time as an ‘Angry Atheist’ as I think most of us do. Though now I find civilized discourse much more meaningful. I don’t think I’ve converted anyone to my stance, but I’ve certainly clarified my own feelings and rationale for myself.
March 3rd, 2008 at 4:14 pm
Kraeg,
Have you ever felt anything remotely in your life that you would classify ’supernatural?’ Anything that you could call ’spiritual?’
March 3rd, 2008 at 4:17 pm
Does God exist? When I die I’ll be better able to figure this out, no sooner.
March 3rd, 2008 at 4:29 pm
Yes.
God is energy.
=Pantheism.
March 3rd, 2008 at 4:41 pm
Jesus is my homeboy
March 3rd, 2008 at 4:42 pm
DiscHuker; I am not an atheist, I just don’t believe in god in the traditional sense. Your point about everybody not being worthy; Do not Christian fundamentalists believe that they are not worthy unless they accept Jesus Christ as their personal saviour? Then you get to go to heaven? I don’t know too many Muslims or Jews or Buddhists that are going to do that. How can heaven be such a restricted area? I don’t understand. My spirituality has room for all. There are many roads that lead to the same place.
March 3rd, 2008 at 5:25 pm
About as much as I believe in Santa Claus…
March 3rd, 2008 at 5:27 pm
mom424: accepting Christ doesn’t make us worthy. He alone is worthy and we are just, for lack of a better phrase, riding his coat-tails.
as far as muslims, jews or buddhists go, the rules are the same. there is no discrimination between any of those guys and christians. repent of your sin and confess your need of a savior.
March 3rd, 2008 at 6:46 pm
I believe. If you don’t, I don’t care, it doesn’t affect me at all. Likewise, my belief shouldn’t affect you.
Now, I’m going to look at the best superhero thread…
March 3rd, 2008 at 7:51 pm
how can anyone argue this either way. Either you believe in a god or not. How can you argue against a God that you could not possibly comprehend? “Antichrist”.. are you God? shut up
March 3rd, 2008 at 7:53 pm
If God’s so smart then why can’t he prove he exists!
March 3rd, 2008 at 7:56 pm
God could prove that he exists. If you can eat vegetable soup then you know God exists.
March 3rd, 2008 at 7:58 pm
wat
March 3rd, 2008 at 8:07 pm
I think #374 says it best. Excellent!
March 3rd, 2008 at 8:20 pm
I do not believe in God but I am still skeptical that science will eventually tell us how all was created. I believe that we still know virtually nothing about the nature of the universe and our brains are not currently advanced enough to understand 99.9% of it.
March 3rd, 2008 at 8:34 pm
Gah, how do I disable the follow-up comments notification? It floods my junk mail folder so (I wouldn’t normally call listverse stuff junk mail, but there’s just too many responses coming in right now).
The “Stop notifying me…” below exists as only text and cannot be clicked on.
March 3rd, 2008 at 8:42 pm
Thanks dv, and cambrex.
I don’t personally have anything against Atheists, honestly. I have plenty of atheist friends and we respect each others beliefs. I don’t have any intention of making atheists seem stupid, or saying ALL of them hate christians and argue 24/7. I’m just saying, many of them devote the internet to doing nothing but making pointless “anti-religion” comments. And the whole “god is a fairy and he made the universe fairy knows how”. Seriously. The other atheists are respect 100 percent. Wow, firefox. If I spell atheist lower-case it’s fine, if I spell christian lower case, it’s wrong.
March 3rd, 2008 at 8:47 pm
This list is just going to gradually get bigger and bigger…until it consumes us all…But I do like the points made!
March 3rd, 2008 at 9:38 pm
Heh – Tell you what, SnowKid. You don’t judge all of us by some of the inane atheist postings out there, and I won’t judge you by the christians who also devote their use of the internet by making pointless ‘Yay Jesus’ comments.
For the most part, this column has been pretty respectful.
I think you’ll find that the majority of atheists online tend to rant and rave only because it’s the first instance of a broad, open, and somewhat anonymous community that allows the announcement and discussion of atheist beliefs without being fearful of the ramifications of that announcement. It’s difficult to not get carried away at first. As with a lot of religious followers, as you mature into your beliefs, so the ranting and raving gets put aside for more reasonable discourse.
March 3rd, 2008 at 10:13 pm
bucslim,
I have felt the effect you describe. I occasionally take ecstasy recreationally. The experience is profoundly similar to that claimed by religious awe. And the research seems to back that up. Same parts of the brain affected. Similar effects.
I have also experienced moments of incredible joy that mirror those feelings without the use of recreational substances
However your question is whether I have felt this in relation to anything spiritual or supernatural and I have to answer that with a no.
I strongly believe, that whatever the experience of joy brought on from religious conviction, it is a purely natural and completely internal phenomenon and not actually due to any outside supernatural or spiritual sources. My belief comes from examining the research of others into the physiological effects of religious awe.
March 3rd, 2008 at 10:19 pm
535. Nazmazh
not sure what’s going on w/ that. anyone else experiencing the same problem?
March 3rd, 2008 at 10:52 pm
Randall:
you make a good point about hiding out and praying. It does mention that in the Bible. But don’t dare call me a none-believer. Sometimes when people hear that you will pray for them, it either will boost their spirits or make then think about the way they are living their life. I’m not at all perfect, but I do know that I don;t want to go to hell when I die.
People ask why we are having all these wars and devastation in the world these days. Well, the answer is this: in the Bible in Matthew chapter 24 starting at verse 6 — And ye shall hear of wars and rumors of wars: see that ye be not troubled: for all this must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom…there shall be famines, and earthquakes………(all these words were spoken by God Himself) the list goes on and on. Please read this and then tell me there is no proof of his existence.
March 3rd, 2008 at 11:31 pm
it’s honestly as simple as this; the idea of God, Allah, Eloheem etc. are on the same level of absurdity that we put on the Greek/Roman gods of years before. It’s unbelievably arrogant how in today’s society we’ve so easily deemed the religious figures of past societies fake, yet an unrelenting faith in a figure of unknown origin is somehow rational.
March 4th, 2008 at 1:11 am
God Is Imaginary:
No I didn’t find a flaw because I didn’t have time to read the whole thing because I didn’t have the time, it would not influence my belief either way, though, so I probably never will. But as we both seem to agree on God can’t be proven or disproven but MODERN LOGIC which can change…you say it can’t change yet it’s been changing continuously for thousands of years! I mean 500 years ago we didn’t know about atoms and molecules and such but when we did learn that they were there and how they worked our whole view of logic changed because if something didn’t make sence it was no longer “magic” or “trickery” it was science. So now we think we have everything figured out but who’s to say that somewhere else in the universe nothing we know applies? The laws of physics, basic concepts and logic could be compleatly different we just don’t know! And don’t come back saying “well you didn’t read my list so you don’t know” because I can assure you that it would only re-enforce my beliefs. Even if I didn’t believe in God I couldn’t believe that we both as a race and a civilization just accidentally happened by chance…something/someone created us. If you don’t believe that, fine…but I do and always will so please stop trying to convince me otherwise. If I did that to you would would say i’m forcing my beliefs on you yet when you do it you call it “logic” when there is no real proof either way.
And I have read my bible…many times. You don’t agree with it because you don’t want to so your mind tries to rationalize it. It’s human nature to rationalize and I don’t blame you for it. I’m not “condemning” anything i’m just stating the fact that by todays standards there is no proof either that is irrefutable.
I know I said eariler that I didn’t watch any of your videos however as i’m writing this I did and I found no “proof” just more so called commen sence…but commen sence changes over the years and what we know as fat diictates that. But when commen sence and fact start to become one and the same in peoples minds that’s when the troble starts. Not just with religion but with everything! “If something seems to be true then it must be” the false belief that causes so many problems. So many people who don’t believe in god fall into the belief that the stereotypical christian is what christianity shuld be but that is not true. Religion is so watered down these days that it seems to teach that “pray for whatever you want and you will get it” which, I think, is the reason so many people turn away from it! Because they see the fault in that thinking that that IS true christianity when it is not. Religion isn’t about praying for what you want and always getting it and yet that is the single biggest peice of evidence that athiests give as proof against gods existance! Modern religion has become a product of man and like I said that is probably so many people turn away from it. Because hundreds of years ago to be a christian actually meant something and going to church wasn’t just a “loophole” to get to heaven…but if someone is a true christian they will not be the stereotypical christian and they won’t fall into the lie that God is just some guy whose job is to make us happy. So many comments here have said things along the lines of “if God is real why do bad things happen?” which basically means that they think God isn’t real because he doesn’t fix everything! But it isn’t his “job” to fix everything! When somehing bad happens many people pray that it will just get better yet if it does they will probably just go about their daily life lie a miracle never happened! (I know you’re gonna hate this statement but whatever)Yet God listens to those who not only believe in him but truely follow him which is something a VERY FEW people actually do. So don’t just say “well I prayed for my sick friend to get better and God didn’t preform a miracle so he’s not real” because anyone who is truely a christian knows that that isn’t howthings work. Your site is based on the stereotypical view of christianity and God and therefore isn’t any proof at all…you can believe it if you want but please stop trying to convince everyone to believe the same. Until there is rock solid proof and not just commen sence either way anyone can believe whatever they want.
March 4th, 2008 at 2:42 am
Nazmazh: it tells you at the bottom of each of those emails how to disable it – give that a try
March 4th, 2008 at 2:44 am
HE DOES!! exist:
You make a very good point with that last paragraph…
March 4th, 2008 at 2:45 am
Typo:
“as fact” not “as fat”
March 4th, 2008 at 3:15 am
threads like this make me wanna purge, in a vomit kinda way. i read everyones post an i think, is this how people live a good life? go on internet sites an try an prove/disprove wether a higher power exists? what in the blue F@#$ people nobody wants to hear you spout crap thats already been written by other people, get your own views, establish your own lifestyle, be a f’ing man.
fact of the matter is religion is bigger than you an you will never exterminate it, not to mention some christian morals are appropriate an needed. an dont mistake me for a christian cuz i certainly am not one. the only higher power i believe in is a foot in your ass planted by yours truly.
if you really wanna prove god doesnt exists, i know of no better way than putting a bullet in your head, youll find out that way.
if you really wanna prove god does exists, i know of no better way than putting a bullet in your head, youll find out that way.
until then why dont you LIVE your life the way YOU want to, find out your own truths, an stop trying to validate your own views with logic that is incapable of answering such questions.
Stop philosophizing And do something about it!!!
March 4th, 2008 at 4:11 am
i dont think this thread is about proving/disproving whether god/s exist, its should be an open area for individual opinions hence the ‘your view’ title.
An an agnostic (leaning towards atheism), i dont believe in a god, i find to much proof in evoltion to give credit for that to, in essence, a few books and human belief.
now having said that – each to their own.
The reason i call myself an agnotic, is because i have no place to judge those who do believe in god/ his past or present existance.
People say that certain topics should never be spoken about when drinking (politics and religion), personally,religion is best left for private conversations as it always leads to the righteous (either for or against) trying to push, argue or flat out demand others take there opinion as pure fact (or gospel as some wold say).
March 4th, 2008 at 4:47 am
what ever happened to the strong silent type, thats my god.
sometimes i think i shouldnt have been born in this generation…
March 4th, 2008 at 5:28 am
Gods will continue to exist as long as we keep discussing them
March 4th, 2008 at 5:35 am
yes i believe but god and i are now what you call on “break”..why???because he doesnt seem to answer most of my request but other than that where fine…
March 4th, 2008 at 6:31 am
rhea:
God isn’t there to do what you want him to…if anything it’s the other way around…
March 4th, 2008 at 6:54 am
HE DOES!! exist:
I think you need to go back and re-read what I wrote you, before you recommend reading material to ME. What I was doing was explaining to you how the statement “I will pray for you” comes off, not calling YOU a non-believer.
Now, you clearly glossed over what I was telling you, and then you go on to say: “Sometimes when people hear that you will pray for them, it either will boost their spirits or make then think about the way they are living their life.”
Two things: 1) it’s not your job in life to do that, to make people think about how they’re living their lives. AGAIN, by taking that attitude you are–whether you mean to or not–taking a judgemental, “I am better than you” tone and stance. Not only is this offensive to most people, it also violates the principles of being Christian. 2) No one’s spirits are boosted when someone says they will “pray for them.” Again, go back and re-read what I said to you originally—the statement itself is a kind of boasting “I am holier than you and I will intercede on your behalf, as you are lesser than me” statement. People don’t like hearing that kind of thing. And it doesn’t paint you well as a Christian, either.
The only people whose spirits are lifted by being told that others will pray for them are people who WANT others to pray for them.
Your next statement is all the more silly:
“People ask why we are having all these wars and devastation in the world these days.”
Oh… do they REALLY, “HE DOES?” come on. Nobody’s asking you this. You’re using it as a rhetorical trick to work in a little Bible quote to proselytize some more. Stop it. This is phony… and again–phoniness doesn’t behoove god’s standing in this world or with your fellow human beings.
If people are really asking you such things then they’re utterly ignorant of human history. There is no more “war and devastation” in this world today than there has been at any other time in history. In fact, in some sense one could say a good deal less. And certainly the world if far more at peace than it was, say, 65 years ago.
And I HAVE read the quote you mention. I’ve read the Bible, “HE DOES.” Again, you show off your lack of humility and your sense of self-superiority by *assuming* that I haven’t.
And no, that quote does not in any way whatsoever “prove” god’s existence. Mind telling me how it does? Because I just don’t see it.
Moreover–god clearly states he isn’t in the *business* or “proving” his existence to us. So how can YOU claim that any passage of the Bible *does* do just that? Do you not understand faith? (I’m thinking you don’t, given the things you’ve said and the attitude you’ve taken). But then, you see… many people LIKE you, who claim to have faith, really don’t—because they’re so scared that science and the disbelief of others challenges their faith that they fight science, denying it and trying to take it away from the rest of us. I’m not saying you are one of these people–I merely observe the similarity in tone and attitude. In fact, however, science is NO threat whatsoever to someone with TRUE faith. Such people understand that science is simply another way that god speaks to us, or for us to read his plan.
Of course, this is off-topic as you haven’t identified yourself as a creationist or anything of that nature–but your response to me and to others makes me suspect you are at least in sympathy with such notions. And certainly your holier-than-thou stance reveals you to be of a similar mindset.
March 4th, 2008 at 7:25 am
Gosh people don’t have a heart attack over this question.
March 4th, 2008 at 8:38 am
all this god thinge has come in thanks to all those ancestors of ours who at that time had no idea of ehat are the sceintefic reasons for about everything which at that time they found strange…………
for example if an idiot did something wrong and coincidentaly there was a heavy rain….it was related to the wrong doing of that particular person………it got carried on like that……..
and all god -lovers refuse to open their eyes because they are made to believe so since they are small
if you do a research……..hinduism started off as the first ever religion.following came christianity and islamism.which are very simialar……….so is jainism and buddhism……
this argument is baseless……….and thosed who believe refuse to see the truth dancing in front of their eyes…….:)
March 4th, 2008 at 9:07 am
AJ: your argument is one of the most arrogant and prideful ones that i have heard. let’s apply your standard of looking at the truth dancing in front of us.
2 generations ago, most of america felt that african-americans were substandard humans. which was way better than 2 generations before that when they were considered sub-human.
here is the first of two questions i have for you…what beliefs of just 75 years ago, of your ancestors, are you ashamed of?
the second one is similar…what beliefs of yours will your ancestors, 75 years from now, be ashamed of that you currently hold to be true?
the argument from “now we are way smarter than they were then” is laughable, considering that we continue to develop.
March 4th, 2008 at 9:20 am
If you’re stupid enough to believe in a god, enjoy it, I’ve learned to think for myself.
One of the few arguments I’m not gonna touch with a 20ft pole, as religious people have the IQ of a grain.
A million response like “I know he exists how does all on earth get here otherwise” and “It;s written in the book he exist” or other dogmatic reasons are just gonna do me head in.
March 4th, 2008 at 9:23 am
Diskhuker:
though i agree with what you wrote, what is the relevance of that to the religion debate?
although not well written and a bit exagerated, AJ has a point.
going back thousands of years, before most evoltionary/physcial/moleclar sciences where known, people lived there lives a certain way, generally basing any kind of natural act on a god, this sometimes being justfiable.
it doesnt necessarily mean we are smarter now, but with technological advancement we are as a whole more informed.
March 4th, 2008 at 9:41 am
Of course God exists. As we discover more, humans continue push forward to our own demise. What a privilege to live in such a self-centered country and time! My entire life has been a study of God’s existence. If you REALLY want to know the truth, start with your own search of your own nagging questions(all these other opinions seriosly cloud important issues) and start in the past, where you can “stand on the shoulders of others”. Any fool can make up a god to fit.
March 4th, 2008 at 10:01 am
For me it is less about if God does or does not exist- I believe that if I am the best person I can be, do the best that I can and live in the HERE and NOW and NOT because of a moral code defined by reward (I’m sorry, we aren’t 5 years old and “Heaven” etc. is not a substitute for a gold start for good behavior)-we should just be good to one another because WE SHOULD JUST BE GOOD TO ONE ANOTHER. Period. All the BS fighting is not justifiable by anything, least of all in the name of a “God” that may or may not exist.
I’m just happy to be alive and am going to make the best of it while I can-either way, I think that’s life’s point. I don’t think that this God personae is an egomaniac and would have “created” us explicitely to be worshipped-
I’m just happy to be good to other people, kind, loving, caring, empathetic, understanding, whatever each persons belief is. The only moment that truly exists is NOW.
So live it to the fullest-be the best person you can be. The only thing that we can count on with absolute proof is CHANGE.
God or no God, not really the big question for me. Or the question of significant importance.
How can I contribute positively to the world, to my fellow man/woman-how can I show the people I love that I do love and cherish them; those are my questions of significance.
March 4th, 2008 at 10:03 am
torecca: absolutely. but to say that we can now dismiss what older generations believed because now we are more informed is extremly short-sighted.
March 4th, 2008 at 10:23 am
Torecca/AJ;
The argument made (by AJ) is an old one that addresses *superstition* specifically—not the larger question of spirituality. The deeper question of “is there a god?” goes beyond superstition. Yes, we can dispense with the superstitious beliefs of past civilizations and societies who thought that there were malevolent spirits running around who had a powerful influence on daily life–we know this is not the case and know that science can explain many of the things that were mysterious to our ancestors—but this is not an argument against belief in a god—merely an argument against superstition.
March 4th, 2008 at 10:26 am
satori:
Just to play devil’s advocate on behalf of god, though–the question has always remained–what incentive is there to BE good, if one removes belief in god from one’s “personal equation”? You could argue (and people have–your argument is an old one) that people would be equally inclined to be hugely selfish and even downright evil/harmful to others, under such circumstances.
I do, however, agree with you wholeheartedly that living a full life, doing good, and finding experience and satisfaction in life is what it’s all about.
March 4th, 2008 at 11:20 am
DiscHuker: We can absolutely abandon what previous generations once believed if, through the knowledge and technology we have acquired in the mean time, we can prove that belief to be false. That is not short-sighted, that is coming to terms with the fact that sometimes long-held, traditional beliefs turn out to be false, inaccurate, or just plain illogical. However, there are certain questions we can *never* know the answer to, no matter how advanced technology gets. That is why the question of “does god exist?” is still a valid one, if not altogether sound.
Also, you seem to contradict yourself between comments #561 and 556.
March 4th, 2008 at 12:07 pm
448 DiscHuker: Perhaps the meaning was lost or Ishould have chosen different words. I DON’T condem or judge PEOPLE who do believe. I DON’T pass judgment on any religion or belief. I myself believe on a personal level that god and religion are bullcrap. When I was younger and in school (Catholic) the bible and god were drilled into our heads on a daily basis and I DID believe. When I questioned a part of the lesson I was told to “shut up, don’t question, believe it, it is the bible.” This made me grow up and learn to start thinking for myself and not take everything at face value. Granted, I didn’t become an atheist over night, but I am now. If anyone want’s to believe in god or a higher power that is there choice, just like I CHOSE to not believe. Hope this clears it up for you.
March 4th, 2008 at 12:30 pm
“Sometimes when people hear that you will pray for them, it either will boost their spirits or make then think about the way they are living their life.”
You clearly didn’t mean it like that. And most atheists will NEVER take it like that. From what I am aware, it is used as a type of insult by Christians when talking to or about atheists.
March 4th, 2008 at 12:31 pm
547. DR.Dooooooom
Are you against all discourse between opposing views, or just religious discourse.
That’s part of life, my angry friend, people sharing views which at times contradict. It makes for interesting dialog. Especially when both sides leave the anger behind.
It’s fantastic that you would rather not spend time rehashing exisitng viewpoints. All the power to you. Don’t. Leave. Go climb a mountain. Explore god or no-god in your own way. But stay out of the discussion in that case.
A large part of any discussion involves raising the opinions of others who have also researched the subject. But let’s be frank here, your statement about a bullet being the only true way to discover if there is a god or not is hardly original. Get involved in the conversation, or stay out.
March 4th, 2008 at 12:36 pm
557. Ian
You also need to leave the anger behind. Not all followers of religion are idiots. Not all atheists are above average intelligence. And it makes not only yourself look bad, but all atheists by association when you send out a blanket statement like that.
I understand your point though, so use that. You know you’ve done all you can in the argument when your counterpart’s only retort is ‘you just gotta have faith’. And I think that’s the only way to get your point across. Force someone to repeat that phrase until even to them it starts to sound hollow.
March 4th, 2008 at 12:41 pm
For all we know, the bible may have been written by a bunch of drunken idiots…..as a joke. Bet they are rolling in their graves right now, if that were the case.
I was raised as a Christian, but have lost my faith long ago. Way too many things out there that could never be explained by religeon.
March 4th, 2008 at 1:17 pm
demize: so you went to catholic school and are surprised that they tried to teach you the Bible? also did they actually say “shut up, don’t question, believe it, it is the bible.” you recollection seems to discredit the truthfulness of your report.
March 4th, 2008 at 1:21 pm
slick: i see your point. let me clarify…
if history shows us that modernity is only so precious and intelligent because it is our current frame of reference, perhaps we shouldn’t be so dogmatic in our dismissing of what has happened before but rather try to understand why and how they believed what they did when they did.
March 4th, 2008 at 1:41 pm
I believe that there is a God, but that it is so different from anything we know that human thoughts and emotions cannot be attributed to it, especially Pride; why would a being so far more advanced than us care if we worship, or even believe in it? God must be apathetic towards our kind, or it would not allow the suffering of good people or the success of evil people.
March 4th, 2008 at 1:47 pm
DiscHuker:
Don’t be so quick to dismiss demize’s feelings or recollections on this matter.
I am not Catholic nor was I raised Catholic–but I had many friends who were. Most of my friends, in fact. And demize’s feelings about Christianity, based on his/her falling out with the Catholic church, are all too typical and I feel are justified. Many of my friends have abandoned their Catholic faith because of the very sort of entrenched and rigid attitude (on the part of the church) that demize cites.
Institutions should learn that indoctrination, while seeming to work, is not really an effective tool for bringing people to a meaningful spirituality.
March 4th, 2008 at 1:59 pm
For life to spontaniously occur upon the earth it would take billions and billions of protein molecules of the ninth configuration. For just one of thses molecules to reach the earth by sheer chance is 236 to the 10th power,and I find that far,far more fantastic then simply believing in a god.
March 4th, 2008 at 2:07 pm
No, I don’t believe in God, for reasons that have already been explianed above by Antichrist and others.
Personally, I like to think of God as an abstract metaphor. The same way many polytheistic gods are though of as personifications (for example, Poseidon is a personificationj of the sea) I think of any monotheistic god as simply a personificatio of the universe.
March 4th, 2008 at 2:09 pm
randall: i am not doubting his feelings at all. what i am calling into question is perception vs. reality. did he just remember it as being repressive in light of what he currently thinks about christianity/the church? or did someone actually say “shut up, don’t question, believe it, it is the bible.”
let’s be accurate with our accusations and not just add unnecessary fuel to the fire.
as to your last point, what method should churches use to bring people to meaningful spirituality?
March 4th, 2008 at 2:10 pm
DiscHuker: True enough, I would agree with that statement. However, referencing the original statement that your argument was directed to, our knowledge and technology has progressed so far in the last hundred years…hell, the last fifty years, that we are literally at a point in our development unlike anything ever seen in all of recorded history. Modern science has accomplished things that are dumbfounding to the average person, and without a frame of reference, would seem quite miraculous. I think it is important to recognize – as you said – why our ancestors held certain beliefs. There are things that have perfectly natural, scientific explanations that, a thousand years ago, two thousand years ago, would seem utterly impossible, and to witness them would be to witness an act of god.
The difference between the cyclical nature of history and the current state of affairs is that the current state of affairs is something incredibly unique in the human timeline. Past beliefs were recycled into other, more recent past beliefs, without any justifying explanation. If it could not be explained in the simplest of terms, there was something supernatural and mystifying about it. The current landscape is changing; people now are, by and large, more aware that the natural world can be explained in very human, concrete terms. Experiences once thought supernatural are now understood to be explainable in non-supernatural terms. The world is becoming more exposed to the naked eye, and attitudes are changing to reflect that. Say what you want about the God experience or the effect that God has had on your life, the fact is, God was created as a way for our big, self-aware brains to explain that which could not be explained in an era before we had the tools to explain them. Is it so unreasonable that someone would reject God in this day and age, an age where a more grounded, concrete, logical explanation of events can be ascertained without the involvement of the supernatural element?
What I’m trying to get at is this: if we logically examine the beliefs of those that came before us, and determine that this belief can be useful to us in some way, we should not dismiss it. If we determine that the things we know now, things which have never been known until now in all the span of human history, supercede the beliefs of a more primitive time and prove them to be inaccurate or false, we should abandon them.
March 4th, 2008 at 2:18 pm
Conan121: Simple proteins have been synthesized from non-organic ingredients in a laboratory setting, utilizing conditions that were closest to the best idea we have of the surface of pre-Cambrian Earth. Based upon the evidence we have of this (the Miller-Urey experiment) and other similar, replicable experiments, it is not unreasonable to assume that life spontaneously generated here on Earth from non-organic components. No “protein molecules floating across the depths of space” justification needed. That statistic is particularly amusing though, would you happen to have the source on your “236 to the 10th power” statement?
March 4th, 2008 at 2:22 pm
DiscHuker:
See, what you’re doing is ignoring the experience of others. Which is a cowardly way of dealing with an argument.
demize is TELLING you that he went through the whole Catholic experience and found it stifling and that it in fact led him AWAY from belief. I am telling you that I have known MANY former Catholics who feel the same way.
Now, instead of dismissing the issue, find a way to respond to it with honesty. I find it sad that this happens to people. You seem to just want to brush it aside.
As to the question you put to me, it’s clear that allowing people the right and dignity of free thought and will about something so vital as spirituality is FAR more productive and results in a deeper and more REAL kind of spirituality than control, indoctrination, and isolation. Fundamentalism loses as many people as Catholicism does–perhaps more–for this very reason—that it tries to stifle and force conformity on its followers rather than encouraging them to seek and investigate and question.
March 4th, 2008 at 2:22 pm
conan
Do you ’simply believe in god’ or have you given it a lot of thought and arrived at that conclusion. The most learned of religious scholars don’t merely ’simply believe in god’. They find more and more support for their ideas in the religious texts and discussions. It’s so far beyond ’simply believing in god’. What an astounding understatement.
There isn’t anything simple about the concept of god. Any follower will tell you that. And from an Atheists perspective, so many questions. Where did he begin? Where does he exist? When did he begin?
Do you think these are simple questions?
My point being, the idea of life beginning spontaneously on earth, however improbable, still contains a measure of probability. The idea of god is not simple in comparison to that. Your statement, ironically, argues more in favor of there being no god.
But an even greater point is that you feel that god is the ONLY other option than life spontaneously coming into being. That god is the opposite. Oops – science got that wrong, the answer therefore must be god. No the truth is that god is one possible solution out of so many others.
An example: Medical science didn’t figure out that the transfer of microorganisms causes sickness for centuries. So the answer was obviously god – or the devil – made us sick. Couldn’t possibly have any other explanation.
As medical science progressed more answers, completely disassociated from god, were discovered.
It continues to astound me that those having enough imagination to envision this higher being and all he entails, don’t have the imagination to conceive there might be other answers.
March 4th, 2008 at 2:23 pm
slick: all very true and agreeable. here is an example of, at least from a christian perspective, how this hurts us.
500 years ago, just to be safe, a lightning storm scared people to death. they thought that God was throwing light at them from the sky. thunder sent grown men to their knees in prayer.
today, we can explain how the atmospheric instability and lining up of electrons causes these phemonema. we have totally taken all of the mystery out of something truly powerful and breathtaking and dismissed God from his hand in these actions.
according to christian scripture in Jeremiah 10:12-13
But God made the earth by his power;
he founded the world by his wisdom
and stretched out the heavens by his understanding.
13 When he thunders, the waters in the heavens roar;
he makes clouds rise from the ends of the earth.
He sends lightning with the rain
and brings out the wind from his storehouses.
i would love to see a harmony of the two that are so commonly pitted against one another. science is a way that God has given us to know more about him. the Bible says that he does indeed send the lightning. science tells us how.
March 4th, 2008 at 2:24 pm
“There are no atheists in a foxhole.”
When I watch the BBC series Blue Planet, I wonder how can there not be?
March 4th, 2008 at 2:31 pm
DiscHuker:
I see what you’re getting at, in your answer to SlickWilly… but I don’t agree with you.
We have not “taken the mystery” out of anything. You mistake “understanding” and comprehension for an erasure of mystery. Mystery isn’t simply not knowing why or how things happen—it’s knowing that there is an unseen behind the seen, or at least accepting or believing that there is.
Yes, I agree that we can view science as a way for us to know god, and a way that god has given us to understand him…. but this doesn’t require a harmony with superstition–superstition is the enemy of understanding. We don’t need to believe that god sends lightning—that remains superstition.
March 4th, 2008 at 2:32 pm
randall: while i didn’t intend to dismiss his beliefs, just seek accuracy, i can see how it came across that way and i apologize. i am simply looking for a level playing field instead of hyperbole.
as to the second point, please define what it looks like when you say that your mehtod has yielded “FAR more productive and results in a deeper and more REAL kind of spirituality”.
i agree that this is the goal. but i think this goal comes only with right thinking about the true God. if i wanted to teach you to play football correctly, wouldn’t there be control and indoctrination. to know something as it is in reality means that you cannot know false things about whatever it is. this is where teaching and study comes in, otherwise people would think they are playing football when they are really just running around.
March 4th, 2008 at 2:42 pm
DiscHuker: I think perhaps you originally meant that we should not abandon the idea of God simply because the idea was in existence long before our presence on the earth, and born from a time of technological unsophistication. I agree whole-heartedly. There is as much evidence today of the presence of a God as there was two thousand years ago. The idea of God is not altogether unreasonable, even for an atheist such as myself. God is not a primitive idea anymore than it is a modern one…God simply is. That being so, a *lot* of good can be had from the idea of God, the worshipping of him, and the concious emulation of the purported behavior of his son. If only more people tried to behave like Jesus, the world would be a much better place. I don’t think the concept of God is unreasonable, and it is certainly useful in these modern times, so I don’t think it should be abandoned. A personal spiritual relationship is very healthy. Religion, on the other hand…I don’t want to get started on that, you probably know all the arguments already. In any case, yes, we should dispense with silly ideas that our forefathers had that we now know to be untrue. Is God one of these ideas? No, certainly not.
And *I* personally believe that understanding how lightning forms, along with learning about the scientific explanation behind a lot of different phenonmena does not dispell the awe and power of them. For me, it deepens it. The only difference is, for me, the awe shifts from the perceived presence of some supernatural force to the questions of how the electrons line up in the first place, why these particular conditions, is there a “planc epoch,” so to speak, with lightning strikes? etc. etc
March 4th, 2008 at 2:45 pm
Dishuker: Correct me if I’m wrong, but it seems as if you are arguing against Randall that domination, isolation, and indoctrination *are* the best way to bring people to spiritualiy.
March 4th, 2008 at 2:51 pm
slick: lol. yes that is wrong. my point being that his words of “control and isolation” are introducing meaning into a religous debate that they wouldn’t into a debate of, for example, football rules. in playing pee-wee flag football, my behavior was controlled by the coach. if i didn’t do what he said i had to do push-ups. the rules of the game were “drilled into my head”. if i didn’t follow them during a game, the referee threw a flag on me.
in order to know anything in truth there has to be some “indoctrination”. just look at the rules stated below the comment box. these are rules for LV’ers to post by. in order for the posters to follow them, they must be “indoctrinated”.
March 4th, 2008 at 3:11 pm
DiscHuker: Yes, but football and commenting correctly in a forum are a set of skills, not a belief. The idea of God and spirituality is a belief, so the only reason indoctrination would be necessary is if that belief needed a set of skills to work. You’re essentially not arguing that a belief in God should be indoctrinated, you’re arguing that the accompanying religion should be indoctrinated, and indeed, it seems, must be so in order for there to be any truth to it. This is something I disagree with. It seems, by the way you are phrasing your argument, that you are fusing the concepts of “spirituality” and “religion,” which are actually two separate ideas.
I believe that perhaps you are arguing from a Christian hard-line perspective. “There is no other path to god than the one I suscribe to.”
March 4th, 2008 at 3:22 pm
Im thinking of starting a new religeon…..Would you all be my disciples?
March 4th, 2008 at 3:23 pm
Just an additional point on one of your comments, DisHuker:
the rules of the game were “drilled into my head”. if i didn’t follow them during a game, the referee threw a flag on me.
In sports – rules and plays are drilled into your head so they are followed instinctively. without thought. without question. I’m certain that you don’t mean this to be a comparison to religious belief.
March 4th, 2008 at 3:24 pm
Chickensoup: not exactly sure what was ment by you post,even as no non believer hearing ‘i will pray for you’, give me comfort of a sort, i tae it as a sign of compassion of that person that they’re willing to spent there time thining of my sitation, never as an insult.
the problem with this thread is that its forced all the supremists (of whichever side) ot of hiding, i dont see how someone trying to force their beliefs onto others is a true believer. i had a deeply religious friend for many year an we often strayed into religious conversation, mainly out of my curiosity, and never once did she try to ‘convert’ me.
dont get me wrong the majority of people on here have genuine points to think over, but its a little bit sickening reading some of the crap that people have come out with.
DiscHuker: agree, was not trying to suggest that tradition has turnt to fallacy .
March 4th, 2008 at 3:24 pm
slick: i’m not sure that calling it a “hard-line perspective” is necessary. it is orthodox belief in christianity since it’s inception. Christ himself said as much in the book of John 14:6 “Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.”
so, yes, i do believe there is right belief and wrong belief.
March 4th, 2008 at 3:25 pm
even within my own heart and mind. which is what i am constantly trying to drive out.
March 4th, 2008 at 3:25 pm
RANDALL-I’m saying that I don’t think that “incentive” should be a determining factor in being a good person. I think it’s a lot like paying it forward-or karma if you will. One smile to a person who is having a bad day may be passed along to another and another etc. And shouldn’t that be “rewarding” enough? We’re adults-we have to get over being needy and seeking validation from something “greater” than ourselves. Are we not great as we are? Why do we believe ourselves so undeserving and so terrible without needing to give away responsibility to something/one else–sounds like mind control to me–Can we not believe in ourselves and feel fulfilled in that? That same smile that you passed on to 1 person may come back to you by the end of your day.
“A thing is neither good nor bad but thinking makes it so”-Shakespeare
We create our own dreams and nightmares-we can learn from challenges, or we can be defeated by them. But we face them alone. That is my point. That in and of itself is why people should be fulfilled in being “good”–the character for “chaos” means two things (I think in Chinese)- opportunity or unhappiness. I’ve always subscribed to that as a life mantra.
Conveluted I know, but I hope that it made sense and answered your questions RANDALL.
March 4th, 2008 at 3:28 pm
kraeg: when something is vitally important, i hope that it comes to me without thought. i am glad that my body has figured out how to breathe without constantly having to tell my lungs to take air in.
i seek to know God to the degree where living a holy life comes as second nature. that temptation has no effect on me. that helping those in need comes without thought. that loving my wife more than myself isn’t an argument in my soul.
March 4th, 2008 at 3:34 pm
DiscHuker, SlickWilly, et al; When I asked you way back in the comments about fundamentalist beliefs about heaven you said
“as far as muslims, jews or buddhists go, the rules are the same. there is no discrimination between any of those guys and christians, repent of your sin and confess your need of a savior.” Which saviour exactly is the Buddhist going to require/ask for? and the Jewish fella? I think you ducked my question.
(I would have asked earlier but I figured slick or randall or someone else would have picked that up)
By the way I come from a RC/Protestant background, My Uncle is a priest, (I missed out on being blessed after his ordination; I was behind the Church having a smoke), and he has never been the beat you with a stick kind of Priest. He also counseled the use of Birth Control etc., Compassion for the family with 5 kids and no money overcame whatever indoctrination he had been subject to. Just a little note to let Randall know that not all RC’s are inflexible and unquestioning…
March 4th, 2008 at 3:35 pm
I’ve taken a different path to reach my conclusions. Back in 2000, I began a 3 year exploration of this topic. At this time I was basically agnostic. I saw people who were on both sides of the debate who I thought were loons, but that didn’t deter me because there were more than enough rational voices still out there. Here’s my starting points:
-Either there is a God or not
-If there is a God, then its worth understanding if that matters or not
-If it matters, then its very important to understand the relationship I personally have with God, if any
-If I do have a relationship, then which faith, if any, enriches that relationship
In short, I eventually came to conclusion that there is some sort of God. I then dove into religious philosophy with the guidance of friends who subscribed to their faiths. I can’t tell you how many bad books there are out there on this, but there are MANY great books as well.
To condense those years into a short blurb here, is tough. So let me jump to the end, I came to the conclusion that Christianity is the answer and I was Baptized when I was 29. Couldn’t be happier.
A couple of hurdles that I had to clear to get there:
-Dogma and faith are 2 different things. I had issues with Dogma, but not faith
-Evils of men shouldn’t be viewed as evils of a God
-Science and Religion are wholly compatible. Anyone who says they aren’t are operating from the viewpoint of an agenda
-The Bible and other religious texts aren’t necessarily literal. In fact, they liberally use stories to teach and convey the path to understanding God.
-Its OK and healthy to ask difficult questions
aaaand then the BIG one
-I may not have all the answers right away, or even in 20 years, but that isn’t a problem
March 4th, 2008 at 3:38 pm
Disc: Well, the orthodox belief certainly is hard-line. If you are not a Christian (and for the longest time, a *Catholic* Christian) you will go to hell. No reason to mince words here, that’s what the bible says. If you suscribe to this belief, that is your choice. I don’t agree, but then we are two different people. As long as you act appropriately towards others, there is no problem. However, as I’m sure you’re aware, the orthodox church is being seen in the modern world as an archaic and stagnant institution, based upon a rigid structure of beliefs that are being increasingly indicted in the face of new scientific and scholastic knowledge. It is understandable that many people these days would question this particular structure of worship and biblical interpretation as useless in contemporary times and abandoned, along the vein of our discussion. It is tough being educated and faithful in today’s world, so for that I applaud you. It is much easier to wrap your head around God when you lack a proper understanding of the way the world around us works. Perhaps that is why the bible urges us to “approach God with the mind of a child.”
March 4th, 2008 at 3:42 pm
Mom424: Well, Buddists don’t have a “messiah” or savior, persay. And last time I checked, the Jews were still waiting for their messiah. I think perhaps, based on the context of the statement, that the writer meant “Christian savior.” All Muslims, Jews, Buddists, etc. need to repent their sins and accept the “Chrisian savior.” That sounds a bit more to the point.
March 4th, 2008 at 3:55 pm
“i seek to know God to the degree where living a holy life comes as second nature. that temptation has no effect on me. that helping those in need comes without thought. that loving my wife more than myself isn’t an argument in my soul.”
I would be much more satisfied to know that all you mention comes as a matter of course, as it does in myself, without feeling that you have to know god to make it happen.
I am truly sorry that you don’t feel free enough to live the equivalent of a holy life without the threat, or fear, (or call it love if you will) of god. And I’m sure your god, who gave you free will, would also share my disappointment if he actually existed.
Once you start preaching indoctrination on any level as a way to come to god, you take away the freedom of choice that religions claim we have right to.
March 4th, 2008 at 3:56 pm
sorry – my previous post (600) was a reply to595. Dischuker
March 4th, 2008 at 4:37 pm
I think this list has spiraled out of all control. Chaos, Beautiful! Jamie you are a better man than me to keep this up. Have Fun!
March 4th, 2008 at 4:43 pm
You can’t prove a negative. No one can prove that God DOESN’T exist. And honestly, if you look at the facts and study them with a non-partial view, I think it’s impossible to believe that God doesn’t exist.
March 4th, 2008 at 4:47 pm
“You can’t prove a negative. No one can prove that God DOESN’T exist. And honestly, if you look at the facts and study them with a non-partial view, I think it’s impossible to believe that God doesn’t exist.”
Well, you’re wrong there.
March 4th, 2008 at 4:48 pm
Firstly -I’m sorry if i’m repeating points already made – there are too many posts here for me to read!
I don’t believe in God. I think the whole idea of a god who intervenes in our lives, or has any human characteristics is totally absurd. The only god i could possibly entertain the thought of would be a deist god, which seems silly to me, as it would involve him/her/it setting up the universe and simply backing off. There seems to be little point in that, and certainly no point in praying to such a god. It also begs the question ‘who created this god?’, which places us back at square one.
It is also obvious that religion has made no progress, and does not attempt to do so, in answering these questions. Science, on the other hand, is constantly discovering more and more about the origins of the universe. It seems to me to be disrespectful of those scientists who work so hard to suggest that they are incapable of answering the big questions eventually.
Finally, I would like to comment on how insulting it is for people to question where we can get our morals from if not from god. Can’t we decide rationally what is right and what is wrong? Surely we don’t really need to rely on ’sacred’ texts to tell us that killing is bad; texts that, surprise surprise, get their morals from human rationality in the first place.
Sorry if there’re any grammatical mistakes there – it’s late!
March 4th, 2008 at 5:05 pm
Holy cow, 605 posts! (sorry about the pun and repetition, if I do so)
I’m going to save my neck by saying that Jamie asked if “God” exists and not “a god” or “god”. That would be referring to the Judeo-Christian deity, and my answer to that would be: doesn’t matter to me, I wouldn’t worship Him if He does exist. Can we prove He exists? I think we can’t. I believe His soul existance is based purely on faith, which is something you cannot prove.
March 4th, 2008 at 7:11 pm
Yes I. Greetings in the love of God. Yeah, I read a lot of these posts. People are approaching this from a materialist perspective. You must try to understand your position in this life as best you can. Ask yourself if you have soul. If the answer is “no, the chemical and electrical reactions in my beautiful brain constitute perception and compose my idea of me,” I make this point. Life comes from life. Life has never come from matter. At no point did life on this planet arise from matter. Life on this planet has evolved over millions of years. This planet in this galaxy is suited for life, thus it was bestowed with it. The galactic center gave birth to our sun represented as Isis and the child Horus just as Mary gave birth to the child Jesus. The purpose is to understand the position of man relative to God. We are all sparks struck off the flint of God. People want to empirical proof of the existence of God. Give empirical proof of the existence of the soul. There is no material evidence of the soul because the soul is amaterial, higher energy. If you cannot accept that you are not this body, there is difficulty moving on to other points. You are not the body, you are an eternal spirit. Your natural position is loving God. In this material life, everyone suffers and dies. To understand and meditate on the nature of God and the harmony of the macrosystems of the universe is the purpose of this life.
March 4th, 2008 at 7:20 pm
Ah, thank you!
That’s much better. I guess part of the problem was that I had never actually opened any of the e-mail messages, only deleted them and went to the list to read the new comments.
March 4th, 2008 at 7:34 pm
How has this not broken 1,000 yet, it was a hotcake of comments waiting to happen!
March 4th, 2008 at 8:14 pm
SlickWilly; that was the point I was trying to make exactly!
Thanks for helping out. It is also the reason that I don’t subscribe to the traditional god image and do not personally believe in any organized religion. Too exclusionary for my tastes. If there is a heaven/alternate consciousness (I believe there is), I think even atheists can have a spot, my spirituality cares how you act not what you believe.
March 5th, 2008 at 12:59 am
no, i dont believe in god.
creatonists base their clame of a superior force on the statement that big bang couldnt have done anything, because life can only be created by inteligent life.
by saying this; they also claim that all life has to be created by an superior intelectual being. by this, they deny god themselves.
just because god cannot be disproved, doesnt at all prove his existence. if this matter was taken to court, the existence of god would be “disproved.”
if there arent substantial evidence of things being so, it never happened. guilty or not.
and besides, why god? all questions were once spiritual ones, and have been disproved. like the gods of thunder and the oceans. soon, life can be explained scientificly, when that time comes, the same will happen to this “god.”
March 5th, 2008 at 2:29 am
YashaMaru:
Judging from that first paragraph you know nothing about what ‘creationists’ believe. And you say that since there is no proof of God that that is proof that there is not? Yoy contradict yourself as there is no ‘proof’ that the big bang happened either! There is no proof either way…and ‘commen sence’ doesn’t count as proof as so many people seem to think.
March 5th, 2008 at 2:32 am
Mom424:
Indeed there will probably many ‘non-believers’ in heaven (or alternate consciousness as you say) as so many people believe that just because they go to church once a week and pray before a meal sometimes that they are going to heaven…modern religion has almost compleatly turned away from what religion is supposed to be.
March 5th, 2008 at 2:51 am
“my spirituality cares how you act not what you believe.” MOM424 I couldn’t have said it better myself!!! That’s what I was trying to say-obviously not as well or susynctly! Thank you!
March 5th, 2008 at 3:39 am
fishing4monkeys -
would you be happier going back to what religion was supposed to be?
Slavery? Vengeful gods? Stoning neighbours for working on the sabbath? Stoning children to death for disrespecting parents? Offering up your daughters to be raped to spare the visiting angels the same fate?
Really?
Don’t fool yourself – what religion was supposed to be was a method of scaring us into good behaviour in the case of the judeo-christian god. Religion always has been a way of control. At first it was a way of controlling our environment. ie. if we pleased the gods, the world would behave in a better way for us. Then it became a way to control the masses. And this is pretty much where it has rested since. Modern religion is no better or worse than what religion is ’supposed to be’.
March 5th, 2008 at 6:51 am
YashMaru; You can’t disprove a concept. Spirituality is of the mind, it neither has nor requires physical proof.
1 : something conceived in the mind : thought, notion
2 : an abstract or generic idea generalized from particular instances
March 5th, 2008 at 6:58 am
He does but not in a way that we can even begin to comprehend.
March 5th, 2008 at 7:08 am
gozer – weren’t you in the dominion of Zeul? Gozer the Gozarian right? What form of the destructor are you taking? Who are the Key Master and Gate Keeper?
March 5th, 2008 at 7:36 am
Satori:
Understand… I agree with you. I was simply saying that the absence of a spiritual belief does not necessarily lead to people acting altruistically and humanely. It can just as easily lead to brutality and selfishness.
But then we have that WITH religion, also.
March 5th, 2008 at 8:21 am
DiscHuker:
This analogy with sports you brought up is hopelessly clumsy, as people have already pointed out to you. Spirituality is not the same as learning football or basketball. You ought to see the error yourself, now, in attempting to relate the two.
But I think the fact that you coughed up such an analogy speaks volumes about your attitude towards spirituality. The very idea that one would tout a system of indoctrination, of a system where questioning and individual thought are suppressed or at very least discredited… well, I see no need to comment further. It speaks for itself.
You ask–in regards to the method *I* have presented as preferable–what it would look like, how someone would come out of that. Answer–the results would look like my daughters—intelligent young people who have been taught to ask questions and probe for answers all their life–to not simply *dismiss* the invisible and unseen, but neither to swallow it whole, either.
What you probably fear is someone turning their children loose with no guidance or instruction—and therefore you believe that the only alternative is indoctrination and control. Wrong. The responsible thing is, rather, to raise responsible, independent, clear-thinking adults with *guidance* and instruction, NOT indoctrination. And what you guide them in FIRST and foremost is HOW to learn, HOW to question and HOW to gain knowledge. With this they can do much better than simply cramming them with the knowledge you wish them to have.
Spirituality is no different from any other intellectual endeavor, except that it involves questions and ideas that cannot be answered by the tools of science. It requires open and thoughtful minds, not stifled and controlled minds. Children should be *exposed* to the spiritual (if you wish them to be) and taught to consider it. They should then find it for themselves. I trust a child growing into adulthood finding these things with help, but more on their own, to find TRUE spirituality—over a child pushed, cajoled, and indoctrinated into it—because oftentimes such people, once they reach adulthood, abandon spirituality as a form of natural rebellion.
March 5th, 2008 at 9:52 am
Chickensoup: How so?
March 5th, 2008 at 10:16 am
Joss: How so? It’s wrong because there are plenty of people who have looked at the facts, being as impartial as anyone can be, without coming to the conclusion that God must be real.
March 5th, 2008 at 10:43 am
There aren’t any ‘facts’ that suggest god’s existence. It’s why most arguments on this topic eventually resort to the defense of – I just feel it, or You just have to have faith.
There aren’t any ‘facts’ that suggest god doesn’t exist either. But since god’s existence is the hypothesis, and it fails, there is no need to prove his non-existence.
His existence, like any failed hypothesis, is considered wrong until it becomes a provable, testable theory.
March 5th, 2008 at 10:45 am
[this is where you insert comment about how you just feel it, or how you just have to have faith]
March 5th, 2008 at 11:10 am
OK, life can come from non-life. Scientists have shown that Amino Acid, aka. protein, can be produced through chemical reaction.
You think the purpose of humankind is to reconnect with God. BULL FREAKING SHIAT. There are millions of people who never heard the concepts of Gods. I said the purpose of humankind is to live his life, for better or worse.
March 5th, 2008 at 11:17 am
/shrugs
I think you’re as crazy as you think I am.
March 5th, 2008 at 11:23 am
Sure Joss, but Tonny SS’s point of view at least doesn’t require the servitude to a god that no one is capable of understanding.
March 5th, 2008 at 12:01 pm
Brett -
But you didn’t solve the problem. You replaced on problem with an identical one. The universe couldn’t just be, so it must be god. But then you allow that god COULD just be. So why not allow that for the universe and not take the next step.
OR even better. Allow that the universe couldn’t just be and that you are waiting for a better explanation.
What you do by leaping to ‘god is the answer’ is the same way early man leapt when he first heard thunder. He had no answer and decided god was the answer. We have since discovered on many, many fronts that god was never the answer.
I am fully willing to give you we don’t know yet how the universe began – but that doesn’t mean that the ONLY possible other answer is god.
March 5th, 2008 at 12:03 pm
[ummm... there was a comment there by Brett. Honest. Don't know where it went.]
March 5th, 2008 at 12:05 pm
Kraeg – I’ve read your comments with some interest because we interacted a while back. I think you make some valid points.
One of the problems with faith is exactly what you pointed out. Which was one of the points of the Thomas story in the New Testament – you know blessed is he who believes without seeing?
In some ways this argument turns to babble because I’m saying my trust and belief comes from something unseen and seemingly unprovable. I could bring up creation, opponents would point to big bang and evolution. And I think it’s impossible to come to this faith through an intellectual argument, even though some of the world’s greatest philosophers were men of faith.
I think my faith in God brings meaning and purpose to my life now and beyond. Am I coming to that conclusion based upon fear? Maybe, maybe not. Can an atheist have meaning and purpose – of course, except when confronted with the grave. My opinion of course, you’re born, you scurry around for a few years, then you die. OK, what’s the point? Most people ask those kinds of questions – who am I and why am I here?
Simply put, I believe in God, and I believe what He said. I’m supposed to tell other people about it. Not everyone’s going to go along with that. And no, I don’t have all the answers. I’m just like everybody else trying to figure this thing out.
OK, you heathens can continue now dancing around the maypole naked!
March 5th, 2008 at 12:20 pm
You know guys, we were talking about psychedelic drugs and their relationships to supposed religious experiences a while back. I hate to say I told you so buuuut….
http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5gEOpkeLopJixolK1-9AQ_zNeWe5g
[Take with one grain of salt and call me in the morning.
]
March 5th, 2008 at 12:23 pm
Note the mention of ayahuasca and the bark of the acacia tree….yeah, that would the substance DMT. Just like we were talking about earlier.
March 5th, 2008 at 2:28 pm
Bucslim -
I have an issue with an instructional book that requires you to go out on a limb to accept it’s instructions, and includes parables within itself on how to go out on that limb.
The idea that it’s impossible to come to god without resorting to the concept of blind faith should come as a warning sign. We don’t allow that sort of lack of intellectual argument to govern any other aspect of our lives, so why do we allow religion that freedom?
As to my view on life/death – yes. I’m born. I scurry around for a few years. With no greater point, other than what I do while i’m here. I live my life, maximizing my enjoyment, without sacrificing the enjoyment of others. I don’t need there to be a larger meaning beyond ‘We’re here accidentally. Let’s enjoy it while it lasts.’
I think my next question would be why is it you need greater meaning to your life? Do the things you do lose meaning if there isn’t anything else beyond it? Is it only the fear of your actions following you into the ‘next life’ that requires you to act correctly in this one?
March 5th, 2008 at 2:57 pm
To the us soldier shot by a muslim extremist, allah is just as real as the bullet that struck him.
it’s all subjective.
March 5th, 2008 at 3:10 pm
Logick Bomb: …huh?
March 5th, 2008 at 3:11 pm
excuse me being blunt, but that is a load of crap Logick Bomb.
Allah doesn’t become more real. Either his own god does, or his anger at religious extremism does.
I can create any manner of atrocity in the name of any god I choose without it altering the receivers perception of that god.
If they are a believer in my god they will feel i’ve stepped off the path.
If they are a believer in another god they will think I worship a false one.
If they don’t subscribe to any such beliefs they think I am simply deluded.
March 5th, 2008 at 3:15 pm
Kraeg, have you not ever questioned what’s next?
Your argument to enjoy life for life itself presents puzzling moral questions. What moral difference is there between a good person and Jack the Ripper if in the end we are all trail mix for maggots? You could come back and say we have laws against that kind of activity and subsequent punishments, but in a short span of history, no one will ever remember the event, and any murderous bastard and victim alike will have turned to dust. Dust has no moral questions to answer. Why not enjoy the fruits of hedonism if there isn’t anything else to look forward too? That’s a little empty and shallow don’t you think?
And where does that morality come from?
Being as it may, fear is the lowest form of worship. I might worship something if I’m afraid of what that thing might do to me. The highest form is out of love – like that dude in Lord of the Rings said – fealty with love. The lifestyle I choose is out of a love for my creator and my fellow man, and not necessarily out of punishment if I step out of line.
March 5th, 2008 at 3:18 pm
BTW Slick – I see I have no hope of ever catching you in the comments race. You’re the Bill Gates of commenting on this site and I’m some dork in a stained paper hat running a pretzle kiosk. Congrats.
March 5th, 2008 at 3:31 pm
bucslim: Lack of religion doesn’t necessitate lack of morality. Sure there are people out there who are naturally hedonistic; they just use atheism as a way to justify their behavior to themselves. However, being a good person is a predisposition…people are born with the equipment to be either good or bad, and they’re upbringing will have much to do with which disposition they end up with. I am a good person, not a hedonist, I enjoy moderation, and treating others the way I would want to be treated. Morality without god can come from a healthy respect for the rights of other individuals on human terms, rather tha supernatural ones.(i.e. “We are all God’s children.”) Ever heard the term “secular humanist?” Yeah…a term created by atheists who want to distance themselves from the common stigma of atheism being part and parcel of immorality.
March 5th, 2008 at 3:34 pm
Yeah, also…I could deal with the loss of self-respect if I had a building full of gold coins I could swim in too, a la Scrooge McDuck. I have too much damn free time…or maybe it isn’t free. I actually get paid to do work, but do this instead. So not only have I no life, it would seem I’m also irresponsible. Of course, I should have been able to realize when I first spotted my name at the bottom of the top commenters list, but my hubris got the better of me.
I *like* pretzels, by the way.
March 5th, 2008 at 3:46 pm
Slick – true, a godless person can live a moral life, and you did a nice job of summarizing the golden rule, which, if I’m not mistaken, is one of the tenets of Christianity. LOL.
My question is why? Why live a moral life if in the end, we are all headed into the mouths and out the ass of maggots?
March 5th, 2008 at 3:52 pm
bucslim: Heh.
Also one of the main tenets of most other organized religions.
Why? Because I certainly like to lead a nice, normal life without having to worry too much about being fucked over by strangers on a regular basis, which I’m sure most every other reasonable person would agree with. Also…I was raised to be moral, to show people respect and to adhere to the fundamental laws of the society I live in. Someone who is raised without these lessons is much more likely to be hedonistic, hostile and ferociously self-serving.
March 5th, 2008 at 3:57 pm
Buclism: Because you don’t have to be religious to have feelings for other human life. For example I don’t want to kill a person, not because I don’t want to go to hell (I would consider myself an atheist/agnostic whatever…I guess agnostic) but because I don’t believe another human life should end for my own personal gain. It has NOTHING to do with how I end up after I die. I live a moral life because I have regard for others and I have a conscience, it’s not ruled by what happens after I die…unless you want to get into the argument that God gave us a conscience…well then I can’t really argue against that.
Anyway there is my answer, Slick I’m sure you’d agree…
By the way, I’m not knocking your faith on God, I believe having faith in something is a really good thing, whatever the religion (unless your a crazy extremist haha)
March 5th, 2008 at 3:58 pm
Hahaha Slick…I think we just answered at the same time
March 5th, 2008 at 4:46 pm
Modern pop religious are plagerized and propagandaized versions of older religions.
For example, the 10 Commandments are a corrupted subset of the Egyptian 42 Affirmations of Ma’at.
March 5th, 2008 at 4:50 pm
Bucslim, without reiterating others responses, I will ask you to look into the religious beliefs of the current residents of prisons in the U.S.
I’m pulling from memory here but it is roughly 86% Christian, and less than 2% atheist.
So I would have to suggest that ethics and morals come from somewhere else and are not necessarily influenced by belief in any god.
Additionally, there has been some very interesting research done in the nature of morals and the inherent genetic benefits of morality. I’d be happy to provide references if you aren’t already up on it.
The overall point being you tread a very, very slippery slope when you start to present religion as a basis for morals, considering the small and large transgressions in this world perpetrated by followers of religion. It’s one of the weakest pro-religion stances there is.
March 5th, 2008 at 4:58 pm
I didn’t answer your question, Bucslim, on the origin of morality if not the word of god.
I pose you this question. If god told you that murder is ok, would you immediately feel that this is good?
I strongly suppose you would not. This is due to an inherent understanding of what is morally correct and what is morally wrong. For the most part, the word of god supports this inherent morality with each and every one of us. But it doesn’t dictate it.
I’m not saying that the modern laws of the churches can’t raise a law abiding citizen, but it is very interesting that the majority of transgression against societies’ laws are made by those that supposedly believe in a god. I don’t remember the last time a child in school was bullied and hurt for his religious beliefs, but i can point out to you the few current news stories where on has been hurt for his lack of them.
March 5th, 2008 at 5:20 pm
RE: Morality and god.
Morality has nothing to do with god, or belief in an afterlife granted by your personal god. In fact, that would be ‘faking’ it and god would presumably know the difference; if you act morally here on Earth only to achieve entrance to the pearly gates, well I’ll see you in Hell. Which brings me to my main point, NO ONE truly is altruistic, it goes against human nature, and the concept of altruism as a virtue is silly. Under altruistic motives, if someone were to give me assistance in some manner (money, food, whatever), would I not be evil if I then did not search out someone even less fortunate, who has more need? Don’t confuse altruism with kindness, you can be a kind, generous person and completely reject altruism as some sort of ‘way to live your life’.
If religious people are indeed sacrificing their true desires here on Earth so that St. Peter will part the gates, then doesn’t this make them selfish (doing something only for the return on the investment)? It is known that some of the most philanthropic people, who raise tons of money for charities are indeed nasty, mean-spirited, jerks to individuals. Mother Teresa was like this, MT a very selfish person.
People, lose your fear and start living a good life based on enjoyment and happiness here on Earth, unshackle yourselves from religious indoctrination and breathe. Learn about your ancient ancestry, it will teach you more about yourself than any ‘holy book’.
March 5th, 2008 at 6:13 pm
What’s the score? Who’s winning? Any hot cheerleaders here?
March 5th, 2008 at 6:45 pm
Joss, I don’t think you’re crazy. Just ill-informed.
A quick thought: if evolution was a myth, surely the only music that would exist would be Gregorian plainchant. Any thoughts?
March 5th, 2008 at 7:16 pm
Kraeg: I actually am interested in those articles on research about having inherent morality if you have any. Thanks!
March 6th, 2008 at 3:10 am
No.
If “god” did exist he/she would have to be either “infinite” or finite. If infinite, he/she would have billions upon billions of stars and planets and species to mind over distances spanning millions of light years and we down here would be just about infinitely insignificant. Any prayer by individual or group would be lost in the noise. But, if finite, then there could be more than one such entity in which case god is merely an alien whose sense of humor I do not admire.
March 6th, 2008 at 5:53 am
Kraeg; Your stats on criminal offenders is lame-o. Most people believe in god. Atheists, at least in North America, Europe, Australia and most of the rest of world, are the minority. Of course most offenders are gonna be believers. Morality is an inherent characteristic? Bullshit! You may be genetically predisposed to love and care for your own family, but that’s about it. People left to their own devices will not create Utopia.
March 6th, 2008 at 8:26 am
zmeya: so for the purposes of your argument you will consent to a God that is infinite but is not omnipresent?
what about his sense of humor do you not admire?
March 6th, 2008 at 11:01 am
Jackie: Heh, I knew someone would call me on it. That’s the problem with referring to articles you have read, but don’t have any idea of how to re-reference them.
That being said, a quick google of ‘evolutionary morals’ pulls up a lot of the current discussions on the topic.
March 6th, 2008 at 11:15 am
Mom424:
I beg to differ. I am fully aware of the ability to use statistics to further ones agenda. But in this case, If you look at the statistics that claim anywhere from 10-20% of americans are atheist and compare it with the statistic of belief within prison populations it supports my point. The ratio of Atheists to Believers is less in prison populations than in the general population. So either Atheists are somehow less able to be brought to justice for their crimes, or they just aren’t committing crimes to the same degree that believers in the various gods are.
You, unintentionally, support my point. If our morals come from god, or at least the teachings of god, then why would you dare say ‘of course most offenders are going to be religious’? That seems to be counter-intuitive to me, based on the whole morality is taught by god argument.
I do partly agree with you one one point – some people, left to their own devices, will not create utopia. Unfortunately for the religious side of the argument, the vast majority of those transgressors claim religious convictions of varying degrees.
And if you want to look at my previous suggestion, 655., please feel free to do your own reading on the validity of some of these discussions. I won’t try to force it upon you. But it is generally accepted that morality and ethics contribute to the survival of a species and can be demonstrated as an evolutionary positive.
March 6th, 2008 at 11:28 am
Kraeg; Prison population is irrevocably tied to socio-economic placement in society. In case you didn’t realized the majority of prisoners are poor and uneducated. Poor and uneducated folk , for the most part, don’t spend time pondering the meaning of god and whether or not he/she exists. They believe what they were taught. (Whether they truly believe is up for debate, more likely just fill in the box on the questionnaire). Again your stat is meaningless. Poverty = Crime NOT Religion = Crime
March 6th, 2008 at 12:46 pm
Kraeg: Did you know that the number of murders in a given year is directly proportional to how much ice cream the city sells each year? As ice cream sales go up, murder rates go up. Crazy right? Except what I’m leaving out of this equation is that both groups of variables are *not* causally linked to each other, but to a third variable: the heat. As the heat in the city goes up, tempers flare, people have less patience, violence ensues. Also, people like to eat ice cream when it is hot outside. The ice cream sale rate and the murder rate are correlated, but one does not *cause* the other. This is the assumption and the fallacy you are making in your argument about the link between crime and religion.
There are two reasons that come immediately to mind: first, that what Mom424 said is generally correct. Propensity for crime and violence is directly linked to the low end of the socioeconomic scale, for a number of different reasons. As such, a propensity for belief in God and adherence to religion is to a certain extent causally linked with low SEC status. It is not religion that causes crime, its that low SEC status contributes to both the high crime rate and a concentrated number of religious faithfuls. They are mutually exclusive of each other, despite seeming connected. Secondly, there is an exceptionally high religious conversion rate in prison, again for a number of reasons, some genuine, some not. Many of those people that did not have religious affiliations in the past, when the crime was committed and they were convicted, later went on to become religious and identify themselves as belonging to a particular religious denomination. These are both two very real (and honestly, more practical) explanations for the correlation between religion and crime rates than the idea that somehow atheists either get away with the crimes more often, or more laughably, that religious people commit more crime because they are religious.
March 6th, 2008 at 1:16 pm
SlickWilly; Thanks, common sense and education go hand in hand once again…
Interesting stat re: smoking cigarettes and birth defects/deficiencies – once they factored in poverty and the drug abuse/poor nutrition/lack of pre-natal care that accompany poverty, smoking itself was found to have little effect, in fact near nil
(I’m not advocating smoking while pregnant, why take any chance?, but interesting none the less)
March 6th, 2008 at 1:28 pm
Heres an interesting fact for all of you, 75% of America is Christian, 75% of all inmates in prison are Christian, 0.02% percent of all inmates in prison are atheist, think on that.
March 6th, 2008 at 1:31 pm
Mom424: Mmm…yes, perhaps. I’ve never heard that before, but I had seen studies that show that tobacco use during pregnancy *can* lead to birth defects. I believe that all of those factors will play a large part in the contribution towards birth defects and deficiencies, but it’s also interesting to note that the ratio of tobacco users to non-tobacco users is much higher in low SEC subset than in the general population. Those on the lower end of the scale smoke more cigarettes, more freqently than those at the middle or higher end. So I wouldn’t be surprised if, for all these reasons, the birth defect ratio is higher for the impoverished than for the general population. Of course, you might be right…the compounded effects of those other factors may have overridden any damage done by the cigarettes, and those that suffer from drug abuse/poor nutrition, etc., would have given birth to a child with defects anyway, with or without the use of tobacco. It *is* interesting.
March 6th, 2008 at 2:37 pm
Mom424 – you misunderstand me. I’m not equating crime with religion. I’m merely pointing out that the correlation between a strong moral/ethical code and theism is a tenuous one at best, and yet theist consistently try to use it as one of their strongest criticisms of atheism.
March 6th, 2008 at 3:15 pm
Yes….God is real…..there is so much proof that he is real. Just look around, how can we be here? Trust me, my ancestors were not mad from gook from a cosmic fart that happened “billions” of yrs ago. Us “Evolving” and working is like putting a smashed up clock in a paper bag and shaking it until we get a fully working clock….the solution is GOD!!! Joey Isa. 6:8
March 6th, 2008 at 3:22 pm
SlickWilly – You are incorrect that there is a high conversion rate to theism in prison. There may be a redefining in some way. Strengthening of already present religious belief, etc. But you will find that there are very few inmates converting from a disbelief in god to a belief, whatever the motivation.
As I said, I understand that statistics have to be treated carefully. I wasn’t using this as a method of compartmentalizing theists as criminals. I am using it to demonstrate the wrongness of thinking that atheists are more bankrupt (morally) than theists, and it just isn’t the case.
Mom424 – I’m not sure what journals you’ve read but
smoking’s effect on the fetus has been separated from socio-economic divisions. A quote from a peer reviewed journal, the Acta Paediatrica:
Conclusion: In subjects hospitalized due to early wheezing,
pre- and post-natal smoke exposure increase the risk of
asthma in early adulthood. The connection between pre-natal
smoke exposure and asthma appears to be mediated via the
development of bronchial hyper-responsiveness.
Feel free to cite your own sources.
There is one of the actual drawbacks to a belief in the supernatural. Once you’ve accepted something as fact because it just feels right – in this case god – it allows that pattern of thought to bleed into other areas of intellectual consideration.
March 6th, 2008 at 3:46 pm
Joey: Well Joey, you actually *are* right. Your ancestors were not made from the gook of a comisc fart that happened billions of years ago. That is quite astute of you. As it happens, your ancestors were the same ancestors as the apes you see today. That ancestor’s ancestor (and coincidentally, most other mammals’ ancestor) was most likely an ampibious creature reminiscent of a reptile or fish. That ancestor’s ancestor (and coincidentally, the ancestor of every animal in existence ever in the history of the world) was likely a simple, one-celled organism that was constructed of self-replicating protein chains and a primitive cell wall. An amoeba, if you will. You should do some reading up on the fact of evolution. It’s all really very interesting.
And your watch analogy is actually a perversion of the very old watchmaker analogy. The only problem is, your version doesn’t work, because you assume that nature is completely random and that somehow, life evolved purely by chance. This is incorrect; there are actually several aspects of evolution that have nothing to do with chance and everything to do with a very rigid, systematic process of selection for reproductive fitness. The concept of natural selection is far from random; the same can be said about the concepts of gene flow and speciation. No, your analogy is ineffective. The (much stronger) argument you were probably going for is as follows:
1. The complex functional mechanism of a watch are such that their existence necessitates the presence of a designer.
2. As with a watch, the complexity inherent in the world around us necessitates a designer.
A better example might be the simple anecdote: If you came across a pocketwatch in the woods, and nobody else was around, you would naturally assume that the watch was created by an intelligent designer nonetheless. The popular rebuttal of this argument is that Paley (the man who originally made this argument back in 1802) is begging the question here by already assuming the answer to his question when he was asking it. He does not even allow for the possibility of natural complexity in the world around us by using a watch, something we know was created by a designer, and generalizing it to the whole world, something we do not know was created by a designer, through the tenuous connection of complexity alone. Instead, think of nature as, as Richard Dawkins put it, a blind watchmaker. It has all the necessary tools and parts at its disposal, and since it cannot see what it is making, it randomly assembles parts and pieces, rejecting that which does not end up as a watch, and starting over until, by chance and by non-random procedures, a watch is created.
If you want to, understand that God put evolution into motion, and that science is His gift to us to realize the wonder and scope of His creation. Don’t be ignorant and turn away from the hard scientific evidence that proves that evolution is true in a feeble attempt to protect your faith. That is just moronic, really.
March 6th, 2008 at 3:48 pm
Ernest Hemingway said that all thinking men are athiests. I used to think non stop about if there was a god. I thought and thought and searched for absolutes. The only absolute in life is that if you are alive then you will die. God can not be proven or disproven, and neither can the origin of the earth, the universe, or life. We all have our own theories, but in reality, humanity will never be able to have a definate answer to all of those questions. To believe or not believe in God takes faith. Believing in evolution takes faith. Being an athiest takes faith. Believing in God takes faith. Personally, I realized this and that they are all on the same playing field. They all take faith. I essentially became a nihilist. If there was no provable rhyme or reason for being alive or the origin of everything, then I felt as if humanity only had meaning once they placed that meaning upon themselves. I personally couldn’t apply meaning to my own life when I knew that everything else had no provable meaning either. These thought consumed my thought life and I couldn’t move on. In desperation I “prayed” to “god” or whatever was out there that “created” life and the universe and the earth. It was my last resort before I would have probably killed myself. The day after I prayed I was at work, and I was thinking about praying the night before, and then I felt this supernatural power come over me. I felt a deep down fulfillment and joy and peace. I had never had an experience like that before, but I KNEW that it was God. It was the sign that I personally needed to believe that God is real. After that I read the book of John in the bible and accepted Jesus as my personal lord and savior. That was about 5 months ago from this day, and I’m completely different. Jesus is the reason I live, and without him I’d have no meaning.
March 6th, 2008 at 3:51 pm
Kraeg: I know what you are getting at. Honestly, it’s a self-evident fact. Not all atheists are immoral and not all theists are moral. There are no universally true, sweeping generalizations of any group of people, and if someone believe otherwise, they are not worth even trying to have an intelligent conversation with, which makes this whole thing, really, a moot point.
March 6th, 2008 at 3:53 pm
is it bad to be post 666 on a religous list?
March 6th, 2008 at 3:55 pm
Gotta say – this list is now the second most commented list – the only one it fails to beat is the bible stories list with 1176 comments. Tomorrow I will do a new Your View which is bound to incite at least a little violence
March 6th, 2008 at 4:09 pm
DiscHuker: that depends – if poster 666 thinks of someone dying and they die – yes – it is a bad thing. Otherwise, probably not.
March 6th, 2008 at 4:15 pm
jayfray: did you get the last email following up on the one you did not receive?
March 6th, 2008 at 4:20 pm
DiscHuker: no – try frater@gmail instead
March 6th, 2008 at 4:31 pm
oh no not violence
March 6th, 2008 at 4:54 pm
I agree with you SlickWilly. Although i feel the same about anyone trying to bring up the watchmaker analogy. Not worth the conversation time.
Neal – belief in evolution takes no faith. It has been proven. Being an atheist takes no faith. It is the antithesis of that, refusing to take god on faith.
You are confusing the fact of Evolution, with Evolutionary Theory. There isn’t any debate that Evolution exists outside of the Intelligent Design enthusiasts. Any debate in reputable journals revolves around particulars of Evolutionary Theory and not on the credibility of Evolution itself.
And please don’t confuse an atheist with someone who believes in the big bang theory of the universe. Most big bang enthusiasts are atheists, but not all atheists subscribe to that theory.
You need to really educate yourself on the meaning of the word faith before you start applying that label to all ideologies.
March 6th, 2008 at 5:43 pm
Kraeg: Joey happened to bring up what was a pretty twisted version of the watchmaker argument. I just wanted to correct him and show him why the argument fails. It’s not a self-evident truth.
March 6th, 2008 at 5:45 pm
Kraeg – I don’t know the difference between the evolutionary theory or the fact of evolution. Admittedly I’m not very educated on it, but even before I believed in god I didn’t buy evolution. In my opinion, no matter what facts I see on paper and explained to me.. I just can’t believe that my species evolved from fish. I believe it takes a lot of faith to believe that. But you know more about it then me.. so if you’d like to fill me in on something I’m keeping an open mind. I’m not abandoning anything I believe, however, but I don’t think that’s the point of this.
I wasn’t confusing athiests with people who believe in the big bang theory. I mean athiest as people who don’t believe in God. I know many different athiests believe many different things, but to define terms.. athiest = no belief in god. God can’t be disproven. It is impossible for humans to know the origin of all things. To say it wasn’t created by god is a theory. To say it wasn’t created by a giant kangaroo is a theory. We don’t know. Faith – belief that is not based on proof. I don’t understand how I misused the word “faith”, but if you’d like to explain further I’d appreciate it.
Despite all this debate, I can not denounce my faith in Jesus Christ because of the super natural feeling that came over me in the midst of the deepest depression I’ve ever felt. It’s undeniable to me.
I’m not going to be rude to you and I’ll respect what you have to say dispite my beliefs.
March 6th, 2008 at 6:04 pm
No worries, Neal. And I apologize if my note came over as rude. i’ve tried to not be in this forum but sometimes passion can take over.
Faith is used to refer to the adherence to concepts and theories despite a complete lack of supporting evidence.
Ok – Evolution. A fact undisputed by all but Intelligent Design supporters. Evolution has happened and accepted.
Evolutionary Theory is the exact path and process that Evolution has taken. There is a lot of dispute within this topic regarding timelines, family branching, gene theory, etc.
You misused the term faith by saying evolution requires it.
I mentioned the Atheist/Big Bang connection as you have determined that Atheists also have faith. What that usually refers to is faith in that particular theory of how the universe began. I should have been more clear with that.
You again misused the term when saying it requires faith to be an atheist. The Big Bang – while an incredibly interesting and tidy explanation for the universe – falls within the definition of faith. I subscribe to this theory for now, but am not so fundamental that I need to adhere to it if evidence suggests otherwise.
To say the universe isn’t created by god, in response to the assertion that it is, doesn’t constitute a theory. It is a response to the theory – that there is a god – that doesn’t have supporting evidence.
To say it wasn’t created by a giant kangaroo would only be a theory if we had evidence to suggest that it might have been. Then I could pose a theory that it was not.
We have NO evidence that the universe was created by a god, so no theory is needed to counteract. Merely the rejection of the god theory.
I hope you find this more clear, and not perceived as being rude
March 6th, 2008 at 6:21 pm
i scroll down without having read any of the comments , purely within the metaphysical boundary, or as you may find, without recourse to common sense, everyone within the context of a historical heresy justifies the common belief, if by adhering to the prevalent orthodoxy you find peace so be it, simply don’t ascribe a very human concept with omniscient, omnipotent endeavour, when basically you’re describing your own inclinations and obvious limitation. Be thankful for what on earth you are, rail against the injustice, but for your sake don’t for the time being use your imagination as a get out clause.
March 6th, 2008 at 6:21 pm
Kraeg; I am aware of the correlation with asthma, I was speaking only of prenatal birth weight and defects. I in no way think smoking is ok during pregnancy or for that matter at any time. I will try and find the article/study and post it later. (I think it was a UK study)
I don’t believe atheists to be morally bankrupt, or at least any more so than the general population. In fact, most of the atheists that I know belong to the higher socio-economic bracket and likely are less morally bankrupt than average. Again due to circumstances, not belief. (I’m using the term morals loosely here folks, Mystern, Slick) Using crime statistics just isn’t the correct way to make this particular point.
“There is one of the actual drawbacks to a belief in the supernatural. Once you’ve accepted something as fact because it just feels right – in this case god – it allows that pattern of thought to bleed into other areas of intellectual consideration.” I’m not entirely sure who this comment was directed to but I would suggest that Randall might take issue. Personally I’m an adult and I know that just because something feels right does not make it so. I have no problem separating the spiritual from the secular. I don’t even believe in God in the traditional sense, but that is a far cry from believing that we would be better off without religion. Without religion and its “controls” or aims we would be far worse off. Religion was/is a unifying force. It demands unselfish behavior and sets standards to live by. These are good things that are overshadowed by the atrocities and excesses committed in its name. (mostly for secular reasons, ie; crusades,inquisition)
The problem is not religion, but allowing Religion to upset or replace Reason. Blind faith, the kind required by Fundamentalist religion of any denomination, is exactly that; Blind. Stumbling around in the dark is dangerous, you’re bound to get hurt. Lets not paint all religion and all faith with that same brush.
March 6th, 2008 at 7:29 pm
jfrater: what kind of your view is it?
March 6th, 2008 at 7:44 pm
It is an astounding fact that evolutionary theory, if true, could only produce ever weaker creatures with continually narrowed adaptive traits. A Dutch zoologist, J.J. Duyvene de Wit, explains that if man were descended from animal ancestors, “man should possess a smaller gene-potential than his animal ancestors”!
Well, that is a breath-taking discovery! If we had
actually descended from monkeys, then we would have less genetic potential than they have! Our anatomy, physiology, brains, hormones, etc. would be less competent than that of a great ape. In turn, the monkey is supposedly descended from
something else, and would therefore have less genetic capacity than its supposed ancestor had. Somewhere back there, the first descendant came from protozoa. All that follows in the evolutionary ladder would have to have
considerably less genetic potential than protozoa! That point alone eliminates biological evolution! The “Evolutionary Theory” twists data and warps conclusions in an effort to vindicate itself.
March 6th, 2008 at 7:57 pm
Kraeg; I think comment #681 illustrates my comments and the worst excesses of Religion. Maybe atheism is the way to go!..lol
I never cease to be amazed at the ignorance all around us. It is mind boggling. and oh so sad…
March 6th, 2008 at 8:01 pm
There is no god. The day i believe in your “god” is the day he comes down, sits beside me, and apologizes for being such an asshole.
March 6th, 2008 at 8:12 pm
mom242 – Its easy to call someone ignorant, but why? Why is that incorrect? Why is that comment wrong?
Mike s – If you think that you are importaint enough that you can get an infinite all powerful God to come and apologize……well i guess you got balls then friend.
March 6th, 2008 at 8:12 pm
SlickWilly, God did not put Evolution into motion, Evolution isn’t even real! God created the Earth with hand, not with and “Big Bang!” Also explain this to me. How could that mass of nothingness explode? How could nothing explode and turn into something? Also, how come we have planets and universes that rotate in different directions? Hav eyou ever heard of the Coriolis Effect? Here lets use this example.
You take three kids and put them on a Merry-Go-Round. Then you take 4 football players and get them to spin that merry-go-round very fast. Eventually when those kids fly off they should spin the same direction. Same thing applies for the universe. This also disproves evoultion.
March 6th, 2008 at 8:13 pm
Sorry i meant to say a not and slickwilly
March 6th, 2008 at 9:00 pm
Hoo boy… what a better topic to rile up a furiously fevered debate then religion. It’s about time, jfrater.
But any ways, here’s my two cents. Religion has played a major role in the development of civilization and culture since the first cave man looked to the sky and questioned the sun. For ages, religion has had a massive grip on society, through government and folk alike, pouring stories and tall tales down the masses throats for centuries and centuries. I like to think of religion as a primitive form of “science”. Hundreds and hundreds of years ago, if you were to ask who made the skies blue or the clouds white, your answer would inevitably be “God”, or, depending on who you were asking, “Thor”, or maybe it was “Tabaldak” but this guy says it was “Citlalicue” while that other guy says it was a giant serpent. But during the past 150 years, mankind has seen some massive advancements and discoveries in the field of science and has only then begun to really question if there really is a bearded man in the sky watching our every move. It’ll only be a matter of time until the influence of all the current major religions dwindle to that of cult status, possibly making room for a new, “science-friendly” new wave cult that’ll take the world by storm. Who knows?
As for what I think, I think all religions are rubbish. The thought of an all-seeing-eye in the clouds is purely fictitious. But with that said, sometimes I do think that there maybe is a “powerful” force that aided the creation of our massive universe. Do I think that this is all the work of a massive, bearded being in a white robe? No, but possibly this force is in the form of some sort of “divine” dark matter or possibly a sub-atomic wave. I could go on and try to explain it but it’s 9 o’clock at night and I don’t have the energy to explain it. Hell, I don’t even understand it myself.
So, I guess I’m agnostic, borderline atheist.
March 6th, 2008 at 10:22 pm
Joey, that is so retarded
March 7th, 2008 at 12:40 am
mom424:
On joey we agree. I’m either very sorry he chose your side, or very glad. As yet undecided.
March 7th, 2008 at 1:08 am
why is it that this topic is on it’s 690th post? It’s obvious that it is a huge topic…but why? Has society caused us to question the existence of a god? or is it each individual? What many of the people on this forum are talking about involves trying to prove or disprove god with hard evidence, or theories, or both. Believing in god takes faith, and god won’t be proven. It is a faith based belief. If god were to prove himself real, then it wouldn’t require any faith. God is omnipresent, but he won’t enter anyone’s life uninvited.
And just to throw this out there, I know I sound ridiculous to everyone who isn’t a christian. You all sound ridiculous to me too. I’m not saying that to offend you, but to let everyone realize that we simply won’t all agree, hence this being the 690th post haha.
March 7th, 2008 at 1:13 am
oh, and i also think this is interesting. I’m not a historian by any means, but isn’t it strange that loong long ago before the continents of earth could communicate with eachother.. many different societies had their own versions of a divine creator or the origin of certain things? How come they had the same basic ideas about an abstract idea (god/divine creator) when they didn’t have contact with each other? Can anyone elaborate or fill me in on this?..nicely? lol
March 7th, 2008 at 1:42 am
Kraeg – ok so you got me on the definition of the word faith i guess. But what I was trying to say was that when someone has certain beliefs.. they have trust in those beliefs. Perhaps I’m using words wrong, but I’ll still try to come off as clearly as I can. Kraeg, are you satisfied with what you believe? In my opinion, beliefs are what someone should live and die for. It’s the core of who you are. Do you believe that you have a purpose? One thing that we can all agree on is that we are alive and we perceive what is reality to us by our 5 senses. We are all alive, and we all have our own ideas on how we should live the lives we have.. however we originally acquired them. Everyone seeks their own self satisfaction. Kraeg, have you found your own self satisfaction? I have such deep fulfillment and joy from Jesus. I didn’t pick a religion to make myself feel better. I can’t apply meaning to something that is meaningless. But with Jesus, I don’t have to, because he came to me. I know I make no sense to you. But know this. Whatever satisfaction you have in whatever you believe, it won’t ever compare to the joy and peace and love and fulfillment I know by having a relationship with Jesus. I can’t make you believe anything and I’m not going to try to make you believe by debating. Before this supernatural thing happened to me, someone could yell at me till they were blue in the face and I still wouldn’t believe. I mean.. I grew up in church! I definitely heard about it, but it meant nothing until a personal “enlightenment” happened that I knew was god. That happened when I was 18 (I’m 19 now). It isn’t a christian’s duty to MAKE anyone believe. Christians are called to be witnesses.
March 7th, 2008 at 1:48 am
Neal, one theory is that at one point in humans history we all spoke the same language. People united and tried to build a tower to heaven to reach the sky. God changed their languages to confuse them. People scattered into separate areas based on their new language……….that would kinda explain it conceptually, but im sure that people are going to jump all over this explanation.
March 7th, 2008 at 1:57 am
Neal= one theory is that at one point in humans history we all spoke the same language. People united and tried to build a tower to heaven to reach the sky. God changed their languages to confuse them. People scattered into separate areas based on their new language……….that would kinda explain it conceptually, but im sure that people are going to jump all over this explanation.
March 7th, 2008 at 2:06 am
“Mike s – If you think that you are importaint enough that you can get an infinite all powerful God to come and apologize……well i guess you got balls then friend.”
If God is infinite and all-powerful, then fulfilling Mike’s request would take nothing from him, it would simply be an act of will, and if God existed and wanted us to believe in him, then why wouldn’t he do it?
March 7th, 2008 at 2:51 am
I’m terribly sorry Neal and Joey.
But it appears as if you are just downright neglectful of facts upheld. One of you actually mentioned that you choose to ignore FACTS simply because you “don’t like them”. How can you even think to challenge us atheists [or anti-theists] if you do not even accept the same set of base facts? How is an argument to take place if there is no common ground?
The evolution discussion is not what this post is about.
This boils down to the old faith vs. reason argument, yet when st. thomas aquinas himself was a proponent of faith, he said faith should pick up where reason left off. HE HIMSELF said that reason is more trustful than faith in that simple statement. If you choose to ignore science, you choose to ignore reality.
I do, however, have an idea.
Let’s play a game. It’s called the “Magic Milk Jug Game”.
Instead of taking your beliefs solely off faith thusly denying reason, simply pray to the Magic Milk Jug to show you the answers. And 100% of the time, it answers your prayers. You beg to differ? God [God is Imaginary] does the exact same thing. He/it answers prayers with the following results: “Yes.” “No.” and “Wait.”
“We have to trust that He knows what’s best. God answers prayers in the form of ‘yes’, ‘no’ and ‘wait’. Sometimes the hardest answer to accept is ‘wait’. It’s difficult to be left in limbo, wondering how God will handle our problem, but we must have faith that He will!” – Christianity.com
If you pray to the Magic Milk Jug that you get a promotion, and later that day you are moved into a window office, the Magic Milk Jug just answered your prayer. [YES]
If you pray to the Magic Milk Jug that you get a new promotion, and nothing happens, the Magic Milk Jug just answered your prayer. [NO]
If you pray to the Magic Milk Jug that you get a new promotion, and nothing happens, until 6 weeks later, you are moved into the window office, the Magic Milk Jug just answered your prayer.[WAIT]
It has every base covered, so it answers every prayer without failure. You see where I am going with this?
God [God is Imaginary] does the exact same thing.
Statistically, you will get the same result. No bullshit, no altering of data, all that happens is that the Magic Milk Jug/God [God is Imaginary] will win every time.
AND HERE ARE THE FACTS ABOUT THIS OCCURRENCE. READ THESE AND UNDERSTAND WHAT YOUR “GOD” [GOD IS IMAGINARY] REALLY IS. [A DELUSION IN THE MIND OF IGNORANCE]
How do we know this? How do we know that every answered prayer truly is a coincidence? The way to know is to look at every valid scientific study that has been done to test the effectiveness of prayer. Scientists have proven it over and over again: Prayer has absolutely no effect.
For example, the New York Times wrote this:
“In a large and much touted scientific study, one group of patients was told that strangers would pray for them, a second group was told strangers might or might not pray for them, and a third group was not prayed for at all. The $2.4 million study found that the strangers’ prayers did not help patients’ recovery.”
In fact, there wasn’t even a placebo effect. The people who knew that they were being prayed for actually did worse than the others.
The Boston Globe points out:
“A review of 17 past studies of ”distant healing,” … found no significant effect for prayer or other healing methods.”
USA Today says:
“A positive attitude does not improve the chances of surviving cancer and doctors who encourage patients to keep up hope may be burdening them, according to the results of research.”
We see this every day:
People who pray die of diseases at exactly the same rate as people who don’t pray.
People who pray get divorced at exactly the same rate as people who don’t pray.
People who pray win the lottery at the same rate as people who don’t pray.
We all know it. Prayer does not have any effect on events.
You might have a thousand rationalizations. For example, you might say to yourself,
“God cannot be tested!”
Or
“God must remain hidden!”
But these are rationalizations, nothing more. The fact is, the scientific studies are correct. Every answered prayer is a coincidence.
Once you understand the illusion of the Magic Milk Jug, you can see exactly what is happening.
The scientific studies are correct.
You should be able to see that now. Take the time to actually look at the science. You will see that it is true.
You are a smart person.
You cannot deny reality.
And then use your intelligence to understand this simple truth:
The reason why prayer has no effect is because God is imaginary.
God is imaginary.
March 7th, 2008 at 3:42 am
ENOUGH
March 7th, 2008 at 3:46 am
thedragon23: hehe. It gets overwhelming in the end eh?
March 7th, 2008 at 3:48 am
God Is Imaginary: I don’t think you can cite “scientific proof” that the prayers did not work – you do not know whether the person being prayed for would have gotten worse without the prayers – therefore you do not know if the prayer had an effect.
March 7th, 2008 at 4:21 am
I use Firefox
March 7th, 2008 at 5:25 am
Yes he exists
He’s just blind and deaf…
But Heck, I’d be blind and deaf too when I’m that old.
March 7th, 2008 at 7:47 am
No one will win this argument, you have all gone off on a tangent here, you’re talking about religion not whether God exists or not, some people believe in God but not in any structured religion.
March 7th, 2008 at 7:58 am
Yes God exists necessarily so. I find it amusing how a lot of atheists try to sound smart, while the guy who invented calculus asked the telling question of ‘why is there something rather than nothing’? So the fact of existence itself is our starting point. Some have tried to cast off existence as a dream, but to dream you must exist must you not?
God exists. My science teacher once drew a circle on the board and asked us what we thought it is. Various answers included ‘cirle’, ‘ball’ etc etc.. but with that ‘circle’ he was referring to the big bang theory. That is, the original planet which blew up and consequently gave shape to the universe we know today. He then told us that serious scientists will never discount the existence of God merely because consistent logic would need a cause for the existence of that primordial planet. Where did THAT planet come from?
The Being, capable of bringing about that planet from nothing, i.e., without the use of any raw materials, necessarily has to be God.
What is more convincing is that THAT Being himself communicated with us. An examination of salvation history gives you the inevitable sense that from the beginning of his dealings with humankind, God was telling us that He Himself would one day come and walk in our midst. This is Christ. This is Christianity, take it or leave it.
March 7th, 2008 at 8:06 am
Oh, and to the question, ‘Then where did God come from?’ one would have to say that THAT QUESTION is besides the point being made–that to bring about that original planet, there had to be a Being powerful enough to do so with no materials in hand. Now either you believe in that Being as God, or keep believing in your denial of logic. Where God then came from is beyond us logically speaking. The birth of existence is different than the birth of the cause of that existence. And in speaking of the cause of all existence, we speak of a cause different from the nature of all other causes known to us.
March 7th, 2008 at 8:08 am
Antichrist, bravo, bravo! Yours is among the best arguments I’ve read from someone without all of those tedious letters after their name.
As for myself. I was raised Mormon, and in my teens found out that my father had been a Satanist before he converted. I decided to do a little digging into different religions with the intent of enlightening myself so that I could make better arguments for the existence of god, etc. I ended up using my intellect entirely the way it was meant to be, and finding so many holes in every religious text I read that couldn’t be satisfactorily explained away that I dropped my religion.
Please note: I DROPPED it. I didn’t lose it. TO lose one’s religion connotes an intent and a desire to “find” it or something like it to fill that void that it leaves behind in your life. I have opted to fill my time and my life with doing what I want, and what I want is most important to me. This does not mean that I am selfish. I want to prove that you do not need religion in your life to be a good person. To that end, I strive every day to be better than Christians, Muslims and the like; and I succeed most of the time.
My argument against the existence of god is simple: Where are the miracles? Where are all of the signs and stuff that we should be able to see, like in the Bible?
I’ll tell you. They never were. You’ll note that not one single prophet wrote his own book that was named for him; they were written in their name, posthumously. Also, if any of them really did see and hear what they claimed to have experienced, then that makes them schizophrenics, not religious leaders.
These schizos played on the people’s fear of the unknown, i.e. Death, and their extreme hesitance to admit that they were swindled. The price for peace of mind from cradle to grave? Why; your freedom of course.
March 7th, 2008 at 10:00 am
Peter:
You’ve made a factual errors and a couple logical errors.
To begin with, the Big Bang theory does not posit some “primordial planet” that blew up, creating the universe. What the Big Bang theory in fact assumes is *a singularity,* a very different thing from a “planet.” A planet is a rocky or gaseous body formed of matter, usually orbiting a star (though as we know, the definition is knocked about a bit these days). Can’t have matter BEFORE the Big Bang, Peter. A singularity is a thing without dimension (or with one dimension) and is not “matter” itself. Singularities are believed to be what exists at the heart of black holes. I would suggest you protest your science teacher’s ignorance and see that he/she go back to school or find a new occupation, as you’ve been fed a seriously wrong fact.
Now… you may still say, “well, planet or singularity, it had to COME from somewhere.” Well, good point—but here’s where you make your logical error. You answer that it came from god… and then, anticipating someone ELSE asking, “but…. where does GOD come from?” You conveniently choose to dispense with their question by saying it is “beside the point.” Hardly, Peter. This is simple dishonesty. These questions represent a chain and one question is not any less valid than another.
If you ask, where did the universe come from, and then answer, “from god,” then it is just as legitimate to THEN ask, “where did god come from?” If the answer then is, “well, god has always existed…” then why not save a step and simply assume that the universe always existed?
You simply ignore the chain and wish to assume some kind of being/intelligence had to be there to cause these events to happen—but you offer no proof of this, you simply say “it must be.”
This is *by no means* logic, Peter. It’s far from it.
If “where god came from” is “beyond us” logically, then why not assume that ALL questions are beyond us logically? (or at least the hard questions). Why stop at god?
You say that the “birth of existence” is different from (it’s from, not than) “the birth of the cause of existence.” Why? You offer no logical or factual support for this assumption.
Your point about god having “spoken” to us is also utterly illogical, and invalid. There is no proof whatsoever that god has “spoken” to anyone—the Bible could be entirely the creation of men, and the mere fact that it is self-supporting in some ways proves nothing, as prophecies are often clearly written *after the fact.* Moreover, the theme of a god dying and coming back to life (in agrarian cultures) is a common one in mythology, going far back before the period when the Hebrews began codifying THEIR mythology. Is this proof of god, or does it merely indicate that humans repeat themes that are meaningful to them? Certainly it cannot be taken as proof of god, because there is no factual reason to assume such a thing.
Nice try, Peter, but your argument is both circular and ill-conceived.
March 7th, 2008 at 10:15 am
@Peter (703)
Randall’s response to your (im sorry, but it truly is) dumb post is more than to the point, but i would just like to ask you one other thing. When closing your post, you say “This is Christ. This is Christianity, take it or leave it.” – what about the other religion’s gods? ALL religions have some fairy tale to explain the origin of the world/life/universe.
In fact, they all came up with a fairy tale so that the minds of the people could cope with some “view” of the world/life/universe and keep them sheepingly silent.
There is NO god. And the proof is irrefutable
, cause if there is, smite me right here and now, with fire and ashes and brimstone. …. still waiting…. damn, no lightning fury…. sorry, no god.
As i quoted before, in the evolution list, “religion is the childish blanket people take to adulthood to help them cope with the world”.
Thank you for your time,
CC
March 7th, 2008 at 10:29 am
Neal, sorry to be picky, but I’ve found the only way we can all clearly communicate is for us to both be on the same page regarding the terms we use.
Your questions to me regarding my beliefs and my satisfaction regarding those beliefs says a lot about yourself and your own reasons for your belief in god.
I would surmise that not only are you not content with a godless universe, but it is a downright scary proposition. It means that all of this was once just random chaos. And without a higher purpose – what’s the point of it all? And if there isn’t any point to it all – do I matter?
I don’t have those questions. I accept that I, and the universe are here by some chance of circumstances. And that is enough. There are causes I believe in, but only to try to make the world, and my satisfaction in it while i’m here, a better place. Self-satisfaction is the term you use. Do I have it? You claim to have it, yet claim it comes from knowing Jesus. That isn’t satisfaction of self. That’s comfort from believing there is something else out there. I do have self-satisfaction, because it truly comes from within. And if something goes wrong, it’s up to me to change it. And when I change it, I take the credit. I don’t hand it off to some imaginary being who let me suffer in the first place – because he loves me.
To your previous question regarding common belief systems in separated societies.
The answer, of course, is we all evolved in the same geographical area where common traits and beliefs and early culture was shared. As we spread out through the world, lack of communication allowed the various beliefs to develop independently into the modern religions we know today.
Or, you could take Taylors version of things – The tower of babel story. If this is your preferred take, we’ll probably never see eye to eye, but it’s been enjoyable talking with you.
If you don’t however then I need to ask you a question. How do YOU choose which words of god to believe and which to not believe. There are very few people in the world that follow their religious teaching to the letter. And the tenets followed vary from individual to individual.
So how do YOU, Neal, decide which is real and which is not. If you think some of the bible is the work of man and some is not, how do you decide which was which? Can’t you see at least the possibility that religion is man-made, and by extension, god also?
March 7th, 2008 at 10:36 am
Randall – excellent reply. If only I could communicate half as well.
March 7th, 2008 at 10:42 am
to God is Imaginary – 5 months ago I prayed and in the midst of my deep depression I felt a deep down love and joy and peace that I knew was from God. That was prayer, and that wasn’t a yes, no, or wait answer. It was an I love you. Your argument didn’t prove or disprove anything. And to get a little ridiculous, how do you know those facts are real? Do you trust the men and women who discovered those facts? Or did you figure those facts out yourself? Are you satisfied with those facts? Would you die for those facts? No one is answering these questions
March 7th, 2008 at 10:42 am
to God is Imaginary – 5 months ago I prayed and in the midst of my deep depression I felt a deep down love and joy and peace that I knew was from God. That was prayer, and that wasn’t a yes, no, or wait answer. It was an I love you. Your argument didn’t prove or disprove anything. And to get a little ridiculous, how do you know those facts are real? Do you trust the men and women who discovered those facts? Or did you figure those facts out yourself? Are you satisfied with those facts?
March 7th, 2008 at 10:51 am
hey Kraeg – I’ll be gone all day but I’ll respond to you tonight
March 7th, 2008 at 12:08 pm
I feel like we are all wandering off topic a little.
The original question, does god exist, can’t be agreed upon. We can’t ever come to resolution because there exists a fundamental difference between the ideology that incorporates his existence and the ideology that doesn’t.
Are you prepared to accept ‘truths’ about the world with absolutely no concrete evidence?
If you are, you can incorporate god into your ideology.
If you aren’t, you cannot.
I cannot accept a being, whose only existence is entertained within a few religious texts whose sole purpose is to herald his existence.
I believe that most theists, while on the whole are very nice and amiable, are also somewhat deluded.
March 7th, 2008 at 12:40 pm
billions of people believe in a higher power. Since the beginning of time. People die over their religious views. All of shrict appostles died horrible deaths. What is more likely, that billions of people throughout time are babbeling deluded idiots, or maybe a million people are correct? I know those numbers area little off, sorry, but my point still stands.
March 7th, 2008 at 12:45 pm
God Is Imaginary – Yes God Does Exist! Listen 3 yrs ago, my aunt was pronounced dead. We pryed for he for about an hour and then she sat up and was talking to us like nothing ever happened. how does that happen? God! It takes alot of faith that your prayers will be answered. Not let me tell you something. You need to stop ignoring the facts that God is Real. All you are doing is not believing in Him because you are trying to make yourself a God.
March 7th, 2008 at 1:13 pm
This is a response to Taylor and JesusFreak.
Taylor – Just because millions of people believe something is true, doesn’t actually make it true. To me and the other born again believers in Jesus that I talk to, it’s so obvious that there is a God and we see his work in everything. But before Jesus saved us, we thought this god stuff was crap too. I thought it was a crutch. I knew religion was made up for people who couldn’t accept reality. And I accepted that I had no purpose and that there were no answers to my questions because we CAN NOT prove them as fact. But I couldn’t function by not having these questions answered, and I was completely hopeless. Then Jesus saved me.. and that’s the only real argument I can give with this whole discussion. Something illogical and supernatural totally changed me.
JesusFreak – That sounds like an awesome miracle, first off. Before I was saved, I was blind to the facts that God is real. God was the only one who could have convinced me that he was real, and that’s exactly what he did. To those who haven’t had this happen to them… all of this god stuff is ignorant nonsense. I know I sound like a fool to the people who don’t believe, but please keep in mind that God is the only one that can convince anyone of himself, and the only way he will do that is if that individual invites him to do so.
March 7th, 2008 at 1:41 pm
Faith is the evidence that God exists. I also like the “Wind” argument. You can’t see the wind but you see the effects of the wind. Most people who believe in God will tell you they have never seen him. Virtually all people who believe will tell you they have seen the effects of God demonstrated personally in their own life in some way. My least favorite kinds of people are the ones who treat the question of the existence of God as something that is beneath them and modern thought. “Simply quite an absurd notion that one would believe in an all powerful unseen being in the sky. Preposterous!!” Seriously, your arrogance and condescending attitude will come back and bite you someday.
March 7th, 2008 at 1:55 pm
Well that’s pretty easy.
Ofcourse not,
why believe in something that someone made up? where’s the logic…
March 7th, 2008 at 2:18 pm
@Sedulous (717):
Faith is the evidence that there are still many people that don’t fully understand the world around them and dont bother trying to.
To the list poster:
Since you dont mention it, i take it “God” is -a- god (one of the thousands of gods in the thousands of religions) not specifically the christian one. I’d like to see a Hindu take on this argument too. It has EXACTLY the same -zero- value, but hey, to each his poison.
Thank you for your time,
CC
March 7th, 2008 at 4:54 pm
Sure I believe!
March 7th, 2008 at 5:49 pm
To Randall #706,
Hi Randall, actually my alluding to a past science lesson was to emphasise the question of what gave rise to contingent beings and material existence, and not to give a perfect illustration of what the big bang theory states. If it sounded like I was trying to describe the big bang, I wasn’t. But let’s go beyond the big bang to the question of energy. We once held that energy could neither be created nor destroyed, but the other day I saw that a prominent Yale professor has posited the thesis that energy began as well, when all things began to be, but that all things BEGAN TO BE in the point he was making.
You said I made a logical error by saying we can’t ask the question of where God comes from. I wasn’t saying THAT either. I was saying that it is besides the point for a very LOGICAL reason. The reason is this. If I am speaking to an atheist, then I can talk about the things we can see and touch and have known by experience or discovered in the past. That’s what we’re workin with in order to be consistently logical. So you ask.. ok, trees. We see them. We touch them. And they came from seeds. Cars.. were built by human beings. Human beings came from other human beings. Human beings (if we hold to evolution) came from primordial heat molecules, or whatever. Those came from somewhere within the earth, an earth the crust of which was once united, not it’s separated so we have continents. An Earth which came into being at a particular point in time. From the ’singularity’ you spoke of. So, there was a beginning to everything material, which we know through our senses… trees, cars, other people, continents..this world and others, and what may have given rise to the shape of our universe. But the question is, if you go all the way back to that starting point, it would seem to me, IN THIS CONTEXT, an illogical proposition to say that yes on the one hand, the universe began to be at some point, and on the other that it was uncaused. If it was caused, it was caused from nothing, otherwise we cannot speak of beginning.
So I’ll stick to that which is most logical–(and it is only NOW that God comes into the argument, and not before)that there had to be a being powerful enough to bring about something from nothing, ‘ex nihilo’ to use the latin of philosophers past. This is the ONLY thing that makes sense to me. So the position is this: we have the universe and its beginning. What caused that beginning. If you say it’s singularity, than singularity is the beginning. What caused singularity, because it just couldn’t appear out of nowhere. That’s what experience has taught me, I don’t know about you. Nothing can appear from no where. To answer how the universe came to be, you have to posit an omnipotent Being. To then say that THAT Being has a beginning is illogical, because there would have to be ANOTHER omnipotent Being to bring this about. You can’t have two omnipotent Beings because if one of them needs the other to be brought about, that NEED proves that that being is NOT omnipotent, like ourselves.
I hope this makes the position somewhat clearer and I am sorry for the length, eventhough the clarification required it.
March 7th, 2008 at 9:10 pm
at 715
im sure if you post what happened to your aunt, someone will thoroughly rip your “miracle” apart…
March 7th, 2008 at 9:57 pm
I know….its sad
March 7th, 2008 at 10:07 pm
One thing that makes me really mad is when mothers let their children play on the road, because ‘God makes sure they won’t be hit by a car, and when they do, they’ve somehow deserved it’. (I’m not saying that every Christian thinks this way, but some do.)
March 8th, 2008 at 1:25 am
Its as simple as this, everyone talks about the big bang and thats how the world started. They say God was not the driving power behind creating this world. Lets say the big bang theory is correct; if there was a force that made things move to go “bang”, what made them move in the first place??? Things dont move on their own and if nothing existed before the big bang, what created the big bang? There had to be some force that caused time and space to move because time and space is something that has to be created in order to exist. Everyone starts at the big bang but does not go back and realize something or some force had to start the big bang. So are you saying the big bang created itself???? How is that possible???? Everything has a start and an end and the only entity that does not follow these rules is God. Simple as that.
March 8th, 2008 at 1:36 am
WHO AND WHAT STARTED THE BIG BANG???? IT HAD TO HAVE A START AND SOMETHING OR SOMEONE OR SOME FORCE STARTED IT, SO TELL ME WHO OR WHAT STARTED IT. EVERYTHING HAS A BEGINNING AND IF YOU START SOMETHING YOU TAKE CREDIT FOR IT. MY QUESTION IS WHAT FORCE IS TAKING CREDIT FOR THE BIG BANG???
March 8th, 2008 at 1:44 am
sounds like one of those chicken or egg moments
March 8th, 2008 at 2:02 am
The things that we all have in common far outway the things that we do not. That in and of itself is a unity we so often dismiss. It seems we keep coming up with ways to part further from eachother rather than support one another. That saddens me. I don’t think that religion is about what you believe as much as it is about the community of like mindedness. To know that you are not alone in the world is a beautiful thing. Yes, our life’s plot ends the same way, but we do not have a companion in death. That is what life is for. To be a companion in multiplicity-I’ve always loved the saying that it takes a village to raise a child-I believe that it holds much truth. Our village is a lot larger than it was 1000 years ago, 2000 years ago, 3000 years ago however, we are a village non the less. I do not dispell what ever anyone believes-it may not be meaningful to me, but it is my lovlies, meaningful to you. For that, I respect you all. At a base level, I believe that it is far better to be understood and unified than to be “right” and alone.
There is much that we can teach eachother-A decision about faith is not made lightly (one would hope)-There are many life experiences and choices that brought you to a place where you determined what was sacred to you and to your life. You came to it just as we come to any decision-with great pause and thought. Isn’t it much better to hear a new voice than to hold a gun? To the Gods and Goddesses, Kings and Queens within us all, to the forces of nature that we all are, I humbly give you my respect.
That is everything and nothing all at once.
Thank you for reading.
March 8th, 2008 at 2:19 am
how is it a chicken and the egg moment phil? obviously you cant answer the question right so you generalize it with a retarded answer. all you gotta do is answer my questions i put in the post and sway my way of thinking, if you cant do that then you shouldnt be on this post. Is it hard to think about something as so simple as the first post i put up there??? i asked a simple question and you gave me the most retarded complex answer in the history of all answers. you get one more try phil.
March 8th, 2008 at 2:41 am
lol and as far as the chicken and the egg and who came first phil, it was the chicken, think about it, imagine if you came before your father or mother, would you be even able to feed yourself at the tender age of zero lol, probably not. so are you gonna give me another retarded answer for this one or are you just going to answer it with an intelligent thought process???
March 8th, 2008 at 2:47 am
Brooklyn – you need an attitude adjustment. Phil was merely being glib. And if you expect a site like listverse to resolve the mysteries of the universe for you, then you are the retarded one.
Why not try typing “big bang” and “singularity” into google, and start by gaining some insight for yourself.
March 8th, 2008 at 3:26 am
Hello All,
I believe in God.
I can’t define God…the closest word is love.
Many have tried to define God and thus have made
a bloody mess, resulting in wars, religions, the
oppression of knowledge, class systems that cause
much harm, etc..
I don’t blame God for what humans have done.
I seek God because I want to continue to grow.
I recognize that I can grow and expand my knowledge
and experiences, but also realize my perceptions are
constantly changing, hopefully maturing with wisdom.
Take Care,
Fieldthistle
March 8th, 2008 at 4:17 am
kiwiboi, u have now convinced me that the population is filled with in bred idiots such as yourself, u will no longer be talking to me, face your attention to the wall, I don’t want to hear any more that comes from your mouth
March 8th, 2008 at 4:19 am
“Your daily life is your temple and your religion.
Whenever you enter into it take with you your all.
Take the plough and the forge and the mallet and the lute,
The things you have fashioned in necessity or for delight.
For in revery you cannot rise above your achievements nor fall lower than your failures.
And take with you all men:
For in adoration you cannot fly higher than their hopes nor humble yourself lower than their despair.”
Kahlil Gibran
March 8th, 2008 at 4:49 am
Brooklyn Souljah – and I have no desire to read anything that so obviously emanates from your ass. So why not sit down and give your brain a rest.
I would insult you even more, but you clearly don’t have the intelligence to be offended.
March 8th, 2008 at 7:55 am
The less you know, the more you believe.
March 8th, 2008 at 9:57 am
Peter (#721)
You are a classic example of the person who talks a lot but says nothing. And talks in incessant circles.
Now, to begin with, YOU brought up the Big Bang. Your description of it was dead wrong. I corrected you on it. No need to go into circuits of blather to explain it. I know what you were getting at. Needless to say–*you’re still wrong.*
You keep driving back (on winding roads) to the point that if science says everything had a beginning, well then by gum—someone must have BEGAN it. But sorry, Peter, that just doesn’t follow–no matter how badly you WANT it to follow.
(I’ll also remind you that we don’t yet fully understand the Big Bang, either–String Theory, for instance–which is gaining adherents and greater legitimacy—states that the Big Bang was not a “beginning” but merely an incident of sorts–the collision of two membranes of dimension. So your repeated attempt to use the Big Bang as the end-all of existence may itself be off-the-mark).
Moreover—YOU are the one who SAID that we couldn’t logically address the question of where god comes from. You still have not in the least answered WHY you believe this. That entire second paragraph you wrote in comment #721 is needlessly wordy and, with all the weight of words in it, still fails to make any sense. (In fact, Peter, you seem to be having a hard time getting your points across. I’d suggest that you stop trying to sound “intellectual” and focus on communicating with clarity). It ends up with you saying that you basically can’t reconcile the universe having a beginning, and yet it being “uncaused.” Well no shit, Peter, nobody likes this proposition. But A) few cosmologists want to stop there–the problem isn’t that they choose to, but rather the problem is that we’re going only as far as the evidence can take us—and B) even if you reach a point of a beginning, and need to find a cause—where does it “logically” say that this cause has to be god? You make the assumption that it must. I don’t see this at all.
I think, Peter, that you’re a bit too impressed with the sound of your own voice–or in this case, the look of your own words–and far too enamored of your idea of “logic,” while the pity is you don’t seem to have a *grasp* of what logic IS.
You say, for instance: “To answer how the universe came to be, you have to posit an omnipotent Being” and pretend that somehow you’ve built up a logical basis for this totally illogical statement. But you haven’t done anything of the kind, Peter… and, as I said–your statement is NOT logical. You haven’t proven in the slightest that in order to answer how the universe came to be, that it MUST involve god. I mean, for chrissakes, Peter, if it were THAT easy, don’t you think someone far cleverer than you would have thought up this argument long ago? Sure they would have! Reason they didn’t? Because it makes no sense. Your conclusion doesn’t follow, logically, from the known facts.
The rest of your “logic” doesn’t follow either, though I can see how, in your tortured sense of reasoning, you coughed it up… but that doesn’t make it any more valid.
You see, Peter, in fact what you’ve done is screwed yourself right into getting my point—though you can’t see it for the cloud of nonsense you’ve surrounded yourself with.
YOUR argument boils down to saying that we MUST have a god to create the universe, because something can’t come from nothing. My response to you is, then ALL YOU ARE DOING is avoiding the question. We ask, “where does the universe come from?” FROM GOD, says Peter—thinking he’s got it all cleverly figured out. And we then naturally ask wizard Peter, “well but…. then where does GOD come from, Peter?” and your answer is, “God? GOD DOESN’T COME FROM ANYTHING. GOD JUST IS. If he came from something, he’d have to come from another god.. and we’d have an endless chain of gods then, silly children.”
But see, Peter–in thinking you’ve been “logical” and smart about this, you’ve in fact missed how dumb this argument of yours is. And failed to see the point I was making. IF you say that the answer to where the universe comes from is a GOD who can’t be further questioned–then why the hell do we NEED god in the equation? Why can’t we just dispense with god and say that the UNIVERSE always existed?
And hell, why not just dispense with questions altogether, since Peter says there’s a final question that can’t be answered?
No Peter–this is what we call a circular argument that you’ve made, and it’s totally invalid.
You have not offered proof of god’s existence, you’ve simply indulged in some pretentious pretzel logic that makes zero sense.
Either everything demands an answer, Peter, or nothing does. Resorting to gods–i.e., unanswerable questions–in a chain of questions, is illegitimate and wrong.
Go now and ponder on this, my son. For you are lost. But you can find your way to reason if you think it through a bit harder.
March 8th, 2008 at 12:49 pm
ok im gonna make a few bold and possibly idiotic comments
someone once said to me that God is just invisible friends for grown ups. I believe that is accurate.
If mankind was to be wiped out tommorow and then a million years from now a new species came to be on earth (this kills the whole god teory anyway) and were to find a copy of lets say the lord of the rings would they then base their life on frodo and the fellowship?
i think people find faith because they are unable to find faith in themselves and hope that by turning to someone or seomething else it will help them find themselves again.
religion tends to do more bad than good (there is a lot of good dont get me wrong) most wars are started because someone didnt like what someone else believed in (be it religion or other) and most people will tend to force religion upon others which i think misses the point.
To many religion some of them straight forward some of them scams and for the christians out there who are itching to tell me its not about religion its about having a relationship with god, well i do have a relationship with god in a distant cousin twice removed sort of way. Plus end of the day its the same thing.
March 8th, 2008 at 12:58 pm
God is only as real or fake as you believe it to be in my opinion. Just because there is a book written on tales and teachings of God and followers doesn’t mean they are true or fake at that. Since I don’t believe then God does exist but if I do then he does, so in essence we make our own gods based on what we wish it to be nothing more there fore that makes our individual beliefs ntohging more.
March 8th, 2008 at 2:41 pm
JesusFreak:
Science and logical reason can explain every second of her NDE.
Guaranteed. Beg to differ?
jfrater:
Yes, actually, I can. Did you not read my statistics? Or are you another theist thinking you know the end-all be-all of existence? Take some time to read up on the FACTS, not the FAIRY TALES.
Randall:
You, sir, are an excellent mind and a worthwhile proponent in the anti-theistic movement of late. Too bad more people are not like you and I.
Peter:
You logic is extremely fallible. You say that nothing can come from nothing, yet “God” [God is Imaginary] exists outside of that metaphysical boundary. Care to explain why? Your logic starts off strong, then each conclusion is irrelevant to the basis of the former. You end up concluding that God [God is Imaginary] dwells outside the realms of logic and reason, simply because “he always existed”. Blatantly, you have no grasp of what logic really is. Read up on the roots and inner working of how logic works, it may help you to understand.
BurnPianoIslandBurn:
No, I’m sorry. He is imaginary not matter what. No reality exists with a God [God is Imaginary] inside it.
Khyberman:
Excellent quote. The more intelligent you are, the less “faith” has control over you. Logic dominates, until a better system is created.
All of you have YET to find a flaw with my website.
March 8th, 2008 at 3:36 pm
God Is Imaginary – Yes, I do beg to differ! Tell me how can a brain dead person come back to life and dont give me any bull crap either.
March 8th, 2008 at 3:49 pm
God Is Imaginary – That website is so stupid. I just went to that “godisimaginary.com”. Seriously, dont you have anything better to do with your life? I went to the read the Bible section, that was ancient law. You pick the most negative part out of the Bible just to prove your stupid little theory. NDEs are a religous experince, i was in one. I was in a near fatal motorcycle accident. I experienced this before the ambulance came and a woke up before the ambulance came.
Ezekiel 28: In the pride of your heart, you say, “I am a god…” But you are a man and not a god, though you think you are as wise as a god. You were the model of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. You were blameless in your ways from the day you were created till wickedness was found in you. Your heart became proud on account of your beauty, and you corrupted your wisdom because of your splendor. So I threw you to the earth; I made a spectacle of you before kings…All who knew you are appalled at you; you have come to a horrible end and will be no more.
March 8th, 2008 at 4:08 pm
Hey guys. Here is the only personal evidence that I know God exists. I can’t prove it to you that he is real, and I’m currently having some doubts.. but there are a few things that have happened to me in the past that no matter what.. I can NOT deny was God. I used to be haunted by the knowledge that there is no god and that if there is no loving god behind an infinite, empty universe, then I mean nothing and have nothing to truly live for. I always wanted something that I could be ridiculously passionate for and live my entire life for, but my passions would never be fulfilled because god wasn’t real, and if I lived my life for something that would fail or be forgotten.. then I knew I’d be forgotten and my life would be reduced to me only living to find as much empty pleasure as I possibly could. I felt completely empty. Then I prayed to god and told him that if he really isnt real then I am worthless and I’ll kill myself, because I can’t live without worth.
Then the day after I prayed.. I was at work and out of nowhere I felt the power of god. I felt the deepest love, satisfaction, joy, and peace that I had ever felt, and all in the midst of my deep and serious depression. I can NOT deny that that was god…even despite all of the evidence that he isn’t real. It may be foolish, but I can’t denounce it.
The next reason I believe in god is also pretty unexplainable. I had grown up in church, but never applied those beliefs to myself. I didn’t understand them and I though that they were ridiculous. I thought that they were a crutch. Well, after this supernatural feeling came over me at work that one day… I read the bible and it made sense to me! It made complete sense. It explained exactly what happened to me in explicit detail. I was reading the gospel of John. Something called the “holy spirit” lives inside of me. It is the reason I don’t feel worthless. It’s a part of who I am. It reassures me that god is real. It’s apparently Jesus’s spirit.
Also, I’ve read some things debunking that prayer works. The examples that I see make sense to me.. but things that have happened in my own life involving prayer just can’t be coincidence. This isn’t anything totally miraculous in itself, but it’s still beyond coincidence. I had a question to ask god. I wondered that since I’m supposed to devote my entire life to serving Jesus.. then is it OK to have a job? It says that god will still provide despite me having a job, but i couldn’t function properly in society if I didn’t have a job, so I asked god where I should read in the bible to answer this question. God told me “Thessalonians”, and so I read it. In 2 Thessalonians chapter 3 verses 6 – 15 talks specifically about how christians are supposed to have jobs and be independent. I don’t know how that could have been coincidence that I could have read the right book out of the 66 books in the bible on the first “guess”. I had also never read that book before. I had only been a christian for about 5 months, and I didn’t get to that book yet.
I understand that this proves nothing. I understand that most of you don’t believe me. I understand you think I’m crazy. But I can not deny that these things were of god and I can not denounce my faith in Jesus Christ no matter how incorrect it may seem. I do not understand everything in the bible.. some things sound ridiculous, but I have no choice other then to believe it because it is a part of who I am.
The only proof that god exists is in the people that have the holy spirit. It is in the people at my church that have experienced the exact same things that I experienced.. the exact same super natural presence. The best way that I can describe the holy spirit in my life is if I were to give you a big bear hug and never let you go. I have no provable facts. I have no logical arguments. I only have the holy spirit.
March 8th, 2008 at 4:35 pm
Chicken and the Egg Solved: Dino> Egg> Post Dino> Egg> Pre Bird> Egg> Bird> Egg> Pre Chicken> Egg> Chicken. Evolutionary chain of events. Up to AND Including domestication into what we now call The Chicken. If I need to spell it out anymore just go choke on a bone.
March 8th, 2008 at 5:03 pm
God Is Imaginary- SHUT UP, ASSHOLE.
March 8th, 2008 at 5:06 pm
Oh, and I found a flaw in your site. “Proof 7″: Santa’s real.
So HA.
March 8th, 2008 at 5:07 pm
Crimanon – God created the Chicken and then the Egg…evolution is a myth
March 8th, 2008 at 5:49 pm
Do I smell a fanatic?
Yes, yes I do.
March 8th, 2008 at 7:37 pm
whenever I post an entry about how god personally changed my life.. i don’t seem to get any responses. Someone please respond to my post prior to this one. I want to see what someone has to say about it.. and I mean something intelligent. But I’m sure I’ll get the response (I’ll repay intelligence for intelligence). Tell me what you think of it.
March 8th, 2008 at 9:50 pm
Neal: That ’supernatural presence’ you are talking about, I call it natural intuition.
It isn’t due to God that you want to have that feeling that there’s always someone to watch you back, it’s because that’s how evolution makes that there’s no lion jumping at your neck.
However, I think that it’s great that you feel your life is more complete now.
March 9th, 2008 at 12:21 am
Nice try Bass. Keep the language clean, huh?
So as you can see, there are no flaws.
God IS Imaginary.
Neal:
Everything is a series of chemical reactions, and the consequences of such are what makes things move forward.
Nothing exists to prove without clause the existence of a god [God is Imaginary]. In science, a theory is not applied until it can be proven. So why should religion be outside those boundaries? Until something is proven, a rational person will not believe it. Seeing as how no proof exists to prove a god [God is Imaginary] exists, the obvious assumption is to understand that God is Imaginary. Take the path of reason even if it hurts to understand. Many people refuse to give up religion simply because they don’t like to understand what mortality really means.
March 9th, 2008 at 12:24 am
Hello All,
Neal, I believe what you have is real. I see no real to
prove or disprove what you experience and have in your spiritual life. You will prove it over the span of your
life.
I respect and appreciate science. Applied science has created so many useful things that makes life easier.
Theoretical science is interesting and stimulates the mind, but usually spends more time and effort disproving previous ideas than creating new ones. But that nature of examining
ideas and notions refines and often creates new angles of
a theory. I think that is beautiful. I think that is the
way of God.
I am a Christian. I cannot define my God, but I think we
have been given an existence to explore and understand.
We have a physical world that we can unravel the secrets of
much easier than the spiritual world.
While I want to know more and more of my God, it is hubris
and beyond my capacity to make God a lab rat that I can
understand Holy Being, Holy Reasoning, and Holy Sensuality.
Nevertheless, it appears God has shared among all peoples
of the earth, throughout times, a common notion of love.
Each peoples, cultures, and time-period has taken that notion
and re-defined it according to their needs, wants, and also
the political/religious human power structure’s agenda.
Humans have often misunderstood, abused and misused, or
simply not heard the messages that God has given to us.
So we must be cautious, discerning, and examine any one
or any creed that tries to wear the cloak of God.
It is by the actions of the love by us that others can
witness that we are children of God.
The next problem is…what is Love, and how is it given
and manifested? The questing is wonderous, is it not?
Take Care,
Fieldthistle
March 9th, 2008 at 12:52 am
Fieldthistle:
I am guessing you are a die-hard believer, unwilling to even listen to the other side’s argument.
I would risk my life on that statement.
At least do a little digging. Expand your mind to take in what would otherwise be cast down and neglected. Read a little of my website, just tell me what you agree or disagree with. Thanks.
March 9th, 2008 at 1:19 am
God Is Imaginary: You missed my point – it doesn’t matter how many people you have doing the test, deaths or worsening illnesses are not scientifically quantifiable – therefore, you can not use them to prove that prayer does not work. I am not saying that your point of view on God is wrong – I am not saying that prayer is proven, I am saying your “proof” is not valid and you need another – especially in your extremely difficult task of trying to prove a negative (that God does not exist).
P.S.: We have all seen your web address – please stop posting it as a signature – we don’t like signatures in comments here – they add clutter.
March 9th, 2008 at 4:42 am
Ok, I do believe in a superiour entity. I’m not saying everyone should believe, but, if there isn’t..than why does everything seem so…perfect, not only in the universe, but in this earth.
I’m a Apostholic Roman Catholic (not starting monty python song), but I don’t quite agree with organized religion, nor do I agree with some of its rules. I would say, the pope is more of an example, than a connection to god. Because religion ought to be more like…a correction to the people’s moral. The Bible is a story, maybe some parts of it true, some not, (that makes it a legend) but in reality, it doesn’t tells us that Esau was betrayed by his brother, or anything, it tells us what we should do. Its objective is to give us a perspective of life, in which our life is enrichened by good deeds, even if there’s no afterlife to get our “payment”.
Maybe Jesus WAS born from some superior entity, but I’m a Christian because I attempt to follow his teachings at least. I believe he once was, and that he was a great man, like Moses or Buddha, some other prophet. Jesus tried to correct the old “stone your kid” habits, and promoted love among everyone.
I think there is suffering and pain because if there wasn’t any, then what would be the point of life? There wouldn’t be choices or wrongdoings. No one would be happy because no one would be miserable. If people didn’t know what hunger or “evil” was, they had no reason to feel safe, etc.
Probably people will disagree with me, but I hope I made my points understood.
March 9th, 2008 at 9:37 am
God Is Imaginary- if he really is imaginary, where did we come from?
March 9th, 2008 at 5:23 pm
Belief in God is a belief in faith.
If you have faith, you believe in God.
If you don’t have faith, then we pity you.
March 9th, 2008 at 5:35 pm
No. There is no scientific evidence.
March 9th, 2008 at 9:05 pm
Of course God is real.
Enjoy your transient freedom while you can, imbecilic cattle.
Cthulhu f’htagn!
March 9th, 2008 at 10:10 pm
oh dear Bass. Intentional ignorance. Either re-read the posts that deal with evolution, or do some research yourself.
I love the posters who decide to ignore your answer and re-posit the question.
Neal:
Not ignoring you. I responded a long time ago that i have had a similar sensation, brought about by recreation drug use, which itself has been repeated without such stimulants. Since it is possible to feel that level of elation naturally, without the intervention of a god, why create a god to explain it.
March 9th, 2008 at 10:18 pm
I have a couple question for all of those theists out there, and i’m not actually being glib. I’d like to hear your take on them.
If god has always existed -
1. what do you suppose he was doing up until the point he decided to create the universe from chaos and darkness?
2. what changed in god’s eternal cosmos that made him suddenly decide to do so?
My point being, if god always was around, we don’t really have any info on what he was doing before. And if the answer is nothing, what spark made him decide that now was a pretty good time to get down to some serious universe construction. But if the answer is – god was busy with a couple of other projects on the go… what were they?
March 10th, 2008 at 3:02 am
Hello All,
Kraeg, the answer to your questions about what was God doing
and what changed in God’s eternal cosmos…is I don’t know.
I didn’t know what my biological father and mother were doing
and why they decided to marry and do with their lives what they did before I was born. I don’t know why they did what they did after I was born.
If I make a new friend, I don’t know a pittance of their lives before our friendship, and will only know of our limited experiences together once we become friends.
While we all need a mythology to establish relationships with one another, I recognize the mythology is often incomplete,
bias, and my understanding is shaped by my life experiences.
It is the same with my relationship with God.
Take Care,
Fieldthistle
March 10th, 2008 at 7:48 am
757. Aseityn
Thank you Aseityn. For your pity. And your unbelievable arrogance.
How would you feel being told that instead you were pitied? Pitiied, as Dawkins put it, for having the gall to believe the religion you happened to be born into, by fluke of geography, is the correct one.
Get over yourself. Believe what you wish to believe, but having the arrogance to think you can pity others without having one shred of evidence indicating you chose the correct way is, in a word, ridiculous.
March 10th, 2008 at 2:40 pm
Hmm fluke of geography. That’s a good way to put it.
Let me rephrase my stand on this.
There may be a God, but I refused to believe it’s those of Christian, Islam, or any religion that comes to a person due to the fluke of geography where one is born into.
March 11th, 2008 at 12:02 am
I believe that God exists, because I think someone should create this universe and it can’t be made by itself. I believe that the universe needs someone to manage and control it.
Let’s think, someone is standing on a ship in the middle of the sea. Suddenly the ship is destroyed and he falls in the water and everyone is going to die. What do you think he’ll say at that time? I swear that he says “God help me”.
By the way, I believe to the only God, because I think not everyone can control this universe and not two kings can give orders in a country!
Finally, I believe everyone has his/her own god, and everyone should think and find his/her god. Everyone is free, to have a god or not, it depends on yourself. Maybe your god is deferent from my God! It’s not important everyone can have his/her idea. But I believe that everyone has at least a god, for example, the money is someone’s god. That’s why I think everyone has a god!
March 11th, 2008 at 2:52 am
@fery (765)
[ship sinking] … “he says “God help me”.
That is just cultural imprinting, not belief in god.
A fellow by the name of Richard Anton Wilson got it right:
“”I used to be an atheist, until I realized I had nothing to shout during blowjobs. ‘Oh Random Chance! Oh Random Chance!’ just doesn’t cut it….” – R.A.W. ” [check http://www.dangermedia.org/innerview/raw1.html for source].
Thank you for your time,
CC
March 11th, 2008 at 6:10 am
Faith always has and always will fly in the face of man’s incessant need for “proof”.
Like the old saying goes: For those who do not believe, no proof is sufficient for those who believe, no proof is necessary.
If one could actually prove the existence of God then faith would be unnecessary. One does not need to have faith in what can be seen, felt, and as required by science, measured. Many of the arguments regarding the existence of God seem to be based upon why He does or does not intervene in the tragedies that difficulties that plague mankind. We can hardly blame God for those things which we have, by our own hands, have brought upon ourselves. Maybe not as individuals, but as a whole. We have been given free choice to live as we decide. We are not forced to make the choices that bring catastrophe, but we as a people do those very things, and when it blows up in our faces, we seek to blame a God that we claim does not exist. I have to question the logic behind blaming and entity that one does not believe exists. That is human nature though. Adam blame God and Eve, Eve blamed the serpent…the boss blames the workers, the workers blame the computer…and so on.
There are answers to those arguments about why God does not intervene. There are answers to many of the arguments and questions imposed, but those answers will do us no good at all if we cannot even wrap our heads around the faith concept. The only way we will ever begin to understand such things is to first get past our own arrogance and selfishness as a people. It takes a humble heart and a clear mind to see these things. Can’t really see much when we’re full of ourselves.
Have a great day and keep searching for the truth. As long as you are arguing about God, you haven’t yet closed the door on Him.
March 11th, 2008 at 8:47 am
zman -
One of the fundamental problems with the concept of faith – is that the christian god of the bible had no problems showing himself to mortals, and no issues with granting incredible powers to others in order to prove his existence. Yet strangely, from the age of reason onward, he has remained quiet, distant and aloof.
Faith is a relatively modern invention brought about once we’d put our world in a more rational context.
March 11th, 2008 at 10:09 am
Do you have an understanding as to why God chose to reveal Himself in the past and to whom? Do you have any idea what His plan was at that time? The answers are there for anyone who actually takes the time to look. I do not believe that God has any trouble revealing Himself to mortals…I do believe that we mortals have a problem that He chooses not to. He showed quite a display of manifest power when the Hebrews were led away from Egypt. Guided by a pillar of a cloud during the day and a pillar of fire by night. Even the sea parted and the Hebrews walked across on dry ground to safety while the Egyptian army was destroyed. What did the people do? They turned to their own desires and began to worship a golden calf. Do you really think that human nature is any different today than it was then?
All too often people spend so much time forming an intelligent sounding argument that they forget to do the research, leaving out critical facts. They only look for those things which may bolster their agenda rather than being objective and honoring even the facts which could dismantle their position. We humans have a fatal flaw in our characters…we will often fight to the death for things we do not even fully understand. Don’t bother learning beyond our own attitudes and prideful natures…Just win an argument, which does not alter the truth in any way. Truth always remains truth regardless of whether or not we like or accept it.
God did show Himself and He had very specific reasons for doing so. I would definitely encourage you to study the bible with a mind geared toward understanding rather than attempting to undo something much greater than you can imagine.
Look at the Apostles for example. Peter walked with Jesus on a daily basis and many time witness His power to heal and control the elements, yet when the time came to take a stand denied even knowing Him.
I do not have to defend God or His word. He and His word can stand on their own without any help from us. Many people have tried to defame God over the centuries and all they have really accomplished is to appear foolish. I did not log on this forum to propagate further argument, but in the hope that someone may actually see past themselves and gain a greater understanding of God. By the way, your definition of faith is quite weak and not worthy of rebuttal.
Human philosophy will always win the argument against faith because they human reason refuses to accept what it cannot see, feel, measure, or destroy. In the end though faith is the only thing that will sustain any of us and you might be wise to consider how very much you do not yet understand.
Have a great day and may God bless you in ways that blow your mind.
March 11th, 2008 at 10:38 am
Actually zman, I am very aware of how much I do not understand. And that is why I keep an open mind. Failure to believe in god is not indicative of having a closed mind. It is quite the opposite. The closing of the human mind is what allows the belief in god.
As I’ve noted before, there have been many times in the past that we have attributed various phenomena in our universe to god, only to have the truth discovered. The nature of the sun being the most basic example I can offer.
Ok – if you are participating in a discussion, discuss. Don’t tell me my definition of faith is flawed without supplying your own ‘more correct’ definition.
And again, your arguments only weaken your stance.
Yes god ‘apparently’ showed himself to many people – in the past. At the time he perhaps felt that they needed more compelling reasons to accept him – and yet as you point out they still did not. You also feel that we haven’t changed much since then. I would argue that we have become more cynical and yet god wouldn’t take that into consideration?
The same god that decided he needed to convince us in the past with true demonstrations of his power – doesn’t feel that we would have at least the same requirements as 3000-4000 years ago?
You see zman – it’s not just looking for pieces to ‘bolster my agenda’. The problem is that faith on it’s own is a strong argument. But when you try to reconcile that faith with the tenets of whichever faith you happen to subscribe to, you run into problems. Your god no longer stands up to rational discourse. It’s is unnecessary to accept a god that gave us the capability to rationalize, and then asks us to ignore it all and accept him on faith. He didn’t expect it in the Old or New testament, and he shouldn’t accept it now.
I have read your bible. And I find it lacking. I find it lacking in cohesiveness, and I find it lacing in moral fibre. I find it lacking in describing a god who is worthy of your love and I find it lacking in describing a god who is actually worthy of respect.
You can preach faith all you like, but your god made us a part of the physical world and capable of reason. You can claim to know his intentions all you like – which counts a heresy the last time I checked – but I will never accept that any god would want me to discard that reason based on no physical evidence.
Have a great day and may you learn to love the universe and world for what it is… and not what you are told to believe.
March 11th, 2008 at 10:48 am
Faith, is believing in something with no evidence to prove it or even with evidence against it.
You can have faith in your friends to help you if you ever get sick, or you can have faith in a superior entity that will cure you or a family member.
That’s faith.
March 11th, 2008 at 11:10 am
Faith is used to refer to the adherence to concepts and theories despite a complete lack of supporting evidence.
Totava – I don’t have faith in my friends. I know some would be there to help and some wouldn’t be. That’s not faith – that’s knowing the people in your lives that you are close to. Knowing is a very different word to faith.
I have faith in the idea that the universe started from a singularity because it feels better than other explanations. I know that evolution is a fact because i’ve seen the data that supports it.
And when it comes to ideas I hold in faith – I am open to changes as the evidence proves otherwise.
March 11th, 2008 at 11:10 am
Faith is very good to make you understand concepts otherwise not yet explained.
It was faith that -obviously- said the earth was flat.
It was faith that -obviously- said there were witches and heretics and burned them at the stake.
It was faith that -obviously- said the earth was the center of the universe.
It was faith that -obviously- said “it” was better than others’ “faith”.
I for one would rather see faith burn in a very bright fiery pit than have my brain so castrated. There isn’t ONE single good thing ever to come out of god or religion, any god or any religion, that couldnt also be achieved by following some rather civil moral values or scientific achievements.
[And for the n-th time, stop acting like christianity is somewhat superior to other religions. It even has less gods than many other religions.]
Thank you very much for your time,
CC
March 11th, 2008 at 11:11 am
hear hear cc.
March 11th, 2008 at 12:07 pm
I really find no reason to continue with this discourse. I have no reason to believe that your responses have anything to do with trying to understand the existence of God, but rather another feeble attack on His character.
The old saying goes:
Don’t wrestle with a pig, you both get dirty and the pig enjoys it.
I’m not at all calling you a pig, however the saying does seem appropriate. Be well and try not to hang yourself in your own loopholes.
March 11th, 2008 at 12:11 pm
@zman (775)
Another satisfied customer…
CC
March 11th, 2008 at 12:18 pm
kraeg – God does, in fact, reveal Himself but not in the way some demand. In one sense God is indeed hidden because He is Spirit and cannot be seen physically (John 4:24). The demand for certain types of physical evidense of God will leave us wanting, and may be misplaced, as it diminishes the need for faith. Further, God may deliberately hide himself in order to expose people’s hearts, drawing closer those who believe, while turning away from those who turn from Him (Deuteronomy 31:17; Isaiah 59:2).
You see, the Bible incourages us with promise that if we seek God faithfully, we will find Him (Jereimiah 29:13 – You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart.) While God is hidden in some sense, yet He is knowledgeable, so we may ask God to show Himself to us.
March 11th, 2008 at 12:22 pm
nice zman – good recourse. Resort to name calling.
Look – you entered a forum and joined an ongoing discussion on whether or not people believe in the existence of god and their reasons for or against.
If you don’t want to continue – feel free to leave.
We’re not here to convince, or even to understand the other’s point of view. We’re here to express our own and our reasons for it.
Is this how all your discussions go? You disagree with me so i’m packing up my toys and leaving? Grow the hell up before you join any other discussions.
March 11th, 2008 at 12:29 pm
JesuFreak – I hear what you are saying. But it is aligned with standard theist rationale.
Have you ever had an experience with god that isn’t an internal experience? If god is absolute, exists everywhere, and is part of everything then why must it be a spiritual, internal revelation.
Your experience with god is purely subjective. The same way I experience love for my wife. It is powerful, overwhelming, and all-consuming. But it is my subjective experience and has no bearing on the outside world, or the function of the universe.
The bible itself is a flawed tome, written by men, assembled by men from a host of writings, books and scriptures, many of which didn’t make it into your ‘modern bible’ (King James Version) and whose readers pick and choose what parts they follow and what parts they don’t.
Surely you must have better justification for faith god than the bible?
March 11th, 2008 at 1:25 pm
Jesusfreak: No Evolution created the Chicken; God created Evolution! Now open your mind before I take a hammer and nail and give you a third eye.
March 11th, 2008 at 1:39 pm
Just to let you know im on your side, zman is immature…anyways, why do go against God so much? Do you feel like thier shouldnt be anyone more powerful than you? Do you feel like you are your own God?
Also Kraeg, I’ve been through the whole Bible and it never contridicts itself. There is so much proved out of the Bible, such as the story of Moses and the Red Sea, when the Pharoh as his men and chariots went across the dry bed of the sea floor and the water caved in on the Pharohs men (none of the hebrews were hurt.) People now are finding chariot wheels and fossilized chariot tracks near the Red Sea.
March 11th, 2008 at 1:54 pm
To Kraeg:
I’ve been watching these postings for a few hours now and from what I can see you tend to pounce on anyone who claims to believe in God, and when they speak up about it you start crying and whining. You tell people to leave the group. You arrogant little thin skinned pansy hiding behind a keyboard. You need to be dragged out back and set straight. Some of the people on here sound like they’ve forgotten more about life than you’ll ever learn. It’s you that needs to grow up you mindless little monkey brained control freak. You don’t have an ounce of sense. I really do believe that there is a God and people like you remind us all that theres a devil too. Moronic idiot!
March 11th, 2008 at 2:01 pm
JesusFreak; Jonah and the big fish? Burning Bushes? Noah’s ark and two (or maybe 7, it says both in the bible) of all the birds and beasts? All true?
Contradictions; there are plenty
An eye for an eye – turn the other cheek
he LORD is a man of war: the LORD is his name – Now the God of peace be with you all.
Prepare slaughter for his children for the iniquity of their fathers – the fathers shall not be put to death for the children, neither shall the children be put to death for the fathers
We could go on forever with this. The bible is not the argument to use with any rational person and a weak reason for faith.
March 11th, 2008 at 2:10 pm
wow butcher. way to pounce. Do I hear a little whining and thin skin in your tone as well?
Who exactly is hiding behind a keyboard? I’m using my name at least – were you christened butcher?
Let me set you straight, as it’s a long post and reading and learning don’t seem to come second nature to you. Every one of my responses is to someone telling me they disagree with my belief, or to a fallacy they have stated. That’s part of the process of discourse.
You seem to be another foul-mouthed cretin of lower intelligence who doesn’t like having his beliefs questioned. Don’t show up in discussions in that case. The whole point of discussion is to challenge beliefs. And I welcome you to challenge mine.
But alas, your best retort is to start slandering, and name calling. Typical.
March 11th, 2008 at 2:15 pm
Thank you for that Mom424.
JesusFreak: here’s a list of your supposedly non-existent contradictions. (http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/jim_meritt/bible-contradictions.html#good_to_all)
As to discovering chariot tracks and wheels near the Red Sea – what does that prove in your eyes? That perhaps, once upon a time, there were chariot ways near the red sea?
Is it not possible that wheels get lost or broken and are replaced on the spot. Is it possible that Chariots could be ferried across the red sea and been lost overboard? Again – why go for the answer god did it, when there are many other possibilities. Chariot wheels and tracks do not demonstrate a sea parting.
March 11th, 2008 at 2:17 pm
JesusFreak:
I understand that at times, out of context, postings can come across as very angry. I’d like to assure you, there isn’t any in any of my posts. Re-reading a couple of them makes me realize that if anger is expected it can be read into them. I am enjoying the conversation and apologize if I come across as either angry or condescending.
March 11th, 2008 at 2:26 pm
I stand by what I said. You and your mommy424 have no sense. I have no tolerance for your insolence and as far as your referal to my reading ability-that fancy book learnin’ ya’ll been talkin’bouts has earned me a 4.0 average you ignorant pieces of human waste.
March 11th, 2008 at 2:28 pm
Yes, yes butcher. yet another shining example of your superior stance and intellect. Surely you are god’s chosen work.
And what a piece of work you are.
March 11th, 2008 at 3:49 pm
The Butcher – He is standing up for what we believe. Its okay,him and I are having a friendly debate. zman was immature. If you are a Christian, you need to witness with love.
March 11th, 2008 at 3:52 pm
Kraeg, what do you believe
March 11th, 2008 at 4:02 pm
Im just asking and also i can tell that you’re not mad, emotions are hard to type…
Crimanon – I have already opened my eyes, see your whining because I went against what you believe…mature a little bit and stop making threats, your acting like a three year old….
March 11th, 2008 at 4:30 pm
And you Clearly haven’t Read any of the posts above to even find out what my beliefs are. To call me a Whining little child shows even more ignorance of others beliefs. Most of what I’ve read of your posts have already been discussed and unlike some of the more lazy posters I have read ALL of the posts here. If you had done the same, you wouldn’t have made such simple arguments.
March 11th, 2008 at 4:41 pm
JF – I don’t believe in god. a god. a pantheon of gods. old gods. new gods. etc.
I believe that so far, the best explanation for the universe we have is the Big Bang theory, but it is by no mean satisfactory or complete.
I am certain that there wasn’t a god behind it, no matter what the origins of the universe.
I know there were good reasons for why we initially believed in god, but that we have outgrown them as a species and as a culture.
I know that people do good and bad things of their own accord, not due to supernatural influence.
I know that we do not need the questionable morals that come with organized religion to do good in the world.
March 11th, 2008 at 4:45 pm
Freak: What makes you think that “Science” isn’t just another way for “God” to hide his “Miracles” ? We Can’t See God, We Can’t Hear God. But “We can see His hand at work everyday”? The only thing we can see/measure over time is evolution. Hand of God?… Sure, just so long as he does it in a way so that we can’t actually see His hands working. Is this really a hard concept? You can have your Faith and Breakfast too!
March 11th, 2008 at 4:55 pm
I think it takes more faith to be an atheist than to be a believer. There has to be an enormous capacity for denial to say that there couldn’t possibly be a god.
March 11th, 2008 at 5:56 pm
ZMan: If things are “Greater than You can Imagine”, what makes you think you’re right?
March 11th, 2008 at 7:16 pm
Because, you said you are a Christian and you believe in evolution? God said that he created the World in 7 days. Not “billions” of years….If that was so, that means there was sin before death, when God said sin created death…so……
March 11th, 2008 at 7:46 pm
Thanks Kraeg, I needed to know that…i knew that you didn’t believe in God, but I wasnt sure what else…but how do you know that there is NO God?
March 11th, 2008 at 8:03 pm
Freak: Did I just get my lines crossed? Did you just say I said I was a christian? You Really don’t read do you?
Comments:48 56 62 64 83 95 97 103 108 113 114 118 121 124 126 131 133 135 136 139 141 147 149 155 161 162 165 167 169 172 175 178 180 185 189 191 203 206 212 217 218 220 223 227 228 233 237 242 245 247 250 252 258 259 261 271 273 274 275 279 281 283 284 287 295 302 303 307 310 313 317 364 412 424 427 602 744 780 792 794 796 and this one.
Where in any of this do I say Im christian? NO WHERE! I’m not nor do I approve of such tactless Falsifications. Fuck what you think you know of me and read what I HAVE said. Then bring your ignorance to rest on my alter, I’ll gladly supply the knife. I did the work to post my comment numbers, You do the work and read them! If anyone needs me, I’ll be in the middle east resurrecting Jesus so that he can slap this little shit.
March 11th, 2008 at 9:33 pm
Sounds like this guy has pms……….lol
March 11th, 2008 at 9:34 pm
Sounds like this guy has pms…….lol
March 11th, 2008 at 9:36 pm
Why did you two post the same thing? Oh, and im not sure if God exists, still trying to figure out….
March 11th, 2008 at 9:42 pm
Joey: No, I just don’t like being insulted. What if I called you a Brain-fucked, Ass-licking, Waste of life? Not nice. I don’t like being called christian either.
March 11th, 2008 at 9:44 pm
not directed at you, just making a point.
March 11th, 2008 at 9:45 pm
Im sorry, i miss understood…..You said that God created “evolution”…….excuse me…
March 11th, 2008 at 9:47 pm
Excuse me, i didnt call you a waste of life……..i did not emply that to you…….im trying to talk to you and you throw a fit….
March 11th, 2008 at 11:44 pm
Freak: You don’t know how to argue from a different perspective. This makes you a poor candidate for debate. “God Created evolution” was giving you a new perspective. You Are bending words, Words that I have fought for. If you want to Quote me Do It Right… “God”, “Science”, “Hand of”, “Evolution”… Get It Right, and realize that there are more than just Youth groups in this world. Some of us Thinkers, don’t listen to Fictitious materials or use then to justify doing Right By Man. I don’t need “HIS” (in Quotations) words to be just. I’m No more christian Than Jamie is a Scientologist.
March 11th, 2008 at 11:45 pm
and once again comment 806 proves that you have no perspective.
March 12th, 2008 at 12:33 am
No perspective, excuse me, i was aplogizing, you are arrogant..
March 12th, 2008 at 12:42 am
Sorry, I have been extremely busy of late and have not had a chance to post answers to these lost minds.
To everyone: QUIT WHINING AND RESORTING TO PREMATURE SLANDER. This is a BIG BOY [or girl] discussion
JesusFreak, why do you believe in a God? [God is Imaginary]
Use a logical basis and sequential explanation, if you will. Historical records and/or archaeological findings, facts, statistics, any of these; cite some of these in your argument.
flyonthewall:
That statement is CLEARLY inverted; only when you switch the two key terms does it make a factual reality. There are NO facts to prove gods [God is Imaginary] exist. However there is plenty to the contrary.
March 12th, 2008 at 5:03 am
The Butcher; You don’t read very well do you? I believe in God/Higher consciousness. Just not the way you believe. Kraeg and I had a lovely debate about it. My main point was that all faith is not narrow minded; faith does not mean you have to believe the bible to be the literal truth, nor does it have to be exclusionary. In fact your attitude and that of other fundamentalist christians/muslims/whatever are why I don’t believe in Religion. Faith cannot and should not replace reason. And calling someone evil because they don’t agree with you is the exact stupidity of which I speak. My god wouldn’t like you very much. I’m pretty sure your’s isn’t very happy either, or do you just ignore the part about kindness, turning the other cheek, the meek shall inherit the earth etc., Only follow the parts you agree with?
March 12th, 2008 at 9:19 am
JesusFreak – Your question is – odd. How do I know that there is no god?
What I know is at some point in time, someone postulated the idea that there is a god.
I reject that postulate due to a complete lack of supporting evidence.
So I have no belief in god. I do not know there is no god, but it doesn’t matter. I know that there is no proof of god which amounts to the same stance.
But now I ask you – how do you KNOW there is a god? At what point did you start believing? And were you raised in a christian home?
795. flyonthewall: no it doesn’t. It takes a complete lack of faith to not believe in a god. There can only be a denial of fact if that a hypothesis has been proven true, or proven likely. God has not been proven to any degree. It is you who denies the reality of the world in order to continue with your faith. You are one of the few Christians i’ve heard from that doesn’t understand that. Faith is the adherence to something that is not tangible in any way, shape or form.
Crimanon: take it down a level. Please. When we’re trying to present atheism as the rational alternative, you do it no justice by taking it to an irrational level. Please – no name calling, less arrogance.
March 12th, 2008 at 10:16 am
Kraeg, I should say that your insistence upon proof is still a very relative recent idea in our history. I am not sure, but I think the need for proof, empirical evidence, etc., is all a product of the enlightenment. You are asking where JesusFreak got his idea of a God – perhaps a Christian home, well, where did you get your idea that you need proof? Where did you get the idea that you need tangible proof of something? Where does your insistence on logic or the rational come from? I can guarantee you doesn’t come about because you are a human being and have a brain. You are heavily influenced by your culture.
So, while I think there are some great apologetics out there for the proof of God, I know there are arguments to the contrary. While I am a devout Christian, I don’t want to reduce my faith to something that can be tested and proved. If you believe things must be proven in order to know they exist, I do not believe I could ever prove God’s existence to you, anymore than I can the existence of love, hope, or other intangible emotions or feelings. Sure, you may respond by saying “Well, I have evidence of love or hate by the way someone treats me, etc,” but I would wager that’s you believe these emotions are demonstrated, which is largely based on upbringing and cultural context. But I digress. If you do not believe in faith or the idea of faith, we have little common ground in this area.
March 12th, 2008 at 10:21 am
Kraeg: Who said I was atheist? Far from it, however, Rationality is a staple of my beliefs. A nifty conglomeration of Heresy and Pious. As far as the name calling, I was simply making a point that members are jumping the gun on belief systems without doing research into others thoughts (Read above comments for further details). What you call Arrogance, I call intensity, Comments 238-242. Again, all about walking in another mans shoes, If people were more open minded we could get along.
March 12th, 2008 at 10:28 am
JLo: Good point, But why would it have to be Faith in God, Why not Faith in each other, Or for the mathematically endowed Faith that Pi is never ending? Everyone has their “Grail”. Why can’t we make common ground that we all believe in Something Greater?
March 12th, 2008 at 11:12 am
Apologies Crimanon. I jumped to an incorrect conclusion based on some of your most recent posts.
JLo – Heavily influenced by my culture would, in all likelihood, push me into Christianity. It’s using that human brain, to rationalize, that allows me to disbelieve in a god.
Requirement of proof being a relatively recent idea is correct. It came about when we entered what is commonly referred to as the age of reason. Humans started using reason to explain the world around us, and to understand that what we learned could change in a moment as our learning progressed.
I have an inherent problem with faith in that it tends to be difficult to change when new evidence arises. When one doesn’t have to rely on proofs, the world can take on any shape you wish it to. Faith in god in particular is an issue in that it is the only faith that people deem above reproach.
And I say to you, that faith is the relatively modern invention. Faith is what is left when the so-called evidence from the past no longer holds conviction. Gone is our gullible past. We no longer believe that gods pulled the sun across the sky, that thunder resulted from their wars, that the earth is the center of the universe. Faith is what you need to rely on when all other evidence has been stripped away. God apparently used to present himself to mere mortals. In the age of reason, he does not. So theists rely on the concept of faith to keep their beliefs from crumbling.
We live in a world where all we see and do is given the courtesy of supplied evidence. Religion should not be exempt from the same courtesy.
March 12th, 2008 at 11:13 am
@JLo (813)
I know it wasnt directed at me, but i find the need to answer to your argument.
The need for proof comes from the acknowledgment that faith alone has been wrong -always-.
). For instance, 2000 years ago it was acceptable to have slaves. Thankfully that practice is much more reduced today. Not because of any god or faith based action, but because the humanity moral values have shifted and adjusted.
Thinking evolves, people are (slowly) removing the veils from their eyes and deciding to think for themselves. Imho, that is a great achievment of mankind.
Surely you accept that the general world view is constantly changing and evolving (how i like that word
Religious establishment are, of course, against all types of enlightenment of the people. It weakens it’s grip on their minds and purses.
Thank you very much for your time,
CC
March 12th, 2008 at 12:47 pm
Why is it assumed that using our brains would mean a lack of faith? Has no one ever heard or read of some the great thinkers of our time that have believed in faith, if not the Christian faith then some faith.
(817)”Religious establishment are, of course, against all types of enlightenment of the people. It weakens it’s grip on their minds and purses.”
Not this tired argument. This really does cut both ways. If someone to were earnestly believe in something at the expense of not believing something else, it’s automatically considered narrow minded or bigoted. However, to believe in all things and everything is utterly absurd too. It’s like the quote, it’s fine to keep your mind open as long as your brain doesn’t fall out.
Are we honestly going to insist that faith/religion is the arbiter of all that is wrong with this world again? If faith is so good about discouraging enlightenment/improvement, why is it often great men of faith (Christ, Gandhi, Buddha, MLK, Jr) are the ones who brought about change and the betterment of mankind. Just like anything else, religion has been used to abuse people in the name of God. Heck, why I am willing to concede religion has been responsible for many travisties, I can also find numerous examples of faith imrpoving society as a whole, including with the issue of slavery.
No, I don’t agree morality has evolved, just our regulation and implementation of morality through enlightenment and civilization. These are but constructs. I guarantee you that if you go to some part of the world, you will find some people group with an entirely different view of morality than ours, so does that assume they are more barbaric, more backwards? Why would we ever insist one culture is better than another, and why would we ever think that way in the first place?
(816)”Faith is what is left when the so-called evidence from the past no longer holds conviction. Gone is our gullible past…So theists rely on the concept of faith to keep their beliefs from crumbling.”
But how does this benefit theists or those who belief in God? Would this assume that inside all theists is an inherent disbelief in God? We just hold onto this belief outwardly for other people? Why would I personally go through the trouble of having faith if in the end I could be berated, tortured or killed for my faith. Do you really think I hold onto my faith because I use it to make sense of life? If faith was used to make sense or give us hope, what is left when the world falls down around you and all you have left is faith? In my opinion, it takes more courage to believe in something beyond yourself in the midst of those circumstances than it does to not believe.
Religion and faith are two different things, my friend. I can have faith and not be religious, and I can be religious and not have any faith. You can try to get faith to supply you with evidence, but as I’ve said before you are gonna be hard pressed to find evidence for a lot of other unseen things in our human world. And after you have siphoned the mystery out of everything, what is left? That is what the Enlightenment has done to faith, in my opinion…it has tried to suck the mystery out of it.
March 12th, 2008 at 2:17 pm
I’m sorry JLo – you write very well. But it doesn’t make you correct. You are mistaken or misinformed on much. And on other fronts, you put together words beautifully, but they hold no meaning.
It reminds me of a Simpson’s episode when Lisa, gazing on a marquee in Australia “Yahoo Serious Film Festival” commented – “I know all those words, but I don’t know what that means”
First – Do you honestly believe it was Religion or Faith that motivated MLK into fighting for equal rights? And again – do you really believe it was religious ideals that motivated Ghandi? That denigrates great men by saying without god in their lives they wouldn’t have been motivated to see human suffering around them and take action. Buddha didn’t become a ‘great man’ due to faith. He created faith by being a profound thinker. It’s like saying the thought of the taste of butter is what prompted the first person to stir cream indefinitely. It was the byproduct of the action, not the other way around. Hmmm – Christ – not necessarily a true person, and if he is, not necessarily the person people think he was. All we have is writings based on translations of other writings of translations of writings that occurred hundreds of years after his death.
With or without religion, you have good people doing good things.
Do you honestly believe that it was theism that initiated emancipation? You need to go back to your history book and see where Religion stood on the issue of slavery. When you twist history to this extent, the rest of your writing loses all credibility.
To continue: in your opinion it takes more courage to believe in something beyond yourself … than it does to not believe. Really? More courage to believe what the majority of the population already believes. More courage to take something that is profoundly unbelievable, and accept it as believable. I don’t think you quite understand the meaning of the word courage. I think conformist is the word you are looking for.
Grade 12 students wearing pink to support a bullied student, takes courage. The student was bullied by theists who questioned his sexual orientation.
Justin Trottier, who was beaten up by theists when he was putting up posters announcing a symposium on the fallacy of god, at Ryerson University knows what courage is about.
You ask about benefits to theists. The same way all delusions help anyone – they help to make sense of a world that doesn’t seem to make any sense. They introduce an element of safety when the holder of those delusions feels unsafe. I wouldn’t suggest you hold that belief outwardly for all people. But i do suggest that you hold it inwardly for yourself to be used for sense and hope. Most theists deride atheism as an outlook without hope. There are tremendous benefits to theists by continuing to have faith.
You are correct – Religion and Faith are two different things: Faith in god is belief without doctrine. Religion is doctrine to tell you HOW to believe in god. You are correct in believing you can have faith without religion, but you are incorrect in thinking you can have religion without faith. You can follow religious doctrine without faith, but that doesn’t make you religious.
To your final thoughts – You’re going to be hard pressed to find evidence for a lot of other unseen things in our human world – Name one. (And please, stay away from other supernatural aspects here – ghosts, esp, psychics)
Don’t for one moment think that we are intelligent enough to siphon the mystery out of everything. There are too many questions and too much to know. Reason should suck the mystery out of faith. It has all along. As we have learned more about our world, the phenomena in it, the microorganisms that affect it, the path of the heavens, the connection of ecosystems, it has become less of a mystery, and less room for god to fill in those gaps.
But why is it you feel that losing that mystery makes the world a lesser place? It becomes more beautiful in and of itself. Knowing why the various accompaniments in a piece of classical music affect each other as they do, doesn’t make it any less a beautiful piece.
March 12th, 2008 at 2:18 pm
sorry about the length of that previous post, but I felt JLo was so off base she needed to be addressed properly.
March 12th, 2008 at 2:20 pm
JLo: That is precisely why I believe what I believe.
Big Bang Theory and the First: The Big Bang is commonly believed to be, By scientists, the Creation. A great explosion from a “Singularity” causing all manner of matter to spread throughout the expanse that we now know of as Our Universe. Theoretically, these Singularities can be found in black holes scattered throughout space. If we are to assume that, then it is reasonable, to think that our Current Universe came from a Singularity located in Another Universe. By simple train of thought we can come to the current, science has taken us only so far, conclusion that the same could be said about the “Other” Universe. This cycle may be a neverending circle Or Maybe what we should look for Instead of God is the First Universe. How did It come to be? Was it Actually God? Is it something that will Never be understood?
No matter how much you analyze that, You can still have the Faith, Be it Atheist (Science) Or Religious (God).
Book 1, Chapter 1, Stanza 1, “And God said “Let There Be Laws Of Nature” and there Were.” Now close the book you’re done.
March 12th, 2008 at 2:44 pm
Kraeg – I started believeing in God when I was 13 after a very strong bond with drugs. I was deeply involved to the point where I excommuicated myself from my family. I wasnt raised in a Christian home until i was about 15. I know that God, Heaven, Hell, etc. is real. I have seen thing i cant explain. I am serious, (dont jump on me for saying this, anyone.) Look at the human body. That’s proof of God’s existance.
Let me try to explain how God exists in a way you’ll understand ok.
– How ever you section physical reality, you take the physical universe as you see it and how ever you slice it down to its smallest form, the fact of the matter is, you end up with a physical entity or quantity that doesn’t have the reason for its existence in itself. Ultimently, the physical universe reduced in any form cannot explain its own origin has to find its explaination outside of itself which means the first explaination of a universe as we see it has to have something non-physical as a first cause. So you sorta have a haunted universe without know what the first cause is.
Next we come to the arguement we call not from design but to design and thats what i said if you walk on a planet and see a McDonald’s wrapper with letters of the alphabet you immediatly there is information and behind thatnformation is a mind. Ex. You dont think that a dictionary came together by and explosion at a printing press do you? No a mid put that together.
So let me break it down wat im saying:
1.) The physical quantity cannot explain itself.
2.) THe is intelegabilty which assumes a prior mind
Which comes to number 3………
3.) In the history of society, human experience, and histroy itself, you begin to realize the moral issues, the social issues, and human intercourse demands the explaination of a moral reality.
So you have a first cause that is spritual, a first cause that is mind, a first cause that needs t explain morality. You take these three struggles Kraeg. Okay pause with me real quick. There are four fundemental questions in life: origin, meaning, morality, and destiny. You take these 4 questions and the 3 causes and put them together and only God is big enough to explain this universe.
March 12th, 2008 at 2:48 pm
Help! Ive fallen and I cant get up
March 12th, 2008 at 3:28 pm
Anyone have any Visene? After reading these posts for the last hour or so starting around the last time I commented. . .
Ah screw it, Gilligan’s Island is on.
March 12th, 2008 at 3:29 pm
JesusFreak – I enjoy reading you. You’re coherent, and persuasive. I don’t want to keep picking at details so I’ll leave it with this.
I think you’ve thought through your faith quite thoroughly, and are happy with what you’ve found. I won’t try to take that away from you.
Myself, I am happy with the universe as I see it – but I don’t see that there are four fundamental questions. Only one – What do we do while we are here?
I do agree that we don’t have an adequate explanation for how the universe started. But that doesn’t mean the answer is therefore ‘god did it’. It’s not enough. It hasn’t been enough for most phenomena in the history of the world, and this is only one more that we have yet to discover.
March 12th, 2008 at 3:51 pm
Kraeg I enjoy reading you to, to tell you truth this is a very hard topic to persuade someone. You are a great debator. by the way if any letters are missing in my comments, it is because of my keyboard. its a piece of crap…but anyways.
Kraeg – I know there are many ways that people look at the universe. But I can just look at the Rincon Mountains here in Tucson and just see that a Master Designer created this and not by random chance. I can look into my dirlfreind’s eyes ad just see the beauty and the complexity of the eye. Even Charles Darwin said that the human eye is even the work of a designer because of its complexity. I just don’t understand how people cannot see that God created this master peace. There is so much proof that God created this…people just need to pull the filter away from there eyes and stop worshiping the created instead of the Creator.
March 12th, 2008 at 3:58 pm
Heh – Darwin is misquoted a lot:
“To suppose that the eye with all its inimitable contrivances for adjusting the focus to different distances, for admitting different amounts of light, and for the correction of spherical and chromatic aberration, could have been formed by natural selection, seems, I freely confess, absurd in the highest degree. Yet reason tells me, that if numerous gradations from a perfect and complex eye to one very imperfect and simple, each grade being useul to its possessor, can be shown to exist;”
It is difficult, i’ll go further and say impossible to convince anyone within this conversation.
I think the best we can hope for is that we have opened each others eyes for future more open consideration.
March 12th, 2008 at 4:35 pm
I enjoy your retorts Kraeg, even your condescending comments are quite humorous in a humanistic sort of way. I always find it so ironic that humanists, atheists, et al are allowed to look at faith or religion and see it’s benefits to mankind from a vantage point that seems somewhat godlike. Bless their hearts, they try to make meaning of life, but they are really all there is. But I digress.
“First – Do you honestly believe it was Religion or Faith that motivated MLK into fighting for equal rights?…”
I believe it played a large part in who they were, yes. The same for Ghandi and the others I mentioned. Not so much that they believed in a religious system, but that their faith motivated them to make this world better.
I have a question, though. If theists are all deluded, were Ghandi, King, et al, all deluded as well? How can you for certain say that they were not motivated by their faith in something beyond themselves. I would assume that’s the case. If theists are people who believe in gods or a god, and theists hold onto delusions, must not all the above mentioned men be deluded in their thinking and possibly their motivations? Why on earth would we ever want to trust anyone who is deluded? If all theists are delusional, we need to revisit some of the people we have revered in history.
“I think conformist is the word you are looking for.”
Sure, in America at our current time it is not hard to be a person of faith. However, I was referring more to the early church, or to other people in different parts of the world who are persecuted, tortured and killed for their faith, whatever faith that is. Is this conformity too? Oh wait, let me guess, this is group think? Or wait, I wish I knew more about anthropology I could ascribe something like that to it here.
“To your final thoughts – You’re going to be hard pressed to find evidence for a lot of other unseen things in our human world – Name one.”
As I said earlier, hope, love, compassion, etc, are not really quantifiable are they? I mean, you could say a person giving something for nothing is an example of compassion, but is it? How do you measure that or know that?
“Most theists deride atheism as an outlook without hope.”
I am serious when I ask this, what does hope mean to atheist? I really want to know. I am studying to be a hospital chaplain, and I will deal with people of varying spiritual, or I suppose non-spiritual, backgrounds and I would like to know how to console an atheist who may be dying.
“But why is it you feel that losing that mystery makes the world a lesser place? It becomes more beautiful in and of itself. Knowing why the various accompaniments in a piece of classical music affect each other as they do, doesn’t make it any less a beautiful piece.”
I think there is merit in a childlike view of the world and its beauty and mystery. This is a poetic outlook, I suppose.
And on that note, my first comment on this whole thread quoted G.K. Chesterton, and I will quote it again:
“Most of the very great poets have been not only sane, but extremely business-like; and if Shakespeare ever really held horses, it was because he was much the safest man to hold them. Imagination does not breed insanity. Exactly what does breed insanity is reason. Poets do not go mad; but chess-players do. Mathematicians go mad, and cashiers; but creative artists very seldom. I am not, as will be seen, in any sense attacking logic: I only say that this danger does lie in logic, not in imagination…To accept everything is an exercise, to understand everything a strain. The poet only desires exaltation and expansion, a world to stretch himself in. The poet only asks to get his head into the heavens. It is the logician who seeks to get the heavens into his head. And it is his head that splits.”
You had mentioned that faith should not be above the same criteria used for everything else in our world, and that’s fine. But I wonder how can you do that? How would you evaluate, test, try, and test again faith? I am not talking about god or gods, but a faith in something beyond who we are right now, something unseen. I would wager that at some point in our history we think we can solve all mysteries in the world, but how would we know? Honestly, is that which is real is only that which is available to our senses?
March 12th, 2008 at 4:41 pm
One last thing, I am not trying to convince anyone of anything here. I am a Christian, but I not think I can convince you of the reason why I am, or why I believe, I just do. My faith has been hard at times, and at times it seems like it’s done me no good. At times I’ve experienced such amazing doubt, but I keep coming back to something in me that says, no, this is true.
Believe me, there were times in my past when life was easier when I didn’t believe, when I didn’t have to grapple with the paradoxes of my faith. Back then I could just be “religious” without sincere faith, or not even religious at all. This is not the case anymore. Something inside me clings to this truth, and I know it because I know it. I am not saying any of this as a defense of anything. I know personal information is not the way to carry on an argument. I am just disclosing why I feel it is impossible to prove or disprove the existence of God or Faith.
March 12th, 2008 at 5:47 pm
I am god and you are god. Grok?
March 13th, 2008 at 6:03 am
sorry i have to break in here for a second…
kraeg: if you want to talk about being delusional and not accepting facts, you need to look at your statement that faith had nothing to do with MLK’s fight for justice in america. this is a seriously delusional statement.
you don’t even have to dig. just look at the transcript from his “i have a dream” speech. btw, this speech was ad libbed, so you know this is what he believes deep down. his main motivation for racial equality in the speech is that we are all “God’s chilren”. he is even quoting scripture.
you want to talk about holding a position in the face of evidence. take a look at yourself, bro.
March 13th, 2008 at 9:13 am
JLo – this is one thing that I dislike about debating with believers. You tend to throw out everything you can think of to support your side of the argument. When those arguements are proven patently false (like your assurance that the church had something to do with the abolition of slavery) you ignore it, choose not to apologize for LYING, and move on. I read your post and was planning on responding to it until I reached the point where you state that it’s rationals that go insane on a regular basis, and not creative types (because for some reason you have started equating creative types with believers in faith).
Once again – you’ve lost all credibility. You’ll find that being a genius in ones field puts you at risk of going over the edge and while that includes mathematicians as you say, the easiest field to find examples of insanity are in the artistic disciplines.
But you can go ahead and ignore this and try yet another tack. I think we are finished discussing this as all you seem to be able to do is toss excrement at a wall to see what doesn’t fall off.
DiskHuker – like any great speaker, MLK used words he knew would motivate his listeners. I accept that he was a man who believed in god but there were many other black ministers before him, and of his time who chose to do nothing despite their faith. It was the man himself who spoke to that crowd. And shame on you for trying to diminish that accomplishment to further your own agenda.
March 13th, 2008 at 9:48 am
JLo – this is one thing that I dislike about debating with believers. You tend to throw out everything you can think of to support your side of the argument. When those arguements are proven patently false (like your assurance that the church had something to do with the abolition of slavery)
Woah, did I say it did? Where did I say that? I think I said people within the church or people who were motivated by faith wanted to abolish slavery, but I am not sure I ever said the church did it. Again, you are mixing the church/religion with people of sincere faith. I think anytime anything truly positive has been done via the church it’s been a bottom-up effort, not a top-down. What I mean is that people within the church were motivated but not necessarily because a church mandated it. For example, MLK Jr, William Wilberforce, the dude that started the Salvation Army, et al.
“…you ignore it, choose not to apologize for LYING, and move on.”
I am sorry I missed where I was intentionally lying. I do apologize if I did that, but it was clearly not to avoid anything or to mislead anyone honestly.
“I read your post and was planning on responding to it until I reached the point where you state that it’s rationals that go insane on a regular basis, and not creative types (because for some reason you have started equating creative types with believers in faith).”
Your beef is with Chesterton. I tend to agree with some of what he said but not all of it. My point is that I think it’s not valid to apply logic or scientific reasoning to matters of faith, and I am not sure how you can. If God came down from heaven, how would you know it was God? How can you prove or disprove faith?
“Once again – you’ve lost all credibility.”
Did I have some credibility in your eyes? From what I understood, I was already delusional for constructing a faith in order to make sense of my reality. Or a conformist.
I don’t think you answered my questions either, Kraeg. I apologize if I have side-stepped some of your questions. If you list them out, I will do my best to answer. Honestly. the thing about this medium is that it’s hard to get tone. I am not being mean or hostile here, and I seriously want to understand your point of view, even if I disagree with it.
JLo – this is one thing that I dislike about debating with believers. You tend to throw out everything you can think of to support your side of the argument. When those arguements are proven patently false (like your assurance that the church had something to do with the abolition of slavery) you ignore it, choose not to apologize for LYING, and move on. I read your post and was planning on responding to it until I reached the point where you state that it’s rationals that go insane on a regular basis, and not creative types (because for some reason you have started equating creative types with believers in faith).
Once again – you’ve lost all credibility. You’ll find that being a genius in ones field puts you at risk of going over the edge and while that includes mathematicians as you say, the easiest field to find examples of insanity are in the artistic disciplines.
But you can go ahead and ignore this and try yet another tack. I think we are finished discussing this as all you seem to be able to do is toss excrement at a wall to see what doesn’t fall off.
“I accept that he was a man who believed in god but there were many other black ministers before him, and of his time who chose to do nothing despite their faith. It was the man himself who spoke to that crowd. And shame on you for trying to diminish that accomplishment to further your own agenda.”
1) Are you certain others never did anything? How do you know?
2) What does “doing something/nothing” mean in this context? Preaching/not preaching about it? Leading protest marches? I concur that faith should be a prime motivator for us to get off our butts and fix the world, but I would wager that might look different for all of us.
3) I think MLK Jr would be upset that you want to dimish his faith in light of his accomplishments, especially since they played such a vital role in his speeches and visions.
Okay, I will ask you the questions I asked above again.
“I am serious when I ask this, what does hope mean to atheist? I really want to know. I am studying to be a hospital chaplain, and I will deal with people of varying spiritual, or I suppose non-spiritual, backgrounds and I would like to know how to console an atheist who may be dying.”
and this one
“You had mentioned that faith should not be above the same criteria used for everything else in our world, and that’s fine. But I wonder how can you do that? How would you evaluate, test, try, and test again faith? I am not talking about god or gods, but a faith in something beyond who we are right now, something unseen. I would wager that at some point in our history we think we can solve all mysteries in the world, but how would we know? Honestly, is that which is real is only that which is available to our senses?”
I understand there are several questions here, so I understand if you don’t get to all of them. Please understand I am not being snide or snarky here. I genuinely want to dialog about this. It’s important to me and my journey in my faith to help me understand how I can empathize, care, listen to others coming from different backgrounds and belief systems. That may sound hokey, but I am speaking the truth.
March 13th, 2008 at 10:23 am
Hope to an atheist is the same as hope to any human being. Hope is what we have when we want a positive outcome even when there is evidence to the contrary. Our lives are filled with hope due to the fact that we can’t control every single facet therein. Hope is the necessary delusion we all give ourselves to avoid stressing and fretting about each and every circumstance we encounter. In that regard – we are all subject to delusions.
I don’t require hope when contemplating death. Death will come, it is inevitable. I won’t like it when it gets here as I will always think I want more time. But the reality is, I do everything possible to enjoy my time here – not at the expense of others – to make sure I haven’t wasted it.
It’s this concept of hope that makes me understand the real necessity of faith. Hope that this isn’t just it. Hope that life means more than just the hand each person happens to be dealt. Hope that there is reconciliation with those gone from our lives. I don’t subscribe to the hope of something more, but I do understand some peoples need for it.
Next question: How to measure faith? I don’t require you to. Faith isn’t something that can be measured, just like the emotions you mentioned earlier. It is an intangible. But the concept in which you put your faith can be tested. This is where theists tend to get upset. The object of their faith is the existence of god. Great. Prove him. But he cannot be proven. Religion has adapted the creator to something that cannot be proven as a final stance.
In the past, stories carried great weight. If something was important enough to be written, it was taken as true. So the stories about god were taken at face value. We are in a more enlightened age, some might say cynical, where we understand that not everything is true. Some ‘truths’ are written with an agenda. The god of the bible understood that humans needed more than faith to believe in him so he sent firestorms, angels, transformed people into salt, parted seas, flooded the earth. But this same god, who supposedly understands everything, incorrectly feels the more enlightened/cynical version of his creation doesn’t need that quality of evidence. So he removes himself and asks us to believe in him. To have faith that he exists. It’s too convenient. It’s too human a story.
But what we can do is test the theories of religious doctrine.
i.e. prayers will be answered.
Which we have done. And they are not. There is no empirical evidence of prayers being answered.
i.e. ‘miracles’ can be tested.
They tend to be explainable and are shown for what they are, or in other cases non-theists are barred from actually testing the site of a miracle.
For the record, we all put faith in things beyond ourselves. i.e. I haven’t read every piece of literature on evolution and evolutionary theory there is. But I am well-versed enough to accept it as plausible, to the point of being true. There is certain degree of faith involved here.
But the difference is – I, and other rational thinkers, am open to new ideas. If a new piece of evidence came along that shattered evolutionary theory as we know it – I’m all for looking at the new ideas that arise. That’s what rationale, and by extension science, is about. Looking for testable truths. But theists constant throw up caveats, and when they run out it comes back down to ‘you just gotta have faith’ without giving any reason for ‘WHY you just gotta have faith’ other than a ‘good gut feeling’.
I hope I have answered your questions.
March 13th, 2008 at 11:42 am
kraeg: i’m stating to feel your frustrations about somebody not acknowledging a point when it is blatantly obvious. to say that MLK’s belief in God had nothing to do with his actions is just plain, well, retarded.
March 13th, 2008 at 12:15 pm
Thanks, Kraeg. I appreciate the time you took.
And for what it’s worth, as a theist, I am not upset by anything you have said regarding the lack of evidence for my faith, believe in God, etc. I don’t feel the need to say “You just gotta have faith in God/Unseen Force, et al,” because you don’t. Honestly, no one has to have faith, I just have it as sure as I’m breathing. I don’t always get a good gut feeling from it, and especially not warm fuzzies, but it’s just there, deep inside who I am. I am not trying to avoid answering any of your questions, but unless you can cut me open and find my soul or something like that, there is really no other way I can prove to you my faith in God is real.
If my faith can be disproven or invalidated by the scientific arguments or new evidence out there, it wasn’t really faith in the first place. That’s not to say that Christianity has not been challenged by the new evidence, but for me, it has refined and sharpened my faith. It has shown me where my faith was not faith and was merely an accepted version of things.
Hope that make sense.
One question, and I am no apologist, if morality has changes so much through the history, why does it seem that some of the same moral codes have existed for all people groups everywhere? I will grant the Ten Commandments are not entirely original or new, but the same commands of not murdering, stealing, coveting, etc have been seen in countless other people groups from New York to New Guinea. Yet one thing is for certain – the laws of physics and mathematics have changed and will continue to change. Why is there more uniformity in moral laws than possibly in scientific laws? As you pointed out earlier, people have not always followed these laws, but they have existed in some form throughout time.
I am not apologist, so I shouldn’t even go into this territory. This quote from the philosopher Wittengstein seems to make sense to me: “[E]ven if all possible scientific questions are answered, the problems of life still have not been touched at all.” I guess this echoes what I said earlier in that a lack of faith in a god or God or some unseen being cannot really explain or speak to the issues of love, grief, hope, etc. What does an atheist offer someone experiencing grief, terminal illness, etc?
How would you comfort someone with this kind of outlook on hope (quoting you): “Hope is the necessary delusion we all give ourselves to avoid stressing and fretting about each and every circumstance we encounter.”
It’s been great discussing this with you Kraeg. You’ve definitely challenged me.
March 13th, 2008 at 12:16 pm
Upon consideration – it is as likely that MLKjr is the man he is due to his faith as it is likely that he just saw wrong in the world and wanted it changed. I’m projecting my view of my ideal of the man, and I shouldn’t do that.
It’s a moot point though, as I don’t know if any of us can correctly argue his motivation.
It is arguable that his actions weren’t inline with the ‘religious views’ of the day. Thus he would have had to reconsider his faith in those views, and the god they represented. I would suggest by that, that his motivation was not brought on by faith, but that the changes he was looking for helped to shape his faith.
March 13th, 2008 at 12:23 pm
Hello All,
I must admit I have not read any of the last postings.
Sometimes I just need to clear my mind in order to say
what I feel, believe I know, and want to say without
being influenced by others.
I don’t like religions. They are power structures
that start off with good intentions, seek or say they possess a truth and a desire to heal a pain that has not been addressed properly by society. They need a veil or a sanction of holiness to convince others, but all that
seek power over others use the same techniques. Even Atheists do this.
I am a Christian. Do not hold that against me and my words.
We are all shattered fragments of a mirror, some seeking
to re-unite the mirror, others hurt and ready to cut and draw
blood from others due to pain and mindlessness, and others
that are lost and clueless, wanting joy, and the list of
who we are could go on and on and on. I could explain why
Nazis’ exist. We are shattered fragments; some ready to heal
and some ready to embrace pain, and the list of how we deal
with our fragmentation could go on and on.
I believe the at the beginning of most religions or faiths,
atheism included, the spirit and motive of their movements
was to heal our wounds and re-create a mirror in which all
could look into and see the true beauty and potential of
ourselves.
I believe the institutions, including atheism, have failed.
They have failed. They can be instruments to help others,
to have a social center, or for a tax write-off. But if you are truly seeking God, they have little power. I could be wrong. Maybe there is reality and truth in institutions
that use peer-pressure, books (holy or secular) and judgment
or grades that convinces people that they are good or bad,
have passed or failed the prescribed standards of the gods.
Society seeks and demands structure and likeness. It teaches
us then that God demands the same. Society demands common
answers. Society demands the power structure to heard and
obeyed.
But God Does Not.
We must render unto Caesar, but we can
seek God if we wish, or not if we wish.
Humans have, so often with good intentions,
assumed the mantle of God and spoke, written,
and enslaved the will of peoples in order to
help our Human Condition. Sometimes, good results
happened, and other times we have had hell on earth,
and usually it is a mixture of both. That is Caesar.
Science is stable. The Rules are there to understand
and when they are broken we are seeing the results. It
is a place to continue learning.
God’s Way, the Paths, the whatever you want to de