Naked Science Forum

On the Lighter Side => That CAN'T be true! => Topic started by: tony6789 on 09/02/2006 14:41:19

Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 09/02/2006 14:41:19
Could God actually be real i mean i am a Christian but every piece of science we have today say he is not real. That raises the big quustion is He REAL?

- Big T
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: rosy on 09/02/2006 15:05:35
Nah, there's no real science to say that god isn't real, I don't think (and I'm quite emphatically *not* a christian, or jew, or hindu, or whatever), just none I believe in that says he, she, it or they is or are real.
Of course, there is overwhelming scientific evidence that the biblical creation story is at best an allegory for I-don't-know-what, and it all depends on what you mean by god...
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 09/02/2006 16:04:30
Exactly what do i mean? Who reallt knows? What is god is he man girl blakc white or evan mexican!

- Big T
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: rosy on 09/02/2006 17:07:07
Quite.
I just thought tjat if you're a christian you might know what sort of god you believe in.
If you're interested in whether science has disproved (your) god, you're going to need a hypothesis about what (your) god is...
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 09/02/2006 17:29:33
What do you mean by real (let alone, what do you mean by God)?

Gad has no role to play in a scientific model of the universe.  The rules of science require determinism and repeatability, something that is inherently at odds with the notion of a sentient being.  Science even has problems dealing with human free will, so how is it going to deal with the notion of the free will of a supernatural being.

This does not mean God exists, or that he does not exist, only that he cannot exist within a scientific model of the universe.

The question then is whether the definition of real existence is constrained to that which is within the scientific model or not.  Can one have multiple co-existing models where something can exist in one model, but not in another model; and can such an existence be regarded as a real existence.

That something can exist in one model but not in another is self evident, so the remaining question is whether such an existence is a real existence.

If one were to assume a religious model that included a God, is there any limit to the number of permutations of such models that one can create, and how does one judge one model as functionally superior to another?

I suppose the first question one must ask is that if you wish to imagine a model of the universe that includes a God, what problem is that model supposed to solve, and how do you demonstrate that your model is the simplest way of solving that problem.

One of the problems with most real religions is that they actually create extremely complicated models of the universe, and models that contain very many arbitrary assumptions, and create extremely ambiguous answers.  These are attributes that are highly undesirable in any model.

Could you succeed in creating a model of the universe that contained a God, that was simpler, had only a minimum number of assumptions, and gave clear and unambiguous answers to the problems presented to it?
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 09/02/2006 19:41:51
Well I find myself as a staunch non believer in what I think is irational thought of believing in an illogical supernatural being/force/entity/deity....

..however...I remain avaialable to be convinced otherwise....so perhaps I have agnostical leanings.

Men are the same as women.... just inside out !!
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Ottehg Star on 09/02/2006 20:45:00
when i see scientific evidence for a god i will believe it but all i see are stories from a book. No one can come up with any evidence to prove there is a god and there is data to disprove some of the bible but not all of it. to me the bible is no more real than any other book for example The lord of the rings. if everyone made statues of frodo and worshipped it they would get locked in an asylum with padded walls. Going by this theory religion is merely an accepted form of Mass Hysteria and with no evidence for it. sorry if i offended anyones beliefs but im really anti religion.

on this subject whos read Angels and deamons by Dan Brown, this forum reminds me of that book, its excellent
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: DocN on 11/02/2006 20:55:39
Is it possible that someone like Einstein was closer to God because of his theory formation, than say, organized religions?  I did just hear an interesting idea about this from a minister, who felt that the true message of Christian salvation was that God was present in everything and everyone--that one should try to live the moment to the fullest, by finding God in the universe and, perhaps the universe itself, is God.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 13/02/2006 14:16:37
I don't know what to think rosey

- Big T
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: daveshorts on 13/02/2006 19:58:46
I would have said that the bible is more real than the lord of the rings - in that there is a load of (almost certainly extreemly biased - most of it was written by people trying to create a national myth) history in there, but I wouldn't want to base my world view exclusively on a book that was written by lots of people with political, and personal axes to grind, with a definite interest in making people think one way about Jesus... If there had been another version of the Bible which was essentially - 'well he is just this great guy with a load of interesting ideas..' I don't think it would have got so many bums on pews...

My attitude is that if there was good scientific evidence for there being a god/gods/flying spagetti monster, I would want to know how he/she/they/it worked and what physics it worked on.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ukmicky on 13/02/2006 23:07:12
The question  was is god real or not, which is an unanswerable question because in the end the only thing that it comes down to is individual beliefs, you either believe or you don't.

Science as yet cant help because it can't prove anything either way in regards to the question, all it can do is refute writings written down in the bible. Which actually prove nothing either way .The only thing that science can prove is that some peoples beliefs are so strong that they felt the need to make up stories as a way to manipulate the minds of the unbelievers. A preacher needs something to preach and it helps if all the preachers of the same faith say the same things.

The way i see it is because nothing can be proved either way then everyone should be allowed to believe whatever they like without argument or prejudice.

Michael
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: rosy on 13/02/2006 23:28:01
quote:
The way i see it is because nothing can be proved either way then everyone should be allowed to believe whatever they like without argument or prejudice.

I'd agree up to a point... where there's no proof one way or the other (such as on the existence of a god)then the only practical response is an open mind... but where people persist in believing that which is demonstrably untrue then I reserve my right to a low opinion of their ability to reason and to regard their other beliefs with an increased degree of scepticism.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ukmicky on 14/02/2006 00:15:11
Hi rosy

Compare your perception of colour compared to a group of people who are colour blind,and without science prove to them they are the ones seeing things incorrectly, Now try to prove to somebody who's whole life has been dedicated to god that god doesnt exist without any proof that what your saying is true. To them your the one that persists in believing in something which is demonstrably untrue.[:)]

Michael
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 14/02/2006 01:53:09
quote:
Originally posted by ukmicky

Hi rosy

Compare your perception of colour compared to a group of people who are colour blind,and without science prove to them they are the ones seeing things incorrectly, Now try to prove to somebody who's whole life has been dedicated to god that god doesnt exist without any proof that what your saying is true. To them your the one that persists in believing in something which is demonstrably untrue.[:)]

Michael



Sorry Michael, but it is quite possible to demonstrate to a colour blind person that “they are the ones seeing things incorrectly “.

Take 10 flat circular counters that the person who is colour blind cannot tell apart, but that you are able to distinguish (supposedly by colour) into three separate groups.  Mark the back of each counter with a number.  Then ask the person who is colour blind, and a person with colour sight, to separate the counters into groups by colour.  Repeat the experiment several times.

The person who can see the colours, should be able to repeat the grouping on each occasion, but the person who is colour blind will create different groups on each occasion.

This does not prove that what is being perceived is actually colour, but it does demonstrate that the people who claim to be able to see colour can see something that the person who is colour blind cannot see.

But, as I say, all it proves is that the colour blind persons view of the universe is incomplete.  Proving that an atheists view of the universe is incomplete would not the same as proving there is a God, only that there is something more than is understood.

George.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ukmicky on 14/02/2006 03:10:40
quote:
Sorry Michael, but it is quite possible to demonstrate to a colour blind person that “they are the ones seeing things incorrectly “.


Now go back a few hundred years to before Sir Thomas young and the modern theory of light so your in the same position as we are in now with trying to prove to a someone who passionately believes in god that god is fake with no science to back up our claims. Remember with no science to deal with colour you will have no idea how to create any tests to prove that a colourblind person is seeing things inaccurately, so how can you prove to him and expect him to accept your claims that his colour perception is not normal, as far as he is concerned your the one with screwed up vision and are mad because you you wont accept HIS colour perception as being normal.

its the same situation with god  we cant prove nothing in regards to our claims that there is no god so why  should he a lifelong believer in god  believe what we believe when we are in the same position as him and can't actually prove anything. at least he got faith , what have we got

Michael
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 14/02/2006 04:12:45
quote:
Originally posted by ukmicky

Now go back a few hundred years to before Sir Thomas young and the modern theory of light so your in the same position as we are in now with trying to prove to a someone who passionately believes in god that god is fake with no science to back up our claims. Remember with no science to deal with colour you will have no idea how to create any tests to prove that a colourblind person is seeing things inaccurately, so how can you prove to him and expect him to accept your claims that his colour perception is not normal, as far as he is concerned your the one with screwed up vision and are mad because you you wont accept HIS colour perception as being normal.

its the same situation with god  we cant prove nothing in regards to our claims that there is no god so why  should he a lifelong believer in god  believe what we believe when we are in the same position as him and can't actually prove anything. at least he got faith , what have we got

Michael



There is nothing that I suggested that would technically be unavailable to the ancient Greeks.  The most that you could argue is that the ancient Greeks did not do statistical analysis.

As I said above, there is nothing in the test that assumes anything about the theory of light, or the physiology of perception; it merely makes the assumption that if someone cannot see a difference between two groups of things, they will not be able to group them consistently into correct groups, while if someone can see a difference, they will be able to group them correctly.

I did make it very clear that the test cannot say anything about the nature of what is seen, only that it proves that one group of people can see something that another group cannot see.  Thus, it proves that the group who claim to see colour differences can demonstrate that the view of the colour blind group is incomplete.

George.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: rosy on 14/02/2006 14:55:36
'ere, Michael...
Read what I wrote again please... I said very clearly that where there's no evidence one way or the other (like whether a god or gods exist(s) ) then people should be allowed to get on with believing whatever makes them happy (or in the case of some, their prefered variation on miserable).
However, there are people who believe that the sun goes round the earth (don't get silly with me about reference frames, I know all that and it isn't what they're saying) and I don't hold with people who suggest that I should accept that belief to be as valid as mine that the maths comes out one hell of a lot easier if we put that aside and let ourselves get on with basing our calculations on the idea that to all intents and purposes the earth goes round the sun.

I think that's a nice, uncontroversial example.

To look at yours about colour blindness... I can distinguish between light which has a measurable wavelength of 450 nm and that which is at 600 nm (I picked the numbers out of the air, I don't know what the real ones are for colour blindness). Some people can't. That doesn't mean that the interaction of light with matter happens differently depending on who's looking at it. Equally, in the UV spectrum *everyone* needs a spectrophotometer to see what's being absorbed/emitted.
I was going to say it's a spurious example, but actually I think it makes my point rather well.

Our perceptions of what's true have damn all to do with what *is* true, and common sense doesn't come into it much. Some things are more-or-less measurable by the instruments nature/god has granted us (sights/sounds) some are measurable with the tools we've devised (most of chemistry, the genetic code) and some we can't get at (god/morality/beauty). The relativists should only be allowed to get their grubby paws on group 3.

I don't want to disprove God, I think he's an irrelevance. Either he's there and gave us this world to try to figure out, or he ain't and there's a world to figure out entirely by chance... it makes no difference to my life. I would quite like to discourage people from being unpleasant to each other on the grounds of who they are and who they go to bed with, and am consequently biased against organised religion as a whole, but that has nothing at all to do with the point I was trying to make above.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 14/02/2006 16:45:44
quote:
Originally posted by rosy
I don't want to disprove God, I think he's an irrelevance. Either he's there and gave us this world to try to figure out, or he ain't and there's a world to figure out entirely by chance... it makes no difference to my life. I would quite like to discourage people from being unpleasant to each other on the grounds of who they are and who they go to bed with, and am consequently biased against organised religion as a whole, but that has nothing at all to do with the point I was trying to make above.



Firstly, in terms of science, you are totally correct, God is, and must remain, an irrelevance.  Demonstrating that He is an irrelevance is not the same as demonstrating that He does not exist.

In terms of philosophy, anything to do with knowledge, and human perception of knowledge, and matters pertaining to the human psyche, must be relevant.  The concept of God has a pertinence to the human psyche, and for many people, to human perceived knowledge; and thus asking questions about the nature of religion, and thus the nature of the concept of God is relevant.  The bigger problem in terms of the philosophical discussion of God is the lack of adequately agreed frames of reference.

The arguments against organised religion have more to do with organised humanity than with religion.  Nationalism is no less dangerous that organised religion, and the vehement anti-religious perspective of mainstream communism is also no less dangerous.  Religion is merely one of many ways in which you can segregate people into 'us' and 'them', and it is not the religion itself that is dangerous, but the segregation.  Unfortunately, it is an innate part of human nature that we do like to feel we 'belong' to a group, which inherently requires that we distinguish between the group we belong to and those who are outside of that group.

George.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: rosy on 15/02/2006 17:47:29
quote:
The arguments against organised religion have more to do with organised humanity than with religion. Nationalism is no less dangerous that organised religion, and the vehement anti-religious perspective of mainstream communism is also no less dangerous. Religion is merely one of many ways in which you can segregate people into 'us' and 'them', and it is not the religion itself that is dangerous, but the segregation. Unfortunately, it is an innate part of human nature that we do like to feel we 'belong' to a group, which inherently requires that we distinguish between the group we belong to and those who are outside of that group.

I'd suggest this is only partly true. I'll grant you the human tendancy to xenophobia, but would contend that where specific "outside" groups are designated, or perceived to be so, by a religion that it is more difficult to bring those people into the "inside" group if the communities are living side by side... bigotry is accompanied by a belief that it's righteous, rather than a set of unthinking assumptions which can (I would suggest) more readily be broken down in the face of real people who turn out to be much like the people on the "inside".

quote:
The bigger problem in terms of the philosophical discussion of God is the lack of adequately agreed frames of reference.

Quite. See my first post in this thread.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 15/02/2006 18:45:54

quote:
The bigger problem in terms of the philosophical discussion of God is the lack of adequately agreed frames of reference


Roll on utopia.

Unfortunately there will never be an overall agreed format for the definition of ' god '.Such is the realm of human nature to get caught up in endless rows over semantics.

If a principal subject is so complicated, with variations in definition, with so many facets, and differing methods of interpretation, so convoluted in nature , with numerous overlapping opinions and meanings….how on earth can a stable model of such topic be ratified ?


Is it that for some people that ,it is crucial to sway us to their belief ? and for others, it is the actual debate itself, that is the crucial element.....I think it is our very nature to disagree (and agree)...I suppose that's part of sentience eh ?....but I reckon it's that nature of ours that will be responsible for our downfall, ultimately the cockroaches will inherit the Earth.

I know knowledge helps us to understand, and thatt understanding often leads to further questions and though we don’t know the true nature of the Universe and ‘ God’…I suppose the fact that we feel compelled to discuss these topics helps us to understand them , or maybe, to put it another way, it helps us to familiarise ourselves with the topic and so lead to clarity in the ability to discuss and debate.

The God thing I think generates so much debate that sometimes I feel that it’s all pointless, I mean, does anyone actually think that one day there will be a harmonious belief that we’ll all believe the same thing ?..I don’t……what I do hope is that one day there will be a harmonious belief that we’ll all just get along fine despite our differing beliefs, creeds and ethnicity and affiliations etc etc

Anyway...I seem to have digressed....getting back to my original point, how can there ever be an all encompassing agreement on a topic that is so complicated ?




Men are the same as women.... just inside out !!
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 16/02/2006 01:17:39
quote:
Originally posted by rosy

I'd suggest this is only partly true. I'll grant you the human tendancy to xenophobia, but would contend that where specific "outside" groups are designated, or perceived to be so, by a religion that it is more difficult to bring those people into the "inside" group if the communities are living side by side... bigotry is accompanied by a belief that it's righteous, rather than a set of unthinking assumptions which can (I would suggest) more readily be broken down in the face of real people who turn out to be much like the people on the "inside".




I would ask whether what you are talking about is religion or God?  There are religions that have no notion of God (Buddhism being one that comes to mind), and I would also suggest that communism itself has many of the properties of a religion, although they would be horrified to think of it so.

Unless you accept the tenets of moral relativism, then it becomes inevitable that you have to fall back on some kind of notion of a righteousness that makes your notion of right superior to someone else's notion of right.  Whether you attribute your notion of right as God given, or simply somehow 'self evident' or otherwise unarguable, by whatever mechanism, you have to either accept that there is no absolute right, or that a particular version of right that is superior is based on irrational bigotry.

Once you accept that your version of right is the superior right, then it follows that anyone who believes a different version of right must be inferior to you.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 16/02/2006 14:29:34
But what if some punk thought of a good fairy tale to write so he called it the Bible. Waht if people spent there intire lives worshiping a fairy tale if God is real we had better know and soon! Because the way this world is going we could all be killed in an up coming World War 3. IN 1902 when Mary supossedly appeared she predicted a devastting tsunami, Many earthquackes, and a World War 3. 2 of 3 of these evaents has happened. Whitch raises more questions than ansewers. Is God real? It is all a big mystery. I don't know how many Cathlics we have out there but at sometime or another you must have asked your self this question: Is God Real??? And i will not come to this conversation again because obviusly no one to date really knows the answer.

- Big T
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: rosy on 16/02/2006 18:34:03
quote:
I would ask whether what you are talking about is religion or God? There are religions that have no notion of God (Buddhism being one that comes to mind), and I would also suggest that communism itself has many of the properties of a religion, although they would be horrified to think of it so.

Religion. I don't know much about Buddhism, but religions in general proscribe certain activities (and I'll go back to the sexual morality example because it's the one that comes to mind) simply because they're "wrong". I'd agree with you that communism (in some of its manifestations) has some aspects of a "religion" too... and it's those aspects, both of religion and of communism that I find objectionable. I'm not saying that I like anything else in particular just because I'm suspicious of religions.

quote:
Unless you accept the tenets of moral relativism, then it becomes inevitable that you have to fall back on some kind of notion of a righteousness that makes your notion of right superior to someone else's notion of right. Whether you attribute your notion of right as God given, or simply somehow 'self evident' or otherwise unarguable, by whatever mechanism, you have to either accept that there is no absolute right, or that a particular version of right that is superior is based on irrational bigotry.

No. I disagree. If we accept that there is only one "truth" (whether or not any of the existing religions/non-religions have any kind of handle on what that is), then moralities based on writings purporting to be "divinely inspired" by the deity of a religion which doesn't correspond to that truth is of less value than one which is based on truth.
Since we can't know who, if anyone, has the right idea then we have to reach a pragmatic balance where *provided no harm is done to other people*, we're all allowed to get on with what we believe is right. The effects of this are quite close to those you'd get by taking a relativist view *but* is philosophically very different.

quote:
Once you accept that your version of right is the superior right, then it follows that anyone who believes a different version of right must be inferior to you.

No. That is exactly my problem with the whole thing. Religion requires belief without rational backup. A rational view says "this appears to be best so we'll run with it until we find something better". Essentially it's a case of approaching right as you would science.


quote:
And i will not come to this conversation again because obviusly no one to date really knows the answer.

I don't suppose you'll read this, Tony, but didn't you say you were a Christian? Isn't the not knowing pretty firmly entrenched in Christian doctrine? The need for Belief and all that?
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 16/02/2006 22:50:19
quote:
Originally posted by tony6789

And i will not come to this conversation again because obviusly no one to date really knows the answer.




Did you really expect that, after thousands of years of people asking this question, there would be a simple answer to it.  On the other hand, are you so lacking in curiosity to be satisfied with the easy questions?

George.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 16/02/2006 23:27:12
quote:
Originally posted by rosy

Religion. I don't know much about Buddhism, but religions in general proscribe certain activities (and I'll go back to the sexual morality example because it's the one that comes to mind) simply because they're "wrong". I'd agree with you that communism (in some of its manifestations) has some aspects of a "religion" too... and it's those aspects, both of religion and of communism that I find objectionable. I'm not saying that I like anything else in particular just because I'm suspicious of religions.




But does that not happen whether formal religion is involved or not?

150 years ago, sodomy (of either gender) was illegal, but girls could legally marry at 14 years of age.  We may argue arbitrarily for one or the other, but aside from our own emotional prejudices, one cannot prove a utilitarian argument in favour of either state of affairs.  It is still the case that in many countries in the world, marriage at 12 is not illegal, and polygamy is also accepted – not something that is likely to happen in the near future in this country in this country, but the only argument against it is that it is 'wrong'.

Other issues that are debated in this country are issues regarding animal rights – again, there is no utilitarian test one can pursue to determine an independent notion of right and wrong in such questions.

quote:


No. I disagree. If we accept that there is only one "truth" (whether or not any of the existing religions/non-religions have any kind of handle on what that is), then moralities based on writings purporting to be "divinely inspired" by the deity of a religion which doesn't correspond to that truth is of less value than one which is based on truth.
Since we can't know who, if anyone, has the right idea then we have to reach a pragmatic balance where *provided no harm is done to other people*, we're all allowed to get on with what we believe is right. The effects of this are quite close to those you'd get by taking a relativist view *but* is philosophically very different.




But how do you judge harm, and is harm itself independent of social context.

We regard harm as primarily a physiological issue, whether it be harm to the body or measurable harm to the mind.  Many religious doctrines regard harm to the soul as greater than harm to the body or mind.  I am not saying they are right or wrong, but merely suggesting that there can be different perspectives on harm.  Even any discussion of measurable of mental harm is fraught with difficulty (to a lesser extent, this difficulty also extends to measuring physical harm).

One can make simple measurements, such as what might effect life expectancy, and often through lack of any better measure, that is what is used; but it is generally wholly inadequate for what most people would aspire to, and denies people the right to take action that might risk shortening their life.




quote:


No. That is exactly my problem with the whole thing. Religion requires belief without rational backup. A rational view says "this appears to be best so we'll run with it until we find something better". Essentially it's a case of approaching right as you would science.




So how do you, without falling back on any irrational judgements, disallow human slavery but yet allow the farming of animals, and allow the enforced education of children.

One can in both cases suggest that what is being done is in the interests of society, that assumes that whatever is good for society is right, and in different contexts, where the needs of society are different, the rights of these situations are different.  Thus we get back to moral relativism, and as such, we would have to accept that where slavery is in the interests of society, in such a society there is nothing wrong about slavery.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: daveshorts on 21/02/2006 12:06:59
I think that there is a difference between irrational judgements that are a product of society and therefore alterable, and those that were divinely inspired 2000 years ago and therefore, the truth, the absolute truth and nothing but the truth, and therefore one is right in doing anything to promote these truths, and they can't be tempered with new information.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 21/02/2006 14:10:12
quote:
Originally posted by daveshorts

I think that there is a difference between irrational judgements that are a product of society and therefore alterable, and those that were divinely inspired 2000 years ago and therefore, the truth, the absolute truth and nothing but the truth, and therefore one is right in doing anything to promote these truths, and they can't be tempered with new information.



At a theoretical level, yes; but in practice, there is much less difference than the theory might imply.

Religion creates a legal framework, no different from the secular legal framework of the land.

Just as the secular legal framework can use historic precedent, and can claim rights going back to the Magna Carta, so too can religious law claim a continuity with the past.

Just as lawyers keep reinterpreting the secular law, so too do religious groups keep reinterpreting the religious law.

I would agree that religious legal reinterpretation moves slower than secular legal reinterpretation, but it is a matter of degree rather than a true difference in nature.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: G-1 Theory on 21/02/2006 16:02:09
Dear Tony;

   "Science" is what we are talking about here, to me science is the study of just what our cerater did at the begainning of time!!!!

    And the creator is my "God"

Edward E. Kerls


"Learn the facts and go on from there, and never stop asking questions."

Admiral Rickover
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 22/02/2006 14:21:10
WOWWWWWWWWWWWWW you people sure do post looks like i am staying in this argument!


- Big T
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: BigBen on 22/02/2006 14:29:13
GOD IS REAL IDIOTS!!!!!! i AM A VRY STRONG CHRISTIAN!!!!! BESIDES WHO MADE THE BIBLE IF HE DIDNT EXISIST
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 22/02/2006 14:33:19
Exactly who did make the bible if He doesn't exist? Was it just a fairy tale that a grandma made up to put the kids asleep? or was it really Matheuw, Mark, Luke, and John?

- Big T
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: daveshorts on 22/02/2006 15:52:53
A load of people who thought he did exist, essentially. Doesn't mean they were right.

Why do you need a supernatural being to write a book? If you need a supernatural bing to write a religious text then he must have also written the torah, quran, various hindu, buddist, shinto, anamist, pagan etc texts. If god did write or inspire them all, either he is, or he wants us to be, very confused...
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ROBERT on 22/02/2006 15:59:22
quote:
Originally posted by daveshorts

 a supernatural bing


Indeed Mr Crosby's crooning was heavenly.  [:)]


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bing_Crosby
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 22/02/2006 16:05:06
I don't recall ever seeing a rally of athiests !!..I seem to forget the mass protests and demonstrations against religion, and the posters and flyers and people coming up to me to help me find the right way by disbelief !

As an athiest, I usually comment in response ...I am not on the active duty list of the PRO-ATHIEST campaign.....however, I may present an opinion based on something I have seen or heard and I ususally find it's the religious who make the most noise !


ie: BigBen calling us IDIOTS !!


The bible was written by a bunch of people over a period of quite a few years and is allegorical (look it up)...it's the best selling book of fiction there is !...oh by the way..that is MY opinion !

However, I am willing to be persuaded otherwise by proof that I require so perhaps I am an athiest with agnostitcal leanings !!



Men are the same as women.... just inside out !!
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: rosy on 22/02/2006 17:50:54
Ben, that's not really an argument that's going to convince anyone. Just because you, personally believe something doesn't make it so... I *don't* believe there's a god (tho' I accept the possibility) but just because I don't think there's anything out there doesn't make that so either.
Since (at least most of) the bible doesn't even purport to be more than a true account of the history of god's people (the Jews, and subsequently the Christians) written down by their scribes often considerably after the event, to suggest that it could only have come from god is not a remotely helpful argument for his existence.
Unlike the Islamic Koran (sp?) which is said to have been revealed to the prophet directly by an angel, the stories of the bible are simply accounts of certain stories, written down by many different individuals over the years, and even if the originals were true they have been given a slant to suit a particular school of thought at the time when they were written down.
So no, Tony, I don't think grandma made it up to tell the kids, and yes, it's entirely possible (as far as I know) that the gospels were written (or at any rate first related by )Matthew, Mark, Luke and John respectively.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ariel on 22/02/2006 21:56:02
let me just clear things up
there is a god
FSM
visit www.venganza.org if you wish to find out more and quite possibly become a pastafarian like myself

it's sacrilicious!
(https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi11.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fa196%2Fbariel%2Ffsm.gif&hash=116f609c0f056f254741b55db917b1e9)
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 22/02/2006 22:36:32
Well...I'm convinced !

Men are the same as women.... just inside out !!
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 23/02/2006 14:33:52
this is a personal response to ben. ben what if the priests are wrong? What if there really is no god. I mean i go to church and every thing but i not a 100% sure it is real. What evidence is there ,besides a book, that supports that God is real?

- Big T
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: rosy on 23/02/2006 14:58:37
Have *you* been touched by his noodly appendage?
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Carolyn on 23/02/2006 21:04:58
quote:
Originally posted by BigBen

GOD IS REAL IDIOTS!!!!!! i AM A VRY STRONG CHRISTIAN!!!!! BESIDES WHO MADE THE BIBLE IF HE DIDNT EXISIST



I believe God is real also and I'm a Christian, but God is love. I don't believe He wants us to call people idiots because they disagree with us. Being a "strong Christian" should mean that people can see the love of God through you, not by how loud you can yell "I'm a Christian".

Carolyn

Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 23/02/2006 21:19:46
One things for sure...God & God related topics are popular...even on a science based website...at last count there are about 10-15 threads that all dwindle down to the same old thing....God is real...god is not real...I am right...you are wrong.

Personally...I believe in harmony....and threads like this (IMO) seem to stimulate disharmony and dissension.

Men are the same as women.... just inside out !!
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ariel on 24/02/2006 00:19:02
as a matter of fact, I have been touched by his noodly appendage [:D]
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Ray hinton on 24/02/2006 00:20:57
wow....
i see it like this...
god is the good,careing,kind,loving,warm,friendly,side of every single one of us,and the devil,who by the way no one has mentioned,but plays a significant part in the bible,is the cold negative side,so god is in us not controlling us from afar.
im an ex soldier who has seen both sides of the human character.
its not always a pretty sight,we can be awfull,and we are capable of such wonderful acts of kindness,god could definately be in us.

RE-HAB IS FOR QUITTERS.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ariel on 24/02/2006 02:53:42
now you have got me thinking. if flying spaghetti monster is god, who is the devil?
floating macaroni vampire?
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Ray hinton on 24/02/2006 10:58:45
(https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi48.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Ff238%2Frayhinton56%2F36_11_6.gif&hash=0d3eb24272f48a9e208899d11a5fcab7)brilliant,and i thought i was being profound and deep.

RE-HAB IS FOR QUITTERS.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Buggerlugs on 25/02/2006 00:43:20
Does God exist?...We probibaly wont know the answer to that question until we all die...(or mabey we wont).  Look, if God does exist, he probibaly isnt the God you will be expecting because your religion has been so diluted over the past 2000+ years and if he doesnt exist then mabey there will be still some place to reside with lost loved ones.

We are entering a new age of Quantum physics and there are many arguments between Theoretical Physicists, Creationists, Evolutionists ect...all searching for 'the truth'. My guess is we are not even close and never realy will be because as a human species we are built to 'question' and will never be satisfied with 'the truth'. Todays theories are tomorrows scientific history.

You have good and bad inside you...and free will, so you decide.. i dont think it realy matters in the grand scale of things.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 26/02/2006 00:15:23
But i mean we have no real evidence besides a book that he is real

- Big T
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 27/02/2006 14:37:55
For instance if i picked up a mothergoose book am i supposed to worship her?


- Big T
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Ray hinton on 27/02/2006 14:46:11
hey if she is the one that lays the golden eggs,im up for a bit off water-fowl worship.

its the drugs,y-know.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 27/02/2006 15:23:56
Tony (you young whippersnapper you !)...eventually you'll come to your own decision as the years go by.....what about your family ?..are they religious ?...any guidance from them ?...of course you may eventually decide that you just can't make up your mind....

That, along with , 'why do three buses turn up at the same time  ?' is one of life's BIG questions.

Men are the same as women.... just inside out !!
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 01/03/2006 14:15:58
is god a hoax?

- Big T
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 01/03/2006 14:26:50
Ok like i said there is no evidence on god that he is real. man i am getting more read here that in the chat section

- Big T
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Carolyn on 02/03/2006 06:31:41
Tony - I don't know that you will ever find evidence that God exists.  That's what faith is all about.  I'm glad you're asking questions.  There is nothing wrong with that.  I'm almost 40 and I question alot of the things I was brought up to believe. Although I do question alot of the religious "stuff", I have never questioned that God is real. I have experienced many miracles in my life, and I will be glad to share them with you, although I'm not sure this is the place for that.  I agree with Neil, you will have to make your own decision about what you believe.  Spirituality is very personal, we each have to work out our own salvation.  It is between you and God.  There are alot of things I want to say to you, but I need to get my thoughts in order first.  

What I will say now is that there are alot of zealots out there, on both sides of this issue.  I know alot of religious fanatics that believe its a sin to tell a joke.  Some say its a sin to associate with non believers.  I think they're full of crap.  I believe God has a tremendous sense of humor. He loves to hear us laugh.  I personally love a good dirty joke. (ok that may not be so good, but we all have our weaknesses)  I believe God wants us to love everyone, including non believers.  Neil and I have different beliefs, but I enjoy reading his posts and "chatting" with him.  I have a lot of friends who believe different things and thats ok.  Listen to your heart and you'll find the right answer.  Ask all the questions you need to ask.  God gave you that brain, he expects you to use it.

Carolyn
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 02/03/2006 14:07:22
Excellent post Carolyn.

Men are the same as women.... just inside out !!
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 02/03/2006 14:13:11
I agree that was a good post. Ok can i ask this do you have any info or knowledge in the Divinci(sry it is misspelled why can't they just call him bob?) Code. I am very interested in it

- Big T
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: jiggster on 03/03/2006 17:16:54
I am a catholic year 10 doing philosophy as level God I think is not real were as the evidence the big bag which was a compassion of particle is a bit more believable then God went pop pop in 6 days created earth the whole universe. It’s so well designed it would have took milliners to design 1 plant let alone billions it’s just not believable.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Carolyn on 04/03/2006 01:05:53
Tony - I started reading the Bob Code, but something about it just gave me the creeps.  It really gave me a queasy feeling in the pit of my stomach.  I don't know why, but it bothered me enough to put the book down.  That's never happened to me before.  Generally, I am the type of person who has to finish a book once I've started it.

Someone asked back on page one if anyone had read Angels & Demons by Dan Brown.  I have read that, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Also, since you're grappling with whether God is real or not, let me suggest the Left Behind series of books.  These books are based on the Bible, but they are FICTION.  I enjoyed every one them and I could honestly say I would have liked them even if I weren't a Christian.

I'm praying you find the answers you are looking for.  Have a blessed weekend.
Carolyn
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: namaan on 09/03/2006 05:23:00
I am a Muslim, for a change

I've just finished reading the Quran, the only good English rendering of the Quran that I know of can be found at: http://www.ourbeacon.com/7101.html
It’s available free for download.

First of all you all will probably be surprised at the type of arguments that I am going to make considering I am going to use the Quran as my reference.  This is the reason why I cited the version of the Quran that I read, since it is the only English rendering which is devoid of contradictions and is truly flawless as the Quran, the most pragmatic book on the planet (believe it or not, and if you don’t read it and find out) itself asserts.  Also, for the remainder of the post, since this seems to be a largely secularist forum, please temporarily assume that God exists.

I haven't read all the posts, but as a general response, the problem I seem to see with most of the arguments here is that everyone tries to 'fit' God into science, even though God is the one who initiated matter from nothing and began time when it didn't exist and created the very fabric of the universe from nothing.  So, does it really make sense for us to try to frame the One with the capacity to create the quarks and the electrons and protons and so on from nothing into a system (science) which is directly derived from His creations?  

What you forget is that science in all its glory only creates a representation/instance of the world around us and not a copy of it.  This is so since all renderings/simulation of the world around us, no matter how sophisticated, will run on a looping function with a finite delay between frames.  Will you find some sort of minimum time interval between universal progressions?  Do the physicists think that there is some form of program running in the background of the universe that is calculating the trajectory of an object thrown in the air or launched from the spring?  Do the chemists think that there is some sort of program running in the background of the universe calculating the position of each electron and its progression through time and space between/among atoms causing the various chemical reactions they study?  Science can tell us what is, but it can’t tell us what ought to be.  The most humans can attain from the Ultimate Glory of the creations of God (the Heavens and the Earth), is a mere representation of our immediate surroundings as to best suit our needs for a logical and stable environment.  

If God had willed, he could have created an unstable environment in which the so called “Universal Forces” (gravity, weak force, strong force and electromagnetism) kept changing orientation or be completely replaced by some new law.  If God can initiate such laws to begin with, then why would He not be able to change them?  However, it says quite a few times in the Quran that God himself promises that his laws will never change, and it is for this very reason that there is even such an occupation such as a scientist.  

So, for the person apt in deductive and logical reasoning, you may find that the question to ask is not whether or not God exists.  It is whether or not the universe around us exists, and as far as that is concerned; I doubt that it even deserves a passing comment.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: namaan on 09/03/2006 05:31:28
By the way, incase anyone is interested, Islam is not a fatalist religion.  In fact every concept in the Quran is explained from within the Quran, what I call an autoderivation.

Also, when I quoted the Universal Forces, it was to deny their existence, but rather to imply their synthetic nature.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: namaan on 09/03/2006 05:37:21
Wow, for the second time:
When I quoted the Universal Forces, it was NOT to deny their existence, but rather to imply their synthetic nature.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: clouded.perception on 09/03/2006 06:51:37
I, personally, am an athiest, but I freely admit that science has not disproved the existence of a god. Scientific-minded people tend to be logical thinkers, and so dislike the idea of believing something on pure faith (God is as difficult to prove as to disprove), so atheism and agnosticism are very apparent in the scientific community. But not all (or even close to all) scientists are atheist or agnostic. Check your local library; they're always full of the works of Christian scientists on topics such as creation and Noah's flood and suchlike.

I can picture in my mind a world without hate, a world without war.
And I can picture us attacking that world, because they'd never expect it.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: namaan on 09/03/2006 15:29:00
I'm not sure as to whom you are responding to, if anyone, but I am a logical thinker (too young to be considered a scientist or anything) and I also do not believe in something on pure faith.  But I specifically said that Islam is not a fatalist religion, if indeed that was a response to my post, and went on to explain the reasoning for why God exists from within the framework of science and not from without.

By the way, I have no clue as to what you meant by the last sentence and how it relates to the second to the last sentence, please elaborate.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 09/03/2006 20:02:09
quote:
Originally posted by hddd12345678910

I am a Muslim, for a change



Nice to have a change of view.

Just to keep my cards on the table, I am one of the many atheists in this debate.

quote:


I haven't read all the posts, but as a general response, the problem I seem to see with most of the arguments here is that everyone tries to 'fit' God into science, even though God is the one who initiated matter from nothing and began time when it didn't exist and created the very fabric of the universe from nothing.  So, does it really make sense for us to try to frame the One with the capacity to create the quarks and the electrons and protons and so on from nothing into a system (science) which is directly derived from His creations?




It is a fair comment that God need not fit into science, but if God does not 'fit' into science, then He cannot be real when viewed from a scientific perspective.  This does not preclude His existence when viewed from other perspectives, but then one has to be careful to define the parameters of the particular perspective in which He does become a reality, and be careful to show that the perspective in which He may exist cannot overlap the scientific perspective.

quote:


What you forget is that science in all its glory only creates a representation/instance of the world around us and not a copy of it.




Yes, I can go with that.

quote:


This is so since all renderings/simulation of the world around us, no matter how sophisticated, will run on a looping function with a finite delay between frames.  Will you find some sort of minimum time interval between universal progressions?




Now you've lost me.  I can understand that one can view the universe as discrete time intervals, it does not follow that this is an inherent property of all possible scientific models.

quote:


Science can tell us what is, but it can’t tell us what ought to be.




In this, I would slightly disagree with you.  The importance of science is not that it will tell me what is (my own eyes can tell me that), but that it can tell me what will be (i.e. it can extrapolate from the present into the future, and can then demonstrate that that extrapolation correlates with the perceived reality at the time).

quote:


If God had willed, he could have created an unstable environment in which the so called “Universal Forces” (gravity, weak force, strong force and electromagnetism) kept changing orientation or be completely replaced by some new law.  If God can initiate such laws to begin with, then why would He not be able to change them?




This does not follow.

Even if one assumed that God created all that is the universe we see, humans are notorious for creating things they are subsequently unable to control, so to assume that because God creates something thus he must be able to manipulate and control it at will is not a logical inevtability.

quote:


However, it says quite a few times in the Quran that God himself promises that his laws will never change, and it is for this very reason that there is even such an occupation such as a scientist.  




Aside from whether, that the Quran reports God as saying something, does it actually mean the report is true; but even if it is an accurate report, how can you demonstrate that God himself is telling the truth?  Given the enormous power that God supposedly has, how could you possibly hope to be able to catch Him out on a lie?  I am not saying that He was lying, I am merely asking whether you have the competence to tell whether He was lying or not.

quote:


So, for the person apt in deductive and logical reasoning, you may find that the question to ask is not whether or not God exists.  It is whether or not the universe around us exists, and as far as that is concerned; I doubt that it even deserves a passing comment.




To ask whether the universe around us exists is a perfectly valid question for a solipsist to ask, it is merely a very difficult question to answer.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: namaan on 09/03/2006 21:28:26
quote:
Originally posted by another_someone


It is a fair comment that God need not fit into science, but if God does not 'fit' into science, then He cannot be real when viewed from a scientific perspective.  This does not preclude His existence when viewed from other perspectives, but then one has to be careful to define the parameters of the particular perspective in which He does become a reality, and be careful to show that the perspective in which He may exist cannot overlap the scientific perspective.




Judging from your reply, you did not thoroughly understand my post (or maybe you’re ignoring some aspects of it because of being an atheist).  I essentially stated that it makes no sense for humans to frame God around our system of understanding of the universe around us (namely science), since it is God who created the system that we analyze with the limited abilities we possess.  So if God does not ‘fit’ into our system of science, then it does not mean that He does not exist, but rather it means that our system is too provincial and limited in capacity to provide for such a possibility.  

I suppose the problem here is that for some wildly strange reason unknown to me, and surely will remain unknown to me, atheists and people in general have no concept of the fact that God CREATED FROM NOTHING EVERYTHING AROUND YOU!  Some how, this is not a big deal to most people.  As though God is only peripheral to humans and for some reason has no power over us even though He created us from NOTHING.  If any of you thinks this to be some small task, then I challenge any of you to create matter, or destroy it for that matter.  Create even a single atom or electron from nothing if you feel God to be somehow marginal in any regard.  And if you some how manage to do so, then figure out a way to create the rest of the universe and to some how figure out a way to evolve the progression of matter in the universe to a state when the various atoms produced in the cores of stars Super Novi alike end up in the form of the humans and apples and the neurons which give you the abilities that you so frequently flaunt besides God.  To be honest I have to really restrain myself while writing this because to me it is a ridiculous and extremely selfish notion that God, our Benevolent Creator, should conform to our understanding of the universe that He created.  Instead we are the ones that should be conforming our system of science to His eternal laws.

quote:


Now you've lost me.  I can understand that one can view the universe as discrete time intervals, it does not follow that this is an inherent property of all possible scientific models.




Scientific models are not simulations, they are just, well…models.  I was referring to simulations that actually actively simulate the world around us like the type you may see on a game like Grand Tourismo which if you didn’t already know is a racing simulation.  Of course you could get a really sophisticated simulation to calculate the events occurring at extremely small time intervals, but ultimately, that’s what you would be doing: calculating.  Basically my point was that no matter what, you cannot create a simulation that can replicate the quality of the universe, namely the infinite divisibility of time, or a physically infinite large universe either.

quote:


In this, I would slightly disagree with you.  The importance of science is not that it will tell me what is (my own eyes can tell me that), but that it can tell me what will be (i.e. it can extrapolate from the present into the future, and can then demonstrate that that extrapolation correlates with the perceived reality at the time).




First of all, the only reason that you are able to know what will be is because of the stability of the universal laws.  As I previously mentioned, if the universal laws kept changing with God’s will, then you and anyone else would be completely devoid of the possibility of even knowing for sure such a thing as if an apple detaches from a tree it will fall down.  And Newton would never have found an apple falling from a tree of any significance since the next day the apple might just stayed there.  

Secondly, you never responded to portion that stated “it cannot tell us what ought to be”, so I’m going to have to assume that you agree with that statement.

quote:


This does not follow.

Even if one assumed that God created all that is the universe we see, humans are notorious for creating things they are subsequently unable to control, so to assume that because God creates something thus he must be able to manipulate and control it at will is not a logical inevtability.




Besides the, in my opinion, extremely selfish desire to compare the intellect of humans to that of God in his infinite Wisdom and Knowledge (selfish because of the reasons already mentioned), humans don’t Create anything!  The most they can do as far as creation is concerned is the creation of ideas and concepts, but even those are gifts from God, for if He had willed He could have made us like the rest of the animal kingdom; unaware of their own existence.   Everything else we humans do is purely the manipulation of whatever is already created and supplied from God.

And why do you think that humans are notorious for ‘creating’ things they are subsequently unable to control?  It is because humans are not even remotely aware of their ‘creations’ at a fundamental level (the subatomic or atomic level in this instance).  If the chemist was able to consciously know what was occurring at the atomic level when doing his/her experiment, do you think that he/she would ever make a mistake cause some kind of undesired/uncontrollable reaction?  God did not make his Creations from a macroscopic context and subsequently leave it up to chance what happens at the subatomic level.  How could any living organism possibly survive for a day without constant adjustments taking place at a microscopic or further yet at an atomic level?  Indeed God created everything around us from the most fundamental level of organization.  And if the chemist was able to know what was occurring at the most fundamental level, would he/she not have absolute control of his experiment? (Not to draw any further comparison between God and a chemist then enough to respond to your statement)

quote:


Aside from whether, that the Quran reports God as saying something, does it actually mean the report is true; but even if it is an accurate report, how can you demonstrate that God himself is telling the truth?  Given the enormous power that God supposedly has, how could you possibly hope to be able to catch Him out on a lie?  I am not saying that He was lying, I am merely asking whether you have the competence to tell whether He was lying or not.




If you read a book in which 100% of the information in it that you can UNDERSTAND is found by yourself to be accurate, then what reason would you have to assume that the things in the this book that you CURRENTLY DON’T UNDERSTAND are incorrect!  Such an assumption in this situation can only come from blatant ignorance.  Following this, God promises himself that He does not lie and his laws never change among other things in the Quran.  And by the way, the Quran doesn’t ‘report’ anything, the author of the Quran is none other then God.

quote:


To ask whether the universe around us exists is a perfectly valid question for a solipsist to ask, it is merely a very difficult question to answer.
 


If after all that some one is to make such an argument as the universe doesn’t exist, then don’t expect me to waste my time on such futile logic.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ukmicky on 10/03/2006 02:29:48
quote:
        I essentially stated that it makes no sense for humans to frame God around our system of understanding of the universe around us (namely science), since it is God who created the system that we analyze with the limited abilities we possess. So if God does not ‘fit’ into our system of science, then it does not mean that He does not exist, but rather it means that our system is too provincial and limited in capacity to provide for such a possibility.



Are we not supposed to be created in god’s image and therefore wouldn't our limited abilities be his limited ability.How is one supposed to follow and worship if we haven’t been given the ability to understand what one is following.

Why would a god who wishes to be obeyed and followed through laws written down in a book of all things,(so simplistic considering the workings of the universe) give his creations the ability to investigate and question his existence through science and then fail to give them what’s required  to understand and  prove his existence. Wouldn’t that be classed as dumb and certainly not what you would expect from someone with the wisdom and ability to create the universe.

By the way i'm a catholic who is in a struggle with his faith due to the scientific method given to us by god[:)]



Michael
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 10/03/2006 03:18:44
quote:
Originally posted by hddd12345678910

Judging from your reply, you did not thoroughly understand my post (or maybe you’re ignoring some aspects of it because of being an atheist).  I essentially stated that it makes no sense for humans to frame God around our system of understanding of the universe around us (namely science), since it is God who created the system that we analyze with the limited abilities we possess.  So if God does not ‘fit’ into our system of science, then it does not mean that He does not exist, but rather it means that our system is too provincial and limited in capacity to provide for such a possibility.




Firstly, I am sorry if there has been a misunderstanding, but you will have to realise that you and I are approaching this issue from different starting points, and it is inevitable that there will be differences in our basic assumptions and the way we interpret what is said.

On the other hand, what you have said above is subtly, but significantly, different from what you said earlier, and I think this is in part the cause of the misunderstanding.

You have referred above to “our system of understanding of the universe around us (namely science)”, whereas before you merely referred “science”.

You had stated later in your post that “science in all its glory only creates a representation/instance of the world around us and not a copy of it”.  I assumed the distinction you were making here was that science, being merely a representation, was incomplete, and necessarily had to exclude some of the reality of the universe.  As such, I was acknowledging that since science was incomplete, it is perfectly legitimate to hypothesise that things, such as God, might exist outside science (i.e. that science was not a complete system of understanding the universe, but was a sufficient system for the purposes required of it).

If you are now saying that science is a complete system of understanding the universe, and yet it excludes God, and yet you still believe God exists, then you seem to have created an unresolvable logical contradiction.


quote:
 

I suppose the problem here is that for some wildly strange reason unknown to me, and surely will remain unknown to me, atheists and people in general have no concept of the fact that God CREATED FROM NOTHING EVERYTHING AROUND YOU!




No, this is not the main problem with the notion of God.  In fact, it is a situation that science itself does not answer very satisfactorily.  The present dominant theory in science (although it is a theory that still has its dissenters) is that the universe started with a big bang, but it does not attempt to answer adequately how the conditions for that big bang came about.

The problem I have with God is firstly, that he cannot fit into the scientific model.  By this, I mean that the purpose of science is, as I said before, not to look at the past, but to look at the present and then project out into the future.  I cannot have any mathematical equation in which I can include the notion of God that will in any way help me predict a future event, at least an event that is testable and repeatable by experiment.  Thus, the notion of God is not experimentally provable.

Nor can the notion of God be proven by any formal logic (Descartes  may have tried to do this, but most people believe his logic was flawed – you may ofcourse make up your own mind on this matter).

And if one did assume God existed, then which model of God, and why would one assume one model of God the right interpretation and another model of God to be the wrong interpretation (and I'm not merely talking about the various 'religions of the book', Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, which substantially refer to the same God, but Hinduism, Taoism, Zoroastrianism, and many others)?

If one looks at all the possible beliefs, and asks which is the simplest and most minimalist belief, that is to believe there is no God at all.

Another reason why a lot of people shy away from the idea of God is that they have seen in history that far too many people have killed each other over disagreements about which God to worship, and how He should be worshipped.  I actually think this is an erroneous argument, since atheists have proven themselves just as capable of killing each other as people who believe in one God or another, but it has left religion with a bad reputation in some people's eyes.

quote:


 Scientific models are not simulations, they are just, well…models.  I was referring to simulations that actually actively simulate the world around us like the type you may see on a game like Grand Tourismo which if you didn’t already know is a racing simulation.  Of course you could get a really sophisticated simulation to calculate the events occurring at extremely small time intervals, but ultimately, that’s what you would be doing: calculating.  Basically my point was that no matter what, you cannot create a simulation that can replicate the quality of the universe, namely the infinite divisibility of time, or a physically infinite large universe either.




In a broader sense, you cannot make a complete simulation of the universe from within the universe, since you would need to duplicate all the information within the universe, and you would need at the very minimum an entire other universe to do it in.


quote:


First of all, the only reason that you are able to know what will be is because of the stability of the universal laws.  As I previously mentioned, if the universal laws kept changing with God’s will, then you and anyone else would be completely devoid of the possibility of even knowing for sure such a thing as if an apple detaches from a tree it will fall down.  And Newton would never have found an apple falling from a tree of any significance since the next day the apple might just stayed there.




Indeed, science does require stability in the underlying laws of the universe, but that very stability implies there is no active intervention within the universe by anything outside of the universe (namely God).  It does not ofcourse prove that there has never been intervention in the universe in the past (e.g. at the time of creation), but it does demonstrate that there is no intervention at present (at least insofar as it is possible to accurately predict the current and future behaviour of the universe).

quote:

 

Secondly, you never responded to portion that stated “it cannot tell us what ought to be”, so I’m going to have to assume that you agree with that statement.




In a narrow sense, I do agree with you that science does not say what ought to be, but need we assume that there is anything that ought to be?

In human terms, we may ofcourse set ourselves objectives, and determine that in order to meet those objective certain things ought to be, but this is a human interpretation of the universe it is not an absolute or scientific interpretation of the universe, and it assumes human objectives.

quote:


Besides the, in my opinion, extremely selfish desire to compare the intellect of humans to that of God in his infinite Wisdom and Knowledge (selfish because of the reasons already mentioned), humans don’t Create anything!  The most they can do as far as creation is concerned is the creation of ideas and concepts, but even those are gifts from God, for if He had willed He could have made us like the rest of the animal kingdom; unaware of their own existence.   Everything else we humans do is purely the manipulation of whatever is already created and supplied from God.




I think most of the above is semantics.  I accept that to 'create' something, one does so by manipulating what is.  If by 'create' you are using the word to merely mean to make something out of nothing, then I agree humans cannot do that -  in fact, it is doubtful if in any logical sense it could ever be possible to do that.  The act or creation is an act of causality (i.e. one has caused something to be created), and thus one must also have a means of causality, and thus something must be created from something (even if that something is totally from outside of this universe).  This is not to say that it is logically impossible for something to appear without cause, but that is not a deliberate act of creation, it is a random act without prior cause.

It is also a matter of uncertainty whether all animals are unaware of their existence.  I am not saying that all animals think as humans think, or even that any animals think as humans think, but to say that animals think differently from humans is very different from saying that no other animal besides the human animal has self awareness.

quote:


And why do you think that humans are notorious for ‘creating’ things they are subsequently unable to control?  It is because humans are not even remotely aware of their ‘creations’ at a fundamental level (the subatomic or atomic level in this instance).  If the chemist was able to consciously know what was occurring at the atomic level when doing his/her experiment, do you think that he/she would ever make a mistake cause some kind of undesired/uncontrollable reaction?  God did not make his Creations from a macroscopic context and subsequently leave it up to chance what happens at the subatomic level.  How could any living organism possibly survive for a day without constant adjustments taking place at a microscopic or further yet at an atomic level?  Indeed God created everything around us from the most fundamental level of organization.  And if the chemist was able to know what was occurring at the most fundamental level, would he/she not have absolute control of his experiment? (Not to draw any further comparison between God and a chemist then enough to respond to your statement)



That humans cannot ever predict to the minutest detail, and with 100% certainty, the consequences of their actions; I would agree with, and in fact follows from what we have agreed about an inability of ever making a complete simulation of the universe.

Whether this has anything to do with God is something I suspect we shall have to agree to disagree about.

quote:


If you read a book in which 100% of the information in it that you can UNDERSTAND is found by yourself to be accurate, then what reason would you have to assume that the things in the this book that you CURRENTLY DON’T UNDERSTAND are incorrect!  Such an assumption in this situation can only come from blatant ignorance.




The statement is, at its most basic sense, logically incorrect.

If I read a book written in Serbo-Croat, I will not understand a single word written in the book, and yet every word that I understand will be true.  This will be so, even if every word in the book is untrue, because I do not understand any of the words that are untrue.

Ofcourse, the matter might be different if you had said that you could personally corroborate 90% of what you had read in the book, and had to accept on trust only 10% of what was written.  But even this situation does not mean that the totality of the book is demonstrably true, it only means that the book has sufficient credibility that in the absence of contrary evidence you might accept the other 10% as the basis for a working hypothesis.  It is important to take into account how pertinent the bits of the book that you can corroborate are to the bits that cannot be directly corroborated, and whether that which can be corroborated can stand alone without that which has not been corroborated.

quote:


Following this, God promises himself that He does not lie and his laws never change among other things in the Quran.




I'm sorry, but to quote Mandy Rice-Davies, “He would say that, wouldn't he”.

quote:


And by the way, the Quran doesn’t ‘report’ anything, the author of the Quran is none other then God.




I am sorry if I sound ignorant on this, but I thought the Quran was supposedly written by the Prophet, and those who came before him, supposedly at the behest of God, but not by God in person.

quote:


quote:


To ask whether the universe around us exists is a perfectly valid question for a solipsist to ask, it is merely a very difficult question to answer.
 


If after all that some one is to make such an argument as the universe doesn’t exist, then don’t expect me to waste my time on such futile logic.




No, I did not say that the universe does not exist, I said it was valid to ask whether it existed, and it is not actually possible to prove beyond any shadow of a doubt that it does exist (can you really be certain that everything you see is not an illusion or hallucination?).  As a working hypothesis, we have no option but to assume that the universe, as we see it, does exist; but we cannot prove that to be the truth, we merely have no other alternative hypothesis that we can work with.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: namaan on 10/03/2006 03:48:39
First of all, pardon me for my serious overtone, I know I've been talking in a bit stoic manner. I suppose that's what happens when you base everything on logic. [:D]

Now, on to the reply:
quote:

Are we not supposed to be created in god’s image and therefore wouldn't our limited abilities be his limited ability. How is one supposed to follow and worship if we haven’t been given the ability to understand what one is following.


So firstly, I'm not Catholic, or Christian for that matter, but rather I am Muslim, as I have already stated.  So the things you are referring to in your statement are all Biblical accounts of God and His capacity.  In the rendering of the Quran which I had mentioned in my first post (found at http://www.ourbeacon.com/7101.html) you will find a completely different account, one which remains perfectly intact even after all the science humans can muster up.  And thus, I’m not sure what I’m supposed to make of the ‘we’ in your first sentence as it does not pertain to me.

So to remain consistent with my argument, no, we are not created in God’s image (He is far too Glorious to be completely represented in the form of any of his Creations; Infinite, while we are finite).  Thus our ‘limited capacities’ do not in any way correlate to the capacities of God (Please read my previous posts).  And I have repeatedly stated that Islam is NOT A FATALIST religion, it’s technically not even a religion for that matter but I won’t go there.  So you are NOT supposed to follow or worship that which you do not understand.  God strictly prohibits blind-following.  This is why the Quran and the previous books of God were sent down to humans.  And the reason why I quoted ‘limited capacities’ is because although these were my own words in a previous post, it was not meant to signify stupidity in any way; it was only to signify the fact that compared to God, human capacity is limited.  But compared to a rock or a cockroach or a turtle, it is (as deemed by God) far superior.  And we ARE given the ability to understand all concepts of God and His universe by reading the Quran and previous such books as the Bible and Torah (although unlike the Quran, the preservation of the Bible and the Torah was never guaranteed and so I doubt anyone would be capable of finding original/untainted version of them available anywhere).

quote:

Why would a god who wishes to be obeyed and followed through laws written down in a book of all things,(so simplistic considering the workings of the universe) give his creations the ability to investigate and question his existence through science and then fail to give them what’s required to understand and prove his existence. Wouldn’t that be classed as dumb and certainly not what you would expect from someone with the wisdom and ability to create the universe.



Again, God did not fail to give us what is required to understand and prove his existence, for after having read the Quran, I am fully cognizant of his existence.  And if you have read my previous posts, you will hopefully realize that I am a person of reason and logic and am not goaded by blind-following in the least.  The problem is (no offense) maybe you have simply been looking for a thorough proof of his existence in the wrong book.  And there is absolutely nothing simple about the Quran, it is meant as a book for all humans and for all times, which I truly understand now having recently finished it.  At this point I don’t think that I need to answer the last part of your statement.

I have already said the Quran is absolutely in no way removed from scientific thinking.  Indeed several times throughout the Glorious book, God has stated that only the scientists will ever be able to truly appreciate the Glory of the Universe that he has created.  There are even mentions of the big bang and PLENTY of mentions of human evolution and no, in the Quran women are not made from the ribs of men and there is an entire chapter devoted to equal rights of women.  

Here are verses from the Quran that might get you thinking:

51:47 And it is We Who have built the Universe, and behold, We are steadily expanding it.

23:14 Then We fashioned the gametes into zygote, a clot, then the hanging little lump, the embryo. Then We created bones within the embryonic lump, and then clothed the bones with flesh. (Thus We designed it into a fetus). And then We made it into a new creation (the human infant). So Blessed is Allah, The Best of creators. (33:7-9, 71:14).

4:166 Allah bears witness concerning what He has revealed to you. With His Own Knowledge He has revealed it. If you reflect on the Order in the Universe, you shall find that His angels, the Universal Laws, bear witness. And Allah is Sufficient Witness.

Hope that helps[:)]
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Carolyn on 10/03/2006 04:09:26
Hi Hddd12345678910 - I don't know anything about the muslim faith, but I'm curious, do Muslims believe in Jesus Christ?

Science is a subject that I've never had much interest or understanding in.  I think it intimidated me.  I enjoy this site, although some of the topics are difficult to follow. My 12 year old son is a "science geek".  He was voted class scientist last year.  He's one of the reasons I come on this site (and the zeta thread).  I want to be involved in things he's interested in.  My point is this.  I know he is very young, but he believes in God.  It would break my heart if he ever told me he didn't believe because of science.

Michael - I'm sorry that you're struggling with your faith.  I know from personal experience that's a difficult place to be.  I struggled with my religious beliefs but never with the belief in His existence.  I'm still struggling.  My church closed and I'm hesitant to find a new one.  I have serious issues with all of the bull ***** & and complete ignorance that goes along with going to church.  But that's another story.

My belief is in God and not religion.  I will be praying for you Michael.  I'm praying that you find peace and the answers you're looking for.

Carolyn
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ukmicky on 10/03/2006 04:41:37
Thank you Carolyn your comments are very much appreciated.

Michael
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: namaan on 10/03/2006 05:17:31
Ummm…these posts are getting too long, lol…  
There has indeed been a misunderstanding; I absolutely do not believe that science is a complete system of understanding the universe.  And your initial interpretation was more or less correct.  
quote:
The problem I have with God is firstly, that he cannot fit into the scientific model


As usual, you seem to be interpreting my arguments from its periphery, and are still not getting the core of what I’m trying to say, or maybe you just don’t find the core of my argument very interesting (if that’s the case please tell me so I stop wasting my energy).  The core of my argument is, as I have already said, the problem shouldn’t be that God doesn’t fit into any type of human-made scientific model, it’s rather that you are even trying to fit God into a system which is directly founded/based from His creations (namely the Heavens and the Earth and please refer to my previous posts for reference).  And as far as your mathematical equation example goes, please refer to your own quote:
quote:
As such, I was acknowledging that since science was incomplete, it is perfectly legitimate to hypothesise that things, such as God, might exist outside science (i.e. that science was not a complete system of understanding the universe, but was a sufficient system for the purposes required of it).

Indeed, what ever math humans learn is sufficient for us to be capable to build buildings and bridges and calculate trajectories out in space, but since they are only a representation/interpretation of the universe that God has created, they are of limited use when trying to represent concepts based on higher logic than that required to know the best gear ratio for a car.  
quote:
Nor can the notion of God be proven by any formal logic

As far as I’m concerned, formal logic is relative in nature and God is Absolute.  So what ability does the relative have to get a peak at the Absolute?
quote:
And if one did assume God existed, then which model of God, and why would one assume one model of God the right interpretation and another model of God to be the wrong interpretation (and I'm not merely talking about the various 'religions of the book', Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, which substantially refer to the same God, but Hinduism, Taoism, Zoroastrianism, and many others)?


I guess my most uncontroversial response to that statement is which ever survives the test of time and is the last one standing.  God states in the Quran that no matter which way humans try to govern themselves, all man made systems will continue to fail until humans ultimately realize, by way of exclusion, what system is indeed the best for the governance of humans.  This is of course the most extreme case, and one undoubtedly containing the ravages of World War III, I personally would hope the humans would find another way to learn about themselves without consistently resorting to mass crises to wake them up.

However, if you want a more concrete understanding of why one is the best over others, I would have to say it’s the one that is most logical in nature.  What proof do any of these other religions have of any of their claims?  The proof to backup the Quran is the Sun, the Moon, the inherent stability of the universe and all the stars dressed up as ornaments in the night sky as well as any and all scientific discoveries humans may ever make.  But I wouldn’t dream of being able to sum up ‘main theme’ of the Quran even if there was one.  I have already directed anyone interested to http://www.ourbeacon.com/7101.html for further reference if you are in any doubt of anything I say.  This is so since the Quran is capable of explaining itself better then I could ever hope to do so myself.
quote:
Another reason why a lot of people shy away from the idea of God is that they have seen in history that far too many people have killed each other over disagreements about which God to worship, and how He should be worshipped. I actually think this is an erroneous argument, since atheists have proven themselves just as capable of killing each other as people who believe in one God or another, but it has left religion with a bad reputation in some people's eyes.


I will be the first one to admit to you that of the billion or so ‘muslims’ in the world, I would be surprised to find any that are actually Muslim.  I wouldn’t be surprised to find that 99 percent of these staunch believers in the Quran have not the slightest clue of its true meaning and significance and are stuck in rituals and blind following of the ‘religious leaders’.  The reason why I mention this is that without doing so, it would be nearly impossible to make room for the following verse from the Quran:
97:5 Peace! It is a Message of Peace, and inevitably shall dawn a new Morning of Enlightenment (39:69).
I could elaborate on this if you want me to.
quote:

I think most of the above is semantics. I accept that to 'create' something, one does so by manipulating what is. If by 'create' you are using the word to merely mean to make something out of nothing, then I agree humans cannot do that - in fact, it is doubtful if in any logical sense it could ever be possible to do that. The act or creation is an act of causality (i.e. one has caused something to be created), and thus one must also have a means of causality, and thus something must be created from something (even if that something is totally from outside of this universe). This is not to say that it is logically impossible for something to appear without cause, but that is not a deliberate act of creation, it is a random act without prior cause.


To this, to save time, the following verse along with my previous posts should basically sum up my argument:
112:2 Allah is Absolute, Eternal, Unique, Self-Sufficient, Perfect, Independent, the Uncaused Cause of all that exists, Besought of all .

quote:

That humans cannot ever predict to the minutest detail, and with 100% certainty, the consequences of their actions; I would agree with, and in fact follows from what we have agreed about an inability of ever making a complete simulation of the universe.

Whether this has anything to do with God is something I suspect we shall have to agree to disagree about.


The point that I was trying to make was that if you could Create something from nothing and be cognizant of the creation in a most fundamental level (atomic and subatomic or even strings if we want to go that far) then I don’t see how its possible for one to argue against your ability to have full control over your creation for all time.  

quote:
If I read a book written in Serbo-Croat, I will not understand a single word written in the book, and yet every word that I understand will be true. This will be so, even if every word in the book is untrue, because I do not understand any of the words that are untrue.

I didn’t have time and incorrectly assumed that you would understand that I had as an obvious basis, understood the majority of the Quran.  Do I seem to you as someone capable of blind following? I hope not…

quote:
I'm sorry, but to quote Mandy Rice-Davies, “He would say that, wouldn't he”.


Here I’m assuming that you mean that I said what I said to underhandedly promote the Quran?  Correct me if I’m wrong.  If not, then if you don’t believe what I had stated, then I challenge you to read it and find out for your self whether or not I had made up the statements.

quote:
I am sorry if I sound ignorant on this, but I thought the Quran was supposedly written by the Prophet, and those who came before him, supposedly at the behest of God, but not by God in person.

I’m not at all surprised, considering that the average muslim has no concept of what the teachings of Quran are, I could hardly expect you, a westerner, to have any better understanding.  The Quran is authored by God, but since he promised that he and his angels would not physically interfere with humans outside the laws of the universe, he can’t actually send down a pre-written book because that would be breaking his promise.  No offense, but this is why the Prophets were called Messengers after all, they delivered the messages of God for humans, and in the case of Mohammad, the last of the Prophets, the message was as deemed by God recorded in the form of a book by honored scribes through the recitations of the Prophet who was just a plain human.

And Carolyn, yes Jesus was a Prophet of God as was Mohammad, and Noah was the first prophet.  A common misconception is that Adam was the first Prophet, but in the Quran, it refers to Adam in a metaphorical sense to all humans (man and women), and there was no Eve.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: namaan on 10/03/2006 23:11:34
Here's a quote from a book titled Sir You Said It by Shabbir Ahmed that you might find interesting to consider:

Who wrote the Qur'an? The non-Muslim's answer to this important question usually sounds like this:
"The Qur'an was authored by a human being; it is not a literal revelation from God. It is a book created by human intelligence, like any other book. It was, as a matter of historical fact, written by Muhammad, in the seventh century A.D."
If this is your view, rest assured that you have plenty of company!
You should also know, though, that this point of view is not without its difficulties. To believe it, you must also believe that Muhammad, peace be upon him:
- Knew that the Earth and heavenly bodies were once a single point, and were separated violently (21:30)
What's more...
- If you don't believe that he had access to special knowledge that made possible this prefiguring of the modern Big Bang theory -- a theory entirely unknown to the Arabs of the seventh century -- you must conclude that 21:30 of the Qur'an is merely an intriguing coincidence, a matter of getting something right by chance.
Perhaps this passage is simply an intriguing coincidence. If it is, however, it is not the only one.
This man, the supposed "author" of the Qur'an, would also have to have:
- Known about the relativity of time (22:47; 23:112-114; 70:4), a subject similarly unknown to Arab tribes of this period.
Either he possessed some extraordinary source of knowledge allowing discussion of this subject thirteen and a half centuries before Einstein, or we are looking at another intriguing coincidence.
Which is it?
- Most non-Muslims will instinctively answer along these lines: "Even if it means granting the text of the Qur'an a second striking coincidental feature, the likeliest explanation is that both passages are merely examples of happenstance."
And yet:
Consider that the same author would also have to have:
- Known that the universe is continuously expanding (51:47).
- Known that matter is created in pairs (36:36). (By the way, this discovery earned the scientist Paul Dirac the Nobel Prize in 1933.)
- Known what modern biological science knows about the foundation of life on Earth, namely that it is water-based (21:30).
- Known that iron is not native to the Earth, coming instead from an extraterrestrial source (57:25).
- Known that the planet Earth travels in an orbit (27:88; 21:33).
- Known that the sun, too, moves in an orbit (37:38), as indeed modern astronomy proves that it does.
- Known that the Earth's atmosphere acts like a protective shield for living creatures (21:32).
- Known that the stages of human development in the womb unfold in a specific, describable sequence (23:14) that has been confirmed by modern experts in human embryology.
- Known that the roots of mountains extend deep into the earth and serve the function of preventing shocks (21:31).
- Known details of how the Earth's rain cycle functions that were mysteries to scientists until the twentieth century (30:48).
- Known what modern oceanographers have now learned, namely that bordering seas meet but do not mingle with one another (55:19-20).
- Known that oceans have complex subsurface wave patterns (24:40).
- Known that, in communities of honeybees, only the females are workers (16:68-69). (The Arabic verb forms can connect only to female beings).
- Known, seven years ahead of time, that the humiliated Byzantine Army of his day would rejuvenate itself and secure a major victory, which in fact it eventually did against the Persians (30:1-4).
Known, two years before he did so, that he would enter Mecca in triumph (48:27).
- Known that the body of the Pharoah who had opposed Moses would be preserved for future generations (10:91-92) -- it is today on display in the Royal Mummies Chamber of the Egyptian Museum.
- Known to refer (12:54) to the Egyptian head of state of Joseph's, peace be upon him, era as king (Aziz-Malik) and not as Pharoah, the word that appears erroneously in the book of Genesis.
- Known that the fabled Arabian lost city of Iram (89:6-8) whose historical existence was confirmed by archaeologists only in 1990, was a historical reality.
- Known that the ancient flood that had beset the southern Arabian people of Saba from their dam system (34:15-17), similarly confirmed by modern archeology, was a historical reality.
- Known the name of Haman (28:38), a historical figure close to the Pharoah of the era of Moses, peace be upon him ... despite the problems that a) the name Haman does not appear in the Torah's version of the story, and b) the ability to translate the hieroglyphic language system of the Egyptians had been utterly lost for centuries at the time of the revelation of the Qur'an, and indeed would remain lost until the year 1799. After the discovery in that year of the Rosetta Stone, scholars were able to unlock the mystery of the hieroglyphs and, eventually, to confirm that there was indeed a Haman, unmentioned in the Hebrew scriptures, who was close to this Pharoah in this period, and who was involved in construction (especially of towers and of temples), just as the Qur'an says. If we believe that human authorship is the only possible explanation for the origin of the Qur'an, we must assume either that Muhammad (S), somehow had access to this information, or we must believe that this passage is yet another in a remarkably long series of intriguing coincidences.
How many coincidences do we need to get the message?
The message is simple: no human intelligence could have produced this book in the seventh century.
Please know that there are many, many more such coincidences in the Qur'an.
I have listed here only those that do not require advanced knowledge in such topics as Arabic, mathematics, Islamic history, or classical poetic forms.
Even with the brief list I have provided, there comes, I think, a point at which one is obliged to evaluate the Qur'an's Message carefully, closely, and respectfully. These supposed coincidences are, I believe, clear signs to humankind that the Qur'an's Message is of a special quality, and must not be ignored.
Only the repeated exposure of the individual human heart to the Qur'an's Message can settle such a momentous question, "Who wrote the Qur'an?"
If you are a person who believes that there is no such thing as a divinely inspired revelation, the question is: how many coincidences does it take for you to consider that such a revelation to humanity may be possible?
If you are a person who believes that there is such a thing as a divinely inspired revelation, the question is, how many coincidences are you willing to ignore before considering the possibility that a particular text presents such revelation?
Please know that I am NOT interested in any debate about the possibility that any ONE of these verses I have cited is just a coincidence, or is for some other reason unpersuasive to you.
The truly remarkable thing is that ALL of these features should present themselves in a text supposedly composed by human intelligence -- and the profound unlikelihood of that is the intriguing coincidence I wish to discuss.
Knowing what you now know about these supposed coincidences, do you honestly believe that the Qur'an is simply the product of human intelligence, a book like any other book? Or does it seem more likely to you that its Message is of a special quality?
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 11/03/2006 04:14:20
quote:
Originally posted by hddd12345678910

Ummm…these posts are getting too long, lol…  




Indeed – I may not necessarily answer your post point by point, otherwise we may well get exponential growth in the size of posts, but if there is a particular point that you think I have mossed that I should have addressed, then by all means get back to me and I shall seek to address it more directly.

I will also try and put forward some new ideas in order to try and create some middle ground between the position you hold and that which I hold.  I am not expecting you to agree with the correctness of that middle ground (clearly, you have your own position, and you have no wish to shift your position, not even to such a middle ground), but it will give an opportunity to understand what within that middle ground does make sense in your model of the world, and what does not, and so help me better understand the parameters you are working to, and maybe might help you understand the parameters which I am working to, and thus help develop a common language by which we can explain better what each of us means, because each of us has done more to explain the unspoken assumptions in our words.

quote:


quote:
The problem I have with God is firstly, that he cannot fit into the scientific model


The core of my argument is, as I have already said, the problem shouldn’t be that God doesn’t fit into any type of human-made scientific model, it’s rather that you are even trying to fit God into a system which is directly founded/based from His creations (namely the Heavens and the Earth and please refer to my previous posts for reference).  And as far as your mathematical equation example goes, please refer to your own quote:
quote:
As such, I was acknowledging that since science was incomplete, it is perfectly legitimate to hypothesise that things, such as God, might exist outside science (i.e. that science was not a complete system of understanding the universe, but was a sufficient system for the purposes required of it).





OK, I accept, and realised at the time I wrote the above, that it did include inherent contradictions, and I was not expressing myself very well.

I suppose what I was trying to say is that I could not find a model into which the concept of God could fit into that has contemporary utility and that could not just as well be supplanted by a simpler model that excludes the notion of God.

Ofcourse, it is perfectly valid to argue that the Quran, just as Vedas for Hinduism, or Avesta  for the Zoroastrian religion (and many others) does provide some sort of model into which their own notion of God(s) fit into, but none of these models are simple, and one must ask whether any of them have significant contemporary utility.  All of these works were written in an era when modern science, philosophy, secular law, and politics, had not matured to the point they have today, and to a significant extent they were intended to provide the utility that in many cases has been superseded by modern science, philosophy, secular law, and politics.  Thus, at very least, one might say that these models are burdened with components that have been replaced by the secular arts, and thus at very least they require significant simplification to perform more efficiently whatever roles one might consider have not been superseded by the modern secular arts.

So the question that arises is, what aspects of the model of the universe that would once have been fulfilled by religion is now better fulfilled by modern secular arts, and what role might remain (if any) to be filled by religion of one sort or another.

Clearly, the question of how the universe functions is now best satisfied by the scientific model of the universe.

The question of what the universe is is best satisfied by the philosophers.
You have mentioned the question of what the universe ought to be, but I am not certain that such a question has any meaning in any absolute sense.  Even if one were to decide that Mount Everest out to be two foot taller, what does that mean, and what is one going to do with that knowledge?

One question that has not been addressed is the question not of what but of who.  To some extent, this is a question that is addressed in secular law, where the apportionment of legal and criminal responsibility is apportioned, but not all responsibility is of a criminal or legal nature.  It can also be noted that the legal domain is one domain where the the concept of God, albeit in a slimmed down form, still survives in the legal concept of an act of God, this being action that has occurred that cannot be ascribed as the responsibility of a human entity (a single person or collection of people), and thus is ascribed by default to an abstract entity that is outside the scope of human responsibility (namely God).

Can this notion of God be taken further than the narrow legal scope?  The question of who
certainly can be ascribed a wider scope.  If one asks who built the Eiffel tower, one might ascribe responsibility for that to Gustave Eiffel, but if one were to ask who built Mt St Helen, one cannot ascribe responsibility to any human agent, and thus one may, by analogy to the legal precedent, suggest it was an constructed by God.

Would the above be a rational thing to do?  After all, many people, if asked who built Mt St Helen, would simply say that is a non-question, because it is a question without a rational answer.  On the other hand, if I asked how many times does the number zero divide into the number two, you would also have two schools of thought; the school of thought that would suggest that this is a non-question, because zero cannot be divided into two, and the school of thought which ascribe the abstract notion of infinity as the answer, saying that zero will divide an infinite times into the number two.  Infinity, like God, is not a real entity (insofar as neither correspond to any notion of physical reality), but each could, within the particular context, be used as an abstract answer to a question which could not otherwise be answered.

Does this notion of God undermine scientific or philosophical models of the universe?  I don't think so.  If a scientist asks a scientific question pertaining to the Eiffel tower, he will ask how was it built, and the answer that Gustafe Eiffel built the tower is not relevant to that question.  If a scientist asks a scientific question about Mt St Helen, he will ask how is it constructed, and the answer that God constructed Mt St Helen is not an answer to his question, but neither does it contradict the correct answer to his question, it is merely an answer that is in no way pertinent to the question.

I am sure that this notion of God could be taken further, but the basic constraint must be that any extension of this notion of God must make sure that it does not try to answer scientific questions, or questions that might be better answered by another of the modern secular arts,  because the moment it does it will risk having to either invalidate the modern secular art, or itself be invalidated by the modern secular art.

The problem is that this notion of God does not fit well into any of the established religions, because they were not constrained by the sciences and other modern philosophies, because at the time of their creation these modern philosophies did not exist, and so they have naturally extended their reach into areas where they they now do conflict with modern philosophies (e.g. creation theory).

quote:


quote:
And if one did assume God existed, then which model of God, and why would one assume one model of God the right interpretation and another model of God to be the wrong interpretation (and I'm not merely talking about the various 'religions of the book', Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, which substantially refer to the same God, but Hinduism, Taoism, Zoroastrianism, and many others)?


I guess my most uncontroversial response to that statement is which ever survives the test of time and is the last one standing.  God states in the Quran that no matter which way humans try to govern themselves, all man made systems will continue to fail until humans ultimately realize, by way of exclusion, what system is indeed the best for the governance of humans.  This is of course the most extreme case, and one undoubtedly containing the ravages of World War III, I personally would hope the humans would find another way to learn about themselves without consistently resorting to mass crises to wake them up.




At the most basic, it is reminiscent of the logic behind trial by combat, or trial by ordeal.  In essence, the logic behind that is that if one man accuses the other of a crime, then let the accuser and the accused do battle, and God, being a just God, will always ensure that the righteous will win over the sinful.  The modern preference is to judge by evidence rather than merely assume that divine intervention will always favour the innocent over the guilty.

The other consequence of the above statement is that it actually alleviates the responsibility from the individual to decide which religion is right, since your argument seems to say that we should wait and see, and in the end, only one religion will remain (which may or may not be the religion of Islam), and then we shall know by that which is the right religion.
 
quote:


However, if you want a more concrete understanding of why one is the best over others, I would have to say it’s the one that is most logical in nature.  What proof do any of these other religions have of any of their claims?  The proof to backup the Quran is the Sun, the Moon, the inherent stability of the universe and all the stars dressed up as ornaments in the night sky as well as any and all scientific discoveries humans may ever make.  But I wouldn’t dream of being able to sum up ‘main theme’ of the Quran even if there was one.  I have already directed anyone interested to http://www.ourbeacon.com/7101.html for further reference if you are in any doubt of anything I say.  This is so since the Quran is capable of explaining itself better then I could ever hope to do so myself.




I would ask whether you have yourself read any of the religious texts of the other religions, so that you might know better how they compare, whether they are more of less logical, than the text of the Quran (I mean this not in any accusatory manner, but merely to ask whether your belief that the Quran is the most logical religious text is supported by any comparative studies of your own)?


quote:


The point that I was trying to make was that if you could Create something from nothing and be cognizant of the creation in a most fundamental level (atomic and subatomic or even strings if we want to go that far) then I don’t see how its possible for one to argue against your ability to have full control over your creation for all time.  




I would suggest that you look a little more at chaos theory.  It is quite possible to create chaotic systems that are extremely simple in nature, and where each individual interaction can be fully and completely understood, and yet the complexity of the overall system remains such that one cannot accurately predict how the system in total will act over extended periods of time (or, at least, the amount of computing power needed for such a prediction would be beyond the capability of any current or foreseeable technology).

There is also a problem when one develops a system where the observer is a part of the system itself, because that creates a problem that the mere act of observation alters the system and thus invalidates the predictions one would make of the system.

This last point is one of the basic problems I have with the notion of God who can know everything (present and future) that will happen in the universe.  The only way such a God could operate is if He was totally disconnected from the universe He was observing, and thus is neither effected by that universe, nor has any effect upon it.  The moment He has an effect upon the universe, He can no longer predict the outcome, because in order to predict the outcome, He would have to predict Himself.



quote:

quote:
I'm sorry, but to quote Mandy Rice-Davies, “He would say that, wouldn't he”.


Here I’m assuming that you mean that I said what I said to underhandedly promote the Quran?  Correct me if I’m wrong.  If not, then if you don’t believe what I had stated, then I challenge you to read it and find out for your self whether or not I had made up the statements.



Sorry, that is not what I intended to imply.

You stated that:
quote:
Following this, God promises himself that He does not lie and his laws never change among other things in the Quran.


What I was trying to say was that if it can be independently corroborated that God does not lie, then the statement that tells us the He has said He does not lie is superfluous.  On the other hand, if God does lie, then the statement He makes telling us He does not lie may itself be a lie.  Thus the statement carries no verifiable meaning.

quote:

quote:
I am sorry if I sound ignorant on this, but I thought the Quran was supposedly written by the Prophet, and those who came before him, supposedly at the behest of God, but not by God in person.

I’m not at all surprised, considering that the average muslim has no concept of what the teachings of Quran are, I could hardly expect you, a westerner, to have any better understanding.  The Quran is authored by God, but since he promised that he and his angels would not physically interfere with humans outside the laws of the universe, he can’t actually send down a pre-written book because that would be breaking his promise.  No offense, but this is why the Prophets were called Messengers after all, they delivered the messages of God for humans, and in the case of Mohammad, the last of the Prophets, the message was as deemed by God recorded in the form of a book by honored scribes through the recitations of the Prophet who was just a plain human.



But does not the fact that a messenger recites texts to a scribe amount to creating a report – by that, I mean that one has not only to trust the original source to which the material is ascribed, but one must also trust the integrity of the messenger.  I am not saying that one can say the messenger was necessarily a false messenger, but it is rational to ask the question as to whether there is proof that the message he brought was indeed a true and accurate account of that which it portends to be?  How would one go about seeking independent verification for the accuracy of message that the messenger brings?



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: namaan on 11/03/2006 06:57:46
I am going to be covering a lot of ground here, so brace yourself.  Just so you know I am not a seasoned philosopher/religious person coming here to argue about things.  I am actually a 19 year old undergrad just curious after having finished the Quran what kinds of things people argue about related to religion out here in cyberspace (essentially a general representation of [pop] culture).  I just found it curious seeing a topic having to do with God in a site discussing mainly science.  Following your last post and reading over a bunch of other posts in other places, I again came to the realization of what made sense to me from the beginning.  

I knew from the beginning that there was no way of actually convincing anyone of anything (although my hopes were admittedly high during the last few posts).  Before my initial post I had from experience, from this increasingly secular society, begun to realize how essentially we all live in a relativistic society; a society in which a person can call just about anything an argument.  A society in which the source of all types of moral restraints are removed from some higher plane and place as a responsibility to the shoulders of individuals; resulting in the frequent removal of moral restraints more or less altogether.  A society in which the quick gains of the immediate are taken over the investment in the long term (You have to read the Quran, the version that I have reference a couple of times, to understand some of these statements).

Essentially, this is a society that has lost hope in the concept of an Absolute (largely due to [from what I can tell] city life, frequent exposure to wars and affects of wars, observation that the causes of various conflicts throughout the world can find religion as their source, a wealth of available information that is relative in nature providing critiques of the human condition and yet devoid of an Absolute undertone, to name a few).  I obviously am not saying this is the worst society in the world or anything, my point is that we should be ever progressive and never compromise on anything that slows down the process of humanity reaching an equilibrium with each other over the long term (in terms of human rights).  

Before I continue, please keep in mind that I’m 19, so that I am mostly in contact with college students; maybe now you can understand where I’m coming from with my argument for relativism if you hadn’t already.  They might not represent the current society, but since they aren’t too far off from becoming the backbone of this society, I think it’s fair to consider the society in their light, even if only temporarily (I find most college students to be quite annoying; yes I AM fairly weird).  Also, I know full well that I am generalizing a whole lot here, and don’t presume to be a genius or something; I am simply here to learn, as are you I assume.

By now you are of course wondering what the heck this has to do with my argument.  Well, basically, as a general thing, I am trying to make a case for an Absolute and do so because I feel that relativism is only slowing down humans and will in the long run fail which ever way you look at it.  After writing this sentence, I felt an urge to write an entire book on how the very concept of relativism is flawed, but as you can tell from what I have already written, I am in no mood for further argument and now feel it’s time to actually critique the processes we are using to argue rather then follow the tried-and-true-and-futile method of arguing back and forth in a relativistic society in which any one can make just about anything an argument.  There has to be a line drawn some where otherwise progress will be greatly slowed to a snail-pace in which humans require some type of global disaster of catastrophic proportions every time in order to implement any type of laws and legislation in a global level.  

I could say in response to your quote:
quote:
The other consequence of the above statement is that it actually alleviates the responsibility from the individual to decide which religion is right, since your argument seems to say that we should wait and see, and in the end, only one religion will remain (which may or may not be the religion of Islam), and then we shall know by that which is the right religion.


that in the Quran, humans are tasked only as much as provided by the Grace of Allah (a smart, free person should be able to accomplish more than a provincial slave; thus the smart, free person would be expected to do more than the bound one) and are never asked to do more pushing beyond their limits.  And so, to the best of our abilities, we should be searching for the Truth.  But then you could counter this by simply removing any significance from whatever I personally know to be Absolute, by pulling it down to the level of something relative.  From there, we could continue to delve in the relative; arguing about this endlessly until our heads explode. [:D] And so you may understand why I choose to not argue further in the same manner.  

When I gave you references to the Quran (I’m assuming that you never ended up reading any of it) I hope you did not think that I was trying to get you to get in the habit of calling your self a muslim and going out to perform a bunch of rituals and take part in religious dogmas and pray five times a day and talk to completely provincial and closed-minded people just because of a couple of words that I proclaimed.  It was my sincere attempt to help you understand that the Absolute does have credibility.  I mentioned previously that Quran is technically not a religion, but at the time I didn’t feel like getting any further into it.  The Quran is a Deen, a system of life (please remove all concepts of rituals and dogmas and so on as you read this).  It is and has always meant to be a most efficient system of governance for humans and a most efficient system of social practices (please remove from your mind all concepts of stoning, chopping hands and feet, or any other types of cruel rituals that the foolish mullah or “religious leaders” have fashioned for themselves as well as all concepts of unequal treatment of women as none of these is consistent with the teaching of the Quran).  

Isn’t the average human ultimately looking for a stable form of a global government which leaves space for every one in society to prosper in all aspects of life anyway?  So what does it matter what the source of such perfect governance is.  You may feel uncomfortable with the idea of a religious book providing practical, sensible means to govern the masses yet not questioning for a second their human rights and their dignity as humans.  But again, if it is able to do just that, what reason, besides giving way to preconceived notions and biases, could one have of ignoring it?  I only refer the Quran to you because I have already stated that it can explain it self better than any human, and it indeed is able of providing answers to all the questions that you may ask (provided you are an open-minded individual and read it without preconceived notions, which I am sure you are otherwise I most likely wouldn’t have spent this much time and energy arguing with you).

Although all this may seem off topic, the original question was after all whether or not science is able to prove or disprove His existence.  So, as my more or less final argument, I say to you that since we already went down the road of trying to argue about it in terms of science (which of course ended up in one relative argument overtaking another), I suggest that you consider the Quran at its most fundamental level of function.  It was meant for a perfect form of governance.  Then from farily simple deductive reasoning (the Prophet could not have known all the things mentioned in my previous post, what human would be able to create such a perfect form of governance and social behaviors for other humans, and of course the topic that we started out with being all the order and perfection bestowed from God [before humans began to ignore their Lord's Grace and thus ruined themselves], this, all of this could not have come from any but a Devine and Absolute source) we, or atleast I so far, have found that God indeed does exist.  So I ask you, if you do after all decide to take on the challenge, to read the Quran from a purely a socio-economic and warfare (basically all aspects of a formal government) perspective and I think you will be surprised at what you find.  Finally the link to the free downloadable version is http://www.ourbeacon.com/7101.html.

By the way, if you are still stuck on the Concept of God not fitting into modern science, then I refer you to my previous post which was all about the Quran and science.  You never commented on it, so I’m assuming you might have missed it.  It probably won’t answer your question specifically, but I think it may hint at the answer in a broader sense.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: namaan on 11/03/2006 07:03:48
To quictly correctly my self, the Quran promotes the Deen Islam
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 11/03/2006 11:41:25
I am somewhat tired at the moment, and in a hurry, so I will not try and address much of what you have said, and it is possible that in what I do say I may not express myself as well as I might.


quote:
Originally posted by hddd12345678910

I knew from the beginning that there was no way of actually convincing anyone of anything (although my hopes were admittedly high during the last few posts).




This is true, but I would also ask is it fair even to ask others to change their beliefs unless you are willing to entertain the notion of doing likewise?  Should you be asking of others that which you are not yourself willing to offer?

quote:


  Before my initial post I had from experience, from this increasingly secular society, begun to realize how essentially we all live in a relativistic society; a society in which a person can call just about anything an argument.  A society in which the source of all types of moral restraints are removed from some higher plane and place as a responsibility to the shoulders of individuals; resulting in the frequent removal of moral restraints more or less altogether.  A society in which the quick gains of the immediate are taken over the investment in the long term (You have to read the Quran, the version that I have reference a couple of times, to understand some of these statements).




It is erroneous to regard relativism as equivalent to amorality.  All that relativism requires is that you judge the morality in some context, and do not assume that you can have context free morality (in the same way that Einstein's notion of relativity did not seek to remove time, but merely suggested that time had to be measured according to the context, and there was no such thing as context free time.

I do agree that we live in an era where we are increasingly looking for short term gains, but this is a consequence of people being denied the benefits of long term investment, and so simply have no incentive to make long term investments.

quote:


Before I continue, please keep in mind that I’m 19, so that I am mostly in contact with college students; maybe now you can understand where I’m coming from with my argument for relativism if you hadn’t already.  They might not represent the current society, but since they aren’t too far off from becoming the backbone of this society, I think it’s fair to consider the society in their light, even if only temporarily (I find most college students to be quite annoying; yes I AM fairly weird).  Also, I know full well that I am generalizing a whole lot here, and don’t presume to be a genius or something; I am simply here to learn, as are you I assume.




You also have to recognise that the 19 y.o. kids that are your contemporaries will not remain 19 y.o. kids forever.  Time changes us all, and changes our perspectives on life.

quote:


By now you are of course wondering what the heck this has to do with my argument.  Well, basically, as a general thing, I am trying to make a case for an Absolute and do so because I feel that relativism is only slowing down humans and will in the long run fail which ever way you look at it.  After writing this sentence, I felt an urge to write an entire book on how the very concept of relativism is flawed, but as you can tell from what I have already written, I am in no mood for further argument and now feel it’s time to actually critique the processes we are using to argue rather then follow the tried-and-true-and-futile method of arguing back and forth in a relativistic society in which any one can make just about anything an argument.  There has to be a line drawn some where otherwise progress will be greatly slowed to a snail-pace in which humans require some type of global disaster of catastrophic proportions every time in order to implement any type of laws and legislation in a global level.




Clearly, assuming a context free environment is simpler and quicker to work with than having to develop conclusions that are relevant to the context you are working in; but then were you not complaining about short termism, people looking for quick solutions?

quote:


When I gave you references to the Quran (I’m assuming that you never ended up reading any of it) I hope you did not think that I was trying to get you to get in the habit of calling your self a muslim and going out to perform a bunch of rituals and take part in religious dogmas and pray five times a day and talk to completely provincial and closed-minded people just because of a couple of words that I proclaimed.  It was my sincere attempt to help you understand that the Absolute does have credibility.




I appreciate your earnestness in your intent, on the other hand I also realise that getting to grips with a work as significant as any of the major religious texts is a non-trivial undertaking, and I doubt it is something one can just dip in and out of when one has a few moments to spare and expect from that any great understanding of it.







George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: namaan on 13/03/2006 05:55:52
Firstly,
quote:

It is erroneous to regard relativism as equivalent to amorality.


I never I said this
quote:

but then were you not complaining about short termism, people looking for quick solutions?


nor this

Now, regarding the first quote, I never, as far as I can recall, said that the two are equal, I only said that in this society it is the individual’s responsibility to develop a sense of moral on their own, and essentially went on to state that this will logically lead to a break down of morality among certain people in the population.  And I attributed this breakdown to the fact that we live in a relativistic society.  Of course I would expect you to now argue about whether or not there even is such a thing as an absolute understanding of moral.  Obviously, I would say yes since I read the Quran.    

Now for the second quote.  Who in their right mind would complain about people looking for quick solutions?  I am utterly at a loss as to how a quick solution is inferior to a long dragged out one.  (all other things being equal of course).  I was complaining about people looking for quick GAINS, not quick solutions.  And even in this, I was not necessarily referring to it in terms of time, a lack of investment in the long term could just as well come from arrogance (one would rather delve in the relative), the removal of which doesn’t have some sort of time limit (it could happen quickly, after a long time, or never).  

quote:

I do agree that we live in an era where we are increasingly looking for short term gains, but this is a consequence of people being denied the benefits of long term investment, and so simply have no incentive to make long term investments.



It is obvious by now that we are speaking from two different backgrounds.  I think that you may have generalized this a bit too much, because I can’t picture of any particular instance of this.

More importantly, I neglected to specify that I don’t just mean long term investment in this life, but indeed, just as much, if not much more, in the afterlife (obviously a Quranic theme, as I doubt you understand the specific context in which I am speaking).

Now I’m going to be honest with you.  I don’t actually have any interest of arguing with you or anybody else about religion or God, which I sort of hinted on in my previous post.  I like to learn about humans which ever way I can, mostly through observing their behavior.  Of course the best way of observing people’s behavior is through some sort of cause and effect relationship (I post up some opinion I have and observe and analyze the effect).  You could obviously be wondering at this point, that if I am arguing for a lack of argumentation, then aren’t I destroying my own argument?  Well…depending on your perspective…I suppose.  Needless to say this is more or less my last post.

quote:

This is true, but I would also ask is it fair even to ask others to change their beliefs unless you are willing to entertain the notion of doing likewise? Should you be asking of others that which you are not yourself willing to offer?



Frankly, you’re absolutely correct; I am not willing to entertain the notion of the correctness of another religion.  It’s the same reason you are not going to read the Quran (I consider atheism to be a religion since, Christians believe in Christ, Buddhists believe in Buddha and atheists believe to not believe). So, if you haven’t already figured it out so far from this post, I wasn’t actually serious in asking you to consider reading the Quran.  I new you weren’t going to read it, and even if you did, it would only have been an added bonus and wasn’t as though that was some how my ultimate goal.  

But seriously, think practically for a second, could you imagine even one person in the history of online forums who actually changed their minds online and converted religion while having a discussion with words and sentences across the globe?  Or even slightly changed their spiritual orientation?  

I’m sure, however, that it wouldn’t be too difficult for you to imagine the majority of people, including you and me, who only strengthen their own pre-conceived notions and biases by coming to online forums.  This is referred to as selective attention in psychology; essentially to look for things that confirm our biases.  

And so when you said:

quote:

Clearly, assuming a context free environment is simpler and quicker to work with than having to develop conclusions that are relevant to the context you are working in



which seems to me to be just a stretched out way of calling me a coward, I have this to say: I don’t argue where I know for a fact that neither my arguments are going to have any affect on the opposing party nor are the arguments of the opposing party going to have any affect on me, and not only this, but more likely than not both parties are only going increase in conviction in their respective ideologies.  More importantly, I don’t argue, if I don’t think that I, or the person I am arguing with can benefit from it in some way.  

In my case, the benefit comes in the form of whatever knowledge I was interested in attaining, such as knowledge about human behavior.  So I leave you with this question: what reason do YOU have for reading this post?
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 13/03/2006 14:36:07
.........wow...........lotsa qoutes.....

- Big T
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 13/03/2006 22:15:18
OK, I did say that I was in something of a rush on Saturday, and I apologise if I jumped to conclusions that you had not intended in your text.

But, looking in general with regard to issues of relativism and absolute moral codes.  At the time the Quran  was written, it was an era when both slavery and polygamy were accepted practice, and the Quran supported both concepts.  Polygamy is still accepted by the proponents of Islam, although there is no doubt that it is beginning to fall out of favour, while slavery is now condemned as much by Muslims as by any other mainstream religion (all of which had supported slavery in the past).

The question is, if the values of religion are absolute, then can it be possible to support slavery in one century, and then condemn slavery in the next?  On the other hand, if one accepts that morality has to function within the context of its time and its social environment, then one can say that in the era when slavery was condoned by the Quran and the Bible, it was appropriate for that era, but no longer appropriate to the changed circumstances of the modern era.

quote:

quote:

but then were you not complaining about short termism, people looking for quick solutions



Who in their right mind would complain about people looking for quick solutions? I am utterly at a loss as to how a quick solution is inferior to a long dragged out one. (all other things being equal of course). I was complaining about people looking for quick GAINS, not quick solutions. And even in this, I was not necessarily referring to it in terms of time, a lack of investment in the long term could just as well come from arrogance (one would rather delve in the relative), the removal of which doesn’t have some sort of time limit (it could happen quickly, after a long time, or never).




I am not quite sure what you regard as a solution that does not provide a gain?  Ofcourse, you may be using the term gain in a purely monetary manner, in which case I can understand the distinction; but I would argue that quick fixes of any kind are always going to be inferior to those solutions that are carefully and painstakingly constructed, a process that almost inevitably will take time.  As a general rule, the quicker you construct something, the quicker it falls down.  Ofcourse, there are times when things do naturally come to the end of their useful life, but one would rather not pre-empt that time by not spending the time to check that your solution is sufficiently robust.

As for whether the relative is more of less arrogant than the absolute – I think I would take quite the contrary view.  Is not the absolute essentially say that the answer I  have in the only valid answer; whereas the relative is saying that the answer I have is one of many answers, and your answer may be just as valid as my answer.  So, which would you really consider the more arrogant?  This is even more the case where the two answers relate to circumstances in totally different societies (maybe separated by hundreds of years of time).  Where you and I must share a common society, then clearly we must find some common ground upon which we can base our codes of conduct, although this does not require that we share a common belief system.

Nor is relativism the quick or simple alternative.  On the contrary, an absolute system, once constructed, never needs to be updated or modified.  A relative system constantly needs to take into account changes in the context it is operating in.

Ofcourse, one might counter this by saying the very complexity of a relative system makes it more prone to error, and providing a simpler absolute moral code, even if this lacks flexibility in dealing with new social environments, at least relieves the practitioner from the responsibility of having to adjust the system to take into account changing circumstances (a little like providing a driver with a car that cannot change gear – it may have a more restricted application, but at least it's simpler to use – and I am excluding cars with automatic transmission for the purposes of this analogy).

quote:

think practically for a second, could you imagine even one person in the history of online forums who actually changed their minds online and converted religion while having a discussion with words and sentences across the globe? Or even slightly changed their spiritual orientation?



In all reality, I would think such a person to be very fickle if they did.

But, in my view, the value of such exchanges is not that either party should switch allegiances, but that each side, by having to think about questions that they may not necessarily have thought of asking themselves, is given the chance to extend their own belief system, to try and work out how their own belief system might answer a question they might not have thought of before.

I do not expect that you would walk away from this any less a Muslim than you were at the start, but that maybe at the end of this discussion, you might go back to the Quran and try and think of slightly different ways of interpreting it than you did before, because you now have new questions to ask that you had not asked before, and likewise, I might spend time thinking about how I might view my own thoughts and beliefs slightly differently because I have had to answer questions I had not thought of before.  You will still remain a Muslim, and I still remain an atheist, but each of us still maybe now armed with a few more questions than we had before.

quote:

I’m sure, however, that it wouldn’t be too difficult for you to imagine the majority of people, including you and me, who only strengthen their own pre-conceived notions and biases by coming to online forums. This is referred to as selective attention in psychology; essentially to look for things that confirm our biases.



I can agree with this insofar as it pertains to what I am willing to listen to from you, or you from me.  As I said above, the interesting aspect of such exchanges are not that I will listen to your answers, but that I will listen to your questions.  The questions are more important than the answers.  Accepting someone else's answers is for idiots who cannot think for themselves, but accepting someone else's questions give one cause to think answers out for oneself, answers that mean something to oneself, which may be something very different from the answers that mean something to someone else.

quote:

I consider atheism to be a religion since, Christians believe in Christ, Buddhists believe in Buddha and atheists believe to not believe



Buddhists believe in  Buddha as Muslims believe in Mohammed, but  Mohammed is not God, and neither is  Buddha.

Buddhism is actually an atheist religion, it has no intrinsic belief in a God (although, I believe some variants of it might integrate theist notions within Buddhism).

Atheism, of itself, is insufficient to be considered an entire belief system.  The other side of the coin, believing in God is not of itself enough to define a particular religion.  Believing in God does not make a person a Muslim, since there are many people who believe in God who are not Muslim (although, ofcourse, believing in God is a prerequisite for a Muslim, but not a sufficiency for it).  By the same token, a belief that there is no God is not sufficient to define all those who share that belief as belonging to a common belief system.

As I said, atheism may indeed form a part of a belief system.  Buddhism is an atheistic religion, and I would argue that Communism is an atheistic religion (albeit, most Communists would themselves be horrified to think of themselves as such, but I would regard that Communism is a complete enough system to be regarded as a belief system).

It may be arguable that it is human nature that we all have some sort of belief system (whether it be a theistic or atheistic belief system), but it is open to debate whether most atheists share enough of a communal belief system that they could be regarded as actually sharing in a communal religion.  This last point is something I am presently undecided about – to what extent do most atheists in a community share a common belief system, and to what extent do their belief systems vary, and how does one decide which religious community does an atheist belong to, since there is no communal gathering of atheists, nor any communal self identification of atheist communities?



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 13/03/2006 22:17:10
quote:
Originally posted by tony6789

.........wow...........lotsa qoutes.....

- Big T



Well, since you started the topic, I hope you've been reading all the responses (we may be asking questions on it later [:D]).



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: namaan on 13/03/2006 23:13:10
Don't worry, I was aware of the fact that you were busy, I was going to point out those things regardless...

quote:

But, looking in general with regard to issues of relativism and absolute moral codes. At the time the Quran was written, it was an era when both slavery and polygamy were accepted practice, and the Quran supported both concepts. Polygamy is still accepted by the proponents of Islam, although there is no doubt that it is beginning to fall out of favour, while slavery is now condemned as much by Muslims as by any other mainstream religion (all of which had supported slavery in the past).

The question is, if the values of religion are absolute, then can it be possible to support slavery in one century, and then condemn slavery in the next? On the other hand, if one accepts that morality has to function within the context of its time and its social environment, then one can say that in the era when slavery was condoned by the Quran and the Bible, it was appropriate for that era, but no longer appropriate to the changed circumstances of the modern era.




I know that I said I’m done arguing, but (no offense), you have very little understanding about the Quran, so I feel as a Muslim it is my duty to provide correct information.  Rather then say my own words, it would be better if I just dug up a couple of verses from the Quran:

4:92 It is not conceivable that a believer will slay another believer unless it be a mistake. If one kills a believer by mistake, there is the duty of freeing a believing person from bondage; may it be slavery, extreme poverty, crushing debt or oppression. And pay compensation to the victim's family unless they forgo it by way of charity. If case the victim was a believer, and belonged to a tribe who are at war with you, free a believing person from bondage. If the victim was a believer, and belonged to a tribe with whom you have a peace treaty, you should pay the compensation to his family in addition to freeing a believing person from bondage. For those who find this settlement beyond their means, two consecutive months of Abstinence, as in the month of Ramadan, are ordained by way of repentance from Allah. And Allah is the Knower, the Wise.
9:60 Remember that the funds that the Central Authority receives as Alms and Charity belong to the following categories:
- The poor. Those who are not able to earn enough living to meet their basic needs, for any reason.
- Those whose running businesses have stalled or the ones who have lost their jobs, who have become needy with their active lives coming to a standstill.
- Officers who have been appointed by the government to collect alms and charity.
- Those who are hindered from joining the Divine System for financial reasons.
- To free men and women from bondage of any kind: physical slavery, unjust captivity, and oppression from any quarters.
- Those pressed under the load of ransom or heavy debt from an enemy.
- Defense of the Ideological State, in the Cause of Allah.
- The wayfarer who becomes needy, or travels to the believers in destitute condition, and the homeless son of the street.
This is a Duty from Allah. He is the Knower, the Wise and His Commands are based on Knowledge and Wisdom.

And here’s one relating to polygamy:

4:129 Men who have been permitted a second wife for post-war exigencies (4:3) must understand that: You will not be able to deal equally between your wives however much you wish. But turn not altogether away from one, leaving her as if in suspense between having and not having a husband. Fulfill the rights of each one of them and be mindful of Allah. Verily, Allah is ever Forgiving, Merciful. (Your effort is seen 53:40, and He is the Absolver of your imperfections).

I was looking for a much better verse, but was didn’t have enough time.  However, this should be enough to make the point.  The ONLY time that a man is allowed to marry more than one wife is after a war.  The reason for this, if you haven’t already realized, is that since men were the majority of the soldiers (yes women were also allowed in the army, but of course were the minority), most of the casualties were men.  So a lot of the men get killed, there are a lot of widows who can’t necessarily support themselves; thus in this instance, and only in this instance, is a man allowed to marry another women in order to SUPPORT her.    

As far as your actual argument is concerned, I’m not about to give you a history lesson on Islam, as it would be essentially impossible to cover everything.  I would be better off just giving you a reference of the source of my knowledge.  Most of your argument can be found to be flawed even if you only read the preface of the rendering of the Quran which I have mentioned many times.

The rest is detail that just goes around in circles (as I like to say, delves in the relative), as far as I’m concerned.  Don’t mind me, its not as though I’m the only one reading your post, some one will surely find it of some use, but I have already dropped out from further argumentation.

Have I shown you one aspect of Islam that you found disagreeable?  I’m not talking about your current understanding of Islam, but aspects of Islam that I presented to you?  If so you would be correct in saying that finding new questions to ask is the point of all these discussions.  But you missed my whole point.  I have accepted the absolute, you have not, so if the Quran is telling me that all the questions as to how to best and most efficiently live my life while taking into consideration the well being of the rest of humanity are answered within the book, then what need do I have to look for new questions?  I've already throughly explained to you that I'm not a blind follower of anything and have at the most fundemental level agreed with everything I could understand in the book (I was able to understand most it). Your argument isn’t incorrect, it just isn’t relevant.  
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 14/03/2006 00:11:24
quote:
Originally posted by hddd12345678910

Have I shown you one aspect of Islam that you found disagreeable?




I have never had anything intrinsically disagreeable about Islam, it has simply not convinced me that it was technically the most meaningful world view for my view of the world.  This does not mean that I am, or have ever been, antagonistic to Islam.

quote:


But you missed my whole point.  I have accepted the absolute, you have not, so if the Quran is telling me that all the questions as to how to best and most efficiently live my life while taking into consideration the well being of the rest of humanity are answered within the book, then what need do I have to look for new questions?




I have two issues with this.

Firstly, most of the quotes you gave relate to how Muslims should treat each other, not how it should treat the rest of humanity.  I am not doubting that the Quran does also tell you how you should treat non-Muslims, it is merely that it (as does the Bible, particularly the Old Testament) does appear to be quite discriminatory in treating one's own differently from treating outsiders.

More specifically, I don't know what the Islamic tradition is, but certainly in the Jewish tradition (and at least some branches of the Christian tradition) there are people who spend their whole lives looking at the Bible and seeking to find new answers to questions from therein.  Sometimes the answers can seem like an over-interpretation of what is written, but nonetheless it does demonstrate the principle that merely because a body of written knowledge is fixed, it does not mean that one cannot seek new knowledge even from that fixed set of words.





George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: namaan on 14/03/2006 01:01:53
2:62 (That was a glimpse of the past.) Behold, those who believe (in the Qur'an and call themselves Muslims), and those who are Jews, and Christians and the Agnostics - whoever truly believes in Allah and the Last Day and does work that benefits humanity - surely their reward is with their Lord. For them shall be no fear from without, nor shall grief touch them from within.

Well, you pretty much hit a wall right there...What can I say, that's the point of a religion these days.  But although it’s complicated to you; it’s not at all so for me.  If you want a general summary of humanity in view of the Quran, here it goes:  Humans are created; they begin agriculture and so forth, begin to form permanent dwellings and begin to ask the big questions about life.  Without any direct guidance from God so far, Noah comes to them as God's first message.  History continues, and essentially more and more prophets keep coming to warn humans of wrongdoing and show them a way towards bliss and security.  From the time of Prophet Noah, to the time of Prophet Muhammad, all nations recieved a prophet (such as Moses to Egypt and Jesus to Israelites) and thus a fair warning and incentive to do good works for ALL humanity.  The Torah and Bible were both authored by the same God that authored the Quran, but since humanity was slowly developing its infrastructure, these books were revealed in stages, with the Quran being the final message.  And so that is the reason why no prophets are needed any longer, the Quran is the final message and it is well preserved unlike the other books who's original message has been thoroughly decimated because of the selfish desires of humans.

quote:

Firstly, most of the quotes you gave relate to how Muslims should treat each other, not how it should treat the rest of humanity.



Your argument makes no sense.  What do you expect them to do, go into the other society, and fight whoever is oppressing there own people?  That’s like saying the United States embarking on a mission to save a homeless person in another person’s society…And keep in mind the world was not globalized as it is today.  It wasn’t even as though the other societies at the time besides the Islamic society were weak in strength.  But besides this, there are plenty of verses, which I don’t have time to find right now, that relate to leaving people at peace as long as they wish to remain at peace.  

2:190 [All mankind should agree upon and mark their calendars for four months of peacetime. However, true following of the Divine System of Life will meet with harsh opposition.] So, fight in the Cause of Allah those who wage war against you, but do not commit aggression. Behold, Allah loves not aggressors. (2:194, 2:217, 4:91, 9:5, 9:36, 22:39, 60:8.)

2:193 Hence, fight them only until there is no more harassment, and Deen may be adopted for the sake of Allah alone. And if they desist, then let there be no hostility except against those who replace peace with aggression.

Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 14/03/2006 02:48:33
quote:
Originally posted by hddd12345678910
quote:

Firstly, most of the quotes you gave relate to how Muslims should treat each other, not how it should treat the rest of humanity.



Your argument makes no sense.  What do you expect them to do, go into the other society, and fight whoever is oppressing there own people?  That’s like saying the United States embarking on a mission to save a homeless person in another person’s society…And keep in mind the world was not globalized as it is today.  It wasn’t even as though the other societies at the time besides the Islamic society were weak in strength.  But besides this, there are plenty of verses, which I don’t have time to find right now, that relate to leaving people at peace as long as they wish to remain at peace.  




Firstly, my comment was with regard to your quotes, not the totality of the Quran, which as I said, although I did not know exact texts, I was aware did include clauses about how to treat non-Muslims.  The only issue I was raising was that you were saying how great Islam was for humanity, and I was saying that your quotes only pertained to how great Islam was for Muslims.

Secondly, your comparison with the USA is both erroneous and inconsistent.

In most regards, the law of the USA pertains to all persons legally living within the USA, whether they be US citizens or not.  US jurisdiction, for the most part, does not have global reach, and so does not pertain to persons living outside of the USA, of whatever nationality.  I accept that this is a generalisation, and there is some extraterritoriality in US law, and there are some differences in the rights of US and non-US citizens resident within the US, but these are a few exceptions, and in principle all humans within the jurisdiction of the US law are equal under the law.

Beyond that, to try and compare Islamic law with US law would imply that Islam was merely a nation State.  It is not that, and certainly it has ambitions to be far more than a nation State.

Your comment that “keep in mind the world was not globalized as it is today” seems to imply that you implicitly accept that one should read the Quran within the context in which it was written, and regard it as pertaining to that context.  Does this not run counter to your argument that the Quran should be read context free, and its law should be regarded as valid for all contexts, without regard to the context in which it was written.

By the way, none of the above is intended to be a condemnation of the Quran, just simply highlighting that it is more the work of man than of God, and as such it should be regarded as having the imperfections of all works of men, including the fact that it was more concerned with what was happening within the society in which it was written (the society that was what the human authors of the Quran were concerned about) than it was looking at a broader world view.  Within that limitation, it is a valiant attempt of its time.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: namaan on 14/03/2006 04:06:52
Sorry, but this is exactly why I stopped arguing.  This whole arguement is just going in circles since I'm sure I have already covered everything you are arguing in previous posts.  You made an intial mistake which sprang out from still not fully realizing my absolute prespective from which I am speaking and rolled with it to the end of the post.  So as far as I'm concerned, I felt that much of the post towards the end was irrelevant.  I feel like typing, "maybe now you understand what I mean by delving in the relative", but I'm sure that you don't.  I'm not blaming you or calling you ignorant, but this is the obvious limitation of speaking across online forums which I throughly explained in a previous post.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 16/03/2006 14:42:08
Hey i got on most replied topic YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

- Big T
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 16/03/2006 14:44:36
SO no one really knows the answer oh well but i hey i mean there is a possiblity that he is not real i mean people belive what they would like to think is true. People like the idea of a god and jesus so they beilieve it

- Big T
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: mcduke on 23/03/2006 03:59:26
Hi all, this is my first post here so be gentle
So, is God real? I'm assuming you mean the biblical all powerful, all knowing creator of everything God. Well, first of all you would think such a being could do a better job of preventing the confusion with all the different religions in the world. There's to much of the, you must believe the same as me or you'll burn in hell for an eternity (cuz that's what a loving God does?). Lets face it, two thousands years ago there wasn't a heck of alot to do except the usually fight for survival bit with alot of why am I here thinking going on. To have a bunch of guys on earth write down on tablets rules to live by and leave it at that, well, Can you be a God by proxy? Our father who art in heaven! If any parents on earth tried being a parent by proxy they'd be thrown in jail for child abuse. Ok kids, I'm going to have you write these rules down for you to live by and I'll look in on you from time to time, but you won't see me. I think if there is a supreme being then he/she needs to be more hands on, and I'm not seeing that.
Religion provides security and comfort in a world where nature is harsh, cruel, and frightening. I've had friends who've turned back to they're religous beliefs in hard times when they need comfort and security. After all, it's what they were raised with. When they've tried to talk religion to me I side step the conversation. Not because I'm afraid of the conversation. I'm simply respecting their belief and don't want to take away their security and comfort. A majority of people cling to a specific belief simply because of how they where raised (it's what they're used to and comfortable with).

Here's an interesting thought. In the bible God can be angry, jealous, and loving. How about bored? Let's face it, being all powerful and able to do anything anytime you want sounds like a perfect recipe for boredom eventually. Therefore, the universe, and we, where created for entertainment. That's why the world is such a confusing mess. And we're all channels on a remote control for the ultimate plasma tv. Click, lets see what Bob is up to today! oh, what a card, that Bob is funny. How about Jack? What's Jack doing today. Oh Jack, that's being a bad boy. So, a perfect world is a boring world not to mention an over populated world.
So, is there a God? If there is one then none of us really have any true idea what he is or wants from us (atleast not unitl you die, maybe). As for me, I like Buddhism, they're peaceful and respect others.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 23/03/2006 04:28:06
quote:
Originally posted by mcduke

Here's an interesting thought. In the bible God can be angry, jealous, and loving.



One of the things you also have to bear in mind is that over time the very meaning of the words used has changed, so what the people intended when they wrote the words might have been subtly different from the way we reed those words.

quote:


 How about bored? Let's face it, being all powerful and able to do anything anytime you want sounds like a perfect recipe for boredom eventually.



It actually sound like a recipe for indecision – if you can do anything, then you can also do it an infinite number of ways, and no one way is any better than another, so there is no rational basis for choosing one way of doing something over another way of doing it.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ukmicky on 23/03/2006 04:31:16
I wonder if he's got fast forward,or slow reverse[:)]

Michael
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 26/03/2006 09:31:19
the idea of something being all-powerful is self defeating and natural selection and evolution continue to compound hard evidence, showing a creator is unneccesary.

god doesnt and exist and he never did. what, have you people lost it?
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 27/03/2006 15:15:41
hey hey hey ok gecko prove that he does not exist

- Big T
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: mcduke on 28/03/2006 04:54:28
The reason people believe is because they need the security and comfort of that belief, that there is something greater and benevolent out there watching over us. The mess this world is in pretty much answers that question. Sure we may be the most intelligent beings on the planet, but that just means our ways are that much more complicated then the other creatures on the planet.
I've been asked do I believe in God, but what I'm really being asked is does my belief match his belief? These days I tell em I'm buddhaRue. That means I'm peaceful and live in harmony with all things unless you piss me off, lol.
Most important is just to have fun in life. After all, if you can't have fun then what's the point?

I bet that Gods remote control has fast forward and backwards, and even slow forward and backwards for full entertainment value.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 28/03/2006 05:13:34
tony, i cant prove god doesnt exist anymore than you can prove he can.

 when you say something exists with no evidence whatsoever, just because of faith or belief, you can never be proven wrong. i believe theres a planet in the universe ruled by a race of skyscraper sized ants who eat nothing but pancakes. if you cant prove me wrong, than is that true?

 god is just about as likely, considering theres the same amount of proof for both. i always want to see evidence before i believe in something... for some reason objectivity and skepticism have taken a backseat to the whimsy and wonder of religion
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 28/03/2006 13:43:57
In the physical world (i.e. away from mathematics or pure logic), then the only thing that can be proven is “I think, therefore I am” - everything else is hypothesis, and its usage depends upon its utility not upon absolute proof of absolute truth.

It may be argued that the utility of God as a working hypothesis has been superseded by other theories that provide greater utility in many contexts, but none of this proves any of them to be an absolute truth, or absolute falsehood.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: mcduke on 29/03/2006 02:55:20
Inorder to prove if God exist or not, don't you need to know what religious version to prove or disprove? I think there's a reference in the Bible to Gods, not just God. So, if there is more then one, which one/ones would you like to prove/disprove?
I would think that a God would provide better order in the world, ya know, like just one religion, and if someone gets the idea of starting a different/wrong religion God would pay him/her a visit(or atleast send an angel) to say,"hey, that's wrong". I would think an all powerful being would be able to do that. If not, then the confusion here must be on purpose, as in, We're entertainment for a supreme being that is bored. Or, maybe just a science project. Of course there is the possibility that we're just nature at work void of any divine intentions.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 29/03/2006 04:07:08
In my opinion, God is an invention via the imagination of man.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Ultima on 29/03/2006 08:39:52
What I dont get is that there is neither "proof" for or against some super deity behind the scenes. So why would someone jump to the conclusion that one exists? Maybe back in the day before we had any scientific method or knowledge it was the simplest answer to the great question; Why? But now we have scientific method and a nice simple answer that the universe just is and runs on natural interactions between stuff and other stuff. So why would anyone continue with deity worship? Personally I embrace EVERYTHING as if it were God because clearly we are all part of the grand interconnected system that is life.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ockham%27s_Razor

Assuming that there is a hidden super being running the show isn't exactly justified in my mind. Why do I need to think that there is one?? When the world merrily goes on working without me doing so in a reasonably predictable way from currently available evidence. If suddenly we find that everything we thought was true breaks down and four giant horsemen come flying about my head I might be inclined to change my mind [;)]

A lot of religions don't take themselves quite so seriously as Christianity or Islam etc. Most of the eastern philosophies take a far more relaxed approach and dont assume anything is true [:)] or that any of their deities truly exist in how they worship and symbolise them. So who is right???
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 29/03/2006 16:17:15
quote:
Originally posted by mcduke

Inorder to prove if God exist or not, don't you need to know what religious version to prove or disprove? I think there's a reference in the Bible to Gods, not just God. So, if there is more then one, which one/ones would you like to prove/disprove?
I would think that a God would provide better order in the world, ya know, like just one religion, and if someone gets the idea of starting a different/wrong religion God would pay him/her a visit(or atleast send an angel) to say,"hey, that's wrong". I would think an all powerful being would be able to do that. If not, then the confusion here must be on purpose, as in, We're entertainment for a supreme being that is bored. Or, maybe just a science project. Of course there is the possibility that we're just nature at work void of any divine intentions.



Maybe God would rather remain anonymous, and is quite happy if we don't know who he is, but would worship some non-existent phantom – who can tell.

The problem is, if the guy is all powerful, then He would scarcely need to send angels to correct His
mistakes, because the mistakes would not have happened to be corrected.

In fact, the notion of God being all powerful implies that He must be the only God, since if He had any competition, then he could not be all powerful.  But, if He is all powerful, then why would He even require assistants, such as angels?

quote:
Originally posted by Ultima

What I dont get is that there is neither "proof" for or against some super deity behind the scenes. So why would someone jump to the conclusion that one exists? Maybe back in the day before we had any scientific method or knowledge it was the simplest answer to the great question; Why? But now we have scientific method and a nice simple answer that the universe just is and runs on natural interactions between stuff and other stuff. So why would anyone continue with deity worship? Personally I embrace EVERYTHING as if it were God because clearly we are all part of the grand interconnected system that is life.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ockham%27s_Razor

Assuming that there is a hidden super being running the show isn't exactly justified in my mind. Why do I need to think that there is one?? When the world merrily goes on working without me doing so in a reasonably predictable way from currently available evidence. If suddenly we find that everything we thought was true breaks down and four giant horsemen come flying about my head I might be inclined to change my mind [;)]




The point is that there are different ways of looking at the world.

The modern perspective is almost purely functional, and the question we ask most is “how does it work” - and the answer to this is not well facilitated by the notion of God.

In the past, the world was less scientific, less functional; and people were more interested in hierarchies of allegiance and responsibility, and having a God at the root of such a model makes as much sense as the Big Bang makes to the fill the lack of direct knowledge about the roots of cosmology.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: mcduke on 30/03/2006 21:37:44
Well, may the force be with you.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 30/03/2006 23:40:11
isnt the idea of all powerful-ness adressed with-

can god make a stone so big he couldnt move it?

if he can, then he is not all powerful; because he cant move the stone. if he cant, then he is not all powerful either; because he cant make a large enough stone.

thats what always killed all-powerfulness for me.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 31/03/2006 00:24:20
quote:
Originally posted by gecko

isnt the idea of all powerful-ness adressed with-

can god make a stone so big he couldnt move it?

if he can, then he is not all powerful; because he cant move the stone. if he cant, then he is not all powerful either; because he cant make a large enough stone.

thats what always killed all-powerfulness for me.



Perfectly valid argument, excepting one has to ask whether things like mass, or even stones, are actually the same in God's reality as they are in ours.

Ofcourse, even if we remove ourselves from the specific issue of whether mass exists in God's world, there remains the more general question as to whether God is capable of creating a situation he is unable to change.

But, the point I was indirectly making is that in polytheist religions, none of the Gods are all-powerful, because each operates in their own domain, each with their own restrictions.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: JimBob on 31/03/2006 02:23:20
This topic seems to be going nowhere. Personally, I do not care if there is or is not a god.

IF there is a god, it is beyond any human understanding or mental contrivances, including logic and anthopomorphication (which most of the discussion has had at its logical core and is thus a limitation of something which, by definition, has no limit).

It doesn't really matter if there is or isn't a god. All will have their opinion. It is tantamount to arguing how many fleas there are on all the dogs in Sweden.  8 quintillion or 8 quintillion and 1? It just doesn't matter. It is a personal, not a public, belief and arguing about it is useless.

My personal belief is that there are two forces inside me, one working to better me and another to create confusion and strife. Whether these force are connected to anything else in the universe just doesn't matter. That is something I must judge for myself.

God's existence is subjective and not objective. This thread is thus, logically, irrelevant.
 



The mind is like a parachute. It works best when open.  -- A. Einstein
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: GOD on 31/03/2006 02:43:24
At last. Someone who understands my irrelevance.

I am GOD..You are Not..I don't exist !!
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 31/03/2006 02:45:42
quote:
Originally posted by JimBob

God's existence is subjective and not objective. This thread is thus, logically, irrelevant.



God's existence is subjective, but that does not make the debate about God's existence irrelevant.

The belief in God, as distinct from the fact of His existence or non-existence, is far from irrelevant, since it gives an important insight into the human psyche.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Carolyn on 31/03/2006 02:51:13
Hi everyone!  I got this e-mail today and thought it was funny.  It is not meant to make any statements about my religous beliefs, or offend anyone.  I just thought it was funny.

An atheist was taking a walk through the woods.
What majestic trees.  What powerful rivers.  What  beautiful animals
he said to himself.
As he was walking alongside the river he heard a rustling in  the
bushes behind him.  He turned to look.  He saw an 8 foot Alaskan  grizzly
charge toward him.

He ran as fast as he could up the path, he looked over his  shoulder
and saw that the bear was closing in on him.
He looked over his  shoulder again, and the bear was even closer.  He
tripped and fell on the  ground. He rolled over to pick himself up but saw the bear right on top of him,  reaching for him with his left paw and raising his right paw to strike him.

At that instant the Atheist cried out: "Oh my God..."
Time stopped.  The bear froze.
The forest was  silent.As a bright light shone upon the man, a voice
came out of the  sky:

"You deny my existence for all these years, teach others I don't exist, and even credit the creation to a cosmic accident.  Do you really expect me to help you out of this Predicament?
Am I to count you as a believer?"

The atheist looked directly into the light, "It would be  hypocritical of me to suddenly ask you to treat me as a Christian now, but  perhaps you could make the BEAR a Christian?"
"Very well," said the voice. The light went out.  The sounds of the forest resumed. And then the bear Dropped his right paw, brought both paws  together and bowed his head and spoke:

"Lord, bless this food, which I am about to receive from thy bounty, through Christ our Lord,
Amen."[:D]

Carolyn
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: JimBob on 31/03/2006 03:37:58
quote:
Originally posted by another_someone

quote:
Originally posted by JimBob

God's existence is subjective and not objective. This thread is thus, logically, irrelevant.



God's existence is subjective, but that does not make the debate about God's existence irrelevant.

The belief in God, as distinct from the fact of His existence or non-existence, is far from irrelevant, since it gives an important insight into the human psyche.



George




Exactly. Every psyche is different and it is thus a matter of personal  PERCEPTION, not a fact. Insignt in to the human psyche is far difference that the existence or non-existence of God. What is being discussed is logical proof, not a subjective belief. I DO believe in God, but that is not proof I am right. I have made a subjective judgement based on my life experience, not fact.

By the way, I am a hingh church person - a dyed in the wool smells and bells person. But it has NOTHING to do with logic. It is my Opinion[/] (and experience) that in order to reap the full benefits of belief that logic must be suspended for the experience of God to be manifest. Read Thomas Aquinas. I am not saying anything new here.







The mind is like a parachute. It works best when open.  -- A. Einstein
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 31/03/2006 03:53:43
Certainly debating God leads to revelation (pun intended)...but revelation ,as has been mentioned ,of the psyche. Just like a debate on any subject about absolutely anything you like will also reveal these qualities.

A persons characteristics are open for display when any discussion is at hand. It is of course relevant to discuss god insofar that it serves it's purpose as a topic to debate.

 Communicating at length on a variety of subjects soon reveals the psyche and in some cases one can predict with some authority how a person will respond.

Circumstances have prevailed for all of us that we will think that we know how a person will react or what they will say in certain situations that offer conclusive answers to questions that meet the criteria for revealing the psyche.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 31/03/2006 17:01:57
When I referred to the human psyche, I was not only referring to the psyche of the individual, since religion is a social phenomenon, and effects entire societies.

As you say, every personal psyche is different, and the precise nature and reason for each person's belief is subtly different, but there still remains certain beliefs that are more prominent in certain societies, at certain times in history, than in other societies and in other times.  Thus one must conclude that the belief is not merely a personal choice, but also a social choice that serves a purpose within the society itself.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 31/03/2006 17:57:58
I agree.

You can not ignore the influences culture has on an individuals' opinions and convictions.

Without a doubt, society, for which I am including the family, and it’s trends are  the single most influencing factor upon a persons beliefs and therefore their psyche.

However unique we may think our psyche is, we can not help but have it impressed upon by the society we live in and the fashions of the day. It is in fact a product of that society.


Men are the same as women, just inside out !
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Hadrian on 31/03/2006 18:10:47
The original question was “Is God real or not?”    The word real means true, genuine, or valid among other things. If the indented question was Does God exist or not? Then this is one of the most thought about question of all time. There is an answer for everybody out there. The right answer for you for me for anyone who asks. God is, to the degree you believe in God.  

What you do speaks so loudly that I cannot hear what you say.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: mcduke on 02/04/2006 00:54:01
Do you mean God as in the most generic term. That there is just some form of intelligence out there that created/is part of everything? Even if all creation was done through trial and error? Well then, Yes!
Then again Dog spelled backwards is?
You guys really know how to over think things. lol
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Hadrian on 07/04/2006 16:37:02
quote:
Originally posted by mcduke

Do you mean God as in the most generic term. That there is just some form of intelligence out there that created/is part of everything? Even if all creation was done through trial and error? Well then, Yes!
Then again Dog spelled backwards is?
You guys really know how to over think things. lol



Well it all up to each of us to belive or not

What you do speaks so loudly that I cannot hear what you say.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: daveshorts on 08/04/2006 00:02:30
quote:
Well it all up to each of us to belive or not

That sort of depends whether a tendancy towards skepticism is heritable or not I suppose... he says kicking off another debate

I have heard that an artistic temperament correlates with a tendancy to see patterns where there are none - I wonder if this has anything to do with religion.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 08/04/2006 05:24:51
quote:
Originally posted by daveshorts

I have heard that an artistic temperament correlates with a tendancy to see patterns where there are none - I wonder if this has anything to do with religion.



I think that religion actually comes in a variety of forms.

Certainly, it has been said that certain types of religious experience can be linked to certain peculiar forms of epilepsy, but I don;t think that this correlates with the more common social aspects of religion.

Ofcourse, one could even suggest that science, in its own way, is a form of religion, and in some ways, has its own believers just as much as any other religion, and has its own social pressures for people to conform to the established doctrine of that religion.  Again, I think this is one way in which people approach religion, but other people have other reasons for being religious, and for them, merely accepting and belonging to the established doctrine is not the primary motivation.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ZMIVI on 08/04/2006 07:03:44
If you are saying that god is not real then are you saying some man 2,000 years ago made the book up? Someone who that long ago somehow knew about the evolution process that was proved to be chronologicly correct? Someone who just guessed on all of the events in the bible proven to have really happened? Even if you beleave much of it was made up HOW can you explain everything that has been proven right? Or the fact that the persons writing skills were as great as William Shakespears and as smart as Albert Enstien and new more than him before electricity was known to man?
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ZMIVI on 08/04/2006 07:04:21
If you are saying that god is not real then are you saying some man 2,000 years ago made the book up? Someone who that long ago somehow knew about the evolution process that was proved to be chronologicly correct? Someone who just guessed on all of the events in the bible proven to have really happened? Even if you beleave much of it was made up HOW can you explain everything that has been proven right? Or the fact that the persons writing skills were as great as William Shakespears and as smart as Albert Enstien and new more than him before electricity was known to man?
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 08/04/2006 13:50:05
quote:
Originally posted by ZMIVI

If you are saying that god is not real then are you saying some man 2,000 years ago made the book up? Someone who that long ago somehow knew about the evolution process that was proved to be chronologicly correct? Someone who just guessed on all of the events in the bible proven to have really happened? Even if you beleave much of it was made up HOW can you explain everything that has been proven right? Or the fact that the persons writing skills were as great as William Shakespears and as smart as Albert Enstien and new more than him before electricity was known to man?



Not sure exactly who you are responding to, or exactly what aspect of what you have read that this is a response to.

Firstly, there are two separate arguments, those regarding the truth of the Bible in general, and the specific questions regarding the existence of God.  Since there are many different conjectures in different religions, and even different sects within the same religions, as to what is and is not God, one can argue the existence/non-existence of God totally separately from the specific issue of whether the totality of the Bible is correct, or merely symbolic, or merely misunderstood, or a total fiction.

As for people's writing skills being as good as William Shakespeare's – which version of the Bible are you reading?  If it happens to be the King James Bible, then it would have been written within a few decades of William Shakespeare's death.  If you are reading the Bible is classical Greak, Aramiac, and the various other original languages, then it is another matter.  I have no doubt that there were some very good authors in ancient Greece, in Babylonia, and elsewhere in the ancient world; but I would not suppose to be a critic of their work, since I do not understand their native tongues.

It is folly to regard the ancients as stupid.  They were just as clever, and just as foolish, as we are today; they just did not have the material and intellectual infrastructure that we have upon which to base their work.  Hero, a Greek living in Alexandria around the time of Christ, invented the first known steam engine, almost 2000 years before anyone found any practical use for it – these are not the acts of stupid people.

Albert Einstein, smart as he was, got many things wrong; but no man who is willing to be as revolutionary as he was can reasonably expect to get everything right.

I am not sure what you mean by “ knew about the evolution process that was proved to be chronologically correct”?  In the first place, this seems to presume that evolution is a correct theory, which is something that some adherents to the Bible would argue goes against the teachings of the Bible.  What the writers of the Bible did assume was that the simpler parts of life were created first, and the more complicated came later – this is not an unreasonable judgement to make, no matter what the mechanism was that increased the complexity of life.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: mcduke on 19/04/2006 23:32:24
It seems that the God of the bible, old and new testament, is the one being discussed. So, your choices are that you're either jewish or christian as far as your particular belief. The God of the old testament was pretty violent and harsh. The God of the new testament gave his only son and, well, you know the story. Does this mean that God evolved into what we need at a specific time in our existence? If everyone simply lived by the rules of christianity it would certainly be a wonderful world, if not overpopulated.
I wouldn't mind believing if I had some proof. Isn't that what science is all about? Proof!
So, how many in this discussion actually believe that there is a God (as per the bible)? And I actually mean believe, not think there is, or concider it a possibility.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: elegantlywasted on 19/04/2006 23:59:30
My main problem with the bible is where do the women come from!? Adam and Eve have Cain and Abel, where does Cain's wife come from? If we are all decendants of Adam and Eve, are we all decendants of some odd incestouous (sp?) relationship?

-Meg
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Laith on 20/04/2006 19:15:13
"I believe in a creator, but i don't believe in a personal God"
                                 Albert Einstein






Laith
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 21/04/2006 14:14:00
y do frogs hop? they got 4 legs? :)

- Big T
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: time-cop on 22/04/2006 00:56:29
someone said that the time of the creation and garden of eden,was approximately 4000 bc,this coincides with the change by early humans to a pastoral life,instead of being hunter gatherers,and they have placed this in the euphrates/tigres valley,so did early man just have more time to wonder about his environment and who put in there,you only have to watch a child play to see how fantastically inventive the human mind is,i would never condemn or ridicule some one for their beliefs,i personally dont believe, my choice, and everyone should be able to have their own choice,and not be press-ganged into a belief.

http://www.armybarmy.org
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 02/05/2006 14:18:23
SO i guess no 1 will really know till they die huh?

- Big T
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 02/05/2006 15:13:13
quote:
Originally posted by tony6789

SO i guess no 1 will really know till they die huh?

- Big T



You're spot on there Tony.

Let your imagination take flight.

You may find comfort in a belief of God...millions and millions do...and they may be right..

Personally, I sometimes think I want to believe but I just can not take that leap of faith like others can and do....so, I always remain open and available to be convinced but it has to be convincing enough to my satisfaction...



Men are the same as women, just inside out !
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 04/05/2006 14:15:52
Same here i want to believe it but it just doesnt eem possible...

- Big T
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 04/05/2006 17:09:24
if i was to just choose, facts aside, how id like the universe to be, id definitely choose no god or creator. we all command our own actions and morality and that gives me much more comfort then "something else" doing it. note thats not the reason i believe there isnt one.

i just cant understand this atheist in pain syndrome...'i want to have faith in some vague, wishy-washy impossible thing, but im just so tortured by critical thinking and sense!'

whats the big deal? be proud of your ability to reason, so then you wont drink the kool aid when hale-bopp comes around again(im probably mixing up 2 groups of nutjobs)
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 11/05/2006 14:30:16
Y wouldnt u want to have a god? In most religions "God" is portraied as a kind, loveing, genourous, and forgiving...ummm...thing....or spirt. So y wouldnt u want God?(I am speaking, of course, of the God that ties in with Jesus and the Saints)

- Big T
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Laith on 11/05/2006 19:01:12
i agree with tony, and they also offer more life after death..

Laith
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 11/05/2006 19:39:19
quote:
Originally posted by Laith

i agree with tony, and they also offer more life after death..

Laith



I thought Buddhism, which lacks a God (although some variants have mixed atheistic core Buddhism with local theistic beliefs), and yet is the pre-eminent religion for reincarnation.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 11/05/2006 23:51:06
i do not want to live in a universe with a "god" because i do not want a supreme authority figure or even a loving father figure watching over me. i dont want a "right" and a "wrong", i want to decide these things for myself. i think individualism is far more important than some sort of maternal love with the invisible.

as far as life after death, thats a different question, its not really asking me about god because its not neccesarily one and the same. however, i dont want to believe in life after death either. living this one life is painting my masterpiece, and i dont know if i could take more than 75-100 years of keeping myself occupied. why would you want to live more than that? life is already long enough.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 12/05/2006 14:16:47
y? thats what im asking. y wouldnt y want "the ultimate protector" by ur side?

- Big T
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Hadrian on 12/05/2006 15:02:07

Would you?
 



What you do speaks so loudly that I cannot hear what you say.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: JimBob on 12/05/2006 19:27:44
quote:
Originally posted by Hadrian


Would you?
 



What you do speaks so loudly that I cannot hear what you say.




Agreed - It can be a very frightening approach.


The mind is like a parachute. It works best when open.  -- A. Einstein
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Hadrian on 12/05/2006 20:28:47

Turn your attention away from the surface of you mind and sink into the joy and peace in the depths of your hart. Only there will you be whit the I am.  



What you do speaks so loudly that I cannot hear what you say.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 16/05/2006 14:26:12
ok back 2 the arguement. then how do u people explain exercism? when a demon controls the body.

NEVER! underestimate youth
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 18/05/2006 18:22:36
you are the reason people think americans are stupid(i am one, by the way). you keep asking for scientific explanations of supposed actions by your obviously pseudo-christian abrahamic god. look at the whole world man. its bigger than one silly belief system and vision of god.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Carolyn on 18/05/2006 21:02:31
quote:
Originally posted by gecko

you are the reason people think americans are stupid(i am one, by the way). you keep asking for scientific explanations of supposed actions by your obviously pseudo-christian abrahamic god. look at the whole world man. its bigger than one silly belief system and vision of god.



You are so wrong!  You just called a 13 year old boy stupid.  What kind of person are you?  This young man is curious and looking for answers. How are kids supposed to learn if they don't ask questions?  Curious children aren't the reason SOME people think SOME americans are stupid.  Maybe you should do a little scientific research before you make such ignorant assumptions.  

Carolyn
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 18/05/2006 22:00:43
i did not realize this person was 13, and am truly sorry. really.

i might have been taking out some vain agression where i shouldntve been.

im very embarrased
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 19/05/2006 13:40:37
Tony is our resident youth !...and gecko was not aware of his age...and also, though I can see the inference of Geckos post he didn't actually say Tony was stupid directly. Though, the implication was there.

Unfortunately this topic ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS generates debate, frustration, confusion, anger and a whole host of other emotions which because of the nature of ' GOD ' are self perpetuating....the fact of the matter is ..I can't prove there is not a GOD and others can't prove there is a GOD.....

These topics(about God and Religion)  never have a resolution...because we just do not know...so all we can do is philosophise, speculate and elaborate on our personal points of view.

I am sure Tony is Ok and it's nice of Gecko to apologise as such.

Men are the same as women, just inside out !
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 19/05/2006 13:43:22
If you really want to debate GOD I can direct you to a forum where Philosophies, God/lack of God and Religions of ALL types are openly discussed and debated with accord and discord but always with an open mind and respect.

Tony, you will find it an excellent site...in fact everone will.

let me know [:)]

Men are the same as women, just inside out !
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 19/05/2006 14:21:51
It's ok gecko

NEVER! underestimate youth
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Carolyn on 20/05/2006 05:40:50
quote:
Originally posted by gecko

i did not realize this person was 13, and am truly sorry. really.

i might have been taking out some vain agression where i shouldntve been.

im very embarrased




I also apologise.  I was a bit harsh.

Carolyn
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 23/05/2006 14:10:08
So what about exercism

NEVER! underestimate youth
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 23/05/2006 14:33:21
?

NEVER! underestimate youth
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: upton on 23/05/2006 16:38:03
quote:
Originally posted by tony6789

So what about exercism

NEVER! underestimate youth



Though I understand that exorcism exists I do not know if any have been accurately documented. You would think that the recording of such an event, with witnesses, would help to establish a truth in this respect.

~~~I can't think of a signature~~~
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Kevinkrupp on 24/05/2006 03:32:02
What is wrong with you all
There is a God and he sent his one and only son to die on the cross for you and you wont even believe in him

Well then how did humans get to be on this planet.
If the earth was tilted one direction up we would all burn and if it was tilted one direction down we would all freeze.
or if the earth was closer then everything would burn and it if where farther away we would all freeze

For example if i wound a wrist watch in the middle of a field i would not assume that it just appeared out of nowhere and i would not assume that it had always existed i would assume that it had a designer but you dont know the designer you would still KNOW there was a designer.

we realize that there will always be skeptics who have their own ideas concerning God. and will read evidence accordingly. and there will be some people who no amount of proof will convence them (it all comed down to fait.)

God shows himself through creation, and his word, and he sent his son jesus crist.

Kevin Krupp
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 24/05/2006 20:48:06
that's exactly what we r arguing on. All the proof we have og Gad or Jesus is the Bible!

NEVER! underestimate youth
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 25/05/2006 06:31:57
kevin krupp, you are everything i hate.

im so angry i cant even gather my thoughts well enough to tell you everything that is wrong with what you just said.

im retiring from this whole "debate". sorry to be the embodiment of the "angry atheist" but sometimes thats just the way it is...
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 25/05/2006 13:28:09
we do not know if god really sent jesus or created the world. we have no proof if he does or has ever existed


NEVER! underestimate youth
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 25/05/2006 13:53:16
You see this is the problem (Whilst writing this I am having a ' here we go again moment '...and it's not nice)

Kevinkrupp believes in God...he believes in God so much that what ever one might say, his staunch point of view (ie: belief) wins through every time and nothing anybody will say will change his mind.

Nothing wrong with that I respect his beliefs  ( I personally don't share them )...but please leave the proselytising for a non science site !!

Incidentally...I'm sure I saw a program which mentioned the finding the watch thing....of course a watch may well have a makers mark on it !..YES...I suppose one could argue that the earth and the universe etc has it's own makers mark too...I suppose *le sigh*)....I am sure Kevinkrupp is happy in his certainty so much so that he thinks we're all blind to the obvious.

I have found that such perspectives have a weakness though.....it's the inability to entertain the possibility that there may be another answer.
 However, he MIGHT be right. we just do not know and will never know unless God calls round for tea and a chat !!....and that's why (it's that 'here we go again' moment')....this thread...like all the religious ones before it.......never have a resolution to them.


For the recent members...I once held a running poll on this site as to whether one believed in God or not...I wanted to keep it simple so the premise was...do you believe in God..Yes or No ?....it's interesting that after about 8 months...the votes were split right down the middle...that did surprise me considering the nature of this site........

I deleted the thread because it later became a place of argument and derision...but I did think the results interesting.

Men are the same as women, just inside out !
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ejirolove30 on 26/05/2006 06:41:14
1. Does God exist?

Throughout history, in all cultures of the world, people have been convinced there is a God.
Billions of people, who represent diverse sociological, intellectual, emotional, educational makeups...believe that there is a Creator, a God to be worshipped. Now, the fact that so many people believe something certainly doesn't make it true. But when so many people through the ages are so personally convinced that God exists, can one say with absolute confidence that they are all mistaken?
"Anthropological research has indicated that among the farthest and most remote primitive people today, there is a universal belief in God. And in the earliest histories and legends of people all around the world, the original concept was of one God, who was the Creator. An original high God seems once to have been in their consciousness even in those societies which are today polytheistic.

Does God exist?

God not only has revealed Himself in what can be observed in nature and the world as kevin mentioned below, and in human life, but He has even more specifically shown Himself in the Bible.
God's thoughts, personality, and attitudes can only be known if God chooses to reveal them. All else would be human speculation. We are at a loss if God does not wish to be known. But God wants us to know Him and has told us in the Bible all we need to know about His character and how to relate to Him. This makes the reliability of the Bible an important consideration.
Archaeological findings continue to confirm rather than refute the accuracy of the Bible. For example, an archeological find in northern Israel in August 1993 confirmed the existence of King David, author of many of the Psalms in the Bible.10 The Dead Sea Scrolls and other archaeological discoveries continue to substantiate the historical accuracy of the Bible.

 The Bible was written over a 1500-year span, by 40 different authors, in different locations and on separate continents, written in three different languages, covering diverse subject matters at different points in history.11 Yet there is an astounding consistency in its message. Throughout the entire Bible the same message appears:

God created the world we live in, and created us specifically to have a relationship with Him.
He deeply loves us.
We have sinned and are under God's judgment, in need of His forgiveness.
God provided a way for our sins to be forgiven.
He asks us to receive His forgiveness and have a relationship with Him that will last eternally.
Along with this central script, the Bible specifically reveals God's character. Psalm 145 is a typical summary of God's personality, thoughts and feelings toward us. If you want to know God, here He is.

No other book on earth can make 11 correct prophecies in the space of  2000 yrs, yet the bible has over 340 prophecies that was written over 2000 yrs ago and came to pass.

Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ejirolove30 on 26/05/2006 06:44:00
If you truly want the answer read http://www.everystudent.com/features/isthere.html


No other book in this world can make 11 correct prophecies yet the bible  has over 340 prophecies that came to pass.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ejirolove30 on 26/05/2006 06:49:19
quote:
Originally posted by gecko

tony, i cant prove god doesnt exist anymore than you can prove he can.

 when you say something exists with no evidence whatsoever, just because of faith or belief, you can never be proven wrong. i believe theres a planet in the universe ruled by a race of skyscraper sized ants who eat nothing but pancakes. if you cant prove me wrong, than is that true?

 god is just about as likely, considering theres the same amount of proof for both. i always want to see evidence before i believe in something... for some reason objectivity and skepticism have taken a backseat to the whimsy and wonder of religion




You want to see evidence?  Look around you.  something you probally take for granted oxygen. think how plants breate in what we breathe out and produces clean air. think how the planet is position in such a way that one slight move to or from the sun can lead to destruction of planet earth.

God has left evidence all around us that He exists.  Only the fool say in his heart there is no God.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: science_guy on 26/05/2006 19:41:44
here is an example of the truth of the bible:

ask yourselves when the bible was written.  Pre columbus times, right?  

in the bible, it never suggests that the earth is flat, and even mentions that it is round.  Now we have people proving, in science, what the bible already tells us.  There is no proof, in science, that God does not exist.  The universe had a beginning, and anything that has a beginning must be created.

E=MC2... m=deg/360 X C... C= PiD

therefore E=deg/360 X 2(PiD)
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ejirolove30 on 27/05/2006 00:25:42
It is a scientific fact that life can only come from pre-existant life, not from matter alone.  Therefore to trace life back to its source we must  come back to God Himself.

When you know that there is a God, now read the bible to find out if this book speaks of this God.

Read my argument above as to why the bible is the word of God.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: science_guy on 27/05/2006 01:15:36
you know, there are other topics in this forum, you dont have to post in one topic only.

Aside from that, i agree, in a scientific perspective, with everything he has said


E=MC2... m=deg/360 X C... C= PiD

therefore E=deg/360 X 2(PiD)
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ukmicky on 27/05/2006 05:08:18
quote:
No other book on earth can make 11 correct prophecies in the space of 2000 yrs


So that one correct prophecy for every 181 years, not much luck then. How many did it get wrong? If I was to sit back and write a book I reckon I could do better especially if I had 2000 years of coincidence and luck to play with.

Also if god created us and the earth why did he wait over 4 billion years before he created us and put us on it , Did he fall asleep .

why did he create the dinosaurs first, were they more important than us.


 
quote:
You want to see evidence? Look around you. Something you probably take for granted oxygen. Think how plants breathe in what we breathe out and produces clean air.

And evolution has had 4 billion years to do it, no god required.



 
quote:
Think how the planet is position in such a way that one slight move to or from the sun can lead to destruction of planet earth.


When you consider there are over 100 billion stars in our galaxy and as far as we can tell most of them have planets around them, then the chances of at least one of them having the correct condition for life as we no it, is pretty good. A god isn’t required to position our planet where it is. A god isn’t required for a planet to have an atmosphere like ours.

 
quote:
It is a scientific fact that life can only come from pre-existent life, not from matter alone. Therefore to trace life back to its source we must come back to God Himself.


It’s a scientific fact is it, if that’s the case then show me these scientific facts.


 
quote:
in the bible, it never suggests that the earth is flat, and even mentions that it is round.


Take a look at the moon it looks round to me ,so why wouldn’t they also think the earth is  round, Something round can still be flat.


 
quote:
Now we have people proving, in science, what the bible already tells us. There is no proof in science that God does not exist.


There is also no proof in science that god does exist,the good thing about science it deals with evidence, something written in a book is proof of nothing.

 
quote:
The universe had a beginning, and anything that has a beginning must be created.



So our universe had a beginning but who is to say that our one is the only one, as far as we know there could be multiple universes ,billions of the things. also what happens to your creationist theories if our universe  started through events in one of those other universes.

If everything has to have a beginning who created god did he just pop up from nothing.

The earth has been around for over 4 billion years more than enough time for evolution to sort itself out and create what we see today.


Michael
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ejirolove30 on 27/05/2006 05:42:59
Maybe you need to take a look at nature and do a little studing.  Evolution cannot cause such order as we see today. Maybe take a look at the food chain or do a study on gravity. I guess evolution placed gravity as well.    You cannot bring God down to your state of mind and ask who created God. We are subject to time not God.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ejirolove30 on 27/05/2006 05:49:48
Also you misread my part about prophecies.  I stated that the bible has over 340 prophecies that already came to pass.  No one cannot make such accurate prophecies.   There are extensive prophecies dealing with individual nations and cities and with the course of history in general, all of which have been literally fulfilled. More than 300 prophecies were fulfilled by Christ Himself at His first coming. Other prophecies deal with the spread of Christianity, as well as various false religions, and many other subjects.

There is no other book, ancient or modern, like this. The vague, and usually erroneous, prophecies of people like Jeanne Dixon, Nostradamus, Edgar Cayce, and others like them are not in the same category at all, and neither are other religious books such as the Koran, the Confucian Analects, and similar religious writings. Only the Bible manifests this remarkable prophetic evidence, and it does so on such a tremendous scale as to render completely absurd any explanation other than divine revelation.

If one will seriously investigate these Biblical evidences, he will find that their claims of divine inspiration (stated over 3,000 times, in various ways) were amply justified.

Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ejirolove30 on 27/05/2006 05:50:53
Another striking evidence of divine inspiration is found in the fact that many of the principles of modern science were recorded as facts of nature in the Bible long before scientist confirmed them experimentally. A sampling of these would include:

    * Roundness of the earth (Isaiah 40:22)
    * Almost infinite extent of the sidereal universe (Isaiah 55:9)
    * Law of conservation of mass and energy (II Peter 3:7)
    * Hydrologic cycle (Ecclesiastes 1:7)
    * Vast number of stars (Jeremiah 33:22)
    * Law of increasing entropy (Psalm 102:25-27)
    * Paramount importance of blood in life processes (Leviticus 17:11)
    * Atmospheric circulation (Ecclesiastes 1:6)
    * Gravitational field (Job 26:7)
    * and many others.

These are not stated in the technical jargon of modern science, of course, but in terms of the basic world of man's everyday experience; nevertheless, they are completely in accord with the most modern scientific facts.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: daveshorts on 27/05/2006 12:46:44
Have you actually looked at this stuff and more importantly thought about it critically?

For those of us who don't know the bible by reference

 (Isaiah 40:22) "He sits enthroned above the circle of the earth, and its people are like grasshoppers.  He stretches out the heavens like a canopy, and spreads them out like a tent to live in."

Is talking about circles not spheres. The greeks had worked out the world was a sphere by the time the bible was collated anyway.

(Isaiah 55:9)"For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts."

Urr so being higher than a mountain is almost infinite?

(II Peter 3:7)"But the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.

Sounds a lot more like a threat than an exposition of E=Mc2

(Ecclesiastes 1:7) "All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full; unto the place from whence the rivers come, thither they return again."

This is just coming from logic - the sea isn't filling up and the rivers keep running - it misses the only unobvious bit about evaporation and clouds

(Jeremiah 33:22) As the host of heaven cannot be numbered, neither the sand of the sea measured: so will I multiply the seed of David my servant, and the Levites that minister unto me.

Sounds like 'My god has a big army so don't mess with him' It doesn't even mention stars!!!

(Psalm 102:25-27) "
 25Of old hast thou laid the foundation of the earth: and the heavens are the work of thy hands.

 26They shall perish, but thou shalt endure: yea, all of them shall wax old like a garment; as a vesture shalt thou change them, and they shall be changed:

 27But thou art the same, and thy years shall have no end.
"

Urr you will die, and old clothes wear out, sounds a bit like everyday experience to me...

(Leviticus 17:11)"For the life of the flesh is in the blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls: for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul."

Firstly blood isn't of paramount importance to life processes, most of life gets along perfectly well without it - plants, fungi, bacteria, many simple animals. You can keep flesh alive without blood, give it some oxygen, glucose and salts, and it will get along fine.
So the only thing this is saying is that vertibrates need blood to survive - do we think this was the result of divine revalation or empirical study?

(Ecclesiastes 1:6)"The wind goeth toward the south, and turneth about unto the north; it whirleth about continually, and the wind returneth again according to his circuits."

This one is better than most - but more an observation that the wind changes direction. Even if it is the modern meaning, it could be worked out by conservation of stuff, rather than a deep understanding of atmospheric circulation. The whole atmosphere runs on convection, this involves vertical winds, and surprise surprise it doesn't talk about this.

(Job 26:7)"He stretcheth out the north over the empty place, and hangeth the earth upon nothing."

Urr this sounds more like a deep misunderstanding of gravity - as the earth needs hanging on something apparently gravity would be pointing in one direction.


People were no more stupid 2000 years ago than they are today, they observed stuff fairly accurately, and made theories based on it. So surprise surprise there is a lot of stuff in the bible broadly in agreement with how the world works. However none of the things you have just showed me requires any more than this!
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 27/05/2006 13:59:01
Hey Tony,

Assuming you have not poisoned yourself then it seems you might have a chance at getting this thread in the top 25 !!

Anyway, here's a nice little website filled with all types of biblical contradictions !!

http://www.evilbible.com/Biblical%20Contradictions.htm

Men are the same as women, just inside out !
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ejirolove30 on 27/05/2006 16:50:21
http://www.christiananswers.net/menu-at1.html#contradictions

read that to find out that there are no contradictions in the bible.

and they guy above you have read all those scriptures but yet you do not understand what I said.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ukmicky on 27/05/2006 18:55:39
You just dont like the scientifically proved fact that your related to a banana.[:)]

PS i clicked on your link and read quite a bit. The word miracle comes up quite a bit,a bit too much for my liking , its seems  a nice and easy way to get around answering a question if you ask me.

There are literary hundreds of questions which i could ask.I will start with 4 easy ones for you for.

 
How did jonah actually survived in a whales stomach for three days.

How old do you believe the earth is.

How long ago were the dinosaurs walking on the earth.

Where's all the water from the great flood in the noahs ark story gone. and dont say its now underground because your talking about enough water to cover the highest mountains.

How did noah get around to every region of the world and find every animal.

I know what is supposed to of happened to the birds but what about the bees and all the other insects.
How did noah re-populate the world, did he drop off every animal from where they came from.

what did the lions and tigers etc eat once they were freed.

What happened to all the plants and trees did noah have a seed bank or something.

why do we share a large proportion of our genetic make up with a banana or a chimp if there is no such thing as evolution.
Michael
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: GOD on 27/05/2006 19:54:03
Ooops...I forgot my 11th commadment.

Thou shalt not believe in me.

It's tough not existing !!
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ejirolove30 on 27/05/2006 20:44:06
http://www.christiananswers.net/q-aig/aig-floodwater.html

there is your answer.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ukmicky on 27/05/2006 21:14:56
quote:
Originally posted by ejirolove30

http://www.christiananswers.net/q-aig/aig-floodwater.html

there is your answer.



No i want your answers in your own words.

if you believe in the bible you should know all the answers, after all you wouldnt believe in something you know nothing about would you.

PS ive added a few more sorry[:)] COME ON SHOUDNT BE HARD



Michael
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ejirolove30 on 27/05/2006 23:21:37
Are u kidding me? Why should I type whats already there?

Why are u trying to pick a fight with me? I taught this board is about sharing your opinions.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ukmicky on 27/05/2006 23:38:11
ejirolove30

I'm sorry if i gave you the impression that i was trying to fight with you,i just fiqured you were happy to enter into a dissusion regarding your posts.

Please enjoy the rest of the forum

Michael
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ejirolove30 on 28/05/2006 04:25:56
I am more than happy but your request was very silly. You want me to give you the same answer that is listed in the site i provided. if in my own words or not, the answer is already given. if i did not know what i am talking about, that i am just coping links than all i have to do is go and read and come back and tell you what i read.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: daveshorts on 28/05/2006 08:53:25
quote:
Originally posted by ejirolove30

http://www.christiananswers.net/q-aig/aig-floodwater.html

there is your answer.



Ok that is a good scientific answer... so the whole of the himalayas have been formed in the last 3000 years... In fact within a couple of months, lets be really generous, give it 1000 years. Have you even thought about the consequences of this? Mountains are a bit like ice bergs, they have roots, to make the Himalayas and the tibetan plateau you have to shorten a plate by at least 1000km, that means that the plates would have to be moving a 1km/yr, only 10000 times faster than they are now!!! Ignoring all the thermal effects (doing this would probably cause all the seas to boil - sending the world into a nuclear winter) and the fact that there would be huge evidence of this, the Indians and Chinese have records going back longer than this, don't you think they might have mentioned that all their villages were getting much closer together every year!! Oh and there were at least 3 very large earthquakes a day!!!

So the earth's magnetic field must have been flipping at least once a year over this time as well in order to produce the magnetic stripes found in the seabed, oh and god must have built a huge system of pipes through the new oceanic crust in order to make it cool down that quickly (no matter how cold the surface was you can't cool something 10km thick very fast - in less than a few million years - I can show you the maths if you like) - the amount of energy released would also boil most of the seas, with immense climatic and other effects.

It is at least intelectually consistant to say God magiked it so it was as the bible says, as he doesn't have to obey the rules of nature, however then there doesn't have to be any evidence - he could have just magiked the world so it looks like the flood never happened.

Saying it is all scientific but ignoring immense amounts of scientific evidence, and not doing any trivial calculations is either lazy or intelectually dishonest.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: spud on 28/05/2006 10:59:56
It would seem pretty hypocritical to believe that everything in this universe was the product of a designer (meaning that everything in the universe is not self existent) and then believe in something that is supposedly greater than everything in the universe combined, and assume that it/he/she...whatever gender you want to give god...is self existent. Sounds pretty stupid to me.
    But don't get me wrong, i'm not an atheist to the fullest extent of the meaning of the word. I believe in the universal consiousnous of life. I believe that the universe we live in is just one of many interdimentional planes of existence. I also believe that this universe is the creation of what we ourselves think or desire it to be. In a sense, we are all god.
     In a way, it all comes down to what your personal interpretation of god is. It is different with us all. I don't think it matters what our ideas of god are, just as long as it fills that curiosity inside us, and we don't try and force these ideas on others.[:D]
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: spud on 28/05/2006 11:15:43
[I have removed the content of this post as it was not conducive to a sensible discussion, people's ideas are fair game, but personal abuse isn't]

Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ejirolove30 on 28/05/2006 14:53:33
Well here is where people make the biggest mistake.  The earth was not created 6000 yrs ago.  Humans were created 6000 yrs ago.  There is a big gap from genesis chapter 1 and gensis chapter 2.  

Remember in the bible it states that when the devil rebelled against God that he and 1/3 of the angels were cast down to the earth.  That was before Genesis chapter 2.  The bible does that state when the world was created, it said in the beginning. Could have been millions if not billions of years ago.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ukmicky on 28/05/2006 21:14:32
quote:
According to the Bible: Dinosaurs first existed around 6,000 years ago.5–7 God made the dinosaurs, along with the other land animals, on Day Six of the Creation Week (Gen. 1:20–25, 31).8  Adam and Eve were also made on day six—so dinosaurs lived at the same time as people, not separated by eons of time.  Dinosaurs could not have died out before people appeared, because dinosaurs had not previously existed, and death, bloodshed, disease and suffering are a result of Adam’s sin (Rom. 5:12,14, 1 Cor. 15:21–22).8
Representatives of all the kinds of air-breathing land animals, including the dinosaur kinds, went on board Noah’s Ark (see How did the animals fit on Noah's Ark?).  All those left outside the Ark died in the cataclysmic circumstances of the Flood—many of their remains became fossils.  
After the Flood (around 4,500 years ago), the remnant of the land animals, including dinosaurs, came off the Ark and lived in the present world, along with people.  Because of sin, the judgments of the Curse and the Flood have greatly changed the earth.  Post-Flood climatic change, lack of food, disease, and man’s activities caused many types of animals to become extinct.  The dinosaurs, like many other creatures, died out.  Why the big mystery about dinosaurs?. http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/Area/AnswersBook/dinosaurs19.asp


How dumb is that. They actually believe dinosaurs like T rex were walking around the earth along with his buddies 4,500 years ago at the same time as man. If that was so why are their fossils found in rock that can be scientifically proved to be 100s of millions of years old, why are there no ancient wall paintings of dinosaurs.Why is there no written record of dinosaurs.  At least evolutionists try to find scientifically provable evidence as to why there theories are correct. Creationists just point to the bible as there evidence.  a book proves nothing ,I can write a book.

My advice to everybody is to bookmark the web address below and whenever you feel depressed or in need of lift, then just click on the link and have a read.

I can guarantee you will be happy with a broad smile across your face within the first 5 minutes of reading any one of the article's in the question and answers section; most of the stuff is so hilarious you will never need your anti depressants again.

  http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/qa.asp


Michael
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ukmicky on 29/05/2006 00:22:59
ejirolove30
I found the answers to the questions I asked you after looking at the website you posted and I can now see why you didn’t wish to answer me as the answers are not exactly what I would consider believable and in most cases are laughable

Q: How did Jonah actually survived in a whale’s stomach for three days.
A: There was air in the whale’s stomach allowing him to breath either that or he died and then was brought back too life by god.

Q  How long ago were the dinosaurs walking on the earth?
A: 4500 years ago,they came off the ark with all the other land animals.

Q: Where's all the water from the great flood in the Noah’s ark story gone. And don’t say it’s now underground because you’re talking about enough water to cover the highest mountains.
A: There were no mountains only high hills. The land mass then rose trapping the water in the valleys; Mount Everest grew in the last 4500 years after the flood.


Q. How did Noah get around to every region of the world and find every animal.
A: He didn’t, all the animals even came to him.

Q: How did the animals from far flung places like Australia get to the ark
A: 4500 Years ago the earth was either a single land mass or their was an ice age locking up so much water that it created land bridges allowing animals like kangaroos to get to the ark.

Q: How did Noah re-populate the world, did he drop off every animal from where they came from.
A: No they all walked home.


Q: I know what is supposed to of happened to the birds but what about the bees and all the other insects.
A: NOAH only took things which could breath through there nostrils, most insects breath through there skins and so were able to survive. And those which had difficulty surviving took to rafts made out of twigs and debris.

Q: What did the lions and tigers etc eat in the first weeks when they were freed.
A: Something’s we don’t know the answers to, all we know is they just survived and the proof to that is the fact that most of them are alive today.
 

Q: What happened to all the plants and trees did Noah have a seed bank or something.
A: They all died but their seeds survived under the water and re-populated the world once the water had gone.


CONCLUSION
I have no problem with people believing in a god,its actually a nice thought that their could be something watching over us but I can't believe in the bible or the creationist’s interpretation of it, as to do so would be stupid.  None of the creationist’s arguments contain facts, and nothing can be scientifically tested like evolution and natural selection can.
 
So I know which one I would put my money on.


Michael
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 29/05/2006 01:11:46
Great Posts Michael.

Men are the same as women, just inside out !
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: JimBob on 29/05/2006 02:50:23
There is no defending belief but there is a check of facts. I believe that I can be trusted to check bible facts. I was brought up ultra-hardshell Baptist, my great-grandfather rode circut in the back hills of southeast Tennessee befeor 1900. I learned the Bible backwards and forwards, had a perfect 12 year attendence in Sunday School from age 5 to 17 and .

So lets look at the Bible facts:

quote:
Originally posted by ejirolove30

Well here is where people make the biggest mistake.  The earth was not created 6000 yrs ago.  Humans were created 6000 yrs ago.  There is a big gap from genesis chapter 1 and gensis chapter 2.  
 
Remember in the bible it states that when the devil rebelled against God that he and 1/3 of the angels were cast down to the earth.  That was before Genesis chapter 2.  The bible does that state when the world was created, it said in the beginning. Could have been millions if not billions of years ago.



So it follows very logically from the 6000 year age of man that a day does not mean 24 hours. Does the Bible say a day is 6000 years long - anywhere? NO. A day is a defined in Genesis 1:5. A day is " the evening and the morning". If one part of the Bible is to be taken literally, then all of it must be taken literally. Noone can pick and choose which parts are to be taken literally and which are to be interpreted AND be consistent in their logic.

Secondly - A Challenge - Where in the Bible does it say, I quote you that "when the devil rebelled against God that he and 1/3 of the angels were cast down to the earth" ??? In Matthew 25:41  is says "Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels: ..." But where in the Bible does it say the devil rebelled or that 1/3 of the angels were thrown down? It doesn't. Your belief is one you were taught by someone else or something you made up. It seems not to be based on YOUR reading of the Bible, the Bible being the only teacher you can depend on. Where in the Bible is the story that tells you the angels were cast out of Heaven and thrown into Hell? Tell me.

I am teachable and will admit I am wrong but I will not be convinced unless the story of the fall is literal.

MY POINT:

I am a Christian. I have been one all my life. Christianity (and God) as you would have us believe is incompatable with (my brand of) science. That I believe dinosaurs lived more than 65 million years ago does not damn me. It is mearly that I believe the way God set in motion the Universe is unknown to Humans. God is beyond any human knowlege.

If christians had been correct through all of history, they would not have believed the earth was flat, that the earth was the center of the universe, nor burned Bruno at the stake for saying Aristotle was wrong. Christians have been wrong about science of the demonstrable and provable for a long time and will continue to be in the future. Belief in God does not damn modern science. YOU damn it.

By saying "you fool" to us, you condemn yourself. (Matthew 5:22) Take care of and educate your own soul before you try to teach others what is or is not righteous. Being a Sadducee (literalist) is not a winning position. (That is in the Bible.)

I cannot say I am right or wrong.  I do know I cannot tell another person that they are wrong.  (Matthew 7:3-5)






The mind is like a parachute. It works best when open.  -- A. Einstein
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 29/05/2006 04:15:09
Excellent Post Jim.

Men are the same as women, just inside out !
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ejirolove30 on 29/05/2006 05:13:56
Oh boy!!! Did i say a day is 6000 yrs long? I said there is a big gap between genesis 1 and genesis chapter 2. Some believe God created the earth millions or even billions of years ago Genesis 1.  God in genesis 2 created man, it did not say that God created man when he created earth.  Read and you will see the big gap for yourself between those 2 chapters.

Isa 14:12-15, spoke of satan cast down to the earth.  The bible call those who say there is no God a fool. Because evidence of His existence is all around us.  People say evolution can be proven, but it cant. Only the fools will say that man who is created with his nose in the right position, not facing up or when the rain fall he will drowned,lol.  Or one eye at the back of our head and one in front, or ear down to our belly and one on the side of our head.  Evolution cannot position the amount of order that is all over the world.  

So becareful my friend to call me sadducce.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: spud on 29/05/2006 08:12:21
[again edited for personal insults - Dave]
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: daveshorts on 29/05/2006 10:34:51
What evidence do you have that evolution can't explain the order in the world. If you ever studied biochemistry in depth, it is a strange mix of beautifully elegant design, and horrible hacks.

So either God is alternately inspired and lazy
or
he evolved everything anyway.

 You even get them on a large scale - why do we get so many back problems? It makes sense if we have only recently evolved, and there hasn't been time for subtle issues like back ache to evolve out, but does it if we are made in the image of God?

Why is childbirth so difficult and dangerous? Because a pelvis that was designed for giving birth to quatrapedal small headed apes has has evolved to bipedalism, and babies heads have got a lot bigger, and evolution hasn't had time to come up with a good answer - or god is still punishing women for Eve falling for a classic entrapment scheme 6000 years ago - nice example of a loving god that one.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: JimBob on 29/05/2006 19:10:23
WHY ARE YOU UNABLE TO ANSWER A QUESTION DIRECTLY?

In Genesis, a day is defined as 24 hours. How do you get 6000 years or more in a day???? If you can get more than 24 hours in a day what is the difference between 30 hours , 6000 years or 65 to 125 million years?

Secondly, you still have not shown me in the Bible where 1/3rd of the angels were thrown down, much less any angel.

Isaiah 14:12
"How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning"
This passage in Isaiah is about Nebuchadnezzar, King of Babylon. Lucifer is the Morning Star, one of titles of Nebuchadnezzar. The passage is about Babylon, both before and after in Chapter 14 of Isaiah.  Isaiah 14:4 "That thou shalt take up this proverb against the king of Babylon, and say, How hath the oppressor ceased! the golden city ceased!" Your reading is out of context. It is also a reading that is not consistent with the Hebrew original.

The word angel is never used.

It was not until Jerome (full name = Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus) translated - incorrectly - the Hebrew and Greek texts of the Bible into the Latin vulgate, or "common Latin", that the word "Lucifer" was even used. The Hebrew word used in Isaiah 14:12 is "heylel" and it has two meanings. 1.) the Morning Star or the planet Venus, 2.) of or pertaining to the King of Babylon. Lucifer is the Latin word for Venus.

It was only about 1310 when Dante wrote the Divine Comedy that there is any evidence in all of Christian writing that the angels and Satan were connected with this passage. This is over half of the history of Christianity. It was either Dante or John Milton who claimed that 1/3rd the angels fell with Satan; it is not in the Bible. In the Hebrew language "Satan" is a word for a completely different concept than the planet Venus; it is translated as "adversary."

As for Sadducee, the word refers to priests of the temple who interpreted the Old Testament literally. (look it up in a good  dictionary.) If the shoe fits, wear it.

My belief in God is only bolstered by the elegance of design I see explained in my science.

It has been my experience that scientist have given more thought to the question of the existence of God than any other group of people I have ever been acquainted with. The reason: the elegance and beauty and the PROVABLE REPETITIVE RESULTS found in an theory of mountain formation or a formula for particle physic or in evolution is awe inspiring. The beauty and majesty of this Universe makes a scientist ask questions or we would not be scientist. Some come to one conclusion, others come to another. The thought that goes into this decision is equal to the thought that is given to the existence of God among theologians.




The mind is like a parachute. It works best when open.  -- A. Einstein
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ejirolove30 on 30/05/2006 03:00:38
You do not understand what I meant by genesis 1 and 2. I never said 24 hours is not a day. You misunderstood me or I am not explaing myself very well.

To everyone else, everything I say, you tell me you need facts. I am going to say this that all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. God gave His only son Jesus Christ to die for the sin of mankind.  Jesus Christ has died for the sins of all and has risen from the dead. Those who call upon His name and trust in Him shall be saved.  It is only through faith that man will receive salvation.  

It is only through faith that you will believe that miracles did take place in the bible and that evolution have never setup the order that is all around us.


I  wish you the guys the best in your qwest for God.  Remember you were told the truth and refuse it because of the theories you were taught by your teachers and professors.

Take care guys.

Dan
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ejirolove30 on 30/05/2006 03:05:12
Luke 10:18-20, jim. There is a part in revelation that speaks about 1/3. I do not remember the exact verse.

Those are my last words, unfortunately this is a debate/conversation that I cannot win with words, it can only be by having faith without having all the proof. If that was the case, God will come down everyday on the earth and speak to man face to face.  It is by faith and only by faith in Jesus Christ shall all men be saved.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 30/05/2006 03:31:54
You've certainly hit the nail on the head there.

Faith is eveything...and yours is most certainly true and forthright. I am happy at the obvious comfortability factor that you have in your faith.

With others, their faith is of a different kind, but of equal determination..........perhaps scientific more than religious.

And you know what ?...YOU may be right...we just do not know !..though I understand in your subjectivity....you do know.

Men are the same as women, just inside out !
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: science_guy on 30/05/2006 19:33:21
quote:
If everything has to have a beginning who created god did he just pop up from nothing.

I dont believe anybody has answered this yet.

God transends dimensions, so therefore he has more than one dimension of time.  Assuming that he only has even 2 dimensions of time, that is still sufficient for this.  with one dimension of time, its a timeline.  With two, its a "timesquare" of sorts.  with the two directions, there are an infinite amount of directions of time to go, and therefore he has no creation event.

there are two different creationist theroys.

1) young earth creationist.  They say that earth was literally created in 6 days, along with the universe and all other things, including our galaxy.  That cannot be so, because our galaxy would have to be coming from a white hole, and that is obviously not true.

2) Old earth creationist.  This is my belief.  Earth is how old we believe it is, 4.6 billion years, and all scientific facts that we have found are true.  The Record of Nature and the Word of God are both true, since God created them both, and he cannot lie.  The only problem is human interpretation. Days, as we call them are 24 hours long, and the day metaphor is how long it seemed to God.  Since God can trancend dimensions, time is irrelevent to him.  

That is my argument, and I polightfully request that we have no heated debating, just conversation.

E=MC2... m=deg/360 X C... C= PiD

therefore E=deg/360 X 2(PiD)
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 30/05/2006 20:20:01
quote:
Originally posted by science_guy
2) Old earth creationist.  This is my belief.  Earth is how old we believe it is, 4.6 billion years, and all scientific facts that we have found are true.  The Record of Nature and the Word of God are both true, since God created them both, and he cannot lie.  The only problem is human interpretation. Days, as we call them are 24 hours long, and the day metaphor is how long it seemed to God.  Since God can trancend dimensions, time is irrelevent to him.  



If God is capable of all things, then why is he not capable of lying, and lying so well that we could never catch Him out?

As for the word of God, all we have is the word of man that he purports to be the word of God.

Ofcourse, the word of Man that purport to be the word of God, may indeed be the word of God, and indeed, maybe God is not lying – but what evidence do we have that these possibilities are indeed the reality?

quote:

God transends dimensions, so therefore he has more than one dimension of time.  Assuming that he only has even 2 dimensions of time, that is still sufficient for this.  with one dimension of time, its a timeline.  With two, its a "timesquare" of sorts.  with the two directions, there are an infinite amount of directions of time to go, and therefore he has no creation event.



Makes God sound very like a tachyon, except that has 3 dimensions of time, and only one of space (although that might be argued to be consistent with God's omnipresence, since if all space is compressed into one dimension, then to be everywhere you only need to be everywhere in that one dimension.

Ofcourse, there is a contradiction between omnipresence and freedom of movement, since you can only move to somewhere you are not, so if you are everywhere, you cannot actually move anywhere.  If God only exists in 1 dimension of space, then he can fairly easily be everywhere in space (but can move nowhere in space), but if He exists in two or more dimensions of time, then he may have a great deal of freedom of movement in time, but he most be absent from most of time, otherwise he would have to constrain his freedom of movement.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: spud on 30/05/2006 20:21:41
you guys are pathetic. while your sitting here trying to figure out if there is a god or not, kevin krupp is out on the loose corupting the minds of the elderly...thats right kevin krupp,

edited due to foul language
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: rosy on 30/05/2006 21:42:39
Spud:
Urmm... do you know something about Kevin Krupp that we don't? All I can see by him is a rather poorly argued post in favour of the God hypothesis which whilst it isn't saying anything either new or interesting, and certainly doesn't convince, doesn't appear to me to be particularly objectionable (compared, say, to your own..) and I'm especially confused by your reference to corrupting the minds of the elderly... do you mean us? Would you like to explain yourself (preferably in moderate terms so the mods don't take it down before anyone can read it..).
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: spud on 30/05/2006 22:25:43
DELETED TEXT DUE TO ETREME VILE PROVOCATIVE LANGUAGE TOWARDS ANOTHER MEMBER
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 30/05/2006 22:38:03
for anyone who is interested this is SPUDS info:

After what I just deleted this waste of space is most certainly NOT WELCOME here




IP address:                     69.145.88.53
Reverse DNS:                    host-69-145-88-53.grf-mt.client.bresnan.net.
Reverse DNS authenticity:       [Verified]
ASN:                            33588
ASN Name:                       BRESNAN-AS
IP range connectivity:          2
Registrar (per ASN):            ARIN
Country (per IP registrar):     US [United States]
Country Currency:               USD [United States Dollars]
Country IP Range:               69.144.0.0 to 69.145.255.255
Country fraud profile:          Normal
City (per outside source):      Great Falls, Montana
Private (internal) IP?          No
IP address registrar:           whois.arin.net
Known Proxy?                    No

.............................................

Men are the same as women, just inside out !
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 30/05/2006 22:39:26
And some more:

OrgName:    Bresnan Communications, LLC.
OrgID:      BRESN
Address:    One Manhattanville Rd
City:       Purchase
StateProv:  NY
PostalCode: 10577
Country:    US

ReferralServer: rwhois://rwhois.bresnan.net:4321

NetRange:   69.144.0.0 - 69.146.255.255
CIDR:       69.144.0.0/15, 69.146.0.0/16
NetName:    NET-CORE-BB-1
NetHandle:  NET-69-144-0-0-1
Parent:     NET-69-0-0-0-0
NetType:    Direct Allocation
NameServer: DNS1.BRESNAN.NET
NameServer: DNS2.BRESNAN.NET
Comment:    
RegDate:    2003-05-13
Updated:    2005-04-15

RTechHandle: BRESN1-ARIN
RTechName:   BCC Manager
RTechPhone:  +1-406-294-6600
RTechEmail:  ********@bresnan.com

OrgAbuseHandle: BOA2-ARIN
OrgAbuseName:   Bresnan OnLine - Abuse
OrgAbusePhone:  +1-919-319-8112
OrgAbuseEmail:  *****@bresnan.net

OrgTechHandle: BRESN1-ARIN
OrgTechName:   BCC Manager
OrgTechPhone:  +1-406-294-6600
OrgTechEmail:  ********@bresnan.com

# ARIN WHOIS database, last updated 2006-05-29 19:10
# Enter ? for additional hints on searching ARIN's WHOIS database.

Men are the same as women, just inside out !
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 30/05/2006 23:18:41
quote:
Originally posted by ariel

let me just clear things up
there is a god
FSM
visit www.venganza.org if you wish to find out more and quite possibly become a pastafarian like myself

it's sacrilicious!
(https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi11.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fa196%2Fbariel%2Ffsm.gif&hash=116f609c0f056f254741b55db917b1e9)



Continuing the lighter note on religious doctrine, here is another one favoured by some Mensans.

http://www.thebudgiecult.org/

(https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fbudgiecult.butterleypark.org.uk%2FImages%2FBudgieOff.gif&hash=8890cd203fe26406be2a1feb1a69f891)





George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: JimBob on 30/05/2006 23:59:23
I need to apologize to the group for getting hot under the collar about an extreme fundamentalist position their beliefs on this group, trying to change our minds from a family held position.

His belief is a meaningful to him as mine is to me. Having asked questions about my belief, and gone through much inquiry and self examination, the threat of someone who does not acknowledge the continually growing mythology of Christianity threatening my belief system (family do it too much) I became defensive an protective.

I was wrong to become defensive. It ceratainly does not reflect the values I say I hold.


The mind is like a parachute. It works best when open.  -- A. Einstein
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 31/05/2006 00:18:57
Well, as far as I can see there was no apology needed , required or expected...but seeing as you're apologizing anyway jimmy boy..then It's humbly accepted....truly though....no apology needed chum.

I would also like to apologise.......not for anything really...just to apologise...so.......sorry people !

Men are the same as women, just inside out !
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ukmicky on 31/05/2006 02:41:58
Well seeing as we are all in the mood for apologises i will try to think of something i can apologise for.

PS Jim as neil said, you have done nothing to apologise for.

Michael
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ukmicky on 31/05/2006 02:44:10
I'm really really sorry, but i just can't think of anything. its not fair why am i so good [:(][:)]

Michael
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: JimBob on 31/05/2006 02:48:58
WE HAVE FOUND GOD

Praise Michael?

[?]

The mind is like a parachute. It works best when open.  -- A. Einstein
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ukmicky on 31/05/2006 02:49:47
LOL

Michael
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: JimBob on 31/05/2006 02:52:38
About Dawn, Michael?

The mind is like a parachute. It works best when open.  -- A. Einstein
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: JimBob on 31/05/2006 04:17:29
quote:
Originally posted by science_guy

quote:
If everything has to have a beginning who created god did he just pop up from nothing.

I dont believe anybody has answered this yet.



There have been Gods since before history was written.

I think George is just trying to cause trouble [:D] [:D] [:D] - let's assume God doesn't lie!

quote:

God transends dimensions, so therefore he has more than one dimension of time.  Assuming that he only has even 2 dimensions of time, that is still sufficient for this.  with one dimension of time, its a timeline.  With two, its a "timesquare" of sorts.  with the two directions, there are an infinite amount of directions of time to go, and therefore he has no creation event.

there are two different creationist theroys.

1) young earth creationist.  They say that earth was literally created in 6 days, along with the universe and all other things, including our galaxy.  That cannot be so, because our galaxy would have to be coming from a white hole, and that is obviously not true.

2) Old earth creationist.  This is my belief.  Earth is how old we believe it is, 4.6 billion years, and all scientific facts that we have found are true.  The Record of Nature and the Word of God are both true, since God created them both, and he cannot lie.  The only problem is human interpretation. Days, as we call them are 24 hours long, and the day metaphor is how long it seemed to God.  Since God can trancend dimensions, time is irrelevent to him.  




It's behind door # 2, as you also believe.

As for WHY I believe, It is a lot of different things, but one of reasons is the singularity. As I understand it, Big Bang theory says that the universe was created from a single point of nothing. The math for it works very well going back until that instant of the bang itself. There the math falls apart. It is the absence of any reason for the big bang to occur that causes many people to find the causative effect to be God. Thus, the reasoning goes, god created the universe.

This is just one of the many reasons I believe in God. I would need to give you a life history for me to try to convey all of the reasons.

As for you, let me propose an test for you to perform. Try living without any religious or spiritual actions for 6 months, then with them for six months. Be rigorous in what you think and do. Then at the end of the year figure out which six months were the best for you.

Decide for yourself. The subject is not going to be resolved in this forum or in our collective minds. It is a personal experience and decission that everyone makes for themselves. My personal decision after 32 years was that God was real. Yours may be different.

Good luck.



The mind is like a parachute. It works best when open.  -- A. Einstein
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: science_guy on 31/05/2006 18:38:56
Very good post!

Im posting hugh ross's site, http://www.reasons.org/, where I learn all my arguments.  He can explain things for you better than I can.

Also, If you happen to live near L.A. County (Sorry U.K. Residents[:(]), you can go to his skeptics forum on certain dates at Sierra Madre Congregational Curch.

E=MC2... m=deg/360 X C... C= PiD

therefore E=deg/360 X 2(PiD)
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 31/05/2006 22:50:27
quote:
Originally posted by JimBob
As for WHY I believe, It is a lot of different things, but one of reasons is the singularity. As I understand it, Big Bang theory says that the universe was created from a single point of nothing. The math for it works very well going back until that instant of the bang itself. There the math falls apart. It is the absence of any reason for the big bang to occur that causes many people to find the causative effect to be God. Thus, the reasoning goes, god created the universe.



This leaves a number of problems.

Firstly, the Big Bang is merely a hypothesis, and no doubt will be subject to much modification at some future time.  There are cosmological models that do not include a Big Bang, and although they are not the most fashionable of hypothesis, but no-one has conclusively demonstrated them to be wrong.

Secondly, your argument assumes only that God existed at the point of the initial conditions, but not that He exists today.  In fact, your hypothesis seems to implicitly say that whether God does or does not exist today, He certainly does not play any part in the cosmos today.

Thirdly, and this is the biggest problem with trying to mix God and science, using God in such an argument is a cop-out – it may give a a possible reason why we cannot know more about what happened, but in doing so it implicitly slams the door in the face of any investigative scientist who is trying to extend the frontiers of knowledge beyond that point where you say 'beyond here lies God'.

quote:

This is just one of the many reasons I believe in God. I would need to give you a life history for me to try to convey all of the reasons.

As for you, let me propose an test for you to perform. Try living without any religious or spiritual actions for 6 months, then with them for six months. Be rigorous in what you think and do. Then at the end of the year figure out which six months were the best for you.

Decide for yourself. The subject is not going to be resolved in this forum or in our collective minds. It is a personal experience and decission that everyone makes for themselves. My personal decision after 32 years was that God was real. Yours may be different.



What you are suggesting is that a belief in God has an effect.  I never doubted that a belief in God was real, the question is whether God himself is real, not whether the belief is real.

Ofcourse, you might argue that from a pragmatic point of view, if the belief in God has a substantial placebo effect, then giving the patient a placebo is a as valid a cure for his ills as giving him a real drug (it may even sometimes be a better cure).  This is the dilemma often with creating pragmatic fictions, where the fiction has a positive personal or social value, but is nonetheless a fiction – do you continue the fiction because it has a positive effect, or do you undermine the fiction because of a commitment to physical truth, even if that truth may actually be socially or personally undesirable?



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: JimBob on 01/06/2006 00:52:42
I am not arguing anything. I am stating opinion, as all post concerning the question in play seemingly do.

I am describing a subjective experience, not an external fact. Eschatology (or the absence thereof) can be discussed at profoundly excruciating leingth without resolution. Logic's "home" is not in this discussion; logic obfuscates a straight up or down answer to the question at hand.

The question before us is as follows: (tony6789: 9 Feb, '06, this thread.)

quote:
Could God actually be real i mean i am a Christian but every piece of science we have today say he is not real. That raises the big quustion is He REAL
(bold is mine)

Can this be proven by Science?
No.

Does this mean there is no God?
No. Science just cannot prove it.

Will discussion resolve this?
No.

Can a human being resolve this question?
Individually and alone only, from their own perspective.



The mind is like a parachute. It works best when open.  -- A. Einstein
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 01/06/2006 16:08:32
big bang theory is more than a theory. it discribes accurately the..ummm...darn it! what waz it called!> :( ummm the thing where stars or galaxies r red shifted. and another thing this is ganna go a bit off topic. but lets just say the Bible is exact accurate. it gives hints of "people from the sky" they say that they came in "BIg structes" or in other words aleins visting them in U.F.O.s(spaceships) soif the Bible is accurate then that means for a faCT THAT ALEINS R REAL!  ha! take that u strong belivers! :)

NEVER! underestimate youth
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: daveshorts on 02/06/2006 12:54:26
Just some definitions of terms:

hypothesis - an idea with no support by evidence

theory - a hypothesis with supporting evidence

law - something that historically had lots of supporting evidence, and for reasons largely historical is considered important, if not necessarily right.

What is a law is jsut random, so scientifically everything is a theory, they just have varying amount of supporting evidence  ;)
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 02/06/2006 15:50:18
i think every 1 knows those terms...at least i hope...


NEVER! underestimate youth
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: science_guy on 02/06/2006 19:12:41
quote:
it gives hints of "people from the sky" they say that they came in "BIg structes" or in other words aleins visting them in U.F.O.s(spaceships) soif the Bible is accurate then that means for a faCT THAT ALEINS R REAL! ha! take that u strong belivers! :)

That is the problem of human interpretation.  What the bible is talking about could be anything, from advanced technology that was lost that humans had (atlantas maybe) or somthing like angels from heaven.

besides, Nobody has ever proven that Aliens aren't real.

E=MC2... m=deg/360 X C... C= PiD

therefore E=deg/360 X 2(PiD)
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Laith on 03/06/2006 05:18:24
quote:
Originally posted by science_guy

besides, Nobody has ever proven that Aliens aren't real.




I think no one can ever prove that aliens aren't real. If anything, the only thing we can prove is that they do exist.

Laith
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: CL on 06/06/2006 13:58:25
Jesus Said, take the evidence of which he has dne and has been layed before you, believe or dont, If you doubt in God, Then your mind is Lost, for the belief in God can be simple and can be Hard, It is said the bible was writtin by Man jesuses dicples, Moses and his people and was enterily inspired by God, Do not look upon the termoils that happen in life, for example some innocent childs murder, God is Fair and Loves all regardless, He gave us freewill. and sometimes ones choices affect others for example the rapist chose to rape the girl now the girl has to pay for his action as well as he will, take heed, but If that girl chooses to accept God and sees it was God that saved her from death, do you who have ittle faith still not believe? Many Women who are raped are killed, you talk about why does he not pervent somethings from happning  he prevented her from being slain, Now that same girl knows what it is like, and is more powerful then ever inspiring other rape victims to stay strong, and her words and einspiration has brought unto her the light of God, it is said with all that you ask of God  in his will it will be anwserd for every question you ask it will be anwserd, and jesus said layed unto us and the quest to discover gods mystery you must keep your eyes wide open and ears to to see the anwsers he has brought to you, and Listen well to the wisse teachings before you the Holy bible, written by Man inspired by God. Still in disbelief?
Jesus said take hold of the evidence of him and his doings and believe or dont, when so many share their stories, for a Woman casted into a dream saw a Man she once knew in years Past in front of her, and a voice said It will not be a boy but you will be happy either way, then years later everything that happned in that dream happned. accptthe evidence of God Or dont God left that choice to you., and the person who said "God is real Idiots, I tell you this My friend. you say you are a christian, Jesus said Love all and judge not, do not bee nticed by their unknowing, yfoor they are still lost in darkness and only they can go to and through the path to God, and you who believe must be their light so that they may see through the path
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 07/06/2006 05:57:50
are you people serious?

get a job.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: science_guy on 08/06/2006 18:30:06
Who are you asking?

If you are asking the people who believe in God, like myself, some do have a job, some have interest in science, like myself, and others are trying to do their job by preaching here.

If you are talking to the ones who dont, just polightly state your point, and they will decide whether to believe or not.

This topic was made to ask the point if God is real, and people should believe what they want to believe.  I may be wrong, but in my convictions and experiences, God is real to me.  And I sincerely hope that you will as well.  But i will not attempt to push it upon you, or make you feel guilty, and i will not aggressively make my point upon any of you.

Just because we post on this kind of topic doesn't mean we dont have a job.

E=MC2... m=deg/360 X C... C= PiD

therefore E=deg/360 X 2(PiD)
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 10/06/2006 23:09:38
you are taking me way too literal. my attempt to lighten up the mood of this thread has now failed. brevity is the sould of wit, but it always just gets me in trouble.

"get a job" to me is a very broad term similar to "get a life"...that is to say- just start doing something more important than this. its ironic because i am here too.

this time, by "are you people serious?" i actually mean all sides of this argument. everyone is talking in circles, when the faith people question the logic peoples faith they cant stick to logic to defend themselves, and when the logic people question the faith peoples logic they just profess even stronger faith. what a load. lets cure some diseases and think some new thoughts. not bicker about imaginary friends.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 12/06/2006 15:15:58
did god ever have a life???

NEVER! underestimate youth
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: science_guy on 12/06/2006 19:18:04
I logically try to profess my faith [:D]

And about God ever having a life, He does.  It's watching us.  And I dont think of God as an imaginary friend, but omnipresent and omnipotent.

E=MC2... m=deg/360 X C... C= PiD

therefore E=deg/360 X 2(PiD)
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 14/06/2006 15:57:25
waz he ever "mortal"

NEVER! underestimate youth
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: science_guy on 15/06/2006 19:16:28
well, That is a good question.  As the father or the Holy spirit, no.  But the third part of the trinity is the Son, Jesus.  he came as mortal and died for us, redeeming us for our sins.

E=MC2... m=deg/360 X C... C= PiD

therefore E=deg/360 X 2(PiD)
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 19/06/2006 15:22:13
ok it has come to my attention that there r certain...uhhh....writings that were in the original Bible were cut out as the Church deemed them "un worthy of the bible" things that the Church wouldn't like 2 mention any1 have ideas what these writongs could be????

NEVER! underestimate youth
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: leesw on 20/06/2006 02:25:05
Just a few websites to look over for this:

http://www.doesgodexist.org

and

http://www.illustramedia.com/umolinfo.htm

Does God exist?  (http://www.doesgodexist.org)
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Sungrazer on 21/06/2006 15:50:20
quote:
Originally posted by tony6789

ok it has come to my attention that there r certain...uhhh....writings that were in the original Bible were cut out as the Church deemed them "un worthy of the bible" things that the Church wouldn't like 2 mention any1 have ideas what these writongs could be????

NEVER! underestimate youth



The recently revealed Gospel of Judas, for example:

http://www.nationalgeographic.com/lostgospel/

And the Nag Hammadi Library, for another:

http://www.gnosis.org/naghamm/nhl.html
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 22/06/2006 14:48:55
it is crazy in'it?

NEVER! underestimate youth
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 26/06/2006 16:03:16
i guess noe 1 wants to post here any more

NEVER! underestimate youth
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 28/06/2006 02:55:27
"I refuse to prove that I exist," says God, "for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing."
    "But," says Man, "the Babel fish is a dead giveaway isn't it? It could not have evolved by chance. It proves that You exist, and so therefore, by Your own arguments, You don't. Q.E.D."
    "Oh dear," says God, "I hadn't thought of that," and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic.
    "Oh, that was easy," says Man, and for an encore goes on to prove that black is white and gets himself killed on the next zebra crossing. "


from the hitchhikers guide to the galaxy.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 29/06/2006 15:20:23
um may i ask what the heck a Babel fish is?

NEVER! underestimate youth
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 29/06/2006 17:58:08
You may ask, to which Gecko has referred you to 'The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy' (but then, I believe that you only got a second rate version on film in the USA, not the original radio broadcasts, so you may be excused for not knowing about this cult icon).

.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babel_fish
quote:

The Babel fish is a fictional species of fish in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams, who describes it like this:
quote:

The Babel fish is small, yellow and leechlike, and probably the oddest thing in the Universe. It feeds on brainwave energy received not from its own carrier but from those around it. It absorbs all unconscious mental frequencies from this brainwave energy to nourish itself with. It then excretes into the mind of its carrier a telepathic matrix formed by combining the conscious thought frequencies with nerve signals picked up from the speech centres of the brain which has supplied them. The practical upshot of all this is that if you stick a Babel fish in your ear you can instantly understand anything said to you in any form of language. The speech patterns you actually hear decode the brainwave matrix which has been fed into your mind by your Babel fish.





I was never myself a great fan of HG2G, but it is such a cult series in this country that it is difficult not to be familiar with some of its characters and ideas (I hesitate to use the word plot, because that is something is lacks to any great degree).

AltaVista named their automated language translator (http://babelfish.altavista.com/) babelfish after the fish in HG2G.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 30/06/2006 15:28:14
so its mythical or not real so that is not proof of god at all

NEVER! underestimate youth
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 30/06/2006 16:29:28
quote:
Originally posted by tony6789
ok it has come to my attention that there r certain...uhhh....writings that were in the original Bible were cut out as the Church deemed them "un worthy of the bible" things that the Church wouldn't like 2 mention any1 have ideas what these writongs could be????



The Bible has been rewritten several times, and still continues to regularly be revised (something that does not happen with the Koran, nor with the Old Testament Bible used by the Jews), but this does not normally remove whole sections of the Bible, it merely carefully substitutes for words and phrases which are seen as anachronistic, irrelevant, or maybe even uncomfortable for the more modern Church.

The very early Bible, at the birth of Christianity, is another matter.  At that time, neither the Jews nor the Christians had an authoritative compilation of the books that would later form the Bible.  There was a general body of folk tales and religious stores, and many books in circulation, in many different versions.  With the diaspora of the Jews (and later with the Christian underground movement) there was a fear that these collections of religious and folk stories would be lost, so there was an attempt to create a compilation of the major known works.  Clearly, they could not include everything, so much had to be left out.  Clearly, they wanted to created a cohesive body of work, so anything that did not fit into that model would be excluded from the final work.  Bear in mind that the early bible was not designed as an academic work, but something that would be read by any Jew or Christian, and so needed the simplicity of a Hollywood movie (it looks more complicated to us because it was written for an alien world), and so all of the nuances and contrary opinions were removed, just as they are removed from  Hollywood movie, but just as Hollywood movies still leave contradictions within their plot line (so long as they don't get in the way of the main story), so too this remained with the Bible.

The bigger problem then arose when different branches of Christianity started using different versions of the Bible.  It was not that The Church left out some sections, but that different branches of the Church included different sections, and so which version of the Bible you read identified you as 'one of us' or 'one of them'.  It is a little like which day of the week one regards as the Sabbath (the Bible does not actually say which is the Sabbath, but Christians, Jews, and Muslims have each chosen different days of the week).  During the period of the Inquisition in Spain, taking Saturday as your Sabbath was a very dangerous thing to be seen to be doing, as it labelled you as a Jew; and so too, reading the wrong version of the Bible would label you as the wrong kind of Christian.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 29/06/2006 15:20:23
um may i ask what the heck a Babel fish is?

NEVER! underestimate youth
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 29/06/2006 17:58:08
You may ask, to which Gecko has referred you to 'The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy' (but then, I believe that you only got a second rate version on film in the USA, not the original radio broadcasts, so you may be excused for not knowing about this cult icon).

.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babel_fish
quote:

The Babel fish is a fictional species of fish in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams, who describes it like this:
quote:

The Babel fish is small, yellow and leechlike, and probably the oddest thing in the Universe. It feeds on brainwave energy received not from its own carrier but from those around it. It absorbs all unconscious mental frequencies from this brainwave energy to nourish itself with. It then excretes into the mind of its carrier a telepathic matrix formed by combining the conscious thought frequencies with nerve signals picked up from the speech centres of the brain which has supplied them. The practical upshot of all this is that if you stick a Babel fish in your ear you can instantly understand anything said to you in any form of language. The speech patterns you actually hear decode the brainwave matrix which has been fed into your mind by your Babel fish.





I was never myself a great fan of HG2G, but it is such a cult series in this country that it is difficult not to be familiar with some of its characters and ideas (I hesitate to use the word plot, because that is something is lacks to any great degree).

AltaVista named their automated language translator (http://babelfish.altavista.com/) babelfish after the fish in HG2G.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 30/06/2006 15:28:14
so its mythical or not real so that is not proof of god at all

NEVER! underestimate youth
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 30/06/2006 16:29:28
quote:
Originally posted by tony6789
ok it has come to my attention that there r certain...uhhh....writings that were in the original Bible were cut out as the Church deemed them "un worthy of the bible" things that the Church wouldn't like 2 mention any1 have ideas what these writongs could be????



The Bible has been rewritten several times, and still continues to regularly be revised (something that does not happen with the Koran, nor with the Old Testament Bible used by the Jews), but this does not normally remove whole sections of the Bible, it merely carefully substitutes for words and phrases which are seen as anachronistic, irrelevant, or maybe even uncomfortable for the more modern Church.

The very early Bible, at the birth of Christianity, is another matter.  At that time, neither the Jews nor the Christians had an authoritative compilation of the books that would later form the Bible.  There was a general body of folk tales and religious stores, and many books in circulation, in many different versions.  With the diaspora of the Jews (and later with the Christian underground movement) there was a fear that these collections of religious and folk stories would be lost, so there was an attempt to create a compilation of the major known works.  Clearly, they could not include everything, so much had to be left out.  Clearly, they wanted to created a cohesive body of work, so anything that did not fit into that model would be excluded from the final work.  Bear in mind that the early bible was not designed as an academic work, but something that would be read by any Jew or Christian, and so needed the simplicity of a Hollywood movie (it looks more complicated to us because it was written for an alien world), and so all of the nuances and contrary opinions were removed, just as they are removed from  Hollywood movie, but just as Hollywood movies still leave contradictions within their plot line (so long as they don't get in the way of the main story), so too this remained with the Bible.

The bigger problem then arose when different branches of Christianity started using different versions of the Bible.  It was not that The Church left out some sections, but that different branches of the Church included different sections, and so which version of the Bible you read identified you as 'one of us' or 'one of them'.  It is a little like which day of the week one regards as the Sabbath (the Bible does not actually say which is the Sabbath, but Christians, Jews, and Muslims have each chosen different days of the week).  During the period of the Inquisition in Spain, taking Saturday as your Sabbath was a very dangerous thing to be seen to be doing, as it labelled you as a Jew; and so too, reading the wrong version of the Bible would label you as the wrong kind of Christian.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 07/07/2006 04:38:35
they should of had left it as it waz


NEVER! underestimate youth
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 07/07/2006 14:30:35
quote:
Originally posted by tony6789
they should of had left it as it waz



As it 'waz' when?

The Christians themselves inherited the Old Testament from the Jews, who inherited many of the stories from pre-Jewish traditions.  You might well have to be reading some of your Bible in cuneiform script, in the old Mesopotamian languages, and maybe some from Egyptian Hieroglyphs, and many other scripts and languages.

Once Christianity was accepted as the official religion of the Roman Empire, then the Bible was all converted to Latin and Greek (not sure which is the older version, since after the fission of Catholic and Orthodox Churches, the west used the Latin Bible, and the East used the Greek Bible)..

The question about whether the Bible should remain in Latin, or be translated into the vernacular, so that ordinary people could read it in their own languages, was one of the major issues that split the Church church in the late middle ages, leading to the reformation.

One of the criticisms some people have of the Koran is that it is in Arabic, which may be fine for those people for whom Arabic is their first language, but it limits the ability of people who do not speak Arabic as a native language to fully understand it.  The counter argument ofcourse is that since the Koran remains in its original language, it has not been subject to the distortion of translation (although, ofcourse, the Koran inherited much of its material from the Bible, and so there is a translation step there, just as the Bible had its own translations from the pre-biblical stories that it inherited).



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 07/07/2006 22:30:36
yes az it waz!!! *sticking toungue out*

NEVER! underestimate youth
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Flat-Liner on 25/07/2006 06:32:48
 How can you just [be] and then create off of your self? "god created all"...how?
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: 4getmenot on 27/07/2006 05:15:45
how did god get created???

k
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 27/07/2006 18:18:44
he didnt
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: 4getmenot on 28/07/2006 05:32:41
then how did god come to be??

k
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 29/07/2006 03:02:18
he didnt
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: 4getmenot on 29/07/2006 19:05:49
if he didn't then how can he "be" ???? if he was never created or never came to be then how did he get anywhere???

k
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 29/07/2006 20:30:56
What Gecko I think is saying is that there is no God, and therefore the issue of how he was created does not arise.

Perfectly valid argument, since there is no way of proving the existence of a God, one cannot argue conclusively against His supposed non-existence.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: 4getmenot on 27/07/2006 05:15:45
how did god get created???

k
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 27/07/2006 18:18:44
he didnt
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: 4getmenot on 28/07/2006 05:32:41
then how did god come to be??

k
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 29/07/2006 03:02:18
he didnt
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: 4getmenot on 29/07/2006 19:05:49
if he didn't then how can he "be" ???? if he was never created or never came to be then how did he get anywhere???

k
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 29/07/2006 20:30:56
What Gecko I think is saying is that there is no God, and therefore the issue of how he was created does not arise.

Perfectly valid argument, since there is no way of proving the existence of a God, one cannot argue conclusively against His supposed non-existence.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 31/07/2006 14:56:34
we will find out soon as u would know if watch the news. they say the israli bible is unfolding be4 our eyes

NEVER! underestimate youth
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 03/08/2006 06:05:04
At the moment no evidence for god exists. One thing is true though religion does exist and it's insipid.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Acoustic Samurai on 03/08/2006 20:41:35
I had breakfast with God yesterday,
Omelets as a matter of fact.
And he said i have pretty eyes.

        -Timmy-

"Science Rules"

            Bill Nye The    
             Science Guy
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 04/08/2006 18:28:15
since most famous atheists are more well spoken than me- heres a neat list of quotes i found.
http://www.chrisbeach.co.uk/viewquotes.php

my favorite is "if atheism is a religion, than not playing cards is a hobby"

this resonates with me, because a real atheist(rather than just a fallen-from-faith faux atheist, like so many are) doesnt walk the earth thinking about how god doesnt exist all the time, he doesnt pray to science. its not compareable to religion. he thinks about actual life, love, and other observable things instead. hes not plagued by god whatsoever- he doesnt even think about it!

what freedom!

anyway, i hope that shows some perspective for you blind-faithers.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 04/08/2006 18:29:12
http://www.chrisbeach.co.uk/viewQuotes.php
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 04/08/2006 19:08:40
quote:
Originally posted by gecko

since most famous atheists are more well spoken than me- heres a neat list of quotes i found.
http://www.chrisbeach.co.uk/viewquotes.php

my favorite is "if atheism is a religion, than not playing cards is a hobby"

this resonates with me, because a real atheist(rather than just a fallen-from-faith faux atheist, like so many are) doesnt walk the earth thinking about how god doesnt exist all the time, he doesnt pray to science. its not compareable to religion. he thinks about actual life, love, and other observable things instead. hes not plagued by god whatsoever- he doesnt even think about it!

what freedom!

anyway, i hope that shows some perspective for you blind-faithers.



I think you are confusing atheism (a non-belief in God) with a lack of religion.

Buddhism is a religion that has no God – so they are at once atheists but yet are religious.

I would myself regard many forms of communism as a religion – although they were, in most of the extreme cases, militant atheists.

I would say that one of the defining issues of a religion is an intolerance of competing religions.  If you really do not have a religion, then you have nothing to fear from any religion, because that religion is not in competition with you.  The fact that communism was intolerant of religion was one of the criteria I would use to suggest that it was in competition with other religions, and thus a religion in its own right.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 04/08/2006 22:06:31
youre correct that non-religious is not the same as atheist. but in this thread where only the abrahmaic and muslim god have been brought up, its easy confuse the 2.

i dont fully agree that if youre not religious, than youre not being threatened by any religion. this is the way it should be, in a perfect world, however... being a life long non-theist, people are constantly trying to convert me. religion is so widespread that it cant just be ignored, even though i desperately feel it should. i used to always say "im not religious" which NEVER failed to spark an uncomfortable conversation. finally i just switched to "im atheist" because it scares people a little more and theyre less likely to continue bothering me.

its interesting you bring up communism, because i am some sort of leftist, probably more of an anarcho-syndicalist. communism, as it is written, doesnt say much about religion. the quote from marx is

"Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people."

stating simply religion is counter-revolutionary because it makes people more likely to accept their opression. he didnt say anything more about it.

of course i am sticking to the original doctines, because communism has been ruined forever by the likes of mao and stalin. the way they applied it, more of a state oligarchy, yes, they were in competition with religion. i believe they had their own agenda beyond communism, but communism as written isnt a religion any more than capitalism is.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 05/08/2006 00:16:15
Yes, the term “Religion is the opium of the people” is a quote so well known that it has become almost cliché.

The fact that communists do not class themselves as a religion does not of itself make it so.

As I said, there are leftist that do not go as far as Karl Marx, let alone the personality cults of Stalin and Mao (although one might substantially say that a personality cult has also arisen around Karl Marx, even though he may not have sought it in the way that Stalin and Mao did).  There are many socialists, and even communists, who believe there is no contradiction between their Christian values and militant communism – namely Liberation theology.

That religion is counter-revolutionary depends upon whether it is in a position of power or not.  Christians can be just as revolutionary as any communist, if they are not in a position of power.  Exactly the same could be said of communists – they are revolutionary only until they obtain power, and then seek to oppress other revolutions that might displace them from power.

That religion can be an opiate is true, but so can communism.  There are communists who have endured hardship for their cause, and so it must be regarded that the cause can make hardship more tolerable, just as Christianity can.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 05/08/2006 01:39:36
God real or not. My opinion "not"

If you get hold of a BBC mini series called "the atheism tapes" where Jonathan Miller talks to The late Arthur Miller, Colin McGinn, Steven Weinberg, Richard Dawkins, Denys Turner and Daniel Dennet then I would recommend you watch them. I found them very thought provoking and interesting conversations.

link below is to the bbc page concerning this series


http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcfour/documentaries/features/atheism-tapes.shtml

Steven
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 05/08/2006 18:07:13
i didnt say communism wasnt a religion simply because it doesnt class itself as one. youre stating an argument i never made and then disprooving it. i know i said this before, twice, but im done with this. arguing left wing politics on a thread about gods existance is pretty far off. i know i exacerbated it, so sorry.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 06/08/2006 03:39:58
quote:
Originally posted by another_someone

Yes, the term “Religion is the opium of the people” is a quote so well known that it has become almost cliché.





Isn't the quote "Religion is the opium of the masses".

In the end it kind of means the same I guess.

Steven
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: TeapotTheist on 10/08/2006 10:03:44
quote:
Originally posted by ejirolove30

Humans were created 6000 yrs ago.



Preposterous statement, disproven by all the scientific evidence (fossils, genetics etc.)




Faith is not a virtue
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 10/08/2006 12:25:39
Yep.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: TeapotTheist on 10/08/2006 17:39:26
quote:
Originally posted by tony6789

SO i guess no 1 will really know till they die huh?


A good and quite funny(!) book, suitable for kids, certain
to answer many of your questions, although mostly scientific ones:
Bill Bryson "A Short History of Nearly Everything".
Well, I enjoyed it...

---------------------
Faith is not a virtue
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 11/08/2006 13:09:07
I have that book. My brother is reading it at the moment.


Steven
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: rcoyle13 on 14/08/2006 23:29:58
Listen: God is real.

Or do you not see and feel the Sun. I suppose this worldis simply chance?  Evolution by Chance. Not a very strong argument.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: vetteluv on 15/08/2006 03:48:20
Hey folks, just stumbled onto this forum and found myself fascinated by all the different points of view on this subject. I would like to add a couple, hopefully their not too redundant.

1. Of all the posts I've read, I've read nothing that mentions faith. While faith is probably one of the most unscientific concepts we have, it is one of the strongest markers of ones belief in a religion / god. It's really just the ability to believe w/out proof.
2. There are many stories in the bible about having faith in God, as well as God testing the faith of believers. If someone proved or disproved God's existance w/science, it seems that you would be eliminating one of the foundational concepts of the the bible which is faith.

I too have spent alot of time researching and studying this (i'm hear, ain't i)because I would like to find the truth. I do believe in God not because I have emperical scientific evidence, but because I've been taught to have faith. Faith does not exist to discount science, but science is used quite often to discount faith.
I think it's funny that when people are at their most desperate moment before death, such as a 500 m.p.h. vertical nosedive in a crashing plane, they some how abandon the scientific method for faith just long enough to to get in one "can you please save my as- Lord prayer".

Dennis
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 15/08/2006 18:48:47
quote:
Originally posted by rcoyle13

Listen: God is real.

Or do you not see and feel the Sun. I suppose this worldis simply chance?  Evolution by Chance. Not a very strong argument.



I see the sun because of rods and cones in the retina of my eye which link to the optic nerve and then to the occiptal lobe which deals with the information, thus I see an image.

I feel the sun because of heat receptors in my skin which once again transmit information to the brain.

You saying evolution by chance is not a very strong argument just proves you know absolutely nothing about evolution. Read the origin of species a few times and don't just listen to intelligent design/creationist propaganda.

I am an atheist and I feel religion and to some extent believing in god can be harmful. I however don't attack people who believe in god because most are harmless and quite nice infact.

However, when people attack science because they are overly religious when they don't even have any evidence, just a contradictory book of fiction, it does bother me.

You may post your archaic and anti-scientific views somewhere else.

Here perhaps http://www.groupsrv.com/religion/


Steven
_______________________________________________________________
In a time of universal deceit - telling the truth is a revolutionary act.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Carolyn on 15/08/2006 21:42:08
quote:
Originally posted by Mjhavok

quote:
Originally posted by rcoyle13

Listen: God is real.

Or do you not see and feel the Sun. I suppose this worldis simply chance?  Evolution by Chance. Not a very strong argument.



I see the sun because of rods and cones in the retina of my eye which link to the optic nerve and then to the occiptal lobe which deals with the information, thus I see an image.

I feel the sun because of heat receptors in my skin which once again transmit information to the brain.

You saying evolution by chance is not a very strong argument just proves you know absolutely nothing about evolution. Read the origin of species a few times and don't just listen to intelligent design/creationist propaganda.

I am an atheist and I feel religion and to some extent believing in god can be harmful. I however don't attack people who believe in god because most are harmless and quite nice infact.

However, when people attack science because they are overly religious when they don't even have any evidence, just a contradictory book of fiction, it does bother me.

You may post your archaic and anti-scientific views somewhere else.

Here perhaps http://www.groupsrv.com/religion/


Steven
_______________________________________________________________
In a time of universal deceit - telling the truth is a revolutionary act.



Steven - I'm just curious, in your last two sentences, are you addressing rcoyle13, or all Christians in general?

Carolyn
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: RMorty on 15/08/2006 22:36:38
quote:
Originally posted by vetteluv

I think it's funny that when people are at their most desperate moment before death, such as a 500 m.p.h. vertical nosedive in a crashing plane, they some how abandon the scientific method for faith just long enough to to get in one "can you please save my as- Lord prayer".



 I like that, because it's true, that does seem to be how it works. Yes, it is funny.  But I guess most people are raised with "Oh god" as a regular saying when something bad happens sort of like saying "oh [place four letter word here]!!"

I agree with vetteluv, this thread is awesome because of the low numbers of pointless posts.

  Here's my two cents.... I respect other's religious beliefs, finding them harmless most of the time. However, it's when you get millions of people believing what is right without any reasoning, especially in politics that it becomes a problem.

 The bible is two thousand years old and it has never been revised.  We update everything. Our computers, textbooks, cars, electronics, clothing styles, power systems. I know this may anger a lot of religious fanatics, but perhaps it's time for a new edition.  Two thousand years ago world population was around a quarter billion now it’s over 6 billion. So yes, when Jesus was walking the earth(a good guy I might add, he fed people fish and gave them alcohol) they needed people to reproduce, people weren't living to be eighty years old, we didn’t have the same medicine as today, so no wonder the bible forbids abortions and homosexuality, they wanted all able people to reproduce. Today it's different we have an overpopulated planet and it's not getting any bigger. I say again, maybe its time for a new edition.  Religion was an excellent way to control people back then by making answers that can't be questioned without being executed.

  As far as the possibility of god, I'd say it’s extremely possible because science hasn't figured out origins of the universe for example, the big bang theory, including the things with matter and antimatter. Whatever the theory, it raises one question... where did that big ball of matter that exploded come from?  Where did the unthinkable amount of energy needed to make matter and antimatter atoms come from?  We don't know....  if religious fanatics say "oh well god exists because he is necessary and never had a beginning or an end and just is because he must be" then the non-believers say "well then how do you know the universe isn't existent just because it is?"

  Now let me get to my point, I said earlier I believe god is very possible.... HOWEVER... I don't imagine this god being anything like "an invisible man -- living in the sky -- who watches everything you do, every minute of every day. And the invisible man has a special list of ten things he does not want you to do..And if you do any of these ten things, he has a special place, full of fire and smoke and burning and torture and anguish, where he will send you to live and suffer and burn and choke and scream and cry forever and ever 'til the end of time! ..But He loves you"(George Carlin[Napalm and Silly Putty])  I would say this god would be an invisible man living in the sky who created the universe because he can, and not only is this god the creator of the universe but himself has a creator and that which created this god has a beginning and he dosen't give a damn about earth we're just another little ball of mold floating around a star and so on... But not some dude who's like "worship me and let your planet get cluster-****ed with 7 billion people because homosexuality and abortion are wrong and if you do you can live with me forever worshipping me with every moment of eternity.

  I think religion is only making overpopulation worse. I respect the fact that every one of us, each person reading this, was at one time an embryo, but abortion on a small cluster of cells, would be no more killing a human being than if I cut the tip of my finger off with a meat slicer and tossed it in the garbage. I do however disagree with later stage abortion when there is brain activity, but before it gets advanced there is no good reason why abortion isn't okay. I personally am not for the idea of homosexuality simply because I am straight, but I really don't care. In theory, you have couples who PHYSICALLY CANNOT HAVE KIDS and they are willing to adopt children who need families. I have heard some studies say children raised by two same gendered parents grow up no differently if not better than ones with both.

 I am aware of how much I contradict myself in my post but I simply do that to 1. Keep an open mind and 2. Be a step ahead of those wanting to make contradicting points... although I do try to make my personal opinion clear.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 16/08/2006 00:06:16
quote:
Originally posted by RMorty
 The bible is two thousand years old and it has never been revised.



Sorry, but this statement is categorically wrong – when did you last read the old testament in Aramaic, or even the new testament in Latin?

Then again, Muslims have their own updated version of the bible (OK, it is still about 1,400 years old, but still newer that 2,000 years).

The English version of the bible has been regularly updated.  Not even the King James' version is any longer what most people refer to.

Ofcourse, most of the major revisions have been a consequence of a schism in the Church (Martin Luther being a prime example, splitting the church over his attempt to have the bible translated into the vernacular, as well as some issues with papal power).

Ofcourse, other new religions, such as Scientology, also keep springing up; and the Mormons had their own particular update of the bible.

There is nothing that prevents you from drafting a revised bible, or even to completely rewrite the bible from scratch (after all, if L. Ron Hubbard can create a new religion, so can you).  The problem you have is that Christianity has a 2000 year head start on you, and has a large established user base that may not immediately wish to throw away its long established systems, systems that millions of people are comfortable with, for the new and untested invention you may have in mind).

quote:

So yes, when Jesus was walking the earth(a good guy I might add, he fed people fish and gave them alcohol) they needed people to reproduce, people weren't living to be eighty years old, we didn’t have the same medicine as today, so no wonder the bible forbids abortions and homosexuality, they wanted all able people to reproduce. Today it's different we have an overpopulated planet and it's not getting any bigger.



Not even sure that the bible does forbid abortion – not sure it was actually an issue that was raised in biblical times.  The prohibition on homosexuality is there, as is the prohibition on masturbation for men (although it is not at all clear to me that the story of Tamar and Onan is really about masturbation so much as about a woman's right to bear children, but it has subsequently been interpreted as being a prohibition on masturbation).

I don;t actually believe we are overpopulated.  What is true is that in the aftermath of industrialisation, increasingly most labour in human society is undertaken by machines rather than by human beings, and so the wealth of human societies is no longer linked to its population of humans, but rather associated to its population of machines (it is interesting that no-one argues that the world is overpopulated with machines, although there are probably more machines out there than people, and the energy and raw material consumption of those machines is far in excess of the energy and raw material usage of human beings – the only machines people tend to be sometimes concerned about are motor cars).

Ofcourse, you are always at liberty to start a religion that forbids procreation (there certainly has been many past religious societies that have demanded their members abstain from sexual practices, which inevitably means that their members did not have children).



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 16/08/2006 00:20:23
quote:
Steven - I'm just curious, in your last two sentences, are you addressing rcoyle13, or all Christians in general?

Carolyn



I was addressing rcoyle13 and people who attack science without any kind of evidence or facts behind them. I know people who believe in god and I have friends who do so. It is their right to believe in what they want.

Steven
_______________________________________________________________
In a time of universal deceit - telling the truth is a revolutionary act.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: RMorty on 16/08/2006 05:51:11
quote:

Not even sure that the bible does forbid abortion – not sure it was actually an issue that was raised in biblical times.  The prohibition on homosexuality is there....



I understand what you mean by it dosen't directly forbid abortion because, as far as I know they didn't have it then and no where in the bible is the word abortion. However, it says you should not kill and many people interpret abortions as "Murdering babies" and then the religions look at it as a violation of religious rules.

quote:

Ofcourse, you are always at liberty to start a religion that forbids procreation (there certainly has been many past religious societies that have demanded their members abstain from sexual practices, which inevitably means that their members did not have children).



  No, I don't agree with saying that people shouldn't be allowed to reproduce, that's everyone's right. All I was saying is that there are things that could assist the issue of overpopulation and homosexuality and abortions are among them.  I hope everyone understands where I am coming from with this.

  All of my statements are with the assumption that religion was created to control people and I was simply trying to point out some possible explanations of why certain things in the bible are what they are.

  Also to anwser one of your questions the last time I read any version of the bible is never, sorry.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 16/08/2006 08:16:19
quote:
Originally posted by RMorty
I understand what you mean by it dosen't directly forbid abortion because, as far as I know they didn't have it then and no where in the bible is the word abortion. However, it says you should not kill and many people interpret abortions as "Murdering babies" and then the religions look at it as a violation of religious rules.



But this does not prevent most of them from going to war.

There is a very selective interpretation of 'Thou shall not kill'.  To be fair, I suspect the original was far more selective (it certainly was not written in English, and has been subject to translation, and the losses that that imposes).  I suspect the original was more along the lines of 'Thou shall not commit murder' (analogous with the prohibition 'Thou shall not steal'.

quote:

  No, I don't agree with saying that people shouldn't be allowed to reproduce, that's everyone's right. All I was saying is that there are things that could assist the issue of overpopulation and homosexuality and abortions are among them.  I hope everyone understands where I am coming from with this.

  All of my statements are with the assumption that religion was created to control people and I was simply trying to point out some possible explanations of why certain things in the bible are what they are.



The problem is that the reason people like religion is precisely because that sort of simple control absolves them from the responsibility of complex uncertainty and ambiguity of morality.

quote:

  Also to anwser one of your questions the last time I read any version of the bible is never, sorry.



I am an atheist - I do not avidly read the bible myself, and have never read it cover to cover; but I am interested in history and in human behaviour, and you cannot really understand either unless you are at least a little familiar with the religious texts that humans use.  It is true that for obvious cultural reasons, I am more familiar with the Bibles than with the Koran, or other religious texts; although they are all in their own way equally as significant in the understanding of past and present human behaviour.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: RMorty on 20/08/2006 05:01:35
I agree with you on this, good discussion.  Thanks for pointing out some of those things, Another_Somone.

  Also, I have heard rumors. Only rumors, that the government has scientifically proven over almost a century of work and research that the existence of god, I mean any god is impossible.  The suspicious part is that the rumor includes that the government won't take it public because it would, for lack of a better way of putting it, piss a lot of people off.  Yes, it would. But the complexity of the possibility of being able to scientifically disprove it would be hard to agree with.  That's the problem with this topic is it's hard to say for sure that a god is impossible and on the contrary its hard to say for sure that a god is real.  That's why I say I am agnostic. For those who aren't familiar with agnosticsm it is basically beleiving that the possibility of god isnt impossible but you would need real proof to beleive it Ie. Jesus floats down from the sky ina column of light one night when your sitting in the back of your pickup truck discussing why god can't be real with your buddy after work, then he stands there and says "Okay guys I'm real so you can stop talking **** about me now.....". Then floats back up.

P.S. Isn't his 2000 year return time up yet?
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 23/08/2006 23:17:40
I watched a DVD of the comedian Bill Hicks and he talks about the return of christ and the fact that catholics wear crosses. He basically states that if jesus did come back to earth the last thing he would want to see is a cross. How true.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 23/08/2006 23:17:40
I watched a DVD of the comedian Bill Hicks and he talks about the return of christ and the fact that catholics wear crosses. He basically states that if jesus did come back to earth the last thing he would want to see is a cross. How true.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: 4getmenot on 25/08/2006 01:37:38
quote:
Originally posted by RMorty

quote:
Originally posted by vetteluv

I think it's funny that when people are at their most desperate moment before death, such as a 500 m.p.h. vertical nosedive in a crashing plane, they some how abandon the scientific method for faith just long enough to to get in one "can you please save my as- Lord prayer".



 I like that, because it's true, that does seem to be how it works. Yes, it is funny.  But I guess most people are raised with "Oh god" as a regular saying when something bad happens sort of like saying "oh [place four letter word here]!!"

I agree with vetteluv, this thread is awesome because of the low numbers of pointless posts.

  Here's my two cents.... I respect other's religious beliefs, finding them harmless most of the time. However, it's when you get millions of people believing what is right without any reasoning, especially in politics that it becomes a problem.

 The bible is two thousand years old and it has never been revised.  We update everything. Our computers, textbooks, cars, electronics, clothing styles, power systems. I know this may anger a lot of religious fanatics, but perhaps it's time for a new edition.  Two thousand years ago world population was around a quarter billion now it’s over 6 billion. So yes, when Jesus was walking the earth(a good guy I might add, he fed people fish and gave them alcohol) they needed people to reproduce, people weren't living to be eighty years old, we didn’t have the same medicine as today, so no wonder the bible forbids abortions and homosexuality, they wanted all able people to reproduce. Today it's different we have an overpopulated planet and it's not getting any bigger. I say again, maybe its time for a new edition.  Religion was an excellent way to control people back then by making answers that can't be questioned without being executed.

  As far as the possibility of god, I'd say it’s extremely possible because science hasn't figured out origins of the universe for example, the big bang theory, including the things with matter and antimatter. Whatever the theory, it raises one question... where did that big ball of matter that exploded come from?  Where did the unthinkable amount of energy needed to make matter and antimatter atoms come from?  We don't know....  if religious fanatics say "oh well god exists because he is necessary and never had a beginning or an end and just is because he must be" then the non-believers say "well then how do you know the universe isn't existent just because it is?"

  Now let me get to my point, I said earlier I believe god is very possible.... HOWEVER... I don't imagine this god being anything like "an invisible man -- living in the sky -- who watches everything you do, every minute of every day. And the invisible man has a special list of ten things he does not want you to do..And if you do any of these ten things, he has a special place, full of fire and smoke and burning and torture and anguish, where he will send you to live and suffer and burn and choke and scream and cry forever and ever 'til the end of time! ..But He loves you"(George Carlin[Napalm and Silly Putty])  I would say this god would be an invisible man living in the sky who created the universe because he can, and not only is this god the creator of the universe but himself has a creator and that which created this god has a beginning and he dosen't give a damn about earth we're just another little ball of mold floating around a star and so on... But not some dude who's like "worship me and let your planet get cluster-****ed with 7 billion people because homosexuality and abortion are wrong and if you do you can live with me forever worshipping me with every moment of eternity.

  I think religion is only making overpopulation worse. I respect the fact that every one of us, each person reading this, was at one time an embryo, but abortion on a small cluster of cells, would be no more killing a human being than if I cut the tip of my finger off with a meat slicer and tossed it in the garbage. I do however disagree with later stage abortion when there is brain activity, but before it gets advanced there is no good reason why abortion isn't okay. I personally am not for the idea of homosexuality simply because I am straight, but I really don't care. In theory, you have couples who PHYSICALLY CANNOT HAVE KIDS and they are willing to adopt children who need families. I have heard some studies say children raised by two same gendered parents grow up no differently if not better than ones with both.

 I am aware of how much I contradict myself in my post but I simply do that to 1. Keep an open mind and 2. Be a step ahead of those wanting to make contradicting points... although I do try to make my personal opinion clear.





The bible is a story...Adam and Eve are only a concept....an idea of what people are supposed to be like...the ten commandments are also an idea of how people should act or not act like or do or not do etc... when the bible was written EVERYTHING would have appeared to be a miricle since noone knew any better. like what weather was for instance...yeah maybe it did rain for 40 days, but in Oregon it is not called a miricle today right?? The virgin mary having this miraculas child...well back then women who were not married were "called" "virgins". So basically it was a women having a child out of wedlock. The bible has been revised and rewritten many times only put into more "readable or understanable" terms and different languages, seems like a shame that a man made establishement can determine what chapters are put into this bible story and which ones THEY want left out of it huh?? Almost everything the bible talks about can be explained today since science and humanity has grown and become smarter. The things thus far unexplained are only a matter of time to be figured out. As for faith well..to each thier own and there is nothing wrong with it...If you take the good from ALLLLLLLLLL the different religions and just try to live your life with that then it could be a better worl to live IN. Nothing wrong with the "concept" of being good to eachother in life.

k
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 23/08/2006 23:17:40
I watched a DVD of the comedian Bill Hicks and he talks about the return of christ and the fact that catholics wear crosses. He basically states that if jesus did come back to earth the last thing he would want to see is a cross. How true.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: 4getmenot on 25/08/2006 01:37:38
quote:
Originally posted by RMorty

quote:
Originally posted by vetteluv

I think it's funny that when people are at their most desperate moment before death, such as a 500 m.p.h. vertical nosedive in a crashing plane, they some how abandon the scientific method for faith just long enough to to get in one "can you please save my as- Lord prayer".



 I like that, because it's true, that does seem to be how it works. Yes, it is funny.  But I guess most people are raised with "Oh god" as a regular saying when something bad happens sort of like saying "oh [place four letter word here]!!"

I agree with vetteluv, this thread is awesome because of the low numbers of pointless posts.

  Here's my two cents.... I respect other's religious beliefs, finding them harmless most of the time. However, it's when you get millions of people believing what is right without any reasoning, especially in politics that it becomes a problem.

 The bible is two thousand years old and it has never been revised.  We update everything. Our computers, textbooks, cars, electronics, clothing styles, power systems. I know this may anger a lot of religious fanatics, but perhaps it's time for a new edition.  Two thousand years ago world population was around a quarter billion now it’s over 6 billion. So yes, when Jesus was walking the earth(a good guy I might add, he fed people fish and gave them alcohol) they needed people to reproduce, people weren't living to be eighty years old, we didn’t have the same medicine as today, so no wonder the bible forbids abortions and homosexuality, they wanted all able people to reproduce. Today it's different we have an overpopulated planet and it's not getting any bigger. I say again, maybe its time for a new edition.  Religion was an excellent way to control people back then by making answers that can't be questioned without being executed.

  As far as the possibility of god, I'd say it’s extremely possible because science hasn't figured out origins of the universe for example, the big bang theory, including the things with matter and antimatter. Whatever the theory, it raises one question... where did that big ball of matter that exploded come from?  Where did the unthinkable amount of energy needed to make matter and antimatter atoms come from?  We don't know....  if religious fanatics say "oh well god exists because he is necessary and never had a beginning or an end and just is because he must be" then the non-believers say "well then how do you know the universe isn't existent just because it is?"

  Now let me get to my point, I said earlier I believe god is very possible.... HOWEVER... I don't imagine this god being anything like "an invisible man -- living in the sky -- who watches everything you do, every minute of every day. And the invisible man has a special list of ten things he does not want you to do..And if you do any of these ten things, he has a special place, full of fire and smoke and burning and torture and anguish, where he will send you to live and suffer and burn and choke and scream and cry forever and ever 'til the end of time! ..But He loves you"(George Carlin[Napalm and Silly Putty])  I would say this god would be an invisible man living in the sky who created the universe because he can, and not only is this god the creator of the universe but himself has a creator and that which created this god has a beginning and he dosen't give a damn about earth we're just another little ball of mold floating around a star and so on... But not some dude who's like "worship me and let your planet get cluster-****ed with 7 billion people because homosexuality and abortion are wrong and if you do you can live with me forever worshipping me with every moment of eternity.

  I think religion is only making overpopulation worse. I respect the fact that every one of us, each person reading this, was at one time an embryo, but abortion on a small cluster of cells, would be no more killing a human being than if I cut the tip of my finger off with a meat slicer and tossed it in the garbage. I do however disagree with later stage abortion when there is brain activity, but before it gets advanced there is no good reason why abortion isn't okay. I personally am not for the idea of homosexuality simply because I am straight, but I really don't care. In theory, you have couples who PHYSICALLY CANNOT HAVE KIDS and they are willing to adopt children who need families. I have heard some studies say children raised by two same gendered parents grow up no differently if not better than ones with both.

 I am aware of how much I contradict myself in my post but I simply do that to 1. Keep an open mind and 2. Be a step ahead of those wanting to make contradicting points... although I do try to make my personal opinion clear.





The bible is a story...Adam and Eve are only a concept....an idea of what people are supposed to be like...the ten commandments are also an idea of how people should act or not act like or do or not do etc... when the bible was written EVERYTHING would have appeared to be a miricle since noone knew any better. like what weather was for instance...yeah maybe it did rain for 40 days, but in Oregon it is not called a miricle today right?? The virgin mary having this miraculas child...well back then women who were not married were "called" "virgins". So basically it was a women having a child out of wedlock. The bible has been revised and rewritten many times only put into more "readable or understanable" terms and different languages, seems like a shame that a man made establishement can determine what chapters are put into this bible story and which ones THEY want left out of it huh?? Almost everything the bible talks about can be explained today since science and humanity has grown and become smarter. The things thus far unexplained are only a matter of time to be figured out. As for faith well..to each thier own and there is nothing wrong with it...If you take the good from ALLLLLLLLLL the different religions and just try to live your life with that then it could be a better worl to live IN. Nothing wrong with the "concept" of being good to eachother in life.

k
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 30/08/2006 03:09:10
I thought I was harsh on religion.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Carolyn on 30/08/2006 04:34:11
quote:
Originally posted by Non_Believer

Don't come to me with ignorant ideas like "What if the person is: deaf, paralyzed, and blind. Life would only be to that person, non-existant." Because for one, if that were to actually happen, that person would have no reason to live, not one reason at all. They would kill the baby because of all what is apart of the baby. The person could never learn, he/she could never be able to do anything, it'd be a lifeless body. They couldn't move, respond, or anything that humans with most of their senses about them could do.



After reading your post here, especially this paragraph, I think you have a lot of nerve calling me ignorant.

Have a nice day[:)]

Carolyn

P.S. Steven, I am often harsh on religion also.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Carolyn on 30/08/2006 14:21:57
quote:
Originally posted by Non_Believer

Did I personally call you ignorant? No. I'm calling the people who say incompetant bull like that. Read, and don't misunderstand what someone is saying. It's gets you a lot further in life.


Yep.  I'm pretty sure you did.  Did you not make the following statement?

quote:
God is just an idea, to control the "stupid" ones.  


You may not have said "Hey, Carolyn.  You're ignorant.  But what you basically said was people who believe in and worship God are stupid.  I'm not going to argue whether God exists or not.  I don't have to.  I know he does and don't need scientific proof.  That's called faith.  He has proven his existence to me time and time again.  What prompted me to post at all was your arrogance in calling me and all christians ignorant.  I would never call someone ignorant/stupid because they have different beliefs.  Whether you believe in God or not is between you and God, or you and Satan, or you and Count Dracula.  It is not my place to judge you.
quote:

There is no such thing as being too harsh on religion. Religion is pointless, you don't need some kind of cult to make sure you are living a good life, in the way God wants you too, you can do it yourself without the help of someone else.


I often question religion and am often harsh regarding it.  Religion is NOT God.  Religion is man made. I think alot of people take their religion and wear it like a banner.  Something to say "I'm better than you, I'm holier than you.  I'm going to Heaven, you're going to Hell".  That's not what God wants.  My opinion is that God is far too big and too powerful to be confined to one religion.

quote:

I may not believe in God, but I live a good life, as any other teenager I do mess up, but I don't do immature things like: drinking, smoking, doing drugs, or having sex before marriage. You can call those morals all you want, but they are rules for myself. You can live a good life without the help of someone else. Makes you look stupid to have someone else tell you how to live your life. Live life to the fullest, but stay within the boundaries of the law.

Further more, religion = for the idiots.



Glad you are living a good life.  Who taught you?

Carolyn
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: GOD on 30/08/2006 18:17:23
Hello, God here. Lets try to be nice and polite shall we ?

I know I do not exist and I will not proselytise the fact that I do not also, and so I know Religion is man made, just like me !

Each to their own. It's the militants I don't like, nor the fundamentalists and extremists. At least most of the time the people who do believe in me are nice, though, I think they could use their energies believing in the non-exsitant me for the better. Don't go to church, go visit a neigbour instead.

Peace and Harmony to all.

It's tough not existing !!
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 30/08/2006 22:31:20
quote:
Originally posted by Non_Believer
Faith? I laugh at faith. Faith is the utmost idiotic idea to be thought of. Let's believe in something that can't be physically proven, wether it be a mythical creature, or God (in this case).



So prove that the Earth exists, or that the Sun exists.  You cannot do so without first having faith in your own perception – which itself is unprovable.

It is totally reasonable that one should work with the minimum of axioms, but one cannot work with zero axioms, and those axioms must be taken on faith.

quote:

You're still misinterpreting what I am saying. The idea of God is to control ones who are less fortunate of knowledge, ones who can't control their lives without a higher being.

To believe in God, means you are an incompetant fool, you HAVE to have someone/something to control your life, because you can't.

That is the basic idea of God.



Might I suggest that different people have different reasons for believing in God, and to tell another person why they personally believe in God is somewhat presumptuous.

There is another matter when one talks of the purpose of religion, since religion is a social rather than a personal matter, and thus one can discuss how religion functions at a social level quite legitimately.

quote:

Just so you know, life is science, and that is how we live, by science, not faith. Because faith can't be proven, as much as God can't.



Just so you know, life is not science – science is the study of life, which is something completely different.


quote:

I taught myself to be the way I am. I can control myself without the need of someone else. Sounds hard for teenager, doesn't it? Well for me, no. I don't need to believe in some fictional idea to make my life better, and easier.



That you have no need to believe in God is fine, neither do I – but to say that you can control yourself is in effect to say that you are out of control.  Society depends for its good order that people can control each other, for a person outside the control of society is a psychopath.  This is nothing to do with God, but it is to do with allowing others to influence your life, just as you would hope to have an influence on the lives of others; and so it disallows that the only person controlling you is you.

quote:

Religion is just a counterpart to God, or whatever any other religion calls him/her/it.

And if he is so big and powerful. Why doesn't he come to EVERY human in this world and tell every single one of us, he is real. Your idea of him being so powerful is inept, you have no truth behind him, just a fictional book and an idea.



A religion is a political entity, just as a nation is a political entity.  Yes, religions create myths, just as nations create myths – that is why every good patriot believes there country is right, and views history from there own particular perspective (and much of the Bible is nothing other than the historical folklore of the Jewish people, which was subsequently inherited by the Christians and the Muslims).

In that respect, one can in some ways view God in the same light as the Stars and Stripes (or, for us, the Union Jack – except the Brits don't pay as much head to the Union Jack as the Americans do to the Stars and Stripes).  What power God actually represents is something else, but the important issue for religion is that it creates a focal point for the religion, just as the flag can create a focal point for nationalism.  And, just as many people may imbue God with powers others may question he has, so too many people, while maybe not imbuing the flag itself with such powers, will think of their Government as bordering on the all powerful, as well as being all good.

You might also note that the decline of religion has fairly much mirrored the rise of nationalism – this is not in my view mere coincidence, because they both perform the same social role.

This is the role that religion uses God for, but the fact that religion uses God in this manner does not mean that each individual uses God in this manner – once something is created, it tends to have a life other than was intended by its creator, and this is just as true when the creation is nothing but an abstract idea.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 30/08/2006 23:35:42
quote:
Originally posted by Non_Believer
The sun, and earth are proven. Basic science. We're on the earth this minute aren't we?



Prove it!

I don;t merely mean tell me that you are seeing/feeling it – I mean prove it without resorting to your senses – senses can be fooled.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solipsism
quote:

The word solipsism (Latin: solus, alone + ipse, self) is used for two related yet distinct concepts:

  • An epistemological position that one's own perceptions are the only things that can be known with certainty. The nature of the external world — that is, the source of one's perceptions — therefore cannot be conclusively known; it may not even exist. This is also called external world skepticism.

  • A metaphysical belief that the universe is entirely the creation of one's own mind. Thus, in a sense, the belief that nothing 'exists' outside of one's own mind.




Is solipsism falsifiable?


According to one argument, no experiment (by a given solipsist A) can be designed to disprove solipsism (to the satisfaction of that solipsist A). Solipsism is therefore said to be unfalsifiable in the sense in which Karl Popper used the word. A solipsistic viewpoint held by a particular individual is unfalsifiable only to that individual, however. Any other person B might by introspection (cogito, ergo sum) conclude that he or she (B) does in fact exist and therefore that A is proven wrong (though B might symmetrically doubt whether A exists, and therefore would not have disproven solipsism per se, only solipsism by A). Even though B has proven A wrong, there is no way for B to validly convince A to abandon solipsism, since A doubts B's very existence, let alone B's experiences or experimental results.

Brain in a vat


A thought-experiment related to solipsism, although in principle distinct (for one thing, it posits a real mad scientist, brain, and vat, which a metaphysical solipsist would dispute), is the brain in a vat. The person performing the thought-experiment considers the possibility that they are trapped within some utterly unknowable reality, much like that illustrated in the movie The Matrix. A mad scientist could be sending the same impulses to one's brain in a vat that one's brain (understood to be that of a person in the "real world") might receive, thereby creating "the world" as one knows it from the mad scientist's program. Yet, for one's brain in the vat, that "world" would obviously not be "real." This raises the possibility that everything one thinks or knows is illusion. Or, at the least, that one cannot know with any certainty whether one's brain is in the "real world" or in a vat receiving impulses that would create an equivalent consciousness— or even if there is a real world, mad scientist, brain, or vat (all experience could be simply a never-ending dream).



Now – what do you think – can you really prove beyond all doubt, without any act of faith, that the Earth and the Sun really do exist?

quote:

I do control myself, no one else does. No one is in my brain, controlling my every thought, and move. Only you can control yourself, no one else.



Aside from the 'brain in the vat' thought experiment – this is still an incomplete truth.

You respond and react to the outside world - you obey laws – you do things that other people may ask or demand of you – in this way, they have a control over you. and more subtly (although not without controversy) you might respond to pheromones, and thus be controlled in that way (but pheromones are merely another way in which you respond and are controlled by environmental stimuli, many of which are social or interpersonal in nature).

One of the interesting paradoxes in science is that science does not allow for free will.  Science assumes that all events are a consequence of some cause, and thus your own actions, although they may appear to be an act of free will, is itself a consequence of some external cause.  To assume otherwise would be to assume there is a consequence without a cause, which is unscientific – is it not?.

quote:

God is non-existant, because nothing you do, proves his existance. Main reason why I replied to this topic.



Lack of proof of existence is not the same as proof of a lack of existence.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 31/08/2006 00:35:36
quote:
Originally posted by Non_Believer
How is it not the same? If you can't prove something, then there is a lack of existence. How ignorant are you? If you can't prove something to be real, then how is it real?



I would refrain from calling me ignorant until you have read and answered my point with regard to the 'brain in the vat' thought experiment, or any experiment that can definitively prove that what you sense is a real sensation.  You are arguing from just the same bigoted blind faith that you accuse others of.  Yes, I have faith in my senses, because I have no better alternative – but it is not blind faith – I do recognise that it is faith, and it is conceivable that my senses are wrong.

quote:

How can your sense touch/feel be fooled when you feel something you can feel it. It is unlogical to say your sense of touch/feel can be fooled when in reality it can't. Senses such as taste, smell, and hearing can be fooled, but touch/feel cannot be fooled. If you feel the rays of the sun hitting you, it is a small proof to say the sun is real. If you touch the ground of the earth, and you feel it, it's real. Don't be stupid to those senses.



Lets start with:

http://www.wellcome.ac.uk/en/pain/microsite/medicine2.html
quote:

After amputation of a limb, an amputee continues to have an awareness of it and to experience sensations from it. These phantom limb sensations are also present in children born without a limb, suggesting that perception of our limbs is 'hard-wired' into our brain and that sensations from the limbs become mapped onto these brain networks as we develop.
If phantom limb sensations are normal then so too, alas, is phantom limb pain. This occurs in a majority of those who lose their limbs. (1) In fact, limbs do not need to be lost; it also occurs in conditions in which the brain is disconnected from the body, such as peripheral nerve injuries and after spinal cord injury, when an area becomes insentient (and usually paralysed).



Now you can ask how can you have sensations from a limb that is not there.  But it is clear that such sensations can exist.  So would you then suggest it is impossible to fool the senses.

It is also not that difficult to convince someone they are feeling something that is not actually there while they are under hypnosis.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 31/08/2006 00:43:44
quote:
Originally posted by Non_Believer
Put it this way: If was personally talking to you in person, and I said there is a horse right beside me. Would you believe it's existance? If you can't see it, smell it, touch it, hear it, or taste it, then there is a lack of existance there.



I would at the first instance assume that you were suffering some form of psychosis – although ofcourse, it is possible that it is I who is suffering the psychosis.  In general, it will be left to a third party to decide between the two (and one of the two of us will be taken away for treatment).  But the point is that such hallucination are perfectly possible, and perfectly natural.  To someone who is suffering such a psychosis, to them the horse is very real (or not very absent), and that is their absolute and unshakable belief.

quote:

 It's the same with God, you can't see him/her/it, smell him/her/it, touch him/her/it, hear him/her/it, or taste him/her/it, there is a lack of existance because the sense touch DOES NOT come in. And if there isn't any proof of him/her/it existance, then there is a lack of existance!



No, it is not the same at all.

If we are talking about visitations (people who claim to actual see a physical manifestation of God, or of a saint), then I would agree there is some similarity (although there still remains some difference also).

If someone tells me they believe something that cannot be directly sensed does exist, then there is no contradiction in the fact that I do not sense it.  Your argument earlier related to a horse that you fully expected me to be able to sense, and yet I did not sense.  No-one has yet come forward and suggested that I should be able to hear/see/smell God, so there is no contradiction in the fact that I do not smell/hear/see God.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Carolyn on 31/08/2006 01:13:25
George - Thank you so much for jumping in on this thread.  I was just far to annoyed to post any further.  Your intelligence continually amazes me, as well as your ability to communicate effectively without showing anger.

So George, If I was personally talking to you in person, I'd tell you that you are awesome!!!  Oh, yeah.  Welcome to the ignorance club.[^][;)]

Carolyn
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Carolyn on 31/08/2006 02:41:41
quote:
Originally posted by Non_Believer

Annoyed? So you're telling me you got offended by a harmless post? Seriously. How old do you have to be to not get offended by something on the internet? Which in turn, you don't have to read, but do anyways. How mature of an adult, perhaps? That in itself is a form of ignorance. To get offended by something you don't have to read, but chose to read. Yes, emotional feelings are hard to control on your own, but you still chose to read my post even further, to make yourself even more annoyed. It's like reading a book on opinions, and then throwing it away because it annoyed you and you thought it was garbage of a book but kept on reading it when it still flustered you. It is something stupid to get annoyed over, and let your emotions fluster over something so small.



Actually what annoys me is that you are on a forum where there are people of all different races and beliefs.  People generally get along rather well here.  Instead of trying to understand or accept those differences you choose to call people names and remain argumentative.  Are you not able to have a discussion without being insulting? Somehow I doubt that you can.  Everything you've written is dripping with arrogance and disdain.  One more thing that annoys me is this.  You have the nerve to call people you know nothing about ignorant, when you are proof that the Florida School system has gone to hell in a handbasket.  Print it out, take it to your english teacher and ask him what he thinks.

Carolyn
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 31/08/2006 03:11:41
quote:
Originally posted by Non_Believer
Maybe this should be handled maturely, lets end this post with a sincere "Goodbye". We all have our opinions, and let it be at that, I don't believe in God, George is more intelligent than I am (maybe because of age and have learned more?), and Carolyn believes in God.

[:)]



Thank you for that.

Without being angry, or trying to be patronising, I would suggest the first thing you should learn is how little anyone (including me) can ever really know, and none of us should ever assume we have, the definitive answer to any question.

The second thing, having realised that, is to have a little tact in how you approach these things (it saves a lot of embarrassment and heartache all around at the end of the day).

Besides that, whether you choose to say goodbye (which, bye the way, actually is a corruption of “God be with ye”) is up to you, but you are more than welcome to stay.

You are right that it takes a brave and honest man to admit when they have made a mistake -and you have my respect for that.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Carolyn on 31/08/2006 03:33:38
quote:
And I'm not much like other people, you have proven me wrong in many places (yes, being proved wrong is good for me, lets me learn even more), but still realize, I'm just a teenager with an opinion.


Steven - I sincerely apologise to you. I didn't mean to be so harsh, I was just trying to make a point.  Nothing wrong with making mistakes as long as we learn from them.  Saying that you are just a teenager implies that you aren't, for lack of a better word, valuable.  You are valuable and your opinion matters, whether I agree with you or not.

quote:
My English teacher is an idiot to a major degree, and I have many people who will agree to that. But no I can have a normal discussion without being insulting. I do come off insulting because of how I feel about the ideas of God, religion, and science. Most people can't take something without getting offended. And I can much agree with you on the Florida School System, I have not fully lived this school system, but many others.

I'm pretty sure as an American yourself, you are in the same damn basket of idiots as we're all in. This whole country is full of ignorance, and it drips with it. We know nothing about respect, and I've grown up never getting respect, so I barely give any respect back to anyone who asks for it.

But as this is the internet, I have ALL rights to say what I want, and how I feel about something, wether I get nasty about it or not.


This just made me laugh.  I get the feeling you have a wonderful sense of humor, I just missed it.  Sorry I didn't see it.  I also live in Florida, and have one child in the FL school system, and one that's graduated and is off in college.  It is a challenge making sure my kids don't get behind the 8 ball when it comes to an education in Florida. You mentioned that you went to school outside of Florida too?  Have you had to take that awful FCAT yet?  If so, I hope you did well.  If not, good luck.

Steven - I'm sorry you haven't been shown respect.  I hope that changes for you very soon.

quote:
I'll mistreat the use of the internet, I'll abuse the hell out of it. For my own purpose. You and everyone else on this forum, I can give less care for. Your opinions (some great at that) don't matter to me. No one that I don't know that isn't close to me is just an itch on the arm to me. Forums of this such don't matter, you people don't matter.


Yes, these forums do matter.  I've learned alot here and have made some good friends.  And although I've disagreed and argued with you, you should know that you and your opinion matter.  Hope you stick around and check out some other topics.
quote:

Maybe this should be handled maturely, lets end this post with a sincere "Goodbye". We all have our opinions, and let it be at that, I don't believe in God, George is more intelligent than I am (maybe because of age and have learned more?), and Carolyn believes in God.


Something we can agree on.  George is more intelligent than most of us.

Carolyn



Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Non_Believer on 31/08/2006 03:34:59
Thanks and I will stay here, maybe not posting much though.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Non_Believer on 31/08/2006 03:44:08
quote:
Originally posted by Carolyn

quote:
And I'm not much like other people, you have proven me wrong in many places (yes, being proved wrong is good for me, lets me learn even more), but still realize, I'm just a teenager with an opinion.


Steven - I sincerely apologise to you. I didn't mean to be so harsh, I was just trying to make a point.  Nothing wrong with making mistakes as long as we learn from them.  Saying that you are just a teenager implies that you aren't, for lack of a better word, valuable.  You are valuable and your opinion matters, whether I agree with you or not.

quote:
My English teacher is an idiot to a major degree, and I have many people who will agree to that. But no I can have a normal discussion without being insulting. I do come off insulting because of how I feel about the ideas of God, religion, and science. Most people can't take something without getting offended. And I can much agree with you on the Florida School System, I have not fully lived this school system, but many others.

I'm pretty sure as an American yourself, you are in the same damn basket of idiots as we're all in. This whole country is full of ignorance, and it drips with it. We know nothing about respect, and I've grown up never getting respect, so I barely give any respect back to anyone who asks for it.

But as this is the internet, I have ALL rights to say what I want, and how I feel about something, wether I get nasty about it or not.


This just made me laugh.  I get the feeling you have a wonderful sense of humor, I just missed it.  Sorry I didn't see it.  I also live in Florida, and have one child in the FL school system, and one that's graduated and is off in college.  It is a challenge making sure my kids don't get behind the 8 ball when it comes to an education in Florida. You mentioned that you went to school outside of Florida too?  Have you had to take that awful FCAT yet?  If so, I hope you did well.  If not, good luck.

Steven - I'm sorry you haven't been shown respect.  I hope that changes for you very soon.

quote:
I'll mistreat the use of the internet, I'll abuse the hell out of it. For my own purpose. You and everyone else on this forum, I can give less care for. Your opinions (some great at that) don't matter to me. No one that I don't know that isn't close to me is just an itch on the arm to me. Forums of this such don't matter, you people don't matter.


Yes, these forums do matter.  I've learned alot here and have made some good friends.  And although I've disagreed and argued with you, you should know that you and your opinion matter.  Hope you stick around and check out some other topics.
quote:

Maybe this should be handled maturely, lets end this post with a sincere "Goodbye". We all have our opinions, and let it be at that, I don't believe in God, George is more intelligent than I am (maybe because of age and have learned more?), and Carolyn believes in God.


Something we can agree on.  George is more intelligent than most of us.

Carolyn







Ugh, the FCAT, I have only one left to take, Science FCAT (I'm in 11th). I've lived in Texas, Missouri, North Carolina, and a native from Georgia. Florida is just about the worst place I have lived (there is probably worse, I just haven't experienced them). Respect with me has always been an issue, as in my beliefs, and just how I am (music and clothing). But the respect is coming around better than what it used to be. But I'll check out the other forums here and all. Gonna go watch some of that mindless TV that is out there, and work on a little homework. Good night.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Non_Believer on 31/08/2006 06:59:37
Bill Hicks - It Seems So Plausible:
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Carolyn on 30/08/2006 14:21:57
quote:
Originally posted by Non_Believer

Did I personally call you ignorant? No. I'm calling the people who say incompetant bull like that. Read, and don't misunderstand what someone is saying. It's gets you a lot further in life.


Yep.  I'm pretty sure you did.  Did you not make the following statement?

quote:
God is just an idea, to control the "stupid" ones.  


You may not have said "Hey, Carolyn.  You're ignorant.  But what you basically said was people who believe in and worship God are stupid.  I'm not going to argue whether God exists or not.  I don't have to.  I know he does and don't need scientific proof.  That's called faith.  He has proven his existence to me time and time again.  What prompted me to post at all was your arrogance in calling me and all christians ignorant.  I would never call someone ignorant/stupid because they have different beliefs.  Whether you believe in God or not is between you and God, or you and Satan, or you and Count Dracula.  It is not my place to judge you.
quote:

There is no such thing as being too harsh on religion. Religion is pointless, you don't need some kind of cult to make sure you are living a good life, in the way God wants you too, you can do it yourself without the help of someone else.


I often question religion and am often harsh regarding it.  Religion is NOT God.  Religion is man made. I think alot of people take their religion and wear it like a banner.  Something to say "I'm better than you, I'm holier than you.  I'm going to Heaven, you're going to Hell".  That's not what God wants.  My opinion is that God is far too big and too powerful to be confined to one religion.

quote:

I may not believe in God, but I live a good life, as any other teenager I do mess up, but I don't do immature things like: drinking, smoking, doing drugs, or having sex before marriage. You can call those morals all you want, but they are rules for myself. You can live a good life without the help of someone else. Makes you look stupid to have someone else tell you how to live your life. Live life to the fullest, but stay within the boundaries of the law.

Further more, religion = for the idiots.



Glad you are living a good life.  Who taught you?

Carolyn
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: GOD on 30/08/2006 18:17:23
Hello, God here. Lets try to be nice and polite shall we ?

I know I do not exist and I will not proselytise the fact that I do not also, and so I know Religion is man made, just like me !

Each to their own. It's the militants I don't like, nor the fundamentalists and extremists. At least most of the time the people who do believe in me are nice, though, I think they could use their energies believing in the non-exsitant me for the better. Don't go to church, go visit a neigbour instead.

Peace and Harmony to all.

It's tough not existing !!
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 30/08/2006 22:31:20
quote:
Originally posted by Non_Believer
Faith? I laugh at faith. Faith is the utmost idiotic idea to be thought of. Let's believe in something that can't be physically proven, wether it be a mythical creature, or God (in this case).



So prove that the Earth exists, or that the Sun exists.  You cannot do so without first having faith in your own perception – which itself is unprovable.

It is totally reasonable that one should work with the minimum of axioms, but one cannot work with zero axioms, and those axioms must be taken on faith.

quote:

You're still misinterpreting what I am saying. The idea of God is to control ones who are less fortunate of knowledge, ones who can't control their lives without a higher being.

To believe in God, means you are an incompetant fool, you HAVE to have someone/something to control your life, because you can't.

That is the basic idea of God.



Might I suggest that different people have different reasons for believing in God, and to tell another person why they personally believe in God is somewhat presumptuous.

There is another matter when one talks of the purpose of religion, since religion is a social rather than a personal matter, and thus one can discuss how religion functions at a social level quite legitimately.

quote:

Just so you know, life is science, and that is how we live, by science, not faith. Because faith can't be proven, as much as God can't.



Just so you know, life is not science – science is the study of life, which is something completely different.


quote:

I taught myself to be the way I am. I can control myself without the need of someone else. Sounds hard for teenager, doesn't it? Well for me, no. I don't need to believe in some fictional idea to make my life better, and easier.



That you have no need to believe in God is fine, neither do I – but to say that you can control yourself is in effect to say that you are out of control.  Society depends for its good order that people can control each other, for a person outside the control of society is a psychopath.  This is nothing to do with God, but it is to do with allowing others to influence your life, just as you would hope to have an influence on the lives of others; and so it disallows that the only person controlling you is you.

quote:

Religion is just a counterpart to God, or whatever any other religion calls him/her/it.

And if he is so big and powerful. Why doesn't he come to EVERY human in this world and tell every single one of us, he is real. Your idea of him being so powerful is inept, you have no truth behind him, just a fictional book and an idea.



A religion is a political entity, just as a nation is a political entity.  Yes, religions create myths, just as nations create myths – that is why every good patriot believes there country is right, and views history from there own particular perspective (and much of the Bible is nothing other than the historical folklore of the Jewish people, which was subsequently inherited by the Christians and the Muslims).

In that respect, one can in some ways view God in the same light as the Stars and Stripes (or, for us, the Union Jack – except the Brits don't pay as much head to the Union Jack as the Americans do to the Stars and Stripes).  What power God actually represents is something else, but the important issue for religion is that it creates a focal point for the religion, just as the flag can create a focal point for nationalism.  And, just as many people may imbue God with powers others may question he has, so too many people, while maybe not imbuing the flag itself with such powers, will think of their Government as bordering on the all powerful, as well as being all good.

You might also note that the decline of religion has fairly much mirrored the rise of nationalism – this is not in my view mere coincidence, because they both perform the same social role.

This is the role that religion uses God for, but the fact that religion uses God in this manner does not mean that each individual uses God in this manner – once something is created, it tends to have a life other than was intended by its creator, and this is just as true when the creation is nothing but an abstract idea.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 30/08/2006 23:35:42
quote:
Originally posted by Non_Believer
The sun, and earth are proven. Basic science. We're on the earth this minute aren't we?



Prove it!

I don;t merely mean tell me that you are seeing/feeling it – I mean prove it without resorting to your senses – senses can be fooled.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solipsism
quote:

The word solipsism (Latin: solus, alone + ipse, self) is used for two related yet distinct concepts:

  • An epistemological position that one's own perceptions are the only things that can be known with certainty. The nature of the external world — that is, the source of one's perceptions — therefore cannot be conclusively known; it may not even exist. This is also called external world skepticism.

  • A metaphysical belief that the universe is entirely the creation of one's own mind. Thus, in a sense, the belief that nothing 'exists' outside of one's own mind.




Is solipsism falsifiable?


According to one argument, no experiment (by a given solipsist A) can be designed to disprove solipsism (to the satisfaction of that solipsist A). Solipsism is therefore said to be unfalsifiable in the sense in which Karl Popper used the word. A solipsistic viewpoint held by a particular individual is unfalsifiable only to that individual, however. Any other person B might by introspection (cogito, ergo sum) conclude that he or she (B) does in fact exist and therefore that A is proven wrong (though B might symmetrically doubt whether A exists, and therefore would not have disproven solipsism per se, only solipsism by A). Even though B has proven A wrong, there is no way for B to validly convince A to abandon solipsism, since A doubts B's very existence, let alone B's experiences or experimental results.

Brain in a vat


A thought-experiment related to solipsism, although in principle distinct (for one thing, it posits a real mad scientist, brain, and vat, which a metaphysical solipsist would dispute), is the brain in a vat. The person performing the thought-experiment considers the possibility that they are trapped within some utterly unknowable reality, much like that illustrated in the movie The Matrix. A mad scientist could be sending the same impulses to one's brain in a vat that one's brain (understood to be that of a person in the "real world") might receive, thereby creating "the world" as one knows it from the mad scientist's program. Yet, for one's brain in the vat, that "world" would obviously not be "real." This raises the possibility that everything one thinks or knows is illusion. Or, at the least, that one cannot know with any certainty whether one's brain is in the "real world" or in a vat receiving impulses that would create an equivalent consciousness— or even if there is a real world, mad scientist, brain, or vat (all experience could be simply a never-ending dream).



Now – what do you think – can you really prove beyond all doubt, without any act of faith, that the Earth and the Sun really do exist?

quote:

I do control myself, no one else does. No one is in my brain, controlling my every thought, and move. Only you can control yourself, no one else.



Aside from the 'brain in the vat' thought experiment – this is still an incomplete truth.

You respond and react to the outside world - you obey laws – you do things that other people may ask or demand of you – in this way, they have a control over you. and more subtly (although not without controversy) you might respond to pheromones, and thus be controlled in that way (but pheromones are merely another way in which you respond and are controlled by environmental stimuli, many of which are social or interpersonal in nature).

One of the interesting paradoxes in science is that science does not allow for free will.  Science assumes that all events are a consequence of some cause, and thus your own actions, although they may appear to be an act of free will, is itself a consequence of some external cause.  To assume otherwise would be to assume there is a consequence without a cause, which is unscientific – is it not?.

quote:

God is non-existant, because nothing you do, proves his existance. Main reason why I replied to this topic.



Lack of proof of existence is not the same as proof of a lack of existence.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 31/08/2006 00:35:36
quote:
Originally posted by Non_Believer
How is it not the same? If you can't prove something, then there is a lack of existence. How ignorant are you? If you can't prove something to be real, then how is it real?



I would refrain from calling me ignorant until you have read and answered my point with regard to the 'brain in the vat' thought experiment, or any experiment that can definitively prove that what you sense is a real sensation.  You are arguing from just the same bigoted blind faith that you accuse others of.  Yes, I have faith in my senses, because I have no better alternative – but it is not blind faith – I do recognise that it is faith, and it is conceivable that my senses are wrong.

quote:

How can your sense touch/feel be fooled when you feel something you can feel it. It is unlogical to say your sense of touch/feel can be fooled when in reality it can't. Senses such as taste, smell, and hearing can be fooled, but touch/feel cannot be fooled. If you feel the rays of the sun hitting you, it is a small proof to say the sun is real. If you touch the ground of the earth, and you feel it, it's real. Don't be stupid to those senses.



Lets start with:

http://www.wellcome.ac.uk/en/pain/microsite/medicine2.html
quote:

After amputation of a limb, an amputee continues to have an awareness of it and to experience sensations from it. These phantom limb sensations are also present in children born without a limb, suggesting that perception of our limbs is 'hard-wired' into our brain and that sensations from the limbs become mapped onto these brain networks as we develop.
If phantom limb sensations are normal then so too, alas, is phantom limb pain. This occurs in a majority of those who lose their limbs. (1) In fact, limbs do not need to be lost; it also occurs in conditions in which the brain is disconnected from the body, such as peripheral nerve injuries and after spinal cord injury, when an area becomes insentient (and usually paralysed).



Now you can ask how can you have sensations from a limb that is not there.  But it is clear that such sensations can exist.  So would you then suggest it is impossible to fool the senses.

It is also not that difficult to convince someone they are feeling something that is not actually there while they are under hypnosis.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 31/08/2006 00:43:44
quote:
Originally posted by Non_Believer
Put it this way: If was personally talking to you in person, and I said there is a horse right beside me. Would you believe it's existance? If you can't see it, smell it, touch it, hear it, or taste it, then there is a lack of existance there.



I would at the first instance assume that you were suffering some form of psychosis – although ofcourse, it is possible that it is I who is suffering the psychosis.  In general, it will be left to a third party to decide between the two (and one of the two of us will be taken away for treatment).  But the point is that such hallucination are perfectly possible, and perfectly natural.  To someone who is suffering such a psychosis, to them the horse is very real (or not very absent), and that is their absolute and unshakable belief.

quote:

 It's the same with God, you can't see him/her/it, smell him/her/it, touch him/her/it, hear him/her/it, or taste him/her/it, there is a lack of existance because the sense touch DOES NOT come in. And if there isn't any proof of him/her/it existance, then there is a lack of existance!



No, it is not the same at all.

If we are talking about visitations (people who claim to actual see a physical manifestation of God, or of a saint), then I would agree there is some similarity (although there still remains some difference also).

If someone tells me they believe something that cannot be directly sensed does exist, then there is no contradiction in the fact that I do not sense it.  Your argument earlier related to a horse that you fully expected me to be able to sense, and yet I did not sense.  No-one has yet come forward and suggested that I should be able to hear/see/smell God, so there is no contradiction in the fact that I do not smell/hear/see God.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Carolyn on 31/08/2006 01:13:25
George - Thank you so much for jumping in on this thread.  I was just far to annoyed to post any further.  Your intelligence continually amazes me, as well as your ability to communicate effectively without showing anger.

So George, If I was personally talking to you in person, I'd tell you that you are awesome!!!  Oh, yeah.  Welcome to the ignorance club.[^][;)]

Carolyn
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Carolyn on 31/08/2006 02:41:41
quote:
Originally posted by Non_Believer

Annoyed? So you're telling me you got offended by a harmless post? Seriously. How old do you have to be to not get offended by something on the internet? Which in turn, you don't have to read, but do anyways. How mature of an adult, perhaps? That in itself is a form of ignorance. To get offended by something you don't have to read, but chose to read. Yes, emotional feelings are hard to control on your own, but you still chose to read my post even further, to make yourself even more annoyed. It's like reading a book on opinions, and then throwing it away because it annoyed you and you thought it was garbage of a book but kept on reading it when it still flustered you. It is something stupid to get annoyed over, and let your emotions fluster over something so small.



Actually what annoys me is that you are on a forum where there are people of all different races and beliefs.  People generally get along rather well here.  Instead of trying to understand or accept those differences you choose to call people names and remain argumentative.  Are you not able to have a discussion without being insulting? Somehow I doubt that you can.  Everything you've written is dripping with arrogance and disdain.  One more thing that annoys me is this.  You have the nerve to call people you know nothing about ignorant, when you are proof that the Florida School system has gone to hell in a handbasket.  Print it out, take it to your english teacher and ask him what he thinks.

Carolyn
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 31/08/2006 03:11:41
quote:
Originally posted by Non_Believer
Maybe this should be handled maturely, lets end this post with a sincere "Goodbye". We all have our opinions, and let it be at that, I don't believe in God, George is more intelligent than I am (maybe because of age and have learned more?), and Carolyn believes in God.

[:)]



Thank you for that.

Without being angry, or trying to be patronising, I would suggest the first thing you should learn is how little anyone (including me) can ever really know, and none of us should ever assume we have, the definitive answer to any question.

The second thing, having realised that, is to have a little tact in how you approach these things (it saves a lot of embarrassment and heartache all around at the end of the day).

Besides that, whether you choose to say goodbye (which, bye the way, actually is a corruption of “God be with ye”) is up to you, but you are more than welcome to stay.

You are right that it takes a brave and honest man to admit when they have made a mistake -and you have my respect for that.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Carolyn on 31/08/2006 03:33:38
quote:
And I'm not much like other people, you have proven me wrong in many places (yes, being proved wrong is good for me, lets me learn even more), but still realize, I'm just a teenager with an opinion.


Steven - I sincerely apologise to you. I didn't mean to be so harsh, I was just trying to make a point.  Nothing wrong with making mistakes as long as we learn from them.  Saying that you are just a teenager implies that you aren't, for lack of a better word, valuable.  You are valuable and your opinion matters, whether I agree with you or not.

quote:
My English teacher is an idiot to a major degree, and I have many people who will agree to that. But no I can have a normal discussion without being insulting. I do come off insulting because of how I feel about the ideas of God, religion, and science. Most people can't take something without getting offended. And I can much agree with you on the Florida School System, I have not fully lived this school system, but many others.

I'm pretty sure as an American yourself, you are in the same damn basket of idiots as we're all in. This whole country is full of ignorance, and it drips with it. We know nothing about respect, and I've grown up never getting respect, so I barely give any respect back to anyone who asks for it.

But as this is the internet, I have ALL rights to say what I want, and how I feel about something, wether I get nasty about it or not.


This just made me laugh.  I get the feeling you have a wonderful sense of humor, I just missed it.  Sorry I didn't see it.  I also live in Florida, and have one child in the FL school system, and one that's graduated and is off in college.  It is a challenge making sure my kids don't get behind the 8 ball when it comes to an education in Florida. You mentioned that you went to school outside of Florida too?  Have you had to take that awful FCAT yet?  If so, I hope you did well.  If not, good luck.

Steven - I'm sorry you haven't been shown respect.  I hope that changes for you very soon.

quote:
I'll mistreat the use of the internet, I'll abuse the hell out of it. For my own purpose. You and everyone else on this forum, I can give less care for. Your opinions (some great at that) don't matter to me. No one that I don't know that isn't close to me is just an itch on the arm to me. Forums of this such don't matter, you people don't matter.


Yes, these forums do matter.  I've learned alot here and have made some good friends.  And although I've disagreed and argued with you, you should know that you and your opinion matter.  Hope you stick around and check out some other topics.
quote:

Maybe this should be handled maturely, lets end this post with a sincere "Goodbye". We all have our opinions, and let it be at that, I don't believe in God, George is more intelligent than I am (maybe because of age and have learned more?), and Carolyn believes in God.


Something we can agree on.  George is more intelligent than most of us.

Carolyn



Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Non_Believer on 31/08/2006 03:34:59
Thanks and I will stay here, maybe not posting much though.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Non_Believer on 31/08/2006 03:44:08
quote:
Originally posted by Carolyn

quote:
And I'm not much like other people, you have proven me wrong in many places (yes, being proved wrong is good for me, lets me learn even more), but still realize, I'm just a teenager with an opinion.


Steven - I sincerely apologise to you. I didn't mean to be so harsh, I was just trying to make a point.  Nothing wrong with making mistakes as long as we learn from them.  Saying that you are just a teenager implies that you aren't, for lack of a better word, valuable.  You are valuable and your opinion matters, whether I agree with you or not.

quote:
My English teacher is an idiot to a major degree, and I have many people who will agree to that. But no I can have a normal discussion without being insulting. I do come off insulting because of how I feel about the ideas of God, religion, and science. Most people can't take something without getting offended. And I can much agree with you on the Florida School System, I have not fully lived this school system, but many others.

I'm pretty sure as an American yourself, you are in the same damn basket of idiots as we're all in. This whole country is full of ignorance, and it drips with it. We know nothing about respect, and I've grown up never getting respect, so I barely give any respect back to anyone who asks for it.

But as this is the internet, I have ALL rights to say what I want, and how I feel about something, wether I get nasty about it or not.


This just made me laugh.  I get the feeling you have a wonderful sense of humor, I just missed it.  Sorry I didn't see it.  I also live in Florida, and have one child in the FL school system, and one that's graduated and is off in college.  It is a challenge making sure my kids don't get behind the 8 ball when it comes to an education in Florida. You mentioned that you went to school outside of Florida too?  Have you had to take that awful FCAT yet?  If so, I hope you did well.  If not, good luck.

Steven - I'm sorry you haven't been shown respect.  I hope that changes for you very soon.

quote:
I'll mistreat the use of the internet, I'll abuse the hell out of it. For my own purpose. You and everyone else on this forum, I can give less care for. Your opinions (some great at that) don't matter to me. No one that I don't know that isn't close to me is just an itch on the arm to me. Forums of this such don't matter, you people don't matter.


Yes, these forums do matter.  I've learned alot here and have made some good friends.  And although I've disagreed and argued with you, you should know that you and your opinion matter.  Hope you stick around and check out some other topics.
quote:

Maybe this should be handled maturely, lets end this post with a sincere "Goodbye". We all have our opinions, and let it be at that, I don't believe in God, George is more intelligent than I am (maybe because of age and have learned more?), and Carolyn believes in God.


Something we can agree on.  George is more intelligent than most of us.

Carolyn







Ugh, the FCAT, I have only one left to take, Science FCAT (I'm in 11th). I've lived in Texas, Missouri, North Carolina, and a native from Georgia. Florida is just about the worst place I have lived (there is probably worse, I just haven't experienced them). Respect with me has always been an issue, as in my beliefs, and just how I am (music and clothing). But the respect is coming around better than what it used to be. But I'll check out the other forums here and all. Gonna go watch some of that mindless TV that is out there, and work on a little homework. Good night.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Non_Believer on 31/08/2006 06:59:37
Bill Hicks - It Seems So Plausible:
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ROBERT on 01/09/2006 16:42:46
Perhaps this thread is the correct place for this story, (I have moved it from Chat).

" Medical practices blend health and faith
 

By Rob Stein

Updated: 10:03 a.m. ET Aug. 31, 2006
Sandwiched between a swimming pool store and a spice shop on Lee Highway in Fairfax, the Tepeyac Family Center looks like any other suburban doctor's office. But it isn't.

The practice combines "the best of modern medicine with the healing presence of Jesus Christ," a brochure at the reception desk announces. An image of the Madonna greets every patient. Doctors, nurses and staff gather to pray each day before the first appointments.
 
The center is one of a small but growing number of practices around the country that tailor the care they provide to the religious beliefs of their doctors, shunning birth-control and morning-after pills, IUDs and other contraceptive devices, sterilizations, and abortions, as well as in vitro fertilization. Instead, doctors offer "natural family planning" -- teaching couples to monitor a woman's temperature and other bodily signals to time intercourse.."
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14576677/

Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Non_Believer on 01/09/2006 22:48:18
That's odd, because most Christians, and some just God believers (ones who believe, but don't have a religion), don't believe in medical help; but not all obviously.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Non_Believer on 02/09/2006 21:59:15
It's more like a lot, rather than most.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: cranial_implant on 02/09/2006 22:58:24
I have to say that I am a non believer too.

My head is not what it used to be.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ROBERT on 04/09/2006 17:21:18
quote:
Originally posted by ROBERT

 
The center is one of a small but growing number of practices around the country
 that tailor the care they provide to the religious beliefs of their doctors

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14576677/




If the practice was Buddhist would it include a veterinarian ? [:)]
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 05/09/2006 05:47:10
Prove I exists mm.

Cogito ergo sum
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 05/09/2006 05:50:04
Solipsism is metaphysical mumbo jumbo. If you take solipsisms into account then you can prove nothing. Hence what is the point. You may aswell be nihilistic.

Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more; it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Titanscape on 27/09/2006 15:34:25
God is more than real, the source of the space, time and matter and cogniscience of it, cogniscience of self and God. It is formed from and according to Him. We are like cartoons or Trons in God's formation.

God is like a universe of strange dimensions and processes who is much bigger and surrounds the vast space which to him is like a bowl.

Or again the universe is like God's brain fluid, in the space widening from the spinal cord into the brain.

A place of comparative simplicity. Of free wills and their creations within His.

God is the higher reality.

He speaks and we can hear it and all can read the Bible. That is I heard my secret thoughts revealed, and my conscience was cleansed. I was convicted I needed more. I got more, I fell to the ground. My fears were driven away, I drank living water... Things I read about in the Gospel, I experienced.

It makes sense to say reality comes from something, not nowhere or nothing. It comes from God, order and cogniscience, good and evil.





Titanscape
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 27/09/2006 20:16:24
quote:
Originally posted by Mjhavok
Solipsism is metaphysical mumbo jumbo. If you take solipsisms into account then you can prove nothing.



Solipsism is far from mumbo jumbo, but it is a philosophical issue rather than a scientific one.

Ofcourse, if one takes solipsism into account, one can prove nothing beyond one's own conceptual existence (and technically, one can also argue that everything else also conceptually exists, only one cannot prove the physical existence of anything beyond oneself, and while one may reasonably assume one's own physical existence, one cannot prove anything about the nature of that existence).

You are right that taking solipsism into account highlights the limitations of what may be proven absolutely, and thus highlights that no matter what science one tries to perform, one must make some assumptions.  This does not invalidate science, it merely places some limits on science, and limits upon knowledge in any form.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: bostjan on 28/09/2006 08:16:44
I think solipsism is such an extreme philosophy, that it attracts a lot of attention.  From a purist's standpoint, however, you must define something as reality in order to even talk about reality clearly, thus solipsism, upon it's assumption that reality cannot be seen nor sensed in any way, leaves reality undefined, and cannot speak clearly of reality, which is the very thing it intends to make us aware of.  Therefore, in my opinion, by this argument, it is useless to any form of science.

God, can be argued along the same lines.  If we define god such that god exists everywhere, yet cannot be sensed, thewn the very idea of god is merely a plaything with no basis on any logical or scientific process.  If you define god in a way that has something to do with logic or science, then there would be some way to find god.  But as long as we are uncertain in our terms of what we are looking for, there will be no means of finding.  In the cases where gods have been defined as something tangible, evidence has always disproved their existence.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: ROBERT on 28/09/2006 17:19:25
Transferred this from Chat:-

(https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi24.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fc23%2FSUEDONIM%2Fjccombo.jpg&hash=c8c3152236ab214a0893eca718c95d61)

SNAP !

http://www.cathnews.com/news/609/98.php
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shroud_of_Turin
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: neilep on 28/09/2006 22:13:17
OMG Robert...that's amazing !!..........some bloke never finished his drink !!! [:)]

Men are the same as women, just inside out !
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 29/09/2006 02:38:28
who is that, ted nugent?
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 29/09/2006 02:44:54
quote:
Originally posted by bostjan
I think solipsism is such an extreme philosophy, that it attracts a lot of attention.  From a purist's standpoint, however, you must define something as reality in order to even talk about reality clearly, thus solipsism, upon it's assumption that reality cannot be seen nor sensed in any way, leaves reality undefined, and cannot speak clearly of reality, which is the very thing it intends to make us aware of.  Therefore, in my opinion, by this argument, it is useless to any form of science.


Solipsism is extreme, but no more so than the concept of infinity, or the infinitesimal – neither can exist in reality, yet are valid ways to explore concepts at the limits.
As you say, any 'reality', as a scientist would understand it, must include assumptions.  What solipsism demonstrates is that it is in fact impossible to have a substantial reality without some arbitrary assumptions.
quote:

God, can be argued along the same lines.  If we define god such that god exists everywhere, yet cannot be sensed, thewn the very idea of god is merely a plaything with no basis on any logical or scientific process.  If you define god in a way that has something to do with logic or science, then there would be some way to find god.  But as long as we are uncertain in our terms of what we are looking for, there will be no means of finding.  In the cases where gods have been defined as something tangible, evidence has always disproved their existence.


There is much of the above I agree with, but not everything.
Science and logic are not the same thing.  One can apply logic to concepts that are not inherently scientific, although the converse is not true, science cannot exist in a context devoid of logic.
It is quite possible to speculate upon the notion of a God that is logical, but I would agree that it is not possible to speculate upon the notion of a God that is consistent with science.
I also agree that most of the modern definitions of God are extremely woolly to say the least, and this does inhibit any proper logical debate about God.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: bostjan on 01/10/2006 07:41:41
Sorry to speak frankly, but there is very little logical about god.  He is argued to be every opposing extreme in monotheistic religion as well as pantheistic religions, which cover most modern religions.  I never intended to say that science and logic are the same.  They are tools, which together help us understand nature.  Science without logic existed in early greek and egyptian history.  Logic exists without science.

Solipsism is essentially the philosophical scepticism of science.  I'm taking much liberty to paraphrase it as such, but the belief that what we measure and observe is not to be trusted is the same to me.

The extremism of infinity is absolutely different from how i mean the term to describe a philosophy or rhetoric.  Perhaps 'radical' would be a more fitting term.  The way it claims that we cannot claim anything about the outside world is taking a simple fact that observations are tainted by the observer- to the maximum tangible level.

Ok, back to the logical issues with debating god- a logical implication A implies B may be true if A is false or if both A and B are true - and if the truth of A actually tells you about the truth of B, yet in theological arguments, people often try to use this to prove B, which is unprovable by use of A that is simply true but has nothing to do with B.  I.E.- Look at how beautiful a butterfly is!  The beauty of the butterfly must mean there is a god!  or  The bullet just barely missed me so there must be a god!
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 01/10/2006 20:53:30
quote:
Originally posted by bostjan
Sorry to speak frankly, but there is very little logical about god.  He is argued to be every opposing extreme in monotheistic religion as well as pantheistic religions, which cover most modern religions.


Most people who speak of God are not logicians, and do not attempt to create a logically cohesive view of God.  This does not mean it is not possible to create a logically cohesive philosophy that includes the notion of a God (this does not make the philosophy scientific, but it can nonetheless be logically cohesive).
quote:

Solipsism is essentially the philosophical scepticism of science.  I'm taking much liberty to paraphrase it as such, but the belief that what we measure and observe is not to be trusted is the same to me.
The extremism of infinity is absolutely different from how i mean the term to describe a philosophy or rhetoric.  Perhaps 'radical' would be a more fitting term.  The way it claims that we cannot claim anything about the outside world is taking a simple fact that observations are tainted by the observer- to the maximum tangible level.


I don't disagree with you, but I don't see how it invalidates that extreme.

quote:

Ok, back to the logical issues with debating god- a logical implication A implies B may be true if A is false or if both A and B are true - and if the truth of A actually tells you about the truth of B, yet in theological arguments, people often try to use this to prove B, which is unprovable by use of A that is simply true but has nothing to do with B.  I.E.- Look at how beautiful a butterfly is!  The beauty of the butterfly must mean there is a god!  or  The bullet just barely missed me so there must be a god!


But, again, you are arguing that because some people (even many people) abuse logic in trying to create a view of God, that therefore there cannot be a logical model that includes the concept of God.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: bostjan on 02/10/2006 03:32:41
I have yet to see one logical explanation that even comes close to proving the existance of any spirit (non-material) being.  If you define god as 'the supreme being who was creator of the universe and is now ruler of the universe,' then there are plenty of things, in the abstract sence, which would possibly fit the definition, such as gravity, energy, or time, but to say there is some personified creature that rules the universe is really non sequitor, as far as I'm concerned.  It just doesn't make any sense.  Why does there have to be someone ruling the universe?  What exactly do they do to execute this rule?  What exactly does the existance of this person explain?

There does not have to be.  The rules of nature govern the behaviour of the universe.  Nothing.  The existance of god does not explain anything.  As a scientist, I have no interest in theories that raise more unanswerable questions and explain nothing observable.  If I was a philosopher, I would probably be intrigued…
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 02/10/2006 04:09:55
quote:
Originally posted by bostjan
I have yet to see one logical explanation that even comes close to proving the existance of any spirit (non-material) being.



I think you missed what I said.  The issue of proof is another matter.  What I said is that one can develop a logically consistent system that includes a God – this is not to say that in any scientific sense one can 'prove' the existence of God.

I have always said one cannot have a scientific system that includes God.  I am not sure whether one can regard anything that is counter-scientific as provable, in that most people here would regard 'proof' as being something scientific.

quote:

but to say there is some personified creature that rules the universe is really non sequitor, as far as I'm concerned.  It just doesn't make any sense.  Why does there have to be someone ruling the universe?  What exactly do they do to execute this rule?  What exactly does the existance of this person explain?

There does not have to be.  The rules of nature govern the behaviour of the universe.  Nothing.  The existance of god does not explain anything.  As a scientist, I have no interest in theories that raise more unanswerable questions and explain nothing observable.  If I was a philosopher, I would probably be intrigued…



Science deals with certain questions, but only those questions.

There are generally regarded as 5 types of question – who, where, why, what, and how.  Science deals with what and how, and not much else.  For a scientist, or an engineer, this is enough; but it is hopelessly inadequate to a judicial system.  The judicial system is primarily concerned with who; and how, or why, is only needed insofar as it helps show 'who' is responsible, but beyond that, 'how' is not pertinent to the judicial system, and 'why' is only slightly pertinent.  Thus, while science has dismissed the notion of God, since nothing in the concept of religion has much relevance to 'how'; but the judicial system retained the notion of an 'act of God', because that explains 'who', but it does so at the expense of ignoring the 'how' – but as I said, the judiciary is not that concerned with 'how'.

Again, as you say, the anthropomorphism surrounding the notion of God is arbitrary, but again, since the notion of God does not try to explain 'how', or even 'what'; thus it is rather arbitrary what God may or may not be.

I know that the above is inherently unscientific, because science can never ignore 'how'; but I always said that God can never fit into the scientific model.  All I said is that there are models where God can perform a valid logical function.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 03/10/2006 21:23:09
this topic is still going?! jeez

NEVER! underestimate youth
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: bostjan on 04/10/2006 05:42:00
I always thought engineers were curious about how things worked and physicists in why they worked, but this is immaterial.

What logical model relies on the existance of god?
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 04/10/2006 12:01:10
quote:
Originally posted by roarer
I tell you...I ONLY use the words "soul mode" and "body mode" NOT  because I am religious..but because there are NO other words I can think of to distinguish between the two. I suppose I can define those "states"..is that the right word?.....like "death"...and "life"..or something similiar. But I bet that even if I used these words....they would be challenged.
Now to the defintion of death. What does medical science define the state where the heart stops and the brain is starved of oxygen..if it is NOT death? Is there a medical or scientific definition of this and if so what is it called?



OK, let us get back to a more mechanistic, and less semantic, view of this.

The human being is essentially composed of information – the information within the DNA, and the information within the brain.

In theory, the DNA can survive in a dormant state for quite long periods of time (although not for eternity).  Whether a person reconstructed from dormant DNA is still the same person is debatable, and comes down to the question whether two identical twins are really two people or one person (in normal usage they would be regarded as two separate people, and thus it implies that the reconstruction of a human being from dormant DNA does not amount to the reconstruction of the same person, but of a clone that, while sharing the same DNA, is a separate life to the person who may have 'died').

That leaves the information within the brain.  Clearly, like the DNA, so too, information will (at least partially) remain in the brain even as the brain is starved of the means to live.  The functioning of the brain is the ability to process the information; just as the functioning of the cells of the body is to process the information stored in the DNA
quote:
Originally posted by bostjan
I always thought engineers were curious about how things worked and physicists in why they worked, but this is immaterial.



Engineers are concerned how to make things work, while physicists are concerned with how things do work.  Neither are concerned with why (i.e. the purpose for) the universe is as it is.  In fact, scientists and engineers are equally disdainful of the very notion of asking 'why').

quote:

What logical model relies on the existance of god?



There are two different aspects of this.

As I indicated above, while the question of 'relies' may be extreme (on can always find other ways of expressing it), but the judicial system finds the notion 'act of God' to be useful within its model.

But, as has been indicated often enough here, 'God' is simply a word, and the difficulty is to associate a precise meaning to it.

One can use the word to define a range of ideas, or equally, if the word is out of favour, one can use a different word to associate with an idea that might previously have been considered as God.  There are many examples of the substantially same idea being rehabilitated by use of a different name because the old name has become socially unacceptable.

As I said, in my view, the main value of the notion of God is to answer the question 'who?' to things that were not the creation or responsibility of humans.  It is a little like when mathematician asks about the square roots of numbers that are not real positive numbers, so they create the notion of 'imaginary numbers', numbers that can have no physical existence, but are useful to answer a question that can be asked, but cannot otherwise be answered.

Ofcourse, where one can say the problems start is when one applies arbitrary attributes to the notion of God that go beyond it's simple purpose.  When one starts trying to imagine physical manifestations of this metaphysical idea (e.g. imagining a human 'son of God'), then it does somewhat stretch the plausibility of the idea.




George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: bostjan on 05/10/2006 06:12:07
'Act of God' is a phrase with no pure logical motives.

I don't see how we can be in disagreement as to how a word with no specified meaning has anything to do with logic.  Logic is cut and dried.

Logic: "a science that deals with the principles and criteria of validity of inference and demonstration : the science of the formal principles of reasoning," "something that forces a decision apart from or in opposition to reason"

See my point?  From what do you infer or demonstrate the existance of god?  Notice the word 'science in the dictionary definition of 'logic?'
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 05/10/2006 10:16:39
quote:
Originally posted by bostjan
'Act of God' is a phrase with no pure logical motives.



Ofcourse it has a logical meaning.

The role of the judiciary is to attribute blame for a particular misadventure.  If that blame cannot be attributed to any human entity, then it needs some target for that blame, and God is a useful target to attribute blame (or responsibility) for that which cannot be attributed to a human.  In that context, God becomes a generic abstract substitute for a human.

quote:

I don't see how we can be in disagreement as to how a word with no specified meaning has anything to do with logic.  Logic is cut and dried.

Logic: "a science that deals with the principles and criteria of validity of inference and demonstration : the science of the formal principles of reasoning," "something that forces a decision apart from or in opposition to reason"

See my point?  From what do you infer or demonstrate the existance of god?  Notice the word 'science in the dictionary definition of 'logic?'



If you are willing also to accept theology as a science, then maybe so; but it is certainly not a science in the way that I had intended to use the word (i.e. as a study of the physical environment as we perceive it).  Logic is the study of the abstract, not of the physical; hence why I distinguished it from science.  I would accept that logic is a branch of mathematics (or at least that formal logic is such), but while mathematics is a necessary tool of science, I would not regard mathematics to be a component of science in and of itself (although we have have here another issue about whether 'a science' may be different from 'science').



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: bostjan on 06/10/2006 08:02:00
Mathematics is a branch of science as much as chemistry is.  Physics is also a tool used in chemistry, does that make it not a branch of science?

BTW, physics is the study of the physical environment as we percieve it.  Science is merely the study of the nature of things, including life (biology), the earth (geology), chemicals (chemistry), and numbers (mathematics) and much more.

And there is nothing logical about making up a person to put blame onto for a misadventure.  Just read what you said 'generic substitute for human.'  There is no logic in making a wild assumption to make up for circumstances you cannot explain.  Logic would require starting with something and deducing a result with a sound explaination, not just pulling something out of the blue.

Anyway, I do not see 'God' being endicted for any of these judicial decisions.  Does the court get a priest to take a deposition from the Bible to get 'God's' testimony?  Or do they consult a Rabbi about the Torah?  Perhaps an Imam for the Koran, or get all three together and see how much agreement you get.  As I said, there is no pure logical motive behind the phrase 'Act of God,' it's merely a poorly worded phrase with a vague meaning.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 06/10/2006 11:34:56
quote:
Originally posted by bostjan
Mathematics is a branch of science as much as chemistry is.  Physics is also a tool used in chemistry, does that make it not a branch of science?



Physics is a different model to chemistry, and although one has the intermediate model of physical chemistry, chemists have long practised chemistry without being concerned by physics.

quote:

BTW, physics is the study of the physical environment as we percieve it.  Science is merely the study of the nature of things, including life (biology), the earth (geology), chemicals (chemistry), and numbers (mathematics) and much more.



Firstly, mathematics is much more than merely the study of numbers.  Number theory is the study of numbers, but there is also set theory, boolean logic, geometry, calculus, and endless other branches of mathematics.

Secondly, mathematics has very little to do with 'things', it is only about ideas and the manipulation of the abstract.  One cannot conceive of experimental mathematics, and one does not seek to verify mathematical theory by observation of the natural world.  Unlike physics, chemistry, or biology; mathematics need only be shown to be internally consistent in order to show correctness, and need not be shown to be consistent with any observation of the external.

As I say, if you are going to regard mathematics as a science, then you should also regard theology as a science (after all, it is an 'ology' – i.e. a branch of knowledge, and if you do not regard correlation with observation as a prerequisite for science, then all knowledge, however far removed from physical observation, must be regarded as equal).

quote:

And there is nothing logical about making up a person to put blame onto for a misadventure.  Just read what you said 'generic substitute for human.'  There is no logic in making a wild assumption to make up for circumstances you cannot explain.  Logic would require starting with something and deducing a result with a sound explaination, not just pulling something out of the blue.



Read what I said.  There is as much logic in inventing a God for situations that cannot be explained otherwise as there is in inventing imaginary numbers for numbers that do not fit into the established order that existed before that invention.

Theoretical science is all about invention of ideas to fill in the gaps in knowledge.  The difference between science and other branches of knowledge is that the theory is then tested against observation (as I said, this is not possible with mathematics, because we do not have observational or experimental branches of mathematics).

No-one can rightly say that string theory and various theories involving 10 or 11 dimensional space are anything but 'wild assumptions' to make up for circumstances that one cannot explain.  At present, they remain wild assumptions until such time as someone can invent an observational experiment that might provide some observational support for these 'wild assumptions'.  That we require these observational experiments is what we regard as 'scientific methodology', and that to me is what distinguishes what I would regard as 'science' from 'mathematics', 'logic', 'philosophy, or 'theology'.

quote:

Anyway, I do not see 'God' being endicted for any of these judicial decisions.  Does the court get a priest to take a deposition from the Bible to get 'God's' testimony?  Or do they consult a Rabbi about the Torah?  Perhaps an Imam for the Koran, or get all three together and see how much agreement you get.  As I said, there is no pure logical motive behind the phrase 'Act of God,' it's merely a poorly worded phrase with a vague meaning.



Historically, papal power was very real.  In historical terms, the courts were answerable to the King, the King (in European terms) was answerable (at least in theory, if not always in practice) to the Pope, who was then in theory answerable to God.  This ofcourse was one of the reasons so many Kings and Princes of Europe so quickly embraced protestantism, because in the protestant model the King was no longer answerable to the Pope.

It is still the case in this country that the Head of State (although one must distinguish between Head of State and source of government) is also the Head of the Church of England, and thus at least nominally (although no longer in reality) the Government does refer to the local church leader, since the nominal source of secular government is also the nominal head of religion.

Certainly, there are laws in Israel that have come about because of consultation within rabbinical authority (the very notion of which day is regarded as the Sabbath, is a secular law that has its origins in religion, and hence the Muslim countries regard Friday as the day of the Sabbath, Israel regards Saturday, and the countries with a Christian history regard Sunday).  The Israeli law of return assumes that people of a Jewish tradition have a right to migrate to Israel where others do not, and while there is debate in Israel about how to define a Jew, there is no question that religious authorities have their part to play in that debate.  In Islamic countries, there is much debate about the role of sharia law.

In all of the above cases, the legal authorities have either referred to religious authorities in order to 'get God's testimony' as you put it.

'Act of God' is by no means a poorly worded phrase, although you may argue that in an increasingly secular society, it is increasingly an anachronistic phrase.

Interestingly, many people still resort to anthropomorphic notions of 'nature' and 'the Environment', as if they were talking about God; so in many ways, the role of God has not really changed, only the name has changed.  When people say something is 'unnatural', it is as if they say it is contrary to God's law (in the world of science, there is no such thing as unnatural, anything that may be observed must be natural, even if it is observed only as an artifice of human endeavour).  When people talk about harming the Environment, or the Environment fighting back at us, these are all anthropomorphic ideas that have no meaning in science.  The very notions of 'good' and 'bad' are in some way religious notions – in science, things merely are as they are, there is no value judgement of 'good' and 'bad'.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: bostjan on 07/10/2006 09:44:22
I'll keep this short.

First off, Chemists who ignore the laws of physics will never go anywhere, since a reaction is determined by entropy and energy.

Second, imaginary number have a vast logical motive behind them.  They are well defined and their behaviour is completely predictable.  'God,' on the other hand, is poorly defined and is completely unpredictable.

Third, it is easy and plausible to test theories in mathematics.  Simplest example: 2+2=4, take two rocks and throw them in with two more rocks and count how many rocks there are.  There is no such thing in the field of theology.  Certainly, most of the details of string theory have not been tested at all, but it is a very new theory in comparison with theological theories such as Judaism and Christianity.

Last, I appreciate the long explainations, but have to disagree with many points you make.  I fail to see how there is any reasonable ammount of logic involved in any concept of god, and I still have yet to see any logical deduction using god that makes the least ammount of sense.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 07/10/2006 23:56:07
quote:
Originally posted by bostjan
First off, Chemists who ignore the laws of physics will never go anywhere, since a reaction is determined by entropy and energy.



This is, strictly speaking, not true.

If you had said that the laws of chemistry must be consistent with the laws of physics, then I would agree with you; but the whole point about chemistry as a separate discipline is that a chemist does not have to carefully calculate the energy of each electron within a hydrogen and chlorine atom in order to work out how the two will react, but rather takes a higher level model that does ignore the low level physics, and simply says that there is a certain amount of energy that is released by a reaction between hydrogen and chlorine.  The chemist uses a different model to the physicist, but since they are both scientists, the two models must be consistent with each other.

quote:

Second, imaginary number have a vast logical motive behind them.  They are well defined and their behaviour is completely predictable.  'God,' on the other hand, is poorly defined and is completely unpredictable.



I do not disagree that God is poorly defined, and more critically, there are many different definitions of God.  What I am saying is that if someone chooses to define God with less ambiguity, then it is quite possible to build a coherent logical model using many possible closely defined concepts of God.

One of the roles of theology is precisely to try and narrow down these ambiguities (just as scientists try and ever more closely narrow down the ambiguities of the observed world).

I accept that in practice, because there is no experimental verification possible with the notion of God, thus religion is substantially polluted with political expediency, but I would also suggest the same is true of Environmentalism.

quote:

Third, it is easy and plausible to test theories in mathematics.  Simplest example: 2+2=4, take two rocks and throw them in with two more rocks and count how many rocks there are.



I would suggest there are many branches of mathematics, such as aspects of set theory, that is anything but easy to prove.  You are confusing mathematics, which is a very broad discipline, with simple arithmetic of real numbers.

In fact, it can be proven that mathematics must be an incomplete discipline

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6del%27s_incompleteness_theorems
quote:

Gödel's first incompleteness theorem is perhaps the most celebrated result in mathematical logic. It states that
    For any consistent formal theory that proves basic arithmetical truths, it is possible to construct an arithmetical statement that is true 1 but not provable in the theory. That is, any theory capable of expressing elementary arithmetic cannot be both consistent and complete.



Gödel's second incompleteness theorem can be stated as follows:
    For any formal theory T including basic arithmetical truths and also certain truths about formal provability, T includes a statement of its own consistency if and only if T is inconsistent.




The above explains why mathematicians keep expanding the field of mathematics, since if mathematics is to remain consistent, then it must always remain incomplete.

You may, interestingly, argue the exact converse with the notion of God – that anyone who proposes God as part of a theory that is complete, must inevitably have a theory that is inconsistent.  If you want a theory of God that is consistent, then it too must remain incomplete.

Set theory is another theory that seeks completeness, and so has some problems with inconsistency:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russells_paradox
quote:

Let M be "the set of all sets that do not contain themselves as members". Formally: A is an element of M if and only if A is not an element of A.
    (https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fupload.wikimedia.org%2Fmath%2F4%2F5%2Fc%2F45ce5810bc2e3d6ec39c48c4fefc7782.png&hash=2eb92a488f7580fcd342c0a3e19ff5d7)

Nothing in the system of Frege's Grundgesetze rules out M being a well-defined set. If M contains itself, M is not a member of M according to the definition. If M does not contain itself, then M has to be a member of M, again by the very definition of M. The statements "M is a member of M" and "M is not a member of M" cannot both be true, thus the contradiction



Another interesting logical variation of the Russell paradox is the Grelling-Nelson paradox:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grelling-Nelson_paradox
quote:

Definition


Define the adjectives "autological" and "heterological" as follows:
  1. An adjective is autological if and only if it describes itself. For example "short" is autological, since the word "short" is short. "Sophisticated" and "pentasyllabic" are also autological.
  2. An adjective is heterological if and only if it does not describe itself. Hence "long" is a heterological word, as is "monosyllabic".

All adjectives, it would seem, must be either autological or heterological, for each adjective either describes itself, or it doesn't. The Grelling-Nelson paradox arises when we consider the adjective "heterological".
To test if the word 'foo' is autological you can ask: Is 'foo' a foo word? If the answer is 'yes', 'foo' is autological. If the answer is 'no', 'foo' is heterological.
Is 'heterological' a heterological word? If the answer is 'yes', 'heterological' is autological (leading to a contradiction). If the answer is 'no', 'heterological' is heterological (again leading to a contradiction).
There is no consistent answer to the question: Is the word "heterological" heterological? On the one hand, if the word "heterological" is heterological, then it does not describe itself. Since the fact of it not describing itself does, in fact, describe it, it is autological, which means it isn't heterological. On the other hand, if the word "heterological" is not heterological, then it must be autological, which means it describes itself, and therefore it must be heterological. Either case leads to the contradiction that the word "heterological" is both heterological and not heterological, which is impossible.

Analysis


The Grelling-Nelson paradox can be translated into Bertrand Russell's famous paradox in the following way: identify each adjective with the set of objects to which that adjective applies. So, for example, the adjective "red" is equated with the set of all red objects. In this way, the adjective "pronounceable" is equated with the set of all pronounceable things, one of which is the word "pronounceable" itself. Thus, an autological word is understood as a set, one of whose elements is the set itself. The question of whether the word "heterological" is heterological becomes the question of whether the set of all sets not containing themselves contains itself as an element.



The only way out of Russell's paradox is by deliberately excluding certain sets, and thus making set theory incomplete.

This question of inconsistency and incompleteness also pertains directly to the issue of any argument against the notion of God.  If the argument against God depends upon the argument that the concept of God is inconsistent with science, then that must assume that science is both consistent and complete.  If science is allowed to be inconsistent, then there can be no contradiction in a concept that is merely inconsistent with science, since science itself is inconsistent.  If science is incomplete, then this allows the concept of God to exist outside of science because of the incompleteness of science.

None of this is to say that one cannot show that a particular concept of God might not be inconsistent with the accepted domain of science, only that one must nonetheless accept that there will always remain certain concepts (and thus certain possible views of God) that while not consistent within science is not contradicted by it.

quote:
Originally posted by bostjan
Certainly, most of the details of string theory have not been tested at all, but it is a very new theory in comparison with theological theories such as Judaism and Christianity.



Truth is not about how old or how new a theory is.  Some theories can take centuries to prove, (no reason why others would not take millennia to prove), while others are proven in days.

In any event, I was deliberately not talking about Judaism or Christianity, only about the abstract notion of God.  Actual implementations of religion are as much about politics as about theology, and I was not trying to argue the absolute truth of the Bible (or even any particular part of it) – I was merely trying to say that it is possible to have a logically consistent theological doctrine, even though such a doctrine must exist outside of science (but, as I have said, being outside of science is not a proof of illogicality).

If you are trying to answer the question whether God, in any particular context, is a logical concept or not; then that is a general question that is much wider than whether Judaism or Christianity accurately describes a logically consistent implementation of a God.  You cannot prove the illogicality of the general merely by proving the illogicality of the specific, unless you can first demonstrate that the specific in fact can be mapped completely on to every possible general case.  Are you wishing to try and pove that the Judao/Christian model of a God can in fact be mapped onto every other conceivable model of God?  I have seen no formal attempt to make such a proof.

quote:

Last, I appreciate the long explainations, but have to disagree with many points you make.  I fail to see how there is any reasonable ammount of logic involved in any concept of god, and I still have yet to see any logical deduction using god that makes the least ammount of sense.



Thinking about set theory, I would try and phrase it so:

If God be the set of all things that do not belong to any known set of things.  This ofcourse leads to issues that if something belongs to God, and if God is a known thing, then such a thing cannot belong to the set known as God – hence God cannot be in the set of known things.

This explains why, as our knowledge of the world increases, so the number of things that do not belong to the a set of known things diminishes, but it can never reach zero (except by violating the consistency of science – back to Gödel's first incompleteness theorem).



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: bostjan on 08/10/2006 01:34:41
I'm sorry, but it is true.  Whether you calculate the energy of each electron, which no one does for realistic molecules anyway, mind you, or you measure it with a calorimeter, you are measuring the energy and using thermodynamics, which is a branch of physics.  Even as you use these measurements to predict whether a reaction will go or not, depends on the laws of thermodynamics.  As a double major in chemistry and physics, I could tell you that nearly every branch of chemistry is concerned with the laws of physics.

Arithmetic is a branch of mathematics, I only used the example I did for simplicity.  If I can show one counterexample to the assumption that there are no experimental tests for mathematics, I prove that assumption false.

Claiming to know something in the set of unknown things is, itself, a paradox, so if god is in the set of unknown things, there cannot exist such a thing as theology, as it is the knowledge of an unknown thing.

Surely these are things you cannot disagree with outright.

Mind you, it's nothing against religion, but I stick to the argument that there is little to no logic involved in them.  Explaininig set theory to a person who has taken two courses at the upper undergraduate level in set theory  is going to convince them neither that mathematics is not a science nor that the notion of god is a logically based axiom.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 08/10/2006 04:26:52
quote:
Originally posted by bostjan
Whether you calculate the energy of each electron, which no one does for realistic molecules anyway, mind you, or you measure it with a calorimeter, you are measuring the energy and using thermodynamics, which is a branch of physics.  Even as you use these measurements to predict whether a reaction will go or not, depends on the laws of thermodynamics.  As a double major in chemistry and physics, I could tell you that nearly every branch of chemistry is concerned with the laws of physics.



That the laws of chemistry can be mapped to the laws of physics, I do not argue with; but they are distinct and different laws - otherwise, why waste time and resources having separate subjects – why not just call them both 'physics'?  The reason why they are different subjects is because they present different models, each model having its own virtues.

quote:

Arithmetic is a branch of mathematics, I only used the example I did for simplicity.  If I can show one counterexample to the assumption that there are no experimental tests for mathematics, I prove that assumption false.



But who has said that “there are no experimental tests for mathematics”?

What you said earlier was “it is easy and plausible to test theories in mathematics”.  I read this to mean that all mathematics is amenable to experimental tests, not merely that some was.  I did not question that some mathematics was amenable to experimental tests, and thus you have not contradicted me by disproving that “there are no experimental tests for mathematics”.

quote:

Claiming to know something in the set of unknown things is, itself, a paradox, so if god is in the set of unknown things, there cannot exist such a thing as theology, as it is the knowledge of an unknown thing.

Surely these are things you cannot disagree with outright.



Knowing about something is not the same as knowing the thing itself.

In any event, I did not require that God belong to set of things that belong to God.

quote:

Explaininig set theory to a person who has taken two courses at the upper undergraduate level in set theory  is going to convince them neither that mathematics is not a science nor that the notion of god is a logically based axiom.



While I accept that I did not know what to level your knowledge of set theory extends to (apparently substantially greater than my own), but then neither was I trying to teach you set theory, merely highlighting certain pertinent aspects of it.  You are totally at liberty to correct any errors I have made, but I hope that my venture into the field was not so deep as to lead me into serious error, merely deep enough to demonstrate my points.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: bostjan on 08/10/2006 09:32:05
Ah, but this is all I said in the first place, that physics is a powerful tool for chemistry as is mathematics, and that a good chemist relies on models that do not ignore the laws of physics.

Quote from: George
One cannot conceive of experimental mathematics, and one does not seek to verify mathematical theory by observation of the natural world.

Perhaps I misunderstood this statement?  Much but certainly not all mathematics has been tested.  Any theory of the natural world based on a mathematical model can be used as an example.  If mathematics was not useful in the natural world for experiment and observation, experimental scientists would be wasting their time to learn mathematics, yet it seems they take great pains to understand as much of the subject as they can.  If it were not for the geometries of Minkowski, we could not have the theories of General Relativity, which have been tested observationally many times and hold very consitent.

I suppose we have reached the point where any argument made by either of us will just be taken by the other to reinforce our own positions, so that we remain divided no matter what points are presented here.  My stance that god concepts have little to do with the branch of science known as logic remains firm, and you are unrelenting in the least to acknowledge this stance.  This is precisely why I included a pre-emptive apology in that statement.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 11/10/2006 01:27:11
Has anyone purchased Richard Dawkins latest book "The God Delusion". He has also started a website (www.richarddawkins.net) which is the RDF (Richard Dawkins Foundation for Science and Reasoning). Very Interesting book and website. You should check it out if you are interested in the topic of this thread

-Steven

_______________________________________________________

Religion is an insult to human dignity. With or without it you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.

-Steven Weinberg
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: RMorty on 18/10/2006 02:33:13
quote:
Originally posted by another_someone

quote:
Originally posted by Mjhavok
Solipsism is metaphysical mumbo jumbo. If you take solipsisms into account then you can prove nothing.



Solipsism is far from mumbo jumbo, but it is a philosophical issue rather than a scientific one.

Ofcourse, if one takes solipsism into account, one can prove nothing beyond one's own conceptual existence (and technically, one can also argue that everything else also conceptually exists, only one cannot prove the physical existence of anything beyond oneself, and while one may reasonably assume one's own physical existence, one cannot prove anything about the nature of that existence).

You are right that taking solipsism into account highlights the limitations of what may be proven absolutely, and thus highlights that no matter what science one tries to perform, one must make some assumptions.  This does not invalidate science, it merely places some limits on science, and limits upon knowledge in any form.



George




  Well, I have noticed an annoying re-occurence of this word for about the past page or so of this thread. It is being used to shoot holes in peoples scientific knowledge.  BUT here is what I think. Solipsism is only able to be applied to everything as a whole. But reality only goes as far as each and every one of our perceptions of the world through our senses. So if I say we are on a planet moving through space around a big ball of fire we call the sun and you say "prove it.... but you can't because solipsism means that what you see could be bull**** and you are in your own little world that dosent exist at all its just a figment of your imagination"  in response to that I say that it is possible that maybe there is nothing. No sun, no planet no universe BUT! I see it and THAT is what we define as reality.  Solipsism can only be used if you are looking at reality from the outside in.  

  What I am saying is that maybe it isn't what we perceive, as not being real.  Maybe you would need to look at it as reality not being real, but we still have a reality, so therefore the sun and earth are real.

  This response goes all the way back to the original post made that mentioned Solipsism and was shooting holes in somones opinion.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: RMorty on 18/10/2006 02:46:46
Something I find sort of funny is the number of different religions, and a lot of them beleive that thier god(s)or the lack thereof, is/are the only god(s).  In that case a lot of people must be wrong! Right?  

  So if only a small group is right does that mean we all go to hell? Even christians that had protestant denominations.  If everyone really thought religion was important they wouldn't get angry with eachother and decide to split off and make thier own modified version of the religion.

Let me use roman catholics as an example.  They were the original christian religion.  After that I beelive it was the Episcopal church that allowed divorce because some king in England wanted a divorce.  After that more protestant religions were made.  In that case does that mean that anyone who isn't a strict roman catholic is going to hell?

  My point being is that it would be silly to say that so many good people are doomed for hell because they dont beleive in the right religion.  Also, there are good people who are athiest etc.  So does that mean that if there is a hell, it will be filled with a ton of cool people who had good morals and led good lives but simply missed a minute detail like confessing thier sins with thier mouth?

  So for all the christians who beleive jews, muslims and homos will all go to hell, guess what! All of the people who beleive in different christian religions better watch out because if God's word is "written in stone" then one group of y'all are right and the rest are screwed eh?

 See, that sounds kinda silly, now dosen't it?
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 18/10/2006 02:59:58
quote:
Originally posted by RMorty
  What I am saying is that maybe it isn't what we perceive, as not being real.  Maybe you would need to look at it as reality not being real, but we still have a reality, so therefore the sun and earth are real.



I am not quite sure I understand what you are saying, or whether it conflicts with anything I have said.

If what you are saying is that we need to define an arbitrary reality as being an arbitrary absolute starting point, I have no problem with this.  All I was trying to say is that you cannot state any reality as being guaranteed to be the only possible reality; but that does not stop you from selecting a reality as something that you choose (out of expediency) as being real (assuming you actually exist [:)]).

You may arbitrarily define a Sun and Moon to be real in order to accord with your perception of them, but this does not mean that you can demonstrate with total certainty that the Sun and Moon are a unique physical reality, only that they provide a pragmatic solution to your perceptions of reality.



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 18/10/2006 05:05:08
cant we all just come to our senses and realize theres no god?
 
i mean really. knock it off!
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: bostjan on 18/10/2006 08:24:05
roman catholics were not the 'original' christian religion.  that'd be the twelve disciples.  the coptic christians are much closer than roman catholics to the practices of the disciples.

but yeah, that's a great point!  what if only jehovah's witnesses are right?
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 18/10/2006 13:11:32
quote:
Originally posted by bostjan

roman catholics were not the 'original' christian religion.  that'd be the twelve disciples.  the coptic christians are much closer than roman catholics to the practices of the disciples.

but yeah, that's a great point!  what if only jehovah's witnesses are right?



Technically, the twelve disciples were Jews, not Christians.  Exactly where one draws the historic line between early Christianity and Judaism is difficult.  Clearly, by the time the Roman Empire adopted Christianity (and not Judaism) they were separate, but what the Roman Empire adopted was what we now regard as the Greek Orthodox form of Christianity, but by the time that was adopted there were already many different variants of Christianity (in fact, since there was not prior to Christianity becoming the State religion of the Roman Empire and standardising body for Christianity, there would have been no standard Christianity).



George
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: RMorty on 18/10/2006 18:53:31
Ah I see, I was taking the solipsism thing as being a way to say that you cant use science to disprove or prove anything because you dont know its real.

 
quote:
However, you have explained you simply meant reality is only what it is toeach of us differently. kinda?  It is a very confusing concept. i got cross eyes reading If what you are saying is that we need to define an arbitrary reality as being an arbitrary absolute starting point, I have no problem with this. All I was trying to say is that you cannot state any reality as being guaranteed to be the only possible reality; but that does not stop you from selecting a reality as something that you choose (out of expediency) as being real (assuming you actually exist ).


I got a little confused, but I now see you meant that as exactly, reality is only as real as it is to each of us.

Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: bostjan on 18/10/2006 19:45:07
quote:
Originally posted by another_someone

quote:
Originally posted by bostjan

roman catholics were not the 'original' christian religion.  that'd be the twelve disciples.  the coptic christians are much closer than roman catholics to the practices of the disciples.

but yeah, that's a great point!  what if only jehovah's witnesses are right?



Technically, the twelve disciples were Jews, not Christians.  Exactly where one draws the historic line between early Christianity and Judaism is difficult.  Clearly, by the time the Roman Empire adopted Christianity (and not Judaism) they were separate, but what the Roman Empire adopted was what we now regard as the Greek Orthodox form of Christianity, but by the time that was adopted there were already many different variants of Christianity (in fact, since there was not prior to Christianity becoming the State religion of the Roman Empire and standardising body for Christianity, there would have been no standard Christianity).



George




I have to disagree with two things you said.  Christian means literally 'follower of Christ.'  If you believe Jesus of Nazareth to be the one called 'Christ,' then a) The disciples were the first followers of Christ, because they not only followed him around, but they followed his teachings and b) the start of Christianity was the same as the start of Jesus's teachings.

It is semantical and quite a simple line of thinking.

But yes, of course the disciples were Jews.  If you read my post, I mentioned 'coptics.'  If you do a little research, you will find that the coptic denomination was spread by Jews like St. Mark and Theophilus, but I didn't say they were the first Christians, just that they are closer than Roman Catholics.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: RMorty on 29/10/2006 06:36:11
Right, but did they follow the same teachings of the original bible. Whatever that may be?  What I mean is, if the 12 dudes and the roman catholics believed the same things, then are they really different at all.

  Also, what do Christians have to say about people living before Christ?  Did they all go to hell for not believing in god?  See that sounds friggin dumb! How can that be explained?
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: simeonie on 06/11/2006 23:05:01
I am a christian myself =D and to be honest i dont know the answer to that question but i can deffo find out  from my pastor or something.
To be honest though perhaps they went to hell? no one deserves to go to heaven, if justice prevailed then everyone would go to hell. But God showed mercry and sent his son so that didnt have to happen.
   As the Bible seems to indicate, some people did go to heaven even before christ like before they died then went up to heaven
   I dont know for sure the answer to ur question and i am myself interested in the answer. I am just thankfull that god gave me a chance to go to heaven
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 13/11/2006 00:26:34
Read "The God Delusion" By Richard Dawkins and "The End of Faith" By Sam Harris.

I think religions cons out weight any pros it may have.

People who say they find it comforting to think they will go to heaven or that when a loved one dies they go to heaven, I can totally understand that they would find comfort in this. That said, just because something is comfortable doesn't make it true. Like Richard Dawkins I care about what is true. If I had cancer I would want to know about it even if it was terminal.

In science we can't yet understand everything, we might never understand the theory of everything. Just because we don't know or can't understand something doesn't mean god did it. That is a cowardly cop out and highly insufficient.

The latest attempt by Intelligent Design and creationist nuts is to try and equate out lack of understanding of quantum mechanics to someone prove god. This is intellectual criminalism in my opinion. Just another snake oil salesman. Morally reprehensible.

My tired is over :-S.

www.richarddawkins.net is a great site for Secular, Humanists, Atheist freethinkers or anyone who feels they are the edge with regards to religion.

I'm not Richards PR agent by the way lol, just a huge fan.

"Isn't it enough to see that a garden is beautiful,without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too."
-Douglas Adams

Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: gecko on 16/11/2006 21:36:04
this is my real advice people, if you think you need moral guidance, read aesops fables. its morals dont contradict each other like the bibles do. no one is ever brutally murdering each other cause a bully in the sky said so.
it has more complicated morals than "dont steal cause god will punish you". in fact, it involves things like not getting tricked, pacing yourself, and not taking advantage of others kindness. it doesnt rely on punishment and bribery to teach lessons.

if youre having trouble with not knowing what to believe; in general terms: study logical fallacies. read each one of them, recognize what is illogical and start to notice these arguments presented in everyday life. i have never heard "proof of god" that didnt involve a logical fallacy. but it is a good thing to have in mind no matter what your stance on god, in regards to what human beings try to convince you of.

i suggest this, because i did it. so after this, after i have learned many complex moral dillemmas and truisms to live my life by, after i know when someone is trying to lie to me or trick me, what can god do for me?
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 26/11/2006 17:45:51
When Napoleon asked the Mathematician and Astronomer Laplace where God fitted into his model of the universe, the scientist’s answer was: “II ne me faut pas de cette hypothése-la” (I have no use for that hypothesis which you mention).
Title: God real or not
Post by: nature boy on 16/01/2007 09:02:25
If is he is,If isn't he isn't.It all depends on what you perceive as god.

Nature is my relegion and science is my language.So,i feel god everywhere,because nature is ubiquitous.

Let me explain it using the uncertainity principle.

If you define the position of god in churches temples snd mosques,there will be an uncertainity related to his effect,he is ineffective.

On the other hand if you attach an uncertainity in his position by saying nature is god , he is effective.(there will be a positive impact.

 beleive in god and not in relegions.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 17/01/2007 00:42:56
This is all good and well. A kind of Einsteinian religious feeling. You don't believe in an invisible sky daddy though.
Title: God real or not
Post by: nature boy on 17/01/2007 06:10:23
What does that mean ?Invisible sky?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 18/01/2007 15:19:40
Invisible sky daddy. Invisible and Sky in the sentence are both used to describe the word daddy (god). I'm sorry I left out the footnotes for dummies.
Title: God real or not
Post by: nature boy on 19/01/2007 09:45:32
Thanks Dummy(whatever that might mean).
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 20/01/2007 00:05:06
You asked.
Title: God real or not
Post by: nature boy on 20/01/2007 19:26:23
So ......?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Titanscape on 20/02/2007 12:07:16
Many founders of science held the belief there is a god. Aristotle, Newton, Einstein, RJ Oppenheimer.

Where does the idea come from? Homo Sapien hardwiring, ancestry, hearing, seeing, reading then.

Motive and reason are different.

People actually love God/gods.

People ask, "where did I come from, where am I going?"

People sense a need to attribute good and evil to sources.

So science doesn't prove He isn't, it suggests He is, but belief only comes from revelation and testimonies and evidence, not scientific proof. Such as in a test tube.

Aristotle I think deduced gods, the Greeks had gods and started science off. And that there are gods too.

The sky and earth are an awesome richly detailed enduring abundance, begging a source and sourcing promise of more and the unseen. An intelligent source says the ancient Greeks. For me it is family tradition, based on history and Jesus.

Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 20/02/2007 12:19:44
Ok you know nothing about Einstein. He didn't believe in a Christian type god or afterlife. This is a typical argument from christian apologists. It is called "the argument from great men". They usual say "oh Isaac Newton was a smart man, a scientist, he believed it god." Typically they use a scientist that is pre darwinian before anyone really knew better. Also in the past Atheist or people who didn't believe where killed because of it. Aristotle I think had doubts but probably was religious as back them everyone was, Newton was religious, Einstein did not believe in god in the sense that he listens to prayers or punishes sin.

At most Einstein was a deist.

He said "I believe in Spinoza's God, Who reveals Himself in the lawful harmony of the world, not in a God Who concerns Himself with the fate and the doings of mankind."
Title: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 20/02/2007 13:33:59
Since Einstein was a Jew - he may have believed in a Judeo-Christian type God, but not a strictly Christian type God in any narrower sense.

The ancient Greeks had quite a lot more diversity in their beliefs, and the notion that you were somehow persecuted if you did not believe – just look up Epicurus , or his later Roman counterpart, Lucretius.

It was the Jews who introduced the idea that religion was a matter of social loyalty (Judaism has always been a nationalistic religion – and while Christianity and Islam may have gone further, and become supra national, they still demanded unconditional allegiance).

One also has to bear in mind that in past centuries, the accusation of atheism had a different meaning to what it has today – and atheist was not one who did not believe in God, but rather one who was not God fearing, and thus was judged as amoral.

As for whether people who, in the Christian era, genuinely believed in God, or just found they had to use the language of God to express ideas for which they had no other widely accepted language, that is a matter that is always difficult to debate, because how can one look behind that which is said, to ideas that could not be expressed at the time.  If we try and apply modern language to past ideas, we come across the problem that people of the past would have no understanding of the modern language, and would have found it as alien as we find their language.

Ofcourse, when we get to the Oppenheimers and Einsteins of this world, we are talking about substantially modern personages, who had access to much of the vocabulary we use today, so the argument that they simply could not have expressed themselves in any other way does not hold true.

I think the bigger problem when we discuss the Einstiens and Oppenheimers, is our own attitude to these people (and to great scientists in general), that we regard them in some way as great prophets of life in general – these guys were good at what they did, but it does not follow that everything they said and believed must somehow be superior to the rest of humanity – they were still, outside of their own field, just ordinary human beings.
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 20/02/2007 20:43:23
God, real or not?

does it actually matter? I for one do not believe in some form of supreme being, whether it is god or not. This is a discussion that only leads to arguments and throwing quotations and inevitably Einstein and other names about.

The two side in the discussion will never be able to come together and agree to disagree, so what is the point?

The only thing that matters is, does having god in your life make a difference! If it does then all well and good. We all need something to behold and believe in, some people choose religion other something else.

As long as you do not try to impose your values and beliefs on others than who gives a damn.

Paul
Title: God real or not
Post by: Titanscape on 24/02/2007 10:11:55
It is tricky, some people will tell you being approached or hearing a sermon meant a lot to them. Others hate it. Jesus wants the little ones brought to Him.

Christians are out sometimes handing out tracts or talking with people, but some hate it. But for a few who appreciate it, we are there.

Sometimes christian's children dislike their parent's message.

I wish I had a more christian childhood.

I would persuade others to agree with my values and ideals, on love and honour...

I would suggest to people that the human spirit is eternal and that there is a Father of light and one of darkness. And a judgement day, and Christ crucified.

I learned people don't like the message and don't push it. Some people have their day made, if you want to talk with them about it?

One point some here are making is that scientists with their reason and freedom didn't unbelieve, so science at best doesn't mean, god is not.

Science and technology, cars, ships, refridgerators, spanners made of titanium alloy, computers... doesn't make us much happier... just tools and perception of the natural world, doesn't really have a place in determining beliefs about the origin of your spirit or death and where we go after our bodies give up...

Science was first called, natural philosophy.

Even the Bible says next to nothing about the pre natural, glorious earth Adam knew as a boy. The supernatural gives us a view of the natural quite unlike the athiest's. Example, death isn't natural. Faith, to accept the revelation of the unseen, regarding the seen. We think there was a time before the natural, observed order took root. So no evolution...

Then can evolution point to there being a god or not? Some would even say yes.

Some reason there is a god, some are motivated to look for one from young.

My computer cannot indicate to me there is no god.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 24/02/2007 18:58:01
Since Einstein was a Jew - he may have believed in a Judeo-Christian type God, but not a strictly Christian type God in any narrower sense.

The ancient Greeks had quite a lot more diversity in their beliefs, and the notion that you were somehow persecuted if you did not believe – just look up Epicurus , or his later Roman counterpart, Lucretius.

It was the Jews who introduced the idea that religion was a matter of social loyalty (Judaism has always been a nationalistic religion – and while Christianity and Islam may have gone further, and become supra national, they still demanded unconditional allegiance).

One also has to bear in mind that in past centuries, the accusation of atheism had a different meaning to what it has today – and atheist was not one who did not believe in God, but rather one who was not God fearing, and thus was judged as amoral.

As for whether people who, in the Christian era, genuinely believed in God, or just found they had to use the language of God to express ideas for which they had no other widely accepted language, that is a matter that is always difficult to debate, because how can one look behind that which is said, to ideas that could not be expressed at the time.  If we try and apply modern language to past ideas, we come across the problem that people of the past would have no understanding of the modern language, and would have found it as alien as we find their language.

Ofcourse, when we get to the Oppenheimers and Einsteins of this world, we are talking about substantially modern personages, who had access to much of the vocabulary we use today, so the argument that they simply could not have expressed themselves in any other way does not hold true.

I think the bigger problem when we discuss the Einstiens and Oppenheimers, is our own attitude to these people (and to great scientists in general), that we regard them in some way as great prophets of life in general – these guys were good at what they did, but it does not follow that everything they said and believed must somehow be superior to the rest of humanity – they were still, outside of their own field, just ordinary human beings.

Einsteins parents may have been jewish but I don't think they where strict. Einstein on many occasion stated he didn't believe in a god that hears & answers prays. He also didn't believe in an afterlife.
Title: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 25/02/2007 01:53:42
Einsteins parents may have been jewish but I don't think they where strict. Einstein on many occasion stated he didn't believe in a god that hears & answers prays. He also didn't believe in an afterlife.

He certainly stated that he believed in a God that not play dice - so he certainly had some notion of God.  I cannot say whether his idea of God included an afterlife, or one that answers prayers (neither of these have as much relevance in Jewish tradition than they have in Christian tradition).  I could not even tell you if he strictly kept the Sabbath, but I think he was a Zionist (although that tells you more about his political affiliations with Judaism than about his religious ones - but it does indicate that he actively thought of himself as a Jew in some way).

Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 25/02/2007 02:06:52
Here are two quotes from Einstein.

"It was, of course, a lie what you read about my religious convictions, a lie which is being systematically repeated. I do not believe in a personal God and I have never denied this but have expressed it clearly."

"I believe in Spinoza's God who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what exists, not in a God who concerns himself with fates and actions of human beings."

Einstein used the god word in many quotes and in his writting but just saying the word doesn't make him a believer. I am an atheist and I can say "God" I can even say I believe in him. I would be telling a lie.

Some religious folk usually Christians often of the fundamental persuasion always come up with the Einstein, god, dice quote. As if saying it proves anything.

Alot of fairly non religious people still stick to religious customs as it was how they where raised. Tradition and custom seem to be very important to human beings.
Title: God real or not
Post by: jolly on 25/02/2007 15:41:42
deleted as inapproprate
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 25/02/2007 16:05:21
If god dose exist he/she wont let you prove he/she does. that dosnt mean you couldnt prove it, it just means god would stop you. If god dosnt exist, how could you prove he/she dosnt. I don't think you can! decartes could be right and all this is just one big dream, and nothing is real. where ever you go with or without god its a leap of faith. So I think you should go with your heart; after all your heart looks for happyness not sadness. And most people want to be happy.   

I disagree. I don't have faith. I have evidence.
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 27/02/2007 14:43:47
i love this topic...lol
Title: God real or not
Post by: Titanscape on 01/03/2007 04:04:43
We have evidence, we have no proof of error, so why do some believe and others do not? Does science offer an alternative to faith? Is Jesus unbelievable?
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 01/03/2007 12:32:13
wat is our proof?
Title: God real or not
Post by: jolly on 01/03/2007 19:42:24
Mjhavcok please show me. If decartes is right your evidence is a dreamed illusion. You can never know. But the best bit is decartes believed in god thats how he got off the rock. It is all a leap of faith, I bounced a ball 10 times and can now prove it. the 11th time it might not do the same thing. You walk down a road and get hit by a twig you carry on walking and get hit by another, if you keep walking will you get hit again?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 01/03/2007 20:56:04
If a ball bounces 10 times when you let it go on the same spot. That is evidence for you thinking it will do the same again. Faith is belief without evidence. What would you like me to show you jolly?

If god dose exist he/she wont let you prove he/she does. that dosnt mean you couldnt prove it, it just means god would stop you. If god dosnt exist, how could you prove he/she dosnt. I don't think you can! decartes could be right and all this is just one big dream, and nothing is real. where ever you go with or without god its a leap of faith. So I think you should go with your heart; after all your heart looks for happyness not sadness. And most people want to be happy.   

Your comment suggests that you know the mind of god if it existed. How do you know god would not let me prove he/she existed. Perhaps I just don't have the tools or knowledge yet that would allow this.

Supposing that everything is a dreamed illusion doesn't get me anywhere. In that case nothing is real. Why even have a debate about it.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 01/03/2007 20:57:00
I don't know how anyone is convinced by Descartes ontological argument.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 01/03/2007 20:57:59
We have evidence, we have no proof of error, so why do some believe and others do not? Does science offer an alternative to faith? Is Jesus unbelievable?

Reason, rationality and skepticism is an alternative to blind faith.
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 02/03/2007 17:44:53
thats not wat i call proof really..
Title: God real or not
Post by: jolly on 02/03/2007 19:18:48
Empiricists even hume believed in god.

I quote: "whatever exists must have a cause or reason of its existence.....If there be no necessarily existent being, any supposition which can be formed is equally possible....was it nothing? but that could never produce anything......there is consequently, such a being-that is, there is a deity".

I'd like to thank the academy for this award as its great; I will polish it nightly.lol
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 02/03/2007 22:41:51
Huh?
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 02/03/2007 23:02:53
Hume's Fork.

"When we run over libraries, persuaded of these principles, what havoc must we make? If we take in our hand any volume; of divinity or school metaphysics, for instance; let us ask, Does it contain any abstract reasoning concerning quantity or number? No. Does it contain any experimental reasoning concerning matter of fact and existence? No. Commit it then to the flames: for it can contain nothing but sophistry and illusion."

The academy may be ringing for that award back.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 02/03/2007 23:05:44
Nice quote but book burning doesn't sit well with me. Makes me think of Nazis.
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 02/03/2007 23:12:10
I like mice also
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 02/03/2007 23:15:40
Mice quote but book burning doesn't sit well with me. Makes me think of Nazis.

who burned more books the nazi's or American Secular and religious authorities?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 02/03/2007 23:28:32
I don't have a tally. Does it matter who burnt more?

Are you religious?
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 02/03/2007 23:34:59
I don't have a tally. Does it matter who burnt more?

Are you religious?

Off hand i would say more books were/are burnt in america than by the nazi's. books are still being banned there, which in my opinion on much scarier.

No, i am not religious. Most of my family are catholic, but i do not personally care for any religion...and find the greeters at the entrance quite scary
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 03/03/2007 00:47:11
Ok Paul. I am not from America (incase you thought I was). I myself am not religious and never was brought up so. When I was younger perhaps 10-15 I thought something perhaps god or something else existed that created the universe. I never knew then what I know now. I have listened to many arguments on both sides of this debate. My knowledge of science has also increased massively since I was 10-15 years old. At most I was a deist back then and probably heading towards pantheistic. I am now an atheist. I don't have a problem with anyone who is pantheistic. I just think that people who think human beings are the center of the universe and the universe was put here by god for us, I think these people are just deluding themselves. I think they are being egotistical and it just reeks of self importance. Knowing what I know now (which is available to anyone) I can't honestly believe in anything supernatural. I don't see any need for that as an explanation for anything and it just brings up more questions.

Reason, rationality and skepticism is the only way we can find out what is true. As much as we can know if anything is true.

Thanks
Title: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 03/03/2007 02:04:06
Nice quote but book burning doesn't sit well with me. Makes me think of Nazis.

Book burning is as old as books themselves, going back to the first Chinese dynesty (and maybe even earlier, but they had already burnt the history books that would have recorded those book burnings).  It is a way of making sure everybody agrees with your version of history.
Title: God real or not
Post by: jolly on 03/03/2007 15:26:58
paul he said both so what does that say about him, he either belived one or the other, or maybe he believed both.lol
Title: God real or not
Post by: Titanscape on 03/03/2007 17:09:43
Reason, rationality, I agree with them, but skepticism, mmm. I have some, but accepted the message of theology and the philosphy taught in school.

I had a spiritual experience too.

I think atheism advocating peoples as unimportant, and central, is dangerous.

The universe is generous and resists decay.

Matter by itself doesn't matter, except for what it is in relation to people. Hypotheticaly, Lose Mars or the Earth into the sun or a massive meteorite shower, which do you choose?

Or if you could make 500 pounds for every hectare of Amazon destroyed or 100,000 for all gone at once, knowing that after you die, the O2/CO2 equilibrium is destroyed permanently, do you take the sterling?

Some gods advocate "man should have small egos, those play things." "The stars are our home."

Jesus cross promotes that a friend is worth dying for, yet it humbled Peter after and is not ego boosting, or if it is, is that bad?

Sometimes reason needs accept revelation, reason can err. God is by nature according to the Old Greek word agape, self existently. When meeting a stranger, you need be prepared for a revelation, rather than try to reason out their values and attitudes by looking at their car and attire.

Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 03/03/2007 17:13:08
You think "atheism advocating peoples as unimportant, and central, is dangerous." (which is not what I do).

Do you not think people who think they have religious absolutes are dangerous.

Your spiritual experience isn't proof I'm afraid. The mind is a powerful simulator.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Titanscape on 03/03/2007 17:30:28
Religous absolutes, if you mean extremists, it is bad.

My spiritual experience gave me a knowing, proof for me. In turning to Jesus, response, sensing a presence so I had to kneel, and my conscience became clear. Promises of restoration...

I and many others have such experiences. 600,000,000 million charismatics today, struggling with questions or worshipping God with enthusiasm.

I never knew what I got to simulate it.

That first experience gave me like a knowing, and faith came around it like a tent around a pole.

I recall it. And other experiences and insights by others into my secret thoughts confirm and advance it.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 03/03/2007 17:39:00
I have weird experiences every night when I go to sleep. It is called dreaming. Once I had a dream that me and optimus prime where fighting the decepticons. Does this mean it was real? ofcourse not. I am just stating that your brain can simulate many things. I think if you read some neurology you would find this out .

I am sorry but I am a naturalist and people claiming to have inner revelation and personal experience of god just doesn't hold any weight for me.

Funny how you think you felt Jesus Christ and not Mohammed or Vishnu or Zeus as your inner revelation. Perhaps because you where brought up in a Christian country?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Titanscape on 03/03/2007 18:52:08
Well, repentance and praying the Our Father, and Jesus don't let me die, are christian ideas. And that His Spirit walks into rooms... Even forgiveness and a clear conscience, and the hope of heaven and restoration.

I later tested the name Allah and called on it three times. I heard a response, such that I call on Jesus.

If I were brought up in China, what could I experience? Paul called Zeus a weak and beggarly element.

True I had no thought of anyone but the Trinity. And Mary, Catholic boy then.

That experience was objective and subjective.

But look perhaps, see if you can have an experience in alertness, of your own. Some Pentecostal preachers are dry or whacky, but some have the gift of prophecy and knowledge, ask one to lay hands on you, you may hear your secret questions revealed.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 03/03/2007 18:58:28
But look perhaps, see if you can have an experience in alertness, of your own. Some Pentecostal preachers are dry or whacky, but some have the gift of prophecy and knowledge, ask one to lay hands on you, you may hear your secret questions revealed.

Sorry your opinion is now void. The last two sentences of your last post are crazy nonsense. That is putting it lightly.

Comments that ask me to allow a preacher to put his magic hands on me and give me answers don't belong on a science forum. Also preachers get into trouble for their magic hands.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Titanscape on 03/03/2007 19:17:16
This is the "That Can't Be True" section. Many testify, so it is evidence, yet unscientific. Just suggesting testing something rather than external judgement, without a test.

What is this trouble you mention?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 03/03/2007 19:24:07
Preachers ---> Magic Hands ---> Touching people.

Work it out.
Title: God real or not
Post by: jolly on 03/03/2007 20:56:05
deleted as inapproprate               
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 03/03/2007 21:13:47
Unfortunately jolly all religious people don't share this view.
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 03/03/2007 23:34:56
paul he said both so what does that say about him, he either belived one or the other, or maybe he believed both.lol

ok, he did say both, somaybe you can have that award.....just for now. like i said before if people get comfort from having religion in their life all well and good. but any topic debating if god id real or not, is in my opinion not woth having. you either believe or not..no minds are changed. not too many rational ideas put forward. they just end up as im right you are wrong
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 04/03/2007 00:03:09
Jolly,

i'm not having a go but, if you could use paragrahs it would make you posts that bit easier to read. I for one, struggle to read them as the words all seem to mix together.

Thanks in advance.

Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 04/03/2007 01:20:58
It just occured to me, but nobody has quoted anything from south park!

The only place to truely learn about life and god, here are quotes from an episode:

Stan: “Why would God let Kenny die, Chef? Why? Kenny’s my friend. Why can’t God take someone else’s friend?”

Chef: “Stan, sometimes God takes those closest to us, because it makes him feel better about himself. He is a very vengeful God, Stan. He’s all pissed off about something we did thousands of years ago. He just can’t get over it, so he doesn’t care who he takes. Children, puppies, it don’t matter to him, so long as it makes us sad. Do you understand?”

Stan: “But then, why does God give us anything to start with?”

Chef: “Well, look at it this way: if you want to make a baby cry, first you give it a lollipop. Then you take it away. If you never give it a lollipop to begin with, then you would have nothin’ to cry about. That’s like God, who gives us life and love and help just so that he can tear it all away and make us cry, so he can drink the sweet milk of our tears. You see, it’s our tears, Stan, that give God his great power.”

Stan: “I think I understand.”
Title: God real or not
Post by: GBSB on 04/03/2007 01:34:29

 any topic debating if god id real or not, is in my opinion not woth having. you either believe or not..no minds are changed. not too many rational ideas put forward. they just end up as im right you are wrong

I agree. I think nothing productive can come from such a discussion.

On the other side discussion about different religion and role what have religion in history and every day life could be productive only I think that is more delicate question than question about existence of God.

I'm an atheist and I thank God for it (George Bernard Shaw)
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 04/03/2007 01:39:11
somebody agrees.....with me....maybe there is a god after all!

*sits down, head in hands, have i been wrong all this time? where's the whisky*
Title: God real or not
Post by: jolly on 04/03/2007 12:57:46
o.k I'll re-write it.

well, the sikhs believe that all religions lead to God, so you could say that each of the names the different religions use are really just different names for the same god.

Jesus and mohammid relativly said the same thing, Its each head-preists interpretation that affects the message a different religion has. I think, really they all say the same thing, treat others as you wish to treated. 'most' the main 3 use the 10 commandments, I think seeks do to. That being the case, Thou shall not kill, all should abide by.

Jesus asked us to love thy enemy, and turn the other cheek. Why? Because if you fight evil with evil you make more evil. You have to fight evil with love and you make more love. In doing so you help evil people- to become good, As there is good in everyone.

Dawkins said he's an atheist for Jesus. I agree that you dont need God to be good, If the only reason someone is good is because they are scared of God thats immoral. There are plenty of reasons to be good without God. To say I'm only good because of god, is the same as saying- "I want to kill and mame and hurt people I just dont because god will get me if I do" Good people do not harbour these thoughts, they find where they come from and remove them (they go into pandoras box which is inside each person and kick out their demons).

If you except that others exist, and they too like you, feel pain and pleasure, happy and sad, love and hate, and like you- enjoy feeling happy, love, and pleasure surely as you like it and know they like it, you should work to promote it.

God is above that If he/she exists, he/she would clearly love us and want us to be happy and free. Bottom line is evil kills itself(not talking about sucide) and others. love promotes life, evil dosnt. Evil men start wars. loving men try to stop them. The trouble with many religions is they mis-use Gods message for their own selfish, desires= vainity, power, greed etc and in doing so they try to keep there flock in ignorance- to the reality of their own hypocracy.

Noah, according to the Talmud(genesis9:18-19)was given seven basic principles by which to live. This is called the 'Noahide code' It is forbidden:-
1. Idolatry  2. Blasphemy  3. Incest  4. Murder  5. Robbery  6. Cruelty to animals  and  7. requires honesty and fairness.

The Holy Qur'an

2-the cow section 8 62.
"Lo! Those who believe (in that which is revealed unto, thee muhammad), and those who are Jews, and Christians and Sabaeans-Whoever believeth in ALLAH(God) and the last day and doth right-surely their reward is with their LORD, and there shall no fear come upon them neither shall they grieve"
75. "Have ye any hope that they will be true to you when a party of them used to listen to the word of ALLAH, then used to change it, after they had understood it, knowingly?"
Section 11
87. "And verily we gave unto Moses the scripture and we caused a train of messengers to follow after him, and we gave unto Jesus, son of Mary, clear proofs of ALLAH'S sovereignty and we supported him with the holy sprit. Is it ever so, that when cometh unto you a messenger (from ALLAH) with that which ye yourselves desire not, ye grow arrogant, and some ye disbelieve and some ye slay? And they say: Our hearts are hardened. Nay, but ALLAH hath cursed them for their unbelief. Little is that which they believe".   

Jesus in my opinion as mohammid, are both teachers as is buddha. Thou shall have no other gods before me. If anyone puts either before god they break the first commandment. Really the commandment is saying thou shall value nothing above God. So if you put money, or fame, or anthing above god you break the first commandment. So if money is more importamt to you than anything else it has become your God, has'nt it. 

Thou shall not kill has been taken to also mean thou shall not harm, But that isnt just in action, it is also in thought, as a good person shouldnt think about killing or harming someone either.

Thou shall not covert thy neibours ox, wife ect. Really means you should try not to think about what someone else has with envy. Very hard to do the moment you think about it- you have coverted. Thou shall try not to covert. after all thinking your neibours spouse is attractive, is not the same as thinking about having sex with them. That gos for everything your neigbour owns(though why you'd be thinking about having sex with your neibours car I dont know/lol just kidding). Dont envy other peoples possesions.

moses, jesus, mohammid, buddha, gandhi, guru Nanak, Bill hicks(the p~~~~d off prophet) are all teachers in a school, they are not the aministrator. You may go (pray) to them for help, guidance and forgiveness(silly really as you have to forgive yourself; for- if you cant you cant move on).

Eating the apple was never the first sin- as you need to be inteligent to know the difference between right and wrong. The first sin was really- running from God in fear, through inteligence.

King David was not a good man or king. He repeatedly did the wrong thing and had to repent for it and then on his death bed what did he want- what was his last request? That somone be murdered= JOAB. Even on his death bed he broke the commandment- thou shall not kill and the Noahide code also. God had place Adonijah on the throne, and again David went against God and put soloman in instead- Not that soloman was a bad person as the psalms prove he was a good king. But when you consider the psalms of David you find nothing more than a confused, scared and angry man begging for some light to help him through his darkness.
 
BILL HICK QUOTES:

"Boy, when they said anybody could be president, I didnt realise what that meant till this year, ANYBODY! A body of water, a dead body".

"This guy said, God had told him to run for office, pretty scarey, but its o.k as God told me not to vote for him".

"Jesus- murdered, Gandhi- murdered, John lennon- murdered, Reagan- wounded".

"Adam and Eve are in the garden of eden and adam says "look eve here we are, In a beautiful place sorrounded by nature, at one with god, totally happy and in love". Eve says "yeah its just not enought is it".

JUST A RIDE,
"Life is like a ride on a roller coaster, you go up and down around and around, its very load and brightly coloured, and fun for a while, and you think its real coz that how powerful our minds are. Some people who have been on the ride for a long time, begin to question is this real or just a ride. Some remember and they come back to us, saying "dont be scared, dont worrie, ever! Because its just a ride". And we kill those people.lol But that dosent matter because its just a ride. We live in a world where good men are murdered and demons run amok"
End quote.

Free will and suffering.

People suffer because they choose too(buddhism). God dosnt kill people, people do. as god made man free, so- if God stops someone evil killing he stop them being free. A condatiction so god wont stop them(all God could do is try to save the good person-after they've been shot).
If man in his freedom destroys the world god cant step in(if there is one).
If you love yourself do you not see that no matter what happens to you, you still like who you are, and dont blame yourself or feel down. Hurrican carter spent how many years in prison, and he was innocent, framed by the police.
Yet when he left prison what did he say? "in the end, I like myself". If you like yourself you dont suffer, if you dont fight you dont suffer. If you feel pain and fight it- you suffer; if you except it you still feel it- but dont suffer. God dosnt make people suffer to hurt them but to help them as getting out of suffering makes you- a happier and better person.
what doesnt kill you makes you stronger. suffering is a choice as the buddhist believe. Buddhist state: 'life is suffering'- 'unless you become enlightened'. 

God made man free and soverigns of the earth. Therefore we are free to destroy it(the earth) if we wish. If god stopped us, God would have to take our freedom away to do so. As the saying gos- All evil needs to take control, is for good people to sit back and do nothing.

With regards to evolution:

why can't you have both, we still dont understand mutation, mutation could be god playing with the dna of an embroy. If god made everything i'm sure he's a scientist. If she/he wrote the dna code. why not? maybe god just put a few animals here and the rest evolved as science says they did or maybe god just put a sponge here and we all come from that. But also it is possible that its not true and it all just happened by chance. one dosnt disprove or prove the other. There all equally likely.
You can never know both are a leap of faith. so go with what you feel. which do you prefer and why? just god did it, just evolution did it or both togther? there all equally plausable. Not talking inteligent design as thats silly; I.D tries to prove gods existance. Which if god does exist, he or she would never allow. Doesnt mean you couldnt prove it, just means god would try to stop you. Afterall with proff theres no need for faith. 

'Fighting' Evil:

If you see someone trying to harm someone else you should try to stop them. But useing restraint. You hold them down till the police arrive, to take them to prison. If you kill them trying to restrain them, then you never intended to kill them or harm them, it would be accidential.

The frog and the scorpion:
The frog helps the scorpion to go over the river and the scorpion sting the frog half way across; the frog asks why? and the scorpion says "it's in my nature".
Evil kills itself=scorpion frogs= help people and sometimes die trying.
the scorpion could still of stung the frog on the river bank/ either way (helping or not) the frog could have died- surely its better to die helping.
So if you die trying to fight evil- hopefully God would'nt let you. But if you do, atleast your death would be for something you believe in/somthing positive. Like spook in star trek 3 where he enters the reactor and kills himself to save the ship and everyone on it. The needs of the many out weight the needs of the few, or the needs of the one. 

HABAKKUK 2.6-20

"woe to him who piles up stolen goods and makes himself wealthy by extortion! How long must this go on? Will not your debtors/creditors suddenely arise? Will they not wake up and make you tremble? Then you will become their victim, because you have plundered many nations, the people who are left will plunder you! For you have shed human blood; you have destroyed lands and cites and everyone in them".
"Woe to him who builds his realm by unjust gain, to set his nest on high, to escape the clutches of ruin! You have plotted the ruin of many peoples, shaming your own house and forfeiting your life. The stones of the wall will cry out, and the beams of woodwork will echo it".
"Woe to him who builds a city with bloodshed and establishes a town by a crime. Has the LORD Almighty not determined thats people's labour is only fuel for the fire, that nations exhaust themselves for nothing?"....
"Woe to him who gives drink to his neighbours, pouring it for wineskin till they are drunk, so that he can gaze on their naked bodies. You will be filled with shame instead of glory. Now it is your turn! Drink and be exposed! The cup from the lords right hand is coming round to you and disgrace will cover you glory. The violence you have done to lebanon will overwhelm you, and your destruction of animals will terrify you. For you have shed human blood; destroyed lands and cities and everyone in
them".
"Of what value is an idol, since someone has carved it? or an image that teaches lies? For those who make them- trust in their own creations; they make idols that cannot speak. Woe to him who says 'wood come to life!' Can it give guidence? It is covered with gold and silver; there is no breath in it. But the LORD is in his temple; let all the earth be silent before him." A-MEN.

Judgement is reserved for God alone. Who are you or anyone else to judge others. Ofcourse if you catch a person commiting a crime then you may and do judge them and sentence them to pay their debt to society(prison). But spritual judgement is for god alone, Let he who is with out sin cast the first stone! We are all free under god to decided if we are going to be good or bad. God wants us to choose life or death, good or evil, no slaves in heaven please.

SHABBAT:

"That which is hateful unto thee do not do unto thy neighbour. This is the whole of the Torah(and all the books). The rest is commentary. Go and study". I agree- SO WALK. 

HH DALAI LAMA:

"Sometimes when I meet old friends, it reminds me how quickly time passes. And it makes me wonder if we've utilized our time properly or not. Proper utilization of time is so important. While we have this body, and especially this amazing human brain, I think every minute is somthing precious. Our day-to-day existence is very much alive with hope, although there is no guarantee of our future. There is no guarantee that tomorrow at this time we will be here. But still we are working for that purely on the basis of hope. So we need to make the best use of our time. I believe that the proper ultization of time is this: If you can, serve other people, other sentient beings. If not atleast refrain from harming them. I think that is the whole basis of my philosophy.
So, let us reflect on what is truely of value in life, what gives meaning to our lives, and set our priorites on the basis of that. The purpose of life needs to be positive. We Weren't born with the purpose of causing trouble, or harming others. For our lives to be of value, I think we must develop basic good human qualities-warmth, kindness, compassion. then our lives becomes meaningful, and more peaceful- happier". 

The Lord Buddha said:

"Salvation does not come from the sight of me! It demands strenous effort and practice, so work hard and seek your own salvation diligently".  

Guru Nanak:

"Remember God, work hard and help others. God is pleased with honest work and truthful living".

You see really all the prophets say the same thing. I say be good and be happy, live and love, love and learn, life is too short to waste time fighting- so go find out who you are and make your life amazing. It is in the end merely a choice- You are and you live, as you choose to. Be free and be godly.x   
    
Lets face it the corporations have put money(profit) at the top of there agenda. and as a result greed is now the only thing people seem to work for- its involved in every transaction you carry out. They have made money more important than people- and even products more important than people.
The corporations sadly today control the world as the market has been allowed to take control of all areas- this includes science. Polticians are now mere puppets who realativly are told what to do and say, But they've not been bribed- oh no they have been seduced.lol I say death to fascism and all the hate they stand for.
Lets revoke the charters and give power back to the people- Freedom for everyone. lets end this plutocratic totalitarian nightmare we currently call the free market. There is no invisable hand. So stop just thinking about you and start thinking about others for a change maybe heaven might dawn. Do unto others as you wish to be done unto you- the rest is comentary go study.   

      
Title: God real or not
Post by: that mad man on 04/03/2007 18:47:06
What I find difficult to understand is why it is necessary to believe in a religion in order to have a belief in God. From an outsider is seems to be out of a desire to belong to a "tribe" and to be different and exclusive from others.

In the 3 main religions, Judaism, Christianity and Islam the same arch angel Gabriel was involved so in my reasoning they must all have the same God.
Its a strange warping that somehow the prophets now become more important than the God that is to be worshipped.

The idea of a God or God's pre-date the organised religions of above so just worship God (if you feel the need to) and cut out the excess baggage.

TMM
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 04/03/2007 19:01:31
ok, this may be nit picking but:

in term of numbers, Hinduism is the third largest organised religion, with an estimated 851 million members.

No single creed or doctrine binds Hindus together. Intellectually there is complete freedom of belief, and one can be monotheist, polytheist, or atheist. Hinduism is a syncretic religion, welcoming and incorporating a variety of outside influences.

The most ancient sacred texts of the Hindu religion are written in Sanskrit and called the Vedas (vedah means “knowledge”). There are four Vedic books, of which the Rig-Veda is the oldest. It discusses multiple gods, the universe, and creation. The dates of these works are unknown (1000 B.C.?). Present-day Hindus rarely refer to these texts but do venerate them.

Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 04/03/2007 19:31:26
I agree If God makes you free, you have to make up your own mind about whats what. The only thing I think that is concrete is that you should be good not evil. But how do you know the difference, afterall the devil could ask you to give a hungry person a cheese sandwich, and you thinking its a good thing, give that poor/hungry person a cheese sandwich, that person then dies as they were alergic to cheese, and the devil laughts at that 'good' persons stupidity. You can know the difference between good and bad; you cant know if what your doing will have a good or bad outcome untill after the fact. So a good person should always consider the concequences of their actions and stop if they see somthing bad happening.

If you were a god fearing person, would you do the devils bidding by giving the sandwich?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 20/03/2007 02:35:37
It just occured to me, but nobody has quoted anything from south park!

The only place to truely learn about life and god, here are quotes from an episode:

Stan: “Why would God let Kenny die, Chef? Why? Kenny’s my friend. Why can’t God take someone else’s friend?”

Chef: “Stan, sometimes God takes those closest to us, because it makes him feel better about himself. He is a very vengeful God, Stan. He’s all pissed off about something we did thousands of years ago. He just can’t get over it, so he doesn’t care who he takes. Children, puppies, it don’t matter to him, so long as it makes us sad. Do you understand?”

Stan: “But then, why does God give us anything to start with?”

Chef: “Well, look at it this way: if you want to make a baby cry, first you give it a lollipop. Then you take it away. If you never give it a lollipop to begin with, then you would have nothin’ to cry about. That’s like God, who gives us life and love and help just so that he can tear it all away and make us cry, so he can drink the sweet milk of our tears. You see, it’s our tears, Stan, that give God his great power.”

Stan: “I think I understand.”


:-D Paul.
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 20/03/2007 19:39:34
hahaha omg south park rocks my socks!!!
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 30/03/2007 16:52:50
i no i just skimmed it but i saw south park and i just had to say somethin lol
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 12/04/2007 20:48:32
Prove Jesus and God are in fact real.

Define your definition of god. Is god the Christian tyrant in the sky. Is he the vengeful Islamic god? Is he Love, Nature or something ambiguous like this?

Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 13/04/2007 14:36:24
if jesus is real then so is god...if god is real then so is jesus
Title: God real or not
Post by: Seany on 13/04/2007 14:38:54
Yes.. I'm afraid these questions cannot come out with a strict "ONE" answer. But I must say one thing to you all..

I am the Living Messiah
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 13/04/2007 14:41:56
HALLOWED ARE THE ORI.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Seany on 13/04/2007 14:43:02
Yes. Let us proclaim the mystery of faith!!

Christ has died..
Christ is risen..
Christ will come again!!

AND HERE I AM!!
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 13/04/2007 16:20:16
Yes. Let us proclaim the mystery of faith!!

Christ has died..
Christ is risen..
Christ will come again!!

AND HERE I AM!!

No offense, I think that blasphemous.

Many of you feel that Jesus is God. This clearly is not the case Jesus is Gods greatest prophet.
JOHN 1-  4.7-12
'Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves is born of God(born again) and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, BECAUSE GOD IS LOVE. This is how God showed his love among us: he sent his one and only son into the world so that we might live through him.......12 None has ever seen God; but if we love one another , God lives in us and his love is made complete in us'.

It is quite clear that Jesus was not god. It is the father God, The son- the prophets and the Holy Sprite- your soul. GOD- JESUS- PEOPLE. THE FATHER-SON-HOLY SPRITE.

Please reject hatred, and embrace LOVE.   

No, Jesus is God, who is also the Holy Spirit, who is Jesus. Jesus, God, and the Holy Spirit are all one person.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Seany on 13/04/2007 16:23:32
Yes yes.. Sorry my bad.. [:-'(]
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 13/04/2007 16:23:51
People say "Prove God is real! I can't see him!" Sometimes you beileve in things you can't see. Like wind for example, people beileve in wind even though they can't see it.
Then they say "Yeah! But we can feel wind!" Just as I can feel God working in my heart to make me a better Christian.

You can't feel the wind if you put a coat on. That's what the people who question God's existence have done. They put a "coat" around their heart to keep him out.
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 13/04/2007 16:36:28
idk but all of u had better strighten up....the myans have predicted that we would have cars, we would fly around in machines, and that we will go into space and on the moon. they were right about all those things but another prediction is yet to come...they predict that in 2015 there will be en epic event. this huge event could be the end of the world where we will find out if god is real or not...but it could also mean other things like a huge plague that kills millions or first contact with aliens or WW3 no1 knows
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 13/04/2007 16:43:23
idk but all of u had better strighten up....the myans have predicted that we would have cars, we would fly around in machines, and that we will go into space and on the moon. they were right about all those things but another prediction is yet to come...they predict that in 2015 there will be en epic event. this huge event could be the end of the world where we will find out if god is real or not...but it could also mean other things like a huge plague that kills millions or first contact with aliens or WW3 no1 knows


First, I don't beileve aliens. Second, WWIII is entirely possible, just ask Seany! [:)]

Third, maybe the mayans did predict we would have cars and fly around and go into space and the moon..but were there visions the same as ours?

What if they imagined, sorry visualized cars had 2 or 6 wheels instead of 4? What if they visualized airplanes being box-shaped (which wouldn't make sense.) What if they visualized it was someone besides Neil Armstrong who landed on the moon. What if they visualized me or some monkey landing on the moon?

Sorry about all the "what if's".
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 13/04/2007 16:49:34
it doesnt mattter how they invisoned them to be..of course they had there own imaginations but the main reason is that they still predicted that we wud go to space(humans) we wud land on the moon, we would go around in cars no matter how many wheels, and that we wud fly in huge machines no matter wat shape.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 13/04/2007 16:53:41
I think it does matter, because if their visions are different from ours, they could a little off about the 2015 thing..who knows? It, whatever "it" is, could happen in 2115.

That's the longest song ever by the way. 2115. It was made by Rush.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Batroost on 14/04/2007 15:45:25
Wrong - it was 2112
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 14/04/2007 17:05:22
God is an imagined anthropomorphic personification. A malignant meme. A pernicious, malevolent, capricious dictator.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Batroost on 15/04/2007 20:09:51
Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able?
     Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing?
     Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing?
     Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing?
     Then why call him God?

Epicurus - had it figured-out 2300 years ago...
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 16/04/2007 21:09:26
Which god?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Batroost on 16/04/2007 21:39:36
To quote Pratchett: "All religions are true, for a given value of true"
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 17/04/2007 16:19:59
God is both willing and able, I think God just wants people to be good through choice not through slavery. Evil comes from Freedom but so does love- Its a choice. You are who you choose to be.
So by giving us freedom God allows people to be evil as well as good- But God loves us and wants us to be good and free.
If you use your gift of life to destroy others then- It is your funneral.
I think God wants to save as many as possible so God gives enought time to each to decided what he/she wants to be- Angel or demon.
Your choice- Your life- your death.
God does'nt kill people- people do.
You have your alotted time so use it as you want- You are in the end free.
Well if your good your free- the Devil makes you his slave. 


Nice post Jolly.[:)]
Title: God real or not
Post by: Batroost on 18/04/2007 20:10:11
Quote
But God loves us

And also gives us Earthquakes, and Volcanoes, and Lightning Strikes, and Tsunamis, and Tornadoes, Flooding, Cylones, Hurricanes, disease, droughts and age-related illneses ...?

 
Title: God real or not
Post by: that mad man on 18/04/2007 21:34:48
Saying you have a belief in God is fine by me but, it is a personal individual feeling so accept that it is not always shared.


If you believe that God has put you here and that he has also given you free will, will he interfere with man's future decisions?

Bee


Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 19/04/2007 16:30:52
could there be more than one god? like maybe the god that some of us believe in has a mom and a dad?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Batroost on 19/04/2007 19:27:19
God is not a reason (as there is no God).
Title: God real or not
Post by: RMorty on 20/04/2007 01:48:15
 Jolly,

  Good point about the fact that god doesn't matter if a person is only moral because of fear.

  Someone who is religious. Please explain how Christ died for everyone's sin.  I wasn't alive when he died on the cross, what sins exactly?  If the world still has sin did he really die to so anything to sin?  Also, the thing saying that everyone has a sin once they're born "the cardinal sin" or whatever it is called, that thing... it really sets off my bullshit alarm.

  For those of you who are naturalists.  You don't believe in a deity as this topic is discussing so that sort of information has no place here, it simply created more angles to look at things, which are off topic.

  If you believe that there is a god that created anything, if you are a deist, if you believe in Greek gods etc.

  Scientology isn't involving a "god", nor is naturalism. 

Back on track now.  If there is a god, then why does he demand that we all believe by faith?  What's wrong with telling us he is real.  If I had tangible proof then I would have no doubt.  If I tell you that I had $867 shoved up my ass crack, and I told you I did, and then, I asked you if you believed me, then you said yes.  Then how about I say, if you reach up my ass and grab the money it's yours?  Would you do it just to find out I was cuddling  with you?  It would make it easier if I said, hey, here's the money, now its going between my ass cheeks and if you are man/woman enough to reach in there and take it it's yours.

  That is a really jacked up analogy I know, but it works.  Sure I can spend 1/7th of my week praising the unknown to die and realize that there is nothingness (if realizing a reality in nothingness were possible).  Or, God could simply let he world know he exists without a doubt then the logical people wouldn't have to wonder about it.

  Sure, I think the idea of a loving god id nice, but I CAN'T, I literally CAN'T, I can lie and say yes I believe in god, but I don't and the way preachers put it, that's what counts.

  My belief is that I didn't exist before I was born, and I won't exist afterwards.  As a matter of fact, thinking that I won't exist once I am dead is more comforting than believing that I will either spend eternity in bliss or eternity in a place full of pain and anguish.

  it's also funny that god loves you until you're dead.  He loves everyone no matter how much she sins, but once they die... bye bye.

 Also a parting thought.. isn't the devil a "good guy." I mean think about it. If he is punishing those who "betray god" isn't he sort of like an employee? lol. Like a jailer is to the legal system?
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 20/04/2007 16:36:04
God is not a reason (as there is no God).

that is an extremely bold quote Batroost and my and i assume others probably dont appreciate that. You can express your opinion on this site but dont flat out say stuff like its a fact refer to it as your opinion. thx
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 20/04/2007 16:40:24
I don't appreciate it that's for sure.

But is bold the right word?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 20/04/2007 16:42:33
Quote
But God loves us

And also gives us Earthquakes, and Volcanoes, and Lightning Strikes, and Tsunamis, and Tornadoes, Flooding, Cylones, Hurricanes, disease, droughts and age-related illneses ...?

 

God uses these catastrophes to turn people to him. Sin also causes all of those. So you can't entirly blame God.

If there's a war..did God start that war? Or did people start that war?

..Or did natural sinful nature make us start that war?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Batroost on 20/04/2007 17:03:39
Quote
Quote from: Batroost on 19/04/2007 19:27:19
God is not a reason (as there is no God).


that is an extremely bold quote Batroost and my and i assume others probably dont appreciate that. You can express your opinion on this site but dont flat out say stuff like its a fact refer to it as your opinion. thx

You're absolutely right. In my opinion "God is not a reason (as there is no God)."

Now, can I see the same qualification from those who so blatently assert the existence of a deity?

No offence intended of course but why does theology always seem to find its way onto Science Forums? - I've got no excuse really, I studied Theology alongside my Physics degree.
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 20/04/2007 18:00:09
yea i agrre with u there are many things that disprove god but there are also many that prove his existance
Title: God real or not
Post by: that mad man on 20/04/2007 18:44:14
Ben6789.

Sin is a Christian concept that only applies to the Christian religion and those taught "the word of god" within it. The concept of sin does not appear until late into the bible (Romans) where Paul interpreted it differently. He had to as without sinning Christianity would mean nothing i.e. Jesus would not have died for OUR sins. God never mentions sin in Genesis, where it was supposed to happen nor did Jesus mention it. Also one reason the Jewish religion does not believe in sin.

The problem is that under the Christian religion there can be no salvation without sinning first as the whole Christian ideal depends on sin, redemption and being scared of God!

So sin is relative to what you believe, or not as it does not affect all.


Bee

Title: God real or not
Post by: Seany on 20/04/2007 21:47:05
Also a parting thought.. isn't the devil a "good guy." I mean think about it. If he is punishing those who "betray god" isn't he sort of like an employee? lol. Like a jailer is to the legal system?

Cool! I never thought of it that way! But then again, Jesus would punish anyone who sins, but would always forgive. I don't think the devil forgives, and punishes them too much, just for their own sake and happiness.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 20/04/2007 22:21:22
God is not a reason (as there is no God).

Neither does Santa
Title: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 20/04/2007 22:43:16
yea i agrre with u there are many things that disprove god but there are also many that prove his existance

This is a contradiction.  You cannot simultaneously prove and disprove.  What you can say is that there is evidence for, and evidence against; but proof implies an absolute for which there can be no contrary.
Title: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 20/04/2007 23:22:31
Ben6789.

Sin is a Christian concept that only applies to the Christian religion and those taught "the word of god" within it. The concept of sin does not appear until late into the bible (Romans) where Paul interpreted it differently. He had to as without sinning Christianity would mean nothing i.e. Jesus would not have died for OUR sins. God never mentions sin in Genesis, where it was supposed to happen nor did Jesus mention it. Also one reason the Jewish religion does not believe in sin.

The problem is that under the Christian religion there can be no salvation without sinning first as the whole Christian ideal depends on sin, redemption and being scared of God!

So sin is relative to what you believe, or not as it does not affect all.

Bee

The word 'sin' has a roots in Latin and Germanic languages, so would not have existed as a word in the pre-Latin bible.  On the other hand, there is no doubt that God is supposed to have wrought punishment upon the Jews if the strayed from the path of righteousness; but for the Jews, the religion was more of a social instrument rather than a personal duty, and so in the Old Testament, one sees more often a communal punishment for the people as a whole, than a personal punishment for the individual (although, that having been said, one can look at the punishment met out to David and Bathsheba for their adulterous relationship.

Aside from that, both Hindu and Buddhist religions have the idea of leading a good life, free of evil, and the idea that if you do evil, it will rebound on you in the next life.  Unlike Christianity, the next life is not regarded as some other place (a heaven or a hell), but a reincarnation into this world, but with the burdens of the sins of your past lives placed upon your present life.  It is only when you have worked off all of your past evil deeds with good deeds, that you can free yourself from the cycle of reincarnation.

Different details, but not so very different in underlying ideas.

In fact, my own suspicion is that there is a fair degree of Hindu influence in Judaism, although I would not go as far as to say that Judaism evolved from Hinduism (or maybe Zoroastrianism), only that it evolved under the influence of these religions.
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 21/04/2007 01:22:31
God is not a reason (as there is no God).

that is an extremely bold quote Batroost and my and i assume others probably dont appreciate that. You can express your opinion on this site but dont flat out say stuff like its a fact refer to it as your opinion. thx

Tony, can you prove there is a god, until you can them may we assume or have the opinion that there is no god because you can not prove it.



God uses these catastrophes to turn people to him. Sin also causes all of those. So you can't entirly blame God.

If there's a war..did God start that war? Or did people start that war?

..Or did natural sinful nature make us start that war?

If god was so almighty, why would he use war and catastrophies to get followers and believers? surely, he would use love and peace.

again i feel the quote from south park sums up what god does, if there is a god.

Stan: “Why would God let Kenny die, Chef? Why? Kenny’s my friend. Why can’t God take someone else’s friend?”

Chef: “Stan, sometimes God takes those closest to us, because it makes him feel better about himself. He is a very vengeful God, Stan. He’s all pissed off about something we did thousands of years ago. He just can’t get over it, so he doesn’t care who he takes. Children, puppies, it don’t matter to him, so long as it makes us sad. Do you understand?”

Stan: “But then, why does God give us anything to start with?”

Chef: “Well, look at it this way: if you want to make a baby cry, first you give it a lollipop. Then you take it away. If you never give it a lollipop to begin with, then you would have nothin’ to cry about. That’s like God, who gives us life and love and help just so that he can tear it all away and make us cry, so he can drink the sweet milk of our tears. You see, it’s our tears, Stan, that give God his great power.”

Stan: “I think I understand.”

Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 21/04/2007 01:49:54
yea i agrre with u there are many things that disprove god but there are also many that prove his existance

This is a contradiction.  You cannot simultaneously prove and disprove.  What you can say is that there is evidence for, and evidence against; but proof implies an absolute for which there can be no contrary.

There is no evidence to believe in a god. Most people substitute god for a gap in their knowledge. It is true that you can't disprove god. Especially if you use the word god in a way that is ambiguous and unclear. That said just because something can't be disproven doesn't mean that the chances of it being true are 50/50. I would say given my currently knowledge of the cosmos I think it is highly unlikely a god (personal deity who answers prayers etc) exists.
Title: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 21/04/2007 02:56:08
There is no evidence to believe in a god.

Clearly untrue.

People do not arbitrarily believe in anything, however absurd that thing might be, without any evidence.  The evidence might be superficial.  The interpretation of that evidence might be flawed.  Despite all of that, there must be some reason why that thing was believed in, and another competing idea was not believed in, and that reason must be considered to be evidence, however weak and inadequate it might be.

Most people substitute god for a gap in their knowledge.

But is that not also much of the argument for dark matter - it is to fill a gap in our understanding of the way galaxies behave?

Any theory usually starts with an attempt to fill the gap in our knowledge, and then that theory is tested.  There are serious problems with testing the God theory, which places severe limits upon what that theory may now be used for (if anything); but simply saying that the theory is bad because it was created to fill a gap in our knowledge would condemn much of the theoretical model of the universe that we have today.

Incidentally, there are also severe problems with proving string theory, or many other grand cosmological theories; but that does not of itself falsify the theory, only for the time being limit the trust one can place in them.

It is true that you can't disprove god. Especially if you use the word god in a way that is ambiguous and unclear. That said just because something can't be disproven doesn't mean that the chances of it being true are 50/50. I would say given my currently knowledge of the cosmos I think it is highly unlikely a god (personal deity who answers prayers etc) exists.

Probabilities can be used to mean two things:
What might reasonably be argued from a purely philosophical perspective is that the concept of a God has no scientific or engineering utility; but the philosophical response to that is to ask whether scientific and engineering utility is an adequate definition of existence?

Clearly, from an economic perspective, engineering utility is paramount in our ability to create wealth and the lifestyle we have become accustomed to, but does that make it nonetheless the only arbiter of existence?  I should stress that I do not regard this as a rhetorical question, but a genuine question - should we regard engineering and scientific utility as the sole arbiter of existence, or should we allow other values to define existence (maybe other types of existence, or to extend a single notion of existence)?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 21/04/2007 03:48:25
Clearly untrue?

Can you give me the evidence for believing in a god. I don't mean reasons why people believe. I know many reasons why people believe. I am saying when you look for evidence there is a severe lack of it. It always ends up coming down to faith. The god hypothesis has nothing to back it up. At least string theory has some fancy maths.

I know the current problems in physics. Mentioning them doesn't discount what I said.

Science for me answers questions that start with the word how. How did this happen? How did that come to be? for questions that start with why then I would perhaps look elsewhere. I am under the impression that the universe doesn't owe me a why. Why are we hear? Why is there something rather than nothing?

As for quantifying the sources or error in prediction the absence of a god. I would need a strict definition of the word god. With the multitude of definitions people give that word it makes the word almost meaningless. If god is what you call the wonder of nature then I am a believer. If you define god as the god of the bible then I am an atheist and not worried at all about going to hell.

Just a quick addition. Thanks for the reply George. You always make good points.
Title: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 21/04/2007 04:26:46
Clearly untrue?

Can you give me the evidence for believing in a god. I don't mean reasons why people believe. I know many reasons why people believe. I am saying when you look for evidence there is a severe lack of it.

I would say that substantially, reason and evidence, while not equivalent, do have a substantial overlap.

One aspect where one might look for 'evidence' is in faith healing.  The scientific answer would be the placebo effect, but if one wants to discount the scientific answer, one could look for religious answers.

A second piece of evidence might be that a society that believes in God is a more stable society, with stronger internal cohesion.  Scientific answers could look for psychological reasons for this, but again, if one discounts the scientific argument, you could give a religious argument that God rewards societies that believe in him.  Ofcourse, this same cohesion is why religion is often blamed for wars.

Another social argument for God (and probably one of the most important, in historic terms) is with regard to the hierarchy of power.  In a society where each individual is answerable to his master, a serf might be answerable to his lord, and a lord is answerable to his king, and the king must then be answerable to someone, and that someone would be God.  It is a logical progression. It must be so, since it was regarded that a man without a master was a man without a place in society, and thus a man without allegiance, and a man without morality; so if the king was to be regarded as a moral person, a person with a place in society, so he must have a master.

The point is that I am not saying that the evidence is unanswerable, only that the evidence clearly does exist, and did (at least in the pre-scientific age) give real reason to believe in God.


It always ends up coming down to faith. The god hypothesis has nothing to back it up. At least string theory has some fancy maths.

Having a mathematically constructed deity would not make the deity any more real.

Science for me answers questions that start with the word how. How did this happen? How did that come to be? for questions that start with why then I would perhaps look elsewhere. I am under the impression that the universe doesn't owe me a why. Why are we hear? Why is there something rather than nothing?

Yes, I would agree with this; as science also seeks to avoid asking the question 'who'.

The point is that in a society that is very person focused 'who' is an important question.  The modern world is a very materialistic world, where 'what' and 'how' are important, and 'who' and 'why' is totally unimportant.  Whether it is a good or a bad thing that we have moved from a world where the thing mattered less than the person, to one where the person is largely irrelevant, and the thing is the all important, might be speculated upon, but as a matter of fact, that is what has happened, and it is that shift from 'who' to 'what' that has moved us from 'God' to the Big Bang.


As for quantifying the sources or error in prediction the absence of a god. I would need a strict definition of the word god. With the multitude of definitions people give that word it makes the word almost meaningless. If god is what you call the wonder of nature then I am a believer. If you define god as the god of the bible then I am an atheist and not worried at all about going to hell.

Again, I do not disagree with any of the above; I was merely saying that making judgements as to whether the probability was 50/50, more so, or less so, was itself meaningless.

Just a quick addition. Thanks for the reply George. You always make good points.

Thank you  [:)] [^]
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 21/04/2007 14:29:18
Lets bring this debate to a close:
No scientist can claim that there is no GOD.

As Feynman said- 'If it does not comply with experiment it is not science'-


but he also said "There are a lot of tricks of the mind and human perception that cause people to believe things they have no evidence for"

No Evidence, show us your evidence that there is a god.


WHERE SCIENTISTS IS YOUR EXPERIMENT TO PROVE GOD DOES NOT EXIST- You do not have one- you have no proff- No experiment- So that being the case any scientist that says there is no god- Is really not a scientist- Point in Fact.

No, No ,No. you must first show us the evidence that he/she does exist, then let us examine your evidence.


Atleast Feynman realised he had been a moron and repented.


So, Feynman was a moron eh. How are you qualified to call such a man such things? i Guess you have many papers published, a nobel prize, work at los alamos. I never knew you were so qualified.


and JESUS is free- to be who he wants to be- who are any of you to say how he will act or what he will say or do or dress- You all have some deluded fantasy of Jesus- Hopefully some of you will look when the time comes with open eyes and a loving heart. and not be blinded by your illusion.

P.s No one can garentee you a place in heaven- anyone says they can is working for satan. God decides no-one else.

Jesus is not free. you have collection plates and contributions. Now some religions do guarantee a place in heaven, so are they not actually religions?
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 21/04/2007 15:27:04
Paul grow up. Its not my problem if you dont understand what I have said. And to say what you just did, shows you havent understood.

Jolly, yet again you have to stoop to a personal attack if someone does not agree with your position. Then what do you do? You go back and alter and add to your previous post!

How many times have you done this? if you look at your posts, a high percentage of them have an "edit". why edit your posts when you have received a reply? why not simply make a new post?

not only does this affect the reader, it shows that you can not hold your argument so resort to altering your original text to suit or make the replier look stupid.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 21/04/2007 15:33:07
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. The burden or proof doesn't lay with the non believer. The person making the claim must provide the proof.
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 21/04/2007 16:49:44
has nothing to do with that I see spelling mistakes and add to comments to improve them others edit theres as well- your comment is unvalid- trying to make out im cheating or somthing- silly I do not alter my text I correct the spelling mistakes and add to the text- on occasion I swap words around as it reads better. But then if you dont bother reading it whats the difference. 

I do not see the point in creating loads of new boxes it makes the forum huge- when it does not need to be and gives you a huge post count- I could careless about my post count.

spelling errors are one thing. i will be the first to admit that at times my spelling is so atrocious that i have to go back and correct it.

But i do not alter the text or make additions, swap words around!!! i do believe that a few posts ago you added:


"Marx, Freud, Einstien all jewish All I believe- belived in God-
Marxs attacked how religion was used by the elites to supress the poor- he did not attack God persay. Einstien said he didnt believe in a personnel God- but that could really be seen as him saying God is for everyone, not just the jews, he just said it in a vague way to stop himself being attacked by jews.

Decartes and Hume both believed in God- Fathers both of modern philsophy and impericism.... The list gos on and on- But then as a scientist you cannot deny God- to do so is unscientific- A leap of faith- There is no evidence against- and some towards- Your free- you choose. "


that is not spell checking or altering a few words!
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 21/04/2007 17:49:08
Yes so you claim there is no god- prove it- its the same.


I don't claim there is no god. I have lack of a belief in a god. With my current knowledge and all available evidence I see no reason to have that belief. This is different from saying "I KNOW THERE IS NO GOD"

Theists are the ones making the claim. I don't go around trying to prove that things don't exist. I don't go around trying to justify the things I DON'T believe in. That would be preposterous.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 21/04/2007 18:09:12
My point exactly.

Strange. When I read what you wrote that isn't the impression I got.
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 21/04/2007 18:23:02
Yes I added it as I felt it was needed- who the hell are you to tell me how I should relay information to people- Not just you read this- Some people will not read this stuff till next week- I will post as I see fit thank you!

You dont like it thats your problem. Tell me how to post? Who are you exactly? What gives you the right to tell me how to post?

Rather than making a whole new box I add on- to things that relate- as I think of things to say. That way its all together. not all over the place- Then I answer you complaints- and add on to them as I have new or better understood answers. DEAL WITH IT.

It is not my fault that you do not understand what I say then put up silly posts, thats your problem- not mine- Keep digging your hole- please...

In what part of my text did i tell you how to write your posts? Nowhere. All i am saying is that by constantly adding, and deleting, whole paragraphs once replies have been made is unfair to the replier and later reader of the topic.

How can i understand what you are trying to say, when the post i reply to changes?

What hole and i digging?

i see you even edited the post to which i am replying!
Title: God real or not
Post by: Batroost on 21/04/2007 22:25:11
Quote
YOUR NOT BETTER OR MORE INTELIGENT THAT ANYONE ELSE- YOU JUST THINK YOU ARE.

BY the same assertion I would refute:

Quote
Alot of christians feel they speak with God- They know they do-.

Why is this position a valid one and yet saying that there is no god is seen as an attack on faith? If you truly believe what you say you beleive then nothing I or anybody else says here will shake your faith. Well done, you are then a convincing christian.

BUT THIS HAS ABSOLUTLEY NOTHING TO DO WITH SCIENCE! A scientist should never hold true to dogma. A model is only as good as the current evidence. A theory can always be changed or abandoned if new evidence presents itself, or a lack of evidence is apparent when an experiment is performed.

A discussion on science uses evidence to support models of the world. Where there is no evidence there is no discussion - there is only bigotry.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 23/04/2007 13:22:12
jolly! Paul fr.! please calm down!

BUT THIS HAS ABSOLUTLEY NOTHING TO DO WITH SCIENCE! .


That's right. It doesn't. That's why this topic is so popular.

Science and religon never mix. Never will. They contradict. Water and oil. But that's why this has 19 pages. Everyone's chosen a side. Everyone knows their reasons. But this topic will go on forever, just as tony6789 wanted. "Prove he is real!" "Prove he isn't!" It all comes down to opinion in this one.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 23/04/2007 13:38:13
Paul grow up. Its not my problem if you dont understand what I have said. And to say what you just did, shows you havent understood.

The evidence I was refering to would be the books- as well as the religious community- Alot of christians feel they speak with God- They know they do- But how do I prove that to you- You would just say they were delusional or somthing. To love is to know- Its individual- Proff denies faith.

There is no proff to prove god does not exsist- there is some elimentary evidence to suggest that there is a God. Ergo more in favor than against.
Not evidence against- a tiny bit for. But no scientist should be claiming things they have no evidence for- So you cannot say there is no god- as a scientist- as a person you may.

Personal revelation isn't evidence. People who have temporal lobe seizures have profound religious experiences.
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 23/04/2007 13:40:35

"Prove he is real!" "Prove he isn't!" It all comes down to opinion in this one.


Not really, if you happily go along your normal days business with nothing to worry about that's fine. Suddenly some nutter approaches you and tells you there is a god. you say "wow, i will believe you if you can just prove it".

The onus is on the one making the first claim, IE that god exists, not the disbeliever. The argument only came about because of the claim that there was a god, the claim has to be proven.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 23/04/2007 13:42:22
jolly! Paul fr.! please calm down!

BUT THIS HAS ABSOLUTLEY NOTHING TO DO WITH SCIENCE! .


That's right. It doesn't. That's why this topic is so popular.

Science and religon never mix. Never will. They contradict. Water and oil. But that's why this has 19 pages. Everyone's chosen a side. Everyone knows their reasons. But this topic will go on forever, just as tony6789 wanted. "Prove he is real!" "Prove he isn't!" It all comes down to opinion in this one.

This is because one is a dogmatic ideology and the other has a self correcting mechanism.
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 23/04/2007 13:51:32

The evidence I was refering to would be the books- as well as the religious community- Alot of christians feel they speak with God- They know they do- But how do I prove that to you- You would just say they were delusional or somthing.

Lets take, Joseph Smith shall we. He was clearly delusional and a fraud. Books eh, have you read the book of mormon! what outragious and ludicrus claims he makes. Now if you want to follow his teachings and live a happy contented life, that's fine by me. But don't tell me this man was not a fraud.

look at the evidence:

Joseph smith believes/said

I was out in the woods, praying I was asking God if I should be a Protestant, or a Catholic, or what? And suddenly God and Jesus appeared before me.  And they said I should start my own church, because none of the others had it right.

Last night, a Native America angel told me where I could find another testament of Jesus Christ, so I went out to the woods. I dug around all morning where the angel had told me to look. he found a stone box
 Inside the stone box, he found the magical seer stones. Under that, he found four gold plates written in strange writing

he was not allowed to take them. You see, after he found the plates, the angel Moroni appeared to me again and said that I am not allowed to show the plates, or the seer stones, to anybody. Because first I must translate what's written on the plates into English, so you can all read it!

i don't have the will to go on, but clarly he was a nutter!
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 23/04/2007 16:21:58
Yeah and where he found them just happens to be where the twin towers are..were...
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 23/04/2007 16:23:34
Yeah and where he found them just happens to be where the twin towers are..were...

and your proof for that?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 23/04/2007 16:32:51
It's just what I heard..urban legend probably.
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 23/04/2007 16:38:18
It's just what I heard..urban legend probably.

well they were (supposed to have been) found in or around new york, in a place called palerma. not sure if that is the correct spelling but it sounds right. in western newyork
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 23/04/2007 16:41:11
It's just what I heard..urban legend probably.

well they were (supposed to have been) found in or around new york, in a place called palerma. not sure if that is the correct spelling but it sounds right. in western newyork

Try a spell check to see if you did.
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 23/04/2007 16:42:26
It's just what I heard..urban legend probably.

well they were (supposed to have been) found in or around new york, in a place called palerma. not sure if that is the correct spelling but it sounds right. in western newyork

Try a spell check to see if you did.

but that would only work if i wnew which spelling was correct!
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 23/04/2007 16:45:18
oooooo, that's right.

Sorry, I get stupid sometimes..most times..
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 23/04/2007 16:47:03
Palmyra, western New York. is that near where the towers were? he lived there for a few years and supposidly food the plates in the woods there.

edit: oops he found the plates, not food them.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 23/04/2007 16:51:16
found or food?
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 23/04/2007 16:55:57
found or food?

lol, i edited it. i suppose the plates made him think of food  [:)]
Title: God real or not
Post by: that mad man on 23/04/2007 18:43:09
Jolly there is a difference between believing in a God and believing in a religion, you can believe in a God without believing in any religion.

If the God that you believe in is omnipotent and everywhere why is it necessary for him to talk to angels and prophets instead of talking directly to us? Could it be that the only way he can exist is by prophets inventing stuff and lying about being "chosen", its in the prophets or the teachers benefit to do so.

There have been threads about Dreaming and I think most would agree that dreaming is not reality and yet, most prophets saw visions (dreams) about the words of God and we are expected to accept that as fact!

It the old con trick, "I know, I saw! I cant prove it but believe me it was God and was real and if you don't believe me then you must believe in evil".

How come you have to pay a priest to get married or carry out a funeral service? Do you see many destitute or poor priests? How much is the "Church" worth?

We are sensible enough now to treat or lock up people that say they have strange visions or talk to God, to talk to God and have visions is now considered a sign of madness! Go tell the doctor that you have strange visions and have Gods voice in your head and you will be promptly offered psychiatric help.

The voices in the head is a popular one!



Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 24/04/2007 16:24:42
lol
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 24/04/2007 16:25:39
Yes it is..but visions of God talking to people are entirly possible.

If you have one, don't tell anyone who doesn't beileve in God, less chance of getting sent to Mental Institute.
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 24/04/2007 16:37:16
lol tru dude tru all the way
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 24/04/2007 16:38:38
thanks, i appreciate the support.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 30/04/2007 13:15:44
NIce post.

Again! You should get a reward.
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 04/05/2007 16:35:51
yea i agree
Title: God real or not
Post by: chimera on 04/05/2007 17:00:55
How much is the "Church" worth?

Some say The Vatican is worth 1 billion (euros), some say 5, but the real total value sold at an auction, say, would probably be a multiple of that last number. Highest I've heard is close to 50 billion, Holy See + Vatican City.

Ofcourse, that's only the Roman Catholic Church, them poor, poor beggars. Other numbers of other faiths are much harder to obtain, because of a lack of a big central organisation like the RCC has.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 04/05/2007 19:09:12
How much is the "Church" worth?

Some say The Vatican is worth 1 billion (euros), some say 5, but the real total value sold at an auction, say, would probably be a multiple of that last number. Highest I've heard is close to 50 billion, Holy See + Vatican City.

Ofcourse, that's only the Roman Catholic Church, them poor, poor beggars. Other numbers of other faiths are much harder to obtain, because of a lack of a big central organisation like the RCC has.


5 euros or 5 million euros?
Title: God real or not
Post by: chimera on 04/05/2007 20:23:58
All numbers are billions, although some reports use dollars, so it's only roughly equivalence with euros. But not lire or zloty, in any case. [:)]

You have to add up quite a few separate not-so-impressive cashflows together though and take all the assets artwork/real estate into consideration as well, especially that last one's an enormous figure alone. Now that's all 'priceless' and valued at 1$, like. Token value.

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20061201175736AAx89Vt
http://www.nationsencyclopedia.com/Europe/Vatican.html
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 04/05/2007 22:14:39
The Vatican is one of the most opulent places on the planet. It is probably priceless. No one could ever buy it.
Title: God real or not
Post by: chimera on 05/05/2007 02:16:27
Think that's very relative - a lot of the Church's gold came from Latin-America, and in a lot of cases was formerly representing totally different religious embellishments/artforms, equally priceless. Melting pots and greedy people care very little about such things. :P
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 07/05/2007 16:45:11
Umm, sure.
Title: God real or not
Post by: jolly on 07/05/2007 17:44:11
lol.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 09/05/2007 16:29:14
WHat? No one knows what to say all of a sudden?
Title: God real or not
Post by: socratus on 11/05/2007 18:42:15
Science & Philosophy. Religion & Physics.  XXIc.
================
The laws of physics and mathematics in the different countries
of the world  are  identical, but religions - different.
 Why?
Because the religion is not proved with the laws
of physics and mathematics.
Question:
Is it possible to unite the laws of physics with religion?
Answer:
Yes. It is possible.
================   
The time, when concepts: “religion, god, spirit” are possible
to explain with the formulas, equations and laws of physics, has come.
 In my book and on a site I approve that it is possible.
==================
The secret of words 'God', 'soul ', 'religion', ‘ Existence’,
'dualism of consciousness', 'human being'  hide
 in the “Theory of Light quanta”.
================= .
   http://www.socratus.com
Title: God real or not
Post by: Batroost on 11/05/2007 19:29:55
Quote
Is it possible to unite the laws of physics with religion?
Answer:
Yes. It is possible.

Why bother trying?

If you don't believe in the latter then it has no relevance to the former.
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 14/05/2007 16:26:21
if u try then u can finally know the truth
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 14/05/2007 16:33:11
Anyone else think socratus is smoking way too much crack?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 14/05/2007 16:36:02
Anyone else think socratus is smoking way too much crack?

No...why would anyone think that? Because he thinks it's possible for the God, to exist?

Or because he thinks science and religon can be joined?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 14/05/2007 16:46:12
No because he thinks he has done it.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 14/05/2007 16:50:26
Joined religon and science? Impossible. Need proof? See how long this religous post has grown on a science site? Everyone's made up their mind on what they beileve and have good reasons, but so does the other side and neither are giving ground.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 14/05/2007 16:54:43
You act like they both have equal footing in reality.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Batroost on 14/05/2007 18:09:35
Both science and religion are true.

(For a given value of 'true').
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 15/05/2007 13:22:18
God's truer then any science thats for sure.
Title: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 15/05/2007 13:38:26
God's truer then any science thats for sure.

Is this a fuzzy logic argument?

I did not think that most religions had a very high tolerance for fuzzy logic - they usually regarded as something being either true or false, and so one could not have degrees of being 'true'.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 15/05/2007 16:31:21
No, it's not a fuzzy logic arguement.
Title: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 15/05/2007 16:48:21
No, it's not a fuzzy logic arguement.

So how do you explain the notion that "God's truer then any science" - unless you regard science as false?

Either you regard science as false, or you regard both science and God as equally true, but to regard that science is not false, but is less true than religion, smacks of fuzzy logic to me?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 15/05/2007 16:52:53
Science is true...in some things.

But God's better at being less fuzzy in some topics.
Title: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 15/05/2007 17:50:29
Science is true...in some things.

But God's better at being less fuzzy in some topics.

But this just reiterates what batroost stated, that they are true (if so they be) in different domains; not that one is more or less true than the other.
Title: God real or not
Post by: kdlynn on 15/05/2007 18:20:20
well tony, that's where faith steps in... do you believe he is real?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Seany on 15/05/2007 21:08:58
Mehh.. Don't you think that this is such a broad topic to discuss? Whether God is real or not.. I think that we should decide that for ourselves. Although discussions are perfectly fine, but.. Most wars are religion-based. We may just get a WW3 here. [;)]
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 16/05/2007 16:48:00
Nah, your theroy of how WWIII would start was completly different.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Seany on 16/05/2007 20:43:02
LOL! About N and S korea? [;)]
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 17/05/2007 13:14:30
You bet. But with the USA [;D] [:D] [:)] [O8)]on your side, it's a guranteed win for S Korea.
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 21/05/2007 16:49:34
N korea...urgh dont even get me started
Title: God real or not
Post by: Titanscape on 21/05/2007 17:25:41
God has to be a relational being, "No man is an island."

Where does your soul come from and go?

I bet you are minding the question.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Nobody's Confidant on 22/05/2007 13:17:55
Your soul comes from God, and when you die, your soul leaves your body behind to go heaven. Not that complicated.


N korea...urgh dont even get me started

Why what's wrong with N Korea?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 22/05/2007 13:37:22
Your soul comes from God, and when you die, your soul leaves your body behind to go heaven. Not that complicated.


N korea...urgh dont even get me started

Why what's wrong with N Korea?

Is this a serious question?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Nobody's Confidant on 22/05/2007 16:31:57
Yeah, why wouldn't it be?
Title: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 22/05/2007 17:17:48
Yeah, why wouldn't it be?

I think Paul was a little incredulous that there was anybody who was not aware of the rather extreme regime that runs N.Korea at present, and the current controversy regarding their development of nuclear weapons.

I think it is probably a little unfair to show such incredulity, since one should not assume everyone knows everything about everything - we all have gaps in our knowledge, and even something that one person assumes to be basic general knowledge might still be part of a gap in another persons knowledge.
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 22/05/2007 17:23:00
Yeah, why wouldn't it be?

I think Paul was a little incredulous that there was anybody who was not aware of the rather extreme regime that runs N.Korea at present, and the current controversy regarding their development of nuclear weapons.

I think it is probably a little unfair to show such incredulity, since one should not assume everyone knows everything about everything - we all have gaps in our knowledge, and even something that one person assumes to be basic general knowledge might still be part of a gap in another persons knowledge.

Not me?
Title: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 22/05/2007 17:33:51
Yeah, why wouldn't it be?

I think Paul was a little incredulous that there was anybody who was not aware of the rather extreme regime that runs N.Korea at present, and the current controversy regarding their development of nuclear weapons.

I think it is probably a little unfair to show such incredulity, since one should not assume everyone knows everything about everything - we all have gaps in our knowledge, and even something that one person assumes to be basic general knowledge might still be part of a gap in another persons knowledge.

Not me?

My sincere apologies - it was Steven being incredulous.

Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 22/05/2007 22:40:53
I wouldn't consider that a small gap. If he was truly asking the question then I apologise for seeming so incredulous.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Ben6789 on 23/05/2007 13:22:05
no sweat, Mjhavok. I always considered Kim Jong Il a joke. Everytime i hear his voice, i hear circus music.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Nobody's Confidant on 23/05/2007 16:51:57
Some people might consider that offensive. Watch out.

Title: God real or not
Post by: Nobody's Confidant on 25/05/2007 16:52:12
I can't contain it anymore, the hypocrisy is overwhelming.

People say, "Take "under God" out of the pledge!" and yet they have don't complain about Easter break, historically a religous holiday. The Easter bunny is some shoddy sellout to despratley hide their hypocrisy.

People who are atheists curse in God's name without second thought, even though they do not beleive in him.

Then whenever i mange to let a small curse slip, they gasp and point and say "Don't do that or you won't go to heaven." In the most ridiculing voice possible and laugh to show off to their friends.

Grrr, I can't stand anything hypocritical. I hate it. [xx(] [xx(] [:(!] [:(!] [>:(]
Title: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 25/05/2007 17:45:11
I can't contain it anymore, the hypocrisy is overwhelming.

People say, "Take "under God" out of the pledge!" and yet they have don't complain about Easter break, historically a religous holiday. The Easter bunny is some shoddy sellout to despratley hide their hypocrisy.

People who are atheists curse in God's name without second thought, even though they do not beleive in him.

Then whenever i mange to let a small curse slip, they gasp and point and say "Don't do that or you won't go to heaven." In the most ridiculing voice possible and laugh to show off to their friends.

Grrr, I can't stand anything hypocritical. I hate it. [xx(] [xx(] [:(!] [:(!] [>:(]

The Easter Bunny and Easter Egg refer back to a pre-Christian pagan festival of spring and fertility.

The celebration of holidays is a complex issue.  There are many Muslims, Sikhs, Hindus, et. al., who celebrate Christmass in Britain, not because they take any religious significance from it but because they want to show solidarity with their Christian (or pseudo Christian) neighbours.  If I lived in a Muslim country, I'd be as likely to celebrate Muslim festivities as I would Christian one's in this country.  I believe in neither, but they are both celebrations that help bring the community together in a common celebration.

If one wants to show another, secular, context to this.  If I was in the USA, I would have no qualms about sharing the American 4th July celebrations, despite the fact that these celebrations actually celebrate the defeat (and killing) of my own countrymen.

We also have a very similar celebration over here - the 5th of November.  This day celebrates (with fireworks and bombfires) the overthrow of a Catholic plot against a protestant parliament, and so if taken literally, could be regarded as an anti-catholic celebration.  In fact, most catholics would celebrate it as willingly as any protestant, and all have largely forgotten the significance of the celebration.

The case about the oath is different.  OK, maybe I should not say much about it, because it is not my country, and it is not for me to decide what another nation should choose for themselves, so I speak only as to what I might think if it were my country, rather than to suggest that I have any right to dictate to another country.

If one casually curses in the name of God, without thought, that is one thing.  If one takes an oath that one is supposed to believe in, then one should take an oath that has meaning to oneself.  When one stands in court, and gives an oath to the court to tell the truth, one has a choice to take a secular affirmation or a religious oath, according to one's own beliefs.  The problem with the "one nation under God" is that it assumes the belief system of the nation, not of the person taking the oath; and I would consider it (if I were an American) inappropriate that anyone should regard me as a member of that nation as being under God.  That a president might, on his own account, swear under God, that is for him to choose, but he should not choose for those of his nation who may not share his belief.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 25/05/2007 22:36:56
Well done George.
Title: God real or not
Post by: jolly on 10/06/2007 21:41:33
Mehh.. Don't you think that this is such a broad topic to discuss? Whether God is real or not.. I think that we should decide that for ourselves. Although discussions are perfectly fine, but.. Most wars are religion-based. We may just get a WW3 here. [;)]

Sorry seany But Wars are always ecconomic in origin, wars are always about ownership, money, land more power! Religion is not the cause, however religion is a tool men in power use to manipulate people into fighting, you know there devils go kill them ect...

But the reality is that truely godly people do not engage in warfare! If all these godly people turned around and said ´no! you sick hypocrite, I am not going to go kill anyone as my religion states quite clearly ´thou shall not kill!´.

Then all armies would just have athiest in them; and all the religious people on both sides would do everything they can to stop the war! But sadly many a religious Leader, sells out and lies to the flock saying its o.k to fight! Sorry not so!

Good men stop wars, bad men fight in them! For you cannot turn the other cheek or love thy enemy with a gun in your hand, And you certainly cannot run around killing people and then claim to be a member of any of the faiths, If you do not keep the covernant you cannot be a jew, christisn or muslim! By the covernant are you known!
Title: God real or not
Post by: that mad man on 10/06/2007 22:50:53
Jolly, if you read the Bible correctly there is no sin committed by the unbeliever. The idea of sin was never in the old testament and was introduced into the NT by Paul because the basis of HIS teachings in the NT relies on "sin".

So, Paul introduced it to make HIS ideas work and not Gods.

Christ would not have had to die and then rise to save our sins otherwise, so as you can see the story requires "sin" for it to work.

Freedom is not freedom if it carries with it conditions, if God was love then he should have given us true unconditional freedom instead of binding us.
Title: God real or not
Post by: that mad man on 11/06/2007 19:07:03
That's the whole point jolly, with sin you also get the new idea of repentance and forgiveness just to make the whole complete.

One of the reasons the "New" (Catholic) religion gained popularity because it meant that the individual could sin and as log as they were repentant then they could be forgiven.


Rational, as in society if you break the law your locked up! What are you suggesting that people should be allowed to kill each other?

People already kill each other and the idea of sin does not prevent that, in fact as pointed out before the "Church" and religiously lead governments have been responsible for some wicked crimes in the past and all in the name of their GOD.

Judging a crime and locking people up is sensible in a modern society but very different from breaking the commandment "you shall not murder" and putting them to the electric chair!

Bee
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 08/07/2007 17:23:28
most who use that dont beleive in god....
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 08/07/2007 17:37:31


The case about the oath is different.  OK, maybe I should not say much about it, because it is not my country, and it is not for me to decide what another nation should choose for themselves, so I speak only as to what I might think if it were my country, rather than to suggest that I have any right to dictate to another country.

If one casually curses in the name of God, without thought, that is one thing.  If one takes an oath that one is supposed to believe in, then one should take an oath that has meaning to oneself.  When one stands in court, and gives an oath to the court to tell the truth, one has a choice to take a secular affirmation or a religious oath, according to one's own beliefs.  The problem with the "one nation under God" is that it assumes the belief system of the nation, not of the person taking the oath; and I would consider it (if I were an American) inappropriate that anyone should regard me as a member of that nation as being under God.  That a president might, on his own account, swear under God, that is for him to choose, but he should not choose for those of his nation who may not share his belief.

I am not American and by no means an expert on their constitution but doesn't it include a mention of the separation of church and state. Isn't having 'In God we trust' on the money and "One nation under God" in a court oath a bit of a violation of that?
Title: God real or not
Post by: socratus on 11/07/2007 15:02:48
If your understanding of God is dead try mine.
========
The people created a God.
No one knows what the external characteristics
of this God are, a God who made himself known
with the name " I am who I am ".
Is it enough for us in the XXIc ?
Why didn,t the formula E=Mc^2 write in the Bible?
I explaine RELIGION by simple laws and formulas of Physics.
www.socratus.com
Best wishes.
Title: God real or not
Post by: socratus on 11/07/2007 15:09:23
The words "God", "soul", "religion",
 " dualism of consciousness", "human being"
 are possible  to explain  with the physical formulas and laws.
===============
THE GENESIS.
==============
1.
     T = 0K.
2.
    C/D=pi ,  E=Mc^2, R/N=k ,  h = 0 , i^2=-1 .
3.
     h = 1, c=1. ( light quanta).
4.
       h = h /2pi ,  c>1.
       E = hw,   e^2 = hca  ( electron).
      The Lorentz   transformations.
5.
     Star formation:
 e- -  k  -  He II - He I - rotating He - thermonuclear reaction:
      a) hw > kT
       b) hw = kT
       c) kT > hw
6.
     p ( proton)
7.
    Evolution of interaction:
       a)  electromagnetic,
       b)  nuclear,
       c)  biological.
8.
     Laws:
    a) The Law of conservation and transformation energy.
    b) The Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle / law.
    c) The Pauli Exclusion Principle/ law.
9.
      Biopsychology: dualism of consciousness.
        The theory and practice.
===============================
 http://www.socratus.com
P.S.
This model of GENESIS is so simple, logical and clear,
that GOD himself will put his signature under it .
Question:
'Why isn,t God putting his signature now?
Answer:
Now he is busy.
Some time ago He opened his palm and
a process ' big bang' happened .
And now  He tries to compress his palm and
to change the 'big bang' in the 'singular point'.
As soon as He is free, He will sign this document.
======================


Title: God real or not
Post by: johnbrandy on 20/08/2007 02:42:28
For me, and probable most people, God is a concept, an idea. How do we go from a concept to a living fact? Moreover, there a different concepts of God. If we adhere to a certain concept, and its wrong, we might miss the mark. If it is possible to know God, it seems clear that we must first understand our own minds, in rather complete ways. And our capacity for self-deception. Until we transcend biases and preconceptions, how can we genuinely know anything, especially God. Yes, I understand the challenge, but what is the alternative. Few of us are willing to do the necessary work required to achieve the quality of mindfulness that can lead to direct perception. No doubt, this may sound fanciful, or unrealistic. How can you hope to entertain the "absolute" if you have not come terms with the relative. How can you  hope to entertain God if you have not come to terms with ordinary reality. It is possible to achieve greater levels of insight and understanding. Firstly, you must be absolutely serious and committed and willing to investigate the viability of this enterprise. There are many exercises than can facilitate this goal, but none are more important than continuous self-awareness. In other words, deliberately raising self-awareness to monitor your thought processes in order to detect biases and preconceived notions. This habit can lead to the cleansing of the doorways of perceptions and allow for  the possibility of direct insight, and eventually an appreciation of divinity, in term of your understanding. Thank you for allowing me to participate.     
Title: God real or not
Post by: nothingnobody on 27/08/2007 10:07:42
GOD IS AN ENERGY, NOT A PERSON.
Title: God real or not
Post by: another_someone on 27/08/2007 11:11:44
GOD IS AN ENERGY, NOT A PERSON.

To say God is this or that, whether He be energy or a concept, all misses a key part of the underlying question - is He sentient.

God may indeed be energy, but is it sentient energy?  Are you suggesting that all energy is God, or God is only some forms of energy?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Quantumorigin7 on 29/08/2007 17:13:18
I think there has to be a God because like in another thread, I put it plain and simple. If the universe is as we know it, then it could have very well existed for eternity as other universes, and there had to be something that created them, they didn't just come out of complete blackness, I mean, come on now!!
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 29/08/2007 22:50:21
I think there has to be a God because like in another thread, I put it plain and simple. If the universe is as we know it, then it could have very well existed for eternity as other universes, and there had to be something that created them, they didn't just come out of complete blackness, I mean, come on now!!

Worst argument ever?

Smacks of desperation.
Title: God real or not
Post by: paul.fr on 29/08/2007 23:18:07
Worst argument ever?

Smacks of desperation.

ever? i think your "praise" is too high, it's only one of the worst arguments ever [;)]
Title: God real or not
Post by: Quantumorigin7 on 30/08/2007 00:13:27
I think there has to be a God because like in another thread, I put it plain and simple. If the universe is as we know it, then it could have very well existed for eternity as other universes, and there had to be something that created them, they didn't just come out of complete blackness, I mean, come on now!!

Worst argument ever?

Smacks of desperation.

I get this on every forum, it's so cliche to me now.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 30/08/2007 00:22:31
I think there has to be a God because like in another thread, I put it plain and simple. If the universe is as we know it, then it could have very well existed for eternity as other universes, and there had to be something that created them, they didn't just come out of complete blackness, I mean, come on now!!

Worst argument ever?

Smacks of desperation.

I get this on every forum, it's so cliche to me now.

Maybe you get it on every forum because everyone but you seems to see it is a terrible argument.


There has to be a god because there has to be because there just has to be.

This satisfies you?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Nobody's Confidant on 31/08/2007 14:54:16
GOD IS AN ENERGY, NOT A PERSON.

Please explain.

This thread will never end. It is a forever conflict.
Title: God real or not
Post by: johnbrandy on 12/09/2007 05:10:24
Herein are many worthy ideas. God is and is not the issue. It is clear that the questions about God are the same as the questions about truth and knowledge. These are intellectual and philosophical questions, and therefore subjects of debate. Is this not largely the purpose of this forum? No one can prove the existence of God. Even if a genuine proof could be written, whom among us is prepared to comprehend and accept it? Yes, again, I must introduce the notion of the prepared mind. Free to evaluate these questions without the encumbrance of reactionary thinking. I do not know if God exist, in terms of the many definitions that I have been exposed to. But I will never know if I allow myself to surrender to shallow and reactionary opinions; lacking in reasoned thought, deep reflection, and sincere intentions. The important thing is to cultivate the need to seek truth and understanding. For me, discovering God is the absolute need to know the genuine truth in all things. "Forget" definitions. If God is the ultimate reality, why would you believe this reality would conveniently fit into anyones definition. Perhaps thats the problem, many religions and many definitions. Maybe the real question  is should we live our lives as if a divinity existed; a loving, knowing, intelligent force for the greatest good. I think so. How much better would the world be if we could accepted this simple idea. Look to your children for insight . Consider every kind deed. Consider the effect of acts of love in your life. It is very well possible that you already know "God", without direct or reflective insight. Take your time and be honest. "Knowing God is not knowing God". Knowing God is connecting with and reflecting the deepest impulse of the human spirit.   
Title: God real or not
Post by: sooyeah on 21/09/2007 16:39:39
In other words, deliberately raising self-awareness to monitor your thought processes in order to detect biases and preconceived notions. This habit can lead to the cleansing of the doorways of perceptions and allow for  the possibility of direct insight, and eventually an appreciation of divinity, in term of your understanding.

I believe thats called, the circumcision of the heart.

Knowing God is connecting with and reflecting the deepest impulse of the human spirit.   

Thankyou Johnbrandy, I heartily agree with you.

Title: God real or not
Post by: the environmentalist on 22/09/2007 19:29:51
btw, the universe COULD have come out of completey nothing.  (now I REALLY HOPE THIS IS RIGHT  [8]) ok, if there is only energy, no time, no matter, just energy, then its means that matter could have been made, there is energy in all matter, so this must be able to work the other way around. "the big bang" could have just been the sudden introduction of matter into the universe, giving us our dimensions. high presure goes to low preasure right? so this matter ball would have spread out into the void (low preasure areas) very fast, and maybe this is why the universe is still expanding, I know that space isnt matter as most people know it, but there is a constant stream of antimater-matter particles in void.  maybe this is just spaces way of spreading into the low preasure areas.

just a thought
Title: God real or not
Post by: Quantum_Vaccuum on 19/10/2007 05:13:44
Do you think god exists?
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
there is your answer!
Title: God real or not
Post by: Radrook on 27/10/2007 05:45:05
Someone had to code the DNA instructions for cellular replication. To me that someone is God.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 28/10/2007 18:17:15
Someone had to code the DNA instructions for cellular replication. To me that someone is God.

Your presupposition is fallacious.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Nobody's Confidant on 06/11/2007 17:54:02
Someone had to code the DNA instructions for cellular replication. To me that someone is God.

Your presupposition is fallacious.
Wha?
Title: God real or not
Post by: RMorty on 10/12/2007 01:50:28
Someone had to code the DNA instructions for cellular replication. To me that someone is God.

So you think Charles DeLisi is God?
Title: God real or not
Post by: RMorty on 10/12/2007 02:01:07
The Big Bang theory, and faith are neither proof of anything.  The big bang is a theory created by atheist scientists who are unable to offer an explanation for how the universe was created, or wasn't created. Faith is just a believers quick fix to the same problem.

  Why would the bible have so much false and contradictory information anyway?

 A lot of christians contradict themselves as well.  I must have missed the footnotes of the 10 commandments where it said.  "These commandments apply only to those not violating any of the terms and conditions within the Bible."  For example, the golden rule is to treat everyone the way you want to be treated, yet homosexuality is against their religion so suddenly the golden rule does not matter.

It is okay for homos to be outcast and shunned by churches, yet all of the people within those churches are supposed to always treat everyone with kindness.

How does that work? Something that is the supposed word of God can be so back-asswards.  If it is God's word truly I would expect it to contain reasoning and logic not comparable to that of a 1st grader.

Any comments?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Nobody's Confidant on 19/12/2007 17:39:38
The Big Bang theory, and faith are neither proof of anything.  The big bang is a theory created by atheist scientists who are unable to offer an explanation for how the universe was created, or wasn't created. Faith is just a believers quick fix to the same problem.

  Why would the bible have so much false and contradictory information anyway?

 A lot of christians contradict themselves as well.  I must have missed the footnotes of the 10 commandments where it said.  "These commandments apply only to those not violating any of the terms and conditions within the Bible."  For example, the golden rule is to treat everyone the way you want to be treated, yet homosexuality is against their religion so suddenly the golden rule does not matter.

It is okay for homos to be outcast and shunned by churches, yet all of the people within those churches are supposed to always treat everyone with kindness.

How does that work? Something that is the supposed word of God can be so back-asswards.  If it is God's word truly I would expect it to contain reasoning and logic not comparable to that of a 1st grader.

Any comments?
I believe those Christians are not really Christians.
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 19/12/2007 18:20:08
christians have really no sense of beliveing anymore i mean think of this question all u ppl out there!


IF INCEST IS SO WRONG HOW DID ADAM AND EVE'S CHILDERN HAVE KIDS TOO?????
Title: God real or not
Post by: that mad man on 19/12/2007 23:32:46
What happened in Genesis times was not subject to the 10 Commandments or any idea of sin.

Those ideas came much later with the formation of modern religion.

Eve was cloned from Adam and told "be fruitful and multiply" and the same applied to the children.


Title: God real or not
Post by: RMorty on 20/12/2007 00:05:23
I don't know what Genesis is.  It sounds like a great title for a futuristic action movie though.

I believe those Christians are not really Christians.

I agree.  However, the bible itself is contradictory.  The people I described act on it, but the bible does basically dis gay people.

I use that only as an example. I am not trying to promote homosexuality, but I don't bash it either.  Basically, it doesn't have anything to do with me so I ignore it, and I feel that others should do the same.

My point is the bible contradicts itself.  I would think that the golden rule should basically sum the whole damn book up.
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 20/12/2007 17:30:27
y does god change his mind tho i mean wat if i wanna be "fruitful and mutiply" with my sister i mean come on i have one HOT sister so that is wrong now that god changed his mind?
Title: God real or not
Post by: opus on 20/12/2007 18:10:08
Too much information tony6789!  What would your Mum say?
Title: God real or not
Post by: that mad man on 20/12/2007 20:03:10
@ RMorty

You know about the Bible and not about Genesis.  [???]

@ tony6798

I agree with opus.

When growing up all sorts of confusing feelings rush at you. If you are worried about your thoughts then I would advise some counselling with someone professional.

Peace.


Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 20/12/2007 20:09:33
lol rotfl lmao
Title: God real or not
Post by: Simulated on 20/12/2007 21:37:13
y does god change his mind tho i mean wat if i wanna be "fruitful and mutiply" with my sister i mean come on i have one HOT sister so that is wrong now that god changed his mind?

anthony..idk idc lol cuz i've gots all i wants lol
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 21/12/2007 16:30:19
kraner think about wat i said...lol MY sister
Title: God real or not
Post by: Simulated on 21/12/2007 16:36:38
Yeha you don't have a sister? lol
Title: God real or not
Post by: Nobody's Confidant on 21/12/2007 16:43:39
In the beginning, or at least close to it, they had to incest because there was no one else, but as society evolved, incest was looked down upon and seen as a sin because so many other people had now populated the earth. Technically, incest still happens, seeing as we are all related through Adam and Eve.
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 21/12/2007 16:46:40
lol yea
Title: God real or not
Post by: Simulated on 21/12/2007 21:35:59
lol yea

Wow 565 replies. go anthony lol
Title: God real or not
Post by: RMorty on 22/12/2007 17:33:58
No, can't say I am a scholar of either.  But I do know about what I've written.
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 08/01/2008 19:07:19
but still ben we r still doing sumthing that'll send us to hell lol right???
Title: God real or not
Post by: Quantumorigin7 on 17/06/2008 21:15:06
You want the answer? Here's the answer. God is not part of our known science. Our science says he does not exist, frankly, because it cannot suffice the ability to explain him. We have 4th. dimensional physics and we have the "paranormal" somewhat explained. But God is "supernatural". The supernatural, if it exists, has, is, and always will be beyond our comprehension. I always told people around me that if there is a God, he let science take it's course after he decided to create a big mess of whatever in oblivion, thus, evolution took place and we got smarter and smarter and now we think we can say there is no God when we really don't know.

Beyond our dimension lies a dimension not of sight, sound, but of mind. The mind projects into a higher dimension and therefore, when it dies, becomes part of that dimension and then, it A.)starts a new life or B.)becomes a "soul" in the supernatural, the eternal heaven or the eternal hell. We don't know yet, the only people that know are the dead, if they exist now. If they don't exist, then it never happened, it's like before you were born and had no before life. If there are past lives, then what we know as birth will always happen until the "big splash" and then what will happen? Perhaps an intersecting 4th. or 5th. or even 6th. dimension will open up and have it's chance to evolve and create what I would like to call "the intersecting race of persons once known" They will possess the higher learning ability our "projected" minds passed on and will not really have any need for physical strength, like Neanderthals.

Intersecting dimensions, mind projection, parallel universe, it's all theory. God is belief. You either believe in him or you don't, got it?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 17/06/2008 22:27:14
Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge: it is those who know little, and not those who know much, who so positively assert that this or that problem will never be solved by science.
-CHARLES DARWIN, Introduction, The Descent of Man (1871)
Title: God real or not
Post by: Quantumorigin7 on 18/06/2008 13:28:49
Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge: it is those who know little, and not those who know much, who so positively assert that this or that problem will never be solved by science.
-CHARLES DARWIN, Introduction, The Descent of Man (1871)

Ok, smart a**, tell me who God is then.
Title: God real or not
Post by: BenV on 18/06/2008 13:41:47
Intersecting dimensions, mind projection, parallel universe, it's all theory. God is belief. You either believe in him or you don't, got it?

Okay then.  I don't believe in him, and so to me god is not, never has been and can never be real.  Surely that's the end of the discussion?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 18/06/2008 15:57:39

Ok, smart a**, tell me who God is then.

God is a concept that human beings created to explain mysteries of a primitive time. Throughout human history many of these fictional deities have been created. The particular one you believe in no doubt is tied up with a bunch of your emotions and then you use post hoc rationalisation.

Human beings make things so when we looked at the natural world we thought "someone much bigger than us must have made this". As we progressed we discovered better explanations for natural phenomenon. We know Zeus doesn't cause lightning. In modern society most people no longer think god is even a person. He is some kind of nebulous spirit that purveys the universe. I have no problem with you or anyone believing this but I use Occam's razor and think it is unnecessary. I wish people didn't believe stuff without evidence but hey you can't always get what you want. What really gets me annoyed is when they think they can tell me what a fictional omnipotent beings wants me to do.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Quantumorigin7 on 18/06/2008 16:55:48
I have to agree, having someone forcing religion on you is like telling you to go out in the middle of the 4 way intersection blind folded. I know what it's like, being raised Catholic.

I've heard it time and time again that "God is a concept", but can someone, other than myself, reason upon "afterlife experiences" through interdimensional interaction?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 18/06/2008 22:36:08
but can someone, other than myself, reason upon "afterlife experiences" through interdimensional interaction?

Please elaborate as I have no idea what this means.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Quantumorigin7 on 19/06/2008 12:45:55
Basically, can someone, like I do, relate "afterlife" experiences with hologram theory, the mind as a hologram, passing on to a higer dimension upon death and existing as just the mind in that time and space. You can say, "afterlife" or simply, "reincarnation". The mind could project to a higher dimension and then find itself another meat puppet(human body) to be born into, but of higher intelligence.
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 05/03/2009 18:11:51
ive never heard of that theory b4...
Title: God real or not
Post by: lyner on 05/03/2009 23:43:36
Basically, can someone, like I do, relate "afterlife" experiences with hologram theory, the mind as a hologram, passing on to a higer dimension upon death and existing as just the mind in that time and space. You can say, "afterlife" or simply, "reincarnation". The mind could project to a higher dimension and then find itself another meat puppet(human body) to be born into, but of higher intelligence.
It may appeal to you but, to me, that's just a bundle of unrelated buzz words.
How can you be sure that these 'afterlife' experiences are anything more than dreams / hallucinations? Why do they have to be given any more fancy explanation?
Title: God real or not
Post by: KingJames on 06/03/2009 18:27:02
In the Bible, God is quoted to say "I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end".  "The beginning and the end", eh?  Could God be time?  Or could he have been hinting at a mystery of science, inconceivable for us at that point in history?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Damo the Optics Monkey on 07/03/2009 10:43:02
I am a Catholic and Buddhist, as well as being a Scientist... I am not oing to discuss the reasons, intricasies etc of this.

However, one thing I am certain of and it was mentioned very early in this thread - no one is going to be converted toanyone else's line f thinking on the internet.

For example, there is *no way* that I will be convinced by any words to alter mybeliefs in any way whatsoever and there will be no way that I could try and change anyone here (whichI have no interest in doing anyway).

People are simply going to have to accept that people believe differently to they do, no matter how strongly they hold their beliefs.
Title: God real or not
Post by: lyner on 07/03/2009 11:12:29
In the Bible, God is quoted to say "I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end".  "The beginning and the end", eh?  Could God be time?  Or could he have been hinting at a mystery of science, inconceivable for us at that point in history?
In the film 'Judge Dread', Stallone says "I am the Law". Does that have some significance, too?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Damo the Optics Monkey on 07/03/2009 11:21:46
all hail Judge Dredd!!
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 09/03/2009 15:15:55
thats just a movie it doenst really have any significance if u think about it
Title: God real or not
Post by: lyner on 09/03/2009 15:31:23
It is a story, written by someone. Where's the difference between the film and a religious book - which was written by someone?
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 09/03/2009 15:43:48
with film they can pretty much say and do anything they want so long as its "BASED" on the "true story"
Title: God real or not
Post by: lyner on 09/03/2009 18:31:10
So, ignoring the fact that some people feel able to call on extra 'authority' for some religious texts, where's the difference between them and some films, plays, poems, novels etc.?
Title: God real or not
Post by: SkaterMcgee on 16/03/2010 14:21:50
you tell me.

(https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.bearotic.com%2Fimg%2F2009%2F03%2Ffamily-guy-god-as-flash-gordon.jpg&hash=ae13e357cea609f9b0a7fda2ea23bb1a)
Title: God real or not
Post by: BenV on 31/08/2010 11:15:08
There are scientific proofs of God's is existence, one of is the number Phi, sometimes called the divine proportion or the golden number.
Phi = 1.618

According to the book "The Da Vinci Code" (and this true), if you measure the length from the tip of your head to the floor , and divide that by the length from your navel to the floor,you get Phi. If you measure the length from your hip to the floor, and divide it by the length from your knees to the floor, you get Phi. If you divide the number of female bees by the number of male bees in a bee hive,you get Phi. "Sun flower seeds grow in opposing spirals, the ratio of each rotation's diameter to the next is....PHI.
Fundamentally, Phi appears in everything; music, art, nature, architecture....everything.
This (at least for me) proves two things;
1- Divine power definitely exists.
2- Only ONE God exists, otherwise we wouldn't find such an astonishing link between everything in existence.

This is not, in any way, proof of the existence of any god.  Sorry.
Title: God real or not
Post by: BenV on 31/08/2010 11:42:19
Coincidental numbers in nature do not speak of a deity.  Especially when you consider that we all evolved from the same source.  Pi also appears over and over again in nature (in anything circular), does pi prove the existence of god?
Title: God real or not
Post by: peppercorn on 31/08/2010 12:51:25
Believing in the existence of God is in either one or both of two ways, Faith, and scientific proof.

Scientific evidence for the existence of God as of AD 2010 - Zero.
Please do not misuse the term scientific proof, especially on a science forum.

You are making wholly irrational leaps from finding commonality in biological structures to claiming the validity of the creator myth.
Title: God real or not
Post by: peppercorn on 31/08/2010 15:30:39
I suppose I got excited and when I do, my comments no longer make sense because I just throw bits of information in that in my make perfect sense, but when I later come to read it, it does not.
Appreciated. There's times when I've got carried away with an idea or apparent 'evidence' before and come a cropper.  However, I'm not sure it's just a problem of expressing yourself clearly in this case. There is a fundamental problem in that you will not find current evidence anywhere in science that will support the idea of a creator.

Quote
After all, a piece of 'evidence' might be a reason for an individual to believe in God, but to another, the very same evidence is the reason for him to disbelieve in God
I'm afraid this can only be a question of personal faith, not reason (so far a science is concerned).

Quote
...so a person must be open to different ideas and must respect other people's views ... If you felt that I was stressing my point too much, my apologies.
No need to apologise.  I respect your right to believe in these concepts, but they are not going to be accepted by science without reasoned argument, supported by irrefutable evidence (meaning more than a selection of related values). ...

...Sorry  [:)]
Title: God real or not
Post by: peppercorn on 31/08/2010 21:29:38
By the way, Peppercorn, did you take a look at the site I mentioned above?
I'm afraid my inbuilt bias (some may call it close mindedness) will not allow me to take much notice of a website under the banner of creationism.

Quote
The scientific proof that deals with the existence of God is not really proper scientific proof, but more like logical reason with a sprinkle of science, so it is open to criticism.
I'm not entirely sure this is what Russell was saying, but still.  Scientific proof is, or should be, applied coldly and without the bias of feeling (the same is not required of the scientists themselves though  [;)]).  Above, you imply that a special strain of science is needed to deal with the question of God existence - there is not.  Going back to your hidden enlightenment through nature's 'hidden' number patterns theory (if I can call it that) - there is definitely no application of 'logical reason' in your support of it.  Sure, there are oft reoccurring values and mathematical patterns in nature, but this in no way leads logically to a creator, higher-conciousness, Godhead - call it what you will.

Quote
So it is not fair to say that there is no proof whatsoever for the existence of God
I disagree. Plainly, "there is no [scientific] proof whatsoever for the existence of God".
If there was even the slightest -scientifically measurable and repeatable- proof of God the world would be a very different place. For a start the 'believers' would no longer need faith.

Quote
[it's] not fair to say that there is proof which proves the existence of God 100%
A common misconception is that good science can ever work on principles of 'Absolute Truth'.  Therefore, the moment new evidence comes to light revealing a more complete understanding about the workings of some aspect of nature, there is no (or shouldn't be) idealogical battle between the old view and the new.  That's not say scientists are not resistant to changing cherished beliefs, being human as they are.

Where science is not wholly explaining of nature as we observe it, there is of course room for speculation, but to be worthwhile (for progressing human understanding) that has to be carried out along empirical paths.
Title: God real or not
Post by: peppercorn on 01/09/2010 10:35:05
Oh dear. I obviously confused you there, Rami:
You quoted Bertrand Russell, then say "This is exactly what I meant."  Then went on to explain,
The scientific proof that deals with the existence of God is not really proper scientific proof, but more like logical reason with a sprinkle of science, so it is open to criticism.
Without copying out his quote again, I was saying that what Russell meant differs from you interpretation.

As I said, proof of the existence of God is not like other proofs.
It is as far as science is concerned. This is a science forum. QED.

If you have visited either or both of the sites above, then perhaps we could discuss this point more, but since you just plainly state what is in your mind with out much proof, and just not accept any other view but rather criticize others', I see no outcome on this point but repetition of ideas.
Not true. I said I was resistant to visiting a 'creationist' website. Life is short and the 'net is full of opinion.  If there's a specific quote or argument from this website that has any relevance to scientific discussion, please post it here.  Keep it short though - members are not keen on trawling through BS.

Regarding you 2nd link, I had a look, but could find nothing that could be described as proof in a practical sense.  Discussing philosopher's arguments and physiological drives for man to seek out God - cuts no mustard in the world of the physical sciences.

For a start the 'believers' would no longer need faith.
No, you didn't read my previous post well.
[::)] Well, enlighten me then!
Title: God real or not
Post by: peppercorn on 07/09/2010 15:46:23
Quoted from my first link: ...
You mean your first link from a website titled 'Creationism.com' or some such?  Excuse me if I am not immediately accepting of the statement that "Proteins are so hard to make that in all of nature, they never form except in already living cells."

I don't have a background in biology and neither do I wish to spend masses of time delving into the probabilities of life's evolutionary steps.  That thousands of biologists the world over are, almost without exception, supportive of the general mechanism in which life can spontaneously arise on Earth, given enough aeons, is good enough for me.

A quick search threw up, this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abiogenesis
Obviously, wikipedia is only a start point for any investigation, but do have a read.


Peppercorn, I keep on saying that what I mean by proof is not 'scientific proof', but rather like mental proof, but for some reason, you keep on saying that I say they are scientific, why?

Though you have not said "My ideas should be taken as following scientific principles", you are indirectly agreeing to this statement by posting on a Science forum.  If you just want to express your arbitrary (from the point of view of science) beliefs or feelings then there is a 'Just Chat' board here for non-science discussion and light-heartedness.
Title: God real or not
Post by: peppercorn on 07/09/2010 21:58:12
Quote
"except in already living cells."
Yeah, I got that bit. It doesn't change my opinion.

Quote
Yet you feel comfortable about neglecting those pieces of evidence which lay unread by yourself.
The world & esp. the internet is full of stuff haven't read. That doesn't mean I should keep a totally open mind on it all.  The fact that the is a huge body of scientifically competent biologists out there that can do the work for me (& all if us non-biologists) is what makes the idea of scientific progress so powerful.

Quote
Can a jury make a fair decision without reading every fact that is present?
The key word here is 'fact'. In the case of our discussions that has to be scientific fact.  Simple as.   A worldwide community of respected biologists have already peer reviewed their way through reams of observation that points to evolution running the 'show' from the start.

Quote
I just keep on repeating myself but somehow it does not get to you, it seems that your ego has overtaken you a little bit.
Certainly, I would never claim that I am immune to the temptations of 'ego', who isn't?  But, in my defence, I would never rule out the possibility of a creator, just as I would accept the remotest possibility that aliens purposely seeded the Earth. However logic tells me that these explanations are so as close to impossible as makes no odds.

Quote
As I have seen logicality and a little bit of science in them, I decided to post them here.
I have to point out that nothing you have posted so far can be claimed as scientific in nature. I'm not saying it's beyond all possibility that buried on the links you've supplied, but unless you can quote it on here (please remember that it will need to pass the 'science' test for it not to be instantly dismissed) as I've said already I'm not willing to trawl through, sorry.

Finally, it's funny you should mention repeating myself as I have felt like my arguments are repeatedly bouncing off a rubber sheet.
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 08/11/2010 17:45:25
got eeeem
Title: God real or not
Post by: CliffordK on 01/12/2010 02:01:56
Quote
He SEES you when you're sleeping.
He KNOWS when you're awake.
He KNOWS if you've been bad or good.
So be good for goodness sake.
Oh, wait, that was Santa Claus....

Can you truly explain an omniscient being?
What is the chance that any single being could track what 6 or 7 billion people on earth are doing at any one time, and give individual attention to all 7 billion?

Now, we could be like bacteria in a petri-dish...  or perhaps like a dog to it's owner.  But, it would take a very faithful dog to be devoted to an owner that hasn't shown up for generations and never put out the food dish.

Perhaps we were visited by aliens...  or a race from Atlantis who possessed technology far beyond our own.  If modern man was to return 10,000 years in the past, who wouldn't be impressed by the ability to communicate over great distances, fly through the air, and spit death with a wave of the hand and a sharp bang.  But, does that mean they would be gods?

If you have a theory, and premise after premise is proven false...  how long until one must just consider the entire theory false?  There seems to be enough evolutionary evidence to indicate that all species of animals have evolved and changed over time, and many have become extinct, only to be replaced by others.  And humans are no different.

So, God didn't create all life in 7 days...  rather it slowly evolved from the bacteria and single cell eukaryotes over a 4 billion year timecourse.

Divine birth... or birthright.  King of Kings...  Shepherd over Sheep...  It sounds to me that someone just wanted to rule, and be revered, as is the case in many cultures and religions.
Title: God real or not
Post by: SteveFish on 01/12/2010 03:57:14
If you put a bunch of amino acids together, outside of a living cell, many proteins will be spontaneously formed and broken down every microsecond because of the molecular motion of heat. What a living cell does is to bias the probability that useful proteins will be formed.

The reason that creationism is not appropriate in a scientific context is that it involves belief in the supernatural. Because supernatural events cannot be detected, and their invocation can explain just about anything, the statements of a creationist are not trustworthy and, thereby, not worth any attention in a discussion that involves cause and effect or logical consequences.
Title: God real or not
Post by: peppercorn on 01/12/2010 11:48:30
These annoying threads keep rearing their ugly heads.
Even though the answer is always the same.
This one's been dead for five months now.
So to avoid sparking it back into life,
We shouldn't feel too much to blame!
[;)]
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 21/12/2010 13:46:24
this is a "HOT" topic :)
Title: God real or not
Post by: QuantumClue on 21/12/2010 14:01:04
There are scientific proofs of God's is existence, one of is the number Phi, sometimes called the divine proportion or the golden number.
Phi = 1.618

According to the book "The Da Vinci Code" (and this true), if you measure the length from the tip of your head to the floor , and divide that by the length from your navel to the floor,you get Phi. If you measure the length from your hip to the floor, and divide it by the length from your knees to the floor, you get Phi. If you divide the number of female bees by the number of male bees in a bee hive,you get Phi. "Sun flower seeds grow in opposing spirals, the ratio of each rotation's diameter to the next is....PHI.
Fundamentally, Phi appears in everything; music, art, nature, architecture....everything.
This (at least for me) proves two things;
1- Divine power definitely exists.
2- Only ONE God exists, otherwise we wouldn't find such an astonishing link between everything in existence.

This is not, in any way, proof of the existence of any god.  Sorry.

Yes, I agree.

Also, the Bee thing is a myth.
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 21/12/2010 14:19:24
Phi lol, such a random word.
"hmmm what to call this astonishing connection..."
"idk how bout phi?"
"like what you pay?"
"nawww like p.h.i. that there sounds smart"
Title: God real or not
Post by: QuantumClue on 21/12/2010 14:23:15
Phi lol, such a random word.
"hmmm what to call this astonishing connection..."
"idk how bout phi?"
"like what you pay?"
"nawww like p.h.i. that there sounds smart"

No. It's a Greek Letter.
Title: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 21/12/2010 14:28:21
well don't i feel dumb =p
Title: God real or not
Post by: QuantumClue on 21/12/2010 14:34:35
Don't, if you have never used it in any practical means, why be embarrassed?
Title: God real or not
Post by: cheryl j on 11/11/2011 21:38:26
I'm not religious, but one could consider God as not real or unreal, but a "model" that explains something to you about the mystery of existence, good or evil, suffering, love, etc. And I guess how well this model explains what you experience or observe, depends on your conception of this model or the qualities you endow it. Even our scientific models don't replicate every feature of "the real thing" that they are supposed to represent, although scientific models do a pretty good job of corresponding consistantly, or predicting events. Still, how many times has the model of the atom been redesigned?
Title: God real or not
Post by: Titanscape on 21/11/2011 13:31:23
God is real, some used to like to think of him as being where everything must have come from, but accept the big bang instead. But even that had to come from somewhere bearing in mind oxymorons like before time.

But it is a bit narrow minded to think that sight and test finds the limits of all that are. Like "there must be a vacuum on the other side of a wall for I can't see beyond it."

I am a mystic, science is just a tool, not a spiritual philosophy.
Title: God real or not
Post by: Mjhavok on 21/11/2011 23:34:16
God is real

That is a noncognitive statement to me. I have no idea what you mean.
Title: God real or not
Post by: jameslancer33 on 01/12/2011 09:48:25
I hope he is real. I think he is real. It seems he does have a big sense of humor cause of the events happening in my life.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: NaphthenePalmitate on 05/01/2012 16:34:50
you can't prove God isn't real. Not absolutely anyway.

You also can't prove that a Flying Spaghetti Monster didn't create the world and all we know with his noodly appendages. Nor that Global warming isn't the result of a decreased pirate population [As the pirate population declined the temperature of the earth has increased, therefore global warming is the result of less pirates]. Also Samolia Has less carbon polution than anywhere else in the world, and they also have the most pirates.

My personal favorite is the religion I've founded.
Jaborah can't be disproven, and Jaborah is awesome.
Jaborah created the world with 5 days of hard work. And after that fifth day Jaborah decided to through a party. All the god's got pretty hammered. Some punk ass god Jehova started causes problems at the party with some really mixed messages to his girlfriend about how he loved her unconditionally with conditions. And that if the conditions weren't met he was gonna kill her. So, they kicked Jehova out and everyone partied the night on. Anubis was sooooo high, and Venus was all up on Susano's [censored]. Orochi was drunk again [he sure love's his Sake] and Thor was chillin' with Zeus having fun with thunder.

It was a good time so Jeborah threw another party the next day. And all was good. The next day, All the god's were hung over and Jeborah declared that day hangover day.

Jeborah decided that everyone should work 5 days a week and at the end of the last day the optional party is highly recommended. The sixth day another party is also recommended and the 7th day is reserved for hangover recovery so one will be prepared to work the next work week.


Jeborah can't be disproven either, nor any of the other religion me and other's have "founded".
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Sprool on 12/01/2012 00:05:00
This is basically the Bertrand Russell Cosmic Teapot postulation that you can't 100% prove a negative. I could tell you there was a teapot orbiting the sun and you would not be able to prove me wrong. Because you cannot definitively prove me wrong does this mean the teapot therefore exists? Of course not. You could never disprove it, you could only say you've not yet found it. It's the same for god.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: CliffordK on 12/01/2012 01:56:37
The answer to that, of course, is that there are close to one billion teapots in orbit around the sun.
[:)] [;)] [:D] [;D] [???] [::)]

It all depends on how you phrase the question.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: lukaradulovic on 13/01/2012 04:40:26
Exactly what do i mean? Who reallt knows? What is god is he man girl blakc white or evan mexican!

- Big T

simple, a potential, probably an entity percieving a higher number of dimensions, who created all this.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Gordian Knot on 27/01/2012 01:50:36
Well, whatever else he is, the Christian God is a plagiarist! A tidy part of stories in the Old Testament were ripped off from earlier religions to be used in the Bible. All supposedly the Word of God like he was the one who created them.

I'm not exactly sure what authority one should report this to!
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Titanscape on 31/01/2012 03:42:25
You know God is real, when you experience Him, such as secret thoughts and memories revealed by a believer after prayer. And a clear conscience after repentance. All fears subside after prayer for Jesus' blood. The heart is refreshed after drinking living water in worship.

There is no revelation in history of a flying spaghetti monster. It is nonsense, whereas a just, merciful, loving and wise God like Elohim are different. The pattern Moses wrote of creation is simple to complex life.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Sprool on 06/02/2012 12:37:57
this does not form a very rational or satifying explanation to sceptics and non-believers.
I might as well say "since I have not experienced him I therefore know he does not exist."
Both arguments have equal validity.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: imatfaal on 06/02/2012 16:36:53
this does not form a very rational or satifying explanation to sceptics and non-believers.
I might as well say "since I have not experienced him I therefore know he does not exist."
Both arguments have equal validity.

I hate to be on the side of the religious - but your argument is not valid.  Move it away from god:

I have seen a red pencil case - it exists. 
I have never seen a red pencil case therefore I know it does not exist.

You cannot prove a negative like that - or in this sort of case (non-existence) at all.  His argument requires proof which is not forthcoming - yours is void.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Gordian Knot on 06/02/2012 23:26:33
You know God is real, when you experience Him, such as secret thoughts and memories revealed by a believer after prayer. And a clear conscience after repentance. All fears subside after prayer for Jesus' blood. The heart is refreshed after drinking living water in worship.

There is no revelation in history of a flying spaghetti monster. It is nonsense, whereas a just, merciful, loving and wise God like Elohim are different. The pattern Moses wrote of creation is simple to complex life.

I think you missed the point! People have truly believed in their Gods for millennia. Centuries before the Christian God, people truly believed in Odin, and Zeus, and before their time Inanna. These people believed as devoutly as you do. But they were all deluded and you are not? Or to put it another way, if you are right in your belief, why weren't these other people right in their belief in ancient Gods.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 08/02/2012 11:39:23
wooowww i made this topic years ago lmao i was like 14 amd now im 19 when this topic was started hahahah
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Sprool on 09/02/2012 12:34:20
wooowww i made this topic years ago lmao i was like 14 amd now im 19 when this topic was started hahahah
so have your views changed over time? The ususal heated forum debates about religion go round in circles; people who are opinionated enough to bother contributing seldom change their stance during such debates, no matter how logical or illogical the facts
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: tony6789 on 09/02/2012 17:36:05
well Marine Corps bootcamp turned me very religous, idk if its all real but it is comforting regardless
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: RMorty on 10/02/2012 20:31:29
I would like to start with sharing my favorite quote regarding the knowledge of the proof of God existence or lack thereof. 

"So are we going to give you the answer? Of course we are! In fact, we'll give you more than one of them!  Paul’s answer to the ultimate question of existence was: 'I don’t know, and that’s OK.'  Sean’s answer was this: 'I know that I don’t know.'  While Paul’s answer is a bit more comforting (at least to Paul), Sean’s is actually more useful.  Being aware that you don’t know is an important thing. Sean’s thinking goes something like this: 'I know that I don’t know.' 'I am also quite sure that you don’t know either.' 'I am even fairly confident that no one knows, and that no one ever has known; but, I don’t know that for sure.' 'I am somewhat less convinced that no one will ever know, but that is something that I will probably never know.' 'The one thing I am really, really sure about is that I just don’t know.' 'And you can quote me on that!" (hastings, 181-82)

Hastings, Sean and Paul Rosenberg. God Wants You Dead. Vera Verba, inc. 2007.

Let me explain my stance before I give my personal reasons.  First, anything I say must be taken as a theory with things that have yet to be understood. Second, I am not an atheist or an agnostic.  I think there is a god.  Third, I do not think God is an author.  If we have rules for life, I think those rules are what we refer to as, well, common sense.  It is very clear, even from a scientific standpoint, that the Qur' An and the bible have things in them that are clearly not a true god's word or are contradictory.  That has been a non-issue for me for a very long time.

Now approaching the question from the raw stance of, "did something make this stuff happen or not?"  This is what I have decided on. 

It is, in my opinion, as foolish to vindicate that there is no god as it is to vindicate that there is a god.  The best anyone can do is to find as much evidence as possible and make a decision.

My personal logic towards there probably being a god is "the hard problem."  If you aren't familiar with it when do a little research on the hard problem of consciousness and see if it doesn't blow your mind and make you look at reality with a different perspective.

"There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened." -Fit the Seventh

It would seem that the answer to this thread's question is one of two possibilities.

1. We find where the universe came from, where that came from, and so on until we find something that we can with absolute certainty say has always been and is just the way of nature.  I doubt that because it in itself is basically a non-sequitur.

2. We find where the universe came from, where that came from, and so on until we find something that we can with absolute certainty say is a creator.  I doubt that because it in itself is basically a non-sequitur.

Both of these are non-sequiturs because there can always be a question of where something came from.  "Certainty" is the part that is a non-sequitur.  So, I feel like I can safely say, "we will never know for certain."  Whether something has always been and just is or if a god is discovered and just is. What could possibly be done to answer where either one came from? 

It is an rolling extension of dead ends from a philosophical standpoint.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Titanscape on 13/02/2012 04:40:00
Some people look at where the universe, everything came from. Others at what it expresses. Others still at the historical theophanies. Some are amazed by complex life, and some of them disbelieve because of evils wars and other dark chaos.

Some people understand DNA, leading to faith, others think it explains things naturally and relieves need of faith.

Some think God must be, for that is where it all comes from. Some see the bigness and beauty of the universe as commanding faith, others think god can't be, the universe doesn't make sense...

Faith can come from philosophy, seeing. For others who believe for sight or philosophy, it can be proven wrong, other things convince.

Historical gods, now dead like Zeus, are so, because they saw power in Paul the apostle's ministry. Also later, Constantine heavy handedly  pushed for Christianity.

So chaos haters have a problem with European conversion.

God revealed in Israel captivates most people. Some need to see it themselves and some of them don't look in or give God a chance.

The ancient most god of India, Purusha, lost one third of his angels, so can be said to be alike or the same being as Elohim. Genesis' god.

I am one of those who needed God and found he was there, or was found by Him. This weighs more to me than philosophy. I had my own theophany.

I experienced presence and goodness, and never studied creation science. The experience is my lens and perspective.

Historical theophanies are blurred by other claims to similar experiences which disagree with those from the fifth century back.

Faith by definition is not delusion.

There is the matter of near death experiencers visions, peace, and knowledge that is evidently fact, which to some somehow comes from hallucinations. Hallucinations that know earthly details and facts. So far only one fold blind tested.

There is sense in the life of Jesus, and theophany, and history, and continuing gifts.

Jesus dealt with three major issues, disease, injustice and death. Truly godly stuff. Hard to believe, that all will rise from the dead and be judged. Evil, finished with. Good news if you can believe with great patience. This the message and power and by gifts and other works the Greeks, came to disbelieve Zeus and believe in Jesus. A real god. Not myth. Consistent, old and new testaments.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Gordian Knot on 13/02/2012 17:04:18
Titanscape said "Historical gods, now dead like Zeus, are so, because they saw power in Paul the apostle's ministry."

Wow, that is some statement. Any chance you could tell us where you unearthed this little bit of information? What about modern folk who still do believe in Zeus, or Odin. Just delusional, I guess? Not knowing that their Gods are dead.

There are several other gems in your post Titan, so allow me to choose the one that fascinated me the most to comment upon.

Your comment: "Faith by definition is not delusion." (emphasis added).

Faith, by definition, is not spaghetti either! I'm confused why you think what something is not defined as is in any way relevant, or material. I believe we all know the standard definitions of faith, so I will only add the word's origin, according to dictionary.com.

Word Origin.
1200–50; Middle English feith  < Anglo-French fed, Old French feid, feit  < Latin fidem,  accusative of fidēs  trust, akin to fīdere  to trust.

To have faith is to trust that something is true. That trust can be based on something, like I have faith the sun will rise in the east in the morning. This trust is based on scientific evidence, plus a very basic understanding of physics.

Then there is trust that is based on personal belief. No evidence required. This is the bastion of religious faith. That evidence is not required to trust that it is true. (Note, I am not putting any spin on that statement, simply stating a fact).

This acceptance of faith without any evidence is a requirement of religious belief. The fact is that the Christian God has not chosen to announce his/her/its presence to humanity in a direct way for several thousand years.

There are plenty of humans who speak for God, but they themselves have no direct line to have a discussion with the almighty. Even the great religious leaders of the day, including the Pope of Catholicism has no apparent direct contact with God. He speaks for God, but he has never stated something to the effect that "I just got off the phone with God and this is what he told me."

This is the nut in the issue when it comes to nonbelievers. For a supreme being, he seems rather distant. Now a whole lot of people have told me that there is indeed proof of God, and that I simply refuse to see it.

The issue for me is that I have to trust another person's perception for the validity of that proof. Another human, just like me. That may be proof, or it may be their perception of proof. There is no way for me to know.

Faith without proof is nothing more, and nothing less, than a belief a person chooses to accept. To pretend that is is anything else is unwise.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Titanscape on 14/02/2012 09:26:12
How many medieval or modern Greeks or Romans, believed in Zeus? New agers have chosen to go back to ancient ancestors gods, that their ancestors no longer worshiped after found Christ crucified and resurrected, or they were forced by Constantine to take up Christendom. The latter a motive for new agers to go back.

In the book of Acts, many turn from idols. How many still worship Artemis of the Ephesians?

How many Germans always worshiped Odin?

When they, being the pagans saw Paul's and Peter's powers and John's, not forgetting the other converters, many chose Christ. Eventually like Latin, the worship of Mars died.

They were so taken by Jesus in Rome, before Paul visited, later they they preferred to die than worship Nero.

A delusion is insanity. A belief, even if false, is a sound minded conviction. Hebrews ch 11 defines Christian faith. Faith itself is evidence. The Pauline gifts and powers are still available and in use in Africa and South America, as two examples. About six million African pagans and others there convert to Jesus each year. The reports from S.A. are amazing demonstrations of power. Links by Bonnke and Global Awakening.

In Bogota Columbia church growth was explosive, and many turned from drug use, so sadly, many pastors are being killed by drug lords.
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Gordian Knot on 14/02/2012 17:56:00
It may surprise you to know that Odin worship is alive and well today. Mostly in the Scandinavian countries.

Quote: A delusion is insanity. A belief, even if false, is a sound minded conviction.

Ah but who decides what is a delusion and what is a belief? You have one perspective. Others have different perspectives. All of them are decisions made by humans; why should yours be elevated above others?

Your entire answer is non-responsive. I ask again for a response to my main point. There are plenty of humans who speak for God, but they themselves have no direct line to have a discussion with the almighty. People speak for God. God does not speak for himself. People are flawed. How can we know that people's interpretation of God's Word is correct? We cannot!
Title: Re: God real or not
Post by: Titanscape on 15/02/2012 13:45:13
What is said about belief is that we best respect other people's beliefs. And not call them delusional because they don't agree with us. Dawkins was being a bit disparaging when he called his book "The God Delusion"

The gifts and powers of the apostle Paul are available for the spiritual and disciplined. The author of the NT teaches it to the reader. Actually there is an ancient teaching called Lectio Divina, to ask the Spirit of Truth to teach you as you read. But I am mainly talking about revivalism, the revival of Pauline gifts and powers. The Catholics have a revival or renewal movement. Outside Catholicism, there are many revivals and historical ones. This is why I mention Jesus blood and the two examples of Ps Bonnke and the move called Global Awakening.

PJP2 did actually prophesy and many today still do. True, people can have gifts and misinterpret the scriptures.

On at least one occasion I heard a voice speak to me, with what sounds like wisdom. Others also speak of this. I am a revivalist, coming out from Catholicism.