[Fluffy]

 Trinidad, on 2013-January-09, 07:17, said:

To get to the core of your funny comparison: There is a big difference between scientists and priests. You, Gonzalo, can test science for yourself. And every scientist will encourage you to do just that. You and everyone in the world are also actively encouraged to come up with an alternative for string theory.

Continueing on funny mode, I could kill myself to test religion just the same as testing science, but for one reason or another I do neither, just the same as an overwhenmly majority .BTW I don't actively encourage everyone on the world to test religion

[Fluffy]

Continuing with f-comparison (f stands for funny for me, but it can stand for flannery or something for others), here is an hypothesis, in the end there is a scientific theory tht is discoverd and really explains all, no more holes and everything makes sense, there is only one way to test it, but sadly if the test succeeds it will end the universe. I would bet it would be tested sooner or later.

[billw55]

 32519, on 2013-January-09, 04:19, said:

MikeH (and now Nige1 as well) wants to know why I believe. I will give just 2 reasons –
2. Just as Paul had his Damascus road experience when he was confronted head on by God, the same thing happened to me in the early 1990s. Since then God has revealed to me on at least another 3 occasions that he exists and is real. If he did that for me he can do the same for you. It's not my job to convince you of anything.

Quite right! It is God's job to convince us that he exists, just as he convinced you. If God wants me (or mikeh, or passedout, or mgoetze) to believe in him, surely he is well capable of giving us a message that cannot be mistaken.

Is there some reason by which he chooses to whom he reveals himself? What do you think that reason might be? What form do such messages typically take?

I would also be interested to hear from Fluffy and Codo on these questions.

[gwnn]

 nige1, on 2013-January-09, 05:40, said:

Even Google denies the existence of "Ahauthovius"

There's a subtle difference between

• Not believing that God exists (The doubting Thomas view seems defensible)
• Believing that God does not exist (Arguably a leap of faith)

Yes there is and there is more than one way to define atheism and agnosticism, do not automatically assume that the one you use is best, or the only one.

This is one way of defining the terms:
http://wiki.ironchar...st_vs._agnostic

[Fluffy]

 billw55, on 2013-January-09, 07:54, said:

I would also be interested to hear from Fluffy and Codo on these questions.

Depends on the model, on one of them god is an 11 year old girl playing sims, and she is afk now. But for the main one (similar to christian) it seems that the final proof is that he will not reveal, he wants us to believe without proof, so he always lets an open door for plausible-withoutgod explanation.

there is an old joke about this:

http://www.turnbackt...d-will-save-me/

(BBF tels me I cannot use that image sadly)


For me this means that no matter how evident it is that god is there helping you, if you want to believe that he is not there, you will always find a way.

EDIT: I also sometimes think: but he has just sent us his ***** son 2000 yeas ago? what other revelation do we expect?

asuming the unvierse is as big as we think, and how "slow" the galaxies move, I doubt that god's sense of time is anywhere close to ours, unless he can play slow motion

[billw55]

 Fluffy, on 2013-January-09, 07:34, said:

Continuing with f-comparison (f stands for funny for me, but it can stand for flannery or something for others), here is an hypothesis, in the end there is a scientific theory tht is discoverd and really explains all, no more holes and everything makes sense, there is only one way to test it, but sadly if the test succeeds it will end the universe. I would bet it would be tested sooner or later.

Indeed, even if it were no test at all, but only an act of spite.

I often fear, when a nuclear weapon will be used in an act of terrorism. It seems inevitable to me, I hope I am wrong.

(Some may argue this has already happened, that isn't my point).

[hrothgar]

 32519, on 2013-January-08, 23:56, said:

Apart from Philippi (where there was no synagogue), everywhere Paul went he first entered the synagogue and preached to the Jews.

I never claimed that Paul did not preach to Jews.

However, I am directly stating that growth of the early church came from converting gentiles and that Paul of Tarsus was predominantly converting Gentiles.
He even referred to himself as "Apostle to the Gentiles" (Romans 11:13)

As early as 50 AD, the Christian Church had to hold a council in Jerusalem to address circumcision.
(The Jewish religion mandates circumcision, however, circumcision was was considered culturally abhorrent in the Hellenistic world)

This is why Act 15 contains language like the following:

Quote

Then pleased it the apostles and elders, with the whole church, to send chosen men of their own company to An'ti-och with Paul and Barnabas; namely, Judas surnamed Barsabas, and Silas, chief men among the brethren:
and they wrote letters by them after this manner; The apostles and elders and brethren send greeting unto the brethren which are of the Gentiles in An'ti-och and Syria and Cili'cia:
Forasmuch as we have heard, that certain which went out from us have troubled you with words, subverting your souls, saying, Ye must be circumcised, and keep the law; to whom we gave no such commandment:
it seemed good unto us, being assembled with one accord, to send chosen men unto you with our beloved Barnabas and Paul,
men that have hazarded their lives for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
We have sent therefore Judas and Silas, who shall also tell you the same things by mouth.
For it seemed good to the Holy Ghost, and to us, to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things;
that ye abstain from meats offered to idols, and from blood, and from things strangled, and from fornication: from which if ye keep yourselves, ye shall do well. Fare ye well.

This is a round about way of saying that you are really overstating things when you claim that all of the New Testament is intended for a Jewish audience.

[mikeh]

 nige1, on 2013-January-09, 03:23, said:

IMO

• Occam's razor is no more than a useful heuristic.
• Many have advanced interesting evidence for their views.
• But nobody has yet produced convincing evidence for the existence or non-existence of God.
• And few of us are holding our breath

Your (inaccurate) one line definition tells you more about my position than my lengthy posts do? Or the posts of the other non-believers? You're an idiot if you think that I base my core beliefs on your (or my) dictionary. I say again, beause obviously you can't so far understand simple english: nobody here, least of all me, seems to have said (as far as I can see) that 'god does not exist' as a positive statement. I don't think it does..I think God is an invalid explantion for the existence of the universe. But I can't prove it. In almost every realm of human discourse, other than religion, the onus of proving the existence of a phenomonen rests on the one asserting its existence. Oddly, god-bots seem to take the reverse position, which to me says a lot about the power of religious indoctrination, and the human capacity for self-deception. 'God' as the ultimate answer, seems to me to be a staggerngly large proposition which ought, in the ordinary course, call for a staggeringly large amount of testable evidence.

If there are those whose brain chemistry persuades them that they have 'seen' god, then I'm fine with that. I strongly suspect that they are mistaken but it does't bother me at all, until and unless they start using that subjective and unprovable experience to tell others how to live their lives.

[kenberg]

My approach, fwiw, is something like this:

I have known people who believe that the position of Saturn in the sky influences daily events. Possibly Nancy Reagan believed something like this. I don't. Of course it could be true, but by saying that it could be true it does not really make me agnostic on the issue. I simply don't believe it and I don't plan to spend any time thinking about it. It could be true only means that it also could be true that I have a brother somewhere that everyone has kept secret from me. Could be so, but in practical terms it is not so.

Now to God: If we are talking of God as the creative force behind the universe, meaning that God created the Big Bang and then retired, I don't much care whether that is true or not, I don't see why it matters or even much what it means since it does not seem to attribute any real qualities to God other than this one, admittedly impressive, act of creation. The Big Bang happened. True. Otoh, if we are speaking of a God who will answer my prayers, that certainly is an important God, but I have never seen the slightest reason for believing this, and so again I just don't much think about it. This is much the same as I spend no time thinking about astrology. At some point in life, we make up our minds. We may re-visit a topic later if we see that our current view has some flaws. But religion is not one of the things I have seen any need to re-address.

None of this will convince a non-believer, nor is it meant to convince him, nor is it meant to insult him. It is simply a statement of how I deal with life. We all get to, and have to, choose.

[Codo]

 billw55, on 2013-January-09, 07:54, said:

Quite right! It is God's job to convince us that he exists, just as he convinced you. If God wants me (or mikeh, or passedout, or mgoetze) to believe in him, surely he is well capable of giving us a message that cannot be mistaken.

Is there some reason by which he chooses to whom he reveals himself? What do you think that reason might be? What form do such messages typically take?

I would also be interested to hear from Fluffy and Codo on these questions.

Thanks for asking.
I tried to explain it before: If he shows up, you cannot believeanymore. You will know that he exists. And you cannot believe in something you know. I can believe that the Seahawks will win the superbowl. But I cannot believe that the Giants won in 2012- I know it.
I know that this is not true to all believers. Some hold so strong believes or had some phenomena, so they know for themselves that God exists. Obviously their spirutiality is different from mine...

I had some memorable moments in which I think and believe that he helped my case or send me a sign. But I did enough scientific work myself to know that these incidents will never be a real wonder or a real proofe for anything. They could simply be great luck and just a joke of nature.
So with all said and done: I have no evidence that he ever showed up, no evidence that he is there- I just believe.

[blackshoe]

 Trinidad, on 2013-January-09, 07:17, said:

This is entirely different from Christian priests and ministers.

This (the scientific method) is entirely different from the methods of almost all religions (I'm not sure about Buddhism and Taoism — and the latter only became a religion, as opposed to a philosophy, when it ran into the former).

 Trinidad, on 2013-January-09, 07:20, said:

If we just keep writing about Him, pretty soon they won't.

Hypothesis: gods exist because people believe in them.
Tentative conclusions: The more people believe, the more power the god has. The fewer people believe, the less power the god has. Currently the god of the Book has the most power.

The conclusions are tentative because they have not been scientifically tested. I'm not sure they can be so tested. In which case this is not science. But it's at least an attempt at a start.

Alternative hypothesis: God split himself into a myriad of parts, that He might have friends. (Thanks to Robert Heinlein).
Tentative conclusion: we're all God.
This conclusion has not been scientifically tested either, but Heinlein explored it a bit in the novel Stranger in a Strange Land.

I make no assertions as to the truth of either hypothesis.

[Trinidad]

 nige1, on 2013-January-09, 05:40, said:

The dictionary said:

Atheist: noun: someone who denies the existence of god
Atheism: noun 1. Disbelief in or denial of the existence of God. 2. Godlessness.
Agnostic: noun: someone who believes that it is not possible to know whether God exists or not

Didn't I tell you to stop using such a poor dictionary!

The problem is that your dictionary doesn't know statistics. With the help of statistics it is possible to know what is impossible to know.

Rik

[mikeh]

 kenberg, on 2013-January-09, 08:25, said:

My approach, fwiw, is something like this:

I have known people who believe that the position of Saturn in the sky influences daily events. Possibly Nancy Reagan believed something like this. I don't. Of course it could be true, but by saying that it could be true it does not really make me agnostic on the issue. I simply don't believe it and I don't plan to spend any time thinking about it. It could be true only means that it also could be true that I have a brother somewhere that everyone has kept secret from me. Could be so, but in practical terms it is not so.

I applaud, and have upvoted, this post (which I have only partially quoted). As I think most of the atheists here have stated, the problems with religion arise, in our view, when the requirements imposed by the religions upon their followers become imposed on non-believers by the religious control of secular institutions.

To use your astrology argument, I suspect that you and most others in the US would become very worried indeed if evidence emerged that Obama was using a tarot reader and/or an astrologer to make important decisions, such as whether to invade Iran.

Yet many governments around the world do allow the dictates of local religious leaders to influence and in some cases direct important decisions.

It may be that the short-sighted and selfish desires of Big Oil in the US has a lot to do with why climate change deniers dominate the Republican Party and thereby thwart any attempt to rein in the contributions by the US to combat the problem...which thwarting is a handy reason for the leaders of other, less wealthy countries to refuse to do anything of substance. But there can be no argument but that many of the republicans (and others in the denial business) point to the bible in support of their position. A number of eminent politicians have espoused the view that man cannot destroy what god has provided for us, so that it is therefore impossible that man has caused or will cause any sort of global catastrophe.

In Nigeria, the impact of US Xian fundies on the body politic has resulted in extreme anti-gay legislation, while in the US (and elsewhere to perhaps less effect) the opposition to gay marriage is almost entirely religious even tho many aspects of marriage have primarily secular effect.

So while one can perhaps remain on the sidelines with respect to a belief system (astrology) recognized by an overwhelming majority as kooky, and with no apparent real life consequences, it seems mistaken to remain on the sidelines with respect to a belief system that is used by the majority to oppose efforts to save the planet from the effects of massive climate change, or to continue a long-standing tradition of discrimination against a recognized minority.

When one stays neutral, despite a belief that one side is demonstrably more likely, than the other, to be correct, then one enables the sort of situation in which a Michelle Bachman, a Sarah Palin, or a Rick Santorum are seen as legitimate contenders for the most powerful position in the world.

[32519]

 32519, on 2013-January-07, 21:12, said:

What is the purpose of life?

I have given you the reason for life of the God of the Jews. What is the reason for life of non-believers?

[billw55]

 mikeh, on 2013-January-09, 12:37, said:

It may be that the short-sighted and selfish desires of Big Oil in the US has a lot to do with why climate change deniers dominate the Republican Party and thereby thwart any attempt to rein in the contributions by the US to combat the problem...which thwarting is a handy reason for the leaders of other, less wealthy countries to refuse to do anything of substance. But there can be no argument but that many of the republicans (and others in the denial business) point to the bible in support of their position. A number of eminent politicians have espoused the view that man cannot destroy what god has provided for us, so that it is therefore impossible that man has caused or will cause any sort of global catastrophe.

That is .. disturbing. Not doubting you, but can you cite/link some examples?

 mikeh, on 2013-January-09, 12:37, said:

When one stays neutral, despite a belief that one side is demonstrably more likely, than the other, to be correct, then one enables the sort of situation in which a Michelle Bachman, a Sarah Palin, or a Rick Santorum are seen as legitimate contenders for the most powerful position in the world.

Democrats can be Christians too. Obama at least superficially identifies as such - indeed, this is treated as a requirement for the office (i.e. you can't get elected if you are openly atheist). Does Mormon count? Hard to say, but Romney definitely lost some votes from his own party's religious wing because of it.

Perhaps the most devout Christian president in recent times was Jimmy Carter. He was not an effective president, but I know of no reason to think that this was related to his religious belief, or that such belief unduly directed his policy.

[billw55]

 32519, on 2013-January-09, 13:04, said:

I have given you the reason for life of the God of the Jews. What is the reason for life of non-believers?

Coincidence of course .. the meeting of very small probabilities with very large amounts of time.

[dwar0123]

 32519, on 2013-January-09, 13:04, said:

I have given you the reason for life of the God of the Jews. What is the reason for life of non-believers?

Generically, the purpose of life is to procreate.

Specifically and ideally the purpose of any individual life is what ever they want it to be.

For you that is to glorify God. A god who apparently created a 13.7 Billion year old Universe with 100 Billion galaxies sprinkled across the visible Universe that spans a mere 93 billion lightyears. Each galaxy containing about 100 billion stars. And which thanks to Kepler we now reasonable suspect that the planets out number the stars. Yet the God capable of this and so much more, needs you to glorify him.

I guess that makes sense to you.

[hrothgar]

 32519, on 2013-January-09, 13:04, said:

I have given you the reason for life of the God of the Jews. What is the reason for life of non-believers?

To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentation of their women...

One a more serious note, for me the reason for life would seem to be a job that I enjoy, a good dinner (preferably with friends) and a good night's sleep.

(A lot of other stuff gets superimposed on these cases)

[mikeh]

 billw55, on 2013-January-09, 13:38, said:

That is .. disturbing. Not doubting you, but can you cite/link some examples?

google dick amery (spelling uncertain) with reference to global warning. He was acting as a lobbyist when he made the statement, but his history is as a republican politician....US politicians often go on to lucrative lobbying careers: indeed a cynic might suggest that this forms a career goal for many aspirants to the House of Representatives.

Quote

Democrats can be Christians too. Obama at least superficially identifies as such - indeed, this is treated as a requirement for the office (i.e. you can't get elected if you are openly atheist). Does Mormon count? Hard to say, but Romney definitely lost some votes from his own party's religious wing because of it.

Perhaps the most devout Christian president in recent times was Jimmy Carter. He was not an effective president, but I know of no reason to think that this was related to his religious belief, or that such belief unduly directed his policy.

Oh, I don't disagree, but it is one thing for a candidate to have a personal faith and quite another for a candidate to espouse national policies designed to implement the tenets of that faith. Santorum, for example, was positively proud that his exposure to college did not impact his faith and it is clear that politically imposed restrictions on stem cell research and so on are religiously motivated.

[nige1]

 mikeh, on 2013-January-09, 08:22, said:

Your (inaccurate) one line definition tells you more about my position than my lengthy posts do? Or the posts of the other non-believers? You're an idiot if you think that I base my core beliefs on your (or my) dictionary. I say again, beause obviously you can't so far understand simple english: nobody here, least of all me, seems to have said (as far as I can see) that 'god does not exist' as a positive statement. I don't think it does..I think God is an invalid explantion for the existence of the universe. But I can't prove it. In almost every realm of human discourse, other than religion, the onus of proving the existence of a phenomonen rests on the one asserting its existence. Oddly, god-bots seem to take the reverse position, which to me says a lot about the power of religious indoctrination, and the human capacity for self-deception. 'God' as the ultimate answer, seems to me to be a staggerngly large proposition which ought, in the ordinary course, call for a staggeringly large amount of testable evidence. If there are those whose brain chemistry persuades them that they have 'seen' god, then I'm fine with that. I strongly suspect that they are mistaken but it does't bother me at all, until and unless they start using that subjective and unprovable experience to tell others how to live their lives.

Lewis Carol in Through the Looking Glass said:

`I don't know what you mean by "glory,"' Alice said.
Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. `Of course you don't -- till I tell you. I meant "there's a nice knock-down argument for you!"'
`But "glory" doesn't mean "a nice knock-down argument,"' Alice objected.
`When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, `it means just what I choose it to mean -- neither more nor less.'
`The question is,' said Alice, `whether you can make words mean so many different things.'
`The question is,' said Humpty Dumpty, `which is to be master - - that's all.'

T. S. Eliot in Sweeney Agonistes said:

I gotta use words when I talk to you
But if you understand or if you don't
that's nothing to me and nothing to you
We all gotta do what we gotta do
we're gona sit here and drink this booze
we're gona sit here and have a tune
We're gona stay and we're gona go
And somebody gotta pay the rent.

IMO

• Sensible debate is difficult without a common vocabulary -- and dictionaries provide a reasonable starting point
• You don't need to be able to prove something to believe it.