How to Make SURE to Not raise an Atheist

You are pushing the argument to the absurd. You can comprehend the words - at their face value - no need for interpretation. To say you cannot would mean that you cannot understand written language. This point is done - what is, is.





We can all agree there is some degree of evolution. Though I would like to understand how evolution does not form the foundation for racism. I mean this sincerely, I have not really looked into it beyond the surface.

But it sounds like you have a difficulty with God allowing suffering. For you it is easier to say there is no God, than to say there is a God and he allows suffering - is that it?




I probably do not understand evolution as much as you do - but that is OK because evolution does not negate Christianity nor does it negate God. The last time I looked into evolution seriously was back in the 1980's - at that time the fossil record was substantially lacking transitional proof - maybe that has changed since then, But even if it has, it does not hinder a belief in a creator nor in the God of Christianity.

You act like you have this miraculous answer in saying that the universe pulled itself together, on its own, created order, organized systems, and these systems evolved into everything we see today. You act like that does not take a bit of faith. Then you secondary fall back is that you do not know. So are you saying the Bible is not real - or that you do not know?

What would prove it to you? If the Bible had modern science laid out? Have you not studied history. Science constantly makes advancements. What scientists believe is true now may be proven false in the future with new discoveries. Therefore if the Bible said one thing in, say, 1950, science may disagree only to find out later that the Bible was correct all along - as science catches up.

If tomorrow an alien ship landed and showed you that we came from another planet and then explained everything to you, why the earth is as it is, the fossil record etc - you would believe it. I am certain you allow in your mind for that as a possibility. Then why not God?

Does it all come back to the question of suffering for you?

Holy fuck. Read much?

How many times in this thread are you going to suggest that evolution justifies racism? It does not. Race is a matter of geography. Blacks are no less evolved than whites and vice versa. End of story.

As for your last paragraph. Yes, if aliens landed on Earth tomorrow and showed us details of the origin of our species and we all saw it with our own fucking eyes it would be pretty damn convincing. So why not the idea of a god you ask.....
 


We can all agree there is some degree of evolution. Though I would like to understand how evolution does not form the foundation for racism. I mean this sincerely, I have not really looked into it beyond the surface.

I probably do not understand evolution as much as you do - but that is OK because evolution does not negate Christianity nor does it negate God. The last time I looked into evolution seriously was back in the 1980's - at that time the fossil record was substantially lacking transitional proof - maybe that has changed since then, But even if it has, it does not hinder a belief in a creator nor in the God of Christianity.

What about all the Christians who don't believe in evolution but are still racist? Even if evolution did create a foundation for racism that's beside the point.

If you take the time period literally that the bible describes in how long it took to create living things on earth then yes it does conflict quite a bit with evolution.

Also the fact that the bible starts with humans just being here, not evolved over many many years as in evolution.
 
Holy fuck. Read much?

How many times in this thread are you going to suggest that evolution justifies racism? It does not. Race is a matter of geography. Blacks are no less evolved than whites and vice versa. End of story.

And racism is more based of cultural differences in which the 'race' is just attached to due to how groups form socially.
 
You are pushing the argument to the absurd. You can comprehend the words - at their face value - no need for interpretation. To say you cannot would mean that you cannot understand written language. This point is done - what is, is.
It is not absurd to think that an all-knowing god would know how people of the future would interpret those 2000 year old words.

Do me a favor and try to use Occham's razor on this concept... i.e. answer me which is more likely to have happened:

A. A giant space fairy who is all powerful and all knowing wanted to communicate with a silly little race that he cares about on one of his quadrillions of planets so he wrote them a book but only in verbiage that the people of that very year would understand, yet felt it was too much work or something to use a few words like "Sphere" in the right place to let people for all times on that planet know he really existed.

or,

B. There are no giant space fairies. A bunch of men over 2000 years ago wrote this book to the best of their knowledge to that time.

Can't you see how freaking absurd YOUR side of the argument is??


We can all agree there is some degree of evolution. Though I would like to understand how evolution does not form the foundation for racism. I mean this sincerely, I have not really looked into it beyond the surface.
I feel that racism could be a side effect of evolution, but this is completely and utterly not related to this topic. It's such a tiny, insignificant aspect of humanity next to the wonders of evolution that to mention it in the same breath just demeans evolution.

Racism will be destroyed soon enough anyway. It's time on earth is limited because of 2 reasons:

1. As we get smarter we are learning more about each other and the fear of the unknown will grow smaller.

2. Ironically, as time goes by we will crossbreed down to a point where all of humanity will be one single race again. (Leaving no room for racism) This too is part of evolution!

But it sounds like you have a difficulty with God allowing suffering. For you it is easier to say there is no God, than to say there is a God and he allows suffering - is that it?
It is one of hundreds, literally hundreds of clues to his non existence that I know of. Not even a major one.


I probably do not understand evolution as much as you do - but that is OK because evolution does not negate Christianity nor does it negate God. The last time I looked into evolution seriously was back in the 1980's - at that time the fossil record was substantially lacking transitional proof - maybe that has changed since then, But even if it has, it does not hinder a belief in a creator nor in the God of Christianity.
LULZ!

This statement will make any ex-christian or person who understands evolution laugh out loud.

Trust me on this one, you clearly do not understand the whole theory of evolution. It's so much bigger than fishes turning into monkeys turning into men... It doesn't just happen to life, it happens to MATTER. It's the exact same process as the stars forming from gas clouds and spinning off planets... It creates life itself from non-living goo, gases, and electricity.

How life came about and what its' place in this universe becomes very clear once you get the big picture of evolution in your head all at once.

And sky fairies will be the first thing to go when you do.

If you REALLY want a great visual overview of evolution, read Stephen Baxter's Evolution [ame="http://www.amazon.com/Evolution-Stephen-Baxter/dp/0345457838/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpt_7"]Stephen Baxter's "Evolution."[/ame] It reads like a history book of life on Earth from the single-cellular up to the impossibly-far future. It's some awesome, big-vision stuff.

You act like you have this miraculous answer in saying that the universe pulled itself together, on its own, created order, organized systems, and these systems evolved into everything we see today. You act like that does not take a bit of faith.
It honestly does not when you understand evolution fully. When you see it all then it really couldn't happen any other way. The pieces just fit together.


What would prove it to you? If the Bible had modern science laid out? Have you not studied history. Science constantly makes advancements. What scientists believe is true now may be proven false in the future with new discoveries. Therefore if the Bible said one thing in, say, 1950, science may disagree only to find out later that the Bible was correct all along - as science catches up.
Honestly that's possible. But extremely highly unlikely.

It would be more likely for me to win the $12 billion jackpot at the Martian lottery this year in fact.

Meanwhile there is a perfectly plausible explanation over in Darwin's camp...


If tomorrow an alien ship landed and showed you that we came from another planet and then explained everything to you, why the earth is as it is, the fossil record etc - you would believe it. I am certain you allow in your mind for that as a possibility. Then why not God?
If either god or aliens landed on my lawn and told me face to face, sure, i'd likely believe either one of them.

That's called adding new evidence. Scientists do this on a daily basis.

There's just never been any credible evidence before for anything supernatural.

Does it all come back to the question of suffering for you?
No.

It does and always will come back to Occham's Razor and Evolution together clearly explaining everything so perfectly.
 
If tomorrow an alien ship landed and showed you that we came from another planet and then explained everything to you, why the earth is as it is, the fossil record etc - you would believe it. I am certain you allow in your mind for that as a possibility. Then why not God?

Does it all come back to the question of suffering for you?

Yes we would, the difference being that there would be proof in front of our eyes which could be substantiated and backed-up to more than just imagination (and wishful thinking) as is with the idea of a god.

'God' has never had a moment like this or even close to showing any kind of proof.

It's only in the poor reasoning skills of people like yourself that the idea is allowed to continue.
 
> Once again he was communicating to people of the time in a way they could
> understand.

Yet, if the book contained a slightly fuller, more accurate description of how the phyisical universe worked as we know it now (a hundred words would do - one sentence might even do it, as I illustrated earlier), I'd be a fucking christian today and so would most other atheists, muslims and hindus. You can't explain that missed opportunity without convoluted excuses.

Why have copious amounts of detail about supernatural stuff that sounds as if it was just made up, but no description of anything physical beyond the very basics that these people already knew? That is inconsistent. You're suggesting he was talking to all of us about extraordinary aspects of creation like the tree of knowledge, talking snakes, man from dirt and women from ribs (because that's new, incredible information even for modern societies), yet the physical, more mundane, natural aspects of our solar system were dumbed down and aimed specifically at the ancient savages for some reason. Why not take the opportunity to lessen the amount of faith required to swallow this bullshit?
 
...there's no good reason to believe in a god. There's no scientific evidence for it...You can't even define god without contradicting yourself...Do you believe in voodoo dolls REImkt?

You are correct. I cannot define a being outside of the dimensions in which I know. I can only describe that being n the ways in which he/she/it has chosen to reveal him/her/itself within my understanding and dimensions. By the way a voodoo doll can work. I do believe in the supernatural.


How many times in this thread are you going to suggest that evolution justifies racism?... Race is a matter of geography. ... if aliens landed on Earth tomorrow and showed us...the origin of our species it would be pretty damn convincing.

If someone already addressed it in this thread - then I missed it.
If evolution, and I do believe in evolution to a point, but if it is true, aren't we all evolving from different sources? Therefore aren't some sources superior to others? Some more "evolved" than others?
Surely they cannot all be equal. And why are there so few animals on earth even close to attaining the levels of thought and superiority than humans?
Once again, I have not studied evolution since the 1980's, but this seems a natural question.

What about all the Christians who don't believe in evolution but are still racist? Even if evolution did create a foundation for racism that's beside the point.
...the time period literally that the bible describes in how long it took to create living things on earth then yes it does conflict quite a bit with evolution. ...the bible starts with humans just being here, not evolved over many many years as in evolution.

Those Christians are idiots and not following the Bible. It is beside the point for me, but clearly a problem for those that have inconsistent views on this world.
There are plenty of Christians that believe in an Earth that is millions and millions of years old. There are ignorant people in all religions, all philosophies, and all groups within society.
How do you know how it happened? Maybe God let everything evolve and then created humans? Maybe God created a mature earth with all the transitions built in. Maybe the Humans he created are different, though similar in material as the fossils you find.
There are dozens of explanations, none of which are any more convoluted than what is being presented as Science. Personally I have no idea how it worked, I am simply saying that evolution is not contradictory to the Bible. Now have I ever been taught that it is.

And racism is more based of cultural differences in which the 'race' is just... how groups form socially.

I suppose I am thinking of Racism as the thought that one race is superior to another with an underlying assumption that these racists believe there is a foundational genetic component to this belief.


It is not absurd to think that an all-knowing god would know how people...would interpret those 2000 year old words.
try to use Occham's razor on this concept
A. A giant space fairy who is all powerful and all knowing wanted to communicate with a silly little race that he cares about on one of his quadrillions of planets so he wrote them a book but only in verbiage that the people of that very year would understand, yet felt it was too much work or something to use a few words like "Sphere" in the right place to let people for all times on that planet know he really existed.
or,
B. There are no giant space fairies. A bunch of men over 2000 years ago wrote this book to the best of their knowledge to that time.
Can't you see how freaking absurd YOUR side of the argument is??

That all knowing God wanted man to understand the points He was communicating. The points are understood to this day.
By the way - Occham's Razor is not the end all of science. I have read a lot on it since you first pointed me toward in another thread a long time ago - As I always have said I am sincere in my honest exploration of all of these issues. I want to know the truth.
and I am a lot more open minded than most of you would imagine.


I feel that racism could be a side effect of evolution...It's such a tiny, insignificant aspect of humanity next to the wonders of evolution that to mention it...demeans evolution.
Racism will be destroyed soon enough anyway... because of 2 reasons:
1. As we get smarter we are learning more about each other and the fear of the unknown will grow smaller.
2. Ironically, as time goes by we will crossbreed down to a point where all of humanity will be one single race again. ...

I agree about inbreeding (I did my part I married Japanese). It is interesting that you say we will be one single human race again. Does that mean that your evolution has a single human ancestry or multiple vines leading to our current state of being?

LULZ!
This statement will make any ex-christian or person who understands evolution laugh out loud.
...you clearly do not understand the whole theory of evolution. It's so much bigger... It doesn't just happen to life, it happens to MATTER. It's the exact same process as the stars forming from gas clouds and spinning off planets... It creates life itself from non-living goo, gases, and electricity.
How life came about and what its' place in this universe becomes very clear once you get the big picture of evolution in your head all at once.
And sky fairies will be the first thing to go when you do.
If you REALLY want a great visual overview of evolution, read Stephen Baxter's Evolution Stephen Baxter's "Evolution." It reads like a history book of life on Earth from the single-cellular up to the impossibly-far future. It's some awesome, big-vision stuff.

I do not know how many times I have to say it, evolution does not negate God or Christianity. You can tell me all of your processes and I can say God designed it that way. So arguing this is counterproductive because Evolution does not negate God.
And Yes I did read on the evolution of matter and even on Baxter's Evolution which sounds similar to James Michener's The Source.

Honestly that's possible. But extremely highly unlikely. Meanwhile there is a perfectly plausible explanation over in Darwin's camp...

Why unlikely that advanced science presented in the Bible thousands of years ago would not be looked at with skepticism and ignored?
Maybe God wrote it to them that way because they needed to hear it that way, just as when you teach a child in a way a child understands, not in a way an adult communicates/understands.
God then knew that thousands of years later man would still be able to get the gist of his message - in the book that he preserved over the centuries.


If either god or aliens landed on my lawn and told me face to face, sure,...
That's called adding new evidence. Scientists do this on a daily basis.
There's just never been any credible evidence before for anything supernatural.

What is evidence to you? And an Alien is hardly "supernatural". The alien would simply be a species that was created or evolved elsewhere. Do you not allow for that?


No.
It does and always will come back to Occham's Razor and Evolution together clearly explaining everything so perfectly.

Occham was a man from what, the 13th century. And what he said is Gospel to you? Maybe the complex answer is actually the truth.

By the way, what is more plausible,

A tiny dense concentrated piece of matter excising on its own without any explanation for what else exists in addition to it or around it or before it or after and then it exploded into a series of Big Bangs into evolving matter and everything else.

or

A being that created time, is outside of time in another dimension, created everything we know and can understand because we are limited by the dimensions in which we exist and understand?

... the difference being that there would be proof in front of our eyes...substantiated and backed-up to more than just imagination...as is with the idea of a god.
'God' has never... even close to showing any kind of proof. It's only in the poor reasoning skills of people like yourself that the idea is allowed to continue.

The Christian would look at history and say look at the preserved text, the accuracy of the Bible, the fulfilled prophecies, the historically provable timeline where events are foretold and then happen.
Look at the explanations of the world, look at the explanations of the future. Is there anything on earth more miraculous than the Bible, its accuracy, and its proven historical prophecies?
That there is a creator that created man to fit within a certain relationship with this creator and as a result of violating that relationship has to do the best they can while alive to re-connect with that creator later otherwise they will be eternally separated from that creator.

The Non Christian says, look at the Christian who twists history to match prophecy, who believes in the unproven supernatural, who believes foolishly that they are in violation of a divine being and have to eat his flesh etc etc etc.
The Christian is a fool for all of this nonsense and lack of scientific method.

But the Non Christian is wrong in their presumptions about true Christianity. They assume the Christian is an idiot and then quote so-called facts that are not even within true Christian doctrine.

There are problems with Christianity, but what you guys think are problems are not problems at all. They are all well reasoned and laid out in Christian doctrine and beliefs. That is the difference between Christianity and so many Religions - everything within in it is open for debate, examination, and verification - no secrets.
 
The Christian would look at history and say look at the preserved text, the accuracy of the Bible, the fulfilled prophecies, the historically provable timeline where events are foretold and then happen.
Look at the explanations of the world, look at the explanations of the future. Is there anything on earth more miraculous than the Bible, its accuracy, and its proven historical prophecies?
lol, I think you need to take some courses in Biblical Scholarship. Learn about the background of these books - who wrote them, when were they written, and how were they written, etc. Take the Book of Genesis for instance. It's common knowledge among biblical scholars, heck even a 1st yr seminary student knows this, that the authors who wrote Genesis heavily "borrowed" from the existing mesopotamian/summerian creation myth that was predominant at the time. (Plagiarism? :p ). The creation story found in the Bible is simply a 'rough sketch' of this mesopotamian creation story. It's not even unique or original!:

iij8h.jpg

At the beginning of time there were only gods and goddesses on earth. They had to work the land to grow crops to eat. This was difficult and they worked very hard.

xDyue.jpg

Each god and goddess had a job to do. Some dug the fields and planted the crops. Others brought water to the fields in ditches which had to be kept clear of weeds.

N9eqG.jpg

The work was hard, and they were not happy. They got together to discuss what could be done to lighten their
workload.

PPt7t.jpg

They went to get advice from Enki, who was wise and clever. Enki was fast asleep in his underwater house.

aPNGr.jpg

Enki suggested that he create creatures to serve them by working the land. Then the gods' and goddesses' lives would be easier.

p2bHj.jpg

The gods and goddesses thought that Enki's plan was a good solution. Enki collected clay from around his watery
home and used it to make humans.

DqMPh.jpg

He breathed life into the clay figures, but he limited how long they would live. Only the gods and goddesses would
live forever.

EB3N8.jpg

The humans were put to work in the fields. As servants of the gods and goddesses they had to provide them with
food and drink for their tables.

pw4SY.jpg

The humans took water from the rivers and fed the dry and lifeless lands. They dug the soil and planted crops.

SiK42.jpg

With hard work the humans brought life to the land, and the gods and goddesses, who had brought life to the
humans, were happy (i.e. the gods "rested")......... for the moment...........

FWIW, you'll find later on that Enlil was this authoritarian god/leader who really didn't like us being around. To him we were a genetic abomination made in their (annunaki summerian "gods") image. (We were the replicants like in 'Blade Runner' lol. But instead of a 4 yr lifespan, we had a potential 120 yr lifespan (based on our current DNA). In fact, he wished that we were wiped out from the Great Flood later on. Enki was the scientist, the geneticist, who created us. The 2nd banana. The mischevious "serpent". He later saved us replicants/slaves from extinction by instructing Ziusudra (biblical Noah) to create a wooden submarine to save mankind from extinction. :p
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lol, I think you need to take some courses in Biblical Scholarship. Learn about the background of these books - who wrote them, when were they written, and how were they written, etc. Take the Book of Genesis for instance. It's common knowledge among biblical scholars, heck even a 1st yr seminary student knows this, that the authors who wrote Genesis heavily "borrowed" from the existing mesopotamian/summerian creation myth that was predominant at the time. (Plagiarism? :p ). The creation story found in the Bible is simply a 'rough sketch' of this mesopotamian creation story. It's not even unique or original!:


FWIW, you'll find later on that Enlil was this authoritarian god/leader who really didn't like us being around. To him we were a genetic abomination made in their (annunaki summerian "gods") image. (We were the replicants like in 'Blade Runner' lol. But instead of a 4 yr lifespan, we had a potential 120 yr lifespan (based on our current DNA). In fact, he wished that we were wiped out from the Great Flood later on. Enki was the scientist, the geneticist, who created us. The 2nd banana. The mischevious "serpent". He later saved us replicants/slaves from extinction by instructing Ziusudra (biblical Noah) to create a wooden submarine to save mankind from extinction. :p
------------------


You will have to make some more parallels for me because I do not see the Genesis story in your post - nor on the site from the link.

It also stands to reason that there was an oral tradition prior to the written record. Having a similar story, even though thtis one is not similar, there are others that are, still does not negate the validity of the Bible.

Once again, there are problems with the Bible. But what you guys think you know, are all points that are easily refuted with simple logic and reason. I am not appealing to some secret tablets or Watchtower or whatever - I am simply explaining Christianity as it is taught and understood by Christians - and I am just a man on the street - imagine if you had to debate or bring up your points with true experts.

If you want to spread your atheism by some means other than emotion and name calling then you need to step up your game, at this point you all are ineffective.
 
You will have to make some more parallels for me because I do not see the Genesis story in your post - nor on the site from the link.
Wow, you really are thick.

It also stands to reason that there was an oral tradition prior to the written record. Having a similar story, even though thtis one is not similar, there are others that are, still does not negate the validity of the Bible.

Sumerian text were from written records. In any case, I suggest you research the historical background of the books themselves before being all lazy, making up your mind before you did the research. Be a true biblical scholar for once, get off your lazy ass and dig deeper. Not a sheeple that simply accepts the contents of the books at face value and/or what the priests tell you. Learn the history behind it.
 
No, but there are verses about turning a woman into a pillar of salt for looking at a city. Stuff like that kind of makes it a sour source for information.

I don't believe in Jebus - but that's mineralization, bra. The power of an explosion to cause what happened in that story has potential to do that and all kinds of wacky shit. I think the whole "turning around and getting salted" is just broken telemaphone.

But seriously.

god-is-an-alien.jpg
 
If you want to spread your atheism by some means other than emotion and name calling then you need to step up your game, at this point you all are ineffective.

Who said I was an athiest? :p I'm probably more a Deist like the Founding Fathers of this nation (save for one or two of them). If you check their writings, they've all mentioned how they thought religion based on revelations like Christianity were fairytales. They (founding fathers) were all children of the renaissance age. I made this post in another heard before:
Not exactly sure if this helps, but at least it gives a brief history/outline of how we got out the Dark Ages to get away from organized religion/dogma/belief systems and to embrace REASON. But it seems we're still doing the Age of Enlightenment all over again lol

Age of Enlightenment - (fwiw, some folks seem to have this wrong impression that when reason/enlightenment is mentioned it just entails the hard sciences (biology, chemistry, physics, etc). But it's a mindset that affects the Arts, Creativity, liberal arts, etc, as well. It's a change in mindset/worldview.

Also for the benefit of those who're probably part-deists/part-agnostics and probably not hard-core athiests (like moi :p )?:

Deism - I especially like the part where it mentions how the Founding Fathers of this country weren't evangelical rightwing christians like how many in the religious right desperately try to paint them as such. Once again it's about the move away from organized religion and it's arrogant dogmatic mindset in order to embrace REASON.

While you're at it, google 'Spirituality vs Organized Religion'. You'll see my point. You can believe in a higher power, etc. Doesn't mean it needs to be for a particular dogma/religion/creed like Christiniaty. Case in point: our Founding Fathers being Deists and NOT evangelical/fundamentalist christians.
 
Wow, you really are thick.



Sumerian text were from written records. In any case, I suggest you research the historical background of the books themselves before being all lazy, making up your mind before you did the research. Be a true biblical scholar for once, get off your lazy ass and dig deeper. Not a sheeple that simply accepts the contents of the books at face value and/or what the priests tell you. Learn the history behind it.


In referring to an oral tradition, if I did not make it clear, it is my understanding that these stories were passed down orally before written. After all, the story of Job is set between 5th & 4th century BCE (according to Wikipedia, I really had no idea).

Your linked site has the story written on tablets as just starting 5,000 years ago and later - Wikipedia has it roughly at 3100BCE
Your Link From UK Website Citing 5,000 years
Wikipedia citing 3100BC - 520BC

You are right, I am a lazy ass. My point in this thread is not to be a Biblical Scholar - but to defend Christianity a little when the Atheists run around like they know everything - I simply want them to up their game and understand that most of their points are ineffective and irrelevant.

And again, you can tell me I am thick, but your story does not mirror Genesis except maybe the part where the God "breathed life into them" - but since an understanding of the Christian God pre-dates all of this, Job had a full understanding of his relationship with God before all of this was in any written form that we have discovered, then some of the following stories can mirror some of the truth.

A Christian could also argue that stories from other cultures, ones you and others have yet to point out, mirror Chrisitanity. But the Christian could say those stories were inspired by the Devil and simply were variations of the truth - after all, the devil and demons etc understood God from the outset.

Atheists tell Christians they are stupid, ignorant, losers, idiots, weak minded, etc - but fail to come to the table with real meaty and weighty facts. This is why Atheists fail - they could research and have real facts to make the Christian expand their mind - but the Atheist is lazy - they would rather call people names and walk away.

This thread is getting old and I need to get back to work - I think I made my point.
 
Who said I was an athiest? :p I'm probably more a Deist like the Founding Fathers of this nation (save for one or two of them). If you check their writings, they've all mentioned how they thought religion based on revelations like Christianity were fairytales. They (founding fathers) were all children of the renaissance age. I made this post in another heard before:


While you're at it, google 'Spirituality vs Organized Religion'. You'll see my point. You can believe in a higher power, etc. Doesn't mean it needs to be for a particular dogma/religion/creed like Christiniaty. Case in point: our Founding Fathers being Deists and NOT evangelical/fundamentalist christians.


I saw this after my last post.

What you said is fine by me - I have never studied if the Founding Fathers were religious or not. This thread was about Atheist and Christian Bashing as per the OP - I simply wanted to defend the underdog and expose the shallow Atheists that are in their social bubble of assumed superiority because they have such a miniscule understanding of Christianity.
 
I am simply explaining Christianity as it is taught and understood by Christians - and I am just a man on the street - imagine if you had to debate or bring up your points with true experts.

So are "true experts" only people that agree exactly with you? It's not just biblical scholars and such that have different interpretations. Women can't be priests in the Roman Catholic Church for example, whereas bisexual female Sinead O'Connor is an ordained priest in another Catholic sect.


Biblical criticism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Internal consistency of the Bible - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 
So are "true experts" only people that agree exactly with you? It's not just biblical scholars and such that have different interpretations. Women can't be priests in the Roman Catholic Church for example, whereas bisexual female Sinead O'Connor is an ordained priest in another Catholic sect.


Biblical criticism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Internal consistency of the Bible - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


I knew if I quoted Wikipedia enough you would show up - I hate citing Wikipedia because it can be so wrong and is really a horrible joke on knowledge. Plus, every time we give it links it makes it that much more difficult for people to beat it in rankings.

With that said.... there are all types of sects in all religions. I suppose when I think of an understanding of Christianity I would say a reasoned understanding that looks to the Source text in its original form. WikiPedia picks up on a few issues but they are not of doctrine but secondary. I do not understand why Sinead wants to be a Catholic unless for publicity. The Catholics are crazy about a lot of things also - I could argue against Catholics, against Judaism, against Islam, even against Christianity. As I said many times, I am not the expert, I am simply pointing out the simplicity of the Atheist positions as put forth in this Christian Bashing thread.

I believe that many of you expected a Christian to show up deny evolution, deny history, deny science, deny the supernatural, deny everything. For those of you that expected this - that is not rational Christianity nor is it Christianity as I or any Christian I know was taught. The Christianity you get in the news, from Hollywood, and from fringe sects is all craziness - as are many fringe sects within society.

This thread is dead.
 
I do believe in the supernatural.
Herein lies your problem.

Test the supernatural. It will fail any solid testing. 100% of the time.


How do you know how it happened?
We don't KNOW, but we have a damn good idea because of countless clues from all over the world left in the fossil record that agree with each other.

Personally I have no idea how it worked, I am simply saying that evolution is not contradictory to the Bible. Now have I ever been taught that it is.
All of the people that have taught you were clearly not in possession of the whole theory of evolution.

Don't think that's rare though. I'd bet half of america or more is in the same boat with you! The educational system here is so bad it's absolutely criminal.

I'm from the south and we didn't have one single teacher in any of my schools brave or smart enough to teach about evolution. Our textbooks didn't mention it. -There was one teacher in my senior year that was smart enough actually, but he admitted to me a decade later that he would have lost his job the very day that he would have admitted that evolution might be more than an INCORRECT theory.

Occham's Razor is not the end all of science. I have read a lot on it since you first pointed me toward in another thread a long time ago
Then you read too much but didn't absorb the important bit.

All you need to really understand is that in this universe, the one you're currently breathing in, the most likely answer is almost always what happens.

The problem that allows religion and belief in the supernatural to keep on existing is that most of humanity is REALLY BAD at figuring out the likelihood of events occurring.

I'm not saying I'm a probability genius, but it does appear that you are not very advanced at being able to judge the likelihood of events happening in general.

===============================================================
Quick quiz:
===============================================================
Rate each of the following 1-5; 1 being the most likely to occur, and 5 being the least likely:


__ Santa Clause heading out in a flying sleigh each christmas eve & leaving free gifts down the chimney of every christian child around the world in 24 hours flat.

__ A spiritual healing master who can remove tumors and cancers with touch alone, instantly.

__ The Easter Bunny leaving chocolate eggs in those same kids' yards every easter.

__ Spirits of dead humans being able to actually move a solid object 1 millimeter to the right in a genuinely haunted house.

__ A heavenly father creating us all and the whole universe; who truly cares about us and wishes us well.

===============================================================

I know it won't prove anything, but it would really be interesting to see your rating of these four events' probability.


As I always have said I am sincere in my honest exploration of all of these issues. I want to know the truth. and I am a lot more open minded than most of you would imagine.
Sometimes I believe you when you say things like this, but other times when you blindly defend points you lost long ago like the Sphere thing I feel you are trolling us and have no interest whatsoever in truth. It's hard to tell but I figure since I'm debating for fun and not to "win a convert" then it's not big deal if you turn out to be a troll. -I can't speak for others though.


It is interesting that you say we will be one single human race again. Does that mean that your evolution has a single human ancestry or multiple vines leading to our current state of being?
You're talking Anthropology 101 stuff here. There are clearly multiple vines like Neanderthals (who they now believe we used to rape a lot and most humans have a little neanderthal in them) and older lines.

The thing is though, time is BIG. Just in the last 2000 years we've lost many a civilization and it's made a huge impact on the worlds' cultures, languages, and bloodlines.

But 2k years compared to the likely 20-50 MILLION years or so that humans have been jaunting around the globe is so small it's completely silly to think of it as any change at all whatsoever.

In that scale of time, Neanderthals practically just arrived and died out in the same millisecond, just a millisecond ago. Not enough time to think of as significant at all.

We only talk about them as being an older species because we don't have any evidence of the 40 thousand other humanoid species that came before them. Just a dozen or so.

So did all mankind come from any single organism? No one will ever know because that single organism could have been a rat-sized mammal 79 Million years ago that was brainlessly just trying to keep from being a Veloceraptor's lunch.

It is A-OK to say 'we don't have evidence yet.' It is plain stupid to say 'a sky fairy must have created us to look like him.'

In fact, if you lived in the sky, would you have need for legs & feet? It seems really damn ignorant to think that we are in god's image if he lives in the sky or "everywhere" or someplace other than here on the ground with us.

I do not know how many times I have to say it, evolution does not negate God or Christianity. You can tell me all of your processes and I can say God designed it that way. So arguing this is counterproductive because Evolution does not negate God.
And I don't know how many times _I_ have to say it, but evolution, the entire theory with all its' extended connotations, perfectly explains every part of our existence in a very LIKELY, probable way. That doesn't of course prove that there can't be a god, but it does take away all reason for him to exist. (Because no one would need to have created the heaven & earth & man... etc. It was all here without his help.)

To say that god "designed it all that way" is a rationalization of absurd purportions.
That's like saying my invisible friend designed the Grand Canyon that way simply because my little mind couldn't conceive the process of erosion.


And Yes I did read on the evolution of matter and even on Baxter's Evolution which sounds similar to James Michener's The Source.
You read the whole Baxter book? If so, which animal form did you feel was the earliest that was likely to be our ancestor?


Why unlikely that advanced science presented in the Bible thousands of years ago would not be looked at with skepticism and ignored?
As stated elsewhere, the bible uses the word Sphere. People of the time knew it, that's not advanced science.

If he --->JUST<--- used the word sphere instead of circle to describe the earth, that would have told all mankind something truly hard to know before we could circumnavigate the globe.

Calling the earth "circular" just means that the map is round. Many maps were made round so there was nothing revealing at all in calling it a circle.

What a HELL of a wasted chance to not use 'sphere' at that point.

To be continued...
 
God then knew that thousands of years later man would still be able to get the gist of his message - in the book that he preserved over the centuries.
But the problem is that only a few people with poor understanding of probability are "Getting the gist" anymore. The rest of us have taken all the clues long ago and rationally come to the conclusion that the book is just plain stupid.

We came to that conclusion because "he" said shitloads of stupid shit like 'circle' instead of 'sphere.' Once or twice we would have been able to overlook, but dude, there are reams of inconsistencies that he would know we wouldn't be cool with today now that we've got some science.

What is evidence to you? And an Alien is hardly "supernatural". The alien would simply be a species that was created or evolved elsewhere. Do you not allow for that?
Of course I allow for aliens... They would not be supernatural at all in any way, even if they wave magic wands and make buildings appear out of nowhere.

To get here, aliens would have a very advanced knowledge of science. There is no comparing aliens to human superstitions. Totally different ballpark. Their 'magic' would be explainable with the laws of science.

Evidence to me that god exists could be as slight as him appearing and telling me so.

But that certianly wouldn't prove it to humanity, just to me and those that saw it first hand unless we got some great video footage.


Occham was a man from what, the 13th century. And what he said is Gospel to you?
LULZ. He's just an old dude who made sense. Calling that gospel is taking it way too far.


By the way, what is more plausible,

A tiny dense concentrated piece of matter excising on its own without any explanation for what else exists in addition to it or around it or before it or after and then it exploded into a series of Big Bangs into evolving matter and everything else.

or

A being that created time, is outside of time in another dimension, created everything we know and can understand because we are limited by the dimensions in which we exist and understand?
With our current understanding of the universe, it's very obviously #1.

-And that's without even attributing a caring god that talks to us or made us in his own image to #2... Things get really dubious when you start adding things from the bible into the picture.

Do you believe that god set the universe off at the big bang and has never had anything to do with us since then? Like we're in his petri dish and he's just watching?

Look at the explanations of the world, look at the explanations of the future. Is there anything on earth more miraculous than the Bible, its accuracy, and its proven historical prophecies?
Was that intended to make us laugh?

But the Non Christian is wrong in their presumptions about true Christianity. They assume the Christian is an idiot and then quote so-called facts that are not even within true Christian doctrine.
More often we just assume that it's overwhelmingly idiotic to give a second's thought to any hocus pocus at all. Christianity=Islamism=Gremlins=Easter Bunny. Who the hell cares about the intricacies of a ancient book that talks about sky fairies as if they have some impact on anything important? Who has time to waste on that shit?

There are problems with Christianity, but what you guys think are problems are not problems at all. They are all well reasoned and laid out in Christian doctrine and beliefs.
Too bad they don't stand up to any scientific testing though... Only lots of excuses, never anything provable. That's "Christian doctrine and beliefs" in a nutshell.
 
I hate citing Wikipedia because it can be so wrong and is really a horrible joke on knowledge.

Despite the way people act in here sometimes, this isn't the supreme court. Linking to wikipedia isn't meant as concrete proof of anything, but it's usually the easiest way to show an overview of something, and over 99 percent of the time it is accurate. Even if you ignore the main entry and just skip straight to the references, it is still a valuable resource.