GameOver22 said:
kowhoho said:
pizzahut451 said:
kowhoho said:
pizzahut451 said:
Statistics are constantly being used for the betterment of mankind and are a huge component of all the developements which make your life easier. For you to say that they are 'stupid' or 'biased' is quite frankly an insult to what humanity has accomplished for itself.Bias is always present as human error cannot be entirely removed from a human study, but there are methods that statistics use (such as random sampling or double-blind studies) which bring the potential for bias down to an acceptable level. A good statistcical study ensures that its results have less than a 5% chance of happening by chance, and those studies are often repeated many times regardless, so there is a complete certainty of their results.
You also seem to be overlooking the point I'm trying to make. I never said that atheism CAUSES wealth, low crime rates or anything of the sort. Neither did he. I can most definitely say that an atheist is less likely to commit crime or be poor because of the negative correlation between the two. This prediction is only based on the correlation between the variables. This is not a generalization and in no way does it imply that NO atheist would commit crime.
Let's use a different example.
Consider a study where students' GPA and the hours they watch TV are compared. Let's say that the study finds a strong negative correlation between Hours of TV Watching and GPA (more hours of tv = lower GPA). From this data, assuming it was taken with a randomly collected sample of students and biases were minimized, I can predict that a student who watches a lot of TV will have a low GPA. Yes? However this does not mean that watching TV CAUSES bad grades. There could be a third unknown variable which is causing both the high amount of TV watching AND the low GPA, such as inherent laziness.
Now let's move on to your use of the term, "real christian." Can you actually define to me right now what a real christian is? I seriously doubt it. I find it funny that you call my arguments shallow and them use terms with no operational definition. There are a thousand sects of christianity that don't agree with one another. Are you so vain as to say that your church has a monopoly on morality? Your statements are uninformed, narrow-minded and arrogant. |
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I never insulted ALL statistics ever made. I just said that that one statistic sucked. I have absolutely nothing agaisnt the statistics as long as they are good, accurate and unbiased.
And i understood what you wanted to say. But you still cant say that an atheist is less likely to comitt a crime either. An individual atheist is less likley to comitt a crime? Probably. Atheists as a group of people are less likely to comitt crime and are more richer than other people? HELL NO! Thats why that argument is dumb IMO. To say that atheists are less likely to comitt a crime than christians or muslims or jews is wrong.
And let me put that really simple for you: A good christian is a good person who believes in the teachings of Jesus Christ. A person who steales, rapes, kills, aussaults people is NOT a real chrisitan, regardless if he believes in Jesus or not. Thats the way God sees things, and thats the way i see them too.
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You have no basis for the underlined. It isn't "wrong" to use statistics to predict the character of a person. Please explain to me how these statistics are anything but "good, accurate and unbiased." Without any reasoning behind that comment it sounds like you're just trying to find details that will support your argument and ignore anything that doesn't.
"Good" is also a subjective term. My "good" is likely to be very different from your "good." It is not an objective term to be used for definition.
And how do you know how God sees things? It's wonderful that you think that you share a kind of "holy vision" with him/her/it, but where do you get this statement from? Please don't use the word bible in your answer. >_>
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The point being made is that in order to be a Christian, a person must follow Christian doctrine. In terms of crime, the obvious example here is the Ten Commandments . I would not go so far as to say a person is a bad Christian if they committ a crime because humans are not perfect, but a Christian does need to generally avoid breaking the law in order to be in compliance with Christian doctrine. If someone told me they were a Christian and then proceeded to habitually steal from others, I would question their Christianity because their actions are in direct conflict with Christian teachings. I am not saying that general adherence to Christian doctrine is a suffiecient condition for saying someone is a Christian, but it is a necessary one.
Just as another note, while Christian denominations and sects disagree on some things, I think you will find that they are in agreement with each other on the major issues. For example, they will believe that God created the universe, that Jesus Christ rose from the dead, and they will agree on the Ten Commandments. Also, asking pizzahut to present God's view without referring to the Bible is asking a bit too much. Without the Bible, he would just be making up his own vision or alludicating someone else's vision. I am not an expert on the Bible, but I think most Christians consider the Bible to be the best source for interpreting God's intentions and God's vision of the world.
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