Grey Acumen said: Phendrana said: Grey Acumen said: Andir said: Phendrana said: /sarcasm? No, just because they couldn' understand it, it MUST mean that God exists. just because they think they do understand it, it MUST mean that God doesn't exist. Yes, I think I do have an understanding of evolution, or at least a much better understanding of it than jer133, and I never once said that evolution disproves God. Wasn't reffering to you, or evolution specifically with that piece. Andir said: So, if you don't give God your love, then you shall be forced to live an eternity of suffering? How is this any different than a "need"? If he doesn't need you to love him, why would you be threatened with eternal damnnation for not doing as your told? Why does he need to strike fear into you to get what he "wants"? Hey, my parents told me that if I don't listen to them and eat my veggies I won't grow up healthy, and if I keep playing with matches, I'll get burned, and if I don't look both ways when crossing the street, I'll get hit by a car, and if I accept candy from strangers, I could get kidnapped. Why are they threatening me in order to get what they want!?! Grow up.

(1) Oh, then you were just being a smartass? 
(2) You parents did not have the ability to make it so that eating candy all day made you grow up big and strong, and that you were fireproof, and that jumping in front of a bus won't leave you as a stain on the pavement.  It's not a threat, it's a warning.  But God's warning is warning you about a threat he can presumably put an end to, but for some reason chooses not to. 

In short, he's asking "Why would God make it so that I'll go to Hell if I don't follow His rules?" and you reply, "Why are there rules?"  EXACTLY. 

Final-Fan said: senseinobaka, appolose may be mistaken about death not being destroyable (assuming the existence and willingness of God to do such a thing), but the lake of fire that unbelievers are thrown into is clearly not merely a metaphor for complete nonexistence. "And the devil... was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever." I understand, what with people coming back from the dead at the end, that the Bible's authors might feel the need to specify "destroyed forever" (countering one of appolose's criticisms) but the description of "day and night for ever and ever" just makes no sense at all in that context. "I'm going to kill you, and you'll be dead forever, all seven days of the week. Especially on Tuesdays." The explicit description of something happening on a constant basis does not apply to something happens once and remains that way forever.

Isn't the current Catholic interpretation of that "Hell isn't really a place, you'll just feel like a dick for eternity for not believing in god and therefore won't be as loved and feel like being a jerk for being a failure."

At least that's what i thought it was. Everyone goes to heaven but it's only "Perfect" for those who "pass the test" so to speak, and everyone else feels like a jerk on varying levels depending on how much of a jerk they were.

I do remember something about the Catholic Church saying there was no hell. It was on Sports Night. Ah I miss that show and it's almost complete lack of sports.

Also keep in mind, back in olden times people loved flowery unneeded language.   "To be destroyed forever and ever" is a phrase i've heard many times before... as nonsensical as it may be.

Kasz216 said: veiam said: Kasz216 said: veiam said: Isn't the status quo set by what most people believe? Most people believe there is some sort of god, though disagree which one is the case. Therefore you in fact would have to prove it as such. There is also no proof that the existance of belief in a god didn't originate itself with consious thought. Status Quo - the existing state of affairs; specifically : the last actual and uncontested state of affairs that preceded a controversy and that is to be preserved by preliminary injunction In other words, the status quo was the time before religion was introduced. Number of believers doesn't mean anything. If I get everyone in the world to state that fire doesn't burn, would that make it the status quo and therefore true? Also, I was raised without the mention of anything relating to a god or religion (meaning there wa neither "god is great" nor "there is no god" in my house at all) until I was 8-ish. And then I remember my grandmother teaching me how to pray and my mom being pissy about it. I couldn't understand why my mother was so angry about it back then, but right now it makes perfect sense. In an environment where the person is not introduced to god he will simply not believe just because he has never been brainwashed into believing in something purely based on faith. Then where did the idea of God come from in the first place?

I answered that in the following post. It has been spawned by the ignorance of humans when the brain is constructed to work with a cause and effect structure of learning.

veiam said: Kasz216 said: veiam said: Kasz216 said: veiam said: Isn't the status quo set by what most people believe? Most people believe there is some sort of god, though disagree which one is the case. Therefore you in fact would have to prove it as such. There is also no proof that the existance of belief in a god didn't originate itself with consious thought.   Status Quo - the existing state of affairs; specifically : the last actual and uncontested state of affairs that preceded a controversy and that is to be preserved by preliminary injunction In other words, the status quo was the time before religion was introduced. Number of believers doesn't mean anything. If I get everyone in the world to state that fire doesn't burn, would that make it the status quo and therefore true? Also, I was raised without the mention of anything relating to a god or religion (meaning there wa neither "god is great" nor "there is no god" in my house at all) until I was 8-ish. And then I remember my grandmother teaching me how to pray and my mom being pissy about it. I couldn't understand why my mother was so angry about it back then, but right now it makes perfect sense. In an environment where the person is not introduced to god he will simply not believe just because he has never been brainwashed into believing in something purely based on faith.   Then where did the idea of God come from in the first place?     I answered that in the following post. It has been spawned by the ignorance of humans when the brain is constructed to work with a cause and effect structure of learning.

Yet you believe no one would believe in god if left on their own and no one was told of god.

That's uh, quite contradictory to say the least. Since then not talking about god would not in fact create no god. But in fact every individual person would create their own god that makes the most sense to them to fill in the things they are ignorant about.

In other words, you wouldn't be an atheist, you would believe in your own tailored god that best suits your ignorance. This god you would believe in whole heartidly as he would be the only one you would ever have heard of, and there would be no contradictions in your mind about how he does stuff.

Based on your premise.  Organized religion is needed or atleast talk of god is needed for people to not believe in god.  In which case, organized religion should be quite a valuable thing to the atheist. 

Final-Fan said: senseinobaka, appolose may be mistaken about death not being destroyable (assuming the existence and willingness of God to do such a thing), but the lake of fire that unbelievers are thrown into is clearly not merely a metaphor for complete nonexistence. "And the devil... was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever." I understand, what with people coming back from the dead at the end, that the Bible's authors might feel the need to specify "destroyed forever" (countering one of appolose's criticisms) but the description of "day and night for ever and ever" just makes no sense at all in that context. "I'm going to kill you, and you'll be dead forever, all seven days of the week. Especially on Tuesdays." The explicit description of something happening on a constant basis does not apply to something happens once and remains that way forever.

 The metaphor is clear. The english language is not. The word translated torment is from the greek word "basanistes" It literally means 'jailers'. The idea behind the scripture you are quoting is that Satan will be destroyed forever and he will be jailed there in destruction day and night forever. 

For satan there is not chance of ever coming back. He has no parole. The english laguage makes the word torment ambiguos. It could mean torture. But thankfully the greeks had a different word for that, so by examining the original language the tought is clear.

I do agree with you that it could be rather reitterative, but such emphasis and restatement of ideas in almost exagerated ways is a halmark of the bible literature. 

Kasz216 said: veiam said: Kasz216 said: Then where did the idea of God come from in the first place? I answered that in the following post. It has been spawned by the ignorance of humans when the brain is constructed to work with a cause and effect structure of learning. Yet you believe no one would believe in god if left on their own and no one was told of god. That's uh, quite contradictory to say the least.

To be fair, his claim is that today the natural inclination would be to not assume a supernatural explanation, whereas an individual in a more primitive society would be much more inclined to create some higher being(s) in his mind to explain the many, many phenomena so far beyond his understanding. 

(Not that all people of modern societies necessarily actually truly understand that much, but the worldly explanations are available.)

senseinobaka said: Final-Fan said: senseinobaka, appolose may be mistaken about death not being destroyable (assuming the existence and willingness of God to do such a thing), but the lake of fire that unbelievers are thrown into is clearly not merely a metaphor for complete nonexistence. "And the devil... was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever." I understand, what with people coming back from the dead at the end, that the Bible's authors might feel the need to specify "destroyed forever" (countering one of appolose's criticisms) but the description of "day and night for ever and ever" just makes no sense at all in that context. "I'm going to kill you, and you'll be dead forever, all seven days of the week. Especially on Tuesdays." The explicit description of something happening on a constant basis does not apply to something happens once and remains that way forever. The metaphor is clear. The english language is not. The word translated torment is from the greek word "basanistes" It literally means 'jailers'. The idea behind the scripture you are quoting is that Satan will be destroyed forever and he will be jailed there in destruction day and night forever. For satan there is not chance of ever coming back. He has no parole. The english laguage makes the word torment ambiguos. It could mean torture. But thankfully the greeks had a different word for that, so by examining the original language the tought is clear. I do agree with you that it could be rather reitterative, but such emphasis and restatement of ideas in almost exagerated ways is a halmark of the bible literature.

But the point of "jail" is that the person is still there, locked up.  Not nonexistent.  Even if he's there forever, he's THERE.  That's the difference between life in prison and the death penalty.  (Aside from the possibility of an overturned sentence -- unlikely in Satan's case.)

Grey Acumen said: Andir said: So, if you don't give God your love, then you shall be forced to live an eternity of suffering? How is this any different than a "need"? If he doesn't need you to love him, why would you be threatened with eternal damnnation for not doing as your told? Why does he need to strike fear into you to get what he "wants"?  Hey, my parents told me that if I don't listen to them and eat my veggies I won't grow up healthy, and if I keep playing with matches, I'll get burned, and if I don't look both ways when crossing the street, I'll get hit by a car, and if I accept candy from strangers, I could get kidnapped. Why are they threatening me in order to get what they want!?! Grow up.

Wow, resorting to calling me a child for not believing in God or his ways?  I guess that's the method, huh?

We are talking about fact vs fiction as far as I'm concerned.  If I don't eat my veggies, I most definitely will not have the proper materials my body needs to grow up and be healthy.  This has been proven by science and fact.  Yes, if I run out in the street, I will get hit by a car.  This is physics at it's best.

What do your parents want of you?  To grow old, maybe have kids.  Continue the bloodline as we've been taught over the ages to promote.  If we didn't do this, humans would cease to exist.  I, however, do not require "love" to grow old.  Sure, it's nice... but there is no proven chemical or physical requirement for living.  It's a social aspect.  People love each other to remain close and continue life, not living.  They do it to have what they consider fun.  Kids can be a great ball of fun and a great responsibility.  But they are only required to continue human existence.  They use love (or fondness) to feel safe, secure, and needed.  But again need, security and safety feelings won't get you to 85 years old without nutrition, safe actions, and a secure domicile.  You're twisting physicality with emotion.  And apparently such emotion resorts to degrading me to protect itself from harm.  Has what I've said hit too close to being truth or meaningful to trigger such a reaction?

Final-Fan said: Kasz216 said: veiam said: Kasz216 said: Then where did the idea of God come from in the first place? I answered that in the following post. It has been spawned by the ignorance of humans when the brain is constructed to work with a cause and effect structure of learning. Yet you believe no one would believe in god if left on their own and no one was told of god. That's uh, quite contradictory to say the least. To be fair, his claim is that today the natural inclination would be to not assume a supernatural explanation, whereas an individual in a more primitive society would be much more inclined to create some higher being(s) in his mind to explain the many, many phenomena so far beyond his understanding. (Not that all people of modern societies necessarily actually truly understand that much, but the worldly explanations are available.)

This is something i disagree about. Partly because people greatly underestimate the intellegence of past societies. Some had science in some fields that are equal to, or were possibly better then what we have today.

Partly because there are still no similar scientific answers for why things exist still today.

The best answer we have for the creation of the Universe is the Big Bang. Why did the Big Bang happen? It just did.

Well presumibly it hapened after a "big crunch" after the universe expanded as far as it could then contracted on itself. However, what caused that... another big bang... followed by another big crunch.

It's a bit of an endless cycle that doesn't exlain how things came to be in a cycle to begin with and instead proports that things have been like this for Infinity. Though not Infinity as we know it since time is realitve but "True Infinity" of "True Time" in which we arn't even able to properly appreciate since we don't live outside of the universe.

Not that a human being can even properly appreciate Infinity anwyay. The time existing forever after now is the easy part. The hard part is that time existed infinitly before this moment. In other words their is an infinite amount of time before this point in the Big Bang/Big Crunch theory.

Which makes you wonder how we ever got here if there was Infinite Time before here. Unless time isn't linear but only appears linier, but this is a whole nother discussion. Which ironically is one that can be used to explain how someone would know the future and how his actions would effect it the minute he did such.

Most people, nearly everyone seems to hate the non linear time theory.  I can see why.  It's tough to believe that when i'm typing this workd.  I am also tying this word.  But that's because people are well... people, and not super genius better then everbody knows more then everbody... well gods.

In other words. The more you think about what lies just out of the edge the more you realize people don't know anything. I think most people would still assume a god at play even if your theory was that belief in God was some primiative belief from the past.

As we still are primitative. Extremely primative, and there are some things that truely are likely beyond are comprehension and always will be.

Heck, even science doesn't work like we expect half the time. We think Physics are an absolute, but then we find out that at some level even the laws of physics break down.

Final-Fan said: (1) Oh, then you were just being a smartass? (2) You parents did not have the ability to make it so that eating candy all day made you grow up big and strong, and that you were fireproof, and that jumping in front of a bus won't leave you as a stain on the pavement. It's not a threat, it's a warning. But God's warning is warning you about a threat he can presumably put an end to, but for some reason chooses not to. In short, he's asking "Why would God make it so that I'll go to Hell if I don't follow His rules?" and you reply, "Why are there rules?" EXACTLY.

Well, lets look at it logically. If I created an android that meant to be able to learn how to read through visual character recognition, but it was taking too long to figure it out, and so I plugged in a computer and started reading the book myself and punching it directly into the programming, what would I have accomplished? Nothing.

Do you you know the steps to always winning or getting a tie in tic tac toe? If so, would you want to play that game over and over again? you always win, so what purpose does it have?

God created us with free will, we have the ability to fail or succeed, because it is through choice that there is any purpose to anything. If he just put us straight into heaven, then we would have never had a chance to make a choice, and if we'd get into heaven no matter what choice we made, then any choice we made would be pointless.