Pokerface

Unless you're the Lord of Creation, he's not mocking you.

If you're going to assert as FACT the believability of the Judeo-Christian God over the Flying Spaghetti Monster (which you have -- and strong belief or no... dang, I wouldn't make that claim about my MOM'S believability in the Sandbox), then you need to expect posts like Beatnik's, where he refutes your factual claim.

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Tempus: Pokerface is nailing it right on the head. Everyone who is arguing against him is simply arguing against reality.
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Requital

Well for one, scientific isn't all it is cracked up to be. A lot of science that is taught in schools is poor science and a lot of texts omit important facts that make life without an intelligent designer impossible or at least unprovable to the point a faith in science must become belief just as flawed as you see religious belief. So if you take the time to read this article I hope you can understand how everyone stands on equal footing, except your believe is in nothing and that is a very precarious position to be in.

http://www.creationism.org/heinze/SciEvidGodLife.htm

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Requital

So when you say that conceptual tools used for critical thinking, do you mean arguments that go along with "You can't prove it's true?" , when at the same time "You can't prove it is false?" also applies. I remember going through the logic behind anything being true and how do you know if something is true or not? It was pretty fascinating. I came to the conclusion that you have to start with a premise that something must be true otherwise the mind is doomed and there is no ground to stand on. The whole Matrix quandary of are we all in The Matrix (non reality) or am I God in my own world I created and everyone around me is simply a figment of my imagination (very complex imagination)? It's tough when you get into the abstract(I know there is a specific term that is better than abstract, but I can't think of it at the moment). I had to conclude that since people do not act as if the world is abstract and something needs to be true (something innately says it wouldn't work) for man to function as he does, then there really is a spoon and if someone used it to carve out your heart it would hurt really bad.

Zoop

As for the Kantian beliefs, wasn't it Kant who did the metaphysics?"I am a butterfly dreaming I am a man"? Matrix style?

I am an ant defending my dinosaur friend.

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Switch

I must say, this whole thread makes me ill.

First, stop arguing about the FSM. Its a parody religion meant as satire to draw attention to how ridiculous the debate about evolution and ID is. It has served its purpose. It wasn't created to debate the existence of god, only to point out the ridiculous argument that ID is somehow of equal scientific relevance to evolution.

Second, people are completely capable of upholding moral virtues without any belief in god, its rewards, or its punishments. If anything, it would seem that history has shown religion to be a major factor in people behaving AGAINST their internal moral barrier.
I can't stand it when people argue that no one would be 'good' if it wasn't for god. Maybe YOU would be a total screw up if you didn't fear god and adhere to the rules of a 2000 year old fairy tale, but a majority of the people in this world are completely capable of living their lives in relative harmony without fearing the divine.

Third, you cannot make 'factual claims' using the bible. The bible is a religious text that has endured repeated mistranslation. It has been intentionally altered throughout history to serve political motives. Its an ancient fairytale. Like many epic poems of the past, I'm sure it makes reference to plenty of factual events and places, but so does most modern fiction.

Fourth, why hasn't anyone considered the possibility of an afterlife existing without any divine creator. Its perfectly plausible that if there is 'life beyond death' it exists without the guiding hand of a grand master god.

Fifth, belief is god is not factually based. The word faith has been used specifically to describe belief in most religion. This is because most religions acknowledge that there is no factual way to assert the existence of god. Don't act offended when people are not willing to take your 'leap of faith' and STOP arguing like you have factual evidence

Requital, if you want to argue your faith, go ahead, but please don't speak for science.

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Kerostasis

Er...I didn't say he was mocking me. I said he was mocking my Lord. Which he is.

He didn't actually refute anything though. He just expressed his bitterness that 84% of the world disagrees with his view that there is no God. (Thanks Beatnik, I'm using your source for the numbers this time!) He offered no facts, no logic, merely his opinion that the claims of Christianity were too outrageous to be true (nevermind how many of those claims he misinterpreted or exaggerated, thats really beside the point).

But since, as we've just seen through the last few posts, everybody in here agrees that the believability of the FSM is precisely zero, it really doesn't take much credibility to exceed that level. Dogged insistence that Christianity be limited to the same level of credibility as the FSM is just a poorly disguised way of claiming all Christians to be misguided fools who have drowned themselves in lies.

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RandomGuy

Whoa there, I'm not sure anyone agrees that the believability of the FSM is precisely zero. In fact you were previously giving arguments as to why God is many more times believable than the FSM. It's still a very big jump to say that the believability of the FSM is zero but the believability of God is non-zero.

I originally brought up the FSM in response to Pascal's wager. It was not meant to be related to the science education issues. I probably should have referred to the Invisible Pink Unicorn instead to avoid bring unrelated issues up.

Actually I think it's a pretty-much-undisguised way of trying to explain that claim.

SmokingTarpan

Again, you seem to boil it down to a numbers game. You offer as your proof of God (note that I already acknowledge a god not needing followers to exist): "Because X million people believe in God, God must definitely exist." I offer evidence to the contrary: Well before the Judeo-Xian religion arrived, Zeus, the Great Bear Spirit and numerous other gods/things were the divine being worshiped by the majority of the world's population. If tomorrow, 95% of the world fervently believed in the Purple Elephant Monkey as the supreme being, would their faith be the truth? As your argument stands now, it would have to be. Would you abandon your God if this came to pass? Concerning things such as religion that can't be tested by science, I don't understand how you cannot see how ill-conceived the Numbers of Faithful argument is as proof. That's why I ask for something other than numbers of "blind" faithful as proof.

I would say that the majority of people across the world believe that a republic (which is what we have, though it's almost always mis-labeled as true democracy) is the best form of government. Despite those numbers, and despite the fact that I live in a republic that I believe is the best country in the world, I don't believe a republic is the best form of government. Times and people change, as do their beliefs. What was believed 4000 years ago is different than what was 2000 years ago, is different than what is believed now, is likely to be different than what is believed in 2000 more years.

People's lives also change because of alcohol, nearly dying from a heart attack or, as in my own case, an abrupt realization that they simply no longer like what they had been studying in college for the past 3 years. You might say that these events were God's hand shaping the world. I would say that the person simply took advantage of a chance to change their lives in pursuance of fate. Who's right? You, because a book was written (and changed, re-written multiple times) long ago and millions now share your outlook? Me, because of my fervent belief despite the odds against me? Or neither of us? I remind you that long ago, Christianity was in the minority, so bringing current numbers into it is a bad idea.

I don't believe in what you propose will happen to my soul once I shed my current body. However, I acknowledge that I could, in fact, be wrong in my spiritual beliefs. I'm human, not divine, therefore am capable of a big screw-up. I could die and show up at the gates of Heaven, shaking my spiritual head because I know I'll likely be descending into Hell shortly.

What I ask, aside from the usual proof of your God, is why you (and theists in general) can't also say, "Yes, I could be wrong, but I have faith that I'm not." Why would a loving, just God punish you for acknowledging that you could be faulty in your human assumptions, yet continuing to believe strongly in Him anyway? If God truly demanded absolute, blind faith, why have priests and toss down miracles every once in a little while? Wouldn't a true believer simply believe, not needing millions of others and a 2000 year old book before coming to their beliefs?

Theists generally can't state that they may be wrong with regard to their religion, which irks me for several reasons. Aside from the fact that I think it shows stronger faith to believe despite acceptance of possible fault, it also seems sacrilegious to claim you can't be wrong in something when your own religion states the only being that can't ever be wrong is God. Unless you are God, that is.

I don't want you or anyone to change your beliefs; it's a big thing for someone to have a change of faith. It usually involves a bad life shake-up, and I've actually fought to help others keep their beliefs despite them being different than mine. All I'd like is for members of other belief schools to show a bit more tolerance for views contrary to their own and stop using bad arguments, such as, "More of X belief than Y," and, "Because I said so," as solid proof.

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Requital

So, if you would be kind enough to prove to me it is a fairytale I would be happy to stop using it as a factual text.

I simply pointed you to an article that makes the proof of life without an intelligent designer very precarious. Let me quote a point. You can't have the cake and eat it too.

"Abiogenesis, the idea that the first life started with no intelligent designer, is contrary to real science. It contradicts:


•The Laws of Probability that calculate the chance of a thing happening,


•The Principle of Biogenesis (life only comes from life),


•The tendency of things to become disordered, described by the entropy of the Second Law of Thermodynamics,


•The observation of what happens in nature,


•The experimental evidence.


As new information about the complexity and information content of cells is discovered, the evidence against life having formed without a Creator mounts up and the case for an intelligent Creator becomes stronger. Something is being done about that! The very definition of science is being changed to get rid of the obvious conclusion that God created living things.


The term “science” once meant “knowledge discovered by experimentation, observation and objective investigation.” To be scientific, a thing had to be observable, testable, and repeatable. When one scientist did an experiment, others could repeat his experiment, and obtain the same results. If no one who repeated the experiment came up with the same results, those results had been “falsified” (shown not to be true). Science thrives on this definition. It helps us understand how things work, but it is a big problem for those who don’t believe in the Creator. They claim that a first cell came together spontaneously from mindless chemicals, but this is an opinion about ancient history. It is not observable, testable, or repeatable, so it is not science. Public schoolbooks should not teach it as science."

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Embiggener

Does that mean i can use peter pan as a factual text until someone proves with absolute certainty that it didnt happen?

Beatnik

I'm not mocking an apparition who I don't believe exists. I'm mocking the hubris of those that anthropomorphize all the unknown in the universe into an old man with a beard that made us just like him. After all, what's more plausible, the creator of everything we know that exists in the universe creating us in his image (nevermind the fact we share 99% of our DNA with chimps), or us creating "god" in our image?

No problem. Unfortunately, you've misattributed my bitterness, which in fact lies with the incredible amount of power, both political and, for the past 7 years, military, that wingnuts who talk to ghosts and use that as a basis for embarking on an unprovoked war against "evildoers", have acquired. Like I said, every man is entitled to his superstitions. When you go asserting your flawed perspective as fact though, let the fun begin!

Those were in response to your claims of the plausability of Christianity. Some claims may have been exaggerated for my (and a few others', hopefully) entertainment. Irregardless, I certainly didn't make up the garden of eden of noah's ark or the devil. Though I wish I did - I could've sold a lotta books!

Just to clarify, this isn't some personal attack at you (or Your Lord), dude. If anyone came into the sandbox saying silly stuff like that, I'd have responded pretty much the same.

EDIT: This video pretty much sums up how I feel about man's place in god's world. And yes, that's Kurt Cameron.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zwbhAXe5yk

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Requital

Not a very good source. It was written as fiction. You of course are welcome to believe that as being true, but it seems a bit silly to given it wasn't intended as such.

The Bible is composed of two parts. The Tora (Jewish Document describing the events pre-Christ) and the New Testament (eye witness accounts of the life of Christ and Letters between church members). Both of which have archaeological and contemporary wittings that give it credence.

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Embiggener

LOL!!

You know some people open bananas from the other end? I think monkeys do that actually. You know what that means. People who dont open bananas from the god given tab end are evil evolutionists/heretics.

also note the convenient biodegradable wrapper, unlike those wretched saran wrapped mango fruits.

Requital

The only reason "More of X belief than Y," and, "Because I said so," is used as substantial proof: We are dealing with something that is unscientific. Not measurable and not repeatable. So when a friend of mine say's "You won't believe what happened! This guy had a hole in his neck and was dying, but then this guy came up and told him to get up and that he was fine and I looked back and there was no wound!" It is not repeatable and not explainable through scientific methods, yet the man who was dying say, "I thought I was dead then this guy came along and...." People don't believe it. It didn't happen. They are lying and they edited the film to make it look real. So regardless of "proof". It still is false. How would I go about showing that it was true since people will disbelieve no matter what? God is not an ilogical concept, people don't disbelieve in God because they need proof, they just don't want to believe.

"There are only two possibilities as to how life arose: One is spontaneous
generation - a rising evolution. The other is a supernatural act of God.
There is no third possibility. Spontaneous generation was scientifically
disproved 120 years ago by Pasteur and others. This leaves us with only
one logical conclusion - that life arose as a supernatural act of God.
I will not accept that philosophically because I do not want to believe
in God. Therefore, I choose to believe in that which i know is scientifically
impossible."

~George Wald, Nobel Prize (Medical) 1967

Christianity never claims to be scientific. It claims to describe the unscientific. That which can not be measured. The worth of a man, the value of right and wrong. Christianity doesn't claim that Christians are right nor the authors of it, but they are simply witnesses to God's work. Some people label themselves as Christians and yet have no idea who God has described Himself as. I am not sure that they would be the best authorities on the God who gave himself as a sacrifice and called himself the way the truth and the life. Christ said no one can go to the Father except through Him. God said it, I am not the author of life, so I don't think I have the authority to contradict it.

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Kerostasis

You completely misinterpret my argument. Given that of the 6 Billion people on this planet, at least 2/3 disagree with any particular religious statement you can make, it would be somewhat silly to argue that a statement becomes true as soon as enough people believe it, because at least that many people will also disbelieve it and so the opposite would then also have to be true.

Thus I do not offer X million believers as proof of my God. Rather, I offer 0 believers as disproof of the FSM. Not because this is the strongest proof available, as proper proofs would have to go into the bizarre theology of proposed FSMism, but because it is by far the fastest proof -- If, among all the people who have looked at FSMism, not a single one has ever found it worth believing, including those defending it in this very thread, then its probably not worth believing. A more rigourous proof could be made, but why bother when such an easy shortcut exists?

The same cannot be said of Christianity because, while many have looked upon it and rejected it, many others have accepted it with joy. That alone does not prove that Christianity is correct, but it does at least prevent it from being quickly disqualified without a second glance.

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Requital

I think if you look at most of the animals on the planet we share a significant amount of DNA. We share somewhere around 98% of DNA with wolves as well. I am not sure how that makes any kind of point? We are created beings.

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