thebackalleys

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ccbVCxWNn8

all i can say is

laughing
my
fucking
ass
off

seriously?

It was a technical legal question!

i don't see what's so funny about it

richard dawkins is a very intelligent guy. it's not going to happen but i hope it gets more attention and further destroys the reputation of the catholic church

I beg you, look for the words "social justice" or "economic justice" on your church Web site. If you find it, run as fast as you can. Social justice and economic justice, they are code words. Now, am I advising people to leave their church? Yes! If I'm going to Jeremiah's Wright's church? Yes! Leave your church. Social justice and economic justice. They are code words. If you have a priest that is pushing social justice, go find another parish. Go alert your bishop and tell them, "Excuse me are you down with this whole social justice thing?" I don't care what the church is. If it's my church, I'm alerting the church authorities: "Excuse me, what's this social justice thing?" And if they say, "Yeah, we're all in that social justice thing," I'm in the wrong place.

Quote from: rtili don't see what's so funny about it

richard dawkins is a very intelligent guy. it's not going to happen but i hope it gets more attention and further destroys the reputation of the catholic church

i was laughing because dawkins is making a fool out of himself for even attempting that. As you said, it's not going to happen, and if he wanted to destroy the reputation of the catholic church a little more, then he could probably have come up with a plan that wouldn't make him look stupid as well.

Richard Dawkins is dumb once I saw a video where he was STUMPED by a christian question what a DUMB ASS!

Quote from: dvvebbbsiuoI beg you, look for the words "social justice" or "economic justice" on your church Web site. If you find it, run as fast as you can. Social justice and economic justice, they are code words. Now, am I advising people to leave their church? Yes! If I'm going to Jeremiah's Wright's church? Yes! Leave your church. Social justice and economic justice. They are code words. If you have a priest that is pushing social justice, go find another parish. Go alert your bishop and tell them, "Excuse me are you down with this whole social justice thing?" I don't care what the church is. If it's my church, I'm alerting the church authorities: "Excuse me, what's this social justice thing?" And if they say, "Yeah, we're all in that social justice thing," I'm in the wrong place.

glenn beck

Quote from: railgun

Quote from: rtili don't see what's so funny about it

richard dawkins is a very intelligent guy. it's not going to happen but i hope it gets more attention and further destroys the reputation of the catholic church

i was laughing because dawkins is making a fool out of himself for even attempting that. As you said, it's not going to happen, and if he wanted to destroy the reputation of the catholic church a little more, then he could probably have come up with a plan that wouldn't make him look stupid as well.

not really.. people have been arrested outside of their home country for humanitarian crimes before. just because he's the pope doesn't mean he has special privileges to harbor child rapers and molesters.

if anything it will damage the reputation of the vatican.

now now,Im catholic, but I dont fully trust the catholic church as a religious institution for many reasons.

While i dont aprove the corruption of many individuals on that church, i think this is a problem that the catholic community should solve itself. I think a lot of atheists, while do have valid points of view, simply "have fun" attacking the church. Ive met my share.

This tought came to me because this dawkins person directs his statements agaisnt the pope,claiming hes covering up the actions of the rest of the members like if the church had some sort of south park-ish plot to abuse children and the pope was the mastermind behind it.

Its fun to think this only happens in the catholic community but many religious comunities in the world have problems like this.

I think instead of blaming the pope himself they should investigate the rest of the padres as they would do with a common criminal case. Dont know if they have some sort of immunity tough, i think they do in some countries, but I dont aprove that either.

i hope I didnt look like im defending perverts and murderers

Quote from: emannow now,Im catholic, but I dont fully trust the catholic church as a religious institution for many reasons.

While i dont aprove the corruption of many individuals on that church, i think this is a problem that the catholic community should solve itself. I think a lot of atheists, while do have valid points of view, simply "have fun" attacking the church. Ive met my share.

This tought came to me because this dawkins person directs his statements agaisnt the pope,claiming hes covering up the actions of the rest of the members like if the church had some sort of south park-ish plot to abuse children and the pope was the mastermind behind it.

Its fun to think this only happens in the catholic community but many religious comunities in the world have problems like this.

I think instead of blaming the pope himself they should investigate the rest of the padres as they would do with a common criminal case. Dont know if they have some sort of immunity tough, i think they do in some countries, but I dont aprove that either.

i hope I didnt look like im defending perverts and murderers

but dawkins clearly says that the pope was not the one who committed the criminal acts. what the pope is doing, though, is harboring them and then calling himself infallible when he is called to trial. no one on this earth is infallible, we're all people and we all make mistakes.

athiests have fun attacking christians because it's so easy. it's hard to claim you're a christian and then have anyone take you seriously on matters of ethics, social standards, morals, law, medicine and science.

i mean the catholic church couldn't even admit galileo was right until 1992, over 3 centuries after his death.

I think that MOST of the world is past the point where religion is needed. It was used to control the masses and make order out of the chaos of anarchy. America, Britain, and many other countries were founded on Christian beliefs. Other countries around the world use their religion to base their government on. Things around here seem pretty stable without the church running everything.

Quote from: emanI think a lot of atheists, while do have valid points of view, simply "have fun" attacking the church. Ive met my share.

attacking the catholic church is a fun, healthy way of creating a better future for mankind, much like recycling or choosing to ride your bike to work

Quote from: dvvebbbsiuoI beg you, look for the words "social justice" or "economic justice" on your church Web site. If you find it, run as fast as you can. Social justice and economic justice, they are code words. Now, am I advising people to leave their church? Yes! If I'm going to Jeremiah's Wright's church? Yes! Leave your church. Social justice and economic justice. They are code words. If you have a priest that is pushing social justice, go find another parish. Go alert your bishop and tell them, "Excuse me are you down with this whole social justice thing?" I don't care what the church is. If it's my church, I'm alerting the church authorities: "Excuse me, what's this social justice thing?" And if they say, "Yeah, we're all in that social justice thing," I'm in the wrong place.

God, who created all things, is a holy God of justice and truth. In His holiness He is absolutely and infinitely separate and pure from sin, lawlessness, and unrighteousness. As a God of justice, He has established His law and demands justice to be served. God loves righteousness, but He abhors sin and lawlessness. The word of God tells us that God is angry with the wicked every day and that He hates all evildoers (Psalm 7:11-12, 5:5-6). God is offended at every sin and is of purer eyes than to look upon evil.

Mankind has fallen into sin and broken the law of God (Romans 3:23). God's word says mankind is abominable and filthy, and drinks iniquity (sin) like water (Job 15:16). We've broken every commandment and never done anything except sin against God. Even our righteous deeds have been wicked in God's eyes, and our prayers have been an abomination to Him (Isaiah 64:6; Proverbs 28:9). We don't need to be taught how to sin-we do it naturally; we lie, steal, fight, etc. But we must be taught to tell the truth, not to steal, or fight. God's word declares that by nature we are children of wrath and that the wrath of God is upon us (Ephesians 2:3; John 3:36).

The justice of God demands sin to be punished. The consequence for sin is death (Romans 6:23; Ezekiel 18:4). The death we know of where the heart stops beating and the body rots in the grave is merely the physical result of death. Death is everlasting destruction in the lake of fire (2 Thessalonians 1:9; Revelation 21:8, 14). This place, known as Hell, is where the righteous justice of God is satisfied in the punishment of those who have sinned against God. It is everlasting because the price of sin is so great that we can never pay it; a sin against an eternal God results in an eternal consequence. All who are found guilty of just one sin will be cast into the lake of fire. All it takes is one sin (James 2:10), and yet we are guilty of an endless amount of sin each and every day. The measure of our sins is filling up and the wrath of Almighty God is awaiting us (1 Thessalonians 2:18).

There is hope, but it is only in the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the eternal Son of God. God entered history in Jesus Christ and was born as a man through a virgin. He lived a perfect and sinless life and honored the law of God all the days of His life. And then He was taken by lawless hands and cursed, beaten, and nailed to a cross. While Jesus Christ hung on that cross, broken, bleeding, and dying, all the sins of His people were placed on Him and He bore their sins in His own body (1 Peter 2:24). God made Him who committed no sin to be sin for His people (2 Corinthians 5:21), and then the wrath of God, the holy hatred and justice of God, fell upon Him and consumed Him in fury, thereby punishing all the sins of His people in Him. In order to save a people like us it took the death of God's own Son, where the Son of God was slaughtered by the wrath of His own Father (Isaiah 53:10; Matthew 27:46). The death of Christ vindicated His Father because it revealed that God is righteous to punish sin.

Jesus Christ rose from the dead 3 days later, conquering death, sin, and Hell (1 Corinthians 15:3-4). His resurrection vindicated His own holiness, proving that He indeed was sinless and righteous and that His sacrifice was accepted. He ascended to Heaven and sat down at the right hand of His Father and has been given authority over all heaven and earth. God has appointed this Jesus, the Righteous One, as the King of glory and the Judge who will judge the living and the dead (Acts 10:42). God has appointed a day on which He will judge the world for its sins and bring an end to unrighteousness (Acts 17:31).

What Must You Do?
God commands all men everywhere to repent from their sins, turn to God, and believe in the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ (Mark 1:15; Acts 17:30; Luke 13:3). Come to Christ, flee from the wrath to come! To repent is to turn away from everything in your life that goes against the nature and will of God, including your works, words, and thoughts. Stop fighting against God! Fall down before Him and stop trying to justify yourself and declare your own righteousness. Admit your wickedness before a holy God, your helplessness and inability to do anything to please Him, and trust in nothing except what Christ has done on your behalf. If you come to Christ, repenting of your sins and believing in Him, you will be saved. All your sins will be washed away. God will remove your sins from you as far as the east is from the west. And not only will He take away all your sins, but He will give you His own righteousness through the work and merit of Jesus Christ His Son. Come to Christ, all you who are weary and heavy laden, and He will give you rest for your souls (Matthew 11:28-29).

Assurance of Salvation
If after reading this you are alarmed or concerned for your eternal destination, and you feel as though you have repented and believed, and received salvation in Christ, know that the assurance of salvation is not a one time event. That you repented and believed is not assurance in and of itself that you are saved. God's word declares that if God has begun a good work in you, He will finish it (Philippians 1:6). Therefore the evidence that God has saved you is that you continue repenting-striving to practice righteousness and putting to death sin in your life, and believing-trusting only in the work of Christ to save you (Philippians 2:12-13). If this is no longer a reality in your life after some point, the word of God says that you never were truly saved to begin with, but you only fooled yourself (Matthew 7:17-18, 19-20). He who began a good work in you will finish it. And if it isn't being finished, nothing ever started. Take heed, and look to Christ always. May God have mercy on your soul.

i think that the pope should be arrested for more than allowing children to be raped

i like richard dawkins

what i like is the fact that he\\\'s pretty straightforward. for that reason everyone claims he\\\'s arrogant and insulting, but the fact is that most arguments are actually what most people would consider "insulting" or "offensive" at a base level, but people use fanciful language to sort of cover it up. we\\\'re all really afraid to say that people\\\'s beliefs are wrong and i don\\\'t know why that is

Quote from: OrangebeefGod, who created all things, is a holy God of justice and truth. In His holiness He is absolutely and infinitely separate and pure from sin, lawlessness, and unrighteousness. As a God of justice, He has established His law and demands justice to be served. God loves righteousness, but He abhors sin and lawlessness. The word of God tells us that God is angry with the wicked every day and that He hates all evildoers (Psalm 7:11-12, 5:5-6). God is offended at every sin and is of purer eyes than to look upon evil.

if god exists then this is not true

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2FARDDcdFaQ

i think if the pope had punished those child molesting priests and said he did so because good christians dont so such things, he would have saved alot more face than by this way, which is in fact making the catholic church make look even more bad (because hes saying its ok for catholic priests to molest children) so its kinda ironic

also ive watched quite a few videos of dawkins like the one taylor posted and it seems that hes playing a pretty easy game because most religious people he takes on know nothing about evolution and the ones that do are christian, and the earth isnt 6000 years old. what im saying is id like him to take on an intelligent buddhist or muslim biologist that doesnt use third-grade biology therms or is extremely dumb and extremist

proving that certain dumb christians are wrong doesnt mean youve proven that religion is false/untrue/wrong

i hope i dont cause a big drama thing

Quote from: chickeni think if the pope had punished those child molesting priests and said he did so because good christians dont so such things, he would have saved alot more face than by this way, which is in fact making the catholic church make look even more bad (because hes saying its ok for catholic priests to molest children) so its kinda ironic

also ive watched quite a few videos of dawkins like the one taylor posted and it seems that hes playing a pretty easy game because most religious people he takes on know nothing about evolution and the ones that do are christian, and the earth isnt 6000 years old. what im saying is id like him to take on an intelligent buddhist or muslim biologist that doesnt use third-grade biology therms or is extremely dumb and extremist

proving that certain dumb christians are wrong doesnt mean youve proven that religion is false/untrue/wrong

i hope i dont cause a big drama thing

well as long as nobody acts like an idiot douchebag/gets offended then i dont think you'll cause any drama

i just want to point out that dawkins is a pretty intelligent guy and in all of the cases that you mentioned where he is arguing with stupid christians, it's because he was called to that show for questioning not because he petitioned to get on there.

and even if he DID (since i dont really know for certain) it's not like he knew beforehand how stupid these people are

and he has a lot of points for why believing in any religion other than atheism (which IS a religion it's just not a theistic religion) is bad and most of the maren't covered in the videos posted. if you'd like to know them i can message you or you can look it up but i don't feel like typing them out here becaue i know that nobody wants to read them

text etx text text text CAPS text text

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Man

Quote from: chickeni think if the pope had punished those child molesting priests and said he did so because good christians dont so such things, he would have saved alot more face than by this way, which is in fact making the catholic church make look even more bad (because hes saying its ok for catholic priests to molest children) so its kinda ironic

also ive watched quite a few videos of dawkins like the one taylor posted and it seems that hes playing a pretty easy game because most religious people he takes on know nothing about evolution and the ones that do are christian, and the earth isnt 6000 years old. what im saying is id like him to take on an intelligent buddhist or muslim biologist that doesnt use third-grade biology therms or is extremely dumb and extremist

proving that certain dumb christians are wrong doesnt mean youve proven that religion is false/untrue/wrong

i hope i dont cause a big drama thing

well as long as nobody acts like an idiot douchebag/gets offended then i dont think you'll cause any drama

i just want to point out that dawkins is a pretty intelligent guy and in all of the cases that you mentioned where he is arguing with stupid christians, it's because he was called to that show for questioning not because he petitioned to get on there.

and even if he DID (since i dont really know for certain) it's not like he knew beforehand how stupid these people are

and he has a lot of points for why believing in any religion other than atheism (which IS a religion it's just not a theistic religion) is bad and most of the maren't covered in the videos posted. if you'd like to know them i can message you or you can look it up but i don't feel like typing them out here becaue i know that nobody wants to read them

i have read alot about him and what he has written and i have listened to some podcasts where they actually ask him very good questions (like the one on the inquirer) but again when he talks about religion, hes actually(in most cases, except when hes talking about the argument that when you cant prove that something doesnt exist, you might as well believe in zeus, thor, spaghetti monster etc. ) referring to christianity. he has said himself once that he only knows alot about the christian religion, not alot about the other religions. so i stay with what i have said before

Quote from: chicken

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Man

Quote from: chickeni think if the pope had punished those child molesting priests and said he did so because good christians dont so such things, he would have saved alot more face than by this way, which is in fact making the catholic church make look even more bad (because hes saying its ok for catholic priests to molest children) so its kinda ironic

also ive watched quite a few videos of dawkins like the one taylor posted and it seems that hes playing a pretty easy game because most religious people he takes on know nothing about evolution and the ones that do are christian, and the earth isnt 6000 years old. what im saying is id like him to take on an intelligent buddhist or muslim biologist that doesnt use third-grade biology therms or is extremely dumb and extremist

proving that certain dumb christians are wrong doesnt mean youve proven that religion is false/untrue/wrong

i hope i dont cause a big drama thing

well as long as nobody acts like an idiot douchebag/gets offended then i dont think you'll cause any drama

i just want to point out that dawkins is a pretty intelligent guy and in all of the cases that you mentioned where he is arguing with stupid christians, it's because he was called to that show for questioning not because he petitioned to get on there.

and even if he DID (since i dont really know for certain) it's not like he knew beforehand how stupid these people are

and he has a lot of points for why believing in any religion other than atheism (which IS a religion it's just not a theistic religion) is bad and most of the maren't covered in the videos posted. if you'd like to know them i can message you or you can look it up but i don't feel like typing them out here becaue i know that nobody wants to read them

i have read alot about him and what he has written and i have listened to some podcasts where they actually ask him very good questions (like the one on the inquirer) but again when he talks about religion, hes actually(in most cases, except when hes talking about the argument that when you cant prove that something doesnt exist, you might as well believe in zeus, thor, spaghetti monster etc. ) referring to christianity. he has said himself once that he only knows alot about the christian religion, not alot about the other religions. so i stay with what i have said before

i guess my response in favor of dawkins in this case would be that it doesn't really matter that much if you know the fione details of those other religions. as long as you have a good idea of the belief system that's all you need

one of his major points is that it's both irrational to believe in something which has next to no proof to support its existence, but it's also immoral to shape your life around beliefs that could actually be damaging to society and hurt other people. an obvious example are islam extremists and the crusades, who kill others for not following their religion. at first glance this might seem easy to attack because you could say "wouldnt the belief that another religion is immoral lead to the things like the crusades?" but no. this is only true if incredibly stupid/ill-informed people are followers of atheism. most people would know that killing another person is immoral because it is hurting someone else, which is why we claimed that other religions were wrong in the first place. to kill someone like that would be to not follow the laws of morality

Quote from: Old-Mantext etx text text text CAPS text text

one of dawkin's ideas for not enough proof is this (i'm sure you've heard this)

you probably believed in santa claus and the tooth fairy when you were little. they seemed pretty real to you then, especially since your parents told you that they exist. now, you eventually gave up that belief because either you rparents told you they weren't true, all of your friends told you that they weren't true, or you just figured it out because it's really fuckin obvious that their stories told make any fucking sense. apply the same thing to god and religion. most people are raised a certain religion, but their parents never tell them that the religion isn't true and their friends don't usually stop believing either. that average person probably won't ever stop believing in god

in this argument i'm sort of making the case that humans are really stupid and are primarily effected by the ideas of their peers and their authority. obviously it isn't true with everyone but it seems like everyone is effected by their peers to an extent. the point is that the people who ARE effected by this external stimuli are holding these beliefs which have no more proof than santa claus and the tooth fairy, primarily because their parents and friends hold that belief

a lot of people hold their beliefs because they were taught to believe that "everything that their parents taught them is true". may stepbrother was apparently taught that and he told me that's why i believes in god. then i killed him

i actually think that there's MORE proof for santa claus and the tooth fairy than there is for god, because i mean santa always comes on the exact sdame day and leaves you presents, and the tooth fairy always takes that tooth and replaces it with money when you were a kid. that's way more dependable than god ever was

there is a god in every one of us.....

Quote from: Old-Manthere is a god in every one of us.....

echo echo

Quote from: Old-Manecho echo

i read that as "echo" meaning the first person form of the spanish verb "echar"

lmao i'm getting to the point where when i read things i read them in spanis hthis is great

people who take imaginary things too seriously tend to get eaten by bears

what if it's the grizzly man

id suggest getting some salmon from the salmon fairy

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manone of dawkin's ideas for not enough proof is this (i'm sure you've heard this)

you probably believed in santa claus and the tooth fairy when you were little. they seemed pretty real to you then, especially since your parents told you that they exist. now, you eventually gave up that belief because either you rparents told you they weren't true, all of your friends told you that they weren't true, or you just figured it out because it's really fuckin obvious that their stories told make any fucking sense. apply the same thing to god and religion. most people are raised a certain religion, but their parents never tell them that the religion isn't true and their friends don't usually stop believing either. that average person probably won't ever stop believing in god

in this argument i'm sort of making the case that humans are really stupid and are primarily effected by the ideas of their peers and their authority. obviously it isn't true with everyone but it seems like everyone is effected by their peers to an extent. the point is that the people who ARE effected by this external stimuli are holding these beliefs which have no more proof than santa claus and the tooth fairy, primarily because their parents and friends hold that belief

a lot of people hold their beliefs because they were taught to believe that "everything that their parents taught them is true". may stepbrother was apparently taught that and he told me that's why i believes in god. then i killed him

i actually think that there's MORE proof for santa claus and the tooth fairy than there is for god, because i mean santa always comes on the exact sdame day and leaves you presents, and the tooth fairy always takes that tooth and replaces it with money when you were a kid. that's way more dependable than god ever was

if that was the case, then how did religion even come up. Now i know it's because of stuff like astrological events and things like nature catastrophes, but mainly it's the questions "why are we here" or "how did we get to this point".

Now I am in no way religious and i think most of you guys know that, i prefer logic over belief, but this still bugs me. Ever since the 16th century i think, which is where people stopped believing and leaned more towards science (could've been the 17th or 18th century tho, not sure), there has been no progress made as to why we are here. the big bang theory explains it all very well i have to admit, but it just starts right as the big bang starts. I don't think it explained what exactly caused the big bang or how those particles could have collided in first place. This is the only thing that could make me believe in god, but then again, all i'm waiting for is an explanation for that. As soon as that is given, there is no reason for anyone to believe in god anymore imo.

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manlmao i'm getting to the point where when i read things i read them in spanis hthis is great

shut up

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manone of dawkin\\\'s ideas for not enough proof is this (i\\\'m sure you\\\'ve heard this)

you probably believed in santa claus and the tooth fairy when you were little. they seemed pretty real to you then, especially since your parents told you that they exist. now, you eventually gave up that belief because either you rparents told you they weren\\\'t true, all of your friends told you that they weren\\\'t true, or you just figured it out because it\\\'s really fuckin obvious that their stories told make any fucking sense. apply the same thing to god and religion. most people are raised a certain religion, but their parents never tell them that the religion isn\\\'t true and their friends don\\\'t usually stop believing either. that average person probably won\\\'t ever stop believing in god

in this argument i\\\'m sort of making the case that humans are really stupid and are primarily effected by the ideas of their peers and their authority. obviously it isn\\\'t true with everyone but it seems like everyone is effected by their peers to an extent. the point is that the people who ARE effected by this external stimuli are holding these beliefs which have no more proof than santa claus and the tooth fairy, primarily because their parents and friends hold that belief

a lot of people hold their beliefs because they were taught to believe that "everything that their parents taught them is true". may stepbrother was apparently taught that and he told me that\\\'s why i believes in god. then i killed him

i actually think that there\\\'s MORE proof for santa claus and the tooth fairy than there is for god, because i mean santa always comes on the exact sdame day and leaves you presents, and the tooth fairy always takes that tooth and replaces it with money when you were a kid. that\\\'s way more dependable than god ever was

it is true that believing something just because other people told you so is not logical and ignorant

Quote from: railgunthe big bang theory explains it all very well i have to admit, but it just starts right as the big bang starts. I don\\\'t think it explained what exactly caused the big bang or how those particles could have collided in first place. This is the only thing that could make me believe in god, but then again, all i\\\'m waiting for is an explanation for that. As soon as that is given, there is no reason for anyone to believe in god anymore imo.

yep were all waiting for that big moment

Quote from: railgun

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manone of dawkin\\\'s ideas for not enough proof is this (i\\\'m sure you\\\'ve heard this)

you probably believed in santa claus and the tooth fairy when you were little. they seemed pretty real to you then, especially since your parents told you that they exist. now, you eventually gave up that belief because either you rparents told you they weren\\\'t true, all of your friends told you that they weren\\\'t true, or you just figured it out because it\\\'s really fuckin obvious that their stories told make any fucking sense. apply the same thing to god and religion. most people are raised a certain religion, but their parents never tell them that the religion isn\\\'t true and their friends don\\\'t usually stop believing either. that average person probably won\\\'t ever stop believing in god

in this argument i\\\'m sort of making the case that humans are really stupid and are primarily effected by the ideas of their peers and their authority. obviously it isn\\\'t true with everyone but it seems like everyone is effected by their peers to an extent. the point is that the people who ARE effected by this external stimuli are holding these beliefs which have no more proof than santa claus and the tooth fairy, primarily because their parents and friends hold that belief

a lot of people hold their beliefs because they were taught to believe that "everything that their parents taught them is true". may stepbrother was apparently taught that and he told me that\\\'s why i believes in god. then i killed him

i actually think that there\\\'s MORE proof for santa claus and the tooth fairy than there is for god, because i mean santa always comes on the exact sdame day and leaves you presents, and the tooth fairy always takes that tooth and replaces it with money when you were a kid. that\\\'s way more dependable than god ever was

if that was the case, then how did religion even come up. Now i know it\\\'s because of stuff like astrological events and things like nature catastrophes, but mainly it\\\'s the questions "why are we here" or "how did we get to this point".

Now I am in no way religious and i think most of you guys know that, i prefer logic over belief, but this still bugs me. Ever since the 16th century i think, which is where people stopped believing and leaned more towards science (could\\\'ve been the 17th or 18th century tho, not sure), there has been no progress made as to why we are here. the big bang theory explains it all very well i have to admit, but it just starts right as the big bang starts. I don\\\'t think it explained what exactly caused the big bang or how those particles could have collided in first place. This is the only thing that could make me believe in god, but then again, all i\\\'m waiting for is an explanation for that. As soon as that is given, there is no reason for anyone to believe in god anymore imo.

actually, most scientists were theists until evolution came around - and rightfully so, there were no plausible explanations for our existence besides an all-powerful being.

religion was a way for man to explain the question of existence and the purpose of existence. and it is still used in that way. most religions have similar stories for creation, man, and gods in their basic concepts.

and just because we don\\\'t know the answer, doesn\\\'t mean "god did it", i know you know this but i just want to point it out for the sake of the argument. because for every question science answers, it creates new questions again. and that is the real beauty of science, it is always growing and expanding on its knowledge. whereas religion stagnates and sticks to its stone age barbaric sky worshipping roots. and that\\\'s why it harbors stupidity and ignorance.

Quote from: chicken

Quote from: railgunthe big bang theory explains it all very well i have to admit, but it just starts right as the big bang starts. I don\\\'t think it explained what exactly caused the big bang or how those particles could have collided in first place. This is the only thing that could make me believe in god, but then again, all i\\\'m waiting for is an explanation for that. As soon as that is given, there is no reason for anyone to believe in god anymore imo.

yep were all waiting for that big moment

there really is no big revalation we are waiting for here - the "big bang" is not the beginning of the universe as we know it. as far as science is concerned, matter is eternal, and it can expand and contract. what we don\\\'t know is whether the universe is expanding or contracting, and what cycles it goes through. we also don\\\'t know the shape of the universe or if there are more than one of them.

the real smoking gun scientists are looking for is the "missing link". a full fossil record of the evolution of man. but even then, you know religion will drag its knuckles along with the rest of the world forever.

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: railgun

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manone of dawkin's ideas for not enough proof is this (i'm sure you've heard this)

you probably believed in santa claus and the tooth fairy when you were little. they seemed pretty real to you then, especially since your parents told you that they exist. now, you eventually gave up that belief because either you rparents told you they weren't true, all of your friends told you that they weren't true, or you just figured it out because it's really fuckin obvious that their stories told make any fucking sense. apply the same thing to god and religion. most people are raised a certain religion, but their parents never tell them that the religion isn't true and their friends don't usually stop believing either. that average person probably won't ever stop believing in god

in this argument i'm sort of making the case that humans are really stupid and are primarily effected by the ideas of their peers and their authority. obviously it isn't true with everyone but it seems like everyone is effected by their peers to an extent. the point is that the people who ARE effected by this external stimuli are holding these beliefs which have no more proof than santa claus and the tooth fairy, primarily because their parents and friends hold that belief

a lot of people hold their beliefs because they were taught to believe that "everything that their parents taught them is true". may stepbrother was apparently taught that and he told me that's why i believes in god. then i killed him

i actually think that there's MORE proof for santa claus and the tooth fairy than there is for god, because i mean santa always comes on the exact sdame day and leaves you presents, and the tooth fairy always takes that tooth and replaces it with money when you were a kid. that's way more dependable than god ever was

if that was the case, then how did religion even come up. Now i know it's because of stuff like astrological events and things like nature catastrophes, but mainly it's the questions "why are we here" or "how did we get to this point".

Now I am in no way religious and i think most of you guys know that, i prefer logic over belief, but this still bugs me. Ever since the 16th century i think, which is where people stopped believing and leaned more towards science (could've been the 17th or 18th century tho, not sure), there has been no progress made as to why we are here. the big bang theory explains it all very well i have to admit, but it just starts right as the big bang starts. I don't think it explained what exactly caused the big bang or how those particles could have collided in first place. This is the only thing that could make me believe in god, but then again, all i'm waiting for is an explanation for that. As soon as that is given, there is no reason for anyone to believe in god anymore imo.

actually, most scientists were theists until evolution came around - and rightfully so, there were no plausible explanations for our existence besides an all-powerful being.

religion was a way for man to explain the question of existence and the purpose of existence. and it is still used in that way. most religions have similar stories for creation, man, and gods in their basic concepts.

and just because we don't know the answer, doesn't mean "god did it", i know you know this but i just want to point it out for the sake of the argument. because for every question science answers, it creates new questions again. and that is the real beauty of science, it is always growing and expanding on its knowledge. whereas religion stagnates and sticks to its stone age barbaric sky worshipping roots. and that's why it harbors stupidity and ignorance.

what about a religion that encourages their believers to research things and learn about nature and science? one that turned an entire nation of previously ignorant and minimalistic people to highly educated people that preserved and build upon the the knowledge that was gained by the ancient greek, which ultimately lead to the renaissance in europe?

Quote from: chicken

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: railgun

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manone of dawkin's ideas for not enough proof is this (i'm sure you've heard this)

you probably believed in santa claus and the tooth fairy when you were little. they seemed pretty real to you then, especially since your parents told you that they exist. now, you eventually gave up that belief because either you rparents told you they weren't true, all of your friends told you that they weren't true, or you just figured it out because it's really fuckin obvious that their stories told make any fucking sense. apply the same thing to god and religion. most people are raised a certain religion, but their parents never tell them that the religion isn't true and their friends don't usually stop believing either. that average person probably won't ever stop believing in god

in this argument i'm sort of making the case that humans are really stupid and are primarily effected by the ideas of their peers and their authority. obviously it isn't true with everyone but it seems like everyone is effected by their peers to an extent. the point is that the people who ARE effected by this external stimuli are holding these beliefs which have no more proof than santa claus and the tooth fairy, primarily because their parents and friends hold that belief

a lot of people hold their beliefs because they were taught to believe that "everything that their parents taught them is true". may stepbrother was apparently taught that and he told me that's why i believes in god. then i killed him

i actually think that there's MORE proof for santa claus and the tooth fairy than there is for god, because i mean santa always comes on the exact sdame day and leaves you presents, and the tooth fairy always takes that tooth and replaces it with money when you were a kid. that's way more dependable than god ever was

if that was the case, then how did religion even come up. Now i know it's because of stuff like astrological events and things like nature catastrophes, but mainly it's the questions "why are we here" or "how did we get to this point".

Now I am in no way religious and i think most of you guys know that, i prefer logic over belief, but this still bugs me. Ever since the 16th century i think, which is where people stopped believing and leaned more towards science (could've been the 17th or 18th century tho, not sure), there has been no progress made as to why we are here. the big bang theory explains it all very well i have to admit, but it just starts right as the big bang starts. I don't think it explained what exactly caused the big bang or how those particles could have collided in first place. This is the only thing that could make me believe in god, but then again, all i'm waiting for is an explanation for that. As soon as that is given, there is no reason for anyone to believe in god anymore imo.

actually, most scientists were theists until evolution came around - and rightfully so, there were no plausible explanations for our existence besides an all-powerful being.

religion was a way for man to explain the question of existence and the purpose of existence. and it is still used in that way. most religions have similar stories for creation, man, and gods in their basic concepts.

and just because we don't know the answer, doesn't mean "god did it", i know you know this but i just want to point it out for the sake of the argument. because for every question science answers, it creates new questions again. and that is the real beauty of science, it is always growing and expanding on its knowledge. whereas religion stagnates and sticks to its stone age barbaric sky worshipping roots. and that's why it harbors stupidity and ignorance.

what about a religion that encourages their believers to research things and learn about nature and science? one that turned an entire nation of previously ignorant and minimalistic people to highly educated people that preserved and build upon the the knowledge that was gained by the ancient greek, which ultimately lead to the renaissance in europe?

if you're talking about islam all you have to do is look at what it's become and it doesn't take long to figure out that didn't last so long

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: chicken

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: railgun

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manone of dawkin's ideas for not enough proof is this (i'm sure you've heard this)

you probably believed in santa claus and the tooth fairy when you were little. they seemed pretty real to you then, especially since your parents told you that they exist. now, you eventually gave up that belief because either you rparents told you they weren't true, all of your friends told you that they weren't true, or you just figured it out because it's really fuckin obvious that their stories told make any fucking sense. apply the same thing to god and religion. most people are raised a certain religion, but their parents never tell them that the religion isn't true and their friends don't usually stop believing either. that average person probably won't ever stop believing in god

in this argument i'm sort of making the case that humans are really stupid and are primarily effected by the ideas of their peers and their authority. obviously it isn't true with everyone but it seems like everyone is effected by their peers to an extent. the point is that the people who ARE effected by this external stimuli are holding these beliefs which have no more proof than santa claus and the tooth fairy, primarily because their parents and friends hold that belief

a lot of people hold their beliefs because they were taught to believe that "everything that their parents taught them is true". may stepbrother was apparently taught that and he told me that's why i believes in god. then i killed him

i actually think that there's MORE proof for santa claus and the tooth fairy than there is for god, because i mean santa always comes on the exact sdame day and leaves you presents, and the tooth fairy always takes that tooth and replaces it with money when you were a kid. that's way more dependable than god ever was

if that was the case, then how did religion even come up. Now i know it's because of stuff like astrological events and things like nature catastrophes, but mainly it's the questions "why are we here" or "how did we get to this point".

Now I am in no way religious and i think most of you guys know that, i prefer logic over belief, but this still bugs me. Ever since the 16th century i think, which is where people stopped believing and leaned more towards science (could've been the 17th or 18th century tho, not sure), there has been no progress made as to why we are here. the big bang theory explains it all very well i have to admit, but it just starts right as the big bang starts. I don't think it explained what exactly caused the big bang or how those particles could have collided in first place. This is the only thing that could make me believe in god, but then again, all i'm waiting for is an explanation for that. As soon as that is given, there is no reason for anyone to believe in god anymore imo.

actually, most scientists were theists until evolution came around - and rightfully so, there were no plausible explanations for our existence besides an all-powerful being.

religion was a way for man to explain the question of existence and the purpose of existence. and it is still used in that way. most religions have similar stories for creation, man, and gods in their basic concepts.

and just because we don't know the answer, doesn't mean "god did it", i know you know this but i just want to point it out for the sake of the argument. because for every question science answers, it creates new questions again. and that is the real beauty of science, it is always growing and expanding on its knowledge. whereas religion stagnates and sticks to its stone age barbaric sky worshipping roots. and that's why it harbors stupidity and ignorance.

what about a religion that encourages their believers to research things and learn about nature and science? one that turned an entire nation of previously ignorant and minimalistic people to highly educated people that preserved and build upon the the knowledge that was gained by the ancient greek, which ultimately lead to the renaissance in europe?

if you're talking about islam all you have to do is look at what it's become and it doesn't take long to figure out that didn't last so long

at what its become? the religion is still the same, its the great majority of the people that have become that which youre probably referring to (not so intelligent anymore) but they dont represent the religion they represent a big society and there is a difference

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manatheism (which IS a religion it's just not a theistic religion)

ok

will you please explain yourself here. i'm holding back on why i do not agree with this, but i want to hear an explanation first.

i think he means that atheism is BELIEVING that there is no god, therefore being a religion, one that believes in no god

so getting back on topic i think the pope should go fuck himself

just because you have a silly hat doesn't mean you can get away with protecting child rapists and helping them rape again

no matter how you feel about god

in fact, if you truly believe in the catholic faith, you should want the pope out more than anyone, because he's making your faith look like horseshit

Quote from: rtiland just because we don't know the answer, doesn't mean "god did it", i know you know this but i just want to point it out for the sake of the argument. because for every question science answers, it creates new questions again. and that is the real beauty of science, it is always growing and expanding on its knowledge. whereas religion stagnates and sticks to its stone age barbaric sky worshipping roots. and that's why it harbors stupidity and ignorance.

and that is probably the most interesting thing about religion for me.

it's human nature to look for answers and question things, but religious people don't question the existence of god which to me is really weird.

[spoiler]just sayinthis thread is great, it makes want to look more into science and religion, i hope ill become a better and more informed person after my 'research'[/spoiler]<coolstorybro

Quote from: chickenat what its become? the religion is still the same, its the great majority of the people that have become that which youre probably referring to (not so intelligent anymore) but they dont represent the religion they represent a big society and there is a difference

the book might be the same, but the way people interpret it is different. this is the problem with religion in modern day society - you have these ancient books written to an ancient world, and you try to apply them to a global, 21st century world and look at what happens. i have not read the qu'ran, but i have read the bible, and if they are similar in any way, they are not acceptable handbooks for modern day societies and should be treated like fairy tales instead of god's word.

Quote from: railgunit's human nature to look for answers and question things, but religious people don't question the existence of god which to me is really weird.

because questioning the existence of their god shatters their view on everything. having the "faith of a child" is a cornerstone to solidifying your ignorance in religion.

The Bible to me seems more like a set of morals than anything else. It's chock full of metaphors and, well STORIES which idiots then took as stone cold fact instead of just interpreting the messages in the stories.

And then you get to the middle ages with the royals etc. using the book's messages (particularly the idea of Hell) to spread fear and control these poor, stupid, gullible people and other horrible, horrible things. It was a remnant from another time and must have seemed like genuine history to them.

I still think its really fucking sad that people in THE YEAR 2010 genuinely believe a bunch of stories on the same level of feasability as harry fuckin potter. But the majority of people naturally fear death, so it must be nice to think this big pink paradise awaits on the other side  

This thread is silly.

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: chickenat what its become? the religion is still the same, its the great majority of the people that have become that which youre probably referring to (not so intelligent anymore) but they dont represent the religion they represent a big society and there is a difference

the book might be the same, but the way people interpret it is different. this is the problem with religion in modern day society - you have these ancient books written to an ancient world, and you try to apply them to a global, 21st century world and look at what happens. i have not read the qu'ran, but i have read the bible, and if they are similar in any way, they are not acceptable handbooks for modern day societies and should be treated like fairy tales instead of god's word.

the way i see it, its the problem with modern day society with religion, and just because alot of people interpret something wrongly doesnt mean its suddenly not the truth anymore

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: railgunit's human nature to look for answers and question things, but religious people don't question the existence of god which to me is really weird.

because questioning the existence of their god shatters their view on everything. having the "faith of a child" is a cornerstone to solidifying your ignorance in religion.

again, this is probably only true for the christian religion. what if the religion actually challenges people to look at the universe and how it works, and after you see how harmonious, elegant and complex this whole thing is, its hard to believe that there isnt someone behind al of it.

its not like we should use 'god' as the answer to everything we dont know yet (why does an object fall ? because god pulls it to the ground) but learn about how he made it work (why does an object fall to the ground? because of gravity, a rule set by god)

now dont go and say oh now youre pulling the 'god created science-card', because thats not what im saying and that way youre just trying to demean it. what im saying is that man created science to help them understand more about god's creation, and when you talk about the beauty of the ever growing science, youre actually talking about how big the universe is and how there is still so much to learn for us

Accusing the pope certainly is a right thing to do but demanding to punish him will most likely not succeed and isn't really worth the effort for not even many of the priests and church servants who have committed these crimes seem to get charged because of lapse of time (which is even more ridiculous, though these people sit rot in their wheelchairs in retirement homes, are senile and shit their pants nowadays)

In the justice systems of some Islamic countries there is a certain law of vengence (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/12/13/AR2008121302147.html) which alows you to punish someone by doing of letting do exactly the same thing to this person that he or she has done to you. This, yet, is questionabe after so many years and in a situation as described above...
But in certain cases as for people who rape (and murder) children it woudl just be adequate in my opinion since people like that most likely are sent to psychatries for five years, being released afterwards to seek their next victim and to destroy the lifes of another entire family by doing so. If someone would have killed (and/or maybe raped) someone I loved I would desire nothing elso but to slowly and painfully torture him to death and in this case I mean it and I'm pretty sure most people here think the same way...

Anyway, in the case of the pope there have been reported cases of victims trying to tell him what has happened to them but he either ignored it or just didn't believe them. And why? The answer is simple. These people who were accused were men he probably know well, colleagues of him or even friends whom he trusted and who he would never connect with something as child abuse. And no matter how realistic a story sounds and how many evidences there are; if you don't want something to be true, you just suppress the truth, no matter how truthful and good you usually are.

I am not a big fan of the pope and I'm pretty sure he has fucked up a lot of shit in his life and the way he deals with the issue as the statements he gives are just ridiculous and an insolence for every single victim, also I think that accusing him for covering the abusers and for sugarcoating the truth definitely is something that should be done, regardless wheather he will get punished for it in the end or not.

Quote from: vegetaThe Bible to me seems more like a set of morals than anything else. It\\\'s chock full of metaphors and, well STORIES which idiots then took as stone cold fact instead of just interpreting the messages in the stories.

And then you get to the middle ages with the royals etc. using the book\\\'s messages (particularly the idea of Hell) to spread fear and control these poor, stupid, gullible people and other horrible, horrible things. It was a remnant from another time and must have seemed like genuine history to them.

I still think its really fucking sad that people in THE YEAR 2010 genuinely believe a bunch of stories on the same level of feasability as harry fuckin potter. But the majority of people naturally fear death, so it must be nice to think this big pink paradise awaits on the other side  

the problem with this notion is that the bible mnakes RELIGIOUS TRUTH CLAIMS. the bible says that the bible is true

the point is the people were idiots for believing it at all. most of these events obviously didn\\\'t happen and if you take them metaphorically it sort of destroys the purpose of even believing in the judeo-christian god, because there are other ways to get morals than believing in fables

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manlmao i\\\'m getting to the point where when i read things i read them in spanis hthis is great

shut up

i\\\'m sorry that i enjoy the fact that spanish is sinking into my subconscious

Quote from: Jeinu

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manatheism (which IS a religion it's just not a theistic religion)

ok

will you please explain yourself here. i'm holding back on why i do not agree with this, but i want to hear an explanation first.

there are two prevalent definitions of religion

definition 1 - a conceptual system that provides an interpretation of the world and the place of humans in it (this is basically just the definition of a worldview)

definition 2: diagnosis/cure - religion asserts we ALL have a basic, non-physical illness that deeply cripples us. religion then offers a cure


in both definition atheism fits the bill as a religion. in definition two, science answers all of our questions and cures our illnesses etc, and in definition 1 it fits because it tells us how the world is and how it works. a theistic religion would answer those questions with the assertion of a god or gods of some sort

please don't get the idea that i think i'm some sort of philosophical genius with all of the answers. i'm only in a fuckin high school philosophy class. i just think that this shit is fun to talk about

islam is clearly th best

Nice autoplay

Quote from: chickenthe way i see it, its the problem with modern day society with religion, and just because alot of people interpret something wrongly doesnt mean its suddenly not the truth anymore

they\\\'re not interpreting it wrongly, and that\\\'s my point. the simple truth of the matter is that these ancient religions do not evolve with mankind - they constantly stay the same, never changing, never swaying. sure, the good, charitable things about them are easy to point out. but there are many practices from islam, christianity, and any monotheistic religion that just don\\\'t make any sense in a modern, civilized society. they cripple people and societies. they hinder progress, human rights and science. religion can never be an ultimate tool for good, because it is designed to control people.

if religions were like photo albums, there would be so many pages that they\\\'d try to hide from the world with bad photos they wouldn\\\'t be proud of. and that\\\'s what they continue to do to this day. and now science is beginning to chip away at the relevance of religion in society, which just makes it worse. i notice that the more science is prevalent in the world, the more religions tend to stray away from it and go back into their caves, clinging to ancient beliefs and lives of total ignorance. what is so hard about accepting the fact that there is no god? just live life to your fullest and forget about what happens to you when you die. nobody knows, no one will ever know, until you\\\'re dead. so forget about it.

Quote

Quote

Quote

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: railgunit\\\'s human nature to look for answers and question things, but religious people don\\\'t question the existence of god which to me is really weird.

because questioning the existence of their god shatters their view on everything. having the "faith of a child" is a cornerstone to solidifying your ignorance in religion.

again, this is probably only true for the christian religion. what if the religion actually challenges people to look at the universe and how it works, and after you see how harmonious, elegant and complex this whole thing is, its hard to believe that there isnt someone behind al of it.

its not like we should use \\\'god\\\' as the answer to everything we dont know yet (why does an object fall ? because god pulls it to the ground) but learn about how he made it work (why does an object fall to the ground? because of gravity, a rule set by god)

now dont go and say oh now youre pulling the \\\'god created science-card\\\', because thats not what im saying and that way youre just trying to demean it. what im saying is that man created science to help them understand more about god\\\'s creation, and when you talk about the beauty of the ever growing science, youre actually talking about how big the universe is and how there is still so much to learn for us

when you put it that way, i would be surprised if god gave two shits about humans and probably put us here for his own amusement. and if he ever cared about us, that time has long past and he probably got bored and hasn\\\'t been here for centuries.

and saying \\\'god made these rules\\\' is so easy for religious people. i mean look at your religions. you can\\\'t see god, you can\\\'t talk to god, god is nowhere but everywhere at the same time. he cannot be observed in any way nor can you explain anything he does except that it was by his will. you don\\\'t have to prove anything, you can just say that he\\\'s behind it all and that\\\'s all you have to do. it\\\'s not good enough.

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Man

Quote from: Jeinu

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manatheism (which IS a religion it\\\'s just not a theistic religion)

ok

will you please explain yourself here. i\\\'m holding back on why i do not agree with this, but i want to hear an explanation first.

there are two prevalent definitions of religion

definition 1 - a conceptual system that provides an interpretation of the world and the place of humans in it (this is basically just the definition of a worldview)

definition 2: diagnosis/cure - religion asserts we ALL have a basic, non-physical illness that deeply cripples us. religion then offers a cure


in both definition atheism fits the bill as a religion. in definition two, science answers all of our questions and cures our illnesses etc, and in definition 1 it fits because it tells us how the world is and how it works. a theistic religion would answer those questions with the assertion of a god or gods of some sort

ok i\\\'m sorry but the "atheism is a religion" argument is probably the dumbest thing i hear from the dumbest people - mostly new earth creationists. it\\\'s just not true. atheism has no set guidelines for how to live, what our purpose is here, or a "cure" for anything otherworldly. there is nothing spiritual about atheism because it is completely devoid of it.

a religion disqualifies a supernatural force. the very drive behind atheism is a disbelief, not a belief. when something cannot be explained, an athiest acknowledges that. a religious person would be more apt to attribute it to a divine power or force, "acts of god".

if athiesm was truly a religion, theists would have no problem with athiesm being taught in schools, nor would they criticize it, and vice versa. what you\\\'re suggesting is irrational and illogical.

Quote from: BamyasiThis thread is silly.

(https://thebackalleys.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi46.tinypic.com%2F2usy9nq.png&hash=0c36250d1864a958f467c83a8721531b60dc2507)

Keep fightin' the good fight.

Quote from: dillybar

Quote from: BamyasiThis thread is silly.

Quote from: rtil

Quote

Quote

Quote

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: railgunit's human nature to look for answers and question things, but religious people don't question the existence of god which to me is really weird.

because questioning the existence of their god shatters their view on everything. having the "faith of a child" is a cornerstone to solidifying your ignorance in religion.

again, this is probably only true for the christian religion. what if the religion actually challenges people to look at the universe and how it works, and after you see how harmonious, elegant and complex this whole thing is, its hard to believe that there isnt someone behind al of it.

its not like we should use 'god' as the answer to everything we dont know yet (why does an object fall ? because god pulls it to the ground) but learn about how he made it work (why does an object fall to the ground? because of gravity, a rule set by god)

now dont go and say oh now youre pulling the 'god created science-card', because thats not what im saying and that way youre just trying to demean it. what im saying is that man created science to help them understand more about god's creation, and when you talk about the beauty of the ever growing science, youre actually talking about how big the universe is and how there is still so much to learn for us

when you put it that way, i would be surprised if god gave two shits about humans and probably put us here for his own amusement. and if he ever cared about us, that time has long past and he probably got bored and hasn't been here for centuries.

and saying 'god made these rules' is so easy for religious people. i mean look at your religions. you can't see god, you can't talk to god, god is nowhere but everywhere at the same time. he cannot be observed in any way nor can you explain anything he does except that it was by his will. you don't have to prove anything, you can just say that he's behind it all and that's all you have to do. it's not good enough.

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Man

Quote from: Jeinu

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manatheism (which IS a religion it's just not a theistic religion)

ok

will you please explain yourself here. i'm holding back on why i do not agree with this, but i want to hear an explanation first.

there are two prevalent definitions of religion

definition 1 - a conceptual system that provides an interpretation of the world and the place of humans in it (this is basically just the definition of a worldview)

definition 2: diagnosis/cure - religion asserts we ALL have a basic, non-physical illness that deeply cripples us. religion then offers a cure


in both definition atheism fits the bill as a religion. in definition two, science answers all of our questions and cures our illnesses etc, and in definition 1 it fits because it tells us how the world is and how it works. a theistic religion would answer those questions with the assertion of a god or gods of some sort

ok i'm sorry but the "atheism is a religion" argument is probably the dumbest thing i hear from the dumbest people - mostly new earth creationists. it's just not true. atheism has no set guidelines for how to live, what our purpose is here, or a "cure" for anything otherworldly. there is nothing spiritual about atheism because it is completely devoid of it.

a religion disqualifies a supernatural force. the very drive behind atheism is a disbelief, not a belief. when something cannot be explained, an athiest acknowledges that. a religious person would be more apt to attribute it to a divine power or force, "acts of god".

if athiesm was truly a religion, theists would have no problem with athiesm being taught in schools, nor would they criticize it, and vice versa. what you're suggesting is irrational and illogical.

well it's definitely a controversial issue, but i also think that it's an irrelevant issue. it doesn't really matter if you consider it a religion or not.

but really, one of those definitions asserts that we have a non physical illness that it needs to cure. that illness is the fact that we crave knowledge but don't have answers for the biggest questions (where did we come from, why do we exist, etc). that's what the actual illness is, and the cure is found in all religions. in theism, their god or whatever can explain it all, and that's why people believe in it. with atheism, science can answer those questions. there are more questions after that entail after each answer (where did god come from if he made us? what triggered the big bang?) which no one has a REAL answer for. it's only real guideline for living is to live your life, which is a way of living, and most atheists want to say that there is still morality without god, so you still need to live by those rules or else you're either going to go to prison or just have a bad life

but yeah, big time atheists disagree with each other on whether or not it's a religion. who cares though? why does it matter if it is or is not a religion? theists are going to disagree with it either way because it claims their religion(s) is/are wrong. that doesn't really have any effect on our schooling though, because theism is only taught in catholic schools or special schooling made for the religion itself. public schools don't teach any religion unless you take some sort of religious class or something and i dont think that's very common

whether or not atheism is a religion or not does not affect whether it is true or not

Quote from: Billyso getting back on topic i think the pope should go fuck himself

just because you have a silly hat doesn't mean you can get away with protecting child rapists and helping them rape again

no matter how you feel about god

in fact, if you truly believe in the catholic faith, you should want the pope out more than anyone, because he's making your faith look like horseshit

I can agree with all of this except for the last paragraph

my beliefs in god and the way I act independently of my religion are all of my own. I know most of you dont have religious affinities but let me put it like this since I do:

I am a very moderate christian and not like the idiots who believe everything they hear.I have never met a christian who does not admit (or "believe" fff) in evolution and Id like to think most of them know creationism is obviously bullshit. There is something in christian religion called "dogmas de fe" wich means things you are forced to believe in in order to belong to that religion and most of them are purely theological and cant realy be proved by science because the ones that can be proved by science are not "dogmas". cretatonism for example, is not a dogma. you can choose to believe or not to believe in it and still be a christian etc.

even tough I will always approve science vs religion as a source of explanation for things, i am still a believer on my own right.

And I think the catholic church, not the catholic/christian religion, is the source of the problem.

I dont care about the actions of the church because I dont feel it represents christianity. I try to think there is no institution between the love of god and ones self. If you can believe in such things...


















































Also this has turned into a debate thread god job every1!

Quote from: Wasimislam is clearly th best

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manwell it's definitely a controversial issue, but i also think that it's an irrelevant issue. it doesn't really matter if you consider it a religion or not.

but really, one of those definitions asserts that we have a non physical illness that it needs to cure. that illness is the fact that we crave knowledge but don't have answers for the biggest questions (where did we come from, why do we exist, etc). that's what the actual illness is, and the cure is found in all religions. in theism, their god or whatever can explain it all, and that's why people believe in it. with atheism, science can answer those questions. there are more questions after that entail after each answer (where did god come from if he made us? what triggered the big bang?) which no one has a REAL answer for. it's only real guideline for living is to live your life, which is a way of living, and most atheists want to say that there is still morality without god, so you still need to live by those rules or else you're either going to go to prison or just have a bad life

but yeah, big time atheists disagree with each other on whether or not it's a religion. who cares though? why does it matter if it is or is not a religion? theists are going to disagree with it either way because it claims their religion(s) is/are wrong. that doesn't really have any effect on our schooling though, because theism is only taught in catholic schools or special schooling made for the religion itself. public schools don't teach any religion unless you take some sort of religious class or something and i dont think that's very common

whether or not atheism is a religion or not does not affect whether it is true or not

even though rtil already covered it, i just want to add a few more thoughts. i actually took catholic theology and world religion classes in high school so kind of have a pretty good idea of what a religion is. In every religion i learned about, there were several defining features that made a religion, a religion. The three main things i can think of are that there is a communal, traditional, spiritual aspect to each of them. Communities of faith will gather together on their holy days or weekly sabbaths to celebrate their beliefs. Traditions such as interpreting their sacred texts and preforming rituals during certain times of the year, or a complex hierarchical system of clergy that only certain people are allowed into. And lastly, spirituality, which usually involves the belief of a soul/spirit that travels to an afterlife and must suffer consequences or enjoy rewards based on just how well the person followed the religion's traditional rules while on earth.

Seeing as atheism cannot apply for any of these features, i really feel it cannot be shoved into the religion department. furthermore, atheists can differ from one another in their world views/philosophies extremely. You could be atheist and spiritual (ie in non-theistic religions like Buddhism), atheist and moral and progressive (ie secular humanism), or just atheist, immoral, ignorant and a hedonistic bastard in general.

er anyway yeah just thought i'd throw that in there

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manwell it's definitely a controversial issue

only amongst fundamentalists who would like to group atheism into religion to make themselves feel better

Quoteit doesn't really matter if you consider it a religion or not.

yes, it does. it matters that everyone acknowledge that atheism is not a religion, in order to understand it correctly

Quote
but really, one of those definitions asserts that we have a non physical illness that it needs to cure. that illness is the fact that we crave knowledge but don't have answers for the biggest questions (where did we come from, why do we exist, etc). that's what the actual illness is, and the cure is found in all religions. in theism, their god or whatever can explain it all, and that's why people believe in it. with atheism, science can answer those questions. there are more questions after that entail after each answer (where did god come from if he made us? what triggered the big bang?) which no one has a REAL answer for. it's only real guideline for living is to live your life, which is a way of living, and most atheists want to say that there is still morality without god, so you still need to live by those rules or else you're either going to go to prison or just have a bad life

atheism doesn't denote providing answers or morality or ANYTHING. it is the DENIAL of the EXISTENCE of GOD and the SUPERNATURAL. science and atheism aren't the same thing.

atheism is a denial of theism.

science is a means of understanding what surrounds us.

and please don't tell me you think "morality" comes from religion.

Quote
but yeah, big time atheists disagree with each other on whether or not it's a religion.

no they do not.

Quotewho cares though? why does it matter if it is or is not a religion? theists are going to disagree with it either way because it claims their religion(s) is/are wrong. that doesn't really have any effect on our schooling though, because theism is only taught in catholic schools or special schooling made for the religion itself. public schools don't teach any religion unless you take some sort of religious class or something and i dont think that's very common

whether or not atheism is a religion or not does not affect whether it is true or not

it doesn't affect whether it's true, but it does affect its perception. atheism is important - it's the only thing that keeps religion out of state and law. religion is a private practice, it should not encroach on society in a way that would give it any power over people. that's what the middle ages were, and we don't want to go through that again.

richard dawkins isnt stupid UR STUPID

i get the feeling that you think that i'm a theist or something

the idea that atheism is or is not a religion is debatable is all i'm saying. saying it was controversial might have been a strtch, but i DO know that some major atheists consider it a religion

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manwell it's definitely a controversial issue

only amongst fundamentalists who would like to group atheism into religion to make themselves feel better

i don't understand what you're saying with this

Quoteyes, it does. it matters that everyone acknowledge that atheism is not a religion, in order to understand it correctly

that's assuming that atheism is not a religion

Quote
atheism doesn't denote providing answers or morality or ANYTHING. it is the DENIAL of the EXISTENCE of GOD and the SUPERNATURAL. science and atheism aren't the same thing.

atheism is a denial of theism.

science is a means of understanding what surrounds us.

and please don't tell me you think "morality" comes from religion.

theism = belief in god
atheism = belief in lack of god

i don't see where the denial comes in. i'm sure you can argue that atheism is not a belief but i'm not really sure i agree it's just denying theism. it's more like the belief that we exist without any gods at all. but really this is sort of semantics. it's two ways to say the same thing

i think atheism entails the belief in the use of science. i'm sure there are people who are atheists who don't believe in the use of science, but that is really confusing. i tihnk atheism is sort of tied in with science in its definition or else it sort of doesn't work. you aren't worshipping science but it seems to be the only way to understand the world

i think i said in my earlier post that i think it's stupid to try to get morality from religion. i believe morality is a human trait

Quote
no they do not.

uh this is just denying the truth

Quote
it doesn't affect whether it's true, but it does affect its perception. atheism is important - it's the only thing that keeps religion out of state and law. religion is a private practice, it should not encroach on society in a way that would give it any power over people. that's what the middle ages were, and we don't want to go through that again.

i still don't see how atheism being a religion affects this

if taylor can provide me with one accurate source that proves atheism is a religion, then i will be convinced

too bad there arent any because this is a stupid argument that makes no sense

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Man

Quote
no they do not.

uh this is just denying the truth

haha ok tell me one major atheist today who openly acknowledges that atheism is a religion

as far as the other things you've mentioned it's like talking to a brick wall so i'm done

YOURE A RELIGION

i think the reason it's like talking to a brick wall is because i'm not even arguing with you but you think that i am

the reason i think that atheism is a religion is because it's what i was taught in my philosophy class and my teacher is really smart

though he did tell everyone that some atheists claim it to not be a religion. when he was going over religions he didnt make a big deal on whether or not it is or is not a religion, and now i realize it was probably because it doesnt fucking matter

i would look more into it and atheism may or may not be a religion the whole deal is that i just don't think it's important so i'm not gonna go search the internet for any proof (because the internet is a really bad source for anything philosophical in nature)

i think like half of the four horsemen of atheism think it's a religion but still back to point 1 i dont care if it is ir is not a religion because i'm not really looking at it in the legal sense or how it would affect the world if we called it a religion, i'm only concerned with if it fits the definition and so far as i can see it does

so yeah i pretty much agree with you the other stuff is sort of semantics so this isn't really even a debate. i mean i'm an atheist and it looks like you're an atheist so i don't really know what we would have to argue about

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WcAFkYUnSjg

freezepop fucking sucks

that music video reminds me of like a tim and eric thing

sports!

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: chickenthe way i see it, its the problem with modern day society with religion, and just because alot of people interpret something wrongly doesnt mean its suddenly not the truth anymore

they\\\'re not interpreting it wrongly, and that\\\'s my point. the simple truth of the matter is that these ancient religions do not evolve with mankind - they constantly stay the same, never changing, never swaying. sure, the good, charitable things about them are easy to point out. but there are many practices from islam, christianity, and any monotheistic religion that just don\\\'t make any sense in a modern, civilized society. they cripple people and societies. they hinder progress, human rights and science. religion can never be an ultimate tool for good, because it is designed to control people.

if religions were like photo albums, there would be so many pages that they\\\'d try to hide from the world with bad photos they wouldn\\\'t be proud of. and that\\\'s what they continue to do to this day. and now science is beginning to chip away at the relevance of religion in society, which just makes it worse. i notice that the more science is prevalent in the world, the more religions tend to stray away from it and go back into their caves, clinging to ancient beliefs and lives of total ignorance. what is so hard about accepting the fact that there is no god? just live life to your fullest and forget about what happens to you when you die. nobody knows, no one will ever know, until you\\\'re dead. so forget about it.

they ARE interpreting it wrongly , and thats my point. all these ignorant cave-people do not represent the religion itself
and why shouldnt the religious moral rules work now, i mean adultery is still adultery, just because we have computers and more scientific theories doesnt make it any different
what is so hard about thinking that there is a god behind all this?

the hard thing about \\\'accepting the fact that there is no god\\\' means that there is no purpose to this life

living an atheistic 'just live your life to the fullest' life is like knitting a huge sweater, youre not making it for anybody, youre just making it
and then when you leave it all behind not you or anyone is gonna wear that sweater because you werent making it for anyone, you just made it

Quote from: chicken

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: chickenthe way i see it, its the problem with modern day society with religion, and just because alot of people interpret something wrongly doesnt mean its suddenly not the truth anymore

they\\\'re not interpreting it wrongly, and that\\\'s my point. the simple truth of the matter is that these ancient religions do not evolve with mankind - they constantly stay the same, never changing, never swaying. sure, the good, charitable things about them are easy to point out. but there are many practices from islam, christianity, and any monotheistic religion that just don\\\'t make any sense in a modern, civilized society. they cripple people and societies. they hinder progress, human rights and science. religion can never be an ultimate tool for good, because it is designed to control people.

if religions were like photo albums, there would be so many pages that they\\\'d try to hide from the world with bad photos they wouldn\\\'t be proud of. and that\\\'s what they continue to do to this day. and now science is beginning to chip away at the relevance of religion in society, which just makes it worse. i notice that the more science is prevalent in the world, the more religions tend to stray away from it and go back into their caves, clinging to ancient beliefs and lives of total ignorance. what is so hard about accepting the fact that there is no god? just live life to your fullest and forget about what happens to you when you die. nobody knows, no one will ever know, until you\\\'re dead. so forget about it.

they ARE interpreting it wrongly , and thats my point. all these ignorant cave-people do not represent the religion itself
and why shouldnt the religious moral rules work now, i mean adultery is still adultery, just because we have computers and more scientific theories doesnt make it any different
what is so hard about thinking that there is a god behind all this?

the hard thing about \\\'accepting the fact that there is no god\\\' means that there is no purpose to this life

i think that there might be a meaning to life without god, but even if there isn\\\'t, who cares? it would be stupid to want to believe in something that isn\\\'t true because it sounds good.

if there was a god who created the universe, he doesn\\\'t exist now. and if there is a god who created the universe and DOES exist, there\\\'s no way that he is an "all good" being. he might omnipotent, omnipresent, and omniscient, but he\\\'s not omnibenevolent

think about all of the evil shit in the world. there\\\'s a type of wasp that breeds by implanting its eggs into another insect, causing the newborns to have to eat themselves out of the other insect. why would god need to make such an unnecessarily evil process of reproduction for this animal?

then there is the problem of moral evil and gratuitous evil. moral evil is basically when someone knowngly chooses to do something evil. this action usually ends up with bad consequences, but can sometimes bring about good things in the long run. gratuitous evil is completely evil actions which never have any sort of positive outcome

there are thousands of women and children being raped and murdered in the congo. there are thousands of children who are sold into sex slavery in other countries. all of this shit happens none stop, and if there were a good god he would do something about it. i know that "god works in mysterious ways", but how long does it fucking take to punish a rapist? in the old days, he would smite people just for fucking LYING. why doesn\\\'t he uphold his own rules anymore? you could say it\\\'s because he wants us to have free will so he won\\\'t kill random people, but that doesn\\\'t get over the fact that he\\\'s done it before. there\\\'s also another reason: is a rapist\\\'s freewill worth more than a child\\\'s well being? why is it ok to sacrifice an evil person\\\'s freewill for the suffering on someone completely innocent, when it won\\\'t bring any good to anyone?

i know that at this point i\\\'m primarily talking about the christian god, but still. any god who is omnibenevolent would get rid of all this rape, child molestation, war, etc but he doesn\\\'t. if he does exist, i don\\\'t know why you\\\'d want to worship him

it\\\'s not a wasp it\\\'s a mosquito or some shit whatever

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manfreezepop fucking sucks

Quote from: Malhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WcAFkYUnSjg

if I was a mod I would have locked this topic instead of/before locking the rest of the so-called "shitty topics" that are abundant in general

atheism is not a religion because it doesn't assert anything that requires objective evidence to prove. if there's a wall, and i say there's nothing behind it, and you say there IS, it's on you to prove that it's there, not on me to prove it isn't. i don't think about religion in my day to day life, OR about my atheism -- it's not something i devote time or thought to, it's just not a part of who i am. atheism isn't religion, it's a LACK of religion. and in any case, disputing whether atheism is or is not a religion is a thoroughly pedantic argument that doesn't really relate to the larger argument at hand

yeah anyway back to the topic at hand

i think it's a pretty good sign that somebody can call out the pope like this and not instantly be burned at the stake like it woulda been maybe 400 years ago. i'm sure there are a ton of people that aren't too happy with richard dawkins but things could definitely be worse.

Quote from: emanif I was a mod I would have locked this topic instead of/before locking the rest of the so-called "shitty topics" that are abundant in general

if you were a mod i would throw up dramatically

good talk I think we've turned some heads and saved some souls

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manthe reason i think that atheism is a religion is because it's what i was taught in my philosophy class and my teacher is really smart

though he did tell everyone that some atheists claim it to not be a religion. when he was going over religions he didnt make a big deal on whether or not it is or is not a religion, and now i realize it was probably because it doesnt fucking matter

i would look more into it and atheism may or may not be a religion the whole deal is that i just don't think it's important so i'm not gonna go search the internet for any proof (because the internet is a really bad source for anything philosophical in nature)

i think like half of the four horsemen of atheism think it's a religion but still back to point 1 i dont care if it is ir is not a religion because i'm not really looking at it in the legal sense or how it would affect the world if we called it a religion, i'm only concerned with if it fits the definition and so far as i can see it does

so yeah i pretty much agree with you the other stuff is sort of semantics so this isn't really even a debate. i mean i'm an atheist and it looks like you're an atheist so i don't really know what we would have to argue about

good for him, but i'd like to hear his explanation on how one could be both atheistic and religious at the same time. it's an oxymoron.

i do really think it matters that people understand that atheism is not a religion, because some people are honestly seeking to be part of something that is not religious in nature. and that is atheism. that is the definition of atheism. i don't know how much more clear the subject can be.

Quote from: chicken

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: chickenthe way i see it, its the problem with modern day society with religion, and just because alot of people interpret something wrongly doesnt mean its suddenly not the truth anymore

they're not interpreting it wrongly, and that's my point. the simple truth of the matter is that these ancient religions do not evolve with mankind - they constantly stay the same, never changing, never swaying. sure, the good, charitable things about them are easy to point out. but there are many practices from islam, christianity, and any monotheistic religion that just don't make any sense in a modern, civilized society. they cripple people and societies. they hinder progress, human rights and science. religion can never be an ultimate tool for good, because it is designed to control people.

if religions were like photo albums, there would be so many pages that they'd try to hide from the world with bad photos they wouldn't be proud of. and that's what they continue to do to this day. and now science is beginning to chip away at the relevance of religion in society, which just makes it worse. i notice that the more science is prevalent in the world, the more religions tend to stray away from it and go back into their caves, clinging to ancient beliefs and lives of total ignorance. what is so hard about accepting the fact that there is no god? just live life to your fullest and forget about what happens to you when you die. nobody knows, no one will ever know, until you're dead. so forget about it.

they ARE interpreting it wrongly , and thats my point. all these ignorant cave-people do not represent the religion itself
and why shouldnt the religious moral rules work now, i mean adultery is still adultery, just because we have computers and more scientific theories doesnt make it any different
what is so hard about thinking that there is a god behind all this?

the hard thing about 'accepting the fact that there is no god' means that there is no purpose to this life

so without god there is no purpose in your life? does the fact that there is a god drive you to be good? if god was absent, would you rape, murder, kill and steal? why does there need to be a god in order for us to be civilized and purposeful?

the problem with religion is that it creates a crutch for humans. it tells you that an invisible, all knowing, all seeing, all powerful being created you for one purpose and one purpose only - to serve him in your physical being until the day that you die. you are born into this and there is no opt out except for eternal suffering. i don't know what the qu'ran says about salvation but in christianity that's pretty much the deal. god died for your sins even if you didn't really ask for it, and because of that you are eternally bound to serve him and obey his rules and pay him tribute (tithing, worshiping, spreading the gospel, etc.)

if you ask me, serving some eternal selfish being on a matter of faith alone is a purposeless life.

a life with purpose is a life that you live to the fullest. to make you and the ones you care about happy. have fun.

why spend such short time you have here on earth bowing down to the sky in the distant hope that you'll spend eternity in some bizarre utopia? doesn't eternity sound a little boring to you?

Quote from: chickenliving an atheistic 'just live your life to the fullest' life is like knitting a huge sweater, youre not making it for anybody, youre just making it
and then when you leave it all behind not you or anyone is gonna wear that sweater because you werent making it for anyone, you just made it

i don't get it.

so if an atheist lives his life to the fullest, and, say, cures a disease, or starts a charitable foundation, starts a business that employs people, or helps the sick and the homeless, he left nothing behind?

Quote from: rtilif you ask me, serving some eternal selfish being on a matter of faith alone is a purposeless life.

a life with purpose is a life that you live to the fullest. to make you and the ones you care about happy. have fun.

i agree with your first statement

i mean if god already knows whats going to happen, and he's the one who caused it to happen, it seems as though you have no free will. what kind of life is that?

i think the second one is sort of debatable. i don't really have a strong opinion on it because i can't figure out the answer. is life meaningless? it seems like it is but it seems like it isn't at the same time and i have reasons for and against it

i did a philosophy debate for the meaninglessness of life where i said i thought it had meaning but my teacher was able to stump me so now i don't really know

keep in mind that when i'm talking about meaningful, i mean an over-arching meaning.

imo, the purpose to life is to find your own purpose. you can't have it handed to you by anyone. you have to find your own meaning.

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a life with purpose is one that isnt wasted trying to find it

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Quote from: Jeinuimo, the purpose to life is to find your own purpose. you can't have it handed to you by anyone. you have to find your own meaning.

Yeah i agree with this

but you know what, curious as this might sound I think some people, myself included, find religion as a boost or impulse for that purpose or find it as an impulse for happiness.

Idk I mean if believing in god and practicing the religion etc makes you happy, independently of the existance of god, then I think thats very fine.

Same for buddhists or islamists (except I think budhism is a secta, not a religion). If meditating for 3 hours makes you happy, for god sake, do it.

But yeah it kinda sucks that some religions have potentially agressive or violent behaviors/traditions.

I honestly think I was a happier person when I was a more hardcore believer. i guess I just...want to believe in something and i feel a bit empty about it these days

You know i just dont believe, or dont want to believe, that this life is all there is. Because humans are not just flesh and bone, I KNOW there has to be something more

Quote from: emanI honestly think I was a happier person when I was a more hardcore believer

most of them do

until they realize they've missed out entirely on living life

i really disagree with you. The way you wish to live, and if you want to live a happy, exciting life or not, is entirely up to you, and imo it has nothing to do with your religious beliefs.

ive met a lot of happy christians and sad christians as i have found happy atheists and sad atheists.

if you truly follow the doctrines of christianity, you are missing out on a lot of life. sure you can be happy doing that - after all, ignorance is bliss.

Quote from: MrScriblama life with purpose is one that isnt wasted trying to find it

the whole idea "your lives have meaning if you give them meaning" is stupid imo. you might have had some accomplishments in your life but when you die everyone wil forget about it and it won't mean anything. and even if you are remembered, when humanity goes extinct like it will inevitably, nothing you have done will have mattered

the most you can hope for is a temporary meaning in life but i don't really know what the value of that is

to me, whether or not life has meaning is not a big issue because it's beyond anyone's control

Quote from: rtilif you truly follow the doctrines of christianity, you are missing out on a lot of life. sure you can be happy doing that - after all, ignorance is bliss.

very few people do that these days.

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manyou might have had some accomplishments in your life but when you die everyone wil forget about it and it won't mean anything.

thats everyone after they die

the only difference is people like that dont sit around and wait to die their whole lives

my thoughts on religion:





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Quote from: MrScriblam

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manyou might have had some accomplishments in your life but when you die everyone wil forget about it and it won't mean anything.

thats everyone after they die

the only difference is people like that dont sit around and wait to die their whole lives

well i mean just because life is meaningless doesn't mean that you should just kill yourself or anything

and i dont really know if life is meaningless or not

again it's a question we can't answer so i dont know why we ask it

who defined what counts as "meaningful" anyway.
thats as broad a criteria as 'what is good'

look at this man


and this walrus


has he not found meaning in his life? dancing the nights away with Carlito the Walrus? he doesn't need your approval. he doesnt even need music. he just needs Carlito.
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Quote from: Zekeythats as broad a criteria as 'what is good'

that's not really that hard

just look at what is bad and anything that gets rid of things that are bad is good

i mean that's a really simple definition and i'm srue you could get a whole lote technical but that's a start

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Man

Quote from: Zekeythats as broad a criteria as 'what is good'

that's not really that hard

just look at what is bad and anything that gets rid of things that are bad is good

i mean that's a really simple definition and i'm srue you could get a whole lote technical but that's a start

you've missed my point entirely:

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AHHHHH! This thread is just one big textwall!!!

Quote from: IxintroAHHHHH! This thread is just one big textwall!!!

that isn't a bad thing

in fact

it's really good

Going from threads like "gay" to this is a pretty hard transition. After a while, it's like sand in a sieve for my brain, everything just pours right through it.

it's a breath of fresh air imo and i'm not sure why everyone opposes them

anyway pretty much everything i wanted to say has already been said

i basically decided that it was not worth it to worship someone/something who may or may not even exist, even if it meant going to hell/being a sinner



ye

Quote from: systech

Quote from: IxintroAHHHHH! This thread is just one big textwall!!!

that isn't a bad thing

in fact

it's really good

yes it leads 2 ultimate enlightenment

if god exists then you are all pissin him off if he doesnt then we are all just wastin words see either way just fuck everyone

Quote from: emanif god exists then you are all pissin him off if he doesnt then we are all just wastin words see either way just fuck everyone

oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooh!

it\\\'s pretty high and mighty of you to think that if god exists he gives a fuckin shit what people say on the internet about him he made the fuckin universe right

i mean if i were god i\\\'d probably had forgotten the earth existed by now

lmfao that is one interesting tought

well he probably does since judeo-christian god always said that if you think something it's just as bad as actually doing it in regards to morality

so if we type and think a lot of stuff denouncing god's existence then we're all a bunch of heathens

oh my god

i have had sex with hatsune miku

uh oh u better pray 4 forgiveness

no i will make her my waifu

oh you already did because u just thought about it

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manwell i mean just because life is meaningless doesn't mean that you should just kill yourself or anything

and i dont really know if life is meaningless or not

again it's a question we can't answer so i dont know why we ask it

the meaning of life on a 'nature' level is pretty much to survive and reproduce. our higher intelligence has unfortunately made us into pompous twats who only care about how our OWN lives are going to unfold because unlike tigers and pandas, we are not an endangered species

so with all these nukes and wars we're pretty much completely fucking that up, good going human species have a fuckin medal

this thread needs an autoplay and a picture of crap over waffles

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lmao that works too

uh oh it looks like we're wrong guys

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P47OC439x88

Aw damn, I posted one of his videos earlier, but realized I put it in the wrong thread :/ Oh well

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=urlTBBKTO68

Quote from: rtili mean if i were god i'd probably had forgotten the earth existed by now

this is correct
earth was actually the beta for a much better world called Zork that god is developing
its not done yet but there are screenshots

sounds good i hope there arent wasps on this one

major fuckup there godboy

and mosquitoes god fucking dammit i cant stand mosquitoes

Quote from: Wasimislam is clearly th best

^

great talk!

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: chicken

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: chickenthe way i see it, its the problem with modern day society with religion, and just because alot of people interpret something wrongly doesnt mean its suddenly not the truth anymore

they\\\'re not interpreting it wrongly, and that\\\'s my point. the simple truth of the matter is that these ancient religions do not evolve with mankind - they constantly stay the same, never changing, never swaying. sure, the good, charitable things about them are easy to point out. but there are many practices from islam, christianity, and any monotheistic religion that just don\\\'t make any sense in a modern, civilized society. they cripple people and societies. they hinder progress, human rights and science. religion can never be an ultimate tool for good, because it is designed to control people.

if religions were like photo albums, there would be so many pages that they\\\'d try to hide from the world with bad photos they wouldn\\\'t be proud of. and that\\\'s what they continue to do to this day. and now science is beginning to chip away at the relevance of religion in society, which just makes it worse. i notice that the more science is prevalent in the world, the more religions tend to stray away from it and go back into their caves, clinging to ancient beliefs and lives of total ignorance. what is so hard about accepting the fact that there is no god? just live life to your fullest and forget about what happens to you when you die. nobody knows, no one will ever know, until you\\\'re dead. so forget about it.

they ARE interpreting it wrongly , and thats my point. all these ignorant cave-people do not represent the religion itself
and why shouldnt the religious moral rules work now, i mean adultery is still adultery, just because we have computers and more scientific theories doesnt make it any different
what is so hard about thinking that there is a god behind all this?

the hard thing about \\\'accepting the fact that there is no god\\\' means that there is no purpose to this life

so without god there is no purpose in your life? does the fact that there is a god drive you to be good? if god was absent, would you rape, murder, kill and steal? why does there need to be a god in order for us to be civilized and purposeful?

the problem with religion is that it creates a crutch for humans. it tells you that an invisible, all knowing, all seeing, all powerful being created you for one purpose and one purpose only - to serve him in your physical being until the day that you die. you are born into this and there is no opt out except for eternal suffering. i don\\\'t know what the qu\\\'ran says about salvation but in christianity that\\\'s pretty much the deal. god died for your sins even if you didn\\\'t really ask for it, and because of that you are eternally bound to serve him and obey his rules and pay him tribute (tithing, worshiping, spreading the gospel, etc.)

if you ask me, serving some eternal selfish being on a matter of faith alone is a purposeless life.

a life with purpose is a life that you live to the fullest. to make you and the ones you care about happy. have fun.

why spend such short time you have here on earth bowing down to the sky in the distant hope that you\\\'ll spend eternity in some bizarre utopia? doesn\\\'t eternity sound a little boring to you?

of course, without believing in god i wouldnt be raping, murdering etc. because i think thats wrong for obvious reasons, but i would think lighty of smaller things like lying and cheating. but with believing in god i also believe that i will be rewarded for not doing those things, so its a second motivator to do good and keep doing good
also, worshipping does not only mean sitting in a corner and praying all day long: being good to your loved ones, learning about nature and science, being healthy and clean is also a great part of worshipping god. the quran says that every step you take towards your school or university will be rewarded greatly

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: chickenliving an atheistic \\\'just live your life to the fullest\\\' life is like knitting a huge sweater, youre not making it for anybody, youre just making it
and then when you leave it all behind not you or anyone is gonna wear that sweater because you werent making it for anyone, you just made it

i don\\\'t get it.

so if an atheist lives his life to the fullest, and, say, cures a disease, or starts a charitable foundation, starts a business that employs people, or helps the sick and the homeless, he left nothing behind?

he does leave something behind, but he doesnt take anything with him. sure the people he leaves behind may live happy lives becaue of what he did but what good does that do him in the end? it may be enough for him to live just for that, and it is a good cause, but its not good enough. if you believe youre doing good charitable work, employing people etc. to serve god youre helping the people AND yourself in the end

and when you say there doesnt need to be a higher purpose, or who cares if there isnt a meaning to life, you look at this great universe and say this is here for nothing?
it is true that its dumb to believe in a lie just because you would like it if it were true, but the thing is you cant say if its a lie. and i find it hard to believe that were here just because were here, ignoring how great beautiful and complex this universe is, THAT is ignorance

as for why god doesnt intervene when someone does wrong to for example a child, we have to take responsibility for our own actions and we are responsible for punishing the bad guys now. the good guys cant just sit around while god punishes the bad guys for them, they have to do that.
and that poor child that was molested and murdered, atheism gives nothing to him, but god rewards that child in the afterlife, and thats justice

what the fuck are we doing here when theres no justice? if i was a rich maffia guy, stealing and plundering and raping people, and i have a wife and kid and a happy life and die peacefully in my sleep, or if i was a poor woman and my husband abuses me daily, was good to my kids and die a horrible death in the end, wheres the justice in that? there has to be justice

Quote from: Zekey

Quote from: rtili mean if i were god i\\\'d probably had forgotten the earth existed by now

this is correct

yes its correct, if YOU were god

Quote from: chickenwhat the fuck are we doing here when theres no justice? if i was a rich maffia guy, stealing and plundering and raping people, and i have a wife and kid and a happy life and die peacefully in my sleep, or if i was a poor woman and my husband abuses me daily, was good to my kids and die a horrible death in the end, wheres the justice in that? there has to be justice

that\\\'s kinda like saying a lion should get \\\'justice\\\' for eating a poor innocent zebra, leaving its kids to fend for themselves. but of course, that zebra is the lion\\\'s meal for the day.

life to me is just a big game of survival

however, the human race has dominated most of the land on this planet, and many people are born into comfort and a system that ensures survival if they do their part in society - so what do they do? they enjoy it. they have fun because at the end of the day, they aren\\\'t going to be here forever.

Quote from: chickenas for why god doesnt intervene when someone does wrong to for example a child, we have to take responsibility for our own actions and we are responsible for punishing the bad guys now. the good guys cant just sit around while god punishes the bad guys for them, they have to do that.
and that poor child that was molested and murdered, atheism gives nothing to him, but god rewards that child in the afterlife, and thats justice

this doesn't explain why god is inconsistent with his own previous actions of punishing the bad, and also it doesn't explain why there are natural evils (like the mosquito that reproduces while killing another)

not only that, but god is better equipped to right the large amount of evil in the world. why doesn't he at least HELP US A LITTLE BIT

and the whole note on how atheists ignore the beauty and complexity of nature; i disagree. just because we say that the beauty is a chance occurence doesn't mean we deny its beauty

Very few of the intellegent theologians / preiests / and even church-goers I talk to bother debating the existance in God.  Like one of my old teachers said, the bible isn't about God, it's about humanity.

In my opinion atheists using scripture to refute the existance of god come off, as C. S. Lewis said, "Angry that God doesn't exist".  Using the bible to prove the existance of God is flawed, but using it as a reference for ourselves etc etc

what is religion

You guys are so cute.

alright thank you bamyasi and wasim for proving that you are really cool and above our conversation now can you stop posting unfunny shit

suck my dick

Quote from: vegeta

Quote from: chickenwhat the fuck are we doing here when theres no justice? if i was a rich maffia guy, stealing and plundering and raping people, and i have a wife and kid and a happy life and die peacefully in my sleep, or if i was a poor woman and my husband abuses me daily, was good to my kids and die a horrible death in the end, wheres the justice in that? there has to be justice

that's kinda like saying a lion should get 'justice' for eating a poor innocent zebra, leaving its kids to fend for themselves. but of course, that zebra is the lion's meal for the day.

life to me is just a big game of survival

however, the human race has dominated most of the land on this planet, and many people are born into comfort and a system that ensures survival if they do their part in society - so what do they do? they enjoy it. they have fun because at the end of the day, they aren't going to be here forever.

the lion didnt mean bad, its all about intention. and the little zebra children will de rewarded in the afterlife if they dont succumb to their situation that god put upon them

a big game of survival? so youre saying anyone can just do whatever they want to survive no matter what he does to other people? humans are diffent than animals because we have morals
and of course you should have fun and enjoy life, but life is more than just that

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Man

Quote from: chickenas for why god doesnt intervene when someone does wrong to for example a child, we have to take responsibility for our own actions and we are responsible for punishing the bad guys now. the good guys cant just sit around while god punishes the bad guys for them, they have to do that.
and that poor child that was molested and murdered, atheism gives nothing to him, but god rewards that child in the afterlife, and thats justice

this doesn't explain why god is inconsistent with his own previous actions of punishing the bad, and also it doesn't explain why there are natural evils (like the mosquito that reproduces while killing another)

not only that, but god is better equipped to right the large amount of evil in the world. why doesn't he at least HELP US A LITTLE BIT

and the whole note on how atheists ignore the beauty and complexity of nature; i disagree. just because we say that the beauty is a chance occurence doesn't mean we deny its beauty

it does explain why god doesnt intervene anymore, because back then it was neccecary for god to take action because the good moral people were in the fast minority. now we should clean up our own shit.

and natural 'evils'? come on, that mosquito isnt any different than any other animal killing another animal to survive

and lastly about the complexity and beauty of nature: i think its like coming across a house and saying, ignoring the fact that its nearly impossible for this house to be created on its own because its so complex and stuff, you say you dont believe a man made it because you never saw or heard him, or because you cant prove that there has been a time when this house wasnt there, so you cant prove that anyone created it, so as far as youre concerned this house has been here forever.

its stupid to argue about religion in general, because no matter what you say you will never get the other person to change their mind about what they believe. all that ever comes out of a religious argument is someone getting offended, so lets just all agree that being religious or non-religious is cool as long as you dont try to impose your beliefs or way of life on to others. ok !

Quote from: shuraits stupid to argue about religion in general, because no matter what you say you will never get the other person to change their mind about what they believe. all that ever comes out of a religious argument is someone getting offended, so lets just all agree that being religious or non-religious is cool as long as you dont try to impose your beliefs or way of life on to others. ok !

ok sure but there's practically none of that in this thread

Quote from: shuraits stupid to argue about religion in general, because no matter what you say you will never get the other person to change their mind about what they believe. all that ever comes out of a religious argument is someone getting offended, so lets just all agree that being religious or non-religious is cool as long as you dont try to impose your beliefs or way of life on to others. ok !

this is false for numerous reasons

for one, i know that people do change their beliefs when they get in arguments because it's happened before. a couple of years ago i was a christian, then i was an agnostic and now i'm an atheist. it worked 4 me and it can work 4 u!!!!!!

also, you SHOULD impose your beliefs on others to an extent. you have to be open-minded, so that if you encounter an argument against your beliefs that is convincing that you can change them, but you SHOULD be pretty confident in your own beliefs and have something to back them up. the reason that you should impose your beliefs a little is because there is one correct belie system, and if the followers of it don't spread it then we'll never have a chance of knowing the correct one

now that doesn't mean kill someone because they're catholic or ignore people because they're a jew, but if you disagree with their beliefs you should definitely criticize them as long as you're not being hateful

Quote from: vegeta

Quote from: shuraits stupid to argue about religion in general, because no matter what you say you will never get the other person to change their mind about what they believe. all that ever comes out of a religious argument is someone getting offended, so lets just all agree that being religious or non-religious is cool as long as you dont try to impose your beliefs or way of life on to others. ok !

ok sure but there\\\'s practically none of that in this thread

wait what. i wasn\\\'t talking about people in this thread imposing their ideas onto others, i was referring to the kind of people who try to get the teaching of evolution banned from schools or making gay marriage illegal and etc

also taylor, just because you questioned religion and changed your beliefs doesn\\\'t mean everyone else does. most people are set in their ways and dont want to change what they have been brought up to believe.

also this thread is really gay and i am really gay for posting in it

Quote from: shura

Quote from: vegeta

Quote from: shuraits stupid to argue about religion in general, because no matter what you say you will never get the other person to change their mind about what they believe. all that ever comes out of a religious argument is someone getting offended, so lets just all agree that being religious or non-religious is cool as long as you dont try to impose your beliefs or way of life on to others. ok !

ok sure but there's practically none of that in this thread

wait what. i wasn't talking about people in this thread imposing their ideas onto others, i was referring to the kind of people who try to get the teaching of evolution banned from schools or making gay marriage illegal and etc

also taylor, just because you questioned religion and changed your beliefs doesn't mean everyone else does. most people are set in their ways and dont want to change what they have been brought up to believe.

also this thread is really gay and i am really gay for posting in it

were not trying to convince eachother about anything were just sharing our thoughts!

and as a matter of fact i am ready to change my ways when i read or hear something convincing enough, im really interesed in reading dawkins book about how evotution proves that god doesnt exist, but this isnt about me im just sayin so whatever

i dont think this thread is gay

Quote from: shurawait what. i wasn't talking about people in this thread imposing their ideas onto others, i was referring to the kind of people who try to get the teaching of evolution banned from schools or making gay marriage illegal and etc

oh ok. just came out of the blue is all

this thread isnt gay at all IMO its very interesting to see what everyones different opinions are on these sorts of things - plus it's not like its a hurf durp lerpa derpa atheist vs. christian thread

despite rtil and taylor both being atheist for example, even they are disagreeing on quite a few subjects

we were going good right?

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Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manalright thank you bamyasi and wasim for proving that you are really cool and above our conversation now can you stop posting unfunny shit

Okay

ingredients for a religion thread:

2+ users engaging in debate
20+ smug users that are above discussing religion on the internet posting to point out said fact

Welcome to my friend's list, tmk.

yeah i like how this thread's goin so far, doesn't seem at all gay to me.

there are two things i want to point out right now from reading this thread:

the first argument i heard briefly mentioned about seeing a house or something that must have been built by someone or stood there for all eternity, must have a creator. this argument (which is much more commonly used as something like "if you see a watch, you know there's a watch maker. same with mankind/creation" is pretty bogus because you're comparing two completely different things. one is something that is contructed out of nonliving materials. the other is organic, it can reproduce and evolve over time. you just can't compare these two in an analogy because they have completely different properties. and the "there can't be something coming from nothing". that's not what most scientists assert to be true. and besides, previous to the big bang, while everything was existing in that one-point dimension/singularity, the reality before could have had a completely different set of laws that would allow that to happen. we don't know it all yet but we're getting there.

the second is the thought that mankind have morals and are above animals. we're not. i think a lot of people assume we must be some great species chosen to become caretakers of the world and explore space idk stuff like that. the thing that differs us from animals is that we have an extremely complex social structure and language. the most common morals that we have are simple basics like, don't kill each other, don't take each other's stuff, etc. why? because we have evolved to live in this communal structure, our brains are hardwired to get along. it is in the community's, the species', the individual's best interest to get along. we've evolved so that as individual's we are not very able to survive on our own; it is in our numbers that we've grown to be the clever mammals that we are.

what's always stumped me is if there was a 'beginning', what came before that beginning exactly

or in relation to the Christian argument, if God is the creator then what created God? if he just 'popped' into existence, then where did existence itself come from?

idk guys maybe some wanker really IS sat up there and laughing at us trying to figure out the mystery of his little puzzle

in the end, even christians admit there is, at the root of it all, an ineffable mystery
whether you think the universe has always been there or god has always been there, no one will ever know how it all began
atheism sort of eliminates the middleman

so should we arrest the pope y/n

Quote from: Jeinuyeah i like how this thread's goin so far, doesn't seem at all gay to me.

there are two things i want to point out right now from reading this thread:

the first argument i heard briefly mentioned about seeing a house or something that must have been built by someone or stood there for all eternity, must have a creator. this argument (which is much more commonly used as something like "if you see a watch, you know there's a watch maker. same with mankind/creation" is pretty bogus because you're comparing two completely different things. one is something that is contructed out of nonliving materials. the other is organic, it can reproduce and evolve over time. you just can't compare these two in an analogy because they have completely different properties. and the "there can't be something coming from nothing". that's not what most scientists assert to be true. and besides, previous to the big bang, while everything was existing in that one-point dimension/singularity, the reality before could have had a completely different set of laws that would allow that to happen. we don't know it all yet but we're getting there.

the second is the thought that mankind have morals and are above animals. we're not. i think a lot of people assume we must be some great species chosen to become caretakers of the world and explore space idk stuff like that. the thing that differs us from animals is that we have an extremely complex social structure and language. the most common morals that we have are simple basics like, don't kill each other, don't take each other's stuff, etc. why? because we have evolved to live in this communal structure, our brains are hardwired to get along. it is in the community's, the species', the individual's best interest to get along. we've evolved so that as individual's we are not very able to survive on our own; it is in our numbers that we've grown to be the clever mammals that we are.

well first what if i say that the universe and all living things are made out of molecules, like a watch is made out of cogs, those are both inanimate right?
and scientists may eventually discover how the universe was created (what happened before the big bang, or how was that other universe with the different set of laws created etc.) but i dont know if theyll discover who created it or if there was someone behind it

and lastly, why wouldnt the humans be the caretakers of the world? we know how to get along with eachother better than animals with our morals as you said, were smarter than them and more intelligent as you said. in fact were already the caretakers of the world, we are the greater species. the world is in our hands now and we decide whatll happen to it and we can either fuck it up or keep it clean and our intelligence and morals has led to that responsibility of being the caretakers

Quote from: Jeinuthe second is the thought that mankind have morals and are above animals. we're not.

IF this were true, then we would have to give animals the same rights as people. that would mean we couldn't kill insects, cows, chickens, etc. killing a cow would be comparable to killing an adult human because there would be no difference between them on a moral standpoint

if you do the reverse of that, where we CAN kill cows, that means we can kill humans and eat them and it doesnt matter because nobody has any rights and i dont believe that either

animals ARE less than us in my opinion. animals don't have consciousness (when i say that, i mean that they aren't conscious of their existence. an animal doesn't ask what the meaning of life is. an animal can't even grasp the concept of being alive), they also don't have morals. an animal makes decisions purely on pain and pleasure it feels because of an action. animals don't have free will and they don't have any substantial cognitive abilities

it's not ok to be inhumane to animals but it is ok to kill them and eat them in my opinion

humans DO have morals, and i believe that morals are specific to humans because of our cognitive ability. we have emotional reactions to actions and occurences, just like any animal (except our emotions are more developed too), BUT THEN we can analyze our emotional reactions with our rational thought. since we're all the same species, i would argue we all have the same emotional reactions, but some people aren't rational/well-educated so they don't have good morals. i think this explains what happens in the congo with people who rape tons of women with no remorse; they're just not educated or intelligent people so they can't rationalize they responses. they see a woman they want to fuck and they'll rape them without thinking about the fact that they're hurting another person.

that's how it seems to me at least

i honestly think morals etc. are just a byproduct of our higher intelligence

i think humans ARE animals, we're just probably the first to actually ask questions

Quote from: vegetaif God is the creator then what created God?

he was not created, he is all that there was,is and will be. that is the mistery behind god.

Supossedly god did not give us a mind complex enough to understand him, but not only as a supernatural entity, hell hes not even a "being", god does not "live" like us humans and animals do.

Any asumptions about god, both from the christian and atheist side, are nothing but that, assumptions.

also some people like the argument of afterlife "eternity sounds too boring" or "doesnt god get bored,etc" esentially, he cant get bored, you would have to be alive in order to be bored.

btw i agree with jeinu, I think the mentality of people that believe humans are superior to animals in any way is selfish and arrogant and causes things like bullfighs and zoos too exist

sorry that went a bit off topic

yeah i agree with eman. i dont believe in god but if there IS a god, he lives on an alternate plane of existence than we do, where there is not time. there\\\'s not an end or a beginning either. and if god exists and is all powerful and he got bored he could just make the boredom go away. so yeah those are kind of irrelevant arguments i think

if there IS time where god exists then we\\\'re fucked because we don\\\'t have free will (this is assuming he exists which he doesnt)

god is in such a convenient position that we are just far too inferior to understand anything about him, so we can't ask any questions about him or his intentions cuz there's just no point! certainly works to a monotheistic religions advantage doesnt it?

by the way, there was no "beginning" or anything before the big bang. scientists don't know everything about the universe, but they do know that matter as it exists in the universe is seperate from the concept of time

yeah quantum physics are some fucked up shit which give us endless plausible explanations to explain that the big bang just happened with no trigger

so time and matter were created at the same time?

matter was never created

time is a concept

I can't wait for the LHC to finally work at its intended energy level, it might shed a bit more light on the properties of early universe. I don't think we could ever know what comes before the universe, before this concept of time began. I just like to think it's a tiny, but super-massively dense particle that is so unstable that quantum mechanics dictates that it has to decay into what we now know as the universe. The only problem with it though, is working out why the expansion of the early universe, when mapped out, has a bottleneck shape.

I know it is a very convenient position for religions to put god in a position where he is hiding from us all not letting us see what the fuck is going on but I dont have all the answers. and priests/religous figures who state miseteries of the universe/religon/god as facts are not giving the correct answers.

I dont think there is a "correct" religion but I dont believe in the atheist point of view either because for me the idea that you, a human, are nothing but felsh bone and tought and that you have one single life and then you die and thats it just seems to systematical and impossible to me

I am more inclined to believe in the afterlife and in god than in believing death is the end and than there is not something that we humans dont understand about the nature of the universe














Let me explain my point by telling you about a tought i had a few days ago.

Imagine you were born fucking blind. this means you are lacking a sense, a source of information about the world. You are unable to even imagine what an image is or what colors are because they are just concepts and words to you. words told by others. does that mean colors/images do not exist??  is there a big lie revolving around these images and colors?? how could you know, you are blind alright, its not your fault if you can/cant see them. Of course, unlike god, the fact that you believe or not in the existance of colors and images does not affect you in the afterlife, if you believe in such things. But hey, you will never see colors or images, you cannot imagine them because there is not even enough information in your mind about what things are or look like. Hell as far as youre concerned, the existance of them does not matter, at least to you. your life will be the same wether you believe on the existance of colors or not.

I feel humanity is like this

we lack something that lets us REALLY see things like they are.

I know this might sound dumb, im probably not really good at articulating what im trying to say, but i hope you can try and comprehend

uh, who said we knew everything about the universe? it's a humbling thing - nobody thinks they know everything about the universe. for every question we answer there are ten more questions we uncover.

you sound like you're simply more inclined to believe in an afterlife and heaven because it makes you feel comfortable.

Actually I don't find the concept of a single life impossible or illogical. We may be organic beings, but we're essentially made up of particles fortunate enough to avoid their anti-particle pair. Elsewhere in the universe, particle and anti-particle pairings are appearing and annihilating each other almost instantaneously, so for me, it's not hard to believe that I have this one life and after that, there's nothing.

If there is something, that's a bonus, but I find that people might tend more to believing that sort of stuff because it's a comforting thought. We're so used to experiencing and sensing the world, that the sudden end of existence is discomforting, particularly while we are young. If there was more than just flesh and bone, I don't think the urge to reproduce would be so strong.

I'd rather not throw away the best years of my life worrying whether or not I'll get another chance to live, or if I'm appeasing some guy/spirit/creator who hasn't appeared, or laid down his rules particularly well. I just want to enjoy what I have while I have it.

Quote from: rtilyou sound like you're simply more inclined to believe in an afterlife and heaven because it makes you feel comfortable.

this is partially true, but hey, humans seek answers. Religion provides answers. independently of if these answers are truth or false, the answer on itself is enough to make us feel secure.

some people feel secure about making crimes in this world because they dont believe in a latter punishment.

and some people feel secure about making crimes because they believe if they pray to their god, they'll have forgiveness and will go to their religion's heaven.

Quote from: emansome people feel secure about making crimes in this world because they dont believe in a latter punishment.

if you need religion to stop you from committing crimes you have a mental issue.

absolutely agreed

It doesn't matter because we're all going to die in 2012 anyway.

^

Quote from: vegetai honestly think morals etc. are just a byproduct of our higher intelligence

morals allowed humanity to build a society and develop intellegence

Religion used to have a great purpose but it has fulfilled this purpose.
The purpose was to be a first kind of law and to give the animal called man something that prevented him from thinking only with his instincts. I am convinced that beliefs have (in their beginnings) taught a certain kind of moral and were the first reason people didn't just kill each other because of envy and grief of important goods or foods thousands of years ago; the basis of a working society.

Over the years it has been replaced with other and better kinds of laws and men would have been able to survive and to keep up their societies without religion, and though it has often played an important role in the justice systems of almost every society until the end of the 19th century in modern countries you can say that it got redundant long time before the three main religions were created because of the already existing law systems set by rulers or politicians.
In fact it's quite ironic to think that probably more blood has been shed and more people have been abused and suppressed over and with these religions than lifes that were made better by them.

Nowadays religion only exists to answer these questions that no man will even be able to answer and considering that the status and the importance that it still has for modern society is way too high.

I just watched Aquirre, the Wrath of God.
Man what a great film.

Quote from: emanI dont think there is a "correct" religion

how is that possible

let's say that atheism is NOT religion because i don't want to go down that road again, but let's GROUP IT with all other religions just for the sake of this argument. they all offer answers to the question "where did we come from". not all of these answers can be correct, because most of them conflict. other religions also conflict on other aspects, such as which morals are the most important, what is ok to eat and what is not ok to eat, etc. with all of these answers that conflict with each other, they can't all be true. they're either all wrong, or one is right. religious pluralism is a stupid relativistic notion

Religion was created by ugly people to make beautiful people feel bad for having sex all the time. At the heart of it all, life is about having sex, this is my philosophy, I call it Sexism.

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Man

Quote from: emanI dont think there is a "correct" religion

they can't all be true. they're either all wrong, or one is right

yep
if you're gonna be part of a religion you can't play the "all roads lead to the same end" card. doesn't really follow the guidelines of any monotheistic religion.

Quote from: BamyasiAt the heart of it all, life is about having sex

lmao

life is actually about the advancement of breast implant technology

my dick look good :

my dick looks great sandwiched in between two large breasts

alright guys take a break
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t6jqaA_jeZ8

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Man

Quote from: emanI dont think there is a "correct" religion

how is that possible

let's say that atheism is NOT religion because i don't want to go down that road again, but let's GROUP IT with all other religions just for the sake of this argument. they all offer answers to the question "where did we come from". not all of these answers can be correct, because most of them conflict. other religions also conflict on other aspects, such as which morals are the most important, what is ok to eat and what is not ok to eat, etc. with all of these answers that conflict with each other, they can't all be true. they're either all wrong, or one is right. religious pluralism is a stupid relativistic notion

dude im sorry but atheism is not a religion and i think you probably should given up on that argument earlier and recognize it as a small mistake instead of letting others build it up like this...It became kinda distracting and slowed you down to prove potentially valid arguments later on. that being said...

well, i just think the idea of a "true god" or a true religion is puerile. I believe 2 oposing facts can exist and be true at the same time and that 2 different religions can still lead into a healthy, happy life. its just a matter of perception.

I think all believers believe in the same god.

Religion is mostly about learning not to break your own vows with yourself and with god, or jesus, or gaia or whatever entity you choose to pray to etc

i wrote a looot of shit here but i erased a lot of it because I realized that it didnt explain anything and reminded myself the religion arument is going around in circles

Quote from: eman

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Man

Quote from: emanI dont think there is a "correct" religion

how is that possible

let's say that atheism is NOT religion because i don't want to go down that road again, but let's GROUP IT with all other religions just for the sake of this argument. they all offer answers to the question "where did we come from". not all of these answers can be correct, because most of them conflict. other religions also conflict on other aspects, such as which morals are the most important, what is ok to eat and what is not ok to eat, etc. with all of these answers that conflict with each other, they can't all be true. they're either all wrong, or one is right. religious pluralism is a stupid relativistic notion

dude im sorry but atheism is not a religion and i think you probably should given up on that argument earlier and recognize it as a small mistake instead of letting others build it up like this...It became kinda distracting and slowed you down to prove potentially valid arguments later on. that being said...

well, i just think the idea of a "true god" or a true religion is puerile. I believe 2 oposing facts can exist and be true at the same time and that 2 different religions can still lead into a healthy, happy life. its just a matter of perception.

I think all believers believe in the same god.

Religion is mostly about learning not to break your own vows with yourself and with god, or jesus, or gaia or whatever entity you choose to pray to etc

i wrote a looot of shit here but i erased a lot of it because I realized that it didnt explain anything and reminded myself the religion arument is going around in circles

1. i avoided bringing back the atheism/religion issue in the very first part of my paragraph, so i dont know what you're talking about
2. if two opposing facts can be true simultaneously then truth doesn't exst. that's obviously not true, therefore you're wrong
3. not all believers believe in the same god. some religions are monotheistic and some are polytheistic. the gods are all called different things and have different traits. it's pretty much impoassible that they're all the same thing
4. if you have to choose which entity you pray to then they are not the same person, therefore further proving that your thrid argument isn't true

Quote from: emanwell, i just think the idea of a "true god" or a true religion is puerile. I believe 2 oposing facts can exist and be true at the same time and that 2 different religions can still lead into a healthy, happy life. its just a matter of perception.

I think all believers believe in the same god.

you may think that, but your catholic doctrine and the bible clearly state that following, believing in and submitting to the god of the christians is the only path to salvation, and pretty much everyone else is going to hell.

sorry i didnt put a lot of tought into all that im pretty much just brainstorming stuff

as a matter of fact im not a very "catholic" or "religious" person i mean i used to be a lot more religious when I was like 13, 14.

And a pretty great part of the reasons i became slowly more distant to my own church was all the bullshit like the presumed existance of "limbo" to explain what happens to abortioned kids, and the fact that even if youre not a good person you cant enter heaven if you do not believe in god.

as I believe i said before, i dont think that the church truly represents what I feel about god because i intelectually differ with some of its ideas.

Also i have learned over the years that some priests make stupid claims about delicate subjects like the 2 ones i mentioned above because they dont know what to respond to people who demand answers. Limbo was made up by these people to satisfy their hunger for security. Like i mentioned before, an answer, wether is right or wrong, can suffice peoples desires to know it all. But, theres nothing in the bible about it as far as I know. And they cant explain why should you be forced to believe in order to enter heaven even if you were a good person.

My interpretation of this is that they obviously dont know the truth about the god they pray to. when i die i simply hope god be cool and let all the nice people enter heaven without making distinctions about beliefs.

I believe in god. I dont "believe" in the church. And I dont believe everything i read in the bible blindly, but I try to see past that, and focus on the intentions and concepts i read. its true,I want to believe. my desire to believe in something is probably a lot greater than my actual faith. I dont even go to church as often as I should, or as I feel i should. But when I do, I feel reliefed. Maybe its just my own mind, maybe its god, maybe its both?

I believe in god and I believe in the power of my own mind to decide how i act and how i react to things. I dont need god to appear before me to know hes real, i just feel it. i know it. Its sort of a combination between being monotheist and using the law of attraction to my own contempt.

if that makes any sense. again im just letting my toughts out here

btw i feel like you two guys thinks im a fucken idiot right now but its true this is more less what i feel.

Quote from: emanMaybe its just my own mind

you might be onto something there

I don't exist.

arresting the pope could work

eman as a side note, you keep saying the word "thought" and spelling it like "tought" at first i thought it was a typo but since you've said it like 5 times i wanted to clear up that it's spelled "thought"

and a lot of this religion stuff really does come down to a gut reaction really. neither positions can answer the questions sufficiently enough to satisfy everyone. i just think atheism is the one that makes the most sense at the moment

I can't watch the video because I'm at school, but I'm for anything that helps eliminate an organization that places idols as figureheads over it's "people" because they're "closer to god." I'm not a fan of any kind of organized religion to be honest, but as long as they don't have a fucking hierarchy built into them, I'm not really bothered. Catholicism is a primitive religious denomination that's stuck around way too long.  It shouldn't exist in the modern world.

Quote from: rtilby the way, there was no "beginning" or anything before the big bang. scientists don\\\'t know everything about the universe, but they do know that matter as it exists in the universe is seperate from the concept of time

matter was never created

would this be a legitimate explanation of how scientists \\\'discovered\\\' that?

Quote from: chickenits like coming across a house and saying, ignoring the fact that its nearly impossible for this house to be created on its own because its so complex and stuff, you say you dont believe a man made it because you never saw or heard him, or because you cant prove that there has been a time when this house wasnt there, so you cant prove that anyone created it, so as far as youre concerned this house has been here forever.

i mean how did they discover it? did they say well we cant prove that matter was created, therefore it has never been created, meaning matter is seperate from the concept of time? if thats the case then its just an example of how we simply cant scientifically prove that god doesnt exist

or did they first discover that matter is seperate from the concept of time, which means that matter was never created? if that were the case, then maybe matter wasnt created in a way were accustomed to (one time it wasnt there, then one time it was), maybe we cant discover how it was created because we dont have the knowledge, our cup isnt big enough for that ocean. im not saying that weve already discovered how big our cup is, but were getting there

Quote from: ShidaI can\\\'t wait for the LHC to finally work at its intended energy level, it might shed a bit more light on the properties of early universe. I don\\\'t think we could ever know what comes before the universe, before this concept of time began. I just like to think it\\\'s a tiny, but super-massively dense particle that is so unstable that quantum mechanics dictates that it has to decay into what we now know as the universe. The only problem with it though, is working out why the expansion of the early universe, when mapped out, has a bottleneck shape.

the way i see it, there was no chance this universe could not have been created, and if you look at evolution, there was no chance we would not have become the way we are now: it was all predestined

i think its all about wether you think youre just flesh and bones, or if theres more, something you cant grasp.
but correct me if im wrong, if we are just flesh and bones, why do we die? doesnt a dead body have the same amount of particles as a living body?

Ok, screw this... that's way too much actual thinking and philosophing for this place. Let's reduce the level of intellectuality a little and get back to our dumb and primitive roots instead of repeating over and over what has already been said a douzen times without being noticed for noone has read every single post in this thread anyway.

Here are my thoughts:
(https://thebackalleys.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fkitschian.files.wordpress.com%2F2009%2F08%2Fgod-figure.jpg&hash=ffea847ae899d8e0c5e68d34274779c4e12a29e3)

Bad thing: ^This could actually be counted as an intelligent post if you took the picture's content as a metaphor, so don't even think of making a comment on this previous post, acknowledging it as a valuable contrubution to the discussion and explaining why.

either you choose to comfort yourself with thinking that you have no responsibility and noone to answer to and that this life is just it, or you comfort yourself with thinking that there is a reason why youre living, a reason greater than living for the sake of life itself

Quote from: chickeni mean how did they discover it? did they say well we cant prove that matter was created, therefore it has never been created, meaning matter is seperate from the concept of time? if thats the case then its just an example of how we simply cant scientifically prove that god doesnt exist

the way i see it, there was no chance this universe could not have been created, and if you look at evolution, there was no chance we would not have become the way we are now: it was all predestined

Actually, there was a chance that the universe was not created, it's just that we can't be aware of such a condition because we wouldn't exist and experience a universe that didn't exist! It's like when you play russian roulette, there is a chance that you'll fire a bullet, or you won't, and you won't be aware of the other chance because there can only be one outcome per round. For all we know, and it has been suggested, that there could be millions of universes out there with different factors, and probabilities associated with existence because of inital conditions. However, since the universe is the scope of our existence, its like living your entire like in a room with no windows or doors, and trying to guess whats out there. Science doesn't say it can prove or disprove the existence of God - the problem science has is when religious people try to make science prove that god doesn't exist, when the onus is on religion to prove indefinitely.

Quote from: chickeni think its all about wether you think youre just flesh and bones, or if theres more, something you cant grasp.
but correct me if im wrong, if we are just flesh and bones, why do we die? doesnt a dead body have the same amount of particles as a living body?

Nope. A dead body begins to decay, losing particles to the air and the ground. A living body replenishes its dead cells and pretty much maintains the number of particles. We die though, because like everything else, we're made up of limited resources. Once you've lost enough to sustain the stresses of living its pretty much the end of your life. Just think of all the problems that old people face - the chemicals responsible for hair colour run out - leading to grey hair, the skin looses the chemicals that give it elasticity, leading to wrinkles and creases and saggy skin. The bones become more brittle and likely to break. All because we're born with a set amount of resources.

Quote from: chickeneither you choose to comfort yourself with thinking that you have no responsibility and noone to answer to and that this life is just it, or you comfort yourself with thinking that there is a reason why youre living, a reason greater than living for the sake of life itself

Having no one to answer to doesn't mean you don't have responsibility. It's a long stretch to suggest that because we'll always have ourselves and our own morals and conscience to answer to. Only people with mental problems lack the ability to feel guilt when they've done something wrong.

Quote from: chickenwell first what if i say that the universe and all living things are made out of molecules, like a watch is made out of cogs, those are both inanimate right?
and scientists may eventually discover how the universe was created (what happened before the big bang, or how was that other universe with the different set of laws created etc.) but i dont know if theyll discover who created it or if there was someone behind it

and lastly, why wouldnt the humans be the caretakers of the world? we know how to get along with eachother better than animals with our morals as you said, were smarter than them and more intelligent as you said. in fact were already the caretakers of the world, we are the greater species. the world is in our hands now and we decide whatll happen to it and we can either fuck it up or keep it clean and our intelligence and morals has led to that responsibility of being the caretakers

the cogs and molecules analogy are still making a comparison between two different things. Cogs would not interact with one another unless due to human intervention. Molecules are constantly reacting and responding to one another (due to the forces of strong, weak, electromagnetic.. etc), and science has slowly begun to understand more and more of things on a molecular level.

i don't think humans should announce themselves caretakers of the world because we don't even know how to take care of ourselves. scientists have estimated that if all humans disappeared off the face of the earth, every living species would FLOURISH within the next 50 years. in contast, they estimate if all insects disappeared off the face of the earth, all life would end within 50 years. turns out, we're not actually that important. sure, our technology could be used to conserve the earth for future generations, but it seems those in charge would rather use technology for constantly out-doing rival nations militarily.

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-ManIF this were true, then we would have to give animals the same rights as people. that would mean we couldn't kill insects, cows, chickens, etc. killing a cow would be comparable to killing an adult human because there would be no difference between them on a moral standpoint

if you do the reverse of that, where we CAN kill cows, that means we can kill humans and eat them and it doesnt matter because nobody has any rights and i dont believe that either

animals ARE less than us in my opinion. animals don't have consciousness (when i say that, i mean that they aren't conscious of their existence. an animal doesn't ask what the meaning of life is. an animal can't even grasp the concept of being alive), they also don't have morals. an animal makes decisions purely on pain and pleasure it feels because of an action. animals don't have free will and they don't have any substantial cognitive abilities

it's not ok to be inhumane to animals but it is ok to kill them and eat them in my opinion

humans DO have morals, and i believe that morals are specific to humans because of our cognitive ability. we have emotional reactions to actions and occurences, just like any animal (except our emotions are more developed too), BUT THEN we can analyze our emotional reactions with our rational thought. since we're all the same species, i would argue we all have the same emotional reactions, but some people aren't rational/well-educated so they don't have good morals. i think this explains what happens in the congo with people who rape tons of women with no remorse; they're just not educated or intelligent people so they can't rationalize they responses. they see a woman they want to fuck and they'll rape them without thinking about the fact that they're hurting another person.

that's how it seems to me at least

i actually do hold the first assertion to be true. i believe all life is valuable. perhaps more so than people who believe in an afterlife, because this is all i've got. because of this belief, i've slowly been workin my way to vegetarianism (stuck on the pescatarian level... just can't stop eatin fish it's so delish). and i think you'd be surprised to see that animals do commonly exhibit what humans would call "morals" in their lives. for example,  there are several types of squirrels, lemmings, and prarie dogs that will let out a warning cry if they see a predator, which 99% of the time will result in the predator eating them. essentially they sacrifice themselves for their families, it's something most scientists refer to as "kin selection". if you were to replace this example with humans, you could say that the sacrificer would be someone truly altruistic, who thought of the community first. and what of those stories you hear about occasionaly when a loyal pet saves their owner from death? are these animals acting morally? no? they just saved their owner's lives so they can get fed later on? yet animals cannot have a sense of time as we do, and cannot plan for the future. why would they act to save anyone? kin selection. why do humans act to save each other? i believe it's also kin selection. albeit, a very complex version.

i do agree with you on your closing remark though, that higher intelligence leads to a far more complex morality due to rationalized thought.

Quote from: Shida

Quote from: chickeni mean how did they discover it? did they say well we cant prove that matter was created, therefore it has never been created, meaning matter is seperate from the concept of time? if thats the case then its just an example of how we simply cant scientifically prove that god doesnt exist

the way i see it, there was no chance this universe could not have been created, and if you look at evolution, there was no chance we would not have become the way we are now: it was all predestined

Actually, there was a chance that the universe was not created, it's just that we can't be aware of such a condition because we wouldn't exist and experience a universe that didn't exist! It's like when you play russian roulette, there is a chance that you'll fire a bullet, or you won't, and you won't be aware of the other chance because there can only be one outcome per round. For all we know, and it has been suggested, that there could be millions of universes out there with different factors, and probabilities associated with existence because of inital conditions. However, since the universe is the scope of our existence, its like living your entire like in a room with no windows or doors, and trying to guess whats out there. Science doesn't say it can prove or disprove the existence of God - the problem science has is when religious people try to make science prove that god doesn't exist, when the onus is on religion to prove indefinitely.

im not saying that science says that it can prove that god exists or not,  i know its not their intention to prove that, what im saying is that it cant, simply because of that room situation you described or the cup/ocean situation i described

Quote from: Shida

Quote from: chickeni think its all about wether you think youre just flesh and bones, or if theres more, something you cant grasp.
but correct me if im wrong, if we are just flesh and bones, why do we die? doesnt a dead body have the same amount of particles as a living body?

Nope. A dead body begins to decay, losing particles to the air and the ground. A living body replenishes its dead cells and pretty much maintains the number of particles. We die though, because like everything else, we're made up of limited resources. Once you've lost enough to sustain the stresses of living its pretty much the end of your life. Just think of all the problems that old people face - the chemicals responsible for hair colour run out - leading to grey hair, the skin looses the chemicals that give it elasticity, leading to wrinkles and creases and saggy skin. The bones become more brittle and likely to break. All because we're born with a set amount of resources.

ok in that prospect youre right i suppose. i guess what the soul is something we simply cant grasp

Quote from: Shida

Quote from: chickeneither you choose to comfort yourself with thinking that you have no responsibility and noone to answer to and that this life is just it, or you comfort yourself with thinking that there is a reason why youre living, a reason greater than living for the sake of life itself

Having no one to answer to doesn't mean you don't have responsibility. It's a long stretch to suggest that because we'll always have ourselves and our own morals and conscience to answer to. Only people with mental problems lack the ability to feel guilt when they've done something wrong.

so youre saying that a mob boss, a ruthless and corruptious leader, or someone in a simular position, someone who can do what he wants to other people and their possesions without being punished (in this life) is mentally unstable?

living in a world with a god makes more sense to me (now more than ever) because then there is justice, there is a purpose and there is someone to whom i can be thankful for for my fortunately easy and happy life, and thankfulness leads to even more happyness

Quote from: emanI dont even go to church as often as I should, or as I feel i should. But when I do, I feel reliefed. Maybe its just my own mind, maybe its god, maybe its both?

i think if you ask most churchgoers about if they feel beneficial after going to church, they will answer 'of course!'. there have been many studies done showing that people are happier when they're around.... more people. we're communal creatures. so of course we'll be happier around our fellow man. if you ask a lot of people about their happiest memories, i bet you that most of those memories will involve people in a group. religions know this, they use it to their advantage and get everyone together as often as possible.

however, this is a downside to this. a community of faith will pressure those straying into staying faithful, which leads to the individual's anxiety and often unhealthy relationships with peers. to let it go on long enough, it can lead to bitterness, severed ties with life-long peers, loss of communication, even mental problems.  

Quote from: chickenim not saying that science says that it can prove that god exists or not,  i know its not their intention to prove that, what im saying is that it cant, simply because of that room situation you described or the cup/ocean situation i described

well of course science can't prove god does not exist. it's logically impossible to prove a negative. the burden of proof is on those who assert it to be true. seeing as the only proof religion often has to offer is something circular in their texts like, "god wrote the bible. the bible says god's real. god doesn't lie. therefore god is real".

Quote from: Jeinu

Quote from: chickenwell first what if i say that the universe and all living things are made out of molecules, like a watch is made out of cogs, those are both inanimate right?
and scientists may eventually discover how the universe was created (what happened before the big bang, or how was that other universe with the different set of laws created etc.) but i dont know if theyll discover who created it or if there was someone behind it

and lastly, why wouldnt the humans be the caretakers of the world? we know how to get along with eachother better than animals with our morals as you said, were smarter than them and more intelligent as you said. in fact were already the caretakers of the world, we are the greater species. the world is in our hands now and we decide whatll happen to it and we can either fuck it up or keep it clean and our intelligence and morals has led to that responsibility of being the caretakers

the cogs and molecules analogy are still making a comparison between two different things. Cogs would not interact with one another unless due to human intervention. Molecules are constantly reacting and responding to one another (due to the forces of strong, weak, electromagnetic.. etc), and science has slowly begun to understand more and more of things on a molecular level.

i don\\\'t think humans should announce themselves caretakers of the world because we don\\\'t even know how to take care of ourselves. scientists have estimated that if all humans disappeared off the face of the earth, every living species would FLOURISH within the next 50 years. in contast, they estimate if all insects disappeared off the face of the earth, all life would end within 50 years. turns out, we\\\'re not actually that important. sure, our technology could be used to conserve the earth for future generations, but it seems those in charge would rather use technology for constantly out-doing rival nations militarily.

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-ManIF this were true, then we would have to give animals the same rights as people. that would mean we couldn\\\'t kill insects, cows, chickens, etc. killing a cow would be comparable to killing an adult human because there would be no difference between them on a moral standpoint

if you do the reverse of that, where we CAN kill cows, that means we can kill humans and eat them and it doesnt matter because nobody has any rights and i dont believe that either

animals ARE less than us in my opinion. animals don\\\'t have consciousness (when i say that, i mean that they aren\\\'t conscious of their existence. an animal doesn\\\'t ask what the meaning of life is. an animal can\\\'t even grasp the concept of being alive), they also don\\\'t have morals. an animal makes decisions purely on pain and pleasure it feels because of an action. animals don\\\'t have free will and they don\\\'t have any substantial cognitive abilities

it\\\'s not ok to be inhumane to animals but it is ok to kill them and eat them in my opinion

humans DO have morals, and i believe that morals are specific to humans because of our cognitive ability. we have emotional reactions to actions and occurences, just like any animal (except our emotions are more developed too), BUT THEN we can analyze our emotional reactions with our rational thought. since we\\\'re all the same species, i would argue we all have the same emotional reactions, but some people aren\\\'t rational/well-educated so they don\\\'t have good morals. i think this explains what happens in the congo with people who rape tons of women with no remorse; they\\\'re just not educated or intelligent people so they can\\\'t rationalize they responses. they see a woman they want to fuck and they\\\'ll rape them without thinking about the fact that they\\\'re hurting another person.

that\\\'s how it seems to me at least

i actually do hold the first assertion to be true. i believe all life is valuable. perhaps more so than people who believe in an afterlife, because this is all i\\\'ve got. because of this belief, i\\\'ve slowly been workin my way to vegetarianism (stuck on the pescatarian level... just can\\\'t stop eatin fish it\\\'s so delish). and i think you\\\'d be surprised to see that animals do commonly exhibit what humans would call "morals" in their lives. for example,  there are several types of squirrels, lemmings, and prarie dogs that will let out a warning cry if they see a predator, which 99% of the time will result in the predator eating them. essentially they sacrifice themselves for their families, it\\\'s something most scientists refer to as "kin selection". if you were to replace this example with humans, you could say that the sacrificer would be someone truly altruistic, who thought of the community first. and what of those stories you hear about occasionaly when a loyal pet saves their owner from death? are these animals acting morally? no? they just saved their owner\\\'s lives so they can get fed later on? yet animals cannot have a sense of time as we do, and cannot plan for the future. why would they act to save anyone? kin selection. why do humans act to save each other? i believe it\\\'s also kin selection. albeit, a very complex version.

i do agree with you on your closing remark though, that higher intelligence leads to a far more complex morality due to rationalized thought.

cogs react to eachother just like molecules do, but on a far more complex level. because god is far more intelligent than a simple human watch-maker, he can make something more complex. so its really the same, the ratio is just really large on one side

and yeah if we continued living like this we would end all life, but we cant just all kill ourselves, we are on this planet too and we may not be that important but we need it to live. so we have the power and the choice(which came with our intelligence) to destroy or save this planet, respect other living beings and be selfless. that power makes us the responsible care-takers

Quote from: Jeinu

Quote from: chickenim not saying that science says that it can prove that god exists or not,  i know its not their intention to prove that, what im saying is that it cant, simply because of that room situation you described or the cup/ocean situation i described

well of course science can\\\'t prove god does not exist. it\\\'s logically impossible to prove a negative. the burden of proof is on those who assert it to be true. seeing as the only proof religion often has to offer is something circular in their texts like, "god wrote the bible. the bible says god\\\'s real. god doesn\\\'t lie. therefore god is real".

nope, my proof is this universe we live in

Yup, I believe a ruthless/corrupt leader who does act on his untouchable position, and feels no guilt or remorse for what they have done, has issues. They might not be mentally unstable, but something definitely isn't wired up right. However not all leaders are ruthless and corrupt, and you don't have to be a leader to be selfish.  

The world we live in now only keeps making me think there isn't a god out there. At least, not a god that many of the monotheistic religions describe. There are many innocent people out there who are given a bad hand. People born into poverty-stricken lands through no fault but chance. Volcanos and tsunamis that destroy homes and lives. I can't believe that a god who deals in justice would be so unfair to so many people. The point of justice is that people who deserve to be punished get punished, and those who are good remain free. All I can do is appreciate how fortunate I am to be alive now.

Quote from: chicken

Quote from: rtilby the way, there was no "beginning" or anything before the big bang. scientists don't know everything about the universe, but they do know that matter as it exists in the universe is seperate from the concept of time

matter was never created

would this be a legitimate explanation of how scientists 'discovered' that?

um, it's an abridged one i guess. not sure what you're getting at.

Quote from: chickenthe way i see it, there was no chance this universe could not have been created, and if you look at evolution, there was no chance we would not have become the way we are now: it was all predestined

in what bizarre way do you see that we were predestined to evolve in the manner we have? humans may be the most intelligent creatures on earth, but we certainly still have our flaws. we are rather weak, slow, and prone to many illnesses and diseases, some that are capable of wiping out sizable numbers of us, even threatening extinction without intervention by us or even another species. we can't survive in any sort of harsh climates, and our survival skills are generally poor. before the modern age the average lifespan was around 50 years at best.

on top of all this, it took billions of years for us just to reach this point alone. it was only recently in the history of the earth that mankind was able to make its mark on this planet, and only in the last hundred years or so has the quality of life begun to improve dramatically.

to put things in perspective, if the history of the earth was squeezed into a 24-hour day, humans as we know them only appeared in a fraction of the last second of the day.

we are nothing special, and besides our mental capacity to separate ourselves from the rest of the earth's inhabitants with our higher intelligence and speech, we are simply a product of billions of years of a natural, explainable process completely devoid of anything supernatural.

we are not important, and we could be easily wiped out by the earth's natural cycles itself. look at the icelandic volcano that just erupted, disrupting all of european air traffic. and there's nothing we can do about that with all of our technology.

and you think our evolution was predestined? predestined for what?

Quote from: chickennope, my proof is this universe we live in

this answer is dodgy and a cop-out at best. you can't use statistics to prove the impossibility of the universe existing in its present state. by that logic, i can say that the placement of a specific grain of sand on a beach is a divine work of god because of its impossibility.

Quote from: ShidaYup, I believe a ruthless/corrupt leader who does act on his untouchable position, and feels no guilt or remorse for what they have done, has issues. They might not be mentally unstable, but something definitely isn't wired up right. However not all leaders are ruthless and corrupt, and you don't have to be a leader to be selfish.  

The world we live in now only keeps making me think there isn't a god out there. At least, not a god that many of the monotheistic religions describe. There are many innocent people out there who are given a bad hand. People born into poverty-stricken lands through no fault but chance. Volcanos and tsunamis that destroy homes and lives. I can't believe that a god who deals in justice would be so unfair to so many people. The point of justice is that people who deserve to be punished get punished, and those who are good remain free. All I can do is appreciate how fortunate I am to be alive now.

ok, so he has issues, and he must be punished for what he has done. and those unfortunate kids are put through an ultimate test, we will never get a reward as great as theirs if they pull through
the world as it is now is not because of god, its because of ourselves. and he doesnt take action because there is hope and because we can solve this on our own

i dont think you get it, religious people dont go around not raping and killing people because their religion says so, they accept the religion to be true because it says things that makes sense, it says those things are wrong and its fair

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: chicken

Quote from: rtilby the way, there was no "beginning" or anything before the big bang. scientists don't know everything about the universe, but they do know that matter as it exists in the universe is seperate from the concept of time

matter was never created

would this be a legitimate explanation of how scientists 'discovered' that?

um, it's an abridged one i guess. not sure what you're getting at.

Quote from: chickenthe way i see it, there was no chance this universe could not have been created, and if you look at evolution, there was no chance we would not have become the way we are now: it was all predestined

in what bizarre way do you see that we were predestined to evolve in the manner we have? humans may be the most intelligent creatures on earth, but we certainly still have our flaws. we are rather weak, slow, and prone to many illnesses and diseases, some that are capable of wiping out sizable numbers of us, even threatening extinction without intervention by us or even another species. we can't survive in any sort of harsh climates, and our survival skills are generally poor. before the modern age the average lifespan was around 50 years at best.

on top of all this, it took billions of years for us just to reach this point alone. it was only recently in the history of the earth that mankind was able to make its mark on this planet, and only in the last hundred years or so has the quality of life begun to improve dramatically.

to put things in perspective, if the history of the earth was squeezed into a 24-hour day, humans as we know them only appeared in a fraction of the last second of the day.

we are nothing special, and besides our mental capacity to separate ourselves from the rest of the earth's inhabitants with our higher intelligence and speech, we are simply a product of billions of years of a natural, explainable process completely devoid of anything supernatural.

we are not important, and we could be easily wiped out by the earth's natural cycles itself. look at the icelandic volcano that just erupted, disrupting all of european air traffic. and there's nothing we can do about that with all of our technology.

and you think our evolution was predestined? predestined for what?

Quote from: chickennope, my proof is this universe we live in

this answer is dodgy and a cop-out at best. you can't use statistics to prove the impossibility of the universe existing in its present state. by that logic, i can say that the placement of a specific grain of sand on a beach is a divine work of god because of its impossibility.

first, what im getting at was that that theory was just a guess, since we cant scientifically prove if matter was created. its outside out cup/windowsless room

and to deny that were not something special is ignorant
we are weak, imperfect and unimportant for the existance of this planet, but to god we are important, god created this planet for us, and we are only here now because we can only survive in this little period of earth's time. this whole planet was made for us, and when the time was right and when the place was save enough for us to live in, we emerged. thats what i mean by predestined. predestined to exist in this world and do what god has made us for

and lastly, what i mean by that is like that watch/watch-maker thing. if you see a simple lego block construction you know a child made that, you see a piece of clothes, a more intelligent person made that, you see a monitor, a lot of intelligent people made that, and you see the universe: a very intelligent entity made that

Quote from: chickenfirst, what im getting at was that that theory was just a guess, since we cant scientifically prove if matter was created. its outside out cup/windowsless room

and to deny that were not something special is ignorant
we are weak, imperfect and unimportant for the existance of this planet, but to god we are important, god created this planet for us, and we are only here now because we can only survive in this little period of earth's time. this whole planet was made for us, and when the time was right and when the place was save enough for us to live in, we emerged. thats what i mean by predestined. predestined to exist in this world and do what god has made us for

this is how your arguments go

P1 god thinks we're important
P2 god created this planet
C therefore god exists

that's pretty much begging the question. it's circular logic. all of your premises assume your conclusion to be true

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Man

Quote from: chickenfirst, what im getting at was that that theory was just a guess, since we cant scientifically prove if matter was created. its outside out cup/windowsless room

and to deny that were not something special is ignorant
we are weak, imperfect and unimportant for the existance of this planet, but to god we are important, god created this planet for us, and we are only here now because we can only survive in this little period of earth's time. this whole planet was made for us, and when the time was right and when the place was save enough for us to live in, we emerged. thats what i mean by predestined. predestined to exist in this world and do what god has made us for

this is how your arguments go

P1 god thinks we're important
P2 god created this planet
C therefore god exists

that's pretty much begging the question. it's circular logic. all of your premises assume your conclusion to be true

i wasnt using that to prove that god exists, i was explaining what i meant by 'predestined'

P1 were special but also weak
P2 we could only survive and utilise our intelligence in this period of time
C therefore its all planned out predestined

then i said what my religion says about that, its all predestined because god made the planet for us because he thinks were important

Quote from: chickenfirst, what im getting at was that that theory was just a guess, since we cant scientifically prove if matter was created. its outside out cup/windowsless room

there is substantial evidence to suggest matter is eternal, which means it was never created. matter may change its appearance, density, etc, but it is never created. the "something from nothing" idea, which theists typically believe, is not a supported scientific theory.

Quote
and to deny that were not something special is ignorant

actually it's the other way around haha

we are insignificant specks in this universe, so unimportant it's hard to put into words. to think otherwise is pretty high and mighty of yourself.

Quote
we are weak, imperfect and unimportant for the existance of this planet, but to god we are important, god created this planet for us, and we are only here now because we can only survive in this little period of earth's time. this whole planet was made for us, and when the time was right and when the place was save enough for us to live in, we emerged. thats what i mean by predestined. predestined to exist in this world and do what god has made us for

three issues here:
1. you assume god exists yet present no observable, scientific, reproducable or empirical evidence that he does - only anecdotes that you have faith in. it's hard to take your arguments seriously when you presume things based on what is essentially blind religious faith.

2. why do you assume that we "emerged" at the correct time? are you sure about this? are you aware that three major plagues have threatened to wipe out humans in our short time here on earth?

3. if we are predestined by a higher being, we have no free will. do you accept this?

Quoteand lastly, what i mean by that is like that watch/watch-maker thing. if you see a simple lego block construction you know a child made that, you see a piece of clothes, a more intelligent person made that, you see a monitor, a lot of intelligent people made that, and you see the universe: a very intelligent entity made that

no, i don't. when i see legos, clothes and monitors, i know a human made it because i have observed humans doing it.

when i see the universe, i see nature on a grand scale. nature is not driven by any intelligent entity. nature is automatic, an unstoppable, eternal force. it negates a creator.

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: chickenfirst, what im getting at was that that theory was just a guess, since we cant scientifically prove if matter was created. its outside out cup/windowsless room

there is substantial evidence to suggest matter is eternal, which means it was never created. matter may change its appearance, density, etc, but it is never created. the "something from nothing" idea, which theists typically believe, is not a supported scientific theory.

thats what i mean, it only suggests it, we dont know it for certain

Quote from: rtil

Quote
and to deny that were not something special is ignorant

actually it\\\'s the other way around haha

we are insignificant specks in this universe, so unimportant it\\\'s hard to put into words. to think otherwise is pretty high and mighty of yourself.

we small but if you wanna think of yourself as unimportant to anything then so be it. i wanna think of myself as someone somebody cares about

Quote from: rtil

Quote
we are weak, imperfect and unimportant for the existance of this planet, but to god we are important, god created this planet for us, and we are only here now because we can only survive in this little period of earth\\\'s time. this whole planet was made for us, and when the time was right and when the place was save enough for us to live in, we emerged. thats what i mean by predestined. predestined to exist in this world and do what god has made us for

three issues here:
1. you assume god exists yet present no observable, scientific, reproducable or empirical evidence that he does - only anecdotes that you have faith in. it\\\'s hard to take your arguments seriously when you presume things based on what is essentially blind religious faith.

2. why do you assume that we "emerged" at the correct time? are you sure about this? are you aware that three major plagues have threatened to wipe out humans in our short time here on earth?

3. if we are predestined by a higher being, we have no free will. do you accept this?

1. of course i cant prove that god exists with those things, we cant, no one can.
and you assume that god doesnt exists and base your arguments around that based on scientific suggestions, what scientists assume how things might as well work. but that isnt enough against something supernatural
2.well if we emerged in the ice age or some other dangerous time we would never survive. its like god furnished a house before we can enter it
and we survived those plagues, right?  
3. we do have a free will. what you say makes no sense. we can do whatever we want, but god already knows what were gonna do with our free will. only him and noone else

Quote from: rtil

Quoteand lastly, what i mean by that is like that watch/watch-maker thing. if you see a simple lego block construction you know a child made that, you see a piece of clothes, a more intelligent person made that, you see a monitor, a lot of intelligent people made that, and you see the universe: a very intelligent entity made that

no, i don\\\'t. when i see legos, clothes and monitors, i know a human made it because i have observed humans doing it.

when i see the universe, i see nature on a grand scale. nature is not driven by any intelligent entity. nature is automatic, an unstoppable, eternal force. it negates a creator.

how do you know nature is not driven by any intelligent entity? just because you havent seen him? you just assume god doesnt exist and base your facts on that

i know i do that too but the other way around: so in the end its all about a matter of faith

would you agree?

Quote from: chicken

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: chickenfirst, what im getting at was that that theory was just a guess, since we cant scientifically prove if matter was created. its outside out cup/windowsless room

there is substantial evidence to suggest matter is eternal, which means it was never created. matter may change its appearance, density, etc, but it is never created. the "something from nothing" idea, which theists typically believe, is not a supported scientific theory.

thats what i mean, it only suggests it, we dont know it for certain

i'm sorry, but yes, we do. the way you put it suggests we don't know for certain if, say, the theory of gravity is true. it has long been known that matter cannot be created or destroyed, it only changes form. the scale is irrelevant, and your point is moot.

Quote

Quote from: rtil

Quote
and to deny that were not something special is ignorant

actually it's the other way around haha

we are insignificant specks in this universe, so unimportant it's hard to put into words. to think otherwise is pretty high and mighty of yourself.

we small but if you wanna think of yourself as unimportant to anything then so be it. i wanna think of myself as someone somebody cares about

your friends and family care about you, not a selfish god who demands tribute and a life of submission.

Quote

Quote from: rtil

Quote
we are weak, imperfect and unimportant for the existance of this planet, but to god we are important, god created this planet for us, and we are only here now because we can only survive in this little period of earth's time. this whole planet was made for us, and when the time was right and when the place was save enough for us to live in, we emerged. thats what i mean by predestined. predestined to exist in this world and do what god has made us for

three issues here:
1. you assume god exists yet present no observable, scientific, reproducable or empirical evidence that he does - only anecdotes that you have faith in. it's hard to take your arguments seriously when you presume things based on what is essentially blind religious faith.

2. why do you assume that we "emerged" at the correct time? are you sure about this? are you aware that three major plagues have threatened to wipe out humans in our short time here on earth?

3. if we are predestined by a higher being, we have no free will. do you accept this?

1. of course i cant prove that god exists with those things, we cant, no one can.
and you assume that god doesnt exists and base your arguments around that based on scientific suggestions, what scientists assume how things might as well work. but that isnt enough against something supernatural
2.well if we emerged in the ice age or some other dangerous time we would never survive. its like god furnished a house before we can enter it
and we survived those plagues, right?  
3. we do have a free will. what you say makes no sense. we can do whatever we want, but god already knows what were gonna do with our free will. only him and noone else

let's get one thing perfectly clear before you say another word - science is NOT based on suggestions or assumptions - ever. it is based on fact. there are speculative parts of scientific theories, but if a theory is proven wrong, it is thrown away immediately and it's back to square one.

everything you have today you have science to thank for. and not once has science ever come across any scrap of evidence that would suggest a god exists.

although science is not looking for god, it is safe to say i have the advantage on this side of the argument.

i have a mountain of evidence on my side, and you have nothing but blind, speculative faith to counter it.

for point #2, early man lived through an ice age, and we will enter one again very soon. so unless god only intended modern man to inhabit the earth for, oh, 10,000 years, until things get uncomfortable again, it's a rather rude gesture.

and you don't seem to understand predestination or have studied it at all. if god knows what we will do before we do it, we do not have free will, we are pre-determined to do what god knows we are going to do.

Quote

Quote from: rtil

Quoteand lastly, what i mean by that is like that watch/watch-maker thing. if you see a simple lego block construction you know a child made that, you see a piece of clothes, a more intelligent person made that, you see a monitor, a lot of intelligent people made that, and you see the universe: a very intelligent entity made that

no, i don't. when i see legos, clothes and monitors, i know a human made it because i have observed humans doing it.

when i see the universe, i see nature on a grand scale. nature is not driven by any intelligent entity. nature is automatic, an unstoppable, eternal force. it negates a creator.

how do you know nature is not driven by any intelligent entity? just because you havent seen him? you just assume god doesnt exist and base your facts on that

why do you continue to fall back on the "god did it" argument for everything?

i'll tell you how i know nature is not driven by any intelligent entity - because we understand how they work. we don't need a god to explain how the earth spins, the trees grow and crystals form, etc. why? because we know why they happen.

for things that we don't understand, we don't just say "god does it". with that kind of attitude, why even bother trying to discover anything or advance mankind at all? there'd be no point, because there'd be no mystery behind any of it.

but clearly, there is an explanation for everything that is observable and everything that can be deduced mathematically.

nothing supernatural behind any of it. and if you ask me, it's much more fascinating when you take god out of the picture.

and i don't base my facts on the "assumption that god doesn't exist". i base my facts on facts. and there is no factual evidence to suggest god exists. and the existence of a god and any religion he might come along with as well comes with many contradictions, fairytales, bizarre stories, backwards logic and stone-age, unchanging beliefs which are a detriment to society.

i don't see any benefit in pretending to believe in such nonsense.

Quotei know i do that too but the other way around: so in the end its all about a matter of faith

would you agree?

no.

Quote from: rtiland you don't seem to understand predestination or have studied it at all. if god knows what we will do before we do it, we do not have free will, we are pre-determined to do what god knows we are going to do.

rtil is right about this. if god made humans to do something, and he knows what we will do in the future, then our actions are merely his doing, not our own. no matter what we do, he already knows what it is that we've done and we didn't have any other option because he knows what we did in the future.

the ONLY attack on this is that maybe god lives in another plane of existence in which there isn't time. then he would just know all without knowing the future. my main issue with this is that it makes everything way too complex and i don't see why you're making excuses for something that doesn't exist

science is based on what we can understand with our human minds, which is very limited. so any scientific 'evidence' against the existance of god is false as far as im concerned. thinking that we can figure it all out is pretty high and mighty and arrogant if you ask me

ok then so we dont have free will, when were born god already knows if were gonna go to heaven or hell. but the point is: we dont know (until we get there)
so if i do good things and i believe that god knows my destiny i also believe he is fair and wont send me to hell when i did good things

so what if it is a rude gesture: were here only for a while and then we leave

on your point that there would be no point to discover things if you believe god made it all: what if god also tells you to go and discover things?

and lastly: we may understand how things work, but well never know it completely, and you can either think the universe is great because of the unlikelyhood of how it could work on itself, or you could admire god for how great he is that he created a universe that works like this

i still hold by the idea that we (the planet earth and its inhabitants) are just one giant cosmic accident

i\\\'m also a firm believer that we create our own paths through life, i think destiny/fate is a silly concept

Quote from: vegetai think destiny/fate is a silly concept

if i gave you the chance to do something, and after youve done it i tell you i already knew what youre gonna do, what difference does it make? you did what you wanted right?

Quote from: chickenscience is based on what we can understand with our human minds, which is very limited. so any scientific 'evidence' against the existance of god is false as far as im concerned. thinking that we can figure it all out is pretty high and mighty and arrogant if you ask me

ok then so we dont have free will, when were born god already knows if were gonna go to heaven or hell. but the point is: we dont know (until we get there)
so if i do good things and i believe that god knows my destiny i also believe he is fair and wont send me to hell when i did good things

so what if it is a rude gesture: were here only for a while and then we leave

and lastly: we may understand how things work, but well never know it completely, and you can either think the universe is great because of the unlikelyhood of how it could work on itself, or you could admire god for how great he is that he created a universe that works like this

science is not based off of what we can understand, what we understand is based off of science

what's the point of life without free will? that doesn't make any sense to me. we're just god's bidding and we're entirely replaceable

if god did a rude gesture, then god is not all-good. why would you worship someone who isn't all good?

how do you know that we'll never know it completely? what's your basis for thinking that? look at how far we've come in only a couple thousand years. now think about how long the dinosaurs lived. if we lived that long, whose to say what we'll know by then? i'm not going to admire someone who didn't do anything because he doesn't exist

i want to make the point that you don't ASSUME that god doesn't exist. when you're born into the world, whether or not god exists, there is no evidence of her. you assume then that there is a god, otherwise you're not making any assumption. i don't assume that there aren't evil crab people, i just have no reason to believe that there ARE evil crab people

Quote from: chicken

Quote from: vegetai think destiny/fate is a silly concept

if i gave you the chance to do something, and after youve done it i tell you i already knew what youre gonna do, what difference does it make? you did what you wanted right?

well yeah, but i don't believe everyone has a pre-set 'route' through life

Quote from: chickenscience is based on what we can understand with our human minds which is very limited.

proof?

Quoteso any scientific 'evidence' against the existance of god is false as far as im concerned.

let me explain this one last time - there is no scientific evidence refuting the existence of god.

what i said was there is no scientific evidence that suggests there is a god, and there never has been.

Quotethinking that we can figure it all out is pretty high and mighty and arrogant if you ask me

this is a fascinating phenomenon theists seem to do with atheists - they take words out of the atheist's mouths and try to turn it around against them.

the fascinating part is that it never works.

i never suggested we can "figure it all out" - in fact, i have mentioned several times that the more we learn, the more questions we have. the universe is a humbling place, and the more we learn about it the more we realize we are never going to know everything.

Quoteok then so we dont have free will, when were born god already knows if were gonna go to heaven or hell. but the point is: we dont know (until we get there)
so if i do good things and i believe that god knows my destiny i also believe he is fair and wont send me to hell when i did good things

so you think whichever one of these heavily doctrinated god's from whichever may be the right religion will let you into their heaven if you simply are a good person? you also assume this god is fair? what about humanity would demonstrate that god is fair if he indeed exists?

Quoteso what if it is a rude gesture: were here only for a while and then we leave

i'm talking about the history of humanity, not the life of a single individual.

Quoteon your point that there would be no point to discover things if you believe god made it all: what if god also tells you to go and discover things?

what and where does a theistic god say this? the christian god certainly does not.

Quote from: vegeta

Quote from: chicken

Quote from: vegetai think destiny/fate is a silly concept

if i gave you the chance to do something, and after youve done it i tell you i already knew what youre gonna do, what difference does it make? you did what you wanted right?

well yeah, but i don't believe everyone has a pre-set 'route' through life

no, not "yeah". he's wrong. chicken is saying that if you do something, and i had a pretty good idea what you were going to do, you do it, and i was right, you still had free will. that's true, but god knows what you're going to do without a doubt. what this means is that you don't have a choice. whatever you do, god knew that you were going to do it. you cannot do something that he does not know that you're going to do, and none of your actions are things that he didn't already decide.

dinosaurs don't exist, satan put the fossils there ot make people not believe in god and fall into his trap
plus i think the wicked creatures that died in the flood

(https://thebackalleys.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Ftheformofmoney.blogharbor.com%2FWitchBaphomet.gif&hash=9e1741f25df40a3bafc05c394f07307a00c0af72)

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Man

Quote from: vegeta

Quote from: chicken

Quote from: vegetai think destiny/fate is a silly concept

if i gave you the chance to do something, and after youve done it i tell you i already knew what youre gonna do, what difference does it make? you did what you wanted right?

well yeah, but i don't believe everyone has a pre-set 'route' through life

no, not "yeah". he's wrong. chicken is saying that if you do something, and i had a pretty good idea what you were going to do, you do it, and i was right, you still had free will. that's true, but god knows what you're going to do without a doubt. what this means is that you don't have a choice. whatever you do, god knew that you were going to do it. you cannot do something that he does not know that you're going to do, and none of your actions are things that he didn't already decide.

well that pretty much places god as some sort of giant puppetmaster which contradicts one of the most famous bible stories - the one of adam and eve. i said 'yeah' because it actually wouldnt make a difference if chicken told me he knew what i was gonna do. it would however make a difference if he actually did know exactly what i was gonna do before i did it though. but that would be nuts.

Quote from: Billydinosaurs don't exist, satan put the fossils there ot make people not believe in god and fall into his trap

hahaha i was actually taught this in church

but the weird thing was that in my church's version god actually put the fossils there. why? nobody knew, of course

Quote from: vegeta

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Man

Quote from: vegeta

Quote from: chicken

Quote from: vegetai think destiny/fate is a silly concept

if i gave you the chance to do something, and after youve done it i tell you i already knew what youre gonna do, what difference does it make? you did what you wanted right?

well yeah, but i don't believe everyone has a pre-set 'route' through life

no, not "yeah". he's wrong. chicken is saying that if you do something, and i had a pretty good idea what you were going to do, you do it, and i was right, you still had free will. that's true, but god knows what you're going to do without a doubt. what this means is that you don't have a choice. whatever you do, god knew that you were going to do it. you cannot do something that he does not know that you're going to do, and none of your actions are things that he didn't already decide.

well that pretty much places god as some sort of giant puppetmaster which contradicts one of the most famous bible stories - the one of adam and eve. i said 'yeah' because it actually wouldnt make a difference if chicken told me he knew what i was gonna do. it would however make a difference if he actually did know exactly what i was gonna do before i did it though. but that would be nuts.

i know it contradicts the bible, but htat's because the bible is wrong. even people who are theists don't really believe in the bible because so much of it contradicts reality, and it's actually counter-evidence for god's existence

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: Billydinosaurs don't exist, satan put the fossils there ot make people not believe in god and fall into his trap

hahaha i was actually taught this in church

but the weird thing was that in my church's version god actually put the fossils there. why? nobody knew, of course

a 'test'.

Quote from: vegeta

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: Billydinosaurs don't exist, satan put the fossils there ot make people not believe in god and fall into his trap

hahaha i was actually taught this in church

but the weird thing was that in my church's version god actually put the fossils there. why? nobody knew, of course

a 'test'.

oh ya that was it to test our faith!!!!!!! haha silly god u almost got me there

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: vegeta

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: Billydinosaurs don't exist, satan put the fossils there ot make people not believe in god and fall into his trap

hahaha i was actually taught this in church

but the weird thing was that in my church's version god actually put the fossils there. why? nobody knew, of course

a 'test'.

oh ya that was it to test our faith!!!!!!! haha silly god u almost got me there

Quote from: Fuzz

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: vegeta

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: Billydinosaurs don't exist, satan put the fossils there ot make people not believe in god and fall into his trap

hahaha i was actually taught this in church

but the weird thing was that in my church's version god actually put the fossils there. why? nobody knew, of course

a 'test'.

oh ya that was it to test our faith!!!!!!! haha silly god u almost got me there

see thats exactly what im trying to say.

I think a lot of the credibility of the church has been lost not because of the religion itself, but because of stupid claims that people in catcholic churches/priests say.

well it's hard for the church to accept scientific evidence that challenges the historical accuracy of the bible, which is hardly accurate in the first place

Quote from: rtilwell it's hard for the church to accept scientific evidence that challenges the historical accuracy of the bible, which is hardly accurate in the first place

exactly I mean

there is no reason not to acknowledge these facts (evolution, big bang,etc), so why do these dumb fuckers make up even more explanations?

I have never met any genuine creationists but if i do id probably think they are very dumb

ok let me put it this way:
why saying that you know FOR A FACT that god doesnt exists is the dumbest thing you can ever say:

mass cant be created or destroyed? of course not. not with our hands and tools! not with the system of units we discovered using our eyes and hands and brains
you cant prove god exists? of course not: not with our eyes
because hes supernatural: his existance or his role with the creation of the universe or how he watches over it is SUPERNATURAL: we cant see or prove it with what we have, because all we have is the NATURAL

so in the end it all comes down to this: either you believe that all we see with our eyes and all we come to understand with our brains is all there is; or if theres something more than that.

all the prove against god will be something like this:
how do you know that the supernatural doesnt exist?
- because i cant see it
how do you know that only that which you see exists?
-because there is nothing else!
how do you know that?
-because i cant see it

ETC
all other arguments go the same as the above, only each other time you dont use sight or light but sound or any other unity of measurement that weve discovered using our eyes and brains. can you see whats wrong with the above?

whereas religion goes like this:
how do you god exists?
-because i have faith in him

so in the end: being atheistic is just as much a choice as being theistic is: you choose to believe that all you see is all there is and the evidence you have is all you see because thats all there is and you know that based on the fact that you cant see anything else etc etc

possible arguments against this:
-certainly works to religions benefit!
-everything we discover through scientific research is a fact
-yeah well you rely on blind faith, i rely on what i perseive to be true
-la! la! la! la! la!

is that the best you can come up with? it only proves my point that atheism is a choice and either you choose to live in a world where there is no justice, no hope, no reward and no higher purpose, nothing but this short life and nothing after it and youre just a worthless tiny little insignifigant speck in a big universe that doesnt care about you or your shit.

- religion just wants to control me! religion says the world is 4000 years old and that dinosaurs didnt exist!

that is only because you have experience one version of one religion, thats all i have to say

-if god exists and he knows whats gonna happen, then we have no free will

if god exists, he knows the future like in this scenario: first i travel to 10 minutes in the future using time travel, then i look at what you wrote on that piece of paper. i write it down and go back 10 minutes. i ask you to write down whatever you want in 10 minutes. after youre done i show you my piece of paper, proving that i knew what youre gonna write.
god is like that, time doesnt affect him, he doesnt exist 10 million years more than he did 10 million years ago, he is timeless

please respond

well done chicken boy  

Quote from: chickenthere is no justice, no hope, no reward and no higher purpose, nothing but this short life and nothing after it and youre just a worthless tiny little insignifigant speck in a big universe that doesnt care about you or your shit.

here's the thing - why SHOULD there be universal justice? Why SHOULD there be a 'reward'?

On the flipside, why should someone go off gallavanting saving elephants and following morals and wasting their own life doing things they might not want to do, in order to please some high lord and gain access to an eternal kingdom that they can't actually be sure even exists?

it also makes me wonder - are some of the 'nice' people in this earth genuinely positive-natured, social animals who wish to help their fellow species, or are they just people putting up this facade and performing set tasks in order to gain access to this cloud kingdom once they pop their clogs?

why should there be justice? i dont know you tell me!

wasting your life? either you choose to believe that this life is all there is, or you choose to believe that there is something afterwards.
if you 'waste' your life serving god (which i really disagree with) and in the end there is no god what does it matter? youre dead and there is nothing
but if you did waste your life NOT serving god, and there is a god in the end, then youre in trouble

saying it like this probably makes you think that the chance is 50/50, the only thing thats gonna make you more sure of the chance that there is no god is arrogance and the other is faith

and theyre not putting up a facade (at least, thats not what youre supposed to do if youre religious) you CHOOSE to do gods bidding and do nice things because you think its right and that it makes sense. and either way, a helping hand is a helping hand.

chicken I can't really keep debating against you, because you keep making a straw man out of the atheist viewpoint and use it as a reason why we should follow religion. this in my opinion, leads to the cyclic nature of the posts on this thread now.

just to clear things up for you; atheists believe in justice, just not divine justice. we look to our own laws and government to provide justice to the people, as imperfect as it might be. atheists are also not without hope. we see the world is imperfect, and we hope (and then act on that hope if we so wish) to see that it is improved for everyone by people wanting to help people. humanists might be a more fitting word for the atheist view.

Quote from: Shidachicken I can't really keep debating against you, because you keep making a straw man out of the atheist viewpoint and use it as a reason why we should follow religion. this in my opinion, leads to the cyclic nature of the posts on this thread now.

just to clear things up for you; atheists believe in justice, just not divine justice. we look to our own laws and government to provide justice to the people, as imperfect as it might be. atheists are also not without hope. we see the world is imperfect, and we hope (and then act on that hope if we so wish) to see that it is improved for everyone by people wanting to help people. humanists might be a more fitting word for the atheist view.

you cant deny that being atheistic doesnt come with those things i listed
theists believe in justice (we enforce our laws too you know) AND in divine justice(for those who are above our own laws), which makes the whole justice thing complete, but if you dont want to believe thats its complete; thats your choice

and i cant see how atheists have hope, hope for other peoples short lives yes but no hope for your eternal life(because you dont even believe in it)

Quote from: chickenand i cant see how atheists have hope, hope for other peoples short lives yes but no hope for your eternal life(because you dont even believe in it)

how about hope for the survival of our species? hope that we will create a better future for our ancestors? hope that we will eventually expand from this one planet and start unravelling the great mystery that is the universe?

\\\'life-ist\\\' is a more fitting word because you only care about this life, because you believe there isnt anything else

Quote from: vegeta

Quote from: chickenand i cant see how atheists have hope, hope for other peoples short lives yes but no hope for your eternal life(because you dont even believe in it)

how about hope for the survival of our species? hope that we will create a better future for our ancestors? hope that we will eventually expand from this one planet and start unravelling the great mystery that is the universe?

yes but that picture isnt complete either. what about YOUR better future?
religion doesnt say we should be careless of our grandchildren and our species and other lives on earth, we should be selfless in this world. we should care about this life AND the afterlife

Quote from: chicken'life-ist' is a more fitting word because you only care about this life, because you believe there isnt anything else

that's a foolish generalization - i'm quite open to the possibility of another plane of existence or time or space that we might enter once we leave 'this' life. a return to the chaos from whence we came or something. however, i don't believe whatever eventually happens to you there would be dictated by how you spent your time on the physical plane - after all, why should it? what if morals are completely irrelevant in this next plane of existence?

Quote from: vegeta

Quote from: chicken\\\'life-ist\\\' is a more fitting word because you only care about this life, because you believe there isnt anything else

that\\\'s a foolish generalization - i\\\'m quite open to the possibility of another plane of existence or time or space that we might enter once we leave \\\'this\\\' life. a return to the chaos from whence we came or something.

youre contradicting yourself
you may be open to the possibility of another plane of existance, but youre not doing anything for it. because you dont care about it-> you only care about this life.
so its not a foolish generalization

Quotehowever, i don\\\'t believe whatever eventually happens to you there would be dictated by how you spent your time on the physical plane - after all, why should it? what if morals are completely irrelevant in this next plane of existence?

if you like to believe that then so be it, i like to believe that it does matter.
its all a matter of choice whether you choose that it matters what you do here or you choose that all of it doesnt matter

enjoy your stay!

Those people who are not religios but believe that there must be something, responsible for the creation of all this or that there must be something after death than just believing in pure emptiness are no atheists, they are called agnostics. And I'm really sure that most of you who already declared themselves atheists actually are agnostics.


I think that pretty much everyone has his own religion, even if he associates himself with a religion, he will most likely create his own subreligion. No one really takes every single bit of philosophy and rules a religion has seriously. Religious rules and morals are just a kind of golden thread that helps people to live their lifes easier.

Quote from: KottThose people who are not religios but believe that there must be something, responsible for the creation of all this or that there must be something after death than just believing in pure emptiness are no atheists, they are called agnostics. And I'm really sure that most of you who already declared themselves atheists actually are agnostics.


I think that pretty much everyone has his own religion, even if he associates himself with a religion, he will most likely create his own subreligion. No one really takes every single bit of philosophy and rules a religion has seriously. Religious rules and morals are just a kind of golden thread that helps people to live their lifes easier.

being agnostic sounds pretty foolish to me. you believe there must be something yet you dont go out to discover what
if there is someone out there he mustve left a message behind and its up to you to go around and find which religion is the truth and makes the most sense

those who only practice part of their religion are also foolish, if you beleive in something you believe in the whole package. if you only pick out what you like and what is easy then you might as well be atheistic

how is agnosticism foolish? none of these gods have ever bothered to make themselves apparent in any way. agnosticism exists because of the effort god went through to make himself completely invisible if indeed one existed. sometimes a book of fairytales and the "god is in creation" stories aren't enough for people who aren't so naive.

and i can guarantee you don't follow your religion to the letter. nobody does - that's the point of theistic religion. that we are imperfect sinners who are incapable of achieving the perfect lifestyle that some higher power expects of us. therefore we need his forgiveness and must serve him and pay tribute to him until the day we die. it's a life of submission and a means of controlling people. how did you not figure this out already?

you don't seem to understand the benefits of atheism. you have to live a life in complete and utter fear that you may one day suffer eternally simply for being who you are. your motives are driven by the promise of eternal rewards.

atheists can live a life of happiness and peace knowing that all of that is nonsense. we do good from our heart, not because of a religion. we don't need religion as a crutch to validate our lives and our deeds.

Quote from: rtilhow is agnosticism foolish? none of these gods have ever bothered to make themselves apparent in any way. agnosticism exists because of the effort god went through to make himself completely invisible if indeed one existed. sometimes a book of fairytales and the "god is in creation" stories aren't enough for people who aren't so naive.

how do you know that only the things that are apparent to us exist? religious people arent naive, its the atheists who are arrogant

Quote
and i can guarantee you don't follow your religion to the letter. nobody does - that's the point of theistic religion. that we are imperfect sinners who are incapable of achieving the perfect lifestyle that some higher power expects of us. therefore we need his forgiveness and must serve him and pay tribute to him until the day we die. it's a life of submission and a means of controlling people. how did you not figure this out already?

knowing that god will forgive you for your sins if you pray for forgiveness gives us hope and happyness
and by saying 'controlling people' who controls who? god controls us? if thats the case then youre saying that he exists. theres no controlling of theres no controller
other people could not be the controller for they could not have come up with this book, and im not talking about that book of fairy tales

Quoteyou don't seem to understand the benefits of atheism. you have to live a life in complete and utter fear that you may one day suffer eternally simply for being who you are. your motives are driven by the promise of eternal rewards.

atheists can live a life of happiness and peace knowing that all of that is nonsense. we do good from our heart, not because of a religion. we don't need religion as a crutch to validate our lives and our deeds.

you dont live in utter fear except when youre atheistic and fear that god exists because then he will punsih you, and id rather believe that there can be a reward for me than believe that all there is is this life. this life is short and id be dumb if i waste this life only doing things i like and miss eternal life thats waiting for me

and how many times do i have to explain this: we dont do good because our religion says so, its a constant reminder to do good. if i didnt have goodness in my heart then i wouldnt believe that doing good is good.

also, goodness of our hearts? sounds like you believe that theres more to life than flesh and bones..

its your choice: slave of god but with an eternal reward afterwards, or a short life
theres no proof that either one of these is true or more likely than the other, as i have stated with that long post from before

its faith or no faith

I'll go for no faith then! Sounds more fun.

Quote from: chicken

Quote from: rtilhow is agnosticism foolish? none of these gods have ever bothered to make themselves apparent in any way. agnosticism exists because of the effort god went through to make himself completely invisible if indeed one existed. sometimes a book of fairytales and the "god is in creation" stories aren\\\'t enough for people who aren\\\'t so naive.

how do you know that only the things that are apparent to us exist? religious people arent naive, its the atheists who are arrogant

so...the search for knowledge is arrogant? should i instead reject modern teachings and emulate a lifestyle condoned by an ancient, irrelevant religious book on the notion that a god may one day punish me for not doing so? explain.

Quote

Quoteand i can guarantee you don\\\'t follow your religion to the letter. nobody does - that\\\'s the point of theistic religion. that we are imperfect sinners who are incapable of achieving the perfect lifestyle that some higher power expects of us. therefore we need his forgiveness and must serve him and pay tribute to him until the day we die. it\\\'s a life of submission and a means of controlling people. how did you not figure this out already?

knowing that god will forgive you for your sins if you pray for forgiveness gives us hope and happyness
and by saying \\\'controlling people\\\' who controls who? god controls us? if thats the case then youre saying that he exists. theres no controlling of theres no controller
other people could not be the controller for they could not have come up with this book, and im not talking about that book of fairy tales

no - god doesn\\\'t control people, religion does. even if there was a god, his "word" was interpreted by man. it\\\'s always been that way, and that\\\'s why religions are just as corrupt as anything else. religion has been used to brainwash and control millions of people throughout the ages.

and i\\\'m not suggesting a god exists. every time i mention god i\\\'m being hypothetical - hell i even imply that i am.

god only exists as an illusion created by man to explain things he doesn\\\'t understand in order to rationalize it.

Quote

Quoteyou don\\\'t seem to understand the benefits of atheism. you have to live a life in complete and utter fear that you may one day suffer eternally simply for being who you are. your motives are driven by the promise of eternal rewards.

atheists can live a life of happiness and peace knowing that all of that is nonsense. we do good from our heart, not because of a religion. we don\\\'t need religion as a crutch to validate our lives and our deeds.

you dont live in utter fear except when youre atheistic and fear that god exists because then he will punsih you, and id rather believe that there can be a reward for me than believe that all there is is this life. this life is short and id be dumb if i waste this life only doing things i like and miss eternal life thats waiting for me

and how many times do i have to explain this: we dont do good because our religion says so, its a constant reminder to do good. if i didnt have goodness in my heart then i wouldnt believe that doing good is good.

also, goodness of our hearts? sounds like you believe that theres more to life than flesh and bones..

"goodness of the heart" is a figure of speech. stop taking every bit of imagery you can shove a religious meaning onto and try to make it an arguing point, it doesn\\\'t work. obviously our heart is just an organ that pumps blood through our body. it\\\'d be like when i say to someone "you don\\\'t have a soul", doesn\\\'t imply i think they have a soul, it means i think they\\\'re a mean, careless person.

but surely you know this and are just playing whatever cards you can at this point.

atheists don\\\'t fear god because atheism is a belief that there is no god. so what you say doesn\\\'t make any sense.

if there were a god when i died, i do not see why they would punish me for not believing they existed, nor do i think i would be judged at all. if i did believe in a god, i would imagine them to not care about humans or the earth in the least.

i will never understand why you think a life wasted is a life lived to the fullest, where you got to experience everything you wanted and more, and would rather waste away on your knees praying and begging to some imaginary man in the sky for forgiveness for simply being human.

Quote from: chickentheres no proof that either one of these is true or more likely than the other

you don\\\'t know how wrong you are

i hope someday you find out

Quote from: rtili will never understand why you think a life wasted is a life lived to the fullest, where you got to experience everything you wanted and more, and would rather waste away on your knees praying and begging to some imaginary man in the sky for forgiveness for simply being human.

nobody believes a life lived to the fullest is a waste of life.

we dont believe in god because we fear punishment, we believe in god because we feel that he drives us away from the bad things in life and encourages us to keep being good. I dont see god as an anrgy man in the sky forcing me to do things.

I believe heaven is not an imaginary magical place in the sky, its a state of mind and well being you have during your life. some call it nirvana, some south american cultures reffered to it as "the dream of heaven" in earth.

Again, some people, (not me since I dont generally practice this), find praying as a surce of health,spiritual and mental piece, not necessarily asking for forgiveness. I dont see anything wrong with that.

but like i said before, if sitting to meditate 4 hours and praying makes you be in a positive state of mind, if THAT makes you happy, independently of if you do it because of god or for yourself, my god, just do it. Religion can cause positive reactions in people who have moral principles and believe in such things.

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: chicken

Quote from: rtilhow is agnosticism foolish? none of these gods have ever bothered to make themselves apparent in any way. agnosticism exists because of the effort god went through to make himself completely invisible if indeed one existed. sometimes a book of fairytales and the "god is in creation" stories aren't enough for people who aren't so naive.

how do you know that only the things that are apparent to us exist? religious people arent naive, its the atheists who are arrogant

so...the search for knowledge is arrogant? should i instead reject modern teachings and emulate a lifestyle condoned by an ancient, irrelevant religious book on the notion that a god may one day punish me for not doing so? explain.

no thats not what im saying. the knowledge that we have gained is as true as all the things you see around you, and that doesnt mean that its not true, but as far as religion goes, it means that its not EVERYTHING
its arrogant to think that there is nothing out there that we cant see simply because YOU cant see it, to refuse to think that there is something out there that you can never find out about, which is the supernatural
and the book may be ancient, but its not irrelevant. read something else than the bible before you say that

Quote

Quote

Quoteand i can guarantee you don't follow your religion to the letter. nobody does - that's the point of theistic religion. that we are imperfect sinners who are incapable of achieving the perfect lifestyle that some higher power expects of us. therefore we need his forgiveness and must serve him and pay tribute to him until the day we die. it's a life of submission and a means of controlling people. how did you not figure this out already?

knowing that god will forgive you for your sins if you pray for forgiveness gives us hope and happyness
and by saying 'controlling people' who controls who? god controls us? if thats the case then youre saying that he exists. theres no controlling of theres no controller
other people could not be the controller for they could not have come up with this book, and im not talking about that book of fairy tales

no - god doesn't control people, religion does. even if there was a god, his "word" was interpreted by man. it's always been that way, and that's why religions are just as corrupt as anything else. religion has been used to brainwash and control millions of people throughout the ages.

and i'm not suggesting a god exists. every time i mention god i'm being hypothetical - hell i even imply that i am.

god only exists as an illusion created by man to explain things he doesn't understand in order to rationalize it.

god created religion and if god exists than he would not make his word to be misunderstandable. and if we do interpreted it wrong then were just dropping rules and twisting words to our benefit and leisure

Quote

Quote

Quoteyou don't seem to understand the benefits of atheism. you have to live a life in complete and utter fear that you may one day suffer eternally simply for being who you are. your motives are driven by the promise of eternal rewards.

atheists can live a life of happiness and peace knowing that all of that is nonsense. we do good from our heart, not because of a religion. we don't need religion as a crutch to validate our lives and our deeds.

you dont live in utter fear except when youre atheistic and fear that god exists because then he will punsih you, and id rather believe that there can be a reward for me than believe that all there is is this life. this life is short and id be dumb if i waste this life only doing things i like and miss eternal life thats waiting for me

and how many times do i have to explain this: we dont do good because our religion says so, its a constant reminder to do good. if i didnt have goodness in my heart then i wouldnt believe that doing good is good.

also, goodness of our hearts? sounds like you believe that theres more to life than flesh and bones..

"goodness of the heart" is a figure of speech. stop taking every bit of imagery you can shove a religious meaning onto and try to make it an arguing point, it doesn't work. obviously our heart is just an organ that pumps blood through our body. it'd be like when i say to someone "you don't have a soul", doesn't imply i think they have a soul, it means i think they're a mean, careless person.

but surely you know this and are just playing whatever cards you can at this point.

atheists don't fear god because atheism is a belief that there is no god. so what you say doesn't make any sense.

if there were a god when i died, i do not see why they would punish me for not believing they existed, nor do i think i would be judged at all. if i did believe in a god, i would imagine them to not care about humans or the earth in the least.

i will never understand why you think a life wasted is a life lived to the fullest, where you got to experience everything you wanted and more, and would rather waste away on your knees praying and begging to some imaginary man in the sky for forgiveness for simply being human.

youre right about the figure of speech, and youre right about the fear, those who believe in god do fear him but also believe that he is all-forgiving. noone enters heaven by his deeds alone, but because god is merciful, thats what we believe
our fear for god is like when you get someone you really love a present and fear he or she might not like it, only in our case, the thing we give god are our lives

and i disagree that a life where you do everything you desire equals a life lived to the fullest. this is only true of you believe that all we live for is to have fun

Quote

Quote from: chickentheres no proof that either one of these is true or more likely than the other

you don't know how wrong you are

i hope someday you find out

give me ANY proof that there are no supernatural things like angels and god

p.s. Also some christians, and, well, other religous people, DO see god as an anrgy man in the sky forcing them to pray to him and DO HIS BIDDING.
i think this is one of the many missinterpretations of religion, and specially a phenomena of the human condition of fearing punishment.

Quote from: emannobody believes a life lived to the fullest is a waste of life.

chicken does.

Quote
we dont believe in god because we fear punishment, we believe in god because we feel that he drives us away from the bad things in life and encourages us to keep being good. I dont see god as an anrgy man in the sky forcing me to do things.

but god is a very angry god. have you read the bible? he killed millions of people on a whim for things he didn't like. what makes you think he's so merciful and kind now?

he even promised to slaughter those who don't believe in and worship him during his "final judgement".

Quote
I believe heaven is not an imaginary magical place in the sky, its a state of mind and well being you have during your life. some call it nirvana, some south american cultures reffered to it as "the dream of heaven" in earth.

that's all good and fine, but again, have you read the bible? heaven is described very clearly.

here's just one example. Isaiah 66:22-24:

"As the new heavens and the new earth that I make will endure before me," declares the LORD, "so will your name and descendants endure. From one New Moon to another and from one Sabbath to another, all mankind will come and bow down before me," says the LORD. "And they will go out and look upon the dead bodies of those who rebelled against me; their worm will not die, nor will their fire be quenched, and they will be loathsome to all mankind."

i bet you just can't wait to be worshiping god while looking at your dead descendants and friends that your god killed for not appeasing his self-serving ways.

QuoteAgain, some people, (not me since I dont generally practice this), find praying as a surce of health,spiritual and mental piece, not necessarily asking for forgiveness. I dont see anything wrong with that.

but like i said before, if sitting to meditate 4 hours and praying makes you be in a positive state of mind, if THAT makes you happy, independently of if you do it because of god or for yourself, my god, just do it. Religion can cause positive reactions in people who have moral principles and believe in such things.

sure it can. but it's all in your mind. just like when people think god tells them to do things.

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: emannobody believes a life lived to the fullest is a waste of life.

chicken does.

no i believe a life where you do all the things you desire isnt a life lived to the fullest


serving god is a life lived to the fullest, thats what i believe

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: emannobody believes a life lived to the fullest is a waste of life.

here\\\'s just one example. Isaiah 66:22-24:

"As the new heavens and the new earth that I make will endure before me," declares the LORD, "so will your name and descendants endure. From one New Moon to another and from one Sabbath to another, all mankind will come and bow down before me," says the LORD. "And they will go out and look upon the dead bodies of those who rebelled against me; their worm will not die, nor will their fire be quenched, and they will be loathsome to all mankind."

I dont remember ever seeing this passage before but i dont think thats directed specifically towards non-believers, but to devils and evil men.

My christian education in home had a very different focus to the one portrayed in this passage you pasted, but the education that i recieved in school essentially portraied god as an asshole who did want to manipulate mankind etc, with passages similar to this one. my teachers were assholes with us and most of them did not aknowledge other religions as true or good. With time and growing up i realized that a lot of the things that these "good men" say are lies and comments formed by their prejudices on other people and life. And in order to manipulate the enormous ammount of kids in school they convince kids that they are small and meaningless towards gods plan, mere gears in the machine, to make them feel impotent and miserable, and justify their selfish acts. I was so miserable every day in that place, and so convinced that "god would hate me" if i didnt go trough christian education, that I kept being in that school for almost 4 fuckin years!!

One day I decided to leave it and move to an atheist school, and I wasnt recieved exactly with arms wide open, but in time they learned to accept my beliefs as part of me and i started to get along with these people. after that I was like "wow holy shit i wasted 4 years of my life in that place". Curiously enough, it was during my time in an atheist school where I developed my idea of god that I have today.

I have formed myself an image of god that isnt entirely depending on the bible nor in the christian church, and hey, i admit it, and a lot of christians admit it, a lot of the stuff that appears in the bible is whacky bublee do im god do what I say . As fas as I know the only thing that pisses god off is the breaking any of the 10 commandments (going agaisnt god).

I believe the bible has been interpreted,written and manipulated by angry men, similar to my ex-christian teachers, who are in frustration,resentment and fear towards the world.






that will be the last wall of text youll see from me i promise!

Quote from: chickenno thats not what im saying. the knowledge that we have gained is as true as all the things you see around you, and that doesnt mean that its not true, but as far as religion goes, it means that its not EVERYTHING
its arrogant to think that there is nothing out there that we cant see simply because YOU cant see it, to refuse to think that there is something out there that you can never find out about, which is the supernatural
and the book may be ancient, but its not irrelevant. read something else than the bible before you say that

i never said that if i can't see it with my naked eye that doesn't mean it is there.

i can't see atoms, molecules, magnetic fields, ultraviolet light, all kinds of things. but i know they are there. i know they are there because they can be observed, replicated and demonstrated scientifically and mathematically.

and we are always observing, discovering and improving new things thanks to the knowledge of those before us. that's how mankind becomes more technologically advanced. because of science, not because of a magical god in the sky.

a god never gave us everything. it's thanks to man you live in the world you do today.

Quote
god created religion and if god exists than he would not make his word to be misunderstandable. and if we do interpreted it wrong then were just dropping rules and twisting words to our benefit and leisure

but isn't your god supposed to be all knowing? if he knew people would misinterpret his word and use it to kill people, threaten people and control people, why did he give it to man? he's not making such a great name for himself these days. you'd think he'd do something about it if he's all powerful - especially now that man is learning we don't need him anymore.

Quote
youre right about the figure of speech, and youre right about the fear, those who believe in god do fear him but also believe that he is all-forgiving. noone enters heaven by his deeds alone, but because god is merciful, thats what we believe
our fear for god is like when you get someone you really love a present and fear he or she might not like it, only in our case, the thing we give god are our lives

yes i'm aware of what the fear of god is - it's a prevalent idea in the christian faith, which i was born into. the way you describe it is funny and also a good argument against not getting involved in religion as it sounds like a huge waste of time considering the effort and length of time it would take only to have the opportunity to be disappointed. for eternity.

and the 'god is merciful' thing is hard to believe, knowing the violent history of theistic religions.

Quote
and i disagree that a life where you do everything you desire equals a life lived to the fullest. this is only true of you believe that all we live for is to have fun

all humans desire is fun? this is news to me.

Quote
give me ANY proof that there are no supernatural things like angels and god

give me ANY proof there are no unicorns. no one has ever seen a unicorn, but there are stories about unicorns, and some of them say that they saw unicorns and that unicorns told them things 2,000 years ago. therefore, i believe in unicorns. you can't prove they don't exist, therefore they exist, and my argument is flawless.

this is an example of your argument on a smaller scale - which is a logical fallacy, but i'll humor you. the difference is that god invalidates his existence through man's description of him. there is substantial proof that god doesn't exist. enjoy educating yourself about the following:

• occam's razor
• omnipotence paradox
• omniscience paradox
• omnipresence paradox
• the theodice problem/the problem of evil
• ontological argument fallacy
• the problem of hell
• inconsistent triad

and, unlike with scientific theories, there is no factual evidence to suggest god exists in any way, so you can only wish he exists - not know. further, if god does exist, there is no way of knowing if he listens to you, hears you, or knows you exist. you can only speculate. it does not go beyond this. you must either accept your faith is blind, naive, not based on any facts or truths and live in ignorance of the overwhelming evidence against you, throw away logic, reason and rationality... or reject it all and live your life free of the crutch of religion.

life is all about suckin dick and swallowing the semen to create a feeling of acceptance between you and your lover

Quote from: chickenknowing that god will forgive you for your sins if you pray for forgiveness gives us hope and happyness

If god doesn't forgive for my minor sins because I haven't prayed enough or even dooms me because I have chosen the wrong religion he's a cuntnugget and in that case I don't want into his shitty bitty lil paradise anyway and will instead cheerfully go the path to hell.
If he was such a great guy he wouldn't want us to waste our lifes, worshipping him for nothing but the pure believe has no use at all.
The hordes of barbarians are coming. One guy falls on his knees and starts praying. Anotherone takes his Spear and his shield and beats the shit out of them.
Who has solved the problem? The praying guy who avoided the fight he feared by asking god to do the shit he was too lazy to even try to solve or the warrior who lost his life for his family, for his people and for this little prick?
And if you were god, whom would you rather send to heaven? The, according to his belief, sinless man who believes his prayer has given his men the strength to survive the fight or the less religious, maybe heathen warrior who has shed the blood of others and given his life to protect the ones he loved by actually trying to solve the problem actively?

Belief isn't a bad thing; it can give us lots of strength and believing that there is a higher being leading your sword, feather or guitar pick surely often helps. But belief isn't all that matters, not for this life and not for what comes after it. If you really believe in god, being the ultimate good being, you would as well believe that he wouldn't doom someone for having chosen the wrong religion, even if this person was the best, the most faithful and the most impeccable one that has ever lived in this world. But religions are intolerant. They don't accept each other and that is why I don't accept these religions and have my own worldview instead.


Though I'm not really religios, on paper I am Evangelic by the way which ironically actually fits to the above way of thinking... and even if it doesn't seem to be much different from being catholic... According to fuckheads like the pope I will go to hell for this coice once my life has ended.

Quotebut isn't your god supposed to be all knowing? if he knew people would misinterpret his word and use it to kill people, threaten people and control people, why did he give it to man? he's not making such a great name for himself these days. you'd think he'd do something about it if he's all powerful - especially now that man is learning we don't need him anymore.

god created the world fully knowing that 1 way or another mankind would do some fucked up shit and you'd probably think God won't do anything, of course God takes action.. i mean just recently there was a huge earthquake that fucked up haiti even worse, it's been known that Haiti is one of the few countries thats been heavily worshipping the devil and been comitting all that voodoo there's WAY more of that in history. check out pompeii, it used to be one of the biggest places to commit sins and just fuck everything that walks, God eventually took action and wiped that shit out of the world. God takes action every single day. every day there are disasters, small, big, it could be a completly different kind of disaster etc. that where created by god usually those disasters are a wake up call, you know that you realise that life is short and that that shit can happen to you too.

Sex

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: chickenno thats not what im saying. the knowledge that we have gained is as true as all the things you see around you, and that doesnt mean that its not true, but as far as religion goes, it means that its not EVERYTHING
its arrogant to think that there is nothing out there that we cant see simply because YOU cant see it, to refuse to think that there is something out there that you can never find out about, which is the supernatural
and the book may be ancient, but its not irrelevant. read something else than the bible before you say that

i never said that if i can't see it with my naked eye that doesn't mean it is there.

i can't see atoms, molecules, magnetic fields, ultraviolet light, all kinds of things. but i know they are there. i know they are there because they can be observed, replicated and demonstrated scientifically and mathematically.

which is an extension of our 'sight' or that which we can comprehend and understand and explain

Quote
and we are always observing, discovering and improving new things thanks to the knowledge of those before us. that's how mankind becomes more technologically advanced. because of science, not because of a magical god in the sky.

a god never gave us everything. it's thanks to man you live in the world you do today.

yes we are discovering more and more of that which god has given us

Quote

Quotegod created religion and if god exists than he would not make his word to be misunderstandable. and if we do interpreted it wrong then were just dropping rules and twisting words to our benefit and leisure

but isn't your god supposed to be all knowing? if he knew people would misinterpret his word and use it to kill people, threaten people and control people, why did he give it to man? he's not making such a great name for himself these days. you'd think he'd do something about it if he's all powerful - especially now that man is learning we don't need him anymore.

theres always gonna be evil in the world, partly because of satan
but he gave the few good ones among us a chance to go to heaven, thats why he has given it to us
and you may think we dont need him to life in this life, we need him in this life for the afterlife

Quote

Quoteyoure right about the figure of speech, and youre right about the fear, those who believe in god do fear him but also believe that he is all-forgiving. noone enters heaven by his deeds alone, but because god is merciful, thats what we believe
our fear for god is like when you get someone you really love a present and fear he or she might not like it, only in our case, the thing we give god are our lives

yes i'm aware of what the fear of god is - it's a prevalent idea in the christian faith, which i was born into. the way you describe it is funny and also a good argument against not getting involved in religion as it sounds like a huge waste of time considering the effort and length of time it would take only to have the opportunity to be disappointed. for eternity.

and the 'god is merciful' thing is hard to believe, knowing the violent history of theistic religions.

the violent history isnt because of god, its because of man

god didnt create evil he created only good
evil just occurs when there is no good, just like how a shadow comes where there is no light, cold where there is no warmth

Quote

Quoteand i disagree that a life where you do everything you desire equals a life lived to the fullest. this is only true of you believe that all we live for is to have fun

all humans desire is fun? this is news to me.

fun, or anything you desire. its a matter of how you define 'living to the fullest'
you define it as doing what you like for the sake of this life
i define it doing what i like, which is using it to try and get a place in heaven

Quote

Quotegive me ANY proof that there are no supernatural things like angels and god

give me ANY proof there are no unicorns. no one has ever seen a unicorn, but there are stories about unicorns, and some of them say that they saw unicorns and that unicorns told them things 2,000 years ago. therefore, i believe in unicorns. you can't prove they don't exist, therefore they exist, and my argument is flawless.

thats not what i said. if you wanna do it with unicorns it would be like this:

give me ANY proof there are no unicorns. no one has ever seen a unicorn, but there are stories about unicorns, and some of them say that they saw unicorns and that unicorns told them things 2,000 years ago.  you can't prove they don't exist, therefore i can choose to believe in them or i can choose not to, and i choose to because i like to, its my choice

only with god i also choose to believe in him because it makes sense to me because then there is justice, purpose etc.

and with unicorns you can prove if they existed or not by looking for fossils or any biological proof, but with god you cant, because hes supernatural. all we can grasp and understand is the natural

Quote

this is an example of your argument on a smaller scale - which is a logical fallacy, but i'll humor you. the difference is that god invalidates his existence through man's description of him. there is substantial proof that god doesn't exist. enjoy educating yourself about the following:

• occam's razor
• omnipotence paradox
• omniscience paradox
• omnipresence paradox
• the theodice problem/the problem of evil
• ontological argument fallacy
• the problem of hell
• inconsistent triad

and, unlike with scientific theories, there is no factual evidence to suggest god exists in any way, so you can only wish he exists - not know. further, if god does exist, there is no way of knowing if he listens to you, hears you, or knows you exist. you can only speculate. it does not go beyond this. you must either accept your faith is blind, naive, not based on any facts or truths and live in ignorance of the overwhelming evidence against you, throw away logic, reason and rationality... or reject it all and live your life free of the crutch of religion.

but i will educate myself on those things you listed

are all dutch people this stupidly religious

Quote from: WasimGod takes action.. i mean just recently there was a huge earthquake that fucked up haiti even worse, it's been known that Haiti is one of the few countries thats been heavily worshipping the devil and been comitting all that voodoo there's WAY more of that in history. check out pompeii, it used to be one of the biggest places to commit sins and just fuck everything that walks, God eventually took action and wiped that shit out of the world. God takes action every single day. every day there are disasters, small, big, it could be a completly different kind of disaster etc. that where created by god usually those disasters are a wake up call, you know that you realise that life is short and that that shit can happen to you too.

Yess! And as well as that god is responsible for Katrina blowing the shit outta New Orleans and giving cancer to people as rappers!

I hope you weren't being serious in that post...

keep up the good work

Quote from: chickengive me ANY proof that there are no supernatural things like angels and god

it cannot be done. before you go "HA. gotcha there!" i will explain why.

you CANNOT prove a negative. it is impossible logically, philosophically, metaphorically. it simply cannot be done. I'm sure those of you who've taken philosophy or logic and reasoning courses have talked about this in class, as i was taught. This is one of the weakest arguments for a god, in saying things like "well, you can't prove he doesn't exist !!!" and here's an example WHY:

let's say i set out to prove that reindeer cannot fly, so that i can disprove the myth of santa claus. i gather up hundreds of reindeer and start pushing them off a cliff to observe if they fly or not (ah, purely for science of course!). one by one they'll hit the ground. in the end there's going to be a large pile of unhappy, broken reindeer at the base of the cliff. does this prove my hypothesis? no, actually, it does not. Perhaps the reindeer CHOSE not to fly. santa claus enthusiasts will claim, "well it's only the 8 reindeer from the northpole that can fly and, oh, they can only do it one night out of the year." GREAT, that narrows the field of study down quite a bit, but it doesn't make for a very testable hypothesis. no, my firm belief that reindeer cannot fly is based off of my knowledge of the average reindeer's aerodynamic abilities. but hey, we can't be sure if i'm right or not until someone actually scientifically records a reindeer flying.

So, hopefully this example shows you, you can't prove a negative. Our knowledge of the universe is defined on proofs we have made, based on POSITIVE claims. the burden of proof is on those that make the claim, not the other way around. Another great example would be the way the court system is made up-- "innocent until proven guilty" -- the burden of proof is on the accuser.

Quote from: Jeinu

Quote from: chickengive me ANY proof that there are no supernatural things like angels and god

it cannot be done. before you go "HA. gotcha there!" i will explain why.

you CANNOT prove a negative. it is impossible logically, philosophically, metaphorically. it simply cannot be done. I'm sure those of you who've taken philosophy or logic and reasoning courses have talked about this in class, as i was taught. This is one of the weakest arguments for a god, in saying things like "well, you can't prove he doesn't exist !!!" and here's an example WHY:

let's say i set out to prove that reindeer cannot fly, so that i can disprove the myth of santa claus. i gather up hundreds of reindeer and start pushing them off a cliff to observe if they fly or not (ah, purely for science of course!). one by one they'll hit the ground. in the end there's going to be a large pile of unhappy, broken reindeer at the base of the cliff. does this prove my hypothesis? no, actually, it does not. Perhaps the reindeer CHOSE not to fly. santa claus enthusiasts will claim, "well it's only the 8 reindeer from the northpole that can fly and, oh, they can only do it one night out of the year." GREAT, that narrows the field of study down quite a bit, but it doesn't make for a very testable hypothesis. no, my firm belief that reindeer cannot fly is based off of my knowledge of the average reindeer's aerodynamic abilities. but hey, we can't be sure if i'm right or not until someone actually scientifically records a reindeer flying.

So, hopefully this example shows you, you can't prove a negative. Our knowledge of the universe is defined on proofs we have made, based on POSITIVE claims. the burden of proof is on those that make the claim, not the other way around. Another great example would be the way the court system is made up-- "innocent until proven guilty" -- the burden of proof is on the accuser.

if you wanna do it with unicorns it would be like this:

give me ANY proof there are no unicorns. no one has ever seen a unicorn, but there are stories about unicorns, and some of them say that they saw unicorns and that unicorns told them things 2,000 years ago. you can't prove they don't exist, therefore i can choose to believe in them or i can choose not to, and i choose to because i like to, its my choice

only with god i also choose to believe in him because it makes sense to me because then there is justice, purpose etc.

and with unicorns you can prove if they existed or not by looking for fossils or any biological proof, but with god you cant, because hes supernatural. all we can grasp and understand is the natural

if you DO think we can grasp the unnatural, that which we cant grasp, PROVE it

turns out, youre the accuser and the burden is on you

http://www.thebackalleys.com/forum/index.p...mp;#entry174847 (http://www.thebackalleys.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=8845&st=0&p=174847&#entry174847)

Quote from: chickenwhich is an extension of our 'sight' or that which we can comprehend and understand and explain

for the purposes of illustration, yes. but there are plenty of things in science we can't actually observe because it's impossible, like a 4 dimensional object. but there are broader things we can't directly observe either, like macroevolution. however, we know these things exist because we understand how they work and we have insurmountable evidence to prove it.

we did not observe mankind evolving and we never will. but we know it happened.

Quoteyes we are discovering more and more of that which god has given us

god never gave us plastics, composites, computer chips, biotechnology, pharmaceuticals, pretty much anything you use in your daily life and probably take for granted. they were created by man.

Quote
theres always gonna be evil in the world, partly because of satan

ah the old blaming it on satan fallback. one of the "problems with god" paradoxes explain why this makes no sense - most specifically the "problem of evil".

Quote
but he gave the few good ones among us a chance to go to heaven, thats why he has given it to us

what about those who are oh so unfortunate to never hear the word of (insert regionally specific god here)?

Quoteand you may think we dont need him to life in this life, we need him in this life for the afterlife

why?

Quote
the violent history isnt because of god, its because of man

of course, but they were driven by the sole belief that their god was better than someone else's god. it's religion-based warfare, and it's been going on non-stop for millenia.

Quotegod didnt create evil he created only good

according to theistic religions, god created everything - he also created evil, without exception. otherwise god is a paradox, an oxymoron, a lie.

Quote
evil just occurs when there is no good, just like how a shadow comes where there is no light, cold where there is no warmth

evil can be brought about by good intentions. not sure what you're getting at.

Quote
thats not what i said. if you wanna do it with unicorns it would be like this:

give me ANY proof there are no unicorns. no one has ever seen a unicorn, but there are stories about unicorns, and some of them say that they saw unicorns and that unicorns told them things 2,000 years ago.  you can't prove they don't exist, therefore i can choose to believe in them or i can choose not to, and i choose to because i like to, its my choice

only with god i also choose to believe in him because it makes sense to me because then there is justice, purpose etc.

justice, purpose, morals, anything your religion claims to give you, can be explained by biology and evolution.

Quoteand with unicorns you can prove if they existed or not by looking for fossils or any biological proof, but with god you cant, because hes supernatural. all we can grasp and understand is the natural

you're missing the point. the point is that i can apply the argument to anything that no one has ever found proof of - gods included - and just say at the end of it "therefore they exist".

and supernatural beings have also made physical appearances before in stories, even some theistic gods. so the supernatural is not excluded from this analogy. in fact, people look desperately for physical evidence of jesus the son of the christian god all the time.

if we COULD prove gods existance through science then god might as well have been visible 24/7 for all to see
but thats not what believing in god means, it means believing in the supernatural , it means you feel that there should be justice and meaning

and wether you call that blind thats totally up to you

Quote from: chicken

Quote from: Jeinu

Quote from: chickengive me ANY proof that there are no supernatural things like angels and god

it cannot be done. before you go "HA. gotcha there!" i will explain why.

you CANNOT prove a negative. it is impossible logically, philosophically, metaphorically. it simply cannot be done. I'm sure those of you who've taken philosophy or logic and reasoning courses have talked about this in class, as i was taught. This is one of the weakest arguments for a god, in saying things like "well, you can't prove he doesn't exist !!!" and here's an example WHY:

let's say i set out to prove that reindeer cannot fly, so that i can disprove the myth of santa claus. i gather up hundreds of reindeer and start pushing them off a cliff to observe if they fly or not (ah, purely for science of course!). one by one they'll hit the ground. in the end there's going to be a large pile of unhappy, broken reindeer at the base of the cliff. does this prove my hypothesis? no, actually, it does not. Perhaps the reindeer CHOSE not to fly. santa claus enthusiasts will claim, "well it's only the 8 reindeer from the northpole that can fly and, oh, they can only do it one night out of the year." GREAT, that narrows the field of study down quite a bit, but it doesn't make for a very testable hypothesis. no, my firm belief that reindeer cannot fly is based off of my knowledge of the average reindeer's aerodynamic abilities. but hey, we can't be sure if i'm right or not until someone actually scientifically records a reindeer flying.

So, hopefully this example shows you, you can't prove a negative. Our knowledge of the universe is defined on proofs we have made, based on POSITIVE claims. the burden of proof is on those that make the claim, not the other way around. Another great example would be the way the court system is made up-- "innocent until proven guilty" -- the burden of proof is on the accuser.

if you wanna do it with unicorns it would be like this:

give me ANY proof there are no unicorns. no one has ever seen a unicorn, but there are stories about unicorns, and some of them say that they saw unicorns and that unicorns told them things 2,000 years ago. you can't prove they don't exist, therefore i can choose to believe in them or i can choose not to, and i choose to because i like to, its my choice

only with god i also choose to believe in him because it makes sense to me because then there is justice, purpose etc.

and with unicorns you can prove if they existed or not by looking for fossils or any biological proof, but with god you cant, because hes supernatural. all we can grasp and understand is the natural

if you DO think we can grasp the unnatural, that which we cant grasp, PROVE it

turns out, youre the accuser and the burden is on you

you completely missed the point. read it over a few more times. i am not the one saying you can grasp the supernatural/unnatural. i have no proof of the supernatural/unnatural, so i have no reason to believe it. you rebuttal really doesn't make logical sense.

this pope was an ex nazi youth right

Quote from: chickenturns out, youre the accuser and the burden is on you

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man)

Quote from: chickenif we COULD prove gods existance through science then god might as well have been visible 24/7 for all to see

why is that?

Quotebut thats not what believing in god means, it means believing in the supernatural , it means you feel that there should be justice and meaning

and wether you call that blind thats totally up to you

no, believing in god is FAITH, because faith does not require any single scrap of evidence. that, by definition, is naive and child-like. the christian bible even describes that believing in god requires the faith of a child. because if you think too much about it, you begin to doubt it. it's completely natural, considering there is zero evidence a god exists.

im having a deja vu

i'm going to do chicken a favor here

chicken you're going in circles now because you can't make a logical rebuttal yourself so i'm going to do it for you

i'm an atheist but chicken if you're going to be a blind theist you should at least have some sort of backup




how much of our own beliefs are made of assumptions that we don't have proof of?

we think that we ate breakfast today. we even think that we can remember what we ate. what if a demon created the universe 5 minutes ago, and he created everyone to have memories of what they did that morning? he even created us with the food in our stomaches that we supposedly ate this morning. we can't PROVE that this doesn't happen

obviously, if anyone actually believed that, you would think he was insane. no one can disprove it, but we all assume that we really DID eat breakfast today, even though we don't actually have proof of it. it could have been the demon

the same thing goes for almost all knowledge we read in textbooks. they say that china has a population of a billion, that 6 million jews were killed in the holocaust. did you actually go to germany and see the dead bodies? did you go to china and count the population? it's doubtful that you did. you just believe it because around 99% of our knowledge and beliefs are taken from these assumptions (it's called 'testimonial evidence') that things are true

the same thing can be said about god. you would be crazy to not make the assumption that you really do exist, that you really did eat breakfast, that there are a billion people in china

therefore, it's rational to believe in god

(i think this argument has a lot of flaws but i thought i'd help chicken out)

what happened to gettign on aim taylor

oh shit sorry after dinner i got into a convo with my dad

Quote from: Taokakathis pope was an ex nazi youth right

Yes, he was a Hitler Youth in nazi germany

this thread is a perfect example of why a debate forum is a bad idea

this chihuahua song makes me want to leave any thread

Quote from: Old-Manthis thread is a perfect example of why a debate forum is a bad idea

actually i think right now this and the other thread are the only good threads on tba

i agree

this thread is very enlightening indeed

Im gonna have to call this threwd an epic fail

oh hey billy has an autoplay in his sig good thing i don't have quicktime installed

Quote from: systechoh hey billy has an autoplay in his sig

not anymore

oops sorry billy no hard feelings.................

whats going on in this thread

wow thanks a fucking lot systech

Quote from: J_Seedwhats going on in this thread

Something about falling reindeer, unicorns and dancing chihuahuas

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manany religion other than atheism (which IS a religion it's just not a theistic religion)

Atheism is nothing more than the absence of a belief in any gods (occasionally, specifically the disbelief in particular gods). A religion is composed of doctrines, rules, customs, morals, texts, traditions, holidays, myths, some sort of belief in (and usually worship for) something divine or supernatural. The term atheism has nothing to do with any of those things. To suggest that atheism is a religion is really just nonsense. What would that even mean? Let's live our lives based on the things that god didn't say, because he isn't real? At best a person's atheism has an indirect influence on their morality. For example, something like "It's okay to work on Sunday because it's just like any other day of the week and it doesn't matter that a commandment says I shalt not because that god doesn't exist." The conclusion "it is okay to work on Sunday" doesn't come from "I do not believe in god." Sunday is okay by default. For that matter, saying "atheism is a religion" is like saying "monotheism is a religion." It isn't. It's a very specific and individual beleif about god(s). However, a religion can be atheistic if it has no gods.

Neverminding the semantics, I think you'd find that the overwhelming majority of people that describe themselves as athiests generally mean that they are likewise a-religious and have no beliefs in anything supernatural at all.

well i have realised now that all i have is faith, which is enough for me to believe in god

I don't see why we feel the need to know things like this. Maybe it just doesn't appeal to me, but why do we have to analyze everything? Everyone has their own ideals and aesthetics about beauty and such but why do we feel the need to challenge and assert these ideas against others? Why can't we just go with the flow, you know?

personally i think the world would be better off without religion, and i care about the future of the world and mankind. and if i ever had kids (yeah right) i'd want them to live in a world where they didn't have to deal with religion trying to encroach on their freedoms while demanding respect from the modern world for their stone age beliefs and backwards practices.

I'm OK with this. I see nothing wrong with his desire to arrest the pope.
But chances he'd ever succeed are, in all honesty, nil.

Quote from: BamyasiI don\\\'t see why we feel the need to know things like this. Maybe it just doesn\\\'t appeal to me, but why do we have to analyze everything? Everyone has their own ideals and aesthetics about beauty and such but why do we feel the need to challenge and assert these ideas against others? Why can\\\'t we just go with the flow, you know?

because if we did that with everything we wouldnt have a working society

Quote from: Isabella

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manany religion other than atheism (which IS a religion it\\\'s just not a theistic religion)

Atheism is nothing more than the absence of a belief in any gods (occasionally, specifically the disbelief in particular gods). A religion is composed of doctrines, rules, customs, morals, texts, traditions, holidays, myths, some sort of belief in (and usually worship for) something divine or supernatural. The term atheism has nothing to do with any of those things. To suggest that atheism is a religion is really just nonsense. What would that even mean? Let\\\'s live our lives based on the things that god didn\\\'t say, because he isn\\\'t real? At best a person\\\'s atheism has an indirect influence on their morality. For example, something like "It\\\'s okay to work on Sunday because it\\\'s just like any other day of the week and it doesn\\\'t matter that a commandment says I shalt not because that god doesn\\\'t exist." The conclusion "it is okay to work on Sunday" doesn\\\'t come from "I do not believe in god." Sunday is okay by default. For that matter, saying "atheism is a religion" is like saying "monotheism is a religion." It isn\\\'t. It\\\'s a very specific and individual beleif about god(s). However, a religion can be atheistic if it has no gods.

Neverminding the semantics, I think you\\\'d find that the overwhelming majority of people that describe themselves as athiests generally mean that they are likewise a-religious and have no beliefs in anything supernatural at all.

i suggest you go to the other thread but i\\\'m an atheist and i don\\\'t believe in the supernatural but according to the definition of religion that i\\\'m aware of that is popular among most philosophers, atheism just fits the category of religion because the definition doesn\\\'t entail any belief in the supernatural or higher powers, just the fact that you have some views that make up the way you view the world

please if your\\\'e going to respond to this, do it in the other thread (that\\\'s why i made it)

(https://thebackalleys.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fcomethatmidnight.files.wordpress.com%2F2010%2F01%2Fxenu2.jpg&hash=7109fa28a6b3e8e381a454eec9e23872a51e3f57)

aaaaa

this thread went from really bad to decent to really really gay lock it please

john Lock it lulz

debate topics are fascinating and fun to read. i dont know why anyone would want them locked.

look at whats happened since i became a mod. has tba gotten any better? not even slightly. for a while ill try not locking threads? you'll see that it wont make tba any gayer.

Because everything that had to be/ could ever be said has been said and people are apparently too intolerant to think about their own opinions due to arguments by others, questioning or being against their beliefs and because that bear in your sig looks like a fucking moogle from the old snes games without wings and that strange red ball attatched to its head. (Secret of Mana was a good game)

*member profile pic

What exactly is your problem, J_Seed?

it does look like a moogle

my bad kott it slipped out

lmfao... I was halfway done, sending you an angry pm, asking for a reason... The roots of most confilcts probably are overactings and missunderstandings...

oh my lord, praise the lord. god hates fags

whenever eman requests a thread to be locked it makes me not want to lock it ever

yeah just because right now it seems like meaningful discussion has stopped doesn't mean we need to immediately lock it

if someone else has something interesting to add they wouldnt be able to

I don't understand why threads are being locked on these boards anyway...

i dont understand how magnets work

hhhh now i have to find a new avatar so that all my fans wont get me confused with jseed
goodness gracious

its ok kian ill change mine

there more confusion

see thats kind of a problem since i was planning on making that my new avatar too

lets agree to share

im so glad we can agree on something

request to have my name changed to Jr. Seed

hey guys

i would love it if this phenomenon continued

What phenomenon?

Quote from: FuzzWhat phenomenon?

lock this thred

make me

make me

lock it

i like what you guys are doing with rtil's avatar a+

I hate turkeys. If you go to the grocery store and you stand in front of the lunchmeat section for too long, you start to get pissed off at turkeys. You see, like, turkey ham, turkey pastrami, turkey bologna... somebody needs to tell the turkeys, "man, just be yourself!"

golly gee wilikers! this is a big thread!

and we stayed on-topic for like 15 pages that has to be some kind of record

kinda, it started being about the existance of god/atheism being a religion around page 4 and kept that way but originally it started as "fuck the pope"

Psi43 posted that video for entertainment.
You should all be ashamed of yourselves.

these rtil avatars are driving me bonkers

yeah

totally nuts

(https://thebackalleys.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fupload.wikimedia.org%2Fwikipedia%2Fcommons%2F8%2F89%2FEugene_shown_in_1920_advert.jpg&hash=feb7f43cef7fe170b82497b4eb3b9075d1c38da9)

its like this and like that and like this and uh

(https://thebackalleys.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi41.tinypic.com%2F30w2hk1.jpg&hash=247a6a44ee4524d52563e682dbc54cd3b2a4269b)