why do we blank out the word god?

[[PTG]shogun]

I believe in belief

the human mind is an amazingly complex thing, belief in something/anything can help aa situation. the old sugar pills trick

I was once told by a Jehovah witness that i and a Muslim relative would go to hell because we weren't Christian o0, tehy start staring through windows if you ignore them knocking on the door :s.

anyway, i have no problem with religion in general, it is a way of life so long as they don't expect others to agree and respect their decision not to.

EDIT: my old headmaster was a right hypocrite he was a devout christian but it was hard to get learning support from him because he didn't belive in dyslexia because there was no proof all in the mind and was faked to get attention. seriously what is up with that

 

[yantorsen]

JW's should not be compared to "normal" christians.

and I don't think Hell is a place of fire, and where people are tortured etc.

 

[Psyk]

You could say that about anyone, there's no reason to suggest he was though, so I think it unlikely beyond reasonable doubt.

Personally I take the opposite stance. We know hallucinagenic drugs exist, and we know that burning bushes are a natural occurence in that part of the world (talking about Moses here) so to me it makes sense to assume that is the more likely situation, since it doesn't involve anything that we don't already know for sure exists.

The Bible does contain lots of historical information though. But the writers have interpreted many of those events to have something to do with god. Just because the events may have happened, doesn't mean their interpretation of it is right.

 

[Jet]

In my opinion god is used to explain things that many people can't get their head around.

In the past the people couldn't imagine how weather worked therefore they assumed a god did it.

Now we know how weather works to a large degree and thus we no longer believe in a weather god.

People can't understand (or maybe we don't know yet) what the origin of the universe is or even that species evolved over millions and millions of years. Therefore people use god to explain it.

I think in the future we may also disregard other gods as wrong too.

I think if you went back in time and swapped Harry Potter for the first bibles (changed some stuff to make it more mysterious) people would probably believe it today as well.

There's no evidence it was the word of god.

 

[tomanders91]

god probably wears man thongs

 

[Gilly]

No I wouldn't, I don't have what you'd call hard evidence, but to me, the experiences of atleast 15 people I personally know, that have no motive to lie, is hard evidence. If nothing else to the exsistance of a supernatural being.

So what you're saying is you have the word of some religious nuts, and you're calling it hard evidence.

Heh, OK.

yes but clearly you lack experience with the Bible, because it's not like the bates are in plain black and white, it can easily be interpretted different ways.

Of course it can. I'm not arguing that. It was done like that on purpose so no matter what arguments are levied against it, you can come back with 'the lord works in mysterious ways' or 'it is metaphor' or whatever.

If it could be easily disproven it wouldn't be very deceitful, would it?

Poetic = written to get a msg across but not exactly historically acurate.

So metaphorical then?

and clearly to question God is fine, but to suggest you know better, is quite proposterous, God is a much more complex idea than this discussion and I don't think that the human mind can really fully understand the idea.

Proposterous? I do not agree.

Your god may be a complex idea, but I don't believe he exists, so that doesn't get us anywhere.

okay, and if you beleive that it requires faith, no? there certainly isn't much evidence for it.

so you have faith in that too?

No, not faith, opinions and guesswork. The likelyhood of it being pure chance that we're here makes a lot more sense than some dude with a beard making us all.

 

[Gilly]

Gilly's asumptions made within this thread as requested:

I think you need to grab yourself a dictionary and look up the word 'assumption'

that's because God controlls the rules of science, so that she didnt have to concieve sexually.

Yet god doesn't exist, back to square 1. You can't say 'god did this' and 'god did that' without any evidence at all, because it begets nothing.

and how do you get from "The VIRGIN Mary" that she hadn't had sex? clearly she hadn't.

Because they called her a virgin? Now who is being naive?

Prove he doesn't.

I don't need to. You made a statement, you back it up.

 

[yantorsen]

So what you're saying is you have the word of some religious nuts, and you're calling it hard evidence.

Heh, OK.

no, not at all, i don't mean what they tell me about there religion, but what has happened to them.

none of your other points seemed to be worth replying to or quoting but if you wish to point out any specific point you'd like a response to, please do.

 

[Gilly]

All of them? None of them? You claim to have proof that god exists. I have proof of aliens.

There's plenty of people that say they've encountered aliens, therefore that is proof they exist

 

[yantorsen]

All of them? None of them? You claim to have proof that god exists. I have proof of aliens.

There's plenty of people that say they've encountered aliens, therefore that is proof they exist

if someone is of stable mind and the person who claims to have seen aliens, then I have no reason to disbeleive that person.

plus I do have my own personal experience to go buy aswell as other peoples.


are you somebody that thinks christian faith is blind?

 

[Gilly]

if someone is of stable mind and the person who claims to have seen aliens, then I have no reason to disbeleive that person.

It does not surprise me that you would believe them without evidence. it is how you have been brought up

plus I do have my own personal experience to go buy aswell as other peoples.

Ah, you've met god have you?

are you somebody that thinks christian faith is blind?

I know it is

 

[yantorsen]

It does not surprise me that you would believe them without evidence. it is how you have been brought up

if that is the case, why does the british legal system trust witness acounts without them needed to back up what they say with evidence in a court?

 

[Gilly]

if that is the case, why does the british legal system trust witness acounts without them needed to back up what they say with evidence in a court?

It also acknowledges that had you 100 independant eye witnesses they'd all have seen something different.

With no corroborating accounts there is little emphasis on it, especially if there is evidence to support a different story.

 

[yantorsen]

It also acknowledges that had you 100 independant eye witnesses they'd all have seen something different.

With no corroborating accounts there is little emphasis on it, especially if there is evidence to support a different story.

thats irrelevnt, it still trusts them.

and i want to come back to faith is blind in a moment.

 

[xen_]

if that is the case, why does the british legal system trust witness acounts without them needed to back up what they say with evidence in a court?

If a witness stood in court and said a lot of supernatural things and experiences with god I very much doubt they would be believed. They also wouldn't listen to just a witness account and make a verdict would they? A court would need more then just taking the word of someone.

A witness is "evidence" of a sort, but on it's own doesn't really prove anything. Someone could have had one of these experiences from a range of different things. I'm not calling the people you know liars but I'm sure we have all hallucinated or seen things before, illness, medication etc can all cause these things. Regardless of what issue it is, I wouldn't take someones word for something if they said they had some dream or something like that for example, so it's not just a dig at religion, I wouldn't accept that sort of thing as proof for anything.

 

[Gilly]

thats irrelevnt, it still trusts them.

Not without corroboration it doesn't.

 

[semi-pro waster]

if that is the case, why does the british legal system trust witness acounts without them needed to back up what they say with evidence in a court?

I've kept out of this thread since I figured one thread on religion was enough to be going on with but I can't just let this one go. What do you mean by that? The witness statement itself is evidence, if it is uncorroborated then that will be noted and less weight attached to it because of this fact but it is still evidence which can be put before the judge/jury and considered.

 

[yantorsen]

I've kept out of this thread since I figured one thread on religion was enough to be going on with but I can't just let this one go. What do you mean by that? The witness statement itself is evidence, if it is uncorroborated then that will be noted and less weight attached to it because of this fact but it is still evidence which can be put before the judge/jury and considered.

yes that's what im saying, but Gilly just passes them off as religious nuts regardless.

 

[yantorsen]

I know it is

Some faith is blind, and blind faith can be very dangerous, especially if its coupled with a blind obedience to an evil authority.
That is true though weather the blind faith is that of religious or secular people.
But faith is not blind, because faith itself carries with it the ideas of, belief, trust, and commitment, and is therefore only as robust as the evidence for it.

Faith in the flying spaghetti monster of Richard Dawkins, is blind because there is no evidence for the flying spaghetti monster.

But faith in relativity theory is not blind because there is evidence supporting it.

I cannot speak for other religions, but faith in the Christian sense is not blind. And I do not know a serious Christian who thinks it is.

Indeed, as it says, blind faith in idols and figments of the human imagination, (in other words delusional Gods), is roundly condemned in the bible.

My faith in God and Christ as the son of god is no delusion, it is rational and evidence based, part of that evidence is objective, some of it comes from science, some from history, and some is subjective coming from experience.

Now when I said proof before hand I meant proof for me, enough evidence in other words to convince me, or in other words beyond reasonable doubt, proof is only possible in the strict sense to get in mathematics. For every other field you can't really speak of proof, but evidence and pointers of convinced beyond reasonable doubt.

It is important to note that science is limited, it seems that there is a danger of linking science with rationality, but what is beyond science isn't always necessarily irational, for instance science does not tell us if a poem or literature, work of art, or a piece of music, is beautiful or good?

Science can tell you that if you sufficiently poison someone they'll die, but it doesn't tell you if it's morally right to do so.

Science has it's limitations, as pointed out by sir peter medawar, and you can easily see it's limits,
it cannot answer the elementry questions of a child, “who am I?” “what is the purpose of my exsistance”, “where am I going?”

that will do for now.

 

[Gilly]

yes that's what im saying, but Gilly just passes them off as religious nuts regardless.

That is not what you were saying. It is the opposite of what you were saying.