Its worth pointing out here that nihilism does in fact follow from Atheism. I just doesn't exclusively follow from Atheism. That is to say, Nihilism is a reasonable conclusion of the Atheistic world view. It is not the only reasonable conclusion, but it is one of them.
Whats more, none of your examples run counter to nihilism. A Nihilist would be more than capable of being "appy with fulfilling jobs, family and friends, the enjoyment of nature, food, wine, dancing, sex. Some of even like to play Magic or debate on the internet."
Just because one views life as without meaning, does not mean one cannot enjoy said meaningless life. (I personally enjoy meaningless activities all the time - like participating in futile internet debates.)
You seem to be defining nihilism as a lack of supernatural meaning. It isn't, though you are free to invent some other term to mean that. Nihilism is a lack of meaning; it doesn't specify the kind. Atheists are free to find meaning in their lives in a variety of ways and it is legitimately meaningful to those Atheists. Likewise the idea of gods, though I don't think any gods exist, are legitimately meaningful to Theists. Meaning resides in the mind and nowhere else.
BULL. ☺☺☺☺. There is no (NONE) evidence that you can cite to showing that Atheists tend to be more educated, more tolerant, commit less violence etc.
Thats purely a "I'm an atheist, so atheist must have all these better traits" view. I'd wager that if you actually did a statistical study you'd find that the percentage of atheists and religious people in each of those categories would be just about the same.
I'm sure you'll resist every point made in this video but here ya go.
Yeah, this is true. Not everybody has the personality to be an Atheist so religious belief might stick around a long time just based on credulous people.
Most (not all) Atheists also believed the existance of GOD at least once in their life and decided not to believe because GOD has failed them; therefore they tend to set a mindset to disprove the existance of GOD by definding what is GOD and then destroy GOD with the process of logic. There is also a good number of Atheists that has a psychological disorder in wanting to prove the non-existance of GOD to the world which is equally to those wanting to prove that GOD does exists. (Ying and Yang)
Yeah, I think it's safe to say you don't understand Atheists that well. Those that were once theists do tend to feel let down in the same way that a kid can be disappointed when he finds out Santa isn't real, but you make it sound like a pretty desperate scrabble to keep convincing yourself. Which I think you are confusing with what is actually happening to most Atheists at least in this country: they keep having to explain and defend themselves in a largely religious society that doesn't understand them and is afraid of them.
The vast majority of Atheists are at peace with their beliefs in themselves.
I'm not an Atheists, so it's hard for me to relate and believe that pure Atheisim can exist becaues everything that I see has GOD within it's relationship so I can imagine an Atheists family having a complex task in raising their children as Atheists. I would also believe it's those children that are true Atheist since they never had GOD in their mindset.
I think it's a lot easier than lying to your kids. Kids see right through religion from the start. They're great at asking those millions of "why? why? why?" questions and religion can't stand up to that.
Mortality looks ugly when you suddenly realize there is no Heaven (rewards for doing good deeds) and no Hell (punishment for your sins).
Yeah, mortality sucks. Sorry.
But I don't think you make it any better by having to choose from roasting over an eternal fire or spending all your days singing praises to a celestial dictator. Give me nothingness over either of those.
What would stop a person from looting? Raping? Murder?
Self interest in society, shame from being raised right, not wanting to think of yourself as a bad person, caring about others, and fear of getting caught.
Sure there's gong to be a fear of death, maybe serving prison, but the proof of the non-existance of GOD also tells us that this is the only life we are going to live so why should we bound ourselves with silly things like morals. Why should I honor my Marriage? What would stop another man from wanting to screw my wife?
What's stopping him now? It isn't hell. It's the fact that you lock your doors, the fact that you live in a good neighbourhood, the police, your wife's ability to defend herself, and the fact that people have to want to screw her in the first place. Ha, sorry I didn't mean it like that I meant that someone would have to want to be a bad person and most people just flat out don't want to do bad things.
And you should honor your marriage because you want it to work. That's the only reason. How would your wife feel if you told her that if it weren't for that pesky God fellow you'd be sleeping around left and right? She'd be offended. She wants you to not do it because love her, not because you're afraid of hell.
I'm not seeing how that could possibly strengthen his point. He was claiming that he had a better reason for his belief than it being a pleasant belief. The "better reason" he gave wasn't a reason it all. It was a tautology.
Because if the definition of belief is and is only "accepting as true what you think to be true" then it cannot be "accepting as true what you think to be pleasant." Which would make the latter something other than belief entirely.
@colonel coo: ok that helped a little. There were some words and a few other syntactic clues missing from those sentences that made it tough to follow initially (like ending sentences, announcing when you are swtiching modes and making sure each thought has a subject and a verb.)
Atheists don't have a concept of heaven or hell. Speaking for myself, I have a distinct desire to see people in heaven and not hell. When I used to be an atheist, my desire to promote it was not at all the same.
Yeah, that's true. Heaven and Hell are stronger motivators than just being interested in the truth. But then again, there's more religious preaching per believer than there is per non-believer. So that makes sense.
And besides, we both share this earth so that's what Atheists want to improve and we think that religion interferes with progress and happiness. So that's a motivating factor.
Again, the truth is a bitter pill to swallow sometimes, but you would do well to accept this as the life lesson it is.
I've attempted to keep this on topic since my first mistake of mentioning that I have a Theology degree, which I repudiated as an appeal to authority and intellectually lazy. But if people keep bringing it up to take swipes at me, I'm going to come back to it and defend myself. You have no life lesson to teach beyond that, and calling it a life lesson is a bit of a joke. And in no way are you "pointing out" that I don't have credentials or that I didn't pay attention or that I don't get the complexity of Theology.
You are the one with the preconceptions about how someone with a theology degree would behave and you are the one who is trying to get dialectical leverage by bringing the point up. Do you think that just because you study a complex system of lies that you have to then respect that system? You don't. I know enough of the ins and outs of Christian theology and I'm comfortable saying that at this point I've demonstrated even in this thread enough theological literacy to make absurd your stance that my understanding of theology is questionable. To make a critique of theology, you cannot and should not accept the claims it makes as sensible.
*
Theology in fact arises precisely because people have questions about the faith - they see absurdities, they don't get it, the holy stories don't hold water, the scriptures contradict themselves. That's the only reason there even is theology. Religion isn't intellectually inclined and if it didn't make enough people confused it never would have occurred to religion to institute theology in the first place. My claim is that those questions, those contradictions, those absurdities, they are all valid. That's where people should be. People should be going with their primitive instincts that there is something wrong with the God stories. But theology has long ago smoothed those rocky surfaces over and I'm saying that smoothing over is a sham. The questions are real, and are good ones.
*
I understand theology but I reject much of its complexity as rationalization of a concept that has no bearing in reality. How exactly would you expect an Atheist with a theology degree to act other than how I am? Of course I am going to reject the trinity. Of course I am going to insist on the inconsistencies that I encountered in my studies as being valid points and not ones that can be dismissed with wordplay and hand waving. Or course I am going to show disdain for intimate details of the system that I consider to be a sham. Of course I am going to espouse opinions about what is theologically normative that's different than you - there is no consensus and to pretend that there is is the hallmark of the believer!
One last point: I did not say that I attended American University. I said that I attended an American University. I do make the concession that the objections to faith I am making are not all sophisticated ones: they're primitive ones that anyone can make, not just someone who knew details of a theological system. I think those are the strongest objections and that's why I use them, not because I don't have technical objections, which I also do and have done. Please don't confuse that point. Now when you are ready to get back to the point, so am I.
Ugh. I'm tempted to ignore Highroller since he is trolling me more but then again he is far more worthy an opponent than mystery, who is barely putting sentences together and never gives me even a single sentence that makes me think. In fact all of his posts make my mind go as blank as the content they contain. Okay, I'll ignore mystery (barring some good point made in the first sentence of any paragraph) and engage a troll more suited to make me think.
Almost all of the notions in Christianity about personal responsibility come from Paul and the letters. The Gospels alone paint a very drastically different picture. Of course you can stretch things and find the message there if you are looking but the Gospels are only bound to the letters of Paul by book glue, not by similarity of message.
You're not making any sense. You seem to be accusing God of committing murder but acknowledging that God is Himself Jesus. One cannot murder oneself.
I invoke the insanity of the Trinity. Tell me what I need to prove to make my point and I will invoke the theological flexibility of the trinitarian relationships to make my point. It's a soft spot and leaves Christianity very open. An openness I will use.
It's your argument that doesn't make any sense. You're accusing God as being morally unjust for somehow sacrificing Himself to Himself in Jesus' willingly going to His own death and likening this to murder. I feel like you've confused yourself in creating a convoluted argument that doesn't make sense and are casting blame for your self-imposed confusion outward.
You acknowledging this point is all I wanted. Or, more specifically, that this 1984 doublespeak is doubleplusbad. The whole malarky of the trinity and the historical interactions of incarnations, ascensions, crucifixions, descentions, and resurrections are ripe for ridicule and parody - and my point is that the absurdities lie in Chrisian mythology. That's where these contradictions find their birth: in the incredibly unclear thinking about Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
My contradictions are an attempt to adopt the lexicon of this maddening absurdity.
read the pauline letters. Don't be gay, don't worship other gods, don't lie, don't be a woman who wants to speak, don't rebel against your master if you are a slave, don't .... well, the list goes on.
Seriously? Are you really asking what god should have done besides NOTHING in the face of his children suffering and dying in horrible pain and ignorance and fear?
This is what I'm talking about when I say moral illiteracy. What would you have done after a thousand years of watching people you love die while you sat in blissful omnipotence, able to save them and spare them without the slightest effort?
SERIOUSLY, what would you have done after one thousand years of watching this?
What are you talking about? Where did I imply it wasn't?
I was implying both
a) that God didn't "voluntarily accept an execution" which would be impossible for a being that could see the future with perfect clarity as a timeless member of the trinity must be able to but rather deliberately planned his death from the start to the very detail and then did it
and
b) that the notion that the jews or romans or humans had any meaningful contribution to this affair is negated by the fact that it was all a farce planned out in advance to the most minute detail executed by a control freak who needed to take center stage for his moment in the spotllight instead of admitting he had some anger problems and needed to forgive people because he might be an ☺☺☺☺☺☺☺ for condemning humnanity.
I think it's a funny image. If humans had played a meaningful role and free will were in effect, there would either have to be a plan B for the redemption of man or Jesus would have to get crucified even if the humans involved in this decision decided to go a different way and let him live. Which might involve him frighteningly putting himself to death, lashes and all.
The fact that you did not consider if the answer would be yes shows that you are not a sympathizer for rape victims. As does your previous response which glossed over the awful position the rape victim would be in carrying a fetus that would be genetically half her assaulter.
That would not be just. For starters, it would not undo the effects, because the woman would still have psychological trauma and physical harm. Second, it would be killing a child, who has committed no error or fault of his own.
It wouldn't be perfectly just but I think a life of raising a child that grows into the image of your rapist is a bit worse - no, a ☺☺☺☺ton worse that any sane science-minded person could recognize with ease - than flushing a half established tissue.
For starters, you have to understand that we're dealing with a very different concept of guilt. Guilt to a first century Jew means something totally different than guilt to us now.
I'm trading in modern moral concepts. You can have the Iron age ideas.
(And by "you have to understand", I mean, no, seriously, you should already know this if you have the credentials you claim. Honestly this whole thread is one big "Are you sure you paid attention in class?")
Here's what I meant by trolling. Our disagreement is not evidence of my lack of schooling. I wonder, since you seem to want to bring it up and measure dicks, what and where did you study; how many years of grad school did you go do, what was your GPA; how many full scholarships did you have; how many majors did you have; how many fellowships were you accepted to; can you prove any of this? Despite the fact that I have no desire to post personal information about myself to prove this point, I sleep well at night knowing that I am far better educated than you. And what that has taught me more than anything is how little that means. Even if you were in the tiny majority of people who were better educated than me it would make no difference to how I approached what you had to say. And please don't bother to answer any of these things because I don't care. I'm not even going to read it and I am going to consent to your ideas or reject them on their own merits.
Are you trying to claim that this statement somehow contradicts what I said? Because it doesn't.
yes; a life for others involves respect for others. A life devoted to making heaven come about for you and others involves violating their freedom and disrespecting them and taking any means necessary to save them.
Though it doesn't surprise me to see a believer conflate the two. You would need to do that to not label yourself an ass.
It sure does. You just are resisting clear thinking on theological matters. Either forgiveness is unconditional, in which case you can be an ass after being forgiven; or it is conditional forgiveness and you can not.
I've been running Mystic ever since WWK was spoiled, despite a lot of people calling it garbage in the cube, and it's great. A cheap tutor for some of the most broken aggro cards stapled to a useful body for 2 is a staple, IMO. Just don't expect her ability to come up frequently, though I look forward to flashing in a Bonehoard some time. I'll generally maindeck her with 2 or more equipments.
I wanted to get one based on my initial impressions but held off because of the lukewarm and hate around these fora. Damn. Shoulda gone with my gut reaction. Based on standard I should've bought a dozen, actually.
Hey, guys, hope all is well! Haven't been around much lately. Most of my free time has been sucked up by work and vacation, and I've been doing a ton of IRL cubing. I haven't had as much time to post on the forums or update my lists for which there are significant changes.
What's new in the cube world? What's the latest and greatest Morphling/Absorb debate? What's the best card no one's playing? Anyone get any particularly spicy pimp cards from the post man this week?
If anyone is interested, I recorded a video on Auction/Winston cube drafting that I posted to the In Contention Blog. I'm working with a few guys in my playgroup on a live Winston draft which I will hopefully post in the next week or so.
Long time no see! Also for me, but I apparently popped back in a little before you did.
Absorb debates to a minimum. We've got a new Morphling debate in the other thread right now... it's not too late to miss out on all the fun! Also, Aftershock, Impulse and Arcane Denial in rant's cube thread. Good stuff.
Nah, you haven't missed anything.
Need to follow that. Arcane denial always interests me. I think it's crap. So many other people I respect think it's awesome. I try to get it. I learn a little more about Magic and end up eventually still not liking Arcane Denial.
There's a lot of spells that could be considered "unnecessary", but we use them because they're powerful. But I don't even consider these spells unnecessary.
Card selection is paramount in an environment with a metagame as diversified as the cube, where you don't know what to expect, and both your deck and your opponent's deck have a good amount of inconsistency. Card selection makes your deck more consistent, allows you to correct from flooding/drought, digs for outs and smooths your draws. I consider them all to be both powerful and staples for the cube.
I'm pretty much sold by how insane these effects are in Vintage and Legacy. They're key, they're solid, they're amazing, they're the unbanned broken.
That may not 100% translate to the cube but it does translate quite a bit. You may not get as reliable an answer since you don't have a constructed deck...yet at the same time you so much more desperately need some kind of reliability to balance out your limited deck!
We admitted we were powerless over alcohol—that our lives had become unmanageable.
Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.
It's not exactly religious -- but it sure is close. (I'm fiarly certain that those of you claiming his stance about 12 step programs and God being intertwined didn't actually know what the 12 step program involved. Now that you've seen it do you still think the anoalogy was) absurd?
NOT EXACTLY RELIGIOUS?
sorry.
Whaaaat? That's a religious creed fer crissakes! I think there are creeds where God is mentioned less in other actual religions! Being syncretist doesn't mean it's not a religion - or maybe a better word is metareligious. Certainly no Atheist or Freethinker could do these steps and that makes it a de facto religion since an Atheist is just someone without a religion. Those steps do not make any sense if you try to apply them to anything but God.
Position put forward that all persons who seek or say there is a diety deserve ridicule.
I put forward that this is not true and you shouldn't ridicule religious beliefs just yours are not the same.
Of course those who don't agree that their beliefs could possibly be wrong (ie they've reached the enlightment of the 'real-truth') immediately object and ridicule.
I take two extremes: geneocide and personal correction.
Note: ALL PERSONS who seek or say diety should be ridiculed was the position clarified several times by several posters.
Now 'perspective' becomes key I guess. Not that the need for perspective on ridicule was ever key. Just perspective if I want to show the worst impacts of enlightment of the real-truth. Hmm.
Taking it to a level people can associate with (recovering alcholics) suddenly I get told I need ever better/improved perspective. Well which is true then? Did I or did I not provide an example of religious experience and belief in deity that should not be ridiculed.
I am asking this question in an earnest desire to be respectful and aid communication and I'm sorry for the offense if the answer is no. Is English a second language for you? Because I am having a bit of a tough time following some of the nuances of your train of thought.
I am curious about the ideas behind atheist prostheltization. Would you mind clarifying?
You think you are right. (plus)
You like to convince other people of that (and/or)
You think the world would be better if there were more people who believed like you (and/or)
You like to help other people see the truth or you just care about the truth.
In the words of Doestoevsky "If God does not exist everything is permissible."
"Because God exists, anything is permissible in his name."
That's how it worked a long time before the russian gulags. God is a powerful force in whose name any evil act can be done, even by people who think they are doing good. Of course we can torture to save his soul. of course we should start a war for God's glory. Of course we should repress science and tolerance as they oppose God's will!
"I praise the God that does not exist for their not being an afterlife so I can do in this life what I want."
You think a bastard like that would have been a nice dude if he just believed in God? No, he'd be an ☺☺☺☺☺☺☺ who believed in God and used that reasoning to let him do bastard things.
If you want to reject God as the moral law giver than you are left with things that denounces the inert value of human life. Things like reductionism and nihilism. Something that atheist must reflect on if they are to be fair to Christianity.
You have a lot of work to do if you think nihilism follows from Atheism. Atheism is (and only is) rejecting all claims that gods exist. Nihilism is the rejection of all meaning in the world. Big difference, man. Not everybody put all their life's meaning in the frail egg of the God concept. Maybe you think when somebody cracks that egg they are left with nothing but a lot of people are happy with fulfilling jobs, family and friends, the enjoyment of nature, food, wine, dancing, sex. Some of even like to play Magic or debate on the internet. But I guess that would all go away if there were no invisible sky wizard, right?
Please don't misquote me. What I'm hinting at and this is the basis for the moral argument for God's existence is that for moral absolutes to exist there has to be a transcended moral law giver as naturalism never tells us of what should be but only of what is.
I really disagree here. I think Hume was flat out wrong. Ok, technically right but he is so misused.
Once you study humans very well and become appraised of various possibilities and situations and take good polls, I think that (from this mere set of facts!) you can obtain the most robust human ethics ever conceived. The only "ought" you need to derive de novo is that you should give people what they want as best you can to all people.
That's it. And that seems a pretty simple and uncontroversial assertion. From that you can start to build a society that makes people happy and all you need are solid facts and good science.
so your looking at people acting out their alter-egos (fantasy character) within a matter of days and the destruction of Mankind in a matter of weeks or a year (since those with the stronger/violent fantasies would overcome) although I'm assuming this, it could take 100 years or even 2 days, it really depends on how many people are shielding their dark fantasies because the fear of GOD.
Wow. Maybe that's what you would do if you had to drop belief in God, but perhaps you should examine how most Atheists actually tend to behave first before you start to pin that on everybody.
They tend to be more educated, tolerant, commit less violent crime, become scientists and lawyers and generally make the world a better place (probably because they value this life as the only one.)
Those that were bad before it was proven that God didnt exist are likely to either become worse or wouldnt feel the need to contain their actions... So I could see serial killers becomming spree killers.
Serial killers are mentally ill and are rarely held in check by a fear of God. They will just work that into their madness if they feel the need to.
There has always been a great amount of fear. People have just been covering it up by telling themselves that they're not really going to die, just go to a different place...over...and over...and over. It's tough to actually face your mortality but it makes you a better person to face the reality of your own death without lies to comfort you.
[quote=Soldier;/comments/11123159] Again, people are given the sudden realization that there is no afterlife. Somemay kill themselves /quote]
If you assume death is final, why would people kill themselves?
Reductionism at the heart of naturalism. Makes me wonder why people would adhere to a world view that demeans human life.
I believe based on what I think is true, not on what I think is pleasant.
Being a reductionist is just being able to see that things are composed of other things and that their properties are derived from their composite parts. It doesn't mean the mereological whole is therefore nullified; just understood as a system explicable in simpler terms.
Also I don't see how what I said was reductivist at all. I do see how it was naturalist.
Again there is a difference between physical punishment and spiritual punishment. you cannot mix the two of them together.
Utter nonsense. Not only do you take absolutely no steps to define or even casually explain what the difference is despite repeatedly using this distinction, you also ignore what seems to be obvious: when you punish someone physically, it affects their mood and disposition inevitably. And when someone's spirit is hurting and chastised they also feel that manifested in the form of real physical symptoms like fatigue, and upset stomach or a headache.
No, you're spouting off whatever you can to fill space with very little in the form of answers. And what answers you are giving are filled with errors of reasoning, are totally or somewhat off the point and usually just regurgitated sermons. And at the same time you are enjoying the liberties of floating in and out of various Christian heresies (more power to you) as it suits you to make your points and explain the trinity and defend the actions of god and Jesus in their redemption play.
May I remind you that someone asked you to explain yourself more than once on the same point and you told them politely to go ☺☺☺☺ off because no one was forcing him to read this thread? And now you are being dismissive again. Why don't you go find the original point and explain yourself on it and answer the man's question?
Unfortuantly like most of the other things that you have said this is not correct either.
Man, you are really not capable of following even the slightest subtleties, are you? I was talking about a state of affairs I consider to be entirely fictional, and presenting an interpretation of a story I found moral resonance with: all the while I stated clearly that it was heterodox.
So what was your response? To do me the favor of telling me I'm not right. I wasn't even trying to be right nor do I think anything of the sort happened! You're so off the mark here it's like going to a town hall meeting on health care and singing show tunes. What thread are you following?
It's quite disrespectful that you stay in your own world of ideas and never bother to enrich the debate by trying to understand the other person's points and worldview. If you did, you would likely have more trenchant things to say to undercut me, like I do for you, but instead you just keep talking past me.
The final sacrifice had to be perfect otherwise it would not work. the only person able to pull that off would be the Son.
Human sin is finite. Therefore it only takes a finite to reconcile man to God. Jesus is not necessary.
See? That's perfectly plausible. You may not agree it's true and I doubt you will bother yourself with condsidering it as plausible even but it makes at least as much sense as saying you need an infinite hammer to pound a finite nail.
After His death he became more he became The Son of God once again only this time he held the keys of death and still holds them to this day.
And then falls to it!!! Jesus was god and man all along! He had to be God all along if it was necessary for God to be sacrificed to reconcile man! Also, why did God not have the power over death before he killed his son? What's that about?
Again, what's bothersome is that for all of these things, he could have just done it without all this crazy fuss. Which is why this poorly constructed Christian narrative looks exactly like what it is: a religious-based hoax.
Because he is 3 beings in one. God the Son stepped down from his place as God the Son and took up the mantel as the Son of man. He was still part of the trinity only in human form.
So he is part of the trinity, but he's not God when he's on earth? Mystery, I will protect you when the other Christians start to call for you to be burnt at the stake for your beliefs.
again jesus is part of the trinity. he had the power after his death to do so. after Christ died he was no longer the Son of Man but the Son of God. Only now he had the reigns to hold domion over the earth as a gap between us and the father.
Okay, I am starting to see your workaround. You think he stopped being God between the incarnation and the resurrection. Fine. But you still contradict your own account, as I claim that all attempts to make this story make sense inevitably do.
I repeat: Jesus wasn't God when he was sacrificed and therefore the sacrifice was finite, which by your accounts was not enough.
It doesn't impinge in anyway. It can because God loved the creation that he had made even in the wickedness of their ways. So he delievered another way to redeem his creation from their fate.
I think un-godding one of the three eternal beings counts as impinging. I also think changing one of the three into a human, consubstantiation or not, counts as impinging too.
they are not flaws at all nor are they contradictions. You are trying to limit the power of God to your own understanding and knowledge. which is well not going to work.
Yeah, I'm going to limit myself to things I understand or things that can be understood. I am a rationalist. Most believers revel in jumping to conclusions about things they could have no way of knowing since that is pretty much the foundation of religious belief.
Christainity makes sense to billions of people around the world.
Irrelevant. Rape makes sense to millions of guys across the world. Islam makes sense to billions. At one time, Zeus made sense to a lot of people. Have you had enough of appealing to the masses? This can't be the first time you have pulled that stunt and I can't believe you've never been called on it before.
It's invalid. What other people believe means nothing, not even that it makes sense.
I hope that you really do not follow that line of logic either because it could be very dangerous.
I do. And reality is very dangerous. One day it's gonna kill you just like the rest of us including me. And then nothing will ever happen to you again. For me, I choose to live in reality while I still can.
I'm 100% positive I posted these, yet your quotes say Harkius. Just wondering whats up with that. Sure, end day prophecies, you might not be alive for that, but look at the other prophecies in the Bible, most of them have come true.
When four people avoid the subject of rather or not ridicule is D_E_S_E_R_V_E_D and simply state: I ridicule people who think differently than I do, then yes it is group-think.
Of course I think it's deserved! It's not to be mean, though that's clearly part of the effect, but I think religion looks a lot like a low-level mental illness that almost everyone has. Or, I guess religion is worse in that you can choose to get rid of it and probably have the power to do so whereas people who literally hear voices have no say in the matter. Religion is pervasive, irrational, unprovable, incredible, harmful bunk.
I think it's mild to say that people should smirk, roll their eyes, or sigh exasperatedly when someone starts to go on about Jesus or Mohammed.
To me, then it is a logical extension that those who ridicule the idea of diety should stand outside every AA meeting that is held and hold up signs ala West Borough Babtist style and state "you're weak and a drunk! You're brain power sucks! There is no God and you're just another wpos alcoholic!"
Well, that's just lack of perspective on your part. I don't have the time or desire to define my life in reaction to an irrational belief.
I tried to compare this infantile position with likewise but more harsh comparison to genocide. Suddenly people were offended and retorted that this was unfair.
see we can dance around the subject all day and night. But my EBA comments seems a direct spot on occureance when you let your viewpoint outwieght the evidence. The 'enlightenment' of rather or not there is a god/gods/God does nothing to address that my original statement that diest are the subjective norm and they are undeserving of ridicule.
Seriously - do you really think a majority shouldn't be ridiculed per se? That is just so bizarre!
Is all religous expression worth of ridicule? Yes has been then answer.
So here's my next question: Shouldn't alcoholics who are trying to stop drinking via AA be ridiculed for their belief in a 'higher power'?
if not, my point is proven and should be conceded.
Again, get some perspective! Maybe we can let the drunks go and believe in something if it's saving their lives literally. Then later we can try to help them see reality. Or perhaps they need to stay in the ignorance of religion for their whole lives. I don't think being an Atheist is worth dying for or killing for. But that doesn't make it less correct.
Wow, can we cut out the mystical nonsense-talk? We aren't in church bro.
I have a feeling that there's no off switch. Nonsense and non-sequitur have become part of the inner dialogue and aren't just a defense mechanism to not having a good answer.
An you must also separate Christians who actually try to be Christ-like and follow his word from those people who ☺☺☺☺ up their life, then try (and often fail) to be good Christians. Christianity, by taking "all comers", no matter how awful, and giving them the opportunity to have a clean (spiritual) slate, are not promoting crime... They're giving "irredeemable people" an "out".
I don't think irredeemable people deserve an out. I think scumballs who have done heinous things all their lives don't deserve the comfort and acceptance of a community willing to embrace them. I think rapists and murderers deserve the torment of guilt and isolation appropriate to their crimes. I think letting people off the hook, acting like they are enjoying rewards when they die is very perverse.
Especially when you consider that the same God supposedly is burning people forever for thinking for themselves and seeing through the farce he sets up in religion. Oh, and also gays and non-christians, and people who enjoyed life.
Even in the "raped your sister scenario", if we had "mind readers who could show that a person was truly penitent and it would never happen again, then outsid of deterrence value, further incarceration has no logical justification unless you believe society should exact vengeance. Even then, either viewpoint would be atheist-compatible.
Maybe just because it's never going to happen again they should still be punished. Maybe that's just what justice is, maybe they need to experience analogous suffering or grow as a person by being deprived. And maybe you just need a deterrent.
Also, saying a belief is Atheist-compatible isn't saying much. All beliefs are, outside of ones like "there is a god or gods."
if you have read them or the bible then you would know they were about personal responsibility.
I've read the bible. And I would say that the stoning was about refraining from judgment, not about responsibility. Render to Ceasar was about not caring about this world, and the woman at the well is about evangalization among the gentiles, an important point for the early church to take a stand on.
You can stretch anything to fit responsibility, but that doesn't make it what these stories were about. I was really expecting at least one good one where that was the main point. Where if you asked people afterwards what the story was about in one word without prompting them they would answer correctly.
I guess that come down to how one views Jesus's/God's sacrifice. I always saw it more as a show solidarity with sinners and wrongdoers: the perfect being degrading itself to humanity and allowing himself to suffer and die. Might not be the official view, but I always found Jesus's death as more symbolic of God;s love and understanding of his children then as a necessary tribute (if the latter is the case then I might need to talk with a theologian for a better understanding)
This is actually a very cool and interesting point. It's heterodox as all get out but narratively I think it has the most resonance. It's as if God had to become a man, realize the conditions he lived in, the indignity, the temptation, the pain, and then feel God's condemnation. I like to think that it's God that learns the lesson in this case, walking away appreciating what it means to be man, what it means to be condemned, and vowing not to condemn anyone ever again, even if he feels they deserve it.
And on that day, an immature sky-tyrant grew up just a little bit.
it is similar to the stoning of the women. Jesus is at a well, and a women comes up to him and he begins to talk. She began to get into her husband, and Christ responded that she had 5 husbands (which in those days meant she got around). The man she was with no was not her husband. He informed her to go and sin no more. AKA take responsibility for yourself.
Actually, the remarkable thing here is not the imperative to be responsible; it's the implication that she is forgiven her sins, which was un heard of for a man to do. Telling someone not to sin was an everyday response that could come from the Sanhedrin or the Pharisees or any teacher of the Law. But only Jesus could forgive and that is the only thing a Christian of the first century would be thinking about after hearing that story.
the one time that he wasn't was when he was on the cross. When he had taken the sin of the world on him. He cried My God My God or probably my Father My Father why have you forsaken me. the reason? sin. A perfect God cannot stand sin. He will not tolerate it in his kindgom.
just as matter and anti-matter cannot exist in the same space sin cannot exist in the existance of God.
Matter and anti-matter explode. I just need to send God a package with some sin in it and the whole thing will be over with.
But seriously, there are some major problems here. How can God be separated from himself on the cross? Also, how can Jesus be united to sin, condemnation, and how can he go to hell since hell is separation from God and he is supposed to be God? How can a created scenario impinge on the nature of the Trinity, divine and removed from time, and perfectly unchanging in all ways transcending creation?
These aren't mysteries. These are flaws. These are flat-out contradictions. Christianity makes no sense and CANNOT be true.
The things that i have stated are both biblically and theologically backed up.
What isn't? Literally, find me a position and I will find you three theologians who hold that position and two more that think it doesn't go far enough.
For God so loved the world that he sent his only begotten son, that whoever should believe upon him shall not perish but have everylasting life.
For while we were yet sinner's Christ died for us.
there is really are not conditions on God's love. We put conditions on love all the time. God does not.
He loves you just as much now as he did before you were born.
If I cut you would you just bleed scripture? Ya know what? I know you take pride in answering that with a "yes."
Do you think God is justified to condemn all of the people that will ever exist to earthly sickness and pain, all of creation to misery, carnivorous death and malady, and all people to eternal fire and rape because two people wanted to know the difference between good and bad?
I guess you miss the part that actions have consquence. For the wages of sin is death. That is the consquence of sin death. Not only a physical death but a spiritual death as well.
You are morally abdicating by being such a copypasta.
Seriously, though, you are just vomiting up verses and missing the point. The accusation is that God is a judgemental ☺☺☺☺☺☺☺ who has a lot of conditions for acceptance (think ...neither fornicators nor idolators... et al.) his love ends where sin begins. And eternal condemnation pretty well bridges the gap between sinner and sin and all are condemned.
Defend this ass-magnet, I dare you. He is without recourse.
Without Christ death the debt of sin could not be paid. Christ death was the final sacrifice. In biblical terms blood was considered life. without it then you were dead. So Christs blood and death go hand in hand.
Forget get the mystery elements. But it still makes zero sense. I know blood is life and sacrifice is redemption, but other than stating it is so, what use is the death of an iron-age Jew to anyone but that dead Jew?
Just because someone takes the responsibility of your actions doesn't mean that there are not other consquences involved.
I think "responsibility" is being parsed here. I think people generally accept that responsibility can't be transferred and that's a good thing that people get that. But what is the point of the tortured Jude then?
If no consequences are removed, no effect was effected. QED.
T
Just as God can forgive your sin but you are going to suffer the consquences of that sin.[/quote]
Just what the hell does forgiveness mean to this monster?
You seem to be defining nihilism as a lack of supernatural meaning. It isn't, though you are free to invent some other term to mean that. Nihilism is a lack of meaning; it doesn't specify the kind. Atheists are free to find meaning in their lives in a variety of ways and it is legitimately meaningful to those Atheists. Likewise the idea of gods, though I don't think any gods exist, are legitimately meaningful to Theists. Meaning resides in the mind and nowhere else.
I'm sure you'll resist every point made in this video but here ya go.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mbef07aQtB8
and one on the nations of the world
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VdtwTeBPYQA
Yeah, this is true. Not everybody has the personality to be an Atheist so religious belief might stick around a long time just based on credulous people.
Yeah, I think it's safe to say you don't understand Atheists that well. Those that were once theists do tend to feel let down in the same way that a kid can be disappointed when he finds out Santa isn't real, but you make it sound like a pretty desperate scrabble to keep convincing yourself. Which I think you are confusing with what is actually happening to most Atheists at least in this country: they keep having to explain and defend themselves in a largely religious society that doesn't understand them and is afraid of them.
The vast majority of Atheists are at peace with their beliefs in themselves.
I think it's a lot easier than lying to your kids. Kids see right through religion from the start. They're great at asking those millions of "why? why? why?" questions and religion can't stand up to that.
Yeah, mortality sucks. Sorry.
But I don't think you make it any better by having to choose from roasting over an eternal fire or spending all your days singing praises to a celestial dictator. Give me nothingness over either of those.
Self interest in society, shame from being raised right, not wanting to think of yourself as a bad person, caring about others, and fear of getting caught.
What's stopping him now? It isn't hell. It's the fact that you lock your doors, the fact that you live in a good neighbourhood, the police, your wife's ability to defend herself, and the fact that people have to want to screw her in the first place. Ha, sorry I didn't mean it like that I meant that someone would have to want to be a bad person and most people just flat out don't want to do bad things.
And you should honor your marriage because you want it to work. That's the only reason. How would your wife feel if you told her that if it weren't for that pesky God fellow you'd be sleeping around left and right? She'd be offended. She wants you to not do it because love her, not because you're afraid of hell.
Yep.
They usually get over it.
Oh that's funny. I didn't even catch that.
Because if the definition of belief is and is only "accepting as true what you think to be true" then it cannot be "accepting as true what you think to be pleasant." Which would make the latter something other than belief entirely.
Yeah, that's true. Heaven and Hell are stronger motivators than just being interested in the truth. But then again, there's more religious preaching per believer than there is per non-believer. So that makes sense.
And besides, we both share this earth so that's what Atheists want to improve and we think that religion interferes with progress and happiness. So that's a motivating factor.
I've attempted to keep this on topic since my first mistake of mentioning that I have a Theology degree, which I repudiated as an appeal to authority and intellectually lazy. But if people keep bringing it up to take swipes at me, I'm going to come back to it and defend myself. You have no life lesson to teach beyond that, and calling it a life lesson is a bit of a joke. And in no way are you "pointing out" that I don't have credentials or that I didn't pay attention or that I don't get the complexity of Theology.
You are the one with the preconceptions about how someone with a theology degree would behave and you are the one who is trying to get dialectical leverage by bringing the point up. Do you think that just because you study a complex system of lies that you have to then respect that system? You don't. I know enough of the ins and outs of Christian theology and I'm comfortable saying that at this point I've demonstrated even in this thread enough theological literacy to make absurd your stance that my understanding of theology is questionable. To make a critique of theology, you cannot and should not accept the claims it makes as sensible.
*
Theology in fact arises precisely because people have questions about the faith - they see absurdities, they don't get it, the holy stories don't hold water, the scriptures contradict themselves. That's the only reason there even is theology. Religion isn't intellectually inclined and if it didn't make enough people confused it never would have occurred to religion to institute theology in the first place. My claim is that those questions, those contradictions, those absurdities, they are all valid. That's where people should be. People should be going with their primitive instincts that there is something wrong with the God stories. But theology has long ago smoothed those rocky surfaces over and I'm saying that smoothing over is a sham. The questions are real, and are good ones.
*
I understand theology but I reject much of its complexity as rationalization of a concept that has no bearing in reality. How exactly would you expect an Atheist with a theology degree to act other than how I am? Of course I am going to reject the trinity. Of course I am going to insist on the inconsistencies that I encountered in my studies as being valid points and not ones that can be dismissed with wordplay and hand waving. Or course I am going to show disdain for intimate details of the system that I consider to be a sham. Of course I am going to espouse opinions about what is theologically normative that's different than you - there is no consensus and to pretend that there is is the hallmark of the believer!
One last point: I did not say that I attended American University. I said that I attended an American University. I do make the concession that the objections to faith I am making are not all sophisticated ones: they're primitive ones that anyone can make, not just someone who knew details of a theological system. I think those are the strongest objections and that's why I use them, not because I don't have technical objections, which I also do and have done. Please don't confuse that point. Now when you are ready to get back to the point, so am I.
Flaming.
Almost all of the notions in Christianity about personal responsibility come from Paul and the letters. The Gospels alone paint a very drastically different picture. Of course you can stretch things and find the message there if you are looking but the Gospels are only bound to the letters of Paul by book glue, not by similarity of message.
I invoke the insanity of the Trinity. Tell me what I need to prove to make my point and I will invoke the theological flexibility of the trinitarian relationships to make my point. It's a soft spot and leaves Christianity very open. An openness I will use.
You acknowledging this point is all I wanted. Or, more specifically, that this 1984 doublespeak is doubleplusbad. The whole malarky of the trinity and the historical interactions of incarnations, ascensions, crucifixions, descentions, and resurrections are ripe for ridicule and parody - and my point is that the absurdities lie in Chrisian mythology. That's where these contradictions find their birth: in the incredibly unclear thinking about Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
My contradictions are an attempt to adopt the lexicon of this maddening absurdity.
read the pauline letters. Don't be gay, don't worship other gods, don't lie, don't be a woman who wants to speak, don't rebel against your master if you are a slave, don't .... well, the list goes on.
Seriously? Are you really asking what god should have done besides NOTHING in the face of his children suffering and dying in horrible pain and ignorance and fear?
This is what I'm talking about when I say moral illiteracy. What would you have done after a thousand years of watching people you love die while you sat in blissful omnipotence, able to save them and spare them without the slightest effort?
SERIOUSLY, what would you have done after one thousand years of watching this?
I was implying both
a) that God didn't "voluntarily accept an execution" which would be impossible for a being that could see the future with perfect clarity as a timeless member of the trinity must be able to but rather deliberately planned his death from the start to the very detail and then did it
and
b) that the notion that the jews or romans or humans had any meaningful contribution to this affair is negated by the fact that it was all a farce planned out in advance to the most minute detail executed by a control freak who needed to take center stage for his moment in the spotllight instead of admitting he had some anger problems and needed to forgive people because he might be an ☺☺☺☺☺☺☺ for condemning humnanity.
I think it's a funny image. If humans had played a meaningful role and free will were in effect, there would either have to be a plan B for the redemption of man or Jesus would have to get crucified even if the humans involved in this decision decided to go a different way and let him live. Which might involve him frighteningly putting himself to death, lashes and all.
Ok, I'll admit I'm appealing to taste here. Are you in the "killing your son to solve a simple problem" is normal crowd?\
'Cause that's in bad taste.
The fact that you did not consider if the answer would be yes shows that you are not a sympathizer for rape victims. As does your previous response which glossed over the awful position the rape victim would be in carrying a fetus that would be genetically half her assaulter.
It wouldn't be perfectly just but I think a life of raising a child that grows into the image of your rapist is a bit worse - no, a ☺☺☺☺ton worse that any sane science-minded person could recognize with ease - than flushing a half established tissue.
I'm trading in modern moral concepts. You can have the Iron age ideas.
Here's what I meant by trolling. Our disagreement is not evidence of my lack of schooling. I wonder, since you seem to want to bring it up and measure dicks, what and where did you study; how many years of grad school did you go do, what was your GPA; how many full scholarships did you have; how many majors did you have; how many fellowships were you accepted to; can you prove any of this? Despite the fact that I have no desire to post personal information about myself to prove this point, I sleep well at night knowing that I am far better educated than you. And what that has taught me more than anything is how little that means. Even if you were in the tiny majority of people who were better educated than me it would make no difference to how I approached what you had to say. And please don't bother to answer any of these things because I don't care. I'm not even going to read it and I am going to consent to your ideas or reject them on their own merits.
I suggest you do the same.
Save us from whom? A god is Vengeant,. that's who.
yes; a life for others involves respect for others. A life devoted to making heaven come about for you and others involves violating their freedom and disrespecting them and taking any means necessary to save them.
Though it doesn't surprise me to see a believer conflate the two. You would need to do that to not label yourself an ass.
It sure does. You just are resisting clear thinking on theological matters. Either forgiveness is unconditional, in which case you can be an ass after being forgiven; or it is conditional forgiveness and you can not.
I wanted to get one based on my initial impressions but held off because of the lukewarm and hate around these fora. Damn. Shoulda gone with my gut reaction. Based on standard I should've bought a dozen, actually.
Sad.
Cubing and hairy dudes? No, that's cool. I can deal with that.
Long time no see! Also for me, but I apparently popped back in a little before you did.
Need to follow that. Arcane denial always interests me. I think it's crap. So many other people I respect think it's awesome. I try to get it. I learn a little more about Magic and end up eventually still not liking Arcane Denial.
I'm pretty much sold by how insane these effects are in Vintage and Legacy. They're key, they're solid, they're amazing, they're the unbanned broken.
That may not 100% translate to the cube but it does translate quite a bit. You may not get as reliable an answer since you don't have a constructed deck...yet at the same time you so much more desperately need some kind of reliability to balance out your limited deck!
NOT EXACTLY RELIGIOUS?
sorry.
Whaaaat? That's a religious creed fer crissakes! I think there are creeds where God is mentioned less in other actual religions! Being syncretist doesn't mean it's not a religion - or maybe a better word is metareligious. Certainly no Atheist or Freethinker could do these steps and that makes it a de facto religion since an Atheist is just someone without a religion. Those steps do not make any sense if you try to apply them to anything but God.
I am asking this question in an earnest desire to be respectful and aid communication and I'm sorry for the offense if the answer is no. Is English a second language for you? Because I am having a bit of a tough time following some of the nuances of your train of thought.
You think you are right. (plus)
You like to convince other people of that (and/or)
You think the world would be better if there were more people who believed like you (and/or)
You like to help other people see the truth or you just care about the truth.
Applies to Theists and Atheists alike.
"Because God exists, anything is permissible in his name."
That's how it worked a long time before the russian gulags. God is a powerful force in whose name any evil act can be done, even by people who think they are doing good. Of course we can torture to save his soul. of course we should start a war for God's glory. Of course we should repress science and tolerance as they oppose God's will!
You think a bastard like that would have been a nice dude if he just believed in God? No, he'd be an ☺☺☺☺☺☺☺ who believed in God and used that reasoning to let him do bastard things.
You have a lot of work to do if you think nihilism follows from Atheism. Atheism is (and only is) rejecting all claims that gods exist. Nihilism is the rejection of all meaning in the world. Big difference, man. Not everybody put all their life's meaning in the frail egg of the God concept. Maybe you think when somebody cracks that egg they are left with nothing but a lot of people are happy with fulfilling jobs, family and friends, the enjoyment of nature, food, wine, dancing, sex. Some of even like to play Magic or debate on the internet. But I guess that would all go away if there were no invisible sky wizard, right?
I really disagree here. I think Hume was flat out wrong. Ok, technically right but he is so misused.
Once you study humans very well and become appraised of various possibilities and situations and take good polls, I think that (from this mere set of facts!) you can obtain the most robust human ethics ever conceived. The only "ought" you need to derive de novo is that you should give people what they want as best you can to all people.
That's it. And that seems a pretty simple and uncontroversial assertion. From that you can start to build a society that makes people happy and all you need are solid facts and good science.
Wow. Maybe that's what you would do if you had to drop belief in God, but perhaps you should examine how most Atheists actually tend to behave first before you start to pin that on everybody.
They tend to be more educated, tolerant, commit less violent crime, become scientists and lawyers and generally make the world a better place (probably because they value this life as the only one.)
Serial killers are mentally ill and are rarely held in check by a fear of God. They will just work that into their madness if they feel the need to.
There has always been a great amount of fear. People have just been covering it up by telling themselves that they're not really going to die, just go to a different place...over...and over...and over. It's tough to actually face your mortality but it makes you a better person to face the reality of your own death without lies to comfort you.
[quote=Soldier;/comments/11123159] Again, people are given the sudden realization that there is no afterlife. Somemay kill themselves /quote]
If you assume death is final, why would people kill themselves?
I believe based on what I think is true, not on what I think is pleasant.
Being a reductionist is just being able to see that things are composed of other things and that their properties are derived from their composite parts. It doesn't mean the mereological whole is therefore nullified; just understood as a system explicable in simpler terms.
Also I don't see how what I said was reductivist at all. I do see how it was naturalist.
Utter nonsense. Not only do you take absolutely no steps to define or even casually explain what the difference is despite repeatedly using this distinction, you also ignore what seems to be obvious: when you punish someone physically, it affects their mood and disposition inevitably. And when someone's spirit is hurting and chastised they also feel that manifested in the form of real physical symptoms like fatigue, and upset stomach or a headache.
Try defending the moral standards of your god, not decrying me for having some.
No, you're spouting off whatever you can to fill space with very little in the form of answers. And what answers you are giving are filled with errors of reasoning, are totally or somewhat off the point and usually just regurgitated sermons. And at the same time you are enjoying the liberties of floating in and out of various Christian heresies (more power to you) as it suits you to make your points and explain the trinity and defend the actions of god and Jesus in their redemption play.
May I remind you that someone asked you to explain yourself more than once on the same point and you told them politely to go ☺☺☺☺ off because no one was forcing him to read this thread? And now you are being dismissive again. Why don't you go find the original point and explain yourself on it and answer the man's question?
Man, you are really not capable of following even the slightest subtleties, are you? I was talking about a state of affairs I consider to be entirely fictional, and presenting an interpretation of a story I found moral resonance with: all the while I stated clearly that it was heterodox.
So what was your response? To do me the favor of telling me I'm not right. I wasn't even trying to be right nor do I think anything of the sort happened! You're so off the mark here it's like going to a town hall meeting on health care and singing show tunes. What thread are you following?
It's quite disrespectful that you stay in your own world of ideas and never bother to enrich the debate by trying to understand the other person's points and worldview. If you did, you would likely have more trenchant things to say to undercut me, like I do for you, but instead you just keep talking past me.
Human sin is finite. Therefore it only takes a finite to reconcile man to God. Jesus is not necessary.
See? That's perfectly plausible. You may not agree it's true and I doubt you will bother yourself with condsidering it as plausible even but it makes at least as much sense as saying you need an infinite hammer to pound a finite nail.
mystery narrowly escapes heresy here...
And then falls to it!!! Jesus was god and man all along! He had to be God all along if it was necessary for God to be sacrificed to reconcile man! Also, why did God not have the power over death before he killed his son? What's that about?
Again, what's bothersome is that for all of these things, he could have just done it without all this crazy fuss. Which is why this poorly constructed Christian narrative looks exactly like what it is: a religious-based hoax.
So he is part of the trinity, but he's not God when he's on earth? Mystery, I will protect you when the other Christians start to call for you to be burnt at the stake for your beliefs.
Okay, I am starting to see your workaround. You think he stopped being God between the incarnation and the resurrection. Fine. But you still contradict your own account, as I claim that all attempts to make this story make sense inevitably do.
I repeat: Jesus wasn't God when he was sacrificed and therefore the sacrifice was finite, which by your accounts was not enough.
I think un-godding one of the three eternal beings counts as impinging. I also think changing one of the three into a human, consubstantiation or not, counts as impinging too.
Yeah, I'm going to limit myself to things I understand or things that can be understood. I am a rationalist. Most believers revel in jumping to conclusions about things they could have no way of knowing since that is pretty much the foundation of religious belief.
Irrelevant. Rape makes sense to millions of guys across the world. Islam makes sense to billions. At one time, Zeus made sense to a lot of people. Have you had enough of appealing to the masses? This can't be the first time you have pulled that stunt and I can't believe you've never been called on it before.
It's invalid. What other people believe means nothing, not even that it makes sense.
I do. And reality is very dangerous. One day it's gonna kill you just like the rest of us including me. And then nothing will ever happen to you again. For me, I choose to live in reality while I still can.
yeah, bad copy-paste on my part. Sorry.
Of course I think it's deserved! It's not to be mean, though that's clearly part of the effect, but I think religion looks a lot like a low-level mental illness that almost everyone has. Or, I guess religion is worse in that you can choose to get rid of it and probably have the power to do so whereas people who literally hear voices have no say in the matter. Religion is pervasive, irrational, unprovable, incredible, harmful bunk.
I think it's mild to say that people should smirk, roll their eyes, or sigh exasperatedly when someone starts to go on about Jesus or Mohammed.
Well, that's just lack of perspective on your part. I don't have the time or desire to define my life in reaction to an irrational belief.
Again, get some perspective.
No, they should be secularized so people can be made well without lies.
Seriously - do you really think a majority shouldn't be ridiculed per se? That is just so bizarre!
Again, get some perspective! Maybe we can let the drunks go and believe in something if it's saving their lives literally. Then later we can try to help them see reality. Or perhaps they need to stay in the ignorance of religion for their whole lives. I don't think being an Atheist is worth dying for or killing for. But that doesn't make it less correct.
I have a feeling that there's no off switch. Nonsense and non-sequitur have become part of the inner dialogue and aren't just a defense mechanism to not having a good answer.
Yeah, forever.
Their crime? Wanting to know what gets people sent to their rooms and what doesn't (knowledge of good and evil.)
I don't think irredeemable people deserve an out. I think scumballs who have done heinous things all their lives don't deserve the comfort and acceptance of a community willing to embrace them. I think rapists and murderers deserve the torment of guilt and isolation appropriate to their crimes. I think letting people off the hook, acting like they are enjoying rewards when they die is very perverse.
Especially when you consider that the same God supposedly is burning people forever for thinking for themselves and seeing through the farce he sets up in religion. Oh, and also gays and non-christians, and people who enjoyed life.
Maybe just because it's never going to happen again they should still be punished. Maybe that's just what justice is, maybe they need to experience analogous suffering or grow as a person by being deprived. And maybe you just need a deterrent.
Also, saying a belief is Atheist-compatible isn't saying much. All beliefs are, outside of ones like "there is a god or gods."
I've read the bible. And I would say that the stoning was about refraining from judgment, not about responsibility. Render to Ceasar was about not caring about this world, and the woman at the well is about evangalization among the gentiles, an important point for the early church to take a stand on.
You can stretch anything to fit responsibility, but that doesn't make it what these stories were about. I was really expecting at least one good one where that was the main point. Where if you asked people afterwards what the story was about in one word without prompting them they would answer correctly.
Just like no one is forcing you to make sense. We're asking you to.
This is actually a very cool and interesting point. It's heterodox as all get out but narratively I think it has the most resonance. It's as if God had to become a man, realize the conditions he lived in, the indignity, the temptation, the pain, and then feel God's condemnation. I like to think that it's God that learns the lesson in this case, walking away appreciating what it means to be man, what it means to be condemned, and vowing not to condemn anyone ever again, even if he feels they deserve it.
And on that day, an immature sky-tyrant grew up just a little bit.
Actually, the remarkable thing here is not the imperative to be responsible; it's the implication that she is forgiven her sins, which was un heard of for a man to do. Telling someone not to sin was an everyday response that could come from the Sanhedrin or the Pharisees or any teacher of the Law. But only Jesus could forgive and that is the only thing a Christian of the first century would be thinking about after hearing that story.
Matter and anti-matter explode. I just need to send God a package with some sin in it and the whole thing will be over with.
But seriously, there are some major problems here. How can God be separated from himself on the cross? Also, how can Jesus be united to sin, condemnation, and how can he go to hell since hell is separation from God and he is supposed to be God? How can a created scenario impinge on the nature of the Trinity, divine and removed from time, and perfectly unchanging in all ways transcending creation?
These aren't mysteries. These are flaws. These are flat-out contradictions. Christianity makes no sense and CANNOT be true.
What isn't? Literally, find me a position and I will find you three theologians who hold that position and two more that think it doesn't go far enough.
Name three solid citations of clear cases. I am ready to be wrong on this one, and it should be easy if he was "constantly" doing it.
If I cut you would you just bleed scripture? Ya know what? I know you take pride in answering that with a "yes."
Do you think God is justified to condemn all of the people that will ever exist to earthly sickness and pain, all of creation to misery, carnivorous death and malady, and all people to eternal fire and rape because two people wanted to know the difference between good and bad?
You are morally abdicating by being such a copypasta.
Seriously, though, you are just vomiting up verses and missing the point. The accusation is that God is a judgemental ☺☺☺☺☺☺☺ who has a lot of conditions for acceptance (think ...neither fornicators nor idolators... et al.) his love ends where sin begins. And eternal condemnation pretty well bridges the gap between sinner and sin and all are condemned.
Defend this ass-magnet, I dare you. He is without recourse.
Forget get the mystery elements. But it still makes zero sense. I know blood is life and sacrifice is redemption, but other than stating it is so, what use is the death of an iron-age Jew to anyone but that dead Jew?
Not to be a stickler but it has more to do with having a dick *** inside your uterus against your desires than living in a world of sin.
I think "responsibility" is being parsed here. I think people generally accept that responsibility can't be transferred and that's a good thing that people get that. But what is the point of the tortured Jude then?
If no consequences are removed, no effect was effected. QED.
T
Just as God can forgive your sin but you are going to suffer the consquences of that sin.[/quote]
Just what the hell does forgiveness mean to this monster?