oh no, people died. Death isn't that bad a thing, the person could have been going to heaven which would mean death in that case is a great thing. If they're going to hell, then they deserve it, and that's their own fault. no use crying over spilled milk as they say. Coincidences. Just like you would say that someone who was prayed for is healed by coincidence. or someone who predicted something, claiming to be told by God, turned out to be right is a coincidence. As it is with most people. Although I will contend the burning bush one. There very well may have been a burning bush at the top of the mountain, recently struck by lightning or something, and hearing a voice with an unidentifiable source would definitely lead to confusion. So you would just attribute the voice to the thing that is most prominent, and obviously a burning bush would be prominent.
Why is it their faults? People are told many, many lies throughout their lives. Should we believe everything we're told? No. It's common sense.
If it was just the Hammurabi code that had a relation to the Bible, then yeah, its a coincidence. But that and a great flood in a religious testament all from the same civilization? Yeah right. People at ~0 AD knew sure enough.
This image wraps a lot of good arguments into one. I am not going to embed it due to it's large size, but the link is here
Diablo, if this helps, I put together a little something summing up why most of us are not religious.
Norlinsky, those people are idiots. They are selfish, and only think for themselves. There are other religions out there, and there should be no reason why a school would only involve one of the many out there today. At my school, it's very diverse, and I like that. However, there's always that one little ****tard who will insult your beliefs because you haven't accepted 'Jesus' into your.. heart? Does anyone here have teachers that express their Christianity frequently? What are your views on that?
That's false. Death is a bad thing, and if they suffered a very painful, 5 day death, then it's completely ridiculous to assume that "Death in that case is a good thing". What are you saying? If I were to torture you and then brutally slaughter you it would be a good thing. Because your doing to an imaginative place? Would you really sacrifice your life to find out the truth? After killing you I could "repent" anyway and still meet you in heaven =D Your selfish to think that they could deserve going to hell. I don't even think you read my previous argument because this one is just too hard to comprehend. [FONT=Georgia, serif] [FONT=Arial, Verdana, Geneva, Helvetica, sans-serif][FONT=Arial, Verdana, Geneva, Helvetica, sans-serif]To cry over spilled milk is to remain upset about a past loss.[/FONT][/FONT][/FONT] Nope your right. No matter how unjust your god is (or ridiculous your argument), we shouldn't be upset over the deaths and suffering of 25 million. Nope your COMPLETELY RIGHT!!!! God just LET that happen to teach us a lesson. Peasant or Noble [/Sarcasm] How could you be so ignorant? P.S.-Dow...That was Beautiful! I want to post that up on Facebook. Love the top that explains how Religion always decides what's right or wrong, and how slavery was generally accepted along with sexism. Great stuff.
On Dow's link on the far right, beneath "Let me tell you bout Mithra", there is a pretty good summary on the similarities between Mithra, a Persian/ Indian god, and Jesus. Mithra was born in the 6th century BC, pre-dating Jesus, so (knowing this) it would be naive to believe that Jesus is more likely to have existed than Mithra. There's a pretty good summary of this in "The God Who Wasn't There", though I recommend the extended interviews over the movie itself.
It all boils down to whether or not you believe that God exists. I think he does. I mean come on. HUMAN LIFE is a great example that could pinpoint some proof that God exists. Scientist can't even create artificial life at all and we're more advanced now than this world has ever been. What makes you think life could just appear? Big bang? That is possibly THE dumbest theory out there. In order to create human life or any kind of life at all there has to be a creator; God. Theorists don't like the idea of there being a God because it makes their theories seem null and void. Don't believe that? You don't have to I really don't care. All I'm saying is you can accept that their is a God or you don't have to. Your choice.
The big bang theory isn't about the creation of the universe, it is what happened right after the universe was created. The only theory on that is goddidit.
Saying "Scientist can't even create artificial life" implies that creating A.I is a simple process, which couldn't be further from the truth. Being able to assess the human brain, our consciousness, to be able to replicate the result of millions of years of evolution into a better, more advanced form is certainly not easy. Organic molecules exist freely in nature, created by natural physical/ chemical reactions. Life just happens, but it takes time (millions of years) to be conscious of itself. A GOD? An omnipotent being who created humans and then designed the world to look exactly like it would have to look if evolution and other scientific principles were true, to "test" whether people would believe in him with no actual evidence? That theory seems a bit HOLEY if you ask me. Get it? Holy? I'm right there with you George. Theorists don't like the idea of god because he's incompatible with logic, not out of some vanity to retain credibility. What a relief.
*Face palm* All you're doing is twisting a few things here and there then throwing in a few new age science ideas. Look my friend. Google, wikipedia, madsci or whatever site you guys use to form your opinion aren't always right. Humans create their own opinion, other humans look at that opinion and either say, "Hmmm, that sounds good." while the other disagrees. We are flawed. No one is perfect. Human Error exists and even though the brain is a very complex thing doesn't mean you or me or anyone in this world has the right answer. All of that ^^ probably made no sense. I'm pretty tired right now. Anyways. Actually okay explain to me the basic engineering it takes to create a human brain?
New age science ideas? A.I, abiogenesis and evolution are hardly cutting edge. I don't even know where to begin. You see to be confusing opinions with scientific facts. A HUMAN brain you say, well when two people... Here's a good description of the process. YouTube - Flight of the Conchords- Business Time EDIT. If you'd like a physical description of different separate brain processes, then I suggest you looking it up. On google. Fun times.
I Agree with what you said earlier, but this ^ is what I'm wondering about. It seems like you have a problem with religion not God, I believe in God but not in the way religion teaches people. I agree completely that all religion is wrong to the most extent, but God doesn't have to be the Zeus looking guy that most people imagine him as. I accept God isn't a conscious being but rather the source for everything we know. I don't worship god but I changed what I see God as, God is the Entity that caused the big bang, everything at once, which is what religion actually got right. Along with the let there be light theory, the big bangs explosion must have made the largest explosion ever known in our galaxy. so technically god did exist but not in the way people perceive it.
That sounds more like you are just taking an occurrence and naming it God, not giving it any God-like attributes, but just saying, this isn't God, but the idea itself, and when it happened, is 'God'. Like if I see a basketball bouncing and attribute my own name to this action, like, "the energy and entity of that bouncing ball is Blarf. Blarf is not a conscious being or anything, but it's the energy and name of what is happening to the ball" That's just at least, how I perceive what you said. Correct me if I'm wrong, I wasn't sure.
Well your half right, God is just an idea, a believe in that there is something we cannot comprehend. if you saw the ball bounce and stop abruptly in mid-bounce and it stayed there for 5 seconds then exploded? what explanation could you provide other than a miracle? now I know the likely hood of anything like this happening is nearly impossible. but here and now humans don't fully understand everything there is in this universe. so to counter the fear of the unknown people simply come up with their own idea of reality. which is simply what I was stating. I believe god is just an Idea, Tied to many Explanations that this universe holds, God to me also Represents the life I life, any good deed done, and all the happiness in this world. God is what has bee described as all good things as well as bad, thats what I grew up to believe and so after learning that there was once a single entity that eventually exploded to create all we know now. Religions have the basis on what it means to be a good person, or what we perceive as good anyway. Do not steal, Do not kill, Do not be jealous of others, but all these are impossible to follow, surely yourself has stolen something, killed something and has been jealous of someone. that is why I believe Religion is flawed, not God. Besides that energy of the ball bouncing is due to gravity and Newton's law. therefore naming it something else is merely redundant as accept that to you a ball bouncing may be 'blarf', who am I to question what you perceive as reality? if you believe god is a man who sits and judges you on your wrongs then who am I to argue? even atheists like me have beliefs, it is only human nature. Edit: I forgot to ask, what are god-like attributes to you? god gives life, shows us the way, etc.
Well I am an Atheist lol, but if you believe there is something, I wouldn't say you're an atheist, but probably more agnostic. And as to the bolded part: That's my point about taking everything in the universe, like you said in the italicized/underlined parts, and calling it God, just cause.
I'm not saying I believe in any sort of god just simply stating that I believe god is just an Idea, a way for explaining the the beauty of science. sure we can explain almost everything with science but being human we all have beliefs, thats what gives us an opinion, thats what makes us a beautiful thing in nature. saying you have no beliefs is not true, you believe things have an explanation to it, an explanation that is brought by science. who are we to argue that fact? god exists because people believe it does, no matter how much you would like to say their wrong. I only say that its god because we choose the name first given, god was the name given to a being that was everything at once, while they got the living part wrong, they got the single entity right.
Ahh ok, I didn't gather what you were saying. I thought you were saying that you personally believe a God exists in that manner, I didn't realize you were just stating he is simply and only an idea. THAT I can agree upon. Like Santa, the easter bunny, Hanukkah Harry and the goddamn batman, God exists, but only as an idea and in works of art/whatnot. Now we're on the same page.