Christianity argued from fact and reason.
John Ings
On Sun, 25 May 1997 03:37:33 GMT, m...@azstarnet.com (Michael R.
Hagerty) wrote under the thread "Creation Proven":
>>>Christianity can be successfully argued from fact and reason.
>
>>It can? OK. Start another thread with that title and lets see you do
>>it.
>
>Before endeavoring to do so, a few points need to be made clear. I
>do not claim to *prove* that Christianity is true;
Awww shucks . . .
> only that it is reasonable
Well actually it is the reasonable part that I hoped to get at.
> and that the probability of it being true is high enough to
>enable an intelligent belief.
There is one other delimiter that needs to be determined, and that is
how close YOUR version of Christianity is to mainstream Christianity.
I will naturally make certain assumptions on the basis of your beliefs
matching those of the majority, and we will be at cross-purposes if
they are not.
>You or others may reject the truth of what Christianity claims; but it
>is my contention that you cannot do so successfully or with honesty on
>the basis that Christianity is unreasonable, without factual basis or
>that it requires that all rational processes be abandoned.
I will argue from the viewpoint that the Christian faith presents God
as an unreasonable being, that Jesus Christ is a myth only loosely
based on a certain Y'shua ben Yusef, and that belief in the Christian
faith is irrational.
> The
>capacity to regard as true the claims of Christian belief requires an
>exercise of faith or what older folks referred to metaphorically as
>the “having of one’s eyes opened”
I would refer to it metaphorically as having one's brain washed.
> This, I maintain, is not
>accomplished by the application of logic and reason, but must be
>personally and individually perceived.
You said argued from fact and reason. Already you begin to back off
from that contention?
>Second, we would need to come to some agreement on what is acceptable
>for demonstrating the point in question. In my experience, debunkers
>of Christianity are often committed to a hyper-rationalism which
>admits nothing which reason and science cannot demonstrate.
That's not hyper rationalism, it's agnosticism, and it is my personal
creed, so don't expect me to abandon it.
> If this is
>the environment in which a discussion would ensue, there would be no
>common ground upon which a meaningful discussion could proceed.
That must be the case then, and your original claim of argument from
fact and reason turns out the be a chimera. Ah well . . .
>My principle argument is that Christianity is a faith, not a logical
>syllogism. For someone to exercise faith properly and with integrity
>there must be sufficient reason and probability that the object of
>their faith represents truth and reality.
Your definition of faith differs from the common Christian practice of
it then. What is it you mean when you say admiringly of someone
"He is a man of great faith"?
>Third, to place extreme and irrational demands on what is reasonable
>is a condition which cannot foster favorable expectations. The
>reasonableness and rationality I propose is that which is acceptable
>to the common, moderately intelligent man who may not be a scientist
>or a skilled logician but can recognize sound reasoning when it is
>presented.
I suspect we are mostly amateurs here, though I think I saw a
reference to your attending a seminary?
> For example, to assess the testimony of the NT authors
>against the exacting requirements of modern journalism places
>unreasonable demands on ancient accounts. To argue that a statement
>or account cannot be trustworthy because it is not the way a modern
>journalist would report the event is not only inappropriate but
>betrays a prejudice to discredit out of hand.
Fair enough, but you must also consider the testimony of the NT
authors in the light of their milieu. You cannot ignore the historical
fact that many other religions were making similar claims about THEIR
respective saviours at the same time the Gospels were being written,
and that including hearsay tales of miracles was not considered
dishonest.
>Fourth, it is my expectation that an adult, intelligent and honest
>discussion proceed. I’ve had more than a few respondents from
>alt.atheism reply with childish and infantile remarks which managed
>only to expose their incapacity to handle the subject seriously.
Well, we have no means of excluding trolls, but I resort to insult and
invective only when provoked and even then try to be creative about
it.
>If you and others can accept these conditions, I’m game.
G. Soderberg
john...@ottawa.com (John Ings) writes: > On Sun, 25 May 1997 03:37:33 GMT, m...@azstarnet.com (Michael R.
> Hagerty) wrote under the thread "Creation Proven":
>
> >>>Christianity can be successfully argued from fact and reason.
> >
> >>It can? OK. Start another thread with that title and lets see you do
> >>it.
> >
> >Before endeavoring to do so, a few points need to be made clear. I
> >do not claim to *prove* that Christianity is true;
>
> Awww shucks . . .
>
> > only that it is reasonable
>
> Well actually it is the reasonable part that I hoped to get at.
>
> > and that the probability of it being true is high enough to
> >e
Want to hear something really irrational? The fact that you, part of
a monkey-race, can exclude a Creator.
How's that possible. Your so called science can't prove there's no God.
Then how could you?
And should a religion be logical? Then why should we believe?
The human mind is to weak to explain certain things. Therefor don't
try.
Religion and science is the same thing: two ways to explain life in a
human way of thinking.
Capella
G. Soderberg wrote:
>
> Want to hear something really irrational? The fact that you, part of
> a monkey-race, can exclude a Creator.
>
> How's that possible. Your so called science can't prove there's no God.
> Then how could you?
>
> And should a religion be logical? Then why should we believe?
> The human mind is to weak to explain certain things. Therefor don't
> try.
>
> Religion and science is the same thing: two ways to explain life in a
> human way of thinking.
Want to hear something really irrational? The fact that you, part of
a christian cult can exclude Marduk as your Creator.
How's that possible. Your so called faith can't prove there's no
god named Marduk. Then how could you?
And should a religion be logical? Then why should we believe?
The human mind is too weak to explain certain things. Therefore
don't try.
Religion and mythology is the same thing: two ways to explain life in a
human way of thinking.
--
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Capella #5
Dallas, Texas
See the planet Saturn at Capella's Observatory
http://web2.airmail.net/sybil/capella/
Lisa Gardner
In article <338986...@egocities.com>,
Giant Robot Messiah <robot_...@egocities.com> wrote:
>G. Soderberg wrote:
>
>> And should a religion be logical? Then why should we believe?
>> The human mind is to weak to explain certain things. Therefor don't
>> try.
No... IMHO we must try, we are compelled to try... and by
trying, our perception of our reality can become more
finely-grained. We decorate our world.
>
>Certain things? Name one.
>Betcha can't.
The nature of that thing which is the partner of consciousness
in the continual creation of the reality in which we live- that
thing that lies forever for us behind the perceptual curtain of
our own senses, conceptions, perceptual mechanisms, etc. but
towards which we are compelled to reach and seek an understanding
of anyway. Nothing can enter into our conscious awareness without
first being cloaked with some conceptual clothing/whatever...
trees, rocks, water,*G*od... all of these things are elements
which exist only within the reality which results from the
interaction between the "partner of consciousness" I spoke
of above and consciousness itself. *None* of these things
necessarily exist as components of the "partner of consciousness"
itself... IMHO.
But hey, maybe I'm completely wrong.
Lisa
--
this is a non-confusing .sig lgar...@mbay.net
John Ings
On 26 May 97 11:24:49 GMT, G. Soderberg
<thaz...@falun.mail.telia.com> wrote:
>> >>>Christianity can be successfully argued from fact and reason.
>> >
>> >>It can? OK. Start another thread with that title and lets see you do
>> >>it.
>Want to hear something really irrational? The fact that you, part of
>a monkey-race, can exclude a Creator.
Who says I did?
>How's that possible. Your so called science can't prove there's no God.
>Then how could you?
I can't. Nor do I intend to try.
>And should a religion be logical?
If you expect me to believe in it, yes.
>Then why should we believe?
Because it is logical.
>The human mind is to weak to explain certain things. Therefor don't
>try.
By that algorithm, we'd all still be living in caves.
>Religion and science is the same thing: two ways to explain life in a
>human way of thinking.
Except that one works and the other doesn't.
As Voltaire said
"As long as there are fools and rascals, we'll have religions."
Michael R. Hagerty
The main discussion of this new thread will begin with an opening
proposition from me on the subject named. The following concerns
preliminary consensus as to the rules and intent of the proposed
discussion.
john...@ottawa.com (John Ings) wrote:
>On Sun, 25 May 1997 03:37:33 GMT, m...@azstarnet.com (Michael R.
>Hagerty) wrote:
>> only that it is reasonable
>Well actually it is the reasonable part that I hoped to get at.
>> and that the probability of it being true is high enough to
>>enable an intelligent belief.
>There is one other delimiter that needs to be determined, and that is
>how close YOUR version of Christianity is to mainstream Christianity.
>I will naturally make certain assumptions on the basis of your beliefs
>matching those of the majority, and we will be at cross-purposes if
>they are not.
I'm not sure what might be meant by mainstream Christianity but I
would venture a guess that you're referring to what the average
Christian believes as opposed to splinter factions or radical
theologies. It would be the theology of the Dagwood Bumsteads of the
world who with their wives and families attend a mainline denomination
church as opposed to the Apostolic Holy Ghost Temple elsewhere in town
whose rafters ring nightly with the blaring sounds of brass and
tamboreen.
My theology is more characterized by the word conservative than by the
word denominational. I believe in the verbal-plenary inspiration of
scripture and affirm and use the historico-grammatical method of
interpretation. I concur with the use and reference of the original
languages of the Bible, whether through personal skill and training or
through research among those authors who have earned respect of
careful and unbiased scholarship.
The Bible is for me a reliable and trustworthy rule for faith and
practice in the Christian life and I take the gospel accounts at their
face value for what they claim to be. I currently believe that the
traditions about their authorship are correct, but am also aware of
the precariousness in being dogmatic on this point.
I further believe that the Christian life is more than just an
assessment of the teachings and commandments of Jesus and the
compunction to go and do likewise. It is a life which involves the
indwelling presence of God in the person of the Holy Spirit which is
given at regeneration. It is necessary that a man acknowledge the
wrongness of a life in which God has had no place or priority. He
must genuinely and sincerely desire repentence from his former way of
life, combined with an earnest desire to fulfill the requirements of
God's view of righteousness. Even in this, he cannot succeed in and
of himself but requires divine assistance - hence the Spirit and the
Grace of God.
I believe that faith in the saving effect of Jesus' death and
resurrection bring this to those who exercise it. That faith is based
on a measure of facts and reason, which themselves are insufficient or
incomplete. In this I agree with Kierkegaard that reason brings us to
the edge of a cliff. The remainder of the way must be spanned by a
leap of faith.
This is the fundamental problem facing atheists and Christians in
virtually any dialogs between them. The atheist wants reason and fact
to pave the entire pathway to the truth. The Christian knows that it
doesn't work that way, but can't effectively communicate this because
it is something which must gel in the mind and heart of each
individual. Without this, the atheist sees only an ineffective and
fumbling attempt to explain.
This, and this alone, is all I can really do. I can merely explain
the facts and reasoning behind Christian faith that bring you to the
edge. Beyond this I can do nothing else but encourage anyone who
finds themselves there at that juncture that the leap is worth the
risk.
>>You or others may reject the truth of what Christianity claims; but it
>>is my contention that you cannot do so successfully or with honesty on
>>the basis that Christianity is unreasonable, without factual basis or
>>that it requires that all rational processes be abandoned.
>I will argue from the viewpoint that the Christian faith presents God
>as an unreasonable being, that Jesus Christ is a myth only loosely
>based on a certain Y'shua ben Yusef, and that belief in the Christian
>faith is irrational.
Fine. But we must also clarify that while something may be
unreasonable to you personally (and that is what counts for you), it
may not be unreasonable, per se. We must distinquish between not
having a reason or explanation and simply not liking the reasons
given.
We may not like the way the Islamic world regards the rights of women.
But it is one thing to say we don't care for their practices and
attitudes and quite another to infer that they have no logic or reason
for doing so.
>> The
>>capacity to regard as true the claims of Christian belief requires an
>>exercise of faith or what older folks referred to metaphorically as
>>the “having of one’s eyes opened”
>I would refer to it metaphorically as having one's brain washed.
I hope to change your mind about this. Can you honestly say that my
responses to you are from a brain-washed mind? There may be some who
talk like they are, but I trust you're intelligent enough to tell the
difference.
>> This, I maintain, is not
>>accomplished by the application of logic and reason, but must be
>>personally and individually perceived.
>You said argued from fact and reason. Already you begin to back off
>from that contention?
If we're talking about verifying the *truth* of Christianity, I never
promised to argue this, only that it's teaching and propositions are
reasonable and have certain bases in fact. After all, it never was
illucidated as to what aspect of Christianity was to be argued. I
believe I picked up the gauntlet at the original remark that someone
had never seen a valid reason for belief in Christianity.
>>Second, we would need to come to some agreement on what is acceptable
>>for demonstrating the point in question. In my experience, debunkers
>>of Christianity are often committed to a hyper-rationalism which
>>admits nothing which reason and science cannot demonstrate.
>That's not hyper rationalism, it's agnosticism, and it is my personal
>creed, so don't expect me to abandon it.
Rationalism is clearly defined as the belief that reality is only
comprised of those things which can be empirically known, discovered
through science, or deduced from pure reason. All other things which
might be conceivable but which fail these tests do not in fact
comprise reality.
Agnosticism may embrace rationalism but its primary tenet is that God
may exist but he has not or cannot be known.
Rationalism is primarily a cosmological and epistemological concept.
Agnosticism is primarily a theological one.
However, since we are dealing with whether Christianity has a
reasonable basis, the limitation against rationalism would only apply
to the truth claims which we are not discussing. We can discuss
whether an argument uses valid and sound reasoning without addressing
whether it is also true. As I stated before, the truth of
Christianity will depend on the methodology one chooses for testing
truth in general.
>Your definition of faith differs from the common Christian practice of
>it then. What is it you mean when you say admiringly of someone
>"He is a man of great faith"?
Faith is what scripture states it is, "the assurance of things hoped
for, the evidence of things not seen." To believe something because
you see it proven before your eyes is a mis-use of the term. The
words 'to believe' and 'to have faith' were particularly coined so as
to be differentiated from the experience of knowing. To believe is
to affirm as true something which isn't demonstrated by evidence. In
essence, it is the *absence* of evidence which characterizes these
terms.
I'm not sure what your question intended. My saying, "He's a man of
great faith." may or may not have anything to do with what I believe
faith to be.
>> For example, to assess the testimony of the NT authors
>>against the exacting requirements of modern journalism places
>>unreasonable demands on ancient accounts. To argue that a statement
>>or account cannot be trustworthy because it is not the way a modern
>>journalist would report the event is not only inappropriate but
>>betrays a prejudice to discredit out of hand.
>Fair enough, but you must also consider the testimony of the NT
>authors in the light of their milieu. You cannot ignore the historical
>fact that many other religions were making similar claims about THEIR
>respective saviours at the same time the Gospels were being written,
>and that including hearsay tales of miracles was not considered
>dishonest.
We can deal with that is the formal discussion.
MRH
lunati...@rocketmail.com
In article <33897...@d2o22.telia.com>,
G. Soderberg <thaz...@falun.mail.telia.com> wrote:
> Want to hear something really irrational?
Well at least to correctly labled your post. The stuff you posted past
this statement were very definately irrational.
> The fact that you, part of a monkey-race, can exclude a Creator.
And again you are correct. It is quite easy for us primates to reject the
baseless invention of a creator.
> How's that possible. Your so called science can't prove there's no God.
> Then how could you?
Ah, what little education we indicate. 1) It's YOUR so called science
also. Your computer and this internet would not existif it weren't for
science. There has not been even _1_ airplane built and flying that
relies on religion and ignores FACTS learned thru science. Then there is
modern medical science that saves millions of lives compared to the
ignorace of previous religion based societies. 2)A Negative not only
can't be proved. It doesn't need to. It is up to the one holding the
positive belief to provide sufficient support to validate belief in it.
3) Science CAN prove lots of things to such a great extent that it would
be foolish to not accept them. 4) Science can provide enoungh support to
DISPROVE the potential credibility of something sufficient to disregard
the concept.
> And should a religion be logical?
Why of course it should. To accept anything that violates logical
analysis in favor of something lacking factual support is a harmful,
dangerous philosophy.
> Then why should we believe?
My point exactly. Thanks!
> The human mind is to weak to explain certain things.
You can only speak for yourself on this. I know MINE isn't that weak.
> Therefor don't try.
Also your suggestion regarding walking while chewing gum? We should not
have bothered finding out if in fact the world IS flat? Demons caused all
illness? Man can not fly?
> Religion and science is the same thing: two ways to explain life in a
> human way of thinking.
No. Religion is a predefined set of rules that must be blindly accepted
and followed. Science is a method of observing and understanding what is
ACTUALLY happening around you.
They are two very different things.
-------------------==== Posted via Deja News ====-----------------------
http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Post to Usenet
David J. Vorous
G. Soderberg wrote:
snip
> Want to hear something really irrational? The fact that you, part of
> a monkey-race, can exclude a Creator.
What? I had to page through 10 pages of stuff that I already read to get
to this? If you can't make a rational statement, at least learn how to
snip. What is a monkey-race? I never heard of that. Excluding a creator?
It was humans that created the "Creator".
> How's that possible. Your so called science can't prove there's no God.
> Then how could you?
Science has never tried to prove there is a god, nor have the tried to
disprove one either. They left that stuff up to the philosophers.
> And should a religion be logical? Then why should we believe?
> The human mind is to weak to explain certain things. Therefor don't try.
That should say that _some_ minds are too weak. A religion cannot be
logical, it is based upon faith, not logic. Believe if you want, it's
your business, not mine.
> Religion and science is the same thing: two ways to explain life in a
> human way of thinking.
But the difference is in the way of deriving that explanation. There is
logic and reassoning or faith and emotions. Take your pick.
--
David Vorous
da...@snakebite.com
http://users.aimnet.com/~dvorous/home.html
Austin Cline
>Want to hear something really irrational? The fact that you, part of
>a monkey-race, can exclude a Creator.
Can you provide any good reasons to presume a creator? I doubt it, since
you didn't it. So why waste everyone's time?
>How's that possible.
Easy: don't assume anything for which there isn't sufficient evidence.
Your so called science can't prove there's no God.
>Then how could you?
The same way science excludes *all* gods and *all* fanciful creatures like
elves: lack of sufficient evidence.
>And should a religion be logical? Then why should we believe?
A belief, if valid, ought to have some basis in logic and reason. If you
abandon that standard, you can believe anything. Explain, if you can, why
you should be approached any differently from someone who believes in
alein abductions and invisible elves under their house.
>The human mind is to weak to explain certain things. Therefor don't
>try.
The mentality of a slave: some things are just too tough for me mommy, so
I just won't bother trying - you just tell me what to think.
>Religion and science is the same thing: two ways to explain life in a
>human way of thinking.
Science is a method of acquiring knowledge about the world in the most
logical, common sensical way possible. Religion is a means of projecting
wish-fulfillment onto the world.
Austin Cline; German Department; Princeton University
--- This is a world of compensations; and he who would *be* no slave must consent to *have* no slave. Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves; and, under a just God, cannot long retain it. [Abraham Lincoln, 1859]
Austin Cline
In article <5mdb54$f...@news.azstarnet.com>, m...@azstarnet.com (Michael R.
Hagerty) wrote:
>This is the fundamental problem facing atheists and Christians in
>virtually any dialogs between them. The atheist wants reason and fact
>to pave the entire pathway to the truth. The Christian knows that it
>doesn't work that way, but can't effectively communicate this because
>it is something which must gel in the mind and heart of each
>individual. Without this, the atheist sees only an ineffective and
>fumbling attempt to explain.
If you don't use reason and fact as standards for deciding on beliefs,
what on earth do you use? Random emotion? Intuition? Arbitrary guesses?
Why shoudl - or would - I consider your beliefs any different from the
nuttiest beliefs possible? Please provide good reason to say that your
beliefs are better than those of people who think that they were abducted
by aliens.
Personally, I find that using reason and fact are the *only* way to take a
stand against lunacy, irrationality, and unrestricted credulousness. Your
path allows you to believe absolutely anything - you have *no* set
standards, at least none which can be discerned. That scares me.
<snip>
>If we're talking about verifying the *truth* of Christianity, I never
>promised to argue this, only that it's teaching and propositions are
>reasonable and have certain bases in fact.
The please do so. You can start with the proposition that a god exists -
then continue with the propositions that state what that god is like.
Austin Cline; German Department; Princeton University
--- If only it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to ... destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?
[Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn; The Gulag Archipelago (p. 168)]
Giant Robot Messiah
G. Soderberg wrote:
> And should a religion be logical? Then why should we believe?
> The human mind is to weak to explain certain things. Therefor don't
> try.
Certain things? Name one.
Betcha can't.
Giant Robot Messiah
-------------------
"Whaddya gonna do, outwit me?"
{My reply-to address is cleverly encoded within this very sentence}
dml...@cloudnet.com
On 26 May 1997 21:34:57 GMT, lgar...@otter.mbay.net (Lisa Gardner)
wrote:
>
>No... IMHO we must try, we are compelled to try... and by
>trying, our perception of our reality can become more
>finely-grained. We decorate our world.
Lisa,
Are you saying here that our perception of reality is quite distinct
from reality itself?
BTW, you a photographer? Do you see perception as similar to a
certain resolution film (i.e. speed), in which the better the
resolution, the more "defined" reality becomes?
>The nature of that thing which is the partner of consciousness
>in the continual creation of the reality in which we live- that
>thing that lies forever for us behind the perceptual curtain of
>our own senses, conceptions, perceptual mechanisms, etc. but
>towards which we are compelled to reach and seek an understanding
>of anyway. Nothing can enter into our conscious awareness without
>first being cloaked with some conceptual clothing/whatever...
>trees, rocks, water,*G*od... all of these things are elements
>which exist only within the reality which results from the
>interaction between the "partner of consciousness" I spoke
>of above and consciousness itself. *None* of these things
>necessarily exist as components of the "partner of consciousness"
>itself... IMHO.
>
>But hey, maybe I'm completely wrong.
>
>Lisa
>
This is kind of a new twist to me. You are saying that reality is the
result of an interaction between consciousness and a thing termed
the "partner of consciousness". It is creative. We are compelled to
seek understanding of it. Is it part of *mind* or is it independent
of it?
Pax,
david
Me
Sure.. we can answer who, what, where, when, how with our
science.. but we don't seem able to answer "why".
Why a universe? Why the way it is? Why is there evil?
"Why" seems to be the province of poets, prophets, and
philosophers.
We can't even say for certain whether there is or is no
"why" to be asked. We suspect there is. We can argue
for or against it. But how can we know? Why should we
be able to know?
Giant Robot Messiah <robot_...@egocities.com> wrote in article
<338986...@egocities.com>...
G. Soderberg
Giant Robot Messiah <robot_...@egocities.com> writes: > G. Soderberg wrote:
>
> > And should a religion be logical? Then why should we believe?
> > The human mind is to weak to explain certain things. Therefor don't
> > try.
>
> Certain things? Name one.
> Betcha can't.
>
>
>
> Giant Robot Messiah
> -------------------
> "Whaddya gonna do, outwit me?"
>
> {My reply-to address is cleverly encoded within this very sentence}
Well, for one thing, why should I decode your stupid message?
It wasn't so clever by the way. Don't think I'll fall for the old
'look on this 3-D picture'-phrank.
It is important to remember that most scientific theories, are not
proven fact. All these theories does, is to sound logical.
What Atheists do, is the same thing they accuse Christians for: trying
to explain life with human means. Ergo: Atheism is religion. A very
primitive form of it, anyway.
John Ings
>>There is one other delimiter that needs to be determined, and that is
>>how close YOUR version of Christianity is to mainstream Christianity.
>I'm not sure what might be meant by mainstream Christianity
Yes, I needed to be more specific there.
>My theology is more characterized by the word conservative than by the
>word denominational.
Well as I said, I tend to make assumptions about the beliefs of
Christians which sometimes gets me at cross purposes in debates.
For instance I have encountered people who term themselves Christians
who assured me I don't have to make a choice between heaven and hell.
So, do you believe in:
Heaven and Hell.
The Ressurrection.
The Trinity
Salvation
Original Sin.
>The Bible is for me a reliable and trustworthy rule for faith and
>practice in the Christian life and I take the gospel accounts at their
>face value for what they claim to be.
So you do not accept the findings of the Jesus Seminar?
> I currently believe that the
>traditions about their authorship are correct, but am also aware of
>the precariousness in being dogmatic on this point.
Indeed.
> It is necessary that a man acknowledge the
>wrongness of a life in which God has had no place or priority.
Whereas I consider the whole concept of worship to be an insult to
whatever God there might be.
[ the Spirit and the Grace of God]
>I believe that faith in the saving effect of Jesus' death and
>resurrection bring this to those who exercise it.
One of the fundamental points I consider illogical about Christianity.
>That faith is based
>on a measure of facts and reason, which themselves are insufficient or
>incomplete. In this I agree with Kierkegaard that reason brings us to
>the edge of a cliff. The remainder of the way must be spanned by a
>leap of faith.
>
>This is the fundamental problem facing atheists and Christians in
>virtually any dialogs between them. The atheist wants reason and fact
>to pave the entire pathway to the truth.
So does the agnostic.
> The Christian knows that it
>doesn't work that way, but can't effectively communicate this because
>it is something which must gel in the mind and heart of each
>individual. Without this, the atheist sees only an ineffective and
>fumbling attempt to explain.
Not just ineffective. If it were only that it would do less harm. Each
time the believer sends a convert off on this path that involves
"something which must get in the heart and mind of each individual" he
invites delusion. The leap of faith undertaken seldom comes up with
the same results in each individual. That is where sectarianism
begins, it is the source of all sorts of dissention, bigotry, hatred
and ultimately jihads. The Muslim is as certain of his leap of faith
as the Christian, and just as violently sanctemonious.
>This, and this alone, is all I can really do. I can merely explain
>the facts and reasoning behind Christian faith that bring you to the
>edge. Beyond this I can do nothing else but encourage anyone who
>finds themselves there at that juncture that the leap is worth the
>risk.
But is it worth the risk to the rest of humanity. How many more sects
do we need? Even if your algorithm produces a hundred thousand gentle,
loving souls for every David Koresh or Jim Jones, it also produces
several thousand bigoted, intolerant, sanctemoneous jerks, many of
whom show up in these newsgroups.
>>>You or others may reject the truth of what Christianity claims; but it
>>>is my contention that you cannot do so successfully or with honesty on
>>>the basis that Christianity is unreasonable, without factual basis or
>>>that it requires that all rational processes be abandoned.
I intend to attack on all three grounds.
>>I will argue from the viewpoint that the Christian faith presents God
>>as an unreasonable being, that Jesus Christ is a myth only loosely
>>based on a certain Y'shua ben Yusef, and that belief in the Christian
>>faith is irrational.
>
>Fine. But we must also clarify that while something may be
>unreasonable to you personally (and that is what counts for you), it
>may not be unreasonable, per se. We must distinquish between not
>having a reason or explanation and simply not liking the reasons
>given.
Let me make an example here, to clarify what I consider unreasonable.
Many times I have asked Christians to explain the logic behind the
atonement. How it is that Jesus sacrifice can pay for sins not even
comitted yet? Ultimately, after a lot of backing and filling and
hemming and hawing, the same answer always seems to come back.
"God wants it that way".
Unreasonable.
>We may not like the way the Islamic world regards the rights of women.
>But it is one thing to say we don't care for their practices and
>attitudes and quite another to infer that they have no logic or reason
>for doing so.
A good example, for it illustrates the difference between having a
logical reason and having a logical reason others find acceptable.
However, let us take this example a little further. Having accepted
the contention that there is logic and reason behind the practice of
say, female circumcision (it promotes chastity), is the practice just?
Is it merciful?
The Christian pridefully labels his God merciful and just, while the
Bible portrays him as being quite the opposite. The whole concept of
salvation for instance, is in my view most unjust, yet the Christian
blandly tells me "Well God thinks it's just, so it is!"
Unreasonable.
>>> The
>>>capacity to regard as true the claims of Christian belief requires an
>>>exercise of faith or what older folks referred to metaphorically as
>>>the “having of one’s eyes opened”
>
>>I would refer to it metaphorically as having one's brain washed.
>
>I hope to change your mind about this. Can you honestly say that my
>responses to you are from a brain-washed mind? There may be some who
>talk like they are, but I trust you're intelligent enough to tell the
>difference.
There is a book that bears the rather clumsy title, "You are what you
were when . . ." In it the author explains that a man's attitude
toward life tends to be roughly what it was when he was about ten
years old. If he was ten years old in the midst of the depression for
instance, he will tend to regard employment as a precious commodity,
while if he was ten in the mid sixties he won't have the same attitude
at all.
A persons attitude toward religion is subject to this same bias too. I
have more respect for the faith of an adult convert than I do for the
faith of a man who learned his faith at his parents knee. It is harder
to sell the fantasies of religion to an adult than to a trusting
child, especially if that adult has a good education.
So are you brain-washed? Well, where and when did you aquire your
faith, as opposed to your theology?
>If we're talking about verifying the *truth* of Christianity, I never
>promised to argue this, only that it's teaching and propositions are
>reasonable and have certain bases in fact.
I will be content to argue against that.
>>>Second, we would need to come to some agreement on what is acceptable
>>>for demonstrating the point in question. In my experience, debunkers
>>>of Christianity are often committed to a hyper-rationalism which
>>>admits nothing which reason and science cannot demonstrate.
>
>>That's not hyper rationalism, it's agnosticism, and it is my personal
>>creed, so don't expect me to abandon it.
>
>Rationalism is clearly defined as the belief that reality is only
>comprised of those things which can be empirically known, discovered
>through science, or deduced from pure reason. All other things which
>might be conceivable but which fail these tests do not in fact
>comprise reality.
>
>Agnosticism may embrace rationalism but its primary tenet is that God
>may exist but he has not or cannot be known.
That is the modern dictionary definition. I take my definition from
the man who coined the word, for he had a more general concept in
mind:
"Agnosticism is in fact not a creed, but a method, the essence of
which lies in the application of a single principle.[ . . .]Positively
the principle may be expressed: In matters of intellect, follow your
reason as far as it will take you, without regard to any other
consideration. And negatively: In matters of intellect, do not pretend
that conclusions are certain which are not demonstrated or
demonstrable." Thomas Huxley 1893
>Rationalism is primarily a cosmological and epistemological concept.
>Agnosticism is primarily a theological one.
As you can see from the above, Huxley had a broader field in mind.
>>Your definition of faith differs from the common Christian practice of
>>it then. What is it you mean when you say admiringly of someone
>>"He is a man of great faith"?
>
>Faith is what scripture states it is, "the assurance of things hoped
>for, the evidence of things not seen."
I feel that's a poor translation. My RSV has "the conviction of things
not seen" and I think that's more what Paul meant. Often I find
theists contending that their faith has brought knowledge. I keep
insisting that if they have knowledge they don't need faith. Faith
requires an element of uncertainty or it isn't faith.
> To believe something because
>you see it proven before your eyes is a mis-use of the term. The
>words 'to believe' and 'to have faith' were particularly coined so as
>to be differentiated from the experience of knowing.
Exactly. But try and tell that to many Christians.
>I'm not sure what your question intended. My saying, "He's a man of
>great faith." may or may not have anything to do with what I believe
>faith to be.
I suggest what you mean is that this man has to some degree emulated
Job. He has remained steadfast in his faith despite severe trials.
This is a much admired behaviour among theists, while among scientists
just the opposite is true. A scientist who stubbornly clings to a
belief in the face of contrary evidence is regarded as a poor
scientist.
Donna Coyne
Giant Robot Messiah (robot_...@egocities.com) wrote:
: G. Soderberg wrote:
[snip]
"Christianity argued from fact and reason"? What is this?
One of those "World's thinnest books" joke titles, like
"Good Movies Starring Frank Stallone" or "The Wit and Wisdom
of Dan Quayle"?
Anybody got any more?
Austin Cline
In article <01bc6a64$68dcb5a0$7c95a8ce@default>, "Me"
<no...@urbusiness.com> wrote:
>Sure.. we can answer who, what, where, when, how with our
>science.. but we don't seem able to answer "why".
You assume:
1. That "why" is always a sensible question. It isn't.
2. That a "why" question, even if sensible, also *must* have an answer.
>Why a universe? Why the way it is? Why is there evil?
Why not?
>"Why" seems to be the province of poets, prophets, and
>philosophers.
And people who don't have lives.
Austin Cline; German Department; Princeton University
--- My either/or does not in the first instance denote the choice between good and evil; it denotes the choice whereby one chooses good *and* evil/or exculdes them. Here the question is under what determinants one would contemplate the whole of existence and would oneself live. [Kierkegaard; Either/Or, p.173]
Austin Cline
In article <338b1...@d2o22.telia.com>, G. Soderberg
<thaz...@falun.mail.telia.com> wrote:
>It is important to remember that most scientific theories, are not
>proven fact. All these theories does, is to sound logical.
You don't seem to understand what a Scientific Theory is. In science, a
theory is something which has been repeatedly confirmed and for which
there is no clear counter-argument. These theories do more than sound
logical: they explain all the available evidence and make testable
predictions which turn out to be correct.
>What Atheists do, is the same thing they accuse Christians for: trying
>to explain life with human means.
False. Atheism is a lack of belief in gods. Some go further and deny
certain gods or even all gods, but need not. An atheist might explain
their lives in any manner they wish, but atheism does not dictate how this
might be done.
> Ergo: Atheism is religion.
Religion is not defined by the attempt to explain life - if it were, just
about every philisophical system would be a religion. Perhaps if you got a
clue and bothered to study religion, something so basic might sink it.
Religion is based primarily upon the belief in the supernatural - be is
supernatural creatures, powers, or realms. Normally there is also a fixed
doctrine. However, it is the element of the supernatural which
distinguishes religion from other human pursuits.
A very
>primitive form of it, anyway.
What is truly primitive is your base understanding of the relevant issues.
Austin Cline; German Department; Princeton University
--- ..Any organization could profit from a 10-year-old member with
enough strength of character to refuse to swear falsely."
[New York Times editorial, 12/12/93, on the Boy Scouts' refusing
membership to Mark Welsh, who would not sign a religious oath]
Barry O'Grady
m...@azstarnet.com (Michael R. Hagerty) wrote:
:The main discussion of this new thread will begin with an opening
:proposition from me on the subject named. The following concerns
:preliminary consensus as to the rules and intent of the proposed
:discussion.
Sounds good to me. I look forward to a serious discussion.
[Many lines of nonsense deleted to save space]
Oops! There's nothing left. I hope it gets better than this.
Barry
--------------------------------- John 3:16 ------------------------------
16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that
whosoever believeth in him would believe anything.
=====================================
To reply via email please remove the XX from my
return address.
cz...@freenet.edmonton.ab.ca
Me (no...@urbusiness.com) wrote:
: Sure.. we can answer who, what, where, when, how with our
: science.. but we don't seem able to answer "why".
: Why a universe? Why the way it is? Why is there evil?
Why not?
: "Why" seems to be the province of poets, prophets, and philosophers.
...And other people who don't work for a living.
: We can't even say for certain whether there is or is no
: "why" to be asked. We suspect there is.
"We" (meaning, I'm assuming, most of the human race) do so because the
alternative (that we are completely insignificant in a vast, impersonal
universe) is more than a little scary. Atheists, though, are not afraid
to face this fact, and so are the only brave and grown-up people on the
planet.
--
***********************************************************
I saw weird stuff in that place last night -- weird,
strange, sick, twisted, eerie, godless, *evil* stuff!
And I want in!
Homer J. Simpson
***********************************************************
Barry O'Grady
G. Soderberg <thaz...@falun.mail.telia.com> wrote:
:Want to hear something really irrational? The fact that you, part of
:a monkey-race, can exclude a Creator.
Want to hear something really irrational? Listen to G. Soderberg talking.
:How's that possible. Your so called science can't prove there's no God.
:Then how could you?
So called science can't prove there's no Invisable Pink Unicorn but it
sure did a good job of providing the computer you dribble on. Your so
called God couldn't invent computers.
:And should a religion be logical? Then why should we believe?
You mean that feeble brained idiots like yourself figure that if it
can't be understood it must be true?
:The human mind is to weak to explain certain things. Therefor don't
:try.
Fine. Then don't you try to explain the state of the world by using
a so called God.
:Religion and science is the same thing: two ways to explain life in a
:human way of thinking.
Science is restricted to facts while religion is free to say what it
wants.
Barry
Barry O'Grady
m...@azstarnet.com (Michael R. Hagerty) wrote:
:john...@ottawa.com (John Ings) wrote:
:
:>On Fri, 23 May 1997 16:47:43 GMT, m...@azstarnet.com (Michael R.
:>Hagerty) wrote:
:
:>>Christianity can be successfully argued from fact and reason.
Where would you find a reasonable Christian? Can't be done since all
reasonable Christians are now atheists.
:>It can? OK. Start another thread with that title and lets see you do
:>it.
:
:Before endeavoring to do so, a few points need to be made clear. I
:do not claim to *prove* that Christianity is true; only that it is
:reasonable and that the probability of it being true is high enough to
:enable an intelligent belief.
Did someone with intelligence tell you that? You can't be intelligent
while being a Christian.
:You or others may reject the truth of what Christianity claims; but it
:is my contention that you cannot do so successfully or with honesty on
:the basis that Christianity is unreasonable, without factual basis or
:that it requires that all rational processes be abandoned. The
:capacity to regard as true the claims of Christian belief requires an
:exercise of faith or what older folks referred to metaphorically as
:the "having of one's eyes opened". This, I maintain, is not
:accomplished by the application of logic and reason, but must be
:personally and individually perceived.
Backing down already. How typicaly pathetic of the terminaly deluded
such as yourself.
:Second, we would need to come to some agreement on what is acceptable
:for demonstrating the point in question. In my experience, debunkers
:of Christianity are often committed to a hyper-rationalism which
:admits nothing which reason and science cannot demonstrate.
That's all we have to play with.
:If this is
:the environment in which a discussion would ensue, there would be no
:common ground upon which a meaningful discussion could proceed.
Yep. You can't expect a person without your form of mental illness
to see things the way you do.
:As for presuppositions of which I might also be accused, I do not
:hold that the Bible contains the only truth, nor that science and
:reason are false or corrupted forms of knowledge. It is clear that
:representatives on both sides of the issue have often presented
:distorted and biased viewpoints of not only their own approaches to
:the truth but especially of the opposing side.
The differance is that a true scientist has no need to spread lies
and rumours yet Christianity can only continue to exist by causing
confusion and uncertainty as well as by deliberate spreading of lies
and fear. Your attempt will be based on confusion by the use of
double talk.
:I believe science,
:philosophy and theology can be brought into harmony and each can be
:seen to make unique but incomplete contributions to our total
:knowledge of the world as it really is.
Theoligy has nothing to say about the way the world is.
:The Bible is not a reference
:on science; neither is science a reference on matters of theology.
Quite so. Science talks about what exists while theoligy talks about
what people with a certain type of mental illness think.
:Both contribute uniquely to our understanding of reality.
Theoligy contributes to our knowledge of the reality of mental illness.
:My principle argument is that Christianity is a faith, not a logical
:syllogism. For someone to exercise faith properly and with integrity
:there must be sufficient reason and probability that the object of
:their faith represents truth and reality.
Faith is belief in something because that person wants it to be so.
Faith is a part of the mental illness and has nothing to do with reality.
Faith is belief even when evidence is against the object of belief.
:It can be demonstrated that Jesus was crucified (a fact).
If that is part of your act then you have lost already.
:That he was
:the Son of God will always remain a matter of belief - a belief based
:on the truth of certain key facts which can be known and conjoined
:with the reasonableness of the conclusions drawn.
Proof that Jesus was not the son of God is as simple as the fact that
there is no God.
:Third, to place extreme and irrational demands on what is reasonable
:is a condition which cannot foster favorable expectations.
Certainly not favourable to you.
:The
:reasonableness and rationality I propose is that which is acceptable
:to the common, moderately intelligent man who may not be a scientist
:or a skilled logician but can recognize sound reasoning when it is
:presented.
You want to confuse people so that they think you must know something.
:For example, to assess the testimony of the NT authors
:against the exacting requirements of modern journalism places
:unreasonable demands on ancient accounts. To argue that a statement
:or account cannot be trustworthy because it is not the way a modern
:journalist would report the event is not only inappropriate but
:betrays a prejudice to discredit out of hand.
:
:Fourth, it is my expectation that an adult, intelligent and honest
:discussion proceed. I've had more than a few respondents from
:alt.atheism reply with childish and infantile remarks which managed
:only to expose their incapacity to handle the subject seriously.
Listen Dickwad. You are a moron, and morons that come here trying to
refute their mental illness deserve contempt. No sensable person
can take idiots like you seriously.
:I don't in any way mean to imply an offense to you or to members of
:alt.atheism, per se. I don't mean to imply that I won't tolerate a
:bonehead or two in an open forum such as this. I only mean say that
:while I'm a big boy and can take a fair amount of valid criticism, my
:participation is qualified with the condition that if all I get are
:remarks like the above, the discussion will be over.
How pathetic. You know that your stupid religion can't stand up to the
light of day. Do you think that your speach will get people to respect
you so that they can then be taken in?
:If you and others can accept these conditions, I'm game.
You won't look quite such an idiot if you stop using the ae character
in place of the ' in your text.
:MRH
Ryan Muise
On 27 May 97 17:23:12 GMT, G. Soderberg
<thaz...@falun.mail.telia.com> wrote:
>Giant Robot Messiah <robot_...@egocities.com> writes: > G. Soderberg wrote:
>>
>> > And should a religion be logical? Then why should we believe?
>> > The human mind is to weak to explain certain things. Therefor don't
>> > try.
>>
>> Certain things? Name one.
>> Betcha can't.
<snip>
>What Atheists do, is the same thing they accuse Christians for: trying
>to explain life with human means. Ergo: Atheism is religion. A very
>primitive form of it, anyway.
Exactly. When I realized this, I could no longer be an atheist. Now,
as an agnostic, I feel that I am being more "true" to myself. I no
longer claim to know things which I cannot know.
It seems many atheists and theists still do not understand that they
are quite similar in their "religion".
Ryan Muise
eni...@klis.com
********************************
"The veil that clouds your eyes shall be lifted
by the hands that wove it. You shall see and you
shall hear, yet you shall not deplore your noble
blindness or regret having being deaf"
-Children of the Bong
Steve Keppel-Jones
Donna Coyne <dco...@email.unc.edu> wrote:
>
>"Christianity argued from fact and reason"? What is this?
>One of those "World's thinnest books" joke titles, like
>"Good Movies Starring Frank Stallone" or "The Wit and Wisdom
>of Dan Quayle"?
"Norman Rockwell's Abused Children"? "James Burke's Great
Mistakes"? "The Collected Military Intelligence"?
Steve
f003
>Want to hear something really irrational? The fact that you, part of
>a monkey-race, can exclude a Creator.
How can a fact be irrational OR rational? Facts just ARE. They're either
right or wrong - not irrational or rational. But I take it you mean that
atheists are irrational in excluding a Creator (i.e. a god of some sort)
from our beliefs.
And having the same ancestor as monkeys does not make us part of a monkey
race.
>How's that possible. Your so called science can't prove there's no God.
>Then how could you?
Sure it's possible. I disbelieve, but not *despite* science's inability to
prove that gods do not exist. I disbelieve because science has not proven
that gods exist.
Think about it. Do you disbelieve in the existence of smurfs despite
people being unable to prove that they don't exist - or - because no one
can prove that they exist? (If you do, in fact, believe in smurfs,
substitute smurfs for something you don't believe in.)
But if you believe in something on faith, and without a shred of evidence,
you are being irrational and inconsistent. After all, why Jesus, and not
Allah, Krisna, Brahma, Vishnu, Zeus, Odin, Ra, Kwan Yin, etc.?
>And should a religion be logical? Then why should we believe?
Each religion *does* have logic behind it. Otherwise, it would be
completely incomprehensible, and would have no adherents whatsoever,
because no one could understand what the fuck it was about.
What if Christianity had no logic? First of all, the Bible would be
utterly worthless - after all, without logic, who could understand what it
was saying? For all we know, Satan created the Universe for oysters, Man
was created to prepare the way for oysters, God is an imposter and Jesus
died on the cross to give roaches near-immortality.
Sure (theistic) religion has logic. But this logic is a house of cards
built on baseless assertions - that god(s) exist, that they are
undetectable but somehow influence our lives (and afterlives) in
detectable ways, that they somehow want/need our respect/worship, etc.
I suspect people believe because they *want* to believe. They then take a
blind leap of faith and accept that this flimsy, unseen and unsound
foundation is actually there. The rest follows naturally.
>The human mind is to weak to explain certain things. Therefor
>don't try.
Yours, and many others in history, certainly. But civilization is advanced
by the brave minds who push against our limits, instead of the timid who
fear to venture into the unknown. If all of our ancestors had your attitude,
we would probably still be living in caves.
>Religion and science is the same thing: two ways to explain life in a
>human way of thinking.
By your logic, ignorance and knowledge are the same thing: two ways to
explain how much we understand in a human way of thinking. Sorry, but
religion and science are opposite sides of the same coin.
--
===========================================================================
Foo, Chik Yau a#198
f0...@ms1.hinet.net
Raistlin Majere, Archmage
On Wed, 28 May 1997 21:16:29 GMT, eni...@klis.com (Ryan Muise) let it be
known that:
>On 27 May 97 17:23:12 GMT, G. Soderberg
><thaz...@falun.mail.telia.com> wrote:
>
>>Giant Robot Messiah <robot_...@egocities.com> writes: > G. Soderberg wrote:
>>>
>>> > And should a religion be logical? Then why should we believe?
>>> > The human mind is to weak to explain certain things. Therefor don't
>>> > try.
>>>
>>> Certain things? Name one.
>>> Betcha can't.
>>What Atheists do, is the same thing they accuse Christians for: trying
>>to explain life with human means. Ergo: Atheism is religion. A very
>>primitive form of it, anyway.
>
> Exactly.
Well then I guess you can provide me a list of what every atheist
believes and what every atheist worships.
> When I realized this, I could no longer be an atheist. Now,
>as an agnostic, I feel that I am being more "true" to myself. I no
>longer claim to know things which I cannot know.
Well which are you: an agnostic atheist or agnostic theist?
Agnosticism in and of itself is indefensible.
> It seems many atheists and theists still do not understand that they
>are quite similar in their "religion".
I'd really like for you to explain how atheism is a religion.
Atheism has only one item: a lack of belief in a god or gods. That's it. A
lack of belief is not a belief.
Raist
alt.atheism atheist #51
When in danger, when in doubt
Run in circles, scream and shout
Nothing is the miracle it appears to be--Simon Stevin
<dkresch><at><execpc><dot><com>
J. Michael Phillips
arc...@phoenix.princeton.edu (Austin Cline) wrote:
***snip***
>
>Science is a method of acquiring knowledge about the world in the most
>logical, common sensical way possible.
That is true. However, the universe does *not* make sense, why should
we expect science, which is rational to accurately describe it? Take
for instance sexual reproduction. It is a rather ODD way for a
species to procreate. Many children spend a LOT of time and energy
denying the reality of it when told about it, because it *doesn't*
make sense! Even the scientific knowledge of it is merely descriptive
in nature. It goes nowhere towards making it any more sensible.
>Religion is a means of projecting
>wish-fulfillment onto the world.
This, rather than fact, is an opinion, and unverifiable. It seems odd
to me that someone who is so rigorous in their analysis of others'
arguments would present an opinion as fact. Why do you suppose that
is?
Live Long and Prosper
J. Michael Phillips
http://www.eskimo.com/~wizkidm/
J. Michael Phillips
"David J. Vorous" <da...@snakebite.com> wrote:
***snip***
>It was humans that created the "Creator".
This is your opinion, and is unverifiable. Why do you report opinion
as fact? I have SEEN you jump down the proverbial throat of theists
for the same thing. Why is it wrong for them, but OK for you?
>
>> How's that possible. Your so called science can't prove there's no God.
>> Then how could you?
>
>Science has never tried to prove there is a god, nor have the tried to
>disprove one either. They left that stuff up to the philosophers.
That is not entirely true. There have been experiments (however
misguided they were) to do just that. They were not successful.
>
>> And should a religion be logical? Then why should we believe?
>> The human mind is to weak to explain certain things. Therefor don't try.
>
>That should say that _some_ minds are too weak. A religion cannot be
>logical, it is based upon faith, not logic.
This is demonstrably false. While many *do* believe and obey blindly,
there are also many who's belief is based largely on logic and
reasoning.
>Believe if you want, it's
>your business, not mine.
>
>> Religion and science is the same thing: two ways to explain life in a
>> human way of thinking.
>
>But the difference is in the way of deriving that explanation. There is
>logic and reassoning or faith and emotions. Take your pick.
Or, you can use both. Personally, I prefer using ALL my faculties,
including intuition and emotions. If you would prefer to use only
*some* of your faculties, you are certainly welcome to. I will not
belittle you for doing so. I would appreciate it if you would not
belittle me for my position either (or any of my brethren who choose
as I do).
WolfLogic
>"David J. Vorous" <da...@snakebite.com> wrote:
>
>***snip***
>
>>It was humans that created the "Creator".
>
>This is your opinion, and is unverifiable. Why do you report opinion
>as fact? I have SEEN you jump down the proverbial throat of theists
>for the same thing. Why is it wrong for them, but OK for you?
Actually, he makes a good argument from ignorance. Let's see how does
that go?
If A can't be proven, it must be false; VS If A can't be disproven
it must be true..
Since the burdon of proof lies with the believer, and proof is not
forth coming, then it stands to reason that since God can be assumed
not to exist, that the thought or concept of God was created by
humans. Hmmm sounds pretty logical to me.
>>
>>> How's that possible. Your so called science can't prove there's no God.
>>> Then how could you?
>>
>>Science has never tried to prove there is a god, nor have the tried to
>>disprove one either. They left that stuff up to the philosophers.
>
>That is not entirely true. There have been experiments (however
>misguided they were) to do just that. They were not successful.
How do you create an experiment to disprove God.
The condition of observability has to exist before something can be
disproven.
For example, I can prove that an elephant is not in my house. All I
have to do is search for the elephant and by observation prove the
elephant is not there.
The rules for disproving God is that first he must be observable. And
if his existance was observable, then his existance would be proven.
>>
>>> And should a religion be logical? Then why should we believe?
>>> The human mind is to weak to explain certain things. Therefor don't try.
>>
>>That should say that _some_ minds are too weak. A religion cannot be
>>logical, it is based upon faith, not logic.
>
>This is demonstrably false. While many *do* believe and obey blindly,
>there are also many who's belief is based largely on logic and
>reasoning.
>
False logic and false reasoning. Or just immature logic and
reasoning. Depends on how you look at it.
>>Believe if you want, it's
>>your business, not mine.
>>
>>> Religion and science is the same thing: two ways to explain life in a
>>> human way of thinking.
>>
>>But the difference is in the way of deriving that explanation. There is
>>logic and reassoning or faith and emotions. Take your pick.
>
Yes there is logic and reasoning OR faith and emotions. And the
latter two usually tend not to have anything to do with reality.
John Ings
On Wed, 28 May 1997 21:16:29 GMT, eni...@klis.com (Ryan Muise) wrote:
>>What Atheists do, is the same thing they accuse Christians for: trying
>>to explain life with human means. Ergo: Atheism is religion. A very
>>primitive form of it, anyway.
>
> Exactly. When I realized this, I could no longer be an atheist. Now,
>as an agnostic, I feel that I am being more "true" to myself. I no
>longer claim to know things which I cannot know.
> It seems many atheists and theists still do not understand that they
>are quite similar in their "religion".
Sorry Ryan, but you have not solved your problem. You still must
decide whether you are an atheist or not, for agnosticism is
orthoganal to theism-atheism.
Now do you believe in a god or not? If you do, you are an agnostic
theist. If you don't, you are an agnostic atheist like me.
The Christian quite rightly takes umbrage when an unbeliever attempts
to tell him what a Christian is. Similarly, the Christian has no
business telling an atheist what constitutes atheism.
Stix
Ryan Muise posted the following to alt.atheism:
>G. Soderberg
>>What Atheists do, is the same thing they accuse Christians for: trying
>>to explain life with human means. Ergo: Atheism is religion.
Your initial premise is faulty. Christian mythologists try to explain life
by interjecting supernatural critters to whom we're subordinate.
Atheists lack that "quality." Ergo, your conclusion is bogus and
non-sequitur.
> A very primitive form of it, anyway.
Ch'yeah, just like "baldness" is a primitive form of hair colour.
> Exactly.
Exactly? Settle down. Atheism is the lack of theism, not a religion.
> When I realized this, I could no longer be an atheist.
Hmm. Do you have theism (belief in a god or gods)? If not, you're an
atheist whether you like the word or not. Don't be fooled by christian
idiots who try to tack other meanings to the word. In it's unqualified
form, "atheism" merely states the lack of theism, not reasons for that
lack.
> Now, as an agnostic, I feel that I am being more "true" to myself.
Agnosticism is a statement about knowledge. If you claim that you cannot
know whether a god exists or not, you certainly fit the title, but it still
says nothing as to whether or not you *believe* a god exists, despite the
inherent inability to know. If you don't believe a god exists, then you
don't have any theism. If you don't have any theism, you are *without
theism* and therefore you're an atheist.
An agnostic (or weak) atheist, but an atheist nonetheless. Live with it. :)
>I no longer claim to know things which I cannot know.
You don't NEED to. It's a common theistic deception. Weak atheism is best
described as simple, rational skepticism - the withholding of belief
pending substantiation - not necessarily an outright rejection.
> It seems many atheists and theists still do not understand that they
>are quite similar in their "religion".
Bah, in what way?
I'm a strong, critically explicit atheist, meaning I believe no god
thingumy's exist, I reject theistic claims, and I'll attack and criticize
theistic blether when I see it spouted as truth. In what possible way is
that similar to a religious belief? It has no bearing at all on how I live;
god-thingumy's or the lack thereof simply never enter the equation.
I attack theistic bullshit when I see it in exactly the same way I'd attack
other bullshit claims. If someone started barfing on about the moon being
made of Jello and how non worship of the Jello moon would cause an eternity
of suffering and that there were some Jellovian moon rules to live by, I'd
rip the shit out of *that* nonsense too.
Bugger-all to do with any religion on my behalf, unless you want to call
reality a religion - but you'd be redefining the word "religion" into
meaningless obscurity.
Stix
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
"Mysticism is a disease of the mind."
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
J. Micheal Nobles
> barr...@fastlink.com.au (Barry O'Grady) writes:
> :G. Soderberg <thaz...@falun.mail.telia.com> wrote:
> :Want to hear something really irrational? The fact that you, part of
> :a monkey-race, can exclude a Creator.
> Want to hear something really irrational? Listen to G. Soderberg talking.
Interesting that an insult is the best you can do...
> :How's that possible. Your so called science can't prove there's no God.
> :Then how could you?
> So called science can't prove there's no Invisable Pink Unicorn but it
> sure did a good job of providing the computer you dribble on. Your so
> called God couldn't invent computers.
Assertion. Just because YOU believe that God does not exist, does not mean
that if He did exist He could not have invented computers. One small detail
lends weight to the idea that indeed He can, and has. He invented the human
brain, which by accounts, is much more complex than any computer that we can
come up with. Yes, yes! I know! You will now say that God does not exist.
It would be just as stupid to say that Bill Gates doesn't exist. We just happen
to have different evidence in this regard.
> :And should a religion be logical? Then why should we believe?
> You mean that feeble brained idiots like yourself figure that if it
> can't be understood it must be true?
Again an insult. Why so bitter? Are you really afraid that all of this just
might be true?
> :The human mind is to weak to explain certain things. Therefor don't
> :try.
> Fine. Then don't you try to explain the state of the world by using
> a so called God.
I think the point he was making has escaped you.
> :Religion and science is the same thing: two ways to explain life in a
> :human way of thinking.
> Science is restricted to facts while religion is free to say what it
> wants.
No, science is restricted to the physical universe. Scientific theories are
sometimes formed before they are tested, ie without facts to back them up.
After they are tested, you could claim this. Religion attempts to explain
what science does not deal with.
Mike Nobles | "But if any man lacks wisdom, let him ask of God,
Univ. of Tulsa | who gives to all men generously and without
Mcfarlin Library | reproach, and it will be given to him."
nobl...@centum.utulsa.edu | James 1:5 NASB *SUPER SHEEP*
arnold v. lesikar
In article <338cfbaa...@news.eskimo.com>,
>This is your opinion, and is unverifiable. Why do you report opinion
>as fact? I have SEEN you jump down the proverbial throat of theists
>for the same thing. Why is it wrong for them, but OK for you?
That is not opinion. In fact, I would consider it to be a truism. Study
comparative mythology for example. The Greeks took the Iliad to be fact, and
regarded as atheist and immoral those who doubted the truth of Homer's
stories.
You don't believe in Zeus and Hera, do you? Why should we regard the mythology
of the Bible as any more valid than the mythology of Homer or the mythology of
the Mahabharata?
>>> How's that possible. Your so called science can't prove there's no God.
>>> Then how could you?
>>
>>Science has never tried to prove there is a god, nor have the tried to
>>disprove one either. They left that stuff up to the philosophers.
>
>That is not entirely true. There have been experiments (however
>misguided they were) to do just that. They were not successful.
You mean they showed no "God effect"... That should tell you something!
>>That should say that _some_ minds are too weak. A religion cannot be
>>logical, it is based upon faith, not logic.
>
>This is demonstrably false. While many *do* believe and obey blindly,
>there are also many who's belief is based largely on logic and
>reasoning.
Logic shmogic. The issue is data. There is no objective evidence for the
existence of an entity like the Biblical God, or for the existence of an
entity like Zeus, for that matter.
The Greeks accounted for lightning by the actions of Zeus the Thunderer. The
modern world knows that lightning results from electrical charges generated by
natural phenomena in a thunderstorm. A deeper understanding of nature
eliminated the need for a divinity to explain the phenomenon. That's generally
what happens when humankind replaces both fictionizing and armchair logic with
the actual close examination of nature. The need for gods disappears.
>>But the difference is in the way of deriving that explanation. There is
>>logic and reassoning or faith and emotions. Take your pick.
>
>Or, you can use both. Personally, I prefer using ALL my faculties,
>including intuition and emotions. If you would prefer to use only
>*some* of your faculties, you are certainly welcome to. I will not
>belittle you for doing so. I would appreciate it if you would not
>belittle me for my position either (or any of my brethren who choose
>as I do).
It depends on what facet of existence you're interested in. Emotion and faith
is of remarkably little use in understanding the world of physical objective
reality. Faith in God may be a useful tool for dealing with feelings, but it
is a mistake to imagine that God represents some kind of actual objective
reality.
arn
http://walt.stcloud.msus.edu/
les...@tigger.stcloud.msus.edu
G. Soderberg
arc...@phoenix.princeton.edu (Austin Cline) writes: > In article <338b1...@d2o22.telia.com>, G. Soderberg
> <thaz...@falun.mail.telia.com> wrote:
>
> >It is important to remember that most scientific theories, are not
> >proven fact. All these theories does, is to sound logical.
>
> You don't seem to understand what a Scientific Theory is. In science, a
> theory is something which has been repeatedly confirmed and for which
> there is no clear counter-argument. These theories do more than sound
> logical: they explain all the available evidence and make testable
> predictions which turn out to be correct.
>
is to poorly equipped, both in intellect and technology, to make the
right, empirical falsifications.
> >What Atheists do, is the same thing they accuse Christians for: trying
> >to explain life with human means.
>
> False. Atheism is a lack of belief in gods. Some go further and deny
> certain gods or even all gods, but need not. An atheist might explain
> their lives in any manner they wish, but atheism does not dictate how this
> might be done.
>
No, it's not false. If I rule out a 'thinking' Creator, and claims
that everything is a matter of science, which in turn can be understood
by the human mind, I'm not exactly making my life tougher.
By becoming an atheist, I can suddenly understand everything. That feels
rather nice!
I'm telling you: Atheists are the real 'simplifiers'.
> > Ergo: Atheism is religion.
>
> Religion is not defined by the attempt to explain life - if it were, just
> about every philisophical system would be a religion. Perhaps if you got a
> clue and bothered to study religion, something so basic might sink it.
> Religion is based primarily upon the belief in the supernatural - be is
> supernatural creatures, powers, or realms. Normally there is also a fixed
> doctrine. However, it is the element of the supernatural which
> distinguishes religion from other human pursuits.
>
When are you people going to realise that philosophy, theology and
science should be viewed as one single subject?
Why should I define Religion? Reality is so much more than a dictionary.
> A very
> >primitive form of it, anyway.
>
> What is truly primitive is your base understanding of the relevant issues.
>
Flatter will get you nowhere.
> Austin Cline; German Department; Princeton University
> --- ..Any organization could profit from a 10-year-old member with
> enough strength of character to refuse to swear falsely."
>
> [New York Times editorial, 12/12/93, on the Boy Scouts' refusing
> membership to Mark Welsh, who would not sign a religious oath]
>
G. Soderberg
Stoney
G. Soderberg <thaz...@falun.mail.telia.com> wrote:
>When are you people going to realise that philosophy, theology and
>science should be viewed as one single subject?
They are different subjects entirely and should be dealt with that
way.
Regards,
Stoney
Due to commercial spams; header address is falsified.
Real email address is: cc1...@cdsnet.net
#9
lunati...@rocketmail.com
In article <338c984e...@news.klis.com>,
eni...@klis.com wrote:
>
> On 27 May 97 17:23:12 GMT, G. Soderberg
> <thaz...@falun.mail.telia.com> wrote:
>
> >Giant Robot Messiah <robot_...@egocities.com> writes: > G. Soderberg
wrote:
> >>
> >> > try.
> >>
> >> Betcha can't.
>
>
> >What Atheists do, is the same thing they accuse Christians for: trying
> >primitive form of it, anyway.
>
> as an agnostic, I feel that I am being more "true" to myself. I no
> longer claim to know things which I cannot know.
> are quite similar in their "religion".
>
> eni...@klis.com
> ********************************
> "The veil that clouds your eyes shall be lifted
> by the hands that wove it. You shall see and you
> shall hear, yet you shall not deplore your noble
> blindness or regret having being deaf"
> -Children of the Bong
-------------------==== Posted via Deja News ====-----------------------
http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Post to Usenet
Ryan Muise
On Thu, 29 May 1997 08:51:55 GMT, st...@REMOVE.ozemail.com.au (Stix)
wrote:
<snip>
>
>> Exactly.
>
>Exactly? Settle down. Atheism is the lack of theism, not a religion.
Read my other posting...
>
>> When I realized this, I could no longer be an atheist.
>
>Hmm. Do you have theism (belief in a god or gods)? If not, you're an
>atheist whether you like the word or not. Don't be fooled by christian
>idiots who try to tack other meanings to the word. In it's unqualified
>form, "atheism" merely states the lack of theism, not reasons for that
>lack.
This is one sided. Here's an example of what I'm trying to say:
If I approach you with an apple in my hand, and ask "Do you like the
TASTE of apples?", there are more than two possible answers. 1) "Yes
I like them". 2) "No, I dislike them". 3) "I have never tasted them
before" OR the agnostic answer "I eat them all the time, however I
have no tastebuds (or even they removed the tastebuds to cut down on
subjectivity) :)
In my mind (I could be totally wrong) both atheists and theists
ASSUME things that cant be assumed.
>> Now, as an agnostic, I feel that I am being more "true" to myself.
>
>Agnosticism is a statement about knowledge. If you claim that you cannot
>know whether a god exists or not, you certainly fit the title, but it still
>says nothing as to whether or not you *believe* a god exists, despite the
>inherent inability to know. If you don't believe a god exists, then you
>don't have any theism. If you don't have any theism, you are *without
>theism* and therefore you're an atheist.
>An agnostic (or weak) atheist, but an atheist nonetheless. Live with it. :)
Again, you're only looking at it from one side. I simply do not hold
any beleif on this issue. I do not have a lack of belief, or any
positive belief. The belief is non-existant...it is not a positive or
negative assertion.
This whole arguement is worthless anyway. We are debating over
defintions of words...it's just semantics.
>
>>I no longer claim to know things which I cannot know.
>
>You don't NEED to. It's a common theistic deception. Weak atheism is best
>described as simple, rational skepticism - the withholding of belief
>pending substantiation - not necessarily an outright rejection.
Do you think this is a more rational approach then *attempting* to be
neutral?
>> It seems many atheists and theists still do not understand that they
>>are quite similar in their "religion".
>
>Bah, in what way?
>
>I'm a strong, critically explicit atheist, meaning I believe no god
>thingumy's exist, I reject theistic claims, and I'll attack and criticize
>theistic blether when I see it spouted as truth. In what possible way is
>that similar to a religious belief? It has no bearing at all on how I live;
>god-thingumy's or the lack thereof simply never enter the equation.
It's the "critical" part that I dislike. Why be critical of something
that may or may not exist. If one cant know that this creature exists,
arguing over it becomes worthless (yes, I really AM this morbid :) )
>I attack theistic bullshit when I see it in exactly the same way I'd attack
>other bullshit claims. If someone started barfing on about the moon being
>made of Jello and how non worship of the Jello moon would cause an eternity
>of suffering and that there were some Jellovian moon rules to live by, I'd
>rip the shit out of *that* nonsense too.
I find it interesting that you hold the power to tell what is
"bullshit" and what isn't. If you really do have this ability, please
tell the rest of us. If you do, all the world's problems will be
solved, since everyone will agree each other!
>Bugger-all to do with any religion on my behalf, unless you want to call
>reality a religion - but you'd be redefining the word "religion" into
>meaningless obscurity.
The perception of reality is relative, because if it was not, we all
would agree. Since humans can only perceive reality, "truths" become
unreachable, hence agnosticism.
I'll try to elaborate at a later time..I'm just too busy at the
moment. Ryan......
Ryan Muise
On Thu, 29 May 1997 04:28:56 GMT,
Rais...@Tower-of-High-Sorcery.Palanthas.com (Raistlin Majere,
Archmage) wrote:
<snip>
>>
>> Exactly.
>
> Well then I guess you can provide me a list of what every atheist
>believes and what every atheist worships.
>
>> When I realized this, I could no longer be an atheist. Now,
>>as an agnostic, I feel that I am being more "true" to myself. I no
>>longer claim to know things which I cannot know.
>
> Well which are you: an agnostic atheist or agnostic theist?
>Agnosticism in and of itself is indefensible.
I do not consider myself a "theistic atheist" or an "atheistic
agnostic". I simply claim that I do not know, and that I am incapable
of knowing, so I do not bother coming to the useless conclusion of
"Yes" or "No".
>
>> It seems many atheists and theists still do not understand that they
>>are quite similar in their "religion".
>
> I'd really like for you to explain how atheism is a religion.
>Atheism has only one item: a lack of belief in a god or gods. That's it. A
>lack of belief is not a belief.
Definition wise a religion is a set of ideals or beliefs. I agree
with you that atheism doesn't exactly fit into this category, but to a
certain extent it does. i.e. 1) God likely doesn't exist --Besides
from that, the individual creates other ideas based on this claim.
I agree with you that atheism isn't *really* a religion...that's why I
originally put "religion" in quotations.
I disagree with your second claim however. It's the "Is the glass
half full or half empty" idea. Any idea that is believed in is a
belief. You BELIEVE that there is a lack of belief for God. As you
said it is also a lack of BELIEF. There are the exact same thing, said
in different ways.
Michael Williams
I've herd people claim that evolution is based on evidence, WELL WHERE
IS IT! Darwin saidf the fossil records would prove him right and 100
years later there are still know fossil record! A few assumptions and a
couple of "its possible" and BAM millions of people believe! Boy I wish
my faith was like that of evolutionist! No one can prove evolution yet
you believe!
Isaiah 40:22 calls the earth a sphere 1000's of years before Columbus.
Scientist now say there is evidence that there was once a world wide
flood - Boy I wonder if the Bible has anything to say about that? What
book is most used by archeologist? I can tell you its not Darwin's
Origin of Species! Could it be the Bible? Why is the Bible more acurate
than shakespeare! Scrolls were found that told of prophecy and the
prophecies were verified to have been fulfilled!
This "Stuff" might not prove anything but I believe it qualifies as
evidence!
David J. Vorous
WolfLogic wrote:
snip
> >>Science has never tried to prove there is a god, nor have the tried to
> >>disprove one either. They left that stuff up to the philosophers.
> >
> >That is not entirely true. There have been experiments (however
> >misguided they were) to do just that. They were not successful.
Sorry, no modern scientist has ever tried to devise a test to prove if a
diety exist or not. Who ever told you that they have, lied to you.
> How do you create an experiment to disprove God.
You can't.
--
David Vorous
da...@snakebite.com
http://users.aimnet.com/~dvorous/home.html
lunati...@rocketmail.com
In article <338b1...@d2o22.telia.com>,
G. Soderberg <thaz...@falun.mail.telia.com> wrote:
> It is important to remember that most scientific theories, are not
> proven fact. All these theories does, is to sound logical.
You have a LONG way to go before you have a good understanding of the
thought process, don't you? This is typical of a xian, you are taught NOT
to think.
Aristole promoted the concept of something being tru if it simply made
sense. This is the concept of "empiricism". This has long been rejected
and replaced ultimatley with our current scientific method. Our senses
and thought processes are only slightly more accurate than revelation as
a form of truth finding.
Current process takes the validity of accepted theories to a
significantly higher level of Critical Thinking. While YOU are stuck in a
mode of thinking developed 3-4,000 years ago. Try to catch up to this
century, before it changes to the NEXT century.
> What Atheists do, is the same thing they accuse Christians for: trying
> to explain life with human means. Ergo: Atheism is religion. A very
> primitive form of it, anyway.
You also have a twisted concept of the meaning of "religion". No wonder
you think the way you do. Some knowledge would go a long way. Here is
what Websters says about religion:
re·li·gion Etymology: Middle English religioun, from Latin religion-,
religio supernatural constraint, sanction, religious practice, perhaps
from religare to restrain, tie back Date: 13th century
(Interesting start, "to restrain" How appropriate)
1 a : the state of a religious <a nun in her 20th year of religion> b (1)
: the service and worship of God or the supernatural (2): commitment or
devotion to religious faith or observance 2 : a personal set or
institutionalized system of religious attitudes, beliefs, and practices 3
archaic : scrupulous conformity : CONSCIENTIOUSNESS 4 : a cause,
principle, or system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith
The closest that religion's def comes is #4 except that it requires
"faith" and you should probably look that up before you make another of
your mistakes with what words actually mean.
Earle Jones
In article <338E18...@mindspring.com>, Michael Williams
<ba...@mindspring.com> wrote:
--
Wow! I can't believe that you are "ba...@mindspring.com". Are you sure
you're not "mi...@ballspring.com"?
You say: "...and 100 years later there are still know fossil record!"
Know fossil record, huh? Well who nos better than you?
"The bible is more acurate than shakespeare!" Hogwash!
Your stupid diatribe is the most anti-intellectual piece of crap I've seen
lately, and believe me, reading this group, that's saying something!
Stay off line and try to learn something, if that is possible.
earle
--
__
__/\_\
/\_\/_/
\/_/\_\ earle
\/_/ jones
gd...@netonecom.net
> If A can't be proven, it must be false; VS If A can't be disproven
> it must be true..
>
> Since the burdon of proof lies with the believer, and proof is not
> forth coming, then it stands to reason that since God can be assumed
> not to exist, that the thought or concept of God was created by
> humans. Hmmm sounds pretty logical to me.
I look at it this way,
If A equals A then A is not non-A
this is the logic of anti-thesis, and objective reasoning in which the
Judeo/Christian belief system makes perfect sense.
Greg
>
gd...@netonecom.net
> Sure (theistic) religion has logic. But this logic is a house of cards
> built on baseless assertions - that god(s) exist, that they are
> undetectable but somehow influence our lives (and afterlives) in
> detectable ways, that they somehow want/need our respect/worship, etc.
>
> I suspect people believe because they *want* to believe. They then take a
> blind leap of faith and accept that this flimsy, unseen and unsound
> foundation is actually there. The rest follows naturally.
>
> >don't try.
The logic of religion in lies in mans attempt to define himself in relation
to himself and others, and in the physical world around him. It is reasonable
for a man to question his presence in this world and why he is the way he is.
It is logical that men have been doing this since the dawn of time because we
are different from the other creatures of the earth. Mans questioning of
existence is not built on a house of cards, but built on the very real evidence
of the peculiar and singular situation he finds himself in on this planet. To
scoff at those who ask the hard questions, who offer solutions to mans dilemma
is illogical and foolish.
Greg
Brad Franklin
John Ings (john...@ottawa.com) wrote:
: That is the modern dictionary definition. I take my definition from
: the man who coined the word, for he had a more general concept in
: mind:
: "Agnosticism is in fact not a creed, but a method, the essence of
: which lies in the application of a single principle.[ . . .]Positively
: the principle may be expressed: In matters of intellect, follow your
: reason as far as it will take you, without regard to any other
: consideration. And negatively: In matters of intellect, do not pretend
: that conclusions are certain which are not demonstrated or
: demonstrable." Thomas Huxley 1893
:
OK, if you want to introduce a non-standard definition of agnosticism,
then you'd best be ready for agnostic christians. I would be one
of them, since I practice (to the best of my awareness and capacity)
Huxley's method, yet I follow Jesus Christ.
: >Rationalism is primarily a cosmological and epistemological concept.
: >Agnosticism is primarily a theological one.
:
: As you can see from the above, Huxley had a broader field in mind.
:
: >>Your definition of faith differs from the common Christian practice of
: >>it then. What is it you mean when you say admiringly of someone
: >>"He is a man of great faith"?
: >
: >Faith is what scripture states it is, "the assurance of things hoped
: >for, the evidence of things not seen."
:
: I feel that's a poor translation. My RSV has "the conviction of things
: not seen" and I think that's more what Paul meant. Often I find
: theists contending that their faith has brought knowledge. I keep
: insisting that if they have knowledge they don't need faith. Faith
: requires an element of uncertainty or it isn't faith.
:
: > To believe something because
: >you see it proven before your eyes is a mis-use of the term. The
: >words 'to believe' and 'to have faith' were particularly coined so as
: >to be differentiated from the experience of knowing.
:
: Exactly. But try and tell that to many Christians.
:
Talking about christianity is not the same as talking about christians.
Neither is christianity the sum total of what is believed by people who
call themselves christians. In fact, I doubt we could all reach agreement
on what exactly christianity is. Unless we have a working definition,
the argument must fall back onto one's experiences of people who call
themselves christian. This is a relevant thing to consider, but it is
inadequate for reaching conclusions about the veracity of
the doctrine of christianity.
: >I'm not sure what your question intended. My saying, "He's a man of
: >great faith." may or may not have anything to do with what I believe
: >faith to be.
:
: I suggest what you mean is that this man has to some degree emulated
: Job. He has remained steadfast in his faith despite severe trials.
: This is a much admired behaviour among theists, while among scientists
: just the opposite is true. A scientist who stubbornly clings to a
: belief in the face of contrary evidence is regarded as a poor
: scientist.
:
You really miss the whole point of Job here. The fact of Job's suffering
in no way represents evidence against the existence of a loving God. What
it did represent is a temptation to lose his faith in God which served
him so well in good times.
When you think about it, the notion that the if the Creator
were loving then people would always get punished for doing
bad and rewarded for doing good is a very strange one, and largely
incompatible with free will.
Cheers,
Brad
Raistlin Majere, Archmage
On Thu, 29 May 1997 20:13:31 GMT, eni...@klis.com (Ryan Muise) let it be
known that:
>On Thu, 29 May 1997 04:28:56 GMT,
>Rais...@Tower-of-High-Sorcery.Palanthas.com (Raistlin Majere,
>Archmage) wrote:
>
>
> <snip>
>
>>>
>>> Exactly.
>>
>> Well then I guess you can provide me a list of what every atheist
>>believes and what every atheist worships.
>>
>>> When I realized this, I could no longer be an atheist. Now,
>>>as an agnostic, I feel that I am being more "true" to myself. I no
>>>longer claim to know things which I cannot know.
>>
>> Well which are you: an agnostic atheist or agnostic theist?
>>Agnosticism in and of itself is indefensible.
>
> I do not consider myself a "theistic atheist" or an "atheistic
>agnostic". I simply claim that I do not know, and that I am incapable
>of knowing, so I do not bother coming to the useless conclusion of
>"Yes" or "No".
Well what is it that you don't know? I'll give you the def.s of
agnostic atheist and agnostic theist. And agnostic theist says that god
exists, but exactly what god is is a mystery/unknowable. An agnostic
atheist says that not only what god is is unknowable, but the existence of
it is also unknowable.
Just to claim that you don't know means nothing unless you explain
what it is that you don't know. By positing "I don't know", and that's it,
is more of a cop-out.
>>
>>> It seems many atheists and theists still do not understand that they
>>>are quite similar in their "religion".
>>
>> I'd really like for you to explain how atheism is a religion.
>>Atheism has only one item: a lack of belief in a god or gods. That's it. A
>>lack of belief is not a belief.
>
> Definition wise a religion is a set of ideals or beliefs. I agree
>with you that atheism doesn't exactly fit into this category, but to a
>certain extent it does. i.e. 1) God likely doesn't exist --Besides
Actually, from the literal definition you are incorrect. See below
as to why.
>from that, the individual creates other ideas based on this claim.
>I agree with you that atheism isn't *really* a religion...that's why I
>originally put "religion" in quotations.
Okay.
> I disagree with your second claim however. It's the "Is the glass
>half full or half empty" idea. Any idea that is believed in is a
>belief. You BELIEVE that there is a lack of belief for God.
No, that's the definition. A lack of belief cannot ever be a
belief, for that would be self-contradictory.
The positive statement "I believe that there is no god" does not
equate to "I lack belief in a/some/all gods". For instance, a person who
was never told anything about gods since birth is by definition an atheist.
That person lacks belief in a god (or gods). But this person does not have
the belief that no god exists.
Does that clear anything up?
>As you said it is also a lack of BELIEF. There are the exact same thing, said
>in different ways.
See above.
Claude Martins
On Thu, 29 May 1997 19:01:03 -0500, Michael Williams
<ba...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>I've herd people claim that evolution is based on evidence, WELL WHERE
>IS IT!
None so blind as they who will not see.
>Darwin saidf the fossil records would prove him right
The fossil record did prove him right.
>and 100
>years later there are still know fossil record!
Outright lie.
>A few assumptions and a
>couple of "its possible" and BAM millions of people believe!
As people "believe" in gravity, or that the sun will rise tomorrow.
>Boy I wish
>my faith was like that of evolutionist! No one can prove evolution yet
>you believe!
Proof is meaningless in science.
> Isaiah 40:22 calls the earth a sphere 1000's of years before Columbus.
Circle != Sphere
>Scientist now say there is evidence that there was once a world wide
>flood - Boy I wonder if the Bible has anything to say about that?
Outright lie.
>What
>book is most used by archeologist? I can tell you its not Darwin's
>Origin of Species!
Of course not, OoS is not about archaeology.
>Could it be the Bible? Why is the Bible more acurate
>than shakespeare!
Dramatic license?
>Scrolls were found that told of prophecy and the
>prophecies were verified to have been fulfilled!
Nostradamus has a better hit ratio with prophecies.
> This "Stuff" might not prove anything but I believe it qualifies as
>evidence!
Troll.
Regards,
Claude.
--
Claude Martins, "Timberwolf", Dept of Comp Sci, York Univ, Ont, Canada
mailto://mar...@cs.yorku.ca && http://www.ariel.cs.yorku.ca/~martins/
"Listen to them: children of the night. What music they make."
- Count Dracula, Dracula
Stix
Donna Coyne posted the following to alt.atheism:
>Giant Robot Messiah (robot_...@egocities.com) wrote:
>: G. Soderberg wrote:
>
>[snip]
>
>"Christianity argued from fact and reason"? What is this?
>One of those "World's thinnest books" joke titles, like
>"Good Movies Starring Frank Stallone" or "The Wit and Wisdom
>of Dan Quayle"?
>
>Anybody got any more?
Yep.
"Statements made by christians that contain no lies."
"An exhaustive list of all honest christians."
"Rational arguments put forward by Boatwright."
"The benefits of christian mythologism."
"Zoner's intellectual inspirations."
"Atheist arguments defeated by christian mythologists."
"Evidence in favour of belief in god-thingumy's."
WolfLogic
>:
>: I suggest what you mean is that this man has to some degree emulated
>: Job. He has remained steadfast in his faith despite severe trials.
>: This is a much admired behaviour among theists, while among scientists
>: just the opposite is true. A scientist who stubbornly clings to a
>: belief in the face of contrary evidence is regarded as a poor
>: scientist.
>:
>
>You really miss the whole point of Job here. The fact of Job's suffering
>in no way represents evidence against the existence of a loving God. What
>it did represent is a temptation to lose his faith in God which served
>him so well in good times.
>
I think that the point of Job is actually in the mind of the beholder
just like art. An atheist views Job as futile, since no God exists
for the atheist. So in actuallity, Job wasn't just written for the
believer, but the non-believer as well as sort of a kind of joke. To
point out the stupidity of man.
Barry O'Grady
dco...@email.unc.edu (Donna Coyne) wrote:
:Giant Robot Messiah (robot_...@egocities.com) wrote:
:: G. Soderberg wrote:
:
:[snip]
:
:"Christianity argued from fact and reason"? What is this?
:One of those "World's thinnest books" joke titles, like
:"Good Movies Starring Frank Stallone" or "The Wit and Wisdom
:of Dan Quayle"?
:
:Anybody got any more?
:
"What God has revealed to man"
Barry
=====================================
To reply via email please remove the XX from my
return address.
Barry O'Grady
john...@ottawa.com (John Ings) wrote:
:On Wed, 28 May 1997 21:16:29 GMT, eni...@klis.com (Ryan Muise) wrote:
:
:
:>>What Atheists do, is the same thing they accuse Christians for: trying
:>>to explain life with human means. Ergo: Atheism is religion. A very
:>>primitive form of it, anyway.
:>
:> Exactly. When I realized this, I could no longer be an atheist. Now,
:>as an agnostic, I feel that I am being more "true" to myself. I no
:>longer claim to know things which I cannot know.
:> It seems many atheists and theists still do not understand that they
:>are quite similar in their "religion".
:
:Sorry Ryan, but you have not solved your problem. You still must
:decide whether you are an atheist or not, for agnosticism is
:orthoganal to theism-atheism.
:
:Now do you believe in a god or not? If you do, you are an agnostic
:theist. If you don't, you are an agnostic atheist like me.
:
:
:The Christian quite rightly takes umbrage when an unbeliever attempts
:to tell him what a Christian is. Similarly, the Christian has no
:business telling an atheist what constitutes atheism.
:
:
:john...@ottawa.com
An agnostic is a gutless atheist.
Barry O'Grady
wiz...@eskimo.com (J. Michael Phillips) wrote:
:"David J. Vorous" <da...@snakebite.com> wrote:
:
:***snip***
:
:>It was humans that created the "Creator".
:
:This is your opinion, and is unverifiable. Why do you report opinion
:as fact? I have SEEN you jump down the proverbial throat of theists
:for the same thing. Why is it wrong for them, but OK for you?
It is a fact that humans created all Gods. Your dislike of that fact
does not make it any less a fact.
:>> How's that possible. Your so called science can't prove there's no God.
:>> Then how could you?
:>
:>Science has never tried to prove there is a god, nor have the tried to
:>disprove one either. They left that stuff up to the philosophers.
:
:That is not entirely true. There have been experiments (however
:misguided they were) to do just that. They were not successful.
One only needs to be observent and unbiased to know that none of the
Gods named by man exist.
:>> And should a religion be logical? Then why should we believe?
:>> The human mind is to weak to explain certain things. Therefor don't try.
:>
:>That should say that _some_ minds are too weak. A religion cannot be
:>logical, it is based upon faith, not logic.
:
:This is demonstrably false. While many *do* believe and obey blindly,
:there are also many who's belief is based largely on logic and
:reasoning.
Logic and reasoning can only ever lead to a rejection of all religions.
Since there is no factual basis to any religion only faith, which is
belief in the face of evidence against, can allow a person to believe.
:>Believe if you want, it's
:>your business, not mine.
:>
:>> Religion and science is the same thing: two ways to explain life in a
:>> human way of thinking.
:>
:>But the difference is in the way of deriving that explanation. There is
:>logic and reassoning or faith and emotions. Take your pick.
:
:Or, you can use both. Personally, I prefer using ALL my faculties,
:including intuition and emotions. If you would prefer to use only
:*some* of your faculties, you are certainly welcome to. I will not
:belittle you for doing so. I would appreciate it if you would not
:belittle me for my position either (or any of my brethren who choose
:as I do).
If you use all your facilities you can only come to a discust at, and
total rejection of, all religions. Faith is not a facility. It is a
means by which you can bypass your higher facilities and believe in
something simply because you want it to be so. Faith is an admission
that you are weak and need a crutch. Faith is the doorway to the
mental illness called religion.
Ken Morton
Ryan Muise wrote:
> In my mind (I could be totally wrong) both atheists and theists
> ASSUME things that cant be assumed.
This atheist assumes that beings for which there is no evidence of
existence don't exist. It's a default position pending evidence to the
contrary. It is not a knowledge claim.
> >>I no longer claim to know things which I cannot know.
> >
> >You don't NEED to. It's a common theistic deception. Weak atheism is best
> >described as simple, rational skepticism - the withholding of belief
> >pending substantiation - not necessarily an outright rejection.
>
> Do you think this is a more rational approach then *attempting* to be
> neutral?
It's not clear that your version of agnosticism really translates into a
position of neutrality. Just what are you agnostic about? The "God"
character in the Bible? All gods? All supernatural beings? Disembodied
intelligences? Specific knowledge claims of theists of a particular
creed?
One could argue that atheism is neutral because it is the stance of
witholding belief in the knowledge claims of others pending evidence to
support the claims. Being agnostic about preposterous claims is hardly a
neutral position -- it's just unwarranted credulity (Are you agnostic
about Santa Claus? Why not?). Being agnostic lends unjustified credence
to the ungrounded claims of theists.
A more blunt way of putting it might be, why should we take the claims
of theists seriously enough to be agnostic about them? Why aren't their
claims just plain ridiculous, like the claims of the Heavens Gaters or
Channelers or other peddlars of superstitious tripe?
Ken
Raistlin Majere, Archmage
On Thu, 29 May 97 21:46:06 GMT, gd...@netonecom.net let it be known that:
> The logic of religion in lies in mans attempt to define himself in relation
>to himself and others, and in the physical world around him. It is reasonable
>for a man to question his presence in this world and why he is the way he is.
>It is logical that men have been doing this since the dawn of time because we
>are different from the other creatures of the earth. Mans questioning of
>existence is not built on a house of cards, but built on the very real evidence
>of the peculiar and singular situation he finds himself in on this planet. To
>scoff at those who ask the hard questions, who offer solutions to mans dilemma
>is illogical and foolish.
We scoff at the theists answers, which in reality are questions
themselves. Mostly the answer is "goddidit" or "godmadeit" or
"godwhateverit". This begs the question of HOW god did what. Just positing
a god as a cure-all (the infamous "god of the gaps") is useless.
Brian E. Clark
Ryan Muise <eni...@klis.com> wrote:
[...]
> Definition wise a religion is a set of ideals or beliefs.
Ideals and beliefs do not, except in the minds of careless thinkers,
equate to religion. Boy Scouting embraces certain ideas and beliefs, but
it is not a religion. Neither is fiscal conservatism a religion. The
conviction that a healthy diet and freqent exercise are necessary to
remain fit cannot be considered religion, either.
> I agree with you that atheism doesn't exactly fit into this category,
> but to a certain extent it does.
Would you like some syrup for those waffles? ;-)
> i.e. 1) God likely doesn't exist
Pointing out an atheist's skepticism regarding God's existence does not
support the idea that atheism is a religion.
> --Besides from that, the individual creates other ideas based on this
> claim.
It should be clear that an person does not base his life upon what he
disbelieves, but on what he believes. It would be foolish to assert that
a Christian "creates other ideas" based on his disbelief of (or
unfamiliarity with) Shintoism. Likewise, an atheist does not "create
other ideas" based on his lack of belief in God.
> I agree with you that atheism isn't *really* a religion...that's why
> I originally put "religion" in quotations.
Perhaps you need to clarify your purpose?
[...]
> Any idea that is believed in is a belief.
I guess if you stick to truisms, you avoid any risks.
> You BELIEVE that there is a lack of belief for God.
Shall we next talk about a belief in a belief in a belief in a lack of
belief of a belief of a lack of a belief?
> As you said it is also a lack of BELIEF.
So what? If I have no fruit in my refrigerator, you cannot claim that an
absence of fruit implies the presence of fruit -- even if you accentuate
your point by capitalizing the word fruit.
> There are the exact same thing, said in different ways.
That's correct only if "I have no apples" is just another way of saying
"I have apples."
Brian E. Clark
brian<at>telerama<dot>lm<dot>com
____________________________________________________
Show me somebody who is always smiling, always
cheerful, always optimistic, and I will show you
somebody who hasn't the faintest idea what the heck
is really going on. -Mike Royko
John Ings
On 29 May 1997 22:26:01 GMT, fran...@math.wisc.edu (Brad Franklin)
wrote:
>John Ings (john...@ottawa.com) wrote:
>
>: That is the modern dictionary definition. I take my definition from
>: the man who coined the word, for he had a more general concept in
>: mind:
>: "Agnosticism is in fact not a creed, but a method, the essence of
>: which lies in the application of a single principle.[ . . .]Positively
>: the principle may be expressed: In matters of intellect, follow your
>: reason as far as it will take you, without regard to any other
>: consideration. And negatively: In matters of intellect, do not pretend
>: that conclusions are certain which are not demonstrated or
>: demonstrable." Thomas Huxley 1893
>:
>
>OK, if you want to introduce a non-standard definition of agnosticism,
Well, if YOU want to consider a dictionary to be a standard. Mostly
dictionaries report common usage, which is often wrong.
>then you'd best be ready for agnostic christians.
They're the best kind. Reasonable people.
> I would be one
>of them, since I practice (to the best of my awareness and capacity)
>Huxley's method,
Good for you.
>Talking about christianity is not the same as talking about christians.
>Neither is christianity the sum total of what is believed by people who
>call themselves christians. In fact, I doubt we could all reach agreement
>on what exactly christianity is.
I have observed that.
>: >I'm not sure what your question intended. My saying, "He's a man of
>: >great faith." may or may not have anything to do with what I believe
>: >faith to be.
>:
>: I suggest what you mean is that this man has to some degree emulated
>: Job. He has remained steadfast in his faith despite severe trials.
>: This is a much admired behaviour among theists, while among scientists
>: just the opposite is true. A scientist who stubbornly clings to a
>: belief in the face of contrary evidence is regarded as a poor
>: scientist.
>:
>
>You really miss the whole point of Job here. The fact of Job's suffering
>in no way represents evidence against the existence of a loving God.
Ah but it does represent evidence against God's loving.
The Book of Proverbs is full of the sort of promises to mankind that
God is supposed to have made. The righteous are supposed to prosper
and the evildoer is supposed to fail. History often demonstrates just
the opposite.
> What
>it did represent is a temptation to lose his faith in God which served
>him so well in good times.
What it represents is a priestly parable. In reading about Job the
Hebrews were suppposed to see themselves, for after the good times
under King David and Solomon, there came conquest and captivity and
defeat. All the promises in proverbs broken. Evidence that God had
abandoned his chosen people.
>When you think about it, the notion that the if the Creator
>were loving then people would always get punished for doing
>bad and rewarded for doing good is a very strange one, and largely
>incompatible with free will.
Quite. But for verse after verse after verse, that's just what
Proverbs promises.
Landis D. Ragon
st...@REMOVE.ozemail.com.au (Stix) wrote:
>Donna Coyne posted the following to alt.atheism:
>
>>Giant Robot Messiah (robot_...@egocities.com) wrote:
>>: G. Soderberg wrote:
>>
>>[snip]
>>
>>"Christianity argued from fact and reason"? What is this?
>>One of those "World's thinnest books" joke titles, like
>>"Good Movies Starring Frank Stallone" or "The Wit and Wisdom
>>of Dan Quayle"?
>>
>>Anybody got any more?
>
>Yep.
>
>"Statements made by christians that contain no lies."
>
>"An exhaustive list of all honest christians."
>
>"Rational arguments put forward by Boatwright."
>
>"The benefits of christian mythologism."
>
>"Zoner's intellectual inspirations."
>
>"Atheist arguments defeated by christian mythologists."
>
>"Evidence in favour of belief in god-thingumy's."
>
Did you forget...
"Promises kept by <nameless>?"
David J. Vorous
In the J/C religion the "if" in the above statement is replaced with a
presupposition. In any case they have not given any evidence that "A
equals A", therefore the rest of the logic is faulty.
Giant Robot Messiah
G. Soderberg wrote:
>
> Giant Robot Messiah <robot_...@egocities.com> writes: > G. Soderberg wrote:
> >
> > > The human mind is to weak to explain certain things. Therefor don't
> > > try.
> >
> > Betcha can't.
> >
> >
> >
> > -------------------
> > "Whaddya gonna do, outwit me?"
> >
> > {My reply-to address is cleverly encoded within this very sentence}
>
> Well, for one thing, why should I decode your stupid message?
When did I ask anyone to decode a message?
> It wasn't so clever by the way. Don't think I'll fall for the old
> 'look on this 3-D picture'-phrank.
What a mook.
Here's an important message, just for you. It's in a very special code,
so it may take you a while to figure out what it actually says.
{Bite me where it hurts, altar-boy}
> It is important to remember that most scientific theories, are not
> proven fact. All these theories does, is to sound logical.
>
> What Atheists do, is the same thing they accuse Christians for: trying
> to explain life with human means. Ergo: Atheism is religion. A very
> primitive form of it, anyway.
Actually, life has been satisfactorily explained, as far as I'm
concerned. I know why I'm here, how I got here, and how I work.
It's the finer points of quantum physics, neuropsychology and the like
that people like myself are still grappling with.
And atheism is not a religion. What do you think the A in atheism
represents?
You still haven't named anything that the human mind is too weak to
explain. Dang, I should have bet some _money_ on that one.
Giant Robot Messiah
-------------------
"Whaddya gonna do - outwit me?"
{My reply-to address is still cleverly encoded within this sentence, but
the encryption method has been modified.}
Giant Robot Messiah
J. Micheal Nobles wrote:
> You will now say that God does not exist.
> It would be just as stupid to say that Bill Gates doesn't exist. We just happen
> to have different evidence in this regard.
Different evidence? The difference is in our _definitions_ of evidence,
it seems. To an atheist, the testimony of a moron does not count as
evidence. You people, however, will accept some dusty old book (written
by people who probably got too much sun, and lived in mud-brick
buildings) as evidence.
> > :And should a religion be logical? Then why should we believe?
>
> > You mean that feeble brained idiots like yourself figure that if it
> > can't be understood it must be true?
>
> Again an insult. Why so bitter? Are you really afraid that all of this just
> might be true?
Come on! An insult was far and away the most appropriate response! Look
at Sodypop's question! That's stupidity, in its purest form.
> > :The human mind is to weak to explain certain things. Therefor don't
> > :try.
>
> > Fine. Then don't you try to explain the state of the world by using
> > a so called God.
>
> I think the point he was making has escaped you.
I think the point he was making has escaped you.
> > :Religion and science is the same thing: two ways to explain life in a
> > :human way of thinking.
>
> > Science is restricted to facts while religion is free to say what it
> > wants.
> Religion attempts to explain
> what science does not deal with.
You're right on this point - science doesn't deal with the imaginary.
Giant Robot Messiah
-------------------
"Monkey prefers the Charleston, but doesn't mind the swing."
Michael R. Hagerty
Before beginning the exposition that follows, here are some
preliminary remarks about the scope of the discussion at hand.
Feel free to snip this in subsequent replies.
What This Discussion is Not About
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
This is not a discussion about proving the existence of God, even
though its proposition is a necessary predecessor to Christian
thought.
This not a discussion about proofs for the truth of Christianity. If
you’re looking for the type of information which impresses the
scientist or mathematician, you will meet with disappointment.
Exceptions to this are in those areas where Christian propositions
involve facts known otherwise to history. Propositions of historical
fact whose origin is in the New Testament are evaluated as to their
historicity.
This is not an analysis of every single statement or claim in the New
Testament.
This discussion does not propose that absolutely every statement in
the New Testament can be explained or shown to have a reasonable basis
to the satisfaction of all.
What This Discussion Is About
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
This discussion repudiates the claim that Christianity is
unreasonable. It proposes to demonstrate that the events, teaching,
and systematic doctrine of Christianity have a reasonable basis with
respect to logic and inference and a factual basis for its key events
in human history.
It is, however, acknowledged that if one never becomes convinced that
the stated presuppositions, below, are true, a reasonable basis for
Christianity cannot, alone, establish its truth. The truth of
Christianity and its presuppositions about the existence of God are
ultimately a matter of faith whose experience is not an operation of
logic and reason. This is not a declaration or an agreement that the
operation of faith must, by definition, be devoid of a rational basis
or that its operation requires the suspension of logic and reason.
Matters of Introduction
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
The principles of logic and inference as applied to an argument have
two properties of significance: validity and truth. This discussion
primarily deals with the former. With respect to the truth of an
argument, wherever possible, facts used in a premise will be
discussed either as to the proofs which can establish them as true or
as to the degree of probability that the facts are true.
It is also important to distinguish the difference between the
reasonableness of a statement or proposition and the fact that it is
simply not to one’s liking. For example, if one does not like the
concept of a God who authorized the annihilation of the Canaanites,
this must be distinguished from the claim that such an act has no
basis in reason. Similarly, the attitude toward women in Islamic
nations may not meet with approval in Western society, but this is not
the same as saying that the practice is based on invalid reasoning.
No single argument or system of thought attempts to exhaustively
embrace all its logical predecessors. Acknowledgment of the existence
of these predecessors is necessary for the sake of analyzing
individual arguments further along in the process. In the case of
Christianity, certain key propositions presented in the Old Testament
are logical predecessors to the beginning of Christian thought.
These are:
1) That the God of Christianity is synonymous with the God of
historic Judaism as revealed in the Old Testament of the Bible.
2) That man has fallen from his original created state into a
condition which prevents him from fulfilling, by his own efforts,
the standard of God’s righteousness.
3) That in his grace, God has postponed or delayed the consequences
of man’s fall, to await a remedy for man’s condition which will
restore the relationship and fellowship once lost.
Exposition:
- - - - - - - -
Christianity proposes to solve finally and completely a problem which
originated in the events of the Old Testament and for which only a
provisional remedy was instituted until a final solution could be
actualized. That problem was man’s inability to comply satisfactorily
with the principles of righteousness as required by God (sin) and the
consequences which sin brought about.
Christianity introduces the following summary propositions:
1. That the principle documents of the New Testament,
called gospels, present what is characterized as
“good news” respecting the problem of man’s sin and
his inability to meet the requirements of righteousness.
2. That the “good news” of the gospels is in the person of
God’s only Son, who appeared among men in human flesh
in the person of Jesus of Nazareth, also called the Christ,
at a specific time and place.
3. His purpose in appearing was to introduce and invite all
men to receive the grace of God, the key element of which
was God’s provision of a final solution to the problem of
man’s sin.
4. That the solution offered by God was to be effected by
his Son’s death in order to fulfill the requirements of
justice before God, which required a man’s life in penal
compensation for his unrighteousness. That the death of
his Son was accepted by God as a singular, compensatory
transaction on behalf of all men, being that the individual
death of a guilty man could not compensate judicially for
the sins of all other men.
5. That the resurrection of God’s Son subsequent to his death
serves not only as the vindication that his death effected the
solution promised of God but also as a hope that all who
accept and appropriate his death will enjoy the gift of eternal
life, promised of God.
6. That the act of receiving the grace of God is called
salvation,
which once received in a genuine act of faith, grants access to
eternal life following death of the body and also provides
temporal grace during a man’s physical life, by enabling him
to have a spiritual fellowship with God and his risen Son.
Other doctrinal statements and propositions expand on these points and
represent, in some cases, essential beliefs necessary to being a
Christian in NT terms (i.e. the belief in the second coming or return
of Christ into earthly affairs, etc.)
Each of the points above have subordinate arguments and exposition.
I believe this is sufficient material to for an extensive discussion
of the subject of this post.
MRH
Ryan Muise
On Fri, 30 May 1997 13:15:47 GMT, barr...@fastlink.com.au (Barry
O'Grady) wrote:
<snip>
>
>An agnostic is a gutless atheist.
>
A "gutless" atheist?? Here's is a posting that I found that I did not
write. I don't totally agree with it but I htink it does have some
merit:
"An agnostic is an atheist who isn't so idiotic as to say that there
is
no higher being and that he has no idea what the nature of the
universe is.
What kind of an arrogant, stupid asshole actually comes right out and
says he knows the true reasons/causes of existence? A religious
person and an atheist."
As I said...I dont totally agree with it, but it does hold some
truth.
cz...@freenet.edmonton.ab.ca
Stix (st...@REMOVE.ozemail.com.au) wrote:
: "Rational arguments put forward by Boatwright."
Available on a scrap of paper the sizr of a postage stamp.
In large print.
--
***********************************************************
I saw weird stuff in that place last night -- weird,
strange, sick, twisted, eerie, godless, *evil* stuff!
And I want in!
Homer J. Simpson
***********************************************************
Stoney
lunati...@rocketmail.com wrote:
[snip]
>re·li·gion Etymology: Middle English religioun, from Latin religion-,
>religio supernatural constraint, sanction, religious practice, perhaps
>from religare to restrain, tie back Date: 13th century
>(Interesting start, "to restrain" How appropriate)
I was not aware of the religare to restrain connection, but I was not
surprised, it fits snugly. Yep, the christian's are into bondage and
discipline-[partial humor for those who are humor impaired]. How else
can fear=love? My suspicion is that George Orwell came up with the
foundation of his book '1984' from observing christianity with it's
'Double-speak' in action.
Due to commercial spams; header address is falsified.
Real email address is: cc1...@cdsnet.net
#9
Stoney
Ryan;
> Definition wise a religion is a set of ideals or beliefs. I agree
>with you that atheism doesn't exactly fit into this category, but to a
>certain extent it does. i.e. 1) God likely doesn't exist --Besides
>from that, the individual creates other ideas based on this claim.
Not quite. Atheism is a lack of belief, or more accurately-because of
the 'a' in front-*without* belief.
Regards,
Stoney
Dave Haas
Ryan Muise wrote:
>
> On Fri, 30 May 1997 13:15:47 GMT, barr...@fastlink.com.au (Barry
> O'Grady) wrote:
>
> <snip>
>
> >
> >An agnostic is a gutless atheist.
> >
>
> A "gutless" atheist?? Here's is a posting that I found that I did not
> write. I don't totally agree with it but I htink it does have some
> merit:
>
> "An agnostic is an atheist who isn't so idiotic as to say that there
> is
> no higher being and that he has no idea what the nature of the
> universe is.
>
> What kind of an arrogant, stupid asshole actually comes right out and
> says he knows the true reasons/causes of existence? A religious
> person and an atheist."
>
> As I said...I dont totally agree with it, but it does hold some
> truth.
>
What is truth? You are saying maybe God exists and created humans but
maybe he didn't? So you do you mean that the chances you have been
created by a God are exactly 50/50? I don't see the odds like this I
think the evidence supports a natural causes. I, therefore, can't
believe in something that doesn't appear probable. For the same reason I
wouldn't bet all my money on a 2000 to 1 long shot. Have you ever
gambled?
D. Haas
"Life always comes to a bad end. (Life's a bitch then you die)
Marcel Ayme
"The more ridiculous a belief system, the higher the probability
of its success." Wayne Bartz
Michael R. Hagerty
les...@tigger.stcloud.msus.edu wrote:
>Personally I cannot understand why you are wasting time with this and even
>worse want to waste our time. Are you really so obtuse as you give yourself
>out to be?
The statement that started this was that Christianity did not have a
reasonable basis, NOT that it's truth could not be conclusively shown.
You may not like the conditions of the discussion, but I clarified
them before starting and got no guff nor a request to go back where I
came from.
MRH
Frank O Wustner
G. Soderberg (thaz...@falun.mail.telia.com) wrote:
: Want to hear something really irrational? The fact that you, part of
: a monkey-race, can exclude a Creator.
"Monkey-race"? Perhaps you should figure out what you are talking about
BEFORE you talk. We humans are not a "monkey-race". Humans and monkeys
have a common ancestor, but they are not the same as each other.
And excluding a creator is RATIONAL, not irrational, because we have seen
no evidence for a creator. In light of a lack of evidence, the rational
thing to do is to not believe.
: How's that possible. Your so called science can't prove there's no God.
: Then how could you?
Because science doesn't prove that there IS a god either. And it works
just as well when a creator is excluded as when one is INcluded. In
short, the existance of a creator is irrelevant.
: And should a religion be logical? Then why should we believe?
: The human mind is to weak to explain certain things. Therefor don't
: try.
OK. I won't try to explain why you believe in some higher power, because
such a concept is completely alien to me. But why not make the attempt
to explain things that CAN be explained? Such as how animals survive in
the wild and how thermodynamics effect the universe, and so forth.
: Religion and science is the same thing: two ways to explain life in a
: human way of thinking.
Not true. The scientific theory is not a human way of thinking, to MOST
humans that is. Most people would be quite content with their own little
perceptions and pre-conceived "truths" and would feel quite threatened
if those perceptions were challenged.
Science is an attempt to get at the truth. Religion is an attempt to
keep to the status quo.
The Deadly Nightshade
|-----------------------------------|
|"I, too, believe in fate... |
|the fate a man makes for himself." |
|Lord Soth |
|-----------------------------------|
|"Quoth the raven, 'Eat my shorts!'"|
|Edgar Allan Bart |
|-----------------------------------|
|"Ack. Thpppbt." Bill the Cat |
|-----------------------------------|
| Atheist #119 |
|-----------------------------------|
Alex
Barry O'Grady <barr...@fastlink.com.au> wrote in article <338ed2bf...@news.fastlink.com.au>...
> dco...@email.unc.edu (Donna Coyne) wrote:
>
> :Giant Robot Messiah (robot_...@egocities.com) wrote:
> :: G. Soderberg wrote:
> :
> :[snip]
> :
> :"Christianity argued from fact and reason"? What is this?
> :One of those "World's thinnest books" joke titles, like
> :"Good Movies Starring Frank Stallone" or "The Wit and Wisdom
> :of Dan Quayle"?
> :
> :Anybody got any more?
> :
>
> "What God has revealed to man"
>
> Barry
>
How about "Complete list of intelligent christians"
Alex # 616
J. Michael Phillips
Rais...@Tower-of-High-Sorcery.Palanthas.com (Raistlin Majere,
***snip***
>
> We scoff at the theists answers, which in reality are questions
>themselves.
Let's look at what you're so scornful about then . . .
>Mostly the answer is "goddidit" or "godmadeit" or
>"godwhateverit". This begs the question of HOW god did what.
. . . interesting . . . you've missed the whole point, apparently.
Theology isn't about "how" God did anything, but "why." When it comes
to chemistry, physics, and the like; theology only provides us with
the paradigm of a rational universe. From that rationality, the user
must go on to other disciplines to answer the "how" questions.
>Just positing
>a god as a cure-all (the infamous "god of the gaps") is useless.
Useless to you, perhaps. Many others, however find the same to be
very useful.
Live Long and Prosper
J. Michael Phillips
http://www.eskimo.com/~wizkidm/
J. Michael Phillips
john...@ottawa.com (John Ings) wrote:
>On Wed, 28 May 1997 21:16:29 GMT, eni...@klis.com (Ryan Muise) wrote:
>
>
>>>What Atheists do, is the same thing they accuse Christians for: trying
>>>to explain life with human means. Ergo: Atheism is religion. A very
>>>primitive form of it, anyway.
>>
>> Exactly. When I realized this, I could no longer be an atheist. Now,
>>as an agnostic, I feel that I am being more "true" to myself. I no
>>longer claim to know things which I cannot know.
>> It seems many atheists and theists still do not understand that they
>>are quite similar in their "religion".
>
>Sorry Ryan, but you have not solved your problem. You still must
>decide whether you are an atheist or not, for agnosticism is
>orthoganal to theism-atheism.
Where did you get this? Agnosticism is not necessarily orthogonal to
theism/atheism. One can be an agnostic and be neither atheist nor
theist. Most agnostics, however *do* have tendencies towards one or
the other, but it is not *necessary*.
>
>Now do you believe in a god or not? If you do, you are an agnostic
>theist. If you don't, you are an agnostic atheist like me.
See next paragraph:
>
>The Christian quite rightly takes umbrage when an unbeliever attempts
>to tell him what a Christian is. Similarly, the Christian has no
>business telling an atheist what constitutes atheism.
As the Christian and the atheist both take umbrage at others deigning
to "tell them" what they believe, isn't it reasonable for the agnostic
to do the same?
J. Michael Phillips
>reasonable Christians are now atheists.
No, we're not.
>
>Did someone with intelligence tell you that? You can't be intelligent
>while being a Christian.
That is demonstrably false.
>
>The differance is that a true scientist has no need to spread lies
>and rumours yet Christianity can only continue to exist by causing
>confusion and uncertainty as well as by deliberate spreading of lies
>and fear.
I don't know where you get your information, but this, too is false.
There is no percentage for a Christian to lie. In fact, it is rather
frowned upon by his religion.
>Your attempt will be based on confusion by the use of
>double talk.
While it may be true that *you* are confused, and you can't tell the
difference between double-talk and explanations, that doesn't mean
that the explanation really *is* double-talk. Many people aren't
confused by attempts to explain Christianity. You may be one who is
confused. I would recommend that (rather than casting aspersions on
the character of the poster) you make a concerted effort to have
someone knowledgable in such things help explain them to you.
>
>Theoligy has nothing to say about the way the world is.
Theology has a lot to say about the way the world is. It has nothing
to say about certain things, but "how the world is" is something that
theology talks about all the time.
>
>:The Bible is not a reference
>:on science; neither is science a reference on matters of theology.
>
>Quite so. Science talks about what exists while theoligy talks about
>what people with a certain type of mental illness think.
You seem to be confused about this. Science *describes* the world
around us. It gives the "how" of the universe. Theology, on the
other hand, gives us the "why" of the universe. They are completely
different disciplines, which try to answer completely different
questions. Neither of them has anything to do with mental illness.
One can be mentally ill, and study either of them. One likewise can
be completely sane and study either of them.
>
>:Both contribute uniquely to our understanding of reality.
>
>Theoligy contributes to our knowledge of the reality of mental illness.
That is true. Theology has led to many insights into mental illness.
Not in the way you imply, of course, but theologians have contributed
significantly to the study of mental illness, just as they have the
study of most anything else.
>
>Faith is belief in something because that person wants it to be so.
I couldn't find a dictionary that used that definition. I couldn't
even find anyone who would agree with you on this point.
>Faith is a part of the mental illness and has nothing to do with reality.
While some mentally ill people can be very "faithful" regarding many
things, faith has nothing whatsoever to do with mental illness per se.
Faith and reality go hand in hand.
>Faith is belief even when evidence is against the object of belief.
Sometimes yes, sometimes no. Faith can be in something that is
demonstrated as well as something that is not demonstrated. In fact,
when things ARE demonstrated to be true, one's faith is usually
strengthened. We say that someone is acting "faithfully" when they
stay true to that which their faith is based on, even when it *seems*
that the evidence is stacked up against the belief. It frequently
happens that one acts faithfully in those situations, and then finds
that their faith was well placed after all. New evidence supports
their original faith, and explains why the seeming discrepancies
actually *support* their original faith.
>
>Proof that Jesus was not the son of God is as simple as the fact that
>there is no God.
Ummm . . . pardon . . . that is not a demonstrable fact, but your
opinion.
>
>:The
>:reasonableness and rationality I propose is that which is acceptable
>:to the common, moderately intelligent man who may not be a scientist
>:or a skilled logician but can recognize sound reasoning when it is
>:presented.
>
>You want to confuse people so that they think you must know something.
How did you come to that conclusion? That is not what he said at all.
YOU may be confused by what he says, but most of us are not. If you
are still confused later, you might want to seek out the help of
someone who doesn't have your difficulty in understanding him.
>:
>:Fourth, it is my expectation that an adult, intelligent and honest
>:discussion proceed. I've had more than a few respondents from
>:alt.atheism reply with childish and infantile remarks which managed
>:only to expose their incapacity to handle the subject seriously.
>
>Listen Dickwad. You are a moron, and morons that come here trying to
>refute their mental illness deserve contempt. No sensable person
>can take idiots like you seriously.
Well, this certainly seems to vindicate the original poster's
assertion, doesn't it?
>
>:I don't in any way mean to imply an offense to you or to members of
>:alt.atheism, per se. I don't mean to imply that I won't tolerate a
>:bonehead or two in an open forum such as this. I only mean say that
>:while I'm a big boy and can take a fair amount of valid criticism, my
>:participation is qualified with the condition that if all I get are
>:remarks like the above, the discussion will be over.
>
>How pathetic. You know that your stupid religion can't stand up to the
>light of day. Do you think that your speach will get people to respect
>you so that they can then be taken in?
I'm not the original poster, but it seems apparent that the answer to
your question is a resounding "no." It also seems apparent that you
were accurately describing yourself as "confused," so I'll try to
elucidate: What he was saying here was that while he expects a certain
percentage of people to respond childishly, if some will engage in
adult conversation with him, he will ignore the childish responses,
and continue the adult conversation. Is that a little clearer for you
now?
>
>:If you and others can accept these conditions, I'm game.
>
>You won't look quite such an idiot if you stop using the ae character
>in place of the ' in your text.
. . . and this coming from someone who's so confused by such simple
statements! I find it amusing also that you would point out a
typographical error, and try to assassinate the poster's character
after so many spelling errors yourself!
**sigh**
J. Michael Phillips
fox...@estreet.com (WolfLogic) wrote:
***snip***
>>>That should say that _some_ minds are too weak. A religion cannot be
>>>logical, it is based upon faith, not logic.
>>
>>This is demonstrably false. While many *do* believe and obey blindly,
>>there are also many who's belief is based largely on logic and
>>reasoning.
>>
>False logic and false reasoning. Or just immature logic and
>reasoning. Depends on how you look at it.
Neither and both. While some believe based on false logic, or
immature reasoning, there are many more who believe based on sound
logic and adult reasoning. There are many thousands of examples of
each.
>>>
>>>But the difference is in the way of deriving that explanation. There is
>>>logic and reassoning or faith and emotions. Take your pick.
>>
>Yes there is logic and reasoning OR faith and emotions. And the
>latter two usually tend not to have anything to do with reality.
While it is true that sometimes, faith and emotions have little to do
with reality, it is also true that they frequently are based on, and
accurately reflect realtiy.
G. Soderberg
lgar...@otter.mbay.net (Lisa Gardner) writes: > In article <338986...@egocities.com>,
> Giant Robot Messiah <robot_...@egocities.com> wrote:
>
> >G. Soderberg wrote:
> >
> >> And should a religion be logical? Then why should we believe?
> >> The human mind is to weak to explain certain things. Therefor don't
> >> try.
>
> trying, our perception of our reality can become more
> finely-grained. We decorate our world.
>
Yes, of course! It may be impossible, but it's so amusing.
> >
> >Certain things? Name one.
> >Betcha can't.
>
> in the continual creation of the reality in which we live- that
> thing that lies forever for us behind the perceptual curtain of
> our own senses, conceptions, perceptual mechanisms, etc. but
> towards which we are compelled to reach and seek an understanding
> of anyway. Nothing can enter into our conscious awareness without
> first being cloaked with some conceptual clothing/whatever...
> trees, rocks, water,*G*od... all of these things are elements
> which exist only within the reality which results from the
> interaction between the "partner of consciousness" I spoke
> of above and consciousness itself. *None* of these things
> necessarily exist as components of the "partner of consciousness"
> itself... IMHO.
>
I interpret that you mean a divine intellect when you say 'partner
of consciousness'. An interesting paralell, is a scientific
theory about thoughts. It claims that there are two poles in the brain,
one emananates random signals, the other emanates non random signals.
When these two signals collide an idea, or thought appears.
In this case, reality would be organised as a human brain, with mankind
as one pole, and God as the other.
> But hey, maybe I'm completely wrong.
>
> Lisa
>
> This theory are dependent on a conscious mankind. That is something I
can never agree with. Man is slave under his own lusts and weaknesses,
and can never fully understand.
G. Soderberg
>
>
> --
> this is a non-confusing .sig lgar...@mbay.net
Daniel J Adams
In article <3390fe31...@news.eskimo.com>, "J. Michael Phillips"
<wiz...@eskimo.com> writes
>>Did someone with intelligence tell you that? You can't be intelligent
>>while being a Christian.
>
>That is demonstrably false.
uhh...actually it is demonsrably true. Out of 43 tests conducted in
North America, 39 showed there to be a correlation between religious
belief and low intelligence.
--------------------------------------------- ------------------
| Daniel J Adams | |
| | Atheist |
| http://www.kerbcrawler.demon.co.uk | #603 |
| kerbc...@earthling.net | |
--------------------------------------------- -----------------
John Ings
>This not a discussion about proofs for the truth of Christianity. If
>you’re looking for the type of information which impresses the
>scientist or mathematician, you will meet with disappointment.
How very hard it is to be
a Christian.
'Tis well averred,
A scientific faith's absurd . . .
. Robert Browning
As I said, I will attack only the reasonableness of believing in the
Christian myth, but you're going to encounter the findings of
historians, anthropologists, psychologists, philosophers and
scientists in my posts.
> In the case of
>Christianity, certain key propositions presented in the Old Testament
>are logical predecessors to the beginning of Christian thought.
>These are:
>
>1) That the God of Christianity is synonymous with the God of
>historic Judaism as revealed in the Old Testament of the Bible.
>
>2) That man has fallen from his original created state into a
>condition which prevents him from fulfilling, by his own efforts,
>the standard of God’s righteousness.
>
>3) That in his grace, God has postponed or delayed the consequences
>of man’s fall, to await a remedy for man’s condition which will
>restore the relationship and fellowship once lost.
>
>Exposition:
>- - - - - - - -
>Christianity proposes to solve finally and completely a problem which
>originated in the events of the Old Testament and for which only a
>provisional remedy was instituted until a final solution could be
>actualized. That problem was man’s inability to comply satisfactorily
>with the principles of righteousness as required by God (sin) and the
>consequences which sin brought about.
Here is where I see the first error in logic, the first unreason in
the faith you propose. The concept proffered is that a creator can
create something and then hold his creation responsible for its
inadequacies. If a design is inadequate, if it fails to perform, that
is the creators fault, not the creation's.
If your house falls down about your ears, do you blame the house or do
you blame the contractor?
If a child breaks you window, do you go to the child for redress or do
you knock on his parent's door?
Let us take Adam and Eve as a first case. You and I were taught our
morals by our parents, but Adam and Eve's only parents were God.
Whatever morals they had were instilled in them by God. Whatever will
power, strength of will, righteousness, whatever- that they had in
them was put there by God. How then are they to be held responsible
for what they did wrong by this divine parent who has so demonstrated
his inadequcies in that role?
Suppose for instance, that Eve had posessed the same moral fibre as
the Virgin Mary. Would she have incited Adam to eat the Fruit of
Knowledge then? So if Eve wasn't up to Mary's standards after being
taught her morals by God in person, why is she to blame?
Further to this minor illogicality we have an even greater example of
theological non-sequitur. The mystical leap to the conclusion that
this sin of Adams was somehow passed on to his progeny. That because
he sinned they we are all tainted by "Original Sin". Now there is a
classic bit of Babylonian Bronze Age logic for you.
As I declared in my preliminary post, my purpose is not to attempt to
prove the unreasonability of believing in a God, but rather the
unreasonability of believing in the God that the Christian
proseletizes.
>Christianity introduces the following summary propositions:
>
>1. That the principle documents of the New Testament,
> called gospels, present what is characterized as
> “good news” respecting the problem of man’s sin and
> his inability to meet the requirements of righteousness.
A manufactured problem, conceived by priests in the same spirit as the
Madison Avenue flack who invents and advertises a disease in order to
sell you the nostrum to cure it. If man cannot meet the requirements
of 'righteousness', that's Gods fault. Let him create a better
product. He's screwed up twice according to Biblical mythology. First
he creates angels who won't behave, then he makes himself a gardener
who has higher ambitions in life and he's unhappy about that too.
>2. That the “good news” of the gospels is in the person of
> God’s only Son, who appeared among men in human flesh
> in the person of Jesus of Nazareth, also called the Christ,
> at a specific time and place.
Here we have a new creation, man's creation this time. The inventor of
Christianity as we know it was Paul of Tarsus, a 1st century Jimmy
Swaggart. He who would be all things to all men. The 'second
generation Pharisee' who also claimed to be a Roman citizen and knew a
suspiciously great deal about the Greek Mystery religions. Have you
read Maccoby's books?
>3. His purpose in appearing was to introduce and invite all
> men to receive the grace of God, the key element of which
> was God’s provision of a final solution to the problem of
> man’s sin.
The "logic" of which is that a believer will be forgiven even though
he deserves punishment, while an unbeliever will be punished even if
he's innocent. This, according to the Christian myth, is just.
>4. That the solution offered by God was to be effected by
> his Son’s death in order to fulfill the requirements of
> justice before God, which required a man’s life in penal
> compensation for his unrighteousness.
What would you think of a court that would permit a man to suffer the
death penalty passed on another man? Would you not say they were
crazy? Would you not even perceive as a mockery of justice a man being
permitted to serve someone elses jail term? If a court operated like
that anywhere in the country, would there not be cries of outrage and
demands that the judge be removed from the bench?
> That the death of
> his Son was accepted by God as a singular, compensatory
> transaction on behalf of all men, being that the individual
> death of a guilty man could not compensate judicially for
> the sins of all other men.
Said death lasting all of three days and not being that much of a
sacrifice anyway. What madman wrote the requirements of this
"justice"? Presumably the Christian believes that God imposes these
rules on himself, like a man playing solitaire. Lets change the
scenario to a courtroom:
The criminal(man) has been brought before the judge(God) for
sentencing in a country where the penalty for theft is like that in
some Arab countries. The judge sentences the culprit to have his hand
cut off. But, explains the judge, he loves this miscreant so much,
that he is willing to take the guilty party's punishment for him. He
therefor proceeds to cut his own hand off, that "justice" might be
served.
Subsequently it turns out it was an artificial hand that can be easily
re-attached three days later.
Alice found better logic than that at the Mad Hatter's tea party.
>5. That the resurrection of God’s Son subsequent to his death
> serves not only as the vindication that his death effected the
> solution promised of God but also as a hope that all who
> accept and appropriate his death will enjoy the gift of eternal
> life, promised of God.
First off, there is no evidence that the testimony about Y'shua's
'resurrection' was anything but the product of Judean political
propagandists. The testimony was that he had been 'exhalted';
raised up to heaven to sit at the right hand of God where the Roman
authorities couldn't get at him. The resurrected Y'shua was the
invention of Kingdom of God activists. He was supposed to return with
armies of angels and drive the hated Romans out of Judea. He was not
supposed to be a God for the Gentiles, which is what Paul's followers
made of him in later centuries.
>6. That the act of receiving the grace of God is called
> salvation,
> which once received in a genuine act of faith, grants access to
> eternal life following death of the body and also provides
> temporal grace during a man’s physical life, by enabling him
> to have a spiritual fellowship with God and his risen Son.
>
>Other doctrinal statements and propositions expand on these points and
>represent, in some cases, essential beliefs necessary to being a
>Christian in NT terms (i.e. the belief in the second coming or return
>of Christ into earthly affairs, etc.)
Do they make any sense of this metaphysical lunacy? That's the point.
Belief in this theology is reasonable you say. Why? Why should I
believe that whatever God exists is a nutcase who thinks like a Bronze
Age Babylonian priest or a Judean peasant?
Why should modern man buy this metaphysical mumbo jumbo about a man
dead for three days 2000 years ago atoning for his sins today?
Especially when there is much evidence that Rabbi Y'shua ben Yusef
didn't have that in mind at all. That his cry on the cross asking why
his God had forsaken him was an echo of the cry of generations of Jews
before him whose God had deserted them and who continued to do so for
the next two milennia.
The goal seems to be to answer the puzzle of theodicy. I offer to
Occam's razor the following solutions.
1. The Deists answer: God allows evil in the world because he doesn't
give a damn. He may not even have noticed that man has evolved.
2. The atheist's answer. There is no god to care.
3. The philosopher's answer:
. There is no act so vile some pervert does not think it good.
. There is no act so innocent some prude does not think it evil.
# The history of the race, and each individual's experience, are thick
# with evidence that a truth is not hard to kill and that a lie told
# well is immortal. Mark Twain
john...@ottawa.com
Barry O'Grady
ejo...@hooked.net (Earle Jones) wrote:
:Wow! I can't believe that you are "ba...@mindspring.com". Are you sure
:you're not "mi...@ballspring.com"?
:
:You say: "...and 100 years later there are still know fossil record!"
:
:Know fossil record, huh? Well who nos better than you?
Give the guy a break. He herd about it somewhere.
Besides: Know fossil record, no God; no fossil record, know God.
:"The bible is more acurate than shakespeare!" Hogwash!
:
:Your stupid diatribe is the most anti-intellectual piece of crap I've seen
:lately, and believe me, reading this group, that's saying something!
He makes me look good. (I hope.)
:Stay off line and try to learn something, if that is possible.
:
:earle
Barry O'Grady
Michael Williams <ba...@mindspring.com> wrote:
:I've herd people claim that evolution is based on evidence, WELL WHERE
:IS IT!
Must be a herd of Christians.
:Darwin saidf the fossil records would prove him right and 100 years
:later there are still know fossil record!
Saidf? I didn't know Darwin was a computer programmer. But you are
right when you say we know the fossil record.
:A few assumptions and a
:couple of "its possible" and BAM millions of people believe! Boy I wish
:my faith was like that of evolutionist!
Faith is the only way you can meet God. Faith is needed because God does
not exist in reality.
:No one can prove evolution yet you believe!
Just be thankfull that the Christian God does not require faith, or
we would have to conclude that it does not exist.
: Isaiah 40:22 calls the earth a sphere 1000's of years before Columbus.
:Scientist now say there is evidence that there was once a world wide
:flood - Boy I wonder if the Bible has anything to say about that?
It does not, because no scientist even hints at a world wide flood.
:What book is most used by archeologist? I can tell you its not Darwin's
:Origin of Species! Could it be the Bible?
Archeologists would refer to the Bible because it contains some factual
information. Few people would deny that.
:Why is the Bible more acurate than shakespeare!
If it is, it would be because Shakespeare is not history while parts
of the Bible are.
:Scrolls were found that told of prophecy and the prophecies were
:verified to have been fulfilled!
No Bible prophecys have been shown to be fulfilled after they were
written.
: This "Stuff" might not prove anything but I believe it qualifies as
:evidence!
Evidence that has been refuted. Try again.
wf...@enter.netxx
On Thu, 29 May 1997 19:01:03 -0500, Michael Williams
<ba...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>I've herd people claim that evolution is based on evidence, WELL WHERE
>IS IT! Darwin saidf the fossil records would prove him right and 100
>years later there are still know fossil record!
yeah there is 'know' fossil record. we know it well. thats the basis
of evolution...fossils exist. so does evolution
A few assumptions and a
>couple of "its possible" and BAM millions of people believe!
hardly. with all you religious fanatics wandering around its a wonder
people know anything.
Boy I wish
>my faith was like that of evolutionist
we are called 'scientists'.
! No one can prove evolution yet
>you believe!
> Isaiah 40:22
isaiah has zip to do with science. all it proves is that you are
biased to a religious view of the world and will say anything to prove
your point, similar to the communist lysenkoists in the 30's.
calls the earth a sphere 1000's of years before Columbus.
>Scientist now say there is evidence that there was once a world wide
>flood -
gee whiz im a scientist and havent said this...whoops i
forgot..creationists are permitted to make stuff up. after all, theyre
not bound by facts.
> This "Stuff" might not prove anything but I believe it qualifies as
>evidence!
well it certainly does prove something..about the intelligence of the
poster.
delete the xx from my email address to reply
The Big Kahuna
In article <338EE2...@tiac.net>, Ken Morton <00_km...@tiac.net> writes...
>Ryan Muise wrote:
>
>> In my mind (I could be totally wrong) both atheists and theists
>> ASSUME things that cant be assumed.
[snip]
>It's not clear that your version of agnosticism really translates into a
>position of neutrality. Just what are you agnostic about? The "God"
>character in the Bible? All gods? All supernatural beings? Disembodied
>intelligences? Specific knowledge claims of theists of a particular
>creed?
>
>One could argue that atheism is neutral because it is the stance of
>witholding belief in the knowledge claims of others pending evidence to
>support the claims. Being agnostic about preposterous claims is hardly a
>neutral position -- it's just unwarranted credulity (Are you agnostic
>about Santa Claus? Why not?). Being agnostic lends unjustified credence
>to the ungrounded claims of theists.
Atheism most certainly is a statement that there is no God; agnosticism only
claims to not be sure (do to lack of knowledge). Both atheism and theism make
conclusions w/o evidence; agnostics just admit that they have no clue. I will
admit I lean towards atheism, but I mainly agree with Buddha's frame of mind:
Who cares if there is a God or not; whether or not there is a God does not
change the state of man and his suffering. It's like the man who is wounded
by an arrow in the gut, and will not have it treated until he learns who shot
the arrow, what kind of bow was used, the wind direction at the time, where
was he aiming,...; in the mean time he is dying.
>A more blunt way of putting it might be, why should we take the claims
>of theists seriously enough to be agnostic about them? Why aren't their
>claims just plain ridiculous, like the claims of the Heavens Gaters or
>Channelers or other peddlars of superstitious tripe?
David DBO...@utarlg.uta.edu
o00 @
0000 0 @ "Instant Loser, Just add Life" --- Chris Boggs
000000 @
O'Brennan @ "There are no bugs, only undocumented features"
0000 0000 @ --- Bob Dobbs
o000000 @
o000 @ "I'm a deeply shallow person" --- Andy Warhol
David J. Vorous
Michael R. Hagerty wrote:
snip
> I believe this is sufficient material to for an extensive discussion
> of the subject of this post.
No it isn't. You base your position upon something that you are
unwilling to discuss: the bible and its veracity. If the bible was taken
away, you would have no base for your arguements. I do not worship the
bible and therefore your whole arguement is meaningless.
John Ings
>>Sorry Ryan, but you have not solved your problem. You still must
>>decide whether you are an atheist or not, for agnosticism is
>>orthoganal to theism-atheism.
>
>Where did you get this? Agnosticism is not necessarily orthogonal to
>theism/atheism. One can be an agnostic and be neither atheist nor
>theist.
No. Either you believe in a god, or you do not. One or the other.
It's a dichotomy.
> Most agnostics, however *do* have tendencies towards one or
>the other, but it is not *necessary*.
The necessity has nothing to do with agnosticism. Agnosticism concerns
your belief about whether you can prove things about the supernatural.
It has nothing to say about what beliefs you might hold in that
regard.
>>Now do you believe in a god or not? If you do, you are an agnostic
>>theist. If you don't, you are an agnostic atheist like me.
>
>See next paragraph:
>>
>>The Christian quite rightly takes umbrage when an unbeliever attempts
>>to tell him what a Christian is. Similarly, the Christian has no
>>business telling an atheist what constitutes atheism.
>
>As the Christian and the atheist both take umbrage at others deigning
>to "tell them" what they believe, isn't it reasonable for the agnostic
>to do the same?
Yup. But you're discussing this with an agnostic.
For a good book on the subject, try George H. Smith's
"Atheism: The Case Against God" from Prometheus books.
Michael E. Rippie
The.Las...@worldnet.att.net
http://www.netchurch.com/tlc/ mri...@sierra.net
The World's Most Dangerous Book
For many centuries the Roman Catholic
Church was opposed to translating the Holy Scriptures into the "vulgar
tongue." To this day, you can still get rid of a Bible salesman by saying,
"But we are Catholics and, of course, don't read the Bible." The Catholic
hierarchy included subtle theologians and scholars who knew very well that
such a difficult and diverse collection of ancient writings, taken as the
literal Word of God, would be wildly and dangerously interpreted if put
into the hands of ignorant and uneducated peasants. Likewise, when a
missionary boasted to George Bernard Shaw of the numerous converts he had
made, Shaw asked, " Can these people use rifles?" "Oh, indeed, yes," said
the missionary. "Some of them are very good shots." Whereupon Shaw scolded
him for putting us all in peril in the day when those converts waged holy
war against us for not following the Bible in the literal sense they gave
to it. For the Bible says, "What a good thing it is when the Lord putteth
into the hands of the righteous invincible might." But today, especially in
the United States, there is a taboo against admitting that there are
enormous numbers of stupid and ignorant people, in the bookish and literal
sense of these words. They may be highly intelligent in the arts of
farming, manufacture, engineering and finance, and even in physics,
chemistry or medicine. But this intelligence does not automatically flow
over to the fields of history, archaeology, linguistics, theology,
philosophy and mythology which are what one needs to know in order to make
any sense out such archaic literature as the books of the Bible.
This may sound snobbish, for there is an assumption that, in the Bible,
God gave His message in plain words for plain people. Once, when I had
given a radio broadcast in Canada, the announcer took me aside and said,
"Don't you think that if there is a truly loving God, He would given us a
plain and specific guide as to how to live our lives?"
"On the contrary," I replied, "a truly loving God would not stultify our
minds. He would encourage us to think for ourselves." I tried, then, to
show him that his belief in the divine authority of the Bible rested on
nothing more than his own personal opinion, to which, of course, he was
entitled. This is basic. The authority of the Bible, the church, the state,
or of any spiritual or political leader, is derived from the individual
followers and believers, since it is the believers' judgment that such
leaders and institutions speak with a greater wisdom than there own. This
is, obviously, a paradox, for only the wise can recognize wisdom. Thus,
Catholics criticize Protestants for following their own opinions in
understanding the Bible, as distinct from the interpretations of the
Church, which originally issued and authorized the Bible. But Catholics
seldom realize that the authority of the Church rests, likewise, on the
opinion of its individual members that the Papacy and the councils of the
Church are authoritative. The same is true of the state, for, as a French
statesman said, people get the government they deserve.
Why does one come to the opinion that the Bible, literally understood, is
the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? Usually because
one's "elders and betters," or an impressively large group of ones peers,
have this opinion. But this is to go along with the Bandar-log, or monkey
tribe, in Rudyard Kipling's Jungle Books , who periodically get together
and shout, "We all say so, so it must be true!" Having been a grandfather
for a number of years, I am not particularly impressed with patriarchal
authority. I am of an age with my own formerly impressive grandfathers (one
of whom was a fervent fundamentalist, or literal believer in the Bible) and
I realize that my opinions are as fallible as theirs.
But many people never grow up. They stay all their lives with a passionate
need for eternal authority and guidance, pretending not to trust their own
judgment.
Nevertheless, it is their own judgment, willy-nilly, that there exists some
authority greater than their own. The fervent fundamentalist whether
Protestant or Catholic, Jew or Moslem is closed to reason and even
communication for fear of losing the security of childish dependence. He
would suffer extreme emotional heebie jeebies if he didn't have the feeling
that there was some external and infallible guide in which he could trust
absolutely and without which his very identity would dissolve.
This attitude is not faith. It is pure idolatry. The more deceptive idols
are not images of wood and stone but are constructed of words and ideas
mental images of God. Faith is an openness and trusting attitude to truth
and reality, whatever it may turn out to be. This is a risky and
adventurous state of mind. Belief, in the religious sense, is the opposite
of faith because it is a fervent wishing or hope, a compulsive clinging to
the idea that the universe is arranged and governed in such and such a way.
Belief is holding to a rock; faith is learning how to swim and this whole
universe swims in boundless space.
Thus, in much of the English-speaking world, the King James Bible is a
rigid idol, all the more deceptive for being translated into the most
melodious English and for being an anthology of ancient literature that
contains sublime wisdom along with barbaric histories and the war songs of
tribes on the rampage. All this is taken as the literal Word and counsel of
God, as it is by fundamentalist Baptists, Jesus freaks, Jehovah's Witnesses
and comparable sects, which by and large know nothing of the history of the
Bible, of how it was edited and put together. So we have with us the social
menace of a huge population of intellectually and morally irresponsible
people. Take a ruler and measure the listings under "Churches" in the
Yellow Pages of the phone directory. You will find that the fundamentalists
have by far the most space. And under what pressure do most hotels and
motels place Gideon Bibles by the bedside Bibles with clearly
fundamentalist introductory material, taking their name Gideon from one of
the more ferocious military leaders of the ancient Israelites?
As is well known, the enormous political power of fundamentalists is what
makes legislators afraid to take laws against victimless "sins" and crimes
off the books, and what corrupts the police by forcing them to be armed
preachers enforcing ecclesiastical laws in a country where church and state
are supposed to be separate ignoring the basic Christian doctrine that no
actions, or abstentions from actions, are of moral import unless undertaken
voluntarily. Freedom is risky and includes the risk that anyone may go to
hell in his own way.
Now, the King James Bible did not, as one might gather from listening to
fundamentalists, descend with an Angel from heaven AD 1611, when it was
first published. It was an elegant, but often inaccurate, translation of
Hebrew and Greek documents composed between 900 BC and AD 120. There is no
manuscript of the Old Testament, that is, of the Hebrew Scriptures, written
in Hebrew, earlier than the Ninth Century BC But we know that these
documents were first put together and recognized as the Holy Scriptures by
a convention of rabbis held at Jamnia (Yavne) in Palestine shortly before
AD 100. On their say-so. Likewise, the composition of the Christian Bible,
which documents to include and which to drop, was decided by a council of
the Catholic Church held in Carthage in the latter part of the Fourth
Century. Several books that had formerly been read in the churches, such as
the Shepherd of Hermas and the marvelous Gospel of Saint Thomas , were
then excluded. The point is that the books translated in the King James
Bible were declared canonical and divinely inspired by the authority (A) of
the Synod of Jamnia and (B) of the Catholic Church, meeting in Carthage
more than 300 years after the time of Jesus. It is thus that fundamentalist
Protestants get the authority of their Bible from Jews who had rejected
Jesus and from Catholics whom they abominate as the Scarlet Woman mentioned
in Revelation.
The Bible, to repeat, is an anthology of Hebrew and late Greek literature,
edited and put forth by a council of Catholic bishops who believed that
they were acting under the direction of the Holy Spirit. Before this time
the Bible as we know it did not exist. There were the Hebrew Scriptures and
their translated into Greek the Septuagint, which was made in Alexandria
between 250 BC and 100 BC There were also various codices, or Greek
manuscripts, of various parts of the New Testament, such as the four
Gospels. There were numerous other writings circulating among Christians,
including the Epistles of Saint Paul and Saint John, the Apocalypse
(Revelation) and such documents (later excluded) as the Acts of John , the
Didache , the Apostolic Constitutions and the various Epistles of Clement,
Ignatius and Polycarp.
In those days, and until the Protestant Reformation in the 16th Century,
the Scriptures were not understood exclusively in a narrow literal sense.
From Clement of Alexandria (Second Century) to Saint Thomas Aquinas (13th
Century), the great theologians, or Fathers of the Church, recognized four
ways of interpreting the Scriptures: the literal or historical, the moral,
the allegorical and the spiritual and they were overwhelmingly interested
in the last three. Origen (Second Century) regarded much of the Old
Testament as "puerile" if taken literally, and Jewish theologians were
likewise preoccupied with finding hidden meanings in the Scriptures, for
the concern of all these theologians was to interpret the Biblical texts in
such a way as to make the Bible intellectually respectable
and philosophically interesting. Concern over the historical truth of the
Bible is relatively modern, whether in the form of fundamentalism or of
scientific research.
But when the Bible was translated and widely distributed as a result of
the invention of printing, it fell into the hands of people who, like the
Jesus freaks of today, were simply uneducated and who, as the depressed
classes of Europe, eventually swarmed over to America. This is, naturally,
a heroic generalization. There were, and are, fundamentalists learned in
languages and sciences (although the standard translation of the Bible into
Chinese is said to be in fearful taste), just as there are professors of
physics and anthropology who somehow manage to be pious Mormons. Some
people have the peculiar ability to divide their minds into watertight
compartments, being critical and rational in matters of science but
credulous as children when it comes to religion.
Such superstition would have been relatively harmless if the religion had
been something tolerant and pacific, such as Taoism or Buddhism. But the
religion of the literally understood Bible is chauvinistic and militant. It
is on the march to conquer the world and to establish itself as the one and
only true belief. Among its most popular hymns are such battle songs as
"Mine eyes have seen the glory" and Onward, Christian Soldiers. The God of
the Hebrews, the Arabs and the Christians is a mental idol fashioned in the
image of the great monarchs of Egypt, Chaldea and Persia. It was possibly
Ikhnaton (Amenhotep IV, 14th Century BC), Pharaoh of Egypt, who gave Moses
the idea of monotheism (as suggested in Freud's Moses and Monotheism).
Certainly the veneration of God as "King of kings and Lord of lords"
borrows the official title of the Persian emperors. Thus, the political
pattern of tyranny, beneficent or otherwise, of rule by violence, whether
physical or moral, stands firmly behind the Biblical idea of Jehovah.
When one considers the architecture and ritual of churches, whether
Catholic or Protestant, it is obvious until most recent times that they are
based on royal or judicial courts. A monarch who rules by force sits in the
central court of his donjon with his back to the wall, flanked by guards,
and those who come to petition him for justice or to offer tribute must
kneel or prostrate themselves simply because these are difficult positions
from which to start a fight. Such monarchs are, of course, frightened of
their subjects and constantly on the anxious alert for rebellion. Is this
an appropriate image for the inconceivable energy that underlies the
universe? True, the altar-throne in Catholic churches is occupied by the
image of God in the form of one crucified as a common thief, but he hangs
there as our leader in subjection to the Almighty Father, King of the
universe, propitiating Him for those who have broken His not always
reasonable laws. And what of the curious resemblance between Protestant
churches and courts of law? The minister and the judge wear the same black
robe and "throw the book" at those assembled in pews and various kinds of
boxes, and both ministers and judges have chairs of estate that are still,
in effect, thrones.
The crucial question, then, is that if you picture the universe as a
monarchy, how can you believe that a republic is the best form of
government, and so be a loyal citizen of the United States? It is thus that
fundamentalists veer to the extreme right wing in politics, being of the
personality type that demands strong external and paternalistic authority.
Their "rugged individualism" and their racism are founded on the conviction
that they are the elect of God the Father, and their forebears took
possession of America as the armies of Joshua took possession of Canaan,
treating the Indians as Joshua and Gideon treated the Bedouin of Palestine.
In the same spirit the Protestant British, Dutch and Germans took
possession of Africa, India and Indonesia, and the rigid Catholics of Spain
and Portugal colonized Latin America. Such territorial expansion may or may
not be practical politics, but to do it in the name of Jesus of Nazareth is
an outrage.
<p>
The Bible is a dangerous book, though by no means an evil one. It depends,
largely, on how you read it with what prejudices and with what intellectual
background. Regarded as sacred and authoritative, such a complex collection
of histories, legends, allegories and images becomes a monstrous Rorschach
blot in which you can picture almost anything you want to discover just as
one can see cities and mountains in the clouds or faces in the fire.
Fundamentalists "prove" the truth of the Bible by trying to show how the
words of the prophets have foretold events that have come to pass in
relatively recent times. But any statistician knows that you can find
correlation's, if you want to, between almost any two sets of patterns or
rhythms between the occurrence of sunspots and fluctuations of the stock
market, between the lines and bumps on your hand and the course of your
life or between the architecture of the Great Pyramid and the history of
Europe. This is because of eidetic vision, or the brain's ability to
project visions and forms of its own into any material whatsoever. But
scholars of ancient history find the remarks of the prophets entirely
relevant to events of their own time, in the ancient Near East. The
Biblical prophets were not so much predictors as social commentators.
I am not in the position of those liberal Christians who reject
fundamentalism but must still insist that Jesus was the one and only
incarnation of God, or at least the most perfect human being. No one is
intellectually free who feels that he cannot and must not disagree with
Jesus and is therefore forced into the dishonest practice of wangling the
words of the Gospels to fit his own opinions.
There is not a scrap of evidence that Jesus was familiar with any other
religious tradition than that of the Hebrew Scriptures or that he knew
anything of the civilizations of India, China or Peru.
Under these circumstances, he was faced with the virtually impossible
problem of expressing himself in the peculiar religious language and
imagery of his local culture. For it is obvious to any student of the
psychology of religion that what he needed to express was the relatively
common change of consciousness known as mystical experience the vivid and
overwhelming sensation that your own being is one with eternal and ultimate
reality. But it was as hard for Jesus to say this as it still is for a
native of the American Bible Belt. It implies the blasphemous, subversive
and lunatic claim to be identical with the all-knowing and allruling
monarch of the world its Pharaoh or Cyrus. Jesus would have had no trouble
in India, for this experience is the foundation of Hinduism, and the Hindus
recognize many people in both ancient and modern times as embodiments of
the divine, or sons of God but not, of course, of the kind of God
represented by Jehovah. Buddhists, likewise, teach that anyone can, and
finally will, become a Buddha (an Enlightened One), in the same way as the
historic Gautama.
If the Gospel of Saint John , in particular, is to be believed, Jesus
emphatically identified himself with the Godhead, considering such phrases
as "I and the Father are one," or "He who has seen me has seen the Father,"
or "Before Abraham was, I am," or "I am the way, the truth and the life."
But this was not an exclusive claim for himself as the man Jesus, for at
John 10:31, just after he has said "I and the Father are one," the crowd
picks up rocks to stone him to death. He protests:
"Many good works have I shown you from my Father; for which of
those works do you stone me?" The Jews answered him, saying, "We do not
stone you for a
good work, but for blasphemy, and because you, being a man, make yourself
God."</blockquote>
And here it comes: Jesus answered them, "Is it not written in your law, I
said, you are gods [quoting Psalms
82]? If He [i.e., God] called those to whom He gave His word gods and you
can't contradict
the Scriptures how can you say of Him whom the Father has sanctified and
sent into the
world, 'You blaspheme!' because I said, 'I am a son of God" [The original
Greek says "a son,"
not "the son."]</>
In other words, the Gospel, or "good news" that Jesus was trying to
convey, despite the limitations of his tradition, was that we are all sons
of God. When he uses the terms I am (as in "Before Abraham was, I am") or
Me (as in "No one comes to the Father but by Me"), he is intending to use
them in the same way as Krishna in the Bhagavad-Gita : He who sees Me
everywhere and sees all in Me; I am not lost to him, nor is he lost to Me.
The yogi who, established in oneness, worships Me abiding in all beings,
lives in Me, whatever be his outward life.
And by this "Me" Krishna means the atman that is at once the basic self
in us and in the universe. To know this is to enjoy eternal life, to
discover that the fundamental "I am" feeling, which you confuse with your
superficial ego, is the ultimate reality forever and ever, amen.
In this essential respect, the, the Gospel has been obscured and muffled
almost from the beginnings. For Jesus was presumably trying to say that our
consciousness is the divine spirit, "the light which enlightens every one
who comes into the world," and which George Fox, founder of the Quakers,
called the Inward Light. But the Church, still bound to the image of God as
the King of kings, couldn't accept this Gospel. It adopted a religion about
Jesus instead of the religion of Jesus. It kicked him upstairs and put
him in the privileged and unique position of being the Boss's son, so that,
having this unique advantage, his life and example became useless to
everyone else. The individual Christian must not know that his own "I am"
is the one that existed before Abraham. In this way, the Church
institutionalized and made a virtue of feeling chronic guilt for not being
as good as Jesus. It only widened the alienation, the colossal difference,
that monotheism put between man and God.
When I try to explain this to Jesus freaks and other Bible bangers,
they invariably reveal theological ignorance by saying, "But doesn't the
Bible say that Jesus was the only -begotten son of God?" It doesn't. Not,
at least, according to Catholic, Eastern Orthodox and Anglican
interpretations. The phrase "only-begotten son refers not to Jesus the man
but to the Second Person of the Trinity, God the Son, who is said to have
become incarnate in the man Jesus. Nowhere does the Bible, or even the
creeds of the Church, say that Jesus was the only incarnation of God the
Son in all time and space. Furthermore, it is not generally known that God
the Son is symbolized as both male and female, as Logos-Sophia, the Design
and the Wisdom of God, based on the passage in Proverbs 7:9, where the
Wisdom of God speaks as a woman.
"But then," they go on to argue, "doesn't the Bible say that there is no
other name under heaven whereby men may be saved except the name of Jesus?
But what is the name of Jesus? J-E-S-U-S? Iesous? Aissa? Jehoshua? Or
however else it may be pronounced? It is said that every prayer said in
name of Jesus will be granted, and obviously this doesn't mean that "Jesus"
is a signature on a blank check. It means that prayers will be granted when
made in the spirit of Jesus, and that spirit is, again, the Second Person
of the Trinity, the eternal God the Son, who could just as well have been
incarnate in Krishna, Buddha, Lao-tzu or Ramana Maharshi as in Jesus of
Nazareth.
It is amazing what both the Bible and the Church are presumed to teach but
don't teach. Listening to fundamentalists, one would suppose that if there
are living beings on other planets in this or other galaxies. they must
wait for salvation until missionaries from earth arrive on spaceships,
bringing the Bible and baptism. But if "God so loves the world" and means
it, He will surely send His son to wherever he is needed, and there is no
difference in principle between a planet circling Alpha Centauri and
peoples as remote from Palestine AD 30 as the Chinese or the Incas.
It should be understood that the expression "son of" means "of the nature
of," as when we call someone a son of a bitch and as when the Bible uses
such phrases as "sons of Belial" (an alien god), or an Arab cusses someone
out as e-ben-i-el-homa "son of donkey!" or simply "stupid". Used in this
way,"son of" has nothing to do with maleness or being younger than.
Likewise, the Second Person of the Trinity, God the Son, the Logos-Sopia,
refers to the basic pattern or design of the Universe, ever emerging from
the inconceivable mystery or the Father as the galaxies shine out of space.
This is how the great philosophers of the Church have thought about the
imagery of the Bible and as it appears to a modern student of the history
and psychology of world religions. Call it intellectual snobbery if you
will, but although the books of the Bible might have been "plain words for
plain people" in the days of Isaiah and Jesus, an uneducated and uninformed
person who reads them today, and takes them as the literal Word of God,
will become a blind and confused bigot.
Let us look at this against the background of the fact that all
monotheistic religions have been militant. Wherever God has been idolized
as the King or Boss-Principle of the world, believers are agog to impose
both their religion and their political rulership upon others. Fanatical
believers in the Bible, the Koran and the Torah have fought one another for
centuries without realizing that they belong to the same pestiferous club,
that they have more in common than they have against one another and that
there is simply no way of deciding which of their "unique" revelations of
God's will is the true one. A committed believer in the Koran trots out the
same arguments for his point of view as a Southern Baptist devotee of the
Bible, and neither can listen to reason, because their whole sense of
personal security and integrity depends absolutely upon pretending to
follow an external authority. The very existence of this authority, as well
as the sense of identity of its follower and true believer, requires an
excluded class of infidels, heathens and sinners people whom you can punish
and bully so as to know that you are strong and alive. No argument, no
reasoning, no contrary evidence can possibly reach the true believer, who,
if he is somewhat sophisticated, justifies and even glorifies his
invincible stupidity as a "leap of faith" or "sacrifice of the intellect."
He quotes the Roman lawyer and theologian Tertullian Credo, quia absurdum
est , "I believe because it is absurd" as if Tertullian had said something
profound. Such people are, quite literally, idiots originally a Greek word
meaning an individual so isolated that you can't communicate with him.
Oddly enough, there are unbelievers who envy them, who wish that they
could have the serenity and peace of mind that come from "knowing" beyond
doubt that you have the true Word of God and are in the right. But this
overlooks the fact that those who supposedly have this peace within
themselves are outwardly obstreperous and violent, standing in dire need of
converts and followers to convince themselves of their continuing validity
just as much as they need outsiders to punish.
Mindless belief in the literal truth of the Bible and furious zeal
to spread the message lead to such widespread follies, in the American
Bible Belt, as playing with poisonous snakes and drinking strychnine to
prove the truth of Mark 16:18, where Jesus is reported to have said: "They
[the faithful] shall take up serpents: and if they drink any deadly, thing,
it shall not hurt them." As recently as April 1973, two men (one a pastor)
in Newport, Tennessee, died in convulsions from taking large amounts of
strychnine before a congregation shouting, "Praise God! Praise God!" So
they didn't have enough faith; but such barbarous congregations will go on
trying these experiments again and again to test and prove their faith, not
realizing that by Christian standards this is arrant spiritual pride.
Meanwhile, the Government persecutes religious groups that use such
relatively harmless herbs as peyote and marijuana for sacraments.
What is to be done about the existence of millions of such dangerous
people in the world? Obviously, they must not be censored or suppressed by
their own methods. Even though it is impossible to persuade or argue with
them in a reasonable way, it is just possible that they can be wooed and
enchanted by a more attractive style of religion, which will show them that
their unbending "faith" in their Bibles is simply an inverse expression of
doubt and terror a frantic whistling in the dark.
There have been other images of God than the Father-Monarch: the
Cosmic Mother; the inmost Self (disguised as all living beings), as in
Hinduism; the indefinable Tao, the flowing energy of the universe, as among
the Chinese; or no image at all, as with the Buddhists, who are not
strictly atheists but who feel that the ultimate reality cannot be pictured
in any way and, what is more, that not picturing it is a positive way of
feeling it directly, beyond symbols and images. I have called this "atheism
in the name of God" a paradoxical and catchy phrase pointing out something
missed by learned Protestant theologians who have been talking about "death
of God" theology and "religionless Christianity," and asking what of the
Gospel of Christ can be saved if life is nothing more than a trip from the
maternity ward to the crematorium. It is weird how such sophisticated
Biblical scholars must go on clinging to Jesus even when rejecting the
basic principle of his teaching the experience that he was God in the
flesh, an experience he unknowingly shared with all the great mystics of
the world.
Atheism in the name of God is an abandonment of all religious beliefs,
including atheism, which in practice is the stubbornly held idea that the
world is a mindless mechanism. Atheism in the name of God is giving up the
attempt to make sense of the world in terms of any fixed idea or
intellectual system. It is becoming again as a child and laying oneself
open to reality as it is actually and directly felt, experiencing it
without trying to categorize, identify or name it.
This can be most easily begun by listening to the world with closed eyes,
in the same way that one can listen to music without asking what it says or
means. This is actually a turn-on a state of consciousness in which the
past and future vanish (because they cannot be heard) and in which there is
no audible difference yourself and what you are hearing. There is simply
universe, an always present happening in which there is no perceptible
difference between self and other, or, as in breathing, between what you do
and what happens to you. Without losing command of civilized behavior, you
have temporarily "regressed" to what Freud called the oceanic feeling of
the baby the feeling that we all lost in learning to make distinctions, but
that we should have retained as their necessary background, just as there
must be empty white paper under this print if you are to read it.
When you listen to the world in this way, you have begun to practice
what Hindus and Buddhists call meditation a re-entry to the real world, as
distinct from the abstract world of words and ideas. If you find that you
can't stop naming the various sounds and thinking in words, just listen to
yourself doing that as another form of noise, a meaningless murmur like the
sound of traffic. I won't argue for this experiment. Just try it and see
what happens, because this is the basic act of faith of being unreservedly
open and vulnerable to what is true and real.
Certainly this is what Jesus himself must have had in mind in that
famous passage in the Sermon on the Mount upon which one will seldom hear
anything from a pulpit: "Which of you by thinking can add a measure to his
height? And why are you anxious about clothes?
Look at the flowers of the field, how they grow. They neither labor nor
spin; and yet I tell you that even Solomon in all his splendor was not
arrayed like any one of them. So if God so clothes the wild grass which
lives for today and tomorrow is burned, shall He not much more clothe you,
faithless ones? . . . Don't be anxious for the future, for the future will
take care of itself. Sufficient to the day are its troubles." Even the most
devout Christians can't take this. They feel that such advice was all very
well for Jesus, being the Boss's son, but this is no wisdom for us
practical and lesser-born mortals.
You can, of course, take these words in their allegorical and spiritual
sense, which is that you stop clinging in terror to a rigid system of ideas
about what will happen to you after you die, or as to what, exactly, are
the procedures of the court of heaven, whereby the world is supposedly
governed. Curiously, both science and mysticism (which might be called
religion as experienced rather than religion as written) are based on the
experimental attitude of looking directly at what is, of attending to life
itself instead of trying to glean it from a book.
The scholastic theologians would not look through Galileo's telescope, and
Billy Graham will not experiment with a psychedelic chemical or practice
yoga.
Two eminent historians of science, Joseph Needham and Lynn White, have
pointed out the surprising fact that in both Europe and Asia, science
arises from mysticism, because both the mystic and the scientist are types
of people who want to know directly, for themselves, rather than be told
what to believe. And in this sense they follow the advice of Jesus to
become again "as little children," to look at the world with open, clear,
and unprejudiced eyes, as if they had never seen it before. It is in this
spirit that an astronomer must look at the sky and a yogi must attend to
the immediately present moment, as when he concentrates on a prolonged
sound. Years and years of book study may simply fossilize you into fixed
habits of thought so that any perceptive person will know in advance how
you will react to any situation or idea. Imagining yourself reliable, you
become merely predictable and, alas, boring. Most sermons are tedious. One
knows in advance what the preacher is going to say, however dressed up on a
fancy language. Going strictly by the book, he will have no original ideas
or experiences, for which reason both he and his followers become rigid and
easily shocked personalities who cannot swing, wiggle, lilt or dance.
In this connection it should be noted that the blacks of the South swing
and wiggle quite admirably, even in church but this is because the
preacher, starting from the Bible in deference to his white overlords, very
soon reverts to the rhythms and incantations of some old-time African
religion, and there is no knowing at all what he is going to say. This is
perhaps one of the principle roots of conflict between whites and blacks in
the American South that the former go by the Book and the latter by the
spirit, which, like the wind, as Jesus put it, blows where it wills, and
you can't tell where it comes from or where it's going.
Thus, we reach the seeming paradox that you cannot at once idolize the
Bible and embody the spirit of Jesus. He twitted the Pharisees as today he
would twit the fundamentalists: "You search the Scriptures daily, for in
them you think you have life." The religion of Jesus was to trust life,
both as he felt it in himself and as he saw it around him. Most of us would
feel that this was a ridiculous gamble to the Jews a stumbling block and to
the Greeks foolishness but, come to think of it, is there any real
alternative? Basically, no human community can exist that is not founded on
mutual trust as distinct from law and its enforcement. The alternative to
mutual trust, which is indeed a risky gamble, is the security of the police
state, and we can't have that.
Http://personalweb.sierra.net/~mrippie/911.htm
--
Mike Healy
fox...@estreet.com (WolfLogic) wrote:
>On Thu, 29 May 1997 04:33:20 GMT, wiz...@eskimo.com (J. Michael
>Phillips) wrote:
>>"David J. Vorous" <da...@snakebite.com> wrote:
>>
>>***snip***
>>
>>>It was humans that created the "Creator".
>>
>>This is your opinion, and is unverifiable. Why do you report opinion
>>as fact? I have SEEN you jump down the proverbial throat of theists
>>for the same thing. Why is it wrong for them, but OK for you?
>Actually, he makes a good argument from ignorance. Let's see how does
>that go?
>If A can't be proven, it must be false; VS If A can't be disproven
>it must be true..
>Since the burdon of proof lies with the believer, and proof is not
>forth coming, then it stands to reason that since God can be assumed
>not to exist, that the thought or concept of God was created by
>humans. Hmmm sounds pretty logical to me.
>>>
>>>> How's that possible. Your so called science can't prove there's no God.
>>>> Then how could you?
>>>
>>>Science has never tried to prove there is a god, nor have the tried to
>>>disprove one either. They left that stuff up to the philosophers.
>>
>>That is not entirely true. There have been experiments (however
>>misguided they were) to do just that. They were not successful.
>How do you create an experiment to disprove God.
>The condition of observability has to exist before something can be
>disproven.
>For example, I can prove that an elephant is not in my house. All I
>have to do is search for the elephant and by observation prove the
>elephant is not there.
>The rules for disproving God is that first he must be observable. And
>if his existance was observable, then his existance would be proven.
If God created the universe and everything in it, as Christians
believe, he must have immense power. Power so immense that it
incomprehensible to us!
How long can a person look directly at the sun without damaging his
eyes? Therefore, if God created ALL the stars in the known universe,
just how much energy emenates from his being? This is why , when
Moses asked God if he could see his glory, the answer was:
" You are not able to see my face, because no man can see me and
live." ( Ex. 33:20)
As God is not made of flesh, blood and bone, he is invisible to the
naked eye. (Heb.11:27) However, although he is invisible ,
'his invisible qualities' can be observed in his creation. (Romans
1:20, Luke 24:39)
[snip]
S.H.
Raistlin Majere, Archmage
On Sun, 1 Jun 1997 07:11:29 GMT, wiz...@eskimo.com (J. Michael Phillips)
let it be known that:
>Rais...@Tower-of-High-Sorcery.Palanthas.com (Raistlin Majere,
>
>***snip***
>>
>> We scoff at the theists answers, which in reality are questions
>>themselves.
>
>Let's look at what you're so scornful about then . . .
Yes, let's see how badly you'll screw up.
>
>>Mostly the answer is "goddidit" or "godmadeit" or
>>"godwhateverit". This begs the question of HOW god did what.
>
> . . . interesting . . . you've missed the whole point, apparently.
Nope. Hit it dead on.
"How did the universe come about?"
"Goddidit."
"Well how did "goddoit"?"
"We don't ask those questions."
>Theology isn't about "how" God did anything, but "why."
We're not talking about theology, dumbshit.
> When it comes to chemistry, physics, and the like; theology only provides us with
>the paradigm of a rational universe.
The physical sciences have fuck-all to do with theology. Theology
is concerned with the nature of whatever "god" the particular people are
following and the defense of the belief in that god.
> From that rationality, the user must go on to other disciplines to answer the "how" questions.
>
>>Just positing
>>a god as a cure-all (the infamous "god of the gaps") is useless.
>
>Useless to you, perhaps. Many others, however find the same to be
>very useful.
Yeah...as useful as having the male urethra travel through the
prostate gland (which, by the way, it does. Rather bad that it does. Poor
"design", if you ask me).
Raist
alt.atheism atheist #51
When in danger, when in doubt
Run in circles, scream and shout
Nothing is the miracle it appears to be--Simon Stevin
<dkresch><at><execpc><dot><com>
Raistlin Majere, Archmage
On 1 Jun 1997 09:38 CDT, dbo...@utarlg.uta.edu (The Big Kahuna) let it be
known that:
[snip]
>Atheism most certainly is a statement that there is no God
Nope. Sorry. Wrong answer.
atheism--a-theism: literally a lack/without a belief in a god or
gods.
>; agnosticism only claims to not be sure (do to lack of knowledge).
But what aren't they sure of? They must take a stand as to "what"
it is they don't know.
Shell
gd...@netonecom.net wrote:
<snipitty>
> In the Judeo/Christian belief system there is a basis for our presuppositions
> that other belief systems do not have.
Uh oh.
The "if" works this way.."If we
> determine that a piece of fruit we are looking at is an orange, we can then
> reasonably conclude that it is not an apple. Our evidence is the that our
> senses have told us the fruit looks like an orange, and it tastes like an
> orange.
Well there's evidence for ye. Funny how so many other belief systems
might just could say the same.
In the Christian ethos the evidence lies the written eye witness
> testimony of several people of Christs life, death and resurrection.
Uh, not actually. I think most biblical scholars think the synoptic
gospels were actually written by other authors with the exception
of...Luke? So they probably weren't written down by eyewitnesses, but by
those who had heard the story several times removed from the
eyewitnesses.
There is
> also the evidence of the change in our lives when we accept this evidence.
But this same kind of "evidence" exists for other faiths.
In a court of
> law the best possible evidence that can be produced for, or against something
> is eyewitness testimony. The New Testament is loaded with eyewitness
> testimony...."I John have seen with my eyes, and heard with my ears.........."
> As with any eyewitness testimony you can choose to believe that evidence, or
> not, but you cannot say the evidence does not exist.
> Greg
Well lets get John up here and have him tell his tale. "Eyewitness
testimony" implies, I believe, not just that there exists a manuscript
that contains the purported testimony, but that the witness is
producable.
Further, this sort of evidence is of the same sort that Joseph Smith and
his coterie had for the Books of Mormon, and I'm presuming you don't
believe those accounts. Why not? Think of all the evidence; why, those
people actually SAW those plates with the writing on them, and signed
their names to a document that stated such! Why that, and not this?
Shell
--
<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>
Just how weird can you stand it brother
Before your love will crack?
<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>
gd...@netonecom.net
> > If A can't be proven, it must be false; VS If A can't be disproven
> > > it must be true..
> > >
> > > Since the burdon of proof lies with the believer, and proof is not
> > > forth coming, then it stands to reason that since God can be assumed
> > > not to exist, that the thought or concept of God was created by
> > > humans. Hmmm sounds pretty logical to me.
> >
> > If A equals A then A is not non-A
> > this is the logic of anti-thesis, and objective reasoning in which the
> > Judeo/Christian belief system makes perfect sense.
>
> In the J/C religion the "if" in the above statement is replaced with a
> presupposition. In any case they have not given any evidence that "A
> equals A", therefore the rest of the logic is faulty.
>
In the Judeo/Christian belief system there is a basis for our presuppositions
that other belief systems do not have. The "if" works this way.."If we
determine that a piece of fruit we are looking at is an orange, we can then
reasonably conclude that it is not an apple. Our evidence is the that our
senses have told us the fruit looks like an orange, and it tastes like an
orange. In the Christian ethos the evidence lies the written eye witness
testimony of several people of Christs life, death and resurrection. There is
also the evidence of the change in our lives when we accept this evidence. A
man on this news group has posted messages testifying to the fact that he was a
skin head, and now after accepting Christ has turned his life around. This kind
of life changing force is very real, and happens all the time. there is no lack
of evidence, indeed it is the best kind of evidence you can get. In a court of
law the best possible evidence that can be produced for, or against something
is eyewitness testimony. The New Testament is loaded with eyewitness
testimony...."I John have seen with my eyes, and heard with my ears.........."
As with any eyewitness testimony you can choose to believe that evidence, or
not, but you cannot say the evidence does not exist.
Greg
--
Jeff Candy
gd...@netonecom.net writes:
|> In the Judeo/Christian belief system there is a basis for our presuppositions
|> that other belief systems do not have. The "if" works this way.."If we
|> determine that a piece of fruit we are looking at is an orange, we can then
|> reasonably conclude that it is not an apple. Our evidence is the that our
|> senses have told us the fruit looks like an orange, and it tastes like an
|> orange. In the Christian ethos the evidence lies the written eye witness
|> testimony of several people of Christs life, death and resurrection.
I have a piece of paper with the words, 'the sun orbits the earth'. Is that
evidence for the sun orbiting the earth?
|> There is also the evidence of the change in our lives when we accept this
|> evidence. A man on this news group has posted messages testifying to the
|> fact that he was a skin head, and now after accepting Christ has turned
|> his life around. This kind of life changing force is very real, and happens
|> all the time.
This is evidence for the psychological effects produced by believing in
a myth. Perhaps you have heard of one of the most profound discoveries
of modern medicine -- the placebo effect?
People also turn their life around by working out at the gym. They gain
an increased sense of well-being, a superior self-image, and so on -- for
physiological and psychological reasons.
|> there is no lack of evidence, indeed it is the best kind of evidence
|> you can get.
... for a case study in the power of delusion, of course.
|> In a court of law the best possible evidence that can be produced for,
|> or against something is eyewitness testimony. The New Testament is
|> loaded with eyewitness testimony
The New Testament is a polemic work, and your argument is circular.
How can the veracity of the bible be established by reference to the
bible? The truth or falsity of the testimony itself is what is
under scrutiny.
...."I John have seen with my eyes, and heard with my ears.........."
|> As with any eyewitness testimony you can choose to believe that evidence, or
|> not, but you cannot say the evidence does not exist.
"The bible says the bible is true" is hardly eyewitness testimony!
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Jeff Candy (179) http://mildred.ph.utexas.edu/~candy
-----------------------------------------------------------------
WolfLogic
> In the Judeo/Christian belief system there is a basis for our presuppositions
>that other belief systems do not have. The "if" works this way.."If we
>determine that a piece of fruit we are looking at is an orange, we can then
>reasonably conclude that it is not an apple. Our evidence is the that our
>senses have told us the fruit looks like an orange, and it tastes like an
>orange.
The biggest flaw of logic here is that the fruit is observable. God
is not.
Your logic is called "The argument from Ignorance". And there is a
mighty fine book written about just this sort of thing. The point is
that in order for this logic to work, the subject must in some way be
observable.
Brad Franklin
J. Michael Phillips (wiz...@eskimo.com) wrote:
: >Faith is a part of the mental illness and has nothing to do with reality.
:
: While some mentally ill people can be very "faithful" regarding many
: things, faith has nothing whatsoever to do with mental illness per se.
: Faith and reality go hand in hand.
:
: >Faith is belief even when evidence is against the object of belief.
:
: Sometimes yes, sometimes no. Faith can be in something that is
: demonstrated as well as something that is not demonstrated. In fact,
: when things ARE demonstrated to be true, one's faith is usually
: strengthened. We say that someone is acting "faithfully" when they
: stay true to that which their faith is based on, even when it *seems*
: that the evidence is stacked up against the belief. It frequently
: happens that one acts faithfully in those situations, and then finds
: that their faith was well placed after all. New evidence supports
: their original faith, and explains why the seeming discrepancies
: actually *support* their original faith.
*Seems* is indeed the operative term. I have faith in God, and that
faith can be tested in certain situations, but I never hold any belief
that doesn't pass the test of calm, considered reason.
I would gladly give up my belief in an omnipotent, ominscient,
loving God if somebody could show me the error of my ways. Before
you go trying to do this, keep in mind that I am aware that there
are children dying of starvation as well as other things every minute,
probably while I composed this message several died. It's hard for
me to think of a greater challenge to faith than that -- and yet,
even that leaves room for faith. Though frightfully little, I admit.
Without faith, people are incapable of carrying out actions
consistent with their meticulously developed creed. This has
been shown repeatedly to me. Reason without faith lacks
staying power.
Can I prove this to you? Most certainly not. I _can_ ask that you
consider my point thoughtfully in light of your walk on this
earth and decide for yourself if it has merit. This I do.
Now I'm not saying that there can't be moral atheists who do lots
of good things in the world. Conversely, I'm also not saying there
aren't a whole hell of a lot of people (literally?) whose faith is
weak (myself included) and who do lots of clearly evil things, all
the while calling themselves Christians. I am rather saying that
faith goes where reason cannot tread, and that it is useful and
worthwhile at least to _consider_ going there.
When it's faith v. reason, I'll always yield to reason. The surprise
is in realizing just how difficult it can be to set these two against
each other -- that is, unless you feel that the Bible is always to be
taken literally and that you are not meant to think about possible
meanings of the text in light of what is written on your heart
(that's God's word too, you know!) and what can be seen with
your eyes. For literalists (such as the Pharisees), faith and reason
and love are often at odds. One of the greatest things I get out of
the Gospel is watching how Jesus responds to the "accusers".
-Brad
Ryan Muise
On Sun, 01 Jun 1997 22:17:14 GMT,
Rais...@Tower-of-High-Sorcery.Palanthas.com (Raistlin Majere,
Archmage) wrote:
>>; agnosticism only claims to not be sure (do to lack of knowledge).
>
> But what aren't they sure of? They must take a stand as to "what"
>it is they don't know.
>
This is the situation: People all over the world are taking a stand
on the issue of "belief in a God". Atheists say the have a *lack* of
belief. Theists say they have a *positive* belief in a God. Agnostics
simply do not make a positive or negative assertion on the topic
:"belief in a God". They claim that they cannot know, so there is no
point in wasting their time making a decision that they know that they
cannot come to. Saying, "I do not know if a God exists", is NOT the
same as atheism, which is a negative assertion.
Ryan Muise
eni...@klis.com
********************************
"The veil that clouds your eyes shall be lifted
by the hands that wove it. You shall see and you
shall hear, yet you shall not deplore your noble
blindness or regret having being deaf"
-Children of the Bong
Austin Cline
>On Sun, 01 Jun 1997 22:17:14 GMT,
>Rais...@Tower-of-High-Sorcery.Palanthas.com (Raistlin Majere,
>Archmage) wrote:
>
>
>>>; agnosticism only claims to not be sure (do to lack of knowledge).
>>
>> But what aren't they sure of? They must take a stand as to "what"
>>it is they don't know.
>>
>
> This is the situation: People all over the world are taking a stand
>on the issue of "belief in a God". Atheists say the have a *lack* of
>belief. Theists say they have a *positive* belief in a God.
So far, so good. You have just described a black & white, either/or
situation. No third choice.
Agnostics
>simply do not make a positive or negative assertion on the topic
>:"belief in a God".
Neither do atheists, necessarily. As you said - they *lack* the belief.
You either have it or you don't, that's all there is to it.
You are either at-home or not-at-home. No grey area, except for brief
periods in the doorway.
You are either in-water or not-in-water. No grey area, except for brief
periods as you step in/out.
Similarly: one either has a belief in a god, or lacks it. No grey area,
except for brief periods as one contemplates the matter.
Maybe you should examine what "acknowledge" means: to own or admit to
knowledge of; to recognize the status of; etc.... Obviously all of that
would entail beilef *in* the exsitence of the thing in question. If you
*don't* admit to knowledge of gods, if you *don't* recognize the status of
any gods (except as hypothesis, maybe), and if you don't believe *in* any
gods, then you cannot be said to *acknowledge* any gods. Then you would,
by definition, be an atheist (albeit a weak atheist)
Another issue:
There is a difference between thinking:
"Do I or do I not believe in a god/elf?"
and
"Should I or should I not believe in a god/elf?"
The latter allows that the person thinking *could* either believe or not
believe. I am wondering if you are sure about whether or not you are doing
the *first* or the *second*. Since I draw a distinction between the two, I
consider it important to know which you really mean.
I recognize the second as a valid pursuit, and one to which a person may
never find a satisfactory answer. I cannot bring myself to quite say the
same about the first. The first looks, to me, more like the question of a
person who is unaware of their own state of mind *if* (and only if) it is
a question which persists continually and is not brief.
People with reasonable mental capabilities *should* be able to decide *if*
they believe something or not, even though they may never decide if that
belief/lack of belief is proper/justified.
Do I or do I not believe in Santa Claus? That is answerable, and is not
debatable. Should I? That's another matter, and is debatable.
Do I or do I not believe in the Resurrection of Jesus Christ? That is
answerable, and is not debatable. Should I? That's another matter, and is
debatable.
Do I or do I not believe that mass numbers of people are being abducted by
aliens for weird and kinky experiments? That is answerable, and is not
debatable. Should I? That's another matter, and is not debatable.
I *know* whether or not I accept the truth of the above propositions. I
*believe* that any thinking person should also be able to come to a
conclusion about whether or not they accept the truth of the above
propositions (even if they have to think for a bit). I cannot say that I
*know* that I should or should not accept the truth of the above
propositions. In some cases, maybe I should. In other cases, maybe I
shouldn't. I have what I consider to be reasonable justifications for not
doing so in all cases, but that is not the same a certain knowledge.
As long as I am sure of my sanity and mental stability, I will not
actively or continually question whether or not there are certain beliefs
that I have, whether or not there are certain propositions which I hold to
be true or false. As long as I am convinced that skepticism and a "habit
of reasonableness" are the proper ways of examining claims, I will be
willing to actively and continually question whether or not certain
beliefs *should* or should *not* be held to be true.
They claim that they cannot know, so there is no
>point in wasting their time making a decision that they know that they
>cannot come to.
Which is not relevant to the question of whether or not one believes in
any gods. Atheists do not, generally claim to KNOW. In fact, it is often a
key for atheists that absolute knowledge is not required when making
certain decisions. Since absolute knowledge is *not* possible, one *has*
to make decisions about belief based on what is availabe. Since what is
available cannot lead to a reasonable belief in the existence of gods, an
atheist rejects said belief.
Saying, "I do not know if a God exists", is NOT the
>same as atheism, which is a negative assertion.
Atheism is not a negative assertion, and you know that - that is obvious
from your correct statement above that "Atheists say the have a *lack* of
belief." Lacking a belief is not the same as making a negative assertion -
a fact which is obvious to anyone with a modicum of reasoning cabalities.
Up to that last point, you were very reasonable, even if mistaken. You
ruin your credibility, however, when you lie by deliberately contradicting
known fact and even your own statements!
Saying "I do not know if a god exists" (notice the lower case spelling) is
not the same as atheism - but it is also not *relevant* to whether or not
one is an atheist or theist. Once can make that statement and be *either*.
You need to study a bit more on atheism and philosphy.
Austin Cline; German Department; Princeton University
--- Religious persons often consider gambling to be a bad thing. It certainly
causes a great deal of misery. But much of the badness of gambling consists in
its refusal to face the odds and be guided by them; and in the matter of
refusing to face the odds religion is a worse offender than gambling, and does
more harm to the habits of reason. Religious belief is, in fact, a form of
gambling, as Pascal saw. It does more harm to reason than ordinary gambling
does, however, because it is more in earnest.
[Richard Robinson (1902-1996), Professor at Cornell and Oxford wrote in 'An
Atheist's Values']
John Ozechowski
John Ings wrote:
>
> On Mon, 26 May 1997 23:16:09 GMT, m...@azstarnet.com (Michael R.
> Hagerty) wrote:
>
(snipped)
> Let me make an example here, to clarify what I consider unreasonable.
> Many times I have asked Christians to explain the logic behind the
> atonement. How it is that Jesus sacrifice can pay for sins not even
> comitted yet? Ultimately, after a lot of backing and filling and
> hemming and hawing, the same answer always seems to come back.
> "God wants it that way".
>
> Unreasonable.
1. God is a covenant God. He made a covenant with Israel laying out what
was expected, what was allowed and what the penalties were. This same
covenant lays out the benefits. God is constrained keep this covenant
(Mosaic Law) even if we try to break out of it. Therefore (as an
example) the wages of sin is (still) death.
2. The atonement (amends made for an injury or wrong (Websters))
demanded by the law is the death of something in place of the sinner.
I.e. if you sin either you die or something dies in your place.
3. God knew that we could not keep the law so He found a way to fulfill
the law. Jesus the son of God became man, lived a perfect life and died
on the cross. Every sacrifice prior to this was in some way flawed. Even
a lamb without spot or blemish was not entirely perfect. The Lamb of God
however was perfect in every way. This one perfect sacrifice was
sufficient for all the sin of the world, past present and future.
4. The choice now falls to us. Do we acccept the Jesus died in our place
as a sacrifice for our sins? Is He the atonement for us? If so then our
sins are covered. The bible says he died once for all.
5. see Hebrews chapters 8 through 10 (especially 10) for a better
discussion of this.
>
> (snipped)
> The Christian pridefully labels his God merciful and just, while the
> Bible portrays him as being quite the opposite. The whole concept of
> salvation for instance, is in my view most unjust, yet the Christian
> blandly tells me "Well God thinks it's just, so it is!"
>
> Unreasonable.
Just is defined as honorable and fair in dealings and actions
(Webster's). God is always both honorable and fair. He sticks to the
letter of the law in all cases (Those who have accepted Jesus have
fulfilled the law through Him) and is not a respecter of persons.
Everyone lives by the same rules. His mercy is shown in that while we
were yet sinners He sent Jesus to die for us. If we choose not to accept
that that doesn't mean God's not merciful.
>
(snipped)
> A persons attitude toward religion is subject to this same bias too. I
> have more respect for the faith of an adult convert than I do for the
> faith of a man who learned his faith at his parents knee. It is harder
> to sell the fantasies of religion to an adult than to a trusting
> child, especially if that adult has a good education.
I accepted Jesus at the age of 26.
(snipped)
> I feel that's a poor translation. My RSV has "the conviction of things
> not seen" and I think that's more what Paul meant. Often I find
> theists contending that their faith has brought knowledge. I keep
> insisting that if they have knowledge they don't need faith. Faith
> requires an element of uncertainty or it isn't faith.
I have found that faith does bring knowledge. If I believe then I will
eventually see. (This idea is also put forth by almost every successful
business motivational speaker) In my spiritual life I have found that if
I have faith then God will provide the certainty.
(snipped)
> I suggest what you mean is that this man has to some degree emulated
> Job. He has remained steadfast in his faith despite severe trials.
An excellent case. He believed and eventually saw his faith confirmed.
> This is a much admired behaviour among theists, while among scientists
> just the opposite is true. A scientist who stubbornly clings to a
> belief in the face of contrary evidence is regarded as a poor
> scientist.
Scientists can be as blind (or even more so) than anyone else.
God Bless
John O.
David A. Fuller
I must question the definition of faith that some seem to be operating
with. Faith seems often to be used as some sort of blind belief that in no
way takes account of reality. My dictionary (The Random House Dictionary
provides the following definitions:
1) Complete confidence or trust
2) Belief in God or the doctrines of religion
3) A system of religious belief
4) Loyalty or fidelity
My dictionary causes me to gnash my teeth by offering the following
definition of belief:
1) Something believed (what that about defining a word by using it in the
definition?)
2) Confidence, faith, or trust
3) A religious tenet or tenets
Synonyms: Conviction, opinion, view
Finally, believe
1) To accept the truth or reliability of something without proof
2) To accept the truth of a story
3) To have confidence in (a person)
4) To suppose
As the Bible uses the word faith, it is speaking of confidence and trust in
God and it is not asking any to do this without proof. The proof of God's
existence is all around us. How we assess that proof is the key. There
are some that will never believe that Timothy McVeigh is guilty or that OJ
is innocent. However, some found the evidence strong enough to convince
them that TM was guilty and OJ was innocent. Some of us find the evidence
around us strong enough to convince us that we were created and have an
obligation to our Creator. Some don't. Perhaps those of us who do are
suffering from diminished capacity, or we may have expanded capacity It
took me the better part of 40 years to become convinced that we were a
creation that was designed to function in a certain manner, but given the
opportunity to reject that conviction. Unfortunately, my confidence is not
in a God that quit talking to people some 2000 years ago and left them only
a book to argue about and use to thump others with. My confidence is in a
God that is still willing to prove himself daily and provide guidance in
today's world.
Someday, you too may come to the realization that we were created and, as
such, we are under an obligation to the Creator. Perhaps that realization
will avoid you. But, if you do, you will also come to realize that the
Bible passage, "Come let us reason together," is a sincere invation not to
a belief without evidence, but to a person that is infinity worthy of our
confidence and very willing to prove it.
I remain, still drooling all over myself in my madness,
Dave Fuller
Barry O'Grady <barr...@fastlink.com.au> wrote in article
<338ed2ff...@news.fastlink.com.au>...
> wiz...@eskimo.com (J. Michael Phillips) wrote:
>
> :"David J. Vorous" <da...@snakebite.com> wrote:
> :
> :***snip***
> :
> :>It was humans that created the "Creator".
> :
> :This is your opinion, and is unverifiable. Why do you report opinion
> :as fact? I have SEEN you jump down the proverbial throat of theists
> :for the same thing. Why is it wrong for them, but OK for you?
>
> It is a fact that humans created all Gods. Your dislike of that fact
> does not make it any less a fact.
>
> :>> How's that possible. Your so called science can't prove there's no
God.
> :>> Then how could you?
> :>
> :>Science has never tried to prove there is a god, nor have the tried to
> :>disprove one either. They left that stuff up to the philosophers.
> :
> :That is not entirely true. There have been experiments (however
> :misguided they were) to do just that. They were not successful.
>
> One only needs to be observent and unbiased to know that none of the
> Gods named by man exist.
>
> :>> And should a religion be logical? Then why should we believe?
> :>> The human mind is to weak to explain certain things. Therefor don't
try.
> :>
> :>That should say that _some_ minds are too weak. A religion cannot be
> :>logical, it is based upon faith, not logic.
> :
> :This is demonstrably false. While many *do* believe and obey blindly,
> :there are also many who's belief is based largely on logic and
> :reasoning.
>
> Logic and reasoning can only ever lead to a rejection of all religions.
> Since there is no factual basis to any religion only faith, which is
> belief in the face of evidence against, can allow a person to believe.
>
> :>Believe if you want, it's
> :>your business, not mine.
> :>
> :>> Religion and science is the same thing: two ways to explain life in a
> :>> human way of thinking.
> :>
> :>But the difference is in the way of deriving that explanation. There is
> :>logic and reassoning or faith and emotions. Take your pick.
> :
> :Or, you can use both. Personally, I prefer using ALL my faculties,
> :including intuition and emotions. If you would prefer to use only
> :*some* of your faculties, you are certainly welcome to. I will not
> :belittle you for doing so. I would appreciate it if you would not
> :belittle me for my position either (or any of my brethren who choose
> :as I do).
>
> If you use all your facilities you can only come to a discust at, and
> total rejection of, all religions. Faith is not a facility. It is a
> means by which you can bypass your higher facilities and believe in
> something simply because you want it to be so. Faith is an admission
> that you are weak and need a crutch. Faith is the doorway to the
> mental illness called religion.
Brian E. Clark
David A. Fuller <Dave_...@ncci.net> wrote:
> I must question the definition of faith that some seem to be operating
> with. Faith seems often to be used as some sort of blind belief that
> in no way takes account of reality.
"Blind belief" describes many people's faith in the Trinity, the Virgin
Birth and the Resurrection rather well. Moreover, "blind belief" in a God
of love, in direct opposition to observable reality, is the only sensible
way to categorize some aspects of Christian faith. No one -- ever -- has
presented a workable theodicy that does not, at the end, depend on an
unsubstantiable leap of faith.
[...]
> As the Bible uses the word faith, it is speaking of confidence and
> trust in God and it is not asking any to do this without proof.
Easily said. But will you present proof or evidence?
> The proof of God's existence is all around us.
The answer to my question seems to be no. You present only more faith,
more question-begging, which to another person count neither as proof nor
as evidence.
> How we assess that proof is the key.
What you're demonstrating is this: faith can diminish the reasoning
powers of the faithful. To assume that proof of God exists, then to
question whether others are appraising the "proof" correctly,
demonstrates that you've lost your grip on the difference between
assertion and demonstration.
> There are some that will never believe that Timothy McVeigh is guilty
> or that OJ is innocent.
You are now comparing the "evidence" in criminal trials with "evidence"
for God -- but you haven't presented any evidence at all, so your
comparison is inapt. That maneuver, rhetorical in its entirety, bolsters
my accusation that your belief has rendered your ability to present a
genuine argument (regarding such matters as religion) weaker than it
needs to be.
[...]
> Some of us find the evidence around us strong enough to convince us that
> we were created and have an obligation to our Creator. Some don't.
Why persist along these lines? Your post amounts to a misdirection, as
you speak constantly of evidence while never producing a jot of it.
[...]
> It took me the better part of 40 years to become convinced that we
> were a creation that was designed to function in a certain manner,
> but given the opportunity to reject that conviction.
It does not matter whether it took you 40 years or 40 minutes to make up
your mind. What matters is *why* you decided to believe what you believe.
Brian E. Clark
brian<at>telerama<dot>lm<dot>com
____________________________________________________
Show me somebody who is always smiling, always
cheerful, always optimistic, and I will show you
somebody who hasn't the faintest idea what the heck
is really going on. -Mike Royko
_my2cents_
John Ings wrote:
»On 3 Jun 1997 05:07:53 -0700, les...@tigger.NONSPAM.stcloud.msus.edu
»wrote:
»
»>> This is the situation: People all over the world are taking a stand
»>>on the issue of "belief in a God". Atheists say the have a *lack* of
»>>belief. Theists say they have a *positive* belief in a God. Agnostics
»>>simply do not make a positive or negative assertion on the topic
»>>:"belief in a God".
»
»On the contrary. An agnostic is quite capable of having a belief in
»God. Or not, as the case may be. Agnosticism is about KNOWING about
»gods and the supernatural. If you acknowledge that you cannot know if
»there is a god or not, and maintain that no one else can know either,
»then you are agnostic. You can even be a Christian and be agnostic, or
»an atheist like me and be agnostic.
PMFJI. This is an interesting point. Jon, you stated above that an
agnostic may believe in that which he admits he cannot objectively
know. If this is true (and I'm not implying that its not), then it
seems to me that belief *by* an agnostic *in* something they cannot
objectively know falls into one of two categories:
1. believing in something for which there is no evidence, or
2. believing in something for which there is subjective evidence.
Does that sound right to you?
»>IMHO you are making a big deal over a minor difference. In arguing that
»>you cannot know if a God exists, you are saying that the evidence put
»>forth by the major religions is not convincing. Therefore you cannot and
»>will not join in crying "Hallelujah - Thank you, Jesus!"
»
»It goes further than that. It is not just that no evidence put forth
»is convincing, it is that no possible evidece could be convincing.
When you say "no possible evidence could be convincing", I take it to
mean both [a] subjective evidence is insufficient *for you* to
exercise belief in God, and [b] objective evidence, by agreement of
all parties, does not exist which compels a belief in God (for if it
did, then there would be no need for faith in the face of objective
evidence).
Have I accurately deduced your meaning here?
»If I were to find myself standing before that mythic Golden Throne on
»Judgement Day, I would almost certainly cease to be an atheist, but I
»would remain an agnostic. I have no way of knowing if that judge on
»the throne is God or an imposter.
This issue of knowing whether the judge on the throne is God is a
little more complex that what you state here. The simplification
implied here is that subjective evidence is insufficient for a factual
determination.
This resolution to ignore subjective evidence sort of creates a
circular defense which is impenetrable. Let me try to explain why I
think this is circular:
The initial axiom is that non-objective = irrational. This is not a
tautology, rather an implication. It may be that the subjective
evidence was enough for a person to arrive at a conclusion which
aggrees with objective reality, albeit by processes which are best
described as intuitive.
For the sake of clarity, when I say intuitive, I am using the sense as
defined in my dictionary: "1a. The act or faculty of knowing without
the use of rational processes; immediate cognition. b. The knowledge
gained from the use of this faculty."
I realize that I have not demonstrated that intuition is a fact, but
please allow the hypothesis that it exists to follow my reasoning.
The significance of this hypothesis will be shown by the conclusion I
am attempting to demonstrate.
The impressions received via intuition may originate either internally
or externally. Internally originated impressions might be random
thought associations (the domain of neurologists and psychologists) or
perhaps a "sixth-sense" (the domain of parapsychologists). External
examples might be the mode of communication known as telepathy (again,
the parapsychological domain) as well as the way a non-physical being
might communicate with a physical one (this is the domain of theology,
and what many people who express having experienced God, refer to when
they say they "know").
Now the big if in my mind is this: *IF* intuitive impressions cannot
be proven to originate exclusively from an internal source, then the
possibility that some impressions may originate external to the person
is plausible until shown otherwise.
This plausibility of external impressions seems to have at least some
basis for consideration in that people still claim to hear from God in
prayer as well as hearing from "other voices" to kill the president,
etc. In the context of "casting out demons", multiple personalities,
delusions and hallucinations, communion with God or other supernatural
entities, etc., the ability to demonstrate that intuitive impressions
could be externally originated is extremely relevant, IMHO.
This would suggest a discipline which would not be so concerned with
only verifying the accuracy of intuition (as has been done in the
past), but with *first* identifying the origin of each intuited
impression, *then* being able to express its "accuracy potential" (for
lack of a real term). To wit, impressions which could be accurately
identified as "from God" or "from a good angel" (weak examples, I
know, but remember, I'm suggesting the beginning of a new domain of
study) would be given the highest "accuracy potential", while
impressions "from Satan" or "from a bad angel" would rate much lower.
The inherent problems I see with this, from a corporate perspective,
is that we could never be sure that the person sharing his/her
intuition (sense 1b) has accurately identified the source of the
impression, e.g. saying it is from God when it is not.
The upside to such a scenario is that we, individually, could learn to
distinguish between those impressions that come from a reliable source
and those that do not.
The ultimate conclusion from this is that, while it would be
objectively impossible for you to know if the judge was certainly God,
it would be subjectively possible for you to intuitively know the
judge is certainly God.
This scenario is one of the reasons I have difficulty accepting the
"non-objective = irrational" axiom. If there are such entities that
impress us (including God, the devil, angels on both sides, etc.) and
if they do communicate with humanity in a manner that can best be
described by the intuitive model, the "objective evidence only"
resolution *guarantees* that this intuitive model will *never* be
accepted. To reiterate, if the intuitive model is a genuine aspect of
our humanity, and if there is a supernatural dimension in which
supernatural entities exist, the objective-only model will utterly
fail to discover it.
The objective-only model fails, IMHO, to admit the possibility of the
supernatural. In doing so, it disallows the supernatural possibilty
*by definition*, and in so doing becomes guilty of the same
accusations that are written of thesists when they try to use the
Bible to establish God, the Bible, etc.
[snipped the rest as irrelevant to my point]
__
/ /\
/ / \ Richard C Harlos II / rha...@exit-109.com
/ / /\ \ (remove dash to reply)
/ / /\ \ \
/ /_/__\ \ \ Christian, husband, father, friend, thinker,
/________\ \ \ writer, online-junkie, programmer, poet.
\___________\/
agave
Ryan Muise wrote:
>
> On Sun, 01 Jun 1997 22:17:14 GMT,
> Rais...@Tower-of-High-Sorcery.Palanthas.com (Raistlin Majere,
> Archmage) wrote:
>
> >>; agnosticism only claims to not be sure (do to lack of knowledge).
> >
> > But what aren't they sure of? They must take a stand as to "what"
> >it is they don't know.
> >
>
> on the issue of "belief in a God". Atheists say the have a *lack* of
> belief. Theists say they have a *positive* belief in a God. Agnostics
> simply do not make a positive or negative assertion on the topic
> point in wasting their time making a decision that they know that they
> same as atheism, which is a negative assertion.
>
> eni...@klis.com
> ********************************
> "The veil that clouds your eyes shall be lifted
> by the hands that wove it. You shall see and you
> shall hear, yet you shall not deplore your noble
> blindness or regret having being deaf"
> -Children of the Bong
alot of people don't see atheism/theism conflict as being symetrical, as
apposed to what you seem to think. you seem to see both positions as
being equal, that believing either way is equally in error, because both
are unknowable (us being the imperfect creatures that we are).
you see it this way:
atheism = -1
you = 0 (nuetral)
theism = +1
i see it this way:
atheism = 0 (nuetral)
you = +0.5
theism = 1
atheism is a lack of acceptance, of the letting go of something, and
returning to ground zero.
theism is an act of acceptance, some thing is done, some thing is held.
you are somewhere in between.
in otherwords, i don't accept the nuetrality of your agnosticism.
if you respond and use the word 'generalization' one time, i will
scream. i mean it.
bill yohpe
(the great an allpowerful AGAVE)
by the way, is the quote after your sig autobiographical? ;)
Bill Felton
J. Michael Phillips wrote:
>
> Rais...@Tower-of-High-Sorcery.Palanthas.com (Raistlin Majere,
>
> ***snip***
> >
> > We scoff at the theists answers, which in reality are questions
> >themselves.
>
> Let's look at what you're so scornful about then . . .
>
> >"godwhateverit". This begs the question of HOW god did what.
>
> . . . interesting . . . you've missed the whole point, apparently.
Perhaps, although I think you've missed the point of the objection --
which is that absent a "how", (or a provision for the conditions of
the possibility of a "how", ie, "how" must be meaningful),
saying "god did it" is not an answer to *any* kind of question.
> Theology isn't about "how" God did anything, but "why."
This rather flies in the face of a broad range of theologies
which assert that such knowledge is explicitly and specifically
*impossible* with respect to a deity. That is, the assertion made
by a large number of theologians, in response to the theological
asserttion you make (as do a large number of theologians, of course)
is that "we cannot ask 'why' about *any* act of the deity/deities,
we must simply accept."
Further, it is suspect to suggest that a "why" answer is possible
or senseful in the absence of a "how" answer.
> When it comes
> to chemistry, physics, and the like; theology only provides us with
> the paradigm of a rational universe.
This I must challenge!
Many theologies are explicitly irrational. Many theologies
are explicitly 'dualist' in that they admit of both reason
and faith as "equal but disjoint partners" in the acquisition
of knowledge.
In neither of those cases does theology provide a "paradigm of a
rational
universe".
Further, the notion that theology provides such a paradigm is
question-begging at its worst. Can it be demonstrated
that theology, per se, can or does provide any sort of paradigm
whatsoever for the "natural world"?
Theology and natural science (or rational science) are fundamentally
disjoint -- one is the "logos" of the deity, one is the "logos" of
the world.
> From that rationality, the user
> must go on to other disciplines to answer the "how" questions.
It has yet to be demonstrated that there is rationality
in theology per se, let alone any specific theology.
> >Just positing
> >a god as a cure-all (the infamous "god of the gaps") is useless.
>
> Useless to you, perhaps. Many others, however find the same to be
> very useful.
But the question, surely, is whether it IS useful, not merely
felt to be useful.
Bill F.
John Ings
>> This is the situation: People all over the world are taking a stand
>>on the issue of "belief in a God". Atheists say the have a *lack* of
>>belief. Theists say they have a *positive* belief in a God. Agnostics
>>simply do not make a positive or negative assertion on the topic
>>:"belief in a God".
On the contrary. An agnostic is quite capable of having a belief in
God. Or not, as the case may be. Agnosticism is about KNOWING about
gods and the supernatural. If you acknowledge that you cannot know if
there is a god or not, and maintain that no one else can know either,
then you are agnostic. You can even be a Christian and be agnostic, or
an atheist like me and be agnostic.
>IMHO you are making a big deal over a minor difference. In arguing that
>you cannot know if a God exists, you are saying that the evidence put
>forth by the major religions is not convincing. Therefore you cannot and
>will not join in crying "Hallelujah - Thank you, Jesus!"
It goes further than that. It is not just that no evidence put forth
is convincing, it is that no possible evidece could be convincing.
If I were to find myself standing before that mythic Golden Throne on
Judgement Day, I would almost certainly cease to be an atheist, but I
would remain an agnostic. I have no way of knowing if that judge on
the throne is God or an imposter.
>Thus agnostics are de facto atheists in regard to the Christian religion,
No. The fundamentalist Christian would argue that, but not the main
body of Christianity.
>and no doubt in regard to the Jewish religion as well, for in denying
>the knowability of God, you deny the major claim of these religions that
>*CAN* be known, through Jesus "Christ" or through the Torah "delivered at
>Mount Sinai".
What happened to faith?
>Agnostics like atheists, live in a godless world, for a God that cannot be
>known, doesn't matter.
Sheepdip. The unknown is commonly held to be more feared than the
known.
>So all in all, it seems to me that the use of the word "agnostic" is more
>a matter of public relations and image than a matter of substance.
>"Agnostic" a word that unbelievers use when they don't want to bear the
>stigma of the atheist label.
I think you should leave up to agnostics and atheists to define what
they believe. Do we tell you how to be a Christian?