It was just a matter of time before the believer(s) here fell into the trap of attempting to defend belief and scripture by way of actually addressing a verse from scripture.

Scripture is the written underpinning of belief. What happened here mirrors the untenability and danger of scripture: The defender(s) dissemble and instinctually fall into a primal, tribalistic lashing-out toward anyone who thinks outside the claustrophobic toxicity of a malignant mentality.

Your should ask yourself why leaving a dumb post is easier than responding point-for-point. Is that how the belief in Christ comes into play in a situation like this?

Your obvious ignorance of scripture proves the fallacy both of your ridiculous claims of expertise and your jaded interpretation of scripture. You have no credibility and so your "analysis" is garbage.

How kind of you billnewbie.

Your claim as to the meaning of "son" in the Deuteronomy post is baloney. It is back-pedaling, after-market theology that is akin to the rewriting of history in George Orwell's novel, 1984.

The word "son" is used to distinguish a male child from a female child. (Even back then boys and girls acted differently.)

Gluttony and drunkenness are not to be associated with children?! Didn't they have young teenagers back then?! Well, there are teenagers now-a-days and some of them are known to be gluttonous and drunkardly, even after 2000 years of christianity. C'mon. You're making stuff up!

Then you say:
--
"Now I realize that stoning to death an adult offspring [for gluttony and drunkenness] my seem too harsh, but I’m sure that many people may think that the principle of punishing such unruly progeny is valid and may find some merit for it even in our culture, short of capital punishment of course, since we can’t seem to bring ourselves to execute mass murderers either."
--

For continuity I inserted the words gluttony and drunkenness because those are the offenses stated in the verse. So, billnewbie, even if we put aside young teenagers, your concession here approves of stoning someone to death for over-eating and getting juiced-up if he is an adult. And you try to mitigate this by saying this might seem "harsh." What?!

And the point of this verse is to establish a standard of behavior toward parents?! What?! And don't give me that metaphor stuff.

I did not twist your words. I straightened them out so that others and YOU can fully understand what you're saying.

Again your application of an "updated", contra-word-of-god meaning to a biblical verse is proof that god and scripture are products of the human mind.

I still stand on my claim that I am an expert of scripture.

Now what about that 'daughter' verse?

billnewbie's post from another blog:

-----------------------------

I’ve decided to offer my rebuttal to Gazettefan’s contentions for those verses in Deuteronomy anyway since they cry out for correction.
Deuteronomy 21:18
If a man have a stubborn and rebellious son, which will not obey the voice of his father, or the voice of his mother, and that, when they have chastened him, will not hearken unto them:
19 Then shall his father and his mother lay hold on him, and bring him out unto the elders of his city, and unto the gate of his place;
20 And they shall say unto the elders of his city, This our son is stubborn and rebellious, he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton, and a drunkard.
21 And all the men of his city shall stone him with stones, that he die: (and also the part Gazettefan left out) so shalt thou put evil away from among you; and all Israel shall hear, and fear.
.
Gazettefan’s obvious and erroneous contention here is that the word son refers to a child, and for his purposes the younger the better. But the examples of crimes attributed to the rebellious son are that he is a glutton, and a drunkard, not crimes one associates with misbehaving children as Gazettefan claims. Furthermore, as Gazettefan should have noted, since he's claiming to be a biblical authority, that the word son is a translation from the Hebrew word “ben” which is not age specific. The context that Gazettefan claims isn’t there is historical in that in that ancient culture, a man or a woman was under the authority of his father for as long as his father lived in contrast to our culture where an adult offspring achieves total independence at the age of majority, a concept that ancient culture never had. So, for Gazettefan to draw the conclusions he has, he must ignore the historical and cultural context of the time this scripture was written and instead substitute our present day culture as if such substitution were valid which of course it is not.
.
Now I realize that stoning to death an adult offspring my seem too harsh, but I’m sure that many people may think that the principle of punishing such unruly progeny is valid and may find some merit for it even in our culture, short of capital punishment of course, since we can’t seem to bring ourselves to execute mass murderers either. And that is the purpose of this scripture, to establish a standard of behavior towards our parents with the possibility of terrible punishment for the worst offenders, but clearly not children.
.
There it is Gazettefan, you may now commence twisting and stretching my words into an unrecognizable form as if they were taffy. And don’t forget that quote you promised to provide.

I can't go back and respond to every point and question point-for-point. But I can say this:

All of billnewbie's spiel here, including 'grace' and the 'sovereign god', is just a bunch of made up stuff. It doesn't apply to the real world. It's only a way for him and others to separate themselves from everybody else. It's primitive tribalism.

It's their own tribalism and all their other primal instincts that they can't face and come to terms with. They live with that inability to face the truth by projecting their darkness onto non-believers. Non-believers have come to terms with the full nature of their existence and have the intelligence to reject the childish but dangerous fantasies of judeo-christian-islamic belief.

Believers allow this stuff to stunt their intelligence. They reject the science of evolution and then attempt to counter and destroy that science with junk-science. This is barbaric. Believers have continually stood in the way of scientific and medical advancements and in so doing have delayed those advancements by centuries. Whenever they belatedly accept advancements they claim those advancements are a gift of god.

They are taking a free ride on the backs of all humans who are intelligent and courageous. Shame on them!

Since when is "religion" synonymous with "Christianity"?

Last I knew, "religion" meant
–noun
1. a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, esp. when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.
2. a specific fundamental set of beliefs and practices generally agreed upon by a number of persons or sects: the Christian religion; the Buddhist religion.
3. the body of persons adhering to a particular set of beliefs and practices: a world council of religions.
4. the life or state of a monk, nun, etc.: to enter religion.
5. the practice of religious beliefs; ritual observance of faith.
6. something one believes in and follows devotedly; a point or matter of ethics or conscience: to make a religion of fighting prejudice.

I know the article was about Christianity in particular, but it is inaccurate and misleading to use the term "religion" to infer Christianity is the only one.

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's *** God *** entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their *** Creator *** with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--

MDC...., all she did was quote scripture. Much of which was of the violent and apocalyptic kind.

That's unfortunate, GF. Without her posts, this thread makes no sense. Might as well take it offline, gazette.

Nice catch, MDC. A blogger was totally dumped from this site because reasonable questions agitated the primitive tribalism that is the psychological basis for religion and monotheism. The problem corresponed perfectly with the inherent and pathological stunting of thought that goes hand-and-hand with zealottry.

That blogger raved out at me in unacceptable fashion.

I'm on the fly at a library now. I'll get back to the blogs when I can.

Just to show you what I mean- here's what I see (content of posts removed- just name and date/time listed) going back a couple weeks or so:

MDCCLXXVI
Feb 26, 2009 at 2:29 p.m.
gazettefan
Feb 20, 2009 at 5:18 p.m.
gazettefan
Feb 19, 2009 at 3:02 p.m.
gazettefan
Feb 18, 2009 at 2:23 p.m.
gazettefan
Feb 18, 2009 at 8:53 a.m.
gazettefan
Feb 17, 2009 at 4:21 p.m.
gazettefan
Feb 17, 2009 at 4:08 p.m.
gazettefan
Feb 17, 2009 at 3:12 p.m.
gazettefan
Feb 17, 2009 at 7:44 a.m.
ncpanfan
Feb 14, 2009 at 11:56 a.m.
ma_tafoya5
Feb 14, 2009 at 11:29 a.m.
gazettefan
Feb 14, 2009 at 10:08 a.m.
gazettefan
Feb 14, 2009 at 10:02 a.m.
elmooso
Feb 14, 2009 at 9:32 a.m.
ncpanfan
Feb 14, 2009 at 9:15 a.m.
gazettefan
Feb 13, 2009 at 2:32 p.m.
gazettefan
Feb 13, 2009 at 6:52 a.m.
gazettefan
Feb 12, 2009 at 5:04 p.m.
gazettefan
Feb 12, 2009 at 7:12 a.m.
gazettefan
Feb 11, 2009 at 3:46 p.m.
gazettefan
Feb 10, 2009 at 8:15 p.m.
MDCCLXXVI
Feb 10, 2009 at 1:47 p.m.
gazettefan
Feb 10, 2009 at 8:19 a.m.
billnewbie
Feb 9, 2009 at 6:33 p.m.

GF: can you see something I can't? (insert God joke here). Seriously though, you seem to be having a conversation with someone, but we're only seeing 1 side of it- the last 10 or so posts shown are all you, but your posting as though your talking to someone...
I think you broke the site. nice going. ;]

The prophecies also referred to the immediate future "soon". They weren't meant to apply years, decades, centuries, and millennia later.

The so-called prophesies of the bible are not prophesies. They were dishonestly written after the events depicted. They were written as though the "predicted" events hadn't yet happened. Language changes in Hebrew and the use of foreign words that came into use long after the depicted events reveal all this. None of the "prophesies" pertain to our time. The claim that the prophesies are metaphor is sacrilegious and rationalization.

The belief that the prophesies are prophetic is only a matter of tunnel vision, selective perception, confirmation bias, confabulation, delusion, and outright deceit.

So-called bible scholars and those with scripturitis and the hopelessly gullible have no grasp on this. The frauds have a full grasp on it.

The tally for posts is increasing but without addition posts being visible. Maybe the tally increases when somebody who's been permanently dumped leaves posts, but the posts don't appear. The dumped poster sees his posts but no one else does.

That poster will never see a reference to him.

Journalist Wolf Job reports:

World Court indicts god for crimes against humanity.

Chimp attack has some people wondering if religion is in the DNA and have we really evolved as much as we think.

By the way, Momar got some sense slapped into him a long time ago. It's Iran that's the problem.

Now was that so hard, aletheia? No chance that one'll be dumped.

And the factions abound; ALL under the name of Christ!!!

Mata: Good post. I tried the love theory earlier in the post but it was shot down quickly by some. I guess I will stick to my idea of belief and leave it between me and God. I don't try to push Him on anyone but I am not ashamed to say that I have faith. If others fault me for that then so be it. :)
Gazette: Yes that was a sad tragedy. :(

This all is so sad. Over zealous christians that destroy their witness to "nonbelievers" by all of the lecturing and over "religious" people who are stuck on tradition and haven't a clue about the "relationship". Remember that the wisdom of God and the Bible will always be foolishness to those who are of the world belief system and that they will know you by your love! I didn't read much love in any of the preceding posts :) We should all lead by example. Others will see by your life whether your views/beliefs are right or not. Do they give you peace during trials in life, do they give you contentment, love for others, compassion for needy/poor, hope? I suppose in the end everyone will know the absolute truth.
There are churches (not religions) that do follow the Bible without adding or subtracting from it but they are few and far between. (I added that due to a few much earlier posts stating that there are no religions that use all of it anymore.) I assume the term "religions" to mean churches in their posts. Jesus disliked "religions" also! They were all about pushing what they "believe and arguing little things to prove points" rather than simply living a life that loves God and excepts Jesus as our savior. "This is my commandment that ye love one another that your joy may be full."

My post below was for ncpanfan.

alethiea, again innocent non-christians, including dead babies of all kinds, will suffer eternally as a result of the restrictive requirements that you and your kind embrace -if any of it were true.

I'm sure there was. I'm also sure there was a lot of praying on that plane that crashed near Buffalo.

STOP! STOP! Already, this thread has been going on over a month..

I don't know about Captain Sully but from the interviews I have seen and articles I read it does sound like there were ALOT of people in the back praying. :)

"Captain Sully, they didn't pray for the engines to restart? It's like they wanted a water-landing."

"Maybe so, maybe they're Baptists."

Chuck Darwin freed us from another kind of slavery -some of us, anyway.

Today is Charles Darwin's birthday. Happy Birthday, Chuck.

Captain Sully, what was going through your mind at the time?

Well, I was hoping those goofs in the back were praying for the engines to start up again, but nooooooooooooo!!!!!

;~)

And yet another site to click on!!! No wonder the saints are discouraged!!!

;~)

MDC...., NOT YOU.

Which site did I cite? (unless you're referring to someone else).

In summation (so far):

On the pro-belief side we have:

A woman who adopts scripture to a degree that celebrates scripture's marginalization of women.

We have a man who is so over-focused on scripture that he posts (for his side of the debate) a site that is in exact contradiction to what he says it says.

We have another man who is so over-focused on scripture that he cites (for his side of the debate) Mark Twain who is a staunch opponent of scripture.

And a good thing they were too!

Captain Sully, did you pray at any time?

I was concentrating on the plane, I suspect someone in the back was doing that.

Yes, aletheia, you have certainly lost track. You have entirely lost track. You show your inability to stay on track re: the entirety of reality every time you post. Every time you post you are unable to truly respond to the previous post.

Your total immersion into scripture has put you in the place that scripture puts all women. You've come a long way, baby!

That was a nice sermon, but where is part 3? I see neither a question nor an answer to a question already asked. Again, if your comments are in reference to a previous post, you'll have to point it out, because I've lost the continuity of the thread with your posts.

If you’re referring to my comment that modern Christianity has more in common with Buddhism than original Christianity, then I'll expand on my comment:

I was talking specifically about the contemporary vision of what God is, and the Godhead. In order to avoid conflicts with scientific progress, the Christian notion of God has transformed from the God of the Old Testament who walked in the Garden of Eden with Adam, who spoke to him and Eve in person, to something completely alien to man. Today God is preached as being incorporeal, omnipresent, and without passions. How can you claim that this non-being is the same God that created Man in His own image?

The issue is further muddied by the modern notion of the Godhead, a being who is simultaneously three distinct beings while being a single being.

MDC:

aletheia has nicely personified every thing wrong with scripturized and institutionalized religion and theism.

That which exemplifies our transcendence from our animal past, language and reason -the exchange of ideas-, is abandoned by her as she cowers with instinctive defensiveness in a lair whose only exit welcomes her to the world of free thought.

As much as she tried to avoid true dialogue and thorough examination, she with full flourish revealed everything.

She revealed everything with a religiosity so severe and so alienating that she is left as the preacher and follower in a church of one.

aletheia, if that was a response to my post, you have to be clearer- I have no idea what your getting trying to say. You're just stringing together scriptures. Like statistics, you can make scriptures say anything. Your argument is that the Bible is accurate because the Bible says so? That makes no sense whatsoever, and is out of context.

aletheia, yeah, that's some side-splitting humor -if you'll pardon the "split side" reference. How's that for humor?

So you stopped caring about my opinion of you AFTER you wouldn't give your age?

If it's in the bible it's okay, right? We'll shouldn't you be smiting all the infidels? Even the ones who claim to be chrisians but don't share your "accurate" view of it all?

I realize I jumped into this discussion late, and that after the first couple hundred posts I started skimming, so I didn’t read the post that made the argument your debating, but I’m surprised your taking it seriously. It is a non-starter. There are objective truths and subjective truths. It is a mistake to dismiss either as being unimportant. Subjective truths are very real. Each of us is the center of our own unique universe. If I believe a thing to be true, and my behavior is changed by that belief, then that belief takes on a real and tangible meaning. It doesn’t matter what is real, it matters what we believe is real. Subjectively if a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it, it does not make a sound because unless we observe the tree either directly or vicariously through a trusted source, the tree does not exist in our universe. We cannot be certain that the tree exists even if we do observe it, because our senses and thus our ability to observe the universe as it truly is are limited. We believe the tree is real, however, and that belief makes it real to us.

As real and important as subjective truths are, that does not mean that we should dismiss or abandon the pursuit of objective truth. Objectively the tree makes a sound. The tree does not require an observer to exist. The discovery of the objective nature of the universe should be the goal of all men.

The number of people who believe in God is important because it makes it truer subjectively. Even if you do not believe in God, the fact that many people do affects your life in real and tangible ways. But that does not in any way prove or disprove the objective existence of God.

I also wonder if the idea that the state of our society is in fact in contradiction with the existence of God, subjective or objective, is valid. Most people are mostly good most of the time. The fact that we have survived this long is proof that we have, to some degree, transcended our animal natures. The world is not as evil as the media would have you believe.

Regarding God being revealed through scripture: again, I can’t speak for all Christians, but I believe that statement is completely reversed: Scripture is revealed through God. It is folly to suppose that a collection of texts that have been translated, copied, edited, condensed and even maliciously altered are the literal word of God. God did not write the scriptures, nor has He supernaturally protected them from alteration. Scripture is not to be understood by academic study, but through prayer and personal revelation. I would be cautious of anyone who tells you what the scriptures mean. Religions are human institutions created by men for our own benefit. They have set themselves up as the intermediary between man and God. God does not need an interpreter to speak to His children; He has the Holy Ghost for that purpose. Pray for understanding and clarity, and try reading the scriptures without prejudice.

aletheia, you're much more interesting and vital when you don't quote or parrot scripture.

My questions were in reference to billnewbie and ICY's claims that the "prevalence" of open belief and the existence of places of worship verified the existence of god.

The first part of your post verifies that Christ showed no interest in establishing a church. (That interest only came later with Pistol Pete). Your post also emphasis that institutional religion, including the many churches of Christ, were not meant to verify the existence of god. And that any claim to that effect contradicts Christ and scripture. This means that the claims of the religiosos re: the "prevalence" of the belief in god by way of organized religion is no basis for the belief in the existence of god.

The rest of your post has for centuries inspired tribalistic wars against non-christians and tribalistic wars among christian factions.

aletheia and MDC....., I appreciate your detailed posts.

My question was: What is a christian/religioso? (A religioso being one who considers him or herself a believer in god as revealed by scripture -regardless of denomination.)

I asked the question to address the claim here by some posters that the existence of god, as manifested by scripture, is verified by the large number of people (more than half, maybe even 90%) who answered yes to a certain question. (Apparently the number was arrived at by a survey.)

If the number is true (leave aside the definition of christian or religioso, for now), how can this prevalence of believers within our society -given the state of our society- verify the existence of god?

-----------

Now if an adjustment is made by whittling down the number of people who answered yes to the survey question by weeding out the pretenders who did not in fact measure up to the definition of a christian or religioso (that definition agreed upon by: MDC, aletheia, and billnewbie) how does the new number verify the existence of god?

--------------------

The pretenders would have to made up of atheists, agnostics, and deists, none of whom can be used to verify the existence of god of scripture. (Atheists, agnostics, and deists do not impose a scripturized religiosity on society.) -Remember, god is supposed to be revealed by scripture.

Back later.

But if we're recommending readings:

The Plague by Albert Camus

1776- Wow, that is probably the best blog I have ever read on gazetteextra.com

This is for both GF and aletheia, regarding the question of how one defines a Christian:
The point GF is making I believe is that there are two possibilities: either a person is Christian simply by virtue of self declaration, or by virtue of meeting some criteria of behavior and belief. If the former is true, then we are a Christian nation, but the moral state of our society is an indictment of Christianity. If latter is true, then Christians are a tiny minority (leaving aside the whole question of what the criteria are to be declared a Christian).
When I was about 19 I read “Atlas Shrugged” and “Illuminatus!”, and decided I was a Libertarian. This predates the internet, so there was no website to visit, no Google, and no local sources I was aware of to explore the modern Libertarian movement. I formed my own notion of what Libertarianism was independently. I called (and still do) myself Libertarian and registered to vote as such. In recent years I have had the opportunity to visit the Libertarian homepage, to read their platform, to read what the “official” Libertarian movement stands for. Unfortunately, I have come to realize that my opinions are not held by the majority of Libertarians. I find the exodus of far-right leaning ultra conservative religious people to Libertarianism from the Republican Party particularly troublesome. They seem to be attracted only to the religious freedom plank of the party, ignoring or vocally opposed to other key planks, such as ending “wars” that are doomed by reason of faulty semantics (you can’t declare a “war” on drugs, poverty, illiteracy, or terror). Personally I find the official position on free market economics to be unrealistically naïve (total deregulation is at best irresponsible, and worst catastrophic because free market forces do not come into play in the absence of true competition or in markets with prohibitively high costs of entry).
The point I’m trying to illustrate is that I now find myself in a conundrum: am I Libertarian? I hold that I am, but only by my own definition. I am more Libertarian than I am anything else, but I refuse to accept the “official” party platform, just as much as they would refuse to support me should I decide to run for office.
Likewise I am, by my own definition, Christian, but I reject a great many of the tenets held by the self-proclaimed apostolical churches today, just as they would reject my beliefs. Who has the authority to decide if I am Libertarian, or Christian? Perhaps I am Libertarian* and Christian*, with disclaimers. Are we a Christian nation? By definition we are not. Are we a nation of Christians? Perhaps, but only by a slim margin, and the oft repeated notion that we are, in my estimation, is misleading. I believe the best description of America is “non-denominational deists”.

Of course I also believe that modern Christianity has more in common with Buddhism than early Christianity, so what do I know.

Whether he did or not most of the 154 other people probably were.

Anyone hear Captain Sully make an appeal to god?

No.

"We're landing in the Hudson."

aletheia:

The christian/race comparison doesn't apply. Race is a physical fact of birth. And, each race has bad actors that do not reflect the whole.

But christianity is an adopted state of mind and behavior. And the designation of "christian" is precluded if one doesn't think or act like one, correct?

If the answer is "yes" then the so-called number of christians here is skewed by people who say they are christians, but actually are not christians because they act otherwise.

If the answer is "no", then the nature of christianity hardly recommends itself -no improvement for our lot.

So, since this is supposed to be a predominately christian society, the nature of that society doesn't speak well for us or christianity.

Or, the claim that we are a christian society, or even a religious society, is false.

I wasn't sure you're a woman. The "a" ending to your name and billnewbie using feminine pronouns suggested it.

I asked your age because I'm wondering if your zeal is a matter of youthful exuberance toward understanding things, or is it some born again thing stemming from some sort of disorientation.

alethiea, yes, society is satan. And all the people who are making society so bad are not christians. Which of course greatly reduces the number of people who are christians regardless of what some people say when they are asked the question that prompts the answers that seems to support the claim that there are a lot christians out there.

You should watch ETWN -with the nuns praying. I can only take about two minutes of it. There's something wrong with those chicks!!!

How old are you?

I haven't forgotten or ignored your question, aletheia, I'm still thinking. Personally, I'm not sure it's possible for the human mind to really contemplate a singular universe. I find the whole concept terrifying. If I were given the choice between infinite life in a singular universe vs. nothingness, I find nothingness much more comforting. An eternity of boredom seems like the definition of hell to me. I'm not being flippant. What would be the point of eternal life without conflict? Like I said, still thinking.

Yes, aletheia, scripturized. There's a difference between memorizing something by repetition than their is to read something and truly comprehend it. Sure MCD read the books, so did I. We didn't tattoo the contents onto our mentalities for automatic, knee-jerk spewation. We comprehended those books for what they are. That's why we can talk about them without falling into a severe disconnection from reality.

For future purposes, when I say something like "society is god" or "god is society", read the word "god" to mean the fable that you place in front of you for the purpose of obscuring reality -use the absence of capitalization as a clue.

Society is composed of the things that would constitute god if god existed, only without the supernatural and without the peculiar violence that is at the core of the bible and koran.

Watch those nuns on EWTN and ask yourself what in the world they are doing.

Yes, I was certain that MCD..... did not present himself as an atheist. His ability to articulate in a conversational way is because his thinking has not been scripturized. He has not subjected himself to trance-like memorization of scripture nor does he run on automatic with scripture in response to reasonable questions. Absent are the blinders and tunnel vision that cause comprehension and articulation problems.

MCD...., great point re: that the violence of religion is in accordance with scripture. Humans have fought for centuries over pride and real estate. But the fighting that is attached to the belief in the supernatural and scripture is especially irrational and merciless.

I did not declare myself an Atheist. Either I misspoke, you misunderstood something I said, or you have me confused with another poster (at nearly eight hundred posts in this thread alone, that would be understandable).

GF: Thank you. Coming from you that is high praise indeed. I find that on the rare occasions that I discuss theology, I find that Atheists are the most rewarding people to talk to. They seem to be the only ones willing to evaluate an idea on its own merits. Everyone else simply counters with worn out dogma, circular logic, or language that seems to contradict common sense (or as you so elegantly put it: "A cloistered discipline skews the common meaning and usage of words in real world vernacular." I found that to be particularly insightful. Not to be too critical, Aletheia, but you have a habit of dropping into language that is peculiar and is only meaningful to those who already accept your set of beliefs).
You make a valid point which I admit I had not fully considered. There is no force of reason that can withstand the power of the promise of eternal glory. Religion holds more power over man than any other human construct. God and the afterlife offer rewards that cannot be matched on Earth, are available to all men equally regardless of stature in this world (making religion especially attractive to those less fortunate than you or I), and are beyond doubt or reproach.
We would like to pretend that suicide bombers are insane. The reality is that, in context, their actions are perfectly rational. There is no realistic hope for peace in the Middle East when three mutually exclusive, aggressive religions all claim the same plot of land to be their holy land. So long as there are fundamentalist Christians, Jews and Muslims in the world, there will be bloodshed. The real irony is that there is nothing inherently sacred about any particular plot of land, anywhere. To suppose that a place has some mystical power and to kill another human to take control of it is nothing short of idol worship.
While this is a clear indictment of religion, I hesitate to extend the fault to God, should He exist. I appreciate your position that a true God would not allow such pointless conflict among people who genuinely profess to believe in Him and worship Him. It seems like an obvious question: how can God allow this to happen, when it would be so easy for him to unify His followers? The answer is less obvious, and I fear it will sound like an obvious cop-out to an Atheist, but I hold that it is true nonetheless: to show Himself to man denies free will. It also puts a terrible burden on man. So long as there is the possibility of doubt, that doubt is excusable, and sin is forgivable. If God were to show himself to the world, then there is no hope for forgiveness. Aletheia hinted earlier at the “unforgivable sin”. She did not name it, so I can only guess at what she meant, but my understanding is that the unforgivable sin is to deny God after having perfect knowledge of His existence. If God reveals Himself to you in person, and you then reject God, there is no hope for forgiveness or redemption. That is not a burden I am ready to bear.

I don't particularly like the Amish. But for the low, low price of just a glass of lemonade they will help you build a barn.

So, how about it Gazettefan, are you the world's first Amish Atheist?

MDCCLXXI, I reject dualism for the reasons I stated. Sorry you can't see it that way.
.
And God said, let there be light: and there was light. Gen. 1:3 . Sounds like an act of creation to me, not an act of separation at all.

MDCC...., your posts are comprehensive, focused, and well written.

You are correct in that everything negative about the human experience comes from humans -as does everything good. Humans will always endeavor to form in groups and therefore there will always be frictions.

The problem with groups, cultures, and nations formed with a religious basis is that the frictions between those formations and the frictions within those formations will greatly exacerbated the tribalistic intensity of humans. Dogma is not organic. This is especially true of Islam and christian factions in other parts of the world. Someone who believes god is on his side is empowered to a state of monstrous righteousness.

Despite what's been going on with the U.S. in recent years, we do not involve ourselves overseas on the basis of being a religious country. We are a democracy. The abusiveness of the religions here is internal. The media continually carries stories of abuse by clergy and other religious people in this country.

Bill: you somehow got my point exactly while completely missing what I was driving at: everything you said about animals not being evil is true. In fact that was my point: because they cannot discern between good and evil, they are amoral. We, however, can. The struggle between our souls which know God and our bodies which are animal is the very essence of the struggle between good and evil. Now, I’ll grant that there is evil that seems to fall outside the scope of even the basest animal instincts. I won’t pretend to know where the urges to do these things come from or how they relate to basic biological needs. What compels a man to rape a child is a mystery to me, but I would guess that it is based on the biological need for sex, perverted by other needs such as power and control.
To blame Satan I think is to oversimplify the matter. I am not denying Satan exists, but rather that he is the source of evil. Evil is nothing more than ignoring what we know to be right. I don’t know what version of the Godhead you adhere to, but I think it is a common belief that the Holy Ghost exists to speak to us. If we ignore that voice, there is another to fill the void: our animal instincts. They are not inherently evil, but rather evil in the context that they are in defiance of the instructions of God. The role of Satan is to push deceive us into believing that our acts are not really evil, to doubt what we know to be true.
As to duality, I’m afraid we can only disagree. Your argument denies one of my primary axioms: that the universe is inescapably dualistic. If it were not so, if God were in fact the prime singularity, then how can evil exist?
Certainly a true God could not create evil. If God indeed created everything, and God is perfect good, then evil exists simply because good exists: in order for God to be, evil must also be.
As I said, light does not need dark to exist; it needs darkness to be quantifiable (darkness does not “fill the room” either. Darkness can’t fill anything). Evil is not the perversion of good, it is the absence of good, and is necessary to define and quantify good. Without evil, without the ability to choose anything other than good, good is trivial and meaningless. I don’t understand why you insist on rejecting what to me seems self evident.
Your argument is based on a situation completely devoid of good. Again, you’re right, but only sort of. The complete absence of good implies an empty universe, so of course evil would be meaningless. You can’t measure evil any more than you can measure darkness. Light can be measured, however, as well as goodness (The Judgment).
Just open your Bible to the first page. God does not magically wave his hand and create light. He separates light dark, day from night, earth from the heavens and so on. Genesis beats you over the head with duality.

GF: Most people see Atheism as being cynical and pessimistic. I think the problem is quite the opposite: Atheists are unrealistically optimistic. I believe that religion is a symptom, not the cause of most ills. I would argue that tribalism is an inescapable human condition, another manifestation of animal instincts that manifests itself as not only religion, but also nationalism, racism, and pretty much any other ‘ism’ you care to name.
My point is that if, somehow, the question of the existence and nature of God were settled once and for all, there would be no need for organized religion. That, however, would not free the world of conflict or even diminish it much. The acts of evil that are blamed on religion are not the fault of religion. They are the fault of man. I hold that there has never been a war fought over religion, any more than there has been a war fought for any cause other than one: power. Whether it is money, land, slaves, or natural resources; greed and the lust of power is always the motivation for war.
Granted, the people who either volunteer or are pressed into service might honestly believe that they are fighting for God and Nation, but that does not make it a religious war. Religion, or any other form of tribalism, is simply a lever used to motivate people to give up their lives for a cause they believe in.
This does not mean that I have any disrespect for our soldiers; just because you recognize tribalism for what it is does not diminish its power or decrease its value.
Atheism, however, seems to cling to the naive assumption that empathy and the social contract are enough to compel people to be well behaved, without the need for the structure of religion or state. Call me misanthropic if you must, but I believe that without the fear of God, society would be impossible to maintain.
While people of average intelligence will recognize that the social contract is, in the long term, self serving and the only logical way to ensure safety and comfort, there are lower level needs and urges that are difficult for most people to control based solely on reason. Religion and the state then are, if nothing else, necessary evils to maintain civilization.
To put it another way, if we recognize that evil done in the name of religion is simply tribalism that, in the absence of religion would find some other guise, then the net benefit of religion on society is greater than the net harm done by religion. We are not sufficiently advanced to expect empathy and reason to overcome our animal instincts. Tribalism is a stopgap, a natural instinct that has allowed us to organize ourselves into societies without eating each other.
To your last point: free-thinking and conformity are in opposition. Humans feel the need for both. Typically, conformity prevails. Men readily abandon free thinking in favor of security.

billnewbie, even with help you can't concentrate on issues worthy of real discussion; as a matter fact, needing the help is an act of avoidance.

And you with the advantage of being associated with the almighty. Avoidance is what it's all about, isn't it. The retreat from reality.

Building an argument is like building a house, Gazettefan. It takes tools and material. If you want to build your house of debate with a hammer and nails, suit yourself. I prefer a nail gun. Using the internet is no different than any other reference source, but it's a lot faster. I wonder, do you get around on horseback or do you drive a car?
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I knew you would love that last quote. It suits you perfectly.

Aletheia, when I wrote that I reject original sin, I meant that I reject the Catholic doctrine that Adam's original sin is born by us all. We inherit the propensity to sin from his original sin, but not his guilt. There is no need for it as we all have sinned and have our own guilt to bear as Romans makes clear. It is also in Romans 5:12 where it was stated that sin entered the world through one man and with it death. Yes, once saved always saved as it says in Romans 8:38-39 “For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

billnewbie,when it comes to disagreeing with me you seem hardpressed to find something. I don't recall using the word "evil" at all on this blog-possibly,I referenced it. Your reference to it amounts to quibbling. And how all that takes you to subject of moral relativism makes no sense.

I call child rape criminal in the sense that it is not only a crime against the victims but it is also a crime against humanity -this is not relativistic, it is absolute. And to refer to it as as a crime is to include the expectation of punishment -totally absent of forgiveness-"forgiveness" you know, that thing religion likes to throw around in lieu of punishment-forgiveness has the malleability of relativism.

If you'd like to get past the problem of quibbling over the word "evil",tell me your definition and maybe we can come to an agreement on what it means. Although,I can tell you now that it does describe the act of child rape.

I don't know what you mean by "how evil squares with atheism and evolution." Your statement isn't coherent.

Re:references etc. We are talking about how we view the world and reality. You should be able to tell me how you view the world and reality without references and copying and pasting. Because even though you've been influenced by your studies, you had to assimilate that "knowledge" and "kind of reasoning" into your everyday worldview. You don't make your way through each day with references by way of googling on your computer,do you?

Debating here is absent the pitfalls of in-person communication.That's good. But when having a discussion about your worldview in person, do you do it near a computer where you can google things up for the other person? You seem to be avoiding talking about your personal relationship with god. It seems relevant to the debate here but instead you hide it.

And this thing about Twain. I gotta tell ya that first quote is goofing on religion. By the way, if you agree with Twain why don't just put that thinking into your own words? Furthermore, you see me as the atheist opposition here but I don't need to quote and copy and paste.

The first quote or copy and paste job works entirely against you:

“Most people are bothered by those passages of Scripture they do not understand, but the passages that bother me are those I do understand”.

In the first part he's saying that some scripture is incomprehensible. In second part he's saying that the parts of scripture that can be deciphered are disturbing.

The second quote:

“The rule is perfect: in all matters of opinion our adversaries are insane”.

What's going on here in this debate certainly proves the universality of the quote. Which, by the way, doesn't make you any less guilty. And I would submit anytime our debate to the judgment of anyone as wise as Twain for the purpose of seeing who's the most crazy. Would you?

MDCCLXXVI, I see a problem with you light and darkness analogy. When you turn off the light, darkness fills the room but not so with good and evil. In the absence of good, there is no purpose for evil, there is nothing desirable to covet, nothing beautiful to lust after, no justice to seek through vengeance, no “goods” to steal, nothing at all to gain through evil. Yet in the absence of evil, good flourishes. Therefore the inescapable conclusion is that there is no duality, there is good, and there is the perversion of good which is evil meaning that good is independent but evil needs good to exist.
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If you are going to claim that evil is the result of animalistic instincts then you need to provide evidence of evil in animals but you cannot because evil is a distinctively human activity. You mistake savagery for evil no doubt due to its effects. But effects are not what define evil. Evil is based in the intent. When an accident occurs and someone dies do we call the person who caused the accident a murderer? No, even though a person is just as dead as if an angry man plunged a knife into his heart. Do we call a person who defends himself or another from an attacker with deadly force a murderer? No, in fact we may call him a hero yet someone has died. Evil is a commission of the heart, an act no animal is capable of and something quite different from instinct.
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Concerning reason, the point I tried to make is that we are imperfect creatures with an imperfect capacity for reason. We must be very careful to filter out our biases when we reason which is a task beyond all of us as we cannot filter out them all. Therefore we are susceptible to the same failures of reason as our ancestors had when they were convinced that the earth was the center of the universe. We now know that to be false due to new perspectives. There are new perspectives yet to be discovered. Today’s consensus of conventional wisdom may well provide amusement for future generations as so many are amused by those of our forbearers.

Gazettefan, the fact is that your philosophy genuflects to your situational temperament. When the topic is Catholic priests, the concept of evil fits right in, but when discussing how the concept of evil squares with evolution and atheism then suddenly the word has a different meaning. That is relativistic whether you acknowledge it or not.
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How can one discuss Twain without quotes, which are what "cut and paste" is? Where do you get this notion that you can discuss the work of others without references? That's like discussing atheistic philosophy without reference to its progenitors and contemporaries (an example of a cloistered discipline). In spite of your attempts to restrict my comments, here’s another quote from Twain that I’m sure will irritate you “Most people are bothered by those passages of Scripture they do not understand, but the passages that bother me are those I do understand”. It seems he was less hostile to religion that you would like to believe. Are you aware that his body of work exceeds the couple of books you may have read? Still, I do not present him as a moral authority as he was just a satirist with his own stack of problems. However, I think you’ll find that you can identify closely with this quote from Twain “The rule is perfect: in all matters of opinion our adversaries are insane”. He of course was lampooning that notion whereas you embrace it.

aletheia and MKM, the fighting that goes on between religions (which includes communism and fascism) and within religions (and within communism and fascism) -factions- is proof that all these ideologies are man-made. The fighting is a manifestation of the fighting that would take place to a lesser degree if these ideologies did not exist.

What makes the fighting worse between and within religious/ideological institutions is the prohibition of free-thinking among the multitudes. All authority is centralized to only one or a few people. The input of the multitudes is not allowed to stunt the danger of the negative extremism of the one or the few. Religion, itself, has the added danger of sanction from the supernatural. Belief in the supernatural further stunts or denies free-thought.

Pt3
As for reconciling reason and belief: I stand by my statement. There is no difference between my reason and Tom the bagger’s. Tom and I have different experiences and thus different perspectives. Neither of us is able to see the whole picture and thus will likely come to different conclusions about what is reasonable. But that does not condemn reason. The Universe is reasonable. There are laws that govern the workings of all things, laws that can be observed and in some small ways even understood by man. Science is the pursuit of the understanding of these laws. God’s power is derived from the perfect knowledge of these laws. He knows all, and thus has the power to control the universe. But that does not mean God is magical. If that were the case, then what was the point of Christ dying on the cross? If God’s power were truly arbitrary, then He would be an unbelievably cruel God, and not one I could worship. I realize that you will read this as me trying to limit the power of God, but I am not. I’m saying that God is not arbitrary or without reason because that is the very essence of God: order. Entropy is an observable phenomenon. All systems will, without interference, become disorderly, eventually settling into an inactive state of chaos. But entropy is not a force. It is more like darkness: the absence of order. Life is the force in the universe that countermands entropy. Living things create order out of disorder. The fact that the universe is orderly suggests one of two possibilities: either the universe itself is alive, or it was created by a living being. Either way, there must be something greater than Man to explain the observable order in the universe; no other rational explanation exists for the orderly state of the universe which entropy is constantly undoing.

(pt2)
Bill: Your point about duality seems to be true on the surface, but you’re really just playing games with semantics. Put it this way: Does light need anything from darkness to exist? Absolutely not. If the universe was uniformly filled with light, the light would be just as real as it is in our universe. But would the inhabitants of that universe be aware of it? No. There has to be the possibility of darkness in order for light to exist in a meaningful way. If evil were impossible, then what value would good be? The analogy extends quite well: evil is nothing more or less than the absence of good, just as darkness is simply the absence of light. Believe it or not, GF is 100% right with regard to evil: the animal instinct is the drive that causes us to do evil. How many scriptures talk about the light of Christ? How is the answer not obvious to you? The struggle between good and evil in man is simply the struggle between the soul, which carries the light of Christ, and the animal bodies we live in. Hell is not literally “fire and brimstone”. Those were just metaphors to explain the torment we would feel knowing that the decisions we made in life caused us to be separated from God. Hell is nothing more than the absence of God. The torment we feel will be self-inflicted. That does not make it any less terrible than the more literal reading of the description of hell.

(pt1)
GF: If your asking me to reframe my argument as to why babies go to heaven in the framework of the existing debate between you and the other 3 active participants, I can’t. Many of their axioms are, in my opinion, questionable. Because they take them to be fact, however, there’s really no room for debate. They read a scripture and interpret it (or have been told what it means) one way. I read it another. There is no way to ‘prove’ my interpretation is correct. Given enough time and motivation, one can justify almost any belief based on scripture. Furthermore the notion that you can defend religion by citing scripture is absurd. You can’t say God exists because the Bible says so. Aletheia’s argument is, to me, particularly offensive. From what I can get out of her responses to the question, she is basically arguing for determinism. A baby dies, and God evaluates the child’s soul. Some go to heaven, some don’t.
There are so many things wrong with that argument I’m not sure where to start. First, if we accept that a soul is created by God, then aletheia’s argument would mean that, ‘out of the wrapper’ some souls are defective. How could a prefect being knowingly create a soul that was flawed, doomed to Hell before even being born? What if that baby lived? Does that mean that, regardless of what path their life took, they were predestined to go to Hell? I’ll be frank: I would rather side with the Atheist than a God fearing Determinist. Original sin has no scriptural foundation, and is, in my opinion, fundamentally wrong.
This is but one of the many reasons I asked aletheia not to pretend to represent all Christians. I didn’t ask you to refrain from expressing your opinion, I asked you to refrain from presuming you speak for all Christians. You do not. Preach all you want, but be clear about who’s version of the Gospel your spreading (and don’t say “God’s”. You do not have the authority to speak for God. Comparing yourself to Jesus is pretty presumptuous, even for you).

Geesh - All these blogs make me so happy to be an Atheist. No heaven, no hell, no god, no fighting and piety about who is right or wrong on their interpretation of a book that is full of horror, violence, evil, righteousness, damnation, historical errors and blatant contradiction to what is normal and natural in this evolved world.

Feels good!

I told you before I'm not a moral relativist.

It's good you brought up semantics. If you don't attach anything supernatural to the word "evil", then it's ok to use that word. How you made the weird leap that I only think child rape is "troublesome" is another example of erratic reading.

I call child rape horribly criminal. That term carries the expectation of punishment.

You quibble even more when you confuse the word "belief" as I used it re: egg-chicken. alethiea does the same thing with the word "faith". She equates "faith" (to believe without reason) with the term "believe" as in "reasonable expectation" (e.g. the sun will appear tomorrow -even if behind clouds).

A cloistered discipline skews the common meaning and usage of words in real world vernacular.

If you're a Twain scholar, let's hear about how he felt about religion. Please, no links or copy and paste jobs.

I am no different than you. I have trod your path.
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So, there it is. You reject the concept of evil. I have been there too. Then just what are those acts of child rape the priests committed if not evil? Was it just troublesome behavior, then? How can you condemn them without a strong feeling that what they did was evil? How can you condemn the crusades or 9/11? Weren't they all just acts of an out of control animal instinct? Isn’t “tribalism” evolved as well as religion? If there is no evil, then what else could it be? All”troublesome” activities must be the result of evolution and therefore no blame can be attributed to any human for anything. That is an unacceptable moral relativist’s paradise. Of course there is evil. Calling it “trouble” is just substituting semantics for reason. Without the concept of evil we lose the concepts of right and wrong. Justice then has no meaning and your contempt for child raping priests becomes a psychosis as opposed to righteous indignation.
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No Gazettefan, you have no reason to believe beyond conjecture that the first chicken egg was laid by an almost chicken. Besides, if evolution is proven as you have claimed before, then belief has nothing to do with it. Your anger makes you drop your guard and reveals your insecurity while causing you to falsely identify anger in others.
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I sincerely doubt that you can speak with any authority on just what Mark Twain would change if he could, but it does take a high level of chutzpah to be so presumptuous.

billnewbie, you're cluttering up the real point with the loaded word "evil." Much of the time our animal instincts are out of sync with what makes an orderly society. This why there's trouble. To call it evil gives it a religious, supernatural connotation. I quoted a cumbersome statement of yours that clumsily included the word "evil." That we have, to some degree, risen above pure instinct is not misanthropic, it is human affirming. To label us with the word evil is misanthropic. There are no magic solutions, like god and religion.

Everything that's wrong with humans is amplified through the dangerous intensity of religion. Crusades. 911.

Again, I was pointing out that christianity from it's outset splintered into warring factors. How could this be? Evil? No. It's a manifestation of man's tribalistic instinct in extremis, made worse by the intensity of religion.

And it's specious to say that the pedophilic priests are not christians. If that's true then you have to subtract from your claimed numbers the other so-called christians who don't meet with your approval. And then we are right back into tribalism.

Do you really think you're coming off as someone who isn't angry? You do come off as angry. You're not hiding it. Even with the advantage of walking with the lord and with a blissful eternity in your future. It's the animal part of you that's coming through with all this. Whatever it is you think you have, you're no different than me.

There's more reason to believe that the first egg was laid by something that was almost a chicken than there is to believe in a promise that doesn't always sustain you.

If I remember my Huckleberry Finn correctly, Mark Twain wasn't very enamored with religion, including christianity. I would bet that if Twain were alive today, he'd modify the quote you left:

“There is something fascinating about ____________. One gets such wholesale returns of conjecture out of such a trifling investment of fact.”

Aletheia, I don't subscribe to the doctrine of Original Sin as an imputed guilt for Adam's act. Sin entered the world through Adam. As a result we all sin. There is no need for imputed sin other than a justification for calling baptism a sacrament and requiring it for infants, both of which I reject, since we all have sinned on our own and fall short of the glory of God. Sacraments are little more than rituals which have no value in light of the Substitutionary Atonement of Christ. Baptism can have a meaning, but it is not for the forgiveness of sins. Only accepting the free gift of salvation through Christ (an act of free will) accomplishes that and enables one to truly say Christ is Lord. That is what finishes the work of salvation, but it is the starting point of the new life in Christ known as being born again. Many who call themselves Christian never get to that point.

That’s funny,Gazettefan, you act like you don’t understand what’s meant by "the perversion of the definition of evil" and then you proceed to pervert the definition of evil by claiming it is the result of latent animalistic instincts. Animals are incapable of evil. They lack the capacity for malice aforethought. They do not plan evil, they do not covet, they feel no anger, no hatred, they do not conspire to do evil, they smply act on instinct. There is nothing evil about instinct. Certainly the results of acting on instinct can be detrimental for other animals, even lethal, but hardly evil. If we are mere animals acting on instinct then we should have no guilt, no remorse and no knowledge whatsoever of the concept of evil just as the animals have none. Really, your contention of our animalism sounds quite misantropic.
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You wrote that I’m “affiliated with a violent, sexually perverted institution”. Wasn’t it the Catholic Church you referred to as having “institutionalized child rape”? The implications of your statements are clear. Again I say I am not a Catholic and that you are still unreasonable when you claim that church has institutionalized child rape. By the way, those priests may be Catholic but they were not Christian as no one could do that while calling Christ Lord, a distinction I expect you not to grasp.
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I’m sure the Hindus would agree with your assessment of a monotheistic God. You say that a true God would have the power to unify. Was this one of the tests that you think He failed that caused your anger?
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Aside from conjecture, how do you know an “almost chicken” laid the first chicken egg? Maybe it was an “almost dinosaur”. Maybe it was a dwarf ostrich. Perhaps it was a “mini-turkey”? I have to agree with Mark Twain when he said “There is something fascinating about science. One gets such wholesale returns of conjecture out of such a trifling investment of fact.”

ICY is there some reason you can't show us what's positive about being a christian?

billnewbie, what the heck is "the perversion of the definition of evil"?

I've said that the propensity for humans to do bad things comes from the fact that we are part animal with animal instincts. This denial causes even religious people to do horrible things -like your fellow christians raping children.

I didn't say you were a Catholic. You gloss over the fact that severe differences are taking place here even between "christians." What's going on here is a manifestation of the fact that even the ideal of a monotheistic god can't unify humanity. What we see here is a mild form of the tribalism that has factions within a religion warring with each other. This is more proof that religion and the idea of god is man-made. A true god would have the power to unify.

By the way, in accordance with evolution, the egg came first. It was laid by something that was almost a chicken. Try not to react too quickly, give it some thought.

I_C_Y, did you notice his deceitful tactic of assigning to us statements we didn't make. I've told him I'm not a Catholic yet he keeps trying to hang that albatross around my neck. I told him I don't consign anyone to hell yet he keeps saying I do. Even when you answer his pitifully self-serving questions he ignores the answers if they don't fit his agenda. He claims to want “truly responsive posts” while ignoring the responses. I guess his definition of truly responsive means acquiescence to his contentions. And still he expects to be taken seriously.

Mdcclxxvi, I would take issue with some of what you wrote. For instance, dualism assumes some type of parity between good and evil and such is not the case. Good needs nothing from evil to be good. For instance, the love and admiration of a fellow human can be cultivated honestly and for strictly honorable purposes with no evil intent. But no one would cultivate the hatred and contempt of another in the same way. An evil act may include a deceptive attempt to cultivate love and admiration for an ulterior purpose, but to cultivate the opposite is never attempted, though it may result as an after effect of a despicable act revealed. So God can and did exist prior to evil as he has no need for it. We do not live in a dualistic universe, we live in a good universe that has been corrupted by evil which is sin.
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I can agree that we are not born condemned, but we are born with a propensity for sin, an obviously hereditary condition since we are all afflicted with it, even atheists who contend that humans are inherently good but cannot explain why there are no examples of totally good people without perverting the definition of evil. I also agree that children are not held responsible for their sin until they attain the ability to understand sin and consciously choose to sin anyway.
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As far as reconciling one’s beliefs to reason, I would ask, who’s reason? Today’s reason which seems to many to be true but has not yet stood the test of time and seems so fraught with wishful thinking? Yesteryear’s reason which very often has failed that test of time and often has been shown to be the result of wishful thinking? Or God’s reason which he relates to us through his word in the bible. I know which I choose.
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When you say that God’s “Omnipotence is a result of omniscience” and not the other way around, I wonder, do any of us understand the attributes of God well enough to determine that? Your statement seems reminiscent of the old rhetorical question, “What came first, the chicken or the egg?”
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What is it that makes one a Christian? Is it adherence to a particular set of doctrines? No. A Christian is one who can say with honesty “Christ is Lord”. All other theological disagreements may make one a Catholic, or Lutheran etc. But Christians accept Christ as Lord and that is the only requirement.

MDCC....., how do you explain the difference between ICY/billnewbie's posts and my posts? Factor in that your post contradicts what they say is in scripture: babies and other innocent people going to hell.

alietheia, that's not the first time I've been called ungodly. And let's honestly hear what you think of the scholarship of ICY's and billnewbie's posts. Don't worry, I don't expect an answer. I just want to make you think about it.

ICY and billnewbie, my posts attempt to get truly responsive posts. You should think about how easy it for you to be base in reaction to reasonable questions and points. You think you're using a clever tactic but all you've done is reveal the mess that you are trying to pass off as character.

I'll continue to point out that you're affiliated with a violent, sexually perverted institution until you make an effort to respond with at least an attempt at reasoning (You don't have to agree with me.) Are the both of you too embarrassed about being unable to articulate anything here? Too embarrassed for your Sunday school classes?

GF:Yes, all babies go to heaven.
Sin and evil are necessary parts of a dualistic universe.
If God is perfect good, then by definition evil must exist in order for God to exist. The natural universe is amoral. A tornado is not evil, regardless of the misery it causes, because it is not sentient. Likewise an infant can not commit sin. Sin requires free agency, and the ability to know right from wrong. Adam and Eve brought sin into the world by partaking of the tree of knowledge- once they knew the difference between right and wrong, only then were they able to commit sin. (I won't get into how much of the Bible, and Genesis in particular, should be read as metaphorical. The point of the story is not if they literally ate from a forbidden tree, it is that Sin and the ability to discern right and wrong are directly related).

Sin, however, is not genetic, as so many Christians would have you believe. Being a sinner is not a condition we are born with. It is simply the reality of living. We don't have to be born sinners- we take care of the sinning all on our own.

I won't argue the fact with aletheia- s/he believes it because that's what s/he was taught, and believes that interpreting the Bible is best left to the professionals. I know that nothing I say will change their mind. For what it's worth, I agree with GF's arguments against absurd religious beliefs 99% of the time. Any true religion must reconcile itself with reason. It amazes me that so many allegedly religious people reject reason in favor of dogma, when every religion I know of teaches that God is omniscient. Omnipotence is a result of omniscience, not the opposite. In other words, God's power comes from perfect knowledge. A truly religious person would then seek out truth relentlessly. If they believe that they are made in God's image, then why reject what their own senses tell them?

I realize that that particular question was put to bed some time ago, but I wanted to give you a clear and unambiguous answer.

aletheia and company: Please refrain from hiding behind the blanket name of "Christian" if your going to be promoting doctrine and dogma that are not universally Christian. It might be what your particular brand of Christianity believes, but don't pretend to speak for all of us.

In the name of all things decent, it is way past time when 'Travis' (as played by the Gazette webmaster) takes Old Yeller, (as played by this snarling, drooling, crazed thread) out in the back and does the merciful thing. Please hurry!

I_C_Y, isn't it interesting how he calls challenges to his pretensions insults while freely using derogations as a carpenter uses nails, all the while complaining bitterly of the disrespect he's shown while showing nothing but disrespect for any who cross him? The funny part is that he expects to be taken seriously after all that.

ICY, will you ever be able to think for yourself? If you did you'd be able to figure out that the alleged truth of your cut and paste jobs only proves that ignorance is bliss.

But seriously, can you honestly say that your junk "studies" factored in the longevity of the people slaughtered by your religious cohorts? The Nazis and other Germans were happy till the end. So were your religious brethren on 911 -how about those 72 virgins. You poor christians only get to float for eternity on a cloud, playing a harp. (By the way, when you get to heaven do you automatically know how to play the harp or do you have to take lessons? If so, are the lessons easy? After all, it is heaven.) If christians do live longer, it's probably in great avoidance of the eternal numbskullary waiting for them on the other side.

OK, enough of that. Now, did the "studies" factor in the health of the victims of child rape by your brethren in the clergy? No. And how about the health of those christian-scientists and other idiots of other factions who deny their children proper medical care? No.

And you brought up the nuns. Have you ever seen the ones on ETW? They look like they're severally stunned from fear, sexual repression, and the effects of psychotic scripture. You call that living?! Why is this the desired state for women in the clergy. Oh, the misogyny thing.

But wait that one who leads them in prayer. She's seems to be joyous at the ripe old age of about 200.

And speaking of being drawn to institutions that dictate sexual repression, how about that pederast in the news these days, Haggard. Did his connection to the supernatural jar his repressed sexuality loose? Don't bother answering. Go find something else to copy and paste.

gazettefan Feb 1, 2009 at 9:19 p.m.
..
And as usual, you supply nothing to support anything you spew! So much for corroborative facts!

gazettefan Feb 1, 2009 at 9:19 p.m.
..
I am entertained by your emoting though!
..
Do you have anything new, that you haven’t already regurgitated, to bring to this discussion? In case you haven’t noticed, your previous blatherings are still available for all the world to see below!

gazettefan Feb 1, 2009 at 9:19 p.m.
..
Please define (based on your world view) a description of intelligence?
..
Your references to intelligence are left wanting, in comparison to Webster’s version:
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionar...

billnewbie, you're always whining about insults, but let your and ICY's recent posts show who in the absence of reason relies on insults.

If atheists gather in packs they don't gather in packs to the degree that believers do -you know, religions, religious factions, churches, and mosques, all that stuff. I'm not religious but I know that believers gather in packs. Do atheists gather in packs in kind? That's the point. Was that too hard to understand? It's only a question of: Did you two solips deliberately evade the point or were you both too thick to get it.

Yes, I do think for myself. I don't need to be parented by psychotic scripture.

ICY, your inability to comprehend anything even slightly complex continues. I can only hope that you can rely on the excuse that you haven't reach adulthood yet. Maybe you should try reading something more than once. You have an extreme attention span problem.

Here it is again, with fewer words:

Fascism, nazism, communism, and religion are all manifestations of the same psycho-dynamic: The need for some people to have an unelected, all-powerful leader who gives the promise of unrealistic happiness. Such people being willing to commit atrocities for the leader and the promise.

Democracy is antithetical to fascism, nazism, and communism. But the freedom of democracy allows the the practice of religion. Naturally democracy stunts the harm of religion. Though that harm still shows itself by way of such things as the behavior of your christian brethren when they rape children.

I suspect you two scholars are Sunday school teachers, why don't you have your flock read this blog. Better still, why don't you have them post here. It would be interesting to see how they express themselves under your tutelage when faced with some intelligent opposition. Maybe they can comment on god's decree that the parents of misbehaving children can have them stoned to death and on god's decree that fathers can sell their daughters to men.

ICY, remember, read twice. No, at least three or four times.

billnewbie Feb 1, 2009 at 6:31 p.m.
..
Bill,
..
As well as the contradiction with documented science that Religious people live longer, healthier lives.
..
…..Consider these well-replicated findings. First, religiousness (measured variously as high levels of traditional religious belief;
frequent involvement in religious institutions such as churches, synagogues, mosques, and temples; and engagement in religious
practices such as reading scripture, worship, and prayer) has a small, positive association with longevity. In a meta-analytic review
of 42 independent effect sizes, McCullough, Hoyt, Larson, Koenig, and Thoresen (2000) discovered that people who were
highly religious were, on average, 29% more likely to be alive at any given follow-up point than were less religious people (95%
confidence interval: 1.20 to 1.39).
http://www.psy.miami.edu/faculty/mmccull...
..
…Epidemiologists have noted that nuns have longer lives and age more “successfully” than their lay counterparts, and I believe that this example highlights a number of key elements that contribute to this model of successful aging
http://women.ucla.edu/csw/Newsletter/Jan...
..
…“We’ve found that people who are more religiously involved, especially in their religious communities, tend to have better health,” Koenig said. “They have less depression, greater well-being, cope better with stress, have lower blood pressure and stronger immune systems, and they live longer.”
http://media.www.dukechronicle.com/media...

I_C_Y, he proved some of what I've been writing about him when he wrote "consistent with the absence of pack mentality of non-believers I don't know of prominent atheists nor do I read their works nor do I listen to them". How would he know that his fellow atheists lack the "pack mentality" when he admits that he doesn't know of them and that he doesn't read their works? It seems he bases his “knowledge” on wishful thinking as he is his own authority on every subject.

gazettefan Feb 1, 2009 at 1:54 p.m.
..
Do you actually read the psychobabble you write?
..
Where to start?
..
- The circular arguments?
- The “no true Atheist” argument, again?
- The lack of historical knowledge?
- The complete absence of substantiating references?
..
Do you try to construct the most illogical tumult possible?

aletheia, consistent with the absence of pack mentality of non-believers I don't know of prominent atheists nor do I read their works nor do I listen to them.

I learn from life experience which includes dealing with believers.

ICY, when it comes to comfort, the comfort you feel with god and how god shows itself with the horrible content of scripture and its damaging effects should be your cause for concern.

And as I said before:

Communism in China and Russia (Soviet Union) came about as products of all-powerful, unelected leaders (you know, like Jesus) tapping into intense, centuries-old religiosity already in place.

Communism is an even more perverse form of the unworkable and abandoned promise of blissful communal life (communist and communal -same root word) of the origins of christianity.

Note that believers are always claiming that atheism and communism are religions. "Atheism" in the form of communism shares a common psycho-dynamic with theism. Since god and the supernatural do not exist, it is humans who actually do all the damage.

The concern should be toward doing-away with the psycho-dynamic that underlies communism/religion.

gazettefan Feb 1, 2009 at 11:19 a.m.
..
So, in summation, you are much more comfortable with the “institutions” set up by several Atheists in the last century, that have killed millions more people, than all the wars over the last several centuries…
..
Historical Event…….Responsible...Dates………Total Deaths...Deaths per Year
Great Leap Forward..atheists………1958–1963..43,000,000…..8,600,000
Holodomor…………atheists………1932–1933…3,500,000…..1,750,000
http://www.amazon.com/Irrational-Atheist...... (Sec10:219)

gazettefan Feb 1, 2009 at 11:19 a.m.
..
So, in summation, you are much more comfortable with the “institutions set up by several Atheists in the last century, that have killed millions more people, than all the wars over the last several centuries…
..
Historical Event Responsible Dates Total Deaths Deaths per Year
Great Leap Forward atheists 1958–1963 43,000,000 8,600,000
Holodomor atheists 1932–1933 3,500,000 1,750,000
http://www.amazon.com/Irrational-Atheist... (Sec10:219)

ICY, your claim that one person made that statement placed up against the word of "god" lacks proportion. (I will not click on that site and for the sake of argument assume that it wasn't taken out of context. You can copy and paste more of his statement if you wish.)

The kind of religion we're talking about here is based on belief in the supernatural and exerts its power by way of institutions. This kind of religion spreads terror and violence by way of sanctions based in superstition (belief in an almighty god) and the imposition of institutions on human society.

Harris' statement, as you present it does not meet with my approval. And he is only one person and does not represent universal non-belief. He does not represent non-belief, especially in the way that god represents belief -after all, god is god, isn't he? And it was god who stated that men are permitted to sell their daughters. God also said it was permitted for parents to have children with disciplinary problems stoned to death. This godly attack on children within institutionalized religion continues in various forms to this day.

By the way, orwellian thought-crime is first decreed in the Old Testament: Punishment for impure thoughts. Maybe, to some degree, Harris' own thinking hasn't quite escaped his reading of the horror within scripture.

And it's not clear if the quote is only confined to thinking wrong thoughts without the verbalization of the those thoughts. Verbalizing the wrong thoughts can amount to conspiracy. Certain kinds of conspiracy are against the law; though, justifiably, conspiracy itself, of any kind is not a capital offense.

Case law over the centuries as weaned-out much of the irrationality of scripture. For example: the "legitimacy" of scripture-based terrorism as a remedy for differences between religions and religious factions is illegal. Though, as we all know, scripture based terrorism is still with us.

gazettefan Feb 1, 2009 at 7:46 a.m.
..
And some Atheist's (Sam Harris) believe preemptive murder is acceptable, what is your point?
..
….. “[s]ome propositions are so dangerous that it may even be ethical to kill people
for believing them.”32 So it’s okay to kill people who believe in dangerous propositions—….
http://www.amazon.com/Irrational-Atheist... (sec6:129)

In the Old Testament, god permits men to sell their daughters.

All questions have been answered. I'll continue to ask more of them in order to un-ossify paleolithic, dangerous thinking.

If you understood anything about people (or reasonable discussion) you'd know that you are in love with an unliberated woman. Is this the status you wish on all women?

aletheia Jan 31, 2009 at 7:38 p.m.
..
I commend you!
..
You have as well bested gazettefan at his own game! Well, done!

aletheia, I appreciate your enthusiasm about making posting here an interactive task but I won't be copying and pasting anything.

You said, in response to "personal relationship with a supernatural being" something about waiting his return. And you said that your faith amounts to telling others what pleases god.

I state this from memory. Don't bother to answer. Your erraticism is duly noted.

You must be a real headache in other areas of negotiation.

Though I do find your intensity intriguing. I imagine that that intensity put to other uses would have an interesting outcome.

aletheia, I knew you wouldn't answer my question but I gave you some slack because you're a girl. (How does stating that other religions etc. claim the supernatural answer the question?)

Your religiosity amounts to telling others what is pleasing to god. And you got this mission and this information from reading scripture. And you don't have an everyday, personal relationship with an omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent supernatural being -or god.

Am I right?

And is the Civil War thing settled?

They are called journals, diaries and letters. I believe there may even be recorded interviews I would have to look up in the Library of Congress. I understand that religion has corrupted your ability to think and trust people who don't believe in your god, but Jesus Christ do read anything other than the fully written bible. I just don't trust people who think quoting the bible makes them a good Christian.

Oh, the Civil War thing? I forgot.

What's that all about? If I say the proof that the Civil War was real comes from the written word, you're going to say the written word is what proves the existence of god and that Jesus was the messiah?

The problem is the written word that you'll cite claims the supernatural while the written word re: the Civil War doesn't.

aletheia, it seems you're bringing the messiness of the trinity into this.

But most importantly, you seem to be saying that right now you don't have a personal relationship with god -be he the father, son, or holy ghost. Am I correct?

I hope this easy question allows you to give a real answer.

ICY and billnewbie, your delusional need to believe that I that feel the victim only reveals your need to have victims.

I'm busy right now, but because ICY shows signs of wanting to have a debate, I'll be back later.

aletheia, the Civil War has been over for a long time. So, the kind of evidence that proves that the Civil War was real isn't the same kind of evidence required to prove that god exists because your claim is that god exists right now at this moment. The gap in reasoning that caused your gaffe underlies the irrational gap-happiness that ruins your ability to understand evolution.

Darwin1, when your argument degenerates to invectives such as "stupid" "bigot" and "jacka..", that means you know you lost and your having a temper tantrum like your pal Gazettefan when he bemoans the "abuse" he feels at the hands of "Islamo-Christians" while he inveighs such verbigeration as ""comprehension problems and projection problems" and "dangerous thinking" or "blather and pseudo-wisdom" or "dissembled" and "labor under the weight of delusion" and that we're not "able to deal with reason and clarity". Maybe Gazettefan and Darwin1 think they own the Janesville franchise for acerbic wit? That would be fun wouldn't it, to defang the opposition while sharpening your own fangs?

gazettefan Jan 31, 2009 at 6:07 a.m.
..
Ah, the hypocrisy, the irony.
..
You attack people, and their faith system, and expect that your “kindness” will not be returned in kind?
..
You have substantiated the personality descriptions attributed to your described position.
..
As for having a debate, if you would actually provide some type of substantiated reference (btw, Wiki-pedia is not a valid reference), or link, people may actually take you seriously, verses your tiring, circular bloviating.
..
Perhaps if you also went back and actually answered some of the questions posed to you that you choose to not acknowledge, it would be a start.
..
To start playing the victim card at this point is quite entertaining!

Can I get some fries with that Asperger?

So ICY and billnewbie are back to imagining someone has a severe mental disorder and making fun of it. That's one way of deflecting the stress of a learning disability. And very islamo-christian too.

But when it comes to maladaptive social behavior, maybe mentioning the sexual repression of chrisitianity and islamism with its attendant misogyny is order. (That repression being part and parcel of the violent, lingering origins of religion.) And once the repression gives way, with the aid of the giddy power that comes from being attached to the "supernatural", we see almost on a daily basis in the media what smolders below the surface: adultery, prostitution, sado-masochism, genital mutilation, bestiality, sodomy, including the sodomization of children by of all people, clergymen. And the crimes against children in the largest christian church in the world covered up and effectively endorsed by the "spiritual" descendant of the first vicar of Christ.

Yes, you two have revealed nicely how fragile is the layer of delusion that protects you from what you struggle to keep at bay.

From your reluctance to actually participate in a real debate, by dragging down the mentality here, it's obvious that you would like this blog frozen or disabled. But know this, even if you get what you want the truth will not go away. Read the paper and watch and listen to the news.

I saw Mr Dawkins on the Colbert Report and he was very social and witty. He is not virulently atheist, he just doesn't see any empirical evidence for the existence of a God or divine being and is concerned about people who makes unsubstantiated claims that there is a God. Do you have an experiment that proves God exists?

So, your making unscientific statements about people you don't know. So your stupid and a bigot.

billnewbie Jan 30, 2009 at 5:36 p.m.
..
Bill,
..
I suggested previously, that he seek qualified assistance. But to no-avail!!
..
…”Based on Wired Magazine's observation that atheists tend to be quarrelsome, socially challenged men, to say nothing of the unpleasant personalities of leading public atheists such as Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens and Michel Onfray, one could reasonably hypothesize that there is likely to be a strong correlation between Asperger's and atheism. It's by no means a scientific test, but it is interesting to note the coincidence that 59 of the virulent atheists over at Dr. PZ Myers place report an average score on the Asperger's Quotient test of 27.8. And this does not include the two individuals who actually have Asperger's but did not report any test results.

The test notes that "Scores over 32 are generally taken to indicate Asperger's Syndrome or high-functioning autism". The average male score is 18, the average female score is 15. By way of comparison, I scored 14.”
http://voxday.blogspot.com/2007/08/socia...
..
http://www.piepalace.ca/blog/asperger-te...
..
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2007/...

I_C_Y, it looks like Gazettefan has been reduced to writing little more than childish innuendo offered for its shock value.
.
Why would an atheist mock God, an entity he denies? Why would he try to offend God? is he testing God's patience. I think that what I said is true, that nearly all atheists are actually anti-theists with embittered souls. Little does Gazettefan realize how long-suffering God is. There will be no lightning bolts striking Gazettefan tonight, much to his disappointment at his failure to irritate Him.

ICY, oh, I get it. He couldn't handle the stress of reasonable questions too. If he's your, billnewbie's, and aletheia's leader that explains a lot.

By the way, you do answer the questions, you just don't realize it.

billnewbie Jan 30, 2009 at 2:44 p.m.
..
Bill,
..
I think this one probably fits GazetteFan best:
..
” Matthew 22:18 But Jesus perceived their malice, and said, "Why are you testing Me, you hypocrites?”

Why is there so much christian-on-christian violence? aletheia, an explanation from scripture?

LOL

More astute commentary from Gazettefan. Why I don't swear off my beliefs as a result is truly an enigma.

Can't find it? O.K. It is in Mark chapter 2. Christ said in response to his critics "The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath: Therefore the Son of man is Lord also of the sabbath."
.
Many of the people who heard Christ felt very much about him as you feel about me Darwin1. They did end up killing him after all.

Tick...tick...tick...

Christ and his crew terrified the people with suffering and eternal damnation for the purpose of extorting money. This is how the churches got built and aided the chance of survival of christianity.

aletheia, I think you have a problem with the Catholic Church. Did you hear about its newest monstrous scandal? The FBI is investigating the cardinal in LA for more of the institutionalized child rape in that church. More christian-on-christian atrosities. How'd that happen?

That's right Darwin1, the bible was written in 2 parts, and part 1 was finished before Christ was born.
.
I won't bother to tell you chapter and verse but perhaps you'll remember at least this one example where Christ did debate biblical semantics with his critics. His detractors were trying to trap him into a contradiction (much like some in this debate have done) when they questioned his followers picking grain in a field on the sabbath. Do you remember what Christ said in response? The clock is ticking....

It still wasn't the Bible. Notice the question mark after the word Torah. It means I was asking you what the hell you were referring too. The Bible has two testaments, O-N-E, T-W-O.

Too bad billnewbie can't take his own I know what everyone is thinking advice. If billnewbie was actually correct about what everyone is thinking he could really help the police and the CIA. Clearly he does not. Try reading your Bible again. Clearly, Jesus was not a Jacka-- like you. Still none of you have ever responded to the fact that Jesus wouldn't have been spending his time arguing over Biblical semantics.

Were my slings and arrows a little too close to the mark? Methinks thou protesteth to much Gazettefan.
.
It took me nearly an hour to write this post as I was laughing so much that I couldn't type from Gazettefan's silly protestations of I_C_Y's perceived insults after that barrage of insults Gazettefan leveled. Frailty, thy name is Gazettefan!

gazettefan Jan 30, 2009 at 10:11
..
As usual, you don’t address the documented facts, you change the subject!!
..
Did you and R. Blagojevich evolve the same “morals”?

billnewbie, it looks ICY is trying to start trouble between us. ;~(

The positive side of my putting ICY in his place is that his verbal vomit of pseudo-articulations aren't as long as they were before. But, alas, he's still here with short projective insults.

billnewbie Jan 29, 2009 at 1:28 p.m.
..
Bill,
..
As you noted, and has been documented throughout this blog, The great bloviating-fan, is:
1. irrational
2. illogical
3. delusionary
4. Sociopathic
..
All the things needed to be an effective troll.

And your 9:08 post only reveals the personal disappoints that caused you to seek solace in an imaginary world because the real world proved to be too painful and non-negotiable.

Self-centered?! Consider the solipsism of anyone who believes they have a personal and joyful relationship with an almighty, omniscient, omnipresent supernatural being at the very moment other people are abandoned to brutalization and murder. Self-centered, indeed.

So, billnewbie, you agree with aletheia's literalism re: the bible and its terroristic origins. Such origins being responsible for the christian-on-christian factional violence taking place in the world today.

One also might wonder, just what are these atheists? How many are liars that are actually angry with God for not being there when He was needed, or for not providing what was sought, in short, failing the test. How many are prisoners of their own egos, to proud to bend a knee to any one or any thing, unwilling to acknowledge any power greater that himself. Unwilling to consider all the possibilities and unwilling to face one's own shortcomings. A captive of an egocentrism so developed that it would prefer oblivion to humility.

Sorry Gazettefan, wrong again. Aletheia holds her own quite nicely against you trolls.

Yes Darwin1, "weasel" isn't something one uses when one debates sincerely, but you need to take that up with your pal Gazettefan as I was mimicking his use of that word to illustrate the very point you made.
.
By the way, the Torah is the first five books of the Bible. Christ also quoted Psalms, Isaiah and many of the other books of the Old Testament during theological debates with both his followers and his detractors. You really don't have the depth of biblical knowledge to speak with any authority on the subject, you know.

Quoting Pinky and the Brain. That sounds about right. You know if you want to actually learn about science you can listen to the Science Magazine podcast or the Nature podcast or watch Nova online. Just Google it. Nature even let's you listen right on their site.

alet, I don't know what that's supposed to be but it seems consistent with the numbskullery of your scripture citations.

I think bill is embarrassed by you.

The next related topic should be what are the people, really, who answer yes to the question: Are you a believer?:

How many are nominal only, how many are lying, how many are recidivists cluttering up prisons, how many are of aletheia's ilk -sripturized, and how many are in prison and scripturized.

A slight justifiable dig allows ICY, aletheia, and billnewbie to avoid responding to a brilliant explanation of religion and god and how those things came to be.

Islam is doing a delayed criminal reaction to the Crusades. Christianity is responsible for the recent slaughters in eastern Europe and Africa.

Society is god.

Understand it and set yourself free

When did Jesus quote from a Bible that didn't exist? I think you may be referring to the Torah? But as far as the Bible existing back then it would have been missing the Gospels and Paul's letters. So it would not have been a Bible. Way to go "weasel". Isn't "weasel" one of those idiot words that idiots use when they can't think of something intelligent to say.

I_C_Y, when one's hatred distorts one's reason, any contradiction can be rationalized. That's what's meant by referring to such arguments as calling good evil and evil good. That's also what is at the root of Islamic terrorists motivations as well. Their hatred has overpowered their reason to the point that they can rationalize their murder as an act of "Jihad" in spite of what their scripture says. Radical atheists have much in common with them even if not to that degree.

billnewbie Jan 29, 2009 at 11:59
..
Bill,
..
I love this part of the great bloviating one! …”the increase in magnitude of weapons of mass destruction will eventually become available to terrorists and then it'll all be all over.”
..
So, by extrapolation, science is “bad” because it gave us the Nuclear bomb, and/or biological weapons.

Misanthropist, a lawyerly weasel-word if ever there was one, used here as a derogation of all things religious as a politician might use the word "rich" or a radical feminist the words "chauvinist" or "misogynist", a catchword meant to stifle debate. As for the rest of that post, it's unreasonableness speaks for itself and warrants no further comment.

Yes, everything bad about humanity comes from humans including religion and the fascistic institutionalization of humans that passes for the idea of god as presented in religion. But everything good comes from humans too. So, this is not misanthropic, it is analytical and hopeful.

To understand that we are inherently unfettered to religion and "god" is to understand that we can abandon the philosophy of religion and its terroristic basis. Humans will still have the propensity for bad but the fascism of religion with its power drawn from the belief in an almighty, unelected, supernatural leader will be left behind and will be a profound improvement for the human condition.

The bible and judeo-christianity and islamism reeks with violent solutions not only for each of those religions but for every faction of each of those religions. These violent solutions are for the purpose of their own survival and for the purpose of making every human a member of their religion or faction. All the terrorism going on today is based in religions and their factions.

To say that god is off the hook for causing and permitting bad things because humans have free will is an unwitting way of saying there is no god. The god/free will trope amounts to lawyerly weasel-words.

The statement: Society is god is profound because everything that is attributable to god -good and bad- make up the elements of society. Societies generate sin, crime, and evil because it is composed of humans. Society also provides a safe haven for humans and everything that is good about humans. Society offers hope for a good life. Everything in this paragraph fits the benevolent/malevolent rendition of the god of scripture. For the purpose of control humans channeled these elements into the philosophy of religion and gave it additional force by attaching it to the supernatural. This is how "god" and religion came to be.

And like communism, time will show that religion and the belief in god and its fascistic mentality is not everlasting. If not, the increase in magnitude of weapons of mass destruction will eventually become available to terrorists and then it'll all be all over.

When I said "tearing apart the answers", I meant in a destructive and condescending way...in a "learning" way it would be different.

Well, I didn't intend to-nor will I-get into a Bible study here, not for the reasons you seem to want to-but I agree with you, Gazettefan, about how it seems with Aletheia-"aletheia celebrates them with great enthusiasm." To be fair, I haven't read each of hers entirely-I have my own "Bible study" opportunities-but, these kinds of thing can lead to the wrong conclusions when taken out of context.
Anyway-about it seeming misanthropic about giving credit to God for good, and credit to man for evil-do you mean that I don't think much of humankind? Or do you mean "how convenient"? If it's the former-I am only talking about the humans who are capable of, and likely to commit, such acts. And it has nothing to do with whether or not they are believers. If you mean "how convenient"-well, it's for things like this that they invented that phrase (Not again!): It is what it is. If you believe in God-you already know it's true. If you don't-well then, what else could be true? You really would have to do your own studies if you really want to know. You have the free will to draw your own conclusions. But God does expect obedience, but we have the free will (not to be confused with permission) to obey, or not.
About the Bible-in layman's terms maybe you could call it a reference work-inspired (NOT dictated) by God, but containing the word of God, prophesy, archeology, history. Maybe "text book" would be another way to think of it. That is why the books of the Bible have names such as Matthew, Mark, Luke and John...or more completely "The Gospel ACCORDING to Matthew...."
Ask Aletheia to explain her references in complete context. Ask her also, if you're interested, about God saying (I'm paraphrasing) “Let the children come to me, and do not stop them, for the my kingdom belongs to such as these”. (Now ya made me "quote" Bible verse and I WASN'T going to get into that!)
The last thing I'll say: Even as a "believer", if I believed God was a punisher-doing evil for evil's sake, exerting his power just because he could-for the fun of it, I wouldn't even have commented here. If I lived in FEAR my take would be different-the word is respect, not fear as in "scared to death". And you wouldn't even have the choice to dis-believe, so there would be no one to "debate" with.
Darwin-there's probably validity to your points (2&3) for the reasons you gave-and that's why I don't want to belabor these points. Anyone can look these things up. Asking questions for the sake of tearing apart the answers is not a good use of anyone's time. (Well, not for this many posts anyway.)

If there is no God then religion is the invention of humankind. If one condenms religion as evil, its adherents as weak minded, dim-witted fools who live in fear of the unknown, and that the vast majority of humankind considers itself religious then these unflattering contentions are made by those who are themselves misanthropic.
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What Christianity and Judaism does is it illustrates the nature of man as having a propensity for evil. We know this to be true when we read the news every day. That is why humans invented locks, doors, weapons, police and the military to name just a few of the things we use to circumvent the evil in the human soul. It has further been proposed that a good God would not allow such evil acts to be perpetrated against the innocent. But, if God did create us he endowed us with the attributes we possess such as free will. If God were to interfer with our free will to prevent evil, then in fact there would be no free will. Instead, he provided us with our inventiveness which we used to create those things I mentioned above as well as civil government whose entire purpose is to prevent evil and dispense justice along with a conscience which, when fully functional does a good job of identifying and preventing evil.
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Even if one rejects the existence of God, one cannot deny that the credit for all evil in this world must be placed at the feet of humankind since there is no other alternative. That is not misanthropic, it is a realistic assessment of the human condition.

After reading the profundity provided by darwin1 in his last post, I can hardly believe that my faith in God has been shaken not at all. Yet one cannot help but notice his dearth of knowledge when he states that Jesus has no bible as Christ quoted extensively from it and was known to read from it publicly. I guess darwin1 missed the episode of the 700 Club when they covered that.

1. I am not exactly sure how your following Jesus by reading the Bible since Jesus had no Bible.
2. Do you really think Jesus would spend his day arguing over Biblical semantics?
3. God knows Bible proselytizers and all their look at me and how much I lllllooooooooooovvvvveeeee God are nothing but a bunch of suck ups.

EASTERN EUROPE

RUserious, if I ask why god lets bad things happen I'm not acknowledging that god exists, I'm really asking how someone can believe that god exists when god being god wouldn't let horrible things happen to innocent people.

What does exist is religion. And the bad things done in the name of religion should make someone at least doubt the existence of god. And this applies to the thinking that gives god credit for the good and attributes blame for the bad to humans This seems misanthropic.

Look at aletheia's post. aletheia cites scripture of the most horrible kind. Recently in 1990s in western Europe and in Africa genocide was exacted by christian factions on other christian factions. aletheia's citations and other parts of the bible are the religious basis for these crimes against humanity. And aletheia celebrates them with great enthusiasm. If you don't doubt the existence of god, you have to at least doubt the written basis of religion which is supposed to be the word of god.

Thanks, gazettefan, for the response-now I can :-)
I appreciated your comments, and your respectful tone.
We apparently share a fascination with science and philosophy-and, in my case, neither tempers my belief in God-they enhance it-and vice versa. Also, I don't profess a belief in God so that I might fool my way into heaven. I'm wise enough to know that it doesn't work that way-and anyway-wouldn't that be some kind of fool's version of a catch-22? Like trying to keep it a secret from God that I don't believe in him so I'll still make it to heaven? Contrary to what you said, it would be easier NOT to believe-if I had to work at it. Anyway-I can't help what I believe any more than I can help what color my eyes are-to use that phrase that's on this year's "phrases we love to hate": It is what it is.
As far as who is damned to hell-I believe the hell of the non-believer is simply not getting into heaven (eternal life-and not the fairy-tale kind), because you can never find what you don't believe exists. The end is just that-the end. What's the magical age, you asked. I sure don't know-there's no "number", but each individual knows for himself-and when they know-they've reached that point. But the tortures of hell are reserved for those who do believe, who are "sane", but still commit the most atrocious acts known to man, and have no remorse or regret about their acts-so don't, or can't, ask for forgiveness-at least not sincerely.
As far as crimes or atrocities committed in the name of religion (or in the name of anything else for that matter)-anyone can claim that-doesn't mean they were sent by God (or the investment firm, the Boy Scouts...name your "social institution") to do the very things that you and I would be condemned to hell for. How about Bernard Madoff? How about Ted Haggard? How about any slimy degenerate claiming to do (whatever selfish act) in the name of (whatever organization he uses for his own gains)? Is it really fair to blame God, Investment Firm, Boy Scouts just because their name was used by someone else for financial gain, power, fame, committing degenerate acts? Why does God let bad things happen to good people? He doesn't LET things happen, man causes things to happen. If we didn't have free will-if we were like pawns on a board game-we wouldn't be having this conversation. All things would be laid out for us-and you wouldn't be allowed NOT to believe. And no one gets hurt.
Anyway-I enjoyed the exchange-and remember: never say never.

RUserious, PART TWO:

That's why in my better moments I feel I'm being merciful by saying the trashers have learning disabilities. A lot of the time it's hard to have even a bit of respect for the trashers for taking the easy, lazy way out when attempting to understand life and the cosmos.

That those scientists are dumbfounded is a tribute to science. Look what believers do when something doesn't fit into their dogma. Rather than wonder and think about it as scientists do, they trash it and say it's an abomination against god.

To be amazed at the existence of human life and a belief in god are not mutually inclusive. Life and the cosmos are amazing just as they are. A need for the belief in god takes away from that amazement. I'll pass on the horrible things that are intrinsic to religion in this post and only state that god is not required for me to have wonderment about it all. I do not need the promise of eternal bliss to numb my fear of death. I'm not greedy. I'm glad I had a chance to be alive. I don't need the promise of eternal life. What do people in heaven do, anyway? Oh, I forgot, aletheia says my long-term concern should be for an eternity in hell.

Some scientists are believers but many aren't. Maybe more than half aren't But the ones who are believers don't believe in a way that trashes science like some of the posters here do.

Re: Your reference to someone who refers to god or "him" or "he." I do this too. I do it to address and make reference to what others say god wants, says, and thinks.

Again, I'm glad you think innocent people are not condemned to eternal suffering because they're not christians or are not the kind of christians that only suit the hard core christian fanatics on this blog.

I hope this covers everything.

RUserious, PART ONE: I'm glad to hear that babies of any kind do not go to hell. Aletheia with her citations says they do. Of course if babies do not go to hell, at what magic age does a non-christian person go there?

It's deistic of you to say that the matter of god is between the individual and god; this is a great improvement on theism. It means you're not a proselytizer and you are separated from the people who want to impose their imposing beliefs on us.

I read the story because religion is really a philosophy and such things interest me. I can't remember specifically why I started posting on this story except that I felt prompted by something someone said. The nature of human life and the universe interests me. And when someone throws out an incredibly simplistic answer for such my particular intellect is prompted to respond. Especially in a forum like this where we don't have the pitfalls of in-person conversation. It's pure thought here.

If you're going to believe in god, it's good that your "faith" in science is at least as strong. My stance is: I reject any belief that denies the validity and value of science. Great minds have made great scientific developments for the betterment of humans. Some have even suffered for such at the hands of religion. This hostile reaction happens because science is difficult and it is so much easier to just trash it.

Oh and when I started the comment it was in reply to your comment where you referred to CS Lewis and a grandfatherly figure who makes you feel good and I took that to mean that when I referred to my Heavenly Father you were comparing my feelings to that and saying I only did it to feel good. My heavenly Father has been better to me than my earthly one ever has. Yes He makes me feel good but that is not the only reason I consider Him my Father. Does that make sense to you? I don't know if I am wording it right to show you what I was feeling.

I agree with alot of what you say especially about watching out for so called Christians. However we will have to agree to disagree on the love aspect, I suppose.
I grew up in a very disfunctional family and love was not readily found and I left home while in high school and went to school and supported myself to go on and graduate. Therefore believe me when I say that it was through the grace of God and the LOVE of God and others that I came to know God. Perhaps that is why I long to show it to others because one never knows when it may be the only love they see or feel. I know there is more to it than love but once again I will say that in my opinion love plays a big part of the plan and that it does indeed lead others to Christ.

I suppose for arguments sake I need to put a cooment that says not you personally behind every word that could be construed as thinking I am aiming it personally??? Apparently others have not had a problem grasping what I was saying when I did it without one...

See last post please!!!

I couldn't follow that post with a gps and an indian guide.

Once again you assume that when I make points they are directed at you. Hello??? I was including myself and everyone in there. I find it interesting that you pick and choose which comments you want to pick apart as well. For the most part I have agreed with things you have said, I only tried to point out that we are to love one another as ourselves. If you think that is wrong, so be it.
I do not have to give you proof that I am a christian. I am a believer and what I do is between me and God and I am confident in His love for me and that he forgave me for my sins and will continue to because I AM A SINNER who sins every day. My faith is my faith and just because it isn't exactly like yours doesn't make it wrong. I am not ashamed to say I am a christian, but I am ashamed of how some of them act.
For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish but have everlasting life. Is that a good enough quote for you as to why I believe I am saved???
I understand what you say and what you quote but my point has only been there has to be some love in there. People respond better to love than to hatred and for someone who is undecided and trying to decide isn't it better to see people love others as Jesus loved when He was here?

"You aren't debating me. I was never debating you. You leaped out of some pit and tried to come at me. Well, actually, you had an adverse reacation to scripture (not that I am surprised, Jesus found the same thing in the Temple)"-- aletheia
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Wow. I leapt out of some pit and had an adverse reaction to scripture. Hmm
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by my calculations Unkbd = satan
let the witch hunts begin.

I do beg to differ that I do believe that my love can indeed love someone into God. Granted I cannot guarantee that because it all depends on their choices but I know firsthand of people who I have met and have come to tell me that I helped change their lives and a few of them were non-believers who came to turn their lives over to God because I LOVED them enough to show them love, tell them about God's love, Pray for them to come to know God, and to be an example to them. Granted my love did not save them, God did BUT my love helped push them in the right direction.....

I never questioned whther you loved God. I made points of showing that God does indeed require us to LOVE one another...

There are many definitions of love and each could be interpreted differently by every person.

No greater love has man that he would lay down his life for another...

God's love triumphs all love

Family love

Friends love

Love my children love

love my pets love

etc..

Oh that is too funny. You just broke down and questioned a part of scripture!!!!!Not my words, words from the BIBLE....

Okay let me put it another way: We have no right to point out any sin that someone else does and tell them they will go to hell for it when we are sinners ourselves. Yes we can tell them about God and love them because that is what God has commanded. No I can't love them as much as God but I can love them and show love. You say you don't care if people of the world don't love you. That must get very lonely.
I don't proclaim that everyone loves me and I am sure they don't but I have alot of friends and I am thankful every day to God for their love and friendship. If you alienate every person you meet because you force God on them and they don't want to hear it or listen at the time (perhaps because God hasn't laid it on their hearts yet)then how can you spread the word? Those people will tell everyone they know if that is what it means to be a Christian then forget it.
Maybe you have always been a believer. I was raised in church but wasn't a true believer until my 20's. I didn't want to hear it, I was doing my own thing but eventually God said ok that is enough, I would really like you to get to know me. I found Him and the peace and love that comes from my faith. People preaching to me that I was going to hell didn't turn me to God, love, patience and understanding from a few friends and God did!!
Then there were the hypocrits who once I was saved and became a member of their church who told me they couldn't eat lunch with me anymore at work because I was still friends with my old friends who drank and smoked and didn't go to church! Oh and that I was going to hell for wearing pants. So that was the end of that church but not my new found faith. When Jesus came he didn't only hang out with the "good" people. (He loved everyone and died for all our sins.) He taught and loved and showed compassion and by doing so showed others the way they should live...

I hate these qwerty keyboards. They put the s right next to the d and the spell checker can't spot that I meant to use the past tense rather than the plural such as included instead of includes.

Certainly Gazettefan you have to confess that I would never accept your own evaluation of the relative mildness and compassion of your latest derogation as anything other than the self-serving drivel that it is. If you contend otherwise that would call into question whether the gaps in your reason have developed into chasms.

Ncpanfan, to your observation that evolutionists choose to believe it over the alternative I would add this, that evolutionists, including scientists, are human with the same human nature that we all possess including our common weaknesses. We all tend to readily accept evidence which supports what we want to be true while treating evidence that doesn’t suspiciously and even cynically. It is also true that there have been erroneous and even fraudulent claims in support of evolution that to this day some still hold to be true such as transitional fossils of humankind’s evolutionary ancestors like Nebraska man which was proclaimed as a missing link but was nothing more than the fossilizes tooth of a pig. Then there was Piltdown man, a discovery thought to be another missing link in human evolution that was described to be a nearly modern human skull with an apelike jawbone but turned out to actually be a human skull and an orangutan jawbone. The fact is that evolutionists, scientists includes, are just as susceptible to wishful thinking and personal and cultural biases as are the rest of us. To be fair I’ll note that there have been a great many frauds committed in the Lord’s name as well. These frauds do not disqualify either religion or evolution, but just as contentions of religious proof must be approached with skepticism, so too must we approach proof of evolution.

And lastly:
Jesus replied: " 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' – Matthew 22:37-39

And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. - 1 John 4:16

We love because he first loved us. If anyone says, "I love God," yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. – 1 John 4:19-20

If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.

4 Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6 it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. 7 It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
1st Corinthans 13

So are you saying there is no such thing for me Alethia? Because I choose to believe he is a loving God who loves me and obviously you are the expert on God so He only is your God? He won't have anything to do with me because I think He loves me and I think we ought to love others?
Not once have I ever said God only wants us to have a good time. Trust me I know that there is bad and good in this world and my faith has gotten me through alot. Yes I know God wants us to spread his word but he doesn't want it forced down someone's throst to the point that they want nothing to do with it. He wants you to set an example that makes others want what you have (happiness, peace, etc..)Do you remember the words in the Bible where Jesus said that as you have done to the child you have also done to me (yes I know that is not the exact quote)? I believe in God and I know I am a sinner but I also know IT IS NOT MY PLACE TO JUDGE... I may not like what someone does or how they act but that doesn't mean I am not supposed to love them as God does!!!!!!!

RU: I like how you worded it! I was reading about evolution yesterday (for and against) and one of the articles had quoted an evolutionist (sorry don't remember who) and he said he believed in evolution basically because the alternate choice (created by God) was unbelievable. (not the exact words) Wow! So really alot of people who believe in God do so by faith as do some of those who believe in evolution. So ultimately we have our free will to believe in whatever or whomever we want.
I, like you, choose to believe I have a loving Father in heaven and I also like you think that what I do is between me and Him and it is not my place to judge others.
I don't belittle others who do not believe what I believe or those that don't believe period. While there are some who do, not everyone does and so it should be the same in return. One should not be belittled because they have faith. If someone thinks I am crazy then so be it, that is their right but they can be nice about it and just say sorry I don't share your beliefs. Basically agree to disagree...

Thanks, Gazettefan, with almost 600 posts under this heading, it's not surprising. I commented to you on Jan 14 at 10:31 and you commented to someone else exactly 10 minutes later. I felt bad :( Anyway-thanks for being gracious about it.
I said:
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"No one asked me-but if I may give the very obvious answer to the question of whether (any) babies go to hell if they die: Of course they do not, any more than they go to jail for any "crimes" they might commit while in diapers. Babies are not capable of even fathoming the concept of believing in God or not, or of being a faithful follower. A baby is not capable of rational thinking. I believe in a fair and just God, and He alone can judge fairly when you are responsible for your thoughts and actions. So, these kinds of determinations are really between God and the indivdual-do you remember your first experience with being aware what you were doing or thinking was a "no-no"? You don't really have "free will" when you can't even go make your own bottle.
Why are you reading this obviously Christian story anyway? To "learn", or to belittle those of faith?"
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I'll also add, I have questions about religion as well as about science, but my faith in God is at least as strong as my "faith" in science. I watched an episode of "The Universe" last night-and even the scientists are dumbfounded by their most recent discoveries-and, as you know, being a scientist does not preclude a belief in God. We are mere mortals-how are we expected to fathom everything?
And-most importantly, I don't believe someone is condemned to burn in hell for eternity for not discovering God-I believe those who are condemned are condemned because they do something heinous DESPITE believing in God.
I remember once someone telling me they thought my God was terrible for condemning him to hell for not believing he was real. I thought it was a strange statement coming from someone who didn't believe in Him anyway. Or was there something deep inside....

Yes bill, I did see that post. In my defense though, it was posted significantly later than my post.
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As far as aletheia goes, from his/her second post he/she has given as good as he/she has gotten. The rest of his/her posts seem to be mostly quotes, derisive comments, and scripture to the point where I engaged him/her. I am sorry, I can't feel sorry for someone who brings it on themselves by being so inflexible.

billnewbie, you have to confess that as criticisms go that one is relatively mild and compassionate.

The gap-happiness of anti-Evolution people is a stress relieving manifestation for gaps in reasoning. It is a form of confabulation.

RUSerious, everyone who disagrees with Gazettefan has a learning disability. Just ask him, he'll tell you since that is probably the only type of question he'll answer.

RUserious, apologies, possibly I was offline for a while and didn't see it among a bunch of other posts. I can't find it now. State it again and I'll respond.

Hey Unkbd, you wrote "No one is trying to change any beliefs or asking you to forsake your chosen deity". Did you see the post just 2 entries below this one? Maybe you haven't tried to force any changes of belief, but not everyone is so noble since Aletheia has been unfairly abused with ridicule almost since her first post. She may well be a bit defensive, and rightfully so.

gazettefan: "And how about god condemning non-christians, including babies, to eternal hell. Did we ever get to the bottom of that? No wonder you and your pals have a severe learning disability, the fear of hell must be distracting."
I responded to that-and directly to you-how come you didn't comment on my reply to your oft repeated question-or even respond to my question for you? You just keep saying no one has responded to your question. Was it because you are more suited to attacking those you find you are on a level playing field with--those you claim have a learning disability?

Good work unkbd and some others here who have exposed nicely the learning disabilities that go with believing in a god in the form of a tyrannical Jesus who invented eternal life (the fear of death) and eternal damnation. No wonder the fear of the Theory of Evolution abounds in the head of some people.

It's laughable that the Theory of Evolution is denied and doubted by the very people who believe in a weird supernatural being for which there is no proof.

aletheia, have you noticed that god in the bible doesn't mention animals that the humans in bible were unaware of? And that germs are never mentioned? Comments?

And I got you to restate some of the cruelty in the bible. Now tell us how it commands people to enslave others.

And how about god condemning non-christians, including babies, to eternal hell. Did we ever get to the bottom of that? No wonder you and your pals have a severe learning disability, the fear of hell must be distracting.

I would love to have the last word here with you but I see that as a fruitless effort as your logic is hard to follow.
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I have no disgust of scripture. I was merely pointing out that in response to some questions you replied with your ramblings. Nor did I say I hated Gods word.
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As to you "not listening", you didn't have to say anything about not listening. Your posts indicated that you were not open to the other posters ideas on the topic. You made a point of dispelling any suggested evidence to the contrary of your beliefs. As is your right. But never once did you say, "Hmm, that may be but this is what I believe." Instead it was an implied and emphatic NO.
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I do have one question though. What on earth does a 3 1/2 year peace plan have to do with my insinuation that you are stubborn and unyielding?
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Thank you for your time. Love thy neighbor and turn the other cheek when your neighbor tries to Love thee. As for me, my resolution is to debate with more heavily armed opponents than Aletheia.

I suspected as much.

excuse me .... you're kidding right?

What responsibility am I shedding by hearing out alternative thoughts and ideas?

your kidding right?

Furthermore, your closed minded unwilling attitude is a clear indicator of your vacuous personality.

Aletheia ..... Your scripture filled ramblings and flat out refusal to even consider or respect the thoughts and ideas of others trying to discuss alternative ideas to the ideology you subscribe to is closed minded. Your typical display of that mentality makes it easy to see why the Israelites and Palestinians have been at war for centuries. No one is trying to change your beliefs or asking you to forsake your chosen deity.

mrbread Jan 27, 2009 at 6:51 p.m.
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I apologize if I was unable to make my position clear.
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I am not against Science. I am against those in the scientific realm who have allowed their positions to become politicized for political/monetary gain; it is a disservice to all of science.
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mrbread Jan 27, 2009 at 6:53 p.m.
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As for a resolution, for me there are two rules; "The second is like it, ' YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.'

Right again, all made up, a consipiracy. I don't "believe" it either. National Geographic has embarked upon a conspiracy to prove your god doesn't exist. Did you notice all the references to religion in the article? There weren't any? Now that IS a hidden agenda. Quit dodging the real question, What's your new year's resolution?

fyi, you do understand this is the abstract of the published article and “Details of this transition, including the sequence of character acquisition, have not been evident from the fossil record, relates to evidence prior to the find of Tiktaalik don't you?

Wasn't this article about New Year's Resolutions? I'm going to try and get on a steady workout program, as I do every year.

Your right icy, let's stop progress. One article sums up all of evolutionary theory. It must have been magic.

As I said before, at this rate, Biology will become a "Soft" Science within a decade.

mrbread Jan 27, 2009 at 5:57 p.m.
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Perhaps you missed the large conjecture points;
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1. “Details of this transition, including the sequence of character acquisition, have not been evident from the fossil record”
2. …”sarcopterygian fish most closely related to tetrapods”
3. …”shares derived features with tetrapods”
And of course the best;
4. …”The sequence of modifications suggests changes in head mobility and intracranial kinesis that have ramifications for the origin of vertebrate terrestriality.”

and in the journal Nature

Among the morphological changes that occurred during the 'fish-to-tetrapod' transition was a marked reorganization of the cranial endoskeleton. Details of this transition, including the sequence of character acquisition, have not been evident from the fossil record. Here we describe the braincase, palatoquadrate and branchial skeleton of Tiktaalik roseae, the Late Devonian sarcopterygian fish most closely related to tetrapods. Although retaining a primitive configuration in many respects, the cranial endoskeleton of T. roseae shares derived features with tetrapods such as a large basal articulation and a flat, horizontally oriented entopterygoid. Other features in T. roseae, like the short, straight hyomandibula, show morphology intermediate between the condition observed in more primitive fish and that observed in tetrapods. The combination of characters in T. roseae helps to resolve the relative timing of modifications in the cranial endoskeleton. The sequence of modifications suggests changes in head mobility and intracranial kinesis that have ramifications for the origin of vertebrate terrestriality.

nc, actually a recent find is thought to be that link, or rather one of the intermediates.
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/...

Mrb: I have been online reading several different articles on evolution. Many in support and some not. I do have a question for you. One article stated the lack of being able to find fossils which show half fish-half reptile, etc.. but that in 140 years of looking none have been found and that the species seemed to end and start in whole? Forgive me if that last word isn't right. I can't rememebr the exact wording. If I am correct this is what has been referred to as the missing link??

Aletheia .... sorry for misspell

You figured it out alethia, evolutionary theory was created to nullify belief in jesus christ. I wish I could've seen it, right there in front of me. Explain why the catholic church and the popes endorse evolution then? They're tired of working?

actionbioscience.org/evolution/lenski.html and en.wikipedia.org/wiki/evolution-as-theory-and-fact Both of these sites say evolution is a theory, and a fact. The first one also talks about species mutating(evolving) and not being able to reproduce with the other. It`s just a matter of what you want to believe, or dis-believe. The problem comes in when one side believes so strongly in something that they threaten, or coerce, the other. This country was founded as a secular one, you are not supposed to even ask if someone believes, or doesn`t, in a god when they are up for public office.

Alethea said, "Just looking at statistics for the development of our solar system, earths placement in it, it's tilt and spin, gravity, compostion, that life is sustainable here etc etc etc.... To what Nth degree of impossible odds are we talking about here?"

From your posts I assume that you are of the belief that there is a God. He created heaven and earth and all life. Yes? Your statement above alludes to that, yet also could be take to suggest that we are not alone in the universe. One of the primary premises for Scientology.

aletheia, Jonathan Wells is also an advocate for AIDS denialism, which means that he doesn't believe the HIV virus causes AIDS. True the guy has a PhD from a prestigious university, but he was never capable of getting a real job, and the Discovery Institute doesn't qualify, as it's the laughing stock of the scientific community.

tech. whos the fool? the fool? or the fool who follows the fool?

Good point newbie, that is actually where the only legitimate debate over evolutionary theory lies, with the mechanisms that drive it. How did the origin of life come into this debate? alethia, if you think that branches of science are disconnected, then you are definitely mistaken. For instance, understanding biology requires an intimate understanding of the mechanisms that drive life, including changes in matter (chemistry), energy transfer in a system (physics), geology, and the list goes on. I'm content to agree to disagree as nc suggests, however and finally, if you are going to speak to a topic, I think that some research should preclude any judgement.

Actually, common sense is quite uncommon. Most people suffer from personal biases which interfere with their cognizance. Scientists are no exception. Some cannot overcome those biases even when they are fully aware of them due to a variety of reasons such as a lifelong commitment to faulty ideals. In the end we are all human and that is just one of our frailties.

In spite of how sincerely one accepts his favorite theory it is still a choice. A choice to accept not just the premise of one's favorite theory but even to choose one' favorite definition of that word , which is what I tried to show. And yes, evolutionary theory is most certainly conjecture, not that it has no basis whatsoever but that it involves a leap of faith to accept that all species, ourselves included, descend from a common form without a supernatural influence of any kind as that aspect of the theory transcends the bounds of empirical research and enters the realm of philosophy, even theology since it is used as a justification of atheism. I contend that if evolution is true, and I have no "proof" that it is not, one cannot preclude the possibility that evolution is the mechanism that God created to bring forth life (other than human life) but that is precisely what some of the posters here contend. However, as I have said, all of this is conjecture. We cannot "know" that God exists any more than we can "know" that life began when a lightning bolt struck a puddle of primordial soup.

If you didn't mean anything then I apologize but the way you worded it was that common sense should prevail which I took to mean my thoughts and opinions are wrong and lack common sense.

alethia: that wasn't my quote, it was from the article I read.

aleth-I don't think that's how it works, if you want to stir the pot again, find someone else. Nc-my mother has a tremendous amount of common sense, and a strong belief in god. Have fun fighting.

With all the many articles available online, how does one determine which are credible? Are they only credible if they agree with one's own opinion? Surely you can understand the dilema in trying to determine them.

So are you saying that if one chooses to believe in God they have no common sense?

alethia, great points, however to assume that religion and christian faith are as easy to believe in as the notion that a green ligh means go seems to be a stretch to me. Nonethless, I completely understand your convictions to your faith, and I am not judging those in any manner. The only reason I began posting, is to attempt to clarify some misconceptions people have about not only scientific progress, but the relationship that it has to religion is unfounded. nc, meanness was not meant to be overt in any posts. Common sense should prevail. How about returning to the topic of the article? Anyone have any new years resolutions?

MRB: There is no need to be mean to me or insulting me for what I read. I thought it was interesting and seeing as how it was directed at showing your points thought you could be fair minded in admitting that it hasn't been 100% proven just as God has not been proven. If you had bothered to read any of my previous posts you would see where I STATED I CANNOT PROVE GOD EXISTS which is why I made the point that neither theory has been proven.
Still in the end you can believe what you believe and I can believe what I believe and the choices we make are our own which is also why I stated we would have to agree to disagree???

One thing we must remember, is great scientific ideas all start as theories. Copernicus proposed a theory that the planets revolve around the sun, everyone thought he was nuts. Newton proposed a theory on an invisible force called gravity, that to this day still isn't fully understood. There is a new theory in physics called string theory, which in its infancy makes some pretty outrageous claims about the composition of matter. The two things I take solace in are; theories are based firmly in scientific evidence, observations, and valid hypothesis (not conjecture), and theories adapt to new evidence, unlike many peoples' point of view.

It appears as though many believe that science and religion are incongruous, however that needn't be the case. If the premise of your argument is contingent upon that, then some may ask you where is your proof in god? However, we all know that faith is a different entity that doesn't require evidence. You set yourself up to win, you can just say because or that it happened magically. I guess at the end of the day, if you take solace in that, there is nothing wrong with it. However, remember that science doesn't need religion and religion doesn't need science. If you do decide to speak on one or the other, make sure you know of what you speak. If you don't, perhaps its better to keep your opinions to yourself, rather than exploiting your anonymity on a site such as this. Perhaps you might spend some time on the internet looking at credible sources of information. I might suggest nationalgeographic.com, they have a new article this month, which describes a bit of history about Darwin and his voyage. Darwin may have gotten the ball rolling along with Wallace, but evolutionary science has changed quite a bit in last 150 years.

part 2:
But how do we really know the original hypothesis is true? What if it completely misses the mark, but gives the right answers just by coincidence? Or what if it is just an approximation, giving generally correct answers while failing to capture the true reality of what is going on? How can we ever be sure that these things are not the case?

The answer is, of course, that we cannot know this. This is why no scientific theory, including evolution, is ever considered to be proven. The more evidence that accumulates to support a theory, the more our confidence in it grows. Eventually, a point may be reached where the quantity of evidence supporting the theory is so vast, so overwhelming, that further attempts to deny or question it would be futile and unfounded. This is the case with the theory of evolution, as it is the case with the other theories, such as the atomic theory of matter or the theory of plate tectonics, that form the pillars of modern science. But this is not absolute proof. Not even the best-supported, most thoroughly verified theories of science are put on a pedestal and considered infallible, since at any time, some shocking new piece of evidence might turn up that completely contradicts accepted knowledge. We have no way of knowing that this will not happen in the future."
There is more to the article but too much to paste on here. :)

Mrb: I was reading online and found this interesting. It defends your position but also states there is no absolute proof. I understand your postion and you have every right to believe what you believe, but I also have every right to believe what I believe. It shouldn't be a fight or that one says the other is absolutely wrong. It should be a case of we will have to agree to disagree??

"Has Evolution Been Proven?
No, it has not been.

Many creationists would be content to end this essay there, but in reality, the situation is not so simple. To argue against the theory of evolution by saying that it "hasn't been proven" is to demonstrate a severe misunderstanding of the nature of science, which this essay will endeavor to correct.

It is true that the theory of evolution has not been proven - if, by that term, one means established beyond any further possibility of doubt or refutation. On the other hand, neither has atomic theory, the theory of relativity, quantum theory, or indeed any other theory in science. The reason for this is that science does not deal in absolute proof, only in the balance of the evidence.

To see why this is and must be true, imagine that we are scientists seeking to explain some feature of the natural world. Based on the evidence available to us, we can construct a hypothesis - an educated guess - which we offer as that explanation. If more evidence turns up that supports our hypothesis, if our hypothesis is testable and falsifiable, and if our hypothesis can be used to make predictions which turn out to be correct - if all these things are true, then our hypothesis graduates to the status of a theory and, in time, becomes accepted scientific wisdom.

billnewbie Jan 27, 2009 at 12:12
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Too bad Physicist’s aren’t able to play by the same model/Theory set up by Biologists!

billnewbie Jan 27, 2009 at 12:12
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I especially like this part
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...” especially one that has been tested and confirmed as a general principle helping to explain and predict natural phenomena.”
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Since .. .” It happens on the scale of geologic time”, it appears it won’t be able to be repeated any time soon.
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Also since the time scale is geologic, we won’t be around to verify if any actual predictions are validated….How very nice!

btw billnewbie, look up theory again, the first entry should read something like this: (a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world; an organized system of accepted knowledge that applies in a variety of circumstances to explain a specific set of phenomena) "theories can incorporate facts and laws and tested hypotheses"; "true in fact and theory" or you might find this one: an explanation or model based on observation, experimentation, and reasoning, especially one that has been tested and confirmed as a general principle helping to explain and predict natural phenomena.
Its more fun to pick the one you like though, rather than the one that is right.

If you consider that perhaps there are more than one definition for a word, as any dictionary clearly references, you might find that theory as it applies to science is used differently, I wouldn't have thought that needed to be stated. Look up the definition for shoe, and you will find 28 different ways that it can be used. Evolution does not happen on the scale of lifetimes as we see it. It happens on the scale of geologic time which is undoubtedly hard for us to fathom. The term species additionally has several interpretations. For years now, the biological concept of species does not revolve around inability to breed, however reproduction isolation does lead to speciation. As differences accumulate in separately reproducing populations of a given species, the changes that will occur within those genomes of the interbreeding individuals will eventually lead to reproductive isolation, and furthermore what you define as a species. You know what else can't be fully explained? Gravity or light, however our understanding of these two tangiable components of our environment is very sophisticated. Please don't take offense at this next statement, ignorance does not equate to truth. If something is unknown to you, or your opinion is biased, you shouldn't speak as an expert on the topic. Furthermore, hiding behind religion is undoubtedly, according to your logic, based on false assumptions. I do not claim to be an expert on religion, as such I do not profess to understand all that it entails. However, I do have an extensive background in evolutionary science, and believe I can speak freely on the topic. I promise, I am not picking an argument or asking anyone to defend their set of beliefs, it can be frustrating to listen to debate about evolutionary theory centered on a rudimentary understanding of a rather sophisticated branch of biological science, that has been developed over the last century.

Here's my preferred definition of the word theory as it pertains to evolution,
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"An assumption based on limited information or knowledge; a conjecture". From The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition copyright ©2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2003. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

The fact is that the only principle of evolution that can actually be established by empirical research is the adaptability of the species. No instance of any species evolving into a new species that is incompatible (unable to breed with) its predecessor has ever been observed. The theory that new species emerge is total conjecture and its acceptance is as much an act of faith as is a belief in God.
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I offer no credit for guilt, conscience and the knowledge of good and evil to culture. In fact, the opposite is true.

I won't be offended by fact but please do show me in writing where it says that evolution is 100% purely proven to be true, with no missing links, no questions.... Not just the partial as you have stated but the full unquestionable, undebatable proof in writing as in announced to the world that it is no longer a theory and has been proven 100% beyond any doubts...

Do we still have the "old" species? The organisms that are best adapted, pass on their genetics and survive. Do we still have old species of bacteria? Yes, do we have new species that have evolved to selection pressures (antibiotics) that are now untreatable? Yes. Do we still have wooly mammoths? Do we still have dinosaurs? Are the species that have survived in the face of a changing environment chemically identical to their ancestors? No. Did you evolve from a primitive ancestor? Yes. That does nothing to devalue your intelligence. If I asked you to believe that patterns of reproduction in overexploited fisheries have changed due to selection pressures (overfishing) would you? What would you want to see? Evidence? We are inundated with evidence, it shouldn't be seen as controversial, it happens. Don't be offended by fact.

Mrb: Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, doesn't mean yours is always right and mine is always wrong. I never said I don't believe in science. Although I did hate in in school, the dissecting was gross. LOL
I just choose to believe that I was created and not evolved from a fish or a monkey or whatever else there is. I guess I can't understand why if we evolved that we still have the old species? And they aren't going away, every day more are born, hatched, whatever...

I understand what you say gazette but my point was more to make the point that neither has been proven as fact (some accept evolution, some accept God.) Both are widely accepted by different groups. They teach evolution in school (some present it as fact not theory)but aren't allowed to teach the theory of creationism?
As I have stated before I am a believer and nothing you say will convince me God doesn't exist as nothing I say to you can prove He does or will convince you to believe what I believe. I wish I could prove He is there but I can't and while you may think I am foolish I am content in the knowledge of my faith in and love for God. :)

I just love how these discussions progress. It should be stated that the Catholic church, the current pope and the former pope, both recognize evolution as the mechanism by which organims change, and new species originate. The only debate between scientists and theologians in regards to evolution deals with the mechanisms by which evolution DOES occur. Scientists are ok with random chance events selecting which organims ultimately are proven fit, while theologians argue that god plays a role in guiding the ultimate forms of organisms as the do evolve. Not that it matters to those who accept scientific progress, irrespective of your view on religion. Again, religion requires faith, science requires quantitative data. If you don't "believe" in science, then quit going to the doctor, or for that matter using your computer to read this, as it was the application of scientific data that allowed it (technology) to exist. I have to admit, it easier to say that my computer is magic, than actually understand how it works.

ncpanfan, like many words, the word "theory" has more than one meaning. The meaning of "theory" as it pertains to the term: Theory of Evolution is this:

A set of statements or principles devised to explain a group of facts or phenomena, especially one that has been repeatedly tested or is widely accepted and can be used to make predictions about natural phenomena.
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I don't necessarily bother to prove that god doesn't exist; I only challenge anything that is presented as proof of the existence of god. Also, if god does exist, there's no proof that we know what it is and that we know how it thinks.

"If you make a claim, YOU have to prove your claim and not the other way around."
Darwin you said this but isn't it also true by your own words then that evolution has also not been proven which is why it is called the theory of evolution? That claim has not been proved either, they still have not found the missing link. And yet daily it is taught.

aletheia, your love for scripture and your need to cite it omits the more violent and cruel stuff, why?

No non-governmental organization is permitted to police its own when it comes to criminality. Congress is a governmental body that can impeach and try government officials. (Impeachment is the equivalent of indictment.) Impeachment then a trial takes place to see if a government official should be removed from office. And, whether a government official is removed from office as a result of impeachment does not exempt him from criminal prosecution.

Blago in Illinois has been impeached and soon will probably be removed from office. His criminal trial awaits. (Even if Blago is permitted to stay in office, his criminal trial awaits.)

What's your point?

MiltonRedmen Jan 26, 2009 at 10:48
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It appears from reading other peoples comments, that they have absolutely no problem with Doctors policing their own, or Lawyers policing their own, or Congress policing their own?
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No contradiction there!

The Catholic Church went beyond the conceit of "forgiveness" when it aggravated its criminality by transferring rapist priests to new parishes with fresh flocks of victims without warning the victims and the victims' parents.

Religion is a belief system based on Faith. Science is a belief system based on empirically based facts. To consider the two equals denies the hundreds of years of scientific progress based on those facts. Religious progress has only occurred because of those scientific facts. If you make a claim, YOU have to prove your claim and not the other way around.

The Catholic Churches position is that it is in the business of forgiveness. So, they simply forgave child molesters. This course of action clearly demonstrates a disconnect with the reality of what child molesters are. They may think prayer and forgiveness works, however, the reality is that it doesn't. This is the inevitable outcome of people who think that faith and science are equal.

MiltonRedman, when the child abuse scandal kicked into high gear about 10 or 15 years ago the Catholic Church announced that it would police its own. What?! Police its own?! What organization should be allowed to police its own criminality against society? None. What was the basis for their assertion? It couldn't be anything other than that the Church is close to god and has special privileges. Which included NOT to police its own until outside pressure brought the problem to the public's eye. Prior to that, rapist priests were transferred to new parishes and new victims without warning. More special privilege.

Also, if I know someone is religious or a believer, I do not pick an argument with that person. I do not proselytize. (That's what christians do -in extremis with the Crusades and the Holocaust.) This site is available for such a debate. I've responded here to claims that certain things exist that do not exist. I mainly state that there's no proof that god exists. If someone continues to insist that god exists, I will challenge that baseless claim.

True, no one can prove it either way. I don't claim to offer proof that god doesn't exist except to challenge any claim of proof that god does exist. billnewbie, offers a false syllogism as to the existence of god. One of my recent posts shows that his "logic" is faulty.

I will also add that the belief in god rather than be a solution to the propensity for human violence is itself just as guilty when it comes to facilitating that violent urge. Where's the advantage of being aligned with an almighty supernatural being? It all boils down to the fact that religion and the belief in god is merely a human psychological ruse.

gazettefan - I doubt they want a free pass from their crimes against children simply because they are believers, they simply don't want to go to prison. Most humans would do what they can to prevent the inevitable after getting caught. I don't care if you're a believer or not, do the crime do the time.
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You also mention foisting an imaginary being on other humans. The other side is equally as true, you are doing just as much to push you're belief and opinion that there is not a God by attempting to state that it is a fact when in fact none of us can prove whether or not God exists - we either believe or we don't.

Now you're talking about irrational guilt. Sometimes things misfire. Rational guilt is an adaptive trait for living in society. It is a manifestation of cultural evolution.

Rampant promiscuity is bad for individuals and the species. It disturbs cohesion in families and groups and spreads disease -both bad for individuals and the species.

Cultural evolution transcends what you're overly focused on. Culture is not proof of am imaginary, supernatural being. Human life is amazing without it.

Now even guilt is claimed to be a result of natural selection. That seems contrary to the findings of modern psychiatry which claim that guilt is detrimental to the health, well being and even the reproductive abilities of those so afflicted. If evolution is true, we should feel no guilt in any effort to procreate or inseminate as each of those acts with as many different partners as is possible promotes healthy natural selection. Just as we should feel no guilt in the murder of a rival, either for direct access to a sex partner or to food and shelter which promote our well being making prolific breeding possible. Both guilt and our knowledge of good and evil with a preference for good inhibits natural selection and therefore cannot be the result of evolution.

Gazettefan, you forgot to note my "comprehension problems and projection problems" and my "dangerous thinking" or my "blather and pseudo-wisdom" or that I'm "dissembled" and that I "labor under the weight of delusion" and that I'm not "able to deal with reason and clarity". Whew!

billnewbie, another false premise of yours is: If morality is cultural then there'd be no guilt. Why? Guilt is a recognition that humans as a group/species have determined right and wrong. The threat of guilt during the anticipation of doing something wrong helps people to decide not to do that wrong deed. The ability to feel guilt promotes the well-being and survival of individuals and therefore the species.

And guilt following the commission of doing a wrong deed helps them to decide not to repeat it.

milton......, they are both equally irrational. The issue here is the foisting of an imaginary being by human beings onto other human beings. This is especially offensive when the "believers" by virtue of being believers want a free pass for their crimes against children.

I believe people can do good with God or without God, too. But I contend that the motivation felt by all to do good is embedded within us by God, whether one believes that or not.

Careful there, Unkbd, you seem to be embracing eugenics when you write “What we have done however, in order to succumb to our cultural evolution, is abandon the idea of natural selection. So much so that the planet is overflowing with people of a sub par caliber. However politically incorrect it may be to say so. Whether it be a physical, mental, or illness related shortcoming, there are too many of them”. The problem with what you wrote is just who is it that decides which among us is of “sub par caliber” and what criteria is used to determine that. I believe that as the special creations of God, all of us are of equal standing, we all have the same claim to life and liberty and we are all due the same considerations as any one else regardless of physical or mental defect. Even our evolutionary atheistic humanist friends who post here have rejected eugenics with such moral outrage and vehemence that they have tried to lay it at Christianity’s feet, rejecting its obvious connection to the concept of natural selection. The fact is that every human knows that to euthanize the weak and defective is immoral and is only attempted by those who go to great lengths to rationalize the act as an act of mercy, that it is better for the subject.
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Concerning the cultural roots of “good and evil”, also known as morality, the problem I see with that is that if morality were a cultural phenomenon, there should be remarkable differences in what constitutes good and evil between human cultures which until recently have been physically isolated from each other’s influences. Yet instead, what is remarkable are the similarities in these various concepts of morality. The Chinese, the Hindus, the Hebrews, the Greeks all developed the same concepts independently. Certainly there are variations such as concerning promiscuity. These cultures may well have disagreed with just what constitutes the specifics of promiscuity but they all hold that a person cannot just have anyone they want. Then you have the problem of guilt. If morality were just a cultural phenomenon there would be no particular reason to feel guilt, particularly when no one else knows of the offense. Yet we do feel guilt even then. Clearly, the source of our concept of good and evil and the conscience that nags us to do good is not just a cultural phenomenon.

"Who is more irrational? A man who believes in a God he can't see, or a man who is offended by a God he doesn't believe in?" -- Brad Stine

I believe in God, I believe people can do good with God or without God.

the problem with people today is that you can just flick a lighter in their face and they think you have magic powers. Just tell them to follow or you will make the moon disapear and the eclipse will scare them into following. Ah booga booga!! I also have a box with demons in it. The voices tell me what to do. you might call it a cell phone but its full of demons! I say that hokey religions and ancient weapons are no match for a good blaster at your side.

It is not evidence of the existence of god. You make no argument to support that. You are baffled by the culture bearing aspect of the human experience. The answer as to why you are baffled lives within your personal psychology.

Positive cultural behavior is not instinctual. It is an elaboration of instinct, an improvement and transcendence (exceeding usual limits) of instinct. It is not evident all the time everywhere. You over-focus on instinct. Why?

Again, misanthropy resides in your need to attribute everything good about humans to something imaginary. You do this for strictly personal reasons.

Ya lost me bill..... who said anything about morality?

Again the “phenomenon” of morality is claimed as an evolutionary device, an instinct, with only the slightest attempt to support that contention with evidence either of fact or reason. Yes, some animals care for their young while others eat them when they can. Both actions can be considered as beneficial to their species but neither is a result of a need to do good as we humans are driven to. Instinct is just something that animals do. When a bear cub dies, its mother (female bears are well known for their maternal instincts) doesn’t mourn the lost for days let alone all its life, and its father, which may well have killed its offspring as male bears are known to do, obsesses not at all and even if that father killed the cub, it is nonsense to claim it had evil intent. Evolutionarily speaking, our species would be better off if the weak and defective children and adults were “culled” before they have a chance to breed. Yet it is these very ones who invoke the greatest compassion and protectiveness within us, unlike the animals such as our fellow mammals, the most advanced on the evolutionary scale, who, when faced with a defective offspring will actually deny it access to nursing and even abandon it, an act that would evoke guilt and recrimination of the most severe kind on us humans both from ourselves (our conscience) and our fellows. It is clear that this need to do good is neither instinctive (since it is not irresistible) nor beneficial (since it often urges us to put ourselves in harm’s way for the sake of another) for the advancement of the species, from an evolutionary point of view.
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Again I point out that the existence of the conscience does not prove the existence of God, nothing does. It is merely evidence thereof, just as it is evidence that there is a profound difference between humans and all other animals.

billnewbie Jan 26, 2009 at 7:09 p.m.
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Bill,
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I do not need to investigate. I am secure in my knowledge of “I AM”, Yeshua, and The Spirit.
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My point is, that it must be a personal conviction, and the scholars listed have done extensive labor in detailing through documentation, many of the available paths.
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As the saying goes, “The gates of Hell are locked from the inside”
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As well, “pay me now, or pay me later”
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Additionally, “Do not throw pearls before swine”

I will secede you the point of "needing natural selection". As a matter of fact we need it now more than ever. What we have done however, in order to succumb to our cultural evolution, is abandon the idea of natural selection. So much so that the planet is overflowing with people of a sub par caliber. However politically incorrect it may be to say so. Whether it be a physical, mental, or illness related shortcoming, there are too many of them.
All of the things you listed as not being vital for our evolution are not, I agree. Where I disagree is that they are a result of our cultural evolution rather than the result of a divine intervention. Don't get me wrong, I believe in a superior being, I am just skeptical about how much influence that being actually used/uses in the developmental stages of our initial ancestry and future progeny. As far as good and evil goes I believe that that knowledge is passed from one generation to another whether it be via the parents or society. Each child learns what is acceptable behavior and what is not from one or both of those sources. After that it becomes a matter of free will whether that person choses to abide by the acceptable guidelines or not. And Free will is yet another discussion entirely.

Recent posts attempt to prove the existence of god with logic. The basic structure of logic is the syllogism. The syllogism is composed of:

Major Premise: All men are mortal.
Minor Premise: Socrates is a man.
Conclusion: Therefore, Socrates is mortal.

billnewbie's syllogism is:

Major Premise: _________________________

Minor Premise: Evolution doesn't explain the qualities that separate humans from animals.

Conclusion: Therefore, God explains the qualities that separate humans from animals therefore god exists.

But what is the major premise? His Major Premise would have to be "God exists."

This is the fallacy of argument known as begging the question. (The term "begging the question" is popularly misused to mean "demand the question" or "compel a particular question to be asked.")

Begging the question is the fallacy where the conclusion is drawn from an argument, or syllogism, that already assumes that the conclusion is true. This is the circularity that ICY wrongly attributes to me. (The circularity that plagues him comes from his inability to follow a complex statement or paragraph from beginning to end. He stays stuck at the beginning and feels that somehow he went somewhere only to end up in the same place.)

So, billnewbie's syllogism should read:

Major Premise: Unknown

Minor Premise: Evolution doesn't explain the qualities that separate humans from animals.

Conclusion: Therefore, the cause for the qualities that separate humans from animals is unknown.

But that cause is known. unkbd's post is on the right track. The dynamic of evolution shows itself culturally. Even animals care for there young. Obviously, humans have this instinct too, without the imposition of god or religion. To care for children and to care for the extended family and to extend that caring to members beyond the family has proved to be adaptive (pro-survival) and pleasing. This is an important element of culture and society. The species benefits from this.

But, indeed, we are still half animal and we still have to deal with animalistic instincts. This makes life difficult. The better side of religion attempts to deal with this difficulty. Nonetheless, no religion and no religious person have ever proved the existence of god.

The question of faith is too important to leave to someone else I_C_Y. I implore you to investigate it for yourself. You don't need your own experience on the road to Damascus, just consider the testimony of the one who did.

billnewbie Jan 26, 2009 at 3:36 p.m.
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Bill,
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As you state “before one can build a house, one must lay a foundation.”. The foundation of TENS is crumbling on an almost weekly basis. For those following the mental gymnastics that Biologists continue to propagate in the name of TENS it is becoming a charade. At the rate they are preceding, Biology will find itself becoming a “soft” science, unless they start re-evaluating TENS from the vantage of information that has been brought forward of late.
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As for “Faith”, the very essence of your end summation; I will leave this to scholars of higher caliber, ie Saul of Tarsus, Thomas Aquinas, Martin Luther, and various others.

I_C_Y, before one can build a house, one must lay a foundation. There are many who have accepted evolution as a basis for their atheism. I am trying to show that evolution cannot explain some of those traits that identify us as human in contrast to other species of life. How the animals behave is understandable from the evolutionary point of view, but not humans. We are plagued, evolutionarily speaking, by an ideal of how we should behave, towards each other and even when we are alone that are incompatible with the processes of evolution and natural selection. The only logical explanation is that there is a God who caused us to exist. That is both a philosophically logical hypothesis and the foundation of a theological hypothesis as well.

Unkbd, the problem I see with that is there is no basis for saying that we have outgrown the need for natural selection if evolution is true. Don’t men still try to attract women away from rivals? Don’t women still attempt to attract as many men as they can so that they can choose “the best”? Isn’t our “need to breed” so strong as to affect every aspect of our lives, particularly as adolescents and young adults? If evolution is true, then natural selection is a natural process quite beyond our control which I think my rhetorical questions clearly show. Even if one were to say that natural selection has been interfered with by man, even that is a result of natural selection since evolutionists say we are a result of natural selection and therefore whatever changes we cause in nature are a result of our naturally selected nature. As for Apes, isn't it still true that the biggest and the strongest rule their tribes, take what they want, breed indiscriminately and prohibit and enforce with discipline any others of the tribe that do likewise? Do they spend much time lamenting their own selfish behavior or do they just accept that rank has its privileges? Don’t those that are subject to the whims of the ruling Ape accept their status? I sincerely doubt that Apes suffer from any guilt, or even mild regret about their status.
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I personally do not accept the proposition that unguided evolution is responsible for life. I have doubts that life is the result even of “intelligent design” guided evolution. But whether God created every life form himself or whether he created an evolutionary process, I believe that humans are a special creation formed directly by the hand of God. I believe that our consciousness and our conscience are strong evidence of that. We think, we are aware of self and others, we reason, we love, we know what is right, we have compassion for our fellows, and we are concerned about the future long after we are gone. None of these are vital for the evolution of our species, nor are they particularly helpful to it. Some are actually a detriment. Are we evolved? No.

billnewbie Jan 26, 2009 at 11:23
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Bill,
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So as not to construe something that wasn’t there.
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Are you enquiring for logic based, rationalized hypothesis?
Or, a Theological hypothesis?

Bill ... not for arguments sake just an observation. Humans have outgrown their need for competition on the "natural selection" game board. As a result of this and thousands of years of cultural evolution humans have developed accepted rules of behavior concearning good and evil. These rules were developed well after humans had risen to the top of the food chain and well before orgainized religion. Apes are not very far behind us evolutionarily and studies have shown that even they have a sense of what is good and acceptable behavior amongst themselves. In short I think that you are comparing apples and oranges. By nature and natural selection I agree that there can be no explanation for our sense of good and evil. Only after we no longer needed natural selection for survival of the species did we develop our cultural evolution which does explain our sense of good and evil. Just food for thought.

This is getting repetitious but I’ll write it again, I only offer answers to serious questions sought by sincere inquirers, and that excludes Gazettefan as his recently offered cynically laced posts attest.
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However, I have a few general questions of my own aimed at no one in particular, just musings offered for the consideration of anyone who may be interested.
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If we are the strictly the result of evolutionary processes undirected by any supernatural force, why are we driven to be good? Why do we even know the meaning of good? How is it that we can tell the difference between what is good and what may be convenient and therefore advantageous to us? Why do we feel so guilty when we do something advantageously convenient for our own benefit but harmful to another if natural selection is our only real consideration? What possible benefit does a built in behavioral restraint system (conscience) hold for the promotion of one’s genetic legacy?
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The answers to these questions seem obvious to me. There is in fact an evolutionary disadvantage to a voluntary adherence to morality as the strong often fall to the clever and the deceitful. If one can deceive or even murder a rival that is an advantage, evolutionarily speaking. Yet we all have within us a sometimes overpowering urge to restrain such behavior. Even those among us who indulge in such behavior appeal to the conscience of others to protect themselves from being the targets of such immorality. And we all are driven to make excuses for ourselves when we violate our own consciences even when no one else knows of our offence. Therefore, there can be no natural explanation for our own concept of good and evil, our ability to recognize the difference and our consciences which drive us to choose good over evil as there is no natural advantage to it. This is evidence of the existence of God, a God who prefers good over evil and has endowed us with that preference as well. The challenge for the atheist isn’t to disparage God for the evil they perceive in those who have faith, but to show some natural, rational and reasonable explanation for the existence of the knowledge of good and evil and our apparent preference for good even to our own detriment.

billnewbie Jan 26, 2009 at 10:20
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Bill,
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Agreed. When one encounters a personality who’s arguments are circular in natural, and unable to cognitively construct linear rational thinking, as well as meeting documented symptoms for a clinical syndrome. Perhaps one is best served by rising above the din!

How about a group of people who need to be involved in a debate while not actually participating?

I wonder, does anyone who disagrees with "you know who" not suffer from "comprehension problems and projection problems"? I am in good company.

ICY, your comprehension problems and projection problems continue. You post a site that says the exact opposite of what you claim it says. This particular lack of comprehension on your part is symptomatic of the very mental disorder you cite. Yours is a case of classic projection -to see in others what is painfully below the surface of a defensiveness that leaves one flailing around for equilibrium. And this flailing around is what's going on here in general: The cognitive dissonance that comes from an attempt to defend with reason that which is not based on reason.

And if that isn't enough you have no problem with exploiting a severe mental disorder and the victims of that mental disorder in an attempt to insult someone else.

billnewbie, state the MEANING you attach to your life. A meaning that comes from the impetus to do good only under the threat of suffering and eternal damnation at the caprice of an all-powerful supernatural being. And state why you need to embrace a philosophy that promises eternal life to soothe your selfish fear of death.

Silently ask yourself these questions: Why can't one be good without being under a threat? Why can't one face the finality of death? Is one's "faith" nothing more than a self-imposed psychological ruse to defend one from what one is and what one fears?

billnewbie Jan 23, 2009 at 11:59
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Bill,
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There is also the logical conclusion, that since this particular population group has high correlations with Aspergers Syndrome, there may in fact be the ability for this population group to seek medical help for their afflictions.
( http://www.humaniststudies.org/enews/?id... )

Aletheia, your attempt to investigate me for the purpose of sustaining pre-conceived notions is duly noted.

billnewbie, you are projecting again. This is most obvious when your poor comprehension skills cause you to misrepresent how I think while nicely laying out how your own head works.

The both of you on some level are aware of your untenable positions. You had to decide: which is worse?: to "reason" with dogmatic speech and references or by answering in your own words as you write. You chose the former because the latter would have been painfully revelatory. But either of your self-imposed choices are self-condemnatory. Such is the thinking of occupants of a tiny world.

That smallness makes you incapable of comprehending the true nature of religion, especially as you represent it. If you were capable of comprehending what religion is as you represent it, particularly christianity, you would understand that communism and fascism are naturally descended from early islamism/christianity:

Idealized belief in a communal life ruled by an all-powerful, unelected leader. Consistent with this is: North Koreans regard the American aid of food and medicine as "offerings to the devine."

Most christians, or people who claim to be christians, and many non-christians alike, believe that good christianity is more accurately described in ncpanfan's two recent posts.

billnewbie, I liked that.

Yes, The Hitlerian zealots are stymied. They mock the theological beliefs of those who post them and ask disingenuous questions with the transparent aim of either getting answers they can ridicule or, when their purposes are recognized, having them ignored so that the faithful can be castigated for providing no answers. All while offering their own outrageous theories about the nature of the One whom they do not accept, denying the principles, history and bases of their own sad philosophies, refusing to acknowledge questions or provide verification for their contentions and refusing to read anything offered as verification from others.
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One is therefore drawn to the conclusion that for deists generally and Christians particularly, the atheists harbor resentment. Resentment that the deists have hope and a meaning of life that no evolutionary existential atheistic humanist possesses. After all, if you believe there is no God and no afterlife, that the end of this existence is just that, the end of existence, that limits one’s capacity for hope considerably. As for any meaning of life, when you believe that life is the result of a cosmic accident, that the evolutionary process is one fortuitous fluke of fate after another, then the obvious conclusion is that there is no meaning. We are just the end result of a natural process, an assembly line, without souls. Beyond family there is no connection to anyone other than that provided by the spin of the cosmic wheel of fortune. There is only a series of naturally selected occurrences that relate one human to another only slightly more closely than to a monkey or any other animal for that matter. That, in my opinion, leaves a void in their souls. A void they cannot fill. And that makes them angry at those who have no such void. Their anger leads them to try to destroy the hope that deists and Christians have that they lack, and covet.

Perhaps I should not call myself a christian as much as I should say I am a believer with faith. I know that because of all the hypocrits and so called "christians" who make others hate the thought of being one and all being lumped together, these days if you call yourself one people automatically assume it is a bad thing.

Gazette: As a Christian I don't pretend to have all the answers. I don't know how to answer your questions. I know the Jews are God's chosen people and that according to the bible in the end times will be leaders during the tribulation. I know you don't believe in God and have many questions and thoughts on the subject. I question many events in the world and I also question events that are to come in the Bible but I do not question my faith.
My faith has seen me through many good and bad times. As I stated before I do not fear God, I love Him. I also don't believe that babies (even non-christian) go to hell. Everyone has different opinions on things. How boring would it be if we all thought the same!
While I am sure I will never convince you that God exists, neither will you convince me He doesn't. It is hard to explain why I have faith, I just do. I didn't always have it but my life has changed since I found it. I wonder did you ever have faith and lose it or have you never believed? I am just curious. I have friends who are atheists and we have briefly discussed our beliefs but neither of us could give proof for our reasoning of belief / non belief, it was just our personal choices and opinions.

The Hitlerian zealots are stymied. Intelligent questions have smote them.

In the real world, I would like anti-Semitism from christianity and other religions to stop; and for the attacks on Israel to stop.

But for the purposes of this blog and getting an actual answer from you:

What will happen to the Jews re: "judgement day" or "White Throne Judgment" and re: the thoughts of christians?"

What's going to happen to the Jews?

The purpose of Christ' Life, Death, and Resurrection was not to make bad (sinful) people good but to make dead (sinful) people live. With that said all people have sinful nature. When one accepts Jesus as their saviour they are saved not only from their past but also from their present and their future. One of these days Jesus will come back and get those who know him and make them complete that is that sinful nature will go away. Thank you , Lord

desperate for attention this morning Gazettefan?

I hope it's not that White Throne-thing again.

Then god knows when innocent people suffer and he has the power to prevent that suffering but does not.

And all non-christians, including non-christian babies, will go to hell.

Got it. What's the next bible lesson?

Once again people in this world feel that if God does not provide justice for all the evil in this world right now. Then God is un-knowing and un-powerful. Did you ever consider that he is showing grace and mercy to those who don't follow him. Keep in mind, that justice will come to all for evrything that is sinful in their lives unless accepts the Gift of his Son Jesus

Ouch!!! ;~(

It's rude not to answer and speak in plain English.

I'm not a moral relativist.

And as much as you'd like to believe you have a monopoly on human decency, you do not.

If the White Throne thing isn't a joke, what is it?

"If the new poster is a young bible student or something of that sort then he or she is benefiting early from a kinder version of what the larger world has in store when it comes to the truth about the universe and life." What powers of rationalization! In other words, the new poster didn't agree with the master of moral relativism and therefore deserved what he got, an otherwise unprovoked attack and for his own good, too! How graceless.
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And now the paragons of self-fulfilling existential atheistic humanism have stooped to toilet bowl humor. That must be the high road I saw referred to previously.

White Throne judgment might refer to the status of the toilette bowl when someone has a severe hangover!

White Throne Judgment wasn't that a Burt Reynold's movie from the seventies. So, you think an all powerful all knowing god splits hairs? Christianity isn't an excuse to be a moron.

White Throne?!!!

And why is that your best suggestion?

Well if God is all knowing and all powerful and then allows there to be evil it would seem that he is in fact not all knowing and all powerful. If your god were human he would go to jail for not doing something to stop murders from taking place that he is suppose to be aware of. In words, it seems god is a criminal.

Try to take the high road here and all you get is another unprovoked attack from billnewbie.

Your paling in comparison only comes from not being able to deal with reason and clarity.

You're wrong if you think I'm irritated about not getting answers to my recent questions. I know they'll never be answered here. My purpose is to just ask the questions and make you think about the fact that you have the answers in your head but you're ill-equipped to state those answers in clear language. I'm sure that is also the case for the new poster.

If the new poster is a young bible student or something of that sort then he or she is benefiting early from a kinder version of what the larger world has in store when it comes to the truth about the universe and life.

I see that Gazettefan is exhibiting his legendary respectfulness again. How the rest of us pale in comparison.
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If one wants answers one must have been reciprocating all along though it is irritating to get no answers, especially sincere ones. Most of us knows just how he may feel, I'm sure.
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I wonder if Sir Grace felt a self-fulfilling testosterone rush as he savaged the new poster to this discussion, a person who had never tugged at the thorn in the lion's paw. Way to "Man Up" big guy! Well done!

Also, it is misanthropic to give god credit for the good stuff while blaming humans for the bad stuff.

This mentality makes it easy for priests to manipulate and abuse children.

Recent posts are dealing with the claim god saved the people in the recent plane crash. He and someone else won't answer this question in clear English: Was it god's will and behavior that caused the other plane crashes that were fatal?

The bible references below are insensitive to the suffering of innocent people: stating that somehow they all had it coming -babies included.

Do you agree with them?

Please, make your statement in everyday clear language without the insensitive insularity of bible-babble.

Gazettefan: You seem to imply that all things evil that happen in this are directly from God.

That simply is not correct. Evil occurred when man made a decision to follow what they wanted to do instead of trusting God. When God made human's there had to be a risk of rejection in order for there to be a potential for love worship.

You were made for his glory along with all this world. The big difference between all the world and humans is a soul. The soul lives forever. How we respond to Jesus will determine where we live after we die.

The problems that people have with God is that any and all evils that happen in this world need to be dealt with or preempted by God.

Or the justice delayed is no justice at all
The Bible is the only book that details that God will judge all using Jesus as the measuring stick.
Keep in mind nobody is good (everbody is evil) Jesus' sacrifice makes the transaction complete that covers the penalty of sin.

So if one rejects Christ Gift they choose to do so because they want to.
But there are consequences to any decision we make. In this case it is life or death

I see that Gazettefan is exhibiting his legendary politeness again. How the rest of us pale in comparison.

aletheia, the content of what you wrote is extremely insensitive toward the millions of people who have wrongly suffered throughout human history -that's what I got from your post. Is that what you intended?!

You need to restate your bible references in real world language and then you'll see how cruel and insensitive bible mentality and you are toward the suffering of innocent people. The bible language is insulating you from your cruel and insensitive demeanor.

Speaking in real language will also help you to understand my posts!

aletheia, maybe if you attempted to put things in your own words it would help you to eventually think and speak in the realm of the real world. Your post is mercilessly and cruelly insensitive to the millions of people throughout human history who have wrongly suffered.

Paul is explainable by the fact that he had a psychotic breakdown on the road to Damascus.

Thankfully, Dylan's thumper period was shortlived. His early folk stuff and early rock stuff is righteous. Lately he's been serving his wallet.

I go to church to 1) worship God and 2) share the talents God has given me with others. God commands us to gather together (Hebrews 10:25). I hope you all have a wonderful Lord's day - and even if you do not know Him as personal Lord and Saviour - you can still honor you and our family by declaring one day a week as a day of rest and of family time.

Personally, I can't believe the Europeans aren't all over this so called plane "miracle". They and their high wage socialism built a plane that saved a bunch of free market capitalists and didn't break apart when it hit the water. Vive la France. Vive la Marx.

Maybe the Church should require tithing to help pay the billions of dollars going out for civil suits.

Church-going is entirely social.

Would any of you thumpers like to explain god's participation in the Holocaust and other times innocent humans are brutalized and murdered?

Try to do it in plain, everyday language.

Christians chose Dec.25 to draw the Pagans into their ranks, and let them keep their Pagan rites on that day. Looks like the best guess is Jesus was born September 29, 2BC. The early Popes let, no encouraged, their citizens to torment the Jews on Christmas. In Poland, Christmas 1881, 12 Jews were killed and hundreds of thousands of dollars damage was done to their property, not to mention the rape of the women.

My but those self-fulfilling existential atheistic humanists get testy when their unsubstantiated claims are challenged.
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Did anyone read the news item in the Gazette about that airline crash survivor, a Wisconsin lawyer and her fiance? She said that when they "heard the pilot tell passengers to brace for impact, they kissed, told each other "I love you" and prayed out loud." The article also said that "She says they are thankful to God and the pilot". I guess you just had to be there to fully appreciate the miracle.

"Do you think religious leaders should, or should not, try to influence government decisions?" U.S. poll 37% yes 61%no Canada 25/72 Mexico20/77 France12/85 Australia22/75 Spain17/76 U.K. 20/77 South Korea21/68 Barbary Treaties of Peace and Friendship, 1796, Article 11, "as the government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion" signed by President Adams, passed unanimously by the Senate. "We`ve never been a Christian country. We`re a secular country by our constitution." Billy Graham, David Frost interview, 3/30/97

There is some chaos in this world but even chaos isn't completely random. What I mean is that randomness occurs within a set of parameters. The spot on Saturn is a giant hurricane. It is chaotic, however, the mass itself is stable. Much like weather patterns. You can read James Gleick's book Chaos to learn more about Chaos and fractals and how engineers deal with errors. There was also a recent Nova on fractals http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/fractals/ and it gave an example of what communications engineers thought was chaos however when Mandelbrot looked at it he saw a pattern in the static in transmission lines and was able to provide a solution that helped to reduce that static.
This is because nothing in this world is 100%. Nothing. This can be good or bad. Bad in the sense that we will never be able to completely eliminate crime and violence but it also means that there is no such thing as a disease that kills everyone.

Good and bad luck are simply the perception of coincidental events. "We" give meaning to events that coincide with one another in a context. Once during football practice I kicked a 50 yard field goal. Had it occurred during the last few seconds of a game some people might have called it a "miracle" since I am not a kicker.

I think luck is 20%. In words, if you just randomly selected answers to a 5 option multiple choice test the best you should do is 20%. Chance is a tough one. It seems great when the pilot lands the plane but do you really want your doctor to have gotten "lucky" on his Board exams.

factcheck, interesting Dewey quote. It contradicts the supernatural order that religionists attribute to the universe and the human experience.

alethiea apparently cherry-picked a Dewey quote that she believes supports her beliefs. What Dewey said in that quote is tantamount to saying that mathematicians don't concern themselves with existential matters. Meaning the disciplines of formal logic and mathematics aren't reducible to existential explorations -or religious explorations, for matter.

Though inductive logic blows religion right out of the water.

"I have seen something else under the sun: the race is not to the swift or the battle to the strong, nor does food come to the wise or wealth to the brilliant or favor to the learned; but time and chance happen to them all." Ecclesiastes 9-11 "Men live at the mercy of forces they cannot control. Belief in fortune and luck, good and evil,is one of the most widespread of human beliefs." John Dewey

Luck is chance, it could be good or bad. It's good or bad depending the one's opinion of the effect. It's not metaphysical.

Do you know what formal logic is?

Luck is defying the odds. It is beating the spread with a 70 yard Hail Mary touchdone with no time left on the clock. It is winning the lottery with billion to one odds that you won't win. It is ditching a jet in a river in January without loss of life. Those with skill and ability can position themselves for a higher probability of a good outcome. No guarantee, but a better chance than those without skill and ability.
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Luck is metaphysical? Or did you mean supernatural? Either way, you're wrong. Luck is a phenomenon of the physical world. Luck and extentialism are not mutually exclusive. billnewbie, you have just topped all your other gaffes.

Maybe you have luck confused with karma. The two things are quite the opposite.

There is a record of it being crap that is easily accessible. If you had read the post and comprehended it you would know that I have seen that crap argument on the 700 club. I realize that it is difficult for you to understand that some people actually know what they are talking about.

Luck? Did the existentialist actually allow for the possibility of the existence of luck? Doesn't existentialism deny the realm of the metaphysical in which luck resides? Do my eyes deceive me? I know I read somewhere that the authoritative existentialist among us claimed that there is nothing beyond the physical realm. Yet here it is in black and white, "Luck: yes". How nimble a relativist he must be to be able to adjust his philosophies like a contortionist adjusts his posture. What will he adopt next?

Calling it crap doesn't make it so. There is a record, easily accessed that indicates who founded that movement.
Somehow I doubt that Darwin1 is a Pat Robertson fan. Neither am I. In fact I can honestly say that I've never watched his programs and I have never read a thing he's written. I suspect that's true for Darwin1 as well.

Pilot skill: Yes

Luck: Yes

God: No

How many languages do they speak at the International House of Pancakes? Is it like the Tower of Babel?

Again, exactly what facts. In Origins Darwin provides many examples of creatures that have adapted to their surroundings. He realized this because he himself had misclassified the birds he had collected from the Galapagos. An ornithologist pointed out that all the birds from the Galapagos were Finches, however, they were all similar to birds known in England. When Darwin came across a flower on Madagascar that had a very long stamen he predicted their would be a moth or bird with an equally long tongue. It was a moth and was only discovered recently found a couple years ago. This is the same reason why animals evolve toxins that have the potency to kill predators thousands of times their size that do not prey on them. It is called an evolutionary arms race. Prairie dogs evolve immunities to rattlesnakes. Garter snakes evolve immunity to orange salamanders. I know that this is hard stuff to comprehend. Your comprehension of science, that would truly be a miracle.

billnewbie this eugentics stuff is the same crap Pat Robertson spews on the 700 stupids club. It is crap.

I understand that it is very easy to say "God did it" as an answer to everything you don't understand. However, you should try to resist the temptation of mental sloth.

So, none of the zealots have read Origins. Imagine that.

No problem.

Lets get an in person roundtable discussion organized. I think it would be neat. As far as the venue, any place but IHOP!

whythefuss, gotcha! My bad for not getting my facts straight! My apologies to you and the readers. God bless.

Kleej - I don't believe Christians are superstitious-I would be insulting myself if that were the case. It was more of a question to Gazettefan who seems to always boil it down to that. If he can't have a concrete explanation it must be superstition
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I agree wholeheartedly with what you are saying.

God gives us all freewill and entrusts us to seek the truth which is his word. I believe people are not "entitled" to anything less. However, I understand that others don't see things as I do and I don't have a corner on the market when it comes to my beliefs. I've been down the entitlement road and all routes lead me to God. My stance is, believe what you will and I'll love and respect you regardless. God requires that of me and with nothing less than a loving heart. I'm all in.
why-thefuss..... Christians are superstitious?? At the risk of sounding judgemental, you couldn't be more off base.

The randomness that I refer to isn't in the pilot's competence, it was in the pilot rotation of that airline. Would a different pilot have been so skilled? Perhaps but maybe not. There were so many variables involved, some of which I mentioned, most of which have nothing to do with pilot skill but could only be attributed to fate, coincidence or perhaps some would say luck, or God.

So why are atheists reasonable and Christians superstitious?
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God gives us free-will which is why some of you choose to not follow/believe. That doesn't necessarily make you more reasonable.
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If it were all up to God you would believe.

I don't think that there is anything random about competance. I think that the pilot having accumulated the skills necessary is a result of hard work and training. I guess that to me, it makes more sense to attribute those skills to something that can be explained. Perhaps the notion of control comes into the reason. I don't know. I'm not going to lie, I do get frustrated with people who attribute these things to God, especially when they neglect to attribute the reasoning behind the possible disaster to God. This isn't meant to be a personal attack against you or anyone else who believes in God. I understand where you're coming from, I just don't share your faith. Maybe someday I'll be singing a different tune. Who knows.

As I said Lakennedy, it's all in the possibilities. I accept the possibility of the miraculous. What makes you think that the pilot and his skills being present weas strictly a random act? What make you think that the abilities of the pilot to control the powerless aircraft were strictly the result of that skill. What held back the wind that could easily have gusted and blown the plane into the ground? What kept the explosion in the engine confined enough to not spread to the fuel stored in the nearby wing? As I said, there are so many possibilities.

If the pilot, you, or whomever else wants to attribute the surviving of those on the plane to God, that's your business. I just question the reasoning behind it. In particular, your reasoning behind it. Why does it make more sense to you to attribute the safety of those on the plane to God than to the skill of the pilot/co-pilot who landed the plane so skillfully?
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I also think that those who are agnostic/atheist that identified themselves as Christians at one time in their life, were mostly indoctrinated at a young age. My grandma forced me to go to a methodist church. Am I angry about it? No. I do maintain that whatever religon you feel is right for you is a serious choice/commitment. I don't think it's one you should be forced into at a young age. I think it's a decision you should make on your own after reviewing all of the options.

I tried to get someone to read Gazettefan's posts to me but after a few lines they couldn't stop laughing.
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The historical record is clear, eugenics is an atheist construct by people who had at one time in their lives identified themselves as Christians, much like some who post here. Claiming otherwise, no matter how emphatically, is just the result of one who will not see (or take reading assignments) and cannot be reasoned with.

The only way the pilot can sensibly give credit to god is if he rails at god for allowing all the other airline crashes that were fatal.

Reason always trumps superstition.

We'll see what the pilot has to say about that soon, Lakennedy. Maybe he'll take all the credit, maybe he'll share some with his co-pilot, maybe he'll attribute some to fate or even coincidence, and maybe he'll credit God. If he does credit God, will you want to excoriate him as well? Perhaps you'll pass him of as a weak minded fool like Gazettefan no doubt would? Maybe you'll suggest that he's traumatized. What if he says that he's not really sure what happened? There's so many possibilities, I wonder if you are open to all of them, unlike Gazettefan.

Billnewbie, sorry it was I C Y I was trying to reach. adherents.com/religions

And as for that other person: It looks like the hallucinogens have kicked in.

Great point, lakennedy. And, billnewbie, couldn't god have saved himself the trouble of using up one of those valuable miracles by just not causing the plane to go down?! Where was he? off listening to the selfish requests of football players on opposing teams?!

Again, billnewbie's religious, misanthropic bent is showing: God gets credit for the good stuff and humans get the blame for the bad stuff!

By the way, billnewbie, I already did blame christianity for eugenics. Get someone to read my posts to you.

And to you and ICY: Congratulations, now that it's unacceptable for you people to do things like make anti-Semitic slurs about Jews, you contrived a way to slam me by attributing membership to me of a group of which I am not a member. You did this because you can't deal with my reasoning and writing skills.

Continue to spew the junk-science and junk-info. It's amusing. It's of the same caliber as the bible.

Right billnewbie, somehow it makes more sense to attribute the well being of the 155 people aboard the plane to God than to the skill of the pilot. Definitely. This doesn't sound crazy to you? Really? Why not thank Santa? Or the Easter Bunny? You've got just as much proof to their existence, maybe not as much faith in them, but that's just you.
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Also, I'd like to remind everyone that it doesn't matter how many people belong to a religon. A religon of two people holds the same rights and power under the constitution as a religon with five billion people.

Who is being simplistic Darwin1? You read the Bible and have determined that it has no facts and provides no evidence? Don't you really mean that it has no facts and provides no evidence that you will accept? The Bible is a lengthy tome of considerable complexity. Are you quite sure you gave it an honest trial? Are you certain you were up to the task? Was your effort one of discovery, or was it an assignment to an unwilling and disinterested student? Or even a cynical excursion in search of something you could condemn? Would you accept such a claim of me about “The origins of the species” without some verification?
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If one contends that there is no evidence or fact in the bible, one must distort the historical record. There is certainly evidence that Christ lived, that he was crucified and that some claimed he rose from the dead in Roman records, an independent verification of facts in the Bible. There are ancient records of Egyptian, Babylonian and Assyrian origin that also verify the facts of the Bible. A myriad of archeological discoveries have also verified the facts of the Bible. But I suspect that what is really sought is proof. Proof that God exists and proof that he is how the Bible describes him. As I’ve said before, there is no proof, only evidence.

Factcheck I believe you may have meant that post for someone else. I haven't offered any posts describing the age or the size of the atheistic community, if you can call it that. I would like to see the source for your contentions though, if you don't mind.

gazettefan--
When it comes to Catholics and the church, God continually puts my character to the test. I have my opinions regarding that subject and I do my best not to be judgemental about it. It's like anything else, you always have the
"bad apples" spoiling the whole bunch. I always go back to me. I make sure I'm conscious of the way I live my life with the mindset that I have others counting on me and not letting them down by acting in a fashion unbecoming, not just of a Christian, but, a person of character period. Those things are inside jobs. Collectively we make a difference. It's hard to come up with a reply to that subject without sounding judgemental for sure. I'll say this, what happens in the Catholic Church doesn't define Christians overall. I'll just say that. God bless.

Not to start a big brouhaha Bill, but atheism has been around since 600 years before Christ. And there are 2.1 billion Christians in the world, compared to 1.1 billion who are atheist, agnostic, secular, or non-religious. the largest part of those are non-religious, with atheist being 2-3 percent. Not going to argue any kind of theology, just facts.

gazettefan Jan 16, 2009 at 9:30 a.m.
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You have clearly documented yourself as a rube, and a charlatan.
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If you actually understood TENS (Theory of Evolution by Natural Selection) you would be able to comprehend the magnificent holes in the Theory, similar to the real-time debunking of the “Global Warming / Climate Change” mongers, that is occurring currently.
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Additionally, the hypocrisy that you exhibit towards the Catholic Church, while establishing yourself the high Atheist priest, is entertainment at it’s highest! In Psychiatric realms this would be considered a psychosis, which explains the high rates of suicide within your peer group!
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As for you, and your peer groups take-over of civilization, if you weren’t so maleducated about History, you would know that this “New fad” called Atheism has come and gone every 100 years or so. The other 99 % of society that doesn’t follow your mantra, will only need to wait a generation or so, as has been in the past, your peer group fails to self replicate, unlike those evil Hispanic Catholics, and Muslims.
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So you see, you need to enjoy your brief moment in time, as you and your peer group will be but a foot note in the annals of History!
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Enjoy boys!

How about that plane crash in the Hudson River yesterday? Many are calling it a miracle (an act of God) and with good reason (more evidence for our side). For that plane to land on the river, intact within easy reach of ferryboats that were manned and operational was truly miraculous indeed. I know, those wise and knowledgeable self-fulfilling existential atheistic humanists among us will ridicule cynically any who accept that event as anything other than a series of incredibly improbable coincidences, each one scientifically explainable beyond a reasonable doubt (by what they view as reasonable) if and when the facts are know. One must put a great deal of faith in the existence of coincidence to accept their contention. Yet faith is something they claim that they live without. I wonder how many atheists were on that plane just before it landed on the water, ready to face the end of their not yet completely self-fulfilled lives? Thank God they have been spared to live another day as have we all.

Meantime our not so noble self-fulfilling existential atheistic humanists in opposition are busily distorting the historical record. How Orwellian of them. Too bad they have yet to flush those inconvenient philosophers down the memory hole yet. Next they'll claim that eugenics was a Christian concept. Easy to do when you won't accept reading assignments.

darwin1, our devastated and loyal opposition is off practicing their skills at cherry-picking contrarian stuff off the internet.

If you had actually read anything like Mein Kampf you would know that Hitler would have had to have the duplicity of organized religion to achieve his goals. He says so himself in his book. And he rounded up Jewish people because why?

The world is not a dichotomy. This simplistic view of the world is part of the problem. This is because people generally think they are good and others are bad. The problem with the world is a lack of empathy and an inability to see another persons point of view.

Here is a fact: People who criticize Darwin have never read Darwin. However, I have read the Bible and it contains no facts or provides any evidence to support the fairy tale inside.

Kleej and factcheck, our institutions are supposed to be a guides and influences toward the sense of right and wrong. When an institution like the Catholic Church fails in this regard we know where at least part of the blame resides.

Kleej, what you mention in your last post is exemplified shockingly in the Catholic Church's organized criminality. Right and wrong: pedophilia and pederasty is wrong yet it takes place in the church. Correcting being wrong: the church transferring offending priests to new parishes and new victims. Recognizing wrong: the church blaming its child abuse problem on society in general when it is quite the contrary: The Church's behavior has given aid and comfort to those who wish to do bad things by passing the blame beyond itself.

What's going in the Church is emblematic of the awesome fact that organized religion's time has come and gone. It's frail foundation has been exposed by the Church and it cannot sustain the weight of the modern world, a world in which people are more reality orientated. The tougher road ahead tells that we must be good for the sake of being good. That being good is the only way for society to work. We must recognized that any thing good about society since civilization began is based in evolutionary, adaptive thought and behavior.

ICY, what?!!!

fatcheck--exactly. Trust is lacking in our culture more than ever now. How did it get to this point? One good place to start is "right" vs "wrong". God requires people to live a life of integrity and character and never waiver. When we do fall, get back up and ask for forgiveness and move on. Nobody can possibly be perfect through the eyes of God and we are embraced just the same. Where humans go wrong, is our lack of seeking wisdom and truth in our lives, which in turn, keeps us on a learning or leadership journey our entire lives allowing each and every one of us to get just a little better the next day than the day before. If the principles of character are in our conscience, we can exemplify it. It's when it's wiped out of society's conscience that we have chaos. Much like todays culture. It's called the modern age world under the rule of the vanishing conscience.

billnewbie, you're in no position to tell me what to read. Furthermore, why don't you just attempt to make your point with your own words? Instead of responding to a troublesome post by googling your head off with selective perception. None of the people you mentioned were Nazi philosophers except maybe Heidegger. (As a matter of fact, Kierkegaard was an avowed christian.) And the Nazis were not existentialists.

In case you skipped over my previous post, I am not a communist.

The "darwinism" you refer to had nothing to do with Darwin. That "darwinism" was social darwinism and was a perversion of Darwin's work. Darwin nor any darwinist ever said that the Theory of Evolution applied to the human social experience.

The eugenics and mentality of Nazi Germany sprang from early christianity with its urge toward the collective and an all-powerful, unelected leader. Communism and fascism are more alike than they are different.

gazettefan Jan 15, 2009 at 9:56 p.m.
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Apparently you are unable, or unwilling to see the hypocrisy in your earlier statements and this current one of yours?

gazettefan Jan 15, 2009 at 9:56 p.m.
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Ah yes, the “no true Atheist” argument.
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Gee I never saw that coming (sarcasim)!

ICY:

It's true that communist regimes kill more people than democratic ones. But it is wrong to attribute this difference to atheism. It is the nature of communism, with it's lack of regard for the individual, that accounts for its willingness to kill en mass. Not to be overlooked is that the idea of communism is descended from the idea of early christianity: the idealized wish to live communally with a strong all-powerful, unelected leader.

A fine line is required for people to be at once as individuals and cooperative participants in a society. Communism leans too far in the direction of the group. This urge toward the collective is the same urge that causes christians to be proselytizers and willing participants in sending millions of people to gas chambers and non-christian babies to hell. So, it is the early, unrealistic idealism of christianity that resonates to the present and accounts for so much bloodshed. Because communism runs against human nature, christianity, in order to survive in nominal form, had to transmute into its exact opposite.

Christ was a communist but the leaders of current world democracies are not communists and they are therefore not christians in thought and deed. They are democrats (small d intended) and capitalists. Democracy and capitalism is antithetical to Christ.

Point being: Your analysis of what causes mass murder is deficient by way of its lack of comprehension.

True to point my here is that the only people I've ever killed were communists.

gazette did not say Hitler was a Christian, he said Germany was a Christian nation, and it was. The vast majority of Germans were not Nazis. The pride of the country was low enabling a dynamic leader to take over. The ruling Nazis were mostly psychotic, greedy, amoral individuals, some of them enamored with the occult. Just because a countries leaders are bad, doesn`t mean the whole country is. The reverse is also true, good leaders don`t guarantee the rest of the country is going to be that way.

Not that Gazettefan would ever distort the historical record by fallaciously referring to Nazi Germany as a Christian nation, but maybe he just likes the sound of that so much that he adopted the contention without question. However, if anyone would care to glance at some fact that contradicts that absurd contention try this, http://www.papillonsartpalace.com/endC.h...
Here you will find 2 news articles based on documents collected for the Nuremburg trials by the U.S. government as well as a link to those documents. One article is an accredited reprint from the Philadelphia Inquirer and the other from WorldNetDaily with a link at the bottom of the page to yet another article from WorldNetDaily that further discusses Hitler’s anti-Christian philosophies.
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One other interesting note is that when you search for Nazi philosophers and Existentialism philosophers and compare the lists, you get many of the same names, Søren Kierkegaard and Friedrich Nietzsche, Martin Heidegger and Jean-Paul Sartre to name a few.
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Nazism’s underlying philosophies were rooted in a handful of 18th and 19th and 20th century philosophers and scientists including Darwin. Evolution spawned that ignoble scientific theory of Eugenics, a term coined by its progenitor, Francis Galton, Charles Darwin’s cousin, which Hitler incorperated into his tome “Mein Kampf” as justification for his “aryan” superior policies and ultimatly his “final solution”. Nothing of this is Christian but it is clear that it is quite existential and humanist in origin.

The problem is you don`t always know who is an atheist, just a freak, or a hypocrite. Not every one tells the truth. This is a very religious country, but we just killed 100,000 Iraqis for no reason. Israel, and Palestine are religious countries, as is Iran. Atheists, Jews, Muslims ,Catholics,Bhuddists,Hindus, Lutherans, Mormons, etc.they all murder! The Spanish explorers decimated whole civilizations and said they did it for their God.Those civilizations were religious too, just worshiped the wrong gods I guess! Back to my point, you are still dead no matter if an atheist or zealot kills you. Polls say more Americans, by percentage, are religious now than ever before in our history, but the murder rate is rising. If you`re concerned about the chances of being murdered, maybe you`d be better off in Canada, a religious country, but a much lower murder rate. Not all atheists kill, and not all religious people are "saints", it`s human nature.

factcheck Jan 15, 2009 at 7:10 p.m.
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It appears the summation was lost on you.
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I will make it succinct; You have multi-fold higher probability of being murdered in an Atheist regime, verses a Religious one. Therefore, if your objective is to not be murdered, staying away from Atheist regimes is highly recommended!

Body count logic? Under that logic we could conclude that christian white men are all murderers? France? Aethiest? Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha that's good. Then why didn't they tear down Notre Dame Cathedral.
The last several regimes were Asian. Does that make all Asians murderers? Your confusing coincidences with causes. You clearly have no understanding of Chinese history and how the religion of ancestry worship was used to justify how the poor were treated as Rome did to the Hebrews. In fact, the Christianity that Jesus preached was an economic system nearing socialism. He hated money. Told people to share and be generous. He even was subversive enough to help Roman soldiers. From each according to his abilities to each according to his needs. Isn't that what Jesus would do?

You get killed by an atheist, you get killed by a religious zealot, you`re still dead. Neither one of them is a moral human being. "Thou shall not murder!" (before it was modernized)

factcheck Jan 15, 2009 at 6:07 p.m.
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So let have a comparison with Atheist’s:
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…However, there have been twenty-eight countries in world history that can be confirmed to have been ruled by regimes with avowed atheists at the helm, beginning with the First French Republic and ending with the four atheist regimes currently extant: the People’s Republic of China, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, the Lao People’s Democratic Republic, and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. These twenty- eight historical regimes have been ruled by eighty-nine atheists, of whom more than half have engaged in democidal15 acts of the sort committed by Stalin and Mao and are known to have murdered at least 20,000 of their own citizens.16
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The total body count for the ninety years between 1917 and 2007 is approximately 148 million dead at the bloody hands of fifty-two atheists, three times more than all the human beings killed by war, civil war, and individual crime in the entire twentieth century combined..
( http://irrationalatheist.com/ - You really should buy the book - http://www.amazon.com/Irrational-Atheist... )
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Statistically, I prefer a Religious Nation, over an Atheist one!

Thanks, factcheck.

ICY, what is the percentage of bicycle accidents that relates to the 10 million deaths of the Holocaust and the millions of other deaths caused by the christian state of Nazi Germany?

Even burning one person alive for not believing the way you do is too much. Wikapedia says about 2000 executions from the start of the Inquisition in 1478 to 1530. Not millions but too many!

ICY, I'm inspired. I'm also able to recognize the difference between bicycle accidents and murder.

Hitler was a Catholic, but hadn`t gone to church for years. Germany was a christian nation, but more people were turning away from the church in the 30`s. Nazi`s could attend a "reich church" that featured a swastika instead of a cross, and "Mein Kampf" instead of a bible. Nazi party endorsed "positive christianity" those who supported a "return to conservative Christian traditional values". Jehovahs Witnesses were persecuted because they wouldn`t say that Hitler was the Messiah. Most of this info is from wikapedia, and other sites by going to "religion in nazi Germany." The citizens of Germany felt persecuted after WW1 and were ready to follow any strong leader that espoused nationalism, even a froot loop like Adolph. Their are about twenty "religious" wars going on in the world right now, including the civil war in Iraq.

gazettefan Jan 15, 2009 at 4:36 p.m.
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In reference to your gazettefan Jan 15, 2009 at 3:30 p.m. post.
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For your edification:
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There was not one, but four Inquisitions:
…the Medieval, the Spanish, the Portuguese, and the Roman. Of these four, it is the
Spanish Inquisition to which most critics commonly refer…( http://irrationalatheist.com/ - you should buy the book, it’s quite informative )….. In light of its nightmarish reputation, it will surely surprise those who believe that millions of people died in the Spanish Inquisition to learn that throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries,
less than three people per year were sentenced to death by the Inquisition throughout the Spanish Empire, which ranged from Spain to Sicily and Peru.23 Secular historians given access to the Vatican’s archives in 1998 discovered that of the 44,674 individuals tried between 1540 and 1700, only 804 were recorded as being relictus culiaesaeculari. The 763-page report indicates that only 1 percent of the 125,000 trials recorded over the entire inquisition ultimately resulted in execution by the secular authority, which means that throughout its infamous 345-year history,
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Here’s the best part
……the dread Spanish Inquisition was less than one-fourteenth as deadly on an annual basis as children’s bicycles.

just another example of EVERYONE having memory issues to some degree...not just us smokers:) i dont care how cold it is im goin in. and for every hundo i get over my goal im gettin out and goin back in:) you can donate to me and i see whatever you want me to see or im sure nothing at all. xxx if you want. if you donate to me i cannot stay anonymous so if you divulge any info i will be forced to have stoner nation wage war on you and free the gazette from its original fan.

Yet more proof of alienation from the real world.

gazettefan Jan 15, 2009 at 4:21 p.m.
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Myth. Please supply references, resources to support this hyperbole.
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Wait for it…wait for it
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Next comes “All the wars caused by Religion” (myth)
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You are following right along the playlist.

thekid, no I'm not high, yet. I'll be having a few beers soon. And give me a break, I can't remember everything.

Will I be able to donate anonymously and you get the credit?

What if it's as cold as is it up there now on that day in February?

Hitler's Germany was a christian state. Unofficially, Hitler was regarded as the Messiah. The swastika adopted from the Buddhists (and others) is a good luck sign and was used by Nazis as the twisted cross.

ICY, if anyone is in arrears when it comes to proving himself it's you.

gfan are you high?? i said in my post the polar plunge is in feb. i see you didnt click on the link i posted an donate 10 bux to the wisconsin special olympics. thanx anyways...to anyone who wants to help donate here or email me and ill tell you how you can pledge me and my team 10 bux and i promise its for the wisconsin special olympics and not the wisconsin chapter of NORML;)
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https://www.specialolympicswisconsin.org...

Here's someone who understands God's grace and chooses better over bitter like so many people in our society.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LtCrlXdd...

gazettefan Jan 15, 2009 at 3:30 p.m.
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Please tell me you actually have some knowledge about the Inquisitions, before you continue that myth!
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I will give you a chance to acknowledge your lack of facts on the subject.

True, this country was founded on "Godly principles". What we're up against is the fact that so many people are wrapped up in taking "God" out of everything, they're taking the essential "principles" out of everything as well. This is where our leaders have gone wrong. If a person is here by chance, then any authority figure can manipulate people for the authority's purpose. If a person is created, then that leader must help the individual fulfill the purpose he or she was created for. This is the reason we're fighting this culture war that we are! Are leaders leading people to fulfill their Godly purpose, or are leaders manipulating people for the leader's self interest? If there is no God, then the leader must decide what the purpose of the people is..SCARY THOUGHT! Adolf Hitler for example. How we view man and his creation has a huge impact on how we view America and our roles as leaders.

Tell us about the religious virtues of Islamo-Fascism and the Inquisition.

billnewbie, you're dissembled.

"Where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths which are the instruments of investigation in courts of justice? And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle."
............George Washington

Hey Fastcheck, when watching a dog fight, never get between the dogs. I hope Gazettefan doesn't turn on you, but don't worry, I won't.

In other words, Gazettefan, because because? Your repetitious post is non responsive to mine.

gazettefan Jan 15, 2009 at 2:23 p.m.
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What hyperbole!
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Since the Gay lifestyle is an evolutionary dead end, how does it still exist?
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What about Alcoholism?
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Pedophilia?
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So all these are evolutionary?
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Illogical!, and once again irrational.

billnewbie, gazettefan, neither one of you is going to convince the other to change his/her mind. And ,at this point, neither one of you can PROVE he/she is right. Believe what you want as long as you don`t infringe on anybody`s rights!

Human consciousness is an evolutionary phenomenon. Co-operation and civility are dominant human traits that formed when those two human features accommodated the survival of the species.

Only a small percentage of humans are causing the trouble that makes the world appear as though it is in chaos.

The proof of all this is obvious just by examining current reality. Those who labor under the weight of delusion will have trouble seeing this.

.Is that a baseless claim that "human mentality existed pre-religion", or have you some evidence? (Yet another question that will no doubt go unnoticed)
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Should I use your model of politeness? (Do you need me to re-post excerpts of your archive like I did just 2 hours ago?) So many questions, so few answers.
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Why, Gazettefan do "we know that the best way to exist is to care for others". What spark of evolutionary creativity produced such knowledge. Certainly one can explain such an inbred knowledge if one accepts the proposition that we are the result of the creative activities of a power who possesses such characteristics itself (God), but just how does one reason that such morality (there is nothing else to call it) came into existence through a process that is devoid of it? Just saying it did doesn't explain it. You might just as well say "because" and nothing more. Do you accept such explanations of deists? If what you say is true, their must be some reasonable explanation even without evidence. Or do you accept that on faith alone? That couldn’t be possible since faith seems to be the antithesis of atheistic humanism and existentialism. Please enlighten me.

billnewbie, reread my recent posts. The self-fulfillment is inextricably linked to a healthy social consciousness, and is devoid of ridiculous delusions.

And if the origin of the universe is a mystery, that doesn't mean that your god or your idea of a god, or any god is the explanation. We know we are here and we know that the best way to exist is to care for others. That particular human mentality existed pre-religion. It was co-opted by the origin religionists for reasons previously stated.

If you need to take the easier road, go ahead, but try to be more polite.
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thekid, What question? By the way, how'd the dunk go? You are showing signs of not being dead.

fatcheck, that is true. Not only that, every time some modern age intellect feels the need to lobby to the govt. because "they" feel some law just insn't fair for them and we allow our govt. to bend over for these people, it also goes against our forefathers. Corporate driven greed is great example of that. Everytime the constitution is altered and changed it's been for the good of the few and not the good of the many. It's agenda driven, and it's wrong. It's the very reason it's called the rock solid foundation that a nation must be built on. Just like a house or building. People don't build these things on sand because they won't stand the test of time. Again, much like this country. We're not standing the test of time very well. Not a coincidence that the principles behind our forefathers laws were based on CHRISTIAN principles. This doesn't make us a Christian nation (so everyone doesn't have to get their undies in a bundle). Principles NEVER change. When they're altered and ignored, nations fall. It's been proven through history.

So we are to accept that the goal of atheism, humanism and existentialism, even life itself, is self fulfillment? It probably is. And so what becomes of that fulfillment. Do you leave it to your heirs? Do you line your coffin with it? You can’t take it with you because you’re not going anywhere. At least no one will rob your grave for it like they might for the lifetime achievements of the self-fulfilled rich. If this physical existence is all there is and we are the accidental product of an unknowing, unfeeling and disinterested nature which simply rearranged a few trillion atoms randomly in our production then life has no meaning or value whatsoever. Therefore nothing we accomplish has any meaning either. We are just a collection of individuals with no other purpose than to fulfill what ever desire we may have which often includes a sense of self-righteousness. Perhaps that may explain the need for a moral code, a creed such as “do unto others…”, that and the need to protect one’s lifetime accumulations from other seekers of self-fulfillment. I still need someone of greater intelligence that I to explain just how a concept of morality evolved from a universe whose nature is so obviously devoid of it. While they are at it they can explain the composition of that mineral paste and the voltage and amperage of the lightning bolt that struck it and made all of this debate possible.

I was starting to feel like the Lone Ranger, thanks Tonto.

billnewbie you're not new here. you know gfan wont answer a direct question. silly.

quote--The wish to be happy all the time is childish. A sense of fulfillment is the realistic goal. unquote--- AMEN !

As long as Gazettefan expresses disdain for what I write I'm pleased since we think so much alike.
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How did you like my admiration for how respectable you are, idol of mine? How about that assertion of your contention that the "Golden Rule" was a co-opted humanist creed, most ingenuous one? No cleverly insulting rejoinder about those? Take your time.

If anyone is entertained by the tangled syntax, meandering sophistry, and suffocating insularity of billnewbie but would like to save time in doing so, then savor his sentence below:
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"But [existentialism] is only the philosophy created by atheists as a competing code of conduct for Christianity since it came to be within the Christian realm and is heavily influenced by it rather than the other way around as Gazettefan would have us believe."
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Edgewater, existentialism is not an institutionalized creed. It is a description of a mentality and behavior that accurately comprehends and engages reality.

Organized religion is a social mechanism that exists for the purpose of benevolently and malevolently controlling and guiding people. Reason strips away the supernatural aspect attributed to religion. What is left is a social phenomenon. And because there is nothing intrinsically all good about religion we have abominations such as the organized criminality of the Catholic Church.

Gazettefan -

Fascinating, thanks. I would really enjoy expanding our discussion about existentialism vs Christianity. I am always up for learning new ideas and beliefs in the world's culture. It's too bad this blog is not the right forum. This 'way of life' (I am not sure of another way to use that phrase as it relates to existentialism - no offense given)...this way of life appears to be working for you quite well. I have just as much passion about Christianity and God. The sad fact remains this: it becomes too easy for others to carp a belief of another if the critic doesn't fully recognize these alternate beliefs exist in the first place. More power to you, my fellow blogger.

"try responding to an entire post and not just your misread part of it."
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"Get your head out of that pseudo-scholarly effluvia and try it yourself. It seems as though there's nothing substantial going on in that noggin of yours."
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"I already explained that. Scroll down and step out of your own windy atmosphere for a while."
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"are you high?!!! You're posts don't make any sense."
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With such honorable remarks such as these anyone can see how respectable Gazettefan strives to be.
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I see from Gazettefan’s numerous unprovoked references to me that I have embedded myself into his consciousness. Apparently my posts have some effect on him. How flattering.
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Gazettefan has ventured to test the chilliness of the waters of self revelation by identifying himself as an existentialist. But that really is only the philosophy created by atheists as a competing code of conduct for Christianity since it came to be within the Christian realm and is heavily influenced by it rather than the other way around as Gazettefan would have us believe. It does not explain why one became an atheist or why atheism is true which Gazettefan still refuses to attempt an articulation of and understandably so as it is much easier and entertaining to pick at the beliefs and character of others. Apparently, atheists have as much trouble following codes of conduct as theists do. Since the concept of the inclination toward evil of humans has been labeled “misanthropic” with the contention that humans are actually inclined to be good, how does that square with the fact that those who contend such seem to believe that the religious are inclined toward evil as is religion. How can that be for if humans are by nature good, their constructs must therefore also be good. Yet atheists contend that religion, all religion is intrinsically evil. That seems like an irreconcilable contradiction to me. But I’m sure Gazettefan will attribute my faulty perception to my weak character as he always does.
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Gazettefan has repeated the bizarre contention that the “Golden Rule” is a co-opted humanistic, and therefore atheistic creed. While its true that the “Golden Rule” is not uniquely Christian, it is also mentioned in ancient Hindu records as well as Buddhist, Confucian, Sikh, Zoroastrian, Shinto and many more, it most certainly in not an atheistic concept. None of these ancient civilizations were atheistic in any way, shape or form. Certainly Gazettefan can do better in defense of atheism than to stoop to historical distortion. Or could it be that he actually accepted that as fact from what he read somewhere because it fit what he wants to believe? I’m sure he’ll condemn my conclusions as defective while pointing out that he thinks I believe what I want to believe, but that simply draws one to the conclusion that atheists really are not the superior humans that some of them like to think they are since we all seem to share the same types of character.

im not denying any religion I_C_Y. my point again i believe, is that if i believe what you believe i believe you believe i will be accepted into yo heaven. my belief is that if the doorman believes similar to your belief, as im sure you believe he does, and he believes that cuz i didnt believe enough on earth that once i die and am staring at the pearly gates i will have no choice but to believe, even tho i, at that point, will OBVIOUSLY KNOW the beliefs were actually more than beliefs and even tho theres now no need to believe, i believe it will be to late to believe. and i do believe thats not a fair or just belief to begin with. good day sir.

gazette: I believe in God! :) Do I want others to? Sure it would be nice but I don't force my beliefs on them, that is their choice to make. I don't want others to believe in God because I think it will benefit me. I just want others to find the peace that having faith can bring.(faith in their own beliefs) It is hard to explain it but my faith has gotten me through bad times and good times. It doesn't get rid of the bad, just helps make dealing with it easier.

Speaking of Abraham. Hey Abe to glorify god, god needs you to murder your son to prove how much you love him. So, if God is all knowing and powerful why does he need Abraham to murder is own son. Sounds like a rather psychologically unstable god wouldn't you say.

2005, atheists, agnostics, humanists, and no religion at all, make up over 14% of the U.S. Second only to Christians as a category in the religious beliefs in this country. Judaism is third with 1% of the population. The founders set up the U.S., separation of church and state, so no one religion would be the "state"religion, you are supposed to be free to practice what you want, as long as you don`t infringe on anybody else. wikapedia Those born before 1946, 5% were considered atheists, those born after 1979, 19% considered atheist. The country is changing, soon over 25% will be atheist, agnostic, humanist, or no religion. When you try to force your religious views on other people, you are going against the founding fathers.

ICY, what are you talking about? I express myself in my own words. Get your head out of that pseudo-scholarly effluvia and try it yourself. It seems as though there's nothing substantial going on in that noggin of yours.

Edgewater, here is part of an earlier post.

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..... even so called religious people don't factor in being watched by god during all their positive actions. I think it was Max Weber (Veber) who said that: society is god.

What he meant is: the urge to be good is the result of a social contract each member of society has with the rest of society. To be good is believed to cause other people to be good to you (and this is true, though not all the time, whether or not people are religious). The other benefit is the satisfaction derived from being good. This is what holds it all together. It's the golden rule. The golden rule came from humans and one way or another, a long time ago, it was co-opted by religion. Religion co-opted all the good things (and bad things) about humans.

If it seems more difficult to be good without a belief in god, that's because to do so requires courage and character.

-----------------------

I am an existentialist. That means I take responsibility for what I am and what I think regardless of external impositions. In tough times, existential responsibility requires that we just persist in a respectable and ultimately fulfilling way. The result of such an approach doesn't produce Nirvanic ecstasy. There is no such thing.

The wish to be happy all the time is childish. A sense of fulfillment is the realistic goal.

gazettefan Jan 15, 2009 at 7:07 a.m.
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gazettefan Jan 15, 2009 at 7:03 a.m.
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You clearly demonstrate that you are unwilling, or unable to support any of your assertions with any kind of references, or facts.
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You have proven my point.
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You are irrational!

Gazettefan -

This is one long blog, and please understand if I missed it somewhere in your messages, but, what is your belief? Do you believe in self or a higher power of some sort? I am trying to get a fix on you. What drives you in great times of uncertainty, distress, or need? You certainly have the gift of wonderful thought. Are you thankful for this or other areas of your life? I ask these questions sincerely and not sarcastically.

ICY, people don't believe in god, they only believe in the belief in god.

People don't believe in god they only want others to believe in god. People want others to believe in god because people believe they will benefit from others believing in god.

ICY, try responding to an entire post and not just your misread part of it.

The golden rule is a humanist mentality that was co-opted by religions and presented as though humans couldn't have conceived of it on their own.

thekid3477 Jan 14, 2009 at 10:22
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The point is, the very construct for the “good and righteous life” that you live in (If in fact you live and were raised here in the the U.S., being the Internet you could be anywhere) were founded on Judeo-Christian principles.
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Can you choose to live within that construct? Absolutely! But to deny that Religion upon which that construct was founded, does not influence you, is illogical, and, or disingenuous!
..
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Second point; When one ventures into an open forum such as the Gazette. One can postulate that it will represent the demographics of region/nation.
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Since identified Atheist’s make up .3 % (yes that’s point 3) percent of the population, based on 2001 US Census information ( http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/2... ), (http://www.census.gov/popest/archives/20... ), I find it entertaining that this group feigns aversion, when there is dissenting commentary to their opinion, from the other 99 % plus populous.
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It is also quite irrational!

My New Year's Resolution is I will NOT discuss religion with the bloggers on the Gazette
:)

i didnt mean to imply that i made the statement up. what i meant is that its possible to live that lifestyle and not spend every sunday in church or even care if theres a higher power that notices you are living life by the golden rule. is faith the ONLY thing, in your eyes, that allows some one to live with principles and have a good and righteous life??

thekid3477 Jan 14, 2009 at 9:48 p.m.
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….TREAT OTHERS AS I WANT TO BE TREATED,…
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I think I have seen that somewhere before?
..
You shall love your neighbour as yourself.
JUDAISM: Leviticus 19.18
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Treat others as thou wouldst be treated by thyself.
SIKHISM: Adi Grandth
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Desire not for anyone the things that ye would not desire for
yourselves.
BAH ' FAITH: Gleanings 66
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That nature is only good when it shall not do unto another whatever is
not good for its own self.
ZOROASTRIANISM: Dadistan-i-Dinik
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All things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even
so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.
CHRISTIANITY: Matthew 7.12
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Not one of you is a believer until he loves for his brother what he
loves for himself.
ISLAM: Forty Hadith of an-Nawawi
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Hurt not others with that which pains yourself.
BUDDHISM: Udana 5.13
..
Regard your Neighbour's gain as your own gain and your neighbour's
loss as your own loss.
TAOISM:T'ai Shang Kan Ying P'ien
..
Never do to others what would pain thyself.
HINDUISM: Panchatantra 3.104
..
Do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you.
CONFUCIANISM: Analects 15.23
..
Carlisle Bah ' Group
http://www.bci.org/carlisle/truths.html
..
Another Hindu precept that is very similar:
..
Men gifted with intelligence and purified souls should always treat
others as they themselves wish to be treated. (Mahabharata 13.115.22)
..
The True Light
http://www.thetruelight.net/SiteExplanat...
..
I’m intrigued to find that religion has not affected you

gazettefan Jan 14, 2009 at 9:17 p.m.
..
ICY, if there's any truth to your claim about psychiatry…
..
I make no claim; I provided a reference to a document, identifying several studies detailing “religious affiliation is associated with significantly lower levels of suicide compared to religiously unaffiliated people, atheists and agnostics.”
..
I am fascinated by your self-constructed reality perspective though! Please continue to enlighten us.

if 'cannibals in South America are principled. in their frame of reference they live a good and righteous life' well...do you think they care what you think?? who are you to say that they are not living a good and righteous life?? their culture is to eat mans flesh, im sure as a RELIGOUS belief, so why does your religion trump theirs?? maybe they eat it for survival. i REALLY doubt they cannabilize for the same reasons as dahmer or hannibal lector.

what construct are you to determin my morality?? well, quite frankly, i dont give a rats keester what you think of my morality or how you want to gauge it. if i do what i decide is the right thing to do in any given situation, and TREAT OTHERS AS I WANT TO BE TREATED, then who are you to deem me immoral just because we dont share a faith??

ICY, I already explained that. Scroll down and step out of your own windy atmosphere for a while.

ncpanfan: Interesting that in response to the same posts your demeanor is so much more pleasant than billnewbie's, alesthiea's, and ICY's.

thekid3477 Jan 14, 2009 at 8:33 p.m.
..
I_C_Y: define my principles?? what a silly question. and a good and righteous life by what reference?? that too is silly.
..
Let me try to elucidate for you; Cannibals in South America are principled. In their frame of reference they live a good and righteous life.
..
The problem is that if you are not a cannibal, you just may become their lunch!
..
If you say you don’t follow any religion, but say that you are a moral person, by what construct are we to determine that morality?

ICY, if there's any truth to your claim about psychiatry re: religious people, that truth only reflects that religious people have deluded themselves about the rigors of reality. They've shirked their existential responsibilities.

For example, the positive face psychiatry puts on believers would also include the pedophile priests in the Catholic Church. Considered the self-absorbed happiness of the offending priests as they continue on their multi-parish, multi-victim rampage until they're caught, after which they remain unrepentant. Bad, conscienceless people are happy.

Edgewater, thanks.

Yes, thekid, he's probably chug-a-lugging the red stuff.

"If it seems more difficult to be good without a belief in god, that's because to do so takes courage and character." Gazette: I really liked this comment! :)I don't think it should be more difficult to be good without a belief in God and in fact you have to admire anyone who stands up and chooses to do right even though it may not be the easiest or most popular way. I do not have my faith because I fear God. I have my faith because I love Him and my faith helps me through hard times. I also like to do the right thing or pass on love and kindness because it just makes me feel better about myself. If I can help someone or make someone happy by some small act of kindness then I feel I have made a contribution to the world and helped to make it a better place (although as mentioned earlier theses days it doesn't seem like a very good place anymore). I don't do it for money, or fame or glory but just because it makes me happy. (So much that my friends call me a happy geek, LOL oh well I can live with that!)Now I know this is just my opinion and I am entitled to it and many may disagree but it is just who I am. -
Remember smiles are contagious; be a carrier!!!!

no i dont disagree with you at all. im aware other people will be affected by someones decision but the guilt/reward of the decision is no ones but mine. you may have to live with a negative choice i make, and you may be rewarded from a positive effort...but the fact is you have to live with the CONSEQUENCES of the choice...i, and i alone have to live with the choice i made...and ironically maybe NOT the consequences. i agree to that it SEEMS like evils are gaining on the goods, but in the big picture i dont think its even close. if there was ANY way to put a % on evil vs good of 100 or 200 years ago...i bet you would see the % was close to the same then as now. the difference is with the current technology if someone commits a sin, or does evil in janesville, wi and its relevant in tallahasee, fl you know about it RIGHT NOW. even if its not relevant you know about. we just KNOW of more evil now...that doesnt mean more exists.
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I_C_Y: define my principles?? what a silly question. and a good and righteous life by what reference?? that too is silly. i have the same principles and reference to a good and righteous life as those who attend church every sunday. again, i know the faith based have trouble with this, but it really is possible to live life by just treating others as you would want to be treated w/out having to do it to impress an almighty 'being'. im not bashing religion here...cuz if having faith makes your personal life better well who am i to say thats not the way it should be. my point is that if you lead life with principles of doing right instead of wrong you should live a good and righteous life and be accepted into the heaven of whichever religion is correct. if the doorman tells me im goin south cuz i didnt attend church every sunday or give 10% of my check to them...well then honestly that sounds like an elitist group id rather not be a part of to begin with.
.
gfan: please dont blame my stuff for I_C_Y cuz based on your numbers, and uncle sams, theres a way better chance I_C_Y consumed a little to much 'blood of christ';) odds are good, real good, ill 'cheat' for the plunge. sorta the same as the other 10 people were meeting at a bar...only ill have to hide in my car to do mine what with all the ignorance and hypocrisy....;)

Science does not admit anything. It proves its case through experiments that can be repeated. Experiments that can't be repeated are thrown aside. Sadly, you would not look through Galileos telescope because it would not serve the Glory of God. People like atheistlia, prove how religion can become an addiction. You speak of evidence but provide none. You speak of a glory of God that is even beyond any language Jesus himself used. Jesus doubted God and yet you are unable to follow his example. Right now men of unflinching faith are bombing innocent people believing full well in the righteousness of their cause. Talk about a false prophet.

I have to admit - these messages are good reading and very informative. People's posts show solid opinions and, for the most part, are respectful of others. This sure beats reading complaints about lack of street plowing, salting of streets, the cold weather, and other trivial topics. Thank you sincerely bloggers, especially to Gazettefan, Darwin1 and Billnewbie.

thekid... I agree with most of that. But the part about me having to live with your decisions I don't agree with. We've got a culture of misguided generations who were raised with no morals or values in their lives and they do effect my children, and other people's children. If you don't buy into that, take a good look at some of the schools around the area. Go into the inner cities of Chicago and New York and tell me what you see. The old cliche', "You hang out with dogs long enough, you'll get fleas" is true. Evil has always existed in our societies as far back as history goes, however, the good always outweighed and outnumbered the evil. The tide has been turning over time and the good is losing out. Do you live in the same world as me? I believe so. Whether you or I like it or not, WE all DO have a moral obligation as to the way we conduct our lives everyday and this world is way bigger than just you and me. If you disagree with that, I'm sorry to hear that, but, it's the truth.

gazettefan Jan 14, 2009 at 4:33 p.m.
..
…Religion is no better than people without religion.
..
And yet, documentation supports otherwise:
The American Journal of Psychiatry religious affiliation is associated with significantly lower levels of suicide
(http://www.adherents.com/misc/religion_s...)

gazettefan Jan 14, 2009 at 6:33 p.m.
..
Perhaps if you use your scroll button to move down the page to your original comment denoted, it will be in a format more presentable to you.

ICY, are you high?!!! You're posts don't make any sense.

gazettefan Jan 14, 2009 at 8:45 a.m.
..
ICY, did you misstate your item number 2?
..
Did you misread it?
..
I'm referring to the hell mentioned by aletheia. But in any case, you pick it. Or refer to all hells, if there is more than one.
..
So you have no reference? You rely on others beliefs?
..
And quit dodging the question!
..
Au contraire, if you can’t define your statements, and, or, positions, how can I possibly answer them? Unless you are expecting some type of SWAG?

thekid3477 Jan 14, 2009 at 5:42 p.m
..
…enough to keep me in line with my principles...
..
Please define?
..
….a good righteous life..
..
By what reference?

thekid, what's this not judging people?!!! Humans do it all the time. What you mean is: be tactful about expressing your judgment.

Some people regard the pope as a bling festooned drag queen. He really is a spectacle. I think if JC did come back, he'd give the pope a good b-slapping.

Yeah, that's it. Will you be tokin' before the plunge?
---------------
matthew..., even so called religious people don't factor in being watched by god during all their positive actions. I think it was Max Weber (Veber) who said that: society is god.

What he meant is: the urge to be good is the result of a social contract each member of society has with the rest of society. To be good is believed to cause other people to be good to you (and it does, though not all the time, whether or not people are religious). The other benefit is the satisfaction derived from being good. This is what holds it all together. It's the golden rule. The golden rule came from humans and one way or another, a long time ago, it was co-opted by religion. Religion co-opted all the good things (and bad things) about humans.

If it seems more difficult to be good without a belief in god, that's because to do so takes courage and character.

yes. answering to myself and only myself is enough to keep me in line with my principles. how do i hold myself accountable?? well i just do. god doesnt have to live my decisions. you dont have to live with my decisions. ONLY I HAVE TO, which means i should be accountable to ONLY MYSELF. nevermind the fact that if youre living a good righteous life there shouldnt be much to be accountable for. its a hard concept for the 'faith based' to grasp...but it really is just that simple...

it shouldnt be about money but it 'mostly' is. but 'some people' 'some churches'. its not like you to judge gfan;). are you saying the pope is wearing bling?? umm what do you mean will i be cheating?? im not sure how one can cheat when one jumps into freezing cold water. are you asking if i will catch a buzz before i jump in??

Okay people we get it. It's possible to live a moral and principled life without having religion in your life. Nobody is disputing that. Certainly not I! Here's my question... how do you hold yourself accountable to living that moral life and is answering to yourself and only yourself enough to keep you in line with those principles? People think they don't need motivation or positive influence in their lives on a regular basis and they couldn't be more wrong. It's like taking a shower. We need to do it everyday or we get stinky. Our attitudes work the same way. We're human. That's why I'm so convinced and it's been proven that our daily dose of motivation via the media-- TV, radio, periodicals, video games etc. aren't going to get that done. Anyone who thinks it's healthy and that our culture can recover as long as we continue down the path we're traveling, they need a reality check. To each his own, but, any parent with kids who thinks our media is just "peachy".... turn on the TV and watch "Two and a Half Men" once. Is it funny, I admit, it sure is. Is it healthy for my children, absolutely not. Is it readily available for anyone to watch, you bet it is. Is it censored by the FCC? Not anymore. Profanity, sex, immoral conduct have become acceptable in our mass media and we have a culture of people who don't know the difference between moral and immoral, yet, wonder why crime is at an all time high and why their children become disconnected from them. We can continue to bury our heads in the sand and act like this isn't happening, or good people can do the right thing and start standing up and doing something about it. Those that are all about themselves and could care less will keep their heads in the sand and those who care will step up and do something. Plain and simple.

Good one, darwin1.

ncpanfan, it shouldn't be about money but it mostly is, at least for some people and some churches. Consider the jewelery the pope wears etc.

thekid, will you be cheating on that polar plunge?

Who ever said being religious was about making money? Maybe at some churches, but not in one's heart...

Here is a suggestion for the religious. Start a company called Religious Solutions Inc. You could provide religiously based solutions for engineering, medical, educational problems and see how much money you make. Good luck.
-
Religion is not a science because it begins with a conclusion and seeks evidence to support the conclusion: this is dogma. Darwin gathered hundreds of specimens and came to a theory based on that evidence. In fact, he didn't even come up with it first and admits as much in his book which I am will to bet no religious person on this blog has read (lazy). There are many good books by actual scientists like Carl Sagan and Richard Dawkins which can explain this better. Intelligent design = God did it. The next time I take a biology test I will just write God did it.

Persecution is not proof your right. If that were the case then all Hebrew people would be right about everything.

Saw the Ben Stein interview. Life didn't randomly occur nor does it randomly evolve. It evolves towards life. Dawkins pointed this out himself in his book, but Stein is such a buffoon that he doesn't even know this.

good thing your plunge isn't tomorrow, you would be jumping into ice and freezing that way!! LOL

hey Kid, he doesn't have to be that close.

i have no doubt nc. they think appearance alone gets them into heaven regardless of their 'closet'. i bet the big guy can sniff out a phony a mile away...:)

i cant even imagine a world where people do the right thing...cuz...well..its the right thing to do.
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speakin of the right thing to do...some friends and i have signed up for the polar plunge next month in madison to benefit the wisconsin special olympics!! go to this link and donate if youd like...or email me and i will give you a link to my page and you can pledge me whatever to help me hit my goal!!
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https://www.specialolympicswisconsin.org...

Kid: There are alot of people out there who go to church every Sunday who don't have a clue what true faith is. They make appearances but that isn't what it is about. :)

But that is kinda what I am saying, that we need to be good people and do things that are right and good because it is the right thing to do, even if you have no religion or faith. What a better place the world would be!-
I try to live right and be kind to others and not just because it is what my God and faith say we should do but because in my heart I know it to be the right thing to do.-
:) LOL I think I am married to a cranky old man and his dad is way worse!!

thekid, I think I'm getting that!

And if Moses hallucinated fantastic things it was because he was smoking that burning bush!!!

ncpanfan, most people base their opinions about religion on pure reason.

Certain religious people exemplify the irrationality of religion. Take billnewbie for example. The way he deals with the disorientation he's experiencing from this debate is to trick himself into believing that he and I think alike.

good posts. to get my digs in i started reading the bible once but gave up when they started talkin about stuff that was physically impossible. i dont know...i got bored and picked up a dift fictional book;) but i have read in MY bible, the emperor wears no clothes, that JC possibly had a hempen elixer in his glass at the last supper:)
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someone posted there are 10,000 religions?? really?? how do you know your religion is the correct one. i mean if there REALLY is a god/heaven there certainly cant be 10,000 of them. i chose not to worship, not sayin i dont believe and not sayin i do, but i dont worship cuz my belief is that if i live my life as a good person and follow the golden rule i should be accepted into anyones heaven regardless of whether i went to church every sunday or even to their church for that matter. god or allah or whomever you want to believe would have to be a real A hole to turn a hippie pothead away:)

ncpanfan, to some degree religion served as an expression of positive human qualities. The problem is that religion, contrary to its shouts of righteousness, also serves as an expression of negative human qualities. Religion is no better than people without religion.

People use religion as an easy fix for the shock that comes from being alive. Well, as we are seeing now, the easy fix has run it's course. It is disingenuous to assume goodness under the fear of a supernatural punisher. Such an assumption gives license to all sorts of bad human behavior by embracing the sanction of a powerful patron.

It's time to show courage by being good beyond the shadow of the cranky old man.

Oops one more thing, sorry... Some of them had bad experiences with religion thus leading to their choice to not believe or to decide against: and it was with the "structured" church, not the faith behind it that caused them to distrust religion...

Oh and I would have to respectfully disagree that you cannot blame it on something other than religion. I know alot of good people who are agnostic and even atheists and in their opinion (and mine) they live their lives trying to make good and right decisions. Just because they don't believe in God or question who or what they believe in they still feel like it is their choice to do right or wrong so religion plays no part in their decisions. Just as they try to live a good life, there are others who choose to make bad decisions (murder, theft, etc..)

gazette: So you agree that religion at one time had a positive effect on people? I think the issue is that too many people look at the "structure" of this religion or that religion when it should be based on the faith and teachings and beliefs, not the physical church or buildings or what the laws of this church or that church are, do you know what I am trying to say? -
Love one another, judge not lest ye be judged, take care of your fellow brethren and sisters,etc....
I think that is why people have come to hate religion, not because of the reasons behind it but the fact that it is misused and some are a bunch of hypocrits who because they say and do what they do "in the name of Jesus or christianity" turn others off instead of letting them see the good that can come from true faith and good deeds and kindness and love...

People get so wrapped up in their hate for religion, that they miss the good it stands for. Too many people who can't get the pride thing out of the way and wouldn't admit they were wrong even if they knew in their hearts it was absolutely the right thing. It's called cutting of thine noses to spite thine face.

Good point, ncpanfan, but how does all that fit into the context of religion or lack of religion? The problem-people come directly or indirectly from parents or grandparents etc. who came of age in a society when religion had a greater positive influence on people than it does now. What dissipated whatever positive influence religion had on the thinking and behavior of people? I think it's a mistake to blame something outside of religion. The answer is that there is something intrinsic about religion that fails the human experience. (This is especially exemplified in the Catholic Church and the sorry, hermetic and alienated mentality of many of the posters here.) Sooner or later this was bound to happen. It's happening now.

Everything positive that has ever come out of religion was an expression of innate human goodness. Now is the time to recognize that important fact and now is the time to shed the delusion of the cranky old man.

No Gazettefan, I have no interest in your opinions on the consignment of babies to hell. You do not accept the existence of such a place therefore your opinion would be just another characterization of how you perceive and interpret the opinions of others. I want your opinion. I don't want your opinion my opinion, or that of anyone else. I would like you to articulate why you are an atheist if you can. I don't think you can without the usual ridicule, allusions, characterizations and interpretations of God and those who believe in Him because atheism, like evil, cannot stand alone.
.
Some claim that evil is equal to good. But that's not true. An evil person does not commit evil deeds for the sake of evil the way a good person commits good deeds for the sake of goodness. An evil act always has as its goal something good. Take promiscuity for instance. The promiscuous want sex, or probably its end result, orgasm, which is itself a good thing. We may differ in what constitutes promiscuity but we all agree that one may not simply have sex with whomever one chooses. So the goal of an evil act isn't to propagate evil, it's goal is something good that the perpetrator desires. So it is with atheism. One cannot articulate an atheistic philosophy without some reference to God, His perceived injustice and the perceived injustice of His followers. Aside from your own posts, scroll down and read the entries written by those who believe as you. Not one positive argument in favor of atheism that does not have at its root something negative about God and/or his followers such as " It's interesting that some people don't grasp the fact that if the world is going to heck in a handbasket, it's because religion has had a foothold on humanity for thousands of years and not because something awful outside religion is screwing everything up." Sound familiar?
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The fact is that atheism cannot stand alone. It needs the concept of God for its very existence. In fact, it's not atheism at all, it's anti-theism.
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That's how I see it, let's have your prospective, Gazettefan.

gazettefan-- It's just the opposite. The further this country has gotten away from the Christian based principles this country was founded on, the further we've dipped into chaos. The Constitution wasn't designed to designate a national religion, it was designed by intellects who knew without principled guidelines that withstood time, it would be impossible to prevent lawlessness! Those foundational principles have been constantly compromised by people who have choose to serve their best interests rather than the good of all. When you allow that to become acceptable in your culture, society's crumble. I'm not into telling someone that I feel they're not close enough to God or anything remotely close. I am into standing up and saying that we've moved way too far away from the principles that made this country so great. It boils down to leadership. Character, integrity and accountability are killing this country! (The lack thereof) Don't look at the leaders we have now and point fingers, look in the mirror at ourselves and ask OURSELVES, "what have we allowed to happen to OUR country"??? The people in leadership roles were born naked and screaming just like the rest of us. They were taught to be self serving, they were taught that integrity wasn't a big deal, they were taught character wasn't a big deal. The principles of moral and ethical living have been broken down and diluted and the only way to fix it, is to get back to those principles. In essence, that foundation is made up of two components, "right" or "wrong"......there is no in between.

Gazette: I agree about the world but could it be due to the fact that some people don't have morals anymore, some parents let their kids run wild without teaching them manners and how to act and to treat others (heck alot of those same parents act the same way), criminals don't fear the law anymore because in most cases they get off easy or no trouble at all, etc... the list could go on and on. Whatever happened to helping your neighbor and treating others the way you would like to be treated, being honest, being kind???

It's interesting that some people don't grasp the fact that if the world is going to heck in a handbasket, it's because religion has had a foothold on humanity for thousands of years and not because something awful outside religion is screwing everything up.

billnewbie, does your weird reaction have something to do with my baby/hell question? If so, don't be so all over the place; maintain the proportion by asking me the same question.

I won't mention an specific religions, but, in one in particular, if you go against the laws of their religion, you're banished for life. That would be a cult. Me, being a Christian can break every commandment and never be banished from my Chrisitan church. (The church is the person!) In Christianity, it's already accepted that we are all fallen and Jesus died on the cross for our future shortcomings. Plus, Christian faith professes not to judge others, but treat others as you would like to be treated yourself. In other words, Christian faith teaches to live and let live and refrain from one's own judgement, however, be prepared for your final judgement by the almighty should you choose not to live a moral and principled life that is commanded of you while you're here on Earth.

futureteacher~ People like you are the reason people choose to home school their children. The teachings going in many of our schools today reflect your biased and misdirected feelings. If anything, public schools with their "new age intellect cirriculum" that's mandated, monitored and forcefed to these teachers to be passed onto the upcoming generations is a "cult"! I don't see many teachers taking a stand and putting their foot down when it comes to teaching our true history as opposed to this new aged redirect that's so apparent. I know, they gotta make a living right?? At the expense of our youth and compromising the foundation this country was built on? Get real. Any religion that professes "you will do this or else" mentality could very well be a cult. Christianity isn't one of them! There are principles set forth that have been the same for 2000 years that act as guidelines for people to build a strong, healthy, productive life around. What's so bad about that? Here's an example first hand that religion isn't a cult: My God professes that "thou shalt not kill".....yet, many people, including Chrisitans, choose to go against that principle. A very noble principle, but, nonetheless, they still kill. How is that a cult. In a cult people do everything they're told to do. The same is true with every principle God layed out and simplified it by breaking it down to the bare minimum and called it the TEN COMMANDMENTS. These are guidelines. He gave people freewill and these guidelines for them to live a principled life and this life he expects people to live is all about loving and serving others. Again, most people don't do that either. Where's the "cult"???? If teachers waiver from the cirriculum regardless if it's right or wrong, they get fired. HMM...sounds a bit cultish to me.

Islam doesn`t believe Jesus was crucified, or died in any way, just went to heaven before any kind of death. He is number two on their list of prophets behind Muhammad.

Factcheck needs a fact check. Christians believe that Christ was crucified and rose ascended alive into heaven as well. Then there was that event between the two that so many find unbelievable, that Christ rose from the dead which is a necessary detail to make accepting both of the other 2 events possible.

So, Gazettefan finds my definition of him to be defective? It probably is, at least to some degree. Yet he still chooses not to define himself while offering such definitions of others apparently being oblivious to his own perceptive limitations.
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Come on, Gazettefan, weigh in with your own opinions. "Just post your views in your own words, please, and take the effort and the risk". Isn't it disingenuous to suggest a course of action for someone that you will not take yourself?

I gave you the sources, it`s up to you if you want to check or take my word on "faith!"

There are over 10,000 religions in the world, the majority are considered Christian. They cannot agree on what the "one true religion" is. Every one thinks they are the "one." I could care less about what anyone believes until it starts to interfere with other peoples rights to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." When they say, "you don`t believe what I do, you`re going to Hell, and I don`t want you to be married, or get an abortion, or vote, or even live!" Then they infringe on my rights to believe, or not, on whether I`ll be allowed to work at certain places, gay marriage, even to just let me live. There are religious wars going on right now because certain adherents to their religion do not want people of different religions to even exist. Most religions believe in one god, but after that they vary tremendously. Jesus was either crucified(Christian), or rose to heaven while alive(Islam). If you would just believe what you are sure is right, and leave the other guy alone, this would be a better world. Remember, your religion is also just a product of where you were born, if you had been born in Saudi Arabia, chances are you would be a Muslim! "Those who believe in the Quran, AND those who follow the Jewish Scriptures, AND the Christians...AND all who believe in God and the last day and work righteousness, shall have their reward with their Lord." Quran 2:62 Nobody can PROVE evolution(yet), but you can`t prove creationism either! By the way, "self replicating RNA", has been done by scientists since 2007. Sciencemag.org astrobiologymag-january 2008

Placebo, my version of your offering is:

When something good happens, god gets the credit, when something bad happens, humans get the blame.

There's something very misanthropic about that. It should compel all people to be humanists.

Part of the nuttiness going on in the world today involves religious people killing each other over their faiths.

Treat others how you want to be treated.

As someone looking from the outside in, why is it when something bad happens its God's will, yet when something good happens its God looking out for someone or something?

Why can't people take credit for their accomplishments and failures. You win some you lose some, God or no God.

Continue to argue. I'm sure all religious issues will be put to rest on this comment page.

whythefuss, saying you DON'T KNOW re: the babies/hell question is an acceptable answer to me. You should have said so sooner.

billnewbie, OUCH, such a scathing indictment of me. By the way, I was raised a Lutheran.

alethieia, you didn't answer the baby/hell question because your answer is YES. If that weren't the case you would have answered with a NO, instead you were avoidant. Claiming I took something out of context is only more of your attempt to be advoidant.

To all, any discussion of religion runs the risk of being questioned by reality.

Thanks ncpanfan :-) Happily for everyone here, I have no time to bloviate (and we know I am capable of that!), but since several people have answered gazettefan's question, I was really asking a serious question of him when I asked "Why are you reading this obviously Christian story anyway? To "learn", or to belittle those of faith?" I really, really want to know, and the answer is probably much easier to define in a "yes" or "no" way.

Billnewbie -

Excellent response to Gazettefan. Well thought out. Let's see what his next response is. I highly doubt it will top your message. Curious minds want to see....

gazettefan, I'll speak for myself instead of letting you put words in my mouth.
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Ultimately I don't know what happens to un-baptized babies. I am confident in God and his infinite wisdom to decide what is best and right.
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I am sure you will continue to post your question because that is a tactic you use. It is neither risky nor bold. You are merely argumentative. I don't truly believe you care about the answer.
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By the way what does your question have to do with the article- sounds off topic if you ask me.

Since Gazettefan won't define himself and as he appears to claim the right to define me, I hereby claim the right to define him.
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Gazettefan suffers from post Catholicism syndrome (an unoffical condition). Since the only exposure he’s had to Christianity is through that Church which he so vehemently rejects, and since he believes that Roman Catholicism is the root of all Christianity which that Church itself proclaims (it is not), then he freely assigns all its perceived deficiencies upon all Christians. Since the Catholic Church teaches that all infants must be baptized within that Church to achieve salvation, Gazettefan automatically assigns such doctrine to all Christians. He has little knowledge outside of Catholic teachings of the Reformation and Protestantism. He cannot perceive that Christians exist who do not accept the sacraments. It has escaped his notice that there are Christians who do not accept baptism and what he calls eucharist as devices for the forgiveness of sins. He believes that because he found Catholics who seemed eager to consign all non-Catholics to hell that all Christians must also believe thus. In short, the revulsion he holds for his childhood Catholicism has left him quite myopic, theologically speaking.

Good post RU!! :)

whythefuss, yes, I don't take reading assignments. Just post your views in your own words, please, and take the effort and the risk.

Also, it is duly noted that your unexpressed answer to the question....

When non-christian babies die, do they go to hell?

... is YES.

------------------

ncpanfan..., your "faith" seems to be a mental mechanism designed by you to give you comfort during hard times, there's nothing wrong with that because it doesn't seem to make you aggressive, hostile, or irrational.

You are not included with the ilk here who believe that when non-christian babies die they go to hell.

Why don't you let me define me, while you can define you, if you dare.

No one asked me-but if I may give the very obvious answer to the question of whether (any) babies go to hell if they die: Of course they do not, any more than they go to jail for any "crimes" they might commit while in diapers. Babies are not capable of even fathoming the concept of believing in God or not, or of being a faithful follower. A baby is not capable of rational thinking. I believe in a fair and just God, and He alone can judge fairly when you are responsible for your thoughts and actions. So, these kinds of determinations are really between God and the indivdual-do you remember your first experience with being aware what you were doing or thinking was a "no-no"? You don't really have "free will" when you can't even go make your own bottle.
Why are you reading this obviously Christian story anyway? To "learn", or to belittle those of faith?

LOL

Well, billnewbie, your belief is developed enough for scrutiny and it obviously leaves you with a deep sense of shame. Although the enormity of that shame is yet to be understood by you.

You and your kind believe that when non-christian babies die they go to hell.

And according to alisthesia, even christian babies who die go to hell because they haven't had a chance to examine themselves.

Now scroll down and post your next non-sequitur.

Gazettefan: I am a believer and I have faith and that faith has seen me through many troubled times. I can't explain it or the way it makes me feel but it is my choice. -
I don't think non-christian babies go to hell when they die. How could they be held accountable when they haven't reached an age to make their choices? Of course that is just my opinion and I do not claim to know everything...

Gazettefan- do non-christian babies go to hell?
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Since you are so interested to this answer, let us know when you get there.
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Obviously your only intent to this question is to stir the pot, as you have accused me of in the past - you really don't care about the answer, you're just using un-christian babies to promote your side of the story.
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Here is one take on it from the WELS http://www.wels.net/cgi-bin/site.pl?1518...
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Althought I am sure you won't take the time to read it since you really don't want an answer.

It seems the lion has a thorn in its paw.

That's just a rationalized justification of your disingenuousness, Gazettefan. I know you have a position, state it and then you can defend it just like you are trying to make those others defend themselves. Or is your philosophy not yet well enough developed for such scrutiny?

My question is not disingenuous, billnewbie, but your unwillingness and the unwillingness of the apostles here to answer it is disingenuous. How can you live with such a disturbing mentality?

My question is the real world slapping you in the face and rattling your fragile, sad little world. The answer to my question lingers and festers along side the organized criminality of the Catholic Church.

And your sophomoric and failed attempts at wit and humor are a sign of panic.

If you attempt to discuss religion and science with the "believers" like alesthiea and ICY they are only able to just make stuff up.

But if you ask them a very specific question like...

When non-christian babies die, do they go to hell?

... they can answer the question but the don't because they believe that the answer is YES, when non-christians babies die, they do go to hell.

Their religiosity is symptomatic of severe alienation from the real world and is, at a minimum, a strong indication of schizotypal personality disorder or even full blown schizophrenia.

I'm so disappointed. I was expecting lyrics.

Like the inquisitors he claims to detest, Gazettefan is only seeking answers which he can use to condemn. What chutzpah for that not so artful dodger to demand that others stop dodging.
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Gazettefan, why don't you stop trying to sandbag the unwary with your disingenuous questions and just state your position. Come on, man up! Make your stand and take the same kind of lumps you so eagerly want to distribute. State your case or shut your face! (I don't really want you to shut up, that line was so clever that I just had to use it)

In answer to someones question, I have math degree and am getting certified to teach math k-12.

I think religion is big business. It is hypocritical then to the moral and ethical values it preaches. There is that book in another thread for example. Dont read or own it because you will go to hell.... please. Words are words. Facts are proved facts and belief in something non factual with so much of a persons core is silly.
While I am a zappa fan, and i can think of many quotes from him on religion, my point was they would be taken just as i take those from bible belters who need to quote a fiction book as proof of its validity.
ok, a couple . . . hehe

"Remember there a big difference between kneeling down and bending over"

"The essence of Christianity is told to us in the Garden of Eden history. The fruit that was forbidden was on the Tree of Knowledge. The subtext is, All the suffering you have is because you wanted to find out what was going on. You could be in the Garden of Eden if you had just kept your f'ing mouth shut and hadn't asked any questions."

“The only difference between a cult and a religion is the amount of real estate they own”

darwin1 Jan 14, 2009 at 8:14 a.m.
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It appears you believe in the religion of “new science”, i.e. Dawkins, Harris and Hitchens.
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Please provide some references to support your hyperbole.
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As for “Cold Fusion”, perhaps you should do a little research on “LENR (Low Energy Nuclear Reactions) and CANR (Chemically Assisted Nuclear Reactions) “ because Billions of US tax dollars are being spent at several Universities repeating and trying to understand the process of “Cold Fusion”.
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Here are some links:
http://newenergytimes.com/index.htm
http://lenr-canr.org/
http://www.cerg.org/research/publication...
http://www.ias.ac.in/currsci/apr102008/8...

ICY, did you misstate your item number 2?

I'm referring to the hell mentioned by aletheia. But in any case, you pick it. Or refer to all hells, if there is more than one.

And quit dodging the question!

Darwin1~ For you!
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=...

gazettefan Jan 14, 2009 at 6:46 a.m.
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When non-Christian babies die, will they go to hell?
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1. Your enquiry is disingenuous.
2. You have no facts to support your assumption that Christian babies will not go to hell.
3. Define hell?

We know she had no faith in the end because of the many letters she left behind saying as much.

Look back at history. Time and time again when religion has tried to explain the natural world it has ALWAYS been wrong. Science and its methods have time and again proved the religious wrong. Science unlike religion admits its mistakes and changes according to the facts. Remember cold fusion. I don't really care if people believe in a Deity or not. What I care about is when public policy is distorted because of it.

EO Wilson researched how science progressed over time and found that basically people had to die. Is this what religion offers? People so unwilling to change that they must die for it to happen.

With all that blather and pseudo-wisdom, billnewbie and alethesia and a few others here can't answer this question:

When non-christian babies die, will they go to hell?

realitybytes~ that site is just another tool that satan uses to keep people from being close with God. So many pretenders with their hidden agendas. They like to keep chipping away at the foundations of our culture and we're allowing it to happen. We should be ashamed of ourselves. I am.

Darwin -

Please don't confuse religion with Christianity or faith. You used both terms to convey the same idea which makes you look uninformed with no basis of facts, just opinion. For example, can you back up the comment that faith-based or God-based people are lazy? At the risk of sounding boastful, and I do so to make a point so please see take it in the proper context, but I hold a Doctorate in Economics and two Masters in Business, so would you honestly call me lazy? I also believe in God, but do not practice religion. People practice religion, faith in [a] God is a deep belief. You seem like an intelligent person; however, your generalities lose you points.

By the way - the comment about bleeding and a form of treatment is very insulting and woefully ignorant, if you are referring to the Crucifixion. If I assumed wrong, please disregard.

Respectfully

Perhaps some think that if a christian of some stature can be discredited then the whole of Christianity will collapse. While some may worship at the feet of Mother Teresa, most do not. Still it is interesting that since that icon had what can be called moments of doubt in faith, many seize on this as proof that she was in fact without faith "in the end". While that may be true, no one can know such a thing conclusively about another. To claim such is pure conjecture and representing that conjecture as fact is disingenuous.
It's amusing that those who have so little regard for honesty often smugly claim superiority.

What were we before we were monkeys? I forget...Dub190
*
You are the missing link. Q.E.D.

darwin1 Jan 13, 2009 at 9:05 p.m.
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Perhaps you could actually supply some references to support your hyperbole?
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I am fascinated how a population group (Atheist’s) representing less than 1 percent of the population can continue to perpetuate such grand charade of being “the intellectual group”, when as much, have been documented are less than such?
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(http://irrationalatheist.com/downloads.h...)

Just a reminder that Saint Mother Theresa had no faith in God in the end. You see most religious people lead very sheltered lives of God because they are afraid of the things they don't understand. When they don't understand something it is miraculous or God did it. They know a lot of non-details and non-specifics. They have vague criticisms of science because most have never read a science book. Most aren't even very smart Christians. They ignore passages like love your neighbor as yourself and turn the other cheek. Most act like faith is an arms race each claiming to have more faith than the other. When they quote the bible they leave out the contradictions, the glorification of sex and violence, they can't even grasp the concept of a new and old "testament". Having faith in a real person is fine. Having faith in "something" is a little ridiculous. Have faith in what? Magic tonic that heals all? Bleeding as a treatment for what ails you? Faith in a god isn't a sign of weakness its a sign of being lazy. This explains why their are so many religious people and so few scientists. Can a man really live on the bible alone?

dub190 Jan 13, 2009 at 6:26 p.m.
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What were we before we were monkeys? I forget...
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Well of course a “MonkeyFishFrog” !
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(http://www.metacafe.com/watch/1504745/so...)
*** Warning Graphic language

Always look on the bright side of life. ( Insert Whistling )

Actually I personally have no concerns in that manner what so ever. It was more that I felt Aletheia was very condescending. In her response to me she said "What part of "in essence" and "not in essence" do you not comprehend?" Here she assumes that I must be of lesser intelligence and she must attempt to insult me.
"It is my hope you'll one day be restored from your emasculated condition." and here I only can guess she means that I am too effeminate to have any personal strength. LOL if she only knew my husband really laughed when I read him this one.
She did also make statements in regard to others (llund22) about their lack of faith and they were spitting on God and would be going to Hell.

Futureteacher

I am curious about you. Where do you plan to teach? What are your subjects? What will be the grade level?

Thanks

billnewbie~ that was well said. Great analogy about the lion. People with a cause that are willing to stand for whats right will always be going against the current. It's the way God intended. There are dead fish and there are live fish. I happen to be one of the living ones. Doesn't make me any more special than anyone else, just alive.

Quite true, that is not what the Lord intends. Yet how much of what you read here actually attempts to consign you to hell? Could it be that you only perceive it as such? Even if someone has attempted to make you fell that way, do you think that all are therefore so callous?

Bill there is a difference in defending your faith, even wanting to share your believes especially if it has given you inner peace and ridiculing and telling others they will burn in Hell for not believing the same. Making people feel that they are unintelligent and in general being hurtful is not what Jesus intended.

Remember the old Aesop's fable about the lion with the thorn in its paw? When the man who stumbled upon the lion removed the thorn the lion was grateful. In truth, if you try to remove a thorn from an untranquilized lion, you will be lucky to get your arm back without the hand. So it is with people. Those of us who defend our faith often face criticism that we are judgemental, intolerant, assuming, even arrogant and less than intelligent. How much of that pain is delivered by the words of the defender of faith and how much is perceived by those who guard wounds in their souls that may be inflamed by what they read?

future, So you have a hard time that the Bible is the best "SELLING" book of all time??
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What a thing to have a "problem" with.
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I'm sure there are far fewer dollars spent on bibles than on cars, so you must have a HUGE problem with cars.

lakekennedy~ our faith doesn't tell us these truths. God does. Like anyone else, Christians are required to walk the walk just like anyone else. The people who choose to live outside these principles are the one's who will have to answer. I realize it's the American way to deny these truths and take the easy way out and pretend they're not real so people can live their lives as self serving as they wish. That's fine. As I've said before, ideas have consequences. Just as people choose to break laws and violate rules, there are penalties for these actions whether we like them or not. Too many people trying to change something they have no control over. It's called being "fallen". Jesus took care of that part for everyone, it's up to the individual to their part.

It appears to me that Aletheia truly believes that (s)he is more intelligent than the masses. And proves that most highly religious people are hypocrites and intolerant of others. As I mentioned holier than thou. (S)he has spent a lot of effort in ridiculing others in this blog masked as Godly righteousness. I myself will continue to live my life helping the homeless, battered woman, giving of myself asking for nothing in return and hope that she is doing the same since she is obviously in "the" elite. Peace to my brothers and sisters.

Not all christians do that you know??

lake: Yes I do!! Who am I to judge anyone? It is not my place to, I am far from perfect and wouldn't want the job of judging others....

ncpanfan...you mean like when people who aren't christian are "lumped" together and said to be going to hell? Or like when homosexuals are "lumped" together and said to be going to hell? Just wondering how Christians have a problem of being "lumped" together when their faith does just that...

It seems strange that a "Future Teacher" would take issue with those who quote from sources of influence and then threaten to quote Frank Zappa in retaliation. Quote away FT but don't forget to properly attribute! I would be especially curious to see which quotes from old Frank you think may be applicable here.

. . . . . and your point is? You CAN use your own words to express your point, can't you? (sarcasm--->)I will try not to quote various sources of text like government documents or negatively rated music lyrics written by Frank Zappa to define my points .....if you could only do the same please.

future: Why must you say that if someone has faith they are a weak individual? You say it is a crutch for things they can't understand. Yes there are alot of things I don't understand and you must be very wise to call me weak. Can you explain everything that happens in the world to me? If you have a student in your future class who doesn't understand what you teach will you also call him or her weak and leave it at that? I think that to call someone weak because they have faith or believe in someone or something is wrong. Do you have people in your life that you have faith in or believe in (that they can accomplish something, that they love you, that they are faithful to you) If you do as most people do does that make you a weak individual? No it doesn't. I think it makes you stronger to have faith in someone or something and I believe that it can make you happier and maybe a better person at times. You have your beliefs and thoughts and I have mine as every person does, it doesn't mean we are right or wrong. We are entitled to our beliefs and to make fun of someone, insult someone or lump all people into one category is unfair and unjust.

future, to each his own. "Altheia" is the cancer that any large group has to put up with. There are many noble organizations, groups, religions etc. that have my utmost respect, regardless of the few like "Altheia" who make them look bad by feeling they have to hide behind someone else's intellect to get their point across. (Not sure what that point is)

aletheia,
your righteous dribble reminds me of marketed TV religion. I hope you have gotten your money's worth from whatever faith you "worship." Religion is for those weak individuals who need an explanation, scapegoat, and crutch for life and the things they cant understand. It is the best selling book on earth... SELLING! It is big business that rivals a world economy. It is fiction. 1000 years from now people like you may find a transcript of a steven king novel and profess that it is "gospel" Your blinders and those of others need adjusting.

Well done Ms. Idzerda! You've created that "internet blog traffic" that you set out to do. You should go to your superiors and demand residuals for this. My father was right many years ago when he said, "Garbage has value too".

"Aside from the obvious benefits, strengthening our spiritual fitness can have the added benefits of improving our relationships with others, improving our own mental health and making those Sunday trips to church more of a joy and less of a dutiful burden."

...not to mention blessing the church with tidings from your bank account, no wait, i mean the church will rid you of the evils of your bank account

Apparently, Gazettefan decided to sell himself the rope with which he has now hung himself, figuratively speaking, that is, since historical distortionists lose all credibility.
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No doubt he was kicked out of Mensa… for being even more narcissistic than that order of egotists can bear.

Bored...., gazettefan is away from his desk right now. Yes indeed, he was kicked out of Mensa for being a know it all!

GFAN seems like a know-it-all

Though communism is supposed to be atheistic, the Soviets, consistent with the dictum: religion is the opiate of the people, allowed the churches to exist.

Accordingly, religion and the churches there had nothing to do with the fall of Soviet Union. That downfall came from the de facto atheistic democracy and capitalism of the western world, especially the United States.

aletheia, how would know that?

All that book-learning and still incapable of answering a reasonable question.

Such immersion into a self-contained other worldliness explains the inability to deal with a reasonable, real-world question. Your studies are rendered worthless.

How does a non-christian baby (or any baby) examine him or herself?

I wonder why Gazettefan asks questions about spiritual matters? He has made it plain in past posts that he rejects all things spiritual yet here he is asking questions as if he had a real interest in the answers. Could it be that his real purpose has something to do with his crusade against faith? He asks questions about hell, the existence of which he adamantly rejects. Gazettefan offers critique of God and His intent concerning Abraham and Isaac while in fact he denies His existence and the validity of that story. It is obvious that Gazettefan is simply trolling for responses he can ridicule. At first glance one might think that Gazettefan is oblivious to how deceptive his posts are, but it seems clear from his posting history that he is well aware of it and that he has no problem with being dishonest.
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Come on Gazettefan, honesty is the best policy for your credibility. Either you reject God and all things spiritual (as you have stated so clearly) and proselytize thus, or you hate God and wish to undermine him and all who believe in him, one argument or the other. You seem enamored of courts of law, what would a judge call such contradictory arguments made at trial by the same party? Inadmissible, I suspect.
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The very basis of virtue is honesty. How can Gazettefan judge the virtuousness of God and those of us who believe in him or promote the theory that God is a fraud (whichever or if ever he settles on one) when he cannot even master that most basic of virtues.

Mainstreet, your comment was both hurtful and uncalled for ! I only asked that question because so many people were hell bent on me having my free stuff thing at a church. My question is, why? For the record,I never asked for fame nor do I just sit on a folding chair. It is a lot of work to do what I do and the paper came to me,not the other way around !

wiscchick: try this church

http://www.churchofreality.org

How exactly does one go from being "ungodly" to "wicked"? Didn't Jesus doubt God three times? Would this then make him ungodly and therefore wicked? Is St Mother Theresa then wicked because she didn't believe in God in the end?

For those who might have missed it let me say once again, this was a nice article. Thank you Ms. Idzerda for a positive piece.

OK, now back to "Worldviews in Conflict".

Wow, Mainstreet, I hope it's OK to ask my next question.

Aletheia, what determines which non-christian babies go to hell and which don't?

These posts serve to remind me why exactly I quit going to church.

I have not read all the comments here nor do I wish to. I think I have seen enough. For those who know me and that I have said Im not comfortable in a church,why have you not asked if I believe in God?? That question has gone through my mind several times since I was in the news and people blogged about me. If asked that question,I would have to say that I dont believe in something you cannot prove to me. It isnt that I dont believe in God,It is just that I have never seen any reason to believe. I think there is,for sure,a much higher power than us little people,I just have a hard time putting faith in some old guy in the clouds! I may be wrong, I may be right....one never knows until the end comes ! (now comes time where you all bash me)

I have no desire to study the Bible as I don`t believe in any religion. I don`t care if others do as long as they don`t interfere with my life, or anyone else who is not interested. I believe you can be a good person without religion, and I don`t usually get involved in these types of discussions because they are pointless. Nobody is going to change their mind here.

One can truly believe in their own religion, and in their mind they have found the way to Heaven. That`s fine, until they start insulting others who believe differently, albeit, just as faithfully, that they are right. The Bible is just a book, subject to interpretation, and revisions, a multitude of translations, deliberate exclusions, etc. As I said, nobody knows what has been excluded, or mis-translated, or even changed. I don`t care what people want to believe as long as they don`t try to hurt, or insult, someone who believes different. More people have been killed in the name of religion in the history of the world than can be counted. The Crusades used religion as an excuse to kill and plunder. The Inquisition as an excuse to rid the world of undesirables. Muslims target Jews, Protestants target Catholics, Christians used to kill Mormons. Now Islam is corrupting the Koran to send suicide bombers across the world. Believe what you want, but leave others out of your faith, unless they express an interest. This country was supposed to be founded on religious freedom, that is, if you are you are, if not, so be it.