Theism vs. Atheism ... will it ever be settled?

If people are offended by your large plastic testicles, that's their problem. 

Trademark wrote: The question isn't whether you CAN say those things, you certainly can (and have done so).  the real question is whether you should.  I am allowed by law to drive around with large plastic testicles hanging from the trailer hitch of my pick up truck.  The real question is Is it really a good idea to do something that is so clearly offensive to such a large number of people.  For my part the answer is no, it is not a good idea.  In a private discussion I can give my opinion in a way that may be well received.  In public it is not appropriate.

Mr ProgFreak wrote: jampa17 wrote: That's unaccurate to say the least. I have many friends that don't believe in God (most of them pretend no to, but I don't really mind) and we have very strong relationship without any of those "problems" of breaking or end up fighting. Try not to complicate it too much: Believers tell you what they believe, they don't have to force you to believe nothing, they just have to show you what they believe. You, in the other hand should take their words and try to understand them BEFORE confronting. It's what I've been telling you all this time, just try to put in anyones shoes and comprehend, a little. Then you can wonder about things and then, but only when you try to understand the others position, then you can argue about your complains, not before. It's the same in my case, I hear what you atheists believe, I don't have a problem with that and I found a lot of your arguments strong enough, but at the end is not that simple, and there's when I start to tell you what my Church said about those things trying to you see the other side.   You continously confront, instead of argueing... that's the problem... This was a response to Textbook's post, but much of what you said you would probably also aim at me, so let me give you a quick response: I have spent a lot of time reading about Christianity. It's just that I haven't yet found any substantial argument in favor of it. At the end of your post you said "when I start to tell you what my Church said". I'm not really interested in those statements. What do they contain? References to scripture. What does scripture contain? References to more scripture. Atheists usually aren't interested in that. Scripture can be interesting from a historical standpoint, but if it is thousands of years old and millions of people regard it as authoritative, that doesn't mean anything to me. Millions of people think that the book of Mormons is authoritative, yet you would never accept it and not being a Mormon, you see through the whole scheme and say "well of course, Robert Smith made it up!".  You have faith in your belief, I don't. You ignore all the evidence that contradicts your belief, while the same evidence (which I see with different eyes) prevents me from taking your belief seriously. This will probably never change for either of us. But please, when I find it silly that Eve is supposed to have been created from Adam's rib, are you really offended by that?

Come on Mike, there's no need to be offended by that. I already said what is what I find offensive and I think we are over it. Now you say that I ignore "evidence that contradicts your belief" which is silly, because it doesn't. You have theories, no more than that and I'm not willing to drag down those ideas, is just that none of them contradicts my believes, most of them made it stronger. Is just that you see the glass half empty and I see it half full...

jampa17 wrote: Mr ProgFreak wrote: jampa17 wrote: That's unaccurate to say the least. I have many friends that don't believe in God (most of them pretend no to, but I don't really mind) and we have very strong relationship without any of those "problems" of breaking or end up fighting. Try not to complicate it too much: Believers tell you what they believe, they don't have to force you to believe nothing, they just have to show you what they believe. You, in the other hand should take their words and try to understand them BEFORE confronting. It's what I've been telling you all this time, just try to put in anyones shoes and comprehend, a little. Then you can wonder about things and then, but only when you try to understand the others position, then you can argue about your complains, not before. It's the same in my case, I hear what you atheists believe, I don't have a problem with that and I found a lot of your arguments strong enough, but at the end is not that simple, and there's when I start to tell you what my Church said about those things trying to you see the other side.   You continously confront, instead of argueing... that's the problem... This was a response to Textbook's post, but much of what you said you would probably also aim at me, so let me give you a quick response: I have spent a lot of time reading about Christianity. It's just that I haven't yet found any substantial argument in favor of it. At the end of your post you said "when I start to tell you what my Church said". I'm not really interested in those statements. What do they contain? References to scripture. What does scripture contain? References to more scripture. Atheists usually aren't interested in that. Scripture can be interesting from a historical standpoint, but if it is thousands of years old and millions of people regard it as authoritative, that doesn't mean anything to me. Millions of people think that the book of Mormons is authoritative, yet you would never accept it and not being a Mormon, you see through the whole scheme and say "well of course, Robert Smith made it up!".  You have faith in your belief, I don't. You ignore all the evidence that contradicts your belief, while the same evidence (which I see with different eyes) prevents me from taking your belief seriously. This will probably never change for either of us. But please, when I find it silly that Eve is supposed to have been created from Adam's rib, are you really offended by that? Come on Mike, there's no need to be offended by that. I already said what is what I find offensive and I think we are over it. Now you say that I ignore "evidence that contradicts your belief" which is silly, because it doesn't. You have theories, no more than that and I'm not willing to drag down those ideas, is just that none of them contradicts my believes, most of them made it stronger. Is just that you see the glass half empty and I see it half full...

When you examine the books of the Bible, who wrote them, how they were compiled etc. - when you do all that you see that many of the tenets that you as a Catholic follow are actually most likely the product of centuries of debate among Christian theologians and/or leaders, many of which may have had their own agendas. There's nothing divine about them, and even if at some point some of the texts were divinely inspired they most likely got changed and edited over the centuries, so you have no way of knowing whether the texts that we today have contain the divine inspiration that believers claim to see in them. Feel free to see that as "half full", but I would say that it could be seen as a contradictory information. "Evidence" may indeed be too strong a word here, since none of us can go back in time - all we have are historic documents which we can analyze and compare. I really think that the only way for you to get past this contradictory information is to ignore it ... which has always been considered a virtue for believers (e.g. seeing contradictory evidence as a test of faith).

Mr ProgFreak wrote: jampa17 wrote: Mr ProgFreak wrote: jampa17 wrote: That's unaccurate to say the least. I have many friends that don't believe in God (most of them pretend no to, but I don't really mind) and we have very strong relationship without any of those "problems" of breaking or end up fighting. Try not to complicate it too much: Believers tell you what they believe, they don't have to force you to believe nothing, they just have to show you what they believe. You, in the other hand should take their words and try to understand them BEFORE confronting. It's what I've been telling you all this time, just try to put in anyones shoes and comprehend, a little. Then you can wonder about things and then, but only when you try to understand the others position, then you can argue about your complains, not before. It's the same in my case, I hear what you atheists believe, I don't have a problem with that and I found a lot of your arguments strong enough, but at the end is not that simple, and there's when I start to tell you what my Church said about those things trying to you see the other side.   You continously confront, instead of argueing... that's the problem... This was a response to Textbook's post, but much of what you said you would probably also aim at me, so let me give you a quick response: I have spent a lot of time reading about Christianity. It's just that I haven't yet found any substantial argument in favor of it. At the end of your post you said "when I start to tell you what my Church said". I'm not really interested in those statements. What do they contain? References to scripture. What does scripture contain? References to more scripture. Atheists usually aren't interested in that. Scripture can be interesting from a historical standpoint, but if it is thousands of years old and millions of people regard it as authoritative, that doesn't mean anything to me. Millions of people think that the book of Mormons is authoritative, yet you would never accept it and not being a Mormon, you see through the whole scheme and say "well of course, Robert Smith made it up!".  You have faith in your belief, I don't. You ignore all the evidence that contradicts your belief, while the same evidence (which I see with different eyes) prevents me from taking your belief seriously. This will probably never change for either of us. But please, when I find it silly that Eve is supposed to have been created from Adam's rib, are you really offended by that? Come on Mike, there's no need to be offended by that. I already said what is what I find offensive and I think we are over it. Now you say that I ignore "evidence that contradicts your belief" which is silly, because it doesn't. You have theories, no more than that and I'm not willing to drag down those ideas, is just that none of them contradicts my believes, most of them made it stronger. Is just that you see the glass half empty and I see it half full... When you examine the books of the Bible, who wrote them, how they were compiled etc. - when you do all that you see that many of the tenets that you as a Catholic follow are actually most likely the product of centuries of debate among Christian theologians and/or leaders, many of which may have had their own agendas. There's nothing divine about them, and even if at some point some of the texts were divinely inspired they most likely got changed and edited over the centuries, so you have no way of knowing whether the texts that we today have contain the divine inspiration that believers claim to see in them. Feel free to see that as "half full", but I would say that it could be seen as a contradictory information. "Evidence" may indeed be too strong a word here, since none of us can go back in time - all we have are historic documents which we can analyze and compare. I really think that the only way for you to get past this contradictory information is to ignore it ... which has always been considered a virtue for believers (e.g. seeing contradictory evidence as a test of faith).

No, really. Which evidence you have? Over all these threads you have only theories that you want to take into anti-christian ground, but you have seen time and time again that there's always an inference between the fact and what you want to make from it. If the so called "evidence" were punctual, I'm sure many christians will step back, but at the end those are only theories and none of them contradicts the purpose and escence of believing in a God.

Mr ProgFreak wrote: Dean wrote: ::snip::  Quite what the poor brethren thought when a 88kg Goth dressed in black with long black hair, big "goth" boots and sporting a pentagram pendant knocked him to the ground I cannot say, but since they are not permitted to be judgemental, I'm sure it was something nice. http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/contra/judge.html It's not as clear cut as that - unless you apply some picking and choosing.

Dean wrote: Since 1989 the Brethren have been excused Jury Service in the UK on the grounds that they refuse to sit in judgement on another man. Whether they are picking and choosing is immaterial, their right not to judge is protected by statute law and it is as clear cut as that.

Who said anything about curtailing their rights? I merely said that it doesn't necessarily follow from the Bible that one mustn't judge.

Dean wrote: All that has done is resulted in the factionising of the christian religion into the multitude of denominations there are today. But it hasn't changed the fundamental message that those denominations follow. They are all of the same faith, even if their interpretations of the book vary considerably.   Western Agnostism and Atheism are just extreme forms of those christian factions, because their focus appears to be on the proof or disproof of god through interpretation of the words contained in the bible.   I just think you're all looking in the wrong place.

Christianity is (still) the biggest religion on the planet and also the prevalent one in my country and that of most of the people who post here, so it's only naturally that this is the one I find myself arguing against. I'm not looking for anything in Christianity.

Dean wrote: Mr ProgFreak wrote: Dean wrote: Mr ProgFreak wrote: It is religious people who are misusing science and keep making claims that clearly contradict science. ::snip:: And that is what I rally against too, just as I rally against the misuse of science to contradict a faith. Let's not forget though that the video was a response to a Theist trying to prove a religious claim by using (bogus) science. My point is that bogus science is bogus whoever uses it.

Your point is that trying to use science to disprove religion is bogus. I think you have to be more specific. Using science to disprove the existence of any god? That's obviously bogus. Using science to prove to a Creationist that the earth isn't 6000 years old? Makes a tad more sense to me. The Creationist will still simply refuse to consider the scientific arguments - but that doesn't mean that you can't use science here. In fact science is the *only* way to counter an argument like that. Or would you rather say "let's agree to disagree - maybe I'm right, maybe you're right"?


Edited by Mr ProgFreak - August 10 2010 at 14:51

Mr ProgFreak wrote: Who said anything about curtailing their rights? I merely said that it doesn't necessarily follow from the Bible that one mustn't judge.

Mr ProgFreak wrote: Your point is that trying to use science to disprove religion is bogus. I think you have to be more specific. Using science to disprove the existence of any god? That's obviously bogus. Using science to prove to a Creationist that the earth isn't 6000 years old? Makes a tad more sense to me. The Creationist will still simply refuse to consider the scientific arguments - but that doesn't mean that you can't use science here. In fact science is the *only* way to counter an argument like that. Or would you rather say "let's agree to disagree - maybe I'm right, maybe you're right"?

^^ "religion is false" ... that's not a statement that I would support, and neither is "atheism is true".

The difference between Theism and Deism is that Theism makes claims about the natural world. Theists are not only saying that there is a God in the supernatural sense, which by definition is an unfalsifiable claim, they are saying that not only this God interacts with the natural world, but also that they know how he does that, and what he wants us to do. That makes their position vulnerable to logical arguments. Their way of evading this problem is usually simple ignoring the arguments, or - over the course of centuries - slowly changing their position and moving it into the supernatural realm, until it essentially becomes Deism.

One direct example is early Christianity: Jesus' followers were expecting a new kingdom, as predicted by Jesus (he selected 12 f because there were twelve tribes, and each disciple would reign over a tribe in this new kingdom). Then Jesus died, eventually the disciples died, and Christians had to change their interpretation of this new kingdom. Eventually they moved it into the afterlife, and thus completely into the supernatural realm. An ingenious idea IMO, since that meant that people did not have to make up excuses anymore for why the predicted kingdom never arrived. They started out with a concrete claim about the physical world and ended up with a claim that's entirely supernatural. It's the same with the question of whether Jesus was human or a divine entity: In the end they simply said that he was both at the same time - issue solved.

EDIT: changed "apostles" to "disciples", in order to avoid confusion (apparently the term "apostle" is ambiguous here)

IMO it's things like this which make it obvious that Christianity was a flawed concept to begin with. I also think that all these inconsistencies and oddities about the tenets of Christianity can serve as pretty conclusive historical evidence with the obvious conclusion that the whole thing is highly likely to be as false as all the other religions we all, Atheists and religious people alike, today accept to be false. Theists who disagree have not yet managed to explain to me how they can get around those universally agreed upon problems, short of simply ignoring them.


Edited by Mr ProgFreak - August 10 2010 at 16:25

jampa17 wrote: Mr ProgFreak wrote: ^ What I've said about the Bible in the previous post is not really contested by most Christian scholars ... it's not new information either. I've cited Bart Ehrman repeatedly, and he still believes in God. He merely points out that today we have no way of determining how we are supposed to follow him, given the situation. About the transubstantiation: The history of religion is full of examples of preposterous claims - from winged horses through Jesus as an alien to the earth being trillions of years old. Why do religious leaders (or societies in a collective process of story-telling) come up with these claims? Simple: To make their religion more magnificent. Today this gets increasingly difficult because in modern civilizations the overwhelming majority of all people are literate ... but back in those days the opposite was the case: Almost none of the people were literate. If the priest told them that the Eucharist was the actual body of Christ, who were they to contradict? Add to that the rather extreme penalties for heresy or apostasy ... So you can't answer that too... hmmm... Look Mike, I want to keep it simple and not dive into some things I'm sure you don't know about and I'm sure there a lot of explanation that are missing me right now but look it this way: If was the bishop or the pope I surely would invented something more believable than "eating your god", which is something hard to believe right? and in the case that people is forced to believe it that way, then there's no sense for those to convert people, because it's not free salvation. You see, I find more contradictions on that "manipulating" theory than actually believing that Jesus said "Do this in my name until I'll return..." which is basically what it's on the Bible.

First of all: I'm touched by all this condescension and belittlement.

I already answered your question, and you simply ignored the answer. Look at Scientology: They have some of the weirdest stories of all the religions I know, and still they manage to recruit new people. Weirdness is no deterrent.

jampa17 wrote:   If I were one of those angry mean men who build up the Bible, I should cover up some "contradictions" instead of leaving there hard concepts like "Love your enemy" or "Bless those who fist you...".

Clearly you meant something else ...

jampa17 wrote:   And it's not hard to say what god tell us to do, since in the Bible, in the new testament you have very clear what Jesus told to the people. There are no contradictions there Mike. It's easy, interpret those speaches and put them in practice, you will see that everything said there happens right the same now, 2000 years after and everything Jesus said will be the exact reaction from people. It's not hard at all...

I could give you some examples of the inconsistencies which you keep denying, but knowing that you'll simply ignore anything I say and simply get more angry, I'll spare myself the trouble. Those who are interested can read Bart Ehrman's book - or listen to KingHeathen summing them up: