Originally posted by JimL
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Forum Rules: Here
This forum is open discussion between atheists and all theists to defend and debate their views on religion or non-religion. Please respect that this is a Christian-owned forum and refrain from gratuitous blasphemy. VERY wide leeway is given in range of expression and allowable behavior as compared to other areas of the forum, and moderation is not overly involved unless necessary. Please keep this in mind. Atheists who wish to interact with theists in a way that does not seek to undermine theistic faith may participate in the World Religions Department. Non-debate question and answers and mild and less confrontational discussions can take place in General Theistics.
Forum Rules: Here
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I - an atheist - have an objective standard for Good
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Originally posted by Juvenal View PostNot unintentionally.
I'll ask him about that if it turns out he was right. More likely, he was blowing smoke. Also not unintentional.
Pick the right villages.
It bears repeating that most Christians don't elevate the Bible into an object of faith. Catholics, I understand, go even further, making acceptance of the Bible contingent on the choices of the Church.
Most of the rest is hopelessly anachronistic. We don't do kings or thrones anymore, well, most of us don't, anyway, and the rest see the position as mostly ceremonial. Our social contracts are instead based, ideally, on compromises between equals. Right and wrong are based on principles of harm. Makes it a lot easier to argue for agreement that way.
The argument that something's right or wrong based on the Bible needlessly excludes the vast majority of humanity, not to mention a majority of Christianity itself. It's not defensible, even in principle. What's objectively right, or objectively wrong, can't depend on the authority of any book. Arguments from authority are informal fallacies.
The need to invoke that informal fallacy is an argument against your personal God, just by the way. You'd be better off sticking with the principles of Christianity that can be rationally defended, in my opinion. As an argument, the gift of faith works for Jesus. Stick with that. The gift of faith doesn't work for the Bible, though, because, well, the Bible makes mistakes, and even if it didn't, mistakes are inevitable absent an inerrant interpreter.
I tell the kids to pick up their calculators, press the inverse button, then the ln key, then 1, then equals, and write down what's displayed, the base of the natural log, e, according to their calculators.
Then I have them subtract the number they've written down. Most displays give e as 2.718281828 and a difference between the stored value and the display of 4.59 EE -10. That's not right, because e is irrational, and in fact it's transcendental. But in either case, as a decimal it goes on well past the 15 digits stored in the calculator.
The calculator gives the wrong answer for the difference because nothing you can hold in your hand is infinite, so eventually, it runs out of memory to store things.
Humans are finite. Eternity isn't. Eventually, if you're finite, you'd have to start shedding experiences.
Don't confuse the infinite with the all-encompassing, though. There are an infinite number of fractions, but none of them are equal to e.
I don't know how that would work, either, but I'm entirely sure you'd eventually run out of memory, if your comprehension remained finite.
Believing in a God you can't see.
Seems an odd entry requirement to me, unless, well, ya know ... you never do get a chance to see Him.
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Looks like we are at the point in the discussion where you just ignore everything I say and keep repeating the same thing over and over. It is clear you aren't reading my posts. I will answer one more time then I am done.
1. The bible says that those who do not have the law will be judged by their own law, the law written on their conscience, which will either condemn them or defend them on their actions.
2. Christians will be forgiven for all of their sins.
3. This doesn't mean that someone can just become a Christian with a magical prayer and live a life of sin, it is an actual commitment to follow God, even if you mess up along the way. God is interested in your heart and whose "side" you choose to be on. Your own, or his.
4. If you are not a Christian (see #1) you will stand in judgment for your sins. Unless you are sinless, you will end up in hell. The only sinless person who ever lived is Jesus. There are things you have done which you KNOW were wrong and you did them anyway. Your own conscience will condemn you for those actions when you face God. You know you did wrong. So you will face judgment for those actions.
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Originally posted by Sparko View PostNo, because Allah doesn't forgive your sins, he just judges you for them. And in an arbitrary manner, by weighing them on a scale. As long as you are 51% good, you get into heaven. At least if you are a person of "the book" (bible) - I am not sure what happens to atheists in Islam. I think they might just go straight to hell, do not stop, do not collect 72 virgins.
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Originally posted by JimL View PostRight, so Allah is more just and less petty than Jesus, he judges the sinfulness of a person not whether they believe in him or not. Why do you think an omniscient god would be so petty as to require human beings, imperfect in knowledge, to believe he exist and is god in order to show mercy? If you put yourself in gods shoes and think about that I think you'd find that to be both unjust and petty as well.,
I am sure you can make up a perfect God to believe in. You can name him, JimL, and worship him in the mirror. He will judge you to be flawless and require nothing in return.
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Originally posted by Sparko View PostYou just want to believe any God that doesn't let you get away with everything you want to do without holding you accountable is "petty"
I am sure you can make up a perfect God to believe in. You can name him, JimL, and worship him in the mirror. He will judge you to be flawless and require nothing in return.
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Originally posted by Sparko View PostNo it isn't. You're an idiot. Faith is trust. And trust is built on evidence. What you are describing is BLIND Faith, and that isn't biblical faith.
And it's hardly surprising to see a Christian resort to insult and attack when they are confronted with someone who refuses to agree with them.
Originally posted by Sparko View Postderp. It wasn't wrong because it wasn't trying to be scientific. If I say the sun rose at 7AM this morning, am I wrong? I know it didn't actually move, the Earth did. But I am speaking colloquially. So does the bible.
All you are doing is giving yourself an out when confronted by the errors you deny exist.
Originally posted by Sparko View Postperhaps. It was a miracle.
Originally posted by Sparko View PostI am speaking of things that can be checked. Like finding confirmations in other historic writings, finding coins with people's names on it from the time and area, finding archeological evidence that confirms the descriptions in the bible showing the authors were indeed there and so on.
Originally posted by Sparko View PostNo because the people Joseph Smith fooled never saw the angel or the book or any evidence. We have their own word on that.
Originally posted by Sparko View PostNo, wrong.
Originally posted by Sparko View PostGo for it. Start a thread.
Originally posted by Sparko View PostArcheology can just support inanimate claims like buildings, people existing (statues, coins, etc), it take writings to document events and occurances. And we have those. The archeology just supports that.
Originally posted by Sparko View PostYes, they are. We have evidence that the writers were trustworthy and told the truth about the things we can check out. Smith for example invents an entire civilization that we have never found any evidence of whatsoever. And again,
Originally posted by Sparko View PostYes, they would have known. It was a pretty small community. Jesus was known to everyone in the area. His death was a public spectacle. He resurrected and ran around showing himself to everyone for 40 days.
Originally posted by Sparko View PostThen he rose in view of everyone into the sky.
Originally posted by Sparko View PostIf someone tried to make that all up and spread a new religion there in Jerusalem, it would never have gotten off the ground. It would be just a bunch of liars telling lies that everyone there would know was lies. And they could just go to his grave and show his body. The Sanhedron could have just stopped this cult by opening the grave and displaying Jesus' corpse in the public square. Yet instead they spent decades chasing down the believers.America - too good to let the conservatives drag it back to 1950.
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Originally posted by JimL View PostI don't believe in a god at all, Sparko. There may or may not be an actual god, though we've created many of them in our own image, but even if there be an actual god I know nothing of him/her/it so don't concern myself with it. That you do is fine, but had you grown up in Islam there's little doubt that you'd be a believer in Allah, not Jesus/YHWY.
And you know what? If I grew up and became a muslim, whether here or in the middle east, the result would be the same, I would be wrong and unless I accepted Jesus, I would stand before God on Judgement Day and be judged for my sins. I would hope that some Christian would find me and tell me the gospel. If I am the same person otherwise, I know I would listen and examine the evidence and become a Christian just as I did in this life.
What's your excuse?
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Originally posted by Electric Skeptic View PostBlind faith is redundant. All faith is blind; that's why it's faith, rather than belief.
And it's hardly surprising to see a Christian resort to insult and attack when they are confronted with someone who refuses to agree with them.
So when Jesus says that the mustard seed is the smallest of all seeds, he's not wrong (even though he was wrong) because he wasn't trying to be scientific?
Just like the people who wrote the gospels never saw Jesus.
Why? All I'm doing is noting the fact that the evidence against Christianity is comparable with the evidence against all the other religious you disdain.
None of which give the slightest confirmation of or even the evidence for the religious/spiritual/miraculous claims of the bible.
We have zero evidence that the writers were trustworthy in any of their religious/spiritual/miraculous claims. Many of Dickens' stories were set in London; does that mean they are all true because we can verify London's existence?
lol completely unsupported.
Similarly unsupported.
You have zero evidence of any of that. What we actually know is that we have no record by anybody until at least 20 years after Jesus' death, and we have no idea who actually wrote the records we have. To claim they are in some way better evidence for Christianity than are Joseph Smith's claims for Mormonism is absurd.
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Originally posted by Sparko View PostSure you have a God. Yourself. Anything less than letting yourself off scot-free for your sins, is being "petty."
And you know what? If I grew up and became a muslim, whether here or in the middle east, the result would be the same, I would be wrong and unless I accepted Jesus, I would stand before God on Judgement Day and be judged for my sins.
I would hope that some Christian would find me and tell me the gospel. If I am the same person otherwise, I know I would listen and examine the evidence and become a Christian just as I did in this life.
What's your excuse?
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Originally posted by Sparko View PostThat's just wrong. What do you think "belief" is I wonder? This will be good.
Definition of belief
:
2: something that is accepted, considered to be true, or held as an opinion : something believed
:
Definition of faith
:
b(1): firm belief in something for which there is no proof
:
Originally posted by Sparko View PostThen don't say stupid stuff.
So...it's wrong. Another instance where the bible is wrong - and this is God actually speaking. And you want to let it slide because it's a 'figure of speech'. Not a figure of speech anybody else has ever used, mind you.
Originally posted by Sparko View PostSure they did.
Originally posted by Sparko View PostAnd yet you have shown none.
Originally posted by Sparko View PostArcheology doesn't record any events, that is what documents do. And the gospels are documents.
Originally posted by Sparko View PostIt means that the writers were there and accurately described the surroundings. If the gospels were written hundreds of years later, the writers would not have known such things. As we find in the many apocrypha writing from 200+ years out.
Originally posted by Sparko View PostIt is supported. You think a nobody that no-one noticed ended up becoming the most famous person in the history of the world? LOL. That's a miracle right there.
Originally posted by Sparko View PostIt is supported by documents written by eye witnesses.
Originally posted by Sparko View PostYou can deny it all you want, but any serious biblical scholar and archeologist believes the documents are genuine, written by Jesus' followers, and contain accurate information.
And no amount of scholarship can verify that the religious/spiritual/miraculous claims they make are accurate.
Originally posted by Sparko View PostThe fact that you don't want to believe doesn't change that.
Originally posted by Sparko View PostYou are welcome to your own opinion, but that opinion is based on ignorance.
See? I can ad hominem you just as well as you can, me. Or we can both stick to the issues instead of attacking each other. Your call (although I guess your repeated insults have shown you've already made your call).America - too good to let the conservatives drag it back to 1950.
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Originally posted by Sparko View PostAnd you know what? If I grew up and became a muslim, whether here or in the middle east, the result would be the same, I would be wrong and unless I accepted Jesus, I would stand before God on Judgement Day and be judged for my sins. I would hope that some Christian would find me and tell me the gospel. If I am the same person otherwise, I know I would listen and examine the evidence and become a Christian just as I did in this life.America - too good to let the conservatives drag it back to 1950.
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Originally posted by Electric Skeptic View PostIf you grew up and became a muslim, you would think anyone who accepted Jesus was wrong, and be just as sure of it as you now are that anyone who does not do so is wrong. And if some Christian found you and told me the gospel, you would dismiss it just as you now dismiss every other religion.P1) If , then I win.
P2)
C) I win.
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Originally posted by Sparko View PostYou just want to believe any God that doesn't let you get away with everything you want to do without holding you accountable is "petty"I am sure you can make up a perfect God to believe in. You can name him, JimL, and worship him in the mirror. He will judge you to be flawless and require nothing in return.
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