location: sunnyvale TRAILER PARK

enough said.

your conclusion is not the intelligent person's conclusion. the intelligent person weighs in ALL factors before making a decision.

Since his post isn't about decisions, I think you should revisit school sometime in the near future.

Also, did you make your decision to say "enough said" basing it solely on what his location says? Way to weigh ALL the factors brah! Wp Wp

I could bash your sentence structure, too.. but this ain't no crusade!

My location is reference to a t.v. programme, trailer park boys. (get over it)

My conclusion is based on study and exploration, because i have always been interested in big questions, i have two honours degrees, one in Christian theology, one in Philosophy, and ur questioning my intelligence.

Giving psychological reasons for constructing a belief system, which i did, to me is more intelligent than blindly excepting a Supernatural God. All early civilisations created these gods, literally hundreds of diff examples, it screams that it was a necessary human psychological development to help us cope with life, and not actually revelation by hundreds of gods, are all religions right??

u dont even say what is wrong with my arguement or what u propose instead.

Exactly. I almost started a new thread posing that very question a few days ago.

So religion just got started up 2000 years ago? Interesting.

I contend that many atheists are arguing exactly that - that matter came from nothingness - and they don't even know it. The OP thinks "variance" created the origin... This is literally the first time in this thread that anyone has made the argument that there never was "nothingness." I guess that is possible.


Do tell.


Thank you.

I don't think I'm coming from a position of faith, not reason. I would actually consider myself an agnostic, not a theist, despite the fact that I do "believe" there is a God. My belief is not from faith, though. It is from evaluating all the info I have and determining that a certain answer makes the most sense to me.

I have also argued time and time again that Christianity (my version, which simply entails following the words of the character "Jesus Christ," not the perverted version that Bible-thumpers espouse) works to make the world a better place whether or not the story is true or whether or not you believe it. That's the beauty/genius of the concept. If everyone went around treating people how they wanted to be treated, would we live in a better world? Seems obvious, doesn't it? And I don't think you have to believe anything to see that. There's a difference between being a "reasonable" person, being a skeptic and just being an ***hole.

Again, I do NOT value faith over reason. And, by the way, I do NOT view you as a rationalist. You are a misguided, closed-minded skeptic, plain and simple.

actually, no. how about you ask an atheist where he thinks matter came from instead of making your cute contentions? i'm sure if you ask any atheist who has put some thought into the question, you'll get an answer that is similar to:

"i don't know, but there's no reason to believe at this point, knowing what we do know, that the energy from the big bang didn't always exist in some capacity."

and in fact, in quantum mechanics, you see matter coming in and out of "nothing" all the time. so who knows? one thing that is fairly clear is that the answer to "where did all the matter come from? it just doesn't make sense that it all came from nothing!" isn't "god did it, and this god being has just always been there. don't ask me any more questions about the origins of god because that would expose a flaw in my line of reasoning"

Actually "God did it, and this God being has just always been there" is just as good or better than any argument I've heard any atheist make.

Clearly there is a flaw in my line of reasoning. There is no proof and there is no debating that. However, at least I have a theory and a theory that explains virtually everything since the origin.

You are just another skeptic, which is fine, but please accept the fact that you don't know ****, either. I am only offering my opinion based on what I know and what makes sense to me. I am not saying I'm definitely right or even trying to convince others of anything. I am just putting an idea out there and you seem to take some pleasure in shooting it down, despite the fact that you offer absolutely nothing that makes more sense.

This doesn't make sense. If people don't know that they are arguing for something, i.e. that matter came from nothingness, but you think they really are arguing for it, then that must be because you think it is a logical implication of their position. But then you admit that there is another possible view. Doesn't make sense.

So let me get this straight. You say that you are not a theist, but you believe in God. You say that you are an agnostic, but the basis for your belief in God is reason and evidence, not faith.

If this is your understanding of these words, then I am glad we disagree--you seem to understand them in a way completely contradictory to my own.

Fine. If you wish to follow some of the moral teaching of the NT, I have no problem with that. I wish to follow some of the moral teachings of the NT. But TexArcher is correct then. If this is your concern, then why bother engaging with people on whether or not the (non-moral) claims of the Bible are true? After all, your version of Christianity doesn't actually claim that they are true.

Also, there are differences between being a skeptic, an ***hole, and a reasonable person, but these differences don't preclude someone being all three.

I'm not saying all, I'm saying some. I gave an example.


I think of words like these as subjective. Clearly we disagree on that.

I didn't think that was what I was engaging with people about. I think this thread is about whether or not intelligent people can believe in God. And, for the record, my version of Christianity is the literal one. Everyone else is wrong, lol.

You are very good at this! I couldn't agree more.

In order for it to be a logical implication, it must be all. If it is not a logical implication, then your claim is unjustified.


Clearly we do.

I'll assume your use of "literal" here is kind of like how you use "theist" and "agnostic," very subjectively. Also, this thread has never been about whether intelligent people can believe in God. That is clearly true. OP is a relatively transparent troll.

I'll admit I'm an ******* to a lot of theists/believers. Because I get so ****ing sick and tired of their God damned cherry picking! You cannot have your cake and eat, too! Unless you have a digestive system similar to a fly's.

..l.,

Do you guys really not see how unbiased objective observers don't believe what you do (i.e. an invisible entity in the sky)? On what grounds do you think everyone should believe as you do? What if we aren't persuaded by biblical stories as you. Some do not believe in things they cannot see, touch, hear, and have no manifest on my reality whatsoever.

Is it REALLY that hard to understand how it's possible for some not to accept your god and beliefs the way you do?

Heh. One of the things you can see in this thread is how this question can also be fairly asked of many atheists as well. Theists hardly have a monopoly on bias.

Didn't you read thread, the op got slammed. I wonder how that would work the other way around.. you should start that thread.

I don't believe in an invisible entity in the sky. I don't believe in biblical stories, either.

I think the issue is the bolded part. You see, many people see, touch and hear God every day and it is very obvious to them. Have you considered that you may be the one who is blind?

And no, it isn't that hard for me to understand that someone does not accept "my" God & beliefs. I'm OK with that. It is only when people get indignant that I hold certain beliefs (eg- the op of this thread) that I get upset.

I did read it. I just wanted the opposite thread out there for balance.

of course. Most atheists will happily say that if God wanted to "open their eyes" they would ... he is O3 and should certainly know how to.

Unfortunately, despite there being a few honest theists out there, most would claim they are 100% certain that God (their version of God of course) exists, and nothing could convince them otherwise. I have never met an atheist who has made that claim regarding their disbelief in God before (although I'm sure they exist, even on this board)

FYP. Thinking something or believing something are very different from something actually happening.

This is very much my position.
I dont think its very smart to have no belief!

I actually wrote your version first and then changed it. In practice, there is very little difference between seeing something and thinking you see something. Life is practice, not theory.

This is similar to the 'knowledge' discussion we had earlier ITT. Your point is not invalid, but it implies only that you mean something different by 'seeing god' from what you mean by 'seeing a "Stop" sign'*.







*When you're driving your airship

so whatever people think they see, hear etc we have to accept that they really did see, hear etc. There is a huge diff between thinking you have a exp and experiencing something in reality.

I knew someone who thought Jesus walked into the room he was in when he was having a hard time in life and helped him turn his life around. While of course he believes he saw this, it does not mean it happened in reality, he was alcoholic, cudnt get out of a rut, so his mind subconsiously created this image to help him. The belief he had this experience helped him, but it did not really happened, see the diff?

Sorry. But you DO believe in something invisible, right? You can't show me this god you believe in, can you?

If I'm blind, I'm blind. I was speaking to (splendour's) remark at how the question should be turned around i.e., how can anyone not believe in god who is intelligent? You just said it's a blind thing and not an intelligence thing. This has nothing to do with what I was referring to.

Such an assholic thing to say. Would you ever say this to a real blind person because they lacked the ability to see?

I've never had a spiritual experience, and it's not for lack of trying. It may very well be that I'm completely incapable of experiencing God the way you do. Some people are handicapped by that their entire lives, and there isn't a damned thing they can do about it. Calling us blind or blaming us for something beyond our control is soooooo unbelievably arrogant.

This of course assumes that you ACTUALLY experience God. If you don't, well, then your comment makes an even bigger condescending ******* out of you.