Why won't god do something incredible that will compell non-believers to believe NOW?
06-20-2010
, 09:22 PM
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I'm just starting to read the entire thread now, so this may have been said, but do you not think its possible that God is pleased by faith rather than knowledge, and therefore God has given each person just enough personal evidence to supplement their faith but not enough to ever give them total knowledge?
06-20-2010
, 10:11 PM
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He has done the ultimate already........
He raised Jesus Christ from the dead........
If you do not believe that one rose from the dead, then you will not believe anything else, thats for sure.
There is no need to do anything beyond what he has already done. Its the Christians who are living now that have the responsibility to hold for the word of God and to reconcile men to God.
True believing Christians who understand HOW to operate the power of God do miracles all the time. Never for show, and definately never to prove to someone who confesses that they believe there is no God.
You are a whining person who just looks for any angle to pretend that you really want answers, but in all reality your true colors shine forth very vividly to me, and I am sure to others on this forum.
What? Why do you think that God should do some fantastic thing to convince you above and beyond what He has already done?
You athiests on this forum for the most part, are pretty much just here to waste time and try and convince people that there is no God, with your very, very limited mis-understandings of the bible.
He raised Jesus Christ from the dead........
If you do not believe that one rose from the dead, then you will not believe anything else, thats for sure.
There is no need to do anything beyond what he has already done. Its the Christians who are living now that have the responsibility to hold for the word of God and to reconcile men to God.
True believing Christians who understand HOW to operate the power of God do miracles all the time. Never for show, and definately never to prove to someone who confesses that they believe there is no God.
You are a whining person who just looks for any angle to pretend that you really want answers, but in all reality your true colors shine forth very vividly to me, and I am sure to others on this forum.
What? Why do you think that God should do some fantastic thing to convince you above and beyond what He has already done?
You athiests on this forum for the most part, are pretty much just here to waste time and try and convince people that there is no God, with your very, very limited mis-understandings of the bible.
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I'm gonna go against the grain of my incredible and obvious atheist bias and say that this isn't a good reason to not believe.
There's really no reason for god to have to do any of these things, if he had just created a world which meshed and made sense with our (supposedly god-given) sense of justice then I think more than 10% of the most intelligent people would believe. But we live in a world of chaos, suffering, and instability that just could have been done better. I'm certainly not the smartest person in the world or even my city, but I could do a hell of a lot better job if I were omnipotent.
That being said, the world is amazing and the real story of life is about a million times more fascinating and beautiful than anything you'll read in Genesis. It's just that this world looks like the end result of some crazy random processes more than it does something that came from some omnipotent thing's design.
There's really no reason for god to have to do any of these things, if he had just created a world which meshed and made sense with our (supposedly god-given) sense of justice then I think more than 10% of the most intelligent people would believe. But we live in a world of chaos, suffering, and instability that just could have been done better. I'm certainly not the smartest person in the world or even my city, but I could do a hell of a lot better job if I were omnipotent.
That being said, the world is amazing and the real story of life is about a million times more fascinating and beautiful than anything you'll read in Genesis. It's just that this world looks like the end result of some crazy random processes more than it does something that came from some omnipotent thing's design.
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it should be stressed again that the OP isn't actually asking
a question (lol at everyone in this thread trying to answer it).
he's simply pointing out an obvious and very simple logical flaw with fundamentalist christian tenets.
1. god desires all humans accept christianity
2. god is responsible for and freely manipulates human environment and temperment
3. most humans reject christianity BASED on their environment and/or temperment (easily demonstrated by cultural and intellectual demographics)
that absolutely is evidence that fundamentalist christianity is false
a question (lol at everyone in this thread trying to answer it).
he's simply pointing out an obvious and very simple logical flaw with fundamentalist christian tenets.
1. god desires all humans accept christianity
2. god is responsible for and freely manipulates human environment and temperment
3. most humans reject christianity BASED on their environment and/or temperment (easily demonstrated by cultural and intellectual demographics)
that absolutely is evidence that fundamentalist christianity is false
Also regarding #1....is it not possible that God does indeed desire for everyone to follow him, but that desire takes a backseat to his overwhelming desire for justice? And while we may not understand why it is so, perhaps unrepentant humans really do deserve Hell(I'm pretty sure thats exactly what the bible teaches).
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Yes, you are confused. You are an atheist because you do not believe in all of the other gods that humanity has worshipped throughout time. You have an atheistic view of the ancient Egyptian gods, and also of the gods of the ancient Greeks.
Your analogy to government does not make sense. Someone who doesn't subscribe to the communist ideology is not necessarily anti-government, they're just anti-communist. Someone who is anti-government is an anarchist. (i.e. Ronald Reagan didn't believe in communism, but he wasn't an anarchist.)
Your analogy to government does not make sense. Someone who doesn't subscribe to the communist ideology is not necessarily anti-government, they're just anti-communist. Someone who is anti-government is an anarchist. (i.e. Ronald Reagan didn't believe in communism, but he wasn't an anarchist.)
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Please...take the time to read "The Greatest Show on Earth" by Richard Dawkins. In it, Dawkins explains the scientific evidence behind evolution with great clarity. If you truly understand evolution, religion starts to look silly.
"There are only two kinds of men in this world; intelligent men without religion, and religious men without intelligence."
"There are only two kinds of men in this world; intelligent men without religion, and religious men without intelligence."
I do think its possible for a god to exist and evolution have occured. Does the book give reasons why this can't be so?
I think you're the one misusing the word atheist. Being a monotheist means that you believe in one God and not in any others....so a Christian isn't being an atheist towards other Gods, hes just being a monotheist towards them.
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This maybe technically true - its really a semantic question and depends on definitions. The whole point of putting it that way is simply to make the point that was made above: that the reason we don't accept your god is the same reason that you don't accept every other god. Whether its technically correct, the phrase makes a valid point.
But regarding your above post, the reason I was always attracted to Christianity over other religions(other than the fact I was born here in America, which I will easily admit is probably the #1 factor on the religion I chose) is that most other religions seem to be about man doing enough to gain God's approval, and that never seemed right to me. On the other hand, Christianity seems to be about submission, admitting you can't reach God on your own, and letting Him do the work.
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OP's point really goes to whether this god is all-loving, not whether he exists. But this really depends, IMO, on what happens to people who are not saved. If they get eternally damned, with torture, and fire, and all that jazz (or any other variation) then such a God first, should never allow that. But if he is going to allow that then if he is all loving he should do everything in his considerable power to get his creations on a path that avoids that fate. Free will is no benefit at all if it results in >100 years of freedom, and an eternity of torture.
Now, if all that happens to non-believers is that we poof out of existence entirely, then we have a different story. I don't have a problem with most of us having no consciousness after death and a few who devote their lives to God getting a bonus of everlasting happiness.
However, everlasting torture wil always be a pretty serious hit against the concept of an all-loving God. This may be an argument from ignorance, but I can't think of any human activity that could ever warrant such a fate. Not even for the worst and heinous people in human history. I could go for some finite type of punishment - but eternity can never, IMO, be justified.
Now, if all that happens to non-believers is that we poof out of existence entirely, then we have a different story. I don't have a problem with most of us having no consciousness after death and a few who devote their lives to God getting a bonus of everlasting happiness.
However, everlasting torture wil always be a pretty serious hit against the concept of an all-loving God. This may be an argument from ignorance, but I can't think of any human activity that could ever warrant such a fate. Not even for the worst and heinous people in human history. I could go for some finite type of punishment - but eternity can never, IMO, be justified.
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The search and you will find thing doesn't work because what i find when i search for answers to moral questions is my moral beliefs. And what i find when i search for or talk to God is hes not home or talking back.
If you want to tell me logically why that is i have no problem, i might get heated sometimes but it all good.
If you want to tell me logically why that is i have no problem, i might get heated sometimes but it all good.
I don't think Christianity calls for "genuine belief", I think it calls for faith based belief.
06-20-2010
, 10:16 PM
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I'm just starting to read the entire thread now, so this may have been said, but do you not think its possible that God is pleased by faith rather than knowledge, and therefore God has given each person just enough personal evidence to supplement their faith but not enough to ever give them total knowledge?
06-20-2010
, 10:19 PM
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I'd be interested in reading it. In the meantime, can you give me the cliff notes on how everything supposedly got started? For example, if the Big Bang caused our universe to form then what created the gasses that caused the Big Bang? Basically what caused "existence" to begin?
06-20-2010
, 10:32 PM
A theistic argument I've heard before says....
Atheists constantly complain that theistic views are absurd, but if theres a box in a room then isn't it more absurd to believe the box magically appeared rather than believing someone put it there?
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It is quite simple. You are accountable for all your actions when you die. And if you have never heard of Jesus, how can you be held accountable for that? How can you go to hell for not believing something that you have never heard of?
Anything else you want me to respond to?
Anything else you want me to respond to?
Last edited by Assani Fisher; 06-20-2010 at 10:48 PM.
06-20-2010
, 11:31 PM
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As I said, I'm really not sure if God exists. However, if God does exist then I think we greatly underestimate the gap between God's knowledge and ours. I mean, I would have to think that God trying to explain his reasoning to us would be worse than a person trying to explain algebra to a cat. Theres just no way the cat would ever be able to comprehend it.So if a god does exist, then I find it pretty funny that people can say what God "should" do.
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Perhaps He is showing you(over the course of your life)....perhaps thats what the meaning of life is: A time for us to gradually understand God and his purpose for us.
Plus i really have no understanding of God or his purpose for me. I don't even know if he is real so im more like an ant with a blindfold on and learning nothing about God.
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Perhaps your wanting for God to suddenly come down to you and instantly explain everything isn't how he wants it to work.
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In my personal experience, I've found the average atheist to be much smarter than the average Christian. Now if faith(and not knowledge) is the way to God, then do you think its possible that when many atheists try to "search for God" they are too intellectually arrogant and they refuse to consider using faith over reason? It does make sense that dumber people would be more willing to forego reason and logic than people blessed with strong intelligence.
But in any case when someone says to me i just need to have faith there's a problem. How do i go about getting faith in God because i honestly don't know? In a way its like saying just choose to believe and you will believe.
06-20-2010
, 11:33 PM
Also, nobody in science is claiming anything was "magically created". They claim that synergistic complex natural forces of various kinds created the universe. That's not magic, because there is scientific evidence to suggest that these forces exist.
06-20-2010
, 11:44 PM
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Yeah, this is a good argument imo. I do think that the more I am honest about things, the less I believe in God. At this point in my life, I'm really on the edge. But I definitely do hope their is a God.
Atheists constantly complain that theistic views are absurd, but if theres a box in a room then isn't it more absurd to believe the box magically appeared rather than believing someone put it there?
Atheists constantly complain that theistic views are absurd, but if theres a box in a room then isn't it more absurd to believe the box magically appeared rather than believing someone put it there?
I agree, but at what point are you going to be honest with yourself and realize there are no real answers outside of God? Yea you will find an answer to something, but it is not the least bit satisfying and ends up with way more questions.
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Can you back that up with bible verses? Exactly how much about Jesus does someone have to hear before he is held accountable? If I went to these foreign countries and yelled "Jesus Christ!" and then left, would they be held accountable? What if I talked to them for 30 seconds about Jesus and his message? What about 30 minutes?
If you are held accountable for everything, how can you be held accountable for not hearing about Jesus? Unless of course, God might of planned for that person to learn of Jesus if that person lived a more righteous life. I don't know, this is just what i perceive using common sense. Obviously this could be a much deeper issue.
06-20-2010
, 11:48 PM
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These two don't work together vary well. If im a cat i can't really have understanding of God or his purpose for me. And in a way you are telling God what he does or should do also. He does and should Give his knowledge in the way you describe, with a perhaps which good.
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I dont want God if there is one to come down and explain everything to me, i like mystery. I only want God to show himself and tell me his rules if he wants me to believe in him and follow his rules. I don't see how i can believe without him showing himself and i dont know how i can follow his rules if dont know them.
Your words say you want to know God exists, but your actions say otherwise.
06-20-2010
, 11:53 PM
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Just because you think you are hopeless doesn't mean you can speak for others.
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IMHO, you should hope there is not. Because it would be so unjust, unfair, and cruel that existence itself would be the worst nightmare conceivable. The only goal in such a meaningless existence is to make your entire life one long act of begging a monstrously malevolent force not to be cast into a pit of torture for eternity, just like the rest of the majority of your entire race, all of which have committed no acts that truly warrant such a fate (as if any mortal act could possibly warrant eternal torture-think about that carefully).
06-21-2010
, 12:10 AM
Reading his word and rules is what made me stop believing in the Biblical God and his words and rules keep me not believing in him. The God of the bible makes no sense to me.
And i would like to know if there is A God or if there isn't but i don't. I would also like there to be a God over there not being one.
06-21-2010
, 01:02 AM
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These two don't work together vary well. If im a cat i can't really have understanding of God or his purpose for me. And in a way you are telling God what he does or should do also. He does and should Give his knowledge in the way you describe, with a perhaps which good.
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I dont want God if there is one to come down and explain everything to me, i like mystery. I only want God to show himself and tell me his rules if he wants me to believe in him and follow his rules. I don't see how i can believe without him showing himself and i dont know how i can follow his rules if dont know them.
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But in any case when someone says to me i just need to have faith there's a problem. How do i go about getting faith in God because i honestly don't know? In a way its like saying just choose to believe and you will believe.
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IMHO, you should hope there is not. Because it would be so unjust, unfair, and cruel that existence itself would be the worst nightmare conceivable. The only goal in such a meaningless existence is to make your entire life one long act of begging a monstrously malevolent force not to be cast into a pit of torture for eternity, just like the rest of the majority of your entire race, all of which have committed no acts that truly warrant such a fate (as if any mortal act could possibly warrant eternal torture-think about that carefully).
I mean, if some supernatural being is actually powerful enough to create and maintain life as we know it, then I'm pretty sure my knowledge of His world is absolutely minuscule compared to His knowledge of it.
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They claim that synergistic complex natural forces of various kinds created the universe. That's not magic, because there is scientific evidence to suggest that these forces exist
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I agree, but at what point are you going to be honest with yourself and realize there are no real answers outside of God? Yea you will find an answer to something, but it is not the least bit satisfying and ends up with way more questions.
As for "not the least bit satisfying".....I realize that, but as I try to learn more and more, the more and more I start to feel that we simply aren't that important and there are no "satisfying" answers. I was just watching Joe Rogan's theory about the purpose of human life, and while I don't necessarily agree with it, I do think its refreshing to find a view of ourselves that doesn't make us out to be ultra-important in the grand scheme of things. So many views seem to make humans out to be extremely important, and I think we may be prone to think that way because we want it to be that way rather than because it is the truth.
06-21-2010
, 01:46 AM
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When I earlier said that perhaps the atheist's "sin" is intellectual arrogance, this is what I was talking about. I'm perfectly fine acknowledging that theres a distinct possibility that there is no God. But if there is a God, then His understanding of the universe is simply miles and miles above yours, and any attempt you make to judge God is too uninformed of an opinion to matter.
I mean, if some supernatural being is actually powerful enough to create and maintain life as we know it, then I'm pretty sure my knowledge of His world is absolutely minuscule compared to His knowledge of it.
I mean, if some supernatural being is actually powerful enough to create and maintain life as we know it, then I'm pretty sure my knowledge of His world is absolutely minuscule compared to His knowledge of it.
Naturalistic explanations already account for the creation of Earth, the solar system, the galaxy, all of the other galaxies, and everything else (known) in the universe going back 13.7 billion years. That's far enough for me to establish that nature could have solely created us. Were just a pale blue dot of a planet in a near endless cosmos already, as it is. It's not much of a stretch to say the universe could have also been created naturally. Even without all of this information, I find God a lot harder to believe, anyway.
06-21-2010
, 03:03 AM
/golfclap
06-21-2010
, 03:20 AM
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Everything I stated came from his own supposed word, the Bible, about the nature of existence. If he can't be judged by his own word, what can he be judged by? We have nothing else on the nature of God? Or are you asserting we just can't judge God at all no matter what he says? Well that's ridiculous. I don't see how It's reasonable to, at the same time, interpret the Bible claiming to judge what God is and what God wants, and not be able to also judge the nature of the morality proposed in the Bible (which is indeed part of what God is also). It's a self contradictory double standard for judging. And we judge other Gods, you have no problem judging Allah, why not this God too? And wouldn't it matter what God said? If God said to rape children in his honor would you still say "we cannot Judge his universe"? All of the books of the Bible have God saying and doing even worse things than that, along with also damning most of humanity in an obviously unjust fashion (infinite torture for finite crimes).
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Because it would be so unjust, unfair, and cruel that existence itself would be the worst nightmare conceivable
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The only goal in such a meaningless existence is to make your entire life one long act of begging a monstrously malevolent force not to be cast into a pit of torture for eternity
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all of which have committed no acts that truly warrant such a fate
So basically every one of your statements is refuted by the bible. How exactly are you claiming that your statements were biblical?



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Naturalistic explanations already account for the creation of Earth, the solar system, the galaxy, all of the other galaxies, and everything else (known) in the universe going back 13.7 billion years. That's far enough for me to establish that nature could have solely created us
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Even without all of this information, I find God a lot harder to believe, anyway.
Option #2: Something always existed.
Option #3: Only God always existed(otherwise, nothing existed). God created the universe.
Tbh, all three options are quite difficult to comprehend. I really don't see a strong argument for favoring one over the other, and if I was forced to chose one I think I'd go with #3 because the concept of something always existing or something coming from nothing is just completely inconceivable to me.
I'm sure you're talking about the theists who refuse to consider any option other than their own religion. However, I do think that many of the atheists have that same level of close-mindedness when it comes to the issues of faith vs reason. And I do think your OP definitely came across as trying to "win an argument" rather than trying to objectively seek truth.
06-21-2010
, 03:36 AM
Asking questions that theists don't happen to have the answers to means I'm trying to win an argument and don't care about truth.
Nevermind, theists you guys can keep him
Nevermind, theists you guys can keep him
06-21-2010
, 11:00 AM
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Oh, I'm not saying that they do work together well. I'm beginning a lot of my statements with "perhaps" because I really don't know what exactly i believe right now. I'm just throwing out different possibilities, some of which won't work together very well with other possibilities I throw out.
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I know thats what you want. But perhaps in order to fully teach you about the truths of the universe, God can't do it that way. Perhaps the struggle between man/God, faith/knowledge, religion/logic is necessary. What you want is often what is best and easiest for you. I think its possible that God uses pain/suffering to produce ultimate good in our lives, so the easy way isn't always optimal.
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Yeah, this is one of the issues I"m struggling with right now
Last edited by batair; 06-21-2010 at 11:16 AM.
06-21-2010
, 02:17 PM
You were basically using a form of the Socratic method to try to prove a point. When called out on this, you became hostile and started posting in a mocking and condescending nature. To me that demonstrated that the pursuit of truth was not your primary objective with this thread. I don't know why you continue to deny this, as its very obvious to everyone reading that you didn't make this thread because you were truly curious about Christianity and desired to give faith a legit shot.
As for your questions that "theists don't happen to have the answer to", I don't think you ever responded to what I said in post #300:
From reading your posts, it seems as if you have built the entire foundations of your worldviews upon logic and reason. Often times your logic and reason is sound. However, I have yet to see you once accept that there is non-zero possibility that faith is the way to God and not logic and reason. Your entire set of philosophies ignores this possibility, and therefore I believe you have some flaws in your basic philosophies, as one's basic philosophies should never prevent him from reaching any type of possible truth be it through faith, reason, knowledge, or anything else.
I've met and debated with a lot of great philosophical minds during my life(philosophy major ftw). And one common trait that all of them had was that they were very open minded and constantly willing to rethink their own basic philosophies. When someone came along and questioned them, they looked at it as an opportunity to improve themselves. Yet when people question you, you seem to look at it as another debate that you have to win. I don't think your way is optimal. I think every one of us should welcome critique and criticism because that is what helps us improve our own thoughts. This close-mindedness is the enemy of intellectual growth. Stop going into debates with theists with an attitude of "these guys are all idiots, watch how dumb I make them look" and start going into debates with an attitude of "let me learn as much as I can and reshape my own views until they're the very best I can make them." If everyone did this, philosophical growth would occur much more quickly.
I know that most people think that their current worldviews are the best and that they'll most likely never change, but if you go and talk to some older philosophers you'll realize just how much a person can change over the years.
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I dont really struggle with trying to get faith in God anymore then i struggle with trying to get faith in disbeliveing in God. Its not a struggle it just is and i dont know either way.
Last edited by Assani Fisher; 06-21-2010 at 02:25 PM.
06-21-2010
, 02:23 PM
I mean, just look at these posts. Do these posts come across as a guy trying to honestly learn or do they come across as a guy trying to make theists look stupid and put them down? I have absolutely no clue why a philosophical discussion would be handled with such immaturity or result in ad hominem attacks. If both sides were honestly pursuing truth, it would never come to that.
06-21-2010
, 03:03 PM
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Also regarding #1....is it not possible that God does indeed desire for everyone to follow him, but that desire takes a backseat to his overwhelming desire for justice? And while we may not understand why it is so, perhaps unrepentant humans really do deserve Hell(I'm pretty sure thats exactly what the bible teaches).
the issue is that the tenets of fundamentalist christianity fit a pattern of inconsistent incoherent crowd control man-created mythology, and thus have as much chance of being factual as any other human religion and can be safely ignored.
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I don't think Christianity calls for "genuine belief", I think it calls for faith based belief.
06-21-2010
, 03:23 PM
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I fully believe you RIGHT NOW. I think that for you to accept God RIGHT NOW that is what you'd need. However, don't ignore the possibility that God has a plan for your life and that plan includes undergoing changes which may eventually lead you to a point where you can do it God's way(through faith) and not your way(through knowledge).
To me it seems like faith in Gods laws is a guessing game were i would just be pulling out the morals i believe in and forcing them onto a God whos morals idk. And that doesn't seem right to me to "speak" for God like that if there is one.
And as far as faith in believing there is a God. Like i said i dont know how to go about getting faith but if God wants to change that the ball is in his court.
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I know that most people think that their current worldviews are the best and that they'll most likely never change, but if you go and talk to some older philosophers you'll realize just how much a person can change over the years.
Are you opened to the idea faith might be misplaced and God might actually be found and want to be found through knowledge of his creation and not faith?
Last edited by batair; 06-21-2010 at 03:30 PM.
06-21-2010
, 04:07 PM
So if the only options were Christianity and atheism, where the Christian doctrine is understood as infinite reward in the afterlife for believers vs infinite punishment for unbelievers, then as long as there's a nonzero probability of Christianity being true, it would be +EV to be a Christian. Which still isn't a reason to believe Christianity is true. That is, if your best estimate is that the doctrine of Christianity has a 1% chance of being true, you aren't going to believe Christianity is true (you don't believe something if you only think it has a 1% chance of being true). You might want to believe so as to soak up the +EV conferred by belief, but unfortunately for you, you'd still consider "Christianity is false" to be far more likely than "Christianity is true". And if the Christian God required your assessment of Christianity's truth to be > 50%, off to hell you'd go. You can't choose to believe whatever you'd like to believe. You believe whatever it is you consider to be the actual truth, for which the EV calculation isn't relevant.
But further, Christianity and atheism aren't the only two choices, so it isn't even clear that belief in Christianity is +EV. You have to factor in all the other religions too (at least, all the other religions that have a nonzero probability of being true). If you pick Christianity but the one true religion turns out to be something else, you go to hell anyway (at least if the one true religion happens to send believers in other religions to hell). And why stop with the traditional, well known religions? Why are they any more likely to be true than obscure religions that you've never heard of, or even a bizarre hypothetical religion based on the divinity of cardboard boxes that some local pothead made up while he was high?
So there would seem to be an unlimited set of non-falsifiable religious belief systems one could imagine - no matter how unlikely each one may be you can't absolutely prove any of them to be false. Without some sort of evidence for one religion over the others, you'd have no basis on which to choose (from among an infinite set of candidate religions that include the infinite reward / infinite punishment duality). You can even imagine religions that send only Christians to hell and everyone else to heaven, or only atheists to heaven and everyone else to hell (God exists but wants us to believe he doesn't exist). So much for religious belief being +EV - without some type of evidence we just have no idea which beliefs might be advantageous.
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As I said, I'm really not sure if God exists. However, if God does exist then I think we greatly underestimate the gap between God's knowledge and ours. I mean, I would have to think that God trying to explain his reasoning to us would be worse than a person trying to explain algebra to a cat. Theres just no way the cat would ever be able to comprehend it. So if a god does exist, then I find it pretty funny that people can say what God "should" do.
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In my personal experience, I've found the average atheist to be much smarter than the average Christian. Now if faith(and not knowledge) is the way to God, then do you think its possible that when many atheists try to "search for God" they are too intellectually arrogant and they refuse to consider using faith over reason? It does make sense that dumber people would be more willing to forego reason and logic than people blessed with strong intelligence.
06-21-2010
, 05:16 PM
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This sounds like Pascal's Wager, which has been analyzed ad nauseum and there are several problems with the argument (that wiki link could get you started in case you aren't familiar with it).
So if the only options were Christianity and atheism, where the Christian doctrine is understood as infinite reward in the afterlife for believers vs infinite punishment for unbelievers, then as long as there's a nonzero probability of Christianity being true, it would be +EV to be a Christian. Which still isn't a reason to believe Christianity is true. That is, if your best estimate is that the doctrine of Christianity has a 1% chance of being true, you aren't going to believe Christianity is true (you don't believe something if you only think it has a 1% chance of being true). You might want to believe so as to soak up the +EV conferred by belief, but unfortunately for you, you'd still consider "Christianity is false" to be far more likely than "Christianity is true". And if the Christian God required your assessment of Christianity's truth to be > 50%, off to hell you'd go. You can't choose to believe whatever you'd like to believe. You believe whatever it is you consider to be the actual truth, for which the EV calculation isn't relevant.
But further, Christianity and atheism aren't the only two choices, so it isn't even clear that belief in Christianity is +EV. You have to factor in all the other religions too (at least, all the other religions that have a nonzero probability of being true). If you pick Christianity but the one true religion turns out to be something else, you go to hell anyway (at least if the one true religion happens to send believers in other religions to hell). And why stop with the traditional, well known religions? Why are they any more likely to be true than obscure religions that you've never heard of, or even a bizarre hypothetical religion based on the divinity of cardboard boxes that some local pothead made up while he was high?
So there would seem to be an unlimited set of non-falsifiable religious belief systems one could imagine - no matter how unlikely each one may be you can't absolutely prove any of them to be false. Without some sort of evidence for one religion over the others, you'd have no basis on which to choose (from among an infinite set of candidate religions that include the infinite reward / infinite punishment duality). You can even imagine religions that send only Christians to hell and everyone else to heaven, or only atheists to heaven and everyone else to hell (God exists but wants us to believe he doesn't exist). So much for religious belief being +EV - without some type of evidence we just have no idea which beliefs might be advantageous.
If an all-powerful all-knowing being exists, his mind is infinitely more powerful than ours. Agreed, our minds are useless by comparison and we can't even begin to understand the mind of God, if he exists. We're still going to use our minds in an attempt to make sense of our world because it's the best we can do. If we're working with inadequate tools, so be it. What's the alternative?
So if the only options were Christianity and atheism, where the Christian doctrine is understood as infinite reward in the afterlife for believers vs infinite punishment for unbelievers, then as long as there's a nonzero probability of Christianity being true, it would be +EV to be a Christian. Which still isn't a reason to believe Christianity is true. That is, if your best estimate is that the doctrine of Christianity has a 1% chance of being true, you aren't going to believe Christianity is true (you don't believe something if you only think it has a 1% chance of being true). You might want to believe so as to soak up the +EV conferred by belief, but unfortunately for you, you'd still consider "Christianity is false" to be far more likely than "Christianity is true". And if the Christian God required your assessment of Christianity's truth to be > 50%, off to hell you'd go. You can't choose to believe whatever you'd like to believe. You believe whatever it is you consider to be the actual truth, for which the EV calculation isn't relevant.
But further, Christianity and atheism aren't the only two choices, so it isn't even clear that belief in Christianity is +EV. You have to factor in all the other religions too (at least, all the other religions that have a nonzero probability of being true). If you pick Christianity but the one true religion turns out to be something else, you go to hell anyway (at least if the one true religion happens to send believers in other religions to hell). And why stop with the traditional, well known religions? Why are they any more likely to be true than obscure religions that you've never heard of, or even a bizarre hypothetical religion based on the divinity of cardboard boxes that some local pothead made up while he was high?
So there would seem to be an unlimited set of non-falsifiable religious belief systems one could imagine - no matter how unlikely each one may be you can't absolutely prove any of them to be false. Without some sort of evidence for one religion over the others, you'd have no basis on which to choose (from among an infinite set of candidate religions that include the infinite reward / infinite punishment duality). You can even imagine religions that send only Christians to hell and everyone else to heaven, or only atheists to heaven and everyone else to hell (God exists but wants us to believe he doesn't exist). So much for religious belief being +EV - without some type of evidence we just have no idea which beliefs might be advantageous.
If an all-powerful all-knowing being exists, his mind is infinitely more powerful than ours. Agreed, our minds are useless by comparison and we can't even begin to understand the mind of God, if he exists. We're still going to use our minds in an attempt to make sense of our world because it's the best we can do. If we're working with inadequate tools, so be it. What's the alternative?
Also as for "you don't believe something if you think its 1% true", the Bible does have a verse(sorry don't remember the reference) that says something along the lines of faith as small as a mustard seed being enough to move mountains....basically meaning that you don't need a ton of faith reach God, but rather just a tiny bit.
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I don't know what it would mean to "use faith". Why should I have faith in one thing and not another? What are the criteria? Imagine my neighbor John says he's a powerful sorceror. I've never seen him do anything impressive, and he refuses to demonstrate his powers. Is there any reason that I should apply faith to the existence of God, but shouldn't apply faith to my neighbor John's sorcery claim? A few of my other neighbors tell me they have faith in John's sorcery (they haven't seen any proof either, but they all have faith and want me to have faith too). At what point, or on what basis, should I have faith in John's sorcery claim?
06-21-2010
, 06:44 PM
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I'm also not certain that your conclusion of "can be safely ignored" logically follows from your statements. Certainly you'd agree that if there was one true religion and if there was a devil trying to deceive others with a bunch of fake religions that those fake religions would appear to be very much similar to the real one at first glance, no?
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If a god exists and if he is pleased through faith, then I would think that finding such faith would come through an honest pursuit of truth.
nothing personal but the stuff you are spouting is just sophmoric religious apologist babble, not stuff i would expect to be coming from a philosophy major.
06-21-2010
, 07:31 PM
As for being a philosophy major, I graduated 7 years ago and haven't studied much since....I certainly don't claim to be an expert of any kind, nor do I take offense to your statement. More than anything, I'm trying to learn through discussions such as these, and I think learning begins through humility often.
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all religions and cults have unique details that their followers find significant from an internal perspective. from an external perspective details are irrelevant.
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it can be safely ignored in the sense that all of human mythology can be. i doubt you lay awake at night worrying that ancient greek, norse, egyptian etc. gods are real and are judging you. i'd bet you don't spend a lot of time worrying if you should be following the koran or vedas.
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it is trivial to demonstrate that is false. humans can and do convince themselves of many different mutually exclusive, as well as empirically false things through the honest use of faith as a means to truth. whatever your definition of truth is faith is obviously not a reliable tool in finding it.
basically, I'm the guy who isn't ruling out anything. I'm trying to be very open minded about EVERYTHING because I believe that an open mind and a willingness to learn is the very best way to educate yourself. So I'm not going to say "Well I could possibly delude myself by trying to believe in God through faith, therefore I better not even bother considering if there is a God who is pleased by faith."
The only hard stance I've taken in this thread is against those who I believe are being close minded or who are arguing just for the sake of winning an argument. I certainly don't think I deserve to be grouped in with the rest of the religious crowd which spouts "sophmoric religious apologist babble" all the time.
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