[Blaise Russel]

Originally posted by Stunaep
And if we based our morals on what society is like today, we'd make it okay to drink since the age of 7, **** anything that moves and has something with a vague resemblance of a hole, etc.

What's wrong with that?

[karajorma]

Originally posted by Stunaep
And if we based our morals on what society is like today, we'd make it okay to drink since the age of 7, **** anything that moves and has something with a vague resemblance of a hole, etc.

Are you deliberately misunderstanding me or something? I mean not basing morality of stupid assumptions from 2000 years ago like Homosexuality = evil or stem cell research = evil. Crap like that. Not everything that people do these days is correct.

Originally posted by Stunaep
Actually, my point here was describing, how God is not only a white bearded man with sandals. For you, empathy is God. God is this ultimate larger than life creature that you base your actions on. Once you start basing your actions on yourself, you'll inevitably fall into self-destruction. Which is why we need a god, at least for the time being.

How nice of you to try to define my entire world view in one sentence. Pity you got it so completely wrong. I'd already stated that game theory is a major part of it and you've completely missed it.
 Let me give you an analogy. Take your computer. It has finite resources. Every program wants to grab as much of them as it can so it can run at full speed. However you can't run the system like that. The only way that a computer works properly is if all the processes share the CPU with no one task attempting to grab more of the run time than it needs.
 Now. The world also has finite resources.... I'm sure you can figure out the rest for yourself. It all follows pretty logically from there.  No mysticism involved.
 Try reading up on Game theory and especially Axelrod's (sp) prisoners dilema experiments.  It's scientifically proven that the most viable theory for sharing any resource with any large number of other creatures is simple tit-for-tat.
 I mentioned empathy because you need it to make sure tit-for-tat works.

Originally posted by Stunaep
So, people with religion do ****ty things, and people without it do ****ty things. So why bother at all? Let those who need religion have it, and those who don't won´t. And believe me, there will always be those who need it. At least in the scope of the next millennia or so.

I never once mentioned the ratio in which they do ****ty things. I happen to believe that without religion the ratio would be lower. Maybe that's because I tend to see ****ty things being done more often by people who are recognisably religious than atheists.

Originally posted by Stunaep
Which brings me back to the point I've stated several times. I don't we can yet. I mean, humanity has finally reached a point, where we are no longer holding religious wars, or at least not on the scale of 1000 years ago. But most people aren't ready yet for a world without religion. I feel it would release the floodgates you consider non-existant. But I guess we'll never know, since there ain't a chance of God going away any time soon.

That's your belief then fine. You're welcome to believe it. I don't simple as that.  I don't consider the floodgates non-existant. I simply believe that the effect of religion is a greater force for evil in the world than the effect of its abscence would be.

[TrashMan]

There is proof all around us that God exists....There are just people who are too blind to see it....

Ancient writing from Egypt and Rome confirm the Flood/Locust/Plage, etc... that happened during the time Abraham was there and the incredibly strange events that happend after Christ Died...
The both hated Cristinas...so why would they ever write something like that if it wasn't the truth...

Allso, look at all the monotheistic religions today...they are 99% the same (the 1% difference is man's product)..The same God?

And the greatest proof that there is a God is in science itself..
The vastness of the universe, it's complexity, the subatomic chaotic nature, yet perfectly ordered on a large scale...
The complex machines that are our bodies, the circle of life, the incredible adaptibility of nature, it's beauty..
And the fact that a large part of it can be understood by scientific methods and our own pitifull minds...

All is just too well ordered to be a product of pure chance...it's clearly a product of a mind greater than we can ever imagine..

and there's allways the question of the beginning of the universe...Science can't explain it...Logic can't explain it...Only the existance of God explains it...

[aldo_14]

Originally posted by TrashMan
There is proof all around us that God exists....There are just people who are too blind to see it....

Ancient writing from Egypt and Rome confirm the Flood/Locust/Plage, etc... that happened during the time Abraham was there and the incredibly strange events that happend after Christ Died....

How do you know that these events were not just simply interpreted as miracles or divine intervention, then placed in the Bible as a result?

Even if something does happen, and it is ascribed to God, does not mean it was actually cause by (a) God.

i mean, the Great Flood was suppossed to have wiped out all life on Earth, yes?  But was China affected?  Or europe?

[Grey Wolf]

I still say that the Black Sea theory is the single flood explanation that makes the most sense.

[mikhael]

Originally posted by TrashMan
And the greatest proof that there is a God is in science itself..
The vastness of the universe, it's complexity, the subatomic chaotic nature, yet perfectly ordered on a large scale...
The complex machines that are our bodies, the circle of life, the incredible adaptibility of nature, it's beauty..
And the fact that a large part of it can be understood by scientific methods and our own pitifull minds...

All is just too well ordered to be a product of pure chance...it's clearly a product of a mind greater than we can ever imagine..

and there's allways the question of the beginning of the universe...Science can't explain it...Logic can't explain it...Only the existance of God explains it...

Your gross misunderstanding of the nature of the universe is insulting. You are barred--BARRED--from discussing science again until you have a basic understanding of cosmology, the anthropic principle, chaos theory and numerical combinatorics.

[Rictor]

Originally posted by aldo_14


How do you know that these events were not just simply interpreted as miracles or divine intervention, then placed in the Bible as a result?

Even if something does happen, and it is ascribed to God, does not mean it was actually cause by (a) God.

i mean, the Great Flood was suppossed to have wiped out all life on Earth, yes?  But was China affected?  Or europe?

A while ago (maybe a year) a saw a program on TLC (The Learning Channel, sort of like Discovery but more interesting) that actually went through the 10 Plagues visited on Egypt and tried to find a scientific explaination for them all, taking into consideration the time at which they allegedly took place. And I must say, it did a pretty good job.

[Ghostavo]

Does anyone here actually believe that there are 6 billion people on this planet because of 8 persons that were on "the arc"? How could there be enough genetic variability considering they were a family?!?!?

[karajorma]

Originally posted by Ghostavo
Does anyone here actually believe that there are 6 billion people on this planet because of 8 persons that were on "the arc"? How could there be enough genetic variability considering they were a family?!?!?

Not to mention that we are supposedly all decended from two people, adam and eve. That would mean that for any particular point on the genome there could only be 4 possible genes.

[Grey Wolf]

Which is why, assuming you're intelligent and religious, you tend to ignore the entire Book of Genesis.

[Bobboau]

though humans do have some of the least diverse gene pools of all animals, there is more diversity in a litter of pupies than the entier human race, it's beleved that at some point in our not to distant past the human race was down to about 10,000

[aldo_14]

Originally posted by Bobboau
though humans do have some of the least diverse gene pools of all animals, there is more diversity in a litter of pupies than the entier human race, it's beleved that at some point in our not to distant past the human race was down to about 10,000

Does the Ice Age count?

[Mr. Vega]

Originally posted by karajorma


Not to mention that we are supposedly all decended from two people, adam and eve. That would mean that for any particular point on the genome there could only be 4 possible genes.

Unless evolution occured:p

[Janos]

Originally posted by Mr. Vega
Unless evolution occured:p

[TrashMan]

Originally posted by aldo_14


How do you know that these events were not just simply interpreted as miracles or divine intervention, then placed in the Bible as a result?

Even if something does happen, and it is ascribed to God, does not mean it was actually cause by (a) God.

I mean, the Great Flood was suppossed to have wiped out all life on Earth, yes?  But was China affected?  Or europe?

Tsk, tsk...
Use your brain! The Old Testament is written simoblicly. You have to put yourself in the position of a man from that age. They didn't know much of the world (I bet 99% of them never left the country). To them their country WAS the world. There was a "Great Flood" that covered the whole region where Israel/Palestina now are ....

@mikhael - LOL...I have knowledge of that things...I love science...The question is...are YOU lacking the understanding of the nature of the universe?

Adam and Eve...it's allso symbolical... It probably represents the first people groups (like nations...thousands of individuals)

And the fact that most "wonders" can be explain...God created the universe...thus, he created everything in it (floods, winds..etc..). ..What's so surprising about him causing things like storms by using nature itself (so it looks like it ain't nothing special...alltough it is... In the case of the Great Sea, the winds conditions that have caused the sea to "split" are so extreeme that they statisticly appear every 750(or something) years...talk about timing..).

I mean, he IS God...you really don't expect him to leave his fingerprints behind?

[Janos]

Originally posted by TrashMan

...    ...   ...  

what

I mean... Uhh... Eeerr.. what.
 Please, in your previous comment you said that there's PROOF "all around us" that god exists. Now you back off and say that proof does not exist, because God does not want us to see it. (Why would he do something like that boggles my mind.)  

I want to see this proof.

[aldo_14]

Originally posted by TrashMan


Tsk, tsk...
Use your brain! The Old Testament is written simoblicly. You have to put yourself in the position of a man from that age. They didn't know much of the world (I bet 99% of them never left the country). To them their country WAS the world. There was a "Great Flood" that covered the whole region where Israel/Palestina now are ....
 

So God didn't cause a great flood to wipe out life on Earth and start a new age, then?

[karajorma]

Originally posted by Bobboau
though humans do have some of the least diverse gene pools of all animals, there is more diversity in a litter of pupies than the entier human race, it's beleved that at some point in our not to distant past the human race was down to about 10,000

Yep. The Toba Supervolcano. Damn near wiped humanity out completely.

Click me

Originally posted by Mr. Vega
Unless evolution occured:p

At least one person appreciates the basic irony involved in the fact that people who believe the bible is 100% true can only explain the genetic diversity of human beings by using evolution  

Originally posted by TrashMan
Adam and Eve...it's allso symbolical... It probably represents the first people groups (like nations...thousands of individuals)

Ahhh. So you're one of those christians. The "What I think God meant to say" kind. The problem I have with them is how can we take anything you say seriously? If you say that your own religions holy book is incorrect or symbolic in places how can you state that anything in it is the word of God?
 In fact since you already believe that God is perfectly happy to lie to his own followers how can you be certain that the entire bible isn't as test of faith and the only way to pass it is to renounce the stupid parts of it (Like laws banning homosexuality or bits saying that women who are raped really wanted it) completely?

[Sandwich]

The way I see it, the account of Adam, Eve, and their sons, Cain and Abel, is too specific to be referring to people groups, what with the geneologies and all. Although it certainly doesn't make sense that they were the only humans on earth at the time, since Cain took a wife from somewhere. Perhaps God created Adam and Eve first, but then created others, about whom we are not told.

Or maybe they are representing people groups. Who knows? I certainly don't.

[Stryke 9]

Urgh. There's something so inherently wrong in picking and choosing what you want in a religion.

Stu is basically right that the vast majority of people aren't mature enough to accept a worldview more nuanced or complex than "Big leader say this true, big leader say do that". There are a couple cases on this board where such is painfully obvious, and at risk of sounding snobbish I'll put forward that those literate (and computer literate) enough to access this board are probably disproportionately capable of abstract thought. It seems highly unlikely that were everybody in the world suddenly to understand the vast improbability of God's existence everyone would instantly set out a-murderin', but then it's almost inconcievable that they'd accept that, or that there wouldn't be a proxy for similar levels of blind faith ("Scientists say this true..."). People in general don't like to think about most things too deeply- probably given sufficient examination the same applies to everybody- they just want to accept what they're told and get on with their lives.

Trashman, in any other age you'd get burned at the stake far faster than any atheist, and I think I can see why. Reinterpreting faith to suit personal interests is wrong. The idea is that God creates you, not that you invent God.

Kara, in reference to the "evolution" bit- not quite. It's all apocryphal and generally is only really a standard of the nastier racists, but there are supposedly Biblical explanations for the diversity of mankind. Black people, for example, are supposed to be the descendants of Ham, after he was "marked" for seeing his father drunk off his ass and buck naked (which is really yet another case of God picking on the wrong guy... but then again, it's pretty established that he played favorites with the likes of Noah). I won't repeat the reasons that's the purported Biblical source of blacks, for reasons that'll be pretty clear to anybody who knows the passage, but that's a starter. I'm also reasonably sure there was an interpretation of the Bible that accounted for American Indians, though I'm not so sure about the other races. Probably the results of some other curse, I'm guessing, knowing the interpreters.