In a recent issue of Scientific American, arch-Darwinist Richard Dawkins and physicist Lawrence Krauss discussed the relationship between science and religion.
Dawkins, whose latest book, The God Delusion, is only one of a slew of recent books attacking religious beliefs, prefers an “in your face” approach. He once wrote that “if you meet somebody who claims not to believe in evolution, that person is ignorant, stupid, or insane.” He then added “or wicked, but I’d rather not consider that.”
In his discussion with Krauss, Dawkins stood by his statement, calling it “a simple and sober statement of fact.”
For his part, Krauss prefers to “reach out” to people and “understand where they are coming from”—not so that he might learn from them: Like Dawkins, he assumes that the people in question have little, if anything, to teach him. Rather, his goal is to “seduce” them into “understanding” and accepting scientific truths.
Thus Krauss says that “telling people . . . that their deepest beliefs are simply silly—even if they are” is counterproductive.
As you may have inferred from the “even if they are,” Krauss does not deny that religious belief is “irrational.” He simply thinks that religion is too deeply ingrained to be done away with. Better to help people “moderate” their beliefs and “cut out the most irrational and harmful aspects of religious fundamentalism.”
All of this begs the question: “Is faith, in particular, Christianity, irrational?”
Neither Dawkins nor Krauss comes close to proving this. Instead, Dawkins and Krauss simply assume that materialism—the idea that there is nothing besides matter—is true. Thus, what makes a faith “rational” is whether it can be proven empirically.
Dawkins and Krauss do not offer any arguments to justify their assumptions. They do not tell us why materialism is true: Instead, they ask you to take its truth as a given—in other words, on faith.
Speaking of faith, what Dawkins means by the word faith is, to put it politely, idiosyncratic. His technique, on display in the Scientific American piece, is to find the most extreme, fringe Christian positions and ascribe them to all Christians. He then cites these beliefs as proof that all Christian faith is irrational.
Reading their discussion or anything else associated with Dawkins and what is being called the “New Atheism,” you would not know that many of the greatest scientific discoveries were made by people of faith—not scientists who happened to be Christians, but people whose faith inspired and informed their scientific endeavors.
The work of physicists like Krauss would not be possible without Michael Faraday’s work in electromagnetism. Faraday was a devout Christian who believed nature to be intelligible because it was created and upheld by a God who made Himself known in both His Word and in nature.
Rodney Stark, the eminent sociologist, writes that Christianity rescued reason. Christians saw reason as a gift of a rational God, and it could, therefore, be used to explore the universe and world that God had made. This belief made modern science possible.
If you meet someone who says your Christian faith is irrational, ask him to explain the basis of his faith.
This commentary first aired on October 12, 2007, and is part five in a five-part series.
_________________________________________________
From BreakPoint®, December 31, 2007, Copyright 2008, Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with the permission of Prison Fellowship Ministries. All rights reserved. May not be reproduced or distributed without the express written permission of Prison Fellowship Ministries. “BreakPoint®” and “Prison Fellowship Ministries®” are registered trademarks of Prison Fellowship
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Chris333,
“I honestly do not see how they could possibly go about testing the veracity of all faith's answered prayers in any less than a completely subjective fashion.”
It’s called ‘triple blind studies’, in which not even those involved with the testing can impact the results, that’s how. That’s how science removes intentional bias.
“You would also have to consider the spiritual state of the person who is praying”
Not really, either one particular group of faith has above average answered prayers over others or they don’t, its really not that complicated.
I wasn’t implying praying is a get out of jail free card, but the results show it’s overrated, that they do attest to.
“Prayer is largely a personal thing, I have seen as many "scientific" tests saying they prove the power of prayer as those who say they have disproven it. “
Are they triple blind studies? Do you have the links to vouch for such claims? At best with both sides considered you will have prayers and their effectiveness largely being a mixed bag and hardly conclussive, certainly not something to reside in the realm of faith alone.
“You haven't explained how if science cannot comment on the supernatural, how it can comment on prayer?”
I never said science couldn’t comment on the supernatural, I think to a degree it can. They are overlaping. With respect to prayers and wine turning into blood and crackers being the embodiment of Christ (transubstation) it already has.
Right, it’s a local flood. NOT ALL cutlers around the world record a world wide flood, but many do have stories about a flooding.
“ I disagree that the story of Noah must have occured 4000 years ago as well. Even the most conservative biblical scholars admit that we cannot know for sure about exact dates before Abraham's time.”
Well, the Epic of Gilgamesh is at least a 1000 years older than the 1200 BC OT, so at worst it’s an adaptation, so it hardly matters. it's a symbolic adaption, nothing more.
“The author on that site did mention that the one testimony was later added, but he said that was not the only testimony and the others are reliable.”
Right, but the author doesn’t go into the details on what interpolations are added, which negates his very point.
”Finally, theism can be logically believed in.”
I guess so, if you also think UFO’, Big foots and tons of other things where the evidence isn’t very credible, then in those terms virtually anything could be believed in and be logical, which itself isn't very logical.
“I argue that it can also be rationally believed in, you haven't given strong reasons why this is not so.”
Well, define the precepts of ‘god’ so we can know how to critique his nature and thereby we can validate the claim of his existence for or against. you still haven't done this and i doubt you will. You’re the theist, define 'god' and I’ll reply why it doesn’t fit with what we see in nature and can test.
Agentorange,
First I would like to comment on your "scientific" tests of prayers. I honestly do not see how they could possibly go about testing the veracity of all faith's answered prayers in any less than a completely subjective fashion. This would be pseudo-science at best. You would also have to consider the spiritual state of the person who is praying, different faiths may say that a more spiritual person is required to pray if the prayer is to be answered, also prayer is not just some kind of "get out of jail free card" so doing some test on patients with prayer doesn't show that prayer is inneffective. Prayer is largely a personal thing, I have seen as many "scientific" tests saying they prove the power of prayer as those who say they have disproven it. You haven't explained how if science cannot comment on the supernatural, how it can comment on prayer?
Regarding the flood, I personally don't believe the Bible account forces a "worldwide" flood (the word world often only referred to the surrounding area, much the same way Romans said they conquered the world, when in fact they knew there was more) However, it is at least interesting that all major cultures all around the world have a devastating flood story, that was supposed to have occured sometime in the past. I disagree that the story of Noah must have occured 4000 years ago as well. Even the most conservative biblical scholars admit that we cannot know for sure about exact dates before Abraham's time.
This post is getting exceedingly long, and so I cannot provide every argument, but I would point you to Evidence that Demands a Verdict, by Josh McDowell (he was a lawyer but his views are not expressed) or Lee Strobel's "The Case for the Real Jesus" Both relevant to your criticisms of mythic religions and the strength of outside testimonies to Christ. You are forgetting however, that Josephus' accounts are taken (other than the clearly added part) to be legitimate accounts of history. The author on that site did mention that the one testimony was later added, but he said that was not the only testimony and the others are reliable.
Finally, theism can be logically believed in. You haven't demonstrated this to be not so. I argue that it can also be rationally believed in, you haven't given strong reasons why this is not so. And you have given no reasons why atheism can be logically believed in, and if it cannot be logically believed in, then it is irrational.
“Who are these theists? I have never met a Christian that said that only Christians had prayers answered.”
Oh, get off it already. You and I know exactly what I am talking about. No religious theist would ever logically say that other faiths receives answered prayers, as the very act would mean it would negate the very reason why a group of believers in a particular faith would believe in their faiths prayer at all.
”You then go on to say that my answered prayers don't mean anything to you….“You did nothing to fight this claim, you didn't even address it. You just said that that doesn't matter to you.”
Have them scientifically validated, then I will consider them as credible of anything otherwise I contend that people that believe in what they find miracles or answered prayers can actually be shown by science to be something else entirely or the result of placebo affect. People that walk on hot coals are lead to think somehow their acts are miraculous, but science has shown why it’s not at all and those that think its still a miracle neglect how conduction of heat and energy works.
“You said that science proves that prayers are ineffective, aside from your blatant double standard that theology has no place in science but that science can decide the veracity of something such as prayer”
Well, you saw the results, you be the judge if prayers work or not. What are talking about, there is no double standard. What can Theology answer in regards to Science? Science can show the efficacy of such Theistic things that deal with the natural world, but what can Theology answer about Science?
“and also the fact that in the same breath you also say that every religion has their prayers unanswered”
No. Perhaps I confused you. Look they’ve done 2 different studies/tests: one to determine if a particular group of believers has their prayers answered at a higher ratio of success above any other faith. As I said, all faiths showed that across the board the success and failure ratio of all faiths is the same. In other words, no particular faith received a high ratio of success or failure compared to any other faith. This gives credence that prayers are partially user induced placebo affect.
Then, ANOTHER group of studies/tests were done on just THE EFFECTIVENESS OF PRAYERS, in particular Christianity.. This time the results showed that the EFFECTIVENESS of prayers wasn’t noticeable at all. 2 Completely different types of Analysis coming to their own conclusive results.
“"God works in mysterious ways" does not show the believers complete ignorance of God, it only asserts that God's ways are higher than our own”
Fine, not complete ignorance but partial ignorance. Too much to lend credence on any certainty that's for sure. It's like arguing that you see ghosts, but when asked to define them you resort to 'well, ghosts work in mysterous ways'. What illogical nonsense. Either way it doesn’t help to claim to have utter absolute certainty in the matters in which everything hinges off of faith alone. Even worse, something for which even the believers lack enough information to discern the credibility of the proposition results in faith built propositions. It’s like arguing that you’re only partially ignorant of big foots as a reality and yet you have absolute faith in the proposition of its existence. That isn’t logical at all.
“you seem to want a god that fits in a box, most likely so you can just find something to criticize about him.”
Well the only way we as humans can discern if indeed he exists are to explore and critique the evidence for and against him. Duh. If souls were found to exist you’d no doubt trumpet it into the skies that b/c souls exist its more evidence that god is real right? So it could work towards your benefit as a theist, or it could disregard at the very least how religions interpret god. Well, the proposition of his very existence by the definitions that religions attribute to him should be tested, this would at least give due credit to the proper faiths that have through out time said have spoken with him directly.
“you didn't challenge the rest of the sources he quoted that support Jesus' historicity”
No, I didn’t b/c there wasn’t enough room, but I mentioned I would if you’d like. Would you like me to? I considered his neglect to mention what was interpolated as reason enough to not warrant any further. Keep in mind the guy from your site didn’t bother to mention what interpolations and how the document was doctored later by Christians at all. Most ingenious. He left it in a subjective view that the Flavoium was something of credibility, when even apologetics will acknowledge it has been doctored.
“At last I do agree with you that our assumptions and our faith should be based on evidence, not simply on blind faith.”
Good, then lets test and analyze all the propositions that religions put forth on the nature of god and see who has it right. Everything from prayers to how wine really turns to jesus’ blood according to catholics. Anything in this world can and should be tested.
For the ones that truly are intellectuals and know things outside their bible, many times they resort to an apologetic stance and not a literalist one and this is really the only way to preserve their faith in wake of modernity. The more ignorant ones, regardless of religions, will believe no holocaust, or other propositions for which there is lacking or non-credible evidence
Polkinghorne’s stance on his on faith, and how rational it is as he defines it, is only b/c he’s an apologetic who ignores much of the biblical nonsense for sake of keeping the faith. He has erected this partition in his mind that separates the nonsense from what is possible in the bible. That would be like a husband denying all the signs his wife is cheating on him and them coming to terms with the fact she is and then in the end still be in deluded enough to think that she’s faithful. Such a stance isn’t logical at all, and this is exactly how apologetics come to grips with a holly text riddled with errors. it is in principle a form of self dillusion for sake of having to face the facts that what one originally thought just aint so.
“My argument is not what kind of theology is rational, it is that theism is rational and logically.”
Sure, if you’re an apologetic and you basically ignore much of the conflicting data, any could make such rash decisions seem logical under such premises.
“What is your explanation?”
Of the oldest cutlers, all settled according to areas of access to water and flooding on the Nile and other main bodies of water would have been common and to ignorant people they would link this as an act of god. My explanation is that both the Ancient Chinese, Egyptian and numerous other cutlers were started before the Noachian flood 4000 years ago and went on right through without any signs of such a global event. The pre Dynasty ere of Egypt was well underway and built the pyramids before the alleged flood and never slowed down until the times of the Roman Empire.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egyptian_pyramids
To even consider it as factual would mean you’d have to be ignorant of how a global water system works and you’d have to explain where it all went afterwards. You’d also have to explain how 8 people reproduced fast enough to create the populations that are recorded in some the oldest wars (impossible). The Noachian flood if anything was local and mirrors the Epic of Gilgamesh that occurred 1000 years prior that it’s an adaptation of that real event.
“Atheism is not based upon objective evidence, agnosticism perhaps but not atheism. Make your case if it is otherwise.
”The corruptions in the history of Josephus he left out, what is your problem? Besides that it is clear they were later additions many years later.”
Ugggh, the guy didn’t note all the interpolations and added text that Christians doctored onto the Josephuses accounts, that’s the problem pal. He gave a subjective viewpoint while not including all the evidence.
"No, this is what most theists will tell us. Only believers in ‘X faith’ can have answered prayers, in other words, faiths are mutually exclusive as they define only their faith as the true one, while others are some cult or what have you. "
Who are these theists? I have never met a Christian that said that only Christians had prayers answered. It sounds to me like this is some strawman that atheists build so they can just knock it down, whatever you are saying here, it is simply untrue and isn't obvious or even pertaining to my argument.
You then go on to say that my answered prayers don't mean anything to you, as they probably shouldn't, but this doesn't change anything. You said that science proves that prayers are inneffective, aside from your blatant double standard that theology has no place in science but that science can decide the veracity of something such as prayer, and also the fact that in the same breath you also say that every religion has their prayers unanswered, I don't think you have much of a point here. I am not saying that a science test determines the tenacity of theism, rather I am saying that my faith, and others such as Polkinghorne, are verified to some extent by prayers that are answered, and other miracles that we perceive. You did nothing to fight this claim, you didn't even address it. You just said that that doesn't matter to you. Well I do not care whether it matters to you or not, I care that theism is logicaly tenable and even rationally believable, and that atheism is not. You didn't show how my faith was irrational, you haven't even scratched it, you surely haven't shown how theism as a faith system is illogical or irrational.
The phrase, "God works in mysterious ways" does not show the believers complete ignorance of God, it only asserts that God's ways are higher than our own. Paul says that "God works for the good of those who love Him" This doesn't show our stupidity, it shows our humility and limited understanding. Again you seem to want a god that fits in a box, most likely so you can just find something to criticize about him.
By the way, Lee isn't a Lawyer, he is a journalist, but it doesn't even matter if he was a 5 year old, because it is not his opinion that is being voiced it is that of highly respected scholars from their respective fields with all the PhDs and the things that make you sleep better at night.
Also regarding the website, you just seemed to criticize one point that was agreeing with you, you didn't challenge the rest of the sources he quoted that support Jesus' historocity, or his argument in general. You only asked for early sources, I gave them to you and you aren't happy. But here is the truth, it doesn't matter what I or anyone tell you, it is clear you are only hearing what you want to.
At last I do agree with you that our assumptions and our faith should be based on evidence, not simply on blind faith. This goes hand in hand with Christianity, Paul himself said, "If Christ did not come back to life, then our faith is worthless, and we are to be most pitied among men." This doesn't sound like someone saying, "Hey just BELIEVE no matter what" I also agree with you that some people base their faith on obviously unsupported presuppositions. But you cannot honestly assume that the multitudes of highly intelligent Christians do so? I mean to even begin to say something like that would kill your argument and show incredible arrogance.
You are not dealing with what I am saying agentorange, Polkinghorne has an apologetic for his Christian faith, yes he believes some parts of scriptures need to be interpreted differently than others, but most Christians do believe that, you bring in things that are not relevant to what I am saying, you didn't deal with the fact that Polkinghorne has a rational faith, it is logical, I want you to say yes or no, not yes but. My argument is not what kind of theology is rational, it is that theism is rational and logically tenable and atheism is not. There are ancient flood stories in Chinese history and native american, of course as well in the middle east. What is your explanation? Do you think they imagined it at the same time, while they were yet disconnected from each other? Denominations are not a change in the faith, it is a change in the people. You make a bad argument to assume otherwise, the Bible has changed very little if any, only the catholic and orthodox churches believe that they define the faith. Atheism is not based upon objective evidence, agnosticism perhaps but not atheism. Make your case if it is otherwise.
The corruptions in the history of Josephus he left out, what is your problem? Besides that it is clear they were later additions many years later. The rest wasn't corrupt
“Personally I have never had a prayer unanswered, I have known people who keep a prayer journal and have seen that God was faithful”
Personally I am not impressed, have your prayers proven under a blind study process in a scientific method that ensures no cheating, favoritism and the utmost accuracy and you might have something noteworthy, otherwise it’s white noise. Please reply back with why other followers of other religions have their prayers answered in equal preportion to other faiths.
“What is really ironic about your postion, is that you go from saying that I have to show all the answered prayers of multitudes of people around the world to be false (in order to prove that "my god" exists, but then you say that there is no evidence that prayers are answered. Be consistent,”
Well, according to any particular faith, only the followers of their faith receives answered prayers, so yes explain such things if you can. It is you theist that claim such things, so explain them with evidence or rationalize them and be appolgetic of prayers too. If only Christians should have answered prayers, as all Christians will emphatically say, then there is no logical reason why other believers in other faiths receive answered prayers at all and why their ratio of success/failure is equal to that of all faiths across the board. Clearly this is a problem for theists that they always ignore. The links I gave you showed that those that were prayed for didn’t show any significant beneficial results of being prayed for and actually did nominally worse as a result of knowing they were being prayed for. this was attributed to anxiety.This was a triple blind study to ensure accuracy and no favoratism and you should not that the chief Dr. overseeing the study is a Christian so if anything the results if cheated would have occured would result in stats in the opposite direction.
“Finally you use this phrase "God works in mysterious ways" as if it shows the stupidity of every believer.”
Well, from an evidence based perspective it makes no sense. A theist that declares such a thing is admitting they equally have no clue how god works (if at all) and yet they illogically soldier on as they rationalize why their prayers weren’t answered. (you just did this). It’s like finding evidence that your wife is cheating on you and yet you defy the evidence with more instances that require no evidence and resort to faith alone. To have faith that ones spouse isn’t cheating on them despite all the contradictory evidence is called ‘self delusion’. And you’re saying I only hear what I what to hear? This is what happens when one believes emphatically in a proposition without any credible evidence. Refer this to how all other religions obtain answered prayers randomly and it’s obvious something isn’t right.
“you believe that if God did exist then we must be able to know everything about Him and see a miracle every time we need a little boost.”
No, I am proposing that people of faith acknowledge what the evidence shows. Like those links that I showed that prayers didn’t work and in some cases made patients worse off as they suffered from anxiety. Also, more confounding is how all other religions have answered prayers which counters what all theists define as possible as only their faith should received answered prayers. Clearly something is wrong.
“I resent the fact that you believe that prayer does not do anything, and then you show "scientific" studies to prove this!”
Well, of course you resent it, but that’s b/c you have faith that prayers work and no bit of evidence can touch a proposition that requires faith alone. But could you imagine if the studies came back and showed it was the other way around and that prayers do work? You no doubt would have no problem trumpeting into the skys for all to hear that science had proved prayers work, so clearly you’re a hypocrite. You can't have your cake and eat it too. Confounding evidence will be ignored, but supportive ones would be accepted? Illogical. And you’re saying I am the one that hears what they want to hear? Ha!
“You say theology cannot comment on science all day long, but then you hypocritically say that science has the right to comment on theology, what is that!?”
No, like I said before science can prove or disprove many instances within faiths as their instances occur here in reality where they can be tested. It could both help or harm ones case for what they believe entirely on faith alone. Surely if science showed the existence of a soul you’d have no problems with that. What can theology comment on regarding science anyway? Nothing. That’s a nonsensical statement.
“I said the heart cannot believe what the mind cannot accept! In other words faith and reason go hand in hand, in other words you cannot have faith with out being able to logically accept what you hear.”
Faith is faith b/c no evidence exists, otherwise why call such a proposition faith based? You wouldn’t say you have ‘faith’ that when you walk off a cliff that you would not fall, as evidence and reason tells you otherwise. A proposition that has no evidence and requires only faith ought to be rejected all together. To say we have faith in propositions that have so little, or horrid evidence is nonsensical and illogical. Therefore, faith and reason do not go ‘hand in hand’. You can have ‘faith’ that the sun really does orbit the earth as it appears it does, but the evidence and the reason we use to understand this evidence says otherwise. ‘Faith’ and ‘reason’ are actually at opposite ends to understanding our world. To have faith in something means you have no credible evidence for its proposition, while to use reason that something is a certain way requires evidence.
To buy ‘all in’ if you will into prayers and their affects one must put aside any doubt, skepticism and above all else 100% emphatically have ‘faith’ that their prayers are being answered. This isn’t logical in any situation. But this alone is illogical as mentioned before one should look at other major religions and how their follower’s prayers are equally answered. If this isn’t a red flag, then you’re logic and reason is off kilter.
“I have spent all this time trying to show you a simple logical proposition, and now you right me off as someone who only uses his heart and not his head?.”
Yes, when a proposition that’s only foundation is ‘faith’ or lacking evidence that is exactly not thinking at all with your head! I can have ‘faith’ or ‘think with my heart’ aka hope that I will find a diamond the size of a refrigerator in my backyard and I could dig for a decade and if my faith still isn’t overcome with evidence based reasons that no such thing is in my backyard my thinking with my heart, or’ faith’ will have been the most illogical reason for accepting a proposition to begin with. Disagree? Evidence for propositions is what gives them their weight.
"http://www.lewrockwell.com/barnwell/barnwell57.html"
As I already alluded to, the writers of the Da Vinci Code already admitted before publication that their stories are purely fiction based. I am not talking about Da Vinci Code nonsense. I am saying from the site the guy refers to Josephus account of Jesus (Testimonium Flavianum"), which were shown to be modified and doctored by early Christians. Why oh why would they even bother to doctor the work unless they’re lying to cover a lie? You only lie to cover a lie.
Did you even read this article? Here’s what he wrote:
“The "Jesus Never Existed" crowd would like for you to believe that these citations were all Christian corruptions, but aside from the controversial lines of the Testimonium Flavianum which I have omitted, the majority of scholars do not question the authenticity of these references.”
Gee, he never even bothered to include the parts that were CORRUPTED. Nice. Couldn’t see that one happening. Perhaps you should look into what exactly was interpolated/corrupted by early Christians, if that doesn’t appear as a red flag I don’t know what is. If you’d like I’ll go into the details on why the other extra biblical accounts he mentions on his site of Jesus are also not s favorable as would seem.
“I wouldn't jump the gun and believe everything you hear, check out Lee Strobell's The Case for the Real Jesus.”
Why would I accept Lee Strobells account, he’s a LAWER. Lawers aren’t exactly known for being the most ethically type of persona to put faith into.
“ What is your problem with this statement? You seem to be under the impression that if God exists then He must be all 3000 religions? Or that God cannot answer everyone's prayers but only those of a particular religion?”
No, this is what most theists will tell us. Only believers in ‘X faith’ can have answered prayers, in other words, faiths are mutually exclusive as they define only their faith as the true one, while others are some cult or what have you. The others of another faith, according to theists, will not have answered prayers as according to them unbelievers follow something not according to gods ‘sacred texts’. To admit otherwise shows how fillacious religious doctrine is from the get go.
My point was this, if only believers in a certain faith can have prayers answered, then why do followers of other major religions have answered prayers at all? It makes no logical sense and I don’t see how most Theists obviously overlook such a thing. According to Theists, ONLY believers in a certain faith will have answered prayers and go to heaven and so on. To suggest otherwise, that all faiths have prayers answered means: 1) either god isn’t partial to any particular faith, (this would negate the need for religion pretty much on face value) 2) prayers are hit and miss coincidences and highly dependent upon the Placebo Effect of the user, thus why all members of all religions have prayers answered.
“(By the way there is good evidence that some kind of world wide catastrophe in the form of a flood did happen”
Catastrophic and local to the Sumerian era and location yes, ‘world wide’ not even close. By all means please divulge the details and I’ll be happy to debunk them per instance. I live for debunking YEC nonsense. These type of fallacious accounts that creep into someone’s holly text should be a red flag that at least in part otherwise noteworthy accounts were wrongly recorded, never occurred and not miraculous in the least bit and therefore do more harm to ones religion than to help. This is why apologetics are even around! The details are exactly what matters, for it was shown that many of the miracles didn’t occur in your text you’d likely question the very basis for being a Christian at all. Miracles, and illusions of going to heaven while serving justice by sending unbelievers to hell are perhaps the key reason people have religion in there lives. Hope and fear wrapped in one.
“Atheism does say that God does not exist. They make an assumption, one that is not logically tenable”
Well, Theists equally make the inverse assumption that indeed he does exist, and there assumption is on many times on horrid or lacking evidence for such outrageous claims altogether. If would be like saying that big foots certaintly exist! This is why some many other religions exist, as people in the past were ignorant and in many terms illogical for their reasons on believing certain propositions. To believe in something simply b/c you have faith in the matter is the worst logical conclusion. Our decisions should be evidence based and not based around wishful thinking. This is exactly why the details matter, as without the miracles you’d have little reason to resort to ‘faith’ to believe in such propositions at all.
“Everyone has to give the reasons for their faith”
But you see with Atheism there is no ‘faith’ involved, it’s simply objective evidence based analysis of what is factual, what isn’t and what is even worth putting into consideration to begin with. To rest an entire proposition entirely on ‘faith’ alone is the worst proposition as from the get go you’re admitting you have so little evidence either way and resort to it for your decision in the process. Would any rationale adult ever say they lack the evidence of Santa/UFO’s/Bigfoots, etc. to prove or disprove them and resort instantly to saying they have’ faith’ they exist? No, it’s an utter contradiction of logic from the get go.
“Polkinghorne is a Christian though, and he does have a strong apologetic for why he is so. This shows a logical faith, …“
Right, only b/c he’s an apologetic can he dismiss the literalist view and come to reason that the case for his religious views makes sense. It’s like admitting your spouse actually has been cheating on you on all this time and you finally come to terms with it and nevertheless still accept her as being faithful. Under a fundamentalist/literalist view he could never come to such a conclusion as that be would contrary to what much of the scientific evidence indicates regarding most of the nonsense in the bible. Only by adopting this apologetic stance can he even begin to rationalize and make his own belief tenable. It’s an utter logical fallacy in itself as it means he’s accepting the bible with numerous flaws and thus reduces its authority in the matter and credibility and yet he soldiers on. It’s like admitting that virtually much of a story is false or doctored and coming to a conclusion that the story still (somehow) has weight. I guess being an apologetic is good for something.
“This is not comparable to Christ, all the deities of Hinduism did not perform miracles in front of multitudes who recorded it,”
Actually, many of them did. If you look up all the previous gods that existed prior to jesus and in the same era, many of them had strangely very similar miracles performed. Chruch father Justin Martyr even mentions this. Simon Magus or Apollonius of Tyana ring a bell? So similar it reeks of cross pollination of religions. In fact to this very day many in Hindu faiths think that some people that walk today that perform such miracles are godly. Sam Harris mentions one instance of a Hindui mystic here. www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2VZjeWh36w
“Some religions, such as buddhism and hinduism have changed over time, but the core of Christianity has changed very little if any.”
Right, that’s why in only 200 years Christianity in USA has splintered into who knows how many sects and denominations.
“As far as people's interpretations of events such as the flood, that doesn't change at all what happened or what is recorded, this is not a change in the faith, but in the people's perception”
Right, people adopt a more apologetic stance so they don’t have to admit the fallacious accounts in the bible as being ludicrous. It’s called lying to yourself so you don’t have to admit how shifty the foundation of ones faith is.
"Are you serious? You think jesus was the only god ever to be ‘dead for 3 days and rise again’, this is one of the older religious themes. Can you say ‘cross pollination of religions’?"
I wouldn't jump the gun and believe everything you hear, check out Lee Strobell's The Case for the Real Jesus.
I said if God exists then He can prove Himself to you. What is your problem with this statement? You seem to be under the impression that if God exists then He must be all 3000 religions? Or that God cannot answer everyone's prayers but only those of a particular religion? I didn't say these things, you brought them in. Who is trying to define God here?
"Oh, so you’re saying I have to remove any sense of skepticism, doubt and intuition on reality to accept faith in a proposition? "
Do you read anything I write? I said the heart cannot believe what the mind cannot accept! In other words faith and reason go hand in hand, in other words you cannot have faith with out being able to logically accept what you hear. Your problem is not skepticism, it is hearing only what you want to hear. I have spent all this time trying to show you a simple logical proposition, and now you right me off as someone who only uses his heart and not his head? I do not need you to think for me thank you, rather I would like for you to try thinking for yourself, sometimes it is useful. Finally you use this phrase "God works in mysterious ways" as if it shows the stupidity of every believer. I do believe that God works in ways that are beyond our understanding, generaly this is acknowleding the humility of the believer in not being able to understand fully what God's plan is, but this is unacceptable for you, you believe that if God did exist then we must be able to know everything about Him and see a miracle every time we need a little boost. Perhaps arrogance is another of your problems. I resent the fact that you believe that prayer does not do anything, and then you show "scientific" studies to prove this! You say theology cannot comment on science all day long, but then you hypocritically say that science has the right to comment on theology, what is that!? Personally I have never had a prayer unanswered, I have known people who keep a prayer journal and have seen that God was faithful. This doesn't mean that you get everything you want, but it does mean that God is faithful. What is really ironic about your postion, is that you go from saying that I have to show all the answered prayers of multitudes of people around the world to be false (in order to prove that "my god" exists, but then you say that there is no evidence that prayers are answered. Be consistent, I am not even having to argue against you, you do it for me.
Your 3000 or more religions do not affect my argument, the majority of these religions do not have miracles that were perceived by everyone. Buddha had a small group of followers and most of his miracles were performed when he was alone meditating, Muhammad's only legitimately attributable miracle was receiving the Koran, where he would fall and start frothing at the mouth. This is not comparable to Christ, all the deities of Hinduism did not perform miracles in front of multitudes who recorded it, rather they were supposed to have been only myths which at the very least did not occur in either time or space, even intelligent Hindus today will tell you this. The vast majority of other relgions do not have good if any evidence for their supposed miracles. Some religions, such as buddhism and hinduism have changed over time, but the core of Christianity has changed very little if any. The Bible we have today was the most likely scriptures that were originally believed in, even the most liberal scholars will admit this (at least in the case of the NT, but the OT has good evidence for it).
As far as people's interpretations of events such as the flood, that doesn't change at all what happened or what is recorded, this is not a change in the faith, but in the people's perception. (By the way there is good evidence that some kind of world wide catastrophe in the form of a flood did happen in the ancient world, every major culture from around the world has a flood story, there is also some archaelogical evidence as well, again I do not want to turn this into a debate about the little things and it doesn't directly pertain to my argument).
Atheism does say that God does not exist. They make an assumption, one that is not logically tenable. If they say that God probably does not exist, then they have a real argument, and they are called agnostic. Everyone does define God in some way, the agnostic says that at best God cannot be known. Everyone has to give the reasons for their faith (whether it is faith that God exists or not, and if they say He does, then they have to defend their idea of God) Also, I resent the fact that you just passed that site off as disreputable, you have to take the period off of the end, that is your problem with accessing it. Anyways I know the site's status is important, but at least look at the points, they are either right or wrong, regardless of who is saying it. Anyway I am sure I can find a site with .org on it that says the same thing.
Polkinghorne is a Christian though, and he does have a strong apologetic for why he is so. This shows a logical faith, perhaps his assumptions are wrong, but nonetheless his faith is based on reasoning and evidence. This is going too far for my original argument however, I just wanted to show that there is logical coherency in theism and not in atheism.
Regarding your statement that we may some day create AI or some bacteria. Here is the point, it will be created, it will not have been formed by nature. You are proving God's existence with your argument. But I do not want to get bogged down in the evolution/ID debate, there are plenty of other blogs on this site for that.
“Of course do check out those articles, even if a heart wants to believe in God, if the mind is against it then it cannot be a real faith.”
Oh, so you’re saying I have to remove any sense of skepticism, doubt and intuition on reality to accept faith in a proposition? This is why I don’t accept it, as it requires the user to ‘buy all into’ the idea/proposition and remove any doubt to begin with. What kind of proposition is that? Why don’t you open your heart and have faith in any of the other countless gods? Come on, what’s wrong with you open your heart and have faith in them. Or, why don’t you just have faith that big foot and UFO’s really exist? Would you ever even consider the last 2 (big foot and UFO’s)? I doubt it and that is b/c you have good reason to reject them as the very proposition lacks credible evidence to give it authority in the first place. If something really have sufficient evidence one wouldn’t say to have ‘faith in it’ at all, instead the very thing would be evident.
In science we don’t have ‘faith in theories’ we are always skeptical and attempt to prove an idea via predictions and results and testing. Only religion can use such a contradiction in logic so as to ask a person to ‘just believe for beliefs sake’. Don’t you see what a contradiction of logic that is?
“(if you don't mind, hey it cannot do any harm because if I am wrong then nothing will happen, and if I am right then it may just do something!)”
By all means pray for me, and I’ll think for you. Or, consider all the times the prayers aren’t answered. Typically theists will reply back with nonsense like, ‘ well, god works in mysterious ways’ The hell does that mean? It answers nothing. How do they not know that their prayers aren’t being answered ever and that its merely coincidental 'hit and miss'? and again, if their believe that only their particular faith recieves answered prayers, why do other major religions have answered prayers at all?
“ If Christ was the intervention of God into the world, then deism is not true, because deism asserts that God is just some distant first cause who set the universe in motion. There are other ways of arguing against the idea of deism, but I want to make a positive case for Christ in order to show deism false. “
Right, now you see why I said Theists must indirectly disprove all other instances of other gods and their nature to equally believe in their own? With so many multitudes of gods, obviously they can’t all be right and in a sense that means they are all logically wrong. It becomes more evident when you consider how old the concept of belief in god is and how it has evolved over time.
“My argument would center on the resurrection of Christ primarily, because I believe it is the center of the Christian's faith.”
Are you serious? You think jesus was the only god ever to be ‘dead for 3 days and rise again’, this is one of the older religious themes. Can you say ‘cross pollination of religions’?
“ More importantly however, I would ask you to pray and ask God to reveal Himself to you. I cannot prove that God exists, but He can do it Himself if He is true. “
I am being sarcastic, but which god should I pray to? Member that 3000+ gods figure? It’s not exactly a flip of a coin now is it? If prayers work and only with faith in Christ as you elude to, why do other major religions also experience answered prayers at all? Ever hear of ‘Placebo Affect?’ This either means god really isn’t too partial on ones faith, or prayers in general are bogus. Some recent tests actually confirm the bogusness of prayers of medical patients. Here are some that back that claim up
American Heart Journal 151: 4, 2006 934-42
http://www.thoughtbubbles.org/psychology/prayerhealing/
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/31/health/31pray.html
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&list_uids=16569567
“By stating that God exists, you are defining God, you are giving Him the property of existence. “
Right, so define him already so we can begin stripping away at what characteristics certainly aren’t expressly the works of god. If you’re going to mention consciousness and creating life, those won’t suffice as I alluded to earlier.
“Atheism gives Him the property of non-existance. “
Well, not really. We're not defining his atributes, Theists are. We look at the abstract and look for god just as you do, details and all. Specifically all the details Theists attribute to him/it, but our more rationale side says ’in all likelihood, all things considered, there is no god.’ As the details Theists use doesn’t conform to our universe. Just like those that claim ‘big foots or UFO’s exist.’ We look at the details the big foot and UFO folks describe and see how it conforms and what science and tests can reveal. In the end, we make a resolute decision on said existence weighing all things considered and conclude they don’t. What we don’t do is just in a whim say ‘UFO’s can’t exist’, rather we used the details the UFO believers use and see how they live up to reality and testing and base that on a conclusion.
“Every body defines God in some way, we just have to challenge those assumptions. I think you need to understand this, because it is not just the theist that defines God, it is everyone.”
Well not really, the idea of a god existing is a theistic view, and theirs alone to provide the required details to validate or rebuke it. Just like the UFO folks. But Theists are the ones who give the weight of gods existence to begin with and declare his existence according to their own definitions, atheists don’t do this. Atheists look as the evidence and don’t see how it conforms and so they reject the proposition of existence, just like UFO’s.
Theists coined the idea, of ‘god existing’ if you will, just like UFO folk are the ones who coined the ideas of UFO’s being real. Without the idea of a ‘god existing’ that Theists have given to humanity to begin with we wouldn’t even be having this discussion. Theists in a sense created the ‘gods existence’ ball rolling, not Atheists.
“Certainly historians do not have to prove that every person other than George Washington was not the first president in order to prove that he was? “
No they don’t, but our records were and are adequate enough to know that indeed he was. This type of documentation gives authority and credibility to his being the first president above all others. It removes any and all questionable doubt and skepticism to begin with. If there was sketchy documentation, or others that were equally written of and given accounts of being the ‘only first president’ we’d have logical reason to not only doubt G.W., but to put all others at least on equal footing.
This same type of argument can’t be used amongst all the 3000+ religions as most have their own accounts of which god is the ‘president’ if you will. Many have documentation on creation, death and many other dualities of man, many miracles witnessed by the masses and other things they attribute to this particular god being the correct one. When one factors in how sketchy the texts are and how they don’t conform to the nature of our actual universe and then when all when all are collectively compared it’s a mixed bag at best. To resolutely say, ‘of these 3000+ gods, I choose Vishnu!’ Is hardly logical or tenable.
Of particular interest is how religions have splintered, evolved and adapted over time all in an effort to retain the faithful, to combat other faiths for their followers and not for simply adhering to written accounts which are dubious. IE, many Christians don’t take seriously some of the more obvious symbolic passages in their texts and instead relegate them to metaphors as they certainly never occurred. To actually think that a world-wide flood occurred is to enter into the realm of science which can prove that no such thing occurred and this and other such events that can be tested with science can remove the authority of texts, unless one refers to them symbolically.
“About the evidence for Christ's existence, I was merely asserting that you had asked me for evidence of a non-Christian who called Jesus Christ. “
No. Outside of the bible, I am asking for CREDIBLE DOCUMENTATION that is contemporary to the era of jesus christ’s existence, nothing more. Don’t give me some account from 200 years later, something in a range of 50-70 years of his ministry should suffice. If he was such a shaker, we should have documentation of him outside the text that proclaims him as the Christ. We have this at least of Mohamed as a prophet of Allah. If the documentation of Christ is sketchy or shows being forged (Josephus) then it makes one wonder on the veracity of such things to begin with.
“http://www.lewrockwell.com/barnwell/barnwell57.html.”
‘Page not found’. No Dir or Doc exists. Try again I am afraid. This site doesn’t seem to have authority on of its own as it’s a ‘.com’ which are business related, you’d want a .org, .edu for perhaps more authoritative sites on the matters.
Polkinghorne reasons for belief in god, and I think you’d agree, come not from the origin of any religious holy text but more from his understanding in particle physics and philosophy and intelligibility of the universe. He like perhaps both us argues that the existence either way we can’t even logically attain, at least not yet. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Polkinghorne
“ I would challenge your assumption that the truth cannot be known if God exists.”
Well, I didn’t want to say with any certainty that we could or couldn’t, but that if anything it will the hardest thing to prove or disprove ever on any level of certainty. Through science and other means we may know the true nature of god, this is loosely what Einstein believed as in his eyes ‘nature = god’ and he lacked a belief in some personal savior type god. Christians often neglect to notice this key difference.
The issue I have with the concept of ‘god’ is partly in how it’s left so ambiguous so it could mean virtually anything, this in particular is advantageous only to the Theists. Is creating consciousness the sure sign work of a god? And if so, when we in the coming decades use Quantum computers that have AI, they too would be conscious. Would this mean we ourselves are gods? I doubt you’d say yes, but the more advanced we become this type of fuzziness of what can be attributed to being the sole work of god will be removed.
This progress would deflate one of Polkinghornes main points on intelligibility. We are very close to creating synthesized artificial life (bacteria), a completely new species strain. If that is not the work of god, I don’t know what is. This too would also make the definition even more constrained to perhaps just to the Deistic ‘initial mover’ if you will, most theists being religious couldn’t accept such a thing. They need miracles and the belief in them to sustain. That won’t leave a whole lot of work for god to do in the big scheme of things and certainly one could in turn question why call it god at all if that’s the case?
You did say that if you did accept some idea of God then it would probably be deistic in nature. I will challenge this by making a positive case for Christ. If Christ was the intervention of God into the world, then deism is not true, because deism asserts that God is just some distant first cause who set the universe in motion. There are other ways of arguing against the idea of deism, but I want to make a positive case for Christ in order to show deism false. My argument would center on the resurrection of Christ primarily, because I believe it is the center of the Christian's faith. I hope you will look at the website above, and also that you might check out the debate between william lane craig and bart erhman (you can find it easily by google). More importantly however, I would ask you to pray and ask God to reveal Himself to you. (He said that if you prayed asking for the truth with an open heart then He would reveal Himself to you). I cannot prove that God exists, but He can do it Himself if He is true. I would just ask that you take the first step in letting your skepticism down and making a simple prayer for the truth. Of course do check out those articles, even if a heart wants to believe in God, if the mind is against it then it cannot be a real faith. I do believe that there are rational reasons to believe in God, but I also realize that a personal experience is necessary and that arguments do not prove anything by themselves. I can testify that I have both in my life, and I will pray that you can too (if you don't mind, hey it cannot do any harm because if I am wrong then nothing will happen, and if I am right then it may just do something!) I have really enjoyed this conversation and I hope everything goes well with you.
Chris
You went on to say, "That would be like saying we can’t define santa and we can’t be certain of his nature so he therefore MUST EXIST. Waaaahat? Saying that you can’t define something so as to leave it from being critiqued at all means its worthy of being accepted as reality now? That is exactly what theists that use such rhetoric are actually saying. That makes no logical sense at all."
I agree fullly with this point. However my contention is that theists mostly do not say that we cannot define God in anyway (except maybe some eastern religions which might as well just be called philosophies). I said specifically that we can define somethings about santa (of course not everything) but the belief that he resides at the north pole. These things can be tested and proven false. However this leaves something unsaid, there was in fact a certain person named Saint Nicholas who did live in Europe and did show generosity towards people. Rather than saying Santa Claus never existed, we should say that the true picture of the actual person was obscured and largely forgotten. The same can be said of God in our many religions (why not?) sure there are many accounts, just like there are many versions of santa, but that doesn't mean there is not truth behind false accounts and that possibly there is one account that is true. It is the skeptics job to discern what is true if anything, unless they don't care, but if they don't care then they do not have a right to criticize those who do believe something.
Namely that if I am a Christian I do not have to disprove every other faith system, I only have to give a strong enough case for my own to show that it is true. Certainly historians do not have to prove that every person other than George Washington was not the first president in order to prove that he was? They only have to make a strong enough case for G.W. and then it rules out all other possibilities. About Muhammad these later fabrications of his life went directly against what he set out in the Koran, the only miracle he gave us supposedly was the Koran itself. About the evidence for Christ's existence, I was merely asserting that you had asked me for evidence of a non-Christian who called Jesus Christ. Since you clarified and said that you only wanted extrabiblical evidence that makes this a different story, I would point you to this website http://www.lewrockwell.com/barnwell/barnwell57.html. Check it out and see what you think.
Now I would like to direct attention to another argument you bring up and that is by asking me to define God. You know I am of Christian perspective, but first I would like to talk about theism. By stating that God exists, you are defining God, you are giving Him the property of existence. Atheism gives Him the property of non-existance. Agnostics just say that at best we cannot know anything about God, and at worst He doesn't exist, so they would say God is at least unknowable. Every body defines God in some way, we just have to challenge those assumptions. I think you need to understand this, because it is not just the theist that defines God, it is everyone.
Agentorange,
Good, we are making some headway in this discussion now. I think we cleared up a lot of what we meant to say. Let me start with my main argument and then talk about Christianity.
My main argument was that theism is logically tennable and atheism is not. The burden of proof is upon the theist to support the existence of the God in which they believe in, but this task can be undertaken (look at Polkinghorne for an example of a Christian who presents strong secular reasoning for God's existence). This is different from the atheist's position, the atheist says that God does not exist, now the burden of proof is on the atheist to validate his claim, or else he has an irrational faith based upon opinion only. You rightly defined yourself as agnostic in your final post, by saying that you could not absolutely deny the existence of God, this is a logically tennable position and I respect it. I would challenge your assumption that the truth cannot be known if God exists. This would be similar to saying that we cannot be sure of anything that exists. The precondition is that we have to have reason for our beliefs about things, such as the fact that George Washington was indeed the first president of the US, we don't have to be skeptical of such things. I think this extreme skepticism of the knowability of the truth is something that postmodernism has dealt poorly too us, it is good to be skeptical but not to an extreme. This ties into my next argument,
Chris333,
"Do you, agentorange, know for a fact that God does not exist?" In other words are you 100% sure that God is not"
No, of course not. That is a bit of a rhetorical question, I could never prepose such a thing. As skeptical asI am, my rational logical sense knows that I could never make any such absolute claim, either way. But in terms of gradation and where I find myslef regarding its existance, that doesn't mean I should adpot any 100% certainty in either direction in the matter. I am Agnostic towards the Deistic and perhaps Pantheist concepts of god, but the religious one I don't find the authority of evidence that I would prefer for any realm of resolute confirmation of their truths and thus I am Atheistic towards those.
If I had to choose on which form of god I find most resolute, the Deistic view is one that is malable and conforms well to the nature of of universe.
”Finally something of substance and relation to what I am talking about! Lets take Santa for an example, he is supposed to be a jolly fat man who resides at the north pole and delivers presents to every child on earth on December 25th via his flying reindeer. We can go to the North pole and discover he does in fact not reside there, we can take a poll of children and see if every child on earth receives a present on December 25th. We can see this to be false.
“However theism is not comparable to this, it asserts that there is a God, not that God is this or that way, or that God lives at the north pole, it only says, there is a God.”
Then define god and we can like the example of Santa determine by our own universe which one is unworthy of such authority to begin with. Oh, but see there’s the catch, some theists, particularly religious ones say ‘we humans can’t possibly understand, nor know god in any definitive way’, this is usually murmured in such phrases as ‘god works in mysterious ways’. They declare that we are inept and unable and reply with ‘god can’t be defined’ so at to avoid having to admit we do have defined ways of what god is. In fact it’s in their very holy books! It gives descriptions on how he acts and works and behaves and this alone we can falsify. Well, fancy that logic.
That would be like saying we can’t define santa and we can’t be certain of his nature so he therefore MUST EXIST. Waaaahat? Saying that you can’t define something so as to leave it from being critiqued at all means its worthy of being accepted as reality now? That is exactly what theists that use such rhetoric are actually saying. That makes no logical sense at all.
Regardless of any evidence for or against jesus we should be able to look at the very depictions of god in holy texts and critique them to see how them conform to our universe. If they don’t conform, for what reason should we accept the very claims of texts to begin with?
“Muhammad does, but he never performed any miracles and so there is nothing so special about the evidence”
Muhammad didn’t ride up to heaven on a winged horse and did he not see the archangel Gabriel descend from the sky? Both were witnessed by the masses too. Did he not talk with god?
“and I do not know of any good evidence for “mythical” stories like those of Zeus.”
“You are comparing apples to oranges.”
No, I am comparing religious miracles amongst each other and I find no reason to believe more so in the ones attributed to jesus than to others that performed very similar miracles like healing the sick, walking on water, ascending into heaven, being born under a star in the east, being born of a virgin, being transfigured, etc. these and several others have been attested to of other religious gods in the past that it shows how they’re related.
Davinci codes? No, that is purposely-fictional accounts, even the writers admit to this. I have read numerous books on Gnostic accounts (lost Christianities among others) and of other early competing ministries that were very similar to early Christian doctrine and their origins were before Christian doctrine was even cannoned, so it is on equal footing for authority. All I am conveying is that from the get go the NT doctrines weren’t absolute, nor were they of single origin. Any accounts of Jesus to be portrayed in a non-miraculous fashion would likely have been torched.
“I can show you examples of Roman writers and historians that persecuted the Christians from very early on for their belief that Jesus was the Christ, but I don’t know if you want that.”
Ok, so people that believed in Christ were persecuted, but that perhaps doesn’t testify so well on the validity of his miracles let alone of his existence at all. I asked for his credible evidence, historical or otherwise of his existence and people getting persecuted in his name isn’t the greatest.
Any credible historical written evidence is what I was referring to.
“ What on earth is your point here?”
My point was, since YOU’RE THE ONE MAKING THE CLAIM OF SAID TYPE OF GOD EXISTS, THE BURDEN OF PROOF IS ON YOU TO PROVE SUCH AN INSTANCE and not an skeptics job to disprove they don’t exist. That is logic 101. it’s illogical to shift the burden of proof onto the person that isn’t making the claim. If I claimed that I see purple elephants you’d insist I prove them and not that you would have to disprove them as it’s my claim. Get it?
“Those reasons can be debated, but there exists logical reason for that persons faith, if I tell you that I see a blue Elephant, and I provide good reason why I see it, then it is logical.’
I agree they can be debated and you’re right you would have to prove your blue elephant, just like you’d have to prove your god and however the doctrines set him up to be define.
“But if you say, “In all the universe and in other dimensions, there exists no blue elephant”
What evidence do we have to suggest the blue elephant does exist? None, so we shouldn’t feel obligated to be agnostic about such a thing to begin with. Suppose we said in all dimensions ‘Christian depiction of god doesn’t exist.’ With such a claim we can observe our universe and make an educated claim as to the nature of our universe and if it is coherent with how the bible depicts god. If they don’t conform and aren’t coherent then we know something is wrong and can check that god off the list. This is one reason why other past religious gods were tossed on the scrap heap as many of them were wrong.
“However that doesn’t mean I have to believe someone who says there is a blue elephant in another dimension, I can say “You know I cannot prove it, but I see no good reason to believe it should be so”
This is exactly my stance with reference to god. I think you would agree we can’t not know for absolute certainty either way, if we did know everything in the Universe and beyond we would in a sense be gods…. and so for me my rational side says that I see not enough good evidence/reason to believe god existence is so. If new evidence comes forth I will likely adopt a new stance, if anything it would be towards a Deistic form as universal.
“it’s the Theists job to provide evidence and prove their god(s) and not an atheists job to disprove the multitudes of definitions don’t exist.”
”If I am a theist I do not have to show how Krishna is true, I have to show how God is likely or at the least give my reason for believing in God.”
But you’re not just a theist, you’re a Christian so that involves more details, meaning either your version of god is right and all others is wrong or some other god is right and yours is wrong. The only way you can prove your version of god via Christianity is absolute and correct is through indirectly disproving the other 3000+ religions, otherwise you’re saying they are equally ‘correct on god’ and that I know you wont say that.
"Well, isn’t that just convenient for your side of the argument. You can declare him by fiat as indefinable and left ambiguous, no wonder we can’t disprove him. What a joke"
No you can disprove Him, I made no contention that you couldn't. Just because we cannot know everything about the Christian God, doesn't know we cannot know some things. For instance Jesus' resurrection. We do not have to know everything about God in order to debate its historicity as many do (please see william lane craig vs bart earhman). I did not say that you cannot know anything about God (other than that He exists) which would create a logically undefeatable and most likely untrue statement, I said you cannot know everything.
Also, though some "religions" do have a "god-in-a-box" mentality, Christianity, Islam, and Judaism do not. You cannot define God as you choose, you have to accept or reject the view of God presented. I don't really want to argue this point, other than that theists do not get to just define God how they want. We do this in every aspect of life, politicians do not get to define politics, rather they accept a certain framework and work within it. Besides that, Atheism just says, "the box is empty" But they forget that the box is not just this universe but even beyond it. So they really haven't looked everywhere.
I will end with a question that I hope will illustrate what my argument has always been about: "Do you, agentorange, know for a fact that God does not exist?" In other words are you 100% sure that God is not.
”Theism does not assert anything other than that God exists.”
That I will agree with, but this is only in the terminology of the word theist and doesn’t account that the vast majority of Theists are Religious which are dependent on their doctrines on how god is defined.
“Particular belief systems do not get to “setup God” however they want.”
They don’t? Why does every religion have their own unique definitions and confines of how they describe god and in addition good vs. evil dualism then? The Abrahamic gods certainly assert he/it is omnipresent, omnipotent, omnibenevolent and other typically humanistic qualities such as caring, loving, compassionate, while in the bible he is show to be also merciless and a vindictive bully who lacks any compassion and mimics the acts of a genocidal made man. These same traits aren’t the same others like Amen Ra, Osiris, Mithras, Zoroaster, Zeus, Apollo, etc. Each religion depicts their god in this defined box and which determines if he can be known at all. Even Deists and Pantheists have their own unique temporal box they put god into, albeit they don’t define him as much as religions do.
“Rather they have to conform their ideas to the framework in which they believe in.”
Exactly, each religion conforms their view on god dependent upon how their doctrines define him/it. And with 3000+ doctrines, THAT’S A LOT OF VARYING DEFINITIONS.
“Christianity specifically says that though we are able to know somethings about God through revelation, we are by no means able to know everything about Him….”
Well, isn’t that just convenient for your side of the argument. You can declare him by fiat as indefinable and left ambiguous, no wonder we can’t disprove him. What a joke.
“But we aren’t agnostic towards Santa, gnomes, elves, leprechauns , or ‘invisible teapots. And by your logical premise we can’t be 100% in the universe such things don’t exist, but still anyone who said they were ‘agnostic towards Santa’ would be quite silly and the overwhelming odds are that they don’t exist.”
Finally something of substance and relation to what I am talking about! Lets take Santa for an example, he is supposed to be a jolly fat man who resides at the north pole and delivers presents to every child on earth on December 25th via his flying reindeer. We can go to the North pole and discover he does in fact not reside there, we can take a poll of children and see if every child on earth receives a present on December 25th. We can see this to be false. However theism is not comparable to this, it asserts that there is a God, not that God is this or that way, or that God lives at the north pole, it only says, there is a God. If you have a good reason to believe that there is a God, then you have a rational faith. Agnosticism says, “I do not know if there is a God (and then you can say, there might be, no evidence suggests that there is, or I am highly suspect)” Atheism says, there is no God. If you are a theist, then you provide a good reason why you believe God exists, if an agnostic, then you provide a good reason why you feel either that God is unknowable or that he most likely doesn’t exist, if an atheist you give your reason why God does not exist.
“Well so could the believers in previous or other current gods. By their point of view they too were or are equally logical and rational decisions, but in retrospect you equally don’t believe in them either. You are atheistic towards them as much as I of “
Again I am not debating for every religion, I am debating that theism is logically tenable and atheism is not, theism does not equal every belief, you need to understand that.
“strange obsession considering how lacking the evidence is over the millennia, how its evolved and adapted and has been for all the known 3000+ gods. It would be like groups of adults obsessively believing in Santa, the tooth fairy and other such non substantiated entities that can’t be proven or disproven. Considering that number of gods, it appears from your view that all but yours are wrong on their view of god.”
Again I am not debating for every religion, I am debating that theism is logically tenable and atheism is not, theism does not equal every belief, you need to understand that.
“ In order to accept theism, even under any religious banner one must equally know everything. Not just about ones own religion, but ALL OTHERS, including Deism and so on so as to ensure those others aren’t the correct one and that they’re following a wrong theistic religion. “
Again I am not debating for every religion, I am debating that theism is logically tenable and atheism is not, theism does not equal every belief, you need to understand that. And no, a theist does not have to prove that every idea other than his own is right any more than a historian has to prove that every person other than George Washington was not the President of the United States.
Regarding my comment that Christianity has good evidence you said:
“Same with Mohammed, Krishna, and other gods. But also keep in mind all the evidence that speaks against the doctrines of Jesus, and how they reduce its authority. Gospels of Judas, Thomas, ‘Q’ Document and mystery cults that were around the time of the first Christians show that Christianity if anything wasn’t a single unified message from the get go.”
Krishna does not have good evidence, Muhammad does, but he never performed any miracles and so there is nothing so special about the evidence, and I do not know of any good evidence for “mythical” stories like those of Zeus. You are comparing apples to oranges. What is more you bring in the so-called gospels of Judas and Thomas. These documents are not on par with the Biblical accounts. To suggest something shows your ignorance, and I am not going to debate with you on this, you can read any number of books which show how ridiculous your claim is. The “Q” document is not a document it is an idea, that is somewhat ridiculous to hold. What is interesting is this, it seems that more and more elaborations and mystery cults formed around Christianity did come and expand as time went on, this actually supports the traditional view of Christianity that it is the purest form. I think you have been watching too much davinci code and not looking at scholarly factual arguments.
“Outside of the bible, can you show me any credible contemporary evidence from when Jesus lived that he was the Christ?”
What are you saying here? Are you asking me to show you a non-Christian who believed Jesus was the Christ?? I can show you examples of Roman writers and historians that persecuted the Christians from very early on for their belief that Jesus was the Christ, but I don’t know if you want that. This goes without saying that the Bible is an amazing historical document, it has more manuscript and less time between the recordings and the events than any other document from ancient times.
“This all comes down to how credible the evidence is. The only reason you doubt the miracles of Mohammed or other gods is it’s not your particular faith, and that you weren’t raised in such a give time and location to worship such other gods. Had you lived in classic Greece you equally swear up and down about your Hellenic god(s) existence. so this alone doesn’t make the proposition more tenable.”
It is amazing how everything you say has little to nothing to do with my argument. Not only that you assume Muhammad performed miracles, you need to do a bit of research there. My proposition is that Theism is logically tenable and Atheism is not. I did not mention Hellenistic gods. Nonetheless you said it yourself, it all depends on how credible the evidence is. Just because I might be born with atheist parents doesn’t make it right.
“if I told you that I see purple elephants that are wearing green top hats with pink bow tie, naturally you’d doubt this. And you should. And as the one proposing the existence of something so incredible, it would up to prove the existence of said elephants and not the job of the skeptics to disprove the existence.”
Again theism is not proposing the existence of purple elephants. What on earth is your point here? My point is this plain and simple, THEISM PROPOSES THE EXISTENCE OF SOME GOD, IF YOU HAVE A GOOD REASON TO BELIEVE IN SOME GOD THEN YOU HAVE A LOGICAL FAITH. Those reasons can be debated, but there exists logical reason for that persons faith, if I tell you that I see a blue Elephant, and I provide good reason why I see it, then it is logical. But if you say, “In all the universe and in other dimensions, there exists no blue elephant” Then you have the burden of proof to show that, unless you have, then you cannot say it is so. However that doesn’t mean I have to believe someone who says there is a blue elephant in another dimension, I can say “You know I cannot prove it, but I see no good reason to believe it should be so” However, I am talking about theism, not the belief in blue elephants, Christianity or Krishna, This is a specific example and isn’t even dealing with what I am talking about so it is not worth my time addressing, but I do anyways for sake of argument.
“it’s the Theists job to provide evidence and prove their god(s) and not an atheists job to disprove the multitudes of definitions don’t exist.”
It is not the theists job to provide evidence for all belief systems. If I am a theist I do not have to show how Krishna is true, I have to show how God is likely or at the least give my reason for believing in God. The Hindu on the other hand has to show the claims of Krishna to be true, you are mixing specific with general. You go off on these tangents which are not related to my argument or this post in general.
Agentorange,
I am not sure if this is falling on deaf ears, but I am going to try to explain once more what my position is.
“How exactly is theism more tenable that atheism? “
Because theism asserts a positive and atheism asserts a negative, tenable in the sense of logical thinking.
“theists get to setup the concept of ‘god’ to their liking and define his nature, if at all in a whim. This allows them to redefine how god is to be found, if at all by being able to move the target of what defines god. It’s quite hard to prove or disprove this notion of ‘god’ considering its ambiguousness ranging nature from every culture in time now isn’t it? Which definition are we to use to prove or disprove existence?”
No, you and Dawkins are blatantly wrong on this point. Theism does not assert anything other than that God exists. Particular belief systems do not get to “setup God” however they want. Rather they have to conform their ideas to the framework in which they believe in. Nobody is redefining God. Christianity specifically says that though we are able to know somethings about God through revelation, we are by no means able to know everything about Him, and the Bible gives strict warnings about attributing to God what is not in accord with the scriptures. This alone is enough to refute your point, but this is only if you accept the Christian framework. If you are just a theist, who prescribes to know system of belief, then you glean your understanding of what “god” might be like from the nature of the universe. Nonetheless, a theist who does this is by no means creating his version of God, rather he is basing his idea of what God might be like by observation. No one is redefining God, or setting Him up to their liking, except for maybe pluralists. You also seem to miss the point that theism is a system only of belief in God. You are trying to pull Christianity or other beliefs into this debate, which is not what I was debating about in the beginning.
DARWINISM and ATHEISM both UNSCIENTIFIC & MYTHICAL
http://evolutionfacts.blogspot.com
star2: "When I was young my mother took me to a Baptist Church where the Pastor was a fire and brimstone preacher. God gave me a revelation of the reality of hell. I went forward during invitation time and ask Jesus to save me."
Something similar happened to me when I was 14, though I was not even in a church. I know that books have been written by people whose lives were profoundly changed after seeing the reality of Hell.
“there is good evidence to believe historically in the resurrection, and the person of Jesus"
Same with Mohammed, Krishna, and other gods. But also keep in mind all the evidence that speaks against the doctrines of Jesus, and how they reduce its authority. Gospels of Judas, Thomas, ‘Q’ Document and mystery cults that were around the time of the first Christians show that Christianity if anything wasn’t a single unified message from the get go. Rather it consisted of numerous competing splintered sects (ie Gnostics) all vying for believers. Not until Constantine around 325 CE was the NT cannoned. Outside of the bible, can you show me any credible contemporary evidence from when Jesus lived that he was the Christ? Go ahead, mention the account in Talmud that doesn’t even conform to what the bible suggests Jesus was, or Josephus’ doctored letters, or other such evidence that’s been tainted.
This all comes down to how credible the evidence is. The only reason you doubt the miracles of Mohammed or other gods is it’s not your particular faith, and that you weren’t raised in such a give time and location to worship such other gods. Had you lived in classic Greece you equally swear up and down about your Hellenic god(s) existence. so this alone doesn’t make the proposition more tenable.
“as a theists I could rationally logically sustain my point of view.”
Well so could the believers in previous or other current gods. By their point of view they too were or are equally logical and rational decisions, but in retrospect you equally don’t believe in them either. You are atheistic towards them as much as I of
"Theism itself is wrong"
Not so much wrong, but a strange obsession considering how lacking the evidence is over the millennia, how its evolved and adapted and has been for all the known 3000+ gods. It would be like groups of adults obsessively believing in Santa, the tooth fairy and other such non substantiated entities that can’t be proven or disproven. Considering that number of gods, it appears from your view that all but yours are wrong on their view of god.
“In order to reject theism on a whole you have to know everything.”
The equally can be said of theism. In order to accept theism, even under any religious banner one must equally know everything. Not just about ones own religion, but ALL OTHERS, including Deism and so on so as to ensure those others aren’t the correct one and that they’re following a wrong theistic religion.
But we aren’t agnostic towards Santa, gnomes, elves, leprechauns , or ‘invisible teapots. And by your logical premise we can’t be 100% in the universe such things don’t exist, but still anyone who said they were ‘agnostic towards Santa’ would be quite silly and the overwhelming odds are that they don’t exist.
Chris333,
“I was saying that theism, the belief that there is a transcendent power exists, is rational and logically tennable and that atheism was not.”
How exactly is theism more tenable that atheism?
Logical fallacy #1, as I alluded to earlier, theists get to setup the concept of ‘god’ to their liking and define his nature, if at all in a whim. This allows them to redefine how god is to be found, if at all by being able to move the target of what defines god. It’s quite hard to prove or disprove this notion of ‘god’ considering its ambiguousness ranging nature from every culture in time now isn’t it? Which definition are we to use to prove or disprove existence?
This wide ranging degrees of ambiguous leaves theists to move the definition of god in a whim so they don’t have to deny his existence, let alone answer questions they themselves don’t know. This is often murmured in such phrases as, ‘well, god works in mysterious ways’. They can say they see god in a piece of cheese that has the virgin Mary on it. While other religions reproduce similar results with their gods, whom are we to take up on such incredulous authority and logic?
Logical fallacy #2, if I told you that I see purple elephants that are wearing green top hats with pink bow tie, naturally you’d doubt this. And you should. And as the one proposing the existence of something so incredible, it would up to prove the existence of said elephants and not the job of the skeptics to disprove the existence.
This mirrors the example with your prescribed god, whether he Mohamed, Jesus, Zeus, Jupiter or Poseidon, etc. THE BURDN OF PROOF IS ON WHO EVER CLAIMS that these outrageous thing(s) exist. Therefore, it’s the Theists job to provide evidence and prove their god(s) and not an atheists job to disprove the multitudes of definitions don’t exist.
"it was supposed to have occured at a certain time, on earth, and in a certain way.”
How is this account any different than the acts attributed to other gods?
HAWK49-
“Answer: This is an in-house argument among you evolutionists. Take the issue up with Mr Gee if you need to pursue this. Obviously, there is disagreement under your roof.”
If you like to quote mine so often you should at least put the quotes in context so we can all see how relevant it is.
”I’ll leave the detailed discussions of scientific theory up to the professionals and I have chosen to trust the IDers Vs the evolutionists due to the history of hoaxes, lies, censorship, distortions, closed-mindedness and narrow spectrum of study of the evolutionists.”
Why ID? They haven’t predicted, tested or proven anything, so they are even more worthless by such measures. By a measure of integrity depicted in the Dover Trial it's clear that ID is neo creationism, like the judge said.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kitzmiller_v._Dover_Area_School_District
So what? Flew became a Deist as a result of the complexity that in his mind couldn’t be explained by evolution. In retrospect its now obvious he made a knee jerk reaction that such complexity couldn’t arise via natural means. Like the eye, immune system, bacteria flagellum and other such instances where the IDiots in the 2005 Dover Trial had to confess they could be resolved through naturalistic means. Only b/c Behe didn’t bother to read the 50 chapters, 9 peer reviewed articles, and 2 books that discuss the processes involved in the evolution of the immune system did he assume it must be the result of ID. In the end he had pie on his face.
Snip quote mine #2. Big deal Hawk Keep in mind what % of actual scientists actually have moved to ID camp is like a total of 700 scientists, or some .05% of the total. It’s insignificant and meaningless, at alas you love to quote mine.
“Contrary to the Darwinist claim, intelligent design theorists do not claim that science can show us the identity of a designer.””
Well I don’t recall any scientists claiming that via science we could be shown the identity of the designer anyway. And if we can’t by science be shown who the designer is, then we can equally infer aliens constructed our organic DNA as opposed to god now couldn’t we? And ID proponents certainly wont say aliens did it, so that leaves only one other option- god. You should go read the interview given by William Dembski, one of the principal proponents of Intelligent Design: "God is the designer", he said. Does it hurt when you run into the brick wall?
Well just whom do you think the Intelligently Designer is referring to?
Thanks for NOT answering either of my earlier questions regarding human chromosome 2 fusion and 7 Identical ERV’s. Next time please do.
Evidence of Common Ancestry: ERVs
www.youtube.com/watch?v=De-OkzTUDVA
Evidence of Common Ancestry: Human Chromosome 2
www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-WAHpC0Ah0
Ph.D Ken Miller on Human Evolution
www.youtube.com/watch?v=zi8FfMBYCkk
Agentorange,
Sorry about the delay in responding. You said that the Christian asserts a personal creator God, I agree, however that is not what I was debating. I was saying that theism, the belief that there is a transcendent power exists, is rational and logically tennable and that atheism was not. Christianity is a view point within theism, it can be wrong without affecting a person's belief in some god. Even though I am trying to steer away from specifics and focus on atheism, I will use Christianity for an example.
In Christianity we believe in the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, Paul himself says that if the resurrection was not true then our faith is worthless. This was not just some metaphysical, solely spiritual event, rather it was supposed to have occured at a certain time, on earth, and in a certain way. All this being said, there is good evidence to believe historically in the resurrection, and the person of Jesus alltogether. We can debate this evidence, but there is good reason to accept it. If I were to do such, then I would have a rational belief in God. Therefore as a theists I could rationally logically sustain my point of view. The atheist doesn't just say, "Oh well your evidence is wrong" Rather the atheist (by the definition of the word) says, "Theism itself is wrong" That is what A-theism means, you are saying, "I am not a theist" Logically speaking this view is untennable, you can say "I am not a Christian" Because you only have to show good reason to reject Christianity. In order to reject theism on a whole you have to know everything. This is not to say that one could not take the stance, "I feel at the time being that the evidence does not support theism, and that as far as I can see God does not exist" This is logically tennable and debatable, it is also called agnosticism.
In closing someone who rejects Christianity is not an atheist, he is only a non-Christian, someone who believes that any god does not exist, is an atheist.
agentorange: You said “Saying ALL the evidence for human evolution can fit in a small box is a lie. Go read a biology or paleontology book like “From Lucy to Language” and tell me it will all fit in a small box.” Answer: This is an in-house argument among you evolutionists. Take the issue up with Mr Gee if you need to pursue this. Obviously, there is disagreement under your roof.
This site is not about evolution only, but about the purported rationality of science Vs the irrationality of religion controversy perpetuated by Dawkins et al. My purpose here is to debate the fallibility and limitations of science and question how this area of knowledge can be considered rational and factual as well as the only reliable source of truth that trumps Biblical truth. So I won’t go down the evolution rabbit trails of details.
I’ll leave the detailed discussions of scientific theory up to the professionals and I have chosen to trust the IDers Vs the evolutionists due to the history of hoaxes, lies, censorship, distortions, closed-mindedness and narrow spectrum of study of the evolutionists. I have been about 8 years ahead of world renowned philosopher Antony Flew who changed from an atheist to deist worldview after he read Darwin’s Black Box as well as other scientific sources and decided to follow the evidence wherever it leads rather than remain constrained in the narrow spectrum evolution.
Here’s another critique of the Evolution series: “So the makers of Evolution have effectively censored important controversies within the field of evolutionary biology. They have thereby missed a golden opportunity to make science more interesting for the general public. They [the scientists] have also left viewers with a one-sided and misleading view of what evolutionary biology means to its own practitioners.
But the sin of omission goes much deeper. The series also completely ignores the growing number of scientists who think that Darwinian theory at its root is inconsistent with the latest developments in biochemistry, paleontology, embryology, genetics, information theory, and other fields. According to these scientists, Darwin’s unguided process of random variation and natural selection is insufficient to account for the highly ordered complexity found in biological systems, which show evidence of directed development or “intelligent design.” (Contrary to the Darwinist claim, intelligent design theorists do not claim that science can show us the identity of a designer.)”
How rational is it to put your trust in a fallible science that is not adhering to the scientific method but rather upon dogma and propaganda?
I flagged my entry below because I wanted to give more detail.
ifeelfine72 - you said, "I've never met one legitmate convert who came to the cross by preaching fire and brimstone."
When I was young my mother took me to a Baptist Church where the Pastor was a fire and brimstone preacher. God gave me a revelation of the reality of hell. I went forward during invitation time and ask Jesus to save me.
Chris333-
“It is the assertion of a positive though, atheism is the assertion of a negative. For instance, all I need is one proof, be it experiential or natural, to believe in God, atheism has to disprove every evidence, and then show that nowhere does God exist.”
But that’s not what it really is all about. Christian theists will ONLY accept evidence for a personal type Jesus god and not a Universal Deistic ‘first cause’ type of god, that much is certain. And you know this.
So even that your claim that any such proof would be enough to prove such existence of a given concept of ‘god’ isn’t sufficient as the meaning of ‘god’ has so many ranging diverse descriptions that one could postulate that nearly anything in the universe could be considered ‘god’ in a whim, if just to settle their belief in him.
If we define ‘god’ in a given box, as Dawkins did, one could, with reasonably rationale assert that god doesn’t exist, at the very least in this definition. But, b/c theist get to move the definition and create a moving target it's by their own design impossible to disprove.
*The problem is that it all depends on whoever is proposing god and what defines it/him.*
Theists, by defacto get to set the rules and how ‘god’ is to be defined, if at all. They use such ranging human characteristics, (omnibenevolence and so on) that do more harm to prove his existence than to his non-existence. Our universe is certainly not omnibenevolent.
This very wide ranging diverse definition is the ONLY reason why it’s that atheist must, as you contend, disprove every instance. But this proposal you offer isn’t true and this alone is a logical fallacy as it allows WHOEVER presumes the existence of said entity how they are to be defined and therefore the limits of disproving him.
This would be like saying that non-santa believers have to disprove not only the jolly, fat, red suit wearing, santa…. but every other possible concept of ‘santa’ that has been created since time. This same time of logical fallacy could be extended out for anything else that are supernatural, unfalsifiable, non-existent enties. Weather they elves, gnomes, wizards, or teapots. And therein is the problem. The BURDEN OF PROOF FALLS on WHOEVER claims such a thing EXIST and not those that skeptically request evidence for said instances.
“…not unless you are god, or God told you He did not exist, both of which would negate the premise.”
Yes but this very premise when inversed is equally opposed for gods existence, do you not see that? One could equally argue that unless god conveyed to a very large multitude of people (perhaps millions concurrently) at once that he does exist (so as to discredit that they’re hallucinating) would be the only way to assert he does exist. This premise is a door that swings both ways.
Agentorange, theism is not absolute certainty, no one defined it as such. It is the assertion of a positive though, atheism is the assertion of a negative. For instance, all I need is one proof, be it experiential or natural, to believe in God, atheism has to disprove every evidence, and then show that nowhere does God exist. It is doubtful if anyone can have absolute certainty about anything, I cannot say absolutely that George Washington was the first president of the United States. Atheism literally means the belief that there is no god/s. Theism simply means the belief in some god/s. Agnosticism means that you don't know, perhaps all the evidence points away from a god existing, but you haven't found evidence throughout the universe and beyond, that some god does not exist. This is different from asserting a positive, where all you need is some evidence to make the case. In other words we do not have to prove that every other person ever to have lived was not the first president of the United States in order to show that George Washington was, we only need some evidence to show that. Theism asserts a positive, it asserts that God exists, atheism a negative, God does not exist. Logically it is untennable. That is my point. Agnosticism is logically tennable.
Regarding your second comment on Dawkins, my point wasn't to show that he was agnostic towards specific faiths, I meant to show that he was agnostic in his view towards the existance of God. We can debate about specific evidences (though I don't believe this is the post to do so) but regarding the irrationality of Atheism, in its honest form, is not logically debatable, not unless you are god, or God told you He did not exist, both of which would negate the premise. Thank you for responding.
HAWK49
Saying ALL the evidence for human evolution can fit in a small box is a lie. Go read a biology or paleontology book like “From Lucy to Language” and tell me it will all fit in a small box.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_evolution
refer to all the articles and external links for a brief overview.
Considering ‘Cambrian explosion‘ occurred over a 50 Million year time span, it was hardly an overnight explosion of life as you think. Like I said read.
“Which story is correct? Life from non-life here on earth or transported here by space aliens?”
It’s inconclusive so far; we need more research and evidence. Besides, neither deal with Evolution, but as I mentioned earlier both refer directly to the ORIGINS OF LIFE and NOT ORIGINS of SPECIES. Whether life arose from a primordial pool, was planted here by aliens via panspermia, or *poofed* by god in 6 days doesn’t negate that evolution occurs. It has no bearing on life adapting, changing and evolving; it’s a non-factor. Evolutionary theory ONLY deals with life after its already existing and changing.
“Then you would have to determine how these space aliens originated.”
Exactly. IF we conclude aliens planted life here we’re back to square one, but it would produce an infinite regress in which life had to form on its own somewhere, unless we are to refer back to the non falsifiable 6 day creation story. This revelation would surely shatter god creating humanity in his image in 1 day nonsense, but in itself doesn't negate god.
“Is macro-evolution a slow, incremental process or one of an instant transformation that occurs every now and then? What does the scientific method tell us?”
Well consider how long it took from the ancestors to become primitive and modern horses was nearly 47 million years I would call that anything but ‘instant’ . It is certainly slow, however genetic drifting and other factors accelerate it.
”You still haven’t answered the real issue; the foundation of origins science is on shifting sands.”
Well, if you read what I wrote earlier about ORGINS OF LIFE and ORIGNS OF SPECIES being two different fields of scientific study you see why its irrelevant. Scientific understanding isn’t always some set in stone concept that is timeless. Newton’s view of gravity was wrong thanks to the works of Einstein. Did Einstein’s work negate gravity? No, it only shined more light on how it works relative to light speed.
‘neo-darwinism’ what the heck is that? Give me a break.
Hey Hawk, YOU didn’t bother to answer either of my 2 questions on Human Chromosome 2 fusion and 7 Identical ERV’s to you and instead referred to quote mining again.
Chris333,
(Regarding Dawkins).” This makes him agnostic, not that he hasn't thought about it enough, as in all he would have to do to become atheist is think about it some more. Nor does it mean that he doesn't care, this is obvious.”
He is Atheistic towards religious depictions of ‘god’. He defines himself in this manner so as to avoid implying he’s not thought about it at any length. But those depictions of ‘god’ that fall in the realm of being harder to disprove or even form an educated guess of (Deistic, Pantheist,) he is Agnostic of, but still highly skeptical about their existence as well. B/c ‘god’ depends highly on one’s view of what it all entails god could be so impossible as to define that to base judgment on insufficient quantitative qualities make either propositions of absolute theism or atheism on a scale harder, if not impossible to judge. This is why, considering the present evidence, his stance on being atheistic towards religious gods is rationale, while being less atheistic towards deistic concepts of god is also rational.
Chris333,
”I was not saying that Theism was at all rational (though I do believe it is) I gave an example of a person who might, for various reasons rationally take up Theism.’
But why? Why is any absolute certainty in ones view of theism more rational that of atheism? If both are equally unable to achieve 100% certainty, than the only rational view is to, at the very least have limited doubt on the existence and how it is to be defined.
On both ends one should be shading slight doubt, which is more reasonable than to outright declare either proposition a given 100% certainty. Generally, only the most Pious take this absolute route. This is exactly what Dawkins admits to doing for a rational perspective. That you should at least agree with.
Agentorange stated: ‘What an outright lie.’ regarding Henry Gee’s attribution. Answer: For the Gee quotations see: Henry Gee, In Search of Deep Time (New York: The Free Press, 1999), 23, 32, 113-117, 202.. On the fact that mere similarity is insufficient to establish Darwinian descent with modification, see Jonathan Wells and Paul Nelson, “Homology: A Concept in Crisis,” available at: http://www.arn.org/docs/odesign/od182/hobi182.htm
Wasn’t it Gould, a paleontologist, that masterminded the punctuated equilibrium concept as he confessed the fossil record failed to support the slow, macro-evolutionary processes of neo-darwinism? Perhaps the Cambrian explosion had something to do with this concept as well. I believe both Hoyle and Crick supported the panspermia as they both believed that purposeless, blind chance of life forming from non-life is impossible as their scientific and mathematical investigations concluded. Which story is correct? Life from non-life here on earth or transported here by space aliens? Then you would have to determine how these space aliens originated. Is macro-evolution a slow, incremental process or one of an instant transformation that occurs every now and then? What does the scientific method tell us?
In 1997, Arizona State University anthropologist Geoffrey Clark wrote that “we select among alternative sets of research conclusions in accordance with our biases and preconceptions—a process that is, at once, both political and subjective.” Clark suggested “that paleoanthropology has the form but not the substance of a science.” G. A. Clark and C. M. Willermet (eds.), Conceptual Issues in Modern Human Origins Research (New York: Aldine de Gruyter, 1997), 76.
You still haven’t answered the real issue; the foundation of origins science is on shifting sands. I am convinced Clark’s observation fits neo-darwinism well.
sorry agentorange, one more thing,
you said, "to be agnostic in the matter either means you haven't thought about it enough or are indifferent."
No, agnosticism can mean those two things, but it can also mean that you have looked at the evidence and have found it wanting. The word literally means, "one who doesn't know".
Dawkins supposes he has viewed the best arguments and found them wanting, or more likely that he simply has discovered some points which make the possibility of God existing (exempting the deistic idea) highly unlikely. This makes him agnostic, not that he hasn't thought about it enough, as in all he would have to do to become atheist is think about it some more. Nor does it mean that he doesn't care, this is obvious.
Anyway it was a little hard to follow your point there, I hope this clears it up. I have not read the God delusion yet or the Dawkins Delusion. I am in another country right now and it is a little difficult to get the books. I intend to read both when I get the chance.
also agentorange,
I was not saying that Theism was at all rational (though I do believe it is) I gave an example of a person who might, for various reasons rationally take up Theism. My point, as it always has been on this blog, is to show that Atheism is blatant irrationality, more so than theism ever could be, please refer to the debate below to see why that is true.
ifeelfine, nobody is afraid of evolution (except for maybe the natural implications of evolution).
Angentorage,
I suppose you haven't read the Dawkins Delusion (Allister McGrath) or One World (John Polkinghorne) or The Real Face of Atheism (Ravi Zacharias).
Ifeelfine72 -
<<I've never met one legitmate convert who came to the cross by preaching fire and brimstone.>>
Not sure why you’re thinking I’m preaching fire here; just pointing out that being wrong in the physical world has consequences, so why think the same isn’t true of the spiritual world?
And while I don’t think it’s the best evangelistic technique to tell people they’re bound for Hell if they don’t choose Christ, you overlook history and the fact that one of the largest and most successful revivals in this country began with Jonathan Edwards’ sermon “Sinners in the hands of an angry God.”
Sometimes the most loving thing you can do for someone is warn them of a tragedy that you can see, but they cannot.
<< Would you say that other major religions like Islam and Buddhism are not "rooted in space/time history >>
Looks like you’ve switched gears on me; first you were referencing Zeus, and now Islam and Buddhism, which certainly do have historical entities like Christianity to investigate.
<< In India there are real life messiahs, living incarnations of God, who have millions and millions of devoted followers from around the world, and who perform miracles in front of thousands of eye-witnesses on a regular basis.>>
They are? No offense, but then why aren’t they on the news every night raising the dead, curing cancer, and walking on water?
<< Or do you still think that the Christian religion is special somehow? >>
Most certainly. Buddha is dead. Muhammad is dead. Confucius is dead. And all the Indian messiahs you were referencing will die and stay that way. I only know one Guy who went into the grave, came back out, and stayed that way. His resurrection is one of the most solid pieces of history that comes from the ancient world. Now I ask you: if you’re going to listen to one person about matters of life, death, God, and eternity, wouldn’t you want to pick the only One who overcame death and proved He was who He said He was?
HAWK49-
‘There are three primary stories for evolution; darwinian, punctuated equilibrium and directed panspernia; how come?”
No offence hawk, but you need to read more. First off, punctuated equilibrium is a process, like genetic dritting, or evolutionary synthesis and many others that describes how evolution works via Natural Selection. The only model on evolution is the Darwinian model.
Panspermia on the other hand involves HOW LIFE GOT ON EARTH, as in ORIGINS of LIFE and that is not evolution at all.
Darwin’s book was called ORIGIN OF SPECIES, and not ORIGIN OF LIFE and its only intention was describing how life changes over time and not how it got here to beging with. Evolutionary theory ONLY deals with life adapting and changing over time, nothing more.
The theory and study Abiogenesis (origins of life) is where panspermia would belong.
“Henry Gee, chief science writer for
Nature (and an evolutionist), has pointed out that all the evidence for human evolution between about 10 and 5 million years ago “can be fitted into a small box.”
What an outright lie. Quoteminning to boot to? Perhaps you’re not aware of all the hominid fossils we have then? Or all the genetic research either? Of the evidence left on cave walls and buried in the ground as artifacts?
ifeelfine72
" Because they are fundamentalists, evolution scares them. They don't understand it and they fear it. They fear it proves God wrong."
Acutally it DOESN"T PROVE GOD WRONG, or that he/it doesn't exist. Merely that the literalist creation interpretation is in error. What a suprise? Evolution doesn't negate a Deistic or Pantheist concepts of god, and that is the saddest thing. They could have their cake and eat it too, if only they realized Evolution not a discredit to god or his work, but towards theological doctrine of which they for whatever reason take verbtim.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deist
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pantheism
I mean, when one really learns and understands evolution they could easily see how evolution could be something ol god intended via how the universe is organized for organisms to undergo evolution so as to increase the odds of its survival. Sounds like a awefully smart god in that context. I don't know, but if I had to define 'omniscience' that would sure be a way of arguing for such a trait.
Ph.D Ken Miller, a Catholic, said it most succinctly saying 'I believe in a god, but not a deceptive one'. in refering to biological evidence of Evolution.
Chris333,
" I would like to add that there is absolutely nothing wrong with taking a postion that says, right now, all of the evidence points against God, but supposing strong enough evidence was presented, I may believe in Him. I think this is a respectable position, and the only logically tennable one."
I doubt you've read 'the god delusion' but dawkins goes into all the methodical reasons why any concept outside of the Deisitc view of god is highly improbable and unlikely and thus an irational. His very own conclussion on gods existance stems directly from evidence, for and against, and thereby he employs a baysien equation to deduce the likelyhood of the proposition of existance. Thus - the god hypothesis. In fact, in the end Dawkins defines his own disbelief as one of not being 'absolutely certain' of gods non existance, but still defines himself as such so that others understand he geniuenly, emphatically disbelieves. to be agnostic in the matter either means you haven't thought about it enough or are indifferent.
Some theists argue for an Intelligent Designer type of god, however they purposely overlook the very counter arguements against an intellgent, benevolent anything.
Astrophycisist, Neil deGrasse Tyson briefly touches on it here.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_nqySMvkcw
agent orange - Because they are fundamentalists, evolution scares them. They don't understand it and they fear it. They fear it proves God wrong. It seems apparent that you are an atheist and if believing in God meant being as ignorant as these folks, I would understand but one can believe in a higher power and evolution. I promise you.
Hawk49 - You really have no understanding of evolution do you?
anniefourjesus-
“Hmm, the Bible says the world is round and so I'll just go right on believing God, after all, HE is the only Authority of Life, man only knows in part and GOD knows in full!”
Ya, the same god that told the jews that insects have 4 legs, or that handling snakes and drinking poison was perfectly sensible. Or that same god that told that jews many times over that the ‘earth moveth not’ and that it ‘rests on pillars’. You might want to be a little more objective when asserting it’s authority.
”hmm, let me see, scientists are men, and man is flawed, so hmm, hence their theories are flawed and they don't have any evidence to support their own theories; those are all dead in the water.”
Well, lets extend your horrid logic further. The holly texts of every book we have were also (drum roll) written by men. So, by your logic your very holly books would cease to have authority (as if they don’t already).
It’s nice you don’t respect any gifts Science has provided and its derived theories as anything but man made mistakes. After all, the very process you’re using on the Internet was created directly b/c of mans work and not some god. In fact, since you’re so anti-science why do you go hang with the Amish and their anti technology ways? Little do you realize that your very existence directly stems from mans work and his understanding of the universe through science. Don’t like science? Don’t drive a car then. Don’t refrigerate your food. Don’t use your cell phone, or your regular phone for that matter. The very civilization you enjoy is all the result of science, have some respect.
HAWK49,
Seeing as you continually refer to evidence for evolution that has been self corected through the scientific method instead of more recent substatial evidences, i would like your input on 2 such cases.
#1
Long before the human genome was mapped scientists predicted that there must be some evidence for why we Sapiens only have 23 chromsomes, while other higher primates have 24. the only possible solution was fusion of a chromosome, as this is the only way the host could go on to survive and pass on its genes without dying aburptly. Human DNA analysis has recently shown that Human Chromosome 2 (which just happens to be larger than any other chromosome) is the direct result of fusion of 2 chromosomes. This can be seen in where the telomeres are located on Human Chromosome 2 and other atributes.
#2
We and Chimps share the exact same 7 ERV markers in IDENTICAL locations of our genomoes. Impossible odds. If you know anything about ERV's and how each one is inserted into an animals genome you might find this odds of such a thing astronomically small if you're to assume we're not at all related and share no common ancestory with Chimps.
If, however one considers evolutionary theory as a means to explain said data, both work quite well.
your thoughts?
To: jester_in_the_Kings_court LOL! That was the funniest, best description I have heard yet!!! I'm still laughing!!
Hmm, the Bible says the world is round and so I'll just go right on believing God, after all, HE is the only Authority of Life, man only knows in part and GOD knows in full!
Man is so full of himself and stuck on himself that when the evidence is right in front of him and still he fails to see that!
hmm, let me see, scientists are men, and man is flawed, so hmm, hence their theories are flawed and they don't have any evidence to support their own theories; those are all dead in the water.
The Heavens declare the majesty and awesomeness of God, The Creator, name Jesus Christ, God with us, Immanuel! Every star HE calls by Name that is our great Creator, every living thing has a name.
I think it's going to be quite interesting when God fully reveals Himself in such a degree that no one will be able to deny Him then, what will all man's theories do for him then??
Ifeelfine72: What you said doesn't answer the real issue. During the period that some scientists introduce the hoaxes until the time that other scientists dispell the hoaxes another set of scientists are touting the hoaxes as true, undisputed fact and adding very creative, fictional displays in museums and in science textbooks. People are falsely lead to believe that origin science is built solidily on the scientific method and in reality, it is not. It is a system built up on shifting sand. Which neo-darwinian issue is being touted today as 'scientific fact' that will end up being tomorrow's hoax? Some of these hoaxes demonstrate signs of a theory in trouble:
After Darwin advanced the claim with his book The Descent of Man that man evolved from ape-like living beings, he started to seek fossils to support this contention. However, some evolutionists believed that "half-man half-ape" creatures were to be found not only in the fossil record, but also alive in various parts of the world. In the early 20th century, these pursuits for "living transitional links" led to unfortunate incidents, one of the cruellest of which is the story of a Pygmy by the name of Ota Benga.
OTA BENGA: "The pygmy in the zoo"
Ota Benga was captured in 1904 by an evolutionist researcher in the Congo. In his own tongue, his name meant "friend". He had a wife and two children. Chained and caged like an animal, he was taken to the USA where evolutionist scientists displayed him to the public in the St Louis World Fair along with other ape species and introduced him as "the closest transitional link to man". Two years later, they took him to the Bronx Zoo in New York and there they exhibited him under the denomination of "ancient ancestors of man" along with a few chimpanzees, a gorilla named Dinah, and an orang-utan called Dohung. Dr William T. Hornaday, the zoo's evolutionist director gave long speeches on how proud he was to have this exceptional "transitional form" in his zoo and treated caged Ota Benga as if he were an ordinary animal. Unable to bear the treatment he was subjected to, Ota Benga eventually committed suicide.
Hawk49 - I stand by what I said:
http://www.clarku.edu/~piltdown/map_expose/chain_of_fraud.html
After reading this article, and recently *debating* science/*rational thought* with a friend of mine, I am most struck with a feeling that what is really important, is my Christian /faith/. A veritable leap of faith, the very idea of stepping into a reality that is not immediately known, knowing things in ways we are not used to, isn't something science could empirically prove anyways. We can treat them as seperate ways of interpretation, keeping in mind they do however overlap in some areas, but they can't explain each other.
In the same way, scripture seems to stress the importance of faith, the faith of a child and their Father, and that just doesn't seem to me to be anything that pure rationality could (or would I want it to) explain.
Quill, even if Christianity goes down to 5% of the population, it wouldn't effect me. I think a lot of people in America just say they are Christians and do not live a near Christian life anyways. As you say many of them are giving Christianity a bad reputation, they say they are Christians but then live the secular life and behave like secular people. For that matter I would warn you, do not judge a worldview based upon its abuse, rather look at it for what it really is and what it really says. In other words, Christians lying does not make Christianity a lie, as you assume.
Hey Wiggy, we have started an avalanche of comments on this post, not a bad thing.
I too am glad to have the debate with you. I would like to re-emphasize that the second definition, a disbelief in god/s is still asserting a negative, it just changes the language around. Also, you said something along the lines of saying that, believing in absolutely that no god/s exist is almost as irrational as asserting that one does exist. I want to challenge that and say, no asserting that no god/s exist is by far more irrational than to say one does exist. For instance if I say, "In my life, God has revealed Himself to me through the truths I have found in the Bible, as well as through certain examples in my own life." This statement asserts that there is reason for this person to seriously believe in God, there is absolutely nothing irrational about that. But for a person to say, "I know 100% that god/s does not exist" Unless they know everything, it goes against all rationality and is logically untennable.
I agree that agnostic, in the popular mind, does connote some sort of person who might be very easily convinced to become a theistic-minded person, but this is in no way what the word means. Dawkins points that out quite vociferously. Atheism, in the popular mind, is conveyed as a person who is not absolutely sure that God does not exist, but is very sure. This however is not what the word ever meant. I would like to add that there is absolutely nothing wrong with taking a postion that says, right now, all of the evidence points against God, but supposing strong enough evidence was presented, I may believe in Him. I think this is a respectable position, and the only logically tennable one.
Thanks for your conversation, it has helped sharpen my own perspectives, I would also like to urge you to seriously look at the evidence for Christianity, if you haven't already. This isn't the post to present my case for Christianity persay, but I would point you to Ravi Zacharias or William Lane Craig, or possibly John Polkinghorne. In any case, it is only if you are interested, I find them to provide intellectually based reasons for believing in Christianity, not just emphatic ones or highly irrational ones.
Ifeelfine72: Another example that the foundation of origin science is on shifting sands. In 1912, a well-known doctor and amateur paleoanthropologist named Charles Dawson came out with the assertion that he had found a jawbone and a cranial fragment in a pit in Piltdown, England. Even though the jawbone was more ape-like, the teeth and the skull were like a man's. These specimens were labelled the "Piltdown man". Alleged to be 500,000 years old, they were displayed as an absolute proof of human evolution in several museums. For more than 40 years, many scientific articles were written on "Piltdown man", many interpretations and drawings were made, and the fossil was presented as important evidence for human evolution. No fewer than 500 doctoral theses were written on the subject. While visiting the British Museum in 1921, leading American paleoanthropologist Henry Fairfield Osborn said "We have to be reminded over and over again that Nature is full of paradoxes" and proclaimed Piltdown "a discovery of transcendant importance to the prehistory of man.
It was determined that the teeth in the jawbone belonging to an orangutan, had been worn down artificially and that the "primitive" tools discovered with the fossils were simple imitations that had been sharpened with steel implements. In the detailed analysis completed by Joseph Weiner, this forgery was revealed to the public in 1953. The skull belonged to a 500-year-old man, and the jaw bone belonged to a recently deceased ape! The teeth had been specially arranged in a particular way and added to the jaw, and the molar surfaces were filed in order to resemble those of a man. Then all these pieces were stained with potassium dichromate to give them an old appearance. These stains began to disappear when dipped in acid. Sir Wilfred Le Gros Clark, who was in the team that uncovered the forgery, could not hide his astonishment at this situation and said: "The evidences of artificial abrasion immediately sprang to the eye. Indeed so obvious did they seem it may well be asked-how was it that they had escaped notice before?" In the wake of all this, "Piltdown man" was hurriedly removed from the British Museum where it had been displayed for more than 40 years.
"An extensive scientific debate began surrounding this fossil, which came to be called "Nebraska man", in which some interpreted this tooth as belonging to Pithecanthropus erectus, while others claimed it was closer to human beings. Nebraska man was also immediately given a "scientific name", Hesperopithecus haroldcooki."
That sounds like they're critical...they're so busy arguing whether it was a "pithosalerjelakjroejn" or a human being, I can see how that could misinterpreted as being "critical" of the find.
"Evolutionist circles placed such faith in this "ghost man" that when a researcher named William Bryan opposed these biased conclusions relying on a single tooth, he was harshly criticised."
That sounds like the scientific group was critical of the find.....
yes, i can. and you can continue thinking the universe revolves around you. and we'll both be happy.
jester - actually it wasn't scientists who started saying this is the golden ticket. Most of them were skeptical from the start - it was the media at the time that started saying it.
You can go back to thinking the world is flat too.
ifeelfine,
duh? it certainly wasn't a bunch of golf players! but your "intelligent" mind failed to see the obvious point. it was those wonderful smart scientists who first jumped on the bandwagon without any proof whatsoever to begin with. which shows just how biased they are. as soon as someone cries "proof of evolution" you see a bunch of monky boy scientists running down the road after the wagon, each one stumbling over each other just to get in. THEN, once they're in, they realize..."hey! this wagon ain't goin nowhere! just 'round in circles!". so then they hop out, slink into the bushes to await the next wagon,,,hoping that one at least goes somewhere.
Hawk49 - Nice try but that pig tooth was debunked by . . . you guessed it, scientists. They are clearly interested in the facts. And piltdown man? Ooops, the scientists did it again.
You can go back to thinking the world is flat again. Thanks.
quill: The typical drawing of the progression of man's evoltuion from an ape-like creature to a fully erect human is based on sheer imagination that appears to be copied often for depicting fabricated societies of Neanderthals, Lucy's Piltdown man, Tasaday tribe, etc. There is no concrete fossil evidence to support the "ape-man" image, which is unceasingly promulgated by the media and evolutionist academic circles. With brushes in their hands, evolutionists produce imaginary creatures, nevertheless, the fact that these drawings correspond to no matching fossils constitutes a serious problem for them. One of the interesting methods they employ to overcome this problem is to "produce" the fossils they cannot find. Piltdown Man, which may be the biggest scandal in the history of science, is a typical example of this method.
Quill: another possibility is you bought the lie.
Nebraska Man: A Single Pig Tooth
In 1922, Henry Fairfield Osborn, the director of the American Museum of Natural History, declared that he had found a fossil molar tooth belonging to the Pliocene period in western Nebraska near Snake Brook. This tooth allegedly bore common characteristics of both man and ape. An extensive scientific debate began surrounding this fossil, which came to be called "Nebraska man", in which some interpreted this tooth as belonging to Pithecanthropus erectus, while others claimed it was closer to human beings. Nebraska man was also immediately given a "scientific name", Hesperopithecus haroldcooki.
The picture on the left was drawn on the basis of a single tooth and it was published in the Illustrated London News magazine on July 24, 1922. [this is the kind of fabrication you find in the natural history museum] However, the evolutionists were extremely disappointed when it was revealed that this tooth belonged neither to an ape-like creature nor to a man, but rather to an extinct pig species.
Many authorities gave Osborn their support. Based on this single tooth, reconstructions of the Nebraska man's head and body were drawn. Moreover, Nebraska man was even pictured along with his wife and children, as a whole family in a natural setting.
All of these scenarios were developed from just one tooth. Evolutionist circles placed such faith in this "ghost man" that when a researcher named William Bryan opposed these biased conclusions relying on a single tooth, he was harshly criticised.
In 1927, other parts of the skeleton were also found. According to these newly discovered pieces, the tooth belonged neither to a man nor to an ape. It was realised that it belonged to an extinct species of wild American pig called Prosthennops. William Gregory entitled the article published in Science in which he announced the truth, "Hesperopithecus: Apparently Not an ape Nor a man. 67 Then all the drawings of Hesperopithecus haroldcooki and his "family" were hurriedly removed from evolutionary literature.
It appears the foundation for your Origins Science is built on shifting sand.
quill: Are you a plant by the Disco 'tute people? There is nothing in the Bible that suggests evolution didn't / can't happen. Christianity has nothing to do with denying science. Sure there are a few fundamentalists that would like to but most scientists say they are Christians and more than 99% of them accept the facts of evolution. That doesn't sound like a dichotomy at all.
Christianity is expected to fall below 70% of the US population in 2008. It's declining faster than any other religion in America as a percentage of the civil population. And it's all about science. In the modern world, any religion that pits is dogma against science is a religion that doesn't have long to live. You Christians are just cutting your own throats by opposing evolution. In the courts of public opinion, you prove yourselves to be liars, and by proxy, you prove Christianity to be a lie, every time you do it.
There is such a thing as observed reality. When Darwin said that anyone who actually rejects evolution and believes in creationism has to be ignorant of both, he was saying nothing that should be offensive. It's a simple fact. One of those things really is true and one of them really is false. That's why you can walk into a natural history museum anywhere in the world and see a human ancesty exhibit. It's not a conspiracy.
Chris333 - Wiggy might be a special example (as he / she seems to be open to learning about Christ) but most of the atheists / agnostics on this site don't seem to genuinely be seeking the Truth. Most of them already have their minds made up and are more interested in changing our minds than changing their own (which is natural - all of us Christians that post here, myself included,do the exact same thing to other Christians that post here).
I've never met one legitmate convert who came to the cross by preaching fire and brimstone.
Thank you Chris333. I appreciate your honest and civil answer to my question. In return I'm willing to concede that I am not an atheist according to the first definition you gave in your earlier post. I would hate to submit to a "doctrine" of atheism. Stating absolute certainty in the absence of a god is almost as irrational as stating absolute certainty in the existance of a god.
So what we have is indeed a simple semantic problem. infidel57 and I both prefer to use the second definition you gave for atheism; a simple disbelief in gods rather than a doctrine of believing that there are no gods. I suggest you also start applying the second definition in your debates with atheists because I'm sure you won't find many who categorize themselves under the first definition.
While I guess you could technically say I'm agnostic, I personally don't like the term because it lends a certain plausability to religion that I think is undue. I liked your answer about belief in unicorns and I think it more or less sums up the atheists' position on gods. I guess that while you find the claims for the truth of Christianity convincing, I just don't find them any more impressive than the claims of the other religions I reject.
DARWINISM and ATHEISM: UNSCIENTIFIC & MYTHICAL
http://evolutionfacts.blogspot.com
In this article, Dawkins is quoted "He once wrote that “if you meet somebody who claims not to believe in evolution, that person is ignorant, stupid, or insane.” He then added “or wicked, but I’d rather not consider that.”
Why do we get upset when an athiest says that about us? The Bible says that a fool says in his heart that there is no God. So, if the Bible says that about them, why do we expect any less from them? I'm honored that I'm called those things, and more. Because that means my faith is evident, unlike many Christians out there.
when I said, "Wiggy and infidel do not want that either" I meant that, I am assuming they do not want to just have a nice simle and be told that I love them. Rather I believe they want real answers and to debate their positions, that is why they are here posting after all.
Also, Ifeelfine, I do not want to downplay the importance of respecting others while disagreeing with them. I am not "hating" wiggy and infidel or anyone else I debate with. If I really hated them I would tell them that all truth is relative and then reassure them that we are both right.
The first thing to say, is that Buddhism is nontheistic, if not atheist itself. Hinduism is not rooted in time and space, it is not comparable to Christianity in that regard. Islam is, but we can challenge its claims.
As for our ongoing debate about atheism being logically untennable, I will still say unicorns are not comparable to atheism versus theism, do to the fact that unicorns are specific and theism is dealing with the general assertion that the supernatural, exists (i.e. god/s). However I would be willing to concede that I am in fact agnostic towards unicorns. This is because in fact I haven't been throughout the universe to see if unicorns did not exist anywhere. However I have good reason to believe that unicorns do not exist, one they are obviously created fanciful creatures, they were supposed to have roamed the earth some time ago, and there is no evidence for them anywhere. This makes me highly susceptible, but I cannot say I have been through the entire universe, to every planet and looked for them. Suppose someday archaelogists find a skeleton of a unicorn like creature, and it is proved to be genuine, then I would have reason to believe. Taking this line of thought with theism, if there is little proof that there exists god/s then we can say we are agnostic about the existence of a supernatural.
However, I think we are arguing more over the definition of atheism. Atheism literally means no-theos, no god if I say I am a theist, that means I believe in a god/s, if I say I am an atheist it means I believe in no god/s. If I ask you, "Are you 100% sure God does not exist?" You will respond (I assume), "Well, no, but it seems to me that all the evidence suggests no God" Excellent you are agnostic, welcome to the club!
In closing, the evidence for unicorns is nonexistant, there are many good reasons to believe in some god, and I would argue good reasons to believe in the Christian God, but that is not what this post is about. My only purpose here is to show that atheism is the most irrational and logically untennable faith system. Thank you both for helping me clear up my argument, I hope you understand this way.
ifeelfine, I agre that we need to show people the love of Christ, but not at the expense of the truth. You don't tell a person, "look it is okay that you don't believe in God, just pray a nice prayer to Jesus, who you don't believe in, and then sing a song and you will be saved." We need real debates not just sucking up to people. Wiggy and infidel do not want that either, they have a desire to know things, not be fed a smile and told nice words.
schumacr, you say that the Christian religion is different from other, merely "mythical religions" because it is "rooted in space/time history." Would you say that other major religions like Islam and Buddhism are not "rooted in space/time history." In India there are real life messiahs, living incarnations of God, who have millions and millions of devoted followers from around the world, and who perform miracles in front of thousands of eye-witnesses on a regular basis. I would say that these men are more firmly rooted in space/time history than Jesus. Wouldn't you? Or would you say that just someone's existance, the Indian living messiah's existance for example, is not enough to prove their extraordinary claims? Or do you still think that the Christian religion is special somehow?
schumacr - Do you know anyone that has ever had a faithful conversion into a life with Christ using these tactics? I've been going to church for 35 plus years now and I don't know a single person that has ever come to the cross this way. I do know lots of people that have come to the Lord by showing them the love of Christ. I pray for non-believers's souls too but there are possitive ways and negative ways of leading one to Christ. I would humbly say that this is the wrong way.
Wiggy/Infidel57 –
Respectfully I would draw your attention to the fact that you continue to use the logical fallacy of false analogy when comparing God to unicorns or mythological concoctions like Oden. The concept of God and Christ are rooted in space/time history; a history, in fact, that has more evidence to back up its claims that anything else in the ancient world.
In addition, you ignore reason and logic in your conclusions. If something exists (and it does) and if non-being cannot produce being (and it can’t), then a necessary and eternal being must exist. Your only two choices are in impersonal/natural eternality (the universe) or a personal/supernatural eternality (God). And since the universe isn’t eternal, God exists.
Further, you seem to revel in your stance of disbelief, but I would respectfully point out that wrong ideas have wrong consequences, and ignoring the truth and reality brings unpleasant results at times. For example, imagine a burglar breaking into a home and being met by a homeowner with a gun. Wouldn’t it be nuts for the burglar to respond, “Well, I don’t believe in guns!”? I guarantee you he’ll believe if the homeowner pulls the trigger.
Cris333, Hawk49, and other Christians on this site aren’t interested in winning debates and firing zingers across your bow; they’re trying to persuade you to consider the very real evidence of Christianity and understand what turning away from God means, both now and in eternity. Remember – eternity is an awfully long time to be wrong, so that’s why it’s critical to fully investigate and consider things now.
Chris333
Why didn't you just stop your post when you took the trouble of looking up the definition of atheism and saw that the 2nd definition is exactly as I defined it? Wait a minute. I said non belief, and your definition says disbelief. Did the prefixes confuse you?
As Wiggy says, when you posit a god, I am entitled, without having to furnish proof, that I don't believe you. You have the same right to "disbelieve" in Vishnu or Oden or Baal. You are under no obligation to disprove the existence of those creations.
Chris333, just a quick question. Would you say that atheism is any different from afairyism, aunicornism, asantaism or abigfootism? If so, why?
Science is a powerful tool, a strong and compliant servant, but it has its limitations…a scientist has ‘just got to know his limitations’—and the limitations of the scientific method. Otherwise, many scientists will spend their lives seeking that which the scientific method cannot deliver—absolute truth. They will build their houses on a foundation of sand—knowledge that is constantly shifting—and will end up mistaking golem for God, worshipping the creation rather than the Creator
Wiggy, I have just one more thing to comment on
You said:
"Good science remains untouched by religion and cannot comment on the supernatural."
It is funny you would say this, you say that good science remains untouched by religion and in the same breath you say it cannot comment on the supernatural! The definition you give for science makes it so that God could never, ever affect science. It is this kind of thinking that makes atheist scientists say, "Science does not support the idea of a supernatural creator, oh yes science cannot comment on the supernatural." This is a circular argument, it is unfalsifiable. Even if the evidence clearly pointed to a supernatural creator, scientists would be forever doomed to only consider the wrong answer, very scientific! I have a brilliant idea! Let's redefine science, we will have a science that simply follows the evidence where ever it leads, then we can make a label on the old science that says, "Warning: This science is clearly biased" But I am glad you brought it up, keep reassuring yourself that science has nothing good to say about religion and also that it can't comment on it.
Wiggy,
Thanks for continuing on the ignorance about atheism, now I have to restate myself again. It is getting repetitive. Yes, Atheism asserts a negative, it is the very nature of Atheism. It says, there is no God. It is not a reaction in and of itself, you attribute its reactive quality, but that is not the actual meaning of the word. No it is not comparable to any of the examples you gave. It would be similar to saying this, "I believe there are no purple rocks in the universe" Even if there were no purple rocks on earth, without infinite knowledge you could not know this. The skeptic's beloved Richard Dawkins understands this, but you and infidel can't. Anyway, maybe you should write a letter to Dawkins and get him to change his mind.
If one says, "I believe in God" then this person needs only to show that God exists, for one to say, "I do not believe God exists" one has to show that God does not exist anywhere in the universe or even externally or independent of the universe. This is not comparable to your examples. It is logically tennable to say, "At this moment I feel the evidence does not support a God" This is called agnosticism.
Let's put it this way, if I asked you, "Do you believe in God?" you would probably say, "No, I do not believe in God" Then I would ask, "Ok, are you 100% sure that God does not exist, anywhere in the universe and beyond?" Then you would probably respond, "Well, I am not 100% sure, but I am extremely sure that God doesn't exist because of...etc...etc..." This is not atheism, it is agnosticism. Atheism means, according to dictionary.com =),
1. the doctrine or belief that there is no God.
2. disbelief in the existence of a supreme being or beings.
But now you can go write a letter to dictionary.com and tell them they are wrong too.
I think attacking contemporary scientists as "materialist" on the basis that early scientists were Christian is pointless. Would anyone disagree that there are still a lot of high profile scientists who are also Christian? How many of them reject evolution? Good science remains untouched by religion and cannot comment on the supernatural.
Chriss333 says "I might add that atheism is the most irrational faith of all because it asserts a negative." Atheism doesn't assert a negative. Theism asserts a positive and atheism doesn't accept it. Let's substitute some other words in the same sentence to illustrate the point.
1. I might add that moon landing hoax denial is the most irrational faith of all because it asserts a negative.
2. I might add that non-astrology is the most irrational faith of all because it asserts a negative.
3. I might add that skepticism is the most irrational faith of all because it asserts a negative
Atheism is not asserting anything and is not in any way irrational. If pre-Darwin scientists were shown his ideas and the scientific evidence I have no doubt they would have also accepted evolution. Whether they would have remained Christian is beside the point.
infidel, you are 100% wrong about atheism. Atheism literally means the assertion of "no god" "no theology" it is not just lack of belief it is the assertion that there is nothing. You need to understand what you believe. We are not 99.9 percent in agreement. There is a difference between Christianity and other "religions" and that is something you obviously do not understand. I am also not asserting a negative, for instance, you could say, "Oh well we can't possibly say that George Washington was the first President of the United states, because there are billions of other people that could be, and by saying that he was the first President, you are saying all the rest arent!" This statement is bluntly stupid, irrational, and without base. We look at the evidence when choosing what we believe, we either say that the Christian faith is the most rational faith, another is, or else agnosticism is (namely that there is not enough evidence to decide one way or the other). These assumptions can be debated and challenged. Atheism cannot be, it asserts a negative and therefore there is no room for debate, because you have to have absolute knowledge in order to be an atheist. That is why Dawkins knows better than to say he is an atheist, he says he is an agnostic. Try again with your arguments.
One last point, there is not the same amount of "objective evidence" for the other gods as there is for the Christian worldview. You need to look into that yourself instead of just saying things.
Infidel57: you wrote: "Science is a method, the best one we have, for gathering information. If someone could come up with a better method, it would become the scientific method. A hypothsis is formed, experiments designed and performed and observations are made. This is repeated to test the hypothesis, and the results are recorded for other scientists review. If mistakes are made, or fraud is committed, sooner or later it will be discovered.
Religion, on the other had, suffers mightily for that inexactness. My evidence. Just look under the Yellow Pages under "churches" and see how many interpretations of the scriptures lead in so many different directions."
Our captives in the government schools and govt funded TV programs are spoon fed evolutionary inexactness and told it is all fact such as:
For example, several episodes deal with human origins. We are treated to lots
of wildlife photography of apes, and numerous dramatizations featuring human
actors in “missing link” costumes, seen from afar—like shots of “Bigfoot”—
while we listen to stories told by people who apparently think a very little evidence can go a very long way. But Henry Gee, chief science writer for
Nature (and an evolutionist), has pointed out that all the evidence for human evolution between about 10 and 5 million years ago “can be fitted into a small box.” According to Gee, the conventional picture of human evolution as lines of ancestry and descent is “a completely human invention created after the fact, shaped to accord with human prejudices.” Putting it even more bluntly, Gee wrote in 1999: “To take a line of fossils and claim that they represent a lineage is not a scientific hypothesis that can be tested, but an assertion that carries the same validity as a bedtime story—amusing, perhaps even instructive, but not scientific.” The makers of Evolution ignore such in-house critics, preferring to leave viewers with the misleading impression that the evidence for human evolution is much stronger than it really is.
There are three primary stories for evolution; darwinian, punctuated equilibrium and directed panspernia; how come? Doesn't appear to be much different than your critique of multiple Bible believing Christian denominations. At least the Christian denominations agree on the majors.
Your discription of science makes for good PR, but it lacks one thing. The human weakness (built in biases and presuppositions) for interpretation of the observations.
"Science is not an exact study..."
Science is a method, the best one we have, for gathering information. If someone could come up with a better method, it would become the scientific method. A hypothsis is formed, experiments designed and performed and observations are made. This is repeated to test the hypothesis, and the results are recorded for other scientists review. If mistakes are made, or fraud is committed, sooner or later it will be discovered.
Religion, on the other had, suffers mightily for that inexactness. My evidence. Just look under the Yellow Pages under "churches" and see how many interpretations of the scriptures lead in so many different directions.
"I might add that atheism is the most irrational faith of all because it asserts a negative "
Nope. Atheism is merely non belief. Everyone is an atheist in some respect. I could name 1000 "gods" that man has worshipped through the ages, and you would be atheistic toward 999 of them, and I would agree with you. Where we would disagree is on the particular god you believe in. The problem? There is just as much objective evidence of the 999 other gods as there is of your particular god.
So you see, we are 99.9 percent in agreement.
Amen Chris333!!!
Science is not an exact study, everything in this world is flawed, this is a fallen world, and destined for fire, due to man's sin and nothing that anyone does is going to stop this; God's Word is quite clear on this; The signs of the End Times have escalated, and man needs to get right with God, and repent and turn to God, it is to God that man has sinned, and only God can give pardon, and He has done that through Jesus Christ, we only have to lay aside the pride and receive what the Lord has done, In Jesus Name, Amen!
I love how these folks want me to prove my faith in God; but they have no facts to back up what their own theory is!
Personally I do not even let bother me what these folks claim. Claims are made every day. Mr. Dawkins opinion of me and my faith is quite funny! Jesus said, we are a peculiar people, so I'm not offended Mr. Dawkins!
Our God also said, "nothing shall offend thee" because all your insults and barbs fall on our Great God, and HE is quite big enough to handle them.
Almighty God is bigger and more majestic than you can ever imagine Mr. Dawkins; but your heart is closed off to him and your mind as well.
I used to walk like you, denying God; until HE found me in the gutter where people had left me; and HE picked me up, washed off all the muck and mire that I and others had put on myself.
He cleansed my spirit and healed my wounds and He is in the process of restoring my mind.
I give The Lord all praise and glory for what He has done in my life. Mr. Dawkins I am the living proof that God is real, HE changes lives, and HE gives HOPE to the hopeless and HE loves us.
Man doesn't even know what love is apart from God.
You look around this world and you see the escalation of violence, hatred and evil, without JESUS CHRIST, man will wipe every human life from the face of the earth!!!
All these scientist out here who don't believe in God, but you can't stop anyone from DYING!
God can though and He does so many times, both spiritually and physically!
I just have to look at the STARS in the evening sky and I know Almighty God, my Heavenly Father is magnificent!! Open up your eyes and heart; man's reasoning and intellect is flawed!!!!
An excellent story, I might add that atheism is the most irrational faith of all because it asserts a negative (Dawkins knows this so he just calls himself a highly skeptical agnostic, who might as well be atheist). I thought this article was well written. Dawkins and other militant naturalistic scientists defend their position by saying that science and history do not attest to the validity of the supernatural, and specifically of the validity of the Christian faith. But at the same time they undergrid this statement with the assumption that science and history only deal with naturalistic explanations for things. This is illogical, blatantly circular, self-defeating reasoning. They say that science cannot make judgements on supernatural things, and then say that science does not support supernatural things. Then they say history does not make judgments on supernatural events, and then they say history does not attest to the truth of the Christian message. Oh but here is the catch, science and history cannot say God is true, but they can say with relative assurance, that He is not true.