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At 3/12/07 11:59 AM, Grammer wrote: So? Can you prove it was the religious leaders who "held the truth down"

Umm... religious leaders were the rulers. They made the "rules".

how do you know it was their religion that motivated them to teach that?

I don't and never claimed it did. Anyway, it's a moot point, as it's been widely evidenced that this whole majority believing in a flat earth was pure bollocks to begin with, historical myth.

And if those same religious leaders taught that the earth was flat, then yet, they are to blame for that as well...

I guess every time I commit a crime my religion's to blame...

No, YOU are to blame. That those in power were religious is coincidence, and I have NEVER ONCE SAID that it ws RELIGION that did it. RELIGIOUS LEADERS =/= RELIGION.

Get it through your fucking skull arleady.

Which makes you... the minority.

Only slightly (guess what, not "vast"), and since noone's a majority, then it's moot anyway. Christians have a plurality, but even combined with Muslims they don't represent a majority. They might if you combine ALL the Abrahamic religions into a single group... but something tells me Israel and Palestine mite take issue with that.

Then you can't believe you'll ever win the lottery, you can't believe you'll be successful in life, you can't believe you'll have a nice car, big house, cute wife, and adorable children, because to believe in that requires evidence, and since you don't have it you're illogical for believing it'll happen.

I have plenty of evidence for everything on that list (except the lottery which I don't play because I think of it as a tax on people who can't do math), I don't know what kind of black hole YOU'RE living in. I have an almost-finished college education which is strong evidence for a successful life, and enough money to afford all those niceties. I don't dig ugly chicks, so that is evidence towards a cute wife, and I'm fucking HOT, so with a cute wife our kid(s) will be heartbreakers all of them. Circumstantial? Sure, but guess what, everything is.

Actually, I don't believe in God because I know he exists. I believed in him before that, but it's already because I have faith :)

Wow, that made no sense. Care to wind up and take another swing at whatever it was you were trying to say?

At 3/12/07 06:33 PM, DrBrainTrust wrote: Ravariel, first, your situation concerning waiting for your girlfriend only gives credence to the idea of religion being a logical way of thinking... There is a huge body of circumstantial evidence attesting to God's existence (the many abrahamic scriptures, at least a hundred thousand people who claim to have seen or heard God or felt His presence, possible personal experiences of encountering God or His heralds), so according to your example, it would be reasonable to have faith in God's existence.

You make a reasonable point, but none of the evidence FOR christianity is verifiable or reproducible, whereas many people know, have witnessed both independantly and separately, that my girlfriend is timely. There have been no recorded miracles since the Bible, much less miracles attributable to the Christian god. "Feeling god's presence" is simply a form of self-stimulation... reproducible by anyone believing in anything, not attributable to the christan god. Those growing up in a christian social network would feel/see/hear that presence as God, similarly would those in Muslim feel it as Allah.

I say this with conviction not because I have done studies on it, but because it follows with social psychology. You should check out that link the the Power of Situation vid that Imperator has posted a couple times. Crazy stuff.

Second, your idea that omniscience cannot coexist with free will takes a very narrow view of time. Free will is incompatible with the idea of linear time, which your post assumed would have to be true in order for there to be omniscience.

Um, no. Free will's existence only requires no predestination. I already believe time to be only apparently linear. Check out the No Boundary Proposal and Imaginary Tim for why.

There are multiple ways to look at things; Assuming God knows everything, he would have all knowledge of every thing in existence. If the future doesn't exist yet, then god would have no knowledge of it until it happened, yet he would still have all knowledge in existence.

That would assume that god is bound by time, a feature of (and only of, as far as we can tell) this universe, which he created. If he created it, he must be "outside" it, as if he was inside it, he would have created himself, and we get a paradox. Thus if he is "outside" the universe he is also "outside" and not bound by time. If he WAS bound by time, he would not be omnipotent.

Another way you could look at the situation is that time has as many branches as there are multiple outcomes for a given situation, and God knows them all. In that case, you would have the free will to act in whatever fashion you pleased, and god would know the outcome without hindering your ability to make decisions independently of His will.

See, now THERE we have an interesting take on the situation. Knowing the outcome of all possible choices, yet without the definitive knowledge of WHICH one will actually happen... I might be able to get behind that idea. The question would be then, is the unknowableness of the actual choice a function of the fundamental existence and riles of spacetime, or one of God's own characteristics? Is this limit to his knowledge the same as the limit to his power of being unable to create a paradox? And is that, a limitation that disqualifies him from omnipotence/omniscience?

I'd like to see some religious scholars debate THAT idea.

From your posts, I still don't see how the idea of God is impossible or how believing in God is irrational, and I definitely don't see how belief in religion is inherently opposed to science.

There being zero evidence for a deity (regardless of all the testimonal and anecdotal "evidence", much of which is spurious at best), and there being INFINITE possibilities for the FORM of that "being" (if it can even be classified as such), believeing in any ONE version is irrational BY DEFINITION. Especially when in fact the universe may very well NOT have any "beginning" per se (again, see No Boundary Proposal), and thus no need for a beginnER.

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At 3/13/07 01:14 AM, Ravariel wrote:

At 3/12/07 11:59 AM, Grammer wrote:

There being zero evidence for a deity (regardless of all the testimonal and anecdotal "evidence", much of which is spurious at best), and there being INFINITE possibilities for the FORM of that "being" (if it can even be classified as such), believeing in any ONE version is irrational BY DEFINITION. Especially when in fact the universe may very well NOT have any "beginning" per se (again, see No Boundary Proposal), and thus no need for a beginnER.

the hearsay in favor of God's existence may be dubious at best but it is till more than nothing. People have been convicted for less :) And as far as what form or idea of God is being worshiped, God is pretty much considered to be universally unknowable. The ways of God are mainly considered to be shrouded in mystery. To believe in any kind of God is to indirectly believe in all of the possibilities of God.

Your description of God brings me to a question I had posed earlier in this thread. As I mentioned before, the only definitions of God relate only to how he is described by the ways in which He is worshiped. So the question I asked was "what is God?" Neither the people who worship God nor the people who deny His existence really know what God is. It seems like kind of an interesting situation to me.

religious debate is fun if it stays civil.

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At 3/13/07 02:16 AM, DrBrainTrust wrote: the hearsay in favor of God's existence may be dubious at best but it is till more than nothing.

Eh, fair enough I suppose.

To believe in any kind of God is to indirectly believe in all of the possibilities of God.

Heh, I dare you to get the more fundamentalist folk to agree... though I do find it to be a sound idea.

Your description of God brings me to a question I had posed earlier in this thread. As I mentioned before, the only definitions of God relate only to how he is described by the ways in which He is worshiped. So the question I asked was "what is God?" Neither the people who worship God nor the people who deny His existence really know what God is. It seems like kind of an interesting situation to me.

Well, being as I don't believe in any supreme "being", nevermind one with the various features described by current religions, I'm not entirely sure that I can even attempt to answer that question.

Though in it's simplest form I guess it would be: The actor from whose action the universe was created.

At least, most common religions woudl give it that basic description (prior to other features such as having an earthly child, etc etc). But I am not certain we can even call whatever it was that created the universe (if, indeed there was anything at all) an entity that can be called an "actor"... as having a stated purpose. The "thing" that created the universe could be a completely nonsentient force of some sort, some characteristic of spacetime itself, as well as one or none of an infinite number of things capable of the feat of our loverly home.

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At 3/13/07 03:48 AM, Ravariel wrote:

At 3/13/07 02:16 AM, DrBrainTrust wrote:

At least, most common religions woudl give it that basic description (prior to other features such as having an earthly child, etc etc). But I am not certain we can even call whatever it was that created the universe (if, indeed there was anything at all) an entity that can be called an "actor"... as having a stated purpose. The "thing" that created the universe could be a completely nonsentient force of some sort, some characteristic of spacetime itself, as well as one or none of an infinite number of things capable of the feat of our loverly home.

That's the main reason I have a problem with people just making blanket statements like"there is no God" and whatnot when we don't know exactly what God is to know it doesn't exist. It just seems kind of closed minded to assume that the very idea of any kind of thing that could be considered God is wrong.

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At 3/13/07 03:48 AM, Ravariel wrote:

Well, being as I don't believe in any supreme "being", nevermind one with the various features described by current religions, I'm not entirely sure that I can even attempt to answer that question.

um.. you should look up Hinduism a bit more, Brahman (or how ever it is spelled) is what you need to know about.

Though in it's simplest form I guess it would be: The actor from whose action the universe was created.

At least, most common religions woudl give it that basic description (prior to other features such as having an earthly child, etc etc). But I am not certain we can even call whatever it was that created the universe (if, indeed there was anything at all) an entity that can be called an "actor"... as having a stated purpose. The "thing" that created the universe could be a completely nonsentient force of some sort, some characteristic of spacetime itself, as well as one or none of an infinite number of things capable of the feat of our loverly home.

No, what you are saying is the laws of the universe, laws are unexplained and are the universe, instead of being in it. It is logical to assume that a "characteristic of spacetime" would not exsist before space and time exsisted.

Space and time are the universe (befor and after the big bang), until atheism at least trys to answer 'why' it should not be credited as even a intelligent idea. In one sence, atheism is the opposite of science... "i just know god doesnt exsist, so why ponder exsistance? i should just focuse on my little life and dont think or argue or wonder why".

I know that my idea on relligion might be wrong, but any peacful religion is a better explaination than atheism, i perfer free-thought than close-mindedness.

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At 3/13/07 02:45 PM, Zoraxe7 wrote:

No, what you are saying is the laws of the universe, laws are unexplained and are the universe, instead of being in it. It is logical to assume that a "characteristic of spacetime" would not exsist before space and time exsisted.

I mostly agree with your last statement save for what it may be implying; Namely, that what ever existed before space time is fundamentally unknowable, that doesn't quite follow (I could of course be reading deeper into it then intended.). Now for your first statement, it's a non sequitur. There's no reason for a law to be unexplained, in fact many of the “laws” in physics do have descent explanations (see Maxwell's equations , as a good start). However, if by explanation you mean “why”, then this isn't necessarily a relevant question (Note, sometimes when people ask “why”, they really mean “how”. As the case of “why” doesn't concern a natural process.)

Space and time are the universe (befor and after the big bang), until atheism at least trys to answer 'why' it should not be credited as even a intelligent idea. In one sence, atheism is the opposite of science... "i just know god doesnt exsist, so why ponder exsistance? i should just focuse on my little life and dont think or argue or wonder why".

I know that my idea on relligion might be wrong, but any peacful religion is a better explaination than atheism, i perfer free-thought than close-mindedness.

What your referring to isn't atheism it self. Now it might be a small subset of atheist, but again it isn't atheism as a whole. Your making the assumption that an atheist just says there is no god, as if there was little to no though in the whole process. Well this simply isn't true, many atheist (my self included) have come to this conclusion after think long and hard about existence and the world around us. I just don't see a need for such a priori in the universe, nor would most fellow atheist. There is simply no evidence for the existence of a deity/deities, and I'm sorry, but the argument from design doesn't hold. Now given that it seams impossible to measure, observe, or even interact with a god (this follows from my previous statement, of no evidence), an atheist will deiced to simply remove the cumbersome god idea from the equations, and philosophies of our lives. This doesn't make us immoral or bad people, (except in the eyes of people who believe morality flows soley from god, which is it self a flawed argument), quite the opposite really. For in the end we have to justify our beliefs, as there is no single book which can give us our morals. We have to go out and consider the nature of our ethics, and morals in terms of reality and what we see. These are three of the more importan conclusions I've come up with, and are part of the back bone to my philosophy.
1: There is no one to forgive me for my transgressions, save for the one or many I have wronged. In the end I find my self trying to be a good person to keep the burden of “sin” from weighting my “soul” down.
2: Every principle I follow must be justifiable in a logical manner. None of the morals I have in life can simply be given, and they have to be well understood, otherwise how do I know what is right?
3: The world is not coated in Nerf. It has sharp edges and you will occasionally be bruised, scraped, cut, and some times worse. But this is part of how we learn, and part of what it means to be alive. With pain in life how do we know we are even alive? How are we to know we've done something wrong?
Now these are simply a few of the components to my philosophy, to go over all of them, and my derivations for them would take a while. Needless to say, an atheist can be a moral person whit out having there morals given to them.
Now as for close-mindedness, most atheist have a minimum need of evidence before they'll believe something. With out that minimum they'll usually push it off to the way side. This isn't being close-minded as to them there was nothing there to be close-minded about. Again statements in of them selfs are meaningless unless accompanied by a decent explanation. If you have a good line of reasoning an atheist will most likely hear you out, unless there in a hurry or you've pissed them off before :P.
As a final a side, many atheist get asked the same questions over, and over so they may ignore an argument if they've heard it before, and found little progress in talking with the speaker about it.

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At 3/13/07 02:00 PM, DrBrainTrust wrote: That's the main reason I have a problem with people just making blanket statements like"there is no God" and whatnot when we don't know exactly what God is to know it doesn't exist. It just seems kind of closed minded to assume that the very idea of any kind of thing that could be considered God is wrong.

Well, if we know what god "is" then musn't we believe in his existance? And if there is no god, then knowing what he is is impossible, by definition of nonexistance. We may not be able to know what god is but we can know what god isn't, through logic and axiomatic deductions.

At 3/13/07 02:45 PM, Zoraxe7 wrote: um.. you should look up Hinduism a bit more, Brahman (or how ever it is spelled) is what you need to know about.

Actually I have studied a lot about Hinduism, and find their idea of Brahman to be the most logical of all religions. As far as their ideas go, it's only the other details that hang me up... mainly reincarnation, but that's a completely different discussion, I think.
*coughmythreadcough*

No, what you are saying is the laws of the universe, laws are unexplained and are the universe, instead of being in it. It is logical to assume that a "characteristic of spacetime" would not exsist before space and time exsisted.

Who says there's a "before" spacetime? Is it necessary? Cannot spacetime itself be the acting force that brought about the matter and energy that is the universe? Pair creation already exists, so me know that something can come from nothing with no causal event... maybe our universe was just an abnormally big something.

At 3/13/07 05:09 PM, EndGameOmega wrote: Again statements in of them selfs are meaningless unless accompanied by a decent explanation. If you have a good line of reasoning an atheist will most likely hear you out, unless there in a hurry or you've pissed them off before :P.

>_>

<_<

*whistles innocently*

As a final a side, many atheist get asked the same questions over, and over so they may ignore an argument if they've heard it before, and found little progress in talking with the speaker about it.

This is very true. I've had to explain, for example, the omnipotence and free-will paradox probably a dozen times on this board alone, so when I get asked to do it again, I can become annoyed. And I can't just say "look at my post history", because telling someone to look through 800+ posts to find something they're reluctant to believe anyway is no better solution.

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At 3/13/07 05:09 PM, EndGameOmega wrote:

What your referring to isn't atheism it self. Now it might be a small subset of atheist, but again it isn't atheism as a whole. Your making the assumption that an atheist just says there is no god, as if there was little to no though in the whole process. Well this simply isn't true, many atheist (my self included) have come to this conclusion after think long and hard about existence and the world around us. I just don't see a need for such a priori in the universe, nor would most fellow atheist. There is simply no evidence for the existence of a deity/deities, and I'm sorry, but the argument from design doesn't hold. Now given that it seams impossible to measure, observe, or even interact with a god (this follows from my previous statement, of no evidence), an atheist will deiced to simply remove the cumbersome god idea from the equations, and philosophies of our lives.

If you are color blind and have never seen the color red, unless you have faith in someone you can never know that red even exsists, despite thinking long and hard about how red might look, unless you are convince red does not exsist there is nothing to prove to you otherwise.

:This doesn't make us immoral or bad people, (except in the eyes of people who believe morality flows soley from god, which is it self a flawed argument), quite the opposite really. For in the end we have to justify our beliefs, as there is no single book which can give us our morals. We have to go out and consider the nature of our ethics, and morals in terms of reality and what we see. These are three of the more importan conclusions I've come up with, and are part of the back bone to my philosophy.

I never said atheism makes people with bad morals. You never chose your morals, your shaped by the world you live in, a world that is heavily influence by religion, you are very much a creature of religion like me and even dre-man.

1: There is no one to forgive me for my transgressions, save for the one or many I have wronged. In the end I find my self trying to be a good person to keep the burden of “sin” from weighting my “soul” down.
2: Every principle I follow must be justifiable in a logical manner. None of the morals I have in life can simply be given, and they have to be well understood, otherwise how do I know what is right?

No one makes a change, the influences of the world do it to you, your mama, the TV, anything you might look up accidentaly on the internet, never yourself however.

3: The world is not coated in Nerf. It has sharp edges and you will occasionally be bruised, scraped, cut, and some times worse. But this is part of how we learn, and part of what it means to be alive. With pain in life how do we know we are even alive? How are we to know we've done something wrong?

Because your Mama taught you better.

Now these are simply a few of the components to my philosophy, to go over all of them, and my derivations for them would take a while. Needless to say, an atheist can be a moral person whit out having there morals given to them.

No one is moral without the morals given to them.

Now as for close-mindedness, most atheist have a minimum need of evidence before they'll believe something. With out that minimum they'll usually push it off to the way side. This isn't being close-minded as to them there was nothing there to be close-minded about.

in other words, you closed your mind to the idea

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At 3/14/07 10:20 AM, Zoraxe7 wrote: If you are color blind and have never seen the color red, unless you have faith in someone you can never know that red even exsists, despite thinking long and hard about how red might look, unless you are convince red does not exsist there is nothing to prove to you otherwise.

Wrong. Light comes in a spectrum, which is quantitized and measurable by machines. If someone can't see red, I can pull out a frequency spectrum and point to which light is seen by everyone else as "Red." He may never see the color as others do, but I can physically show to him what "red" is and exactly what properties it has.

I never said atheism makes people with bad morals. You never chose your morals, your shaped by the world you live in, a world that is heavily influence by religion, you are very much a creature of religion like me and even dre-man.

You make a lot of assumptions. Sure, environment does affect personal opinions, but it is the individual who chooses exactly what to believe. In the same environment, you and others decide to cling to the robes of Religion; he decided to reject it. Your morals rely on another's word, his are ones he chose to follow. The distinctions between individual choices are critically important.

No one makes a change, the influences of the world do it to you, your mama, the TV, anything you might look up accidentaly on the internet, never yourself however.

If you've ever spent a bit of time in internal reflection, you'd know how wrong you are. External influences and experiences can have an impact, but it is ultimately the individual who chooses what they want to believe or follow. It is entirely the self who decides.

Because your Mama taught you better.

Or she may not have. And let's not be sexist: fathers can teach just as well as mothers. But really, very few individuals follow the exact things taught by their parents, and often childen go in distinctly different directions.

No one is moral without the morals given to them.

You misunderstood his statement. He said you can still be moral without the morals being given to you-- i.e. from a God or other supreme moral deity. Someone can easily be extremely moral on their own grounds, and often these self-chosen morals are held much more strongly and followed more closely than the ones commanded by Religion.

in other words, you closed your mind to the idea

No, in the correct words, you have no case at all! You want someone to believe something that he has absolutely no reason to believe. It's like me describing a race of aliens who live 4 billion light years away, and then assuring you that they are totally real. Why should you believe me if I cant give the least bit of proof and my claim is illogical (how do I know about them)?

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I'm a christian but i think the bible cannot be taken literally,For example:Science has prooven that our smartness comes from a genetic failure on a monkey wich means that the first smart monkey was a inteligent retard,and with the brains on his side he could get all the monkey chicks and maybie the first two monkey babies that inhereted this genetic "gift" where Adam and Eve?

On to the big bang theory:Lets say there is no universe but just a whole lot of gasses floating around in space,now whats the odds of those gasses exploding and making a chain reaction and create the universe?Maybie something or someone gave it a little help?We will probably never find out,before we die that is.And if you want the full package with Jesus and Moses and all of that you can just check out some shows on explorer where they find stuff that actually happend in history in the same places wich can be taken as miracles(i'm not saying they werent i am saying they where and the history stuff prooves it) so thats my opnion,a little bit of both!

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At 3/14/07 10:45 AM, Draconias wrote:

Wrong. Light comes in a spectrum, which is quantitized and measurable by machines. If someone can't see red, I can pull out a frequency spectrum and point to which light is seen by everyone else as "Red." He may never see the color as others do, but I can physically show to him what "red" is and exactly what properties it has.

And he/she could not belive you, and what if every one was color blind in the future?

You make a lot of assumptions. Sure, environment does affect personal opinions, but it is the individual who chooses exactly what to believe. In the same environment, you and others decide to cling to the robes of Religion; he decided to reject it. Your morals rely on another's word, his are ones he chose to follow. The distinctions between individual choices are critically important.

The morals he choses to follow are his choice, as are yours and mine, relligion is besides the point. But the morals he choses to follow are because he was influnced to think that way, as is his favorite color, his favorite food, and his charicter, other wise people wont develope mentally, are you the same as you were when you were 10?

If you've ever spent a bit of time in internal reflection, you'd know how wrong you are. External influences and experiences can have an impact, but it is ultimately the individual who chooses what they want to believe or follow. It is entirely the self who decides.

Incorrect, or els pedophiles are the way they are because of them being evil, and not because they are sick and need help.

Or she may not have. And let's not be sexist: fathers can teach just as well as mothers. But really, very few individuals follow the exact things taught by their parents, and often childen go in distinctly different directions.

Well, mothers and fathers teach there kids in different ways, but i diddnt mean to be sexist i was just pointing out a big influence on people. People that dont have a mom or a dad more often than not become criminals.

You misunderstood his statement. He said you can still be moral without the morals being given to you-- i.e. from a God or other supreme moral deity. Someone can easily be extremely moral on their own grounds, and often these self-chosen morals are held much more strongly and followed more closely than the ones commanded by Religion.

Relligion is not the point, its the society, the parrents, the rolemodles, the freinds, the life experiences. So you shape your own life by your actions and actions done to you, and that allows you to decide your morals. Religion has influence the world, and your apart of it.

No, in the correct words, you have no case at all! You want someone to believe something that he has absolutely no reason to believe. It's like me describing a race of aliens who live 4 billion light years away, and then assuring you that they are totally real. Why should you believe me if I cant give the least bit of proof and my claim is illogical (how do I know about them)?

What color are these aliens?

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You make a lot of assumptions. Sure, environment does affect personal opinions, but it is the individual who chooses exactly what to believe.

Just one small clarification. The social situation and personality are said to only account for 33% of behavior alone, but it's the combination of them (interactionism) that truly defines the behavior. Stronger situations merit that the social sit will influence behavior stronger, while weaker situations merit that personality will act stronger. Then you can get into all sorts of things like willpower, authority, innate vs learned behaviors, conditioning, etc. Where Social Psych meets Personality Psych essentially.......

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Religion is toxic...

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mmmno. I think Hope and faith are to different things.

Faith is more like just believing in something completely unproven and showing a will to follow an ideal that may or may not come to fruition and hope is wishing and wanting something to come into fruition.

Slightly different, but a difference is there.

I think what we need now in this discussion is a clear set of definitions everyone can agree on.

So fo example, what warrants the term "proven" or "explained"?

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At 3/14/07 09:16 PM, Grammer wrote: Where the Hell did you just get that from? I just said I believe in free will, not predestination, you fucking retard

Dude, I QUOTED the passage. let's do it again, in case you missed it:

At 3/12/07 11:46 AM, Grammer wrote:
2.) ... If you were destined to go to Heaven, then you're going there.

Tard. Which is it? Are you destined, or do you choose?

Hope
1. the feeling that what is wanted can be had or that events will turn out for the best: to give up hope.
6. to look forward to with desire and reasonable confidence.

Faith
1. confidence or trust in a person or thing: faith in another's ability.
2. belief that is not based on proof:

Same. Damn Thing. Now shut up.

No. They're. Not. Now shut up. If the difference between thoswe two concepts isn't apparent to you, then you don't have the mental acuity to be worth debating. I've had the feeling you're only trolling anyway, so maybe you are hopeless after all.

*Definitions*... Where's the contradiction?

Do you agree that all of those can be used to describe god?

You can't, but God can :)

Actually I can.

tri·an·gle

n. 1. The plane figure formed by connecting three points not in a straight line by straight line segments; a three-sided polygon.

Now we take a spherical plane, give it an arbitrary "North" pole, and place one point on the pole. Place your second point on the "equator". Place your third point also on the equator, on the point that desribes a 90 degree arc. Connect the three points. Triangle. The angles are 90, 90 and 90 degrees, adding up to 270.

I guess that would make me god, now wouldn't it?

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You're even worse than the Christians who come to your door and tell you to repent or burn, because at least those people eventually go away.

I'm not debating you anymore, because:

Grammar, you need to check yourself. You post you aren't going to debate, and since then have made 4 more posts directed at Rav.

Frankly, this shit has gone on long enough. Both of you seem to have lost sight of whatever the fuck this feud started on.

Check your attitudes at the door and stop wasting forum space.

Neither of you are trolls, but you're both acting like morons in your own unique ways. Grammar, you've turned into the little shithead teenagers you like to debate against so much, keep it up and I'll present you the title of Dre-Man.

I double post for great emphasis.

You double posted to make yourself sound like a jackass. Mission Complete.

You're convinced that if I have any sort of faith or hope, I must therefore be illogical.

You're a moron if you actually believe that's Rav's take on things. A fuckin MORON! Now think about that for one goddamned second and you'd realize how much of an ASS you sound on here.

Rav, you fuckin KNOW better than to lower yourself to his standards, especially if he's gonna pull low punches. If he don't fuckin listen, then it's physically impossible to prove him wrong, and you know it too. Having the last word does NOT entail a victory in a debate. Having the BEST word does. The fuck are you wasting precious time on him for? You go to U of M, you know DAMN well that time can be better spent. At least go find some 15 year olds to torment, it'll solve the problem of venting on the forum and clean up their trash at the same time. Stop acting like a damn Spartan, you're a WOLVERINE, so STOP fueling the fire.

Three goddamn pages of bullshit no one wants to read, and probably shit even YOU TWO don't wanna read.....

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At 3/15/07 12:40 AM, Grammer wrote: Obviously if you choose God, then you're destined to go to Heaven.

But you said "If you were destined to go to heaven then you're going there", past-tense. Not "if you choose god you're going there", which is present tense. Now was this just poor phrasing, a freudian slip, or are you now trying to cover something up?

Regardless, do you believe that God knows which you will choose? This ties into the definitions.

Oh yeah, I'm trolling. I come here, say science and religion don't conflict, then you have a hissy fit because you want to make conflict, and I'm trolling. Tell me, since obviously I don't have the "mental acuity", explain to me how they're different.

Faith is belief without proof. Hope requires neither belief nor lack of proof to exist. If I am unsure of an answer on a test, I HOPE I got it right. However, I do not have faith that I did, because that would require me to believe I got it right. Hope is less deterministic than that. It does not require an affirmative belief. you can hope for something while not believing it will happen (i.e. lottery, being able to fly, etc etc). If I had faith I could fly, I would jump off a building... with only hope, I'm not about to test my luck.

Oh wait, they're not. And even if they were, you have still yet to prove faith is illogical, because we believe things w/o proof all the time.

And it is illogical to do so. I never said that meant it never happened.

Faith: Belief without proof.

Logic: convincing forcefulness; inexorable truth or persuasiveness: the irresistible logic of the facts.

Faith is not logical.

Fuck off.

Lol. Take some college-level physics, chemistry, anthropology, biology and logic courses before you go accusing me of not having a good enough grasp of science.

And just because you yell "NO YOU DIDN'T!" doesn't mean I haven't given a rock-solid argument as to why faith, and therefore God, is illogical. Denial doesn't make it go away.

It's always a good sign when people resort to such anger... it means I'm getting to you, that you're having a harder time arguing my ideas. Oh, I know you'll deny it, blame it on my own bullheadedness, and I don't really care if even YOU believe it. But heat of that sort is only found when one is forced to question their hard-and-fast beliefs. And if I've been able to get you to THINK, if not believe, then I've done my job.

Yes... what's your point?

My point is that all of those features make free will impossible. His atemporality means that OUR time is all one to him. If you'll allow me a metaphor since atemporality + temporality is decidedly tricky on the tenses:

Consider the universe as like a tapestry, with people's lives like the strands that make up the big picture. Past on one end, future on the other. We travel down our threads at the pace of our time. But God being all godly and stuff, he can see all of the tapestry, the past present AND future. He MUST see and know exactly how where and why people have done things, do things and will do things, because if he didn't, he would not be omniscient. And our "future" is irrelevant to him because his is eternal and atemporal.

Now, free will is a sticky thing... it requires a lack of determinism to exist. Determinism in physics is a tricky thing to get around... the Heisenberg uncertainty principle as well as the probabilistic nature of quantum mechanics gets around it a bit... but I digress. Determinism is the idea that with infinite information about the past, we can predict the future with zero error. It's basically a large-scale application of causality. Any omniscient god would REQUIRE (by definition, which you already gave me) infinite information, his atemporality would REQUIRE (by definition) his knowledge of our future, which would DETERMINE that future "before" it happened, rendering moot any "choice" because there was never any other way you COULD have gone.

I ask again, do you believe go to be omniscient and atemporal?

I ask again, do you believe god doesn't know which path you will choose?

I also DARE you to find a logical flaw in that argument.

I guess that would make me god, now wouldn't it?

No, you're just a dipshit who likes to create conflict and tell people they're wrong for having personal faith.

You said that only God could make a triangle's angles add up to more than 180 degrees. I did it, so therefore I must be God.

Now, if you had the "mental acuity" necessary for this discussion, you could have easily pointed out the flaw in my example instead of resorting to flames, ad-hominem attacks and blatant misrepresentation (straw-man) of my points. I had hoped for better, though my faith in you was rather limited.

Trolls are people who start conflict when there is none.

The only conflict between science and religion is when someone tries to justify, prove, or disprove one with the other.

Trolls are people who keep posting even after they've been proven wrong.

Seems I've done most of the proving here... all you've done is say "no it isn't" when I prove religion and faith are illogical... so who's the troll again?

And why does it upset you so much that faith is illogical? I have illogical faith in things. I believe things for which there is no proof, or even evidence. I realize that is illogical, but I do it anyway. I fail to understand your resistance to this idea. Or do you believe that only things that are logical are real?

Trolls are people who will force their opinion on you, and if you disagree then they're "illogical". You sir, are the troll, not I.

I'm not forcing anything. You could have ignored everything I said easily, simply not responded and left it at that. And if I felt the need to be free of your views, I could have done the same thing. However, having seen you post several times, I thought you might be able to challenge me, my ideas, make me think more deeply on what I hold to be true. Sadly you weren't. Dr.BrainTrust and EndGameOmega were able, with only a couple posts, to make me think more during our conversation than you have.

And with that, and Imperator's scolding, I'm out.

At 3/15/07 02:05 AM, Imperator wrote: Rav, you fuckin KNOW better than to lower yourself to his standards, especially if he's gonna pull low punches. If he don't fuckin listen, then it's physically impossible to prove him wrong, and you know it too.

You've got me there :/

I did allow myself to get dragged into a pointless argument. I've done this enough times that I should be better able to tell when debate is a lost cause.

At least go find some 15 year olds to torment, it'll solve the problem of venting on the forum and clean up their trash at the same time. Stop acting like a damn Spartan, you're a WOLVERINE, so STOP fueling the fire.

Fair enough. I've ended the chain I started with my definitions questions in this post. It's as good a place as any to end it.

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WOW, this thread neads a Dre-man in it so every one here wont flaim each other and focus on him 0.O

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Wasn Voltaire that french guy that was stabed in his bath?

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I haven't cared for you since you tried to break up the debate between me and that guy in the OBT, a while back.

Hold a grudge much? How mature of you, way to show your true colors though. Really brings out the point that you are an idiot.

(there is no "logic" courses in College)

http://www.lsa.umich.edu/cg/cg_detail.aspx?co ntent=1660PHIL180001&termArray=f_07_1660

Philosophy 180- Introductory Logic.

http://www.lsa.umich.edu/cg/cg_detail.aspx?co ntent=1660PHIL201001&termArray=f_07_1660

Phil 210: Introductory Logic.

http://www.lsa.umich.edu/cg/cg_detail.aspx?co ntent=1660PHIL296001&termArray=f_07_1660

Phil 296: Honors Intro to Logic

http://www.lsa.umich.edu/cg/cg_detail.aspx?co ntent=1660PHIL303001&termArray=f_07_1660

Phil 303- Intro to Symbolic Logic

http://www.lsa.umich.edu/cg/cg_detail.aspx?co ntent=1660PHIL414001&termArray=f_07_1660

Phil 404: Mathematical Logic

Suck a dick Grammer, you don't have the FIRST clue what you're talking about.
Your inability to see the underlying point of what Ravariel posts and frusterations about his "Ignorance" is making you look like a damned clown.

He thinks the concept of God is illogical and inherently flawed, and he is wrong. It is simple as that.

You're a friggin moron. The concept of God IS inherently flawed, and in many cases, completely illogical. So is drawing art. So is playing music, and so is this dumbass 5 year old style debate. Religion does not provide the end all necessities for life, and only in SPECIFIC situations provides Maslow's higher properties such as self-actualization. GOD! Get it through your THICK head that religion isn't perfect, it's a construct of MAN, and therefore inherently FLAWED.

learn to take your own beliefs with a grain of salt and grow the fuck up!

I don't care what you think, this forum is for debating, since you haven't been sitting here reading our posts (or so I assume), it's safe to say you don't have grounds to call me a moron, unless you have something specific to point out.

The past 2 pages are filled with almost ONLY you two going off on each other. You've completely scared away any semblance of intelligent conversation, and you're a MORON for doing so. The lack of diversity on this thread as of late is proof enough I'm not the only one who's grown sick and tired of this bullshit and stopped reading.

You whine about how you shouldn't debate in a Politics forum, as if we cared. Mission complete.

Oh yeah, there are no rules whatsoever in Politics debates. It's all no holds barred......
Laughable.....

You haven't been reading this thread, have you? No, I didn't think so. Who's the moron here?

YOU! The fact that you haven't been able to spot Rav's position and understand it in 3 pages of bullshit, whereas I knew what it was BEFORE this started is proof. Pull your head out of your ass.

What are my standards?

You chiefly argue against 9/11 conspirators for the easy win. Quick to resort to ad hominem attacks, easily irritable due to frusteration of others' "ignorance".......pretty LOW I'm guessing.....

If you don't wanna hear the debate, then don't read it. You probably haven't, so I suggest you whine somewhere else.

Reap what you sow and practice what you preach. Then maybe you'll have an actual POINT against me.

It seems you're hopeless...

Thinking with your MOUTH and closing your EARS is no way to go through life, let alone any way to enter a political debate. It's not whether you win or lose, it's how you play the game.

You play it like a fuckin spoiled brat who doesn't get his way. Get off your high horse and stop being a friggin close-minded idiot.

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People! People!

Stop it! no one has said anything so far to deserve such negative comments, altho i like a good flame war as the next, you are too intelligent to fight with each other like that, just appologize to each other and "be bigger men"

Your all being children.

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Science:
States that the universe was created by a cataclymistic event known as the "Big Bang".

Religion
Mentions that the world was created in 6 days by God.

Very conflicting don't you think?

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At 3/15/07 08:28 PM, Jimmy-jackass wrote: Very conflicting don't you think?

very over simplified, no?

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At 3/15/07 08:28 PM, Jimmy-jackass wrote: Science:
States that the universe was created by a cataclymistic event known as the "Big Bang".

Suggests, based on a theory. However, the actual nature of Science is competely independent of this matter and has to do with the pursuit of truth based on empirical evidence.

Religion
Mentions that the world was created in 6 days by God.

Christianity does. However, the factor which has made Religion so strong in the face of science is the practically unlimited number of variations of belief. Eliminative proof is impossible against that kind of ambiguity and variation, but elimination is the only way to disprove the existance of a deity. Hence "faith" and the inability of Science to beat it.

Very conflicting don't you think?

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At 3/15/07 08:08 PM, Zoraxe7 wrote: People! People!

Stop it! no one has said anything so far to deserve such negative comments, altho i like a good flame war as the next, you are too intelligent to fight with each other like that, just appologize to each other and "be bigger men"

Your all being children.

Hey, the fuck do you think I've been doing but quelling a flame war? Unfortunately, sometimes you have to fight fire with fire......

A little tough love was enough to get Rav to drop things, but not Grammer. I'm hoping a lot more tough love will be enough to get Grammer to drop it as well.

None of my comments were purely negative. I may have told him to suck a dick, but I explained why he should, moreover with ways of improving himself.

If he fails to realize that dropping the issue or changing the subject is also in HIS best interest as well, he deserves to get burned. Ravariel is not one of the typical 9/11 conspirators Grammer normally debates and to which he has become so accustomed. Grammer's usual tactics will simply NOT work, and he needs to stop bantering like "work as usual" if he ever hopes to pull anything out of the debate.

Ironically, this is a lot like the Peloponnesian War. Grammer (Sparta) thinks he can win against Anthens (Rav) by using what he's best at (hoplite warfare). Athens is planning on disappointing Grammer by making him fight HIS style of academic debate (naval warfare), a trait in which Grammer is probably so rusty on at this point from lack of practice that he has no hopes of winning. Hopefully the result of this will not be a 30+ year war resulting in the general decline of Greece as a whole......

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At 3/15/07 08:28 PM, Jimmy-jackass wrote:

Very conflicting don't you think?

Shut up Jackass!

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At 3/16/07 03:30 AM, Imperator wrote:

Ironically, this is a lot like the Peloponnesian War. Grammer (Sparta) thinks he can win against Anthens (Rav)

um... Imperator.... Sparta DID win the peloponnesian war, you need a better examply.

Sparta kicked thens Athens ass.

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At 3/15/07 08:28 PM, Jimmy-jackass wrote: Science:
States that the universe was created by a cataclymistic event known as the "Big Bang".

Religion
Mentions that the world was created in 6 days by God.

Very conflicting don't you think?

But there is a problem in this confliction. Scientists will always try to find evidence about the big bang. Religion does not. This is probably one of the main reasons why people are becoming less religious these days.

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At 3/16/07 05:47 AM, I-have-2-arms wrote:

But there is a problem in this confliction. Scientists will always try to find evidence about the big bang. Religion does not. This is probably one of the main reasons why people are becoming less religious these days.

People becoming more smart has nothing to do with people becoming less religious. Its just society today is obsesed with today and themselvs and money, the USA in paticular.

People are stupid.

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At 3/11/07 07:33 PM, CinergyStudios wrote: the problem is u evolutionist are believing in some big bang theory.. something u cant prove and that you only believe in by faith, in which u have created your own religion in it... and your saying those who believe in a God they cant prove are fools, where you have merely done the same thing.

...

Too easy.