Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Consider This About Jesus........

RM,

I can conceive of many things greater them myself. As an example, there is much in nature I could not compete with. Nature is neutral and will kill you ever chance it gets. Failing to respect nature is a good way to win a Darwin Award.

No.

Your response just demonstrates that you do not understand evolution.

So, you check resumes instead of investigating content. Again, no surprise.

But, there is Dawkins for all to see. He will not answer the question. Is it that he cannot?

Dawkins runs away from the question and starts mocking. I suppose that is all he can do. He has no intelligent answer so he gives none.

The guy is all hot air and poor rhetoric.

One of your heroes I suppose.

Same with hitchens. Read what Curtis says about him. but, you won't, you don't want facts and you can't stomach truth.

Dawkins is a lightweight and apparently afraid to answer the question "What if you are wrong?"

How about you AS?

What if you are wrong and Jesus is who he says he is? What happens?

I've already addressed this. Perhaps you did not like the answer, but it was addressed.

I'm not going to lie and pretend to believe in a god for which I see no evidence in hope that he will be too stupid to know I'm just pretending to get into heaven. I'd much rather face my judge with my principles and dignity intact.

Heck, maybe that was the right answer all along. All you have is human texts claiming to be the word of God. Copies, of copies, of copies of reactions, and in some cases out and out forgeries. Inconsistent, contradictory claims not supported by any independent sources.

"What you were really so naive that you believed, or were pretending to believe? HA! Wrong answer, off to Hell with you.

No.

If there is a judgement day (which I doubt), I choose not to attend as the either the fool, not the liar.

Sorry TF.

I was too busy shooting with my daughter this afternoon to answer.

He's forgiven?



Dave

This^^^. And, its simple to see.

Unfortunately, the Darwin award will go to those who reject the Word.

AS, you purposfully reject seeing the fulfillment of Gods prophecy. You spend your efforts not in being open minded, but to find your feeble excuses to not be rejoicing to see the path to everlasting life.

Yes, you should rejoice, but you prefer death, and that your spirit perish to forgiveness and everlasting life.

Rather telling, about your mental condition. You care nothing, about your spirit, or do you profess to not have one?

You gave the answer I expected.

You see it's effects, but..... can you duplicate it in a laboratory?

Can you find its source?

And.... as usual, you ignore the basic claim I made which is that science cannot lead you to Atheism.

So all your appeals to science brand you as a phony.

You CHOSE Atheism.

Can you tell us why?

It's not about what I prefer, it's about what is.

It would be my preference to have a billion dollars in my personal brokerage account and go shooting tomorrow.

I don't, so I'll go to work instead.

If I were to act as if I had a billion in the bank and not go to work, that would have some bad consequences.

You can pretend all you want. It won't change the facts now, nor when you are dead.

As I've explained before. I reject your theistic claims because it is not supported with evidence.

You are also an atheist toward a thousand god. I'm just an atheist toward 1000 +1.... or +3 depending on your position on the Trinity.

But I'm also an aleprechaunist, an aunicornist, abigfootist, aNessyist, adragonist, and amermaidist, all for the same reason, a lack of evidence for their existence.

Guess you missed my earlier post regarding why people with high IQ's have no need for the proposition either. To save you the trouble of looking, I'll repost it for you:

The final explanation is that intelligence provides whatever functions religion does for believers. There are four such functions as proposed by Zuckerman, Silberman, and Hall.

First, religion provides people a sense of control. This was demonstrated in a series of studies conducted between 2008 and 2010, which showed that threatening volunteers’ sense of personal control increased their belief in God. This may be because people believe that God makes the world more predictable and thus less threatening. Much like believing in God, higher intelligence has been shown to grant people more “self-efficacy,” which is the belief in one’s ability to achieve goals. So, if intelligent people have more control, then perhaps they don’t need religion in the same way that others do.

Second, religion provides self-regulation. In a 2009 study, it was shown that religion was associated with better well-being. This was interpreted as an indication that religious people were more disciplined in pursuing goals and deferring small rewards for large ones. Separately, a 2008 meta-analysis noted that intelligent people were less impulsive. Delayed gratification may require better working memory, which intelligent people have. So, just like before, intelligence is acting as a substitute for religion, helping people delay gratification without needing divine interventions.

Third, religion provides self-enhancement. A 1997 meta-analysis compared the intrinsically religious, who privately believe in the supernatural, to the extrinsically religious, where people are merely part of a religious group without believing in God. The intrinsically religious felt better about themselves than the general public. Similarly, intelligent people have been shown to have a sense of higher self-worth. Again, intelligence may be providing something that religion does.

Last, and possibly the most intriguing, is that religion provides attachment. Religious people often claim to have a personal relationship with God. They use God as an “anchor” when faced with the loss of a loved one or a broken relationship. Turns out intelligent people find their “anchor” in people by building relationships. Studies have found that those who score highly on measures of intelligence are more likely to be married and less likely to get divorced. Thus, intelligent people have less need to seek religion as a substitute for companionship.

Reasonable question. Would he be forgiven by a God he does not believe in? Forgiven by a God he mocked, presumably for most if not all of his life?

I do not know AS status with Jesus nor do I know what his status might be at his death.

Heck, all I know about him is his internet persona.

Time will tell.

I should probably stay out of this.....but WTH, I got nothing else to do right now!

To my mind, the argument of irreducible complexity holds some merit. I was doing some spring cleaning in the shop today and was doing some thinking on this topic. I was thinking about archaeology and the discovery of lost cities and the like. Some of these sights are completely lost to history, we don't know who built them, only a rough idea of when and no idea why. Still, we can say with certainty that they were built by an intelligent species, presumably humans. Why can we be certain of that? Because they are put together and engineered in a way that we know cannot happen by accident. No one could argue with any credibility that these massive structures are the result of random chance, shaped by wind and water. Humans, animals, the earth and the entire universe are impossibly more complex than even the most impressive structure, so I find it highly improbable that there was no intelligence driving it.

The second point that I don't see discussed often is WHY? Even if we know HOW, the more important question is why. Even if evolution is totally correct, the question of why remains. Why should life have begun at all? Suppose it happened by accident, why did it then continue to evolve? Why would a simple single cell be dissatisfied with its current state and evolve into something else? The standard answer is that life evolves to better suit its environment and to better propagate its species. Fine, but why? Why should it want to do any of that? Why should any living creature care that another takes its place and carries on the species? Something must be driving it to do so, or else it would simply live out its life as best it could and die. I say this about the most basic of life forms, which really can't be said to possess the ability to think and reason, but when you begin to look at humans it becomes even more absurd.

Why do humans have things like emotions, wants and desires? Why do we crave fun and excitement? It doesn't make any logical sense at all, from a strictly scientific point of view. If we are simply a highly evolves species who's only real function is to propagate, then evolution did a piss poor job. All those extra abilities and functions we have are our undoing. Wanting to have fun kills us. It makes us do things that distract us from the task at hand, namely making babies. It would make far more sense for us to be like insects, for example ants or bee's. We would be born, grow quickly to maturity and immediately begin to breed. When not breeding we would work cooperatively as much as humanly possible to build our colonies and collect food for our young. That would make sense, from an evolutionary standpoint, if there is no intelligence that has programmed us, for lack of a better term, to act differently. In a sense we are like a cnc machine, we can do all sorts of cool stuff but if there is no data input, nothing comes out. Who programmed our DNA to act in ways that are not only unnecessary but potentially harmful to us? Obviously it is these very traits that make our lives as humans interesting and enjoyable, but who cares?

So, if we can see that in order or complex structures to be built and intricate parts to be machined, there must be an intelligent force at the controls, why does the same not apply to the universe?

I think a big part of the God problem comes from the limitations of our human mind. For example, try to think of a color you've never seen, something completely different than anything you've seen before. No matter how hard you try, you just end up mixing colors you already know into something that looks like something you've already seen. The same problem crops up when we try to think of a higher intelligence. Since humans are the highest form of intelligence that we know(SOME humans...) we have a really hard time trying to imagine what something vastly more intelligent might look like. We invariably end up with some sort of super human, bigger,smarter and with super powers, but still somehow human-ish. For a lot of people, that just seems absurd, and I agree. We try to explain that God must be an infinite being, not bound by the laws of the universe as we know them, not tied to a physical body etc but somehow that image of the big guy in the sky still creeps back in. Most people can't hope to follow the work of the best astrophysicist or understand string theory, myself included. Even those who can, and are at the top of their field, are constantly searching for answers and solutions to things that they still don't understand. Seems to me that if such a "God" being exists,and did indeed egineer all that is, the chances of us being able to wrap our heads around it and understand it completely are pretty small.

I also know that no matter how hard I try, I can never be completely objective or unbiased in my beliefs and views. Things that we are taught and believe as children are incredibly powerful, and many otherwise intelligent people can believe in utter nonsense, because questioning those beliefs is incredibly uncomfortable. Humans do not enjoy discomfort, and most will do anything they can to avoid it. Physical discomfort is easier to handle than what I guess you could call intellectual discomfort. With physical discomfort, we know what the problem is and generally have some idea of when it will end or how to bring it to an end. When faced with the discomfort of not knowing what to believe, or fearing that what you believe may be wrong, many people will rather grasp onto something that they find comfort in than to continue farther down rabbit hole, not knowing what they'll find or if they should believe it when they find it. When you add in the idea of an immortal soul, and the potential eternal torment of said soul, it becomes overwhelming for many. The easiest solution is to either find enough evidence, that you personally find believable, that no higher intelligence than the human exists, or that it does exist and you are in its good graces and will be taken care of.

If I had to bet, I would put my money on everyone being wrong. I don't think anyone has it all figured out, or understand a fraction of whats really out there. I have my beliefs, and I'm pretty sure many of them are wrong. I hope I can get a lot more answers before its all over.

No, it won't be anything like you describe. Your dignity and pride would not be intact.

And you know this how?

Good post. Evidence of both wisdom and clear thinking.

Trying to argue another person's beliefs are wrong is an exercise in futility. Everyone's personal experience is different and their exposure levels differ. The Science vs. Religion debate will continue forever and will never be decided completely. Beliefs like feelings are individual and arguing it with one of a different belief or feeling is pointless. Discussing points of personal experience may help a person of a different view point to see what you see or believe in. Both religious and scientific views can be swayed to make a point in that individuals interest. I choose to believe in certain things that many would find crazy. In fact I believe in things now that 25 years ago I would have never excepted.

Same way you know there is no evidence for the existence of God? Looking at the same data as you but coming up with a different conclusion.

He's probably an a-hole.

But a forgiven a-hole.

Unless it's post rapture.

Then he's a fugked a-hole.

Tough being an a-hole. Unless you're a curdog type a-hole. Then you're good to go.

Sometimes.




Dave

I had to google.

All of them.





Dave

Just be careful what links you click on. The mermaid believers are really wacked out.