GOD EXISTS

Hutch wrote:...PeterZ and Mad-4A are coming from Faith, an unshakeable ...belief that what they have learned is the Truth and that Truth brings order and serenity to their lives (under the benevolent gaze of God)...

Actually I have viewed the other religions including Atheism with scrutiny and have rejected them all. Some for reasons previously described, Atheism because it goes against the law of conservation of energy & information. If true, it means that when I die, all the information of myself, my memories (& personality), & the energy of my sentience just go poof, I'm gone, cease to exist, so where did I go? The energy just stops existing, I don't think so! At-least the Buddhist and Shintos think it goes somewhere.

Hutch wrote:...It is only when I'm told this is a "Christian" nation, or that imposing religious beliefs (Creationism in Science class, distributing Bibles in public schools) is to be accepted that I put on the brakes and start growling.

It is a Christian Country, founded by Christians, built by Christians & expanded & made great by Christians. And now falling apart as non-Christians force there way into control. Even the very Document which made us an independent nation cites God for it's existence

God entitle them...The Declaration of Independence:

This is why...

peke wrote:...in the US, "atheist" was a terrible brand to bear, and most people would avoid it like the plague, even if they considered themselves atheists.
Help me here. Why is atheism treated so?...

You probably don't even remember the Blue-Laws. Even up through the '70 there were Christian Laws, known as the Blue Laws, that prevented anyone from being allowed to work on Sunday. Saturday was a big shopping day because you couldn't even go to the store (no-one could work at the store so the stores weren't open) you had to make sure you had everything you needed for Sunday, on Saturday. We are however a Nation built on freedom & rights of the individual (a Christian concept - not any other religion is so accepting - in India they through you in jail for eating a Hamburger!) These other religious groups (especially Atheists) have since been forcing their beliefs on this country. In particular the falsehood (which gets me growling) of so-called "separation of Church and state " which appears NOWHERE in the Constitution. The law is that the Government can create no laws RESTRICTING religious practice. A law which has been repeatedly violated over the last few decades (by Atheist forcing their religion on everyone else). The main reason there are few Atheists who chime in here is that Atheism is a religion of Lack-of-faith Most (didn't say all) people who become Atheists are those who have a complete lack of faith in anything, so Atheism is a simple religion that requires no faith at-all. If you wan't to test this, I suggest going down to your nearest Army or Marine recruiter & joining up as infantry or SpecForce with a requirement put in your contract that you will be sent to Afghanistan an put in direct combat. There is an old Army saying which ALWAYS holds true: "There's no such thing as an Atheist in a foxhole" The military will teach you faith.

peke wrote:...And for the record, Darwin is in my top-ten list.

You are aware that Charles Darwin was a devoted Christian and his theories were (by his admission) am attempt to explain how God created the world.
BTW speaking of Atheists & Faith, I sent a challenge to David Silverman, the head of your religion. He completely lacked the faith in his own belief to take me up on it, or even reply. Do you? I'll offer you the same challenge, if you think you have the faith in your belief to accept.

MAD-4A wrote:

Hutch wrote:...PeterZ and Mad-4A are coming from Faith, an unshakeable ...belief that what they have learned is the Truth and that Truth brings order and serenity to their lives (under the benevolent gaze of God)...

Actually I have viewed the other religions including Atheism with scrutiny and have rejected them all. Some for reasons previously described, Atheism because it goes against the law of conservation of energy & information. If true, it means that when I die, all the information of myself, my memories (& personality), & the energy of my sentience just go poof, I'm gone, cease to exist, so where did I go? The energy just stops existing, I don't think so!

Oh good grief...


1. There is no such thing as the law of conservation of information. It is something the creationist William Dembski simply made up.

2. No, the law of conservation of energy is not violated by atheism... unless I missed the part of atheism that says that when you die all your constituent atoms are obliterated from the universe.

Death is not a violation of the conservation of energy. It is simply a state transition from your brain and organs functioning to them not functioning.

I know religious types have great difficulty facing their mortality, but making things up about dying being a violation of the laws of physics is taking denial to an extreme.

BTW speaking of Atheists & Faith, I sent a challenge to David Silverman, the head of your religion. He completely lacked the faith in his own belief to take me up on it, or even reply. Do you? I'll offer you the same challenge, if you think you have the faith in your belief to accept.

Well, my position requires no faith, atheism is not a religion, and David Silverman is certainly not the head of it... but ooh! Me! Me!

gcomeau wrote:...Who... being as or more powerful than God... cannot be stopped by God?

Of-course not - no more than you can't be, or a serial killer can't be - Yes God could have come down in the middle of the night and smacked Jeffery Dahmer with a lighting bolt, but that would interfere with free-will, God has given us free will to chose, he gave Lucifer Free-will & Lucifer decided to use that free-will to try to disrupt Gods work. For God to stop him would not only interfere with his free-will but yours as-well. This is all about choosing God, not because you fear "burning forever" but because you want to. You can't do that if there is no competition to chose from. (To very-simplify things) what kind of car do you like? lets say Ford for argument (easy to type - sub your own) before Ford won an anti-trust lawsuit a small group controlled all car manufacture. If Ford had been given exclusive right to make cars on the entire planet the Ford would be the ONLY car available. would you like them then, you'd buy them cause you have no choice but you wouldn't like them, you would want a choice. With lots of cars to chose from you can chose which one you want. Doesn't mean it's the right one (as anyone whose bought a lemon will tell you). God wants you to have a choice and to chose him because you could chose not to.

MAD-4A wrote:

gcomeau wrote:...Who... being as or more powerful than God... cannot be stopped by God?

Of-course not - no more than you can't be, or a serial killer can't be - Yes God could have come down in the middle of the night and smacked Jeffery Dahmer with a lighting bolt, but that would interfere with free-will, God has given us free will to chose, he gave Lucifer Free-will & Lucifer decided to use that free-will to try to disrupt Gods work.

So the Devil is free to do *absolutely anything he wants* without any interference whatsoever from God because God won't violate Lucifer's free will? Is that what you're telling me?


God has given Lucifer free reign over the earth, and humans are left to fend for themselves against an evil magical super being God created but now will not step in and stop?

Want to think the implications of that through for a bit?

gcomeau wrote:
Actually we don't know that. There are competing models that disagree on that and the test data is still inconclusive on which are right.


So once again the honest thing to do here is say "we don't know yet"... not make up magical fairy tale explanations to fill in the gaps. The God of the Gaps always gets diminished with every gap filled by science. And this one will get filled eventually too. And then you'll have to find some other things science hasn't gotten around to explaining yet and declare "Aha! That's because God!"

Sorry, but a deep part of me views the lack of commitment you describe as cowardly. Science cannot describe a situation where is has no referents to use to predict anything. Whatever is used to describe the primal cause, it cannot be science. It might be logic, philosophy, or even theology, but not science for science asserts there was nothing before the Big Bang. So science predicts that nothing caused the Big Bang, but something did act as that primal cause.

That answer is unavoidable. So to say I (this poster)don't know and I (this poster) would prefer to avoid the question of whatever my responsibilities might be to creation and the life that surrounds me is an act of cowardice. I don't mean to say that others should feel this way or that I view others as cowards if they don't view this as I do. I do assert that I Do feel this way.

PeterZ wrote:

gcomeau wrote:
Actually we don't know that. There are competing models that disagree on that and the test data is still inconclusive on which are right.


So once again the honest thing to do here is say "we don't know yet"... not make up magical fairy tale explanations to fill in the gaps. The God of the Gaps always gets diminished with every gap filled by science. And this one will get filled eventually too. And then you'll have to find some other things science hasn't gotten around to explaining yet and declare "Aha! That's because God!"

Sorry, but a deep part of me views the lack of commitment you describe as cowardly. Science cannot describe a situation where is has no referents to use to predict anything. Whatever is used to describe the primal cause, it cannot be science. It might be logic, philosophy, or even theology, but not science for science asserts there was nothing before the Big Bang.

So we're just going to ignore where I just told you that no, science does not say there was nothing before the Big Bang.... that science has competing models that differ over whether there was a "before" the Big Bang or not, and that those models are still under testing to try to figure out which are right?

That testing is still underway. it will likely be underway for a very long time indeed. In the meantime saying "we don't know" about what, if anything, preceded the Big Bang is not a lack of commitment. It is honesty.


(And it has nothing whatsoever to do with whether or not I have any responsibilities in life. I determine that, it is not determined by whether there was a magic superbeing at the beginning of time or not)

gcomeau wrote:
So we're just going to ignore where I just told you that no, science does not say there was nothing before the Big Bang.... that science has competing models that differ over whether there was a "before" the Big Bang or not, and that those models are still under testing to try to figure out which are right?

That testing is still underway. it will likely be underway for a very long time indeed. In the meantime saying "we don't know" about what, if anything, preceded the Big Bang is not a lack of commitment. It is honesty.

Do tell. What assumptions does this line of inquiry entail? Do you have a brief description about what those various models look like? Am I to take your word for it that these models exist and their insight into an area that even Steven Hawking asserts that neither time and space exist? Not just that, since time and space does not exit, then he postulates that nothing could act/change in this period, including God.

I don't ignore your points, I am politely waiting for you to describe what alternatives there might be. What other scientific models are there about the primal cause and what do they predict? You have done nothing but claim they exist. Fine, bring them forth that we may discuss them.

gcomeau wrote:...

completely wrong...

gcomeau wrote:2. No, the law of conservation of energy is not violated by atheism... unless I missed the part of atheism that says that when you die all your constituent atoms are obliterated from the universe.

Not your atoms, your sentience - your self-awareness - that is a different energy than anything else, it cannot be defined by the inert energies so-far defined by physics (& don't try to claim otherwise) it supposedly just "ceases to exist" when you die.

gcomeau wrote:Atheism is not a religion

Completely Wrong

Religion:
1.a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe...
2. a specific fundamental set of beliefs and practices generally agreed upon by a number of persons or sects:
3.the body of persons adhering to a particular set of beliefs and practices:
6.something one believes in and follows devotedly

Atheism:
the doctrine or belief that there is no God.
(dictionary.reference.com/)

Atheism is the Religion that there is no afterlife or God. that is by definition YOUR RELIGION even if that belief is that there is none.

gcomeau wrote:David Silverman is certainly not the head of it...

Well, don't know what country your in, but if you'r American, then he's your Pope:

The Board of Directors of American Atheist
President: David Silverman
Atheists.org

The biggest problem with religion is not God but the people running the religion, It is always the human corruption that induces into the religion that then corrupts it. The thing about Atheism is that it is a religion completely devoid of God. It was made by men for men and run by men, so it is the worst of all religions in that it is corrupted by men from the start and threw-out.

gcomeau wrote:

peke wrote:I've read the entire thread from the beginning. Seen agnostics, respectful believers, a single (in my opinion) zealot, the works. But I've not seen a single outspoken atheist.

I read somewhere that in the US, "atheist" was a terrible brand to bear, and most people would avoid it like the plague, even if they considered themselves atheists.

Well now. I'm an atheist myself. Made the choice when I was about 13.

Help me here. Why is atheism treated so? Why is my choice to be and atheist so horrifying to some people? I simply don't get it.

One entirely plausible reason:

http://www.psmag.com/health-and-behavio ... -believers

Read the thing. Methodologically, it's got holes big enough to fly a battlecruiser through.

Sideways.

Let's begin.

Experiment one goes as follows:
1 - Pick a population of subjects. (236 subjects)
2 - Remove the atheist component. (34 subjects. 202 remaining)
3 - Divide the population in two halves. Each group is asked to answer a different question, or set of questions.
4 - Finally, ask all subjects to compare atheists and quakers in a scale of personal liking.

Okay, now for the holes.

Step 1. The composition of the population is snafu. Two-thirds Christian majority, with the remainder being Muslims, Buddhists and Jews. High homogeneity is needed when studying a particular group, and high heterogeneity is needed when making a broad population study. This composition is neither.

Step 2. Removing the atheist component is plain good sense, as they represent an almost certainly biased segment of the population. The problem, however is the assumption that the remaining population is unbiased. It's certainly not. Or are you going to argue that Christians have no bias against atheism?

Step 4. You're asking people to compare how much they like two different groups. These people have a supposedly neutral attitude regarding one group, and a certainly active bias regarding the other. Seriously, do you actually think you could gleam any meaningful information from that? Given the inherent population bias, this result is preordained.


My conclusions of this experiment are as follows:

Step 3 involved two tests, one for each half of the group. One test was to "describe the emotions that that the thought of your own death arouses in you". The other test was responding to "parallel questions regarding thoughts of extreme pain". We'll come back to these in a moment.

If there was no inherent group bias, then these questions would actually separate the two groups, and the differences in final results would be meaningful. But there is bias, and therefore the whole thing is bogus.

This experiment aims to find whether atheism "challenges fundamental defense mechanisms that protect people from fear of death." As it stands, however, all this "experiment" does is tie the elements "emotions regarding death" and "thoughts of extreme pain" to atheism, in the minds of whoever reads this piece without going deeper.



Okay, now for experiment 2. It goes like this.
1 - Pick a population of subjects. (174 subjects)
2 - Divide them in three groups. (One-third and two-thirds)
3 - Ask each group to perform a different task.
4 - Put both groups to a single task.

The aim is to find out how the task in step 3 could affect the results of the task in step 4.

Now for the holes.

Step 1. Since nothing is said about it, I'll assume that their choosing criteria is roughly equal to the criteria used in experiment 1. Therefore, I assume it to have the same flaws. (This is a tentative hole, but I think it holds water)

The real hole requires some explaining. The third test requires the two-thirds group to, randomly, describe the emotions arousing from thoughts of their death, or from thoughts of extreme pain (same as experiment 1). The other group was asked to write down, specifically, what atheism meant to them.

Finally, the were all asked to perform a task (completing words) that would presumably give information about how much their thought process had been slanted towards "deathly thoughts" by the previous task.

The article isn't very clear, so I'm going to assume three groups of roughly equal size. One for the question "emotions arousing from thoughts of their death", one for the question "thoughts of extreme pain" and one for the question "what atheism meant to them". Classic three group test.

The problem is bias. Again. Since I assume that the population is, again, majorly Christians, the people tasked with writing their feelings on atheism were certainly NOT having warm and fuzzy thoughts while doing this task. Atheism is something that contradicts - negates - every part of their belief structure. And a very large part of that belief structure is death, and the promise of an afterlife. So it's not stupid, but actually very likely, that writing about atheism elicits thoughts of unease about death. The point, thought, is that it's not atheism per se causing morbid thoughts, but rather, those thoughts come from the way atheism contradicts their beliefs about death. This, while not a conclusive hole, is certainly more that enough to cast doubt on the whole experiment.


All in all, I consider this article to be a waste of some perfectly good megabytes in a server somewhere.

at bottom. - htm

gcomeau wrote:
So the Devil is free to do *absolutely anything he wants* without any interference whatsoever from God because God won't violate Lucifer's free will? Is that what you're telling me?


God has given Lucifer free reign over the earth, and humans are left to fend for themselves against an evil magical super being God created but now will not step in and stop?

Want to think the implications of that through for a bit?

Gnosticsm. (sic)
(What an excellent place for a 'sic'!)
The implications of that idea have been thought
through for 18 centuries. The religion that they lead
to is called "Gnosticsm."
It is considered a Heresy by Christians, Moslems,
and Jews.
HTM