Religion Thread of Reference

[ManagerJosh]

This thread is just to archive posts on discussion of religon. Please post in the thread entitled "religon"

[ManagerJosh]

Who says there is anything beyond this life? And another thing: why does it matter, anyway? It seems to me that the life I am certain about is the one I should be concerned with. - Dagny_taggart

[ManagerJosh]

Such short view on the earth....don't you care that your soul will be tormented for the rest of your life?

[ManagerJosh]

Who says I'll lose? Maybe it's time for the sheep to rebel against the shepherd(read the lyrics of "Sheep" by Pink Floyd). - Dagny_taggart

[ManagerJosh]

Your soul will still be tormented. Read the Bible...particularly in Revlations.

[ManagerJosh]

The important thing is that I know what I believe is right and what religion is trying to force down people's throats is wrong. What is man's evolutionary adaptation to survive? Is it sharp, pointy teeth? No! Is it pointy claws? No! Is is extreme speed? No! Man's means of survival is not physical force! Man's means of survival is a rational mind. We have no natural instincts; man must learn everything based on what he observes. And religion is asking that man negate his reason and accept things on faith. Do you ever wonder why the most devout religious people are always struggling to survive? It is because the code declares that man must bleed himself to death for the sake of others! Slowly committing suicide is not an act of virtue in my book--living for yourself is! If there is a God (I'm not saying that there is), I would still proclaim to his face that I know I am right--I am not afraid of what could be inflicted upon me (of course this is based on the irrational assumption that there is a God).

Another question to ask, why is it that a truely superior being would be so petulant about whether or not he receives praise from his inferiors? It seems to me that man has never come up with a God that is superior to man in any of the religions in the world. All of these Gods seem "to have the manners and moral of a spoiled child" as Robert A. Heinlein said in Time Enough for Love.

Yet another question: how do you know God exists? - Dagny Taggart

[ManagerJosh]

I think your breaking rule 10<.>,it says were kid-frendly!youre saying tomorrow kids should quote you and say "I dont want to go to church!its just c***!" - SlimSim

[ManagerJosh]

Originally posted by dagny_taggart
Yet another question: how do you know God exists?

it says in the bible that adam and eve both saw god - SlimSim

[ManagerJosh]

First off, who wrote the Bible (I'm talking about the human being who wrote it down, not "God")? I never heard that Adam and Eve wrote any part of it, so therefore there is no primary source, Q.E.D. your statement proves nothing.

And I will add that what I am saying is kid-friendly: I did not use any profanity in my statement, and I am not saying to go harm other people or their property (as a matter of fact, I am completely against the initiation of physical force against another person, but I'm fine with self-defence, as long it is of an appropriate magnitude)--I am simply practicing my First Amendment rights in expressing my opinion of religion (would you be as vehement to shut up a Muslim, Jew, Hindu, Buddhist, or any other religious group if they said something in opposition to Christianity as you are to shut up this atheist?). The day it becomes wrong for me to express my opinion of religion is the day that this beautiful country has lost sight of the principles that it was founded upon. I am an American, and I have a right to express my opinion of religion! - dagny_taggart

[ManagerJosh]

Religeon is a bad topic to debate/discuss in my opinion. People take things a lot more personally when on this subject than others. They get really defensive, and we all know that we aren't going to change anyone's opinion by what we post (or at least, I don't think so). Religeon threads usually don't outcome in anything but hard feelings, from what I have seen for the past few years on message boards (not that all take it to heart, or get truly offended). - TylarRose

[ManagerJosh]

I still say that what I am saying is kid-friendly, slimsim, and I might remind you that I am a moderator--I do have some idea of what is appropriate and what is not. The general rule of thumb on the internet is, if they don't explicitly prohibit talk about certain views of religion in the rules, it's considered acceptable (as I said, I'm not asking anyone to cause harm to anyone). In my opinion, talking religion is on the same level with talking politics. - Dagny_taggart

[ManagerJosh]

Originally posted by dagny_taggart
The important thing is that I know what I believe is right and what religion is trying to force down people's throats is wrong.


That is only in some cases. But in this case, I will represent Christianity.

Christianity does NOT force religon down your throat Dagny. It is free will and of free choice that you choose to accept god or not. We do send out missionairies out into the world to change people, and you may call that forcing it upon people HOWEVER, in the very end, we ask whether a person wants to accept Christ or not, in which a person says yes or no.

Yes Or No, that is a decision there, and one of free will


Originally posted by dagny_taggart
What is man's evolutionary adaptation to survive? Is it sharp, pointy teeth? No! Is it pointy claws? No! Is is extreme speed? No! Man's means of survival is not physical force! Man's means of survival is a rational mind. We have no natural instincts; man must learn everything based on what he observes.


Little Known Facts...
Darwin, upon his death bed admitted that his theory of evolution was wrong... though people tend to neglect that fact
As for rational mind, some people aren't rational, eg the people who went on a muck on September 11, 2001.


Originally posted by dagny_taggart
And religion is asking that man negate his reason and accept things on faith. Do you ever wonder why the most devout religious people are always struggling to survive? It is because the code declares that man must bleed himself to death for the sake of others! Slowly committing suicide is not an act of virtue in my book--living for yourself is! If there is a God (I'm not saying that there is), I would still proclaim to his face that I know I am right--I am not afraid of what could be inflicted upon me (of course this is based on the irrational assumption that there is a God).


Technically that is a stereotype Dagny. I am a Christian, and yet I don't struggle on issues such as morality. Of course I am human, and I also mess up. But God is always there to pick me up when I mess up. He shows unconditional love to me and no matter how many times I disregard him, or hurt him, he still loves me and loves me for who I am, even if I'm not perfect.

He loves us so much that He sent his own son down to earth so that we may not perish, but have eternal life. (John 3:16)


Originally posted by dagny_taggart
Another question to ask, why is it that a truely superior being would be so petulant about whether or not he receives praise from his inferiors? It seems to me that man has never come up with a God that is superior to man in any of the religions in the world. All of these Gods seem "to have the manners and moral of a spoiled child" as Robert A. Heinlein said in Time Enough for Love.


As I stated before, God loves us so much that he sent his only son down to earth to die for our sins. ROber A. Heinlein does not have a valid point because if God was selfish and has a manners of a spoiled child, he would not have sent his son down to die for our sins in the first place.


Originally posted by dagny_taggart
Yet another question: how do you know God exist?


Let me ask you this question:

The Air we breathe, and the Wind....We do not see, yet we know it exists.



Originally posted by dagny_taggart
First off, who wrote the Bible (I'm talking about the human being who wrote it down, not "God")? I never heard that Adam and Eve wrote any part of it, so therefore there is no primary source, Q.E.D. your statement proves nothing.


God wrote through man, Dagny. In the early parts of the bible, it was written by Moses (Genesis, Exodus, Levticus, Numbers, and Deuteronmy). It was Man Who was Inspired By God who wrote the bible.

And before you ask, "how can you prove the bible is accurate," I'll tell you this. God is all powerful. He would have known that man would have made errors in the writing, however he would have accounted for it God inspired man at the same time to avoid those errors and at the same time, incorporated those errors into the bible and it would have conveyed the exact meaning God wanted in the first place.

So in short, if you think man could have made an error, God has already accounted for it and made sure that it wouldn't be there in the first place.


Originally posted by dagny_taggart
I am simply practicing my First Amendment rights in expressing my opinion of religion (would you be as vehement to shut up a Muslim, Jew, Hindu, Buddhist, or any other religious group if they said something in opposition to Christianity as you are to shut up this atheist?). The day it becomes wrong for me to express my opinion of religion is the day that this beautiful country has lost sight of the principles that it was founded upon.



I'll certainly let you express your viewpoints, though I might add that many of your viewpoints are flawed.


Originally posted by dagny_taggart
I am an American, and I have a right to express my opinion of religion!

If you are an atheist, why are you portraying it as a religon here?

[ManagerJosh]

Though I thoroughly disagree with debating religeon as it never ends and probably won't end until the thread is closed...I'll have to say you made some very good points ManagerJosh.

Though, I do know what Dagny means by pushy Christians, one case of it still pisses me off what I think about it. Sophomore year, honors English class, teacher leaves and puts one of the students in charge. Student happens to be a very involved member at the nearby First Assembly of God church, we'll call her.."Tina." Another student, who we'll call..."Jim," ask to put a CD on. Tina says no, because it does no praise God. Jim pleads with her saying that the CD has no offensive lyrics and therefore can be played. Tina protest again saying that we will have no music played unless it praises "God." At this point Jim sits back down because after all, this is a lost cause. The class is silent, most in disbelief at what just happened, and we look around the class. I mentioned earlier it was honors, only because as we most know, and not to be so stereotypical, but there are many Asian students in honor class, more so from India or Pakistan areas in mine. Tina had not thought of students of other faiths, many of which were in our class. I wondered how she'd act if the roles were reversed. When I think back of this, it still bothers me, and it's the only thing that bothers me from HS.

There were a whole little "gang" of Christians that "Tina" hung out with, who were always behaving very nicely and inviting everyone to Youth Group (many ppl from school did go) and to go to our High School's Christian Group. But I had friends who had been friend's with them and they were looked down upon if a bad word slipped out, or a shirt was too low cut, and even made a friend of mine cry by the ridicule.

Hah, in the end considering I side way more towards ManagerJosh, I do not help the case much, but I do believe the patient understanding Christian is extremely better than the types I described above. - Tylarrose

[ManagerJosh]

In remark to your last point first: I would like to mention that I said "opinion" of religion, not religious beliefs.

As for forcing down people's throats, I was mentioning what the religious faith tries to get its people to believe (and I will add that many religious sects, Christian, or otherwise, do try forcing their beliefs down other people's throats: the Romans, the Crusades, numerous wars between the Muslims and other neighboring peoples, which can include the most recent terrorist attacks, the Spanish conquistadors, etc, etc, face it: the history of man is filled with incidents of people trying to force their beliefs down other people's throats).

Why is it that people call messing up "human"? As far as I'm concerned the statement "I'm only human" translates to mean, "Please don't judge me, I'm only subhuman!" Doing anything right and rational is so gloriously human! What does your "technically that is a stereotype" paragraph have to with what I said?

As for evolution and Darwin, why bring up the last five minutes of his life? So what if the first evolutionist suddenly doubted his own theory on his deathbed? I've heard that people suddenly change on their deathbeds (fear promotes irrationality, and I think we can both agree about that). There have been so many evolutionists since Darwin, and they have a much fuller picture of what the theory truely entails. It would take me too long to cite all of the examples used to support evolution right now. I need to go to dinner before the dining hall closes. I will pick up on this refutation later (don't start in on me again until I finish--it's bad to cut in on the middle of an argument.) - Dagny_taggart

[ManagerJosh]

Excuse me, I did read the last sentence of your post, but you know, if I am in an "argument" and the other person pauses and gives me a chance to speak, then I will. I don't man to disrespect you, but I feel like a dog stuck on a leash unable to leave my "boundaries."

Not all Christian's force their religeon down other people's throats.

"Why is it that people call messing up "human"?" Maybe because no one is perfect. That's a well known fact. We all make mistakes, therefore we all mess up, which makes it a human act.

You made a very good point about people making quick decisions in their last moments of life, however, that doesn't mean he was right before he quickly changed his mind.

For example: A man lives his life in prejudice against another race or sexual preference, he lies on his deathbed and begins to feel guilty so he expresses his regret that he treated others unlike him so horribly. Now, since it was a change right before his death does that mean he was right to be prejudice? There you go.


Once again, I believe this thread is never going to end until it is locked. - TylarRose

[ManagerJosh]

Originally posted by TylarRose
Though I thoroughly disagree with debating religeon as it never ends and probably won't end until the thread is closed...I'll have to say you made some very good points ManagerJosh.

Though, I do know what Dagny means by pushy Christians, one case of it still pisses me off what I think about it. Sophomore year, honors English class, teacher leaves and puts one of the students in charge. Student happens to be a very involved member at the nearby First Assembly of God church, we'll call her.."Tina." Another student, who we'll call..."Jim," ask to put a CD on. Tina says no, because it does no praise God. Jim pleads with her saying that the CD has no offensive lyrics and therefore can be played. Tina protest again saying that we will have no music played unless it praises "God." At this point Jim sits back down because after all, this is a lost cause. The class is silent, most in disbelief at what just happened, and we look around the class. I mentioned earlier it was honors, only because as we most know, and not to be so stereotypical, but there are many Asian students in honor class, more so from India or Pakistan areas in mine. Tina had not thought of students of other faiths, many of which were in our class. I wondered how she'd act if the roles were reversed. When I think back of this, it still bothers me, and it's the only thing that bothers me from HS.

There were a whole little "gang" of Christians that "Tina" hung out with, who were always behaving very nicely and inviting everyone to Youth Group (many ppl from school did go) and to go to our High School's Christian Group. But I had friends who had been friend's with them and they were looked down upon if a bad word slipped out, or a shirt was too low cut, and even made a friend of mine cry by the ridicule.

Hah, in the end considering I side way more towards ManagerJosh, I do not help the case much, but I do believe the patient understanding Christian is extremely better than the types I described above.


You must also understand this too Tylar, that many people in the world calls themselves Christian and yet they do not behave like one. They are hypocrites.

Though I wasn't in the classroom to witness it, I'll keep a neutral stand point, but I must say that "Tina" is still human and that she makes mistakes.

Being a Christian does not mean imply you are perfect.

[ManagerJosh]

Originally posted by dagny_taggart
In remark to your last point first: I would like to mention that I said "opinion" of religion, not religious beliefs.

As for forcing down people's throats, I was mentioning what the religious faith tries to get its people to believe (and I will add that many religious sects, Christian, or otherwise, do try forcing their beliefs down other people's throats: the Romans, the Crusades, numerous wars between the Muslims and other neighboring peoples, which can include the most recent terrorist attacks, the Spanish conquistadors, etc, etc, face it: the history of man is filled with incidents of people trying to force their beliefs down other people's throats).


First of all Dagny, that Christianity is on choices. You choose whether to be a Christian. No one can make that decision for you. People may talk to you about Christianity, but that does not imply they are shoving Christianity down your throat.

You still need to make your choice and accept Jesus as your Lord and Personal Savior.


Originally posted by dagny_taggart
Why is it that people call messing up "human"? As far as I'm concerned the statement "I'm only human" translates to mean, "Please don't judge me, I'm only subhuman!" Doing anything right and rational is so gloriously human! What does your "technically that is a stereotype" paragraph have to with what I said?/quote]

It is because everyone sins that makes us human. No one on earth, who was ever born on earth is perfect and has not lived a life of sin. We have all lusted at one point or another. We have lied. We have cheated. We have done numerous things in our life and sinned in God's Eyes.

It was the beginning when Adam and Eve sinned, and the sin carried over. God judges only sinners who have heard the word of Christ and refuses to believe.


[quote]Originally posted by dagny_taggart
As for evolution and Darwin, why bring up the last five minutes of his life? So what if the first evolutionist suddenly doubted his own theory on his deathbed? I've heard that people suddenly change on their deathbeds (fear promotes irrationality, and I think we can both agree about that). There have been so many evolutionists since Darwin, and they have a much fuller picture of what the theory truely entails. It would take me too long to cite all of the examples used to support evolution right now. I need to go to dinner before the dining hall closes. I will pick up on this refutation later (don't start in on me again until I finish--it's bad to cut in on the middle of an argument.)


First, I never said during the last 5 minutes of Darwin's life he admitted he was wrong. I said Deathbed. It could be months. It could be years I don't know. All i know that Darwin was dying and he admitted his theory was wrong.

Secondly, you brought up the Theory of Evolution in your post earlier. I'm pointing out that the creator of the theory admitted his theory was incorrect. Indeed there has been many evolutionists since Darwin however if you read enough of their work, they based a good key part of their foundation upon Darwin's Theory.

Thirdly, it is a theory. Do you recall the tree of evolution? According to Darwin's theory, there are suppose to be fossils when a certain creature took two paths, one took this route and another took another one.

For sake of illustration, we'll say Creature A is at that base, and it is the turning point of where it would either turn into a reptile or a mammal.

Yet to this very day, no fossil has ever been found of Creature A. Fossils exist of reptiles and mammals and yet none of Creature A. Even today the Scientific Community is reevaluating this because the theory is slowly falling apart through scientific evidence.

[ManagerJosh]

Originally posted by ManagerJosh
You must also understand this too Tylar, that many people in the world calls themselves Christian and yet they do not behave like one. They are hypocrites.

Very very true, and I completely agree with that.


Originally posted by ManagerJosh
Though I wasn't in the classroom to witness it, I'll keep a neutral stand point, but I must say that "Tina" is still human and that she makes mistakes.

She is human, yes, and it wouldn't be so bad if that was the only incident. Regardless of it all, I saw her walking to the bus stop downtown two days after I saw her and her broke down car on the campus parking lot, so everyday when I drive through downtown to college I look for her in case I can offer a ride. -TylarRose

[ManagerJosh]

About evolution: of course you're not going to find a fossil show the split between the reptiles and the mammals--birds came between the two. And I ask you to take a look at the fossil record and notice the distinct progression of forms. Then notice the gradual changes in structures between the vertebrates, going from fish to amphibian to reptile to bird to mammal. Explain vestigal organs to me (vestigal organs are organs that serve no function in all members of the species) without evolution. Why would there be organs that serve no function in a being if it wasn't because it was a leftover from an earlier form. And another thing to consider about evolution is that it is an incredibly gradual process taking millions of years. Genetic lines are mutating all of the time. There are a few cases when we get to witness a microcosim of natural selection over the case of a few years. For example, there is this species of moth in England that comes in a white color and a grey color (I am not making this one up--this was an actual study). There are a lot of white trees in the area, so the white moths could blend in with the trees better than the grey moths, so there were many more white moths than grey moths. However, a factory was put in nearby, and in the course of a few years, the trees were grey from all of the soot in the air being deposited on them. The grey moth replaced the white moth as the dominant moth in the area (and I do believe they checked the grey moths to make certain they actually were grey moths, or one of the colors had a certain type of spot on the wing, which would help with identification). These types of events on a much larger scale are the core of evolution. It does not matter if the man who started the fire (i.e. Darwin and evolution) suddenly started to hate the fire at the end of his life, the point is that other people saw the fire, and realized that it is good and added kindling and gasoline to the fire. I would also like to point out that there are two different types of evolution: gradualism and punctuated equilibrium. This distinct and sudden change in the species that you mention in your example is an example of punctuated equilibrium, which seems much less plausible than gradualism, in which the forms gradually mutate over time (so gradually that it would take millions of years to notice drastic changes). You obviously don't know that much about evolution if you don't realize that there are several distinct versions of the theory. I will also add that it is pointless to try bring religion up as an argument against religion: I know many people who do try to reconcile religion with evolution, and some of them are fundamentalists.

I would like to add that when you ask a person to take something on faith instead of using reason, you have just negated their free will, because reason is the only thing that allows us to make decisions.

As for what I said about all the gods that man has dreamed up having the manners and morals of a spoiled child, I never used the word "selfish" in reference to them, and it is wrong for you to put that word into my mouth, especially since I mean something different by it than what it is conventionally considered (I will get to the corruption of the term selfish in the next paragraph). It is childish to expect people to worship you! And don't go on about how he "loves" us all. Love is an incredible emotion that cannot be given out wantonly: it is stupid to "love" everyone. Love is a recognition given to a person saying that you see in that person what you value and that seeing that virtue in that person brings you joy. It is impossible to love everyone, since not everyone is a good representation of what you value. Don't fool yourself into thinking that a person can "love" everyone. Considering the way I am, if there was a God (I am not saying that there is), in the proper sense he would hate my guts, because I am in direct opposition to what he values. I still ask of you, why would a superior being demand to be worshiped by his inferiors and threaten to punish them if they don't?

Moving on to selfishness: conventionally a person is considered selfish if a person is concerned with obtaining material gains and other desires for himself, at the cost of sacrificing others to himself. One of the problems with the conventional view of selfishness is that a person is trying to better his or her standing in the eyes of others, not in his own eyes, and often uses sacrifice as the primary means of achieving his goals; so the person considered selfish in the conventional sense is actually selfless, because the person is more concerned with what others think of him and how he can manipulate them than what he thinks of himself. Under the way I define selfishness, along with the Objectivists, a selfish person is intent upon achieving his own potential without sacrificing others to himself or sacrificing himself to others, and relies on his own rational thoughts in his course of action. The selfish person in the true sense is not concerned with what others think of him. A key difference between the Objectivist view of selfishness and the conventional view is how a person determines his course of action. The conventionally selfish person acts on emotional whims, but under the Objectivist view of selfishness, the selfish person's course of action is determined by rational thought, not whims. I will not ascribe the status of selfish to any gods, since they do not deserve to be labeled with this beautiful term.

About how can I prove that the air exists, first off I would like to say that you can see air, you just don't think about it. If we did not have an atmosphere, the sky would not be blue (even at night the sky is a shade of dark blue, not pitch black). On the moon, where there is no atmosphere, the sky is always pitch black. I will also add about air that the colors you are seeing right now are influenced by the color of the air around you. Glass is pretty transparent, and yet you know that it exists. We can see the light reflecting off of the air just like we can the light off of glass--it's just more transparent. Also, you can see gases when they are more concentrated, like when you are heating something and the gases are suddenly released, and the gase does not disappear as it moves away--the particles just spread apart to the point that you do not notice them. I can't believe you tried to use something as ridiculous as saying "How do you know that air exists?" You do not answer a question by asking another question!

About the historical veracity of the Bible: how do you know that God wrote through man? How do you know that it wasn't just written by a group of sick, psychopathic people who wanted to see how miserable they could make mankind? And I will add that in the study history, a primary source generally carries much more weight than something written by someone who was not there at the time, and was not based on a primary source. If Adam and Eve did not write that down, then there is no primary source on it, so we cannot say that that is what actually happened.

What really disgusts me is your calling error human. Achievement is human, nor error! If you don't believe me about error being human, then ask yourself how it is that you are sitting in your nice cozy little building in your storebought clothes clacking away at your computer connected to the Internet, instead of still living in a cave, wearing animal skins and clubbing animals for dinner. Human achievement is what brought us up out of the cave! The mistakes are the subhuman! The truth is that few people have actually aspired to their human potential, and it is those few to which the credit for our coming up out of the cave must be given to. I am one of these proper human beings, only do not kid yourself into thinking that I will bleed myself to death for the sake of these subhumans around me. I will offer them my services only in exchange for a value from them. This is the way of survival proper to man. - Dagny Taggart

[ManagerJosh]

Someone had to say it--and it might as well be me, since most people don't seem to have figured out what I have. To be honest, my parents did take me to church when I was a little girl, but I never really did accept what I heard, but waited until much later to give myself a more honest label. About two years ago, I reclassified myself as agnostic, and on October 13, 2001, I finally decided to call myself atheist (I remember the exact date because I was reading on the bus ride to the Westlake Marching Contest--man, that was the best time I had at Westlake: my band received our highest scores ever at that contest, and I was reading Atlas Shrugged). My basic beliefs never have really changed: what has changed is what I was trying to pursue. I never did like Christianity, but as a little girl, I assumed that I must be missing something, so I left analysis on the back burner of my mind. On the day I declared myself atheist officially, I finally realized that my doubt was well-founded. What I saw on that day was not proof against the existence of God, but a really good reason why man should not worship God. Basically, all religions are saying that you should negate reason and accept answers to life's most important questions on faith, which leaves man without his means of survival. Basically the only reason man has survived so far is because those who do use their rational minds have not realized how society is cheating them, evaluating the subhumans around them to be better than they really are. Most social systems have claimed an automatic right to the innovations of these innovators, because they have "need." "Need" is not a claim on the life of a person better than you. A lot of people don't realize that the innovators don't have to provide them with the innovation if the innovator doesn't want to. In a proper society, value must be exchanged for value. I am disgusted by all of the government welfare programs that rob people for the "common good." If a person is too lazy to work--don't help that person--leave the lazy bum in the gutter. If you want to help a person after you have taken care of yourself, that is all right, but you must put yourself first if you want to survive. Since I am against altruism, my prefered social system is lassiez-faire capitalism. I believe that the only function of the government should be to protect the rights of its citizens. As for freedom of action, it must be noted that there can be no such thing as the "right" to cause physical harm to another person or that person's property. I believe that the only sections the government should have (outside of the legislative section) are: courts, a military, and a police force. There should be no governmental welfare programs and the schools should be privatized. Why should a person have to pay for something he or she doesn't sanction? And taxes should be voluntary (don't immediately think that voluntary taxes won't work, listen to me explain how you can get people to want to pay taxes). The government could require that a certain percentage of the monetary transaction in a contract be paid to it in order make the contract enforcible in the legal courts. If your business is making an important transaction, I certainly think that if you had to pay a fee in order to make certain that the contract can be enforced, you would. Imagine what would happen if your business had a multi-billion dollar contract with another company and the other company didn't come through on their part of the deal--you'd lose a lot of money if it wasn't legally enforcible. Lassiez-faire capitalism is much more effective than any altruist system. Selfishness is such a beautiful thing--the only proper way for man to live (reference paragraph 4 of my previous post for my definition of selfishness, which is significantly different from what the term has been corrupted to mean). - Dagny Taggart

[ManagerJosh]

I'll be refering to this book: (Evolution: a theory in crisis."
by Michael Denton) (Non-Religious)

Organisms and watches are similar because both are complex and have many co-operating parts. But they differ also in many ways. For example watches are made of glass and metal, and organisms are not. This is not a relevant difference. Relevant for the validity of Paley's analogy are properties bearing on the questions 'Where did this object come from?' or 'How was it produced?'. The following properties are relevant for the validity of the watchmaker analogy:

Watches don't reproduce
Watches don't have heredity
Watches don't have mutations

Typical for artefacts, a watch is produced from raw materials by external forces. Watches don't self-assemble. Watches don't descend from other watches. There are no father and mother watches, no baby watches. Every single watch we encounter is necessarily produced by external forces because watches are unable to reproduce themselves. Obviously watches need a watchmaker!
We know today that organisms reproduce and self-assemble on the basis of internal information (DNA). Watches don't have internal self-descriptive hereditary information. The instructions to manufacture a watch are located outside the watch, which explains why they cannot reproduce themselves. The properties reproduction and heredity tell us how living individuals come into existence. This is not a superficial difference, but a fundamental difference.

To my surprise Paley proposed designed, self-reproducing watches (10) and concluded that his design inference was reinforced. He was right that self-reproducing watches are a more powerful design. And he was right that self-reproduction is not an 'ultimate' explanation, because self-reproduction was designed by the watchmaker and not by the watch itself. Now my point is that if self-reproducing watches are a more powerful design strategy, then creating the first form of life and let it evolve into all the million of species, is certainly a far more powerful design method. Furthermore, designing the laws of nature and creating the initial conditions of the Big Bang must be the most powerful creation method. Paley wrote his book before Darwin's Origin of Species. If he had known about natural selection, then only the religious dogma of the fixity of species (biblical 'special creation') could prevent that one species could originate from another species. And the whole point of his analogy was to prove a Designer without relying on revealed religious knowledge. (11)
=========

Next you do not negate your own free choice. You still make decisions whether to commit a sin or not. You still make decisions on a daily basis...and you hardly negate your free will there.

If you trace the lineage of Love, there are several terms for it. It dates back to Greek culture where there are three types of love.

1) Eros
2) Agape
3) (can't remember)

But each of those three loves are different. Eros is love as in romance. Agape is unselfish loyal and benevolent concern for the good of another: as (1) : the fatherly concern of God for humankind (2) : brotherly concern for others

But in short, love is such a broad definition, and the love I'm refering to is Agape.

In response to your claims of air, it is a metaphorical reply. Your claims earlier stated that you only believe what you see. I replied back stating that you can not see the air or the wind, and yet you know they exist and you believe that they are there.

How do you know that it wasn't just written by a group of sick, psychopathic people who wanted to see how miserable they could make mankind? Because if they were sick, God would still have influenced them no matter what. Man was inspired by God to write the Bible.

As for "And I will add that in the study history, a primary source generally carries much more weight than something written by someone who was not there at the time, and was not based on a primary source. If Adam and Eve did not write that down, then there is no primary source on it, so we cannot say that that is what actually happened.," God told Moses what to write. God is first person since he is omnipresent, therefore he falls under your category of first person.


Originally posted by dagny_taggart
What really disgusts me is your calling error human. Achievement is human, nor error!


Well I'm glad to see that you take it as an achievement that Adam and Eve sinned.


Originally posted by dagny_taggart
If you don't believe me about error being human, then ask yourself how it is that you are sitting in your nice cozy little building in your storebought clothes clacking away at your computer connected to the Internet, instead of still living in a cave, wearing animal skins and clubbing animals for dinner. Human achievement is what brought us up out of the cave! The mistakes are the subhuman! The truth is that few people have actually aspired to their human potential, and it is those few to which the credit for our coming up out of the cave must be given to.


People learn, dagny. We learn from observations and experiments. That is hardly evolution.


Originally posted by dagny_taggart
I am one of these proper human beings, only do not kid yourself into thinking that I will bleed myself to death for the sake of these subhumans around me. I will offer them my services only in exchange for a value from them. This is the way of survival proper to man.


First is who are you to call yourself proper? That is very...um...well biased and neo-nazi. You ahve no right to judge yourself as a "God" nor to call yourself superior to anyone else.

[ManagerJosh]

and stop with the sub-humans! It portrays you as a racist.

[ManagerJosh]

“Everyone is entitled to their own opinions but not their own facts.” Sen. Daniel Moynihan - TylarRose

[ManagerJosh]

How can it be racist if I am not refering to race, but mental ability? And don't try telling me that any person off the street could discover calculus, laws of physics, chemistry, create a multi-billion dollar corporation or any other such act of extreme achievement. It takes a rational mind, a person who has not succumbed to the mysticism of religion (or the mysticism of muscle, which is something I am not going to discuss here, since it would take a while to define the term and the mysticism of muscle isn't really relevant here), and desires to build concepts off of their sensory perceptions. What many people tend to forget is that the innovators are not replacable--you cannot grab another person off the street and tell him to become Newton, Gaileo, Sir William Harvey, Einstein, or any other such person.

As for that watch metaphor, that proves nothing. First off, self-replicating watches are an utter impossibility--metals are relative trace on this planet in comparison to organic compounds. How would the watch ingest the metals and silicates (compounds to make glass) needed to reproduce? Maybe the watch could find enough silicates, but I doubt that the watch would be able to ingest the right type of metal easily. And watches don't think! It is hardly fair to compare a coagulate of inorganic compounds that doesn't even think with coagulates of organic compounds that do think, and some of them being self-aware. If you are so intent upon everything being created, then answer this question for me: who created God? And then I might add that there is recent evidence showing that a repeating cycle of Big Bangs is possible without an increase in entropy, because as the universe is getting close to the next time to go through the Big Bang (which causes an enormous amount of entrophy), the entrophy in the universe decreases enough that the overall net flux of entrophy in the cycle cancels out, leaving the entrophy the same. In the most recent cyclical theories, two universes collide with each other, which builds up enough energy for a Big Bang in each universe. The universes separate, and go about their own way for billions, maybe trillions of years, building up and gradually degenerating, then collide again (it might collide with another universe, which would imply an even longer cycle). The point I'm getting at about this cyclical universe is why can't it be that the multiverse was always here, and always will be here.


Originally posted by ManagerJosh
Well I'm glad to see that you take it as an achievement that Adam and Eve sinned.


But they didn't sin--reason is man's means of survival, so therefore rational thought is not a sin, despite what the Bible might say. I will now quote Ayn Rand on Original Sin, because she put it so much more eloquently than I can at this point (I'm not Rand yet, but I'm getting there [maybe she herself was at this same point at 17, I don't know since her the first of her mature novels was published when she was nearly 38]).



Death is the standard of your virtues, death is your chosen goal, and you have to keep running, since there is no escape from the knowledge that the pursuer is yourself. Stop running, for once--there is no place to run--stand naked as you dread to stand, but as I see you, and take a look at what you dared to call a moral code.

Damnation is the start of your morality, destruction is its purpose, means and end. Your code begins by damning man as evil, then demands that he practice a good which it defines as impossible for him to practice. It demands, as his first proof of virtue, that he accept his own depravity without proof. It demands that he start, not with a standard of value, but with a standard of evil, which is himself, by means of which he is then to define the good: the good is that which he is not.

It does not matter who then becomes a profiteer on his renounced glory and tormented soul, a mystic God with some incomprehensible design or any passer-by whose rotting sores are held as some inexplicable claim upon him--it does not matter, the good is not for him to understand, his duty is to crawl through years of penance, atoning for the guilt of his existence to any stray collector of unintelligible debts, his only concept of value is a zero: the good is that which is non-man.

The name of this monstrous absurdity is Original Sin.

A sin without volition is a slap at morality and a insolent contradiction in terms: that which is outside the possibility of choice is outside the province of morality. If man is evil by birth, he has no will, no power to change it; if he has no will, he can be neither good or evil; a robot is amoral. To hold, as man's sin, a fact not open to his choice is a mockery of morality. To hold man's nature as his sin is a mockery of nature. To punish him for a crime he committed before he was born is a mockery of justice. To hold him guilty in a matter where no innocence exists is a mockery of reason. To destroy morality, nature, justice and reason by means of a single concept is a feat of evil hardly to be matched. Yet that is the root of your moral code.

Do not hide behind the cowardly evasion that man is born with free will, but with a "tendency" towards evil. A free will saddled with a tendency is like a game with loaded dice. It forces man to struggle through the effort of playing, to bear responsibility and pay for the game, but the decision is weighted in favor of a tendency that he had no power to escape. If the tendency is of his choice, he cannot possess it at birth; if it is not of his choice, his will is not free.

What is the nature of this guilt that your teachers call his Original Sin? What are the evils man acquired when he fell from a state they consider perfection? Their myth declares that he ate the fruit of the tree of knowledge--he acquired a mind and became a rational being. It was the knowledge of good and evil--he became a moral being. He was sentenced to earn his bread by his labor--he became a productive being. He was sentenced to experience desire--he acquired the capacity of sexual enjoyment. The evils for which they damn him are reason, morality, creativeness, joy--all the cardinal values of his existence. It is not his vices that their myth of man's fall is designed to explain and condemn, it is not his errors that they hold as his guilt, but the essence of his nature as man. Whatever he was--that robot in the Garden of Eden, who existed without mind, without values, without labor, without love--he was not man.

Man's fall, according to your teachers, was that he gained the virtues required to live. These virtues, by their standard, are his Sin. His evil, they charge, is that he's man. His guilt, they charge, is that he lives.

excerpt from John Galt's speech in Atlas Shrugged, by Ayn Rand, pp. 938-939


That statement in itself covers a lot of ground, not just Original Sin.

About the air argument again, you're putting words into my mouth (which you've been doing the entire time). I never said "I believe only what I see," (actually, I don't think I've completely defined the core of how I gain my knowledge, I've just said reason) but I believe (I don't like using the word believe here, but to avoid awkward phrasings, I will have to use it) things based upon how it fits in with my sensory precepts and the concepts I have drawn from them. Sensory precepts also include hearing, smell, taste, and touch. I simply used the evidence that air can be seen since what that statement was refuting refered to sight.

Going back to the topic of primary sources, you missed what I meant by sick, psychopathic people. What I meant was, "How do you know someone didn't make it up just to be cruel to mankind? How do you know it isn't just a giant hoax?"

You still haven't proven to me that God exists. I've already explained the nature of a cyclical multiverse, instead of one with a beginning and an end.


Originally posted by ManagerJosh
People learn, dagny. We learn from observations and experiments. That is hardly evolution.


I said that reason is man's evolutionary adaptation to survive. Maybe you should take a class in semantics.

As I'm seeing you arguments, I'm starting to wonder if it's even worth arguing with you--you're too indoctrinated in what everyone else has been preaching to you to see that I'm right. Before you try arguing with me again on this topic, I suggest you read at least Atlas Shrugged, so you can get a much better idea as to where I'm coming from. It is very true that someone else wrote this book, and my ideals are what she pushes, but it must be said that I am attracted to her philosophy because it is pretty much what I have believed all along, and I enjoyed investigating just why I am right. If you're too lazy to read a novel over 1000 pages, then I suggest you read two of her non-fiction works instead: The Virtue of Selfishness and Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal. Although Atlas Shrugged is fiction, it is a philosophical treatise in itself (especially John Galt's speech that lasts for nearly 60 pages, which you have just had a small bite of in that quote--small in comparison to the size of the speech). When you do the assigned reading--then try arguing with me again--I think it will be much more effective. (Don't tell me to read the Bible before I step in again--I did go to Sunday School because my parents forced me to as a little girl, and I was the one who always knew my lessons!) - Dagny_Taggart

[ManagerJosh]

Any one who don't believe in GOD, is truly a mentaly ill person who seems to have no life or brain,And im sayin this to all you people who dont believe in God, You are very pathetic and very VERY...Stupid.. one more thing who ever dont believe..YOU NEED TO GET A LIFE! > IF YOU DON'T LIKE IT DILL WITH IT - lnk_prk_gurl18

[ManagerJosh]

The idea of the watch metaphor states that it wasn't by chance or luck that everything suddenly came together and a watch was formed. Can you image that suddenly parts came together and made a watch? Highly unlikely

How about the many people on earth? Do you think out of this entire universe that atoms and molecules would actually come together to form us?


Originally posted by dagny_taggart
But they didn't sin--reason is man's means of survival, so therefore rational thought is not a sin, despite what the Bible might say.



If you could only see how hard I'm laughing here. Adam and Eve did sin. God clearly told them they could eat anything from the Garden except from the two trees in the middle of the garden. Yet they ate from that...

And that is disobeying therefore sinning.

I never said rational is a sin. I said making poor choices is a sin. Lust, cheating, lying, etc. are sins.


Originally posted by dagny_taggart
About the air argument again, you're putting words into my mouth (which you've been doing the entire time). I never said "I believe only what I see," (actually, I don't think I've completely defined the core of how I gain my knowledge, I've just said reason) but I believe (I don't like using the word believe here, but to avoid awkward phrasings, I will have to use it) things based upon how it fits in with my sensory precepts and the concepts I have drawn from them. Sensory precepts also include hearing, smell, taste, and touch. I simply used the evidence that air can be seen since what that statement was refuting refered to sight.


First, let me remind you of your own statement. If one thinks an inteprets it, it basically means I can't see God so why should I believe something I can not see...



Yet another question: how do you know God exist?

Next, all your observations still require sight to view them.

About how can I prove that the air exists, first off I would like to say that you can see air, you just don't think about it. (sight)

If we did not have an atmosphere, the sky would not be blue (even at night the sky is a shade of dark blue, not pitch black). On the moon, where there is no atmosphere, the sky is always pitch black. (sight)

I will also add about air that the colors you are seeing right now are influenced by the color of the air around you. (Sight)

Glass is pretty transparent, and yet you know that it exists. We can see the light reflecting off of the air just like we can the light off of glass--it's just more transparent. Also, you can see gases when they are more concentrated, like when you are heating something and the gases are suddenly released, and the gase does not disappear as it moves away--the particles just spread apart to the point that you do not notice them.(sight)

All your statements above are still based upon sight. However you still do not see air. You don't see it moving up your nose. You don't see it moving up, down. To the eyes, it is just a bunch of empty space.


And I am not indoctrinated. Considering the book I quoted from is written by a non-Christian and a non-religous person, I find it even more ironic that one who is non-religous isn't the least bit receptive to another one's words.

[ManagerJosh]

But things don't happen by random chance: it is by the laws of physics, which have always been in place. I have taken too many Chemistry classes to believe that the will of a being will have any influence upon the chemicals: if you put in the wrong amount of a chemical in an experiment--you're probably screwed, if the reaction happens fast enough that you can't add more of the other chemical, and you will probably have to start over again, no matter how much you want the experiment to suddenly work on the wrong quantities of chemicals. The very idea of God suggests that at one point the laws of physics were not in place, which is a huge contradiction (and contradictions cannot exist). How could one being suddenly change the laws of physics? Don't say because he willed it! How does any type of God fit into the concept of a cyclical universe (remember here, I'm not accepting your concept of a linear universe)?

About my air and sensory precepts argument, I iterate: I used the visual evidence simply because that was the manner in which you originally asked the question. There are numerous other sensory precepts a person can have of air: a person can feel the air when it moves (i.e. wind or air conditioning), a person can hear the movement of air, a person can smell the air (air is really the only way a person can smell). I simply used vision because it was the least obvious argument of sensory perception of air. Please don't try telling me about all of those incidents in the Bible when people "saw" God--most of them are perfectly explainable natural phenomena that don't suggest the presence of God.

About that statement on Original Sin: let's examine the myth of the Garden of Eden again--they can eat from anywhere but that apple tree, the tree of knowledge. When they eat from that tree, they gain knowledge. Why would God say they could eat from any tree in the Garden but the tree of knowledge? Because he doesn't want them to gain knowledge. So I am right in saying that gaining knowledge is the sin (which always struck me as being so wrong--knowledge is good). You obviously don't know the meaning behind this story if you're claiming it was merely eating from the tree. It was the knowledge they acquired from it that made it wrong in God's eyes. Of all the stories I remember from the Bible, I would have to say that the Garden of Eden one has always been the one that infuriated me the most--which is one of the primary reasons I never have been able to accept Christianity.

About the remark about non-religious people, it is absurd for you to claim that a non-religious person will automatically accept what another non-religious person will say. It may seem hard for you to believe this, but *gasp* not all non-religious people believe the same things. Compare Ayn Rand (my favorite philosopher ), Friedrich Nietzsche, and Karl Marx some time, why don't you? These three could not more diametrically opposed to each other in terms of their philosophy: Rand being the advocate of reason and lassiez-faire capitalism, Nietzsche being the hedonist, and Marx being the communist. Don't try saying that all non-religious people are the same: our ethical codes vary drastically (some don't even have ethical codes--I am not one of those). It is appropriate to label me as an atheist, however it is even more appropriate to call me an Objectivist (the philosophical movement started by Ayn Rand). It is also very important to note that Objectivists are not blind followers: the very nature of the philosophy makes that impossible, since Objectivist are strong individualists that make their decisions based on their own rational thoughts, and it is for this reason that there are already several distinct factions in the philosophy: the Randian faction (whom can just be called Objectivists, since this is the original form), the Nathaniel Branden faction (he was associated with Rand until 1968; they disagreed on several points and split up), and the post-Objectivists. There are probably more factions than that, but I can't keep track of all of them. Basically, there are a few minor disagreements on very specific details between the factions (and I would argue that on some of these details, you could hardly call the Nathaniel Branden faction and the post-Objectivists Objectivists; they're just tolerable almosts).

As I said, it would probably help if you're more familiar with where I'm coming from before this can turn into an effective disscussion (reference the essay "The Anatomy of Compromise" from Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal for why this disscussion isn't getting anywhere--I know what your premises are, yet you don't know what mine are). I strongly recommend you read at least Atlas Shrugged, which is by Ayn Rand. Although this is a very complete philosophical treatise of Objectivism, it is a novel. Even if you don't like what she has to say, you can still enjoy it--the plot is pretty intense. When reading this, pay particular attention to Part 3, Chapter 7--"This is John Galt Speaking" (you may have to read this chapter several times--it contains an incredible synopsis of the philosophy, but read the rest of the book, because you need the events leading up to it). After Atlas Shrugged, I recommend reading Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, and The Virtue of Selfishness, which are two of Rand's non-fiction works (the two combined are considerably smaller than Atlas Shrugged). If you don't want to read both of these non-fiction works after Atlas Shrugged, then I suggest you read the essays "The Anatomy of Compromise" from Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, and "Isn't Everyone Selfish?" (which is actually a Nathaniel Branden essay) and "The Argument from Intimidation" (a type of argument which many of you, most especially lnk_prk_gurl is guilty of using--I confess I might have used something similar to one of these after I had already explained something, but that is different than automatically starting with one of these arguments) from The Virtue of Selfishness. Would you actually take the time to do the reading to turn this into a proper disscussion?

If you try to turn this statement on required reading around on me, I will again remind you that I am all too familiar with what the Christian beliefs are--I was forced to go to Sunday School and a year of Confirmation, and I happened to be one of the best students in terms of knowledge of the material (not practice, though, which they didn't know and didn't expect from me--ironically [or maybe not ironically, if you catch my drift], the other girl who knew her Sunday School lessons pretty well is now a pagan, but I think the the boy in the class who was a pretty good student is still Lutheran [or maybe not, I haven't seen Brady in years, and Kim didn't say anything about him]). - Dagny Taggart

[ManagerJosh]

Originally posted by dagny_taggart
But things don't happen by random chance: it is by the laws of physics, which have always been in place. I have taken too many Chemistry classes to believe that the will of a being will have any influence upon the chemicals: if you put in the wrong amount of a chemical in an experiment--you're probably screwed, if the reaction happens fast enough that you can't add more of the other chemical, and you will probably have to start over again, no matter how much you want the experiment to suddenly work on the wrong quantities of chemicals. The very idea of God suggests that at one point the laws of physics were not in place, which is a huge contradiction (and contradictions cannot exist). How could one being suddenly change the laws of physics? Don't say because he willed it! How does any type of God fit into the concept of a cyclical universe (remember here, I'm not accepting your concept of a linear universe)?


Since you've taken so many Science classes, you know how big the universe is. You also know that the universe is so large that even to this day we are finding new undiscovered parts of the universe. You also know that the expanse of the universe is great too.

So we are back to my point. The universe is so large, and it was not random in any such way. The laws of physics never stated anything about God because then we'd have a bunch of people storming the government demanding it be removed (on the idea of seperation of church and state)

So what's the next best way to teach and please everyone? One without God.


Originally posted by dagny_taggart

About my air and sensory precepts argument, I iterate: I used the visual evidence simply because that was the manner in which you originally asked the question. There are numerous other sensory precepts a person can have of air: a person can feel the air when it moves (i.e. wind or air conditioning), a person can hear the movement of air, a person can smell the air (air is really the only way a person can smell). I simply used vision because it was the least obvious argument of sensory perception of air. Please don't try telling me about all of those incidents in the Bible when people "saw" God--most of them are perfectly explainable natural phenomena that don't suggest the presence of God.


You are absolutely most certainly correct Dagny. There are other ways of knowing that Air and Wind Exists....Just as how there are other ways of knowing God Exists as well.

First sign of God's existance is you, dagny. You exist. God created you whether you believe it or not. If God didn't exist, who would have created you? It is a 1/600th of a percent chance that you could have been concieved Dagny. So your talking close to about a 1 of a trillion that it would have been you. And yet you were born Dagny. You were picked out of the trillion other possibilities. Evolution certainly couldn't have picked you. It doesn't have a brain. It can't think. Someone of a greater being must have existed in order to choose you to exist.

Please also let me remind you that evolution isn't an answer in this case. It is still "Theory." Never has been proven.

Secondly, how about a instance of a fond memory? When we recall a fond memory, we see ourselves doing something fun and exciting, and when we do something good, we see it through "God's" eyes. That is why we see ourselves having a good time.

Lastly, why are you here on this world? You don't suddenly appear here just to take up space. There is a reason and a purpose of your existance, hence back related to my first point on why you were born on this world.


Originally posted by dagny_taggart

About that statement on Original Sin: let's examine the myth of the Garden of Eden again--they can eat from anywhere but that apple tree, the tree of knowledge. When they eat from that tree, they gain knowledge. Why would God say they could eat from any tree in the Garden but the tree of knowledge? Because he doesn't want them to gain knowledge. So I am right in saying that gaining knowledge is the sin (which always struck me as being so wrong--knowledge is good). You obviously don't know the meaning behind this story if you're claiming it was merely eating from the tree. It was the knowledge they acquired from it that made it wrong in God's eyes. Of all the stories I remember from the Bible, I would have to say that the Garden of Eden one has always been the one that infuriated me the most--which is one of the primary reasons I never have been able to accept Christianity

It wasn't the knowledge that was bad. If you read the bible in depth carefully, the serpent tempted Adam and Eve and said that if they "ate" the fruit they would have become just like God knowing everything Both Good and Evil.

God was mad at Adam and Eve for attempting to become God, trying to be as smart or smarter. But if you looked already, they already knew what was right and wrong. God told them previously that they should not eat the forbidden fruit. They knew it was wrong. Yet they choose to eat it, therefore my statemeng needs to be revised.


It wasn't the knowledge that was bad. If you read the bible in depth carefully, the serpent tempted Adam and Eve and said that if they "ate" the fruit they would have become just like God

[ManagerJosh]

Originally posted by dagny_taggart
About the remark about non-religious people, it is absurd for you to claim that a non-religious person will automatically accept what another non-religious person will say. It may seem hard for you to believe this, but *gasp* not all non-religious people believe the same things. Compare Ayn Rand (my favorite philosopher :D), ...

Aren't there absolute truths that everyone believe in? Absolute truths do exists. 1 + 1 = 2

There are things that everyone would agree upon, where things will be true and can't be disproved. Things such as Terrorism, racism. (majority people. I'm just not including into the factor racists and terrorists)

I'll start from that...that society views them as bad. A relativist might say evil coes from society and that ethics are formed by the people who call them but if you stop and think about it, and if it this was true, then everyone would be right since society once thought that bad things were okay like slavery.

The belief of genetics, the survival of the fittest that ca n be seen as the strongest killing the weakest, raping them, stealing from them, doing all these bad things are opposite of ethics and that they say society constructed therefore ethics are not natural, but supernatural. God expects us to have faith based on evidence like in Acts when people check scriptures. In John 14:11, Jesus says to believe because of evidence, eyewitness. and you can't use science to disprove the bible to be true. Some things can't be proven by the Scientific Method. It is not like you can apply science to any religon, especially to the Bible.

People agree Plato and Aristotle lived and wrote right? So how do we know Jesus existed? The Bible? THere were so many more compies of it around.

Plato wrote in 400B.C. but the earliest written copy was found in 900A.D., a timespan of 1300 years and 7 copies found.

Aristotle wrote in 300B.C., the earliest copy found in 1100A.D. with a total of 5 copies found.

The new testament was written in 100A.D. and the earliest copy was written in 200A.D., a timespan of 100 years and yet a total of 5,300 copies exist.

The Dead Sea Scrolls, a copy of the Old Testament dates back before Plato and Aristotle (2nd century BC), and yet it matches up with current biblical texts and was is found in today's bible. The discovery shows how accurately the scribes had copied thes special words throughout the centuries. Mind you these text were found in 1947, a testimony through the ages

If it was false, someone would have disproved it by now. It is not like that many people would back up a lie and the Bible makes lots of references to historical characters and events so you can't say some maniac wrote it considering each book was written by someone else through a different time period. It can't be a conspiracy because people would not stand for it.

The bible consists of 44 DIFFERENT authors, over a timespan of 1500 years, 66 different books, and only 1 theme.

The theme was the coming of Christ. It is very unlikely that these 44 authors could have gathered at a symposium and talked that they would discuss about Jesus. And you know that Time Travel is impossible :)

How about prophecies? It was stated in the bible that anyone who brings harm to Israel shall fall themselves. (Genesis 15:13) & (Isaiah 14)

Look what happened to the Nazi Empire, the Egyptian Empire, The Babylon Empire, and the Roman Empire. Each one brought harm to Israel at one time or another, and yet they fell. Each claimed that they would be the lasting power on Earth yet they fell.

Moreover there are lots of other prophecies. It was predicted in the bible that they would be scattered to the far corners of the earth and would eventually rejoin years latter. This was fulfilled when Israel reached statehood in 1950.

The visions of Daniel had references to Babylonia, Persia, Greece, and Rome.

Gold, Silver, Bronze, and Iron. In chapter 7, it refers to animals.
Lion, Bear, Leopart and a Terrible Beast respectively, to those kingdoms. How could they be knnown? They came true. Can anyone predict what is going to happen in 2000 years and then it comes true?

It is God's Man, God's Will and God's Vision.


Originally posted by dagny_taggart
As I said, it would probably help if you're more familiar with where I'm coming from before this can turn into an effective disscussion (reference the essay "The Anatomy of Compromise" from Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal for why this disscussion isn't getting anywhere--I know what your premises are, yet you don't know what mine are). I strongly recommend you read at least Atlas Shrugged, which is by Ayn Rand. Although this is a very complete philosophical treatise of Objectivism, it is a novel. Even if you don't like what she has to say, you can still enjoy it--the plot is pretty intense. When reading this, pay particular attention to Part 3, Chapter 7--"This is John Galt Speaking" (you may have to read this chapter several times--it contains an incredible synopsis of the philosophy, but read the rest of the book, because you need the events leading up to it). After Atlas Shrugged, I recommend reading Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, and The Virtue of Selfishness, which are two of Rand's non-fiction works (the two combined are considerably smaller than Atlas Shrugged). If you don't want to read both of these non-fiction works after Atlas Shrugged, then I suggest you read the essays "The Anatomy of Compromise" from Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, and "Isn't Everyone Selfish?" (which is actually a Nathaniel Branden essay) and "The Argument from Intimidation" (a type of argument which many of you, most especially lnk_prk_gurl is guilty of using--I confess I might have used something similar to one of these after I had already explained something, but that is different than automatically starting with one of these arguments) from The Virtue of Selfishness. Would you actually take the time to do the reading to turn this into a proper disscussion?


I think I'll let you read this review...



Trying to fit my own feelings about the book in 800 words, when considering the rich debate already surrounding the book, is somewhat intimidating. But I'll give it a good try.

Atlas Shrugged starts as hard-core industrial fiction detailing the tribulations of a railroad company. All is not well in the world, though, as lassitude and plain apathy seems to corrupt society from within. Our heroine, Dagny Taggart, does her best to succeed, but ultimately comes to realize that someone, behind the scenes, is doing his best to stop the motor of the world. "Who is John Galt?" indeed.

It doesn't take a long time to figure out that Atlas Shrugged is not only science-fiction (it is!), but that it takes place in an alternate pocket universe with scant relation to ours. The curiously Soviet industrial feel of the book, with its pronounced brushed-steel aesthetics, is a dead giveaway. So are the ridiculously convoluted relationships between the thirty or so characters populating the book. It's one of those worlds where everyone knows each other. (This becomes very handy, later on, when Rand gets around to postulating her main conceit, which depends on a few dozen people around the country.) The psychology of any of the characters is also incompatible with our reality, from the impossibly virtuous protagonists to the cackling villains. The antagonists of Atlas Shrugged are so impossibly evil and idiotic that you can only wonder at how they're supposed to form an effective force. Rand stacks the deck a wee bit too much to make an impact. It just ends up being laughable.

And frankly, once I started giggling at Atlas Shrugged, it proved very difficult to stop. Strip the emperor of her clothes, and Rand becomes a humorist. Brain-damaged characters spouting contrived slogans in a made-up universe; funny! Chapter VII "This is John Galt Speaking", a skimmable fifty-page monologue clumsily stuck in the narrative; hilarious! The conviction by which Rand's protagonists are so certain of what they're doing; riotous!

As you may gather, I wasn't completely convinced by Rand's philosophy, or even her narrative. It surprised me somewhat; As someone routinely accused of having too much faith in other people's reason, I should be a prime candidate for Rand's dubious "Objectivist" philosophy.

Instead, it strikes me as a suspicious "rational" justification for acting like a selfish child. Calling other people "leeches" isn't much of an argument. Objectivism looks like an excuse for doing whatever you want without regard to other people. And that's just, well, irrational. Budding Republicans and Libertarians might love it, though. - Christian Sauve

[ManagerJosh]

I swear--what I say goes in one ear and out the other! I've got much better things to do that to debate with you! I will say one thing before I withdraw (I'm still saying I'm right--I'm just exhausted trying to prove that I am to you--I'd probably have better luck convincing a brick wall that I am right!): don't judge a book by the reviews--actually read it (and I will also tell you that that review is a rare exception--most reviews are quite the opposite, and I might add that Atlas Shrugged was ranked #1 in several reader's choice polls for the best novel of the century, most notably the Random House Modern Library list). I will also add that there are so many things that are wrong with that review. The last sentence refers to "budding Republicans and Libertarians", but Objectivists are not Republicans, not Libertarians, and definitely not Democrats. Most Objectivists do not classify themselves with a political party at all. We do not like the Democrats because their agenda is completely opposite to what we want (obviously); we do not like the Republicans because they try to justify capitalism on the grounds of altruism--which is a contradiction, a capitalist system cannot also be altruistic (altruism can only exist with statism), and we do not like the present mixed economy (don't fool yourself for one minute into thinking that this is a capitalist system we're under--just ask any Macroeconomics teacher); and we do not like the Libertarians because they do not try to justify what they are pushing for on a philosophical basis, so in essence they are really advocating anarchism, amoralism, and subjectivism (I will remind you that Objectivists want lassiez-faire capitalism, do have a ethical code, and are objective, not subjective). I will also add that the protagonists are not such impossible people. Just you wait--there is a John Galt--he just happens to be a she--Who is Sarah Ellis? (Yes, I am going to start the same type of strike that John Galt started in the novel.) And as for the bad guys not being real--I dare you to compare James Taggart, Orren Boyle, Wesley Mouch, and Mr. Thompson to some of the leading figures in the Democratic party in the past few decades. Atlas Shrugged is all too real in that sense. Rand defined herself as a romantic realist in that the setting is here and on this earth, but that she portrays things as they ought to be. In the context of Atlas Shrugged, the state of the world in the earlier days of the strike is pretty much what it is now (I dare you to check the newspapers and compare the two), and the romantic element is what the strike accomplishes (i.e. the changes Rand wants to see). I will mention that right now there are actually quite a few "strikes" on the much smaller scale going on: for example, American biomedical workers going overseas because of our laws restricting human stem-cell and cloning research (a side note: WAY TO GO CALIFORNIA!!! Someone had to question the federal goverment's effective ban on stem-cell research). So there are some strikes happening now--they're just on a much smaller scale than the strike in Atlas Shrugged--but I intend to make "Atlas shrug" completely, just like John Galt. Hmm, maybe I should rename this thread "Who is Sarah Ellis?" because this is like my own smaller scale version of John Galt's speech (and one of the functions of John Galt's speech was to answer in very full detail, who is John Galt). I will not refute any of your other points, because as I have already said, it's not getting anywhere--I still haven't convinced you I'm right--I'm just smart enough to know when to close my mouth, unlike someone else I know! *cough*Josh*cough*

Most importantly, if you haven't read Atlas Shrugged--actually read it: don't base your opinion of the novel off of one bad review if you haven't read it!! - Dagny_Taggart

[ManagerJosh]

One more thing I couldn't resist remarking on after reading your statements a little closer:

Quote:
And you know that Time Travel is impossible


No I don't know that it is impossible (and accepting the idea of a cyclical universe lends more credence to it)--I might be the one to figure it out--especially if the universe is really made up of ten dimensions, like string theorists are starting to say it is--time travel in theory requires being able to manipulate through a higher dimension to reach a different point on the four-dimensional area. An explanation of how this might work is a mouse running through a maze. The mouse normally moves through the maze staying on the plane, but the mouse could reach the point in the two-dimensional continum much faster by making a three-dimensional movement and jumping to where the cheese is. Most time travel theories are some variation upon the jumping through a higher dimesion concept. Maybe if I do figure this out someday (it will probably be decades), I can bring back Ayn Rand to scold you (hey, maybe I should get working on this time travel idea now--I bet she'd have the perfect insult for your Christmas present).

[ManagerJosh]

Originally posted by dagny_taggart
I swear--what I say goes in one ear and out the other! I've got much better things to do that to debate with you! I will say one thing before I withdraw (I'm still saying I'm right--I'm just exhausted trying to prove that I am to you--I'd probably have better luck convincing a brick wall that I am right!): don't judge a book by the reviews--actually read it (and I will also tell you that that review is a rare exception--most reviews are quite the opposite, and I might add that Atlas Shrugged was ranked #1 in several reader's choice polls for the best novel of the century, most notably the Random House Modern Library list). I will also add that there are so many things that are wrong with that review. The last sentence refers to "budding Republicans and Libertarians", but Objectivists are not Republicans, not Libertarians, and definitely not Democrats. Most Objectivists do not classify themselves with a political party at all. We do not like the Democrats because their agenda is completely opposite to what we want (obviously); we do not like the Republicans because they try to justify capitalism on the grounds of altruism--which is a contradiction, a capitalist system cannot also be altruistic (altruism can only exist with statism), and we do not like the present mixed economy (don't fool yourself for one minute into thinking that this is a capitalist system we're under--just ask any Macroeconomics teacher); and we do not like the Libertarians because they do not try to justify what they are pushing for on a philosophical basis, so in essence they are really advocating anarchism, amoralism, and subjectivism (I will remind you that Objectivists want lassiez-faire capitalism, do have a ethical code, and are objective, not subjective). I will also add that the protagonists are not such impossible people. Just you wait--there is a John Galt--he just happens to be a she--Who is Sarah Ellis? (Yes, I am going to start the same type of strike that John Galt started in the novel.) And as for the bad guys not being real--I dare you to compare James Taggart, Orren Boyle, Wesley Mouch, and Mr. Thompson to some of the leading figures in the Democratic party in the past few decades. Atlas Shrugged is all too real in that sense. Rand defined herself as a romantic realist in that the setting is here and on this earth, but that she portrays things as they ought to be. In the context of Atlas Shrugged, the state of the world in the earlier days of the strike is pretty much what it is now (I dare you to check the newspapers and compare the two), and the romantic element is what the strike accomplishes (i.e. the changes Rand wants to see). I will mention that right now there are actually quite a few "strikes" on the much smaller scale going on: for example, American biomedical workers going overseas because of our laws restricting human stem-cell and cloning research (a side note: WAY TO GO CALIFORNIA!!! Someone had to question the federal goverment's effective ban on stem-cell research). So there are some strikes happening now--they're just on a much smaller scale than the strike in Atlas Shrugged--but I intend to make "Atlas shrug" completely, just like John Galt. Hmm, maybe I should rename this thread "Who is Sarah Ellis?" because this is like my own smaller scale version of John Galt's speech (and one of the functions of John Galt's speech was to answer in very full detail, who is John Galt). I will not refute any of your other points, because as I have already said, it's not getting anywhere--I still haven't convinced you I'm right--I'm just smart enough to know when to close my mouth, unlike someone else I know! *cough*Josh*cough*

Most importantly, if you haven't read Atlas Shrugged--actually read it: don't base your opinion of the novel off of one bad review if you haven't read it!!

I think you missed the words..."Science Fiction". I too can also claim that what I say goes in one ear and out the other for you dagny. Moreover you will always view your viewpoint as correct until you stop and consider others and that will only happen until you keep an openmind.

I've understood your viewpoint but I also ask that you understand mine..




In response to your claims of Time Travel, it is theoritically possible however if people did go back in time, why don't people go back in time right now and correct the many errors of September 11? But imagine the amount of chaos it would bring if someone did allow Time Travel. Someone would mess with the time continium and alter history completely, and one to disliking of many of today's people....including yourself..

:rolleyes:

[ManagerJosh]

You missed my point--have you read it yourself?

As for the time travel theories--that is for another thread together.

At this point I will remind you that I promised to shut up on this topic, and if you are wise, so will you! - Dagny_Taggart

[ManagerJosh]

one more thing then I'll shut up...



Of all the stories I remember from the Bible, I would have to say that the Garden of Eden one has always been the one that infuriated me the most--which is one of the primary reasons I never have been able to accept Christianity



I think you have it wrong. You are not keeping an open mind which is the primary reason why you have never been able to accept Christianity.

[ManagerJosh]

Sigh...argument was archived or deleted somewhere at the forums I attend but at least I still have this :D :p