Summer means no religion or politics?

[Intense Degree]

I was staying out of this, but that sounds suspiciously like a protection racket to me.
"These rules are for your own good, because if you follow them I won't kill you."

Yeah, I see where you're coming from with that but the rules were/are honestly for Man's own good rather than some kind of attempt at extortion or something. Man has nothing that God needs.

In fact, when Adam & Eve were turfed out of the garden of eden they were provided with clothes by God as he still cared and the rejection was not on his side.

[Ultra Magnus]

if you don't make peace with God you can't go to heaven, Jesus Christ was the son of God, Jesus was sent to the world by God, making peace with Jesus is like making peace with God

But Tommy doesn't know what day it is.
He doesn't know who Jesus was, or what praying is.
How can he be saved from the eternal grave?

Yeah, I see where you're coming from with that but the rules were/are honestly for Man's own good rather than some kind of attempt at extortion or something. Man has nothing that God needs.

Except for the ego stroking that comes with unquestioning loyal devotion, of course ("for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God”).

[MrColossal]

I enjoy the thought of being banished from the garden as a Necessary Sin. If man didn't disobey god then we would not be here. No one would be here. There never would have been computers or airplanes or pictures of the Earth from the surface of the Moon or Chow Chows

Does it not seem then that you'd have to thank adam and eve for original sin or you'd never have been born?

This of course presupposes a belief that not only does God exist but that the Bible is a literal telling of events...

[Jim Reed]

Sure Tommy-my-boy, if no one told you about God, He may pop up one day to introduce himself. It's possible, as there are many other ways to learn about God than the one I described, also.

What if someone was tutored by an apostole and he is now tutoring Tommy? That's a possibility.

Or maybe Tommy becomes able to see God (a part of him) during his life (yes, that's possible) and realize what it is.

Maybe he'll catch an angel and the angel will say it to him. And yes that's possible, too.

[Nacho]

The moment Eve ate the fruit was the most important moment of history of humanity. Humans gave the Paradise, the shelter of a God, the comfortability away for curiosity and will of knowleadge. I praise Eve and Adam for that. Thanks, dear antecessors, for saying "Frack you!" to that  despot who offered shelter only if you worship Him and with the condition of not touching His beloved stupid fruit. Thanks, dear antecessors, for a thrilling life of good and bad human emotions away of the boring spiritual life that this fascist offered!

Edit: Hehehe... just read Eric' s post... Yeah, just what I meant, mate, I agree! THIS is much better than a life under God's shelter.

[Intense Degree]

Ultra Magnus:

1. As to Tommy, I honestly don't know.

2. Jealousy. I spent a lot of time thinking about and looking into this as it initially seemed to me like a bad thing on God's part which wouldn't appear to accord with the Bible saying he is good.

Firstly, some jealousy is good. For instance I (and most men I would assume) don't want anyone else to sleep with my wife. This is a jealous love that I have for my wife. It doesn't mean that I won't let her talk to another man or anything like that, that would be bad jealousy of course, but I am jealous of that part of our relationship because we promised each other when we married we would be faithful to each other and I don't want anyone else getting involved!

Secondly God is actually worthy of unquestioning loyal devition/praise/worship whatever you want to call it. This was a hard concept to grasp for me because I have never met anyone else who is(!) and that made it seem arrogant to me. However it's not arrogance if it's true and only in this one case it is.

However, God does not need the "ego-stroking" from us and what's more he doesn't get it! I would love to say that I am unquestioningly loyal to God (as a christian) but I know, from my own experience that I am not, no matter what my intentions are.

MrColossal:

I don't see why (taking your pre-suppositions of course) the disobedience would mean we would not be here, or that we would not be creative, intelligent and all the other things that we can be. On the contrary, it seems to me that if we (man) had not been thrown out of the garden of eden, (pre-suppositions again), things might be a lot better!

[MrColossal]

Well then you get into the wondering what God's plan was for 2 people in a garden. Would man eventually have built... cities?

If God had a plan for 2 people in a garden then that plan was changed which raises more questions about the fallibility of an omnipotent presence and his ability to plan. One of the major questions being, was man set up to fail?

I dunno, I still like the idea of Necessary Sin, it ties nicely in to the myth of Prometheus disobeying the Gods and stealing fire from them.

[Nacho]

I've added "God" to my friends list in facebook... and he told me that I was right. He said:

"Do what you want, no worshipping, of course... If you do this you'll enjoy double and suffer half. And of course I invented the Snake, for bringing you curiosity and knowleadge... Don't trust what priests tell you about that matter!"

He told to me.

[Khris]

The second chapter does not say that man was created before animals. I presume you are referring to 2:19 which is where God brought all the animals etc. that he HAD (past tense there you may notice) created to man to name them.

Then in v21  God makes woman, which on any reading cannot be before he made man or the animals.

So I suppose my questions to you would be If you are going to read the bible can I suggest you do it a little bit more carefully?

I was actually referring to 2:7 where god forms man out of dust before he creates the garden, puts man into it and proceeds to make the animals and Eve.
Here's a direct, unaltered quote:

And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam

Doesn't sound like animals first, then Adam.

So before insulting my intelligence you should maybe do a little careful reading yourself.

Also, I was writing "We're talking about the inspired word of god here, describing how the universe came into existence, right?" to suggest that it seems a little odd that the god-inspired people who wrote this can't decide on one order and leave in the blatantly contradicting parts when describing a very important issue like the creation of the universe. Not really the universe even, rather just earth. A distinction between night and day doesn't really make sense with regard to a universe.

Also, in my opinion the Genesis account is exactly what I would expect people from the stone age to explain how the earth, humans and the rest got here.
It's not what I would expect from an omnipotent god. Why did he use dust to form man? Why not poof him into existence? And why doesn't the bible contain any information that said stone age tribesmen couldn't have?
Makes you wonder.

[Jim Reed]

A, B, C and D go for a walk one day.

A: Did you know that I believe in X, and that He created man before animals?
B: Can't be! I believe in Y, and He created animals first, and made the first woman out of leaves and the first man out of the womans earwax.
C: No! I believe in Z, and He says that He created the holy ostrich first, and that man is from Mars.
D: Nah, I don't believe in X, Y or Z, but a man I consider smart, the famous professor N of the institue M, said that we all came from frogs, so I think animals were here first.
A: Bah, who is N against X?
B: No, you're both wrong, Y made us all.
C: But you don't respect my opinion at all, you morons!
D: C, you're are what I consider Q because you said bla, B you're just plain dumb, and A? You're what I consider R if you know what R is. If not, that just proves that I'm the smartest here. And the world revolves around me.
A: Fuck you D!
B: But the world revolves around me!
...

Suddenly, a hungry tiger jumps in the midst of them!

A: (screams and runs)
B: (screams and runs)
C: (screams and runs)
D: (screams and runs)

What's the point?
Who cares how it all began? We're here now.
And the tiger is going to eat you no matter what you believe.

Cheers!

[Intense Degree]

I was actually referring to 2:7 where god forms man out of dust before he creates the garden, puts man into it and proceeds to make the animals and Eve.

Khris, did you go on to read 2:8? In 2:7 we hear about God creating man and giving him life. Then in 2:8 he put man in the Garden he HAD created

Here's a direct, unaltered quote of 2:19 from NIV (reportedly the most widely used English version of the bible):

Now the Lord God had formed out of the ground all the beasts of the field and all the birds of the air. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them:...

The chapters are consistent, including your quote (which I assume is 2:19 from another translation) as even there the creation of the animals is past tense and it does not say that Adam was created first, merely that after they were created they were brought to Adam. Chapter 1 tells us they were created first.

You will note that Chapter 1 deals with creation of the world and chapter 2 (from verse four onwards at least) is concerned particularly with Adam and Eve.

Also, I was writing "We're talking about the inspired word of god here, describing how the universe came into existence, right?" to suggest that it seems a little odd that the god-inspired people who wrote this can't decide on one order and leave in the blatantly contradicting parts when describing a very important issue like the creation of the universe. Not really the universe even, rather just earth. A distinction between night and day doesn't really make sense with regard to a universe.

Also, in my opinion the Genesis account is exactly what I would expect people from the stone age to explain how the earth, humans and the rest got here.
It's not what I would expect from an omnipotent god. Why did he use dust to form man? Why not poof him into existence? And why doesn't the bible contain any information that said stone age tribesmen couldn't have?
Makes you wonder.

As above there is no decision on one order or the other, I do not accept there are contradictions here.

I do say there are contradictions in your posts though. You first said that chapter two said God created Man, then the Woman from his rib and then the animals and now you have said that it was Adam, the animals and then Eve.

Also, as previously stated this is not a "scientific manual" which is focused on the practical methods used for the creation of the earth as it is "skimmed over" in one chapter (effectively). It is primarily about Man and God. Therefore there is no use trying to read it as something it isn't.

Furthermore, I'm sorry if you think I was insulting your intelligence, I honestly didn't mean to. I did disagree with what you said concerning the first two chapters of Genesis and tried to put that to you in a non-insulting way. If I did insult you I apologise as I know you would never be insulting yourself if you disagreed with someone...!

[Intense Degree]

(apologies for double post)

Well then you get into the wondering what God's plan was for 2 people in a garden. Would man eventually have built... cities?

If God had a plan for 2 people in a garden then that plan was changed which raises more questions about the fallibility of an omnipotent presence and his ability to plan.

Gods plan for 2 people in a garden:

Genesis 1:28

..."Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground."

i.e. expand, explore, innovate, be creative. Sounds OK to me and I don't see why this would stop us building cities. In fact it sounds a little bit like what we have done (not all good things of course but we have done the things mentioned above) and therefore in respect of that, what change of plan?

Also, I don't know about set up to fail but given the opportunity to fail - certainly.

[Chicky]

I can't believe you're looking into this in such detail, does it matter? I'm sure that something this old has had a few confused translations along the way.

[Khris]

Intense Degree:

I've looked up several different translations, both German and English. In ALL OF THEM, the order in Gen. 2 is: Adam, Garden, River(s), Animals, Eve.
You can stick to the one translation that uses a "had", ignore all the other translations, ignore that "had" is used like in "the judge had him removed from the court", as in, ordered somebody to remove him, but that won't change the fact that you're wrong on this one.
Jesus, it even says "Now" at the very beginning of your quote!

Also keep in mind that the great thing about my position is that it's sufficient to find exactly one contradiction to confirm my hypothesis, while yours requires the bible to be completely free of them.
I've merely taken the first verse I came across that striked me as a contradiction, but there's plenty of others to choose from.

Misj':
You didn't have to write the same stuff twice. Instead you could have reacted to my arguments against your points.

As I said earlier, according to a Jewish way to study scripture, every verse in the bible has 70-something possible explanations.

Let's take this verse, Gen. 5:26: "After he became the father of Lamech, Methuselah lived 782 years and had other sons and daughters."
I really wanna see that Jewish way to study scripture come up with seventy explanations for that.

Just because some asshat somewhere invented some bullshit method to "study" something doesn't make it relevant in any meaningful way automatically.
I could publish a book on how gravity is an illusion and base its claims on my way to "study" gravity. If I based my "research" into gravity on the "fact" that football-sized objects float but didn't do experiments with anything else than helium balloons, would you consider my research meaningful and the conclusions drawn from it justified at all?
No, you'd simply ignore them, even though you didn't have a diploma in Khrismuc-Non-Gravity, wouldn't you?

[Lionmonkey]

Proof proof proof proved prove proof prove PROOF!!!"

Is there any proof that any proof can be trusted?

Spoiler

No, because there's no proof that proof of that any proof can be trusted. And so on.
So, if you think that science is the way to go, you believe in it just like it is with religion.

[close]

[Akatosh]

That's admittedly the main problem with induction, and the reason such a big fuss is made about falsifiability - we may not be able to prove something is true, but failing to prove it's false depite a theoretically possibility to do so is the next best thing, really. Oh, and despite this problem, scientifc theories aren't just "made up" despite the impossibility of proof - in order to get your hypothesis elevated to the high, high level of "theory", you have to have a lot of evidence. We don't make shit up as we go (unless funding runs out).

On the overall, I'd still rather trust someone that says "Here are the facts, here is our theory. They line up almost perfectly, and the latter can accurately predict and describe the former, but you're welcome to try and disprove the theory" than somebody who continually screams "I AM RIGHT DESPITE THE FACTS YOU'RE LOOKING AT THEM WRONG I AM RIGHT I AM RIGHT I AM RIGHT!"

[guitar_hero]

Akatosh, it's still a circular argument. You can't proof the logic of a certain system with it's own logic. By saying the big bonus of scientific theories is that they're "not just made up" you're only saying that scientific theories use scientific rules. Even if you put high trust in science you should be aware that it's comforting safety only is found (to illustrate that with a picture) inside the house - not in it's foundation.

[Matti]

Lionmonkey:

Science relates occurances ans processes, predicts and describes things, puts diverse prcedures into context etc. You can call that truth, belief or whatever you can come up with, but it's still the same... it's an observation of the world as we see and know it.

When you, on the other hand, say, that some guy heard a burning bush speaking some thousand years ago, it has nothing to do with truth, the world or whatsoever.

That argument is basically a negation of what people sense (in every way - seeing, smelling, feeling etc.) and just a fragile monument of thoughts that doesn't make any sense unless you believe in it.

EDIT: Guitar hero, science doesn't follow "scientific rules". Okay, yes it does, but for every work there must be a plan on how to do it. It's nothing else than that. As I stated above, science doesn't make its own rules, but it takes a look at nature and draws conclusions from it. And afterwards it can apply these rules to other processes. When something works out, it counts as a rule (or as "truth" if you will) and I wonder what your argument against that would look like.

Also, science doesn't deliver "safety" or "comfort", it's just trying to make us understand what's going on in the world.

[Khris]

Oh my god, I can't believe the amount of stupid I have to read here.
We went to the moon. We got rid of several major, evil diseases. We have cars, television sets, Playstations, cell phones, GPS navigation, X-Ray machines, and had light bulbs and electric typewriters and steam machines even way before that.
None, NONE of those are possible without discovering/building and applying scientific principles/theories.
It simply works, no matter how many bullshit arguments you people throw at it.
Science delivered, delivers and will deliver, no matter how many stupid idiots are trying to discredit it.

Please, move to Canaan, go live in a hut and become a goat herder, praying all day for not dying of the flu if you must, but please leave us sane people alone with that vacuous crap.

[guitar_hero]

Oh my god, I can't believe the amount of stupid I have to read here.

Guess you just have re-read your own posts? Seriously you can believe me, you're not the only one with that sentence in your mind.

It simply works

That's what I already said in my first posts in this thread. I don't see anyone here descrediting science. Some people simply don't share your believe that only the scientific view of the world is good/right/whatever...

Ok, so I said everything I have to say.