Summer means no religion or politics?

[Tuomas]

See, you're the one that goes after the quick reward situation. You pray for your ill uncle and God cures him?

Well if he can't cure him, he ain't no use to me. I'll let my girlfriend do the praying, if it makes her feel better, I sure know it won't help her anyway, but it might make her worry less. I guess.

[Khris]

Edit: @Vince Twelve
Exactly.

Misj:
I assume you want to raise the completely bogus assertion that science fans/atheists are religious, too, because they swallow everything a scientist says without demanding proof and are like followers of a cult themselves.
If you meant something else, please clarify.

miguel:
That sounds all very esoteric to me. And how does cancer or HIV not count in my life? I'm a smoker and I have sex, so I'm facing the very real dangers of getting lung cancer or contracting an STD.
Could you please contribute something that has a connection to the actual, real world we all live in?
You seem almost delusional.
And who decided who God will listen to?
Could you tell us to what degree you're taking the bible as the literal true word of god?
See, that's primarily what annoys me about religious people, they seem to know all these details about how and why (a hypothetical) god acts and feels the way he does.

[LimpingFish]

See, that's primarily what annoys me about religious people, they seem to know all these details about how and why (a hypothetical) god acts and feels the way he does.

And it's primarily that which led me to Agnosticism.

Our understanding of existence is limited by our mortality. What lies beyond will either be an Afterlife or the void, but you're free to believe in either outcome.

Until that moment, the only absolute is the here and now.

[Jim Reed]

Greets!

Has anybody here read Castaneda?

Oh, and yes, God definitly exists.

Edit:
Oh yes, it's a long story...but, as seen with my very own eyes, many times, praying healing works. Therefore, I'll advocate (Christian) God's existence to ones interested, as seem proper.

[MrColossal]

Shit, really?

Alright guys, nevermind, let's pack it up. We were wrong.

to expand on this post:

The thing one needs to do when debating religion is first do a Q&A with the religious person to find out what team they are on [catholic? muslim? seventh day adventist? (Seventh Day an Adventurist?)], what they believe as far as their own holy book of choice [old testament? new testament? king james version?] and how they interpret that holy book.

If you're debating the abstract notion of a god like being, good luck, there's not much to debate. But if you can pin someone down to beliefs you've got a discussion that is worth having. Faith flip flops from one person to the next it's insane keeping track of these things, personally. Especially on an internet forum where too many belief systems interact in the conversation, if you try to pin someone down "Why doesn't prayer heal amputees!?" and someone says "prayer doesn't work that way!" but someone else says "prayer DOES INDEED work like that! FAITH OF A MUSTARD SEED!" and then someone else says "Prayer has been blocked by the devil and his minions on earth by satellites so since the 70s all our prayers are being bounced back on us and causing global warming!" it makes it hard to have a conversation.

So, I would suggest maybe picking one premise and fleshing it out after learning the beliefs of the person you are debating.

[Ghost]

So, I would suggest maybe picking one premise and fleshing it out after learning the beliefs of the person you are debating.

Best, most sensible tip so far. That's why I really dislike religious discussion, it's like punching fog. And being drunken while doing so.

[Nacho]

But it doesn't explain where all this came from, including the energy etc. for the big bang. And what went before.

This is true.  Science doesn't yet explain what there was before the big bang, or if there was nothing, then where the big bang came from.  But that doesn't mean that it will never be able to explain this!  

But it has prooved that the Big Bang created everything. And everything means, everything, including the empty space, the rules of physics and the time. Therefore, there was no God before Big Bang (There was nothing, actually). Or... There was, and he died, since the origin of all was a infinitelly tiny funnel where nothing can pass through.

One quick question for Christians... Why in the Old Testament God was a intenrventionist full of rage being, coming to help every certain time its people, and after that he stopped his appearances? He became shy?

[Misj']

Misj:
I assume you want to raise the completely bogus assertion that science fans/atheists are religious, too, because they swallow everything a scientist says without demanding proof and are like followers of a cult themselves.
If you meant something else, please clarify.

Ok, to clarify, I think atheists - and when I use that term in this post I do not mean all atheists, but at least several involved in this thread - are hypocrites (whether that makes them religious is up to you). Now why do I say that (in other words: what really, really annoys me)?

1. They claim that the followers of religion consider themselves superior of non-believers because of their 'enlightened' world-view (without God you're less of a human, they say that religious followers say). However, at the same time these same atheists consider themselves superior to religious people because they have an enlightened world-view (since there is no God they are not hung-up on fairy-tales and see the world as it REALLY is). It's like saying: "I hate that guy, he always thinks he's the best...but I am the best, and he should treat me like that"...

2. They claim that religious people are illogical and irrational because they blindly accept what some people say without critically testing it themselves (you can only believe in God and stuff if you shut down your brain and stop thinking). However, at the same time these atheist blindly accept what some other people say without critically testing it themselves either (they repeat  the words of some (popular) scientists like parrots, but never took the time to test whether it was true).

3. If a religious person writes a book, blog, or whatever on scientific subject without having a scientific background, but based on a number of books that he has read, he is ridiculed everywhere for being a whack who doesn't know what he's talking about, and who should let the science to scientists, who actually know what they are talking about (and the only people who believe such a fool must be brainwashed believers who also have no scientific background). However, when an atheist makes a number of scientific statements without having a scientific background - basing it solely on a number of books that he has read - he (and his fellow atheists) suddenly consider him an expert on the field who should be accepted because he has read a bunch of scientific books.

4. Religious people are disrespectful of others who have a different opinion. They always feel the need to tell these people 'how things really are' and convert them to their 'world-view'. At the same time these same atheists are disrespectful of others who do not share their opinion (on the subject God or Not), and feel the need to tell these people 'how things REALLY are' and convert them to their 'world-view'.

I think these atheists (again I'm not talking about ALL atheists here) should take their own advice...because their current behaviour is hypocrite to me. I think many of their accusations towards (a number of) religious people is completely valid. It is however a pity they did not learn from it, and make exactly the same mistakes. If that makes them cult-followers, religious or just dumb for not learning from the past...well, that's up to you.

Ps. There are many atheists whom I do not consider hypocrites (concerning the above statements) by the way.

[Intense Degree]

So, I would suggest maybe picking one premise and fleshing it out after learning the beliefs of the person you are debating.

The person you are debating? Woah what happened since I went to bed last night?! :o

For me, this started as a debate over whether or not belief in God was illogical (or at least me questioning Nacho's statement that it was). Now it feels like it's starting to get this "hunt the christian" vibe and I feel people's anger getting up.

Apologies if I have misunderstood anyone's intentions here but for me it's time to bow out of this thread, as I would ideally like to make friends here rather than anger people, which is what appears to be happening.

Hoping we can all be friends despite differences in belief .

Point of interest - I am not backing out of this just because someone is challenging my faith, in fact I have not really said what my faith is for anyone to challenge besides a belief in God. Rather because the tone of the thread appears (to me) to be changing from fairly objective debate, when I initially questioned Nacho's statement, towards (i.e. not all the way there yet...) a "Christian hunt".

But if anyone wants to know and/or ask questions of my faith etc. and wouldn't get too wound up by the subject please feel free to PM me.

[SSH]

But it has prooved that the Big Bang created everything.

Then why do some scientists not beilive in the Big Bang? There are many other theories, even if you exclude those involving supernatural beings.

The whole big bang theory is based on extrapolating backwards from the current observed state of the universe by relativistic physics. There are some pretty big assumptions in this:

1) The rules of physics have been constant forever
2) Our current knowledge of the rules is complete enough to make such an enourmous extrapolation

It may be that these assumptions are valid, but if they are not, we may be trying to extrapolate the starting position of one of those magent/ball "perpetual motion" office toys from its current state through billions of years of chaotic interactions. The slightest miscalculation would lead to a totally invalid answer.

[veryweirdguy]

Um, guys, I think the only think we can take from The Big Bang Theory is that occasionally nerdy physicist types can be friends with attractive blondes.

[Lionmonkey]

About logic:

There are some opinions that theism has got no logical basis. I must say that no matter how much Science can explain the World logically, there's always a tiny little "illogical" thing one has to believe in, in order to embrace the scientific theory. So my conclusion is: It is illogical to believe in (be assured of, think that it is the truth, underline the appropriate) any theory, be it religious or scientific.

So what do I do? I hear people's opinions and neither approve of them, nor I do not. As for myself, I just do not allow my mind to care about it. I don't think "So that's how the World appeared, and that's how it didn't", more like "So that's this person's opinion and that's the other one's".

And in the end I feel myself much greater than any of these guys who keep arguing about stuff. So why don't you guys stop all the arguing and just feel how great you are?

[Khris]

Misj':
Alright, I can see your point and I agree to some degree.
My objection would be that there's a major difference between a scientific and a religious approach to "looking for the truth".

A scientist tries to make as few assumptions as humanly possible while a religious person is always going to interpret everything they find in the light of their preconceived belief system.
If a scientist discovers something that is going to overthrow the current prevailing view among his group, he's going to be as sure as possible it actually will, then is going to present it to the public. Every other scientist can now reproduce the experiment or whatever it was, and there's going to be a big struggle. But in the end, the old "beliefs" will be shedded and will be replaced by the implications of the new discovery. It has happened numerous times and it is still happening to this day, and will always be the case among honest scientists (which luckily most of them are).
Take the discovery that ulcers are caused by bacteria, not stress, or the rearrangement of the root of the tree of life.
The beauty of this method is that it is inherently self-policing. Given enough time, wrong conceptions are all efficiently weeded out.

The only time when something similar happens in a religious environment is when a part of the belief system clashes so heavily with current moral or ethical standards (in the western world) that the church simply has no other choice than to take a step back in order not to loose its more intelligent followers.
Just look at how many Christians were disgusted by how the Pope protected that fucking holocaust denier.

To put it as a very simple analogy, a scientist will leave the house without windows equipped with suntan lotion and an umbrella, and he will use whatever is appropriate.
And the believers (at least those who even bother to leave the house) won't. They will stand in the thunderstorm, happily applying the lotion.

That's why the "scientific way" is objectively superior IMO. And no matter how many points you raise to try to put it on the same level as the religious approach, nothing's gonna change that.

Lionmonkey:
Scientific theories are well established conceptual frameworks, to a degree that it is very unlikely they get overthrown as a whole. Small parts of it are gonna change though, and it continuously happens.
But nothing about them is illogical. You could say that one has to believe the theory, but what is the point of saying that? Is it somehow beneficial if I decide to stop believing e.g. the theory of gravity?

And luckily, scientific truths aren't decided by a majority vote, contrary to religious "truths".

It's nice that you feel great when indulging in your ignorance though.

[miguel]

KhrisMUC, I think you're getting too personal about this. Natcho, I can handle him, because he's just Spanish and the best footballer in the world is Portuguese. 8)
My life is pretty real. It's even hard sometimes. I started this thread to see if people could spar some thoughts in a mature way. And the main barrier I see is that most non-believers see the world as it is today and cannot put themselves, by a simple exercise using their imagination, on how life was in the past.
Actually I see non-believers as very narrow-minded people, sorry to say it.
You keep coming back with the Bible witch is common sense that it cannot be read like a novel. Yet Natcho goes about the Old Testament without even taking a simple google search and find out what scientist (wow, really? Scientists?) have done so far in tracing back history through the events of the Bible. Surprising it may be, Khris, all the main events described in the Bible have related coherent occurrences both geographically and on our known time line.
About you smoking and the possibility of getting cancer it's really up to your willing on diminishing the probabilities. What I meant and I agree I didn't pick the right words was that science may cure those but will at the same time create other.
Science is getting into a very dangerous path and we will pay a enormous price. Super medication side effects are clear. It creates Super bacteria.
Before you judge me for what I just wrote, let me tell you that if I had to take this red pill to live even knowing that humanity COULD suffer some time later with my action, my answer is that probably I would take the pill.
I am not better than you. Maybe you would throw the pill away.
------------------
Who decides who God listens to?
Why do I know what and why God does things?
Well the answer is through praying. It's a state of mind. I can't be any more clear than this because I lack the words or talent to do it.
If I sound delusional to you then I know it's time for me to retire from the very thread I started. I can see your tolerance towards different opinions is next to zero.
I've been mocked, insulted and even my wife was called a nazi.
I feel just like a Christian in Imperial Rome.      

[Phemar]

The events in the old testament probably did happen at some stage in time somewhere. Doesn't prove God though.

[miguel]

Isn't by now accepted in this thread that I cannot prove God's existence to you?

[Nacho]

That' s funny, intense... ^_^ When I said "Believing in God is illogical" it was a "good time for debating".

When the big bang and other scientific theories came to the debate, according to you, it became "hunt the christian".

Yes, I agree... When rationality and science gets into the debate, it basically becomes a "hunt the beliver" thing...  

SSH: There are scientists who believe that racist theories are okay. Some others believe in cryptofauna and in UFOs. I think there is absolutelly nothing in earth which has a compete "Quórum". We must choose which things are sensible and which not. I believe in Big Bang. And Big Bang was a cosmic meatcracker which destroyed it all before (IT ALL... even the t-X law physics). If God was there before time, he died. If he was there after T>0... Then how can he be the creator???

Okay. Some questions:

Some years ago "believers" believed that eart was created something like 6,000 years ago, in 6 days, and every animal, including men, where created in that period. They were CONVINCED it was true. Nowadays believers (Or at least, most of them) say: "Well, you know? That was poetry! Metaphors and all that... We know God did not created the Universe that way... But we are CONVINCED he was there, and he created the universe more or less in the way scientist say"

-How can you, knowing that the "conviction" of the "old believers" was uncorrect, be so sure that your "conviction" is the correct one?
-Do gorillas have a soul? When were humans awarded with a soul? Homo Habilis? Homo Erectus? Did neandertals had a sould? If so, why God allowed them to be terminated?
-If the best and kindiest golden-heart person in earth is born in a place where they don' t know God and he does not have the possibility to become a believer... can he go to heaven?
-Can Hitler go to heaven if he confesses his sins before passing away, if his confession was "correct" according to catholic standards?
-Is it okay to force your sister in law to marry her brother in law if she widowed shortly after?
-Who can go to heaven? Christians? Those who follow the religions of the book, muslims and jews can go to heaven as well?
-What happens with those who believe in Shiva?
-What happens with the souls of those who were in earth before the old testament was written?
-What happens to you if you made a mortal sin one week before it was written in the Old Testament?
-What happens to you if you make a mortal sin that has been recently added to the Old testament, but you had no possible way to read it because the last edition of the book hasn't arrived yet to your local book store?

As you can see, I am being very respectfull... I am curious about religion and I want answers... Thanks!

[Nacho]

He... Miguel made a post before I finished.

1) Is Messi portuguese? I thought he was from Argentina.
2) "Scientists" discovering that there are real things in Old Testaments. Yes... and there are also evidences of old houses destroyed in Arkansas by tornados: Do we believe in Dorothy and the Wizard of Oz? There are also "evidences" of the laberynth of the minotaur. Archeologists have found toys in the cave where Zeus was supposed to hide for not being killed by his father, and they were more or less about the same period when the tradition tells that happened... Do we believe in Zeus? There are also "evidences" of Troy... Should we believe that Laoconte and his sons were attacked by a giant sea snake? Do we believe in Centaurs, and cyclops?

They are not really "scientist", we must say. They are archeologists: People who works in a land devastated by (religious) wars who have a difficult task and need money. Every sensationalist headline counts. If a boat is found in Tiberiades sea, it's "Jesus' boat". If a tomb is found in deep old Jerusalem, it's "Jesus' tomb". When you pass of the headline and read the complete article, you found nothing but lot of noise and very few nuts. Simillar case as for "evidences of Atlantis" or "the UFO incident in Roswell".

Can you answer me a question? Why there is no record (not even a sigle word) of the stay of Isralians in Egypt? A culture which documented, wrote and drawed everything? Why there is not even a single hebrew word written in an old stone in Egypt?

[miguel]

Natcho, can't you ask questions that were not answered before?

- Why are you so sure they were wrong? Because I told you so?

- Gorillas have souls, you don't!

- The best and kindest golden-hearted person in earth will surely die in peace. That's Heaven.

- I have no doubt someone like Hitler could confess his sins. If he truly acknowledged what he did, I wouldn't want to be inside his head. Haven't you done bad things that you regretted later, Natcho?

- I will not answer the question about your sister. If you don't need God then figure it out yourself.

- Everybody can "Go to Heaven", even you.

- I hope those who believe in Shiva play Dave Gilbert's game

- Read the Old Testament again.

- The same as above.

- What do you think?

Your answers Natcho.  

[Misj']

Alright, I can see your point and I agree to some degree.

I'm glad to hear that.

My objection would be that there's a major difference between a scientific and a religious approach to "looking for the truth".

The problem is: science is not 'looking for the truth'; this is a common misconception of science, but it's just not the job of science. Science is about 'looking for the mechanisms (based on objective observations)'. There is no why, there's only a how in true science. So your story is (more or less) correct when it concerns the mechanisms by which things work (also not entirely because there's a lot of politics in science).

A scientist tries to make as few assumptions as humanly possible while a religious person is always going to interpret everything they find in the light of their preconceived belief system.

However, since science is about the 'how' a preconceived belief system makes no difference. Cells won't divide differently if they are created by a god or by accident. The preconceived belief system plays only a role in non-scientific (non-about-mechanisms) questions...and as a consequence there is no difference between the pre-assumption that there is or is no god, because neither of them concern the field of science.

If a scientist discovers something that is going to overthrow the current prevailing view among his group, he's going to be as sure as possible it actually will, then is going to present it to the public.

And it is likely not going to be accepted for publication by the peer reviewers...unless of course the person who wrote is is already a big-shot in the field.

Every other scientist can now reproduce the experiment or whatever it was, and there's going to be a big struggle. But in the end, the old "beliefs" will be shedded and will be replaced by the implications of the new discovery. It has happened numerous times and it is still happening to this day, and will always be the case among honest scientists (which luckily most of them are).

But how many of them will actually reproduce it? - Let me tell you a story here: I know someone who was to review an article. He tried to reproduce the experiment outlined in the article and failed to do so. However, his professor told him to accept it anyway because the group that had written the article was a well respected group. This is actually quite a common practice in science...although most experiments aren't reproduced because it costs money and cannot be published (if it fails you can't publish it because it is in disagreement with the accepted literature, if it is in agreement you can't publish it because it's already published...so the entire experiment was a complete waste of money).

Also...if most scientists have as few assumptions as possible then why do most of them start writing the article (including the conclusion) even before a single experiment was conducted. This too is common practice, and is often advocated to save time and money. Only if the outcome of the experiment is really different from the expected (assumed) result he will rewrite it.

Take the discovery that ulcers are caused by bacteria, not stress

Ah yes...a great story: in tissue of the stomach people saw small dark spots. But when students drew them the established scientists told them that it were artefacts and should be removed from the drawings because they weren't real. At one point someone was fed up with that answer and decided to find out what kind of artefact it really was. He then found that it wasn't an artefact at all but rather bacteria. So in the end indeed they found the correct answer...however, had it not been for the scientists they would have found that answer much sooner. Stress by the way plays a role too.

The beauty of this method is that it is inherently self-policing. Given enough time, wrong conceptions are all efficiently weeded out.

In theory...and only concerning mechanisms.

The only time when something similar happens in a religious environment is when a part of the belief system clashes so heavily with current moral or ethical standards (in the western world) that the church simply has no other choice than to take a step back in order not to loose its more intelligent followers.Just look at how many Christians were disgusted by how the Pope protected that fucking holocaust denier.

Either you know little about church history or you just vastly ignore it. Religious ideas are highly dynamic (just compare the ideas in 20-year-old books to those of 100-years-ago and those today). Sure, there are similarities...but the existence of similarities is not in disagreement with dynamics.

To put it as a very simple analogy, a scientist will leave the house without windows equipped with suntan lotion and an umbrella, and he will use whatever is appropriate.
And the believers (at least those who even bother to leave the house) won't. They will stand in the thunderstorm, happily applying the lotion.

I have no idea which scientists or believers this applies to, but this highly contradicts my general observation of either group.

That's why the "scientific way" is objectively superior IMO. And no matter how many points you raise to try to put it on the same level as the religious approach, nothing's gonna change that.

So there is nothing I can say to convince you that your pre-assumptions about what scientists do and what science is are mere assumptions? - That's a pity...particularly because I don't think you base your assumptions on first-person experiences (with scientists)...you may proof me wrong of course.