By the way mags,I just repped you for being the one to bring acid trips into the discussion. A lot can be learned through the introspection inspired by tripping.
God is something that can't really be proved or disproved. I hate it when people who believe in a religion think that people who don't believe in their religion are morons and vice versa. Just because someone believes something differently than you (whether that be christianity, judism, islam, hindu, or just plain not believing) doesn't make them dumb or mean they are going to hell because they don't believe what you do. So to those who believe, keep on believing. But if I choose to not believe in some of your teachings, don't judge me or look down upon me as I've experienced MANY churches and church-goers do. It's like ok...I drink alcohol. Don't act like I'm a hoodlum because I drink. In a lot of cases the person judging me for drinking alcohol was an alcoholic before they became "saved." True story. One of my best friends growing up was the son of a pastor. I went to a church camp with him when we were 15. We got to the camp before any other kids, so we found a cabin, put our stuff in it, changed into shorts and went to the gym to play basketball. 30 minutes later, people chase us down and say we need to move to another cabin since we put our stuff in a girls cabin (cabins were not identified or anything, so we just picked the cabin we wanted since we had never been to that camp before). So we go back, get our stuff and move to another cabin. Later that night, I notice I'm missing my jacket and we realize I must have left it in the previous cabin. So we go to the girls cabin and I see my jacket inside, I ask for it without stepping inside of the cabin, and receive the jacket. the next morning my buddy and I get pulled aside and get in trouble for going to the girls cabin. A "leader" of the camp tells us we have bad attitudes and are going down the wrong path. If we aren't careful we will be whipped by chains and hit with baseball bats in a dark alley and the only thing that can save us is Jesus. Funny thing is I've never done anything "bad" and I pretty much was a great kid growing up. The truth is, no one will know if there is a God or not until you die. And if there is a God, he is going to judge people for what they have done, we shouldn't be the ones to judge people for what they believe in, His judgement would be the only one that mattered anyways. /rant
can't have it both ways. the convention that everyone's unscientific religious beliefs deserve 'respect' is exactly WHY they are still hindering scientific endeavor in these enlightened times. sure people have the right to believe whatever they want. that doesn't mean they shouldn't be mocked for beliefs that are objectively false.
you were making sense up until the 'doesn't mean people who don't believe what you do are going to hell part'. obviously that belief is a prerequisite of certain religions. if there's no god or afterlife it's going to be hard to know that after you die
Mocking in my experience, is rarely an efficient means to ones desired ends. Demonstrating verifiable links repeatedly is more likely to eventually work than mockery. For example, explaining fossil records, DNA, plate tectonics and so forth are more likely to convince people (over time) that the earth is more than 6000 years old, than calling people idiots. If we mock, then we are asses, and who would want to side with asses?
They can believe the person is going to hell, but can they prove it? If you can't prove it....why judge someone and tell them they are going to hell for their sins? Yes, if there is no god or afterlife, it's a moot point. Who knows what happens though? What if you die and the Jehovah's witnesses were right? They could be, you don't know. Hindu's? Maybe they are right. Won't know until you die.
Completely true ABM. I can say, as in my last post that the age of the earth can be objectively determined to be true or false, but not the existence of God, the Holy Spirit or Christ.
Well, 'effectively' effectively translates to 'subjectively'. That said, if there truly were solid evidences that God doesn't exist, then, well........there aren't any. Hence, man's finite mind is left to none other than supposition, speculation, and subjectivity.
Not really since in science to call something false you need to be able to disprove it. There are no experiments that can be set up to test the hypothesis that god (or Christ, or Holy Ghost) does not exist. Since we can not prove it, it is not as seen through the lens of science objectively false.
that's a really simplistic, limiting view of science. science deals with questions in terms of probabilities, not absolutes. to say something is objectively false just means the probability of it being false is effectively, not actually 100%. it's trivial to show that the tenets of christianity are contradicted by many facets of science and originated in typical human mythology, and are effectively just as statistically likely to be false as the earth is statistically likely to be older than 6000 years.
Science deals with the measurable. The existence of god is not measurable, so it is not up to science to prove or disprove. If I'm wrong, what are the statistics that you talk about that can be used to prove/disprove god?
there are no experiments to test the hypothesis that god did not create an earth that looks 4.5 billion years old 6000 years ago. that type of thinking is just a cop out - pandering to religion. the exact same type of science that points to an old earth points to the tenets of christianity being false. there is no difference.
So I do think you could have a point if you talk about proving/disproving a particular religion being right, since science can show certain aspects of that religion to be false (age of earth). However, ABM was talking about god, Christ and the Holy Ghost, none of which can be disproven. Religion is not the same as god.
i'm not referring to a vague generic notion of god, just the support that holds up the tenets of christianity. things like the origin of yahweh being traceable in mythology, dubious origin of the gospels and other key books, historical (and current) unreliability of reports of miracles etc. does not paint a pretty picture for christianity in the same way formation of strata, continental drift, radiocarbon dating etc. does not for a 6000 year old earth.
the existence of yahweh/christ/holy ghost are specific tenets of christianity. they can be disproven in the same way the easter bunny, santa, or russell's teapot can. i agree a generic/vague/deistic notion of god can't be disproven, pretty much by definition. obviously that's not what ABM is talking about, though.
