Religion Talk shoot off

so what u r saying is your are joining terra on the Riki bandwagon?

Riki bandwagon? Riki just happens to be one of those that understands Religion as well as I do...And you call yourself a Christian!

Rather than ramble on about stuff I just need to say that everything Verti said in this topic I agree with 100%

^^Personally I say it's just more fun to ramble in topics like this

just watch it, attempt to keep content in your posts, I am not gonna give out warns, bans, and shit like that unless someone is really spamming, but enough posts with no content, and a thread is killed. This lowers activity...

so, lets discuss the affect of media violence on youth today, compared to the affect of domestic violence of youth in the past.

in a new thread or this one...i vote new thread?

Hadn't noticed this and don't feel up to fully reading all of the above, but I feel the need to just throw in the fairly solid fact that anyone discussing the validity of the tenets of most "major" religions need look no further than the problem of evil to find a definitive answer. Most of the claims of most religions are easily shown to be unreasonable.

please...explain

Really, look at it like this...

Do you believe in scientology?

some guy wrote a book! this book had many life lessons, and told people the same thing that every other major religion has ever told anyone. (the same general rules for controlling a society)

In later years, people reading this book decided that it was a true story. Through fear, love, stupidity, and a billion other reasons, people either followed the book as though it wasnt written by a human, or re-wrote their own version of it, and tried to convince other people that their version was better.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-594683847743189197

best video for the topic. For those of you with busy lives, I suggest you skip ahead to 15 minutes in, and just watch 20 minutes if you want to see my point. If you are interested, there are some george carli quotes, and video clips of explosions in the first 15 minutes, but they dont really deal with the topic.

zeitgeist! i saw that movie before and it is really interesting. but why would you skip explosions??? fire is sexy =p

Basically the problem of evil is a simple argument that aims to show a contradiction in any belief system that involves a being who is an omniscient, omnipotent, and omnibenevolent- that is, all powerful, all knowing, and all good- who created the universe.

People have put it a million different ways. I don't know what my favourite way is, but here is the problem of evil in brief:

Assume that the universe was created by a god having the above properties (a god like the one imagined by Christians, Muslims, etc.). Such a god would be opposed to evil, as follows from his being omnibenevolent, and further, he'd have no shortage of ability to remove evil from his creation (much less a desire to create its sources in the first place). However, as we can readily observe, the world is full of evil of all sorts, all sorts of things that such a god would, logically, not desire.

We are left with a simple conclusion; the god, and further the worldview of his proponents, is in contradiction to the existence of evil. One of the two simply must be false. Which one it is, is easy to figure out; we don't doubt the existence of evil, since evil is observed. With evil confirmed, the only conclusion can be that a god of this type- the type proposed by most major religions- does not exist.



One more thing: I noticed Glorn already touched on, above, what has been my favourite argument for a while now. He said that he doesn't believe in a god, but that if a god exists, he must wish it to be so. Take another look at this... isn't it preached that God wants nothing more than for everyone to believe in him? If this is the same omnipotent and omniscient God as they usually speak of, then a single nonbeliever is a solid reason to seriously doubt the existence of that god. You can literally make the following argument, which would sound stupid if not for these claims made by theists: "I don't believe in God; therefore, God does not exist."

Well that is all well and good if the god you believe in forgot/chose not to create choice...

What if the god decided created the ability to do something selfish, because really at its root all evil stems from selfishness, so then this like sub-god that the main god created decides to take try to overthrow the big god and gets cast out of god club. so then he is pissed and decides to screw up god's favorite creation. and since god gave his favorite creation the ability to choose they choose poorly, and over time more and more of them choose poorly...

Why did god create the ability to choose and do selfish things? IDK the best way i can understand it is that everything would be meaningless if we did not have the ability to choose. How can I do anything right if there is no such thing as wrong? How can there be good without bad? How can there be love without hate? So basically God had to create at least the ability for us to choose to do things he doesn't like or else we couldn't choose to do what he does want us to do. being all powerful all knowing and all everything does not actually mean you definitely HAVE to control every single thing all the time but that you could. So god can want everyone to believe in him and he COULD force it on us, but what would be the point of that? Its like the difference between a lover and a sex slave...

if the existance of god is contingent on a single persons belief in him, then that is not the god i believe in

and finally if God did not create everything, who, or what, did?

what if.. and stick with me here...

what if the universe is actually a single cell on a wart on some giant space toads ass?

i mean, really, what is a planet but a single atom?

compare planets and atoms, they have a lot in common. We are so small and insignificant that our lives our nothing, we are a spec on a spec of a spec.

Really, why would "god" have to create a universe for us? We are stuck on this little planet, you could travel at light speed until the end of time, and never reach the end of the universe!

Maybe god created something bigger, and more important somewhere else. Maybe there are billions of earths, and he is seeing which one is better. Or maybe, just maybe, he doesnt give a fuck.

But then again, did you know, according to religious fanatics I have personally met and talked to, that fossils, and the idea f dinosaurs were created by satan... he put them in the ground, so people wouldnt believe in god... that tricky bastard, trying to fool us.

And that is why i dont believe in religion! "Why does this thing that disproves your story exist?" --"ohh, because some OTHER giant invisible guy put them that, and the BIGGER invisible guy never thought to took them out."

1. i am not opposed to the first idea that the universe is just a spec of what all god made

2. thats actually a bit ridiculous ont he fossil argument, but from what i understand there is nothing about fossils that on their own disprove God...and if someone thinks they were made by the devil...well they just are ridiculous.

3. i believe that religion is what happens when imperfect humans try to understand faith...therefore i am not religious...i am faithful

Quote :

compare planets and atoms, they have a lot in common. We are so small and insignificant that our lives our nothing, we are a spec on a spec of a spec.

Stay there glorn, I called the suicide hotline, help is on its way!

The counter argument from free will has been made repeatedly and has failed repeatedly. When I and others make the argument from evil, we aren't forgetting about human choice; the question is, did this omniscient and omnipotent creator forget about human choice?

If you are omniscient, you know everything- absolutely everything- and if you are omnipotent, you can do anything... in other words, it's important to realize that this god is going to get whatever he wants. In a premise: If the aforementioned god exists, then everything that has ever happened and ever will happen is his will.

We can talk about choices all we want and it will not free us from the problem of evil. What is happening when we make a choice? A rather broad question; we'd come up with different answers depending on our definitions of the word, our understanding of psychology, etc. However, we can agree, I think, that when we make a choice, certain mechanisms are at work in our minds. They take in some input (knowledge, influence from experiences, whatever we want to consider) and some sort of processing goes on, and we end up with a choice.

Now, if we want to believe in the aforementioned god, we must admit to ourselves that the mechanisms by which choices are made must be part of this god's design. However, we are going to encounter problems once we admit this.; it would seem, since we see that people make bad and terrible choices very often, that the mechanisms of free will are flawed. But this cannot be in accordance with the properties we've established for this perfect god of ours. Any system designed by this god would have to work exactly as he intended it to; there is no way around this.

And so we come again to the problem of evil; the god who is meant to oppose evil has seemingly created a system that results in it. We can't evade the conclusion; if we say the bad choices result from bad input (bad experiences, ignorance of necessary fact), we must then ask where all input comes from... the answer would again be God, according to theistic worldviews. If we say that no, it is not God, but humans that are flawed, we must ask ourselves who created humans, and imparted these flaws in his design very deliberately, as only such a being could do? The buck stops at God, with or without human choice.


Regarding the contingency of the existence of god on one person's belief: that was not really what I was suggesting. I was stating that if we are talking about a creator god who is not only omniscient, omnipotent, and omnibenevolent, but who also desires humans to believe in him (the gods of pretty much every religion, for example... though there are some scary lines in Islamic texts that talk about how the nonbelievers are meant to exist, and to suffer greatly), then all it takes to show a fatal contradiction between this god and the world we know to exist, is a single person who does not believe in god. If we can show that one person has ever died a non-believer, then it would seem that an omniscient and omnipotent being has failed to achieve what they sought to achieve; this is not possible, and so either the nonbeliever does not exist, or God does not exist.


To your final question: I have never claimed to know the answer to this question; in discussions like this, my aim is simply to show that certain proposed answers to it are unreasonable.

You know it could be we humans are greatly overrating this socalled all knowing entity. Think of God or Gods or whatever as being the same as a map creator. Now he/she/it makes the map of Earth adds in characters, mobs, abilities, items, general game strategy, the works. We all begin to play this game called life, some of us are better then others at the particular game, noobs greatly suffer, you have your pros and your intermediate who try to either carry the noobs or let them fail, and of course everygame has their share of cheaters and game ruiners. After playing the game a while some begin to notice certain imbalanced, certain things that are easily abuseable, okay what now? Contact the creator about them right? Uh-oh he has no address, no identity, and cannot in any shape way or form be contacted other then supposed willing him/her/it the urge to do something about it (aka prayer). In other words its the one and only edit end of story. Now how many of you expect the game creator to be absolutely perfect and all knowing about every single aspect they add to the game? I sure as hell dont its a kind of find out as you go along what certain changes do. How many expect the first addition of the map the map maker made to be absolutely perfect the first time out? Many Religions try to sell you on the perfect god but in reality all they really are, are fan boys, they even have theyre legendary players of the game which oddly enough are also overrated at times (aka messiahs or saviors) did anybody have any fun reading all this blasphemy in this post?

Lol, interesting.

Some claim that a specific religion is the right one and all the others are wrong. However they are in conflict with everyone that believes in any other religion. Another possibility is that perhaps parts of all or some religions are right or partially right and they are just different paths to the same place. Finally perhaps all religions are wrong as there is vary little hard evidence for any of them.

It is probably true that no religion is correct. Most will put boundaries around established laws in order to keep their parishioners farther away from the possibility of sin. It's important to note though that true Christianity is not a religion, and those who tell you differently have seen the 'boundaries' that have been created by men who feel they need something more than just a relationship with Christ. True Christianity is a relationship with the living God and nothing more

Christians will say that Christianity is right above all other religions; Muslims will say that Islam is best; Jews will say that Judaism is best; Daoists will say Daoism.

Religious fanatics said that the earth was flat and that the Sun and planets orbited the earth, but science proved them wrong. Many scientists of the past and present have faced persecution for challenging the validity of religious dogma.

The correct religion is the one that you believe to be most fitting. The correct religion is the one that does not condone slavery, oppression/victimization, chauvinism, injustice and terrorism. The correct religion is the one that enriches the lives of the majority and not just a selected few in political and religious office. The correct religion is the one that demonstrates peace, love, harmony, righteousness and compassion, in every single assertion of their scriptures and in every act of their leaders. The correct religion is the one that preserves life and nature. The correct religion is the one that abhors all acts of greed, envy and selfishness. It is also the one that fills you with spirituality, righteousness and piety. It is the one that makes you a living instrument of divinity, which you shall freely share with all of humanity.



EDIT: Useful Site: Click Meh Plz... KTHXBI

1. fuzzy banana i am glad to see someone else ascribes to the religion is bad, faith is good belief

2. accursed i understand where you are coming from but its a very closed minded, closed box approach. It assumes, like i said before, that God actually DOES control every little thing that happens. I believe that he could, but not that he does. There is a difference. I can see that your main point is that at the very most basic level in some form or another God allowed evil to become a part of reality. I will even go so far as to say I won't argue against him creating evil, though I don't believe it to be true in the sense that we can understand. But, the biggest problem I have is that you are applying logic to God as if he were a computer, and that just isn't the case. Basically you are trying to make God fit in your box, in your human, imperfect, limited box, and that to just doesn't work. You can now say at this point I am just making a cop out response, and i can see where you take that approach.

What it boils down to is that I believe you cannot truly believe in God without faith, and you cannot explain everything about God, and you cannot make God fit into your box. We are made in HIS image, not the other way around. Unfortunately people who do not believe in any god won't typically allow for 'faith' or 'the bible' to be used as support for arguments because they themselves do not believe in them. Which also makes logical sense. So at the end of the day it basically comes down to is if you believe there is even a chance that a god exists, then at that point you can choose to research the appropriate text (the Bible) and try to understand the teachings, and eventually you will have to decide for yourself whether you are going to literally make the leap of faith, or not.

hmm... this is still going on? how long can you guys keep up a debate about the same thing? =p

as long as new ideas or discussion is being had?

but it isnt really new ideas.. people kinda say the same thing. Religion is bad, followed by religion is good. idk, maybe i just dont see the point =p

well if your not interested dont click on the topic...its in the off topic thread and there are new ideas actually.

off topic, but has anyone else noticed that ads for this topic??? Someone explain wtf "Bible Exploration" is please? how is it that one goes about "exploring" a book?