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Oguma
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1. Because the intent of the book is for a way of living? You are free to take it as you wish anyways, never tried to sway you

If the way of living is false, then I am going to point it out.

Part of the way of it living is believing in a God that is omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent, and omnipresent. They're not logically fair to vest belief in.

2. Somehow, despite not wanting it I must add, I felt you were going to fall for this one.

Because you were cryptic. But let's see it.

Your and my logic will clearly state that the mars thing is stupid, albeit in quantum physics it says there is a really small chance it can occur.

It's just as with electrons. Example:

A ---------B----------C

An electron in point A may appear at point C without passing through point B. Logic says that is impossible- yet it is true.

The point is: Logic can be flawed, since we are imperfect.

This doesn't mean that it's logically impossible, it means that it's very improbable. And again, this does not mean that it is logical to conclude that the event is going to occur. It's possible, in the same sense that someone may teleport to Mars by crossing the street, that invisible and intangible monkeys are defecating on everyones' heads, or that the Earth was made ten minutes ago, or that the Earth could simply wink out of existence spontaneously; this doesn't make believing any of these things reasonable or fair, and your example in no way injures logic. You're talking about something that has only ever been shown at the very smallest bits of our Universe, and talking about it seriously occurring in large quantities is akin to talking about me waking up and finding that I am Spiderman.

And God or no God, aren't the commandemts good by themselves? Just to place something.

No. A few are alright, but that's not to say that they're all terrific. Especially having no Gods other than that of Christianity's God.

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Even if you have no religion, I would wager that you could appreciate the virtues in Galatians 5:22-23.

"But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law."

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Even if you have no religion, I would wager that you could appreciate the virtues in Galatians 5:22-23.

"But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law."

This I can agree with. The idea that some guy randomly decided to play legos with us, not so much.

Edited by Crystal Shards
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No Buddhists around? :(

Even though I have a religion I follow, I still view it as well as other religions as objectively as possible. While I cannot deny nor prove that Jesus was the actual son of God for example, it is undeniable he was an influential figure that immensely inspired people during the time he had lived. Likewise, I do not explicitly agree or deny that God exists because no evidence means there will be no evidence in the future. The open mind is certainly a lot more useful in religious debates and not so offensive to other hardcore followers.

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If the way of living is false, then I am going to point it out.

Part of the way of it living is believing in a God that is omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent, and omnipresent. They're not logically fair to vest belief in.

Because you were cryptic. But let's see it.

This doesn't mean that it's logically impossible, it means that it's very improbable. And again, this does not mean that it is logical to conclude that the event is going to occur. It's possible, in the same sense that someone may teleport to Mars by crossing the street, that invisible and intangible monkeys are defecating on everyones' heads, or that the Earth was made ten minutes ago, or that the Earth could simply wink out of existence spontaneously; this doesn't make believing any of these things reasonable or fair, and your example in no way injures logic. You're talking about something that has only ever been shown at the very smallest bits of our Universe, and talking about it seriously occurring in large quantities is akin to talking about me waking up and finding that I am Spiderman.

No. A few are alright, but that's not to say that they're all terrific. Especially having no Gods other than that of Christianity's God.

Way of living is false? First of, isn't that bordering on an insult on all Christians here? Calm down dude :P

Pray tell me, why your logic is better? or even correct? You just say something is logic without giving out why ;)

And the Mars thing... it was actually say it can occur, don't over exaggerate- you seem to have a tendency to do so.

The point is, it can happen in a very low probabilities- and before me telling you that, did you find that logic?

And lol, when I said it occurs in large quantities? As much as you hate people to put words in your mouth (as you said to bork), don't do so to others then. As you yourself say, "it's insulting".

Where did I say anything as incredible (or something along those lines)? Again, stop putting words in my mouth.

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Way of living is false? First of, isn't that bordering on an insult on all Christians here? Calm down dude

Is it an insult to geocentrists to state that heliocentrism is correct?

No. And likewise, I'm not being insulting by challenging the Christian religion and calling it false.

Pray tell me, why your logic is better? or even correct? You just say something is logic without giving out why

Let me try and break it down for you why an omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent, omnipresent, perfect being is wrong:

Omnipotence is derived from omnis "all" + potens (gen. potentis) "powerful". It refers to a being that is "all-powerful". This means that the individual can do anything that they wish. This is not logical, and is not possible to obtain by any reasonable means. This is because in being able to do some things, you cannot do others. In being free of limitations, for example, omnipotence cannot possibly set limitations on itself. To use an age-old argument, he cannot create a rock that is heavier than he can possibly lift and possibly lift the rock. This is because it would be limiting what he is able to do.

Additionally, he cannot perform things that are outright impossibilities. For example, God cannot, under any circumstances, make an unstoppable force and an immovable object meet one another, because if an unstoppable force exists, an immovable object does not, and vice versa.

In this sense he cannot do things that defy each other. He cannot exist before he existed. He cannot move without moving. He cannot speak without speaking. He cannot create a circular square. This is because these concepts are incompatible.

So now that we have analyzed omnipotence, let us move on to the next quality attributed to God; omniscience.

Omniscience is derived from omnis "all" + scientia "knowledge". It refers to the ability to know everything there is. This means that the individual endowed with it is instantly aware of everything there is, past, present, and future. This is impossible, because in order for one to be endowed with the capability to see the future for a fact, it would necessitate a loss in free will.

In other words, omniscience does not refer solely to the world around the observer. If they know the future for a fact, that includes their own future. The problem here is that foreknowledge changes the future. For example, if John is endowed with omniscience and witnesses himself being hit by a car in five minutes, chances are he will use his sudden ability to survive by going inside and staying there. The problem is that if the individual is truly endowed with omniscience and this is the actual future they have observed, then they cannot act out to stop what will happen.

What this means is that while Johnny sees himself being hit by the car and desires to stop himself from being hit, he must be hit by the car, otherwise he did not see the actual future. And in the case of omniscience, it is not a simple glance or vision; it is total knowledge of everything at all points in time. One could argue that God can see each and every one of his choices and the effects of them, but this would not change that his options are still limited. In other words, God can only ever make one decision, and in the same sense that our choices are based off the environment and a process of cause and effect, so too would God's choices. He can only ever make one, and it's as deterministic as our own.

And now, moving on to omnibenevolence.

Omnibenevolence is defined as "unlimited or infinite benevolence". What this means is that an individual that is endowed with omnibenevolence will help to their utmost in whatever situation they are involved in. It additionally means that the one endowed with it is all-loving and merciful in every possible facet of existence.

This is not the case when it comes to the God in the Bible, especially the God of the Old Testament. This can be evidenced by simple passages:

Jeremiah 13:14 And I will dash them one against another, even the fathers and the sons together, saith the LORD: I will not pity, nor spare, nor have mercy, but destroy them.

And another to boot:

Malachi 1:2-4 "I have loved you," says the LORD. "But you ask, 'How have you loved us?' "Was not Esau Jacob's brother?" the LORD says. "Yet I have loved Jacob, but Esau I have hated, and I have turned his mountains into a wasteland and left his inheritance to the desert jackals." Edom may say, "Though we have been crushed, we will rebuild the ruins." But this is what the LORD Almighty says: "They may build, but I will demolish. They will be called the Wicked Land, a people always under the wrath of the LORD.

These are not the words of an omnibenevolent God. He doesn't just dislike, he hates. "But Esau!" you say, "He only hates that which is evil!"

This could be argued. But his idea of evil is so skewed it is as though he is a child:

I Samuel 15:2-3 "Thus saith the LORD of hosts, I remember that which Amalek did to Israel, how he laid wait for him in the way, when he came up from Egypt. Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass."

One could potentially argue that he was killing the evil, but by no stretch of any wild imagination can one possibly rationalize calling suckling infants evil.

If you require more evidence of the lack of omnibevolence in God --quite the contrary, he is rather malevolent-- then I would be quite willing to oblige. I've dozens more.

Now let us address omnipresence.

Omnipresence refers to the ability to exist everywhere simultaneously. An individual endowed with omnipresence is ubiquitous, and aware of everything happening everywhere. There is no area he is not at, or unable to see.

Rather than listing the many impossibilities of any higher-thinking consciousness to being endowed with omnipresence, I will instead point to an enlightening article:

http://www.philoonline.org/library/mccormick_3_1.htm

Now let us examine them in conjunction:

Omnipotence is the ability to do all. While it is contradictory with itself alone, it is far less logical in the case of a being that knows everything past, present, and future. This is because if God is aware of all futures, he is aware of his own, and must adhere to what he has seen set out for himself. What this means is that God's will is severely limited, and he cannot do anything aside from what he's fated to do. This is quite contradictory to omnipotence, as he cannot even stop himself from performing his actions in the future.

This also does not follow to the Bible's actions of God. Were God omnipotent, and knew the many errors that man would have made at so many various times in the Bible, he should not have allowed them to occur anywhere. For example, even one not endowed with omniscience should have been easily capable of grasping the idea of two beings that are utterly incapable of grasping the meaning of good and evil by a tree you tell them not to touch and leaving them alone. He, with his omniscience, had no excuse to punish these individuals, when he was well aware of their actions. This can be applied to many events in the Bible. Continuing on:

Omnipotence, as earlier stated, is the capability to do all that one wishes. In the case of an omnibenevolent and omnipotent being, there can be no such thing as displeasure. This is because he, being omnibenevolent and omnipotent, would make a world without sadness. However, this is not the case. There exists sadness, fear, sickness, hunger, displeasure...The world is not possibly the result of an infinitely kind, loving, benevolent God endowed with infinite power.

Finally, let us examine perfection:

Perfection is a quality that is attributed to God constantly. What it say is that God is the best of the best; he is perfect in every manner possible.

However, this is impossible. Perfect is subjective. What you find perfect, I may find disgusting. But this is not the only reason that he is simply not perfect. Allow me to present the Unmotivated God argument:

Statement: God is perfect, therefore God can have no needs/wants. In particular, God could have no motivation to create the world; and a perfect being would not do something without motivation (i.e. a perfect being does not act randomly). Therefore, God did not create the world.

Explanation: for an entity X to want/need some Y means two things:

(1) X does not already have Y and

(2) X benefits or percieves to benefit from Y.

Clearly, God cannot benefit from anything, since God is already perfect. Therefore, God can have no motivation to do anything, in particular to create the world. An even stronger statement is true: God cannot decide to want/need something at a certain point if he didn't want/need it before, since there can be no external stimuli independent of God itself (external stimuli is the only thing that can possibly alter God's judgement, since that judgement is perfect).

Therefore, since theists assert that God always existed, either God always wanted to create the universe, or God never wanted to create the universe. If God never wanted to create the universe, we would not be here (yet we are here!); if God always wanted to create the universe, the universe would have always existed - and thus:

(1) the universe would not have been created at all, or

(2) God could not possibly want to create the universe since the universe would have always existed.

And the Mars thing... it was actually say it can occur, don't over exaggerate- you seem to have a tendency to do so.

Yeah. And in a similar sense, it's possible that there are invisible and intangible monkeys defecating on everyone's heads. Do you deny this?

The point is, it can happen in a very low probabilities- and before me telling you that, did you find that logic?

I find it as logical as the Earth spontaneously ceasing to exist. You're not talking about something that occurs in our world; you're talking about something that has never been directly observed in the macro world occurring.

And lol, when I said it occurs in large quantities? As much as you hate people to put words in your mouth (as you said to bork), don't do so to others then. As you yourself say, "it's insulting".

When you posited the likelihood of a person teleporting to Mars when they walk across the street, I had though.

I apologize if you feel that I put words in your mouth. It was not my intention.

Where did I say anything as incredible (or something along those lines)? Again, stop putting words in my mouth.

What?

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Atheist here. I don't believe in God or any other higher beings, but I don't go making people believe in what I believe in.

Edited by Rei
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Atheist here. I don't believe in God or any other higher beings, but I don't go making people believe in what I believe in.

You can't MAKE someone believe something. Unless you've discovered some sort of Mind Control device. You CAN convince them.

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What's the point of arguing? It's not like anyone will change their faith because some people on the internet said so and contested their faith. Faith needs more than that to be broken.

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What's the point of arguing? It's not like anyone will change their faith because some people on the internet said so and contested their faith. Faith needs more than that to be broken.

Uh, speaking as someone without Faith, it shouldn't be THAT hard.

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If you care enough to argue back, you're faith isn't being broken anytime soon.

And some people DON'T argue back. They read it and go "Oh."

It's why people argue anything. You're not likely to argue about something if you agree about it, are you?

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What's the point of arguing? It's not like anyone will change their faith because some people on the internet said so and contested their faith. Faith needs more than that to be broken.

What's the point of you asking what the point is about arguing? Obviously you wanted to ask, so you did. Likewise, they wanted to bring up their points, so they did. If you don't appreciate it, well, then I guess you're missing out, because some really interesting point have been brought up.

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Thought I'd pitch in a few sparks into the fire.

Admit that parts of the Bible are metaphor. If they are, then maybe God is a metaphor too, and doesn't exist at all.

Basically, by saying that the Bible is a book not of facts but of messages, you also say that God is just another message in it, and that his existence isn't fact.

Ironically enough, the previous Pope has already admitted the bloody fact that all general stories given by holy scripture (and I'm talking about each section, even Deuteronomy, not the parables, silly) are meant to be taken as metaphors, and nothing more, as if a set of morals meant to guide humanity's path in life, despite the fact each moral it provides is impossible to follow. Of course, this begs the question as to whether an individualistic, secular, group of memvbers can survive without biblical morals, in which case they would follow ethics, a set of rules which could be seen as much more appreciating.

However, taking GOD as a metaphor? A metaphor for WHAT exactly? The overglorified icon to whom his own scripture defines as a sadistic entity who seems to take joy out of others' mishaps?

Your and my logic will clearly state that the mars thing is stupid, albeit in quantum physics it says there is a really small chance it can occur.

It's just as with electrons. Example:

A ---------B----------C

An electron in point A may appear at point C without passing through point B. Logic says that is impossible- yet it is true.

Quantum mechanics is a theory, so it's slightly dissenting as to you referring to it as fact, though I do see your point of view. However, quantum physics aside, you had never stated the form of travel had to be linear.

"But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law."

Bullshit. Again, as I, some others, and Ted Kacynzki may say, there is a way around everything, especially those oversocialized. These commandments, as well as virtues, are impossible to follow due to their generality, whereas an individual could easily abuse the fact that "there is no law against these" but that's more of a subdivision.

If you require more evidence of the lack of omnibevolence in God --quite the contrary, he is rather malevolent-- then I would be quite willing to oblige. I've dozens more.

Just to add on here on teh point of the Christian God's malevolence:

"Take upon the Lord's duty. He shall hand you the heathens of the world, you shall bathe them in tongues of flame and you shall beat them with a rod o' iron...."

-----Meaning this somewhat benevolent being, claiming equality over all, instead opts to destroy those that defy him or choose to not recognize his existance; VERY empathic, wouldn't you say? Another example, par supplice, would be Noah's story, particularily that in the Curse of Ham, whereupon God gives Noah ability to decide his son's fate after "witnessing his father's nakedness" (incest or otherwise):

"Let Seth be ruled above, his armies multitudinous, his life prosperous, and let Canaan be his slave...."

----Through this mentality, seeing as these three brothers would represent the three main cultures of the world (Whites, Afro-Americans and Asiatics), it can be said that not only did this God allow a father to thrust his son into servitude, but otherwise invented the very concept of Racism. Also, the most amusing example of yet would be one of God's particular orders: the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah; quite acepting of homosexuals, I see.

I would continue with some examples of Satan's existance, but I realise some Catholics do not adhere to the word of Revelation.

What's the point of arguing? It's not like anyone will change their faith because some people on the internet said so and contested their faith. Faith needs more than that to be broken.

Rather silly question, I must say, as debates can not take form without arguing. It was warned at the entrance that flaming would be present here by any regard, so take it into acount: it was inevitable someone would take predisposition to strike at another's beliefs, whether they be Catholic, Orthodox, Shintoist, Buddhist, Nihilist, Atheist, Satanist or whatever the fuck they may wish.

Edited by Winston Smith
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Wow. You folks are way smarter than the guys at FEE forum. I'll come back when I find my intellegence :P

Though you did get your ridiculous arguments torn to pieces over there. You're not planning on bringing over the Trinity nonsense here, I hope?

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