thread of life, the universe and everything else (Atheists are still stupid >:D)

[2b BOY]

Original Titel:Atheists are stupid (*Lights the match*)...*Unzipps, and puts it out*

Friggen idiots.

http://atheistdelusion.cf.huffingtonpost.com/

[one2hit]

www.shaveeverywhere.com

[2b BOY]

hahaha

[NoSeRider]

Uhmmm, do you have to be an a'hole to be Christian?

They have a picture of Stephen Hawkins and call him a scientist 'freak' that doesn't believe in God?
http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/antony_flew/hawking.html
I don't know...I think he believes in God.

Science and reason has no room in our lives?

This is sarcasm ain't it? This can't be real.

[sciboy]

Of course it isn't.

[2b BOY]

Deffinetly not sarcasm. I'm 100% concentrated honesty. Responses to the movie...http://deludedmailbag.cf.huffingtonpost.com/

[JERI]

That video looks rather tongue-in-cheek to me.

These, on the other hand...
http://www.jwz.org/images/Dino2.jpg
http://www.jwz.org/images/Dino3.jpg
http://www.jwz.org/images/Dino4.jpg
http://www.jwz.org/images/Dino5.jpg
http://www.jwz.org/images/Dino6.jpg

[Chance.]

To the guy who started the thread.

I don't know what faith you claim to be a member of, I didn't bother to look at your links. However you are not doing your faith any credit by acting like this.

I have to ask, what is the purpose of calling anyone stupid? If you are trying to change someone's views you are going about it the wrong way. Words like these only serve to inflame and make others angry. If you think that you are so much better than others, why don't you start acting like it?

Words are empty, lead by example.

This thread won't be open long, because it has no purpose, all you are doing is trying to incite argument.

This is an art forum, if you want to discuss religion, I suggest you find another forum.

[Goog]

*sigh* Isn't religious stuff generally looked down upon in the Lounge?

[Elwell]

That whooshing sound you hear is this thread going over the heads of half it's posters.
:nohope:

[2b BOY]

no kidding

I don't know what faith you claim to be a member of, I didn't bother to look at your links. However you are not doing your faith any credit by acting like this.

Just click the damn link Q...

[Jason Snair]

"Destroy the ark. Kill them"

hahahaha.

no wait. this isn't funny at all. wow.

[HunterKiller_]

Lol @ that comic.

I agree that Atheists are stupid. :)

[Jason Rainville]

That whooshing sound you hear is this thread going over the heads of half it's posters.
:nohope:

hahaha :D that made my night.

[DavePalumbo]

hahaha, "Checkmate!"

yeah guys, hit the link before getting pissed (or hit the link so you can get pissed, whichever)

[Xpose]

That whooshing sound you hear is this thread going over the heads of half it's posters.
:nohope:

Haha no joke... Calm down guys... it's going to be okay. All the dinosaurs have drownd, god hates cold blooded creatures after all.

[nofingers]

Although I want to remain nuetral on the issue of God, this is perhaps my favorite argument for the non-existence of God, from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

http://onegoodmove.org/1gm/1gmarchive/2006/11/puff.html

There is an audio clip on there as well.

2b BOY: I'm not gonna call you stupid, just try to play nice around here.

[2b BOY]

You did just call me stupid by stating you were not. So how am i not suppose to think you didn't imply that? You sly sly dog.
Besides that I found it funny. Lighten up. I knew it was gonna offend some self rightous ass on either side of the issue. Because i don't take things so seriously does not mean I am stupid. I don't have "thoughtful" conversations on a forum about religion and philsophy all that often, because people just bicker and argue and moan and whine. Plus I'm bored. Don't let what i do offend you. I don't mean any of it personally, it's just a joke.

Anyway i don't know if you implied anything or not. I'm probably just paranoid.

Edit:: Let me add as well, that this is just a joke thread. There are so many posts on the lounge about religion, global warming, evolution intelligent design, politics. All that is good and fine, but what's funny is they always seem to turn into flame wars (I probably don't help). But, I do try get involved in one every once and a while. Most of the times when i post though I'm being a cheeky bastard because people seem to be getting to serious. I just try to be a neutralizer. I would like people to lighten up a bit. And, to this I say....Come ooooooonnnnnn. eh. Come oooooooonnnnn. Group hug.

[Pseudomantia]

Personally, I think religion is a waste of time for intelligent people. And I think as well about atheists that don't seem to know what atheism actually means (and even those that do). My opinion is the only ideal that can't be wrong is agnosticism. Because it is a mere ideal that one can not claim to know that which is unknown, I can safely believe in nothing but the fact that I may never know if there is or is not a God. The question is as silly as trying to find evidence of a tooth fairy.

I'm here on Earth, society has insured that a quarter of my life is wasted before I can actually do anything with it, and there is a lot for me to do in order to meet my life expectations and live comfortably. Anything else is just philosophy, not that I don't enjoy a healthy debate or philosophical conversation. No matter my efforts, I will one day die and all I can hope is that something I touched or created remains for many more years. When I die the answers may come, but until then I see no reason why I should spend my life searching for an answer that does not wish to be found.

[2b BOY]

Pseudo, your post was great. I am agnostic, and the way you put it, I could never have done so well.

[Justin.]

Why do people have to rag on Christians so much?

[sciboy]

It's not so much they're "rag"ing on Christians but a comedic stereotype.
Put it this way, it's like poking fun at Australians through imitations of crocodile dundee.
WE DO NOT WRESTLE CROCODILES DAMN IT!

[2b BOY]

Ugh I'm treating like this a chat room. Anyway, Christians are just the whipping boy these days for people. Probably because it's one of the largest religions in the world, and there are many radicals and extremists that annoy a lot of people. The only thing I'm truly against is extremism, and self rightousness. (Edit!!!::WITH ANY RELIGION OR IDEAL!)
And, many of the western religions have been perverted by to much interpretation, and changes for the times that it ruined the vision of what religion is suppose to stand for and do. Create morals, inspiration, and hope for people. But, these days it's agendas, goals, and manipulation. Same can be said for buddhism and hinduism. It's a rough ride for any religion and ideal these days. Science brings along many studies people need to take into consideration, but look at science as being the answer to things. Religion has plenty of room with these discoveries, it's just rituals and out of date stories that are being disproven, not the main message. Some people just get carried away on either side. Science cant DISPROVE God, only the concept. The concept of God is probably completely different than what many truly believe. People who think of God think of the Christian stereotypical point of view.

It's not so much they're "rag"ing on Christians but a comedic stereotype.
Put it this way, it's like poking fun at Australians through imitations of crocodile dundee.
WE DO NOT WRESTLE CROCODILES DAMN IT!

Yes you do.>:| You also fish with dynamite, and you carry around large knives. Oh yeah and you all have koalas and kangaroos as pets. Say "G'day mate. Let's put another shrimp on the barbe'.". Please....

[Justin.]

many radicals and extremists that annoy a lot of people

Because those Islamic Extremists certainly don't annoy people at all!!!


IMO it's beacuse it is the majority religion in America. It's just because of zealots from all religions, they are only allowed to mock the majority, otherwise it's "politically incorrect". Kind of like how white people can't say the N word, but Black people can call us Crackers, whitey, Honkeys, etc.- Just because white people are the majority, it makes them a target because they can't retalliate.

[Mitchell]

haha awesome video.

[2b BOY]

Because those Islamic Extremists certainly don't annoy people at all!!!


Any extremist. Islam including. Obviously. I should've probably written my post better, I did what I could.

[Dimension]

Thought some of you might find this interesting.

The Cosmological argument:
Premise 1. Whatever begins to exist must have a cause.
Premise 2. The Universe began to exist.
Conclusion: Therefore the Universe has a cause, and God exists.1
Whatever begins to exist must have a cause. Most of us have no problem accepting this principle. We assume its truth in virtually every aspect in our daily lives. Our experience always confirms it and never denies it. But surprisingly philosophers have been unable to prove its veracity.
Nevertheless, it has always been a fundamental first principle of philosophy and science that "from nothing, nothing comes", "being cannot come from non-being". Even the great skeptic David Hume, who argued that we could not prove the causal principle through ordinary means, still believed it to be true and thought a denial of it was absurd, "I never asserted so absurd a proposition that anything might arise without a cause."2
Surely it is more reasonable to hold to this premise than to believe that things pop into existence out of nothing and by nothing. Can we reasonably disagree with the atheist Kai Neilson when he writes, "Suppose you suddenly hear a loud bang and you ask me, 'What made that bang?' and I reply 'Nothing, it just happened.' You would not accept that - in fact you would find my reply quite unintelligible."3
Scientific Confirmation
Regarding premise number two, we have both scientific confirmation and logical argument for the Universe having a beginning. According to the standard Big Bang expansion model, space, time, matter and energy all came into existence simultaneously around 12-15 Billion years ago. The beginning point is often called a singularity, the boundary of space and time, or a mathematical point, where our expanding universe was shrunk down to nothing at all. Significantly, it was not the result of prior natural, physical processes. The atheist philosopher, Quentin Smith, acknowledges, "It belongs analytically to the concept of the cosmological singularity that it is not the effect of prior physical events. The definition of a singularity...entails that it is impossible to extend the space-time manifold beyond the singularity. ...This rules out the idea that the singularity is an effect of some prior natural process."4
Furthermore, according to the Second Law of Thermodynamics, given enough time, the universe will eventually reach a state of equilibrium, a cold, dark, dead, virtually motionless universe. Clearly, if the universe is beginningless, then there has been an infinite length of time preceding this present moment. But obviously, there is still plenty of heat, light and movement left in the universe. Thus the past must be finite. The universe had a beginning.
Infinite Past Impossible
“The infinite is nowhere to be found in reality. It neither exists in nature nor provides a legitimate basis for rational thought. The role that remains for the infinite is solely that of an idea. – David Hilbert”
The third and strongest piece of support for the beginning of the universe comes from the impossibility of an infinite past. This is because an actual infinite number of anything cannot exist in the real world. But to have a universe with no beginning you would have to have an actual infinite number of past events. We might think that since we do use the concept of infinity in mathematics there would be no problem here.
But mathematicians who work with the concept of actual infinity, do so by adopting some arbitrary rules, like "the whole is not always greater than the part", and "subtraction and division are not allowed", to avoid the absurdities and contradictions that come with an actual infinite number of anything. And these rules don't apply to the real world. Actual infinity only works in the abstract realm, and only with some special rules.
As David Hilbert, one of this century's greatest mathematicians has written, "The infinite is nowhere to be found in reality. It neither exists in nature nor provides a legitimate basis for rational thought. The role that remains for the infinite...is solely that of an idea..."5
An Absurd Library
To see the absurdity and contradictions of an actual infinite number of things in the real world imagine or hypothesize your campus library having an infinite number of black books and an infinite number of green books, alternating colors on the shelves and numbered consecutively on the spines.
Does it make any sense to say that there are as many black books as there are black plus green books together? But that is what you would have to say if you want to claim the infinite is possible in the real world.
Suppose you withdrew all the green books. How many books are there left in the library? There would still be an infinite number of books in the library even though we just withdrew an infinite number and found a way to get them home! Suppose you withdrew the books numbered 4,5,6...and so on. Now how many books are left? THREE! Something surely is wrong here! One time we subtract an infinite number of books and we're left with an infinite number; the next time we subtract an infinite number and we're left with three - a clear logical contradiction. Since our hypothesis leads to a contradiction, the hypothesis must be false - a library with an actual infinite number of books cannot exist.
While we can avoid these contradictions in the mathematical realm by making up rules like you can't subtract or divide when using infinity, we cannot in the real world prevent people from taking books out of libraries.
Therefore, since a beginningless past would be an actual infinite number of things (events) and since an actual infinite number of things cannot exist in the real world, it follows logically that the past is not infinite. The universe had a beginning.
Furthermore, an infinite past is impossible because adding one member after another cannot form an actual infinite. It's like counting to infinity - you just never get there. Just like we can never finish counting to infinity, we can never begin to count down from a negative infinity. There is no first term. As the great skeptical philosopher David Hume admitted, "An infinite number of real parts of time passing in succession...appears so evident a contradiction that no man whose judgment is not corrupted... would ever be able to admit of it."6
Thus the Big Bang Theory, the Second Law of Thermodynamics and the impossibility of an infinite past all support the universe having a beginning.
Since whatever begins to exist must have a cause, it follows logically that the universe has a cause. And since it cannot be the result of some prior natural process, the cause of the universe must be beyond nature.
Most Common Objection
"What caused God"
The question "What caused X?" only makes sense if there was some indication that "X" had a beginning. There is nothing that indicates that the cause of the Big Bang had a beginning. In fact since time did not exist beyond the Big Bang, the cause of the Big Bang must have existed timelessly. Thus it could have no beginning, and hence no cause. We may want to say this about the universe, but we can't, since as we have seen, the evidence is the universe had a beginning.
Astrophysicists have been discovering that the Big Bang appears to have been incredibly fine-tuned. Stephen Hawking describes the situation,
"...the universe and the laws of physics seem to have been specifically designed for us. If any one of about 40 physical qualities had more than slightly different values, life as we know it could not exist: Either atoms would not be stable, or they wouldn't combine into molecules, or the stars wouldn't form the heavier elements, or the universe would collapse before life could develop, and so on..."7

The numerical values of the different natural forces like gravity, electromagnetism, subatomic forces, charges of electrons, etc. "just happened" to fall into an extremely narrow range that is conducive for life to exist. Minute changes in any one of these forces would have destroyed the possibility for life and in most cases destroyed the universe itself.
Consider these examples from among dozens:
1. The Proton/Electron Mass Ratio is 1836 to 1.
- Had it been slightly different, there would be no chemistry.
2. Yet the electrical charge of the proton and the electron are exactly equal numerically.
- Had they been fractionally different, hydrogen atoms would repel one another, and there would be no galaxies.
3. If the strong force (the force that binds protons and neutrons in the nucleus) was just
- 2% less, it would have destroyed all nuclei essential to life
- 2% more, it would have prevented the formation of protons and therefore matter
4. If the expansion rate of the universe was
-less by one part in a million million, the universe would have collapsed very early
-greater by one part in a million, galaxies, stars and planets would never have formed.
Chance or Design
If the Big Bang was merely a chance happening it is virtually impossible that the values of all of these 40-50 forces would have been exactly right to ensure the survival of the universe and to allow life. Given the potentially infinite number of other values these forces could have taken, it is much more likely that they would have fallen outside the very narrow range that is conducive to life. As John Leslie, the philosopher of science has put it, "Life prohibiting universes are much more probable than life permitting universes." This is evidence of an intelligent designer behind the Big Bang who ensured that it happened in such a way that the universe could support life.
No wonder scientists like Dr. Paul Davies, internationally known author and professor of Theoretical Physics, has said this finding represents "the most compelling evidence for an element of cosmic design.";8 and Dr. Robert Jastrow, Founder of NASA's Institute of Space Studies, has called this "the most theistic result ever to come out of science."9
Most Common Objection
"It is not surprising that we observe the initial conditions of the universe to be conducive to life because those are obviously the only conditions that could precede our existence."
This is only the case if one assumes beforehand that our existence itself is not surprising. But our argument is that, given the potentially infinite number of non-life values the forces could have taken, it is extremely surprising that the entire scenario has taken place, i.e., the right initial conditions and the existence of observers. If one assumes that the second part is not surprising, then of course it follows that the first part is also not surprising. But that clearly begs the question.
Summary and Conclusion
Just like two cords wound together become a strong rope, so too the cumulative effect of these two arguments provide us with a powerful case for the existence of God.
Taken together these two arguments tell us that the cause and designer of the universe is an intelligent, immaterial, powerful, changeless being that existed in a timeless, eternal state beyond the beginning of the universe. This, I suggest, is close enough to the traditional Judeo-Christian concept of God that we can justifiably conclude that indeed, God does exist.

[Crash]

people who say there is life after death and people who say there doesnt exist life after death are both idiots.



Theres no way of telling.

[2b BOY]

This is also an interesting look see. Thanks for your post Dimension.



http://www.tenthdimension.com/flash2.php

Click the numbers on the right to see the flash aniamtion.

There could be infinit universes/dimensions, and quantum physics is always supplying interesting theories. Heh, the number 0 is a very amazing thing.
We (everything) especially organic, is built up of smaller and smaller things. The human body consists of cells, living organims, which actually make us up as a being in itself. We look further and further till we get to an atomic level. Energy. Quarks, I think is the smallest thing we can witness so far. We are nothing and we are everything, and we have to make up something just like the cells make us up. So, I'm just saying if we are a part of something as small as we may be, and as smart as we make think we are, that could be a way of defining "god" as a whole. Not a figure that is concsious of us, and not one that casts any judgement. We live in a chaos of laws, which forms a whole. Earth is nothing special, but it isnt insignificant. That's what i've gathered so far, just my idea of a possibility. This is called pantheism i think.

[Dimension]

"Theres no way of telling"

That's why it's called beleif.

[Infinit]

great links
thank you guys

[Brendan N]

Dimension - many thanks for that wonderful post, great read very informative. In fact if this wasn't an art forum, i'd vote to put in "The Best of...." section.

A good freind of mine told me of a documentary he saw that had scientific proof for the existence of an intelligent designer. Eager to read up some more on this topic.

Religion, in my view, is like a backbone. It's something to fall back on. Which is why I oppose any religion. A leading Atheist recently published a book (haven't read it yet) - but it attacks religion with some good points. No religion means no Crusades, no holocaust, no jihads, no fatwas, no 9/11, no fanaticism, nothing of the like. I'm sorry to say but it seems like religion has been as responsible for bad things as it has been for good things, if not more so. That's from my point of view right now.

[2b BOY]

This will be my last post for today. Brendand, that is true. But, if we get rid of ideals and/or religion all together pure atheism can breed sociopaths, apathetics, fanatacism of different philosphys of life (communism, democracy, anarchy etc.), uncreativity, basically a robotic souless society. Neither side needs to get rid of, and of ofcourse those are just extremes and I'm being the devils advocate. We still need ideals as humans, and we are always going to fight over something, when religion is gone there is still racism, and prejudice of different types. Ofcourse maybe no religion, such as doctrines based on past stories and people claiming they are god, or others doing so, and practices that dont make any sense. We just need the basics of true morals, along with knowledge and reasoning, and the possibility that there is an answer dont be so quick to judge that there is no point to our exhistence whther it is important or not. Hopefully some day we will be able to live on the earth, that is just like the star trek universe.:tihi:

[Dimension]

I forgot to mention that the post I made earlier is not written by me, and I'm not actually sure who it's written by.

I have to disagree with you Brendan about religion being the reason behind such violence and attrocities. I only see it as a vehicle to justify, and rationalize hate and violence. I never fails to baffle me how distorted and perverted religions become after they're tailored to suit personal agendas.
Without religion, there are many other ways to rationalize and justify wars, genocide, etc. Race, oil, democracy etc.

Religion is not responsible for bad things, people are. Violence is at the core of our being.

I'd like to post more, but it's getting late. Maybe I'll finish tomorrow.

[Brendan N]

I forgot to mention that the post I made earlier is not written by me, and I'm not actually sure who it's written by.

I have to disagree with you Brendan about religion being the reason behind such violence and attrocities. I only see it as a vehicle to justify, and rationalize hate and violence. I never fails to baffle me how distorted and perverted religions become after they're tailored to suit personal agendas.
Without religion, there are many other ways to rationalize and justify wars, genocide, etc. Race, oil, democracy etc.

Religion is not responsible for bad things, people are. Violence is at the core of our being.

I'd like to post more, but it's getting late. Maybe I'll finish tomorrow.

Of course, my post made it sound like it was religion's fault, I worded it very badly lol. It's still people's fault, and religion can't fix anything if people don't fix anything. Religion has rarely been the sole reason (I think it is safe to argue that with the Crusades, religion forms a large part of the reason, but I may be wrong) but I feel that it has often been used as an excuse - ie a vehicle to justify. That is the problem I have with it.

Another thing I have against some religions - especially Christianity - to me it uses Heaven as a reward for being good and Hell as a threat of punishment. One should be able to be a good person without the promise of heaven or the threat of hell. That's just a moral issue, this idea has lead to many good things in the past.

2b - I see your point and I'm definitely not writing religion off as all bad no way. Religion provides many people with morals and principals, but many atheists such as myself have morals and principals that aren't derived from religion. As for ideals - ideals means idealism, and idealism was the mother of fascism (according to many scholars). I believe it both stupid and wrong to idealise anything.

Concerning what we need - we already have it. As dimension's post states, everything that exists has a cause. There is a lot of yin-yang-train-of-thought involved, but as I see it: We need murder and wars so we can be reminded of how precious peace and life is, we need sadness because without it we cannot be happy, you know what I'm getting at. We have all we need, so right now we need religion. And we need atheism.

I disagree with you on atheism producing a soulless society though. In fact, looking at the Christian Fundamentalism spreading throughout both our countries, I'd say religion can make for a far more soulless society than atheism. But that's just from where I stand lol. Creativity doesn't need to have anything to do with religion or the lack of it.

blah, I'm tired of typing more later. very intersting thread though, hope it doesn;t get closed soon haha

ciao!

- d.

[tokaru]

first there is not real prube that god is real, or even better, something that you may think is real is just and ilusion, so i don´t care if you belive in bullshits like god or that kind of crap.

to me there is no god.

[squidmonk3j]

hahaha, that comic rocks!

you kids and ur religious bickerings....acceptance of the the monomyth with a thousand faces will deliver u all into bliss:)

[DesperateCuban]

haha funny vid but this thread is even more entertaining. I love when people get into religious or political arguments. Its not like you are going to convince other people to change their views or opinions. Most people are set in their beliefs and no matter what explanation you give them, even if it is the greatest argument in the world, wont make them change them. So why dont you all give up your false religions and accept the true prophet Raptor jesus
http://media.urbandictionary.com/image/large/raptorjesus-36752.jpg

[squidmonk3j]

raptor jesus is a false prophet, Optimus Prime is the real deal!

http://osiris.rutgers.edu/~smm/projects/Optimus_Prime.jpg

[sciboy]

Well since we're at it.
ALL HAIL THE MIGHTY FLYING SPAGHETTI NOODLE MONSTER! (http://www.venganza.org/)
May he bless you with his noodly appendage. :^^:

[Hai]

Just wanted to thank Dimension for that post, although you could have broken it into more clear paragraphs. :P

[Brendan N]

something that you may think is real is just and ilusion, so i don´t care if you belive in bullshits like god or that kind of crap.

but illusions are real. :P

We ARE real on at least some level of existence because we are aware of our own existence.

- d.

[Mike Frank]

Dimension that proof of god is probably the most compelling, was something that I had thought about somewhat recently. The only thing about it is that once you get to that point and you say "ok, maybe there was this creator that came first".. but that doesnt necessarily mean that its the same god as described in the bible.

[Leiana]

Thought some of you might find this interesting.

The Cosmological argument:
Premise 1. Whatever begins to exist must have a cause.
Premise 2. The Universe began to exist.
Conclusion: Therefore the Universe has a cause, and God exists.

I'm just a novice debater, but (being agnostic, leaning on the side of athiesm) I don't believe premise one necessarily holds water. To use a popularly accepted arguement, matter cannot be created nor destroyed, but that also means that things might have a cause, but maybe not a creator. On the other hand, if I used that sentence of "whatever begins to exist must have a cause", then I would argue it makes more sense that the universe has been around forever. Just because we have a limited time to live does not mean that that is true for the universe.

Not many people tend to think this way, but I didn't see this opinion here. I'm not trying to push these beliefs here, but I thought some of you might be interested in the idea.

[squidmonk3j]

actually, neither the premises nor the the conclusion (which is yet another premise with its own conclusion) hold water. it's just made to appear very rational and scientifical. fun read, tho. not as fun as the comic, but funny still:)

[dfacto]

I agree that Atheists are stupid.

I'm a stupid atheist and I approve of this message.:canadian:

[Prometheus|ANJ]

That comic cracked me up. Bold underlined words sure makes it a lot more convincing.

By the way, regarding first cause, anthropic principles, etc. Hawking goes into that in his book "A brief History of Time". He talks about different ideas that physicists have come up with to tackle the concept of a 'finetuned' universe, he doesn't seem to keen about appealing to the anthropic principle. Some ideas include "cosmic inflation" and "no boundry". Worth checking out maybe. From what I've understood (I just started that chapter of the book) there could be some selfbalancing deal going on.

Edit: Here's some stupid atheist stuff regarding the ... fuck, okay I have no clue what's it about. The link said it had to do with Hawkings No-boundry-Proposal, i.e. stuff that has to do with the initial state of the universe. There are some interesting formulas on page 5!
http://www.arxiv.org/PS_cache/hep-th/pdf/0003/0003052.pdf

[LaPalida]

Atheists are idiots

Argument to the man better known as an ad hominem. I can't come up with a good argument so I have to resort to calling you names. You stink therefore I win.

Most Common Objection
"What caused God"
The question "What caused X?" only makes sense if there was some indication that "X" had a beginning. There is nothing that indicates that the cause of the Big Bang had a beginning. In fact since time did not exist beyond the Big Bang, the cause of the Big Bang must have existed timelessly. Thus it could have no beginning, and hence no cause. We may want to say this about the universe, but we can't, since as we have seen, the evidence is the universe had a beginning.

Special Pleading otherwise known as my argument is special and doesn't have to obey laws of logic therefore I win.

PS. If you actually read the theory you would know that the universe is posited as being timeless or rather was always there (whatever that means when time doesn't actually exist yet). Big Bang is thought to be the current iteration of the universe. Occam's razor cuts God out of the equation.

[LaPalida]

They have a picture of Stephen Hawkins and call him a scientist 'freak' that doesn't believe in God?
http://www.infidels.org/library/mode...w/hawking.html
I don't know...I think he believes in God.


Regardless of what you believe in reality Stephen Hawking is a professed atheist.

EDIT: Nm I misunderstood what you wrote about him being a 'freak'

[Blue]

Hey guys! Look at me! I have an idea! If you don't agree with my idea, you must be an idiot!

Why is my idea right? Because my idea says so!

[Elwell]

Whoosh!
Whoosh!
Whoosh!

[Aether]

Opinions are like assholes, everybody has one.

[Blue]

Opinions are like assholes, everybody has one.
And they all stink.

[2b BOY]

2b - I see your point and I'm definitely not writing religion off as all bad no way. Religion provides many people with morals and principals, but many atheists such as myself have morals and principals that aren't derived from religion. As for ideals - ideals means idealism, and idealism was the mother of fascism (according to many scholars). I believe it both stupid and wrong to idealise anything.

Brendan, I think your mistaking IDEALism (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/Idealism)with IDOLism (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/Idolism). Damn "ISMs".

And, I second Elwells Whoosh! And, to the picture of the jesus raptor, may I say el-em-ay-O.

[squidmonk3j]

according to many scholars, this thread should be merged with the cheer me up thread.

[Brendan N]

Brendan, I think your mistaking IDEALism (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/Idealism)with IDOLism (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/Idolism). Damn "ISMs".

And, I second Elwells Whoosh!

Nope.

and yep, I hear the wooshes.....

- d.

[Brendan N]

Dimension that proof of god is probably the most compelling, was something that I had thought about somewhat recently. The only thing about it is that once you get to that point and you say "ok, maybe there was this creator that came first".. but that doesnt necessarily mean that its the same god as described in the bible.

Most definitely - just because atheists are wrong doesn't mean Christians or Jews or Muslims are right, now does it?


- d.

[Jabo]

God came to me last night when I was praying. I asked him if he could make a lock that not even he himself could open. Guess what he said...

Checkmate!

[Tully]

My opinion is the only ideal that can't be wrong is agnosticism.

I'll agree with you in principle, pseudo, but it has to do with labels. I'll label myself atheist (which is a decision I came to after a long bout with agnosticism) because I'm reasonably certain that there is no god(s) in the conventional religious sense of the word. Almost certainly no abrahamic god.

However, just because you cannot disprove god--and you certainly can't--doesn't mean that there's an equal probability of god vs no god. Given that there's absolutely no real evidence that god actually exists, I might as well believe in unicorns or the old china teapot. So I'll be a teeny bit reservedly agnostic while still not giving a personal god the time of day. Those that are absolutely certain 100% that there isn't a god are unfortunately committing the same fallacy of faith that they're trying to go against, but I think those people are few and far between.

I just finished reading The God Delusion the other day so forgive me if it sounds like I'm quoting dawkins, but I find the guy rather sensible(if a bit prickly).

[Aether]

Atheism is just as valid a belief as christianity or islam, because thats what they all are, beliefs.

"God is dead"

[Pseudomantia]

just because you cannot disprove god--and you certainly can't--doesn't mean that there's an equal probability of god vs no god.

Well, that was sort of my point. I don't give equal weight, I just don't concern myself with it. I lean a little more toward deistic beliefs but if I had to invent a belief to label what I really lean toward, it'd be that some kind of force created this universe and it may or may not be called a god. I don't think this "god" or force would be anything like us in terms of sentience. Personally I wonder if there is some kind of "infinity" that surrounds our linear dimension as if we were a pocket. Perhaps it is even the collective unconscious of all living beings. Ever had some dreams that upon awakening could no longer be comprehended and faded away almost instantly?

In the end, I'll seek the answer in death, if it can indeed be sought.

[LaPalida]

Wonderful Tully! I'm so glad to hear that people read! (ok this maybe interpreted wrongly - what I meant to say is: I'm so glad that I'm not the only one who reads that kind of book!) I am currently half-way through the book :)

[2b BOY]

Well, that was sort of my point. I don't give equal weight, I just don't concern myself with it. I lean a little more toward deistic beliefs but if I had to invent a belief to label what I really lean toward, it'd be that some kind of force created this universe and it may or may not be called a god. I don't think this "god" or force would be anything like us in terms of sentience. Personally I wonder if there is some kind of "infinity" that surrounds our linear dimension as if we were a pocket. Perhaps it is even the collective unconscious of all living beings. Ever had some dreams that upon awakening could no longer be comprehended and faded away almost instantly?

In the end, I'll seek the answer in death, if it can indeed be sought.

Pantheism. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pantheism) There's an Ism for everything. Religion is like the bearucratic system in Brazil (the movie).

[N D Hill]

May the great and powerfull lord Xenu escape from his laser prison and smite all of you heretics. The thetan levels you people must have is astounding. By the mighty volcanos of Teejiak, may a DC-10 space-plane crash into this thread!

[Prometheus|ANJ]

Dimension's copypasta greatly simplifies the issue to the point where the the conclusion can be choosen (Naturally in favor of God, as deviously hinted by the title of the copypasta sauce: "Does God Exist?").

Further more in depth reading:

The Cosmological Argument (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmological_argument) (Wikipedia)

The Anthropic Principle (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_Principle) (Wikipedia)

A Fine Tuned Universe (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fine-tuned_universe) (Wikipedia)

[Dimension]

Dimension that proof of god is probably the most compelling, was something that I had thought about somewhat recently. The only thing about it is that once you get to that point and you say "ok, maybe there was this creator that came first".. but that doesnt necessarily mean that its the same god as described in the bible.

I guess when you get to that point you have to ask yourself, did this creator leave a message, and do you beleive it?

[sve]

Why there is no evidence of this jump from animal to human now.. Why they don't evolve in this way now? Looks like human race was just planted here on Earth, without any retrace.

[cotron]

All I know is that when I poop too hard, it hurts my butt. Goddamn!

[jfwalls]

Here's an interesting link for all of those people taking this thread seriously.

http://abyss.uoregon.edu/~js/ast121/lectures/lec25.html

[guggemmaneuver]

ownage:
Micheal shermer, Skeptic Magazine, and Scientific American columnist lectures intelligently about this for a few brief moments in this exquisite speech. (http://www.ted.com/tedtalks/tedtalksplayer.cfm?key=m_shermer)

g

[Jason Snair]

guggenmaneuver that video was awesome. I used to kind of hate that guy...only because he'd always be on tv shows tearing a part UFO's sightings, etc, etc...and he always came across as pretty smug.

But that video was great. I'm emailing it to friends now.

[Elwell]

guggenmaneuver that video was awesome.
Seconded. The basketball demonstration is absolutely brilliant.

[chaosrocks]

---lights it on fire.....
fire is good.....

flaming dessert
chaos

[Jason Rainville]

Has this (http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=58880&highlight=creationists) been been posted here yet?

[LaPalida]

Hah I love that speech by Shermer. I never thought that he was arrogant or smug although it irked me that for a long time he was a global warming denier (same for Penn and Teller). That video was my favourite for a long time. Don't know how many people I sent it to. Alot of them were shocked at not seeing what was right in front of their eyes but I did get some people who noticed that "something was wrong" hehe.

@ Rhineville - "Oh no you didn't!"

[Daniel Millar]

we should totally add some discussion about politics to this thread.

[2b BOY]

mmmm politics and religion. Such a good mix...

[Seedling]

If any of you really want to get into some juicy discussions about atheism, agnosticism, secularism, pantheism, apathism etc. etc., for or against, try the Internet Infidels (http://www.iidb.org/vbb/index.php).

[Prometheus|ANJ]

Infidels... Hmmm, When the topic of an entire forum is religion (and related politics), how do you start an offtopic flamewar thread? Maybe something about Manga style and Abstract art?


As for the basket ball thing, the 'event' distracted me so much I lost count instantly. People were supposed to not notice it? I thought it was a trick thing, so I were trying to count the black guys passes aswell.

[2b BOY]

depends on if you have ADD or not.

[LaPalida]

As for the basket ball thing, the 'event' distracted me so much I lost count instantly. People were supposed to not notice it? I thought it was a trick thing, so I were trying to count the black guys passes aswell.

Yeah some of my friends got distracted by the 'event' too. That's because you and them didn't follow the directions as you were asked to :p. You probably didn't know the right count of passes because you didn't concentrate on the task. That was the point ofcourse: attention blindness.

[hito]

All I know is that when I poop too hard, it hurts my butt. Goddamn!

Eat your veggies Cody

[Brendan N]

All I know is that when I poop too hard, it hurts my butt. Goddamn!

Eat your veggies Cody

And drink lots of water.

If we're going to bring politics into it let's just make it "thread of life, the universe and everything else" and end with 42. Right now we have science, religion and philosophy. I suppose it'll bleed to over to politics along the way in any case....

- d.

[Gilles]

Muhawhahhrhaaahrrhaaa!!!


First of all, cool video's and links! This thread makes me feel warm and fuzzy... and it makes me laugh!

Being an atheist normally doesn't make me the most loved person at the party. For some reason I always get people coming to me out of the blue asking me if I really believe God doesn't excist and if really believe that we come from monkeys. I normally start by pointing out that I have no evidence to support that god doesn't excists, nor have I got evidence he does excist. I just find the idea of a supernatural being that designed and controls everything very improbable. I find the world around me much better to be understood if I leave out the idea of a god. Well, of course none of these arguments ever got someone to say to me: "wow, you really changed my view, I don't believe in God anymore". In the contrary, I make people angry... so angry that some even tell me I've been tempted by the devil. Well, if sceptic and secular thoughts belong to the devil than there's no wonder god has such large group of blind followers.

I can go on for hours about this, I just like the fact we can have such a conversation here at CA. Oh and please rip me apart if you want, I gladly talk more about this subject!

Cheers

[LaPalida]

Why there is no evidence of this jump from animal to human now.. Why they don't evolve in this way now? Looks like human race was just planted here on Earth, without any retrace.

http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CB/CB928_1.html
http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CB/CB928_2.html

1. Environmental pressures may have changed.
2. Not necessary to evolve intelligence to survive.
3. Speciation is unique - doesn't repeat itself but "there are many ways to skin a cat" so to speak. Look at wings of bats, birds, insects and pterodactyls. Different solutions to the same problem.

Sve if you really want to know about this go to www.talkorigins.org and check out their FAQ. More specifically:
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-misconceptions.html#observe
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-speciation.html
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/speciation.html
http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/list.html

:D

[sve]

No, no I believe in evolution, although yeah it is a believe, I need to take some things in faith... But there are some facts, like genetic code is one for all living creatures, except mitochondrias and chlorophyll-containing complexes, it is the same principle of transcription of DNA and synthesis of proteins, ferments... btw i don't know if it rejects the idea of one creator...

And yeah, differencing is the force which made all this variety.
if you wanna survive, go out of your niche... Healthiest and the most fitted survives... it is not so in human world...

What makes me think more is how low possibility for organic material to appear in this primary broth, they have theory about... Imagine the ocean and you need to combine several events at once, produce DNA from scattered nucleotides, which supposed to be synthesized with lighting present as source of energy for chemical reaction, then you need very sophisticated ferments to be present for reaction to go, and where do you get them from? they are proteins, they need to be synthesized too....

and they still have A HUGE problem to synthesize a protein in laboratories, it is such an elaborated process, needs to many coincidence to happened, really needs to have special ferments for reaction to go be present... I'm talking how small the possibility of life, organic substances which can reproduce themselves is. so small... Sometimes it is easier to think it was directed by someone.

The other thing, humans are different branch of evolution, they didn't evolved from human like apes... They had separated source. although the Code is similar.

[blacky]

fuck opium
give us soma

[blacky]

No, no I believe in evolution, although yeah it is believe, i need to take some things in faith... But there are some facts, like genetic code is one for all living creatureS, except mitochondrias and chlorophyll-containing complexes, it is the same principle of transcription DNA and synthesis of proteins, ferments... btw i don't know if it rejects the idea of one creator...

And yeah, differencing is the force which made all this variety.
if you wanna survive, go out of your niche... Healthiest and them most fitted survives... it is not so in human world...

What makes me think more is how low possibility for organic material to appear in this primary broth, they have theory about... Imagine the ocean and you need to combine several events at once, produce DNA from scattered nucleotides, which supposed to be synthesized with lighting present as source of energy for chemical reaction, then you need very sophisticated ferments to be present for reaction to go, and where do you get them from? they are proteins, they need to be synthesized too....

and they sill have A HUGE problem to synthesize a protein in laboratories, it is so elaborated process need to many coincidence to happened, really need to have special ferments for reaction to go be present... I'm talking how small the possibility of life, organic substance which can reproduce themselves is. so small... Sometimes it is easier to think it was directed by someone.

The other thing, humans are different branch of evolution, they didn't evolved from human like apes... They had separated source. although the Code is similar.

Didn't you know humans where created by aliens?

They shot dead the dinosaurs too, with the magic bullet

[sve]

Yeah, I'm hinting on this, life could have been planted on Earth. The possibly of someone's directed will is close in my mind to the possibility of the organics being synthesized in a huge endless ocean.

[LaPalida]

What makes me think more is how low possibility for organic material to appear in this primary broth, they have theory about... Imagine the ocean and you need to combine several events at once, produce DNA from scattered nucleotides, which supposed to be synthesized with lighting present as source of energy for chemical reaction, then you need very sophisticated ferments to be present for reaction to go, and where do you get them from? they are proteins, they need to be synthesized too....

and they still have A HUGE problem to synthesize a protein in laboratories, it is such an elaborated process, needs to many coincidence to happened, really needs to have special ferments for reaction to go be present... I'm talking how small the possibility of life, organic substance which can reproduce themselves is. so small... Sometimes it is easier to think it was directed by someone.

While it may be true that we cannot synthesize life in a lab yet - if you think that "life" means DNA ofcourse is a different story - (at least we can't produce a DNA like replicator - we can produce the proteins it's made of) there is no necessity to posit that the god hypothesis is true. You still have to prove that life was intentionally designed by a superior intelligence like god. It's not a default hypothesis. If my theory fails you still have to prove yours to be true. You're also plugging in god/creator into the gaps of knowledge that we have about the world. The more we find out the smaller the gaps shrink leaving no room for god. It may be easier to think that "god did it" but then if you do what's easiest you'll never get anywhere. It's an ultimate non-answer. It's intellectually lazy to dismiss something you can't explain as a miracle by god. If people did that we'd never have any progress.

The other thing, humans are different branch of evolution, they didn't evolved from human like apes... They had separated source. although the Code is similar.

Not sure where you get that. We are animals as much as other animals. Our DNA is 98 % similar to Chimpanzees. That's 98% exact match and 2% difference (the 2% that makes us who we are). Evolution deals with life... there are no other branches. If you mean the study of humans called Anthropology that's a different story.

Yeah, I'm hinting on this, life could have been planted on Earth. The possibly of someone's directed will is close in my mind to the possibility of the organics being synthesized in a huge endless ocean.

Could be but that only pushes the question back further. How did life originate, never mind how it originated on Earth. It also creates the question of "Who designed the designer"?

[sve]

Yes... it is a scientific definition of life... organic substances which can reproduce themselves. Do you know any other clear definition? please tell... That's how it is defined in biological books.

What do you mean it is a lazy thinking to allow God in the way to analize? why is that worse than to fill those gaps you are talking about with your own interpretations... In both cases you allow some imagination and faith, if you don't have facts to support it.. Yes, Darwin theory is a theory, very strong one, but still. maybe there is no jump from animal to human because it is not how it happened in life. And why you think there are two different definitions, two different words, human and animal... because there is a difference, that's why...Apes and humans had probably different sources. there is no fact known to find this jump from ape or any humanlike monkey to humans...

You can tell all you want how you hate religions or how it stops the progress and seeds evil still. but religion was a force of progress too and the most educated people of past were religious schoolers... Why deny it?


<Could be but that only pushes the question back further. How did life originate, never mind how it originated on Earth. It also creates the question of "Who designed the designer"?>

So? it creates more questions... like you were not aware of it... yeah, a lot to learn...

Planted, transferred unconsciously or not...

I repeat that until we have scientific facts to support how life was created the directed creation is as good as any... it is a speculation.
Noone recreated human person from non organics too, still, so... one didn't repeat the experiment... so it is a theory. Theory becomes a fact if it is repeated consistently in experiments, on practice, more than once, of course and it should be done clearly. or it is not a truthful fact.

And yeah, there is one more genetic code , mitochondrial... it is different. why is it different? if everything came from one source? Why do you skip those questions if you are so strict with nothing to be left behind unscrutinized. consider all contradictions if you want to dig out truth.

Please tell in which way, at what point evolution theory denies existence of God?

And I think you are mistaking, replications of DNA are done successfully in labs, I did that when was a student... synthesis of protein, that's what takes so long to recreate. Takes too much time and energy and it is still pathetic, comparing how it happens in life. DNA is not made from proteins, it is made from nucleotides, four different ones, adenine, thymine, guanine, cytosine. Proteins are made from amino acids, they are more than four, it is a huge number, that's why it is harder to synthesize, that's why partly the possibility for it to happen in primary broth is very low, very complicated process.

[Prometheus|ANJ]

Please tell in which way, at what point evolution theory denies existence of God?

It doesn't, unless you define god as someone who are placing oranges on my desk all the time, cuz right now I don't see any oranges on my desk. If you're a young-earth creationist, then yes, that type of god is 'denied'. If you're talking about a god who just sits there and does nothing, no, such a god isn't denied. Nor is a pink elephant on the other side of the galaxy. Nor is a green elephant that just killed the pink elephant. Nor is a white elephant wearing a crazy hat which shoots magical beams that annihilates other gods all over the universe in such a way that the white elephant has monopoly on being god. The idea that Satan created the entire universe last Tuesday isn't denied by science either, providing he made it look very old. However, one could argue that the white elephant would have killed satan with his magical hat.

Science produces various models that are useful for making accurate predictions. Since these predictions are useful to us, we like to pick the theory that yields the most accurate results.

[sve]

With this I agree, Occam's razor. if we can make as less assumptions as possible we should do that. ..."the explanation of any phenomenon should make as few assumptions as possible, eliminating, or "shaving off", those that make no difference in the observable predictions of the explanatory hypothesis or theory"...
But still how life originated is not known... And complexity of the world makes me think about some direction too. And I'm still not satisfied with knowledge about origins of life which is known now.

And to think the thesis God created Earth in seven days :)... what if it was an eternity in human years :).

Still there is no denying of God existence, IMO.

[v0rbiss]

........ARC sux!

[Prometheus|ANJ]

Still there is no denying God existence.

What if the white elephant used his magical hat to kill all other gods, then performed Seppuku?

[Prometheus|ANJ]

And to think the thesis God created Earth in seven days ... what if it was an eternity in human years.

In hinduism, old Veda stuff, I think there's a part that describes Brahma (expanding egg) having blinked twice so far, with each blink being 4 billion years. I'm not sure about the details.

[sve]

Well, saying humans evolved from apes an assumption too... and will never be proved. More of it there is a theory humans evolved from hominids, not apes. It sounds better for you than God's theory? you didn't stand by and hold the candles, why is it better? Not gonna be proved in experiments too.. it is an eternal theory.
My point is there are some spots which hold on assumptions in modern theories too.

[Prometheus|ANJ]

There's no proof that a single line of footprints in snow is left by a man walking there. It could've been aliens that landed, lowered a footprint device into the snow, then flew away to pluto, next, a moose came by, with a shoe on it's horn, which it lowered into the snow. Next, a one legged man bungy jumped, making the third footprint.

The 'assumption' that a man left the footprint is by far the most likely one, even if no one saw him walk there.

If you have a competing theory which is useful for making predictions based on observations, go ahead, submit it to some scientific journals for peer review.

[sve]

Will you make prediction or promise you can repeat creating humans race from an ape? will you be able to create conditions for that? saying that there is not necessity to evolve now, or conditions are different are the same assumptions as you wrote before and matter of faith too.. How can you make predictions in things like this? they might take centuries to happen, or they might be just wrong assumptions. Don't you think it is a matter of faith too? until there are facts to give it more weight?

[LaPalida]

A human footprint in the snow is hardly an extraordinary claim. Plus we make them every winter. A superhuman intelligence that is capable of creating reality... gonna need proof for that.

[sve]

Well I need prove that life was synthesized occasionally from non organics without any direction in huge moving ocean too. sounds too random to me...

[LaPalida]

With this I agree, Occam's razor. if we can make as less assumptions as possible we should do that. ..."the explanation of any phenomenon should make as few assumptions as possible, eliminating, or "shaving off", those that make no difference in the observable predictions of the explanatory hypothesis or theory"...
But still how life originated is not known... And complexity of the world makes me think about some direction too. And I'm still not satisfied with knowledge about origins of life which is known now.

That's why the razor is handy here. No need to posit god where evolution and natural selection can explain life perfectly. Abiogenesis belongs to Chemistry not Biology so if you want to know how life originates then you would have to go there with your question.

[sve]

My dear, I don't look at world as separated objects, described by different sciences, it's all united to me. If you want to see united picture of world you need to look at it as one.]
I don't think there is a perfect explanation. still a lot to dig.

Abiogenesis belongs to Chemistry not Biology? come on... you don't want to know the beginning? it is pure biology. How those unique rare conditions happened?

[LaPalida]

Well I need prove that life was synthesized from non organics without any direction in huge moving ocean too. sounds too random to me...

http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CF/CF002_1.html
http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CF/CF003.html
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/abioprob/
specifically: http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/list.html#CB0

http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CB/CB010.html

[LaPalida]

My dear, I don't look at world as separated objects, described by different sciences, it's all united to me. If you want to see united picture of world you need to look at it as one.]
I don't think there is a perfect explanation. still a lot to dig.

Abiogenesis belongs to Chemistry not Biology? come on... you don't want to know the beginning? it is pure biology.

Indeed nor do I. However we as humans divide our fields of research because it makes it is easier for us to deal with the world (break it down in chunks). So if you want to know about abiogenesis the person to ask is a Chemist not a Biologist. That's their area of expertise. I agree that sciences overlap. Biology reduces to Chemistry and Chemistry reduces to Physics.

I agree there is alot to find out yet. Abiogenesis is an expanding field.

But why bother?.... just say god did it and get it over with. Why do we need to know the origin of life? We already know god directed the molecules to combine....

[sve]

sweety, if you want to argue your way, tell it in your words, no need to send me to find little grain in heap of trash. I know the only thing to support is that some organics were noticed to appear with using electric charge with certain primitive chemicals of non organic present. But do you know what it takes to synthesize very complex organic substance... it is very, very complex and not random at all. How those conditions happened? it is too hard to believe.
<Biology reduces to Chemistry and Chemistry reduces to Physics.> ???? what is this? it is many sides of one thing. Nature. its laws.

Sciences don't overlap. they explore one thing, nature... when you obtain new knowledge, you don't put it in little box where it belongs. ( it is a pure chemistry no need to take it farther...) you try to combine it, fit it in united picture of the world.
<Why do we need to know the origin of life? We already know god directed the molecules to combine....> Yeah, who wants to know, can ask Chemistry expert... what is your version of how life appeared? Or you don't want to dig in this filed of knowledge...

[LaPalida]

sweety, if you want to argue your way, tell it in your words, no need to send me to find little grain in heap of trash.

Well how condescending...

I know the only thing to support is that some organics were noticed to appear with using electric charge with certain primitive chemicals of non organic present. But do you know what it takes to synthesize very complex organic substance... it is very, very complex and not random at all. How those conditions happened? it is too hard to believe.

No one said it was random. You're making staw men and arguments from personal incredulity everywhere. Maybe if you read those links you would have avoided making those fundamental logical errors. And btw... I sent you relevant links to the questions you have asked. They explain it better than I can ... after all that "trash" is compiled by Biologists... but then what the hell do they know right?

[sve]

I read your links, few didn't work, other were links to other links. if you want to argue you need to form your thoughts yourself. If you chose them you supposed to read them first yourself. So why not to tell me why you think they are answers to my questions. Internet is full of links, a lot of them just water, nothing solid. Tell what you think yourself, that's the arguing. What you mean they will tell me better? who are they? virtual entities? do you believe anything you read on Internet? I sure don't . I'm discussing it with you...


<No one said it was random.> ???? meaning it was not random? meaning it was some direction in it? do you understand it means it was some sort of creator? Nature is random.

[Shamagim]

The human genome is very veeery similar to the common rat genome :).

ouch!....but it makes some sense tho.

[sve]

The human genome is very veeery similar to the common rat genome :).

ouch!....but it makes some sense tho.

I wrote it few posts before, Shamagim... it is one of the things that has an argument for the one source of life... but there is one more source, mitochondrial DNA and again, I repeat, God can easily coexist with all this.

[LaPalida]

@ Sve - Fine, fair enough. I'm at work and I can't afford to type up a novel. However when I get home I'll try to respond to some of the stuff you said in my own words. I don't know, it maybe more to read for you. As for random... no evolution is not random, but there is no direction to it.

[Zaknafain]

Status quo is: god does exist... its the thing that makes people do all kind of things. An idea, or a theory that is what it is (and therefore this discussion is the prove that it exists).


Just think of what god can do with a human beeing. (good things or bad things). It is even powerful enough to start wars...

Of course a god that has control over weather or something like this is highly unrealistic (and this would be the case, god would be quite an asshole... it always starts to rain when I go outside.)

[sve]

Directed evolution called artificial selection. that's how sorts and breeds are created, natural selection supposed to be random. that's why there is so many species... they all have right to exist. it goes in all directions at once simultaneously. Artificial selection is directed by human person, induced, sort of model with God actively participating.
You don't have to prove me anything if you don't want to... I will be glad to read your thoughts. And. yes, I think it shows more respect to an opponent's time than to send him surfing the Internet.

[Prometheus|ANJ]

I had a long reply typed out for you sve, but I erased it and decided to give you a chance. Formulate your theory, submit it to Scientific journals for peer review, and I will read it. Really, do it.

You can start with probability calculations for "it is too hard to believe", I think they're going to want a value for that, you know, Scientists and values. I bet they're going to be impressed by your credentials too, because you do have a PhD in physics, chemistry and biology right? You could debunk stuff like.. the big bang theory, including, the brane theory, the no boundry proposal, cosmic inflation. Then you can proceed with a massive attack on the entire field of paleontology showing how it's all bunk. Next, you can demonstrate that both chemistry and natural selection are both in fact completely random and doesn't guide anything at all! To finish it off, you present your awesome alternative Theory of "maybe something else did it, I dont know".

[theincredibleandy]

Seconded. The basketball demonstration is absolutely brilliant.

Thirded. The audio stuff is nice too. With evolution vs creationism, the argument will not end. Anything scientists prove with evidence will be trumped by saying that God used science to make it happen, and any time someone says God did something the scientists will ask how God did it and search for scientific evidence explaining it. Religious people use a supreme power to fill gaps that science doesn't explain, but scientists are laughed at if in the middle of their theorem they say "step 2: A miracle happens here." Religion and science are different and they shouldn't pretend to be each other.

[sve]

PhD in chemistry and biology, yes. You will listen me better after this? that's ridiculous. you listen to meaning, not words...
Is it your argument? go to there and tell them? and you are , what? have no good words? ....<on the entire field of paleontology>... There is no proof we are originated form apes. Source is still unknown.
You guys need to argue your way, not to press your opponent with arguments sort of "all word thinks like this". You don't agree, argue your thought in civilized manner. with facts.

[ah.heng]

regarding evolution.
look at childbirth.

[Prometheus|ANJ]

Forgive me sve, but I'm having trouble understanding your fragmented writing style, so if I'm not responding to things you write it's because I didn't understand what you were getting at.

Yes, I will listen to authorities on subjects. In a way, my argument is an "Appeal to Authority". You phrased that argument as "all of the world agree with this". This is ill phrased I think, if by 'world' you mean regular people. Regular people are barely capable of pushing a steelwagon in front of them and put food in it, then go home and look at moving pictures on a box. Scientists make up a very small part of the world, so I probably agree with a minority, not "all of the world".

If you require a personal reason why I tend to agree with mainstream science:

When I were 16 I wrote a program that simulated gravity between planetary bodies, in fact, I kinda made up a formula from what seemed to be reasonable. I was glad to see that it matched that of my faith (in gravity). Since then I have written computer programs that on a low level demonstrates the mechanisms of emerging complexity and natural selection. I am not a Stephen Hawking or John Horton Conway, but the limited journeys I have taken into the field of science have confirmed that these science guys aren't just making things up. Without patting myself on the back too much, I think I have a greater understanding of these mechanisms than the average Joe atleast. I'm constantly baffled how powerful and surprising these mechanisms can be, so, these "How could life just appear randomly???" arguments carries a lot less weight for me. I'm also baffled how I can actually get 2000 lines of code working, making all sorts of complex gameplay appear, without being notably smart (I'm an artist and not much of a coder). If there was an intelligent designer, it's quite possible he didn't have to be very intelligent!

I do not have a PhD is Physics, Chemistry, Paleontology or Biology. I have a certain degree of respect and trust/faith in most of those who hold these titles. If someone is building a massive expensive particle accelerator I'm not going to question their expertice. I think that I'm not brainy enough to ever understand complex sciences on a formula level. You can not debunk these issues by 3 sentence statements on a messageboard. Physics, Biology, Chemistry, etc are difficult complex sciences that require great in-depth attention if you seek to quarrel with them.

I was not being too uncivil. I simply asked you to give them this in-depth attention if you seek to disprove them. A good way to present theories and facts is to submit and article to a scientific journal for peer review. I'm not joking here. If your facts and argument is correct and logical, you should be able to show this. Or someone else should, then you may link me to an abstact of the theory. I have a sincere intrest in these issues.

Is this one of your facts? Looks like a statement to me.
There is no proof we are originated form apes. Source is still unknown.

Now, to show that this postulation carries weight, you would need to show some peer revieved scientific papers. Peer review means that other scientists look at it to see if the facts check out and the logic holds. Again, these issues are very complex, and I don't think the laymens here, including myself, are capable of discussing these issue at the depth that is required to come to any sensible newsworthy conlusion. There are educated scientists that do this for a living. They have proper channels for discussing these kind of issues at a professional level. If you seek to have any real impact on their discussions, then use their channels. You could maximize the impact of your alternative theory by using these channels.

I responded to your posts to present the first immidiate counter arguments that I believe science offers to your arguments (I believe I'm atleast qualified to provide these abstracts). If you want a more in depth discussion at advanced formula/research levels (which is required sooner or later), I'm not qualified, and I never will be.

[_Mario]

Just a few things for sve: This post is not about religion versus science or anything, I just wanted to show you some possible explanations to your questions.

1. There are no facts in science, just theories that work at the moment. Some get better and more detailed, some get proven wrong. Science is about constant change, and it has nothing to do with god. Per definition a fact is not compatible with the word theory. It may be a fact that my post (this here right now) makes me look like a know-it-all but this has nothnig to do with science ;).

2. Humans didn't evolve from apes (This one is not really for you but more for the people who still say that). "Humand evolved from apes" is just a generalization. Humans and apes just have (most probably) common ancestors (that are extinct now, again most probably because of ape and human competition) but it's easier to to say that we come from apes than to say we have common ancestors. And the whole myth isn't that easy to change in the public perception.

3. Just to show you a little example of your "missing knowledge" regarding the whole evolution theory thing and other information close to the topic: your original questionAnd yeah, there is one more genetic code , mitochondrial... it is different. why is it different?Answer from here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitochondrion)Origin

As mitochondria contain ribosomes and DNA, and are only formed by the division of other mitochondria, it is generally accepted that they were originally derived from endosymbiotic prokaryotes. Studies of mitochondrial DNA, which is often circular and employs a variant genetic code, show their ancestor, the so-called proto-mitochondrion, was a member of the Proteobacteria.[5] In particular, the pre-mitochondrion was probably related to the rickettsias, although the exact position of the ancestor of mitochondria among the alpha-proteobacteria remains controversial. The endosymbiotic hypothesis suggests that mitochondria descended from specialized bacteria (probably purple non-sulfur bacteria) that somehow survived endocytosis by another species of prokaryote or some other cell type, and became incorporated into the cytoplasm. The ability of symbiont bacteria to conduct cellular respiration in host cells that had relied on glycolysis and fermentation would have provided a considerable evolutionary advantage. Similarly, host cells with symbiotic bacteria capable of photosynthesis would also have an advantage. In both cases, the number of environments in which the cells could survive would have been greatly expanded.

This relationship developed at least 2 billion years ago and mitochondria still show some signs of their ancient origin. Mitochondrial ribosomes are the 70S (bacterial) type, in contrast to the 80S ribosomes found elsewhere in the cell. As in prokaryotes, there is a very high proportion of coding DNA, and an absence of repeats. Mitochondrial genes are transcribed as multigenic transcripts which are cleaved and polyadenylated to yield mature mRNAs. Unlike their nuclear cousins, mitochondrial genes are small, generally lacking introns, and many chromosomes are circular, conforming to the bacterial pattern.With further reading regarding the topic of endosymbiotic theory here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endosymbiosis). Like all science stuff it's just a theory that stays until something better is found. By found I mean: accepted by people.

And PhD in chemistry and biology? When did that happen if I may ask? Because your writing does not show a lot of the most generic knowledge (regarding biochemistry) that is available these days. Your information sounds a little bit out-dated; see following example:What makes me think more is how low possibility for organic material to appear in this primary broth, they have theory about... Imagine the ocean and you need to combine several events at once, produce DNA from scattered nucleotides, which supposed to be synthesized with lighting present as source of energy for chemical reaction, then you need very sophisticated ferments to be present for reaction to go, and where do you get them from? they are proteins, they need to be synthesized too.... Have you ever heared of Stanley Miller (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanley_L._Miller)? By any chance? Or his experiment (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miller-Urey_experiment)?

And your Proteins are made from amino acids, they are more than four, it is a huge number huge number is 22 (for protein synthesis). ;)

I would not have posted anything and just watched this funny thread would you (sve) not have written that you have a PhD in biology/chemistry without having some of the most fundametal generic knowledge. That was a bit like you having a driving license while not even exactly knowing what a car is (bad comparison, I know, but it roughly describes my surprise).

I wrote this post without referencing hundreds (probably thousands) of pages of really detailed information and I don't think that I will hunt anything for a totally unrelated discussion on this forum. And this post may look a bit (or more) agresive, blunt and disrespectful but your (sve) writing in this topic just seems to be a bit on the rough side too and with regard to this I am just to lazy to pack it in nicer words.

PS: And yes you would have to read the texts that I linked to because I don't see it as very productive to just copy/paste or paraphrase all the writing. I would just lose the nice formating (and pictures) and probably some good/useful infomation.

[sve]

No, Mario, your post was not aggressive at all, and all you said is truth, including my out-of date knowledge - I did study genetics and worked at biological laboratory, but I'm not working in this field for many years now.
My English, yes, probably hard to understand, I apologize for that. Still the conversation was about the existence of God. And this is a matter of faith and strictly speaking there is no direct evidence s/he doesn't exist... and no direct evidence to the contrary... While God is not required to explain many facts of life (Occam's razor), it doesn't mean s/he does not exist. We don't need Antarctica to explain many things, and majority of people never saw it, but it does exist totally independent of our believes and/or our approval. I don't see contradictions in my arguments, except 20+ amino acids, and the reason I mentioned them is to demonstrate that probability of spontaneous synthesis of the protein is very low... More possible combinations.
By the way I don't recall arguing about humans and apes not having common ancestor. But I expected that my opponents would state it (they didn't). Same goes for mitochondria argument. I know there is a theory they were devoured by other types of cells. They still have different from the whole cell DNA though.

Actually I don't see anything I said that contradicts your post... I agree with scientific facts in your post. The manner in which I said it, giving only half of an information, well, I did it consciously, wanted to hear counterarguments. Don't understand why it is bad. It is just a manner to converse.

Having said that I want to apologize for being a little bit rough, and curt in this thread. I wasn't angry at anyone in this thread though. The word trash was not appropriate, I apologize for that too.

I mentioned this experiment with a synthesis of primitive amino acids (Stanley Miller experiment of 1954 year, not last moment news too. We studied it) in my post before. <I know the only thing to support is that some organics were noticed to appear with using electric charge with certain primitive chemicals of non organic present.> that's my words.
However, living organisms have one more crucial feature besides being organic, they can reproduce themselves, and that is quite a complicated process with fermentation involved.
I didn't tell anything contradicting to known scientific facts... Where do you see me saying something not truthful?

Number one argument is actually for my opponents, in my opinion. That's was my point, we need to stay open minded. I know that it is theories which work until proven wrong or better explanation is given.

[Jason Manley]

:)

Scientists have discovered at least 52 new species of animals and plants on the southeast Asian island of Borneo since 2005, including a catfish with protruding teeth and suction cups on its belly to help it stick to rocks

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16270956/

[Shamagim]

Some old, overlooked species are cool too :D

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c8/Cococrb2.jpg
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c8/Cococrb2.jpg

[Brendan N]

I read in a National Geographic magazine of an island in French Polynesia where evolution is taking some radical "turns." Didn't read through the whole thing but the jest of it was that the island had some pretty unique variation of species including huge pigeons and reptiles. Don't think it's the same one J mentioned, but close. Found it very interesting.

- d.

[Cwn Annwn]

That whooshing sound you hear is this thread going over the heads of half it's posters.
:nohope:

lol. It's getting breezy enough to keep me cool here this Aussie summer's day.






On the other hand many thanks to Seedling for that nifty link to Internet Infidels.

[NoSeRider]

http://conceptart.org/forums/image.php?u=23733&dateline=1161198865

Gawd this Sig Pic is gross. Well, I mentioned Gawd...still in context of the thread.

[Prometheus|ANJ]

Where do you see me saying something not truthful?

Again, I had some problems understanding what you were getting at, maybe you don't even disagree with me. Here are some questions for you:

Could you clarify the following?

<No one said it was random.> ???? meaning it was not random? meaning it was some direction in it? do you understand it means it was some sort of creator? Nature is random.


I'm reading it as: (sorry I don't mean to put words in your mouth, but I have to make a guess what you mean)
Not you: "It is a common misconception that 'Evolution' is random stuff happening without any guiding forces."
You: "Are you saying evolution isn't random and has a directing force? I conclude this force is a creator, namely God himself. Nature is just random, so a creator is needed to guide things."

If this is the case, why are you omitting chemistry and natural selection as guiding forces? They have both been proved as facts (note that I'm not saying that the Theory of Evolution is a fact). What can be argued is that they're not strong enough as guiding forces to stimulate Evolution.

You did say this:
The other thing, humans are different branch of evolution, they didn't evolved from human-like apes... They had separated source. although the Code is similar.

What are you getting at here? Are you just saying that humans didn't evolve from present day apes, (which is like duuh), or are you saying that humans didn't evolve fom ape-like primates / schimps whatever 5-7m years go?

Also, what logical framework are you using to define these gods? If we can't disprove them, how can we define them without "making things up"?

[Nerahla]

prometheus your sig is tehfunneh :p



Anyone read The God Delusion?

[Prometheus|ANJ]

Remember, sufficiently small panties are indistinguishable from perfection.

No, I didn't read the God Delusion, but I'm familiar with Dawkin and his line of arguments. He's a bit of a Zealot, but enlighting at times. Maybe this would intrest you RuneCaster? Scroll down to Sam Harris
http://www.longnow.org/projects/seminars/

[LaPalida]

I used to think that Dawkins was a bit on the extreme side. I have since revised my views. I think he is very reasonable. This is after watching and listening to alot of debates and reading his books. BTW I can no longer say that evolution is not in conflict with the God hypothesis. It very much is. NOMA is a faulty concept.

Some relevant links:

http://beyondbelief2006.org/Watch/wa...eo=Session%203

If anyone wants to watch the complete Beyond Belief go to http://beyondbelief2006.org/Watch/. Dawkins speaks in the first 1/3 of the third video posted there (the link above) and then again later. But don't miss out on others. Especially Steven Weinberg, Sam Harris, Michael Shermer, Neil deGrasse Tyson and Ramachandran.

Check out all "Beyond Belief" videos. It's a get together of scientists where they talk about God and religion and how it's compatible with Science.

[Prometheus|ANJ]

I fail to see the relevance of those videos LaPalida, that is, to anything you said in your post, not to the overall topic. Interesting though, Dawkins is surprisingly good at articulating himself.

I'm not sure I agree with Dawkin's strict atheist stance. I'd probably label myself 'occamist'... meaning that I don't ascribe any wieght to, or try to define properties that exist outside our realm of deductable logic. It's pretty much the same as as atheism/agnostism in practice though.

It could be argued that with Hawkings "No Boundry Proposal" (which is just a proposal, I just finished that chapter), god(s) gets even fewer gaps to exist in. In many ways, the number of possible definitions of god(s) have decreased as our knowledge in Science increase. God(s) has been reduced to a vegitable outside time and space.

Yeah, Science assumes, but it doesn't really violate Occam's razor now does it? For example, I know gravity works, so I will assume that it also works for larger bodies far out in the solar system that doesn't seem to move when I look at them in the night sky. The same goes for evolution. It's a good sound theory, and where there's datapoints missing interpolation seems to be the most reasonable thing to do.

[LaPalida]

Oh sorry Prom. If you watch the videos... there is a part (I think it's one of the first 3 - not the links but the videos on the website www.beyondbelief2006.org) where Dawkins explains his stance on religion, and how or why it conflicts with evolution, very well. Ofcourse "God Delusion" goes more in depth on that topic. (You're right, I think the first video link I posted was the wrong one actually now that I look at it. There was another with him on YouTube but I don't see it there any more, however if you go to the website I think it's one of the first 3).

EDIT: Ok it's the 3rd video. Here it is http://beyondbelief2006.org/Watch/watch.php?Video=Session%203. He in the first 1/3 of video after the most boring droning of Joan Roughgarden.

[Prometheus|ANJ]

I did watch the videos. The first one was about how morals have changed on a wide front throughout time. Maybe you linked the wrong one? You better go back and fix your links, the bold tag intereferes with one.

[LaPalida]

I did watch the videos. The first one was about how morals have changed on a wide front throughout time. Maybe you linked the wrong one? You better go back and fix your links, the bold tag intereferes with one.

LOL that's hilarious. It links to Oral B. I didn't know it could do that. Euh no wonder people keep saying my links are broken.

[Prometheus|ANJ]

Thanks, I'm running them in the background while painting (http://web.telia.com/~u48508900/starflight/landingvehicle.jpg). There's some interesting arguments going on between those guys, little battles going back and forth.

[kingshaj]

SHAM:
i bet there werent 2 of those on the ark!
yikes! ...but i want one. name him squirtle.
and he would be very religous, but we'd still be pals... sigh


old thought:
originaly the word atheism meant without worship A-theism = without a theology
and Agnostic meant without knowlege and originaly implied that as a negative
not the way we now define it as a proud "heck if i know...im just a lil guy"

SANTA is real!!!!!!!! and any one hoo doesnt belive wont get anything cool.

[LaPalida]

@ Kingshaj - You're right. That's pretty much how I use those words. Agnosticism is a claim that knowledge about god is unatainable not the "wishy-washy-so-called-reasonable-golden-middle" position of uncertainty of whether or not god exists that is used by most people today (existence or non-existence being described in terms of a 50/50 chance). BTW a-theism was used by Romans describing Christians because they didn't believe in Jupiter or any other Roman god. Both pagans and Christians in turn called each other atheists when each side lacked a belief in the other side's particular gods. This was used in a pejorative sense that's why atheism still carries that negative connotation to it.

[blacky]

everything's relative
me, for example; I don't even believe there had ever been anything non alive in this Universe......

[Prometheus|ANJ]

Oh my *I'm watching the Beyond Belief 06 Sessions while concepting (http://web.telia.com/~u48508900/starflight/bugs.jpg)*... when Dawkins came on after the nervous woman... haha. Blunt is the word, but I think it's refreshing in a way to see that he doesn't compromize his position.

[blakboks]

Infinite Past Impossible
“The infinite is nowhere to be found in reality. It neither exists in nature nor provides a legitimate basis for rational thought. The role that remains for the infinite is solely that of an idea. – David Hilbert”
The third and strongest piece of support for the beginning of the universe comes from the impossibility of an infinite past. This is because an actual infinite number of anything cannot exist in the real world. But to have a universe with no beginning you would have to have an actual infinite number of past events. We might think that since we do use the concept of infinity in mathematics there would be no problem here.

Now, I have to lead off saying that I've been very confused when reading this thread, because some people say one thing and then say exactly the opposite later on, so I'm never really sure if people are pro-religion or not.

But, I think trying to discount the idea of infinity as ones support for religion is probably not so good of an idea. Borat would not say "very nice" in this instance. It's not a good argument, since belief in religion 99.9+% (sorry, can't reference an exact number) of the time includes belief in the afterlife--in which the spirit may reside in heaven or hell (or whatever the religion's preferred afterlife may be) for "all of eternity".

-Chris

[Cwn Annwn]

Damn this thread...I can't resist posting.

My problem with some of Dawkin's works is that some of it seems flawed and rushed from a scientific viewpoint. Here's a post a physicist made earlier, (yeah I'm a lazy cow)

http://richarddawkins.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2739


I also wonder about the ethics of some proposals that seem to want to steer the globe into the beginnings of a monoculture.

[LaPalida]

Oh my *I'm watching the Beyond Belief 06 Sessions while concepting*... when Dawkins came on after the nervous woman... haha. Blunt is the word, but I think it's refreshing in a way to see that he doesn't compromize his position.

Hah wait until you hear some peoples reaction to what Stuart Hameroff said. Now that's blunt lol. The guy pretty much left right after he gave his speech. He made alot of peoples blood pressure rise haha.

[Prometheus|ANJ]

Thanks Cwn, I was just reading about that argument and finding it a bit too easy and 'tailored'. I even was going to post and ask if anyone had a critical analysis of it, and there your post is! Ohhh, this is getting spooky!

(I guess, whenever I understand something, I get a little suspicious, being paranoid and all... but you know what they say, perfect paranoia is perfect awareness!)

[guggemmaneuver]

what does the following say about the EVOLution of this thread?
:heart: EVOL spelled backwards is LOVE :heart:

[Carl Dobsky]

1-God is Love
2-Love is blind

Therefore, God must be Ray Charles.

[kingshaj]

god is obviosly santa....have you ever seen them in the same place at the same time?

[Dimension]

in which the spirit may reside in heaven or hell (or whatever the religion's preferred afterlife may be) for "all of eternity".


That would be assuming that the spirit is a part of our physical world.

In a way, my argument is an "Appeal to Authority".

Have you heard the phrase "Question all authority"?

[Prometheus|ANJ]

Have you heard the phrase "Question all authority"?

I am well aware of the... problematic nature of my stance.

How many people here have seen the stars with their own eyes? Probably a good amount. How many have seen the Andromeda galaxy or Mars? Probably a lot less. How many have observed the parallax effect or redshift and used it as a method to deduce the distance to a star? None? Yet most of us don't believe that stars are just dots of light placed upon a hollow sphere. Even if you're a well educated astronomer, you have faith in other areas where your expertice is lacking.

The difference here between having faith in a scientific theory and faith in an arbitrary definition of something outside our realm of logic, is that someone can disprove a scientific theory (otherwise it isn't one, right?), sometimes even the person who formulated the theory himself. Hawking did with a part of his black hole theory (I think it was information leakage or destruction), he spent a lot of time formulating that theory too. I think it would be pompous for me to say that I could've done it. I'm only at a level where I can understand the summaries of his theories. I suppose my faith is not really mine, it just happens to ride with whatever goes at the moment. I certainly wouldn't keep my faith in a theory after it has been proven wrong or less likely than another theory.

I have a two-fold trust. I believe that scientists aren't just making things up, because I also believe that if they do, someone will eventually expose them (because people are competitive and loves to prove others wrong). There are different degrees of trust, we have established science and newly published science. Trust is not a boolean, a flag or no flag. Sometimes all we have is a theory that we have reasons to be sceptical about, but between that and being satisfied with an arbitrable explaination, I'd rather subsribe to the former.

[LaPalida]

Prom I think you have to distinguish between faith in religion - belief that something is true without proof vs. trust or belief in science - belief based on evidence and proof. I think you have to agree that they're not the same. Sure no one has seen an atom directly but that doesn't mean that we don't have proof for it's existence. We definitely have indirect evidence for atoms so it doesn't take faith to believe in them. It takes faith to believe in something that has not the slightest shred of evidence.

[alxcote]

I'll go ahead and contribute to this great thread by posting some links to the great IPU.

http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Bit/6458/pinkunicorns.html

http://www.palmyra.demon.co.uk/humour/ipu.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invisible_Pink_Unicorn

[Nerahla]

Well, I haven't read ALL of Dawkins' books, just the first 100 pages of The God Delusion before my husband snatched it out of my hands. He's the one who reads them all.

He doesn't seem rushed to me, since he isn't talking about science in this book - he's talking about the fact that he wants to make it clear to people of faith that its OK to question your faith.

To the indoctrinated, they believe it's against their faith even to question it -- quite a self reinforcing meme, really.

Why it works so well.

The thing I found the most interesting to me personally is that in this day and age it's more accepted to be a homosexual than an Atheist.

So of course because I love being an outsider, this makes me giddy in the pants.

Besides, I'm Carlin-ian.


yes. That would be George Carlin.



"We get a free ticket to the freak show when we're born. So just sit back and enjoy the show."

Amen brother.

[Prometheus|ANJ]

I think maybe you misunderstood me LaPalida. You're talking about people as if they are perfectly informed and rational. Yes, Science as a method is trying to get rid of faith. Scientists, hopefully, are well informed and rational. I'm not talking about Science as a method, or the Scientists. What I'm talking about is that good data is not readily availabe to average Joe, and if it was, would he have the deducing power to come up with a good theory? If Joe has an IQ of 65 and haven't read any books on astronomy, but still believes in gravitational lensing, the basis of his decision is not rationality, proof or evidence. It's faith on the same grounds as religious faith, he reads a widely published text from an authoritive source, and decides it's therefore true.

Of course, as I hinted at in my second paragraph in the previous post there's a difference in belief in a scientific theory and a non-disprovable statement (I should add, I'm talking about the cases where I'm well out of my league). If I place my bet on a Scientific theory, I know that there's an incentive not to just make things up, as there are actually ways of getting caught. It's also possible that I can benefit from predictions/results produced of the theory. I'm really just trying to be honest here, there's Scientific theories that I understand, half-understand and don't even can begin to grasp without someone describing it for me in baby language.

Edit: I sometime toy with the thought of going back in time 1500 years. What impact could I have, given I got a good position as science advisor somewhere? My statements about planet and galaxy formation, energy translation, DNA, evolution, etc would probably appear very dogmatic initially. How well could I do and how much do I really know? I think a Polish writer wrote a scifi book on this subject once...

[blacky]

[QUOTE=Prometheus|Edit: I sometime toy with the thought of going back in time 1500 years. What impact could I have, given I got a good position as science advisor somewhere? My statements about planet and galaxy formation, energy translation, DNA, evolution, etc would probably appear very dogmatic initially. How well could I do and how much do I really know?...[/QUOTE]

I've been playing with simillar thoughts a lot.

Guess, you wouldn't even get noticed. Cuz you'd know too much. Means, you'd eather be tacken serious and therefore ignored/ riduculed or gotten rid off not to interfere with s.b. elses interests or you would be declared a psycho.

So better have an uzi along :confident
:uzi: :bow:

[fixx]

I sometimes toy with the idea of how I will ever help that other science fellow prove that there's a teapot orbiting Pluto, and a frozen cave filled with frogs inside the sun.

[Prometheus|ANJ]

I think I found the book and author. The author Leo Frankowski wrote a series called "The Adventures of Conrad Stargard" where some guy (an engineer I believe) goes back in time to 13th century Poland, where he has a great impact on the technological development.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conrad_Stargard

Just a heads up if anyone is interested. I was recommended these books but haven't gotten to them yet.

[Seedling]

originaly the word atheism meant without worship A-theism = without a theology
and Agnostic meant without knowlege and originaly implied that as a negative
not the way we now define it as a proud "heck if i know...im just a lil guy"


Actually it’s a bit more complex than that. But it’s too silly and complex to get into what the words used to mean. Stick with modern definitions to prevent headache. :-)

agnostic – “one who does not presume to know if gods do or do not exist”
atheist – Either “one who lacks a belief in gods”, OR “one who believes that there are no gods”. There is a significant difference between those definitions, but many people muddle them horribly.

To make things more exciting, you can consider agnosticism and atheism to be on two different perpendicular lines of a graph. In one direction, you have a line running from theism to atheism. On the other, you have gnosticism to agnosticism. (For the sake of the nifty graph, assume that a gnostic is “one who thinks they know all the answers concerning gods or the lack thereof”. It doesn’t actually have this definition.)

So, on this chart, one could be an atheist agnostic, an atheist gnostic, a neutral theist, a gnostic theist, an agnostic theist, true neutral, etc.

I would be an agnostic atheist by this chart on most days – but there are days when I’m feeling punchy and might consider myself a gnostic atheist. Where do you guys fall on this spectrum?

[LaPalida]

Agnostic atheist. In Dawkins's sense of agnosticism. I lack a belief in a god but I don't know for certain there isn't one in the same sense as I don't know for certain that there aren't invisible pink unicorns or leprachauns. In fact I should first point out what do you mean by god. If you mean the Abrahamic god then I can say with a very high degree of certainty that he doesn't exist. In fact if you make any empirical claims about your gods and we can test them then we can prove with certainty that there is no such god as you posit (or any other paranormal claim for that matter). If you mean by god some nebulous untangible entity that created the reality and cares nothing for what we do or how we behave there is a higher degree of uncertainty there. However if a person is making a claim it is their job to prove to the world that the claim is true not the other way around. In fact I call into question as to how you came upon the knowledge of this entity. If you have no evidence whatsoever for your claim ... how can you possible ask me or the rest of the world to take it seriously. I mean in science we form theories to explain facts. We don't form theories and then try to conform facts to the theories. If new evidence surfaces THEN we compare them to our theories and judge whether or not the theories stand up to scrutiny. That's what makes or breaks a theory. Theists seem to do just the opposite. They claim god exists and created the universe without any proof and then go about conforming facts to their claim. If facts don't fit then they do some mental acrobatics and twist facts or their claim about god is non-falsifiable. Fundamental theists twist science to fit their literal religious views (ie. carbon dating is bs or there is no evidence for evolution) and liberal theists twist religion to fit their scientific and progressive views (ie. cutting people down with the sword is a metaphor, what it really means is "show them the righteous path to virtue"). Sorry for a bit of a rant on my part hehe. Couldn't help it.

[Nerahla]

Seedling I'm with you - on my more tolerant days I'd like to say I'm agnostic atheist.

But yeah, punchy is the perfect word for those other days :D

[Ethax]

Douglas Adams on why he isn't "agnostic":

If you describe yourself as “Atheist,” some people will say, “Don’t you mean ‘Agnostic’?” I have to reply that I really do mean Atheist. I really do not believe that there is a god - in fact I am convinced that there is not a god (a subtle difference). I see not a shred of evidence to suggest that there is one. It’s easier to say that I am a radical Atheist, just to signal that I really mean it, have thought about it a great deal, and that it’s an opinion I hold seriously. It’s funny how many people are genuinely surprised to hear a view expressed so strongly. In England we seem to have drifted from vague wishy-washy Anglicanism to vague wishy-washy Agnosticism - both of which I think betoken a desire not to have to think about things too much.

People will then often say “But surely it’s better to remain an Agnostic just in case?” This, to me, suggests such a level of silliness and muddle that I usually edge out of the conversation rather than get sucked into it. (If it turns out that I’ve been wrong all along, and there is in fact a god, and if it further turned out that this kind of legalistic, cross-your-fingers-behind-your-back, Clintonian hair-splitting impressed him, then I think I would chose not to worship him anyway.)

Other people will ask how I can possibly claim to know? Isn’t belief-that-there-is-not-a-god as irrational, arrogant, etc., as belief-that-there-is-a-god? To which I say no for several reasons. First of all I do not believe-that-there-is-not-a-god. I don’t see what belief has got to do with it. I believe or don’t believe my four-year old daughter when she tells me that she didn’t make that mess on the floor. I believe in justice and fair play (though I don’t know exactly how we achieve them, other than by continually trying against all possible odds of success). I also believe that England should enter the European Monetary Union. I am not remotely enough of an economist to argue the issue vigorously with someone who is, but what little I do know, reinforced with a hefty dollop of gut feeling, strongly suggests to me that it’s the right course. I could very easily turn out to be wrong, and I know that. These seem to me to be legitimate uses for the word believe. As a carapace for the protection of irrational notions from legitimate questions, however, I think that the word has a lot of mischief to answer for. So, I do not believe-that-there-is-no-god. I am, however, convinced that there is no god, which is a totally different stance and takes me on to my second reason.

I don’t accept the currently fashionable assertion that any view is automatically as worthy of respect as any equal and opposite view. My view is that the moon is made of rock. If someone says to me “Well, you haven’t been there, have you? You haven’t seen it for yourself, so my view that it is made of Norwegian Beaver Cheese is equally valid” - then I can’t even be bothered to argue. There is such a thing as the burden of proof, and in the case of god, as in the case of the composition of the moon, this has shifted radically. God used to be the best explanation we’d got, and we’ve now got vastly better ones. God is no longer an explanation of anything, but has instead become something that would itself need an insurmountable amount of explaining. So I don’t think that being convinced that there is no god is as irrational or arrogant a point of view as belief that there is. I don’t think the matter calls for even-handedness at all.

[Elwell]

I miss Douglas Adams.

[Craig D]

Didn't the existance of the Bablefish kill god in a puff of logic?

[2b BOY]

I cant say I'm agnostic in the "just in case" sort of sense. Thing is I just can't prove anything. All I can do is reason, there may not be a god, and if there is it's probably a completely different concept than from the traditional. Heck i don't know if how I think of god should be considered "god". You're not being judged, except only by yourself and your own people.

I just don't think there is a magical being looking down us watching every move we make, we are just a part of something bigger. I dismiss old stories such as Jesus being the son of God, or Moses being a messenger or even Noahs Ark. It also goes for the stories from any other religion. Buddhisms story, I understand it to be over exxagerated, but I do believe there was a prince who decided to enlightened people after discovering the true misforune people have to suffer through. I basically argue with myself. Hell, humans only have 5 senses, there is probably more to this exhistence then we can even study, I don't know. But, what i do know is I love hearing other points of views, I take them into consideration, but I never take them seriously. I do lean towards a more atheist viewpoint, but I don't like to be black and white on this issue to much. I'm an Imperical or "soft" agnostic. I am never going to claim I KNOW anything about this, all I know is I have a good Idea of what there is. The only thing I dont like and dismiss is superstitions, and misinterpreted stories, or stories blown out of proportion to manipulate. Praying wont heal you or save you, holy water wont bless you, or kill vampires, voodoo dolls dont work, and meditating does help but it is overexxagerated to how helpful it can be etc etc.

And self rightousness is the biggest thing I witness that pisses me off.

Btw how's it goin Sep? *waves*

[Hookswords]

http://www.slate.com/id/2155745/?nav=ais

[bunny]

I cant say I'm agnostic in the "just in case" sort of sense. Thing is I just can't prove anything. All I can do is reason, there may not be a god, and if there is it's probably a completely different concept than from the traditional. Heck i don't know if how I think of god should be considered "god". You're not being judged, except only by yourself and your own people.

I just don't think there is a magical being looking down us watching every move we make, we are just a part of something bigger. I dismiss old stories such as Jesus being the son of God, or Moses being a messenger or even Noahs Ark. It also goes for the stories from any other religion. Buddhisms story, I understand it to be over exxagerated, but I do believe there was a prince who decided to enlightened people after discovering the true misforune people have to suffer through. I basically argue with myself. Hell, humans only have 5 senses, there is probably more to this exhistence then we can even study, I don't know. But, what i do know is I love hearing other points of views, I take them into consideration, but I never take them seriously. I do lean towards a more atheist viewpoint, but I don't like to be black and white on this issue to much. I'm an Imperical or "soft" agnostic. I am never going to claim I KNOW anything about this, all I know is I have a good Idea of what there is. The only thing I dont like and dismiss is superstitions, and misinterpreted stories, or stories blown out of proportion to manipulate. Praying wont heal you or save you, holy water wont bless you, or kill vampires, voodoo dolls dont work, and meditating does help but it is overexxagerated to how helpful it can be etc etc.

And self rightousness is the biggest thing I witness that pisses me off.

Btw how's it goin Sep? *waves*


i'd have to agree with you there, esp. on the 5 senses point. A while ago, I watched a movie at a film festival - 3 short films on the theme of death - and most of it was shittily edited and jumpy and hard to follow, but there was one particular scene I remember. It was in a morgue, from the point of view of a mortician who had died and it starts as, "I have been dead for three days, yet I am still conscious" and for a few minutes the narrator runs through a few scientific theories as he tries to grab a philosophical hold of his own death. The quote that really stuck out for me - which your post reminded me of - was when he said, "Perhaps the soul is made of matter that has not yet been discovered?" Honestly, my views around death and religion and the afterlife etc were completely turned around by that quote. Stranger and stranger!

Anyway, personally I don't really feel the need to jusify my own beliefs to anyone. Belief in whatever or the lack of a belief in whatever is a personal thing, and it's all good so long as no one gets killed over it...


aahahha. This thread reminds me of that episode of south park, with the otters and the Athiests and stuff - "Our logic is greater than your logic!"

[Brendan N]

aahahha. This thread reminds me of that episode of south park, with the otters and the Athiests and stuff - "Our logic is greater than your logic!"

wait, which ep is that? I only remember the one where the whole town gets suspicious of the catholic priest and decide to turn Atheist - the ep where Cartman discovers if stick food up your arse you crap out your mouth. Still need to see most of season 9 + 10 ...

- d.

[Cwn Annwn]

Didn't the existance of the Bablefish kill god in a puff of logic?



Yes indeed, - but don't forget we got killed on the zebra crossing not too long afterwards.

[bunny]

wait, which ep is that? I only remember the one where the whole town gets suspicious of the catholic priest and decide to turn Atheist - the ep where Cartman discovers if stick food up your arse you crap out your mouth. Still need to see most of season 9 + 10 ...

- d.


it's around the end of season 10, where Cartman can't wait for the Wii release so he freezes himself and... well, you should see it yerself :)

[Prometheus|ANJ]

Paul Davies talks about "levitating super turtles" as being ultimately invoked by both religion and science to explain the fine-tuning/bio-friendlyness of the universe. It's in LaPalida's Beyond Belief 06 link.


Truths -> Knowledge <- Beliefs

is discussed here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epistemology

This old fellow also dwelled a great deal on the matter of the definition of god
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baruch_Spinoza

[LaPalida]

Anyway, personally I don't really feel the need to jusify my own beliefs to anyone. Belief in whatever or the lack of a belief in whatever is a personal thing, and it's all good so long as no one gets killed over it...

How about Jim Crow laws or the Caste System? Both of which were/are beliefs "justified" through religion, which is to mean unjustified.

i'd have to agree with you there, esp. on the 5 senses point. A while ago, I watched a movie at a film festival - 3 short films on the theme of death - and most of it was shittily edited and jumpy and hard to follow, but there was one particular scene I remember. It was in a morgue, from the point of view of a mortician who had died and it starts as, "I have been dead for three days, yet I am still conscious" and for a few minutes the narrator runs through a few scientific theories as he tries to grab a philosophical hold of his own death. The quote that really stuck out for me - which your post reminded me of - was when he said, "Perhaps the soul is made of matter that has not yet been discovered?" Honestly, my views around death and religion and the afterlife etc were completely turned around by that quote. Stranger and stranger!

I don't want to push my view on anyone but consider this: What you're doing with a belief in a soul or any other unjustified belief is basically coming up in with a positive claim that you believe to be true, an extraordinary claim, and then try to prove it true. It's backwards. It's bad thinking. You have no proof for it, no evidence. You learned about it from religion. Now what you're doing is looking for evidence to prove the idea is true by appealing to gaps in knowledge. You can't say something exists until there is evidence for it. There is a disconnect with alot of theologians here. They are certain that god exists and bend all evidence to fit their theory. If it doesn't then they discard the evidence. Simply ask yourself. Could you be wrong about the existence of the soul? If so how could it be disproved? For example: If evolution is a good theory it has to be falsifiable. What would falsify evolution? Simply find one single fossilized rabbit in the PreCambrian. That's all it would take to destroy the theory of evolution. Find one fossil out of place. So it would be for the soul. If the soul exists then what would show that it could be false?

Buddhisms story, I understand it to be over exxagerated, but I do believe there was a prince who decided to enlightened people after discovering the true misforune people have to suffer through. I basically argue with myself. Hell, humans only have 5 senses, there is probably more to this exhistence then we can even study, I don't know.

While it may or may not be true that there is more to the world than our five senses we can't say anything about this until we have evidence for such. Nothing brought to the table stands up to scrutiny so far. Every case examined has fallen short of it's claims.

[Prometheus|ANJ]

Doesn't this bring up another interesting discussion? To what degree are beliefs acted out, and what exactly are beliefs that have zero impact on behaviour?

Can we systematically figure out what beliefs has the largest positive effect on our personal and social structure? Certainly we shouldn't encourage beliefs that are harmful to us right? Are there cases where the truth actually is harmful to us and a belief in something false is more beneficial?

(I'm still watching the Beyond Belief guys, it'll be interesting to see how much they touch upon that subject)

[LaPalida]

I think that all unjustified beliefs all lead down the same road. Irrationality. I think that benign beliefs allow by their definition for malicious beliefs to exist ( I am coming from Sam Harris' point of view on this) and be accepted. I am talking about faith not belief that the sun will rise the next morning (quite justified). Our ability to see into the future has given us a certain amount of anxiety. You could argue that it is harmful (depending on what your defenition is ofcourse). We get pretty nervous when some astronomer announces that some asteroid is going to hit the Earth at a certain date (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/99942_Apophis). But ultimately because we know of this we can do something about it which is beneficial for our survival. Ignorance gives you a false sense of security. I prefer truth ... no matter how harsh.

[blakboks]

i'd have to agree with you there, esp. on the 5 senses point. A while ago, I watched a movie at a film festival - 3 short films on the theme of death - and most of it was shittily edited and jumpy and hard to follow, but there was one particular scene I remember. It was in a morgue, from the point of view of a mortician who had died and it starts as, "I have been dead for three days, yet I am still conscious" and for a few minutes the narrator runs through a few scientific theories as he tries to grab a philosophical hold of his own death. The quote that really stuck out for me - which your post reminded me of - was when he said, "Perhaps the soul is made of matter that has not yet been discovered?" Honestly, my views around death and religion and the afterlife etc were completely turned around by that quote. Stranger and stranger!

Although, I'm not 100% for or against religion, that's actually something I believe could very well be true. I very much believe that ghosts or spirits or whatever you'd like to call them are attached to buildings or land, too. That if you renovate a house that was haunted, that it would no longer be haunted. (clearly, there're some flaws to this thinking and easy arguments against it, but I don't assert that this is a finished theory at all, either) Having had what I believe to be an encounter with a true ghost, I will admit that I truly believe that there are such things out there. Interesting stuff...

-Chris

[bunny]

How about Jim Crow laws or the Caste System? Both of which were/are beliefs "justified" through religion, which is to mean unjustified.



I don't want to push my view on anyone but consider this: What you're doing with a belief in a soul or any other unjustified belief is basically coming up in with a positive claim that you believe to be true, an extraordinary claim, and then try to prove it true. It's backwards. It's bad thinking. You have no proof for it, no evidence. You learned about it from religion. Now what you're doing is looking for evidence to prove the idea is true by appealing to gaps in knowledge. You can't say something exists until there is evidence for it. There is a disconnect with alot of theologians here. They are certain that god exists and bend all evidence to fit their theory. If it doesn't then they discard the evidence. Simply ask yourself. Could you be wrong about the existence of the soul? If so how could it be disproved? For example: If evolution is a good theory it has to be falsifiable. What would falsify evolution? Simply find one single fossilized rabbit in the PreCambrian. That's all it would take to destroy the theory of evolution. Find one fossil out of place. So it would be for the soul. If the soul exists then what would show that it could be false?



While it may or may not be true that there is more to the world than our five senses we can't say anything about this until we have evidence for such. Nothing brought to the table stands up to scrutiny so far. Every case examined has fallen short of it's claims.

Well, I honestly don't give these things much thought these days so bear with me.

I never said I believed in the whole human ego immortal soul God-Jesus-Religion-whatever spiel, which I think you insinuated in your "you learned about this from religion" point. This whole thing stands on shakey ground since neither of us have DEFINED a soul in the first place anyway ;)

I was just saying that the movie clip got me thinking for a while about what a soul may be. I consider myself quite pragmatic, and I agree with you that making assumptions because of lack of evidence isn't any good. I just fancied the idea of a soul in a poetic sense... I mean what would the soul be composed of? would it be wedged somewhere in our grey matter? is it produced by the nucleus? DNA? RNA? Amino acid chains? I certainly don't consider these thoughts BELIEFS and I'm certainly not sure of any of them enough to go looking for evidence to back them. I am honstly unsure on the issue, I'm all for pragmatism and science, I just feel there's a little more too it than I/we could possibly prove ;) My aunt, a cytologist, reminded me that the more we learn, the more we learn about the things we don't know. Of course this is kinda contradicting my feelings towards lack-of-evidence-assumptions blah blah blah, but whatevs. I'm certainly not a very eloquent person and I'm certainly not well pracised in debating via text.

Anyway. I'm going to go... draw now.

[LaPalida]

I see what you're saying but I didn't exactly mean that you in particular hold this belief positively. What I tried to get accross is that the very idea of a soul comes from a religious/superstitious base (that's how we know about it). In fact people in many cultures used to think that breath (breath of life) was your soul and when you sneezed it meant that your soul was trying to escape your body (http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mgesundheit.html), or when you stopped breathing (died by the definition of that time) means your soul left your body. We know ofcourse that breathing is associated with life so it's only natural that people would assume that. Nowdays you're not clinically dead until you are brain dead. We narrowed down our personhood to the brain (to the frontal lobe to be precise). Since science has shown what breathing is all about the precise definition of soul has shifted (see shifting goal posts fallacy) to some kind of a nebulous intangible undetectable thing the enters the body at conception or whatever. If you listened to the Beyond Belief talks that I gave a link to one of the Ramachandran (a neuroscientist) he mentions one case where a man with a Corpus Callosotomy suddenly became 2 different people with different opinions where one held a belief in God and the other was an Atheist. Huh? Did his soul split in two? Did he suddenly get 2 souls and one hemisphere is going to hell and the other to heaven? Really if you think the idea of a soul through first you will realize just how absurd it really is.

For Reference:
http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mgesundheit.html
http://www.snopes.com/language/phrases/blessyou.asp
http://skepdic.com/soul.html
http://www.positiveatheism.org/hist/darrow0.htm

[fixx]

Edited for length and incoherency (never let it be said atheists have no sense of humour ;) ): I'm with Richard Dawkins. And every other atheist around.

Basically what I attempted to say in millions of little words, was that I tried out agnosticism. It didn't fit. Any attempt to try to reconcile science and religion, I find is hypocritic. I've tried saying: Well, we don't know, we can't disprove God. But the more I read, the more scientists do.

That is it. Short and sweet.
And all the links brought up by either side, have been equally interesting. Though, the first poster was of course, the best.

[Nerahla]

Fixx that was utterly incoherent.



I want to know more about the hemispherectomy guy. That's awesome!

[LaPalida]

This is the guy who said it

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vilayanur_S._Ramachandran

This is where he said it

http://beyondbelief2006.org/Watch/watch.php?Video=Session%204

I love this guy's accent. It's about 1/3 of the way through if you want get right to it :)

EDIT: Ooops my bad on the terms. It's called Corpus Callosotomy not Hemispherectomy. The other one is where half the brain is removed. I'm going to change it Runecaster.

[Dimension]

You have no proof for it, no evidence.

That's why it's called a beleif, and not fact.

[Silvertone]

Quoted from HERE (http://www.spscriptorium.com/SPMedia/SPSecrets-092206.htm)


South Park and Atheists?


In addition to garnering the show tons of media attention, the episode caused a disturbance within the "South Park" family. Musician and actor Isaac Hayes, who played the character Chef and is a Scientologist, quit.
"We knew that that was a possibility and we were sad that he decided to quit," Parker says. "We held off on doing a Scientology show for years because of Isaac's personal religious belief. And after a while, we were like, you know, we've made fun of everything else. There's just too much funny stuff there. We have to do it. And if he quits, that's his right, and then he did so."
Stone, who was raised Jewish, says he's not religious. Parker says he considers himself religious, but it would take him a long time to explain it. Both say they believe in God.
"I believe there's something going on that we don't know," Parker says. "That's as far as I can go."
"Recently, atheists and people who hate religion have, like, really glommed on to our show because we make fun of a lot of religions," Stone notes. "But neither one of us is anti-religious at all. I mean, I'm fascinated by religion."
"All the religions are superfunny to me," Parker adds. "The story of Jesus makes no sense to me. God sent his only son. Why could God only have one son and why would he have to die? It's just bad writing, really. And it's really terrible in about the second act."
But Parker says atheism is more ludicrous to him than anything else.
"Out of all the ridiculous religion stories -- which are greatly, wonderfully ridiculous -- the silliest one I've ever heard is, 'Yeah, there's this big, giant universe and it's expanding and it's all going to collapse on itself and we're all just here, just 'cuz. Just 'cuz. That to me, is the most ridiculous explanation ever," he says. "So I think we have a big atheism show coming."
The two offer mock-apologies to anyone offended by their show.
"Part of living in the world today is you're going to have to be offended," Stone says. "The right to be offended and the right to offend is why we have a First Amendment. If no speech was offensive to anybody, then you wouldn't need to guarantee it."
Parker says "South Park" mocks that which is dearest to him all the time -- though few people know it.
"A lot of people don't realize this, but probably the one person that gets made fun of in "South Park" more than anybody is my dad," he says. "Stan's father, Randy -- my dad's name is Randy -- that's my drawing of my dad; that's me doing my dad's voice. That is just my dad. Even Stan's last name, Marsh, was my dad's stepfather's name. So my dad grew up Randy Marsh. And he is, by far, the biggest dingbat in the entire show. And we've had him, you know, with his pants down, drunk, throwing up, you know. And my dad was a great dad. He's a great dad. And my dad is constantly like: 'Why did you do that to me?' And I'm like, 'Dad, I'm just having fun.' I hold my father very dear. But it doesn't mean I'm not going to rip on him."

Mr. Garrisons thoughts on evolution before aethist conversion (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APiQ7tnCN5w&mode=related&search=)

After aetheist conversion (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z444XZbVFu0)






.

[2b BOY]

Anyone who celebrates christmas and makes their kids believe in santa are devil worshippers!!! hehehe...Nehhhh, I'm a heathen.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_dnxHmvrrW0

*shrugs* I found it interesting and fun. Knowledge is power...

[That fat kid]

Against my better judgment I'd like to join in, and just say that the video was hilarious from any point of view.

The thing I find most absurd about religious belief is that it's for the afterlife, something that no one is sure exists, but works toward. Why not put all that thought and all that energy into making sure that you and the ones you love have a good life in the time you happen to have in this life. Why waste it hoping and praying that something good might happen, go out and make the good thing happen, without trampling someone else's life. In that respect, you'll make it to heaven or wherever it is that you aspire towards, and you can die without regrets, knowing you led a good and honorable life.

The problem I have with Christianity, specifically, is that if a person works his whole life, sacrificing himself for his loved ones and doesn't break any law, yet he doesn't believe in God, or hasn't been baptized, or hasn't accepted Jesus as his Lord and Saviour, he'll go straight to hell. Whereas, a convict who murders several people in cold blood, but asks for forgiveness and finds Jesus, gets to go to heaven. Seems a bit weird.

Anyhow, its not right to piss in someone's face for disagreeing with you. Just because they aren't right, doesn't mean you are.

~A

Hopefully I'll get attacked and some heated debate with ensue.....I believe that would be irony

[2b BOY]

Against my better judgment I'd like to join in, and just say that the video was hilarious from any point of view.

The thing I find most absurd about religious belief is that it's for the afterlife, something that no one is sure exists, but works toward. Why not put all that thought and all that energy into making sure that you and the ones you love have a good life in the time you happen to have in this life. Why waste it hoping and praying that something good might happen, go out and make the good thing happen, without trampling someone else's life. In that respect, you'll make it to heaven or wherever it is that you aspire towards, and you can die without regrets, knowing you led a good and honorable life.

The problem I have with Christianity, specifically, is that if a person works his whole life, sacrificing himself for his loved ones and doesn't break any law, yet he doesn't believe in God, or hasn't been baptized, or hasn't accepted Jesus as his Lord and Saviour, he'll go straight to hell. Whereas, a convict who murders several people in cold blood, but asks for forgiveness and finds Jesus, gets to go to heaven. Seems a bit weird.

Anyhow, its not right to piss in someone's face for disagreeing with you. Just because they aren't right, doesn't mean you are.

~A

Hopefully I'll get attacked and some heated debate with ensue.....I believe that would be irony


I'll drink to that.:confident

[LaPalida]

Christians join the war on Christmas weeeee...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5XEuzmu7ocM

On the origin of Jesus myth:

http://altreligion.about.com/library/weekly/aa052902a.htm

[LaPalida]

But Parker says atheism is more ludicrous to him than anything else.
"Out of all the ridiculous religion stories -- which are greatly, wonderfully ridiculous -- the silliest one I've ever heard is, 'Yeah, there's this big, giant universe and it's expanding and it's all going to collapse on itself and we're all just here, just 'cuz. Just 'cuz. That to me, is the most ridiculous explanation ever," he says. "So I think we have a big atheism show coming."

Is the guy actually saying that Atheism is the belief in the Big Bang? LOL and by that implication ... what does that say about Christians that believe in the Big Bang theory...?

EDIT: But anyway ABC is the maker of such films as "The Path to 9/11" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_path_to_911)... so take that quote with a grain of salt. I'm sorry... did I say grain? I meant a pound.

EDIT2: http://www.spikedhumor.com/articles/65035/Matt_Stone_Trey_Parker_On_Nightline.html Ok here is the interview.. Wow Parker doesn't know what Atheism means.. that's sad. I'm rather surprised.

[JM]

Bahahaha, Christians are so funny on how they contradict themselves xD

[Christian223]

im not following this discussion very well, but i wanted to remind you that there are many Christian sects and cults around the globe, all thinking differently, with even oposing beliefs, so dont put us all in one bag because that would feel very uncomfortable, thanks.

[Shamagim]

Mmmmm, sects and cults....:)