As I am not an atheist but an agnostic, switching to God-centric thinking isn't hard for me. But even from that point of view, I disagree. I cannot possibly imagine that a divine being that has created the entire universe (and, perhaps, more than one) has ideas that can be put in a book written by mere humans. In short, my problem lies not with your assumption of a god, but with your assumption of the bible being the word of god.
Humans are easily deceived. I say this from experience with magic, pickpocketing and general con-artistry. Their minds prefer to remember things they expect, not things that actually happen. The only thing that, to me, sets the Bible aside from, say, Harry Potter is its age. Then again, there's probably a very old about elves as well which I am just as inclined to believe.
Humans wrote the Bible. And humans are utterly incapable of objectivity. Everything in that book is in context of their environment, their culture, and their ideas. The ideas put forward by God (which is another assumption I dislike, I'll get back on this) have more likely than not been distorted, perhaps beyond recognition, before being written down.
And then there's the whole point that the Bible has been created after Gods ideas. Satan might as well have been the one talking to Jesus. Satan might have, well, caused everything in the Bible to happen. Perhaps Judas was the one guided by the hand of God.
We cannot judge which things are Gods will and which things are not. We must, as you have done as well, decide what is true and what is not. We, as humans, will fail in doing so and must therefor adapt our concepts as time goes on. We can only do our best, put on our most altruistic hat and make decisions. Without God coming down from the sky and telling me how to so, I will, and must, use my own judgment.
Joined: 2/28/2006
Posts: 2275
Location: Milky Way -> Earth -> Brazil
Scepheo, maybe you can imagine... but you're able criticize and filter it as impossible and incoherent.
Religious people receive that same info through metaphors and other persuasion tricks, bypassing the limits imposed by critical thinking.
They are told several different stories, all based upon the existence of a god.
The stories are catchy and very unusual, so while their conscious mind is lost in the fantasy, the idea of a personal god silently grows stronger and stronger.
If you make people focus on a single thought or idea hard enough, it will eventually become real for them.
"Genuine self-esteem, however, consists not of causeless feelings, but of certain knowledge about yourself.
It rests on the conviction that you — by your choices, effort and actions — have made yourself into the
kind of person able to deal with reality. It is the conviction — based on the evidence of your own volitional
functioning — that you are fundamentally able to succeed in life and, therefore, are deserving of that success."
- Onkar Ghate
Bisqwit wrote:
This is a rather common confusion in terminology.
There are two pairs of opposite concepts: Theism/atheism and gnosticism/agnosticism. These pairs are completely independent from each other, and choosing a concept from one pair does in no way imply a concept in the other.
"Atheist" means "not theist", nothing more, nothing less. If you are not a theist, then you are an atheist. It doesn't matter if you don't take a stance on whether some god exists or not, if you are not a theist, then you are an atheist, by the very definition of the word. So the question is: Do you believe that the claim "there exists a god" is true? If the answer is no, then you are an atheist by definition.
"Atheism" does not mean belief in the inexistence of a god. Even someone who doesn't take any stance is by definition an atheist because he is not a theist. (The term "strong atheism" is often used for people who positively believe there is no god. This is different from the sole concept of "atheism" which is simply a lack of belief in the existence of a god, although the difference is often confusing.)
Gnosticism vs. agnosticism is a completely separate concept. A gnostic is one who claims to know, while an agnostic is one who does not make such a claim. It doesn't matter what the claim of knowledge is. If you claim that you know that a god exists, you are a gnostic theist, and if you claim that you know that a god doesn't exist, you are a gnostic atheist.
Most people who classify themselves as "agnostics" are in fact, and by definition, agnostic atheists (in other words, they are not theists, but they don't claim to know for sure one way or another). Likewise most people who classify themselves are "atheists" are also agnostic atheists (for the exact same reason).
In principle it's possible for someone to be an agnostic theist: Someone who believes a god exists, but doesn't make claims of certainty (iow. concedes that he might be wrong).
In reality though, if you tell somebody you're an atheist, most people will immediately assume that you are a gnostic atheist (completely sure that there is no God). We may well be in the midst of a shift in the meaning of the term "atheist", so I guess it makes sense to distantiate oneself from atheism as an agnostic nowadays.
More on topic: Imho candy canes are an absolute must for decorating a christmas tree. :)
In reality though, if you tell somebody you're an atheist, most people will immediately assume that you are a gnostic atheist (completely sure that there is no God). We may well be in the midst of a shift in the meaning of the term "atheist", so I guess it makes sense to distantiate oneself from atheism as an agnostic nowadays.
Terms are indeed being muddled nowadays, often for ideological reasons (eg. to demonize and vilify people with certain views, such as grouping all non-theists, iow. atheists, into the same group of "bad" people).
The term "atheist" tends to carry a lot of baggage nowadays, even though it shouldn't. For example, it's assumed to imply that atheists are always strong atheists, anti-theists, skeptics, humanists, rationalists, evolutionists and whatnot. That's a lot of baggage to carry, Of course, as said, the term "atheism" does not imply any of that. Technically speaking (and AFAIK) eg. buddhists could be classified as atheists because they don't believe in any gods, yet most people wouldn't call them that. Likewise someone who believes that aliens created life on Earth (but don't believe in any gods) are atheists.
Joined: 11/18/2006
Posts: 2426
Location: Back where I belong
I decorated my Christmas tree this year with 4 strands of white lights (non-blinking), several dozen ornaments (almost exclusively comprised of sentimental ornaments from my childhood and the past few years), and a cheap star on top, which really needs to be replaced by something less tacky looking next year.
[skims thread]
Oh, the title is misleading. It should be "Another thread devolving into religious idiocy". Sorry I went off-topic with what I wrote above.
You should make an ornament that looks like your avatar to use as the star on top. Or a giant dildo since that's supposedly what these christmas trees are about anyway.
>Or more to the point, what good would it possibly do for me to make a guess?
You are of course in no way obligated to answer any of my questions.
Your answer to why God lets Satan run around hurting people seems to be "I don't know, it doesn't make sense to me either, but God is smarter than me, so it must be the right thing." (my interpretation of what you wrote).
So this goes back to the other question: how do you know that the Bible is true and gives a correct view of God?
Some entertainment and laughs might come from it, if it's extreme enough, like Westboro Baptist Church.
Warp wrote:
Jesus taught that we should not judge others. Perhaps you don't understand what that means, but you are doing exactly that here.
I learned from watching some clips about Westboro Baptist Church that the Bible does teach that we should judge, but we should judge rightously, which means, according to the Bible: http://www.metamind.net/judgement.htmlTruncated wrote:
Why doesn't God just take away Satan's powers, or lock him up where he can't mislead humans?
It says actually in the book of revelations that some angel will lock him/it up for a thousand years (although "after that he has to be let free for a little while", I'm not sure why...)
That's a common answer that Christians give to your question. As for "how do we know Satan didn't write the Bible", God would probably not allow that, and Christians believe prophecies in the Bible have been fulfilled which prove its veracity.
Funny avatar, pirate_sephiroth :P
Joined: 2/28/2006
Posts: 2275
Location: Milky Way -> Earth -> Brazil
"People go to church for the same reasons they go to a tavern: to stupefy themselves, to forget their misery, to imagine themselves, for a few minutes anyway, free and happy."
Mikhail Aleksandrovich Bakunin
hehe... yeah it's great to make fun of them but I'm pasting this anyway
"REASON IS EASILY OVERRULED BY IMAGINATION"
"Once an idea has been accepted by the subconscious mind, it remains until it is replaced by another idea."
The companion rule to this is:
"the longer the idea remains, the more opposition there is to replacing it with a new idea."
"Genuine self-esteem, however, consists not of causeless feelings, but of certain knowledge about yourself.
It rests on the conviction that you — by your choices, effort and actions — have made yourself into the
kind of person able to deal with reality. It is the conviction — based on the evidence of your own volitional
functioning — that you are fundamentally able to succeed in life and, therefore, are deserving of that success."
- Onkar Ghate
Bisqwit wrote:
Basically, God shows (for a thousand years, during which He is the king, and during which the spiritual forces which tempt away from God are disabled), this is how I wanted you to live in the world. During the thousand years, supposedly almost nobody is going to defect, because it is so perfect all-around. After the thousand years have gone, He will give the people the option: You have all seen and experienced first-hand how the world will turn out if you follow my laws and my guidance. You now have the option: Which one will you choose? You can once again take a gander at the ungodly, and ignore my presence and ignore my commandments, for the short term satisfaction it may give you, if you so choose. In other words, He is trying to be fair to also those people who have born and lived during the millennial kingdom during which God's perfect guidance was globally taken as a granted, because He emphasizes free will to such degree that He only takes people who will live with voluntarily. That is how I have understood this. (From hearing a teaching about the subject.)
Basically, God shows (for a thousand years, during which He is the king, and during which the spiritual forces which tempt away from God are disabled), this is how I wanted you to live in the world. During the thousand years, supposedly almost nobody is going to defect, because it is so perfect all-around. After the thousand years have gone, He will give the people the option: You have all seen and experienced first-hand how the world will turn out if you follow my laws and my guidance. You now have the option: Which one will you choose?
I think if we would get rid of money, we could have a thousand years of peace. Money, or lack of money, is the root of most problems and evil behavior in the world. As long as we have a money-based society, people will care more about money, than people. Jesus told us to render unto Caesar that which is Caesars (money), so I guess he meant that we should get rid of money. Money could be what the Bible called "Mark of the Beast" because you can't buy or sell without it and it's located on your hand or mind/forehead. If we managed to create a society without money, almost nobody would defect from this system during a thousand years because of how much better it would be. Spiritual forces like greed would disappear if everybody had everything they want for free (sharing things is fun). At the end of the thousand years we will have the option to choose: money or Good. "You can't serve two masters" (Matthew 6:24).
http://www.ridingthebeast.com/articles/gold-money-666/http://www.bibleprophesy.org/666mark.htmhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gKX9TWRyfs
Joined: 2/28/2006
Posts: 2275
Location: Milky Way -> Earth -> Brazil
Bisqwit wrote:
(...)That is how I have understood this.
"No man ever believes that the Bible means what it says; he is always convinced that it says what he means."
- George Bernard Shaw
"Genuine self-esteem, however, consists not of causeless feelings, but of certain knowledge about yourself.
It rests on the conviction that you — by your choices, effort and actions — have made yourself into the
kind of person able to deal with reality. It is the conviction — based on the evidence of your own volitional
functioning — that you are fundamentally able to succeed in life and, therefore, are deserving of that success."
- Onkar Ghate
Bisqwit wrote:
Oh, the title is misleading. It should be "Another thread devolving into religious idiocy".
I think the conversation was interesting from a rational point of view (regardless of what one's convictions might be). Well, at first. It has since degraded.
Joined: 2/28/2006
Posts: 2275
Location: Milky Way -> Earth -> Brazil
Warp wrote:
mmbossman wrote:
Oh, the title is misleading. It should be "Another thread devolving into religious idiocy".
I think the conversation was interesting from a rational point of view (regardless of what one's convictions might be). Well, at first. It has since degraded.
isn't christmas religous idiocy?
what is the "misleading" you are talking about?
"Genuine self-esteem, however, consists not of causeless feelings, but of certain knowledge about yourself.
It rests on the conviction that you — by your choices, effort and actions — have made yourself into the
kind of person able to deal with reality. It is the conviction — based on the evidence of your own volitional
functioning — that you are fundamentally able to succeed in life and, therefore, are deserving of that success."
- Onkar Ghate
Bisqwit wrote:
To me as a somewhat neutral observer it seemed as though Bisqwit didn't use any logical fallacies, as long as he starts from the premise that the Bible holds absolute truth.
Well, any reasonable person must admit the bible contradicts itself on numerous occasions, so the assumption itself that the bible holds absolute truth is, logically speaking, irreparably fallacious. The entire concept of using the bible as an axiomatic system holds no meaning in any logical sense, so accusing Bisqwit of logical fallacies (or saying he has displayed none) equally makes no sense given that he has not represented his bible-based system of beliefs as such. This highlights one of the main problems of trying to "argue" against a per se* irrational worldview with logic: you can't. It's meaningless.
tl;dr - the bible is not math.
Please note that I am not attempting to make any value judgments, here. I personally hold many irrational beliefs and don't think any irrational belief in and of itself is a good or a bad thing simply by dint of its irrationality.
*Most people don't actually know the meaning of this Latin phrase, so its correct usage here may be confusing. It means "instrinsically". (As far as I can tell, most people seem to think it means "so to speak".)Bisqwit wrote:
And he says, it's as disgusting as a rag used to absorb menstruation.
...
The wife is to be obedient to her husband
I will chuckle condescendingly at those little gems, though. Hee hee. How truly blessed Bisqwit must be that he was not born a disgusting woman with the vile consequences of being such. Perhaps you fellows should not be arguing with one so obviously blessed, after all.
I personally hold many irrational beliefs and don't think any irrational belief in and of itself is a good or a bad thing simply by dint of its irrationality.
And the husband is to love his wife! Do not ever forget that part.
Otherwise, it is a very unbalanced situation indeed.
Just a reminder of what love is according to the Bible (or to be more precise, by the same author who also wrote the part about the husband and the wife):
If I speak in human or angelic tongues, but do not have love, I am but a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body [to hardship] that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient, love is kind.
It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.
It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.
Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.
Love always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
When Yeshua was asked, what is the greatest commandment in the Torah, He answered:
Love YHWH, your God, with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself. All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.
Joined: 2/28/2006
Posts: 2275
Location: Milky Way -> Earth -> Brazil
Let's discuss the bible then!
Link to video
but yeah, I know..
The bible does not mean what it says. We just lack prophetic eyes or something.
WE KNOW IT'S ALL ABOUT THE LOVE!
"Genuine self-esteem, however, consists not of causeless feelings, but of certain knowledge about yourself.
It rests on the conviction that you — by your choices, effort and actions — have made yourself into the
kind of person able to deal with reality. It is the conviction — based on the evidence of your own volitional
functioning — that you are fundamentally able to succeed in life and, therefore, are deserving of that success."
- Onkar Ghate
Bisqwit wrote:
I personally hold many irrational beliefs and don't think any irrational belief in and of itself is a good or a bad thing simply by dint of its irrationality.
Why?
By asking "why?" it seems you are implying that you disagree with the statement "merely being irrational is insufficient to classify a belief as good or bad." It's fairly obvious to me why that statement is most likely true, one only has to come up with an irrational belief whose essential classification (as good or bad) has nothing to do with its irrationality. If you ask me to present an example, I can, though I suspect you are also capable.
Love is patient, love is kind.
It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.
It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.
Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.
Love always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
I have never found it profitable to discuss religion with the religious in the past, so I suspect this question, likely my first and last, is a mistake. Regardless, I feel an irrational compulsion and curiosity to violate my own principles and nonsensically draw some of your beliefs to a logical conclusion and witness your response. Anyway, my perception of your concept of god is the following:
Your god is jealous. (I understand you think this wholly distinct from envy.)
Your god is boastful.
Your god is proud.
Your god dishonors others.
Your god is self-seeking.
Your god is easily angered.
Your god keeps a record of wrongs.
Your god does not always protect.
Your god does not always trust.
I am making some leaps, perhaps, based on the few words you've said on the subject, but I think at the very least you would find it hard to reasonably argue against the statement that "your god keeps a record of wrongs". Does the correctness of any of the above statements imply your god is not love / does not love humanity?
Anyway, my perception of your concept of god is the following:
①Your god is jealous. (I understand you think this wholly distinct from envy.)
②Your god is boastful.
③Your god is proud.
④Your god dishonors others.
⑤Your god is self-seeking.
⑥Your god is easily angered.
⑦Your god keeps a record of wrongs.
⑧Your god does not always protect.
⑨Your god does not always trust.
①Yup, he says "you shall not make a substitute of me, nor lift anything I have created to a position higher than me", and gets quite angry (see ⑤, below) when we do. I think that such behavior is understandable in his position.
②Rightfully so, though. Is there anything greater than him that he could possibly boast about but which he really does not have? And his "boasting" is not a symptom of ③, but rather, a reminder of what I explain in ⑤.
③He was happy about what he created, yes. Or are you talking about something else? Proudness? Pride? I don't think I understand this concept well. Maybe overestimation of one's abilities? N/A. Underestimating one's dependence on their provider? N/A. I can't see how this works.
④I suppose you are talking about speaking bad about people (or exposing evil), which I think it's not a bad thing, but actually it is a good thing, when it is done by talking truth, with no intention of malice, but actually in the context, "to dishonor" meant "to behave in an inappropriate way". I don't think God does that.
⑤Yup, and no. He does everything and all in order to point to himself, but there is no indication in the Bible saying that he seeks to comfort himself with the expense of anything else; rather, he does it because he _is_ the provider upon which we depend and we have the tendency to forget that the first chance we get.
⑥I'm starting to regret I used the NIV translation here. KJV says "is not easily provoked", and the Finnish translation says akin to "does not become embittered". God is not easily provoked (he is patient for up to centuries; he does not thus rush pointless retribution), but he does get angry (see ⑦) over things that may seem minor to us (see ①). I think it is because of his greater understanding of the long-term consequences than ours. Embitterment is a condition in which a person holds a grudge towards another person and they refuse to give the other person a chance. It is a different one from justice. God does not indulge in embitterment. (Leviticus 26:40-45 makes this clear.)
⑦Yup, though, under certain conditions, is willing to tear the record in pieces (see Jeremiah 31:33-34). And arguably, he's not doing that for selfish reasons, but because of the position he is in when compared to us (see ⑤). A parent that constantly and permanently ignores wrongs their child does is not a very good parent. And when they do turn attention to the wrongs, it doesn't mean that the parent is exacting retribution for personal reasons, though the child may sometimes think so. (Been there, done that.)
⑧Arguable. Protect what? Again, NIV uses a misrepresentative word here... KJV and the Finnish translation say more akin to "doesn't mind genuine mistakes even in the long term".
⑨N/A. To clarify, in Wikipedia, there is the term "assume good faith", which refers to that when someone seems to have blanked a section of text or typed something wrong, it is good etiquette to first assume that they did so by an accident rather than to intentionally vandalize, and to select one's response to the mishap-doer appropriately. This does not apply to God because he knows our heart. He does not need to guess.
I considered it self-evident that we could agree upon the correctness of at least one of my perceptions of your concept of god. I fail to see the relevance of your blow-by-blow justification for god's moods. I understand that religious apologists feel the need to contextualize everything according to whatever interpretation supports the argument at hand, but in some real sense it appears that "god is not love" and "god's feelings toward humanity cannot be correctly described as loving" are reasonable things to say. That runs counter to my understanding of how most people internalize the concept of god(s), so I was curious about your thoughts on that. Predictably, you responded to me by explaining irrelevancies rather than addressing what I actually asked. Anyway, I don't fault you for it. I fully expected no meaningful discussion to result from my question, so perhaps I was merely goading you. My post was indeed a mistake, so I withdraw the query and will ask none further.
I considered it self-evident that we could agree upon the correctness of at least one of my perceptions of your concept of god. [...]Predictably, you responded to me by explaining irrelevancies rather than addressing what I actually asked.
So basically, you expected to waltz me along to a conclusion you made, while holding the claims leading to the conclusion in an immutable and indisputable position? That is hardly a way to conduct meaningful discussion.
