patrick.net

Vicente says

People have convinced themselves they've seen everything from ghosts to fairies to flying pink elephants.

Right, the Sherlock Holmes stories, written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, were all about "detection" and using logic to solve crimes and mysteries. Doyle later wrote books about the reality of Fairies. This obsession with Fairies and "Christian Spiritualism" happened after the deaths of many of his close family members, so there was probably something psychological about his later mysticism.

"Coming of the Fairies" 1921
http://www.sacred-texts.com/neu/eng/cof/index.htm

thunderlips11 says

For every verse that attests to God's goodness, I can find a verse where he attests to his own jealousy, cruelty and vengeful attitude by word or deed

You're exactly right! If you peruse the scriptures with a mindset of cynicism and disbelief, then you've made up your mind beforehand. If you seek scripture for edification and a receptive attitude, then God will meet you where and how you are and guide you through the Holy Spirit to ultimate salvation through Christ. How many times throughout the centuries do you think these same arguments have been hashed and rehashed to exhaustion? That's why I believe arguments such as this are useless because that's all it is is arguing.

Vicente says

Whether I "believe in electricity" or not, it's a demonstrable fact. I don't need to see electrons with my naked eye. Nor do I need to "see" the Ebola virus. There is ample observable and repeatable evidence of their existence that does not require my ability to "see it". I can stick a fork in an electric socket and get a personal demonstration

"Faith, hope and love", the subjects of 1st Corinthians 13, have never been nor can ever be scientifically examined or quantified in even the most modern laboratories, but do you doubt their existence? Have you ever seen a faith, hope or love of which you speak, integrity or honesty or ambition or greed sitting in a room in the real? We speak and think of them as if they exist, but no one has ever had the experience of having to walk around or ponder now where would be a good place for this "love" that weighs in at about 30-40 lbs. And yet these insubstantial, invisible, unprovable things probably influence over 90% of one's impulses, activities and emotions every day far more than the three-dimensional, provable furnishings of everyday life.

P N Dr Lo R says

You're exactly right! If you peruse the scriptures with a mindset of cynicism and disbelief, then you've made up your mind beforehand.

Nothing to do with a mindset, can you prove to me that just one human being went to heaven or hell, with evidence from beyond the Bible? If you can't, it's just words in a book, that often contradicts itself, with no proof outside of it.

I bet if you read the Quran, or the Tao Te Ching, or the Poetic Edda, you didn't read it with the same reverence and credulity you did with the Bible.

It's just "woo", the bronze age version of people talking about "Crystal Vibrations affecting our consciousness", with the relative level of violence from back then.

I have the same mindset towards "Chakras" "Tantra" "Mantra" and "homopathy" and "Numerology". Demonstrate it working or it don't exist.

The evidence against God healing for example, is very compelling: Nobody in the past 2000 years ever regrew a lost limb. Testimony that somebody's back pain is reduced can be explained by any number of factors, and is subjective. Praying to god to restore a limb blown off in a war or car accident, and actually having it grow back, would truly be a miracle, and strong evidence of a deity. Science would have a very hard time explaining a human limb that regrew spontaneously. But not surprisingly, this is the one thing that never happens.

It is silly and dangerous to plan the life of one man, much less the life of an entire nation, around claims that cannot be verified at all.

I can't relate to either side of this argument. I like to leave the question unanswered, but so doing in a way where I enjoy many of the benefits of the the believer, but without the dogma. Why not just celebrate the mystery, and respect it. I don't need any specific doctrine to appreciate this thing that I have no name for, but which some call "God."

On another note, today is December 8th, the day John Lennon was shot. What a sweet man he was. I heard this on the radio today.

So this is Christmas
And what have you done
Another year over
And a new one just begun
Ans so this is Christmas
I hope you have fun
The near and the dear one
The old and the young

A very merry Christmas
And a happy New Year
Let's hope it's a good one
Without any fear
And so this is Christmas
For weak and for strong
For rich and the poor ones
The world is so wrong
And so happy Christmas
For black and for white
For yellow and red ones
Let's stop all the fight
A very merry Christmas
And a happy New Year
Let's hope it's a good one
Without any fear
And so this is Christmas
And what have we done
Another year over
And a new one just begun
Ans so this is Christmas
I hope you have fun
The near and the dear one
The old and the young
A very merry Christmas
And a happy New Year
Let's hope it's a good one
Without any fear
War is over over
If you want it
War is over
Now.

Zachary says

all that I can say is did you hear what his last words were as reported by his family as he breathed his last breath? "ow wow, oh wow!" you'll probably say that it was the electrical circuits in his brain giving off some showtime event. LOL.

That is not a joke. Serious questions are being asked in neuroscience related to the human inclination towards religious belief.

http://www.youtube.com/embed/mzVwf26igJE

Gentlemen,
It' been a good discussion, and I will pray for you. I know that you don't feel that you need my prayers, however, you're smart guys and if God (whom you don't believe in) decided to intervene in your lives in real way, how cool would that be? If He did, would you say, hey I don't believe in you, go away? I would hope not. Since I believe in and have experienced miracles, my prayer is that you do too. That you experience the joy of this Christmas season to. May the Lord Jesus touch your hearts. Amen. God bless you guys and thanks for the lively and intellectual discusion. Bye!
Zach

Nomograph says

Animals have no recognition of their own mortality

Do we know that ?

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-399615/Elephants-grieve-lost-relatives.html

http://www.youtube.com/embed/C5RiHTSXK2A

http://www.youtube.com/embed/TjtrdpSwEUY

Point taken though. We certainly have more ability to reflect on existential
questions than any other animals.

Nomograph says

Animals have no recognition of their own mortality, only humans have this ability.

That's true. As the brain scientist V.S. Ramachandran says: "This 3 pounds of jelly can contemplate the vastness of the interstellar space and at the same time, can contemplate on meaning of infinity, can contemplate on itself contemplating on the meaning of infinity".

The recursive/self-similar nature is fascinating.

The below talk is one of the best I've seen about brain research.

http://youtu.be/Rl2LwnaUA-k

Nomograph says

One theory is that religion is a psychological defense that allows us to circumvent this conflict with the idea of an eternal life.

Interesting.

P N Dr Lo R says

"Faith, hope and love", the subjects of 1st Corinthians 13, have never been nor can ever be scientifically examined or quantified in even the most modern laboratories, but do you doubt their existence?

Again, there is ample evidence of EXISTENCE of love in it's demonstrated form. Parents who raise you, a spouse who will sacrifice some of their "single" privileges to raise a family. Even most teenagers dating can tell you the difference between a SO that has WORDS of love but no actions.

If I go around saying I have an invisible friend named Harvey who is a 6-foot rabbit people will think I'm crazy. Your invisible friend is just on the approved list.

Vicentr Zach's Believe it or Not
In 1979 my wife and I were told that I was sterile, very sterile
800,000 to 1.2M sperm per ml
90% of those sperm were dead
anything below 20M sperm is considered sterile and the normal male has 60M to 110M sperm per ml
One night, I couldn't sleep and I walked into the living room and started to pray. I was crying out to "my imaginary friend" as you say, the Lord Jesus Christ. I related my physical condition to the Lord and told him how much we wanted children. He said to me (in the spirit), "is anything impossible for me?" I said no Lord. He said, "Was it impossible for the aged Abraham and Sara?" I said no Lord. He said was it impossible for Zachariah and Elizabeth (John the Baptist's folks) and I repeated no Lord. Wasit impossible for the Virgin Mary and once again, I said no Lord. Then He said something to me that startled me..."Praise me for your children." Now understand that my wife and I were trying to get pregnant for 2 years at thi point (since 1977--we were married in 1974). During the next few weeks I was out jogging and ran into my wife's gynecologist who was also an infertility specialist. He had sent me to an oncologist who tested me and said that if he performed a surgery on my testacles that he could increase my sperm count by 20%. Well a 20% increase wouldn't even get me to a million sperm, so I decided not to move fowardwith it. As we ran down the street together he told me that he didn't blame me and asked me what I was going to do? I told him that I was going to believe God for a miracle. My wife and I had been praising God for our children. After 30 days when my wife's period didn't come, we went out to buy a pregancy test which was positive. I drove over to the gynecologists office to show him the test tube with the round circle in it and asked him what he thought. He's a tall guy, around 6'5" and he fell down onto a stool and started to stammer. He was an athiest and he confirmed that she was pregnant. I reminded him that we were praying for a miracle. How we all know that it only takes one sperm, so he called my sperm super sperm to be able to get through all of the stuff in a female's anatomy designed to kill off all of the weak sperm.
After some time, I prayed and asked God what I should name this child and that same small voice in my spirit said, "name this child "gracious gift from God for this child is a gift from me." Then the name Jesse popped into my head. I went and grabbed a book of names we had bought and looked up the name Jesse. It said that Jesse meant wealthy...so I though that I missed it??? On a trip to the supermarket, while at the cash register, I noticed a small baby name booklet. I opened it up to Jesse and it said, Wealthy, Gift from God!!!" Wow, how cool is that?
So now my wife was 6 months pregnant and I boldly told folks that we were going to have a son and his name was to be Jesse.
Now it gets even better...
On the night that my wife was giving birth, in between labor pains, I was running back and forth to the father's waiting room becuase Larry Holmes was fighting Duane Bobbick. I've been a fight fan since listening to Floyd Patteron winning the heavywight championship on th radio in the late 1950's. I'm sipping a soda and I tipped my chair back.I looked down and this cylinder ashtray, the kind that used to have a crome top with sand in it. On the side, I noticed this:

Zach,
JESSE
I almost fell off the chair. these to names were carved into the side of the ash try. Now you have to understand that in 1980, Zachary was not a popular name. My nichname was Zach. From 1951 until 1980, I had only met about 5 Zachary's in my entire life. So here I see my name carved into the ash tray...and then right below my name in larger letters, it say JESSE. The Lord had one or two different people crave that information in the ash tray for me, like a loud speaker saying...ZACH...just as I TOLD YOU...Jesse. Jesse was born that night and he's now 31 years old.
That's my story and while you say something sarcastic about imaginary friends, you better wake uo to the TRUTH. God created you, His son Jesus died for you to prepare a place in His Kingdom for you to enjoy for all eternity. This is not a fairy tale. He is real and if you would simply tune into his transmission (the Holy Spirit) with an open heart...He will meet you and reveal himslef to you. He is no respecter of persons and there is nothing special abput me. I pray to ask Him to visit with you.
God bless you Vicente

Zachary says

I must be a fool for believing such a line of crap that took me from a life of drugs and pain and set my path on a more righteous life.

Trading one delusion for another is no gain. Furthermore, blind faith is not righteous. You could worship Hindi gods and get the same result. Does that make the Hindi gods real?

Nomograph says

Animals have no recognition of their own mortality, only humans have this ability.

One theory is that religion is a psychological defense that allows us to circumvent this conflict with the idea of an eternal life.

Yes, as humans became more intelligent, our genes had to keep us from getting depressed about our own mortality or we wouldn't propagate those genes. So our genes lied to us by giving us the delusion of immortality so we didn't rebel against them.

I don't buy that other animals have no sense of mortality though. Most don't obsess about it though. However, they clearly have a sense of self-preservation that wouldn't make sense if they didn't feel threatened by death. Have you ever tried to catch a squirrel?

In any case, other apes, monkeys, and elephants have been observed mourning for fallen relatives.

If you talked him out of his faith, would that make you feel good ?

Marcus,
After what I've experienced in my life, there isn't a chance of it. They can debate words, but they can't debate the love of Jesus Christ and everything the Holy Spirit has done for me and my family.
My challenge continues to be to them to be honest with themselves and ask the Lord Jesus to reveal Himself to them, with an open heart. I doubt that this is possible right now because I detect such a spirit of hate and bitterness towards Christ.

Why waste time on multiple Gods when I honor and worship the one true God?
Thanks, Zach

It's not hate and bitterness. It's just that they too are invested in their beliefs. It's sort of like logic is their Jesus.

Personally I don't have the faith that you do, nor is Jesus or a personal God at the center of my spiritual beliefs. But I respect you for having the faith you do, and have no interest in trying to change you.

Ha, good catch!

thanks Marcus...
I wish that everyone knew Jesus as I do. It's a shame but most Christian churches don't accept having a personal relationship with Christ. It's written in the book of Acts...wait for the comforter who will come in my name. He' still available 2,000 years after Jesus accended into the heavens.
Z

LOL, this thread should probably move to religion section because it has veered off so far away from the subject of communism.

marcus says

If you talked him out of his faith, would that make you feel good ?

It would make me feel good about our species. Irrationality is what's going to lead to the destruction of mankind whether through nuclear fire or ecological collapse. We're facing a few Litmus tests here. If we pass, we colonize the galaxy. If we fail, we go extinct. Religion and other forms of irrationality keeps pushing us towards extinction.

And don't think that a population of 7 billion can't go extinct if we render the Earth a lot less hospitable to human life.

marcus says

It's sort of like logic is their Jesus.

Yes, logic and reality are the basis of our belief system. And that's bad, why?

Dan8267 says

If we pass, we colonize the galaxy

Are you saying that you believe religious dogma is propaganda that was brought here by aliens who don't want us to colonize the galaxy ?

uomo_senza_nome says

LOL, this thread should probably move to religion section because it has veered off so far away from the subject of communism.

agreed

Speaking of communism, it would appear that Karl Marx predicted our current crisis...

http://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/n8v0f/i_recently_read_the_communist_manifesto_by_karl/

Museum of Communism FAQ:
http://econfaculty.gmu.edu/bcaplan/museum/comfaq.htm