Food, I'm going to post an essay I wrote recently for you to read if you would like. It's called "Subjective knowledge of objective reality, and the limits of nihilism." I post it mainly for your benefit because most of the people here have heard alot of my arguments. Here it is:

But wait, if I was a true skeptic, how should I even follow your train of thought? Why does A=A, and why doesn't A=non-A? I have to hold some faith in reason and basic logic for me to even listen to a word you say and not dismiss you and go sit in my corner of skepticism, which I think we have both established. So now, we may say that everyone who wants an ounce of knowledge has to have faith. Christians have faith in a God, and you have faith in experience and time.

Chesterton often says that the life of a skeptic will often lead into insanity, and since I personally have experience, I would agree.

On your topic of morality, I do not see how you can go about claiming that morality is merely a way to promote survival. I entirely disagree! Morality is morality because it often means placing other's above yourself, sacrifice! If morality is all about survival, I don't know why morality often leads to dying for someone else. What is it about humans that makes so many of us so selfless that we would give our lives for another, with no profit to ourselves?

And one more thing that I find interesting about you speaking about freewill. If the universe did not begin with a God, how could any of us have any sort of freewill? If the universe did not start with something metaphysical, the universe's beginning have to be entirely material. However, how can that be so? From everything that we have observed in all of our existence, material things are not made from nothing, nor do they last forever. So then how can we explain the origins of the universe with only believing in that which is material?

It seems to me that the only explanation for the origins of the universe is something that is metaphysical, something that goes above the natural laws (supernatural). If something did indeed begin from something material, would not all of our actions be predetermined? Everything that has happened is merely a chain-reaction since the explosion (or what have you) that created the universe.

Does it appear to you as well as it does to me that humans cannot possibly have any freewill without a God?

I'm no skeptic, true skeptics don't really exist anyway. You can't live without faith in something somewhere along the way.

I'm no scientist, so if you want to ask about the origins of the earth you should probably be asking someone more involved there, or at least check out Stephen Hawking's A Brief History of Time.

Does it appear to you as well as it does to me that humans cannot possibly have any freewill without a God?

No, I think I see what you're saying about causality, but with pure causality there is no true logical explanations, or priori knowledge, or anything like that. Libertarianism answers those questions.

FencerforJesus wrote:

And this is an area where the free-willies and predestination crowds both agree, before Genesis 3 and the Fall, man had free will where they could choose to obey God or not. There was only one command: "Don't eat from the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil". It was simple and you will notice that Eve actually added to it in Genesis 3. She said "you must not eat of it and you must not touch it.". God didn't say that.

(emphasis added by T.O.M.)

Eve was not yet taken out of Adam when God issued the command:

Gen. 2:15-18

15 The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.
16 And the LORD God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden;
17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.”
18 The LORD God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”

I mentioned earlier that I read a few Jewish books this past summer to try to better understand the culture in which Jesus grew up. This "neither eat of the fruit nor touch it" is one of the debate topics of Judaism. They asked long before we did, where did that addition come from? They said that, since Adam heard the command and told Eve, it is more probable that Eve repeated what Adam told her, rather than Eve making up stuff.

This tactic is called "building a hedge around the Law/Torah" and that if Adam did it, it was intended as a protection! That is, if neither of them touched the fruit, they certainly wouldn't be in danger of eating it, or bumping into it accidentally, or picking it up to put it back and thereby squishing it between their fingers and absent-mindedly licking off the juice, or anything else that could be construed as fruit-ending-up-in-mouth.

By the time Jesus came along, the experts in the law had added so many hedges around the original Jewish laws, such as the Ten Commandments, the Great Commandment, and all the rest, that the people were burdened down with made-up laws to "protect" them. The well-intentioned hedges grew into a corn maze!

But no, since Adam and God had the conversation about the forbidden tree before Eve came along, the odds are that Eve was repeating what she was told by Adam.

By the way, Satan used that discrepancy to pry open a door: once he had caught the two humans in a contradiction (however well-intentioned), he went on to try to persuade Eve that the rest of what she had been told was wrong too.

Judaism has always believed that man was never meant to live in the Garden of Eden forever. They don't share our Christian belief in original sin. They believe "like Adam, all have sinned" (as do Eastern Orthodox Christians, BTW) as opposed to the Western Latin/Catholic/Protestant translation and belief that "in Adam, all have sinned." Judaism believes that, if Adam and Eve had never Fallen, they would have left the Garden as they grew to tackle the responsibility to work the rest of creation and turn it into part of that Garden.

Now, there is another way in which you could say that Eve made it up herself: there is a strain of Judaism that teaches that Adam was created with both male and female elements, and that the creation of woman wasn't God producing Eve's nature and soul ex nihilo (with Adam providing only the flesh). Rather, this strain teaches that the creation of woman was God's separating the male and female elements into two bodies. Adam had female elements removed from him, and Eve was taken away from the male elements that stayed with Adam. In this way, humans will always be looking for their missing half.

I know there are people who find this distressing, but I haven't figured out whether it's based on:

1. if Eve was part of Adam when God said "don't touch that," then she would have known she was making up stuff later ... but the human also would be in that combined state when God gave the human dominion ... which would mean that Eve was supposed to have dominion alongside Adam, and not be under him ... which would refudiate patriocentrists, and wouldn't make complimentarians too happy either, as it would mean that the roles of men and women are a result of the curse and not part of God's original plan;

or,

2. eww! Girl germs! get it off me! get it off me! yuck! yuck! yuck!

Please inform of the option you dislike least.

I'm no skeptic, true skeptics don't really exist anyway. You can't live without faith in something somewhere along the way.

I'm no scientist, so if you want to ask about the origins of the earth you should probably be asking someone more involved there, or at least check out Stephen Hawking's A Brief History of Time.

Well, scientists actually say that they have no real idea where the origins of the universe came from. Stephen Hawkings is indeed a smart man, but he is slightly crazy as well, if you ask me. He believes that there are aliens around us, and that they will conquer and colonize Earth. He doesn't really seem like a man of real evidence to me, but that's a whole other debate in itself.

Here's some stuff he's said about that:

“We only have to look at ourselves to see how intelligent life might develop into something we wouldn’t want to meet. I imagine they might exist in massive ships, having used up all the resources from their home planet. Such advanced aliens would perhaps become nomads, looking to conquer and colonize whatever planets they can reach,” he said. “If aliens ever visit us, I think the outcome would be much as when Christopher Columbus first landed in America, which didn’t turn out very well for the native Americans.”

It sounds like he's more like a science fiction fan rather than a cosmologist. Many of his peers disagree with him, so I'm pretty wary on trusting what he has to say, however smart he may be.

Actually, I'm fairly certain Hawking doesn't believe there are aliens around us at this moment. He, like many sensible physicists, embraces the idea that in a universe so vast there is a chance there is life out there. In that quote and his other work he has stated that if there is a small chance that there is intelligent life out there, he doesn't think programs like SETI are a good idea, and we should instead try to keep our existence quiet.

For someone who spends their life contemplating the origins of the universe and space travel, it's not that weird that Hawking has at some point considered his response to contact with other intelligent life.

A Brief History of Time barely touches on these subjects anyway, it's quite a basic overview and doesn't delve so deeply into his own beliefs as his other works do.

Basketball players have a choice to play or not, we don't.

Like has been said in this thread by others wiser than me, all analogies will break down at some point. To be a bit more...blunt, I should say that the option of playing the game as some kind of choice for us is essentially non-existent. We're born playing it, as a fish is born to a life of swimming. It is so because it is the fish's nature. The fish didn't ask to swim, but yet it is and has no power over its own destiny. Only the one who made the fish can determine that fish's fate.

May I ask who your picks for March Madness are?

As a mod I would have to direct this to the Sports thread here in the Spare Oom.

But I will say that if Duke manages get back Kyrie Irving they're a shoe-in for winning the Championship...might as well hand them the trophy now. They're a good team without but I'm afraid they may not be able to to the same without Irving. If Duke doesn't get Irving back in time I'd point at Ohio State as the likely winners of the Big Dance.

Moonlight, I'd encourage you to check the Bible again — as you once did (do you remember the Predestination discussion? — and see if it really says God will unfairly punish a person for a sin that someone else did. No. Adam's sin affected our nature, according to which we ourselves make sinful choices.

MoonlightDancer wrote:So yes God is punishing us for a choice we didn't make but that Adam did.

Hmm. Are you claiming that you're perfect and have never, ever, of your own choice — whether the "sin nature" idea is Biblical or not — sinned? And thus if the Bible is true, and God is real and holy and loving, and you came before Him, you could honestly say, "Nope, I'm 100 percent clean!"?

Could you also say Yes, God, I want to spend eternity worshiping you in all I do or would you admit, You know, I want Your gifts, but not You Yourself?

Apart from God, I know I couldn't. And I'm a NarniaWeb mod and everything.

Are you asking me if I think I'm perfect? Well...yes. Anyway, I'm not sure what you're getting at. The whole predestination discussion was a long time ago. I'm a Christian by my actions because I believe it's a good set of morals to live by but I don't actually believe the Bible word for word. I do not think God is just for punishing us for something that is innate in us. We choose to sin but we cannot choose to be perfect. I think that's the point. It's impossible for us to be perfect and I think it's unfair for God to expect it.

I think it's impossible to believe in the Bible without believing in the whole predestination, which is one of the reasons I don't believe in the Bible anymore--although I do like reading it for fun.

This may be beside the point but ever since I gave up believing in Christianity I've found I'm a MUCH happier person. The credit for my good actions goes to me and me alone. My motivation to do good deeds is based on making myself into a better person. I'm much happier when I take the credit for myself and act good because I'm becoming a better person. Before when I acted in good morals because God commanded me to, I felt bitter and resentful, but now I feel satisfied. I would encourage everyone to stop being a Christian and see how much happier you are.

Sorry about not following up on the discussion I was in the middle of. I needed to focus on studying for some exams. Now it seems that several new discussions have sprung up, so I'll reply to what you had to say, FoodForThought.

On your topic of morality, I do not see how you can go about claiming that morality is merely a way to promote survival. I entirely disagree! Morality is morality because it often means placing other's above yourself, sacrifice! If morality is all about survival, I don't know why morality often leads to dying for someone else. What is it about humans that makes so many of us so selfless that we would give our lives for another, with no profit to ourselves?

Well, first we need to define the goals of life. The 2 main biological goals of life are self-preservation and reproduction. I don't think there's any confusion there.

However, the first goal, self-preservation, is not always an individual one. Bees will commit suicide by stinging intruders to save the hive. They are not doing this to save themselves, they are doing this to save the whole colony, and preserve the life of bees.

If you're going to argue that human martyrs are selfless, I would have to disagree. Deep down inside, their motivation is clear - they want to go to heaven. Everywhere I go, and even at my doorstep, I am bombarded with Christian missionaries who shout, "God loves you! You can receive eternal life!" Never mind the fact that the reason we go to heaven is to spend infinity praising God. A much more honest Christian missionary would say, "God is our almighty creator! We owe our lives to him, since without him we would not exist! We should commit our entire lives to serving the one who made us!" (And I am aware that missionaries like this exist, but they seem to be much rarer.)

The only truly selfless human act that exists is an atheist giving up their life for a stranger. It's not surprising that this is hardly ever observed, since humans are selfish pigs. However, there's a difference between a stupid selfish pig and a smart selfish pig. A stupid selfish pig robs, steals, and does everything that you would consider immoral for short term gain. However, the stupid selfish pig will chip away at the quality of society through his reckless behavior, and his wrath could turn upon him (he could end up robbed, murdered, etc.). A smart selfish pig puts others before himself, and works hard to contribute to society. If he wants to have a quality life, he will help create a society that would serve him and everybody else better. If everybody put others before themselves, the benefits would be mutual because everybody would help each other.

Of course, this is wishful thinking because there are always stupid selfish pigs in the world and nobody is ever a completely smart selfish pig. But that's no reason not to try and be a smart selfish pig. (In the same way that Christians strive to never sin, even though that's impossible.)

If something did indeed begin from something material, would not all of our actions be predetermined? Everything that has happened is merely a chain-reaction since the explosion (or what have you) that created the universe. Does it appear to you as well as it does to me that humans cannot possibly have any freewill without a God?

It doesn't appear to me that way at all because the idea that "all of our actions would be predetermined by physics" is an outdated world view. The official name of it is scientific determinism, first expressed in the early 1800s by French scientist Marquis de Laplace. Laplace reasoned that if we knew the positions and velocities of all the particles in the universe at one time, the laws of physics should allow us to predict what the state of the universe would be at any other time.

There are several problems with scientific determinism. First of all, the uncertainty principle dictates that we cannot measure accurately both the position and the velocity of a particle at the same time. The more accurately we measure the position, the less accurately we can determine the velocity, and vice versa. Nobody - not even God, theoretically - could know both the position and the velocity of a particle. So even if our actions WERE predetermined, we would have no way of predicting them and thus we would technically have free will from our perspective in the universe.

But our actions aren't predetermined! The double slit experiment demonstrated that when given the choice, particles will simultaneously perform every possible outcome. We can calculate the wave function for the boundaries of the outcomes, but if we try to observe, the wave function is destroyed.

Here's a cool little animation that gives a rather basic, but easy-to-understand introduction to the topic...

By the way, I learned much of that from Stephen Hawking's book "The Universe in a Nutshell", which brings me to your next post, where you start calling him crazy...

It sounds like he's more like a science fiction fan rather than a cosmologist. Many of his peers disagree with him, so I'm pretty wary on trusting what he has to say, however smart he may be.

First of all, he says he imagines, no that he believes. Secondly, he's just applying the fundamental goals of life to aliens who are more powerful than us. The ultimate goal of life is to preserve itself and reproduce, regardless of whether things might be destroyed in the process. Humans have no trouble cutting down rainforests and destroying habitats that even fellow humans live on. Why would an alien think of us as anything more but animals, if they had developed to a point of being able to travel the stars?

And his reason for thinking that intelligent alien life exists is that, in terms of probability, it is very likely. I don't feel like paraphrasing his explanation, as this post has already taken about 45 minutes to write. He explains it more in his books.

Andrew, I have no issues with you disagreeing with me and others here BUT it's your attitude that really stinks. The manner in which you voice your opinions and beliefs can be done in a loving manner. I'm not seeing that here.

Warrior, I don't like certain people's attitude here toward me, but really, does it matter? I'm here to discuss and debate philosophy, and his attitude has nothing to do with whether or not his philosophy is legitimate, nor does whether I want to respond to how he says what he says. A philosopher, after all, is a lover of wisdom. I define love as putting something before yourself, and since I love the truth, I'm going to put it before political correctness, niceness, etcetera. Does that mean I can't be nice? No, and I'll admit I could probably be nicer, and I'm completely open to working on that. But I'm still putting the truth first.

And since I disagree with you, it automatically means I'm not interested in learning from you, or having a discussion, and on top of that I'm an arrogant jerk for not speaking in schoolworthy jargon.

Alright mista, if your not interested in having a discussion, then why are you writing on this forum in the first place? To teach all us a philosophy, but not even glance at another one. I'm afraid it doesn't work that way. Your method comes close to insults. Nobody is going to listen to you at that rate.

Further, your quote makes no sense to me. You won't be able to learn much if you are never interested in having a conversation with other people when you disagree with them. By that method, how are you to know if you are right or wrong? For all you know, you could be thinking up a fantasy all on your own (we humans like to do that). But, unfortunately, since you agree with yourself always, alea jacta est!

Actually, I'm fairly certain Hawking doesn't believe there are aliens around us at this moment. He, like many sensible physicists, embraces the idea that in a universe so vast there is a chance there is life out there. In that quote and his other work he has stated that if there is a small chance that there is intelligent life out there, he doesn't think programs like SETI are a good idea, and we should instead try to keep our existence quiet.

For someone who spends their life contemplating the origins of the universe and space travel, it's not that weird that Hawking has at some point considered his response to contact with other intelligent life.

A Brief History of Time barely touches on these subjects anyway, it's quite a basic overview and doesn't delve so deeply into his own beliefs as his other works do.

"... a universe so vast." Yes, that is true in one sense, but I just want to bring another perspective to the table, that of Chesterton. Enjoy!

But modern thought also hit my second human tradition. It went against the fairy feeling about strict limits and conditions. The one thing it loved to talk about was expansion and largeness. Herbert Spencer would have been greatly annoyed if any one had called him an imperialist, and therefore it is highly regrettable that nobody did. But he was an imperialist of the lowest type. He popularized this contemptible notion that the size of the solar system ought to over-awe the spiritual dogma of man. Why should a man surrender his dignity to the solar system any more than to a whale? If mere size proves that man is not the image of God, then a whale may be the image of God; a somewhat formless image; what one might call an impressionist portrait. It is quite futile to argue that man is small compared to the cosmos; for man was always small compared to the nearest tree. But Herbert Spencer, in his headlong imperialism, would insist that we had in some way been conquered and annexed by the astronomical universe. He spoke about men and their ideals exactly as the most insolent Unionist talks about the Irish and their ideals. He turned mankind into a small nationality. And his evil influence can be seen even in the most spirited and honourable of later scientific authors; notably in the early romances of Mr. H. G. Wells. Many moralists have in an exaggerated way represented the earth as wicked. But Mr. Wells and his school made the heavens wicked. We should lift up our eyes to the stars from whence would come our ruin.

...

Their infernal parallels seemed to expand with distance; but for me all good things come to a point, swords for instance. So finding the boast of the big cosmos so unsatisfactory to my emotions I began to argue about it a little; and I soon found that the whole attitude was even shallower than could have been expected. According to these people the cosmos was one thing since it had one unbroken rule. Only (they would say) while it is one thing it is also the only thing there is. Why, then, should one worry particularly to call it large? There is nothing to compare it with. It would be just as sensible to call it small. A man may say, "I like this vast cosmos, with its throng of stars and its crowd of varied creatures." But if it comes to that why should not a man say, "I like this cosy little cosmos, with its decent number of stars and as neat a provision of live stock as I wish to see"? One is as good as the other; they are both mere sentiments. It is mere sentiment to rejoice that the sun is larger than the earth; it is quite as sane a sentiment to rejoice that the sun is no larger than it is. A man chooses to have an emotion about the largeness of the world; why should he not choose to have an emotion about its smallness?

To me, this makes sense. As he said, if the universe is one, then there is nothing to compare it with. So, why not call it small. But, I do have something to compare it with. That is God! When you put him into the mix, the universe is definitely small!

Well, whether I've contributed to this discussion (or any discussion) or not, I just had to share anyway.

~Watz

Pokes his head into this heated debate to add... A little bit more then his two cents

In chat today I had a interesting conversation with Tesseract and a few others about this Agnostic thing... As I had trouble distinguishing between Atheists and Agnostics... Here's the transcript and my comments on it... My comments are in italics and Tess' are in bold.

So. What your saying is that Agnostics are... Essentially people who don't believe in God but believe in the possibly of A god... So basically a watered down version of an Atheist?

Agnostics are people who just haven't decided anything.

So... What do we call people who just never even think about religion and just live life without even considering it?

They are agnostics, narnia nerd. Atheists are people who have actually given it thought and decided that there is no God.

O.K, So if someone found out that aliens were a probable "god" then an Agnostic would consider them?

I am open to a God possibly existing, I think it might be possible to prove that the Christian God doesn't exist through internal contradiction.

An internal contradiction would simply be a opinion, Tess.

Not necessarily, Joe.

"Opinion–noun, a personal view, attitude, or appraisal. " If you make an internal contradiction, wouldn't it simply be an opinion, a personal view; so to speak. Which you could not prove via science.

Joe, it is not my opinion, for example, that an invisible pink unicorn cannot exist. It is a fact. Something cannot be both invisible and pink at the same time.

How can you prove scientifically that a pink unicorn can not exist, if it is invisible? You can't, its impossible. So therefore, as an Agnostic, you are required to except the possibility of it existing, otherwise, you defeat the purpose of being an agnostic.

That's called circular logic.

After this own conversation kinda turned into goofiness, due to the fact that our fellow chatters couldn't stop giggling at the fact that our conversation was about invisible pink unicorns.

Alright mista, if your not interested in having a discussion, then why are you writing on this forum in the first place? To teach all us a philosophy, but not even glance at another one. I'm afraid it doesn't work that way. Your method comes close to insults. Nobody is going to listen to you at that rate.

Remember yall, Drew really feels out numbered. I don't blame him, its hard not to feel corned when the ratio is like, twenty to one. Drew, I've learned in debates that it is usually best to say your points and nothing else, specially when you are the minority.

Because anything you say will be used against you, in a way that is perfectly acceptable, but never the less could be taken as threat if you are the one who said it in the first place. "Say what needs to be said, do what you need to do and don't mix in any junk" That's my motto.

Anyways... Back to the discussions.

FoodForThought wrote:
On your topic of morality, I do not see how you can go about claiming that morality is merely a way to promote survival. I entirely disagree! Morality is morality because it often means placing other's above yourself, sacrifice! If morality is all about survival, I don't know why morality often leads to dying for someone else. What is it about humans that makes so many of us so selfless that we would give our lives for another, with no profit to ourselves?

Emotions. One two syllable word, we were given them for a reason. Soldiers give up their life for each other everyday in wars. Why? Because they have become attached to their comrades. Friends, good enough friends to jump on a grenade for each other.

Friendship is a emotion, almost everything we do in life is driven by one most primitive function of the brain, think about it; why do we cry? Emotions, why do we smile? Emotions, why do people lay down their lives for their friends? Emotions. Point in case.

I'll be back later for round two. Its good to be back in here.

To clarify some things that I said in Narnianerd's post - "I am open to a God possibly existing, I think it might be possible to prove that the Christian God doesn't exist through internal contradiction." In the hectic pace of chatroom discussions, I phrased this strangely. What I meant to say was, "I am open to believing that a God exists if given evidence...(to a different person) I think that it might be possible to prove that the Christian God doesn't exists because some of his attributes contradict each other". There were about 6 other people in the chatroom at the time, and I was trying to talk with them at the same time as Narnianerd. "That's called circular logic" was also in response to someone else.

How can you prove scientifically that a pink unicorn can not exist, if it is invisible? You can't, its impossible. So therefore, as an Agnostic, you are required to except the possibility of it existing, otherwise, you defeat the purpose of being an agnostic.

Is "you" referring to me? If so, I'll clarify that I'm an atheist.

The main confusion between Narnianerd and I is over what an agnostic actually is. The question I would pose to others in this discussion is, what is an agnostic?

Here's another train of thought that developed in my mind recently that I thought I'd put out here as well.

In the American judicial system, lawbreakers are punished in many different degrees. Lawbreakers are generally given various amounts of time in jail. However, if a crime is too severe, the lawbreaker is not deemed worthy to be on this earth anymore, or having any further value to society. Then the lawbreaker is executed. Execution is the worst punishment possible, rotting in a jail cell for an infinite number of years is not. This is rather straightforward, and makes sense, even though it's not perfect.

God's system of punishment, however, is less straightforward and makes far less sense. Non-believers often seem to be rewarded on earth, while there are countless stories of persecuted Christians. This can be explained with our limited knowledge of God's "mysterious ways". But Christianity makes it clear what the ultimate punishment is. In the afterlife, God grants all the believers access to heaven, while the atheists get sent to HELL.

Wouldn't it make more sense for God to just "execute" the souls, and obliterate them? That would make God's afterlife plan seem a lot more fair. Christians would go to heaven and enjoy an eternal party, while Atheists would get exactly what they expected - nothing! Isn't it punishment enough that the Atheists don't get to go to heaven? By judging them, God has deemed them to have no further value to his creation. So why wouldn't he just have them be obliterated, instead of sending them to the eternal supernatural torture chamber? The atheists aren't going to learn anything while enduring the misery. They've already lost their last chance to be saved - no amount of punishment now will do them any good.

Looking at the matter this way, it seems that hell is primarily a scare tactic used to frighten Christians into believing in God. Was God's gift of eternal life in heaven not convincing enough? The only way he can get people to believe in him is by threatening to send them to HELL?

Why wouldn't God do it this way? It'd satisfy everybody. Christians would go to heaven and be happy that they were right, and Atheists would be "right" too, but they wouldn't be around to disrupt heaven because they'd just be gone altogether.

I find it interesting that many bible verses seem to suggest that God does indeed merely obliterate the bad souls. To give just one quick example, look at John 3:16. "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life." Nothing is said here about perishing being followed by something undesirable. Back then, people just straight up feared death! Nothing is mentioned about going to heaven either, apparently having mere eternal life is just as good.

Hello Tesseract,

Nice to meat you.

I don't know what kind of literature you read, but there is one book I strongly recommend to you: Orthodoxy by G.K. Chesterton. Chesterton was a man who didn't believe in a God, just like you. In the book, he describes how his journey went from not believing in God to believing Him. Though you may disagree with his points, I think you would be very interested in reading about a man who once had similar views as yourself and why they changed for him. Further, he deals with difficult subjects, including the one just posed: original sin, The Trinity, Hell, just to name a few. The book can be found on the web for free. Just google othordoxy chesterton and you will be able to download if for free. At the very least, Chesterton is a madly entertaining author to read. I hope you enjoy!

EDIT: Another important note about Chesterton: He believed that by through his own reasoning there was no God! That's important for you to know. You may have said, "well, he was just a guy who didn't believe and then he did, but never reasoned it through beforehand." That isn't the case at all. He had his own doctrine reasoned out set and firm, without a God. Then, through the journey which the book describes, he went on to believing that there was a God.

~Watz

Responses to Tesseract

I find it interesting that many bible verses seem to suggest that God does indeed merely obliterate the bad souls. To give just one quick example, look at John 3:16. "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life." Nothing is said here about perishing being followed by something undesirable.

Nothing here is said about how it's wrong to ignore a poor person, either. An argument-from-silence, especially from only one verse, isn't very persuasive one way or the other (no matter how much evangelicals overemphasize John 3:16!).

Elsewhere in Scripture, God is clear about how bad sin is in His sight, worthy of punishment forever and ever — not just giving a non-Christian "what he expected" (what does God owe anyone to meet their expectations?) And Jesus is clear about how Hell, for non-Christians, lasts just as long as Heaven does: forever.

It's sad stuff, but I can't sugar-coat it. Christ warned of Hell in ways He never needed to say, if God simply planned to annihilate those who hate Him. Have you looked at those verses, Tesseract? You can find them with an internet search, or ask someone here to remind you of them. And have you seen the perspective Jesus gives: not that a person should repent or be really-really-good in order to avoid Hell, but because a person is grateful that Christ went through that same kind of suffering on the Cross, so His people wouldn't have to?

Responses to Andrew

Now for Andrew, here in the middle, though it may take a while ...

I recognize that in big long discussions like this, it's difficult to keep up with everything. Still, I did include the links in the last post, and you seemed simply to ignore them in favor of a Fight. Trust me, the internet "fight fatigue" wears on you for a while. And if your profile age is correct, I've been doing it longer than you've been able to read.

I've pretty much gotten what I came for anyways, which was for you all to help me find flaws in the argument I first posted.

That's what supports my contention that you're not really here to have a conversation. You'd rather use people for your own alternate intents. Trust me, I've tried that and it gets boring after a while. You just end up chasing fleeting thrills from the Fight and leading a reaction-based life.

I just like to have a conversation with someone. And if my troll senses are tingling, I'll say so. Therefore my challenge was this: simply show me you're not a troll and actually want to learn from someone else's beliefs!

No serious Christian minds someone criticizing Christianity. But what would you think if I went on as if (as you seem to be projecting my motives to be) all atheists believe in alien abductions and are secret animal-abusers and have absolutely no morals at all? That would be wrong. And atheists who've been around longer than you have have already shown that. But if an atheist already calmly informed a Christian that this was the case, and the Christian simply went on as if the atheist hadn't said anything -- ugh. (I've seen that happen before, by the way. But it's not happened here.)

Here's where I gave the quotes and links before, not just from me but from The Black Glove, who I believe summarized it better: that whenever you say you believe something is not right, or not consistent, what is your foundation for desiring that anyone take what you say as anything but nonsense? As TBG said, you might as well just say "booooo" as a "rebuttal" Christianity or anyone else's ideas. Not very persuasive, is it?

Furthermore, if you wish to understand the beliefs you claim to criticize, I encourage better research. I had to chuckle at your misuse of Matthew 7:14. What does anything Jesus said in that chapter and sermon (yes, it's a whole argument He makes, not simply a bunch of Random Slogans) have to do with supposed holy wars?

You do realize you're behaving just like an ill-mannered ignorant Christian, right? Yes, they're the same folks who rip Bible verses out of context? Dude, the Bible is not nearly so "special" that anyone can read it randomly like that. You don't read any other document that way. Just respect plain human language and the genre of any book or document, regardless of its age. I'm sure you can do better; anyone can learn how to pay attention to genre, context and metanarrative. Then you can find fault if you wish, but be much better informed about what the Bible actually contains.

Anyways, you haven't gotten around to answering what I actually say

As I said before: what's in it for me? Again your rather self-centered slip is showing — you seem to expect special treatment, at least here, and balk when someone (as you perceive) treats you in the same way. And again your lack of plain reading comprehension seems revealed: I already said, with numbers and everything, that you still haven't answered the stuff before, and that as soon as you do that, I'd be glad to engage you with other stuff. No single person here runs the conversation or decides simply to ignore certain responses out of convenience. Well, theoretically you can, of course, this is the internet, but don't complain when someone is paying attention and calls you on it and rings the Troll Bell.

Some closing comments, before I turn elsewhere.

I like your last couple lines. God's law isn't just because it isn't livable, so either there is no god, or theres a sado-masochist "God" who makes problems just so people need him to solve them.

You're missing Fencer's point. The whole idea behind the Law of the Bible is that yes, God is showing us how bad our problem is. Only He can solve it and restore the relationship between Creator and created.

But of course, if one denies there is a God, and act like a god by supposing that one can re-write reality simply by speaking it or believing it — well, that could seem to resolve the problem. "If there's nothing wrong with me, there must be something wrong with the universe."

Yet as many here have tried to say already, one can't be consistent with that idea of self-made morality or even support logically the idea that consistency is required.

Andrew, unlike your earlier lurch toward the incorrect assumption that I (or any other Christian) believes he or she is perfect, I struggle with these same things. That's the point of Christianity: not that God gives rules just to keep people in line, or to be a masochist, but because He is the Creator. He's not our buddy, not some galactic overlord. Not all authority is intrinsically evil (and again, how are you defining evil?). Christians believe, and the Bible presents, that the universe is His world — He owns it, and wanted/wants His creatures to be the most joyful they can be, because they're in relationship with Him. Outside of that there is no true happiness. Want a world where one can simply enjoy God's happiness forever apart from Him? As Lewis said (summarizing a Biblical truth), "There is no such thing."

Responses to MoonlightDancer

Are you asking me if I think I'm perfect? Well...yes.

My actual question was if "you're perfect and have never, ever, of your own choice ... sinned?" Ever done anything wrong at all, past or present?

And if you say "X isn't a sin," how do you know? Who says it isn't?

That isn't the last of the questions I'll be asking you here, urging you not simply to sit back and think about how to fix them on your own, but to look outside yourself — practicing the same unselfishness you've said you want to see from others — and to God's Word for the answers (not just reading it for "fun"!).

Anyway, I'm not sure what you're getting at. The whole predestination discussion was a long time ago.

I'm not talking about predestination. Instead I'm asking why you seem to think that God simply loses interest in people who want to steal all things He's given them — food, air, life itself — and reject Him personally.

I'm a Christian by my actions because I believe it's a good set of morals to live by but I don't actually believe the Bible word for word.

Based on your thoughts in the Mush thread, actually (to which I replied in this, you're considering things even beyond use-the-Bible-as-a-buffet lifestyle. Why do you think it's not true? One must come up with something beyond "I think" or "I feel" such-and-such.

I hope you also know that you're certainly not the first person to want to salvage the Bible for bits and pieces that appeal personally to them. It's a bit cliche, really. How do you think the Bible's Author feels about that?

I do not think God is just for punishing us for something that is innate in us.

Interesting thought (but not a new one!). What if you're wrong?

We choose to sin but we cannot choose to be perfect. I think that's the point. It's impossible for us to be perfect and I think it's unfair for God to expect it.

What if you're wrong? The Bible says God is absolutely fair and holy and perfect and loving, the only way for us to know what truth and love are. So you like the parts in the Bible (if they're in there) about being a nice person, but throw out the parts about how God expects perfection. Why?

And why expect (for one must therefore expect it) everyone else to accept and reject the same sorts of parts that you do? People are very different. Some jerk out there might suddenly decide he hates the parts about being nice and would prefer going around killing people he doesn't like, based on some twisted reading of the go-kill-the-Canaanites verses. Who's to say you're right and such a character as that would be wrong?

I think it's impossible to believe in the Bible without believing in the whole predestination, which is one of the reasons I don't believe in the Bible anymore--although I do like reading it for fun.

Again, not sure what the predestination thing has to do with it. That's a behind-closed-doors issue for Christians only to debate for fun and kicks.

This may be beside the point but ever since I gave up believing in Christianity I've found I'm a MUCH happier person. The credit for my good actions goes to me and me alone.

And yet you said in the other thread that you're afraid of ending up romantically affiliated with someone who's selfish. We can continue that discussion there if you like, but why impose this belief on someone else? Why is "selfishness" (whatever that means, to individual people!) suddenly wrong? Something to think about — mostly the inconsistency, expecting someone else to do something you don't want to do yourself ...

The good news is that Jesus died for all the sins and the fake "good actions" we think we come up with on our own. It's all disgusting, Moonlight, and honestly about wanting credit for your own "good actions" won't make them sacred. The Bible says even our "good deeds" are like "filthy rags" compared with God's perspective. Let me translate that into a more easily accessible terms. I'm afraid this may sound quite harsh, but sometimes that's what it takes to disillusion someone: think of the most wonderful, loving, self-sacrificing thing you can do, like dying to save a friend, or dedicating your life to caring for the poor, or slaving away to try to cure AIDS. How much is that worth to God, when we want to claim credit for these good things on our own? It's used toilet paper.

How do you know those parts of the Bible aren't just as correct as the be-nice-to-people parts or the "fun" parts you prefer reading?

My motivation to do good deeds is based on making myself into a better person. I'm much happier when I take the credit for myself and act good because I'm becoming a better person.

Hmm, "better" according to whom? Who defines "good" or "better"? Again, I could say I'm becoming a "better person" by being a racist, or abusing women, or being selfish even in little ways. How do you know I'm wrong?

Before when I acted in good morals because God commanded me to, I felt bitter and resentful

Did you know that the reason for doing things was not to earn God's favor, but to get more of God Himself in relationship with Him? Please refer to my other post, in the Wuv thread, and the closing excerpt for more about what the Gospel really is. What do you think?

Let me put it another way. My wife and I will have been married for two years as of May 30 (and you may remember, Moonlight, that my wife and I first "met" in that Predestination discussion). She does so many amazing things for me to bless me — and why does she do them? Because she wants to earn my love? No, she already has that because of who she is. But she wants to help me, support me, and I want to do the same for her, because we already love each other and this flows naturally into our actions. The same is true with how Christians love God.

I fear you may have missed that, and that part may be not entirely your fault. Many churches go through the Bible and talk about "personal relationship" with Jesus, even while they're enforcing Rules. They don't say how obedience results because of what Jesus has already done to die in place of His people, saving them from punishment.

but now I feel satisfied. I would encourage everyone to stop being a Christian and see how much happier you are.

Again, who defines "happiness" anyway? Is everyone "happy" in the same ways you are? That ignores the diversity of humans. What if I'm happy when I kick a little puppy? I'm not cracking wise. Many people truly do believe this way, and they're quite "happy" in such disgusting behavior.

Regardless, "you'll just be happier in this life if you believe as I do" doesn't work against a convinced Christian any more than against a non-Christian.

I have joy in the Christ Who died to save me from a holy God and has brought me into His Kingdom. As a result I not only have Him in Whom I can delight, but see the world in incredible vibrant colors thanks to His truth and love. Even suffering, as horrible as that is, will have an answer and a purpose. And I can look forward to a New Heavens and a New Earth where my King will personally dwell on His throne, in His rightful place, having made all things new, allowing us to worship Him forever in all that we do: incredible stories and adventures, for His glory.

Compared with that joy, any supposed "happiness" found only in this life is shallow and pathetic. And it will die whenever we die.