Another Atheist...

[Valke2]

btw, why aren’t you running around killing people and stealing? (I’m assuming you aren’t)

 

[phooney]

btw, why aren’t you running around killing people and stealing? (I’m assuming you aren’t)

Why would I?

If there is no afterlife, that means that this is the only one that myself or anybody else will get. As with most things, rarity only increases its value. This life is a wonderful thing, in and of itself.

I don’t need the temptation of eternal heaven to motivate me to do the right thing, I don’t need the threat of eternal hell to stop me from doing the wrong thing. Do you?

It’s in this life that you will be judged if you wrong somebody, and this life is the only one we have evidence for, so this is the only kind of judgement that can really be demonstrated as being important.

Are you running around killing people and stealing? I also am assuming you aren’t. Would you though, if you thought God was telling you to?

By the way, I hate to be a grammar nazi, but the phrase is “I couldn’t care less” don’t make me bring out the caring continuum diagram on you!

I hope you can understand that people don’t need God to be good.

All the best!

 

[grandfather]

@Sams Son

People certainly don’t start out believing in God, so I think a more interesting question is how people get to the point where they DO believe in God.

Faith is a gift. In systematic Theology, it is called a theological virtue, meaning it is given to the soul by God. You can be open to it, or receptive. <<<<<<<<

 

[Valke2]

Why would I?

If there is no afterlife, that means that this is the only one that myself or anybody else will get. As with most things, rarity only increases its value. This life is a wonderful thing, in and of itself.

I don’t need the temptation of eternal heaven to motivate me to do the right thing, I don’t need the threat of eternal hell to stop me from doing the wrong thing. Do you?

It’s in this life that you will be judged if you wrong somebody, and this life is the only one we have evidence for, so this is the only kind of judgement that can really be demonstrated as being important.

Are you running around killing people and stealing? I also am assuming you aren’t. Would you though, if you thought God was telling you to?

By the way, I hate to be a grammar nazi, but the phrase is “I couldn’t care less” don’t make me bring out the caring continuum diagram on you!

I hope you can understand that people don’t need God to be good.

All the best!

For me, the explanation you just gave supports the belief that there is indeed an ultimate moral authority that reality is based upon. Whether one attributes it to God or the innate value of life, I could not care less. (Before I really could care less).

 

[grandfather]

Why would I?
I don’t need the temptation of eternal heaven to motivate me to do the right thing, I don’t need the threat of eternal hell to stop me from doing the wrong thing. Do you?

How do you know what is the right thing?<<<<<<<<

 

[phooney]

@grandfather

Sorry, for some reason your post wouldn’t work with the quote in reply button.

Faith is a gift. In systematic Theology, it is called a theological virtue, meaning it is given to the soul by God. You can be open to it, or receptive. <<<<<<<<

Ok, so faith can also be called a theological virtue. How does THAT prove it is given to the soul by God? What is the soul? As I said, I think this question is too important to take on faith. My definition of faith anyway.

Yes we have different definitions. There is a great deal of evidence for the existence of God. Perhaps you have not examined it.<<<<<<<<<<

Well, I have been searching and examining for a few years now, if there was a ‘great deal’ of this evidence, I would have hoped to have found it by now. Perhaps you could present some, rather than just saying there is evidence?

The natural sciences or anything that is self correcting leaves you never able to know anything as objectively true. The jusrisdiction of the natural sciences or realm of operation is the physical universe and what it contains, that which is contained in time and space. Man observes operations in this realm through his senses and instruments that are extensions of his senses and develops theories that may or may not be true. They can be disproved at any time, meaning there is nothing truly knowable, even about the physical universe, much less the spiritual universe, if one exists, via the natural sciences.<<<<<<<<<<<<

Indeed, you might be starting to get it. Even what you consider your beliefs in the most basic truths should change in the face of compelling contrary evidence. I would also say it is important to not form a belief about something until there is compelling evidence in it’s favour. Yes, man observes this realm through his senses and instruments and develops theories that tie together the facts that he observes.

Of course, our senses and instruments are all we have for observations about reality. Please explain how you can observe the spiritual realm? How can this realm of the apparent non-physical interact with the physical world? I have the same senses, and probably access to more or less the same instruments, as you yet this spiritual universe is apparently not willing to show itself to my rational enquiry. If you are saying that I have to give my belief before it will reveal itself to me and give me reason to believe in it… well, that kind of defeats the purpose of having any filters on what I believe in.

The theories formed through the observation of evidence cannot just be disproved at any time. They are untouchable, except by contrary evidence. Things that do not exist don’t have evidence for them, so I think that lacking belief in pretty much all things that don’t have evidence for them is a pretty reasonable start.

Great! Just wait until you encounter the beauty of the Infinite. The human soul was made to crave beauty, and appreciate it and be awed by it. You were doing in this response to the rings, what you were made to do. You and the rings and the universe and every atom that make it all up have the same maker.<<<<<.

That’s all very poetic… but what are you actually saying here? People like to look at things that are beautiful, therefore everything was made by god? Please explain.

 

[phooney]

@valke2

“For me, the explanation you just gave supports the belief that there is indeed an ultimate moral authority that reality is based upon. Whether one attributes it to God or the innate value of life, I could not care less. (Before I really could care less).”

Hi Valke2, glad I could help demonstrate to you that god is unneccessary to live a moral life.

Of course there are still problems with saying that God (any of the gods postulated by modern monotheistic religions anyway) is our moral benchmark. This ‘model’ for morality asserts that an unchanging, eternally perfect law giver is what we base our morality on. This fails to match the reality that our morality has demonstrably changed over the course of our evolution, and development of our cultures.

 

[Charlie_Zeaiter]

@Charlie Zeaiter

I see this post you linked me to is part of another reasonably long thread, I haven’t read any other posts in that thread, just your one that you’ve linked to.

Let me get this straight, you’re taking prophecies from the bible, showing that the fulfillment of those prophecies in the bible, and taking that as proof FOR the events in the bible?..

Hi again,

No, I don’t believe prophecies are proof for the events in the bible. History itself has proven the bible to be correct. There really isn’t any evidence to deny the virgin birth of Jesus - history is consistent in this claim. And there really isn’t any evidence to deny His crucifixion on Friday 3rd April 33 AD.

Prophecy is interesting because they were written hundreds of years prior to the birth of Jesus. And then Jesus was born and He fulfilled them. How could the writings of these prophecies be possible without divine intervention?

One of my favourite prophecies is the parrallel between the Jewish feast of Passover and the Crucifixion. I encourage you to research it. It’s fascinating.

 

[Hellisreal]

Hello Phooney,

Welcome to Caf. Have you read GK Chesterton? His book, Orthodoxy?

 

[phooney]

@grandfather

@grandfather

How do you know what is the right thing?<<<<<<<<

Naturally, an answer to this would be a bit too long for this forum, but…

In a nutshell, the best explanation I can come up with is that our morality evolved with us, destructive behaviour towards the society is generally legislated against, and the legislation is the codified representation of our morality. ‘Wrong’ behaviour hurts other people, and the evolutionary mechanism that usually stops us from doing that is a neurochemical reaction that causes us to feel ‘bad’ about it or to empathise with the people we have hurt. Of course, I realise that people still do go around killing people all the time. Naturally, it must be noted, many of these examples are over religion, but I’m sure those aren’t the examples you were meaning to dredge up. In many cases, I think it is probably a matter of perspective (as in “I’m so poor and I can’t think of any other way to get some money/food” or “these foreigners want to take away my country”) that causes people to go around killing.

The golden rule, as in treating others as you would like to be treated yourself of course predates Christianity by quite some time, forms of it being in the Code of Hammurabi and perhaps the Ur-nammu code, though I haven’t read the latter.

Your viking example helps illustrate my point, thanks.

This is false. It would take a long time to explain. People do not even know what good is, without divine revelation.<<<<<<<<

And yet I’ve shown how people can know what good is without divine revelation. Are you asserting that all the people who are ‘good’ by most rational standards who have not had a divine revelation are just continually guessing (very luckily) what ‘good’ is?

 

[phooney]

@Charlie Zeaiter

Hi there!

“No, I don’t believe prophecies are proof for the events in the bible. History itself has proven the bible to be correct. There really isn’t any evidence to deny the virgin birth of Jesus - history is consistent in this claim.”

This is a very big claim to make when there are no contemporary accounts of Jesus even existing, let alone contemporary records of the minute-by-minute movements of Mary approximately 9 months before Jesus was supposed to have been born, to confirm that she wasn’t simply lying. I am really floored by the assertion that there is no evidence to deny the virgin aspect of the birth when all evidence we have confirms that, in humans anyway, conception does not happen without sex. (IVF of course, is still sex, and I’m reasonably sure they didn’t do that back around the year 1BC, to get off on a technicallity!)

Could you please provide the extra-biblical, non-biblically inspired, pieces of history that actually does support this claim? Seriously, what is more likely: a virgin gave birth, or she became pregnant the same way billions of other women always have? Explain how a virgin can give birth, without any joining of a sperm and an egg.

“And there really isn’t any evidence to deny His crucifixion on Friday 3rd April 33 AD.”

I do like the work you’ve done on researching this one, could you direct me to the NASA source regarding the eclipse at that time? Of course, as you mention, solar and lunar eclipses are perfectly natural events. What kind of failing is it proposed that the sun had? Did it temporarily disappear? If so, why was the earth not flung out into space?

“Prophecy is interesting because they were written hundreds of years prior to the birth of Jesus. And then Jesus was born and He fulfilled them. How could the writings of these prophecies be possible without divine intervention?”

However, here is where your argument regarding the crucifixtion and prophecies fails though. As mentioned before, even the biblical accounts for Jesus aren’t contemporary TO Jesus. The people that wrote about the life of Jesus would have been fully aware of previous Jewish myths, and this is why these are not good candidates for the status of ‘prophecy’ if they could recall a solar or lunar eclipse, that would be another great way to make the story more fantastic, so set it at that time.

You haven’t mentioned any extra-biblical sources for the passover/crucifixion parallels either. I’m sure you understand my reservations about using the bible to prove the bible.

Thanks for the conversation, and I apologise if you actually WERE using extra-biblical sources, but either didn’t mention them or I missed them, it’s getting very late again, and I’m sleepy now lol!

 

[phooney]

Hello Phooney,

Welcome to Caf. Have you read GK Chesterton? His book, Orthodoxy?

Hi there,

No, I haven’t. Could you give a brief synopsis and why you personally recommend it? (I am assuming you ARE recommending it, hehe)

 

[Hellisreal]

Hi there,

No, I haven’t. Could you give a brief synopsis and why you personally recommend it? (I am assuming you ARE recommending it, hehe)

Oh, like it myself- but I cant go so far as to reccomend it really. Different strokes you know!

I dont know if I can do it justice with a brief synopsis.
Or a lengthy one LOL. Not good at that.

There was just something about reading your posts and my recent re-reading it again a third time that clicked it out there. You sound very nice.

Be sure to meet Mirdath and Neopenthe, I think they are both very good hearts, and they are not believers.

If they still post here? Has anyone seen them?

I need to talk to one of them. I just lost my atheist friend to suicide. Its on another thread in this section.

:crying: :crying:

I am still in shock and blaming myself

 

[Charlie_Zeaiter]

… This is a very big claim to make when there are no contemporary accounts of Jesus even existing, let alone contemporary records of the minute-by-minute movements of Mary approximately 9 months before Jesus was supposed to have been born, to confirm that she wasn’t simply lying. I am really floored by the assertion that there is no evidence to deny the virgin aspect of the birth when all evidence we have confirms that, in humans anyway, conception does not happen without sex…

Thanks for your time reading my replies.

I’d be interested if you have any articles from history that claim the virgin birth is a hoax. I’m just amazed at how much history has accepted the virgin birth. But I can prove the virgin birth - I just glad it fulfills prophecy without any real objection from history.

I do like the work you’ve done on researching this one, could you direct me to the NASA source regarding the eclipse at that time? Of course, as you mention, solar and lunar eclipses are perfectly natural events. What kind of failing is it proposed that the sun had? Did it temporarily disappear? If so, why was the earth not flung out into space?

The NASA Web site…
sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse/LEhistory/LEhistory.html

More info…
bethlehemstar.net/day/day.htm

… You haven’t mentioned any extra-biblical sources for the passover/crucifixion parallels either. I’m sure you understand my reservations about using the bible to prove the bible.

Sorry… but those parallels are for you to work out. You need to get yourself a lesson on Passover, and get yourself a lesson on the Crucifixion. And then you’ll see the parrallels.

If you choose to deny the stories in the bible simply because the bible is a religious book, well then I can’t help you. But if you get yourself a lesson in the bible and see that it is historically accurate, then you’re in for a treat.

P.S. This thread is only the beginning. You won’t find the truth in this thread alone. I hope you stick around in these forums for years to come… asking questions and learning.

… Thanks for the conversation, and I apologise if you actually WERE using extra-biblical sources, but either didn’t mention them or I missed them, it’s getting very late again, and I’m sleepy now lol!

Thanks for your friendliness. I’ll see you around in other threads. Bye-bye.

 

[RebeccaJ]

@Socrates4Jesus

Thanks! I hope everybody here can recognise that I’m not trying to attack them in any way, but I’m not all that concerned if I get a few confrontational remarks, it will take more than that to offend me.

As far as Socrates himself was concerned, sure rationality may very well have been with him. I seem to recall that the quote “all i know is that I know nothing” was from Socrates too though! However, regardless of his measure of rationality, what Socrates certainly didn’t have was the same wealth of information that we do today. It really would only be speculation on both of our parts to decide what any famous respected historical figure may have believed in regards to God if they had access to the same tools and information that we do today, as well as less pressure from society to believe, or at least profess belief, in a God.

Interesting question you raise… I’m not sure it’s answers I’m looking for per se, but evidence. But answers… there’s just too many really. Hmmmm… I don’t think any one question is really the most major one that would make up my mind…How about this one… how can we distinguish an entity that we can’t see, smell, hear, taste or touch or have any evidence of from an entity that does not exist?

Sorry if that’s not really the kind of question you were looking for?

Hi phooney. I was an atheist for many years and went on that search for God myself. It was difficult, I have to say.

One thing to point out to you though. The NT is a compilation of the writings of multiple authors, the Apostles of Christ. They wrote what was taught to them by Christ. We have no writings from Christ himself, and only once is it ever mentioned in the NT that he wrote anything, and that was in the dirt!

Socrates is similar. We have no writings of his, only the writings of the people that were taught by him. The most well known is of course Plato.

When looking at Christianity, it is good to realize that there is a oral tradition that goes with the writings. The same for Judaism.

Back to God. It is not an easy path to go from atheism to theism. Atheism, in the most common form, rationalism, removes the possibility that faith is rational. In order to find God, you need to discover how faith and reason are not at odds, but rather two things that work together, in balance. Faith without reason leads to things like suicide bombing. Reason without faith leads to things like atheism. No, I am not saying that atheists and suicide bombers are the same thing. lol. I am saying they are at opposite ends of the spectrum.

As for scripture, scripture definitely requires translation. That is where tradition comes in. Every question I have raised about any particular passage has an answer, in Christian tradition. More importantly from my POV, in the oldest Christian tradition, Catholicism.

You got me curious about the wise men from the East. I recommend reading about the Magi at the old (90 yrs) Catholic Encyclopedia. The short answer to your question is that the magi were from the East. No where in the NT narratives does it say exactly when they searched and found Jesus. It isn’t like you are thinking, in pop culture, where 3 guys saw a star a followed it like a beacon to the manger.

The Catholic Encyclopedia is a good source. I spent uncounted hours reading there. It is not the authority for Catholic doctrine, that would be the Catholic Catechism.

 

[grandfather]

@grandfather

What is the soul?

It is your life force. It animates your body.<<<

 

[RebeccaJ]

@Charlie Zeaiter

Let me get this straight, you’re taking prophecies from the bible, showing that the fulfillment of those prophecies in the bible, and taking that as proof FOR the events in the bible? It would be more compelling if the people who wrote the NT weren’t actually aware of any of the ‘prophecies’ of the OT when they wrote it wouldn’t it? It would even be nice if the writers were contemporary to when Jesus is supposed to have lived. But they did, and they weren’t.

A double blind test is what you’re after eh?

How about, the people who believed that Christ was a fulfillment of prophesy wouldn’t have known he was the fulfillment of the prophecy if they weren’t aware of the prophecies!

Let’s see you prove the theory of evolution without knowing that the theory of evolutions exists.

 

[RebeccaJ]

@Socrates4Jesus

How about this one… how can we distinguish an entity that we can’t see, smell, hear, taste or touch or have any evidence of from an entity that does not exist?/quote]

Ok, here’s the deal. You can’t see, hear, smell, taste or touch a lot of things. Humans are very limited in our perception. Even the instruments we use, to see things that aren’t readily visible to our eyes, are geared towards our limited senses.

Do you really only believe in what your very limited senses “prove” to you? What does love prove to you? You can’t touch, see, hear, smell or taste love?

God is Love. The evidence is all around you, in your very existence.

 

[grandfather]

Do you really only believe in what your very limited senses “prove” to you? What does love prove to you? You can’t touch, see, hear, smell or taste love?

God is Love. The evidence is all around you, in your very existence.

Love is indeed a spiritual reality. It can not be measured or weighed, held in one’s hand. It is not a physical reality. If it exists and is not material then it is spiritual. But some people have no love. How does one prove to such a person that love exists if he has never experienced it or has no awareness of it?

There is a difference between faith and religious faith. Everyone lives by faith. When we get sick we go to doctors who know more about health matters than we do. They are accepted authorities. We do what they tell us based on the fact that we believe they have expertise we lack. We don’t know what is wrong, how we got sick or the remedy. We take medicine not knowing how or why it works. This is faith. We trust in another’s abilities that we lack. It is reasonable to do this. When we are trying to find our way to a location we ask instructions at a gas station. We believe the directions we are given and go on our way. This is faith. We put our selves in the hands of experts or people who we believe are experts all the time, lawyers, airline pilots, etc. It is reasonable to do so. We have evidence of their ability. We get on planes we can not fly that are flown by people we have never met. Why do we trust they know what they are doing? They are hired by the airline. Why do we trust the airline? We don’t know the people their either. The government sets qualification standards and licenses the airlines and pilots. We never met those officials either. We believe the pilot will get us safely where we want to go based on the testimony of people we never met. We have no personal evidence based on our own investigation that the pilot has ever flown a plane before. We have faith that he knows what he is doing based on the testimony of others. We read news reports of events we have not personally seen of places we have never been. In courtrooms evidence is weighed in an attempt to figure out what took place, who did what, who is at fault, etc. Evidence is presented and it is always the testimony of others who saw things or expert witnesses who know things we do not know. We rely on witnesses and experts to come to conclusions.

This is not religious faith, but in a way it is similar. Religious faith is also relying on the testimony of others. Is that a reasonable thing to do? We all do it every day. Very many people report having spiritual experiences. There are visions, miracles of many different kinds, prophecies, and so on. It is unreasonable to dismiss them all, because we have not personally experienced them.

 

[Socrates4Jesus]

@Socrates4Jesus… Interesting question you raise. I’m not sure it’s answers I’m looking for per se, but evidence. But answers. there’s just too many really. Hmmmm. I don’t think any one question is really the most major one that would make up my mind. How about this one. how can we distinguish an entity that we can’t see, smell, hear, taste or touch or have any evidence of from an entity that does not exist?

Sorry if that’s not really the kind of question you were looking for?

Extremely good question, Phooney!

There’s a story about a famous Christian speaker who said to an audience, “I know God exists; I spoke to him today.” Someone in the audience then leaned over to his friend and said quietly, “Yes, but did God speak back!”

If one were to present sound, objective evidence that God does speak back, would you be interested in examining this proof of his or her or its existence?