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The reason that animals do not love is because they do not posess a soul. They do not understand right from wrong. The have no conscience. They are animals because they only know one need. That need is to survive. Humans can not only survive. They have need, emotions. That all comes from a inner being. THat is your soul.
Get a dog.
 
Love is a emotion that comes from God. Depression comes from the Devil. If you are depressed you have to find the need in you that is missing. That need is God and Love. If you have alot of God in you, you have less depression in you. THe more depression the less of the presense of God. It is quite simple!
How do you know this?
 
Annabea, you said in your posting that love is not God; love is an emotion.

Love is so much more than an emotion. Love is something that we express with our will and effect by our actions.

Jesus showed his love for all, in that while we were yet sinners, he gave up his life to save us. This was an act of will for the good of those who rejected him then, and reject him now by refusing to believe in him and obey his way. I do not know you, and therefore do not “feel” about you one way or the other. But at the same time I can show love for you if I meet you by doing things that are good for you; if I do not meet you, then I can show love for you by praying that one day you take Jesus into your heart.

When you said that love is not God, had you forgotten the words of the hymn which state:
“God is love”

You say we cannot know the truth. Jesus said “I will tell you the truth”. He also said “I am the truth”. Think about what that means - the Truth comes from God, not man. Jesus is the truth. Listen to him.
Would you guys please stop trying to prove me wrong by saying that “jesus died for us and…” Your not proving anything.
 
If you can tell me how we “detect” something without using our senses, sure. You are getting hung up on semantics.
I’m not hung up on semantics. I am trying to get you to nail down specific language that we can evaluate. Right now it’s too informal, too loose for the question at issue.

Let me know if this summarizes your position: At some point in the process of detection, we must use our senses. Instruments (i.e. a baby monitor receiver) may be required to help us detect some things by conversion, amplification, etc., but ultimately detection requires using our senses.

In reduced form, do you agree to the following?

In order to detect something, we must use our senses.
 
LOVE IS NOT GOD! Love is an emotion! Just a very strong one. Depression is an emotion, it is very strong. You are proving nothing with love. Love is a reaction to something we see or feel. Is god a reaction!!! Sorry, I’m on the edge of the plank right now, give me some time to cool off.
If you are so sure, why are you so angry? Love is not a reaction. Love is a source, not the product of a source. You have to first feel love to react to it, not the other way around.

I’m proving that it frustrates those who cannot explain it without faith.
 
If you are so sure, why are you so angry? Love is not a reaction. Love is a source, not the product of a source. You have to first feel love to react to it, not the other way around.

I’m proving that it frustrates those who cannot explain it without faith.
No, it frustrates me that you are saying over and over again that love is god when you cannot prove it. Ignorance drives me crazy.
Here we are sitting here arguing about something that will never be proved, sigh.
Love is the source of what? Love is the outcome of something you like dearly, is god an outcome? (There, maybe that was worded better).
 
I’m not hung up on semantics. I am trying to get you to nail down specific language that we can evaluate. Right now it’s too informal, too loose for the question at issue.

Let me know if this summarizes your position: At some point in the process of detection, we must use our senses. Instruments (i.e. a baby monitor receiver) may be required to help us detect some things by conversion, amplification, etc., but ultimately detection requires using our senses.

In reduced form, do you agree to the following?

In order to detect something, we must use our senses.
Yes, you are right.

Here is my position: Love cannot be physically defined, detected or measured. Is there any other instance in existance where something is produced that cannot be measured or detected which we believe exists in spite of that fact? No, you know radio waves exists because we detect them, right? How do you know love exists? You don’t. You are using a double standard. You are choosing what you’ll believe and what you won’t, the same as me. You are not basing that belief on proof, you are basing it on whether it seems rational. Well, God doesn’t seem rational to you. He does to me because if I use all the information available to me, I can come to the conclusion that God exists. Zeus and Ra have a VERY weak position in history compared to God so I use my rationale to discern that God is real and they are not. You CHOOSE to use the same information to discern that God is not real.

It really has nothing to do with proof, detectible or not. It’s what you choose to believe because it makes sense to you. This claim that Christians can’t proove God exists is so weak it’s pathetic because we as humans don’t hold other beliefs to that standard.

My point is simple and I’ve said it time and time again. You claim the theory you base your beliefs on is “if it can’t be proven, it doesn’t exist” (agnostic by definition by the way). Well, to this moment, you’ve failed to produce proof of love and yet you believe in it. So you’ll have to change your basis for denying God. You’ll have to deny God on other grounds. You cannot show me love in the form of matter any more than I can show you God in the form of matter.

I’m pretty sure we’re at an empass because you will never admit that your basis for atheism/agnositicism whatever you choose to call it, is flawed.
 
No, it frustrates me that you are saying over and over again that love is god when you cannot prove it. Ignorance drives me crazy.
Here we are sitting here arguing about something that will never be proved, sigh.
Love is the source of what? Love is the outcome of something you like dearly, is god an outcome? (There, maybe that was worded better).
I am not ignorant, thank you. I could say that you are disrespectful, but that would be an opinion, not fact.

Are you trying to tell me the source of the way you treat your friends and family is not love (or disdain)? Are you actually saying you treat someone a certain way and then after a time you start to develop the feelings that caused you to treat them that way? That’s rediculous. Maybe you’ll want to take a different position on that one.

Love always comes first. It is the source of “like”. It is the source of every single good thing on earth. Even atheists believe in a source of good and bad from whence everything else comes.

And YES God IS an outcome. He is the Alpha AND the Omega. You cannot have love without God and you cannot have God without love. Not possible. How redundant can I be? The fact that you choose not to believe that is not my consern.

God’s existance doesn’t depend on your belief in the concept. Sorry.
 
By the way annabea, your OP (posted below for your convenience) says nothing about proof. Apparently, you weren’t completely honest about wanting to know what others believe…that’s called trolling. What you really want is an argument in which you can call others ignorant who don’t believe the same way you do and act frustrated when they don’t agree with you.

Why would you torture yourself like that? If it’s knowlege of the Christian faith you want, read. It seems that you and other so-called atheists on here are the ones doing the spitting on people’s shoes (and beliefs).

Don’t pretend to be curious to start an argument so that you can assert your own beliefs against those of others. k, thanks.

"Hello. I am an atheist. Now before you start spitting on my shoes I would like to know a little about what you believe? Belief usually varies from person to person that is why I did not post this in the admin/mod answer question thingy. I would like to know what you think about religion, how you think it is effecting the world, and why you believe what you do.
Thanks!
~Annabea"


*edit: I really didn’t believe you were 12 till you threw the little hissy fit. *
 
Annabea, you said in your posting that love is not God; love is an emotion.

Love is so much more than an emotion. Love is something that we express with our will and effect by our actions.

Jesus showed his love for all, in that while we were yet sinners, he gave up his life to save us. This was an act of will for the good of those who rejected him then, and reject him now by refusing to believe in him and obey his way. I do not know you, and therefore do not “feel” about you one way or the other. But at the same time I can show love for you if I meet you by doing things that are good for you; if I do not meet you, then I can show love for you by praying that one day you take Jesus into your heart.

When you said that love is not God, had you forgotten the words of the hymn which state:
“God is love”

You say we cannot know the truth. Jesus said “I will tell you the truth”. He also said “I am the truth”. Think about what that means - the Truth comes from God, not man. Jesus is the truth. Listen to him.
Amen. Thank you for coming here and putting this back into perspective. Sometimes we get hung up on the intellect and forget.

Peace Be With You libbybeth and thank you for being here today.

HC
 
I am not ignorant, thank you. I could say that you are disrespectful, but that would be an opinion, not fact.

Are you trying to tell me the source of the way you treat your friends and family is not love (or disdain)? Are you actually saying you treat someone a certain way and then after a time you start to develop the feelings that caused you to treat them that way? That’s rediculous. Maybe you’ll want to take a different position on that one.

Love always comes first. It is the source of “like”. It is the source of every single good thing on earth. Even atheists believe in a source of good and bad from whence everything else comes.

And YES God IS an outcome. He is the Alpha AND the Omega. You cannot have love without God and you cannot have God without love. Not possible. How redundant can I be? The fact that you choose not to believe that is not my consern.

God’s existance doesn’t depend on your belief in the concept. Sorry.
You do not love someone immediately. Its what they do, how they act, they way they are that causes you to love them.
Atheists simply believe that there is no god. Anything else we have in common is not a trait of atheism, it is coincidence.
 
By the way annabea, your OP (posted below for your convenience) says nothing about proof. Apparently, you weren’t completely honest about wanting to know what others believe…that’s called trolling. What you really want is an argument in which you can call others ignorant who don’t believe the same way you do and act frustrated when they don’t agree with you.

Why would you torture yourself like that? If it’s knowlege of the Christian faith you want, read. It seems that you and other so-called atheists on here are the ones doing the spitting on people’s shoes (and beliefs).

Don’t pretend to be curious to start an argument so that you can assert your own beliefs against those of others. k, thanks.

"Hello. I am an atheist. Now before you start spitting on my shoes I would like to know a little about what you believe? Belief usually varies from person to person that is why I did not post this in the admin/mod answer question thingy. I would like to know what you think about religion, how you think it is effecting the world, and why you believe what you do.
Thanks!
~Annabea"


*edit: I really didn’t believe you were 12 till you threw the little hissy fit. *
I was interested, until I actually heard that you were just like the rest of the christians, I was hoping to find something a little different. I didn’t. You guys were there, arguing with me. Its both or our faults we are where we are. I learn better by someone teaching me, instead reading out of a text book. I’m not making you come here, or making you argue. If you would like to leave, thats fine. I’m ready to quit, I’m tiring of this thread.

I’m also talking to a lot of people through PMing. I find it easier. I’m learning more from them than I am here, I am not arguing there, simply asking questions about their faith.
 
Yes, you are right.

Here is my position: Love cannot be physically defined, detected or measured.
Bingo. Your challenge was for atheists to prove *your *position, not ours. We have no meaningful doubt that we *physically *detect love. We don’t need scientific instruments. We know we feel it. We do not claim that the experience of love is transcendental.
Is there any other instance in existance where something is produced that cannot be measured or detected which we believe exists in spite of that fact?
“We believe” is far too broad, too sweeping. Naturalists (previously called materialists) do not believe love meets this criterion, so asking if there is another example is a fallacy of complex question. For naturalists, there are no examples.
No, you know radio waves exists because we detect them, right? How do you know love exists?
I detect it. When my kids come home from school, I detect it. I do not need assume supernatural origins for it.
You are not basing that belief on proof, you are basing it on whether it seems rational.
Proof of anything outside of mathematics is a matter of how confident we are of something – that’s the problem of induction philosophers have struggled with for ages. Whether something is rational goes a long way toward how confident we are about it.
Well, God doesn’t seem rational to you.
It’s not *God *I find irrational, it’s most of the arguments provided for the *belief *in God I find irrational. God may well exist, but most of the arguments attempting to lend support to his existence are irrational.
Zeus and Ra have a VERY weak position in history compared to God so I use my rationale to discern that God is real and they are not.
Brahman has a strong position in history.
You CHOOSE to use the same information to discern that God is not real.
How do you assert that we are using the same information?
It really has nothing to do with proof, detectible or not.
Yes, it has a lot to do with it. Detection, for all practical purposes, proves existence.
It’s what you choose to believe because it makes sense to you.
No, it is what I choose *not *to believe because it is *not *reasonably proven.
This claim that Christians can’t proove God exists is so weak it’s pathetic because we as humans don’t hold other beliefs to that standard.
Sure you do – all the time. I’ll trade you your house for my current bank account balance. My balance is currently five billion dollars.

What? You want reasonable proof that my account balance is five billion dollars? I find that offensive.

The standard is reasonable proof, not absolute. Absolute proof exists in mathematics.
My point is simple and I’ve said it time and time again. You claim the theory you base your beliefs on is “if it can’t be proven, it doesn’t exist” (agnostic by definition by the way).
No, your definition is wrong.
Well, to this moment, you’ve failed to produce proof of love and yet you believe in it.
Proof is dependent of many things. Arguing from incompatible starting assumptions won’t get us too far – so proof is dependent on who is evaluating whether it’s been proven.
So you’ll have to change your basis for denying God. You’ll have to deny God on other grounds.
I don’t deny God. Lack of belief does not mean denial.
You cannot show me love in the form of matter any more than I can show you God in the form of matter.
I would say it’s more accurate that I reject your assumptions about love as unwarranted and that the proof you want is contradicted by your definition of it, so there is no point.
I’m pretty sure we’re at an empass because you will never admit that your basis for atheism/agnositicism whatever you choose to call it, is flawed.
The basis is a tentative rejection of things that are not reasonably proven. That keeps the lid firmly closed on Pandora’s box.
 
Actually, I thought it was frightening that a well educated Roman Catholic would not know or be in denial about this part of Church history. I used the word “funny” more in the sense of “I don’t get this; how can it be?”
It is a difference in how we understand Church. Catholics understand Church to be the Body of Christ, which has Jesus as the Head, and the Holy Spirit as the Soul. Due to these divine elements, the chuch cannot err, or sin.

Sinful men, sometimes in positions of authority in the church, can, and have, departed from the Teaching of Jesus and committed atrocities. Blaming Christ (the Church) for the actions of sinful men is like blaming Jesus for the betrayal of Judas. The forsaking of His Divine Teaching does not invalidate what Jesus has taught. It only demonstrates that it is possible to fall from grace, commit sins, and separate oneself from Christ.
So the rules are: It is not enough that unjust killings ordered by RCC leaders are recorded in history, but the events also have to be documented with specific endorsements by the church? Whatever - we can work with your limitations for now.

1209 – Innocent III orders the Albigensian Crusade using armies of French noblemen offered land and booty, and a promise of heaven to any killed crusaders. Unlike the six bloody Crusades in the Holy Land ordered by various Popes, this Crusade was in Southern France. The Cathars were at peace, and their doom was not accepting Church dogmas and growing in numbers. Between the two crusades against them and the brutal inquisition that followed including burning remaining Cathars alive until the 14th century, somewhere between 200,000 and 1,000,000 people were massacred.

1452 & 1455 – Nicholas V’s Papal Bulls Dum Diversas and Romanus Pontifex sanctifies Spain and Portugal to seize land held by Northern African Muslims, pagans, and other “enemies of Christ” anywhere in the world. It also gives permission to enslave the people in the seized lands in perpetuity. These Bulls were elaborated on and expanded with more Bulls, such as the following:

1493 – Pope Alexander VI issues Papal Bull Inter Caetera demanding that the “barbarous nations” of South America be overthrown and brought to the faith.
You are confusing the actions of leaders in the Church with the Teaching and Doctrine of the Church. Men make mistakes, God does not. The Divine and infallible teaching is not nullified because people commit atrocities. Neither do these atrocities invalidate the Teaching of Christ in the Church.
 
Hm, alright. I wonder though, what the difference is between survival of the fittest and natural selection?

Because this life is the only one we have, it is so immensively precious. I know that I cherish this spark of life that I’ve been lucky enough to get, and most others also probably do, so I would never consider taking it away from them. I look at others, and when I see them in a situation I know would suck to be in, I try to help them out of it so they also can enjoy this tiny little spark of life we have.

You forget you were raised Christian in a more or less Christian society. So my next question is, how much of what you term morality is derived exclusively from atheism or rather your being atheist.

Emotions like morality and empathy are also things that are hard-wired into our brains through natural selection - it is not something which has to come from a god.

If it’s hard wired into our brains, then why do people (quite a few actually) do bad things? Are we hard-wired to be bad too?

This is again something gained through natural selection. The species who do not care about reproduction, does not reproduce, and thus their genes won’t move on. The species who do care about reproduction, reproduce, and their reproduction-friendly genes carry on until all/most are reproduction-friendly.

I thought reproduction was an instinctual thing rather than something based on emotion, i.e., “who do not care about reproduction”. Do they really have a choice is what I’m saying? No free will, remember.

When I realise that my time is nearing it’s end, and I have something I can leave for those who still have a lot of time to enjoy life, I will of course give it to them. Again, natural selection. Those given these things by their parents/grandparents have a bigger chance of survival, and thus the “generous” genes have more chance of multiplying.

So everything we are has a biological basis to it? Stupidity, hate, greed, racism, this has nothing to do with sociological factors. How much of what we are is nature rather than nurture.

Love cannot be detected right now, just like radio waves could not be detected 500 years ago. This does not mean love will never be detected.

Well, if your going to use this argument, then, “God cannot be detected right now, just like radio waves could not be detected 500 years ago. This does not mean God will never be detected.”

How does the current undetectability of love prove Yahwe, and why are you so hung up in the definitions of agnosticism and atheism? What are your definitions of the two terms, so we can clear that up?
Because love is not a “how” but a “who”? I have reason to believe this because of the God/Man known as Jesus Christ who defined for us what love is?
 
It is a difference in how we understand Church. Catholics understand Church to be the Body of Christ, which has Jesus as the Head, and the Holy Spirit as the Soul. Due to these divine elements, the chuch cannot err, or sin.
The same situation applies to Secular Humanists. The Secular Humanism Declaration calls for the defense of human rights, and many other good and noble things.

Violate the good and noble things, and you’re acting on your own – you’re not acting as a Secular Humanist.

Same goes for any many religions, companies, governments, political parties, you name it.

I won’t allow that defense for any group that obtains power over others. History shows us it is dangerous.
Sinful men, sometimes in positions of authority in the church, can, and have, departed from the Teaching of Jesus and committed atrocities.
How do you know they were departing from the teaching of Jesus? The leadership of the Church was evidently very convinced for centuries that they were correct. Now it seems we think they were wrong. Why is that? How do we know?
 
The same situation applies to Secular Humanists. The Secular Humanism Declaration calls for the defense of human rights, and many other good and noble things.

Violate the good and noble things, and you’re acting on your own – you’re not acting as a Secular Humanist.

Same goes for any many religions, companies, governments, political parties, you name it.

I won’t allow that defense for any group that obtains power over others. History shows us it is dangerous.

How do you know they were departing from the teaching of Jesus? The leadership of the Church was evidently very convinced for centuries that they were correct. Now it seems we think they were wrong. Why is that? How do we know?
What is the universal moral code of a secular humanist?
 
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