"Religulous".....comments? (ducks and covers)

Posted by: winkyincanada on 09 October 2008

Just saw this . Loved it, and thought it an important movie. I have never laughed so hard out loud in a movie, yet thought that message is as important as can be. However, I think that perhaps it was (dare I say it) "preaching to the (non-)converted".

Any comments?

Disclaimer - I'm a confirmed atheist/(agnostic?) in the Dawkins-style.

Posted on: 20 October 2008 by Don Atkinson

quote:
some cases. But there are also people who state very clearly that it is their faith that compels then to commit (or at least justifies it) what society generally regards as atrocities. We shouldn't ignore this.

Many of us confirm that religion is not above the law. Of course, this presumes that the law is just and reasonable.

And most of us can identify nut-cases a mile away.

Cheers

Don

Posted on: 20 October 2008 by Andrew Randle

quote:
Originally posted by Consciousmess:
With regard to the holy books, I want to close illustrating the sheer irrationality of the concept of God that has been espoused over the years. It is claimed that God is omnipotent, omniscient and omnibenevolent.

That therefore means that God knows a man will perish in hell for eternity before that man is even conceived. It also suggests that if God has omnisicience or is ALL KNOWING, then there is no such thing as free will for mankind.

Well, Christianity views God as operating outside of the borders of time and is aware of the final outcomes.

quote:

On top of this, if you are omnipotent you can do ANYTHING you want INSTANTLY. For there to be a purpose for anything to be done there has to be unfulfiulled desires and goals otherwise there is no purpose in doing it.

God can do anything except break his own code and character, and become "unGod". Purpose can also be the purpose of "being" and experiencing in the now.

quote:

This God being omnipotent, omniscient therefore does not have a purpose to create the universe as by definition he has no unfulfilled desires and goals.

God's purpose is fulfilled, yes.

quote:

I think the presence of natural disasters and innocent children suffering in the world indicates suffering; an omnibenevolent deity who CREATED EVERYTHING therefore cannot exist.

Natural disasters and man-made disasters are two separate issues. Sooner or later we all die, God made us and he has the right to finish us. In an imperfect, constrained and consequential world it is impossible for God to intervene in a way without negatively affect future history. In the end, life is not about our desires being serviced by material justice but about spiritual attitude and love (to add a bit more to the picture, 1 John 4:8 states that "God is love")

Andrew

Posted on: 20 October 2008 by winkyincanada

The philosophy of irrational faith doesn't interest me. It is the outcome that I am concerned with. When a group of people hold an irrational belief, and that belief justifies (in their minds) actions that threaten the beautiful world we live in (holy wars, terrorism, unfettered population growth, discrimination and hatred), then I think those beliefs must be challenged. The "but-it-offends-me-for-you-to-challenge-my-faith" defence just doesn't cut it with me. Lets face it - if only one person truly believed in virgin birth, we'd have them referred to a doctor, or at least laugh politely. Because billions do, we now should "respect" this?

Posted on: 20 October 2008 by Onthlam

quote:
Originally posted by 555:
Some people turn to religion when they have a problem.
I prefer to use google.

LOL!!!

Hello, and welcome to the Psychiatric Hotline. If you are obsessive-compulsive, please press 1 repeatedly. If you are co-dependent, please ask someone to press 2. If you have multiple personalities, please press 3, 4, 5 and 6. If you are paranoid-delusional...

Posted on: 21 October 2008 by Andrew Randle

quote:
Originally posted by winkyincanada:
The philosophy of irrational faith doesn't interest me. It is the outcome that I am concerned with. When a group of people hold an irrational belief, and that belief justifies (in their minds) actions that threaten the beautiful world we live in (holy wars, terrorism, unfettered population growth, discrimination and hatred), then I think those beliefs must be challenged. The "but-it-offends-me-for-you-to-challenge-my-faith" defence just doesn't cut it with me. Lets face it - if only one person truly believed in virgin birth, we'd have them referred to a doctor, or at least laugh politely. Because billions do, we now should "respect" this?

Interestingly a virgin birth is small fish when compared with the existence of a universe that really shouldn't be there - and has no business being there.

Is it faith or the world that is the root of the irrationality and intolerance you mention?

Andrew Randle

Posted on: 21 October 2008 by Don Atkinson

quote:
(holy wars, terrorism, unfettered population growth, discrimination and hatred),

Andrew, tell us that you are NOT defending ANY of these actions.

I don't believe that ANYBODY in our local Methodist, URC or CofE churches would even attempt to defend any one of them. They would condem all of them as vigorously as Winky.

Cheers

Don

Posted on: 21 October 2008 by Andrew Randle

err Don, since where did I defend holy wars, terrorism, unfettered population growth, discrimination and hatred etc.etc. ?

For starters, an *unbiased* reading of the Bible does not advocate any of these.

Secondly, the above atrocities stem from self-interest/hidden agendas, poor contextual knowledge of the subject or plain personality problems (as I mentioned in a previous post).

If there was no religion, these people would pin their excuses to something else they can distort - e.g. politics, philosophy, extreme logic, etc.

Andrew Randle

Posted on: 21 October 2008 by Don Atkinson

quote:
err Don, since where did I defend holy wars, terrorism, unfettered population growth, discrimination and hatred etc.etc. ?

You didn't. But you used the above quote without comment, in the context of a reply. I was simply seeking clarity.

You haven't actually been specific but, unless you state otherwise, I will assume that you do not defend any of those actions.

cheers

Don

Posted on: 21 October 2008 by 555

Posted on: 21 October 2008 by Consciousmess

____________________________________

The more moderate believers say that the books aren't to be taken literally, but that they are still useful as a moral compass telling them how to act and live their lives. The question is, how do they then know which bits of the books to take literally and obey such as love thy neighbour, and which bits to ignore such as kill a daughter who tells you she is leaving the church - (the bible literally instructs people to do this)? The answer is that the morality that guides the choices for moderates is humanistic and societal, and not intrinsic in the scriptures.

Therefore, not only do we not need the scriptures to tell us what to do, but dangerously, the scriptures allow moral justification of abhorrent acts by fundamentalists and extremists.
_____________________________________________

[I]I second this Winky!!I]

To all believers whose posts I have just read,

I must say that I respect you having your beliefs, but must hasten to add that all the holy books are full of contradictions and self-verifications; the Qur'an is plagerised from the old testament of the bible and you are forgetting how unreliable this evidence is and how ethnocentric the original writing was.

I want to recommend the DVD "The God who wasn't there" and I suggest you look this up and watch, because this presents the case that Jesus didn't even exist and that he was almost an amalgamation of all the famous Greek myths.

I probably don't need to say this as you probably already know, but pen was put to paper many years after this 'Jesus' had allegedly died.

If you consider the Egyptians and the time they were around, there is no congruence with biblical stories.

Move on from the bible, totally. Parts are cherry-picked to fit in with modern interpretation and as Prof. Hector Avalos in End of Biblical Studies explains, all scholars who have studied the bible have done so with an agenda to gloss over parts of the text that are offensive to modern sensibilities.

All the translations of the bible as you know it have and continue to be influenced by religiously motivated agendas despite their claims not to be. There have been many flawed techniques that have been aimed at maintaining the illusion that the bible is relevant in today's world.

Kind regards,

Jon

PS It is worth while reading the literature I refer to and watching the DVD.

Posted on: 21 October 2008 by winkyincanada

quote:
Originally posted by Andrew Randle:
quote:
Originally posted by winkyincanada:
The philosophy of irrational faith doesn't interest me. It is the outcome that I am concerned with. When a group of people hold an irrational belief, and that belief justifies (in their minds) actions that threaten the beautiful world we live in (holy wars, terrorism, unfettered population growth, discrimination and hatred), then I think those beliefs must be challenged. The "but-it-offends-me-for-you-to-challenge-my-faith" defence just doesn't cut it with me. Lets face it - if only one person truly believed in virgin birth, we'd have them referred to a doctor, or at least laugh politely. Because billions do, we now should "respect" this?

Interestingly a virgin birth is small fish when compared with the existence of a universe that really shouldn't be there - and has no business being there.

Is it faith or the world that is the root of the irrationality and intolerance you mention?

Andrew Randle

I agree that there would be irrationality and intolerance in spades, even if there was no faith and religion. The combination of faith and intolerance (as preached in the "holy books") is especially dangerous however, as it allows people to defer their personal moral responsibility to a "higher power".

We don't understand the origin of the universe or existence itself. Maybe we never will. Get over it. I don't feel the need to make stuff up to fill the gap. Some do feel the need and that's fine, but I'm especially wary of making stuff up that allows people to justify doing bad things to each other and to the world. This is a necessary component of successful organised religions. They are not naturally stable, but must "fight" for their ongoing existence by way of brainwashing (especially the very young and vulnerable), profligate breeding, marketing and often actual fighting.

Posted on: 21 October 2008 by djftw

Jon,

If you respect those believers who have posted here, then I think attacking their beliefs is a curious way of showing it.

Funnily enough I have just returned from Cambridge where I attended evensong at Gonville and Caius (where my sister is a Choral Scholar), and interestingly the sermon was given by a Professor who was talking about the formation of the Old Testament, and indeed one of the first things he mentioned was a contradiction between the first and second chapter of Genesis about whether Animals or man were created first. He went on to explain that analyzing the texts clearly showed that most of the books of the Old Testament had multiple authors, and indeed often bits of the same story appear to be set centuries apart, or like you mention with the Egyptians certain events appear to be set at completely the wrong point in time. No one in the congregation showed any sign of shock or indignation at this. Most intelligent, educated Christians are fully aware that the Bible is at best an anthology of stories and wise sayings from many different written and oral traditions.

I find it rather entertaining that you seem to think that Christians are not aware of the origins of the Bible, many of them have a far better understanding of it than you do.

Regards,

Dom

Posted on: 21 October 2008 by Bruce Woodhouse

quote:
most intelligent, educated Christians are fully aware that the Bible is at best an anthology of stories and wise sayings from many different written and oral traditions.

I find it rather entertaining that you seem to think that Christians are not aware of the origins of the Bible, many of them have a far better understanding of it than you do.

Regards,

Dom

Woah! I love the 'at best' particularly. I really doubt that is going to get universal agreement, especially from JWM and others who write so intelligently on here about their faith.

Surely the Church Of Rome sees the bible as the inviolate word of god, and indeed the Pope as his messenger and mouthpiece? The Quran IS the word of Allah. End of story.

The entire precept of christian worship is not an academic discussion about the historical origin of the bible but it's acceptance as The Truth, The Word etc etc. If The Bible could be loosely interpreted as a few sayings and myths Christianity would be in ruins. Belief, in some ways essentially without logical questioning is surely the glue that binds together Christians, and indeed other religions.

..or did I get it wrong?

Bruce

(Most intelligent, educated atheists see the bible as an anthology of myths and sayings)

Posted on: 21 October 2008 by Andrew Randle

To Jon,

quote:
Originally posted by Consciousmess:
To all believers whose posts I have just read,

I must say that I respect you having your beliefs, but must hasten to add that all the holy books are full of contradictions and self-verifications; the Qur'an is plagerised from the old testament of the bible and you are forgetting how unreliable this evidence is and how ethnocentric the original writing was.

Actually the Old Testament is one of the most accurate and comprehensive historical documents from the time. The Qur'an, well... that's up for discussion another day - but let's just say that trying to rewrite one perfectly good religion with the words of an angel of unverified origin is very dangerous and liable to error.

quote:

I want to recommend the DVD "The God who wasn't there" and I suggest you look this up and watch, because this presents the case that Jesus didn't even exist and that he was almost an amalgamation of all the famous Greek myths.

Sounds like a DaVinci bandwagon exercise. Evidence of Jesus' existence is written by separate cross-corrobrated historians such as Josephus, Lucian, Tacitus and Luke (acknowledged as a historian by modern historians). His existence is not even disputed by the highest conservative Jewish order.

quote:

I probably don't need to say this as you probably already know, but pen was put to paper many years after this 'Jesus' had allegedly died.

...and the evidence still came from eye witnesses with a strong tradition in accurate retelling of events - cross-corroborated by four different authors.

quote:

If you consider the Egyptians and the time they were around, there is no congruence with biblical stories.

I believe there is recent archeological evidence states otherwise.

quote:

Move on from the bible, totally. Parts are cherry-picked to fit in with modern interpretation and as Prof. Hector Avalos in End of Biblical Studies explains, all scholars who have studied the bible have done so with an agenda to gloss over parts of the text that are offensive to modern sensibilities.

This is not specific enough for me to address at the moment

quote:

All the translations of the bible as you know it have and continue to be influenced by religiously motivated agendas despite their claims not to be. There have been many flawed techniques that have been aimed at maintaining the illusion that the bible is relevant in today's world.

Like? Sure there are translations nowadays that move away from ye olde worlde vernacular, making it very readable while continuing to be consistent.

Andrew Randle

Posted on: 21 October 2008 by Bruce Woodhouse

Andrew

Your post above seems to confirm what I suggested. Christainity views the Bible as rather more than Don suggested?

Bruce

Posted on: 21 October 2008 by Consciousmess

quote:
To Jon,

quote:
Originally posted by Consciousmess:
To all believers whose posts I have just read,

I must say that I respect you having your beliefs, but must hasten to add that all the holy books are full of contradictions and self-verifications; the Qur'an is plagerised from the old testament of the bible and you are forgetting how unreliable this evidence is and how ethnocentric the original writing was.

Actually the Old Testament is one of the most accurate and comprehensive historical documents from the time. The Qur'an, well... that's up for discussion another day - but let's just say that trying to rewrite one perfectly good religion with the words of an angel of unverified origin is very dangerous and liable to error.

quote:

I want to recommend the DVD "The God who wasn't there" and I suggest you look this up and watch, because this presents the case that Jesus didn't even exist and that he was almost an amalgamation of all the famous Greek myths.

Sounds like a DaVinci bandwagon exercise. Evidence of Jesus' existence is written by separate cross-corrobrated historians such as Josephus, Lucian, Tacitus and Luke (acknowledged as a historian by modern historians). His existence is not even disputed by the highest conservative Jewish order.

quote:

I probably don't need to say this as you probably already know, but pen was put to paper many years after this 'Jesus' had allegedly died.

...and the evidence still came from eye witnesses with a strong tradition in accurate retelling of events - cross-corroborated by four different authors.

quote:

If you consider the Egyptians and the time they were around, there is no congruence with biblical stories.

I believe there is recent archeological evidence states otherwise.

quote:

Move on from the bible, totally. Parts are cherry-picked to fit in with modern interpretation and as Prof. Hector Avalos in End of Biblical Studies explains, all scholars who have studied the bible have done so with an agenda to gloss over parts of the text that are offensive to modern sensibilities.

This is not specific enough for me to address at the moment

quote:

All the translations of the bible as you know it have and continue to be influenced by religiously motivated agendas despite their claims not to be. There have been many flawed techniques that have been aimed at maintaining the illusion that the bible is relevant in today's world.

Like? Sure there are translations nowadays that move away from ye olde worlde vernacular, making it very readable and consistent.

Andrew Randle

Andrew,

I have to retort to your last post, as I write with supporting evidence - not sheer testimony and anecdotal claims which your post concerns.

Without this becoming a verbal tennis of retort and rebuttal, I refer you to the following texts:

"The Closing of the Western Mind: The Rise of Faith and the Fall of Reason" Freeman (2003)

"The Portable Atheist: Essential Readings for the Non-Believer" Hitchens (2007)

"Atheism: The Case Against God" Smith (1989)

"God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything" Hitchens (2007)

"The End of Biblical Studies" Hector Avalos (2007)

Regards,

Jon

Posted on: 21 October 2008 by Don Atkinson

quote:
Christainity views the Bible as rather more than Don suggested?

Was this just a typo?

Cheers

Don

Posted on: 21 October 2008 by Andrew Randle

quote:
Originally posted by Consciousmess:
I have to retort to your last post, as I write with supporting evidence - not sheer testimony and anecdotal claims which your post concerns.

Without this becoming a verbal tennis of retort and rebuttal, I refer you to the following texts:

"The Closing of the Western Mind: The Rise of Faith and the Fall of Reason" Freeman (2003)

"The Portable Atheist: Essential Readings for the Non-Believer" Hitchens (2007)

"Atheism: The Case Against God" Smith (1989)

"God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything" Hitchens (2007)

"The End of Biblical Studies" Hector Avalos (2007)

Regards,

Jon

Hi Jon,

I have had a quick look at the Wikipedia summary of many of the chapters in "God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything" Hitchens (2007).

For me, the arguments are unconvincing and indicates that the author has a *superficial* interpretation & pronouncement of the Bible and religion - possibly for his own ends ($$$). At every point in the Wikipedia summary it wheels out the same old misconceptions about what Christianity is.

The truth is that every walk of life has a spectrum of people of different motives and understanding. Those who approach Christianity with pure and altruistic motives and an appetite for understanding the original spirit and purpose of the Bible will find its intended benefit.

If you wish me to find references, which ones would you like me to find? If it is the historical presence of Abraham's descendants in Egypt within the books of Genesis and Exodus then for starters have a look here: http://www.bibleandscience.com/archaeology/exodus.htm

Andrew Randle

Posted on: 21 October 2008 by djftw

quote:
Originally posted by Bruce Woodhouse:
Woah! I love the 'at best' particularly. I really doubt that is going to get universal agreement, especially from JWM and others who write so intelligently on here about their faith.

OK maybe 'at best' is overstating the case, but recognition that the stories in the bible were handed down through oral traditions doesn't necessarily detract from the wisdom of their content.

quote:

Surely the Church Of Rome sees the bible as the inviolate word of god, and indeed the Pope as his messenger and mouthpiece? The Quran IS the word of Allah. End of story.

The entire precept of christian worship is not an academic discussion about the historical origin of the bible but it's acceptance as The Truth, The Word etc etc. If The Bible could be loosely interpreted as a few sayings and myths Christianity would be in ruins. Belief, in some ways essentially without logical questioning is surely the glue that binds together Christians, and indeed other religions.

..or did I get it wrong?

Yes you did, the Roman Catholic Church does not maintain that the Bible is the literal word of God. You also appear to be confusing the Pope with the Archangel Gabriel, held in all the Abrahamic faiths to be the mouthpiece of God. You are broadly speaking right about the Qur'ran, most Muslims still believe it was dictated by... the Archangel Gabriel to the Prophet Mohammed (PBUH), although some Muslim academics and would be reformers differentiate between the parts of the Qur'ran dictated to Mohammed (PBUH) and those that are a historical account of the Prophet's life and the early Muslim community.

Regards,

Dom

Posted on: 21 October 2008 by Ewan Aye

From a purely scientific point of view I would have to say that gravitational forces on the universe in a material sense and a reason for living in a spiritual sense hold the key to it all. In which case, for me, it all points towards Sarah Beeney's breasts.

Posted on: 22 October 2008 by Frank Abela

Hi there again,

Sorry but I got caught in other things and forgot to look back at this thread.

Jon I have a few answers for you which you will undoubtedly kick into touch soon enough

. In an earlier post you made certain arguments about my definition of God, and so my retort:

quote:
This exemption from natural law therefore falls BEYOND the scope of human intellectual comprehension so the full nature of god is not merely unknown, but it is unknowable!!

I am ambivalent about this. In essence I think I disagree with this. There is much historical evidence to support the fact that just because something is beyond the scope of human intellectual comprehension, it is not unknowable. If that were the case, all human development would not have happened.

quote:
If a god is a natural being, if his actions can be explained in terms of normal causal relationships, then he would be a knowable creature – so, if god can be known, he cannot be supernatural. Without mystery and without some element of the incomprehensible, a being cannot be supernatural – and to believe and preach that a being is supernatural implies that this being is beyond human knowledge. Logically then, believers are therefore agnostics.

What is your view to that? Do you understand my logic?

My view is that, you're wrong, with respect of course, since you are much better read on the subject than I am!

You're being absolutist about knowing God, which you can't be because His ability is beyond our ken. There are many things we do not know the entire scope of or don't know the full nature of. We accept that we don't know their full nature and we investigate them in order to further our knowledge of them. If something were supernatural, it may be that we would be completely unaware of it, or that, if the being had the capacity, interest or involvement it may show us just a part of its scope in order not to overwhelm our (sorry, my) poor intellect.

You could argue therefore that if this were the case with God, that what has been revealed is a distortion of His true self, and that all that has been written of Him is distorted fact. I prefer not to think of Him that way, but I certainly would not expect to be able to understand his entire scope. That's a bit like a muscle cell knowing its purpose in life and that it exists as part of a whole and understanding the scope of the whole. It can't do so. Luckily I am not a muscle cell and I have faith!

(Here we go again.)

quote:
So this always comes back to agnosticism and the Christian God uses the terms: being omniscient, being omnipotent, and of course, being omnibenevolent.

These terms are positive characteristics in the sense that the believer says God has them rather than God does not have them (which would be negative characteristics).

Well, actually, my understanding - and feel free to correct me on this - is that God is never quoted as actually saying this. There are lots of places where these attributes are given to God in the Bible, but I am not aware that He actually says He's omnipotent, omniscient and omnibenevolent.

quote:
When a Christian says that God is alive, do they mean that God is alive in the same sense as natural organisms? If so, God must be a material entity who will eventually die.

Ok now excuse me but this is simply fatuous. As with all limitations of language, there has to be a contextual framework for a Christian to say such a thing, and in point of fact a Christian would be wrong to say such a thing: God is. Whether He's alive or not is beyond our ken, something to do with being supernatural...

quote:
When God is said to be wise or possess knowledge, is this the ‘conceptual’ knowledge with which humans are familiar?

No, it's how humans refer to Him in their limited capacity, which is quite a different thing.

quote:
If so, God is capable of error and can acquire his knowledge through mental effort. When God is said to have a certain power or capacity, is this power similar to the concept as we understand it? If so, God must be limited. When God is said to be loving, is this a love with which we are familiar? If so, God must have emotions with which to feel passion.

Once again, you are attempting to read into God by what humans say of Him. If they say God has a certain power, then they mean it from their own position in the world. Needless to say, if they say He has a certain powerthen this power is in the accepted sense of the word in our state. However, they can't actually know He has a power unless they've talked with Him, and even then since few of us have actually had dialogue with a supernatural being of any sort, it's difficult for others to know what the being actually meant. After all, Chinese Whispers is proof positive that it's difficult for us to understand each other let alone supernatural beings.

quote:
The reason why these questions are asked is because if the Christian wishes to use positive characteristics for God while retaining their meaning, he must reduce his god to a human level.

Err...no. God stays where He is thankyou! If I thought any less of you, Jon, would you be diminished? I don't think so. If hundreds of millions of people all over the world don't think of you (as, I'm afraid to tell you, they is the case), does this reduce you to nothing? No. Why should it be the case with God?

quote:
If, on the other hand, these characteristics do not mean the same when applied to god as they do when applied to natural entities, they assume some unknown meaning and are virtually emptied of their significance. God is pushed into agnosticism.

Absolutely not. Just because you don't know there's a bear in the woods doesn't mean the bear isn't there. (Oops, was that Sarah Palin?) You're trying to establish cause and effect on completely separate entities.

quote:
What are your views on the logic trail I'm crafting?

It's broken.

quote:
Please take these questions with respect, as I find this topic rivetting. With regard to the 'soul' I have lots to follow up on, but as this post I'm leaving here is so long, I'll write this in a future post!

Oh I have and it's great fun. I just hope you don't mind this response and accept it in the same vein.

quote:
To answer your question, 'what is love?' the best answer I can give is this. I have experienced true love with a partner on two separate occasions, so I know the subjective feeling of emotional closeness, trust, intimacy, the fact that I would die or kill for them; I remember once upon a time when I was with my first love, looking at her and feeling tears coming from my eyes because I loved her so much. I have experienced heart break from her and found love again 3 years after.

Putting the subjective qualia into words is what poets do, but I have to say that I categorically 'believe' that we are entirely material and the experience of love can be explained as the emergent property of our electro-chemical neurons.

OK, I am sad that you think love is merely a set of (unbalancing

) electro-chemical processes in the body, but I am glad you've found love again. And yet, what is this thing called love that it makes us act so irrationally? Which causes us to blindly go forward and tie ourselves to one being for our lives? Most importantly, how is it that the same electro-chemical processes don't take over after making the conquest for new, younger more attractive conquests? Why do married people freely have flings (that's the electro-chemical process at work) but find it impossible or very difficult to leave their marriage homes, even in cases where financial and material factors are not an issue? This is irrational behaviour which cannot be explained by science, don't you think?

If I get a chance and my head stops spinning, I'll try to respond to the Soul.

Posted on: 24 October 2008 by Consciousmess

quote:
Hi there again,

Sorry but I got caught in other things and forgot to look back at this thread.

Jon I have a few answers for you which you will undoubtedly kick into touch soon enough . In an earlier post you made certain arguments about my definition of God, and so my retort:

quote:
This exemption from natural law therefore falls BEYOND the scope of human intellectual comprehension so the full nature of god is not merely unknown, but it is unknowable!!

I am ambivalent about this. In essence I think I disagree with this. There is much historical evidence to support the fact that just because something is beyond the scope of human intellectual comprehension, it is not unknowable. If that were the case, all human development would not have happened.

quote:
If a god is a natural being, if his actions can be explained in terms of normal causal relationships, then he would be a knowable creature – so, if god can be known, he cannot be supernatural. Without mystery and without some element of the incomprehensible, a being cannot be supernatural – and to believe and preach that a being is supernatural implies that this being is beyond human knowledge. Logically then, believers are therefore agnostics.

What is your view to that? Do you understand my logic?

My view is that, you're wrong, with respect of course, since you are much better read on the subject than I am!

You're being absolutist about knowing God, which you can't be because His ability is beyond our ken. There are many things we do not know the entire scope of or don't know the full nature of. We accept that we don't know their full nature and we investigate them in order to further our knowledge of them. If something were supernatural, it may be that we would be completely unaware of it, or that, if the being had the capacity, interest or involvement it may show us just a part of its scope in order not to overwhelm our (sorry, my) poor intellect.

You could argue therefore that if this were the case with God, that what has been revealed is a distortion of His true self, and that all that has been written of Him is distorted fact. I prefer not to think of Him that way, but I certainly would not expect to be able to understand his entire scope. That's a bit like a muscle cell knowing its purpose in life and that it exists as part of a whole and understanding the scope of the whole. It can't do so. Luckily I am not a muscle cell and I have faith! (Here we go again.)

quote:
So this always comes back to agnosticism and the Christian God uses the terms: being omniscient, being omnipotent, and of course, being omnibenevolent.

These terms are positive characteristics in the sense that the believer says God has them rather than God does not have them (which would be negative characteristics).

Well, actually, my understanding - and feel free to correct me on this - is that God is never quoted as actually saying this. There are lots of places where these attributes are given to God in the Bible, but I am not aware that He actually says He's omnipotent, omniscient and omnibenevolent.

quote:
When a Christian says that God is alive, do they mean that God is alive in the same sense as natural organisms? If so, God must be a material entity who will eventually die.

Ok now excuse me but this is simply fatuous. As with all limitations of language, there has to be a contextual framework for a Christian to say such a thing, and in point of fact a Christian would be wrong to say such a thing: God is. Whether He's alive or not is beyond our ken, something to do with being supernatural...

quote:
When God is said to be wise or possess knowledge, is this the ‘conceptual’ knowledge with which humans are familiar?

No, it's how humans refer to Him in their limited capacity, which is quite a different thing.

quote:
If so, God is capable of error and can acquire his knowledge through mental effort. When God is said to have a certain power or capacity, is this power similar to the concept as we understand it? If so, God must be limited. When God is said to be loving, is this a love with which we are familiar? If so, God must have emotions with which to feel passion.

Once again, you are attempting to read into God by what humans say of Him. If they say God has a certain power, then they mean it from their own position in the world. Needless to say, if they say He has a certain powerthen this power is in the accepted sense of the word in our state. However, they can't actually know He has a power unless they've talked with Him, and even then since few of us have actually had dialogue with a supernatural being of any sort, it's difficult for others to know what the being actually meant. After all, Chinese Whispers is proof positive that it's difficult for us to understand each other let alone supernatural beings.

quote:
The reason why these questions are asked is because if the Christian wishes to use positive characteristics for God while retaining their meaning, he must reduce his god to a human level.

Err...no. God stays where He is thankyou! If I thought any less of you, Jon, would you be diminished? I don't think so. If hundreds of millions of people all over the world don't think of you (as, I'm afraid to tell you, they is the case), does this reduce you to nothing? No. Why should it be the case with God?

quote:
If, on the other hand, these characteristics do not mean the same when applied to god as they do when applied to natural entities, they assume some unknown meaning and are virtually emptied of their significance. God is pushed into agnosticism.

Absolutely not. Just because you don't know there's a bear in the woods doesn't mean the bear isn't there. (Oops, was that Sarah Palin?) You're trying to establish cause and effect on completely separate entities.

quote:
What are your views on the logic trail I'm crafting?

It's broken.

quote:
Please take these questions with respect, as I find this topic rivetting. With regard to the 'soul' I have lots to follow up on, but as this post I'm leaving here is so long, I'll write this in a future post!

Oh I have and it's great fun. I just hope you don't mind this response and accept it in the same vein.

quote:
To answer your question, 'what is love?' the best answer I can give is this. I have experienced true love with a partner on two separate occasions, so I know the subjective feeling of emotional closeness, trust, intimacy, the fact that I would die or kill for them; I remember once upon a time when I was with my first love, looking at her and feeling tears coming from my eyes because I loved her so much. I have experienced heart break from her and found love again 3 years after.

Putting the subjective qualia into words is what poets do, but I have to say that I categorically 'believe' that we are entirely material and the experience of love can be explained as the emergent property of our electro-chemical neurons.

OK, I am sad that you think love is merely a set of (unbalancing ) electro-chemical processes in the body, but I am glad you've found love again. And yet, what is this thing called love that it makes us act so irrationally? Which causes us to blindly go forward and tie ourselves to one being for our lives? Most importantly, how is it that the same electro-chemical processes don't take over after making the conquest for new, younger more attractive conquests? Why do married people freely have flings (that's the electro-chemical process at work) but find it impossible or very difficult to leave their marriage homes, even in cases where financial and material factors are not an issue? This is irrational behaviour which cannot be explained by science, don't you think?

If I get a chance and my head stops spinning, I'll try to respond to the Soul.

Regards,
Frank.

All opinions are my own and do not reflect the opinion of any organisations I work for, except where this is stated explicitly.

Frank,

I firstly have to thank you for your extended reply.

I must firstly say that there are two universes that could be postulated in this debate - one with a god and one without a god. They are substantially different as one had intelligence at the beginning and one had intelligence at the end. No doubt you can see which dichotomy is which, but the point I lead to here is that all valid credible scientific evidence supports the universe with intelligence at the end, i.e. US.

Now taking this back much further, the notion of a god as defined in the past has always included some aspect beyong human understanding otherwise god is just a mortal and material being. By saying this god possesses anything more than this is using adjectives that are UNIQUE in that they just apply to this god. Nothing else is like this god so the adjectives are just true for 'him' and therefore their meaning is washed away.

The classic christian god has been given characteristics of omnipotence, omniscience and omnibenevolence and I wrote about these characteristics in an earlier post. These characteristics have caused troubles for christians to explain for hundreds of years (see Smith, 1974 - Atheism: The case against god). I could list how contradictory they are and totally farcical in concept.

Omniscience means all knowing, so this deity knows a man will perish in hell for eternity before he is conceived; in fact, this deity knows the man will follow e.g. Mormonism before he is even conceived so why should the individual convert their belief to this. (I recently had a wonderful chat with two Mormons at my door, which I loved - I brought down 14 books and insisted they took down all the authors and book titles. It didnt work, but I expected that!)

Omnipotence and omniscience combined tells us that mankind can never ever have free will as there as this deity knows our future already and the universe was created just as he wanted, suffering and all.

Omnibenevolence is a joke in itself as innocent people are always suffering in the world. I know a girl who has just turned 12 and has 3 months to live as she has lung cancer and a brain tumour - totally innocent and her parents have really had their lives destroyed. It is so so illogical for there to be a god regardless of what arguments are made.

I also want to add something else on. I worked as a teacher in a residential school for children with autism for 4 years and this opened my eyes further to how preposterous a belief in god and an afterlife could be. With the right anatomical manipulations and electro-chemical tweaks any human brain could be autistic and this is therefore their soul and nothing else.

I cannot fathom any way the soul could be any different as would therefore not be them. There was a boy who was 18 and had cognition around a 3 year old, who was totally nonverbal and loved carrying textbooks with him everywhere. He would walk in circles in class continuously unless you redirected him and he would be so fixated on his task he'd not even recognise his parents when they visited from home. Absolutely nothing, and my job along with my team was educate and provide therapy.

Where is his soul? I had an intelligent colleague at the time who was a believer and said that we're all made up of a violin and a violin player, but I was totally pushing rocks uphill in talking to him as that is just playing with semantics.

Oh well, with respect,

Jon

Posted on: 24 October 2008 by JWM

quote:
Originally posted by 555:

Because I haven't the time or inclination to reinvent the wheel:

quote:
BBC Radio4 Thought for the Day, 23 October 2008
The Rev. Rosemary Lain-Priestley

London's bendy buses have been the subject of heated debate from the start - some of us love them, apparently many of us hate them - but they are about to be associated with a very different sort of controversy.

This week the UK's first atheist advertising campaign was launched, supported by the British Humanist Association and others. The idea is to place posters on buses to proclaim the message: "There's probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life".

When I first saw it, the campaign slogan puzzled me. Believing in God doesn't cause me to worry or stop me from enjoying my life. On the contrary, religious faith deepens and affirms my passion for life, my joy in being human, my love of the tremendously rich and beautiful world in which I find myself. Faith also reassures me that in times when life is hard, when anxiety and sorrow shape my experience, God is as present and attentive and relevant as in the good times.

So I certainly don't connect the idea of God with fear and apprehension, or the inability to chill out and enjoy myself - but I can see how the less positive associations may have come about.

Historically a whole strand of religious art depicts the horrors of hell by showing the damned receiving punishments appropriate to their specific sin. And where there has been an obsession with sin - or perhaps an over-emphasis on our shortcomings and their eternal consequences - it has given the impression that life before death has very little significance in itself.

But if all that seems to matter is "have I really done what I need to do in order to ensure that my sins are dealt with and my place in heaven secured?" then surely we've missed the point. Religion then fails to be the enriching and exciting experience that it can be here and now.

I find the Christian faith deeply liberating. It encourages me to live well and creatively and to grow in my understanding of the world. I think it also teaches me that God's love is spacious and allows us to engage positively with those who hold different beliefs from our own.

I notice that the atheist posters do not say "There is no God", but "There's probably no God". This does leave room for debate, and surely that's a very good and life-giving thing. After all "Enjoy your life" could just as easily be a religious slogan as an atheist one. In terms of the impact on our lives here and now, the two approaches might have more in common than we usually admit.

copyright 2008 BBC

Posted on: 24 October 2008 by Nigel Cavendish

Jon

I think you should go to logic school, because there is little in what you write and I also think you quite fundamentally misunderstand any concept of God.

Posted on: 25 October 2008 by Consciousmess

Nigel,

Many thanks for your tip, but my logic is based on extensive reading around this debate. It is not me sat back in my armchair rationalising in isolation.

I know text on this forum is just that, but we are all educated enough to follow up points made by reading texts written by the even more educated. I included some of these in my earlier posts, and I have to briefly make a further point to the Rev. Lain-Priestley...

You are right, Dawkins wrote on the bus 'there probably is no god'. He had to write this as that is the scientific method throughout - hypotheses are posed and tested, then adjusted in a circular fashion.

Victor Stengers book "God the failed hypothesis" is also brilliant as science is really well applied to the notion of god here. Please look this up and read. If you want an even briefer book, go read Sam Harris "Letter to a Christian Nation". This will take maybe a week to read.

Other than that, I want all believers on this forum to note I respect them as persons but just don't share their views.

All the best,

Jon