He probably means the fucking Buybull, which calling bullshit is an insult to the excrement of the bovine species.

Dear Bob,

Yours:  "Where do the ideas of the writers of the Bible come from? Why should it be given any special weight?"

The authors of the Old, and New Testaments ideas come from what they say they saw, or heard, or touched.  You can decide on your own whether you will give it any special weight. 

Yours:  "Why? I certainly do not recall ever having any thought like this."

Hmm.  Never any thoughts of a higher power or Creator.  I don't believe you.  

Yours:  "The bible 'teaches' many really nasty things, is full of clear contradictions, and is unequivocally not worth treating seriously as a source of unimpeachable moral or spiritual advice."

I'd guess it's obvious that I think completely opposite.

Yours:  "What evidence. That you include the word 'truth' in there is a silly non-sequiter. It ain't worth treating as truth until the evidence is evaluated."

I agree.  But I don't know which part of the Bible you demand evidence for.

Yours:  "We know this is factually incorrect."

So you grew up in an atheist home?  Never studied all the religions or subscribed to any of them?

Yours:  "No, we search for purpose and meaning as a side-effect of being blessed/cursed with a large conscious brain, and the urge to understand the world, which is generally helpful toward our survival, which is our particular survival strategy as a species. Actually not everyone bothers about that so much, from my observations."

Yes, probably not in the meaningful sense.  I too observe that most people just want to live their life and be happy, doing whatever it takes to obtain whatever goal they have.

Yours:  "In terms of things which can clearly be shown to be outrageous by comparing the ideas against a lot of evidence, I don't think I do. If the evidence is not clear, but fairly strongly suggestive, I try to maintain a more tentative acceptance."

I don't know you Bob, so excuse my ignorance.  How do you believe the universe came into existence?  I only know of the old theory (Big Bang), and I don't know if that is what you believe, or if there have been new discoveries.  What was there when there was nothing, if there was nothing, how did something happen?  If you subscribe to the Big Bang, please educate me on what scientist say about everything calming down, and all the planets becoming circular.  

In terms of earth, where did life start?  How did we decided what was good and bad?  Where did our conscience come from?  If you do not have time to concisely explain these things, you can refer me to a book.

Yours:  "This is where I slice your fingers off with Occam's Razor. Once you start such conjectures, you are actually ignoring a virtually infinite set of equally 'plausible', or I would say 'implausible' scenarios, which, freed from the constraints of being consistent with what we actually have learnt about reality thru serious investigation, can 'explain' anything. You are left with selecting the one which appeals most to your personal preconceptions."

I have not ignored anything.  I simply gave you a possible reason why people conjecture UFO's, alien abductions, et cetera.  You're right, that I have chosen what seems to me to be the most plausible, but otherwise there is good and evil, and people want answers.  If there is no God, everyone is just a delusional atheist.  Which begs the question, why is the majority of the population so selfish and evil?

Yours:  "For many of us here the Bible is very strong evidence against the Christian God, at least. We have had many many theists presenting what they consider strong evidence for God, and it has been uniformly pathetic."

I don't doubt that it has, which is why I dont debate God's existence.

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Dear Kevin,

I like your hypothetical reasoning, and I thank you for trying to gain full understanding. 

Yours:  *He is petty (deciding arbitrarily that he doesn't like someone, so condemning them to eternal hellfire)*

What is so arbitrary about not liking someone who is disobedient? 

Yours:  *Has mortal emotions (Warth / Love, and by your own description, God's love is really not any different than human love. Selfish and largely arbitrary)*

* He creates evil people with the intent & knowledge of sending them to Hell (Sociopathism)*

He has the choice to do and have those things.

Yours:  *He feels that feeding me and giving my a habitable environment is full compensation for eternal hellfire.*

No.  All humans are supposed to be in hell now.  Therefore, He's kind to let you enjoy some time on earth.

Yours:  *He has a divine plan, therefore I have a destiny*

Right.

Yours:  * He has given people free will*

*He is immaterial*

Depends on your definition of free will.  In Christian theology, humans are free to do what is natural to them, which is sin, but even that is constrained to a certain degree.  We believe you are a slave to sin, until God frees you. 

God is Spirit.

Yours:  "...Well, to be fair, at least you do clearly take your God right out of the OT without sprinkling-on the apologetics. We still have a number of puzzling anomalies, however:"

It is the same God in the Old and New Testament, Kevin.

Yours:  "Let's look at the 3rd & 2nd last attributes. These are mutually exclusive; if I have a pre-ordained destiny, I certainly don't have free will - I'm just a puppet in a play that's already been written."

If you knew that, why did you say "He has given people free will"?

Yours:  "How can he be emotional without the biology that creates emotions?"

Seems like you are understanding emotions from a humans perspective, and in a human sense.  Remember, you're trying to understand from a Christian perspective, and from God's perspective, or atleast I thought you were.  

We do not know everything about God, but we do know that if He exist and is infinite, then He is a highly more complicated Being than we can imagine.  God communicated messages to humans at the copacity to which they were able to fathom.  Let's always keep in mind that the Bible is trying to convey a message.   

Yours:  "Our emotions are a result of environmental pressure and natural selection - why would a divine being ever be troubled with such things?"

What do you mean by troubled?  And what is your authority on human emotions being brought about by environmental preasure, and natural selection?  Can these things be orchestrated? 

Yours:  "Moreover, if we look down at #5 again, we see that God already has everything figured-out and set fate in motion - so why the wrath? Why be angry with the result of his own machinations that turned-out exactly the way he intended?"

Again, God is free to choose.  But a half explanation is given in Romans 9:22,23.

Yours:  "Finally, what's the purpose of Hell? Clearly it isn't for 'punishing' anyone (burning someone forever clearly will not, and cannot, reform bad behavior), and by this definition, it can't even be for retribution."

If you go to hell, God is not trying to reform your behavior.  Also, hell is said to be tormenting, and Jesus uses the language of hell being a place "Where the fire is not quenched, and the worm does not die."  Some do not believe hell to be actual fire, but that the symbol is trying to describe something far worse.

Yours:  "...Does God just enjoy burning and tormenting people? If so, why on Earth worship such a deity (much less claim it as possessing 'love')."

No, God has no pleasure in the death of the wicked (Ezekiel 18:32).  We worship in our gratitude of life, mercy, granting of repentence, and the cross of Christ, which sums up as, Grace.

Yours:  "The definition you've given here is self-contradictory. It can't exist, because it is described as having mutually exclusive properties.

So, yeah. I did just prove that this version of Yahweh (...how many have we gone through, now? Anyone keeping count?) doesn't exist."

Maybe you have proved that the version of Yahweh you've conceived doesn't exist.

Yours:  "Of course, I imagine nobody will ever manage to convince you that you were conned when you traded the cow for the magical beans - so, as you were."

*Smiles*  Refresh my memory of what story that was, it's been a long time.

Yours:  "'We know what we're saying -- we know it requires a "leap of faith." But it's deliberate -- designed for those who would rather take that leap than stay in this world.'"

You will never hear such a thing come from my mouth.  You can't take a leap of faith, you're not free to do so.  God must take all the actions, otherwise, you will remain the way you are.

Quick and short instructions on how to use the quote function.

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Sigh..........

Theism is belief in a God. Atheism is the lack of belief in a God. 

You're not a delusional atheist, you're just delusional.  If you wanted to butcher the English language, that's fine, but make sure that you know what you're actually saying.  

Whether or not there is a God is irrelevant to linguistics. It doesn't change the definition of these words. Either way, you're still a theist because you still believe that there is a God.

What exactly are you doing? Are you twisting words to make yourself uncomfortable so that it'll be easier to hang on to your beliefs? 

Theism is a definition of g-o-d rejected by Atheism. Why let the theists "own" the word/definition of g-o-d? That is why I post the way I do. I AM GOD, fuck Abraham's kind of stupid god crap.

I tell the kids they are 100% GOD, all is one and even science proves it, such as thermodynamics etc. Science is the only true worship/study of the awe , of G-awe-D. Simple. Fuck religion god dogma shit. Dogma is all our enemy, to heal, by understanding, as is sometimes called L_O_V_E ....

.... "which is why I don't debate God's existence." - Beatz

 Duh , I am god , WTF is is not god? Atheist Buddha laughed, story atheist Jesus got pissed ... Theology theism sucks Satan's crouch .... idol worshipers suck blindly.

That was really xlint Kevin. Thanks. No deity master has been found. I fucking hate all invented idols of separatist thinkers ....  Fuck all you religious worshipers. FUCK YOU, fuck your idols, sincerely,  me god.

Dear Bob,

The atheist is the anomaly.  %99, of the people I come across, I don't have to ask if they believe in God, I just ask them what church they attend.  Of course in America, this is a give me, but around the world, the atheist is still the anomaly.  Yes, there might be some places with a heavy population of atheist, but still not a significant number. 

Seeing as though mostly everyone already believes in a higher power, the next question is what's His authority.  So the reason I give the Bible special weight is because I think it's God's authority.  The major three world religions (Islam, Christianity, Judaism), all have the same beginning, it's part 2 that the disagreement comes into play.

The reason I believe it, is because the Bible says it.

After your studies, you have came to the conclusion that those are facts.  I on the other hand have come to the conclusion that people misunderstand the Bible.  I even went on the "Freedom From Religion Foundation" website a while ago, and they have a lot of misconceptions about the Bible and Christianity. 

So lets keep in mind that you may see things as nasty, and contradictory, but I'm looking at it from a different angle.  

Not quite.  I agreed that the evidence must be evaluated first, in order to determine whether it is truth.  Sorry, I didn't make that clear.  But I'm assuming you came to the conclusion that the whole Bible is false? 

So why did you take the time out to examine them?  Curiosity? 

What is energy, Bob?  Not the formula, not it's traits; what is it's ontology. 

Assuming there is no answer for that question, can you understand how I think it is outrageous to believe the universe just happened?  I can understand why you think theist are outrageous, but for some reason you feel you are exempted from this bunch.   

Sorry about that, I wont bother you with any more scientific questions after this post.

So someone suddenly knew violence was wrong? 

So let me test if I'm following you correctly: 

There was always energy (according to the first law of thermodynamics) it didn't come from anywhere, it was just always there; energy, for no reason or cause, experiences quantum fluctuations.  These fluctuations you believe, could be responsible for the heat build-up initiating the Big Bang.  As the universe expanded, things began to cool down.  Spherical planets began to form with no orchestration, due to gravitational attraction.  (Are there any other planets besides earth with the same intense amount of gravity in it's atmosphere?)

Over a long period of time, the planet that became the most fortunate, or luckiest, was our earth.  The first particle from the chaos (iron) which is currently around 4000 degrees celsius, was encased by an outercore of iron and nickel. (Does iron naturally come from heated explosions, do any particles naturally come from explosions of heat?)  More time passed, and the gravitational attraction, attracted mantle over the outercore, then the upper mantle came, crust, and ocean.   The Solar system and orbiting was all happening during this process, right?  

Some of the planets cooled down and water formulated on them, from the cooling process?  The earth cooled down and was the right distance away from the sun (that moderately cooled down?), and moon, which enabled it to have liquid water. 

Moving on to the orgins of life to my understanding, science has no answer for.  I skimmed through a few articles that talked about amino acids, proteins, RNA, etc.  But all in all, I found no plausible answers.  Somehow, there is a leap to life.  Is this true?  Is the biogenetic law (life comes only from life) true?  

This all points back to my original statement, that I can understand why you think theist are outrageous for believing in intelligent design, but I can't understand why you wish to exclude yourself from people who have an outrageous belief.  You believe things happened with no cause and no reason, and I think things happened by cause and reason.  Or you will say, you believe there was a cause, but you're not sure what the cause was?

It is true that my assumption will not be plausible to you, because you do not believe in anything spiritual.  And I cannot show you that spiritual exist.  This is why I always say, "If."

I don't necessarily think I'm ignoring the explanations from pyschology, but rather, I think there is more behind it than natural disorders.

You know where my worldview comes from, so why ask the question? 

I think I already answered this above, but to be sure;  I believe God exist because I believe in cause and effect.  You will probably say what caused God, which I find to be a foolish question.  I don't find it hard to believe an infinite Being is responsible for our finite creation.  The universe has not been proven to be infinite, but only has been said that it could be possible.

The law and order of things leads me to lean even more towards intelligent design.  If everything just happened by chance, as atheist believe, I would expect more to still be happening, more earths, more life from other planets, etc.  I would expect to see apples and oranges growing from the same trees.  I find it hard to believe all plantlife produces after it's own kind by chance, or by billions of years of unobservable evolution. 

I would expect the majority of the population to be deformed, and not have taste buds, two eyes (why not 5 or 6?), DNA, heart, brain, and spinal chord all produce itself over time.  What I see is enough for me.  And I'm glad you say that what I observe, you can understand that it applies and is good enough for myself and the majority of the population.       

My first comment (that there is probably not one atheist here who didn't start out as a Christian, Muslim, Catholic, etc), was wrong.  So I'm sorry, and recant that statement.  My second statement, that every person is born with the inate knowledge of a higher power, I believe, because it comes from the Bible.

It's your choice to treat me with disrespect, as a nut-job, or as a deluded and dishonest person worthy of all contempt.  I actually expect that from you and all atheist. 

I have in no way, attempted to prove to you the existence of God.  I'm merely answering the questions you posed to me. 

Using the Buybull as evidence for Christianity is circular reasoning. The Buybull is 100% utter bullshit and one of the most idiotic books ever written.

Dear Kevin,

Sorry I wasn't able to respond yesterday, I didn't have enough time.

You're entitled to your opinion, or maybe you'll say they're facts; you're still entitled.

If God exist, I don't think I am in a position to tell Him what is moral, based on my faulted standards.  And of course I think God always does the right thing.

I disagree.  Instead of God immediately placing everyone in hell, He saves some, and He allows some to enjoy a life. 

If a person is told beforehand that if he murders someone, he is going to get the electric chair, and they let him enjoy a meal before the execution, that's kind.  So God, letting humans enjoy a life, is merciful and kind.

Orwell might've meantioned something similar, but the things I said are from Jesus (John 8:34).

Yes, my perspective is human, but I try to understand from a divine perspective to the best of my ability. 

I think I answered your question, but to be sure; Hell is a place for people who want to be away from the grace of God.  Atheist make the statement that they "would rather go to hell than worship God," all the time, so you'll get what you ask for.  It also serves as a place for punishment, for disobedience.  If you commit the crime, you serve the time.   

You just gave the analogy of prison.  Why do people get life sentences?  What purpose does that serve? 

The world would not get along fine without justice.  Humans paying the price for the sins they commit is justice.  I guess you would prefer God to overlook transgressions of His law, just like you would prefer police to overlook transgressors of the civic laws?

Do you disagree that people like "Stalin" should be served justice, and go to hell?

I disagree.

I'm familiar with the gospels.  They each have certain aspects of Jesus life not mentioned in the others.

This coming from the guy whose tried to prove Adonai doesn't exist by the attributes given from the Bible? 

Besides, I haven't tried to use the Bible to prove the Bible.  I simply told you according to the Bible, God has no pleasure in the death of the wicked.  That's not an effort to prove the Bible.

Why would you expect God to only act in ways that bring Him pleasure?  Is it because that's what you would do, or because that's what makes more sense to you? 

Granted, He does not have to do things that don't bring Him pleasure, but He still has the choice to operate the way He wants.  If you want an outline of the ultimate reasons behind His every act, then I can't help you.  But the Scripture says that everything He does, He does to bring glory to Himself.  You will think that is selfish, and I think God must operate in that manner in order to be God. 

Ok.

No, I thank God for directing it away from my house.

This is a great question!

The stated purpose is to keep unformable criminals unable to harm people. Personally, I don't feel that this is a good justification... but before we derail this into a penal code tangent, let's take a look at what I just wrote:

The stated purpose part.

Beatz still hasn't stated the purpose of Hell. Likely, he never will (not here, anyway) - simply deflecting with matter-of-factly toned questions of his own or appealing to ignorance. Hell certainly isn't about retarding a criminal's ability to cause harm; death has already done that to the fullest extent possible. Even if it hadn't, why torture them? Why not merely detain or annihilate them?

Punishing disobedience is done to correct behavior. But the people in question are already dead, and the punishment is eternal. Forever[/i]. God isn't correcting any behavior this way.

Burning forver is not 'justice', even if we despise the people being treated to such torments. What's done is done, and Stalin is no longer able to inflict atrocities upon the planet. Saying that he should burn forever is spiteful and born of nothing other than malice and a thrist for retribution, given that no amount of pain inflicted upon him can ever reverse the genocide he oversaw.

Doublethink.

Oh my God, you can't even understand something this simple?!?

Then use them correctly.  

The words "theist" and "atheist" don't have jack shit to do with your origins. If you believe in God, you're a theist. If you don't, you're an atheist. It doesn't matter what you were born as. If you currently believe in God, then you're a theist. 

What the fuck does atheist and theist have to do with humans and dogs? Believing in God makes you theist. The definition of a theist is that if you believe in God, you're a theist. Believing that you're a dog doesn't mean that you're a dog!

All you're really saying is that if there is no God, then you're wrong, except you want to stick on the word atheist because that makes it sound "uncomfortable" or something. 

Dear Kevin,

A place where criminals are kept away and from harming others is a stated observation given in the Scripture.  But of course, not the stated purpose you're looking for.

How about you answer for me, because I don't know what answer you want.

And some Christians believe in annihilationism (unbelievers simply burned into non-existence).

In your judgment.  But if God makes a promise then He must keep it.  If He says we will go to hell forever for one transgression against Him, then it's our responsibilty to obey the command.

Smokers need to knock off the red herrings - driving is vital to keep our society in a recongnizable form. Smoking isn't.

Public transit isn't available where I live. It is very harmful smoking nearby- especially to someone with respiratory problems. I'm not saying you can't smoke - just not in public. You're not allowed to have sex in public but that doesn't mean you have to stay abstinent. Have consideration for someone besides yourself for fucks sake.

I don't believe that during the life of a human the mind is separate from the body. Not all Christians believe this - only literalists. I believe that during life, the mind exists in a physical state (the brain) and so is subject to the natural laws of the universe - including chemical alterations to the state of the analog incarnation of the mind.

Drugs are bad - they can cause serious health problems, but as long as healthcare in this country is private recreational drug use should be legal. If universal healthcare were to be implemented though, I wouldn't want it to be legal for people to use drugs for non medicinal purposes since we'd beleft  paying for the medical bills of people who only got sick through use of unnecessary drugs.

Ok, Beatz, where in that pile of ancient dog turd you would prefer to refer to as "the living word" does it condemn rape as a sin in itself? How about torture?

In the OT. he actually seems to encourage visting rape and torture on whole populations if they happen to be getting in the way of his 'chosen people', so I guess it would be a little inconsistent perhaps. Not that that't seems to bother him, or at least the writers recording their fantasies in those pages. Actually it seems all that stuff, including 'thou shalt not kill' etc only applies to people in his own in-group, it's open slather on anyone outside the Yahweh Club.

What a nasty petty hypocritical little tyrant you worship....

The bible, ok a compromise - I'll refer to it as the Dead Word of a bunch of long-dead writers who knew so much less about the universe and human nature than experienced educated people do today, that it is a sick joke that anyone would even try take it seriously apart from its archeological value, as one recounting something about the life and times of a small part of the world a few thousand years ago, unfortunately written under the obscuring pre-conceptions of their particular primitive belief systems.

Once you take seriously the idea of a super powerful all-knowing God thingy, you have rendered potentailly useless any lnowledge about it, because it call all be overturned tomorrow at the whim of a being who certainly is supposed to have the power to do so, and whose ultimate motivations would be forever beyound our grasp.

At least the naturalistic world-view is more consistent with a world governed, at its base, by unconscious natural processes and 'laws' (just regularities of behaviour, not to be confused with the more arbitrary proscriptions handed down from an authority figure of some kind). This assumption (note, no 'faith' required) seems to be working well so far as the progress of science and associated technology vastly beyond anything those scribes who wrote in the Dead Word Book could have imagined.

You should be ashamed for trying to make that childish point about the writings containg references to a number of actual places and events, as though the fact that many current and older super-hero stories are set in real cities means they are not fantasies. Batman is real...

Just one of the sillier attempts to try and wiggle around the intrinsic evil and absurdity of so much of the content of the book.

And of course i was insulting and ridiculing the idea of God, as portrayed in those writings. You make another lame attempt to try and paint the atheist viewpoint as contradictory - we don't 'hate' or ridicule a being we secretly believe exists, or direct hate at a non-existent entity, just at the absurdity and silliness of believing in and worshipping such an (mis-)conception.

Okay, so when we're discussing the Living Word, which one is it? Is it the first half, where everyone should pretty much kill each other because, well, we're all terrible so the slaughter really doesn't matter, or are we now in a kind of situation where the Old Testament is a moot point, and replaced by forgiveness?

Honestly, it doesn't need to be this confusing. In the first part, we all deserve to be in hell, and there is no being "innocent"? Now, there's what? Mercy from what? The hell we no longer need to go to? Did God inspire the Bible specifically to mess with our heads?

Thanks for answering the original question for me, ADC!  I was beginning to think this thread was hopelessly lost.

I'm not going to try to answer this here because the problems with the concept of the soul have been done to death in other threads.  If you're interested in joining that debate, we can certainly start a new thread to talk about it, but for right now, I'll just thank you for offering one Christian answer to my question.

Dear Bob,

We might as well say the same for everyone up to Copernicus.  But let me guess, you revere men like Aristotle?  

Given the technologoy of our day, and all the people who paved the way for your scientific studies, of course you would know more about the universe and human nature.  But I'd say those dead Bible writers have one up on you, atleast they claim to know the origin of human nature, and the universe.

Again, are you saying all the events in the Bible never transpired?

All I can do is put my trust in Him, and what His word says.  He says He doesn't change, and His promises never fail, so I believe it.  But it is true, humans would not be able to do anything to God if He exist, is as complicated as we are able to perceive, and overturns on the things He says. 

No faith required?  It takes a bundle of faith to believe everything proceeds from, "unconscious natural processes and 'laws'."  

So the whole history of the Nation of Israel never happened?  The land of Israel, and the Jews were recently discovered..

I haven't tried to wiggle around anything.  I've been up-front about any content that has been presented.    

You're entitled to insult and ridicule ideas, that's your right.  But again, if it all never happened, and it's just a fairy tail, who cares?  Do you put the same energy towards insulting and ridiculing the ideas of children who believe in Santa Clause?  Let's be fair Bob, you mention "oxymorons" in your signature.