Hi, Warrick here!
Offline Hi guys,
I'm Warrick - I love Jesus because He first loved me.
I'm visiting this forum for several reasons. Most importantly I pray that Jesus use these forums and discussions to reveal the truth to all those who doubt and bring them to a place where they know without a doubt that the God of Israel, the creator of the universe, loves them and nothing can separate them from that love.
Another reason I'm here is because I find discussions with free thinkers revitalising. I'm intent on learning the Word of God and understanding it as best I possibly can and I find discussions with atheists a very challenging and effective way to learn. Mostly because really zealous atheists know more of the Word and seem to spend more time in it than your average Christian. Interesting.
I'm excited by open, honest frank discussion since there is no other way to get to the truth. And Jesus is the Way, the Truth and the Life.
No matter what is said in these discussions, Jesus loves each one of us. No doubt, blasphemy (even against the Holy Spirit) or profanity can change that. Thank you Jesus. In fact Jesus will leave the 99 sheep to find the one that is lost - so all you lost sheep Jesus is looking for you - knocking at the door of your heart waiting for you to let Him in.
God is not a respecter of men. He is the same yesterday, today and forever, And He loves you.
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Offline Mr Warrick,
I arrived at the conclusions that I do not believe in God very simply, by asking what we can actually know. So we enter the world with no knowledge of anything and so we need to find knowledge, the only way being through empiricism (i.e. through the senses). Ok, so in order to know something we have to have evidence of that something, you can't know something unless there is evidence for it. If I pick up a stone and see woodlice underneath then I have evidence that woodlice live underneath stones. God however, what is that? I cannot sense God, nor can he be measured, and there is no evidence for his existence, I would have to take a leap of faith in order to believe in God, but I could never actually know God existed. Ok, there are holy books, the bible, the qu'ran, the book of mormon, the book of the flying spaghetti monster but are these reliable sources? Why should I believe these anymore than I believe that The Lord of the Rings actually happened? They all claim to be the word of God, but how can we know that, just a little bit of study of any of them shows that God is really inconsistent, all loving and yet pretty downright nasty, all powerful and yet somehow he can't be everywhere at once. And then we come to Jesus, there is very scant evidence that Jesus actually existed. And even if he were a real historical person why should I believe he was the son of God? Why should I believe in virgin births (something that contradicts all evidence) how would a virgin get pregnant, well through a great supernatural bloke in the sky? There is also no evidence for worldwide floods either, nor of many other things the bible says.
So religious Gods seem a bit incoherent and again there is no evidence for them. I cannot know anything without evidence. But there is also no evidence for a plain theistic God (one not belonging particularly to a religion) no matter how consistent they try to make him. He cannot be sensed, measured, experienced. The same goes for a deistic God, there's no evidence so why believe.
On to your second question. It could be the case that the universe through a non-physical cause. It does however raise massive questions. How would a non-physical cause make something physical? So far as we know nothing non physical has ever caused anything physical, all physical actions have physical causes. For example the apples on my windowsil aren't going to suddenly be moved by something non-physical. Also we must ask where such a complex non-physical cause came from? You would assume it had always been there right? God has always existed? But such a God is extremely complex, it can break the divide between physical and non-physical, it needs a cause. And then we have to ask ourselves what non-physical is? Are there laws of non-physics? How does it have force if there is nothing physical?
It seems ever more likely that the universe would need a physical cause. In fact there is no reason why it actually needs a beginning at all. The big bang may not be the beginning of the cosmos, all we know is that at some point 14 billion years ago all the matter was crammed together into a space so small it cannot be fathomed by the human brain lest it be mathematically (we know this is possible because the majority of space a single atom takes up is just empty space, if the nucleus were a football (I mean a round football, not your American footballs) then an electron would be a pea 3 or 4 miles away). We know that the big bang was the beginning of the universe as we know it, but we do not know whether it is actually the start of everything ever. It need not be. And is it not more likely that a physical event has a physical cause than a physical event having a non-physical cause. Admittedly we do not know what physical cause that was but we are only really at the beginning of scientific discovery. We do not claim to know everything, as many religions do (how they came by that knowledge without scientific experimentation beats me, perhaps it was made up), but we endeavour to know everything. We go about trying to learn an almost infinite amount of knowledge in the hope that one day we may know everything.
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Offline Quote:You have some misconceptions of atheism. Firstly in 1.1 you say that Atheists believe there is no God. Wrong (although some may) but in general the majority of thinking atheists simply do not believe in God, that is not the same as believing there is no God. I'm fed up of having to explain this to theists but it is a popular misconception.
Other than the comments by razorphreak I'll cop this one. Your commetn makes sense and I'll be sensitive to that in future.
Quote:Atheism is arrived at through reasoned argument,
No it isn't. I say that because every time a reasoned argument is attempted we get the same old responses. Let's you and I have a reasoned argument then.
Quote:very often through personal thinking on the subject.
No argument there. Personal thought based on misconceptions and subjetivity. No reasoned argument.
Quote:There is no church of atheism, no real organisation.
Not explicity maybe. But it is implied. But we can probably just ignore this. It doesn't really make a difference. It's just a point of interest.
Quote:No indoctrination from a young age.
Interesting thought. I agree that indoctrination is not good. But ensuring that your kids get no exposure is also a type of indoctrination. AS with anything moderation is the way to go. Absolutely no exposure is extreme.
Quote:No flawed moral codes pushed down our throats (that is not to say we are amoral,
What codes are moral. Let's talk about this too. Name the moral code and explain what the flaws are. You will not find any flawed moral code in the Bible.
Quote:I personally am a Utilitarian/Consequentialist, a claim I can argue rationally).
OK. Let's argue rationally about the non-physical cause of the physical universe.
Quote:No doctrine really to speak of. The only thing that could be called a doctrine would be the absense of belief but a) it is never forced upon people, it merely remains an option and b) is the only definition of atheist, look at the word a-theist, someone who isn't a theist, therefore in order to be an atheist absense of a belief in God would pretty much be mandatory only by definition, if they believed in God by definition they would be theistic.
OK. Fair enough.
So let's argue rationally then.
1. How did you arrive at your atheist conclusions? What reasoned argument did you use?
2. Is it reasonable to say the cause of the physical universe had to be non-physical, i.e. something that cannot be described by physics?
Let's reason now. No dogmatic statements, no doctrine.
WTF, you dont believe in my invisable purple snarfwidget so you must have a dogmatic doctrine that causes you to reject it.
What lead me to my atheism. Simple, hocus pocus superstition is fiction. There is no such thing as spirt sperm or people surviving rigor mortis. There is no multy armed deity named Ganish and you wont get 72 virgins in an afterlife. It is the same crap as Apollo pulling the sun across the sky with a chariot and the same as Superaman and Luke Skywalker. You just like your myth. So what, so do all the other people who like different myths.
"There has to be something outside physics"
So, why are to so desperate to incert a magical sky daddy into what we dont know? You think rocks talk? No of course not. Do you think that Napolean is lurking in your bedroom closet? No, of course not.
"Their has to be". Yea, and there may be something beyond what we know. But that doesn't nessistate a disimbodied brain. If physics is natural, then I'd hassard to guess that what lies beyond that is not magical, but just as natural, merely unknown at this time.
The point is you like your super hero in the sky and never consider that it is YOU wanting to believe it.
You are in the same boat of lack of evidence as any Scientologist, Kabbalahist, Shintoist, Toeist, Jew or Muslim or Wiccan. All of you make up myths to justify belief in the absurd.
That is not being mean, that is being blunt. I dont sugar coat reality just because you cant face it.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
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BGH, I wanted to go back to this point about the martyrdom. The difference between the Christian persecution and the terrorist acts of the Muslim Jihad are that the Christians were killed by the violent acts of others because of their Christian faith.
Muslim Jihad warriors kill themselves for their own faith. So no, the Muslims cannot be compared to the Christian martyrs.
<The above was my original response. I'm editing to provide a little more justification for my stance>
I believe the comparison is not relevant because the point to be made by the reference to the martyrs was one of consistency. Now, I'm not trying to baffle you (and myself) with BS and tehchnicalities. What I'm saying is that the fact that secular history records very many people being persecuted and put to death for their conviction that Christ was the Saviour lends consistency and bolsters the credibility fo the Biblical accounts - i.e.
1. It corroborates the evidence presented in the Bible that people (around the time Jesus is claimed to have lived) at least believed that Jesus lived
2. They had enough faith that He was in some way special that they would not renounce that faith in public to the point of enduring torture and death.
3. There were very many of them. Mass hysteria might be claimed but that would need to be substantiated. So there is evidence in play which now needs to be discredited.
The Muslim argument is not really relevant (without attempting to side step your point) because it does not go to discrediting the Bible. Nonetheless, in response, the Muslims kill themsleves. They do not have to endure torture at the hands of others. Nobody is asking them to renounce their faith.
The comparison is not relevant in this case and does nothing to lessen the contribution of the secular record on the consistency and credibility of the Biblical accounts.
Tacitus os very credible, corroborating evidence that Jesus existed and people of the time believed He was special in some way. You can of course still dispute His deity and the reaslity of the miracles, even with this evidence in play. But to dispute His existence the onus is now on you to produce proof.
Maybe we can pick this up in your response to the non-physical cause to the physical universe question? I'm working toward shopwing that it is reasonable to accept that there are non-physical, super natural events that cannot be explained by physics. What say you?
You have some misconceptions of atheism. Firstly in 1.1 you say that Atheists believe there is no God. Wrong (although some may) but in general the majority of thinking atheists simply do not believe in God, that is not the same as believing there is no God. I'm fed up of having to explain this to theists but it is a popular misconception.
Atheism is arrived at through reasoned argument, very often through personal thinking on the subject. There is no church of atheism, no real organisation. No indoctrination from a young age. No flawed moral codes pushed down our throats (that is not to say we are amoral, I personally am a Utilitarian/Consequentialist, a claim I can argue rationally). No doctrine really to speak of. The only thing that could be called a doctrine would be the absense of belief but a) it is never forced upon people, it merely remains an option and b) is the only definition of atheist, look at the word a-theist, someone who isn't a theist, therefore in order to be an atheist absense of a belief in God would pretty much be mandatory only by definition, if they believed in God by definition they would be theistic.
Atheist Books
Then you might want to make sure you correct your fellow atheists since that seems to be the message. "Believe in God? We can fix that" is NOT a message of not believing in God but rather a message to show others there is no God.
Before RRS, I had always believed that atheists were passive and would not jump at a chance to discredit any theist. Most examples I've seen simply were to make sure they weren't forced to believe, which I have no problem with. But what I do have a problem with is when they've gone on the offensive and distored the very faith in order to question the existance of God and mark other people's faith as "delusions". That is not the actions of someone who does not believe in a God but rather someone who wants to discredit God and to prove there is no God at all.
What is faith? Is it to believe that which is evident? No. It is perfectly evident to my mind that there exists a necessary, eternal, supreme, and intelligent being. This is no matter of faith, but of reason. - Voltaire
<edited my original response>
Exactly.
Other than the comments by razorphreak I'll cop this one. Your commetn makes sense and I'll be sensitive to that in future.
No it isn't. I say that because every time a reasoned argument is attempted we get the same old responses. Let's you and I have a reasoned argument then.
No argument there. Personal thought based on misconceptions and subjetivity. No reasoned argument.
Not explicity maybe. But it is implied. But we can probably just ignore this. It doesn't really make a difference. It's just a point of interest.
Interesting thought. I agree that indoctrination is not good. But ensuring that your kids get no exposure is also a type of indoctrination. AS with anything moderation is the way to go. Absolutely no exposure is extreme.
What codes are moral. Let's talk about this too. Name the moral code and explain what the flaws are. You will not find any flawed moral code in the Bible.
OK. Let's argue rationally about the non-physical cause of the physical universe.
OK. Fair enough.
So let's argue rationally then.
1. How did you arrive at your atheist conclusions? What reasoned argument did you use?
2. Is it reasonable to say the cause of the physical universe had to be non-physical, i.e. something that cannot be described by physics?
Let's reason now. No dogmatic statements, no doctrine.