Take the Atheist Challenge!!!

Hi. I'm not "replying" exactly; I'm a newbie and I lurk to learn.... until something I see makes me really, really want to chime in!The dialogue with the riverrat has been fascinating. Whether to laugh or cry.....?My comment is merely that I am almost 80 years old, and a high-school dropout, and I know about the Luminiferous Aether and the MIchelson-Morley experiment.
Sheesh, to coin a phrase.

Zachariah responds to me:

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Why do keep saying I'm refering to evolution. I would really like to know where in the quote to which you were refering I mentioned it.

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Did you not read your own words? Don't be disingenuous and claim you were suddenly shifting the conversation to abiogenesis, abandoning evolution, acceding to the fact that evolution has nothing to do with the origin of life, are you?

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I was speaking of the beginning of the universe with LAM I was not talking about how things came to be after that.

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Then why did you mention cells? Message 109: What was the point of this if not to connect evolution to the origin of life?

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Don't read things not there.

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Are you saying you didn't write the following?

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Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

Zachariah writes:

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My "criteria" is to sit down and say a prayer to God. Ask him to come into your life.

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What makes you think atheists haven't done precisely that? Remember, the vast majority of atheists used to be believers. They eventually came to the conclusion that they weren't really hearing god but were only hearing their own desires.

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Read ANYWHERE in the bible.

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You know, I do this pretty much every time I am in a hotel, just to see what happens. I usually wind up somewhere in 1 or 2 Kings. I don't know why. Here, let me try again...yep, 2 Kings:2 Kings 16:10: And king Ahaz went to Damascus to meet Tiglathpileser king of Assyria, and saw an altar that was at Damascus: and king Ahaz sent to Urijah the priest the fashion of the altar, and the pattern of it, according to all the workmanship thereof.That doesn't really fill me with the glory of god.To be honest, the Bible is a frequently boring book. There's a reason most evangelicals tend to stick to the good parts...it's the same reason most people stick to the Inferno and skip the Purgatory and the Paradise.

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The whole idea behind this for me was to get people that had little or no faith or belief in GOD to ask him to come into there life and give them direction.

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Why should they when you won't put your money where your mouth is and do the same thing by giving up your god?Why should they when, if they come out the other end still atheists, you'd just respond that they weren't being open minded but rather had a joking matter and did it "just to say hey Zach I did it and nothing happened"?

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Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

Zachariah responds to me:

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What is your belief exactly? I would like to get on equal battle fields here if at all possible. What religion? What god? Heaven? Hell? How does it work with you?

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As the Man in Black said to Inigo:Get used to disappointment.I am not going to tell you what my beliefs are precisely because of those reasons you gave. I do not want you to respond to my statements with an attitude of, "Of course you would say that. You're an X."You can understand why I want to avoid that. I don't want people reacting to what I say because of some preconceived notion of how a person of thus-and-so characteristic is supposed to behave. I want them to react to what I actually say.Suppose I were to tell you that I was Muslim. What effect would that have upon the validity of my statements? Would their veracity change because a Muslim said them?Suppose I were to tell you that I am a Scientologist. How would that affect the relevance of my statements?What if I were Mormon? Pentecostal? Reformed Jew? Greek Orthodox? Shinto? What difference would it make with regard to whatever I said?Get used to disappointment.

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Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

Now guys, please. Stop or I'll get a swelled head (as if my headshot isn't bad enough....) Thank you for your accolades, but I know there are others on this list who are just as patient if not more so, say things in ways that make me wish I had said them that way, and show nothing but class in all their dealings.

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Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

Zacariah,
I'm taking your challenge and reading the book of John. Per my previous message, you know what my criteria is for an open mind.I started your challenge last night. Here is the prayer I said and will say each time before I start reading so that you know I am sincere in this challenge.Heavenly Father, I thank you for listening to my prayer. Help me today to seek and find you God. Open my heart and mind as I read this book of John and help me to understand any spiritual truth that it contains. Guide me down the path of true spirituality and show me what is true.I trust this is an acceptalbe prayer?My first read through on 5/11/04: I used the NIV study bible
Can't say I care for the prose. Rather choppy and no discernable points of reference so I can see the story. I was unable to get a visual in my mind on this read through.I will pray and read again tonight. Have a great day!

Agreed.
As far as your swelled head, it does look rather large, like a stop sign. :-)
I'll make my avatar a picture of me, shortly and you can see that you are not alone.
I like Lam's pic (of the hot female swordsman, er swordswoman).

Laugh all you like. When you got it you got it.

Are you telling me that I can't make a reference to cells not able to "pop" into being as an example of a creator without YOU telling ME I'm talking about evolution. That's is your problem, if you feel I'm talking about evolution sorry, I'm not. I'm done with talking about it, did so long enough on another forum. And if you don't like the idea of me asking others to take this challenge without me taking yours (giving up christianity for a month) then start your own topic. Challenge away on your own topic, I created this one for one purpose if you don't like it then leave. Do what you want. But don't tell me to take your challenge so you'll take mine. It doesn't work that way here. -Z

I felt the same way It wasn't until the last few months that I really got a new hunger for knowing it better. Now it makes more since and I understand it much better that makes it fun. To me anyway.

Thanks for letting me know. I'll keep you in my prayers. -Z

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No science can be truly proven, there can be evidence, even i suppose some proof depending on how you read into the word, but no absolute proof.

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But everyone in here is telling me that evolution is fact, and proven.

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Of course not. The "why we are here" question is a philosophical question, not a scientific. It is like asking a man "do you still beat your wife?" and demand a "yes" or "no" answer, especially when the man never beat his wife before.

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Although this statement is true by itself, the way you used it implies dishonesty.

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How could you say its a philosophical question only? I think your being dishonest about that. Science would more than Love to explain why we are here. Because if it happened by chance and there was a way to prove it, science would. Science has tried to claim that it could have happened by chance, and also explain how. What do you mean the way I use it. Are you labeling me? You think I am aomething that I'am not. Thats very scientifical.

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Unless you provide some kind of evidence to back up this statement, it is dishonesty on your part. Myself and one other person have asked you to clarify this point before. You've ignored us and I have no doubt that you will continue to ignore us.

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Let me rephrase that, I was incorrect, but not untrue. What I should have said is that the odds of it happening are way against it ever happening by chance. Math has tried to figure out the odds. But thats a whole other arguement, and really has no purpose towards the topic of this thread.

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I'm going to take your word for it and assume that you really know what you were talking about in regards to science. In this case, this was a shameless lie on your part. Science doesn't prove anything. The best it could do is come up with theories (or models) that help us predict what is going to happen if we do this or that. Truth ain't what science is after.

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People in this thread are telling me that evolution is fact, what's up with that then? How could you say science isn't after the truth? Again I think your the one being dishonest, and contradicing yourself, something that happens in science about a billion more times than the Bible.
There are plenty of scietifical things that are proven. Just not theorys(not yet). Science has such a brood range of subjects, how could you say that nothing is proven? You mean that H2O is not water? That hasn't been proven?

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The fact that you chose to ignore Rrhain on this point shows that you selectively left out this explanation and continued to blabber your slogan

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I see your point. Does that mean that they really didn't evolve? Or am I missing something. I will state my stance on this subject soon.

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We don't, but we need not.

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What kind of statement is that? Who gave you authority to state what we need and don't need in science. We are all open to all ideas. We just don't have the time to explore them all.

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To the best of my knowledge ANY biological organism's genes can mutate.

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Is that evolultion?

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Because they did not carry the allele for resistance to the T4 phage

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So did they evolve or not? Did only some evolve? I'm not getting this.
I do want to know though.

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No. Evolution doesn't work in terms of "forwards" or "backwards," "higher" or "lower," etc... Evolution just describes change -- ANY change. As species evolve, they don't evolve up and up like climbing a ladder, but rather they evolve "outward" in all directions like a bush or a starburst.

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If something evolves back to its former state, does this fit the model of evolution? If so, that means we could possibly become "apes" again?
Has any evidence ever shown this besides what happened in the dish. If so, then its not really overwhelming evidence of how evolution works. IMO.

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Love is a psychological process whereas evolution is a biological process. I don't think psychological processes are adequately explain biologically. Evolution might tell us HOW we got brains capable of loving, but it will never tell us WHY we love.

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Why not? Isn't that narrow thinking? Doesn't that limit science? So science could never explain God, because God is Love, and truth. If it can't explain God, then it can't explain away God either. Which is what it seems like some people try to do. I mean this is what we are talking about here right?
You guys seem to be using the "fact" that we evolved as a reason not to take the challenge. Saying that it is a waste of your time, and that you tried it already, blah blah.
Well if science can't explain God, or explain it away, then you have to look for God yourself in a non-scientifical manner, which requires all your heart. Thats the only way of finding God. How you go about this is entirely up to you. I can only state how it happened to me.

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I didn't say there was. I said your interpretation of the text is narrow. Please try to stay focused on my arguments because I'm getting tired of repeating them.

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Now thats dodging. Funny I don't feel narrow.

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It is narrow because it refuses to recognize reality and does not consider that the language may be symbolic rather than literal.

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However you see it is fine with me. That doesn't change the fact that it worked for me.

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Excuse me, but Jesus didn't write ANYTHING that's in the Bible. What we have is hearsay retellings of old oral traditions.

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That is correct, but your are dodging the point or missing it completely. Several people all wrote about things that Jesus did. They each expressed it differently. But when I read it, I wtill get the same "word" from God about what it is supposed to mean to me. It can mean different things to all, and that is beautiful.

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It'll take more than that, but I assure you that insisting that I must deny reality in order to believe as you do is quite the opposite of convincing.

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I hope reality smacks you in the face. Because I think your awesome.
I pray for it, seriously.

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Perhaps you don't understand the meaning of the term "unfalsifiable" and how it describes hypotheses. If you DID understand what it meant, you would realize that your statement that I cited immediately above is nonsense.

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Unfalsifiable hypotheses will NEVER be able to be tested against reality.. you know why? BECAUSE THAT'S WHAT MAKES THEM UNFALSIFIABLE. If they could be tested against reality, even if not now but in the future, they WOULD NOT BE unfalsifiable.

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Is this spoken from someone who doesn't feel God? If I really feel God, isn't that reality for me?

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Those who propose them.

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Not if they know the truth.

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Then give me a reason to believe that you're not.

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Thanks.

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It's rather irrelevant in this case since I've shown quite clearly that you don't know what you're talking about

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Thanks again. Hurt my feelings won't you.

I never claimed to be a know all. How did you get that from me stating that I have a general knowledge of science? I said that in defence of people in this thread claiming that I knew nothing at all about science.I think you will get nowhere at proving your point by insulting me.