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Author Topic:   A question for Athiests/Evolutionists. (re: How can one not belive in something greater than himself? et all)
AdminHambre
Inactive Member


Message 106 of 282 (162326)
11-22-2004 10:57 AM


Turning the Other Cheek Time
To everyone:
Try to discuss the topic without resorting to personal attacks and misrepresentations.
Adminssimo Hambre

  
sidelined
Member (Idle past 5908 days)
Posts: 3435
From: Edmonton Alberta Canada
Joined: 08-30-2003


Message 107 of 282 (162433)
11-22-2004 7:59 PM
Reply to: Message 103 by mike the wiz
11-22-2004 10:13 AM


Re: Any omnipotent being allows evil to exsit
anne
Would this not be evil? Would it be justice?
So then, even you can imagine a circumstance where an evil is just.
Justice does not enter into the equation.My depth of loss would eclipse my sense of mercy in this one instance.As I made mention before evil as an entity has not been my observation rather it is an action arrived at by choice and not a temptation presented by some entity.
That I would commit evil in this case is absolutely certain and it is a calculated decision I made many years ago.That I would be justified in doing so I do not believe to be true and in fact I would expect society to take the proper step of bringing me to justice.Regardless of the years of being a peaceful man I would shred any decency within me for this event and do so fully cognizant of the evil involved.
I am not proud of this stance but I do recognize this capacity in me and thankfully have not been placed in that horrible situation that would set this all in motion.

"Calling Atheism a religion is like calling bald a hair color."
--Don Hirschberg

This message is a reply to:
 Message 103 by mike the wiz, posted 11-22-2004 10:13 AM mike the wiz has not replied

  
TheClashFan
Inactive Member


Message 108 of 282 (162453)
11-22-2004 9:54 PM
Reply to: Message 104 by 1.61803
11-22-2004 10:25 AM


Re: Any omnipotent being allows evil to exsit
I have never heard of that before. I can offer no proof of the devil, nor can I offer proof of God, and I believe that is because if we had any true proof, we would all be pushed to choose God, which isn't the kind of love He's looking for, at least that's what I think.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 104 by 1.61803, posted 11-22-2004 10:25 AM 1.61803 has not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 119 by happy_atheist, posted 11-23-2004 7:22 AM TheClashFan has replied
 Message 125 by The Dread Dormammu, posted 11-23-2004 5:21 PM TheClashFan has replied

  
TheClashFan
Inactive Member


Message 109 of 282 (162454)
11-22-2004 10:02 PM
Reply to: Message 101 by happy_atheist
11-22-2004 5:04 AM


Re: Any omnipotent being allows evil to exsit
Something against the laws of physics? God was the first scientist, and therefore He created physics. Well, think of when people have little chance of surviving something. A number calculated by science if you will, with great odds against them. Even if they survive with seemingly little miraculousy, doesn't it seem amazing?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 101 by happy_atheist, posted 11-22-2004 5:04 AM happy_atheist has not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 113 by NosyNed, posted 11-22-2004 10:42 PM TheClashFan has replied

  
TheClashFan
Inactive Member


Message 110 of 282 (162457)
11-22-2004 10:13 PM
Reply to: Message 97 by CK
11-22-2004 2:34 AM


Re: Any omnipotent being allows evil to exsit
1. I am fourteen.
2. What example are you reffering to?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 97 by CK, posted 11-22-2004 2:34 AM CK has not replied

  
TheClashFan
Inactive Member


Message 111 of 282 (162458)
11-22-2004 10:17 PM
Reply to: Message 98 by CK
11-22-2004 2:35 AM


Re: Any omnipotent being allows evil to exsit
I don't mean that they cover miracles up, they rarely show good things that happen. Most of the time, you see on the news of crimes and tradgedies, not good things. Key word here is RARELY.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 98 by CK, posted 11-22-2004 2:35 AM CK has not replied

  
TheClashFan
Inactive Member


Message 112 of 282 (162459)
11-22-2004 10:23 PM
Reply to: Message 99 by Morte
11-22-2004 2:40 AM


Re: Any omnipotent being allows evil to exsit
In this day and age, it seems that a precious few people have a conscience. From your statement, you are one those few, and I bow to you for it. If someone dies, I belive that they have one last chance to choose God. If they miss it, it's their fault. Basicly, I am saying that evil and temptation are one in the same. By giving into temptation, we give into evil. That is why we have free will. We are tempted to do things which we can choose not to do. I really don't know if this is getting my point across...

This message is a reply to:
 Message 99 by Morte, posted 11-22-2004 2:40 AM Morte has not replied

  
NosyNed
Member
Posts: 8996
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 113 of 282 (162466)
11-22-2004 10:42 PM
Reply to: Message 109 by TheClashFan
11-22-2004 10:02 PM


Survival is amazing?
Even if they survive with seemingly little miraculousy, doesn't it seem amazing?
I don't know for sure what you mean by amazing. I think perhaps you use the word when something is highly improbable.
But highly improbable things happen every day. They don't happen as often as more probable things do of course but they happen.
There are millions and billions of different opportunities for things (of all sorts) to happen everyday. Therefore even improbable things happen now and then.
Isn't it amazing if you pick up the phone to call someone and a voice say "hello?" and it turns out to be the person you were going to call. You picked up the phone before it rang.
It has happened a handfull of times to me. I suspect it has to everyone (by the time they are as old as I am anyway). But it's not "amazing"; it is exactly what I expect to happen.
I phone some people 1,000's of times over a period of a decade or so. There is actually a fairly small window in a day when I might do that. The same applies the other way around. Therefore if we keep phoning over enough time it is bound to happen.
There are about 30,000 (or 50?) people killed in car incidents in the US every year. I'm going to guess that that means more than 15,000 accidents a year. With that number of things happening some of them simple MUST produce some unlikely events. It would be "amazing" if they didn't.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 109 by TheClashFan, posted 11-22-2004 10:02 PM TheClashFan has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 114 by TheClashFan, posted 11-22-2004 10:51 PM NosyNed has not replied

  
TheClashFan
Inactive Member


Message 114 of 282 (162470)
11-22-2004 10:51 PM
Reply to: Message 113 by NosyNed
11-22-2004 10:42 PM


Re: Survival is amazing?
I suppose now that miracles are seen by people who need them. For example, after 9/11 I am sure that many people found miracles because they needed them to reassure their faith. Now, I can assume that since athiests are..well athiests, they don't see miracles because they don't need them. Thank you people so much. This is what I look forward to after school, having intelligent conversations.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 113 by NosyNed, posted 11-22-2004 10:42 PM NosyNed has not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 117 by CK, posted 11-23-2004 5:37 AM TheClashFan has not replied
 Message 118 by sidelined, posted 11-23-2004 6:50 AM TheClashFan has replied

  
Phat
Member
Posts: 18262
From: Denver,Colorado USA
Joined: 12-30-2003
Member Rating: 1.1


Message 115 of 282 (162499)
11-23-2004 1:39 AM
Reply to: Message 16 by TheClashFan
11-19-2004 10:15 PM


Clash Fans thread synopsis
TheClashFan writes:
How can one not believe in something greater than himself? How can one go through life's difficulties and be unable to always know that at least one person loves you? At times, it is my only comfort knowing that God loves me, and I cannot understand how one can go through life without belief in something. Can anyone give me a good reason on why they do not believe in any omnipotent being or deity?
Asgara writes:
Over the years, as my original faith diminished, I have found that I am stronger than I ever thought I was. I feel like I am happier and better adjusted now than I ever was when I used the crutch of belief to get me through the bad times.
I might add that for some, religion is a crutch while for others such as myself, it is an anchor.
Sidelined writes:
I personally have been quite capable of dealing with life.
Its not the director of the dance nor the dancers...its the dance itself, right old chap? (Sidelined and I rarely see eye to eye but I like him!)
Clash writes:
Aren't either of you worried about OTHER things messing with your lives? Things that you may not be able to see or notice?
It really feels good to believe that an Omnipotant God, a gentle and trustworthy father figure, is on your side.
NosyNed writes:
There have been difficult times when it would have been nice to be able to believe in a big helper. From those I think I can understand the inclination to want to believe... that just isn't the way I think. I require some better reason than my own desires. I am much too aware of the history of such ideas throughout the world. There simply isn't any reason to believe in such an idea and there are many to not believe.
Unlike Ned, I have reasons for believing in an omnipotant and approachable God.
Ned has a point in that I can never prove my God to anyone. Both Ned and asgara use much more common and rational sense than I do.
CrashFan, I think that you know deep inside yourself what you actually believe. To me, there are two relationships in life. 1) With God. 2) With other people. God is very personal with me, and I have seen Him work in situations that otherwise never would have happened. It is good to explore how other people think and to have an open mind in these situations.
ClashFan writes:
It embarasses me greatly that men of my faith(Christianity) once slaughter innocent people because they would not convert.
I agree, but I would say that those men were not really Christians to begin with. A true Christian, influenced by the Holy Spirit would never do such a thing. There have been many throughout History who have called themselves Christians who are not.
As for the Demons, I will not say that they do not exist, for I also have had certain experiences in life that would suggest such a presence. You are from a Christian background, so might I suggest to you that it is better to focus on the power of God as Truth and Love and not to focus on the other vibes. They only have the power that we give them...they cannot harm you without your permission.
Born2Preach writes:
I assume the 'other' power as you call it to be more likely to 'jump out' at theists than atheists, because revealing themselves wouldn't do much good to keep the deception of no God going, now would it?
Wow! One of the most astute things that you have ever said! I am impressed! Good point!
Clash writes:
I know that most people reading these posts do think that I'm a nut, but I could just bet that if you looked through your life hard enough, no matter your religion or lack of religion, you will find something unexplained that has affected you.
Clash, I don't think that you are mad at all out of norm for someone your age. I had lots of hangups and emotional boilovers when I was younger. I still do, but I have learned how to cope and overcome them.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 16 by TheClashFan, posted 11-19-2004 10:15 PM TheClashFan has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 129 by TheClashFan, posted 11-23-2004 8:44 PM Phat has not replied

  
YesthisisTrue 
Inactive Member


Message 116 of 282 (162538)
11-23-2004 5:16 AM
Reply to: Message 105 by happy_atheist
11-22-2004 10:48 AM


Re: Any omnipotent being allows evil to exsit
Doesn't detract from the point that I was making...that what was offered as miracles are in fact not good examples.
I agree, but I interpreted what you said to be suggesting that because miracles don't occur today as they have over periods in the past, then that's proof that huge miraculous events NEVER occured.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 105 by happy_atheist, posted 11-22-2004 10:48 AM happy_atheist has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 120 by happy_atheist, posted 11-23-2004 7:38 AM YesthisisTrue has not replied

  
CK
Member (Idle past 4127 days)
Posts: 3221
Joined: 07-04-2004


Message 117 of 282 (162548)
11-23-2004 5:37 AM
Reply to: Message 114 by TheClashFan
11-22-2004 10:51 PM


Re: Survival is amazing?
quote:
Thank you people so much. This is what I look forward to after school, having intelligent conversations.
Hey crash - don't worry if some of us seems a bit harsh at times, this is like our wrestling ring. Pop over to the coffee shop if you get the time and tell us a bit more about yourself and your hobbies.
best
Charles

This message is a reply to:
 Message 114 by TheClashFan, posted 11-22-2004 10:51 PM TheClashFan has not replied

  
sidelined
Member (Idle past 5908 days)
Posts: 3435
From: Edmonton Alberta Canada
Joined: 08-30-2003


Message 118 of 282 (162562)
11-23-2004 6:50 AM
Reply to: Message 114 by TheClashFan
11-22-2004 10:51 PM


Re: Survival is amazing?
TheClashFan
I just wanted to take this time to introduce an article on miracles I read and see what you thought of it. From this website http://www.skeptic.com/eskeptic05-04-04.html#Freeman
In the last issue of the New York Review of Books, Freeman Dyson reviewed a book entitled simply "Debunked!" by Georges Charpak and Henri Broch (Johns Hopkins University, 136 pages, $25), in which he ends by saying he concludes that despite over a century of failed experiments and lack of empirical evidence, there are valid reasons to believe in the paranormal. This, despite his cogent summary of Littlewood's Law of Miracles--defined as: "In the course of any normal person's life, miracles happen at a rate of roughly one per month." Dyson explains:
"During the time that we are awake and actively engaged in living our lives, roughly for eight hours each day, we see and hear things happening at a rate of about one per second. So the total number of events that happen to us is about thirty thousand per day, or about a million per month. With few exceptions, these events are not miracles because they are insignificant. The chance of a miracle is about one per million events. Therefore we should expect about one miracle to happen, on the average, every month."
Jim Holt, in the New York Times ("Throw Away That Astrological Chart April 29, 2004; Page D10) offered another calculation on miracles:
"Have you ever had a premonition? Did you once have, say, a passing thought about an uncle, only to receive a phone call five minutes later informing you that the beloved relative had suddenly dropped dead? If so, this probably struck you as eerie. You might have vaguely believed it was ESP.
Was it? Let's see. Suppose you know of 10 people who die each year. Furthermore, suppose you think of each of them once annually. There are 105,120 five-minute intervals in a year. A simple probability calculation shows that there is a 10 in 105,120 likelihood that you will, as a matter of chance, have a thought about one of these people in the five minutes before you hear of his death. Multiply this likelihood by the population of the U.S. (about a quarter of a billion people) and you find that roughly 25,000 people each year--about 70 a day -- will have a "psychic" experience of this sort. In fact, it's pure coincidence."
Despite this cogent explanation of miracles, Dyson concludes his review:
"The question of the proper limits of science has a strong connection with the possible existence of paranormal phenomena. Charpak and Broch and I agree that attempts to study extrasensory perception and telepathy using the methods of science have failed. Charpak and Broch say that since extrasensory perception and telepathy cannot be studied scientifically, they do not exist. Their conclusion is clear and logical, but I do not accept it because I am not a reductionist. I claim that paranormal phenomena may really exist but may not be accessible to scientific investigation. This is a hypothesis. I am not saying that it is true, only that it is tenable, and to my mind plausible.
The hypothesis that paranormal phenomena are real but lie outside the limits of science is supported by a great mass of evidence. The evidence has been collected by the Society for Psychical Research in Britain and by similar organizations in other countries. The journal of the London society is full of stories of remarkable events in which ordinary people appear to possess paranormal abilities. The evidence is entirely anecdotal. It has nothing to do with science, since it cannot be reproduced under controlled conditions. But the evidence is there. The members of the society took great trouble to interview first-hand witnesses as soon as possible after the events, and to document the stories carefully. One fact that emerges clearly from the stories is that paranormal events occur, if they occur at all, only when people are under stress and experiencing strong emotion. This fact would immediately explain why paranormal phenomena are not observable under the conditions of a well-controlled scientific experiment. Strong emotion and stress are inherently incompatible with controlled scientific procedures. In a typical card-guessing experiment, the participants may begin the session in a high state of excitement and record a few high scores, but as the hours pass, and boredom replaces excitement, the scores decline to the 20 percent expected from random chance.
I am suggesting that paranormal mental abilities and scientific method may be complementary. The word "complementary" is a technical term introduced into physics by Niels Bohr. It means that two descriptions of nature may both be valid but cannot be observed simultaneously. The classic example of complementarity is the dual nature of light. In one experiment light is seen to behave as a continuous wave, in another experiment it behaves as a swarm of particles, but we cannot see the wave and the particles in the same experiment. Complementarity in physics is an established fact. The extension of the idea of complementarity to mental phenomena is pure speculation. But I find it plausible that a world of mental phenomena should exist, too fluid and evanescent to be grasped with the cumbersome tools of science.
I should here declare my personal interest in the matter. One of my grandmothers was a notorious and successful faith healer. One of my cousins was for many years the editor of the Journal of the Society for Psychical Research. Both these ladies were well educated, highly intelligent, and fervent believers in paranormal phenomena. They may have been deluded, but neither of them was a fool. Their beliefs were based on personal experience and careful scrutiny of evidence. Nothing that they believed was incompatible with science."
Here is the letter I sent to the New York Review of Books in response to Dyson:
To the editor:
In his otherwise well-crafted review of Georges Charpak and Henri Broch's Debunked! ESP, Telekinesis, Other Pseudoscience ("One in a Million," Volume 51, Number 5), after reviewing the century-long history of failed attempts to build a scientific case for the paranormal, Freeman Dyson ends with a risibly ridiculous plea for openness to the paranormal because he is not a reductionist, because his grandmother was a faith healer and his cousin edits the Journal of Psychical Review, and because anecdotal evidence gathered by the Society for Psychical Research and other such organizations convinces him that under certain conditions (e.g., stress), some people sometimes exhibit some paranormal powers, unless they are placed in controlled scientific conditions, in which case the powers mysteriously disappear. I expected more from a scientist of Dyson's caliber. He should know that anecdotes do not make a science, and that ten anecdotes are no better than one, and a hundred anecdotes are no better than ten. Anecdotes may lead us to a research program, but the only way to find out if the anecdotes represent a real phenomenon or not is controlled experimental tests. Psi phenomena have now been subjected to rigorous scientific experiments for over a century (as Dyson notes), and the results are unequivocal: psychic power is a chimera.
So whence does Dyson's plea come? I suspect it is the same place that leads him to make statements like this, from his 1979 book Disturbing the Universe: "As we look out into the universe and identify the many accidents of physics and astronomy that have worked to our benefit, it almost seems as if the universe must in some sense have known that we were coming." His quasi-scientific attempts to reconcile science and religion, and to bring a form of nonmaterialistic transcendency into science, in fact, even earned him in 1997 a $964,000 Templeton Prize. Mind you, lots of people hold conflicting and often contradictory beliefs in their logic-tight compartments, primarily, I think, because they have not thought long and hard about the incompatibility problem. Dyson, however, does recognize the problem, but he wiggles around it by invoking Bohr's principle of complementarity where, for example, light can be both wave and particle. I'm sorry, but the principle does not apply to the paranormal (or to politics either, where Bohr tried to apply it). Either people can read other people's minds (or the backs of ESP cards), or they can't. Science has more than adequately demonstrated that they can't. That's the end of the story. And being a holist instead of a reductionist, being related to psychics, or reading about weird things that happen to people, does not change this simple scientific fact.
Michael Shermer Publisher, Skeptic magazine, columnist, Scientific American

This message is a reply to:
 Message 114 by TheClashFan, posted 11-22-2004 10:51 PM TheClashFan has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 128 by TheClashFan, posted 11-23-2004 8:37 PM sidelined has replied

  
happy_atheist
Member (Idle past 4914 days)
Posts: 326
Joined: 08-21-2004


Message 119 of 282 (162568)
11-23-2004 7:22 AM
Reply to: Message 108 by TheClashFan
11-22-2004 9:54 PM


Re: Any omnipotent being allows evil to exsit
Most of us have undeniable proof that our parents exist, yet that doesn't demean our love for them. Knowledge of existence in no way forces love, but it does make love possible.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 108 by TheClashFan, posted 11-22-2004 9:54 PM TheClashFan has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 127 by TheClashFan, posted 11-23-2004 8:24 PM happy_atheist has replied

  
happy_atheist
Member (Idle past 4914 days)
Posts: 326
Joined: 08-21-2004


Message 120 of 282 (162573)
11-23-2004 7:38 AM
Reply to: Message 116 by YesthisisTrue
11-23-2004 5:16 AM


Re: Any omnipotent being allows evil to exsit
Oh, no I wasn't trying to do that. Just to point out the difference between what miracle was then, and what it has become now. We understand the motions of the planets almost perfectly, so if the sun stood still in the sky it would be truly against anything we would expect to happen. Someone surviving an accident, while unlikely in any one instance, becomes almost certain to occur somewhere at sometime given the huge number of accidents as Ned explained (much better than I).

This message is a reply to:
 Message 116 by YesthisisTrue, posted 11-23-2004 5:16 AM YesthisisTrue has not replied

  
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