If Romney gets in which country will America start a war with next?

[JohnMichael]

Bump.

Bump. You demand answers from me faster than you give them. I am finished here.

[RGA]

The problem with faith is that it leads to killing, intolerance and hate. The 9/11 bombers had faith - about as much faith as you could ever have if you're willing to strap a giant gas bomb onto your back and fly yourself into a building. The Westboro Baptist Church folks have plenty of faith too - so much so that they're willing to take on America's churches for not being faithful enough.

The onus is to prove a positive not a negative; therefore, the religious have to prove there is a God.

But science and the arts have disproven numerous religious teachings.

Earth is not the center of the universe (or flat)
Evolution is fact - creationism is bogus claptrap
Noah could not have put two of every animal on the boat
Dinosaurs did not live with man
Dinosaurs were real
The earth is billions of years old and not 6000 years old.

The sky God is illogical on numerous fronts but the "I want to believe in God and so should you because I believe" is dangerous. As you can see from all the people who take it too far "Westboo Baptist Church" types.

Let's start with the logic faults of any sky god. In every case they are said to be:

Omnipotent: All Powerful

Omniscience: Universal or Complete knowledge.

So this is God (or Q from Star Trek)

Free Will:
Galations 5:13
You, my brothers, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature; rather, serve one another in love.

(Might be worthy to note at this point, that I discovered a contradiction in the bible while researching... see the galations 5 text above, and compare to Ephesians 1:11, "In him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will". Which appears to be stating we don't have free will, but are bound by the "grand scheme" that god has put together.)

Omnipotence:
Matthew 19:26
Jesus looked at them and said, "With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible."

Luke 1:37
For nothing is impossible with God.

Omniscience
Psalm 147:4-5
He telleth the number of the stars; he calleth them all by their names. Great is our Lord, and of great power: his understanding is infinite.

Taking these scriptures into account, consider the following statements:

1) If god is Omnipotent, can he make an object so heavy he cannot lift it himself?

2) Free will: If god is Omniscient, than he knows your future. If he knows your future, than it is already set in stone (if your future changed, god would cease to be omniscient). Therefore Free will cannot exist... Which can't be true, since the bible is the infallible word of god, and says we are created free.

3) If god is all knowing, and all powerful, and the creator of all... than he must know who is doomed to hell before they are born. Knowing who is destined for hell, how can he offer a free pass to heaven by believing in Jesus? Surely he knew what you would decide before you were given the option. Therefore, choosing to believe or not to believe is not your choice, but is predestined before you were born. Your ticket has already been written, so don't sweat it... right?

4) If god knows who is doomed to hell before they are born and allows them to be created anyway, than he is sentencing people to eternal damnation for sins never committed... If people are born without their futures etched in stone, than god cannot see the future.

5) If god is Omniscient, knowing what will happen in the future, than he can not use his omnipotence to change the outcome... As he is powerless to change the outcome of future events, he is not Omnipotent.

The conclusion of comparing these scriptures, versus some objective thinking leads to a number of conclusions:

1) God, bound by his own omniscience is completely powerless to do anything but watch events unfold.

2) Since I've established taking parts of the bible figuratively unravles the entire religion itself, the bible is not the true word of god, as god is perfect.

-or-

3) The Christian god can not exist the way he has been presented.

None of these conclusions look good for believers. It pretty much establishes that Christianity is wrong.

Don't feel left out quite yet mormons, jewish, muslim and hindus.... I hope to have enough time to take an objective look at your dogma and religious texts as well! Evidence in Scripture disproving god once and for all, page 1

This is just one aspect as to why Sky Gods don't work. The reason they were "invented" to replace the Roman/Greek Gods is because people saw the logical problems. Gods are perfect infallible, omnipotent and omniscient but in those days Zeus would be mad at Aphrodite or Venus and one would tell the people to do This while the other God would tell them to do That. People figured out that if they were truly perfect they would always AGREE on everything because there would only be ever one correct course of action.

The lack of logic of the Greek Gods (and the fact that science told them things about their world) the realized that faith in this stuff was misplaced. The one God idea is "better" logically since there is one voice and "one" way - but as can be seen from the above it is impossible and thus PROVEN wrong that God could be Omnipotent or Omniscient - so if God is up there and you want to believe he she it is up there then you have to also believe he is fallible - which you're not allowed to believe. And if you believe in this in spite of the logical impossibility then I'm afraid you're a lune who should be in a rubber room. The fact that 80%+ of the population believes in this nutty stuff doesn't validate the point. Most people believe wrong stuff all the time - which is why Republicans get elected.

[Feanor]

"The problem with faith ..." The problem with it is that it doesn't demand empirical evidence or accept rational argument.

So, Richard, I suggest you & I give it a rest for now.

[frenchmon]

The problem with faith is that it leads to killing, intolerance and hate. The 9/11 bombers had faith - about as much faith as you could ever have if you're willing to strap a giant gas bomb onto your back and fly yourself into a building. The Westboro Baptist Church folks have plenty of faith too - so much so that they're willing to take on America's churches for not being faithful enough.

Yeah, but faith in what is the question. Faith from a wrong foundation is misguided faith.

The onus is to prove a positive not a negative; therefore, the religious have to prove there is a God.

Prove it to who RCA?

But science and the arts have disproven numerous religious teachings..

Example please.

Earth is not the center of the universe (or flat)
Evolution is fact - creationism is bogus claptrap
Noah could not have put two of every animal on the boat
Dinosaurs did not live with man
Dinosaurs were real
The earth is billions of years old and not 6000 years old.

So tell me how they proved these wrong before I answer.

The sky God is illogical on numerous fronts but the "I want to believe in God and so should you because I believe" is dangerous. As you can see from all the people who take it too far "Westboo Baptist Church" types.

The Sky God? You lost me here. But again, why base all of christianity on what Westboo does or say?

Let's start with the logic faults of any sky god. In every case they are said to be:

Omnipotent: All Powerful

Omniscience: Universal or Complete knowledge.

So this is God (or Q from Star Trek)

What on earth are you talking about? What is a sky God?

Free Will:
Galations 5:13
You, my brothers, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature; rather, serve one another in love.

(Might be worthy to note at this point, that I discovered a contradiction in the bible while researching... see the galations 5 text above, and compare to Ephesians 1:11, "In him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will". Which appears to be stating we don't have free will, but are bound by the "grand scheme" that god has put together.)

RGA....you have it wrong. You need to read in context. The author of Galatians is talking about Jewish converts and Gentiles believers who where deceived into going back to the old ways of the Mosaic law/Torah. Christ death freed Israel from the Torah, thus making no distinction in Jews and Gentiles. So they where totally free from the Mosaic law....and a new covenant was ushered in... It has nothing to do with the Ephesians passage which is stating that believers now have an inheritance in Christs according to the will of God, which has always been.

RGA, I think I will stop it there. I would like to see your response to the above before I continue on....if you care to continue on. Because I am sure you have taken everything else out of context as well.

Infact...if you want to continue this and not trash the intent of this thread any more, perhaps JM can move us to another section?

[Sir Terrence the Terrible]

Yeah, but faith in what is the question. Faith from a wrong foundation is misguided faith.



Prove it to who RCA?



Example please.



So tell me how they proved these wrong before I answer.



The Sky God? You lost me here. But again, why base all of christianity on what Westboo does or say?



What on earth are you talking about? What is a sky God?



RGA....you have it wrong. You need to read in context. The author of Galatians is talking about Jewish converts and Gentiles believers who where deceived into going back to the old ways of the Mosaic law/Torah. Christ death freed Israel from the Torah, thus making no distinction in Jews and Gentiles. So they where totally free from the Mosaic law....and a new covenant was ushered in... It has nothing to do with the Ephesians passage which is stating that believers now have an inheritance in Christs according to the will of God, which has always been.

RGA, I think I will stop it there. I would like to see your response to the above before I continue on....if you care to continue on. Because I am sure you have taken everything else out of context as well.

Infact...if you want to continue this and not trash the intent of this thread any more, perhaps JM can move us to another section?

Frenchy, you are casting pearls before a swine here. RGA does not like religion, does not believe in God, and takes 300,000 words to say what he can say in 10.

By continuing to engage with RGA, you just give him a full platform to post his ignorance and lack of comprehension regarding the Bible.

Personally, I think we should all eat Barbeque, drink beer, have a group hug, and sing kumbaya in four part harmony. Wait, RGA can't participate in that.......

[frenchmon]

Frenchy, you are casting pearls before a swine here. RGA does not like religion, does not believe in God, and takes 300,000 words to say what he can say in 10.

By continuing to engage with RGA, you just give him a full platform to post his ignorance and lack of comprehension regarding the Bible.

Personally, I think we should all eat Barbeque, drink beer, have a group hug, and sing kumbaya in four part harmony. Wait, RGA can't participate in that.......

Yeah....I believe you are correct here....I will stop here....lets get this thread back to politics.....But Hyfi is correct...you sort of slow down and take a look. Rubber necking.

[RGA]

I'll be the first to admit that I am not as up on the Bible as some but that's like saying I'm not as up on Lord of the Rings novels or Beowulf as some English professors. Since none of the three should be used as "evidence" or "proof" of anything it isn't really in play. Others such as Richard Dawkins grew up Catholic, know the Bible as well as it can be known is smarter than everyone on this board and is much better at ripping down this dumb religion from Bible verse than I.

If you don't know what the term Sky God means read some books. If you believe the earth is 6000 years old and want proof otherwise - read some science books. If you want to know that evolution is in fact a FACT read some science books not religious crazies who don't understand what evolution actually is - we don't come from monkeys - now you do some reading, Start with the God Delusion since it's written for the Layman and is about as spoon-fed as it gets although some find Dawkins a little insulting but if you set that aside and it's not a sin to "just read" a book that questions "God" then that's the place to start.

I am not anti-most people who believe by the way - I don't care that someone is religious - I have Mormon and Pastor friends but where the problem lies is in the belief running their life such that it ends up running mine and other non believers.

I am sure most Christians would not like their life run by Muslim doctrines in any way shape or form. When Bush attacks Iraq because "God told him to" that affects the entire country. Granted he may have just used that wording as propaganda to get Christian right on his side but still - it got some on his side or he would not have bothered to say it. That act affected the entire economy and killed lots of innocent people. And it affected more countries than just the USA and Iraq.

And that's the problem. The average Joe Christian frankly no one cares if you believe in God - believe away. Perfectly harmless upstanding individuals and if faith makes you happy and/or keeps you from committing crimes (as it does for some) then more power to the belief (yes I believe it is good for numerous people).

Even chucking science under the bus for the average person isn't a real problem but again it is a real problem when it affects me. Teaching intelligent design in Science class as a legit "theory" or not teaching evolution is hugely problematic. You want to Intelligent Design have it taught at Sunday School - leave science the hell alone.

[RGA]

Sir T

I find your form of intellectual dishonesty head scratching. You present intellectual ideas you have some understanding of the notion of test the beliefs of others. When someone says vinyl is better than CD you, more than most, took what they said and explored the technology and the lack of evidence and said technically CD should be superior to vinyl. You even went one further than that and actually auditioned the master tape, CD, and a vinyl pressing.

Then you chuck out your brain out the window researching the utter idiocy and illogic of "faith." Something which one bases their entire life and world view on is slightly more important than whether CD is better that vinyl.

And that's the problem with the word "faith"

There would be no problems if the word faith meant faith - but Christians and other religious followers don't see a difference between "Faith and Fact" To them faith is a fact. There is 100% a GOD who listens to them, there is 100% some sort of hell, there is 100% a heaven that only believers get to go to.

When one believes so strongly and adamantly that this "faith" is a fact then you get the likes of Westboro.

Of course 90% of Christians are not that adamant or extreme but it certainly is the case that most Christians are anti-gay, vote republican, and believe that RGA is going to hell for being Atheist. I am therefore "other" and "worse" than they merely because I don't believe. Now in everyday normal 2012 life this doesn't matter but it doesn't take much for the winds to change and I find myself in a concentration camp. And history is littered with the "other" being segregated for such things. The 90% follow the herd and certainly are not at the forefront of stopping gay bashing, or intelligent design in schools, or stem cell research etc. That passivity is a form of support.

Hold your "Sky God" (one God) to the standards of basic logic, sciences and reason. The wishful thinking "I hope there is a God" doesn't make it so. I have that wishful thinking too by the way - I would love for there to be a God. He sure goes out of His way for rational people NOT to believe.

[frenchmon]

Bump. You demand answers from me faster than you give them. I am finished here.

JM...im not perfect, and really don't see what the problem is in telling me what I missed seeing I dont know what I missed.....sorry.