Athiests: What will you say if we've got it wrong?

scblack said:
No. I believe you are quite wrong in the literal truths bit.

Religious people believe there is a god - point blank, and will not entertain ANY OTHER thought.

Techno is actually entertaining the thought that he and other Atheists may be wrong. Hence the thread exists at all. Not point blank.
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That's pretty much exactly what i was saying. Both sides won't concede because they believe in either one or the other. Even Richard Dawkins concedes we may be wrong (nothing can be absolutely proven wrong) but there is overwhelming evidence that we are not. Don't really understand what you are getting at:(
 
flying high dh killer said:
That's pretty much exactly what i was saying. Both sides won't concede because they believe in either one or the other. Even Richard Dawkins concedes we may be wrong (nothing can be absolutely proven wrong) but there is overwhelming evidence that we are not. Don't really understand what you are getting at:(
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Did you actually read my post?:confused:

I have said that Techno, an atheist, WILL entertain the thought that he is wrong. THAT IS THE POINT OF THE THREAD.

I have NOT said that both sides will not concede. I said christians will not concede.

What post were you reading, and what is so hard to understand?
 
Hey, any religious people out there who have gone from being atheist to being religious?

What made you change sides?

Oh, and Whitey, thanks for not "forcing" your religion on me!;) But I still would like a really clear-cut reason as to why YOU would like to convert ME. No need to talk about jesus/god's sacrifice and love and such for me, or how if I don't, I'm up for eternal damnation and the like...

As in, what do YOU get out of it? You don't know me (apart from our brief interaction on the web), we've never met, we have no history, we wouldn't know each other on the street... Why do you want to convert me? Why don't you say "ah well, Techno's gonna be roastin' in hell like a hot weenie"?
 
scblack said:
Did you actually read my post?:confused:

I have said that Techno, an atheist, WILL entertain the thought that he is wrong. THAT IS THE POINT OF THE THREAD.

I have NOT said that both sides will not concede. I said christians will not concede.

What post were you reading, and what is so hard to understand?
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I was originally referring to thecat who said "what if both are right?" and then proceeded to quote quantum theory. I answered this by saying that this can not possibly be the case. By saying 'literal truths' i was inferring that both are theories in their own right that could not possibly coexist and that no atheist or believer would agree that both may 'coexist' depending on what you believe.

It had nothing to do with entertaining the thought that atheism is wrong. As i said before there is always the possiblity that it could be wrong as nothing can be completely disproven. I also completely agree that christians and other faiths for that matter will not concede they are wrong. This is because their beliefs are 'faith' based and would not stand up at all to the sceintific investigation.

Sorry for the confusion.
 
flying high dh killer said:
I was originally referring to thecat who said "what if both are right?" and then proceeded to quote quantum theory. I answered this by saying that this can not possibly be the case. By saying 'literal truths' i was inferring that both are theories in their own right that could not possibly coexist and that no atheist or believer would agree that both may 'coexist' depending on what you believe.

It had nothing to do with entertaining the thought that atheism is wrong. As i said before there is always the possiblity that it could be wrong as nothing can be completely disproven. I also completely agree that christians and other faiths for that matter will not concede they are wrong. This is because their beliefs are 'faith' based and would not stand up at all to the sceintific investigation.

Sorry for the confusion.
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No probs.:)
 
well

It is said in the philosophical school of Vedanta that due to such finite things as sense perception, memory, mind, language and the dualistic nature of the relative reality in which we operate; it is basically impossible for us to determine the true nature of Absolute reality through the senses.

Therefore, to advance our understanding of what Consciousness is we are advised to withdraw the senses and contemplate on the non-dual reality of existence-consciousness-bliss.

God is said to be eternal and basically has no action to perform as it actionless, doerless, formless, nameless, dimensionless - existing beyond the limited terms of reference for what we determine is real. (In an emperical and relative form. God is an Absolute and has nothing to do with mundane reality).

For something to be 'real' it needs to be beginningless and endless. For within the purvue of Vedanta, for something to be real it must be eternal. And for something to be eternal it cannot have taken birth.

Our misinterpretation of the facts or 'erroneous perception', is due the dross which covers our hearts and minds. It doesn't matter what we call God, or what we blame God for (not)doing. The point is, as soon as we use language to describe the indescribable we are limiting 'its' limitless potential.

All we really need to do is look for commonality. If you can see the divine spark that is the core of you in everyone you meet - the taxi driver, your mum, the smackie on the corner then you will find God. If you can see in everyone and everything that which brings joy to your own life. If you can see in all women your mother or daughter, and in all men your father or son, the perhaps there is hope for a world built on trust, love, respect and tolerance.

God dwells within you as you.


OM Purnamidah Purnamidam Purnat Purnamodatchyate
Purnasya Purnamadayah Purnamevavashishyate

Om Shantih Shantih Shanti

If the full is taken from the full
Still only the full remains

Peace be within us all
 
Techno Destructo said:
Hey, any religious people out there who have gone from being atheist to being religious?

What made you change sides?

Oh, and Whitey, thanks for not "forcing" your religion on me!;) But I still would like a really clear-cut reason as to why YOU would like to convert ME. No need to talk about jesus/god's sacrifice and love and such for me, or how if I don't, I'm up for eternal damnation and the like...

As in, what do YOU get out of it? You don't know me (apart from our brief interaction on the web), we've never met, we have no history, we wouldn't know each other on the street... Why do you want to convert me? Why don't you say "ah well, Techno's gonna be roastin' in hell like a hot weenie"?
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Funny that you mentioned this, because i was thinking about that at work and i was talking to my boss about it. Hes orthodox and my argument to him was that religion is bullshit because the notion of god is crap, whereas he said that the typical perception of religion is god, which isnt so. you can be religious but that doesnt mean you have to believe in god, the belief of a higher power or even in doing good deeds and living well is the message of religion and therefore believing in "good" in all its aspects in infact for lack of a better word, religion. Living a good life, which doesnt extend to believing in god, cannot be considered wrong because living a good life is a key fundamental to nearly all religions. the belief in god is not a neccesary factor to religion, people only assume this because of the stereotype of religion being synonomous with god.

These are his views and he is still religious, so religion is your interpretation of it really. just some food for thought.

satattwa said:
It is said in the philosophical school of Vedanta that due to such finite things as sense perception, memory, mind, language and the dualistic nature of the relative reality in which we operate; it is basically impossible for us to determine the true nature of Absolute reality through the senses.

Therefore, to advance our understanding of what Consciousness is we are advised to withdraw the senses and contemplate on the non-dual reality of existence-consciousness-bliss.

God is said to be eternal and basically has no action to perform as it actionless, doerless, formless, nameless, dimensionless - existing beyond the limited terms of reference for what we determine is real. (In an emperical and relative form. God is an Absolute and has nothing to do with mundane reality).

For something to be 'real' it needs to be beginningless and endless. For within the purvue of Vedanta, for something to be real it must be eternal. And for something to be eternal it cannot have taken birth.

Our misinterpretation of the facts or 'erroneous perception', is due the dross which covers our hearts and minds. It doesn't matter what we call God, or what we blame God for (not)doing. The point is, as soon as we use language to describe the indescribable we are limiting 'its' limitless potential.

All we really need to do is look for commonality. If you can see the divine spark that is the core of you in everyone you meet - the taxi driver, your mum, the smackie on the corner then you will find God. If you can see in everyone and everything that which brings joy to your own life. If you can see in all women your mother or daughter, and in all men your father or son, the perhaps there is hope for a world built on trust, love, respect and tolerance.

God dwells within you as you.


OM Purnamidah Purnamidam Purnat Purnamodatchyate
Purnasya Purnamadayah Purnamevavashishyate

Om Shantih Shantih Shanti

If the full is taken from the full
Still only the full remains

Peace be within us all
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ahhhhhh yer what he said.........................wow
 
Techno, I would like to convert you to being a Christian because I think that my views about God are right and I do give a crap that someone whom I don't know might be wrong. I'm trying to separate it from the whole Heaven/Hell thing and say what I get out of it... It's not easy because to an extent they are totally interlinked.

Anyhow I will admit to being soft and that I hate the thought that there are people... You know what? Bugger it! You can't take it away from me believing in heaven and hell and I don't want to see anybody, whoever they are, go to hell. Also the fact that God cares about it too and he has told us to go and tell everybody.

I know it sounds like a big scare tactic. But I wouldn't try to convert anybody by saying "Oi! you're going off to Hell so you'd better believe in God or he'll slam you!" I try to go with the angle that there is a God and he does give a stuff what you do and what you think. Then say that he wants to have relationship with you but he can't because he is perfect and WE are not. That's why Jesus died so that we can be perfect before God.

Now seriously, if it all actually exists the way the bible says, how would you tell people about it without scaring people into it? It's bloody hard. Even so, I don't believe because I'm scared of going to hell. I believe because I find the Bible to be inescapably truthful. And I see plenty of evidence for him in my life.

I don't believe the creation story in Genisis is intended to be literal and give account of how, when, for how long God did his thing. The entire story is there to show you about God. Who he is and what he is like and what he can do. It's written originally for people who have no idea about dinosaurs and what not. If you look at it from that point of view I am yet to see what's wrong with it. I'm happy for people to tell me what is wrong with it. (Yes i've read the rest of this thread).

Before anyone says, I am not on a high horse or looking down at you all from holy on high because I am now perfect in God's eyes. That's because I believe that I am generally a worse person then many of you and it's ONLY Jesus who makes me right with God because I fucked it all up! And continue to do so...

edit: sorry for the long post.
 
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Sorry for posting twice in a row but this is something that I have just been thinking about.

It was mentioned before about if you grab a handful of sand and dump it on a target then one grain will definitely hit the bullseye. O.k. so that says that there is a chance for the Earth to form all by its self to what it is today by big bang theory. I was wondering though, sure one hits the exact bullseye but there are a heck of a lot that come pretty close right? I mean some are right next to it, just not quite there. So if our solar system construction, distance to the sun, size of our planet, composition of our atmosphere and the Earth itself (i.e. the ground), maybe even the location of our solar system in relation to the rest of its surroundings are all just right for the development of life and humans there must be a heck of a lot of other examples that came pretty close but didn't quite work out the way it did here, right?

O.k. So where are they? They should be fairly close shouldn't they? Or maybe we just haven't discovered them yet? (or have they and I didn't know about it?) According to the sand throwing example all the ones that came close should be right near each other or am I thinking about this the wrong way and taking it too literally?
 
whywalkwhenucanroll said:
or am I thinking about this the wrong way and taking it too literally?
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Pretty much. I'm not an astrophysics type, but there are a lot of stars out there, and we have only looked at a small fraction of those close to us. Not all of them have planets, and not all the planets are in the right orbital zone with respect to their sun.

Don't forget that stars in distant galaxies are a loooong way away, so we can only really look at nearby ones in much detail.

Even if there is another planet out there with life, if the life started after us, they might not make any kind of "noise" that we'll notice for quite a while. Remember, it has only been the last hundred years or so that we've been making noise in the radio spectrum that could travel interstellar distances.

So just because we haven't found anyone else out there, doesn't mean that there isn't more life out there somewhere.
 
^^Agreed.

A couple of quick things I'd also like to say:

The Death and resurrection of Jesus was mentioned before. Someone asked whats so good about Jesus dying and coming back to life again? Even the Bible says that several people did that.

True there were a number of people who were brought back to life but there are two things that make Jesus special here. 1st is that on all other accounted occasions someone brought the person back to life. Be it Elijah, Paul, Peter or even Jesus him self. Jesus is the only person who did it on his own. I can find verses to support this if needs be. 2nd is that Jesus is the only person according to Christian beliefs who didn't deserve death. Everyone else did/does.

Also it was said how can we believe in a God who lets all this bad stuff happen? eg Tsunami's?

This is a big question and I don't have much time now but I'll type more tomorrow. I don't claim to have a full understanding of God's will and why he does things but from what I know this is the Christian belief, in short:

In Genesis, People, who were perfect, sinned for the first time. This is known as the fall, and all creation fell with them. The result is that people can no longer be with God cos he is perfect. But its not just people, the Devil is in the world also and the combination of Him and human sin is destroying the order that God set up. This includes physical creation. The perfect balance is now tainted so bad things can happen.

But there is more to it then that. In the example of the Tsunami is it God's fault that rich countries have not supported poorer people and set up early the warning systems that have been around for years? Is it God's fault that these countries have been allowed to become so poor? Is it God's fault that they chose to live on a beech in an area that I'm pretty sure is known as a moderate to high risk of being hit by Tsunamis? (O.k. they probably didn't know better there). Yes God allowed it to happen but c'mon, we wern't exactly innocent.

Ok so God doesn't stop every bad thing from happening but he sent his son to die for the sins that screwed up his creation. If that's not love I don't know what is.
 
whywalkwhenucanroll said:
Ok so God doesn't stop every bad thing from happening but he sent his son to die for the sins that screwed up his creation. If that's not love I don't know what is.
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How about not condemning people to eternal punishment for sins committed over a maybe 80 year life span? Doesn't sound very loving to me.
 
Binaural said:
How about not condemning people to eternal punishment for sins committed over a maybe 80 year life span? Doesn't sound very loving to me.
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Yeah, and sending rain for something like 40 days and 40 nights to drown sinners out. Sounds a little harsh I think; He might need to see someone about anger control.
 
Just a quick aside from the circular argument going on here.

Anyone been watching "The Story of God" series being shown on Compass on the ABC on Sunday nights?

It's presented by porn moustached fanny-mechanic Lord Robert Winston and this coming Sunday's installment deals with the major monotheistic faiths i.e Judaism, Islam and Christianity.

Perhaps everyone who has contributed to this thread should make the effort to watch. I certainly found the first episode to be not only informative but entertaining, and I'm sure anyone with an interest in this topic (on either side of the argument) will feel the same.
 
believe what you believe, but reading to the 100th post in this thread i figured this is the most useless argument that no one can win, cause athiasts(sp) cant prove to religiuse people that there is no god, and religius people cant prove to athiasts that there is. GO RIDE YOUR BIKE
 
whywalkwhenucanroll said:
Ok so God doesn't stop every bad thing from happening but he sent his son to die for the sins that screwed up his creation. If that's not love I don't know what is.
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If he is such a top bloke, why did he send his son to die?? Generally if you make the mistake you accept the blame yourself, well at least a moral person does. A coward would send there son to front up for their mistakes.
 
Ruckus Lord and Binaural you have very good points. Although I'm not sure what you meant was special about 80 years.

It can be a hard thing to get your head around because it just sounds wrong. However God doesn't actually have to save anybody at all, what did humans ever do for God? Indeed what can we? Christians believe that there is no one up to God's standard, never has been, never will be (except of course Jesus). So if God is perfect and just then he is obliged to punish for sins. You wouldn't think it was just to let someone like Hitler go free with there being no punishment at all would you? My point is that this means that God is in fact perfectly right in slamming sinners, even for little sins, as bad as it sounds. Sin is like being pregnant, you either are or you aren't. There's no grey area. All of that makes God incredibly loving that He would even give a stuff about us. Why should he? And as for sending the only son you ever had down from holy on high to live among all us bad people and then have him die one of the most barbaric deaths ever conceived with the weight of everyone's sin on his shoulders. God made Jesus sin to take away ours. Sounds loving to me.
 
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TonyG said:
If he is such a top bloke, why did he send his son to die?? Generally if you make the mistake you accept the blame yourself, well at least a moral person does. A coward would send there son to front up for their mistakes.
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Yes. But the punishment for sin is death. Do you want to accept that? Looking at it from the perspective that we're not meant to die and death just sux. God isn't the one who stuffed up, people are. Sending his son is the only way to redeem us. You can actually say that God himself died for us.
 
whywalkwhenucanroll said:
Yes. But the punishment for sin is death. Do you want to accept that? Looking at it from the perspective that we're not meant to die and death just sux. God isn't the one who stuffed up, people are. Sending his son is the only way to redeem us. You can actually say that God himself died for us.
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Do I accept that the punishment for sin is death?? NO that is barbaric. Only a person of very low moral standing would believe that. Which scares me the most with relegious political leaders. It is thinking like this that leads to wars. We, as in the human race, need to be accomodating and forgiving. We all know what right and wrong is, and as we evolve we are starting to realsie what adequate punishemnts are. These ideals will change.
Just for the record mate, I dont hate god. I dont believe in him at all, but I absolutly dispise what you and that bible consider moral. I think it is the most evil book written.
 
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