Blind Faith (NOT A RELIGIOUS PISSING CONTEST)

[Whitedog]

I had to stop reading after the third post...

<<I dislike it when uber-religious people force it down my throat. For instance, they will not believe proven science, but they will believe a 2000 year old book that was written by 66 people <<am i right?>>. C'mon, those guys wrote what they wanted to, not the truth. I am not saying the bible is wrong, i am saying its not all right. >>

Forcing it down your throat is not right.. I agree with you. Most people just don't have the correct delivery methods..

&quot;Written by 66 people?&quot; You're criticizing what you don't know anything about. There ARE 66 books in the bible, however MANY of them were written by the same person. Moses for example wrote the first 5 books. Paul wrote the majority of the new testement.

You say, the bible is not the truth, then you say the bible is not wrong, but it not right...????

One Third of the Bible is prophetic. Yes. Meaning the writers are talking about events of the future. Why is this? It is God's way of showing that the words written in the bible are HIS words and NOT mans... because Man could not prophecize the amount of data the bible has written in it.

Has these bible prophecies been proven? Yes. Check out the dead sea scrolls... Amoung the dead sea scrolls are EVERY book of the old testement except Ester. Scrolls dated &quot;by scientist&quot; to be more than 2500 years old containing prophecies that occurred Hundreds of years later, just as the bible states. (Alexander the great for one)

Blind Faith... That's the basis of faith, but once you show God you DO have faith in him and believe, he is revealed to you, and thus your faith is not blind anymore.

 

[Athanasius]

Elledan:

There is evidence to support individual consciousness not located within, or springing from, the natural organism. I guess my question would be the same as the beloved Mr. Palco's: are you really searching for evidence?

I can post references to studies that indicate that consciousness may be non-local/non-physical in its core nature. Wil it prove it beyond a shadow of a doubt? No. But absolute proof is hard to establish in many cases.

Still, if you are interested, I can post some references that show that belief in a non-physical (and hence non-local in a physical sense) soul or consciousness.

These evidences show that faith is not &quot;blind,&quot; which is the main point of this thread. Are you interested? Perhaps the choice of faith is still an open question for you?

 

[Elledan]

<<There is evidence to support individual consciousness not located within, or springing from, the natural organism. I guess my question would be the same as the beloved Mr. Palco's: are you really searching for evidence?>>

I don't have any trouble with seeing 'consciousness' as a seperate part of the body (your body is only a tool). However, I do think that consciousness (and 'intelligence') is a result of the design of our brains, just look at dolphins: they have a similar shaped brain as Humans and they too show signs of self-awareness and 'intelligence', i.e. they can react on situations in a way we consider to be 'intelligent'.

As for whether I want to see evidence, yes, indeed. I'm a scientist after all and the word 'evidence' is sacred for us

I would like to add at this moment that I'm a Buddhist, so that's a reason why I don't see religion as an option. (Buddhism is _not_ a religion)

 

[MrPALCO]

<< As for whether I want to see evidence, yes, indeed. I'm a scientist after all and the word 'evidence' is sacred for us >>



Elledan.....I would sincerely encourage you to speak directly to God regarding these matters. He is more than willing to provide you with the evidence that you seek.





ed..spell

 

[Elledan]

<<Elledan.....I would sincerely encourage you to speak directly to God regarding these matters. He is more than willing to provide you with the evidence that you seek.>>

Which god? The Jewish, Christian or Muslim god? Or one of the many gods of Hinduism?

According to the followers of any of those believes, their belief is right and their god does exist, but the other gods are fake.

Ask it an Atheist and he'll laugh at you.

How does a god communicate with Humans? Since it can't talk directly because it isn't present on the earth (according to most believes), how does it communicate then? A voice in your head? People would consider you to be mad in that case.

The faith I have is in science and Buddhism.

 

[NikPreviousAcct]

poop:
Hi!



--okay, so I only wanted to be able to say that I've talked to poop before. Sue me.
Now... if only the poop would talk back!

 

[Zenmervolt]

When I saw this thread up at the top again I though it was probably because a flame war had started. I was quite plesantly surprised to see that an actual discusion had taken root. Anyway, question for Elledan; what would you reccommend for someone interested in Buddhism? I want to get a good background on Buddhism and I'm curious about whether there are certain books about Buddhism which would be helpful.

Zenmervolt

 

[MrPALCO]

<< Which god? >>



Just ask God with a sincere heart, he will answer you. It is not hard.

 

[DABANSHEE]

&quot;Hmmm... Any idea how stupid that statement is?? I'm glad Columbus thought differently than you did... and I'm glad Einstein, Copernicus, Newton etc and all the people that went contrary to popularly held beliefs all thought differently than you did. Just because a mass of people believe or don't believe something does not mean it's correct. Thus, it's not &quot;selfish&quot; or &quot;egotistical&quot; to believe that you are correct and others are wrong. Perhaps they ARE wrong, and perhaps you are wrong, and perhaps you are both wrong, or perhaps you are both right. Noone knows that for certain, except the creator Himself.&quot;

But Columbus was wrong Tagej, the scientific advisors to the Spainish court advised that Japan/India was at least 4 times further travelling in a westerly direction than what Columbus thought. Because they had calculated the circumference of Earth qite accuratly, &amp; thought such a distance impracticle. Columbus stuffed up his calculations &amp; thought Japan/East-indies was only as far in a westerly distance as where the Americas were to be found. Hence when he got there he found new lands but thought he was in Asia.

So your right in a way, one can doubt currrent norms &amp; even end up being wrong, yet end up discovering new worlds in the process.

IMAO, Athism requires a leap of faith nearly as much as any religion. Hence I'm agnostic, afterall who are we to know who's right &amp; who's wrong. But if I was to chose, it would be pagan naturalism (afterall it's the cycle of nature that sustains us all).

What gets me is people who try to rationalise their faith. If someone beleives in Judaic/Christian creationism why can't they just accept it as part of their faith &amp; not go arround trying to rationalise it with such terms as creationism-science, &amp; then demand that it be taught in schools equal to evolution.

How many moslems, buddhists, animalists, Jainists, Confusionists, Pagans, animalists, Hindus etc beleive in Judai/Christian creationism? I'd say virtually none. Yet evolution crosses all religious boundarys, I'd say at least 50% of people in the west who belonging to those previously mentioned religions beleive in evolution, just as at least 50% of christians do to.

This shows that creationism is a faith based idea that many (but not all), christians have. It's doesn't have a place as part of modern secular education. Otherwise schools would have to also teach moslem, buddhist, animalist, Jainist, Confusionist, Pagan &amp; animalist beleifs concerning creation to, &amp; where will it end. Whereas the theory of evolution crosses all religious boundaries, just as other school subjects do.

 

[Elledan]

<<what would you reccommend for someone interested in Buddhism? I want to get a good background on Buddhism and I'm curious about whether there are certain books about Buddhism which would be helpful.>>

Most important is to learn the history of Buddhism, i.e. the life of Sidharta, who was later called 'Buddha' (meaning 'Enlightened One') after he reached full understanding of All.
You might want to get some books about this.

And in case you thought so: there is no Sacred Book for Buddhism. Also, there is no god, or higher being. The 'goal' of Buddhism is to reach Enlightement by meditation, thereby finding eternal peace.

I've found that there are many useful resources about Buddhism on the Internet. Unfortunately I can't point out any.


[edit: typos...]

 

[poop]

Athanasius:

The soldier example is a good one to think about, but I still see it as instinct after some moments pause.

Varied traits are good (for lack of a better word) for the species. They allow diversity, and keep us from getting bored. So it would follow that not all soldiers will try to save other humans. Some will let the self-preservation instinct take over for the species preservation instinct. It could be a different genetic coding that leads to their final action...

Something we have dismissed here is what the conditioning of society does to these soldiers. In the United States, we take groups of our people and train them. Before training, we filter them for desirable traits. One of these is always the person's willingness to give in to the collective. Soldiers are trained to be a part of a unit, each one depending on the other. This happens over a long time and becomes ingrained in the soldier's psyche.

Another trait imbued to soldiers is that they have a lesser fear of death. Training in the military is harsh, and somewhat deadens the soldier to the tendencies of normal man. That is, a soldier is more prone to accept his/her death than a civilian. Therefore, a soldier is more likely to take his/her life to save others than a normal person as myself (who is quite cowardly, I assure you )

This, among a few other reasons, is why I do not see this as any proof for a 'Natural Law', 'Moral Code', or 'System of Right and Wrong'. I see only instinct.

 

[Athanasius]

Poop:

I guess if we start from the presupposition that everything is ultimately instinct, we will arrive at the conclusion that everything is only instinct.

Perhaps all reasoning is circular to some extent: we both probably assume by presuppostion the point we are trying to prove.

Still, you brought in a &quot;nature vs. nurture&quot; argument. In the soldier's case, you suggest that his instinct for self-preservation is curbed by the training he receives. Hence certain instincts are deemed to be of greater value than others.

The soldier is trained to sacrifice himself. Why is he trained that way? To preserve the species? I hardly think so. The people he might possibly go to war against are also members of the same species.

He is taught to sacrifice himself for certain ideals. These ideals are supposedly the ideals and values of the culture he represents.


In the end, I believe it is ideas/memes, not genes, the determine which instincts we encourage and which instincts we discourage in any given situation. This is what separated humanity, as far as we can tell, from the other species that we know of.

We encourage the rule of &quot;high ideals&quot;, but then destroy that foundation by saying that there are no ideals, there is only instinct.

While I am not saying that any particular individual does this, saying that &quot;everything is instinct&quot; is pretty close to saying &quot;everything is ok.&quot; If everything is not ok, then we are introducing some ethic into the equation that is not pure instinct.

We may be introducing that ethic by presupposition rather than by pure logic, but by introducing that presuppostion, we introduce sanity and value to a universe that, by pure mathematics, is destined to have a final value of &quot;0&quot;.