Do you believe there is a god/divine being/lifeforce?

[BatmanNate]

Originally posted by: dguy6789
Question: If God exists, then explain why anyone who comes out and says "God told me to ************" is instantly considered crazy or making it up? One lady a few months ago drowned both of her kids and stated that God told her to do it. If it is the work of God, what right does our Government have to arrest her?

For one, the US Government and the almighty probably have different agendas. While the Hebrew god may sanction that sort of thing, thankfully our legal system respects the right of children to live (at least ones that are already born.) Two, most people consider a person crazy that would kill their own offspring, it's counterinstinctive. Three, she may actually have enough bats in the belfry to believe her story, but it's more likely just an excuse to get out of trouble.

 

[BatmanNate]

Originally posted by: scottish144

Originally posted by: thraashman

Originally posted by: dguy6789

Originally posted by: BigToque

Originally posted by: dguy6789
I do not necessarily believe everything I read or hear, or am told. That is what separates me from the religious.

That's quite the generalization...

That may be, but from my experience, 99% of all Christians and other religious people I have met were taught their religion as fact. They were deliberately told that their religion is 100% true with no other possible way for the world to work. This is an incorrect way to do it.

Religion is a faith, and should be taught as a faith, not as an indisputable fact.

ding ding ding ding ding We have a winner!!! Finally I see someone else in the world who understands the right way to do it!

QFT. My main issue with religion is that most religions are corruptable in some way or other. A good example of this is the Jihadists that currently inflame the middle east. They are terrorists, and nothing more. Yet the Muslum religion has been perverted to fit their goals. It gives them fanaticism, and strict universal muslum doctrine binds them to that fanaticism. Without religion, they would be without such a cause. There would be no belief of heaven or hell, screwing that whole "you will die and get 7 virgins in heaven for blowing up western kids" crap. Overall, the muslum religion is too closely tied to government to govern effectivly as an Islamic state.

Christianity was like this once, but it reached its enlightenment and, although it took a while, evolved into the propserous religion it currently is. Islam has yet to reach this enlightenment, and defies everything to do with democracy as we know it.

Edit: For the record, I believe that there is no god, but if I am shown concrete proof that there is one, I will believe.

Now for some OT: In my view, all Islamic states are clones of Czarist Russia. And guess what happend to Czarist russia once enlightenment reached it? Rebellion. That is why the Arabic dictators are so scared of the US presence in Iraq. Once democracy solidifies, it will spread, they will be without their power, and the world will be a better place. THAT is why we should see it to the end in Iraq.

All institutions are corruptable, governments as much as religions. It's when the two combine that it's most dangerous.

 

[scottish144]

Originally posted by: BatmanNate

Originally posted by: scottish144

Originally posted by: thraashman

Originally posted by: dguy6789

Originally posted by: BigToque

Originally posted by: dguy6789
I do not necessarily believe everything I read or hear, or am told. That is what separates me from the religious.

That's quite the generalization...

That may be, but from my experience, 99% of all Christians and other religious people I have met were taught their religion as fact. They were deliberately told that their religion is 100% true with no other possible way for the world to work. This is an incorrect way to do it.

Religion is a faith, and should be taught as a faith, not as an indisputable fact.

ding ding ding ding ding We have a winner!!! Finally I see someone else in the world who understands the right way to do it!

QFT. My main issue with religion is that most religions are corruptable in some way or other. A good example of this is the Jihadists that currently inflame the middle east. They are terrorists, and nothing more. Yet the Muslum religion has been perverted to fit their goals. It gives them fanaticism, and strict universal muslum doctrine binds them to that fanaticism. Without religion, they would be without such a cause. There would be no belief of heaven or hell, screwing that whole "you will die and get 7 virgins in heaven for blowing up western kids" crap. Overall, the muslum religion is too closely tied to government to govern effectivly as an Islamic state.

Christianity was like this once, but it reached its enlightenment and, although it took a while, evolved into the propserous religion it currently is. Islam has yet to reach this enlightenment, and defies everything to do with democracy as we know it.

Edit: For the record, I believe that there is no god, but if I am shown concrete proof that there is one, I will believe.

Now for some OT: In my view, all Islamic states are clones of Czarist Russia. And guess what happend to Czarist russia once enlightenment reached it? Rebellion. That is why the Arabic dictators are so scared of the US presence in Iraq. Once democracy solidifies, it will spread, they will be without their power, and the world will be a better place. THAT is why we should see it to the end in Iraq.

All institutions are corruptable, governments as much as religions. It's when the two combine that it's most dangerous.

True, but almost all religions are extremely old and primitive in many ways, and they are far more succeptible to corruption when compared to democracy as we have it.

 

[BatmanNate]

Have you ever worked for the government? 😀 And I didn't even have ours in mind. Any large group of people trying to enforce a set of ideals will be susceptible to corruption, the question is whether or not being homogenous (the religion) makes it more or less susceptible. One one hand, having all of the dissenting factions in a democratic society prevents (or attempts to) the collection of power in any one place, but I would argue that having two major opposing powers withing the same governing body festers corruption as well, at least in that the good of the people being governemed is not the deciding factor for many policy decisions and uses of resources. On the other hand, many of the pious in a religion will accept doctrine that is offered unilaterally without question, which is equally dangerous.

 

[MillionaireNextDoor]

Originally posted by: dguy6789

Originally posted by: BigToque

Originally posted by: dguy6789
I do not necessarily believe everything I read or hear, or am told. That is what separates me from the religious.

That's quite the generalization...

That may be, but from my experience, 99% of all Christians and other religious people I have met were taught their religion as fact. They were deliberately told that their religion is 100% true with no other possible way for the world to work. This is an incorrect way to do it.

Religion is a faith, and should be taught as a faith, not as an indisputable fact.

I do not believe in something just because someone else says it exists.

Religious people normally tell us athiests to prove that god(or gods) does not exist, while athiests tell religious people to prove that he does.

I would like to hear what some religious people have to say about this: I am Jesus Christ. Prove that I am not.

No thing is indisputable fact. Read Rene Descartes's writings.

Do not be so closed-minded as to brush it off without really looking for the answers. Have you really looked? Really? Bet you never spent more than a few decades on it seeing as these questions have potentially eternal (infinity or >10^100) ramifications.

You can start with these questions:
What is life?
What is death?
Who are we?
Or, was Jesus a liar, a lunatic or telling the truth?
http://www.tektonics.org/jesusclaims/trilemma.html#nuts

 

[xirtam]

Yes, and I believe in reposts too.

 

[dguy6789]

Originally posted by: MillionaireNextDoor

Originally posted by: dguy6789

Originally posted by: BigToque

Originally posted by: dguy6789
I do not necessarily believe everything I read or hear, or am told. That is what separates me from the religious.

That's quite the generalization...

That may be, but from my experience, 99% of all Christians and other religious people I have met were taught their religion as fact. They were deliberately told that their religion is 100% true with no other possible way for the world to work. This is an incorrect way to do it.

Religion is a faith, and should be taught as a faith, not as an indisputable fact.

I do not believe in something just because someone else says it exists.

Religious people normally tell us athiests to prove that god(or gods) does not exist, while athiests tell religious people to prove that he does.

I would like to hear what some religious people have to say about this: I am Jesus Christ. Prove that I am not.

No thing is indisputable fact. Read Rene Descartes's writings.

Do not be so closed-minded as to brush it off without really looking for the answers. Have you really looked? Really? Bet you never spent more than a few decades on it seeing as these questions have potentially eternal (infinity or >10^100) ramifications.

You can start with these questions:
What is life?
What is death?
Who are we?
Or, was Jesus a liar, a lunatic or telling the truth?
http://www.tektonics.org/jesusclaims/trilemma.html#nuts

I understand the nothing is indisputable fact. However, most religious people tell others that their religion is indisputable fact.

Life is a very general term. There is currently no stone set way of determining what is alive and what is not.

Death is the state of no longer living. See above.

We are Human beings. Homo Sapiens is how we are classified. Other than that, I am afraid I do not have the answer.

I will not pretend to know things of which I am not sure of. However, unlike most religious people, I do not state that which I am unsure of as fact.

 

[Kev]

Originally posted by: CrackRabbit
I got the Marshmallows, who has the grahm crackers and chocolate?

can this be a bannable response, kinda like ******? so unfunny that it actually makes me angry.

 

[AMDZen]

Originally posted by: BigToque
The question is, do you believe that something exists outside the realm that science can explain, that created, drives or somehow influences our world?

There is nothing beyond what science can explain, but yes I believe there are things outside what we can currently explain.

If there is a god or supreme being, there will also be some way to prove of its/his existance through science.

 

[thehstrybean]

I believe in God, as a Christian.

 

[CKent]

Originally posted by: Kev

Originally posted by: CrackRabbit
I got the Marshmallows, who has the grahm crackers and chocolate?

can this be a bannable response, kinda like ******? so unfunny that it actually makes me angry.

If anything should be bannable it should be creating threads like this. A joke about beer & lawn chairs can actually head one off by taking potential responders out of fight-mode. Second in line for banning should be replies like yours 🙂

As for the thread, no - never made any sense to me.

 

[FrustratedUser]

Originally posted by: JulesMaximus

Originally posted by: CrackRabbit
I got the Marshmallows, who has the grahm crackers and chocolate?

Nevermind the kiddie food. Toss me a beer. :laugh:

WTF! I ran out of Pizza here.... anyone got a slice to spare? I got :beer::beer::beer:

 

[FrustratedUser]

Originally posted by: Krazefinn
Sure, given the intricate beauty, symbiosis, coexistence and disparate species, I for one cannot believe its all up to chance for evolution to simultaneously work such wonders. Evidence is all around, let him who hath eyes see, and ears hear..."even the rocks will cry my name".

And evidence of evolution is missing a HUGE link, nor does it explain origin of original space/matter or time/energy that supposedly randomly clumped up and started growing. Entropy describers the opposite: matter tends to disseminate to its most chaotic random state, rather than conglomerating speciously and then starting to form a new life form.

Another question: if scriptures were all fairy tales, why is there such a thorough and negative discrediting of it? It is the most reviled, castigated written work in all recorded human history, yet remains the number one best seller ever. How many millions have died just for reading it or disseminating portions of it? As a book, it al;so has carried the most negative sanctions for itself and possesion, yet still it persists. makes no sense...unless "where there's smoke, there's fire". I believe it does contain Gods truth, and also believe too many do not "rightly divide the pages" to determine the truth for themselves, choosing rather like sheep (or lemmings) to ascribe to the popular interpretations, and not comparing scripture to scripture, verse to verse, accross all 66 boooks, to interpret itsel. it doesnt need any science to qualify it, or any other external source to understand it. But modern prtotestantism tends to do the cafetaria religion, and pick and choose, emphasize or discredit chosen portions.

Any 66-bookcompilation of literature written over a 2500+ yr period by so many authors that posseses poetic, literary, genetic, natural and human history, politics, genetics, prophecy, nutrition, health and medicine, and yet is coherent, has been 100% accurate, having a common theme threading through out, seems to demand some divine inspiration. Doesnt it/

There are certain faith communities that DO teach all of the choices: we were exposed to buddhism, islam, judaism, catholicism, and many other teachings throughout our school years into college. Are we not hearkened to (attributed to isaiah) in gods words: "come' let us reason together". And also given free moral agency, to choose. Any faith that usurps human choice is certainly blasphemic, as not even God chooses for us....it is up to the individual to determine each his articles of faith.

It's not supposed to do that numbnuts.

 

[kurt454]

Yes, I believe in God.