Forums-->Off-game forum-->
<<|<|7|8|9|10|11|12|13|14|15|16|17|>|>>
| Author | May 21, 2011-End Of The World? |
|---|
1. But people do pray for divine intervention while on Earth. The point I'm making is that if it really is god intervening, why don't people pray for the impossible (the limb growing back) instead of just praying for the improbable (Cancer being cured)?
Most people don't have faith to believe in what they didn't hear about happening. We call "impossible" what we know it hasn't happened, not that it couldn't happen. Perhaps some things were called "impossible", but after they happened once they became "improbable". This could happen with anything that we call "impossible" now. | Science gives us the best available answer.
you know why that suffices, Fishy? 'cause you live in a "confort zone" that allows you to keep some questions opened. but that confort zone relies in belief too. do you recognize this as true, or must i put the obvious out in the open? | for Skunder:
Remember that Paul gave a spirited defense against false accusations by those trying to damage his reputation?
He also wished the deeds of those who did evil to him to come back upon their own heads. There is a fine line between those who are lost out of ignorance, and those who have already been given over to a reprobate mind. I think you can understand where I am coming from.
Relax, just having a bit of fun is all. They must be also or they wouldn't keep coming back for more :P | Ok time to bury the hatchet.
Grunge and Fishy, my offer to you is this:
If you swear allegience to Jesus and turn your life around, I will allow you to hang out with me in the next life, but only 5 minutes every thousand years.
The minutes are negotiable but not the thousand years. A saint can only handle so much :P
What do you guys say? Deal? | The next end times sign links the return of Christ to a time where some unbelievers would hold a particular view about what God is like.
Now I debate leftists all the time in political blogs and when they find out I am a Christian, I sometimes read something along these lines...
" Your God is a jealous, murderer and I wouldn't want to spend any time in his heaven even if he were real."
Of course they are parroting Dawkins, a hero of Atheists. I ask you to watch this short clip and see I am telling the truth.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9M_ZF8r5e7w
Now you can debate if Dawkins is correct, not a problem. What I am pointing out is the link to this attitude to end days prophecy.
We can see the link in a parable Jesus gave us.
13Watch therefore, for ye know neither the day nor the hour wherein the Son of man cometh.
14For the kingdom of heaven is as a man travelling into a far country, who called his own servants, and delivered unto them his goods.
15And unto one he gave five talents, to another two, and to another one; to every man according to his several ability; and straightway took his journey.
16Then he that had received the five talents went and traded with the same, and made them other five talents.
17And likewise he that had received two, he also gained other two.
18But he that had received one went and digged in the earth, and hid his lord's money.
19After a long time the lord of those servants cometh, and reckoneth with them.
20And so he that had received five talents came and brought other five talents, saying, Lord, thou deliveredst unto me five talents: behold, I have gained beside them five talents more.
21His lord said unto him, Well done, thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord.
22He also that had received two talents came and said, Lord, thou deliveredst unto me two talents: behold, I have gained two other talents beside them.
23His lord said unto him, Well done, good and faithful servant; thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord.
24Then he which had received the one talent came and said, Lord, I knew thee that thou art an hard man, reaping where thou hast not sown, and gathering where thou hast not strawed:
25And I was afraid, and went and hid thy talent in the earth: lo, there thou hast that is thine.
26His lord answered and said unto him, Thou wicked and slothful servant, thou knewest that I reap where I sowed not, and gather where I have not strawed:
27Thou oughtest therefore to have put my money to the exchangers, and then at my coming I should have received mine own with usury.
28Take therefore the talent from him, and give it unto him which hath ten talents.
29For unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance: but from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath.
30And cast ye the unprofitable servant into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
In verse 24 the unprofitable servant tells God he thinks he is a hard God and takes things that doesn't belong to him. He totally misunderstands the nature of God and for his attitude, is cast out of heaven and into the outer darkness.
Dawkins and his kind only see an evil God in the Bible. His own words condemn him.
Now Dawkins could not have spoken like this years ago because he would be afraid or not even given a platform to do it. But today, the Atheists can write or say whatever they wish with no fear at all. | @224. That predicates that you are going to heaven. Hypothetically, If I'm wrong and there is a God, I can imagine how that conversation with him may go. I can also imagine how the conversation with you will go.
God: Hello {Modi's real name}. At least the atheists had the stones to make a decision. Jew, Christian? It seemed you chose to be whatever was useful at the time. Both are wrong, the Mormons are right, so it wouldn't have helped anyway. Say hello to Lucifer for me when you see him. | for Barbarian-Fishy:
Well Fishy, God can't be wrong about anything and surely you realize that Jesus, Peter, Paul, Matthew, James, John, and MOST of the early church were Jews and Christians?
Ouch. Let's see, a Mexican converts to Islam and he is no longer a Mexican? Really? I thought you didn't believe in magic?
Bwahahahaha | Modi, why do you think we care about what the bible says?
It is simply one of many religious texts. Many religions claim fabulous properties and prophecy for their own books.
I believe it has been shown that elements of your "divinely inspired" collection of Jesus fan-fiction are contradictory. You steadfastly ignored, or were unable to refute the contradictions.
Simply because you want to think that some of the words have a particular meaning in a modern context, maybe if you squint like so and ignore words here and there that don;t quite match, doesn't mean that everyone else chooses to be fooled by the obvious inconsistencies.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I8gsIuEvEs0&NR=1
Now Dawkins could not have spoken like this years ago because he would be afraid or not even given a platform to do it. But today, the Atheists can write or say whatever they wish with no fear at all.
And slavery was acceptable for Christians for how long (http://www.evilbible.com/Slavery.htm)? Yeah, and in the past men like Galileo were tortured to force them to recant their views opposing the popular opinions of Christianity at the time. Do you believe that the Earth is the centre of the Universe? Do you believe that you live under a giant dome (called a firmament) as described in the Bible?
It's amazing that all those aircraft, rockets and the Shuttle manage to miss it all the time. I'm surprised you are brave enough to board an aircraft with your "literal" belief in your religious text.
Have Fun
Grunge | Modi, why do you think we care about what the bible says?
Cuz ya just can't stay away? LOL | Do you believe that you live under a giant dome (called a firmament) as described in the Bible?
You mean pre-flood? Sure do. Do you believe you are obsessed with me? | Incidentally, this is the part of the Bible that *absolutely* convinced me, at an early age, that the Bible is just a bunch of Hokum.
The concept of a firmament is in genesis and pre-dates the creation of Man, so the only source of information regarding this would have to be "God".
"And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so." Genesis1:7
I can see where Modi is heading. Maybe he'll try and claim that the "Firmament of the Sky" was removed to allow the waters in for Noah's flood? Why didn't God put it back afterwards, after all he'd spent most of a day creating this Firmament. Did the rest of the universe simply disappear during the flood until the Firmament was restored? If the Firmament wasn't put back in place why do we still have Stars, the Sun and the Moon? They were all part of the Firmament weren't they?
I'm sure Modi will have some convoluted explanation. After all, christianity (and other religions incidentally) has had centuries to try and come up with an explanation for it. I'm also sure that the explanation is going to be fairly hilarious, to me, when I hear it.
My explanation? The Firmament is a simplistic explanation of what most primitive cultures view as the "Dome" of the sky above them. It is a very common concept in religions of primitive cultures around the world (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firmament - different cultures). Occam's Razor's thirst is slaked.
Well, Modi? You have the floor? What's your explanation?
Grunge | for Grunge:
The concept of a firmament is in genesis and pre-dates the creation of Man, so the only source of information regarding this would have to be "God".
Sort of like the Big Bang? lol | for Grunge:
Let me show you something.
It's 1200 AD and Atheist Grunge is following Modi around, holding a Bible in his hand. He says " Hey Modi, you think your Bible is so great,explain this to me...
9 Then those from the peoples, tribes, tongues, and nations will see their dead bodies three-and-a-half days, and not allow[d] their dead bodies to be put into graves. 10 And those who dwell on the earth will rejoice over them, make merry, and send gifts to one another, because these two prophets tormented those who dwell on the earth."
Modi thinks a minute and has no idea how to answer Grunge.
Grunge laughs in derision and mocks a book that can house ridiculous ideas that its followers can't answer.
"The whole world able to see dead bodies in the street at the same time? And they call this the Word of God? Hahahahahaha!"
Fast forward to 2011. The Christian Modi is showing Atheist Grunge the same set of verses, saying " Grunge, do you see how amazing the Bible is? Think about the man who recorded this vision in 95 AD, how could he guess it?"
Grunge answers, " Big deal." | | @222. At some point everyone has to have belief. I believe in what I can see, hear, smell, sense, touch. What seems logical. That may not be real. For all I know, I may be a butterfly dreaming I'm a man. I could be in a coma, asleep for the last 20 years, dreaming this existence. At a certain point, one has to believe in something. For me, I draw it as early as possible.
I draw the line on believing what I perceive to be real. Why do I not believe further and accept a creator? With no better option, I accept logic.
Who created the creator? At some point something just has to be. It makes more logical sense to not throw in another level. There's a creator that just is who created the universe? The universe just is? Why add that level?
If there was a creator who actually cared about us, why is the message so garbled. Why don't all cultures acknowledge the same god? Because Man created god, God didn't create man. | @234. You are missing what science claims to do. Depending on what it is trying to acheive, the answer only needs to go to a certain point.
Example: You are building a bridge. You need to know enough about the materials and the stresses those materials can take and how different configurations will change the distributions of these stresses and what stresses will be put on the bridge. Knowing that the materials are made of atoms, and those atome are made of sub atomic particles is unnecessary.
Science does try to answer the big questions. There is a theory about the big bang and there is some evidence such as background radiation, the expansion of the universe, etc. But science doesn't say "this is it, the end, we have explained everything". You have string theory, and many other theories floating about.
That's the huge difference. Science says "This is what we think based on current evidence. We challenge you to find out more and improve what we know." Religion say "This is the truth. Don't dare contradict it, no matter what the evidence shows". How long did it take them to forgive Galileo?. Many still don't accept evolution. | awesome, Fishy, now we're tuned in. i agree what you said.
but mind this: you are only talking about matter. you say science goes its way to improve our knowledge of how to build a better bridge. that's fine: we can access the basic structure of matter to whatever extent we can, analyze the results, and apply them. and there we have it: a better bridge. but how can we make a human spirit better? can we access the basic structure of the human spirit? is there a "periodic table" of the spirit's basic structure? the answer is both "yes" and "no". we'll get to that later, if you care to make the journey.
for now, it's relevant to put in clear terms that "anxiety", "ambition", "happiness" and every other feeling is a trait that we cannot find in matter, but only in the spirit. we can only experience them in the first person. even if you consider a causal relation between what's experienced (by the person; the feeling) and the modification in the person's body (neural and nervous processes), you cannot open the person's body or just his brain and actually "see" or record any feeling with any instrument.
so now my question is: regardless of where the material world comes from, where does this spiritual side of yourself comes from?
what traits come from DNA?
what traits come from education (from experience)?
what traits are we unable to trace to an origin?
can DNA and education "create" a spirit? (a stance both capable of representing matter in his mind and capable of feeling)
helpful readings:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophy_of_mind
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self
what's your stand on this issue? | sorry, wrong link (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self --> very poor info)
a much better one: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophy_of_self | I honestly think our spirit is formed from our mind. What makes us is a complex collection of biology and experiences. DNA and experiences can and do create a spirit, which I believes ceases to be when that which is necessary to support that spirit, the biological machine that is man, dies.
No behaviour is strictly DNA. DNA may give people a prediliction towards a myriad of behaviour, but we choose our behaviours. The Vikings who raped and pillaged have mostly the same genes as the people who make IKEA and have one of the most compassionate (or nanny state depending on perspective) government in the world.
How we choose our behaviouts is a complex collection of upbringing, experience and DNA. If your parents were buddhists, then you most likely will be. If your parents were self righteous arrogant individuals who believed in might is right, most likely you will be too.
The best among us can rise above that. They see injustice. They see errors. They see something that they know will cause incredible trouble for them, but they go ahead anyway because it's right. Galileo, Darwin, Martin Luther for example. Why the do that, I can't say, but it would do with their upbringing and DNA.
There doesn't have to be an "other" aspect. And to be fair, I think it diminishes those people, if we claim that their genius, or strength was just because they were built that way. Same as I think anyone claiming genetics as an excuse for evil actions is a cop out. | | can i know who here is a christian here ?? |
<<|<|7|8|9|10|11|12|13|14|15|16|17|>|>>Back to topics list
|
