Vorkosigan

the-cave, Fiach looks dead on to me. I never met a theist who argued that gods did not intervene in the world, somehow. Ergo there's a supernatural realm. Nor has anyone argued about the OT portrait of the Canaanite Deity the Hebrews worshipped. It was one sick bastard, which is why modern Christians do their best to distance themselves from it.

the_cave

I'm pretty skeptical of the claim that "all" Episcopalians, theistic/deistic Unitarians, Reform Jews (who certainly aren't Christians, but they are at least theists), 60's Process Theologians, and the like, believe in the supernatural realm, or at least in the supernatural realm as described--containing "Gods" (???), angels, demons, etc. Sure, plenty of Christians do--I don't deny that. Probably even most, I'll even grant that. But not "all".

If you claim that modern Christians do their best to distance themselves from it, how can you simulaneously support Fiach's claim that "What [Christians] are saying is that God is...cruel, vindictive, unjust, jealous, insecure despite omnipotence, capricious, narcissistic, unforgiving and forgiving, creating Heaven for a small few and Hell for most humans ..." etc? Either they are saying it, or they aren't saying it. You claim they're doing both.

JEST2ASK

quote:
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Originally posted by Fiach
A few Christians spend too much time in the Magical Universe, lose contact with reality and reason, and we call that psychosis.
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Hmmm not all .....and psychosis is an effect of living in a Magical Universe..... That would (IMO) include non-thesist as well.

CavemanUg

I dont believe in God. I believe in science. Energy, mass, acceleration, chemical compounds... you get the idea. But at the root of all things is energy.
"All our experiment indicate that quarks interact as points with no spatial dimensions, and so are fundamental, like leptons. If the fundamental particles really are dimensionless points with mass, flavor, color, charge and other quantum properties, occupying no volume, then the nature of matter appears quite bizarre. The four interactions give matter shape; matter itself is empty! If all four interactions really are unified, and the particles themselves are just points of interaction for the force, the phrase from the Star Wars movies, `May the Force be with you' might really be appropriate." Quarks to the Cosmos by Lederman & Schramm
So, it is in this respect that we are (and everything else in existence is) all composed of energy. The question is what gave this energy form. In lab experiments we have created anti-mater, but, as soon as it comes into contact with any existing matter it vanishes. *poof* no more. So how is it that all things are shaped from this basic energy and given form, which scientists cannot explain or rationalize yet people say there is no God, and to be more to the point that we and everything else are not in that God's image. I don't believe in "God" at least not how the idea hs been presented to me thus far, however, it is hard for me to ignore these scientific "facts." It is a rather toaist phisophy actually, if you set god to represent "chi" and matter and anti -matter the ying and yang. However, it is hard to argue that it is impossible to actually tell where we come from, most atheists just say the big bang. The thing that is difficult about that is the impossiblity of getting from no matter to having matter, it is mathmaticly impossible to get from 0 to any other number. It is that first sprak that shaped the energy to becoem what it is today that to some extent raises the question of "God" not how "God" is preached, but more as a starting for all things that exist, alive or not.