Ronin

It seems to me that there are many people here who no longer need to question whether Christianity is true. [Meaning, they are 100% certain it isn't, at this point]

It may seem that way to you, HelenM, however ~ it seems to me that many people here are critical thinkers and, as such, refute the existence of unicorns until presented with one.

As for myself, should the Angels of Heaven swoop down from the clouds and tell me that God prefers an audience with me, then I would pop in a breath mint and climb aboard.

So it seems to me they are in an analogous situation to Joel.

Again, it may seem that way to you, However ~ Joel is presented with the reality of the universe before his very senses and yet imposes the very ludicrous and limiting myths of his religion upon it.

Have they too limited their use of critical thinking?

No.

Moreover I'm not sure your quote (which I didn't quote back) really applies to Joel because the quote is about someone who shuts out anything that doesn't agree with his belief system. Do you have evidence that Joel is doing that? It seems rather to be the case that Joel has found satisfactory answers to any doubts he has had.

Evidence from Joel, as you require, for your review ~

I don't recall saying that there isn't any reason to conduct critical thinking, but I know I have implied that it should be limited.

[ October 25, 2002: Message edited by: Ronin ]</p>

Starboy

Okay Christians, here is a test on the examination of your beliefs. The resurrection story is clear on the following events:

1. Jesus nailed to cross.
2. Taken down after a relatively short time based on the presumption of death by reason of the poked with a spear test.
3. Placed in tomb.
4. Next day, tomb is open, Jesus is gone.
5. Seen a few days later by several followers.

Given these events there are at least two explanations:

1. The Christian supernatural explanation
2. The rational explanation that Jesus didn't die on the cross. He had accomplices that knew this, removed him from the tomb and revived and nursed him to health.

If examining your beliefs in a critical fashion why would you consider the first explanation at all? If you do accept the first explanation, then do you accept all supernatural explanations of events both past and present? If not then why not?

Starboy

sakrilege

So Amazon is correct in stating

Ronin

p.s to my other post: OTOH I see the inconsistency in saying "I no longer need to question my beliefs. Why don't you question yours?"

Joel is rather resolved in favor of his superstition, however, at this point it may just be the nature of competitive position.

But I think that cuts both ways

Except you forget that you are trying to convince Infidels that a fairy sky king exists in a golden land of faraway ~ plotting a mysterious plan for his dirty, sinful slugs ~ and that, in order to avoid the tortuous cauldron of fire, we must prostrate ourselves before his godly seed ~ forever and ever, amen.

The Infidels appear to say "that is just not a correct assessment of the universe ~ and, come look at what is real."

[ October 26, 2002: Message edited by: Ronin ]</p>

HelenM

I'm not, speaking for myself.

But other Christians probably are - I realize that.

Helen

Amazon

Hi, Joel.

My first question hasn't been addressed yet, but I know you're very pressed for time. More than anything, I hope you'll think hard about the free will vs. all-knowing god problem on your own, and not worry about responding to me. It's an important one, since so much of Christanity is based on both being true, when they are actually mutually exclusive.

I'm surprised no one has tossed out this simple but poignant question yet:


Can god create a rock that is too large or heavy for him to lift?


It's tough being limitless and all-powerful. It's quite the slippery slope.
This and my first question (from page 8) are introductory questions into why the Christian all-knowing, all-powerful, all-loving, omnipresent deity is a logical impossibility.
If a concept doesn't make sense, and there is no evidence, how is a rational person supposed to believe it?

DigitalDruid

Joel, you wrote:

If your interpretation is correct, then the fig tree’s fruitlessness had no bearing on the curse. It didn’t cause the curse. The whole episode happened only because Jesus wanted to make some points.

Now let’s look at the source (Matthew 21 :: New International Version):

You can see clearly that the passage starts with Jesus being hungry and follows a clear line of causality from there to the tree being cursed. The passage also says (in the later part) that Jesus used this opportunity to make a point. That part seems logical. It is good to use opportunities to teach something. But if the fig tree had fruits on it, there would have been no cursing, and so no point-making of any sort. So the curse was clearly precipitated by the fruitlessness of the tree (if we take the passage on its own merit and avoid slapping our own meaning on it). Jesus used the incident to teach something - which is all right.

But you say the curse happened only because Jesus wanted to make a point, and for no other reason. If that is so, why would the passage even mention Jesus being hungry and the fact that the fig tree bore no fruits? Jesus could surely have made his point by cursing any tree and even when he was not hungry. The fact that these two details (hungry jesus and barrenness of the tree)appear in immediate proximity, clearly implies the passage is seeting up the background to explain why the curse was made. By similar reasoning, why would it mention the barrenness of the fig tree in ones sentence, and then immediately in the very next sentence mention the curse taking place? If these two were not linked, why this order?

That’s why I said the passage clearly implies it is the barrenness of the fig tree that precipitated the curse. So the fig tree must have had freewill to deserve curse. Please address the arguments that appear in bold letters above instead of reiterating what you said in the last post.

Also in my last post I mentioned another related point raised by sakrilege. Would you address it please:

In Genesis, God decided to destroy beasts and fowls along with man; in fact he repented for creating all of these. It is then logical to assume that all these animals must have done something terribly wrong to deserve such traumatic painful death.

Three questions on this:
(1) Does it not imply that the beasts and the fowls have freewill? Why punish by death if the transgression committed was not out of freewill?
(2) What terrible act did the birds, worms, and ants commit to deserve this extremely harsh punishment?
(3) Do sinful ants go from ant-hill to ant-hell?

OK, the last one is my attempt at humor. But the first two are serious questions.

Regards.

[edited for clarity]
[ October 25, 2002: Message edited by: DigitalDruid ]

[ October 25, 2002: Message edited by: DigitalDruid ]

[ October 25, 2002: Message edited by: DigitalDruid ]</p>

Rusting Car Bumper

If you really think thats true then do this.

Get a pencil.
Hold it in your hand.
Now ... of your free will.. Choose to believe that gauging your eye out with this pencil will
(a) not effect your vision
(b) not hurt whatsoever and in fact will be a pleasent experience
(c) accomplish only good things commanded by god
(d) and that god is commanding you to poke your eye out.

When you've accompished that, then let me know.

No. You either believe it, are skeptical, or you don't believe it. There is no "choice" implied.

I certainly didn't choose to not to believe in god any more than I didn't choose not think that holding an ice cube in my bare hand produces warm feeling.

DC

Gregg

Helen,

The situation is not really analogous. First, I don't think very many people on this board would say that they are 100% sure that Christianity is not true. 99% sure, perhaps, but not 100%

Second, just because someone does not NOW need to question whether Christianity is true, does not mean that that person NEVER questioned whether or not Christianity was true. Most likely our hypothetical person applied critical thinking in arriving at his/her conclusion. Not going through that critical thinking process again every time the question comes up isn't "limiting" one's critical thinking.

Now, if Joel were to come up with an original argument for Christianity, or were to find some powerful new evidence to support it, and everyone refused to even consider it, you might be justified in saying that they were close-minded or were limiting their use of critical thinking. However, as far as I can tell Joel has not made any argument that most people in this forum haven't heard many times before.

For the sake of our sanity, at some point we do need to say something like, "OK, I've critically examined about 1,000 arguments for Christianity and have found them all unconvincing, and now they are beginning to repeat. So, I'm pretty much going to ignore them from now on, unless I come across one so novel and original and interesting that I have to give it a fair hearing."

Gregg

HelenM

But Gregg, there is an analogy for Christians, of everything you just said about non-Christians.

I.e. why wouldn't Christians similarly get to an analogous point of only examining new or interesting objections to their faith, for the sake of their sanity? Why would it be less true of them that they "applied critical thinking in arriving at his/her conclusion." And that "not going through that critical thinking process again every time the question comes up isn't "limiting" one's critical thinking". To quote you.

I'm going to start a new thread on your statement about certainty because I'm curious whether people here are 99% or 100% certain...

take care
Helen