Shadownought

I am trying really hard not to drag God's omniscience into this debate and turn it into another free will argument...

Shadownought

Quote:

It is evident that prayer works because no matter how hard a situation, if you pray before hand, the result will never ever be as bad as you expected.

I don't think this point has been made yet (though Silent Acorn made a similar one): how can you possibly know that had you not been praying, things would have turned out worse? You can't. It is not "evident" that prayer has any effect on Earth. There is no possible way to rewind the time stream and see what would have happened if you didn't pray.

Things can ALWAYS be worse. The fact that nothing is ever as bad as it COULD have been is absolutely not proof that prayer works.

Take the following example, which is fairly mild compared to some things that happen:

A serial killer has emerged, and kills twenty-seven people in twenty-seven different gruesome ways before he is caught by the police. Saying "I prayed to God after the very first murder that that guy would be caught- if I hadn't prayed, he might still be on the loose!" means absolutely nothing.

Arrogancy

I agree. His argument is flawed due to the obvious lack of perspective.

Defiant Heretic

So you can't describe a universe you've never been too, but you can assume it exists without supporting evidence?


This is essentially the argument you’re making here:

1. Everything in our universe (universe A) needs to have been caused.
2. There is a different universe from ours (universe B).
3. Things in universe B don't need to be caused.
Therefore something from universe B created everything in universe A.

All three premises are unfounded assumptions, and it’s still a non sequitur.

K

You are so right. This is intuitively obvious. Everyone knows that skyscrapers were created by other, larger skyscrapers - not puny little people. And where do these massive ships come from, people? Yeah right! They are clearly created by bigger ships. That's also why computers keep getting slower. The new computers that are created by the older ones can never be anything more than the original.

I'm really surprised that anyone is questioning davidstewart's line of reasoning given it's rock solid and intuitively obvious foundation.

Defiant Heretic

Huh, now that you put it that way, I don't have a single rational argument left that could stand against such flawless logic. I'm convinced.

Hail Thor!

What? Who? Je-him?!


Never mind.

wordsmyth

Cthulhu Worshipper: "My god can eat your god for breakfast"

beyelzu

i just cant bring myself to worship thor.

i mean he wears mittens. and if he doesnt he cant use his hammer. which is too short because his halfbrother stung a troll in the nose while the troll was making the hammer.


sure thats easier to believe in then jebus


but mittens, my god wouldnt wear mittens.

Ivo

Hello All,

First post here, so be gentle.

"There must be two constants. Good and bad....There must therefore be a source for each; we have established that the source of good is God, and therefore the source of badness must be the opposite of God, which God calls Satan."

Satan created evil then, I see. However...

"In order for the trials and tribulations of life to be created, there must be an opposite of good. God created this but he isn't forcing us to use it, on the contrary, he is trying to draw us away from it, even though the dark side is tempting us."

Erm...God created evil then?

If we believe that "there must be two constants" are we saying that without Satan, God would not exist. God's existence would then be contigent on something; namely, Satan.