Vanderzyden

It's not a matter of sensitivity, at all. Insults directed at me would be handled like water off a duck's back. No, rather, the issue is one of practicality and investment of time. When I detect blantant disrespect, I suspect that the motivation of my opponent is to be found other than in pursuit of a serious discussion of the issues at hand. As such, further engagement is fruitless.

Here is what I found disrespectful and disingenuous:

If this is how you proceed, then how can you expect to be taken seriously?


Should you choose to look around, you will notice that I engage others, despite name-calling and bantering. Perhaps it's best that I don't deal directly with you, however, because you will simply dismiss whatever I have to say, and we will continue to talk right past each other.

Vanderzyden

Synaesthesia

Although it's a teeny bit off topic, I would like to advocate the ELF (elusive little freak) analogy as a substitute for the Santa Clause analogy.

Elusive little freaks have been reported since the dawn of recorded history. A sizeable portion of the earth's population has believed in them. Many people still do.

Bible Humper

Vanderzyden, you are spilling much ink expressing indignation on behalf of Yahweh, it's lots of effort wasted that could have been used to address the points I made instead.

I'll answer you regarding these accusations, but will you please deal with the important issues instead of these irrelevancies after this?

What's the problem? You stated that God can't reveal himself because it would rob us of the free will to choose to believe or not. If you stand by that statement, you are indeed admitting that we are right, in your opinion, when we say that the bible stories aren't credible.

Well? If God doesn't communicate with or envelop believers because that would take away our free will to choose whether or not to beleve, then the believers must be indulging in a session of make believe to have these experiences.

Holy shit! What do want from us, a feigned reverence for Yahweh and all aspects of his religion?

Sorry, but to me the bible is what one would expect from rather primitive human beings, not omniscient deities. I'm gonna call it like it is whether you like it or not.

This is a ridiculous objection.

Are you offended by swearing? Bullshit is a commonly enough used word that I wouldn't expect someone to get all offended by it's use. Let's be serious, you knew that we see the miracle stories as being total bullshit long before this talk, so what's the big surprise here that you decided to be offended about?

As for being offended by the phrase "kicking free will in the ass", all I can say about this is that it seems apparent to me that you have done your very best to analize my post in an effort to find anything that you could possibly claim to be offended by, and to call me on it. You seem to have gone too far on this one though, explain what offended you about this.

Despite my last paragraph, I'm hoping that you aren't trying to deflect the discussion away from legitimate issues and that you do plan to address them.

We'll see I guess.

[ September 01, 2002: Message edited by: Bible Humper/ SCoW ]</p>

Bible Humper

I'm in awe of you, Bible Humper. <img src="graemlins/notworthy.gif" border="0" alt="[Not Worthy]" />

How did you intuit that Vanderzyden didn't want to answer those tough questions and was merely trying to deflect? Just incredible!

I'm not worthy to be in the same room as you. I'm leaving.

Mark G.

18 The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19 since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20 For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities--his eternal power and divine nature--have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.
-Romans 1:18-20

Bible Humper

It's funny how the wrath of God looks so much like the indifference of a naturalistic universe, eh?

Funny that God claims to have "made it plain", but most of the world isn't christian.

The portion of the world that actually is christian would be a hell of a lot smaller if atrocities weren't used to prod people into it. Consider the indigenous people of the Americas, it wasn't that God was "plain to them", it was that the stake was "plain to them".

Well, it's funny that there are polytheistic and animistic religions since this omnipotent deity has "made his nature clearly seen".

I would expect that all religions would be monotheistic if there was a real deity and he made his nature clear, even if he didn't send his avatar down to those particular people.

No need to elaborate on the fact that the piece that Mark has bolded refutes the argument, flawed anyway, that Yahweh doesn't reveal himself so as to preserve our free will to choose.

zamboniavenger

Sorry I disappeared, I was out of town this weekend. Anyways, here is a pretty impressive list of miracles from a christian website.
<a href="http://preachtruth.org/training/v-miracles.html" target="_blank">Miracles of the bible</a>
So yes, I think it's safe to say god used to use miracles on a pretty regular basis. Also, note where it says that miracles are supposed to be epic and undeniable(or words to that effect). I'd agree with that totally. So my question still stands; why the (relatively)sudden drop off in miracles? Did god run out? Can an immutable god change its mind and decide to stop using miracles, and if so, why? Or, maybe, there were NEVER any god-inspired miracles. Just a thought.

[ September 03, 2002: Message edited by: zamboniavenger ]</p>

Defiant Heretic

I'd say it is equally unlikely that either exist according to the standard definitions. God is impossible because omnipotence is logically self-contradicting.
<a href="http://www.positiveatheism.org/writ/santa.htm" target="_blank">Santa Clause is impossible because the physics involved in his trip would make him a stain on the back of his chair.</a>

I’ve read the bible. I found 2 Chronicles 1:4:2, and Leviticus 11:4-6,20 particularly interesting.

I would also like to point out that a personal demonstration wouldn’t be satisfactory. I would need others to independently corroborate my story so I would be sure I wasn’t hallucinating.
Now if you’ll excuse me, that damned purple llama is juggling chainsaws again.

[ September 07, 2002: Message edited by: Defiant Heretic ]</p>