Theli

[/QUOTE]Theli: - "Another question also rises, what does "eternal" really mean?
Is it something without time, or something with infinite amount of time?"

Tercel: - "I suppose it could plausibly mean either."[/QUOTE]

More like unplausibly. If something were to have an infinite amount of time, there would always be the question - "before that?". If you were to move further and further back in time, you would eventually reach a point where time started. And before that time there could be no actions nor events.
This is a difficult question about the first event. Something must have happened by itself, without having a previous existance or event/change. I think the point of singularity is the most plausable theory we've got. It's mostly speculations.

About timelessnes... we had this discussion before and I stand by my initial argument. A timeless being can't act (do anything).

I would not. People are stupid, and they get even more stupid when there is more of them. :-)
I would be more interested on how they reached their conclution, rather then their number.

Halt!!! If you suggested that there was a creator of everything I would argue with your proposition as any other scientific theory. But if you use a thing like a squid, then your storys probability decreased to the extreme low. Since you used an animal (and a common one) the probability that you have made this up is HUGE, in comparison to the probability that you are speaking the truth.
My original "non-existant" state is now greatly strenghten because of your use of definition.

No, not really. If your squid is impossible to observe, how do you know it's a squid?
Then I would like you to explain how your squid managed to create the world.
After that, you must prove that light exists outside our space. If no light exist, then how can you know the squid is purple? Would the squid BE purple?
After that I would like you to use your arguments on the squids existance, and apply those to a cat or a dog. If the cat or the dog pass the test, your squid theory get's even weaker.

If you would bring me a good (it would have to be REALLY good argument) I might become an agnostic. But if your argument consists of "the squid might exist" or "it's not impossible", the aren't you also an agnostic?

That's true. I read about "the flood" being just a local disaster at the dead sea, where the water rised a few 100 meters (don't remember the depth).

This is my problem... How could they know that it was really god?
I mean, it's just hearsay, at best.

It doesn't really make religions too plausable. Since their texts are ofter VERY OLD. And the miracles always seemed to happen when people didn't know anything about anything.

About god's existance, I agree with you here.
I wrote some about this in "3 gods in one package", that the "creator god" and the "biblical god" often get's confused with each other.

Of course I have heard others... But that's the one I usually hear about.

Taking on arguments.
1. "Personal testimony of religious experiences, testimony of miracles."

I don't put any value at all in the so called "personal evidence", not when it contradict common sense. If someone were to say they had been to the moon to eat breakfast with Elvis, their testimony would be really weak.

I would comfront it with 3 probabilities.
1. He's telling the truth, he defied the laws of gravity, flew to the moon. Arose Elvis from the dead, and ate breakfast with him.
2. He's delusional. He thinks he ate breakfast with Elvis.
3. He's lying.

Examining probabilities...
1. Hardly probable, ALOT of explaination would be required before I would even consider this.
2. Quite probable. The mind is a strange machine. It doesn't always function as it should. Halucinations are not uncommon.
3. If he was trying to prove a point, I would be pretty sceptical to his testimony. He has an agenda to lie.
Another reason might be to get intention, like some of those people who claims they was abducted by UFO's.

But where has a scientific investigation reached the conclution that the event really was a miracle?
Only because they can't reach a proven theory doesn't automaticly translate itself to "miracle".

What argument? Who was resurrected?

From what I understand by the Trilemma, it's quite similar to the Elvis statement above.
Was Jesus the son of god? Did he only think he was? Did he lie?
I would comfront he's testimony in the same way I comfronted the Elvis testimony.

This is a common argument, I agree. The first cause. I'm not going to get into that again.

I don't really see how the universe is "Fine Tuned". There's lot of chaos, lot of things that are unimportant (or even harmful) for the existance of life.

I'm not familiar with this...

Of course not, I would not present all my arguments at once either. :-)

Phew!!! This might be my longest post ever. If there are some grammatic errors or spelling errors, I'm sorry. Haven't got time to review it, hehehe...

Technos

I suppose you have a point, but how would a specific pattern repeat? It would have to be exact, and energy would practically have to travel in reverse wouldn't it? Thanks for the good reply.

Technos

Actually I'm going by a string of theories, I can't really take credit for any of them seeing as I didn't come up with them. I'm speaking of energy as a single and quite possibly absolute property of our universe, as described by a quite few quantum physicist who study quarks anyway. I get the rest from NASA mainly, from what I pick up at the space and rocket center and from my own current understanding of physics. It's not anything special or unique to me so I don't want to give the impression that this is all original.

PS: I never stated that our universe was/is the only one. I assume that the universe is self contained, but that there's nothing outside our universe isn't something I'd argue because there isn't enough evidence to make either claim soundly. I could very well be just as wrong as those who said there were no planets beyond our solar system or just as right as those who said that life wasn't created by a magical being.

[ February 16, 2002: Message edited by: Technos ]</p>

Ted Hoffman

Theli
The teleological argument is very similar to the fine-tuning argument.

To quote from CARM: "The teleological argument is also known as the argument from design. Quite simply, it states that a designer must exist since the universe and living things exhibit marks of design in their order, consistency, unity, and pattern.
A typical analogy of this is the Watchmaker which was given by William Paley (1743-1805). The argument goes as follows. If you found a watch in an empty field, you would logically conclude that it was designed and not the product of random formation. Likewise, when we look at life and the universe, it is natural to conclude there is a designer see we see how perfectly the universe and life forms operate. The eye is typically used as an example of design. It is a marvelous development. In order for it to work there must be many different convergent parts that individually have no function but have value only in a designed whole. It is only in the combined total do they exhibit"
weaknesses of the teleological argument

"The idea that the universe is designed is subjective. Different observations in the the natural world can produce different theories to account for their existence. Also, this proof is built upon analogy. If we find things in the universe that are chaotic, then by analogy, that would imply there is no designer."

Besides, the eye has been found to be suboptimal in its design by having the photoreceptors (the rods and the cons?) being placed far behind. Having the blind spot etc. Thus even the examples/ analogies used to demonstrate the complexity of design can be shown to be flawed.

Besides, if we find other universes that are also well-ordered, this also blows the argument to pieces, thus its an argument based largely on ignorance (of the existence of other universes).

Hope this is helpful.

Tercel

Several reasons:
* The author of Revelation interprets the serpent as symbolic of Satan
* The creation story is very similar to the Babylonian legends of creation, suggesting it is a mythological account
* The account fails to agree with scientific data on the subject
* There is an occurrence in the account of a miraculous event (the snake speaking), but the account does not recognise this as a miraculous event
* The account contains the legendary style (Imagine Rudyard Kipling’s “Just-So Stories) of explaining why things are the way they are. (eg the snake used to have legs but doesn’t anymore)

For the most part we have to carefully assess each situation and decide what criteria are going to be relevant. However looking at some of my reasons for believing the creation story to be symbolic, we can do a few generalisations:
* The passage has historically been interpreted by others as symbolic
* There is a very strong similarity to known mythologies
* Disagreement with other known factual data
* A miraculous event is treated as common-place
* The account has a legendary style of a “Just-So” story
* The account, when taken literally, fails to agree with sound doctrine (see Augustine quote)

The eating of the apple in the story by Adam (whos name means “mankind” by the way) represents the disobedience of us all to God and his commands. Just like Adam in the story disobeyed God’s command to him, so have we all done things we knew were wrong and so like Adam, God’s punishment should be upon us.

The major doctrines of Christianity are outlined in the Ecumenical Creeds. The <a href="http://www.mit.edu/~tb/anglican/intro/lr-nicene-creed.html" target="_blank">Nicene Creed</a> is the most thorough of these. (I suggest you familiarise yourself with its content if you aren’t already)

I doubt it. I’m referring to the really far out ones here, not just the more “liberal” ones.

I’m an Arminian. But I’m certainly happy to call Calvinists or Catholics “Christians” any day.

Of course not, and I don’t. But if you don’t believe in God and that Jesus Christ was a man and that Christ was crucified and resurrected, you’re not a Christian by my definition and shouldn’t call yourself one.

They’re welcome to their interpretations in these things and for that I have no problem with them and would call them minor doctrinal differences. However the Jehovah’s Witnesses do have some bigger differences as we disagree about the status of Christ and the Spirit. The JW’s deny the Trinity which is fairly central to Christian orthodoxy. Whether they are still “Christian” or not depends upon how far you’re willing to stretch the word.

It’s an important doctrine true, but a minor difference on that doctrine. It depends where you’re prepared to draw the line, and I certainly don’t claim infallibility in such matters.

I don’t know how you worked that one out, because I do embrace science for the truth content and laugh at any Christians who try to do otherwise. Eg Hence my acceptance of evolution.

Sounds like it to me. I simply disagree that I use such reasoning.

Agreed.

That logic only works if you assume time to be a more basic part of our universe than causality, and as I have already argued, relativity gives us cause to suggest it’s not.

Tercel

Ted Hoffman

Tercel
Thank you for your fairly comprehensive response.
I wish LinuxPup could borrow a leaf from you?
Anyway, so you say the Genesis account is mythical.
Please tell us what other myths there are in the bible. Are they too many to list here?
Please tell us where the myth ends and the "history" begins. Does history begin when Adam and Eve are sent out of the Garden of eden? Was Moses real? Because authors like Alan Alford When the Gods Came Down say that even Moses was not a human being but a mythical figure that represented something else.
What objections would you have if I said that the creation account is actually a dumbed-down version of what actually took place?

Which Legends are U referring to? Enuma Elish?
Going by the legends, Alan Alford has built quite a plausible theory saying that ancient religions were exploded-planet cults and the "gods" basically were planets. He hypothesises that an exploded planed fecundated the "fertile" earth with life from whence mankind arose.

Sounds farfetched for instance to be told that Gilgamesh (in the Sumerian Epic of Gilgamesh) was a planet. Not a man.

It has been established that the Jewish/ Hebrew creation account actually borrowed very heavily from older myths from Mesopotamia and North Africa and if indeed you believe this is true, don't you think then that we should actually focus on studying those earlier myths in order to answer some of the questions disturbing mankind today instead of focusing on Genesis which has greatly been changed to marry it with fashionable and more recent ideas like the trinity?
So does changing water to wine and walking on water, so does the scientific data on the flood and ark, so does scientific findings on the existence of Jesus.
While we are at this, could you tell us where Jesus' body could have gone to?

Even Methuselah living for all those years is a miracle. Its not treated as such. Even the burning bush is not treated as a miracle. Even the Israelites wandering in the Desert for 40 years is not treated as a miracle. Even Mary being pregnant without a sperm is not treated as a miracle.
Please tell us how miracles - true miracles are supposed to be treated in the bible.

When the account tells us women will experience pain during childbirth, what specifically is that part of the myth supposed to tell us?
Legendary style? The thunder and fire at Mount sinai when Moses went up - is it also part of the legendary style? and God showing Moses his backparts - thats also legendary style? And Sodom and Gomorrah? was it real? Tower of Babel? Please tell us how to recognise this so-called legendary style.

If Adam is Mankind, who is Eve?

The Nicene Creed, who wrote it and when?

Why are you Arminian? what does the name mean?

GunnerJ

"The Mother of All."

Tercel, I'm going to have to give you a thumbs up here, as you are doing a good job defending your beliefs. I have to respect you for actually trying to come up with a logically consistant method of determining which parts of the Bible are to be taken literally and which are not. It shows a great deal of intellectual honesty. However, I have some comments:

These are the criteria by which you decide if a story is "mythical." The most signifigant point of it seems to be the "miracle treated as commonplace" as it provides a good answer to the skeptics' question of why Genesis is to be taken as allegorical, and yet the Ressurection is not. However, I don't see why this should be limited to Biblical Scripture. Since you're willing to say that the Gospels, which treat many of Jesus' acts are special and miraculous, are not to be taken as just a myth for this reason, are you willing to give the same benefit to stories told about other religious icons (Mithra, Buddah, Mohammed, etc.)?

Draygomb

Technos

If the universe were to continually expand and contract then evertime it expanded it could repeat a previous expansion.

Ted Hoffman

Rimstalker
This is amazing. I believe mankind means humankind ie men + women. So now mankind is synonymous with "men"? Man now means men?

Tercel, did U mean man or men?

Technos

That would only be true if the "core" of our universe were the only source of gravity. There are many things to take into consideration when speaking of the great expansion or the big crunch theories, and unfortunately they are both rather new as is our understanding of the universe beyond our solar system.