Kvalhion

Incorrect. Baloo never stated that a correct guess would automatically equate his belief in the Christian God. What it would do, however, is let him know that the supernatural is probable, just ilke the example of the PMM.

Right now there is no good reason to believe that there exists any supernatural entity, or any entity period that can affect our reality. The authors of the bible did not express the miraculous knowledge it would take to complete a test such as this. They simply wrote about things they already knew or believed they knew and attributed them to God. Even all the prophecies that have supposedly been fulfilled have been shown to be bogus.

Thus, as it stands right now, I am completely with Baloo in his assertion that without even the simplest alteration of what is possible, there is no reason to waste time on the issue.

The most appropriate tool we have used is our brain.

It is a simple thing to assert that a God concept exists, and attribute things to that God. That doesn't mean that such a God has performed any action whatsoever, since a concept is incapable of doing such a thing. That intelligent people believe in a concept of God is not surprising.

What about the failure spoken of? I would venture to guess that the failure is intended as being anything that would verify belief in a real entity of God. Name one concrete example of success.

It is your assertion that there exists a reality-affecting deity. Yet there has never been one example of this that can be verifiable beyond a very small number of people. The authors of the bible did not show the equivalent knowledge this test would require. The myths of the bible have been debunked and are now considered allegorical. Excuse after excuse is invented on why the information in the Bible is not correct. Excuse after excuse is offered on why there is not one shred of evidence to support the existance of a supernatural deity.

At some point you get tired of the excuses and apologetics and say enough is enough. This is what Baloo is doing. I applaud him for it.

God was material enough in the Bible to offer plenty of examples of why people should believe. Unfortunately, a story can very easily be made up. In fact, many of the aspects of the bible are taken word for word from past religions and beliefs. The idea "well, he did it once but never ever has to do it again" is ludicrous to me. You are welcome to blelieve it if you like.

Christian theism is the one that asserts that there is a reality-affecting deity that exists, not us. They are the ones that include materialism, not us. Why would we even consider claims of materialism without one example of it? You might find that unreasonable to expect any example of a claim. I find it logically consistent to do so.

A belief in ANY reality affecting deity should begin with an example of its existance. Not to do so would mean to run around looking for invisible pink rabbits, or a thousand other things you can come up with. A successful completion of this test does not prove the Christian God. It does give what should be a required first step for any rational being. To put it simply, it reduces a vague possibility (of an infinite amount) down to a real probability.

This is such a tired argument. Since we don't believe in God, why don't we roll over and die? Why do we wake up in the morning? Why do we eat food? Why to we breathe air?

The obvious answer is that religious people rarely leave people alone in their religious belief. It helps somewhat to throughly debunk rediculous assertions. The knowledge gained saves time in the future when inevitably the rediculous assertions resurface.

Just because we do not see ourselves as servants of a god doesn't mean we do not value our time or seek to do things we enjoy.

Perhaps if people like you would quit trying to force religion upon others, there wouldn't be a need to spend so much time and attention on it.

[ February 07, 2002: Message edited by: Kvalhion ]</p>

Sandy

You may understand better if Islam was #1 religion in the United States and the government was enacting laws that upheld the tenents of Mohammed that would affect us all, Christian, Jews, Hindu's, Buddists, and the many other assorted "faiths" we have in this country as well as Atheists.

I'm sure this would "rub you the wrong way" since it steps on your particular faith.

I think it's fairly easy to see why non-believers are not willing to just brush the "fictional" under the rug when the fictional is being forced upon us through legislation, in our public schools and in our own sanctuaries, our homes, via door to door sales pitches pimping the "fictional". Small example here for you, in case you think I would exaggerate.

My husband and I were in our room when we heard a knock at the door. My daughter, who was 15 at the time answered it. She didn't call us so we stayed where we were. She was at the door for a good 15 minutes and I assumed it was one of her friends or someone she knew. Later, she told me it was people from one of the large Baptists churches in our area. She had the little pamphlets they pass out. My daughter is the kind of person who cannot find it in her heart to be rude to people so she felt like she had to stand there and listen to them in order to not hurt their feelings. What really pissed me off is that my daughter is a minor, and as such, I, her MOTHER am in control until such time as she turns legal age. I am the person to be consulted and advised when it comes to what my child needs. In other words, I thought it highly presumptuous of these people to pimp their beliefs on my minor child WITHOUT consulting her parents. Lets put the shoe on the other foot for a moment. How would these people like me to knock on their door and preach to one of their children on the virtues of Atheism? I probably would have been arrested, yet I am not afforded the same rights.

So, as you can see, it's not hard to figure out why non-believers cannot just pretend you don't exist. If we were to do that, your particular brand of religion would be forced on us &lt;as if it isn't already&gt; more than it already is. We must be vigilant or our rights to life, liberty and the persuit of happiness would be crushed under the weight of the "fictional".

theophilus

Well, I guess you're the one who wasn't paying attention after all because all you've done is demonstrated a complete misunderstanding of my argument by posing a gigantic circular argument and asserting numerous irrelevant statements based on that.

Here is the argument once more. Atheists cannot account for the immaterial aspects of their existence, i.e., knowledge, morality, logic, etc. without first presuming that the world is what God declares it to be.
This has not been disproven, certainly not by what you offered, and isn't disproven by simply denying the thesis; "god doesn't exist so we can't presume him."
That my friend is begging the question. Without presuming that God has revealed the truth about himself and his creation, you have no basis for any claim to knowledge, certainly not knowledge that he doesn't exist.
Try addressing yourself to the argument, not to the meaningless statemtns you've created.

GunnerJ

So he wants people to believe in him, but he doesn't want to give many reasons for people to. And if a person fails this cosmic game of hide-and-seek, he/she gets punished in the worst way possible. You do realize that you make your god look like a childish mind-fucker with too much time on his hands, don't you?

"He" "revealed" "himself" in a conflicting book of derivative myths and barbaric codes of law from a Bronze-Age tribe of desert goat herders? Some generosity.

&lt;sigh&gt;
p1: If god wishes to be known and loved and to show his love, then he would provide people proof of existence out of his own good character, rather than writing down conflicting rules to a divine scavenger hunt and expecting everyone to pick up all the clues, and find him despite not providing this great revelation to the whole world, but rather to a small, out of the way, backwards province of the Roman Empire.
p2: God does not provide adequete proof of his existance, and according to his followers, the closest he has come is writing down conflicting rules to a divine scavenger hunt and expecting everyone to pick up all the clues, and find him despite not providing this great revelation to the whole world, but rather to a small, out of the way, backwards province of the Roman Empire.
c1: God either does not exist, or does not give two shits wether we know and love him.

Q.E.D.

What a lovely little revenge fantasy you've constructed. Let's ignore the dispicable argument from ignorance, and your further characterization of your god as a childish mind-fucker, and have a little fun:

etc., etc., etc.

sotzo

Hi Kvalhion:

Perhaps if people like you would quit trying to force religion upon others, there wouldn't be a need to spend so much time and attention on it.

An answer to your post will be forthcoming, but in the meantime...may I ask how our dialogue here indicates that anything is being forced on anyone ?? I thought the purpose of this forum was to exchange ideas/arguments???

GunnerJ

Because it has never been proven to begin with, merely asserted.

When I see an actual argument, and not a baseless, idiotic assertion, maybe the debunking can begin. Until you rpove your outlandish and irrational assertions, I have no desire or resposibility to disprove them.

Kvalhion

Your words are dripping with "if you don't believe, why are you here." Trust me, if we were not constantly faced with people who believe they know the Mind of God, the One Right Way, etc, then we probably would have plenty of other things to devote our time to. Let's not be naive, though. I did not mean to imply you specifically as forcing views on people; this is a mistake since I do not even know you. Yet there exists enough theists who do wish to impose their religion onto others through public prayer, audible prayer in schools, laws forbidding actions based upon religious foundations, etc that time and attention to religious issues is not unreasonable and is in fact necessary.

I would classify "wasting time" in the sense of spending time trying to "find God", not defending my freedoms from religious people who would seek to force their ways upon me.

sotzo

Hi Sandy

So, as you can see, it's not hard to figure out why non-believers cannot just pretend you don't exist. If we were to do that, your particular brand of religion would be forced on us &lt;as if it isn't already&gt; more than it already is. We must be vigilant or our rights to life, liberty and the persuit of happiness would be crushed under the weight of the "fictional".

I've no desire to see my religion become nationalized any more than I desire to see secular humanism nationalized. You're singing to the choir on this one.

Apart from that, I think you've missed my point, probably because I did not articulate the point well enough.

My point was that if the question about God's existence is as meaningless and childish as "pink unicorns" and "purple talking rabbits", then there should be no need to spend time with endless threads about the existence of such a Being.

Try setting up a "debunking Santa" thread and see how many posts it receives.

[ February 07, 2002: Message edited by: sotzo ]</p>

sotzo

Hello K-

I did not mean to imply you specifically as forcing views on people; this is a mistake since I do not even know you. Yet there exists enough theists who do wish to impose their religion onto others through public prayer, audible prayer in schools, laws forbidding actions based upon religious foundations, etc that time and attention to religious issues is not unreasonable and is in fact necessary.

See my post below to Sandy. I have no desire to force my religion on anyone.

Cheers

Joel

Kvalhion

If only it were that simple, Sotzo.

Religion has greatly influenced our culture.. or perhaps our culture has greatly influenced religion.

The fact remains that a majority of humans believe that their existance is the focus of the universe. That their personal God made the entire universe so that one solar system with one planet could have us.

A majority of people believe that humanity is outside the very laws that have governed all life on this planet for millions of years. They justify this through their religious beliefs that God created all this for them, that humans were meant to conquer the earth, that humans know what is Good and Evil for everything, that we can decide who lives and who dies.

In the process, we are continuing to live outside the laws that govern all life and are paying the price. There is perpetual hunger, perpetual poor. More and more resources are being used up. More and more speciies are becoming extinct.

If people believe in a literal entity of God, and that God created everything just for us, naturally this view is not going to change and eventually all of us are going to pay the price.

Needless to say religious belief and its consequences are quite complex.