Big Ol' Hairy Religion vs. Athiest Debate

[kagoscuba 0]

"When a scientist’s interpretation of data does not match the clear meaning of the text in the Bible, we should never reinterpret the Bible. God knows just what He meant to say, and His understanding of science is infallible, whereas ours is fallible. So we should never think it necessary to modify His Word. "

Please provide another website that is not as laughable as the one with the quote above. Like I have mentioned before, this post is as much the word of God as the Bible is. This post was written by a man, edited by a man, and it had data not included by choice...just like the Bible. Any person obtuse enough to think the Bible is infallible is either hopelessly ignorant or blindly devout to the point of self-delusion.

This type of delusion is even creeping into our presidential election. Mike Huckabee has already stated he 100% does not believe in evolution and wishes for a country "united by Christ." I like Mike Huckabee for a lot of reasons, but for the two reasons I mentioned, he doesn't have a prayer (pardon the pun) of getting my vote.

[kagoscuba 0]

I slightly misquoted Mr. Huckabee. Here is exactly what was said:

In 1998, Huckabee told a Baptist convention that “I hope we answer the alarm clock and take this nation back for Christ,” and explained why he gave up pastoring for political campaigning: “I didn’t get into politics because I thought government had a better answer. I got into politics because I knew government didn’t have the real answers, that the real answers lie in accepting Jesus Christ into our lives.”

Jesus Wept.

[ELENATION 0]

I was raised Catholic and it affected my life for a number of years. If I want to comment on a concept, I will.

IOW, get over yourself.

Thank you Wassa:clap2::clap2::clap2:

[green 6]

"It is all about guilt."

I was raised on placing blame and instilling guilt. Just an coinkydinkle observation!

Guilt is what my parents gave me for Christmas and at many other times of the year. :phanvan

[joe7777 1]

LOL! The reason "dinosaurs" are never mentioned in the Bible is because the word "dinosaur" wasn't coined until the 1840's. The Bible does, however, mention the Behemoth, Leviathan, sea dragons, and flying serpents.

The description of the Behemoth in Job 40 is particularly reminiscent of a dinosaur.

Curiously, in history we find old cave drawings that depict humans and dinosaur-like creatures together. Certainly these cave dwellers didn't have access to the modern reconstruction of dinosaur bones found in museums around the world.

I don't know from where you get your information, but I've never heard of a young earth creationist who believes dinosaurs are fake. Credible scientists do, however, question long-term radiometric dating. For more information, go to Doesn’t Carbon-14 Dating Disprove the Bible? - Answers in Genesis. It's very technical and might be a bit boring for a non-scientist, but there are plenty of other articles I can provide if you'd like.

Ok, are you serious, dinosaurs lived in the time of humans?? Are you one of THOSE people?!?! Ok, and I'm sorry, but i'm not looking at answersingenesis for my scientific information. Young earth creationists are all over the board, some literally believe dinosaurs were planted as a test of faith, some believe they are fake fossils, some believe they co-existed with humans...all sorts of wacky theorys.

Thats the beauty of science, you make deductions from evidence, in religion, you have the answers and fit the evidence to prove those answers.

Oh, and I did look at your article,

1. It only talks about C14, (the same stuff thats been debunked time and time again by REAL scientists)

2. Radiometric dating is so much more than that, its also Ar/K dating...and there are dozens more. These work on the same (and some on different) scientific principles, yet they INDEPENDENTLY come to the same conclusion.

Do you know why religion is so reluctant to accept change?? Because most of the time, it means they are wrong!

...the vatican did not assert that it was some Jews who had killed Christ. It asserted that it was the Jews who had ordered his death, and that the Jewish people as a whole were the bearers of collective responsibility. It seems bizarre that the church could not bring itself to drop the charge of generalized Jewish ''deicide" until very recently. But the key to its reluctance is easy to find. If once you admit that the descendants of Jews are not implicated, it becomes very hard to argue that anyone else not there present was implicated, either.

Christopher Hitchens (god is not great, 2007)

[kagoscuba 0]

"some Jews who had killed Christ" Jews do not deny they had something to do with the death of the Jew known as Jesus Christ. However, it was a particular sect of Judaism that was concerned with the death of Christ, and it wasn't a crime against Christianity, as Christianity did not exist yet. A group of Jews killed another Jew they accused of heresay. End of story? Nope...it took awhile but 351 years later the religion of Christianity was codified at the council of Nicene. That'd be like the United States declaring independence in 1776 and writing the Declaration of Independence in 2127. Doesn't make much sense.

The more I learn the more I question.

[Wheetsin 714]

Bypassing everything that happend while I was MIA and addressing OP:

Do Atheists believe in other paranormal events/things, such as hauntings, ESP, karma? What happens when an Atheists dies, do they believe in reincarnation?

Generally speaking, atheism is a not believed in dieties, or being nontheistic, hence a (without) theism (belief in the existince of god(s)). Atheists do not believe in theism.

An agnostic, long story short, is someone who cannot state that god(s) exist or do not exist because of some reason, e.g. they have investigated and find that there is no proof, or they do not believe that humans are capable of comprehending the truth, etc. The agnostic will often say I don't think there's a god out there, but there has to be something... we'll just never know what.

Of course, then you get into agnostic atheism, agnostic theism, etc.

There are also different degrees of atheism, not all "atheists" believe the same thing. When referring to the atheist population there are two (generally accetped) types of atheists: a weak atheist (implicit atheism/agnostic atheism/passive atheism/etc.) would be someone who lacks belief in any gods, period. Then there's the strong atheists (gnostic atheism/active atheism/etc.), who is someone who denies would be someone who denies the existence of god(s).

There's actually very important difference here. Saying

'I do not believe in god(s)" and saying "God(s) do not exist" imply entire different abilities and competencies. All atheists are weak atheists because all, on some fundamental level, will say that they do not believe in god(s), but do not try to prove that god(s) do not exist - for them it is enough that they do not believe. Some atheists go the extra mile, so to speak, and believe/state that god(s) cannot exist, which would imply they might have some means of proving it.

And in some cases, most weak atheists are also strong atheists with some gods. As one commonly used example, I don't know single atheist who would not say "Zeus did not exist."

...which label a person uses will tell you something about their general inclination when it comes to debates about gods. A person who uses the label “weak atheist” may deny the existence of some gods, but as a general rule isn’t going to take the step of asserting the nonexistence of a particular god. Instead, they are more likely to wait for the theist to make their case and then examine whether that case is credible or not.

Ok so umm yeah, not all atheists believe the same thing.

I will use my husband for example. He does not believe in the traditional god image. He is more a weak atheist than strong, but definitely not a theist. As for UFOs - I'm going to broaden that to general "other intelligent life in the universe". He absolutely believes there is other intelligent life. He does not see it as any deity's doing. He sees it as something inevitable given the expanse of space, the abundance of raw materials out there, etc. For him, it's a matter of statistics, time, and change in the form of cosmic radiation causing mutations. Maybe some people call that "god" - but in his eyes they're totally separate.

Let's take ghosts as another example. He does not believe in the traditional idea of a "ghost" -- as in, a lost soul or whatever you want to call it. He does think that sometimes iunexplainable things occur. To him, it makes a lot more sense that there might be residual energy (maybe this is a "soul" to theists, but it is not to atheists, e.g. the energy that allows for consciousness is converted into energy that does not). He also believes in the multiverse model - that we could have parallel universes leaking into each other or that perahps we're even receiving leaks from the four dimensions (that we're aware of - maybe more - some scientists are theorizing as many as 11 in recent times).

To show the contrast of theories, a different atheist - having never experienced anything they would classify as a ghost, or having seen reasonable evidence - would simply believe that anyone who sees "ghosts" is having mental disturbances.

Most atheists do not believe in karma in the traditional sense (and let's face it, probably 99% of the people who use the word karma, and have not studied Buddhist/Hindu/Jain/Sikh teachings, don't really know what the word means. Instead we've adopted a sort of colloquial meaning of it to state "you reap what you sow" in a shadily vengeful sort of way.)

One way an atheist might explain (colloquail) karma is that mean people who do mean things can only do them for so long before they're going to put into effect some action or behavior that will reciprocate their actions.

Atheists (none that I've met or spoken with, anyway - though it would be interesting to hear one's explanations/descriptions) do not believe in reincarnation. Reincaration is something that cannot be adequately proven (remember - the typical atheist has a heckuva head on their shoulders, and is not opposed to believing in anything that can be sufficnetly proven). Lots of things have been done to try and prove the idea of reincanation (e.g. MacDougall's work in the early 1900s and the ensuing documentaries) - none of them sufficient - e.g. had MacDougall's work been accurate/irrefutable, it would not necessarily imply anything with religious implications.

To an atheist, when you die, you die. You completely an utterly cease to exist, at least in any "real" way. (E.g. maybe there are still electrical impulses within your body, because it has not yet dissipated out... you can "live on" in the memories of those who loved you, etc). There is no afterlife, you are not reunited with loved ones, etc. To an atheist, these are ideas concocted to make people feel better about death. As I've said before, I think having a belief in the afterlife lessens the sting of loss. If you truly believe you will be reacquainted in a better place, then loss will only hurt so much, whereas if you believe that's it, nice knowing you - differetn scenario.

Hope this has helped to shed some light.

[WASaBubbleButt 41]

"some Jews who had killed Christ" Jews do not deny they had something to do with the death of the Jew known as Jesus Christ. However, it was a particular sect of Judaism that was concerned with the death of Christ, and it wasn't a crime against Christianity, as Christianity did not exist yet. A group of Jews killed another Jew they accused of heresay. End of story? Nope...it took awhile but 351 years later the religion of Christianity was codified at the council of Nicene. That'd be like the United States declaring independence in 1776 and writing the Declaration of Independence in 2127. Doesn't make much sense.

The more I learn the more I question.

There is a good book that I really enjoyed because of the variety of information. "The Dark Side of Christian History" by Helen Ellerbe. I'd check out AddALL book search and price comparison and see if you can find a cheaper copy. Otherwise Amazon.com: Online Shopping for Electronics, Apparel, Computers, books, DVDs & more has it.

[Wheetsin 714]

ETA - just gonna have to deal with my random changes in tense, misspells, etc. I wanted to get through the post, and I'm not about to wade through smilies and tags to edit it now.

[WASaBubbleButt 41]

To an atheist, when you die, you die. You completely an utterly cease to exist, at least in any "real" way. (E.g. maybe there are still electrical impulses within your body, because it has not yet dissipated out). There is no afterlife, you are not reunited with loved ones, etc. To an atheist, these are ideas concocted to make people feel better about death. As I've said before, I think having a belief in the afterlife lessens the sting of loss. If you truly believe you will be reacquainted in a better place, then loss will only hurt so much, whereas if you believe that's it, nice knowing you - differetn scenario.

Not quite. I am an atheist and I believe in an afterlife. The ONLY issue atheists all have in common is a lack of belief in a god/gods. Many assume and afterlife and Christianity go hand in hand and that's not true. HEAVEN and Christianity go hand in hand.

Theism-With a God

Atheism-Without a God

Nothing in there about afterlifes, just a belief or lack of belief in a God(s).

Atheists (none that I've met or spoken with, anyway - though it would be interesting to hear one's explanations/descriptions) do not believe in reincarnation. Reincaration is something that cannot be adequately proven (remember - the typical atheist has a heckuva head on their shoulders, and is not opposed to believing in anything that can be sufficnetly proven). Lots of things have been done to try and prove the idea of reincanation (e.g. MacDougall's work in the early 1900s and the ensuing documentaries) - none of them sufficient - e.g. had MacDougall's work been accurate/irrefutable, it would not necessarily imply anything with religious implications.

Raises hand.

I'm not 100% sure that reincarnation exists, but I can see the possibility and in the end, it doesn't really matter to me. But I am not going to say it does not exist.

[Wheetsin 714]

Yes, I started off witht he idea that the only stable thread through atheists is being without the existence of god(s). In my back and forth of my message, I did leave out "most" or "for the most part" a few times. (Guess I had hoped that the lack of universal absolutes was understood by that point). This was not intended to mean that my statement was an absolute about atheists, or that there are no exceptions to the rule.

My fault for omitting these phrases in a few places, but I'm still not gonna go back and edit to put them in so from here on, just consider them implicit.

[WASaBubbleButt 41]

Yes, I started off witht he idea that the only stable thread through atheists is being without the existence of god(s). In my back and forth of my message, I did leave out "most" or "for the most part" a few times. (Guess I had hoped that the lack of universal absolutes was understood by that point). This was not intended to mean that my statement was an absolute about atheists, or that there are no exceptions to the rule.

My fault for omitting these phrases in a few places, but I'm still not gonna go back and edit to put them in so from here on, just consider them implicit.

The only reason I pointed it out is because that is something many atheists do say and believe. They are under the impression that in order to be an atheist one cannot believe in an afterlife, reincarnation, paranormal, etc.

[Wheetsin 714]

Had a big long response here basically saying I agree. Then the power glitched... %^$ ice storm.

[anonemouse 1]

Atheism is a non-prophet organization.

Sorry. Just had to.

Hee! You made me snort! :clap2:

[gadgetlady 4]

Ok, are you serious, dinosaurs lived in the time of humans?? Are you one of THOSE people?!?! Ok, and I'm sorry, but i'm not looking at answersingenesis for my scientific information. Young earth creationists are all over the board

As are secular thinkers as well. But as for credibility within the Creation Science and Intelligent Design movement, they are not given the time of day.

Thats the beauty of science, you make deductions from evidence, in religion, you have the answers and fit the evidence to prove those answers.

Darwin himself was extremely concerned with the lack of any transitional forms in the fossil record, but felt confident that once more fossils were discovered, transitional forms would arise. Where are they?

...the vatican did not assert that it was some Jews who had killed Christ. It asserted that it was the Jews who had ordered his death, and that the Jewish people as a whole were the bearers of collective responsibility. It seems bizarre that the church could not bring itself to drop the charge of generalized Jewish ''deicide" until very recently. But the key to its reluctance is easy to find. If once you admit that the descendants of Jews are not implicated, it becomes very hard to argue that anyone else not there present was implicated, either..

I'm not quite sure why you brought this up. I believe that MAN was responsible for Jesus' death, not one particular religion. I don't agree with the Vatican on a lot of things.