Why and where is God ? - Page 5

deepsand · #**201** (**permalink**) 04-15-2008, 08:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rickanderson

As usual....you just don't quite get it....and therein lies just another example of your simpleton nature.

How very self-descriptive.

With the exception of that person or persons who seemed to agree with you, you have been egregiously rude. And, you have steadfastly refused any and all attempts at rational discourse.

What you obviously do not get is that people do not want to hear, and will not give credence to, an uncivil zealot.

Which makes you, to use your term, a "noob."

rickanderson · #**202** (**permalink**) 04-15-2008, 09:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by deepsand

How very self-descriptive.

With the exception of that person or persons who seemed to agree with you, you have been egregiously rude. And, you have steadfastly refused any and all attempts at rational discourse.

What you obviously do not get is that people do not want to hear, and will not give credence to, an uncivil zealot.

Which makes you, to use your term, a "noob."

Hoss

I told you not to speak for a month...now be quiet and run along. Take your guns with you as well.

activeco · #**203** (**permalink**) 04-16-2008, 03:52 AM

It must be paint intoxication.

inertia · #**204** (**permalink**) 04-16-2008, 04:39 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by chandrika

Richard Dawkins believes that atheism is the logical extension of understanding evolution and religion is incompatible with science. In his 1986 book The Blind Watchmaker, Dawkins wrote:

"An atheist before Darwin could have said, following Hume: "I have no explanation for complex biological design. All I know is that God isn't a good explanation, so we must wait and hope that somebody comes up with a better one." I can't help feeling that such a position, though logically sound, would have left one feeling pretty unsatisfied, and that although atheism might have been logically tenable before Darwin, Darwin made it possible to be an intellectually fulfilled atheist."

Following the September 11, 2001 attacks, when asked how the world might have changed, Dawkins responded:

"Many of us saw religion as harmless nonsense. Beliefs might lack all supporting evidence but, we thought, if people needed a crutch for consolation, where's the harm? September 11th changed all that. Revealed faith is not harmless nonsense, it can be lethally dangerous nonsense. Dangerous because it gives people unshakeable confidence in their own righteousness. Dangerous because it gives them false courage to kill themselves, which automatically removes normal barriers to killing others. Dangerous because it teaches enmity to others labelled only by a difference of inherited tradition. And dangerous because we have all bought into a weird respect, which uniquely protects religion from normal criticism. Let's now stop being so damned respectful!"

Dawkins continues to be a prominent figure in contemporary public debate on issues relating to science and religion, especially since his 2006 book The God Delusion, which has achieved greater sales figures worldwide than any of his other works to date. Its success has been seen by many as indicative of a change in the contemporary cultural zeitgeist, central to a recent rise in the popularity of atheistic literature. The God Delusion was praised by many intellectuals including Nobel Prize-winning chemist Sir Harold Kroto, American psychologist Steven Pinker, and Nobel Prize-winning biologist James D. Watson. In the book, Dawkins argues that being an atheist is nothing to be apologetic about; instead, it is something to be proud of, standing tall to face the far horizon, for atheism nearly always indicates a healthy independence of mind and, indeed, a healthy mind.

(Reference : Richard Dawkins - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia )

I WAS really enjoying keeping up with this thread. Ive kept quiet through most of it coz it was well out of my league but now it''s decended into lunacy! Stop all the cheap shots and get back to the reasoned debate.

I think chandrika hit the nail on the head with her Dawkins quote. I also think that this reflects the opinion of most of the UK. Where is god? Well, he's not in the UK. That's why were in the process of turning all the old churches into pubs! On the one hand i think the absence of god in the UK is leading to a less "christian" society. I also think that it is a logical progression of mankind. We have more believable explanations to our existence than theology.

Although i agree that we are far too weak minded to know, or be able to handle, the ultimate truth of why we are here.

Dubbya · #**205** (**permalink**) 04-16-2008, 10:26 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by inertia

it''s decended into lunacy! Stop all the cheap shots and get back to the reasoned debate.

Seeing the tones expressed in replies steadily degrade toward what accounts to little more than simple "mud-slinging" and coming to a point where I was feeling drawn into it myself, I chose not to participate until now.

Quote:

Originally Posted by inertia

On the one hand i think the absence of god in the UK is leading to a less "christian" society. I also think that it is a logical progression of mankind. We have more believable explanations to our existence than theology.

Inertia, you've summarised things perfectly and I support these statements wholeheartedly. It is absolutely natural for man to use logic and deductive reasoning in an attempt to explain the unexplained in terms his limited mind can comprehend, this predicated by the assumption that man's limited intelligence can in fact, lead him to the truth.

From where I sit, it would appear that a great deal more faith is required NOT to believe in God, than to believe.

Quote:

Originally Posted by inertia

Although i agree that we are far too weak minded to know, or be able to handle, the ultimate truth of why we are here.

IMHO, this is one of the most valuable contributions anyone has made to this thread thus far.

Finding the "ultimate truth" you refer to, is what most motivates man in his dogged pursuit to either prove or disprove the existence of God. Unfortunately, man is forced to rely on his limited capacities in deductive reasoning, logic and 5 physical senses.

With all his achievements, there's one thing man simply can't make sense of;

If God doesn't exist, why ARE we here?

.02

activeco · #**206** (**permalink**) 04-16-2008, 11:51 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by chandrika

In the book, Dawkins argues that being an atheist is nothing to be apologetic about; instead, it is something to be proud of, standing tall to face the far horizon, for atheism nearly always indicates a healthy independence of mind and, indeed, a healthy mind.

I surely support the idea behind this statement, but I dispute the term "atheism" used here and elsewhere.
Someone already brought it somewhere in this thread - you can't put yourself as an antipode to something you don't support or believe in. Regardless of widely accepted opinions, such nouns are mostly used as derogatory terms for "someone who is not us" and cannot be accepted as identification for an "outsider".
Identifying myself as an atheist is the same as being non-supporter of Yankees or Republicans.
Can you call yourself AScientologist if you are not part of it?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dubbya

If God doesn't exist, why ARE we here?

I am afraid this is a senseless question. The same applies here.
If there is no Golden Calf, Xenu, Blue Cosmo Sparks...why are we here?
If you still insist, you can also ask a classical question: Why does God exist? Any answer to that can be applied to the existence of anything else.

Quote for today: There is no Supreme but there is also no Subordinate.

inertia · #**207** (**permalink**) 04-16-2008, 11:55 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dubbya

If God doesn't exist, why ARE we here?

.02

When I was younger it used to blow my mind thinking about the universe and what was before the big bang and what was before that etc etc.... I got to a point where I realised my little brain was far too underdeveloped to even comprehend such an enormous question and i took comfort in that. The heavily used quote"the more we know, the more we know we don't know" springs to mind.

Religion has seen a steady decline in the UK for decades. The divorce rate is climbing - about 1 in 3 marriages end in divorce, church attendance is dropping, the church now owns a fraction of the land that it used to etc etc... Whether this is a good thing is yet to be seen.

I like the moral standards that are attached to Christianity (not just Christianity) and think that as the UK population becomes less religious these standards will also slip. Why is it that as a species we refuse to see that religion should be about a code of ethics and not about theology?

My 2 peneth...

deepsand · #**208** (**permalink**) 04-16-2008, 01:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by activeco

I surely support the idea behind this statement, but I dispute the term "atheism" used here and elsewhere.

As I earlier noted, one must make the distinction between atheism and agnosticism.

To declare that something does not exist, merely owing to the fact there is no proof of its existence, is a logical fallacy; in such case, the best that one can say is that no conclusion can be drawn from the evidence or lack thereof.

Hence, I hold myself to be an agnostic, rather than an atheist.

Quote:

Originally Posted by activeco

I am afraid this is a senseless question. The same applies here.
If there is no Golden Calf, Xenu, Blue Cosmo Sparks...why are we here?
If you still insist, you can also ask a classical question: Why does God exist? Any answer to that can be applied to the existence of anything else.

Quite correct; the question as framed is itself fallacious, as it assumes facts not in evidence, i.e., that existence presupposes a particular and special type of cause.

deepsand · #**209** (**permalink**) 04-16-2008, 01:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by inertia

When I was younger it used to blow my mind thinking about the universe and what was before the big bang and what was before that etc etc.... I got to a point where I realised my little brain was far too underdeveloped to even comprehend such an enormous question and i took comfort in that. The heavily used quote"the more we know, the more we know we don't know" springs to mind.s we refuse to see that religion should be about a code of ethics and not about theology?

That sound quite familiar.

As a child, I used to lie awake at night pondering whether or not the universe was finite or infinite. In my mind I would picture a box which contained a finite universe, with me inside, and ask myself "What, then, is on the other side of the box?"

I eventually realized that we have no concept of a "null" space, and therefore cannot comprehend such.

activeco · #**210** (**permalink**) 04-16-2008, 02:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by deepsand

Hence, I hold myself to be an agnostic, rather than an atheist.

Don't tell me there was no influence of Bertrand Russell.

deepsand · #**211** (**permalink**) 04-16-2008, 02:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by activeco

Don't tell me there was no influence of Bertrand Russell.

Quite frankly, it's been so long ago that I read any of his works, that I cannot say what influence he may have had.

However, I can, with certainty, say that he had no influence re. my being an agnostic; that occurred while I was still in high school, after engaging in more than a little bit of comparitive religious study.

activeco · #**212** (**permalink**) 04-16-2008, 03:09 PM

When you put the dilemma between an atheist and an agnostic, that's the first person that comes to mind.
Time to remind of Mr. Russell with an appropriate lecture he delivered in 1927.

Why I Am Not A Christian, by Bertrand Russell

deepsand · #**213** (**permalink**) 04-16-2008, 07:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by activeco

When you put the dilemma between an atheist and an agnostic, that's the first person that comes to mind.
Time to remind of Mr. Russell with an appropriate lecture he delivered in 1927.

Why I Am Not A Christian, by Bertrand Russell

Dilemma? What dilemma?

In the strict logical sense, atheism relies on the fallacy of argument from ignorance, taking the absence of proof to be proof of absence, and concluding categorically that there is no God. The agnostic, on the other hand, simply takes absence of proof as being absence of proof; nothing more, but surely nothing less.

The agnostic need look no futher than that which Mr. Russell addresses as the "First Cause Argument" to conclude that the argument for such is reiterative, that it is infinity recursive, and can only be escaped by way of the choosing of an arbitrary exit point, which can be given any name.

For the agnostic, the question of God's existence is therefore a metaphysical one; one which is, by definition, unanswerable and therefore of no value worth pondering.

rickanderson · #**214** (**permalink**) 04-20-2008, 01:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by deepsand

For the agnostic, the question of God's existence is therefore a metaphysical one; one which is, by definition, unanswerable and therefore of no value worth pondering.

which is why they have no values worth pondering.

activeco · #**215** (**permalink**) 04-20-2008, 03:02 PM

Indeed, resurrection.

Let me add that a "stupid man's report of what a clever man says is never accurate because he unconsciously translates what he hears into something he can understand."

-The History of Western Philosophy-

deepsand · #**216** (**permalink**) 04-20-2008, 03:33 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by activeco

Indeed, resurrection.

Let me add that a "stupid man's report of what a clever man says is never accurate because he unconsciously translates what he hears into something he can understand."

-The History of Western Philosophy-

Well put.

**ctabuk** · #**217** (**permalink**) 04-21-2008, 03:27 AM

If one more of you report each other once more - I will close this thread - now, play nice or not at all.

deepsand · #**218** (**permalink**) 04-21-2008, 12:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ctabuk

If one more of you report each other once more - I will close this thread - now, play nice or not at all.

Why should those of us who are able to engage in rational and civil discourse be in any way inconvenienced owing to the actions of those who cannot well comport themselves?