The way I see it, there was something that took or created a singularity 14 billion years ago and ignited it. From that instance onwards the universe has been on its own to expand forever, and whatever fate befalls the isolated galaxies billions of years in the future is in no way controlled by anything divine or all powerful.
Let's expand this debate. There are an estimated 500 billion galaxies with each containing around 500 billion stars, and if string theory is correct there could be multiple universes. Nearly every few months now, around every star they closely scrutinise, astronomers find planets. The potential for life bearing planets in the universe is immense.
We don't even need to go that far... If there is an all almighty GOD... Why are there so many different religions? Why did the Egyptians had so many GODs, except for our own? It was the Hebrews who saw GOD and wrote the old testament. Yes I know... The Grecs printed it. But then Jesus (The son of GOD) comes along... And he don't like the old testament. So he changes it to the new testament. In doing so, he piss off the Hebrews and find himself cruxified for its trouble. Why GOD did not help his son? Was he piss off at him too?... For changing the old testament?
This thread was about religion. It was not meant to be used to start selling us GOD.
I respect people's choice of being religious. But I don't want them to try to convert me to their faith.
If GOD was more powerful than John Howard, he would not let John Howard govern Australia for 10 years. After all, John Howard broke at least one of those 10 commandments. "You should not lie".
If you ask me... For a GOD which is so powerful that he created the whole Universe... He is weak as piss when it comes to deal with us humans.
Tell him to show himself... Because I need to have a talk to him face to face... Starting with "What the...?"
This thread was about religion. It was not meant to be used to start selling us GOD.
I respect people's choice of being religious. But I don't want them to try to convert me to their faith.
I don't think anyone here at eBlah is trying to convert you. It's just open discussion.
Quoted from Aussies_Online
If you ask me... For a GOD which is so powerful that he created the whole Universe... He is weak as piss when it comes to deal with us humans.
Tell him to show himself... Because I need to have a talk to him face to face... Starting with "What the...?"
Wait a minute...who are you to tell God what He should be doing? Is it wise to test God and His motives? What gives you the right to command God to show Himself? It should be His decision, not yours.
Sorry, guess I took your question as a smartass remark.
I'm not saying people are hypocritical, religion itself can be hypocritical, people can be religious but not necessarily hypocritical.
At no point did I say I was superior to anyone else, let's not start making false assumptions.
What I meant was the discrimination that some of the major religions perpetrate against people is hypocritical and goes against their very own teachings of tolerance and acceptance, such as the non-acceptance of gays and branding them as sinners. The ridiculous and out-dated opposition to contraception, intolerance of other religions/lifestyles/races/ethnicities. Some religions consider women having their periods as dirty and therefore prohibit them from entering places of worship or from wearing certain clothing. The list can go on and on.
As I said religion is FMBM.
Sorry I was so harsh with it x452. Fair points you make on it too. The FMBM is the only thing I don't agree with entirely, it's just that we screw everything up I think. That said, there's some Churches and religions I don't have much respect for but it doesn't include everything... so long as I remember that it's because we're screwing it up and not because the thing we're screwing up is screwed up.
We don't even need to go that far... If there is an all almighty GOD... Why are there so many different religions? Why did the Egyptians had so many GODs, except for our own? It was the Hebrews who saw GOD and wrote the old testament. Yes I know... The Grecs printed it. But then Jesus (The son of GOD) comes along... And he don't like the old testament. So he changes it to the new testament. In doing so, he piss off the Hebrews and find himself cruxified for its trouble. Why GOD did not help his son? Was he piss off at him too?... For changing the old testament?
This thread was about religion. It was not meant to be used to start selling us GOD.
I respect people's choice of being religious. But I don't want them to try to convert me to their faith.
If GOD was more powerful than John Howard, he would not let John Howard govern Australia for 10 years. After all, John Howard broke at least one of those 10 commandments. "You should not lie".
If you ask me... For a GOD which is so powerful that he created the whole Universe... He is weak as piss when it comes to deal with us humans.
Tell him to show himself... Because I need to have a talk to him face to face... Starting with "What the...?"
Hi AOL, To get it out of the way, the thread is indeed about religion and not evangelism (until it drifts farther I guess), but at the same time isn't a large part of your contribution, when your intention is to disprove God and claim specific scientific theories... isn't that just the other side of the coin of what you're objecting to?
I'll have to quote because it would be hard to follow otherwise. I dislike picking things apart heavily, it's gotten old. I hope you wont take it as me being critical, and also I'll put forth that I'm either not really necisarrlily seeing the relevance of or not agreeing with most of what else your posting against so I don't want to come off as kicking you in the a** or being on a bandwagon in regards to other debates you're having in the thread. Remember that you've brought Jesus into this though. I know you don't want to be preached to but you've asked questions that require looking at the Bible just a little bit to be able to address.
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If there is an all almighty GOD... Why are there so many different religions?
When you look at from the perspective of a Big Bang theory and evolution, you might also ask why there are so many religions and you'de draw a conclusion, that it's because people don't want to accept their utter mortality. Assuming there is a God, the same question would still apply and unless He made regular appearances people would not beleive. To take that further, if he DID make regular appearances, people still would not beleive. What would they expect? What would it take for people to beleive if He did make appearances? Wouldn't a huge number of them claim that it was smoke and mirrors? Would we get used to it and say "Oh yeah sure... but that's the same as it was the last time he showed up... draining ocean, floating mountain.. what's the differance, it happens and it doesn't make it God, it just means that these things happen." There would no doubt be scientists coming up with theories that show it's very possible for mountains to float around. It would of course be a completely differant world to live in, but I think if you imagine that world, that you can imagine there would be skepticism. Perhaps God would have to kill a bunch of non-beleivers to prove his point even, if He wanted to be effective. The only other way would be if we were in utter paradise all the time, and that we are not doesn't prove or disprove anything. It does motivate people to be skeptical since our circumstance can be hard to accept, and this will always in any situation I think, be a motivation for skepticism.
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But then Jesus (The son of GOD) comes along... And he don't like the old testament. So he changes it to the new testament. In doing so, he piss off the Hebrews and find himself cruxified for its trouble. Why GOD did not help his son? Was he piss off at him too?... For changing the old testament?
This is kind of a bizarre summary of events. The answer to part of that, the "Why did things change?" I can't really say and until I hear better I'd just have to say that it's because it was God's will. It was part of the plan anyway, according to the text, and the Jews are actually still waiting for the saviour to come and didn't recognise Jesus as being that. This is a big part on their end of the events that are beleived to have put Jesus on the cross, is that they didn't think he was their guy but lots of other people did and where it didn't undermine (as they would have perceived) their God, it undermined their authority and their pride. I'm trying to keep this as non-evangelistic as I can and that is pretty much a statement of record from the Bible as a historical book, as I understand it. Further to this though, is that other people at that time asked sort of the same types of questions to Jesus about "Why the hell this then" and "Why the hell that?... you aren't making any sense." and the one particular case that's poking out at me at the moment, he didn't really answer this other than to be even more obscure and confusing to the guy and tell him that it would be apparent later, refering to his death but there really wasn't any way the guy would have understood anything he'd just heard other than a bunch of nonsense. He didn't find himself crucified so much in the respect that he knew it was coming. Not to say it didn't suck a** though. To finish up where I was going, much of what Jesus said while he was alive would have to have been taken as faith. He didn't spend, that we know of, all his time walking around shooting miracles out of his fingertips. The point here is that it probably really wasn't at all clear what the guy was on about to most people, until after he was dead. This begins to answer that last part of your question but we won't go there without being more evangelistic. I couldn't really aviod it btw but I did try to aviod it where it wasn't necisarry. I sort of found AOL, that answering this without being a little religious is as difficult as trying to explain the idea behind string theory without the details of other things like gravity and electromagnetism and that's quite literally a very direct analogy. String theory also usually requires beleif in Big Bang theory even if that part of it is discounted in string theory itself.
Guess it didn't require that much picking apart of your post
You've just contradicted yourself by assuming that God is a 'He' in your other post. So I guess your one of those 'many' people aswell...
touché
Quoted from MeanDean
Sorry I was so harsh with it x452. Fair points you make on it too. The FMBM is the only thing I don't agree with entirely, it's just that we screw everything up I think. That said, there's some Churches and religions I don't have much respect for but it doesn't include everything... so long as I remember that it's because we're screwing it up and not because the thing we're screwing up is screwed up.
Isn't mankind good at screwing everything up! Manking will be known as "The Great Destroyer". We have been like an ever-hungry plague of locusts upon this planet, we have abused and destroyed almost everything we've gotten our grubby little hands on.
I don't disagree that the message Jesus was trying to convey was excellent and a great example of values people should espouse throughout their lives. I have heard that there were people before Jesus who have tried to spread a similar message and there have been people after him (ie. Mohammed).
I sometimes wonder if religion itself has been a conspiracy by men to sideline women and keep them subservient. After all no man can wield the same influence/power over another man that a woman can.
I will discriminate against religion then. It's stupid. Now it's said and done. Thank you.
That comment makes me smile. . . you followed the Big Brother show with 'religious devotion'. . .watching and waiting for every word and developement . . . the time you spent in watching the show. . commenting here and on other boards was amazing. . you are a 'font of information' on all things BB!!.
One could call you the BB High Priestess. . . not all religion is church based you know.
DEMOCRACY = Voters deciding by Poll on who will be the local member that "Big Business" will push around.
Now how are you going to argue that any of that isn't based on faith? It's also pretty much universally accepted that string theory is 100% faith based and by the very nature of it could never be proven and there is no room for 'if' in that part of your reasoning.
I deliberately said "if string theory proves correct", which doesn't require any faith whatsover. Already the original string theory has been proven as unworkable but variations of it and new theories along the same lines have come to light. The point is none of these scientific theories require any faith whatsover, as science never does. They put up theories and these are pulled apart and tested until they become fact or are proven wrong or not fully correct.
What science is doing at an ever increasing rate is finding out more of the creation of the universe, from quantum, subatomic particles, forces, waves, heat (an important one that), atoms, gasses, matter/antimatter/dark matter, minerals, rocks, planets, microscopic life, complex life and so on. The more science finds out the less there appears to be a guiding hand of God (of whatever sex or androgyny).
I or nobody else can ever prove what created the very first bit that went bang and what was the catalyst for it to go bang (even if that was a deliberate act or an accident). One thing that is for certain is that for an almighty perfect being that first bit that went bang was very imperfect, just as is everything that has followed on from that instance. Nearly all of nature including us humans are full of flaws and imperfections, which is pretty sloppy for a grand intelligent designer. In fact if current engineers were given the ability to create life with the knowledge they currently have, they could bulid a much better human being than the current model running around ruining this planet. Come to think of it that is not far off from being reality.
Quoted from Mean
Your post doesn't go anywhere that me saying that it was God's design does not. Can you see that it's aggravating for me to hear about your aggravation toward my faith, and then to read further that you want to persue this sort of argument anyway, after understanding that it's a two way street? All you're really doing is offering up things to be taken apart peice by peice, to be shown as faith and with good logic behind saying so without using spiritual text and within decent thought process we would all agree upon. I don't feel like getting into a string of multiquoted posts that aren't going anywhere though... not right now anyway.
True on the last piece as it will get nowhere as you will just quote "faith' based posts as I throw up lots of proven science.
Quoted from MeanDean
On to something else though, whatever your experience was at school, sounds bad enough that I feel a little bad to bring it up and I'm sorry if something ugly happened.
Yes ugly, but not uncommon for the Catholic Church, as I was to find out more and more as time went on.
Quoted from Gizmo
Intelligent life is relatively new in terms of the universe. . but I would ask you to stretch your imagination a bit. . . and wonder if humans are the very start of that intelligent creation. . .If God had/has a purpose and it got sidetracked temporarily (like the Bible suggests) then us humans could be the very start of future intelligent habitation of other planets . We will have to wait and see.
Well you see this is where I have all the trouble of believing that God had any grand design apart from just starting an imperfect big bang and then just letting it run. It did not in anyway design to have a mankind arrive billions of years down the track and then to start worship of it by that intelligent race. That appears to more accidental than anything else, plus leave it with no future.
If man was all of a sudden given the ability to travel around the universe in seconds it could still not explore the merest fraction of it before the end or the expansion became too big to transcend. Even then a huge amount of the unvierse would be beyond the ability of any organic mortal being to even get near to let alone explore, so mankind must ascend to become the God that created it to even know just a part of the universe.
So I just cannot believe that God created this unbelievably massive universe/multiverse (if theory proves correct) for an intelligent life which, even given infinite time, could not explore but the merest fraction of.
Not only that it turns out the universe is expanding forever and most galaxies are getting further and further apart. In several billion years our galaxy will be alone in blackness, so mankind is left to just exploring and colonising it with the rest of the universe now beyond our scope. Surely a God doesn't create all this magnificence just so one rather miniscule very short lived race can only ever set out to expand into but one of 500 billion galaxies, not to mention missing out on the many other wonders of the universe.
There may have been purpose in the creation of the first imperfect piece of the universe and making it go bang, but since that very moment on the universe has been on its own to do whatever randomness and the physical laws of the universe want to do, until by chance and the right mix of ingredients, intelligent beings evolve and after millions of years start manipulating those laws that is?
Everyone is entitled to be stupid, but some abuse the privilege.
If you don't understand that most of the things you've referanced in this thread can be pulled apart, then you haven't learned very much scientifically. If you think that what you've just described is what is accepted as rock solid scientific process, then you haven't learned enough about science... there's more within it's own feild of thought that you just plain haven't learned and honest to God (pardon the pun), it really shows that you ARE taking a not just a general amount, as I thought originally, but a huge amount of faith in science. If I get motivation later or tommorow or some other time, I'll come back and justify all that. As for now, based on the end part of your reply to me, it's pretty clear that you don't want to have this conversation on equal ground even when your lack of understanding is accounted for, and I don't feel immediatly... responsible, that I should respond to your post when your intention is only to disrespect me and not to have normal debate.
I'll add by the way, for the sake of adding it although I think the rest of the forum got this, that I was never arguing that science is incorrect, or that it isn't making progress toward this or that. All I ever said is that it is based in faith. It's all fine and dandy to say there's enough evidence for this and that that cosmological claims and claims in quantum physics are justifiably recognised as true. Where faith comes in is with evolution, Big Bang theory, archeology, anthropology... those are places where it clearly comes in as much as religion can. Further to that though is that at some level everything is based on faith and just where that line begins in science is no longer at the level of a+b=c and much of that BECAUSE of things like quantum mechanics which takes what was once the nonsense of daydreaming philosophers and throws it at us straight in the face. If you really understood what you were talking about here, you would never rule out the possibility of God unless you were just a plain cynical person. That is a rock solid statement. Perhaps persuing science further is the best thing you can do for now. If I feel like it and have the time, perhaps I will come back and make valid argument against the less complicated issues that you've brought up but as for now your narrowminded and rude post is pissing me off too much
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True on the last piece as it will get nowhere as you will just quote "faith' based posts as I throw up lots of proven science.
I mean dude, "It's something we just can't be sure about" or "I don't know" seem to be things that aren't part of your thought process religion or otherwise I would think. Why would you even waste your time posting here then? Frustrated that people will speak from faith I mean... and too narrowminded to even stop for and look just for a moment that you might be the flipside to the same coin. Did you come here to pick a fight with someone? To waste your time and mine? Is that it... that you're just not a nice person?
If you don't understand that most of the things you've referanced in this thread can be pulled apart, then you haven't learned very much scientifically. If you think that what you've just described is what is accepted as rock solid scientific process, then you haven't learned enough about science... there's more within it's own feild of thought that you just plain haven't learned and honest to God (pardon the pun), it really shows that you ARE taking a not just a general amount, as I thought originally, but a huge amount of faith in science.
Sorry no disrespect intended but just what the hell are you on about?
Science is not faith and has never been, this is the irrational line that Intelligent Designers throw up so they can then claim to debate at the same level.
Quoted from Wilipedia
Science in the broadest sense refers to any knowledge or trained skill, especially (but not exclusively) when this is attained by verifiable means.[1] The word science also describes any systematic field of study or the knowledge gained from such study. In a more restricted sense, science refers to a system of acquiring knowledge based on empiricism, experimentation, and methodological naturalism, as well as to the organized body of knowledge humans have gained by such research.
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If I get motivation later or tommorow or some other time, I'll come back and justify all that. As for now, based on the end part of your reply to me, it's pretty clear that you don't want to have this conversation on equal ground even when your lack of understanding is accounted for, and I don't feel immediatly... responsible, that I should respond to your post when your intention is only to disrespect me and not to have normal debate.
What the hell was that about? I have not nor did I have any intention of disrepecting you and of course I want a debate on equal grounds. Reading what you have just written it seems you are attempting to belittle me and claiming I have a "lack of understanding" as if you have some moral and superior high ground to debate from (thus it is you who do not want to debate on equal grounds).
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I'll add by the way, for the sake of adding it although I think the rest of the forum got this, that I was never arguing that science is incorrect, or that it isn't making progress toward this or that. All I ever said is that it is based in faith.
Science is not based on faith and never has been. If you saw the documentary on Intelligent Design recently, they had a piece on the Christian scientist who is working on the answer to everything. He had no problem reconciling his faith in his religion with the evidence based side of his work. He separted them completely as one being faith based and the other fact based. It is only the nonsense of Intelligence Design that wants to put them both on equal footing so they can then claim the right to have their idiocy taught in science classrooms instead of religious ones. Thank God (pun intended) they lost their court case.
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It's all fine and dandy to say there's enough evidence for this and that that cosmological claims and claims in quantum physics are justifiably recognised as true. Where faith comes in is with evolution, Big Bang theory, archeology, anthropology... those are places where it clearly comes in as much as religion can. Further to that though is that at some level everything is based on faith and just where that line begins in science is no longer at the level of a+b=c and much of that BECAUSE of things like quantum mechanics which takes what was once the nonsense of daydreaming philosophers and throws it at us straight in the face. If you really understood what you were talking about here, you would never rule out the possibility of God unless you were just a plain cynical person. That is a rock solid statement. Perhaps persuing science further is the best thing you can do for now. If I feel like it and have the time, perhaps I will come back and make valid argument against the less complicated issues that you've brought up but as for now your narrowminded and rude post is pissing me off too much.
Where was I rude, please? I will immediately apologise and retract that statement in full.
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I mean dude, "It's something we just can't be sure about" or "I don't know" seem to be things that aren't part of your thought process religion or otherwise I would think. Why would you even waste your time posting here then? Frustrated that people will speak from faith I mean... and too narrowminded to even stop for and look just for a moment that you might be the flipside to the same coin. Did you come here to pick a fight with someone? To waste your time and mine? Is that it... that you're just not a nice person?
What a lot of condescending rot that last lot is. I have not once denigrated or stated that I am against people practicing their faith or following what they believe in. I just stated I don't believe in it and am putting forth my belief in the universe.
This was a debate started on religion and that must included the side of athiests and agnostics, but it appears you really only want a debate that conforms to your beliefs and fob off anything that doesn't agree with your view.
It is not me that has the word Mean in my moniker. I just don't know why you decided to start personally attacking me when I have never done likewise to you. This always happens when you put up an opposing view, especially one that questions the existance of a God at all, to someone who is devout.
Everyone is entitled to be stupid, but some abuse the privilege.
No sir, you don't have Mean in your username. You named yourself after a snake.
Quoted from boomslanger
Where was I rude, please? I will immediately apologise and retract that statement in full.
My problem is that you've stated that you're annoyed that people argue from faith alone but refuse to consider that everything is based on some sort of faith by implying that your point of view is better for the reason that... I'm speaking from faith... which annoys you.
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What I hate about religions is you can never win an argument against someone who is religious as they always revert back to "faith"
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That is the other thing I hate about religion, it blinkers people and closes their minds.
Quoted from boomslanger
I'll try to be as diplomatic as I can, which is hard for me. What crock.
I'll be back another time, probably tommorow, to go over the rest... sort of like I said before you went picking it apart anyway. I should be in a better mood after getting some sleep
Thanks for using the "Wilipedia" for something that's a debatable issue. It would be somewhat of a laugh to look at the revision history of that article I would think.
One should remember that Christianity was founded on the resurection of Jesus. And how many witnesses were there to that resurection?
The Hebrews worship God. The Christians worship Jesus. The Muslims worship Mohamed, the founder of Islam.
Religious people like to talk about "Faith" because that is all they have to go on.
Problem is that we are now living in a world of communication where close to 100% of the information we seek is available for everyone to see.
Faith is for people with no access to information. You take your chance to believe because you have no other choice.
However, people who have access to the information will not take the chance to rely on faith alone. They want proves.
If you go back in history and study the catholic church, you will quickly find that those lover of God had no calms about murdering hundred of thousand of people for not believing in their faith. When a new group emerged "Protestants" they were either killed or chased from France by the Catholics. The Catholic church has committed so many atrocities in the name of God that it is not funny.
If there is a God, he has no control over humanity and never had.
If you are in direct contact with God... Fine... I believe you. If everything you are telling me is from your priest at the local church... Forget it...
Do you know that the Catholic Church own more Real Estate in the world than anybody else? And it is the believers who paid for it. GOD does not own it. He don't need to. He already own the Universe. The Vatican owns it.
Logged
. .watching and waiting for every word and developement . . . the time you spent in watching the show. . commenting here and on other boards was amazing. . you are a 'font of information' on all things BB!!. 
