(January 16, 2016 at 5:42 pm)Whateverist the White Wrote:

(January 16, 2016 at 1:00 pm)athrock Wrote: I was struck by this passage from his interview with PBS:

"As I began to ask a few questions of those people, I realized something very fundamental: I had made a decision to reject any faith view of the world without ever really knowing what it was that I had rejected. And that worried me. As a scientist, you're not supposed to make decisions without the data. It was pretty clear I hadn't done any data collecting here about what these faiths stood for."

I can't help wondering how many people in this forum are in that same position of having rejected faith without actually knowing what it is that they have rejected. When I read the posts of many forum members, it is obvious that they have little to no real understanding of basic theology and that their views of the Bible are based not upon a careful reading of those 72 books but on mischaracterizations of them by Internet bloggers and other forum members.

The irony pointed out by Collins is that while these folks claim to believe in the principles of the scientific method, they behave in a decidedly unscientific fashion by making their decisions to reject God with flawed or incomplete data.

And why is this the case? Collins explains:

"...if you're going to accept the existence of God, at some level you have to give up control, and you can't just do what you want to because it feels good. And I liked very much being in control. I liked not having to answer to what was holy and vote for what was right. Maybe in some way, I was aware already without having put words to it, of the moral law — and aware that I wasn't living up to it.

So in recognizing my desire to have relationship with God, I also had to come face to face with my own massive imperfections. If God is holy, and if you can see God in some ways as a mirror to yourself, you realize just how far you fall short of anything that you could be really proud of. And that is a terribly distressing kind of experience for anybody who's first coming to that. So I would not say I was an ecstatic convert."

And thus it comes down to an emotion-driven act of the will to avoid the intellectual rationale for faith. The brain knows (or fears) that God is real, but the unbeliever does not want to give up control of his life (falsely believing that what he calls freedom is actually slavery to sin), so he refuses to make the choice to act upon that knowledge. From that point on, life for the unbeliever is a daily struggle of swimming against the tide.

Only the apatheist is free from such internal conflict...free because thoughts such as these never cross his mind. But for the atheist, the one who has declared to himself (if not to others) that there is no God, crossing that line has not brought peace but open warfare.

My wife bought his book on faith but I scarcely looked at it.  

Well, hello! Maybe it warrants a more careful read?  

(January 16, 2016 at 5:42 pm)Whateverist the White Wrote: I had made a decision to reject any faith view of the world without ever really knowing what it was that I had rejected. And that worried me. As a scientist, you're not supposed to make decisions without the data. It was pretty clear I hadn't done any data collecting here about what these faiths stood for.

These are good quotes from Collins.  I've always thought it was wrong headed to assume that a "faith view of the world" was nothing but an empirical mistake.  The subjective life of the mind along with its complexity make that way too facile.  So I'm with him so far.

Great!

(January 16, 2016 at 5:42 pm)Whateverist the White Wrote: But then I think he then goes right off the rails:

"...if you're going to accept the existence of God, at some level you have to give up control and you can't just do what you want to because it feels good. And I liked very much being in control. I liked not having to answer to what was holy and vote for what was right. Maybe in some way, I was aware already without having put words to it, of the moral law — and aware that I wasn't living up to it.

From the concession that a faith based worldview need not be dismissed out of hand, it does not follow that one should abandon control to a hypothetical god.  That is just whack.  One can admit that one has less control than many probably surmise without willfully abandoning any role whatsoever in ones life.  Self abnegation is always a mistake as well as reprehensible.

Well, look at this from another perspective: if there is a God who made all things, who made YOU also (even by means of genetics, etc.), then, you belong to Him, don't you?

I know that this is UK-based forum (with a large non-Brit population), right? So, let's try an analogy based upon a monarchy. What fealty did or do the subjects of the King owe to him? And if it is right for a subject to be loyal to his human lord, how much more should we submit our lives to an eternal, heavenly king?

(January 16, 2016 at 5:42 pm)Whateverist the White Wrote: There are ways to live a life with a faith based worldview, and even hold your head up high in doing so.  But Collin's way isn't one of them.  You meet and hear of so few impeccable theists.  I wish those there are would do more to make themselves known to encourage others.  But they probably feel estranged by the fundamentalists who dominate most traditions.  It would be much more interesting to live in a world with those guys to challenge us than it is to be constantly proselytized to my idiot fundamentalists who have so missed the boat.

Accept that there are no impeccable believers, and the Church is not a haven for the perfect few among us. It is a hospital filled with the sick, the wounded, the deranged, the stinking and rotten. In short, it's pretty much like the world outside its walls with one exception: those patients inside have accepted the forgiveness of the Divine Physician who alone can heal them.

Does that sound too trite? Well, maybe I waxed a little too poetic, but the concept is true nonetheless.

(January 16, 2016 at 5:43 pm)athrock Wrote:

(January 16, 2016 at 5:17 pm)Rhythm Wrote: Or it isn't.  You sit on one side of the line and I sit on the other.  Ne'er the twain shall meet, eh?  I have to ask, though...would you advocate that we kill 70k people if our government failed to conduct a census properly?  Will you advocate for the execution of children for the incompetence of a census taker or the crimes of their parents?

Show me that you have the courage of your convictions.  Condone those actions.  Or...... are you a fraud?

You keep assuming that 70K died simply because David conducted a census. And maybe that was true, but maybe there were other reasons for God's punishment of the people with the census merely being the final straw, so to speak.

"Mysterious reasons" are interchangeable with no reasons at all.  Why would you even need to speculate as to these mysterious reasons if you were actually as comfortable with the stated reasons as you claim to be?

Quote:There is no moral equivalency between God and a human government. Consequently, God may rightly choose to act in a way that a government cannot. After all, the government would be executing people who belong ultimately to God, and it has no right to do so any more than you have the right to kill your neighbor's dog for barking all night.

Agreed.  "God" is bush league compared to our governments, which is saying something.......considering.....

Quote:One other point: You do have a proclivity for name-calling, don't you? According to you, I'm a liar, a missionary, and now a fraud.

You seem to be all of these things.  I give you the opportunity to disabuse me of these notions constantly, but you seem to be intent upon doing nothing -but- confirm my assessments.

Quote:Are you this unkind to everyone you meet? Or is this a special hatred reserved for those whose religious views you despise?

I'm unkind to you because you have espoused a litany of fundamentally unkind points of view.  Such as the perfect justice of killing a child for the crimes (and crimes only very, very loosely) of the parent, or the incompetence of a census taker, "mysterious reasons", or a "stench" in a gods nostrils.

Quote:If you and Minimalist are good examples of what atheism does to the soul of those who embrace it, I think you FAIL as ambassadors for your own alternative belief system. With atheists like you spewing your venom in forums such as this, there will be no shortage of people who want nothing to do with your kind of hate.

Seeing as I don't have a soul, it's difficult to see what atheism could do to it.

(January 16, 2016 at 5:22 pm)athrock Wrote: For example, everyone rants about the killing of the Canaanites...conveniently overlooking the fact that the Canaanites were truly horrible people...engaged in all sorts of perversions including child sacrifice to their idols, etc. Or they whine about the flood when God wiped out everyone but Noah's family...again missing the point that the sins of the people were a stench in God's nostrils. Or they point to the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah (recently uncovered by archaeologists, btw - another vindication of the historical accuracy of the Bible), and claim that God was unfair while completely ignoring the sinful lifestyle of the homosexual population of the cities that was the cause of God's wrath.

Infants died as well in those mass murders, and no, the Canaanites were not truly horrible people any more than anyone else living at that time was, and besides, one cannot possibly justify the murder of infants and young children.  But, I await your response!

(January 16, 2016 at 5:42 pm)Whateverist the White Wrote: But then I think he then goes right off the rails:

"...if you're going to accept the existence of God, at some level you have to give up control and you can't just do what you want to because it feels good. And I liked very much being in control. I liked not having to answer to what was holy and vote for what was right. Maybe in some way, I was aware already without having put words to it, of the moral law — and aware that I wasn't living up to it.

From the concession that a faith based worldview need not be dismissed out of hand, it does not follow that one should abandon control to a hypothetical god.  That is just whack.  One can admit that one has less control than many probably surmise without willfully abandoning any role whatsoever in ones life.  Self abnegation is always a mistake as well as reprehensible.

There are ways to live a life with a faith based worldview, and even hold your head up high in doing so.  But Collin's way isn't one of them.  You meet and hear of so few impeccable theists.  I wish those there are would do more to make themselves known to encourage others.  But they probably feel estranged by the fundamentalists who dominate most traditions.  It would be much more interesting to live in a world with those guys to challenge us than it is to be constantly proselytized to by idiot fundamentalists who have so missed the boat.

Yeah, and he never explains why he became a Christian as opposed to a Muslim, a Jew, a Hindu, Buddhist, etc., other than he read some simplistic book by C.S. Lewis on the "3 Ls".  Collins reasoning is just simple-minded, so simple-minded, in fact, that it is likely that he "converted first" (out of emotional despair) and then went looking for "evidence" after the fact.

(January 16, 2016 at 5:44 pm)Cecelia Wrote:

(January 16, 2016 at 5:22 pm)athrock Wrote: LOL. No, because unlike God, Sauron WASN'T a good guy all along.

The census may have merely been the final straw or occasion of punishment for a series of events or patterns of sins that God finally had to address. And yes, I can say that God's just is perfect because His justice matched the offense in ways that you cannot comprehend.

For example, everyone rants about the killing of the Canaanites...conveniently overlooking the fact that the Canaanites were truly horrible people...engaged in all sorts of perversions including child sacrifice to their idols, etc. Or they whine about the flood when God wiped out everyone but Noah's family...again missing the point that the sins of the people were a stench in God's nostrils. Or they point to the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah (recently uncovered by archaeologists, btw - another vindication of the historical accuracy of the Bible), and claim that God was unfair while completely ignoring the sinful lifestyle of the homosexual population of the cities that was the cause of God's wrath.

Like I said before, your emotional reaction to these stories is understandable at one level, but your failure to deal with the full set of data is the real reason why you can't understand why God acted as He did.

You can't just say "God is the good guy", and therefore excuse all of his actions. 

I'm not excusing anything. Believers grapple with these same passages, but they come to different conclusions based upon a more complete understanding of God's character. Where you see an evil, malevolent God, believers see a loving Father who does not want to discipline his children but must for their own good.

(January 16, 2016 at 5:44 pm)Cecelia Wrote: You can't just say "Well his justice is perfect!" and expect people to buy your bullshit hook line and sinker.

True. I expect people to look deeper and come to something more than a superficial, emotional reaction to the passages in question.

(January 16, 2016 at 5:44 pm)Cecelia Wrote: You're just upset that people are questioning the actions of your precious homopobic misogynistic asshole god.  I get that you're also probably a homophobic misogynistic asshole yourself, so you identify with him and love that he killed the homosexuals and that he killed 70,000 people because a census was taken by their king. 

I am? How do you know all these things about me? Fact is, you don't know me and you don't know God.

Let. That. Sink. In.

(January 16, 2016 at 5:44 pm)Cecelia Wrote: You think that's perfect justice because that's what you're told to believe.  You don't ask any questions.

Now, as you read through what I hope are my reasonably well-articulated and thoughtful replies, do I strike you as being the type of shy, retiring type who doesn't ask questions?

(January 16, 2016 at 5:44 pm)Cecelia Wrote: The truth is this just shows you aren't open minded at all.  You blindly accept whatever bullshit your holy book feeds you.  And then you expect others to believe the same.  And when they don't, you call it a 'failure' but the real failure is that you fail to see that if your God existed that he wouldn't be worthy of worship.   You have to prove that god is the good guy, and I just don't see it.  God is the Sauron of this story.  Ever watchful, and completely evil.

Then you should read it again, because you've completely missed the revelation of God.

(January 16, 2016 at 5:44 pm)Cecelia Wrote: For the record, there's no archaeological evidence of God destroying the city.  If something did happen there, there's zero evidence that some asshole god did it.  Or that he did it because there were gay people there.  Apparently God decided not to destroy San Francisco for some reason.  Or any other place that has a lot of gay people, like gay bars.

LOL. Seriously, Cecelia, you need to do a bit more research. Tall el Hammam. That's your starting point.

Of course I don't know God. Neither do you! You don't know god any more than you know Harry Potter or Frodo Baggins. How can you know a fictional character? But going by what the bible says he's a misogynist (the religions of the world have hurt women more than anything else in the history of man), a homophobe (destroyed a city because of gay sex) and an asshole (he flooded the planet and killed 99% of the worlds population including animals and babies because they were apparently bad too. Didn't realize babies could be evil)

As for Tall el Hammam, it fails. Even a biblical believer says that it fails on two accounts:

Geography Fail: Bill Schlegel, professor in Israel for 25 years and author of the Satellite Bible Atlas, explains why the biblical text does not fit the geography of Tall el-Hammam.

Chronology Fail: Eugene Merrill, Distinguished Professor of Old Testament Studies at Dallas Theological Seminary and author of Kingdom of Priests: A History of Old Testament Israel, shows in a recent Artifax article that for Tall el-Hammam to be Sodom one must deny all of the biblical dates before the time of the judges.

http://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily...el-hammam/

There's a starting point for you.

(January 16, 2016 at 6:01 pm)Rhythm Wrote:

(January 16, 2016 at 5:43 pm)athrock Wrote: You keep assuming that 70K died simply because David conducted a census. And maybe that was true, but maybe there were other reasons for God's punishment of the people with the census merely being the final straw, so to speak.

"Mysterious reasons" are interchangeable with no reasons at all.  Why would you even need to speculate as to these mysterious reasons if you were actually as comfortable with the stated reasons as you claim to be?

Dude, I'm totally cool with God's judgments.

(January 16, 2016 at 6:01 pm)Rhythm Wrote:

Quote:There is no moral equivalency between God and a human government. Consequently, God may rightly choose to act in a way that a government cannot. After all, the government would be executing people who belong ultimately to God, and it has no right to do so any more than you have the right to kill your neighbor's dog for barking all night.

Agreed.  "God" is bush league compared to our governments, which is saying something.......considering.....

Wow. The power of your argumentation is truly something to behold. <snicker>

(January 16, 2016 at 6:01 pm)Rhythm Wrote:

Quote:One other point: You do have a proclivity for name-calling, don't you? According to you, I'm a liar, a missionary, and now a fraud.

You seem to be all of these things.  I give you the opportunity to disabuse me of these notions constantly, but you seem to be intent upon doing nothing -but- confirm my assessments.

I'm not sure you have the mental stability or clarity to make accurate assessments of much of anything.

(January 16, 2016 at 6:01 pm)Rhythm Wrote:

Quote:Are you this unkind to everyone you meet? Or is this a special hatred reserved for those whose religious views you despise?

I'm unkind to you because you have espoused a litany of fundamentally unkind points of view.  Such as the perfect justice of killing a child for the crimes (and crimes only very, very loosely) of the parent, or the incompetence of a census taker, or "mysterious reasons".  

LOL. You started the ad hominem attacks days (weeks?) ago...long before today's sidebar discussion of the 70k first mentioned by Cecelia a few hours ago. Don't try to pretend that you've suddenly become nasty. You've been a bastard much longer than this. And you know it.

(January 16, 2016 at 6:01 pm)Rhythm Wrote:

Quote:If you and Minimalist are good examples of what atheism does to the soul of those who embrace it, I think you FAIL as ambassadors for your own alternative belief system. With atheists like you spewing your venom in forums such as this, there will be no shortage of people who want nothing to do with your kind of hate.

Seeing as I don't have a soul, it's difficult to see what atheism could do to it.

Then what part of you is it that has become so filled with hate that you can't help spewing it all over the forum whenever someone who might have a positive thing to say about theism shows up?

If not in your soul, then where in your intellect, emotions or will do you store and nurture such anger and animosity?

It's a pity that you do not see how you are rotting from the inside out and a prisoner of your own hatred. I'm merely a vicarious target for Him whom you truly despise.

(January 16, 2016 at 5:57 pm)athrock Wrote:

(January 16, 2016 at 5:42 pm)Whateverist the White Wrote: But then I think he then goes right off the rails:

"...if you're going to accept the existence of God, at some level you have to give up control and you can't just do what you want to because it feels good. And I liked very much being in control. I liked not having to answer to what was holy and vote for what was right. Maybe in some way, I was aware already without having put words to it, of the moral law — and aware that I wasn't living up to it.

From the concession that a faith based worldview need not be dismissed out of hand, it does not follow that one should abandon control to a hypothetical god.  That is just whack.  One can admit that one has less control than many probably surmise without willfully abandoning any role whatsoever in ones life.  Self abnegation is always a mistake as well as reprehensible.

Well, look at this from another perspective: if there is a God who made all things, who made YOU also (even by means of genetics, etc.), then, you belong to Him, don't you?

Understood in a sufficiently as-if manner, allegorically in other words, I do belong to this 'god' but no more than it belongs to me. We are mutually dependent on the other. I am dependent upon what you're calling 'god' for giving rise to me. But in the same way, this god is likewise dependent upon me for bringing it into a modern world where it otherwise has no place at all. We are this god's vessel as well as its 'creation'. Psychologically, we complete god and do what it cannot.

'God' understood in this way can't just be walked away from and ignored. It is important to please this God because if you go too far astray and serve it not at all, it can withdraw the fundamental ground of being which makes 'you' possible. But you're a fool if you think this 'god' is correctly and exclusively explained by just one tradition, say the bible. The truth is you don't have the first clue about how to please it because you don't 'get it' at all.

(January 16, 2016 at 5:57 pm)athrock Wrote:

(January 16, 2016 at 5:42 pm)Whateverist the White Wrote: There are ways to live a life with a faith based worldview, and even hold your head up high in doing so.  But Collin's way isn't one of them.  You meet and hear of so few impeccable theists.  I wish those there are would do more to make themselves known to encourage others.  But they probably feel estranged by the fundamentalists who dominate most traditions.  It would be much more interesting to live in a world with those guys to challenge us than it is to be constantly proselytized to my idiot fundamentalists who have so missed the boat.

Accept that there are no impeccable believers, and the Church is not a haven for the perfect few among us. It is a hospital filled with the sick, the wounded, the deranged, the stinking and rotten.

You got that right.

(January 16, 2016 at 5:57 pm)athrock Wrote: In short, it's pretty much like the world outside its walls with one exception: those patients inside have accepted the forgiveness of the Divine Physician who alone can heal them.

Yes, they cling to a literal prescription obtained from a book best understood allegorically within the context of the worldwide genre. Sadly that might provide solace -I wouldn't know- but it won't lead to anything more.

I don't mind being a bastard. I'm many things much worse and more sinister than just a bastard.

All of this posturing is pointless Athrock.  Your finger is on the trigger, 70k ahead of you..men women and children.  Do you pull it or not? Can you summon the courage of your "convictions", or not?

(January 16, 2016 at 6:16 pm)Cecelia Wrote: Of course I don't know God.  Neither do you!  You don't know god any more than you know Harry Potter or Frodo Baggins.  How can you know a fictional character?  But going by what the bible says he's a misogynist (the religions of the world have hurt women more than anything else in the history of man), a homophobe (destroyed a city because of gay sex) and an asshole (he flooded the planet and killed 99% of the worlds population including animals and babies because they were apparently bad too.  Didn't realize babies could be evil)

As for Tall el Hammam, it fails.  Even a biblical believer says that it fails on two accounts:

Geography Fail: Bill Schlegel, professor in Israel for 25 years and author of the Satellite Bible Atlas, explains why the biblical text does not fit the geography of Tall el-Hammam.

Chronology Fail: Eugene Merrill, Distinguished Professor of Old Testament Studies at Dallas Theological Seminary and author of Kingdom of Priests: A History of Old Testament Israel, shows in a recent Artifax article that for Tall el-Hammam to be Sodom one must deny all of the biblical dates before the time of the judges.

http://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily...el-hammam/

There's a starting point for you.

Cecelia, you poor woman. 

You have no idea what I know and don't know. You can assert all you want, but you're guessing - hoping really - that your words are true. They are not. Except your admission that you don't know God, of course. But that's YOUR choice.

Now, be honest...had you ever even heard of Tell el Hammam before you did a quick Google search frantically looking for something with which to counter my post?  

Unless you are by chance an archaeology major yourself, I would bet not. But hey, I could be wrong...you could be very current on the latest from the digs in Israel for all I know.

I won't claim to know more about you than you seem to know about me.