(February 28, 2013 at 12:35 pm)apophenia Wrote: I ask that you try not to view it as simply a tool invented to combat religion, and just examine it as nothing more than a scientific hypothesis.

Fair enough. I can respect that.

[quote='missluckie26' pid='405558' dateline='1361702930']
I fear death less as an athiest.


Sorry - but an atheist has NO reason to fear death at all

Death brings nothing past the event to fear

(February 28, 2013 at 6:37 pm)ThomM Wrote: Sorry - but an atheist has NO reason to fear death at all.

The existentialists would say that life is just a brief spark of light surrounded on both side by infinite darkness. All we are is dust in the wind...and every cowboy sings a sad sad song.

Returning to nothingness might not be so bad, but a life without ultimate purpose seems worse to me. But that's just me.

(February 28, 2013 at 7:06 pm)ChadWooters Wrote: Returning to nothingness might not be so bad, but a life without ultimate purpose seems worse to me. But that's just me.

Who says an atheistic life has no purpose? I've got a number of purposes, all self determined and just as valid as the one in your holy book, only far more personal and meaningful because I've chosen to devote the one brief existence I do have to them.

Is not a purpose freely chosen more significant than one dictated to you from on high?

(March 1, 2013 at 2:32 am)Esquilax Wrote: Who says an atheistic life has no purpose? I've got a number of purposes, all self determined and just as valid as the one in your holy book, only far more personal and meaningful because I've chosen to devote the one brief existence I do have to them. Is not a purpose freely chosen more significant than one dictated to you from on high?

Sure you can have proximate meaning. It doesn't come to anything. Everything you worked for, everything you loved and valued, all the people for whom you cared. All gone like it never even happened. Believers strive for what endures.

You assume that believers have no freedom to define their own purpose, but that is not the case. You failed to distinguish between general Provision and specific Provision. We can express our love for the Lord and our neighbor in any way we we feel like doing and still satisfy God's ultimate purpose of making a Heaven out of the human race. The concept is called 'Christian Liberty'.

(March 2, 2013 at 10:35 am)ChadWooters Wrote: Sure you can have proximate meaning. It doesn't come to anything.

It comes from me. Why is that inferior?

Quote:Everything you worked for, everything you loved and valued, all the people for whom you cared. All gone like it never even happened. Believers strive for what endures.

Except you've got no assurance that it will endure. Neither of us do. The difference is that I'm not splitting my time, or potentially tricking myself into believing a lie. We only have one life we can be sure of, after all.

(March 2, 2013 at 10:56 am)Esquilax Wrote: It comes from me. Why is that inferior?

I said it come to nothing. But in answer to your question, it is inferior because it comes from you, a finite being, and is based on your relationship with things in this world, that are finite. While the believer is also a finite being, the believer has a relationship with the Infinite.

(March 2, 2013 at 10:56 am)Esquilax Wrote: Except you've got no assurance that it will endure. Neither of us do...We only have one life we can be sure of, after all.

The difference between us is I have assurance in my continuance. A disbeliever, such as yourself, has no such assurance.

I'm going to ask the obvious here, what 'assurances' do you have that are directly from the allmighty infinite and not the finite men who wrote your Bible?

(March 2, 2013 at 11:35 pm)ChadWooters Wrote: I said it come to nothing. But in answer to your question, it is inferior because it comes from you, a finite being, and is based on your relationship with things in this world, that are finite. While the believer is also a finite being, the believer has a relationship with the Infinite.

The problem with that is, there is no infinite to have a relationship with. You've only deluded yourself into thinking there is. Thus, the 'meaning' you have applied to life is completely fraudulent. In the end, you'll be just another carcass, no different from ours.

(March 2, 2013 at 10:56 am)Esquilax Wrote: The difference between us is I have assurance in my continuance. A disbeliever, such as yourself, has no such assurance.

None of us has any such assurance. We're just being honest with ourselves about that.

It doesn't matter in the end, of course, but you only get this life, you ought not to waste it preparing for an afterlife which exists only in your fantasies.

(March 3, 2013 at 12:35 am)missluckie26 Wrote: I'm going to ask the obvious here, what 'assurances' do you have that are directly from the allmighty infinite and not the finite men who wrote your Bible?

A Supreme Being is metaphysically necessary.