In a world without God...

[Doubting Thomas]

I guess you know now what it is to build your house upon the sand.

You mean like believing in Christianity?

[LastPoet]

I guess a world without god would be exactly like this one... There would still be pricks that invented gods and sheep that follow their words religiously. Yeah, pretty much indistinguishable from our current state of affairs, after all:

The great masses of the people... will more easily fall victims to a big lie than to a small one.

[Drich]

Hypothetically, it can. But then, that would imply that your god is a sadistic, genocidal sociopath, one who is not omnipotent, nor omniscient, not immortal, not loving, not caring, nor even very intelligent.

Does God make these claims? (I'm looking for book chapter and verse, not what you think.)

Hogwash. Curiosity is an eager desire to know; inquisitiveness.

Inqueries can be also made without emotion therefore it is not an emotional response in of itself. It is another form of curiosity that can simply trigger emotion.

The term can also be used to denote the behavior itself being caused by the emotion of curiosity. As this emotion represents a thirst for knowledge, curiosity is a major driving force behind scientific research and other disciplines of human study.

If it is possiable to be curious or inquisitive and not be emotional charged in any way shape or form then these attributes in of themselves are not emotions. These attributes simply trigger emotion.

Example: is it possiable to be angery and it not be tied to an emotional experience? What about joyful or excited? No. One can not be excited and not exhibit emotion. (BTW excitment is the emotion curiosity and inquisitive is the emotion being triggered.) Therefore Excitement, Anger, Joyfulness etc, are emotions. While Curiosity is not. Because it is possiable to be courious and not exibit or feel any type of emotional response while courious.

Oh my god! You apparently see Delvian vipers behind every rock. You should seek a mental health professional ASAP, because, damn. Are you sure you want to stick with that bullshit response?

Another logical fallacy. "Psychologist's fallacy "
..and yes I am not into answering logical fallacies. (So I will be sticking to my answer) If you can not responsiably argue your point without appealing to logical errors then why would I chase your illogical arguement where ever you want to take it? This is known as setting boundries. 'Boundries' are apart of solid mental health. ;P

Erm, what? You say that you question the idea of an all merciful god and then tell us that he is merciful? Do you read any of this shit before you post it?

If you do not understand a precept then simply ask the question. when you mask a question with a trivial assertion you look foolish when your question is answered.

God is not Omni-benevolent. Meaning No where in the bible does it say God is ALL Merciful. The events you all point out in the OT and the fact that there is a Hell proves God is not ALL Merciful. However The bible says God has mercy on who He has mercy. Meaning God's Mercy for those who follow Him is indeed endless as the Bible does indeed teach this.

So in short, God is not merciful to everyone. God's Mercy is reserved to those who Follow Him, and they show mercy to their fellow man.

Yes I have.

Then you know I am right.

You do know we do not have a complete single source stegasaurus right? Every complete example comes from anywhere between 30 to 80 different seperate dig sites. and even then there are only a hand full of examples on the planet.

So what? At least you admit that they existed, right?

The bones did, what they were kit bashed (how they were assembled) into however is anyones guess.

For the same reason I know that the incomplete humpback whale skeleton I worked to complete in the late 1980s at the Louisville Science Center was accurate.

Actually no. It is not the same thing d-bag, because in the 1800's wale bones were collected from where they were harvested for their meat and oil, so biologists could record how and where the bones belonged as they came apart. Again the stegasaurus was put together using bones from 80 different dig sights with no idea if what they put together was indeed what the animal looked like.

Bottom line it takes more faith to believe there was a stegasaurus that looked like what we have in our museums, than it does to believe in God. Because God will reveal himself when one A/S/K, and well stego will just be whatever that first guy decided he was going to be.

Comparative anatomy, and forensic analyses. If you believe that the stegosaurus is not accurately portrayed, I encourage you to write a paper on the subject and get it published in a peer reviewed scientific publication. I wish you good luck in that endeavor.

there are thousands if not millions of papers already written. You just choose not to see them.
http://www.google.com/search?q=Papers+wr...3z1S_mE7-s

With all due respect, I'm not the one infatuated with a single book over 35 million others to the point where my entire life is based on it.

You keep returning to this dry well as if it will produce the shutdown you are looking for.
Again let me explain this to you one more time. If we are talking about the God of the bible then it is to the bible we must go to find those answers. As this is my thread my rules apply, and guess what. We are indeed talking about the God of the bible.

See, this is where I am supposed to apologize for having a well-rounded education

That's my point. It is not well rounded. You only see things or accept them if they are first prepackaged in bite size pieces that look like the pieces you were spoon feed while in school. Everything else is dismissed because it does not fit the profile of legitimacy you have been trained to look for. This is foolishness, because you close yourself off to EVERYTHING we do not currently understand, and everything elses that can not fit this current model. Education should be one of many tools one has at his disposal in the search for wisdom and Truth. But instead your education is your wisdom and truth.

Do you not see the error in that? No of course you don't. Let me explain. Your 'education' is only as pure (close to wisdom and truth) as those who compile it want it to be, and if your apart of the system then your not in a position to truly question it (in a radical way if need be.)

For example the Nazi's had educated men did they not? Do you think that what they were taught about evolution was/is the same thing you were taught? No of course not. (Lest you are of the white supermency cloth) The point being education/the system in which we are taught to collect, process and classify data is subject to the will and whim of the soceity that it resides in. So for instance if a soceity decides to say their primary race is better than all others then you will be hard pressed to argue that fact and remain in the good graces of the 'educated' in that soceity.

In the same way if a soceity says there is no God, then subsequently the education system will be constructed in such a way as to reflect what ever the 'educated' wish to promote. An example is the standby arguement is there is no proof of God. This is not true, there is proof lots of proof, but it is dismissed by those who hold the keys to education. For they have designed a system to exclude any proof that they do not approve of.

This is when truth takes a back seat to an 'approved education.' So no your not well rounded even though you'd call yourself that. At best your an 'educated man.'

[Silver]

(I'm looking for book chapter and verse, not what you think.)

If you properly read the bible, you would know what a sadistic tyrant He is.

Performing heinous acts while claiming them in the name of love does not make a benevolent being.

[Rahul]

Inqueries can be also made without emotion therefore it is not an emotional response in of itself. It is another form of curiosity that can simply trigger emotion.

...

If it is possiable to be curious or inquisitive and not be emotional charged in any way shape or form then these attributes in of themselves are not emotions. These attributes simply trigger emotion.

Example: is it possiable to be angery and it not be tied to an emotional experience? What about joyful or excited? No. One can not be excited and not exhibit emotion. (BTW excitment is the emotion curiosity and inquisitive is the emotion being triggered.) Therefore Excitement, Anger, Joyfulness etc, are emotions. While Curiosity is not*. Because it is possiable to be courious and not exibit or feel any type of emotional response while courious.

*Emphasis added

The below quotes comes from:

Spielberger, C. D. and Reheiser, E. C. (2009), Assessment of Emotions: Anxiety, Anger, Depression, and Curiosity. Applied Psychology: Health and Well-Being, 1: 271–302. doi: 10.1111/j.1758-0854.2009.01017.x

Author Information
University of South Florida, Tampa, USA
* * Charles D. Spielberger, Department of Psychology, University of South Florida, Tampa, FL, USA. Email: [email protected]

Publication History
Issue published online: 15 SEP 2009
Article first published online: 15 SEP 2009
Found on 14 JUN 2013

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.11...x/abstract

Anxiety, anger, depression, and curiosity are major indicators of psychological distress and well-being that require careful assessment. Measuring these psychological vital signs is of critical importance in diagnosis, and can facilitate treatment by directly linking intense emotions to the events that give rise to them. The historical background regarding theory and research on anxiety, anger, depression, and curiosity is briefly reviewed, and the nature and assessment of these emotional states and personality traits are examined. The construction and development of the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI), the State-Trait Anger EXpression Inventory (STAXI-2), and the State-Trait Personality Inventory (STPI) to assess anxiety, anger, depression, and curiosity, and the major components of these emotional states and personality traits, are described in detail.

[orogenicman]

Hypothetically, it can. But then, that would imply that your god is a sadistic, genocidal sociopath, one who is not omnipotent, nor omniscient, not immortal, not loving, not caring, nor even very intelligent.

Does God make these claims? (I'm looking for book chapter and verse, not what you think.)

Then perhaps you don't know the Bible as well as you think you do.

Inqueries can be also made without emotion therefore it is not an emotional response in of itself. It is another form of curiosity that can simply trigger emotion. The term can also be used to denote the behavior itself being caused by the emotion of curiosity. As this emotion represents a thirst for knowledge, curiosity is a major driving force behind scientific research and other disciplines of human study.

You don't get to make up definitions to suit your own arguments. And you are missing the point as well. Without curiosity, there would be no scientific advances. You are living proof that this is true.

Another logical fallacy. "Psychologist's fallacy "
..and yes I am not into answering logical fallacies. (So I will be sticking to my answer) If you can not responsiably argue your point without appealing to logical errors then why would I chase your illogical arguement where ever you want to take it? This is known as setting boundries. 'Boundries' are apart of solid mental health. ;P

So what you are saying is that you are going to stick to your bullshit response. I'm not surprised.

God is not Omni-benevolent. Meaning No where in the bible does it say God is ALL Merciful. The events you all point out in the OT and the fact that there is a Hell proves God is not ALL Merciful. However The bible says God has mercy on who He has mercy. Meaning God's Mercy for those who follow Him is indeed endless as the Bible does indeed teach this.

This is where I call you on your bullshit claims. You don't know that god even exists, and I know this for a fact because you do not have capabilities that I do not have. All you have is your alleged first person revelation, and with all due respect, no one is obliged to believe one person's first person revelation over that of any others. You may be the most honest, god-fearing person anyone has ever known but we still need unambiguous evidence for any of your claims.

Then you know I am right.

I know for a fact that you don't know what you are talking about.

The bones did, what they were kit bashed (how they were assembled) into however is anyones guess.

I can see where someone with your poor science skills would come to believe that to be true. It must seem like magic to an untrained eye such as yours. I know exactly how they did it, because I've done it myself, as have many other experts in the field. Clue - take a comparative anatomy class, and that is just for starters.

Actually no. It is not the same thing d-bag, because in the 1800's wale bones were collected from where they were harvested for their meat and oil, so biologists could record how and where the bones belonged as they came apart. Again the stegasaurus was put together using bones from 80 different dig sights with no idea if what they put together was indeed what the animal looked like.

Actually, yes. Because authentic whale skeletons are very hard to come by, and even harder to gain access to. There is a surprising dearth of research that has been conducted on whale skeletal anatomy, and only a handful of skeletons are available for study. All of the research I conducted to reconstruct that specimen was original, and based on the few nearly complete specimens that were available. But the methodology I used is widely accepted in forensics and comparative biology.

Bottom line it takes more faith to believe there was a stegasaurus that looked like what we have in our museums, than it does to believe in God. Because God will reveal himself when one A/S/K, and well stego will just be whatever that first guy decided he was going to be.

The bottom line is that you don't know what you are talking about,. You are obviously completely deficient in any knowledge of vertebrate anatomy, or anything else having to do with biology, or even geology for that matter. And that is because you refuse, for whatever reason, to do even the simplest thing, like take an adult education course on these subject, or even meet me, who has freely offered his time to educate you on the details of field geology and paleontology.

There are thousands if not millions of papers already written. You just choose not to see them.

None of which are published in peer-reviewed scientific publications that make yourspecific claim that model stegosaurus specimens used at Museums are not representative of the species. So see, you can do something original for once in your friggin life - write a scholarly paper demonstrating your claim. I wish you good luck with that.

You keep returning to this dry well as if it will produce the shutdown you are looking for.
Again let me explain this to you one more time. If we are talking about the God of the bible then it is to the bible we must go to find those answers. As this is my thread my rules apply, and guess what. We are indeed talking about the God of the bible.

I rest my case.

That's my point. It is not well rounded. You only see things or accept them if they are first prepackaged in bite size pieces that look like the pieces you were spoon feed while in school.

Even if that were true, and it certainly isn't, I have to assume that the conclusion that comes from that statement is that you are contrasting my 9 years of college science education with your rather "well-rounded" education, which apparently consists of rather poorly memorized verses from a single 2,000 year old book.

Everything else is dismissed because it does not fit the profile of legitimacy you have been trained to look for.

Well, yeah, I do tend to dismiss long disproved arguments, such as the Earth being the center of he universe, that the Earth is flat, or hollow, or expanding, or that the Book of Genesis has any scientific merit, that rainbows are created by pissing angels, or that mythology is anything but the study of myths.

This is foolishness, because you close yourself off to EVERYTHING we do not currently understand, and everything elses that can not fit this current model.

Not to brag, but I have no doubt whatsoever that I have forgotten more than you will ever know. I am driven to learn. Curiosity drives my learning process. I learn something new every day. I make a point of it. I didn't simply go the lazy route and pick up a single 2,000 year old book from authors unknown and decide that that has to be the way of things, and discard the other 35 million in existence. I discover things that challenge my views on a regular basis. But in all that discovery, the fact remains that the laws of physics still hold true for you, for me, for everyone on the planet, and for whoever/whatever may exist elsewhere in the universe. Try as you might, you cannot escape the laws of thermodynamics; you cannot escape the law of superposition in a gravity field.

Education should be one of many tools one has at his disposal in the search for wisdom and Truth. But instead your education is your wisdom and truth.

So you have nothing to lose and potentially everything to gain by taking up my challenge. Right, grasshopper?

Do you not see the error in that? No of course you don't. Let me explain. Your 'education' is only as pure (close to wisdom and truth) as those who compile it want it to be, and if your apart of the system then your not in a position to truly question it (in a radical way if need be.)

Wrong. Because my education is a product of my own curiosity about the universe. No one taught me how to do astrophotography. I learned it on my own. I didn't read it in a book, and I certainly didn't learn it from the Bible. My teachers did not teach me cartography. They only pointed the way. It is true that I stand on the shoulders of giants like Galileo and Darwin. But neither ever saw the NGC 2403 through a 25 inch telescope, and neither ever attempted to reconstruct a partial skeleton of a humpback whale. I have. Have you?

For example the Nazi's had educated men did they not?

You really should read up on Godwin's law. You've already lost the argument. So sorry for you.

[Drich]

Not a mind game. When someone of true power and authority in our soceity tells you to do XYZ if you want 123, then one does XYZ if He wants 123. Like If I was the little old lady who won that 600 million dollar power ball jackpot and I told you i will give you 100 million dollars if you washed my car with yellow joy liquid soap, rinsed it with bottled water and waxed it with liquid glass, would you wash and wax my car your way? Or would you do it per my instructions to make sure you got what I was offering?

If you would do this (bend your knee to me) for something as trivial as a 100 million dollars, then why would you expect to have God bend his knee before you to give you eternal life?

After all what does it profit a man if he were to loose his soul?

Argument from big stakes.

In your example, you're including in your assumptions that I'm aware that you have the money to pay me, which is the crucial difference between expecting someone to bend their knee to someone you claim exists and washing the car of a real person who really has 600 million dollars.

If a little old lady just told me she had 600 million dollars and would give me a 100 million for washing her car, I'd assume she was demented. I might still wash her car out of pity, not figuring I'll get anything for it.

This is the fatal flaw in your ablity to reason that carries over to your in ablity to grasp what is being done for you here.

Their is a lady in Zepherhills Fl who did win 600 million + dollars. She is 86 years old. She is giving away most of the money.

The conditions were mine. I used them to illustrate this point: The money (100 million dollars) is in no way fair compensation for the work being performed (you sumized this correctly) So one must ask himself why is she giving this money to me for washing her car? Your best answer judged the lady mentally defective. When in reality She is just giving away a large some of money. So larger there is nothing you can do on this earth to deserve it. It is a gift with one condition, that you accept it on her terms.

So too is the gift Christ gives you.

[Faith No More]

...So larger there is nothing you can do on this earth to deserve it. It is a gift with one condition, that you accept it on her terms.

So too is the gift Christ gives you.

The major difference here is that the old lady isn't telling you she'll take away all your money if you don't accept hers, which would no longer make it a gift. Then it becomes extortion used to strongarm a person into making the decision she wants them to make.

Such is the "gift" your god offers.

[Drich]

"IN" would be the first word. You are telling me you can extroplate a date for the word "IN?" What would that date be?

"the beginning" - of course. That sets our upper limit. What follows next? How might we correlate that "beginning" with a number, do you think? You've honestly never taken the time to work this out? Why might that be, do you imagine that the genesis narrative is just too mysterious to be considered...or that maybe you'd just rather not know...something else?

It's been completely 'worked out.' Has been for some time. (well before I started posting here.:

http://atheistforums.org/thread-14190.html

---

The major difference here is that the old lady isn't telling you she'll take away all your money if you don't accept hers, which would no longer make it a gift. Then it becomes extortion used to strongarm a person into making the decision she wants them to make.

Such is the "gift" your god offers.

Ah, no.

God's isn't taking anything away. (Your thinking OT rules) You live your life and are subject to the consenquences of your desisions. So too are the terms of the old lady's gift. Whether you accept her gift or not, you live your life and face the consenquences of your actions.

---

I guess a world without god would be exactly like this one... There would still be pricks that invented gods and sheep that follow their words religiously. Yeah, pretty much indistinguishable from our current state of affairs, after all:

The great masses of the people... will more easily fall victims to a big lie than to a small one.

This is where biblical Christianity differs. It's based on a personal one on one relationship with God, not a mass following.

---

Inqueries can be also made without emotion therefore it is not an emotional response in of itself. It is another form of curiosity that can simply trigger emotion.

...

If it is possiable to be curious or inquisitive and not be emotional charged in any way shape or form then these attributes in of themselves are not emotions. These attributes simply trigger emotion.

Example: is it possiable to be angery and it not be tied to an emotional experience? What about joyful or excited? No. One can not be excited and not exhibit emotion. (BTW excitment is the emotion curiosity and inquisitive is the emotion being triggered.) Therefore Excitement, Anger, Joyfulness etc, are emotions. While Curiosity is not*. Because it is possiable to be courious and not exibit or feel any type of emotional response while courious.

*Emphasis added

The below quotes comes from:

Spielberger, C. D. and Reheiser, E. C. (2009), Assessment of Emotions: Anxiety, Anger, Depression, and Curiosity. Applied Psychology: Health and Well-Being, 1: 271–302. doi: 10.1111/j.1758-0854.2009.01017.x

Author Information
University of South Florida, Tampa, USA
* * Charles D. Spielberger, Department of Psychology, University of South Florida, Tampa, FL, USA. Email: [email protected]

Publication History
Issue published online: 15 SEP 2009
Article first published online: 15 SEP 2009
Found on 14 JUN 2013

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.11...x/abstract

Anxiety, anger, depression, and curiosity are major indicators of psychological distress and well-being that require careful assessment. Measuring these psychological vital signs is of critical importance in diagnosis, and can facilitate treatment by directly linking intense emotions to the events that give rise to them. The historical background regarding theory and research on anxiety, anger, depression, and curiosity is briefly reviewed, and the nature and assessment of these emotional states and personality traits are examined. The construction and development of the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI), the State-Trait Anger EXpression Inventory (STAXI-2), and the State-Trait Personality Inventory (STPI) to assess anxiety, anger, depression, and curiosity, and the major components of these emotional states and personality traits, are described in detail.

http://isites.harvard.edu/fs/docs/icb.to...litman.pdf

This paper was found in the Harvard libary of all places, I'm CURIOUS is that a good thing?

If you take the 15 mins to read it's message is spent trying to sell the idea as to why Curiosity is indeed an emotion much like your paper does.

How does that support my arguement? It's quite simple. If curiosity was already an emotion so many 'doctors' would not have to write papers to convince everyone else of their discoveries.

[Faith No More]

Ah, no.

God's isn't taking anything away. (Your thinking OT rules) You live your life and are subject to the consenquences of your desisions. So too are the terms of the old lady's gift. Whether you accept her gift or not, you live your life and face the consenquences of your actions.

Apparently, you missed the point. Sure, god is not taking anything, but there are negative consequences for not accepting this so-called gift. Considering he is the omnipotent creator that is responsible for the existence of these negative consequences, he is presenting a situation of "accept this or be punished." That is not a gift. It is a threat.

And yes, we face the consequences of our actions, however, we are not in control of what those consequences entail. Supposedly, your god is, and being omnipotent, he bears the responsibility for creating negative consequences for not accepting his "gift." If I put a gun to someone's head and tell them based on their actions I will either shoot them or give them a million dollars, I can't then claim that they bear the responsibility for the consequences of the choice they make. I am responsible for putting them in the situation, so I bear responsibility for the consequences of the choice I am forcing them to make.