Two babies discussion.

[Faith No More]

How does the second baby know all that stuff?

Baby bible.

---

It had a NLE?

Near life experience.

Oh, shit, that one's better.

[Mister Agenda]

MysticKnight's little presentation did a good job of demonstrating the close-mindedness of the the atheist mentality.

By making up a scenario where the nonatheist happens to be right for no apparent reason? You and I have different ideas of 'good' when it comes to demonstrating things.

They exist every day in their little scientific boxes, hoping that scientists will discover for them the cause and reason for life.

If scientists never do, it's not the slightest skin off my nose. I'm not an atheist because of science, I'm an atheist because I can tell a good argument from a bad one.

If that cause and reason doesn't fit in their little world view, they reject it and wait for their scientists to hopefully, someday discover that for them.

You talk as though you have evidence of 'a cause and reason' when you're merely asserting it.

All this even though they know that matter cannot be created from nothing, and if something was never created and always existed, it has qualities attributed to God.

Sure. Quantum foam fits pretty much everything on the list of God qualities except personhood. If you want to worship it, be my guest.

How can someone examine the origin of the universe or contemplate what exists beyond the edge of the universe and not reason out the existence of something beyond the natural world?

How can someone do so and not reason out that the natural world is bigger than they imagined?

I guess time will tell how well I "know" what I believe, but I'm betting it all on it. Tell me how I'm worse off than you are.

Your belief seems to keep you from using your mind to the extent that you should be able to do.

[Esquilax]

Which is really the funniest thing about Lek's comments.

"Tut tut, you wait for evidence and reason before coming to conclusions, and those conclusions can change in the face of new evidence. Poor, deluded fools. I base my world view on morally reprehensible Iron Age myths that present an internally inconsistent, incoherent depiction of a god that's both one thing and three things when the story demands it! Take that!"

I mean, really?

"And if you wait for evidence before forming your beliefs, and won't accept mine as true because I said so, you're close minded!"

[Mister Agenda]

Nobody "knows" anything. We think we know because we can experience it with our senses and others can experience it as well. It may be something totally other than what we have determined it to be, but we don't know that because our physical senses are limited.

How do you get from that to 'you're close-minded if you don't take someone's word for how things really are'?

We do have the ability to reason about things and develop beliefs based on that reasoning. I have reasoned because of statments in my last post that something exists beyond the natural world - therefore the supernatural. I don't "know " this, but I believe it,
and I live my life as if it is true.

It's your business whether you believe it. If you claim it's by reason and don't show your work, we're entitled to dismiss your claim out of hand, and we should.

Also, because of what I stated in the last post, I believe that the universe was created from something supernatural.

You definitely should not believe that if it's based on your last post.

I have read the bible, which was written over a period of centuries by numerous authors, who carried on the story of a coming messiah who would save us from the evil world in which we exist.

None of whom we have reason to trust that they were able to know what they claimed to know.

I know about no other religion that exists or has existed that the same amount of continuing revelation.

Same amount of claimed revelation.

Lastly, I myself have always been interested as much in the "whys" as in the "hows".

Ah, a fan of putting the cart before the horse.

I firmly believe that there is reason for our existence and the existence of the cosmos.

I like carrot cake.

Science doesn't answer that question and leaves me deeply unsatisfied.

So you buy into a made-up answer that you find satisfying. How admirable of you. No wonder you're so proud of it.

I'm not content to believe that we are just born for no reason and die and that's it.

And if you're not content with it, it must not be true, eh?

I do care about the reason why we exist in this sometimes happy and sometimes happy world. One thing I "know" is that no one is always happy and content.

Why should they be so?

We can't verify what I know until we die.

That's one of the things that should tip you off that what you're saying you 'know' isn't actually knowledge.

I sense God being with me, but I also can't prove that till later also. Based on my prior statements I believe that's reasonable, and that's what I'm going with.

Maybe you shouldn't believe things based on your own statements.

Just like you guys say - "we don't know now, but I'm confident that someday it will be proven."

Our confidence level is irrelevant, and whether 'it' is never proven doesn't change much. Might shut a few people on your side who act like they know the opposite is true up.

I do have one consolation that you don't have, though, and that is that you'll never be able to say "I told you so" if you're right, but I will.

To each their own. It seems consistent with someone who doesn't actually care what the truth really is to find that a consolation.

Otherwise we're all don't exist anymore, so who cares?

Um, you ARE aware that other people continue to exist after you die, right?

There could be some great scientific discovery that could change my outlook, but I'm definitely not changing now.

Believe me, in your present state, we wouldn't want you agreeing with us. I often regret that I have no control over who gets to be an atheist.

---

My only argument you attacked directly so far is my "told you so" argument, as if I didn't say anything else. I just gave you that one so that you'd have something to respond to and wouldn't feel so bad.

Sure you did.

[robvalue]

I'm sick of these babies, can we eat them already?

[KevinM1]

I'm sick of these babies, can we eat them already?

I'm thinking a nice, light quinoa salad on the side would go well with lightly pan fried baby.

[Norman Humann]

Are they gluten-free though? Allergies.

[Thumpalumpacus]

MysticKnight's little presentation did a good job of demonstrating the close-mindedness of the the atheist mentality.

No. What it did was draw an inapt analogy.

They exist every day in their little scientific boxes, hoping that scientists will discover for them the cause and reason for life. If that cause and reason doesn't fit in their little world view, they reject it and wait for their scientists to hopefully, someday discover that for them.

No. What we do when we don't know something, is that we say, "I don't know". Yeah, I know it's a strange concept to you little believers, who insist on having answers even when you don't know what you're talking about (cf. your reply to me denigrating science even as you admitted that you didn't know much about science).

All this even though they know that matter cannot be created from nothing, and if something was never created and always existed, it has qualities attributed to God.

As we know, matter can phase-shift from and to energy. As for "qualities attributed to god", well, they're also qualities attributed to Ahura Mazda. Why is your little god more meaningful than him?

How can someone examine the origin of the universe or contemplate what exists beyond the edge of the universe and not reason out the existence of something beyond the natural world?

Argument from Incredulity.

How can you believe in an invisible being which can think things into material existence even as you argue he doesn't exist on a material plane? What is it about the outside Universe which requires a deity? And how can an immaterial being interact with material reality? Answers, please.

And what makes you, of all people, qualified to expound upon the nature of that deity?

That's right: you are unqualified to talk about god. If you wish to disagree, please, lay out your C.V. Let us see why you, of all people, are close enough to your god that you can speak for him.

[vorlon13]

Fetuses are free of original sin while in the womb, too. The onset of that coincides with the first breath and the resulting ensoulment.

Then you can dash them against the stones.

[TheRealJoeFish]

Fetuses are free of original sin while in the womb, too. The onset of that coincides with the first breath and the resulting ensoulment.

Then you can dash them against the stones.

Aha! So THAT'S why Christians care about a fetus right up until the point it's born.