(November 19, 2010 at 4:34 pm)downbeatplumb Wrote:(November 19, 2010 at 12:21 am)FadingW Wrote: It is claimed that answered prayers strengthen the argument for the existence of God.
If that is so, why are unanswered prayers not counted against the existence of God?
Can we really accept as evidence a test where negative results are disregarded?
I think the traditional response is.
'god answers all prayers, its just that mainly the answer is 'no''
I get conflicted sometimes because my argument against there being a god is so good that it can tear apart someone's belief system and actually depress them. The only good thing about religion is that it makes people behave because they believe they will be punished in hell if they don't. A world full of true atheist would have a huge murder rate along with everything else. I feel that I am no better than a missionary type person trying to convert someone if I talk about athiesm to religious believers.
I think we must be the most arrogant race to believe that we have souls. That god waited 4.5 billion years to announce himself in the past 2,000 years and that he needed to sacrifice his son or part of himself so that we could sin and be forgiven because he let himself die on the cross. This all powerful god needed to do this or we all go to hell. We really are full of ourselves.
The only true hell I can think of is existing forever in any form of afterlife.
I truely understand the beginnings of religion because we were ignorant of how things worked. If I was alive 6000 plus years ago, I may have been taught that the Sun was a god and believed it. Even 1000 years ago without our understandings of microscopic world of germs,bacteria, and viruses, I would think I may believe in being punished this way. We have pretty much all the scientific answers to everything was attributed to a god, so why do we still believe we are being punished or rewarded by events that are caused by people and world of physics?
