Biblical Morality

[Kyuuketsuki]

That has to rank as one of the most spectacularly stupid things I've ever heard anyone say ... not only does the Catholic Church do an awful lot of science (their speciality is cosmology but I doubt it stops there) but have you never heard of Professor Sir John Polkinghorne?

Look, it's simple - in science college you don't learn about theology, science or religion, you learn about science. Scientists are not also theologians BY TRAINING. OF COURSE you can be a scientist AND a theologian.

Yet curiously you said the opposite ("I would be surprised to hear that scientists were in fact theologians") ... am I to take it that you concede you were wrong on that point?

So, in science you don't learn about theology so you can't have a valid opinion eh? So, as a biologist (by degree), I cannot have any opinion on computing (an area I've worked in for 20 plus years)? Or perhaps as a journalist you can't comment on, say terrorism (after all what does it specifically have to do with journalism?)? Is that the kind of reasoning you're espousing here?

Apparently you missed the fact that he wrote a book called, "The God Delusion" hmmm? Like it love it, agree or disagree, hate it or whatever there can be no denying he knows an awful lot about religion.

He STILL KNOWS SWEET F ALL ABOUT RELIGION. I've read the book. I know. The whole thing is about how, as a scientist, he has no clue what it's about at all. He doesn't get it.

The fact that his book sold as many copies as it did, that he runs the a number of specifically anti-religious organisations, is involved in anti-religious programming, can easily hold his own against any religious debater ALL OF WHICH would require an in depth knowledge of religion means he doesn't get it?

I know nothing of this.

Well you've been commenting on the threads. Apparently you haven't been reading them as well???

Not, at time of (then) writing, on those ones it would seem.

No feelings one way or the other.

Nice. Thanks.

[SHRUG] I'm just being honest!

Nope, I'm saying truth has nothing to do with science and, math excepted, it varies.

I'm just repeating what you said Kyu. Perhaps you should just argue with yourself in private.

No, you're not REPEATING what I am saying, you're commenting on your own interpretation of what I said ... I believe those interpretations are wrong. If you think otherwise I suggest you post up what I said (literally what I said please) and we'll take it from there.

Note the two phrases I highlighted.

The two statements don't conflict ... the word "truth" does imply certainty, nothing about that says that truth IS certainty and I maintain that truth is actually a variable commodity for (amongst others) reasons already explained.

I think it revealing that you refer to science as philosophy. This is the problem.. science has nothing to do with philosophy.

Wrong philosophy means "to seek knowledge" and, to date, the only methodology that has ever explained anything in any verifiable form is science... science is actually the only real philosophy.

n., pl. -phies.
Love and pursuit of wisdom by intellectual means and moral self-discipline.
Investigation of the nature, causes, or principles of reality, knowledge, or values, based on logical reasoning rather than empirical methods.
A system of thought based on or involving such inquiry: the philosophy of Hume.
The critical analysis of fundamental assumptions or beliefs.
The disciplines presented in university curriculums of science and the liberal arts, except medicine, law, and theology.
The discipline comprising logic, ethics, aesthetics, metaphysics, and epistemology.
A set of ideas or beliefs relating to a particular field or activity; an underlying theory: an original philosophy of advertising.
A system of values by which one lives: has an unusual philosophy of life.

I don't see anything there that agrees with you. Do you?

Obviously I need to explain this a little more.

I pretty much despise standard "philosophy" and am contemptuous of most philosophical style arguments. Why? Because philosophy, alone, can prove nothing (ZERO, NADA, ZIP), Yes philosophy is a useful tool that feeds into the real world but alone it is nothing.

Philosophy seems to have (as is often the case within the English language) a correct meaning and a number of common usage meanings but, thanks to Isaac Asimov (who was one of those dratted scientists as you probably know) and his "New Guide to Science", it appears that it derives from the ancient Greeks. The late, great Isaac Asimov, in his wonderful "New Guide To Science" devotes some space to philosophy where he referred to the Greek investigations of the universe, that they called (and I quote) 'their new manner of studying the universe philosophia meaning "love of knowledge" or, in free translation, "the desire to know"'(page 8). So a true philosopher is a seeker after knowledge and these seekers are not, I believe, those that like to blow philosophical sunshine up each other's arses but scientists and other real world investigators who attempt to provide real knowledge that is of real use to the human race. Science qualifications even reflect this ... whilst it is not absolutely necessary a typical scientist will have a doctorate and a doctorate is what? A PhD, a Doctor of Philosophy.

I would argue that it is because current day philosophers seem to provide little or no direct value to the real world that much of the philosophy bandied about today is little more than academic psychobabble. I'm not saying that philosophy has no value but it is clear to me that the true philosophers of this world are scientists like Richard Dawkins.

Such as?

Which unmovable truths?

There is a God. He made everything. The ten commandments. The beatitudes. The list is endless.

Gods vary (Allah, Yahweh, Jehovah, Quetzalcoatl), the 10 Commandments vary (Catholics I believe have a different set of commandments to Anglican religions, the gods & prophets of religions vary (Joseph Smith for the Mormons, Jesus Christ is a mere prophet in Islam) but the point I am making is simple ... all religions have certain "truths" and they all vary in fine or in gross. It is easy to see that truth is a variable commodity.

Meaningless sure

Back that up.

See above and points made in previous posts

Actually both science and religion attempt to answer the same questions ... the difference is that religion is nearly always wrong.

Christianity NEVER asks those questions. Idiot fundies may do, and dumb scientists with no understanding of what the real question is may do, but Christianity never does. Give me evidence of one question about the physical universe that Christianity answers please. That should be an easy one

Cosmology (creation, stellar & planetary motion, the nature of stellar bodies), geology (creation, weather systems, the nature of the Earth), biology (evolution), mathematics (Pi) ... is that enough to be going on with?

Answer the question!

I did! 3 times!

No you didn't. You DID NOT explain why the genealogies differed and therefore explicitly disprove your claim that the bible is internally consistent. Please do so.

Explain the difference!

The two accounts were written in a different style, but both speak about the same thing. It's not a very contentious issue.

I grow tired of your disingenuousness.

Matthew 27:3 –5 (English-KJV)
Then Judas, which had betrayed him, when he saw that he was condemned, repented himself, and brought again the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and elders, saying, I have sinned in that I have betrayed the innocent blood. And they said, What is that to us? see thou to that. And he cast down the pieces of silver in the temple, and departed, and went and hanged himself.

Acts 1:16-18 (English-KJV)
Men and brethren, this scripture must needs have been fulfilled, which the Holy Ghost by the mouth of David spake before concerning Judas, which was guide to them that took Jesus. For he was numbered with us, and had obtained part of this ministry. Now this man purchased a field with the reward of iniquity; and falling headlong, he burst asunder in the midst, and all his bowels gushed out.

Read those ... it is crystal clear that the two passages outline two different manners of death.

In the first he hangs himself, in the second he falls headlong, burst open and spills his insides out ... how the hell does he do that if he has hung himself?

Kyu