Why knocking is so important.

[Drich]

Of course your method requires the suspension of rational faculties. That is it's problem. This is no surprise since religions like christianity require that to work.

what in what I have said makes you think rational thought has been suspended? If anything I have said rational thought and the lack of support God has in the false pictures of Him we have are apart of the washing away of the old house that Jesus speaks of.

Let's try apply that logic to other situations: First one is dragon hunting. I'm talking about the flying, fire spitting reptile. We have stopped looking. Are we foolish for having stopped? If not why? If we are right for having stopped why? Why should what you propose be treated differently?

we stopped because we have found them.
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pterodactylus

In order to hunt we must have viable prey. This prey is extinct. therefore hunting them is pointless...
See rational thought at work.

As with God all one needs do is let go of the fantasy version/picture we have, and seek out the being we have been given an accurate factual definition of.

It is a virtue to know when to stop.

Indeed. I believe that is why God allows so many of your ideas of Him to die on the vine. So that you may stop seeking a straw man.

This is my next point and situation. Gambling. Should a gambler experiencing a losing streak continue gambling or should he stop? What about when he is winning? Ideally he should stop before he loses to maximise profits. My point is that it is a virtue knowing when to stop.

this is an active example of the suspension of rational thought. A gambler like any other tradesmen should know his particular game. Meaning he should carefully weigh the different variables that change the odds of winning away from him as a means of determining whether or not he should continue or stop. Not his history of winning or losing.

Now I will address your suggestion having established these things. As you can understand (hopefully) abandoning rational faculties impedes this critical self preserving act. What you suggest implants the image of a robot not realising that it has reached a wall. It continues to walk thinking it is gaining ground. Yet it is not.

Is it not more efficient to first establish that the alleged resident exists before knocking on his door?

Ah, no.
At best you tried and successfully failed in trying to establish a three point attack.
First you made the charge that what I have said requires the suspension of rational thought. I showed you where rational thought was the very reason we need to continue to seek. Then you tried to illustrate using your dragon argument. I showed you in that argument as with God we must let go our personal definitions and understandings, and seek out the evidence we have and then Apply it. In your illustration you were trying to describe a smaug/lotr flying dragon, while the evidences we have point to a less than the grandiose smaug, but a flying dragon by definition never the less.

God has (upon request) allowed your fictional take on Him die by not supporting it. But, here (like with your example of smaug) because your fictional understanding of a flying dragon does not exist you foolishly suspended all other rational thought and assume that because a smaug dragon does not exist that nothing can fit that definition. I showed you that flying dragons not only lived, but even reasoned why we can not hunt them. How did I do this? I did not bind my ability to reason to the boxes and categories your ability to reason has been limited by.

The same thing happens with your version of God. Most of you have this grandiose version of God that is not biblically consistent, and it fails under any level of scrutiny, and because this version of smaug/God does not exist you assume no version of God can exist.

So again your first point failed.

Second point was knowing when to stop and you referenced a gambler on a loosing streak. Rather than rationally work though the variables that should help a gambler determine whether or not he should walk away or continue on you appeal to the gamblers knowledge of luck.

This appeal disqualifies your statement because you have suspended rational thought for an appeal to luck.

The third is your summation based on the 2 previous failed points. Ending with object charge that does not stand well with out the support you intended for it to have.

In that you asked: 'shouldn't we establish their is a door before you knock.' This point does not stand because the act of knocking happens no matter what we do or how we want to live. We will inevitable knock or repeatably seek out the life we want to live, no matter what success or [/quote] that we meet.

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Personal testament does not make a credible argument. Find some demonstrable way of showing us that this is correct, rather than your "try it for yourself, and if it doesn't work the first time, you obviously haven't been trying it properly!" method.

Where did I use a personal testimony?

I showed you why it was important to keep knocking.

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I'm guessing you won't understand this but sincerely trying to talk to God is as ridiculous to me as trying to sincerely talk to YodaIts just not even possible, if I tried to do it I'd be laughing my ass off within 30 seconds..

possiable to talk to yoda, it is. But, first "you must unlearn what you have learned."

Perhaps its different for those who at some point did believe but for me.. I have never believed and a sincere prayer to something so outlandish isn't even something that I could do.

I just see this ASK business as a way to make it our fault for not believing. Its just a no win scenario for us. Even if we did it and it failed you just keep coming back saying we didn't do it long enough or haven't tried hard enough. Its honestly pretty pathetic.

Then the question becomes, if God does exist would you want any type of relationship with Him?[/quote]

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Put Krishna to the test, then put what I have said to the test, and then decide for yourself.

I just tried them both and the queen of the fairies answered, what next?

What did they say?

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The idea of A/S/K sounds a lot like a Peter Panism -“Dreams do come true, if only we wish hard enough." I believe J.M. Barrie might even be one of the Bible's many authors. I humored you and read the chapter and verse. I didn't see anything there that leads me to believe or even care to believe. The first sentence of the last verse stuck with me though. “Which of you fathers, if your son asks for[f] a fish, will give him a snake instead?" Every religious person I know thinks their particular species of "fish" is the correct one, and everyone else was given the snake and going to hell. This leads me to ask: "How do YOU know that your parents or whomever introduced you to Jesus were not giving you a snake rather than a fish?
Yes. Bullshit built on rock is better than bullshit built on sand.

P.S. Black Mason, dragons do exist. The bible says so.

I was born in a Buddhist and a spiritualist house hold. The did hand me a snake, because that is what they themselves ate.