The danger of religion. .

[Disciple]

What proof do you have that someone mysitcally reattached an ear?

Well...it says so in his fucking bible. For the likes of this clown that is iron-clad!

Sometimes I wonder if we're metaphorically beating our heads against a brick wall, when it comes to people that use no common sense.

Maybe what we need, instead of more moderators, is an Assignment Clerk. When a new shithead shows up spouting god drivel the Assignment Clerk could pick one of us rational people from a roster to exclusively deal with him/her. Sort of like a reverse mentor. That would certainly break up the workload.

What do you say, Divine Tiberius?

That would be great is a matter of fact! I second that nomination. The only reason I wanted to join you guys forum in the first place was to learn how other people think, learn why I think what i think, possibly learn something i didnt know. Did not come here to get dog piled on by 20 hateful people and a few cool ones. But im cool with that. No whining here my friends. Because even that teaches me something. It teaches me something about the "open minded" "tolerant" "unbigoted" atheist.

Now to get to as many of your questions and replies as I can...wheew!
Norfolk and chance- Why bother to have our 80 or so years here in the 1st place you ask? Im not one to claim to know the meaning of life but im pretty sure that choosing where you want to spend eternity is part of it. If you believe in god then you believe that there was an angelic war before mankind was born. The angels were created and heaven was their birthplace. That didnt end so good. Mabye.. just mabye thats what we are doing here. If we are loyal to God when we are on earth when we cant even see him or talk to him face to face when we get to the eternal city where he does manifest himself there is no question of our loyalty. This is just speculation on my part. Just an idea. Other than that i cant tell you why we are here any more than you can.
Stimbo- good day to you my friend.. Yes it appears that the side that was prayed over in that particuliar study didnt fare to well indeed. We also have to take into consideration that person or persons that were doing the praying and the people that were prayed for. God will not hear the prayers of the non believer. And before that sets of a firestorm let me explain a wee bit. He will in fact hear a prayer of repentence then the person is "born again" then all prayers are heard. I dont know if thats the deal in that specific case I wont pretend to know why God does all the things he does. Im ok with that.

Rythm- The whole lifeboat story was a story the 1st time I wrote it and its a story today as well. Again it was meant to show how God works through people and not from some beam of light from the sky.

You ask me how the whole god thing came to be implying that it was a made up story as well? Thats your perogitive and im cool with that brother. If you want my take on how it came to be then my take is that we were created by god along with everything else. He gave us his word so we could know him and what he has done for us. Some people believe and some dont.

Yes the world is broken we did break it and you dont have to agree with me. There was no such thing as a natural disaster before sin ented the world. I guess you could look at it as before sin entered the world it was a super natural place and after the fact it became natural.

I do not understand how you believe everybody is capable of doing anything in life they wish. Why isnt everybody rich then? We are all made unique with our own strengths, flaws, weaknesses, character defects, and abilities. Some people are very book smart and lack commen sense. Some people can run a marathon and some can barely get off the couch. To claim "anybody can do anything they put theyre mind to" is absurd. Just because you were told that by your pre school teacher will not make it true. You dont even have to look at it as being "gifted" from god. Everybody is NOT the same.
Again if you dont agree with me i will not be tossing and turning in my bed tonite over it. Dont get your bloomers in a bunch if I dont agree with you.

Minimalist- I said I was a christian. That does not make me a bible authoritarian. What I was talking about was pretty close so sue me if they werent romans
I wasnt trying to show how much I know about the sacred scriptures just giving a case where Christ healed an amputee because thats what I was asked about.

genkaus, thor and poetess- I gave you examples and you refuse to see it. Im not saying that in every case it was divine intervention but how do you know for sure that in some of the cases it wasnt? And why does the case have to be recent to be applicable? That is the problem with alot of the proof that god has given us in general with the non believer. You need something recent to keep it relevant. For me, I can take what happened 2000 years ago and still believe it today. One thing that helps me personally is that whole whole lot of people died for their testimony. All they had to do was say that they were not christian and jesus was not the messiah and they would have been pardoned from their death sentence. People will live for a lie however, people will not die for a lie. Peace.

[genkaus]

genkaus, thor and poetess- I gave you examples and you refuse to see it.

Examples from your bible are not examples of actual events. Can you give any actual recorded examples?

Im not saying that in every case it was divine intervention but how do you know for sure that in some of the cases it wasnt? And why does the case have to be recent to be applicable?

It doesn't have to be recent - it just needs to be verified or verifiable.

That is the problem with alot of the proof that god has given us in general with the non believer. You need something recent to keep it relevant. For me, I can take what happened 2000 years ago and still believe it today.

We can accept past events as true - as long as they have been verified from two or more independent sources.

One thing that helps me personally is that whole whole lot of people died for their testimony. All they had to do was say that they were not christian and jesus was not the messiah and they would have been pardoned from their death sentence. People will live for a lie however, people will not die for a lie. Peace.

People will most certainly die for a lie. Especially if they believe it to be true. The fact that your martyrs were as deluded or deceived as you are is not evidence of validity of anything.

[Cyberman]

Stimbo- good day to you my friend..

Ave! It die bene, Deciple?

Yes it appears that the side that was prayed over in that particuliar study didnt fare to well indeed.

One possible reason for that, or at least a putative explanation, is that there might have been a form of 'performance anxiety' at play. Essentially, a person recovering from heart surgery learns that they're being prayed for, then starts to wonder what could be so wrong with them that prayers are being said... resulting in their condition getting worse. It's like a fledgling actor knowing his parents are in the audience; it could tend to throw him off-balance.

Regardless, the point of the study was to analyse the effect, if any, of prayer. Whatever god or gods were being invoked either didn't want these patients to do as well as others in the study, didn't want to play (or was too scared to play), or didn't exist. Note that the Templeton Foundation who ran the study was hoping (and praying?) for a positive result.

We also have to take into consideration that person or persons that were doing the praying and the people that were prayed for. God will not hear the prayers of the non believer.

This is known as a rationalisation, putting a positive spin on what is usually an uncomfortable position. It's also an assertion that attracts that old nemesis of the theist, the burden of proof. Why would the belief status of the person praying make a difference? Does 'God' have a "naughty and nice" list? And does 'he' check it twice? It puts me in mind of the early days of fire insurance we used to have over here; basically, your house caught fire and the firemen would turn up, but if you didn't have a plaque on the wall indicating you'd got insurance, they'd simply stand around and watch your house burn down.

And before that sets of a firestorm let me explain a wee bit. He will in fact hear a prayer of repentence then the person is "born again" then all prayers are heard. I dont know if thats the deal in that specific case

Remember that the Templeton Foundation isn't just your average bunch of research scientists with nothing better to spend their grant money on. They are actively seeking to legitimise religion by riding the coattails of science. Their annual $1.5 million Templeton Prize is given, to quote Richard Dawkins, "usually to a scientist who is prepared to say something nice about religion." Now the ball's back in your court; "God" should have no excuse not to hear their prayers. See, it's all very well making these claims but then you have to bite the bullet and back them up.

I wont pretend to know why God does all the things he does. Im ok with that.

What things does 'God' do?

[Minimalist]

Minimalist- I said I was a christian. That does not make me a bible authoritarian. What I was talking about was pretty close so sue me if they werent romansTongue
I wasnt trying to show how much I know about the sacred scriptures just giving a case where Christ healed an amputee because thats what I was asked about.

That simply makes you a gullible fool.

[Disciple]

Stimbo- good day to you my friend..

Ave! It die bene, Deciple?

Yes it appears that the side that was prayed over in that particuliar study didnt fare to well indeed.

One possible reason for that, or at least a putative explanation, is that there might have been a form of 'performance anxiety' at play. Essentially, a person recovering from heart surgery learns that they're being prayed for, then starts to wonder what could be so wrong with them that prayers are being said... resulting in their condition getting worse. It's like a fledgling actor knowing his parents are in the audience; it could tend to throw him off-balance.

Regardless, the point of the study was to analyse the effect, if any, of prayer. Whatever god or gods were being invoked either didn't want these patients to do as well as others in the study, didn't want to play (or was too scared to play), or didn't exist. Note that the Templeton Foundation who ran the study was hoping (and praying?) for a positive result.

We also have to take into consideration that person or persons that were doing the praying and the people that were prayed for. God will not hear the prayers of the non believer.

This is known as a rationalisation, putting a positive spin on what is usually an uncomfortable position. It's also an assertion that attracts that old nemesis of the theist, the burden of proof. Why would the belief status of the person praying make a difference? Does 'God' have a "naughty and nice" list? And does 'he' check it twice? It puts me in mind of the early days of fire insurance we used to have over here; basically, your house caught fire and the firemen would turn up, but if you didn't have a plaque on the wall indicating you'd got insurance, they'd simply stand around and watch your house burn down.

And before that sets of a firestorm let me explain a wee bit. He will in fact hear a prayer of repentence then the person is "born again" then all prayers are heard. I dont know if thats the deal in that specific case

Remember that the Templeton Foundation isn't just your average bunch of research scientists with nothing better to spend their grant money on. They are actively seeking to legitimise religion by riding the coattails of science. Their annual $1.5 million Templeton Prize is given, to quote Richard Dawkins, "usually to a scientist who is prepared to say something nice about religion." Now the ball's back in your court; "God" should have no excuse not to hear their prayers. See, it's all very well making these claims but then you have to bite the bullet and back them up.

I wont pretend to know why God does all the things he does. Im ok with that.

What things does 'God' do?

Stimbo- i could talk to you all day brother I love you. And wow what good questions. Really making me think on this one arent you. Let me start with when you asked if God has a naughty and nice list haha. that is actually funny man I think you may be mixing him up with saint nick there. If we have to take everything so serious, especially ourselves life becomes unfun. In my own experience anyway. And yes unfun is a word because i just said it and you know what it means . No he does not have a naughty and nice list. One of his names is the good shepherd and that would make us (free ammo for everybody here) his sheep. If a person is not one of his sheep or much less in the green pasture there is no way he can hear them when they call.

Now lets look at the people in the study. We have the people that were doing the praying and the prayees. Just because sombody works for that organization, dosent make them qualified to talk to God. Jobs are scarce and most people will put whatever on their resume to get hired. Could be that the people on both sides had little to no faith that it would actually work. Its written in our bible that faith without works is dead. I can safely determine from that that prayer without faith is nothing more than talking into the air.

Now what about the prayees in the study. What if they were total god-haters. or just didnt believe, or did believe but didnt think he would help them for whatever reason. God cannot be looked at as a lapdog that will do tricks for man whenever asked.

Stimbo you are a credit to your atheist "family" for lack of a better word. Its sad more cant be like you. Looking forward to hearing from ya man. Peace.

---

Minimalist- I said I was a christian. That does not make me a bible authoritarian. What I was talking about was pretty close so sue me if they werent romansTongue
I wasnt trying to show how much I know about the sacred scriptures just giving a case where Christ healed an amputee because thats what I was asked about.

That simply makes you a gullible fool.

Sorry but your circle illustration does not apply here. Other examples were given as well and were not accepted. Just because they were not accepted dosent mean they were not given. And the quote from me that you selected was merely stating that the story i cited about the "guard" getting his ear removed and re attached was accurate. Its just that it was a high priest instead of a roman guard. excuuuse me.

[The Grand Nudger]

POE. That's my two cents. I don't think you're a christian at all. Who would make such poor arguments except one willingly looking to discredit christianity?

[Cyberman]

Hope nobody thinks I'm 'crying off' from this or anything, it's just that I'm not entirely confident in my judgement right at the moment for personal reasons which I'll not burden anyone with. So for now I'll simply make one or two observations rather than a proper dissection, if that's ok.

Stimbo- i could talk to you all day brother I love you.

I try. Then when I've had ten minutes to get my breath back, I try again.

And wow what good questions. Really making me think on this one arent you. Let me start with when you asked if God has a naughty and nice list haha. that is actually funny man I think you may be mixing him up with saint nick there. If we have to take everything so serious, especially ourselves life becomes unfun. In my own experience anyway. And yes unfun is a word because i just said it and you know what it means . No he does not have a naughty and nice list. One of his names is the good shepherd and that would make us (free ammo for everybody here) his sheep.

Wouldn't that be Jesus you're talking about there, not "God"? Besides which, I think you may be mixing him up with Mithras. Regardless, a shepherd does not have the best interests of the sheep at heart, probably on more levels than just the one. Oh, he'll feed you, keep you safe from predators, fleece you (this point alone makes a perfect analogy for religion) and all the other shepherdy goodness. Then money changes hands and he'll dispassionately watch you get taken away to be turned into a Sunday roast.

If a person is not one of his sheep or much less in the green pasture there is no way he can hear them when they call.

Now lets look at the people in the study. We have the people that were doing the praying and the prayees. Just because sombody works for that organization, dosent make them qualified to talk to God. Jobs are scarce and most people will put whatever on their resume to get hired. Could be that the people on both sides had little to no faith that it would actually work. Its written in our bible that faith without works is dead. I can safely determine from that that prayer without faith is nothing more than talking into the air.

Now what about the prayees in the study. What if they were total god-haters. or just didnt believe, or did believe but didnt think he would help them for whatever reason. God cannot be looked at as a lapdog that will do tricks for man whenever asked.

All these rhetorical gymnastics are giving me a headache so I'll call it a night at this point. I'll just ask that you consider all of what you said there in light of all these bible verses in which Mithras Jesus talks about prayer and how to do it:

Matthew 7:7
Matthew 17:20
Matthew 21:21
Mark 11:24
John 14:12-14
Matthew 18:19
James 5:15-16

Stimbo you are a credit to your atheist "family" for lack of a better word. Its sad more cant be like you. Looking forward to hearing from ya man. Peace.

Note to self: must try harder.

Pax tecum.

[Poetess]

What proof do you have that someone mysitcally reattached an ear?

Well...it says so in his fucking bible. For the likes of this clown that is iron-clad!

Sometimes I wonder if we're metaphorically beating our heads against a brick wall, when it comes to people that use no common sense.

Maybe what we need, instead of more moderators, is an Assignment Clerk. When a new shithead shows up spouting god drivel the Assignment Clerk could pick one of us rational people from a roster to exclusively deal with him/her. Sort of like a reverse mentor. That would certainly break up the workload.

What do you say, Divine Tiberius?

That would be great is a matter of fact! I second that nomination. The only reason I wanted to join you guys forum in the first place was to learn how other people think, learn why I think what i think, possibly learn something i didnt know. Did not come here to get dog piled on by 20 hateful people and a few cool ones. But im cool with that. No whining here my friends. Because even that teaches me something. It teaches me something about the "open minded" "tolerant" "unbigoted" atheist.

Now to get to as many of your questions and replies as I can...wheew!
Norfolk and chance- Why bother to have our 80 or so years here in the 1st place you ask? Im not one to claim to know the meaning of life but im pretty sure that choosing where you want to spend eternity is part of it. If you believe in god then you believe that there was an angelic war before mankind was born. The angels were created and heaven was their birthplace. That didnt end so good. Mabye.. just mabye thats what we are doing here. If we are loyal to God when we are on earth when we cant even see him or talk to him face to face when we get to the eternal city where he does manifest himself there is no question of our loyalty. This is just speculation on my part. Just an idea. Other than that i cant tell you why we are here any more than you can.
Stimbo- good day to you my friend.. Yes it appears that the side that was prayed over in that particuliar study didnt fare to well indeed. We also have to take into consideration that person or persons that were doing the praying and the people that were prayed for. God will not hear the prayers of the non believer. And before that sets of a firestorm let me explain a wee bit. He will in fact hear a prayer of repentence then the person is "born again" then all prayers are heard. I dont know if thats the deal in that specific case I wont pretend to know why God does all the things he does. Im ok with that.

Rythm- The whole lifeboat story was a story the 1st time I wrote it and its a story today as well. Again it was meant to show how God works through people and not from some beam of light from the sky.

You ask me how the whole god thing came to be implying that it was a made up story as well? Thats your perogitive and im cool with that brother. If you want my take on how it came to be then my take is that we were created by god along with everything else. He gave us his word so we could know him and what he has done for us. Some people believe and some dont.

Yes the world is broken we did break it and you dont have to agree with me. There was no such thing as a natural disaster before sin ented the world. I guess you could look at it as before sin entered the world it was a super natural place and after the fact it became natural.

I do not understand how you believe everybody is capable of doing anything in life they wish. Why isnt everybody rich then? We are all made unique with our own strengths, flaws, weaknesses, character defects, and abilities. Some people are very book smart and lack commen sense. Some people can run a marathon and some can barely get off the couch. To claim "anybody can do anything they put theyre mind to" is absurd. Just because you were told that by your pre school teacher will not make it true. You dont even have to look at it as being "gifted" from god. Everybody is NOT the same.
Again if you dont agree with me i will not be tossing and turning in my bed tonite over it. Dont get your bloomers in a bunch if I dont agree with you.

Minimalist- I said I was a christian. That does not make me a bible authoritarian. What I was talking about was pretty close so sue me if they werent romans
I wasnt trying to show how much I know about the sacred scriptures just giving a case where Christ healed an amputee because thats what I was asked about.

genkaus, thor and poetess- I gave you examples and you refuse to see it. Im not saying that in every case it was divine intervention but how do you know for sure that in some of the cases it wasnt? And why does the case have to be recent to be applicable? That is the problem with alot of the proof that god has given us in general with the non believer. You need something recent to keep it relevant. For me, I can take what happened 2000 years ago and still believe it today. One thing that helps me personally is that whole whole lot of people died for their testimony. All they had to do was say that they were not christian and jesus was not the messiah and they would have been pardoned from their death sentence. People will live for a lie however, people will not die for a lie. Peace.

I have no problem with older facts, but the catch is, it has to be a fact. The only source you tend to grasp at is some random stories that you don't even know are true and have no real sources to prove they are. All I am asking for is some evidence that is not the bible and not something spouted from a televangelist, preacher or whatever. Give me some cases, studies and proof. If you provide me with proof, rather than speculations, stories from the bible or a random christians' opinion, I will gracefuly admit that I am wrong. What you don't seem to understand is, just because an old book has some off the wall stories, that doesn't mean it's real, nor is it proof. People react this way because christians tend to sling the bible when asked for proof, but we want proof that the bible/and or god is real or true, so a source other than that. A source that is fact. My intention is not to be hateful. I personally don't care what people believe, as long as they don't use it to justify hateful/homophobic or sexist behavior, they don't push it in peoples faces, and people don't get hurt. But when you start telling people that believe in in science and evidence (and some of which have had bad experiences, I, myself am included) that your beliefs are right and fact, then you start providing nothing valid as proof, over and over and over ... People get frustrated.. There is no proof that the bible is true. Since you used a story as an example, I'll give you one for an example. It's like going to a farmer's stand and picking up a carton of eggs that has 'Each egg has 10000 grams of Pantothenic acid in them' written on it, and you ask for source and proof and they say, "My father wrote that down on a paper." You ask for the true evidence behind the source, and they say, "My father wrote it on a paper 50 years ago." No fact or proof coming up there, is there? Once again, I'm not trying to be hateful. I am merely trying to get you to grasp what we are asking. So, do you have any facts and evidence to back these statements up, and to answer our questions? If so, we are more than willing to see them.

[Minimalist]

Against all reason your bible claims that your phony god reattached a phony ear to a phony assailant....but you do not understand the concept of circular reasoning?

It is all a crock of shit, son.

[NoMoreFaith]

To no more faith. That story is merely an illiustration of how its possible to overlook an act of god simply because it comes in the form of ordinary everyday people. if you can add to the story that he sticks his middle fingers up at everybody else, then i can scratch out your ending to the story and add my own. So he already saved all the other flood victims and that was the last guy on the roof

We're not discussing a story however, what we are discussing is verifiable natural disasters and Gods indifference which this parable fails to address.

Let's break this parable down;
Praying to God for a miracle does not mean he will send his hand down and lift you to safety, but allow for you to help yourself out of the predicament.

Now, translate that to the real world; last sunday, 22 worshippers died during the Easter vigil mass when their church collapsed on them following a heavy rainstorm. The incident happened at an outpost of the Christ the King Church.

Do you think they prayed for God to save them as they were crushed under bricks and mortar? Was there some way they could have saved themselves but didn't interpret God's mercy correctly? As people tried to dig them out, and found only bodies.. what message do you think God sent to save them?

This parable happens to disgust me to be honest, I've heard it before and quite frankly it is despicable in its malevolence.
The actions of God are entirely consistent with the natural order of events. If people can be saved, we try, if they can't we can't.

God exempting himself from our standards of morality is the ultimate malevolence. His version of morality is entirely self-serving and without benevolence.

As a thought experiment, a really easy one. Someone you love has their leg tied to the train tracks at a junction and a train is coming down the line.
Next to you is a switch, you can pull at any time to divert the train away and ensure the safety of the one you love.
A man holding a knife is nearby and there is a reasonably likely chance he may be able to cut through the ropes before the train runs over your loved ones leg.

Do you; Ask the man with the knife to cut the ropes and hope he has enough time, or flick the switch and divert the train onto a safe track instead?

Morally, the answer is obvious, I would assume, that even a small risk of massive suffering in this instance would warrant you using your power to avert the crisis in its entirety.

So why is this the moral thing to do? Its because of the relationship of power. You have the power to avert suffering in an instant instead of allowing for the fallibility of man.

What would you think of a person who asked the man to try cutting the rope instead of the easy solution? Would you find their decision highly questionable? Or would you praise them for sending the man? Even if the loved one was saved by the knife man, would you praise the person at the button for sending the man to do the work? Or question why they didn't just change the tracks?

In my belief all good things come from God, this includes all cures for diseases and sickness.

So the inability to cure those diseases, which God knows how man can do it, is withheld until man comes across the answer.
Is man not ready to cure a disease? What makes them ready to prevent suffering, but they weren't ready thousands of years before.

In the same thought experiment, what would you say to the doctor who could have saved a loved one, but refused to impart his knowledge to the student doctor assigned to cure them to find out if the student doctor is ready for the knowledge?