Atheists; what do you base your morals on?

[genkaus]

Why do you use words like "delusion" in this context? Obviously what I am writing is not a delusion.

Because you seem to believe its true while it is not.

The public school system did not fall out of the sky. It is not delusional to suppose that the state should not necessarily force people to attend its schools.

It doesn't. You can drop out or be home-schooled if you like.

This sort of terminology in political discourse is suggestive of some sort of re-education program.

Nope. Simply education program.

Do you think that reasonable people can disagree as to the way that their taxes are taken from them? The tax system is very complex.

You can disagree all you like, you still have to pay them.

You seem to want to live in a totalitarian world.

Quite the opposite. But as long as that is not the case, I'd rather that the state spend the taxes in a way that actually benefit the society.

[jstrodel]

In what sense is the tax code "true". You are talking about the state like it is a religious belief. You support this by citing a definition from a law code as if that defends the view of law.

Don't you realize you aren't making an argument? The tax code could be set up any number of ways, as the education system. Why would you cite the present system to prove your value system (which is that you want an authoritarian state forcing people to get an education from them)? The law dictionary does not demonstrate this.

[DeistPaladin]

Some more strident and literal minded Christians think that scriptures can only be trusted 100% or not at all. That means they believe that if one minor thing is in error then how can you know if parts critical to the faith are not also in error? I do not find 'biblical inerrency' a very helpful approach to have.

I've said it before and I'll say it again. You have two options with the Bible:
1. It IS the Word of God
2. It IS NOT the Word of God.

There is no "sorta-kinda" option.

Anyone who disagrees can feel free to explain to me the supernatural powers you use to determine which parts are divine, which parts are divine but need decoding and which parts are human insertion.

I have no problem with considering Genesis as a collection of legends and parables well suited to conveying spiritual wisdom to an ancient story telling culture.

By what supernatural method can you determine that Genesis is allegory and the Gospels are not?

I think God was able to take existing folklore and fold a spiritual meaning into it.

And you have supernatural powers that tell you God was at work here and we should discard the simpler explanation that human beings heard the story and imported it into the Bible?

Then 400 years go by and you get Moses and that starts the written record. I think most of the things that happened starting with Moses happened pretty much the way they are described.

There is no evidence that the account of Exodus, or any of the other major historical milestones in the OT, actually happened. But you have supernatural powers that tell you otherwise, right?

But he still rounds some numbers, like 100,000 men went into battle, as opposed to say 983,532. Numbers have symbolic value, so when I see a number like that I don't think of it as a historic fact but a number pointing to some timeless spiritual principle.

Putting aside the supernatural powers you've used to pull this number out of the air...
You realize even 100,000 men is about 20 Roman Legions, right? You really think Moses managed to muster nearly the combined might of the Roman Empire? From what was a comparatively tiny Eastern Med kingdom?

Generally, I don't have a problem with someone who "made their home in...that fish's abdomen". Miracles are miracles. So, the Gospels happened pretty much as described, miracles and all. As for Revelations, I think that it is so obviously symbolic one would have to be insane to take it literally.

And what supernatural powers do you have at your disposal to tell you these things again? That making a home in a fish's abdomen is accepted as just another miracle but literally interpreting Revelation is just crazy?

It depends on what you mean by flaws. I understand the point though. Sometimes I think God puts those in there as prompts to remind us not to take the text literally and look for the meaning within the text.

Your supernatural powers tell you so, right?

If a God of infinite Love and Wisdom chose to communicate with hairless apes, I would think he would have to express Himself in analogy and parable because any thing else would be completely beyond our comprehension.

Luckily, we hairless apes have people like you who have supernatural powers that can tell us which parts are literal, which parts are parable and how to interpret what is parable.

[genkaus]

In what sense is the tax code "true".

In the sense that that is the principle behind it.

You are talking about the state like it is a religious belief.

Don't be ridiculous.

You support this by citing a definition from a law code as if that defends the view of law.

No, citing the definition only shows what the law is. It neither defends nor opposes it.

Don't you realize you aren't making an argument?

I do. I'm not making an argument. Simply stating the facts.

The tax code could be set up any number of ways, as the education system.

And I'm simply telling you the way it is set up.

Why would you cite the present system to prove your value system (which is that you want an authoritarian state forcing people to get an education from them)? The law dictionary does not demonstrate this.

That's nowhere close to what I'm trying to prove. All I'm showing you is that you are wrong to assume that paying taxes gives you any voice with regards to how they are spent.

[Tonus]

Just interested

Having been raised a Christian, my morals are still informed mostly by the Bible. For most of my life they were filtered through the Christian lens. These days I consider the practical ramifications of my actions before anything else.

[jstrodel]

I know how the system is setup. You are not making any argument defending the current system, you are making an argument from authority. It is wrong to force people to pay for an education system that goes against the values God has given to people, and in a country that is 80% Christian, people have every right to challenge the way that the system is setup.

You are defending tyranny. I am not saying people should be forced to pay for a Christian education, but they should not be forced to pay for a secular education.

I challenge you to prove to me, based on a trans-cultural perception of ethics, why I should accept the present system, which taxes my money which I worked for and uses it to pay for things that are against the most important thing to me, my faith. Why should my money go to be used to promote liberalism? Why should I ethically, be obligated to pay for research and education that comes from a naturalistic perspective?

If you cannot prove this and still advocate it, you are an irrationalist and a tyrant.

Of course paying taxes give you a voice in how they are spent. Do you know what the concept of citizenship is? The atheist fails to demonstrate the existence of absolute morals and proceeds to try and disenfranchise people so he can demand adherence to his worldview by force, not grounded in any conception of authority but grounded in his own will.

Why do you think Christians are pissed off about this? What do you expect? We built America. We built the universities. We built the schools. Every single US president has been Christian. Atheists build a political bloc through giving people the freedom to do whatever they want, they don't care that they have no moral authority, they don't care that they are nihilists, even if they say that they aren't all they care about is power, which shows where your mind is when you cite the Blacks Law Dictionary to try and prove an ethical dispute.

The classic move of liberalism: when you get to an ethical question, use political/legal tools to deal with it.

[FallentoReason]

I challenge you to prove to me, based on a trans-cultural perception of ethics, why I should accept the present system, which taxes my money which I worked for and uses it to pay for things that are against the most important thing to me, my faith. Why should my money go to be used to promote liberalism?

Umm, maybe because your non-existent god tells you to pay taxes..?

Matthew 22:21
"Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's; and to God the things that are God's."

I'm going to go out on a limb and say you're in fact a Poe. Such a slip up can't be anything else but someone pretending to be a Christian.

[genkaus]

I know how the system is setup.

Do you? It doesn't seem so.

You are not making any argument defending the current system, you are making an argument from authority.

I'm not making an argument.

It is wrong to force people to pay for an education system that goes against the values God has given to people, and in a country that is 80% Christian, people have every right to challenge the way that the system is setup.

I agree - not about the god-given values bullshit. But I do agree that it is wrong to make people pay for a system that goes against their values. So those who are anti-war should not pay for national security and those who are anarchists should not pay taxes at all.

But, that's not the way things work.

You are defending tyranny.

Nope.

I am not saying people should be forced to pay for a Christian education, but they should not be forced to pay for a secular education.

And anarchists shouldn't pay any taxes at all.

I challenge you to prove to me, based on a trans-cultural perception of ethics, why I should accept the present system, which taxes my money which I worked for and uses it to pay for things that are against the most important thing to me, my faith.

Why would I try to prove something I don't agree with?

Why should my money go to be used to promote liberalism? Why should I ethically, be obligated to pay for research and education that comes from a naturalistic perspective?

You shouldn't. But there is a catch - if you don't pay for it, you cannot use its products either. Most of the advances in science, medicine and defense are the product of a liberal and naturalistic educational system. If you want to take advantage of the fruits, you water the tree it grows on.

[jstrodel]

I've said it before and I'll say it again. You have two options with the Bible:
1. It IS the Word of God
2. It IS NOT the Word of God.

What is the Word of God? Where does the definition of what the word of God come from? Have you ever seen a Word of God? What does a Word of God look like?

When you define the nature of the concept "Word of God", what do you use to fill that understand of the concept?

In the Bible, God uses prostitutes, adulterous kings, deceitful people, murders and blasphmers and horrible tragedy to declare his Word.

Where do you get your idea of what the Word of God is?

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I challenge you to prove to me, based on a trans-cultural perception of ethics, why I should accept the present system, which taxes my money which I worked for and uses it to pay for things that are against the most important thing to me, my faith. Why should my money go to be used to promote liberalism?

Umm, maybe because your non-existent god tells you to pay taxes..?

Matthew 22:21
"Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's; and to God the things that are God's."

I'm going to go out on a limb and say you're in fact a Poe. Such a slip up can't be anything else but someone pretending to be a Christian.

Obviously being commanded to pay taxes is different from accepting a tax system in a Democratic Republic that is heavily tilted against the Christian church. Of course, Christians are required to pay taxes, I am not encouraging people to break tax laws, I am saying ethically, why should Christians feel any obligation to accept a system that disadvantages them?

I pay taxes, but I don't accept the system. It is tyrannical.

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And anarchists shouldn't pay any taxes at all.

I was an anarchist before I became a Republican, I still consider myself left libertarian, non-capitalist (but this must come from below), anti-authoritarian.

Liberals are tyrannical.

[DeistPaladin]

What is the Word of God?

By "Word of God", I mean revelation from God.

Since I don't have a belief that the Bible is the Word of God, it's not up to me to define it any more clearer than that. I'm not the one making the assertion. It is up to the one making the assertion to define and prove.

Now Chad has an even more difficult task ahead of him. He must not only define and prove that the Bible is the Word of God, but also explain his magical powers he uses to determine which parts are divine, which parts are human and which parts are divine parable that he uses his awesome divination powers to decode.

---

You are defending tyranny. I am not saying people should be forced to pay for a Christian education, but they should not be forced to pay for a secular education.

Tell you what, I'll make you a deal.

I'll agree to pay a special teach-science-in-science-class tax if you agree to pay the dumb-ass-who-voted-for-Bush-in-04-after-it-was-obvious-he-lied-us-into-a-war-in-Iraq tax.

Your tab comes to about $3 trillion.