Evidence Verses Faith

[infidel666]

I just want to point out that "versus" and "verses" are not the same thing. "Evidence verses faith" sounds like evidence is composing a love poem to faith. Tres droll. N'est ce pas?

"F" is for flesh, "A" is for ass,
"I"'s for the ignorance displayed by your past.
"T"'s for your titties. "H" for harass.
Evidence loves his sassy Faith lass.

[CoxRox]

EvidenceVsFaith, you make some interesting points. You said: 'If its flat out logic why call it 'faith'?' I can't speak for Daystar and will eagerly await his reply to this, but from my experience the faith I employ MUST be based on logic, on reasoning things through. I reason that many things in the Bible have been proved archeologically (people, dates, events etc) and coupled with the moral elements of Christ, and the inference of design in molecular machines, I conclude that there is a good possibility of a Creator, or Supernatural Being. I know these 'proofs' would not be 'proofs' for you. My reasoning has taken a different path maybe, and concluded rightly or wrongly the said 'Creator'. I 'detect' a Creator but cannot prove this, and therefore I employ faith that He/She/It will be manifest at some point of my 'life'. I think 'faith' is scorned upon and misunderstood. I am not ashamed to say I employ faith in my life.....

[Daystar]

I just want to point out that "versus" and "verses" are not the same thing. "Evidence verses faith" sounds like evidence is composing a love poem to faith. Tres droll. N'est ce pas?

"F" is for flesh, "A" is for ass,
"I"'s for the ignorance displayed by your past.
"T"'s for your titties. "H" for harass.
Evidence loves his sassy Faith lass.

Yes, and of course I meant the play on words as a metaphor for the poetry of our discourse. You realize that.

Hey spell check can't fix stupid, what the hell am I supposed to do, look it up?!

[CoxRox]

I just want to point out that "versus" and "verses" are not the same thing. "Evidence verses faith" sounds like evidence is composing a love poem to faith. Tres droll. N'est ce pas?

"F" is for flesh, "A" is for ass,
"I"'s for the ignorance displayed by your past.
"T"'s for your titties. "H" for harass.
Evidence loves his sassy Faith lass.

Yes, and of course I meant the play on words as a metaphor for the poetry of our discourse. You realize that.

Hey spell check can't fix stupid, what the hell am I supposed to do, look it up?!

lol lol lol lol

---

I just want to point out that "versus" and "verses" are not the same thing. "Evidence verses faith" sounds like evidence is composing a love poem to faith. Tres droll. N'est ce pas?

"F" is for flesh, "A" is for ass,
"I"'s for the ignorance displayed by your past.
"T"'s for your titties. "H" for harass.
Evidence loves his sassy Faith lass.

Yes, and of course I meant the play on words as a metaphor for the poetry of our discourse. You realize that.

Hey spell check can't fix stupid, what the hell am I supposed to do, look it up?!

lol lol lol lol

[Daystar]

Yeah but you can make anything fit the pattern.
If you play poker and God doesn't let you win all the time you can simply say that God doesn't approve of gambling.
But there are expert poker players who do in fact believe in God and when they win they thank God. And when they lose they think they went wrong or its part of God's plan for their fortune.

Yeah and what that is is trying to fit your own personal God within your own will. Rather than trying to see what God has to say about it himself. Very childish and pointless other than to justify ones own needs. Atheists tend to do the same thing.

But your INTERPRETATION of the bible is the same sort of ignorance. You are ignorant to think that your interpretation is correct because there are so MANY interpretations. And so many 'EXPERT' interpretations.

Have we discussed the interpretive nature of science? For hundreds of years Newton's theory of gravity was the interpretation and then along comes this Einstein guy and BAM! A new 'EXPERT' interpretation. Now you can say what you want but the FACT is that for hundreds of years science was wrong. They may still be wrong. So what is the problem? We can't be wrong about the Bible?

Bible interpretation is slightly different only in that it is a personal responsibility which may or may not be influenced by expert interpretation. When a Bible scholar comes up to me and says the soul is immortal I say, no it isn't. Read Ezekiel 18:4. Sometimes there are factors of a cultural, linguistic or other aspect of the text that needs to be considered in figurative expressions that Bible scholars have such a problem dealing with, but ultimately the more you study the Bible without religious blinders on the easier it gets. A warning science could use at about this time.

The most consistent interpretation is the entirely literal one. And when you interpret the bible literally not only is most of it an utter load of nonsense - but a lot of it is HIGHLY immoral. Grotesquely immoral in fact if you consider a lot of the old testament.

The most consistent interpretation allows for literal and figurative as well as other considerations and is not limited in ignorance to a stubborn literal interpretation.

Moses said that insects walk on all fours, the short sighted skeptic says insects have six legs but some have 2 leaper legs they don't use for walking and walk on all fours. Others walk on all six like a four legged creature. A small child is walking on all fours, EVF, what does that mean he has four legs or he is walking like a beast using his hands? It isn't rocket science.

So bible interpretation is the same kind of ignorant bullshit that you criticise. And in fact the stuff you were giving examples of is just like what I said about the poker player. He's stupid because he thinks it has relevance with 'God'. But its also a load of total bullshit to make it fit the pattern so you can excuse things when things go wrong or simply say 'God' doesn't apply to certain things because he doesn't approve of them. When you can't know that. Especially when you consider that there's no evidence that he even exists!

The competent Bible student doesn't do that but I will tell you this, the incompetent Bible critic does the same thing in reverse. The same stupid bullshit in criticizing. Only one atheist I have ever come across doesn't do that - Rambo of Bible Babble. He also happens to be the most difficult person to refute because he knows what he is talking about or he looks it up unlike most Atheist who assume out of ignorance and don't have much defense.

[Edwardo Piet]

Yeah and what that is is trying to fit your own personal God within your own will. Rather than trying to see what God has to say about it himself. Very childish and pointless other than to justify ones own needs. Atheists tend to do the same thing.

And how exactly do you "try to see what god has to say about himself", Without interpreting him with your own free will and 'fitting him within your own free will"?

Have we discussed the interpretive nature of science? For hundreds of years Newton's theory of gravity was the interpretation and then along comes this Einstein guy and BAM! A new 'EXPERT' interpretation. Now you can say what you want but the FACT is that for hundreds of years science was wrong. They may still be wrong. So what is the problem? We can't be wrong about the Bible?

I have had this conversation with someone I know. More than once actually. He says "But science has been wrong so many times".
Basically, my answer is. Science gets results. And once again you must understand the burden of proof. You keep getting backwards.
By default. Something doesn't exist. Or isn't true. When someone comes up with a theory then the burden of proof is on THEM to give evidence for its truth. The more evidence it has to support it. The more probable its truth becomes. When it has totally enough significant substantial evidence it is considered scientifically proved. If any unexpected new evidence comes in to contradict it, it is looked at. If the new evidence overthrows it then that is considered proved.
Science progresses hugely. And if it makes a mistake it corrects it. The reverse, and a bad way would be like this.
Think up some theory or just random idea with no evidence supporting it. Meaning its intangible. Completely without content. Assume its true. Try and disprove it. It can't be disproved EVER because there's no evidence supporting it to BE disproved. Its an empty seat. So its really disproved anyway. Non-proved rather. In the sense that it has never been proved or had any evidence to support it so there's nothing TO disprove. BUT it is still stupidly treated as proved because it is assumed it is proved before it has any substance. That's idiotic thinking. And then there is no way it can be disproved. So this empty nonsensical seat gets respected and trusted when its got no support to back it up. There's nothing sitting on the seat. And certainly no God to sit on his throne.
FIRST something is unproved. It needs evidence FIRST before it CAN be disproved. It doesn't start proved. Before that it is nothing but a hypothesis. Its purely hypothetical. Pure speculation until the idea or hypothesized idea, or theory has some form of support. SOME evidence. And of course anything actually testable at all counts as SOME evidence. Anything that is not completely intangible. Unlike the supernatural. Unlike "God". The empty seat.
Correct me if I'm wrong anyone. I'm not a scientist or anything

The most consistent interpretation allows for literal and figurative as well as other considerations and is not limited in ignorance to a stubborn literal interpretation.

So how do YOU make sure YOU interpret it correctly? And don't make a huge cock-up and misunderstand the bible greatly? How do you know when to be literal? And when to be figurative, etc? Its obviously not exactly easy otherwise so many people wouldn't apparently misunderstand it and actually think that the OT is full of complete horror.
And as well as that the bible never gives many reasons to believe in God other than promises, threats and simply "I exist". Does he? There aren't any good ones anyway. Just these 3 terrible AND nonsensical ones and if any others they are at least nonsensical. Please do correct me if you think I'm wrong.

The competent Bible student doesn't do that but I will tell you this, the incompetent Bible critic does the same thing in reverse. The same stupid bullshit in criticizing. Only one atheist I have ever come across doesn't do that - Rambo of Bible Babble. He also happens to be the most difficult person to refute because he knows what he is talking about or he looks it up unlike most Atheist who assume out of ignorance and don't have much defense.

Ok first of all: 1. I DON'T need ANY defense against the bible other than the fact you nor anyone else can give me ANY evidence for the truth of it. And until I know of any evidence its by default to be considered untrue.
And secondly 2: The OT explicitly has repeated gruesome horror in it. How do you interpret THAT?
And, if Christopher Hitchens is correct the original OT didn't have a heaven or hell in it. It was introduced in the original NT. So there was no eternal punishment until the NT. So in a way the NT is arguably worse than even the horrors of the OT. What would you think of that? I don't study the bible myself so perhaps I should ask you? That's why I said "If" and not "I know this".

Occam's razor completely disposes of the supernatural.

[CoxRox]

EVF:

''Ok first of all: 1. I DON'T need ANY defense against the bible other than the fact you nor anyone else can give me ANY evidence for the truth of it. And until I know of any evidence its by default to be considered untrue.
And secondly 2: The OT explicitly has repeated gruesome horror in it. How do you interpret THAT?
And, if Christopher Hitchens is correct the original OT didn't have a heaven or hell in it. It was introduced in the original NT. So there was no eternal punishment until the NT. So in a way the NT is arguably worse than even the horrors of the OT. What would you think of that? I don't study the bible myself so perhaps I should ask you? That's why I said "If" and not "I know this".

Occam's razor completely disposes of the supernatural.''

I'll see what Daystar says and then I'll give you my answers to your points. Good points to note, by the way....

[Daystar]

intense study and careful consideration. I don't wan't to interpret him according to my own free will and even if I did that wouldn't change the Bible it would only change my perception of it. That is why I can criticize the average Xian's pagan influenced interpretation. In the same way my own interpretation is accountable to the same.[quote]
So you "try to see what God has to say about himself", without interpreting him with your own free will. By intense study and careful consideration? So in other words, you interpret God with intense study and careful consideration WITHOUT doing so with your own free will? How on earth is THAT possible?

[quote]Burden of proof? Are you saying that I am bound by some burden of proof to you? The Burden of proof, if you insist upon it, belongs to you. Not me.

Is this according to the bible? Because according to science the burden of proof rests on the believer. I've already explained it to you and others several times to the best of my ability.
If anyone is bound it is YOU the believer who is bound .You believe in something that there is NO evidence of. You might as well believe in Zeus the Flying Spaghetti Monster, the Invisible Pink Unicorn....
Or a rose-coloured spearmint-flavoured goblin.

You are talking to me about science? I don't care about science. Have I not explained that to you before?

You don't care about science? So you don't care about the theory of gravity? You don't care about DNA? You don't care about evolution? You don't care about physics or even maths? You don't care about LOGIC. So you don't care about logic huh? So I guess we're in a completely random nonsensical world according to you and ANYTHING could be as likely as your God. So you might as well believe what you WANT to believe.
No seriously. What are you TALKING about? Good grief.
You believe that the bible says that unbelievers hold the burden of proof. Not the believers? Since the bible is what you believe in? Rather than science that says by default the believer, the person who makes the first claim. Holds the burden of proof.

[lukec]

Well I gotta say Daystar, that you when you say you don't care about science I am a little surprised. I am simply not sure why you, who seem to be a critical thinker, would not be interested in at least the evolutionary biology part of science. This is especially true since you feel strongly about creation... why don't you care about at least bettering your understanding of the theory which you oppose?

The burden of proof he's talking about is the idea that one cannot rationally assume that god exists- innocent until proven guilty is the same idea. You don't assume what you are trying to prove, which is why there is always a burden of proof in trying to provide evidence for a hypothesis.

[Daystar]

Well I gotta say Daystar, that you when you say you don't care about science I am a little surprised. I am simply not sure why you, who seem to be a critical thinker, would not be interested in at least the evolutionary biology part of science. This is especially true since you feel strongly about creation... why don't you care about at least bettering your understanding of the theory which you oppose?

What makes you think that my understanding in evolution can only be bettered? Simply because I don't believe? I make that mistake with Atheists all the time as well. That is what I call religious 'thinking.'

The burden of proof he's talking about is the idea that one cannot rationally assume that god exists- innocent until proven guilty is the same idea. You don't assume what you are trying to prove, which is why there is always a burden of proof in trying to provide evidence for a hypothesis.

One cannot rationally assume anything exists. Even evolution. And you are right, it is innocent until proven guilty and the evidence isn't there though everyone has picked sides.

I was telling him (EvF) that it wasn't my job to prove anything to him, it was his own responsibility. That is what this conversation is about and it can't get any dumber than the that. Science is a lame excuse for hating a God you don't believe exists.

Why, though, are you surprised, Luke? Are you any more interested in that which you oppose than myself?