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Nature's Laws
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 RE: Nature's Laws
May 15, 2015 at 3:10 pm
(This post was last modified: May 15, 2015 at 3:10 pm by FatAndFaithless.)
So, what convinced you in Josh McDowel's books (about which I agree with Simon)?
In every country and every age, the priest had been hostile to Liberty.
- Thomas Jefferson  RE: Nature's Laws
May 15, 2015 at 3:15 pm
(This post was last modified: May 15, 2015 at 3:15 pm by Simon Moon.)
(May 15, 2015 at 2:57 pm)Freedom4me Wrote: I agree. We really don't know why it is that the stuff of nature has to follow the laws of nature. But it seems to me that nature is more than law-like; it is also purposeful. In some way, it seems imaginable that a universe could conceivably exist without any discernible order or purpose. Of course in such a universe, there would be no creatures around to notice the lack of order and purpose. Nature does not follow laws. It just behaves as it does. We observe that behavior, and in an attempt to explain and predict it, create laws to describe that behavior. Quote:Where do our individual rights come from? We assign them. You'd believe if you just opened your heart" is a terrible argument for religion. It's basically saying, "If you bias yourself enough, you can convince yourself that this is true." If religion were true, people wouldn't need faith to believe it -- it would be supported by good evidence.  RE: Nature's Laws
May 15, 2015 at 3:20 pm
(This post was last modified: May 15, 2015 at 3:36 pm by SteelCurtain.
Edit Reason: Coordinating the Natural Laws of quoting.
)
(May 15, 2015 at 2:59 pm)robvalue Wrote: I don't know what makes you think the universe is purposeful. Why do you say that? Just because we exist, it doesn't mean we have an objective purpose. A purpose is something a thinking agency has decided upon. There is no evidence anything in the universe was "designed for a purpose" by anything. In fact, the Earth is going to end one day, and the whole universe will die a heat death. Sounds pretty un-purposeful if anything. Would you say that the ability for an organism to reproduce itself is purposeful? Is the human immune system purposeful? The clotting of blood? Quote:Where do our rights come from? We grant them to each other, we decide what is fair and what isn't. We decide as a society. Rights have evolved as societies have grown and (hopefully) improved.A right doesn't mean anything if no one at all respects it; it must be an agreement. 
Evidence That Demands a Verdict . . . uh, yeah. That verdict was delivered quite a while ago, but the Christians who inflict this waste of paper on others haven't got the memo yet. You could drive a fucking truck through the holes in that book's arguments.
You talk about the order and apparent purpose the universe exhibits. Are you sure that a theistic explanation is the only possible explanation? And if you believe that to be the case, why do you privilege the Christian explanation over other theistic belief systems (and no damn appeals to Josh McDowell please)? 
Bad Wolf
Compulsive procrastinator  Religious Views: Agnostic atheist, anti-theist, whovian, misanthrope? ![[Image: puddle-thinking.png]](https://images.weserv.nl/?url=commonsenseatheism.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2010%2F11%2Fpuddle-thinking.png)
'The more I learn about people the more I like my dog'- Mark Twain
'You can have all the faith you want in spirits, and the afterlife, and heaven and hell, but when it comes to this world, don't be an idiot. Cause you can tell me you put your faith in God to put you through the day, but when it comes time to cross the road, I know you look both ways.' - Dr House “Young earth creationism is essentially the position that all of modern science, 90% of living scientists and 98% of living biologists, all major university biology departments, every major science journal, the American Academy of Sciences, and every major science organization in the world, are all wrong regarding the origins and development of life….but one particular tribe of uneducated, bronze aged, goat herders got it exactly right.” - Chuck Easttom "If my good friend Doctor Gasparri speaks badly of my mother, he can expect to get punched.....You cannot provoke. You cannot insult the faith of others. You cannot make fun of the faith of others. There is a limit." - Pope Francis on freedom of speech (May 15, 2015 at 3:10 pm)FatAndFaithless Wrote: So, what convinced you in Josh McDowel's books (about which I agree with Simon)? It was partly the uniqueness of the bible and a few other points such as the harmony that exists from one book to another, the details involving future events which have come to pass etc.
Oh lord...the consistency and uniqueness of the Bible and prophecy? All three of those things are so despairingly easy to deconstruct...
In every country and every age, the priest had been hostile to Liberty.
- Thomas Jefferson
Bad Wolf
Compulsive procrastinator Religious Views: Agnostic atheist, anti-theist, whovian, misanthrope?
Alright, lets hear them. What prophecies convinced you?
'The more I learn about people the more I like my dog'- Mark Twain
'You can have all the faith you want in spirits, and the afterlife, and heaven and hell, but when it comes to this world, don't be an idiot. Cause you can tell me you put your faith in God to put you through the day, but when it comes time to cross the road, I know you look both ways.' - Dr House “Young earth creationism is essentially the position that all of modern science, 90% of living scientists and 98% of living biologists, all major university biology departments, every major science journal, the American Academy of Sciences, and every major science organization in the world, are all wrong regarding the origins and development of life….but one particular tribe of uneducated, bronze aged, goat herders got it exactly right.” - Chuck Easttom "If my good friend Doctor Gasparri speaks badly of my mother, he can expect to get punched.....You cannot provoke. You cannot insult the faith of others. You cannot make fun of the faith of others. There is a limit." - Pope Francis on freedom of speech  RE: Nature's Laws
May 15, 2015 at 3:30 pm
(This post was last modified: May 15, 2015 at 3:33 pm by robvalue.)
An organism reproducing, or blood clotting, are natural processes. We can look at them and come up with a "purpose", in other words a description of what the process "achieves". But it's really no more than describing it. We're assigning a kind of narrative, and it's easy to get carried away and think that narrative is somehow inherent to the process itself. To put it bluntly, shit happens. As humans, we look for patterns. If stuff didn't work that way, it would work another way.
And yes, if a society decides certain people have no rights, then under that society, those people have no rights. That doesn't mean it's a fair decision, or that other people would agree with it. You can say what rights they should have, but if they aren't ever being respected, they're nothing but wishful thinking. As for prophecies, even if the bible did actually predict some things accurately (it does not) then all that would mean is the authors got some things right. It says nothing about how they knew, or about whether anything else in the book is true. Feel free to send me a private message.
Please visit my website here! It's got lots of information about atheism/theism and support for new atheists. Index of useful threads and discussions Index of my best videos Quickstart guide to the forum (May 15, 2015 at 3:20 pm)Crossless1 Wrote: Evidence That Demands a Verdict . . . uh, yeah. That verdict was delivered quite a while ago, but the Christians who inflict this waste of paper on others haven't got the memo yet. You could drive a fucking truck through the holes in that book's arguments. I'm not saying that a theistic explanation is the only possible one. But theism does seem to accommodate a world view that encompasses more than just the natural world. That was an important thing because I think that there is more to "reality" than just the physical stuff of nature. |
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