My Inquiry

[abaris]

And what's more, Tacitus only repeated what christians claimed. So the claim that he wrote down is in fact christian and not some independent knowledge of actual events. It wasn't as if check, recheck, double check was part of the job description back then. They reported oral history as factual events.

[SteelCurtain]

Right, my bad. I can't reference the Bible here. But Roman reports state that He was called the Messiah, which we can take to mean that He did indeed exist and evidently performed wonders for people to start calling Him Messiah and to later go through persecution and martyrdom for Him.

Let's not get it backwards, you absolutely can use the Bible to support your argument on this website.

The idea is that the thing that asserts an event cannot also be used as evidence for that event. Circular reasoning at its best. I know the Bible is true because the Bible says so. Generally, it is a good idea to use extrabiblical sources if you want to be taken seriously. But there is no rule against using the Bible in support of your argument.

[robvalue]

Sure. You can say you believe it because it says so in the bible. And I will say that's a very poor reason and you're using incredibly low standards, but whatever.

[Simon Moon]

1) God is the creator of the Universe. True, there is no concrete, visible proof of this, but it's the belief that I follow. My God is also a loving, amazing God who bestows mercy and grace upon his children.

How intellectually dishonest of you. 

You come here claiming you have evidence for the existence of your god, but after your flawed arguments have been refuted, you fall back on "well that's what I believe". 

So, as it turns out, none of the arguments you've posted here are what convinced you. You believe because of faith. 

Well, sorry, but we don't think that faith is a virtue. It is pretty much indistinguishable from gullibility. 

So, do you have anything besides logical fallacies and unsupported assertions?

2) That brings Jesus into the equation. Jesus died for our sins on a cross, allowing us to make it into a Heaven and spend eternity with him.

Or so some ancient texts claim. 

But why should we believe the Bible is actually true?

[QuarkDriven]

2) That brings Jesus into the equation. Jesus died for our sins on a cross, allowing us to make it into a Heaven and spend eternity with him.

1) a Ricky Gervais standup comes into mind... lol Funny fucker. You say there is no concrete visible proof of this, but its the belief you follow... why then, with no proof do you follow? Cause of who you were born to and when? Your god is a loving, amazing god who bestows mercy and grace upon his children who also happens to be a fan of infanticide, genecide, jealousy, homophobia, etc.....

2) So it's safe to say, you believe in Adam and Eve and it's through them and a "talking" snake that sin and death entered the world?  and.... IF jesus died on the cross for our sins, then we are all good.. nothing to worry about, nothing/no one to woship... our records are clean.. it's like turning 18 all over again!

[Longhorn]

My God is also a loving, amazing God who bestows mercy and grace upon his children.

He raped Mary, so.......thanks but no thanks

[Tonus]

And what's more, Tacitus only repeated what christians claimed.

And it would seem that neither he nor Josephus took any of the supernatural claims seriously. Because it seems odd that they'd report on what GOD IN THE FLESH was doing just a couple of decades ago without becoming converts themselves.

"Dear Diary, I learned today that the actual creator of the universe and divine heavenly father passed through this region a few years ago, performed incredible miracles, threatened hellfire to the unbelievers, then gave his life as a way for all to earn salvation. Quite amazing, really! Also, I think the neighbor's daughter likes me. She stopped by the other day and we talked about the weather..." *goes on about the neighbor's daughter for seventy additional pages, never mentions jesus again*

[QuarkDriven]

Alright. So it seems most of the arguments I am getting right now are something along the lines of "we have no proof that God exists, therefore he must not exist." I can rebutt that with "we have no proof that God does not exist, therefore he must exist," but that's past the point. I'd like to present to you guys my argument for the existence of God and see what you guys respond with (so far I have not been able to come up with any rebuttal for it.) Please look at this with the open mind that I will look at your rebuttals with

I believe that God exists because of the complexity of the universe. In my opinion, there is absolutely no way this could have all happened by chance. It honestly feels like way too many coincidences to result in the universe we know today.

Take a chromosome. Those seem pretty small and unimportant; I mean, we only have 46 of them. But our 46 chromosomes have about 6x10^9 base pairs in them, totaling up for an information storage of 1.5 gigabytes of data. It also happens that these 6 billion base pairs are perfectly lined up so that we come out as a unique living creature. Just one chromosome pair being off of the 6 billion can give genetic diseases, so if there is no God, why are there so few errors in the chromosome pairing? Shouldn't we have so many errors from the random creation of humans that we are born completely messed up?

You could also take a look at the Earth and, namely, it's position in the Universe. We are perfectly positioned, both by axis of rotation and distance from the Sun, so that we have just enough heat to be comfortable but not contract heat stroke by walking outside and just enough cold to be comfortable but not catch hypothermia or frostbite upon leaving the house. The Earth even has an elliptical orbit that leads to the seasons being created, which seems like an extremely delicate balance to be randomly created.

What about life itself? And not even life, but all the things that come with it- conscience, emotions, etc. We don't have a scientific explanation I know of that can explain the "little voice inside your head." So if there is not a God, what is our explanation for this? How was life first created? And if it was created from biological slime, why haven't we been able to reproduce that?

I've got a few more like this I could put together if anyone wanted. Any and all rebuttals are appreciated!

[/quote]

We do have errors... some mutations are better than others... it happens with all sexual reproduction.. its due to genetic variability.... Happens with humans, plants and animals...

so you're going to maintain that the Earth was put there that way for us vs. we are here because the of the position of the Earth..?

how do you explain the little voice in the Texan woman's head when "god" commanded her to kill her infant daughter... still god?  

These arent logical rebuttals.. someone already said this.. this is simply filling in the gaps with god... it's being content with not knowing... "How did that happen? Want to figure it out? No, god did it... oh.. okay then"

[Whateverist]

Okay, here goes again. As has been said already, most atheists -myself included- are not of the opinion that gods do not exist. It simply seems like too inconsequential a matter to devote any time formulating an opinion. Now, if a god showed up I'd rubber neck it. It would be novel and interesting to find out just what one of these things can and can't do. I'd be curious how advanced aliens were ruled out. But so long as the only 'definitions' I get involve supernatural nonsense outside of time and space, meh, I don't really care whether they exist.

[Cato]

I would like to know when willful ignorance became a fucking virtue.