Best Theistic Arguments

[pocaracas]

[vorlon13]

The LDS Church notes specifically it's members are 'covered' in case of church doctrinal error, God won't hold it against them.

[robvalue]

I question everything, and scrutinize every assumption I make. I want to know the truth, because the truth leads to informed actions which is best for those around me. I don't even care about myself anymore, but I care about those that my actions affect.

I could turn to the bottle or drugs; it's amazing that I haven't and I am proud of myself. I am extremely frequently finding all different forms of escapism, but I'm always very aware of what is real and what I'm fantasizing. What I want to be true is irrelevant; in fact, I've come to see adult life being a matter of coming to terms with how things are and making the best of it.

I don't even know what point I'm making anymore. Anyhow, the idea of "souls" does not even slightly hold up to any sort of scrutiny, neither do "afterlives". They're not even coherent concepts. I can totally understand some people being unable to cope with the idea of these things not being real, although it's my opinion that this dependence is imposed on children along with these ideas, when the mind is vulnerable. I've never been made these promises, so I didn't have them to lose. Ironically, I wouldn't want them now, even if they were offered. God has jaded me that much with his casual sadism.

[KittyAnn]

[Little Rik]

1) You still can not understand how a rock can be full of consciousness as in human life and at the same time it present no life.

Easy.

It is the awareness that make the difference.
The awareness doesn't come easy.
It takes some millions or more years to turn a latent or dormant form of consciousness such as pure matter into plant life, animal life, human life and God life.
This is what evolution is all about.
It is the evolution of the awareness in consciousness that turn matter into something different and more aware.
Consciousness in itself is the same in all form of lives because everything come from the same source but not everything has got the same awareness of who they are.

Consciousness has nothing to do with..........the state of being awake and aware of one's surroundings........instead has to do with being aware of who we are so it is an internal thing not an external one.
Matter does not have a brain or any other way to think or to be aware so no expression is possible.
Even then after millions of years in that bondage something pop up within that make her wish to escape that situation of bondage
and that works with the release of energy as we can see in some minerals such as uranium and other.

There is no evidence that uranium wants anything, and we do not need to invoke unevidenced wants to predict its behavior (see between hide tags below).  If rocks are not in any sense aware, then in what way are they like things that we know are conscious?  What is your evidence for this?

FOOL.

The only way to understand this point is to understand how evolution works which is something that you badly lack.
Matter is the last stage of creation and the first stage of evolution.
It goes in circle.
From pure consciousness to mind, space, air, light-energy, water and finally to matter.
Once the creation reach the bottom and turn into matter the evolution start in order to bring that now latent consciousness back to pure consciousness and to where all started from.
Why all this should be proven right by physical science?
Physical science is called such because she study physical phenomenon not what evolution in consciousness is all about so no if you expect any physical evidence you will not get any but if you engage in intuitional science you will.    

2) There is no way that ketamine and other substances are able to allow the consciousness to leave or disconnect from the body.
An NDE is instead able to do that because that is not cheating.
The fact that people using the chemical way are able to see something big does in no way means that they experience an OBE.
These people also they never die as in a NDE.  

You have no evidence that consciousness is able to leave or disconnect from the body.  When I pointed this out in the evolution thread, you became obstinate and uncooperative and refused to answer further.  Nor do people die in the case of NDEs, as is obvious from the fact that we have the testimony of live NDE experiencers.  The rest of this is just more nonsensical dogma that you believe but have no evidence for.

Now you are very very dishonest.
The evidence is there that people really die during their NDE.
Both doctors and people who had an NDE confirm this fact.
Shame on you liar.  

3) How we determine that something is real?

It is all about developing an high degree of awareness.
Physical science change continuously.
If you stick to what this science say today you will look like a fool tomorrow.
Everything move and change so what science say that is real today will be cast in the rubbish bin of history tomorrow.

The only way to determine what is real is to look within because within there is the real truth but that is something that you will discover later on considering your stubbornness.

Out of one side of your mouth you claim that knowledge from inside is the determinant of the real, and out of the other side of your mouth you claim that evidence from dreams is not justification for believing something.  Apparently, looking within only works if you believe the right dogma.  You don't know what the fuck you believe, nor do you know how to determine what is real.  This is just more Ananda Marga dogma that has yielded bullshit like Sakar's Microvita.

If you think that looking inside through hard spiritual work and dreams are the same thing then you really need to see a mental doctor.
Going from bad to worse yog.

4) Vibrations in inanimate matter are alive as are alive in all other form of life.
The difference however lie in the wave length in which the vibration travel or how the energy is propagated.
The longer it takes to travel  /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\ the less awareness present and the less it takes to travel the more come closer to God wave which is flat___________________________.  

Oh look!  No evidence from NDEs, and no scientific evidence.  Little Rik runs away again.

Give some time yog.
One day you too will understand how the whole system works without banging your head on the wall.  

[surreptitious57]

Surprisingly so many people dont acknowledge that creation itself is evidence of God  

The Universe cannot be evidence of anything because evidence by definition can never be absolute
And so it is a category error to say that creation is evidence of God for it cannot be any such thing

---

What if I am looking also into what is known as Human Nature and see that most humans have a desire to live forever while holding the full awareness that they will die someday

I cannot speak for most humans but I myself would not want to live forever even if it were possible

Death is the only state where there is a complete absence of suffering in all its forms
And which is why I have no fear of it at all and will welcome it when the time comes
An eternal non existence is therefore infinitely better than any idea of living forever

You can have consciousness and suffering or non consciousness and non suffering
You cannot have consciousness and non suffering as that is not how reality works

[surreptitious57]

The Universe had a beginning therefore God

It is an evidence free assertion to claim that the Universe had a beginning. Also in there are two logical
fallacies specifically non sequitur and God of the Gaps. And any God claim is by definition non falsifiable

Surprisingly so many people dont acknowledge that creation itself is evidence of God

The Universe cannot be evidence of anything because evidence by definition can never be absolute
Therefore it is a category error to say creation is evidence of God since it cannot be any such thing

[Fake Messiah]

It doesn't seem that theist have arguments they consider to be "best" to them they're all on the same level and they usually are:

-there are lots of religious people and they can't all be wrong
-my holy book is right
-evolution is wrong and even if it's right it's evil
-faith is a good thing
-atheism is just a religion
-I can feel god when I pray
-ghosts and exorcisms are real
-world is too beautiful to be an accident
-anything is better then being an atheist
-god tortured his son for me
-atheists think they know everything
-my god heals
-I want to believe
-I want to live forever
-I can't face reality
-I don't want to be punished by god for not believing
-my god changes lives
-my religion is the right one
-no one has proved my god doesn't exist

[Angrboda]

[robvalue]

I wanted to say something else on the subject of "faith".

I can have faith in a person, based on my past experiences with them. If they've always shown they know what they are doing in some regard, I'll have faith in them that they'll continue to be good at that particular thing. If, however, I witness them fouling it up, causing chaos and getting awful results, I would have no faith in them in the future.

In this regard, if we assume a hypothetical creator/manager of our environment, do I have faith in them? Absolutely not. I see awful design decisions at every turn, I see mismanagement (or no management), and I see what appears to be pointless sadism.

The only thing that could restore my faith in this creator would be me finding out why the results do not match my expectations. This would necessarily require them not having total control over everything, but instead achieving some overall goal (of which we might be only a small part), using limited resources. This is contrary to what almost every religious theist tells me. Maybe, if this was the case, I simply don't currently understand how everything I am seeing fits in to this. Or maybe, I'd still think it was fucking stupid and/or sadistic. It would depend on the specifics.

One further point: poor animals. They already get the worst deal, being basically our property and foodstuff based on our God-complex over them. But from a theological standpoint, they don't generally even get to go to heaven either. So this huge mitigating factor which is meant to make everything okay in the end doesn't even apply. So their suffering is entirely pointless in this regard, except as pawns in some sick game. Women were also property in the bible, but at least society has moved on with regard to them. I hope one day the same promotion is given to animals.