God: Misinterpreted as an extraterrestrial?

[The Grand Nudger]

It's well within sanity to state that "we don't know". You believe that you know, but believing and knowing are not directly equivalent. Not in common usage, not in definition, not in any way whatsoever, period.

God is by no means a simpler idea than descent with modification. The god concept doesn't even show up as a blip on the radar of simplicity.

There are claims as to what god has given us, and of course claims as to which god gave us exactly what. Claims. Nothing more, unless you have evidence?

Any part of the visible world is proof of the visible world, not faeries. The entirety of the visible world is again proof of the same, and again, not faeries. Everything answers are nothing answers.

If we have evidence of the universe's beginning, it is evidence only of that. It does not extend to "goddidit" unless you have evidence for the existence of god. Your if is showing.

Actually, the "only way a naturalistic origin is plausible" is by realizing that this sort of origin is exactly what has happened here, unless you have evidence that would suggest otherwise? A creator is not yet required to deal with this one universe, why then would he be more necessary to account for more than one? Honestly, just give some evidence for fine tuning or stop talking about it, it's embarrassing.

Evidence of a creator, communication from said creator, the lack of limits to his abilities? You'll have to forgive me if I fail to see the value of a practical application of christianity in my life (especially considering the way in which christians cavort around this website making their entire faith look like complete morons).

[ElDinero]

DOESN'T UNDERSTAND CAUSALITY OR EVIDENCE ALERT!!!

Whew, sorry about that. Your post set off my in built alarm. Here we go again:

You can't use a Bible verse to prove the existence of God. We doubt the authenticity of the Bible. You haven't proven the 'evidence' that is all around us was made by God. It's what's known as a circular argument. If you want to see how puerile and idiotic this line of thinking is, take God out of the premise and replace it with ANYTHING ELSE, like this:

'I know Allah exists because it says in this book I have that we've all seen him at work, and the evidence for Allah's existence is therefore all around you'

Do you believe the statement I just made?

[lucent]

It's well within sanity to state that "we don't know". You believe that you know, but believing and knowing are not directly equivalent. Not in common usage, not in definition, not in any way whatsoever, period.

You can say that you don't know, but can't speak for what I know or don't know. Not believing and knowing are not directly equivalent. Since you don't know, neither do you know if I am correct or not.

God is by no means a simpler idea than descent with modification. The god concept doesn't even show up as a blip on the radar of simplicity.

It is a very simple idea to say that a higher intelligence created the Universe. If there was a cohesive, plausible theory as to how it happened "naturally", that actually worked, you would almost have some philosophical ground to stand on, but that isn't the case.

There is no explanation for origins, no explanation for how the Cosmos came to be..not even the basics like why objects have mass, how stars or planets form, how light or heavy elements form, the list goes on and on. Saying I don't know is not a better explanation. Saying that Universe popped into existence out of nothing and organized itself into elegant machinery that produces life is not a better explanation. It is actually a really stupid explanation that requires a much bigger leap of faith to believe.

If you want to say God is too complex, read this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Divine_simplicity

There are claims as to what god has given us, and of course claims as to which god gave us exactly what. Claims. Nothing more, unless you have evidence?

There is historical evidence, evidence from archaelogy, evidence from fulfilled prophecy etc. What do you want to discuss? What evidence are you looking for?

Any part of the visible world is proof of the visible world, not faeries. The entirety of the visible world is again proof of the same, and again, not faeries. Everything answers are nothing answers.

God cannot be compared to faeries. This is a false analogy, because faeries explain approximately nothing. God is a philosophical idea, at the least, which has explanatory power.

Using logic, if God exists the entire Universe is in fact evidence for His existence.

If we have evidence of the universe's beginning, it is evidence only of that. It does not extend to "goddidit" unless you have evidence for the existence of god. Your if is showing.

It is evidence that the Universe began, ie, it had a cause. Science used to believe the Universe was eternal and people would use that for evidence of Gods non-existence. Now they try to explain God away by saying that something can come from nothing. That's what is embarassing. The mere fact the Universe began to exist is a point of evidence in Gods favor. The discoverer of the CMB stated that there wasn't a better theory (ie, the big bang) which could match up with the Genesis account.

Actually, the "only way a naturalistic origin is plausible" is by realizing that this sort of origin is exactly what has happened here, unless you have evidence that would suggest otherwise? A creator is not yet required to deal with this one universe, why then would he be more necessary to account for more than one? Honestly, just give some evidence for fine tuning or stop talking about it, it's embarrassing.

You have no evidence either way. You like to make these blanket statements of truth in favor of naturalistic materialism, where Science has a theory, which again does not work, and say that is what happened. Where is your evidence that "this sort of origin is exactly what has happened here"? Do you have any? Where is your evidence that "A creator is not yet required to deal with this one universe"? How do you know that? Obviously if God exists a Creator is in fact required. Here is a good list of fine tuning parameters:

http://www.godandscience.org/apologetics/designun.html

Evidence of a creator, communication from said creator, the lack of limits to his abilities? You'll have to forgive me if I fail to see the value of a practical application of christianity in my life (especially considering the way in which christians cavort around this website making their entire faith look like complete morons).

The practical application of Christianity is the adjudication of your sins. Your sin is a legal matter between you and God that only Christ can mediate for you. The penalty for sin is death, and if you were to face God on your own merits, you would be found guilty. That is why He went to the cross, so that anyone who believes in Him would be saved. He paid the penalty for our crimes, so we could be declared not guilty and have eternal life.

The practical application of Christianity has everything to do with your personal responsibility to God. Whether you think me stupid, or not is irrelevent. I'll happily be insulted to tell you about the Lord, and what He has done for you..and especially, how much that He loves you.

Evidence of a creator, communication from said creator, the lack of limits to his abilities? You'll have to forgive me if I fail to see the value of a practical application of christianity in my life (especially considering the way in which christians cavort around this website making their entire faith look like complete morons).

---

I'm well aware you don't believe the bible is authentic. I don't have to prove the bible for that statement to be true. It is obvious by logic alone. If God exists, everything in existence is evidence for the existence of God.

DOESN'T UNDERSTAND CAUSALITY OR EVIDENCE ALERT!!!

Whew, sorry about that. Your post set off my in built alarm. Here we go again:

You can't use a Bible verse to prove the existence of God. We doubt the authenticity of the Bible. You haven't proven the 'evidence' that is all around us was made by God. It's what's known as a circular argument. If you want to see how puerile and idiotic this line of thinking is, take God out of the premise and replace it with ANYTHING ELSE, like this:

'I know Allah exists because it says in this book I have that we've all seen him at work, and the evidence for Allah's existence is therefore all around you'

Do you believe the statement I just made?

[ElDinero]

'If God exists, everything in existence is evidence for the existence of God'

And the proof of God's existence is....

Once again, use the example I gave. Substitute your God for another one. Or substitute him for anything else. Does the logic still hold up?

[The Grand Nudger]

We don't know. You don't know, I don't know. If you do, go and claim your Nobel Prize.

It may be simple to say, but it is, again, not a simple concept. It's easy to say "wood burns", however, explaining this statement would take a fair few more words. I'm familiar with divine simplicity, and it's trash, just like every other piece of theology I've ever seen. Just come up with some evidence, this would all be cleared up real quick.

Heres a short primer on the formation of stars.
http://science.nasa.gov/astrophysics/foc...nd-evolve/
Planets
http://hubblesite.org/hubble_discoveries...anets-form
Again, the only people who claim the universe "popped out of nothing" are theists. What is it that you don't understand about "the universe came from -we don't know-"?

Ah, finally, evidence, yes, I would like to discuss archaeological evidence and evidence for fulfilled prophecy.

God has explanatory power? Excellent, elaborate upon "goddidit" as an explanation for the cosmos. God is exactly equivalent to faeries, unless you have some of that evidence you mentioned? -Mis-using logic, fixed that for you.

Cause is equivalent to god why? Because you believe it to be so? Hardly. Maybe god "caused" my morning erection.

No evidence for a natural explanation of life.....on this planet.....wtf is wrong with you? Please, please, please don't make god out to be an idiot in an attempt to prove that he exists. If god is the cause, it's a bit further back than life. If god is the cause, this natural explanation of life is exactly how he did it. Show me any current scientific model of anything that invokes god. Where is he necessary? You aren't linking Salty's website are you? Because we all had a good laugh at that last time (you didn't actually buy that shit right? your just throwing links up to get rid of me yes?)

The last bit of your post means fuck all because you failed to provide any evidence for this being in the first place. Non-existent beings clearly don't sit in judgement of those of us that do exist, unless you'd like to imagine some leprechaun tribunal lording over all the midgets of the world. Grow up.

[lucent]

We don't know. You don't know, I don't know. If you do, go and claim your Nobel Prize.

Again, if you don't know, you can't say that I don't know. I don't know means I don't know, it doesn't mean I don't know but I know you're wrong. You can't know I am wrong if you don't know.

It may be simple to say, but it is, again, not a simple concept. It's easy to say "wood burns", however, explaining this statement would take a fair few more words. I'm familiar with divine simplicity, and it's trash, just like every other piece of theology I've ever seen. Just come up with some evidence, this would all be cleared up real quick.

Again, what evidence are you looking for? Photographs? Please tell me what your standard of evidence is. Also, how can we reasonably discuss this topic if you dismiss all theology as trash? Isn't that incredibly closed-minded?

Ah, finally, evidence, yes, I would like to discuss archaeological evidence and evidence for fulfilled prophecy.

We can discuss this after we figure out what your standard of evidence is.

God has explanatory power? Excellent, elaborate upon "goddidit" as an explanation for the cosmos. God is exactly equivalent to faeries, unless you have some of that evidence you mentioned? -Mis-using logic, fixed that for you.

Comparing God to teapots is trivial. There is no reason to believe that magic teapots exist, but plenty of positive arguments in Gods favor. I think the explanatory power is obvious. The conception of God unites every metaphysical, epistimological and ethical discipline. It answers questions from the nature of love, to altruism, to morality, to why things are beautiful, to the nature of the truth and so on. It explains why the Universe has an appearance of design, as even Richard Dawkins admitted. It explains origins, history, logic, reason, and all of these explanations for a cohesive unity which is utterly absent in a purely materialistic Universe.

Cause is equivalent to god why? Because you believe it to be so? Hardly. Maybe god "caused" my morning erection.

If you're capable of creating an argument without referring to your anatomy, I'll address this.

No evidence for a natural explanation of life.....on this planet.....wtf is wrong with you? Please, please, please don't make god out to be an idiot in an attempt to prove that he exists. If god is the cause, it's a bit further back than life. If god is the cause, this natural explanation of life is exactly how he did it. Show me any current scientific model of anything that invokes god. Where is he necessary? You aren't linking Salty's website are you? Because we all had a good laugh at that last time (you didn't actually buy that shit right? your just throwing links up to get rid of me yes?)

Here you make the presumption that the naturalistic explanation is correct, and that God couldn't have created it another way. What happened to "we don't know"? There is quite a difference between the scientific model and the biblical account. Specifically, the age of the Universe. The theories about cosmological evolution, even if they did work, all need vast amounts of time to function. If the Universe is much younger than the billions of years that these theories are predicated on, they all fall to dust.

Since you're appealing to websites, I'll point you to this video which explains how horribly flawed big bang cosmology really is

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQ9HbSvtQXs

The last bit of your post means fuck all because you failed to provide any evidence for this being in the first place. Non-existent beings clearly don't sit in judgement of those of us that do exist, unless you'd like to imagine some leprechaun tribunal lording over all the midgets of the world. Grow up.

Whatever you think it means, or what the evidence is, you asked what is the practical value of Christianity to your life. The most immediate practical value is that you are no longer under Gods judgement and are given eternal life. When you accept Christ as your savior, you are a new creation, and you receive a new spirit.

stuff

[Epimethean]

I can say that you're a fucking loony, though, and your posts are the evidence.

[lucent]

May the Lord bless you with faith and a repentant heart.

I can say that you're a fucking loony, though, and your posts are the evidence.

[Epimethean]

May reality land upon you with the weight of sanity and the burden of clear understanding.

[Anomalocaris]

May the Lord bless you with faith and a repentant heart.

Intellectual rigor and a genuine regard for the truth has smitten your lord and blessed us with an firm heart befitting of an undeluded brain.

Your lord won't be blessing anything excepting in crazed imaginings of your bible addled mind.