Atheistic Darwinist Creationism and It's Just a Sack of Chemicals

[TheBarrd]

Whenever a christian goes down this road; what is an atheist doing on a christian website? You can just about be assured, the atheist is making entirely too much sense, using too much logic and the cognitive dissonance is starting to take hold.

Not really. It's something I've wondered about. I mean, I have absolutely no interest in going into a site where atheists gather...come to think of it, I've never heard of such a site. Of course, I've never bothered to look for one.
Then again, if I were all that interested in chatting with atheists, I need only log on to a Christian site...there are sure to be several of them there.

I have met and chatted with literally hundreds of atheists online. Some of them actually do, as you say, make sense, and have some pretty compelling arguments. I'll never forget the first time I ran into an atheist, way back in the days of Yahoo chat...that kid tore into me like he hadn't eaten in a week and I was a plate of his favorite food...
It took awhile, but eventually this kid who had wandered into a Christian chat room to mock actually stayed to pray...
Yes, it does happen. Not often, I'm afraid...but we have seen a few young smart-mouthed atheists come to accept the Lord.
And they are among the most devout Christians I know.

Generally, I get along with most of atheists, and I'm quite fine with them hanging out where I happen to be. Most of them are witty, intelligent, and have a sense of humor, and are generally fun to be around whenever they aren't snarking at my faith. And seriously, most of them, once we have established that I'm not about to try to convert them, nor do I have any intention of giving up my faith, are cool with that, and there is no further argument.
Every once in awhile, however, I do run into one who just can't stop with the snarky remarks...
That does get old pretty quick...
*sigh*
Ahh, well...it's the internet, after all.

 

[TheBarrd]

I'll keep that in mind the next time someone asks me what I'm doing here.

 

[TheBarrd]

The why I'm here has been more than adequately explained above.

For you science is all wrong because it can not explain everything but religion is somehow right because it doesn't explain anything.
No matter how hard I try I can not see the logic in that, could you please explain how you do it?

I never said science was all wrong. Perhaps you didn't read my post.
Science is a tool, and as such, it is a wonderful thing. I, for one, have a deep respect for science, and for what it has accomplished. I'm sorry if I didn't make that clear.
However, science does have it's limits. It is frustrating to hear, over and over again, how there is no "evidence" for God.
If you're trying to find this evidence using science, which is limited to the physical, of course, you will never find it.
If, like most atheists claim, you have actually read the Bible, then you know that God is a Spirit, and must be worshiped in spirit and in truth.

I'm sorry if I made you feel unwelcome...by all means, please come into Christian forums, as often as you like.
I'm just curious as to what you get out of it.
You say it "inflates your ego". I find that amusing. If your ego is so in need of "inflating" that you must come here to feel better about yourself, I feel very sorry for you. You have some pretty deep issues...

 

[TheBarrd]

The Bible says that Faith without works is dead. That means to me walking the walk as well as talking the talk That along with the Christ's parable of the slothful servant speaks volumes of the duties of Christians.
I'm not taunting the man, but I believe that if someone claims to be something then for the credibility of that group, they need to act like it. I can respect that.

You had me right up to where you said "for the credibility of that group".
For me, the credibility of Christianity lies with Jesus Christ...and I'd say that He has earned our respect.
If I had to depend on various "Christians" to define my faith for me, then I would soon lose my faith.
My faith is not in "the church", at least not the visible church...it is in Jesus Christ.

 

[TheBarrd]

You were asked how you detected god, instead of answering the question you asked a question,
I understand that is standard procedure when a Christian doesn't have an answer so a question should really have been expected,
knowing all of that perhaps you would like another chance to answer the question? or would you prefer to dismiss it completely and forget you were ever asked the question in the first place?

Fair enough.
Tell me...how would you tell a person who has never tasted a grilled cheese sandwich what it tastes like?
Or someone who has never smelled Arpege what it smells like?
Or suppose you meet someone who has spent his life in the desert...how would you explain to him what it feels like to dive into the lake and feel the water slide against your skin?
The answer, of course, is that you can't.
It would be easier to make the person a grilled cheese sandwich to taste, or give him a sample of perfume to sniff, or to take him to the lake and let him wade in.

It's a little more difficult to give someone the experience of knowing God. It is something that you have to be open to, for one thing.
As the Lord Himself said, you must become as a little child.
And He does promise that if you seek Him, you will find Him.

Far from forgetting that you ever asked me this question, I very much wish that there were some way I could convey to you how I know God.
Because, believe me when I tell you...nothing in this universe would make me happier than to be able to embrace you as my Brother in Christ...

 

[HitchSlap]

Did you read the article?

My boolean standards preclude your click bait linkies.

 

[JasonClark]

However, science does have it's limits. It is frustrating to hear, over and over again, how there is no "evidence" for God.
If you're trying to find this evidence using science, which is limited to the physical, of course, you will never find it.
If, like most atheists claim, you have actually read the Bible, then you know that God is a Spirit, and must be worshiped in spirit and in truth.

Sadly there is no evidence with or without science you just keep telling yourself that there is because you were told that there is.
When you read or was told that story about the kings new clothes that were invisible I bet you did not side with the boy that thought the king was naked, or did you?

I am one of the few atheists [most American atheists have because they were raised as were Muslims in a country dominated by their religion] who have never read the bible.

 

[JasonClark]

Fair enough.
Tell me...how would you tell a person who has never tasted a grilled cheese sandwich what it tastes like?
Or someone who has never smelled Arpege what it smells like?
Or suppose you meet someone who has spent his life in the desert...how would you explain to him what it feels like to dive into the lake and feel the water slide against your skin?
The answer, of course, is that you can't.

But somehow you knew what a god was when you came across the god, that's amazing, no one could explain it to you but you knew what it was as soon as you felt it.
Do you think Muslims have the same feeling when they are in the same situation? is their god real for them just as it was real for you?

What makes an atheists sceptical is this, how did you know it was a god making you feel the way you did? did it happen in a church where you were expecting it to happen or did it happen somewhere when you weren't expecting it to happen? what I'm asking is, could you have been talked into feeling it was the holy spirit that made you feel that way or were you not even thinking about god when it happened?

You know that people were alive a thousand years ago and they believed in lots of gods who are not worshiped anymore don't you? where are those gods now?
or do you think those gods were all made up gods?

 

[AHH who-stole-my-name]

You had me right up to where you said "for the credibility of that group".
For me, the credibility of Christianity lies with Jesus Christ...and I'd say that He has earned our respect.
If I had to depend on various "Christians" to define my faith for me, then I would soon lose my faith.
My faith is not in "the church", at least not the visible church...it is in Jesus Christ.

I wasn't talking about credibility in the Christian community. Those already within the community and those who are familiar with it know the deal. Those who are not only see hypocrisy and the media will point out the hypocrites far quicker than those who faithfully serve. The goal in spreading religion is not to sustain numbers but to grow them and you can't grow those numbers if those whose voices ring hollow are not pointed out by the rank and file and expunged

To me the Bible is a blueprint for a life style, which wen lived continuously reveals itself to be less dramatic and less caustic. It provide an example that is supposed to draw those with more chaotic lives to you, so you can explain to them how you come by it. It's not because of you but your beliefs and your adherence to those beliefs in your actions that is the key to conversion to your faith. It is the nectar to the bee.

 

[justlookinla]

Let me get this straight, it's anti-choicers who've been caught LYING, but it's Planned Parenthood that's "evil"? Again,IF your cause is just why lie EVER? This tells all I need to know with regard to the TRUE Evil™ here and it isn't PP.

No, you still haven't got it straight. The sickos at Planned Parenthood were caught discussing how to kill babies and harvest their organs for money.

 

[TheBarrd]

Uh, speaking as an outsider living in Germany, no. In the USA, you guys are a huge, significant political force that has massive influence over virtually every single part of public policy. I'm sorry, this is just completely not true. It's convenient for the narrative that Christians are somehow oppressed, but it has nothing to do with what's actually going on.

Perhaps that was true 50 years ago...but in the last several decades, our influence here in the U.S. has been waning. I'm old enough to remember when we prayed in school...a very insignificant, and highly generic little prayer, and no one was forced to participate. And I remember when the huge controversy started, because one woman did not like her daughter exposed to other children praying. And the adults around me crying "This is America! It can't happen here!!"
And then, it did.
And so it has gone. Symbols of our faith that have stood in place for generations have been torn down, lest they "offend" someone.
Every Christmas, some clown starts with the "don't call it Christmas, call it a "Winter Holiday" gig. It never works, because Christians will not shop where they can't say "Merry Christmas", but someone always tries...
And to the present. Our Supreme Court, which is the highest court in our land, has handed down it's decision...gay marriage is now legal in all fifty of our states. Now, given that it is the states who issue the marriage license, you'd think it would be up to them who they issued them to...and that has always been the case, more or less...other than when the Federal government passed the Civil Rights Act in 1965, making it illegal to discriminate against anyone because of their race, which many people see as being a bit different, since skin is something natural, while they don't see gay as being natural, but that's a whole other debate. We do have something called the "Full Faith and Credit Act" which states that if it was legal in the state you did it in, it's legal in all fifty...which kinda settles things, anyway, or at least you'd think so. Go figure, right?
And then there is abortion. A very large percentage of Christians have made it known that they do not support abortion, likening it to murder. However, it is still legal, in all fifty states.
Now, I'm not saying Christians are oppressed in America. That is definitely not true. As long as our Constitution is in force, it cannot be true...however, we do not have the influence we once had, and more particularly since our current president has been in power.
Perhaps we'll see that change soon, as he can't hold more than two terms in office, and his second ends next year, I believe...

Hey, I'm open to good arguments, but I never find good arguments.

Your words:
A) It offers insight into how christians (who form a substantial majority in the west and a politically powerful group in the USA particularly) think and what they believe
B) I find it important to expose myself to ideas such as Christianity, in case there actually is anything to them
C) It makes my ego inflate much in the same way that playing a minor leagues game and scoring a home run each at-bat might inflate Big Papi's.

You had me right up to that last remark about making your ego inflate, which sort of puts the lie to the first two points. You aren't here to learn...you are here to point at those ignorant Christians.
I'm not impressed.

It also takes a fundamentally different approach. Psychiatry is like trying to debug your computer from within the software; neurology is like opening up the case and seeing what's going on inside. While the former is potentially more useful, it can tell you nothing about how the software actually is running, while with the latter, you can see, "Ah, if I remove this piece, suddenly I have no visuals, but the sound still works and the computer is still reactive; Ah, if I remove this piece, everything runs slower and my memory-intensive processes stop working". When we're talking about what's actually going on within the mind, psychiatry is very limited. It offers useful insights into how humans tick, but by its scope, it simply cannot tell us what the nature of our minds is. This is why the relevant field for this discussion is neurology.

I'd say that the relevant field is psychiatry, because what we are looking for is not physical. What we are looking for is exactly what you said...what the nature of our minds is.
Now, of all people, I have a debt of gratitude to neurology...I used to be an epileptic, and I needed a neurologist to keep me from having grand mal seizures.
However, neurology cannot tell me why I suddenly started having seizures at 30-something, nor why those seizures stopped just as suddenly.

...You do understand that there's a pretty significant difference between removing a part of the frontal lobe and trying to brainwash someone, right? I think that with enough understanding of our brain chemistry, we could probably change sexual orientation and almost certainly could change gender orientation. We're not there yet. However, "pray the gay away" camps do not work.

In other threads I have told about my husband's nephew who was gay...not bisexual, but a flaming gay...who is now happily married to a woman and they have three kids. No, he didn't have a lobotomy, nor did he go to a "pray the gay away" camp. He just decided for himself that he would be what God intended him to be, and for him, it has been a beautiful journey out of hell...

Electrical signals traveling through a highly interconnected network of synapses would be the short, snappy, 5-second answer, but as with most things in science, the 5-second answer is a massive oversimplification, and I personally lack the expertise to really get down to the nitty-gritty of it. But let me ask you a question - what's the physical aspects of a computer program?

I actually expected the "snappy 5-second answer".
And I'm pretty sure you know that I can't answer your question, as I am not a computer tech.

Apparently I have a defective God Detector™. I'd send it back to get it fixed, but I don't know where to send it back to.

That actually made me giggle. A "defective God Detector"?
Very witty...

See, not to be a jerk, but when I talk about "bad arguments", that's kind of what I mean. I ask you "how do you detect god's existence", and your response seems to boil down to, "Isn't it obvious?"

Well, no. It's not obvious. If it was obvious, everyone would be a Christian.

I suppose that was an unreasonable response. But to me, it does seem obvious.
I see Him everywhere I look...in a baby's laugh, in a rainbow or a sunset, in the giraffe's silly neck, in young lover's sighs...I honestly do not understand how people miss Him...but that's just me.

However your point is well taken. If it were as obvious to others as it seems to me, everyone would be a Christian.[/QUOTE]

 

[TheBarrd]

I've never seen any reason for religious people to debate their faith in the first place. I think if someone was so sure that a God gave them a duty to uphold then they would not have to justify that duty with any man. I think they should explain themselves but the idea of debating the existence of someone that you are convinced without a shadow of a doubt does exist would be like arguing color with a blind man. Faith is feeling and the triumph of hope over logic. That's what it comes down to and the two are totally incomparable. Believe what you want to believe, but do it completely or not at all.

 

[TheBarrd]

I think the stone thing was Christ saying follow the spirit of the law and not the letter. Many people think that Christ came to bring everything new, but he left a lot of the mosaic laws still intact.

and again:

 

[justlookinla]

Well great. Then stop acting like a scientific explanation of the diversity of life should somehow account for our moral system. It doesn't, because it doesn't try to, because that's not what it's meant to do. The most we can say is that we can use the facts we know from evolution to help derive parts of our moral system - facts like "we are all empathic, emotional, thinking creatures", and "animals are not that dissimilar to us".

If you're referencing Darwinist evolution when you say "scientific explanation for the diversity of life", you're wrong that Darwinism is a "scientific explanation". It's not.

As far as morals, there are no morals in the Darwinist creationist system, only cold reactions from the firing of synapses.

The list of biologists who believe in genetic determinism is fairly short.

Depends on what politically correct view you're talking about. Homosexuality is trumpeted as being 'born that way'.....genetic determinism.

According to "darwinism"? I have no idea, because I have never, ever heard someone identify as a "darwinist". According to evolution? Evolution takes no position on the value of an individual life, because it is not a moral system, it is a scientific theory; you might as well be asking, "According to Einsteinism, is an individual life important?"

Of course Darwinist evolution takes a position on the value of an individual life. It's relatively worthless in that particular creationist worldview, hence the killing of babies for their body parts. Granted, that's not immoral in the Darwinist evolutionary system.....but there is no morality in the system.

If you are interested in the value of individual life in a system largely predicated on scientific advancement and materialism, check out "Humanism". I reject the god hypothesis, I accept that we are all just sacks of chemicals and electrical systems, but I still feel that each individual life is valuable, and I (and numerous other people) can certainly justify those beliefs. The idea that somehow, an acceptance of evolution leaves one with no justifiable moral guide is completely baseless and downright wrong.

Since you believe you're just a sack of chemicals and electrical systems, why do you feel that each human life is valuable, and what is the source of that according to Darwinist evolution?

No, it is a scientific theory which provides an explanatory and predictive model of reality. It does not yield a worldview in any significant way, shape, or form. Materialism might yield a worldview. Scientism might yield a worldview. But acceptance of the theory of evolution? No.

Darwinism isn't based on the scientific method.

What is the value of humanity in a Planckian system? In a Boylesian system? First define what you mean by "Darwinist".

Those who believe they're the product of only random, mindless meaningless, purposeless and directionless naturalistic mechanisms acting on an alleged single life form of long ago

 

[AHH who-stole-my-name]

Fair enough.
Tell me...how would you tell a person who has never tasted a grilled cheese sandwich what it tastes like?
Or someone who has never smelled Arpege what it smells like?
Or suppose you meet someone who has spent his life in the desert...how would you explain to him what it feels like to dive into the lake and feel the water slide against your skin?
The answer, of course, is that you can't.
It would be easier to make the person a grilled cheese sandwich to taste, or give him a sample of perfume to sniff, or to take him to the lake and let him wade in.

It's a little more difficult to give someone the experience of knowing God. It is something that you have to be open to, for one thing.
As the Lord Himself said, you must become as a little child.
And He does promise that if you seek Him, you will find Him.

Far from forgetting that you ever asked me this question, I very much wish that there were some way I could convey to you how I know God.
Because, believe me when I tell you...nothing in this universe would make me happier than to be able to embrace you as my Brother in Christ...

I am an alcoholic that has not had a drink for nearly 30 years. I can not explain to any how that life felt to me and what it was like when I finally withdrew from that world. I say withdrew because when you drink as an alcoholic you pickle your brain in that stuff so bad that even after you stop drinking it takes several months for your brain to clear itself. You will feel just as sick and tired of being sick and tired until that single instant when you wake up with your entire body, mind and soul free of toxins.

It was like emerging from a dark, dank hole filled with foul molasses that suffocated any joy and containment that I could have ever felt anywhere into a bright shiny new world that I remembered so long ago, but now was even more bright with spender and opportunity than it ever could be.

This describes the feelings I had when I was within the JW community. It was not till later that I grew to notice the things that would ultimately remove me from that world. I've looked for that in every religion and form of spiritualism that I've ever explored and I have not seen anything other than the philosophy I hold today that will bring me anywhere close to that feeling.

My search continues!

 

[justlookinla]

Let us suppose you were right that evolution was just a series of guesses and suppositions. That context still makes your statement wrong.

The Darwinist view of evolution is based on guesses and suppositions, not the scientific method.

We should finish the first topic before we move onto all of this other stuff. What is the physical stuff that Darwin opposed?

Darwin had his own views on how the physical stuff was created and arranged.

 

[justlookinla]

Yes.

In what way.?

 

[AHH who-stole-my-name]

But somehow you knew what a god was when you came across the god, that's amazing, no one could explain it to you but you knew what it was as soon as you felt it.
Do you think Muslims have the same feeling when they are in the same situation? is their god real for them just as it was real for you?

What makes an atheists sceptical is this, how did you know it was a god making you feel the way you did? did it happen in a church where you were expecting it to happen or did it happen somewhere when you weren't expecting it to happen? what I'm asking is, could you have been talked into feeling it was the holy spirit that made you feel that way or were you not even thinking about god when it happened?

You know that people were alive a thousand years ago and they believed in lots of gods who are not worshiped anymore don't you? where are those gods now?
or do you think those gods were all made up gods?

How do you describe the feeling you had when you met the person you knew was all so right for you mist all those who you've searched through before you met that person?

 

[AHH who-stole-my-name]

The why I'm here has been more than adequately explained above.

For you science is all wrong because it can not explain everything but religion is somehow right because it doesn't explain anything.
No matter how hard I try I can not see the logic in that, could you please explain how you do it?

Science can explain what we, today have instruments to detect. What we can't detect we can theorize on by the reactions of that which we can detect. Faith is defined not by what one can see, but how what can be seen relates to you. It is there for a reason and that reason resides with he who put it there. It's not a thing of logic. It is a thing of understanding and trust.

 

[AHH who-stole-my-name]

I suppose it really isn't your fault...you do seem like a really great guy.

No, he said "love of Jesus Christ". In other words, you managed to learn about love from the Master of love.

OH, and just so that you know...Christianity does have "other options". Jehovah's Witnesses are considered "fringe lunatics" by mainstream Christians.

Just my luck to be brought up in the thing hum. Can't win for loosing. Heck, I lost my mom.