Honestly, it's not as if the Golden Rule is necessarily contingent on believing in a God and historically it's evident it would spread well enough even with other pessimistic views of ethics prevailing in existence.
Would it? What do you base that on?
I wasn't dismissing it entirely, but I was simply noting as a skeptic that if it did happen, you didn't need some transcendent entity involved. In fact, with the Exodus incident, it makes me think the God in question is immanent more than transcendent, but that's another topic again.
We have been over this, God is both.
Where is the problem with deriving your ethics from reason primarily as long as they work?
I never said there was a "problem" only that things would vastly different then what we have today. far more, in line with the ideas of Plato, perhaps Khan, and others.
The Jesus you currently possess is hardly the same as the one that may very well have existed in the Middle East. I'm reminded of the idiotic and racist notions that Jesus has to be portrayed as white so as not to confuse the children. I bought into it and I am disappointed I ever did except that it's a vicious cycle anyway.
Yes, welcome to the human condition. Even in the face of the Golden Rule, with a God being telling us we are
all his Children, we still seek to find ways to hate each other.
Given that, I am more then very certain that if I removed God, we would only decay.
Things would be different, vastly different.
It it well known that as far as humans go, Hate causes people to act faster and with more force then Love, Greed will move people far quicker and aggressively then Charity.
Given just that, God would be needed just to keep us from preying upon each other, (Not that we don't do that anyway) but, without God. It would be a whole other world and a totally different rule book.
I never said Plato's ethics or morality were better, you're barking up the wrong tree. I never even said ethics or morality were about competition, it's about practical applications.
Exactly! And the Bible clearly goes against the basic human want, which is why it is so unbelievable that it spread at all.
Look at it, in comparison to, say, Buddhism. Last I looked (And this was a while ago) Jesus and his teachings, affected 51% of the world over, with Christians and Muslims going neck and neck in growth.
Last I looked, Muslims where growing a bit faster, as they allowed for violence against those that disagreed with them, thus catering to the human want.
It happened, that's all that concerns me. Again, why I'm an apatheist.
and if the whole world believed as you do? Then what?
In truth, if not for Divine, or God, or what have you, anything has a fair shot at being the one worldview.
You can find the issues online or I can email you the pdf files I have, though I think I'm missing issue 5. you'd be better off buying the first volume like I plan to do in the future, since it gives you Issues 1-5, if I'm familiar at all with Western comics, which I've only just recently started reading again in small doses.
I think I might have read a comic with a similar notion. Good point however, which is what makes Jesus so, unique.
See, God did not have to take on Human flesh, he did not need to know what it felt like to "need a shave" or have bad breath, etc, etc, but he did it anyway, and for the noblest of motives.
Yes. I would say, while there might not be any best argument for God, looking at What Jesus taught, and what he did and what he accomplished, would defiantly be the best Motive.
Moses would be a solid second.
God Bless
