Dad on Youtube

[anyathesword]

By the words of that god, which could be lying.

Yes, all gods lie. But not God.

 

[lasthero]

Personal testimony just like an eyewitness testimony can be used as evidence.

Aren't fossils used as evidence for evolution? Are they contaminated, lost, destroyed or made to produce conclusions based on assumptions?

Same with personal testimonies.

What assumptions?

 

[bhsmte]

Personal testimony just like an eyewitness testimony can be used as evidence.

Aren't fossils used as evidence for evolution? Are they contaminated, lost, destroyed or made to produce conclusions based on assumptions?

Same with personal testimonies.

Personal testimony has nothing to do with the theory of evolution, but you can believe that if it makes you feel better.

In regards to personal testimony about God, I have no issue with that, as long as that person does not claim their personal testimony applies to others as well, because their testimony is just that; personal.

 

[dad]

So an evil spirit couldn't manipulate people into believing a lie?

No. Not if people turned to the Good Spirit.

 

[dad]

That just contradicted what you said in your last post.

Not at all. Miracles are not a universal nature change. Miracles simply override nature in a local situation.

 

[dad]

So says a book, that could potentially be written by liars influenced by a lying entity.

Those that come to God know He is no liar. He is Faithful and True.

 

[Subduction Zone]

Those that come to God know He is no liar. He is Faithful and True.

And yet the Bible was written by men. People can write incorrect information and not be liars.

What evidence do you have that the Bible was written under God's influence? And since the Bible itself is being challenged you need to do better than circular reasoning.

 

[Subduction Zone]

Those that come to God know He is no liar. He is Faithful and True.

Muslims make the same claim.

Why don't you believe them?

Hindus make the same claim.

Why don't you believe them?

Buddhists make the same claim.

Why don't you believe them?

 

[Strathos]

Not at all. Miracles are not a universal nature change. Miracles simply override nature in a local situation.

But you said they require a change, rather than simply bypassing the natural laws. I liked the person's analogy of "house rules".

 

[Gracchus]

Human beings are good at finding patterns in chaos. Having found patterns we then tend to ignore the chaos. Sometimes the patterns we find indicate real order. Sometimes the patterns are illusions. One of the most important patterns we learn to recognize and one of the first, is the human pattern.
We see the "man in the moon" and the face on Mars. We see the Virgin Mary or Jesus on a water-stained wall, or on a piece of toast. The perception of a pattern occurs in neural nodes in the brain.
Here is a clever little video that puts some of these neurological tendencies on display:

Derren Brown - How To Convert An Atheist

After the atheist is converted, the tendency is now to find confirming patterns in our own lives, the confirmation bias phenomenon. As time goes own it is possible to become more and more convinced that the illusory pattern is real.


And when you have devoted so much time and trouble to an illusion, it is not surprising if you become angry, frightened and irrational when the delusional nature of your beliefs is challenged.


Two of the most common methods of dealing with challenges are demonstrated on this forum. AV1611VET simply walls off his delusion. Reality is allowed outside the wall, but any reality trying to intrude inside his belief system is simply ordered to "take a hike".



dad uses a different approach. Anything outside of his immediate perception can be changed at will. The past was different. The past had different laws. All the inconsistencies and paradoxes of his beliefs are magically dispelled by some mysterious "different state".


People believe in gods because it makes them feel important, it makes them feel loved, it makes them feel good. Religion is an anodyne and a euphoric. "What, me worry?" It is the opium of the people.

 

[dad]

But you said they require a change, rather than simply bypassing the natural laws. I liked the person's analogy of "house rules".

Yes normal nature and natural physical only laws need to be overridden in a person to heal them or raise them from the dead, or even walk on water and make wine. That did not mean all water on earth changed to wine!

 

[DogmaHunter]

Yes, scripture supports creation and a flood as did Jesus.

And since we can scientifically prove beyond any shred of doubt that the epic of gilgamesh is nonsense, we can only conclude that plagiarized version thereof in the old testament is even more nonsense.

 

[DogmaHunter]

Because of the events recorded. If for example all animals were on that ark, and were released, we need to get them all over the planet and evolved into many species real fast.

How can you not see that you are just inventing stuff just so you can make reality conform to what you have already decided to be true from some book?

The only reason you propose that the laws of nature have changed is because you need an excuse to continue believing in your religious book.

That's the difference between an intellectually dishonest fundamentalist and an intellectually honest rationalist. We match our beliefs to reality. You match reality to your beliefs.

Here's a test that will prove that that is exactly the dishonest practice you engage in...

Answer this question:
what kind of evidence would make you even only consider that your bible might be wrong after all?

 

[DogmaHunter]

It does actually as far as the bible goes. So many things happened that it indicates there had to be more at work than present physics. The rapid separation of continents for another example....that takes more than our laws to not cook all life on earth...no?

Tectonic activity is anything but rapid. The speed at which tectonic plates move is comparable to the speed at which your finger nails grow.

The only reason you call it "rapid" is, again, because you need to conform reality to your a priori beliefs that the world is only a couple of Thousand years oldt


More irrational dishonesty, nothing more or less.

 

[Armoured]

 

[DogmaHunter]

Science omits God and creation is all it's same state past belief based claims...rather than mentions them.

Why should they mention them?
When we look into a microscope, we see cells and microbes. Not gods.
When we look into a telescope, we see galaxies and stars. Not gods.

There's no god variable in E = mc²
There's no god variable in A² = B² + C²

Here's a nice anecdote...
Newton didn't succeed in explaining why the orbits of the celestial bodies in the solar system where so stable. In his work, he said that this was "the hand of god". It's the ONLY reference to gods you find in there.

When Laplace succeeded where Newton used the "god-of-the-gaps" and thus explained the stability of the orbits of the solar system, Napoleon summoned him after reading through his work. Napoleon asked him "why is there no mention of god in your book".

His infamous reply was "I had no need for that hypothesis".
That says it all. That's why we don't have any gods or whatever other supernatural shenannigans in science.

They are not observed, they are not measured and their only "use" (if you wish to call it that) is to fill gaps in our knowledge. Which, history has shown, will only be a placeholder until the actual explanation is discovered.

Gods would be part of the equation if we could observe them doing anything at all. But we don't.

Adding a god to Einstein's famous equation would do nothing at all:
E = mc² + G

Work that formula out and you'll see that G = 0. It's a useless and obsolete variable.

The methods and conclusions are such that no God could be considered. Inherently evil in other words. Really.

Gods aren't considered for the same reason undetectable 7-headed dragons aren't considered.... no evidence and no use.

Science has certain standards of evidence to comply to. Gods don't meet that standard. That's not science's fault.

If your god could be shown to exist and be shown to have an active role in the workings of the universe, he would be included. But that's not the case, so she isn't.

You can call that "evil" if you want, but all you will accomplish by doing that is exposing your bigotry and unconstructive fundamentalism.

 

[Strathos]

Yes normal nature and natural physical only laws need to be overridden in a person to heal them or raise them from the dead, or even walk on water and make wine. That did not mean all water on earth changed to wine!

But apparently the way all physics worked changed sometime in Genesis... not seeing how that is consistent.

 

[anyathesword]

Human beings are good at finding patterns in chaos. Having found patterns we then tend to ignore the chaos. Sometimes the patterns we find indicate real order. Sometimes the patterns are illusions. One of the most important patterns we learn to recognize and one of the first, is the human pattern.
We see the "man in the moon" and the face on Mars. We see the Virgin Mary or Jesus on a water-stained wall, or on a piece of toast. The perception of a pattern occurs in neural nodes in the brain.
Here is a clever little video that puts some of these neurological tendencies on display:

Derren Brown - How To Convert An Atheist

After the atheist is converted, the tendency is now to find confirming patterns in our own lives, the confirmation bias phenomenon. As time goes own it is possible to become more and more convinced that the illusory pattern is real.


And when you have devoted so much time and trouble to an illusion, it is not surprising if you become angry, frightened and irrational when the delusional nature of your beliefs is challenged.


Two of the most common methods of dealing with challenges are demonstrated on this forum. AV1611VET simply walls off his delusion. Reality is allowed outside the wall, but any reality trying to intrude inside his belief system is simply ordered to "take a hike".



dad uses a different approach. Anything outside of his immediate perception can be changed at will. The past was different. The past had different laws. All the inconsistencies and paradoxes of his beliefs are magically dispelled by some mysterious "different state".


People believe in gods because it makes them feel important, it makes them feel loved, it makes them feel good. Religion is an anodyne and a euphoric. "What, me worry?" It is the opium of the people.

I think people believe in God or in whatever other god out there because it is the reason for their existance. It is what they live for, it is the reason to be alive, not because it feels good or makes them feel important. There is something bigger and eternal outside of what we call reality or life. Life is a short breath of our existance, we only prepare ourselves for what is really ahead.

God or religions is the reason to be alive.

 

[anyathesword]

How can you not see that you are just inventing stuff just so you can make reality conform to what you have already decided to be true from some book?

The only reason you propose that the laws of nature have changed is because you need an excuse to continue believing in your religious book.

That's the difference between an intellectually dishonest fundamentalist and an intellectually honest rationalist. We match our beliefs to reality. You match reality to your beliefs.

Here's a test that will prove that that is exactly the dishonest practice you engage in...

Answer this question:
what kind of evidence would make you even only consider that your bible might be wrong after all?

How can you say what is reality if you were not there to see it? Written history is reality because the people who wrote about the past were there to see it.

An intellectualy honest rationalist will admit that they were not there in the past and all they have is written history to work with.

 

[PsychoSarah]

How can you say what is reality if you were not there to see it? Written history is reality because the people who wrote about the past were there to see it.

An intellectualy honest rationalist will admit that they were not there in the past and all they have is written history to work with.

Um, then who wrote Genesis? Lots of historical documents aren't written by people who experienced the events first hand. And those that are aren't necessarily more reliable because of it.