"Okay, I believe in a higher power(s) now...."

[A_Thinker]

Thank you for that informative reply. So would it be accurate to say your argument is this: the fact that people died for the same of the Christian religion shows that it must be true, because if it wasn't, they would not have died for the same of a lie?

Is that your argument? Or would you like to amend or restate it if you feel I have missed the point?

More specifically that these men testified to the truth of Jesus' resurrection and of their meeting with the risen Christ. If this was a lie, these men would have known it ... and yet they experienced violent deaths for their proclamation of that specific truth.

The other part of the argument is that the aforementioned are witnesses to the truth they witnessed. Even though the U.S. Senate doesn't necessarily think so, ... that's still a pretty impressive body of evidence ....

 

[muichimotsu]

No ... God relies on the heart ... to be drawn to One who loves it.

My wife didn't marry me because I was smart .. or capable. It was because she loved me.

Do you acknowledge the draw of the heart ... or is LOVE simply a rhetorical exercise to you ?

The draw of the heart in the sense of feeling attraction and affection is usually the first appeal, but what justifies it is not merely that sentiment, but considering it alongside a rational notion of practical benefits.

Do you really want to encourage that kind of simplistic mentality in regards to what is supposed to be an important issue of beliefs? Would you remotely apply that standard to ANYTHING else or is God just that special? If it's the latter, then you're engaging in special pleading

 

[muichimotsu]

The intention in the situations discussed was explicit ... not insinuated.

It was the clear explicit objective of the societies I mentioned ... to eliminate the religious from among them.

But that objective is not caused by any necessity from them incidentally being atheist (even that's a stretch, they'd be more antitheist, practically speaking). You're still insinuating that an atheist society would somehow tend towards evil merely because of not believing in God, since that somehow takes away any moral requirements from us

Your insinuation is the problem, not what is supposedly insinuated by an incident in the past, which isn't what was being claimed

 

[muichimotsu]

I don't believe that I have alleged what you allude to here ...

Then why is your belief in God remotely important if not for the idea that you gain some reward from it related to that God's sovereignty?

Altruism is selfless, there shouldn't be a remote implication that one cares about a future reward, but more about the present benefits their aid provides. The notion of looking for salvation seems antithetical to that ethical notion and was why Deism appealed to me, along with eventually abandoning the notion of a deity at all in terms of a cogent worldview, because I cared more about the present rather than being concerned with an afterlife or the commands of a deity that may as well not exist

 

[muichimotsu]

More specifically that these men testified to the truth of Jesus' resurrection and of their meeting with the risen Christ. If this was a lie, these men would have known it ... and yet they experienced violent deaths for their proclamation of that specific truth.

The other part of the argument is that the aforementioned are witnesses to the truth they witnessed. Even though the U.S. Senate doesn't necessarily think so, ... that's still a pretty impressive body of evidence ....

No, you assume we can absolutely trust our experiences as reflecting reality, when that isn't the simple dichotomy you phrase it as. The martyrs can believe they experienced Jesus' resurrection and such, that doesn't mean the alternative is that they were lying, they could genuinely have been mistaken in their assessment of their experiences

No, testimony itself is rarely an impressive body of evidence when the context is so broad in nature. If it's a very narrowed notion of what we're investigating, maybe testimony might be more reliable or valuable, but even in a court of law, testimony can be invalidated by actual evidence contrary to that, people are prone not only to commit perjury, but just be mistaken in what they are conveying about a case, among other variables.

 

[InterestedAtheist]

More specifically that these men testified to the truth of Jesus' resurrection and of their meeting with the risen Christ. If this was a lie, these men would have known it ... and yet they experienced violent deaths for their proclamation of that specific truth.

The other part of the argument is that the aforementioned are witnesses to the truth they witnessed. Even though the U.S. Senate doesn't necessarily think so, ... that's still a pretty impressive body of evidence ....

Okay, then. So your point is that these men said that Jesus had risen from the grave, and that they had seen proof. If this was not true then, faced with martyrdom, they would have recanted. The fact that they were martyred is proof that they really believed that Jesus had come back from the dead and, therefore, proof that He actually did.
Is that your argument?

If so, I have a follow-up question:
How do we know that these men were martyred? What historical source does this come from? Presumably not the men themselves, but did they have friends who left behind sources, or historians who documented these events?

 

[A_Thinker]

The draw of the heart in the sense of feeling attraction and affection is usually the first appeal, but what justifies it is not merely that sentiment, but considering it alongside a rational notion of practical benefits.

Do you really want to encourage that kind of simplistic mentality in regards to what is supposed to be an important issue of beliefs? Would you remotely apply that standard to ANYTHING else or is God just that special? If it's the latter, then you're engaging in special pleading

True LOVE is based upon the worthiness of the BELOVED. For instance, christian scripture states ... "We love Him, ... because He first loved us." Love of God is in recognition of all that He does for us ... providing for our needs on a daily basis, being a shelter to turn to when life is tough, filling our lives with good, delightful, and beneficial things, being a comfort in times of sorrow, etc.

As Jesus states in the book of Matthew, ... God causes His sun to shine ... and His rain to fall upon all, ... those in relationship with Him ... and those not yet.

As I've stated before in this thread, God's LOVE is such that the good and benefit of the whole is the goal, ... rather than simply the good and benefit of the self. Similar to how my wife and I live so as to benefit the WHOLE (of our family), rather than simply ourselves individually. From the moment of our births, we exist in RELATIONSHIP to one another. In the same way, God exists in and encourages RELATIONSHIP in every sense.

Do we FEEL a draw toward those who bring benefit to our lives. Yes ... it is the way we are made ...

 

[A_Thinker]

But that objective is not caused by any necessity from them incidentally being atheist (even that's a stretch, they'd be more antitheist, practically speaking). You're still insinuating that an atheist society would somehow tend towards evil merely because of not believing in God, since that somehow takes away any moral requirements from us.

In these societies, the supposed superiority of athiest thought ... led to manifestly anti-theist actions ...

 

[InterestedAtheist]

In these societies, the supposed superiority of athiest thought ... led to manifestly anti-theist actions ...

It is a common misconception that atheism is a moral position. It is not. All atheism means is that you lack a belief in any God or gods. You can be an atheist and a communist, an atheist and a fascist, an atheist of no political persuasion, an atheist and a pacifist, an atheist and a humanist (hello!), an atheist and a liberal democrat, or an atheist and a kind, loving human being who believes that the highest purpose of your life is to help others in love and goodwill.

If you are a Christian, your beliefs about God shape your morality. If you are an atheist, your morality is completely separate from your lack of belief in God.

I hope you see what I mean?

 

[A_Thinker]

Then why is your belief in God remotely important if not for the idea that you gain some reward from it related to that God's sovereignty?

Altruism is selfless, there shouldn't be a remote implication that one cares about a future reward, but more about the present benefits their aid provides. The notion of looking for salvation seems antithetical to that ethical notion and was why Deism appealed to me, along with eventually abandoning the notion of a deity at all in terms of a cogent worldview, because I cared more about the present rather than being concerned with an afterlife or the commands of a deity that may as well not exist

My belief in God is not based upon anything to do with REWARD ... or any issues of SOVEREIGNTY.

My belief in God ... is a RESPONSE to an offer of RELATIONSHIP ... from One who LOVES me, ... and has LOVED me, ... and has promised to LOVE me forever.

The now, the was, ... and the yet to come ... are all bound up in a gracious outpouring of LOVE ...

 

[A_Thinker]

No, testimony itself is rarely an impressive body of evidence when the context is so broad in nature. If it's a very narrowed notion of what we're investigating, maybe testimony might be more reliable or valuable, but even in a court of law, testimony can be invalidated by actual evidence contrary to that, people are prone not only to commit perjury, but just be mistaken in what they are conveying about a case, among other variables.

Witnesses are not the only examples of significant evidence, ... but are compelling, ... and function as a piece in the puzzle of discovering and affirming truth. Thus, the recent brouhaha over a trial which discounted available witnesses ...

 

[A_Thinker]

It is a common misconception that atheism is a moral position. It is not. All atheism means is that you lack a belief in any God or gods. You can be an atheist and a communist, an atheist and a fascist, an atheist of no political persuasion, an atheist and a pacifist, an atheist and a humanist (hello!), an atheist and a liberal democrat, or an atheist and a kind, loving human being who believes that the highest purpose of your life is to help others in love and goodwill.

It simply doesn't work out that way in practice. As fallible humans (i.e. prone to selfishness), ... our beliefs do color our lives. And we tend to believe that our own beliefs are superior to those of others ... so that we are are, many times, ... inadequately resistant to imposing those beliefs upon others, oftentimes in the most aggressive of ways. It is a common human failing ...

 

[InterestedAtheist]

It simply doesn't work out that way in practice.

Yes, it simply does.

As fallible humans (i.e. prone to selfishness), ... our beliefs do color our lives.

Yes. Prone to selfishness, love, anger, mercy, thoughtlessness, thoughtfulness...people come in all shapes and sizes. As I said before, atheism has nothing to do with morality. They're simply not connected.

And we tend to believe that our own beliefs are superior to those of others ... so that we are are, many times, ... inadequately resistant to imposing those beliefs upon others, oftentimes in the most aggressive of ways. It is a common human failing ...

(shrug) mere assertion.

 

[cvanwey]

You wouldn't know it unless you had seen it, ... but 12 men died martyr's deaths who would have known better if it weren't true.

Not one had an alternative testimony ...

1. Willingness to die for your belief renders that belief true?

2. But even to digress a bit, what evidence supports the assertion that all 12 actually died in the way you say as such? Please provide your source(s)?

 

[InterestedAtheist]

1. Willingness to die for your belief renders that belief true?

2. But even to digress a bit, what evidence supports the assertion that all 12 actually died in the way you say as such? Please provide your source(s)?

I hope it turns out that they are from reputable historians of this period, based on eyewitness evidence from multiple corroborated sources, and written within as short a period of time as possible after the event!

 

[muichimotsu]

True LOVE is based upon the worthiness of the BELOVED. For instance, christian scripture states ... "We love Him, ... because He first loved us." Love of God is in recognition of all that He does for us ... providing for our needs on a daily basis, being a shelter to turn to when life is tough, filling our lives with good, delightful, and beneficial things, being a comfort in times of sorrow, etc.

As Jesus states in the book of Matthew, ... God causes His sun to shine ... and His rain to fall upon all, ... those in relationship with Him ... and those not yet.

As I've stated before in this thread, God's LOVE is such that the good and benefit of the whole is the goal, ... rather than simply the good and benefit of the self. Similar to how my wife and I live so as to benefit the WHOLE (of our family), rather than simply ourselves individually. From the moment of our births, we exist in RELATIONSHIP to one another. In the same way, God exists in and encourages RELATIONSHIP in every sense.

Do we FEEL a draw toward those who bring benefit to our lives. Yes ... it is the way we are made ...

Not sure us "lesser" humans can make claims about what is worthy of being loved in relation to what can't even be demonstrated outside an abstract concept. Assuming God does the things you ascribe to it is begging the question, it's tautological tripe.

You keep talking like only Christianity can convey such an idea about benefitting the whole rather than the individual, yet I can point to Confucianism, which informs many Southeast Asian cultures, or Buddhism, which also considers the interrelatedness of all things in its metaphysics and applies it to ethics

You don't get to assume God has the traits you claim if the only thing the initial argument has granted is that some entity one can call God exists, we haven't even agreed necessarily on the traits it possesses, which is where it becomes a matter of theological noncognitivism, practically, any statements about a god tend to be reduced to speculation at best.

As I said before, feeling the draw is not the same as validating the benefit you perceive, you phrase it as if the whole relationship is self evident, clearly it's not

 

[muichimotsu]

In these societies, the supposed superiority of athiest thought ... led to manifestly anti-theist actions ...

No, I don't think they were remotely claiming that, you'd have to substantiate that claim and even then, it doesn't reflect on all atheists in regards to political policy in a secular world where things can happen in a different manner (where you can respect people's autonomy without necessarily respecting their beliefs in themselves, because beliefs can and do change)

 

[muichimotsu]

My belief in God is not based upon anything to do with REWARD ... or any issues of SOVEREIGNTY.

My belief in God ... is a RESPONSE to an offer of RELATIONSHIP ... from One who LOVES me, ... and has LOVED me, ... and has promised to LOVE me forever.

The now, the was, ... and the yet to come ... are all bound up in a gracious outpouring of LOVE ...

You want eternal love, you're promised it, that sounds much like a reward structure, so forgive me if I don't believe your rhetorical spin to suggest this is just a relationship and not a religious structure of you being bound to this entity's wishes because you think it is for your ultimate benefit.

We are necessarily and naturally egocentric creatures, we have to learn empathy to some extent in how it benefits us to delay some reward for later and it applies quite well to supernatural beliefs regarding the afterlife, especially with a deity that supposedly died for "sin" and such.

You can keep spouting these notions as if I'm just going to change because of the emotional outpouring...I'm not, especially when you're using what is effectively rhetoric at its core rather than logic, not demonstrating your claims, just showing how they're convincing at face value.

 

[cvanwey]

I hope it turns out that they are from reputable historians of this period, based on eyewitness evidence from multiple corroborated sources, and written within as short a period of time as possible after the event!

I'm sure it will, and more

 

[muichimotsu]

Witnesses are not the only examples of significant evidence, ... but are compelling, ... and function as a piece in the puzzle of discovering and affirming truth. Thus, the recent brouhaha over a trial which discounted available witnesses ...

They're not absolutely compelling, they can be if we reasonably can determine they have no ulterior motive to lie and that the situation was such that they were more reliable than someone that was, perhaps, more involved, and thus might not recall as precisely.

The problem becomes taking the witnesses in terms of this supposed divine entity in human flesh as authoritative to whether the entity was who they claim it is and reflects reality. This isn't comparable to a trial about a murder, this is much more far-reaching