Get this clear right now.
Evolution is fine. It happens. Of course it does.
I’m not working to deny evolution.
And by information I mean the genetic instructions for coding working proteins.
Why did evolution even come up? It I think because I was showing evidence for God in the genetic information that exists.
There’s no point in trying to argue evolution, cause its not the point. We have already said evolution does not disprove God, and in fact no science proves or disproves God.
Religion is an innate aspect of human nature. Discuss.
This is a “moral of the story” type thing. The fig tree was given life and a direction. It was supposed to continue on the path and to grow as it was meant to. It refused so it was cursed/cut down/killed. In short, it is a warning to Christians that each of us has a purpose in life. A God given purpose. If we refuse it, then we could be doomed to die.
And if you think that part about the children being killed by bears is bad, there are a ton more messed up stuff in the old testament that are much worse.
I dont take it as God being a sadistic Em Effer, I take it to mean he is not one to be messed with and he gets tired of his children’s behavior. Jesus is simply the buffer that the human race needs in order to pass the pearly gates. :chuckle:
This isn’t really going anywhere. It’s possible to create arguments against the fundamentals of religious texts, but when you put them in a metaphorical sense, debate comes down to interpretation and personal ideals.
I should point out that random chance is a far more powerful force than Mr. Assassin is giving it credit for. The way he is doing this is by ignoring a common human flaw. SCALE. The complexity of systems we exist in may seem simple and odds of randomly occurring events simply causing creation may seem slim, or even impossible. However, when you put it in the context of the size of the system involved, it becomes possible and even likely that random events will cause creation. I will acknowledge that there is limitations where this sort of thing can be analyzed, but when you picture every single particle in existence influencing everything else in existence, even in the smallest way, chance based on actions that greatly change the system we live in.
Physicists like to imagine they work in a frictionless vacuum for even small scale tests because even at the most base of existence systems are so complex, predicting the behavior of anything quickly spirals out of control.
Proponents of the scientifically acceptable god beyond our perception like to point this out as possibly suggesting that it implies a creator beyond the limits of our acceptance of being.
However, given evidence we have this seems unlikely. It seems there is no control of any portion of even the most base building blocks of our universe. There is information that indicates that the activities of matter that doesn’t even exist as we perceive it, behaves in any predictable fashion.
While you COULD interprit this as a limit of humanity, and human understanding when compared to god, I see no evidence pointing to any sort of god. I simply see this as a limitation of our perception in general. To us a 5th dimensional being would seem to be a god. A being able to control both time and all possible outcomes of our universe. But that doesn’t mean that such a being WOULD be a god, because it is possible that there is dimensions where the fundamental rules of existence would be different and such a creature wouldn’t be able to control the rules of existence beyond it’s perceived existence.
What I’m trying to get to here, is that even if there is a ‘god’. Some being of supreme creation of all existence, it seems rather self aggrandizing that such a creature would be OUR god, or would have any concept of our existence because as creatures we are not even visible on the scale of creation. It makes no sense. But it can’t be proven, especially not by us. We are too small, and know too little of the universe to come to any real conclusion about this. You can’t expect protons, electrons, or neutrons to conceive of complex systems. To them we may appear to be gods, because we can combine and separate them at will. But we aren’t. We are just beings beyond the system they exist in, while somehow being tied to their limitations as well. A god being to us may still be limited to different existential limitations. Anything beyond that seems as though the separation in scale is too great to make any real sense.
TALKING DONKEYS: This is a funny story! Here’s the account in the Bible. Numbers 22:21-34
22But God’s anger was kindled because he went,(A) and the angel of the LORD took his stand in the way(B) as his adversary. Now he was riding on the donkey, and his two servants were with him. 23And the donkey saw the angel of the LORD standing in the road, with a drawn sword in his hand. And the donkey turned aside out of the road and went into the field. And Balaam struck the donkey, to turn her into the road. 24Then the angel of the LORD stood in a narrow path between the vineyards, with a wall on either side. 25And when the donkey saw the angel of the LORD, she pushed against the wall and pressed Balaam’s foot against the wall. So he struck her again. 26Then the angel of the LORD went ahead and stood in a narrow place, where there was no way to turn either to the right or to the left. 27When the donkey saw the angel of the LORD, she lay down under Balaam. And Balaam’s anger was kindled, and he struck the donkey with his staff. 28Then the LORD(C) opened the mouth of the donkey, and she said to Balaam, “What have I done to you, that you have struck me these three times?” 29And Balaam said to the donkey, “Because you have made a fool of me. I wish I had a sword in my hand, for then I would kill you.” 30And the donkey said to Balaam, “Am I not your donkey, on which you have ridden all your life long to this day? Is it my habit to treat you this way?” And he said, “No.”
31Then the LORD(D) opened the eyes of Balaam, and he saw the angel of the LORD standing in the way, with his drawn sword in his hand. And he bowed down and fell on his face. 32And the angel of the LORD said to him, “Why have you struck your donkey these three times? Behold, I have come out(E) to oppose you because your way is perverse[a] before me. 33The donkey saw me and turned aside before me these three times. If she had not turned aside from me, surely just now I would have killed you and let her live.” 34Then Balaam said to the angel of the LORD,(F) “I have sinned, for I did not know that you stood in the road against me. Now therefore, if it is evil in your sight, I will turn back.”
So what we have here is Balaam, disobeying God, so an Angel is sent to stop him. Balaam is internationally known for being a ‘seer’, but he is still unable to see an Angel of the Lord, but his donkey, a symbol of stupidity, can. When Balaam will not see the angel, the Lord uses the donkey instead. The speaking of the donkey isn’t the point of the story, its just an amazingly humorous way of humiliating Balaam, and getting his attention in such a dramatic fashion. Balaam had to learn from a donkey before he could learn from God.
2 Peter comments on the foolishness of Balaam.
They have followed(AF) the way of Balaam, the son of Beor, who loved(AG) gain from wrongdoing, 16[/SIZE]but was rebuked for his own transgression;(AH) a speechless donkey spoke with human voice and restrained the prophet’s madness.
The Christian God is a God of mercy, and a God of wrath. Of grace and of justice. His people directly disobeyed his commands, and received the due punishment.
Do you think the Christian God will forgive everyone and no one will go to hell? Do you think he forgives everyone for everything, cause after all he’s a nice bundle of love and happiness and grace and mercy? Then you don’t understand God. The punishment for sin is death and eternal damnation, and people are indeed going to suffer.
He has mercy on whomever He wills, and He hardens whomever He wills.
Sassy, you asked why and I gave my interpretation of it. If you read a verse, there is a meaning behind it. If you read a paragraph, there is a meaning behind it. If you read a book or a testament there is a meaning behind it. If you read the whole thing, by golly there is a meaning behind it all as well.
I am sorry you were not happy with my interpretation of why that happened.
Much like a parent gets sick and tired of her child misbehaving and ultimately kicks him out on the street. (which I have done) It is very painful to do, but if begging pleading nudging grounding taking away and all other means of discipline do not work, what else do you have but to tell the child they no longer have access to your grace.
Not going to read through all these but I will reply to this.
If you truly belief in science then you cannot belief in the supernatural. Scientific laws CANNOT BE BROKEN no matter what the circumstance. Breaking them is like saying 2+2=5. There is no room for the “supernatural” in science. If your idea of a god truly exists then we will have to rethink science.
Just think of it, we have a set of scientific laws that EVERYTHING follows, and there are an infinite situations and an infinite occurrences when those laws were supported. So if SOMETHING, no matter how “supernatural” breaks those laws, then we must find a very very good in-depth scientific explanation for why that thing broke those laws, make a completely new set of laws, or, realize that whatever was breaking those laws doesn’t actually exist.
There is nothing outside of science, everything can be explained by science.
By your own admission, neither do you though.
Let me give some reasons for the interpretation.
Fig Trees are symbols of Isreal.
Hosea 9:10
I found Israel
Like grapes in the wilderness;
I saw your fathers
As the firstfruits on the fig tree in its first season.
Nahum 3:12
All your strongholds are fig trees with ripened figs
In this passage, Jesus just finished talking about the hypocrisy of Israel. The fig tree is fully leafed out, and in such a state one would normally expect to find fruit. I mean if you say any fruit tree, looks healthy and everything with big leaves, you’d be surprised to find no fruit. The fig tree is peculiar in this way, it gets leaves long before there is any fruit. This is like the hypocrisy of Israel. A people who said they honored God, but in their hearts were far from Him is like a tree with an abundance of leaves but no fruit.
You’re right its not the trees fault, he’s using it as a symbol for Israel. We know this is how we are to take the interpretation because we are told that fig trees are symbols for Israel, and it makes sense after a lecture of Israel’s hypocrisy.
Thanks Max. Good comments here.
Only a few remarks.
The very nature of science is the establishment of tangibles ONLY. That if something intangible is attempted in the equation, it can no longer be described as science.
Which is the problem with these threads of comparison. Even though faith allows science, science does not allow faith.
Sassy, lets keep the name calling out pweese?
[COLOR=‘Red’]I want to remind everyone that any hostile replies will be dealt with. I’ve read a few in this thread, but I won’t take any action at this point. Consider this a warning.
Carry on.
Toooooooooooooo many posts too fast!!!
Anyway, say there really is a god out there. Then WTF are his motives??? Why the fuck did he make everything? What’s it mean to him? What was his purpose in making people and the universe? And don’t give me some bullshit that his motives can not be understood. If he is supernatural and odes all this stuff he must be capable of thought, and if he is capable of thought, he then must require motives. And if he truly exists and is truly all-powerful then he should have a motive for creating people. So what was that motive? Was he trying to pick up chicks at a bar by showing them this cool planet he made? Was he bored and decided to make himself an ant farm? Is he trying to learn something by making a massive cage full of guinea pigs?
First answer me this Garth dear. Knowing how crappy the world is, why on earth would you pro-create? Children cause you heartache and pain. They turn against you and dont listen to you. They grow up and who knows if they will turn into murdering monsters. Why bother?
EDIT: speaking of children. Mine are in need of some ah… “attention” today.
@217: Natural laws explain natural things only. They don’t even attempt to explain supernatural things. The scientific laws work for EVERYTHING IN THE UNIVERSE. No need to change them.
@218: Hmm?
@219: I know you don’t believe in him, I was explaining the Christian view towards God.
@223: Soup already asked this. Same answer. Why did God make the universe? Isaiah 43 explains simply. ‘For His own glory’. I want to add something here, that he is not trying to increase His glory, because it would be impossible for him to become more glorious.
@224:
I probably won’t have kid. Mainly because I have a personal aversion to them, I don’t believe it is bad to simply have children, I feel it is bad to have too many children. If everyone had a certain number of children, we could maintain our population or even slowly lower it. Also, most children do the above actions because they have shitty parents. And then they themselves grow up to be shitty parents and the cycle continues endlessly. But I really don’t see what this has to do with this topic.
EDIT: I’m sorry catz, it appear I didn’t quite catch what you were getting at. God is all-powerful, so then he could so easily create perfect children that didn’t cause heart ache.
That’s not really a comparison that is fair catz. Children relate to their creator in a real sense. There is a basis of similarity. A more accurate thing to say is Why do you create proteins in you body knowing they will be burned away in a very short time.
This lack of relation is more accurate to the relationship of a god figure to us. Weather or not ‘god’ creates us out of will, or simply as function is an interesting thought though.
But there isn’t anything but the natural. There is no supernatural. Everything has to function logically and reasonably and there is no logical explanation for the supernatural.
That’s not actually true. There is evidence that there is another set of laws counter to the very laws directing the nature of our existence.
Founded in 2004, Leakfree.org became one of the first online communities dedicated to Valve’s Source engine development. It is more famously known for the formation of Black Mesa: Source under the 'Leakfree Modification Team' handle in September 2004.