meembo

Nazggul, I didn't mean to offend. But it doesn't stand to reason that just because you aren't certain about God's existence that no one else is. Believe it all you like, but you're wrong.

I do in fact think you're quite cynical... To replace a symbol of love (Santa) with a symbol of fear (the Boogieman) isn't faithful to your argument at all. I challenge you to examine your own emotions and come back to the discussion in a different frame of mind.

I also challenge your statement that "Most of the oldest religions imagined their God, or Gods, as vengeful, spiteful, and taking pleasure in the torment their human puppets." Do you have any reference to that, or is that just a simplistic (mis)understanding of the Old Testament? I think gods historically bridge the gaps of understanding to world views of their contemporary cultures, but to say that gods take pleasure in spite and vengeance betrays a serious misunderstanding of good and evil, and it also betrays your own emotional biases to make such a fundamental error.
Monotheistic gods (such as in Christianity) represent the zenith of goodness and love and peace and understanding. If you're imagining polytheistic gods such as the Greek and Roman gods, you are talking about a group of gods representing good, evil, and everything in between.

I'm feisty about people discounting my faith as simply emotion. My faith and intellect are both real, and it's the tension between the two that makes life interesting.

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less I say, smarter I am

empu

I do not consider it to be simple. I consider it to be the simplest of the available explanations. I agree that your bag of legos would not spontaneously land in the shape of a replica of the Taj Mahal, but perhaps a few of them would be stuck together. You may prefer the explanation that these pieces were stuck together by God. I prefer the explanation that they were stuck together by chance.

wilbjammin

Nietzsche "I cannot accept the idea of there being a god because I am not he."

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Innominate.

nanofever

But I was shining-up my flamethrower and everything... *puts it back in the closet*

"we rely on faith notb proof or evidence thats what christianity is about a truth in our hearts we acnnot deny just as u cant deny feeling the emotions of love or hate - we cannot deny that god exists!!thank u"

Can I assume that you are using the royal we ?

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I'm leaving for the University of California: Santa Barbara in 5 hours, give me your best college advice - things I need, good ideas, bad ideas, nooky, ect.

Originally Posted by Norseman on another forum:
"Yeah, the problem with the world is the stupid people are all cocksure of themselves and the intellectuals are full of doubt."

hy_

My friend is a muslum, I am myself a catholic even thought I do not practice the religion really. The other day I was talking with my friend and I tried to way to see why God would not exist and such. This is where we came to.

My first though was that, in the cor'an, it say's "read". As in reading the bible, it also say's that the one that wrote the cor'an didn't know how to write and such before he got into contact with God. Well, he wrote that himself. But if you think about it, those points are just to make you read it. Give you a good reason to read it and follow the religion.

My second though is that in my opinion all religion we're created to fill the gaps we can't fill ourself. Everything we do not have a solution to, we fill God to that problem. A good example would be the universe. Now, our question is how was it created etc. We don't know the answer so we blame it on God, filling the problems we have with a God.

My third though is that if you read the bible or the cor'an. You'll realize that everything that is said is really want we want to hear. Would you like to hear that when you die there wasn't going to be another world waiting for you? Hells no. That's why the religion was created. It's what we want to hear.

My fourth though is the following. I asked many people why they followed a religion, most of them said so they could go to heavens. Well, if you think about it. They are forced to follow the religion because we don't know if there's a heaven and they don't want to take a chance and not get accepted and you guys know it. Ask yourself that. Why am I following a religion, for what goal. It's not the money, not the fun.

If you go back in time, the church used to rule. They ruled because the bible was a good way to attract people and keep people occupied and busy. People had to beleive in their religion because they didn't want to go to Hell. So bingo for churchs because now they have total power over all using religion as a tool.

Nazggul

I wasn’t offended at all, but apparently you were offended by my opinion so you decided to lash out at me. That is your issue to deal with, not mine.

It merely demonstrates why your argument against mine was so off target. It’s not about Santa or the Boogie man or whatever thing we put in that position, it is the simple fact that the act of believing in something does not make it real or provide any proof. Is that really so hard for you to understand?

What does the Old Testament have to do with Norse mythology or the Greek Gods? It certainly wasn’t something I referenced. You might consider spending some time educating yourself about other religions, and perspectives. It isn’t all about your book. You have taken a simple argument, made a boatload of assumptions.

Misunderstanding of good and evil? I am not even going to try to understand where you got that. Once again, educate yourself in something other than your religion.

Oh please, I never discounted your faith. You’ve put so many words in my mouth. Let me reiterate my argument to clarify.

I do not know whether God exists or not.
Nobody has proven that God exists.
Believing in something does not make it real.

That’s all I have to say on this.

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"If something has to give then it always will."

-- Editors

sub zero

you sound like a dumbass 12 yr old. kthx

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Did you Google it yet?

Join the TFP Typing team!!

DownwardSpiral

God exists as a crutch for people who have nothing else to turn too.

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"So Keep on Pretending.
Our Heavens Worth the Waiting.
Keep on Pretending.
It's Alright."

-- H.I.M., "Pretending"

tecoyah

What if every "Religion" just woke up one morning and decided to use the same name for the Gods they worship....would that cahnge anything?Not likely. we humans need a reason to dislike each other at this point in our evolution and I can think of no better hate tool than organized religion....except maybe racism.
HHHMMMMMMM, theres a sweet issue for ya...why is religion more accepted than racist views, they both make people hate, religion just does it on a broader scale.

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Holding onto anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned. - Buddha