GOD

[TINNY]

basically that's what believers of monotheistic religions think.
let's start with the creation of the universe.

the expanding universe would implicate a beginning. so the universe was created out of nothingness. for the big bang, it started from singularity.

give other ideas. then we could compare, and see how the universe developed, and ultimately predict our role in the progress of the universe.

[OpenMind5]

many people feel that certain people believe in god to fill that void of being meaningless...that it makes a perpuse for all of us...to help except death...I for one have felt and seen the work that i know is god...i am a believer...that how i feel...I think all this science stuff that i love so much...is to make us question...but the thing is...god's love is so simple...

Why is it that people can't acept god...(atheists)(_sorry about spelling if wrong) Why do u feel there is no god...then what do u beleive? -to all the atheists out there

And other religions? How do they identify to christanity? I know and few...and for those of u who think i am one minded and have can not think of other religions...NO NAMES...I have lots of friends with different religions...but those r two basic questions i am asking for now...

keep the post coming...

OP5

[sanctus]

Believing in God implies believing in something one can't proof (that's why you <u>believe</u> in god, you can't deduce his existence).
Believers say that the existing world is the proof, but that's not a proof that convinces atheists as it isn't a "scientific" argument.
I think this is one possible reason why people doesn't believe in god.

I for myself don't like to believe, but if I'm sincere I have to admit that I believe in something, something like I said earlier on this post. And I think I believe, as you said, in something just to fill the void and I do that unconsciously, because rationnally I know that this void can be filled also with culture for example instead of religion (for instance I suggest you to read "...and therefore spoce Golem" from Stanislav Lem he there developps a nice theory on humanity).

But the question

How do they identify to christanity?

is completely out of place, because that means (even if you've got friends of other religions) that you believe christianity is the only right religion. Saying

.but those r two basic questions i am asking for now...

, doesn't mean that you do not think that the best thing would be if the others would convert (to your religion as it seems to be the best one).
Writing this I notice another reason for which I don't believe in any religion, just because many of them believe to be the only one and then instead of helping living in a better world they create hatred.

One last reason for which i don't believe in any common godness is because all religions I know of seem to me made of hypocrites (not sll the believers, but too many):I know skinheads (extreme right) that go to churchI know Bush says he is a believer, wouldn't that implie that he should love his ennemy and show mercy, for example while he was gouvenor of texas and on 120 death-sentences he didn't show mercy even oncedoesn't the islamic religion also say to love your ennemy (Jesus is a prophet in their religion)doesn't the buddishm say to respect nature?and so on

I hope i anwered to your questions

[Freethinker]

Of course god exists. God is a mark left on underwear if someone does not wipe themselves completely. And I know that exists.

OK, I gave that reply to show why this question is just the fallacy of the complex question. It can not be answered without a much greater level of information being given.

The word "GOD" is used by so many different people to mean so many different things, that without providing a specific defintion of the term as it is intended here, no serious answer can be given. Even if a somehwat more detailed question is provided it could still be difficult to answer. e.g. if the question was:

"Does the Christian god exist?"

We would still have the problem that Christians can not agree amoungts themselves as to what this god might be. Yes there are some comonalities, but there are also differences. But I will add to the discussion as I can.

"Is there a god?"

As I stated in the beginning, yes my god exists. A good cleaning gets rid of the problem however.

"Is he the reason for existence?"

What makes you think there IS a "reason for existence"? I fail to see anything that indicates there may even be a singular "reason for existence". Just another Fallacy of Argumentation. Begging the Question. A priori thought process. I could ask "What is north of the north pole?" But just because I can assemble the words into a quesation form does not mean that the question makes any sense/ can be answered.

At best, each of us are on our own to invent a personal reason for our personal existence. Some want to blindly accept outside influence such as a god claim. I do not sell my existence that short. I will use the only life we KNOW we have to acheive as much positive as I can for this actual existence. I will not waste me time or efforts to support antiquated religious dogma which has ALWAYS been harmful for humanity.

" Is the bible correct?"

Is there a girl that wears a red cape on occasion? I am sure there is. And just as the Little Red Ridinghood fairytale has some basis of fact in it, that does not give the story any validity in total. So the only accurate answer to your question is "Yes it is correct in some parts, but it is filled with well identified errors and contradictions. Just as any other series of fairytales.

"Is god a he or a she?"

No, god is a stain. Prove me wrong.

"What are your views on god?"

If by god we mean the POV used by religions, god represents the worst of humanity. It has been the reason for more wars, death, killing, ignorace, promotion of hatred and prejudice, ... than any other single reasons.

There have been over 1,000 god(s, esses...) promted throught history. Today most people reject all but one or two of them. The same reasons are given for rejecting the other 999+ that I use to add one more name to the list.

"What experiences have you had? "

As a young person I was considered religious (Catholic). I even had what would be described as religious experience. As I got older and more educated I came to understand the physiology behind these and had similar experiences under any number of other situations. I ahve also learned about things like Optical Illusions and Magicans. These PROVE that a personal experience is of little use for determining reality. Our senese are easily fooled. Thus we show we are fools if we allow too much weight to be given to such experiences for making reasoned, logical evaluation to things.

[Freethinker]

Originally posted by: Tim_Lou
God, is the ultimate, the source of everything.

god is light, god is power,

OK, there IS light and there IS power, so if this is what god is, then yes there is god,. (just like my def about a stain). But I do not see where this is of any value if we are talking about the typical monotheistic supernatural entity meaning of god.

for everything is part of god.

everything? so god is also hate, evil, cancer, torture, murder, infanticide, starvation, ...

people dont believe in god, is because there is no evidence that god exist.

but there is not really an evidence that prove god doesnt exist.

This is the argument fallacy of "shifting the burden of proof". Anyone that takes Philosophy 101 KNOWS it is impossible to prove non-existence. The statement does not even make sense.

Everything was created by the great Invisible Pink Unicorn. You will find much information on the IPU on the net. Now prove I am wrong.

OK, so the idea is that the IPU can not be "disproven" either. But just like ANY OTHER such claim. It is not up to you to DISprove the IPU's existence, it is up to ME, as the person making the claim of existence, to provide enough proof of the IPU's existence to make it worth even discussing it.

Thus when you ADMIT:

people dont believe in god, is because there is no evidence that god exist.

That is all ANYONE needs to outright reject even discussing the existence of something that lacks ANY valid evidence of it's existence.

everyone experience god,

Yes, but laundry soap takes care of it.

[/quote]but the knowledge in our brains cannot admit it thus questions it and deny it.[/quote]

too many internal contradictions in this statement to even begin to cover.

if you question god, god doesnt exist,

so your god is so weak that even bringing it into question destroys it? Hardly what I would consider a worthwhile god! What other failings does your god have?

god is the person that we blame

ah yes, the core of the god concept. Someone/thing to blame. As Bertrand Russell said, only one heart in a thousand is pure enough to be an Atheist. It is a matter of willingness to accept full personal resonsibility. As an Atheist, I accept full personal responsibility. Unlike a believer that is always ready to have:

god (as) the person that we blame

This world (the one we KNOW actually existws) would be a much better place if we all fully accepted personal resposibility, rather than find some god to blame.

...there must be something that is the sources of everything. since everything came out from something.

I simple course in Quantum Mechanics will help you shed this fallacy. (if ANY QM cource could be considered simple)

for those who dont believe anyone kind of god, the life became lifeless. there is nothing after life, everything came from something dead.... so, y not assume that there is a god and you will feel better about the world and have a different view point of it.

you have it exactly 180. when one accepts any of the various superstitions that present a god offering an afterlife, THIS life beconmes secondary. Believers must adopt the absolutely most selfish life approach of achieving PERSONAL salvation. to "assujme" anything else is responsible for things only allows you to live a less than full and complete life. I would never waste my life that way.

[Freethinker]

Originally posted by: Tim_Lou
my believe of god is scientific, it has nothing to do w/ religious.

god is actually a Philosophy term, a hypothesis.

it is very scientific.

scientists had found very difficult to explain the world. why the world exist? why are we here?"

Science/ Scientists have developed a very extensive explaination of the world and HOW it exists.

WHY is a personal choice for those that wish to philosophize. It has nothing to do with REALITY.

However any claims to an answer CAN be approached via the Scientific Method.

a "theory" of god is made to explain verything more easily

and since the concept of a 3rd party external agent, a GOD, violates Ockham's Razor, it can be tossed out easily.

(just like other theories). everything seems to make sense w/ god.

NOTHING makes SENSE when you interject an external non-causal agent.

science is made for us to understand the world better.

Science is used to not only UNDERSTAND, but even more importantly to PREDICT.

while god is one of them that let us understand the world better.

Inserting a god into the equation STOPS all predictablity. It VIOLATES the very nature of Science.

Science helps us understand what will happen when a series of events/ causes are combined. Inserting a god requires ignoring ALL external causation with such nonsens as "god works in mysterious ways". Or any of the other garbage used to excuse events that happen contrary to wishes of those claiming a godly intervention.

Belief in a god requires the intentional rejection of Science and the Scientific Method.

[Freethinker]

Originally posted by: TINNY
the original text of the bible is the word of God, christians say. but bibles have been altered into different versions, each contradicting a little, or are different. so it is not relevant.

There is no such thing as:

the original text of the bible

We do not have a single scrap of paper which can be shown to be the original writings of any part of the bible. The closest we have is a scrap of paper the size of a postage stamp which is claimed to be part of a letter from Paul. Even that is questionable as it contains less than 5 full words.

the quran has no different versions.the ones found right now are the exact one from muhammad, although at that time it was not in the form of a book.

Verbal repitition is always unreliable. By admitting that the qur'an was first passed verbally, you acknowledge that error would be part of the process. It is claimed that muhammad's words were transcribed as he said them. To begin with it is quite certain that when the Prophet died there was no collected, collated, arranged body of material of his revelations. During the Caliphate of 'Uthman, it was found that this material was being recited by different groups of Muslims in different dialectal forms, thus errors introduced.

The Qur'an does not contradict with science.

"And verily We created the heavens and the earth, and all that is between them, in six Days, and naught of weariness touched Us." (Qur'an 50:38) Same nonsense as the bible!

"he is created from a drop (of sperm) emitted-- Proceeding from between the backbone and the ribs." (Qur'an 86:6-7) This to describe human reproduction. First of all, for sperm to originate between the back and the ribs would mean that it comes from the kidneys! Eleven centuries before Muhammad, the Greek physician Hippocrates theorized that sperm passed through the kidneys into the penis. For centuries this was an accepted (and incorrect) belief of the origins of sperm.

" And he followed a road; Till, when he reached the setting-place of the sun, he found it setting in a muddy spring, and found a people thereabout. We said: O Dhu'l-Qarneyn! Either punish or show them kindness." (Qur'an 18:85-86) This is a major scientific blunder in the Qur'an. A man walked until he reached the setting place of the sun, and saw it setting in a muddy spring. Ya OK then!

[Freethinker]

Originally posted by: OpenMindFive
...I for one have felt and seen the work that i know is god...

Sorry, but you THINK this. You have no PROOF of it. There is nothing you can provide to PROVE otherwise. All you can do is take anecdotal evetns and CLAIM they were because of some godly intervention. But there will not be a single verifyable event which can not be easily explained by completely NATURAL events.

Yes you can decide to ignore this and continue to blindly accept such fallacious causality. That is your right. But do not decieve yourself to think that everyone will allow such lack of Critical Thinking in their lives.

Why is it that people can't acept god...(atheists)(_sorry about spelling if wrong) Why do u feel there is no god...then what do u beleive? -to all the atheists out there

Which one? Zuess? Magni? Isis? Mithra? ... YOU reject these and over 1,000 more. I use the same process you do to reject these thousand+ and merely add one more to the list. For the SAME reasons. This havs nothing to do with what I 'feel" or "believe".

Do you "believe" in a refrigerator? Of course not. You KNOW a refrigerator exists. "Belief" is only used when there is no VALID reason to accept the existence of something. As such, I do not BELIEVE in anything. I ACCEPT (for convenience) things when there is enough VALID support for it.

However, I am always open to VALID SUPPORTABLE evidence which would show me that a god existes. In fact I would like to see a defination of a god that is not filled with internal contraditions and does not conflict with logic and reality. I have never found one that even gets close. And I can not find ANY reason why one would even want the monster that is the biblical god to be the real one. I wouldn't even want him as a neighbor, much less a god.

And other religions? How do they identify to christanity?

Christianity is a combination of prior religions. It offers nothing new nor unique. It's customs and traditions are based mainly on pagan traditions and customs.

[Tim_Lou]

Freethinker, i can say that your arugment is way too scientific.
for science, what makes science valid?
science is only a way of us to understand the world, why do you think that science is the total truth?

for example, a dog, he sees the world way different from us, a dog is stupid and wrong (the way he feels the world) since its a dog.
hey, what about us? do we really know everything? no, the answer is no, we also have brains limitation.

the way in science, is the way we see, the way we feel, and the way that we can make sense out of our living world.
since "god" is also a way of making sense, it may not be totally wrong.

if you think that god is stupid or not making sense, think about QM, and other physics. with theories and particles, when the hell in your life is gonna deal w/ those stuffs and when are you gonna have use w/ these? they are all simply an extend of knowledge, something to make us feel better that we understand the world. "god" is also one of them. a way to make sense.

god doesnt contradicts any of the sciences. it is just simply a creator beyond everything. for some scientists found that all the matter may be made by slow photons and the whole world is created out of nothingess. and how can this make sense? it might be actually a illusion of god.

god does have evidence, such as NDEs, near-death experiences. read some posts in the "after life section".

your way of deneying the god is simply because of the limitation of your knowledge, which means that your trapped w/ your existed knowledge and cannot get rip of it. the knowledge you have might not be true, it is made up by all the scientists and you learnt it in school.
to understand the world, you have to be open minded, to accept new knowledge. if not, no new discovery would occur and there would be no improvement in the world.

thx for reading, some of the pts are not organized...... and some you might not understand....

[TINNY]

Verbal repitition is always unreliable. By admitting that the qur'an was first passed verbally, you acknowledge that error would be part of the process. It is claimed that muhammad's words were transcribed as he said them. To begin with it is quite certain that when the Prophet died there was no collected, collated, arranged body of material of his revelations. During the Caliphate of 'Uthman, it was found that this material was being recited by different groups of Muslims in different dialectal forms, thus errors introduced.

Do you find any different qur'an? At the time of muhammad it was memorized by his followers. It is unlikely that with so many people who memorized it, there is no different versions of the qur'an till this day.

"And verily We created the heavens and the earth, and all that is between them, in six Days, and naught of weariness touched Us." (Qur'an 50:38) Same nonsense as the bible!

What is meant by six days is not what we normally say as six days. The creation of the universe was very complex. So for us to understand, god says it was created in six days. Some muslim scholars say it means six stages. From the theory of relativity, we know that time is not what we normally think it is. So it implies a different meaning of 'six days'. read this