Re: Luskin: Judge Wrong To Rule Against ID's Theology


snex wrote:
VoiceOfReason wrote:
snex wrote:
VoiceOfReason wrote:
snex wrote:
<snip>







personally persuasive of what? that the mythological characters
currently espoused by the person's current culture are really real?
...


I suggested that you closely examine your definition of "real", but for
some
reason, you didn't bother.

perhaps you should suggest that theists do so, since they are the ones
who think faith can determine reality.


If you have a case in question, please let us know. But you have repeatedly
used the word. And here you avoid telling us what you mean by it.

"But if evolution is true, there is no 'need' for a deity to create,
organize, and shape the world. What we see around us is explicable in
exclusively natural terms. That is actually a knife in the heart of
Christian belief.

VoiceOfUnreason replies: Only for those with very weak faith.

the implication here is that VoU has strong faith,

No, the implication is that people with weak faith feel threatened by
evolution.

and you are not threatened by evolution and have faith, therefore you
have strong faith. duh.

Yes, that would seem to be rather obvious, wouldn't it?

and that the science
of evolution does not affect his belief that *reality* coincides with
his own personal version of christianity.

And that the majority of the world's Christians are capable of
reconciling science with Christianity.

really? how do they reconcile the fact that science says that people
dont rise from the dead after 3 days?

I don't reconcile it. Several possibilities exist: he rose from the
dead after 3 days by way of some miracle; he wasn't actually dead, but
was comatose and/or unconscious for 3 days; etc. I'm don't know exactly
what happened, but I'm not all that concerned about it.

"some miracle?" i thought you said christians are capable of
reconciling science with christianity.

Most are.

no they arent. you require a miracle to maintain belief in events you
claim were real. that is denial of science.

I don't "require" a miracle, as I clearly explained above. I accept
that as one possible explanation.

your other possibility would be considered heresy by pretty much every
christian denomination out there.

I acknowledge the possibility that whoever wrote the gospel was
mistaken. As I said, I'm not all that concerned about it. Why are you?

if they could have been mistaken, why do you insist on believing them,
when in fact being mistaken is the most plausible explanation?

Where did I say I insist on believing them? You're obsessing on nitnoy
details. The essence of the gospels is not "Did Jesus say *exactly*
those words," but in the overall message.

Again, you're getting hung up on the literalism thing. Most Christians
are not literalists.

VoU, being a christian,
presumably thinks that the jesus of the bible *really* lived, *really*
healed people, and *really* died and rose from the dead. he thinks that
the god described in the christian bible *really* exists and that there
is *really* a heaven he goes to when he dies.

Close enough.

he thinks that his "faith" in these ideas is ample justification to
believe in their actuality, and presumably he will act in an according
manner. he does not care if none of these ideas have evidence,

I do not expect to find evidence for the existence of God.

and yet you claim that god has produced observable effects on the
natural world.

I have not made that claim. I know of no criteria to determine for
certain that an observable effect was produced by a deity or not. God
may have produced observable effects, but I am not aware of them.

the gospels clearly state that god made observable effects happen.

Which one(s) do you have in mind?

jesus was born of a virgin. jesus healed the sick. jesus walked on
water. jesus rose from the dead. etc.

How do you propose that I "observe" those effects 2000 years after the
event?

if
you deny that they can be trusted on those matters, why trust them on
*any* matters?

That's Creationist logic. "You have to accept every word in the Bible
literally in every way or you have to throw the whole thing out the
window" is not a view most Christians hold.

no, it isnt creationist logic.

Yeah, it is. I've heard it countless times from them.

its a question that you once again
failed to answer. IF certain parts of the bible can be shown to be in
error, THEN why should you trust other parts when no evidence exists
for them?

I don't believe in throwing out the baby with the bath water.

when i read a creationist article that makes stupidly absurd claims
like evolution going against 2LoT, i usually dont bother to read any
further.

There's an overwhelming body of evidence that evolution does not
violate the 2LoT. What point were you trying to make?

For example, I accept that creation as described in Genesis is a story
that was never meant to be taken literally. That doesn't bother my
faith.

You seem to be getting hung up on the literalism thing. Most Christians
are not literalists.

he does
not care that all known evidence is against these ideas.

I have not seen evidence for the non-existence of God or Jesus. All
I've heard of is a lack of contemporary written evidence, which isn't
surprising.

maybe you should look into other mystery cults that predate jesus, like
osiris and mithras. their stories are amazingly similar to the jesus
one. do you take the opinion of the early church fathers that satan
seeded these cults with just the right ideas centuries before jesus was
born just so people would think that the jesus story was ripping them
off?

No, I don't take that opinion.

then why is the jesus story so similar to other stories that long
predate it?

Beats me.

first you said you have seen no evidence that the jesus story was made
up. i presented you with some, and your only response is "beats me?"

First, you made an assertion that I cannot immediately verify. Since
you have a track record of making unsupported assertions, it wouldn't
make sense to take your assertion too seriously now, would it?

Second, you made the false assumption that if parts of the "Jesus
story" were made up, that would mean Jesus never existed. That is an
unsupportable position.

just below i accuse you of not caring about truth because evidence is
irrelevant to you, and you said that such is not the case. well here is
the time to demonstrate it. the evidence shows that the jesus story is
ripped off from earlier myths that you probably agree are not true.

No, you've provided one unsupported assertion and one unsupportable
position based on a false assumption.

how do you deal with the fact that the gospels obviously contradict
each other in basic facts that should have been known by anybody
familiar with actual events they were writing about, like the death of
judas?

Humans communicated the gospels verbally, wrote them, transcribed them,
and possibly made mistakes or embellished them while doing so at
numerous points in time. IIRC, scholars have discovered that the
"final" versions of gospels have minor differences from earlier
versions.

the contradictions in events surrounding the death of judas described
in matthew and acts of the apostles are *not* minor.

And?

so these guys are supposedly reliable writers on the matter, and yet
they cant agree on how one of the main characters died?

"Humans communicated the gospels verbally, wrote them, transcribed
them, and possibly made mistakes or embellished them while doing so at
numerous points in time."

he does not
care if these ideas are false, he will believe them anyway.

Wrong.

if you admit that no possible evidence can ever sway you (because no
evidence is possible), then it is correct to say that you dont care if
your ideas are false.

I don't say that no possible evidence can ever sway me.

and yet your position is arrived at through a lack of any evidence
whatsoever. if you are prepared to hold positions without evidence,
then evidence is irrelevant to you.

Non sequitur. If I had evidence that falsified some part of my belief,
then I'd modify my belief.

you cant have evidence, because it is a matter of faith, as you say.

Your staement, not mine.

i see no difference between that attitude and the attitude of a
creationist.

Creationists disbelieve and/or deny scientific evidence that conflicts
with their literal interpretation of Genesis. Most Christians do not.

you deny the scientific evidence that states that men cannot rise from
the dead after 3 days.

No, I don't. I acknowledge the possibility that Jesus rose from the
dead after three days.

what possibility? scientific evidence denies such a possibility.

Science/medicine tells us that a human being cannot rise from the dead
after three days. It has no position on whether Jesus, as God, could
rise from the dead after three days.

special pleading. men cannot rise from the dead after 3 days. by saying
otherwise you are denying science.

Read it again. I didn't say that men could rise from the dead after 3
days.

.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: The Marian Doctrines
    ... is no evidence of such a belief in the scriptures is very telling therefore. ... expect a far smaller bunch of dissenting Christians. ... Jesus nor Paul. ... Because we don't get our beliefs from Scripture. ...
    (uk.religion.christian)
  • Re: Vista beta vs. OSX
    ... >>> I suppose we could consider jesus (which isn't even his name, ... > Sounds to me like God exploited an anonymous proxy to start ... >>> I see no evidence of such a being, and if scripture is correct then I ... >> pagans themselves to blame on the Christians out of spite and hatred, ...
    (comp.sys.mac.advocacy)
  • Re: Historical evidence for Jesus ?
    ... Naturally, as someone interested in history, I would ... Being interested in history, I have checked this evidence, and present ... be evidence for Jesus, along with analysis of how significant they are. ... This is why we have Christians -- originally a derisive ...
    (alt.religion.christian.roman-catholic)
  • Re: Ask an atheist a question
    ... There are certainly documents extant about Jesus that are much ... I don't know how good the evidence for Alexander ... I meant the community of Christians, ... most important event associated with him, namely the Resurrection, ...
    (uk.religion.christian)
  • Re: Luskin: Judge Wrong To Rule Against IDs Theology
    ... And that the majority of the world's Christians are capable of ... dont rise from the dead after 3 days? ... I do not expect to find evidence for the existence of God. ... I have not seen evidence for the non-existence of God or Jesus. ...
    (talk.origins)
Quantcast