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  • edited March 2018 Posts: 4,617
    @FoxRox "Being an agnostic, if God is real, I wouldn’t say God “did this” to Bill. I think anything good or bad can happen to someone without any force of God, if He/it is there.2



    Whats that based on? how is that conclusion reached when we are dealing with a supreme being? You have intoduced tacit consent. As Hitch once put it "Heaven watches with folded arms."

    See from 5.20 in.....



    @Escalus5 No idea is beneath scrutiny and sometimes that leads the idea being belittled. There maybe believers in ghosts or aliens in flying saucers etc within the forum that feel hurt or belittled by previous threads. What are non believers meant to do?

    Agreeing to disagree (whilst an easy option) is an acceptance of the status quo and, if we are to progress (thank goodness we are) we have to keep going. We did not get where we are by agreeing to disagree. Cases are argued, points are made, feelings get hurt and culture/consensus evolves and changes.

    Flat Earth? Agree to disagree.

    Astrology? Agree to disagree

    Thor worshippers ? Agree to disagree

    FGM? Agree to disagree

    Sorry, cant let these things go. Nothing will change for the better if we are too busy worrying about upsetting people's feelings or causing offence.

  • Posts: 12,474
    @patb I say that because life is so random, and I have a hard time seeing how God intervenes in a good or bad way. A supreme being could choose to create but not intervene.
  • ThunderfingerThunderfinger Das Boot Hill
    Posts: 45,489
    Ludovico wrote: »
    Ludovico wrote: »
    Ludovico wrote: »
    What you mean is you trust your own senses and experiences, but not those of others unless they align with your own.

    That's completely fallacious. I trust my own sense to a degree: I know I can be deluded or mislead. But I'll take for granted that the world and reality exists.

    No one here claimed it doesn t .

    Of course not: like I said you used solipsism as a cop out.

    You are making assumptions, and the cop out is yours.

    "Tu quoque" now?

    Et tu, Ludovico.
  • Posts: 4,617
    FoxRox wrote: »
    @patb I say that because life is so random, and I have a hard time seeing how God intervenes in a good or bad way. A supreme being could choose to create but not intervene.

    What is supreme about watching 99.9% of the species you created die out? Thats "not supreme" in anyones book. A 0.1 success rate.

    Plus, God has intervened (according to some), do you believe he has intervened at all? For many, the interventions are used as evidence. If we have no interventions, what evidence is left?
  • Posts: 12,474
    patb wrote: »
    FoxRox wrote: »
    @patb I say that because life is so random, and I have a hard time seeing how God intervenes in a good or bad way. A supreme being could choose to create but not intervene.

    What is supreme about watching 99.9% of the species you created die out? Thats "not supreme" in anyones book. A 0.1 success rate.

    Plus, God has intervened (according to some), do you believe he has intervened at all? For many, the interventions are used as evidence. If we have no interventions, what evidence is left?

    I’m not saying God is real or not. By “supreme,” I’m simply talking about a being that could do whatever it wanted, so if it didn’t care about intervention, it wouldn’t do it - even with the capability.
  • Posts: 15,125
    FoxRox wrote: »
    @patb I say that because life is so random, and I have a hard time seeing how God intervenes in a good or bad way. A supreme being could choose to create but not intervene.

    What would then be the difference between an existant God and an inexistant God?
    Ludovico wrote: »
    Ludovico wrote: »
    Ludovico wrote: »
    What you mean is you trust your own senses and experiences, but not those of others unless they align with your own.

    That's completely fallacious. I trust my own sense to a degree: I know I can be deluded or mislead. But I'll take for granted that the world and reality exists.

    No one here claimed it doesn t .

    Of course not: like I said you used solipsism as a cop out.

    You are making assumptions, and the cop out is yours.

    "Tu quoque" now?

    Et tu, Ludovico.

    Okay thanks for your intelligent contribution to the debate.
  • Posts: 12,474
    @Ludovico Creation.
  • Posts: 15,125
    FoxRox wrote: »
    @Ludovico Creation.

    I'm not sure I understand what you mean. The existence of the world indicates there's a God that created it? If that's what you mean how did you go from the existence of the universe to the existence of a creator?
  • ThunderfingerThunderfinger Das Boot Hill
    Posts: 45,489
    Ludovico wrote: »
    FoxRox wrote: »
    @patb I say that because life is so random, and I have a hard time seeing how God intervenes in a good or bad way. A supreme being could choose to create but not intervene.

    What would then be the difference between an existant God and an inexistant God?
    Ludovico wrote: »
    Ludovico wrote: »
    Ludovico wrote: »
    What you mean is you trust your own senses and experiences, but not those of others unless they align with your own.

    That's completely fallacious. I trust my own sense to a degree: I know I can be deluded or mislead. But I'll take for granted that the world and reality exists.

    No one here claimed it doesn t .

    Of course not: like I said you used solipsism as a cop out.

    You are making assumptions, and the cop out is yours.

    "Tu quoque" now?

    Et tu, Ludovico.

    Okay thanks for your intelligent contribution to the debate.

    Sometimes you have excellent points here and elsewhere, but just as often it is just assumptuous pseudo-intellectual and hypocritical box thinking that doesn t impress or convince in the slightest.
  • Posts: 15,125
    Ludovico wrote: »
    FoxRox wrote: »
    @patb I say that because life is so random, and I have a hard time seeing how God intervenes in a good or bad way. A supreme being could choose to create but not intervene.

    What would then be the difference between an existant God and an inexistant God?
    Ludovico wrote: »
    Ludovico wrote: »
    Ludovico wrote: »
    What you mean is you trust your own senses and experiences, but not those of others unless they align with your own.

    That's completely fallacious. I trust my own sense to a degree: I know I can be deluded or mislead. But I'll take for granted that the world and reality exists.

    No one here claimed it doesn t .

    Of course not: like I said you used solipsism as a cop out.

    You are making assumptions, and the cop out is yours.

    "Tu quoque" now?

    Et tu, Ludovico.

    Okay thanks for your intelligent contribution to the debate.

    Sometimes you have excellent points here and elsewhere, but just as often it is just assumptuous pseudo-intellectual and hypocritical box thinking that doesn t impress or convince in the slightest.

    Well tell me when I did pseudo-intellectual and hypocritical box thinking (ticking?) then. Otherwise I don't care if you're impressed or convinced or not. So far all you've been doing is parroting.
  • TheWizardOfIceTheWizardOfIce 'One of the Internet's more toxic individuals'
    Posts: 9,117
    FoxRox wrote: »
    A supreme being could choose to create but not intervene.

    That's just the Big Bang then isn't it? And we don't worship that do we? I've got no problem if people want to say that whatever caused the Big Bang is God. But once it had banged we've been on our own ever since so why are you worshipping an explosion - and an explosion that put in place cancer in babies?

    If there is an entity that could create but doesn't intervene, he still created the universe and the rules that govern it so he's just as guilty in giving babies cancer as if he could intervene but doesn't.

    If you accept creation as a deliberate act then you must accept baby cancer as a deliberate act also and therefore God as a callous monster who is not worthy of love and devotion in the slightest.


    Ludovico wrote: »
    Escalus5 wrote: »
    I've been looking at the last few pages of this thread and shaking my head. One has to wonder about atheists who choose a Bond forum -- of all places -- to smugly belittle people of faith and to continue to do so even after their targets say "Let's agree to disagree" and leave the thread.

    You think that maybe these charming personalities are overcompensating for something? "Ant-like significance," indeed.

    @Escalus5 you do understand that this thread was created by a theist not an atheist and in the very title it says unbelievers are welcomed.

    Now where did we belittle anyone? Some Christians here made some extraordinary claims. When we call them on it they refused to give an answer to back up said claims or added more extraordinary claims.It's not our fault is someone cannot justify his faith or cannot answer for the inconsistencies, contradictions and absurdities of his beliefs.

    And there are plenty of non Bond topics in this forum: presidential elections, football, what have you. Instead of sneakily asking us to shut up (and by the way I won't shut up on such topic), I suggest you should try to explain why we are wrong and what you believe in and why.
    patb wrote: »
    @FoxRox "Being an agnostic, if God is real, I wouldn’t say God “did this” to Bill. I think anything good or bad can happen to someone without any force of God, if He/it is there.2



    Whats that based on? how is that conclusion reached when we are dealing with a supreme being? You have intoduced tacit consent. As Hitch once put it "Heaven watches with folded arms."

    See from 5.20 in.....



    @Escalus5 No idea is beneath scrutiny and sometimes that leads the idea being belittled. There maybe believers in ghosts or aliens in flying saucers etc within the forum that feel hurt or belittled by previous threads. What are non believers meant to do?

    Agreeing to disagree (whilst an easy option) is an acceptance of the status quo and, if we are to progress (thank goodness we are) we have to keep going. We did not get where we are by agreeing to disagree. Cases are argued, points are made, feelings get hurt and culture/consensus evolves and changes.

    Flat Earth? Agree to disagree.

    Astrology? Agree to disagree

    Thor worshippers ? Agree to disagree

    FGM? Agree to disagree

    Sorry, cant let these things go. Nothing will change for the better if we are too busy worrying about upsetting people's feelings or causing offence.

    Was going to address @Escalus5's points but you boys seem to have got it all covered in those two excellent posts.
  • ThunderfingerThunderfinger Das Boot Hill
    Posts: 45,489
    Ludovico wrote: »
    Ludovico wrote: »
    FoxRox wrote: »
    @patb I say that because life is so random, and I have a hard time seeing how God intervenes in a good or bad way. A supreme being could choose to create but not intervene.

    What would then be the difference between an existant God and an inexistant God?
    Ludovico wrote: »
    Ludovico wrote: »
    Ludovico wrote: »
    What you mean is you trust your own senses and experiences, but not those of others unless they align with your own.

    That's completely fallacious. I trust my own sense to a degree: I know I can be deluded or mislead. But I'll take for granted that the world and reality exists.

    No one here claimed it doesn t .

    Of course not: like I said you used solipsism as a cop out.

    You are making assumptions, and the cop out is yours.

    "Tu quoque" now?

    Et tu, Ludovico.

    Okay thanks for your intelligent contribution to the debate.

    Sometimes you have excellent points here and elsewhere, but just as often it is just assumptuous pseudo-intellectual and hypocritical box thinking that doesn t impress or convince in the slightest.

    Well tell me when I did pseudo-intellectual and hypocritical box thinking (ticking?) then. Otherwise I don't care if you're impressed or convinced or not. So far all you've been doing is parroting.

    Right back at you, and the examples are too numerous. Let s just give up. It s like teaching a pig algebra. It won t get it anyway.
  • Posts: 15,125
    People giving the First Cause argument (the world exists and must have an initial cause therefore God), would first need to explain what makes them think said hypothetical first cause has any of the characteristics of a deity. Which I guess would be conscious of its own existence, willing to create the world, etc. I guess it could be a stupid creator like Ouranos?

    Equating God with something else: nature, "everything", "beauty" is just changing a name for another.
  • Posts: 15,125
    Ludovico wrote: »
    Ludovico wrote: »
    FoxRox wrote: »
    @patb I say that because life is so random, and I have a hard time seeing how God intervenes in a good or bad way. A supreme being could choose to create but not intervene.

    What would then be the difference between an existant God and an inexistant God?
    Ludovico wrote: »
    Ludovico wrote: »
    Ludovico wrote: »
    What you mean is you trust your own senses and experiences, but not those of others unless they align with your own.

    That's completely fallacious. I trust my own sense to a degree: I know I can be deluded or mislead. But I'll take for granted that the world and reality exists.

    No one here claimed it doesn t .

    Of course not: like I said you used solipsism as a cop out.

    You are making assumptions, and the cop out is yours.

    "Tu quoque" now?

    Et tu, Ludovico.

    Okay thanks for your intelligent contribution to the debate.

    Sometimes you have excellent points here and elsewhere, but just as often it is just assumptuous pseudo-intellectual and hypocritical box thinking that doesn t impress or convince in the slightest.

    Well tell me when I did pseudo-intellectual and hypocritical box thinking (ticking?) then. Otherwise I don't care if you're impressed or convinced or not. So far all you've been doing is parroting.

    Right back at you, and the examples are too numerous. Let s just give up. It s like teaching a pig algebra. It won t get it anyway.

    Good so you got choice. I just need one example. If I've been wrong then I'd make amend. It's that simple.

    And I'd be insulted about the pig analogy but then I remember that you generously said that I sometimes make relevant contributions here. Something I cannot reciprocate regarding your contribution to this thread. Not as far as I can remember anyway.
  • edited March 2018 Posts: 12,474
    Ludovico wrote: »
    FoxRox wrote: »
    @Ludovico Creation.

    I'm not sure I understand what you mean. The existence of the world indicates there's a God that created it? If that's what you mean how did you go from the existence of the universe to the existence of a creator?

    What I’m saying is all hypothetical. It’s only one possibility I’m throwing around for discussion. I do still find it hard to believe there could be just one planet in a whole galaxy full of space just right for animal/human life with all these intricate rules and laws. I find it hard to swallow everything is accdient. There could be a force that isn’t necessarily “God” that caused creation. I really don’t know; all I can do is speculate. But like I said, it seems strange Earth is accidental being the way it is among other planets.
  • edited March 2018 Posts: 4,617
    "I do still find it hard to believe there could be just one planet in a whole galaxy full of space just right for animal/human life with all these intricate rules and laws."

    Who is claiming that there is one planet containing life? More arrogance from the human species "we are so special". Who says they are intricate. We have no comparitive data. We may live on a really basic planet with far more comples ones out there with more complex rules and laws.

    Accidents (random events) happen and many humans find it hard to accept. But that says more about our limited imagination as a species rather than the likleyhood of the "accident" happening. Once you take in the size of the universe, it would be far more unlikley for nothing to happen. That would be something that I would struggle to comprehend.

    Latest estimates are around 40 billion Earth sized planets in the Milky Way. Surely, all of them being lifeless is more unlikley?
  • Posts: 15,125
    FoxRox wrote: »
    Ludovico wrote: »
    FoxRox wrote: »
    @Ludovico Creation.

    I'm not sure I understand what you mean. The existence of the world indicates there's a God that created it? If that's what you mean how did you go from the existence of the universe to the existence of a creator?

    What I’m saying is all hypothetical. It’s only one possibility I’m throwing around for discussion. I do still find it hard to believe there could be just one planet in a whole galaxy full of space just right for animal/human life with all these intricate rules and laws. I find it hard to swallow everything is accdient. There could be a force that isn’t necessarily “God” that caused creation. I really don’t know; all I can do is speculate. But like I said, it seems strange Earth is accidental being the way it is among other planets.

    The universe being huge and not knowing all that much about particular planets in it, it's possible and I'd even say likely that there are other lives maybe even intelligent ones in it. Even if we were living on the one and only planet capable of sustaining life, given the size of the universe, the amount of stars that did not make it, died, or could simply not provide the conditions for life I'd say our existence as a species seems on the contrary very much accidental and insignificant. Why would God have bothered creating everything else and sometimes very badly if his big project was the creation of this grain of sand and the primates who evolved on it?
  • ThunderfingerThunderfinger Das Boot Hill
    Posts: 45,489
    Chance is just the name we put on a law not recognized.
  • Posts: 15,125
    Chance is just the name we put on a law not recognized.

    Even if that was the case it's a huge jump from "we don't understand X" to "therefore God".
  • TheWizardOfIceTheWizardOfIce 'One of the Internet's more toxic individuals'
    Posts: 9,117
    Ludovico wrote: »
    FoxRox wrote: »
    Ludovico wrote: »
    FoxRox wrote: »
    @Ludovico Creation.

    I'm not sure I understand what you mean. The existence of the world indicates there's a God that created it? If that's what you mean how did you go from the existence of the universe to the existence of a creator?

    What I’m saying is all hypothetical. It’s only one possibility I’m throwing around for discussion. I do still find it hard to believe there could be just one planet in a whole galaxy full of space just right for animal/human life with all these intricate rules and laws. I find it hard to swallow everything is accdient. There could be a force that isn’t necessarily “God” that caused creation. I really don’t know; all I can do is speculate. But like I said, it seems strange Earth is accidental being the way it is among other planets.

    The universe being huge and not knowing all that much about particular planets in it, it's possible and I'd even say likely that there are other lives maybe even intelligent ones in it. Even if we were living on the one and only planet capable of sustaining life, given the size of the universe, the amount of stars that did not make it, died, or could simply not provide the conditions for life I'd say our existence as a species seems on the contrary very much accidental and insignificant. Why would God have bothered creating everything else and sometimes very badly if his big project was the creation of this grain of sand and the primates who evolved on it?

    And even if we could prove that we are the only planet that has life on it, that alone would not offer the slightest evidence that God exists at all.
  • ThunderfingerThunderfinger Das Boot Hill
    Posts: 45,489
    Are you confusing me for someone else again?
  • bondjamesbondjames You were expecting someone else?
    edited March 2018 Posts: 23,883
    Chance is just the name we put on a law not recognized.
    Precisely. We measure everything by our senses. That doesn't mean there aren't other senses. A blind person cannot see. It doesn't mean there is no sight. A deaf person cannot hear. It doesn't mean sound doesn't exist. I think folks should be mindful that just because something isn't observable by our measures doesn't imply it doesn't exist. Keep in mind I'm not opining on organized religion or the existence of 'God' here.

    Also, regarding creation being chaotic and impure: why is that so difficult to contemplate? Living species birth younger versions of themselves. The process is anything but clean. Moreover, anything can happen with and to a child. It could be born with a congenital disease for instance. That doesn't deter from the fact that it is the parents who created it. Creation is far from pure.

    Creation doesn't appear to be random however. Usually there is a trigger. That's because nothing about life or the universe is still. Everything is changing and moving, even if at imperceptible rates.
  • Posts: 12,474
    What I know is that we don’t know if other planets out there have life like ours, more or less inteligent. That may make us primal, depending on if there is more intelligent life out there (depends on your perspective too). We have no knowledge of any planets near us though that can sustain life like Earth. Maybe it’s not “special” in the grand scale of the universe if there is more life out there, but we still lucked out with 1 in our solar system. Like I said that will depend on your perspective, but I still think that’s neat in itself.
  • DragonpolDragonpol https://thebondologistblog.blogspot.com
    Posts: 18,281
    Are you confusing me for someone else again?

    Probably @Dragonpol.
  • Posts: 15,125
    @bondjames I'm not sure I'm following you. Tgere are things that exist and we don't know about, sure. Why assume the existence of any as plausible before we have some evidence of their existence? Whether it's God, invisible pixies, what have you.

    And if God exists I have no problem to say he's rather mediocre as a creator if not downright incompetent. Chaotic you say? At least parents trying to conceive usually works their best so that their baby is born in the best circumstances and environment.

    But in any case what is the difference between this hypothetical existing but incompetent God and one that does not exist?
  • DragonpolDragonpol https://thebondologistblog.blogspot.com
    Posts: 18,281
    I think that this video might help at this stage. I've been keeping it up my sleeve for a while and I'm sure we can all agreed on it:

  • bondjamesbondjames You were expecting someone else?
    edited March 2018 Posts: 23,883
    @Ludovico, I am not assuming the existence of God. I'm just suggesting that one shouldn't be so certain that he/she/it doesn't exist just because there is no observable evidence either. The earth was indeed observed by our senses to be flat until we could confirm that it was in fact round.

    I am not a God fearing man. However, I don't go out of my way to deny that there could be more to the universe than we now know. I don't have any answers, as I've said before. Just questions. Philosophers have debated and considered this for centuries. We are not the first to ask these questions. I don't believe in what organized religion has to say, but am open to abstract (and potentially random) forces having an impact on our lives. It is in our nature to want answers. That's what differentiates us from other living beings.

    We tend to look at things through our structured and regimented mental lens (e.g. if there is 'a God' then why does he consciously allow mischief, and suffering, and death etc. etc.). God doesn't have to exist in the manner that we think he should. He doesn't even need to be a being. He could be an 'it'. He could be an element of nature itself. A connective tissue between all living things and beings. One has to look at these things in a more theoretical and abstract way I think.

    Regarding the difference between a potential incompetent vs. a nonexistent God: I suppose there really is no difference to us minions. Or there is as much difference as pure chance.
  • Posts: 15,125
    @bondjames I don't think any atheist on this thread categorically denies the existence of a God. What we are saying is that 1)his existence is unlikely, 2)the burden of proof resides on the person making the positive assessment and 3)until something is proven to exist, whether it is God, the tooth fairy or the Flying Spaghetti Monster then the default position is to say that it does not.

    The thing to do when you have questions is to investigate not invent answers out of thin air. And even if for argument's sake there's a mysterious force that created the universe why call it God? You say God does not have to exist as how we define it... then again why call it god and how else can you eventually establish if there is one or even that there could be one? If God can be anything and anyone then the word is completely meaningless.
  • bondjamesbondjames You were expecting someone else?
    edited March 2018 Posts: 23,883
    I'm not disagreeing wirh you @Ludovico. I believe it's quite probable that if a God does in fact exist, such an entity will be quite difficult to qualify or quantify based on our current collective understanding of reality.

    Various religions have created plausible (to some anyway) constructs to explain the existence of something (or one) to make sense of our world. They've done it in ways that are consistent with their existing preconceptions (& for the most part created in their image). The fact that so many theories and perspectives exist should confirm this.

    I am in line with Gandhi's thinking from earlier on this thread. Does it really matter? Not to me. Believe. Don't believe. I couldn't care less. Just don't impose any dogma on me and I'll let you be.
  • ThunderfingerThunderfinger Das Boot Hill
    Posts: 45,489
    [quote="bondjames;854527" Just don't impose any dogma on me and I'll let you be.[/quote]

    Sound advice.
This discussion has been closed.