How Can Anyone Believe in God?

[Vro]

this seems like a rather arbitrary constraint. you cant claim to respect faith while at the same time saying that only certain conclusions that faith leads to are "allowable."

Why are you attacking my personal level of respect for others' faith? I'm not prohibiting nor enforcing anyone to do anything with their faith. I do not believe in God, nor do I care if others do. I can make whatever personal claim I want with how much I respect faith, because it is my respect, not the general public's.

if you respect faith, you have given up the justification to morally judge people that use it, no matter what the results are.

That's completely false. Of course I can respect something to a certain degree, especially if you take it to a radical result. I can respect talented smash players. Does that mean I want to be like them? M2K spends his entire life currently on it. I can respect polite people. Does that mean I want to meet or respect someone that doesn't have a spine? I can respect fire, for the power it holds. Does that mean I want everyone to commit arson?

My fire analogy completely counters your "you have to respect all usages" argument. There is a vast difference between admiring a quality, and commending a radical extenuation of the quality. Hell, I can admire someone for being a fast runner. Does that mean I want them to run quickly from the police? Saying "it's all the same" is complete blasphemy. It is all fire. That doesn't mean I admire every single aspect of fire.

And, I'm not morally judging anyone. All I said was it was slightly admirable to ignore facts and still place faith in a higher being. This is my opinion, and I can have leveling degrees of it. So can you.

 

[snex]

you are again making a false comparison with fire. fire is an object, it is not a method for discovery. faith is claimed to be just that. when you have something that claims to be a method of discovery, and you claim to respect that method, then you have no justification to disrespect the results of that discovery.

an apt analogy would be science. i respect science, because science is a method of discovery that WORKS. but if i were a wacko fundy christian who claimed to respect science, and yet rejected evolution, you would rightly call me inconsistent. i cant respect science while rejecting evolution. likewise, you cant respect faith while at the same time rejecting its conclusions.

 

[SSBbo]

if i were a wacko fundy christian who claimed to respect science, and yet rejected evolution, you would rightly call me inconsistent. i cant respect science while rejecting evolution. likewise, you cant respect faith while at the same time rejecting its conclusions.

1. i don't know any christian that rejects evolution. evolution is demonstratable due to natural selection.
2. You made a horrible example that is extremely vague and doesn't make any sense.
You can respect something without agreeing with it's conclusions, because you can't disprove it, or because you agree with certain aspects of it. which brings us back to your example, someone that disagrees with evolution could still agree with the bonding of elements on a subatomic level to make new substances, or turbines at dams making power by spinning after having water flow through it, or perpetual motion in outer space.

 

[snex]

1. i don't know any christian that rejects evolution. evolution is demonstratable due to natural selection.

then youre not only new to this thread, youre new to this planet. more christians out there believe in creationism than evolution.

2. You made a horrible example that is extremely vague and doesn't make any sense.
You can respect something without agreeing with it's conclusions, because you can't disprove it, or because you agree with certain aspects of it. which brings us back to your example, someone that disagrees with evolution could still agree with the bonding of elements on a subatomic level to make new substances, or turbines at dams making power by spinning after having water flow through it, or perpetual motion in outer space.

uhh wha??

if you respect science as a method of discovery, then you accept its conclusions, including evolution. you dont get to pick and choose which scientific conclusions you accept and which you deny. theyre all generated by the same method - if one is correct, theyre all correct.

if you respect faith as a method of discovery, then you accept its conclusions, including "lets hijack airplanes and crash them into skyscrapers." you dont get to pick and choose which faith conclusions you accept and which you deny. theyre all generated by the same method - if one is correct, theyre all correct.

 

[SSBbo]

1. welcome to the 21st century. religious people now believe in intelligent design (which is the creation of a single-celled organism, by god, that evolved into every living thing on the planet.)

2. if you believe in all of the conclusions of something, that more than likely means you believe in it in every single aspect (which is like it becoming your religion, primary method of discory, philosophy, etc.).

i believe in a few things about the buddhist religion (you shouldn't regret, you shouldn't covet, and you should live peacefully), so i respect it, and can see why other people choose that religion, but I'm not buddhist, because i am not inclined to believe in it entirely, just because i think some of it is right.

*sidenote* only a few nuts that run crazy with religion (less than one percent of religious people) hijack planes, bomb hospitals, etc.

 

[Jack Kieser]

Intelligent design is the assertion that "certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection". - Taken straight from the Wiki.

Intelligent design is just a rehashing of original Creation Science: God intelligently created us to be what we are now. So, no, people who believe in intelligent design (in its truest and most pure form) don't believe in evolution, because we were created as we are now.

 

[snex]

1. welcome to the 21st century. religious people now believe in intelligent design (which is the creation of a single-celled organism, by god, that evolved into every living thing on the planet.)

i hate to be the one to burst your bubble, but you are completely wrong. "intelligent design" is just a relabeling of creationism done to try to sneak it into public schools. see kitzmiller va dover area school district, 2005. furthermore, "intelligent design" is still nowhere near as popular as pure young earth creationism is. polls are constantly showing very high percentages of people asserting that life was created within the last 10,000 years.

2. if you believe in all of the conclusions of something, that more than likely means you believe in it in every single aspect (which is like it becoming your religion, primary method of discory, philosophy, etc.).

i believe in a few things about the buddhist religion (you shouldn't regret, you shouldn't covet, and you should live peacefully), so i respect it, and can see why other people choose that religion, but I'm not buddhist, because i am not inclined to believe in it entirely, just because i think some of it is right.

*sidenote* only a few nuts that run crazy with religion (less than one percent of religious people) hijack planes, bomb hospitals, etc.

you are analyzing what i said backwards. a common misconception of science is that it is just a bunch of facts that you can list off. this is wrong. science is a method of discovery. if the method WORKS, then its conclusions will be correct. you cant have a method that WORKS yet spits out wrong conclusions.

so if you think that the conclusions spit out by applying faith are wrong, then faith DOES NOT WORK. so if it doesnt work, why do you insist on using it?

 

[Vro]

You are right about faith being an improper method of discovery. However, you are clearly misunderstanding my and others' respect for it. A quality in a person is much different from my attitude towards discovering truth. I can admire any aspect of any person to any degree I want. That doesn't mean I believe that that aspect is the truth seeking one. Empirical science will always be the closest to the truth, regardless of what I admire. However, at a personal level, any quality in anyone can be admired, regardless if you want to have a "method of discovery."

 

[snex]

You are right about faith being an improper method of discovery. However, you are clearly misunderstanding my and others' respect for it. A quality in a person is much different from my attitude towards discovering truth. I can admire any aspect of any person to any degree I want. That doesn't mean I believe that that aspect is the truth seeking one. Empirical science will always be the closest to the truth, regardless of what I admire. However, at a personal level, any quality in anyone can be admired, regardless if you want to have a "method of discovery."

ok... then now the question becomes: "why would you ever admire a quality in a person that can potentially lead to the hijacking of airplanes and crashing them into skyscrapers?"

rather than admiring the faith of good people, you should admire their goodness. admiring their faith is like admiring the brokenness of a clock simply because it shows the correct time twice a day.

 

[adumbrodeus]

then youre not only new to this thread, youre new to this planet. more christians out there believe in creationism than evolution.

Curious, do you have evidence to this effect?

uhh wha??

if you respect science as a method of discovery, then you accept its conclusions, including evolution. you dont get to pick and choose which scientific conclusions you accept and which you deny. theyre all generated by the same method - if one is correct, theyre all correct.

if you respect faith as a method of discovery, then you accept its conclusions, including "lets hijack airplanes and crash them into skyscrapers." you dont get to pick and choose which faith conclusions you accept and which you deny. theyre all generated by the same method - if one is correct, theyre all correct.

I think at issue here is that believers in creationalism believe that evolution is bad science. They may be wrong, but that's not the point.


Also, faith isn't a process, it's a preconception (well really a set of preconceptions, and which varies from religion to religion). Methods of applying faith into one's life are a process, but they vary DRASTICALLY. I already correct you on this point.

Whenever somebody says "my faith leads me to do X", there's a hidden "P implies Q", and the statement itself is "P therefore Q".

The scientific method is a set of preconceptions about a method of discovery being accurate and effective, so it is both.

Really, you're being way too categorical, if I claim I arrived at the conclusion that white swans don't exist via the scientific method, would you be forced to reject either my conclusion or the scientific method? No, just because I claim I followed the scientific method perfectly doesn't mean I actually did.

This is especially true of the scientific method where it's fundamental to doubt the conclusions and continually test and retest. The entire premise of the scientific method is that any conclusion that is not existential is to be doubted and never accepted. So not accepting conclusions of the scientific method is a good thing, you're not supposed to. But refusing to recognize the existence of a null hypothesis, and/or categorizing something without evidence as the null hypothesis IS a violation. You can believe something is a viable alternative and test in an attempt to disprove but that's a different story.

 

[SSBbo]

Jack, that's Wiki, it's not always right.
anywho, Ben Stein is who explained intelligent design to me, and he's my role model (you can't argue with mansa, dude).

even if i am wrong about the definition of intelligent design (ben stein is wrong as well, then), i believe in something entirely different. i'm sure most religious scientists believe what i do as well.

alright now i see what you mean about the scientific method. but still, it's virtually impossible for life to be created the science explains it: protiens lined up in a sequence of four over 280 times in a row randomly, among the perfectly balanced conditions needed for life (on a planet in it's star's habitable zone, with oxegen, nitrogen, water, energy, etc.), without being destroyed before it could creat a signifigant amount of offspring (i don't think "offspring" is the correct term when refering to asexual, single-celled organisms) for the species to survive.

oh and, kudos to adumbrodeus.

 

[Aesir]

Curious, do you have evidence to this effect?

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/11/22/opinion/polls/main657083.shtml

"Americans do not believe that humans evolved, and the vast majority says that even if they evolved, God guided the process. Just 13 percent say that God was not involved. But most would not substitute the teaching of creationism for the teaching of evolution in public schools."

Many evangelicals think creation should be taught along with creation. The discovery institute often sites that Evolution can't explain why certain processes happen, despite the fact they have but that's an entirely different topic.

 

[AltF4]

alright now i see what you mean about the scientific method. but still, it's virtually impossible for life to be created the science explains it: protiens lined up in a sequence of four over 280 times in a row randomly, among the perfectly balanced conditions needed for life (on a planet in it's star's habitable zone, with oxegen, nitrogen, water, energy, etc.), without being destroyed before it could creat a signifigant amount of offspring (i don't think "offspring" is the correct term when refering to asexual, single-celled organisms) for the species to survive.

The Anthropic Principle.

I should really make a sticky or something for these bogus arguments that are put forth over and over.


If you played the lottery and won, and were sitting around with millions of dollars lying around in your living room, would you question whether or not you won the lottery by chance? Saying to yourself "There's no way this money could have some from the lottery! The chances of me winning that are unimaginably low! Obviously the money must have come from god!" Of course you wouldn't.

The fact remains: You are sitting with a but load of money, so obviously you DID win the lottery. Despite how low the chances might seem.



Similarly with abiogenesis: Life DOES exist on our planet. So obviously it DID occur. It doesn't matter how unlikely we think it was, it DID HAPPEN.

Scientists (with more intellect and expertise than Ben Stein) are currently trying to figure out exactly how it works. But how is that a reason to substitute a god in?!

 

[SSBbo]

i like the example you used, but i have a philoshophy:
if you can't disprove something, don't deny the possiblility.
even i admit i could be wrong.

 

[victra♥]

You can't disprove Ganondorf, don't deny his possibility.

 

[SSBbo]

You can't disprove Ganondorf, don't deny his possibility.

you are wrong my friend. ganondorf is impossible because a real person that slow wouldn't be allowed to have a character based on him on SSBB.

also, seriously, someone made him up and that is known (because the person that made him up would admit to making him up), but if someone made up god we wouldn't know until we died.... wait... death brings up my next point...
i know someone that has died. he is super-christian, now because he went to hell and back (he used to be agnostic), even though it's contradictory to my statement "hell is a mindset". I've also seen god, as i was dying out at see. he gently pushed my back onto the earth as a friend of mine rescued me... call it hallucination, if you will, but i keep my grip on reality very well.

 

[Deleted member]

Alt thinks he's nullifying you guys when he brings up the anthropic principle, but he's not. He's correct in the fact that obviously there will be life on a life-giving planet, but what makes that planet be able to give life? I don't know the answer, but that's the next question. So don't cop out with Smash jokes when you've got another tangent or four to go.

This is where he is wrong. He's right, but he's assuming that it ends there. It doesn't. I don't agree with his lottery analogy because in the lottery you consciously decide to play it. We just happened.

 

[SSBbo]

you consciously decide to play it. We just happened.

*clap, clap clap* exactly. i believe i used the word "randomly" as well.

free will is one of the biggest reasons i believe in god.

 

[victra♥]

you are wrong my friend. ganondorf is impossible because a real person that slow wouldn't be allowed to have a character based on him on SSBB.

also, seriously, someone made him up and that is known (because the person that made him up would admit to making him up), but if someone made up god we wouldn't know until we died.... wait... death brings up my next point...
i know someone that has died. he is super-christian, now because he went to hell and back (he used to be agnostic), even though it's contradictory to my statement "hell is a mindset". I've also seen god, as i was dying out at see. he gently pushed my back onto the earth as a friend of mine rescued me... call it hallucination, if you will, but i keep my grip on reality very well.

So if I made up something and didn't admit that I made him up, it would be okay? Okay, i believe in Kazuba the Flying Invisible Red Giant of the Sea. I know he's real because i died and then I came back and I saw Kazuba's evil brother Abuzak the Swimming Invisible Purple ****** of the mountains. Trust me, I talked to Kazuba when I drowned at sea because he was gently pushing back to the shore through the body of my friend. It wasn't a hallucination, i keep my grip on reality very well. (I am Atheist after all.)

free will is one of the biggest reasons i believe in god.

Free will is also something that will send you into ****ation for eternity.

 

[EC_Joey]

Ben Stein is not a member of Mensa. He's not a real scientist, but he has been publicly denounced by some real scientists.

The building blocks of life were there. There was plenty of time for something random to occur that arranged things in exactly the right position at exactly the right time. If you have the ingredients and you have the time, who's to say something is impossible, however slim the chances?

It's like the hypothetical situation with the monkeys in a room with typewriters. Given infinite time, with the monkeys randomly pressing buttons, the works of Shakespeare can be written. The chances of it happening are impossibly small, but with enough time it is a possibility.

 

[SSBbo]

I'm not saying it would be okay if you made something up, i'm strictly saying that it is a fact (you can prove it with lie detectors) someone made up ganondorf.

also don't mock, my friends experience with death or my near-death experience. i didn't say "thorough the body of my friend that saved me, i said "seen". when i said "as" i meant "while" i should have made it more clear.

PS. to many stars, use a word and i'll understand you and reply.

 

[AltF4]

Delorted:

If you don't like my analogy, Del, that's fine. It doesn't prove any points, only illustrate them. But you clearly understand what I'm saying so you can ignore it.

And the Anthropic Principle certainly DOES nullify the following argument:

"it's virtually impossible for life to be created the science explains it: protiens lined up in a sequence of four over 280 times in a row randomly, among the perfectly balanced conditions needed for life (on a planet in it's star's habitable zone, with oxegen, nitrogen, water, energy, etc.), without being destroyed before it could creat a signifigant amount of offspring"

Essentially saying:

-The odds of abiogenesis occurring on its own are very small, and therefore did not happen. God must have done it.


If you find that to be a good argument, then please enlighten me as to why.

 

[SSBbo]

I'm not saying it didn't happen or that god had to have done it, i'm saying that i don't think it did happen, i think it could have happened but i don't believe it happened.

 

[Deleted member]

Seems like we're both on the same level. I just wanted to clear some things up.

 

[EC_Joey]

I'm not saying it didn't happen or that god had to have done it, i'm saying that i don't think it did happen, i think it could have happened but i don't believe it happened.

If it didn't happen, why is there life on Earth? What's your explanation for the origin of life? So help me God (hehe) if you say some supernatural force put life on this planet...

 

[AltF4]

Of course, SSBo. I don't pretend to "know" for certain anything. It would be unscientific to assert that something is known for certain. Nobody is making that claim.

However, for the beliefs that we do hold, there must be a reason. Literally, name any belief that I hold and I can tell you exactly why I believe it and what evidence I have to support it in favor of other possible explanations.


YOU seem to be under the impression that god created life on Earth. If you believe that, there MUST be some REASON to. What is that reason? Could it possibly be that it says so in the bible? Is that your reason? Take a good look at yourself for a minute and try telling me with a straight face that the bible is a credible source of information in spite of overwhelming empirical evidence to the contrary.

If you so blindly believe something that you are told without ever critically questioning its validity. If you are so easily persuaded by words written in a book, do me a favor. A big favor.

Never, ever vote.

 

[snex]

given the fact that the most abundant elements in the universe are also the most abundant elements in life (except for helium), and the fact that the most readily-molecule-forming atom (carbon) is also the basis for life, the formation of life seems rather likely, dontcha think?

there are billions of stars in our galaxy alone, among billions of galaxies. most of the stars we have been able to examine with enough resolution have planets. many of the planets, moons, asteroids and comets in our own solar system are teeming with organic molecules. earth, possibly titan, and mars all have or at one time had liquid water. and your silly assertion that the creation of life would require 200+ proteins randomly assembling themselves has absolutely NOTHING in common with scientific attempts to learn about abiogenesis. it is a dishonest screen put up by professional creationists to con you.

 

[AltF4]

^^^

In fact, the whole "life on Mars" question has been reopened. Those bubbles on the martian rock that were initially thought to be fossilized bacteria was ruled out. Well a new discovery or two recently put that topic back into controversy. It might have been bacteria after all.

If life existed on both Earth AND Mars, then clearly abiogenesis is not only possible, but rather likely as opposed to unlikely!

 

[Deleted member]

Alt, I don't think the Bible is a credible source of information. I think that instead of people taking the Bible literally, they should simply see it as a collection of allegories and morals.

Following the 10 Commandments is pretty easy without being Christian. This is an example of what I'm trying to say. However, I have no current explanation as to why the Bible pontificates that gay sex is a sin, and other liberty flaws like that.

Who is to say that Adam and Eve are human? What if they were monkeys? That would incorporate both evolution and an Aesop-style fable with a good moral.

Again, I enjoy building off your points. It's fun.

 

[EC_Joey]

Who is to say that Adam and Eve are human? What if they were monkeys?

I assume this is an honest mistake.

 

[SSBbo]

i'm not going to tell you that just because the bible says something, it's right. i've read some of the bible, the book isaiah predicts the coming of jesus (most people at least say that he existed), even with somewhat of a neutral (not religious and religious) standpoint on the subject.
why i believe in god is: the isaiah thing, and the possiblities of emotion, complex thought, and free will.

on the topic of mars, i think otherwise, if life did exist on mars, i think it would be outragious abiogenesis could've created life on two occasions so close to each other.

 

[AltF4]

That's because you're assuming that it's an unlikely event. That may not be the case. It could clearly be the case that abiogenesis is very likely to happen. You just keep making one baseless assumption after another.

Don't even get me started on Free Will. Go dig up my thread on that if you wish. (Not that other one that somebody else made)

 

[GhostAnime]

they were monkeys?

talking monkeys you mean?

i don't buy it.

 

[SSBbo]

so what is your oppinion on free will? convert me, lol.

 

[EC_Joey]

why i believe in god is: the isaiah thing, and the possiblities of emotion, complex thought, and free will.

I assume you're saying that God endowed mankind with these unique characteristics. Animals have emotions and free will, but they rely on instinct more. As for complex thought, primates have the ability to use tools for problem solving, and communicate through sign language. In the end, everything that we are capable of in some way, directly or indirectly, contributes to our survival as a species.

on the topic of mars, i think otherwise, if life did exist on mars, i think it would be outragious abiogenesis could've created life on two occasions so close to each other.

The distance from the Sun plays an important role in the presence of life on this planet. If Mars had the proper conditions for life, it's not outrageous for Mars to also be able to possess life.

so what is your oppinion on free will? convert me, lol.

He has no obligation to you. Go look it up yourself if you want to know.

 

[SSBbo]

i'm not saying he only endowed humans with these things.

i know that the habitable zone plays an important role, but it would still be rare for life to appear twice within the same solar system.

 

[lonejedi]

I want to just say something that's been bugging me lately. How are athiests are so concerned that there are actually people who believe stuff like Christianity. If we're going by what you think, and we just die and it's over, why make a deal about christians? We're all going to end up the same way then, if we get enjoyment from Christianity why should you stop us? If we're going on your basis alone, you shouldn't lose respect for us because we believe something that would be false.

What bothers me the most about athiests is they are so quick to assume that we only go to church and are christians because we are in fear of ****ation. Quite the contrary, well at least for me. Im not being controlled by those who are over me at my church, I go because I enjoy it, not because of fear.

 

[snex]

based on what calculations? you have NO basis, thats your problem. you just assert its unlikely, but neither you nor any other human currently has any calculation that can tell you this. we simply dont know.

and have you actually ever read bible prophecy? it is not impressive at all, considering the people that came around later deliberately could have lied to make it seem to fit.

 

[snex]

I want to just say something that's been bugging me lately. How are athiests are so concerned that there are actually people who believe stuff like Christianity. If we're going by what you think, and we just die and it's over, why make a deal about christians? We're all going to end up the same way then, if we get enjoyment from Christianity why should you stop us? If we're going on your basis alone, you shouldn't lose respect for us because we believe something that would be false.

What bothers me the most about athiests is they are so quick to assume that we only go to church and are christians because we are in fear of ****ation. Quite the contrary, well at least for me. Im not being controlled by those who are over me at my church, I go because I enjoy it, not because of fear.

you keep talking about how "its all the same when we die" and how atheists should therefore shut up.

uhh hello? atheists are ALIVE HERE AND NOW, and we have to deal with the stupid behavior caused by your silly beliefs.

 

[Jack Kieser]

This is just personally, but I became concerned about religion because of personal experience with extremism. It's tough growing up as a kid being told by your parents to question everything and being told by your grandparents that said questioning will d*mn you for eternity. My family used to own a restaurant, and I'd wait tables there. Every Sunday, a group from this church down the road from us (a big one, too) would come in for lunch... and I swear I've never heard more racist, hateful, and intolerant things in my life.

Do I think that it is the direct cause of religion that these things happen? Of course not. My grandparents were intolerant of my free thought because that is their personality ('my way is the only way'), but religion gave them the vessel to justify it (for years they tried guilt tripping me with the Catholic 'original sin' crap). Same with the group of Baptists that came in for lunch every week. They were intolerant people by nature, but the teachings of their pastor, along with the crutch that religion is often used as allowed them to think that they were perfectly justified in calling blacks, gays, and immigrants ungodly; my dad is a mainland Greek, so that always pissed me off.

That's why I care; sure religion has done some great stuff (Mother Teresa, etc.), but it has done WAY more bad stuff (Crusades, Inquisition, 'Jihad'). As far as I'm concerned, that means that I'd rather see people use critical thinking to break away from religion than have people become more complacent in ignorance, even if that ignorance is used for good.