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thepyro222
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thepyro222
2,150 posts
Peasant

I grew up atheist for 16 years. I had always kept an open mind towards religion, but never really felt a need to believe in it. My sister started going to a Wednesday night children's program at a church. Eventually, I was dragged into a Christmas Eve service. Scoffing, I reluctantly went, assuming that this was going to be a load of crap, but when I went, I felt something. Something that I've never felt before. I felt a sense of empowerment and a sense of calling. Jesus called upon my soul, just like he did with his disciples. he wanted me to follow him. Now, my life is being lived for Christ. He died on the cross for my sins, and the sins of everyone who believes in him. He was beaten, brutalized, struck with a whip 39 times, made to carry a cross up to the stage of his death. This I believe to be true, and I can never repay him for what he has done.
I still have my struggles with Christianity, but I've found this bit of information most useful. Religion is not comprehensible in the human mind, because we cannot comprehend the idea of a perfect and supreme being, a God, but we can believe it in our heart, and that's the idea of faith. Faith is, even though everything rides against me believing in Jesus, I still believe in him because I know that it's true in my heart. I invite my fellow Brothers and sisters of the LORD to talk about how Jesus has helped you in your life. No atheists and no insults please

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HahiHa
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HahiHa
8,256 posts
Regent

in the period of time when we all were supposedly cells, humans were not yet there to meddle in nature, which further lessens the likelyhood of evolution

Are you saying that the crushing power of time and the unchained elements cannot do what we weak humans are able to do? 'Passive' or active change of environment, the result is the same, since it is a natural process that doesn't take into account who just meddled here.
Avorne
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Avorne
3,085 posts
Nomad

Those lizards weren't genetically engineered at all - they were merely introduced into a new environment. If you'd have taken the time to read the article for yourself then you might not have said something so silly. See what HahiHa said for the second part of my argument.

ShinyCowBeast
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ShinyCowBeast
120 posts
Nomad

Are you saying that the crushing power of time and the unchained elements cannot do what we weak humans are able to do? 'Passive' or active change of environment, the result is the same, since it is a natural process that doesn't take into account who just meddled here.


we humans are the most intelligent species. i dont believe that any other species could have ever devised a way of getting off an island, other than flying or swimming.i do not believe that lizards would ever fly or swim. humans brought the lizards off an island to somewhere else that countless uears would never get them. so yes, we weak humans can do what the "crushing power" of time cannot
Avorne
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Avorne
3,085 posts
Nomad

Sea levels rise and fall, plates shift and move around, this world is constantly (if very slowly) changing. Parts of land masses that were once peninsulas can become cut off from the mainland as water levels rise - forming a new island. Land bridges can allow species to travel from place to place and then these bridges get covered with water again.

HahiHa
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HahiHa
8,256 posts
Regent

Mountains, rivers, canyons, so many things that can divide a population. Migration of the populations themselves, changing of the ecologic niche, spreading of a certain species, spreading of a parasite, changes in the climate... so many things can change the settings, I can't see how you can ignore this.

And anyway, if you

believe that evolution(slight changes in characteristics between two generations) is true
, then you cannot
believe that evolution(everyting emerging from one cell) is false
, because the second is the consequence of the first. As soon as you have hereditary changes between two generations, that offer an increased probability to spread your alleles in the population, you have evolution. Just give it time and a non-static environment, and you'll have speciation.
ShinyCowBeast
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ShinyCowBeast
120 posts
Nomad

first off, how would the ocean fall? where would all the water go? if it froze, ocean levels would simply rise very slightly, because water expands when frozen. as for an ice age to create a land bridge, i cant see an ice age being severe enough to affect areas that close to the equator unless the sun went out, in which case animals would die of cold, and most likely lizards would actually die first, being coldblooded

ShinyCowBeast
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ShinyCowBeast
120 posts
Nomad

@ hahiha:
these slight changes go either way. breed a pair of dogs that are long haired. you may get puppies with shorter hair next generation. then the next could be even shorter, and the next could be long like the original. in the unlikely event that the hait was getting shorter a lot more than it was getting longer for a long period of time, the sun would have gone out by then

Avorne
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Avorne
3,085 posts
Nomad

You're probably not going to read it but here's an interesting article on ring species that has some information about how populations of certain species may become separated and evolve different over time.

ShinyCowBeast
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ShinyCowBeast
120 posts
Nomad

One way to study speciation indirectly is to examine geographical variation, or how the characteristics of organisms differ between different locations.

the lizards could not have undergone the geographical variation mentioned if no humans were to take them off of the island. and just a reminder, were supposed to be talking about religon
ShinyCowBeast
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ShinyCowBeast
120 posts
Nomad

gtg, you can discuss this without me

partydevil
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partydevil
5,129 posts
Jester

os much to comment on. so little interest because these guys do not WANT to listen what we are saying.

just 1 thing:

were supposed to be talking about religon


we were talking about god until 1 of you said that science can not disprove it either. what you said about science after this was so wrong (because you obviusly dunno what science actualy is) that we have to correct you.
HahiHa
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HahiHa
8,256 posts
Regent

@ShinyCowBeast, whenever you may read this: oceans rise and fall because of glaciation and warming. But those effects aren't extremely big, what you forgot and which has a much more dramatic effect, is plate tectonics. Continental plates and oceanic plates move, stray away or come together, raise mountains or give birth to volcanoes, that in turn create land. Land is also raised and lowered by plate tectonics, which results in an apparent raise or lowering of the water level. This can create passages between continents, or submerge them.

these slight changes go either way. breed a pair of dogs that are long haired. you may get puppies with shorter hair next generation. then the next could be even shorter, and the next could be long like the original. in the unlikely event that the hait was getting shorter a lot more than it was getting longer for a long period of time, the sun would have gone out by then

That's where genetic drift and natural selection comes in play. Consider a certain allele. It makes the fur of an animal grow a bit longer. Under specific conditions this can give an advantage, even a very slight one, to the carriers of the allele; they have to invest less in keeping their body temperature, and can invest more in food gathering and/or reproduction. If the conditions (cold) stay the same for long enough, under that selective pressure the allele will augment in percentage in the population, until it finally establishes itself.
What made your example not work, is that you had no selective pressure for a certain characteristic.

and just a reminder, were supposed to be talking about religon

This has to do with religions, since they're not needed to explain evolution, and thus become obsolete.
BigP08
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BigP08
1,455 posts
Shepherd

It's like not seeing a flaw in your own logic even if pointed with a finger. Humans have the ability to alter the course of how the world is run, both in minor scale and in major scale. So that "if he intended..." is a wrong clause, because it's being based on false.

But GOD controls everything. NOTHING happens that doesn't go according to his will, so everything that happens IS his will, including those who burn in Hell.
Get along with it, and check yourself.

I'm saying you should summarize it. These links aren't showing us scientific data or biblical study that I otherwise might not believe you on. These are opinionated sources, so why can't you just restate the opinion?
It's an example of Him respecting our free will. Period.

It's not respect if he allows us to unknowingly get tortured forever. See, this is my point. If God revealed himself and said "If you don't worship me, you will burn in Hell" THEN we would be choosing between heaven and hell. But without this, we don't have any reason to believe that we're going to Hell, so why is it fair for God to expect us to assume?
What love would he show you if he forced you to submit to him? By sending you away, he is simply giving you what you want: Life without the Christian God.

When did I say that's what I want? Atheists don't hate the Christian god; they simply don't believe he exists. If he exists, I'd rather be in heaven with him than be tortured forever without him. What love is he showing by allowing us to be tortured forever?
The reason you are cast away into hell is because God cannot bear the sight of sin. You may not stand in his presence if you aren't forgiven.

I could understand (but maybe disagree with) sending me to Hell for being a serial killer, or committing an act that is immoral regardless of whether or not a god exists. But for not believing he exists, there's no reason to send me to Hell, because I wouldn't continue to doubt his existence if I was in heaven.
If he simply made it impossible for you to believe anything else, by showing you absolute proof, he would take away your free will. What sort of loving God would do that?

What sort of loving God would allow me to be tortured forever?!
BY DEFINITION, IT IS EVIDENCE.

It depends what you are saying it is evidence for. It is evidence that a person or persons wrote it. It isn't evidence that any of the claims are true. It IS the claim. The claim is never evidence of itself. Now, if you had some way to provide evidence that there is validity to the claims in the Bible, then you've got evidence (and I'm not saying this is impossible or has never been done). But the evidence for the claims in the Bible still isn't the Bible; it's the evidence that the claims have validity.
God is not the one playing the game with us. Lucifer is.

God allows Lucifer to play this game, and God is all-powerful, therefore more powerful than Lucifer, therefore the game goes on by his own will, therefore he is ultimately responsible for it.
For it is written: But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. 1 Corinthians 2:14

I'm just going to address this real quick. If you're quoting the Bible to show me WHAT you believe, that's okay. But I asked you why this is just. When you quote the Bible at me to answer a WHY question, what this tells me is that you think that it's okay because the Bible says so. And that's fine for you to think that, but why should anyone else agree with you?
No, Cogito Ergo Sum tells you to doubt EVERYTHING.

Then doubt the Bible. Doubt God's existence. You don't have to deny it. I'm not denying it either.


I've really enjoyed this thorough discussion, but I'm apparently a little behind so I'm going to call it quits for now. I'm not going to stop reading what you guys post, but we're kinding going back and forth and there's plenty of atheists to address your points for me. Vesper and Shift, take it easy.
grimml
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grimml
879 posts
Nomad

Wow, ShinyCowBeast, you're saying that evolution is wrong and you argue against it but you don't even take 10 minutes of your time to read Avorne's link... To me it sounds like you don't WANT to accept evolution. You don't even give it the slightest chance. Otherwise you would read about it.

MageGrayWolf
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MageGrayWolf
9,462 posts
Farmer

but science is not always right, because like you said, its just experiments and theories. do you really believe in the big bang theory, or how we all were once a pile of goo? i think this shows how much science is guessing just as, from your point of view, religon is.


A theory is an explanation based on observation and experimentation that has been independently verified multiple times. Any guess work that comes into play is at the point of a hypothesis, even here it's not always a guess and when it is it's again based on evidence or the persons knowledge.
The methods science deploys allow it to correct errors allowing it to move closer to the truth. Religion does not do this, once it has a conclusion it will stay with it even when it goes against the facts at hand. We can see many theists doing this in just this thread alone as an example.

on the contray, evolution is a rather large part of science


Actually it's just a very well supported theory.

it dosent have to be about evolution. it was an example of a retarded theory. evolution does however work off of the theory that we emerged from the goo, which is another retarded theory


You've got that backwards, the theory of common decent relies on evolution. Also all of your examples are far from retarded.

So science has an overall agenda to serve? Because that is what you just said.


Science simply put means knowledge. What is general meant when talking about science is the method used to arrive at this knowledge, "n. the intellectual and practical activity encompassing the systematic study of the structure and behavior of the physical and natural world through observation and experiment"- Oxford Dictionary.

Do you see an agenda in that?

it may be among the most proven things in many people's eyes, but you can't just replace theory with fact, because it is still nothing more than a theory.


Fact; An objective, verifiable observation. They can be, and have been, verified many times.

Theory; A scientific explanation of related observations or events based on hypotheses and verified multiple times by different independent researchers.

Theories can also be facts, such as the heliocentric solar system, gravity or the germ theory of disease. These are facts but they are also theories as the offer explanation. Evolution is also both fact and theory as it fits both definitions.

looks like he also agrees that evolution is nothing more than a theory


Yes I do but notice I'm also agreeing that it's a fact as well.

Evolution: Fact and Theory

Wow, ShinyCowBeast, you're saying that evolution is wrong and you argue against it but you don't even take 10 minutes of your time to read Avorne's link... To me it sounds like you don't WANT to accept evolution. You don't even give it the slightest chance. Otherwise you would read about it.


I sometimes wonder what the line between ignorance and stupidity is.
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