Heartless wrote:People can't misinterpret science because science is fact. It isn't up for interpretation. Religion is blatantly up for personal interpretation...
At any rate, how could they be doing something "wrong" if they are interpreting their religious text in a way that seems right to them? If something like religion is so open for personal interpretation (you said so yourself!), then explain how their are such definitive "rights" and "wrongs." (The answer is that right and wrong is subjective).
Science isn't something that is supposed to be able to be interpreted anyway. But face it, a person could get science wrong after reading about it, couldn't they? They could misunderstand it, couldn't they?
Interpretation doesn't even matter. Someone could simply read something from science and it makes them mad so they do somethin ver bad based upon it.
It's not about what the thing, science or religion, is. It's about what people can do with it.
Dr Frankenollie wrote:But if religion didn't exist, the hypothetical boy probably wouldn't have become a terrorist! In my story, the boy did not seek power and wasn't greedy, but simply wanted to do what he saw as good and ethical - to convert everyone to his faith, even using force to do so.
And I highly doubt that 'any kind of information' would make him act in a negative way; religion is often forcefully pressed upon children very early on in their lives, and when it comes to someone like the impressionably boy, it's doubtless that the negativity comes from the religion itself (telling them to stone gays and whatnot), rather than the person.
Yes and someone could have read the science books that said gays had a disorder and used that to cure gays thinking it was ethical.
And is science pressed upon children? Yup. Does religion have to be pressed on children? Nope.
Once again my point is proven, it's not the things, science or religion that's wrong or would make the world better upon removal. It is what people do with them that can be wrong and should not be done.
Goliath wrote:If you don't know how comparisons work, please refrain from making them, okay?
Religion is an idea. It was created by people. People believe in it. If they didn't, it wouldn't exist anymore. You're not born with a religion.
Race is not an idea. It is not created by people. It is not something people believe in. Race is a fact. You're born into a certain race.
How hard is it to grasp the difference and to see the comparison is utterly ludicrous?
Seriously.
Once again. What I was comparing was not the things, which you are talking about, but how people react to or what they do with those things.
ALRIGHT HERE WE GO. GIANT MEGA REPSONSES TO LOTS OF PEOPLE. Spelling mistakes of mine will probably ABOUND, sorry in advance.
Dr Frankenollie wrote:Sorry for calling you 'loony', however.
Then I'm sorry for calling you a jerk.
Dr Frankenollie wrote:I don't think child indoctrination should be allowed.
I agree more or less, but read on for that.
Dr Frankenollie wrote:I know movies I love are about challenges and conflict, but that is completely irrelevant. There are war and horror movies that I like, but I wouldn't like to be in the situations shown in those films!
I meant that even though these things are bad, they have in turn given you some pleasure in life, something you really enjoy to watch and talk about. It's an example of how complicated life is. If life was the black and white you painted of good and evil, and it was just the kind of all good like you think it should be, we wouldn’t have such complex pleasures.
Dr Frankenollie wrote:And WHY must we prove ourselves worthy of Heaven? Who dictates these ethics? What sane person would believe that countless humans going through decades of suffering and sadness is okay, simply to earn God's love?
You have know idea what Heaven holds for you. You can't say whether all the pain will feel now is not worth Heaven because you haven't been there. All we have is a Bible that says so and the belief that it does. You either believe it or don't, but you must understand that's the idea, that Heaven will be worth it all. You don't think it's possible but it certainly always will be possible unless you prove it's not. I know you've probably wanted to tell me this yourself, but I have to say to you, you must open your mind. Of course there
could be something worth such pain.
Dr Frankenollie wrote:Well if they had to go through intense pain and suffering before going to a place of eternal bliss, I don't think that's very 'loving' of God. As for the fact that it may have been a sin to pray to other gods...if God does exist and showed these Jews no mercy because of the other deities they prayed to, then God is a sick, twisted, evil monster.
No, that's what you
think. The point of God's love is that Heaven will be worth all the pain. That is love. Because the pain and challenges are necessary, and Heaven is so good, that's love. Is it a different way of loving than pur parents do? Yes, because God isn't the same as our parents, he's a being who knows things and must do things our parents wouldn't because our parents are human and he is not. He is like us, but not the same.
Dr Frankenollie wrote:Disney Duster wrote:No I think if you don't believe you will get some retribution, but perhaps even non-believers will get into Heaven. All I know is that you should believe. There's no reason it would be bad for you not to believe, it could only help.
Tell that to women, gypsies and homosexuals persecuted by religion. Tell that to the victims of 9/11. Tell that to the victims of the Crusades...
That's what some people do in addition to believing. I'm talking about believing just by itself.
Disney Duster wrote:The fact you have such a vendetta against it shows it's not that you really don't believe. You are purposely choosing not to and don't want to listen to anyone who can explain why your reasons for not believing don't fly since there is no reason. You can some up with excuses but there's really no specific reason. Believing isn't supposed to be based on evidence yet you say that's what you need. That leads into a nonsensical circle because you are supposed to believe without evidence, other than existence itself and the Bible.
Dr Frankenollie wrote:Duster, I AM open-minded, but the probability of God's existence (his existence cannot yet be scientifically proved or disproved) is highly unlikely to me, and as there is no real, concrete, factual, undoubtable evidence suggesting that he exists, I ignore the possibility of his existence. I have a sort-of vendetta against religion because I think it's dangerous and, at the very least, child indoctrination/brainwashing should be stopped.
I respect your open-mindedness. But I'm telling you believing is a choice, you are supposed to do it with no evidence (or rather, very little evidence, because just the world existing and having some good in it is evidence). That's what it's about. That's what believing is. And you're choosing not to do it. And you have no good reason to other than you don't want to feel stupid or like "an idiot" like that woman said. But merely believing that something made all this and loves you and will make you happy in the end is in itself a very good belief. Why you would not choose to believe it when it's not proven impossible is beyond me.
Dr Frankenollie wrote:...what could possibly make you think that one part of the Bible isn't God's word or not?
I've heard that the Bible has been changed over time, possibly by the Romans and others. And I could believe that the Bible had things added to it simply by the men who wrote it, as well, in addition to God's actual word. Some things just are impossible to believe in, like that being gay is wrong, I'd commit suicide if it really was. I think God wants us to use our hearts and brains when reading the Bible and trying to figure out what to do. He gave them to us after all.
Dr Frankenollie wrote:If God didn’t want us to sit back and let prayers do the work for us, then why in many Holy Books (especially the Bible) is it repeatedly stated that whatever you pray for will come true? It doesn’t matter what any of us say – if ‘God’ says he can do everything for us, then who are we to suggest that we should earn our goals and work hard instead?
Where does it say that if you pray it will definately come true? Anyway, I highly doubt the Bible would mean exactly that, in a literal sense. It could be something that isn't true that they put in. It could mean that you have to have a certain level of faith and be the kind of person to ask the right prayers and they would come true. I dunno. I just know that no Christian expects their prayers will definately certainly come true just as they asked them.
You know, a big complaint of yours is that God isn't as loving as you want him. But you're talking about your definition and requirements for love. Just like your definition and requirements for what is fair, and for tests. Your a human being trying to basically say "Why isn't an all-powerful God us humans can't fully comprehend more like humans?" That's what you're saying. So I think you know the answer now, too. We do compare God to us, we say he is
like a parent,
like a person. But he's not the same. He sets up things you call evil, but the only thing that can be evil is a human by their will. He sets up challenges, and are they awful? Yes, they are awful. Because we are supposed to go through awful things, even awful Hitler with Jews and rapists with children things. We're supposed to go through really, really, bad things because the really really great heaven is worth it all. Now, this may sound bad to you but I don’t care, I’m going to say it: While I don’t particularly like the horrible, horrifying things that are sometimes allowed, I do like that everything is allowed. That we have all this freedom. Well, actually there are some things I wish would never happen, but in a way, knowing that pain, feeling something about it, makes me feel alive and is kind of a weird joy of life, and knowing that in heaven everything and everyone will be okay…it’s amazing to me, in a very good way.
I would have a problem if there were some people who never ever had happiness in their lives, but the people you say do, people in third world countries and stuff, actually you don’t know if they have no happiness. One time I have a discussion with my friend over how the people in those countries have terrible problems but they don’t have the problems we have here in first world countries like families who hate them and who get really bored with all the stuff that’s supposed to make them happy and who cut themselves because they’re so dulled by happy first world life. The people in third world countries usually still have their families and their problems kind of keep them together. They don’t have time to fight and be miserable to each other, their too busy trying to help and comfort each other. They realize love is the most important thing and may find happiness in their family and friends simply being together and so loving.
Dr Frankenollie wrote:I know you and Duster will simply hand-wave this with the fact that ‘God’ is supposedly omnipotent and therefore beyond nature (which is nothing more than an immature, unthinking copout)
This is a heart of what's going wrong. God is omnipotent. He is beyond what we know of physics and nature. That's the point. That's what we believe in. That's what we've always believed in. It's what we're always agruing about what we believe in versus what you do. This is the main thing you need to get. You are actually the one who is doing "the unthinking" (your words, not mine!). Of course you
are thinking, you are smart, but you're not thinking of everything. You're not opening your mind to all possibilities. Of a God who is beyond what your human mind can think of. You are just thinking that as a human you should know how it all should be, and that God should be like a human too. No, God just needs to have the human qualities the Bible tells us he has, like the emotions of love. It's love combined with his great knowledge that
we don't know, so he gives us challenges that yea, we don't fully understand why we get them, but that's the point.
We aren't supposed to know. We aren't supposed to know all God's reasons or see God scooping people out of (even really horrific) harms way with his hand. We are supposed to not know or see it all because if we did, we wouldn't have faith and trust that he was real and good, we would see it, every single person would believe and would be good to not go to hell. That's the point, that we don't all know and see it, we have to believe it. We have to believe in him despite it all.
Dr Frankenollie wrote:Linden, if everything the Bible said is true (contradictions and all), and Eve really did steal from the Tree of Knowledge, an act which God had forbidden...why the bloody hell would we be held to blame for that act?! Couldn't God have let Adam and Eve's future family back into Eden later on? Obviously, they had nothing to do with Eve stealing from the Tree of Knowledge. Just because we're the same species as Adam and Eve doesn't mean we can be held culpable for their actions! Just because Adam and Eve made the wrong choices doesn't mean that every other single man and woman in the history of the universe would do the same!
No what it's about is that God saw that humans sin. Since we all are human, and if you want a scientific analogy, we all have human DNA, he realized all humans would sin. He gave us all free will, spirits, not DNA, but yes, our willfull spirits decided to sin on their own, and with Adam and Eve first doing it, God knew all would do it.
I am going to admit right now that I'm not sure if I even believe this particular story, at least not literally. Just like the creation story it might be all metaphorical about how God created souls with their own wills and in letting them have their own will hoped they would always choose good with their power, but they didn't, and so, we've recieved all that followed. Of course he knew it was going to happen even as he made them, but if something like the Garden of Eden story really did happen, maybe the main point of that was just so the first humans experienced it for themselves, and so that us later humans had a story for ourselves to know how things started and why things are the way they are.
And if you ask "well then why did he make us then?", once again it's all about that we are powerful souls of our own free will and he didn't feel like making restricted robots that can only choose good.
Heartless wrote:Disney Duster wrote:I think the soul is more than state of mind and spirituality. There's so much to it we can't even describe. But as for the choice thing...I mean like...imagine dropping a soul in a zygote, and the soul, even if you do believe it's a state of mind, somehow makes some of the zygote form into a human being the way that it does. It is perfectly possible to believe that some of the extra extrogen a developing fetus gets is because the soul was gay and wanted it to happen. Sure, you and many people probably won't believe it, but you can't prove that's not a possibility.
This is completely based on something you just made up. To say that its possible just because none of us can prove you wrong is like saying that its completely possible that there are invisible 4-headed unicorns living among us in our world. You cannot prove me wrong in anyway, so its a possibility.
Except my theory is based on (my observations of) life and trying to figure it out, no matter how ridiculous you personally think it is, while your unicorn theory is purposely trying to be ridiculous and based on nothing, excetp trying to make an argument against me.
Dr Frankenollie wrote:Super Aurora wrote:But you could also ask yourself how does any thing in and itself begins.
I do, but God is not the answer. I personally think that the existence of a potential 'God', an omnipotent, all-powerful, infinitely complex being, is much more difficult to explain than the existence of the universe.
But they say the universe started with a big bang. What came before that? Nothing? How did that bang
start? What if God was created by a big bang, out of nothing?
But actually, what we believe is that God is so powerful he always was. I suppose you would have a hard time believing that, but since time is a human construct, maybe you could understand the idea of God always being, infinitely? I have also thought about God creating himself, out of nothing, which I know sounds impossible but that's the thing, I can actually believe in something like that which sounds so impossible to
our human minds. I suspect the "always was" theory is what you'd more accept, and I think that's what the Bible and Christian religion say is the case anyway.
You don’t seem to consider the idea of something that is beyond physics or measurable things. The idea of God itself is something beyond that, with the power to make something out of nothing. Something impossible according to what science has observed so far. That’s what God is supposed to be. Beyond what is physically possible. All sorts of things impossible for matter, because God isn’t matter. You’re thinking in terms
of matter.
Dr. Frankenollie and
Heartless, I agree children shouldn’t be indoctrinated. But I think children should be taught about religion when they are little. It’d be nice if they could be taught all religions and choose for themselves, but not only might that be impossible, but they wouldn’t understand much of it. It’s best to teach them the general beliefs you have (which varies from person to person, culture to culture, country to country) that they could grasp, and perhaps some general other big classes of beliefs, and leave that up to them. They could choose to believe it, to not, make up their own, or perhaps ask about other religions. But hopefully you understand why it is a very sweet thing, and is a very good thing, to tell a child about the belief that there is some divine power that loves them and will make everything better in the end. That when people die they go to a better place. Hopefully you understand why this is very comforting and good for children, as long as you do not force them to believe it against their will
Super Aurora, so you believe in a God, a spiritual, non-physical being. So then don’t you believe in non-physical spirit that is inside everyone, and that has an afterlife similar to how God “lives” I suppose? That is what
also separates us from animals (unless you believe animals have them in which case humans have
higher spirits/souls) and since we as humans who indeed are higher than animals have understood a
higher concept than animals of good and evil and judgement, and God is
the highest being, than really it makes sense that the idea of right, wrong, and judgement are high ideas which a being as high as God would know of.
But if religion didn't exist, the hypothetical boy probably wouldn't have become a terrorist! In my story, the boy did not seek power and wasn't greedy, but simply wanted to do what he saw as good and ethical - to convert everyone to his faith, even using force to do so.
). Even if I thought religion was good, even if I had "belief in belief", I could not forcibly believe in God. I can't choose to have faith. And you can't just favour the God theory over the lobster theory simply because it's not what you want to believe. Again, centuries ago people may have preferred to believe that the Earth was round rather than flat, but it is round despite this. Furthermore, the idea of an omnipotent, gigantic being who can hear everything we say and think, see everything we see and do; a being who is part of nature, outside nature and all of nature, is indestructible, immortal and the creator of everything in the universe...that makes less sense to me than a singing lobster floating around outside the universe.