flimsy moral standards? Lets see here.
If I were to shoot your wife, would you have a problem with that?
-michael martin
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An elaborate spoof on Intelligent Design, The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster is neither too elaborate nor too spoofy to succeed in nailing the fallacies of ID. It's even wackier than Jonathan Swift's suggestion that the Irish eat their children as a way to keep them from being a burden, and it may offend just as many people, but Henderson, described elsewhere as a 25-year-old "out-of-work physics major," puts satire to the same serious use that Swift did. Oh, yes, it is very funny. -- Scientific American
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Nic,
.
It appears we are not as different in our views as I first thought.
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I still contend that your question is flawed. Murder cannot be discussed as a moral absolute. Murder by definition is immoral. Killing is a specific action that you can discuss in those terms, but not murder.
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OEJ
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Hmmm… I don’t know whether to be happy or sad that Nic just ignored my comment. Oh well, back to the beer for me.
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In other news, damn, i didn’t realise you guys were all so old… I feel rather amazed to admit I am one of the younger posters (I’ll give you a hint; older than 18, younger than 22, still at uni).
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Still, you guys manage to keep the youthful enthusiam flowing greater than many my own age (maybe there is something in pastafarianism that keeps you eternally young?)
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Gill,
I was lying in bed and I thought of an illustration that MIGHT be more capable of convincing you that an absolute moral standard exists. I had to get up and post it. Here it goes:
Imagine you are in pre 9/11 Afghanistan. A group of men kidnap you and kill you. Why? 1.) You are unwilling to bow to Allah. 2.) You let some one see your pretty little nose. 3.) You are a Jew. 4.) It is the moral thing for these men, who are faithful Muslims, living in a society of faithful Muslims to do.
/
Is wrong for them to murder you? Or to please One Eyed Jack let me rephrase the question: Is it wrong for them to “kill†you?
‘
One Eyed Jack,
I like you. I really do. You think through things, you’re polite, and you name implies you are a pirate. Wow! Now that’s what I call a good personality.
/
You wrote, “Murder by definition is immoral. ” – Who wrote the definition? Where were they standing? How old were they? I could go asking these qualifying questions, but my point is that definition is arbitrary (within the atheistic framework).
/
You wrote, “Killing is a specific action that you can discuss in those terms, but not murder.” – Why not?
Good night to you both!
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@Nic
Murder is inherently wrong because we, as humans, believe it to be inherently wrong. Almost everyone of every faith or lack thereof considers murder to be wrong. Even religions far older than the Judeo-Christian religion believe muder to be wrong. However, our attitudes to murder have changed. Many crimes that were previously punished by death are no longer, because many people now condsider the death penalty to be a form of murder.
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Murder is an extreme example. If you look at many other behaviours that were considered amoral 200 years ago they are not even blinked at by most people today. Take bathing suits as an example, 100 years ago (less probably) bathing suits covered almost every square centimetre of the body. These days women sunbathe topless.
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Another example is rape. A few hundred years ago rape was considered the womans fault. Women could be charged with the crime of seduction if they were raped. Now, fortunatley, the laws in most western countries have changed to reflect current moral standards.
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Another example is corporal punishment in schools. 50 years ago it would have been standard practice to give misbehaving children the strap or the cane. Today it is considered grossly inappropriate for a teacher to physically punish a child in any way.
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I could go on and on with other behaviours where our belief in what was right and wrong has changed. Morality is fluid and for this reason cannot be granted by a deity. Humans decide what is right and wrong not gods. That is why you will find that morals are more closely tied to culture than religion.
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Jingles,
You wrote, “…While the forcing of society’s norm upon an individual may sound cruel, it pales in comparison to forcing an individual’s views upon all of society.” – Please read my most recent post to Gill. Do you still feel the same way?
/
Oh, and way back you wrote, “One last thing… where did this no free will bit come from? As far as I can tell, in the religion v atheism debate, if any side stifles free will, it is the religious one.” Only the Calvinistic Theologians (Basically John Calvin’s Theology is like Newtonian Physics, i.e. God is to Calvinism what the laws of Physics are to the Newtonian Model.) – How do atheists account for freewill? I thought it was all just cause and effect. We’re all a bunch of simple chemical reactions, right? The cause and effect machine predetermines our choices, right? Or are our choices random swerves in our quantum particles. Seems like it would take an awful lot of those random swerves, after all, we are talking about subatomic particle causing macro organisms to make complicated decisions. What’ s you answer. I am very interested.
/
That Wenchy Character,
You wrote, “nic, where is the Christian morality in purposely traveling to, and preaching against the use of condoms in countries where lack of information makes AIDS rife? I consider that dissemination of misinformation akin to murder of innocents!!!!†– I answered you, but probably not very well. My wife is a nurse. She and I have had the opportunity to give lectures on Sex & STD’s to High School students. She and I discussed our paradigm with God and with each other. Here is what we did: We told the students condoms could help protect them against pregnancy, and STD’s, but they are not full proof. The only way to be absolutely sure that they will not get pregnant before they are ready, or that they will not get these horrific diseases was for them to follow God’s plan of one man and one woman being married and having sex with no one except each other. – What do you think about the way we handled that topic?
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nic, I think christianity has very little morality when you think about it. Increasingly scientific evidence is showing that the way people behave is directly affected by mental illnesses and genetic deformities. Because of these deformities people can do evil things either undeliberatelty or with incredibly poor judgement. Yet these people, because of these evil things would be sent to hell. Does that seem fair and ethical to you?
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“We told the students condoms could help protect them against pregnancy, and STD’s, but they are not full proof. The only way to be absolutely sure that they will not get pregnant before they are ready, or that they will not get these horrific diseases was for them to follow God’s plan of one man and one woman being married and having sex with no one except each other.”
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this is a point many christians make, but it ultimately proves to be unworkable in a society which values freedom. the statistics speak for themselves on this – in europe and america, teen pregnancies and sexually transmitted infections are less rife where contraception is available and sex education is taught to a good standard, than in areas where abstinance is taught almost exclusively. you can say that the best way for everyone to live is by the christian standard, but many, many people will disagree, for a great number of reasons (not least of all that god may well be non-existant and christianity is nothing but a lie). once again, it comes down to the few attempting to force their views upon the many.
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And besides, on your last post, you wrote “Gods plan of one man and one woman being married nad having sex with no-one but each other”
Please explain, why would god be so interested in making a grand plan like this? Wouldn’t it make a hell of a lot more sense to make it that he just created a person whenever he felt like it? And the idea of birth from two partners, love, attraction and etc fits in PERFECTLY with evolution.
Which makes more sense to you?
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sorry about the spelling mistake. thats and, not nad.
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Jingles – old? As soon as someone invents the cryostasis tube it’ll be called erm older!
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Nic, fine fine .I guess we’ll just have to agree to disagree. You appearently look at the world from a much different angle then I, and I know enough to know there’s always more to know. You have some good points, and you do know how to get the party started, I’ll give you that!
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Homo narrans,
No matter what the statistics say, and no matter what people do with the information they are taught, the fact of the matter is that abstinence is better than contraception at protecting against pregnancy and disease. You can’t argue with that. Sure, many people want to have sex with multiple partners and they do. They also raise their risk of these unfortunate consequences.
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Jack Sparrow,
You wrotw, “Increasingly scientific evidence is showing that the way people behave is directly affected by mental illnesses and genetic deformities. ” – This assumes that there is some form of behavior that is Right.
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@Nic:
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“You wrote, “…It (Anthropological argument) hinges upon the premise that “If you can’t point to some other cause for X, then X must be caused by a deity.†– I’ll accept that. I will concede that there could be a “Hidden Answerâ€.
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Or possibly no answer at all. That doesn’t negate the value of continuing to search, but one mustn’t get blinded by the self-centered assumption that there must exist a knowable answer.
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“However, surely you can see that the atheistic answers fail miserably.”
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As do the theistic ones. “God did it” is, in my opinion, intellectual abdication. It answers nothing and shuts down further inquiry. It’s not even a satisfying default case.
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“So I recant. If there is a moral absolute it does not necessitate the existence of God.”
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Thank you for that. Be aware that there’s a pretty massive “if” in your statement, though. Without establishing that premise, all conclusions based upon it (theistic or otherwise) are groundless.
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” However, it does negate the atheistic presuppositions.”
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Nope. Just your own strawman statement of “atheistic presuppositions.”
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” And it is a rational reason for people to consider theistic options.”
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That’s your opinion, to which you are welcome. Personally, I think it’s a cop-out.
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Nic – if we all abstain from sex what will happen to the species?
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Once again I haven’t read the posts. Yours are getting shorter and better btw.
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How do we explain the HIV explosion in Africa – original sin?
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Regarding my comment on the old Jehovah’s witnesses. The bible states twelve tribes of Israel. Or is that “up to interpretation”?
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That is my problem – is the bible the absolute word of god or have people messed with it down the line? No matter what John said?
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Jack Sparrow,
You wrote, “Increasingly scientific evidence is showing that the way people behave is directly affected by mental illnesses and genetic deformities.” This assumes that there is a form of behavior this absolutely right. According to natural selection genetic mutations happen all the time. Some are more beneficial for the organism and the environment it inhabits, others are not. However, being less sufficient does not constitute wrongness. I only point this out because it argues for the existence of an absolute moral standard, which I have gone to great lengths to prove.
/
You wrote, “…These people (people with genetic deformities, which cause them to behave badly), because of these evil things would be sent to hell. Does that seem fair and ethical to you?” – First, you should note that no one is sent to hell. Hell was not created for people. People choose to remain separated from God; that separation is hell/eternal death. Hell is a place, which is relatively experienced by each individual. Second, sin itself can be thought as a disease, this disease shows up in different ways, all of which are negative. Maybe it’s not quite as simple as people usually think, i.e. God doesn’t “want†to be around sinners. Maybe it is, as Millard Erickson wrote, that God is, as it were, allergic to sin. This is a difficult concept, but since when is reality simplistic.
/
You also wrote, “…Why would god be so interested in making a grand plan (a plan for sexuality and reproduction) like this?†– Why not?
/
You also wrote, “ …The idea of birth from two partners, love, attraction and etc fits in PERFECTLY with evolution. Which makes more sense to you?†– Personally, I have never seen a sufficient explanation for the existence of the male/female distinction.
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Nic, all I am trying to point out is that christian beliefs are morally wrong. If behaviour is directly related to how your brain was made (which you have NO choice over) yet those people get punished anyway (eternal punishment that is) although they didn’t ever do something.
Either way you have to make the choice: The bible is incorrect or it is morally flawed
also you wrote “This assumes that there is some form of behavior that is Right.”
And what is the “Right” behaviour? there are many incredibly evil things one can do which definitly aren’t in the ten commandments. (i.e exploitation, oppression)
There simply is no “right” behaviour. Your behaviour is (sorry for repeating myself :P) directly dependant on well, the brain. If every person in the world is unique, they must all have different brains. Therefore they have different personality and behaviour. And if EVERYONES personality is different, there obviously is only one IDEAl personality to have EVER existed. Now who is that person?
The point is, behaviour, effort, and personality are completely respective to the person they belong.
If there was a person who’s brain let out endorphins whenever he hurt someone, making him happy, yet he wanted to be a nice person, so he tried as hard as he could to be nice, and so he ended up as a quite nice and behaved person.
Then there is a person who is born as, i don’t know, like awesome at everything, and really nice and behaved. He couldn’t be bothered to try being better, so his behaviour went down quite a lot. Yet he was still better than the ex-sadist. Yet who tried harder? who did the “right” thing in this?
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Also, (you wrote your last post at the same time I did) You wrote “This assumes that there is a form of behavior this absolutely right. According to natural selection genetic mutations happen all the time. Some are more beneficial for the organism and the environment it inhabits, others are not. However, being less sufficient does not constitute wrongness. I only point this out because it argues for the existence of an absolute moral standard, which I have gone to great lengths to prove.”
Genetic Mutations do not prove absoloute moral standard, in fact precisely the opposite. Because of these genetic mutations, moral standard is changing all the time depending on the situation, and the creature it is applied to.
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Geneticist claims to have found ‘God gene’ in humans
http://www.washtimes.com/world/20041114-111404-8087r.htm
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Also, you wrote:
““…Why would god be so interested in making a grand plan (a plan for sexuality and reproduction) like this?†– Why not?”
Well, if there was no sexual reproduction, and god just made very good people whenever he felt like it, there would be no (sorry for bringing this up again) genetic deformities, evil people, athiests (:P), racists, brain problems, physical retardations, mental retardations, poverty, and canadians, because he would be monitoring every single person that was ever born.
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Orthodox Agnostic,
You wrote, “God did it is, in my opinion, intellectual abdication. It answers nothing and shuts down further inquiry.†– No it doesn’t. It just helps you see where and how to look. It is a presuppostional lens, just like atheism.
/
You wrote that there may “possibly be no answer at all†for the existence of an absolute moral standard. – How? There is either an absolute moral standard or there is not. There has to be a reason for the existence or the non-existence of that standard. You are getting a little mystically absurd at this point.
/
I wrote. “If there is a moral absolute it does not necessitate the existence of God; however, it does negate the atheistic presuppositions.†You wrote, “Nope. Just your own straw man statement of atheistic presuppositions.†– So explain to me how an absolute moral standard could be inherent in a system of matter & energy + time & chance? PLEASE DO NOT explain how morals have evolved, because that implies that they will continue to evolve eternally, and thus are actually the antithesis of absolute. Plus I have read that story like a thousand times already.
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It is hard to keep up with all these posts. Please be patient with me.
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Sorry, we will write posts at your own time.
Ps. Could you please explain why fundies like you hate homosexuality? I still don’t understand that, and
Pss. Could you also bring some of your friends over to this site too? this is like the first debate we’ve had in ages! Its fun!
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ps bobby, could you split this comment section in half from where nic entered? for people like me who have slow modems, this page is taking forever to load
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k nic, times up, its been 30 minutes.
you wrote:
There is either an absolute moral standard or there is not. There has to be a reason for the existence or the non-existence of that standard. You are getting a little mystically absurd at this point.
Go onto wikipedia and look up “Moral Relativism”. it may explain.
/
You wrote:
“Orthodox Agnostic,
You wrote, “God did it is, in my opinion, intellectual abdication. It answers nothing and shuts down further inquiry.†– No it doesn’t. It just helps you see where and how to look. It is a presuppostional lens, just like atheism.”
I agree with you and I don’t agree with you. God did it is an answer, but after that you need to go on explain how god did, where he did it, why he did it, and when he did it in complete detail, otherwise its not an answer, and just abdication of thought.
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oops sorry it was actually 10 minutes, but meh.
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Nic – “It is hard to keep up with all these posts. Please be patient with me.”
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Please do not worry. We will be waiting
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You also wrote:
“Personally, I have never seen a sufficient explanation for the existence of the male/female distinction.”
The purpose for male/female distinction (evolutionwise) is so that each can fill in each role that is needed in a family. In pre-historic times (if you are a non young-earth creationist that is) the male was always the hunter and the worker and fighter while the woman stayed at home and looked after the children (more tedious than any of the mens jobs)prepared the food, gathered fruit and etc.
The purpose of sexual attraction between the two is that what one finds attractive in each other most often resembles these original tasks. e.g woman often find fit men more attractive than unfit ones: this means that the man will be better at fighting and hunting, won’t it. Men find women with large breasts attractive: this means that the woman can breast feed young children with more milk.
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Alchemist,
You wrote, “If we all abstain from sex what will happen to the species?†We will cease to exist. I have never argued for total abstinence. God literally commands us to “be fruitful and multiply.†Further, just a quick glance through the Song of Solomon will indicate that God intends for us to enjoy sex. Sex is a gift from God. It’s a mystical union of the physical and spiritual. It’s awesome. I like it. I thank God for it!
/
You wrote, “How do we explain the HIV explosion in Africa – original sin?†– Yes and no. Yes in that all disease, suffering, and death are a direct result of the separation of our universe and God. However, specifically it is unprotected sex that has caused the HIV explosion in Africa.
/
You wrote, “Regarding my comment on the old Jehovah’s witnesses. The bible states twelve tribes of Israel. Or is that “up to interpretation�†– I am a little confused. If I remember correctly, the original context of your statement was that the JW’s refuse blood transfusions for a poor reason. So I’m not sure how that plays into your new question. The were 12 tribes of Israel. I do not know that any of those tribes can still be substantiated at this time. I think that the ten Northern Tribes disappeared after the Assyrians conquered Samaria in 722 B.C. The Southern Tribes Judah and Benjamin to my knowledge ceased to be documented after the destruction of the Temple and fall of Jerusalem in A.D. 70. The one hundred forty-four thousand mentioned in the book of Revelation is a symbolic number, which the JW’s take literally.
/
You wrote, “Is the bible the absolute word of god or have people messed with it down the line?†– Yes I believe that in it’s original form, the Bible is the absolute word of God. Yes people have messed with it down through the years. However, not in the way Dan Brown and others would have you to believe. The problems with the copies of the extant manuscripts consist of spelling mistakes by scribes, and at the worst places where the scribe tried to clarify an ambiguous passage (None of the differences in the extant copies put in any major doctrine in doubt.). There have been no attempts to pervert the Word for political reasons. Other religions, Muslims, Mormons, etc. have changed their “Scripture†to be contemporary; however, the Bible has remained the same. Let me break the situation down for you: Consider the New Testament. We do not have the original documents written by the Apostles; however we have some very early copies. We take all of those copies and try to reconstruct the wording of the original documents. This process is called textual criticism. Have you ever read any of the great works (literature) from antiquity? Do you think they are still in their original state? Aristotle wrote his poetics around 343 B.C., and the earliest copy we have is dated A.D. 1100, nearly a 1,400 year gap, and only five manuscripts are in existence. Caesar composed his history of the Gallic Wars between 58 and 50 B.C., and it’s manuscript authority rests on ten copies dating one thousand years after his death. When it comes to the manuscript authority of the New Testament, the abundance of material is almost embracing in contrast. Over twenty thousand copies of the New Testament manuscripts are in existence today, the earliest of which is only twenty-five years older than the original. The Iliad has six hundred forty-three manuscripts and is second to the New Testament in manuscript authority. The earliest copy we have today of the Iliad was written about five hundred years after the original. Yet, no one doubts that we have what Homer actually wrote. Sir Frederic Kenyon, who was the director and principal librarian at the British Museum and second to none in authority in issuing statements about manuscripts, concludes: “The interval then between dates of the original composition and the earliest extant evidence becomes so small as to be negligible, and the last foundation for any doubt that the Scriptures have come down to us substantially as they were written has now been removed. Both the authenticity and the general integrity of the books of the New Testament may be regarded as finally established.†No one who knows anything about textual criticism and ancient manuscripts will disagree.
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@ Everybody, OK, realize this might get ugly. I might use ugly words and sound like I am a really pissed off raving lunatic, I’m not. I mostly wanted to make a really, really big post! Like nic. I will use the smallest words possible, for a couple of reasons, it’s less confusing to the masses, I don’t want to baffle anyone with bullshit, and lastly, that’s just the way I roll. I am simply addressing (nics) overnight campaign of terror. I am not replying to him, I am giving you my interpretation,
Of what he stayed up all night to manufacture, by the way, I slept like a baby last night. Hope you all did too! And adding my two cents.
Also understand this is the Church of The Flying Spaghetti Monster, we worship beer volcano’s and stripper factories, and pirates are a mainstay, keep this in mind at all times. It might seem important to you, it does me! ( For the most part, I’m the guy in the bracket thingies)
I’ll start with his first of many posts.
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/Nic Dec 3rd, 2006 at 1:39 am
Penne,
I have apologized, retracted my statements, and admitted my potential to be wrong numerous times on this website./
(What he is saying here is, I’m not done with you poor souls yet, so I’ll need to get on your good side).
/
Nic Dec 3rd, 2006 at 1:42 am
Gill,
I can’t really say much to your post. First, because you are a theist and I am arguing that the atheistic presuppostions are insufficient. I could try to convince you that Jesus (the actual Jesus, not the traditional portrait of Jesus) is the God of all creation, but I will not force anything across your computer screen./
(He won’t force anything across the screen. You catch more flies with sugar then vinegar)./
I came to this website originally out of curiosity. I stayed because I saw it as a place to trade insights, learn new ideas, and even to strengthen my faith. I began my posts on this thread because I thought it was a running debate/idea forum on the essence of morality./ (He came to this site to save some lost heathen souls, that’s his station in life! More on that later)./
Second, you claim to be completely at peace with relative morality. Maybe you are. But this means that if your family were murdered you could not logically condemn the murderer. We have laws, and as so many have pointed out those laws would condemn the murderer because murder is not currently considered advantageous for society (Unless you count the radical Muslim desire to eradicate Israel and the West.). But considering the subjective nature of morality that you accept, the murderer is just doing what they feel is right. It’s just their misfortune that they were born in a time and place where murder is considered bad. Right?/ (He means to say he really hates Muslim’s, all Muslim’s! This is just his subjective way of sneaking them into this post)./
Please read the comment to One Eyed Jack that follows, as I believe it will more accurately state my position and hopefully even convince you that I have been reading the posts./(He is saying, Don’t worry dude, I’m not done converting you yet)./
Nic Dec 3rd, 2006 at 1:46 am
One Eyed Jack,
You wrote, “You (me) said there is no basis for a naturalist evolution of morality.†– Let me clarify. Murray Eden, a statistician at MIT once used high-speed computers to ask a question: Beginning with chaos at any acceptable amount of time up to eight billion years ago, could the present complexity come by chance?/ (As far as I can tell, he functions at that speed)/
The answer was absolutely not. However, that experiment was a long time ago. Many argue that it is out dated. Here’s my perspective: Charles Darwin said he couldn’t fathom the formation of the human eye by natural selection, yet he believed that reason convinced him that it was possible. And I agree. I think that it can be argued very persuasively that natural selection is capable of creating the human eye, and even an extremely complicated system of laws based on morality. I do not think that atheistic evolution is the best explanation for the observable cosmos and all of its particulars, but nonetheless, it is a somewhat viable explanation. Here is my point: Natural selection applied socially can account for our “considering†murder to be wrong; however, it cannot account for it’s actually being inherently wrong./ (What he said there, is that regardless of the seven or eight, previous posts, explaining how morality has worked itself into our DNA for the sake of our own good. He will not acknowledge those posts, because they cut Jesus out of the equation)./
Nic Dec 3rd, 2006 at 1:52 am
Fr. Corpus Callosum,
You wrote, “Imagine God as a parent who says he ‘loves his children unconditionally’. One of his children does something that is absolutely against the rules of the household; something that the parent considers to be an abomination. The parent is sad, because he loves his child, but the infraction must be punished. So he kills the child. He didn’t want to do it, but the child drove him to it by breaking the rules, and breaking the rules must be punished.â€/ (What he just said there, is that it is OK to kill your child, so long as it is in Gods order of things, no matter how much it hurts you to kill your own child. God comes first! More on this in a second)./
/
There are a few realities that I would like to share with you:
1.) It is very possible that God is, as it were, allergic to sin. This is a concept that is hard to grasp. However, the Bible seems to teach this to be true. Sin is more than just disobedience to some arbitrary standard. It is something, which is inherently other than God, who is life, and thus, sin is death. I believe sin literally separated God from all creation. It closed the system./ (This completes that it is OK to kill our child, God is allergic to sin! So you had to do it! By the way, does anybody know why God is allergic to sin? I mean come on? God created everything! Why the hell did he give himself an allergy)?/
2.) We observe the effects of this separation and call it the second law of thermodynamics. However, God’s death (Jesus on the cross) enables Him to re-enter and be immanent in the cosmos. How that works exactly I do not know./ (I think that’s why he created sin, it gave him an excuse to nail his own kid up on a cross. Why not? Heck, I’m a dad myself, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve said… Damn I wish I could nail my kid to a cross)!/
3.) Hell is extremely relative. That is, each person will experience “hell†differently. Hell is not a place of literal fire. Fire was simply the best thing God could compare it to so that we could reference the absolute terror of the place. Hell is going to be worse than eternal burning. How?/ (There will be no beer there)!/
4.) I do not know, but it is eternal death, which is eternal separation from God, who is Life./ (Seems like he means to say, hell is death! Live in this world folks! Don’t go through life worried about death! It’s a given, deal with it when the time comes)./
3.) No one has to go to hell./ (We are all going to die someday, it’s a given)!/
God made a way for every one to escape death and re-enter life. Sin is someone saying, “Go away God!†Hell is God granting their wish. C.S. Lewis once said, “The doors of hell are locked from the inside.â€
5.) God is a gentleman./ (Just don’t piss him off! I just realized something, I think I might be God? We have the same temperament)!/
6.) He did not want robots that were forced to love Him so He created men with freewill. I love my wife. I hope that she never leaves me, but I don’t want to chain her up in our home so that she can’t leave./ (He pays an S&M artist $300.00 an hour to do that for him, while he plays with a gay dope dealer. It keeps his marriage together)./
7.) I want her to love me with an authentic love, and be with me because she desires to do so. It’s the same with God./ (She does and is)./
Think about this: It grieves God for His creations to perish. However, He was willing to endure that kind of heartache just to enjoy authentic fellowship with people who would allow Him to save them./ (Lets not forget too, that God is allergic to sin)./
Imagine a man who knows that in order for him to experience the joys of having children his wife will have to endure horrible pain and they will have to lose many children. Imagine that somehow he knew those children that would be lost, and I mean really knew them intimately. Know this: God loves everyone and desires for everyone to be saved. He was willing to endure the tremendous heartache of losing some of His beloved creations for the joys of having an authentic relationship with the others. God doesn’t want anyone to perish. People choose to go to hell, because they choose to remain separated from God./ (And or they pissed God off)!/
/
Let me give you a court illustration (It’s a true story.):
A young women was ticketed for speeding. On her day in court she was brought before the judge and asked if she was guilty. She pled guilty. The judge brought down the gavel and fined her $100 or 10 days in jail. Then something amazing happened. The judge got up, took off his robe, walked down around in front, took out his billfold, and paid the fine. (What’s the explanation?/ His wife told him he better get their kid out of that jam! Doh!)./ The young woman was the judge’s daughter. He loved his daughter, but he was a just judge. His daughter had broken the law and no matter how much he loved her he had to punish her crime./(Even if it meant paying her fine! What did the daughter learn? It’s OK to break the law! My dad’s a judge and has money too)!/
/
It’s the same way with God. He is the perfect Judge. He has to punish our sins. The penalty for sin is death. So He came down here to earth and He paid our penalty. He died our death./(Anybody realize how stupid that sounds)?/
Nic Dec 3rd, 2006 at 1:57 am
Alchemist,
You wrote, “How do you reconcile the wholesale destruction of human life in the name of God?†– I don’t!
/
You wrote, “You have god upon your side. Don’t the Muslims, the Jews, the Zoroastrians. You all believe in the same god!†– No we don’t./ (Another jab at the Muslims, dang he don’t like them Muslims)!/
Christians and Jews worship the same God; however, the Christians have a more complete revelation of that God. That’s not an egotistical statement. First, note that Christians are not a race of people. The first Christians were Jews and there are still many Jewish Christians a.k.a. Messianic Jews. Secondly, this more complete revelation was first foretold to the Jews (333 prophecies, which Jewish and Christian scholars agree are references to the Messiah; these prophecies were written 500+ years before Jesus was born. Dr. Peter Stoner has shown the fulfillment of these prophecies to be practically impossible statistically (The odds of one man fulfilling just 8 of those 333 are 1 in 10 to the seventeenth power.). The American Scientific Association backed his findings. Jesus fulfilled these prophecies, all 333. As for Muslims, etc. they worship an entirely different God./ (What he said there, Jews aren’t to bad, they just aren’t as smart as Christians, I mean they just aren’t as up to date as the Christians are, yeah that’s it! And dang hitting the Muslims again)!/
/
You wrote, “Why do you kill each other?†– Ignorance. Religion is a human construct. The Bible rarely uses the word religion. It defines religion as, “Helping widows and orphans.†The Bible is a guide to relating to God and people. People made religion what it is not God!
/
You wrote, “Why must people suffer for your beliefs – those with multiple sclerosis and other illness that could be cured through stem-cell research?†– I should probably let gill, jingles or One Eyed Jack answer this question for you since they are all so skilled in illustrating why the majority has the right to determine what is moral.
/
You answered you own question about the Jehovah’s Witnesses.
/
Earlier some one made a rather extensive list of passages, which “prove†God is evil. If any one wants to choose a couple for me to interpret I will be glad to give it a shot. I invited that person to do so, but they never took me up on the offer./ (Again he won’t answer a question, he will only ask you to ask it again, this goes around and around and around)./
Nic Dec 3rd, 2006 at 3:34 am
Jingles,
You wrote, “…While the forcing of society’s norm upon an individual may sound cruel, it pales in comparison to forcing an individual’s views upon all of society.†– Please read my most recent post to Gill. Do you still feel the same way?/ (That was some of his best stuff! Hope you are converted now)!/
/
Oh, and way back you wrote, “One last thing… where did this no free will bit come from? As far as I can tell, in the religion v atheism debate, if any side stifles free will, it is the religious one.†Only the Calvinistic Theologians (Basically John Calvin’s Theology is like Newtonian Physics, i.e. God is to Calvinism what the laws of Physics are to the Newtonian Model.) – How do atheists account for freewill? I thought it was all just cause and effect. We’re all a bunch of simple chemical reactions, right? The cause and effect machine predetermines our choices, right? Or are our choices random swerves in our quantum particles. Seems like it would take an awful lot of those random swerves, after all, we are talking about subatomic particle causing macro organisms to make complicated decisions. What’ s you answer. I am very interested.
/ (I’m a little confused here, but did he just say that “free will” means to believe in the bible, and not what you want to believe in? Yeah, by God, I think that’s what he just said)!/
That Wenchy Character,
You wrote, “nic, where is the Christian morality in purposely traveling to, and preaching against the use of condoms in countries where lack of information makes AIDS rife? I consider that dissemination of misinformation akin to murder of innocents!!!!†– I answered you, but probably not very well./ (Most honest thing he’s said so far)./
My wife is a nurse. She and I have had the opportunity to give lectures on Sex & STD’s to High School students. She and I discussed our paradigm with God and with each other. Here is what we did: We told the students condoms could help protect them against pregnancy, and STD’s, but they are not full proof. The only way to be absolutely sure that they will not get pregnant before they are ready, or that they will not get these horrific diseases was for them to follow God’s plan of one man and one woman being married and having sex with no one except each other. – What do you think about the way we handled that topic?
.
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I knew from the very first post I read of nics, that he was some type of crusader.
I am the father of a fifteen year-old girl. The wife and I are members of her school board.
We get “invitations” from the likes of morons like him to come and preach at our school.
100% of the time the board votes them out. 100%. I live in a decent community and we don’t want these jerks to come preach their line of shit to our kids. They say it is to promote safe sex, it is to promote their God! Under the guise of safe sex. My kid is educated by her mom and myself on this topic, thank you for your concern! 21 is the age of consent where I live, we teach that abstinence is the best way to go, until you are of age, so to speak. She is fully aware of STD’s and contraceptives, this is 2006 for God’s sake! I said for God’s sake! Heh heh.
Her mother and I HOPE (key word here) that she will wait until she’s of age to have sex. And hope that she chooses to find love and to stay in a monogamous relationship, before having sex. Be it with a man or woman. We learn by example, hey does that have anything to do with morality? Humm? These are our ideals, I don’t care if anybody agrees with them or not, it’s my life and my kids life. Get the picture there? Stay out of MY shit and we’ll get along fine.
Which is also why I’m taking the time to write this, as stated this is the FSM.
I am educated, In the RC church and in the real world.
I come here to worship beer volcano’s and pirates! MY choice! And when the likes of a “nic” show up, it pisses me right off! Lets think about this, how would nic feel if I busted into his church in the middle of a sermon, dressed as a pirate. And sat down next to his wife and announced (out loud in the middle of the sermon) that beer volcanoes are the only thing that is absolute! His bunch of Jesus freaks would lynch me for sure! Hell yea they would! So keep that in mind if I should sound kinda pissie to the likes of a nic.
This is MY church he just busted in to! And he is trying to disrupt the flow of MY beer volcano’s with his God!
Nic, do not reply to me! I am sharpening my cutlass and I’m half way through a twelve pack. This is how I spend MY Sundays by the way, and you really don’t want to piss me off more then you already have!
To everybody else… Peace Love and…
Ramen
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Jack Sparrow,
How did the male and female types within each species evolve? How can you explain their existence naturalistically? We need both of them, true, but what in natural selection would have caused the differences to exist? That is the question I asked, not what the roles of the ancients were.
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I blame the Hermaphrodites meself, arrrr Jim lad and shiver me timbers.
Ramen.
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Swabbies Bucket,
I know you asked me not to reply to you, but I just wanted to apologize. Obviously, I misinterpreted the nature of this website. Forgive me. I will go. I meant no disrespect to your church.
If any one would like to continue conversation with me they can email me at healthydebatedialogue@yahoo.com
Peace
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@Nic
Oh dear nic, now you are going to have to climb a really really big tree (with lots and lots of branches) and you are going to have to get out an evolutionary ladder to do it.
If I have the energy later, I’m going to have to start talking to you about all sorts of things, incliding microbes, plants and early organisms that gradually migrated out of the sea onto land.
Oh dear!
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OK, I don’t know wheather or not you’ll find these guys on goole or not but I personaly have a hunch that they had a lot to do with Hitler’s, and most of germany’s attitude towards Jews and started the whole purity thing too pre WW2: The Flagellants, I’ve been thinking about these guys almost from the first day I came on the site and somebody(fundie of course) was saying that Hitler and his followers were non-belivers.(I just couldn’t remember their names.) It’s total rubbish of course. He thought he was doing God’s work by punishing the Jews,(and also that god told him to but I’m still looking for that info) and talked the rest of Germany into going along with it by appealing to their faith. Look these Flagellants up, if you find nothing, try Russia’s version: The Skoptzy ……Crazy-ass fundies I tell ya. Gotta go , busy day;>
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And sperm and eggs and male/female reproductive sructures and….and….. why sex become the prominant method of perpetuationg the species in animals, but asexual reproduction is still the mechanism used by some other organisms ect ect ect.
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@Tagliatellius Dec 3rd, 2006 at 3:18 pm
“I blame the Hermaphrodites meself, arrrr Jim lad and shiver me timbers.
Ramen.”
.
I like your answer better. I just started thinking about all the fish that change their sex.
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Nic is definitely not Dr. Martin. To whomever asked: Dr. Martin works for the National Institutes of Health in Rockville, MD. Nic never mentioned Yale once and his thrust is slightly different than the good doc’s. I actually enjoy Nic because he elicits such good reactions in my fellow pirates, especially Gill, whom I enjoy immensely.
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Thanks everyone! Well done!
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Oh, and to whoever asked: God doesn’t hate homosexuals, he hates homosexuality. Hahahahahahahahahaha! What does God care what I do in bed? Now telling me not to eat pork and shellfish is one thing, but telling me who I can fall in love with? That is NUTS.
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One third of the American population is evangelical. The majority of people in the Republican party are evangelical (the rest are fat white men looking to protect their ill-gotten wealth). If the Republicans lose their evangelical base they are dead meat. One third of the country is ruling the other two thirds. The Republicans must bow to their evangelical masters and legislate the perpetuation of their religion. This is why the politics of religion is important. But Nic the Fundy will never take this on.
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Nic. You can blame HIV on peoples sexual immorality. What about the children born of HIV +ve mothers? That is what I meant by the sins of the fathers (original sin).
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You say that the one hundred and forty four thousand is a symbolic number. Yet you continue by saying that the bible, in its original form, is absolute. I’m not that bright but, to me, that is a contradiction. Unless, of course, we can interpret the bible.
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Nic – I was (am???) a Christian. I was baptised (full swimming pool job) and am still a member of the Methodist Church. I don’t attend. The idea that, when people are sick, 1. God is testing them,2. they have sinned 3. they are blessed. Sorry, can’t do that.
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RAmen (or as the Masons say – so mote it be – PS NOT a mason)
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nic, the reason these differences occur is because of random generation of chromosomes.
Every human has 2 chromosomes. There are 2 types of chromosomes, x, and y. females have 2 x chromosomes.
males have 1 x and 1 y.
The first chromosome is always and x and the second has a 50 percent chance of being x, and a 50 percent chance of being y.
When the child is in the mothers uterus, the babys body develops in a way that the chromosome directs.
Don’t ask anything more than that. I’m a friggin 12 year old, not a genetic biologist.
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BTW Nic – I’ve seen someone die of AIDS.
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@Nic Dec 3rd, 2006 at 3:09 pm
“How did the male and female types within each species evolve? How can you explain their existence naturalistically? We need both of them, true, but what in natural selection would have caused the differences to exist? That is the question I asked, not what the roles of the ancients were.”
.
Better still nic, if you have came back to read these posts, have a look at the bascis given on the wikki:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution_of_sex
“Sex allows reconstruction of mutation-free individuals”
Main article: Muller’s ratchet
In a finite asexual population under the pressure of deleterious mutations, the random loss of individuals without such mutations is inevitable. This is known as Muller’s ratchet. In a sexual population, however, mutation-free genotypes can be restored by recombination of genotypes containing deleterious mutations.
This comparison will only work for a small population – in a large population, random loss of the most fit genotype becomes unlikely even in an asexual population……..”
.
Then maybe you should read “The Selfish Gene”
by Richard Dawkins.
Hope this helps!
RAmen
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Nic:
.
(Assuming you haven’t really abandoned this discussion…)
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“You wrote, ‘”God did it” is, in my opinion, intellectual abdication. It answers nothing and shuts down further inquiry.’ – No it doesn’t. It just helps you see where and how to look. It is a presuppostional lens, just like atheism.”
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I’d answer, but Capt. Sparrow did a better job than I would have.
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“You wrote that there may ‘possibly be no answer at all’ for the existence of an absolute moral standard. – How? There is either an absolute moral standard or there is not.”
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Sigh. Do check out Goedel’s Incompleteness Theorem. It proves mathematically that no mathematical system can be both complete and consistent. Since we’re discussing this in a logical (a branch of mathematics) system, there most certainly can be unaddressed elements.
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“There has to be a reason for the existence or the non-existence of that standard. You are getting a little mystically absurd at this point.”
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Why must there be a reason? If you examine that statement, I think you’ll find that your justification is that it would make you uneasy to have to simply accept the (possibly temporary, possibly not) ambiguity of the situation. It’s not mysticism, it’s mathematics as it applies to ontology. _Ibid_ Goedel.
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“I wrote. ‘If there is a moral absolute it does not necessitate the existence of God; however, it does negate the atheistic presuppositions.’ You wrote, ‘Nope. Just your own straw man statement of atheistic presuppositions.’ – So explain to me how an absolute moral standard could be inherent in a system of matter & energy + time & chance? ”
.
Deeper sigh. (a), you have yet to establish that such an absolute moral standard exists. Not doing so or failing to find an explanation for it does not disprove its existence. (b) Invoking a deity as an explanation does not satisfy me. Perhaps “It Just Is”. Ascribing it to a deity adds nothing to the discussion because that deity cannot be probed concerning it. To claim to know something about such a deity reduces that deity to a “card sharp of physics” and all the followers to mindless drones. As Kirkegaard pointed out, the truly faithful abhors the miracle. To attempt to pin down a deity is blasphemous toward that deity. In terms you might better understand (and it bothers me to do this, but so be it), Thou Shalt Not Take Thy Lord’s Name In Vain. In yet other words, quit claiming knowledgte of God’s nature to support your position. I don’t believe you.
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You might want to check out the Universal Church Triumphant of the Apathetic Agnostic.
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Uber-long post, beware.
Nic—Obviously if someone goes and kills my family I’d be a tad ticked off and want them punished. It’s not that I’m ‘comfortable’ with relative morality; it’s that it EXISTS, whether I personally like it or not. The standards of society decide what is right and what is wrong, and standards change over time. Whether the standards in question are good or not isn’t the point.
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“People choose to go to hell, because they choose to remain separated from God.†This is a little off-topic, but I just feel the need to point something out: in the simplest terms, using that phrase, god does not allow people who don’t love him into heaven. Maybe that seems fair to you. After all, why hang out with people who don’t like you? But just because they don’t like you doesn’t mean they’re horrible people. Not allowing otherwise-good individuals to heaven because they don’t ‘like youâ€â€”or have doubts as to your existence—is a prideful maneuver, whether it’s a CORRECT maneuver or not. This makes god prideful, which is supposedly the deadliest of all deadly sins.
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““Why must people suffer for your beliefs – those with multiple sclerosis and other illness that could be cured through stem-cell research?†– I should probably let gill, jingles or One Eyed Jack answer this question for you since they are all so skilled in illustrating why the majority has the right to determine what is moral.â€â€”I believe you are missing the point. Slavery: it was thought to be good once, now it’s bad. Right? There. An example of changing morals. You can feel a certain way on an issue all you want; I think slavery is inhumane and wrong. If such a situation somehow arose I’d try to stop it. I personally think I’m correct in thinking slavery’s wrong. But a slave owner would disagree with me. This has nothing to do with which one of us is right—the very fact that we disagree at all is what makes morals non-absolute.
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“Imagine you are in pre 9/11 Afghanistan. A group of men kidnap you and kill you. Why? 1.) You are unwilling to bow to Allah. 2.) You let some one see your pretty little nose. 3.) You are a Jew. 4.) It is the moral thing for these men, who are faithful Muslims, living in a society of faithful Muslims to do.
/
Is wrong for them to murder you? Or to please One Eyed Jack let me rephrase the question: Is it wrong for them to “kill†you?†–Yes. According to my morals and the mostly-universal idea that human life is sacred, it is wrong for them to kill me. I think I’m right on that fact, and I don’t think you’d disagree with me. But does that mean the moral is absolute? No. As mentioned above, the right/wrong person here has nothing to do with it. The fact that the killer in the above scenario would see it otherwise means the moral cannot be absolute. To give another example, whether Christianity is right or wrong, the fact that not everyone believes in its teachings means that it is not the ‘absolute’ religion. (I know you never said it was, just illustrating.)
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“You are getting a little mystically absurd at this point.†Are you kidding? We ALL got a little ‘mystically absurd’ a long time ago! :)
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Y’know, through all of this the thought comes to mind that if people could just take a step back and realize how silly it is to argue god/no god back and forth, the world’d be a lot happier. I mean, I may think there is one, but do I care if other people agree/disagree with me? Not a whole lot. It’s a personal choice and it’s not something that can be forced on to someone, after all. ‘Don’t pester me about your religion and I won’t pester you about mine’ should really be a law. Last time I checked, no matter what the bible or the Ten Commandments or my second cousin twice removed says, what you believe in religion-wise boils down to faith. You can’t prove god is there, and if you can’t prove god is there then you can’t go around acting as if it’s *been* proven and the ‘poor hell-bound atheists’ are just being stubborn. And you REALLY can’t prove which religion is right out of all of them!
That was entirely off-topic, I just had to get it out.
—-
-Jingles—Hah, I’m younger then that! (This time next Thursday I’ll be 18, and the idea’s freaking the crap outta me.)
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I have also seen someone with AIDS die. It is horrible. The bible was used in my great grandfather’s time to justify slavery. In both the old and new testaments slavery is sanctioned. It is also used to this very day for the subjugation of women. Evil, evil instrument of the devil, that book…
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@ Jingles and Gill. You poor old dears ;)
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gill – 18 – you sod. The problem with getting older is that your mind refuses to believe it. I still want to walk around with long black crimped hair (with interesting red bits). People would laugh at me though (they did before).
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Happy birthday for Thursday.
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Thanks! I still look like I’m about 12, though, sooo….(I can’t tell you how many times a cop has seen me driving by and thought I was underage and stole the darn car or something.)
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OOM. It was the most awful thing I have seen. He was a colleagues son. He was admitted to the hospital I was working at with chest pains – his chest XR showed massive pleural effusions. He had pneumonia.
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He walked in, seemingly healthy. Two weeks later he was dead.
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Nic – explain?
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Turning 18 in Australia is a big deal as it is legal drinking and voting age!
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