religion, oh god... gods!

Well im Christian. I believe that maybe there was a time where i didnt believe in anything but i feel like the has to be.... Something out there higher than us on a level that not even science can explain. Ive chose to believe in this being i call it God. Im not a bible thumper although i do follow it to a degree. I strongly abide by my morals however i do believe that this is situational. I try to be kind and help others. I also believe in an afterlife. I DO NOT however believe that you must forcefully make people accept your beliefs and be so fanatical about religion to the point where you essentially leave your family behind and commit horrid acts that contradict the very word of the god you are trying to follow. There must be a balance between SCIENCE and RELIGION. If we can try to achieve harnony with both we will be better people.

Why? What makes you believe this? And why Christianity of all the religions?

Multiple gods are usually referred to as deities...

Adding to what Superstring said, if you wanna believe in something Science can't explain why do you choose to believe something that an ancient book can explain?

Adding to what Superstring said, if you wanna believe in something Science can't explain why do you choose to believe something that an ancient book can explain?[/quote]

It's hard to explain, but I'll try, its because that is the core value of Religion, "Believe" and let go of your understanding of the world and trust what the world is meant for in terms of what the Good book says. that is why it is not for thinkers for persons like these tend to ask questions while others who can no longer see the value of letting go start to rely on something else that is more "Tangible" because of personal experiences combined with what they learn from non believers experiences especially the traumatic kind of experiences. Again for non believers the reason why they believe is because they don't need to ask the question "Why". Try to intelligently understand them and not just insult them out of the blue for they too are sometimes are targeted by science as an psychological enigma and studies have been conducted but of course for the sake of harmony they leave their findings open ended for people of ye little faith to ponder on. But yes like I said it depends on the kind of Religious person you are talking to if they respect your space.

I have no idea how you can join hatred with respect... Again, it seems like the old mistake I often come across: poor choice of words. I think you mean tolerance, not respect.

I find it particularly tasty that you focus so much on insult and, particularly, direct insult. Mister, you can spend the next twenty years writing a book insulting every single thing that does not adhere to your faith. I couldn't care less. What I care about is when Muslim men marry nine year old girls who die hours after their wedding night, I care about Rabbi who kill babies after passing them herpes through a sick, disgusting circumsion method, I care Russian sociopaths calling upon their faith to humiliate and torture gay people, I care about Ratzinger, the man who nearly made me turn to Christianity when I realized he might be the Devil himself, forgiving pedophile monsters and attempting to hide these hideous crimes as if they were above the law. That's what I care about. And you should realize that I didn't speak of the Inquisition. What I mentioned happened almost yesterday and is happening now. Don't you think for a second that disrespecting religion is about calling people dumb-dumb; it is about calling them on their, for lack of better word, sins.

First of all when I meant respect, I meant to those ordinary people who are voicing out their religious pov on forums and getting ridiculed by those who just want to look cool on the net, never did I connected nor mention respect for samples of atrocities to human life that you talk about. You cannot tolerate something or someone if you do not respect something or someone and it doesn't have to be the person in question or the act of the person that has done wrong against another human life that you hate so much. Not everyone is a monster, sure they are victims and that is unfortunate for them but thinking all religion as evil by the acts of a few is bias and immature thinking against those who did no wrong. Religion is interpreted by human beings maybe even created by them, it has flaws, human flaws and can be rectified but that is a long shot. For religious people if you disrespect their religion it is more than calling them by any foul language you could think of, Some the bloodiest wars were the Holy Wars just because of different beliefs so you should be the one thinking again, Muslims are one of the oldest Religion that has survived many bloody wars but like I said not all of them practice the monstrosities you speak of but mock my words insult their Religion and though they may respect your bravery and stand against them don't think for a second that they will just stand by it like how the Roman Catholics do now and "that" dedication to their beliefs is what you should respect regardless of your hate for some of their questionable traditions, this is not a threat but a friendly advice take it or not from someone who respect you but does not actually like you. Anyway, thank you for being honest about your thoughts and honestly I really enjoyed this simple debate but I have ton of things to do (like reading HManga lol;) so I leave you with the last say (Violent, intelligent, one liner, thesis length... your call)if you ever desire to do so.

Peace

Its simple really. Its followed me all of my life and regardless of anything what gives all religions such a bad reputation is fanaticism. Just like any fandom, its fans that give things bad reputations. Christianity has also ended up being to reliant on divine intervention (rely praying only when you cant do anything else but dont expect it to just magically happen when you didnt even try) Christianity has also served as a pretty good moral code for me i try to always help people. Going back on the subject of why i believe in Christianity i might believe in luck and coincidence but i have to call something divine intervention when a string of random seemingly unconnected events come together to end up helping me achieve a goal. It has happened to me many times beforehand. Same as the fact that evidence points towards there being an afterlife (how do you explain how someone without eyes could tell in perfect detail what was happening in multiple hospital rooms at the same time even to the color of the shirt a doctor was wearing in the other room despite the fact that he never left the room?) science is only based on what man can comprehend and see. however science is actually rather limited in some regards as the only way to explain some things is to think outside the box (no one believed in the big bang theory at first as they called it "outlandish and religious")
. http://www.cracked.com/article_20663_5-basic-things-you-wont-believe-science-cant-explain.html

I'm very sorry Classy Cthulhu but you need to read up on some Rhetoric. You argue in the cheapest way possible. You use an argument of ignorance in two diffent ways. First, you say that evidence points towards an afterlife because we can't explain events related to it. We may not be able to explain all things but we can't explain a great deal of them. I highly recommend you watch a short documentary Penn & Teller did on the subject in which, with scientific experiments, they could explain and even replicate a great deal regarding near death experiments. You saying that evidence points to an afterlife is nothing short of lazy and, as I've said before, cheap.

Then you go on to post a link on things Science can't explain. So you believe Science can explain that the afterlife is likely but you don't think they can explain water? This is like playing chess by yourself. When Science, allegedly, agrees with you, you're on board. When it doesn't know a few things, it shouldn't be trusted for everything, and religion swoops in to fill in the blanks. The argument that Science doesn't know everything in no way supports religion. Science doesn't know everything but it knows a great deal and religion sure as hell knows even less.

I'm sorry to say but you are ignorant towards Science for it does not study only what we can see and comprehend. If that is the case then you contradict yourself when you mention things Science does not know. Science thinks outside the box all the time, otherwise, we would have taken Genesis to begin with and we would have no clue what fossils are.

Now, feel free to discard ALL that I said and answer me this: If Science does not know, what makes you think a book that says lobster is sinful knows?

Its simple..... I dont. Thats the entire point of faith. Do we need reasons to do certain things? Certain hobbies we cant explain at times? No... We dont. I simply believe. Given the fact that i dont exactly find a man made book 100% reliable. But in the end im putting my faith in my god. If im wrong i atleast believed in something. This desire to believe in something stems from this fact. How can we as a whole (Humanity) have a solar system and a planet with the conditions perfectly suited to sustain life where if one little change occured our ecosystem would drastically change (for example moving the moon closer or maybe pushing the sun farther away) you mean to tell me none of that was deliberate planning? This an many other "coincidences" are things that i cant help but keep looking at... Besides well die one day and cross that door when we come to it.

Yes, you do. You are free to believe whatever you want and you should be allowed to. However, you need reasons to say X is true, whereas Y is false. I granted you that I was wrong about all I said (which I wasn't) and you still have no good answer as to why Christianity is better than anything else. And please, don't put hobbies in the same realm as religious faith. It's plain silly. It's one thing to not know but believe and it's a completely different thing to enjoy a particular thing. In fact, yet again you demonstrate your scientific ignorance, a lot of hobbies can be explained. I think you will find most atheletes have different adrenaline glans than non-atheletes, for example.

Yet again I recommend you read a single page of Stephen Hawking and I recommend Lawrence Krauss's «A Universe From Nothing». You are simply using an argument of ignorance. You can't conceive that the universe isn't designed by a god so you reject any possibility that you are wrong. Well, Science knows quite a bit about it and it's finding out more. Your argument goes back to Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas. You could really use a scientific update.

Once again, feel free to ignore what I said. Let's assume something called God does exist. Let's assume the Universe would not be possible without him. I'll give you all that. And now I ask you: What reasons do you have to say that God is Yahweh/Christ and he requires that, for example, the Sabbath day be kept holy? In other words, accepting all your [outdated] philosophical arguments for deism, how do you take the leap towards teism, i.e. Christianity?

I think the answer is plain and simple: geography. I'll bet that you happened to have been born in a place where Christianity is strong, you were told about it as a kid and now you accept it. Well, you still face an inductive argument which, in Logic, is always invalid. I can give you all you said and you still make no argument as to why the Creator ISN'T Allah, Zeus or Greusamwbghuxuqhhf.

Atheist simply because reasoning leads me to believe that things just go dark when you die and morality is subject to what the population finds to be accepted standards of human interaction, not what a book or piece of paper that has been revised more times than you can count on your two hands and has lost plenty of its value.

I'm a Christian and when it comes to religion like the bible says a true christian will escape false and fake religion whatever happens you will feel it and will try to escape from it.

Does it look like i know? I dont know anything at all. I coul be right i could be wrong. I don't know what your goal is by writing all of this. You simply wandered in here and started talking. But in the end faith is faith and my faith id strong enough to believe its not blind faith by any means. But well.... What am i to do? You wont believe me so that's that.

I don't know why but I don't get notifications from you... I'm seeing this now for the first time.

My first objection is: what's wrong with wandering in here and start to talk? It's a forum, dude. Not sure what you mean by that. I could guess but won't.

If your faith is not blind, you must have something else that makes you believe in it. If you do, let's hear it. Seriously. You would instantly become famous and quite possibly rich if you could prove Christianity to be undeniably true. If it is true, then I'm in a bad situation, if it is true, I want to know so I can act accordingly. The problem is that every person from every different religion says that. They can't all be right so why should I take your word for it and ignore theirs especially considering that your argument is the exact same as the one they use?

Yes, I won't believe you because there's nothing to believe. You say Christianity. Other people say Judaism or Islam. Millions of long dead people used to say Ra, Odin or Zeus. How am I suppose to believe yours? All I ask is for a good reason that makes Christianity true over all the others.

Eh whatever it's a bit too personal to say. But no i can't really prove it (insert nonchalant shrug here) But regardless there is a true reason i believe. You choose what you want to follow, if you want to follow anything. I won't go with some Ken Ham level discussion but i think there is a creator who made the universe. Believe what you want choose what you will. But i refuse to simply sit and fade into darkness without some kind of fight.... thinking about this this is probably what everyone else thinks but uh..whatever. Regardless im kinda tired of this whole back & forth debate so Ta ta and Fap on!

Rhetoric 101: If you are done with the debate, you can't have the last word i.e. you can't put forth an argument and leave it at that. If you are done with the discussion, you either say nothing new or say nothing at all. I'm saying this because if I respect your decision to end the debate, there will be some new points I have not adressed which is a minus for me. And since I have something to say...

True reason... That is an epistemological nightmare. You could write a 400 page book on those two words and still be left holding an empty sack. What is a true reason for anything?

A creator who made the Universe... I'm not aguing against that (although I don't agree). All I ask is how do you know the creator is based on religion and of all religions, it is based on Christianity? The creator could be from Islam, Ancient Greece, he could simply not care about us or he could not even exist. Why not?

Your refusal is a clear sign of fear of death. I stand by the Epicurean view that death is, by definition, nothing to worry about. You are more than welcome to disagree in all sorts of ways but your refusal does NOT make it true. You can spend your entire life fighting against the idea that the Earth goes around the Sun but the galaxies won't realign for you. True things are true regardless of what we think.

You are clearly a very smart gentleman Nate. You obviously know more than me in terms of conventional knowledge. And you are right i do fear death i have lots of things i want to do with this life tht ive been given i have some pretty noble pursuits i want to do before i die (be happy, change peoples lives for the better, raise a respectable family) But i never said my creator theory was based on christanity i simply enjoy that religion it works for me so to say. I feel that fighting something like a god or even trying to comprehend the ful concept of one would end in the shattering of our sanity like some kind of lovecraftian tale. You are right upon the fact that "You would be left with an empty sack." My arguments are based on faith the entire point if faith at least for me: is believing in something with little to no evidence. I would also like to adress or say one final thing: What ive noticed in the population of (atleast my religion) the followers of my religion is that most call themselves christians but in truth they leave it at that. You will find them quoting gospel at thwir conviniencw ignoring the other parts of the bible that say that the very thing they are doing is wrong (thou shall not judge for example) and in truth it is rather worrying that "true" christians are seemingly becoming less and less. I hope that we learn to change our ways. Because in the end we arent being a very good example for our religion (WBC) for example. I hope that any of you who read this know that a true christian is the type of person who is willing to help you and is kind nd understanding. (On a side note please excuse my grammar as i am writing on an ipod) hope you all stay gold!

Soren Kierkegaard would disagree with me but faith has no place in Science or Philosophy. Any given proposition P is can only be true or false (or unknowable although I would argue that fits under the false category). So if P means «Christianity is true» that forcefully excludes, for example the proposition P-2 which could be «Islam is true». They can't all be true. At most, only one can be and nothing forbids us to accept that they are all false.

The problem with your point about true Christians is to decide what parts of the Bible to follow and what not to follow which is nearly impossible. You can't have the Bible being half-divine, it would make no sense at all. So some people do take up the humble views of Christianity but the Bible also says gays should be stoned and those who do not believe or follow «false gods» will go to Hell. Where's the authority to say we can ignore the divine commands we don't like and follow the ones we do like? I have no answer for that which is why I conclude there's no reason to accept Christianity or any other religion to be true.

You can still go on believing in Christianity as much as you want. I wouldn't advocate thought crime for a second. The problem is that is it philosophically negligent to defend a view that has no sturdy logical arguments. You are free to believe in it the same way you are free to sing in the shower but you can't make strong claims (such as striking a balance between Science and religion) based on faith.