Evidence Rant

[Thurisaz]

Am I the only one who doesn't see anything in this thread so far?

[Ex-COG]

Perhaps the empty thread is symbolic of the evidence for Christianity?

 

Or maybe there was another server crash and the post was lost?

[Wertbag]

Bloody hell. I typed a page and a half of random ranting, hit the submit button and got a "page not found" error. Returned to the forum to see that the thread had appeared, thought great I didn't lose all that typing... didn't actually check what was in it...

<sigh> I'll re-type tomorrow

[Wertbag]

Right what I was venting about was the number of people I've run into recently who are happy to ignore hard evidence in favour of feelings. The event that brought this up and hence made me want to rant was a debate I was having about Rubin "Hurricane" Carter, the murderer who was made famous by the Bob Dylan song and hollywood movie (both of which he helped write and have very little relationship to the truth, but then what hollywood "based on a true story" type movie ever is?).

Now Carter was found guilty by two seperate juries based on the evidence given. The evidence included bullets in his car, mulitple eye witnesses, mis-matching stories amongst the accused, prior history of assault and armed robbery, pyschiatic reports showing he was paraniod with behavioural problems, motive and now since hes been in jail hes gained a history of assaults on other inmates.

The evidence was strong enough so that there was no reasonable doubt that he commited the crime. What caused the debate? He is black. I was therefore accused of being racist for taking a stand against him, because surely theres no other reason anyone would come to that conclusion? People seem happier to believe that the police, witnesses, jury, judge, doctors were all racist and it was one big frame up than to actually believe that the evidence could stand on its own.

What the hell is with people thinking with their hearts rather than their heads? This guy is guilty regardless of race. The same evidence against a white, asian, hispanic or martian would be just as damning.

So already in a fairly annoyed state I read a few Christian forums, and I see the same blind trust in feelings being mentioned: "I can't believe theres no God, it feels so right", "I can't believe in evolution, I don't want to be related to apes".

I've always weighed up the evidence and the evidence is "beyond reasonable doubt" that creation is false, that the world is not young, that the bible is false, that feng shai/crystals/magnets are of no benefit.

Even my girlfriend did it awhile back. Her best friend died of a drug overdose, and shortly after the funeral (can't remember if it was the night of the funeral or the next day, but very close) she had a visit by his ghost. I stopped her there and said there is an easy way to know if it was a dream or something more real, how did you react to having a ghost in your bedroom? She said "I was calm and peaceful, he said he was sorry and at peace now". I pointed out that anyone seeing a dead person in their room would get a massive adrenaline burst and would run screaming from the room, the very fact you could stay calm in such a situation shows that it was a dream. She thought about this and said "I can't believe it wasn't, it felt so real". She seems content with it so I didn't push the point, but I just can't understand the thought process that can say "I don't care what the facts are, I'm going to believe something else". The whole ability to hand wave away hard evidence without thought is just stunning ("The age of the earth can be measured by coral, ice, rock layers, plate movement or the more than 20 dating methods", "Yeah, but I don't believe in that").

I've heard it said that people are predisposed to believe in things rather than doubt, doesn't this mean people are predisposed to be stupid? Is it the way we are educated? Is it the same world over or are there cultures where reason is valued?

[R. S. Martin]

Perhaps the empty thread is symbolic of the evidence for Christianity?

 

Or maybe there was another server crash and the post was lost?

 

Back when we had the first server crash I found out that you could start a new thread from the stub. Just now I tried to post an empty "new topic" and it doesn't let me. Thus, my guess is that the post for this thread was lost in a server crash. It's been down more than up the past few days. Or so it seemed to me.

[R. S. Martin]

I've heard it said that people are predisposed to believe in things rather than doubt, doesn't this mean people are predisposed to be stupid? Is it the way we are educated? Is it the same world over or are there cultures where reason is valued?

 

If people are predisposed to believe things then they would believe evolution just as easily as they believe a literal creation in six 24-hour days. And I think some people do, just not the Christian fundies. I've heard non-Christian fundies rant and rave about why would anyone doubt evolution? The evidence is all there. Where do they think the dinosaur bones came from?

 

Compare that with: Why would anyone doubt God's existence? The evidence is all there. Where do they think the well-ordered universe came from?

 

The fundy answer re the dinosaur bones: God could have put them there to test our faith. Maybe Satan put them there to deceive us into believing evolution.

 

Some years ago I asked a fundy a question. I forget the content but I don't think it was about religion. I remember his answer: That would be too much like thinking.

 

That's just a fancy way of saying I don't want to think hard enough to discuss the topic. It was also saying he didn't have the answer on the tip of his tongue.

 

For religious things, however, they have to come up with answers and these answers have to sound confident. Jesus said to be sure to have answers for people who ask. To demonstrate faith they have to sound confident.

 

Thus, you get strong sweeping statements about unprovable proofs. And when you press for more info they attack the questioner for not having enough faith. They will make up all kinds of things like "God's ways are not our ways," "Who can know the mind of God," "God wants this or that--we know because the Bible says so!" "God moves in mysterious ways," "Faith makes no sense--that's why it's faith and not knowledge," ad infinitum. There's a foolproof answer for every conceivable question.

 

The impossibility of "No one can know God's mind" and "God wants....." are not ever held together. If I try to hold them together for discussion, the Christian can always tell me it's a special type of knowledge that I cannot be expected to understand. THAT, of course, is stated in self-righteous smugness from the top of Mt. Sinai to the devil (in the form of me or some other deconvert) writhing in Death Valley below.

 

But sometimes we don't writhe. I think they have a problem with that. It doesn't phaze them, though. They have a handy one to slap on--it must be PRIDE. Yes..that's it...Pride. Only Pride would presume to stand tall when confronted with the bible/god approved truth.

 

I think I'm trying to convince myself as much as anyone with the stuff I'm saying here. Still trying to make sense of the way my sister acted on the phone the other day and how I got drawn in.

 

I think it started with her claiming that it is of the devil to question the faith. I was dumb-struck. I said I was never taught that. She kept disbelieving me until I began to see it as a change in preaching since I attended the OOM church. She wanted me to explain that so I did, using evidence she had no choice but to accept.

 

Guess what happened then. She changed her story line. She said perhaps it was not exactly preached that questioning the faith was not okay. Does anyone here know--is there a bible verse to the effect of: Everything that is not of faith is of the devil.

 

If there is I'm sure she used it. It would seem, then, that the evidence HAS to exist. And if we say it doesn't the problem absolutely HAS to be US. God wouldn't leave himself without witness--in fact the Bible says he doesn't.

 

You know, that really puts the Christian in a terrible position. He/she is forced to prove something he or she is of necessity incapable of proving. I wonder what would happen if we ever expressed genuine pity for them being in such a terrible no-win situation. Better leave out the word "no-win." That would allow them to go on a tirade about Christianity not being a no-win situation. It would let them off from actually responding to the thrust of the statement.