Why Do Atheists Care About Religion?

[florduh]

You cannot simply conclude that because there are varying interpretations, that all are therefore wrong.

That is not what I said.

 

All we can know is that everybody gets a different message, and everybody thinks they are the one who has correct understanding.

there is no way to know if anybody actually got it right.

That's what I actually said.

 

Your interpretation of my words was incorrect, but I'm sure you thought you understood it. You added to what I said and took the idea to an entirely different conclusion. Thanks for providing a good example.

 

 

 

If there is a "right" interpretation of the Bible, or even a "right" Bible, somebody's selection of books and their interpretation might be correct, but we'll never be able to know which of the multiple thousands of viewpoints was correct. They all carry equal weight, not to you personally, but to each reader respectively.

[LNC]

Evil people do evil acts and use whatever excuse that suits them. The Bible god is definitely evil. People that worship an evil entity are pretty much by default, evil themselves or they would't worship such a horrid entity. Then to make it worse, they claim such evil is good.

 

Vix,

 

Can you give an objective basis for the existence of evil apart from the existence of God? In other words, can you give an objective basis for morality apart from God? For you must do that before claiming that God or anything else is evil, you have to ground morality objectively, otherwise you are merely stating a preference, not an objective reality.

 

LNC

[LNC]

It's a two-way process. Author intent and relative to the reader. The author has intent, but cannot deny the experience which the audience brings to the text which influence how that text comes alive and what is made of it.It is a two-way process.

 

P

 

I don't deny that the reader brings experiences to the reading; however, it still doesn't preclude the reader being able to get to the author's intent. Otherwise, we end up in relativism and we can end our discussion as no one would be right or wrong, we would merely have our own interpretation of reality. I don't think that many on this board operate under that assumption since we are all reading and critiquing each other's posts and seem to understand the intent that the poster gave in his/her post.

 

LNC

[florduh]

we are all reading and critiquing each other's posts and seem to understand the intent that the poster gave in his/her post.

Misunderstandings abound when reading postings (see my previous post), but these posts don't claim to be inspired by any deities. People don't use what's written here to decide how to live and what to believe is absolute truth. Those are rather important distinctions between that which claims to be a holy book and some Internet postings.

[LNC]

I distrust any segment of society with such a tenuous grip on reality that spirits, spooks, and other-worldly gods are not only deemed to exist but worshipped.

 

Vehement lengthly protests such as above are generally a sign of "convincing ones self."

 

Is it vehement lengthy posts in general that you distrust? If so, there are posts just as vehemently lengthy as mine, and some more so.

 

Sorry for your trust issues, but you apparently distrust the majority of society. I'm not arguing that because a majority believe in immaterial beings, that they are true, just pointing out that you distrust most of the world's population. However, a person in your position is not off the hook of having a tenuous grip on reality. For example, have you solved the infinite regress paradox? If not, you are living with it hanging over your head as you must argue that the material world has existed into the infinite past and that you and I have crossed that infinite span of time to reach today. Zeno could not solve that one, have you? If so, please post your answer. If not, I think you are in a tenuous position in regards to reality.

 

LNC

[LNC]

there is no way to know if anybody actually got it right.

That's what I actually said.

 

Your interpretation of my words was incorrect, but I'm sure you thought you understood it. You added to what I said and took the idea to an entirely different conclusion. Thanks for providing a good example.

 

If there is a "right" interpretation of the Bible, or even a "right" Bible, somebody's selection of books and their interpretation might be correct, but we'll never be able to know which of the multiple thousands of viewpoints was correct. They all carry equal weight, not to you personally, but to each reader respectively.

 

Your conclusion still doesn't necessarily follow. How do you know that there is no way to know if anybody got it right, unless you know the right interpretation? Do you know the rules of interpretation that are applied? If you do, I don't know how you can make such a statement.

 

How do we know that we have the right interpretation of scientific theories in light of competing theories? We apply rules of interpretation. The same is done with Biblical texts, that is why we have what the author intended. We have enough writings to compare with the NT, that it is not difficult to do this. Again, your position sounds more relativistic in its nature. More like that of Jacques Derrida's deconstructionist view. Is that what you are claiming?

 

LNC

[oddbird1963]

 

I noticed that you didn't actually state what Brown or A&G say about pistis{/i], you merely give your interpretation of their entries. The root word for pistis is peitho which means persuasion. So, the question is how one is persuaded without some type of evidence or reasoning by which to be so. I don't have either reference you cite handy, so let me refer to some others that I do have here. Strong's says of pistis - to have faith (in, upon, or with respect to a person or thing). It means to entrust one's self. It is no different than the examples that I gave in my previous post and always involves entrusting one's self to a person or thing and that would involve, by implication, evidence that the person or thing is trustworthy.

What's the point in stating what Brown and A&G say? You want me to quote places where they DON'T use the word 'evidence?' I've already noted that they use the sense of conviction or assurance. You agree with that part. What I do point out is that they DON'T bring out the word evidence. What's the point of quoting anything? Do you want me to reproduce the spaces between paragraphs or something?

 

You are being equivocal with your use of the word evidence.

 

Yes. People believe for a reason. But the vast witness of history as well as the witness of the new testament is that people believe because the speaker or preacher sounds convincing and because it lines up with what they have been dogmatically preconditioned to accept. Faith is an internal phenomenon whereby one becomes convinced that something is true or "of God."

 

The reasons people believe are rarely well-thought out, thoroughly investigated, critically evaluated and compared to what is established scientifically. They believe because of the enthusiasm of the preacher, his deep voice, his emotional appeal and the reaction of the crowd around them.

 

If by "evidence" you meant "a reason someone believes something," I would have no argument. But you want people to think faith means something that is well-reasoned, thoroughly investigated, critically evaluated and compared to what is established scientifically. And the greek words for faith as used in the New Testament do not support that. You are majoring on minors and distorting what the New Testament concepts of faith really meant.

 

 

David Hay, in is article Pistis as Ground for Faith in Hellenized Judaism and Paul states, "Subjective pistis also involved trust for Paul - and this passage [Gal. 3-4] indicates that subjective trust of Christians is a response to God's demonstration or proof of his trustworthiness in Jesus. Trust always hinges on a perception of dependability...we should understand that the background for this 'ground of faith' sense of the term lies in the widespread contemporary use of pistis to mean 'pledge' or 'evidence.'" (Journal of Biblical Literature, Vol. 108, No. 3 (Autumn, 1989), p. 464))

 

So, unless you have clear evidence to show that Brown or A&G are speaking of a blind faith, I would suggest that one has to look at the complete etymology of the word and it is generally used as a convinced trust. I wonder how widely you "scoured" those references if you could not find this etymology or whether you simply did not look at the etymology and other uses of the root and forms of the word as it is quite apparent and easy to find.

 

Here are some other related words: pisteuo - believe; pistikos - trustworthy (implies a reason for trust); pistos - believing; pistoo - to make trustworthy (establish trustworthiness). These words imply, when tied together, a reason for the trust that has been placed. However, let's take the occurrence in Hebrews in context and see what we find there.

 

Wait a minute. So you cherry pick an article that uses the word evidence, just like you cherry picked Easton's dictionary? Let's go to an authoratative source!

 

Brown's New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology and Arndt, Gingrinch and Dankers "Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament" are standard's in evangelical scholarly circles for New Testament word studies. When you made your fishy assertions about "flows from evidence" I went to the standards to check out what you said. Your peculiar emphasis on "flows from evidence" is not warranted. It's that simple.

 

And, if you're such an objective, serious student of the New Testament, I am baffled as to why those are not in your library.

 

I think your approach to word study is flawed. You don't "tie" together words that stem from the same historical root and apply the meaning of one word in one context to a different word in the family in a different context. It's tempting when you want to force words to mean things like "flows from evidence. . ." But it's really not responsible word study.

 

 

In chapter 11, he begins, "Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen." Why do we have assurance? He has explained why in the first ten chapters. The word translated conviction, is enchos, which means, evidence. Yes, evidence! So, as I said, there is evidence involved with pistis (faith) and the author says so in this very verse. The root word here is elegcho, which means proof, conviction, evidence. The evidence is within the argument of the first ten chapters. So, contrary to the what the author of the article seems to imply, the author if Hebrews is not, in any way, implying a blind faith. Neither have you made the case for such.

 

 

You actually think I've not read and studied Hebrews? The "reasons" you refer to are the narrative recounts of previous chapters in Hebrews. That is not evidence in the modern sense. That is dogma. The reader is told to have faith because of what the dogma says.

 

And you are trying to imply that faith flows from evidence in the modern legal, historical or scientific sense, not in the weaker sense of "any ol' reason that makes you believe."

 

 

Now, about that word enchos. Let's look at the words of a scholar from Colin Brown,

 

Accordingly, elonchos should be interpreted neither subjectively as if it denoted absence of doubt, nor in a horatory sense as if it meant correction, nor yet in an intellectual sense, meaning evidence.

 

Rather, it should be understood in its context in the theology of Heb. in a strictly theological sense, as referring to conviction, about the power of the future world promised by God which is here described in the language of secular Gk. as "things not seen."

 

- - New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology , Vol. 2, pg. 242.

 

 

So, once again, it is a mistake to sieze upon one specific denotation (evidence), wrest it from its context and make it mean something that you want it to mean (evidence in the modern sense).

 

Remember, you need to pay attention to context in order to get to the intended meaning of a text.

 

 

Remember, LNC, your own bible tells you "do not go beyond what is written." Your evidential form of apologetic is very involved, but you cannot gain some sort of aura of biblical support by sticking your favorite word in there and declaring that "the greek word pistis means . . ."

 

Please quote chapter and verse on this and interpret it in context, please.

I think you would benefit the most from such an exercise.

 

 

 

I have already shown that the word evidence is contained within the very verse under discussion, so your point is falsified.

 

 

Wrong again. You see, one must not only quote people. One has to think about what is said. A reader shouldn't sieze on any ol' denotation that fits what they want a word to mean. That's where apologists often fail because of a deep need to have faith mean the same thing as evidence in the modern sense of the word. Their entire world seems to be colored by an extreme need for apologetics. The real meaning of texts gets distorted and skewed.

 

 

The rest of your argument has already been shown to be moot by what I have explained above. Whether most believers use evidence is another discussion. I might agree with you on that; however, it does not mean that their faith is in vain. Most people board aircraft with no evidence or investigation of the airline's safety record or standards of inspection, training of the pilots, or airworthiness of the plane that they are boarding; however, it does not mean that their trust is in vain if the airline has met all the standards mentioned.

 

I could say that most atheists haven't looked into the arguments thoroughly or sufficiently to ground their beliefs either. You certainly have shown in your post a misunderstanding of one simple verse of the Bible, so I wonder how many others you have really studied and understood beyond the cursory English words on the paper or screen. Do you have proper grounds for you rejection of the evidence of Christianity? Your belief that reason plays no part in the faith involved with Christianity leads me to think that you do not. However, I will withhold judgment and merely encourage you to be more fair and honest in the treatment of the convictions of the Christian faith.

 

My point was that the definition of pistis/faith/conviction whatever doesn't carry the connotation that you want to force it to carry. I said nothing about faith being in vain. That's your straw man. That's a tangent I will not pursue with you.

 

And your tired old airline safety analogy does not illustrate theological faith. It reduces your faith to the mundane realm of rivets, and torque and risk factors and observed phenomena.

 

If you want to live in the basement while your own NT soars into the skies, then more power to you. I won't go off on that tangent with you either.

 

 

 

The author of the article paints with a broad brush in lumping all religious belief systems together and you seem to paint with a broad brush in saying that because some Christians use less evidence to come to their convictions, therefore, reason is not used to come to Christian convictions. That is an unreasoned belief on your part. I have used reason to question the authority of your assertions, I will look forward to your reply.

 

 

Fine and dandy, but you went off on a tangent about Materialistic worldviews, totally off topic. Why? What relevance did it have? What was your point, other than verbage?

 

And I don't paint anything with a broad brush. I'm just saying the point you want to make so much of is misguided and unwarranted. The biblical cluster of words for faith does not require evidence in the sense that you would have people think.

 

"Some reason by which they believe" is not "evidence" in the modern sense of the word.

 

You are trying to back port your modern notions into a word and a biblical theology that plainly does not need it.

[florduh]

How do we know that we have the right interpretation of scientific theories in light of competing theories? We apply rules of interpretation. The same is done with Biblical texts, that is why we have what the author intended. We have enough writings to compare with the NT, that it is not difficult to do this.

Scientific theories can be tested, but that's another discussion.

 

I don't know what your pet doctrines are, but let's look at speaking in tongues. You may show me how the Bible clearly states that tongues are a crucial sign that the Holy Spirit indwells. Someone else could show me that clearly the Bible says that tongues served there purpose and are no longer necessary. One will insist that tongues were/are "spirit language" while another demonstrates through verse that a tongue is a human language.

 

Rapture? Pre-trib, mid-trib or post-trib? All have their evidences in Scripture. Is water baptism a requirement? Does calling a priest "Father" go against Scripture or not?

[oddbird1963]

The picture of faith drawn in the new testament is simple. A non believer hears the preaching of a story. That story is the narrative of the death of jesus on the cross and the resurrection . Because of the perceived power of the person speaking and (presumably) the working of the Holy Spirit in some way, that person "believes" and gains a sense of certainty or assurance that Christ will save him or her.

 

That's it. If they believe the story based on the perception of some divine authority on the part of the speaker, in the message itself or possibly with the crowd that is hosting the speaker, then that is all that is required. "Faith comes by hearing , and hearing by the word of God."

 

That is a fanciful explanation that is biased to your point of view, not what I have shown from the Bible.

 

So, you are saying that the narrative which non-believers hear is NOT the death and resurrection of Jesus? THAT is fanciful? That is biased?

 

Are you also saying that Paul did not write Romans 10:17? And if faith does come by hearing? What do you think they are hearing? Wouldn't it be the story of the death and resurrection of Christ?

 

 

Didn't Paul lay out exactly what I said above?

14How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? 15And how can they preach unless they are sent? "

 

Romans 10

 

Let's see, 1)Someone preaches a narrative (the "gospel"). 2) A listener hears 3) The Listener believes

 

I'm not sure what kind of Christian you are LNC. You consider a biblical summation of the gospel message to be fanciful and biased.

 

Is there no intellectual low to which you will not sink in order to advance your own apologetic?

[Ouroboros]

I throw out the accusation often only because the author committed them with blinding frequency. He did not prove that religion is bad, he only asserted as much. However, my quote shows that he asserts that those who hold these beliefs do it by suspending reason. That is also unproved and an ad hominem. He has attacked the person, not the argument which is what an ad hominem is. When he says, "People use religion to justify the most absurdly cruel acts and attitudes," it seems to me that he is speaking about bad people that use religion as their excuse (not giving evidence as to whether the religion really did inspire this behavior). Second, he cites as his only example the 9/11 attacks, which were perpetrated by Muslims, but then never mentions Islam directly, but instead, attacks Christianity. This is a common pattern practiced by the likes of Christopher Hitchens and others. This is the fallacy of the broad brush. So, I have once again pointed out how he used ad hominem and how he uses a broad brush technique to paint all religions with the same brush, yet without justification within his/her article.

Then tell me, which person did he attack? Who? An ad hominem is an attack on a PERSON, a real entity, a real living being, so who is it? Give me the name? The problem here is that he doesn't name any names. He doesn't accuse or attack any person at all. He attacks religion.

 

You keep on mixing up different kinds of fallacies and handle them in one big lump, and you call them all ad hominem. The broad brush is not ad hominem. Hasty generalization is not ad hominem. And he's not attacking any particular person.

 

Your fallacy is that you think you're so smart, but in reality you fail constantly. (<-- THAT is an ad hominem.)

 

And as an FYI, I checked in three different books I have about reasoning, logic, and argumentation, and as far as I can tell, they all agree with me. You're inventing your own definitions of the fallacy.

 

When he says, "People use religion to justify the most absurdly cruel acts and attitudes," he's making an unsupported statement, but he's not making an ad hominem. He's making an absolute statement and should have added a qualifier for this claim. He should have said, "Some people use religion to justify the most absurdly cruel acts and attitudes." Do you really disagree with this modified claim? What about terrorists who kill people in the name of religion? What about 9/11? Are you saying they were not religious or used religion to justify their cruel act? I'd say they did. So this modified statement is most definitely true and can be supported with valid data. So is this modified claim an ad hominem? How? If not, it proves that it wasn't an attack on the person, but rather it was a very hasty generalization without support. End of story.

[Mriana]

Interesting. I answer LNC's question (post #17) that s/he asked me directly and unlike you guys, LNC has nothing to say about any of my response. LNC has no comeback? Interesting.

[Antlerman]

. . . He goes on to say that cite a verse from the New Testament, Hebrews 11:1, albeit, with a faulty understanding of that verse. His argument is based upon the word faith, which he/she equates to a blind leap of reasonless hope. That is completely contrary to the meaning of the Greek word "pistis" which here is translated "faith."

 

The proper understanding of the word is conviction or assurance and flows from the evidence that gives that conviction or assurance. . .

 

There you go again, LNC, with your faulty definition of faith based on your faulty use of Easton's faulty Bible dictionary, once again.

 

Your addition of ". . .and flows from the evidence that gives that conviction or assurance. " is completely spurious. I could not find that connotation of the greek word pistis in a careful reading of the definition in Colin Brown's "Dictionary of New Testament Theology" Vol 1 . Nor could I find anything remotely resembling your personal augmentation of the real definition of pistis in Arndt and Gingrich's "Greek-English Lexicon of the New testament."

 

Believe me, in trying to give you the benefit of the doubt I scoured those two detailed and thorough treatments and nothing of the sort was even implied. Faith can be described as conviction, assurance, possibly a sense of certainty. But the requirement that it flows from the evidence is just something you have dreamed up because you so badly want it to be so.

 

Remember, LNC, your own bible tells you "do not go beyond what is written." Your evidential form of apologetic is very involved, but you cannot gain some sort of aura of biblical support by sticking your favorite word in there and declaring that "the greek word pistis means . . ."

 

The picture of faith drawn in the new testament is simple. A non believer hears the preaching of a story. That story is the narrative of the death of jesus on the cross and the resurrection . Because of the perceived power of the person speaking and (presumably) the working of the Holy Spirit in some way, that person "believes" and gains a sens of certainty or assurance that Christ will save him or her.

 

That's it. If they believe the story based on the perception of some divine authority on the part of the speaker, in the message itself or possibly with the crowd that is hosting the speaker, then that is all that is required. "Faith comes by hearing , and hearing by the word of God."

 

Your use of the word "evidence" is extraneous at best and just plain misleading at worst. Your addition of the word evidence distorts the true meaning of the word pistis.

 

That is what makes the effort to equate using reason with applying faith so ludicrous. You might have a chance to make your case if you could get people to swallow your "evidence" definition of pistis. But what is ludicrous is that you go from the original point of the article(Atheists have to care about religion because religionists force their way onto society), to a straw man about believing in a purely materialistic world. The concept was never even mentioned in the article.

 

Well, guess what! Most believers don't use evidence. They use their pre-conditioning about the authority of the Bible and their perceptions of the personal authority of priests and preachers to come to an assurance and a conviction about Christ. And , guess what! THAT is pistis. No reasoning required. AND, in most cases, no reasoning desired.

 

What "reason" does, is dare to question the authority of the speaker and the religious preconditioning that many comers to the faith have had thrust upon them. It dares to want to certify and verify everything that promoters of the christian faith have to say and ask, "Is it REALLY so?"

 

Otherwise, we might have overzealous religionists trying to slip the word "evidence" into the definition of pistis to fool people into falling for false perceptions of what faith entails.

Wow. Bookmark this post.

[Galien]

LNC I became a xian in 1970. About four years ago I made a decision to leave church for good because I was sick and fucking tired of being surrounded by people who claim the name of christ, yet run around causing so much damage with their judgement.

 

Because I became a xian as a child, I have always had a childlike faith, pretty well unpolluted by adult justifications for bad behaviour.

 

This is what I saw in the church. People who even though they say they believe in a god of love wouldnt know what love was if it jumped up and bit them on the ass. The church is about CONFORMITY, not about love. If you convince us you are one of US, we will accept you and pretend to love you. But you put one foot outside what we think is acceptable, and we will expel you from among us so fast your feet won't touch the ground. We will gossip about you, judge you, reject you and pretend you never existed. Doesn't matter that you gave your life to serve the brethren that you really did love, and valued the souls of those with whom you worshipped. We will spread unfounded lies about you, laugh at you behind your back and say well "the penny never really dropped there did it"?

 

The church has become a business/social club with a bit of praise god thrown it to make it seem legitimate. It is a heirachy that gives sociopaths a perfect arena to act out their pathologies, because if "god told you" you can get away with anything. You can emotionally, spiritually and mentally abuse people until they commit suicide, you can manipulate anyone and everyone with the social mores the church imposes in the name of god. You can twist scripture to make it mean whatever suits your agenda.

 

In all my years as a xian I have met thousands of them. About 50 of them ever really understood who jesus was. And I recognised them the way the bible said I would, by their genuine humility and love for each other, despite the circumstances. By their belief we are all equal, so they need to feel no superiority over others. By their love for people over money, by their willingness to tell the truth even if it wasnt pretty. Most of all by the way they were prepared to be rejected by the group (church) if they knew what the group was doing was wrong.

 

So for me its not about who has the best arguments or who understands the scriptures. You can keep your Greek meanings. Its about show me. Show me you understand by living them, or don't stand there and tell me anything at all.

 

I am an idealist, I wanted the whole thing to be true, but experience has shown me that in the majority of cases even when people say they are saved, their hearts dont change at all. I'm tired of being part of something that treats people so badly and consistently violates everything it says it believes. I'm done.

[agnosticator]

Wow. Bookmark this post.

 

I second that. Excellent post Oddbird! LNC has no biblical authority to redefine "Faith" as common everyday "faith", like we have in our chairs we sit upon while posting in this forum.

[agnosticator]

The church has become a business/social club with a bit of praise god thrown it to make it seem legitimate. It is a heirachy that gives sociopaths a perfect arena to act out their pathologies, because if "god told you" you can get away with anything. You can emotionally, spiritually and mentally abuse people until they commit suicide, you can manipulate anyone and everyone with the social mores the church imposes in the name of god. You can twist scripture to make it mean whatever suits your agenda.

 

This is exactly how I see it. I also knew of someone who committed suicide due to the abuse, and also one that was murdered by being "disciplined".

 

 

So for me its not about who has the best arguments or who understands the scriptures. Its about show me. Show me you understand by living them, or don't stand there and tell me anything at all.

 

and then shake the dust off your feet and go elsewhere.

[Antlerman]

Wow. Bookmark this post.

 

I second that. Excellent post Oddbird! LNC has no biblical authority to redefine "Faith" as common everyday "faith", like we have in our chairs we sit upon while posting in this forum.

Yes, LNC is trying to make 1st Century Christianity speak to post Enlightenment Western culture. Absurd. Nothing more to say.

[Guest Valk0010]

LNC, one does not need religion to do that.

 

“An Atheist believes that a hospital should be built instead of a church. An atheist believes that deed must be done instead of prayer said. An atheist strives for involvement in life and not escape into death. He wants disease conquered, poverty vanished, war eliminated.” ~ Madalyn Murray O'Hair

 

I never said that an atheist cannot believe these things. I am merely asking for the objective grounding of that belief. Can you give an objective reason, given atheism, why these beliefs as stated by Ms. O'Hair are any better than those espoused by Kim Jong Il who impoverishes, starves, and exploits his people? Just curious.

 

LNC

How about effect, morality cannot form or be even discussed without a perception of harm and benefit. It is kind of like the idea that society can't survive if there is pure anarchy. A base form of law as we see in our books today is morality. Speaking from a evolutionary perspective, if we as a species didn't get the hint that things like murder were harmful (therefore wrong) we would have not survived to the next level of our evolution. It is why the golden rule for example precedes christianity, the idea is that what causes harm is wrong is in itself universal. The objectivity is in the biology, what is better for the species is what is "better." Harm=wrong help/benefit=good

 

The difference between Kim Jong Il and the beliefs stated by O'Hair is that, one benefits and one harms. The harm is labeled and has been labeled since we humans evolved the brainpower to create the concept the same way. That is why we know. It had to become nature, that we understood it. It had to become nature for our very species survival.

 

Now to the subject matter at hand.

 

Faith.

 

I was having a discussion with a fundy uncle one time. He said to me that, faith is evidence. The fact that people have faith is evidence of its truth. While of course I disagree with that. You can have faith in something untrue, that is nonetheless what he said.

 

I also asked a christian, that I am friends with once. Shouldn't we have evidence for belief? She responded, what is faith then. She was trying to get across the point, that there wouldn't be a need for faith if there was evidence, or a need for evidence.

 

I have also heard that, salvation is by faith alone. Now I am no expert in languages so the battle over pistis is out of my range, but it seems that apologetics betrays the idea of faith and the idea of "whoever calls upon the name of the lord shall be saved." It betrays the idea of what jesus said about "blessed are those who have not seen yet believed." Apologetics is the equilivent of asking people to be one of those that seen and believed. It is said that salvation is by faith alone. But faith is the acceptance of, in many ways that things will work or be true, without certainty. Apologetics provides certainty.

[LNC]

we are all reading and critiquing each other's posts and seem to understand the intent that the poster gave in his/her post.

Misunderstandings abound when reading postings (see my previous post), but these posts don't claim to be inspired by any deities. People don't use what's written here to decide how to live and what to believe is absolute truth. Those are rather important distinctions between that which claims to be a holy book and some Internet postings.

 

You seem to have understood my post quite well. Inspiration and interpretation are two separate issues. Inspiration has no direct bearing upon accuracy of interpretation. Still, my point is, and you have aided me in making it, that we can understand the intent of the author using reasoning skills and methods of interpretation. Now, which of Jesus' teachings do you believe should not be practiced and why?

 

LNC

[par4dcourse]

 

Sorry for your trust issues, but you apparently distrust the majority of society. I'm not arguing that because a majority believe in immaterial beings, that they are true, just pointing out that you distrust most of the world's population. However, a person in your position is not off the hook of having a tenuous grip on reality. For example, have you solved the infinite regress paradox? If not, you are living with it hanging over your head as you must argue that the material world has existed into the infinite past and that you and I have crossed that infinite span of time to reach today. Zeno could not solve that one, have you? If so, please post your answer. If not, I think you are in a tenuous position in regards to reality.

 

LNC

 

You claim an undead zombie somewhere "not of this world" and his invisible father who is really him controls earthly events through telepathic communications with us, and I have a tenuous grip on reality.

 

I doubt you really want my views on the birth of the universe, just wanted to impress us with your brilliance. Bravo. I will say that adding an uncaused deity begs more questions than it answers. Occam's razor.

 

Yes, I admit it. Against the mainstream, I see no verifiable proof of any god(s). Care to prove me wrong.

[florduh]

we are all reading and critiquing each other's posts and seem to understand the intent that the poster gave in his/her post.

Misunderstandings abound when reading postings (see my previous post), but these posts don't claim to be inspired by any deities. People don't use what's written here to decide how to live and what to believe is absolute truth. Those are rather important distinctions between that which claims to be a holy book and some Internet postings.

 

You seem to have understood my post quite well. Inspiration and interpretation are two separate issues. Inspiration has no direct bearing upon accuracy of interpretation. Still, my point is, and you have aided me in making it, that we can understand the intent of the author using reasoning skills and methods of interpretation. Now, which of Jesus' teachings do you believe should not be practiced and why?

 

LNC

You were the one drawing a parallel between the Bible and Internet posts. You were the one who misunderstood and embellished what I said, thus demonstrating that people don't always understand what they read.

 

The Bible is unclear on many points, so people take from it what they will. If the message was clear, there wouldn't be so much disagreement and even war among people who claim the Bible as their authority.

 

Everybody thinks they have correctly interpreted the Bible. Why do you think you are right and the Pope (for example) isn't? Remember, the Pope can make a detailed case for his beliefs as well. It comes down to him saying you are wrong, and you saying he is wrong. One of you may be right, or neither may be right. There is no way to tell.

[par4dcourse]

I'm not sure what kind of Christian you are LNC. You consider a biblical summation of the gospel message to be fanciful and biased.

 

 

He is, of course, a True Christian^TM. He and his group, whoever they are, know The Truth^TM.

 

Everybody thinks they have correctly interpreted the Bible.

 

 

"Nobody's right if everybody's wrong"--Buffalo Springfield

 

30k (at last count) branches of xianity, but the bible is god inspired and crystal clear. Yeah.

[NotBlinded]

LNC, one does not need religion to do that.

 

“An Atheist believes that a hospital should be built instead of a church. An atheist believes that deed must be done instead of prayer said. An atheist strives for involvement in life and not escape into death. He wants disease conquered, poverty vanished, war eliminated.” ~ Madalyn Murray O'Hair

 

I never said that an atheist cannot believe these things. I am merely asking for the objective grounding of that belief. Can you give an objective reason, given atheism, why these beliefs as stated by Ms. O'Hair are any better than those espoused by Kim Jong Il who impoverishes, starves, and exploits his people? Just curious.

 

LNC

LNC,

 

You seem to think that an objective reason would be what the bible states. All beliefs come from the same place...the mind of people. Is it really objective then if a person claims that there is an objective grounding for beliefs? No. It's an illusion, LNC, that you bought into.

 

You don't seem to have a problem with people being sinful by nature, why is it you have a problem with people being good by nature? We are all in the same boat with this and you can claim an outside force is responsible all you want, but it doesn't change anything.

[NotBlinded]

I've got to disagree with you. The author states, when "someone has faith in something, no amount of logic or evidence can change their immediate view. Such a thought numbing mindset is not just a justification for cruelty, hate, and violence; it is a direct cause of such things." Why is that not an attack on the person rather than evidence that religion is evil as he states in his premise. This is a clear example of an ad hominem. This does nothing to prove the premise, it only is possibly evidence that some people act irrationally. I can show plenty of atheists who act irrationally, but does that count against atheism or against those people? To paint all people of faith this way is not only false, it is a hasty generalization. Thanks for the warning, but I believe I have properly applied identified the fallacy.

You throwing around the accusations of fallacies like some new years fireworks.

 

I agree with you that it's an hasty generalization, but I don't agree it's an ad hominem. Sorry.

 

He's not saying religion is bad because people are bad, he's saying people are bad because religion makes them bad.

 

He doesn't say religion is wrong because people are bad, he's claims religion is bad because it makes people bad.

 

It's a huge difference.

 

An ad hominem means "to the person." It's an attack on the person who argues a certain argument. The fallacy is to claim that he is wrong because something is wrong with his character.

 

You got it wrong.

Well, the confusion may be in what LNC believes. He believes all people are bad and religion makes them good. He starts off with an ad hominem and goes from there...backwards.

[NotBlinded]

Evil people do evil acts and use whatever excuse that suits them. The Bible god is definitely evil. People that worship an evil entity are pretty much by default, evil themselves or they would't worship such a horrid entity. Then to make it worse, they claim such evil is good.

 

Vix,

 

Can you give an objective basis for the existence of evil apart from the existence of God? In other words, can you give an objective basis for morality apart from God? For you must do that before claiming that God or anything else is evil, you have to ground morality objectively, otherwise you are merely stating a preference, not an objective reality.

 

LNC

This is what everyone does LNC...states a preference. Even you. You want to put it onto some outside entity to make it have reality regardless of whether that reality is actually reality or not. It still ends up being the same. People prefer one or the other. Why do you have to make it so difficult?

[agnosticator]

LNC,

 

You seem to think that an objective reason would be what the bible states. All beliefs come from the same place...the mind of people. Is it really objective then if a person claims that there is an objective grounding for beliefs? No. It's an illusion, LNC, that you bought into.

 

 

LNC thinks he knows God and the Mind of God. Since God can't be proven or disproven, he doesn't really know the Guy In The Sky, or what The Guy thinks. So, you are right NotBlinded!

 

He can't see that the effects of ethical thought and human experience have created morals the are objective to humanity. Laws and rules exist and we follow them (for a simple example of objectivity). It takes feelings of empathy and compassion with reason and human experience to create morals. DOH! LNC can't admit it without crushing his dream.