What Darwinism does is toraise our consciousness to the power of science to explain the existence ofcomplex things and intelligences, and creative intelligences are above allcomplex things, they’re statistically improbable.
Unfortunately anybody that has formally studied any type of applied statistics will tell you that we cant conclude if its statistically improbable. We have no basis to say if theres a .000000001% chance or a 99.9% chance that God exists. There is no sample, there is no historical evidence we can use, and statistics just cant be applied to establish the likelihood that God exists. This takes away much of the passage that you cited given that Dawkins is trying to establish which has a higher probability of being the case - big bang or divine creation. Many people claim that they have experienced God themselves (either through prayer or something comparable), and to them, the odds are 100% that God exists. Unfortunately, from a scientific perspective this is indemonstrable and doesnt fall close to the accepted guidelines of the scientific method. But hold on, this alone isnt enough to discredit the point. I mean, if I tell you that I'm happy and you say prove it, what can I do? Nothing, there is no way of scientifically validating this point and the same applies to everyone thats claiming that they have felt God's presence or w/e.
Now going back to what you said initially about things like evolution and the big bang being incompatible with religion, let me explain the position. Basically the view is as follows: God exists, God says let there be light and the universe comes to be (circa 14 billion years ago) - this IS the big bang, Once the earth is created (circa 4.5 billion years ago), God creates life and animals. The variation here is that I dont take the fist few lines of the book of genesis literally. I don't think all that happened in 7 days (especially since a day is measured in revolutions around a planet's axis and, well, there were no planets as of then...). After life was created, evolution occurs and life progresses a la Darwin. This isnt a ridiculously different interpretation of Genesis and its a really, really common debate amongst the Christian community whether it should be taken literally or symbolically. I know Bishop Berkeley calculated that the world started at like 4000 BC or something like that and, well, when we find something thats from BEFORE 4000 BC, it means that somebody was wrong and the dates in the Bible dont line up right.
Originally Posted by Ryda421
if god sent his only begotten son to this world how come we are still considered his CHILDREN ? also, wouldn't adam be considered his true son because he was 'made' first ?
I dont think that they mean we are like literal children. As in offspring. Its like a symbolic child, not a literal child. Also, I dont understand why Adam specifically would be his true son because he was first but, by your logic, you wouldnt be his true son because you were created like 100 billionth. Anyways, I'd say no.
Originally Posted by DCAllAmerican
What sports did Jesus play as a child?
Basketball. He wrote a playbook that the Detroit Pistons used to win the 2004 NBA championship.
Originally Posted by Its That Dude
Let's say I see a woman about to be robbed. I hear the robber say, "Give me your money or I'll kill you" to the woman. The robber has a gun to the woman's face. I'm behind the robber with a gun and I have the chance to save the woman by shooting the robber. The robber has no idea that I'm there. I choose not to save the woman because I don't feel like it. Bang. The woman is shot in the head and killed.
Can you honestly say I'm good person after I chose to let that woman die? I'm not asking if I'm a bad person, but am I a GOOD person?
Now, can you still say that your all-good God is...good? He's all-knowing, so he knew that the situation was coming. He's also all-powerful, but he let the chooses to let the woman be killed.
How can you say your God is all-good when he CHOOSES to let innocent people die?
I understand that humans have free will and all that bs, but so does God, more so because he's all-powerful. He chose to let that woman and millions of other innocent people die.
Ok , good question. You've basically just asked - why do bad things happen if God is good. What you've just described is called The Problem of Evil. It roughly looks like this in Premise-Conclusion form:
Premise (1) : A God exists that is all powerful and all loving.
Premise (2) : Somebody who is all powerful has the ability to stop any evil from happening.
Premise (3) : Somebody who is all loving would want to evil to happen
Premise (4) : Yet evil exists.
So either:
Conclusion (1): God wants to stop evil but cant. Therefore Premise (1) is false.
or:
Conclusion (2): God can stop evil, but doesnt want to. Therefore Premise (1) is false.
There are a lot of responses to this, some good, a lot bad. My answer would lie with the fact that good and evil are relational concepts. I've actually written a 20 page paper for a philosophy class that I took on this exact question, so you can see what I said. Here is an excerpt from it:
Considering the implications that wouldsoon follow assuming one shall experience events A, B, and C:
Premise (1): A hypothetical universe witha benevolent, divine being exists in which no events have yet occurred.
Premise (2): An event is declared good orevil only relative to events that are respectively deemed better or worse thanit.
Premise (3): A was experienced and isdeclared as good. [By assumption]
Premise (4): B was then experienced andis declared as being ‘more good’ than A.
Premise (5): C was then experienced andis declared as being ‘more good’ than both A and B.
Conclusion (1): Relative to B and C, A isno longer considered to be good and is now deemed as evil.
Conclusion (2): Evil now exists.
Premise (6): In order to eliminate evil,the divine being eliminates A.
Conclusion (3): B is now considered evilrelative to C.
Premise (7): In order to eliminate evil, thedivine being eliminates B.
Conclusion (4): C exists with no otherevent to be compared to, making it neither good nor evil.
Conclusion (5): C remains as the singlenon-evil option and hence, a single-stated universe of monotony is experienced.
As has been shown, what was once good isnow evil simply due to the fact that something better had been introduced intothe world. This demonstrates that to eliminate evil is to eliminate good and indoing so, ultimately experience a world of uniformity [Conclusion (5)]. At thispoint, we may observe that we have a conflict between this state that existswith no evil and the standard monotheistic conception. This is due to the wayin which the standard monotheistic conception addresses the afterlife. That is,once a person dies, he is believed to go to heaven or paradise. It would not bepossible for this to occur while operating under our current assumptions, giventhat there would be a single state of existence and heaven and Earth becomeone.
An advocate of the Problem of Evil maynot, however, find the preceding argument entirely satisfactory. So what if welive in a world characterized by monotony? Although the notion that heaven andEarth becoming one may be an interesting point to consider, it does notdirectly detract from the apparent contradiction that is embedded in thestandard monotheistic conception. To this point, it must be made discernablethat it is logically impossible to accept this proposed world while operatingunder the standard monotheistic conception. One cannot begin their existence inheaven. If you begin in heaven, it is no longer heaven. It may only beconsidered to be heaven compared to our reference point on Earth. Our currentlives function as the benchmark to which all things are compared. If all oneknows is ‘heaven’, then heaven is no longer good given that there is nothingfor heaven to be compared to. This directly contradicts the standardmonotheistic conception of the afterlife being a place of eternal happiness (ashappiness can no longer exist).
Originally Posted by
Its That Dude
oh yea...
Can God make a burrito so hot that he Himself cannot eat it?
I'm totally serious on this one too.
Ok, this question is usually posed as: If God can do anything, can He make a rock so big that he himself cant move it? It may seem like a good point initially, but from a symbolic logic perspective, it is dismissed as an "invalid question". It is not conceivable to be able to do anything and prevent yourself from doing something. A paradox is created and the question itself cannot be answered.
A simpler example of an "invalid question" is something like this: Picture somebody holding up a silver tablespoon. As this person holds it up, he asks: What color are the prongs on this spoon?. It can be quickly seen that a spoon does not have prongs (as in prongs on a fork), so its impossible to answer the question - what color are the prongs. There are no prongs. Likewise, the question above is dismissed as an invalid question given the paradoxical nature of the question itself. It has value neither to the atheist nor to the theist.
Originally Posted by
Heavily Weighted
Originally Posted by
ZeroGravity23
-if diseases are caused by nature, it's safe to say that god isn't the creator of all things, if god makes something it should be obsolete...right? not have the capability to change, where's the logical in that mr. god.
-you say god didn't purposefully cause harm on us, how can you verify that that was truly his message, though.
-creator? isn't it a bit ridiculous to believe that one man is responsible for the creation of all things? lulz.
How do we know god is a man? Or a woman? God could be a chimp for all I know.
Ok the only legitimate claim you brought up was the Problem of Evil - why do bad things happen in the world (ie pain and suffering). You can check out my response earlier, I answered it pretty thoroughly. Let me know if you have any serious points youd like answered.
Originally Posted by
cartune
I wonder if computers ask themselves about their creators and if so can they even rationalize or "think" logically about the thought process of something that created their logic
Well they kind of do. They're programmed to avoid that but it happens on occasion. Look up John Searle and his work on 'Strong AI". He focuses on something along those lines but in more of a theoretical way rather than an empirical way.
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Damn this is a lot of work.. haha well somebodys gotta do it. I hope some of you guys out there appreciate this post and the ability to have your questions actually answered rather than your character attacked. After reading every response in this thread thoroughly, Ive noticed really quickly that there are some damn tough questions asked (and with well supported arguments/evidence as well) and there are some ridiculous claims of truth made with nothing backing it up. Its interesting that theres so little in between those two extremes.
