Oh, I see. You mean in physical form. Well, at the rate the human race is going, the answer to that is easy - extinct.

Creation at its FUNDAMENTAL ORIGIN has never been observed. Something from Nothing. Why would that be taught in school, if it requires more faith to believe that mythology than scientific fact? There is no creationist explanation that is remotely plausible for the origin of life. If there was...we would still be able to reproduce the results.

Science has, through the use of recombinant DNA, created in laboratories organisms that never existed before. I guess, since we can create new life-forms, that puts us on an equal footing with "God", doesn't it?


(If "God" even existed, of course.)

Would you like to know?

Actually, it made the men more suggestible and easier to control. Which humble beginnings in turn evolved into todays society.

At the risk of sounding a tad exhausted here, I do wonder if it's not fear - honest and well-intentioned fear - that stops so many from not just trying to understand people who do not believe in God, but even more mind-befuddling, stops many from being willing to believe that many other true Christians exist that don't happen to share their same sect or view of religion.

You can stop wondering. Ignorance and fear are much easier for people to dwell in than understanding and enlightenment. The latter require some work and some thought. The first - neither.

Well, there isn't that much to understand. lol. Really.

Doesn't the bible discuss "non-believers"?

Why do people have to understand someone who does not believe?

Just recognize that the bible says that there will be such people.

If there weren't, then wouldn't the "word of God" be wrong?

I was taught both. Evolution in biology classes, then we had the regular religion classes. Evolution is taught as a fact JUST as much as religion is taught as a fact too. Do you hear religious people saying ".. if this is how it all went, maybe God created this and this.." or scientists saying ".. if this is how it all went, maybe there was a 'Big Bang' in the beginning and Planet Earth was born..", I think not. The people who teach or study these things, talk about both theories as a fact.

If religion is kicked out of schools and only evolution is taught, then that is weird and stupid by the politicians to do such a decision, there should be both theory lessons available.

Personally, I couldn't care less of bible or God since I'm an atheist -- different religions are interesting though. I did, however, go to the religion classes always (not anymore, none at vocational school -- just studying for a job). What is there to wonder about non-believers? It's everyones own choice to believe or not; it has no meaning to anything than just the fact that you don't believe or you believe. And then what?

Just my opinion folks

And a reasonable opinion it is, Rawe.

However, here in the US, we separate church and state, which is why we don't feel that the religious viewpoint, whatever it may be, should be taught in public schools.


I do see the wisdom in keeping church and state separate - note that in the Middle-East the church/states, including Israel, aren't the most peaceful places - and haven't been even well before the current Iraq situation.

Just an observation, and probably one that would fit better in another thread at that.

A person's personal beliefs are just that - personal. And the presumption that one can tell others that their personal beliefs are "wrong" is arrogant, indeed. I am an Atheist myself, yet I will rise quickly to the defense of anyone whose beliefs are being assaulted by another. For that is wrong. Yet the religionists themselves are quick to assault my unbelief - usually quite rudely. (I do have to laugh when someone tells me that my disbelief of the existence of a "God" is going to result in my being condemned to a place that doesn't exist.)

Believe as you will. Explain those beliefs and their foundation to any that express an interest. Ask others with beliefs different than yours about their own. If someone presumes to assault you with their beliefs (by beating on your front door at seven o'clock on Sunday morning, for instance), simply tell them you are not interested and go about your business. Just don't tell someone that their personal beliefs are "wrong".

Ask yourself how you would feel if someone were to do that to you. If you are honest in your answer, you will go about your business.

I think it's perfectly fine to teach religion in schools, I encourage it actually. Just so long as you're not only teaching one religion exclusively, you're not teaching it as dogma, and you're not teaching it as science.

Just because you do not believe in it does not mean it does not exist.

Just don't tell someone that their personal beliefs are "wrong".

Oh I see....so in other words...don't do what you have done numerous times on this thread, and other threads. Am I understanding that correctly?

Why does God (if it exists) require so much attention and belief in him/her? I don't believe in God, and I certainly don't think it's a one-way ticket to hell for me if he actually exists. There are much more important values in life. No one is perfect, but I'm more than certain there are manymany "heaven deserving" non-believers. Does Bible actually say non-believers end up in some place bad? I still don't believe in things like heaven or hell, God or Satan; there are the opposites of good and bad, it's easy to name them to 2 different higher powers but I believe it all comes down to the people.

Ok maybe I'm out of my range since I haven't read Bible that much nor have I been interested in lectures of such. Just my thoughts.

If he does exist(which he does) it is a one way ticket to hell because the Bible says so. The Bible says to be saved you have to ask Jesus to forgive you of your sins and put your faith in him. You dont have to have proof but God does show himself in many ways. The Bible says all you need is the faith of a mustard seed which is very tiny. You have a lot of faith that when you sit in a chair its going to hold you up.



Yes the Bible says non believers go to hell. Salvation is a free gift but you dont have to take it.
But lets not get off topic here if you want to talk anymore pm's work fine. Or the other topic on religion.

How do we know that anything really exists, except in our own belief that it does? Try an experiment. Convince yourself that you don't exist, with no doubt whatsoever. Then see if you disappear.

Hey,

where'd cowsgonemadd3 go?

I don't recall ever telling someone that they are wrong for believing what they do. I've attacked their empty arguments, their non-evidence, their assertion that one particular mythology concerning where everything came from is, has to be, the absolute truth, regardless of all evidence to the contrary, and over and above the myriad other mythologies concerning the same question. But I don't recall telling anyone that they are "wrong" to believe what they do.

Then again, it's often well after midnight when I do come here, so I suppose I could have slipped up, somehow. Nobody's perfect - especially me!

This just one of the things that makes the whole business sound fishy. A serial rapist-murderer responsible for the deaths of thirty-one co-eds across the United States can be "saved" while sitting on Death Row and reap unimaginable rewards.

Then there's the older woman, an Atheist, who has quietly and tirelessly served her community for decades. She helps a a local soup kitchen; uses her own money to anonymously (even though everyone knows who the "anonymous" benefactor is) provide struggling families with Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners. She volunteers at the local hospital and nursing home, trying to ease the pain of some, and bring some joy to others. The woman whose home, even though her own children are grown and moved on, is always full of laughing children. The one who died trying to protect her granddaughter from the "saved" predator above. When this woman dies, she's to be condemned to unimaginable suffering, despite all of the good things she did in her life?

That's crapola, if you ask me. If there were rewards to be given (there are not), then they should be given on the merits of how one has lived one's life, not by some arbitrary religious dogma. Or maybe we can just behave in whatever heinous fashion we choose, just as long as we're sure we become "saved" before we die. Crapola, as far as I'm concerned. There are just too many things about religion(s) that just plain don't make any sense. Except maybe to the opium-addled Shamans that dreamed 'em up.

Exactly what I was after. Basically you can do whatever you want in your life as long as you have the "faith of a mustard seed" and still be saved. But everyone else goes to Hell if they hadn't even done anything bad; just because they didn't believe.

Then I guess I'll just go to hell with my family literally

Like cwm said lets get back to topic. Just had to post.

Its because the atheist did not ask Jesus for forgiveness and the killer did. Its a free gift by the atheist not asking she rejected Jesus and she gets eternal punishment. Nobody is good the Bible says not even one.

Come on over to MISC reli. topics if you want to talk more on this just start talking.

Mmmmm. 722 posts and it appears that we are still at the starting point. Might be time to give up the argument

Cheers

Nope its not come on people ha ha.

I come back occasionally to see just where on the merry-go-round this topic is repeating. No matter how you try you can't change the mind of one that is incapable of seeing anything other than their specific belief.

Seriously CGM, have you ever thought of using punctuation marks?

So sorry its bugging you,everyone lets use the punctuation marks.

I type way better than most of my text sending friends they go something like this:

Ur on the way to were

town

gr8t

what

grate

still dont understand

Grate!!

and so on.....

Actually some of that made more sense than you sentences minus the punctuation.

Yeah, it's about time to give up on this one. It's no longer amusing and it's a waste of time to try and open locked minds.

okay...

hi mattv
while i agree wholeheartedly with pretty much everything you have posted since your arrival here ,i will have to say your
above statement works both ways

Well, you see, I was brought up in one religion, and have studied most of the other major ones, because I wanted to make sure that my thoughts and feeling s on the matter were not in error. I eventually came to the conclusion that they are not. I did not simply state that something I'd been indoctrinated* into as a child was absolutely truth, without even a willingness to explore other avenues. And I still don't. The possibility that I may be in error is still open. However, I will need something a little more convincing than, "Because the bible says so", to convince me that I am in error. An attitude that most religionists would never even dream of entertaining.


* I was able to resist the indoctrination and retain the ability to think for myself.

once again mattv something i agree with wholeheartedly,and a very thoughtful reply

Agreed. A good debated will say "Convince that you are right," and would provide his two cents when possible. Some people walk into debates forcing their idea without ever listening or reasoning another view.

It was easy to tell how this topic was going to go from the start
e.g.
"Why Is Evolution Taught As Fact, to discuss the topic of evolution being taught as fact when is fails....."
The origional poster was biased to begin with, as we can tell no minds have been changed, why? because religion is a way of thinking and a way of life, they aren'y going to change simply because someone said so.

As for scientific proof, I bet there is more proof for evolution than there is from any religious texts, thats why religion is called a faith.

It's a scientific fact that all things on earth fall at 9.8 m/s/s, the bible says nothing of falling at 9.8 m/s/s does it? (I don't think any religious texts do) therefore i pose a question: how can you believe in religion when it fails to explain some things such as the rate at which objects alls on our planet, or why when you mix cesium with water there is a violent reaction akin to a handgranade?

But on the other hand
"The abscence of proof, is not the proof of abscence"


There are many scientists who have taken a look at the universe, seen how well it has been organized and came to the conclusion that such organization and probabilities in the universe could only be produced by some sort of oversoul. So you really can't say "you're either athiest, or your part of a religion".

Theres also the possibility, if you look at the problem logicly and unbiased of course, that niether evolution nor religious text explain correctly how we came to be.

Somethings for you to think about.

The most powerful force in the universe is random chance. And look at what chance has led to in the last fifteen billion years, or so.

Hmm...

Please MattV...enlighten us on what random chance has led to that makes you admire it so?

Theoretically the most powerful force in the universe is a black hole.

theoreticly because it has such a density that even light cannot escape the warp formed around it, and if Energy = Mass X Speed of light squared, a black hole would have a giant, the mos largest quantity of energy in the universe. But I digress.

The most powerful force in the universe is random chance. And look at what chance has led to in the last fifteen billion years, or so.

You do have to realize the universe and everything is based on chance, even math that we think is so precise is really just a number that is close to a chance of the reality, so when you realize how random the chance it was for the circumstances for us to be able to live, eat, breathe, and function on a planet in such an organized system you start to wounder. Or atleast thats what I think.

It's not a matter of admiration. It simply is. But the forces of chance shaped the universe that we see around us. And I think the universe looks pretty cool. Just wish I could go on a sight-seeing tour.

Actually, the objects that we've been able to compute as being 10+ billion light-years from earth, within a reasonable margin of error, appear to us as they were 10+ billion years ago. The light from distant objects allows us to see back in time, as it were, since it takes light one year to travel a distance of one light-year. If the nearest star to our own were to explode at this instant, we would be unaware of the event for four more years. When it did become noticeable, we would be seeing something that had occurred four years in the past. If a ship could travel to that star system at the speed of light, the journey would take four years. To an outside observer, time in the craft would be seen as standing still, whereas to the crew, time would pass normally. There have been all kinds of fascinating books and articles written concerning the relativistic effects of traveling at or near the speed of light, and relativity has long been a favorite toy of science-fiction writers.

And Einstein wasn't inspired by a "God" when he formulated the simple equation, e=mc². Or the theory of relativity (which has now been shown to be fact, not just theory. Does anyone know why things that have been proven, such as relativity and evolution, are still called "theories"?).

They have been proven to a certain point, you must remember that it is impossible to attain 100% speed of light for humans therefore we cannot prove everything 100%. I mean scientists are still debating whether light is a particle or a wave. We can prove the basic theory E=mc2 because we know the sun is wasting away, why would it be wasting away? because its losing energy which is the light it gives off, therefore it must be losing a mass. We can also prove space is warped around bodies with masses, for example during an eclipse it is possible to see stars directly behind the sun, how so you ask, space around the sun is warped because of it's mass, and the light from the stars are attempting to continue on a strait path through warped space leading us to to see something we normally wouldn't be able to see. Things like time horizons inside black holes in which time stops completely to an onlooker we will never be able to prove because of the mass or the hoel in which even light cant escape, so how would something traveling slower than light with more mass be able to escape (namely a science ship or cosmonaut?

Somewhat similar story, I was raised baptist, so any mention of evolution was met with great disdain. As in, it isn't something to be taken seriously, yet it is because "they" are attacking our religion/beliefs, and how dare they teach that in our schools. And as a youngin' I totally went for it. As a young adult I repeated the same arguments, the watch/watchmaker metaphor, 2nd law of thermodynamics, I was quite convinced. But the older I got and the more I looked into the subject, the less and less likely it seemed that all the world's reputable scientists had banded together in some fantastic conspiracy to disprove religion and appease their sinful conscience or whatever. And as I looked at the actual science, it became fantastically clear that the creationists didn't have half a leg to stand on. There was no science. Just a great big PR campaign with no other purpose than to say "nuh uh, you're wrong 'cuz the bible says so" to the rest of the legitimate scientific world.

It's certainly no easy thing when you come to discover that the things you've been taught growing up aren't as true as you thought they were, nor is it easy to figure out exactly what you believe once you get beyond that. Myself though, I think I'm happy with how it turned out for me. I still think there is truth in the bible, although I believe there is more to spirituality and more to the workings of the soul than we'll see in its pages. I don't mind too much, I've always been a little more comfortable with the unconventional (I enjoy getting the reaction from conservative Christians when I tell them that Paul wrote the vulger term for dung in the Greek New Testament. That's right, the Saint Paul wrote "S**t" in your bible.) I'm still a Christian, I haven't discounted religion altogether because I believe it has value. Christianity itself states that any religion which does not first and foremost care for the poor and helpless is utterly worthless, and I very much believe in that mentality. All the more reason stuff like this grates on my nerves. If you're a Christian you ought to be concerned about the truth, and you should have both the critical judgment and the integrity to recognize and report the truth to the best of your ability. Even if that means admitting the things you believed may have been wrong. Dogma should not be placed before integrity. And when you call something science and yet ignore its most basic tenants, that's exactly what you are doing.

Not to mention the big rallying causes that the religious right are gung-ho about are some of the least things they should be worried about. Up in arms about evolution, church & state, homosexuals, meanwhile literally half a million African people are being slaughtered in Darfur, dying of AIDS, dying of curable diseases, or just plain lack of running water. Think of what could be done if the same kind of outrage was expressed for that instead of something like gay marriage.

-Albert Einstein

(thanks einsteinandreligion.com)

I can't argue with that. Just because there are inaccuracies and impossibilities in the book, it is highest folly to regard all of it as worthless.

On spirituality, I believe that spirituality is an inside job - spiritual development does not need a religion to take place. Spiritual growth is up to the individual. Indeed, I believe religion can do much to hamper spiritual growth.

Religion is concerned with what happens after death; spirituality focuses on how we live our lives. You can have one without the other.

Matt..I think you are quite a confused individual. If you are just speaking of spirituality as a generic term of a person's characteristics, maybe I will grant you the point. But if you are talking about spirituality as it pertains to say...Christian spirituality...you are simply not an atheist. Religion or no religion.

Religion is concerned with what happens after death

Thats simply not true (with regards to Christianity anyway) and easily refutable by hundreds of passages in the Bible.

Just because there are inaccuracies and impossibilities in the book

There are none in the Bible.

I believe that spirituality is an inside job

You believe eh? So if I say, I believe spirituality is a direct byproduct of relationship with Jesus, which is right?

There was no science. Just a great big PR campaign with no other purpose than to say "nuh uh, you're wrong 'cuz the bible says so" to the rest of the legitimate scientific world. (ARCMAN)

So all the reputable scientists today that disagree with evolution and hold to creation are simply discredited because of how you interpret the available facts? Very interesting indeed.

That's right, the Saint Paul wrote "S**t" in your bible. Im positive you have proof of that statement...on a side note...who cares if he did? What does the original Hebrew word translate to? You know, the one that was actually written? I wonder. I think most greek scholars will disagree with you anyway and say it translates to refuse, or even excrement. It certainly was meant to be strong and capture the reader. I happen to agree with Paul on his point. All "things" that I could ever attain are but trash, crap, refuse, garbage, excrement...compared to Jesus.

meanwhile literally half a million African people are being slaughtered in Darfur, dying of AIDS, dying of curable diseases, or just plain lack of running water.
What do you propose be done? What have you done personally to resolve the mentioned situations? Funny, this is the first time I have seen you, being a Christian, mention these things....? (are some of the least things they should be worried about.)
Apparently its okay for the (mysterious) "religious left" to worry about those things (volution, church & state, homosexuals), but not the religious right.

In light of the conversation I thought this might be interesting to add. That is if one has the patience to sit for it as it is quite long. lol

100 reasons why evolution is stupid

I googled Dr Kent Hovind's Qualifications and he doesn't have any of note.Certainly not a medical Doctor.
He is currently in Jail doing 10 yrs for Fraud,so, Who could trust what comes out of his mouth?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_Hovind

I don't even know who he is...who brought him up? Was it the video that was posted (I cant view at work.)?

Thanks for providing the link DSTM...reading more...this guy made a horrible decision. Kind of odd considering he is pretty well educated. Just quickly scanning some stuff on his website, there is a lot of arguments that are rejected by the majority of creationists.

Anyway, don't do the crime if you don't wanna do the time.

Mathematical theories like the string theory are raising strong questions as to how random things really are, it will be interesting to see what we learn in the next couple of decades.

Did you see the PBS program Monster of the Milky Way? If not see if you can find it, it's great.

Mattv, just a question. What is your definition of spiritually?

-Steve