i wasn't trying to sound defensive, my bad, just engaging in online conversation......i agree that there are parts of the Bible that are a stretch for me too.....the Old Testament is brutal, as it was written in brutal times.....it sounds horrible to us now to read some of the blood stories, but death and struggle was much more a part of the everyday life experience for people in those times......even in the days of Christopher Columbus, if you caught a common cold or flu, there was a good chance that you were done.....results of disease, anger, jealousy, and people's failures are not the message i got from it though.....when i read the Old Testament, the message i got from it as a whole was this....."God" does not mix himself with sin, not even for your sake.....so if you partake in constant sin with no remorse, you will be lost and never aware of what a life guided by Him is like"........in all of the hours of reading the books of the OT, i might have completely missed something, but that one sentence is what i got from it.....there were other things throughout the stories that were weird to me too.....like people practicing witchcraft and even the local priests would "throw lots" to decide someone's fate....(throwing lots is pretty much like tossing some chicken bones, then reading the pattern they landed in).....that's ******* lunacy to me......but all examples of people living a life opposite of those who make a conscious effort to walk in obedience to peace and goodness.

 

Suck it hard everyone!

 

this....

 

you realise that its the same god in the old and new testaments? also, yes times were different then, but the god of the old testament COMMANDED some messed up stuff. he also did genocide himself as well as command his followers to.
i'd equate it to the creepy uncle who used to sodomize you as a kid and now he's a decent guy. you want to go hang out with him now though?

 

It sure went down a few grade levels in here. Thought this was a cosmology/philosophy thread? Also, coming from someone who has read several of the holy books of differing religions - belief hinges on one notion. That notion of course being the existence of supernatural events. I won't get into the discussion on the OT as there is alot of misunderstanding going on in here.

Back on the topic at hand, I highly recommend any of Hawkings work as good discussion on the topic of the big-bang. Also other philosophical works include "There is no/a god" by Tony Flew, and several books by Alvin Plantinga and others.

 

Certainly not if the cars were sentient and had feeling. Your God is not very moral if he goes around smashing up humans like your analogy suggests. If I were an omnipotent and omnibenevolent god I wouldn't treat my creation like cattle or french fries. If I took 1000 dogs and just killed them by drowning them, I doubt I would get much credit for being a good person.

And then of course there's the problem of evil..
Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?

 

that's your choice and a fine one at that......but it's not the point....the point is that if we are his creation, we are his to do with what he wants.

 

I would like to think an all powerful, all knowing, perfectly good, timeless being such as the Judeo-Christian God would not simply do with his creation 'whatever he wants.'

Children are people's creation, and yet we cannot simply drown them when they misbehave. If your god is real and did do the things in the old testament then he is a tyrant. Regardless, until someone provides evidence for your God, it is akin to arguing what color the invisible unicorn or Russel's teapot is.

 

this is why these kinds of topics usually get locked on Tech......some ******* guy always has to come along and talk **** or say something insulting....if there is misunderstanding and you know all things, why don't you set us straight with your understanding instead on plugging Stephen Hawkins......again

 

look, i'm trying to discuss these things the best i can, but i can't make everyone else understand things you're already dead set against.....you talk about an all powerful, all knowing diety, then you apply human laws to him?.....we are bound by laws, yes, but if the God you just explained exists, are you prepared to enforce laws against him?

 

Stephen Hawking needs a plug now?

Why is it cool for you to link to your stories about a born again christian but not cool for him to reference someone who actually studies and attempts to answer how the universe was made, the very question the OP asked.


I would hold a perfect being to an even stricter moral code. You seem to be claiming that our laws should be more moral than his because he is more powerful than us? By that logic, animals should have even stricter laws. Obviously, I don't think he exists. Deism is possible but not probable, but again the problem of evil kind of destroys any kind of probable Judeo-Christian god for me. hypothetically speaking to answer your question, I would simply refuse to worship a tyrant should he exist.

 

Oh the problem of evil, not actually much of a problem when you consider it was wrought over 3000 years ago. Even the judeo-christian perspective has a definitive solution for it. We are the cause of evil not God, and he has allowed evil to take place for a greater purpose.
Or let's consider the hindu solution to the problem. God could be arbitrary. It is not without possibility that a creative being could make something out of whimsy only to watch it take its own course?
Buddhist? Let's try that one. Evil is an illusion of the mind meant to keep you from a higher state of awareness. Evil, good, and all thoughts of self must be done away with to achieve perfection.

Shall I go on?

 

I was raised as a PK (Preachers Kid) and had the Bible and the "Word of God" stuffed into my brain as soon as I was born. After becoming a teenager the rebelious side of being a hormonal infested punk kid, I choose to do my own research on the "Word of God and its methology.

Continual research and study into my college years with the History of Christianity. In the end I came to a conclusion that the Supreme Being, God concept didnt make sense to me.

It all comes down to "Faith", and as so well put in the movie- The Da Vinci Code, Faith is something that I have yet to recieve. But reading about philosophers having discussions 100's of years ago saying with out faith into some sort of human conception the human race would no longer succeed. In short, without some sort of existence after death or living by a higher standard, humans wouldnt have nothing to live for and chaos would ensue. Basicly the human race would kill itself....

I do belive that religon and the concept of God(s) and such beliefs has keep the human races moral compass in a positive direction. If someones core fundamentals needs some sort of spiritual faith to get them up and through life everyday, by all means do it... My father was this way, he said he couldnt live with God in his life. BTW- He died a horrible death with cancer.

Me- I see a world with many Gods, people killing each other in the name of Gods, disease infected babies, starving people, people praying to Gods to win sporting events, to win the lottery, Men of God molesting children, asking God to bless the USA....
I see Christians, Baptist, Methodist, Cathloics, Jehovas Witness's (knocking on my door every Saturday morning), Jewish, Budist, the list gos on and on---- all claiming the correct path to God...... I dont need it in my life, I get up try to be the best person I can that day. And when it my time to die, its my time.....

BTW- My wife is a devout catholic, she goes to church twice a day 4 days a week and gets up EVERY morning at 6:00am and prays for hours....

 

See, that always seemed like a copout to me, because if god knows the outcome of every situation, could he not design a perfect world with free will and no evil? If not then he is not omnipotent, if he can and did not then he is not omnibenevolent. I believe Epicurious was simply refuting monotheism when he wrote that argument.

 

Let me set something straight. I am a Christian, but I have studied cosmology and I believe science is just as much truth as 1+1=2 or the historical records of archaeology.

I have read the bible, I have studied it at one of the premier bible schools in the country, I can see past the misconceptions on both sides in here and I don't have the time or wherewithal to correct it. So I stay on topic.

 

Sorry my last post was directed at those saying I was off topic.

 

oh, so now you know everything that the woman in my link has ever read?......she has never studied anything, right?.....so you have already read her entire page and debunked all of her thinking???

i offered her perspective to help explain my first post....that's it.....i didn't use it to jump in and say that the people talking in this thread were stupid for talking about things that she spoke against......i didn't say that anyone has "misunderstanding" for not agreeing with her....

 

409, we do not know whether the existence of free will and no evil is possible. They may be mutually exclusive just by their inherent natures

 

God couldn't fix that? Then he's not omnipotent.

Like I said, It's all kind of moot anyways. Until evidence is shown to point towards a supernatural being, I will continue to not believe in supernatural beings.

My point being that it's not fair for you to criticize him for mentioning Stephen Hawking when you yourself linked to an outside source, not that you shouldn't have...

 

And there we come to my original point about religion. It hinges on the belief in supernatural events.