Only Here, I think I answer some of your points in my above post. Except the following.

Religious thought is not a static enterprise. It's also not unanimous. That doesn't mean God changes.

But if so many people can be so wrong for so long (assuming most christians believe in evolution now) then how do they know that they're correct about anything? If such a large part of a religion can change then it could happen again. And again. God may not change, but how do we know that anyone really knows anything about God? Including that he exists?

6-4-3,

thanks for your input. on baseball and jesus. hehe. i really like your baseball posts...hehe...

umm. so to answer your questions very simply:

did jesus ever say he was the son of god? i thought i read in one of steve's posts that he never actually said that...one main thing that comes to mind is where pontious pilate asks him if he is the son of god and he says something to the effect of "you are the one who says that" or whatever...i'm sorry...its been a while...

that being the case, i dont even believe that dude existed...there is no proof that a historical jesus existed...so all of your questions about how we can explain the various things that happened to him dont matter, because in a non-christian's eyes, none of them every happened from the word go.

in regards to your questions about mankind's moral sense...its not neccesarily "two rocks colliding in space" - i'm no expert on evolution, but i do know that the basic idea revolves around particles replicating and then mutating over hundreds of thousands of years...and over that time, some of these "replications" died out, some kept going, or "survived" due to various developments they had made that allowed them to survive, one of these developments would be altruistic behavior towards other genes or other organisms IF it meant that they could go on surviving...

the name of the game is survival. and if me treating _____ with decency will help me survive, the only way i'm going to survive is by treating ____ with decency... and then of course, there might be some people who come along and try and exploit this idea, and then things get all silly and it eventually balances out...

i'm sorry if i'm generalizing, but like i said, i'm no expert...but maybe that helps the conversation regarding ethics/morals/getting silly

andyk

6-4-3 wrote:
1. How can anyone say Jesus was a 'good man' if he was lying every time he claimed to be the son of God?

2. Where do you suggest mankind's universal moral sense comes from? And don't say 'two rocks colliding in space.'

3. If Jesus did not actually die and rise from the dead, how could he (in his post-crucified condition) have escaped all the security placed outside his tomb?

If you answer by saying that the Romans snagged him for whatever reason, then…

4. If the Romans stole Jesus' body - why? Why would they have carried out the very scenario that they were trying to prevent? Proof to the world that Jesus wasn't the son of God would've been to leave him in the tomb and parade every other mortal within 1,000 miles to walk in the tomb to bare witness that Jesus is indeed, still dead, not resurrected as he said he would be.

5. Few (even today) disagree that Jesus was crucified, based off the BIBLE'S accounts and testimony of those who were there and witnessed it.
Why then, is it so easy to discount the testimony of over 500 witnesses who the BIBLE says testified that they saw Jesus alive following his crucifixion - wind through the holes in his wrists/feet and all?

6. Since the origin of life on earth cannot be absolutely verified, falsified or seen with the naked eye, how does "science" and/or "evolution" amount to anything more than just another faith system? Why is this hypothesis MORE believable than Creationism?

7. If man is nothing more than a random arrangement of molecules, what motivates you to care, give a shit about others and to try and live honorably in this world? Where does conscience come from?
And please don't say two rocks colliding in outer space.

8. If earth and all its detail was created by two rocks colliding in outer space, how do you account for personality arrising from the impersonal (meeting of two rocks), or order resulting from such a chaotic beginning?

These are just questions. To be answered alone in the mirror. I say that because you/we can twist answers any way we see fit to make them sound right from our lips to a room-full of fellow non-believers against one, but there ain't no lying to yourself when you're alone.

One last thing. I'm not a Christian because my parents said I should be. Sure, I was raised in a Christian family who went to church every week and McDonald's afterwards for years. However, there came a moment a while back for me - but it's as clear as if it had happened at lunch today - when I had to make a decision to believe, or discard. It's the same moment all of us - ALL of us - are greeted with at one time or another in our lives. It's a very personal and unavoidable moment that will change your life - one way or the other as well.

Just me thoughts.

Lights, please.

1. A lot of ways.

a. Not everyone agrees the Bible says that he said such a thing.
b. Even if the Bible says he said it, doesn't mean he did.
c. Even if he did say it, it doesn't mean he meant it in the sense that you interpret it. In one sense, aren't we all sons of God?
d. Even if he did say it, and meant it in the sense that you interpret it, maybe he was mistaken - he thought it was true, but it was false.
e. Even if he said it, and meant it like that, and knew it was false, that doesn't mean he's not a good man. He might be a good man who lied sometimes.

2. I'm not sure I understand the question. If you mean what I think you mean, I'd say it's a trait that evolved because it was advantageous to survival.

3. I have no idea, nor do I have any idea what this question has to do with anything. If he died and was placed in the tomb, he, like all other corpses, stayed in the tomb until either he rotted or somebody carried him out.

4. They probably didn't parade the people past Jesus' corpse for the same reason that the US government did parade people past David Koresh's corpse. They didn't think it would matter.

5. We know the Romans crucified people as a punishment. We also know that nobody walks around after they die. So, it's easier to accept an account that conforms with reality than one that doesn't. For example, I posted yesterday a story about my high school. I think most people that read it probably believed that it was true. However, if my story described people flying around on broomsticks, most people reading it would probably have not believed that it was true.

6. This is a question about what science is and how it works. How science works - very simplified:
Someone comes up with a hypothesis.
They perform a test that might disprove that hypothesis.
The results of the test either disprove that hypothesis, or support it. They do not prove it, ever.
Disproven hypotheses are discarded. Supported hypotheses become theories.
Very well supported theories become laws.

Now, Creationism is not a scientific theory because it is not disprovable. It might be true, of course. But I could come up with ten thousand explanations for the origin of life on earth that are not disprovable, and any one of them might be true. Evolution is a scientific theory because experiments that have been performed support it. The data support it. We can't see gravitation, either, but we can observe the effects of it, construct hypotheses as to how it works, perform experiments to test it, and revise our theory accordingly. The theory of universal gravitation is not really a controversial one, and the theory of evolution is not either, at least among serious scientists.

7. These attitudes are advantageous to the continuation of the species. As giraffes evolved long necks, so humans evolved a conscience.

8. Have you heard of the computer program "Life"? Using very simple conditions, which can be seen as an analog of the physical conditions that exist on earth, a chaotic assortment of cells are seen to organize themselves into patterns. There are a ton of things that are interesting about "Life", and this is just one of them.

Oh, man.. while I was writing that, 4 posts intervened... oh well...

6-4-3 wrote:1. How can anyone say Jesus was a 'good man' if he was lying every time he claimed to be the son of God?

How was he lying? Clearly he believed in God, and he believe that he was the song of God. For someone judging his actions & words, it doesn't matter whether or not God exists to decide if Jesus is a good person. If someone saves a bunch of kids from a burning building, I don't care that they did it in the name of Jesus or Allah or whatever - I'll still think they're a good person.

6-4-3 wrote:2. Where do you suggest mankind's universal moral sense comes from? And don't say 'two rocks colliding in space.'

As someone else mentioned, from an evolutionary standpoint, it may come from a group survival instinct.

There's also a love that's shared between people who're close to one another - mother and child, family members, friends - and we naturally extend this love to other people, since we know that these people are like ourselves & like the people we love.

6-4-3 wrote:3. If Jesus did not actually die and rise from the dead, how could he (in his post-crucified condition) have escaped all the security placed outside his tomb?

For a non-bible-thumper, this is a pretty bible-thumping question. There are all sorts of ways this could have happened: someone drugged the guards? killed them and hid the evidence? made up all the stuff about Jesus rising from the dead? I don't know if it did happen; and if it did, I certainly don't know how it happened. Since I don't believe that people can return to life after they've died, the standard he-rose-from-the-dead explanation is just about the least feasible explanation going.

6-4-3 wrote:5. Few (even today) disagree that Jesus was crucified, based off the BIBLE'S accounts and testimony of those who were there and witnessed it. Why then, is it so easy to discount the testimony of over 500 witnesses who the BIBLE says testified that they saw Jesus alive following his crucifixion - wind through the holes in his wrists/feet and all?

That's a bible-thumping question that assumes the people you're asking would accept the bible (which you put in capital letters, for some reason) is filled with irrefutable fact. It's not, so these 500 witnesses don't mean much to me.

6-4-3 wrote:6. Since the origin of life on earth cannot be absolutely verified, falsified or seen with the naked eye, how does "science" and/or "evolution" amount to anything more than just another faith system? Why is this hypothesis MORE believable than Creationism?

Because Creationism, for those who "believe it," is not a hypothesis. Creationism makes assumptions that cannot be proved or disproved. Other sciences come up with theories based on observation and research etc., and add to those theories, tear down the theories when they're proven wrong, etc. That's not an option in creation science.

6-4-3 wrote:7. If man is nothing more than a random arrangement of molecules, what motivates you to care, give a shit about others and to try and live honorably in this world? Where does conscience come from?

See #2

6-4-3 wrote:8. If earth and all its detail was created by two rocks colliding in outer space, how do you account for personality arrising from the impersonal (meeting of two rocks), or order resulting from such a chaotic beginning?

Evolution. Also - there are many people studying this sort of thing (where personality comes from), along with every other sort of thing we have questions about. Why not let them keep at it? If you think you've got the answer already, fine; if others think otherwise, well, one day they'll be proven wrong. It doesn't seem like a necessity to me to have all of these questions answered before I die.

6-4-3 wrote:I believe that it is entirely fair to ask simple questions to non-believers/doubters when debating the matter of faith (and that's really what it all boils down to - faith - as it probably takes more faith to not believe in God/Jesus/the Bible than it does to believe)

This isn't true. It doesn't require faith to believe that all that exists is what we immediately see and know; it requires faith to believe something beyond that.

6-4-3 wrote:I've sinned, am sinning and will sin - and yet, am lucky to be forgiven - while on earth

This is something I dislike about Christianity, this concept of sin and the blood washing away the sins of those who believe. It's like the people who wrote the bible (and I think there's a historical angle to this but I don't know it) took this great guy who had these great things to say & turned his death into a blood sacrifice - something I also don't know much about, but it seems to be what this the-blood-of-Jesus business is all about. I've never had an innate understanding of blood sacrifice, so all this talk of Jesus' blood has always thrown me.

I heard this new concept of sin, though, that I love: the idea of sin as a unifying factor among all of humanity. Since we've all sinned, we're all in the same gutter in the eyes of God. If you're a bible-thumping preacher, you're no more holy, and have no more right to the world of God, as the smack-addicted prostitute down the way. I like that.

Another new concept I heard is this thing where, as a Christian, you're being watched by God, or by the saints or by whoever. The person who explained this said that in some churches, like Eastern Orthodox churches or something, the people who go to the church aren't looking up at the saints and praying to them; they're standing before the saints, so that the saints can see them and judge them. This idea of the entity you worship functioning as a moral compass, something that makes you second-guess yourself when you're making decisions in life, is a good one. WWJD, I guess, but cooler.

Holy balls, I am done.

6-4-3 wrote:
1. How can anyone say Jesus was a 'good man' if he was lying every time he claimed to be the son of God?

Well, for a start, he never said that, except in the context that man is the son of God. He refers to God as his father, but he encourages all of us to.

2. Where do you suggest mankind's universal moral sense comes from? And don't say 'two rocks colliding in space.'

Same place our creativity, romance, greed, envy and sexiness come from -- from active, self-reflective minds.

3. If Jesus did not actually die and rise from the dead, how could he (in his post-crucified condition) have escaped all the security placed outside his tomb?

Cloak of invisibility. Or he was stolen, or who cares -- this part is probably a fable.

4. If the Romans stole Jesus' body - why? Why would they have carried out the very scenario that they were trying to prevent? Proof to the world that Jesus wasn't the son of God would've been to leave him in the tomb and parade every other mortal within 1,000 miles to walk in the tomb to bare witness that Jesus is indeed, still dead, not resurrected as he said he would be.

They proved they could kill him. That was probably enough for them.

5. Few (even today) disagree that Jesus was crucified, based off the BIBLE'S accounts and testimony of those who were there and witnessed it.
Why then, is it so easy to discount the testimony of over 500 witnesses who the BIBLE says testified that they saw Jesus alive following his crucifixion - wind through the holes in his wrists/feet and all?

because the bible is full of entertaining stories meant to prove a point, and cannot be taken as literal truth.

6. Since the origin of life on earth cannot be absolutely verified, falsified or seen with the naked eye, how does "science" and/or "evolution" amount to anything more than just another faith system? Why is this hypothesis MORE believable than Creationism?

Because we can see evolution's evidence all around us, and see the processes in play as we speak. It is infinitely more plausible than Big Ernie clapping his hands and saying, "Behold!" It has as sound a body of evidence as the idea of electrons being the instrument of electricity. Do you doubt science when the lights come on after you flip the switch?

7. If man is nothing more than a random arrangement of molecules, what motivates you to care, give a shit about others and to try and live honorably in this world?

It's hardly random. It has evolved over a very long period of time to be what it is. Why do I care about other people? Because I'm not an asshole.

Where does conscience come from?
And please don't say two rocks colliding in outer space.

From our thoughts and experiences. Even your religious notion requires your participation as a thinking person to be possible. I think thinking is enough.

8. If earth and all its detail was created by two rocks colliding in outer space, how do you account for personality arrising from the impersonal (meeting of two rocks), or order resulting from such a chaotic beginning?

The rocks didn't provide the detail. Time and its processes did. Processes we see at work all around us.

Unbelievably, yes.

I don't understand how the disappointing masses in this country accept the President communicating to us and the world using biblical terms like "evil" to describe his take on foreign policy. What is that? I am embarrassed for everyone when he speaks like that and no-one seems to object.

Perhaps all of those religious nuts (such as Bush) who refuse the science that contradicts the bible (i.e. dating the earth) shouldn't be allowed access to any of the wonders that came from scientific discovery... They can read their bibles by campfire, ride to church on horse and spread the good word using smoke signals.

Marlowe

Does anyone really believe this shit?

Marlowe wrote:Perhaps all of those religious nuts (such as Bush) who refuse the science that contradicts the bible (i.e. dating the earth) shouldn't be allowed access to any of the wonders that came from scientific discovery...

what is the basis for your claim that Bush doesn't believe in the science behind the dating of the Earth?

how specifically do the science that dates the earth and the Bible contradict one another?

Dating the Earth? That sounds more like Clinton's cup of tea!

Hey-o!

Linus Van Pelt wrote:
"3. I have no idea, nor do I have any idea what this question has to do with anything. If he died and was placed in the tomb, he, like all other corpses, stayed in the tomb until either he rotted or somebody carried him out."

"4. They probably didn't parade the people past Jesus' corpse for the same reason that the US government did parade people past David Koresh's corpse. They didn't think it would matter."

This question has to do with the fact that the Bible says that three days after his death, Jesus dissappeared from his tomb, gone, poof, presto. He did NOT stay in the tomb and rot. This is the point of the question. This is also the point of Easter.
Secondly... The Romans didn't parade people past Jesus because he wasn't there, like a good dead and rotting corpse should be. My question is, if he WAS there three days later, contrary to what Jesus preached to a multitude of people - that he would rise from the dead three days after his death - Why wouldn't the Romans make it front page news to all those who believed what Jesus said was true and put an end to this crazy Christianity once and for all? Why wouldn't they get the Ansel Adams of the times to chistle out a picture of his dead body, three days after his death, still laying dead in his tomb? Why wouldn't we read or learn about that? It seems we'd hear about that part of the story somewhere. Yet we don't. Again, just a question that needed clarification.


Spoot wrote:
"Creationism makes assumptions that cannot be proved or disproved."

So does Evolution. No one - NO ONE - can absolutely say or prove that I am typing right now because an ameba evolved into me/mankind over time. This is a theory that many believe to be true. It may, it may not be. But no one has the ability to say definitively that it is or is not. They may have faith that it is true, but they'll never really know for sure. Hence, evolution being another faith system. Given all that, why is this a more plausible explaination than Big Ernie (love that, by the way) clapping his hands and "poof."


Steve wrote:
"Because we can see evolution's evidence all around us, and see the processes in play as we speak."

Give me one example of the naked human eye - your eye, my eye, Ronnie Woo-Woo's eye - seeing the process of evolution taking place and I will not attend a single Cubs game this year.

Sorry, this is all I have time for right now. I must go out and sin by getting drunk at a friend's band's show - hopefully to only sin further in bed tonight with a girl and her sore ears. Only to raise from the sleep, ask forgiveness and go forward with a cleansed heart.