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Cuneiformist
The Imperfectionist

USA
4955 Posts

Posted - 09/10/2006 :  11:25:02  Show Profile Send Cuneiformist a Private Message
This is a continuation of this thread.

Dude
SFN Die Hard

USA
6891 Posts

Posted - 09/10/2006 :  15:40:30   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send Dude a Private Message
GK Paul said:
quote:
For God so "loved" the world that He gave His only Begotten Son.


You still have not explained how this is a meaningful act for an omnipotent god.

If your god is all powerfull, then why the theater? Could he not have just forgiven everyone their sins (the whole sin thing I'm granting you for this argument only) and made everyone realize it?

What kind of petty, evil god would murder a child when so many other options (being omnipotent and all) are open to him?


Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson

"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin

Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth
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Dr. Mabuse
Septic Fiend

Sweden
9688 Posts

Posted - 09/10/2006 :  15:48:19   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Send Dr. Mabuse an ICQ Message Send Dr. Mabuse a Private Message
Too late, Dude.
He's gone into prosetylizing-mode because of brain-overload. Obviously, the moral/ethical dilemmas presented to him was too much to compute.

Dr. Mabuse - "When the going gets tough, the tough get Duct-tape..."
Dr. Mabuse whisper.mp3

"Equivocation is not just a job, for a creationist it's a way of life..." Dr. Mabuse

Support American Troops in Iraq:
Send them unarmed civilians for target practice..
Collateralmurder.
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marfknox
SFN Die Hard

USA
3739 Posts

Posted - 09/10/2006 :  17:35:17   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Visit marfknox's Homepage  Send marfknox an AOL message Send marfknox a Private Message
GK Paul wrote:
quote:
And therein is the great power of the cross. The power to get people off drugs, the power to overcome depression, the power to save marriages, the power to heal, and on and on. The Christian God is mostly a God about love. But as I said before He is serious about sin; because in His Holy perfection sin is repulsive to God. But in His wisdom He gave us a way to be redeemed. And in a way that shows His great love for mankind.


There is zero evidence that born again Christians use drugs less, suffer less from depression, there is actually evidence that they get divorced at a higher rate than the American population in general, and no evidence that prayer or Christian faith heals illnesses of any kind. Are you trying to suggest that having Christian faith and accepting Jesus Christ as your personal savior will result in a better life in this life? If you are claiming such a thing, there is plenty of hard evidence proving it a false claim. What are you going to do if you get cancer, see a doctor or pray? If you could only choose one, which would you choose? Which has a better record for sucess in this life?

From The National Center for Policy Analysis: Bible Belt Leads U.S. In Divorces http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?page=article&Article_ID=10961

quote:
Aside from the quickie-divorce Mecca of Nevada, no region of the United States has a higher divorce rate than the Bible Belt. Nearly half of all marriages break up, but the divorce rates in these southern states are roughly 50 percent above the national average.

According to federal figures:

* Nationally, there were about 4.2 divorces for every thousand people in 1998.
* The rate was 8.5 per thousand in Nevada, 6.4 in Tennessee, 6.1 in Arkansas, 6.0 in Alabama and Oklahoma.
* Of southeastern states, only South Carolina's rate of 3.8 was below the national average.
* By contrast, the divorce rate is less than 3.0 in Connecticut, Massachusetts and New York.

Why so many divorces in the Bible Belt?

Experts cite low household incomes (Oklahoma ranks 46th and Arkansas 47th), and a tendency for couples to marry at a younger age than in many other states.

Religion may play a role, since some of the lowest divorce rates are in northeastern states with relatively high household incomes and large numbers of Roman Catholics whose church doesn't recognize divorce.

Bible Belt states, in contrast, are dominated by fundamentalist Protestant denominations that proclaim the sanctity of marriage but generally do not want to estrange churchgoers who do divorce.


And from Religious Tolerance:
http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_dira.htm

quote:
Barna released the results of their poll about divorce on 1999-DEC-21. 1 They had interviewed 3,854 adults from the 48 contiguous states. The margin of error is within 2 percentage points. The survey found:

- 11% of the adult population is currently divorced.
- 25% of adults have had at least one divorce during their lifetime.
- Divorce rates among conservative Christians were significently higher than for other faith groups, and for Atheists and Agnostics. (My emphasis)


Stick that in your pipe and smoke it.

"Too much certainty and clarity could lead to cruel intolerance" -Karen Armstrong

Check out my art store: http://www.marfknox.etsy.com

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marfknox
SFN Die Hard

USA
3739 Posts

Posted - 09/10/2006 :  17:45:45   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Visit marfknox's Homepage  Send marfknox an AOL message Send marfknox a Private Message
Moral Hypocrisy in the Bible Belt: http://community-2.webtv.net/tales_of_the_western_world/BIBLEBELT/

Includes stats regarding everything from STDs and teen pregnancy to homocide.

It seems that according to reality, the only thing Jesus saves is diddly and squat.

"Too much certainty and clarity could lead to cruel intolerance" -Karen Armstrong

Check out my art store: http://www.marfknox.etsy.com

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GK Paul
Skeptic Friend

USA
306 Posts

Posted - 09/10/2006 :  18:51:38   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send GK Paul a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by Dude

GK Paul said:
quote:
For God so "loved" the world that He gave His only Begotten Son.


You still have not explained how this is a meaningful act for an omnipotent god.

If your god is all powerfull, then why the theater? Could he not have just forgiven everyone their sins (the whole sin thing I'm granting you for this argument only) and made everyone realize it?

What kind of petty, evil god would murder a child when so many other options (being omnipotent and all) are open to him?



If I was God, I would have done it another way also. But were not God. But I'm certain that in His Perfect Wisdom God chose the perfect way to redeem man. But He also in His Love gave you the free will to believe or not believe because God doesn't want you to be a puppet. But, as I've said before, there is always a price to pay for sin. It's just a universal law that God has made for your long term best interest and the best interest of humanity as a whole.


"Something cannot come from nothing" -- Ken Tanaka - geologist

"The existence of a Being endowed with intelligence and wisdom is a necessary inference from a study of celestial mechanics" --Sir Isaac Newton


GK Paul
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Chippewa
SFN Regular

USA
1496 Posts

Posted - 09/10/2006 :  19:29:25   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Visit Chippewa's Homepage Send Chippewa a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by GK Paul
...I'm certain that in His Perfect Wisdom God chose the perfect way to redeem man. But He also in His Love gave you the free will to believe or not believe because God doesn't want you to be a puppet. But, as I've said before, there is always a price to pay for sin. It's just a universal law that God has made for your long term best interest and the best interest of humanity as a whole.



God, in "his love" gives you "freewill" so you won't be a "puppet." (Except that you didn't choose this freewill on your own, it was chosen for you as a pre-existing option by God. This freewill is therefore preordained and defined for you without comparison to other forms of freewill that must exist completely independent and outside God's creation in order to be real freewill. So it isn't really freewill and you are still a puppet, if such a God as described by GK Paul is real.

Then, because GK Paul's God loves you, and chose freewill for you, but you still choose His option of not believing in him, you burn forever in hell. Sounds quite psychopathic.

Diversity, independence, innovation and imagination are progressive concepts ultimately alien to the conservative mind.

"TAX AND SPEND" IS GOOD! (TAX: Wealthy corporations who won't go poor even after taxes. SPEND: On public works programs, education, the environment, improvements.)
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Dave W.
Info Junkie

USA
26022 Posts

Posted - 09/10/2006 :  19:54:28   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Visit Dave W.'s Homepage Send Dave W. a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by GK Paul

It's just a universal law that God has made for your long term best interest and the best interest of humanity as a whole.
Got any evidence of that?

- Dave W. (Private Msg, EMail)
Evidently, I rock!
Why not question something for a change?
Visit Dave's Psoriasis Info, too.
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Hawks
SFN Regular

Canada
1383 Posts

Posted - 09/10/2006 :  20:57:27   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Visit Hawks's Homepage Send Hawks a Private Message
quote:
For God so "loved" the world that He gave His only Begotten Son.

Was that really that much of a sacrifice? And what was the real sacrifice? Having his son life a shortish life and/or dying in pain? Having his son die would hardly be a sacrifice at all since all this entails is for him going to heaven (which is, I believe, better than life on this planet anyway). And given that heaven is better than earth, was Jesus' sacrifice to have to endure actually being on this planet full stop? If this is the case, then most people suffer more than Jesus did, anyway. If this is all true, I can't say I feel terribly sympathetic.

METHINKS IT IS LIKE A WEASEL
It's a small, off-duty czechoslovakian traffic warden!
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pleco
SFN Addict

USA
2998 Posts

Posted - 09/10/2006 :  21:50:09   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Visit pleco's Homepage Send pleco a Private Message
I notice a distinct lack of response on the Lucifer topic (as well as many others).

I think GK Paul is now officially a troll and should now be ignored completely.

by Filthy
The neo-con methane machine will soon be running at full fart.
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Dude
SFN Die Hard

USA
6891 Posts

Posted - 09/10/2006 :  21:54:15   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send Dude a Private Message
GK Paul said:
quote:
If I was God, I would have done it another way also. But were not God. But I'm certain that in His Perfect Wisdom God chose the perfect way to redeem man. But He also in His Love gave you the free will to believe or not believe because God doesn't want you to be a puppet. But, as I've said before, there is always a price to pay for sin. It's just a universal law that God has made for your long term best interest and the best interest of humanity as a whole.


There are several problems with the idea of an omnipotent god and free will.

Mainly that they are mutually exclusive.

If god is omnipotent this implies that he posesses all knowledge.

If god created you, then in the moment of your creation god knew everything you would ever do, and the act of creating you turns your existance into nothing more than an expression of divine intent. God's will, not your free will, has predetermined all the actions that you will take in your life.

If there is an omnipotent being out there, then nothing in the universe can happen that is not the intent of this being.

(edited to add:) This, obviously, plays havoc with things like justice and right vs wrong.


Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson

"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin

Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth
Edited by - Dude on 09/10/2006 21:56:25
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Chippewa
SFN Regular

USA
1496 Posts

Posted - 09/10/2006 :  22:28:53   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Visit Chippewa's Homepage Send Chippewa a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by Dude

...If there is an omnipotent being out there, then nothing in the universe can happen that is not the intent of this being...This, obviously, plays havoc with things like justice and right vs wrong.


Karel Capek, the writer who also introduced the word "robot" – has a short story, "The Last Judgment", which addresses this. In it a criminal dies and in Heaven faces a democratic judgment of his peers rather than God. (Since God knows all, he cannot judge anything.)

Diversity, independence, innovation and imagination are progressive concepts ultimately alien to the conservative mind.

"TAX AND SPEND" IS GOOD! (TAX: Wealthy corporations who won't go poor even after taxes. SPEND: On public works programs, education, the environment, improvements.)
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GK Paul
Skeptic Friend

USA
306 Posts

Posted - 09/11/2006 :  00:42:26   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send GK Paul a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by Dave W.

quote:
Originally posted by GK Paul

It's just a universal law that God has made for your long term best interest and the best interest of humanity as a whole.
Got any evidence of that?

Thomas Jefferson said "we hold these truths self evident". GK Paul holds the above universal truth self evident. I'm sure Jefferson didn't present evidence to the king for the life, liberty, and the pursuit of happinesss truths.


"Something cannot come from nothing" -- Ken Tanaka - geologist

"The existence of a Being endowed with intelligence and wisdom is a necessary inference from a study of celestial mechanics" --Sir Isaac Newton


GK Paul
Edited by - GK Paul on 09/11/2006 00:46:11
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GK Paul
Skeptic Friend

USA
306 Posts

Posted - 09/11/2006 :  00:56:55   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send GK Paul a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by Chippewa

quote:
Originally posted by Dude

...If there is an omnipotent being out there, then nothing in the universe can happen that is not the intent of this being...This, obviously, plays havoc with things like justice and right vs wrong.


Karel Capek, the writer who also introduced the word "robot" – has a short story, "The Last Judgment", which addresses this. In it a criminal dies and in Heaven faces a democratic judgment of his peers rather than God. (Since God knows all, he cannot judge anything.)


I've said it before in this forum. I never believed in the Calvinistic philosophy of predestination for 1 minute. Some apparantly did, but I believe they were wrong which could account for why we don't hear much about Calvinism anymore.


"Something cannot come from nothing" -- Ken Tanaka - geologist

"The existence of a Being endowed with intelligence and wisdom is a necessary inference from a study of celestial mechanics" --Sir Isaac Newton


GK Paul
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Dude
SFN Die Hard

USA
6891 Posts

Posted - 09/11/2006 :  01:04:48   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send Dude a Private Message
Chippewa said:
quote:
Karel Capek, the writer who also introduced the word "robot" – has a short story, "The Last Judgment", which addresses this. In it a criminal dies and in Heaven faces a democratic judgment of his peers rather than God. (Since God knows all, he cannot judge anything.)



The existance of an omnipotent being would still negate the meaning of any such judgement.


Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson

"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin

Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth
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GK Paul
Skeptic Friend

USA
306 Posts

Posted - 09/11/2006 :  01:21:11   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send GK Paul a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by Dude

Chippewa said:
quote:
Karel Capek, the writer who also introduced the word "robot" – has a short story, "The Last Judgment", which addresses this. In it a criminal dies and in Heaven faces a democratic judgment of his peers rather than God. (Since God knows all, he cannot judge anything.)



The existance of an omnipotent being would still negate the meaning of any such judgement.



God could divinely choose not to know how one of his creations
would act in the future. Were getting into the God can't make a rock so heavy that He can't lift it realm which borders on absurdity. If you want to go in that direction go ahead but I'm not.

The road to heaven is straight and narrow. The road to destruction is wide and crooked. You choose the road to go and God in his wisdom can "choose" not to know which road you will choose.


"Something cannot come from nothing" -- Ken Tanaka - geologist

"The existence of a Being endowed with intelligence and wisdom is a necessary inference from a study of celestial mechanics" --Sir Isaac Newton


GK Paul
Edited by - GK Paul on 09/11/2006 01:31:18
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