A Question for the Theists who Believe in Evolution

Defining the end game isn't really necessary.
You both believe that the end game is particular. It has a face, and it won't be altered.

 

With which I obvious took offense, and no, i was not offended.

Right; making it up that I was "offended" is as honest as you can be?

Honest exchange of ideas is not done via making things up or leaping off to unwarranted
insulting conclusions about others.

And there you did it again.

I ask a q, you answer with a q. that involves making it up that i said or implied that it is outrageous.

That was in no way implied by me, that you make up such things is weird.

It may be hard to find out what it is to you, but its easy enough to look up what it is defined to be.
It does not apply to me or anyone I ever met. Why is this obscure and stupid belief important to you?

Making things up, in order to have something to criticize is characteristic of creationists,s but not limited to them.


So we can agree that your remark about me posing to have "superior logic" was misplaced.

i guess you are not into admitting that you made it up that I calimed superior logic.

Hmm, ok, a misunderstanding perhaps. What then does it mean if via feelings you can detect
profoundly significant entities whose detection is beyond the reach of science?

I suspect that you just wish to continue making up things in lieu of anything substantive.

Why do you feel a need to point out the obvious, on something I never suggested I think otherwise?

Whatever you may be out to do is not bolstered by making things up or taking offense where none was intended, then firing back.

You remind me a a middle aged lady in another forum, whose bent was for making up things
(she claimed it was "paraphrasing' even when the meaning came out opposite) and claiming "insult' at every turn. Water and hot oil, cats and dogs, she and I were pure guaranteed warfare, so I found it best not to communicate at all. Tough to accomplish, when the entire conversation
ends up being based on another's fantasy of who I am and what I have to say.

 

So first I remind you of a 13 year old girl, and now of a middle-aged lady? Who would have thought I could age so quickly! Before I know it I’ll suffer from old-age dementia. Maybe then I’ll forget that your post before this one was just as pointless and issue-dodging. So if you have something substantial to say, you'd better hurry up. I may not even live to read it.

 

Well, if you tell me what I believe it would make sense to define it to see whether I agree or not.
As of yet I’m still stumbling in the dark as to what you think I believe and I have an inkling that I may disagree that I actually do believe that.
However, so you don’t want to define the 'unalterable' end-game you think both Vicariously and I believe in, but how about my other questions? If you think all humans are valuable, why do you think that they are? What gives things value?

 

I don't care how you define the end game. I don't claim to know what you think about it. That is not important to the argument. And I haven't said you share the same belief in the end game as Vicariously does. The only point I am making is you both think that what you believe in is inevitable.
It isn't so much that I find anyone particularly valuable intrinsically. I just don't find anyone less valuable than me, and so have no reason to treat anyone with disrespect.

 

What makes you think you are valuable and deserving of respect? (Which I'm sure you are)

 

As all you had to say was things you invented out of thin air, and you are disinclined to take any responsibility for yourself, I think the 13 yr old mind is about right.

We cont see many xtians who dont just make things up and say them as if they were true.

One of many good reasons not to go down their sorry path.

 

You may be assuming too much.
Intrinsically, nothing. That is a characteristic others choose to apply or not, as they see fit.

 

Well I hate to break it to you but you’re breaking anything to me. Perhaps you’ve merely forgotten but not many atheists on this forum have ever suggested that science does or can deal in absolutes. You are dancing around my point though I’m not suggesting it’s on purpose. If everything is valid which is what your last sentence above suggests then nothing is valid. Science takes a claim or theory and tests it. If it provides results it becomes a stepping stone to further knowledge and ideas. If it fails to provide any results and none of the evidence supports the claim it is rejected until evidence is presented. Believing that something is true is no different than wanting it to be true and life proves to each and every one of us that the universe whether created by God or otherwise could care less about what we want. Believing that someone has a soul and that that soul can be corrupted by demons isn’t going to help someone with a mental disorder that makes them prone to violence. You know this is true yet you argue that evidence based subjectivity is the same as belief based subjectivity?

This same argument can be used for the legalization or acceptance of pretty much anything and everything that doesn’t cause physical harm to other people. Who are you to say? Who am I to say? As long as we simply believe it others have to consider it valid right? Or at least respect it right?

Though we agree that obviously every group will have varying types of moderates and fundamentalists I have to point out that atheism in the public arena is the reaction to theism. What you seem to have forgotten about is the very reason we have to have this discussion is because people cannot keep their religion to themselves and will continue to impose it on others from the perspective that they are actually doing a service to humanity. In the future I see people like you and I being strong allies but there is a long way to go before we can feel we’ve progressed beyond such fundamentalism and indeed maybe we never will.

The evidence for which…? How many people are born with the ability and in the atmosphere to learn and see things the way you do? And without imposing your ideas on them through certain means of education how do you propose to rectify that problem? Seems strange that after saying this, “Because subjective truth is so valuable to those who hold it, religious freedom and religious tolerance are high goods.” you would even give an opinion that suggests his approach (which is nothing more than his belief) is daft. Why doesn’t it have just as much value as yours?

As I said in the beginning I know you believe, I’m challenging that which you believe in.

Please enlighten me.

And it makes some people want to get in fights, finding human nature in things created by humans is not supernatural and has no need to be attached to it.

You are confusing what I said. The free will discussion ended during my second sentence in the paragraph you are replying to here. My overall point was in regards to evidence and or the lack thereof. You actually helped me out here though by suggesting I have him tackle his fears which are only real to him because of a lack of evidence and the cognitive ability to control his emotions. My simply telling him that they are not real is as evidential as my saying that they are.

Do I have to choose?

Why do bees make beehives? We care for and love each other because it is beneficial to us, we strive to “progress” and make our lives better because it is beneficial to us….it’s strange but I wonder how many people in this forum don’t believe in the soul and yet lead wonderful lives…if you don’t need to believe in it to be good it seems your fears are unwarranted.

How is my idea of progressing through less subjective and evidentiary means an absolute? I could care less what the future looks like overall just as long as less people are suffering and the world isn’t being destroyed. I guess I get that the very idea of progress is subjective so to be clear my idea of progress as I mentioned has to do with overall suffering. Because I believe “this is it” I have a great desire to make sure as many people get to enjoy it as possible. To be honest if all the kids that die today will just end up in heaven rather than having to possibly suffer here on earth…I just might be doing them a favor by not doing a damn thing to save them.

This last part is something I would only ask you to read a few times and see if anything pops out at you. If not then it won’t make much sense to say more than this; your view of meaning being attached to one and only one point-of-view is as dangerous as it gets but for some strange reason….very common.

 

You really don't like leaving your comfort zone do you?

I wonder what the rest of the theists who responded to my posts feel in regards to your belief that the concept of the soul is above their ability to understand?

 

well at least most offer semblance of knowledge of the soul...

 

And yet they didn't need me to define it for them to join the conversation. Weird.

 

Created us in His image has nothing to do with penises or vagina those are bodily parts design by God to allow humans the ability to procreate. The image that God instil in us to be like Him is the intellect, the free will the ability to think, feel and most of all to create things such as space ships that can reach outer space, understanding atoms, finding cures to diseases.

Your understanding of in God's image is too shallow and is base on your total-extreme hatred towards God and that is part of your free will that God has given you your free will to hate Him.

God gave animals souls but He did not gave them intellect only humans have that special gift that makes humans unique because they were created in God's image. The moral Gandhi and Buddha just like all the Saints and saintly Christians and atheist will find paradise and live in eternal happiness in God's country club. The unrepentant child molester, murderers, slavers and tyrants will find permanent resident in Satan's country Hell club.

 

odd debate method...
it's like your on about some obscure semantic...all i'm asking is a discussion on soul ...i gave a few angles and ways to look at it...some more are impossible to discuss without some sort of input besides semantic style oblivions..

thought it would be interesting and yet you have some inane grudge anger thing going on...

hahahahaha

 

and yet this person is God and God exists for this person's event to take place and you belittle it.
you are portraying a false intellect as you belittle the fire which is divine in that person

 

God exist in that person who in spite of that person's extreme hatred towards God because God respect and recognize that person's free will it is up to that person to accept or reject God.

The infinite intellect of God is so divine that it takes an extra ordinary human or humans to fully comprehend God.
Matthew 16:13 -20
13 When Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say the Son of Man is?”

14 They replied, “Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets.”

15 “But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?”

16 Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”

17 Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven.
18 And I tell you that you are Peter,[a] and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it.
19 I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be[c] bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be[d] loosed in heaven.” 20 Then he ordered his disciples not to tell anyone that he was the Messiah.

 

We are having a discussion on evolution and when we got our souls regardless of how you define it. The original concept in Christian mythology makes sense from a creationist’s stand-point but loses its potency when one considers that life evolved over thousands of years.

If you believe we have a soul then your definition could have easily been presented in your response to the op. If you don’t believe in a soul then why respond? Either way my idea of a soul especially as an atheists has no bearing on what you believe does it?

And since according to you:

“that which continues on after this body dies is defined in many ways .”

“a created soul and an uncreated mind is an argument best left to those that understand the concepts in the first place.”

“like i said it is well above the average person to understand...”

Why not just enlighten the rest of us rather than try and change the topic of discussion?

 

your theological ignorance isn't a disproof of a theological premise.

 

Your point to begin with was that my answer to your OP’s question was without merit because it didn’t claim to know absolute truth only to emphasize your own aversion against absolute truth shortly after.

As for the subjectivity of evidential truth vs the subjectivity of non-evidential truth: apart from the nitpicking philosophical question how anybody can be objectively sure of any evidence, the problem starts when you regard evidential truth as the only valid one, even though the statement, that evidential truth is the only valid truth, is itself not evidential. That self-contradiction makes this statement logically flawed.
Biology’s job is to occupy itself with the natural/material and measurable world. It can’t make any statements beyond that and for a logical person that would include the statement that there is nothing supernatural/immaterial. If somebody concludes from biology that there definitely is no soul, because one can’t find it in a medical check, that’s irrational scientism. If you get diagnosed with cancer and go to Benny Hinn instead of chemotherapy that is irrational superstition.

I never said that I believe a soul can be corrupted by demons by the way. As it happens I don’t believe that, but I would not look down on an exorcist – be it a catholic priest or a native African witchdoctor - who does and makes good use of the placebo effect to enhance another person’s psychological well-being. Needless to say that I am aware of the dangers of negative psychological effects, of not taking necessary meds and of falling victim to abusive frauds.

You misunderstand: If you don’t believe in God or if you do and believe that Genesis is to be read literally, I'd think you are wrong. But I'd respect that to you are honestly convinced that your views are right and that you ought to be allowed to stick to them if I can't convince you of mine. And actually I do think that anything that doesn't do harm to others should be legal.

There is such a thing as freedom of speech and religious freedom includes the right to utter and practice one’s religious beliefs or the lack thereof. Imho to say that the current atheism in the public arena is the reaction to theism is a rather shallow one-dimensional analysis. I think Terry Eagleton has a better one:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCqHnwIR1PY
Again we in Europe don’t have the same problems as you guys in the US (yet). But if you want suitable allies for fighting creationism creeping into biology classrooms and for plain evolution staying in any of my churches bishops would make a better partner than a Richard-Dawkins-type of atheist: http://chronicle.com/blogs/brainstorm/evolution-in-the-classroom-here-we-go-again/45698
However, as long as you spend more time bashing God than talking actual politics, I can’t really tell whether we’d be allies in anything else. Some of your remarks above make me doubt that. For my part I’m a bit of a left-wing anarchist and I surely have as little problems with my atheist political friends as the atheist Noam Chomsky has with liberation theology.

The evidence for all kinds of things. For example I’ve seen atheists priding themselves of their scientific mind and in the same breath making adventurous statements about the history of religion that were at best informed by Dan Brown’s fiction.
As I said I’m rather unique but in no way exceptional . As I indicated: most theists don’t have the slightest problems with science, nor is there a religious war looming because my Pastor disagrees with his Catholic Colleague about how to understand the Eucharist. From my point of view above mentioned atheists would be in as dire need of education as fundamentalist Christians, who don’t have a first clue about Christianity as such and where some of their particular doctrines come from.
I tend to disagree with a lot of my fellow Christians /fellow theists/ atheists whose differing opinion I value because – whilst I don’t share it – I deem it to be well informed. Disagreement as such is not a bad thing – it makes one reflect one’s own position.

Well, I'm not surprised your OP's question wasn't an expression of open-minded interest.

I already tried to – alas as oy yet it seems to no avail. You can lead a horse to water ….

What a bleak view of art!

My question would be: If you (IMHO erroneously, unscientifically and rather smugly) fancy comparing religious belief to a kid’s vivid imagination, why don’t you at least treat religious believers with the same empathy you’d grant your kid?

No. But when you write that “As a proponent of science and philosophy” you have “a big problem with absolute truth especially when it’s tied to the view that even though one cannot know it they will still believe in it.” that doesn’t leave you with a lot of choice. All philosophers I’ve hinted at would already be off your list, Plato, Aquinas, Kant … don’t have your problem. So I’d be interested which philosophies you are a proponent of.

Well, if you believed that life is a precious present and that every life has meaning and is intrinsically good you would not want to deprive any kid of it. If however you’d base your view on these kids merely on biology, you may indeed want to kill them. After all they might get in the way off your own offspring when fighting about future resources.
Mind you: I’m not saying that atheists are prone to kill kids. All I’m saying is that arguments from biology don’t suffice as an explanation as to why killing kids should be necessarily bad and I’m almost certain that you are just as convinced as I am that it is indeed necessarily bad. The reason I’m so certain of that is this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_law.

So how many points of view do you have? As I see it I’m the blind man who is happy to admit not to know the elephant from just touching the trunk. You however come across as the blind man who says there’s surely nothing but the trunk and that that other blind men telling you about the tail and the feet must be bonkers. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blind_men_and_an_elephant

 

Gotta love how "I'm not sure" is considered an unacceptable answer for any theist on any aspect of religion, but is perfectly acceptable for leading figures on deep scientific questions.

I believe that we have souls, and I'm not sure when we individually 'get' souls, or when the first was embodied. I'm not 100% about the origins of man, I've seen major flaws in every model given - but I'm surprisingly okay with an imperfect knowledge of everything.

 

Wow! And you are seriously kidding yourself that you're not prone to scientism? Or is it just that you plainly have no clue about Christian theology while you are happily talking out of your prejudiced arse about it?
Maybe this site can help you - I doubt it though. I usually give this link to fundamentalist Christians who deny evolution - seems there is little difference between their self-imposed ignorance and and yours: http://biologos.org/

 

The theologians I deal with don't have the slightest qualms to admit not to be sure. It's actually an elemental part of most religions to state that God is beyond our human understanding. Even Catholics admit as much and they'd certainly like to be sure.

 

So you think you've got no intrinsic value? And if nobody thought you are valuable that would make you not valuable? So you say people don’t have an intrinsic value and that value as such is a social construct? If everybody thought brown-eyed people are less valuable than blue-eyed people that would make brown-eyed people being less valuable the truth? Really? How about if everybody thought torturing children for fun is fine? Would that make it fine?

 

Not logical conclusions.
In the first, you are still applying a value judgment regarding eye color. My construct doesn't.
In the latter, your value judgment says children have less intrinsic worth. Mine doesn't.

 

I’m not applying any value judgments. I’m giving you hypothetical scenarios and am asking you how your ideas of what constitutes value would apply to them.

If you say that value is not intrinsic but a mere social construct and thus utterly relativistic, it logically follows that you cannot say that torturing children for fun is absolutely and always bad.