The Existence of God

I'm still waiting for this evidence you speak so highly of.

Also; back then they still may not have required evidence, as they obviously felt that they would go to a better place if they endured the suffering they dealt with. Nowadays, however, Christians are praised and run most of the world, so what is there left [such as beatings for being Christian] to test their faith, or to keep them from being Christian? Nothing.

Also, let's bring the case of Mormons into the mix. Mormons are considered by Christians to be blasphemous, and heretical, and underwent abuse at the hands of many Christians [be it verbally or physically], so are you saying that they are right, too?

Also, the Jews were obviously tortured, as supposedly laid out in the bible, so are they right too?

Your point of view can be wrapped around many religions.

The reason I say it is less likely is because you do NOT have proof of God existing, yet we do have proof of the Big Bang, evolution, etc. If you believe in a deist God then we can discuss this further after you reply. Also, did you really just put Astrology and logic into the same sentence? I'm sorry but if you are going to base your evidence off of astrology and logic, then that is an extremely heavy contradiction and you should probably just stop right there.

The Big Bang simply "spewed" matter out into the Universe. The singularity that existed before the Big Bang [which is where the Big Bang came from] was extremely compacted, superheated matter. It was the size of a nickel, yet contained all the matter in the universe.

 

Food for thought: I will also point out that this matter was also extremely dense - therefore it had a MASSIVE amount of gravity.

 

I'm a catholic so i believe that god exists


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Rational means backed by reason, not necessarily by inherent truth. Keep that in mind.

Probability is quantifiable. Do not throw the idea of statistical analysis in unless such an analysis can be performed. IE, what is the probability that God exists? All theories are postulated as the "most convenient" ways to explain things; this property is known as Occum's razor. The simplest explanation will take hold until a more complex can be proven. Obviously, the definition of simplest can be somewhat subjective.

The basic principles of physics disappear at the quantum level of today, and become unpredictable at the extremes. Neither the law of conservation or 2nd law of thermodynamics are necessarily applicable to this situation.

 

I'm a christian and I belive god is real. There is no scientific facts to prove that got does it exist, so if you're obviously not going to belive if you're athiest because you can look for answers from science.

I am christian, I don't pray, I don't go to church, I don't do the natural things of my culture. When I ask god for answers, or when I pray, I do get my answers. It might not be right away, but they come.

Heres an example of god. If you're riding on a plane, and a wing breaks off and you're over in the middle of the ocean, most people will start PRAYING TO GOD that they live and their life doesn't get taken away. This is truley where you realise there is no reincarnation, and that god does is exist. By this time, it is too late.

 

No, it would be where you panic and try to give yourself false hope.

In fact, a pilot recently did that instead of taking the emergency procedures and ending up killing 16 people. (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/03/24/praying-pilot-convicted-o_n_178735.html)

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jk6ILZAaAMI

You should watch that. Prayer has been scientifically proven to be pointless and do nothing.

BTW. 4000th post in this thread. D:

WAIT NO! 3999th...

 

Rather than take the time to refute every argument made by others on my recent posts, I will start from scratch. The problem with that accepted format of rebuttal is over time, the original argument becomes distorted and misconceptions become prevalent. Now, there is obviously so much information needed to argue my case that I could write a book, and several have been written already.

This first post will focus primarily on Faith and Religion which has now been sourced properly due to strange irony I must say. For a site that prides itself on the idea of rule breaking, people sure are quick to pounce on a mistake as meaningless in this context as any. Furthermore, the source of the argument word for word originates from the book mentioned below, however the argument is common on the Christian Apologetic front. The argument does not change nor is it reduced in quality as a result of the following quote, whether it is in my words or another apologist (interestingly enough, Barack Obama was nailed for copying speeches early in his campaign also, in both his and my case, neither of us claimed the work as our own, by rule, exempting us of any "rule breaking" nonsense).

"Despite its apparent persuasiveness, the claim that religion is simply a matter of faith is nothing more than a modern myth - it just isn't true. While religion certainly requires faith, religion is not only about faith. Facts are also central to all religions because all religious worldviews - including atheism - make truth claims, and many of those truth claims can be evaluated through scientific and historical investigation.

For Example, theists (e.g., Christians, Muslims, Jews) say that the universe had a beginning, while many atheists and pantheists (e.g., Hindus) say that it did not (the universe is eternal). These are mutually exclusive claims. They cannot both be right. Either the universe had a beginning or it did not. By investigating the nature and history of the universe, we can reasonably conclude that one view is right and the other is wrong.

The alleged resurrection of Christ presents another example. Christians claim that Jesus rose from the dead, while Muslims say that Jesus never even died. Again, one of these views is right and the other is wrong. How can we know which one is right? By evaluating each of these conflicting truth claims against the historical evidence.

Notice that not only do different religions attempt to answer these questions, but scientists also have something to say about these matters. That is, science and religion often address the same questions: Where did the universe come from? Where did life come from? Are miracles possible? and so on. In other words, science and religion are not mutually exclusive categories as some have suggested.

Certainly not all religious claims are open to scientific or historical investigation. Some are unverifiable dogma. Nevertheless, the validity of many religious beliefs can be checked out. Some beliefs are reasonable - they can be proven with a high degree of certainty - while others are clearly unreasonable." -"I Don't Have Enough Faith to be an Atheist" Norman Geisler/Frank Turek.

So again, to address the common challenge among this thread...offer proof, or this thread is not for you. The topic of the thread is: "Does God Exist?" There is clearly no need to even venture into the topic of religious cannons (e.g., Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, etc.). However, do not suggest that because no verifiable proof of God is presented, then our attempts to reason with the misguided are futile. No evidence can be supplied that would definitively support any worldview (e.g., Theism, Pantheism, or Atheism), otherwise this debate would not be in progress.

So For the Record: ANYONE who suggests "no proof, no argument" should (again) be reported for spamming. Clearly, no proof will be presented for the existence of God, or absence; however, evidence that can convey probability will be presented, and that is unfortunately, as good as it will get.

 

Reported for plagiarism of work without citation.

 

Yes, how silly of people to ask for evidence when somebody makes an outrageous claim like "God exists"! What were they thinking, this is a rational debating/discussion section or something?

I'll humor you though - why do you think it takes more faith to be an atheist? I'm an atheist because I find religion silly and because of the lack of evidence - I freely admit I don't know everything, rather than just saying God did it.
Enlighten me.


(I'm also a little stunned that you plagiarized all that and then you were so bold to say you would report people if they merely inquire if you have any evidence. Any further of that will result in infractions. Feel free to use other sources, but just at least say it isn't yours)

 

Why is everyone that posts on this banned? Wierd, but anyways i do believe there is a god, but i also do believe that there is enough scientific evidence to prove that there isnt a god. They have bones of neanderthals and what not beginning to shape what we look like today. i think everyone who has posted on this believing or not believing in god, has atleast once in there life time in a tough situation looked up in the sky, knelt down, and began to pray to god, just because he was someone to talk to, even if you believed in him or not.

 

I dont have very much time to debate here.. but I will pop in once and awhile..

What do you think of the bible? Do you think it is historically accurate? where do you think it draws the line? What makes you believe that what the bible says is fake?

 

You didn't read anything of what I said, did you?

For the first quote, I was saying he was wrong. I know that for something to be rational it requires reason, which he lacked. He claimed that God was the most rational explanation.

Second quote; The Big Bang and Evolution are on the verge of being proven fact. Evolution is basically there. The idea of a god is nowhere close. Miracles do not qualify as hard evidence...

The third quote isn't even me speaking.

All I have been saying is you have continued on and on about how each religion does have scientific evidence to support itself, yet you have not present such a shred of evidence.

Those of us [atheists] who believe in the Big Bang or Evolution have presented evidence to support our claims, and are building more along the way, while you stand steadfastly behind God still as no evidence comes up in support of him. Theists constantly disregard evidence as unimportant or useless, but without it how are those of us who cling to science supposed to take you seriously? I want you to convince me, through proof [even if it is not foolproof], that God exists.


Remember! What I am discussing is a traditional theist god, I.E. Yahweh, God, Allah, etc. Judaism, Islam, Christianity, Catholicism, etc. I am not discussing a deist god, because it is entirely impossible to disprove a deist god as whatever you claim against a deist god can be disregarded as "well our God made that."

 

The big bang theory is only a theory and will always be a theory. Even if they can "proove it" no one knows what really happened. No one was there at creation.

 

A lot of people get banned on this because they don't seem to understand the concept of intelligent discussion but oh well. You make a good point that almost everyone, whether they are willing to admit it or not, has faced the possibility that there is a greater being out there listening to them. The thing about all of it is the more christians argue with people the more likely they will start understanding that a lot the stuff in the bible is erroneous, and contradictory to itself. Believe me I used to be a devout WELS Christian back in the day but things started falling into place and I started realizing that none of it makes any sense at all. My religion teacher, who is a pastor, has even said himself that the NIV has a lot of mistranslations in it and I'm finding them more and more as I research. If you open your bible, in Isiah 45:7 it will probably say "I create disaster, I the Lord do all these things." But if you go back to a King James Version Bible you will find the true and exact translation saying, "I create evil, I the Lord do all these things." That's probably my favorite example to use because it not only shows a mistranslation that christians fear to mention because it sounds bad, but also because it shows the misteaching probably every church force feeds down their member's throats. I mean literally since I can remember I have been taught that God does not create evil he simply created perfect beings that fell away and sinned. Obviously he creates evil I mean he himself says he does. Assuming you believe him that is. But anyways back to my main point, there's a website you can check out, The Skeptic's Annotated Bible and there you can find just loads and loads of information simply based on the bible itself. It's astounding how many times God tells you its ok to do something and then kills others for doing the exact same thing.

Really though you don't need science to prove that god is not real, you can simply read "his" own book and find just a massive amount of errors.

 

I'll forgive your lapse of judgment

Don't be foolish, everything has a reason or a cause. Whether or not YOU perceive his reasoning to be legitimate is a different case.

Once again, the fallacy here is religious people require evidence to have faith. Either way, you'll notice a trend towards a faith and science that do not conflict, such as "intelligent design". I don't even understand how the Big Bang and the Genesis conflict to begin with...

Yes, I am agnostic, but twisting science to disprove an undisprovable just looks bad.

Fixed, was a misquote.

 

How can we disprove something we can´t see and how do we prove something we can´t see

 

The ultimate question that cannot be proven or disproven


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1. I am not saying that they do not have the right, I am just saying it is foolish. Yes this is my opinion.

2. Genesis says that this was all created within 7 days. For something to occur like that after such an immense explosion, and then have the earth and it's inhabitants is astoundingly ridiculous. Now the common rebuttal is that "Who knows how long a day might have been back then?" Genesis was not written during the creation of the Universe. When it was Written, we had a very good idea of how long a day was and whoever wrote Genesis wrote it with full understanding that a day was just as long as a day is now.

Also, Genesis conflicts with science in many other different ways. It claims that Adam was formed from the dust of the ground. Eve was created from Adams rib. This doesn't conflict with science? Many other fallacies exist in genesis which I will not take the time to explain unless you would like me to.

 

Yes, I must say I totally agree with you. All Christians are fundamentalists, and all believers in God are Christian. I mean, a non-literal interpretation would have to imply paganism!