This is why Christianity is made fun of

[Neo Yi]

Exactly, I respect that. That's how I try to live, I wouldn't say a Christian wouldn't go to heaven or hell, just that I wouldn't go to either. At the end of the day, getting along with others is the main thing for me, not because of religion, just because it makes my life a hell of a lot easier.

Yeah, but people make such a big deal on both sides, but I guess that's the beauty and curse of different people. Ahahaha. Shadow Hog sums it up best and I basically follow that path he chose. I'm Christian, but I don't feel the need to shove my religion on others.

[Light Speed]

I love the way that Chris just assumed that, because I'm not a Christian, I must be an atheist. :P

I assumed that too. To be fair, you're deploying all kinds of typically atheist anti-God arguments that tend to work against all the 'big' holy scriptures/established religions. So what are you, a Scientologist? (Or perhaps just an agnostic!!)

Whatever he is, he is going to hell.

[chriscaffee]

Popcorn surely you can understand that while you see the evidence as worthless others may not share that opinion. And again, you are assuming that Christinanity is wrong for no other reason then you don't believe it. You might not believe it because you feel it is unlikely or even impossible that such events occured, but the reason it is wrong is because you don't believe it, just like to a Christian the reason it is right is because he does believe it. In the end nobody can say that "I am right," but that's what you have been doing this entire debate.

Es, I apologize for the assumptions I made. You weren't specific when you said "go to hell" makes you want to debate so I just filled in the blanks with some of what Popcorn is saying and what other atheists have said. As for assuming you weren't a theist at all, that had nothing to do with being a non-Christian. I like how you assumed that I think everyone who isn't a Christian is an athiest. The arguments you have been bringing up, as Popcorn mentioned, are against religion in general. The only specific point against Christianity was the insect example.

[gr4yJ4Y]

But for some reason, in the realm of faith and spirituality, arguably the most important aspect of human existence, we are supposed to just shut our brains off, sign up for one of the pre-exising religious denominations and then accept every one of their teachings completely and unquestioningly. Most people just believe whatever their parents believe, and that's the end of it. I think that's terrible.

I agree with the last two sentences completely. Most people just mindlessly follow in the ways of their parents without every questioning it and that is something terrible. It's also one of my major issues with organized religion. It doesn't leave room for self discovery in why we believe in what we believe in or searching through the evidence in other religions. That is bad.

But to say that people of faith shut their brains off is a poor assumption. There are people out there who have explored many religions and come to a conclusion on one or another. There's not 100% proof that it's right, but according to their judgement and research they find their religion the most likely to be correct.

Unfortunately I would have to agree that most religious people haven't done the research and go with whatever they find most convenient.


I don't think it's fair to say that Christians should stick to the book in saying "Love thy neighbor" and not warn people about hell. While I wouldn't agree with anyone who would witness someone sinning and tell them that they're on the path to hell, I do think it can be done out of love in a respectable way. I know if I saw someone who was happily drowning in a pool I wouldn't just stare at them and think, "They're so happy. Saving them would be disrespectful."

[Omni Hunter]

Yeah, but people make such a big deal on both sides, but I guess that's the beauty and curse of different people. Ahahaha. Shadow Hog sums it up best and I basically follow that path he chose. I'm Christian, but I don't feel the need to shove my religion on others.

Yeah, that's similar to the rest of my family, they say they're Christian but they aren't very devout. I just don't like to label myself with religion, I don't see myself as Christian, Agnostic or Atheist, I wouldn't accept any of those labels. I'm just in limbo between everything I percieve, because that could change at any time. Either way, I'd rather find out for myself.

As Chris suggested though, religion is not a black-and-white area, I'd hardly say anyone is on the same wavelength here among either Christians or non-Christians.

On Gr4yJ4y's last point though, both you and the person know the water is there. To an agnostic's point of view, they don't percieve Hell like you would so they could find it as rude as them saying that you wouldn't go to Heaven.
I know you wouldn't intend to be rude, but neither would someone who equally believes there is nothing beyond this frame of life, you think you're helping them avoid Hell, they think they're helping you avoid being disillusioned.

[Popcorn]

Popcorn surely you can understand that while you see the evidence as worthless others may not share that opinion.

Good gracious, man. Have you lost it entirely? Yes, I fully accept that other people frequently disagree with me on a whole spectrum of issues, not least in this thread.

And again, you are assuming that Christinanity is wrong for no other reason then you don't believe it.

What the hell is your point? I am assuming that Christianity is wrong 'for no other reason' than I cannot see how it can be right. So yes. You're right. Blimey. Revelatory or what.

You might not believe it because you feel it is unlikely or even impossible that such events occured, but the reason it is wrong is because you don't believe it

So you're basically saying that I 'don't think it's wrong because I don't think it's right'? How many more tautologies have you got lined up for me, Chris? I think it's wrong for all sorts of reasons, which I have discussed in this thread.

just like to a Christian the reason it is right is because he does believe it.

Once again, this makes no fucking sense. Christians believe they are right for reasons, dude-- even if they are shit ones. No-one thinks they're right 'because they think they're right', or at least I really hope they don't.

In the end nobody can say that "I am right," but that's what you have been doing this entire debate.

Anyone can say they're right. Whether or not they actually are or not is a different matter, but someone is, and I believe it's me. Just because someone else thinks equally as strongly that they're right doesn't mean neither of us can be, and it certainly doesn't mean I can't.

[mad_cat_42]

That's what we're criticising here: the assumption. It's a false assumption. That's our criticism.

Yes, we do. No-one's criticising Christians for taking what they think is true to be true; what we're saying is they shouldn't think it's true, because it's not.

If you believe something, great; our suggestion, however, is that you make sure that what you believes is correct.

Prove it. I'm dead serious, go out and prove that God does not exist and go out and prove that Jesus did not exist. Prove that all of your arguments against Christianity's fundamental beliefs are more truthful than Christianity's arguments for them.

[Popcorn]

You miss the point.

[mad_cat_42]

I don't care. Prove that your beliefs are more factual than mine.

[Esrever]

Yeah, sorry Chris, I got a little vague there for awhile. As you could probably tell, that post turned into a kind of venting exercise and I sort of lost sight of what point I was trying to make.

And when I say that most people "shut off their brains" when adopting their spiritual attitudes, I'm not limiting that strictly to religious people, either. There are a lot of atheists who don't seem to have ever given the other possibilities much serious thought (although I don't really get the impression that Popcorn is one of those people.)

Saying that there is no God is a pretty big leap of faith in itself, since by their very nature a God or gods could exist without creating any recognizable evidence on our plane of existence. It's sort of like saying there is no other intelligent life in the universe. We're not really in a position to know that kind of thing definitively.

But we can look at specific aspects of our world, and see if there are plausible explanations for them that do not require the involvement of a higher power. For example, I believe evolution is the most plausible explanation for species diversity, much like I believe the Earth's tilt is the the most plausible explanation for the seasons, and gravity is the most plausible explanation for why I haven't been flung into space. I feel there is enough evidence for each of those things to make them more likely explanations than the catch-all "God does it."

But even if all those things are true, they don't disprove the existence of God, do they? They just conflict with specific texts of specific religions. That's why I don't consider myself an Atheist, but also why I'd never consider myself a Christian. I have no idea if God exists, or what he is like if he does. But I AM pretty sure he didn't make women out of Adam's rib.

[Popcorn]

hrnghhhh there is no reason to believe that something exists when there is no reason to think that it exists

yes I know we can't disprove the existence of god on an empirical basis (although there are some philosophers who have proposed that the idea of a God can be disproved logically) but then I can't prove that there isn't a single purple spanner bured deep under the surface of the moon either and that doesn't mean we should go about believing it.

[mad_cat_42]

Then please stop acting that your beliefs are automatically correct and then rest of ours are automatically wrong. That is the main thing I have been getting from your posts: a sense of "I'm better than you so nyah" arrogance.

Oh yeah, go ahead and prove that there is no reason to think God exists.

[Popcorn]

The 'extra-terrestial life' argument is an absolutely inappropriate analogy, Es, because the universe as we interpet it in no way denies the possibility of aliens existing somewhere. God, meanwhile, is a different concept altogether-- one that defies normal understanding of space/time-- and there are many arguments for and against the ramifications of such a concept.

But that's not my field. A 'god' of some description could exist, I guess, but I insist that the chances of it having anything to do with traditional religious interpretations are so close to being nil as to not worth bothering with. I feel I can confidently state that there is no God as envisioned by any of humanity's faiths, past present or future, because the possibility of God (even if he exists in any capacity, and I don't think he does) actually corresponding with any of them are beyond slim.

[Dache]

Oh yeah, go ahead and prove that there is no reason to think God exists.

You are not as smart as you think you are.

[Popcorn]

Mad Cat, your questions betray a certain level of idiocy that I'm not going to tolerate for much longer.

[mad_cat_42]

Funny, I was thinking that your arguments betray the same level of idiocy.

[Light Speed]

He has at least made arguments, all you have done is yell at him to prove shit that you know can't be proved, which doesn't really stand for anything anyway. Popcorn never once claimed there is no god. He just said that we have no real evidence to support a god existing and from a fairly scientific standpoint we shouldn't believe in one. He also said, or at least someone in this thread did, that we don't plan on changing anyones core beliefs, arguing is just a fun exercise.

You are just turning it into a pissing match that you can't win, because Popcorn can just ban you.

[Esrever]

Well, you can come up with the kind of lame one-off empirical arguments that Intelligent Design supporters often use to attack evolution.

You know, like when they bring up the bombardier beetle. It has two chemicals in two seperate sacks on its butt, and when it shoots them out and they mix together, they explode. How could this beetle gradually evolve into its current form without exploding itself somewhere along the way?

Scientists have come up with various possible evolutionary paths, but they have to be very complex and somewhat "lucky" in order to work... and because we don't have much of a fossil record about the bombardier beetle or its ancestors, we'll never really be able to prove that one of those lucky complex paths is true. So, how can we say with such certainty that the beetle must have evolved?

On the flip side, if humans are a product of Intelligent Design, why do we have an appendix? It is a completely useless organ that we can live quite happily without. Evolutionists suspect that it's a leftover from an earlier stage of our development, and that whatever use it once had has faded away.

But if we didn't evolve... if we were designed the way we are now from the very beginning, why were we given an organ with no function?

Evolutionists argue that just because we don't know the explanation for the beetle doesn't mean there isn't one. And intelligent designers argue that just because we don't know the appendix's purpose doesn't mean it doesn't have one.

These are big theories that encompass everything in existence. That means there will always be certain beetles and appendixes and other things that we can't explain with these theories, because the fact is we don't have mountains of historical evidence about every single thing that ever existed.

So no, it's never a battle to outright empirically prove that God doesn't exist, or to prove that he does. Every theory will always have holes. It all really comes down to plausibility. That's the best anyone can do working with what we have. We can argue which theory is the most plausible. (And for a number of reasons, I think evolution is waaaay more plausible than any other explanations.)

[mad_cat_42]

If Popcorn chooses to ban me, he will simply demonstrate arrogance and cowardice by hiding behind power that should not be brought into a debate whatsoever. Of course, I highly doubt that he reached his position by displaying outright cowardice therefore I believe, Light Speed, that you are in the wrong to expect such behavior of him.

As for my original argument, by saying things like our assumptions are false, what we think isn't true and that the arguments of atheists are superior than that of Christians, he is displaying outright arrogance, whether it is purely his own or whether it is arrogance resulting from his own religious beliefs.

[Light Speed]

I meant that if you just devolve this thread into a pissing match for long enough, among other things him along with the other mods will most likely see fit to ban you. None of our mods would ever ban someone just to get out of an argument.

[smiths32]

Mad Cat, please, just stop while your ahead. Popcorn thinks that Christian assumptions are false the same way you would think that aethistic assumptions are false. At the end of the day, none of us can give an accepted correct response to big questions concerning matters of creation, evolution, etc. Like Esrever showed.

[Esrever]

Why is it offensive for Popcorn to think that your beliefs are wrong and his are right? Don't you feel the same way about your own beliefs?

You can't have a debate without each side thinking their viewpoint is superior. If you can't handle that then stay out of the discussion. Popcorn has provided a number of explanations for why he believes what he believes, and if you don't agree with them then you should address their flaws specifically rather than changing the subject with some arbitrary demand that no one on either side of the debate can meet.

[Popcorn]

None of our mods would ever ban someone just to get out of an argument.

Ooh, I might. I mean, I am a colossal coward.

[chriscaffee]

I guess what I'm saying is this Popcorn: You're arguing with your belief assuming that it is right. I argue my belief assuming it may or may not be right. Just a difference in style I guess. You're style bugs me sometimes (and not just because you're on the other side) probably because I wish I could have that much conviction in a belief, but I'll get over it.

[Popcorn]

Dude, it's not a belief. It's a rational assertation. Anyone can have one. I'm not absolutely convinced I'm right, I just haven't found an argument yet that has led me out of my conclusions. It's no different from your thoughts on gravity: I'm sure you have a pretty solid opinion on whether or not that exists, right?

You've gotta drop this 'You're arguing with your belief assuming that it is right/ I argue my belief assuming it may or may not be right' crap, though, it doesn't make any fucking sense.