Unbelievable. I’m speechless.

They can try to put the blame on anything they wish, but in the end they were the ones who killed a friend in cold blood. I have heard Helter Skelter, played Dungeons & Dragons, even taken illicit drugs and yet I have never killed anyone. Could it be that maybe the reason they killed him is because they are wholly devoid of compassion for other people? I try never to use the word ‘evil’ since I strongly associate it with religious dogma, but what other words can describe these empty hollow children? Vile? Disgusting? Garbage?

May they all rot in jail.

How about Christian?

What a pack of idiots.
But anyway, Les....
BOO!  GET OFF YOUR BLOG!!!! YOU SUCK!!!
You have been officially heckled on International Heckling Day.
No, you were heckled.  Do not try to come back with something clever, or I shall return to heckle you some more.

I don’t think I should have read that article right before bed.  That is probably the single most horrible act I’ve ever heard.  Actually, when I stop to think about it, it’s just ONE of the most horrible acts I’ve ever heard.  This world is filled with such sick people—people who will stop at nothing for the sake of a thrill or a pocketful of money. 

Are these people born like this?  Or do they become this way over time?  The “callous disregard for the value of life” comes from somewhere, Les.  I have my theories—too numerous and lengthy to go into here—but it does come from somewhere.  Yes, I believe there are those who are born bad .... but I believe there are also those who “turn” bad over time.  Damn ... whatever the reason, it’s beyond belief what some are capable of.

Now I better go read something happy so I don’t have bad dreams.

Leigh, yeah it does come from somewhere. Sometimes it’s actively taught to them like the callous disregard that can develop via racism when you’re told that other ethnic groups are sub-human. Sometimes it’s passively taught to them via neglect by parents too busy doing other things to teach their kids right from wrong or provide them with the love and attention they need.

Morals and the value of life are things that people mistakenly assume are instinctual or instilled in us through some divine power, but the truth is these are things that are taught to us by others. Our parents have the biggest influence, but not the only one. Sometimes not being taught to care about others is more dangerous than being taught to hate a particular group.

-=e=-: *Sniff!* I’m so happy! I’ve always wanted to be heckled! It’s a sign I’ve finally hit the big time! Yay!

Heh, I think this is the first response I’ve ever made where I tried to be serious and silly at the same time.

Forgot to respond to Jay’s comment:

I didn’t catch anything in the article that suggested the kids participated in this killing for a religious reason so I don’t think we can expect them to use that as an excuse. From the sounds of it, this was purely a thrill kill.

Here in South Florida, a teenager driving a Corvette at high speeds crashed causing the car to disintrigrate upon impact and killing the driver. Immediately, newspapers and other news media said that he drove so fast because he had just gotten out of the movie theatre where he allegedly say ‘2 Fast 2 Furious.’ On a radio station two days later, the teenagers father said his son never saw that film, nor the first ‘Fast and the Furious.” Buggers, all of them.

You look at the world and say there is no Satan and no God. When you go to a store and see a watch, do you say there is no watch maker? Yet the watch isn’t near as intricate, amazing, beautifull or self-correcting as the universe.
By the same token you ignore the evidence when you write that we are all influenced by our upbringing, that’s how we know right and wrong. I bet you couldn’t get 5 people to agree to any other specific thing. Yet somehow every human culture knows that killing, raping, thieving and dishonesty are wrong. Talk about missing the trees for the forest.
And if the culture knows it’s wrong, how does the environment, that same culture, then produce this “bad behaviour”?  I’m not saying man isn’t perfectly capable of evil all by himself. In fact, I personally believe that self-centeredness is what takes us there. But I think we are guided along the way.

Yet when I look at the watch I see a physical object that was created by a human being...a person that I can see and touch, not an invisible being that that I just have to believe is there. When someone can show me god in the act of creation then I will have to re-evaluate my position, but until then I don’t see where this universe could not have come into being without the aid of intelligent design.

You think that every culture knows that things like rape, murder, and stealing are wrong, but have you ever tried to raise children in absolute isolation and then quiz them on what is right and wrong? My guess is that without any outside influence and without being taught a moral code, such children would have no concept of right and wrong. Right then would be whatever they desired at the time and wrong would be anything unpleasant that happened to THEM.

Cultures arise when the participants agree to certain things like NOT murdering or raping each other or because such things are generally unpleasant, it is not something we are born knowing.

I’ve owned over a couple dozen watches in my life. I’ve never met a single watchmaker. Nor have I even been in a watch-making factory. By your logic, since I’ve never seen or touched these people, they do not exist, and I should believe that watches are naturally occurring. You say you can take me to a watchmaker? I say I will not go with you on that journey, because I believe it would be a waste of my time, and it’s likely just a bunch of hocus-pocus anyway, because watches naturally occur.

I think there are many things you have never seen, but believe to be real by the evidence of their existence. We often “discover” celestial bodies that we cannot see because we see the way other bodies behave and know that there must be a reason for it. All I am saying is: I believe there is an embodiment of evil, and incidents such as these are part of the evidence. The way these people behaved is indicative of an evil force in the universe. Likewise, the faith that some people have is indicative of the existence of God. Just like when I first saw a watch and someone told me that watches come from watchmakers I believed that there were indeed watchmakers.

You look at the world and say there is no Satan and no God. When you go to a store and see a watch, do you say there is no watch maker? Yet the watch isn’t near as intricate, amazing, beautifull or self-correcting as the universe.

And now we come upon, once again, the logical fallacy known as the Argument From Design expressed in a now classical form called The Watchmaker Argument. The argument basically being that something as intricate as the Universe or a human being couldn’t come into existence by chance. That as watches have watchmakers so too must the universe have a universe maker. Allow me to quote to you from the Atheism Web’s article on common arguments:

The Watchmaker analogy suffers from three particular flaws, over and above those common to all Arguments By Design. Firstly, a watchmaker creates watches from pre-existing materials, whereas God is claimed to have created the universe from nothing. These two sorts of creation are clearly fundamentally different, and the analogy is therefore rather weak.

Secondly, a watchmaker makes watches, but there are many other things in the world. If we walked further along the beach and found a nuclear reactor, we wouldn’t assume it was created by the watchmaker. The argument would therefore suggest a multitude of creators, each responsible for a different part of creation (or a different universe, if you allow the possibility that there might be more than one).

Finally, in the first part of the watchmaker argument we conclude that the watch is not part of nature because it is ordered, and therefore stands out from the randomness of nature. Yet in the second part of the argument, we start from the position that the universe is obviously not random, but shows elements of order. The Watchmaker argument is thus internally inconsistent.

Apart from logical inconsistencies in the watchmaker argument, it’s worth pointing out that biological systems and mechanical systems behave very differently. What’s unlikely for a pile of gears is not necessarily unlikely for a mixture of biological molecules.

You find it difficult to imagine how the Universe could exist in all it’s complexity without a designer and you argue the odds are against it. If it’s really that unlikely, however, then the chances of an entity with a mind complex enough to fashion an entire universe and create everything in it including sentient life is, itself, even that much more unlikely. The odds are against the existence of God if you want to base it on complexity as an indicator.

By the same token you ignore the evidence when you write that we are all influenced by our upbringing, that’s how we know right and wrong. I bet you couldn’t get 5 people to agree to any other specific thing. Yet somehow every human culture knows that killing, raping, thieving and dishonesty are wrong. Talk about missing the trees for the forest.

And you know for certain that every single human culture considers all four of those things as wrong? As a matter of general principle it’s possible that every culture does consider them “wrong”, but every culture has many exceptions to those rules as well. For example: Killing is wrong except in a time of war/for self-defense/to avenge an injustice. Rape is still a popular tool of many cultures at war with another (e.g. Rowanda’s ethnic cleansing) and the culture of the people involved saw nothing wrong with it. The Palestinians consider the land taken from them by the Israelis to have been “stolen” yet many Israelis don’t view it as theft. Clearly even if every culture agrees that these things are “wrong” in a general sense, many do not agree over what actions fall under those classifications.

Accepting for the sake of this argument that the above claim is true, it still doesn’t necessitate the existence of a God to explain the universalism. The definition of “culture” states that it is “the totality of socially transmitted behavior patterns, arts, beliefs, institutions, and all other products of human work and thought.” In other words, it’s everything that the majority of people in a particular organization has been taught.

The scientific field known as Evolutionary Sociology has shown us that social behavior evolves over time. Social behaviors of the past that were once accepted by the majority of a culture, such as slavery of another race, may become unacceptable to the majority of a culture at a later date. The more beneficial to survival a particular cultural adaptation is, the more likely that group is to flourish and prosper.

In short, cultures that didn’t see “killing” as “wrong” most likely died out(probably because they kept killing each other)leaving behind only cultures that taught that “killing” is a “bad idea.” This would easily allow for certain concepts to become more or less universal in every culture over time as those which taught concepts that were beneficial to survival replaced those that did not.

I’d say your quip at the end of not seeing the forest for the trees may be more applicable to you than I.

And if the culture knows it’s wrong, how does the environment, that same culture, then produce this “bad behaviour”?

The sociologists have been working on that one for a long time and it’s a field of study, called Social Deviance, that would take entirely too much space to explain in brief. There are numerous courses taught at most colleges about this topic, however, and countless books published on it that I recommend you seek out if you really want an answer to this question. Suffice it to say that “the Devil made me do it” has little bearing on it.

I’m not saying man isn’t perfectly capable of evil all by himself. In fact, I personally believe that self-centeredness is what takes us there. But I think we are guided along the way.

You can believe people who engage in bad behavior are controlled by aliens with bad haircuts and attitudes to match from the planet Weebo if you want to, but it’s not much of an explanation that would be of any use.

I’ve owned over a couple dozen watches in my life. I’ve never met a single watchmaker. Nor have I even been in a watch-making factory. By your logic, since I’ve never seen or touched these people, they do not exist, and I should believe that watches are naturally occurring. You say you can take me to a watchmaker? I say I will not go with you on that journey, because I believe it would be a waste of my time, and it’s likely just a bunch of hocus-pocus anyway, because watches naturally occur.

A simplistic argument, but one that makes a lot of sense to believers. A vital difference, however, is even if you don’t want to go on the journey to see a watchmaker, Eric could still bring a watchmaker to you. Can you produce your God and show him in the act of creation? Additionally, you could be provided with a book that has detailed instructions on everything that’s involved in the the production of a watch so that, if so inclined, you could produce a watch yourself. In essence, becoming that which you seek proof of. Can your religious text help you to create something from nothing and thus prove the existence of God by allowing you to learn his secrets and master his techniques yourself?

If so, I’d love to see a demonstration and I’ll promise to keep an open mind as I can think of many good uses I could apply such knowledge to.

I think there are many things you have never seen, but believe to be real by the evidence of their existence. We often “discover” celestial bodies that we cannot see because we see the way other bodies behave and know that there must be a reason for it. All I am saying is: I believe there is an embodiment of evil, and incidents such as these are part of the evidence. The way these people behaved is indicative of an evil force in the universe. Likewise, the faith that some people have is indicative of the existence of God. Just like when I first saw a watch and someone told me that watches come from watchmakers I believed that there were indeed watchmakers.

Again a rather simplistic argument. If all evil acts can be explained by the influence of “an embodiment of evil” then how can we justify prosecuting anyone for any wrong they commit? Particularly if said individuals lay claim to being powerless to do otherwise due to being under this embodiment’s influence?

Additionally, how do you rectify the problem of people who do evil, but claim it isn’t evil because the act was commanded by God? Many religious texts are full of examples of God condoning and ordering his followers to engage in actions that God has declared as being wrong or ‘evil’ so if you accept those religious texts as factual you now have a problem.

You cite that you view “the faith that some people have is indicative of the existence of God.” Does this mean you also view the faith that some people have that they have been abducted by aliens and had their anal cavities probed as evidence of a race of extra-terrestrials with an ass fetish? What if they produce an artifact that they claim is one of the anal probes in question or an alien technology for reading their minds? Would you accept that as fact simply because these people have “faith” in the truth of their statements?

How about the people who have faith that the Earth is actually hollow with an internal sun and a race of 20 foot tall giants that live in a Utopian society of bliss and harmony? What if those people claimed to be able to telepathically communicate with those giants and allowed you to hold a conversation with one, would you believe them then? If not, why not?

If so, I have some amazing deals on a few bridges I’d love to discuss with you. Don’t worry about the legality of it, God told me he wanted you to have them for a very low, low price.

Repeatedly you write my arguments are simplistic. Indeed. One might infer that a) I was trying to keep it under 1700 words for those that might not want to take the time to read a short novel b) The most simple explanations have this way of often being the correct explanations c) I thought I would (politely) keep my comments as focused as possible on the topic and/or d) I was not arguing, I was merely giving you the shortest distance to the explanation of my view. I’m not so sure that this is the best forum for this discussion, but I will gladly respond to your points in greater depth since you have taken the time to do likewise.

Some general points:
I never claimed belief in a particular god, merely in a least one creator, I’ve yet to claim there couldn’t be more. I think my main point was that there is good and evil, that there are embodiments of those forces. God and Satan if you will, or Buddha and Vampires if you want. While your responses seem to be generated as a thrust against the Christian belief system, I did not specifically refer to it. I’ll settle for agnosticism, for the purpose of this discussion, but atheism just doesn’t cut the mustard in view of the very events that started it.

More specifically:
Analogies are just that. They illustrate a thought into terms that one can more easily relate to. By definition they are limited. 1) I didn’t mention anything about spontaneous v. manipulative creation. See general points about belief system. But I would say that there is at least as much evidence for spontaneous creation as big bang. In fact, every mathematical model I’ve seen points to a beginning where there was nothing. Not a dense lump of something. Since the physicists seem pretty stuck on this point, and nothing comes from nothing, I’m going to agree with them, something must have created the universe.  2) Again, who mentioned anything about one creator? 3) This is an analogy, we expect the application to have differences. In the case of the creation of the universe v. making a watch, I’m really hoping for some. I truly hope that whoever made this place has greater understanding and abilities than the person who made my watch, which right now is running a little slow. I know that conceptual analogies are a more eastern way of thinking and may be difficult for some to grasp, but as I stated, I was trying to keep it short and simple. As for bio and mechanical systems being different, I’d make point 3 all over again.

In fact, if we use complexity as an indicator, all we eliminate are beings of our intellectual abilities being the creators. We daily experience a variety of intelligences. This morning I passed some domestic turkeys on my way to work. My understanding is that if they are outdoors when it rains, they look up to see what is hitting them on the head, and drown as the water pours into their nose. Do you think that they comprehend that an intellect such as yours could exist? Or are they simply not intelligent enough to consider that?

I’m willing to make the broad sweeping generalization that all cultures accept murder, rape, thieving and dishonesty as wrong. In the same way I’m going to make the broad statement that every number divided by itself is 1. Neither of us has divided every number by itself, in fact no one has. But we both agree that it will always work out that way. Uh-oh, that would mean we would have to believe in something we have not seen! Well, you go talk with a mathematician, and when he tells you he cannot actually prove it other than to say it’s always worked that way so far, you try to tell him that all his theories based on that idea are washed up.

I was wrong to originally write killing, I should have written murder. Your illustration on rape I have no answer to, as I’ve not read any interviews with the men who committed the rapes. I find the statement hard to believe, and I bet you find it equally unpleasant to consider that civilized folk might behave thus and be otherwise “normal”. In fact, I think we’d find that to be the case, they are not unaffected by what they’ve done. As in killing in time of war, we find that while we accept the action (really only some of us do) it has a marked effect on those who actually have to do it. The point here is that even getting close to violating this natural law has a negative effect on an otherwise normal person. They somehow know they did something wrong, even with all of us trying to tell them it was right. (This, BTW, I thought was your strongest argument. And I’d like to explore it more).

Now, I’d much rather you’d gone Platonic on me at this point. At least then your argument would have merit. But instead you went social evolution and followed it up with social deviance. If we’re going to discuss facts, let’s stick to them and leave the soft sciences for the National Inquirer to report on. Oddly, it’s you that wants hard proof, and yet you’re willing to accept this stuff. We can debate sociology and psychology all day long and get nowhere. Which might be pleasant over a couple of beers. But I take the idea of God more seriously than that. We are talking life and death, eternal existence, creation of the universe, not trying to divine what causes social problems by examining your sexual desires for your mother or reading tealeaves. To quote you “You can believe people who engage in bad behavior are controlled by aliens with bad haircuts and attitudes to match from the planet Weebo if you want to, but it’s not much of an explanation that would be of any use.”

Now we get to the meat of it:
You combine my comments unfortunately at this point (for your argument). I say man is capable of evil all by himself. I am indicating he has free will to do bad things, and he is therefore responsible for them. That he gets some help along the way does not absolve him of it. Let’s say you were going to steal my cell phone out of my car. You’ve got in and pocketed the phone, but just then your friend comes along and offers to hotwire the car. You take him up on the offer and drive off with the whole car. You intention was to just steal my phone, but you took the car too. Am I indicating that your friend is responsible and you are innocent? Not a chance. Your crime went from petty to felony with a little help from a friend. One who came along just when you were most receptive to his ideas. You might never have considered committing a felony, but he caught you when you were half way there on your own. In the end, the decision to “go all the way” was still yours though. This is the crux of my original point. We can do bad things by ourselves. But I think that sometimes, just when it’ll have it’s greatest affect, we get a little help. And then we do things that at our more lucid moments we would never have done. But right then, it seems so right.
“Was he high at the time?, detectives asked Dominic Coia. “No. I was as sober as I am now. It is sick, isn’t it?” he responded.”
The kid is looking back, and even he thinks what he did was sick. 

Again, look at point 3 and following above about the analogy. You take it too literally. Yes, a watchmaker might be willing to come to me, and he might be willing to reveal his techniques to me. But when was the last time you visited a domestic turkey (while it was still breathing). Would you go to see one because it demanded proof of *your* existence? Would you try to explain Watch Making to it? How about Quantum Mechanics? If you have visited a domestic turkey lately, my money says your were there to either feed it or end it’s life. Interesting parallel, no? I think we’re rather dangerous enough with the knowledge we have (think nuclear here). I think someone clever enough to produce the universe would be clever enough to see that too. As one of my favorite author’s once wrote “Never give a gun to ducks.” (Please try to maintain a sense of humor here)

I think there is lots of evidence for the existence of God. Not just the faith of some. But surely, if I’m going to accept that there is a watchmaker without seeing him, I’m going to look for consistencies in the story. I’m saying that you’re looking at the smoking gun: kids raised by the same society as you and I doing things no-one in any society would accept as anything less than abhorrent. And your response is that there was no killing. I say that there’s the smoking gun, and there are witnesses that saw the shooting. And there is are victims, and there is physical evidence.

If you wanted sell me your bridges, your statements might interest me look into your offer. But I need more than that to buy. I’d want some evidence of the bridge’s existence and of your ownership. You know, I’d also have to trust you, or I just plain wouldn’t do business with you. Ever make a major purchase? I’m talking over $50K. Invariably, no matter how much research you do, in the end you take that leap of faith and sign the paper. You trust everyone will do what they said, because in the end, signatures and guarantees aren’t worth the paper they’re printed on. Belief in God or non-belief is the same way. I cannot prove His existence anymore than I can prove that any number divided by itself is 1. I just have no evidence to the contrary.  I do have contrary evidence to a hollow earth and aliens conducting anal probes (although the odd coincidence of how dogs greet each other and alien theories just struck an interesting chord with me). But I think non-belief takes the same leap. There is such a persistent reality, that it takes more than just standing still to deny it. You have to actively disbelieve. I’d say your lengthy response is evidence enough of that.

But would I have to actively disbelieve if I hadn’t been repeatedly dragged along to church, forced to participate in vague rituals, and was exposed to people of a like mind who were forced as children into that same idiological conformity? I only think about god when it comes up as a topic on a blog, or someone at work mentions something about some church event that they attended over the weekend. I really don’t feel that I am expending any energy avoiding the shining light of truth.

If the simplest answer is most often correct (ala Occam’s razor) then disbelief, or maybe more to the point non-belief requires no action on my part at all.

Attention! Retraction:
In my haste to respond on Monday, I gave a poor mathematical example. I had meant to go back and review it before I posted, but I got distracted and failed (I can only do about 7 things at once). I apologize. I used any number divided by itself is equal to one, which I’m pretty sure is a postulate, not and axiom.

The point holds though, there are axioms we cannot prove, but that we know intuitively will always be true. But we cannot explore every example of them, because they are infinite in number. However, this doesn’t stop us from building complex and often very useful theories on them.

I was bad, I was wrong, please, no, master, NOT THE WET NOODLE!!!

Eric:
I cannot be inside your head. Every man eats his own breakfast. So cannot really comment on your personal experience.

Let us say though that you are correct and there is no God. Why then have so many people (literally billions) believed in a God? People, somewhere, were not dragged to church, and yet created this belief in God to explain thier surroundings. If they had not, then they would’ve had to choose to not believe.

I think we all seek an explanation.  You experience a particularly spectacular thing: a sunset, the birth of a child, sex, music, whatever, and it transcends human understanding. Nature itself, by it’s existence, begs the question. My existence (self awareness) begs the question. Why are we here? You can accept the explanation “We just are.” And sure, that is the simplest explanation. But is there anything else you accept that explanation for? If you had your car/computer/TV/air conditioner/etc. repaired and the repairman said “It’s broken.” Would that be OK for you? It is the simplest explanation of the problem.

In fact, that is my personal experience. I began with “Why am I?” and “I just am.” did not satisfy me.  Even at 14 I could see that science, while good at showing how, was not too hot on why. So we look at the evidence, and we make our best guess. But either way, it requires an effort, a choice, some trust (or faith) to stick by our conclusion.

True, billions of people believe in some form of theism, now...but in the beginning did billions of people all just spontaneously begin to believe at the same time which would indicate some ingrained awakening or knowledge? It is far more likely that one person or a small group converted others to their own unique belief, and then once many were converted and taught to indoctrinate their young in the belief the church used religion in order to control the masses. Much better than brute force to cow a people is the fear that you might spend an eternity in some horrific version of pain and torment (provided that you are superstitious enough to believe it). Hell, the people keep themselves in bondage, instant slave class.

Now how could so many people be kept in the dark for so long? In England in the “Dark Ages” with the exception of nobility only the clergy were allowed to learn how to read and write so they could be used as willing tools to keep the king’s subjects in line. In Ancient Egypt the Pharaoh was also a god on earth which probably kept most unbelievers from saying anything publicly that might invite torture and death. The Incas dark and violent gods required human sacrifice and those who weren’t too keen on worshiping may have suspected that their family member might be needed to insure the next harvest.

If god is some universal truth why don’t we all believe in the same one?

If people believe in a god, a goddess, or gods and it gives them comfort or a sense of purpose then more power to them. All I am saying is I do not need religion to find comfort or give my life purpose and I also need a degree of proof before I am going to believe in an invisible being of omnipotent power.

You cover a multitude of relatively complex topics here. I’ll do my best to keep it brief.
I’d agree, in fact I’d say almost all religions claim that one small group, sometimes an individual, started them. But I think you have the picture of what happened next upside down, or at least sideways – sort of. As I pointed out in my last post, I think almost everyone with the slightest blush of self-awareness seeks a meaning for their existence. So when that small group came along and said, “Here, I have the answer!” the multitudes responded. Unfortunately, most people want to be told what to think and what to believe. I realize that that’s pretty cynical, but I have to rely on my experience here. Most people are happy to follow, in fact would rather follow, someone else. Undoubtedly, some people have used this concept to take advantage, Christianity is rife with examples: The crusades, the Mormons, the indulgences of the Roman Catholic church, Robert Tilton and other “evangelists”. But the Christians are hardly alone on this one. I don’t know of any off hand, but I’d guess whole new religions were formed this on this principle. But I think we are talking about the exceptions here rather than the rule.
Not everyone who believes in God believes in a hell. And even though I’ve already posted that I believe in evil, I haven’t committed to hell, or even an afterlife. But I will say now, that long (12 years?) after I believed in God, I still did not believe in hell – or even Satan. I still do not see hell as a place of eternal punishment with devils sticking you with pitchforks (just where does that silliness come from, anyway?). Rather as permanent complete separation from God. Since you don’t believe in him, you shouldn’t mind being separated from him, eh? But I don’t think one can make any of those arguments before one has established that there is a God. Unless you are willing to at least concede that point for sake of argument, it’s pointless to discuss it.
“In England in the “Dark Ages” with the exception of nobility only the clergy were allowed to learn how to read and write so they could be used as willing tools to keep the king’s subjects in line.” Allowed? My dear boy, are you so spoiled? In modern day US, the internet is readily available to all. Yet still in many parts of the world, paper, pens, and books are unimaginable luxuries. I think the Roman Catholic Church is one of the most archaic dinosaurs I can imagine. I can’t begin to understand why anyone would become a member. I mean, even if you can’t open a book and read for yourself that their own religion does not follow their own stated axioms, you can just listen to Martin Luther, who already did all the thinking for you.  This is not exactly news, good old Martin did his work over 400 years ago. Having written that, I still think we owe them a great debt for preserving literature, art, and science through the dark ages. The only publishing that got done was by monks making copies. And when the printing press was invented, still only the wealthy could afford books, or to learn to read and write for that matter. This was not the fault of the church, this was simply the evolution of technology. Did the church take advantage of the situation? Certs. Does this mean all belief in God is wrong? No, in fact, in fact many would say this is proof that God can use what man intends for evil for His good. I’d agree, after all, just who is in control here?
Again, I’ve yet to demand a belief in a particular religion. If you don’t believe in god, what would be the point in being specific? There are many who believe that each religion has a small piece of the truth. There are many that think they are all true, that God just goes by different names in different religions. There is a huge number of people of many different faiths that believe that although their God is the ONE TRUE GOD, that all other religions are seeking after the same god. The others just don’t have it quite right. Indeed, most religions share most teachings. Which is actually a strong point for my argument:  we are all seeking God, and certain truths about that God are revealed by the nature of the universe and don’t require a religious text in order to know them.
I very much agree that believing in something can provide comfort. Most religions preach this point unabashedly. Even “evil religions” promise gain if you would only worship Satan. I think a lot of animal rights, vegans, green peacers, TQM followers (and it’s relatives) and many many more have turned their causes into religion striving after that same peace. But I say that the peace in believing starts with (get ready, I’m going full hog cliché here) filling that god shaped hole in you. Just like you desire human companionship, you desire companionship with the divine. When you are at home with your loved ones there is a certain peace, likewise a similar peace is there when there is a divine presence in your life. We were designed that way, by God, on purpose. It is why the answer “We just are” doesn’t satisfy.
Twice now you’ve written that you don’t need god to give you comfort. Again I say I can’t be inside your head. But I tell you, and I think we’ll both have a next to impossible time proving our points, that it is part of the human condition to seek the answer to our own existence. If you do not have that desire in you, I suspect that you’d lack the awareness to understand that everyone else does. I strongly doubt that this is the case, or this whole discussion would bore you to tears.

“An unexamined life is not worth living” Socrates

i knew those all of those people in the news article ... i empathize with all of them. they’re not evil, but is where sin will lead someone ... to destruction. i weep for them. without God, we are all so lost.

without God, we are all so lost.

From where I’m standing even when people have God in their lives it’s not much help. One need only read the newspaper to see that.

I find it amusing that you don’t respond to me anymore Les. Or is silence acquiescence? I wonder, have you ever knowingly experienced God in your life so that you’d know the difference? Seems to me that not only does it make a difference in the peace that I have now vs. the lack of it before, but I can see the lack of that peace in others (you and Eric, just to name 2). In fact, is it not one of your arguments that religion is the opiate of the masses? Isn’t the basis of that argument that it provides peace (albeit a false peace for from that point of view)? Bah, you seek to put down what you do not understand. Or as someone far wiser than I said:

“The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it.”

It’s been a matter of time more than anything else. I spent an hour or so working on a lengthy response a few days back which I lost due to a hiccup in my connection and I’ve lacked the motivation to re-do the work. I don’t have much time at the moment, but I’ll attempt quick response to your questions in your current reply.

Have I ever knowingly experienced God in my life? As far as I can tell the answer would be no. In fact, part of the reason I’m now an atheist is due to a realization that even at the height of my belief, and I was once a very devout Baptist, I had never had what I could call a truly religious experience based on the descriptions others have given me over the years. This poses a couple of possibilities such as A) I wasn’t doing whatever it was I supposed to be doing correctly to make myself worthy of God’s attention or B) he doesn’t exist to provide said attention. Considering the amount of honest effort I put into being what I was taught a good Christian was supposed to be I ended up going with conclusion B.

Does this mean I’m not at peace? You seem to think you detect a lack of peace in me, but I would tell you that I feel more at peace with myself than I ever did when I was very religious. I’ve been told by those who know me personally that I seem quite contented and at peace with the world and myself. Maybe they’re blowing smoke up my ass, but I don’t see what they’d stand to gain from that so I’ll accept their comments as their honest opinions.

Is religion the opiate of the masses? To a degree I think it does serve that function, but I’m not necessarily opposed to it for that reason. I think it encourages people to act more like mindless sheep than humans with the ability to think and reason, but there are plenty of religious people who manage to still use the grey matter in their heads despite the message of blind obedience their religion tries to dictate. I don’t really care what religion you believe in as long as you continue to use the brain your God(s) gave you. I’d prefer it if more people dropped the whole religion thing altogether, but I also recognize that many people need something greater than themselves to believe in and I’m not one to deny someone their security blanket if it helps them sleep at night. So long as they’re not trying to force it upon me.

It’s true that I’d rather live with a harsh reality than a comfortable fantasy. From where I’m standing religion ends up causing as many problems as it solves, perhaps more so. For a lot of people it seems to condition them towards greater credulity and opens them up to being exploited and abused. If you’re willing to believe in a nice old man sitting on a cloud handing out wishes based on some master plan then why aren’t you willing to believe that someone has invented a free energy device or that he can talk to dead people or predict your future? At its best religion can motivate people to do some pretty wonderful things, but at its worst it can motivate people to commit the most heinous of acts. Because it’s all based on faith and unverifiable claims it can be masterfully manipulated by skillful hands into justifying just about anything you want it to.

You accuse me of putting down something I don’t understand, but I feel I understand it all too well and that is why I put it down. You seem to think I’m trapped in some form of darkness whereas I feel I’m basking in the light of a truth you can’t see due to the willful blinders you’ve put over your eyes. Which of us is right? Only time will tell.

I think you’ve experienced the confusion that many people (indeed entire church’s full) have between faith and religion. And I think that it’s absolutely possible to come to an intellectual understanding of God, and yet have no faith at all. I can walk you through a proof of Christian faith (i.e. Jesus is God and the Bible is the Word of God) that is completely rational, and the claims are quite verifiable. But it really doesn’t do much good, except for making Christians more comfortable because their faith can be described rationally. But an intellectual understanding of who God is, or even that he exists, is not faith – and gives nothing. Religion is the practice of rituals. If those rituals have meaning to people because they represent something they have faith in, then I think that’s a good thing. If they are just motions, then there are completely without meaning, and lead people to believe they are getting something they are not. Because of that I think religion can be evil. The rituals take the place of faith, and promise something they cannot deliver. The end result is someone like you. Eventually they realize the rituals aren’t doing anything but frustrating them.

I think everyone believes in something bigger than them. I would note that most intelligent people believe in God, and everyone else believes in someone smarter than they are. Most people that I know that have “no faith in anything” believe that scientists can explain it all. Not that they understand the science mind you. They just believe there are people smarter than they are that can answer their questions about existence. And those people that do understand the science, and others at the top of their fields, look to God. I don’t mean this as a cheap shot. Many of your arguments are well reasoned. I am making a broad sweeping generalization. As opposed to your generalizations (mostly in other threads) deriding the intellect of believers.

Sure, a clever person can twist scripture to mean whatever they want it to. Oh, they have to take it out of context, and completely isolate it to do that. But as we have both posted, people like to have other people do their thinking for them. And when those things are combined, it’s bad for everyone. So I can easily come up with a multitude of examples of bad religions or things done in the name of God that are terrible. But that does not mean that God does not exist. It just means that there are smart evil bastards out there.

I trust people who believe in something a lot more than people who believe in nothing. What motivation does a person who believes in nothing have to do something that does not benefit them? People that believe in a code of behavior have a sense of doing the right thing whether it directly benefits them or not. People that believe in God(s), also believe in some ultimate reward or punishment based on their behavior. People that believe in nothing just do what feels best to them at the time. Very unpredictable, very bad for a society, who can trust such a person?

On a personal note, just out of curiosity, the Baptist church your attended; was it part of the American Baptist Association (as opposed to being Southern Baptist, independent, etc.)? I’m guessing it was, you could call it a hunch.

I think you’ve experienced the confusion that many people (indeed entire church’s full) have between faith and religion. And I think that it’s absolutely possible to come to an intellectual understanding of God, and yet have no faith at all.

I disagree with your first statement and I agree with your second statement.

I can walk you through a proof of Christian faith (i.e. Jesus is God and the Bible is the Word of God) that is completely rational, and the claims are quite verifiable. But it really doesn’t do much good, except for making Christians more comfortable because their faith can be described rationally.

Many have made that claim yet none have actually produced such a proof. Instead they took the same course you have and provided an excuse as to why they won’t bother producing said proof. If you’re not going to bother then why bring it up as being possible?

I could just as easily say: I could prove to you that I can produce monkeys from my ass, but it wouldn’t do much good except for making those who believe I can produce monkeys from ass more comfortable because I’ve shown I can actually do it. Somehow I’m willing to bet you’d still have doubts about my ability to produce monkeys from my ass based on that statement alone. Got a proof? Great! Let’s hear it. Otherwise bringing it up is pointless.

But an intellectual understanding of who God is, or even that he exists, is not faith – and gives nothing.

With proof of God’s existence the need for faith in his reality is negated and it does give something. It gives assurance. Now the matter of faith becomes one of believing if God is true to his word. After all I know you exist, but it would be a matter of faith to lend you my car on the expectation that you would return it as promised.

Religion is the practice of rituals.

An overly simplistic definition in my mind, but rituals certainly count as one aspect of it.

If those rituals have meaning to people because they represent something they have faith in, then I think that’s a good thing. If they are just motions, then there are completely without meaning, and lead people to believe they are getting something they are not. Because of that I think religion can be evil. The rituals take the place of faith, and promise something they cannot deliver. The end result is someone like you. Eventually they realize the rituals aren’t doing anything but frustrating them.

So what you’re basically saying is that the reason I never had a religious experience is because I never had any real faith? That I was merely “going through the motions” and relying on that as a substitute for faith?

How do you know how much faith I may or may not have had in the past? It appears to me that you are making conclusions about things you couldn’t possibly know based on what you believe to be the only possible explanation for my current lack of faith. Have you considered the idea that at one point in time my faith may have been as close to boundless as it could possibly be? Of course not, it seems that in your mind if that were true then I’d still have said faith.

For the record, there was a time in my past when the existence of God was a foregone conclusion beyond question in my mind. Had you asked I would’ve unequivocally stated my firm belief in his reality…

...but then, I used to feel the same way about Santa Claus too.

I think everyone believes in something bigger than them.

Your basis for that belief is… what, exactly? Gut instinct? Statistical survey? Stories from Grampa? Because it sounds right? What?

I would note that most intelligent people believe in God, and everyone else believes in someone smarter than they are.

I suppose that depends on how you’re defining “intelligent” and what surveys you’re consulting to draw that conclusion from. I also fail to see the correlation between your claim that most “intelligent” people believe in God and the idea that “everyone else” believes in someone smarter than they are. Are you suggesting that intelligent people who believe in God don’t think there are other people smarter than they are? Or is it just that the dumb people don’t believe in God, but have enough sense to recognize that someone else may be smarter than they are? Are there any dumb people who are so dumb that they think they’re the smartest person in the world?

But let’s go back to my point about how you define the word “intelligent” in your claim that “most intelligent people” believe in God. Compared to sea urchins or cows all people are intelligent and the word becomes pointless as you could just say that a majority of the population believes in some form of God or Gods and that would be true and verifiable based on any number of surveys from around the world.

The fact that a lot of people believe something, however, doesn’t make it true. An easy example is the once common belief that the world was flat and that if you sailed too far out from the coastline you risked falling off the edge. Literally countless millions grew up and died with that belief firmly in their hearts. A belief based as much on faith as any belief in a God. Today the vast majority of the world’s population knows the world is round and there is no edge to fall off, but that doesn’t stop some die-hards from still believing it’s flat even in spite of the evidence to the contrary. Lots of people believing in God isn’t proof of anything other than there are a lot of people who believe in God.

Now then, if what you meant by “most intelligent people” is some level of intelligence higher than the average intelligence of the population then it helps to know what basis you’re using for determining who these intelligent people are. IQ? Profession? Educational level?

Even knowing what the basis for your claim happens to be doesn’t really help your argument. All it would tell us is that “most intelligent people,” as defined by whatever qualifications you happen to be using to award them that label, happen to believe in the existence of God.

Most people that I know that have “no faith in anything” believe that scientists can explain it all. Not that they understand the science mind you. They just believe there are people smarter than they are that can answer their questions about existence.

I’d say you’ve had a very limited exposure to very many atheists then. I don’t know any atheists who A) claim they have “no faith in anything” (just no faith in the idea of God) and B) think that scientists can explain it all. Most people I know that have a basic understanding of science are well aware it doesn’t have an explanation for everything. If it did there’d be no reason to continue with scientific research because we’d already know everything there is to know. It sounds less like you’ve been chatting with atheists and more like you’ve been talking with terminally lazy people who are happy to rely on others to do their thinking for them.

And those people that do understand the science, and others at the top of their fields, look to God.

Now we get some inkling on what you’re using as a definition for “most intelligent people.” Now, do you have some source you can cite that would verify your claim that people who “understand the science” and are “at the top of their fields” look to God?

Let’s take a moment to consider an article published by the journal Nature in 1998 written by Edward J. Larson of the University of Georgia’s Department of History titled Leading scientists still reject God. According to this article a 1914 survey by US psychologist James H. Leuba of 1,000 randomly selected US scientists found that 58% expressed disbelief or doubt in the existence of God and when focused on what he considered to be the 400 “greater” scientists (read: top of their field) from within his sample the percentage rose to 70%. Twenty years later Leuba repeated his survey and found the percentages had increased to 67% and 85%, respectively. In 1996 Larson repeated Leuba’s 1914 survey and published his findings in Nature reporting that little had changed with around 60.7% expressing disbelief or doubt. In 1988 Larson repeated the second phase of the 1914 survey to gage belief among “greater” scientists and found the rate of belief to be “lower than ever—a mere 7% of respondents.” That would be around 76.7% claiming disbelief or doubt. For details on how the scientists were selected and the rate of response I refer you to the linked article above.

So what does all of that prove? Nothing more than the simple fact that a majority of scientists polled in 1988 expressed doubt or disbelief in the existence of God and that the percentages got larger when you looked at the cream of the crop. Well, it also suggests that either A) you don’t have a sound basis for your claim that most people who understand science and are at the tops of their fields believe in God (read: you’re just pulling statements out of your ass) or B) the people you are talking to that seem to understand science and are at the top of their field happen to be “Creation Scientists” or some similar “profession” that would cast doubt on the validity of your statement.

I don’t mean this as a cheap shot. Many of your arguments are well reasoned. I am making a broad sweeping generalization.

Indeed. Very broad sweeping generalizations that don’t appear to have much basis in fact.

As opposed to your generalizations (mostly in other threads) deriding the intellect of believers.

I’m usually fairly specific when I deride the intellect of believers. A favorite target of mine are the Fundamentalists. A group I do use a fairly large brush on, but I’ve yet to meet a Fundamentalist who didn’t fit the generalization pretty well. Otherwise I tend to target those believers who are displaying their stupidity in some spectacular fashion. Those believers who are intelligent enough to not do incredibly stupid things don’t tend to attract my attention because there isn’t much to poke fun at. Most of the believers I know personally seem just fine in the intelligence department and I can think of more than a few believers whom I regard as being more intelligent than I am. It probably helps that I don’t necessarily consider a lack of belief to be a relative indication of greater intelligence. I’ve known plenty of amazingly stupid people who didn’t believe in a God or Gods.

Sure, a clever person can twist scripture to mean whatever they want it to. Oh, they have to take it out of context, and completely isolate it to do that.

I disagree. I’ve seen several men of the cloth use passages consistent with the context in which they were written to justify all manner of things. Certainly taking passages out of context is a very popular way of manipulating the Bible, but it’s not a given that it’s the only way.

But as we have both posted, people like to have other people do their thinking for them. And when those things are combined, it’s bad for everyone. So I can easily come up with a multitude of examples of bad religions or things done in the name of God that are terrible. But that does not mean that God does not exist. It just means that there are smart evil bastards out there.

Indeed, I agree with the point that bad things done by religions or in God’s name is not a disproof of the existence of God, but then I’ve never claimed that it was. I just said that religion causes as much harm, if not more, than it cures and as such is debatable in it’s overall worth to society as a whole. I know plenty of people who believe in God, but are not religious. My wife is one of them. I don’t necessarily agree with your last statement above in which you seem to be implying that people or religions that do bad things are “smart evil bastards.” On the contrary, it has been my experience that these people often believe they are doing the right and just thing based on what they believe God wants them to do. The folks behind the various Inquisitions, for example, committed all manner of atrocities in the name of God in the belief that they were in the right to do so. Some of the things they did were undoubtedly evil and yet they believed themselves to be doing God’s will.

I trust people who believe in something a lot more than people who believe in nothing. What motivation does a person who believes in nothing have to do something that does not benefit them? People that believe in a code of behavior have a sense of doing the right thing whether it directly benefits them or not. People that believe in God(s), also believe in some ultimate reward or punishment based on their behavior. People that believe in nothing just do what feels best to them at the time. Very unpredictable, very bad for a society, who can trust such a person?

I can. Much more than I would trust someone who’s motivation is fear of being punished by an eternity in Hell or hopes that some God would reward them later. I fail to see how the knowledge that someone hopes to gain divine favor through his actions is in any way supposed to make them more trustworthy. On top of that I find it very ironic that you make a statement such as “people that believe in a code of behavior have a sense of doing the right thing whether it directly benefits them or not” and then turn around and undermine that argument by stating that people who believe in God(s) “also believe in some ultimate reward or punishment based on their behavior.” In short you’ve said that believers do the right thing despite an apparrent lack of benefit, but all believers know they will ultimately benefit for doing the right thing because God will reward them. It’s the selfish selflessness argument!

The implication you’re making here is that people are inherently self-centered and selfish and that without some external motivating force, the aforementioned Heavenly reward or Hellish punishment, to put the fear of God (so to speak) in them they have no good reason to help others. I have neither the hope for eternal reward nor the fear of eternal damnation that a believer does and yet I still do help others even when it has no obvious benefit for myself. If your statement that “people that believe in nothing just do what feels best to them at the time” is actually true then how do you explain the contradiction of your theory that I am a living example of? Also note that a lack of belief in a God or Gods does not automatically indicate a lack of belief in a Code of Behavior as you imply it does.

Human beings are social animals with the ability to reason and recognize that the best way to maximize our survivability is through cooperation. There is a growing amount of evidence from the fields of sociology, psychology, and sociobiology that seems to indicate that the motivation most humans have for not just “doing what feels best at the time” is something we are born with. The result of thousands of years of biological and social evolution and not the imposition of some supreme being from on high. Not that this is a new concept. Thousands of years ago Plato and Aristotle taught that morals came from within rather than from the Gods. Smart men, shame more people didn’t listen to them.

Being anti-social and self-centered is therefor detrimental to one’s long-term survival and that alone is a much better motivation than the fear of some old dude sitting on a cloud threatening us with the ultimate metaphysical BBQ if we don’t behave ourselves could ever be. Not that the threat of damnation seems to do much to deter very many believers from doing things that they supposedly know to be wrong. I suppose that whole Jesus-will-forgive-any-sin-if-you-sincerely-ask-him-to escape clause probably contributes a lot to that problem though. So much for belief in a higher power making someone more predictable, trustworthy or good for society.

My trust is earned, not handed over because you’re part of the same “club” as I am. I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt until they give me reason to think otherwise and that has served me much better than making judgments based on whether or not they believe in some form of deity ever has.

On a personal note, just out of curiosity, the Baptist church your attended; was it part of the American Baptist Association (as opposed to being Southern Baptist, independent, etc.)? I’m guessing it was, you could call it a hunch.

Your guess is incorrect. Shalom Baptist is an independent Baptist church. My former Pastor is teaching at Midwestern Baptist College these days in addition to still heading the church I used to attend. Based on the description from the front page of the college website it appears this particular branch of Baptists is very fundamentalist in its approach, which probably goes a long way toward explaining my particular distaste for Fundamentalists.

I disagree with your first statement and I agree with your second statement.

When I write “I think” how can you write that you disagree? You’re telling me what I think? I think not.

Many have made that claim yet none have actually produced such a proof. Instead they took the same course you have and provided an excuse as to why they won’t bother producing said proof. If you’re not going to bother then why bring it up as being possible?

I’ll bother, if it’s your desire. I’ve taught courses in apologetics, and in a classroom setting it is at least 16 hours of material. And that’s in a group that does not challenge every single assertion as I am sure you will. Perhaps people in the past have been daunted by the time and effort it would take. I am impressed with the grace you’ve shown so far in allowing the length of my responses. This might be a good way for us to begin a serious conversation on this matter.

With proof of God’s existence the need for faith in his reality is negated and it does give something.

Nope. And you said you once a devout Baptist. Surely you know that Satan believes in God. Do you think Satan has faith? I would say only in himself. But we are, from your point of view, discussing my invisible friend and his imaginary enemy. Rather pointless.

An overly simplistic definition in my mind, but rituals certainly count as one aspect of it.

And here we get to something that bothered me throughout your response. You separate my sentences so that complete thoughts are not represented - you take them out of their immediate context. Certainly makes defeating the argument easier when you ignore the argument and attack ideas without their supporting statements. When I change to a new thought, you’ll see a new paragraph, ain’t English grand? I may have made a short definition of religion, but that was because I was trying to show you the contrast between “having religion” and “having faith”. And yes, I am saying you didn’t have faith. You yourself stated you’d never knowingly experienced God. And yes, I’m coming to conclusions based on my framework. Is there another way? If your faith was truly boundless, then how could you later lose it? Did you reach it’s bounds? That would mean it wasn’t exactly boundless then, wouldn’t it? You did say as close to boundless as it could possibly be. You mean that the people that have died for their faith, or lived a life of faith over the course of 80 years, yours was as boundless as theirs? I think you need to look that word up in Webster’s.

For the record, there was a time in my past when the existence of God was a foregone conclusion beyond question in my mind. Had you asked I would’ve unequivocally stated my firm belief in his reality…

…but then, I used to feel the same way about Santa Claus too.

I really like this argument form. The “I used to believe like you do, but now I believe this. Therefore I believe correctly, and you are still deluded.” So now I can say to you (and this is truth): I used to believe in Christ as my savior, but then I spent time as an atheist, then I was a Deist, now I believe in Christ again.

So therefore, if you were only as experienced and wise as I, you would become a Deist, which will lead you back to Christianity. No way. Every man eats his own breakfast. And just because you had one wrong belief, cannot possible be construed to mean all your beliefs are wrong. Lastly, if your faith in Christ for salvation was as boundless as your acceptance of Santa Claus, I’m no longer sure how seriously I can take your claim to Christian faith of any kind. Most kids I know (as I did and all my friends when I was small) know it’s a game, you really believed in Santa?

Your basis for that belief is… what, exactly? Gut instinct? Statistical survey? Stories from Grampa? Because it sounds right? What?

I’ll go with D. I’ve lived in 31 different places in 6 different states, and attended 15 different schools. I’ve been basically homeless and I’ve owned a $200,000 house and been a member of the second oldest yacht club in the US. You might say I’ve met one or two people from different walks of life. I’ve never met anyone, once you dig into it, that doesn’t believe in something bigger than themselves, until the last 2 years or so. And I’m starting to see quite a bit of it and frankly, it scares me.

What you need to understand is that the opposite of faith in Christ is not faith in Satan, it’s faith in self. And this is what I mean by no faith in anything: faith only in yourself. Sure, I’ve met atheists that follow the teachings of Plato, Kant, or Machiavelli, it doesn’t matter. At least I can trust them because they follow a code. They’ve figured a way to determine right from wrong. Even if I disagree, as long as I know the ground rules, I can get a sense of what they might do. And I can hold them accountable according to their own philosophy. We have a common framework in which to have a relationship. Likewise, religion creates a similar situation. Yes, people do behave according to how they will believe they will be punished and rewarded. Perhaps you’ve heard of this guy Pavlov? But, people that believe only in themselves have no reason to do anything that they cannot see benefiting themselves. Why would they? Yes, people are basically self centered. Again I’m relying on experience. It’s not selflessness for some, because they’re doing it for the reward. For others (those with faith, not religion) it is selflessness: an out pouring of love, because they have been filled with love. Actually a lot closer to the belief in a particular philosophy. But again, something you’ll never completely understand unless you actually have faith.

Certainly meeting 500 people and noting their beliefs counts for as much as anything published in Nature. A rag, btw, that few scientists take very seriously anymore, because they (Nature) have an obvious agenda, and basically ignore actual science when it suits them. Oh, and the scientists I know? Turns out my wife is the head of biochemistry of the vaccine division of a major pharmaceutical (if you’ve been vaccinated, you’ve used their products). We married while she was in grad school. I also went to school for biochemistry. So, I’ve met quite a few scientists, somewhere deep into the 100’s to be conservative. Admittedly I mostly only know Biologists, Chemists, and MD’s. Of course I’ve read about 20 or so others. Interestingly, only a few are atheists. Only about 25% are what I’d call Christian, but then only about 5% of general populace is what I’d call Christian. I wonder why your survey doesn’t match up with that. Maybe my definitions don’t match his. Perhaps some guy looking for a particular result found what he was looking for. Amazingly, he got better at finding it each time. Any chance anyone else has duplicated that work and published it in a respectable publication? Any chance I can see the actual data? Let me guess, Larson’s Swedish (yes, that was a joke. If you don’t get it, you must not read many scientific papers).

The fact that a lot of people believe something, however, doesn’t make it true.

Absolutely. Which is why those who still say the earth is flat are sticking to their guns. Faith is evidence, not proof, of God.

Now then, if what you meant by “most intelligent people” is some level of intelligence higher than the average intelligence of the population then it helps to know what basis you’re using for determining who these intelligent people are. IQ? Profession? Educational level?

Now, I confess to playing fast and loose here. And I nearly deleted that paragraph before posting, and I wish I had. I have seen surveys that show CEO’s, professional team coaches, and other groups that are leaders in their fields (the wealthiest top ten, Olympians, etc) have a higher percentage of Christians than the general populace. I cannot back it up, because I can’t find the surveys. I’ll totally concede this point.

But you miss the thrust. People that think for themselves, generally have questioned the nature of the universe, and have come to some sort of conclusion. Those that don’t, look to someone smarter than they are to give them the answer or have simply followed in their parents beliefs (which is pretty much the same thing). Both groups are looking for something bigger than themselves. I’ve not met or not heard of any people that have over a 2-year-old’s level of intelligence that haven’t questioned their own existence. In fact, since it so widely written about and debated, I can hardly believe you try to attack this point. I would say that questioning your existence flows naturally from being self-aware. If you’re not self-aware can you truly be said to possess intelligence?

I disagree. I’ve seen several men of the cloth use passages consistent with the context in which they were written to justify all manner of things. Certainly taking passages out of context is a very popular way of manipulating the Bible, but it’s not a given that it’s the only way.

Please share. I want to know how you could manipulate the Bible without taking something out of context. Because that would mean there is a inconstancy in the Bible that could be proved. Something I’m fairly positive doesn’t exist. By context, I mean not just of the passage, but of the Bible itself.

The folks behind the various Inquisitions, for example, committed all manner of atrocities in the name of God in the belief that they were in the right to do so. Some of the things they did were undoubtedly evil and yet they believed themselves to be doing God’s will.

You really believe that the perpetuators in any Inquisitions thought that they were following Biblical principle? How incredibly naive you are in some places and cynical in others. Of course they all say they are “doing the right thing”. But I think you need to look at what those people personally stood to gain from their actions and then ask yourself what their motivations most likely were again. Sure, many of the participants, who could not actually read the Bible for themselves might have thought they were doing God’s work. Which is why, with the advent of common language translations and the printing press, we don’t have too many incidents like the crusades and the Inquisitions any more. You do get the occasional loon who thinks God is speaking to him and goes and shoots his neighbor. But the root of that is lunacy not religion.

I suppose that whole Jesus-will-forgive-any-sin-if-you-sincerely-ask-him-to escape clause probably contributes a lot to that problem though. So much for belief in a higher power making someone more predictable, trustworthy or good for society.

If you’re thinking of it as an escape clause, doesn’t that pretty much preclude it then being sincere? Don’t look now, but your argument just defeated itself.

I am very interested in what you think the motivations are for atheists to do “good” works. But, we can continue to bounce around the board on many of these issues, and as a result branch off into 100’s simultaneous conversations. I suggest that if you want to pursue some particular line, it would be far more profitable. I think the base argument here is that I state that there is embodiments of good and evil that we are affected by, and you do not. I can use that base to begin the rational proof I promised above.

So I ask: Can the truth about reality be known? I believe it can.

Maybe the reason no one has ever provided you with that proof is that when they start to do so, you run away.