If someone gets beat up for no apparent reason on the street.....do you need GOD to tell you if it is good or bad, how do you feel when you see such a thing?
Good or bad was not created by the bible...it uses it....for a good( education of the mass ) purpose I’m sure.
But It cannot be the truth...who are you to pretend knowing such things...God....Creation.
If Christ was here he would tell you to shut up and listen once in a while.

You ridicule yourselves everytime you expose your certitude of the truth to the world ( kinda shooting yourself in the foot if you ask me ).

A good speaker can convince mass populations....we’ve seen it before.Does that make him truthful?
A good book can make you feel like you belong in the story it is telling, regardless of the story.
oh! and you know that Jesus Christ was Jewish....right !
some people don’t like that...too bad.
He was hoping for a better world...you Christians are just following a book that he did not write, a book that was manipulated how many times?
And if it wasn’t...can you prove it?

And don’t forget all the other main religions trying to establish the same certainty about humans and animals...and the truth....Are they wrong?

Science is probably wrong every second time it says something...Thats because It’s a work in progress that never stops trying to put the pieces of the puzzle in the right places.
There is nothing wrong with being wrong, assuming that when you find out you are wrong by finding new evidence you are ready to make things right by updating the books.
Something that religions have a hard time doing and I can understand why.

Self criticism is a form of intelligence.
Obeying is not...that is almost slavery.

Christianity dictates the absolute and unquestionable truth....according to your book God gave us freewill to follow what makes us happy in our life. Why should we be punished if our guide in life isn’t the same as yours.
It looks like you christians are too close to the bible...too involved...like blinded by the thought of being right....absolutely right. 

Should the Inuits or aboriginals read the bible....why?

I did not read as much as most of you and I do not feel have to. Some of the above mentioned big names must be wrong, at least in part. And they read and wrote and thought a lot. so…

Maybe evolution and creation is the same thing.
Only explained differently for different eras.
A little like the way the Earth and the human body have the same way of functioning.
Or the way man built the car pretty much the same way humans or most mammals are built.

And what do you make of animals and plants.
They are alive...should they read the bible?
They are as important as humans....unfortunately some religions are only for humans...it’s a shame.

Last I counted it was 19 versions (thats just the english translations) of the bible. Including Thomas Jefferson’s version.

antman- the reasong you dont find huge amounts of human skeletons in one area ( all drowed at onece) is because humans arnt stupid.

Your attempts at English would give reason to debate that point.

they grab floating trees or whatever they can find that floats. so when they drownded they wernt burried they rotted in the water or were eaten buy the water dinosaurs. they grab floating trees or whatever they can find that floats. so when they drownded they wernt burried they rotted in the water or were eaten buy the water dinosaurs. but you do find some in the ground that is a fact. the reason that some dinosaur bones are found to be older than others is because carbon dating dosent work.

You’ve certainly done your homework in terms of memorizing the Creationist viewpoint, but a lot of the arguments you’re using here have long since been debunked.

you cant find anything from a bone except that the animal it belong to died. Carbon dating works of the assumtion that the amount of carbon is in equlibrium. it isnt.

Two problems with this argument: First, you’re assuming that Carbon-14 testing is the only method for testing the age of something, it isn’t. There are Radioactive methods for determining the age of things as well.

Secondly, you claim that the Carbon-14 method of dating things assumes that the amount of carbon is in equilibrium, which is also not true. In fact, the Creationists make the mistake of assuming that carbon is being released at a steady rate which would allow for a state of equilibrium to occur within 30,000 years. Seeing as the amount of carbon isn’t in equilibrium, the argument goes, the Earth can’t be more than 30,000 years old. The reality, however, is that the rate of carbon emission isn’t constant and fluctuates by as much as 10% either way over time. This fluctuation has been shown to be the result of similar fluctuations in the Earth’s magnetic field. When the field is stronger carbon-14 production is suppressed and when it’s weaker carbon-14 production is boosted.

It’s because of this known fluctuation that any Carbon-14 dating requires calibration in order produce accurate results. In fact, without proper calibration carbon dating of objects older than 400BC will actually give results that indicate the object is younger than it really is (e.g. something that tests out to 6,000 years in an uncalibrated test is actually 6,700 years old). Tree ring dating methods can be used to confirm Carbon-14 dating methods up to about 8,000 years ago and using core samples from lake sediments and arctic glaciers provides us with very good data on carbon levels dating back over 22,000 years ago. The upper limit for this method of dating objects is around 40,000 years and which point other methods must be used.

living mollusk shells have been dated back to millions of years (obviously wrong)

Quite true, but that’s not because Carbon-14 testing is faulty. Plants and animals get their carbon-14 from the atmosphere with the plants taking it in directly and the animals consuming the plants. The one exception to this general rule is, you guessed it, certain types of mollusks which get most of their carbon from dissolved limestone. Limestone is very old and contains very little carbon-14 and thus the mollusks end up testing out to being much older than they really are due to the effect of the limestone. This problem is limited to certain types of mollusks and therefor not every shell will pose this problem.

You dont find huge “mass graves” of dinosaurs because most of them were burried and were squeezed to oil. it dosent take millions of years to do that (i dont remember how long it accually takes but scientists can do in in a lab in a few minits)

Have they now? If so, then why are we still importing all our oil from the Middle East? If it’s that easy to do and takes only minutes, then why aren’t we pumping out millions of gallons of oil every day right here in the States and telling the OPEC countries to go screw themselves?

If people and dinosaurs never lived together how come they find human footprints with dinosaur footprints? the find them side by side and in many cases the human footprint UNDER the dino footprint. Explain that if you please.

Ah yes! The famous Paluxy River Footprints near Glen Rose, Texas! Those haven’t held up to serious study and even creationist John D. Morris, son of Henry Morris and author of Tracking Those Incredible Dinosaurs and the People Who Knew Them acknowledges that those prints aren’t human. For one thing there are claw marks visible on what would be the “heel” part of the foot. I don’t recall humans ever having claws on their heels. At best these mantracks have turned out to be partial dinosaur prints and erosional features and a followup study of stride lengths put the final nail in that coffin. There have been other claims such as The Ryals Trail, the McFall site, Taylor’s Trail and others, but none have stood up to careful examination and even many die-hard Creationists have stopped citing them as evidence. Footprints in Stone, a pro-Creationist documentary on some of these sites, was withdrawn from circulation after these sites were shown not to have any human footprints present.

You really should try to have a little more information on the purported evidence you’re trying to use to back up your claims.

as far as dinos in the bible. Read Job, God makes may refrences to them as well as the springs in the sea(which science did not know about till well into the 20th century), orions belt and many ohter htings that science didnt know about till out century

I don’t recall any references to dinosaurs in the Bible and I’ve read the book 4 times now. The other claims you make here are dubious at best.

where did the microbs come from?

That’s a question science is still trying to answer, but the lack of an answer isn’t proof of Creationists claims.

and how do they know what era the rock comes from? how do they date them?

Any of a number of methods including radioactive dating.

oh and by the way...the brontosaur may be tall, but he wasnt that tall. The water went well above his hight (i dont remember how high)

If you don’t remember how high it went then how do you know it went high enough? For the record, the Bible states that the flood covered even the highest mountains to a depth of more than 15 cubits (roughly 20 feet).

The flood in it’s own right causes all sorts of problems when considered in light of what we know about physics, geology and so on. The first problem being where did all that water come from and where did it go?

As you said, it is fruitless to argue with someone who will believe what he wants.

Especially when that someone doesn’t even have a full understanding of the points he’s trying to argue and keeps saying things like “i dont remember how high.” If you don’t even known your own Bible well enough to remember details of the points you’re trying to argue then why should we accept that you have a clue as to what the hell you’re talking about? I know the Bible better than you do and I’m an atheist.

and one other thing: I dont remember how it was but someone was saying somthing about people like me are the reason for the violence and evil on the planet well if your an aithiest (oh humanist) who are you to decide what is good and what is evil?

Everyone decides what is good and what is evil and quite often those differences of opinion come into conflict. If the definition of what good and evil is so clear-cut because some God someplace has decided for you then why is it that so many different religions can’t agree on what is and isn’t evil in more than the most general of terms? Both Islam and Christianity declare that killing is evil, yet both religions have killed many times in their history and claimed they had God on their side while doing it. Sounds like having someone else determine what is good and evil isn’t much use.

what standard are you using? Think through your world veiw. You dont have a source to say what is good about somthing (or someone) or what is bad.

Sure we do. We have ourselves and our ability to reason. Let’s take random murder as an example. From a purely survivalist stand-point murder is bad for several reasons. 1) All humans have a natural instinct toward self-preservation that increases with respect to a perceived threat. If I kill people at random for no apparent reason then I will be perceived as a very serious threat to other humans who may decide to pre-emptively kill me in order to ensure their own survival. Seeing as I want to survive as long as I can killing people for no good reason is a bad idea if I don’t want people to kill me in return. 2) Human’s chances at survival increase dramatically if they work together. Even if I am strong enough to kill as I please without fear of being killed as a result, this anti-social behavior will result in others not helping me to accomplish the things I need to do in order to survive. If I were to be injured while hunting, for example, they may be inclined to just leave me to die instead of helping me because I have a bad habit of killing people for no apparent reason.

Those are two good reasons right there why killing others is evil and not a good idea that doesn’t require belief in Gods to provide incentive.

and i never said darwin alone was responsible for racism and neither did hovind, darwin was an amplifyer of it but did not cause it.

Actually, Hovind has flat out claimed that Darwin and his theory of evolution is to blame for racism.

Just thought id throw those two side notes in there

Sure thing, how about next time you actually toss in something in the way of support for your claims?

Let me get a few things straight here,

Your saying
1) There is no abosolute truth
2) We decide for ourselves what is true

In conclusion we all create our own reality?

is that what you are saying?

in response to Scott S. about absolute truth.

THE ABSOLUTE TRUTH IS : the COSMOS. It’s everything you know and everything YOU DON’T KNOW.
IT’s the universe infinitely big or infinitely small depending on your view of where mankind stands in all this. Man makes mistakes, right.
And the bible was written by man....so no book can be an absolute truth. But I believe it can be part of it, like science is part of it. Who’s right and who’s wrong has nothing to do with the absolute truth. Where I live, there are tons of religious people, all kinds, Jehovas, raelians, latter day saints, jews, catholics, muslims, name it we have it. a lot of them think...no they are SURE that they posess or that their holy books posess the absolute truth. That would make more than one.....and that doesn’t work for something that is an absolute.
It seem to me that the Bible was written to educate people by giving them a wide variety of guidelines in order to avoid Anarchy in a society.
That’s why every society has its own.
Which to me is a great thing, if it helps some people live a better life, hey that’s what it’s there for. But to turn it into an instrument of fear or to control people with it by making us OBEY it’s every word.
Do you think that a microbe sees us when we look at it through a microscope?
The same thing probably applies to us humans.
So all you religious people...you do not know everything.
My grandmother was told by nuns when she was young that when there was a thunderstorm it was because God was getting angry and you had to walk around with candles and you had to prey. What I mean is that religious people shouldn’t put down science everytime it contradicts their bible. they could use it instead and they might not be as insulted at the end. If you think I’m wrong about this...well....get use to it because science is relatively young. Older than the bible but it’s just the beginning.

I’m assuming you’re addressing this to me, Scott, but if you’re not then you may want to identify whom you’re responding to.

Let me get a few things straight here,

Your saying
1) There is no abosolute truth

Depends on what you mean by “absolute truth.” If you mean “God or Gods” (which is what some people mean by it) then my answer is no, there is no absolute truth. If you mean “objective reality” then my answer is yes, there is an asbolute truth.

2) We decide for ourselves what is true

Again, depends on what you’re addressing. If you’re speaking about morality then, yes, we each determine what our morals are whether that’s a personal decision making process or a decision to follow the guidelines set down in any of a number of different books ranging from religious tomes to ethical philosophies. Even if you believe the Bible is dictated from a supernatural source you still have to make a decision to follow the guidelines therein and as such you decided for yourself that those guidelines were true.

In conclusion we all create our own reality?

is that what you are saying?

If we all create our own reality then there isn’t an objective reality than can be known so I am not saying that, but I am saying that in matters of morals we each have to make a decision as to what is true and what is not. You seem to be mixing up issues here.

Lets just think for a bit that you aithiests are right. There is no God and when you Die you just become so much compost. Theres no point to Life except to enjoy yourself while your alive.

But now think for a moment that What im saying is True. There Is a God, The God of the Bible. He sent his Son to die on a cross for us and the only way to get to heaven is to accept Jesus into our heart and make him Lord of our Life.

If there is no God, then Me following Jesus wont make a bit of diffrence and i have nothing to loose. BUT if What the Bible says is true then there is a heaven and a hell and there is a jugement comming and unless you have Jesus, your going to Hell.

Do you realy want to take that chance?

That’s not faith, that is hedging your bets.

That is insurance. I can’t see wasting my time on afterlife insurance just on the off chance that I will get rear-ended (spiritually speaking).

That’s Pascals’s Wager!

Do you see the problem now Scott? You said “do you really want to take that chance?”. If you and the rest of the Christian community were to say, I don’t want to take that chance and be content to leave others to thier “free will”, alot of problems would be solved !

Scott S. allow me for a moment to take the logic of Pascal’s Wager and apply it back to you.

I know for a fact that hostile aliens intent on turning everyone on the planet into human beef jerky via a particularly nasty anal probe have been making the rounds and are due to arrive in your neighborhood “real soon now” and it’ll be a bad day for everyone involved. Unless, that is, you use my amazing new Anti-Anal Probe Butt Plug which I will give you free. This amazing device emits an ultra-high frequency tachyon signal that the aliens can’t stand to be around so by faithfully using this device every day you will be guaranteed to never fall victim to being jerky-ized. In fact it works so well that you’ll never even see the aliens when they come through your neighborhood.

Now, if I’m wrong there’s no harm done other than you’ve wasted your time inserting an Anti-Alien Probe Butt Plug in your ass every day.

But if I’m right… do you really want to take the chance of being wrong?

See, that’s the problem with Pascal’s Wager. You can apply it to any ridiculous scenario that can’t be proven and it makes sense to play it safe. If that’s the best reason you have to believe in God then you should probably do some more soul searching. The sincerity of your faith is questionable if you’re just hedging your bets. But hey, in case you want to be extra-safe I can always give you one of these butt plugs.

Let me put more fuel in the fire.

I think the question is not about validating God or the bible. The Bible was written to overcome man’s fear of death and to answer questions that man had at that time. It’s the task of all tasks and I believe man did a good job at it.
Most believers seem to KNOW that the bible is a book of laws. What if it is mostly made out of metaphores.
Now if you are ready to admit that man has changed since the time of the ancient testament.( Not much , just a little ). You’ll find that most things that connects to us have changed with us.
Science is not meant to discredit everything that’s written in the holy books, but it can explain, or more like upgrade some areas that couldn’t be explained at the time it was written.

Some people used the holy books to prey and to live a better life.
Some people took advantage of the knowledge in those books to manipulate whole countries and beyond.

Remember that without early science....there wouldn’t be any bible.

Massive amount of things we can’t explain yet, and some we might never even come close to figuring out what happened. Like the beginning of all things. I also know that there was a time the earth was supposed to be flat and the center of the universe.
You can’t blame God for all that we haven’t uncovered so far.

Oh and one other thing. Hell is a man made story to force you to join the Jesus club. Not a lot of serious religious people talk about hell anymore.
Check it out.
Some people choose to have goodness in their hearts.....it includes everything you associate with love and all that is good.
By the way I’m not a hippie. I’m just trying to be objective and non-offensive.....
later.

well Les As far as fear of goin go hell goes, thats not why im a Christian. Its part of it but a small part. There is one diffrence between what you said and what i said. THe aliens would distroy your body, But God will not only distroy your body but cast your soul into hell..for eternity. That is ofcourse if you dont have Jesus as your savior.

The bible says in Luke 12:4-5 “I tell you, my friends, do not fear those who kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do.  But I will warn you whom to fear: fear him who, after he has killed, has power to cast into hell; yes, I tell you, fear him!”

Yes it is free will to accept him Jay, and if you choose not to, its your choice, and we cant be content to leave it at that. mark 16:15 says go into all the world and preach the gosple.
and serge, if you want to beleive hell is made up be my guest, but man are you in for a shock. Lots of religiouse people dont talk about Hell for a few reasons 1) If theres no hell then no one will go there, so i dont have to go wittness to others-lazyness 2) they dont want the possiblility that they may go there themselves.
THeres alot of people running around claiming to be Christians, but there not. so they eliminate hell to cover there bases.

Be sure about things like hell before you say its made up. Because you could be wrong. and so what if it was pascles wagner, its a ligit thing to think about.

oh one other thing, you may ask yourself “well how do i know what he is saying is true”

well i say:
THeres no way for you to know what im saying is true unless you know what the truth is, AND there is no way for you to know what the truth is unless there is a truth that you can know.

NOw digest that for awile ill explain it if you want

Pascles Wagner? What does my Podiatrist have to do with any of this? :o

Scott S, I greatly admire your faith.
Would you repeat the exact same words and without hesitation if I were to tell you that I am muslim.
I wouldn’t be an ATHEIST then. I would be a believer just like you ....no more no less.

If I understand correctly you are talking about the spiritual dimension in our lives.
Like I said earlier, other religious groups claim the same thing as you and they don’t seem to include you in their deal.
Believing to improve your quality of life I can understand but be careful not to fall into blind faith.
You could be the one getting a reality shock.

I am a little more interested in the details surrounding the debate of evolution vs creation.

let’s stay there.....or not...you decide.

Who says the pedophile priests had faith and doesnt the bible record the sins of Jesus’ followers and mention the depravity of man.  When people sin it doesnt disprove anything in the bible,but it does prove we have a sin nature.  Thank God for his mercy and understanding.  I can sin less having a certain measure of faith.  I used to have unrestrained rules of living and hurt many people and myself but drastic changes occured when it dawned on me that Jesus is God and cares about my life.

Well Ed, the pedophile priests themselves claimed to have faith. And the bishops and cardinals that sheltered the pedophile priests claimed they had faith and were “good men” so I guess just about everyone short of you is saying they had faith.

My question to you is this: Why does it take some invisible magical old guy to make you want not to be an asshole? Do you not give enough of a shit about the people who care about you to want to improve for their sakes if not your own? I try to be a better man than I am for the sake of my wife and daughter, two people who are immediately and directly impacted by my actions. Why did you have to think there was some God threatening to toss your ass into a lake of fire before you decided you should be more human to your fellow man?

Ironic in a way. Simple good humanity isn’t enough of a reason, you have to have a fairy god father to make it worth your effort. That’s a pretty sad statement about you as a person if you ask me.

Ed,
If your belief in God made you a better man, then I am sure you are making the right choice for yourself.
Humans are all the same....but not identical.
Humans do not have the exact same needs.
What works for you does not mean it would work for me.
Worshiping God is not MY way of becoming a better man. See, I love people, animals, and plants. On an equal level(I think ). And I would like to see more religious groups involved it this fight.
I know you are going to say that you are in this fight also, and I believe you. Individually, most people are good. Populations are not.
Religious groups only care about their wealth and human issues. The world goes far beyond that.
If there was a God....he would probably agree with that.
I am doing pretty much the same things as a serious believer you know, only I do not need the Bible to show me the stupidity of men. That is just me, and some others.
Like I said, different needs, different tools to achieve the same goal....I think.

Sad,

So very very sad I see this all.  One side wishes with all the heart to save the other, and the other wishes with all the heart for the other to back off.  One side wishes simply wants to “spread the gospel” while the other wants the other to shutup.  Then there are those in the middle, the undecided.  One side wishes to help then through a divine and holy sense, while the other tries to show that man can do what he damn well pleases.  All very odd, but still, rather sorrowful that the entire world can’t find a common truth together.

Dan

Is it odd to you that people have disagreements?  I can’t speak for the rest on this site, but I think that characteristic is only exhibited in an “elite” group of people called “every friggin’ body on Earth!” How would you expect anyone to understand anyone else unless there was dialogue, as there is at this site?

Your laments don’t really add any value to the discussions presented here, in fact, you come off a bit condescendingly.  You may as well express grief that we pathetic humans can’t fly under our own power or breathe under water!  That people disagree on a subject is not exceptional…that they bother to discuss their disagreements is exceptional! Get with the program brother!  Enter the discussion with us…join the struggle…seize the day…jump into the deep end of he pool…don’t be a fence sitter!  I’m out of metaphors, but you get the idea!

Q)What do you call a man with a half inch cock?

A) Justin.

God told me that joke,
so he must exist.

Hmm, I think a good way to understand the various problems that plague our species is Wizard’s First Rule (a fantasy novel written by Terry Goodkind) :
People are stupid.

This extends to everyone from Jesus-freaks to scientists. For example, many scientists make the mistake of expecting to see a certain result in an experiment and will not look further. Case in point, a study was done on chimps in the wild. It was seen that the alpha males dominated the females and concluded the females have no power in choosing mates (i.e. where they get the genetic material for the next generation).
Female scientists decided to ionvestigate for themselves and noticed that often, when the alpha males were asleep, the females snuck out and engaged in intercourse with other males.
The point is that a more solid view of the situation was missed because it conformed with a set of already existing beliefs.

But generally this problem is more prevalent in fundementalists (of any religion) who have little use for rational except to attempt to justify their own view points. Fundementalists are concentrated on the emotional side of human nature. For example, they will try using rational to convince you, but as that often falls short, they attempt playing on the emotions by evoking fear or love towards their deity, which explains the frequent use of hell as punishment.
There is an irony in being a good person who leads a good life but fails to “acknowledge” God’s love, and for failing to do that, is cast into hell.
But my main point is that generally people who try to live life through rational understanding tend to conform their beliefs to the world, while fundementalists such as Scott S conform the world to their beliefs. (by the way Scott, you still haven’t explained how the huge amounts of different water based dinosaurs did not survive the flood.

Yes, I don’t accept creationism for the same reason I don’t just believe any old thing I get told: there’s not any rational justification for such a belief. It’s an illogical belief. And logic is a great tool for understanding the world. Once I had to argue with some art student about logic because he claimed it was created by “the Man” to keep us under control. In other words he argued (using logic of a sort) that logic was created to stop us believing in dumb concepts such as going to hell for not accepting some deity’s love.
Well there are only two kinds of definate truths:
1) analytical truths i.e. a bachelor is never a married man

2)mathematical truths 2 + 2 will always equal 4

that is the basis of logic and it’s infallible. how people use it is up to them, and a logically correct argument can still be false if one of the propositions is false.

anyway, the bible is full of logical contradictions that even most Christians I’ve met have admitted it is not meant to be taken literally. They seem like nice people, so I hope they don’t go to Hell for saying that.

Another point for the creationists: the original hebrew bible, made up of many books, but the main one is known as the torah, is the basis of the christian bible. In it, it says somewhere that God created the world to last for 6 thousand years. Then it will end and for another thousand years our souls will wait to be “purified” for the World to Come (the Jewish version of Heaven) where the body will be reunited from the dust of the earth (which is why jews use wooden coffins and do not accept cremation). If you don’t belief me, eitherlearn hebrew and read up on it yourself or speak to any rabbi about it and they will tell you the world is currently 5 thousand something years. Or even look at the Jewish calender to see the year they believe we’re currently on. My point in this is that according to the basis of the Judeo-Christian belief system the world is less that 6 thousand years old. I have a problem with that because we know for a fact that civilisations such as Myceans have been around for far longer. Hell, Homer wrote his great books such as the Iliad soomwhere between 8000 and 7000 years ago.
Creationists should accept the Jewish date because it is the basis of their religion. But it seems extremely illogical to do so.
But hey, it makes sense in accordance with Wizard’s First Rule.

Dear Sir;

It has always been my belief, that to combat false ideas, one should know MORE about these false ideas than the people who profess them.  In other words, the best way to disprove the Bible, is to know what these believers think they know.  Read what they read in order to dispute them.  So, I read...the Bible itself, and commentaries from prominent people in the field.  In this way, I have learned much about Bible beliefs.  May I suggest people like , for instance, Chuck Missler?(he has a web site called khouse.org, where you can read his work, and listen to his teachings) I am at present attempting to cover all his materials, as he is a very prominent Bible teacher.  I thought a good place to start was his book, “Learn the Bible in 24 Hours” It has been a good place for me to get an overall view of just what the Bible IS!  Now I have begun to delve into some more detailed stuff, such as his commentaries.  Christians seem to think he is really SOMETHING!  Sooooo...thought I’d start with a person these Christians listen to alot. Don’t feel I can debate this subject without a substantial background!

Blessings to you!

The Snerk

I have nothing new to add...I just wanted make this post turn 100.  Do I win a prize or anything?