Beliefs Tied to Geography

sabastious

God has many skins, which would explain why geography is connected to faith. Claiming that those results are evidence against God is silly.

Genesis 1 - 26 Then God said, “ Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.”
27 So God created mankind in his own image,
in the image of God he created them;
male and female he created them.

^ It doesn't say, "then the God's said" it uses a non plural as a divine title. Then right after it mentions "us."

Exodus 3 - 13 Moses said to God, “Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ Then what shall I tell them?”
14 God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘I AM has sent me to you.’”

In the story of the burning bush Moses specifically asks God to indentify himself by name. God uses the opportunity to teach Moses and his eventual followers what He is, and he most definitely is an entity that can be, or always is, more than one thing at a time.

Take the concept of a science fiction shape shifter, what is their original form? It could be said that they don't have an original form, but rather can take any form. Therefore if this God model is correct finding different belief sets based on geography is actually evidence FOR the God of Genesis rather than against the general existence of God. It also is evidence of a personal God that shows Himself to cultures that then take it and run with it often to their error.

-Sab

leavingwt

ZIP Code + Parents = Your Religion <------- 90% of the time.

finally awake

Sabastious - That is the best explanation I've heard.

OnTheWayOut

Sab, talk about twisted reasoning.

The statements are not evidence against a god. They are evidence against a particular god. And I do believe one of those gods says that a house divided against itself cannot stand. Your god of many skins is definitely divided against himself.

If the god of many skins is evidence FOR the god of Genesis, then he is also evidence FOR the other gods you are talking about.

I won't even bother with this line of argument anymore. I will support it. So it is a wonderful thing to accept the gods of your choice. I kind of like the gods of ancient Egypt. I cannot figure out why the god of ancient Hebrews attacked himself at ancient Egypt, though. Maybe it's because humans are so insignificant to the god of many skins. (And maybe he doesn't really have skin)

"Moses, despite my being the gods of Egypt, I grow bored with them and want to be the god of your people now. Go and I will smite the Egyptians and probably not smite your people for decades or even centuries if I don't grow bored with you. Go now. I will be with you and I will seem to be with the Egyptians but let them down right when they need me the most."

ldrnomo

Sab, if your reasoning is true, that means that now what is going on is,

God's or "I am"'s many personna's are fighting against eachother. How does this make sense in your reasonings?

sabastious

So it is a wonderful thing to accept the gods of your choice.

My mother hates that I don't go to meetings. She hates that I can, in good conscience, never even think about a meeting again and still maintain my relationship with God. To her, the Kingdom Hall has to be involved in her worship so she is jealous of mine. That's just my speculation, but it's based off my observations. I get to have my cake and eat it too according to her.

Now, here you are telling me that I get to just gleefully take a "pick of the god litter" which is a strangely familiar argument. Once I pick one, however, you will call me intellectually dishonest for doing so.

My mother doesn't like the idea that her actions her whole life have been more in vain than not. That's a pretty sensible fear in my opinion so in order for her to feel good about herself she needs to validate the Bible. This urge to explain the mystery of this book we found in a cave is not in vain. The choice, OTWO, is to believe in God not what God to believe in. What God to believe in requires empirical evidence to be considered an intellectually honest endeavor. Evidence, that I and many others are trying to find for ourselves.

The statements are not evidence against a god.

The image you posted says "your faith, is not inspired by some divine, constant truth"

There is a constant and that constant is God. In Lawrence Krauss' new book "Something from nothing" he says that when you remove everything what is left is energy or nothing. That Nothing, I speculate is the constant. He also says that "nothing is unstable" which is why there is something rather than nothing. "Nothing", imo, is the canvas of which sets the stage for the painting, or story. Before the paining is started however the brush types are sorted and the type of paint is aquired and set up.

The religions that make up 3.6 billion people on this planet all point to one man: Abraham. The evidence for this man having some connection to forces not known to even us is very possible. Some call it ancient aliens, and some call it God. I choose to call it God, which I believe to be that First Cause, the canvas of life. Evolution has taught us that when given enough time life will always spring forth. I think that's a line of thinking that supports the First Cause: Energy to have a form of consciousness that we cannot fathom with our human brains which exists on that canvas.

-Sab

sabastious

God's or "I am"'s many personna's are fighting against eachother. How does this make sense in your reasonings?

The end of M Night Shyamalan's Unbreakable is the answer to your question.

-Sab

talesin

I like this point, OTWO.

It illustrates how I feel about a couple of things.

That was one of the reasons I wanted to learn about different belief systems around the world, after I left the religion. What I discovered was there are commonalities in all the mainstream religions. The more we explore our differences, the more we find we are alike.

It's also why I always say "happy" or "lucky" to be Canadian, instead of "proud". It is only an accident of birth that I am here. (ie, I don't get patriotism.)

tal

ps. I thought it was quite an interesting, sci-fi thingy way of justifying religion.

NeonMadman

And if you were born in certain secular areas of Europe, you'd probably be atheist or agnostic.

None of which says anything about the truth or falsity of the given belief systems. The argument presented in this graphic is often used against anyone who believes that their particular belief system is true, but it really is no argument. The prevalence of belief or unbelief in certain geographical areas is unrelated to the validity of those beliefs. Citing the cultural, emotional or psychological reasons why someone believes only tells you something about that person, not about the truth value of his or her belief system. As an argument, this could actually be seen as a form of the genetic fallacy, since it seems to imply that belief systems are wrong because of how they were acquired, and not because of their merits as truth claims.

As C.S Lewis wrote,

" Suppose I think, after doing my accounts, that I have a large balance at the bank. And suppose you want to find out whether this belief of mine is "wishful thinking." You can never come to any conclusion by examining my psychological condition. Your only chance of finding out is to sit down and work through the sum yourself. When you have checked my figures, then, and then only, will you know whether I have that balance or not. If you find my arithmetic correct, then no amount of vapouring about my psychological condition can be anything but a waste of time. If you find my arithmetic wrong, then it may be relevant to explain psychologically how I came to be so bad at my arithmetic, and the doctrine of the concealed wish will become relevant — but only after you have yourself done the sum and discovered me to be wrong on purely arithmetical grounds. It is the same with all thinking and all systems of thought. If you try to find out which are tainted by speculating about the wishes of the thinkers, you are merely making a fool of yourself. You must first find out on purely logical grounds which of them do, in fact, break down as arguments. Afterwards, if you like, go on and discover the psychological causes of the error."

In the same essay, Lewis also wrote,

You must show that a man is wrong before you start explaining why he is wrong. The modern method is to assume without discussion that he is wrong and then distract his attention from this (the only real issue) by busily explaining how he became so silly. In the course of the last fifteen years I have found this vice so common that I have had to invent a name for it. I call it "Bulverism". Some day I am going to write the biography of its imaginary inventor, Ezekiel Bulver, whose destiny was determined at the age of five when he heard his mother say to his father — who had been maintaining that two sides of a triangle were together greater than a third — "Oh you say that because you are a man ." "At that moment", E. Bulver assures us, "there flashed across my opening mind the great truth that refutation is no necessary part of argument. Assume that your opponent is wrong, and the world will be at your feet. Attempt to prove that he is wrong or (worse still) try to find out whether he is wrong or right, and the national dynamism of our age will thrust you to the wall." That is how Bulver became one of the makers of the Twentieth Century.

Beliefs Tied to Geography

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