Great thread B_D.
I came to the conclusion that all religious writings are man's thoughts about God, not the other way around.
I haven't seen anything that comes close to changing my opinion on that.
Cheers
Chris
The Watchtower Didn't Make Me An Atheist
by B_Deserter 111 Replies latest jw experiences
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Elemental
"Except the fact that the cloning required technology that wasn't accessible to bronze age man, and the cloned sheep didn't survive long. "
The point is that is was possible to do something which scientists are now discovering. To say that man is the only one who could accomplish this is not only illogical but absurd. Again you are limiting your views to only what you see at the moment. Very narrowminded.
"Because there is evidence for dinosaurs, we have fossil evidence scattered throughout the earth. And depending on how you define "sea monster" I don't really think most people really focus on THAT in the Bible. Usually we laugh at the references to unicorns and dragons, and we laugh at them because there is no evidence that they exist, unlike dinosaurs."
So there were no underwater dinosaurs? The word monster in hebrew simply means gigantic creature. Are you saying there is no such evidnce? Again you show your narrowmindedness as a mutated horse with a horn in its head is plausible. The idea that life came from non existance to me is not.
Your complete misunderstanding of evolution is evident here. Hominids were not monkeys, they were not apes, they were hominids like we are hominids. And yes, a gradual evolution of the brain and vocal chords sound much more plausible to me than an invisible man using magic to make donkeys and snakes talk.
In your mind that is. Again where does it say in the Bible that this was done with Magic?
The Hominidae (anglicized Hominids, also known as great apes [ notes 1 ] ) form a taxonomic family, including four extant genera: chimpanzees, gorillas, humans and orangutans. [ 1 ]
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/homs/species.html
Hominid or hominin?
Some scientists use a broader definition of Hominidae which includes the great apes, and instead call the group I am discussing "hominins". For a good discussion of the hominid/hominin terminology issue, read this article by Lee Berger.
The word "hominid" in this website refers to members of the family of humans, Hominidae, which consists of all species on our side of the last common ancestor of humans and living apes. Hominids are included in the superfamily of all apes, the Hominoidea, the members of which are called hominoids.
Funny but didn't you just get done saying that "Hominids were not monkeys, they were not apes, they were hominids like we are hominids."
So uhm who is ignorant of the subject again?
"Again, you are willfully ignorant of the subject, here. Evolution is not chance, abiogenesis is not life coming from NOTHING. It is the process of trying to understand how the building blocks of life formed. In contrast, you believe nothing created a superintelligent being capable of creating a universe. Which one sounds less reasonable?"
Uhm we both know the answer to that one. I will take the idea of someone that is more powerful than humans any day of the week over the idea that all of it came from no guidence whatsoever. Again you show you limted thinking because I am refurring to that those things all had to come from nothing at some point by random chance. You also show your ignorance of Theology and science becuase there was something at the begining of the big bang that science is now adimiting was there forever. This was in one of my astromony books that I read last year in college that according to the book the thing that was before the begining of the universe was probibly eternal. In short the universe had a start by an eternal something. When I say nothing I refer to the idea of without guidence. If you want a reference I would have to go back to the college and get it to give you an exact response. Since you would not be willing to listen to it and since I have no intent on being here that long, I will not bother getting it. Go to a college and ask yourself.
So the problem is that the data is pointing to my view, not yours.
Straw man argument. You really need to stop getting your information from creationist propaganda. That is NOT what abiogenesis claims.
"abiogenesis claims (or rather is associated with the claim) that all life started from a single celled organism from a primordial soup.This cell evolved over billions of years into the life that we now have on this planet." Is that exact enough for you? You are also missing the point in the fact that when I say nothing I mean without intelligent guidence. " You are the one who keeps complaining that this is not an acidemic website. So per your request I dumbed the discussion down to the level that you wanted.
So make up your mind, do you want dumbed down or technically accurate? You can't complain on the one hand about me using the word nothing in the context that I used it and then get defensive when I point out that you made a mistake in quoting one of the Bible writers namely James in Acts.
"You're going to have to be more specific than saying "science is not showing." Who is this "science" person? What are his credentials? Where is he published? Oh lemme guess, I bet he's published in "Creation rules evilution drools science magazine" right?"
Uhm you DO read don't you? Pick up a book for once and look it up. Then again seeing as you did not look through the Bible in detail and did not have the information correct about hominids, I am not surpised.
Uhm yeah, the college that I went to was a theology college. Not. After all, I never touch books by Bart Erhman or Kenneth Humphreys.
Only an ignorant person would assume that I did not do the research. I had assumed that you had done the research but since that above shows that you HAVE NOT, I will no longer bother discussing it. I don't have time to simply check everything out that you have made a mistake on.
They reject the idea that God could part water but have no issue with this when a scientist in Japan did this a few years back.
Who is this scientist? How did he part water? Assuming he did this in a labratory, how does his experiment work when tried in scale?
It was done a few years back and was dubed the "Moses effect" named after the parting of the Red Sea.
"For example, it was
demonstrated that water in a vessel could be separated into two parts by applying
strong horizontal magnetic fields to create the so-called Moses effect. Reportedly,
diamagnetic materials such as water and wood can be levitated by applying
vertical magnetic fields: magnetic levitation. These phenomena are interpreted in
terms of magnetic force."
The information shows that if a magnetic force is applied to a object such as water it will not only levitate the object but can be used to split it. This was done in a labortory in Japan (but who the scientist was I do not recall) where they split water using a high power magnet. Theoretically if the magnet were powerful enough the effect would be inifite.
Frankly, I do not have enough time to go through every time you make a mistake so I am stopping this right here. The point is that you have shown that you do not know what you are talking about and are biased. A good example is the site you used to point everyone to when you said that "Christians are often dishonest."
Well, it appears that you were not "honest" in telling them that this is an anti creationist website that has wonderful articles such as
- "How Not to Argue With Creationists
- Certain tactics should be avoided in public debates with creationists, as this continuation of an exchange between James Lippard and Ian Plimer illustrates."
- Yeah really unbiased there.
"This statement is not correct. The Miller-Urey experiment did, in fact, produce 22 amino acids, which are, in fact, some of the molecules necessary for life. Additionally, the experimentation did not end there.
As far as the atmosphere goes. Since his first experiment, Miller and others have experimented with other atmospheric compositions, too (sources 1-4). Complex organic molecules form under a wide range of prebiotic conditions. Additionally, the early atmosphere, even if it was oxidizing, was nowhere near as oxidizing as it is today. It was likely high in hydrogen, which facilitates the formation of organic molecules (source 5).
I highly suggest you do some actual research. You'll find that Creationists are often not being honest with you, and will repeat the same tired arguments no matter how many times they've been debunked. Here is a good place to start reading about the Miller-Urey experiment. You'll find it goes into far more detail than "it didn't create the organic molecules required for life": http://talkorigins.org/faqs/wells/iconob.html#Miller-Urey
Finally, your statement that abiogenesis is a "pipe dream" is not proof that a deity wished it all into existence by magic. You're committing a false dichotomy. If Abiogenesis is proven to be false, then the default answer is "we don't know," not "magic man done it!""
Right, but the experiment shows the need for intelligent design for if the lab represents the primordial soup and atmosphere who do the scientists who did the experiment represent? All this shows me is that it took someone with intelligence to bring a cell into existence as they were part of the experiment. I mean are you going to sit here and tell me that no one set up the lab? When you get a lab that set up itself and did the experiment on its own then come back and talk to me. As it is all you have done is reaffirm that someone was behind it. In fact every experiment that you bring here only reaffirms intelligent design as it took intelligence to set up the experiment in the first place. Congratulations.
But like most other atheists you brush that little bit of information aside and pretend that they were not part of the experiment. You thus dismiss them due to your "faith" and pretend they did not exist or were not part of the experiment. You have to consider all of the evidence and the evidence points to you requiring intelligence to set up the environment to bring a cell into existence. Thus we have repeatable, observable, empirical evidence that shows that one must have intelligence to bring something of this magnitude into existence.
This is why I find that it is pointless to have a debate with people like you. You tell me that Christians are delusional and then imagine away that there is any intelligence in the experiment to come to the conclusion that it proves that you can make a cell without intelligence. Bring me a lab that came into existence in its current form on its own and a cell came out of it by itself and we will talk. You call this absurd but that is what you are saying to every person who believes in God. That the earth with all of its wonders and complexity are just a result of a natural occurring event without governing intelligence. You want to prove to me that this is not the case then bring me something far less complex, that lab. DO NOT tell me that I do not understand science or the situation or that my reasoning is absurd because anyone who can come to me and imagine away a scientist in a lab pretending that they did not matter in the experiment is more so.
In fact I am stopping the debate here because if you state anything beyond where the evidence is pointing you are as delusional as the Christians you claim are ignorant.
Have a nice life.
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leavingwt
Wobble,
I see what you're saying. I think perhaps I may have had those same thoughts in the past.
Thank you,
LWT
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leavingwt
I am stopping the debate here
Please don't go.
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superpunk
Uhm we both know the answer to that one. I will take the idea of someone that is more powerful than humans any day of the week over the idea that all of it came from no guidence whatsoever.
That guidance does not have to be a mystical manipulator of space and time, however. It could be natural selection, which may not be "guided" in the sense you mean it by an almighty puppet-master, but it certainly has a specific, purposeful direction.
This is why I find that it is pointless to have a debate with people like you. You tell me that Christians are delusional and then imagine away that there is any intelligence in the experiment to come to the conclusion that it proves that you can make a cell without intelligence. Bring me a lab that came into existence in its current form on its own and a cell came out of it by itself and we will talk. You call this absurd but that is what you are saying to every person who believes in God.
I don't think there's a scientist or evolutionist in the universe who believes this is absurd. The problem is the time constraints involved. Scientists don't have time to sit around and wait for a laboratory to come into existence - and why should they? Billions of years of evolution have already brought us to that point.
This thread has gone from awesome to silly. I hope you take the time to come to a more reasonable understanding of evolution, because every post you make makes it clear that you do not currently possess such an understanding. Maybe once you obtain that understanding, you will still be a Creationist - but at least you will be able to discuss evolution intelligently and from an informed perspective at that point.
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AllTimeJeff
Great thread. Typical replies. For the record, I am not an atheist or a theist. (that isn't a riddle, just a statement of fact.)
Abiogenesis is a pipe dream. It has no basis in fact. Abiogenesis has never worked or been observed in the laboratory.
Neither has the bible.
The context of this thread, which B_deserter started, is that a simplistic argument as to why (it would seem) that JW's who leave tend to be atheists is just that, a simplistic way by some theists to explain what is to them, an unsupportable conclusion.
Those who have left JW's in the past 15 years have had for the first time, a non Christian resource to latch onto, the internet. Prior to this, the gatekeepers if you will to all things about exposing and leaving JW's belonged solidly within the Christian realm. They no longer control the door. They no longer have the exclusive way to paint the ex JW experience. If it seems that ex JW's on the internet tend to be of the agnostic/atheist/spiritual not religious variety, its exactly because there is no other place for them to collect. I can understand why this pooling of ex JW's would attract Christians who used to be JW's as well.
Wobble stated that it seemed to him, atheists need more "faith" then theists, as if this were something to mock. Allow me to take a different tack on that one. In my opinion, atheists are more spiritually advanced then your "typical" Christian theists. (that is a general statement for the sake of discussion....) Atheists and agnostics have allowed themselves a full expression of their mind and heart. To doubt is to take the next step, which is to take responsibility for your own thinking and conclusions instead of taking someone else's word for it and adopting it as your own. For me, this is one of the foundational lessons ex JW's generally have taken with them in their own way.
Elemental's arguments here are not new, but I want to focus on the tone, because I interpret that tone to be in retalliation for perceived "attacks" on faith by Atheists. (such as "The End of Faith" by Sam Harris) What better way to respond to statements like "Faith in god is evidence of a weak mind" then to respond exactly in kind and trying to label Atheists as the stupid ones who refuse to look at "the facts".
In this, Elemental's arguments, (and others like them) are nothing more then a debate tactic, designed to defend one's right to think and believe.
In that, I personally have no quarrel. Believe away. But please don't misrepresent the "evidence" for your beliefs.
Theists who take on a militant and/or a defiant tone usually fail to address this one question: Why does your "god" not speak for herself? (please prove gender if you will while you're at it) Why are you here to defend your hertofore silent and absent deity?
When you get right down to it, it is the faith that someone or something is out there for "you" that is the biggest feature of theists to defend. The message that must be discarded if one stops a professed belief in an unseen and unkown deity is "Its all going to be alright." Atheists and agnostics, while perhaps not at peace with "this life being all there is", usually are pragmatic enough to accept it as such.
I am amused at the amount of evidence that Elemental puts out there. Elemental, you are far more real to me then Jesus. You have talked to me. I would even worship you if you could put out some bona fide credentials. Until "god" somehow gets it through her head that accepting scrolls several thousand years old as evidence do not satisfy the mind that she supposedly created for me to question and learn with, I will abstain from woshiping her, hysterical attempts at defense by some of her adherants notwithstanding.
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Elemental
Elemental's arguments here are not new, but I want to focus on the tone, because I interpret that tone to be in retalliation for perceived "attacks" on faith by Atheists. (such as "The End of Faith" by Sam Harris) What better way to respond to statements like "Faith in god is evidence of a weak mind" then to respond exactly in kind and trying to label Atheists as the stupid ones who refuse to look at "the facts".
In this, Elemental's arguments, (and others like them) are nothing more then a debate tactic, designed to defend one's right to think and believe.
I am amused at the amount of evidence that Elemental puts out there. Elemental, you are far more real to me then Jesus. You have talked to me. I would even worship you if you could put out some bona fide credentials. Until "god" somehow gets it through her head that accepting scrolls several thousand years old as evidence do not satisfy the mind that she supposedly created for me to question and learn with, I will abstain from woshiping her, hysterical attempts at defense by some of her adherants notwithstanding.
Well, I am not asking for all of that :)
Personally I do not care if one believes what I do or not. They have free will to believe as they wish. If you do not want to accept there is a God, that is your choice. It is also true that as I said before one cannot give "proof."
I also said that I had no issue of thinking that perhaps God did use evolution as a means to create the earth. I also have no issue with the earth being 4.8 billion years old. The point is that I am open to these ideas. But what I do get irritated at is the notion that believing in Christ is pure nonsense. It is nonsense to them but not to others. There are plenty of people who do believe that Jesus rose from the dead who are rather intelligent and yet these are dismissed.
Those arguements that you mention are used because for the most part they still work. There is no logical flaw with them from what I can tell other than you cannot accept the idea of the supernatural.
But instead of telling me why my reasoning was flawed, several times I have been insulted by people who say "go back to your imaginary sky daddy." This does not sound to me like people who are simply interested in listening to another's view point. Rather it seems to be just an attack.
Over and over again I was willing to listen carefully to what people on both sides have said as I came from an agnostic/athiestic background. As such I was even willing to admit that persons had points when they did. I told them I could see where they were coming from.
But few times on this board have I ever heard anyone tell me that the could see AT LEAST a valid point to my view. It seems to me that they are so stubborn that they cannot even acknowledge a point. Never have I ever read once someone say "well perhaps they really did feel the Holy Spirit. No, what I hear is delusion, stupidity, arrogance, nonsense. Frankly that does not do much for me because all that tells me is it is nonsense to them.
What truly bothers me about this is that many times I am told that despite the fact of not knowing me that somehow they know me better than I do myself for despite never having met me they can tell me that I am allowing my imagination run away with me or I am insane. It is that level of arrogance that bothers me for when someone tells me I am delusional without knowing me, I get rather irritated. I would never tell anyone that they were delusional unless I had some proof and these people have none.
For example your statement about my coming here and using my view as a debate tactic. I respectfully disagree with this as that was not my intent. My intent was to get more clerification on what was being said and why. Athiests claim that they are not in a religion, that they are above that. Then why mention it at all to people? Why bring it up? If you are truly away from all the "religious nonsense" why tell everybody your business? You believe there is no God. Uhm, okay. Fine. But how do you know that was my idea? Do you know me? But somehow you felt that you were able to figure out my motive. I mean no offense to you but no one on earth is so intelligent that they know what another is thinking. You can guess but you do not know.
It is the fact that they have to mention it to people that puzzles me as I fail to see what it does for anyone. Christians at least feel that they are defending God when they talk. If one believes that there is no God why bring it up? As a result, the one I see using a debate tactic is the athiest after all I did not come here telling people why I accept Christ as that is personal. It is sharing these views with others that shows they wish to debate it. I simply responded to the invitation.
But all of that for the most part is over as I am not going to discuss it futher. I am simply letting you know that I read your post.
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B_Deserter
Right, but the experiment shows the need for intelligent design for if the lab represents the primordial soup and atmosphere who do the scientists who did the experiment represent? All this shows me is that it took someone with intelligence to bring a cell into existence as they were part of the experiment. I mean are you going to sit here and tell me that no one set up the lab? When you get a lab that set up itself and did the experiment on its own then come back and talk to me. As it is all you have done is reaffirm that someone was behind it. In fact every experiment that you bring here only reaffirms intelligent design as it took intelligence to set up the experiment in the first place. Congratulations.
Miller was not part of the experiment because his presence was not required for the equivalent real-life occurences in the experiment to happen, unless of course you think every lightning bolt has a divine purpose behind it, and even then the theory of electromagnetism provides a much more plausible answer. You're arguing for the idea that God is directly behind earthquakes and weather patterns, consciously guiding each one because someone can set up a weather or an earthquake simulation (who does the supercomputer programmed by software engineers represent?). You're arguing that every murderer is guided telepathically by God because crime scene detectives can set up recreations of events they did not witness (who do the detectives and crime scene investigators represent?)
Flipping the switch on the lightning bolt and compiling the molecules in a vessel don't count as being part of the experiment because there is no intelligence required in the equivalent events happening naturally. We know why lightning occurs, and why carbon hydrogen and oxygen would be on the earth, and we also know how the earth got here. None of those explanations require a deity. Stellar nuclear fusion accounts for the elements without the need of a deity, the electromagnetic force accounts for lightning, and the forces of gravity account for the earth. Merely mimicking these natural occurrences for the sake of experiment does not constitute a designer. Sorry.
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shamus100
Elemental,
Thus they have shown themselves to be guilty of the very stupid, narrow-minded arrogance that they claim Christians have. Indeed it saddens me that they who claim to have an open mind who say that they look at things impartially, really are not impartial at all.
Thank you for participating in global labeling.
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ex-nj-jw
Great thread B_D
nj