Atheist 1 - Christian guy 0

[swap]

"What evidence of god existing? There is no such evidence!"

Maybe not to you... But to me, I just look at the world around us.
For me, it's hard to believe that all the diversity (on this planet alone) just happened
to exist from nothing. I believe that everything on this planet was created by a creator.
Even still, these are just my beliefs. They are not fact.

"He tells you to pray and things will be answered. Ask and you shall receive."

It says ask and you shall receive. Not ask and you shall get whatever you want.
Also, I believe this refers to spiritual things, not worldly things.
For example, asking to win the lottery is no good, but asking God to help you grow in your faith is good.

"if i had a dog and he dug out my neighbors trash i wouldn't kill him ..
thats what god did to man. his own creation didn't please him so he flooded us and wiped us out"

The people that died in the flood were already dead spiritually because they rejected God.
God knew this, so he created the flood. However, not every human was killed. The ones who followed God were saved.
The thing you have to remember about the old testament is that it's meant to compliment the new testament.
The flood that washed away the sinful people is complimented in the new testament as baptism washing away sin.

I always enjoy having civil discussions about religion with atheists because it makes me dig deeper into my beliefs.
It's a bit weird having this discussion in a jiu jitsu forum though!

[Andrew Maxwell]

That part i understand. its the little changes that confuse me. for instance.. to get from a worm to whatever comes next, would require multiple changes. None of which would occur overnight. they are all a lengthy process. For instance some believe we started in a pond or body of water, and eventually developed lungs. So lets say to get from a water occupying creature, to becoming something that could take in oxygen from the air, we would need to develope some sort of organ or body part that we didnt have before. bust that obviously wouldnt happen overnight. Or in one generation. so how would this DNA "plan ahead" if you will. Or start this organ needed for air intake generations before it was complete? i hope that makes sense. Because to me, even "small" changes would take at minimum a few generations to evolve. So what would be the evolutionary benefit of the generation in between. before its actually fully functioning? it seems like there would be a lot of half developed parts between the original specimen and the one that had the fully operational (insert whatever the next part to develope was here). do you understand what im saying? Maybe its not coming out right.. if not, ill try to think about it and re-write it sometime lol

I think I'm getting you. Evolution doen't plan ahead and decide that in a million years i'm going to change in a certain way it says what can I start changing now and then builds from there. Say you take an animal like the giraffe. It used to have a short neck. With the short neck it was harder to eat the tall trees leaves. So the giraffes with the shortest of the short necks got less food and died the giraffes with the longer of the short necks survived. So long necks bread with other long necks until the neck was a little bit longer. Evolution had no idea how far it would take the process the DNA just kept making changes based on what the DNA said to do. Now after a long time of the DNA making changes to the species you have this long necked freak of nature we call a giraffe lol. Or take the lungs for example. There was probably several little changes between living in the water and breathing air, those little changes would of had to of been benificial in there own way prior to breathing air in order to keep the process of evolution going. The end result may have been lungs but the first evolutions of the lungs would of had to be benificial in there own way or else they would of been just mutations that never took off, this happens more offen then actual evolution, simple pointless mutations with no benefit what so ever that die off with their host.

[Andrew Maxwell]

I'm saying that there needs to be evidence to justify a claim. That claim being: god exists. Make the claim, back it with evidence. That is how something is determined whether or not to be true. In this case, there is no evidence to back the claim, therefor it is logical that we determine the claim untrue.

The reason the default is atheism is because theism must be taught, it must be learned. You apply new information to a person who previously had no information on the subject. If someone had never heard of the concept of a god, then you would need to explain theism to that person, whereas there would be nothing to explain in terms of atheism.

I'm saying what's the difference if you claim god doen't exist. That claim being: god does not exists. Make the claim, back it with evidence. That is how something is determined whether or not to be true. In this case, there is no evidence to back the claim, therefor it is logical that we determine the claim untrue.

[Andrew Maxwell]

And if i said that the gremlin is not subject to the scientific method, then what?

Everything is subject to scientific method except God beause of the "all knowing, all mighty, all powerful" premises we attach to God. Thats what makes it unknowable the athority given to god makes god untestable.

[Jack LaBarge]

When did I say there was?

Faith is the great cop-out, the great excuse to evade the need to think and evaluate evidence. Faith is belief in spite of, even perhaps because of, the lack of evidence.

[AJ Camacho]

2. You believe in a thing which you do not fully understand but feel compelled towards based upon what you do in fact believe yourself to understand about the subject.

Just some food for thought

Here's the problem, you consistently use the word "believe" but you're mixing semantics. There are multiple definitions for the word "belief" and none of them are interchangeable or equal in their meaning. In fact most words have multiple definitions which could be so drastic as to almost require a different word to differentiate between them.

I don't understand your intention with this semantic game you are playing but I'll try to make my point as clear as possible.

I do hold, as an opinion, based upon my current knowledgeable knowledge that the idea of "The absence of a belief is not a belief." is a valid idea. Is an opinion a form of belief? Yes, it is. But that usage of the term "belief" has nothing to due with the religious usage of the term.

[Andrew Maxwell]

Throughout history, humans have attempted to prove of his existence. All attempts have failed, but that does not mean he does not exist, so is it fair to say that there probably is no god?

In order to say probably the odds must be greater then 50/50. It's best to say I can't be posative either way since the evidence will always be 50/50. For every argument for god there is a fallacious retort and for every argument against god there is a fallacious retort. There is no conclusive deductive or inductive argument either way for or against God, yet.

[chronic_jiujitsu]

wheres your proof god exsist. No disrespect man i like you.......its just the fact ive read the bible. i v read the evild deeds god wants of a man. if i had a dog and he dug out my neighbors trash i wouldn't kill him .. thats what god did to man. his own creation didn't please him so he flooded us and wiped us out ... thats wrong morally and you can't deny that my friend. i love all you tenth planet brothers but you need to think logically for a moment. read the bible and think about it.

This is one of the reasons i think it can sometimes be a scary situation for someone to read parts of the Bible without some sort of guidance can turn people away at first. My ex-gf saw the exact same things when she first started reading the Bible. It was muder here, destruction there.. (reading the Old testament you will run into these things even more often). But Once you get a full understanding of it. You begin to see it from a different standpoint. For instance with the Flood and wiping everyone out. You find in the Bible God gave mankind MULTIPLE chances to do the right thing. Sending messengers who were willing to hear him to talk to the rest who werent. And giving warning after warning. But eventually, all of mankind had turned there back on God and decided to follow after their own desires. And live a life pursuing sin. While at first it may seem like the "Law" of the old testament seems harsh and like a list of things we cant do just because God wants us to live boring funless (I made that word up.. but i like it so im going to use it :P) lives, You find that these laws all have meaning or purpose behind them. To protect us, to help us, or to teach us. Not because he hates us, if that was the case he would just let mankind go the first time they separated themselves from him when they chose to take part in sin in the garden. But instead he gave us another chance. Then again with the Flood. The first time we read it it seems like "wow, God gets mad because they turn their back so he kills everyone? But in reality you can choose to see it two ways. God is killing people because he has an anger issue, or because it somehow ultimately helps mankind as a whole. Which may be hard to understand looking from an outside perspective.. which is completely understandable. But what you have to realize is that had mankind continued the way they were, None of the people would have listened to Noah, because they had all completely turned there hearts away from God. and commited the only "unforgivable sin". which in other words meant they had come to a point in their life that they refused to ever turn back to him. no matter what they were told. So God (being God lol) was aware of that. And he could have continued to allow the world to continue this way and lose all of mankind. Or purge it of this new developed way of life and give it a chance to become "good" again. By allowing Noah to teach his children about the "truth" and what had happened. So that they could pass it along and eventually repopulate the world to a place that would be open to the thought of God rather than completely turned against him. Yes its unfortunate people had to die. But if you believe in the Bible and what it teaches (which i understand you dont but this is just to explain how I see it to address why i dont see me as morally sadistic), then you would see that right now there are more people alive on this planet than all the previous generations combined, And the fact that God chose to purge the world long ago so that all the future generations might have a chance to know who he is, seems less sadistic. I dont think God enjoyed killing all those people. I would assume it would break his heart. But the fact is, it had to be done. the whole "sacrafice the few for the many" type thing. he knew it was too late for them because he understood their heart. And he made the choice he did because of love for humanity, not hate. Sorry this post was so long, and in no way am i trying to convince you of anything. Because i know that you dont believe in any of this.. i just wanted you to see that christians arent as crazy and sociopathic as it might appear at first glance. lol.

[Andrew Maxwell]

Faith is the great cop-out, the great excuse to evade the need to think and evaluate evidence. Faith is belief in spite of, even perhaps because of, the lack of evidence

I'll be honest I agree with you about faith, I just like playing the devils advocate because doubting our own beliefs is the only way to try to make sure you're believing mostly truths. I'm also being honest when I say our belifes aren't as rooted in truth as we'd like to belive they are. Everyone walks arould beliving things without enough emperical evidence, its what we do, I guess we're programed that way. There are alot of Athiests so dogmatic about there not being a god that they don't realize they have faith themselves. Faith that there is no god is still based in faith.

[Jack LaBarge]

This is one of the reasons i think it can sometimes be a scary situation for someone to read parts of the Bible without some sort of guidance can turn people away at first. My ex-gf saw the exact same things when she first started reading the Bible. It was muder here, destruction there.. (reading the Old testament you will run into these things even more often). But Once you get a full understanding of it. You begin to see it from a different standpoint. For instance with the Flood and wiping everyone out. You find in the Bible God gave mankind MULTIPLE chances to do the right thing. Sending messengers who were willing to hear him to talk to the rest who werent. And giving warning after warning. But eventually, all of mankind had turned there back on God and decided to follow after their own desires. And live a life pursuing sin. While at first it may seem like the "Law" of the old testament seems harsh and like a list of things we cant do just because God wants us to live boring funless (I made that word up.. but i like it so im going to use it :P) lives, You find that these laws all have meaning or purpose behind them. To protect us, to help us, or to teach us. Not because he hates us, if that was the case he would just let mankind go the first time they separated themselves from him when they chose to take part in sin in the garden. But instead he gave us another chance. Then again with the Flood. The first time we read it it seems like "wow, God gets mad because they turn their back so he kills everyone? But in reality you can choose to see it two ways. God is killing people because he has an anger issue, or because it somehow ultimately helps mankind as a whole. Which may be hard to understand looking from an outside perspective.. which is completely understandable. But what you have to realize is that had mankind continued the way they were, None of the people would have listened to Noah, because they had all completely turned there hearts away from God. and commited the only "unforgivable sin". which in other words meant they had come to a point in their life that they refused to ever turn back to him. no matter what they were told. So God (being God lol) was aware of that. And he could have continued to allow the world to continue this way and lose all of mankind. Or purge it of this new developed way of life and give it a chance to become "good" again. By allowing Noah to teach his children about the "truth" and what had happened. So that they could pass it along and eventually repopulate the world to a place that would be open to the thought of God rather than completely turned against him. Yes its unfortunate people had to die. But if you believe in the Bible and what it teaches (which i understand you dont but this is just to explain how I see it to address why i dont see me as morally sadistic), then you would see that right now there are more people alive on this planet than all the previous generations combined, And the fact that God chose to purge the world long ago so that all the future generations might have a chance to know who he is, seems less sadistic. I dont think God enjoyed killing all those people. I would assume it would break his heart. But the fact is, it had to be done. the whole "sacrafice the few for the many" type thing. he knew it was too late for them because he understood their heart. And he made the choice he did because of love for humanity, not hate. Sorry this post was so long, and in no way am i trying to convince you of anything. Because i know that you dont believe in any of this.. i just wanted you to see that christians arent as crazy and sociopathic as it might appear at first glance. lol.

Sorry, don't believe the stories men wrote in the bible! The content in the book are not facts! Of course people would need help or guidance to manipulate the words, stories.