Evidence for God's existence (mythology, prophecy, Jerusalem, Holy Spirit)
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One thing that flying saucers and aliens share with God is that they are both difficult to disprove with out attacking the believer. I always found it a coincidence that scientist have proven that with out a doubt the earth will be destroyed by fire. When our sun expands in about 5 million or billion years we will all perish in the flames just as predicted 2000 years ago.
Well, you can believe whatever you like. You can believe in unicorns, Zeus, bigfoot, astrology, God, magic or whatever else, and no one can force you to be reasonable.
In my view, if you don't have a reason for your belief that shows that your belief is justified, then you are being irrational. This is why it is important for theists to try to present evidence for God's existence.
Seems you did not read closely what I wrote. I wrote why I believe in God. Also, I wrote I was not going to make a factual claim.
People often make conclusions based on the information they have in front of them. Later those conclusion can end up true or false.
I am not going to go back an forth and say you are unreasonable becaus you do not believe as I do. I will simply make a claim that from what I have read there is enough information out there to the possibility of a God. That is as far as I can go. I use logic, reason, and facts out there. You may not think I do and many people out there and that is fine with me. I have enough reason but you simply may not accept that and that just fine also. Take care.
There are two points overlooked, however. Not disagreeing with your argument in the least (just the conclusion ) "I think that using logic, reason, and facts it is reasonable to consider the possibility of the existence of God."
Even if that is correct, a possibility is not logically good enough reason to say:-
"I am not going to make a factual claim that God exists. What I will say is that I believe God exists."
Why? A possibility? Then it is a Faith- based claim and the mention of logic, reason and facts is a bit of a smokescreen. If your logic, reason and facts amounted to a probability that God existed, then your argument would be sound. Thanks for the reply. Perhaps I will further clarify what I wrote. In life I will venture to guess that you make decisions at work, at home, at a game, whatever based in partial information. You are aware that you may not have the whole picture. However, you make a decision making the best conclusion possible. I have read your posts a lot and I believe you have heard of the expression "bounded rationality". You base your actions and decision with the information that is in front of you as if it is a fact. So, I may conclude that with what is in front me I go on as if there is a God. Perhaps I used the wrong word, semantics, and intead of possibility probability is more appropriate, fair enough.
You may now wish to argue that logic, reason and facts amount to a probability that God exists. Good luck with that. Now, I must clarify something here though. When I talk about God I suppose what comes in mind with a lot of people is based of preconceptions of what the Bible says. That is not the case with me. Perhaps I use the word God because most people use that word. For all I know you can call it an external intelligence, superios being, I do not know. I simply believe that there is enough reason, logic, and probabilities that an intelligent mind may be a factor in what exist today. That is as best as I can explain it.
Second point. The nature of this 'god' (the rule is lower case) is not defined. That is, are we talking about a sorta god that made the universe and started life and placed everything just so, that we could live here? That is indeed an argument with some mileage. I'll give you that. Good question and I do not know that. My point is what I already explained. For all I know there is a powerful mind that made the universe and went on to make other universes and have fun doing so. Maybe simply set the conditions for things to evolve from a starting point. I do not know. I am not going either way on the one as far as how things became afterwards once things got started and how it took from there.
But if you are talking about the God of the Bible or of its subsidiary cults, then logic, facts and reason definitely does not (I would and will argue) support the probability or indeed the possibility of such a god; and to believe in Biblegod is not in accordance with logic, reason or fact. I think you got my reply on that one. However, I clarify again what I have said before in other posts. I do not believe the Bible is the word of God or that Jesus is his son.
So, amigo, do you just profess to believe by Faith in a sorta creator or are you in possession of facts and reasons which will justify such a belief? In which case, I am tolerant of your beliefs, though I would not agree with them. Good question and this is how I reply. Even the word Faith in the Bible requires evidence as defined. To me it is something that even Bible believers seem to miss when they say they have Faith and you are right in not agreeing in such blind Faith. I will not say there is evidence of the existence, well, direct but to me there is enough circumstancial evidence in what I have read using logic, reason, and facts out there. Let me explained it in another way. Imagine I get a piece of paper and instead of drawing and individual I paint all around a siluette, sorry if I misspelled, I will come up with something not clear but I can see an image of something. The same about God. I may not be able to come up with direct evidence but I believe that with logic and reason and the laws of probabilities it is reasonable to see that maybe something is there. Hope this explains my point more clearly.
But if it is the petulant, incompetent, dishonest, violent and dictatorial God of the bible, then I am not tolerant of your belief because it would be utterly unworthy of any intelligent person in this century.
Which is it?
I believe you got my answer already. Even if the Bible proved to be right regarding the existence of God down the road, I cannot accept the way God is described in that book also. I am with you there. Take care.
I believe you got my answer already. Even if the Bible proved to be right regarding the existence of God down the road, I cannot accept the way God is described in that book also. I am with you there. Take care.
Thank you. Then I really have no quarrel with you. I might quote the words of Dawkins, (Darwin he is his prophet) on the subject of a sort of cosmic creative intelligence to the effect that a case can be made for the possible existence of such an entity. It is not one with which he would agree..' or something close to that - I couldn't find the exact quote.
I could, indeed I have, argue fiercely about the burden of proof, the validity of the evidence or at least the philosophy underpinning that view, and could end up debating about the validity of metaphysical naturalism, human logic and the validity of verified evidence, but that would be academic as while the subject is interesting, it is irrelevant in the area of Faith and belief (in any of the deistgod type of entity), let alone religion.
You and I seem to be on the same page as regards religion. We do not buy into the claims of the Bible or of personal gods and religions which we both (it appears) regard as man - made invention.
I call myself atheist and you call yourself agnostic, but I reckon that we are both actually on the same side.
One thing that flying saucers and aliens share with God is that they are both difficult to disprove with out attacking the believer. I always found it a coincidence that scientist have proven that with out a doubt the earth will be destroyed by fire. When our sun expands in about 5 million or billion years we will all perish in the flames just as predicted 2000 years ago.
I am assuming that you are discussing Peter 13. The chapter starts out my mentioning scoffers who question whether Jesus is really going to return.
Then it mentions that the day of the lord will come as a thief in the night and how he will consume the earth and the heavens with fire. So humanity will be destroyed along with the earth and the heavens with fire.
The problem is that before the sun will expand to swallow up the earth before its death, it will first start losing heat and size. So humanity will not be destroyed with fire, humanity will be destroyed with cold and ice.
Also the universe will exist long after the earth will be gone, and the stars will not be destroyed by a "great noise", and "be lit on fire". The stars will die slowly by running out of fuel.
The timing of this even is after the 1000 year period where Jesus will rule the earth (Luke 1:31-33). After this period, Satan will be released and defeated (Revelations 20:7-10), and after the final judgment the earth and the universe will be destroyed. What does the Bible say about the end of the world?
An obvious problem with this is that during this 1000 year-period before the earth is consumed by the sun it would have already have been uninhabitable for hundreds of millions of years, so no one would have been around when Jesus decided to return to earth.
The OP question is well intended but made to the wrong people. He says if you don't have proof or at least some 'facts" to support your beliefs you are irrational.
That is right, but religion is being irrational. Believers don't look for proofs, they just believe. It's the science-minded people who study-research and look for clues and proofs.
Religion is faith: they belive in the Bible because they want to (and probably, more than that, NEED TO). That's all, there is no "search for the truth" in religion, otherwise it would become a science, not religion.
I am assuming that you are discussing Peter 13. The chapter starts out my mentioning scoffers who question whether Jesus is really going to return.
Then it mentions that the day of the lord will come as a thief in the night and how he will consume the earth and the heavens with fire. So humanity will be destroyed along with the earth and the heavens with fire.
The problem is that before the sun will expand to swallow up the earth before its death, it will first start losing heat and size. So humanity will not be destroyed with fire, humanity will be destroyed with cold and ice.
Also the universe will exist long after the earth will be gone, and the stars will not be destroyed by a "great noise", and "be lit on fire". The stars will die slowly by running out of fuel.
The timing of this even is after the 1000 year period where Jesus will rule the earth (Luke 1:31-33). After this period, Satan will be released and defeated (Revelations 20:7-10), and after the final judgment the earth and the universe will be destroyed. What does the Bible say about the end of the world?
An obvious problem with this is that during this 1000 year-period before the earth is consumed by the sun it would have already have been uninhabitable for hundreds of millions of years, so no one would have been around when Jesus decided to return to earth.
Humanity will be destroyed by neither -- the sun will not begin to cool until after it has vastly increased its radius and radiant energy. The oceans will evaporate and the Earth become a cinder long before it is pulled into the sun.
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) "I think that using logic, reason, and facts it is reasonable to consider the possibility of the existence of God."
I might quote the words of Dawkins, (Darwin he is his prophet) on the subject of a sort of cosmic creative intelligence to the effect that a case can be made for the possible existence of such an entity. It is not one with which he would agree..' or something close to that - I couldn't find the exact quote.
