Six Questions that Christians Refuse To Answer. (soul, translation, hell)
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1. Are there two or more kinds of "nothing" in the universe? Explain.
2. Are the well-established rules for an organism's environmental requirements (habitat, specific foods, & various other critical elements like temp, humidity, seasonality, and so on..) and reproductive ecology different for God's world than for the real universe?
3. Did He suspend reality while He also required extra time to make His universe, instead of using His claimed omnipotential powers?
4. Were all the rules for interactive biochemistry, geology, astronomy etc., temporarily set aside for God's Genesis events? And if so, did He then return them all, including the behavior of radioactive decay within specific elements etc. back to their rational pre- Genesis status? Why?
5. Is it OK to just hand-wavingly dismiss all intellectual reasoning in mindless, thoughtless support of a specific Abrahamic Christianity version, to the total exclusion of logic and reality? Knowing of course that there are also numerous alternate Genesis stories in the world's many many other religions.
6. Why are other far more advanced (at the time..) societies, such as the historically accurate and "date-stamped" writings of the Chinese, ultimately ignored? You know: those whose advanced and far more "scientific" culture pre-empted and pre-existed those droning ME Simpleton's multi-versional writings? These advanced scholars obviously did not note nor document such things as the total inundation of their lands, cultures and thoughts.
As in: Why is the particularly humorous, egregious and absolutely illogical Noah's Ark story taken as The God's Own Absolute Truth, when, for example, the Egyptians, Chinese, other Asian societies, as well as the northern European Explorer societies, and so on, are all simplistically dismissed out of hand?
Hmmm?
(Prediction: no answer. silence is their only answer, since abject fear will always taketh a bite out of their quivering minds..)
I'll give 'em a week and then I'll give the answers myself, because I would have been a helluva Bible-apologists if I had been any kindova Bible-apologist.
1. Are there two or more kinds of "nothing" in the universe? Explain.
2. Are the well-established rules for an organism's environmental requirements (habitat, specific foods, & various other critical elements like temp, humidity, seasonality, and so on..) and reproductive ecology different for God's world than for the real universe?
3. Did He suspend reality while He also required extra time to make His universe, instead of using His claimed omnipotential powers?
4. Were all the rules for interactive biochemistry, geology, astronomy etc., temporarily set aside for God's Genesis events? And if so, did He then return them all, including the behavior of radioactive decay within specific elements etc. back to their rational pre- Genesis status? Why?
5. Is it OK to just hand-wavingly dismiss all intellectual reasoning in mindless, thoughtless support of a specific Abrahamic Christianity version, to the total exclusion of logic and reality? Knowing of course that there are also numerous alternate Genesis stories in the world's many many other religions.
6. Why are other far more advanced (at the time..) societies, such as the historically accurate and "date-stamped" writings of the Chinese, ultimately ignored? You know: those whose advanced and far more "scientific" culture pre-empted and pre-existed those droning ME Simpleton's multi-versional writings? These advanced scholars obviously did not note nor document such things as the total inundation of their lands, cultures and thoughts.
As in: Why is the particularly humorous, egregious and absolutely illogical Noah's Ark story taken as The God's Own Absolute Truth, when, for example, the Egyptians, Chinese, other Asian societies, as well as the northern European Explorer societies, and so on, are all simplistically dismissed out of hand?
Hmmm?
(Prediction: no answer. silence is their only answer, since abject fear will always taketh a bite out of their quivering minds..)
(Oh, and don't forget to enjoy your Sunday church sermon today!)
1. I don't understand the question, or what relation it has to Christianity.
2. Nope.
3. See No. 1. And No. 4.
4. Uh...dude, I hate to break this to you, but the creation story in Genesis is not meant to be taken literally. The first chapter is a poem about creation--read it sometime. There's a rhythm to it. God is not Merlin the Magician who just waves his hands and things appear. That's a human POV.
5. Nope.
6. They aren't. Like the biblical Creation story, the Noah's Ark story is just one culture's version of a story that appears in many other cultures--a great flood, somebody survives it, etc. Probably based on some natural event--I vote for the idea that the last ice age may have ended rather quickly because certain late Pleistocene animals disappeared faster than usual. Not an expert in that field so I'm not going to argue about it, just basing it on things I've read over time.
So, there ya go. I'm a Christian, and I didn't refuse to answer. I've no idea what these questions have to do with Christianity, and I'm pretty sure you just like to argue with the fundamentalist types who believe in biblical infallibility and set this post up to get the argument started.
(Prediction: no answer. silence is their only answer, since abject fear will always taketh a bite out of their quivering minds..)
Come on rifleman, there are plenty of reasons people choose not to respond to every question that someone poses to them. Fear is only one of many of them. I'm not going to answer your questions because I guess I just don't see them as particularly relevant to what I actually believe. I'm not a young-earth creationist nor do I interpret the Bible literally, so I don't think you'd have much fun with my answers anyway. I'd say they'd probably pretty much be the same as MightyQueen's.
Rifleman, give it a rest. Don't assume you speak about all "Christians" because this is a strawman.
Quote:
Originally Posted by rifleman
Here they are:
1. Are there two or more kinds of "nothing" in the universe? Explain.
There is empty space between matter. Effectively, air. Not really nothing, but to our eyes yes. There is darkness (the absence of light, therefore also nothing). Essentially, what nothing is, is the absence of whatever should be there. Entropy is the absence of energy, etc.
2. Are the well-established rules for an organism's environmental requirements (habitat, specific foods, & various other critical elements like temp, humidity, seasonality, and so on..) and reproductive ecology different for God's world than for the real universe?
We are assuming that they are within the ideal temperature, etc for that plant/animal/etc. There are different climates to suit them, much like a zoo. Now, assuming God's world was ideal for everything and not a Heaven for animals, but plants and the like get eaten (making it their Hell), it is assumed that our bodies can somehow produce/retain their own energy without the need of food.
3. Did He suspend reality while He also required extra time to make His universe, instead of using His claimed omnipotential powers?
It isn't time compression. Mercury and Venus vs the Earth has shorter years than Earth, and Jupiter and Saturn have longer years due to rotation around the sun. A being outside the universe, would then have infinite years with regard to time. Whatever God is made of, may measure time by half-life, but more probably, any being called God is made of energy, not matter, and is in a constant state of flux.
4. Were all the rules for interactive biochemistry, geology, astronomy etc., temporarily set aside for God's Genesis events? And if so, did He then return them all, including the behavior of radioactive decay within specific elements etc. back to their rational pre- Genesis status? Why?
3 and 4 are part of the same question. "Does God suspend the laws of the universe so he can do this creation thing?" You've got this screwy mental image of God turning on some sort of miracle device "Okay, suspend reality now." If one is to realistically believe in God in the modern age, who is not a nutter evangelist, we have to accept the premise of post-Enlightenment scientific thinking. That is, the universe runs by laws such as gravity. There may be loopholes (flight in birds/airplanes), but it operates under such laws. God didn't suspend such laws, God made and used them to make the universe.
5. Is it OK to just hand-wavingly dismiss all intellectual reasoning in mindless, thoughtless support of a specific Abrahamic Christianity version, to the total exclusion of logic and reality? Knowing of course that there are also numerous alternate Genesis stories in the world's many many other religions.
Again, you're not actually asking anything new. We're still on question 3-4 premise. Moving on...
6. Why are other far more advanced (at the time..) societies, such as the historically accurate and "date-stamped" writings of the Chinese, ultimately ignored? You know: those whose advanced and far more "scientific" culture pre-empted and pre-existed those droning ME Simpleton's multi-versional writings? These advanced scholars obviously did not note nor document such things as the total inundation of their lands, cultures and thoughts.
As in: Why is the particularly humorous, egregious and absolutely illogical Noah's Ark story taken as The God's Own Absolute Truth, when, for example, the Egyptians, Chinese, other Asian societies, as well as the northern European Explorer societies, and so on, are all simplistically dismissed out of hand?
Hmmm?
Finally, a new question. Okay, what's big deal? I've read the Epic of Gilgamesh. I think there was also a Japanese ark story. You know what that seems to say? There was a flood. Ditto for the stories of Nephilim (half-human, half-angel) and other crossbreeding stories throughout the world.
(Prediction: no answer. silence is their only answer, since abject fear will always taketh a bite out of their quivering minds..)
(Oh, and don't forget to enjoy your Sunday church sermon today!)
So, ummm what were you wanting me to be afraid of?
Five Questions That Fill Any Atheist With Terror (using the same absurd strawman that all of a group are exactly alike, and yea these questions aren't much better):
1. If as you say, consciousness ends, what does your mind shutting off at the end of your life feel like?
2. You've decided you exist, and nobody created you. How then can't you prove you aren't just part of something else's dream, and not real at all?
3. What is the point of life if there's nothing after it? Yea, I've heard "make the most of your life". But how do you do that when everything you make eventually falls apart, everything you say gets misunderstood, and everything you do turns out to be just another way of wasting time?
4. Most people see life from their own perspective. Is there any way to know if your birth was not the first moment of history, and your death is the last, and everyone else is part of a fabricated reality lying to you? I could be one of "them" and you'd never know.
Rifleman, give it a rest. Don't assume you speak about all "Christians" because this is a strawman.
I just kind of assume he's addressing the fundamentalists.
If, Rifleman, you're addressing all Christians I'm afraid you'll have to wait. Question #1 has caused me to ponder the very meaning of nothingness and whenever I ponder the very meaning of nothingness it's just sort of one giant 60's flashback which causes me see visions of..... nothingness. Which would probably be Gary Lewis and the Playboys. That group was the definition of nothingness.
1. Are there two or more kinds of "nothing" in the universe? Explain.
2. Are the well-established rules for an organism's environmental requirements (habitat, specific foods, & various other critical elements like temp, humidity, seasonality, and so on..) and reproductive ecology different for God's world than for the real universe?
3. Did He suspend reality while He also required extra time to make His universe, instead of using His claimed omnipotential powers?
4. Were all the rules for interactive biochemistry, geology, astronomy etc., temporarily set aside for God's Genesis events? And if so, did He then return them all, including the behavior of radioactive decay within specific elements etc. back to their rational pre- Genesis status? Why?
5. Is it OK to just hand-wavingly dismiss all intellectual reasoning in mindless, thoughtless support of a specific Abrahamic Christianity version, to the total exclusion of logic and reality? Knowing of course that there are also numerous alternate Genesis stories in the world's many many other religions.
6. Why are other far more advanced (at the time..) societies, such as the historically accurate and "date-stamped" writings of the Chinese, ultimately ignored? You know: those whose advanced and far more "scientific" culture pre-empted and pre-existed those droning ME Simpleton's multi-versional writings? These advanced scholars obviously did not note nor document such things as the total inundation of their lands, cultures and thoughts.
As in: Why is the particularly humorous, egregious and absolutely illogical Noah's Ark story taken as The God's Own Absolute Truth, when, for example, the Egyptians, Chinese, other Asian societies, as well as the northern European Explorer societies, and so on, are all simplistically dismissed out of hand?
Hmmm?
(Prediction: no answer. silence is their only answer, since abject fear will always taketh a bite out of their quivering minds..)
The universe was created out of nothing by a God who came from... ooopsss. Nothing.
But when we state it probably came about through some natural molecular interaction, we're steadfastly and absolutely told "Oh, but how can all this come from nothing? Huh? Answer me that one, oh atheist smartypants!" So.. izzhat the same "nothing" that we did indeed arise from, sans God?
As to Q4: then how is it He disregards all of it when literalists (who, you bet, are exactly who I'm addressing here, since they for sure come out in droves whenever I ask some questions.) try to out-logic us on the subject? Viz: the Ark's wonderful ecosystem, and only 3500 of the several million known species including the aquatic ones?
Salinity is a critical environmental factor, you know... I've been told so many times that "water is water, dummy!" and that therefore Noah did not have to take any of the fresh or salt-water fish or oceanic plant life on-board. And what about 18 mo of inundation for all the land plant species? What, are you guy really that eco-dumb? Seems so.
Angry? What a hoot that is. I'm just trying to get a rise out of the usual defensive and combative types, like Vizio, or tigetmax, or others here who insist on specific literal translations.
From bulmabriefs, this: "3 and 4 are part of the same question. "Does God suspend the laws of the universe so he can do this creation thing?" You've got this screwy mental image of God turning on some sort of miracle device "Okay, suspend reality now." If one is to realistically believe in God in the modern age, who is not a nutter evangelist, we have to accept the premise of post-Enlightenment scientific thinking. That is, the universe runs by laws such as gravity. There may be loopholes (flight in birds/airplanes), but it operates under such laws. God didn't suspend such laws, God made and used them to make the universe."
I have this idea? Sorry: It's you. You've got it so very wrong, bulma. It's the literalistá Christians who have this wild but hugely errant idea. That it's OK for natural interactions and laws of physics to exist now, but somehow God turned them all off when He was busying Himself making up an entirely new Universe. That's not my idea: it's fundy Christianity all the way down.
Btw, airplane or bird flight hardly "suspends gravity". The basic equation for sustained flight is lift (an upward vector) due to the shape of the wing, plus gravity acting as a negative vector downwards, then thrust, a positive force vector to the front (via wing or propeller motion), and finally drag,(rearwards force vector) which is a result of friction over all aspects of the aeroform."
Ain't science wunnerfull?
Frankly, I have no argument with any rational conservative Christian who understands these ancient written God actions are ALL metaphors, and really did not ever happen. Like a 6 day Genesis (during which God had to, according to recent revisionist versions, add in literally millions of years, since geology and other facts have proven, even to the most literate Christians, that it did indeed take that long. Billions of years, in fact)
Wow! God musta been real tired if He had to change the concepts of time. just soz He could get'r dunnn...). as with His famed Insta-Poof Creationism, or claims from the "There's absolutely no evidence for Evolution!" types. Whom, unless you guys are all blind, turn up here relentlessly. More than I do.
As for everything I (as a militant sad and angry atheist... ) might do in my limited life, I do try to be ethical, generous, kind, giving, understanding to those who are really in need of physical or psychological help. But this is hardly how atheists are typically portrayed by devout and indeed defensive and hostile Christians! We are indeed sad and lonely types, devoid of any of the Christian's vast storehouse of personal satisfaction and joy. Despite that the vast majority of terrible and tyrannical global strife has been attributed to endless religious infighting. It comes form defensive Xtians who do not appreciate that their endless proselytizing be criticized. After all, they are right, right?
As in: tell me, bulma, who is it who comes knocking at my door on a Sunday afternoon? A roving band of "can't shut up" atheists? Hardly. As to that pernicious and invasive nonsense, I do not need the WatchTower or any other blithering tract silliness-guidelines (along with the usual "do you want to be saved from Hell, brother?" blitherations...) just to support an immature and unthinking mind.
Such as a small book of ancient but contradictory words to tell me what to do and when, all in order to Glorify and Rejoice in some invented God.
Now, as for when when I die, I'll just be gone. Like I was before I was born (Btw, who were you? do you remember? Then you don't know, now do you?) I'd more accurately suggest your consciousness is a simple function of a well-evolved set of neuronal connections, or do you fully understand all of that topic as well, down to the level of biochemical interactions? I thought not.
Btw, research has clearly shown that when some of those connections are lost, as the results of injurious brain damage or tumor or other surgery, it does indeed short-circuit specific mappable functionalities and levels of consciousness. After all, why else have that mah-bel-us brain if we only need God to guide our every move? It's simply not logical, as Spock would say.
So.. being an atheist after having been a once-devout Christian puts me in a far more educated and experienced position than fundamentalist Christians who most obviously have not even tried, as I state in my OP, to figure it out. To even consider it for a brief moment. Ever. It's always a clear auto-reject. The consequences of fact are far too frightening to that crowd.
Specifically, "Just continue the chanting and Gd will surely love you! We promise!"
Meantime, this "angry, sad and desperate atheist" is enjoying making sourdough bread (I even get to watch God make the yeast behave!), then off to do my hobby stuff, then I'll read a bit of some American History, including how Christianity had damaged so much of that society's independent thought back in "the day".
All quite enjoyable for an angry and sad-hearted ethically bereft nut! But then, I may later come on back to pester the heck out of those who are so easily pestered!
I also also note that obedience-trained mandatory religionism is hardly worthy of a mature individual's time and efforts, to openly waste so much of it in pointless obligation and mandated rote-chanting. And then... ooops!... you also just die, desperate to be free of those nagging little questions about "Oh but... what if I've been wrong all along! Help me, rifleman™! You are our only hope!".
Finally, as for Mike930's lucid comment:
[b]"The OP comes across as a very angry and insecure person. Fear will do that to you.
I actually pity him."[/B]
Well then, please... send lots of money instead of putting it in the donation tray. I need help, I tell you, and only money can do the trick for a depraved soul such as myself!
Last edited by rifleman; 08-25-2013 at 04:37 PM..
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Nothing like pity from a devout fundy! Thanks!
