Down to the Rapture

Ah, Pascal's argument. Father Satan, I love that one. What if you're BOTH wrong and you're worshiping the wrong God? What if, say the Jews are right? Or the Muslims? Or what if the Christians ARE correct but you have the wrong flavor and, say, the Mormons are really The One True Religion?

 

Stev0 beat me to it. Pascal's argument is so utterly irrational it's pure idiocy. It assumes that there are only two possibilities: Either there's no god, or there's the Christian god. But the Qur'an is later than the N.T., so just as Christians claim the N.T. replaced the O.T., and Jews, who once used to be right are now wrong, so now the Muslims claim the Qur'an replaced the N.T., and Christians, who used to be right, are now wrong.

I'll offer a more rational version of Pascal's argument: Either there are gods (maybe just one, maybe many) or there are not. If you are an atheist you have a 50/50 chance of being right, but with, say 200 religions in the world, and a 50/50 chance that one of them is right, if you believe in one religion you have only one chance in 400 of being right. And if there is a god, he may punish people who believe in the wrong god worse than people who don't believe in any.

When I was in high school there was a kid from Iran. (He called it Persia.) Everyone said to me "Watch out! He'll beat you up for being an atheist." But the opposite was true. We became good friends. He figured someone who believed in no god was closer to the truth, and less blameworthy, than someone who "makes the one god into three."

As for your statement, "What's the harm giving away everything if there is no god?" First of all, I don't believe in a god who wants me to give everything away, so why should I? And second, in this UN-CHRISTIAN country where people are left to die of curable diseases if they have no money for health insurance or doctor's bills, I prefer to have enough money to keep up my very high health insurance premiums (presently $403 per month and I pay the first $5,000 out of pocket each year). I also enjoy taking the occasional trip for hiking or scuba diving or snorkeling/freediving. I have given to charity all my life, and I always give to panhandlers unless I'm driving and it's unsafe to stop. But I see no reason to give everything away because I don't claim to believe in a god who said I should. But Bible literalists sure have to twist Jesus's words to avoid the obvious truth, that only the poor would inherit the kingdom of god.

 

You both have free will to think and do as you like, isn't that grand? Why don't you extend that same courtesy to others without the denigrating comments? BTW dan it's the meek that inherit the kingdom of God.

 

Considering you consider anything but "Why yes, you are 100% correct" to be a "denigrating comment", I'll welcome you to be the first to show courtesy and allow non-worshipers to be non-worshipers in peace.

 

Ha. Well at least as far as this forum is concerned, we all know who stirs the pot and gets these threads going... don't we? If that person showed the same courtesy...

 

I agree 100%. Go back to page 62, and you'll see I bumped this thread because I went back to it and saw posts by somebody I sincerely respected and miss. Then the insults were immediately flung and the pot, as you said, was stirred by some member by the name of Spiderman. Please tell HIM to start showing courtesy, since he was the one who started with the mud-flinging.

 

Right. *wink, wink*. If I misinterpreted your intentions on bringing this post back to life, my humble apologies.

 

Apology accepted.

 

When I see crap, I call it crap. Calling it "religion" does not mean I have to respect it. Now, I've never said you don't have the right to believe in crap, so I extend to you the same "free will" you extend to me. The difference is that you threaten me with hell for being a non-believer, whereas I grant you the same fate I expect for myself after we die: non-existent oblivion.

And I really thought you knew your Bible better: In Matthew the meek shall inherit the Earth, but in Luke the poor shall inherit the kingdom of god.

 

AFAIK not one evangelizing thread or thread threatening eternal damnation in hell has ever been started here yet dan and his ilk are constantly accusing some good and decent people here of such. In fact they constantly use denigrating foul language in their hate infused anti-religious threads and posts. Sorta reminds me of the liberals and the progressive left pointing their finger of hate at the right over the Tucson, AZ tragedy only to realize that the public isn't fooled, they know exactly where the hate comes from because the haters have three of their own fingers pointing straight back at them. :rockon:

 

This whole thread from the #1 OP was a mocking disparaging thread painting many good people with the same brush.

 

P.S. I miss the days, before the neo-cons realized what a good car the Prius is, when Prius Chat was all tree-huggers.

 

Wasn't that the Garden of Heathens?

They weren't Jews...
They weren't Christians...
They weren't Muslims...

Adam and Eve were monotheist heathens.

Yes?

No?

 

Ah yes, that mythical place where everyone knows your name and believes in the same things as you. Hate to break it to you D, it never existed unless you were talking about population me. It doesn't even exists @ my church

 

i've been a member since 05 and am a semi tree hugger. probably more honest about it than most. who would you be referring to?

 

I've said this before: If there was an ontopic thread by a hater stating the Chevy Malibu hybird sucks - therefore all hybrids suck - it would go nowhere.

The SAME type of fallacy seems to be OK on this and similar threads: cherry-picking bad examples of Christians (???) then calling them all bad apples.

You can ALWAYS find bad apples if you are determined to discredit anything. Still, I will say history is repleat with people using the church for earthly purposes. It means there are a lot of phonies/hypocrites that have defamed that faith but does not mean it's false.

 

righteous, man. ^

 

Got a question for those aligned with the more militant atheists on threads like this one:

How is going insulting and personal going to entice others to give up religion?

Is this the kind of tack good salespeople and PR professionals do?

I've seen this for years...do you really think berating someone, at times calling people such as Windstrings a complete IDIOT moves them closer to atheism? (Windstrings was called an idiot or similar about five times daily for about six months on several threads around 2006) Or for that matter, others following the thread? I'm at a total loss at members declaring secular humanism being totally rational yet reduced to badgering people they disagree with. Some on this thread are less civil than the video of Richard Dawkins I saw last night. If it's not already obvious, my beliefs are closer to Rick Warren.


Again, how is going personal at the OP the best way to win people over?

I'm very curious if it's answered what the rationale is.

 

when someone insults you because of His name, blessed are you. consider it all gain my friend.

 

Pretty much the same way Christians figure they can win over non-believers by insulting them, belittling their lack of belief, and basically saying they have no right to express their non-beliefs. Hint: it ain't working, it's not making me buy into your religion (whatever your religion may be - I'm using the generic "your" here). So by belittling those of faith (when we - and there's really no "we" but I can't think of a better pronoun - think of people of faith at all), it's called "giving up and fighting fire with fire." Or "stooping to your level," you choose whichever phrase makes you more comfortable.