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  4. Good Old Professor Dawkins [modified]

Good Old Professor Dawkins [modified]

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  • A Al Beback

    Matthew Faithfull wrote:

    You have already proved yourself wrong by claiming knowledge that you cannot have. No further proof or in fact other proof can be obtained. It is impossible to KNOW for certain what is not true.

    How does this change when you substitute the word 'God' with Santa Claus, Tooth Fairy, Leprechauns, Mermaids, Dragons, etc. Until there's evidence of any of these beings, isn't it correct to say that we know that they don't exist nor have they ever existed? There are plenty of books (hundreds of years old even) that mention their existence -- yet we know they don't exist. There may even be people who claim to have felt their presence -- yet we know they don't exist. But God somehow doesn't subscribe to this logic. Is it because of his awesome magical powers? Or because there are lots of regular folks who claim to believe in him? Or because of the age of the Bible? Perhaps it's just fear of the unknown -- the afterlife. What compels you?

    Obama's plan gives me a $400 per year tax cut. McCain's plan gives me a $80 per year tax cut. Would rather be one of the lucky few to have taxes raised by Obama. (Someone on the Internet)

    7 Offline
    7 Offline
    73Zeppelin
    wrote on last edited by
    #101

    Al Beback wrote:

    What compels you?

    "The power of Christ compels you!" :laugh:

    "If only God would give me some clear sign! Like making a large deposit in my name in a Swiss bank."

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    • 7 73Zeppelin

      Ka?l wrote:

      Can you prove there is no God or is it just a belief?

      That's a non-argument. The onus of proof isn't on those who don't believe, it's on those that do. If you want to invoke the concept of 'god', then it's up to you to prove his existence, it's not up to others to demonstrate his non-existence.

      "If only God would give me some clear sign! Like making a large deposit in my name in a Swiss bank."

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      Rob Graham
      wrote on last edited by
      #102

      I don't think Karl was making an argument, but rather asking a perfectly valid question raised by Dave's discomfort with the lack of certainty created by the word "probably" in the statement to be placed on the buses. That discomfort suggests the Dave is certain, and if so, it is fair to ask how he arrives at that certainty.

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      • A Al Beback

        Matthew Faithfull wrote:

        You have already proved yourself wrong by claiming knowledge that you cannot have. No further proof or in fact other proof can be obtained. It is impossible to KNOW for certain what is not true.

        How does this change when you substitute the word 'God' with Santa Claus, Tooth Fairy, Leprechauns, Mermaids, Dragons, etc. Until there's evidence of any of these beings, isn't it correct to say that we know that they don't exist nor have they ever existed? There are plenty of books (hundreds of years old even) that mention their existence -- yet we know they don't exist. There may even be people who claim to have felt their presence -- yet we know they don't exist. But God somehow doesn't subscribe to this logic. Is it because of his awesome magical powers? Or because there are lots of regular folks who claim to believe in him? Or because of the age of the Bible? Perhaps it's just fear of the unknown -- the afterlife. What compels you?

        Obama's plan gives me a $400 per year tax cut. McCain's plan gives me a $80 per year tax cut. Would rather be one of the lucky few to have taxes raised by Obama. (Someone on the Internet)

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        Matthew Faithfull
        wrote on last edited by
        #103

        Al Beback wrote:

        isn't it correct to say that we know that they don't exist nor have they ever existed?

        Indeed it is correct because we made them up, rather than them making us up as in the case of God. When Ravel's bed goblin (see other part of this thread) turns to him and says, you don't exist then Ravel will know one of two things for sure. Either he's a deity or he's quite mad. If you want evidence for the existence of God, look in the mirror, not because you are God but because you are made in the image of God and you are fearfully and wonderfully made.

        Al Beback wrote:

        What compels you?

        The spirit of God and until you have been so compelled it is impossible to comprehend what that is like.

        "The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)

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        • 7 73Zeppelin

          Al Beback wrote:

          What compels you?

          "The power of Christ compels you!" :laugh:

          "If only God would give me some clear sign! Like making a large deposit in my name in a Swiss bank."

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          M Offline
          Matthew Faithfull
          wrote on last edited by
          #104

          :-D :cool::rose:Hurrah! Zep has scored a direct hit! Well done old chap you hit the nail on the head. :-D

          "The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)

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          • 7 73Zeppelin

            Al Beback wrote:

            What compels you?

            "The power of Christ compels you!" :laugh:

            "If only God would give me some clear sign! Like making a large deposit in my name in a Swiss bank."

            A Offline
            A Offline
            Al Beback
            wrote on last edited by
            #105

            73Zeppelin wrote:

            "The power of Christ compels you!"

            Of course. :doh: :)

            Obama's plan gives me a $400 per year tax cut. McCain's plan gives me a $80 per year tax cut. Would rather be one of the lucky few to have taxes raised by Obama. (Someone on the Internet)

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            • D Dalek Dave

              Putting your money where your mouth is[^] I object to the word 'Probably'. But it will cause an absolute flame war, so good! Here are the donations so far[^]. All within about 3 hours!

              ------------------------------------ "October: This is one of the peculiarly dangerous months to speculate in stocks in." - Mark Twain

              modified on Tuesday, October 21, 2008 5:05 AM

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              hairy_hats
              wrote on last edited by
              #106

              The BBC are now running this story: "Stephen Green of pressure group Christian Voice said: 'Bendy-buses, like atheism, are a danger to the public at large.' "

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              • M Matthew Faithfull

                :-D :cool::rose:Hurrah! Zep has scored a direct hit! Well done old chap you hit the nail on the head. :-D

                "The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)

                7 Offline
                7 Offline
                73Zeppelin
                wrote on last edited by
                #107

                :laugh: Right over your head at supersonic speed! ZZZZOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMM!

                "If only God would give me some clear sign! Like making a large deposit in my name in a Swiss bank."

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                • M Matthew Faithfull

                  Al Beback wrote:

                  isn't it correct to say that we know that they don't exist nor have they ever existed?

                  Indeed it is correct because we made them up, rather than them making us up as in the case of God. When Ravel's bed goblin (see other part of this thread) turns to him and says, you don't exist then Ravel will know one of two things for sure. Either he's a deity or he's quite mad. If you want evidence for the existence of God, look in the mirror, not because you are God but because you are made in the image of God and you are fearfully and wonderfully made.

                  Al Beback wrote:

                  What compels you?

                  The spirit of God and until you have been so compelled it is impossible to comprehend what that is like.

                  "The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)

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                  Al Beback
                  wrote on last edited by
                  #108

                  Matthew Faithfull wrote:

                  The spirit of God and until you have been so compelled it is impossible to comprehend what that is like.

                  But you hear crazy people say the same things and we call them crazy. I'm not saying you're crazy, but surely you can agree that if you were the only person in your town/city going around professing your belief in the supernatural, you'd be committed or at least dismissed as a loon. Why keep making excuses for God? If he really wants us to belief and worship his perfect ass, why doesn't he show himself? Why would that be a bad thing?

                  Obama's plan gives me a $400 per year tax cut. McCain's plan gives me a $80 per year tax cut. Would rather be one of the lucky few to have taxes raised by Obama. (Someone on the Internet)

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                  • A Al Beback

                    Matthew Faithfull wrote:

                    The spirit of God and until you have been so compelled it is impossible to comprehend what that is like.

                    But you hear crazy people say the same things and we call them crazy. I'm not saying you're crazy, but surely you can agree that if you were the only person in your town/city going around professing your belief in the supernatural, you'd be committed or at least dismissed as a loon. Why keep making excuses for God? If he really wants us to belief and worship his perfect ass, why doesn't he show himself? Why would that be a bad thing?

                    Obama's plan gives me a $400 per year tax cut. McCain's plan gives me a $80 per year tax cut. Would rather be one of the lucky few to have taxes raised by Obama. (Someone on the Internet)

                    M Offline
                    M Offline
                    Matthew Faithfull
                    wrote on last edited by
                    #109

                    Al Beback wrote:

                    But you hear crazy people say the same things and we call them crazy. I'm not saying you're crazy, but surely you can agree that if you were the only person in your town/city going around professing your belief in the supernatural, you'd be committed or at least dismissed as a loon.

                    Indeed, probably worse, many hundreds of people are killed every year for their Christian belief all over the world. In the old USSR they certianly were declared mad, drugged and imprisoned in many cases.

                    Al Beback wrote:

                    Why keep making excuses for God? If he really wants us to belief and worship his perfect ass, why doesn't he show himself? Why would that be a bad thing?

                    :laugh: He has, what do think the New Testaement part of the Bible is all about. God has not only revealed himself to us and lived a perfect life among us, he has been punished for the things we have done wrong so that we can go free. He has satisfied his own perfect justice by paying its cost himself through his sacrificial death on our behalf. Now that our debt to his justice has been paid we can have a restored relationship with him and an eternal life with him. It not the he needs our worship, it's that we need to be in a restored worshipful relationship with him because that is what we were made for.

                    "The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)

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                    • M Matthew Faithfull

                      Oakman wrote:

                      Does He talk to you, Matthew?

                      Yes.

                      Oakman wrote:

                      Does He tell you to embarrass Him by prattling on like this

                      If you know he's embarrassed then he clearly talks to you. Or maybe someone else does because he's always rather keen on spreading the good news when he talks to me.

                      "The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)

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                      Oakman
                      wrote on last edited by
                      #110

                      Matthew Faithfull wrote:

                      If you know he's embarrassed then he clearly talks to you. Or maybe someone else does because he's always rather keen on spreading the good news when he talks to me.

                      Never said I knew it, but I can't imagine any self-respecting Master of the Universe* not being embaressed. *Grayskull!

                      Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface

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                      • M Matthew Faithfull

                        Please, the Pharaseas, the guardians of Jewish customs, practices and religeous laws, looked for every oppotunity to trap him, trip him up, kill him, as soon as his popularity amongst those they condemned as outcasts and sinners, mostly for being poor, became a threat to them. They accused him of breaking the sabbath, they famously accused him of blasphemy in front of the High Priest. You really are an odd fish for someone who claims to know his bible so much better then me.

                        "The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)

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                        O Offline
                        Oakman
                        wrote on last edited by
                        #111

                        Matthew Faithfull wrote:

                        Please, the Pharaseas, the guardians of Jewish customs, practices and religeous laws, looked for every oppotunity to trap him, trip him up, kill him, as soon as his popularity amongst those they condemned as outcasts and sinners, mostly for being poor, became a threat to them.

                        So you've switched from constantly to in the last stages of his ministry?

                        Matthew Faithfull wrote:

                        You really are an odd fish for someone who claims to know his bible so much better then me.

                        I even know how to spell Pharisee

                        Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface

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                        • O Oakman

                          Matthew Faithfull wrote:

                          If you know he's embarrassed then he clearly talks to you. Or maybe someone else does because he's always rather keen on spreading the good news when he talks to me.

                          Never said I knew it, but I can't imagine any self-respecting Master of the Universe* not being embaressed. *Grayskull!

                          Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface

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                          M Offline
                          Matthew Faithfull
                          wrote on last edited by
                          #112

                          I apologize for exceeding the limits of your imagination. I'll try not to do so again for a few days at least. :)

                          "The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)

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                          • O Oakman

                            Matthew Faithfull wrote:

                            Please, the Pharaseas, the guardians of Jewish customs, practices and religeous laws, looked for every oppotunity to trap him, trip him up, kill him, as soon as his popularity amongst those they condemned as outcasts and sinners, mostly for being poor, became a threat to them.

                            So you've switched from constantly to in the last stages of his ministry?

                            Matthew Faithfull wrote:

                            You really are an odd fish for someone who claims to know his bible so much better then me.

                            I even know how to spell Pharisee

                            Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface

                            M Offline
                            M Offline
                            Matthew Faithfull
                            wrote on last edited by
                            #113

                            Oakman wrote:

                            So you've switched from constantly to in the last stages of his ministry?

                            No I've given you an example.

                            Oakman wrote:

                            I even know how to spell Pharisee

                            Good, now go back to Gallilee and try not to get pushed off a cliff. ;P

                            "The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)

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                            • S soap brain

                              I hate you.

                              O Offline
                              O Offline
                              Oakman
                              wrote on last edited by
                              #114

                              Ravel H. Joyce wrote:

                              I hate you.

                              If you can't stand the heat stay out of the kitchen. I truly admire the way you can slug it out with Ilion. You've pwned his ass more than once. But if you can handle getting as good as you give, then you're no better than he is.

                              Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface

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                              • K KaRl

                                73Zeppelin wrote:

                                That's a non-argument

                                It's a question.

                                73Zeppelin wrote:

                                The onus of proof isn't on those who don't believe, it's on those that do

                                So what you say is that nonexistence of anything is considered as true unless proven otherwise, right? That is saying 'There is no exoplanets' was true until we discovered some of them. Woops. Any proposal has to be demonstrated to be considered as true. Before that it is plausible, or not. The current status on God is that we don't know, no one having been able yet to prove neither its/his/her existence nor its/his/her nonexistence.


                                Where do you expect us to go when the bombs fall?

                                Fold with us! ¤ flickr

                                L Offline
                                L Offline
                                Lost User
                                wrote on last edited by
                                #115

                                Tell me how to prove that something doesn't exist.

                                - F

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                                • M Matthew Faithfull

                                  Oakman wrote:

                                  So you've switched from constantly to in the last stages of his ministry?

                                  No I've given you an example.

                                  Oakman wrote:

                                  I even know how to spell Pharisee

                                  Good, now go back to Gallilee and try not to get pushed off a cliff. ;P

                                  "The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)

                                  O Offline
                                  O Offline
                                  Oakman
                                  wrote on last edited by
                                  #116

                                  Matthew Faithfull wrote:

                                  No I've given you an example.

                                  But where are the examples from the beginning of his ministry?

                                  Matthew Faithfull wrote:

                                  Good, now go back to Gallilee and try not to get pushed off a cliff.

                                  There is no profit in getting on her in Gallilee.

                                  Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface

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                                  • M Matthew Faithfull

                                    I apologize for exceeding the limits of your imagination. I'll try not to do so again for a few days at least. :)

                                    "The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)

                                    O Offline
                                    O Offline
                                    Oakman
                                    wrote on last edited by
                                    #117

                                    Matthew Faithfull wrote:

                                    I apologize for exceeding the limits of your imagination.

                                    My friend, I wish you would, just once, say something so startlingly original or imaginative that it even approached the limits of my imagination or threatened to stretch my mind. Instead, everything you say I heard over and over again before I was 21. Your "Good News" is no longer news.

                                    Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface

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                                    • L Lost User

                                      Tell me how to prove that something doesn't exist.

                                      - F

                                      K Offline
                                      K Offline
                                      KaRl
                                      wrote on last edited by
                                      #118

                                      Isn't it possible to demonstrate something is not possible?

                                      If you kill a whale, you get Greenpeace and Jacques Cousteau on your back, but wipe out sardines and you get a canning subsidy! Fold with us! ¤ flickr

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                                      • L Lost User

                                        Tell me how to prove that something doesn't exist.

                                        - F

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                                        O Offline
                                        Oakman
                                        wrote on last edited by
                                        #119

                                        Fisticuffs wrote:

                                        Tell me how to prove that something doesn't exist.

                                        Cover a candle with a glass.

                                        Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface

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                                        • O Oakman

                                          Matthew Faithfull wrote:

                                          No I've given you an example.

                                          But where are the examples from the beginning of his ministry?

                                          Matthew Faithfull wrote:

                                          Good, now go back to Gallilee and try not to get pushed off a cliff.

                                          There is no profit in getting on her in Gallilee.

                                          Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface

                                          M Offline
                                          M Offline
                                          Matthew Faithfull
                                          wrote on last edited by
                                          #120

                                          Considering the start of this line of argument I suggest you look at Mark 7.

                                          "The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)

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