warri0r45

Sounds fine by me. Pre update I would have said bugger off, it'll compromise my education and take up time to learn what it is I actually need to know but the fact that it needs to be legislated with a teacher and actually thought out makes it much more potentially productive and less disruptive.

O Warrior, where art thou? I hath spoken (last page). :lol:

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(1) Adaptation but not evolution? Adaptation happens via evolution, defender. I reccomend studying genetics and how evolution actually works. The fact that evolution - a change in the allele frequencies of a population over time - happens for anything with DNA is fact. You can believe otherwise all you like but you'll just be semantically dancing around the fact that a genetically evolving process happens by saying 'adaptation happens, evolution does not.' Tell me, why on earth does evolution have anything to do with your faith in Christ? I'll tell you. It's because you're afraid your literal reading of the bible is being compromised. It has nothing to do with your rational train of thought or critical analysis. (2) You're right. Evolution dose't happen in these situations at all. Populations evolve, not individuals. Again, I reccomed a study of genetics. If you at all want to learn why evolution happens, which I don't think you do because you are not interested in any fact that may change your mind, ask and I'll provide information.

I like your honesty.

Yep, I heard that one when reading through the articles I posted. As in a previous post of mine, I totally agree that you should use your mindset or faith to make you feel better if you want, just don't substitute a doctor for it. Way to dangerous and with disturbing consequences.

You know if it weren't for faith I'd be dumbfounded as to why people freely suggest god is even all knwoing. To know that, we'd have to know each thing that he knows and thus also be all knowing. So an all knowing being can only be known to be all knowing if the being asserting he's all knowing is all knowing. :? Anyway I'll take this opportunity to bring back a previous post of mine. Hypothetical. 1) God has a pair of dice and every time he rolls two sixes, a person dies. 2) He knows fully well that the chance of any outcome occuring is independant of his rolling of the dice. 3) He is all knowing and he forsees millions of people dieing. 4) He does nothing to stop this even though he is equally all powerful and could quite easily let the dice roll but go through an eternity of possibilities until he comes up with no double sixes. Ever. Did god choose this eternity of no double six rolls to roll as they did? If you say yes, how do you know you have free will? How do you know that god didn't go through all possibilities for all choices, ever, and come up with the one we call reality which is so seemingly free that we assume we are acting independantly of any predestination? If you say no, how can you call god loving and forgiving? So god is either manipulative or sadistic. Or, he's not all knowing and all powerful. Take your pick, and feel fre to poke holes in my argument, it's pretty ad hoc.

I quote myself here because: a) I'm an attention seeker and nobody seemed to even read my post and B) i think this is an interesting point Or, the christian god may contain too much sugar or fat and Buddha is a tuna and cucumber sandwich. Possible? (and no, don't take offence, I'm not making fun of your post)

"What's the difference between some drugs and the power of the mind to heal" My response was that the power of the mind does not heal; if you have cancer and think you don't, it's not going to heal. You may get more time from the placebo effect, which as I understand has been documented for some diseases (as far as I've read, the stress relief helps), but you don't get cured from the placebo effect alone. Hence the morphine example; it supresses pain which is the result of you being harmed but dosen't stop you being harmed, just like placebo supresses the notion that you are sick but it dosen't cure your sickness. I hope this makes how I was responding to your original post clearer. You use the mind to believe, to hope, to have faith, to GET better, not put your mind away from it. Using the same example you did, cancer, im sure everyone knows how many cancer survivors used the will to get better even when doctors said nothing could be done. Im not defending some guy that says they touch you and you will be better, im saying the mind can do amazing things, and one of them is to heal or help heal something. What triggers that event could be anything, a book, a quote...if it is triggered by someone touching you...let it be...if it works...good Yes, if your mindset actually cures, great (although a little basis for this claim wouldn't go astray). As for those that get better even though doctors gave them no chance, GREAT! The point I'd like to put out there now is at least they went to the doctor and did everything they could instead of turning thier head at modern medicine because they believed faith had healed them. There was nothing more disturbing when reading through the articles I posted than a woman who discarded a brace with advice on faith only to find the following day her backbone collapsed and she died four months later. I don't care if your faith or optimistic outlook does heal you. All I ask is that no one takes the word of a faith healer over a doctor. Seriously, read the potential repercussions of doing this and you'll be pretty disturbed. Even more disturbing than the broken backbone story is when parents take the cures of faith healers over doctors only to find their kids dead in due course... and themselves with a serious criminal neglect charge over thier heads.

Exactly. This was exactly the rationale behind my morphine point. A mind over body phenomenon dosen't take away the fact that there is damage just like the fact that one percieves no pain due to morphine dosen't make the damage cured.

"What's the difference between some drugs and the power of the mind to heal" My response was that the power of the mind does not heal; if you have cancer and think you don't, it's not going to heal. You may get more time from the placebo effect, which as I understand has been documented for some diseases (as far as I've read, the stress relief helps), but you don't get cured from the placebo effect alone. Hence the morphine example; it supresses pain which is the result of you being harmed but dosen't stop you being harmed, just like placebo supresses the notion that you are sick but it dosen't cure your sickness. I hope this makes how I was responding to your original post clearer.

Perhaps those that say your mind did it all feel the placebo effect is a more likely, documented and demonstrable effect then divine intervention. Or perhaps those that say your mind did it all also don't want to see credulous people getting hurt by faulty medicine and false promises. Or perhaps those that say your mind did it are also disgusted at the manipulative ability that faith healing proposes and are skeptical of it on those grounds. http://www.geocities.com/paulntobin/faithheal.html http://skepdic.com/faithhealing.html http://www.stats.org/stories/faith_health_mar27_06.htm http://www.skeptictank.org/heal1.htm Some parts of these articles is just downright disturbing.

Your brain percieves pain because a damaging stimulus is in play. If you block the neural pathways with morphine, for example, the damage is still being done.

[/hide] 1. Hmm...well, ok. I really can't claim to know how he works, but the only time that's happened that I know of is with Saul. Maybe you'll see him like that if he wants you to, but you probably won't. I won't make any argument out of this unless you want me to. 2. Absence of God, mainly. I'm not so sure about the whole thing of pain, although the Bible likes to mention it a lot. I think the importance of it is that it's an abscene of God though, if you want MY personal thoughts on it. 3. Whoops, really? Sorry, I retract the statement. Thanks for pointing that out and keeping it flame-free (ftw). Goodnight. I'm pretty happy with all that, thanks. As for (2) can you see the crux of my argument to why, if hell is a place of eternal misery, it's unjust for me to go there? Just a comment of understanding from you is fine. I'm not asking you to agree with me at all.

Hypothetical. 1) God has a pair of dice and every time he rolls two sixes, a person dies. 2) He knows fully well that the chance of any outcome occuring is independant of his rolling of the dice. 3) He is all knowing and he forsees millions of people dieing. 4) He does nothing to stop this even though he is equally all powerful and could quite easily let the dice roll but go through an eternity of possibilities until he comes up with no double sixes. Ever. Did god choose this eternity of no double six rolls to roll as they did? If you say yes, how do you know you have free will? How do you know that god didn't go through all possibilities for all choices, ever, and come up with the one we call reality which is so seemingly free that we assume we are acting independantly of any predestination? If you say no, how can you call god loving and forgiving? So god is either manipulative or sadistic. Or, he's not all knowing and all powerful. Take your pick, and feel fre to poke holes in my argument, it's pretty ad hoc.

[/hide] (Thanks for the numbering) 1. You want God to come personally to you before you die so that you can see him as though he was a person in front of your physical eyes? Before I answer, I really want to make sure that's what you're asking. 2. I think you missed my point. My point is: you sinned and marred your soul into imperfection. When you die, your soul faces two paths: perfect heaven, or imperfect hell. Because you're not perfect, there's only one alternative. Again, it's not about how finite your crimes are in how they affect others; it's about how they have marred YOUR soul. If you DID understand that, I'm not sure exactly what you're telling me. 3. Disregard this :lol:. It was meant for Hume, not you. 1) I don't want god to do anything for me. I'm not demanding anything. I just wouldn't mind if he did show himself to me so I could know he exists. 2) I can accept that's what you/christians believe. The important thing I'm trying to get out of this is if you see hell as a place of misery and pain or merely an absence of god. If it's the former, I put forth a suggestion as to why it's unjust for me to go to hell. 3) I know it wasn't meant for me. You ask for people not to generalise christians yet you don't reciprocate the gesture. You insinuated that atheists have selfish morals and deny god as if we somehow know deep down inside that he's real. Neither of these things are true for most atheists I know of.

Nope. As people have said, mind over matter. For one, the belief that faith healing works can be argued as a mind over matter occurance (believing that faith heals) as can the faith healing itself (believing that faith has healed). The problem I have with faith healing is that it can supress a thorough analysis of the medical condition by a professional in favour of unsubstantiated healing that can and I'd speculate has backfired after the big showy performance. Seriously dude, go see a doctor. All a faith healing heals is your faith. The whole thing smacks of the placebo effect though you can easily convince me when you can get a faith healer to heal an amputee.

(1) You wouldn't welcome it if you suddenly realized how filthy your sins made you compared to utter perfection. It's a bit different than you think (no offense to you, though you're obviously mature enough to understand what I mean). (2) Also, could you state why it's unfair? I made a big post for you on that and other things. Did you read it? [hide=Hume] [/hide] (3) Atheism - "No + God". Directly or indirectly, it seems to be a rejection of God. Lack of faith can be one factor, but selfish ideals are one of the things that can BLIND people to any such faith. Also, your "you need to reject something that is real" is correct, although to some atheists, Christianity IS just an idea. (1) Yes I would... Then I could be a believer and go to heaven. If I'm a sinner and that becomes apparant, why would I be upset about that? I would be glad that I had realised truth. (2) Sorry, I think I did respond to your post. My point was there is no justice in an eternal punishment for finite crimes, no matter how bad those crimes may be. Add to that the fact that any crimes coming from me would be miniscule and you've effectively just tortured and executed me for stealing candy. Unjust, is what I'm saying here. (3) Please, don't assume that by lacking faith I'm rejecting your god as if he were real. I don't know that at all and I don't assume he is then reject him based on that. And I don't appreciate the insinuation that atheists have selfish ideals either. Not true.

Sucks to hear that dude. Sorry I can't really give you any meaningful advice, I've just kind of grown into accepting the divorce of my parents. It was years and years ago for me now. Just don't be afraid to talk to both of your parents about it. They will always love you. I don't know what it is, it's like a rule of life though it's always sincere, they will never not love you or be willing to help you through things, thier own divorce included. Other than all that, I reccomed a creative output for your feelings. Helped me heaps.

I don't find that unfair at all. I find the idea that some hold of hell being an eternal agony unfair. And I wouldn't be opposed to being in the presence of god. If there comes a time when that actually happens, I welcome it.

So the aim is to accept the grace of something we can't know of so we can avoid an outcome that's assumed. Here's a hurdle for me. It would make much more sense if the outcome of 'sin' was actually known rather than assumed based on the dictated word of a book, which itself takes faith to accept. On the sin issue, we're sinners because of the actions of adam and eve, right? So as a consequence of others actions and my very existance, the choice of my parents to copulate, I'm damned to hell unless I accept an idea which I can't know of. You can probably see these hurdles I'm faced with here. You can spin this with words to make god sound decent and forgiving, but one wonders why I need to be forgiven in the first place. Why do I need permission not to exist in misery for eternity if my worst crimes are firtsly finite, and secondly within some of the commandments and all state enforced laws? I would have thought this is harsh. Then there's the interpretation that hell is merely being in limbo 'without god' until judgement day. Is this a more accurate interpretation of the bible in your opinion?

I think that most of it is literal (don't quote me on it; this is from personal experience). For example, weird stuff like Jonah and the Whale, miracles, Moses parting the Red Sea, are taken literally. However, I know that some don't take it that way. My dealings with fellow Christians has been limited, so I'm not sure. Also, the subject of creation is under debate among Christians too. If there are some symbolic parts, how have you, personally, distinguished them as symbolic? And, are you confident that your interpretation of these parts as symbolic is accurate? On what basis have you the knowlege to call them symbolic?

Adventurer, perhaps you could help me clear something up - The Bible: do christians (as in the majority, or as in what they are supposed to believe) see it as literal truth or as partly symbolic?

The motivation isn't to turn it into a war, so sure, I'm not going to push the issue. Just know I'm not going to stand by idly whenever someone misrepresents something I know about either. The motivation of this thread is the same for me, but for evolution, so I respect what you're doing here. Infact, I might do something similar in the future with regards to evolution.

This I don't really understand. Are you saying that Christians and non-Christians alike should not take everything in the Bible as 100% fact? It's my understand that the Church teaches the Bible as 100% fact, because it's God's word; God is perfect. Why would the Bible use sybolism if it didn't actually note the use of symbolism? And then by what standard are you allowed to call part of god's word sybolism? Don't get me wrong, I'm all for a less literal reading of the bible, I'm just throwing the question out there (to warren).