Why "God" doesn't explain the Big Questions

http://www.alternet.org/belief/1458...ble_justification_for_god's_existence_?page=1

My gift to Diacanu.

See, there will always be debate about this sort of thing because of a fundamental disconnect between theists and atheists.

Atheists think that a bunch of people were having trouble figuring out why some things are so they theorized "maybe some kind of god did it".

Theists think that God actually got a hold of some people and told them about himself.

You're either going to believe one thing or the other, and there isn't really ANY room for compromise.

More of this shit?

Christ, the Atheists here spend more time on religion than the believers do.

Aristotle would've loved this thread.

I prefer to ignore the whole question and get the fuck on with my life.

The concept of God and the creation of the universe is meaningless without an understanding of time.

And we simply don't know enough about what time even is to make value judgments. Hence its an unknowable (currently), and something you have to take on faith.

There is some pretty interesting work going on about the concept of the multiverse and how different dimensions exist that could have major implications there, but you still have to go back to Aristotle's Prime Mover or at least a prime creation point. One intriguing theory is that gravity is actually a cross-dimensional force, not something native to our reality.

We don't know enough to ask relevant questions IMO.

God explains all if you look hard enough.

This argument was dismantled several hundred years ago.

Exactly.

the thing was TLDR but before I quit I saw this part:

In my experience, atheists tend to more often get "bent out of shape" when someone claims to be a believer than vice-versa (though it happens on both sides)

It's hardly a place where fingers can be pointed

Oh look, it's Shepherd's classic "everything I claim about the other side isn't true about myself or my side" double-talk. Nice to see that he still remembers his roots despite the alleged sex change.

Athiests get bent out of shape when they see the constant effort of fundies to oppress, censor, and intimidate non-fundies. They also get bent out of shape by the fundies' constant efforts to subvert the educational system and remake it into the 700 Club. Just like in Oklahoma (of course, you'd expect this kind of ongoing crap in Oklahoma), where the legislature is yet again trying to ram though another bill to let public schools teach the Bible.

A. not taking your childish bait; and
B. I didn't say it wasn't true about both sides - in fact, that's precisely what i did say.

Of course you do. but you also get bent out of shape - as you are now - when people express a differing view on a message board. Wait until Dicky gets here and you'll see it in it's purest form.

Personally, I find the whole discussion "meh" - so there's at least one believer here who's not "bent out of shape"

They all have, every last one, they just keep being restated, and restated.

Exhibit A your honor.

If God answered all of the Big Questions, there would be nothing left for Man to wonder about and explore. Life is a journey, not a destination.

Or as I remember it from Chu'in , in Remo Williams:

Words to live by.

This bothers me. Mystery is not seen as something to be understood or resolved, but something to be exalted in itself.

Then you didn't read what I wrote.

a.k.a the big bang

Great stuff. Another page long article with no comments from the OP, written by a retard in an internet chatroom?

Funny...it seems to me atheists do the same thing!

All the whining and crying about the ten commandments in court rooms, wailing over prayer in school, so afraid of mere exposure to religious concepts they must scream about the "unfairness" of even being "forced" to look upon or hear such things. Moaning how religious people should shut the fuck up and keep their religious "crap" to themselves. Mocking and harassing people who disagree with them. Being derogatory and nasty.

Even here certain atheists feel the need to ram their shit down people's throats by posting it over and over and over and over again, trying to "educate the ignorant and stupid religious people". Here, it's only the fucking atheists who are trying to convert anybody...the faithful aren't shoving their view in people's faces...no one is trying to convert anyone..hell, even our threads are fairly uncommon.

I'm sure all I'm going to get is smarmy, self-righteous and smug bullshit...but it won't make me any less right.

Well, if it was surahs from the Koran, particularly the misogynistic ones, I wager your gooseflesh would raise.

Yes, because I am constantly gnashing my teeth over all the Greek gods installed in every courtroom in America.

I don't believe in it...I don't give a shit if some chick holding scales is depicted behind the judge.

I don't need everything I see to reflect my world-view...certain atheists do. They are not content with their right to believe as they see fit..they want to eradicate that which offends them if they can get away with it.

You know, we could sit here and play theological volleyball all day, but even Stephen Hawking who has spent the last oh 40 years trying to find the theory of everything considers himself a "theist."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_hawking The specific link to the article where Hawking made this statement can be found in a Reuters article which is cited, all you have to do is click on it if wiki isn't good enough for you. Apparently he and the Pope had tea for a week or something and Hawking delved a bit into his own personal agnostic beliefs.

Even the most renowned of scientists will concede to you that there are such things which exist outside the realm of physical definition, and I'll bet you my marble burial vault, that 4000 years from now, they'll STILL be saying that and you will still have this same old mind numbing tiresome argument.

I hope so...I really do.

Because it's the arguing and thinking and facing your beliefs and trying to verbalize them that strengthen them.

It's people who want to silence the question...who want to call it done and pretend they know the unknowable who are really doing humanity a disservice.

I think it is very few people who have searched out this question for themselves...struggled with the concepts, preconceptions and dealing with the conflicting "facts" people put forward who can honestly say that the journey wasn't worth it...regardless of the personal conclusions drawn.

The "First Cause" agrument is a totally insufficient proof for the existence of God, period.

The insufficiency of the "First Cause" argument is not in any way a demonstration that God does not exist, period.

And that is about all that can be said on the preposition of this thread. The claim that, because the First Cause argument is not at all a reasonable demonstration of the existence of God, that somehow shows that "God doesn't explain the Big Questions," is merely a demonstration that the "logic" of most militant anti-theists is as childish and ignorant as the "logic" of most theists.

The blatant and widespread lack of logic on both sides says nothing, in and of itself, about the validity of the respective positions. It only shows that, despite their claims to the contrary, most people couldn't do rigorous logic if their life depended on it.

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Nor do I.

I'd just like America to be y'know, consistent.

With....anything, really, but the whole separation of church & state deal'd be a nice start.

Hmm....nope, I woulda been a whole happier cutting right to the chase on that one.

Woulda gotten a whole lot more done.

All right then, let's move to other business then.

All right, someone's been throwing Canadian bosses in the plastic bin.

They won't take 'em, stop it!

And empty your damned cans, why is it you people keep leaving these 1-2/8ths of flat soda everywhere?
Is it really so goddamned hard to slam that down?
Your dainty little tummies can't bolt down a fucking sip?
Jesus!
Slobs, why are you people such fucking slobs!!?