The Futile Arguments Thread

[Event_Horizon]

AnimatedDirt,

Just because we read the Bible from a different perspective and are able to pick out what's horrendous about it doesn't mean we're twisting it. Who is more likely to twist a text, the person who doesn't believe, or the believer who's spent their entire lives accepting everything that's said within that doctrine on faith? I think you should introspect a little and reconsider who is actually twisting what.

[AnimatedDirt]

AnimatedDirt,

Just because we read the Bible from a different perspective and are able to pick out what's horrendous about it doesn't mean we're twisting it.

Point taken.  Twisting is harsh and would speak more to the person that is throwing points out without having asked of him/herself first, what may be the context of these words or actions or asked someone else that has studied the whole.  (The Bible, the context, the history, the culture...to better interpret the words and actions)

Who is more likely to twist a text, the person who doesn't believe, or the believer who's spent their entire lives accepting everything that's said within that doctrine on faith?

Twist...again I see as you pointed out is harsh.  The person that isn't studied in the Bible is the person that would most likely not understand.  So not necessarily twisting, but a misunderstanding.

I think you should introspect a little and reconsider who is actually twisting what.

I will.  But for the better understanding, one should put more weight on interpretation from someone that is more adept at interpreting from a certain piece of literature.  Agreed?

[AverageJoe]

Why the emphasis on the word "literature" may I ask?

And on another point, if people can live enjoyable, fulfilling lives without god - and I know many that do - then why is there any need for god?

He's becoming more and more redundant, the way I see it - having said that, he is made up anyway.

[AnimatedDirt]

Why the emphasis on the word "literature" may I ask?

Do you see it as works written by (actually influenced by) God?  No, so you would simply see these books (in one book) as pieces of ancient literature.  If one was to set out to study them in depth, by studying history, culture...and understand them aside from the belief in God, I think even that person would understand and "know God" in a different light than those that simply set out to read and find inconsistencies.  One need not "KNOW" the God of these books to understand "God".

And on another point, if people can live enjoyable, fulfilling lives without god - and I know many that do - then why is there any need for god?

I don't think there is debate on this.  Do you need God?  God is not needed unless you find these books that convey this God as more true than fiction.  If so, then one only needs God if he/she believes this God is their Creator and wishes to be back in the original position God created them to be in.

He's becoming more and more redundant, the way I see it - having said that, he is made up anyway.

Is this opinion or fact?

[AverageJoe]

A fact.

[AverageJoe]

I don't think there is debate on this.  Do you need God?  God is not needed unless you find these books that convey this God as more true than fiction.  If so, then one only needs God if he/she believes this God is their Creator and wishes to be back in the original position God created them to be in.

I hate to say this but I think you're going to be in for a big shock when you throw the 7.

[AnimatedDirt]

A fact.

I'm sure EVERYONE, Atheist and Christian alike, on this forum and in the world would be interested in your absolute proof...you would stand to make millions on this fact.  Please share.

I hate to say this but I think you're going to be in for a big shock when you throw the 7.

Are you suggesting my belief is a gamble?

[Stevil]

The points brought up by Stevil are points that have been brought up out of context and easily shown to be from a twisting interpretation.

Let me provide the context.
I am an Agnostic Atheist. I am yet to see any proof for or against any of the 10,000+ god theories that there currently are. I lack a belief in the Christian god because this is a theory that has not been proven and there is no reason to hold this any more true than any of the other 10,000+ theories. Given this my stance falls to the natural position of accepting life and existence for what it is, understanding that there are much unknowns and that I am capabile of thinking for myself and deciding for myself what is wrong and right, that I am ulimately accountable for my actions and hence I have a great responsibility with regards to how I conduct myself and how I treat others.
I happen to live in a country which officially celebrates the Christian holidays of Christmas and Easter. At school when I was young there was a little bit of bible teaching. We also heard some bible stories near christmas time, I have also seen bible stories on TV and have heard some Christians talk about Bible stories.
I have held a bible and have read the first couple of pages. It starts off like a young children's book. "God said let there be light and there was light and it was good" then it gets nasty with the story of Adam and Eve and the garden of Eden. God sets up a trap for Adam, to acheive this God creates a woman, supposedly for Adam's entertainment (but it appears to me that this woman was meant to lead Adam astray), god creates a tempting fruit tree, puts it in the garden, points it out to Adam and says to Adam not to eat the fruit and then conveniently leaves the garden unattended. When God is gone, a talking snake conveniently appears and convices Eve to eat the fruit, Eve then convinces Adam, God conveniently returns and bestows punishment on Adam and Eve, and all women for all eternity. Quite frankly, in today's time this behaviour would be called entrappment, the perpetrator would be seen as the victim and would be let off, the trap setter would be punished.
At this point, I stopped reading the bible.

So still, to understand the context you must know that I tried not to have any preconcieved ideas of the Christian god, I judge people, creatures based on their actions rather than how they describe themselves or how others describe them. Hence I do not assume God to be perfect and all loving, instead I judge the actions of that creature and see what picture that paints for me. So that's it, my context

My twist? I have no intention to put spin or twist onto Christianity. I am being honest about how I feel about the Christian god as described in the Christian stories that I have heard or seen or read. People state that Hitler was evil, creating war and trying to kill all the Jews, succeding at killing millions of them. I'm sure Hitler would have told us that the Jew were bad and that what he was doing was good. We hear about the Christian god who killed almost all the people, animals and plants that existed on earth, likely much more people than Hitler killed. God predictably said that the people were bad and that God was doing good.

I now have an avid Christian telling me that I choose not to love the Christian god, so I explain that it is not a choice and that given my experiences and the stories of the bible I could not possibly love such a creature, nor do I have the desire to.

A question for you AD, do you have the desire to love Hitler? Do you think if you read his book, Mine Kampf that you might fall in love with this man?

[AnimatedDirt]

The points brought up by Stevil are points that have been brought up out of context and easily shown to be from a twisting interpretation.

Let me provide the context.
I am an Agnostic Atheist. I am yet to see any proof for or against any of the 10,000+ god theories that there currently are. I lack a belief in the Christian god because this is a theory that has not been proven and there is no reason to hold this any more true than any of the other 10,000+ theories. Given this my stance falls to the natural position of accepting life and existence for what it is, understanding that there are much unknowns and that I am capabile of thinking for myself and deciding for myself what is wrong and right, that I am ulimately accountable for my actions and hence I have a great responsibility with regards to how I conduct myself and how I treat others.
I happen to live in a country which officially celebrates the Christian holidays of Christmas and Easter. At school when I was young there was a little bit of bible teaching. We also heard some bible stories near christmas time, I have also seen bible stories on TV and have heard some Christians talk about Bible stories.
I have held a bible and have read the first couple of pages. It starts off like a young children's book. "God said let there be light and there was light and it was good" then it gets nasty with the story of Adam and Eve and the garden of Eden. God sets up a trap for Adam, to acheive this God creates a woman, supposedly for Adam's entertainment (but it appears to me that this woman was meant to lead Adam astray), god creates a tempting fruit tree, puts it in the garden, points it out to Adam and says to Adam not to eat the fruit and then conveniently leaves the garden unattended. When God is gone, a talking snake conveniently appears and convices Eve to eat the fruit, Eve then convinces Adam, God conveniently returns and bestows punishment on Adam and Eve, and all women for all eternity. Quite frankly, in today's time this behaviour would be called entrappment, the perpetrator would be seen as the victim and would be let off, the trap setter would be punished.
At this point, I stopped reading the bible.

Again...having stopped without reading and making any attempt to see the whole picture, your basis for judging the Christian God is based on a few sentences of a book.  In other words, false assertions.

So still, to understand the context you must know that I tried not to have any preconcieved ideas of the Christian god, I judge people, creatures based on their actions rather than how they describe themselves or how others describe them. Hence I do not assume God to be perfect and all loving, instead I judge the actions of that creature and see what picture that paints for me. So that's it, my context

We see your bias and preconceived ideas in that you don't want to seek out the point of it all.  All very well and good.  I hold no ill will on you for this.  However, when you make assertions on something you don't even understand fully or have any idea on the whole, you can see why I say *you twist the words to mean what *you think they do without any knowledge of the whole.

My twist? I have no intention to put spin or twist onto Christianity. I am being honest about how I feel about the Christian god as described in the Christian stories that I have heard or seen or read.

I believe you're being honest on your feelings...but then again as the Atheist claims, feelings can be deceptive.

I now have an avid Christian telling me that I choose not to love the Christian god, so I explain that it is not a choice and that given my experiences and the stories of the bible I could not possibly love such a creature, nor do I have the desire to.

You have made a choice based on your experience...not much different from the claim of a Christian, now is it?  Either way, who's made the decision to believe as you do?

A question for you AD, do you have the desire to love Hitler? Do you think if you read his book, Mine Kampf that you might fall in love with this man?

The answer is in the form of a question.  Does Hitler (and so his book) claim he wants my freewill love?  Does Hitler claim God-abilities?  Did Hitler ever in person or in his book ever claim he created the universe?  Is Hitler claimed to be alive and seen as a god by a good portion of the world?  Did Hitler claim to be God?  Does Hitler make any sacrifice of himself for the supposed betterment (? I hope this is a word) of the world?  If yes to any of these questions, then why does this man die like the coward that he is?

My answer in short, He didn't ask it of me, he made no claims of the like and he not worthy of any fame but fame through infamy.

[Tank]

Time to explain the experiment. Nobody chose to do it. That does not surprise me. I said if you didn't do the test I would consider you a 'wuss'. I could have written that if you had done the test I would be 'very impressed'. Given a sufficiently large group that terminology change would have significantly altered the group response. Thus at the human level 'free will' is an illusion. Your behaviour can be influenced by all kinds of things in the real world.

However each of you who read my post chose to either ignore it or responded and all those that responded chose not to carry out the test. If you have metaphysical 'free will' then you exercised it. If you do not have metaphysical 'free will' you don't know that and felt you had exercised it. You can not tell the difference.

So this brings us to philosophy. Somebody came up with the concept of metaphysical 'free will' and then attempted to justify it 'philosophically'. But you recall the chisel, a great tool, but useless if there is no material to work with. As there is no evidence for metaphysical 'free will' so the philosophy surrounding it is a meaningless example of intellectual masturbation.

[BadPoison]

*Post edited for clarity*

However each of you who read my post chose to either ignore it or responded and all those that responded chose not to carry out the test. If you have metaphysical 'free will' then you exercised it. If you do not have metaphysical 'free will' you don't know that and felt you had exercised it. You can not tell the difference.

Tank,
Would the above quote not apply to any sort of free-will? What do you mean by metaphysical free-will?

[Tank]

*Post edited for clarity*

However each of you who read my post chose to either ignore it or responded and all those that responded chose not to carry out the test. If you have metaphysical 'free will' then you exercised it. If you do not have metaphysical 'free will' you don't know that and felt you had exercised it. You can not tell the difference.

Tank,
Would the above quote not apply to any sort of free-will? What do you mean by metaphysical free-will?

Metaphysical 'free will' would that bestowed by a deity as opposed to one that is just what happens on a day-to-day basis. And you're right if 'free will' were some external force then the statement would be equally true.

[AnimatedDirt]

Metaphysical 'free will' would that bestowed by a deity as opposed to one that is just what happens on a day-to-day basis. And you're right if 'free will' were some external force then the statement would be equally true.

What is the difference between metaphysical freewill and that which we choose daily?  I suggest there is no difference if God bestowed it on His creation.  We use both the metaphysical in whether we choose God and the "common" in what we choose for breakfast.  Both are freewill choices in action.  One simply has a "metaphysical" outcome.

[Tank]

Metaphysical 'free will' would that bestowed by a deity as opposed to one that is just what happens on a day-to-day basis. And you're right if 'free will' were some external force then the statement would be equally true.

What is the difference between metaphysical freewill and that which we choose daily?  I suggest there is no difference if God bestowed it on His creation.  We use both the metaphysical in whether we choose God and the "common" in what we choose for breakfast.  Both are freewill choices in action.  One simply has a "metaphysical" outcome.

One is a fantasy required by theists to explain evil in an attempt to support their institutionalised superstition. The other is an emergent property of human existance.

[AnimatedDirt]

Metaphysical 'free will' would that bestowed by a deity as opposed to one that is just what happens on a day-to-day basis. And you're right if 'free will' were some external force then the statement would be equally true.

What is the difference between metaphysical freewill and that which we choose daily?  I suggest there is no difference if God bestowed it on His creation.  We use both the metaphysical in whether we choose God and the "common" in what we choose for breakfast.  Both are freewill choices in action.  One simply has a "metaphysical" outcome.

One is a fantasy required by theists to explain evil in an attempt to support their institutionalised superstition. The other is an emergent property of human existance.

Interesting.  One one hand you say freewill exists.  On the other hand, and opposed to your own thinking, it doesn't because it supports an "institutionalized suprestition".

I understand how your logic works now.  It speaks volumes of your "experiment" that proves your logic.  Thanks Tank.