Noah's Arc

[Docfeelgood]

Also a final point concerning the absurdity of free will.

The free will is the choice to want to love and be with your GOD.

You know the difference between right and wrong.
its your choice

[Sikander]

Originally posted by Solomwi
I don't think it's hard for even atheists to give credit to the bible for having at least some historical accounts right. I saw an interesting program a while back postulating that the "great flood" was caused by a land bridge across the Bosporus giving way, leading to the creation of the Black Sea. If there's truth to that, certainly it would seem to those in the area that the entire world had flooded. From that point, how much of the Noah story is legend built around someone with a) enough foresight to see that such a thing might happen (similar to the Y2K bunker dwellers, but validated) or b) enough luck to have a boat available when it did start to happen, I don't know.

That is all to say it might validate the bible account historically, but not theologically.

The Bible is almost useless for historical information as more reliable information in greater quantity is usually available from other sources. It is more accurate to say that these other sources while verifying many of the historical events in the Bible also point out a number of flaws in the Bible. The Bible suffers from having been rewritten / purged a number of times, often clumsily. It also suffers from Israel's position as something of a backwater in comparison to Egypt, Syria and what is now Lebanon.

[Sikander]

Originally posted by MrFun


And then we have other examples of religious people, such as the Catholic priest and theologian professor I had for one class in undergraduate school.

He and I have had reasonable, mutually respecting discussion on the issues of reconciling Christian values with homosexuality, in his office outside of class, without him ever suggesting I compromise part of what I am.

Was that the guy who was "showing hard" in the restroom later that day?

[Sikander]

Originally posted by Mr. Nice Guy


Ah ha! This is what I predicted your response would be! It just so natural for an atheist to give such simple explanations for anything.

Notice that these anomalies are not the same color as the natural rocks in the photo. The anomalies are brown. The natural rocks are all dark blue or black.

I'll bet you $1000 that they don't find an ancient ship on top of those mountains in the next five years, let alone Noah's Ark. Seriously.

[Kropotkin]

"Ah ha! This is what I predicted your response would be! It just so natural for an atheist to give such simple explanations for anything. "
Simple eh? Oh of cource, there's bound to be something[]wrong[/i] with simple answers. Ever heard of Occham's razor?

[Flip McWho]

The free will is the choice to want to love and be with your GOD. You know the difference between right and wrong. its your choice

Riight. Nice 'free' choice. You either believe and love your God and go to heaven or you dare to be different and burn in hell. Nice choice there. That is not free will. Free will is to be who you want to be and God should respect you for that.

Also right and wrong. I know what right and wrong is according to my own principles but I can almost guarantee that they will differ to religious rights and wrongs, and I somehow think that some religious peoples should pull their arrogant heads out of their arrogant arses and don't presume that their right and wrongs are the only 'true' ones.

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Sikander
I'll bet you $1000 that they don't find an ancient ship on top of those mountains in the next five years, let alone Noah's Ark. Seriously.

I'll get me some of that action. Boats getting up on a 17,000 foot mountain just ain't going to happen.

However, I'll also bet $1000 that the fundies will cling to rocks as being some sort of "petrified wood" and claim they have proof of the Ark, no matter how resoundlingly it is shown to be untrue.

[Kropotkin]

Free will is to be who you want to be and God should respect you for that.

On the other hand, who can tell if God follows the concept of man, God's is trancendent and omnipotent after all. Perhaps it's faulty to ascribe human thinking to God at all. But from this follows that the religious people that are telling what people should or shouldn't do are as wrong as the next as they are not able to comprehend or understand what God really wants. The relationship with God is then something 'personal' that's beyond morality or human logic. This is something I myself is more into, intellectually speaking of cource as I'm a non-believer.

[Flip McWho]

I agree Kropotkin. I'm just having a dig at the christian concept of free will.

[Kropotkin]

Actually, I posted almost the exact same post as you did some time ago regarding christianity and free will.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Kropotkin
Perhaps it's faulty to ascribe human thinking to God at all. But from this follows that the religious people that are telling what people should or shouldn't do are as wrong as the next as they are not able to comprehend or understand what God really wants. The relationship with God is then something 'personal' that's beyond morality or human logic. This is something I myself is more into, intellectually speaking of cource as I'm a non-believer.

The thing is -- how is it possible for one to tell whether one is really having a "personal relation" or "personal experience" with the Judeo-Christianity god? Given that a) this god is completely incomprehensible, therefore b) nobody has a prior frame of reference on distinguishing a "personal experience" with said god from wishful thinking and mere hallucinations.

[SlowwHand]

I find it so amusing that atheists have this obsession with talking about God.
They don't feel compelled to speak on other things they don't believe in, like lepracauns.

[Kropotkin]

UR: Well, I didn't say that it would have to be the judeo-christian God. But, yeah perhaps so. I wouldn't know as I haven't had any.

Slowwhand: The concept of God happen to be fundamental for western culture, history and even present day politics. And if you at the same time is generally interested in moral philosophy and history, like me, it's not that strange to think about the issue from time to time. Form that I don't exacly know what you base your idea that atheists in general are obsessed. Perhaps they've made an active choice to not believe has made somewhat more interested in the issue than that wast group of people that's just floating along, but I'm not sure that makes them obsessed.

[SlowwHand]

God is not fundamental only to the western culture.
See, you need to talk about things you know, like lepracauns.

[Arrian]

Mysticism/Religion is found in all cultures, so far as I know, but obviously given that we are a part of Western culture, it's religion's influence on Western culture that matters most to us. I saw nothing in Krop's post that indicated that he was trying to say that God wasn't fundamental to other cultures, Sloww.

Nice try, though.

-Arrian