Happy Easter

[Kidlicious]

Prove there is a god... an afterlife... that Jesus was the son of god... and on and on and on. You can't.
There is no right or wrong if you believe or don't believe in god. But it is illogical to believe something that can't be proved to exist.
Do you believe every word of the Bible... It's no different than a comic book or other myths passed on by generation to generation.
While you are welcome to believe, it isn't logical

No. Just one example, you can believe that something will happen in the future. Maybe that's a fantasy, but then you are mentally ill. Normal people believe that certain things will happen, with no proof. You're wrong Ming.

[Kidlicious]

Do you guys believe in other Gods? Because other people do. Actually, more people believe in other gods than yours.
They think you guys are believing in a fantasy, because theirs are the true gods.

I don't think that people that have different beliefs than I do believe in fantasy.

[Ming]

So you believe that people who believed in Manson were being logical? Or any other cult for that matter.
And if you believe that the Christian god is on the one true god, than all other religions are indeed a fantasy simply based on Christian beliefs... And they all believe your god is a fantasy. Less than 1/3 of religious people believe in your god... who is the one living a fantasy....

[SlowwHand]

Gee... there are many many many different religions... and many believe in their true god.
Which one is right?
They can't all be right?

So your one words denials aren't cutting it. Believing in something with NO BASIS of FACT is illogical. Plain and simple.
Saying no over and over again doesn't change that there are no facts to support your beliefs, or for people who believe in different gods...

Actually, and I'm probably wrong again, but I THINK religions believe in a common God.
The difference is in the envisioned prophet.

[EPW]

Yes, I can confirm that you are in fact wrong.

[-Jrabbit]

Still, I appreciate the meta approach.

[EPW]

Everyone, even scientists, believe in all sorts of things that can't be proved. We can't prove right or wrong. We can't prove beauty. We can't prove that the sun hasn't exploded while I wrote this (although we will be able to proof that it didn't in a relatively short while).

I enjoy looking at naked women so I conclude beauty exists. I'm not dead so I can reasonably conclude the sun hasn't exploded in the last eight minutes. You're on Kidicious' side so I can reasonably conclude that I'm right and you're wrong.

Not only that, but no one understands the even a small part of science. There are all sorts of assumptions all over science, and even for the steps without assumptions those who are not scientists still have to take the reality of it on faith (Faith in the scientific process, faith in the empirical endeavor, faith in scientists).

No, being able to predict the orbit of the moon, finding the Higgs-Boson, calculating chemical reactions etc etc etc is more than faith..

The requirement of scientific proof to claim that something isn't fantasy isn fundamentally untenable, even by scientists. It is irrational.

JM

It's irrational to believe something that's highly improbable, like, you know, Jesus exorcising *actual* demons and putting them into a herd of swine and running them off a cliff.

[Ming]

Actually, and I'm probably wrong again, but I THINK religions believe in a common God.
The difference is in the envisioned prophet.

While all religions (with the exception of cults) share similar beliefs, there is a huge difference between Zeus and the Christian God.

[Dauphin]

We should all calm down and have a cup of tea. Anyone seen Russell's teapot lately?

[SlowwHand]

Zeus? That's kind of a stretch, but I'll let you have it, being a tolerant Christian and all.

[Kidlicious]

So you believe that people who believed in Manson were being logical? Or any other cult for that matter.
And if you believe that the Christian god is on the one true god, than all other religions are indeed a fantasy simply based on Christian beliefs... And they all believe your god is a fantasy. Less than 1/3 of religious people believe in your god... who is the one living a fantasy....

Cults brainwash people. You keep going into these other inappropriate categories. I'm not just like a Manson cult believer Ming. I'm not brainwashed and I don't believe in fantasy. That's a caricature.

[EPW]

Where did I claim that it makes it true? Something being true or false is different than it being fantasy.

Science and rational philosophy leaves questions that it hasn't answered as unknowns. It takes an agnostic approach, whether it is about God or the existence of a black hole in our solar system. Now many scientists would consider the question of the existence of God as fundamentally uninteresting because they can't imagine how it could be proven scientifically or could be relevant to their scientific understanding of the world. And that is reasonable.

But that is very different than saying that everything that isn't proved is fantasy.

JM
(I know that I am confusing a bit the scientific approach, philosophical approach and the common approach. For the common approach fantasy depends on what people beleive independent of rational inquiry. In common language, which is probably the most important approach, fantasy holds for things which are accepted as not being part of reality. And as such anything that any significant group of people believe in is by definition not fantasy.)

You're just playing around with definitions. You have no real argument.

[Jon Miller]

I consider ( and I think any rational observer would agree ) that Muslims believe in the same God as the Christians and the Jews ( and various other groups ) and that believers in the God of Abraham make up the majority of the world.

but i think you guys are showing Kid levels of reasoning ability. I have repeatedly said that saying something isn’t fantasy doesn’t mean that it is true or that I think it is true ( and I even argued that you shouldn’t use fantasy to refer to beliefs that large groups have even if it is possible for them to be proved wrong, ie scientology ).

and yes, fantasy is obviously the wrong way to refer to the Greek pantheon. Legend and myth is correct. I thought every educated person knew that?

and once more, that does not mean I think that the Greek pantheon is real.

JM

[Kidlicious]

I consider ( and I think any rational observer would agree ) that Muslims believe in the same God as the Christians and the Jews ( and various other groups ) and that believers in the God of Abraham make up the majority of the world.

but i think you guys are showing Kid levels of reasoning ability. I have repeatedly said that saying something isn’t fantasy doesn’t mean that it is true or that I think it is true ( and I even argued that you shouldn’t use fantasy to refer to beliefs that large groups have even if it is possible for them to be proved wrong, ie scientology ).

and yes, fantasy is obviously the wrong way to refer to the Greek pantheon. Legend and myth is correct. I thought every educated person knew that?

and once more, that does not mean I think that the Greek pantheon is real.

JM

Paganism was a widely practiced religion though. People that believe in fantasy are mentally ill. To call Paganism fantasy is to say that everyone that believed in it was mentally ill, which is obviously not the case. It's ridiculous.

[EPW]

I consider ( and I think any rational observer would agree ) that Muslims believe in the same God as the Christians and the Jews ( and various other groups ) and that believers in the God of Abraham make up the majority of the world.

but i think you guys are showing Kid levels of reasoning ability. I have repeatedly said that saying something isn’t fantasy doesn’t mean that it is true or that I think it is true ( and I even argued that you shouldn’t use fantasy to refer to beliefs that large groups have even if it is possible for them to be proved wrong, ie scientology ).

and yes, fantasy is obviously the wrong way to refer to the Greek pantheon. Legend and myth is correct. I thought every educated person knew that?

and once more, that does not mean I think that the Greek pantheon is real.

JM

sorry, you don't get to define what the word fantasy means for other people. But carry on.

[Jon Miller]

Paganism was a widely practiced religion though. People that believe in fantasy are mentally ill. To call Paganism fantasy is to say that everyone that believed in it was mentally ill, which is obviously not the case. It's ridiculous.

I basically agree (although Paganism is actually an umbrella for many different religions.../etc).

JM

[Kidlicious]

Right. It's the same thing with all the Pagan beliefs. Some people actually have faith in that kind of thing, but it's not fantasy. And I think it's silliness, but people believe all sorts of silly things.