| This thread has been locked, it will not receive new replies. |
Posted on 04/04/2002 10:05:32 AM PST by Heartlander
ROTFLMAO
What a brilliant refutation of my post! Clearly you cannot answer my statements showing that atheism leads to immorality. Perhaps you will wish to give a serious response to my answer to the question above (though I doubt it):
I seriously doubt that in most cases such a rejection is due to deep philosophical or scientific research into the question of the validity of atheism, it is due to their desire to reject any moral restraints upon their behavior or due to their already having acted immorally and wishing to continue to do so.
No, you misunderstood. You can convince me that evolution (MY evolution to use the terminology of the article) is true. I have no theological objection to the concept.
I strongly doubt that evolution (MY) occurs because I strongly doubt that it occurs. Lurking on these list makes me ever more certain. The questions posed anti-evolutionists -- I'll use that term since some of the evolutionists claim a belief in the Creator which makes them, ultimately, creationists -- usually seem to be answered by emotionally driven name-calling.
The other day someone posted an article by Michael J. Behe in which he felt compelled to defend his mousetrap analogy. Apparently, his opponents are resorting to attacking his method of communication rather than his science. Most embarrasingly for them is that they failed in even that.
There were two points in your wildly eccentric post. The first was your statement that Miss rand was "wildly promiscuous." That one is clearly false. You didn't really respond with any evidence. The whole world knows that she had an affair with Brandon. That is no more "wild promiscuity" than the "wildly eliptical" orbits of the planets. I did ask you if you knew of any other evidence, which is NOT asking you to prove MY point, but YOURS. (Do you grasp the difference?)
In your second point you inquired: "...if you can point to anything moral in her philosophy, I would be interested to discuss it." I directed you to HER book on THAT precise topic, which is one of the most moralistic books in all creation. I suspect you haven't read it. When you do, you will (perhaps) understand the answer to your question. I won't, and I really can't, summarize her entire book in a brief post to this thread. If you really care to learn about Miss Rand's views, try this: The Philosophy of Objectivism.
I'm not sure how a persons personal belief system in anyway imparts itself onto a scientific theory. If a Geologist believed a person should be killed for damaging a geological structure, should we then throw out the science of geology? Obviously this geologist is immoral, but the science of geology is still sound. On another note how do we determine the morality of a society based on the Bible? Should we toss the Bible out also since people were put to death using that same book?
As I read many of the post of the creationists, I see a tremendous amount of credence given to a single Biblical verse or an interpretation from a particular scholar. The rub is how does anyone know if that verse is really the correct one. Is it argued from an imprinted engram, or is it argued from a personal revelation? From many observations, I have come to the conclusion that the environment directly influences the worldview taken on by the individual that this individual grew up in. This also includes the fundamental belief systems imprinted into the brain over the years. So people end up taking a particular stance on a many thousand year old writing colored by personal experiences and or a long-term environment that was inhabited.
I constantly hear from the various churches, “baby steps”. Why is this? It is because we learn this way. We have to allow the brain to build those neural interconnects to over a period of time. It’s not unlike flying an aircraft. What was so terribly difficult at first becomes absurdly simple as our brains adapt to the new directives we are imprinting on it. This is the same with the different religions. Over time people imprint the “truth” that is then defended vehemently because it’s “known to be true”.
So here is the rub. How can we determine on a pure faith based belief system, which is the correct model or “truth”? When I ask this question I get answers like; the Bible told me, my pastor stated it, or I prayed and God himself told me. Well, if there were immutable truths, wouldn’t everyone get the same answer when they prayed or read the same book? Since there is an ongoing fierce argument between the different religions, obviously this is not the case.
Now we will throw another monkey wrench into the equation. There have been a number of councils that have determined what is “truth” in scripture and what is not: i.e. the Church Councils at Hippo (393) and Carthage (397, 419), the council of Nicea, etc. So here is another rub, if the word of God has been handed down, why the requirement for the councils?
There also seems to be contradictions in the Bible. For example, the resurrection stories from each of the different Gospels. They are different enough that just to say they were seen from different perspectives does not wash. I always have wondered which is the correct one or the “truth”. If there is that kind of discrepancy in the very thing that defines Christianity (the resurrection itself), how can we not suspect the other verses in this same book? I get answers like the Bible is divine because God stated it was. Well where did he state that but in the Bible. This is not unlike me writing a letter and then stating in that letter that it’s divine because God says so. Would you take that seriously? This is in effect what you are doing with the Bible.
Now we will throw a final monkey wrench into the works. There is a body of knowledge that has been painstakingly complied over thousands of years we refer to today as science. Unlike a belief system, science is a series of models that describe the universe we inhabit from both observation and experimentation. Again unlike an immutable text such as the Bible, science will revise its models as new evidence comes to light. This also gives rise to the false belief that science is shiftless sand that has no firm foundations. This is far from the case. Over the millennia we have made discoveries that we continue to build on as we obtain further knowledge and understanding. Do old ideas get thrown out? Of course! However, not without coming up with a better model to fit the observed phenomena in question. Take gravity for instance. It is a theory and no matter how much evidence accumulates, it will always remain a theory. One of my problems is that we don’t revise (or at least re interpret) the Bible as new facts come to light.
Now if an atheist looks at this, he will see a group of individuals or a church blindly following a faith system that has been handed down over thousands of years that ignore the basic findings of science. For example, there is not one shred of Geologic evidence for a word wide flood approximately 4-6 thousand years ago. However, there are groups that vehemently will defend such to their dying breath just because the Bible told them so. No wonder he/she (the atheist) sees the religion as a foolish waste of time.
So the question is where is the line drawn? Parts of the Bible already have been modified or rejected from what once was considered scripture via the councils. So why not take into account the findings from the scientific community?
Thank you!!! That was a wonderful compliment! :-)
But, to converge upon (if never reach) a perfect understanding of the world, you have to keep making changes. That's what all those changes over the centuries have created: a convergence upon real, useful knowledge.
Bravo!
lies--ideology--spin 'grow'--do..."evolution"!
Stabbed in the back again! I suppose this makes me the bad guy, and causes my integrity to implode. That was the effect a similar freepmail betrayal (a betrayal of my freepmail which I sent to a former friend) had on Nebullis, who posted, at 676:
I don't know what to think of a statement like this [Vade's statement: "I disavow all knowledge"], because, quite seriously, your integrity, (as well as PH's, which I had given the benefit of the doubt over the last year and a half), has imploded on these last few threads.
I'm not sure what you are driving at here. Our understanding of the universe we inhabit changes all the time as new discoveries come to light. For example we now accept the heliocentric view instead of the geocentric view of our solar system.
So why does energy exist? It can't be created according to natural laws.
I'd rather say that atheism doesn't prevent immorality. However, what leads to immorality is not atheism per se. There are other reasons why someone leaves the moral path.
However, atheists are partially rejecting the views of society by becoming atheists so they clearly do not accept all the moral constraints of society.
That would certainly be true if the societies we live in were a monolithic block as has been the case with ancient tribes (Hebrews, Mayas, etc.) where everything was regulated by rigid rules. Contemporary societies are more diverse and consist of several subgroups which may agree on such important issues as murder, theft and the like but disagree on issues like dancing, certain types of food, sacred days, deities, etc. and atheists are one of them because I don't think that the moral code of most atheists comprises murder, theft or lying.
In fact they often try to hide their atheism as gnosticism or deism in order to appear to be in conformance with society.
I wonder what else motivates people to hide their true believes or lack thereof.
So why can these animals interbreed? [Horses, donkeys, and zebras in one case, camels and llamas in another.] Is it a freakish evolutionary fluke or the result of an event popular science fails to recognize?
Freakish evolutionary fluke? What's freakish about finding recently speciated populations? Populations that haven't quite speciated completely? Evolution predicts this!
Cs fail to reason like a E, then try to beat Es over the head with their misunderstanding.
That Behe has to defend himself is not surprising. He left himself open to many different charges with his book, ignoring much of the research that contradicted his claims. In fact, one of his claims is that there was no research in molecular evolution. Ow!
The total energy of the universe may well be zero. How's that sound?
I hate to see you all fighting. Sigh! I have a tremendous amount of respect for all of you.
you make him out to be a founder of evolution----chaos...
not the father of Science/LAWS---orderly universe!
Columbus discovered America---he didn't conjure---evolve it into existence!
These laws--continents existed prior to our understanding--knowing them---
evolution is the arts and crafts---science of the retarded---special olympics!
I believe that is the case.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.