Atheists and Atheism (Little Upsilon)

nothing? i just scientifically quoted John 1:1 ;)

how would you describe DNA? quoting wiki?

how would you explain big bang? perhaps .. let there be light!?

how would you imply that humans originated in east Africa? by telling a story about Adam and Eve?

how would you tell how old Earth is? 6 000 or 4 540 000 000 .. yeah theres "little" discrepancy, but perhaps even 4.54 billion was a little too big number back then.


I don't think its possible to take the Bible literally and derive from it that what is written there is not true because it does not fit todays "state of mind". Its a matter of interpretation, but I can imagine it contains facts, even scientific facts, just told in language used at the time, because it was meant for people of that time not for us.

Then again, Ive never read the book so I wouldnt know, thus yes I admit I'm making it up to fit my argument.

Physics starts with the observation of light too. Time and length are defined by the characteristic wavelengths of elements.

Anthropology and biology does not necessarily conflict with the biblical time line. Adams son Cain moved into a city. There must have been plenty of Homo Sapiens in the garden. Adam was the "first man" because he was the first to have a personal relationship with God as god is understood in the Judeo-Christian tradition.

Of course the bible is not a scientific textbook. My point is that when it does touch on scientific things it has been proven accurate. For example it was not until relativly recent in time that it was realized that the earth was a sphere. Many of course said it was flat. If your opinion differed, then you were tortured or killed. But long before '1492' or whenever the 'idea' of a round earth was discovered, the bible at Isa 40:22 mentions the "circle", or "sphere" or however your particular translation reads. That definatly was a scientific statement, especially in those days.

Another example is of something as simple as hygiene. Many, many civilizations had the practice of using excrement in medicine! The people of that time knew nothing about germs, in fact they thought it was beneficial. But the bible described a technique that involved simply digging a hole and marking where you went. And there are countless ot

What I know about God:

1) There is a God and it isn't me!

That's about it!

A Sufi mystic from the 1300's says it best (imho):

"Even after all this Time

The Sun never says to the Earth,

'You owe me'.

Look what happens with

A Love like that;

It lights up the whole Sky."

-Hafez

Serpent: Columbus did not prove the earth was round. Most scientists, even in the 15th century, believed in a round earth. The Greeks believed in it as well. So did Pythagoras, Plato, and Aristotle. I would not know what year Isaiah was written, but the round earth theory was around many centuries before 1492.
The Bible is certainly not "harmonious" all thru. Just read the 4 Gospels to see the discrepancies. They were telling the story of the life of the man they considered to be the living son of God. Yet, they cannot agree on the details? Even when describing the events of his death, they disagree. Regardless of your faith, you can't read the Bible and say that every line in it is in harmony with every other line in it.
Most early cultures would have had a set of practices that promoted better health, as best as they understood it. I don't think this makes the Bible special. Many books are also persecuted as are many religions. C

If people will read Harry Potter in 2000 years from now, which I doubt because to me this phenomena is just a trend or fashion, then I could agree with the parallel to the Bible.

My opinion is that "value" of "memes", basically (units of) information which can replicate and spread, is in their longevity, and in this sense the Bible or Christian "memes" (values), in some areas, proved themselves.

Sure, we can simply dismiss such reasoning arguing something along the lines of brainwashing, illiteracy, use of force, or restricting freedoms which can be true up to a point, however, I believe such methods work only in short term as people can distinguish elementary "good" form elementary "evil" somehow naturally and thus cannot be, in general, imposed on by "evil" indefinitely simply because only few want to be/come "evil".

Which memes are you referring to? Many of the most common memes in the Bible are not Christian in origin and pre-date the Bible. While many Christians today may live according to these beliefs, that does not make them "Christian beliefs" since many non-Christians (like myself) live accordingly as well.

I dunno I'm not believing Christian, but those which are being referred to as Christian values I assume. In similar fashion any other ideas which carry over from generation to generation like .. wash your hands after taking piss is pretty solid meme.

Think of it this way. Try to come up with own ideas, own values, own memes and try to spread them. If they can survive 2000 years, if millions of other people will be able to relate to them, then I think you probably would be onto .. something.


edit: I think we should distinguish between entertainment and philosophy, between amusement and way of life. Only on this bases comparisons of the Bible and Harry Potter dont just match. People dont live by Harry Potter or do they? Again I wouldnt know, never read it, dunno any people who would live by it.

Jesus during the week. Harry Potter during the weekend. Sounds good to me

I have a frying pan that is both round and flat. Here is a 12th century map of the world:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Diagrammatic_T-O_world_map_-_12th_century.jpg

Another one from 1154:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:1154_world_map_by_Moroccan_cartographer_al-Idrisi_for_king_Roger_of_Sicily.jpg


You can also claim that the sky is a dome. The sun stars and planets orbit on spheres with disc shaped earth inside the sphere.

I was talking to some people on mIRC about this and I would like to clarify Zentrino because our "argument", if there is any, is likely just a misunderstanding.

Yes the Bible has/had amazing "marketing", however, I was trying to say that I dont believe its the primary reason for the existence of Christian religion. The primary reason (time proved memes) I stated already so I will not repeat myself.

I just refuse to, and dont have any evidence for to believe, that virtually any ideas can be sold by marketing, not in a long term anyways. Not only that admitting to this would make us, humans, look like brainless - heartless dolls which in a sense could be possible, but it would deny what is called as the human nature, where human nature is something what is common to humans in general, and such denial is not in agreement with what sciences, natural or social, tell us about humans.

Though human nature is a topi

Zdenek

If you compare memes to genes only a few of them would be necessary to survive and dominate over the last 2000 years. Promotion of literacy is the primary meme. Once you have a ridged script that dictates copying that script the rest of the memes in the script survive even if they have lost their useful functions.

The survival of the ancient Jewish tradition is quite circumstantial. Jews in ancient Babylon became a scribe cast. Their stories survived because they were writing. The bricklayer cast my have had better and more meaningful stories passed down from their ancestors. We will never know. The Judeo-Christian tradition got a second boost from the Roman empire. The Romans tolerated Jewish religion but scattered them after 77 AD. So, Judaism appeared in a diverse set of cultures without having to appeal to those cultures. The destruction of parts of the roman empire did not destroy Judaism or Christianity which was

If you compare memes to genes only a few of them would be necessary to survive and dominate over the last 2000 years. Promotion of literacy is the primary meme. Once you have a ridged script that dictates copying that script the rest of the memes in the script survive even if they have lost their useful functions. - Pathetic Sheep

I agree and that is why I find question:

What to replace religion, as we know it, with or what to reform religion to?

more interesting or important than if there is a God or not.

Ideas evolve, the world is in motion, but some things are to stay it seems. It hard to imagine society, where a smile would imply hostility, and to me its hard to imagine (global) society where "You shall murder" would become the word of God or common (sense) law.

I talk about Christianity only because it was mentioned and its closest to me (my mother is a believer),

Zentrino .

Yes the Greeks were the first culture to 'propose' that the world is a sphere. But the book of Isaiah was written approx 250 yrs before that. Of course this isnt the only evidence that I'd hang my hat on, but this was just one example of many.

You mentioned that the bible does not harmonize, and that the four gospels didn't even agree on the mode or method of Jesus' death... Where? No doubt there may be a place where one writer said there was 10ppl on a particular occasion and another said 11...idk. But keep in mind that those writing were not done at the same time or by the same person. Normally if you had 4 ppl telling the same story that they were eye witnesses to, how different would those stories be.

And of course I realize that Columbus didnt prove the earth was flat, but it was in his general time period.

And the example of hygiene that was mentioned, is again only one of many, many

"And yes there was a scribe cast that helped the bible to endure! But thats kinda my point. These people were not originally scribes, they were slaves to Egypt, Roman and a host of other civ's. hardly the foundation for a educated scribe class. If the bricklayer cast had a number of teachings that they adhered to, of which they claim had divine backing, if that was true, then wouldn't we have those writings, if in fact they were divine? "

The stories of a cast of ancient bricklayers did not survive but the stories of a cast of scribes did. There is a reason why we have the writings of ancient scribes and not the writings of ancient bricklayers. It has nothing to do with the divinity, truth, or value of the scribe heritage.

If the stories of a bricklayers cast was truly divine, then it would survive. That could be proof if it's divinity. If it cant survive, well then its obviously not divine.

My point was that they were not originally a scribe cast, in fact they were less educated that any cast, they were slaves! But their message is still here!

That is truly unique.

Bricklayers did not have pens. Or quills.

According to the old testament the first Jew sold into slavery in Egypt was Joseph. Whether he was a scribe or an adviser depends on translation. The description of activity sounds more like accountant.

When the Jews were taken out of Israel it was mostly just the educated classes. At the time of recording on paper the old testament authors had been separated from the uneducated Jewish class for some time.

When Joseph was sold into slavery he was sold as a slave. His brothers hated him and faked his death and sold him into slavery. It was only after he was there for a while did he get any position in society.

And when the Jews were enslaved by the Egyptians, there was no Israel, they were just a bunch of roaming nomads. Again, not usually noted for high education.

If the 'bricklayer's cast' had truly divine stories, wouldn't that divinity make sure those stories were preserved? There were all kinds of civ's that were more educated than the Jews. They had larger classes of those educated. So why, out of all those civ's that were much larger and powerful.... and educated, there exist any books or stories like it has with the lowly bible. None even close!

It does make me curious.

The Gospels tell different variations on a similar story but are nowhere near "harmonious" in their tellings of Jesus' life and death. I agree that 4 people would often give different eye witness accounts of the same events. However, these men were telling the story of the person they believed was the living Son of the only God. Here is what they record as the last words of the person they believe to be God as he died.

Matthew: "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"

Mark: "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"

Luke: "Father, into your hands I commit my spirit."

John: "It is finished."

If I believed the living Son of the only God was dying in front of me, I think I would listen pretty carefully to what he said. I suppose maybe they were distracted by the commotion and missed parts. However, they all later record that came back to life and talked to them aga

Your God has forsaken you! Repent! Repent!

Oh, wait... Jozi just had gas.

Sorry I havent got back to this more regularly, my internet has been atrocious recently.

I would like to say that the 'golden rule' (Treat others as you would be treated) isnt the best one I can think of. I think a better one would be 'Treat others as they would have you treat them'. IE I might be perfectly comfortable with hugging a stranger, but since some others may not be, I dont go around hugging perfect strangers. Treating others as you would have them treat you assumes that all people want to be treated in the same way, when this is clearly not the case.

Serpant: Regarding your points on the scientific accuracy of the bible (Zentrino does a good job on this):
1. It was known in anicient Egypt that the world was not flat (http://www.metrum.org/measures/measurements.htm). Where the bible states the earth is flat, it was and is wro

Zentrino

Could it be possible that those examples of the last WORDS (plural) before Jesus died all part of his last words. For example, if you and I had a conversation and somebody else was listening and they were later asked what was the last things Zentrino said they could say: he said that "Many other contradictory examples exist." Others may say your last WORDS are "I think the final words of Jesus are always a good starting point since it makes no sense that they would not be able to accurately record the last words of the person they believed to be the resurrected Son of the only God." Still yet others may say, "If Jesus came down into your living room tonight and spoke with you, do you think you'd have trouble remembering anything he said, let alone the very last thing he said? " is the last words you say. Do they have to actually say the last 3 WORDS Zentrino said was "accept that fact." If any

Well I doubt that anyone here believes I am the living Son of the only God. if you do, please PM me at Nevrondona so we can discuss the gifts I would like for you to begin bestowing upon my holiness. My point is that they were watching their lord be murdered. I think I would hang onto every word he said. So, I would not stop at one paragraph or few phrases in--I would get every word down. It also points out that the Bible is written by men and not inscribed by some deity. Of course it is fallible, we all are.
Read the creation story in Gen 1 and Gen 2 and tell me they say the same thing. They contradict each other on the order of events. Should you believe they tell an ancient myth there is nothing wrong with the contradictions for they matter very little. However, should you believe they tell a literal history, or that the Bible does not say anything in contradiction with itself, this poses a problem.
One of the most humorous (but sometimes

Sorry, but how again do I send gifts? I can't find the 'send Holy Gifts' button.

Its not frustrating to me if anybody tries to 'prove' the bible or any particular faith wrong. Nor do I expect anybody to prove anything about 'invisible talking people.' Just like I do not expect somebody to prove to me the complex laws of physics. That is their choice and I of course respect that choice, and this thread is just an expression of various beliefs and ideas... that's all! But I have come to realize that the few so called contradictions in the bible are not contradictions at all, including the creation account in Genesis. Of course it is unreasonable to think the earth was created in 7 24 hr days. But a day is used to describe a time period. Just like you may use the phrase 'back in the day'. When you really might mean back in any particul