Anti-religion internet memes

Discussion in 'The Cesspool' started by StrangerInAStrangeLand, Sep 4, 2018.

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  1. Gawdzilla Sama Valued Senior Member

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    It's pointless to bring evidence from the Bible to a discussion. Cafeteria Christians will just blow it off.
     
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  3. pluto2 Banned Valued Senior Member

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    This world is way too brutal for there to be a God who gives a damn about people and their happiness in life.

    Fact is that many people these days are way too selfish, way too aggressive and way too brutal in order for there to be anything even remotely close to a loving and caring God.

    The fact is that we live in a might makes right society where money and authoritarian institutions rule over people's life every single day.

    People think they are free but in fact we are not free at all because we are enslaved by money and the authoritarian institutions of the state.
     
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  5. StrangerInAStrangeLand SubQuantum Mechanic Valued Senior Member

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  7. Kittamaru Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Adieu, Sciforums. Valued Senior Member

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    I'd say that curing leprosy, restoring the sight of blind folks, a poor lady being healed merely by touching his cloak, rising from the dead, etc should be fairly significant proof... more so than "flying about the place"

    Can you provide evidence that the "stuff that follows" is "made up" to refute/disprove the existence of God?

    *shrug* I've given you the explanation as best and simply as I can within the body of knowledge I have - what you choose to do with it and/or decide to believe is entirely your call.
     
  8. Kittamaru Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Adieu, Sciforums. Valued Senior Member

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    I'm... not sure why any of that would require there not be a God - our own free will means that we have the choice to ignore what is good and right and act in a selfish, brutal, aggressive, et al manner... conversely, taking that free will away is... well, I know in my perspective it'd be perhaps the single greatest punishment that could be inflicted upon me - being forced to live my life as not myself.
     
  9. Michael 345 New year. PRESENT is 72 years oldl Valued Senior Member

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    I didn't know earthquakes had free will

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  10. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    Of course he will be resurrected and his death is just a symbolic sacrifice...a gesture. He is gonna "be baack".....

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    And then it won't matter.....

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  11. Xelasnave.1947 Valued Senior Member

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    Thank you for considering the matter.

    I dont see how any of the events you mention establishes a god even if one could get past a rejection based upon it all being mere magician tricks.

    Clearly the Romans took no notice and had not recorded anything at all so that suggests nothing happened or such tricks were somewhat common place and they raised no interest.

    Flying about would not even establish a god claim but it would have the attention of the Romans and written about.

    But the problem is these matters are not proof because they are heresay.

    Heresay is not treated as evidence in our courts dealing with simple worldly matters so perhaps heresay is even less useful if one is to call upon it to establish the biggest claim of all that one is a god.

    Many made those wild unsupported claims back then offering a similar MO to JC and that suggests it was a somewhat popular scam.

    Absolutely☺.

    Now you are confronted with the frustration of a wild unsupported claim.

    On page one of the good book the account of creation is made up.

    You cant get around that fact.

    Yes you have and I thank you for explaining what it is that you believed.

    However it would seem the body of knowledge you have is simply wrong if you read and rely upon the good book.

    However it is after all heresay so we dont know what JC actually said on the matter but if you follow what is really in the good book JC strongly endorsed the old law.

    Have a great day.

    Alex
     
  12. StrangerInAStrangeLand SubQuantum Mechanic Valued Senior Member

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    ///
    Those are about the Good Samaritan who Jesus said is a neighbor because he helped someone in need. Further, the Samaritans were Jews. There is clearly no indication of it applying to Romans.

    The word which was translated to English neighbor is also translated to friend & to fellow, mostly with no indication of anything other than what we normally think of when we hear those words.

    <>
     
  13. Kittamaru Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Adieu, Sciforums. Valued Senior Member

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    Why would the motion of tectonic plates require free will?

    Or maybe it will; only time will tell which is right and the thing is - once someone finds out, they aren't really in a position to tell the rest of us

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    Please explain to me how a magician could cure something such as leprosy, restore sight to a blind man, or bring someone back from the dead... unless your implication is that Jesus inflicted those ailments on people as part of an act?

    Except the Romans did take notice:

    https://probe.org/ancient-evidence-for-jesus-from-non-christian-sources-2/
    So, a Roman Historian wrote about him.

    The Roman governor of Bithynia wrote about it. I'll let you read the rest.

    https://www.quora.com/Why-is-Jesus-Christ-not-mentioned-in-Roman-records#

    Yeshua was insignificant in the eyes of Rome - they would not have cared much for some odd stories of a religious man from a backwater province - it would be like expecting the "Tales of Perry County" to be national news.

    I would presume, then, that you would also throw out most of recorded history, since it's "all just heresay", right? After all, you can't go back and prove that ancient writings are accurate?

    Also:
    https://www.quora.com/How-can-Christians-effectively-answer-the-charge-that-the-Bible-is-hearsay
    https://www.law.cornell.edu/rules/fre/rule_803

    Heresay would be an account written by someone who heard it second-hand. The Gospels, for example, are written by the people who were witness to Christ's works. That isn't heresay.
     
  14. Kittamaru Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Adieu, Sciforums. Valued Senior Member

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    Prove it - you just said you could, so please, by all means - have at it

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    As I showed above - it is not, in fact, heresay, based on standards of admissible court evidence and common law; the alternative would be to throw out all of recorded history as heresay because you cannot go back and cross-examine them. I'm sure your claim is that archaeology can corroborate the stories told for historic facts... this is true, and in fact is also true for many biblical accounts:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_archaeology

    http://www.sciencemeetsreligion.org/theology/bible-archaeology.php

    Among others.

    So, again, I challenge you to do as you said you can - prove to me that the Bible is falsified and that God and/or Jesus Christ do not/did not exist.

    I await your reply with bated breath.
     
  15. Michael 345 New year. PRESENT is 72 years oldl Valued Senior Member

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    Just checked my posting. It was done before coffee (not a good time)
    I think I was trying to make the point (badly as it turns out) that our free will is a illusion when processes act the same way (selfish, brutal, aggressive) without free will
    Hence my incredulous query

    Will try to flesh out such incredulous queries in future with a technique I have used at times, multiple ???????

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  16. Xelasnave.1947 Valued Senior Member

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    Its heresay so none of these things are facts they are stories told and retold not to be recorded for many years after.
    You are kidding right?
    Did you notice the date mentioned?
    64 ad !!!!!
    Tell me about something you saw 64 years ago.
    Not evidence in any shape or form.
    AD 112!!!!!
    Great evidence.
    Thank you for going to the trouble of rounding it all up but none of it establishes the claim JC existed for sure and certainly no of it proves he was God.
    I cant respond to such a generalisation.
    But there are very few things in history we can be sure about if you really think about it.
    But heresay is heresay and as I said not acceptable in our courts so why use it to determine a claim some human makes that he is God.
    Heck if you only watch Judge Judy you must understand the unacceptibility of heresay...she wont accept it and that reflects the actual law.
    Yet you are happy to accept heresay on the wildest claim a human can make.
    Really...thats news to me.
    Who which ones?
    I thought it was not writen about for up to one hundred years after...or was that fifty...anyways you say we have eye witnesses so who are they and what did they record?
    I was actually making a joke...
    A backhander at theists approach to establishing claims...however.
    Page one.
    In the begining etc etc...do you know the name of the witness?
    Who did god create prior to creation to witness creation.
    Who makes this claim?
    If that is not made up what would you call it?
    I am pretty sure you are wrong.
    Heresay is not addmissable I think you will find.
    Heresay is not addmissable evidence ask a lawyer.

    I am far from convinced that anything you present supports the claim of one human that he was God.
    If there is so much evidence in your view string it together ...that should be easy if you have the goods.
    I have shown page one problem thats enough.

    I can not however prove JC did not exist, but I dont need to as I am not the one claiming he existed and that he was God.

    Sorry to be brief but I am busy and perhaps should have replied tomorrow.

    It is really nice to have you talk openly and present what you feel supports your case.
    I respect that.
    But bottom line is for me.
    JC was one of at least ten that I found with same or similar MO and so I feel he was just another of that type.
    The heresay evidence then becomes even less convincing set on that back drop.
    Add the plot...God sacrificing himself whatever for mans sins in one tiny part of the world in times where superstition ruled etc ..rusing from death in three days in parrallel to the Suns behaviour...no I can understand how it is just a made up story.
    Sorry I have to go...
    Alex
     
  17. Tiassa Let us not launch the boat ... Valued Senior Member

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    They were really forward looking, then. You're aware that none of the Gospels can be dated precisely to Jesus, and start appearing thirty years after his death. There are a number of reasons why scholars argue that framework, but one of the most compelling is to compare the documents to others of the time, attending the selection and application of words.

    There is also the Quelle story—Pagels' Origin of Satan is really good for explaining why Q is important—and we can easily find an incredible literary significance about the Synoptic Gospels, even while acknowledging their periods. Had you been born right after Christ died ... and let's compare it to Hollywood: When you're just passing thirty years old, a movie comes out, Jesus: The Incredible Story, produced by Mark, either a one-name artist or a working group, and maybe you remember hearing something about these hippies when you were little. It's a great film; people are stunned, struck, affected; they want to believe. When you're fifty, the studio decides to reboot the material for, Jesus: As Incredible as He Wanna Be, and this time Matt is in charge, and is so successful the studio reboots again a couple years later, with a new take: Heal: The Story of Jesus, because everyone likes a medical drama, so put the physician, Luke, in charge.

    Pretty much anyone can admit it was a good run for the studio.

    When you're about seventy-five years old, the studio thinks it needs another Jesus film, but a reboot is really risky, so what they're going to do, see, is reimagine the film, instead of rebooting it, and to keep it popular, John borrows a bunch of stuff from any number of knockoffs and wannabes for, Mystery Miracle: Word to the Word.

    It is very interesting to me, at the Q level, how many Christians disdain the best working theses explaining the Synoptic Gospels. It is, in fact, because of pride and superstition. For instance, look around for J.M.W. Turner's Light and Colour (Goethe's Theory) — The Morning after the Deluge — Moses Writing the Book of Genesis. There is so much wrong with the painting it really seems tragic, but for our purposes we might note the now discredited proposition that Moses wrote the Book of Genesis. Similarly, more simplistic accounts of how the Gospels were written have fallen away. Remember, out of two millennia, we're all of about seventy-three years after Nag Hammadi, when our understanding of the Bible began changing radically. Also bear in mind the powerful backlash; when it comes up, Christendom in the pop culture can be seen reacting; attending their reaction, though, suggests these evangelicals aren't familiar with what they're dealing with; if Q is some sinister thesis invented by antichristians, then the fact its name comes from a Christian thesis designating Gospel authors Q, M, and L, might seem important, but if I focus on that particular evangelical retort I'm also overlooking recent scholarship returning to two- and three-source constructions conceding other questions. What other questions? Well, that's just it, the whole prospect depends on a somewhat literalist and prideful outlook: Just who needs such nitpicking validation; over time it's the same people who needed Moses to have written Genesis; the need arises for the sake of a political argument. Quite literally, that last is the difference between thanking God that someone managed to write it down, or insisting on insupportable history in order to argue that some contemporaneous dudes named Matthew, Mark, and Luke, all wrote down what they saw at the time but the only records we have emerge thirty to eighty years later, and haven't been altered. To the other, consider that literalism and pretend you and I are in the writer's room, and we're penning the cheap farce, how do we lead the scene to that anime-style summary, with the fatcat bishop haughtily correcting a fearful subordinate that something, something, must stand, blah, blah, because Matthew wrote or said this or that in his Gospel.

    Understanding the Synoptic Gospels is the key to finding both the historicity and miraculous nature of Christ. It's just that the actual answers are less spectacular and satisfying than people generally expect.

    †​

    Similar notes on authorship, history, and the Bible: You can still find the Epistle to the Hebrews described as "traditionally attributed to Paul", which is weird in the context of whence comes that tradition. I don't dispute that To the Hebrews is included in the Pauline evangelism; for that reason, sure, "traditionally attributed to Paul" is not beyond my recognition and experience. However, it also seems important to note that Eusebius openly doubted Pauline authorship, and in doing so cites Origen, who suggests either Luke, or Clement of Rome. Setting aside the chortle about Luke, it's worth noting that other theses suggest Apollos or Priscilla, one being a working partner of Paul, and the other asserted among the Seventy Disciples of Luke 10. I like the suggestion of Barnabas, but scholarship, these days, more generally looks to an unresolved disciple of Paul.

    Also, on the Epistle of James, consider the question of reading the Bible cover to cover, as a contiguous story presented according to the canon. The New Testament is out of order. True, there is a bunch of "traditionally attributed" lending to this or that, but consider the book of James and the question of sola fide.

    I can't quite explain how important it actually has been in my lifetime; you might be young enough that part of the story sounds strange to you. Do you remember "Rockin' Rollen"? If I say, "Loving God theory", does that ring a bell? Do you recall evangelists telling people to "ask Jesus into your heart"? By the way, do you remember a Simpsons episode called "Faith Off" (#BABF06)? In the year 2000, Bart threw down about the deathbed confession. I don't know, how long has it been since atheists pestered about whether Hitler could go to Heaven? The problem arises from politics and pride: Sola fide—by faith alone—are we Saved.

    In my youth, the issue had to do with Christians Behaving Badly. Actually, it still does; it's just not a headliner. I call it an Idiot Evangelism, because, well, okay, do you remember Flag Salute? Maybe somewhere in this country children still assemble outside, around the flag, to recite the Pledge, but living where it rains enough we mostly just performed the ritual in the classroom. Now imagine a bunch of fourteen year olds gathered at the school flag, praying loudly in public in order to be seen committing their act of piety, because they aren't allowed to pray in public so look at them here praying in public with precisely nobody trying to stop them. And imagine five years before that, a former Marine with a strong recovery and redemption story in the time 'twixt Vietnam and Iraq, with a ministry show on UHF broadcast, and a summer camp where children gather around the bonfire quite literally to throw books and vinyl records into the flames as a demonstration of religious freedom. These are, as you might imagine, parts of the evangelical right wing experience we still deal with today.

    Now, if we read the New Testament in canonical order, sola fide seems a difficult question Paul steers the budding church through, and among the reasons some critics describe American evangelicalist Christendom as some manner of Paulism there is the fact that James seems to reiterate an outcome of this discussion. Here is the tricky part, though: Modern-day Paulines still tend toward a constricted libertine functional hot mess because they ignore James. If I say Paul seems to steer the budding church through a question, well, what is the answer? Sola fide.

    The Idiot Evangelism could never figure this part out. It was enough to argue that you needed to have Jesus because works alone were not sufficient. What they were skipping out on was James' apparent resolution, that faith without works is ineffective, that one's acts must reflect their faith. And if we joke about no wonder they skip out on James, well, yeah, they skip out on Christ, too, so, whatever.

    But the whole bit with sola fide is fouled, because the New Testament is out of order. While James appears to state a resolution to a Pauline question that modern Paulines fail to resolve, or some such, the actual chronology of the record would appear to be that James resolved the question before Paul started mucking around with it.

    If we attend James, sola fide is easier answered than lived. The modern Paulines, however, would have sola fide easier lived than understood, and some days that seems like the point. Remember, to the one, that the Pauline mucking about is a response to the political challenges of organizing and maintaining a growing church community. To some degree, he answers because they ask; in another aspect, he also needs to not offend some powers that could influence or even quell church growth. A modern analogy would be Democrats compromising with everything evil under the sun because for some reason they think they must. If we read the Pauline evangelism as a political compromise, it makes a tremendous amount of sense, but also pretty much indicts itself. Imagine all of these politics centuries later, when the New Testament canon is settled, between Hippo Regius in 393 CE and Carthage in 397 and 419.

    Han shot first. And James wrote first.

    †​

    The end of literalism doesn't invalidate faith, but, rather, changes its priorites.
     
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  18. Kittamaru Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Adieu, Sciforums. Valued Senior Member

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    Ah, now you are moving the goalposts. A shame - here, I thought you actually wanted debate.

    So, once again, we are throwing out all of recorded history - good to know.

    Yep, so no more recorded history because "it's all heresay". Got it.

    The eye witnesses were the disciples - but it's irrelevant, since we're apparently ignoring all of history.

    And, now, backpedaling; you can't do it. Got it.

    *shrug* You go tell Cornell they are wrong, then.


    So you don't intend to debate, but rather wish to simply require ever further levels of evidnece without needing to provide any yourself. Fair enough - I don't see any reason to continue the discussion, however, since you intend to ascribe zero credibility to any historical record.
     
  19. Kittamaru Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Adieu, Sciforums. Valued Senior Member

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    It seems the issue presented is one of order of events, chronologically speaking - I don't purport that the disciples were walking around with a computer, typing up everything as it happened; I would think it apparent that there are going to be discrepancies and other issues, especially when taking the viewpoints of multiple people; a not-so-recent debate on the credibility of eye-witness testimony comes to mind. The general message, however, is incredibly consistent, as well as corroborated by several non-Christian authors and a smattering of known archaeological evidence.

    That is, to say that none of this ever happened is to simply hand-wave away a very large body of evidence; however, that seems to be exactly what some would like to do - after all, history apparently isn't really history, and facts aren't really facts, or so I'm told these days.
     
  20. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    How convenient, .....this is how it is, but we'll never know if any of it is true...

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  21. sideshowbob Sorry, wrong number. Valued Senior Member

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    Recorded history is a vast web of inter-related evidence. That hardly compares with a handful of oblique references that may or may not specify Jesus.
     
  22. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    And mythology is recorded history, no? The difference is that we have decided to treat mythology as imaginary, while we continue to cling tightly to our bible as being truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth...

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    p.s. the bible is not factually usable as a history book. History books are.....

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    p.p.s. the bible is not factually usable as a science book. Science books are.....

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    Last edited: Sep 25, 2018
  23. Gawdzilla Sama Valued Senior Member

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    I remember sophomore poli sci classes too.
     
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