JCviggen

They're all morons, reps, dems...the lot of em

Interesting story m8 Of course it appears to me that the bottom line of your story is people themselves need things to believe/have faith in, and I agree. Of course this whole belief in a higher power is also something that it needed by some people, and not by others, and those "others" are not off any worse because of it at all. It all depends on your personal needs. And when you come as far as that, take into account there is no direct or indirect evidence of a higher power....just people needing one.....well...you can see where i'm going with this Either way, its definitely true humans should be humble...we are but a speck of dust in the Universe, though a precious speck for sure. One of the things I regret the most personally is that I will never have the brain power to understand, or imagine, how enormeous the universe really is....with billions and billions of stars and places we cant and may never be able to explore. We dont have any answer to the question "why" but there very well may be no answer to that question. I dont want to go on anecdotes or other people's belief to fill in any blanks just for peace of mind.

This is true, I only brought it up since some people seemed to think the Ark "has been found" which is a load of crock. I also dont think the "well it cant hurt to believe, its a win-win situation" approach is all that noble. I dont have a problem with anybody believing, as long as they dont try to get scientific about it or intolerant about it. There are varying levels of religious people, but as you can see with the Ark thing some will believe just about anything when it suits their belief ("clinging to" seems appropriate) somewhat comparable with the organisation in the U.S. that still solidly believes the earth is flat (they even have their own magazine) So some people simple accept nothing no matter how sensible, thats all i'm going for here :)

Just to get back to this.... http://www.tentmaker.org/WAR/HasNoahsArkBeenFound1.html http://www.tentmaker.org/WAR/HasNoahsArkBeenFound2.html And finally, about the pointless reference to a "converted" atheist (any idea how many believers/priests lose faith without articles being written on them?) A scientific theory stands or falls according to how well it is supported by the facts, not according to who believes it. Got any more? I'll just got ahead and link another page, this one a nice explanation of how the improbability of life arising on its own is irrelevant (and wrong) http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/abioprob/ How can anyone (and many people do - even in this thread) say that they cant imagine how life could start without devine intervention....when they havent studied the matter at all (or have zero qualifications on the matter) Because you dont know or understand something doesnt mean it didnt happen or could be possible.

:lol:

Ho ho ho, I'm not writing the article itself off as fact. You can check the sources used + check alternate ones, plenty available. If you are going to go against any serious historian and go on believing in the bible in such a way then NO amount of evidence will ever convince you, and you would have made a good believer of the flat earth theory.

Wow. Believing in God is one thing, but to believe the Bible is unchanged or an accurate descendant from the "original" bible(s) is just plain ignorant. The bible has changed hugely over centuries, hell there even used to be 2 "Gods" which were condensed into one. Read the article I linked a page or more back.

Some seem to have the idea the bible changed relatively little through the centuries... if you want to spend time reading about it... http://www.bidstrup.com/bible.htm very good if not a little lengthy essay, well researched.

You would think being a good person and leading a normal good life would be enough to be "accepted" Of course the cult would have trouble sustaining itself if it ever was as compassionate and forgiving as it claims to be. Good luck with religion fellas, i've spent enough braincells on it :)

I'll look it up and link you later Most believers were never non-believers. You pulled that out of your @#{ The overwhelming majority of religious people in this world were born and tought religion. Religion and God have survived because people still want answers they may not get outside of relgion. Wether the answers are actually right or not doesnt matter. Major minority is VERY relative. Religion is usually much stronger in underdeveloped areas of the world. I guess the US is a bit of an excepton, down here in Western Europe religion is fading by the day. Churches are empty. The only thing keeping up the religion numbers around here are the Muslims. There is nothing at all that indicates this decline is going to end. The more understanding people have of their surroundings the less religion matters. Dont believe me? Look at this religion vs IQ chart then. http://www.gnxp.com/MT2/archives/001523.html?entry=1523 Notice anything? I was talking about hardcore believers and well, I never met any that would say "well sure maybe we're wrong" but i dont believe that I am. They're slightly more fundamentalistic than that.

Very true. The whole problem is that what makes religious people believe is something they feel, or that they simply cannot imagine there isnt something bigger. This is fair, and everybody should think the way they feel best! Life's too short and you should live it the way it feels best to you. But when it comes down to it....you simple CANNOT trust the human mind or intuition to be accurate. Its really not. In the grand scheme of the universe, whatever we think or feel is very inconsequential and based on a very narrow point of view. Our brains work pretty well here on earth in our familiar environment. We have made our own reality based on what we see every day. Its not really that straight forward when you dig deeper. A lot of things are counter-intuitive simply because they run opposite to what our eyes show us. This gives us a natural feeling of something being not right. Regardless, many such counter-intuitive things have long been proven. It has also been shown that there are actual differences in the brain of religious people and "non-believers". Since the difference is actually so physical in nature, isnt that a bloody good indication of what religion really is? I often feel uneasy when I see parents teach their children very extensively about religion, it often equates to literally programming humans to be religious. Its not so much that they really believe, it is that they are simply not able to believe anything else. If your whole environment since age 0 had believed in blue spacemonkeys coming soon....it would have felt as normal and natural as any other religion does to their believers. Anyway, in these discussions you will never convince anybody and it's not the point either. But in the best case scenario it at least shows the arguments of hardcore religious people are incredibly superficial and narrow-minded and not based on any sound logic whatsoever. Believing is fine, just keep an open mind and dont push it onto others. I would say that includes your own children. Let them figure it our when they have reached an age where they can think for themselves.

Where to even begin. First of all "before" the big bang is irrelevant as time itself only starts at that point. Secondly, when/what/how was God itself created then? There is NO POSSIBLE WAY except to say "well it just did period and it requires belief" Dont try to argue science if you are not going to be logical. Thirdly, you seem to think facts which are not 100% known/understood for being false by definition. If there is something that humanity does not, or perhaps will never understand this has ZERO to do with wether or not there is a god. We may have limited understanding of the universe, that does not change anything. You just have to be able to accept that we dont know everything. Because you dont know or understand something is zero proof or even suggestion of a God. Science improves itself, is sceptical and tests its own theories. If they fall flat on their behind then so be it. Religion does nothing of the sort, all it does is twist itself into as many ways as possible to hang onto what MUST be true. Uber religious people NEED it to be true. Which leads to the problem that you simply cant argue logic with anyone hardcore into religion. Whatever doesnt fit them is rejected automatically.

The Bible and a God/Supernatural presence are not one and the same. The bible was written and edited by people. It includes some historical "facts" like many other very old scriptures do. It also includes some things that simply didnt happen, unless the archeological and anecdotical evidence evaporated into thin air. It does not include any "facts" about there being a God or not. It should be noted it has been shown other "messiahs" were around in those days. Some of them walked on water, through walls, cured the sick....etc. You need to watch Penn&Teller's episode on the bible Try disproving to me there's an invisible monkey on my shoulder...there's as much evidence for that as there is for a God. Some things in the bible have historical relevance, yes. Others are simply bull with nothing at ALL to back it up. Not to mention many extremely cruel, uncompassionate and downright silly passages.

Wag the Dog > *

lol..lets not go into a debate, but there are no facts about religion other than that its bull. There's nothing to "learn" only fairy tales.

Nope. Just human nature making stuff up

A good article from the BBC news website.... I liked it a lot...and i'm impressed by the US system and how it worked...well done...cookie for you! now try to organize some decently run elections in a couple of years and all is well

I remember here we were on some kind of school excursion when I was 15 and when we stopped for a drink pretty much everyone had beer...teachers were ok with it... generally speaking its ok to drink here from 13-14-15 yrs...and I personally dont know any alcoholics... all this age crap is rediculous if you ask me.

That might just be the most ironic thing i ever read :lol:

I know, I just thought it was funny And what else could they say? Gee thanks for the support guys? lol

its funny how in some threads some people write stuff like "fark other countries, we'll do as we please" then in the next "country xxxxxx endorses Bush/Kerry!" :lol:

Typical example of blind support for candy hand-out politics while the deficit is growing by enormeous amounts every day. One day when the stuff hit the fan it will be the politician's fault...when you're living above your standard the fall is inevitable

Point taken m8.. but I dont agree with the "life isnt fair, deal with it" attitude...in the end the PEOPLE decide everything. Acting like sheep isnt going to put anything in the right direction

somehow that seems ironic to me :lol:

One more thing : i dont see any point in effectively dismissing the votes of a lot of people by the "winner takes it all principle". If you want to give some areas a bigger piece of the vote so that they have some impact on the result, that is understandable up to a point. But lets imagine candidate A wins a state with a few hundred votes to spare. All of the electoral votes the state has, will go to the winning candidate, correct? This means that everybody's votes go to candidate A even though effectively half of them didnt vote for him (or her). The roots of democracy lie in the fact that everybody's vote has an impact on who gets elected. The electoral college defeats this. Up to half of the votes are potentially ignored. How can thàt be a sound system? Of course, you need to start from the ideology that the U.S. is a single country (as it is considered). I think since the federal government has control over all the states, its an accurate assumption even though in technical terms it might not be exactly so.