Re: Religions
 

NEVER compare religion to Santa Claus.. I did that once many years ago.. turned out well.

Re: Religions
 

It's a combination of evolution, tradition, family, and politics. Religion is ingrained in so many aspects of our society.

I think there is a lot of wisdom in religion. Unfortunately, most of the good wisdom is ignored. I'm pretty sure God hates Republicans (AND TO DISCOURAGE AN UNNECESSARY POLITICAL DISCUSSION, he hates Democrats too :p).

Jesus was a hippy who hung out with prostitutes and blind people and preached the New Testament. He was more about giving your stuff to the poor and asking for forgiveness...which is kind of just saying "genuinely love your neighbor and God and good things will come to you."

Re: Religions
 

Jesus asked people to be charitable with their own wealth, to CHOOSE to give to others. He never asked them to take from A to give to B, and Republicans are far more charitable than Democrats.

Back on topic: Now that the discussion has degraded into calling believers "stupid", I'll jump in.

It is a current statistical impossibility that life spontaneously originated on it's own. Those that choose not to believe in God have tried to answer this by presenting theories such as "planet seeding by aliens" (who created the aliens?) to "we just don't know yet, but it wasn't God".

Now either of these may be true, but there is no evidence for either of them. They are guesses. Statements made out of belief, and not fact. Feel free to choose your religion, atheistic or theistic, but no one should pretend that they know more or are smarter than anyone else simply because they choose to not believe in the "spaghetti monster". You simply choose to believe in something else, but in the end, it's just faith... same as the most devout Baptist.

Re: Religions
 

Not disagreeing because I don't know, but I would like to see an actual source for that.

Um no. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miller%...rey_experiment

Re: Religions
 

No, it's really, really not the same. I don't believe in anything. I don't pretend to know the origin of life, but I think I remember reading back in high school about how scientists had conducted experiments using electricity in a box with similar atmospheric conditions to Earth, and small microorganisms formed.

If that's true, then isn't it extraordinarily more probable that life got it's start that way, as opposed to some all-powerful, omniscient being that no one has even a shred of evidence of willing life into existence?

And even if that isn't true and I'm remembering incorrectly, it doesn't change the fact that all religions were created by man, for man. They are a guess, but have no basis in fact. Science does. That is the difference. One is from someone's imagination, the other based on observations.

If one religion or another does turn out to be right, I'll eat my hat, because they just won the cosmic lottery in a most epic fashion.


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EDIT: Sorry Teuth, didn't see your post. Looks like I was remembering right.

Re: Religions
 

Politically, this has been common knowledge for a very long time. Many believe this is because democrats tend to be 1) less religious, and 2) view government programs as charity (consciously or subconsciously).

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/21/op...21kristof.html

I see that they created primordial goo (amino acids), but I fail to see the part where life was created. In fact, experiments have been done where every amino acid needed for life have been put together in ideal conditions with favorable stimulus and nothing has happened. No life created. In the end, we are left with assumptions and the only possibility not being considered is a supreme being. IMO, to believe that the results of the experiments noted in that article = life being created is a leap of "faith" if I've ever heard one.

Again, we see mountains being made out of molehills. The ability to recreate the components of life does not = spontaneous formation of life. Science is about observation and proof, not conclusions based on assumptions that may be correct or incorrect.

I think this is caused by noble cause corruption. People feel the need to prove to everyone that God does not exist, so they extend their argument beyond the boundaries of science in order to "free the ignorant masses". In the end, its things like this that reinforce my belief that most atheists are "true-believers" and not nearly as rational as they think they are. If they were, they would be agnostic.

Re: Religions
 

In terms of probabilities, I believe both come out to about nil. Note: Spontaneous creation of life is not absolute zero, but the chances are so remote it is considered a virtual impossibility. I believe the probability is 1 chance in 10 to the power of 390. To give some context, there is a far greater chance of observing every known atom in the universe than of life spontaneously erupting. (since you can't statistically measure the God equation I'll give Him an absolute zero). The best part of all of this? The most common argument against the probability dismissal is that the creation of true life is NOT RANDOM. So, the defense of abiogenesis is order, or one might say, design?

So we are left with the point of my post: You pick your belief, and I'll pick mine. But one zero doesn't get to be obnoxiously condescending to another zero. They are equal in terms of probability.

Re: Religions
 

I linked that because you said it was statistically impossible. Which it is not. Imagine you have all the ingredients to make a cake. You still need to figure out the right proportion, what to mix with what and when, and even if you somehow manage to get all that right, you need to set it at the exact temperature for the correct about of time. Now think of creating life as infinitely harder and with far more variables, all of what we don't know. Life isn't like making a pie.

To make the jump to a supreme being for anything that can't be explained is the laziest course of action possible.

Re: Religions
 

You are forgetting the most important ingredient in baking a cake. THE BAKER. Without him, there is no cake.

I'm anything but lazy, as I hope I have proven with my background knowledge and research. I am a former atheist, and was raised in a non-religious household. My belief in God is a result of a search of knowledge, and not an avoidance of it. I consider ALL possibilities. Do you? Or have you already made up your mind based on assumptions and statistical impossibilities?

Re: Religions
 

Like I said before, I'm not claiming to know how life on Earth got started.

You are - you are putting forth a hypothesis that there is a supreme being who created everything, but you don't have any evidence, at all, for this.

Also, this question has been asked a million times before, but if a supreme being did create life, then that just begs the question as to how that supreme being was formed.

Either it was created by another supreme being (who created that one?) or it spontaneously sprung into being. And if that life could spontaneously form, why couldn't life on Earth?

Re: Religions
 

You're asking us to prove a negative - it isn't possible. So I guess you win this argument by default?

Re: Religions
 

Heh, going to refer to god as the Baker from now on. The holy trinity of the Butcher, the Baker, and the Candlestick-maker :)


I do find it your shift in perspective to be interesting. I mapped out my logic behind an afterlife previously in this thread. There's enough proof for me to believe life started without a guiding hand. Especially when you consider the sheer size of the universe and the number of planets within it. A freak accident like life is bound to happen. I can't wrap my mind around what existed before the big bang though. Even if this universe is the offshoot of another, where did that one come from? Or if everything was condensed and the universe is cyclical in nature of expanding and contracting, there has to be a starting point. So if I was to give the plausibility of a god to anything it would be that. But then where did that god come from?

But really, why would a supreme being who created all of everything, make one-celled organisms on this planet? Given this discussion, I'm assuming you don't believe all the creatures on Earth were magicked into existence like the really religious types do.

Re: Religions
 

It's funny to think that anyone can "win" this argument. My goal isn't to convince you that God exists and that He created the universe, even though your goal is to convince me that he doesn't and didn't.

Here are my goals:

1) To encourage those that don't believe in God to be honest about the scientific arguments against his existence. Stretching science beyond it's boundaries does not disprove anything, and only hurts science.

2) To make non-believers realize that disbelief in God is a belief, not a fact. Facts must be proven, correct? I'm willing to admit my belief in God is a belief, and not a fact. Can you admit that nonexistence of God is a unproven belief, and not a fact?

3) Combining goals 1 and 3, to encourage atheists to drop the condescending attitudes and superiority complexes. Atheists have one belief amongst many. No need to act like assholes every time God or religion is mentioned.

Overall, I think everyone should be open to the possibility that God is real; not to accept Him, just to be open that he might just exist (I lived in this spiritual limbo for years). An open mind never hurt anyone.

Re: Religions
 

You made that one too easy for me. But I think a baker is a decent analogy.

Probably because I am a deist, and not tied to religion or dogma. In many ways, my belief in God is based in reason. Without a definite answer to everything, and the failure of atheist evangelists like Richard Dawkins to adequately make their case (often betraying themselves when they try), I still have this underlying belief in my chest that there is a God, so I choose to follow that belief.

Good questions, but I doubt I have answers. My belief is that God gave the components and the spark, but then let the engine run on its own, but this isn't a strong belief. Hard to say, but I love trying to find the answer.

As for evolution, I definitely think evolution in a species exists, and there is a strong chance that evolution between species takes place, but I'm not convinced of that. There are a lot of holes in Darwinism that need to be worked out. I'm not anti-Darwin, but I'm also not a blindly devout Darwinist like Richard Dawkins.

My biggest problem with people like Dawkins are that they are so devout in their faith that they lose their objectivity, and at that point they cease to be scientists, and become evangelists. Essentially, he is everything he says he hates, just the perspective is reversed.

Re: Religions
 

Haaaa, that was good, I liked that.

Theres a funny show on netflix called "Animals that Defy Evolution". Its about some scientist guy who believed in evolution but then saw the light and now is trying to disprove it with stuff that doesnt make any sense. Hes things like, if theres a giraffe sitting there and it sees a zebra, hes just gonna chill, but if it sees a lion it runs away. Evolution didnt tell it to run away, god gave it the ability to distinguish between predators and other animals. And if god didnt make whales right on the spot like they are, theres no way it would have survived through evolution. Hes pretty much says that if god didnt make every animal it would have died.