Atheism requires as much faith as religion?

[Hidingfromyou]

RiversideRedneck wrote:

<quoted text>
Atheist, or anti-theist sites do exactly the same. Spout opinions & bullshit.

RR - in my above paragraph, I wrote "apologetic" not "Christian apologetic" so we're in agreement here.

Any kind of apologetic site is going to presented cherry picked, biased information. You can't really grow intellectually from such sites, though people generally like to search for information that backs up their understanding of the world around them. Very few seek out contrary positions to test their knowledge. Those who do probably have more sophisticated understandings of their belief system, though.

[Dave Nelson]

Aerobatty wrote:

<quoted text>
They didn't live long.
Average lifespan maybe 35 or 45 years.

There were lots that lived longer. You have plenty of mountain men that lived to riper old ages, and they lived rough. Most of my alleged male ancestors lived to older age.

Cold weather is brutality. It goes beyond just a simple will to live to endure it. People die for the damndest reasons for this evolutionary "will to survive" to be such a driving force. Just look at those Russians and Germans in WWII living in sub-zero weather working with cold metal. Was easy to die, just sit still long enough in the cold and suffer a little pain, but something more than themselves kept them waking up the next day and going on. Yes, many died, but many more survived. Or were forced to beyond the physical level.

Many years ago I spent hours on a concrete floor in 5 degree weather under a car changing a clutch in a thin jacket. Just kept going. The cold starts shutting the brain down. You just keep going. Out in the frozen fields of Europe with death all around, a way of life, so to speak, and no end in sight, all you had to do was want to go to sleep, and it would all be over.

The individual is not as much in control of their destiny as they would like to think.

I have to sit here and cool my heels until late morning and it warms up enough to finish that damned thing.

[Adam]

Riverside Redneck, your hostility to the catholic church just highlights your ignorance of history. remember they were the ones that compiled your magic story book :)

[ChristineM]

Thinking wrote:

Great, thanks. Been very busy recently, done a lot of travelling.
Hope life is treating you well in that there North.
<quoted text>

Nothing much has changed on topix, there has been an almost insignificant turnover of crustards as some fell by the wayside and others tried their luck with the same old stories, other than that. same, same

Life is great thanks, except of course the weather and taxes but hey, we can’t have it all.

Welcome home

[bossdrop]

Hidingfromyou wrote:

<quoted text>
Call it "punctuated equilibrium" if you want. It's often opposed to "gradualism" but the mechanisms of evolution are the same. They don't change.
The changes that occur lie in the increased deaths of individuals, the increase of selection pressure due to changing environmental conditions.

hiding!...how you been!. long time no speak to. I thought you were supposed to meet me at the Incheon airport for tea during my layover? you dare stand me up:)

That is probably the coolest airport I have ever been in. South Koreans are so nice...they make you want to come back. Anyways my month long asia trip was marvelous. the cuisine with so many cultures is so delicious.

oh yeah...hi the rest of you (cough)'atheists' ROFLMBO. Still see you guys are still in your delusional BANG!..universe..non life...to life..marilyn monroe fantasy <grin>. Hope you all are well.

[RiversideRedneck]

Aerobatty wrote:

<quoted text>
Backed by numerous independent lines of verifiable and repeatable evidence.
Something your beliefs,( i.e., YOUR opinions and bullshit) can never do.
You can believe anything you want, but when your beliefs conflict with solid science, you become an intentional liar.
Your supposed god hates liars.
Hope you have a good Nomex suit.

Ya right! evilbible dotcom is backed by verifiable sources???????

[RiversideRedneck]

blacklagoon wrote:

<quoted text>So...Catholics are NOT Christians? Who knew!!!! You asked what harm Christianity had done, I answered it. Sorry if it upsets you. Would you like me to address each of the hundreds of Christian religions separately?

Christians don't go to Catholic churches...

Christians don't follow (or care) what the pope has to say.

Christians don't follow (or care) what the Vatican has to say.

Get your religions straight.

[RiversideRedneck]

Hidingfromyou wrote:

<quoted text>
Who uses atheist websites? I only post links to science articles or news articles reporting on science.
Oh, you mean about the Bible? Like, different interpretations?

Don't be stupid. Lots of atheists post links & quotes from atheist websites.

[Dave Nelson]

Hidingfromyou wrote:

<quoted text>
I really don't believe it when people make these claims. If you look at low tech societies, quite a few people make it into their late 60's and 70's. Yes, it's a lot less than in our careful, disease free, high food and medically mediated cultures, but in every society you're going to find people who are grandparents.
What changes in low tech societies is the ability to prevent child mortality. Mortality rates increase at all ages, but are most severe prior to age 5 - roughly 50% of children in the absence of modern medicine would die before their 5th birthday. However, if you make it to 10, you're likely to make it to 15. If you make it to 15, you're probably going to reach 25. etc., if you make it to 50, you're likely going to make it to 60.
In fact, the reason we can live so long is because of selection pressure favoring "grandparents." In low tech societies, those families who have grandparents do better than those without. Grandparents can't have kids of their own, but they add to resource collecting and knowledge. In low tech societies, old people know everything and have lived through bounty and scarcity.
When Dave talks of cold weather and claims that his ancestors couldn't live in such temperatures, he's expressing ignorance. He relies on high tech solutions and is basically physically weak. All of us are, who were raised in high tech cultures. In low tech ones, you get adjusted to the weather, have higher pain tolerances, and use different methods of survival.

I can't disagree with your assessment. However, as for myself, I have always hated being cold, especially damp cold. It was painful. I would have died very young in ages past.

[RiversideRedneck]

Adam wrote:

Riverside Redneck, your hostility to the catholic church just highlights your ignorance of history. remember they were the ones that compiled your magic story book :)

I have no hostility towards the Catholic Church.

I read no magic story book.

You have me confused with someone else.

[Hidingfromyou]

bossdrop wrote:

<quoted text>hiding!...how you been!. long time no speak to. I thought you were supposed to meet me at the Incheon airport for tea during my layover? you dare stand me up:)
That is probably the coolest airport I have ever been in. South Koreans are so nice...they make you want to come back. Anyways my month long asia trip was marvelous. the cuisine with so many cultures is so delicious.
oh yeah...hi the rest of you (cough)'atheists' ROFLMBO. Still see you guys are still in your delusional BANG!..universe..non life...to life..marilyn monroe fantasy <grin>. Hope you all are well.

Boss!!! Long time!

I'm glad you're good - that's great! I bet you enjoyed Korea. Most of the cute girls there are Christian, right? I hope you met some :)

I'm in your country right now and enjoying the food, people, architecture and, most of all, indoor warmth.

anyohaseyo!

[Hidingfromyou]

RiversideRedneck wrote:

<quoted text>
Christians don't go to Catholic churches...
Christians don't follow (or care) what the pope has to say.
Christians don't follow (or care) what the Vatican has to say.
Get your religions straight.

Catholics are Christians. In fact, your version of religion is simply a changed version of theirs.

You can separate yourself from them all you want. That's no problem. I would, if I was a Christian - mainly because of the past. But Luther was a total jerk, too. Racist, sexist to boot. I'd also separate myself from that dirtbag.

While you're at it, you should edit out all the immoral stuff from your Bible. Start a Christian religion that is based solely on the moral teachings of Jesus (but leave out the immoral teachings of Jesus). Separate it utterly from science, use it to build a system of spirituality and personal growth that is positive in believers' lives and the lives of others.

That would be a religion worth believing in. Can you do it?

[Adam]

See how hateful these fundies are. Not content with hating Free Thinkers, they also hate other christians.

[Hidingfromyou]

Dave Nelson wrote:

<quoted text>
I can't disagree with your assessment. However, as for myself, I have always hated being cold, especially damp cold. It was painful. I would have died very young in ages past.

Unless you were born some place warm. Hell, maybe you would have been an explorer and left for warmer places.

I'd have died young, too, if it makes you feel any better. But for the grace of modern medicine.

[Hidingfromyou]

RiversideRedneck wrote:

<quoted text>
Don't be stupid. Lots of atheists post links & quotes from atheist websites.

How can evilbible.com exist if the Bible is truly the word of a deity? are deities' words all that corruptible?

That's pretty funny.

I think you just disagree with their interpretation, but they see their website as an expose.

:)

[RiversideRedneck]

Hidingfromyou wrote:

<quoted text>
Catholics are Christians. In fact, your version of religion is simply a changed version of theirs.

Nope. From wiki:

Catholicism is distinguished from other forms of Christianity in its particular understanding and commitment to tradition, the sacraments, the mediation between God, communion, and the See of Rome.

[Hidingfromyou]

RiversideRedneck wrote:

<quoted text>
Nope. From wiki:
Catholicism is distinguished from other forms of Christianity in its particular understanding and commitment to tradition, the sacraments, the mediation between God, communion, and the See of Rome.

Oh, my mistake. I forget that it's acceptable practice to quote-mine wikipedia while ignoring history in the support of your fragile belief system.

Fact:

- From about 100 AD all Christians were Catholic. That changed when Luther nailed his 99 theses on a Catholic church and broke away from the dominant religion

- Luther subtracted 7 books from the Bible that he didn't like

- The Catholics developed most of the theology surrounding Christianity, including the concept of the Holy Trinity

- All Protestant religions, including yours, trace back to Catholicism

If we were to draw a "clade" of Christian religions, yours is a progeny of Catholicism, a derived Catholic religion. Your religion didn't come to exist all by itself, but has a direct lineage straight back to Catholicism - all Christian religions do.

The larger question is: why do you need to ignore history?

[scaritual]

Hidingfromyou wrote:

<quoted text>
Catholics are Christians. In fact, your version of religion is simply a changed version of theirs.
You can separate yourself from them all you want. That's no problem. I would, if I was a Christian - mainly because of the past. But Luther was a total jerk, too. Racist, sexist to boot. I'd also separate myself from that dirtbag.
While you're at it, you should edit out all the immoral stuff from your Bible. Start a Christian religion that is based solely on the moral teachings of Jesus (but leave out the immoral teachings of Jesus). Separate it utterly from science, use it to build a system of spirituality and personal growth that is positive in believers' lives and the lives of others.
That would be a religion worth believing in. Can you do it?

The Jefferson Bible.

"Jefferson's condensed composition is especially notable for its exclusion of all miracles by Jesus and most mentions of the supernatural, including sections of the four gospels which contain the Resurrection and most other miracles, and passages indicating Jesus was divine."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jefferson_Bible

"In extracting the pure principles which he taught, we should have to strip off the artificial vestments in which they have been muffled by priests, who have travestied them into various forms, as instruments of riches and power to themselves. We must dismiss the Platonists and Plotinists, the Stagyrites and Gamalielites, the Eclectics, the Gnostics and Scholastics, their essences and emanations, their logos and demiurges, aeons and daemons, male and female, with a long train of … or, shall I say at once, of nonsense. We must reduce our volume to the simple evangelists, select, even from them, the very words only of Jesus, paring off the amphibologisms into which they have been led, by forgetting often, or not understanding, what had fallen from him, by giving their own misconceptions as his dicta, and expressing unintelligibly for others what they had not understood themselves. There will be found remaining the most sublime and benevolent code of morals which has ever been offered to man. I have performed this operation for my own use, by cutting verse by verse out of the printed book, and arranging the matter which is evidently his, and which is as easily distinguishable as diamonds in a dunghill. The result is an octavo of forty-six pages, of pure and unsophisticated doctrines" - Thomas Jefferson

I have a version in .doc(I think), or .pdf.

Ar Ar is more than welcome to take a look at it. It's freely available online.

At 46 pages, it's just about right in size, and doesn't strain credulity so much like the NT does. None of that removes the issue of there being little to no proof of the Jesus having been a literal person, and I think Jefferson was operating under that premise, and sought to focus on the message or doctrine contained in the NT(he stated as as such).

[bossdrop]

Hidingfromyou wrote:

<quoted text>
Boss!!! Long time!
I'm glad you're good - that's great! I bet you enjoyed Korea. Most of the cute girls there are Christian, right? I hope you met some :)
I'm in your country right now and enjoying the food, people, architecture and, most of all, indoor warmth.
anyohaseyo!

hello back to you hiding! Yeah the girls there are indeed pretty. But there are pretty women everywhere and in every culture. What was a worthy task to me, is finding that one pretty girl, and dedicate to that one pretty girl for life. I refuse go through what general petraeus is going through right now. my, his nights and bed must be very cold..brrr!!

[RiversideRedneck]

Hidingfromyou wrote:

<quoted text>
How can evilbible.com exist if the Bible is truly the word of a deity? are deities' words all that corruptible?

Free will. That's how.