Science, religion and the problem of evil

[Borg3of7]

Saif wrote:

<quoted text>
Hrm.... considering the topic of this thread is Science, Religion, and the Problem of Evil, we may need to look at it like this:
Science has found out that there are many reasons why people get fat. The foremost among them is that they eat too much.
Religion states that gluttony is one of the seven deadly sins (in fact for once they are right, being too fat will most likely cause an early death for you).
The people that pick on you by saying things like "Stewie, Stewie two by four, can't fit through the kitchen door," are carrying out evil because they are damaging you, another human being's feelings.
Just because you are fat enough to have your own zip code doesn't mean that you don't have feelings, right?
Now back to a more on-topic Topix.

ROTFFLMGDAO!!!!!!That has to be the funniest thing I've heard all day!!!!!! but seriously folks...those kids aren't evil...it's what they do that is....Evil is a very difficult thing to pin down (strangely enough), maybe it is defined by intent, or end result, who knows, maybe we are, by this very conversation, defining evil to the point that some one repents of that evil....then again, we might just help push some amoral jerk to fulfill some sort of "evil"....now back to the "fat" person.....you are NOT "just that way!" that is nothing put a cop out!!! there has to be a medical reason or a life style reason, or both....get up off the coach, and DO SOMETHING about it ya' lazy bum!

[bwilliam]

Stop worrying about what other people think or say. Live your own life.

I remember riding to the store with my older brother (18) to pick up his check. He parked out front with the engine running. My younger brother (9) and I (10) were watching people when this extremely large woman came down the walk to enter the store. My brother said to me, under his breath (we thought), "Man, is that woman FAT!" She stopped, came over to the car and commenced to lecture us on people's feelings. I learned a lesson that day. I learned another much later in a hymn:

Who am I to judge another
When I walk imperfectly?
Deep within the heart is hidden
Sorrow that the eye can’t see.

We should keep our criticisms of others to ourselves or not even think them in the first place.

[Inquiring Mind]

bwilliam wrote:

Stop worrying about what other people think or say. Live your own life.
I remember riding to the store with my older brother (18) to pick up his check. He parked out front with the engine running. My younger brother (9) and I (10) were watching people when this extremely large woman came down the walk to enter the store. My brother said to me, under his breath (we thought), "Man, is that woman FAT!" She stopped, came over to the car and commenced to lecture us on people's feelings. I learned a lesson that day. I learned another much later in a hymn:
Who am I to judge another
When I walk imperfectly?
Deep within the heart is hidden
Sorrow that the eye can’t see.
We should keep our criticisms of others to ourselves or not even think them in the first place.

Excellent life lesson. Thank you for the reminder.

[correction for blind eyes]

Science, religion, and evil. What a broad topic but very easy. They are all based off of man, but are connected to God. Here's how: e.g science- let's look at the characteristics of the sun. It gives light to the world, gives new life and creation, and you can't find any darkness in light,hmmm...I know who that sounds like, JESUS! And he is the Son(sun), he gives new life to those in Christ, and a new creation, and there is no darkness in Him. There's plenty more but i'm keeping it simple now. religion: hmmm...religion is based from man in several aspects but i'll use 1. Religion is based off of a spiritual experience to a certain deity (not always God, some use animals and such) to feel connected with that deity spiritually. God mandated relationships, not religion. Which is why we have so many now, because everyone was looking for something other than what the original plan was. The original plan was RELATIONSHIP. evil: that's a simple one, the enemy (Satan). The world is based off of it, too many examples to use, you pick. But the counter to evil is good, and God is good, better than good. Satan is the
"prince of the air" and of darkness,etc. We were never meant to go through hard times but because of sin which derived from Satan before our existance we now have to find our way back to God, and how do we do that, not through evil, nor, religion, nor science, but by relationship with Jesus Christ who died for ALL of our sins and resurrected 3 days after his death. Then 50 days later ascended to heaven to give us the FREE GIFT of the Holy Spirit, whom dwells in us. Through Him we can speak to our Heavenly Father through Jesus our Lord! It sounds like a lot but that's everything in a nutshell, i can offer websites for info if you'd like....email me if you'd like [e-mail] l

[Catch 22]

Money the root of all evil now has all the power. The parasite is not aware if its damage. From the macro to the micro, we all at fault? We as well as our governments are driven by it. Money has no concerns for the future,as it can never even conceive of itself. The bottom line drives it and us.

[Jammercolo]

correction for blind eyes wrote:

Science, religion, and evil. What a broad topic but very easy. They are all based off of man, but are connected to God. Here's how: e.g science- let's look at the characteristics of the sun. It gives light to the world, gives new life and creation, and you can't find any darkness in light,hmmm...I know who that sounds like, JESUS! And he is the Son(sun), he gives new life to those in Christ, and a new creation, and there is no darkness in Him. There's plenty more but i'm keeping it simple now. religion: hmmm...religion is based from man in several aspects but i'll use 1. Religion is based off of a spiritual experience to a certain deity (not always God, some use animals and such) to feel connected with that deity spiritually. God mandated relationships, not religion. Which is why we have so many now, because everyone was looking for something other than what the original plan was. The original plan was RELATIONSHIP. evil: that's a simple one, the enemy (Satan). The world is based off of it, too many examples to use, you pick. But the counter to evil is good, and God is good, better than good. Satan is the
"prince of the air" and of darkness,etc. We were never meant to go through hard times but because of sin which derived from Satan before our existance we now have to find our way back to God, and how do we do that, not through evil, nor, religion, nor science, but by relationship with Jesus Christ who died for ALL of our sins and resurrected 3 days after his death. Then 50 days later ascended to heaven to give us the FREE GIFT of the Holy Spirit, whom dwells in us. Through Him we can speak to our Heavenly Father through Jesus our Lord! It sounds like a lot but that's everything in a nutshell, i can offer websites for info if you'd like....email me if you'd like [e-mail] l

Science:What does that really mean? Science refers to a system of acquiring knowledge. This system uses observation and experimentation to describe and explain natural phenomena.
religion: is a set of beliefs and practices generally held by a human community, involving adherence to codified beliefs and rituals and study of ancestral or cultural traditions, writings, history, and mythology, as well as personal faith and mystic experience.

EVIL:In religion and ethics, evil refers to the morally objectionable aspects of the behaviour and reasoning of human beings -- those which are deliberately void of conscience, and show a wanton penchant for destruction. Evil is what man does.

In the now God is Man made in his (mans)Image.

Way back in the past the Gods were elemental
Gods lighting and thunder. Angry Gods made the mountain blow it's top or a hurricane that destroys a town. As mans knowledge grew so did his Gods.

[Peter]

Bush and Cheyney are evil.They are a cancer in society.They should be excised and eliminated.
911 was an inside job.Watch this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch...

[DMH]

Peter wrote:

Bush and Cheyney are evil.They are a cancer in society.They should be excised and eliminated.
911 was an inside job.Watch this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch...

HI Pete!

[redneck]

245 days left

[correction for blind eyes]

Jammercolo wrote:

<quoted text>
Science:What does that really mean? Science refers to a system of acquiring knowledge. This system uses observation and experimentation to describe and explain natural phenomena.
religion: is a set of beliefs and practices generally held by a human community, involving adherence to codified beliefs and rituals and study of ancestral or cultural traditions, writings, history, and mythology, as well as personal faith and mystic experience.
EVIL:In religion and ethics, evil refers to the morally objectionable aspects of the behaviour and reasoning of human beings -- those which are deliberately void of conscience, and show a wanton penchant for destruction. Evil is what man does.
In the now God is Man made in his (mans)Image.
Way back in the past the Gods were elemental
Gods lighting and thunder. Angry Gods made the mountain blow it's top or a hurricane that destroys a town. As mans knowledge grew so did his Gods.

See you would like do believe something like that. What you just did with what I said was changed it to nonsense. There is no such thing as an elemental god. That is ridiculous. You say back in the past, but if we have elements now then where would "those" god's be? See we like to think of a god that we create within our minds and not the God who created us. That my friend is called idolatry. It's a very dangerous thing. And idolatry covers a magnitude of things. If you claim that because our knowledge grew so did the gods then what "NEW" thing has this so called god created lately from mans knowledge? Like I said before, God,(Abba)Heavenly Father, created all things on the earth and heaven. You cannot have more than one God. Research what God "means" you'll see that you cannot have various gods due to the supreme nature of one god.

[bwilliam]

Catch 22 wrote:

Money the root of all evil now has all the power. The parasite is not aware if its damage. From the macro to the micro, we all at fault? We as well as our governments are driven by it. Money has no concerns for the future,as it can never even conceive of itself. The bottom line drives it and us.

Not so! 1 Timothy 6:10 "For THE LOVE OF money is the root of all evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs." NIV (emphasis mine)

Money has its place, just as other things that should be kept in proper perspective.

[Jammercolo]

correction for blind eyes wrote:

<quoted text>
See you would like do believe something like that. What you just did with what I said was changed it to nonsense.

THE ORIGINS OF WORSHIP
In the evolution of the human species, worship in its primitive manifestations appears long before the mind of man is capable of formulating the more complex concepts of life now and in the hereafter which deserve to be called religion. At one time or another mortal man has worshiped everything on the face of the earth, including himself. He has also worshiped about everything imaginable in the sky and beneath the surface of the earth. Primitive man feared all manifestations of power; he worshiped every natural phenomenon he could not comprehend. The observation of powerful natural forces, such as storms, floods, earthquakes, landslides, volcanoes, fire, heat, and cold, greatly impressed the expanding mind of man. The inexplicable things of life are still termed "acts of God" and "mysterious dispensations of Providence."
1. WORSHIP OF STONES AND HILLS
Stones first impressed early man as being out of the ordinary because of the manner in which they would so suddenly appear on the surface of a cultivated field or pasture. Men failed to take into account either erosion or the results of the overturning of soil. Stones also greatly impressed early peoples because of their frequent resemblance to animals. The attention of civilized man is arrested by numerous stone formations in the mountains which so much resemble the faces of animals and even men. But the most profound influence was exerted by meteoric stones which primitive humans beheld hurtling through the atmosphere in flaming grandeur. The shooting star was awesome to early man, and he easilyAll ancient clans and tribes had their sacred stones, and most modern peoples manifest a degree of veneration for certain types of stones--their jewels. A group of five stones was reverenced in India; in Greece it was a cluster of thirty; among the red men it was usually a circle of stones. The Romans always threw a stone into the air when invoking Jupiter. In India even to this day a stone can be used as a witness. In some regions a stone may be employed as a talisman of the law, and by its prestige an offender can be haled into court. But simple mortals do not always identify Deity with an object of reverent ceremony. Such fetishes are many times mere symbols of the real object of worship.The ancients had a peculiar regard for holes in stones. Such porous rocks were supposed to be unusually efficacious in curing diseases. Ears were not perforated to carry stones, but the stones were put in to keep the ear holes open. Even in modern times superstitious persons make holes in coins. In Africa the natives make much ado over their fetish stones. In fact, among all backward tribes and peoples stones are still held in superstitious veneration. Stone worship is even now widespread over the world. The tombstone is a surviving symbol of images and idols which were carved in stone in connection with beliefs in ghosts and the spirits of departed fellow beings.Hill worship followed stone worship, and the first hills to be venerated were large stone formations. It presently became the custom to believe that the gods inhabited the mountains, so that high elevations of land were worshiped for this additional reason. As time passed, certain mountains were associated with certain gods and therefore became holy. The ignorant and superstitious aborigines believed that caves led to the underworld, with its evil spirits and demons, in contrast with the mountains, which were identified with the later evolving concepts of good spirits and deities.

[Jammercolo]

2. WORSHIP OF PLANTS AND TREES
Plants were first feared and then worshiped because of the intoxicating liquors which were derived therefrom. Primitive man believed that intoxication rendered one divine. There was supposed to be something unusual and sacred about such an experience. Even in modern times alcohol is known as "spirits."The cults of tree worship are among the oldest religious groups. All early marriages were held under the trees, and when women desired children, they would sometimes be found out in the forest affectionately embracing a sturdy oak. Many plants and trees were venerated because of their real or fancied medicinal powers. The savage believed that all chemical effects were due to the direct activity of supernatural forces.India and eastern Russia regard the tree spirits as being cruel. The Patagonians still worship trees, as did the early Semites. Long after the Hebrews ceased tree worship, they continued to venerate their various deities in the groves. Except in China, there once existed a universal cult of the tree of life.The belief that water or precious metals beneath the earth's surface can be detected by a wooden divining rod is a relic of the ancient tree cults. The Maypole, the Christmas tree, and the superstitious practice of rapping on wood perpetuate certain of the ancient customs of tree worship and the later-day tree cults.
The worship of insects and other animals was promoted by a later misinterpretation of the golden rule--doing to others (every form of life) as you would be done by. The ancients once believed that all winds were produced by the wings of birds and therefore both feared and worshiped all winged creatures. The early Nordics thought that eclipses were caused by a wolf that devoured a portion of the sun or moon. The Hindus often show Vishnu with a horse's head. Many times an animal symbol stands for a forgotten god or a vanished cult. Early in evolutionary religion the lamb became the typical sacrificial animal and the dove the symbol of peace and love.
Many of these earliest forms of nature veneration became blended with the later evolving techniques of worship, but the earliest mind-adjutant-activated types of worship were functioning long before the newly awakening religious nature of mankind became fully responsive to the stimulus of spiritual influences.

[Jammercolo]

3.THE WORSHIP OF ANIMALS
Primitive man had a peculiar and fellow feeling for the higher animals. His ancestors had lived with them and even mated with them. In southern Asia it was early believed that the souls of men came back to earth in animal form. This belief was a survival of the still earlier practice of worshiping animals.
Early men revered the animals for their power and their cunning. They thought the keen scent and the farseeing eyes of certain creatures betokened spirit guidance. The animals have all been worshiped by one race or another at one time or another. Among such objects of worship were creatures that were regarded as half human and half animal, such as centaurs and mermaids.
Early men revered the animals for their power and their cunning. They thought the keen scent and the farseeing eyes of certain creatures betokened spirit guidance. The animals have all been worshiped by one race or another at one time or another. Among such objects of worship were creatures that were regarded as half human and half animal, such as centaurs and mermaids.
The Hebrews worshiped serpents down to the days of King Hezekiah, and the Hindus still maintain friendly relations with their house snakes. The Chinese worship of the dragon is a survival of the snake cults. The wisdom of the serpent was a symbol of Greek medicine and is still employed as an emblem by modern physicians. The art of snake charming has been handed down from the days of the female shamans of the snake love cult, who, as the result of daily snake bites, became immune, in fact, became genuine venom addicts and could not get along without this poison.

[Jammercolo]

Did Jesus Christ Really Live?

Not only has the divinity of Christ been given up, but his existence as a man is being more and more seriously questioned. Some of the ablest scholars of the world deny that he ever lived at all.

The Christian religion has been and is a mighty fact in the world. For good or for ill, it has absorbed for many centuries the best energies of mankind. It has stayed the march of civilization, and made martyrs of some of the noblest men and women of the race: and it is to-day the greatest enemy of knowledge, of freedom, of social and industrial improvement, and of the genuine brotherhood of mankind.
What, then, is the evidence that Jesus Christ lived in this world as a man? The authorities relied upon to prove the reality of Christ are the four Gospels of the New Testament -- Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. These Gospels, and these alone, tell the story of his life. Now we know absolutely nothing of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, apart from what is said of them in the Gospels. Moreover, the Gospels themselves do not claim to have been written by these men.

No human being knows who wrote a single line in one of these Gospels. No human being knows when they were written, or where.It is shown that the Gospels of Matthew and Luke were enlarged from the Gospel of Mark. The Gospel of Mark knows nothing of the virgin birth, of the Sermon on the Mount, of the Lord's prayer, or of other important facts of the supposed life of Christ. These features were added by Matthew and Luke.
But the Gospel of Mark, as we have it, is not the original Mark. In the same way that the writers of Matthew and Luke copied and enlarged the Gospel of Mark, Mark copied and enlarged an earlier document which is called the "original Mark." This original source perished in the early age of the Church. What it was, who wrote it, where it was written, nobody knows. The Gospel of John is admitted by Christian scholars to be an unhistorical document. They acknowledge that it is not a life of Christ, but an interpretation of him; that it gives us an idealized and spiritualized picture of what Christ is supposed to have been, and that it is largely composed of the speculations of Greek philosophy. The Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke, which are called the "Synoptic Gospels," on the one hand, and the Gospel of John, on the other, stand at opposite extremes of thought. So complete is the difference between the teaching of the first three Gospels and that of the fourth, that every critic admits that if Jesus taught as the Synoptics relate, he could not possibly have taught as John declares. Indeed, in the first three Gospels and in the fourth, we meet with two entirely different Christs. Did I say two? It should be three; for, according to Mark, Christ was a man; according to Matthew and Luke, he was a demigod; while John insists that he was God himself.

There is not the smallest fragment of trustworthy evidence to show that any of the Gospels were in existence, in their present form, earlier than a hundred years after the time at which Christ is supposed to have died. Christian scholars, having no reliable means by which to fix the date of their composition, assign them to as early an age as their calculations and their guesses will allow; but the dates thus arrived at are far removed from the age of Christ or his apostles. We are told that Mark was written some time after the year 70, Luke about 110, Matthew about 130, and John not earlier than 140 A.D. Let me impress upon you that these dates are conjectural, and that they are made as early as possible. The first historical mention of the Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke, was made by the Christian Father, St. Irenaeus, about the year 190 A.D. The only earlier mention of any of the Gospels was made by Theopholis of Antioch, who mentioned the Gospel of John in 180 A.D.

Jammer

[Pat]

Catch 22 wrote:

Money the root of all evil now has all the power. The parasite is not aware if its damage. From the macro to the micro, we all at fault? We as well as our governments are driven by it. Money has no concerns for the future,as it can never even conceive of itself. The bottom line drives it and us.

I take it then that you don't have much of it.

Money is not evil any more than a gun is evil. You can use a gun to rob and murder someone or you can use it to save someone being attacked and with money you can also choose to use it in positive or negative ways. Only humans cause trouble not the objects they use. The root is human behavior, nothing else.

[Saif]

Hay Jammer, would you like to come up with something original? If I want to read what you post here I can go to infidels.org on my own.

[redneck]

Saif wrote:

Hay Jammer, would you like to come up with something original? If I want to read what you post here I can go to infidels.org on my own.

have you seen the cartoon with muhammed boning a pig?

[Monster]

Science is science, and religion is religion. There should be no inevitable relationship to evil. Right?
I means that science did not cause evil, nor does religion. What we need to do is to look for DNA, evolution,and religion. www.u-dna.blogspot.com

Monster

[wade]

JEANNIE wrote:

There was nothing. Then there was a Big Bang and a universe came into being, complete with everything needed for everything that is. Where did the empty space come from, into which the universe is expanding?
Explain.

Empty space is caused by the vacuum of religious thought