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 Post subject: Edited: For a gentler, nicer anger at myself.
PostPosted: Sat Feb 25, 2006 10:59 pm 
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Sigh... I really need to start writing in Word and THEN transfering stuff here.

Ok... a rediculously long post, that I felt quite good about, was again deleted due to (my) stupidity and being logged-out from down-time while writing it. I'll redo it later. Arg.

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand... again. I did it twice, but the second time it was via a series of rather unfortunate choices involving cutting stuff and closing Word without saving before pasting, and, when pasting in the post, discovering I hadn't really copied it at all. Then I made a frustrated rant, Edited everything into this, as I worked on it for a while. I have decided that I shall wait until AFTER sleeping (or at least taking a break) before trying this again. It's too long and involved, and I don't want the shoddy 'short version' posting I did before. Even if it WAS nice to be able to claim a post that short.

Aaaaaaaaaaaanyhoo... I'm off.

Edited: One more time *dances to daft Punk*
One short thing I can do without going through the entire post is this:
Tomkat:
I'm afraid that I don't speak 'Interneteese' nearly as fluently as 'Christianeese'. Despite my long non-registered lurker status, and my technical status as 'tourist', don't believe I can make heads or tails of the first 'half' of your post. I'd be interested in knowing what that means! Sadly, I'm addicted to learning. Usually it's the things I DON'T need to know to be successful in life. So please teach me, if you don't mind! Or someone else, who knows! Thanks!

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PostPosted: Sun Feb 26, 2006 1:12 am 
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too long; didn't read.

Funnily enough, I'd been having a hell of a time figuring out what it meant when I saw it in other posts. Then Kitty said it, and it all made sense...

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 Post subject: Re: Edited: For a gentler, nicer anger at myself.
PostPosted: Sun Feb 26, 2006 10:44 am 
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tacticslion wrote:
I'm afraid that I don't speak 'Interneteese' nearly as fluently as 'Christianeese'. Despite my long non-registered lurker status, and my technical status as 'tourist', don't believe I can make heads or tails of the first 'half' of your post. I'd be interested in knowing what that means! Sadly, I'm addicted to learning. Usually it's the things I DON'T need to know to be successful in life. So please teach me, if you don't mind! Or someone else, who knows! Thanks!


Whos posty are you referring to?

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 Post subject: Re: Edited: For a gentler, nicer anger at myself.
PostPosted: Sun Feb 26, 2006 11:09 am 
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Wrin wrote:
tacticslion wrote:
I'm afraid that I don't speak 'Interneteese' nearly as fluently as 'Christianeese'. Despite my long non-registered lurker status, and my technical status as 'tourist', don't believe I can make heads or tails of the first 'half' of your post. I'd be interested in knowing what that means! Sadly, I'm addicted to learning. Usually it's the things I DON'T need to know to be successful in life. So please teach me, if you don't mind! Or someone else, who knows! Thanks!


Whos posty are you referring to?


If you look at the line above that it says Tomkat:

So I would assume that's who was refered to.

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 Post subject: Re: Edited: For a gentler, nicer anger at myself.
PostPosted: Sun Feb 26, 2006 12:27 pm 
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onion wrote:
Wrin wrote:
tacticslion wrote:
I'm afraid that I don't speak 'Interneteese' nearly as fluently as 'Christianeese'. Despite my long non-registered lurker status, and my technical status as 'tourist', don't believe I can make heads or tails of the first 'half' of your post. I'd be interested in knowing what that means! Sadly, I'm addicted to learning. Usually it's the things I DON'T need to know to be successful in life. So please teach me, if you don't mind! Or someone else, who knows! Thanks!


Whos posty are you referring to?


If you look at the line above that it says Tomkat:

So I would assume that's who was refered to.


Wow...now I feel stupid. Or should it be stoopid?

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 Post subject: believe it or not, this is the SHORT version
PostPosted: Mon Feb 27, 2006 6:53 pm 
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TB:
TB wrote:
tacticslion wrote:
Another example that I used for this, was poorly used so I could manage to fail to make a point.

Wouldn't it be a violation of free will for God to do that? I still say "walking encyclopedia" -- Jesus chose to take on the essence/theory of God (and succeeded because God had made him perfect). Same result, different person making the choices.


Yeah, technically, it WOULD be a violation of free will… except that the ‘seed’ was all that Jesus was, or rather, what enabled Him to be in the first place. When God impregnated Mary when she was a virgin, it was His ‘brain-seed’ that did the impregnating, making Jesus the same as He was. It’s a poor example, and I admitted as such when I first used it, but anyhoo. Basically, the idea was that Jesus was God, if He didn’t have His divinity. Sorry. The example sucked, even if the concept was sound.

TB wrote:
tacticslion wrote:
So instead of God's infinite everything to back Him up, He literally gave up everything, after a fashion, and gave up His advantage over human kind, and stuck the core of Himself and His essance into a human body, complete with frailty, suckage, and limitations. ...

Except there was nothing for God to give up, since God stayed himself


While God remained Himself, Jesus did not. That’s where I was trying to go with the ‘brain-seed’ idea. After the initial imprint, the two rapidly become different people, in game rules. So, yes, They were different People… because of Their experience, yet They were the same Person because of Who they Were (nature vs. nurture at its finest). Which leads to…

TB wrote:
Oh, he very clearly kept his free will ("not my will, but thine, be done"). He just consistently chose to do what God asked, instead of what he would have preferred.


Actually, we agree on this point. We’ve both been trying to say the same thing, but in different ways. You say that Jesus retained His free will, but did what God asked instead. I, unfortunately with poor wording, attempted to state the same theory. The wording being that Jesus used His free will to submit (or disregard) His free will. So, yeah, sorry about any confusion, but I agree with you on that point, if not semantically.

Oh, and yeah… that particular edition of the KJV for some reason consistently sold out… No, seriously, it did.

And as far as the good/evil force, I understand what you’re coming from. I’m not gonna argue it one way or the other, because ultimately it doesn’t matter. I just think it’s a neat concept!

Tossrock:
Thank you for explaining in the other forum, I’ve actually read both yours and Tamayo’s (I read and responded to yours in the first of several posts I’ve made that were deleted by timed sign-off/submit mistake I’ve attempted to circumvent this time). Also, thank you for your consistency! Without it, we’d not have a debate on our hands!

As far as your problem with original sin, I don’t really understand the difficulty. I am both a science major and a Bible minor. I had a nice, long rant in the first two iterations of how I’d studied a number of other religions, sometimes extensively, sometimes not so, and how science doesn’t have all the answers with <insert personal history and conversations with great atheist scientists and professors here> as proof, but that’s long, I’ve done it a couple of times already, and, unfortunately I don’t feel like doing it again.

The simple answer is that even if Adam wasn’t there, according to God’s law, we’re all screwed. Have you ever done something wrong? Did your father ever do anything bad? You’d be in for it. If not, what about your granddad, or his father, or his father. Seven generations is a long time not to make a mistake, you know. So far, I’ve found that I’ve done enough things to be killed, according to Biblical standards, probably a couple of times. BUT, since science is fundamentally unable to prove our origins (the definition of science is a body of knowledge that we have personally observed and with repeatable experiments to prove said observable theory) evolution is relegated to religion (that which concerns itself/defines/or considers life, eternity, the nature of origins and views on deity… rather a broad subject, don’t you think?) and therefore no science can conclusively prove it, unless a time-traveling device (mathematically and theoretically impossible, unless it sends us forward) happens to poop (yes, this is the correct word) into existence and we are suddenly able to see, hear, and experience the creation of the world.

Further, in creation, it’s pretty much stated that Adam was crafted as an adult. It’d be pretty stupid to make the world an infant, if the man required the ‘adult’ planet. Chickens came before eggs, and wholly crafted universes before men that required them to live. Plus, given all of our disagreeing time-clocks of the universe, we really can’t exist. Given the current rate of magnetic degeneration of our planet (which is speeding up), the magnetic field would be so powerful only 10,000 years ago that no life could ever exist. Heck, at it’s current rate of growth (not compensating for the fact that it’s slowing down), Mt. Everest wouldn’t have existed 3,000 years ago. These are very short life spans for things that are supposed to have taken millions of years to evolve and form.

Nonetheless, we can’t prove that Everest didn’t exist more than 3,000 years ago, just like we can’t prove that we evolved from monkeys. Because there is no record of either. It’s not science, it’s religion.

So… why, then, besides the fact that it’s unpleasant to admit that we’re beholden to a Being much greater than ourselves, and are incapable of making restitution on our own, is it ‘bullshit’ to believe in a mythical progenitor? Heck, Hinduism, one of the most popular religions on earth right now, believes we came from milk. Very well divinely churned, infinite milk. Holy cow. Literally. Technically, so does Buddhism, one of the most respected religions on the planet. And evolution believes that natural processes that have a zero percent success rate are responsible for life, the universe, and everything. Huh. People will believe the craziest things.

So, joking aside, how is it any different from other religions? You pretty much single out Islam, Judaism, and Christianity with your problems with a mythical progenitor who screwed up for everyone. Hinduism (from which Buddhism springs) indicates that without evil, good is useless and worthless. This is pretty much the same thing that Aaron ‘the mad whitiker’ Bourque wrote. While I tend to disagree with him, I understand the concept, and its integral nature to free will. I believe the choice must always exist, but the existence of the results of said choice do not, for there to be any inherent value to good. Anyway, it’s a minor thing, but that’s yet another reason for it.

Finally, if you want more, a friend of mine recently told me that whenever she’s presented with the epicurean paradox, she reminds people of this: when to people go to God? A great many people turn to the religious only in times of problems. Without difficulties in the world, then why would we realize we need God at all?

Regardless of what I write, I know I can’t force you to accept anything, and no one will believe anything they’re set against believing. It’s simple choice, which is what all belief comes down to. Whether it’s believing that the sky is gaseous or solid (Greek mythos), that man has or has not landed on the moon (flat earth society), or that tacticslion is well spoken or ‘full of shit’ (surprisingly more people on the former than I ever believed possible), it all comes down to a choice. That is all that anything is. Even good. Even evil.

Jasper:
Thank you for your gracious words. I appreciate the distinction of being comprehensible and not a raving lunatic. Yeah, it’s a rare compliment when talking to most non-Christians. The fact that more than one person has stated this makes me… well… almost think it might be true!

Honestly, I hope you become a believer, just as I hope everyone on the forum does (see Yorik’s very eloquent rant for more details), but I hold no illusions about anything. It’s quite impossible to force a belief on someone, and people rarely give up their ideals… especially not on something so ephemeral as an internet debate board. Reason rarely, if ever, convinces someone they are wrong about anything, no matter how trivial or important. So, I’m glad that I’ve made a good impression, and if that’s all I’ve done, it’s more than I could hope for. I’ll just trust in God for anything else… it’s part of my belief, ya know! :)

As for those who left because of bad experiences with others… well, it’s not reasonable, but it’s very understandable. Most people choose anything based on their experiences with the people involved. As previously stated, it’s rarely rationality that causes a person to make an important decision. The vast majority of the time it’s how they perceive something, and in religion’s case, how they’re treated by members of that religion. If someone shows you love, you’re far, far more apt to believe, or at the very least be understanding of, what they believe, than if someone treats you unjustly. It’s the sad fact of life that once something becomes popular, many ‘fakes’ come out of the woodwork to wreak havoc with it and ruin it for others who would be sincere. Because with popularity comes power… something everyone wants. Sad, yet true.

Oh, and thank you for the translation. That bothered the daylights out of me. Very courteous of you.

Wrin:
Wrin wrote:
Wow… now I feel stupid. Or should it be stoopid?


Why? I do stuff like that all the time! Plus, the way I’d written it, it is vaguely hard to discern. I didn’t leave much space, so it’s easy to overlook. No stoopidification necessary!

So…
I’ve written a lot. Again. I once again hope I’ve offended none, but also don’t expect the impossible. And…

Thank you. A very large number of people have made me see that there are those who can be reasonable, even if they’ve had very poor experiences. So, thank you, those who agree, or at least understand, and who have accepted my words.
And…
Thank you. Those who disagree, who feel very passionately that Christianity is empty, or who find many holes or problems with my arguments. I appreciate it! It’s challenging, refreshing and nice!

So, this isn’t a call to end this debate board or anything, I just felt like saying thank you while I thought about it (before I forget). So, now you know that when I’m stupid, at least I’m grateful for the opportunity to be so.

So, I guess I’ll be waiting for any more responses?
Until then, peace, joy, and a healthy dost of God!

Edited: for quote suckage and numerous typos
Edited: I discovered that italics doesn't translate from MS Word to this format. I should have known, but never thought of it. SO... I started to go through and change the italics, but I'm tired, I've spent quite a bit of time writing this thing (especially if you count the two previous attempts) and I'm almost too tired to really care about italics at all. So if something would look smarter, more humerous, or better shown in italics, think of it that way, and we can just assume that I probably did it wrongly, but at least now it looks better in your mind! :wink: I also changed the title to something far more fitting. Have a great day! :D

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If a wizard did it,
And if Ian did it,
And if Sarda is the wizard who did it,
Does that make Sarda Ian's alias?


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PostPosted: Tue Feb 28, 2006 3:50 am 
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I like you because you sound reasonable, but I dislike you because you believe stupid things.

First off, culpability for the sins of others: This is idiotic. Why should I be punished for something my father or my father's father did? It makes no sense. Last time I checked morality is not a significant component of sperm. A person should be judged on their own actions, not on the actions of their ancestors. A religion based on punishing someone for something they didn't do is a bad religion.

Second, stupid things about young earth: Of course you can prove that Mt Everest existed more than 3000 years ago. Whatever imaginary evidence you have about the degradation of the magnetic field is almost certainly hosted on something with "bible" in the url. Claiming to be a physicist, you should heard of cosmic background radiation, doppler red shift of quasars, carbon 14 dating, and an innumberable multitude of other things that prove that the earth is about 4 billion years old. It has nothing to do with faith and any attempt to categorize it as such is a blatant fallacy. I honestly wonder what university is giving you a degree in physics.

Edit: Oh and I have no idea where your ridiculous ideas about eastern religion came from but they're horribly wrong, too. Holy milk? :roll: Buddha himself said "Conjecture about [the origin, etc., of] the world is an unconjecturable that is not to be conjectured about, that would bring madness & vexation to anyone who conjectured about it." The patronization of other religions isn't doing much for your own. What was that about not judging that Jesus was big about again? Hmm.

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PostPosted: Tue Feb 28, 2006 4:37 am 
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About the young Earth: This is the sort of thing that can't be proven or disproven, simply because you can say to any contradicting evidence "Well, obviously God created it to look like that." Also, the degredation of the Earth's magnetic feild is well known. It's just that the predominant theory is that it periodically weakens before it reverses. ;)


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PostPosted: Tue Feb 28, 2006 5:18 am 
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Tossrock wrote:
I like you because you sound reasonable, but I dislike you because you believe stupid things and your posts are long and rambling and tedious to read.


In fact, I just scroll past and don't even bother reading them anymore. :-?

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PostPosted: Tue Feb 28, 2006 5:42 am 
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KirimaNagi wrote:
Tossrock wrote:
I like you because you sound reasonable, but I dislike you because you believe stupid things and your posts are long and rambling and tedious to read.


In fact, I just scroll past and don't even bother reading them anymore. :-?


tl;dr


Edit: ohwait, this is the debate club, whoring would be a bad thing. >_>;


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PostPosted: Tue Feb 28, 2006 6:14 am 
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nick012000 wrote:
About the young Earth: This is the sort of thing that can't be proven or disproven, simply because you can say to any contradicting evidence "Well, obviously God created it to look like that." Also, the degredation of the Earth's magnetic feild is well known. It's just that the predominant theory is that it periodically weakens before it reverses. ;)

Well, it can't be proven via religious debate. Via several of the systems of logic invented by humans over the centuries, those depending on evidence, young earth theories are easily disproved. So easily, in fact, that Western scientists gave up on young earth theories close to two hundred years ago--well before Darwin and evolution, I might add.


Goodness, there are trees in California and garbage dumps under Jericho that predate 4000 BC.

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 Post subject: oopth!
PostPosted: Tue Feb 28, 2006 6:57 am 
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ARGH!!! I hate this. It's stupid. I get signed off! I can't believe I forgot! Again! I'm a moron! :bang:

Sigh. Alright. I managed to save some of it before it all farted out of existance (the bottom part). So I don't have to rewrite everthing. I'll be back with the rest of it soon.

Alright… rewrite time.

Ok...

Thanks! Followed by: Sorry! Thank you for your gracious indulgence and honest responses! And, I’m sorry if I offended you about other religions… it’s not my purpose, and I didn’t mean a mocking tone, only a joking one.

Culpability for sins of others: check out God’s words to Moses (and thus to the people through him). God says it, and, while I honestly don’t understand the reasons for it, I can’t deny that it’s in the Bible. Plus, He claims all holiness for Himself… so who would dare be the judge of God? Some would, obviously, but I can’t say that He’s unholy for doing such as that. But, even granted that there is no culpability, given God’s rules of holiness, have you ever screwed up once? You’re fair game. As soon as you’ve done one wrong thing, you’re ready, able, and set to go to hell, and have the worst time of it on earth. Yeah, that sucks. Oh well.

Next point: Mt Everest existed more than three thousand years ago? Prove it, please! I’d love to see the sources and citations, plus their scientific evidence! The fact is, none of us were there, at least not on any kind of scientific record. We can’t say for sure we existed more than three seconds ago… we just kind of have to take it on faith that all of our experience is real, not some made up mass-hallucination/prank played on us by the Big Potato because he thought we were tasty as chicken. Seriously, though, we don’t know that it did or didn’t exist at that time. I’m giving you current rates, and mathematical evidences. For the degeneration of the magnetic field, look at nick012000. It’s a known quantity about which scientists have come up with a magical theory… out of their butts. Our proof that it has to happen that way is that, obviously because of dating procedures we know humans were around long ago, ergo, there had to be something that changed, ergo it must do this cyclically. Yeah, that’s it. Simple logic! Sadly, most of our dating procedures can’t be proven… ‘cause we weren’t there to begin with. We think they work buuuuuuuuuuuuuut…

All of our current theories assume that we have seen all the pulsars in the universe. We don’t know if we can see everything yet, and if there are more outside of our realm of consciousness, the universe becomes unfathomably larger and older than our greatest calculations, screwing everyone's ideas into the trash-heap. We further assume that they had to develop to that stage, and are that way currently. [Queue stuff I managed to save in a last-desperate bid NOT to have my things erased again]. Ironically, these assumptions make no sense. We can't see what we can't see, therefore cannot prove that it does or does not exist. Secondly, we're given that they have to develop to that stage... as opposed to, you know, being originally crafted that way. Logically, there's no reason for them not to be. Thirdly, it takes so long for the light to actually reach us, we aren't even sure there are more than a few other stars out there. If everything in the universe other than our galaxy disappeared, we'd never know it. At least not for a few billion years (we'd have a few hints before then, but not many). Assuming, of course, we're appropriately reading the information (I'm not contending that we are not, I am, however, reminding you that much of our 'proven science' is mathematical conjecture). Finally, they are different ages. Not every pulsar has the same age, or at least, it doesn't as far as we can tell. And if it did, it seems even more suspicious to me... I mean, that'd be pretty weird if every pulsar happened to be produced, spontaneously, at the same time. Yet, we honestly can't truly say when they were formed. We can make guesstimates given enough observational data (another really big issue with astronomy... we can only cover 3% of the sky at any given time), yet these range in millions or even billions of years for the age of such things.

Further, Carbon 14 has been shown to be quite faulty sometimes. We aren't entirely sure why, but occasionally, we'll find an ancient item, date it, and it comes up about eighteen years older than the universe (an exaggeration, but stating that it seems older than the planet is not). Why would this happen? We don't actually have an explanation, other than that, beyond a certain point, carbon dating must speed up radically for reasons we don't currently know. Meaning, it's impossible to tell exactly at which point carbon dating ceases working. I mean, seriously, do you realize that half of our textbooks are publishing bad information? You know... the fact that three-fourths of our paleological proofs of pre-human ancestry are hoaxes or mistakes?

If you want to point out Lucy... certainly she exists. She's human. Her bones look, act, and work like human's. No real surprise there, no reason to deny her existence. I'm really confused because a number of evolutionists have attempted to point her out as irrefutable proof... of what? There isn't any evolution involved with Lucy. She's an old, dead human. Cro-Magnon had arthritis. Nebraska man? Pig's tooth. Piltdown man? An recent human skull mixed with a recent orangutan jaw bone and it's filed teeth, both stained to look old, planted there just to have 'proof'. I'm not saying I have answers for all the fossils, or that there are. I'm saying that consistently, over time, fossils have been proved fakes, hoaxes, or humans.

I'd like to point out that it's very difficult for us to obtain accurate information about our own solar system! We're still arguing about what is and isn't here, orbiting our own star! So, basically we're trying to prove, poke, and understand things of vast power and of distances on a scale beyond human comprehension (seriously, we can't count that high... we just 'skip to the important parts' because our minds don't follow the calculations that long), while simultaneously being unable to find our own butt when we want to scratch it.

Finally, I'd also like to tell you a story, something my astronomy professor Dr. J (for internet purposes) confessed to me one day while we were debating origins and why they did or did not make sense. I was, of course, trying (and failing) to prove creationism to him. He deflected my arguments with less than a wave of his hand (I was a peon student at this point... still am, honestly, compared to great men like him), and I was pretty much done for the night. Still, we talked for a while, and then he said the strangest thing. He's not a Christian, and when he'd gone into astronomy, like any good kid who learned everything he could, he was an atheist. Recent surveys, he told me, indicated that 75% of astronomers started our atheists. By retirement age 75% of astronomers ended theists or more religious. Interesting reversal of roles. I thanked him and left, feeling dejected, not realizing the importance of what he said at the time. Funny how life works like that.

My sources come from three colleges, actually. I studied both science and religion at Brevard Community College (getting an AA), and for my BS, I studied science at Stetson University, and religion at Tennessee Temple University. I've never questioned my beliefs more than I did at TTU. They force you to. Other than that, I've studied it on my own, for the fun of it.

And to your (cr)edit: I apologize if I offended you about this. However, though I am currently unable to find my copy of texts, the Hindu ideas of creation are accurate. The only thing I can find now is my "World Mythology" by Larousse. This was my first introduction into the Hinduism (among other religions) and caused me to study them further. According to Larousse, pg 209, on the creation of the worlds, the Absolute is the entire theological expression of Hindu thought, also known as Brahman (who is truth, the world itself being an illusion).

The last time, we know of, that Brahman manifested, the world was like this: the great Vishnu was lying motionless on a thousand-headed cobra, which floats on an ocean of milk, infinite and immobile. The ONE then multiplies, becoming the wife of Vishnu, then, from Vishnu's navel springs the pink lotus flower that emerges on the end of a long stalk, containing Vayu, and, seated upon it is Brahma, ancestor of the Hindu pantheon. He then spouts the laws of the four books he holds (one in each of his hands, one book with each of his four mouths) but then he ponders the reason for his existence.

Vishnu apparently has disappeared (or is too great for Brahma to notice) for even though he leaves his lotus (which grew from Vishnu) he abandons his search when he finds nothing. Then Vishnu appears to him and advises him, allowing him to begin creation. Then Indra (king of the gods) and Vairocana (king of the demons) are instructed by Brahma to do their individual jobs. Finally all of the gods and demons come together under Brahma and take hold of of the serpent Ananta who is curled around mount Mandara (built on Vishnu, the turtle), and begin a tug-of-war, churning the ocean of infinite milk. From this springs everything. Ala creation by milk-churning.

I apologize that I can't find the exact Vedas, now, though I've read English translations of them before (I am, sadly, fluent in only one language currently despite my multilingual childhood). There is more, but this is what I was referencing. Seeing as Buddhism arises from Hinduism, it seems only logical that it would share the tenets of origins, but I understand that Buddha's words trump other Hindu scriptures (they are two different religions), so, I will accept your point on this. Again, no offense meant.

Oh, and although Larousse clearly labels Hindu Scripts under mythology, he goes into great detail explaining that it's all metaphor, and has great respect of the philosophy, apparently, though his personal interpretations on what the metaphor means were vaguely disappointing for someone who was supposedly an unbiased recorder of facts. Nonetheless, it's quite an interesting read. He and his book are French, so again, I achieved my initial introduction by translation, but I'd tend to guess it's an accurate one. I don't have too much choice... the draw-back of not being omnilingual. :roll:

nick012000:
True. In fact, that is what I've claimed in my posts. It can't be proven or disproved one way or the other. We have educated guesses, but it's all religion, even if it's supposedly scientific theory... if we can't be there, and we can't reproduce it visibly, we can't call it science. But thanks for bringing up the theory! I appreciate it!

KirimaNagi:
I would like to thank both you and Tomkatt for keeping me humble. Yeah, I write a lot. Sorry. I'm trying to make it interesting! I promise! :D

Tatsu:
Funniest thing on a religious debate I’ve read in a while. Thanks for bringing reality checks!

Boss:
Actually, I’m not stating that the earth is that young. As far as the trees in California… which are you referring to? The Redwoods? Or Sequoias? In fact it only takes a century or two (we think) to get that size. Fast growing buggers. If you mean the Joshua Tree, it’s only proved to be around three thousand years old. And the garbage dumps under Jericho bring up an interesting point: rapid fossilization, often happens as a result of various catastrophic failures. Further, if you’d like to point out the oil fields we use for fossil fuel, we’ve shown, scientifically, it would be easy to accomplish the same thing in a very rapid (only a couple of millennia) time, via rapid compression and heat. Heck, it’s how our compost heaps work (we just don’t leave it long enough to become nasty stuff).

Edit: Alrighty! Stuff to Boss and Tatsu is new, as is the intro. Everything else should be as a wrote it. I hope you guys are enjoying this as much as I am. Finally, I'd like to make an apology for shoddily researching Hindu ideology. While I do have a source, it's only one, and I can't find the original copies of the texts that I had once... our place is a mess right now, and I'm afraid several things have gone missing. But... there ya go. So... yeah.

Edit part several agains: 'cause I'd posted everything I ever wrote here on accident. Oops. Should be correct now. Also I edited it for spelling. Dyslexia I hate thee!

Edit: is it just me, or are my posts getting longer as time goes on? Even without everything I've ever posted, I mean. Plus I made a number of minor grammatical and word changes.

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PostPosted: Tue Feb 28, 2006 10:58 am 
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Chinese and some African history dates back nearly five thousand years. We can observe the movements of the stars and tell where they were back then and compare them to the records of ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, Greece, and even the Maya. We have been around for a long time, in terms of human years. I don't really think that I need to verify that somebody saw a mountain some three thousand years ago when the rest of the observable universe follows the rules pretty well out to that time and more.

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 Post subject: Re: oopth!
PostPosted: Tue Feb 28, 2006 10:59 am 
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tacticslion wrote:
ARGH!!! I hate this. It's stupid. I get signed off! I can't believe I forgot! Again! I'm a moron! :bang: .

Something I find useful: if you feel a long rant coming on, switch to your word processor and then paste it back and edit.

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Wrin wrote:
Chinese and some African history dates back nearly five thousand years. We can observe the movements of the stars and tell where they were back then and compare them to the records of ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, Greece, and even the Maya. We have been around for a long time, in terms of human years. I don't really think that I need to verify that somebody saw a mountain some three thousand years ago when the rest of the observable universe follows the rules pretty well out to that time and more.


Excellent! Thank you, Wrin, because this is the point, really, of the entire argument. A mountain is, in itself, incidental. There's nothing special about whether anyone saw Everest or not... the point of it all is: are there enough observable facts around to justify one's possition of belief and view.

We have history records from Greece, Egypt, Mesoptamia, Maya, in China and African nations other than Egypt. These are given, and are excellent admissible proofs (as far as anything is). Nonetheless, when examined more objectively, the question of accuracy and age arises. How old, exactly, are the historical records? Where do they come from, and how trustworthy are the sources? When it comes to it, the Jews were a downtrodden people group who reportedly escaped Egyptian slavery and fled northward, eventually achieving their own country. How reliable could their records actually be? How reliable is anything?

Several tests we put toward historical records quickly point out flaws in a number of texts and histories that are maintained to be old, however we still have Egyptian, Mayan, and Chinese records... impeccible, and beautiful, save for the rather religious outlook, science would hold them in very high regard indeed. The majority of Mesopetamian texts are found to be rediculous (much as the book of Genisis in the Bible is) for their perported long life-spans, and godly powers attributed to mortals. For the same reason - that of the direct interaction of the gods - most Greecian texts are considered historically unreliable, though they are thought to contain a grain of truth. Most of the rest of African records are packed to the gills with all kinds of supernatural references, their history nearly inseperable from their spiritism. Aztecs, though obviously advanced, had very little in the way of historical accuracy before themselves, and are relatively recent, at least compared to some of the other civilizations found in the same area.

Then you hav such wonders as China, Egypt, and Maya peoples.

Chinese records are impeccable, and I admit, I haven't studied as much on these as I would like. They are, however, also filled with mysticism and bound very tightly to the Chinese religious world view. Their philosophy colored everything, and spiritual over-tones covers even the mundane aspects of their lives.

Egyptian history is, likewise, bound to its mythology, and made to be one with the tales of their pantheons and demigods. There cannot be a clear seperation between the histories, despite it's rather well-kept and ancient clarity.

Maya history was their mythology. Their ancient records very hard to decipher, mostly in vague pictographic forms, and, while their technology and astronomical precision is incredible, it's bound deeply into their very religious and non-scientific ideals.

So... your choices on ancient history are religion, religion, religion, or religion. Not necessaril the most fair assesment, but it's the best that I can give, based on my own limited knowledge.

Admittedly, there are things that are hard to explain. Why, even if they disagree, do we have so many astronomical 'clocks' that state that they are ancient? Why do so many religions claim tens of thousands of years of history? Why does almost every major religious culture have a 'flood' story attached to it?

The last, I, of course, feel I can explain. The former two not so much. Nonetheless, these are the kinds of things that scholars debate amongst themselves, and people much wiser and more intelligent than I have tried and failed to come up with answers to these and more questions.

Yet, ultimately, we still fail to prove anything. Because the sources are under debate to crediblity, we can't rely on them... unless we choose to. Ultimately, this is what it all comes down to. If you look at it in any way, no matter what, it's all a choice. A choice on what to believe, what to accept, and why.

I've chosen to believe Jesus was my savior, was God, willingly died on the cross because He loved me. I've chosen to rely for His grace and love to take care of me in eternity. I've chosen to believe that I was destined to spend an eternity in hell, but now I'm not, because I've accepted His gift of eternal life. I've chosen to believe that He loves everyone, and desires them to all come to Him and be redeemed by His blood.

It's simple, it's what I seem to find the Bible says, and it's what I believe because I choose to, as well as find evidence to support. Given the fact that no one has come up with a philisophy that fails to conflict against all of the evidence (and it's impossible, given that much of the evidence is religious), it's simply something each person has to choose for themselves.

So... back to the question. Are the given historical records reliable enough that we can use them to prove ancient humanity. Possibly, but we can't actually tell. With even our own modern dating systems suspect (and no matter how much I read in National Geographic that they've proven they always work, it remains fact that several of them are suspect according to many different proffessors I've quizzed, all devout athiests) we can't rely on anything except what we choose to.

Given all the evidence that we have, we've proven that either a) no one has found the truth yet (because again, the post-Big Bang events have zero percent chance to actually succeed in making us as we are, and obviously, anything with religion in it can't be trusted by science) or b) someone has found the truth and there are things that obscure it so it's not obvious to all. I'd tend to fall under b) myself, but again, it's a choice.

And Boss:
Thanks. Yeah, I'm trying to get better about remembering in the first place! :oops: :lol:

P.S. Yes! I remembered this time! Buwahahahahahah!

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Your historical reading is interesting, Tac, but your science not so much.

Actually, the few references you give aren't any more sophisticated than a Jack Chick track. I remember reading the one where he uses that "its a human skull, so what?" back when I was a kid.

The existence of Deep Time, which is a geologist's term for events happening on the scale of hundreds of thousands and millions of years, was first speculated on back in the mid-18th century, almost a hundred years before Darwin pulbished The Origin of Species. Geology was the science that made the most use of the concept, but astronomy eventually picked it up and biology followed. It was the search for a mechanism to show how animals change through generations of Deep Time that led Darwin to create his theories concerning natura selection and evolution.

Creationism and young earth theories were still argued for in the early 19th Century, but they did not fit the evidence and were abandoned by all but certain religious groups believing in Biblical literalism.

For references, I can only direct you to a good library. There are quite literally tens of thousands of books on the subject, as it has been a fundamental concept of science for a century and a half. All of the sciences make use of Deep Time, and all of them have provided evidence for its existance.

If anyone wants to dispute it, they are free to do so. However, when you try to overturn an important scientific concept, you have to do your homework: evidence, theory, experiment, more evidence, more theory, and so on. That's how all the other theories became part of the scientific canon. A few "gotcha" points about neanderthal man just don't do the job.

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PostPosted: Tue Feb 28, 2006 1:50 pm 
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ACK! I've been likened unto Jack Chick! The horror!
...
Come on now, that's just mean!

Deep Time is an interesting subject, but again, I redirect your attention to the fact that it doesn't match up. We have a number of different clocks, geologic and otherwise, that give us gestimations of the Earth's age... but we can't prove it because we weren't there. Further, the longer we study these things the more questions are raised. I'm sorry I came off like a Chick track... that's a really sad reflection on me, actually, as, while what he's trying to do is good, his processes are not always what one might consider to be quite acceptible. I'm not trying to point to a 'gotcha', but rather using it as an example on hand. I apologize if I came off as harsh, it was unintended.

If you look at the inherent view of creationism, it's that everything was made 'old'. This means that things had an apparent age. They had to, or else we wouldn't exist. Adam was formed an adult, one that had full ability to walk, talk, and do normal things that adults need to, like, you know, sex with his wife. Chickens were made, as were fish, not eggs or embryos, but whole, living creatures. They were made fully formed, already there, and, if the Bible is literal, in one day. This meant that everything, everything had to be in place for them to get to that point of independant life. If the atmosphere was just a little off, or the oceans too acidic, it'd all die and God would have just wasted a day for nothing. Kinda stupid for an omnipotent, omniscient being, woudn't you say?

Nonetheless, I'm not arguing that the universe is lacking an apparent age. I can't and to do so would be foolishness. What I'm arguing is that it's age is simply that: apparant. Our world is impossible, literally impossible, via the evolutionary processes. They simply don't work, not mathmatically, not scientifically, and not reasonably. Evolution's major tennet is science, and only science. That means that it cannot accept any theological intervention (there are theological evolutionists, but I'm refering to the athiestic ones as most theological evolutionary ideals fail in regards to either scripture or evolutionary 'science').

I realize that there is an inherent 'age' for our everything. If there weren't we couldn't exist. Yet the actual age of such things is suspect. Again, look at our means of dating things. In science, we're essentially guessing about everything, based on reason and logic and repeatable experiments. If this is our only standards were reason and logic, we get to the point where we question even everything we experience and recieve, according to our senses. Who is to say that we aren't experience a consentual mass-hallucination right now? Logically, we have no reason to deny it, since we know that our own senses can be fooled, they can't be trusted in all things, and if they can't be trusted in all things, then why trust them at all?

I'm sorry I'm not going into pages of scientific reasoning here... honestly I think it's beyond the scope of this forum, if not this argument. It would be pointless for me to look up all my old science papers and talks with evolutionists, creationists, and everything in between for the purpose of posting it here again. I'm not claiming I can give all the answers... just that I can give some of them, and try my best at the rest.

In the end, everyone's gotta start believing somewhere. Whether they agree to believe that they actually have a physical body or not, that's up to them (after all, isn't the universe but an illusion of the true Bramhan?) but they simply have to start at some point. The fact is, according to science's basic tennets, if we weren't there, we can't define it as science. For anything that lacks a historical record, we can't assume that we were there. That means, it's not science. It can't be proven, and can't be reproduced in a lab without a time-machine.

The best we can do is look at the world around us, go 'Oooooooohhhh, pretty!' and guess our way through everything based on observations. There simply isn't a currently known way to prove the past. It's impossible to prove anything, ultimately. It's ALL faith. Even the fact of our own histories is faith.

Still, via scientific reasoning, Deep Time has a couple problems that come with it. For instance, the fact that while many sciences have provided evidence for 'deep time', very few of them agree on precisely how much deep time there is. In fact, most Deep Time calculations are very rough, at best, due to several problems calculating that much stuff. The universe is very big, and very hard to fit on a piece of paper, even in number form. Further, while comparitively few, there are several large-scale clocks that seem to indicated that Deep Time doesn make sense. Most of these are creatively diverted so that they can fit with Deep Time concepts, or completely abandoned. One original such idea used to make the universe fit was the 'Big Crunch' to go with the Big Bang, essentially generating a universe that was infinite, ever-constant, and ultimately explained how everything got here in the first place. Big Crunch takes it for the win with Deep Time.

However, we've discovered that the universe isn't made that way. In fact, because of things we can't measure (dark matter and dark energy, respectively), there is too much gravity out there, but too little to keep us eternal. The energy is winning, we're all speeding up, and this means that ultimately we will all die a form of light-speed heat death. Universe is suddenly very, very limited, and we still have no origin point for all the stuff that's here. The best anyone could ever describe it to me is 'we don't know the science that goes on when that happens'. Hm. 'God works in mysterious ways' indeed.

Still, I'm not trying to state that evolution is rediculous, nor am I arrogant enough to claim that I can overturn it by simply arguing on a debate board on the internet. That's rediculous.

What I am pointing out, is that evolution, while very well thought out, and has a number of very good, solid points in its favor, is in the same boat as Creationism, and every other religion out there... it's all about faith. There is simply no chance, according to all the laws we know, that we'd end up like we are today. It's not possible. If any other theory were given the odds of evolutionary theory to be correct, it'd be laughed out of town.

Instead, evolutionary theory became suddenly very popular as a means of excising God from a group of scientists who wanted something other than the oppressive religion they'd grown up under. Of course Darwin's theory matched the Deep Time... he'd made his theory based on it. We've now proven that Darwinian evolution is more rediculous than most theories, yet evolution itself persists, just in very different forms. It's getting more refined, more reasonable, and more accurate as time goes on... it's just not there yet, in my opinion, and in the opinion of several very well respected multi-PhD athiests.

So, while Deep Time is a good point, and it's one of many, I'd tend to answer it with the 'made already put together' which, to me, makes more sense than conflicting clocks without a God.

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 Post subject: Re: ACK!
PostPosted: Tue Feb 28, 2006 2:36 pm 
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tacticslion wrote:
.....We've now proven that Darwinian evolution is more rediculous than most theories.....


Who with the what now? You can show evolution works in at least one case by sitting down with some bacteria in a lab for a couple of weeks, TL. Has there ever been a case where anyone has shown that creationism works? If you want to shift the argument to the very nature of truth, then we can go there. I won't be very good at it, but my arguments will include a cat, a box, some very convincing particle physics slashed with quantum mechanics and a little philosophy on the side. For this discussion I am assuming that we are not debating the nature of truth, though. I think the closer we get to the end of this debate the closer we'll get to that threshold where nothing is evidence for or against the subject and everything is about how we define truth. In order to avoid this I'd like to choose an aspect of the argument and start debating that to eliminate or strengthen one of your arguments. Please choose one:

Original Sin - Introduced by Tossrock
Jesus of Nazareth Conflicted - My own interest
Degradation of Earth's Magnetic Field - Your interest, if I'm not mistaken

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You have a problem in that the only people who think Deep Time and evolution have been proved untenable are the creationists. A good rule of thumb for picking out rational arguments (theological, scientific, or political) is to check to see if they have any power to impress or convince anyone aside from True Believers. The only people who think evolution has been debunked are creationists. The scientific community doesn't take them seriously. Further, finding a statistical flaw in current evolutionary theory doesn't debunk the theory as a whole; it just gives graduate students new problems to work on.

Scientific knowledge doesn't claim to have achieved any final answers. However, it does have some strict requirements on how you rate provisional answers. Young earth advocates ruled the universities back around 1800. They lost out eventually because Deep Time advocates spent many decades presenting sound arguments and solid evidence. If the new Young Earth advocates want to get their theories recognized, they need to match that vast body of knowledge with something that fits the evidence better.

As opposed to, say, manuevering to overtrhow science standards in schools so they can push their ideas without any scientific review.

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Last edited by Boss Out of Town on Wed Mar 01, 2006 8:13 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Please, tacticslion, as sole moderator of this forum (Rand has been AWOL for some time) i'm asking you nicely to please try and be a tad more concise with your arguements and evidence - I do afterall try to read all posts made in this forum and only finite time to do so.

Apart from anything, your arguements could benefit greatly if you tightened them up rather than bludgering the reader into submission with your 20+ line paragraphs (and i'm on nice high-res monitor here).

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