Originally posted by DeadFlagBlues
Ash, how disrespectful would it be if somebody started a thread "The Gullibility of Christians?"

Probably about as disrespectful as thread titles like 'Yahweh is an evil God' and 'Christianity is the Antichrist religion.' Or maybe 'Religious Extremists Taking Over ATS' where the thread was focused on Christian ATS members. Or maybe "The Greatest Lie Ever Told: The Bible.' Seems we all need to have some thick skin if we're going to hang around here.

Seems as you've made it your life's work to refute anything than your own religion while simultaneously using it as your platform to discredit others beliefs.

My 'life's work' is actually the business I own but 'discredit' does not seem like the proper term, especially when it has been stated already on this thread my intention is not to 'debunk evolution' or my other thread stated it was not concerning 'the theology of Islam.'

In reality, I hold back many of my more potent and controversial opinions (Yes, they do get worse).

Here are some quotes by that I find revelant to the conversation.
By Dr. Karl Popper none the less. Look him up and possibly learn something unless you have a bias blocking your view.

I shall start it out with a REALLY good one.

When I speak of reason or rationalism, all I mean is the conviction that we can learn through criticism of our mistakes and errors, especially through criticism by others, and eventually also through self-criticism. A rationalist is simply someone for whom it is more important to learn than to be proved right; someone who is willing to learn from others - not by simply taking over another's opinions, but by gladly allowing others to criticize his ideas and by gladly criticizing the ideas of others. The emphasis here is on the idea of criticism or, to be more precise, critical discussion. The genuine rationalist does not think that he or anyone else is in possession of the truth; nor does he think that mere criticism as such helps us achieve new ideas. But he does think that, in the sphere of ideas, only critical discussion can help us sort the wheat from the chaff. He is well aware that acceptance or rejection of an idea is never a purely rational matter; but he thinks that only critical discussion can give us the maturity to see an idea from more and more sides and to make a correct judgement of it.
-- Karl Popper

A great many on BOTH sides of the theist/atheist debate run amok of this truth.

Whenever a theory appears to you as the only possible one, take this as a sign that you have neither understood the theory nor the problem which it was intended to solve.
-- Karl Popper

Like evolution or creation? Mmmmm?

It is often asserted that discussion is only possible between people who have a common language and accept common basic assumptions. I think that this is a mistake. All that is needed is a readiness to learn from one's partner in the discussion, which includes a genuine wish to understand what he intends to say. If this readiness is there, the discussion will be the more fruitful the more the partner's backgrounds differ.
-- Karl Popper

There is an almost universal tendency, perhaps an inborn tendency, to suspect the good faith of a man who holds opinions that differ from our own opinions
-- Karl Popper

Why do I think that we, the intellectuals, are able to help? Simply because we, the intellectuals, have done the most terrible harm for thousands of years. Mass murder in the name of an idea, a doctrine, a theory, a religion
-- Karl Popper

You cannot have a rational discussion with a man who prefers shooting you to being convinced by you.
-- Karl Popper

Note: There are many ways to "shoot" at someone other than using a gun.

When we enter a new situation in life and are confronted by a new person, we bring with us the prejudices of the past and our previous experiences of people. These prejudices we project upon the new person. Indeed, getting to know a person is largely a matter of withdrawing projections; of dispelling the smoke screen of what we imagine he is like and replacing it with the reality of what he is actually like.
-- Karl Popper

We have become makers of our fate when we have ceased to pose as its prophets.
-- Karl Popper

There is no history, only histories.
-- Karl Popper

There is no history of mankind, there is only an indefinite number of histories of all kinds of aspects of human life.
-- Karl Popper

Science may be described as the art of systematic over-simplification.
-- Karl Popper

Now I think one of the reasons why religion developed in the way that it did over the centuries was precisely to curb this murderous bent that we have as human beings.
-- Karl Popper

It is impossible to speak in such a way that you cannot be misunderstood.
-- Karl Popper

Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them
-- Karl Popper

No matter how many instances of white swans we may have observed, this does not justify the conclusion that all swans are white.
-- Karl Popper

[edit on 2-3-2008 by WraothAscendant]

Originally posted by AshleyD
Through implication by those who deem anyone with questions or skepticism as 'ignorant' or 'lying for God.' Or by simply pointing out the conflicts, you must be a 'close minded religionist.'

Ignorant? Yes, most often ignorance is a huge portion of skepticism towards scientific fields, including evolution. "I don't know the answer and can't be arsed to look it up, so it must be fake!" is about all the material I've seen from evolution skeptics. Others, such as yourself, lean totally on things that have long-since been resolved. Piltdown Man, are you kidding me?

Yes, that's ignorance. The cure for ignorance is education.

Now as for lying for god, well, I've seen plenty of this as well. Such as presenting a lime-encrusted boot from a limestone cave as "Evidence" that fossils can happen in a few short years, or, my favorite, chiseling human footprints alongside dinosaur tracks. Hoaxes go both ways, you know. Unfortunately, evolution does not hinge on the hoaxes, but creationism often does.

And yes, those are pretty much the options we have - evolution or creationism. Whether you want to say biblical creationism, or that aliens engineered us, it's the same concept.

HThose were not necessarily all hoaxes as has already been pointed out. And again, there are conflicts already explained above and yes, 'flaws.'

Semantics - you know what I meant. You seem to expect flawlessness and perfection. In other words, you expect religious scripture from science, rather than science. Or at least, you're approaching science as you would scripture. "If it's not flawless, it's worthless"

I'm strongly considering creating the the thread, "Is there a taboo of disagreeing with WF?"

Only when you're wrong and plan to sniffle when I tell you you're wrong.

Are you denying the conflicts of dating fossils and strata? Or the transfer of genetic information? The reliability of carbon dating? Evolutionary species time lines? The cause of vestigial organs? Dubious transitional fossil evidence?

What conflicts in particular? You're going to have to specify there, because you're talking a broad range.

I'm better than the next man because I don't need evidence to go with my instinct, to go with the conclusion I have drawn based on life up to this point and the knowledge I have gathered. Oh yeah, my experiences factor heavily too. The most famous acknowledged people in history took chances, made decisions without 100% proof, and this is why they are famous. Like it or not..

And why do all my prayers end up coming true? its really quite strange, I don't pray often, I should, but I only do it every few days. Or when something worth praying about comes up, like someone's well being or safety for example. And no matter how much the odds are stacked against it, the prayers work out. It's happening more and more often, kinda like noticing 11:11 on the clock. You start to see it, then you dont try to see it but you end up noticing it at least once sometimes twice everyday it seems! and you dont know why! its just like that.

God made man because God knew man would become God-like, and do his job for him. We are the fingertips of God.. without us, he cannot feel the creation, that is .. all that which exists.

On a scientific level, you can't have something from nothing, there's nothing that can just pop into existence without a pre-cursor action or event. The big bang didn't "just happen", if it happened at all. If theres one thing I've learned thus far in life, it's that everything happens for a reason, and nothing happens without a cause. Nothing spontaineously creates itself out of thin air. All the matter which exists in the Universe had to be created, I'm sorry, theres no other fancy physics explanation for it. When you go back to the first millisecond of time, there had to have been a creation of matter, out of thin air. Call it a big bang, call it a 7 day creation, same thing. Even if there was a singularity of matter before the big bang, and thats all that existed, no time, no space, despite the contradiction there b/c you need space for a singularity of matter to exist in, despite all of this.. that singularity had to come from somewhere. Nothing just exists infinitely with no start or finish, with no beginning point somewhere in times past, not even God! This is the purpose of the creation, God had to give of itself to make this, and this is why people say God is in everyone, or that everything is God.

[edit on 3/2/2008 by runetang]

Originally posted by WraothAscendant
Here are some quotes by that I find revelant to the conversation.
By Dr. Karl Popper none the less. Look him up and possibly learn something unless you have a bias blocking your view.

Cool. Karl Popper, the philospher of science who structured science into what it is today.

The same structures that place ideas like intelligent design creationism outside of science by the notion of falsifiability and testability.

Evolution has rabbits in the cambrian, ID creationism has....

Ash.
Nice try at illustrating your point.
I think you did wonderfully.
But all they want to do is drag it back into the same old, tired argument as to who is right.

But as is obvious they won't see past their own proverbial noses.
It's all about them and how they are right and your just a stupid, ignorant, evil Christian.

Alas poor tolerance I wish people would be willing to know thee.





[edit on 2-3-2008 by WraothAscendant]

Originally posted by DeadFlagBlues
Ash, how disrespectful would it be if somebody started a thread "The Gullibility of Christians?" Seems as you've made it your life's work to refute anything than your own religion while simultaneously using it as your platform to discredit others beliefs.

With all due respect, that thread has already been made umpteen times. You and I and everyone else knows that more anti-Christian threads are made on this forum than anti-Atheist threads, or threads made to debate Atheists on this point or that point. Every few days theres a new anti-Christian thread, its the hip thing to do, everyone wants to be a part of the Christian bashing ATS club. You're all a bunch of followers, whose own intellect is so self questionable that you cannot even believe your own thoughts, and requires this so called proof that we all know does not exist, and cannot exist, because it would contradict the free will which all humans have, the will to choose.

This argument is so repetitive, it goes nowhere. Why cant Atheists quietly disbelieve to themselves, and Christians quietly believe to themselves, and stop this? Does anything get accomplished? No. Not a damn thing, nada. Just the same arguments from both sides, nothing new. In fact, what am I doing wasting my time here? Oh yeah, I was sticking up for the underdog.

This is all I have to say, and it sums up this entire debate in one sentence:
You cannot prove God exists, and you cannot prove God doesn't exist.

Therefore, believers will go on until someone proves God doesn't exist, and disbelievers will go on until someone proves God exists, neither of which will happen, both of which are impossible.

Therefore neither side is on higher ground, neither side has more evidence, and NOBODY has any room to say that this is the way it is, or that is the way it is, because theres no proof of anything, existence of God or not.

all I ever hear is wheres the proof? wheres the proof?

I want to know the answer to that same question! where IS the proof God doesn't exist?

[edit on 3/2/2008 by runetang]

Originally posted by WraothAscendant
And you run afoul of this he had to say.

Whenever a theory appears to you as the only possible one, take this as a sign that you have neither understood the theory nor the problem which it was intended to solve.
-- Karl Popper

It's about a group of militant "I am righters." that enjoys bombing on everyone else while accepting whole heartedly what is obviously just another theory.

But no scientist will (or should) claim 100% absolute certainity. We leave that for maths and religion. Ironic that you quote from his book that views knowledge as a form of evolutionary process.

Heh, I give about 0.0000001% for ID creationism. I give 0.0001% for I am just a brain in a vat. I give 0.001% for aliens created all life over time, and they evolved on some planet elsewhere. And I give about 1% for another unknown natural theory.

There we go. Evolutionary theory is not just the only 'theory', just the most likely one. However, two of those above are not scientific theories (and the others would be no more than hypotheses) according to Popper.

I guess you found a bunch of Popper quotes. Just read his books, they're very good.

[edit on 2-3-2008 by melatonin]