The belief in God is a matter of faith. Logic cannot prove or disprove God, even logic a hundred fold better than the flawed logic of the OP. If you believe that God is infinite, then flawed mankind cannot fathom objective knowledge of God. It is through God's revelation that we can know him. That belief requires a DECISION on our part to accept the belief in God.
The Apostle's Creed says it all:

I believe in God, the Father Almighty,
the Maker of heaven and earth,
and in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord:

Either Believe or Don't Believe. Flawed human logic cannot prove or disprove God's existence.

The problem with religious people is that they cant answer a simple question.
They have let this fantasy in and accept it and defend it till the grave. They
try and feed non-believers (or realists) this story how god is this being that
can't be questioned, and we can't fully explain or understand. The more
advanced we become and discover new scientific frontiers that the broader
and more magical god is.

The reason they can't fully explain or understand god is because they simply
don't understand their own crazy stories. They quote pages from the bible,
put their own meaning to em and call it a day.

Sheep.

Water to wine?! Can't explain it can ya?
Virgin birth?! I'm still waiting for that one... oh right mary is a komodo dragon.

I will debate this and defend my view.
Religious people would rather start a war over it.

Originally posted by AgentOrangeJuice
Here is the simple logic that proves the illegitimacy of all religious texts wirtten by man.
So called written BY the all divine creators THROUGH people.
God writes a book, THROUGH a human?
Yet God created the human?
God creates all things?Right?
Evey single thing the stars the earth the universe heaven ALL THINGS.
Right?
But he cant throw down a book?
He cant get together a basic printing press?
He has to talk to some guy, and tell him to write it?
He has to "talk to" the people he created in all things, and ask them to write it for him?
The way they interpret it?
Seriously, this makes no sense.
If the Bible was the word of God, the all being all seeing all knowing creator of all things.
Then the book would have just "appeared".
Right?
Written BY GOD!
Why would he need us to write it down?
When he can move mountains, and turn city's into dust?
Prophets = Profits.
A good MLM scheme.
Wake up fools.
God loves you.
But he didn't write any books.


[edit on 10-12-2008 by AgentOrangeJuice]

You've been nominated for Screwball of the Month on Tektonics.org for Dec. 2008

To base your assertion whether the bible is from God or not simply on whether it mentions dinosaurs is plain silly.

And yes, logic can be used perfectly to believe in God. THere are countless scientists (I picked them because they're known generally to be most skeptical) in various fields who have come to believe in God because of their studies and research.

One such person is Michael J. Behe, a microbiologist. Read up on him and his book "Darwin's black box" - it will give you an idea of how he uses logic to prove to himself that God exists.

As for contradictions and that the bible is full of them - that has been a mindless chant repeated by critics, because I heard my neighbour said that his father-in-law's boss's daughter was told by someone who appeared to know what he is talking about.

If you are bringing up contradictions, why don't you list them? The right thing to do is to say: "I cannot see how anyone can believe in the bible based on the following reasons/contradictions - 1... 2... 3... ..... n"

You have to keep in mind that the bible was not meant to be a scientific book, and it was not meant to be the hitchhiker's guide to the earth type of book. However, where it touches on something of science, it does not contradict it. Even thinking the order of creation, what appeared in which order, is in agreement with the stages of evolution theory. So much for it "contradicting" science.

I think what you mean is that, to you personally, the delivery mechanism of the bible was irrational - it didn't meet your goals, objectives, values, or trade offs. You wanted to have the divine inspiration plopped in your lap so that you could read it cover to cover and understand everything. Could God have done this? Of course. I think what we should be asking is why this wasn't done.

I can think of a few reasons. First, one of the best ways to understand and remember something is to have to transcribe it - to write it down. Second, having man write things down causes inspection and cross verification and validation. Arguing is a good thing because it increases understanding. Third, it provides opportunities for reasoning, e.g. "Did God really say that? I wonder why? Is that consistent with x,y, and z?"

So, I think all you're saying is that you don't understand God's motivations for these things and since you don't understand His motivations, you don't concur with other people's beliefs that the bible is Holy.

Has it occurred to you that your instincts might be bad?

When it comes to logic, anybody who thinks that all of this occured for no damn reason, and was entirely random is the illogical one. It is much more logical to recognize that God or whatever you want to call our "creator" had a hands in things. It is just as illogical as thinking nothing happens to us when we die despite the fact that energy does not just vanish, nor can our "soul", not to mention odd findings when studying such a "supernatural" subject.

I don't claim all the Bible is true, yet certainly there is much truth in it, far more than doubters would ever admit.

I will give it to your straight. Compared to Deists, atheists are complete and ignorant tools as none of their claims of being logical apply. When it comes to religions like Christianity, well it is the duty of the faithful to deal with such hopeless atheist doubters.

Why would God write the Bible himself? Why should God have to? Perhaps it is a way of saying "I am not going to do everything for you, yet here is a chance for your race to redeem and advance yourselves." Perhaps "judgement day" is something far different from what we imagine. Instead of this event occuring when God is ready, perhaps it will occur when humanity has learned the errors of it's ways and is ready. Or at this rate we will destroy ourselves and never achieve this.

In some defense to the OP I think that simple logic can punch major holes in the Bible or at least the interpretations of Christians. With simple logic I can demonstrate how god is either not omnipotent like in the Bible as most Christians believe or that god is sadistic and cruel.

I will start with two beliefs attributed to belief in the Bible:

1. God created everything: god is omnipotent, the end all and be all of everything if you will.

2. If you go against gods' will you go to suffer eternally. You go to Hell. If you do good you get rewarded and go to Heaven.

Most arguments of omnipotence are flawed and use the whole can god create a mountain paradox. However, I will take it a step further and challenge the very laws themselves.

A) If god is omnipotent then that means "he made the rules" this is an important phrase to remember. This means he can make rules he is either bound to or he may even break them as he sees fit.

B) If he is bound to laws outside of himself that he cannot in no way break or did not create this eliminates his omnipotence. Something that is omnipotent should be able to do everything as covered in the type A god.

-----------------------------
Now if we argue that god is the type B then that hurts any beliefs or teachings created from the Bible. This can mean that the Bible is flawed or perhaps the teachings/interpretations are. In any case god would no longer be the ultimate everything he would be subserviant to said existing laws.

If we argue god is type A then that means regardless of all the arguments that stem from, he gave us free will so we choose our fate, it is still undeniable that "he made the rules" no matter what his intentions. To me the fact that he made the rules and knowingly brought into creation a being that stood a chance to suffer eternally because of a rule "he made" means that he is cruel and sadistic. As a lowly human I can think of better and nicer means to deal with those who disobeyed who broke the laws as it were. If the only punishment that would be viable was to make this being suffer eternally he would be shoved into category because he would be bound to a law he cannot break. Since he chose this punishment makes him cruel almost to anyones standards.

So he picked this cruel punishment and chooses to be bound it or chooses not to break it. Or he can't break it and is no longer omnipotent.


As far as calling him cruel goes I think almost any one of us humans would not sentence anyone to suffer eternally in Hell or even want to wipe it out of existence if we had to the power to do otherwise.


[edit on 12-12-2008 by Metalmind]

[edit on 12-12-2008 by Metalmind]

Heres the problem with your disbelief of the bible as the word of God. The bible predict history. The Thousands of scrolls written thousands of years ago predict history now happening. You don't want to believe then you are ignoring facts. Now in days buddy its more logical to believe than not to believe.

And nothing that the OP said has disproves the bible. No evidents, no proves, just words that people have been posting about on the ATS and BTS from the beginning.

But ye lets ignore the real evidents and proves. Lol God bless anyway!!!!

[edit on 15-12-2008 by slymattb]

Originally posted by crmanager
You egomaniacal blowhard.

How dare you ask for God(diety) to personally hand YOU proof of his(her) existance.

You would not believe it anyway. Just say it is a trick "I need more proof then a book."

lol...
That's like telling an orphan "How dare you expect your dad (who is FAR greater than you) to be involved in your life. You would probably just tell him off once you became a teenager anyway. Arrogant little snot..."

Originally posted by theindependentjournal

Originally posted by Mikey84
There is no mention of the Dinosaurs, why? Because when they wrote the bible they didn’t know they existed..... we now know they did.

Read it before talking about like you have read it cause it makes you look STUPID AS HELL!!!

Read Job 40 and then get back to me on the Dinosaurs thing...

I read it... it could be any number of animals, though you will do what you do best - assume.

Footnotes:
Job 40:15 Possibly the hippopotamus or the elephant

But no, even despite all the evidence which says that dinosaurs are millions of years old, you're right. He was describing a dinosaur... lol

Originally posted by theindependentjournal
Better to keep your mouth shut and have people think you're stupid than to open your mouth and prove them right!!!

Indeed.

Originally posted by MikeboydUS
Nothing makes sense. Reality and even human existence is filled with paradox.

Thus my name .
The truth is a paradox, though only to human understanding.