Did a God or Gods create the universe? EDITED
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i'd rather see Socrates comes back to live. [ed] oh, yes. Aristotle too, if he would like to
and asking people of what they really know, one term at a time.
whether it's technically, literally or even philosophically
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@tomsdesk said:
Maybe it's time to stop.
No, it will stop when the posts get further and further apart, resulting in a heat-death that will see it slip slowly down the listing. Until one day, the quantum flux of the forum will result in some new member resurrecting it and it will burst forth once again in the glory of a new Big Bang.
Eric, In the words of the Moody Blues " I think, therefore I am....I think."
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@unknownuser said:
You have your facts awry!
It's quite possible TIG! But I assure you, it's from ignorance and not malice ... Thank you for the corrections.
@unknownuser said:
Scientists are unlike theists, who seem to ignore anything that might mean they have to change one iota of their dogma. Scientists love to find they got it a bit wrong, as it means they can get nearer to a truth.
I'm sure (subjectively, as I lack proof) that not all scientists are happy to get something wrong, and not all theists are resistant to change. Faith, like science, does not seem to reveal itself "all at once" to those who seek truth. Scientists and those of faith are similar in this regard, we both seek "truth", the difference being the answers we seek lay in different domains. Scientists test empirically, I test spiritually.
As far as dogma, well, the Christ gives ample warning about it in John and Luke. Those are my guidelines and I'll leave it at that ...
Cheers
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@unknownuser said:
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I want to be downloaded onto a satellite and shot off into space to forever scoot around at tremendous speed. When the missus dies I hope she can be uploaded too. I want see a star explode. Witness a black hole. Hopefully with time I can be recalled to wherever mankind is and be uploaded to a new body to start again.If I just die as normal I'll still die happy knowing that I existed and did the best I could with what I have.
Reminded me of a movie idea I wrote once.
Earthquakes everywhere and all oil is gone. People are turning their backs on God everyday left and right. Then the unthinkable great nuclear war breaks out. After a while they start to see that there is no saving this world we all have destroyed. They gather a great team of the world’s smartest scientists “the ones that are left”, kind of like the Manhattan project in the forties. They figure out a way to transfer your conscious into a server or big computer like the matrix. The fighting forces realize that there will never be a winner in their war so they combine their forces to make this project happen before the effects of their war makes it impossible. When complete they plot a course into space for this server type thing that will take them on a ten billion year trip with an unlimited solar power supply. In case an asteroid or something destroys earth, the server will still survive. So in the server when one conscious dies it’s just replayed into someone else kind of like a digital version of reincarnation or reborn to someone’s personal criteria. To make a mockery of the few Christians left they come up with biblical like rules to choose who gets to be placed into the server before the effects of their war kills off everyone, proclaiming its God ending the world not the effects of the war. What they don’t realize that it’s really God’s final straw that forces him to end the world. In his final act before the great glory in the true heaven, God grants them a thousand years of peace in their server heaven before he turns it into the hell we read about today in the bible and only takes the Christians that stayed behind waiting for God to return and he welcomes them to the true Heaven.
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Can you get Roland Emmerich to direct? I think he has the right delicate touch to handle a project like this.
Michael Bay maybe?
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IdahoJ
Please recall that "Christ" didn't "reveal it"... it was just some plain ole guys who did that - albeit whilst saying that they were writing on his behalf !
I'm also sure that there are many scientists who'd prefer to be 'right' rather than 'wrong', BUT the basis of science is to put up an idea and then try to support it OR disprove it. If you find it is probably wrong then you retest until you either find it is right, or if it's wrong then you recast your idea to match the new findings... that's the very basis of science.
I know that there have been many dogmatic 'scientists' throughout the ages - e.g. Lord Kelvin - who have held back science because they have insisted that their idea was right in the face of clear evidence to the contrary, and because they were 'important' they held sway for far too long... BUT these are the exception... -
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God has told us, before, about a series of events that will happen, to prove us that He is always trustworthy. Everything God decided, is fulfilled precisely, so I count my faith firmly on His Word (the Bible). What He said is going to happen, It's done..., the only 'problem' is just time, because every event "takes its time." God has always shown his Authority, but people do not take into account…!
True faith isn’t 'blind', as one imagines, but is based on careful research and check 'tangible' things...!
Bible motto is "Prove all things, and keep what is good" (1 Thessalonians 5:21), not that false slogan, embraced by naives in the form "Believe and do not question/ investigate!"
Important aren’t the opinions of different kinds of people about faith, but what the Bible says about it!Faith accepts as real, as reliable, things not seen...yet!
There are, for example, Paradise and Hell. Rational I can not prove their existence but my faith accepts them as real...- Is this a nonsense? - Not at all!
I believe in the existence of God because I can see His work, and the Bible revealed Him to me in many ways...
I believe for example in a future resurrection, because the Bible tells me about this, and because Jesus Christ has already risen, and so forth...
The Bible is the only book in the world, containing prophecies which were fulfilled (or are ongoing...) exactly, in great detail. The Bible is the world's only book written in original without fail, without any inadvertence!
The Bible is an Authority, and explains also all that we need to know now about the Creation...!
- Is this a nonsense? - Not at all!
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You quote "Prove all things and keep what is good." and then go on to do entirely the opposite...you accept, unquestioningly, everything that is in the Bible...OT and NT...as fact, for no better reason than it's in the Bible.
If you can't see the irony in that, there is little point in you having a discussion with anybody.
You claim that everything prophesied in the Bible has accurately come to pass. Like what? Here's a few prophesies which some Tribulation website claims have come to pass already, proving that His time is nigh:-
-many shall come in Jesus' name, saying, I am Christ
False prophets appear any time, any place...rather fewer these days, if anything...at least outside of US TV Evangelism, which the whole of the rest of the planet regards as a joke.-wars and commotions
So vague and commonplace as to be worthless.-Nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom:
Same as above. Been going on since well before Christ.-great earthquakes shall be in divers places, and famines, and pestilences; and fearful sights and great signs shall there be from heaven.
Yet again, absolutely endemic...anytime, anywhere. Don't recall any signs from heaven lately.-Persecution
Yawn!!-ye shall be betrayed both by parents, and brethren, and kinsfolks, and friends; and some of you shall they cause to be put to death. And ye shall be hated of all men for my name's sake.
Seems to be rather more typical of the Middle Ages and the Thirty Years War. Did I blink and miss Judgement day?-ye shall see Jerusalem compassed with armies
When hasn't it been?-Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled.
It WAS trodden down during the Crusades and during the earlier Roman occupation. I was under the impression that it was now controlled by Jews, not gentiles.-there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring;
Astrology, same old same old and weather? Seriously?Most of these come from Matthew 24, towards the end of which Christ states that ALL these things will be fulfilled (including his return) within the generation of those present.....still waiting.
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@unknownuser said:
you accept, unquestioningly, everything that is in the Bible...OT and NT...as fact, for no better reason than it's in the Bible. If you can't see the irony in that, there is little point in you having a discussion with anybody.
Tell you what, when you can prove to me, conclusively and irrefutably, that "facts" are more important than "faith", then I'll give up my faith convictions and live in a totally "factual" secular world.
The Bible is full of allegory and parables. It's faith, not fact that people need to find God. The Christ could have told people the "direct facts" about God, but he chose to speak in parables to the masses. "He that hath ears to hear, let him hear." Matt 11:15. The Christ said this on a number of occasions when we finished His parables. Why? Because for men to find God, they need to discern it in their hearts because it requires faith to accept Him. Even when the Christ spoke more directly to his chosen disciples concerning His parables, they had a hard time with some of it. If they had trouble, and they were right there in His presence, it's easy to understand why we, so many generation apart from Him, have issues.
Concerning the events, wars, famines, Jerusalem trodden underfoot, false Messiahs, etc. all I can say is it's not the events themselves but the timing that is important. It's in Revelations, but you'll have to take in on faith ...
Cheers.
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@IdahoJ
I was addressing Cornel. I don't know how many times I have to say that I don't have a problem with anyone regarding large parts of the Bible as allegory and parables. Such people tend to keep their faith within decent constraints and use it to live a good life...which is just fine. Many of my best friends fall into exactly that category. I'm well aware that a secular life is not for everyone.It's people that not only take the Bible as the literal truth but go on to extrapolate all other kind of nonsense that isn't even in there that are the problem. They hamper scientific progress, they hamper education...and as for the 'Rapture' evangelists...frankly, they ought to be strung up, or at least treated like any other con men. They ruin people's lives on a daily basis and give ordinary christians a bad name. They've mistranslated a single line in Thessalonians, mixed it in with the delusions of some frustrated Victorian spinster and created an entire cult out of thin air.
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@ ‘Alan F.’
When I was young, I was thinking about your way, but I seriously put on research (for decades), and I found that most biblical descriptions already occurred.
There are to achieve a few percent (but those things are already explained), which, by extrapolation, I see them trustworthy, as veridical. -
@unknownuser said:
@ ‘Alan F.’
When I was young, I was thinking about your way, but I seriously put on research (for decades), and I found that most biblical descriptions already occurred.
There are to achieve a few percent (but those things are already explained), which, by extrapolation, I see them trustworthy, as veridical.Obviously not seriously enough.
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@ ‘Alan F’ and ‘IdahoJ’
Bible must be taken literally first! Where exposures arise by parables, metaphorical, allegorical, symbolic, etc. this is mentioned in the text, or explained in context... -
You deceive yourself 'Alan T'. You will stay with laughter, and I with God...
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Alan, again, nothing personal intended. I thought I was addressing the larger "fact vs. faith" dispute. No harm done I hope...
However, considering some of the other posts being done now, this thread has run it's useful course for me. As it has nothing further to offer, I'll say, "adios" folks ...
Cheers
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Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.
Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus - L.Wittgenstein
Question mentioned in the title of this thread leads directly to the traps of language.
Thinking about the existence/nonexistence of God is full of paradoxes one can't solve using our limited minds and linear language...On the other hand.. it is fun
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@starling75 said:
Thinking about the existence/nonexistence of God is full of paradoxes one can't solve using our limited minds and linear language...
On the other hand.. it is fun
No, it is NOT "fun" - IT IS VITAL!
Finally it is eternal life, with God, or hell, apart from God ... -
@unknownuser said:
@starling75 said:
Thinking about the existence/nonexistence of God is full of paradoxes one can't solve using our limited minds and linear language...
On the other hand.. it is fun
No, it is NOT "fun" - IT IS VITAL!
Finally it is eternal life, with God, or hell, apart from God ...Sorry, I am not follower of this eternal life vs hell concept.
Since God is perceived to be omnipotent and omniscient - he/she/it must be inevitably fluctuating on infinitesimally thin border between existence and nonexistence, sense and nonsense, good and evil....After all, I am from my country
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