I can't decide. You?

And I'm referring to any interpretation of God or a higher being (i.e. Buddha, the Jewish/Christian/Catholic/Muslim interpretation of God etc. etc.).

hahahahahaha


miiiiight wanna redo this poll. looks a little one sided so far.

Frankly I told a girl i liked Hall and Oates once - I believe whatever it is that will get me laid quickest

If I die and wind up at the pearly gates and god is pissed I'm blaming it all on rock and roll

These results aren't going to please many christians

nope. never seen him, and never had any reason to believe in him. never heard a good argument why he does exist, and i've heard plenty.

Shawna Hiatt

part of her was definitely man-made

a surprising number of no's so far.

The day I get to marry Shana Hiatt is the day I devote myself to God.


Mark my words.


edit: I sure hope God is reading this thread

If you were god would you want you to believe in him or ravage Shana yourself?

LOL

i believe in God but I am not sure what he or she does. I understand all the power that God possesses but to what extent he uses I am not sure

But, you've never seen the wind either? So do you not believe in it?

i've seen the "wind" moving through colored gas.





you needed to be more specific about what you meant by "god". if you meant god in the generic sense then yes, that is a surprising number. i think most are assuming you meant the biblical christian god specifically, though, in which case the number of no's is less surprising.

The one that shoots lightning bolts, or the one with 8 arms?

Is this the 2nd or 3rd time you've used this sentence when replying to a topic in this forum?


Come up with a better example. Find something that isnt observable by any of our senses and it's existence hasnt been proven by science.

Answer the question then maybe I'll give you a reply. Have you ever seen the wind? Why do you believe in the wind if you can't see it? You can't answer it.

the wind isn't a thing. it is waves of energy caused by variations in pressure moving through the mixed gas (air) of the lower atmosphere. the waves in the atmosphere itself aren't directly observable by our eyes because our air does not reflect photos with wavelengths in the visible spectrum our eyes have evolved to see. however the waves ARE directly observable with optical equipment that can see other wavelengths, or if a gas is introduced that reflects photons with wavelengths in our visible spectrum. if you've watched smoke on a windy day you've seen the "wind".

i agree - gotta be a better example you can come up with.

No Grasshopper.

Or in simple terms, you can see the wind blowing through the trees everyday.

That is not the wind, brother. When you see the wind blowing through the trees, thats the effects(or affects....whatever)of the wind. True I have never seen God, but I have seen the effects/affects of God. Everytime I seen a drug addict become free, or the broken hearted healed, that is more evidence for God than anything you guys can can come up with.

And I went with no.

I use my senses to detect the wind. Can you use your senses to detect God?

Ok, but you can't prove that the addict was cured by God, but one can prove that there is wind. What the **** is this?

It's fine not to believe, but there's no sense tearing down another's belief.

I'm not tearing down anything. I'm just pointing out a logical flaw in his argument. Maybe solving this problem will help him better argue his point in the future.

i dont think explaining why you think someone is wrong is "tearing down" their belief.

its not like people are forced to read a particular post.

if you cant handle reading a post that disagrees with your opinion, then maybe it is time to reconsider your beliefs anyway.

these actually dont work as arguments.

You only know what wind is because you have felt it before. SO when somebody tells you that they feel the wind you draw on past experience in order to know what he means. If you had never experienced wind you could only rely on the guys explanation of what the effects are

When you see an addict who is all of a sudden clean...you are seeing the effect of God but since you have never experienced God you cant understand what he feels.

How do you prove wind? You you look at its effects and you experience it...
How do you prove God? You look at the effect He has had on people and then you also experience it

I've never seen you either, but I do believe you are an idiot.

Yet I am the one treating you badly in the other thread.

Who is the hypocrite now?

have you considered a priori knowledge? Maybe not all knowledge is essencially empirical.

Actually no, it's the wind itself. I am watching it right now as it blows the branches around ouside my window. What I am watching is not an effect of the wind blowing....I am watching the wind blow. That is what I'm doing. If I went outside, I could FEEL it blowing on my skin. I woulnd't be feeling its effects, I would be feeling it, itself.





What if a drug addict cleaned himself up through inner strength? What if, when a junkie says he got clean when he found God, he really means he got clean when he found the inner strength to push himself to succeed? If he thinks it's God, fine....but really it was him himself who made the decision to get clean.

i havent considered this very carefully, but i would disagree.
i think that there is essentially no useful a priori knowledge- just about everything
is empirical.

i can think of only 2 nontrivial or nondefinitional a priori statements

- i know that i exist in some form
- it is impossible to know any nondefinitional truths(except these 2 statements) with absolute certainty.

if you can think of any others, id be interested to hear them.

the wind (pressure-generated energy waves in the atmosphere) is directly observable, not just its effects. again, you guys need to think of a better example because that one is just invalidating your point.

yes

There isn't a better example, because God isn't synonomous with anything. The idea of a creator god is a concept totally unlike any other.

He's not like the wind....He's like some formless wonder who exists everywhere and cannot be seen, heard, smelled, OR FELT directly. You have to believe on faith, faith that you know that He exists, because you have felt His presence inside your mind.

I don't know why anybody is trying to give an example of why they know He exists. They know because they know.

I happen not to know.

My whole point with the wind thing is that you don't have to see something to believe it. What if I told you that I have seen God with my own eyes, what if every other Christian on this site said the same thing? Then you would still say that we all were crazy because none of you have seen Him. I believe in the Great Wall of China even though I've never seen it, why do I believe it? Because people I know have seen it and I believe them. Now, I have never seen God. But, I have seen many awesome things that can only be explained by God. I haven't shared those with you because you're not going to believe me anyway. But, here goes anyway. I once saw a lady with one arm get prayed for and suddenly she had an arm. Can't explain it. On a mission trip some friends and I were swimming in a lake, a friend jumped off a tall rock into some shallow water and broke her ankle. Her leg was crooked. We prayed over her on our way to the hospital and before our very eyes her leg straightened, and the pain went away. A man in my church was actually set on FIRE from head to toe, got to the burn unit, was in the hospital for six months with know drastic improvement, one night(he was an atheist) out of desperation he cried out to God for help, the next day when the nurse came in to change his bandages over 60% of the burns were completely gone, not even a scar. He has PICTURES of this! Now those are some of the more physical examples of God. Many people, even Christians, don't believe in miracles anymore, which is why I think we don't see them as often as we do. But God still works in this way. But of course, seeing isn't always believeing.

The a priori/a posteriori distinction is sometimes applied to things other than ways of knowing, for instance, to propositions and arguments. An a priori proposition is one that is knowable a priori and an a priori argument is one the premises of which are a priori propositions. Correspondingly, an a posteriori proposition is knowable a posteriori, The a priori/a posteriori distinction has also been applied to concepts. An a priori concept is one that can be acquired independently of experience.My belief that it is presently raining,water is H2O and i often get badbeats playing poker are examples of a posteriori justification.

These beliefs contrast with examples:all bachelors are unmarried, red is a colour, four plus three equals seven. I have reasons for thinking each of these statements are true, but the reasons do not appear to derive from experience. I am able to see the truth in these claims by reflecting on their content.

You could argue that the above example are trivial, but im not trying to promote any profound insight to a priori knowledge, only that certain propositions are knowable in abstract.

Your examples are definitions. A bachelor is by definition unmarried, but this does not make it an a priori statement. However, it relies on the a priori concept of self equality (i.e. x=x).

Wether or not self equality is itself just another "definition" of an a priori statement isn't the issue. Justification by reflection draws only what is accessible by virtue of having acquired the relevant concepts, and thus is not dependent on experience.

Yes, I believe but not from the conservative Christian viewpoint. My connection to God is more universal.

I like this explanation. I know.

That is the lamest metaphor I've ever seen.

When you have seen a drug addict quit drugs, you have seen a drug addict quit drugs. You have seen a man make a personal decision to change his behavior in the real world. It happens every day. A God-entity is NOT necessary for a man to change his behavior on the planet Earth.

"Broken-heartedness" is an inherently temporary condition. Time heals this condition quite effectively in most people. A God-entity is NOT necessary for the broken-hearted to be healed.

So we have NO evidence of a God-entity based on these observations. Do better.

i assume you meant two arms but that made me laugh anyway. she had an arm - she was prayed for and... a miracle - it's still there!

you're right, i don't believe you. but for the sake of argument - if god is allowing miracles like that to happen in modern times, why is he hiding them? someone regrowing a lost arm would be an irrefutable miracle, yet nothing like that has ever been documented.

"When God is doing his job right, you won't even know if he's done anything at all?"











- Futurama

Well I believe in God and the only thing that scares me is Kaiser Sose

ROFL this has to be a gag post.....

I voted no, but I might be classified as a maybe. I most certainly don't believe in the christian vision of a god. The thing I can never get answered properly is this: You are to assume that the christian god is all knowing, all powerfull, and all good. So how do you explain all the evils of the world? Free will can't be an answer because, if a God is all knowing, he should have easily seen where free will was going to take us, and if he were all good and all powerfull, he could not willingly give us free will. So how do you explain these evils? He has to be lacking in one of these categories for it to even be possible.

As far as I'm concerned if there is a god, hes either not all powerfull or hes one sick mother ******.

In the book "Case for Faith" there's a good answer to that (although I'm not a Christian I agreed with the logic). I'm paraphrasing, so excuse and correct any mistakes:

Freewill is the answer, but perhaps not in the sense that you were thinking of it. Man's "freedom", what sets us apart from other animals and gives us liberty to think, is our ability to choose and exercise our right to implement that choice.

If I were unable to kill, unable to tell someone to %$#@ off, how would I be free? If I'm restrained from doing certain things then I truly have no liberty, because humanity's freedom is in choice. Although it makes us evil at times, it also allows for the greatest emotions (i.e. love).

You know what, I'm butchering it, so I'm going to stop, because I have one of those mental "images" of the answer to the question that I can't translate properly. I haven't read Case for Christ, and although Case for Faith was one of the most poorly written books I've picked up, he makes some interesting arguments.

this "expanation" for bad things happening only works if god does not interfere with humanity AT ALL, which would contradict the bible and the belief of most christians. if god is directing anything at all about the events of our individual lives or the course of human events in general that explanation falls flat on it's face.

This isnt necessarily correct. If you read the article i posted in the "evil" thread you will see what I mean. The fact that man was givin a moral code to live by and given the ability to choose to sin is what makes God's plan so much better than anything else concievable.


And off topic of this thread..but pertaining to you crow. I happened to be listening to what I thought was going to be a philosophical discussion but turned out to be a missionary story. They posted some interesting facts that would seem to contradict your assessment that christianity is failing. When i get more time ill make a new thread of it with what i believe will be emperical evidence of christianity growing..(I havent seen the website yet just what the guy said should be on the website). There are secular witnesses to miracles that have taken place as well...You should find it interesting

i said if god is intervening in our lives at all, then allowing humans to have free will isn't an excuse for god allowing so many bad things to happen. is that what you're disagreeing with? i can't tell.



i never disputed that christianity is growing world-wide. however fundamentalism is in decline in technologically/intellectually advanced countries, which is a clear indication that it will fail long-term as human society matures (unless there is some sort of social regression or collapse).



i doubt i'll be interested unless there is physical documentation. secular witnesses are just as capable of lying or misinterpreting as theists.