Science today still does’nt disprove the deistic theory. There are several valid philosophical arguments for an intelligent first cause/prime mover. I know for me the argument for first cause mixed with “fine tuning”{improbability of life without it, by “life” It does not mean neccaserily HUMAN life, just ‘life”} and a couple other arguments too. It does not contradict science or rational argument like theism does; Atheism is like deism in that it is a belief based on reason about the nature of the universe or origins/etc, yet like deism it cannot be proven nor disproven{but ignores the argument of fine tunings validity}- I argue both to be equally rational and supprtable and non-contradictory to science and reason, but though atheists love to argue their vbelief does not need explanation and is the “default” position- they are wrong on that front, Pure Agnosticism between the atheist and deist theories is the default that requires no explanation{and I personally allow Agnostic-Atheism and Agnostic-Deisms to be made equal to agnosticism}.

For the record I’m an Anti-theistic Agnostic-Deist{pandeism/panendeism leaning}.

In Reason:
Bill Baker

Dear Anj, I agree when you say you have to read as much as possible before choosing a religion or not. Have you read Kautsky’s “Foundation of Christianity”? I guess not! Historically it has been proven that christianity, judaism and islam are false. So are all polytheist religions. If you have a real open mind, read http://trotsky.org/archive/kautsky/1908/christ/index.htm and make up your mind!

Yes, but they didn’t start it in the name of God. When Pedro said, “No wars…have ever been started by either deists or pantheists — or atheists, for that matter,” he meant religious wars. He could have expressed himself more accurately, but if you read the entire sentence, the point he wants to make is clear: religion provides another — unnecessary — impetus to start wars.

In my view, people (by percentage) would still be good, ethical and moral without religion; goodness has natural and rational roots. But on the other end of the spectrum, religion provides that extra irrational something to get into fights with other people about. If you subtract religious wars from the total number of wars in the world’s history, you have a smaller number of wars. That = fewer dead people and less suffering.

But would you have fewer good deeds without religion? I seriously doubt it. I give people a little more credit than that.

As Voltaire said, (and I admit I got this from Dawkins’ book): “Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.”

The founding fathers were deists, but would NOT have been atheists, because the question of where original variety (information) in the universe came from is not answered. With no original variety, gravity could not have caused the collapse of mass into stars and solar systems, etc. So where did this original information/variety come from? Their answer would have been “deism”.

Most theists (including the ones in this string of comments) are not rational. But Jesus did not teach anything like most theists. He never would have encouraged war, violence, or banning scientific research. JESUS would never start a war. By contrast, the statement that atheists and deists did not start wars is obviously untrue. The founding fathers were DEISTS, and who do you think started the revolutionary war?

BTW, Subjective “miracles” are not proof of anything.

I am not 100% certain of anything, but I don’t live by certainties, I live by reasonable probabilities.

I am a theist. I am Christian.

Christianity is a form of panENtheism, which is a form of pantheism. Pantheism is not anti-theism. Pantheism holds that God = Reality.

PanENtheism additionally holds that the visible universe is not the entirety of Reality. God = Reality, but Reality is bigger than 20 billion light years of space. This is scientific fact; the MHI of quantum physics states this.

Christianity furthermore states that REALITY is personal. This is the sticking point; this is the hard one to accept.

-micah redding
http://thereddingbrothers.blogspot.com/

In order for a Saint to be canonized, a person must have 3 miracles that can not be attributed to science. Yes, we are talking about limbs on amputees coming back, tongues growing where they’re were none, blindness being cured etc. In Lourdes France for instance, home of St. Bernadette, there is a church with over 2,000 crutches lining the walls from a cure caused by the waters of a spring formed there through her so called intervention with God. Also, she died over a hundred years ago, but her body has not decayed. This is also common among saints. I saw her body myself in France - laying there with a blush still on her cheeks. This phenomenon has been rigorously discussed among scientists and cannot be explained. It is the SCIENCE however that backs up these claims that sold me. And this is just ONE case. There are so many cases like this that people simply do not know about.

All I am saying is, there ARE miracles (if you define a miracle to be something that is beyond science, at least as best as we know). Perhaps these extrodinary people are just more evolved, or can manipulate energy to cause healings or not decay after death, but they themselves attributed these gifts to their deep relationship with God.

After I converted, I started to see many experiences on a smaller level everyday among those who believe. Things I cannot explain. There is too much to discuss in a post. Please email me at anjinfo4u@yahoo.com if you care to talk. I am very open minded and love discussing all things regarding religion!! i am not fanatical in the slightest. YES reject irrational ideals. But be educated so that you can tell irrational from rational.

I don’t have an “anti-Christian bias”, I’m simply an atheist. There’s a difference, you know.

As for the rest, assuming you’re a Deist, please tell me what reason you have for believing that there is a god who created the universe. I can think of two, but I don’t want to put words into your mouth.

Please give a single example.

[quote comment="5852"]half-truths[/quote]

Please give a single example.

[quote comment="5852"]and liberal tripe[/quote]

Please give a single example.

So, Christianity is true because the Bible says so?

You know, most other religions also have books saying that they have the only path to salvation, and everyone else is damned…

Why should one believe in one and not in the others?

Changing topics and short attention spans are an American Art–and I hate to tell you this, but there is no biological evidence that we have “grown up” as a species over the last 10,000 years. Could be that we are “digressing” (I mean, of course, “regressing”). Just my irrational observation, mind you. Personally, I blame it all on Satan (just kidding).

We have a problem in that we rest our knowledge growth on history, but where, like laws, is the cut-off? How far back do we go or not in the search of the essence of truth? When we knew little of the science of the origin of the species or of the universe, some supernatural “de-” or “the-” was a convenient stop-gap way of admiring the majesty of both without being able to know thier origin. As we learn the mechanisms, we have also to unlearn the stop-gap explanations.

It is hard to imagine what the mind set of someone who had the priviledge of growing up without the propoganda of religion would be, but I would love to explore those mental pathways!

In general the mindset of our founding fathers was that of pioneers in a new land, looking for a break in history and setting out the furtherest reaching, “enlightened” judgments that they could sell to the population at large and codify into a set of elastic rules that could be a guide, without a draconian history to screw it up, for a new country to grow up with. We imported common law and democracy from our English and Continental European forebears, but left a lot of their history, think bureaucracy, and, shedding some belief systems, gained an edge. We see the effect of an overriding belief system that is so fundamentalists in the Middle East as to stop progress for a millennium and a half, and we are experiencing a right-wing evangelical Christian movement in this country that is determined to foist the same kind of history on us! So, like the current political administration with whom they are so closely allied (note–in history the great powers are always upheld by a political/religious mutual support pact), the religious right is swift-boating our founding fathers,

The founding fathers left a lot of belief systems behind and blind obedience to religious myth was one of them. They knew the destructive (of progress) nature of the political/religious cabal and severed the tie. Yes, they used “god” as did Einstein to explain the, to them, inexplicable aspects of the universe and the human mind–but they gave us a period of un-learning that allows our great inventiveness. So let’s get out there and pioneer a new cycle of human evolution beyond mythical intervention and see if we can survive despite the loser tactics of the right wing. Guess I’ve said it all.

If being unsure of whether a god exists or not is more noble than believing there is none, then, based on the same logic, being agnostic must also be more noble than believing in just one. Any member of Christianity, Judaism, or Islam denies the existence of every god but the one they worship. Granted, the three religions are historically rooted in each other, but the gods are different. Muslims and Jews deny that Christ was the son of God, Christians and Jews deny Islam’s prophet, etc. etc., and the differences are so great that the gods themselves are different. All Christians are atheists because they don’t believe in Allah. All Muslims are atheists because they don’t believe in Jesus Christ. All Jews are atheists because they don’t believe in either.

So, my counter to the original poster of this blurb sounds something like this: If a Christian believes, quite matter-of-factly, that Allah, the Hindu and Pagan gods, and all gods but the Trinity are not real, how is it wrong for an atheist to also believe that Allah, the Hindu and Pagan gods are not real? And if a Jew believes in no gods whatsoever, save the Old Testament god, surely an atheist who has no faith in those gods either is just as moral. To sum up the logic, an atheist is the sum of a Christian, a Jew, and a Muslim and shares many of the same stands on god and is therefore just as noble. If a Christian can automatically discount thousands upon thousands of gods on a personal assertion, so can an atheist. Don’t be hypocritical in your posts; to be a Christian, etc., you must first be an atheist in a thousand other places.

@ Dave Gredlein
I have my own ideas as to why there is this confusion, but it certainly doesn’t jive with your own. You used two words that make two interesting points. Firstly, while god often does things in the Bible that might reflect love, he also often does things that are characteristic of a maniac or a monster. You also mention faith. While you have faith in god that he will ease our troubles and end the confusion for the lost, it is indeed faith and not fact. By definition, religion depends entirely on faith, not fact, and faith simply cannot be proven, whether there is a reason to have faith or not.

If you disrespect the atheists for the above mentioned reasons, shouldn’t you also disrespect the believers for the same reason of being “certain and positive with” their “very short time here on the planet”. True believers are just as, if not, so much more egotistical and self-righteous in their judgments. Most of them pity the non-believers as if they know something the others do not know. Even though their personal experiences are no more valid than the personal experiences of the atheist.[/quote]

i must point out, this is exactly why you people are running in circles. you must let the conversation evolve. Pere, at the time, they were not discussing the religious, what you just said was already stated and agreed apon previously. do you not see how your statement is but a whirlpool into consistency in circles? what comes next his is defending himself of the slanders you just threw, then more into overly debated ideas and things that you both already know, confirming, and attacking each other in your own knowledge whilst you defend yourself and try to shoot the other person.

Jesus, it is sad that i am wasting my time on this shit when i got so much shit i need to do…

hah, i know this is all a matter of opinion, but what isn’t?;
those people who died, their death was on their own hands, no pity should be felt for them, if they wanted to they could have never went into the war. so fear may have been the reason most went ‘fear of the governments iron fist’, that though still is their problem, they had many choices, among them were;
a. leave the country.
In america we can acheive to whatever the hell we want. if you arn’t needed enough that you get
sent to war, you obviously don’t need this country much and can leave and excape the war.
b. a continuation of above but with one change, they could of been something.
there is always going to be a class system, no matter what you want to tell yourself, someone is
always better than someone else, but of course, we can move freely amongst this class system. if
those wretched fuckers who were in vietnam didn’t want that fate, they should have been something
better, they should have been the ones profiting. i mean, we profit off the death of animals
everyday and think nothing of it, human is just another animal, and just like all they other
animals, there are many that arn’t to bright. just because they are the same species means nothing.
now don’t get me wrong, i’m not saying all who are not smart enough too realize things should be
taken advantage of at all cost, of course they should be given all the chances they need to grow
and become something greater and lift up off their scabbed knees, it isn’t by force that they must
go die, the sorry saps choose themselves to go get killed!

I would much sooner feel sympathy for a non-human animal than a human. For unlike the ignorant humanoids [get it?], those animals DO NOT possess the copacity [please, mind my horrible spelling] to rise up and be something greater, they are always slaves to the call of instinct and burdened on the thumbless feet they stand. atleast in their ignorance, they are beautiful.