Do you think there is a Hell?
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Shaper
Member # 5437
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written Wednesday, April 6 2005 16:11
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Just to comment on a couple statements… “I don't believe in hell, therefore it does not exist and I will never go there” This is a very interesting concept. If you think it isn't real it must not be. Perhaps one doesn't believe in photosynthesis? Does that mean it does not occur? “God created all, and nothing created him because he has always been.” This is a way for religious groups try to avoid the explanation of true origin. Who, what, and where God came from, or even its existence for that matter is only opinion. There is no logical explanation for these things. quote:Human belief is not evidence of anything. People have believed whole-heartedly in things that were later scientifically proven to be inaccurate. Also many groups of humans fallow many different gods, but than again who says they don't all exist? [ Wednesday, April 06, 2005 16:14: Message edited by: Dolphin ] -------------------- Nena Posts: 2032 | Registered: Wednesday, January 26 2005 08:00 |
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Shaper
Member # 73
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written Wednesday, April 6 2005 16:38
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A few days ago, I finished the Everworld series by K. A. Applegate. In it, all the gods of the old religions nobody believes in anymore, such as the Greek, Roman, Celtic, Aztec, Egyptian, and Norse gods, got bored of our world (the Old World, as they call it) and decided to create their own universe (Everworld) and move in. Not that this really adds anything too relevant to the discussion, but I figured I'd say it anyway. As for punishment after death, I tend to think more about the reward and heaven aspect than punishment, partly because I like to think that if there is any punishment, it is not eternal, and that after the punishment is done, you go to heaven. It's all I can do to keep a grasp on my sanity. -------------------- The Lyceum - The Headquarters of the Blades designing community The Louvre - The Blades of Avernum graphics database Alexandria - The Blades of Exile Scenario database BoE Webring - Self explanatory Polaris - Free porn here Odd Todd - Fun for the unemployed (and everyone else too) Famous Last Words - A local pop-punk band They Might Be Giants - Four websites for one of the greatest bands in existance -------------------- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 Posts: 2957 | Registered: Thursday, October 4 2001 07:00 |
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BANNED
Member # 5219
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written Wednesday, April 6 2005 17:03
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quote:Yeah, that sounds better. And the truth is, a book. HAHAHA! -------------------- You can take my Windows XP when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 394 | Registered: Saturday, November 20 2004 08:00 |
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Infiltrator
Member # 4784
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written Wednesday, April 6 2005 17:32
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quote:Just a cute quote I like. Many who believe in God, believe that he always exsisted. I like to think of it this way: Before God, time did not exsist therefore there was nothing 'before' God. When God exsisted, God created time and therefore has exsisted since the beginning and will exsist forever. It is difficult to understand an exsistance without time not just being able to go back and forth in time but exsisting for all of time. He created time but does not neccessarily exsist in time, and exsisting outside of time he is aware of all events in all of time. It all sounds very si-fi movieish. God still does show his power and his exsistance. The miracles of the Bible are still happening today, they just don't get the publicity that the Bible does. Go ahead, do a google search on 'miracles today'. You'll find story after story of miracles witnessed by real people. Are some of these stories fake? Maybe. You'll probably believe them just as much as you believe the Bible whether they are actually true or not. Either we're all crazy or we've actually found something. Here's someplace to start looking. Miracles [ Wednesday, April 06, 2005 17:39: Message edited by: Gizmo ] -------------------- Forever Always on Past the End tracihedlund@charter.net[/url] TrueSite for Blades - Blades Walkthroughs Pixle Profusion - BoE Graphics Archive Posts: 563 | Registered: Tuesday, July 27 2004 07:00 |
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Bob's Big Date
Member # 3151
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written Wednesday, April 6 2005 18:32
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Mass Hysteria Sometimes, people just want to believe. Whether or not what they believe is right doesn't seem to matter; they just want to be convinced that it's true. -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
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Shock Trooper
Member # 4214
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written Wednesday, April 6 2005 22:48
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quote:Although I am, as I said, irreligious, I disagree that this is simplistic; Energy can't be created or annihilated, just as God, according to what religious people believe, can't be created or annihilated. quote:That is understandable; Religion is an important source of hope. [ Wednesday, April 06, 2005 22:51: Message edited by: Mind ] Posts: 356 | Registered: Tuesday, April 6 2004 07:00 |
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BoE Posse
Member # 112
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written Thursday, April 7 2005 01:58
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It cuts the other way as well. Some people want to belive there is no God. -------------------- Rate my scenarios! Areni Revenge To Live in Fear Deadly Goblins Ugantan Nightmare Isle of Boredom Posts: 1423 | Registered: Sunday, October 7 2001 07:00 |
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Master
Member # 1046
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written Thursday, April 7 2005 02:45
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So if God exists/ed, then he was the split second that is the Big Bang? -------------------- Polaris - Weather balloons, ninjas, and your big daddy Wise Man. What more could you want? Undead Theories - Don't Ask, Don't Tell Posts: 3323 | Registered: Thursday, April 25 2002 07:00 |
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Infiltrator
Member # 4784
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written Thursday, April 7 2005 05:30
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quote:See you'e thinking in terms of time. Split second, billion years, eternity, all are concepts of time. God exsists outside of time therefore has always exsisted and will always exsist. And if there was a big bang it happened somewhere on the timeline when God already exsisted. quote:While your statement is correct, your example of mass hysteria is flawed. Some miracles might fit the peramaters of mass hysteria but most are very specific, very personal answers to prayer. A large brain tumor exsists on a medical x-ray one day and completely vanishes the next while all the displaced brain tissue is comletely restored. That isn't hysteria in a crowd, it's between patient and doctor and the x-ray as proof. They didn't just 'believe' the tumor was gone. It really was gone. Modern science says it was impossible but it happened anyway. -------------------- Forever Always on Past the End tracihedlund@charter.net[/url] TrueSite for Blades - Blades Walkthroughs Pixle Profusion - BoE Graphics Archive Posts: 563 | Registered: Tuesday, July 27 2004 07:00 |
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Law Bringer
Member # 2984
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written Thursday, April 7 2005 08:39
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I still like the idea that (if there is a Creation involved), then the Creator was in turn Created by another Creator... and so on. I enjoy recursion. ;) Besides, it takes away from that 'unilateralism'. If who/whatever is 'God' in turn has another God to pray to... -------------------- The Encyclopaedia Ermariana <-- Now a Wiki! "Polaris leers down from the black vault, winking hideously like an insane watching eye which strives to convey some strange message, yet recalls nothing save that it once had a message to convey." --- HP Lovecraft. "I single Aran out due to his nasty temperament, and his superior intellect." --- SupaNik Posts: 8752 | Registered: Wednesday, May 14 2003 07:00 |
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
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written Thursday, April 7 2005 14:18
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Never attribute to God anything that can be attributed to human error. Not every scan will be clean of artifacts, and some artifacts may look like tumors. That doesn't mean there was a miracle. There really aren't any verifiable or reliably witnessed miracles that could be nothing but a miracle. —Alorael, who doesn't see the question of where God comes from as any more sticky than the question of where the universe comes from. Neither one has a good answer, except science can try to explain the latter (not yet!) and religion can explain the former (not coherently!). Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00 |
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...b10010b...
Member # 869
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written Thursday, April 7 2005 17:48
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I rather like Hume's argument against miracles. A miracle, by definition, is something that can't happen. Once something has happened it's no longer miraculous. The fact that we don't know how or why it happened is beside the point. (Yes, I'm aware Hume's argument is more elaborate than that, but that's the basic fallback part of it.) [ Thursday, April 07, 2005 17:48: Message edited by: Levitating Netherlander ] -------------------- My BoE Page Bandwagons are fun! Roots Hunted! Posts: 9973 | Registered: Saturday, March 30 2002 08:00 |
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Law Bringer
Member # 2984
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written Friday, April 8 2005 00:22
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quote:In fact, religion can explain the latter (the world was created by God), but not the former. Ask persons of any theist religion where God came from. Also, science can semi-adequately explain the former (God was invented by Man as a moral authority and an explanation for natural laws), but not yet the former. Ironic, eh? -------------------- The Encyclopaedia Ermariana <-- Now a Wiki! "Polaris leers down from the black vault, winking hideously like an insane watching eye which strives to convey some strange message, yet recalls nothing save that it once had a message to convey." --- HP Lovecraft. "I single Aran out due to his nasty temperament, and his superior intellect." --- SupaNik Posts: 8752 | Registered: Wednesday, May 14 2003 07:00 |
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Apprentice
Member # 5662
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written Friday, April 8 2005 09:30
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some people desagree that the only in God's existance favor is that there are many people who believe in Him, as well as the reverse. this kind of argument is actually called ontological. just try to prove that justice or fredoom are good, without using your ideas that say that they are good. in other words, if God's existance was totally impossible, why would people think so much about Him? why do people envy perfection so badly, if they know it is impossible? oh, btw, without time, existance is impossible. time is the very essence of everything that existes. for instance, if there is no time for God, when did he decided to create the universe? if not, then that means the universe has always existed, which contradicts our current information about the origin of everything. how could we even think of an origin if the universe has always existed? Posts: 38 | Registered: Sunday, April 3 2005 08:00 |
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Off With Their Heads
Member # 4045
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written Friday, April 8 2005 10:47
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quote:Oh, pshaw. Time is just another dimension, a direction of movement. There's nothing special about it, any more than there is something special about up or down, left or right. It's not totally impossible for something to exist outside of four-dimensional space (how would we be able to say that?), but it's pretty hard to conceptualize. -------------------- Arancaytar: Every time you ask people to compare TM and Kel, you endanger the poor, fluffy kittens. Kelandon's Pink and Pretty Page!!: the authorized location for all things by me The Archive of all released BoE scenarios ever Posts: 7968 | Registered: Saturday, February 28 2004 08:00 |
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Warrior
Member # 5550
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written Friday, April 8 2005 13:52
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What I've noticed is that in the bible, as time progresses and records go from nonexistent to reliable, he shows up less and less. He talked to Adam and Eve in person. He later showed his back to someone. Then he talked through a bush to Moses. Come to think of it, he's talking through another Bush. My point is that the later it gets and the more able we are to prove historical things, the less God sees someone phyisicaly -------------------- Most Important Questions: Why does one sock go missing? What is the purpose of meaning? What is the purpose of girls? What happened to the other one? Posts: 154 | Registered: Saturday, February 26 2005 08:00 |
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Warrior
Member # 4414
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written Friday, April 8 2005 13:59
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quote:Bah. Bush gives Christians a bad name. -------------------- AIM/Yahoo IM: Cavanoskus Scary artwork and Bad Poetry The Wildlife Research Team SnakeNetMetalRadio "We, who are about to die, salute you." Posts: 86 | Registered: Friday, May 21 2004 07:00 |
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...b10010b...
Member # 869
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written Friday, April 8 2005 15:04
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quote:It's easy enough as long as you're willing to add an additional timelike dimension; a kind of "meta-time" that takes priority over our time. By analogy, consider the process of writing a book. The book has a timeline in which events happen in a certain order, but by existing in "real" time outside the system we're able to alter things occuring at any point in book-time. -------------------- My BoE Page Bandwagons are fun! Roots Hunted! Posts: 9973 | Registered: Saturday, March 30 2002 08:00 |
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Infiltrator
Member # 4784
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written Friday, April 8 2005 17:14
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quote:Moses was also the one to see God's back when he was given the ten commandments. God also spoke to Noah, Abraham, and Jesus. I would argue again that God still talks to people but the occurances are less publicised then the Bible. Today he speaks mostly through the Holy Spirit in our thoughts instead of using an audible voice. Why? For one, the Spirit wasn't yet on the earth in the OT and not until Jesus' death. Maybe he prefers to talk in thoughts. It adds an effort of faith on the believers part to do something they are told to do when they didn't hear the actual words. I watch Joan of Arcadia from time to time and think to myself how easy it would be if that was really how God talked. All I'd have to do is wait for my next assignment. Instead I have to search him out and ask for an assignment. This way is better I think because I have to want to serve God and I have a happy heart to do so. -------------------- Forever Always on Past the End tracihedlund@charter.net[/url] TrueSite for Blades - Blades Walkthroughs Pixle Profusion - BoE Graphics Archive Posts: 563 | Registered: Tuesday, July 27 2004 07:00 |
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
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written Friday, April 8 2005 22:10
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Or perhaps the Old Testament represents God as a tantrum-prone tyke or even an angry teen. Probably the latter; the New Testament is when He has settled down and had a kid. —Alorael, who can handle the idea of time as a direction much better than meta-time as a dimension. Everything seems to move linearly through time, but that doesn't mean everything has to. (There was a theory a few years back on some subatomic particles moving backwards through time, but it may not have been at all valid. It was interesting, though.) Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00 |
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The Establishment
Member # 6
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written Saturday, April 9 2005 10:22
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quote:Perhaps, but the burden of proof is always on the affirmative. It is your responsibility to provide evidence for a certain phenomena. quote:FYI: This is what we call a false dichotemy. The first law of thermodynamics only necessarily applies to the natural universe i.e. observable phenomena. Anything that is not observable, such as those things outside the limits of the uncertainty principle, do not have to follow this. This would also apply to gods, goddesses, pink dragons, and anything else which nature has yet to observe. quote:I think we can say with almost certainty that some of these are fake because it depends on anectdotal evidence, which is quite weak. quote:This is, unfortunately, a testimonial. I have no way to base the credibility of the witness, or even if this is a real person. What makes me doubt this is that a simple x-ray test is one of the most innacurrate ways to diagnose a brain tumor. It can show evidence of one, but more advanced techniques such as CT scans or MRI is necessary to diagnose a brain tumor. Why should anyone believe this point in its current state of presentation other than a naive want to? quote:An x-ray is not the best way to do this, how can they know the tumor was there to begin with? Do you have a picture of the before and after x-ray photograph to substantiate this claim? If you did, it would go a lot farther even though it would be difficult to detect the tumor outright, some comparisons can be made. quote:As of yet, evidence for the existence of anything outside of 4-space has not been experimentally detected. This may change when CERN gets its upgrade. However, right now we have a lot of elegant mathematics in the physics community that a lot of equally intelligent people think are just plain wrong. We need to collect more data on this before I will buy your assertion. [quote]It's easy enough as long as you're willing to add an additional timelike dimension...[quote] Seems like an unnecessary complexity to me to justify the existence of a phenomena which there is no reproducible evidence for. quote:Evidence for these assertions please? quote:How dare you presume the will of God. Don't you think its rather arrogant to conjecture on the wants and desires of an almighty Creator that no one can truly understand? quote:We do have people that claim to hear God talking to them directly today. We call them skittzophrenic or dellusional and CT brain scans generally bare this out. -------------------- Your flower power is no match for my glower power!! Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00 |
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Bob's Big Date
Member # 3151
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written Saturday, April 9 2005 11:43
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Regarding the tumor thing: nothing is universally fatal. Saying medical science 'has no explanation for it' is fallacious, because medical science sees the occasional case in which something overwhelmingly improbable occurs and acknowledges it. Nothing occurs with 100% probability, because the body is not a precise instrument and it does all kinds of screwy things. Crediting odd occurrences to God leads down a slippery slope which ends at blaming plagues on moral turpitude. The big question to those who believe in an active God is this: why would the Almighty help you find your keys, recover from a flu, or enjoy a happy marriage when there are people in this world who are more or less innocent and are starving to death almost entirely because of the country into which they were born? There seems to be an obvious clash of priorities there. -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
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Infiltrator
Member # 4637
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written Saturday, April 9 2005 12:21
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quote:John 3:16, Ephesians 1:7, Rom 8, Acts 16:31: quote:In none of the verses you provided does it say that it is absolutely necessary to become baptized. Read them a few times to yourself, the only thing that some of the mention is that is is necessary to believe in Jesus to become saved. Though baptism is a good idea, it is optional and you don't need to do it to gain salvation. Baptism is just a sign in a way, a public testimony that you've changed your life and are willing to use it to serve God. Get baptized if you can, but generally, you don't have to. Conservative Russian Baptist, voted yes for hell. Edit: Voted yes for hell...now that I think about it, it sounds kind of awkward.[/b][/quote]As you can see in the references I gave you, you show you believe and have faith in Jesus through baptism. You have to born again. If it would be only about believeing, then Satan himself will be saved. He believes Jesus. Hey, he fought Jesus! Sure he believes Him! :P -------------------- Visit the Blades of Avernum Center and the Beta Testing Center -------------- "Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men, according to the basic principles of the world, and not according to Christ." Colossians 2:6-9 Posts: 483 | Registered: Tuesday, June 29 2004 07:00 |
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Master
Member # 4614
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written Saturday, April 9 2005 12:23
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Did you guys even read the testimonies on the site Gizmo gave? That brain tumor wasn't the only one. Try and tell me every single one of those can be attributed to scientific and/or human error. If they were, how could we ever trust a diagnosis from machines ever again? Oh, and Overwhelming, Satan believes in God, but he doesn't accept God as his Lord and Savior. He's like a person who hears about God, believes in God, and then ignores God. [ Saturday, April 09, 2005 12:26: Message edited by: 1001011001000 ] -------------------- -ben4808 For those who love to spam: CSM Forums RIFQ Posts: 3360 | Registered: Friday, June 25 2004 07:00 |
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The Establishment
Member # 6
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written Saturday, April 9 2005 15:01
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quote:The testimonies are irrelevant because they do not offer any evidence I can evaluate, also they are not even under a legal oath so they could lie/fabricate anyting they want. I do not even know who they are or even if they exist, in no way can I evaluate the person's credibilty. I merely have some stranger's (who may or may not exist even) word. If I say I say a purple dragon appeared before me the other day (a miracle if you ask me) but do not offer pictures, evidence of dragon footprints, etc. it is merely an unverifyable claim. I need a lot more information before I can evaluate this. As far as a human error/machine error argument, I bring up a very disturbing study which unfortunately I do not have reference to but could find out if I asked the correct people if you insist. It states that the benefit from hospitals is actually mitigated by the medical mistakes such that in the long view going to hospitals really does not increase your chance of survival. The medical error rate is alarmingly high. There are what, 19 testimonials on that site out of how many hospital visits overall? The chance of misdiagnosing a serious terminal illness is quite high due to messing up equipment, careless practices, etc. That and the machines and doctors do have some finite error rate. The sample size of these "miracles" are well within that rate, so arguments of "there is no way that medical malpractice could account for these" is a bit suspect. -------------------- Your flower power is no match for my glower power!! Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00 |
