God is faith

I really hate this term, and has likely been the biggest turn off to organized religion that has ever crossed my path for consideration. Here is just another example of such errancy .

Hetman writes:

No one ever said [evolution and creationism] could not coexist. They just cannot coexist in science class. Just like alchemy and chemistry cannot coexist in science class. God is faith based. Evolution is based fact.

I respond:

I think it is a little more like comic books are not legitimate reading material for an English class.

Science takes faith too, the faith that we are seeing and understanding things in the same way. It is a philosophy, a method for all of us to look at the world in the same way. By your definition, science is just easier. Where the hell did you get that impression?

Religious faith is based on an exploitation of the human necessity for truth, and tries to give people an easy way out to look at the world. They give you little books with simple stories to memorize, and you are done! True philosophy is a commitment to constantly working towards better understanding.

In theory, organized religion could be a pathway towards understanding, but instead it the infomercial diet pill of the mind.

If you could understand this, you would get why evolution is not a FACT, it is a THEORY.

I think some people are just looking for different thins in the world. Some people see it as something small that if they could just understand it, then they can control it and live out the perfect life. I think some of these people also see things as "if it works, it must be right". The problem with this is is the limitations of our own self observation. So many questions have been asked for centuries about 'what is truth?' and 'how do we measure it?'. There have been models for truth through out history. We still look to classical Greek texts to see how in many ways we have not changed. Our children are not born knowing or understanding more about our universe than civilizations of long ago.

But as new theories, models of understanding, have been tested and evolved over this time, we have perfected to the best of our ability, a path to true understanding and communicating about our world.

Wikipedia, on the Scientific Method, opens with:

[This theory] refers to bodies of techniques for investigating phenomena, acquiring new knowledge, or correcting and integrating previous knowledge. To be termed scientific, a method of inquiry must be based on gathering observable, empirical and measurable evidence subject to specific principles of reasoning.

I would argue that this has been the goal of philosophy throughout history. "Bodies of techniques" is what is specific about the scientific method, while the rest is philosophy. Religion falls into the realm of philosophy, and by this definition, I am sure any theist could argue that by this definition, religion plays this role for people's lives, while science only refers to "stuff" and "things" that their god put here. This keeps science outside the scope of being able to say anything new, different, or conflicting with reality, well, their reality.

What this quote plainly takes out of context is what those bodies of techniques that are integral to understanding the difference between "science" and just "any other philosophy". This is the foundation where we decide what we are going to accept as truth, and what we regard as ideas and speculation. This model illustrates it well, from the sciencebuddies.org web site:

The last step that is not included (because this is a guide for students doing science fair projects) is that the results must be independently verified. Further, and this is the real kicker, the independent results must match as exactly as possible. In general, any hole in a theory breaks it, when such conflict can be verified through an independent study, particularly when such studies come up with better models that more accurately relate a phenomenon. Then further there is the whole difference between causation and correlation. It takes more than seeing two things together to say that one thing causes another, but that is a bit more complicated.

So what does this mean really? I think it means that we either have to accept or reject it as a foundation for absolute truths. It doesn't mean that things that aren't proven by science are false, it just means that they aren't proven as true... by the same token, science can prove that things are NOT true, but it does not mean that things that can not be proven to be false are true.

So in every way I have ever been able to look at things, the bible is just a book. It Is like any other book, there are good books, and there are bad books. Good ones not worth reading, and bad ones worth reading too. Personally, I think there are a lot of other better books worth reading. Unless you just want to know what all the hype is about, go ahead, but i'll just say it is a pretty bad book not worth reading. I am far from saying this simply because it is old it is somehow out dated, it is out dated for many other reasons that would require a close analysis of the text, which is not what I am going to go into at this moment.

Well, to be honest, the old testement is entertaining as insight to what primitive humans undertsoof about the world. It is worth reading from that perspective. The sequel on the other hand has the taste of Uwe Bolle and Michael Moore.

Now I can reconize that I am not taking into account all the impact that "the new testement" has had on history, as many kids today can't appreciate the impact of Birth of a Nation or Citizen Kane had on film, I have lost interest as many kids today will have difficulty appreciating Star Wars in the face of so many fanatics getting in their face telling them how it is the greatest movie ever, and making it out to be so much more than it really is, the latter being more relevant in this case for me, but knowing that the former is a big issue for many people I know that have ever had to endure going to an orthodox church.

More I just don't get...

hufflepuff17 writes:

God and Evolution cannot "Co-exist" because saying God used evolution to create everything is belittling his sovereign power and it being a miracle. We will never be able to wrap our minds around God or how he does things because we cannot conceive perfection or infinite power. So don't try and put God into a box so we can think we understand how he does things because we never will. Evolution is just our way of trying to put the creation story into a box and not letting it be what it really is, which is a miracle.

My reply:

"Evolution is just our way of trying to put the creation story into a box and not letting it be what it really is, which is a miracle."

It is really interesting you would say that because I would not hesitate to say exactly the opposite, that the wonderful place that is our world with all of its things to study and observe, the bible tries to take all that greatness and put into a small box by taking out of context some ancient story of privative human understanding of the universe and trying to say that is exactly the way things must be because it has been accepted for thousands of years.

I WILL agree I put the bible into a box (more like a can to be exact) by limiting my perspective to seeing it as just another book. Why not actually look at the history of the text you revere so greatly. No Star Wars fan boy calls another any less of a "believer" just because they acknowledge that George Lucas's wife may have had a really big role in the original trilogy. The Bible is a collection of stories kept by ancient people and their understanding of the world. Good stuff, very interesting, but why are you taking it apart to be something it is not? What an insult to the PEOPLE that took the time to put and keep it together.

I just know there is something here with these people that I am NEVER going to understand. My only comfort is that this belief does something for them that makes their lives either happier, or more stable. But it still makes me sad.

How to convert an Atheist into believing there MIGHT be a god.

I never believed in God. And I really tried, but it never took While from a young age, I searched many historical / religious text, I never found anything I could really believe in, other than science textbooks. It just made the most sense. If you can call 'Spinoza's God' (Pantheism) a God, then all science text books to me are the manifestations of the glory of God as He inspires us to study His Universe. The one thing I did get from Church ever as a kid was that God was Truth. It really made sense to me, and I ended up believing that with all my heart. So science is the study of truth, and truth is God, then I must conclude that if that is true, then the Bible is pure evil.

But what about the possibility that this is not mutually exclusive with the possibility that The bible is true, different from being truth? The principles of the Bible are true, with regard to the things that we can confirm are true, and despite that some parts are absolutely false, it statistically possible that some of the parts we can't necessarily prove not true, are.

For example, how about if the bible was written by God, and that part of the stories were true. Lucifer was cast from heaven, and became the Bible. He represents all of the lies, super concentrated, and people not only read them, they believe in order to spread evil about the Earth. Let's say Jesus was Satan's fictional character that he played, but the event didn't actually happen. Satan made it all up, but of course it would have to sound all nice, like there was a God or Heaven or such lies, while we see such things as patently not true. You see, there are all these twists and confusions to trick you into believing that truth is just too hard to look for, when it isn't, and that then it presents you with an easy all-in-one convenient story that just gives you all the answers. The Devil teases you like this, trying to keep you from seeing God's glory while you got your nose stuck in a book. The book even warns you about it. Worshiping false idols. Again, this relationship between what is false and what is true.

And again I conclude that the Bible must be false when the truth is all around us, cause remember that God is with us. He can hear our prayers, and grant them. The freedom and power to discover truth, and "the truth will set you free", removing the binds that allowed what was concerning us in our prayers to become resolved.

So, God it real, and He put the Bible on this planet in his way that if understood, such as we could understand the falsehoods in his own story, then you were truly a master, and you will get into heaven when you die, otherwise you just become dirt, and die like you THINK Atheists die. But as the miracle of science shows, matter makes up everything, and your matter will become part of another lifeform, and get yet another chance to get into heaven.

All you have to do is read, and the understand that the Bible is a divine story in which it predicts its own falsehood.

So Atheists are right, and there is a God, and if you understood him, he would never want to believing in such silly non-sense.

To Jonanda42:

Jonanda42, thanks for the request for comment, but reading your page got me into a rant. my comment ended up being way too long to post, so here is what I wrote in full. A reply comment would be appreciated. My other rant on California prop. 8 is included in the article as well.

Take care
---

Thanks for the request for comment. I'll share what I think the most important point is:
I wrote a full opinion on one aspect of the issue (not my usual satire) on my blog. The short of it, many states had constitutional bans on interracial marriage as recently as 2000. Not enforceable since 1963 with Loving v. Virginia, the year before the civil rights at of 1964 that gave extended equal protect of the law regardless of race, GENDER, religion, and national origin. So, are people really arguing that equal protection regardless or gender was a mistake, or needs to be dissected more carefully? With our grossly incompetent congress at this point in time, the reference you want to give them is the bible?!? The bible is a cute piece of fiction with some interesting stories that reveal a lot about life 1600 years ago, and further back for the old testament. People are actually arguing the relevance of the bible to guide our politics, but disregard the constitution as dated because the founders could not have known what todays world would be like? BULLSHIT! I think our founders understood a hell of a lot more about tyranny than the vast majority of the country. Back to prop 8 for a sec, this is the PERFECT example of how democracy is a doomed failure. You want to read an ancient text that was actually based on fact? Read The Histories, a fantastic piece about what the Ancient Greeks learned about why democracy sucks; key point: despite whatever works, it eventually comes down to the majority being able to do whatever they want to the minority. 51% of people can vote to change the constitution while 49% oppose? That is FUCKED UP, and the fact that this is even on the ballot pisses me off. Blacks only make up 15% of the American population... so what? that means the other 85% can RAPE them for anything their hearts desire? Sadly, equality didn't come through change in the hearts of Americans. It took some rouge supreme court justices that looked at the heart of the constitution to understand the great theory of America and FORCED it upon an unwilling majority declaring "WAKE THE FUCK UP, THIS IS AMERICA!!!". So go on and impose your little democratic gestapo because some law might make you come out of the fucking closet, or tell your children they have the right to make informed decisions about love. The one great thing about even the remote chance this might pass is that it will justify an appeal to the United States Supreme Court where it will be found unconstitutional, and it will force EVERY STATE to recognize gay marriage. And not only will your your precious little children be taught about love between two people, but right next to Loving v. Virginia their history books will cits that nasty time in history before fags v. California.

All you can hope for is deadly cancer that will turn you into dirt (sorry, heaven is a lie) so you won't have to see a place where fags can marry. Sorry suckers, it is going to happen, and your gay son is going to help.