God v Atheism

Many years ago when I told some people I didn't believe in an afterlife I was surprised to hear them say "I feel so sorry for you"
Someone else said if you believe in God and heaven, then die and find there isn't one well no harm, but if there is one you may have some difficulties getting in.

I think emusings is a very interesting site regardless of one's beliefs. A much smoother even tempered read than anything overdone Hitchens ever writes. A lot of effort has gone into it and even believers IMO can gain reading some of the essays, if only to see what the other side is thinking.
 
Just callin 'em like I see 'em. Can't do much more then that right now, as I am doped up on pain killers (insert Rush Limbaugh joke here). I had my tonsils and adnoids removed on Wensday.

One thing that did stand out in one of those articles is the ubsurd claim that that the bible doesn't understand human phsychology. Human phsychology, in the broad sense (defined as human nature) is best explained by the bible.; Human nature is inherently selfish. While many people, philosophers and ideologies have tried to say otherwise, all they are doin is simply substituting the definition they want in place of the truth. The biblical definition of human nature has been proven throughout history again and again. Every other definition (without exception) has been disproven.
 
hrmwrm said:
shag, the bible elevates man to special.

1:26 God said, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the sky, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth."

so man is made in gods image. none of the animals are. man. and he is given dominion over all. sounds a little special to me. as i said, without god, man is just another animal.

04's first article wasn't bashing. it was merely a statement from an atheist explaining his ideal and what he isn't by being athiest. and the second wasn't bashing either. it was what this person gets from reading the bible. it doesn't make sense in the authors eyes. (mine either) and one other thing. who is god talking to in the above quote. "let US make man in OUR image". so there is more than one god?
Click to expand...


Yes, according to scriture God made man in his own image. God also gave man dominion over the earth. Even without God, this is generally held true. Man is at the top of the food chain, ect...
We aren't "just another creature", we are the peak of creation (or evolution, whatever you believe); that is something that is accepted beyond the bible, and religion. You are trying to spin scritpture in a way that no one much more qualified than you (theologians, biblical scholoars, christians; basically people who actually study it, and don't try to distort it) does. I will differ to there wisdom and intellectual honesty over yours in this matter.:)
You are trying to spin that christianity is a means to elevate humans beyond their nature. That isn't the case. The scripture you are citing is giving a reason for humans being the dominant creatures on this planet.
For what you say to be true, belief in God would boost ones ego and make one arrogant. While many (I would say the majority) of pastors have an enflated ego and are rather arrogant, it isn't for the reasons you cite. christians generally arrogant but humble. Belief in God is a belief that humbles someone when he realizes there is someone (God) and something (God's plan) greater than him (which is against human nature;selfishness). That is ultimately the test between what you are asserting, and what I am. Are Christians mostly humble and generous, or are the self absorbed? If you find them mostly self absorbed, then you don't know many christian. History alone proves my interpretation here out. Look at all the charities that christians do.

You apply this same test to athiesm, and it stands as what as the opposite. It is inherently self serving (replace God with man, thus making man into his own god). This leads to a affirmation of human nature (instead of changing it, like Christianity strives to do); re-enforcing the selfishness of man. The whole idea of athiesm is to try and intellectually disprove God, an arrogant asumption. as has been shown in this discussion earlier, God cannot be proven or disproven, but athiests assume they are smart enough that to so, even without enough evidence either way. By extension, they insultingly view christians as people who are stupid to not see the world and God as they do.

This whole intellectual attack on christianity, ironically, misses the whole point of christianity entirely; faith. Name one Christian who came to his beliefs on an intellectual basis, you can't. But athiests view faith as an intellectual weakness, which is inherently offensive and arrogant.
 
Atheists put their faith in backlash of politics
By Julia Duin
December 24, 2007


Not since the April 8, 1966, famous "Is God dead?" cover of Time magazine has atheism been the topic du jour.

"Atheism has come into vogue in cycles pretty reliably for the past 300 years," said Nick Gillespie, editor of Reason, a libertarian magazine. "These days, at least you won't get burned at the stake, and you might get a New York Times' best-seller."

A flood of post-September 11 books on the topic have done quite well. Among them are "Breaking the Spell" by Daniel Dennett, Michael Shermer's "Why Darwin Matters," Michel Onfray's "Atheist Manifesto," Sam Harris' "The End of Faith," Ibn Warraq's "Leaving Islam," biologist Richard Dawkins' "The God Delusion," and journalist and critic Christopher Hitchens' "God is Not Great."



Reasons for the surge range from a backlash against radical Islam to a general unhappiness with the Bush administration.



"The rise of militant Islam revived questions as to where does faith lead people?" Mr. Gillespie said. "It all proceeds from September 11, which in many profound ways was a religious act."



Plus, he added, the current administration has given religion-friendly policies a bad name.



"To the extent that this administration has been seen as a complete failure," he said, "on the right, you'll see a reach for a new kind of conservatism. It will have more in common with atheism that says religion should not be part of politics."



According to the American Religious Identification Survey, conducted by the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, the share of American adults who do not subscribe to any religion increased from 8 percent in 1990 to more than 14 percent — about 30 million people — in 2001.


Forty-three percent of Americans don't attend church," said Paul Kurtz, founder and chairman of the Amherst, N.Y.-based Center for Inquiry. "A lot of people realize they don't believe in religion, and they don't want the state to meddle in private belief. They're looking to literature, ethics or philosophy to get guidance."



His group has established 11 "inquiry centers" — the skeptic's answer to a church building — including one on Pennsylvania Avenue. Nine more for what he called "the unchurched, the untempled, the unmosqued" are planned in the next two years. The circulation of "Free Inquiry," the group's magazine, has grown 30 percent in the past two years to reach 35,000.



"We're peeling back the burqa on unbelief," said Nathan Bupp, Inquiry spokesman.



Other cultural indicators include a March revelation by Rep. Pete Stark, an 18-term California Democrat, that he is an atheist. He is the first known congressman to do so.



Earlier this month, a movie for the unbelieving set premiered, albeit to mixed reviews. "The Golden Compass," a sanitized version of the book by Philip Pullman, glorifies the virtues of atheism and the evils of Christianity.



And the Altadena, Calif.-based Skeptics Society will observe tomorrow as Newtonmass, the 365th birthday of Isaac Newton.



Fred Edwords, a spokesman for the American Humanist Association, says nonbelievers are pouring out of the closet.



"Conferences and events put on by various humanist and free-thought organizations have been bursting at the seams with attendance," he said. "We had 1,000 people at a gathering put on earlier this year by our Harvard chapter. Usually we get a few hundred."



The Harvard gathering, which featured novelist Salman Rushdie, ironically ended up in the campus chapel.



"It was the biggest hall we could get," Mr. Edwords explained.



He cites the Bush administration for the atheist surge.



"You see their favoritism toward conservative religion," he said, "and the influence religion has had on foreign policy, and I think a lot of atheists said, 'We're fed up.' "
 
Here's what I got:
Libertarians believe that athiesm is on the rise, and want to say it's because of Bush, in a smear attempt to prove him a failure.
His, failure is purely a matter of perception, as no proof is given in the article, as is no proof that athiesm is on the rise.

Something to note; Libertarianism (at it's worst) is to politics what athiesm is to religion. Both are purely self serving; whatever makes me happy is right.

"free-thought organizations"?! That is a joke. Free thought, except what we don't want you to think.
 
Perception is reality. We welcome that we agree with and dismiss that we do not.

You say there's no proof atheism is on the rise and will undoubtedly dismiss this 2001 survey out of hand for some reason or another.

Many people are fed up with the Bush administration and some are even embarassed and ashamed that such a man is president.

Are there enough of these people to vote the Republicans out of office?

I hope so but that remains to be seen and we're likely to see the dirtiest, nastiest most underhanded election yet.

Let the games begin.


http://www.gc.cuny.edu/faculty/research_briefs/aris.pdf

KEY FINDINGS
1. Religious Identification Among American Adults
The first area of inquiry in ARIS 2001 concerns the response of American adults to the
question: “What is your religion, if any?” This question generated more than a hundred
different categories of response, which we classified into the sixty-five categories shown
in Exhibit 1 below.
In 1990, ninety percent of the adult population identified with one or another religion
group. In 2001, such identification has dropped to eighty-one percent.
Where possible, every effort was made to re-create the categories respondents offered to
the nearly identical question as in the NSRI 1990 survey.5
As is readily apparent from the first Exhibit below, the major changes between the results
of the 1990 survey and the current survey are:
a. the proportion of the population that can be classified as Christian has
declined from eighty-six in 1990 to seventy-seven percent in 2001;
b. although the number of adults who classify themselves in non-
Christian religious groups has increased from about 5.8 million to
about 7.7 million, the proportion of non-Christians has increased only
by a very small amount – from 3.3 % to about 3.7 %;
c. the GREATEST increase in absolute as well as in percentage terms has
been among those ADULTS WHO DO NOT SUBSCRIBE TO ANY RELIGIOUS
IDENTIFICATION; their number has more than doubled from 14.3 million
 
http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_prac2.htm

Polling data from the 2001 ARIS study, described below, indicate that:

81% of American adults identify themselves with a specific religion: 76.5% (159 million) of Americans identify themselves as Christian. This is a major slide from 86.2% in 1990. Identification with Christianity has suffered a loss of 9.7 percentage points in 11 years -- about 0.9 percentage points per year. This decline is identical to that observed in Canada between 1981 and 2001. If this trend has continued, then: at the present time (2007-MAY), only 71% of American adults consider themselves Christians
The percentage will dip below 70% in 2008
By about the year 2042, non-Christians will outnumber the Christians in the U.S
 
04SCTLS said:
Perception is reality.
Click to expand...
In politics and the uninformed


We welcome that we agree with and dismiss that we do not
Click to expand...
Not all of us, and no all the time


You say there's no proof atheism is on the rise
Click to expand...
...in the article you sumitted in your last response.
Context.

... [you] will undoubtedly dismiss this 2001 survey out of hand for some reason or another.
Click to expand...
Not out of hand. If I don't agree with it, I will be very critical and look to see if it is accruate or not in it's methodology and conclusions. But I wouldn't neccessarily dismiss it out of hand, unless it is conducted by someone, or some organization that has the credibility of Michael Moore, Moveon.org, Media Matters, or some other.

Many people are fed up with the Bush administration and some are even embarassed and ashamed that such a man is president.
Click to expand...
Yes, but I have yet to hear a legitimate, well informed reason for such a harsh few.

Are there enough of these people to vote the Republicans out of office?
Click to expand...
The question is, "are there enough 'likely voters' that are willing to do so. Likely votes are usually better informed then unlikely voters, and given the only possiblity being Democrats, there are probably not enough likely voters foolish enough to vote the republicans out, this time around. No way to know until the election
 
04SCTLS said:
KEY FINDINGS
1. Religious Identification Among American Adults
The first area of inquiry in ARIS 2001 concerns the response of American adults to the
question: “What is your religion, if any?” This question generated more than a hundred
different categories of response, which we classified into the sixty-five categories shown
in Exhibit 1 below.
In 1990, ninety percent of the adult population identified with one or another religion
group. In 2001, such identification has dropped to eighty-one percent.
Where possible, every effort was made to re-create the categories respondents offered to
the nearly identical question as in the NSRI 1990 survey.5
As is readily apparent from the first Exhibit below, the major changes between the results
of the 1990 survey and the current survey are:
a. the proportion of the population that can be classified as Christian has
declined from eighty-six in 1990 to seventy-seven percent in 2001;
b. although the number of adults who classify themselves in non-
Christian religious groups has increased from about 5.8 million to
about 7.7 million, the proportion of non-Christians has increased only
by a very small amount – from 3.3 % to about 3.7 %;
c. the GREATEST increase in absolute as well as in percentage terms has
been among those ADULTS WHO DO NOT SUBSCRIBE TO ANY RELIGIOUS
IDENTIFICATION; their number has more than doubled from 14.3 million
Click to expand...


Finally, some proof has been provided.

Here are my questions:

Are apples to apples bein compared here?
Are consistent methods used for obtaining the data, and interpreting that data?​

What is the bigger picture of data, and what does it suggest?
I could very easily pull out numbers from the great depression and the depression in the early ninties and claim that we have been in a depression most of this century. Two points in the data, don't show a trend, or a reaction, or anything. The whole picture is needed.​
 
04SCTLS said:
81% of American adults identify themselves with a specific religion: 76.5% (159 million) of Americans identify themselves as Christian. This is a major slide from 86.2% in 1990. Identification with Christianity has suffered a loss of 9.7 percentage points in 11 years -- about 0.9 percentage points per year. This decline is identical to that observed in Canada between 1981 and 2001. If this trend has continued, then: at the present time (2007-MAY), only 71% of American adults consider themselves Christians
The percentage will dip below 70% in 2008
By about the year 2042, non-Christians will outnumber the Christians in the U.S
Click to expand...

Same questions as above, but one added point about That last line:

"By 242 non-Christians will outnumber Christians in the U.S."

There is no way to know that except through mathematical models; computer projections. Those have proven to be highly innaccurate. Malthus is probably the best example, but all the claims of doom and in the environmental debate whos time has come and passed without said disaster, further prove it. The flaw is spelled out in the phrase "if this trend has continued" (interesting wording too, has continued?). They are making these predicitons on a very large assumption, which we have no indication is going to remain constant.


Neither of these reports have tied the findings back to Bush, as far as I can tell. Which means that claim is purely projection, and wishful thinking on the sources part.
 
Yes it says "If this trend is continued"

Also Posen Foundation which funded a good part of this study is a secular Jewish organisation however that alone should not be enough cause to discredit it's findings.

Jews due to their history know religious and ethnic persecution and demagogery better than most.

Please feel free to tear the findings apart and/or find other comprehensive surveys that refute the findings.



METHODOLOGY4
The American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) 2001 was based on a random
digit-dialed telephone survey of 50,281 American residential households in the
continental U.S.A (48 states). The methodology largely replicates the widely reported and
pioneering 1990 National Survey of Religious Identification (NSRI) carried out at the
Graduate Center of the City University of New York. ARIS 2001 thus provides a unique
time series of information concerning the religious identification choices of American
adults.
The data were collected over a 17-week period, from February to June 2001 at the rate of
about 3,000 completed interviews a week by ICR/CENTRIS Survey Research Group of
Media, PA as part of their national telephone omnibus market research
(EXCEL/ACCESS) surveys. The primary question of the interview was: What is your
religion, if any? The religion of the spouse/partner was also asked. If the initial answer
was ‘Protestant’ or ‘Christian’ further questions were asked to probe which particular
denomination.


6
the election in 1976 of President Jimmy Carter, a self-avowed Born Again Christian,
America has been through a period of great religious re-awakening. In sharp contrast to
that widely held perception, the present survey has detected a wide and possibly growing
swath of secularism among Americans. The magnitude and role of this large secular
segment of the American population is frequently ignored by scholars and politicians
alike.
However, the pattern emerging from the present study is completely consistent with
similar secularizing trends in other Western, democratic societies.3 For example, Andrew
Greeley has found that England is considerably less religious than the USA. He also
notes similarly high levels of secularism in “most countries of the European continent
west of Poland.”
METHODOLOGY4
The American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) 2001 was based on a random
digit-dialed telephone survey of 50,281 American residential households in the
continental U.S.A (48 states). The methodology largely replicates the widely reported and
pioneering 1990 National Survey of Religious Identification (NSRI) carried out at the
Graduate Center of the City University of New York. ARIS 2001 thus provides a unique
time series of information concerning the religious identification choices of American
adults.
The data were collected over a 17-week period, from February to June 2001 at the rate of
about 3,000 completed interviews a week by ICR/CENTRIS Survey Research Group of
Media, PA as part of their national telephone omnibus market research
(EXCEL/ACCESS) surveys. The primary question of the interview was: What is your
religion, if any? The religion of the spouse/partner was also asked. If the initial answer
was ‘Protestant’ or ‘Christian’ further questions were asked to probe which particular
denomination.
3 For an interesting comparison, see Andrew Greeley, “Religion in Britain, Ireland and the USA,” in Roger
Jowell et al, ed., British Social Attitudes: The 9th Report (Dartmouth Publishing Co., Aldershot, England,
1992).
4 For a more detailed discussion of the survey methodology, please see Appendix 1.
AMERICAN RELIGIOUS IDENTIFICATION SURVEY, 2001
THE GRADUATE CENTER OF THE CITY UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK
7
INNOVATIONS
BETWEEN NSRI 1990 AND ARIS 2001
The NSRI 1990 study was a very large survey in which 113,723 persons were questioned
about their religious preferences. However, it provided for no further detailed questioning
of respondents regarding their religious beliefs or involvement or the religious
composition of their household.
In the light of those lacunae in the 1990 survey, ARIS 2001 took steps to enhance both
the range and the depth of the topics covered. For example, new questions were
introduced concerning the religious identification of spouses. To be sure, budget
limitations, have necessitated a reduction in the number of respondents. The current
survey still covers a very large national sample (over 50,000 respondents) that provides a
high level of confidence for the results and adequate coverage of most religious groups
and key geographical units such as states and major metropolitan areas.
For the sake of analytic depth, additional questions about religious beliefs and affiliation
as well as religious change were introduced for a smaller representative sub-sample of
(17,000) households. Even this sample is about ten times greater than most typical
opinion surveys of the US population. This sub-sample as well as the larger sample were
weighted to reflect the total U.S. adult population
These innovations have provided a much richer data set that goes far beyond the mere
question of religious preference. The new data allow for a much more sophisticated
analysis than NSRI 1990. They offer a more nuanced understanding of the complex
dynamics of religion in contemporary American society and especially how religious
adherence relates to countervailing secularizing trends. The information collected is also
potentially much more useful for the various national religious bodies.
 
Sorry for the double posting above.

All this data is essentially pre Bush as he was only in office 4 months by the time the survey was completed and totally pre 9/11 which essentially was made possible by belief in (Islamic) religion and rewards in the afterlife.
 
You realize, there is no such thing as evolution, just creatures that Chuck Norris allows to live. :)
 
Chuck Norris wasn't born. God created him out of rolled tungsten and breathed life into him.
 
fossten said:
Chuck Norris wasn't born. God created him out of rolled tungsten and breathed life into him.
Click to expand...


That's pretty good.

"Chuck Norris lost his virginity before his father did."
 
hrmwrm said:
blah blah blah...
Click to expand...
Just because you can necro a thread and copy/paste doesn't make you a scholar. And your source is suspect because it was written by men, who are fallible. Therefore, it is untrustworthy. Furthermore, none of the men who wrote that encyclopedia witnessed the events which they describe. Therefore, they could very well be describing fairy tales for all the believability said tales convey. For them to try and prove events to be true which they did not witness is to use circular reasoning, and is not credible. Note that this is the same logic you use to try and deny the truth of the Bible.
 
You really have a problem with Christianity, don't you.

hrmwrm said:
there's a lot of effort put in to making facts as correct as knowledge allows from documentated proof. much more reliable than a 2000 year old source that has no living authors.
Click to expand...


That is an absurd statement. By that logic, all first-hand accounts of the Revolution or the Civil War, or Lincoln's assasination are not as credible as something someone wrote today about it because the authors aren't living?! That is a JOKE! Direct sources are always, repeat ALWAYS, considered more reliable then someone writing after the fact. Your whole justification behind claiming your source is more credible then the Bible is based on a huge flaw in reasoning.

I also highly doubt your source doesn't share your bias against Christianity.

and i wouldn't deny the TRUTH of the bible, if it could be proven as true.
Click to expand...

Again, denying the whole point of Christianity; faith. You keep trying to make Christianity an intellectual debate, which only further demonstrates your own bias against it.
 
You are enmeshed in denial and self deception. I have no desire to drag you unwillingly from such a state, especially in a necroed thread.
 
hrmwrm said:
The effort to place the patriarchs in the second millennium
BCE has been unsuccessful, however, because all of the features
in the stories can be attested to in sources of the first
millennium BCE, and some of the items in the stories, such
as the domestication of the camel or reference to Philistines,
Arameans, and Arabs, belong to a much later time. The special
effort to fit the war between Abraham and the kings of
the east (Gn. 14) into the history of the second millennium
by trying to identify the various kings and nations involved
has failed to yield plausible proposals. The four eastern kingdoms,
Elam, Babylonia, Assyria, and that of the Hittites, referred
to cryptically in this text, never formed an alliance, nor
did they ever control Palestine either collectively or individually
during the second millennium BCE. The whole account
is historically impossible, and the story is very likely a late
addition to Genesis."
Click to expand...
This is the only part I've attempted to research cause the camel thing sounded like some email someone would forward that you'd immediately look up and find out it's a hoax. So I checked it out. But don't take my word for it. Do a simple search on when camels were domesticated and you'll see that they've been domesticated for about 4000 years or so. Some sources will say more than 5000, some state 3500, most are in between. So that encyclopedia is wrong on that account.

The information in that encyclopedia seems to be dated because the cities mentioned in Genesis 14 have been historically proven with the archeological site of Ebla in Syria:

http://www.xenos.org/teachings/ot/genesis/gary/gen14-1.htm

From the article:

"Critics viewed cities like Sodom and Gomorrah as mythical (like Babel) because they had no extra-biblical attestation of their existence. All that has changed since 1975, when archeologists excavated the city of Ebla at Tel Mardikh in what is today north-west Syria. They almost 20,000 of clay tablets (SLIDE) which were the royal archives of the city. These tablets date back to the middle of the third century BC, even earlier than Abraham's time. Tablet 1860 names the five cities of Gen. 14:2--in the exact same order--as trade partners of Ebla!"

Note that the quote states "third century BC", but this is a typo in the article. It should have said "third millenia BC". Do a search on the site of Ebla, too, for further verification.
 
The problem here is a lack of knowledge and lots of arrogance.

For one to say that there isn't a God based on their ability to reason is just as ignorant as saying that the earth is flat.

Science supports theories & "facts" that are changed & discredited all the time.

Science is currently looking @ space for answers to the the unaswered, when there are things on earth yet to be "discovered"(check out the oceans and rainforests)

If you have to have evidence of anything before you believe in its existence, or if you won't believe in something b/c you don't like the way it operates is at best just dumb.

To dispute a faith based claim is simply pointless. You can't reason the existence of God. Debating the fact will not bring "conversion". I think some people here thinks that the answers of others are an effort to convert or make "the way" plain.

Simply put, if you are looking for evidence to disprove or contradict the Bible you will find what you are looking for, simply b/c you are already looking from a biased pov.
 
Camels were indeed domesticated in Abrahams time. And here's a link to a very informative site linking Abraham with camels:

http://www.christian-thinktank.com/qnocamel.html

I'll rephrase my statement about that encyclopedia: instead of being dated, it is simply wrong.

Regarding Philistines in the time of Abraham:

http://www.apologeticspress.org/articles/583

The last paragraph of that article: "Although critics accuse biblical writers of revealing erroneous information, their claims continue to evaporate with the passing of time and the compilation of evidence."
 
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