attack religion without fear

[seneca_roman]

Quote from Option Trader:

Some of the stuff I have seen is good, other stuff was pitiful. This is my one contribution to this thread, some food for thought. I am not favoring one religion over another, just bringing a proof (NOT scientific) of God's existence, and of the roots used in three major religions in the world, as follows:

There is one claim in religion that is IMPOSSIBLE to refute. The claim is that God appeared to the Jewish people at Mount Sinai and gave the Jews the Torah/ "Old Testament". The Muslims and Christians also agree this is true--only they have their own branch outs.

I will explain why it is IMPOSSIBLE to refute by posing the following question:
If a person wanted to make up a religion, would it not be far more convincing to say God appeared to "ALL of us" as opposed to just ME or just a handful of people? Since the majority of religions were made-up, would it not be a more believable fiction for thousands of people to come together and to ALL claim they were had the SAME simultaneous Divine revelation to them, instead of just a single individual or group of individuals claiming the revelation? Answer: it is clear a made-up religion could NEVER do that.

The Torah, however, says 600k men between the ages of 20-50 received the Torah from God at Mount Sinai, which totalled about 3 MILLION people. There is NO way this could be made-up, NOBODY could ever get away with that! If I can add, a father always is looking for the "easy way out" for his children, but the Torah is filled of laws and restricitions, totalling 613 of them. There is NO way a father would ever trick his son into accepting hundreds of restrictions, and if he dare tried the children would ON THE SPOT have refuted it and the Torah could not have been transmitted through them.

Again, I am not favoring any religion, just supporting the roots.

The part about 600000 is problematic historically. Since the tribe was in Sinai about a year, they would have left behind an immense amount of evidence, trash, pottery, campsites, etc. Yet none have been found despite immense efforts by archaeologists.

Also, Sinai was under Pharoh rule at the time and his army and minions kept very detailed records. There is no Egyptian record of this many people in the Sinai at the various dates usually ascribed to the Exodus.

Seneca
today's inspiration from Exodus:

Exodus 3:16 (King James Version)


"Go, and gather the elders of Israel together, and say unto them, The LORD God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, appeared unto me, saying, I have surely visited you, and seen that which is done to you in Egypt"


Exodus 33:20 (King James Version)

"And he said, Thou canst not see my face: for there shall no man see me, and live."

Which is it: can we see God or is he invisible. Seems the Bible wants it both ways. Sounds like a politician was somehow involved.

 

[john dough]

Quote from Option Trader:

Some of the stuff I have seen is good, other stuff was pitiful. This is my one contribution to this thread, some food for thought. I am not favoring one religion over another, just bringing a proof (NOT scientific) of God's existence, and of the roots used in three major religions in the world, as follows:

There is one claim in religion that is IMPOSSIBLE to refute. The claim is that God appeared to the Jewish people at Mount Sinai and gave the Jews the Torah/ "Old Testament". The Muslims and Christians also agree this is true--only they have their own branch outs.

I will explain why it is IMPOSSIBLE to refute by posing the following question:
If a person wanted to make up a religion, would it not be far more convincing to say God appeared to "ALL of us" as opposed to just ME or just a handful of people? Since the majority of religions were made-up, would it not be a more believable fiction for thousands of people to come together and to ALL claim they were had the SAME simultaneous Divine revelation to them, instead of just a single individual or group of individuals claiming the revelation? Answer: it is clear a made-up religion could NEVER do that.

The Torah, however, says 600k men between the ages of 20-50 received the Torah from God at Mount Sinai, which totalled about 3 MILLION people. There is NO way this could be made-up, NOBODY could ever get away with that! If I can add, a father always is looking for the "easy way out" for his children, but the Torah is filled of laws and restricitions, totalling 613 of them. There is NO way a father would ever trick his son into accepting hundreds of restrictions, and if he dare tried the children would ON THE SPOT have refuted it and the Torah could not have been transmitted through them.

Again, I am not favoring any religion, just supporting the roots.

Your evidence is very easily refuted, by purely logical means, and without resort to any scientific methodology.

Even if everything that you say is accurate about the event which occurred, there is no way to determine from the testimony of the observers, if the entity delivering the Torah to the Hebrews was a supernatural and all powerful god, or merely a superintelligent but entirely natural being, equally subject to the physical laws of the universe as any human.

From the perspective of the witnesses, there would have been no means of distinguishing between the true God of creation and Fred, on his spring break from Planet Ten University.

 

[Option Trader]

Quote from seneca_roman:

The part about 600000 is problematic historically. Since the tribe was in Sinai about a year, they would have left behind an immense amount of evidence, trash, pottery, campsites, etc. Yet none have been found despite immense efforts by archaeologists.

Also, Sinai was under Pharoh rule at the time and his army and minions kept very detailed records. There is no Egyptian record of this many people in the Sinai at the various dates usually ascribed to the Exodus.

Seneca
today's inspiration from Exodus:

Exodus 3:16 (King James Version)


"Go, and gather the elders of Israel together, and say unto them, The LORD God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, appeared unto me, saying, I have surely visited you, and seen that which is done to you in Egypt"


Exodus 33:20 (King James Version)

"And he said, Thou canst not see my face: for there shall no man see me, and live."

Which is it: can we see God or is he invisible. Seems the Bible wants it both ways. Sounds like a politician was somehow involved.

1. Your point about Egyptian control is inaccurate. The Egyptians as a power were greatly diminished after the 10 plagues (accounted for in the Egyptian hieroglyphics), and further reduced at the splitting of the Red Sea (evidenced by the ancient Chinese, as ALL the water in the world split) when the Egyptians were drowned.

2. The Jewish people's needs in the desert were taken care of by supernatural needs, so of course any pursuit to find rubbish is a waste of time and money.

3. There is a difference between "seeing God" which is NOT possible because God is invisible, versus seeing the glory of God.

 

[Option Trader]

Quote from john dough:

Your evidence is very easily refuted, by purely logical means, and without resort to any scientific methodology.

Even if everything that you say is accurate about the event which occurred, there is no way to determine from the testimony of the observers, if the entity delivering the Torah to the Hebrews was a supernatural and all powerful god, or merely a superintelligent but entirely natural being, equally subject to the physical laws of the universe as any human.

From the perspective of the witnesses, there would have been no means of distinguishing between the true God of creation and Fred, on his spring break from Planet Ten University.

1. Perhaps read the detailed accounting of events at Mount Sinai, with burning fire to the heavens, people quaking and being thrown back a distance of three "mil", the blow of the shofar getting louder and louder (only possible by God) instead of weaker and weaker, the heavens and the earth being opening up to make it clear to everyone the source of everything is God (we have a scientific form of this with E=MCsquared, that all matter has the same common denominator) all the blind and deaf were healed, the world literally stopped functioning till the Jews said they would accept the Torah, the mountain shaking, etc. The best of Hollywood cannot come anywhere close to this!

2. Again, if this accounting of events did not happen and it was made up, there is NO way you could have had 3 million people agree to accept 613 laws and restrictions on themselves and on their children, with nobody "spilling the beans"; in addition, there is no way they would accept upon themselves to leave their fields idle once in seven years (upon entering "Israel") unless it all happened, especially in a society totally dependant on farming , and leaving their borders in "Israel" totally undefended three times a year, for the festivals, when everyone goes to Yerushalayim ("Jerusalem").

3. Finally, look at the quality of the transmission, to the extent that throughout history, even the most simple Jew (including secular ones), would in the mass majority of cases give up their lives so as not to give up their faith. There is no way the parents could have instilled into their offspring this firmness of belief unless it happened.

4. In reality, if a person could feel comfortable believing an explosion just "happened" with raw materials that just "happened" to be there, and explain away literally billions of positive developments with each one having a 1/1,000,000,000 "statistical chance" as being a "fluke", and try to hide from acknowledging ther is "Higher Being", then other such "conclusions" wouldn't surprise me either. It's quite interesting that even atheist scientists acknowledge they have only scratched the surface of seeing wonders & the wisdom of the universe, although if they won the lottery even once, they wouldn't bet much they would win a second time in a row. If there involves a leap of faith to "yes believe" there involves a far greater leap of faith to "not believe".

4b. Also, I find it surprising that some people carry "life" insurance and don't carry "eternal-life" insurance. But the reality is that if a person's desperate enough to dodge the responsibility of believing, he can come up with quite amazing stuff.

 

[Free Thinker]

Quote from Option Trader:



2. The Jewish people's needs in the desert were taken care of by supernatural needs, so of course any pursuit to find rubbish is a waste of time and money.

lol .thank you for "proving" this beyond a shadow of a doubt. i guess when you have been indoctrinated it takes less proof than the rest of us poor unbelieving souls.

 

[austinp]

No doubt there are some highly intelligent minds backed with passionate beliefs about religion pro/con in this forum. That said, I think it is fair to assume even greater minds with stronger passion have debated these exact-same points since the dawn of mankind with no hope for a resolution.

Why do any of us waste our time in such verbal pursuits? What do we get from such endless dialog? Surely all of us here full-well understand there is no chance to change any viewpoints. I would no sooner move my stance one iota than an atheist would concede theirs. With that in mind, why does anyone expend = waste further precious time with such discussion inside this trading website here?

*

Religion's existence or fallacy has an infinite amount of points in support of or deference to. What one chooses to believe is what slants the arguments & evidence either for or against. It really is simple as that: religion is what we choose to believe.

On a personal note, I had a near-death experience on Nov 1st 1972 at eight years old where I was literally pronounced clinically dead by the county coroner of Livingston County, New York State. The details of that personal experience before and afterwards solidifies my belief in God. Would I have the same inner belief without that personal experience and all of its details? Cannot say. Would my sharing of that story soften the heart of any atheist one iota? I highly doubt it.

**

Moral of the story? Many elect to argue various inane points about religion purely out of ego... a joust of mind superiority, if you will. I respectfully suggest it is a far better use of time to go out and enjoy the many wonders of your world around you, regardless how you believe it came to be. All of us will soon be gone, time truly does fly. Where we end up past this life will be known to us when we get there... please enjoy this part of the journey while you can :>)

 

[lkh]

Quote from austinp:

No doubt there are some highly intelligent minds backed with passionate beliefs about religion pro/con in this forum. That said, I think it is fair to assume even greater minds with stronger passion have debated these exact-same points since the dawn of mankind with no hope for a resolution.

Why do any of us waste our time in such verbal pursuits? What do we get from such endless dialog? Surely all of us here full-well understand there is no chance to change any viewpoints. I would no sooner move my stance one iota than an atheist would concede theirs. With that in mind, why does anyone expend = waste further precious time with such discussion inside this trading website here?

*

Religion's existence or fallacy has an infinite amount of points in support of or deference to. What one chooses to believe is what slants the arguments & evidence either for or against. It really is simple as that: religion is what we choose to believe.

On a personal note, I had a near-death experience on Nov 1st 1972 at eight years old where I was literally pronounced clinically dead by the county coroner of Livingston County, New York State. The details of that personal experience before and afterwards solidifies my belief in God. Would I have the same inner belief without that personal experience and all of its details? Cannot say. Would my sharing of that story soften the heart of any atheist one iota? I highly doubt it.

**

Moral of the story? Many elect to argue various inane points about religion purely out of ego... a joust of mind superiority, if you will. I respectfully suggest it is a far better use of time to go out and enjoy the many wonders of your world around you, regardless how you believe it came to be. All of us will soon be gone, time truly does fly. Where we end up past this life will be known to us when we get there... please enjoy this part of the journey while you can :>)

Some of us hope that education will eventually overcome the superstition of religion. So we keep trying to educate.
For instance you say you believe because of a near death experience. What if we could educate you on the science of a near death experience and you were to learn that it is a chemical reaction. Would you then have to at least rethink your position that a near death experience is a religious experience? I would hope so:

Proof #8 - Think about Near Death Experiences

Many Christians find the phenomenon of Near Death Experiences (NDEs) to be proof that "God" and the "afterlife" exist. As described in this article, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Near-death_experience) an NDE contains these characteristics:

The sudden awareness that one has had a 'fatal" accident and not survived.
An out-of-body experience. A sensation of floating above one's body and seeing the surrounding area.
Pleasant feelings, calmness.
A sensation of moving upwards through a tunnel or narrow passageway.
Meeting deceased relatives or spiritual figures
Encountering a being of light, or a light (possibly a religious figure, i.e. Jesus, God, Buddha)
Being given a life review
A feeling of being returned to the body, often accompanied by a reluctance to return
Things like heart attacks, near-drowning and severe loss of blood can all trigger near death experiences.
NDEs have been experienced by thousands of people and have been widely cataloged in a variety of books. Many of these books are "spiritual" or "religious" in nature.

What is not mentioned is that there is a drug called Ketamine that produces all of the elements of an NDE when it is injected into normal, non-dying people. In other words, an NDE is a natural, chemically induced state that the human brain enters. The trigger for an NDE is lack of oxygen to the brain and body. If you read scientific papers like these,(http://www.mindspring.com/~scottr/nde/jansen1.html) you find that there is a completely chemical and completely non-spiritual reason for the features of every NDE.

Is this a direct proof that God is imaginary? No. However, it is a direct proof that the NDE (which many people use as "indisputable" proof that God and eternal life exist) has no supernatural meaning. We can scientifically prove NDEs to be chemical side-effects rather than "a gateway to the afterlife" as many religious believers claim.

 

[Option Trader]

Quote from vhehn:

lol .thank you for "proving" this beyond a shadow of a doubt. i guess when you have been indoctrinated it takes less proof than the rest of us poor unbelieving souls.

So this is the only thing itching you about religion and belief in God is that you can't find garbage remains from the Jews in the desert?

 

[stu]

Quote from austinp:

No doubt there are some highly intelligent minds backed with passionate beliefs about religion pro/con in this forum. That said, I think it is fair to assume even greater minds with stronger passion have debated these exact-same points since the dawn of mankind with no hope for a resolution.

Why do any of us waste our time in such verbal pursuits? What do we get from such endless dialog? Surely all of us here full-well understand there is no chance to change any viewpoints. I would no sooner move my stance one iota than an atheist would concede theirs. With that in mind, why does anyone expend = waste further precious time with such discussion inside this trading website here?

*

Religion's existence or fallacy has an infinite amount of points in support of or deference to. What one chooses to believe is what slants the arguments & evidence either for or against. It really is simple as that: religion is what we choose to believe.

On a personal note, I had a near-death experience on Nov 1st 1972 at eight years old where I was literally pronounced clinically dead by the county coroner of Livingston County, New York State. The details of that personal experience before and afterwards solidifies my belief in God. Would I have the same inner belief without that personal experience and all of its details? Cannot say. Would my sharing of that story soften the heart of any atheist one iota? I highly doubt it.

**

Moral of the story? Many elect to argue various inane points about religion purely out of ego... a joust of mind superiority, if you will. I respectfully suggest it is a far better use of time to go out and enjoy the many wonders of your world around you, regardless how you believe it came to be. All of us will soon be gone, time truly does fly. Where we end up past this life will be known to us when we get there... please enjoy this part of the journey while you can :>)

That might be fine were religion only personal, but it isn't.
Religion, God, Jesus, even Allah these days, lobbies Government and religion is funded by government. Religion is political. Religion is institutionalized.
Anything which is any of those should in my view be under constant scrutiny inside and outside government. Their credibility and credentials under continuous examination. Your personal proof is another's doubts. The State should have no part in that. But it does. Discussion may enlighten society. Crocks might be found out.

 

[austinp]

<i>"Religion's existence or fallacy has an infinite amount of points in support of or deference to. <b>What one chooses to believe</b> is what slants the arguments & evidence either for or against. It really is simple as that: religion is what we choose to believe."</i>

In 42 years of life on earth, I have experienced many things. The more I experience, the more I believe in God's presence.

Key words out of my prior post (this one being the last) are in bold above. Anything we choose to believe is based upon what works for us. The stalwart belief in God works for me. I would not be a crumbled heap of spineless matter without such belief... but life works better for me with personal belief in God.

*

One from my stance might ask, "what benefit is there to change viewpoints and not believe in God?"

How would that new paradigm benefit one's life? What big advantage do non-believers have over believers? Are they happier? Healthier? Richer? More successful?

I see a lot of time and effort in this thread and elsewhere spent trying to dissuade anyone's belief in God. What's the personal payoff? What is the direct benefit to a person trying to sway another's belief in religion or lack thereof?

As for myself, I've reflected on all of these questions in this forum (times 10,000) thru my current time on earth. My personal decision was made, it is resolute and there is no need for further review on my part.

While I appreciate the fact that many others are mired in various stages of belief or doubt, my only concern here in ET is to improve my skills as a trader of financial markets. I'll leave the discussion of all other topics to those who have already mastered the profession of trading.

Best Wishes Always!
Austin P