Original Sin?

Quote: Evenbob

They are called beliefs because facts don't
back them up.

I believe human beings are more important than cockroaches and the facts back me up. You believe your wife loves you and facts back you up. Beliefs without facts to back them up are nonsense and more a tune to insanity like believing you are Napoleon.

Quote: FrGamble

good point. I guess the difference is Christianity is true.

We're about to start turning in circles: proof?

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You and EvenBob have unsuccessfully tried to point out many times (remember his now abandoned list of supposed similarities between Jesus and Horus)that Jesus is a warmed up myth from the Egyptians.

I said "in principle." Jehovah is different from Amun as Thor is different from Zeus. In principle they're the same: made up deities, no more real than Bruce Wayne or Peter Parker.

I grant you some, even all, the regular actions attributed to Jesus in the bible might be true, as well as most or all of what he's said to have said. This would mean there existed a man named Jesus in Judea in the 1st century C.E.(*) And so? Would you believe the whole Iliad and Odyssey are true in all particulars, including the many miracles described, if we found evidence of an Ulysses living around those times? I wouldn't either.

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"We don't know" is only an answer a scientist would give to a question that they realize they have no way of knowing.

No. "We don't know" is the honest answer a scientist gives to questions with unknown answers: why do we dream? how do cells differentiate? what is the composition of the crust of extrasolar planets?

Asimov once said he was very happy that science would find questions faster than it found answers.

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The scientist would reply, "Observation and testing, scientific or mathematical proofs, these are not the only ways that we come to knowledge of what is true and right."

Even historians carefully detail what they don't know for sure or can't find proof of. Funny, though, when they say "The sources for this period are writings from 150 years later. How much of that is true, we don't know." They do not refer me to a theologian or a philosopher, even when this renders the intermediate periods in Egyptian history a mass of frustration.


(*) Some evidence has been circulating lately of ossuaries of a certain Jesus son of Joseph, accompanied by the burial places for two women named Mary and perhaps a man named James son of Joseph brother of Jesus, among others.

This might all be coincidence. Ancient peoples were known for unimaginative naming conventions within families. But what if that is the tomb of the unresurrected Jesus of Nazareth?

I hope for your sake this is not so, as otherwise you'll tie your brain in knots trying to rationalize it.

Quote: FrGamble

Quote: Dalex64

Clearly an opinion, and one which is not shared by the majority of the scientific community. They don't accept that answer and are looking for one they find to be more satisfactory to them. In the absence of proof that this is the correct answer, they still look for an answer which they can prove.

The scientific community are not theologians and the question of God is not their purview. How could science proclaim there is a God or that there isn't? As you mention they deal with things that can be proven by observation and testing. However, there are many things that can be known without being proven in that way. This is why philosophy, theology, ethics, and in some ways the arts exist.

Yes, but finding the origin of the universe is within their purview. I'd say that proving the existence of a soul is outside of their purview. They did do experiments to try to measure the weight of the soul at some point, though.

So, on one hand (most) scientists (I think) are not trying to prove that God doesn't exist, but are trying to prove what created the universe, believing that God didn't do it.

Quote: FrGamble

I believe human beings are more important than cockroaches and the facts back me up. .

You can't list one fact to support that,
other than you're opinion. Go ahead and
try.

Quote: Dalex64

I'd say that proving the existence of a soul is outside of their purview.

I don't see why not. If it exists, science can get at it. If it doesn't exist, well...

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So, on one hand (most) scientists (I think) are not trying to prove that God doesn't exist, but are trying to prove what created the universe, believing that God didn't do it.

Not exactly believing a god didn't do it, but without preconception as to how it came to be, or even whether it came to be.

Quote: Evenbob

You can't list one fact to support that,
other than you're opinion. Go ahead and
try.

Are you serious, you want me to list a fact as to why human beings are more important than cockroaches?!?

Human beings are able to love.

Quote: Nareed

I said "in principle." Jehovah is different from Amun as Thor is different from Zeus. In principle they're the same: made up deities, no more real than Bruce Wayne or Peter Parker.

It is insulting and ironic to compare YHWH to an Egyptian Pharaoh and to think you can compare Him to Zeus or dismiss Him in the same breath as Thor. For all you say about history you seem to not grasp the impact the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob has had on the world. Peter Parker, please. With great power, comes great responsibility. Be responsible in your criticisms and comparisons.

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I grant you some, even all, the regular actions attributed to Jesus in the bible might be true, as well as most or all of what he's said to have said. This would mean there existed a man named Jesus in Judea in the 1st century C.E.(*) And so? Would you believe the whole Iliad and Odyssey are true in all particulars, including the many miracles described, if we found evidence of an Ulysses living around those times? I wouldn't either.

We don't have to worry about that hypothetical do we? Maybe that is because we are talking about reality and what really happened, not fictional stories.

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No. "We don't know" is the honest answer a scientist gives to questions with unknown answers: why do we dream? how do cells differentiate? what is the composition of the crust of extrasolar planets?

Wouldn't a scientist be able to say what they do know and give a theory or hypothesis based on the current knowledge or evidence? If asked about God there honest answer is of course, "that is not a question for a scientist."

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Asimov once said he was very happy that science would find questions faster than it found answers.

I think this is more true for philosophy and especially theology than it is for science.

Quote: Dalex64

So, on one hand (most) scientists (I think) are not trying to prove that God doesn't exist, but are trying to prove what created the universe, believing that God didn't do it.

I don't really see how it matters what religion or lack there of a scientist practices, that is what we call a red herring. Most scientists know the shoulders they stand on, the really great scientists in the past, were strong believers in God and it doesn't seem to bother them. By the way I think scientists should plumb the mysteries of the universe including its beginning, but I'm sure you and they realize there is an event horizon so to speak of before the universe began that it is impossible for them to know anything about simply because there is nothing to observe, no matter, energy, nothing to test or experiment on.

Quote: Nareed

I don't see why not. If it exists, science can get at it. If it doesn't exist, well...

What craziness is this? Love exists does it not? Can science get at it, dissect it for us, and explain its nuances and why and how it exists? Music exists as does art and poetry? Can science get at this too? You my friend need to watch again this clip from a great movie called Dead Poets Society:

Quote: FrGamble

Are you serious, you want me to list a fact as to why human beings are more important than cockroaches?!?.

Let me save you the trouble. Anything
you can possibly come up with is just
your ego postulating. Fact is, humans
are more important to YOU than
roaches, so you think that makes them
more important period. It doesn't.

Who decides what one thing is more
important than any other one thing.
You like to to think it's your god, he's
made it crystal clear that you and all
humans are the important thing. But
of course you invented god, so what
else would he say.

This is why religion is do dang dangerous,
it misses the point completely. You worship
your own ego's and call it divine. You even
think all your ego's are going somewhere
to hang out for eternity, that's how much
you cherish yourselves.