JoeWeber

Joe, No amount of evidence would ever satisfy you. That's some weak shit, Jay. You are holding an empty bag and you know it.

If someone claimed they found Ghengis Khan's grave, and as a consequence you now needed to organize your life around it, you'd ask them to prove it, yes? Don't make yourself a martyr or a victim here, Jay. Either prove that you can factually assert the existence of God and that this God is omniscient or retract the statement.

Is your faith strong enough to allow you to accept that Genesis is not literal truth? Many people can keep their Christian faith without holding on to this like a rock in the sea of disorder. Those are the people I see as having strong faith. After listening to Dr Kent Hovind's lectures I see no reason to consider that possibility. https://www.google.com/search?q=kent+hovind+debate&rlz=1C1SQJL_enUS789US789&oq=kent+hovind&aqs=chrome.2.69i57j0l5.16159j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8 Impressive CV, the good Doctor has. Well, at least he's out of prison and now on probation for tax no-no's. Education Patriot University In 1971, he graduated from East Peoria Community High School in East Peoria, Illinois. He entered the accredited Illinois Central College, then transferred to the unaccredited Midwestern Baptist College in 1972, attaining a Bachelor of Religious Education in 1974.[1] In 1988 and 1991 respectively, Hovind received a master's degree and doctorate in Christian Education through correspondence from (also unaccredited) Patriot University in Colorado Springs, Colorado.[notes 1][9][10] Having a website called "Dr. Dino" has provoked some academics to look closely at how Hovind presents his education and credentials. All his known degrees are from unaccredited institutions, and he has no training in paleontology.[11] Barbara Forrest, a professor of philosophy, expert on the history of creationism and activist in the creation-evolution controversy, wrote that Hovind's lack of training makes academic discussion impossible[10] and has said that his understanding of historical and scientific research is deficient.[12] Patriot University is a diploma mill.[12][13] Karen Bartelt, an organic chemistry professor who debated Hovind,[10] examined Hovind's dissertation and found it is incomplete,[notes 2] contains numerous spelling errors, lacks references, shows flawed reasoning, and states that it does not present any original research.[11][14][15]

Yet, even so, you were smart enough to get the point I was trying to make. Bravo gowlerk! Bravo!! You might recall my making this suggestion earlier in the conversation: Jay, No one here begrudges your beliefs. Why not take a different tack? The truth is that you read the bible and you also read many scholarly works by theologians who are doing their best to make sense of the bible. Why not simply tell us that those readings resonate with you on a very deep and spiritual level. And that's that. The thing is that you claim evidence and proof and so on. When you are pressed nothing materializes. Why not just say that you have no proof or evidence that would satisfy a secularist and that you were mistaken to make the claim? Then tell us that the truth arena that we play in is different from yours and that you hope us the best. I say this because the more you argue ineffectively the less I believe you have no doubts. No reply. Later, in a reply to Bill, you opened with this: "God is in fact omniscient". That's the nuts and bolts of it, man. Your antagonists here maintain that you can not make that statement in honesty. You can say that you believe in God. You can also say that you believe the God you believe in is omniscient. But you can not claim it as fact. And when asked for facts to support your beliefs you default to defending belief with belief, not facts. Evolution is a fact. Gravity is a fact. That the Exodus did not happen is a fact. That water could not have preceded light is a fact. That there is a God or that the presupposed God is omniscient are simply not facts. Ron recently blasted me for derision. Well, the solution is to make statements that are not risible. I further submit that were you and Ron to speak about what you believe more factually you might start to see that you are running on a Mobius strip. Please think about that. Could you have actually written: I personally believe the God I worship is omniscient although, in truth, I have no proof?

So I guess we won't be seeing each other again.

There is so little reason, given the knowledge we have, to believe in the story of Genesis or Noah, that enumerating the evidence is pointless. It is sufficient to merely say that only faith demonstrated by suspension of disbelief could lead anyone to accept these stories as literal truths. But genetic theory does teach us that any mammal species numbering less than a few dozen is doomed. That has been well known for quite some time. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimum_viable_population This is interesting. The study suggests that, "damage to particular areas of the prefrontal cortex indirectly promotes religious fundamentalism by diminishing cognitive flexibility and openness—a psychology term that describes a personality trait which involves dimensions like curiosity, creativity, and open-mindedness." Neuropsychologia. 2017 Jun;100:18-25. doi: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2017.04.009. Epub 2017 Apr 6. Biological and cognitive underpinnings of religious fundamentalism. Zhong W1, Cristofori I1, Bulbulia J2, Krueger F3, Grafman J4. Author information Abstract Beliefs profoundly affect people's lives, but their cognitive and neural pathways are poorly understood. Although previous research has identified the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) as critical to representing religious beliefs, the means by which vmPFC enables religious belief is uncertain. We hypothesized that the vmPFC represents diverse religious beliefs and that a vmPFC lesion would be associated with religious fundamentalism, or the narrowing of religious beliefs. To test this prediction, we assessed religious adherence with a widely-used religious fundamentalism scale in a large sample of 119 patients with penetrating traumatic brain injury (pTBI). If the vmPFC is crucial to modulating diverse personal religious beliefs, we predicted that pTBI patients with lesions to the vmPFC would exhibit greater fundamentalism, and that this would be modulated by cognitive flexibility and trait openness. Instead, we found that participants with dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC) lesions have fundamentalist beliefs similar to patients with vmPFC lesions and that the effect of a dlPFC lesion on fundamentalism was significantly mediated by decreased cognitive flexibility and openness. These findings indicate that cognitive flexibility and openness are necessary for flexible and adaptive religious commitment, and that such diversity of religious thought is dependent on dlPFC functionality. Your best thinking got you and the others to this point. And yet, something is just not right. You come here to debate, castigate, shame and ridicule but satisfaction cannot be found. Agreement among each other, yes. Still peace of mind eludes you. There is that one thing in your life or your past that holds you guilty. You know it is there and you can't find complete relief. You are held captive. Jesus came to set the captives free. The problem here, and it is your problem not mine, is that you guy's are accustomed to people pussy footing around when you make outrageous claims or avoid answering questions because the topic is religion. Your trick is to play the polite society card so as to keep the conversation, your side of it in particular, sounding reasonable. The problem is that what you and Jay are saying is anything but reasonable and some of us are flat out of polite society cards. Consider only what wolfriverjoe just observed: he's out in the world and you are fearfully holed up in the woods. Who is likely to have a more realistic world view? Jay get's damn touchy as a way of getting people to go away. He's called me a snowflake and an ass. Ignoring that only one of those claims is true, isn't name calling a sin?

Bigun, I think I owe you an apology. We are much more in alignment than I previously thought. Joe

There is so little reason, given the knowledge we have, to believe in the story of Genesis or Noah, that enumerating the evidence is pointless. It is sufficient to merely say that only faith demonstrated by suspension of disbelief could lead anyone to accept these stories as literal truths. But genetic theory does teach us that any mammal species numbering less than a few dozen is doomed. That has been well known for quite some time. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimum_viable_population This is interesting. The study suggests that, "damage to particular areas of the prefrontal cortex indirectly promotes religious fundamentalism by diminishing cognitive flexibility and openness—a psychology term that describes a personality trait which involves dimensions like curiosity, creativity, and open-mindedness." Neuropsychologia. 2017 Jun;100:18-25. doi: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2017.04.009. Epub 2017 Apr 6. Biological and cognitive underpinnings of religious fundamentalism. Zhong W1, Cristofori I1, Bulbulia J2, Krueger F3, Grafman J4. Author information Abstract Beliefs profoundly affect people's lives, but their cognitive and neural pathways are poorly understood. Although previous research has identified the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) as critical to representing religious beliefs, the means by which vmPFC enables religious belief is uncertain. We hypothesized that the vmPFC represents diverse religious beliefs and that a vmPFC lesion would be associated with religious fundamentalism, or the narrowing of religious beliefs. To test this prediction, we assessed religious adherence with a widely-used religious fundamentalism scale in a large sample of 119 patients with penetrating traumatic brain injury (pTBI). If the vmPFC is crucial to modulating diverse personal religious beliefs, we predicted that pTBI patients with lesions to the vmPFC would exhibit greater fundamentalism, and that this would be modulated by cognitive flexibility and trait openness. Instead, we found that participants with dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC) lesions have fundamentalist beliefs similar to patients with vmPFC lesions and that the effect of a dlPFC lesion on fundamentalism was significantly mediated by decreased cognitive flexibility and openness. These findings indicate that cognitive flexibility and openness are necessary for flexible and adaptive religious commitment, and that such diversity of religious thought is dependent on dlPFC functionality.

In addition to the events of Exodus being dismissed by Jewish archeologists, let's examine Noah's Ark, arguably one of the most influential stories in the bible. I won't delve into the physical impossibility of fitting that many animals into such a small space, nor the required amout of food for such a lengthy journey. Nor will I question how did all the fresh water fish survive, where did all the water go once the water receded, or did water not refract light prior to the flood. After all, the theist will simply shrug their shoulders and respond with some garbage about miracles and God's power. There are at least four civilizations that existed prior, during, and after the events of the alleged Flood. The Chinese neolithic dynasty, the multiple Egyptian dynasties, Mesopotamians, & the Sumerians. All have a continuous line of recorded history with zero gap to indicate being wiped out and starting from scratch. Then there's "Old Tjikko", a 9500 year old tree in Sweden. And also this little nugget, a study on the results of a population bottleneck some 12,000 years ago. "This event caused an extreme reduction of the cheetah’s genetic diversity, known as a population bottleneck, resulting in the physical homogeneity of today’s cheetahs. Poor sperm quality, focal palatine erosion, susceptibility to the same infectious diseases, and kinked tails characteristic of the majority of the world’s cheetahs are all ramifications of the low genetic diversity within the global cheetah population.".......now if the flood had occurred, this would be apparent in all mammals, not just the cheetah. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC46261/ Two massive stories of the bible easily debunked, why not go for the trifecta? How 'bout the story of Adam and Eve? According to biblical scholars the events happened sometime around 4000 bc, ~6000 years ago. Let's see what the science has to say about it... "Genetic variation at most loci examined in human populations indicates that the (effective) population size has been approximately 10(4) (i.e., 10,000) for the past 1 Myr and that individuals have been genetically united rather tightly. Also suggested is that the population size has never dropped to a few individuals, even in a single generation. These impose important requirements for the hypotheses for the origin of modern humans: a relatively large population size and frequent migration if populations were geographically subdivided. Any hypothesis that assumes a small number of founding individuals throughout the late Pleistocene can be rejected." Listed below is the paper that it's from. There are two more that confirm it, but I could have listed more. So genetics has conclusively stated that there hasn't been a population bottleneck of less than 10,000 breeding pairs in the last half million years......that is in direct conflict with biblical chronology...both Adam and Eve(one pair) and Noah's ark(4 pair) Once Adam and Eve are relegated to mythology the purpose of Jesus falls apart. Four of the biggest stories in the bible disproven by science. Those who continue to claim the bible is "true" or the "inerrant word of God" should pick up another book(s). https://academic.oup.com/mbe/article/10/1/2/1030040 http://www.genetics.org/content/genetics/147/4/1977.full.pdf https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11158380 Tony, That's some great stuff. The genetic diversity of Cheetahs bottleneck was unknown to me. Thanks. I'll look into that, for sure. Strangely species distribution, seen as a confirmation of evolution, gets little play. It's always the fossil record, which while being irrefutable and without exception, is probably less impressive as a proof.

http://www.reformed.org/documents/wcf_with_proofs/index.html?body=/documents/wcf_with_proofs/ch_III.html From that piece: "God from all eternity, did, by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will, freely, and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass" So looks like Jakee is right. Our actions are preordained by God and you are not free to change them. God bless Bill who has the patience of Job and can read that drivel, and then explain it to we mere mortals, so that we too can see the light. And who can yet claim the Lord does not work in mysterious ways?

That can't be true, because he would have known when creating man what the result would be. If he didn't want humans to sin, he could have created humans differently. Like the guy with the girl's name (which you now concede you were wrong about) said, everything that happens is what he planned to happen. Not allowed it, caused it. Again, it's incredibly obvious that you're dodging the question. The question is, why doesn't he straighten the mirror? It's not our fault that it's bent. Jakee, you need to believe it to believe it, believe it, or not. Get it? No? Try repeating it and humming a tune. That always works. You see, it's all spelled out in words that can mean anything you want in #Romans, #Corinthians and #Deuteronomy. And those truth statements are perfectly confirmed by #Numbers, #Proverbs and #Nehemiah. Of course, #Exodus is on hold pending the elimination of the field of Archeology. Feel free to PM me for additional help.

That's an interesting quote. It begs the question as to which side is really insane. Belief or non-belief. The Delusion of Atheism https://youtu.be/HaQpENJLx-I Indeed. That's why I chose it. I think you are delusional and you are convinced that I am, too. No matter. This thread has run it's course in my opinion. No one on either side of the debate seems movable. So why continue? I do not respect what you believe. But I definitely respect you when you stand for fairness. Easter on April Fools day. Gotta love it, no?

God did not create man to sin. He created him to be in relationship with himself. However, sin entered the world through man. Man chose to sin. God knew it would occur. God allowed it to occur for reasons mentioned before. Sin has had a ripple effect throughout time affecting all who follow. The nature of man is corrupted from what it was originally. That sin nature is passed along to us. Apart from God, all of us would freely choose to reject him and go our own ways the result of which has also already been discussed. However, God chose not to leave us to ourselves. God could have chosen other ways but he chose this one. God made you in his own image. It's like looking into a mirror. However, one which is warped by sin, brought about by man, not God, making the reflection distorted. "And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music." Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spake Zarathrustra

Perhaps he attempted to address the paradox, but he certainly failed to resolve it. It's honestly what made it make sense to me. I don't see the paradox. Seriously. Jay, No one here begrudges your beliefs. Why not take a different tack? The truth is that you read the bible and you also read many scholarly works by theologians who are doing their best to make sense of the bible. Why not simply tell us that those readings resonate with you on a very deep and spiritual level. And that's that. The thing is that you claim evidence and proof and so on. When you are pressed nothing materializes. Why not just say that you have no proof or evidence that would satisfy a secularist and that you were mistaken to make the claim? Then tell us that the truth arena that we play in is different from yours and that you hope us the best. I say this because the more you argue ineffectively the less I believe you have no doubts. This Easter morning I reflect back to 16 Mar 1981 when I was stranded in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. I realized that I was lost and dying. The Holy Spirit spoke to me and said, “Why don't you try Jesus? You have tried everything else.” I surrendered and ask Jesus to come into my heart and take control of my life. At that moment I felt the power of the love of God flow over me from the crown of my head to the soles of my feet. I saw memory visions of every time in my life where I denied Christ, cursed God and ridiculed His word. As each memory came into my foreground perception the voice of the Lord said, “I forgive you.” My life and my mind became transformed. I became a new creature in Christ. I was born again. Two years later, 26 Mar 1983, I said to myself that I had to stop drinking alcohol. I had no control to quit as soon as I consumed the first beer. I humbled myself before the Lord and asked Him for help. The first part of April He transformed my thinking patterns once again. He reprogrammed my mind by rearranging all of my memory bytes. I received a new operating system and I was delivered from the desire to use all mood altering substances. God by the Holy Spirit through Jesus the Christ has sustained me these past thirty-seven and thirty-five years respectively. My only desire is to share the good news of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and Him crucified for your sins. Worldwide 15000 children 5 years of age and younger die every day, including Easter. The causes are more often horrible than not. Starvation, animal attacks, defects in their bodies, disease, genocide, you name it. In most cases their parents will have done everything in their power to save them. However, the overwhelming majority of these children and parents will be completely unaware of the Christian God. Consequently they will have no higher power to turn to when all is lost and their cries of anguish and terror will not be heard. None will dress in their Sunday best today, none will frolic at the day's festivities, none will hunt for hidden, colored eggs. For me, the existence of actual, provable truths like that make accepting the revealed truths you prefer utterly impossible.

Perhaps he attempted to address the paradox, but he certainly failed to resolve it. It's honestly what made it make sense to me. I don't see the paradox. Seriously. Jay, No one here begrudges your beliefs. Why not take a different tack? The truth is that you read the bible and you also read many scholarly works by theologians who are doing their best to make sense of the bible. Why not simply tell us that those readings resonate with you on a very deep and spiritual level. And that's that. The thing is that you claim evidence and proof and so on. When you are pressed nothing materializes. Why not just say that you have no proof or evidence that would satisfy a secularist and that you were mistaken to make the claim? Then tell us that the truth arena that we play in is different from yours and that you hope us the best. I say this because the more you argue ineffectively the less I believe you have no doubts.

No worries Bill, I can take that lame shit and more. Jaybird, your discourse is like listening to Sunday school. I get it that you are used to shutting things down when it doesn't go your way. But you can not expect the same courtesy in a public forum. Here your shit stinks.

jaybird18c wrote: Man was created in the image of God. That means we were created to be like him in that we have the ability to share many of his attributes (communicable attributes). The “fruits of the spirit” would be an example. They include but aren’t limited to Joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. On the other hand, there are attributes which are his alone (incommunicable attributes). An example of these would be omniscience, omnipresence, omnipotence. There are many more. I quoted Psalm 50:21. It means that although God has demonstrated much patience allowing time to repent, his patience is not without limit and justice will be done. He is NOT like fallen man with indifference to sin. As ever, you don't answer the questions posed. Of course you believe that stuff. But how do you know? To be credible why not precede your statements with: I believe or my guess is or something similar? To which you replied: First - How do I know? 1. Inner witness of the Holy Spirit. 2. Preponderance of the evidence. In fairness, it was you opened the door to questioning the existence of God. You did so by directly claiming certain attributes he has and we do not. Your reference to scripture was limited to stating: "I quoted Psalm 50:21." So you really stepped on your ding a ling when you claimed to know what you were claiming was true because of a preponderance of evidence. Jaybird, for dancing backwards and in circles you put Ginger Rogers to shame.

I "heard" you the first time. I'll ask again. What specifically are you looking for? Romans 3?

What kind of evidence are you looking for? Just a standard everyday preponderance will suffice. You know, like the one you referenced previously.

How about this? The battle for the soul is in the mind, a Christian concept. If two bodies are joined together with two separate personalities then there are two minds. Each has free will to make choices on their own and be held accountable as individuals. If two bodies are joined together with one mind then the choices are singularly individual. Keeping in mind that sin is mostly attitude not behvior. Are you saying that when separate each embryo has a soul but when joined as a Chimera the souls also join to become one? I am saying count the number of minds and that equals the number of souls. This is just conjecture to some degree on my part. I have counseled people with multi-faceted personalities and some were diagnosed Multiple Personality Disorder. I have never met nor counseled a chimera as far as I know. It appears we are in agreement: it's all in your mind.

How about this? The battle for the soul is in the mind, a Christian concept. If two bodies are joined together with two separate personalities then there are two minds. Each has free will to make choices on their own and be held accountable as individuals. If two bodies are joined together with one mind then the choices are singularly individual. Keeping in mind that sin is mostly attitude not behvior. Are you saying that when separate each embryo has a soul but when joined as a Chimera the souls also join to become one?

Bill, You are not being helpful. Let him chase his tail. I think Bill is being more reasonable and rational than most of the folks in the thread. I'm still waiting for Jay's "Incontrovertible Evidence". All I've seen so far is second hand accounts. What's called "hearsay" in a court of law (note that 'hearsay' is not 'heresy'). And generally inadmissible as "Evidence". Bill is always reasonable, for sure. I simply think that epistemological discourse with Jay or Ron is pointless until they stop stonewalling when they are called on their claims. I'd like for Jay to provide his preponderance of evidence, too. His repetitive quoting of the bible and confessions and the like is just overwhelmingly tedious at the stage. That said, his telling Jack to go read Romans 3 for his answer did have some comedic value. I'd also like Ron to explain where the extra soul goes when a human Chimera is formed from fraternal twin embryos in the womb. But I doubt they will.

Bill, You are not being helpful. Let him chase his tail.

The Roman soldiers were tasked with ensuring his death. You could postulate lots of crazy stuff but it doesn't fit the circumstance. High ranking Roman soldiers at that. Centurions. They were officers in charge of 100 men. One important qualification was the requirement that they be literate so as to be able to understand written orders. Yet, to my knowledge, they left no account. Surely something as interesting as a resurrection and the opening of graves with even more dead being raised to go walking through town would have inspired a word or two.

First - How do I know? 1. Inner witness of the Holy Spirit. 2. Preponderance of the evidence. Second - I don't need to seek your approval. Although, as Christians, we are to give answers for what we believe, truth does not need my defense. Truth stands whether or not either of us believe. And the truth is you will have to give an account one day for every thought, word, and deed in this lifetime. Evidence: The available body of facts or information indicating whether a belief or proposition is true or valid. Where is your preponderance of evidence to be found? Even the Israeli School of Archeology, after exhaustive research in the field, has concluded that the Exodus never happened. With full access to any pertinent sites, they found no evidence. Quoting the bible as evidence is like popping an empty bag: a lot of noise but nothing else. Of course, the fact that it is unsupported gibberish only speaks to it's own falseness; the existence of God, if you like, is still an available argument. So if you have actual evidence that the bible is a work of truth please show it. Otherwise just say I have no evidence, I can not prove anything, it's just what I believe because of a wonderful feeling I get and anyone who thinks that's not evidence enough can just bugger off.