We should put all the books of the bible into the form of movies but not change a single word of it then when everyone goes to see it in movie form (since it's easier to watch than read more people will go see it than read the bible) they can see it for what it truly is
@AntiMatterWave That won't work. Many people would just purposely ignore/block out the messed up elements and probably blame the movie company for desecrating their Bible by making it so f-ed up.
@AntiMatterWave I know. My point was that there would still be willfully ignorant theists who would refuse to acknowledge the accounts of the Bible Movie as applicable to their religion. Like how many Christians say that the Old Testament doesn't matter b/c of Jesus, but still use the Old T to justify homophobia. It's abhorrent and willfully dishonest or plain stupid, but there are theists like this.
@1Lanavis1 true however it wouldn't be to quarrel with religion, just the bible. even if theists declare it to be non-applicable the point would be that more people would be aware of the bible and it would stop being read to kids as if it's some kind of morality handbook, people would have to practice religion without the bible. This would also mean that when theists spout good quotes people would know it's full of evil and stop accepting the bible on the basis of it being the bible
C'mon man. Of course god hasn't chosen our time. The scientific community would rip his work to pieces. MUCH easier to get your work published in a time where people could barely comprehend their own fecal matter. Wait...I take that back. There are still a few Catholics out there that have this same problem.
i really do love all of your work, maybe one day i will be able to speak to the masses in the way that you have spoken to youtube and convince them of the truth.
@Marxamarx, the universe isn't a nice, neat organization. Everything doesn't just stay out of the way of everything else. There are and were cataclysmic impacts. Comets, meteors, moons, and even whole planets strike each other. The entire Milky Way galaxy is colliding with the Andromeda galaxy. Do you honestly believe that amidst all the collisions (long ago, there were far more collisions in our system), that everything would continue spinning in the same direction?
@DarkMatter2525 surely earth would have been hit and taken out of existence by then, don't you think? I'm sure you know as a teacher, that there is a planet called Jupiter, which is basically our solar systems "vacuum" ,so to speak, which sucks in nearly all of the space junk that comes towards us. Quite a convenient position to put Jupiter don't you think?
@CreedChrist just like how the earth is the perfect distance from the sun? umm no. As the sun ages it burns hotter and hotter. So down the road the earth will be nothing more then a burnt rock. what about the fact that the andromida galaxy is on a collision course with the milky way? All of the planets in our solar system formed where they did because it is what happened. The conditions were right for them to form at that time and place. Just like life formed on earth, and evolved. chance....
@Marxamarx Mountain top being scorched. LOL ever heard of lightning? Lightning hits the tall mountain like we know lightning does it burns the top. Really what are you smoking?
@Marxamarx No but Energy is infinite it can not be created or destroyed matter can be converted and not created or destroyed energy becomes matter which changes into different matter. GOD CAN NOT CREATE ITS SELF. DOUBLE RAINBOW WHAT DOES IT MEAN?
@Marxamarx So, your logic is that since certain planetary bodies rotate "backwards," there is a God? Are you even educated to make such a vacuous illation?
The constitution that you live under and are ruled by eventually has been updated..on a daily basis.
Yes the bible is the original constitution..the problem with it is that is has not been updated like the constitution.
I am the update and I have all the asnwers that will set you free in the hate of religion as I have lack of faith in the constitution and an extreme hate of it.
There is no evidence nor will there ever be evidence of a god that doesn't exist. God only exists in the uninformed human mind. Ignorance isn't a bad thing, but choosing to stay ignorant when you have the choice of learning and ACCEPTING the truth... well that is bad. People don't want to let go of the idea of 'god' because they are afraid of death. The are so afraid that their 'afterlife' may not exist that they'll believe anything but the truth. MAN CREATED GOD!
You, my good sir, are very well spoken, and have a well worded speech, to express the simple logic that so many people reject. I hope your effort does not go to waste. I for one intend to reference this in debates with unreasonably religious hard heads.
@southdakotagirl30 What does Jesus specifically saying that he would return during the lifetimes of the people who were alive and listening to him speak have to do with "god's time"? Everyone who was there who could have heard him speak those words are long dead, which means it was a failed prophecy. And I spoke too hastily on the shroud. But, the evidence available seems to suggest a medieval origin, and at the very least does not well-support a 1st century one.
Great video! Even if that farmer could read, it would not be guaranteed that he would be allowed to read the bible. I am thinking of the catholic banning of modern language bible translations, way back in the 15somethings. I have seen it quoted of the Pope Paul iterations where he says that reading the scriptures ruins the catholic religion, or something to that effect,... and in Italian I guess. :)
@southdakotagirl30 And yes, I've heard of the second coming. According to Jesus, it should have happened during the lifetimes of some of the people he was speaking to in the bible. It seems he's a couple millenia late though... I think the bible has something to say about how to figure out if a person is a false prophet... typically if their prophecies fail to come true. So by the Bible's own metric, Jesus apparently was a false prophet.
@southdakotagirl30 Lee Strobel isn't very interesting. What I've read of him is rather unconvincing and is a lot of preaching to the choir stuff. I'm not sure what it means to be a "hardcore" atheist, but in any case, It appears Mr Strobel was an atheist for bad reasons.
The Shroud of Turin is well known to be a fake created long after Jesus' supposed death.
true again mate :D Ive been sighing about something in that area and that is. The word of god was spread by ONE book. then duplicated. A medium worth more than its own weight in gold at that time. Then progressively getting cheaper yet still, unaffordable to the large majority in such a long timespan that the slow spreading of his word gave time for "false" religoins to get their hold on far away regions. Not fair. He could have placed a bible in every persons hand. Instead it became a business
What the U.S.A. needs is a good, national Atheist dating-service.
A lot of small communities in the U.S. don't have many Atheists, and the few who DO live there, are often afraid to admit it, for fear they'd end up treated like GrapplingIgnorance.
Putting an ad in your local paper saying that you're looking for a fellow single Atheist in the U.S., is almost like putting an ad in your local paper in the 1950s, saying that you were looking for a fellow single Communist.
pope has power to make any book holy, and if he decides to he can claim that "Moby Dick" is god's inspired at it will become.
also pope can introduce new dogmas anytime.
just that insane amount of already existing and contradicting stuff makes everything absurd enough.
but there is no obstruction for Jesus to come on dvd, all we need is for pope to proclaim "passion of the crist" or say "life of Theresa" as holly movie.
But his mind deffinatly seems much more intelligent than those of most teachers.
Particularly most public-school teachers.
When a person with a college degree, who had very good grades in school, decides to become a public school teacher (particularly going out of their way to teach at a very bad school, in a very bad area) you know that they're probbably an idealist.
For those of you Theists that say "yes" to his question of a modern day revelation then Convert to Mormonism because thats what they believe actually happen
my issue: The more unbelievable a claim, the more skeptical you should be to be convinced of the claim. I'll never ask anyone to prove they bought a pack of gum, just because I can't see it in their pocket. If someone told me they were half-alien, I'd want a heck of a lot of proof. Why is it, then, that people swallow the God-pill hook, line, and sinker without a single query? That is the most out-there claim ever. There exists an Invisible, Caring Sky Daddy with very specific wishes.
It sure would be interesting to see all of the little children running around with syringes or electric chairs around their necks instead of the cross. Not to mention on the steeples of churches.
I personally believe that there is a reason that Jesus DIDNT come in this era of information exchange and technology. I believe that he came before inventions such as the tape recorder because a vast part of being a christian is having faith that any of it is true. also even if his miracles were recorded they would have been ridiculed as if he were some kind of magician of a fame-seeker. also in this era we dont have laws againt so-called blasphemy so he could not have been martyred.
@dfwilliamsii I find it foolish to follow a religion that requires faith. If there is a lack of explanation of evidence for your beleif, why aren't you allowed to question it? Why should you beleive everythign your religion tells you to swallow without having a concise, vallid argument, explanation, or set of evidence for it? If you choose to accept that, that's fine, but you must see why many people just can't accept the need to "just have faith" instead of having proof?
@GrapplingIgnorance i definately having trouble believing something that you cant prove but most christians would say the opposite. why follow a religion that doesnt require faith? if God was proveable then people would follow him out of fear not out of love and faith. and christians should be encouraged to questions things they dont understand. the masses of society generally believe wat they are told religion or otherwise and that is their own fault. there are many time throughout the bible
@dfwilliamsii So... faith makes it impossible to follow God out of fear? There are many Christian denominations that sell themselves based on the idea that people are sinful and will be damned... fear is a big component of many Christians' religious devotion. If God wants people to love him and devote themselves to him of their own volition then perhaps he shouldn't have set the punishment for failing to do so to be eternal suffering and torture. That doesn't seem like a real choice to me.
@Arkalius80 well im not going to defend religious groups who throw hell at people in order to et them to obey rather than believe and understand because i dont believe its ok either but if i defend every christian who ever said anything stupid id be fighting a losing battle. and its not that God set that as the punishment, thats just the option left over. basically you choose to go to heaven or you dont. wat happens to you after that is out of his hands because you told him not to get
@Arkalius80 through your actions. so if you look at it differently and less critically (and thats not a shot at atheists its just my observation of how alot of people view God) then its like God gave you wat SHOULD BE an obvious choice. go to heaven where you are prtotected and loved or not and be subject to watever other powers that be. so i understnad how that can look like a threat instead of a choice but if you think of God as having a personality and not just a judging force and read the
@dfwilliamsii Here's the problem I have with the whole concept. Obviously, no one actually deserves to go to hell. God, who is supposedly a wise individual would know this. He has the power to prevent people from going there. Given that he knows no one deserves it and can trivially prevent people from going there, the fact that he doesn't leaves him culpable. If you could keep people from suffering a horrible and undeserved fate simply by wanting to, would it not be criminal not to do so?
@Arkalius80 we could argue wat "deserves" really means in that statement but i wont. if i understand you correctly you dont think that anyone but those who commit really heinous crimes should/would go to hell. but th issue, again, isnt that God wants them to go to hell its that we choose to. he gave a no-brainer option to adam and eve and they were tricked and chose wrong. in turn some of us choose not to accept Jesus' sacrifice and God is going to honor that because thats who he is. he isnt
@Arkalius80 going to force us into heaven if we chose not to go there. and i see your point about not helping if you could but like i said its not like an impending danger to us. we chose to go so not letting us would not only deprive us it would make us slaves. and God's not gonna do that to us. he does have th power to stop hell but much like the constitution limits th government God limited himself with the laws he set for himself
@dfwilliamsii Are you saying that everyone who, based on your theology, is bound for hell has chosen to go there? I'm not saying that if someone truly wanted to go there, that God should force them not to. I'm saying that God ought to do something about all the people who, based on the theology, will end up there because they, like me, remain unconvinced of the easily doubtable proposition that he exists, or have in fact never even been exposed to the idea.
@Arkalius80 i am saying that they chose to through not choosing Jesus' help. and he is doing something through his followers (supposing we do our job). If God came down to everyone and spoke to them personally there would be no faith. and if he came to some and not others then the ones he didnt come to would be offended and reject God and it would be counter productive. people like me are trying to get the message across that God isnt all that far-fetched of an idea. it up to those who dont
@dfwilliamsii " i am saying that they chose to through not choosing Jesus' help" And this is where you're getting mixed up. I haven't chosen to refuse Jesus' help. I simply don't believe that, first of all, I need his help, and second, that, assuming he existed, he did anything that could help me. It's like if you offered to conjure up 1 million dollars for me magically and then when I mention that I don't believe you can actually do it, you question my resons for refusing your help.
@Arkalius80 you may not have chosen not to to let Jesus help you but you have chosen for him to help you. i know that sounds kinda backwards but, using your example, i offer a million dollars to anyone who asks for a million dollars and believes i can do it then by not asking me for a million dollars you will not get a million dollars. and whether or not you believe Jesus is the son of God. im sure the event of his death and existence are provable. and i know it seems like jumping blindly to
@Arkalius80 an unsupported conclusion but as i said before there is evidence for it just none that is undeniable. i personally accept the likeliness of its truth. i cant prove its true but i accept the evidence given as proof enough for my faith
@dfwilliamsii I have no problem with the idea that the Jesus of the bible was inspired by a real person, maybe named Jesus or not. Maybe this person was even crucified. However, I do not consider copies of copies of copies with no original manuscripts of stories written by superstitious people decades after the events based on oral traditions good enough evidence to accept the idea that this person ressurected from the dead or walked on water or raised dead people.
@Arkalius80 there may be no original manuscripts of the new testament but there are of the old specifically isiah which corroborates th story of Jesus. also many historians and philosophers write about Jesus and many of the event surrounding him. but i dont like to argue the credibility of the bible mostly for the fact that there are a thousand well-ya-buts to argue against them and i can only argue that that are likely to be true. but if you think about the early church, writing down the
@dfwilliamsii "i dont like to argue the credibility of the bible mostly for the fact that there are a thousand well-ya-buts to argue against them" And, knowing this, you don't have a problem with it? If God is the author of the book, no rational person should be able to find fault with it. To me, if I'm reading a book that's supposedly authored by the all-powerful and all-knowing creator of the universe... well let's just say the Bible is nowhere near what I'd expect.
@Arkalius80 i dont have a problem with it because i think it is that way on purpose. like i said before if i can prove God then theres no reason for faith in him. same with the bible. if i can prove the bible i effectively prove God. also the bible isnt my only evidence for believing in God.
@dfwilliamsii You're kind of confusing me. You talk about how faith is necessary for belief to be sufficiently meaningful, yet you speak of the existence of evidence and experiences that remove your need for faith to believe in your god. If it is all about faith then arguing with someone who finds this kind of faith distasteful is a waste of time. Why do you get to be so fortunate to have these special personal experiences to affirm your beliefs while the rest of us just need to have faith?
@Arkalius80 they dont remove my need for faith they just affirm it. they help my faith to be strong. and i have these experiences because i believed first then asked God to show himself to me. not that i was asking for proof, i was asking to be closer to him because i wanted to see him. kinda like when you want to hang out with a friend and not like asking your friend to prove he is real.
@dfwilliamsii I beleived in god, then asked him for proof to confirm my belief and he never did provide. It's strange how this experience isn't consistant.
@GrapplingIgnorance i dont claim ever saying it would be or that you could produce God's reaction on command. its not that i decided to believe one day and asked to for an experience the next. and i never said i asked him for proof. i asked to be close to him. if experiences with God were a producible procedure that could be replicated over and over God would be more of a puppet than a God
@dfwilliamsii Faith in this context is the belief in something in the absence of good rational reasons, or in some cases in the presence of good rational reasons to disbelieve. You have told me you believe in God based on what I'm sure you consider good, rational reasons. Thus, your belief is not faith-based. "i have these experiences because i believed first then asked God to show himself to me" Translation: "I kicked my confirmation bias into high gear and eventually saw what I wanted to see."
@Arkalius80 well i could see how you could come to that conclusion but i disagree with your definition of faith. the way you define it makes it seem that faith can only occur if you ignore evidence. but i would replace the words "rational reasons" with "rational proof." i can have reasons for believing without having proof. if i felt the need i could tell myself that any visions i had were my imagination or a psychological anomaly. same for speaking in tongues. but i find it more likely (not
@dfwilliamsii Well, if you want to use your own private definition of the word, that's your call. It really hinders effective communication though when you mean something different than a word's definition when you use it. And, I'm not interested in "proof". I am interested in evidence (which is not the same thing as "proof") in the technical sense. Anyway, your claim that good evidence exists for your god undermines your position that faith is necessary for belief to have sufficient meaning.
@Arkalius80 its not my own private definition, its the dictionary. faith - belief not based on proof. having evidence for something doesnt keep a person from having faith in it. evolution for example. you stated before that we cant prove it yet but you believe it is true. you have faith in evolution.
@dfwilliamsii I have no "faith" in evolution. My acceptance of it is based on the perponderance of evidence and observation that supports it. Science doesn't deal with "proof", it deals with evidence. Colloquially, some people consider these words synonymous. Insofar as you allow for this, then there is tons of "proof" for evolution. At any rate, you're mincing words. Faith can only be defined as "belief not based on proof" if you consider proof synonymous with evidence.
@Arkalius80 fair enough. bad analogy. but at least you agree that evidence and proof are not the same. but i think its safe to say that scientific evidence comes closer to proof than philosophical evidence.
@Arkalius80 teachings and event wasnt really as important as actually teaching it. so like i said i could argue th credibility of the bible but we would get nowhere because i would make an assertion, you would say well ya but . . ., i would reiterate the likeliness and repeat and repeat and it would go nowhere. but that isnt the only evidence that supports God/Christ its just the doctrines
@dfwilliamsii I'm not saying that God ought to force people to do anything. He (assuming he existed) just ought to make his existence more obvious. This isn't a debate over whether one should choose heaven over hell. This is a debate over whether heaven, hell, god, and satan all exist. God, based on the attributes assigned to him, could trivally make his existence completely undoubtable, and then we could debate over the path to salvation. But he doesn't.
@Arkalius80 like i said he wants you to have faith. believing in something you can prove isnt really believing in anything. but theres lots of evidence to say he does exist. thousands of reports of miracles, tongues, the bible, etc but its not "undeniable proof" so alot of people dont even count it into consideration. and as i said before God doesnt want you to have undeniable proof, he wants you to have faith
@dfwilliamsii "If God came down to everyone and spoke to them personally there would be no faith" Good! Faith is a bad thing. And, the quran and miracles attributed to allah prove islam, the baghavad gita and miracles attributed to hindu gods prove hinduism, etc. Believing in something without good rational reasons isn't virtuous, it's defective thinking (this is easily demonstrable). I'm not sure I'd want to spend eternity in service to a god that is so vain that he would desire such a thing.
@Arkalius80 to argue the miracles of other religions i can really only attribute 2 things 1 i, personally, dont accept its credibility and 2 satan originally worked for God so he has counterfeit miracles and it says that many times in th bible. and i never said my reasons for believing werent rational i just cant prove it to you. if a man sees a murder occur and he is the only one who did he will still believe it to be true regardless of whether or not he can prove it. at least thats how it
@dfwilliamsii "if a man sees a murder occur and he is the only one who did he will still believe it to be true regardless of whether or not he can prove it" This analogy is going to fail miserably unless you're going to tell me you actually were an eye witness to the events of Jesus' life and ressurection. The problem isn't that there are eye witnesses who can't manage to prove it, it's that we have no eye witness testimony.
@Arkalius80 well you misunderstood my analogy. i have seen things that others cannot. i cannot give someone else my experiences. so its not that the "murder" was his resurection, it that it was God's divinity
@Arkalius80 for me. and you could call God vain but i dont think thats an accurate description of the situation. its kinda like the difference between "he set it on the table" and "he slammed it down." 2 wyas of sayi9ng essentially th same thing but one is more accurate than the other. God created humanity so he could love us and we could love him in return so to say that God wants our love to be based more on decision than logic, to me, just makes it seem as though he wants it to really
@dfwilliamsii "i do it because its that obvious that he exists and if i dont im gonna go to hell" First of all, knowing someone exists isn't going to make me love him or her, even God. Whether I believe in a god and whether I love that god are two completely separate issues... though the latter can't happen before the former. And, if God wants sincere love then he might want to consider removing the harsh consequences for not doing so. You can't make someone love you at gunpoint.
@Arkalius80 well first the statement that you quoted was not wat i MYSELF would say, its wat someone else would say in the previously mentioned scenario. and i know that making knowing the existence of something will not make you love it but it might make you fear it which as i said is not wat God wants. and like ive said before, the misunderstanding here is that you assume that God is holding the gun. satan is holding the gun and the death of Jesus gives you th option to take it away. so to
@Arkalius80 say that "you cant make someone at gunpoint" is the core truth at both of our arguments. Jesus died to remove the gun but only he has th power to take it away but you must ask him first
@dfwilliamsii I'm not buying it. God, being supposedly omnipotent, has the ability to eliminate Satan and Hell with a mere whimsical thought. At the very least, he could ensure no one ever goes to hell, ever (since no one ever deserves it). The fact that he has this power and chooses not to use it unconditionally makes him culpable. "Love me or I won't save you from the man with a gun" is about as bad as putting a gun to the person's head yourself, and just as destructive to free will.
@Arkalius80 about acknowledging his divinity. so i would edit your statement to say "believe i can remove the gun and i will." or "trust i can and i will"
@dfwilliamsii "about acknowledging his divinity. so i would edit your statement..." Ok. It's still wrong. To have the ability to prevent someone from suffering an eternity of torture, and knowingly witholding the use of that power for ANY reason is evil. It's as simple as that.
@Arkalius80 well i would disagree but thats my personal view. also it goes back to wat i said before about letting us make our own decisions. He said he would let us and he has to stand by that as God. and honestly at one point or another the analogy had to stop fitting EXACTLY i mean analogies are used to simplify a complicated situation by example but in no way simplify th original situation. so i would agree that in the gun situation it makes more sense to immediately remove the gun but in
@Arkalius80 that scenario the danger is clear and present so no one would chose to refuse his help. is it to far-fetched to say that we can both agree that the dangers are not entirely analogous;at least from a human standpoint?
@dfwilliamsii Relative to an eternity of suffering, our short lifespan that can end without warning at any moment seems pretty immediate. But I don't care about the analogy. I'm talking about the actual situation your theology descirbes. There's hell in which those who enter remain for eternity. God, being all-knowing, knows that no one deserves this fate. Being all-powerful, he can trivially prevent anyone from enduring it. He chooses not to in some cases. Ergo, God cannot be called "good".
@Arkalius80 there are 3 judeo-christian laws about evil: God is all-powerful, God loves us, evil exists. many people and alot of philosophers try to justify this by saying that God cannot be 1 of these 3 to make it work. But as i said before God has limited himself in saying that he will let is choose. If God says he will do something he is limited by his own power to do so. like how the constitution limits the government yet the Government made the constitution (i think i already made
@dfwilliamsii The constitution was not made by the government, rather it is the other way around. The constitution was created by a group of men that preceded the government thus created. The situation you describe is even worse. Not only now has God chosen not to save some people from a horrible fate, but, according to you, he has made it impossible for himself to change his mind on this topic. Also, the "unstoppable force/immovable object" concept is irrelevant because it is nonsensical.
@Arkalius80 fair enough then ignore the part about the constittion being made by the government but it is still part of the government and limits its power. it not about changing his mind. i keep saying this. its like a law set in place. the only thing with as much authority as God is God's word. this is why he cannot remove evil in the way you desccribe. i dont see why its so farfetched to think that God is giong to let us make our own decisions regardless of the consequences
@dfwilliamsii A belief isn't a decision. It's an involuntary reaction to cognitive inputs. If your god created me, then he gave me my intellect and skeptical nature. No rational person, believing they had a meaningful and real choice, would choose hell. This isn't about choice. This god supposedly created a ruleset that rewards credulity and punishes intellectual honesty, irrespective of what kind of person you are. Hitler, a Catholic, enjoys heaven while I am bound for hell. Sounds really fair.
@Arkalius80 i would disagree with you definition of belief. belief - confidence in the truth or existence of something not immediately susceptible to rigorous proof. a person can be skeptical and still be christian. honestly th skeptical christians are some of the wisest i know. also you make it seem as thought God made you to be a atheist but God made you with th blueprint on which your life built on. and God doesnt punish intellectual honesty. thats your interpretation (wat i believe a
@dfwilliamsii A belief is something one holds to be true. Being "provable" has nothing to do with it. A skeptic who is also a theist is doing skepticism wrong, at least in that aspect of his life. Faith (of this type) is incompatible with and destructive to skeptical and scientific inquiry. This "blueprint" on which my life is built includes the inability to believe something without sufficient evidence and a distaste for the idea of faith.
@Arkalius80 i dont understand how my belief in God "doesnt hold true" but moving on rom that, thats not wat skepticism is. skeptic - a person who questions the validity or authenticity of something purporting to be factual. it doesnt say anything about science just questioning. wat you are describing sounds more like bias toward the scientific against the super-natural. so faith (im not sure wat you mean by of this type) is not incompatible with skepticism.
@dfwilliamsii Don't conflate the generic definition of the word skepticism with the ideological movement called Skepticism. The ideology trancends and encompasses the basic definition. The type of faith I am talking about is the belief in something without good, rational reasons to do so. Since the skeptical movement is all about believing only in that which can be supported rationally, there is no room for that kind of faith among someone who claims the skeptic label.
@Arkalius80 i believe faith can be had with good reasons. it is a choice after all to have faith so why could one not have good reasons to do so? and i pull my definitions from dictionary.reference. com so i havent changed anything about its definition. and i think if someone believes in things that can ONLY be proven then they would either be undecided on many important things or be against many things that could be true or both.
@Arkalius80 i dont htink reality is that black and white. i mean think about politics. i cant prove that one form of government is better than another i can only show you wat i believe to be true. same with evolution i mean you said yourself that we cant yet prove it but many people believe it is true because of the likeliness of its truth (also i figured out it wasnt letting me post because i had a website in my post)
@Arkalius80 misinterpretation). God never told us not to ask questions or try to understand things. he just asks us to have faith and as i have argued, faith is not about blind belief
@dfwilliamsii God probably should have told people not to ask questions. Given how easily doubtable he has made the proposition of his existence, honest inquiry rarely leads to strong belief. I often hear stories of theists finding skepticism and eventually abandoning religion as a result (I am one such individual). I don't think I've ever heard of a story of a non-theist individual adopting skepticism and acquiring religious belief as a result.
@Arkalius80 here is another difference of perspective. satan is known as the father of lies and he is called that because he makes lies seem true. he uses science and logic, of which there is less in the case for christianity (i believe it is this way for reasons i find unimportant to explain), to make God seem impossible. but change your perspective and you find different results. instead of looking for falsification, look for understanding and evidence. i did this with christianity as i have
@dfwilliamsii So, insofar as you want to talk about the necessity of that kind of faith, you're wasting your time. If you want to talk about evidence for that in which you believe, then we can talk. However, I doubt you above all other believers will have something you can present that passes the smell test. But I won't stop you from trying. And personal experiences, while sufficient perhaps for the individual who experiences them, lose their impact and value when retold, so we can skip those.
@Arkalius80 well my original objective wasnt to argue faith at all more to show that there is a perspective that could be considered legitimate. i just dislike it when atheists discount anything christians say just because we're "just stupid christians" because then even if we had undeniable proof atheists wouldnt listen to it. im not sure wat you mean by "the smell test" but i wouldnt be against presenting evidence for God and i would be willing to remove personal experience as long as we
@Arkalius80 dont remove phenomena. but i would have to say that i dont think that it is likely to get us anywhere. i think we would be likely to end with agree to disagree. but it could be fun and it could get somewhere so sure. ill let you start by presenting your evidence first. o and sorry it took me so long to reply ive had a combination of being sick and lots of hours at work
@Arkalius80 also belief may sometimes be an involuntary reaction to cognitive inputs but that would be a poorly evaluated belief. you believe evolution is real but you believe that because you support the evidence. (evolution is just an example you could really apply it to almost anything you believe that cannot be proven)
@Arkalius80 that analogy) so as ive said before God has to stay to his word. this doesnt make alot of sense to most people when i say this because to then its like asking "wat happens when an unstoppable object hits an unmovable wall?" God's power is keeping God from simply removing evil
@GrapplingIgnorance (part 2) it say to "beware the false prophet." so i dont think that people should blindly belive in ANYTHING. but much of the meaning of a relationship with God is faith so it wouldnt make much sense for God to prove his existence
@lenoka ya how it makes some kind of logical sense and all. gee isnt that wierd how a logical argument between 2 intelligent human beings could sound logicall in some ways from both sides. wow its amazing. dont waste my inbox space with this
@dfwilliamsii First Faith: The requirement of faith is a function of time. Jesus wandered around doing miracles for years so he could demonstrate to his followers of the time that he was of God. If Faith was so fundamental to Christianity why the miracles? Faith only became central to the religion when it became apparent that the Kingdom wasn't going to show up anytime soon.
@DIFowner i disagree with your conclusion but thats probably on th basis that i dont quite understand your argument. Christ did miracles for many reasons among which is that he had to show that he was not just a blasphemous crazy person. but faith is mentioned many times throughout the bible pre and post Jesus. if this didnt adequately add to the discussion perhaps you could elaborate more on your assertion so i could understand more wat you are arguing
@dfwilliamsii Martyrdom: His martyrdom was not dependent on the epoch. If he came today and wanted to find laws againt "Blasphemy" he would only need to show up in Saudi Arabia. But that is beyond the point in any case, becuase he was not crucified becuase of any religious preaching. He was crucified because he was a Political Threat to the status quo of the powerful and rich. Just as he would be today if he showed up. If he appeared in the US tomorrow they would line up to hang him again
@DIFowner i dont know wat you mean by "dependent on the epoch" but the laws against blasphemy in saudi arabia are against islamic blasphemy not jewish blasphemy if im correct (which i could be wrong). also although i agree that he was ultimately crucified was because he was able to make the pharisees and saducees look foolish but the crime under which he was charged. so id say its a "both/and" situation not one or the other
Nicely done video. It is a bit suspicious that God and Jesus only manifested in "biblical times", so, come on God - show yourself and clear this little confusion once and for all! Perhaps the confusion is all part of your plan? You do work in mysterious ways and all that!
This reminds me of a woman I used to work with. She was preaching to me about how the second coming of "the lord" was set in motion now that we have the capabilities to spread "the word" more accurately.... On and on.
I was pretty much a captive audience and it was torture.
Between you, darkmatter2525, and philhellenes, you think there would be enough convincing videos on youtube, to convert most of the religious population. I guess no matter how strong the evidence or reason, most will just willingly suspend all logic in order to believe in an invisible sky god that is also a best selling author of a book that rivals the world of a Dr. Seuss book.
Convert them to what? A different religion. Conversion is a dogmatic term, changing of someones 'belief' from one type of faith-requiring bullshit into another with consequent effort to keep them believing in that bullshit.
Using the term 'to convert' in the same sentence with words 'reason' and 'evidence' automatically belittles them.
@kirkey99 .... okay okay, get off your soap box. I simply meant, the videos are so insightful and factual that it would make a person of religion critically analyze their belief system to the point where they might renounce the idea or concept of religion... convert = reject dogmatic preposterous religious beliefs. does that work better for you?
I'll be saving and sharing this with others. I dont specifically remember what material you had before, but I am really enjoying what you have been putting out recently!
Your contribution to the youtube community will be greatly appreciated!
"In humoring the existence of God/Jesus, what if Christ had came to mankind during this current, modern generation, rather than a couple millenniums ago?"
America already has an answer for this: Waco, TX.
(IMO) If "the messiah" showed up today, he'd either end up in an asylum, or the BATF would burn his house down. I find it particularly interesting when remembering the Waco event, every day Christians turning on the Davidians as they do with today's WBC protests.
Why didn't Jesus at least write down his own gospel? The gospels we have describe him reading in the synagogue and writing in the dust, so he is portrayed as literate (and in any case to try to claim that the fact the average person was illiterate would have been some kind of obstacle to god incarnate, seems a bit silly). Why would he have allowed his teaching to come down to us in such a garbled form?
As the musical Jesus Christ Superstar says: You'd have managed better
If you'd had it planned
Now why'd you choose such a backward time
And such a strange land?
If you'd come today
You could have reached the whole nation
Israel in 4 BC had no mass communication
The fact things are so vague as to whether he exists at all, what he expects of us, or what he is offering (bodily resurrection or going to heaven as a spirit? eternal punishment? or anihilation?) makes you doubt he is there
and I also never saw why it should be such a great virtue to have faith, ie. believe strongly in something logically dubious without proof. Satan must have known he existed, but he still rebelled. We have courts and police and jails, but people still break the law.
when you realise that we have hardly enough evidence to even be sure Jesus existed - when believing things about things he did, and their significance, is said to be so vital - you really do think God could have done a better job of things...
wow, your videos are the most interesting videos on atheism I have seen in a long time. it's been getting a bit dull recently with all the videos coming out just being summed up by "god is stupid" phrased in a variety of ways, but yours are original and interesting. (also I think the hood actually makes it more visually engaging aswell )
Ya know...now that you mention it......if god had dropped a DVD way back then...long before DVDs were invented...THAT would go a much better distance to convincing me.
Fantastic analogy, man. I'm glad you're still in the tubes here.
Amazing deduction.
realigiousrayne 1 month ago
We should put all the books of the bible into the form of movies but not change a single word of it then when everyone goes to see it in movie form (since it's easier to watch than read more people will go see it than read the bible) they can see it for what it truly is
AntiMatterWave 3 months ago
@AntiMatterWave That won't work. Many people would just purposely ignore/block out the messed up elements and probably blame the movie company for desecrating their Bible by making it so f-ed up.
1Lanavis1 2 months ago
@1Lanavis1 thats my point though, they cant say it was desecrated because they wouldnt change a single word of it
AntiMatterWave 2 months ago
@AntiMatterWave I know. My point was that there would still be willfully ignorant theists who would refuse to acknowledge the accounts of the Bible Movie as applicable to their religion. Like how many Christians say that the Old Testament doesn't matter b/c of Jesus, but still use the Old T to justify homophobia. It's abhorrent and willfully dishonest or plain stupid, but there are theists like this.
1Lanavis1 2 months ago
@1Lanavis1 true however it wouldn't be to quarrel with religion, just the bible. even if theists declare it to be non-applicable the point would be that more people would be aware of the bible and it would stop being read to kids as if it's some kind of morality handbook, people would have to practice religion without the bible. This would also mean that when theists spout good quotes people would know it's full of evil and stop accepting the bible on the basis of it being the bible
AntiMatterWave 2 months ago
C'mon man. Of course god hasn't chosen our time. The scientific community would rip his work to pieces. MUCH easier to get your work published in a time where people could barely comprehend their own fecal matter. Wait...I take that back. There are still a few Catholics out there that have this same problem.
Digityus 3 months ago
This has been flagged as spam show
you still wear a hood
rollingcube 3 months ago
trip out noone
rollingcube 3 months ago
i really do love all of your work, maybe one day i will be able to speak to the masses in the way that you have spoken to youtube and convince them of the truth.
killswell 3 months ago
@killswell Thank you. Keep making videos, and it can happen.
GrapplingIgnorance 3 months ago 4
Ya ya ya blah blah blah ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
TheDano1947 4 months ago
@TheDano1947 keep dreaming Melisa
SuperMrgabriel 3 months ago
Blind belief = ignorance.
The finale: Unbeatable.
cluengas2k 5 months ago 2
What subject do you teach at school?!!
MJFAN666 5 months ago
god is a figment of man's imagination
octoron85 6 months ago 3
@Marxamarx, the universe isn't a nice, neat organization. Everything doesn't just stay out of the way of everything else. There are and were cataclysmic impacts. Comets, meteors, moons, and even whole planets strike each other. The entire Milky Way galaxy is colliding with the Andromeda galaxy. Do you honestly believe that amidst all the collisions (long ago, there were far more collisions in our system), that everything would continue spinning in the same direction?
DarkMatter2525 6 months ago
@DarkMatter2525 surely earth would have been hit and taken out of existence by then, don't you think? I'm sure you know as a teacher, that there is a planet called Jupiter, which is basically our solar systems "vacuum" ,so to speak, which sucks in nearly all of the space junk that comes towards us. Quite a convenient position to put Jupiter don't you think?
CreedChrist 3 months ago
@CreedChrist just like how the earth is the perfect distance from the sun? umm no. As the sun ages it burns hotter and hotter. So down the road the earth will be nothing more then a burnt rock. what about the fact that the andromida galaxy is on a collision course with the milky way? All of the planets in our solar system formed where they did because it is what happened. The conditions were right for them to form at that time and place. Just like life formed on earth, and evolved. chance....
bobby472 3 months ago
Comment removed
ubermonkey120 7 months ago
You should write a book... LOL
barnzee1 9 months ago 23
@barnzee1 I second this motion. Write a book, GrapplingIgnorance! I'll buy it!
myteethareshiny 9 months ago 19
@barnzee1 I doubt they'd even publish it or put it on the shelves since the book would detest the common belief.
ubermonkey120 6 months ago
@Marxamarx Mountain top being scorched. LOL ever heard of lightning? Lightning hits the tall mountain like we know lightning does it burns the top. Really what are you smoking?
yuo252 10 months ago
@Marxamarx Look up crop cycles there mystical cycles in crops THEY PROVE ALIENS COME DOWN HERE AND STEAL ARE DAMN COWS AND DO SHIT TO THEM!
yuo252 10 months ago
@Marxamarx No but Energy is infinite it can not be created or destroyed matter can be converted and not created or destroyed energy becomes matter which changes into different matter. GOD CAN NOT CREATE ITS SELF. DOUBLE RAINBOW WHAT DOES IT MEAN?
yuo252 10 months ago
@Marxamarx So, your logic is that since certain planetary bodies rotate "backwards," there is a God? Are you even educated to make such a vacuous illation?
therealonethistime 11 months ago
The constitution that you live under and are ruled by eventually has been updated..on a daily basis.
Yes the bible is the original constitution..the problem with it is that is has not been updated like the constitution.
I am the update and I have all the asnwers that will set you free in the hate of religion as I have lack of faith in the constitution and an extreme hate of it.
I have the answer of the angels..ask me a man.
MyFishyWishy 1 year ago
i m the 6000 th viewer :D
anninhilator 1 year ago
There is no evidence nor will there ever be evidence of a god that doesn't exist. God only exists in the uninformed human mind. Ignorance isn't a bad thing, but choosing to stay ignorant when you have the choice of learning and ACCEPTING the truth... well that is bad. People don't want to let go of the idea of 'god' because they are afraid of death. The are so afraid that their 'afterlife' may not exist that they'll believe anything but the truth. MAN CREATED GOD!
AMagicalUsername 1 year ago
You, my good sir, are very well spoken, and have a well worded speech, to express the simple logic that so many people reject. I hope your effort does not go to waste. I for one intend to reference this in debates with unreasonably religious hard heads.
Shad0wIllusion 1 year ago
@southdakotagirl30 What does Jesus specifically saying that he would return during the lifetimes of the people who were alive and listening to him speak have to do with "god's time"? Everyone who was there who could have heard him speak those words are long dead, which means it was a failed prophecy. And I spoke too hastily on the shroud. But, the evidence available seems to suggest a medieval origin, and at the very least does not well-support a 1st century one.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
Great video! Even if that farmer could read, it would not be guaranteed that he would be allowed to read the bible. I am thinking of the catholic banning of modern language bible translations, way back in the 15somethings. I have seen it quoted of the Pope Paul iterations where he says that reading the scriptures ruins the catholic religion, or something to that effect,... and in Italian I guess. :)
MrWindfall 1 year ago
@southdakotagirl30 And yes, I've heard of the second coming. According to Jesus, it should have happened during the lifetimes of some of the people he was speaking to in the bible. It seems he's a couple millenia late though... I think the bible has something to say about how to figure out if a person is a false prophet... typically if their prophecies fail to come true. So by the Bible's own metric, Jesus apparently was a false prophet.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@southdakotagirl30 Lee Strobel isn't very interesting. What I've read of him is rather unconvincing and is a lot of preaching to the choir stuff. I'm not sure what it means to be a "hardcore" atheist, but in any case, It appears Mr Strobel was an atheist for bad reasons.
The Shroud of Turin is well known to be a fake created long after Jesus' supposed death.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
true again mate :D Ive been sighing about something in that area and that is. The word of god was spread by ONE book. then duplicated. A medium worth more than its own weight in gold at that time. Then progressively getting cheaper yet still, unaffordable to the large majority in such a long timespan that the slow spreading of his word gave time for "false" religoins to get their hold on far away regions. Not fair. He could have placed a bible in every persons hand. Instead it became a business
pappapaps 1 year ago
What the U.S.A. needs is a good, national Atheist dating-service.
A lot of small communities in the U.S. don't have many Atheists, and the few who DO live there, are often afraid to admit it, for fear they'd end up treated like GrapplingIgnorance.
Putting an ad in your local paper saying that you're looking for a fellow single Atheist in the U.S., is almost like putting an ad in your local paper in the 1950s, saying that you were looking for a fellow single Communist.
SinnFein4ever 1 year ago
Actually bible is not that old.
pope has power to make any book holy, and if he decides to he can claim that "Moby Dick" is god's inspired at it will become.
also pope can introduce new dogmas anytime.
just that insane amount of already existing and contradicting stuff makes everything absurd enough.
but there is no obstruction for Jesus to come on dvd, all we need is for pope to proclaim "passion of the crist" or say "life of Theresa" as holly movie.
deltaxcd 1 year ago
His voice sounds a bit young to be a teacher.
But his mind deffinatly seems much more intelligent than those of most teachers.
Particularly most public-school teachers.
When a person with a college degree, who had very good grades in school, decides to become a public school teacher (particularly going out of their way to teach at a very bad school, in a very bad area) you know that they're probbably an idealist.
The world neeeds many more like him.
(I wonder if he's single.)
SinnFein4ever 1 year ago
@SinnFein4ever There ARE many more like him, to your fortune.
SomethingSea1 1 year ago
For those of you Theists that say "yes" to his question of a modern day revelation then Convert to Mormonism because thats what they believe actually happen
MrLetmepeeinyourbutt 1 year ago
my issue: The more unbelievable a claim, the more skeptical you should be to be convinced of the claim. I'll never ask anyone to prove they bought a pack of gum, just because I can't see it in their pocket. If someone told me they were half-alien, I'd want a heck of a lot of proof. Why is it, then, that people swallow the God-pill hook, line, and sinker without a single query? That is the most out-there claim ever. There exists an Invisible, Caring Sky Daddy with very specific wishes.
LoneQuietus 1 year ago 2
@LoneQuietus Indeed- extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
GrapplingIgnorance 1 year ago 5
Exactly
EvilBeatsmith 1 year ago
Cheezies making YT videos...now that would be funny, it probably would turn out like the AwedCouple videos!
AbdultheImpailler 1 year ago
It sure would be interesting to see all of the little children running around with syringes or electric chairs around their necks instead of the cross. Not to mention on the steeples of churches.
Tokilladream 1 year ago
I personally believe that there is a reason that Jesus DIDNT come in this era of information exchange and technology. I believe that he came before inventions such as the tape recorder because a vast part of being a christian is having faith that any of it is true. also even if his miracles were recorded they would have been ridiculed as if he were some kind of magician of a fame-seeker. also in this era we dont have laws againt so-called blasphemy so he could not have been martyred.
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii I find it foolish to follow a religion that requires faith. If there is a lack of explanation of evidence for your beleif, why aren't you allowed to question it? Why should you beleive everythign your religion tells you to swallow without having a concise, vallid argument, explanation, or set of evidence for it? If you choose to accept that, that's fine, but you must see why many people just can't accept the need to "just have faith" instead of having proof?
GrapplingIgnorance 1 year ago 9
@GrapplingIgnorance i definately having trouble believing something that you cant prove but most christians would say the opposite. why follow a religion that doesnt require faith? if God was proveable then people would follow him out of fear not out of love and faith. and christians should be encouraged to questions things they dont understand. the masses of society generally believe wat they are told religion or otherwise and that is their own fault. there are many time throughout the bible
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii So... faith makes it impossible to follow God out of fear? There are many Christian denominations that sell themselves based on the idea that people are sinful and will be damned... fear is a big component of many Christians' religious devotion. If God wants people to love him and devote themselves to him of their own volition then perhaps he shouldn't have set the punishment for failing to do so to be eternal suffering and torture. That doesn't seem like a real choice to me.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 well im not going to defend religious groups who throw hell at people in order to et them to obey rather than believe and understand because i dont believe its ok either but if i defend every christian who ever said anything stupid id be fighting a losing battle. and its not that God set that as the punishment, thats just the option left over. basically you choose to go to heaven or you dont. wat happens to you after that is out of his hands because you told him not to get
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 through your actions. so if you look at it differently and less critically (and thats not a shot at atheists its just my observation of how alot of people view God) then its like God gave you wat SHOULD BE an obvious choice. go to heaven where you are prtotected and loved or not and be subject to watever other powers that be. so i understnad how that can look like a threat instead of a choice but if you think of God as having a personality and not just a judging force and read the
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 bible then i think you would find, as i have, that God really does care and works in our favor but wont intrude.
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii Here's the problem I have with the whole concept. Obviously, no one actually deserves to go to hell. God, who is supposedly a wise individual would know this. He has the power to prevent people from going there. Given that he knows no one deserves it and can trivially prevent people from going there, the fact that he doesn't leaves him culpable. If you could keep people from suffering a horrible and undeserved fate simply by wanting to, would it not be criminal not to do so?
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 we could argue wat "deserves" really means in that statement but i wont. if i understand you correctly you dont think that anyone but those who commit really heinous crimes should/would go to hell. but th issue, again, isnt that God wants them to go to hell its that we choose to. he gave a no-brainer option to adam and eve and they were tricked and chose wrong. in turn some of us choose not to accept Jesus' sacrifice and God is going to honor that because thats who he is. he isnt
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 going to force us into heaven if we chose not to go there. and i see your point about not helping if you could but like i said its not like an impending danger to us. we chose to go so not letting us would not only deprive us it would make us slaves. and God's not gonna do that to us. he does have th power to stop hell but much like the constitution limits th government God limited himself with the laws he set for himself
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii Are you saying that everyone who, based on your theology, is bound for hell has chosen to go there? I'm not saying that if someone truly wanted to go there, that God should force them not to. I'm saying that God ought to do something about all the people who, based on the theology, will end up there because they, like me, remain unconvinced of the easily doubtable proposition that he exists, or have in fact never even been exposed to the idea.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 i am saying that they chose to through not choosing Jesus' help. and he is doing something through his followers (supposing we do our job). If God came down to everyone and spoke to them personally there would be no faith. and if he came to some and not others then the ones he didnt come to would be offended and reject God and it would be counter productive. people like me are trying to get the message across that God isnt all that far-fetched of an idea. it up to those who dont
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii " i am saying that they chose to through not choosing Jesus' help" And this is where you're getting mixed up. I haven't chosen to refuse Jesus' help. I simply don't believe that, first of all, I need his help, and second, that, assuming he existed, he did anything that could help me. It's like if you offered to conjure up 1 million dollars for me magically and then when I mention that I don't believe you can actually do it, you question my resons for refusing your help.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 you may not have chosen not to to let Jesus help you but you have chosen for him to help you. i know that sounds kinda backwards but, using your example, i offer a million dollars to anyone who asks for a million dollars and believes i can do it then by not asking me for a million dollars you will not get a million dollars. and whether or not you believe Jesus is the son of God. im sure the event of his death and existence are provable. and i know it seems like jumping blindly to
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 an unsupported conclusion but as i said before there is evidence for it just none that is undeniable. i personally accept the likeliness of its truth. i cant prove its true but i accept the evidence given as proof enough for my faith
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii I have no problem with the idea that the Jesus of the bible was inspired by a real person, maybe named Jesus or not. Maybe this person was even crucified. However, I do not consider copies of copies of copies with no original manuscripts of stories written by superstitious people decades after the events based on oral traditions good enough evidence to accept the idea that this person ressurected from the dead or walked on water or raised dead people.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 there may be no original manuscripts of the new testament but there are of the old specifically isiah which corroborates th story of Jesus. also many historians and philosophers write about Jesus and many of the event surrounding him. but i dont like to argue the credibility of the bible mostly for the fact that there are a thousand well-ya-buts to argue against them and i can only argue that that are likely to be true. but if you think about the early church, writing down the
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii "i dont like to argue the credibility of the bible mostly for the fact that there are a thousand well-ya-buts to argue against them" And, knowing this, you don't have a problem with it? If God is the author of the book, no rational person should be able to find fault with it. To me, if I'm reading a book that's supposedly authored by the all-powerful and all-knowing creator of the universe... well let's just say the Bible is nowhere near what I'd expect.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 i dont have a problem with it because i think it is that way on purpose. like i said before if i can prove God then theres no reason for faith in him. same with the bible. if i can prove the bible i effectively prove God. also the bible isnt my only evidence for believing in God.
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii You're kind of confusing me. You talk about how faith is necessary for belief to be sufficiently meaningful, yet you speak of the existence of evidence and experiences that remove your need for faith to believe in your god. If it is all about faith then arguing with someone who finds this kind of faith distasteful is a waste of time. Why do you get to be so fortunate to have these special personal experiences to affirm your beliefs while the rest of us just need to have faith?
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 they dont remove my need for faith they just affirm it. they help my faith to be strong. and i have these experiences because i believed first then asked God to show himself to me. not that i was asking for proof, i was asking to be closer to him because i wanted to see him. kinda like when you want to hang out with a friend and not like asking your friend to prove he is real.
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii I beleived in god, then asked him for proof to confirm my belief and he never did provide. It's strange how this experience isn't consistant.
GrapplingIgnorance 1 year ago
@GrapplingIgnorance i dont claim ever saying it would be or that you could produce God's reaction on command. its not that i decided to believe one day and asked to for an experience the next. and i never said i asked him for proof. i asked to be close to him. if experiences with God were a producible procedure that could be replicated over and over God would be more of a puppet than a God
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii Faith in this context is the belief in something in the absence of good rational reasons, or in some cases in the presence of good rational reasons to disbelieve. You have told me you believe in God based on what I'm sure you consider good, rational reasons. Thus, your belief is not faith-based. "i have these experiences because i believed first then asked God to show himself to me" Translation: "I kicked my confirmation bias into high gear and eventually saw what I wanted to see."
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 well i could see how you could come to that conclusion but i disagree with your definition of faith. the way you define it makes it seem that faith can only occur if you ignore evidence. but i would replace the words "rational reasons" with "rational proof." i can have reasons for believing without having proof. if i felt the need i could tell myself that any visions i had were my imagination or a psychological anomaly. same for speaking in tongues. but i find it more likely (not
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii Well, if you want to use your own private definition of the word, that's your call. It really hinders effective communication though when you mean something different than a word's definition when you use it. And, I'm not interested in "proof". I am interested in evidence (which is not the same thing as "proof") in the technical sense. Anyway, your claim that good evidence exists for your god undermines your position that faith is necessary for belief to have sufficient meaning.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 its not my own private definition, its the dictionary. faith - belief not based on proof. having evidence for something doesnt keep a person from having faith in it. evolution for example. you stated before that we cant prove it yet but you believe it is true. you have faith in evolution.
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii I have no "faith" in evolution. My acceptance of it is based on the perponderance of evidence and observation that supports it. Science doesn't deal with "proof", it deals with evidence. Colloquially, some people consider these words synonymous. Insofar as you allow for this, then there is tons of "proof" for evolution. At any rate, you're mincing words. Faith can only be defined as "belief not based on proof" if you consider proof synonymous with evidence.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 fair enough. bad analogy. but at least you agree that evidence and proof are not the same. but i think its safe to say that scientific evidence comes closer to proof than philosophical evidence.
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 that i could prove it) that it is God.
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 teachings and event wasnt really as important as actually teaching it. so like i said i could argue th credibility of the bible but we would get nowhere because i would make an assertion, you would say well ya but . . ., i would reiterate the likeliness and repeat and repeat and it would go nowhere. but that isnt the only evidence that supports God/Christ its just the doctrines
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 believe to decide whether or not they want to acceppt or even consider the idea it could be the truth
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii I'm not saying that God ought to force people to do anything. He (assuming he existed) just ought to make his existence more obvious. This isn't a debate over whether one should choose heaven over hell. This is a debate over whether heaven, hell, god, and satan all exist. God, based on the attributes assigned to him, could trivally make his existence completely undoubtable, and then we could debate over the path to salvation. But he doesn't.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 like i said he wants you to have faith. believing in something you can prove isnt really believing in anything. but theres lots of evidence to say he does exist. thousands of reports of miracles, tongues, the bible, etc but its not "undeniable proof" so alot of people dont even count it into consideration. and as i said before God doesnt want you to have undeniable proof, he wants you to have faith
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii "If God came down to everyone and spoke to them personally there would be no faith" Good! Faith is a bad thing. And, the quran and miracles attributed to allah prove islam, the baghavad gita and miracles attributed to hindu gods prove hinduism, etc. Believing in something without good rational reasons isn't virtuous, it's defective thinking (this is easily demonstrable). I'm not sure I'd want to spend eternity in service to a god that is so vain that he would desire such a thing.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 to argue the miracles of other religions i can really only attribute 2 things 1 i, personally, dont accept its credibility and 2 satan originally worked for God so he has counterfeit miracles and it says that many times in th bible. and i never said my reasons for believing werent rational i just cant prove it to you. if a man sees a murder occur and he is the only one who did he will still believe it to be true regardless of whether or not he can prove it. at least thats how it
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii "if a man sees a murder occur and he is the only one who did he will still believe it to be true regardless of whether or not he can prove it" This analogy is going to fail miserably unless you're going to tell me you actually were an eye witness to the events of Jesus' life and ressurection. The problem isn't that there are eye witnesses who can't manage to prove it, it's that we have no eye witness testimony.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 well you misunderstood my analogy. i have seen things that others cannot. i cannot give someone else my experiences. so its not that the "murder" was his resurection, it that it was God's divinity
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 for me. and you could call God vain but i dont think thats an accurate description of the situation. its kinda like the difference between "he set it on the table" and "he slammed it down." 2 wyas of sayi9ng essentially th same thing but one is more accurate than the other. God created humanity so he could love us and we could love him in return so to say that God wants our love to be based more on decision than logic, to me, just makes it seem as though he wants it to really
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 mean something as compared to "i do it because its that obvious that he exists and if i dont im gonna go to hell"
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii "i do it because its that obvious that he exists and if i dont im gonna go to hell" First of all, knowing someone exists isn't going to make me love him or her, even God. Whether I believe in a god and whether I love that god are two completely separate issues... though the latter can't happen before the former. And, if God wants sincere love then he might want to consider removing the harsh consequences for not doing so. You can't make someone love you at gunpoint.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 well first the statement that you quoted was not wat i MYSELF would say, its wat someone else would say in the previously mentioned scenario. and i know that making knowing the existence of something will not make you love it but it might make you fear it which as i said is not wat God wants. and like ive said before, the misunderstanding here is that you assume that God is holding the gun. satan is holding the gun and the death of Jesus gives you th option to take it away. so to
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 say that "you cant make someone at gunpoint" is the core truth at both of our arguments. Jesus died to remove the gun but only he has th power to take it away but you must ask him first
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii I'm not buying it. God, being supposedly omnipotent, has the ability to eliminate Satan and Hell with a mere whimsical thought. At the very least, he could ensure no one ever goes to hell, ever (since no one ever deserves it). The fact that he has this power and chooses not to use it unconditionally makes him culpable. "Love me or I won't save you from the man with a gun" is about as bad as putting a gun to the person's head yourself, and just as destructive to free will.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 about acknowledging his divinity. so i would edit your statement to say "believe i can remove the gun and i will." or "trust i can and i will"
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii "about acknowledging his divinity. so i would edit your statement..." Ok. It's still wrong. To have the ability to prevent someone from suffering an eternity of torture, and knowingly witholding the use of that power for ANY reason is evil. It's as simple as that.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 well i would disagree but thats my personal view. also it goes back to wat i said before about letting us make our own decisions. He said he would let us and he has to stand by that as God. and honestly at one point or another the analogy had to stop fitting EXACTLY i mean analogies are used to simplify a complicated situation by example but in no way simplify th original situation. so i would agree that in the gun situation it makes more sense to immediately remove the gun but in
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 that scenario the danger is clear and present so no one would chose to refuse his help. is it to far-fetched to say that we can both agree that the dangers are not entirely analogous;at least from a human standpoint?
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii Relative to an eternity of suffering, our short lifespan that can end without warning at any moment seems pretty immediate. But I don't care about the analogy. I'm talking about the actual situation your theology descirbes. There's hell in which those who enter remain for eternity. God, being all-knowing, knows that no one deserves this fate. Being all-powerful, he can trivially prevent anyone from enduring it. He chooses not to in some cases. Ergo, God cannot be called "good".
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 there are 3 judeo-christian laws about evil: God is all-powerful, God loves us, evil exists. many people and alot of philosophers try to justify this by saying that God cannot be 1 of these 3 to make it work. But as i said before God has limited himself in saying that he will let is choose. If God says he will do something he is limited by his own power to do so. like how the constitution limits the government yet the Government made the constitution (i think i already made
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii The constitution was not made by the government, rather it is the other way around. The constitution was created by a group of men that preceded the government thus created. The situation you describe is even worse. Not only now has God chosen not to save some people from a horrible fate, but, according to you, he has made it impossible for himself to change his mind on this topic. Also, the "unstoppable force/immovable object" concept is irrelevant because it is nonsensical.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 fair enough then ignore the part about the constittion being made by the government but it is still part of the government and limits its power. it not about changing his mind. i keep saying this. its like a law set in place. the only thing with as much authority as God is God's word. this is why he cannot remove evil in the way you desccribe. i dont see why its so farfetched to think that God is giong to let us make our own decisions regardless of the consequences
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii A belief isn't a decision. It's an involuntary reaction to cognitive inputs. If your god created me, then he gave me my intellect and skeptical nature. No rational person, believing they had a meaningful and real choice, would choose hell. This isn't about choice. This god supposedly created a ruleset that rewards credulity and punishes intellectual honesty, irrespective of what kind of person you are. Hitler, a Catholic, enjoys heaven while I am bound for hell. Sounds really fair.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 i would disagree with you definition of belief. belief - confidence in the truth or existence of something not immediately susceptible to rigorous proof. a person can be skeptical and still be christian. honestly th skeptical christians are some of the wisest i know. also you make it seem as thought God made you to be a atheist but God made you with th blueprint on which your life built on. and God doesnt punish intellectual honesty. thats your interpretation (wat i believe a
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii A belief is something one holds to be true. Being "provable" has nothing to do with it. A skeptic who is also a theist is doing skepticism wrong, at least in that aspect of his life. Faith (of this type) is incompatible with and destructive to skeptical and scientific inquiry. This "blueprint" on which my life is built includes the inability to believe something without sufficient evidence and a distaste for the idea of faith.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 i dont understand how my belief in God "doesnt hold true" but moving on rom that, thats not wat skepticism is. skeptic - a person who questions the validity or authenticity of something purporting to be factual. it doesnt say anything about science just questioning. wat you are describing sounds more like bias toward the scientific against the super-natural. so faith (im not sure wat you mean by of this type) is not incompatible with skepticism.
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii Don't conflate the generic definition of the word skepticism with the ideological movement called Skepticism. The ideology trancends and encompasses the basic definition. The type of faith I am talking about is the belief in something without good, rational reasons to do so. Since the skeptical movement is all about believing only in that which can be supported rationally, there is no room for that kind of faith among someone who claims the skeptic label.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 ok its not letting me put my response on here
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 i believe faith can be had with good reasons. it is a choice after all to have faith so why could one not have good reasons to do so? and i pull my definitions from dictionary.reference. com so i havent changed anything about its definition. and i think if someone believes in things that can ONLY be proven then they would either be undecided on many important things or be against many things that could be true or both.
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 i dont htink reality is that black and white. i mean think about politics. i cant prove that one form of government is better than another i can only show you wat i believe to be true. same with evolution i mean you said yourself that we cant yet prove it but many people believe it is true because of the likeliness of its truth (also i figured out it wasnt letting me post because i had a website in my post)
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii This is becoming far too cumbersome for comments. I'm sending a PM.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 misinterpretation). God never told us not to ask questions or try to understand things. he just asks us to have faith and as i have argued, faith is not about blind belief
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii God probably should have told people not to ask questions. Given how easily doubtable he has made the proposition of his existence, honest inquiry rarely leads to strong belief. I often hear stories of theists finding skepticism and eventually abandoning religion as a result (I am one such individual). I don't think I've ever heard of a story of a non-theist individual adopting skepticism and acquiring religious belief as a result.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 here is another difference of perspective. satan is known as the father of lies and he is called that because he makes lies seem true. he uses science and logic, of which there is less in the case for christianity (i believe it is this way for reasons i find unimportant to explain), to make God seem impossible. but change your perspective and you find different results. instead of looking for falsification, look for understanding and evidence. i did this with christianity as i have
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii So, insofar as you want to talk about the necessity of that kind of faith, you're wasting your time. If you want to talk about evidence for that in which you believe, then we can talk. However, I doubt you above all other believers will have something you can present that passes the smell test. But I won't stop you from trying. And personal experiences, while sufficient perhaps for the individual who experiences them, lose their impact and value when retold, so we can skip those.
Arkalius80 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 well my original objective wasnt to argue faith at all more to show that there is a perspective that could be considered legitimate. i just dislike it when atheists discount anything christians say just because we're "just stupid christians" because then even if we had undeniable proof atheists wouldnt listen to it. im not sure wat you mean by "the smell test" but i wouldnt be against presenting evidence for God and i would be willing to remove personal experience as long as we
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 dont remove phenomena. but i would have to say that i dont think that it is likely to get us anywhere. i think we would be likely to end with agree to disagree. but it could be fun and it could get somewhere so sure. ill let you start by presenting your evidence first. o and sorry it took me so long to reply ive had a combination of being sick and lots of hours at work
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 other religions and christianity won out
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 also belief may sometimes be an involuntary reaction to cognitive inputs but that would be a poorly evaluated belief. you believe evolution is real but you believe that because you support the evidence. (evolution is just an example you could really apply it to almost anything you believe that cannot be proven)
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@Arkalius80 that analogy) so as ive said before God has to stay to his word. this doesnt make alot of sense to most people when i say this because to then its like asking "wat happens when an unstoppable object hits an unmovable wall?" God's power is keeping God from simply removing evil
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@GrapplingIgnorance (part 2) it say to "beware the false prophet." so i dont think that people should blindly belive in ANYTHING. but much of the meaning of a relationship with God is faith so it wouldnt make much sense for God to prove his existence
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii Now isn't that convenient.
lenoka 1 year ago
@lenoka ya how it makes some kind of logical sense and all. gee isnt that wierd how a logical argument between 2 intelligent human beings could sound logicall in some ways from both sides. wow its amazing. dont waste my inbox space with this
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii First Faith: The requirement of faith is a function of time. Jesus wandered around doing miracles for years so he could demonstrate to his followers of the time that he was of God. If Faith was so fundamental to Christianity why the miracles? Faith only became central to the religion when it became apparent that the Kingdom wasn't going to show up anytime soon.
DIFowner 1 year ago
@DIFowner i disagree with your conclusion but thats probably on th basis that i dont quite understand your argument. Christ did miracles for many reasons among which is that he had to show that he was not just a blasphemous crazy person. but faith is mentioned many times throughout the bible pre and post Jesus. if this didnt adequately add to the discussion perhaps you could elaborate more on your assertion so i could understand more wat you are arguing
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
@dfwilliamsii Martyrdom: His martyrdom was not dependent on the epoch. If he came today and wanted to find laws againt "Blasphemy" he would only need to show up in Saudi Arabia. But that is beyond the point in any case, becuase he was not crucified becuase of any religious preaching. He was crucified because he was a Political Threat to the status quo of the powerful and rich. Just as he would be today if he showed up. If he appeared in the US tomorrow they would line up to hang him again
DIFowner 1 year ago
@DIFowner i dont know wat you mean by "dependent on the epoch" but the laws against blasphemy in saudi arabia are against islamic blasphemy not jewish blasphemy if im correct (which i could be wrong). also although i agree that he was ultimately crucified was because he was able to make the pharisees and saducees look foolish but the crime under which he was charged. so id say its a "both/and" situation not one or the other
dfwilliamsii 1 year ago
God and jesus thumbed this video down
Noone1505123 1 year ago
@Noone1505123 The Holy Spirit must have seen the vid! Now there's 3 down votes! (Proof that God exists)
Talamasca124 1 year ago
@Talamasca124 Oh nooooes- the trinity!
GrapplingIgnorance 1 year ago
God the Pod cast, LOL
darkwhitedirewolf 1 year ago
Nicely done video. It is a bit suspicious that God and Jesus only manifested in "biblical times", so, come on God - show yourself and clear this little confusion once and for all! Perhaps the confusion is all part of your plan? You do work in mysterious ways and all that!
LAnonHubbard 1 year ago
It's Toddintheshadows older brother!
;-)
I honestly hadn't thought about revelation in that way before. Well-grappled, sir, well-grappled.
AndrewTheEternal 1 year ago
excellent point. divinely inspired no doubt! :)
oliesbw 1 year ago
This reminds me of a woman I used to work with. She was preaching to me about how the second coming of "the lord" was set in motion now that we have the capabilities to spread "the word" more accurately.... On and on.
I was pretty much a captive audience and it was torture.
cmbmachine 1 year ago
Between you, darkmatter2525, and philhellenes, you think there would be enough convincing videos on youtube, to convert most of the religious population. I guess no matter how strong the evidence or reason, most will just willingly suspend all logic in order to believe in an invisible sky god that is also a best selling author of a book that rivals the world of a Dr. Seuss book.
McGillaaGorillaa 1 year ago 8
@McGillaaGorillaa I take being mentioned in their company as a very high complement. Thank you.
GrapplingIgnorance 1 year ago 2
@McGillaaGorillaa
Maaan..
"to covert most of the religious population"
Convert them to what? A different religion. Conversion is a dogmatic term, changing of someones 'belief' from one type of faith-requiring bullshit into another with consequent effort to keep them believing in that bullshit.
Using the term 'to convert' in the same sentence with words 'reason' and 'evidence' automatically belittles them.
kirkey99 1 year ago
@kirkey99 .... okay okay, get off your soap box. I simply meant, the videos are so insightful and factual that it would make a person of religion critically analyze their belief system to the point where they might renounce the idea or concept of religion... convert = reject dogmatic preposterous religious beliefs. does that work better for you?
McGillaaGorillaa 1 year ago
@McGillaaGorillaa
Yeah, i got it. Didn't really mean to nag.
I watched too much creationist bullshit before that comment, so I was overly annoyed.
kirkey99 1 year ago
Fucking epic, man.
That was great!
ThatOneQuestion 1 year ago
I'll be saving and sharing this with others. I dont specifically remember what material you had before, but I am really enjoying what you have been putting out recently!
Your contribution to the youtube community will be greatly appreciated!
ThatOneQuestion 1 year ago
@ThatOneQuestion Thank you- I'm glad you enjoyed it. Your comments are appreciate too.
GrapplingIgnorance 1 year ago
@Aegidia01 Hmm, I've never heard that. It sounds like a fun song. Had I known about it, I probably would have put it at the end of this video.
GrapplingIgnorance 1 year ago
@henriktor I was thinking of the copied text, but said the printing press when recording this video. That's why I made the annotation at the start.
GrapplingIgnorance 1 year ago
Just FYI, the plural of "millennium" is "Millennia "
starburzt 1 year ago
@starburzt I considered that, but it didn't sound right. I appreciate the correction and will annotate it accordingly.
GrapplingIgnorance 1 year ago
Sums it up pretty well for me.
I wanna go perform some 'dark sorcery' and eat some chicken nuggets.
ne0nblackaeterna 1 year ago
Your videos are gold man! Keep it up! :D
MrTrance420 1 year ago
@MrTrance420 Thank you- I apprecitate the feedback.
GrapplingIgnorance 1 year ago
@GrapplingIgnorance
"In humoring the existence of God/Jesus, what if Christ had came to mankind during this current, modern generation, rather than a couple millenniums ago?"
America already has an answer for this: Waco, TX.
(IMO) If "the messiah" showed up today, he'd either end up in an asylum, or the BATF would burn his house down. I find it particularly interesting when remembering the Waco event, every day Christians turning on the Davidians as they do with today's WBC protests.
VincentVonGoat 1 year ago
@VincentVonGoat I completely agree.
GrapplingIgnorance 1 year ago
@WanderingDayDreamer
Why didn't Jesus at least write down his own gospel? The gospels we have describe him reading in the synagogue and writing in the dust, so he is portrayed as literate (and in any case to try to claim that the fact the average person was illiterate would have been some kind of obstacle to god incarnate, seems a bit silly). Why would he have allowed his teaching to come down to us in such a garbled form?
orlando098 1 year ago
As the musical Jesus Christ Superstar says: You'd have managed better
If you'd had it planned
Now why'd you choose such a backward time
And such a strange land?
If you'd come today
You could have reached the whole nation
Israel in 4 BC had no mass communication
The fact things are so vague as to whether he exists at all, what he expects of us, or what he is offering (bodily resurrection or going to heaven as a spirit? eternal punishment? or anihilation?) makes you doubt he is there
orlando098 1 year ago
@orlando098
and I also never saw why it should be such a great virtue to have faith, ie. believe strongly in something logically dubious without proof. Satan must have known he existed, but he still rebelled. We have courts and police and jails, but people still break the law.
orlando098 1 year ago
@orlando098
when you realise that we have hardly enough evidence to even be sure Jesus existed - when believing things about things he did, and their significance, is said to be so vital - you really do think God could have done a better job of things...
orlando098 1 year ago
wow, your videos are the most interesting videos on atheism I have seen in a long time. it's been getting a bit dull recently with all the videos coming out just being summed up by "god is stupid" phrased in a variety of ways, but yours are original and interesting. (also I think the hood actually makes it more visually engaging aswell )
evilsceptic 1 year ago
@evilsceptic Thank you- it's nice to know there is some appeal to the new look.
GrapplingIgnorance 1 year ago
Wow, this was a well spent 3 minutes and 12 seconds.
Albatrossi 1 year ago
@Albatrossi Good- mission accomplished :)
GrapplingIgnorance 1 year ago
Ya know...now that you mention it......if god had dropped a DVD way back then...long before DVDs were invented...THAT would go a much better distance to convincing me.
Fantastic analogy, man. I'm glad you're still in the tubes here.
WineisyourFriend 1 year ago
You should join forces with some of the other atheist here on youtube.
Your story is amazing and well said, if you add animation to these stories they would spread like wild fire :) GJ
barakuda1111 1 year ago
@barakuda1111 I did several collabs on my old channel that are now no longer usable, but I'm trying new ways to make them and similar concepts work.
GrapplingIgnorance 1 year ago
@GrapplingIgnorance Ok. Keep up the good work :)
barakuda1111 1 year ago
You just lack faith...
Its the same reaon that hay-zues didn't appear in china or japan where people were more literate and more civilized.
savageecho 1 year ago
must say, pretty good.