If I had $1 for every time God bailed me out...

[Codemaster92163]

If I had $1 for every time God bailed me out..

Sad thing is I actually sold my soul to a friend last year for a snapple *Wrote in blood and everything since my finger was actually already cut at the time. I had to do it on a napkin though since we were in lunch*

 

[iKotomi]

If I had $1 for every time God bailed me out..

Does that not make God's morality entirely arbitrary? God could say that slavery is just, and you would be required to follow after it.

While I haven't read up on Kant for a while either, I was under the assumption his premises were based entirely on a God enforcing objective morality? I may be incorrect, it's something I haven't looked at in quite some time.

Yes, for all intents and purposes, if God existed and had a universal measure for morality, it would be arbitrary to us whether or not they are moral, though said god figure might have had some reasoning of his own for establishing such laws. You either broke the law or you didn't, which from a purely objective standard makes it prohibitively difficult to be moral with laws given by the likes of religion.

For example, say for example that we have two universal laws, do not lie and do not kill. If a murderer came to your door and asked you where his target was, if you lie, you break one law, if you tell the truth, you effectively break another. Whatever you do, from an objective standpoint you have committed an immoral action, though one action will have a more desirable outcome than the other. If you're going to be judged without your get out of jail free card, you're probably doomed just because you were not capable of super-humanly not lied and saved the victim. Objective standards can exist, they just trap people into accepting that they are immoral and imperfect beings which is hard for a lot of people to swallow.

Religion tends to get around this point by saying you're a bad person, but you will have your sins forgiven if you do such and such things. Otherwise there wouldn't be any point in people being religious since you're doomed either way in the after life if it exists.

The problem with this is that an objective truth has to be mind independent.

Morality isn't mind independent.

Here's an objective truth. 1+1 = 2. Naming conventions aside, the concept of 1, and the concept of 2 exist regardless of whether or not you believe it or recognize it. You may disagree with that fact, but in the end of the day, you were either right in accepting it or you were wrong in denying its legitimacy.

The same applies with arguments for the existence of God. His existence or non-existence, and the establishment of any laws that are universal is a priori...Nothing you think or argue can change the fact, and you would either be wrong or right depending on if you accepted what was in fact the reality. You're arguing that there are no objective truths. I'm arguing that if there was an objective truth, there's nothing that you can do about it, as I hope is clear with the 1+1 argument.

 

[BlackDragon37]

If I had $1 for every time God bailed me out..

Objective truths aren't based on choice. There are objective truths, like the example you've put up.

My point is that you cannot choose to disobey objective truths, whether you like it or not.

So maybe we're on the same page here.

 

[KoshTheKoala]

If I had $1 for every time God bailed me out..

Link?

http://www.stephenjaygould.org/ctrl/news/file002.html
http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/3506.asp (links to the same article, but it's from a website dedicated to defending Genesis...)

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/2111174/Intelligent-people-less-likely-to-believe-in-God.html

Depends on what you call fact. Since God is not yet proven to exist, the atheists in the thread are gonna be all "It's fact that God doesn't exist because science is responsible for everything," or vice versa, which is not fact, it's an opinion. Show me hard facts that show God doesn't exist, or whatever you're trying to prove. Otherwise, it's an opinion.

That's where you're wrong. If you truly believe in the scientific method, you would never say "it's a fact that god(s) do not exist." You would say "here is all the proof against the existence of a god and here's all the proof for the existence of a god. From all this data I can conclude that gods probably do not exist, but since we do not know everything, it is possible." Unlike religion, science absolutely delights in realizing they've gotten something wrong and fixing it. For example, the discovery that the Earth revolves around the Sun was fantastic to scientists and painful to theists... look up Galileo. This who idea that science seeks to learn is what makes it so powerful. Religion wants to maintain the status quo and looks at any divergence as heresy.

The problem with "showing you facts that god doesn't exist" is that the ball isn't in the court of atheists. It's in the court of the theists... show them proof god exists. Oh right, there isn't any that is verifiable, which means personal revelations and "feelings" don't count as proof.

Honestly, how do you ever have hard proof that something does not exist? Look up the Flying Spaghetti Monster... give me hard proof that he isn't your god. According to the FSM scriptures, he is very adept at hiding himself, just as your god is. But this has been covered by a previous poster.

You know as well as I do that no one knows this. So what are you trying to say?

What I'm trying to say is, why do you believe in a god? What's the point if he's been basically proven to not have done anything except possibly create the big bang, then left the universe forever? Since praying doesn't do anything and the chances are that he really doesn't care about humanity, why live your life with god on your mind?

As Manta said earlier, belief in god has caused most of the world's most evil acts (with Stalin being one of the very few exceptions). A world in which no one can say "god told me to" to defend themselves after killing dozens or hundreds or thousands of people would be a much better world. What if, after 9/11, the entire Arab world condemned Al-Qaeda for the terrorists they are and actively hunted them down? What if there was never a Biblical excuse for slavery or racism or any other hate-crime?

 

[Y-Disciple]

If I had $1 for every time God bailed me out..

http://www.stephenjaygould.org/ctrl/news/file002.html
http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/3506.asp (links to the same article, but it's from a website dedicated to defending Genesis...)

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/2111174/Intelligent-people-less-likely-to-believe-in-God.html

Interesting. Okay, I'll give in to that.

Religion wants to maintain the status quo and looks at any divergence as heresy.

That's generalizing a bit. It all depends on how you interpret the Bible (or whatever book you choose). What I see is that God would want us to be accepting of others regardless of race, sexuality, beliefs, etc. Religion can condradict science or it can agree with it, depending on who you ask.

What I'm trying to say is, why do you believe in a god? What's the point if he's been basically proven to not have done anything except possibly create the big bang, then left the universe forever? Since praying doesn't do anything and the chances are that he really doesn't care about humanity, why live your life with god on your mind??

Why would anyone believe in God? Because it gives me hope and rests my mind. Think about this- if a loved one dies, would you prefer to believe that they're gone for good and you'll never see them again, or would you rather believe that they're now in a state of happiness and someday you will be with them again in the same way? There's a good chance that in reality, it's the former, but the question is, which one would comfort you more?

Or think about this: Hitler lived a life of luxury, killing and torturing innocents, and he died a quick death by his own hands. Wouldn't you prefer that he pay the price in Hell for his crimes than to have died without being properly punished?

And I'll tell you, some weird shit has happened when people pray. Yeah, it could just be a coincidence, but we won't know for sure.

Don't tell me I'm in a make-believe world and giving myself false hope for believing in this because there's a chance that not of this is true. Like I said before, you'd have to tell that to every theist on the planet.

As Manta said earlier, belief in god has caused most of the world's most evil acts (with Stalin being one of the very few exceptions). A world in which no one can say "god told me to" to defend themselves after killing dozens or hundreds or thousands of people would be a much better world. What if, after 9/11, the entire Arab world condemned Al-Qaeda for the terrorists they are and actively hunted them down? What if there was never a Biblical excuse for slavery or racism or any other hate-crime?

Sure, I'll give you that. But what point are you specifically trying to prove? Are you trying to say that because of these atrocities, it's wrong to believe in a god? I want to make sure you're not looking upon believers as inferior to you in any way, because we're all equals, just with different beliefs.


And just so everyone's clear, Heaven is not a "place" where you are fated to live for the rest of eternity, but rather just a state of happiness. It's not like you're doomed to immortality or anything like that.