Your ideas sound like Taoism. Have you read the Tao Te Ching?
"Therefore having and not having arise together.
Difficult and easy complement each other.
Long and short contrast with each other;
High and low rest upon each other;
Voice and sound harmonize each other;
Front and back follow one...
There's nothing intrinsically wrong with that all by itself, although I doubt god would've followed an ethical framework like the Animal Welfare Act to ensure no undue harm came to them. In particular, withholding the ability from them to tell right from wrong, then punishing them for disobeying...
Humans have made a lot of progress, and tons of progress in the last century alone. We're more tolerant, compassionate, and moral than we've ever been. The circle of moral consideration is even starting to expand to include other animals, even as it expands within humanity as we become less...
I think so. I think that, although there is no "ultimate" purpose or meaning to human existence, we create our own purpose and meaning and that is plenty. Since this is the one life we get, the focus is on making is as fulfilling a life as possible, rather than one cut short by self-destructive...
The idea that all of humanity could have arisen from one man and one woman is biologically impossible, based on everything we know about biology, archaeology, and paleontology. (Incidentally, so is the Noah's Ark story, and many many other stories from the bible.) If people want to reinterpret...
You're just preaching a very unusual, atypical interpretation of poetic language. No one else agrees with you. No one else really cares. Sorry. Belief is not an angel. Sorrow is not an angel. Hate doesn't have colors. Also, the consensus of biblical historians is that there is essentially no...
It seems pretty clear that the Church is motivated to protect its institutional image more than any considerations of morality, compassion, or just doing what's right. They have a long and demonstrated track record of this failure. If they want to earn back any shreds of trust with anyone, they...
It seems like Southern racists have never quite been on board with the idea of democracy. They didn't like it in 1788 (Constitution ratified), or in 1861 (Civil War), or in 1964 (Civil Rights Act), and they still don't like it now. I think that to them, white supremacy means democracy is fine...
As a Registered Nurse, I was trained to just go along with any alternative medicines that patients considered helpful for them. It's a good rule. The placebo effect is real, whether or not an alternative medicine is objectively effective. And mindfulness, introspection, and relaxation can impact...
The US has the best health care in the world...if you have enough money. We also do the most medical research and pharmaceutical development in the world, which we seem to partially subsidize as US citizens, through our healthcare costs and taxes.
Still, the US is a major outlier among all...
I mean, I could say that there is no Prophet in Islam because Mohammed is just a metaphor, but that would be objectively ridiculous at this point because of how Islam is commonly practiced and interpreted by its adherents.
Likewise, your arguments that all of the rules about chopping off...
At this point, anyone stupid enough to invest in a Trump business deserves to lose their money. Trump's name primarily attracts grifters, liars, and Dunning-Kruger types, now more than ever. I can't imagine this business doing well for long, if at all.
I've never seen someone able to force a...
Yes. We infer design through induction, using known past examples that we observed. We have no known past examples we've observed of universes coming into existence, nor any evidence for how the one universe we have access to arose. We cannot justifiably infer design.
Also, if the universe or...
I mean, it's all up for interpretation and what you "feel" is correct, right? And there's no reliable method to tell whose interpretation is more accurate beyond their personal insistence.
My understanding is that the commandment not to kill or murder was for the Israelites alone. Namely, they...
It may have been said already, but this gets to what you think a reasonable neutral starting position is. Namely:
1. Should we believe every claim we hear, until there is good evidence that it is false?
- or -
2. Should we disbelieve every claim we hear, until there is good evidence that it is...
Manger scenes on public property are unconstitutional. I'd be very interested if you found an example for any other version of this being an issue. Manger scenes on church property or private property are of course totally fine, barring mundane problems like loud music playing out of them at...
I would accept any novel testable prediction based on the hypothesis that a certain god exists, which is then tested and confirmed, and then is able to make more accurate novel predictions. By novel, I mean something we don't know yet about reality.
For example, "I have a conceptual model of a...
Evangelical apologists can get very worked up by this argument, and will insist that it was definitely a bodily-resurrected Jesus. I think this comes from a tradition of Muslim counter apologetics that casts doubt on Jesus being anything more than another mundane prophet. Some Christians see...