Thief
Rogue Theologian
Not in my opinion. You don't LIKE his point of view. Ok.. you don't have to.
It's not a matter of personal approval.
This is debate.
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Not in my opinion. You don't LIKE his point of view. Ok.. you don't have to.
Newton says that if no force is applied a rotating body will keep on rotating till eternity. Then there is Heisenberg's probability. Then there are virtual particles. One cannot put one's finger on anything. Nothing is at rest. Such is the unknown world of Brahman.Don't have wild dreams. Do you?
First off the big bang was NOT an explosion. There were also two "let there be lights" before recombination and after recombination.
The singularity is not part of the actual BB theory which is basically it was hot and dense in the past.
Its like abiogenesis and evolution.
Nothing is dead, nothing can die in this world. Atoms keep on whirring.Substance is dead material and cannot beget the living. .. The grave awaits.
Nothing is dead, nothing can die in this world. Atoms keep on whirring.
Till Ultimate fate of the universe - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Your assenent is inaccurate because it leaves out too many possibilities.
With this many pages on such popular argument (Pascal's wager) I assume this has been presented. This is a problem with infinity. In order to properly make a decision we must consider all possibilities. Thus every conceivable notion of after death must be considered. While we are dealing with infinite possibilities our chances of being right becomes infinitely small. That said we have in our mix notions of gods who can forgive non-belief but punish belief in a wrong god, further we can have constructions of gods who reward disbelief and punish any belief., still further we can have gods which reward everyone regardless of belief. Despite all of these favorable deities to nontheists If we add all of these up we still get an infinitely small chance of being correct. Thus the risk of an afterlife being true or false cancels out, and we are left with only the first question "which is better believing in God or not." This is completely subjective.
This is Pascal's Wager.Hey guys, I'm just wondering which case scenario do you think is better, and why?
This is provided believing in God leads to heaven and disbelieving in Him leads to hell.
I personally believe that believing in God and heaven and hell in the after life then having it turned to be not real is better, which is the first case scenario. At least then I wouldn't burn in hell because not believing in God and the after life, as the second case scenario suggests, normally lead to it.
Your thoughts?
Note:
There are other possible case scenarios too, but the thread is about these two only.
Update: please re-read the OP and the subject.
Oh, I didn't mean believing in the impossible itself. I meant believing in what might not seem to be be proven to others, like God's existence.
Please don't get me wrong, I wasn't talking about you when I wished people should respect each other. I only stated that I respect your feelings in believing that God does not exist
Also, you said "I'm not too sure why I should 'respect' your feelings." Did you perhaps mean to say "disrespect" instead of "respect"? We all have feelings and it is only humane to respects each others feelings.
How can one respect another as a person without respecting their feelings?
And, I didn't say you should respect ideas, which is different than respecting the freedom of having ideas.
When I first came here I felt something different too. People here are mostly nice people that co-exist regardless. Religious talk can be very delicate, but once we feel for each other, it becomes pleasant to even debate things.
Welcome aboard, my friend
This is Pascal's Wager.
Huh?.. er... As an atheist, I would have to question the possibility of any god. And since no god is proven to my satisfaction, the belief might as well BE about something that is, truly, impossible, in the sense that it can't be demonstrated as at LEAST 51% probable.
But everything is at LEAST in some sense possible to SOME degree, even if that possibility is vanishingly small, almost infinitely small, it still is a possibility.. Santa, Jehovah, Vishnu, the Flying Spaghetti Monster.. everything is possible. Doesn't say much at all for any of these proposed beings.
Mere possibility means nothing in my book. That only rules out something like a "married bachelor" or any other logical contradiction. We would assume that nobody is going to believe in some logical contradiction. THAT would be impossible, but anything else we can dream up? All possible. Probable? Not at all.. Possibility does NOT imply probability.
What does it matter if something is possible only to a percentage of .000000000000000001?.. I'd call that pretty impossible in a practical sense. I wouldn't hold my breath hoping and wishing in it, that's for sure. But I'm an atheist. My use of statiscical analysis is different from the theist's use.
My feelings about it have nothing to do with my reasoning. IF you DO find some of my thinking clouded over by emotions, please point that out for me. That wouldn't be relevant to my ideas.
I don't "respect" feelings. I ACCEPT them. We all have them If you tell me you are sad about something, I don't think that's worthy of respect, you didn't achieve anything by being sad, you didn't choose anything by being sad. You are sad about something? Fine. That's your emotional state. You can have it. I won't applaud or denigrate you for it. I reserve "respect" for something that I hold in high regard. Emotions are pretty low on that scale. Everybody and his dog has emotions..
Because we are much much more than our feelings. Happy or sad, mad or glad, isn't really very important. I am sure that some evil monster on death row is sad about being put to death for some horrendous crime. Yes, and so? We expect that. What matters to me more is a higher level of being than merely "emoting" about something.
I strive for higher than emotions, emotions are base line events. We can't help having them, they feel nice and sometimes, they don't feel so nice, but they are physical reactions, and not something to aspire to, quite frankly. It's way too easy for people to drown themselves in a lukewarm sea of sentiments. What the world really needs is more reason. There is a serious lack of reason.. and too much respect for emotions.
I have emotions, I can't get away from having them..I should not be congratulated for having them. It was never my choice to begin with. I was born that way. It's like my chest hair. Big deal. I have chest hairs. And.. ?
I have to agree with you there.. I love being able to listen to as many ideas as possible just in case my own are wrong. And that MEANS I need to be able to listen to those I disagree with the most.
I'm afraid I'm going to seriously offend someone.. like it's inevitable... So it's nice to see that at least in this case, I haven't. So thanks.
That's very nice of you to say. Thank you again.
Hey guys, I'm just wondering which case scenario do you think is better, and why?
This is provided believing in God leads to heaven and disbelieving in Him leads to hell.
I personally believe that believing in God and heaven and hell in the after life then having it turned to be not real is better, which is the first case scenario. At least then I wouldn't burn in hell because not believing in God and the after life, as the second case scenario suggests, normally lead to it.
Your thoughts?
Note:
There are other possible case scenarios too, but the thread is about these two only.
Update: please re-read the OP and the subject.
Over the last 100 years or so, the resuscitation techniques have improved out of sight. So therefore more than ever before, we have the testimonies of people who have died and have either gone to Heaven or Hell, before being brought back to life. You only have to go to YouTube to examine the testimonies of such people.
Then you could look at what Christ says about the subject in the Bible. It is a reality shock to understand that people’s testimonies and what Christ says are completely in harmony one with another.
Look at the world around you. There are the marvels of creation to stand in awe of. Even the human body is a balance of design and it therefore gives testimony of the Designer.
It then follows that we must pay heed to the Designer of the universe who is Jesus Christ, and to what He says. He is the final Judge of what soul goes where after death. He is the One who provides the criteria for salvation.
It is good that you are looking into such a question, because it is the most important question that you can ever ask. Where am I going to spend eternity? Get it wrong and the consequences will be catastrophic.
Use terms as you please then.....how about....In the beginning.....
and the term....void....is soooooooooo important.
There is nobody in heaven at the moment other than the father and the Son or Allah. The day of judgment is not yet there. The gates of heaven will open only then. At the moment heaven is a totally unoccupied five-star hotel. Why do people not understand this? They have to wait in their graves to be raised.A lot of people think the prophets went to heaven.
I mean if only one thing exists in the universe, then it is at least 13.75 billion year old as is going to be around for many more billion years; so what is death?Yo Dude! Your line drawn as to what is alive is a bit broad!
I mean if only one thing exists in the universe, then it is at least 13.75 billion year old as is going to be around for many more billion years; so what is death?
Thanks @ Shawn001, you have explained it nicely.
There is nobody in heaven at the moment other than the father and the Son or Allah. The day of judgment is not yet there. The gates of heaven will open only then. At the moment heaven is a totally unoccupied five-star hotel. Why do people not understand this? They have to wait in their graves to be raised.
And heaven is not a very large place. Only a small percentage of those who profess faith are going to qualify. Jesus said only one out of a thousand. I think Quran also indicates a similar percentage. The rest are headed for eternal hell along with the unbelievers. At least we unbelievers know our fate clearly.
You realize this is indeed a debate area?It's not a matter of personal approval.
This is debate.