Smoking Gun, Oh Atheists?

[BilliardsBall]

That's according to you, not me. Your contention is that God must be some sort of ignorant, flawed being, because an all-powerful, all-knowing being would not make the ridiculous mistakes that your God has apparently made or be nearly as utterly incapable as you have described your God as being.


I never said that.


The Bible doesn't have any explanatory narratives. Just narratives.

Again, being dismissive with general statements is missing the obvious:

Cosmologies, soteriologies, creation narratives, thousands of books containing such, were all written from the Bible. You are making a vastly overstated claim.

 

[BilliardsBall]

So torturing the baby to death is God's will, but David's fault?

You know, I've been in discussions about morality where "torturing babies" gets thrown around as an example of something that's obviously wrong... and here you are defending it.


And the ends justify the means?


Why does an abusive spouse take their victim on vacations?

You are arguing that a baby that fell ill and died (yes, God's will as listed) was tortured. It's a straw man argument.

 

[Milton Platt]

God designed DNA and DNA shows immense design in its arrangement. I'm unsure what your question has to do with my question/response to you earlier:

"Do you always hold parents responsible for the crimes of their children? That seems an untenable stance. Please tell me more."

You wish to accuse God of our sin, which makes no sense. I recognize I'm accountable for my own misdeeds. But you would punish my Father God or my earthly parents for the misdeeds I have committed? Tell me more.

Where does your scripture outline the details of DNA structure and give an account of a god creating it? You are literally making things up out of thin air.

The poster was not implying anyone should punish your god. He was making a valid point that if Adam and Eve existed and committed a transgression, then punishing billions of people thousands of years removed is a wholly immoral thing. The immorality is compounded be inflicting an infinite punishment for a finite crime.

 

[Milton Platt]

You are arguing that a baby that fell ill and died (yes, God's will as listed) was tortured. It's a straw man argument.

Do you think that children have never been tortured in the history of mankind, or do you recognize that children have been tortured and since the torture happened, it must have been willfully allowed by your deity?

 

[BilliardsBall]

So if a creator exists it created our DNA which determines our temperament and what urges and instincts we have. So god put the urge in kleptomaniacs to steal, god put the urge to rape into rapists, and god decided not to give some people empathy. He also put us in an environment where people are in desperate situations forcing them to do evil things just to survive. So god is responsible for whatever evil exists in the world. God created evil people, god created situations that force good people to do evil things to survive. To then say after that he holds no responsibility for the evil in the world is delusional and completely illogical.

To address your clumsy attempt to try sidestepping my point, parents do not design their children's DNA but they do raise their children, so it is possible in some instances that they are responsible for their child's behavior.

God calls man defective because we sin, but he made us this way, so yes god is ultimately responsible since he created us and then set us loose to do what he designed us to do. Its obvious to anyone not brainwashed since childhood to blindly except fairy tales as reality.

God created people, yes. People are in large part adjusted by environment. So that we recognize good and bad parenting, for example.

In a court of law, however, you cannot defend your actions saying, "God made me a murderer/rapist/paedophile, etc." Human jurors know humans are self-willed and place the blame for your sin . . . on your shoulders, not God's.

Only skeptics insist on placing the blame for every person's sin on God. Why?

 

[Milton Platt]

God created people, yes. People are in large part adjusted by environment. So that we recognize good and bad parenting, for example.

In a court of law, however, you cannot defend your actions saying, "God made me a murderer/rapist/paedophile, etc." Human jurors know humans are self-willed and place the blame for your sin . . . on your shoulders, not God's.

Only skeptics insist on placing the blame for every person's sin on God. Why?

They aren't placing blame. Your own religious teachings make it clear that an all powerful all knowing deity is by definition responsible for the system, beings, and rules he himself put into place. Your own religious teachings logically place the blame. The poster is showing you the fallacy within your own religious system. An atheist or skeptic can't place blame on a being he does not even think exists.

 

[BilliardsBall]

More or less. Conservative Christian churches are known for tormenting LBGT youth exposed to such hatred.

Are known by whom? Again, I'm sorry for what you experienced, but I know many loving people and churches in this situation.

I would recommend you receive some counseling to help as well. Thanks.

 

[ImmortalFlame]

Again, being dismissive with general statements is missing the obvious:

Cosmologies, soteriologies, creation narratives, thousands of books containing such, were all written from the Bible. You are making a vastly overstated claim.

You're just talking nonsense at this stage. Do you have any idea how many Muslim scholars have written books on countless scientific, mathematical and philosophical subjects?

 

[BilliardsBall]

We aren't going to come to agreement on this simply because you are willing to accept it as truth in the face of the absurdity of the whole book. To a logical mind the fact that much of it is obviously nonsense discredits the entire text. I couldn't care less about easily explained away prophecies and claims of mans infallibility from a monstrous god (if we are to believe the old testament). I feel the same way about every religious text I have ever read.

The prophecies that have come true in the modern era aren't easily explained away.

The Bible doesn't read the same to me as my readings from the Apocrypha, the Qu'ran, the Book of Mormon, etc. My experience is the Bible is most different. Here's your chance to change your life, your destiny.

 

[BilliardsBall]

Actually, it is not. It is only one interpretation....the one that suits you.

Please provide your alternative explanation, then, and how it suits the issue at hand, Occam's, etc.

There can be multiple interpretations of a Bible passage but only one correct one. Either Christ is risen or not, we are sinner or not, sin can be redeemed or not, etc.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

Are known by whom? Again, I'm sorry for what you experienced, but I know many loving people and churches in this situation.

As I said, LBGT youth, who are told they are sinners, they are going to hell, they are demented, perverted and demon possessed, and it is not acceptable behaviors. They do not go on and on hounding other "sinners" they way they do LBGT.
And, remember, I did state this is a trend in Conservative churches. I know of a liberal church that made official policy to openly welcome LBGT members before the term "affirming church" was in use.

I would recommend you receive some counseling to help as well. Thanks.

For?

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

You are arguing that a baby that fell ill and died (yes, God's will as listed) was tortured. It's a straw man argument.

Fell ill as a deliberate act by God, according to the story. If the suffering of adrawn-out fatal illness is a deliberate act, I think that "torture" is a fair description.

Regardless of the term, though: you see no moral problem with giving a newborn baby a fatal illness to get back at the child's father? Stop dancing around the issue.

If you really do support what God did, embrace it: say loudly and proudly that killing a child - with a death drawn out over a week - to punish the child's parent is okay in the right circumstances.

If you don't support what God did, then step up and actually condemn God's actions.

Which is it?

 

[Underhill]

The prophecies that have come true in the modern era aren't easily explained away.

The Bible doesn't read the same to me as my readings from the Apocrypha, the Qu'ran, the Book of Mormon, etc. My experience is the Bible is most different. Here's your chance to change your life, your destiny.

Which prophecies would those be exactly?

 

[BilliardsBall]

You're just talking nonsense at this stage. Do you have any idea how many Muslim scholars have written books on countless scientific, mathematical and philosophical subjects?

You can't remember what you wrote two posts back? YOU said the Bible contains no explanatory narratives. I corrected you, and you challenge me that besides the Bible, the Qu'ran has narratives of explanatory power also.

 

[BilliardsBall]

Fell ill as a deliberate act by God, according to the story. If the suffering of adrawn-out fatal illness is a deliberate act, I think that "torture" is a fair description.

Regardless of the term, though: you see no moral problem with giving a newborn baby a fatal illness to get back at the child's father? Stop dancing around the issue.

If you really do support what God did, embrace it: say loudly and proudly that killing a child - with a death drawn out over a week - to punish the child's parent is okay in the right circumstances.

If you don't support what God did, then step up and actually condemn God's actions.

Which is it?

Most of your objections above are framing:

*David prayed for his child to be well, he had a week with his baby before it went to Heaven

*the child went to Heaven, David affirmed this in his remarks

*you would have been there accusing God, David in the narrative blesses and worships God

*David sees what happens as the natural consequence to adultery, murder and lying--you are one of those skeptics who wants to tell God that leniency equivocates justice

*My wife and I lost a child, we don't say "God tortured the child" - you must be no fun at parties

 

[BilliardsBall]

Where does your scripture outline the details of DNA structure and give an account of a god creating it? You are literally making things up out of thin air.

The poster was not implying anyone should punish your god. He was making a valid point that if Adam and Eve existed and committed a transgression, then punishing billions of people thousands of years removed is a wholly immoral thing. The immorality is compounded be inflicting an infinite punishment for a finite crime.

God created Adam and Eve. Did He create them with DNA or did they lack DNA when they propagated children, do you think?

 

[BilliardsBall]

They aren't placing blame. Your own religious teachings make it clear that an all powerful all knowing deity is by definition responsible for the system, beings, and rules he himself put into place. Your own religious teachings logically place the blame. The poster is showing you the fallacy within your own religious system. An atheist or skeptic can't place blame on a being he does not even think exists.

Interesting--I know Christians who ascribe all to a predestinarian God and others, free will. They both anchor their beliefs in the scriptures.

I don't think the issue is a fallacy in Christianity--I think the issue is you and the poster deny that you can go into a court of law and say, "God made me kill" and not be charged with a crime--or insanity.

 

[BilliardsBall]

As I said, LBGT youth, who are told they are sinners, they are going to hell, they are demented, perverted and demon possessed, and it is not acceptable behaviors. They do not go on and on hounding other "sinners" they way they do LBGT.
And, remember, I did state this is a trend in Conservative churches. I know of a liberal church that made official policy to openly welcome LBGT members before the term "affirming church" was in use.

For?

Because a "true" church tells people in at-risk or unhealthy behaviors or emotional upsets "Jesus loves you! Let's work together as partners to resolve your conflicts!" and not "you are a demon-possessed sinner!"

Counseling can help you reframe and learn from the past. You and the church that abused you both have issues to ponder.

 

[BilliardsBall]

Which prophecies would those be exactly?

Here are a few to digest, thanks! There are more listed in the article that the title suggests. The whole thing is provocative:

10 Prophecies Fulfilled in 1948

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Most of your objections above are framing:

*David prayed for his child to be well, he had a week with his baby before it went to Heaven

*the child went to Heaven, David affirmed this in his remarks

*you would have been there accusing God, David in the narrative blesses and worships God

*David sees what happens as the natural consequence to adultery, murder and lying--you are one of those skeptics who wants to tell God that leniency equivocates justice

*My wife and I lost a child, we don't say "God tortured the child" - you must be no fun at parties

The story has the prophet Nathan telling David that God has cursed David's son as punishment for David's sins. What happens to the baby is depicted as God's deliberate choice.

Let me ask you something: how bad would a father have to behave before YOU would infect his child with a fatal disease?

 

[Milton Platt]

Interesting--I know Christians who ascribe all to a predestinarian God and others, free will. They both anchor their beliefs in the scriptures.

I don't think the issue is a fallacy in Christianity--I think the issue is you and the poster deny that you can go into a court of law and say, "God made me kill" and not be charged with a crime--or insanity.

I don't understand what a court of law (I presume a U.S. court of law?) has to to with the subject