What's the point of this forum?

Schuhart

Dades wrote: »

Does is make you feel smug that you don't drink and people around you are falling over drunk?

In fairness, you could hardly hold it against them if they did feel smug. Particularly if they were looking at a hen party.

condra

Maybe someone will go in there and argue that by not drinking, they are actually, drinking.

kelly1

Dades wrote: »

Just discovered there is a Non-Drinkers forum on Boards... Finally we are not the only forum whose existence is based on the absence of something from our lives!

I wonder do they get threads asking them questions like: why is this forum here? So you don't drink - why does that warrant a forum? Does is make you feel smug that don't drink and people around you are falling over drunk?

I admit that my OP was bitter. I despise atheism but not atheists. We were all created by God for God and atheism rejects the ultimate purpose of existence and therefore union with God. The atheist rejects the love of God and there is no person is the wide world that hasn't been touched by grace. The rejection of this grace is truly evil.

Schuhart

kelly1 wrote: »

The rejection of this grace is truly evil.

Hardly. As PJ O'Rourke said, if God wanted us to spend more time in Church He'd have given us larger arses to sit on and smaller brains to think with.

I don't actually forget all that stuff that goes with Catholicism. I remember one value being truth. I cannot reconcile commitment to truth to blind acceptance of 'grace'.

Fallen Seraph

womoma wrote: »

Maybe someone will go in there and argue that by not drinking, they are actually, drinking.

Dades

Kelly, to reject something you must first believe it exists to reject.

Until you realise that, your conceptions of what atheism is will always be tainted by the notion that we somehow choose to not follow a god's path. A genuine belief is not a matter of choice.

Would you prefer we all pretended to believe?

robindch

kelly1 wrote:

I admit that my OP was bitter.

I wouldn't worry -- most of us atheists have been clobbered with religion more energetically than that in the past.

kelly1 wrote:

The atheist rejects the love of God and there is no person is the wide world that hasn't been touched by grace.

No, the atheist does not reject the love of god. Rather we reject the idea that your god, as you believe it, exists, and believe that the love that you believe you feel is nothing more than a convincing, but self-willed, illusion.

Put more simply, we simply don't believe you. And that's not evil.

AngryHippie

So what do atheists believe in then?
The self, and the selfness of others ?
Science ?

bleg

you will find what atheists think will be wide ranging and contradicting. there is not set "code of beliefs" that an atheist has (other than non belief in god of course)

most atheists will believe in what can be factually proven by evidence

AngryHippie

Hmm.
If that is the case, find me proof that one, the number, 1 = 1, prove it exists, because without that, you've nothing to base any mathematics or statistics on...

daveirl

This post has been deleted.

pH

AngryHippie wrote: »

Hmm.
If that is the case, find me proof that one, the number, 1 = 1, prove it exists, because without that, you've nothing to base any mathematics or statistics on...

Can't find a proof that 1=1, but here's a proof that 0.99999... = 1
http://polymathematics.typepad.com/polymath/2006/06/no_im_sorry_it_.html

Is that close enough for you?

condra

kelly1 wrote: »

We were all created by God for God and atheism rejects the ultimate purpose of existence and therefore union with God. The atheist rejects the love of God and there is no person is the wide world that hasn't been touched by grace. The rejection of this grace is truly evil.

We are all created by our parents having sex. There is no such thing as God, and those who believe in a god or gods are utterly deluded.

I hope you see the point I'm making with the above statement Noel. Your inability to state anything as opinion rather than fact, is nauseating.

It only takes a little "in my opinion", or "I believe that" to be a little more polite and earn the respect that you deserve as an intelligent individual.

AngryHippie wrote:

Hmm.
If that is the case, find me proof that one, the number, 1 = 1, prove it exists, because without that, you've nothing to base any mathematics or statistics on...

I can't believe anyone even answered such an idiotic question. No offense AngryHippie.

Fallen Seraph

AngryHippie wrote: »

Hmm.
If that is the case, find me proof that one, the number, 1 = 1, prove it exists, because without that, you've nothing to base any mathematics or statistics on...

Protip: making baseless assertions about stuff that you know nothing about makes you look extremely ignorant.


All mathematics is based on assumptions known as axioms. The natural numbers are based on axioms too. Just like everything else. If you've got some metaphysical objection to doing maths like this, I suggest you make a well reasoned argument.

If, however, you are asserting that atheists having no objection to abstract concepts such as maths leaves them with no reason to not believe in the super-natural, then your argument is so far gone past logic and reason that I don't even know how to reply, other than "abstract concepts =/= super-natural."

This is like wossisname arguing that all of science is wrong because "truth" is not a physical quantity...

Ken Ham! That's who it was.

Overheal

see in my opinion this whole idea of a God that made us for some great purpose? Its all just human vanity - yeah we're sentient and self aware but we know our world is small and pointless so we deluded ourselves into believing in a higher cause.

And thats what this forum is here for: so I can express such opinions. How nice of boards.

AngryHippie

bleg wrote: »

factually proven by evidence

All maths is based on the assumption that 1 exists. Its a philosophical point really, but there is no proof of it beyond I think therefore I am.
Thats what I'm on about.
Evidence infers statistics, without numbers they are meaningless

AngryHippie

pH wrote: »

Can't find a proof that 1=1, but here's a proof that 0.99999... = 1
http://polymathematics.typepad.com/polymath/2006/06/no_im_sorry_it_.html

Is that close enough for you?

Not really, It is an interesting espression of the decimal systems inability to deal with fractions efficiently, But If you look closely, That figure you just described is repeated to infinity, which has more in common with a function of 0 than of 1.

i.e. 1/0 =

By the way :
"Trying to convince you otherwise is like trying to convince an atheist that God exists."

Best to read down the page next time you go quoting my lack of maths ability dudes
That was from an Maths professor

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar

Schuhart wrote: »

Hardly. As PJ O'Rourke said, if God wanted us to spend more time in Church He'd have given us larger arses to sit on and smaller brains to think with.

hahahahahahahahaaaha

condra

AngryHippie wrote: »

All maths is based on the assumption that 1 exists. Its a philosophical point really.

It is logical to assume that 1 exists, and utterly illogical to believe in God.

Your argument is only serving to annoy people and take the thread off on an irrelevant tangent.

You are not in a position to be so smug either, even if you are "an Maths professor".

Scofflaw

womoma wrote: »

Maybe someone will go in there and argue that by not drinking, they are actually, drinking.

Hmm. while they're there, they can also try persuading people that: non-drinking is really a form of alcoholism; that while driving drunk does cause accidents and crime, that's not the case for their particular favourite tipple; that in any case sober people have killed far more people than drunken people; and last but not least, that Hitler was a teetotaller.


cordially,
Scofflaw

condra

That has to be analogy of the month, and boy have there been some recently.:)

Vodka and lime cordially,
Dec

pH

AngryHippie wrote: »

Not really, It is an interesting espression of the decimal systems inability to deal with fractions efficiently, But If you look closely, That figure you just described is repeated to infinity, which has more in common with a function of 0 than of 1.

i.e. 1/0 =

And if you believe that you'll believe any old nonsense .. oh wait.

By the way :
"Trying to convince you otherwise is like trying to convince an atheist that God exists."

Best to read down the page next time you go quoting my lack of maths ability dudes
That was from an Maths professor

I see you're as good at interpreting comments made on a blog as I presume you are at interpreting your holy book - it takes a special person to mistake a comment for part of the blog and to read "an Maths professor" where the text says "Posted by: removed by request | June 15, 2006 at 03:21 AM"

It's not the fact that this forum is attracting many trolls in the last weeks that's starting to annoy me, it's the fact it's attracting stupid ones that's getting me down.

DublinWriter

kelly1 wrote: »

There was some justification in the Church's defence of Christendom against Muslim invaders. Should they have sat back and allowed themselves to be conquered and their religion replaced with Islam?

That there tells me all I need to know about your blinkered knowledge and your lack of historical understanding of your chosen beliefs.

There were up to ten crusades sanctioned by the Church of Rome beween the 11th and 13th Centuries; the common trait of all of them is that they can be best described as exercises in ethnic cleansing.

You seem to be blissfully unaware of how Muslims, Christians and Jews co-existed in Jerusalem in the period immediately preceeding the first crusade.

The crusaders slaughtered Muslim, Christians and Jews wholesale during this period.

They usually butchered Jews en-route in places throughout what is now Germany and Hungry.

Dades

AngryHippie wrote: »

So what do atheists believe in then?
The self, and the selfness of others ?
Science ?

What atheists have in common is what they don't believe in.

And if you want to start a new thread about the link between maths and supernatural belief, do so, otherwise drop it in this one thank you.

kelly1

Schuhart wrote: »

Hardly. As PJ O'Rourke said, if God wanted us to spend more time in Church He'd have given us larger arses to sit on and smaller brains to think with.

I don't actually forget all that stuff that goes with Catholicism. I remember one value being truth. I cannot reconcile commitment to truth to blind acceptance of 'grace'.

Grace is something which God gives freely in order to draw us to Himself. It's our choice to accept or reject it. So you don't have to believe in grace before God gives it to you. God makes the first move and if we accept grace and draw closer to God, more graces will follow and so on and so on. BTW, I'm referring to "actual grace" here. "Sanctifying grace" on the other had is what gives divine life to the soul and this cannot be present in the soul of the atheist because he has rejected God. The problem is that without this grace life with God is impossible and Hell is the only alternative.

There is also the problem of the hardened heart i.e. someone has rejected God's grace repeatedly. The more you reject God's grace the less you "hear" God's call and the less likely you are to ever come back to God. Having said that God can and does given us a "large injection" of grace in situation where you might have someone praying for you or making sacrificies on you behalf. This is one of the reason that religious spend their time locked away inside cloistered walls - praying for people to come back to God.

May God bless you all (despite you lack of faith in Him)
Noel.

Dades

kelly1 wrote: »

God makes the first move and if we accept grace and draw closer to God, more graces will follow and so on and so on.

Noel, if God made the first move we wouldn't be having this conversation.

No matter how you try to word it, what you suggest we do is to accept something as real we honestly believe to be myth. There is no other "rejection" agenda. It's comparable to asking you to accept Vishnu exists.

kelly1

Dades wrote: »

Noel, if God made the first move we wouldn't be having this conversation.

No matter how you try to word it, what you suggest we do is to accept something as real we honestly believe to be myth. There is no other "rejection" agenda. It's comparable to asking you to accept Vishnu exists.

And I am saying that your "heart" is hardened against His grace. You have completely rejected God. *Everyone* is called by God at some point in their lives but so many have turned Him away. I might have been many years ago but I'm sure that if dig down you'll find that you felt called by God and you said NO. Thanks very much God but I'm far more interested in things that I can touch and see. So be it.

Apocalypse 3:20 Behold, I stand at the gate, and knock. If any man shall hear my voice, and open to me the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.

Come judgment day, every person will be judged according the the words of the Gospel and you will discover that you have rejected God's (subtle) grace countless times and you will agonize over this, just as I will.

daveharnett

kelly1 wrote: »

People, I ask you, what is the point of the A&A forum?
- To pour scorn on and poke fun at those who believe in a loving Creator?
- A place where smug people gather to clap each other on the back and wonder at the stupidity of believers while they sit back and marvel at their own superior intelligence?
- A place to discuss lack of belief in God (why bother)?
- To blame all religions including the valid ones for all the ills of the world?
- To build up one's cynicism to ever increasing heights?
- To banish all traces of God from the world?
Or is there something positive that I've failed to notice?

A little bit of each, kelly .
Seriously though, while most posters here are guilting of baiting from time to time (some of us most of the time), I see that most threads here relate to
A: The plilisophical and moral implications of athiesm.
B: Attacks by particular religions on secular society.

Yes, i take your point that some of us do need to learn to have this conversation without condesention or arrogance. In fairness though, I see plenty of both on the cristian boards too. We all need to work on this if we are to do more than talk AT each other.

5uspect

kelly1 wrote: »

And I am saying that your "heart" is hardened against His grace. You have completely rejected God. *Everyone* is called by God at some point in their lives but so many have turned Him away. I might have been many years ago but I'm sure that if dig down you'll find that you felt called by God and you said NO. Thanks very much God but I'm far more interested in things that I can touch and see. So be it.

Apocalypse 3:20 Behold, I stand at the gate, and knock. If any man shall hear my voice, and open to me the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.

Come judgment day, every person will be judged according the the words of the Gospel and you will discover that you have rejected God's (subtle) grace countless times and you will agonize over this, just as I will.

Noel, I have rejected the idea of all gods, fairys, pixies, cosmic designers, orbital teapots and pink unicorns simply because none of them are supported by any evidence.
You seem to think that the truth of your particular god is so obvious that its staring us in the face and that simply isn't the case.

kelly1

daveharnett wrote: »

A little bit of each, kelly .
Seriously though, while most posters here are guilting of baiting from time to time (some of us most of the time), I see that most threads here relate to
A: The plilisophical and moral implications of athiesm.
B: Attacks by particular religions on secular society.

Yes, i take your point that some of us do need to learn to have this conversation without condesention or arrogance. In fairness though, I see plenty of both on the cristian boards too. We all need to work on this if we are to do more than talk AT each other.

Thanks, agreed.