Advertisement
If you have a new account but are having problems posting or verifying your account, please email us on hello@boards.ie for help. Thanks :)
Hello all! Please ensure that you are posting a new thread or question in the appropriate forum. The Feedback forum is overwhelmed with questions that are having to be moved elsewhere. If you need help to verify your account contact hello@boards.ie
Hi there,
There is an issue with role permissions that is being worked on at the moment.
If you are having trouble with access or permissions on regional forums please post here to get access: https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058365403/you-do-not-have-permission-for-that#latest
There is an issue with role permissions that is being worked on at the moment.
If you are having trouble with access or permissions on regional forums please post here to get access: https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058365403/you-do-not-have-permission-for-that#latest
Scientists create artificial life form - another nail in the coffin of religion?
Comments
-
-
-
-
-
-
Soul Winner wrote: »If you can explain the rise of early Christianity, the early Christian's genuine belief that Jesus was the Son of God whom they claimed they seen alive and real after His death and died happily proclaiming that testimony under the most horrific and agonizing of deaths then I'm all ears. And if you can explain that people would easily do this (even knowing that they were wrong) for the ones that they love you then need to explain what turned the apostle Paul around from being this new Faith's most aggressive opponent to become its chief apostle. When I hear GOOD explanations of these facts without needing to invoke anything supernatural then I will not be a Christian.
Haha, really?
0 -
-
-
Haha, really?
Yes, really.
The guy in the photo was protesting discrimination against his religion. He genuinely believed that his religion was truthful.
Soul Winner has referred to a very different scenario altogether - the idea that people would make up an untrue story and then be prepared to die rather than admit that the whole thing was hogwash anyway.
This distinction has been pointed out ad nauseam to those in this forum. the regulars here are either deliberately ignoring the difference or, to be charitable, are just extraordinarily forgetful.
Christians do not argue that the disciples being willing to die for their beliefs proves the validity of those beliefs. That would be a silly argument that, mercifully, doesn't exist outside of a strawman factory. They argue that being willing to die for something you knew fine well to be a lie would be much less plausible.
That of course, simply indicates that the early disciples genuinely believed that Jesus had been raised from the dead, and that they had not just made the story up. Whether you think that genuine belief was a correct belief is a different kettle of fish, and one where I have little optimism that we will agree.
But, hey, disagreement is fine. It happens all the time and, if we can actually understand what we are disagreeing about and be generous enough to describe each other's views accurately then a lot of nastiness can be avoided.
0 -
Advertisement
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
Advertisement
-
-
-
-
-
Yep and as we all know the autobiographical writings of early Scientology leaders is 100% historically accurate....
It's obviously the US navy who is lying when they say L. Ron Hubbard wasn't a war hero...
What evidence do these writings actually have that the accounts of the martyrdoms are accurate?
You don't have proof that any inscriptions , eye witness accounts, or any historical accounts of anything that happened prior to the invention of photography are accurate. Which means you are totally free to reject whatever doesn't suit your ideological position ....... of course the notion of anyone then giving any creedence to your opinion is another matter entirely.
Oh there's evidence alright, but it's evidence you choose to reject (in a quite unbiased manner and entirely coincidentally to it suiting your ideological position to do so of course).There is jack all evidence to support the idea that the apostles actually died willingly at all.And the story of Joseph Smith shows that a fraud can be killed and that can be spun by believers into martyrdom.
Joseph Smith obviously died willingly in that firefight to spread the word of Mormonism
Do you understand what 'die willingly' actually means? Smith was shooting back at his attackers. People usually do this because they're trying to stay alive.And what about the practitioners of Falun Gong who are actively, today, being captured and tortured by the Chinese government for their beliefs?
Why do they not count?
Or how about the Heaven Gate cult? Who all willingly killed themselves because of their beliefs?
Why do they not count.
Oh and btw these are just a few of the more recent examples, we can find hundreds of examples of people both enduring and committing horrible stuff because they believed in a supernatural event that you don't believe in.
Yet some none of them count.
Are you genuinely unable to understand the difference (pointed out earlier in this thread) between people who die for their sincerely held beliefs and people who would die for something that they know to be a fraud?
Try to think really hard for a few minutes. I'm sure it'll come to you eventually.Kindly link to where I said you did?
I specifically said that the ultimatum was made, not that you made it.
But you certainly have been doing a bang up job of moving those goalposts.
When someone is 'moving the goalposts' it usually refers to their having stated one position and then subsequently shifting their ground.
This quite surreal conversation I'm having with you is, as far as I can remember, the first time that I've ever been accused of moving the goal posts from a place where I never placed them in the first instance.
0 -
Advertisement
-
-
-
So do you accept the autobiographical claims of L. Ron Hubbard even thought they have no other supporting evidence and are something in conflict with such evidence?You don't have proof that any inscriptions , eye witness accounts, or any historical accounts of anything that happened prior to the invention of photography are accurate. Which means you are totally free to reject whatever doesn't suit your ideological position ....... of course the notion of anyone then giving any creedence to your opinion is another matter entirely.
1) I never rejected it. Please show where I did.Oh there's evidence alright, but it's evidence you choose to reject (in a quite unbiased manner and entirely coincidentally to it suiting your ideological position to do so of course).
2) I specifically asked you to state the evidence they provide to support the accounts of the martyrdoms.
However because they are by people who could have benefited from their interpretation, and that they are the only sources for the accounts, I'll treat them like I treat the autobiography of L Ron.
With extreme skepticism.
And again, how do you know this wasn't what the apostles did?Do you understand what 'die willingly' actually means? Smith was shooting back at his attackers. People usually do this because they're trying to stay alive.
Maybe they fought back and that fact was conveniently left of the accounts.
Or maybe Joseph Smith fought to a point, then gave up willingly.
Are you actually denying that people don't/can't interrupt his death as martyrdom?
So the leader of Heaven's Gate didn't know it was a fraud and that he was making it up?Are you genuinely unable to understand the difference (pointed out earlier in this thread) between people who die for their sincerely held beliefs and people who would die for something that they know to be a fraud?
Try to think really hard for a few minutes. I'm sure it'll come to you eventually.
Or the leaders of Falun Gong?
How about Jim Jones?
Or the guys at Waco?
Or are they just crazy? And that crazy people can inspire true belief in their followers and those followers can die for their beliefs?
Well we've gone from "There's no other explanation for their devotion." to "why would they die for something they know is a fraud" (which is where you came in) to "why would they willingly die for something they know is a fraud."When someone is 'moving the goalposts' it usually refers to their having stated one position and then subsequently shifting their ground.
This quite surreal conversation I'm having with you is, as far as I can remember, the first time that I've ever been accused of moving the goal posts from a place where I never placed them in the first instance.
But at each turn when we provide examples of each of these scenarios you've added on a reason why they don't count. I'd call that moving the goalposts.0 -
-
-
-
-
sonicthebadger* wrote: »No it gets up my nose when someone tries to pretend that their position is not their position because of semantics. It is goalpost moving.
If your position is that Jesus rose from the dead and your reason for believing that is the behaviour of his followers in dying for this belief then I am not strawmanning your position and accusing me of doing so because you can't convince me your claim contains some truth is petulant.
Being smug about it doesn't help either.
It is not semantics.
We have two positions here:
a) People are often willing to die for something that they sincerely believe to be true.
b) People are much less likely to die for something that they know to be fiction.
So, if a Christian makes point (b) then it is clearly no rebuttal to present them with examples of (a). Even a child can see that.
So, if you continue to insist there is no difference between (a) and (b) then it is difficult to see where we can go from there. If you genuinely can't see the difference then there is an intellectual problem. If you do see the difference but insist that it doesn't exist then there is an integrity problem.
My only participation in this thread has been to point out that (a) and (b) are distinct positions and that therefore using examples of (a) to rebutt (b) is not a sensible manner of debate. I think, in my first post to Zillah, I did that politely and within the terms of this Forum's Charter.
For my pains I have now been accused of engaging in semantics, moving goalposts that I never put anywhere else in the first place, being smug, and being petulant. Which all leads me to conclude that it is probably pointless for me, or any other Christian for that matter, to engage in discussion here. Perhaps you want this forum to be a Christian-free zone where only like minded people can produce paradies of theists'positions to their hearts' content and without fear of correction? If so I congratulate you - you appear to be getting progressively closer to your goal.
I've made the one and only point I wanted to make in this thread. Have fun.
(Edit: Even as I have been typing this I see that Wicknight has posted and once again quite blatantly conflated (a) and (b). I give up with you guys. ) 0 -
-
-
Advertisement
-
It is not semantics.
We have two positions here:
a) People are often willing to die for something that they sincerely believe to be true.
b) People are much less likely to die for something that they know to be fiction.
So, if a Christian makes point (b) then it is clearly no rebuttal to present them with examples of (a). Even a child can see that.
So, if you continue to insist there is no difference between (a) and (b) then it is difficult to see where we can go from there. If you genuinely can't see the difference then there is an intellectual problem. If you do see the difference but insist that it doesn't exist then there is an integrity problem.
My only participation in this thread has been to point out that (a) and (b) are distinct positions and that therefore using examples of (a) to rebutt (b) is not a sensible manner of debate. I think, in my first post to Zillah, I did that politely and within the terms of this Forum's Charter.
For my pains I have now been accused of engaging in semantics, moving goalposts that I never put anywhere else in the first place, being smug, and being petulant. Which all leads me to conclude that it is probably pointless for me, or any other Christian for that matter, to engage in discussion here. Perhaps you want this forum to be a Christian-free zone where only like minded people can produce paradies of theists'positions to their hearts' content and without fear of correction? If so I congratulate you - you appear to be getting progressively closer to your goal.
I've made the one and only point I wanted to make in this thread. Have fun.
(Edit: Even as I have been typing this I see that Wicknight has posted and once again quite blatantly conflated (a) and (b). I give up with you guys. )
Though having said all you said there and without conflating (a) or (b), neither (a) nor (b) makes the claims of said dead people true.
Sincerely believing something to be true does not make it true.
Suffering death to perpetuate a lie is not unheard of, particularly if that lie can somehow serve what the victim believes to be a greater purpose.
The disagreement here before your first post was that the willing death of the apostles was/was not strong evidence for the reserruction. They may well have sincerely believed what they were saying was true, they may have believed that the reserruction was an essential part of the message they were preaching, who knows. But their belief [(a) not to be conflated with (b), I am giving the apostles the benefit of the doubt] does not make it true.0 -
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
Advertisement
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
Advertisement
-
-
-
-
-
-
Advertisement
Advertisement