RELIGION Re: Enhancing health with time on your side

[Guest guest]

RE: RELIGION Re: Enhancing health with time on your side

Gene-

>So there is a genetic mutation which correlates to

>answering 'yes' when asked this specific question?

>

>Sounds like utter bull to me.

" That's because you're not approaching the question in a reasonable

fashion. Whether or not it's true that faith is at least partly

genetic in origin, we have genes which give rise to all sorts of

abilities and personality traits. Why is " faith " (or some root trait

which gives rise to it) necessarily any different? "

Because I don't think that there is a 'test' that can determine faith.

Therefore, the determination of whether someone has faith is based on

the answer to a series of questions, or it is based on some criteria set

by the scientist. Sure - there might be some genetic predisposition to

ascribe to irrational belief systems, but it's difficult for me to

believe that there is a gene that pretty much determines whether you

will believe in god or not. Does this test differentiate between, say,

Bush's 'faith', the people on this list who utter threats of

eternal damnation, and someone with real faith - who simply instantiates

this faith in his/her actions? This just sounds to me like one of many

little blips on the scientific radar that show up all the time on

sensationalist TV shows and then disappear rightfully into obscurity. I

just don't find it very interesting.

[Guest guest]

-

>I realize you intended your comment as a small aside to a larger

>point, but you must acknowledge " Christianity is crap " in any

>context- them's fightin' words!

Hey, I'm ready! <g>

>Truly,I felt the need to speak up to address that very mentality

>being present on an intellectual forum such as this one-

>specifically that Christianity requires faith free from reason and

>anyone who subscribes to it must have checked their rational thought

>at the door.

Certain tenets of Christianity definitely require faith without

reason. Checking rational thought at the door is a loaded way to put

things, though. There's plenty of intelligence brought to bear on

matters of faith (as I'm sure the Jesuits would agree) but I also

think most scholarly religious people would agree that anything that

must be taken on faith cannot be justified or explained with

reason. has said much the same thing in this very discussion.

> At the very least I hope to encourage respect for a

>Christian's belief in Christ as a deity, recognized as a reasonable

>conclusion drawn from a large body of evidence, historical and

>otherwise. Not to engage in apologetics 101, but just for example:

I'm afraid I don't respect that belief in the sense that I think you mean it.

>* First and foremost, logic dictates that everything created has a

>cause.

You're begging the question by using the word " created " .

>Going back to the big bang, we must assume an antecedent

>cause for the universe, one that had to be supernatural- superceding

>space and time- namely, God.

No, there's no reason we " must " accept God. First, there could be a

non-God cause for the universe. Second, there could be no cause for

the universe. Third, if the universe requires a cause, God must

require a cause too -- except for the usual tautological insistence

that God uniquely is eternal and uncreated.

> If one accepts this premise, it would

>also stand to reason that our God had a purpose for his creation and

>a desire to reveal himself to his creation- namely and uniquely, via

>the Bible.

Do you honestly not see how illogical this assumption is? Let's

suppose the universe was created by a God, just for the sake of

argument. Why assume God would have a human-like desire to reveal

himself to his creation? Why isn't the Deist God plausible, for

example? And why assume humanity is sufficiently central to his

creation that we'd be selected to receive his revelation, when in

fact we occupy a minute fraction of the total time and space of the universe?

>No other religious work satisfies this.

No other religion satisfies your Christian and anthropomorphic and

self-fulfilling characterization of God?

> Going further,

>one may also accept that God chose to interact with the world

>through Jesus as documented in the Gospels.

Why?

> Some have even said that

>the Gospel story is so *unbelievable* that it could not have been

>generated by man.

Sorry, but people have come up with all sorts of " unbelievable " stories.

> And that if man wanted to establish a new

>religion, he would have come up with something much more reasonable!

More reasonable? Like other religions?

>* Also, the reliable and consistent testimony of the disciples in

>the New Testament as well as the disciples' martyrdom- it has never

>been documented that anyone has ever knowingly died for a lie.

The further I get into your message, the less prospect I see for

productive discussion. What on earth do you mean by saying " it has

never been documented that anyone has ever knowingly died for a

lie " ? I mean, seriously, WTF are you talking about?

-

[Guest guest]

Suze-

> >Well, given that there is no evidence in everyday life (as far as I can

> >tell) that there is a personal god, I would imagine that the burden of

> >'proof' is on the believer. Where is the evidence? I think that most

> >atheists would LOVE to be convinced that there is indeed a god. But,

> >similarly for most irrational notions, I think that there is no

> >overwhelming obligation to sift through all of recorded history to rule

> >out that there might be some evidence. After all, it always might be in

> >that next source...I think that it is rational to believe that if there

> >indeed were EVIDENCE that there were a personal god, then this evidence

> >would be pretty well known by now.

>

>Just like the evidence supporting WAP-style nutrition is pretty well known

>by now?

There's a huge financial incentive to obscure nutritional

truth. Where's the financial incentive to hide religious truth? If

it's out there, why have none of the fantastically wealthy religious

institutions we're burdened with trumpeted it to the world?

>No, it's not an area I've looked into, but I suppose the supporters of

>Intelligent Design might have some arguments for evidence supporting their

>view.

Yeah, they do: crap arguments full of crap facts and crap logic.

>Sorry, I just feel totally uncompelled to give you anything ;-) But if you

>really care (cough! cough!) then get a copy yourself and read the sections

>on the empty tomb, which btw, is the basis for Christianity. Without any

>empty tomb, there is simply no debate that Jesus was a mortal man.

I see, because there's an empty tomb, Jesus must have risen from the

dead. Does that mean a bunch of pharoahs also rose from the dead,

just to cite one of a vast number of conceivable example explanations?

>such as the case with Josh McDowell, for instance. (Maybe

>he had an unexpressed " God gene " just waiting to be triggered, LOL)

And you think that's so ridiculous? (It's more likely to be a

complex of genes, but that's mostly beside the point except for

allowing the mildly amusing joke that people who believe in god have

god complexes.)

-

[Guest guest]

>Going back to the big bang, we must assume an antecedent

>cause for the universe, one that had to be supernatural- superceding

>space and time- namely, God.

No, there's no reason we " must " accept God. First, there could be a

non-God cause for the universe. Second, there could be no cause for

the universe. Third, if the universe requires a cause, God must

require a cause too -- except for the usual tautological insistence

that God uniquely is eternal and uncreated.

------------------------

Very interesting discussion. The above is the crux of the matter, as far as

I'm concerned. I have always asked, but how did God come into being. It just

doesn't make sense to me that he/it/whatever was always here. It also seems

like a lonely existence for the eons until he decided to create a universe and

then who knows how long before man was created. What did he do with his time.

Oh, excuse me, there was no time. (Mind bongling!) I would have liked the

bible to be much more forthcoming of who he is, where he came from with

explanations that could be tested out. It would have been helpful if the bible

was more straightforward, with less metaphors and stories that read like fairy

tales. Seems like he set up a game that causes men to argue and fight with

each other, because he's been so elusive. Some would say he's testing our

faith. Some just need more valid answers to believe.

jafa

---------------------------------

Photos – Showcase holiday pictures in hardcover

Photo Books. You design it and we’ll bind it!

[Guest guest]

Gene-

>Because I don't think that there is a 'test' that can determine faith.

>Therefore, the determination of whether someone has faith is based on

>the answer to a series of questions, or it is based on some criteria set

>by the scientist. Sure - there might be some genetic predisposition to

>ascribe to irrational belief systems, but it's difficult for me to

>believe that there is a gene that pretty much determines whether you

>will believe in god or not. Does this test differentiate between, say,

> Bush's 'faith', the people on this list who utter threats of

>eternal damnation, and someone with real faith - who simply instantiates

>this faith in his/her actions? This just sounds to me like one of many

>little blips on the scientific radar that show up all the time on

>sensationalist TV shows and then disappear rightfully into obscurity. I

>just don't find it very interesting.

We have a long way to go before we understand the nature of faith in

higher powers and its possible basis or bases in genes, but that's no

reason to avoid scientific exploration of the subjects.

One possible interesting outcome would be for people to start

screening each other for the gene or genes before deciding whether to

have kids together.

-

[Guest guest]

On 1/7/06, Gene Schwartz <implode7@...> wrote:

> Sorry - I don't agree that it is " very clear " that this is his intended

> meaning, but I will have to say that I don't have time (or I don't

> choose to take the time) to refamiliarize myself with the more mystical

> intepretation that I studied at one time. Plus, I have no wish to get

> into another one of these endless arguments with you, and your self

> aggrandizing pomposity.

In other words it depends what his definition of " was " was.

I'm sort of surprised that someone favoring directness such as

yourself would favor the gnostic interpolations that are typical of

after-the-fact " mystical " reinterpretations of any other religious

documents, over the more straightforward reading in , where there

is quite straightforward language that I would interpret as his

intended meaning. Certainly, there are alternative interpretations of

, just like the Sufis had alternative interpretations of the very

earthly and geopolitical intructions for war-making in the Qu'ran, but

it seems more reasonable to interpret in the overt sense of the

straightforward language within the text.

Anyway, I agree that this discussion between us is rather purposeless

and astronomically doubtful to bear any fruit, so I'm not really

interested in continuing either. Too bad we weren't talking about

smoking pot. LOL.

Chris

--

Dioxins in Animal Foods:

A Case For Vegetarianism?

Find Out the Truth:

http://www.westonaprice.org/envtoxins/dioxins.html

[Guest guest]

-------------- Original message ----------------------

From: " kristinmoke " <kmoke@...>

>

> >

> > > >None of the groups had biblical belief. How can

> > > their

> > > >truth ring true then?

> > > >Wanita

> >

> > > There are things besides the Bible that resonate

> > > with God's truth.

> > > Romans 1:20 says " For since the creation of the

> > > world God's

> > > invisible qualities- his eternal power and divine

> > > nature- have been

> > > clearly seen, being understood from what has been

> > > made, so that men

> > > are without excuse. "

> >

> > You're not the first to interpret and liken reverence

> > to nature's power, free of entity, to an entity.

> >

> > Wanita

> >

>

> I attribute the creation of nature itself to an entity- this is very

> different. Examination of the nature of nature if you will points

> strongly in the direction of a Creator.

Well, if you want to take the position that if you don't understand something,

it must be attributable to a supernatural force...

> For example, the consensus

> of the cosmology community is that the universe had a beginning. If

> you follow the logic that what begins to exist has a cause and the

> universe had a beginning, it must follow that the universe has a

> cause.

No, it doesn't follow. First - and this is not easy to do - entire philosphical

works have been based on this - you have to precisely define what a cause is.

You're just throwing around terms.

Second - while we might say that events (at least macrocosmic ones) in the

universe have causes, the notion of cause and effect as we understand it

presupposes time as we understand it (which we really don't...). We don't

understand what it MEANS for the universe to come into existence, and to glibly

then apply terms like cause/effect to the universe coming into being assumes the

same notion of causality existed 'before' the universe began.

> The Cambrian Explosion, which describes the sudden

> (geologically speaking) appearance of the majority of animal phyla

> in the fossil record also points to a creative force rather than

> random mutation and variation.

this is all crap. You are stating this as fact. It is religion and nothing else.

No logic involved either.

>Another example would be the complex

> information contained in DNA and involved in the working of the

> cell. One assumes intelligence is behind even the simplest

> collection of information, how could it not be in DNA which is far

> more complex than the most advanced computer? It's akin to the old

> example of the astronomical odds against all the parts of a 747

> coming together in a tornado to make an operational jet airplane.

If you'd like to believe in intelligent design, more power to you. Just don't

teach it as science, and don't expect to post it here as fact and not get called

on it.

[Guest guest]

--- Idol <Idol@...> wrote:

> Gene-

>

> >So there is a genetic mutation which correlates to

> >answering 'yes' when asked this specific question?

> >

> >Sounds like utter bull to me.

>

> That's because you're not approaching the question

> in a reasonable

> fashion. Whether or not it's true that faith is at

> least partly

> genetic in origin, we have genes which give rise to

> all sorts of

> abilities and personality traits. Why is " faith "

> (or some root trait

> which gives rise to it) necessarily any different?

If Bland at the Human Genome Project is right,

this gene would most likely be in the 70% of genes

that are open to various expressions by environmental

effect and personal choices.

Wanita

[Guest guest]

--- Gene Schwartz <implode7@...> wrote:

> " Washington Times article

>

>

http://washingtontimes.com/world/20041114-111404-8087r.htm

>

>

> God gene search. Gives gene name and question

> amount.

> Book by geneticist.

>

> Wanita "

>

> God Wanita basic quality filter. The issue just

> doesn't interest me.

> It's junk. The Washington Times is a well known

> Moonie right wing piece

> of trash, which adds to the credibility.

God Gene! wouldn't give me a WT leaning result, would

it?

Wanita

[Guest guest]

-------------- Original message ----------------------

From: Wanita <wanitawa@...>

>

>

> --- Gene Schwartz <implode7@...> wrote:

>

> > " Washington Times article

> >

> >

> http://washingtontimes.com/world/20041114-111404-8087r.htm

> >

> >

> > God gene search. Gives gene name and question

> > amount.

> > Book by geneticist.

> >

> > Wanita "

> >

> > God Wanita basic quality filter. The issue just

> > doesn't interest me.

> > It's junk. The Washington Times is a well known

> > Moonie right wing piece

> > of trash, which adds to the credibility.

>

> God Gene! wouldn't give me a WT leaning result, would

> it?

>

> Wanita

God Wanita! I just can't understand your post.

I did check out the article - very little info, as I suspected. And the

scientist did simply ask people a series of questions.

[Guest guest]

> God Wanita! I just can't understand your post.

>

> I did check out the article - very little info, as I

> suspected. And the scientist did simply ask people a

> series of questions.

God Gene!

I'm used to being misunderstood.

Search and link were merely toward more information

besides Barbara Walters. No reason other than toward a

physical reason which it wasn't.

Wanita