₦airaland Forum

^^^ It doesn't say the sun set on a beach. It says that Allah gave Zulquarnain the ways and means to the ends of the earth. (18:84 Yusuf Ali)

And he (Zulquarnain) followed one of these ways. (18:85)

Until he reached the place where the sun set. And he found that it set in "a spring of murky water" (18:86).

I advise you to be careful about how you try and change the Koran. One of your Muslim brothers may decide to kill you one of these days.

The Pink Unicorn argument is basically identical to the Flying Spaghetti Monster argument which was first proposed by the great Bobby Henderson seven years ago.

Back then the Kansas Board of Education was considering including creationism and Intelligent Design in the school curriculum alongside evolution. Mr. Henderson argued that he believed that the universe was created by an invisible, undetectable, omnipotent being that closely resembled spaghetti and meatballs. He pointed out that there was just as much evidence that the FSM created the world as there was that god did therefore both theories are equally valid. He then demanded that the FSM theory also be taught in schools and that it be given equal time in classrooms with Intelligent Design and Evolution.

Basically if you accept one outlandish idea without evidence, then you should be willing to accept others. And if you reject one, you should be willing to reject others. Otherwise, you are not thinking rationally.

ghazzal: Ok for the sake of argument. what did the bigbang theory proove? tell me something different or confess you dont know

The big báng theory doesn't prove anything (science deals in evidence, not proof). It is a theory about the origin of the universe. It says that the universe began as an infinitesimally small, energy dense point called a singularity which inflated till it reached its present size, and continues to do so today. There was no explosion, and no smoke. That by the way was an extremely short, dumbed down summary of the theory so don't think you're now that you've read this post. Read the Wikipedia article for the more complete version.

tell me where d Quran says the sun sets into a muddy pool.

Sura 18:86

"Until, when he reached the setting of the sun, he found it set in a spring of murky water: Near it he found a People: We said: "O Zul-qarnain! (thou hast authority,) either to punish them, or to treat them with kindness.""
Is it possible that you, a Muslim are not aware of this verse? Could it be that I, an atheist am more familiar with the Koran than you? Or were you just being disingenuous because you knew you were cornered?

ghazzal: Ok for the sake of argument. what did the bigbang theory proove? tell me something different or confess you dont know

The big báng theory doesn't prove anything (science deals in evidence, not proof). It is a theory about the origin of the universe. It says that the universe began as an infinitesimally small, energy dense point called a singularity which inflated till it reached its present size, and continues to do so today. There was no explosion, and no smoke. That by the way was an extremely short, dumbed down summary of the theory so don't think you're now that you've read this post. Read the Wikipedia article for the more complete version.

tell me where d Quran says the sun sets into a muddy pool.

Sura 18:86

"Until, when he reached the setting of the sun, he found it set in a spring of murky water: Near it he found a People: We said: "O Zul-qarnain! (thou hast authority,) either to punish them, or to treat them with kindness.""
Is it possible that you, a Muslim are not aware of this verse? Could it be that I, an atheist am more familiar with the Koran than you? Or were you just being disingenuous because you knew you were cornered?

Ibrahim mr fish: Also Quran also stated dat,there is a barrer seprating occeans,which was also proven by science

Rubbish. There is no such barrier separating the oceans. I'm afraid you are talking nonsense.

the big bank theory was also talk about in Quran,the universe is exploded into existance.I belive dat is not a common knowlage back 1400years ago.

The big bàng theory doesn't claim that the universe exploded into existence. And as far as I am aware, neither does the Koran.

What you are doing is selectively interpreting sections of the Koran in ways that make it look scientific and dismissing the more embarrassing passages (like the one about the sun setting into a muddy pool).

The fact is that you could never have derived the big báng, or any other scientific theory from the Koran or bible before that theory was elucidated by scientists. It's only after a theory has become established that your people start trying to massage koranic passages to fit known science. And the patently ridiculous passages (like the aforementioned muddy sunset hypothesis) get written off as metaphysical and not literal.

The only way to convince me that the Koran has real knowledge in IT is for someone to extract information we didn't already know from it. If someone used organic verses to build a functioning warp drive or produce a stable wormhole, that would be pretty convincing.

Bastardising both the Koran and the big báng theory to try and make them fit together is not going to fool anyone with a brain.

Every religion looks senseless to those who don't believe in it.

I totally agree.

And Sam Harris is a boss!

I still remember the first time I set foot in an MFM church. It was way back in 1996 or '97, I was dragged to their headquarters in Akoka by my momsi who had heard about them from one of her born-again friends.

One woman gave a very funny testimony. She was in a bus traveling from Lagos to Ibadan when "the holy spirit" told her that the bus was going to have an accident. So she started praying: "Every spirit of motor accident, fall down and die!" From there, she started praying "machine-gun prayer": DIE! DIE!! DIE!!!. The other passengers soon started complaining that who is this person that is shouting "DIE, DIE" in a bus? They all ganged up on her and made her keep quiet.

The bus then had an accident and somersaulted several times. I'll never forget the woman's next words: "We had accident and notin happened to me. But all the people saying I should stop shouting Die, Die, they rushed them to mortuary. PRAAIISE THE LOOORD!!!"

The MFM crowd shouted hallelujah.

True story, I swear.

dasparrow: @Post

Why is France afraid? No, they should keep their embassies open now. If na to provoke people by making insensitive religious remarks, you will see these French and westerners in action. However, when shyte hits the fans, they want to dodge. People should not abuse freedom of speech. This is how hate and xenophobia all starts. Would the west tolerate people making anti-jewish remarks all in the same of freedom of speech?

First of all stop generalizing. You seem to think that everyone in the west had a meeting and decided to draw Mohammed cartoons. The fact is that most westerners don't care about Islam or Muslims except when they start rioting. The people who draw the cartoons and make the films you are complaining about are a very tiny group and in no way represent the average westerner.

Secondly, the people who are abusing freedom of speech are those who are calling for the death of others over a stúpid cartoon. Making fun of other people's religion is a perfectly legitimate activity which Muslims engage in just as much as everyone else. The idea that Islam or any other religion has some sort of special status over others is one that the no civilized society should ever accept.

Third, this is not how hate and xenophobia start. They start when religious and political leaders start calling for the deaths of others over stúpid YouTube videos and cartoons. If I were a Muslim, or lived in a Muslim country, I would be seriously ashamed of the rubbish some of my "leaders" have been saying recently.

Lastly, you asked if the west tolerates making of anti-Jewish remarks in the name of freedom of speech? The answer as any sensible person would know is clearly yes. The internet is full of antisemitic websites, videos and yes, even cartoons. The reason the Jews don't go about rioting and killing people about it is that most of them aren't homicidal fanatics, and the few who are are kept in check by the societies in which they live.

If Muslims want to live in a civilized world, they will have to learn to accept insults just like every other major religion has. End of story. Your religion so not special, It is not better than anyone else's. And you will NOT be treated differently. Deal with it.

CrazyMan: I believe that everyone is entitled to his/her own views and opinions...so whatever you choose to believe is up to you...

Wrong. The biblical evolution myth contradicts known science. That is a fact, not a matter of opinion.

To choose to continue to believe it is to choose to be irrational.

The main reason why people think Jesus was married is that in the society where he lived, it would have been extremely unusual for a man his age to be single. In fact it would have been an extremely attractive point on which to criticize him. The fact that neither his followers nor the people who opposed him never mentioned the absence if a wife strongly suggests that one did exist.

But the whole argument is moot anyway because the only real evidence that a real, historical Jesus ever really existed are the 3 synoptic gospels. And the gospels are extremely unreliable as proof for several good reasons. First of all, they seriously contradict each other in critically important parts. Most of the sections which agree across all 3 were clearly lifted wholesale from the Gospel of Mark. Secondly, the stories have clearly been embellished, added to and modified by the original author(s) and by others over the centuries and the parts most likely to be changed were those central to the dominant Christian dogma . Not to mention that those gospels were cherry-pickpicked out of dozens of others by early Christian leaders for reasons that were as much political as they were theological.

The truth is that we know next to nothing about the "real Jesus". Even if he did exist, he would have been unrecognizable from the Jesus character we know from the bible. Even if it is legit, this new papyrus fragment doesn't add anything to our knowledge.

tl;dr It doesn't matter if Jesus was married

The National Assembly people have started again with their useless populist nonsense. The only reason they are doing this is so that they can get on the front pages of the press and be portrayed as fighting for the common man while actually doing nothing for him. They've turned this non-issue into a big deal, while there are so many more important problems that are being slid under the table.

Right now, junior health workers in teaching hospitals nationwide are on strike to protest the government's recent massive income tax increase which has laid waste to their take-home pay. Did the NA oppose the tax bill when it was presented to them? Did they discuss it for any significant length of time? Did they even bother to draw people's attention to it so they knew what was coming? The answer to all these is no. They passed the bill quietly and in double time. There was no significant opposition to it even though it wipes out people's disposable income, pushes more families into poverty and directly harms the economy.

The increase in my own personal income tax amounts to 20% of my take-home pay. And that is just the increase, not the total tax. Plus I'm being told that I owe the government over 1 year of arrears. And all that money goes directly into paying jumbo allowances for these useless parasites (who incidentally are not affected by the tax increase).

Fighting for the common man my áss.

35 posts and not a single person has suggested doing an autopsy.

I fear for this country.

They should definitely ban smoking in public places. The smoke harms innocent third parties, sometimes even more than the smokers themselves. People who work in bars and beer parlors shouldn't have to risk getting cancer just to make a living. If you want to smoke, do it in your house or your car and stop forcing others to inhale poison.

Next, we need harsher sentences for drunk drivers and a review of the "prison for taking one way" law.

They should definitely ban smoking public places. The smoke harms innocent third parties, sometimes even more than the smokers themselves. People who work in bars and beer parlors shouldn't have to risk getting cancer just to make a living.

Next, we need harsher sentences for drunk drivers and a review of the "prison for taking Obe way" law.

obadiah777: WHEN THE SAINTS WERE BEING CHOSEN, ONLY BLACK PEOPLE EXISTED ON EARTH. OTHER RACES APPEARED MUCH MUCH LATER AFTER THE FLOOD AND THEY COULDNT BE SAINTS BECAUSE THEY ONLY GOT WRITTEN INTO THE LAW AFTER CHRIST DIED. BY THEN ALL THE SAINTS HAD BEEN SEALED.

This statement is rétarded on so many levels, I don't even know where to start.

This is probably the best example of meta-retardation I've ever encountered on Nairaland.

Which school DoD he get the PhD from anyway? I hope it wasn't a mushroom bible school that he founded himself. That's a trick that more than,a few pastors have used to dash themselves big titles they don't deserve.

@OP
First of all, America is not a Christian country.

Second, voting for someone solely on the basis of religion is an extremely rétarded thing to do. That's the kind of senseless behaviour that landed Nigeria in this present mess, with our incompetent, but "born again" president Goodluck stumbling from one mistake to the other.

Stop being a dumbáss, and stop encouraging others to be dumbásses.

Delafruita: i would be the last person to quote a genesis based text.its true the general belief was that birds descended from dinosaurs.however,that theory has been rendered implausible based on discoveries of scientists over the past 2 decades.one of such research was carried out by the oregon state university in 2009.all the scientists that worked on the research at OSU are evolutionists so the research wasnt out to discredit evolution.

as for birds existing before dinosaurs and during the same age as dinosaurs,you'd have a hard time disproving that seeing as you'd have to contend with national geographic

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2008/02/080208-bird-origins.html

The Oregon State University study is the same one one I was referring to. Like I said there are no other studies that support its findings so it is most likely wrong. The way science works is that research has to be reproducible before it is generally accepted. There are dozens of other studies that not only contradict your OSU one but also align very nicely with each other. Plus morphology is just one of several ways of comparing animals. You also seem to think that the theropod breathing systems is the only or main reason scientists link them with birds which is rubbish. Scientists have approached the problem from several different angles and almost all have come to the same conclusion, that birds are the last theropod dinosaurs.

Also, I read you National Geographic article. I think you need to go through it again because it doesn't say what you think it says. All article says that the common ancestor of modern birds arose in the late cretaceous period about 40 million years before previously thought. Dinosaurs arose during the Triassic period, 230 million years ago, long before the birds. I find it funny that you are trying to use molecular genetics, afield that is entirely based on the theory of evolution, to debunk evolution.

Like I said, you are seriously misinformed. I advise you to go through the Wikipedia article on the origin of birds which gives a good overview of the latest research on the subject, then follow some of the links at the bottom.

[url]en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin_of_birds[/url]

truthislight: even mosquito Adapts to insecticide.

Hanging on to straws.

Human immune system adapt to bacteria infestation all the time.

Just imagine!

Mosquitos adapting to insecticide is natural selection which is what drives evolution.

The immune system response to infection honest drive natural selection because the changes aren't inheritable. Just because your father had already had chicken pox and is bow immune doesn't mean you can't get it.

Delafruita: so what?patterns exist everywhere but that doesnt signify evolution.birds can fly because of their stationary femur.this allows air into their abdominal sacs which enables flight.theropods on the other hand have a moving femur.and even if they had an abdominal sac,any attempt at flight would have resulted in the abdominal sac bursting(that is if they had one).in essence,for theropods to have evolved into birds,they would have needed to make their femur stationary evidence of which doesnt exist.
besides you completelly skipped the part where evidence shows that birds appeared millions of years before dinosaurs.its impossible for birds to have evolved from dinosaurs which they preceded.
seems to me like you need to ask google a lot of questions about recent trends in the world of evolution

What you posted above is a slightly garbled version of a theory referenced in Answers in Genesis, a creationist website. This theory is based on a single paper published in the Journal of Morphology. It's findings have been contradicted by several other studies and it hasn't received any significant support from any other scientists. On addition, the study only questions one of the dozens of features linking birds and dinosaurs and certainly doesn't the rule out. dinosaur-bird evolution as you have claimed. Unfortunately, creationists have latched on to it and are using it to spread disinformation. This is why you shouldn't learn evolution from creationist materials.

Also, please let me know which bird species appeared "millions of years before dinosaurs".

tl;dr Stop reading Answers in Genesis.

Delafruita: as in,seriously?and you seem to have conveniently forgotten that birds are found earlier in the fossil record than dinosaurs.
the reason it was believed birds descended from theropods was because of their lungs.however theropod dinosaurs had a moving femur and therefore could not have had a lung that worked like that in birds. Their abdominal air sac, if they had one, would have collapsed. That undercuts a critical piece of supporting evidence for the dinosaur-bird link.p
A velociraptor did not just sprout feathers at some point and fly offinto the sunset,birds having evolved separately from dinosaurs and developing their own unique characteristics, including feathers, wings and a unique lung and locomotion system.

You sir, are seriously misinformed. I advise you to use Google, do some reading, and find the truth.

Or just look for a picture of an archeopteryx and spot the differences/similarities between dinosaurs and birds.

Tyranosaurus Rex: Big teeth, can't fly, clawed forelimbs, bipedal gait, hollow bones, 3 fingers and toes, wishbone, protofeathers.

Archeopteryx: Small teeth, 3 fingers and toes, clawed wings, bipedal gait, hollow bones, wish bone, large feathers, could fly (or at least glide).

(Super) Eagles: No teeth, 3 fingers and toes, non-clawed wings, bipedal gait, hollow bones, wish bone, large feathers, can fly.

Can you spot the pattern?

Delafruita: perhaps you can give me examples of adaptation that led to evolution into a totally different specie or class of living thing

Theropod dinosaurs evolved into birds.

Edit: A better way of putting it is that birds evolved from theropod dinosaurs. Of course, most of the theropods are now extinct. But the descendants of those that survived look so different from their ancestors that we didn't even realize they were related until very recently.

k2039: Sounds to me like you not a christian(the bolded is the premise for my assumption).
I will just assume I didnt see your post.
It will be a waste of my precious time explaining to you(but think about this,praying for someone(devil) who is doomed for hell already sounds logical to you)

Whether or not I'm a Christian or not is irrelevant. You haven't been able to refute my post so my point stands and the question remains.

If we are supposed to love our enemies, are we not to love Satan? Try and come up with a better answer, but this time apply logic.

telltoo: another case of common ordinary micro-evolution, same stuff that happens when bacteria adpats to some deug and becoms resistant
yawn

"Micro-Evolution" is evolution. The only difference is the amount of time it takes to become apparent.

In the old days, creationists used to flat out deny that evolution was occurring. They claimed that all the transitional fossils were either fakes or different species and because of the large time-scales involved, it was difficult for scientists to show ordinary people how wrong they were. Then as scientists started to gather more and more undeniable evidence of evolution occurring within periods as short as a few years, things changed.

The most stubborn creationists have continued to deny the evidence and are looking more and more foolish as the evidence mounts.The less stüpid creationists have come up with this concept of "Micro-Evolution" where they basically claim that living things can evolve a little, but not a lot i.e small changes only. They seem to believe that there is some sort of invisible wall preventing living things from evolving too far away from their "original form".

The problem is that Micro-Evolution has a huge problem explaining what stops living things from continuing to change over time until they no longer resemble their ancestors. They say there is a wall, but they can't say where it is or what it is made of.

If you want to accept Darwin's theory, you have to accept all its scary consequences. Life can and has become more complex and diverse without the need for any creator or designer to direct it. That is the truth, and you just have to deal with it.

If you insist of paying tithe, why don't you give it to a motherless babies home or something where it can be put to good use? Giving money to church is worse than flushing it down the toilet because it gets used to deceive others, litter the streets with ugly posters and fliers, and make noise in the middle of the night. If you flush the money, you don't disturb anybody else and at least you get some manure out of it later on.

Also, WTF is a spiritual father? Is it similar to the spirit wives they keep mentioning in home videos?

k2039: God is talking about people

Satan is not a direct enemy, though. He is not for us to love or hate, but to avoid and ignore

However Satan is doomed for hell anyway,so it doesnt matter.

It says love your enemies and pray for them. There is no special provisions for non-human enemies. It doesn't qualify the term enemies and therefore there are no exemptions. The bible repeatedly refers to the devil as the adversary and also does not qualify the term in any way so I don't know where you are getting this idea of the devil not being a direct enemy.

Even in religion and superstition, you still need to apply logic when you are analyzing your holy books. You can't just make up an explanation out of thin air every time there is some contradiction in your beliefs. This kind of faulty logic is the reason why atheists look down on you people. You don't seem to know how to think.

seriallink: That ain't guess work. I'm a Christian, it's all faith; it has biblical backups I know it sounds like some trash to you but it's the real thing man~

The biblical definition of faith is the evidence of things not seen. That is basically is an admission that faith is the irrational belief in imaginary things.

The bible is a valuable cultural resource but to base your whole life on it is crazy. The bible is an amalgamation of dozens of different texts and manuscripts all of which have been copied, edited, translated, revised and doctored by thousands of different people over 2500 years. Some of these people made mistakes, some of than changed it to reflect their own preconceived ideassome were outrightly fraudulent. The parts of the bbile that are the most frequently changed are those that deal with the central principles of Christianity and Judeism: Monotheism, the nature of god, the nature of christ, the trinity, etc.

There isn't even agreement on which books should and shouldn't be included the bible. The bible you have today is the result of centuries of changes reinforced by the suppression, persecution and murder of those who believed in different versions of it.

What I'm trying to say to you is that biblical backup is no backup at all. You are building a house on sand.

seriallink: Just because skeletons of modern humans that are older or of the same age as neantherdal man hasn't been found yet doesn't mean that humans & the so-called neantherdal homo sepiens species didn't co-existed at a particular time. What if the neanderthals were just another species of homo sapiens that were a little advanced than apes but weren't related to modern humans? So, to suggest that modern humans evolved from neanderthals or apes without any reasonable evidence isn't logical but pure guess work!

Modern humans and Neanderthals did indeed coexist for a while. We know this from dating their bones, and because we have analyzed their DNA. In fact we know that humans and Neanderthals interbred for a while, the majority of Caucasians have some Neanderthal DNA and are thus partly descended from them. Scientists do not currently believe that modern humans evolved from Neanderthals. Instead, they were a separate human subspecies that evolved independently in Eurasia and have since gone extinct.

Why jump to conclusions when a lot of archaeological researches & discoveries are being made? Just like we can't jump to a conclusion that there aren't planets out there that could sustain life or even have alien life because more planets with the possibility of sustaining life are being discovered in our galaxy alone. Assumption isn't evidence (so, it's 50/50); any reasonable scientist wouldn't use asumptions as evidence!

Nobody is jumping to anything. Scientists draw conclusions based on the best available evidence. Whenever credible new evidence arises, we evaluate it critically and update our theories to reflect it. It is religious people that jump to conclusions.

Atheist & una evolution delusions, just to prove that God doesn't exist. Hell is real o, make una repent b4 e late o!

Nobody is trying to disprove your god. The best available evidence suggests that life on earth evolved solely through natural selection within the laws of physics. There is no credible evidence to suggest the involvement of any supernatural beings. Occam's razor means that scientists aren't going to crowbar an unnecessary god into their theories just to satisfy the judeo-Christian religious people. If you want your god included in science, then do some research to find his footprints or come up with a better theory than intelligent design.

Scientists are not going to abandon logic in order to pander to you people. You guys just have to deal with that.

CrazyMan: If only you took your time to scroll through my post, you would have noticed that I removed that post you quoted up there...meaning it wasn't necessary.

I'm fully aware that you edited your post. Just because you destroyed the evidence that you said something stúpid means nothing.

But then again I'm not surprised, atheists are the worst fools you can ever come across. They have no love, no respect, no kindness...in fact, they live a life of scorn. Very quick to judge other peoples faults as if you guys are perfect.

Bloody animals.

You accuse others of doing something. then do the exact same thing in with the same 3 sentences.

Define hypocrisy.

What!?! Do you dare suggest that the lord our god, the great killer of Egyptian babies, the creator of Satan, and the eternal torturer of souls is evil?

Where did you get that ridiculous idea from?

CrazyMan: I said explosion not expansion.

With just one short sentence, you have exposed the depth of your ignorance. Please go and read up on the Big Bàng Theory before you post again. Why should we waste our time with another long an pointless debate with someone who doesn't have a clue what he is talking about. Wikipedia would be a good place to start.

I swear, debating with Nairaland creationists is like arguing with a goat.