₦airaland Forum

Do you know how many people were rushed to hospital and could not come back recently, worldwide?

Did he predict how he was going to meet his death? Did he get his name right?

Is it likely that about 2000 people would satisfy this same prediction?

Bobbyaf:
@ Huxley

I am not convinced with their version of time needed for petroleum and diamond to be made naturally anyway. Besides, I have already read various versions of the account coming from the evolutionists. I have my own ideas that I have come to accept that I got from a video I watched some time ago.

It was made by Dr. Robert Ventry and it makes for a good view.

This has got nothing to do with evolution. This is chemical engineering or better still petro-chemical engineering in the case of petroleum, and mineralogy in the case of diamond. The evolutionist have nothing to pontificate about these subjects.

I simply asked you how long it takes for organic matter to become petroleum and you are playing all sorts of gyminastics. Is this not a simple straightforward question? How long does your Dr Ventry says it takes. And could new petroleum resources be discovered based on the science Dr Ventry presents?

Looks like such miracles are happening to non-believers more and more now oooh. Some weeks ago I too experienced a miracle where I prayed for Lord Jesus to fill and empty glass with water, and lo and behold, he did fill it with water for me.

Bobbyaf:
@ Huxley

Petroleum from what I know is a mixture of hydrocarbons that is sourced from both plants and animals that once existed some time before.


From what I recall all it takes is high pressure and high temperature, but apart from that I am not too sure about the exact details.

Anyway what are you getting at?

You are on the right track on both counts, but you have been rather superficial. Why don't you research the formation of petroleum and artificial diamond a bit more. Look into how long it takes to form these substances naturally and put some quantitative estimates of the time.

One Enchanted Being:
Neuro-existentialism & Meaning
Owen Flanagan

The Really Hard Problem: Meaning in a Material World (RHP) is my attempt to explain whether and how meaning – existential meaning-- is possible in a material world, and how such

meaning is best conceived naturalistically. Meaning, existential meaning, must be conceived naturalistically, because supernaturalism despite whatever consolation it seems to afford,

provides answers to questions of meaning that are epistemically irresponsible, that show disrespect for truth. Neuro-existentialism conceives of our predicament in accordance with Darwin

plus neuroscience. We are animals, our minds are our brains, and when we die we are dead forever. If our situation is as neuroexistentialism says, then we have a new, deeper, more

truthful place, from which to ask Socrates question: How ought I to live? One answer befitting our natures is hedonistic platonism -- seek eudaimonia by maximizing the pure and mixed

pleasures produced at the fecund intersection of what is true, beautiful and good. If you try to do this, then you will have a shot at having about as good and meaningful a life as is in the

cards for a human. Many find the question of meaning as posed neuro-existentially deeply disturbing – it is a question about what sort of meaning befits an animal -- and the latter sort of

answer unsatisfying, underwhelming, disenchanting, possibly horrifying. My critics, Gregory Peterson (GP), Ann Taves (AT), and Donald Wiebe (DW), show great respect and patience for the

argument of RHP. Here I try to respond in kind to four of their (more than four) deep and insightful criticisms, several of which have worried me also, a couple of which I hear elsewhere and

often about my naturalization . Continue here

Bobbyaf:
@ Tudor

Christians don't really deny the existence of large animals at all ever having existed. The confusion rests with the time we say they existed, and what destroyed them versus what the advocates of evolution hold.

Noah's flood happened to have destroyed them since it covered the earth. No life form survived except those that entered the huge ship that Noah built. There is ample evidence to explain the universal flood. Just look at the fossil formations and you will notice that the larger animals were found at the top including the bones of dinosaurs. These large beasts were able to climb up to the highest points in order to escape the flood, while the smaller animals perished.

Some scientists jump to the conclusion that a gigantic meteor or meteors struck the earth, creating a global firestorm which destroyed the dinosaurs etc and formed the K-T Boundary layer. How boring! So it roasted the dinos, but left the elephants and rhinos? I thought scientists were supposed to be smart. As the Bible says so eloquently, ‘Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools.’ (Romans 1:22) Other scientists say that a giant meteor hit and did not cause a firestorm, but caused a gigantic tidal wave, possibly 1000 feet high.

Ever heard about the K-T boundary? Its a layer of sediment all over the earth. All the fossils of dinosaurs and other extinct creatures happened to have been found below the sediment layer, and never above. How come? MOre and more scientists are becoming convinced that the Bible is as accurate as it comes.

Remember what Jesus said about those who failed to believe on Him? He said that the rocks would cry out if they failed to be a witness, and indeed they are doing just that. The evidence from the rocks are plainly pointing to the accuracy of God's word without a doubt.

Let me put to you another case. Scientists argue that the foundation rocks took millions if not billions of years to have cooled and solidified. Yet deep in thse rocks can be found microspheres called Polonium halos, produced by the radioactive decay of primordial polonium, which is known to have a fleeting half life of a little over 3 minutes.

The fact that these halos are found in the foundation rocks of the earth means one thing. They had to have been made instantaneously to prevent the halos from evaporating. If in deed it took the rocks a very long time to solidify, then logically there could have been no trace of such halos in the rocks in the first place, correct?

Lets create an analogy. Let us say we place alka-seltzer in water, what would you expect? An effervescence correct? To trap those bubbles one would have to suddenly freeze the water, correct? The same principle would apply to an instantaneous solidification of the rocks that would have trapped the radioactive halos from escaping.

QED.

Hello, I have got some questions for you. Here we go;

1) Do you drive a petroleum-based car? Where do you think petroleum comes from and how long does it take to form?

2) Have you heard of artificial diamond? How is it possible to create diamond in the lab and what does one need to know in order to do this?

davidylan:
500 yrs ago when there was neither christianity nor islam in Africa, we were more divided into little tribes and kingdoms than ever.

This is why you wonder whether these anti-religious fools have peas for brains. Is religion a greater divisive tool in Africa than tribe or language?

While I disagree that religion is THE (main) reason Africa are not more united, it is worth noting that there was plenty of religions in Africa before the arrival of Christianity and Islam. The notion of African unity is a relatively new one. The majority of the inhabitants of the African continent will probably want to see unity first within their own countries before the notion of a continental unity. When you realise just how it is to build a nation, then you will see just how almost far-fetched the notion of African unity is.

Obviously today religions does play a role in the disunity of the continent, but probably not much more that the other factors such as language divide, tribal affiliations, territorial disputes, poverty, poor education, etc, etc, etc.

Bastage:
Shallow, Huxley. Very shallow.

You can't prove that evolution is "outside yourself". For all you know it is a theory that you created and then forgot about as you play a computer game in a simulated world. There is nothing to stop you from believing that you are your own god and that everything is a result of the game you are playing - you merely don't remember because you programmed the game so that you don't remember. If you created your perceived material it's hardly "outside yourself" is it.


I can believe in whatever I want to. I can claim any of those beliefs to be knowledge. They are as interchangeable as I want them to be. That is the essence of solipsism. That belief and knowledge may not always hold true in the material world but as the material world cannot be proven to exist, they cannot be proven to be wrong.

To put it another way:

I believe in a material world.
I believe human beings exist.
I believe the scientific evidence.
I believe in evolution.

All are beliefs. None can be said to be truths unless I choose them to be so as I am the master of my own truths (just as you are with yours).


You still haven't answered my challenge.
Prove to me that you exist.

If Sollipsism is the position you hold, it is for you to prove that it is true. It cannot be true by default. I might as well come up with any other crackpot theory and ask you to prove it wrong. There is an infinitude of such crackpot theories and the fact that hardly anyone goes about proving them wrong does not mean that they are right by default.

Bastage:
You haven't read a word of the link or anything I've written have you?

How can I say that evolution is true when I can't even prove that anything other than myself exists?
Everything is a belief.




Prove to me that you exist, Huxley.

To put it simply - you can't.

Who is it who said this?

Bastage:
If you believe in evolution (as I do), then you will be aware that monkeys have learnt astrophysics.

There you are - clearly identifying two things, namely yourself [/b]and [b]evolution.  And you say you believe in it.  How can you hold onto sollipsism, and at the same time believe in the existence of something (evolution) outside yourself?  This is a contradiction.

Bastage:
If you believe in evolution (as I do), then you will be aware that monkeys have learnt astrophysics.

How does [believing] in evolution have anything to do with learning astrophysics? I do not see how these are related in anyway.

By the way, to say one believes in evolution is like saying one believes in gravity, of atoms, or bacteria. It is simply nonsense. It is better to say:

1) I accept evolution as true,

if you mean to say "I believe in evolution".

Bastage:
Are you being stupid on purpose or are you just incredibly shallow?


You emboldened and questioned my statement: "On a philosophical level there is no difference between belief and knowledge."

Solipsism explains that everything is a belief except for I think therefore I am. Therefore all knowledge except for I think therefore I am is a belief. Therefore there is no difference between belief and knowledge on a philosophical level.

OK, I shall ignore the insults and go straight to the substance or non-substance in this case.  This is the definition of solipsism from the Wikipedia link you provided:

Solipsism is the philosophical idea that "My mind is the only thing that I know exists." Solipsism is an epistemological or ontological position that knowledge of anything outside the mind is unjustified. The external world and other minds cannot be known and might not exist. In the history of philosophy, solipsism has served as a skeptical hypothesis.


Some question:

1) To what extend is this generally and universally accepted and truly representing the state of reality?

2)  Solipsism hold that common-sense objects like cars, chairs, goats  cannot be known to exists?  Do you agree with this position?

3)  If you do, then you must also agree that ALL my posts on NL are actually your posts, to the extent that they exist.  Or they do not actually exist?

Bastage:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solipsism

How is this [solipsism] relevant to this discussion?

[size=18pt]                How Religion And God-fixation Are Underdeveloping Africa. Part 2. [/size]

Written by Adebowale Oriku   
Monday, 23 February 2009
Reposted from VillageSquare

The Christian Religion is still heavy stuff in Africa, it is bread and butter, it still has both blood and body. Africa is now bestrewn with ‘living churches,’ that is over against 'dead' churches like Roman Catholic and Anglican (I understand the latter has done a lot to liven itself up now). There are thousands of denominations on the continent. In Nigeria founding a church has become a veritable no-brainer, a Klondike rage that is on the boil, and the rise in the number of churches has consistently ridden tandem with economic hardship. If any editor is thinking of packaging a copy asking Is Karl Marx Truly Dead? he should go to the continent and get his answer, at least he would be able to flesh out the Marxian axiom of religion being an opiate for the populace. And beyond being an opiate, it is also a sop for impoverished souls, warm compress for the sores and festers of poverty.

It is not unusual for misgoverning fatcats in Nigeria to call on people to pray and fast for a better government, pray for an end to corruption, and for an election (often rigged by the government itself) to run smoothly and bring out the best of candidates. The species of Liberation Theology practiced across Nigeria is indeed liberating, its promise to uplift people from poverty unto wealth and prosperity would have been commendable if it is not an imposture, a gooey nostrum. Well, not to mince words, what is practised is the worst kind of Prosperity Theology. The theology of thievery and cupidity, a theology which borrows heavily from the so-called seven deadly sins. I wonder why a name has not been coined for the sort of pentecostal revivalism characterised by Lagos churches, I mean something suggestive of the term ‘Toronto Blessing’ - Lagos Paraclete or Lagos Revelation? Or to be less charitable, Lagos Hocus-pocus.

I have always been concerned about the recent role of religion in boosting mediocrity and undereducation in my country. Primary and secondary school education is too battered for the deadhand of religion to make any further dent, so I’ll leave that aside. Recently the more affluent of the evangelical churches had begun to outdo one another in establishing universities. Although I think universities established by Christians should evince a certain degree of charity by offering scholarships and bursaries in large numbers, the universities have only turned out to be part of the mercenary projects of the church. But then you may not attend the universities if you cannot afford the fees. There is no law that says a Christian University should not indulge in a bit of free-marketeering and money-making.

I asked a nephew who has just finished the first year in the most grandiose of the new Christian universities how he is getting on. The picture he inadvertently painted is a university that is a tattier twin of the late Rev Jerry Falwell’s ‘Bible Boot Camp,’ the hotbed of illibertarianism misnamed Liberty University, second only to Oral Roberts University for being a monument to the elevation of bigotry and  bleached-out booklearning. Although he was an influential figure in American politics for some time, Falwell was not a pleasant man, his Christianity was so narrow and constricted that he might as well have died of involuntary asphyxiation. Unfortunately, Falwell’s university is a testing ground for his views, the students his hobbled guinea pigs.

In that Nigerian facsimile of Falwell’s university, every sort of moral bottleneck is imposed on the undergraduates, and even postgraduates, in the name of religion. This recalls to me a character in Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s First Circle telling another character that a university is the only place a youth can really live freely, fulfillingly, fantastically before the drudge of work and other extramural duties will intervene. I can’t imagine the damage that is being done to the reasoning of students in a Physics Department of one of these newfangled universities whose head is an obdurate creationist who will never mention anything like cosmology or string theory to his students. My nephew is studying Physics in this department. In the university the teaching of philosophy is also forbidden. This is even worse than Plato’s Republic where a ban is placed on poets. Universities should be about ‘love of wisdom’ and knowledge, which is a rough definition of the word philosophy. A university that abominates the teaching of philosophy actually belies its being, its integrity, as a place where anything worthwhile can be taught.

George Bernard Shaw once pointed out the ridiculous tautology of the term ‘Catholic University,’ since the old Greek ‘Katholikos’ means ‘Universal’ - it’s as good as saying ‘Universal University.’ To carry the argument conversely, the very fact of a Christian, Jewish or Islamic University is a contradiction in terms, an oxymoron, especially if such universities intend to see things only from vantage-point of their religions. The word ‘university’ shares a cognate root with the word universe and any university that offers anything less than a rounded, robust, universal curriculum does not deserve the name. Even in enlightened cities of Western Europe, Catholic Universities, despite their overdefined name and pretensions as citadels of great learning, often fall short of teaching anything universal - it is this sort of intellectual limitations imposed by religion that the pentescostal universities in Nigeria have further foreshortened.

Although large pockets of fanatical Christianity in the US do give a lot of people in the West (especially in Europe) a lot of concern, that vast country with its multifarious peoples and attitudes can manage this. America would never be bowled over with Christian fundamentalism – read Sarah Palin. Extreme diversions like the Jerry Springer Show should also testify to this. And you don’t often see the greatest minds from Yale and Harvard gibbering their precious time away in Jerry Falwell’s sort of church, nor would they wish to be part of any department in Falwell’s Liberty University. And when people talk about American being more religious than most countries in the western world, they often omit to say that 94 percent of American scientists are nonreligious. Americans have won the Nobel Prize more than any citizens of any country in the world and 95 percent of the Laureates were/are not religious.

Recently yet another research had reconfirmed the truism that the least religious countries like Sweden, Norway, Japan and even Estonia are doing far better than countries like Senegal, Indonesia, Malawi, Sri Lanka and Congo where most respondents to a vox pop claimed to be blissfully religious. The researchers had acknowledged the anomaly that is the United States, but then there is said to be between 20 and 40 million people in America who would not tick any box if asked what religion they belonged to, and some would only tick to conform or to let the dog of unbelief in them to continue its dogmaless sleep in private. Again, as I have pointed out above, those who are making major contributions to America’s progress are not often religious.  And there is an omission in the list of underdeveloped religious nations. Nigeria. What an oversight!

What may be defaultedly described as a fledgling state like Nigeria does not need the sort of religiosity it has sunk itself in, it augurs nothing for the country but further stagnation, if not regress. It simply takes a people who place too much emphasis on religion and its sib, superstition, to ensure this. If we must look up to a country like America at all, we must focus our gaze on the laboratories and scientific hubs where things happen, not on the vast prayer concourses where big-suited men, oozing both salesmanly sweat and profanely pricey aftershave, tell ancient lies - or, if not exactly lies, stories and folktales spun thousands of years ago by Semitic and Levantine men in desert robes, with some of the stories later doctored by the patristic hirelings of the Roman emperor Constantine. 

It is useless to dwell on the heinous role the church played during the African slave trade - although I must say the church, or rather some churchpeople, later did some compensatory good works. Nevertheless, it irks me that at the time the missionaries were introducing Christian religion to Africa, Charles Darwin was bringing out his Origin of Species and such a hot-and-bothered debate over the ‘Gaderene Swine’ was in full swing in England. In Africa Christianity was sold as the brave new thing. And knowing how long it took Europe to rumble the obscurantist essence of Christianity, it is really not a surprise that today almost all schools in Africa still have what is called morning devotions. Religious Knowledge is still a very important part of schools’ curriculum and evolution has never been part of any school’s teaching list. And possibly the attitude of overwhelming god-fixation today may be rooted in such an ancient selling of religion as the be-all-and-end-all. Although Walter Rodney only intangibly blamed religion as contributive factor in How Europe Underdeveloped Africa, it certainly would have amazed the man today how Africans are busy underdeveloping themselves with religion - together with other things like corruption, Mugabeism (what the snotty VS Naipaul once called Mobutuism) and so forth. Look at the list of men Nigerian government gave national hours recently, two name stand out. Mr Adeboye and Mr TB Joshua - Men of God, so-called. Where are the Men of Science, Men of the Arts, I mean secular savants whose name would stand out as those of these anti-intellectual men of god?

Not once has it been proved that religion and progress in the post-medieval world do not go together. With the advent of the Enlightenment, religion began to dry-rot. Although Voltaire was often described as a deist (shorthand for atheist in those days), no one would read Candide without having second thoughts about god. And we all know about the dark desperation of the church when it introduced the Inquisition: that horrible blot on Roman Catholic conscience was brought to being solely to suppress the rise of scientific knowledge, to scotch any sort of inquiry outside the central quadrangle of the Pope’s main residence, Rome’s St Peters. Which was why Galileo Galilei was forced to renounce the result of his investigation that the earth was not the centre of the universe. Really, there is no time to list the role the church - I mean any sort of church - has played in suppressing knowledge. But if the Roman Catholic Church which prides itself on being the guardian of Christian truth and whose clergy have often truly been well-read and sometimes scholarly could still harbour a lot of obscurantist views up till today, one wonders what sort of education and knowledge an evangelical institution would impart  – a trueblue evangelical sees the bible as his first, if not only,  (definitive) textbook; he is a literalist; he is often anti-science; he believes in such poppycock ‘the world was created only 6,000 years ago.’ Mostly, these are the kind of people we are now leaving the education of our children to. From my understanding, it now even fashionable among lecturers in supposedly secular universities like Ibadan or Ife to parade themselves as born-again Christians, making god and religion the talking points of what should have been more rewarding intellectual colloquies. 

Just before the anniversary of 200 years of the birth of Charles Darwin, in a forum where the troubles of Africa were being debated, someone had asked, What use is the knowledge of evolution to Africa now? A lot of good, I’d say. And more. Whatever arguable good religion may have done for Africans in the past, now it is only an overcrowded bandwagon that’s bearing us backwards and downhill, it is now the most potent force for the desertification of African minds. We need up-to-the-minute science, we need to be part of the latest trends in arts, we need to be counted at the frontiers of varied realms of knowledge: nano-tech, neuroscience, cosmology, quantum mechanics, evolutionary biology etc. Africans need a well-rounded education, the scaffolding of our minds needs a concrete late-modern infusion in every facet, for us to begin what may be a long journey towards self-sufficiency. The kind of comment that Africa does not need to know anything about evolution because the continent is still buried in a welter of problems and troubles is as good as condemning us Africans to live by bread and prayer only.

Bastage:
Huxley.

Before you start burbling more irrelevant drivel again, read my words.
On a "philosophical" level. Not on a "material" level.

What do you mean by "material" level and how is that different from a "philosophical" level? Are you suggesting that the definition I gave is a "material" definition?

Bastage:
My guy, I do not dispute evolution. But I look at it through eyes that judge on the material realism that I exist in. To me, evolution makes sense. Creationism is a literal definition of the Bible that has no foundation in logic.
Within the reality that we exist in we have choices to make. Not always free choices but choices none the less. I am guided to believe that the form in which I exist was created by evolution. But as I mentioned earlier, I try to look beyond the veil. To me, evolution or creationism are just distractions. The real me (and you) are not bound by their physical meanings. The theories of creationism and evolution are only things used to describe our physical being. We exist beyond them.


I hear you. Bear in mind though that an individual can also be a rabble if he is confused by the many voices in his heart. Christian churches are just the same but on a larger scale if you don't try to exert control over yourself and let them overwhelm you. Any answer lies with you and you alone. Personally, I see the Bible as the most interesting book ever written. I've stated time and time again that one has to study the context in which it was written to understand it though. But even then, it's deeper message can only be defined by you and you alone.


[size=14pt]On a philosophical level there is no difference between belief and knowledge. Again, you only have yourself to judge as the measurement. If you believe in your own judgement then you have a knowledge.
[/size]

What is an unbounded number if it is not infinite? Are you saying that an unbounded number has an end? To me, the number is like Pi - it goes on forever. We know Pi exists and that it is infinite so why can we not apply that same idea to our beliefs?

Any epistemologist would be mortified to read this - that tthere is no difference between belief and knowledge. Let me illustrate this with a little common day example;

Supposing, you were asked by a friend or colleague the following question; When was the first moon-landing? And you gave one of the following responses:

1) I belief it was in 1973.

2) I know it was in 1973.

Which of the above attempts to convey sure and certain knowledge? Which attempts to convey a conjecture?


On a simplistic level, knowledge is generally defined as "true and justified belief". It is NOT just any old belief, it MUST be TRUE and JUSTIFIED, to be considered as knowledge. I know there are other more subtle and sophisticated definitions, but none of them equates belief and knowledge. And further, there are major issues about how a belief is justified, a subject about whichh there are no universally agreed methodologies.

Did God know that Abraham truly had faith in Him (God). If God is omniscient, then by definition, he must have known that Abraham was his truly obedient servant, rendering redundant and pointless the cruel ordeal of ordering Abraham to sacrifice Isaac as a test of his commitment to God.

Further, did God know that Abraham was going to comply with the main essence of the test, that is, take Isaac all the way to the sacrificial alter and attempt to slash his throat? If God already knew all of this in advance, then why subject Abraham and Isaac to such and ordeal?

Well, Genesis 22 suggests that God did NOT have foreknowledge of Abraham's state of mind before the stayed sacrifice:

9 And they came to the place which God had told him of; and Abraham built an altar there, and laid the wood in order, and bound Isaac his son, and laid him on the altar upon the wood.

10 And Abraham stretched forth his hand, and took the knife to slay his son.

11 And the angel of the LORD called unto him out of heaven, and said, Abraham, Abraham: and he said, Here am I.

12 And he said, Lay not thine hand upon the lad, neither do thou any thing unto him: [size=16pt]for now I know that thou fearest God[/size], seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son from me.

13 And Abraham lifted up his eyes, and looked, and behold behind him a ram caught in a thicket by his horns: and Abraham went and took the ram, and offered him up for a burnt offering in the stead of his son.



There we are - God saying "[size=16pt]for now I know that thou fearest God[/size]", only after Abraham had nearly slashed his son's throat. Did God not know that Abraham "feareth him" before?

If he did not know, then he cannot be said to be omniscient.


Yet another RUBBISH form the bible

Yes? Then why not watch this lecture on YT.

When the God speaks of other gods, what exactly does he mean? Why does He call these other entities gods? Is there a difference between these other gods and the God. Do these other gods have some or all of the capabilities of the God?

Why does the God not refer to them as something else if they were truly distinct from His own nature? Could it be because the nature of gods and the God are exactly the same. Hence the reason the God referred to them as god?

Does this explain why the God is a jealous god, because he does not like the other gods? If these other entities were not real gods, why would the God be jealous of them?

Then what is this in John 7?

16  Jesus answered them, and said, My doctrine is not mine, but his that sent me.

17 If any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, or whether I speak of myself.

18 He that speaketh of himself seeketh his own glory: but he that seeketh his glory that sent him, the same is true, and no unrighteousness is in him.

19 Did not Moses give you the law, and yet none of you keepeth the law? Why go ye about to kill me?

And  Matthew 5:


17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.

18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.

19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.

20 For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.



So now you know - don't say I did not warn you about the laws of the Old Testament.

If you are a Christian, have you ever wondered why you are a Christian? Which of the following best explains why you are a Christian?

1) You were born in a Christian family and have lived all your life in a Christian community

2) You have thoroughly investigated the Christian narrative and found them to be overwhelming true?

3) Following from the "truth of Christian", you are frighten of the supernatural world of demons, devils, satan and you hope being a Christian would convey protection from these forces.

4) Following from the "truth of Christian", you badly want to serve, worship and praise God.

5) Following from the "truth of Christian", you expect "breakthroughs" being a child of God.

6) You are a cultural Christian cuz you admire the Christian tradition/relics/regalia, etc, etc.

[size=18pt]WARNING:[/size]

Do NOT watch if you are faint of heart, for it is VERY graphic barbaric violence. here .

Fear is the key that unlocks the wallet

@Poster,

You might also learn from Nairaland.  A great deal has been discussed here about the question of religion and non-religion.  Without seeming immodest, I would suggest you go through some of my posts ( I have had other names such as therationa, tpaine and huxley)  and the post of others such as  Mazaje, duduspace, KAG, banom, toneyb and Bindex.  

And compare the post from the non-beleivers to those of the believers yourself and draw your own conclusion as to which viewpoints closely represents the nature of reality.

duduspace:
@blackspade

I welcome you to the state of "Sincere Uncertainty", most of these bible toting types are in such a state as you are hence the reason for the different types of advice, as they are all individually defining their God (though starting from the same basic template).

Here are some of the roads ahead of you (which I don't need any prophetic gift to see) and the decision is all yours.

1. Convince yourself that God exists and become an establishment person like Lady
2. Convince yourself that God exists and become his apologist like Jesoul
3. Convince yourself that God exists and become an hypocrite like Davidylan
4. Convince yourself that God exists and become a fanatic like Abuzola
5. Convince yourself that God does not exist and become a theist's nightmare like Huxley, Mazaje and Bindex
6. Convince yourself that God does not exist but remain a generally nice guy like Chrisbenogor
7. Remain in the state of "Sincere Uncertainty" like myself and a few others (it is not so bad a state to be in as the religionists like to think and I stand corrected in declaring it the most honest state to be in as the others are either lying to themselves and others, being lied to, or making assumptions which may go either way)

e.t.c.

Whatever your decision is, you'll be the one to live with it, I wish you all the best and long live the religion forum.

Well said. Just out of my nosey curiousity, how does someone with "sincere uncertainty" conduct their life? Do you go to church? Do you pray occasionally? Would you baptise your children? Basically, how does being terminally uncertain influence the important decision of life?

pilgrim.1:
There's no need to be pejorative. The gullible, ignorant and drunk abound among atheists - unless you've forgotten so soon that we've dialogued on the subject of atheists who write about "atheistic religions"  - did you forget that?



Edit:
NB, just some links to help some on the last note I made above about "atheistic religions":

* Are there Any Atheistic Religions? Can an Atheist Be Part of Any Religion?

*Some quote:

Pardon me, I agree my comment was inflammatory. But the comment specifically refers to religions (by which I mean theistic and atheistic religions) - althought it is less effective with atheistic religion because atheistic religion does not promise the kind of existential consolations that the theistic religons do.

Religion plays the role of a paliative to the fearful, gullible and ignorant and intellectually feeble in the same  way that alcohol does to the drunk.  Take their religion away, and they are lost.

pilgrim.1:
@debosky,

How body? I think the issue here is clear and straight to the point:

and . . .

Dear debosky, I hope you're not attempting to make a "personal" claim that [size=16pt]ida IS the missing link[/size]?

People who discuss this sort of thing in scientific term DO NOT use phrases like "missing link".  It is rather unfortunate that this phrase has entered into popular parlance, as it conveys little or no information about what it is attempting to say.

The correct terminology is "ancestral form"  or "common ancestral form"  or less precisely "transitional form".

Ida is thought to be a common ancestral form to the primates/apes.  This may mean that present primates/apes are directly descended from Ida (less likely)  or that present primates/apes are descended froma close cousin of Ida (more likel).

SeanT21:
Millions N Millions of Years!!

If you accept that it takes Millions of years, how do you reconcile that with the Genesis and Old Testament narratives which suggest that the earth is only about 10,000 years old max?

Isn't having DOUBT already a SIN?

Romans 14: 23,  But the person who has doubts is condemned if he eats, because he does not act in faith; and anything that is not done in faith is sin.

pilgrim.1:
The non-religious and naturalists cannot all be right as well - they also contradict themselves in so many instances. We should ask them as well: whose claim (among the same non-religious and naturalists) is justified?

Absolutely true observation. I should have added that too, to be fair and balance.

blackspade:
My whole family believes in god and I do too, but recently (as in the last few months) I've been questioning myself with things such as: does god exist? what if religion is just one of the worlds longest running fairytales? why are there so many contradictions in the bible? am I wasting my time worshipping something I can't see? is christianity just a mechanism used by europeans to spread their idealogy and culture?

I want to believe in god, and recognize some of the things in life that we can't explain, and can only be explained by god, but sometimes I just don't know. I've been feeling a little depressed lately, so maybe that has something to do with it, I don't know. What the hell is wrong with me? Am I just going through a phase?

Hello blackspade,

Am curious about how you got to the point of doubting and question your faith in god.  I take it that you were raised in a Christian environment in which conformity to the family/local religion is highy favour and doubting and questioning is treating with disgust?  If that is true, then stand up and give yourself a BIG CHEERS.

Doubts, skepticism and questioning is part of the maturing process and to the extend that you have these sentiments indicates very health cognitive functioning on your part.  You have a number of routes available to you, namely;


1)  Explore alternatives to your religion, including other religions (the supernatual option) and/or non-religious or naturalistic alternatives,

2)  You can consigne thouse doubts to the recesses of your mind (for now) and just carry on with your current beliefs.

My advice to you would be to pursue option 1).  After all, ALL religions CANNOT be right and you own yourself to find out which one (if any) is the right one.  The Islamicist claim their religion is right, so do the Christians, the Jews, etc, etc.  Whose claim to you think is justified?

SeanT21:
Moving plates collide with one another to form mountains. 2 Plates press againts one another until the land is lifted and folded.
Why would anyone belive that??

Many thanks. Can you give an idea as to how long it might take to construct a mountain range as high as the Himalayas?