₦airaland Forum

mazaje:
You should know my position, I am in the I DON'T KNOW category because I believe that NOBODY truly knows anything with regards to what created the universe, why the universe was created or how the universe came about. . . .Any body that says anything is ONLY guessing or expressing an opinion, unless if that person is able to provide evidence for his/her position to which NOBODY has even done that, I dont think there is any body that can ever do that. . . . .All what we have masqurading as evidence are mre arguments and counter arguments which all amount to NOTHING. . . . .I don't believe that it is either God or nothing, I don't know is the best and most rational position to take IMO. . . .

Here is a video that completely expresses my position as to the existence/creation of the universe. . . .I would have made this video myself because the guy says what exactly is in my mind. . . .Pat Condell you remain the greatest. . . .

[flash=400,400]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ovg0eYjM64w?version=3"[/flash]

"When you believe falsehood AGAINST ALL REASON, truth has no way in"

That guy need to get a pulitzer or sumn for that line.

My policy is examine the evidence critically and as fairly as you can and then use agbari. No be by force to believe anything. Unless of course you believe there is eternal fire waiting to burn you for not believing.

The mind is a powerful drug to waste

Where is viaro? What happened to her? I miss all that grammar o. My dictionary is so bored now.

InesQor:
@mrmayor:

Your post above, stating that an authority/professional is always right because you subscribed to their services ab initio CLEARLY shows the problem with the church today, where people do ALL KINDS of things just because a MOG says so. 

But apparently it's ok to believe and do all kinds of things just because the BIBLE says so.  I laugh in Bangladeshi pidgin.

@Inesqor. Ok. Whatever you say

InesQor:
e.g. Making a spiritual claim and reasoning it out in the physical domain will get you nowhere. If you make a claim as a theist about my religious beliefs, it is in the same domain and we must reason it out. If you are an atheist and you say the spiritual domain does not even exist, there is little that can be done that will not be considered "special pleading" because one is attempting an interlocution across domains.

@Inesqor The  claims that most Christians make about Jesus doing those things are not spiritual claims IMO. They are understood as actual events that took place in history. He is not believed to have walked on spiritual water, or healed spiritual eyes, or raised dead spirits. He, according to the bible, was walking down the street, was approached by a blind man, and he healed the guy and told the guy to keep his mouth shut (amongst other "great deeds". What do these events have to do with a spiritual domain? Were Jesus, his disciples, his followers and his "patients" living in a spiritual domain, or in Israel on planet earth?

"Logic within the confines of faith."  So it seems a leap of blind faith is taken, and then logic is applied once you have accepted certain claims as true even though they go against all that you know, based on experience, about reality?

You said in your OP that we should check claims made by others by ourselves and not just follow the leader. If I told you I just saw a guy moonwalking on a live electric cable before disappearing into thin air and reappearing as a dog would you believe it? What if such a story was in the bible? I think the bible is filled with similar stories. How do you believe the ones in the bible and then dismiss the moonwalking electric-proof canine man?

cogicero:
i
@krayola:i assumed a non-eternal universe in my first premise. if the existent something was not derived or gotten, then it must be eternal. you can jump to point 3.

Eternal is a time measurement, I think. Time did not begin till the expansion of pre-big bang whateva was there. So in the context of the universe's origin eternal means little to nothing IMO. Something was there, it started expanding. How that thing got there no one knows. If you call that thing creator because the universe grew out of it then fine. Maybe the universe has a creator. Although I doubt that is what u mean by creator.  

cogicero:
you are shooting your own foot. you just said the existent something was probably not derived. does this not show that it is either eternal (always was, and thus uncaused) or else was caused (by another caused or uncaused abstraction ad infinitum until an uncaused one is reached)?

I did not say the existent thing was not derived. I said that you did not say so in your first premise. I made a statement about your claim. . . I did not make any claims about the universe,  i just pointed out what I thought was a flaw in your reasoning. Nice try tho. 

cogicero:
and then i never said the universe came out of nothing, so can you show where you got that from?

I never said you made such a claim.

I said "if you can show that the universe came out of nothing' then that your premise would work. . . . I never said you said so. I said that I thought your claim that something external and eternal is necessary was valid only if you can show that it was created out of nothing (sumn other than itself. . if "nothing" (no universe or pre big bang whateva was there) exists then it would need sumn external (to the universe or pre big bang WhatevA was there)  to bring it about. U haven't said it came from nothing so i don't think your claim makes sense)

cogicero:
this is poor reasoning on your part, krayola. you are so quick to try to put me in a box like im saying the creator is human, alive and was only one. this is plain logic. the number of the creators doesnt matter. whether the creator is dead or alive doesnt matter (in the context of this argument). . .


if the universe was an offshoot of a pre-existing thing "like a plant from a seed", then its creator is the seed abstraction it grew from. the argument is that it is not a chance occurrence

But is the seed external to/separate from the plant, as you claim your creator is to the universe?

You said there are only two possibilities (An eternal universe or an external creator) . . I showed your what i thought was more possibilities. A tree grows out of a seed. A tree is not a seed, and not external to the seed. A man grows out of a fetus, a fetus is not a man and not external to the man. The universe growing out of something does not make that something a universe, neither does the something have to be external. So IMO the universe does not have to be eternal to not need a creator, neither does it make the thing it grew out of a creator. At least not IMO.

And you said AN EXTERNAL CREATOR, and i pointed out there could be SOME CREATORS. If you just said the universe was created. . . I will not assume a specific number of creators. YOu said the universe has AN EXTERNAL CREATOR!! that means ONE! Abi i lie?

My argument is that there are other possibilities. You try to make it like your conclusions are the only ones that make "sense". I'm not saying u are wrong. I'm just trying to point out other possibilities to you. That's all. You say "these are the only possibilities" and I say ". . .why not consider these possibilities. .  ." i didn't say "u are talking nonsense". Please don't be defensive. We just havin fun here   


I gotta run. i will answer the rest later. God/Creator(s)/Eternal Universe bless you.   

@Inesqor Interesting post. Just have a few questions.

Do you think logic can tell us about past events? As in can I use logic to find out what you had for breakfast yesterday, what goes thru Chrisbenogor's head when that big booty chic in his office walks past? Can we use logic to discover who impregnated Mary, or if Jesus walked on water etc? stuff like that.

The reason I'm asking is because popular Christianity belief is based on faith in the person of Jesus, believed to have done many "amazing" things. He is believed to have been born of a virgin, never did a "bad" thing his entire life, walked on water, raised the dead, resurrected from the dead, and is also believed to have saved the souls of people that believe he did all these, and follow him, or sumn like that.

How does one use logic to verify these claims?

I don't think logic can do anything significant as far that that goes. At some point we have to use the evidence we have to check out how valid these claims are. From my own experience people can not do those things.  I dismiss other ancient stories on the grounds that they are too fantastic, and do not match my own experience of reality. 

Do you believe Jesus was born of a virgin?
Do you believe he walked on water?
Do you believe his death saves your soul from burnin in hell for eternity?
DO you believe he turned water to wine?
Do you believe he healed a blind guy by rubbing spit and sand in the guy's eyes?
How do you make sense of all these claims?
How can you make sense of this, logically, to someone that does not share you faith, without special pleading. e.g I believe in an all powerful God that can make anything possible and did in the case of Jesus.

Is blind faith required, at least to accept the fundamental claims of popular Christian belief? If not how can one make sense of them?

@chrisbenogor Ur email no dey ur profile o.

Chrisbenogor:
Ok na , shebi una don tell me to shut up. Make we see if no be where I talk say una go end na im una go end.O boy you don enter naija? na when be your show na? I wan rub minds with you personally ontop another matter email things abeg my own dey my profile.

Yes boss!
I suppose enter next month. My fam dey do Christmas here plus naija embassy dey waste time with my passport so i no fit make am for christimas. I go email u sharp sharp.

I think an eternal universe is a possibility. Just like a creator God. I'm open to all possibilities. Just keep em coming. Na una wey wan narrow am down to one answer I think say dey miss out

cogicero:
[list]
[li]something exists[/li]
[li]you don’t get something from nothing[/li]

You said something exists. Not that something was derived, or "gotten". I think those are different things. IMO your second premise has nothing to do with the first.

cogicero:
[li]therefore, something necessary and eternal exists[/li]

If u can show that the universe was "created" out of nothing, this could fly. But simply asserting that means little IMO. From my experience something can not come out of nothing, so based on that I have no reason to believe the universe did.

[li]the only two options are an eternal universe or an eternal Creator[/li]

Or three creators. Or a creator that created it for amusement and committed suicide. or a universe that grew out of a preexisting something kinda like a plant goes from a seed. I can keep going. Why are those u stated the only 2 options? That IMO is another faulty premise.

[li]science has disproved the concept of an eternal universe, it is known that the universe began at a point[/li]

Let's say science has disproved the concept of eternal universe,  It does not follow that universe came out of nothing, or was created. It just shows that the expansion started at some point, and very little about what exactly brought it about

[li]therefore, an eternal Creator exists[/li]
[/list]

And his name is Jonathan Goodluck  

@deepsight I edited one of my previous posts. It didn't make any sense. Sleep still dey my eye when i write am. Na hangover abeg no vex  . It now reads "So because something is self existent it must be both immaterial and intangible? Please explain. "

Deep Sight:
The Creator is a self-existent and immutable element. It is not subject to change, as matter is.

Ok. Besides this creator, what else has this quality of immutability? How did you come to know about such a quality at all?

Deep Sight:
First the universe could not have always been in existence because matter is not immutable: therefore not self-existent.

Give an example of a self existent immutable element.

Deep Sight:
Anything that is not self-existent must have a cause to exist: and therefore a beginning.

How do u know the qualities of this "element"? Let's pretend u have demonstrated that there is a creator (which you have NOT),where does this immutability come about? Is it just to deal with the "problem" of an infinite regression? If not, please explain how you know this FOR SURE. Or do u know for sure, or just believe because u as an individual are convinced by "evidence" that may be inconclusive.  (I'm pretty much asking the same question a few different ways so that i can understand your reasoning better. Sorry if it sounds like I'm repeating myself)

Deep Sight:
Second response is a throw back to you: if the universe "could always have been in existence" as you have said yourself, then this shows you accept that some things could "always have been in existence" - thus this eliminates your infinite regress problem in terms of the existence of God.


For in the same way as you state: "Who created God?" - I may also state - "Who created the universe?" Your response to my question would be "the universe could always have existed" and it leaves me dumbfounded that you do not see that that is the same response I give to you: THAT GOD HAS ALWAYS EXISTED.

Now the reason that my answer should succeed whereas yours must fail is the simple reason that the universe CANNOT have always existed because the universe is matter and matter is subject to change: it is thus NOT immutable as self-existent things logically must per force be immutable.

Difference is that we have evidence that the universe exists for sure. We can say many things about the universe that can be objectively verified.

And why are self-existence and mutability mutually exclusive? Why must a "self-existent element" not be subject to change?

Deep Sight:
On the reverse that which is self-existent cannot be matter and as such must be immaterial and intangible.

So because something is self existent it must be both immaterial and intangible? Please explain.

@Justcool How u dey? Hope u good. Nice post

I think what u state here are possibilities. Plausible ones. They are IMO far from answers. You do not demonstrate the existence of a creator, but show that if certain premises are true, then it would not be unreasonable to think there was a creator. I don't think the mere belief in a creative force behind the universe's existence is silly. I think it can make a lot of sense sef. . . even though I'm firmly in the "don't know, don't think it matters" camp".   IMO We do not know enough about the universe to check how valid most of your premises are. . .  eg when u say this

justcool:
Just like a cup of water cannot by itself change from liquid to solid(ice) or to gas without an external force, be it change in the external temperature or other forces; the physical universe cannot be going through these changes or stages without external force acting on it.

or

justcool:
Thus the solar systems are moving away from each other; the universe is expanding. Science knows this; but does not know for sure where this expansion will lead. [b]It is my perception that this expansion will continue till the solar systems are so far apart that the initial pressure that arose from the big band slackens. Then gravity will counter the expansion; the universe will start contracting. [/b]T. . .

There are more but I think these will do. your arguments rely heavily on these types of claims, but u really don't know for sure. So why do u, in your post, seem to "ridicule' people for not seeing these things that u suggest are obvious, when all they may be doing is acknowledging what they see as obvious - That we know too little about the universe to answer "ultimate" questions about the universe.

I think we should be free to speculate and whatever, but be cautious when we start thinking we have answers. U seem to know a lot about the universe so i'm sure u have some idea of how much we don't know. Some of us are not comfortable with making those leaps and then holding on to the conclusions as factual.

Jenwitemi:
Your source is an article from the Smithsonian Institute? That institution that is very notorious for destroying ancient artifacts that contradicts established scientific theories about our ancient past?

Please can you give a few examples? Thank you.

Whoa!!

dexmond:
You dont have any information about him? how is it then you are telling us he walked on water, never saved anybody etc? Is it not logically impossible? You also claimed to be confident that there must have been at least one Jseus at some point in history, your claim is irrational. I might as well say " I am confident that there is big-foot on mars". How do you justify your position without any information?

You need me to provide you information to show you that people don't walk on water and water can't turn into wine and spit does not cure blindness?

That stuff can happen in fairy tales tho.

Jenwitemi:
Here is the first video clip of a 5 part interview where Icke explains more elaborately what he thinks the conspiracy is. This needs a very open mind, of course, or it would make absolutely no sense whatsoever to those who are still living in boxed up reality. 


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X_WJDPjIpl8

ok. Just a quick question. If I watch it and disagree with it would that mean i'm still "living in boxed up reality"?

dexmond:
Where did you get your information from? For you to say these things, you must have read about them, so lets see the exerpts of historical records about his life, death and if possible his alleged ressurection and make sure you dont use my bible.

I don't have any information about anybody. You asked me if Jesus existed and I said Jesus likely existed. I'm pretty confident there must have been at least one Jesus at some point in history.

What I'm saying is that the Jesus of 'popular" Christian belief. . . The one that is said to have walked on water and done all that cool stuff like wash away your sins, is a fairy tale. How can you believe in a Jewish magician that saves souls and deny the tooth fairy that only leaves money underneath a pillow.

Jenwitemi:
Then quit dismissing something that you have next to nothing data about.

5000 years is a long time to be executing some plan. The world is a big place with too many competing parties. It just sounds really bogus to me.

There could as well be a plan for world domination. . . that's not what I'm dismissing. What I'm dismissing is that these religions were created and spread as part of that, or any other plan.

Jenwitemi:
I may not know who are the ones on top of this pyramid of this conspiratorial superstructure(no one does for absolute certainty), but i can tell you that the plan is complete world domination by very few and the royal crown of england is really high up this superstructure.

DO u have any info on the origins of this plan?

dexmond:
Anything that has fake must have an original. Can you tell us a little about your own Jesus without making reference to the bible.

He lived, he died, and stayed dead. Kinda like all people that lived 2000 years ago. Any book that tells me otherwise is very suspect.

Who are these people behind it, and what is this plan that has been playing out for over 5000 years?

I don't have proof that there is no such conspiracy. How would I even go about proving something like that?

dexmond:
@Krayola

Are you saying Jesus never existed? Lets get your point.

The one that did all that magic stuff and is God and saves souls etc. . . I don't believe any such person existed. There was likely a Jesus. . . .just not one that was a deity and saved souls and multiplied bread and fish and so on and so forth.

dexmond:
I have read what others thought about him. They are entitled to their opinion. Our world is filled with hipocrisy, people want to be politically correct to avoid ostracization. Of course you will readily acknowledge what leaders do to placate Muslims who are ready to forment trouble at the slightest opportunity. My opinion of the prophet is that he came to lead men away from the road to heaven, by offering them a mixture of judaism, paganism, zoroasrianiasm and a perverted Islamic jesus.

IMO another equally valid opinion is that Jesus came to lead men away from Judaism by offering them a mixture of paganism, Zoroastrianism, Cynicism and a little bit of shamanism.


Mohammed was both a religious and a political leader. The "killing" was part of the job description,  and marriages were more political  than anything. He was a real person living in a real world doing real things. Mohammed never claimed to be perfect, or asked to be worshiped, or to be "believed" in. His humanity is part of what makes him so great.

The story you love about Jesus is a fairy tale. In my opinion the ultimate fairy tale. Some guy born in a stable, had a king order mass killings in an attempt to end his life, grew up and never sinned . . . never even had an erection. Never said a hurtful thing except maybe call people like you and me dogs, and curse a tree. A great magician that walked on water and turned water to wine, used spit to repair blind eyes etc. . . . and suffered to wash away your sins only and only if you believe in the most ridiculous insult to your intelligence ever made up. Otherwise you burn in hell for ETERNITY.  Clap for yourself.

@Oladegbu Does humanism promote racism, or is your Christian flyer telling lies?

Pastor AIO:
What specific points did you think were rubbish?

Wazzup sir?   Se alafia ni e wa?

I think the part about one big conspiracy manned by a small group of people is nonsense (at least as he presents it). The similarities between the religions that he noted are correct IMO, but I don't think he made a convincing argument for his conspiracy theory.  That the religions may come from the same source does not IMO mean the process was, and is still being engineered by a specific group of people, to a specific end.

can't knock the guy's hustle. Milk this religion stuff for all it's worth.

Pastor AIO:
Eyewitness? Are you the eye-witness that didn't see him carrying any books?

The guy in that video is talking rubbish for the most part IMO.