[Eddie James]

Re: Is there any physical proof god exists?

Perfection, Eddie, is not the only quality that should come into play in this discussion. God made people with choice. People were free to choose how to act, and they chose disobedience. I am not sure that it is our place to judge God's perfection and His decisions and actions within the parameters of that perfection. What I am sure of is that it is upto us to choose to obey God and follow His rules or disobey Him and face the consequences, just as Adam and Eve did. What do you choose?

So the christian objection to this argument involves freewill? Ok, Christians say that a being must have freewill to be happy. The omnibenevolent God did not wish to create robots, so he gave humans freewill to enable them to experience love and happiness. But the humans used this freewill to choose evil, and introduced imperfection into God's originally perfect universe. God had no control over this decision, so the blame for our imperfect universe is on the humans, not God.

Here is why the argument is weak. First, if God is omnipotent, then the assumption that freewill is necessary for happiness is false. If God could make it a rule that only beings with freewill may experience happiness, then he could just as easily have made it a rule that only robots may experience happiness. The latter option is clearly superior, since perfect robots will never make decisions which could render them or their creator unhappy, whereas beings with freewill could. A perfect and omnipotent God who creates beings capable of ruining their own happiness is impossible.

Second, even if we were to allow the necessity of freewill for happiness, God could have created humans with freewill who did not have the ability to choose evil, but to choose between several good options.
Third, God supposedly has freewill, and yet he does not make imperfect decisions. If humans are miniature images of God, our decisions should likewise be perfect. Also, the occupants of heaven, who presumably must have freewill to be happy, will never use that freewill to make imperfect decisions. Why would the originally perfect humans do differently?

The point remains: the presence of imperfections in the universe disproves the supposed perfection of its creator.

[Pastor Ed Lowman]

Re: Is there any physical proof god exists?

So the christian objection to this argument involves freewill? Ok, Christians say that a being must have freewill to be happy. The omnibenevolent God did not wish to create robots, so he gave humans freewill to enable them to experience love and happiness. But the humans used this freewill to choose evil, and introduced imperfection into God's originally perfect universe. God had no control over this decision, so the blame for our imperfect universe is on the humans, not God.

Here is why the argument is weak. First, if God is omnipotent, then the assumption that freewill is necessary for happiness is false. If God could make it a rule that only beings with freewill may experience happiness, then he could just as easily have made it a rule that only robots may experience happiness. The latter option is clearly superior, since perfect robots will never make decisions which could render them or their creator unhappy, whereas beings with freewill could. A perfect and omnipotent God who creates beings capable of ruining their own happiness is impossible.

Second, even if we were to allow the necessity of freewill for happiness, God could have created humans with freewill who did not have the ability to choose evil, but to choose between several good options.
Third, God supposedly has freewill, and yet he does not make imperfect decisions. If humans are miniature images of God, our decisions should likewise be perfect. Also, the occupants of heaven, who presumably must have freewill to be happy, will never use that freewill to make imperfect decisions. Why would the originally perfect humans do differently?

The point remains: the presence of imperfections in the universe disproves the supposed perfection of its creator.

Incorrect, sheep copulator.

The imperfections just show how perfect God is and how anything less than Him equals flaws and imperfections.

I will pray for you.

Pastor Ed

[Cranky Old Man]

Re: Is there any physical proof god exists?

The point remains: the presence of imperfections in the universe disproves the supposed perfection of its creator.

Logic doesn't seem to be your thing. That God is perfect doesn't mean everything He created is perfect.

The Bible even explicitly mentions this: Isaiah 45:7 "I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things."

So you are wrong and we are right. Game over.

[Eddie James]

Re: Is there any physical proof god exists?

Incorrect, sheep copulator.

The imperfections just show how perfect God is and how anything less than Him equals flaws and imperfections.

I will pray for you.

Pastor Ed

This is nonesencical, please explain.

[Pastor Ed Lowman]

Re: Is there any physical proof god exists?

This is nonesencical, please explain.

Read Descartes' Fourth Meditation where it is explained that since God is perfect and can cause no error, and His creation is likewise perfect (except for the bringing of death in the fall), then since God is flawless, it must necessarily follow that anything less than He we call evil, error, tragedy, etc.

I won't do your homework for you.

Atheists sure are stupid.

Pastor Ed

[Eddie James]

Re: Is there any physical proof god exists?

Lets look at the bible, you all say god exists and the bible is evidence. The Bible contradicts itself on matters of history. A person who reads and compares the contents of the Bible will be confused about exactly who Esau's wives were, whether Timnah was a concubine or a son, and whether Jesus' earthly lineage is through Solomon or his brother Nathan. These are but a few of hundreds of documented historical contradictions. If the Bible cannot confirm itself in mundane earthly matters, how are we to trust it on moral and spiritual matters?

One need look to no source other than the Bible to discover its imperfections, for it contradicts itself and thus exposes its own imperfection. It contradicts itself on matters of justice, for the same just God who assures his people that sons shall not be punished for the sins of their fathers turns around and destroys an entire household for the sin of one man (he had stolen some of Yahweh's war loot). It was this same Yahweh who afflicted thousands of his innocent people with plague and death to punish their evil king David for taking a census (?!). It was this same Yahweh who allowed the humans to slaughter his son because the perfect Yahweh had botched his own creation. Consider how many have been stoned, burned, slaughtered, raped, and enslaved because of Yahweh's skewed sense of justice. The blood of innocent babies is on the perfect, just, compassionate hands of Yahweh.

The Bible misinterprets its own prophecies. Read Isaiah 7 and compare it to Matthew 1 to find but one of many misinterpreted prophecies of which Christians are either passively or willfully ignorant. The fulfillment of prophecy in the Bible is cited as proof of its divine inspiration, and yet here is but one major example of a prophecy whose intended meaning has been and continues to be twisted to support subsequent absurd and false doctrines. There are no ends to which the credulous will not go to support their feeble beliefs in the face of compelling evidence against them.

The Bible is supposedly God's perfect Word. It contains instructions to humankind for avoiding the eternal fires of hell. How wonderful and kind of this God to provide us with this means of overcoming the problems for which he is ultimately responsible! The all-powerful God could have, by a mere act of will, eliminated all of the problems we humans must endure, but instead, in his infinite wisdom, he has opted to offer this indecipherable amalgam of books which is the Bible as a means for avoiding the hell which he has prepared for us. The perfect God has decided to reveal his wishes in this imperfect work, written in the imperfect language of imperfect man, translated, copied, interpreted, voted on, and related by imperfect man.

No two men will ever agree what this perfect word of God is supposed to mean, since much of it is either self- contradictory, or obscured by enigmatic symbols. And yet the perfect God expects us imperfect humans to understand this paradoxical riddle using the imperfect minds with which he has equipped us. Surely the all-wise and all-powerful God would have known that it would have been better to reveal his perfect will directly to each of us, rather than to allow it to be debased and perverted by the imperfect language and botched interpretations of man.

The Bible is imperfect. It only takes one imperfection to destroy the supposed perfection of this alleged Word of God. Many have been found. A perfect God who reveals his perfect will in an imperfect book is impossible.

[Pastor Ed Lowman]

Re: Is there any physical proof god exists?

Lets look at the bible, you all say god exists and the bible is evidence. The Bible contradicts itself on matters of history. A person who reads and compares the contents of the Bible will be confused about exactly who Esau's wives were, whether Timnah was a concubine or a son, and whether Jesus' earthly lineage is through Solomon or his brother Nathan. These are but a few of hundreds of documented historical contradictions. If the Bible cannot confirm itself in mundane earthly matters, how are we to trust it on moral and spiritual matters?

One need look to no source other than the Bible to discover its imperfections, for it contradicts itself and thus exposes its own imperfection. It contradicts itself on matters of justice, for the same just God who assures his people that sons shall not be punished for the sins of their fathers turns around and destroys an entire household for the sin of one man (he had stolen some of Yahweh's war loot). It was this same Yahweh who afflicted thousands of his innocent people with plague and death to punish their evil king David for taking a census (?!). It was this same Yahweh who allowed the humans to slaughter his son because the perfect Yahweh had botched his own creation. Consider how many have been stoned, burned, slaughtered, raped, and enslaved because of Yahweh's skewed sense of justice. The blood of innocent babies is on the perfect, just, compassionate hands of Yahweh.

The Bible misinterprets its own prophecies. Read Isaiah 7 and compare it to Matthew 1 to find but one of many misinterpreted prophecies of which Christians are either passively or willfully ignorant. The fulfillment of prophecy in the Bible is cited as proof of its divine inspiration, and yet here is but one major example of a prophecy whose intended meaning has been and continues to be twisted to support subsequent absurd and false doctrines. There are no ends to which the credulous will not go to support their feeble beliefs in the face of compelling evidence against them.

The Bible is supposedly God's perfect Word. It contains instructions to humankind for avoiding the eternal fires of hell. How wonderful and kind of this God to provide us with this means of overcoming the problems for which he is ultimately responsible! The all-powerful God could have, by a mere act of will, eliminated all of the problems we humans must endure, but instead, in his infinite wisdom, he has opted to offer this indecipherable amalgam of books which is the Bible as a means for avoiding the hell which he has prepared for us. The perfect God has decided to reveal his wishes in this imperfect work, written in the imperfect language of imperfect man, translated, copied, interpreted, voted on, and related by imperfect man.

No two men will ever agree what this perfect word of God is supposed to mean, since much of it is either self- contradictory, or obscured by enigmatic symbols. And yet the perfect God expects us imperfect humans to understand this paradoxical riddle using the imperfect minds with which he has equipped us. Surely the all-wise and all-powerful God would have known that it would have been better to reveal his perfect will directly to each of us, rather than to allow it to be debased and perverted by the imperfect language and botched interpretations of man.

The Bible is imperfect. It only takes one imperfection to destroy the supposed perfection of this alleged Word of God. Many have been found. A perfect God who reveals his perfect will in an imperfect book is impossible.

Gonna make anymore cheap, thoughtless cut-and-paste replies?

You talked right past me. Didn't give an ounce of thought to what I posted. Typical atheist.

Pastor Ed

[Mary Etheldreda]

Re: Is there any physical proof god exists?

Before we can discuss the existence of a thing, we must define it. Christians have endowed their God with all of the following attributes: He is eternal, all-powerful, and created everything. He created all the laws of nature and can change anything by an act of will. He is all-good, all-loving, and perfectly just. He is a personal God who experiences all of the emotions a human does. He is all-knowing. He sees everything past and future.

Son, your premise is incorrect, and because of that, your argument is faulty. Firstly, Christians have not endowed God with anything, the Bible tells us what and who God is. Secondly, the concept that God is all-good and all-loving was fabricated in the '70's with the "Jesus-Freak" hippie movement. People who were too stoned to read the Bible simply assumed Jesus was like them (a common fault among those who neglect going to the Source), and thus the idea of a vegan, scraggly, Jesus-walking-the-earth like some cosmic combination of Kung-fu and Shaggy was unfortunately born. However, the Holy Bible, were you to pick it up and read it, will show you the LORD is not "all-loving." I encourage you to read the Holy Bible before trying to play a game of "gotcha."

We humans engage in activities because we are pursuing that elusive perfection, because there is disequilibrium caused by a difference between what we are and what we want to be. If God is perfect, there can be no disequilibrium. There is nothing he needs, nothing he desires, and nothing he must or will do. A God who is perfect does nothing except exist. A perfect creator God is impossible.

Let me guess, you've just completed your first semester of eastern philosophy.

Friend, "we humans" engage in activities because they glorify the LORD. I feed my family and tend to the home because in this way the LORD is glorified. My children are taught at home because this glorifies the LORD and teaches them the importance of obedience unto Him. It is a person's chief duty to love and obey (Ecclesiastes 12:13), not "pursue that elusive perfection."

[Eddie James]

Re: Is there any physical proof god exists?

Gonna make anymore cheap, thoughtless cut-and-paste replies?

You talked right past me. Didn't give an ounce of thought to what I posted. Typical atheist.

Pastor Ed

You cut and paste out of the bible, can I not do the same from my sources?????

[Eddie James]

Re: Is there any physical proof god exists?

I have offered arguments for the impossibility, and thus the non- existence, of the Christian God Yahweh. No reasonable and freethinking individual can accept the existence of a being whose nature is so contradictory as that of Yahweh, the "perfect" creator of our imperfect universe. The existence of Yahweh is as impossible as the existence of cubic spheres or invisible pink unicorns.

Should any Christian who reads this persist in defending these impossibilities through means of "divine transcendence" and "faith," and should any Christian continue to call me an atheist fool, I will be forced to invoke the wrath of the Invisible Pink Unicorn:

"You are a fool for denying the existence of the IPU. You have rejected true faith and have relied on your feeble powers of human reason and thus arrogantly denied the existence of Her Divine Transcendence, and so are you condemned."

If such arguments are good enough for Yahweh, they are good enough for Her Invisible Pinkness.
As for me and my house, we shall choose reality.

[Pastor Ed Lowman]

Re: Is there any physical proof god exists?

Let me guess, you've just completed your first semester of eastern philosophy.

Friend, "we humans" engage in activities because they glorify the LORD. I feed my family and tend to the home because in this way the LORD is glorified. My children are taught at home because this glorifies the LORD and teaches them the importance of obedience unto Him. It is a person's chief duty to love and obey (Ecclesiastes 12:13), not "pursue that elusive perfection."

I think we're being too hard on this one, Mary. That intro philosophy class has obviously gone to his head.

He obviously thinks that using words like "hypothesis," "evidence," and "proof" makes him a smart intellectual scholar. He believes he's got it all figured out and is smarter than Jesus Christ. I'm using kid gloves from this point onward.

[Mary Etheldreda]

Re: Is there any physical proof god exists?

I have offered arguments for the impossibility, and thus the non- existence, of the Christian God Yahweh.

No, dear, you've offered arguments from incredulity. You cannot understand how God "works," therefore you've concluded He doesn't exist. The Bible tells us how God "works": in ways beyond our human, fallible comprehension:

For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.
Isaiah 55:8-9

No reasonable and freethinking individual can accept the existence of a being whose nature is so contradictory as that of Yahweh, the "perfect" creator of our imperfect universe. The existence of Yahweh is as impossible as the existence of cubic spheres or invisible pink unicorns.

That's silly. I can see the effect of God's work when I look out my window at the trees, the birds in them, the wind (that no one can see) as it moves the leaves on those trees. There is no such evidence of cubic spheres and we all know this "invisible pink unicorn" is a fabricated creature recently created to make a point, not an existent animal.

If such arguments are good enough for Yahweh, they are good enough for Her Invisible Pinkness.
As for me and my house, we shall choose reality.

But you're not choosing reality. You're choosing atheism, the rejection of reality, and the rejection of life.

I'll keep you in my prayers, dear. Your soul is in peril.

[Mary Etheldreda]

Re: Is there any physical proof god exists?

I think we're being too hard on this one, Mary. That intro philosophy class has obviously gone to his head.

He obviously thinks that using words like "hypothesis," "evidence," and "proof" makes him a smart intellectual scholar. He believes he's got it all figured out and is smarter than Jesus Christ. I'm using kid gloves from this point onward.

Indeed. This is the problem with modern "education," and why Senator Santorum is correct in calling out universities and colleges as snob-factories. They take our innocent youth and convince them they know more than God Himself. Perhaps Eddie will listen to this negro preacher, maybe he can "speak his language."

[Eddie James]

Re: Is there any physical proof god exists?

No, dear, you've offered arguments from incredulity. You cannot understand how God "works," therefore you've concluded He doesn't exist. The Bible tells us how God "works": in ways beyond our human, fallible comprehension:

For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.
Isaiah 55:8-9

That's silly. I can see the effect of God's work when I look out my window at the trees, the birds in them, the wind (that no one can see) as it moves the leaves on those trees. There is no such evidence of cubic spheres and we all know this "invisible pink unicorn" is a fabricated creature recently created to make a point, not an existent animal.



But you're not choosing reality. You're choosing atheism, the rejection of reality, and the rejection of life.

I'll keep you in my prayers, dear. Your soul is in peril.

No, you assume the work of god when you look out the window.
God isn't in a reality, whether you believe in his existence or not, the fact you claim he lies beyond the realms of reality negates his part in reality.
No one knows how god works, if we did then there wouldn't be denominations, the subjectiveness of the word of god has created many different beliefs, I could pick up the bible and subjectively manipulate it to advocate homosexuality and agnosticism.
You subjectively manipulate in your own way, and I'll just accept it as a 2000 year old book of nonesense
As an atheist, I'm still thankful for your prayers, whether I believe they work or not

[Mary Etheldreda]

Re: Is there any physical proof god exists?

No, you assume the work of god when you look out the window.
God isn't in a reality, whether you believe in his existence or not, the fact you claim he lies beyond the realms of reality negates his part in reality.

Friend, you can repeat this lie as often as you want, but it doesn't make it the truth.

No one knows how god works, if we did then there wouldn't be denominations, the subjectiveness of the word of god has created many different beliefs, I could pick up the bible and subjectively manipulate it to advocate homosexuality and agnosticism.

Now you're being willfully obtuse. Various denominations come from fallible man trying to "fix" what he doesn't understand in the Bible. Anyone True Christian™ will agree with another True Christian™ and will be supported 100% Biblically as well as through personal experiences.