Atheist Q/A (because everyone else has one)

[Astronomer]

How does evolution create genders? Doesn't that seem against natural selection, because it makes males and females dependent on another to keep their species alive, while asexual reproduction would be much better for a single person.

[jasonjannajerryjohn]

The proof for creation and that GOD is the one who made it all is everywhere archaeologists are finding whats called dinosaur graveyards a dinosaur graveyard is a place where a large pack of dinosaurs are found in a small area wich implys the a big event such as the flood wiped them out furthermore the fossils in these graveyards are all faceing the same way and the rock and dirt around them show signs of current such as a great flood. this is just one of many proofs of creation

That implies no such thing. Infact, it implies just the opposite. If you had a worldwide flood, you would expect to see fossils everywhere, since the water would sweep the carcasses away into other places, not all in one place. Also, a bunch of fossils in one area doesn't necessarily imply a global flood. There are many things it could be like any number of catastrophic events or even just any one of a hundred localized disasters: a fire, an earthquake, a flood, or something else.

Also, even if there was a global flood, and the evidence tends to point against it from what I've seen, that still doesn't prove that the universe was created or that there was a god who created it. The only thing it would prove is that there was a global flood. Nothing more, nothing less.

Remember, that when you look at evidence, you have to look at it without pre-concieved notions of what that evidence shows. That's writing the conclusion at the bottom of the paper and than trying to make the evidence fit the conclusion. You have to erase the conclusion and examine the evidence without thinking you know what it's going to show. If you think you know what it's going to show than you put a blinder on and ignore any evidence that doesn't fit your conclusion. That is the very opposite of science. In science you drop your pre-conceived notions and examine it for what it is, not what you want it to be. And the first thing you do when someone brings out a new experiment is to try to disprove their conclusion.

Also, I'd like to see links to sources about these finds, just because it sounds interesting and I'd like to read them.

Ok, sure, proof for creation, I agree, but I must interject before Quad-J comes in and rips your arguement apart...

Not sure if I should be flattered by that or insulted...

The evedence of a "Dinoaur Graveyard," as you call them, could be interpereted many different ways.

It's all about your pre-supositions.

If you go in to view the evedence, pre-supposing that there was a world-wide flood, etc., you are more likely to interperet the information in favor of a world wide flood.

However, if you go in, pre-supposing that there was no world wide flood, you might view it as many local floods that caused these graveyards.
And in order for the few-thousand local floods (that would be needed to create as many "graveyards") to happen, you have to pre-suppose that the Earth has been around for a long time.

Actually you go in without pre-supposing anything if you are a scientist. I talked about this in the answer to the original post. Pre-suppositions get you in trouble when examining evidence and other scientists will rip your arguments apart far better than I could if you assume things without actually testing. I'd also still like to see those sources.

(Also, I assume you listen to the Jonathan Park series? It's a great series, but I feel that they don't do a great job of presenting the arguments... Sure, they work well in the show, but when you try to replicate them in real life, they don't work nearly as well. But I do love the series, because it does have some great stuff.)

I don't know who that is. Maybe the arguments are just flawed to begin with but the atmosphere of the show is one of agreement with everything they say, thus making it easier to believe them if you're already in agreement or already there. It's a group effect. If everyone in the group agrees with each other, you're pressured to agree as well, at least outwardly, even if you don't because you don't want to be left out. Feeling left out is a powerful motivator, again with the group evolution thing.

Although, as I said, I don't know much about that show, so I'm just guessing.

Also, as I see that there are a few Newbies in here, I must warn you that, unless you are prepared to have a very heated debate that has the potential to cause you to doubt your personal beliefs, you should be careful when debating with Quad-J.

Warning: Do not approach the Quad-J. Again, not sure if I should be flattered or insulted.

I should note that questioning is a very good thing. You should always question what you think and why you think it. I do that all the time. Just believing something because someone in authority says it, whether it be a pastor or your parents, is a bad idea. Generally you want to have ideas of your own, and questioning is the best way to get them. Ask yourself, why do I believe what I believe? And than ask yourself what evidence do I have for believing that?

He is a debator at heart, and he knows his stuff.

That one I will take as a compliment. I wouldn't be an atheist if I didn't "know my stuff" as you put it. Most atheists only became that way after long periods of study and questioning. In fact, I've had Christians shocked before because I know the Bible better than they do.

How does evolution create genders? Doesn't that seem against natural selection, because it makes males and females dependent on another to keep their species alive, while asexual reproduction would be much better for a single person.

I need to start this one with a disclaimer. Just because I, personally, don't know something, doesn't mean there isn't an answer. I don't know everything, after all. How annoying that would be too, you'd have to sift through boring and pointless gossip about celebrities and the mundane lives of billions of people to get to interesting things. Also, just because we, as the human race, don't know something doesn't mean we will never know it. At one point, we didn't know much about the human skeleton and muscular system. That doesn't mean that it was a mysterious magical thing that we'd never be able to understand. It just means we didn't know. Saying "I don't know" is not a bad thing.

The world is also full of organisms that have evolved together in a depended relationship, not just male and female. There are various ant and tree species that depend on each other. Flowers depend on birds and bees to carry their pollen and other sexual cells. As popularized by Finding Nemo, the clown fish and the sea anemone depend on each other.

The reason I say that is because I don't know very much about this topic. A bit of googling around says that one of the most prominent hypothesizes is that gender and sexuality are for greater genetic variation. It's also somewhat generally accepted that it's one of the unsolved ideas in nature.

But before everyone jumps on me and says that creation is true and God made everything, you have to realize that just because something is unsolved, that doesn't mean that something else is true. Unsolved means just that, unsolved. To say that "we'll never know x, therefore God" is a rather defeatist outlook. It's basically saying that just because we don't know something now, we'll never know it. That is not true. History is full of examples of scientists discovering new things that they didn't know. In fact, that's exactly what science is and what it's for, to learn and discover new things about the way the universe works.

[Guess Who!]

Why is this in church? We have had a lot of these in the Campbell debate society. Although, fostering community is good for church.

Sorry... I guess I'm not really up for spelling out a second atheist's perspective tonight... /

[jasonjannajerryjohn]

I put this topic here because the other Q/As were here.

[Guess Who!]

oh my! are we the only two on again? That's fun I love those nights

[Marc.]

Why do you type in orange?

[jasonjannajerryjohn]

Why do you type in orange?

YES! Finally someone asked me this. I love you so much. You are one of my favorite people. I've been waiting for someone to ask me this for quite some time.

The answer is because I, at one point, thought I was a Gryffindor and a Hufflepuff (oddly enough). Now I am a Slytherin, which really makes a whole lot more sense for me. Anyway, orange is the combined colors of Gryff and Puff. Scarlet and yellow mixed together. Thus orange. Also, it's a quirky habit I picked up one day on this forum. I wanted to post in color and somehow it just became orange and I've done it for everything I post on this forum ever since. I wanna say I've been doing it since 2007, but I'm not sure about that one. I may have posted some of my posts in black a few times.

PS. I love you!

[Astronomer]

Therefore, your conclusion is the same as a Christians: 'I don't know all the answers, yet I believe it anyway.' Right?

[~JCGJ~]

Also, as I see that there are a few Newbies in here, I must warn you that, unless you are prepared to have a very heated debate that has the potential to cause you to doubt your personal beliefs, you should be careful when debating with Quad-J.

Warning: Do not approach the Quad-J. Again, not sure if I should be flattered or insulted.

You should be flattered. I meant it as a complete compliment to your skills as a debator.

I quite admire you because of your viewpoint (even though I don't agree with it completely).

I agree, we need to test things ourselves and come up with our own conclusions. I believe I have done that to the best of my abilities, even though my conclusions are quite different from yours...

You must admit, however, that it is near impossible to escape the influence of everything.

I mean, I personally believe the scientific comunity is brainwashing everyone, because of the fact that people tend to believe people in authority.

It's the same with both Creationsists, and evolutionsist etc.

Just think about it.
Everyone is taught at a young age the Creation is bogus, and Evolution is truth. That is how it is represented in the classroom; as truth, not a theory (which is all evolution is).

The pre-supposition that Evolution is the truth then causes them to analyze evidence through that filter, because if they find anything that goes against the evolutionary theory, it's always because of some flaw in the equipment/method, and it doesn't prove anything...

I will admit, however, that the church (and the Creationist comunity) does a good deal of "brainwashing" as well... They too look at the evidence with the pre-supposition that Creation is truth, and anything that goes against that is because of some flaw in the equipment/method, and it doesn't prove anything...

All this just goes to say that everyone is influenced by something, and that influence has most likely planted an idea in your head that can be quite devistating to your beliefs if it is proven wrong, hence the ingoring of evidence that goes against their belief.

That is essentially what is meant by brainwashing (ie. planting an idea in someone's head, and convincing them that it is the truth).

He is a debator at heart, and he knows his stuff.

That one I will take as a compliment. I wouldn't be an atheist if I didn't "know my stuff" as you put it. Most atheists only became that way after long periods of study and questioning. In fact, I've had Christians shocked before because I know the Bible better than they do.

That one was meant as a compliment as well.


I will however, point out that I know a debator that can prove to you that the sky is purple, just by using logic.
His arguement is flawed, but it flows in such a way that enough information is presented to make his arguement make complete sense to the listener.

I'm not saying this to say that your arguments are flawed, I'm simply saying this to warn the newbies that debates like this should not be taken to heart...

(By the way, if I can get him to write his "Purple Sky" thing down, I'll send it to you so you can see what I mean.)

[Guess Who!]

This is my proof for God's existence. It is from my Bible Doctrines book from school, and I will give it to you in parts because it is kind of long.

"To the one who says, 'Prove that there is a God,' we can reply, 'Prove that there is no God.' To prove that there is no God, one would have to go to every corner of the universe and look under every rock to show that He is not there. BUt while that person was looking for God on one planet, God may be on another. Therefore it would be neccessary for the indivudual to be everywhere at the same time. Hence in his desire to prove that there is no God, he himself must possess one of the characteristics of God -- omnipresence.

Intuition
It is natural for man to believe that there is a God. The abnormal mind is the only kind that cannot accept the fact of God's existence.
'The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God.' Psa. 14:1
'Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble.' James 2:19
' All the evidence points to the conclusive fact that this universal faith in the exsistence of God is innate in man, and comes from rational intuition.' --William Evans

Tradition
It has been the common characteristic of all peoples throughout history to believe that there is a God and life after death. History proves that man is basically a religious creature. After a detailed study of some of the remote tribes of Africa, David Livingstone concluded that all people have a cpnception of GOd which they have passed on from generation to generation.

Reason
By looking around us it seems obvious to us that Someone with intelligence created, ordered, and organized this marvelous universe.
'For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead.' Rom. 1:20

Cause and effect
Man's observations of this world corfirm a marvelous 'effect.' HIs rationale demands a cause. What is the Cause behind all that man can see? Surely it must be an omnipotent Creator.

Design and Designer
It is extremely doubtful that man will ever be able to create life. But what if God allowed man to have that privilege? What would it prove? Only that intelligence is required to create and order this world. Design demands a Designer. "

Next I will post proof of God in science.

Thankfully, I'm a woman. So none of that could possibly be argument that *I,* at least, might think god a likely hypothesis. JJJJ can debunk the rest quite nicely, but at least I don't even have to work *that* hard. Thanks

Also: have any of you heard of Bayesian reasoning? It is more accurate than previous formulations of probability, and it is definitely true in that that absence of evidence *is* evidence of absence. http://lesswrong.com/lw/ih/absence_of_e ... f_absence/

True, it is perhaps not possible to get to 100% probability, but if you do not get at least to the point of acting on a model of a world with absences of things that there isn't evidence for when positing their existence WOULD likely result in such evidence... one is quickly going to diverge from deciding to do the most helpful course of action for achieving your, or any other humans', goals and wellbeing. (or the stability and comfort of nonhuman creatures too, but I mean, only so far that you can expand your values system anyway when judging these things, we pretty much are guaranteed to agree on human wellbeing to a greater extent than two individual arguing over the best outcome for the world in general...)

[~JCGJ~]

At the slight risk of spamming here, I would like to post this...

I saw this and imediately thought of Quad-J:

^^^^This is Quad-J^^^

And I say that with the utmost respect.

[snubs]

Guys, you really are not supposed to debate in here (or discuss). It's really just for questions.

[Guess Who!]

k sure I'll just go hang out in other threads.

[~JCGJ~]

Guys, you really are not supposed to debate in here (or discuss). It's really just for questions.

Should I move it to the "Questions for..." Forum?

It seems like these Q/A threads would fit better there anyway...

[church]

Well, QJ (for quad j) made the thread, so I think it makes sense to let him decide whether or not to allow debate here.

The premise here is that everything has a cause and that god caused everything. But there isn't a cause for god here, he just exists. But another reason why this doesn't work is why insert this big complicated thing (god) to explain the existence of the universe when you can just say that the universe exists on its own? Why can't there be an infinite regression?

Actually there is a reason to not jump to infinite regression. The second law of thermodynamics states that a closed system, in this case the entire universe, will always increase in entropy over time. Increasing entropy lowers the amount of usable energy in the system, ie the universe. Since entropy must always increase and never decrease, useable energy must always decrease and never increase. You can't even keep the same amount of usable energy. It *must* decrease.

Therefore, since useable energy is always decreasing, there will come a time when there is no longer any usable energy left in the universe. At that time movement inside the universe will cease. If the universe were infinitely old, then the ceasation of movement must have happened an infinite amount of time ago. Except it didn't. Which would mean the universe is not infinitely old.


Now, I have 2 questions.

1) would you please stop typing in orange? It's really hard to read. I have to highlight everything you say to read it.

2) do you believe that any of the predictions/prophecies in the Bible were accurate?

[snubs]

Guys, you really are not supposed to debate in here (or discuss). It's really just for questions.

Should I move it to the "Questions for..." Forum?

It seems like these Q/A threads would fit better there anyway...

Nah, since these Q/A's are all biblical we just leave them here.

And I guess if JJJJJJJJ doesn't mind you all discussing in his thread, then I suppose we can let it slide. *shrugs*

[jasonjannajerryjohn]

Therefore, your conclusion is the same as a Christians: 'I don't know all the answers, yet I believe it anyway.' Right?

Nope. My conclusion is "I don't know all the answers, but I believe only what can be demonstrated to be true." I don't believe anything without the evidence for it (unless it's something as mundane as "there was a bird outside this morning). And I know I don't have all the answers. That's not what science is about. Science is about trying to find out more about the universe. I'm not afraid of admitted that I don't know something. I'm not afraid to say that I don't have all the answers and I probably won't know everything. Not knowing is not a bad thing.

That tends to not be the conclusion of Christians I've seen actually. They tend to think they know everything about the way the world works, filling in God for pretty much any unanswered question.

Here's a video on the matter by the famous scientist Richard Feynman, one of the most famous physicists of all time who worked on the Manhattan Project, just in case you don't know:

You should be flattered. I meant it as a complete compliment to your skills as a debator.

I quite admire you because of your viewpoint (even though I don't agree with it completely).

Well I appreciate that. It took a lot of bravery to question what I previously thought to be true, especially with the people that I'm around. I've worked hard on developing it for years so I hope I can answer questions. ;D

I agree, we need to test things ourselves and come up with our own conclusions. I believe I have done that to the best of my abilities, even though my conclusions are quite different from yours...

That's fine. You don't have to come to the same conclusions that I have. I just want to encourage serious questioning. I don't have nearly as much of a problem with religious people who actually took the serious effort of vigorously questioning what they believe. I want people to start thinking like a scientists, put everything on the table and admit that maybe what they think isn't true. I want to encourage people to be brave enough to ask questions of themselves and others.

You must admit, however, that it is near impossible to escape the influence of everything.

I mean, I personally believe the scientific comunity is brainwashing everyone, because of the fact that people tend to believe people in authority.

That is an interesting belief, well, conspiracy theory. I wonder how you came onto that one. The scientific community is very much against brainwashing. That goes against everything scientists stand for. Scientists encourage what I'm encouraging here: open-minded questioning of beliefs and putting everything out on the table, admitting that anything you believe could be wrong.

Just think about it.
Everyone is taught at a young age the Creation is bogus, and Evolution is truth. That is how it is represented in the classroom; as truth, not a theory (which is all evolution is).

Well, I was taught the opposite, I don't know about everyone else. And in my biology classroom my senior year of high school, my teacher consciously avoided teaching anything about evolution and presented creation as an equally valid alternative. That's probably just because I'm in a really conservative area, but still.

A perfect science classroom would encourage people to find out things for themselves. That's why we have high school students do experiments so they can confirm things for themselves. A perfect teaching of evolution in a science classroom wouldn't even mention "creationism" because it's not science. You don't want to teach students false information. All of the evidence points away from that idea and even if it didn't, evolution has very little to do with that. Evolution is just something that happens in nature. It doesn't have anything to do with the idea that god created everything. However, classrooms are not perfect. Sometimes you just need to teach the material and you don't have the time to have the students do experiments on their own. You're generally on a deadline for how long the class can last and high school students tend not to be so open to learning. I don't know about you, but when I was a high school student, I was more concerned with trying to avoid work than actually learning. So you just have to teach the material and get it done.

Also, if I had a theory that destroyed evolution that I could actually prove and back up, I would send it to every single science journal and wait for the scientists to try to disprove me and then when they couldn't, I'd collect my Nobel prize and all the money I'd make from teaching in a college. And than, and only than, would it drift down into public schools. It's a filter system. I wouldn't try to fill a school board with people who agree with me to allow me to have my theory taught in schools or otherwise protest through politics or something else. Why do you think you don't see a whole lot of ID advocates doing this? You generally see them causing a social and political firestorm than anything else.

You want to teach kids what's actually true about the world (or at least what we currently think is true), you don't want to give false information so you have to wait until the ideas are confirmed through experimentation. It's true that you can't ever know for sure, but you have to teach students things about the world, it's better for them to be informed. Governments generally like to teach their students about the way the world works, science education. Thus you need to teach them what scientists currently think, and when information in the science books becomes out of date and disproved, you replace it with the current information.

Oh I forgot this one. Evolution is a theory, yes. But the word "theory" is used differently by scientists than by everyone else. Scientists use the word theory to mean "an explanation to explain a large body of hypothesis and evidence." Gravity is also a theory. There's germ theory, atomic theory, quantum theory, and many others. When people generally use the word theory they mean "a guess" which is more in line with the scientific hypothesis which is, functionally, an educated guess at how you think an experiment is going to go.

The pre-supposition that Evolution is the truth then causes them to analyze evidence through that filter, because if they find anything that goes against the evolutionary theory, it's always because of some flaw in the equipment/method, and it doesn't prove anything...

Yes, you shouldn't look at anything through a pre-supposed filter, I would agree. That's writing the answer at the bottom of the paper and than trying to make the evidence fit that answer. Many people do do that, and it causes them to be tripped up, interpreting the evidence in the wrong way. As I've said before, you want to avoid that, interpreting the evidence as it is without a pre-conceived idea of what you're going to find.

Also, sometimes the equipment or the method is flawed and you have to do the experiment again. But you have to do the experiment many times over anyway before an idea is thought to be true. The first thing that a scientist does when a new experiment comes out is replicate the experiment and try to prove that it was flawed and incorrect. People replicate an experiment many times over before it's added t the science books.

I will admit, however, that the church (and the Creationist comunity) does a good deal of "brainwashing" as well... They too look at the evidence with the pre-supposition that Creation is truth, and anything that goes against that is because of some flaw in the equipment/method, and it doesn't prove anything...

Now this is true. I lived in that world and I believed that stuff. I was a creationist at one point. I know how they avoid everything that contradicts their position and try to teach kids that everything the scientists say is wrong. Interestingly, when I asked them why scientists still have this idea if the evidence is so clearly there, they told me that scientists just hate God and want to do whatever they want without conforming to God's morality. That was my first sign that something was clearly off because from what I'd seen, scientists are not like that at all. People don't become scientists to participate in brainwashing, they become a scientist to try to earnestly figure out the way the world works.

All this just goes to say that everyone is influenced by something, and that influence has most likely planted an idea in your head that can be quite devistating to your beliefs if it is proven wrong, hence the ingoring of evidence that goes against their belief.

This is very true, and it's one of the sacrifices you have to make as a scientist. You have to dump all your pre-conceptions. Something might disprove a long held and treasured belief, and you have to have the courage to sacrifice that belief. Most people can't do it, and to be fair, it is a very difficult thing to do. But I think it's worth it to confront the world as it really is rather than how you want it to be.

That is essentially what is meant by brainwashing (ie. planting an idea in someone's head, and convincing them that it is the truth).

I also forgot to talk about the idea of authority. It is true that I don't know everything, after all. There are many people who are smarter than me. Therefore I have to defer to their experience. Many people are brilliant scientists who have many credible experiments and have been confirmed by their peers. Those are the authorities whom I'll defer to. I won't defer to someone who has little to no scientific experience and/or is politically motivated, like various pundits who don't really know what they're talking about. I would encourage people to be careful about choosing who to listen to. Would you listen to a psychic on medical matters? No, you'd go to a doctor. In the same way, would you listen to Bill O'Reily or anything politically motivated pundit on science matters? No. You'd listen to a scientist.

I will however, point out that I know a debator that can prove to you that the sky is purple, just by using logic.
His arguement is flawed, but it flows in such a way that enough information is presented to make his arguement make complete sense to the listener.

I know how this works. There are many people who are very skilled at talking and convincing you of something. You have to be careful. For example, don't take my word for anything, go check what I say. Fact check me. Ask more questions. Pick apart my arguments if you can. That's what debating is all about, and I encourage it.

I'm not saying this to say that your arguments are flawed, I'm simply saying this to warn the newbies that debates like this should not be taken to heart...

Than what is the purpose of debating? I really just want to encourage people to ask questions and think about what they believe. Don't accept anything really big without looking at the evidence. And remember that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. It's a very good idea to keep in mind.

Notice, also, that most religious leaders encourage you not to question things. Faith is presented as a virtue. Why do you think that is?

(By the way, if I can get him to write his "Purple Sky" thing down, I'll send it to you so you can see what I mean.)

I'd definitely like to see that. I always admire people who can convince people of something just by talking. ;D

-- 15 Aug 2012 10:28 pm --

Ok, part 2! Took a little break before this one after that long post.

At the slight risk of spamming here, I would like to post this...

I saw this and imediately thought of Quad-J:

^^^^This is Quad-J^^^

And I say that with the utmost respect.

This is quite wonderful. And Golly Gee Whilikers!, I haven't used that smilie in years. NOSTALGIA!

Guys, you really are not supposed to debate in here (or discuss). It's really just for questions.

I encourage debate and discussion. That's really the best thing you can do here to exercise your brain. Please, by all means, question my answers and discuss things with yourselves and not just me.

Guys, you really are not supposed to debate in here (or discuss). It's really just for questions.

Should I move it to the "Questions for..." Forum?

It seems like these Q/A threads would fit better there anyway...

No you really shouldn't move it there. That's HH, and people would no longer take anything seriously and it would stop discussion. The point of this is to ask questions and open discussion and debate. The only reason it's here is because others had Q/As here that had to do with religious things and being an atheist is a position on religious matters. So there's that.

Well, QJ (for quad j) made the thread, so I think it makes sense to let him decide whether or not to allow debate here.

The premise here is that everything has a cause and that god caused everything. But there isn't a cause for god here, he just exists. But another reason why this doesn't work is why insert this big complicated thing (god) to explain the existence of the universe when you can just say that the universe exists on its own? Why can't there be an infinite regression?

Actually there is a reason to not jump to infinite regression. The second law of thermodynamics states that a closed system, in this case the entire universe, will always increase in entropy over time. Increasing entropy lowers the amount of usable energy in the system, ie the universe. Since entropy must always increase and never decrease, useable energy must always decrease and never increase. You can't even keep the same amount of usable energy. It *must* decrease.

Therefore, since useable energy is always decreasing, there will come a time when there is no longer any usable energy left in the universe. At that time movement inside the universe will cease. If the universe were infinitely old, then the ceasation of movement must have happened an infinite amount of time ago. Except it didn't. Which would mean the universe is not infinitely old.

Good point, but I wasn't talking about the universe itself. I was talking about the idea that there are universes constantly forming or when the universe runs down and collapses it reignites again causing it to begin expansion all over again. My (very) basic understanding of the Big Bang Theory is that the universe is constantly expanding and started expanding at one point going out. The beginning of that expansion is referred to as a "bang." The infinite regression I was talking about was perhaps when the universe does run down and collapse, why can't it than begin expanding again over and over again? I don't know how accurate that is as I am rather ignorant on astrophysics so I wouldn't take my word on that. I don't know if that's even a current idea, but it was just one idea. The point was that there could be many different ideas as to how the universe exists. Sure it wouldn't be comfortable for us to think of the universe as always existing like that, but the universe is not obligated to make us comfortable.

Now, I have 2 questions.

1) would you please stop typing in orange? It's really hard to read. I have to highlight everything you say to read it.

NO! It's a tradition that I always post in orange, no reason to break that now.

2) do you believe that any of the predictions/prophecies in the Bible were accurate?

From what I've seen there is no more reason to believe that any of the predictions in the Bible are accurate any more than Nostradamus or other prophets and soothsayers. I'm not impressed by New Testament claims that Jesus fulfills all the prophesies for several reasons. The first being that the people who wrote the NT had the OT writings right there with them, there's no reason that they couldn't have written the NT with all the prophecies in mind. I'm also generally not impressed by very general prophecies that are written to be able to match anything. If you make enough predictions that are general enough, you're bound to get something right. And because of confirmation bias, people will ignore the ones that didn't come true and only take into account the ones that did come true. A prophecy I would be impressed by would be one that we could definitely prove that came before an event and was so specific so that it couldn't be anything else. For instance "In the year two thousand and one, on the eleventh of september, an organization called the taliban will cause the collapse of twin towers in the city of New York in the country of United States." If we could prove that this came from before 9/11, I would be impressed by that. There was a checklist in a book I was reading earlier for making good prophesies:

- Make lots of predictions, and hope that some come true. If they do, point to them with pride. Ignore the others.
- Be very vague and ambitious. Definite statements can be wrong but "possible" items can always be reinterpreted.
- Use a lot of symbolism. Be metaphorical, using images of animals, names, initials. They can be fitted to many situations by believers.
- Cover the situation both ways and select the winner as the "real" intent of your statement.
- Credit God with your success, and blame yourself for any incorrect interpretations of His Divine messages.
- No matter how often you're wrong, plow ahead. The believers won't notice your mistakes and will continue to follow your every word.
- Predict catastrophes; they are more easily remembered and more popular by far.
- When predicting after the fact, but representing that the prophecy preceded the event, be wrong a few times, just enough to appear uncertain about the exact details; too good a prophecy is suspect.

[church]

a follow question:

If there were accurate predictions in the Bible, would you consider that the bible may be accurate?


And the universe is expanding at an increasing rate, so the idea that the universe will recollapse on itself likely isn't true. I think we're already past the "escape velocity" for us to collapse, but I'm not certain on that point.

[~JCGJ~]

If we are pst the "escape velocity," the more likely senerio is that the universe will simply rip apart...

Take a nice, thick rubber band for instance.

If you pull it slowly, it eventually gets to a point when it will snap back together (ie. the "Big Crunch," as many are calling it).

However, if you pull it really fast, it'd be more likely to break (ie. the "Big Break," as some like to call it).

However, I'm not entirely sure how this pertains to the topic at hand, so I shall be quiet now.

[jasonjannajerryjohn]

And the universe is expanding at an increasing rate, so the idea that the universe will recollapse on itself likely isn't true. I think we're already past the "escape velocity" for us to collapse, but I'm not certain on that point.

If we are pst the "escape velocity," the more likely senerio is that the universe will simply rip apart...

Take a nice, thick rubber band for instance.

If you pull it slowly, it eventually gets to a point when it will snap back together (ie. the "Big Crunch," as many are calling it).

However, if you pull it really fast, it'd be more likely to break (ie. the "Big Break," as some like to call it).

Ya, this seems as likely to me as anything. As I said, I'm not an astrophysicist and I definitely don't know a whole lot about it. I'd suggest looking up people like Neil Degrass Tyson or other astrophysicists for more information.

http://www.haydenplanetarium.org/tyson/

a follow question:

If there were accurate predictions in the Bible, would you consider that the bible may be accurate?

Well that depends on what you mean by "accurate." If, as I said before, that they are so general that they can really apply to anything, I wouldn't be impressed by that. If they are extremely specific, so specific that they couldn't possibly be talking about anything else and if we can verify for an absolute certainty that they came before the event and not after the fact, than I would be impressed by that, yes. But you also have to realize that if you make enough predictions, you'll eventually get something correct.

Even if there was a correct prediction, that by no means proves that there was a supernatural helper behind that prediction. Remember, many people make predictions all the time that come true. Weathermen predict the weather, historians predict what's going to happen next, economists predict how countries' economies are going to develop. I predict that Romney is going to win the next election, unless the Tea Party fields a candidate of their own, given a good knowledge of history, politics, economics, psychology, religion, and sociology. Scientists make predictions all the time as to what they think is going to happen in their experiment, it's called a hypothesis, an educated guess.

And even if there were accurate predictions, I would think, well someone was good at making predictions. I wouldn't say that since this one person is good at making predictions than the entire Bible is suddenly accurate. That jump in logic doesn't make any sense. Someone being good at making predictions proves just that and only that, that that someone was good at making predictions. No more, no less.