And boy, isn't he lucky that he was born into a family that happened to know which god was the right one? He could've been born into an Indian family and worshiping Vishnu and then what would happen to his soul? Phew... really dodged a bullet there.
I don't know. I get the sense he's one of those born again evangelical types. As much as I disrespect them for their odious political beliefs, at least you can say they made a conscious and knowing choice about their faith.
Even considering that, it's not like his faith was revealed to him in a predominantly Hindu or Muslim country. It was in a predominantly Christian country. There's a ridiculously strong correlation between geography and faith.
And on a related note, arguing with somebody who believes in the existence of god is like kicking their puppy out into the middle of the road so you can watch it get run over in front of them.
Then there is the almost universal phenomenon that people who fervently claim to know God are unshakably convinced that they have his special approval.
... except it was never really a puppy. It was just an old potato that they called a puppy and took for a walk every day.
Whatever gets them through the day, right? You going to give them something better than the religion they were raised with to replace that? For when it gets dark and scary?
That can easily framed in support of the concept of a supreme entity. if conscious life with the ability to understand, manipulate and control nature can occur naturally from whatever bore the natural universe or multiverse, as our very own existence indicates from a naturalist position, then there is nothing offensive about a larger conscious being existing naturally either, and in fact becomes more likely. on an infinite timeline of an everlasting existence, all potential possibilities actually exist. so once you accept the possibility of an eternal reality (not our consciousness of it - the reality that existed before the formation of our solar system, well before it and well beyond its expected lifespan), the possibility of an eternal being is realistic. "his" springing into existence naturally and controlling the physical universe as we see it, over an infinite forever, is as likely and within the confines and theoretical possibilities of known science as our universe and conscious life springing from nothing to something on its own. his "life" simply occurred prior to what we observe but from that same nothingness that can occur naturally. religion isn't a particular interest of mine. religion is a device used to communicate the concept of a supreme entity, not the creator of it. but man believed in the supreme entity prior to any existence of religion. it could be an inherent aspect of our nature to anthropomorphize everything we see, our fears and insecurity about lack of control, or it could be real. but science itself has historically had us latch onto incomplete answers. dark matter is a prime example. we cannot find it at all, but it is a concept to make sense of an unknown -- where all the mass in the universe is because we cannot see it. I would never argue in favor of organized religion as the answer to anything. there is no observable, repeatable evidence of dark matter either. we simply have a question about where all the mass in the universe is that we cannot see and have a theory that there is matter we can neither see or observe, but are deducing by the effects we observe. it is really no different than attributing the universe to God simply because the effect -- the existence of the universe is observed -- and needing an answer until science can find it. This will appear like a semantic argument, but once you eliminate the description "divine," and accept that everything that exists has to be natural by default, then what you have is a concept that fits within the realm of the known physical universe that we can observe by our own existence. the only way to negate it is to eliminate the possibility of infinity. I agree it hasn't been observed or tested, but my problem to the opposition of the concept of a creating entity is that the claim that it doesn't make sense based on our existing scientific knowledge. I disagree, the concept of a God and where he came from falls in line with what we do know or currently study as likely explanations of the universe. as above, I don't find the classification of God as supernatural necessary or honest. everything that exists is natural; the classification of it as supernatural is a reference to our ability to understand it, not what it actually is. like I mentioned previously, a lighter would have appeared supernatural to cavemen, but that is the result of their lack of scientific knowledge, not any real supernatural elements of the lighter.
Wouldn't it make sense that if gOD scattered mankind across the globe and confused their languages, that hE would also reveal hIMSELF to them in different ways? Only in the past couple of centuries has man begun to realize certain similarities in different faiths. Why would hE scatter their language and culture in such a way and then keep their religion the same? That would give them a common trait.
I think it's obvious to anyone that has reason to want to truly understand gOD that there is nothing plain about hIS actions throughout time but surgical control methods.
Or you could take the common wisdom that god created man in his own image and realize that people are a great source of drama if observed collectively. It's one way to explain the actions of an omnipotent being who seems to positively revel in the suffering that he obviously could stop if he chose to do so.
Why stop there? There really is no payback in creating drama, except for limited entertainment value. Have you ever really explored the idea that the energy created by mental stress in a human being radiates as easily as body heat? Our brains produce more than warmth.
1. Nobody can prove the devil exists or has any abilities to speak via animals. 2. Please provide evidence that 50 pairs of birds could provide thousands of species over a period of 3000 years. Evolution takes much longer than that, and Noah's ark still doesn't make A TINY BIT of logical sense. You also have to account for the dozen+ separate species of hominid that ruled the earth before humans for 2.5 million years. 3. Irrelevant to my point 4. We know the earth wasn't created in 6000 years either. Try billions. Sorry it doesn't add up. There is so much wrong with the literal creation story, it would take all day to explain it all. 5. It absolutely matters. It would be like taking you and your sister and trying to repopulate the earth. The inbreeding would kill the gene pool, cause all kinds of problems and the diversity would disappear, and likely humans would go extinct. It's been proven via genetics. Look it up if you don't agree. The term is "mitochondrial eve"
What I guess I just don't get is the desire to lend some kind of equal credence to all of these currently completely untestable "what if" statements. What if the universe was really shit out of the bunghole of a giant inter-dimensional carp? What if we're really just living in someone else's dream? Insofar as we can find -- or even look for -- answers, those are equally valid to some invisible dude in the sky making the world in seven days. The only real reason for believing in any of these things is that a person finds solace in it. Which is fine. But until it's anything more than that, I really don't see any other purpose or any reason to believe in one currently completely untestable theory over another.
Atheism is the logical position, since no objective evidence for god or a creator exists. Just because we exist, it means god exists? What kind of backwards logic is that? That is a much bigger cop out than atheism, and pretty means you have given up looking for the answer. That is the opposite of science and knowledge.
