Aren't God's creations enough to prove that he exists? Indeed they are. We need not ask if there is a God, because we see his hand every single day! The Prophet Alma speaks of this proof to a king who did not believe: (The Book of Mormon; Book of Alma, Chapter 30) "And now Korihor [the king] said unto Alma: If thou wilt show me a sign, that I may be convinced that there is a God, yea, show unto me that he hath power, and then will I be convinced of the truth of thy words." "But Alma said unto him: Thou hast had signs enough; will ye temp your God? Will ye say, Show unto me a sign, when ye have the testimony of all these thy bretheren, and also all the holy prophets? The scriptures are laid before thee, yea, and all things denote there is a God; yea, even the earth, and all things that are on the face of it, yea, and its motion, yea, and also the planets which move in their regular form do witness that there is a Supreme Creator." What a powerful testimony that is. =) I know that God is our Heavenly Father (we have a Heavenly Mother too!) - we are their children and I know they love us more than we can fathom as mortals on this earth. Our Heavenly Father loves you whether you believe in him or not and always wants the best for you. He wants more than anything to help you, if you just let him.
You start out with sanity, and then just slipped right off into insanity. Your hypothesis: There complexity and beauty of life are evidence of a creator. Fine. Acceptable hypothesis, but impossible to test currently. Now explain to me how you got to, " He wants more than anything to help you, if you just let him". That implies you have some personal contact, communication, etc. Do you drop acid, or dabble in other various hallucinogenics? The real truth is, which you probably wont admit, is some HUMAN told you he (have we determined gender of god?) wants to help you. If you need to cling to your hypothesis to have purpose in life, or if it makes you feel better, GREAT! When we can test it and prove it, I will be very interested in learning about this being, its motives, its values, its desires, its wants, etc etc etc. Until then, when you go around talking about what "it" wants, you sound like a complete nut job, and you know full well there is zero scientific evidence to back a claim that "it" wants anything at all!
Obamanation and halvetti, Can you give me an explanation for the mysterious creations of God? The balance of the universe? The human creation of the first life on earth? The diversity of the animal kingdom? The existence of the spiritual world? If you don't believe in a higher power "God" that made all these things possible...then what is your interpretation ? Enlighten us...
Obamanation: Now explain to me how you got to, " He wants more than anything to help you, if you just let him". Here is where he got it from and there are many more quotes: "Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me". (Revelation 3:20) I know where you might go with this. But..this is one of the most powerful lines in the bible. Of course, obamanation, if you don't invite God to your life and always be cynical, then you will never understand the beauty of knowing God.
If I might jump in for a moment... There are lot of unstated assumptions here, none of which are warranted in the slightest and none of which an agnostic or atheist would accept. First off, you start by asserting that we need an explanation for the "mysterious creations of God," but that's precisely what's up for debate in the first place. You can't begin by asserting your conclusion and then use it to prove your point, that's circular logic. Secondly, you ask for an explanation of "the balance of the universe." What does this mean? There is no rigorous scientific definiton of "balance" that I'm aware of. How is the universe balanced? Why is this proof of design? As far as "The human creation of the first life on earth, I have absolutely no idea what you're referring to. Thirdly, on the topic of the diversity of the animal kingdom I think you'll find that evolutionary theory accounts for it quite well. How does God explain it? More importantly (and this is the key assumption you're making), how is God an explanation for anything? The very concept of an explanation is that it gives understanding into how something works. Positing God as the reason for animal diversity, for example, is not an explanation because it tells us nothing about how diversity actually came about- instead it asserts that some greater being that works in ways we cannot understand is responsible. This is a non-explanation and it has zero usefulness for furthering human understanding. Further, you assert in absence of evidence that a spiritual world exists. What is your evidence for such a world, and what is a "spiritual world" in the first place? I don't believe that you can present a coherent definiton. Finally, the entire point of you posts rests upon flawed logic. You are implying that if no nonreligious (rational, scientific, however you like to call it) explanation for things is available, then God must be the explanation. This is not the case. It could be that we lack the tools or methodology to develop a fully accurate explanation for these things, or that we are missing some key piece of evidence that would allow an appropriate explanation. There is no reason to default to God in absence of another explanation; only in the face of positive proof for God's existence would there be reason to believe. As a final note, you apply specific qualities to your higher power elsewhere in this thread. Even if the proof you have outlined was factually correct and logically sound, it proves only that some sort of higher power exists and created the universe. Any properties beyond that have no basis, so there is still no good reason to believe in your specific brand of deity. Sorry for the wall of text everybody.
I have scribbled more meaningful text on toilet paper while particularly constipated. If you want to kick off of a thread trying to use the term "science" in the same sentence as god, you have to omit use of the bible, the koran, or my toilet paper scribblings as evidence, since they are all equally credible to a scientist. You also might want to read the last paragraph from the post by Person above. It restates well my question about your scientific evidence of gods motives. By the evidence, if god exists, he is a sadistic mother f*cker who likes to inflict people with painful diseases and heartbreaking losses. He is the type of creature who likes to put his offspring in a cage and watch them fight to the death. I would open the door to hear his voice, but I refuse to because I am seriously concerned he would order me to kill you as his first order of business.
Though the Garden is the physical presence of God - The proof of Gods existence is the persuasion all matter must conform to in order to exist - For creatures to exist and to reach the afterlife they must conform to the will of the Creator "triumph against evil" and is the proof of the sole source / ruler of the universe. The afterlife is a state of purity refined progressively reaching the apex defined by God - dare not contemplate a change in definition (on top) as obviously was the intent of Satan.....Good prevailed over evil and must be accomplished by each individual is the proof of Gods existence and the path to the everlasting.
Thanks for your explanations but I see you intentionally missed "The creation of the first life on earth?". Like I said before, I am going to make a thread specifying lots of these points in details. It will include all answers to your questions. But briefly to answer your questions: Q: "mysterious creations of God". You can't begin by asserting your conclusion and then use it to prove your point. A: Is that one of the Atheism rules? Of course I can. What I wanted to hear is YOUR alternative explanation of these mysterious creations that are so precise. Q: "the balance of the universe." What does this mean? A: The precise location of earth from other solar planets. The incoming and outgoing radiation cycle. The precise rotation of our planet almost exactly every 24 hours. By laws of physics, energy is always constant and conserved. Plus, earth is the only planet with life. Earth is the most beautiful planet in the universe. Q: animal kingdom & evolution theory? A: I am not totally against evolution. I do believe its true for some species but not others. Now, here is the important part. Even though, evolution accounts for change or development of a one species into a new species, but somehow, it retains most of the genes and sometimes the physiological features of the original organism. Now, Where did the original cell come from? All of these species had a common ancestor. If you study some of the organisms that took part in evolution, they are always related. You don't see a fruit fly evolving into an elephant. No matter how much time is given. Most of what is written about evolution millions and billions years ago is based on assumptions. Q: Spiritual world exists? A: Yes. Many have witnessed. But again, not everyone is allowed to see this. Plus, not everyone is capable of seeing the outer world.
You have asked "thegreek" about where he got that sentence from. I answered you clearly. Now..what was your comment other than constipating on the toilet? Again...you have nothing to say. I have omitted the use of bible in my thread intentionally. Since you were eager to know where he got it from, I got you a quote. Now..I have heard that bragging about pain and diseases a lot. A known fact...if you're away from God, then you're like a ship without a sail. You are free into this world without a commander to lead you into the right pathway. You're free to hit a rock or even sink and die. You absolutely left God and do not want to listen to his words. God gave us lots of valuable things; a notable one is freedom of Choice. If you are hungry, you grab yourself to the supermarket or a restaurant. But if you don't and die from hunger (assuming you're not broke), then why blame it on the restaurant owner or the supermarket? You follow me? You'd have to sit with someone who knows the words of God and tell you more about the beauty of knowing God.
Well, seems your god has some competition and your "proof" has been blown out of the water: Maverick U.S. scientist creates first synthetic genome http://www.vancouversun.com/technol...tes+first+synthetic+genome/3053797/story.html Sorry, try again.
Were the kids at Columbine some of your fellow god people? Whats funny is that I am totally not anti-religion or god though people like you and the Muslims on this forum are definitely making me more that way. If you think evolution doesn't apply to the human species, that gravity doesn't exist, or that bible stories are exempt from the laws of science, you are welcome to it. When you come to a public forum looking down your nose at educated people, peddling your fiction with starry eyed clarity, you are just annoying. At least the radical Muslims on this forum have their isolated state sponsored indoctrination to blame. What is your excuse?
Before you make a reply..think about what you have to say. Don't waste your time typing nonsense. So you think you descended from a chimpanzee yet you do not believe in God? and you call yourself a civilized educated individual?
I already know about that. If you read enough about it, you'd type in the details instead of reciting a headline. This is not an efficient explanation for 2 main reasons. why? 1) They used Mycoplasma genitalium. One of the smallest bacteria that exists. It doesn't have a complex system. It was an easy target and its genome is very small. 2) The molecular machinery and chemical environment were not synthetic! They used a recipient cell to boot up the synthetic chromosome. So a lot of manipulations were done in this experiment. I completely respect Venter's work but that was not creation. It was a clever way of doing it though and it will have many benefits in the scientific field.
There is no need to accuse me of intentionally missing anything; I ignored it because I felt that the issue of abiogenesis would best be handled by other posters that are more knowledgeable on the issue than I, and because I felt that my general objections to your claims were sufficient. I will address the issue if you wish. No, it's a LOGICAL rule. If you set out to prove something, you cannot accept that thing as true until it is proven. Do I really need to explain why circular logic is fallacious? My alternative explanation is both unnecessary, since God is not an explanation and in absence of a perfectly accurate alternative one would not default to God without positive proof anyway, and quite straightforward, insofar as the physical properties of the universe are such that the formation of planets and eventual development of life are possible. What in the world does the rotation of our planet have to do with universal balance? You are aware that other planets have different lengths of rotation, right? You are aware that life on Earth adapted to the Earth’s rotation time, right? Why does conservation of energy require the existence of God? I would argue that it does not, but is simply a property of the universe and/or energy itself. Your claim that Earth is the only planet with life is possibly incorrect (it is the only planet where life has been observed, but we haven’t even completely ruled out the existence of other life within the solar system yet), but if it is true, so what? Your argument is that Earth is beautiful because it contains life, but this does not imply that God exists, nor does it imply that Earth was made for humans. Rather, the reason human life arose on Earth is because Earth had the ideal conditions for life in the first place. We wouldn’t be around to observe it otherwise. On what basis do you make this distinction? Self-replicating organic molecules in all likelihood. I am rather unqualified to debate the origins of life (abiogenesis, which is altogether a separate issue from evolutionary theory), and have not had time to research the issue as of yet. I will look into it if you wish to pursue this argument further. Of course you don’t. They are two species with a (very distant) common ancestor. If you did see fruit flies evolve into a species of elephant, then evolutionary theory as we currently understand it would be wrong. Perhaps you can explain what these assumptions are. I would argue that this is not the case. Rather, evolution explains the observed phenomena of species divergence and change (I am simplifying here). The mechanisms for evolution such as natural selection provide the theory and make testable predictions, for example, what should be observed in the fossil record. You have said it yourself; all of these species had a common ancestor. Every piece of scientific evidence so far has confirmed the predictions of evolutionary theory. The assertion that evolutionary mechanisms hold even with species that existed millions of years ago is based on a large body of evidence. Please define what the spiritual world is. I still don’t believe a coherent definition of the spiritual world is possible. What makes the spiritual world different from the “real†world? What are its properties? Moreover, I do not accept your claim that it has been observed, because those who claim to have seen visions of some sort of afterlife (which is what I assume you’re taking as evidence of some sort of spiritual world) give conflicting accounts of its nature. Thank you for your time. I would appreciate a response to my more general objections also, but I understand that I’m being pedantic here and don’t mind if you’d rather narrow this discussion to a few main points. Apologies again for the length.
Oh my goodness, they posted this on CNN? The almighty cable news channel has never, ever, ever posted anything that is not true before. I can't believe my eyes! DNA is the final proof that God exists? Finally I have seen the light... Riiiiggghhtttt.....
I personally find it interesting and humorous to watch Person try and reason with Luke. Luke, being 100% brainwashed, is more than happy to read any scientific evidence. The minute something doesn't make sense with his belief system, he will fall back to the "God is beyond the human mind" argument, which happens frequently. One might say his faith is unshakable. I find his attempts to use "science" to explain and justify his beliefs more humorous than when my 2 year old daughter uses a scientific calculator(as a paint brush). I find myself wondering how many more like him there are out there. I watch guys like Mike Huckabee and Rick Warren, who seem to have at least tried to evolve their beliefs with science and I don't worry so much about the faithful amongst us. When I read the kind of blind faith Luke has, I think to myself, this person could be convinced to do anything.
Christians have not a clue: The bold assertion is exactly the opposite, those seeking the afterlife must first attain remittance only them are they again recognized and cared for by the (lowest levels) heirarchy......heaven would still not be in sight. The Almighty's demand to accomplish remittance. - - (not quite because the person would be stepping through, not God "coming in"....the Christians again use self direction as a sin.)
Obamanation, You might say I am brainwashed or even crazy...My faith is unshakable because I know in what I believe in. When you know where you want to go and who to trust, no matter what other people say, you know you are right. I can tell you more about this but you'll never understand. You think everyone who talks about God is trying to brainwash you because the environment that surrounds you made you paranoid about religious people. You want to see God in order to believe...but in fact, you need to believe first in order to be able to see God. The point of my thread was to prove that there are people out there such as intelligent scientists that used their scientific knowledge to connect a meaning of life and presence of God. Was that scientist brainwashed too? No! He was an atheist and also afraid to face the reality but now, he is at another different level with his own will and decision - that itself is very powerful.