Foyle,

<<Why do I not debate your supposed evidence? It is because I have read real evidence from modern scientists and nothing you have said is supported by evaluated, supported, evidence.>>

This is a dodge. As you know, my challenge was direct to the methodology which interprets human fossils on the premise that “Human’s evolved from another species”.

The premise “Human’s evolved from another species” cannot be refuted because one cannot prove a negative. Now I’m not saying you are wrong, just that you have not justified the methodology. There is little incentive for me to discard my religion based on the word of someone who cannot even defend the methodology and resorts to mockery and pompous declarations that I am (no longer) unworthy of their attention.

<<What sort of god offers virgins as a reward? Bit hard on the virgins!!
Don't they have a right to an independent fulfilled life instead of waiting around to be raped by terrorists who murdered about 100 Australian in the WTC 9/11 atrocity. Also many innocent Muslims were victims that day.>>

Why do you blame Islam for these acts? These guys, the Wahhabi re-formers of Islam, were/are following Western culture. To put things in perspective read Daniel Pipes: "The Western Mind of Radical Islam" (http://www.danielpipes.org/273/the-western-mind-of-radical-islam). Of course Pipes is not exactly an apologist for Islam but nevertheless he is able to distinguish between the teachings of Muhammad and the teachings of Wahhabi's who, he argues are largely ignorant of their religion and more influenced by Western culture and ideas. In any case Wahhabism will be gone in another decade, if not sooner, God willing.

So back to the question: Why do you blame Islam?

Answer: Because it suits.

Demonstrating once more how committed fundamentalist atheism is to the truth.

Foyle stated
<< The Muslim caliphate may have had a hey-day while the Western World went through its dark ages but as Terry Lane pointed out, luckily we had our thinkers such as Copernicus, Gallilo, Adam Smith, Hume, Voltaire, and Russell etc. (Adam Smith on ethics rather than economics)

You need to read Hume, Russell, Darwin, Ardrey et al for yourself and broaden your outlook and get out of your dark ages outlook.>>

Without denying the value of such scholarship, for practical purposes I need to think carefully how I allocate my time (I’m neither retired nor a student). So can I ask if you, or anyone else (capable of a modicum of manners), to address the following question:

What can a Muslim learn from these scholars that cannot learned from scholars in the Islamic tradition in regards to ethical conduct?

If you are not familiar with Islamic scholarship then perhaps you can offer what you would regard as the key insights/guide posts to ethical conduct. I would then be able to offer my own assessment and bounce it off you.

salaams

@ Grateful

>> distinguish between the teachings of Muhammad and the teachings of Wahhabi's who, he argues are largely ignorant of their religion and more influenced by Western culture and ideas <<

It is more likely that the Wahhabi’s have got it right --if right means getting it as close as possible to the Koranic –Hadith blueprint .

We often hear with regard ethnic cuisines, that the authentic dishes are served up only in the home country . With restaurants in the West opting to serve locals a modified version that they think will be more in keeping with local tastes—nice, but hardly authentic!

In the same manner and for the same reasons –I’d suggest -- neophytes in the west have been served a sugar coated version of Islam .

>> In any case Wahhabism will be gone in another decade, if not sooner <<

What is more likely is that when the full impact of the massive population increases that most middle eastern countries have allowed, flow through.
And it becomes apparent that neither Mubarak nor the military can solve their problems, the populace will become more susceptible to demagogic figures preaching versions of Wahhabism –or worse!


>> So can I ask if you, or anyone else (capable of a modicum of manners), to address the following question…What can a Muslim learn from these scholars that cannot learned from scholars in the Islamic tradition in regards to ethical conduct<<

I think you’re looking at the issue back-to-front .

The question you should be asking yourself is:
“What could Grateful possibly learn from those dust old “scholarly” Islamic tomes that he could not learn here:
http://www.dummies.com/store/product/Ethics-For-Dummies.productCd-0470591714.html

And if Grateful was honest with himself, he would have to answer – “not much”.

Lan astaslem!

AJ,

See now your arrogance is getting a little absurd. The spirit of our debate was rather charitable but now it's disappointing to see that you're getting emotional. I barely even scratched the surface of justifying my worldview in any kind of detail, so to make the claim that I came "to realise that one of the key rationalisations of (my) entire belief system was fatally flawed all along" is completely ridiculous, so I don't think you're doing yourself any justice here.

If you wanted examples then I don't recall you mentioning anything at all about my brief sketch of C Stephen Evans argument in his new book, nor anything about the Leibnizian Cosmological Argument. You waved off my claim that theism accounts for many facts better than naturalism, and you completely missed my point about extraordinary evidence. You responded, but nonetheless missed the force of the argument I made. Either way, as I said, I distinctly get the impression that your approach to these kind of discussions is not conducive to fruitful dialogue. If I'm wrong, I'm wrong, but I only need to re-read your previous few posts to put the argument behind that assertion. Thus, the valuable and (at the moment) scarce resource called time is too valuable to spend with someone who garners that impression in me.

All the best AJ, now I will make a brief response to David- I have not got the time right now to write a substantive post stretching to the daily limit or anything as I had previously- and this will do for this thread.

David, thanks for fleshing out your views in more detail, now I have a greater understanding of your view about why you expect religions to be supported by "universally accepted evidence" and what that means.

However, your argument fails because you are still thinking in terms of black and white, and thus failing to appreciate grey, not to mention blue and green and yellow and orange and purple and aquamarine and daffodil.

You assume that either Islam is true and Christianity is entirely false, or that Christianity is true and Islam is entirely false, or scientific naturalism is true and they are both entirely false. You then proceed to argue that the most likely hypothesis is that no religion is true.

However, this framework of understanding things is misleading. As a Christian, I do not hold that Islam is entirely false! Islam holds that there is an all powerful creator of the universe- this I agree with. I may disagree about some of the attributes of that creator but at the core there is fundamental agreement. Islam holds that Jesus existed and was an important prophet, just not the son of God- again; there is a lot of agreement.

If you request “universally accepted evidence” which pits them against each other because they are both seen to “universally” exist, you are missing the fact that much of the reasons will crossover due to the great overlaps between the two systems of belief.

Trav,

That a Jesus existed is contentious to say the least. History is not reliable at the best of times being written by the winners and all. Many people think that the study of history is equal to science. It is not and there is no compunction to accept unreliable stories supported by flimsy evidence at best.

One would expect that early promoters of Islam would have knowledge of the Christian Bibles and Occam’s razor would support that fitting the alleged Jesus into their own story would give it some kind of credibility to those suffering a decent dose of ‘I hope it is all true’.

Islam supported the ‘Jesus is a man story’ and Christianity is bolstered by Islam recognising the alleged Jesus supposedly was an historical character even though not divine. The merry-go-round of belief is astounding indeed.

To you, Islam has part truth in that there is a creator god and Muslims are misguided. To Islam, Christianity has part truth but is misguided. Neither Islam nor Christianity can come up with the goods that there was a creator god but both are willing to dismiss that and call their respective gods the creator god.

Personally, I prefer turtles all the way down which neither Christianity nor Islam accept. Silly of them really, as there is the same amount of evidence for that as there is for Yahweh/Jesus or Allah as being the prime mover.

David