George wrote: “>> God would allow a forgiven evil doer into heaven<<
This is a standard Christian belief.
>>as opposed to a morally good person who just happens to be an atheist <<

This is a belief that some atheists hold about Christian beliefs.”

Dear George, It is fact. A Christian cousin of mine told me that my grandmother, his great-grandmother, is suffering the torments of hell because she never accepted Jesus. My grandmother was the most wonderful, kindest and most caring person I have ever known.

George wrote: The same about understanding what e.g. a Christian, informed by contemporary science, believes.

Dear George,

One problem is that many Christians on this list are not informed by contemporary science and spend a great deal of energy attacking evolutionary biology. If a Christian or Jew regards the Bible as literally true he or she must reject contemporary science. Apparently you do not have that problem. Those who do sometimes interfere in science teaching and other activities which are necessary for life in the contemporary world.

Many people take the God of the bible seriously, and the spaghetti monster was set up to ridicule them. I think the evidence for the existence of the God of the bible and the evidence for the existence of the spaghetti monster is the same.

However, religious belief does not rest on objective evidence. Religious belief rests on the feeling of the believer that his of her view of the world requires some sort of supernatural presence. In the case of the Buddhist this supernatural presence is not necessarily a deity.

We talk past each other because many of us who do not believe demand objective evidence of the existence of a supernatural presence.

I have come to feel this is not a reasonable demand on our part, and I therefore no longer have an argument with believers such as you who do not see the Bible as literally true and are informed by modern science.

You merely see the world differently from the way I see it. I see no point in arguing.

Dear david f,

You are probably right, I should have written “This is a belief that some atheists hold about what all Christians believe” since obviously there are naive, silly, aggressive, living in the past, prone to Schadenfreude etc. Christians, as there are naive, silly, aggressive, living in the past, prone to Schadenfreude etc., atheists, Jews, Muslims, etc.

I agree that I probably see the world differently from the way you see it, (e.g. by a different understanding of “evidence”, which I see as dependent on the “coordinate system of the observer” if I am allowed this excursion into Einstein‘s physics).

I also do not want to argue with you, or anybody, about whose world view is better or more reasonable, and I agree there would be no point to it, because I do not think this OLO can turn an atheist into a theist, or vice versa: The best it can do is to help - those who wish so - to have a deeper and intellectually more rewarding understanding of ONE’S OWN world view while making it easier to tolerate alternative, even contrary, world views.

George
I agree with your premise and also with David f's reasoned response. I have no particular bone to pick with Christianity.over any other relgion. Christianity gets greater exposure on this forum simply because of the path that the debate takes, my feelings are the same for all religions.

My comment was more in response to particular statements made by other posters and I do understand that not all Christians hold those more stringent views.

This is one of the problems with Religion. Perhaps I like things too neat and tidy but the disparate views within Christianity, despite the Bible being the common text from which the belief is shaped, is just fuels the idea that it is a man-made construct. Wasn't it King James who decided the rewrite the Bible because it didn't suit him?

In fact my Christian friends and I have much in common, it is only on OLO that the differences between believers and non-believers appear larger than life.

George, I am in no way claiming atheists are better than believers just that we are all the same. We all have to make choices on how we behave no matter what drives us. Religion does not make someone a better person neither does being an atheist.

Even if someone could prove we are the better for Religion I would have trouble believing in something that (for me) does not exist, just to play the game that it is necessary for a just and moral society. Naturally it would be impossible to prove one way or the other.

I heartily believe that we are better with truth and honesty than with supersititious belief. That is not to deny that there are things that we will never understand, that may be beyond human comprehension now, but that the never-ending conjecturing is time better spent doing.

If there is a God and one day he appeared I might change my mind. I would also ask him what it is he wishes from us, given that the humans that speak for him never appear to be in agreement.

Grim and George,

You both have supported the notion that the multiverse is somehow observable or verifiable.

I suggested earlier that if the word ‘science’ means anything, it has to do with that which is observable.

Are you going to continue to claim that the multiverse is part of science? Is it not rather a complete flight of fancy taken by those whose feet are starting to drift away from Terra Firma?

Gee what a long thread. The main point about so called new "Atheist" is we are not about creating a philosophical world view, like old atheism. Old atheism only try’s to differ from religion or at least change to a different basis even though it might share some feature. Old atheism can more realistically be described as agonistic or soft atheists. No the biggest difference between old and new atheist is that new atheist thinks that most of the questions the philosophers (both religious and non religious ask or worse answer) are silly questions. The emotion you can hear in new atheist voices is contempt, contempt at the energy spent by people on question that cannot be answered because there is no answer.
Religions have been invented for three reasons,
To explain why things are they way they are in the natural world. The creation myths like the dreamtime.
To try to codify the laws and group live by and to try and get those people to follow them when no one is watching ( what better then all seeing god/s).
To maintain control of a group of people for power and profit. Think organised religion.
Science has replace the first one, The rule of law and democracy the second. The third one will be with us for some time yet.
We are a herd animal we have evolved behaviours to guide us within the herd, they still serve us well today

George,

The Bible tells me that the only unforgiveable is against the Holy Spirit. “… he who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness” Mark 3:29 “… whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit, it will not be forgiven him, either in this age or in the age to come” Matthew 12:31 But there are rejoinders. “Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man, it will be forgiven him” Matthew 12:32 I tell you the truth, all the sins and blasphemies of men will be forgiven them. Mark 3:28.

My take is that the Bible is saying, should one “know and accept” that Jesus is the Saviour, yet ignore his Sacrifice, he/she is sinning against the Holy Spirit. 'For if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins' Hebrews 10:26. Thus, only those with knowledge of God’s house can divide it against itself. Denying God after one accepts as God is real, is the unforgivable sin. Satanists fit the bill. False Prophets, who accept the Holy Spirit as real, while offering alternative salvation plans fit the bill. I suspect the Late Carl Sagan did not fit the bill, because his studies didn’t take him to believing in god in the first place.

OUG,

In all likelihood Pilate didn’t wash his hands as the Bible states. The allusion is made by a Jewish writer, perhaps with Deuteronomy 21:6-9 in mind, “Our hands did not shed this blood, nor did our eye see it done. So you shall purge yourselves the guilt of shedding innocent blood, since you have done what is right in the eyes of the Lord."