Philo,

In regards to environmental issues, it's not me you should be quoting Bible verses to. I'm well aware of the Bible's stance on the environment. It's the Christians in positions of power and influence, who manipulate what the Bible says for their own selfish purposes – the corporate bigwigs and the politicians; the ones with the power to do so much damage in so many ways – not just environmentally.

In fact, I was going to quote that exact verse to another Christian on this forum in a 'Global warming' thread, who claimed that there wasn't a threat be because God made the Earth too robust for us “puny” humans to destroy.

Some elite Christian groups twist Bible verses to mean that they have permission to [quote] “rape” the earth of all it's resources. Take Revelations 14:15 for example: “Then another angel came out of the temple and called in a loud voice to him who was sitting on the cloud, "Take your sickle and reap, because the time to reap has come, for the harvest of the earth is ripe."

Hence the danger of religion; and Wizofaus' point about theist's using their faith to live without conscience. Radical Islamics are also a prime example of this.

Of course not all of the religious are bad. But even those who are perfectly good people still pose a more mild danger, to themselves, their children, and society by pushing ignorance and discouraging themselves, and everyone else to look further for answers to the mysteries that help us to understand the world we live in.

I remember being told that everything I could ever possibly need to know is in the Bible. This is entirely false.

If it weren't for the “unruly” secular-humanists, we would still be living in a universe that revolved around a flat Earth.

If God is so great then he'd be able to reveal himself a less obscured way that didn't require a “mature” understanding of him. Instead, we're relied on to interpret and cherry-pick the Bible with the risk of punishment if we get it wrong.

I think there is a god of some sorts and only a fool would come to the conclusion that there is nothing more powerful in this universe then humans which many people on this forum seem to be pushing. Sure Gnosticism is all but dead but people who are agnostic are probably closest to being right.

Atheist in my opinion are just as silly as those who believe in Gnostic gods. All the proof you need for there to be something godly in nature can be seen in the fact that we exist and don’t know how the universe we live in came into being.

If the atheist can explain how something like the universe came into being without some sort of divine intervention I will happily call myself an atheist until then I am going to stick to the agnostic crowd which is far more logical group.

Easy Times,

Despite how it may sound, I don't know of anyone that claims with 100% certainty that there is no God. Not even Richard Dawkins claims that.

But considering how extremely improbable the existence of a God is, religion is not worth the problems that it's aiding and creating.

I meant: Not even Richard Dawkins claims the non-existence of a God with 100% certainty.

EasyTimes, you're being just the teensiest bit precious here

>>I think there is a god of some sorts and only a fool would come to the conclusion that there is nothing more powerful in this universe... I am going to stick to the agnostic crowd which is far more logical group.<<

This puts you firmly in the agnostic theist camp. Someone who accepts the existence of God, but can't be sure.

Austin Cline put it best:

"Agnosticism is not about belief in god but about knowledge — it was coined originally to describe the position of a person who could not claim to know for sure if any gods exist or not. Thus, it is clear that agnosticism is compatible with both theism and atheism. A person can believe in a god (theism) without claiming to know for sure if that god exists; the result is agnostic theism. On the other hand, a person can disbelieve in gods (atheism) without claiming to know for sure that no gods can or do exist; the result is agnostic atheism."

>>If the atheist can explain how something like the universe came into being without some sort of divine intervention I will happily call myself an atheist<<

If an atheist were able to do that, EasyTimes, there would be no need for labels at all, would there? You would use the same reasoning to say:

"If the theist can explain how something like the universe came into being with the assistance of divine intervention I will happily call myself a theist"

Cline goes on to say...

"It is also worth noting that there is a vicious double standard involved when theists claim that agnosticism is “better” than atheism because it is less dogmatic. If atheists are closed-minded because they are not agnostic, then so are theists. On the other hand, if theism can be open-minded then so can atheism."

EasyTimes, you say "If the atheist can explain how something like the universe came into being without some sort of divine intervention I will happily call myself an atheist until then I am going to stick to the agnostic crowd which is far more logical group."

Divine intervention requires *more* explanation, not less!

Theists have to explain how the universe came into being, and how the divine being that created it came about.

Sure, go ahead and claim that "God is timeless / self-created / whatever", but that argument could just as well be applied to the universe too, without the need for God.

Pericles, I've never seen a satisfactory explanation about the difference between knowledge and belief. Surely they're basically just different levels of certainty? After all, people once knew that the Sun revolved around the Earth.

Indeed, the only things we know with 100% certainty are those that for which the opposite is logically impossible, or that we define by convention to be so: I know I exist, and I know triangles have three sides.

But I would also not hestitate in claiming to know that my wife loves me. It wouldn't be a stretch to say that the likelihood of that being false is actually quite a lot greater than the likelihood of a divine being that created the universe and interacts with humans on a daily basis. Hence it's perfectly reasonable for me to claim that I know there is no God.