re plant clippings... its cos it stimulates growth and curtails shock and death of the plant, before the cutting can be transplanted;)

Cool, thanks....I'd always wondered about that (and letting tropical fish float in the bag for a while before letting them loose in the aquarium).

Hi Crazy, yes it is the opiate of the masses!

I would agree with Crazy A that there is no evidence either way. This may be a bad way to look at christianity, but if christianity is true and there is a God, then those who dont believe so would go to hell. right? Now that being said, there is absolutely no benefit in not believing in God. So my logical mind says that while i can not prove there is or is not a God, it is easier for me to believe there is a God. And if I am wrong, what have I lost? nothing. If i am right however, i have gained eternity....

and as for Merirosvo's question. How could you appreciate heaven if you weren't here first? Life sucks, I'll agree. but at that, i am not blind or anything else. im sure if i was blind when i gained my sight i would appreciate it more, just like i would appreciate heaven more after living here. Thats like the question why did God create evil if he is good? The easy answer is he didnt....You can have mega light ultra light, infinite light. but when you take light away you have darkness, and you cant get any darker. You can have little heat, mega heat, ultra heat. when you take it all away you have absolute zero, and you cant get any lower. its the same way with God. you can have a little God or a lot of God, but when you take God out of something you have evil, and bibliclly thats how evil entered the world....God didn't create it.

so you are essentially easily manipulated jon, that's what i gather from your statement? you have been scared into religion if nothing else? it is impossible to prove that something doesn't exist, ie to prove a negative. but i think a little common logic can prevail in debunking the myths of christianity. God is one thing, religion entirely another.

absolute zero is theoretical, fyi. never been produced reallym that's the beauty of science though, it keeps plugging away and experiments instead of solely relying on an archaic fairy tale book

I have a confesssion to make. I'm part human and part computer - I've had a micro computer implanted complete with wifi access. I can control it by thought alone.

Why do I tell you this. Well my plan is that when I die I will be able to still log on to webdiplomacy and let all you guys know what is the other side of death. I'll keep you all posted.

Bugger, just my luck. Logged offf step out for a pint of milk and got hit by a truck, fortunately it was a big truck so the end was quick.

Now what do I see? .............

Nothing....case closed.

@jon, pascals wager is a poor substitue for faith. If god does exist, would he let you in heaven if you believe simply because youre unsure of what to believe in? It would seem strange that the place of spiritual enlightenment and reward, or whatever the hells up there, would be offered to someone who argues for God simply because he has nothing to lose

i agree with you guys. i dont believe i am scared into christianity- when i say i am a christian i do not mean i am the typical christian stereotype. i was just arguing from a christian standpoint. i believe there is a God. I dont really have much to back up my belief, but i believe that you're gonna be judged on what you think is right....if you are born and you think the right thing to do is run around shooting people, then God is gonna judge you based on the fact that you were doing what is right. If you believe evangelism is right, and you go around blabbering about your athiesm, i believe you will be judged based on what you did that was wrong....Like I said, i have nothing to support my beliefs other than the fact that I believe there is a God, and that God is just...He wont send you to hell just because you had some doubts or you never heard of him....

I believe in God, and I'll spare the atheists and agnostics their time. No one is going to convince anyone else otherwise on an Internet thread.

once again, GOD and different interpretations of GOD are two entirely different things. existence v interpretation of a force... you are confusing the two. christianity has a tendency to do that, arrogantly in fact for the most part. jon you are certainly not the run of the mill christian and i respect your beliefs, i will not argue with you further. TMW, obviously, good point. however, clarifications can be made, good night people

Unknown. And it will always be unknown unless God actually exercises omniscience and somehow removes all doubt of his existence supernaturally, which would have to take a form as yet unknown to we humans. Any physical "proof" would solve nothing, as physical evidence is hardly evidence at all, since it relies on perception for its interpretation. If God somehow entered out collective psyches and made us as confident of his existence as we are of our own, then we would know. This hasn't happened. It might, but I don't know why it would. Or why it wouldn't for that matter.

Until then we can't really say much else with confidence.

AGAIN?

Good GOD (pun intended) even I'M getting tired of the subject!

Yes, I believe A God/deity/force-beyod-man is out there, I've said a million times why (see Spinoza's theory on cause-and-effect coupled with Thomas Aquinas' First Mover Arguement... well, that's a pair, isn't it, a Jew-turned-atheist having his idea paired with a Catholic Saint! lol) and that despite the fact I believe in AB God, I don't think we know him/it well or even at all, and so to say the Bible or Ten Commandments is "God's Word" or "God's Will" seems to me to be the equivalent of saying an amoeba knows EXACTLY what I think is the best play ever, and why, and how to act on that.

Amoeba-man, man-"God"... THAT'S the gap, and to pretend otherwise and say we know it, follow X and you'll receive Y is a load of dung in my opinion...

Ought to spend our time trying to SOCIALLY evolve (let's try stop killing each other all the time over matters like skin color and belief and race for a start) so we might close that gap a bit, THEN when we're actually of the CAPACITY to understand whatever is the great secret of Life, the Universe, and EVerything... we'll be ready, and able.

There's my view, condensed, for the millionth time-

Can we PLEASE as the philosophic community here move onto another topic?

Say... ethical/political philosophy?

Are you more in line with Hobbes' view (us as desire-pursuing-assholes and the only reason we don't all just kill each other is we're relatively equal, but still the state of nature is terrible as we're all raping and killing without law so Leviathan's the answer excpet when you can break the law ang be sure to get away with it, as you're in it for yourself after all, there's no morality but what you decide and agree upon for yourself and others can get there sohts in, so make sure you get the best of what you want) or John Locke (to make it short and sweet- the American Declaration of Independence sums up a lot of his views nicely... as it was a "heavy influence" on Jefferson and Co... and also in there as opposed to desire pursuing assholes we're essentially "good" beings... whatever that means to you.)

I'm more in line with Hobbes' view... in fact, let me post a riddle for you all, one I read, let me know what you'd do, and WHY:


You are standing at a railroad switch. Before you lie two tracks, and an oncoming train. On present course, the train will hit and kill five people; you cannot warn them, and they will not hear the train or see it- if you do not pull the switch, they will be hit and die. BUT, if you pull the switch and change tracks, the train will hit one innocent man that would have lived if not for your switching the track- just like the five, you can't warn him, and he won't notice in time.

So- pull the switch, or no?

My answer, personally:

Mine's a hedge-statement... IF I don't know the people involved, then I'd let the train keep on going and hit the five, as I don't have any care (or business or even interest) in the live of people that are not related to mine... why are they all on the tracks I don't know, but it's not my fault, not my problem, and if I become involved then it IS... and I've killed someone to save five I don't care about all that much- not going to make ME happy or help ME at all.

BUT if I know those people, then I'm pulling the switch, and to hell with the innocent man- sorry, but my friends to me come FIRST, always will... the reverse works for me as well, letting it hit the five to save the one friend on the other track... if I'M going to be affected, then I'm making sure that the outcome will be to MY liking and my friends' interests...

Is that egoistic?

YEP.

And I think that's justified... if through actions or inactions lives are going to be lost, I have a RIGHT to be egoistic as I'm now essentially in God-like role, ie controlling who lives and dies. If I have to do that... well, sorry if I'm being cruel or unethical or unfair- I'm looking out for me and my friends, the rest of you are at the mercy of pure chance.


SO that was fun ;) Let me here YOUR answer!

(And to root out one common question- the reason the people ARE on the tracks is NOT supposed to be a factor... obviously if the five were drunk and thus its their fault and the one was there fixing the tracks like he was supposed to as a repairman, or vice versa, then it changes things a bit... but that gives an easier out, so for the purposes of our scenario, imagine the five and the one are there under the exact same circumstances, whether that's all of them supposed to be there fixing the track or all drunk and not supposed to be there at all, either way, WHY they are there doesn't matter to us, OUR concern is they are there... what are YOU going to do about it?)

"I would agree with Crazy A that there is no evidence either way. This may be a bad way to look at christianity, but if christianity is true and there is a God, then those who dont believe so would go to hell. right? Now that being said, there is absolutely no benefit in not believing in God. So my logical mind says that while i can not prove there is or is not a God, it is easier for me to believe there is a God. And if I am wrong, what have I lost? nothing. If i am right however, i have gained eternity...."

This is an interesting point Jon, and people in history have brought it up before. Pascal's wager comes to mind.

However this is inherently flawed. It contains the assumption that there are two outcomes possible:

A) The Christian God exists, and believing in him results in Heaven whereas unbelief results in Hell.

B) The Christian God does not exist, and believing in him and not believing in him result in the same fate, which is most likely the absence of existence.

However that is foolishness. What if you are believing in the wrong God? Other religions? Why do you not throw your lot in with them?

An easy answer is that you were raised Christian (or Muslim or whatever) and that this is your culture so it makes sense to just go for that one. Fine, I'll give you that, since you can't know, may as well try right?

But I present you some more possibilities:

C) God exists, but you are believing in the wrong God, so you will go to Hell.

D) God exists, but we have got everything about him all wrong, and the truth is that non-believers are rewarded with heaven while all religious people are condemned to Hell.

E) There is no God, but there is an afterlife, and it is totally random who gets there and who does not, and who goes to Heaven or Hell.

F) There is a God but no afterlife, so believing in him only matters in the context of life itself, which, to date, does not have a very significant impact, so it is in the end up to you.

G) You believe in the Christian God, and he exists, but it turns out he lets Muslims into Heaven and not Christians as they are today, so you should have actually been a Muslim.

H) God exists but he sends everyone to Hell.

I) God exists but he sends everyone to Heaven.

J) God rolls the dice.

K) God doesn't care

L) There is no God and your afterlife will be random.

M) There is no God but there is an afterlife, however it is not heaven or hell, it is reincarnation, or a neutral existence such purgatory, or something totally different.

N) Same as above but with a God.

And so on.......

You have no idea which of these is true. You cannot presume to know. So what you decide to believe really has no impact. Or it might, but you have no idea what impact it will be.

So good luck. I respect whatever you choice is. My choice is mainline nominal Christianity, because it makes me homogeneous in my culture and easing social tension. That's all.

So personally I guess you can count me in the "I hope God exists but I have no clue and honest even if he did exist I wouldn't know for sure if that was a good or a bad thing" category.

I've never read Hobbes' egoism before, and would like to at some time.

Regarding religion, I know Acosmist reckons he has evidence for the existence of god.

Pascal's wager: load of rubbish, mainly because it assumes that you can change your beliefs without simply brainwashing yourself. It also assumes that God cares about whether or not you believe in him, and it finally limits the options (for any claim "doing this might give you eternal life" I can construct the claim "not doing this might give you eternal life", and because you've admitted no evidence about the nature or existence of God, you cannot distinguish between these).

First mover arguments: contradict themselves: Nothing can be uncaused-->Something is uncaused. hmmm....
Also, the idea of causation can only be justified on the human scale, a posteriori, in the words of Russell, "...the universe is just there, and that's all"


I reject every argument for the existence of god, but even more any argument for a particular religion, and I find it bizarre that normally very rational people, who base what they say on sound evidence, should, in the case of religion, accept belief in the total absence of evidence. To me, this is more odd than people thinking that they have proved God's existence rationally when they are making a logical error: everyone does that.

Crazy Anglican, I'll direct this at you because you normally give good answers to things. Why do you have faith in the absence of evidence, and what, if anything, do you think makes your faith valid?

@Obi - Re: Train tracks, are we allowed to half pull the lever making the train derail and kill everyone on board as it hurtles into the five people who were standing on the tracks?

TGM - "Pascal's wager: load of rubbish"

Yes, very much agreed. I echo you.

I love Pascals wager - its so entertaining when you use it to a very religious person. No I don't follow it, but they tend to get so worked up they can't concentrate enough to point out it's flaws.
My personal view? I describe myself as Agnostic/CofE. I go to church every Sunday when home, although whilst at uni its much less frequent or regular.

I'm not at all sure if there is a God or not, but my thoughts are that IF there is a god and IF he's logical and intelligent enough to create man as a logical being in his image (as opposed to some random accident etc) then he would accept that it is illogical for man to believe in something he has no clear proof in. I'm not saying I think there *isn't* a God, because that would also be irrational: I have no proof for that either. Supposing there is a God and he doesn't match those criteria above then I'm not quite sure what to do, but I would suggest that he probably wouldn't care about man anyway.

Hmmm? It looks as if we have figles Wager? A curious backwards Paschals Wager (which I think everyone on both sides forgets was probably tongue-in-cheek to begin with)

I am an agnostic, moving quickly towards atheist.

Someone said evil exists when god is absent, but I think if anyone else had done some of the things attributed to god, they would be declared evil actions. Job. The flood. The plagues. They are declared not evil, because god did them.

Figles Wager - haha, love it. Does anyone know where that is orginally from? Although I thought of it independently surely I'm not the first to do so!

There are more "questionably ethical" acts in the Bible attributed to God, such as all the nations he helps defeat (eg collapse of Jericho) although Job is specifically stated to be the lack of action of God. Whether this makes him guilty by deliberate non-action is a different question.

I was thinking about this earlier and I realised I'm unsure how much proof I would require to believe there is or isn't a God. Most things either way I expect I would doubt quite seriously.

@figlesquidge:
Thought Job was a bet, between satan and god.

Either way, God did nothing bad to Job, he just stopped stopping bad.
[ Not saying you're wrong, just playing devils advocate (which is surreal to say when I'm supporting God!) ]

I guess we won't know until we bite the dust!

superman you are correct, except that when we bite the dust we cease to exist and therefore we will never know

the theist argument seems to feature a false duality to me. anyone else see this?