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Gnarly Gnu

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An atheist was seated next to a little girl on an airplane and he turned to her and said, “Do you want to talk? Flights go quicker if you strike up a conversation with your fellow passenger.”

The little girl, who had just started to read her book, replied to the total stranger, “What would you want to talk about?”

 

”Oh, I don’t know,” said the atheist. “How about why there is no God, or no Heaven or Hell, or no life after death?” as he smiled smugly.

 

“OK,” she said. “Those could be interesting topics but let me ask you a question first. A horse, a cow, and a deer all eat the same stuff – grass. Yet a deer excretes little pellets, while a cow turns out a flat patty, but a horse produces clumps. Why do you suppose that is?”

 

The atheist, visibly surprised by the little girl’s intelligence, thinks about it and says, “Hmmm, I have no idea.” To which the little girl replies, “Do you really feel qualified to discuss why there is no God, or no Heaven or Hell, or no life after death, when you don’t know sh#t?”

 

And then she went back to reading her book.

In my experience it's the god botherers who go around trying to start conversations about their imaginary buddy.

 

 

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Faith , the substance of things hoped for , the evidence of things not seen.

 

What faith can an atheist have ?

 

Belief in nothing =nothing .

 

Thats all I'll post about that.

 

The rest you can hear at Druidvale .

 

IYWT.

 

Mike

 

 

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Faith , the substance of things hoped for , the evidence of things not seen.

What faith can an atheist have ?

 

Belief in nothing =nothing .

 

Thats all I'll post about that.

 

The rest you can hear at Druidvale .

 

IYWT.

 

Mike

You can't use "faith" and "evidence" interchangeably. There is no evidence in faith and no faith in evidence.

 

"Belief in nothing =nothing." Why do you assume that just because someone does not believe in the existence of a deity, they believe in nothing else?

 

I believe in many things - love, trust, friendship, laughter, that most people are good, logic, human rights, the rule of law... I could go on and on. None of these things require a belief in the supernatural.

 

These days you'll find many Atheists like to share their faith also.

"Atheist" is a label slapped on normal people who don't see any evidence for the existence of a god. How about we just call everyone who does believe in a deity, "Theist"?

 

 

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Marty as an example most atheists have faith in Dawinian evolution and abiogenesis. According to the definition of religion established by the High Court of Australia this is very clearly a religious belief. Agnosticism is not religious, atheism is. Agnostics tend not to preach, atheists frequently do.

 

There is no evidence in faith and no faith in evidence.

 

I would say anyone that still believes in anthropogenic global warming is religious by your definition. Totally fine by me of course, just as long as I don't have to comply with or pay for their religious beliefs. See, I've managed to connect with the other religious thread now... spacer.png

 

 

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As an atheist I don't have faith in Darwin's theory of evolution but I do accept it's status as a well established theory (that is theory in the scientific sense). I accept the weight of evidence including paleontological, geological, genetic etc but if tomorrow new evidence came along that could falsify the theory I would be more than happy to accept a new theory that can explain the the evidence. This is the difference between Scientific method and faith is that

 

"Science adjusts it's views based on what's observed.

 

Faith is the denial of observation so that Belief can be preserved."

 

Gnarly I would assume that you accept germ theory? does this qualify for being a religion?

 

 

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As an atheist I don't have faith in Darwin's theory of evolution but I do accept it's status as a well established theory (that is theory in the scientific sense). I accept the weight of evidence including paleontological, geological, genetic etc but if tomorrow new evidence came along that could falsify the theory I would be more than happy to accept a new theory that can explain the the evidence. This is the difference between Scientific method and faith is that"Science adjusts it's views based on what's observed.

 

Faith is the denial of observation so that Belief can be preserved."

There was no one with a notebook writing down observations of evolution taking place many years ago. No observations in science means it will stay a theory of evolution. When people start to make statements about the theory of evolution as if it was a fact, it indicates that they have taken it on board as a belief. Passing a theory off as fact becomes faith in evolution.

 

 

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One time Marine Todd was coming out of Home Depot where he was buying wood in order to build a World Trade Center (Never Forget!) scale replica memorial tree house for his nephew. As Todd was loading lumber into his Ford truck, which was made in ‘Merica by ‘Mericans, he noticed that President Barack Hussein Bin Laden was having a signing for his new book “Why I Hate My Country” at the local mosque/pride center across the street. Todd became flooded with anger and knew he had to do something, but wasn’t sure what course of action would create the most possible freedoms when out of nowhere a Majestic Bald Eagle swooped down and landed on Todd’s truck. Suddenly Todd knew what had to be done. He then proceeded to take a knee and give glory unto God, Jesus, and both President Bush Sr. & Jr. Todd got in his truck full of lumber and drove over to the mosque/pride center and proceeded to board up all of the doors and windows using the materials he had purchased at Home Depot. Once Todd had insured that none of the heathens (including President Barack Hussein Bin Laden) could get out, he then went back to his truck and took out several rockets he had kept as souvenirs from his countless tours of duty in Iraquistan, which he securely fastened to the perimeter of the building. Todd then ignited the rockets, but not before whispering “Not on my watch”. The mosque/pride center then launched into the stratosphere disappearing from sight. Finally, Todd, after receiving a high five from the Eagle, took the ‘Merican flag that was attached to his truck and planted it on the piece of land that had once been an incubator for terrorist abortions, single handedly reclaiming it for God & Country.

 

 

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Marty as an example most atheists have faith in Dawinian evolution and abiogenesis. According to the definition of religion established by the High Court of Australia this is very clearly a religious belief. Agnosticism is not religious, atheism is. Agnostics tend not to preach, atheists frequently do.

Wrong. There's no faith in science. It's actually Darwin's THEORY of evolution, a scientific theory which is a hypothesis that fits all available evidence so is made available for peer review. It's accepted until new evidence comes to light to disprove it. And it wasn't just Darwin whose research led him to the conclusions he had, in fact Alfred Russel Wallace was about to publish his findings and conclusions too, which spurred Darwin to publish first. That's the difference between science and blind faith - science deals in verifiable, measurable data, and puts up theories to be peer reviewed by other scientists. Try doing that with religion.... please!

 

As to the difference between an agnostic and an atheist, as far as I can see there really isn't one. If you really want to slap a label on me, you should probably call me an agnostic, as I cannot say with 100% certainty that there is no god, just as I can't say with 100% certainty that there is no easter bunny. But I certainly haven't seen any evidence for either. I believe even Richard Dawkins, who most people would call an atheist, has said something similar (which makes sense as he's a scientist).

 

I would say anyone that still believes in anthropogenic global warming is religious by your definition. Totally fine by me of course, just as long as I don't have to comply with or pay for their religious beliefs. See, I've managed to connect with the other religious thread now... spacer.png

Wrong again, the data overwhelmingly supports the hypothesis that global warming is caused by human activity. Nothing religious about it. Find yourself a credible scientist who can find sufficient faults in this hypothesis, and have his/her findings supported through peer review, and I will accept that theory.

 

 

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Marty as an example most atheists have faith in Dawinian evolution and abiogenesis. According to the definition of religion established by the High Court of Australia this is very clearly a religious belief. Agnosticism is not religious, atheism is. Agnostics tend not to preach, atheists frequently do.

Is this the definition of religion you were referring to?:

 

http://www.hcourt.gov.au/assets/publications/speeches/current-justices/frenchcj/frenchcj14may13.pdf

 

Their Honours said:

 

We would hold the test of religious belief to be satisfied by belief in supernatural Things or Principles and not to be limited to belief in God or in a supernatural Being otherwise described.

 

The joint judgment of Wilson and Deane JJ also demonstrated the difficulty of formulating a workable legal criterion for determining whether a set of beliefs, practices and observances is a religion. Their Honours identified the following indicia:

 

• The particular collection of ideas and/or practices involves belief in the supernatural, that is to say, belief that reality extends beyond that which is capable of perception by the senses.

 

• The ideas of the religion relate to man's nature and place in the universe and his relation to things supernatural.

 

• The ideas are accepted by adherents as requiring or encouraging them to observe particular standards or codes of conduct or to participate in specific practices having supernatural significance.

 

• However loosely knit and varying in beliefs and practices adherents may be, they constitute an identifiable group or identifiable groups.

 

• The adherents themselves see the collection of ideas and/or practices as constituting a religion.

 

 

When did Darwin's theory become elevated to a supernatural thing or principle? I always thought it was based on entirely natural processes.

 

rgmwa

 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

No problem, Gnu. I find it quite entertaining. I'm a skeptic myself, but hoping to be pleasantly surprised one day. Between my parents and siblings, we've got an athiest, a couple of agnostics, a catholic (small c), a born-again christian (slightly larger c), and a career hare krisna (small h and k), so I reckon we've got all bases covered. I'm sure one of us must be on the right track. Can't wait to see who it is.

 

rgmwa

 

 

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