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Talk:Extraterrestrial life (view source)
Revision as of 10:54, September 2, 2008
, 10:54, September 2, 2008→Salvation rules out extra-terrestrial life?: Reply to Stirlatez
--[[User:Stirlatez|Stirlatez]] 21:17, 1 September 2008 (EDT)
--[[User:Stirlatez|Stirlatez]] 21:17, 1 September 2008 (EDT)
:"''...you go on to make many arguments from a premise which ''I'' don't accept.''": I don't believe that I did, and I already apologised if I inadvertently do so.
:"''...why do you expect me to take seriously a claim such as the following: "Our ideas of good and bad are based on God's revelation to us?" By your own reasoning, why should I even consider this statement at all since you are backing it up with a premise I don't believe?''": What premise is that? Note that I actually said (emphasis added): "''we specifically claim'' that our ideas of good and bad are based on God's revelation to us". Do you reject that we claim that? If so, then okay, you have a point, and we might need to explore that. If you accept ''that we claim that'', then my argument was valid.
:"''If you are going to throw out everything I say because of a statement's "naturalism," then there is nothing I can say to convince you of anything, since of course I will be coming from a naturalistic perspective.''": I'm sure that there will be some things we agree on, such as hard evidence, the usefulness of fulfilled prediction, etc.
:"''...why do you also expect me to listen to any statement of yours invoking God?''": I don't, but I avoid "invoking" God. I will talk ''about'' God, such as correcting your misunderstandings on what God is supposed to be like, but I will avoid ''invoking'' God. I didn't invoke God in that previous sentence; I invoked the Christian ''claim about God''.
:"''...You explain away evolutionary theories on the origins of morality by stating that "God created man with a conscience." First of all, I don't agree with this premise''": I will plead guilty to sometimes abbreviating my comments. When I said that "God created man with a conscience", I was actually saying, "you asked why various cultures agree on a certain points; here's my answer: according to my view, God created man with a conscience". I don't expect you to accept that God did that (as you don't believe in God), but I expect you to accept that I do have an explanatory answer to your question. Your implied point that my view ''can't explain this fact'' is wrong, because I ''do have an explanation''. You won't accept that my explanation is correct, but you should accept that my view ''can explain it'', contrary to your implication. That's all I was expecting.
:"''So if Satan created the false gods, did he also create the moral codes these gods dictate?''": A forger is going to try and get as much as possible of the forgery the same as the real thing. So we would not expect Satan to change ''all'' the moral codes. Rather, he would likely ''keep'' most of them, just changing enough to derail people from the true path. I hope that answer is clear.
:"''...it would appear that Satan doesn't care about overthrowing God's morals but instead cares about duping people into believing in false mythology.''": Correct. His goal is to turn people away from God, not with overthrowing God's morals. The latter is more of a means to an end.
:"''Basically you are saying that an aspect of a religion is necessarily from God if that aspect agrees with Christianity, but the rest of that religion must be from Satan.''": Pretty much right.
:"''Moreover, if all humans have this inherent sense of morality from God, then no effort should be made to dispel atheism since it won't have a moral effect on anyone.''": I'm not sure what you are getting at there, but although all humans have a conscience (what I assume you are referring to), that can be suppressed, such as by atheism.
:"''Next you state that the very reason other people create false Gods is because there must be a true one in the first place. I do not agree with the presumption of this argument.''": Which presumption exactly? And that is not what I said anyway. I didn't say that there ''must'' be a true one; I said that it ''suggests'' that there is a true one.
:"''However, your 'hundred dollar bill' example makes no sense because everyone has seen an authentic hundred dollar bill. It is debatable whether or not anyone has seen an authentic 'true God.'''": Nobody has "seen" electricity, but they've seen the effects of it. And (I would argue) we've see the effects of God. But that's perhaps a bit of a sidetrack. You do perhaps have a point, but my mistake was in not wording it correctly. My point was more to do with where the ''idea'' of a god came from. Even if people haven't seen a real $100 note, they believe that they exist. So a fake might trick them. Conversely, a forger is not even going to ''think'' of making a fake $53 note. Similarly, whether people have actually seen God or not, if they believe that God exists, they can potentially be fooled by fake ones. But if there was no real God, where did the idea of gods come from in the first place?
:"''And what exactly would be the "false god" equivalent of a 53 dollar bill?''": That's sort of my point. Just suppose that there was no God. What exactly would the "false god" equivalent of ''no god'' be? It's not likely to be a god. So where ''did'' the idea of "god" come from?
:"''... do you know that ''your particular God'' is in fact the true one and not a false reinterpretation of the true one?''": By examining the claims about God and seeing if they are internally consistent, consistent with observations, and so on. The Bible records a ''lot'' of information about God and the world with which He interacted. That gives us a lot of points to check.
:"''If people from other religions and cultures had no way of knowing their God was false...''": What makes you think they had no way of knowing?
:"''I suppose you might bring up the very real Saint Nicholas...''": Correct.
:"''...you would be providing a naturalistic explanation for mythical variation''": That's going to be true by definition. A fake copy of a real one will have false elements, i.e. "mythical variation".
:"''Your statement that I should not be allowed to believe in free will...''": I did not say that you are not ''allowed'' to believe in it.
:"''...because other atheists do not is on par with a claim that you should believe in evolution because most people who define themselves as Christians actually do.''": My claim is that free will is inconsistent with the principles of atheism. I ''support'' that claim by quoting atheists who agree with the claim. That is a perfectly legitimate argument to make. On the other hand, Christianity is defined not by the beliefs of its followers, but by the teaching in the Bible. Evolution is inconsistent with the Bible.
:"''"[God] is outside of time. Thus, He already knows what you did decide." Because you say so?''": No, because that's what the Bible teaches.
:"''I don't even accept the presumption of this argument.''": I was explaining the biblical teaching, which you didn't understand, hence your quandary about free will. I take it that you don't believe that God is outside of time. That seems an odd claim given that you don't believe He even exists.
:"''Do you honestly believe that people with much more scientific background then either of us--experts in biology, zoology, chemistry, geology, etc--would waste the better part of a century and a half over a theory if it had such "gaping chasms?"''": Yep.
:"''How do you account for all of the scientifically-grounded experts currently involved in evolutionary theory if it in fact has no basis in reality?''": Many reasons, but at root because this issue—which is more of a ''historical'' issue than a ''scientific'' one—is really a ''spiritual'' issue. Believing evolution gives them an excuse to reject God.
:"''Interestingly Pastuer had the following to say: [quote snipped for brevity]...''": See [http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/arj/v1/n1/louis-pasteurs-views here]. The bit you emphasised was added by an unknown author later.
:"''As for me not adequately responding, why have you not responded to the early example I provided of humans apparently evolving an immunity to HIV/AIDs''": I did respond to the point that that was an example of. Having responded to the point, there's no need to respond to individual examples.
:"''It seems that you think it is sound to reject an argument if you just don't agree with what it implies.''": And yet here I am giving ''reasoned'' answers, not simply rejection.
: [[User:Philip J. Rayment|Philip J. Rayment]] 06:54, 2 September 2008 (EDT)
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