h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

RE: post 244



That's why I said "I think," because i did not know for certain. Furthermore, it does have something to do with the real world, in that light is composed of three primary colors. In any case, in light of the debate over what the three primary colors of light that followed, I have to say that it doesn't actually matter what the colors are, since we know that they exist, and that there are three of them. My point is completely valid without that knowledge: I could as easily have said white light is composed of three primary colors, leaving out any guess as to their identities, and then what reply would you have? Incidentally, taking a minor point easily refuted and making it into the crux of the argument so that you can lambast the opponent over it is a fallacy of logic, the straw man.



That would be why I put light in quotation marks, denoting the common usage of the word, and not its technical meaning. When we say 'light,' we usually mean 'white light.' But I didn't think I would have to explain that.

RE: post 255

What do you mean by "what happens to babies?" I would be glad to try.

RE: post 260

color blindness is a lack of either red or green cone pigments, or an abnormal formation of them.

Which results in the mix of colours being wrong.

As to the statement made (in the forum heading) that Christianity fails to stand up to reason:

Firstly, there could be no "reason" if there were no God. Reason follows from the fact that the universe is governed by laws, both of nature and of morality. The existence of laws necessitates the existence of a lawmaker. The lawmaker is God.

Secondly, how can man presume to subject God to reason? Only if his reason is somehow flawed. "For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile." Romans 1:21 "Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind." Romans 1:28 So we see that it is not Christianity that fails to stand up to reason, but it is a failure of man to possess true reason, able to discern truth, out of a conscious decision, an act of the will, to reject God.

To say then that Christianity fails to stand up to reason is an attempt to deceive even yourself, to refute the truth of God. The problem is not that Christianity is unreasonable (when in fact it is just the opposite); the problem is that you are separated from God and do not want to be reconciled to him. If you can admit that you personally have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God (have you ever in your life been bothered by your conscience?), then you can be redeemed, not by fulfilling the law which you have already fallen short of, but through the free gift of Christ, who has paid for your sins by his death. Redemption through Christ is open to all who are sinners, and all are sinners. What is required is faith, and that includes a belief of the mind as well as of the heart. Do not try to find flaws in Christianity having already made the conclusion that it is wrong. An honest investigator will not make his conclusion before he has his evidence (i.e. innocent until proven guilty). If you would know anything with certainty, you must ask God, who gives all things.

'light is composed of three primary colors'. For the last time -

Light is NOT composed of three primary colours. White light is a continuous spectrum of colours from 400 to 700 Angstrom. That's all the wavelenghths from 0.00004 to 0.00007 millimeters.


Alji (Member of The Guild of Wizards @ U197895)

Perhaps you can answer the question I asked Justin;

Why does an allmighty god need to sacrifice anything? What you are saying is that God became human in order to die as a sacrificial offering to himself so that He could then forgive our sins. Why did he need to die?

Alji (Member of The Guild of Wizards @ U197895)?

"Reason follows from the fact that the universe is governed by laws, both of nature and of morality. The existence of laws necessitates the existence of a lawmaker. The lawmaker is God."

People used to think that god made the weather. That he used to send droughts, thunder storms and rains. We now know better, it is an unconscious, cyclic and chaotic planetary system. *Poof!*, god gets a little less powerful. He's been in retreat before that and ever since, so far in fact that only the period before the big bang is his only refuge.

Why do laws need a lawmaker? You haven't explained that part.

I need no god to explain my morality, all I can see is humans trying to interact with one another in a society. I need no god to explain nature, all I can see is a cold, meaningless, pitiless void, dotted sparsely with interesting clumps of matter which interact in a manner that was dictated at the start of the universe? (What started the universe? I don't know, but the likelihood of some supernatural entity starting it sounds insane to me.) Because science can't (for sure) describe before the universe, that does not mean that *your* god neatly fits into the picture. If you cannot imagine how the universe came to be without a god then that does not automatically mean that there is a god that fits *your* specifications.

"...to deceive even yourself, to refute the truth of God"

This is just as bad as Justin saying, when he was *told* that someone did not believe in god, that they were simply wrong, and they did in fact believe. God is not truth it is merely an opinion. And to say that I am deceiving myself beggars belief.

Imagine if you had never come across Christianity and then read that last paragraph (it's not so hard). It just sounds like madness, random white noise. I could just make *anything* up and claim it to be absolutely true by the looks of this. It all may make sense to you ThEntity, but to many others, including myself, that sort of stuff sounds totally off the wall with no other reason for existing apart from itself.

People say that everything happens for a reason. Why?



Ste

RE: post 267

Because he is a perfectly just and holy God. This means that sin must be paid for. Once sin entered the world through the fall, God had two choices. He could either destroy it right there, or show mercy and redeem it. Destroying the creation would have satisfied his justice, since it was no longer "good." However, God is also the God of mercy. So, having chosen to redeem the world, he had to pass over the sin of mankind, allowing them to live. However, he is still a perfectly just God. Therefore, something had to pay the price for the sin. The only person who could pay that price, then, was Jesus, since the sin of the whole world was at stake. This is what it means by "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son."

To help understand the reason that he could not just forget about the sins of the world, you have to consider the holiness of God. I know that most reading this do not believe in God, but assume for the purposes of the argument that he does exist. If he exists, then he is the best thing in the universe. Therefore, the only thing that he can seek to glorify is himself, being the best thing in the universe. If he were to seek first the glory of something else, man say, he would be putting that thing above himself, and would no longer be God. So, when man sinned, God had to do something about a creation which no longer gave him the glory that even he gives himself. To forget about sin would be to put man in a position outside the law of God, to put man above God, to glorify man, and therefore God, being God, could not do that. That is why the message of the Gospel is so amazing, because it shows how much God loves us, that he would send his son to die for us before he would kill us all. It also allows God to be both merciful and just simultaneously.

Read the book of Romans, especially chapter 4.

RE: post 268

The only part I can answer satisfactorily is that laws need a lawmaker because they cannot come into existence any other way. That may sound circular, but a law says that something shall be this way and not that. You believe that the law of gravity is impossible to break, simply because it's never been broken. I believe that the law of gravity has never been broken because the creation has obeyed the creator in this regard. This happened because God made it happen. The reason that there are laws is because God made them, which is the reason that anything else exists. If there was nothing to begin with, how a law have come into existence to proscribe the correct way for nothing as opposed to nothing? Laws are part and parcel with creation, and they both point to the existence of God.

Everything else you said follows my argument exactly, that you cannot try to subject God to reason, because you are already wrong. You can only understand it by believing, which is true of anything that you understand: you also believe it to be true.

The reason that everything happens (for a reason) is to glorify God. That is the reason that everything happens. If you believe, you will understand why people say that.

< Reason follows from the fact that the universe is governed by rules.> Quite true; always said so.
< Law requires a lawmaker.> Pure bunkum.
No law can be explained by reference to itself alone, but the Laws of Physics cannot be explained like the Law of the land. Legal rules are drawn up WITHIN a framework of already existing human laws and customs. Furthermore they can be changed or disregarded. Neither of these is true of Physical laws. There is no framework of "Law beyond the Physical laws" within which the physical laws are set to give them context.
Is god constrained by some set of rules? If yes, the rules come before god. If no, then belief in god cannot be reasonable, because reason requires the governance of rules. (You said it.)

Choose

RE: post 271

The point is that the "framework of 'Law beyond the Physical laws'" is God. He is the framework on which all laws rest, since he made them.

In a way, God has limits. He is able to do everything that it is within his will to do. His rule, then, is his will. But then, he is his will, and he is not setting his will before himself, since it is part of himself. You have commmited the fallacy of bifurcation with your question.

RE: post 266

Yes, that is absolutely true. But you know what we mean, and you can blend the three primary colors of light and get white light because of the presence of enough of the wavelengths.

"laws need a lawmaker because they cannot come into existence any other way."

Laws are made by *people*. From empirical observations of the universe. These laws are under constant scrutiny, are added to and change from time to time. When man came up with quantum physics did god just sagely nod his head and go "Uh-huh, I was waiting for you to discover that little one, a gold star for you! Sorry I made it such an incomprehensible mess of all that quantum stuff, I did it on Saturday evening you see."? Or did man make the laws?

"That may sound circular..."

I does because it is.

"Everything else you said follows my argument exactly".

"...random white noise..."; indeed.

Ste

RE: post 274

No, not all laws are made by people. Did gravity not exist before man gave it a name and description? Understanding a law and commanding a law are two entirely different things.

<"That may sound circular..."

I does because it is.>

You're taking the easy way out, and it's not fallacious.

By "follows my argument," I was saying case in point (you), or QED.

Because you did not address the rest of what I was saying about needing to believe it, I can only assume that you agree. So, have you asked God to believe?

"You're taking the easy way out", no, I was joking and making a point.

To say that laws require a lawmaker is anthropomorphization, in the same vein that makes creationists say "living things *look* designed, therefore they *are* designed". Then all you can do to back this massive assumption is to throw tautologies about. I admit that reasoning is involved here, but it is reasoning that presumes a god to prove a god. And we return to a circular argument.



"Because you did not address the rest of what I was saying about needing to believe it, I can only assume that you agree."

Why would you assume that? What evidence of my previous postings would make you assume that. Wishful thinking:

"Everything else you said follows my argument exactly, that you cannot try to subject God to reason, because you are already wrong. You can only understand it by believing, which is true of anything that you understand: you also believe it to be true."

So then . I am wrong. And I can only see that I am wrong by believing in the same thing that you believe in? I didn't comment upon this part before because it was laughable. Let me get this straight, god (according to you) gave us this unique and remarkable power to objectively reason. And when it comes down to the most important and fundamental questions regarding his and the universes existence we are supposed to just disengage our gift of reason (thereby becoming no better than pre-conscious animals effectively) and just believe. Believe without questioning. People who do this are fools.

"The reason that everything happens (for a reason) is to glorify God. That is the reason that everything happens. If you believe, you will understand why people say that."

I had a strange feeling that I just sipped my cup of tea to glorify some diety. I must remember to do the dishes tonight to please Zeus.

"So, have you asked God to believe?"

I would have a thorough check up for evidence of schizophrenia before I succumbed to the idea of talking to a make-believe person. So, no, the idea is patently ridiculous.

Ste

Why does God need glorification? Has he got an inferiority complex? Why does God need a blood sacrifice? If God is all knowing then he knew about the fall before it happened so why did he let it happen?
To whom did He sacrifice Himself.

In Luke Jesus said; '....and to offer a sacrifice according to that which is said in the law of the Lord, A pair of turtledoves, or two young pigeons.'

In Matthew He said; 'But if you had known what this means, 'I DESIRE COMPASSION, AND NOT A SACRIFICE,' you would not have condemned the innocent.'


Alji (Member of The Guild of Wizards @ U197895)

RE: post 276

The kind of lawmaker that I am talking about is not a man, therefore it is not anthropomorphization (since anthropos means 'man', not 'being'). Also, I believe you were the one saying that it is people that make laws, were you not?



Excellent! I am glad that you realize this. This is called the appeal to the final authority. I recognize my final authority as God, therefore it must be him that all my arguments rest upon. "Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made." John 1:3. What I have been trying to get you to realize is that your arguments presume something different to make your point. In other words, you have a different final authority than God, whether it be reason or science or yourself. That is what I mean by telling you that you are trying to subject God to reason: you are making reason a God. And you would also have to make a circular argument to defend your final authority. Tell me, what is your final authority?



No he didn't. When did I say that he did? If he had, you would believe in him, at least with your mind. And I said that belief means believing with your mind, not without it. Sorry about the "I can only assume" bit. That's just a bit of unnecessary rhetoric. Asking you if you had asked God to believe was rhetoric also, but not unnecessary. It is still a valid question. Are you willing to believe? "Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God's wrath remains on him." John 3:36

RE: post 277



Read my post 269, second full paragraph again.



To increase his glory. I don't presume to know the mind of God, but I have an explanation as to how it might increase his glory. Consider: When do we consider a light to be bright? In relation to its surroundings, correct? A light seems much brighter in contrast to the darkness. In the same way, God's glory is made greater when it is contrasted with the evil of the fall. And this also brings up the issue of free will. Adam and Eve chose to sin according to their free will, given to them by God. This is not something that God bears the blame for. If he did, we would not be under judgment for sin.



Himself.



Not sure what you're driving at. The sacrifices of the old covenant with Israel were made unnecessary by the perfect sacrifice of Jesus. As for the second passage, Jesus was making a point about the legalism of the Pharisees. He wanted them to see that man looks at the outward appearance, but God looks at the heart. He would prefer that a man have compassion on his neighbor over a man offering a sacrifice and willfully neglecting the needy (sinning in his heart), as the Pharisees were doing; They were like cups spotless on the outside but filthy inside.

Hi ThEntity,

"The kind of lawmaker that I am talking about is not a man" - Precisely...

You are ascribing human characteristics upon god by thinking that he is a law-maker in the mold of ones found in human society, just as creationists ascribe the human ability to design objects upon their diety.

"This is called the appeal to the final authority."

Since you are debating with a person with no belief in this "final authority", why would that argument carry any weight? It is circular reasoning (quite a tight, little circle at that) and tautological. I have a piece of paper in my hand that says "2+2=5, this is the absolute truth." Therefore 2+2=5 because this paper says so. But 2+2=4, surely? Nope, this paper says it equals five, therefore it is the truth. Need any more proof? See? Look at this piece of paper, it says so right here; look! 5! That would be just as convincing as your attempts to prove your god through quoting scripture at me.

I understand what you are trying to get at, but I do not worship reason. I respect logic and reason and I see it's value to humanity as a tool, nothing else.

What do I presume? What is my final authority? It is a mixture of things that change depending upon the situation (but it's probably my wife). Science, logic, morality, self-interest, love, allsorts . At a push I could be called a humanist, so my final authority is humanity.

(I think that "(according to you)" was misplaced slightly, sorry for that one, I was extrapolating from your arguments a bit too much.)

How can I be willing to believe? John 3:36 doesn't scare me by the way, it's probably a mistranslation that was intented to warn of the dangers of keeping goats too close to your laundry or something.