Personal Experience

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Main Page . Personal Experience . Prayer and Miracles . Scripture . Design (Telology) . First Cause . Morality . Suffering (The Problem of Evil) . Parsimony . Prudential Arguments (Pascal's Wager)

Since there are many different, contradictory religions, each with their believers who claim to have experienced their God(s) directly, to claim one's own experiences as evidence is to deny the experiences of others. So this boils down to "I am right and everybody else is wrong"; it is solipsism.

Points Ongoing

Argument for Belief

The word 'evidence' is being used here to mean 'scientific evidence', as in statistical analysis etc.? Yes? Why aren't other forms of evidence acceptable! Such as the number of people in the world who believe in 'God'. Do they all lack intelligence? The fact people have different WAYS of believing is worth studying, but doesn't change the fact that they believe. warner

Do you accept the evidence of the millions of people who believe that Mohammed was the final prophet of God? Do you accept the evidence of the millions of people who believe they've been abducted by aliens? Do you accept the evidence of the millions of Catholics who believe in Papal Infallibility? Do you accept the evidence of the millions of who believe that Star Wars is both good cinema and a reasonable basis for a religion? What about the evidence of the millions of people who *don't* believe in your particular version of God? I guarantee you that there are far more people on this planet who disagree with your conception of God, whatever it might be, than there are who agree. anhaga

Mmm, your right. smiley - yawn Excuse me. I'll go away and think about it. Of course, if you can help me with suitable evidence, I would be very pleased. warner

Archive

'Atheists in Foxholes'

There are very few atheists around when death is imminent. Ask any soldier returning from a battlefield. Novisibirsk

> http://www.atheistfoxholes.org/ if death was imminent for me [...] I wouldn't have the time to ask the rational questions which is if there was a god why is he letting me die. Dot Dot Dot

> C S Lewis is another example of a very vocal atheist who served in the trenches during World War One. He didn't become religious until later in his life. - Gif

> There are millions of graves and and foxholes containing the remains of many people who the alleged bigG did not help out of their predicaments. Adelaide

Visions of Heaven and Hell

>There are many who testify to the reality of hell on Youtube. Perhaps they're lying. Perhaps their experiences were dreams. But their testimony in most cases rings true. KraZyWG Another Link - KraZyWG

Other past-life experiences, such as reincarnation are equally well documented. Gif

The girl's testimony [of reincarnation] is also convincing. KZWG

Can both be true? Gif

The girl's testimony may be true, but that does not necessarily mean she was reincarnated. There may be other explanations. KZWG

But having agreed that her testimony is roughly on a par with McCormack's, doesn't the same apply to him? Gif

  1. There are many Near-Death Experience testimonies, some of which match with Christian theology and many of which don't. Why have you chosen this specific one to refer us to?
  2. There are many unexplained mysteries, many of which also contradict Christian theology. Why have you chosen NDEs?
  3. You are, presumably, aware that people who have NDEs tend to see the kind of afterlife they believe in. Why do you think this is? Why do Hindus and Muslims for the most part get visions of paradise, not hell? Why do only Christians get visions of a Christian heaven?
  4. You are, no doubt, aware that there are good neurological / psychological explanations for NDEs in general, including everything McCormack experienced. Given that the outcome of these neurological effects is identical to the outcome you would expect from a genuine vision of hell, which explanation do you consider more likely: that the laws of biology applied to McCormack exactly as they do to every other living thing, or that the laws of physics were suspended for McCormack? - Gif

This could be another sign that Jesus will return soon.
Link - KraZyWG

Do you find it at all surprising that accounts of people 'returning from the dead' so often involve people who were 'certified dead' with no obvious fatal injuries, in the middle of the night, by a doctor who didn't examine the patient properly and without benefit of modern hospital equipment? - Gif

I think that it's a chemical reaction as the brain shuts down. Given the similarity of the experiences it seems to universally apply to all human brains and is therefore indicative that, at the most basic level, we're all the same. Of course, that same similarity could easily be used to argue in favor of a heaven or afterlife that they are glimpsing during their experience, which I can't counter-argue, as it's entirely a matter of choice as to what you believe "the light" is, and therefore not a particularly useful thing to talk about in any religious argument. - Mr. X

Another link from a Christian, questioning a resurrection account.

Comparative Religions

Why do you not accept scriptural evidence of Mohammed or Gautama Buddha? - Giford

Do any of them claim to be the Way, the Truth and the Life. Do any of them work miracles like giving sight to the blind and raising the dead? Did any return to life three days after being killed? Do any compare with Jesus'sublime moral perfection? - michae1

Well, those standards are clearly based on Christian ideas. Nevertheless, let's look at how they match up. In order:

Yes. Buddha does.

Yes. Healing miracles are a Christian speciality, but miracles in general are common to all religions. Could Jesus touch the Moon? *Split* the moon? Link

Yes. Leaving reincarnation aside, we have: Buddhist Ressurections

Yes. *All* religions claim this. Dharma - Giford

Why do you discount the evidence of personal experience and prayers of non-Christians (who make up the majority of people who pray)? - Giford

I do not discount such things. - michae1

So you would accept that the evidence for multiple gods is just as strong as the evidence for a single god? The evidence for a tripartite God is no better than that for an indivisible God? - Giford

Reading List

The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature - William James


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