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[Urist is dead tome]

You don't know the man very well do you?

[ECrownofFire]

You don't know the man very well do you?

Nah, I've seen people like him plenty of times though. I don't think he's the kind of person who's going to rant about religion unless he knows somebody is going to argue it.

[Urist is dead tome]

Well I guess that's true.

Anyway to pump some life back into this place.

In my opinion religion is next to impossible to prove that it's true. Because any atheist who begins praying to G-d would probably not be doing it to truly become a Christian. And will therefor probably not get results.

And I can't convince anyone because it's their word against mine. I say G-d has spoken to me in dreams. They disagree. It's a stalemate.

Any opinions on this?

[Realmfighter]

I don't believe that God exists, and I would think that you were experiencing a normal dream.

You disagree.

Its a stalemate.

Hurray.

[Urist is dead tome]

My point was that a debate on this sort of thing will go on forever.

And there will always be people who think they have damning evidence and it just prolongs the whole thing.

[Realmfighter]

The debate doesn't go on forever.

The pointless arguing does.

[Urist is dead tome]

Debates no longer exist.

To be replaced with the word "Pointless-arguing" the Hyphen is optional depending on you're location and time period.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

It's not stalemate, at least not in the sense of our entire civilization. The religious have made a claim that their god exist. In the world of science, you must prove that claim before anyone else need give it observation. If you can prove in a observable way under lab conditions that god exists, your claim will be considered. If not, then not. That's all I ask of anyone making a claim, no matter what it is, the difference being that the religious have never met that claim.

My personal thoughts are the matter is that they never have and never will because deep down they know it won't ever work, but that's personal only.

[Realmfighter]

Calling Religion unscientific just seems so..... petty.

This is the Twenty First Century. Religions point is no longer explaining the world and how it works. It's showing you who you are.

[CoughDrop]

Calling Religion unscientific just seems so..... petty.

This is the Twenty First Century. Religions point is no longer explaining the world and how it works. It's showing you who you are.

It's quite obvious that most religious people completely block out most scientific evidence without giving it a second thought.
So calling it unscientific makes it petty? Or are you trying to change the word 'religion' to something that it isn't? /facepalm if we're going to start arguing more semantics.

Uhhh... So not being religious makes you a nobody? I don't understand what you're getting at.

[Realmfighter]

What are we even arguing about anymore.

I don't even know.

Its just me saying something random and slightly rabid, someone responding in turn and repeated Ad Nauseum

[CoughDrop]

I don't know how to respond to that!

[FuzzyZergling]

I'm not quite certain how CoughDrop's reply had to do with Realmfighter's comment.
It is a mystery.

[Norseman]

Anyway to pump some life back into this place.

In my opinion religion is next to impossible to prove that it's true. Because any atheist who begins praying to G-d would probably not be doing it to truly become a Christian. And will therefor probably not get results.

And I can't convince anyone because it's their word against mine. I say G-d has spoken to me in dreams. They disagree. It's a stalemate.

Any opinions on this?

I'm a Christian atheist. I think Jesus was an excellent role-model (and that's quite an understatement), and I do my best to keep his philosophy in mind. Unfortunately, I don't believe in God, or miracles, prayer, or heaven, or souls, or anything like that. I would like to believe that very much. I think it would make me a better person. There's plenty of good things that I don't do because I'm afraid of what will happen to me and my family if I do. It's an ongoing inner conflict, but what it comes down to is that, since I've only got one life to live, I want to cautiously do the best that I can with what I have available. If I believed in God, I wouldn't need to worry about giving up everything I own. I would say goodbye to everyone I know, and I would dedicate the rest of my life helping people, because I'd know that, even if I fail, it was worth trying. If you know you'll go to heaven if you just do good things, and if you know that God really does have a plan to fix everything, that changes the meaning of life completely.

When I read the passage about Jesus being taken away to be executed, and how his friend cut off the ear of one of the people that wanted to kill him, and when I read that Jesus put his ear back on, I honestly cried because I was so happy to see that. Most people aren't really that different. We all know that if someone wants to fight us, we won't take them seriously. Anyone trying to save our lives and help us is probably someone to pay attention to. That's what I'd like to see - help violent people and make them realize that we're their friends. Don't just perpetuate an endless cycle of violence and revenge.

I've got all of the motivation to be a Christian, but I just can't change my beliefs about God, or miracles, or anything else. So, my point is, even an atheist who wants to pray and wants to believe in God still cannot get  results. And, as you've said, you can't convince anyone. It's impossible for anyone to genuinely believe it unless they've had some personal experience that leads them to believe it's true. At best, an argument about the existence of God could only show that some Gods are impossible. For example, we can demonstrate that the conventional Christian God which is all-loving, all-powerful and all-knowing doesn't exist. However, if God were not all-knowing, maybe it's possible. If God were not all-powerful, maybe it's possible. We can only show that some ideas of God are false, but that still leaves the vast majority of deities in a situation where they can neither be proven nor disproven.

[Dr_Pylons]

Unfortunately, I'm not going to buy a book that's supposed to change my life off a recommendation. There is a little problem I have that there are an absurd amount of books that claim to do so, but few that actually do. Then, in the process of purchasing them, I support them financially. Then I feel dirty, while also being slightly more poor. Over new years my wife and I are going to Barnes and Noble though, so I'll see what it's like.

The idea of myths and metaphors helping people is something I'd like to know more about though. I personally love to use analogies when talking about something, and once in a while I'm even complemented on my analogies. However, we have to be careful because all analogies and metaphors fall apart at some point. Often, the failing isn't very easy to see, since we're flawed humans that like to fill in missing details.

Then you should pick it up. It's not a self-help book. It's an interview of one of the world's foremost mythographers, and more of a short summation of the point of mythology and why it's important. It only helped me to understand the point of religion, so I no longer felt deceived by it, since I was raised Catholic and no longer felt attached to my faith. If you do find yourself in a bookstore, do at least pick it up and skim the first few pages and see if it interests you. If not, then no worries. It's just another door to understanding, the one that worked for me.