Santa as God
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- Greedo0
What's the worst thing santa's done? Not given you a BigWheel for xmas?
What's the worst thing god's ever done? Killing all the first-borns in Egypt cause he couldn't accept geopolitical realities?
- teleos0
The reason people stop believing in santa and keep believing in God as they grow up is because there are compelling reasons to believe in God. It's really quite simple.
- The evidence of God, and of Santa's existence, is equally compellingukit
- So without your obvious bias of the amount of lives affected by God that can't be quantified, what are some reasons?DrBombay
- or non-compelling, maybeukit
- such as absolute lack of confirmation either way since there is no tangible evidence, just faith?Greedo
- just faith. like, you know, santa...DrBombay
- see below, you philosophical n00bs.teleos
- ********0
God does not exist.
=> Since Santa = God
Santa does not exist..
- Greedo0
is there an official religion thread yet? i feel like we're about to get herded into one...
- KwesiJ0
my favorite arguement is that God obviously does exist is some compacity because we're all fucking talking about it. Don't you have any faith or relation to your ideas and discussions?
- teleos0
"First, even if the theist could not muster good arguments for God’s existence, atheism still would not be shown to be true.3 The outspoken atheist Kai Nielsen recognizes this: “To show that an argument is invalid or unsound is not to show that the conclusion of the argument is false....All the proofs of God’s existence may fail, but it still may be the case that God exists.”4
Second, the “presumption of atheism” demonstrates a rigging of the rules of philosophical debate in order to play into the hands of the atheist, who himself makes a truth claim. Alvin Plantinga correctly argues that the atheist does not treat the statements “God exists” and “God does not exist” in the same manner.5 The atheist assumes that if one has no evidence for God’s existence, then one is obligated to believe that God does not exist — whether or not one has evidence against God’s existence. What the atheist fails to see is that atheism is just as much a claim to know something (”God does not exist”) as theism (”God exists”). Therefore, the atheist’s denial of God’s existence needs just as much substantiation as does the theist’s claim; the atheist must give plausible reasons for rejecting God’s existence.
Third, in the absence of evidence for God’s existence, agnosticism, not atheism, is the logical presumption. Even if arguments for God’s existence do not persuade, atheism should not be presumed because atheism is not neutral; pure agnosticism is. Atheism is justified only if there is sufficient evidence against God’s existence.
Fourth, to place belief in Santa Claus or mermaids and belief in God on the same level is mistaken. The issue is not that we have no good evidence for these mythical entities; rather, we have strong evidence that they do not exist. Absence of evidence is not at all the same as evidence of absence, which some atheists fail to see.
Moreover, the theist can muster credible reasons for belief in God. For example, one can argue that the contingency of the universe — in light of Big Bang cosmology, the expanding universe, and the second law of thermodynamics (which implies that the universe has been “wound up” and will eventually die a heat death) — demonstrates that the cosmos has not always been here. It could not have popped into existence uncaused, out of absolutely nothing, because we know that whatever begins to exist has a cause. A powerful First Cause like the God of theism plausibly answers the question of the universe’s origin. Also, the fine-tunedness of the universe — with complexly balanced conditions that seem tailored for life — points to the existence of an intelligent Designer.
The existence of objective morality provides further evidence for belief in God. If widow-burning or genocide is really wrong and not just cultural, then it is difficult to account for this universally binding morality, with its sense of “oughtness,” on strictly naturalistic terms. (Most people can be convinced that the difference between Adolf Hitler and Mother Teresa is not simply cultural.) These and other reasons demonstrate that the believer is being quite rational — not presumptuous — in embracing belief in God.
- blah blah blah...
http://www.rzim.org/…DrBombay - So the dinosaur bones can be considered proof of "Leviathan" but not of dragons. OK. Go it.TheBlueOne
- did you actually type this out or do you have it ready to copy & paste somewhere? just curious!sea_sea
- i put it in quotes. Pay attention.teleos
- jesus was a snarky prick, don't forget.DrBombay
- when I can't form a cogent response, I will hurl insults. -DrBobolinateleos
- you just insulted me...DrBombay
- Actually I was stating fact.teleos
- as was I, you are a snarky prick.DrBombay
- blah blah blah...
- TheBlueOne0
*bangs head on table
- harlequino0
here come the long cut n pastes
- KwesiJ0
some people need to expand on the idea of God and what its place is historically in the world of human activity and thought. a little persepctive is needed if you compare fairy tales to God because they're VERY far removed theoretically. 'existance' or not.
- ukit0
Let's just call this The God Thread: Christmas Edition
- gramme0
Eckh... I regret wading into this one.
- So do I..so I'm just going to have fun with it...TheBlueOne
- teleos0
Let me add the following "in a nutshell" evidences:
1. The precision fine tuning of the cosmological constants to support life on earth.
2. The existence of matter, energy and consciousness.
3. The fact that all life, at it's core, is specified information in the form of DNA. Programming code, folks. It's in ya.
4. "Qualia"
5. The historical evidence for the Resurrection of Jesus Christ.
6. The hard wiring of every human heart to seek the purpose of their existence.
- this proves the christian god specifically?DrBombay
- Man,you must be a pip with the kids on christmas morning...TheBlueOne
- My kids have a blast. :)teleos
- And the only evidence i listed there which provides evidence for the Christian God is the resurrection.teleos
- 2000 people saw the ressurection 2000 years ago. 10000 people saw UFO's... That ain't proof dude.DrBombay
- that's a straw man. Research first, then make your argument.teleos
- by what, the shroud of turin?BonSeff
- it's all hearsay.DrBombay
- hearsay != historical accounts which are more reliable than the records of the existence of our first president.teleos
- do a cursory study of something called "textual criticism".teleos
- you will not make me believe in your god, teleos.DrBombay
- TheBlueOne0
Teleos: "OK, gather round children, before we open our presents we're going to review the precision fine tuning of the cosmological constants to support life on earth and our belief in Jesus...Sally, why don't you begin...."
- that's JUST like how it is!!!teleos
- hahahah:)mikotondria3
- KwesiJ0
Santa Claus is more like a human saint who has taken on characteristics of God. If anything he's Jesus or a popular exemplified saint. '...the human manifestation of mystic natural law is common in every religion. God is human and God is everything. The evidence of balanced intellegent design shouldn't be presumed from the subjective stance of a person onto the phsyical world so much as have thier own natural intellegence realized as a reflection of natural order and the will of God.'
