"Violent Extremism"

[Joseph Casazza]

I have never been introduced to the Platonic ideal TRUTH. Perhaps you have. But I have been told that even God cannot scratch the Platonic ideal of DOG behind its Platonic ideal EARS. We all must approach truth as mortals do, by approximation, through the filter of our senses and intellect. Even if you believe in "revealed" truth rather than what you have to work for yourself (and as a conservative Republican, I believe you have to work for everything yourself), it is revealed to a fallible human via fallible senses and intellect. Too many filters there for anything more than an approximation. Anyway, such quibbles are merely a distraction, so nobody has to deal with what is said.

 

[android]

The argument has been made before but still some think it is only right to be told what to think and believe. (Usually by them.)

I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use.
Galileo Galilei

 

[Biltmore Bob]

Plato does not score very high with me.

I like ya' Joe, but you know me, my filter is the Bible. Yeah I know, that makes me a kook that is weak and can't think for himself, blah blah, blah....

I would rather place my faith in Jesus than Galileo or Plato. Why is it that most nonbelievers consider belivers to be stupid?
I'm happy and I'm not an idiot...

 

[Biltmore Bob]

look at the guys on this page...

http://www.icr.org/index.php?module=research&action=index&page=research_physci

 

[android]

First to answer your question about why some Christians are percieved as dumb.

It's mostly because they say dumb things such as, we've been banned from praying in public schools. This is of course patent nonsense. You are completely free to pray anytime and anywhere, just bow your head, close your eyes and whisper away.

The problem is that most Christians don't really want to just pray in school, they want to witness and persuade others to join their religion. So the want to pray aloud and publicly. You can't allow that right without allowing it to all religions. What if satanists wanted to pray in school? If you allow Christians to do it, then you must allow Muslims and Jews and any other religious group to pray aloud and publicly. It is far better if everyone prays to themselves and leaves each other alone.

The other reason is that most of the time the response to a discussion about science will be along the lines of, "I don't know about science, but my preacher said that the Bible said so and so...."

The Bible is a great source of spiritual enlightenment, but if we used it for science, we'd be using 3.0 for pi because the Bible says:

I Kings 7:23 that the altar font of Solomon's Temple was ten cubits across and thirty cubits in diameter, and that it was round in compass."

We just absolutely know this is not correct, but there are many that swear every word in the Bible is infallible.

I would be more than happy if we kept the spiritual, spiritual, science, scientific and leave the government to deal in facts.

 

[Alan Eardley]

Creationism and belief

Guys,

It may be interesting to point out that a significant number of the founding fathers of the USA (most relevantly Washington and Franklin) were active Freemasons. Their creed would therefore have been to espouse the principle of the Supreme Being as the Great Architect of the Universe (and therefore the creator of an eternal design) as a metaphor, rather than as a literal belief.

All Freemasons today (even those who are scientists) still talk in those metaphorical terms as masons. It doesn't mean that they believe it literally. May not the same have applied to those worthy gentlemen at the end of the 18th century?

 

[MK]

That is enough.

We have been down this road before. There have been 50 posts to this thread. I think everyone has had a say by now. I am going to put a lid on it.

No.....I don't mean a hat.