Tim Baker wrote:
Yes. God spoke to me and said it was so.  I'm also about as sure as Jerry Fallwell, Pat Robertson, Robert Tilton, Benny Hine, and the others who seem to be close personal friends of God.  BTW, any idea how long a smighting lasts?  I need to be in Seattle after the New Year and would hate to get caught up in the wrath of God. I don't think GEICO insures against locust

Philippians 2:19, I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timothy (Sorry, couldn't help using this one!) to you soon, that I also may be cheered when I receive news about you.

Whoops! you confused hope with faith again. Strike two! Are you addicted to self-smitings, Tim? What should we call that... pseudo-masochism? 

Tim Baker wrote:
Nor does it necessarily include Him. /t

Absolutely. Therefore, we cannot use realism to either prove *or* disprove God, and therefore your examples do not qualify as reliable examples of the absence (or presence) of God. Therefore, the original post stands unchallenged.

kickfight wrote:

No. It's is fact I have verified with others who have experienced solace via faith at a time of crisis. Reinforced by repeatable and verifiable experiment, it is as real as any scientific theory.

Repeatable and verifible equipment. Wow, we have 'faith detectors' now?  What kind of equipment would that be?  Of course, you wouldn't mind providing links to the research that supports your hypothesis?

Religion is not a scientific theory; it's philosophy.  Please don't use terms like 'theory' in relation to philosophy.  God's not going to like it. 

Proverbs 12:17, An honest witness tells the truth; a false witness tells lies.

kickfight wrote:
Whoops! you confused hope with faith again. Strike two! Are you addicted to self-smitings, Tim? What should we call that... pseudo-masochism? 

I'll email God to tell him you think His words are incorrect in the Bible. I'm pretty sure we will have a new version sent to us as soon as he gets rid of all the hope about which He speaks.  /t

kickfight wrote:
Absolutely. Therefore, we cannot use realism to either prove *or* disprove God, and therefore your examples do not qualify as reliable examples of the absence (or presence) of God. Therefore, the original post stands unchallenged.

My post was phrased in the form of a question.  I asked, "If this God, too?"  The examples I gave were real, not faith based. I'm really having trouble with your logic - you make absolute statements, but when I simply turn your statements into a contradictary one, you then say it can't be proved.  That same logic applies to your 'facts (as you called them) or original statements - they are faith based, period. - /t

I have absolutely no problem with another's faith and I will support their right to practice it; I just don't want it shoved down my throat as 'fact,' 'truth,' "hope,' 'belief,' or whatever you want to call it.

Tim Baker wrote:
Repeatable and verifible equipment. Wow, we have 'faith detectors' now?  What kind of equipment would that be?  Of course, you wouldn't mind providing links to the research that supports your hypothesis?

Religion is not a scientific theory; it's philosophy.  Please don't use terms like 'theory' in relation to philosophy.  God's not going to like it. 

Proverbs 12:17, An honest witness tells the truth; a false witness tells lies.

You need a 'detector' to understand faith? How sad.

Links to what? What I described in my post? Did you read my post? You can't just go through life Googling your way towards understanding, Tim. Gotta aim a little higher, there, bro!

Religion is not philosophy. Please don't confuse terms like that, Tim... you're making a bad habit of it!

Tim Baker wrote:
I'll email God to tell him you think His words are incorrect in the Bible. I'm pretty sure we will have a new version sent to us as soon as he gets rid of all the hope about which He speaks.  /t

Actually, I just got an e-mail from God, and he pointed out that the problem isn't that the words in the Bible are incorrect, it's just that you have a problem with understanding some of the words (like hope) in it. He says remedial reading for comprehension may help you, but he's just trying to be a pal.

Tim Baker wrote:
My post was phrased in the form of a question.  I asked, "If this God, too?"  The examples I gave were real, not faith based. I'm really having trouble with your logic - you make absolute statements, but when I simply turn your statements into a contradictary one, you then say it can't be proved.  That same logic applies to your 'facts (as you called them) or original statements - they are faith based, period. - /t

I have absolutely no problem with another's faith and I will support their right to practice it; I just don't want it shoved down my throat as 'fact,' 'truth,' "hope,' 'belief,' or whatever you want to call it.

I'm sure you can show me examples of
a) where I made an 'absolute statement', and
b) where you turned my statement(s)(?) into a condtradictory one(?).

Yes, my facts are faith-based. They are still facts. They are facts because they can be observed by repeatable experiment.

You don't have to have anyone's faith shoved down your throat, Tim. Just know that you cannot disprove their faith, either. You have failed to do so here.

kickfight wrote:
You need a 'detector' to understand faith? How sad.

Links to what? What I described in my post? Did you read my post? You can't just go through life Googling your way towards understanding, Tim. Gotta aim a little higher, there, bro!

Religion is not philosophy. Please don't confuse terms like that, Tim... you're making a bad habit of it!

Oh for Christ's sake (pardon the pun).  Ever see religion taught as a science (except in Kansas).  Please. Look up the terms philosophy and science and I hope you will quit confusing the terms.  You made the statement in regards to replication and verification.  You talk about 'facts.'  You talk about 'equipment' used to verify one's belief.  Please back up your statements.  And please don't even begin to lecture me about the scientific method of inquiry - I use it every day in my work. /t

kickfight wrote:

Yup, that is 'God', too. The ONLY difference between the person who does not have faith in a creator/creatrix/source-of-creation, and the person who does, is that the former suffers more in each and every one of the above scenarios, while the latter suffers less.

Tim Baker wrote:
Oh for Christ's sake (pardon the pun).  Ever see religion taught as a science (except in Kansas).  Please. Look up the terms philosophy and science and I hope you will quit confusing the terms.  You made the statement in regards to replicatioin and verification.  Please back up your statements.  And please don't even begin to lecture me about the scientific method of inquiry - I use it every day in my work. /t

Tim, you need to get past the prejudices that others have sold you and start thinking for yourself, man. The terms 'philosophy' and 'science' have nothing to do with what we are talking about. If you truly DO understand the scientific process, then you would understand that a group of individuals who have indicated that their suffering during a time of crisis has been significantly reduced by faith is a repeatable and verifiable result set, which, in case you have forgotten, was what we were talking about.

kickfight wrote:

They are real, but none of the examples you stated inherently excluded God (or an external creative force).

Tim Baker wrote:
Yup, that is 'God', too. The ONLY difference between the person who does not have faith in a creator/creatrix/source-of-creation, and the person who does, is that the former suffers more in each and every one of the above scenarios, while the latter suffers less.

kickfight wrote:

No. It's a fact I have verified with others who have experienced solace via faith at a time of crisis. Reinforced by repeatable and verifiable experiment, it is as real as any scientific theory.

Tim Baker wrote:
They are real, but none of the examples you stated inherently excluded God (or an external creative force).

Tim Baker wrote:
No. It's a fact I have verified with others who have experienced solace via faith at a time of crisis. Reinforced by repeatable and verifiable experiment, it is as real as any scientific theory.

kickfight wrote:

Whoops! you confused hope with faith again. Strike two!

kickfight wrote:

Absolutely. Therefore, we cannot use realism to either prove *or* disprove God, and therefore your examples do not qualify as reliable examples of the absence (or presence) of God. Therefore, the original post stands unchallenged.

Tim Baker wrote:
Whoops! you confused hope with faith again. Strike two!

kickfight wrote:

You need a 'detector' to understand faith? How sad.

Links to what? What I described in my post? Did you read my post? You can't just go through life Googling your way towards understanding, Tim. Gotta aim a little higher, there, bro!

Religion is not philosophy. Please don't confuse terms like that, Tim... you're making a bad habit of it!

Re: Your unsupported statements about 'religious experimentation."  Links to the exeriments you discuss and terms "scientific."

Re: Google. Yes, being a good researcher is not knowing all the answers, it's knowing where to look them up.

Re: Getting a little higher. I've spent from nine to ten years in college.  I believe I can critically analyze data, information, knowledge, and wisdom adequately and I can certainly tell the difference between the four areas of the human thought processes we collectively call 'knowledge.

/t

Tim Baker wrote:
Re: Your unsupported statements about 'religious experimentation."  Links to the exeriments you discuss and terms "scientific."

Re: Google. Yes, being a good researcher is not knowing all the answers, it's knowing where to look them up.

Re: Getting a little higher. I've spent from nine to ten years in college.  I believe I can critically analyze data, information, knowledge, and wisdom adequately and I can certainly tell the difference between the four areas of the human thought processes we collectively call 'knowledge.

/t

What statements about 'religious experimentation'? You're just not reading the thread anymore, are you?

Being a good researcher means understanding what you are researching first.

Going to college means you've paid an institution of higher education a lot of money. It does NOT mean you can critically analyze data, information, knowledge, and wisdom adequately.

kickfight wrote:

I'm sure you can show me examples of
a) where I made an 'absolute statement', and
b) where you turned my statement(s)(?) into a condtradictory one(?).

Yes, my facts are faith-based. They are still facts. They are facts because they can be observed by repeatable experiment.

You don't have to have anyone's faith shoved down your throat, Tim. Just know that you cannot disprove their faith, either. You have failed to do so here.

It's quit easy to disprove a 'faith' - but not a specific person's will to believe in their faith (that's entirely up to them).  Here's how:

1. Prove to me God exists?

/t

Tim Baker wrote:
It's quit easy to disprove a 'faith' - but not a specific person's will to believe in their faith (that's entirely up to them).  Here's how:

1. Prove to me God exists?

/t

The proof is simple: The existence of God is evidenced by your enthusiasm to disprove his existence.

kickfight wrote:

Tim Baker wrote:
Re: Your unsupported statements about 'religious experimentation."  Links to the exeriments you discuss and terms "scientific."

Re: Google. Yes, being a good researcher is not knowing all the answers, it's knowing where to look them up.

Re: Getting a little higher. I've spent from nine to ten years in college.  I believe I can critically analyze data, information, knowledge, and wisdom adequately and I can certainly tell the difference between the four areas of the human thought processes we collectively call 'knowledge.

/t

What statements about 'religious experimentation'? You're just not reading the thread anymore, are you?

Being a good researcher means understanding what you are researching first.

Going to college means you've paid an institution of higher education a lot of money. It does NOT mean you can critically analyze data, information, knowledge, and wisdom adequately.

kickfight wrote:

No. It's a fact I have verified with others who have experienced solace via faith at a time of crisis. Reinforced by repeatable and verifiable experiment, it is as real as any scientific theory.

You did make this Post didn't you?  ... repeatable and veriable experiment (sic), it is as real as any scientific theory.

/t

kickfight wrote:

The proof is simple: The existence of God is evidenced by your enthusiasm to disprove his existence.

Challenge back to you. Show me where I have attempted to disprove God's existance .  /t

Tim Baker wrote:

You did make this Post didn't you?  ... repeatable and veriable experiment (sic), it is as real as any scientific theory.

/t

I sure did, and it's still true! As you can see, there is no reference to 'religious experimentation' in that post.

Tim Baker wrote:
Challenge back to you. Show me where I have attempted to disprove God's existance (sic).  /t

No problem

Tim Baker wrote:
Privately, quietly, humbly go to sleep on some downtown business doorstep, homeless and freezing, while you ask yourself, "where is God?"

Or was this not an example intending to question the existence of God, by implying his absence?

kickfight wrote:
Actually, I just got an e-mail from God, and he pointed out that the problem isn't that the words in the Bible are incorrect, it's just that you have a problem with understanding some of the words (like hope) in it. He says remedial reading for comprehension may help you, but he's just trying to be a pal.

Date: December 9, 2005 (or you humans actually think it's 2005)

From: God

To: Timothy

Re: Hope and the Bible

In reference to my earlier email to you, I suggest you stay away from the State of Washington until after the locusts have been sent to the CBN network.  I need to clarify some things with my close friend, Pat, and will be needing those things that creepth on the earth a bit longer.

Regarding the word Hope used through out the Bible, I will be requesting that one of my sheep in Washington state explain what the true meaning of the word 'hope' is.  He's doing one heck of a job converting others to the faith.  My friend Buddha is a bit angry with my sheep's conversion techniques, however Budd and I are having drinks tonight with some of the other boys (Mohammad will be there) and my son, J, will be here, too, to watch the Saturday night fights in the Middle East.  I do say that you mortals have a way of keeping me entertained.

Oh, if my sheep doesn't reply to this email and fulfill his duties, remind him that The LORD will not pardon such people. His anger and jealousy will burn against them. All the curses written in this book will come down on them, and the LORD will erase their names from under heaven.  Oh how I do love Deuteronomy 29:20.  It really makes me sound like a bad ass. 

Take care and keep in touch. Oh, you can't stop with the prayers at dinner. I got the message after the first 1,000,000 times.

kickfight wrote:
Tim, you need to get past the prejudices that others have sold you and start thinking for yourself, man. The terms 'philosophy' and 'science' have nothing to do with what we are talking about. If you truly DO understand the scientific process, then you would understand that a group of individuals who have indicated that their suffering during a time of crisis has been significantly reduced by faith is a repeatable and verifiable result set, which, in case you have forgotten, was what we were talking about.

Please review the concept of anecdotal evidence. It works well for organized religion and infomercials, but it's not part of the scientific method of inquiry. You may want to read Shermer's book, Why people believe weird things. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/080507 … s&v=glance   /t

kickfight wrote:

The proof is simple: The existence of God is evidenced by your enthusiasm to disprove his existence.

I didn't say "Give me your opinion."  I simply said prove it. /t

kickfight wrote:

What statements about 'religious experimentation'? You're just not reading the thread anymore, are you?

Being a good researcher means understanding what you are researching first.

Going to college means you've paid an institution of higher education a lot of money. It does NOT mean you can critically analyze data, information, knowledge, and wisdom adequately.

I assume you're a researcher if you know what 'being a good one' entails.  Using Google or anyother reference source is just as you state, "...understanding what you are researching first."  With that said, how do you 'know' about something that has yet to be researched?

kickfight wrote:

Tim Baker wrote:
Challenge back to you. Show me where I have attempted to disprove God's existance (sic).  /t

No problem


Or was this not an example intending to question the existence of God, by implying his absence?

It's a question. Not a statement. That's why there's a question mark at the end of the question. /t

Tim Baker wrote:
Please review the concept of anecdotal evidence. It works well for organized religion and infomercials, but it's not part of the scientific method of inquiry. You may want to read Shermer's book, Why people believe weird things. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/080507 … s&v=glance   /t

Excellent example of allowing others to do your thinking for you!

P.S. ph, and we're not referring to anectdotal experience here, BTW, unless you're one of those poor souls who incorrectly beleives that any and all experiments involving human experience can be waved away with the 'anecdotal' pixie dust!

Tim Baker wrote:
I didn't say "Give me your opinion."  I simply said prove it. /t

And I did prove it, and you just helped me prove it again!

Tim Baker wrote:
It's a question. Not a statement. That's why there's a question mark at the end of the question. /t

Ah. I see. So, because it's a question, then you think that allows you to weasel out of the corner you're in. Interesting! Transparent and laughable, but interesting!

Tim Baker wrote:
Challenge back to you. Show me where I have attempted to disprove God's existance .

Let's review: did we ever specify that your attempt at disproving God's existence needed to be a statement? Look! No, we didn't! Great! Then we have established that you DID try to disprove God's existence!

Tim Baker wrote:
From: God

To: Timothy

Re: Hope and the Bible

Very nice! Doesn't help your argument much, or do much to change the fact that hope and faith are different concepts, and that none of the Biblical examples of the concept of 'hope' you've used so far have anything to do with the concept of faith, but you *are* a very accomplished humorist. And God loves a sense of humor.

kickfight wrote:

Excellent example of allowing others to do your thinking for you!

No, it's called a critical component of research and critical thinking.  That is the reason we have books (and other collections of electronic and printed material that add to our collective database of human knowledge).  Shermer's book is a very well written work on the fallacies of thinking - or how thinking goes wrong. One of many, many books I've read front to cover.  Another book I've read cover to cover is the Bible.  /t

kickfight wrote:

And I did prove it, and you just helped me prove it again!

Opinion is not proof.  Prove it.  /t

Justin wrote:
I've gotten rather lost in this nonconfrontational dialogue, but it seemed to me that somewhere back, there was some assertion that "hope" and "faith" are the same thing in Judeo-Christian writing.

Just to note that Paul makes a distinction between them in setting out the three theological virtues in the Corinthian epistles. Something on the order of, "faith, hope, and love, but the greatest of these is love."

*******

Existence of God is not science, of course. It may well be a fact, but science is applied to the physical world with hypothesis, experimentation, and proof, which includes predictability.

Actually we're not being confrontational - this is debate. I hope it doesn't come across as anything less.

Thank you for your well reasoned comments.  I particularly enjoyed you quote regarding 'faith, hope, and love ...' as well as your comments regarding science. 

Another major difference between science and religion also is that when I travel to Thailand or Malaysia, for example, my religion no longer is accepted by a majority of the residents of these countries - where well researched scientific principles continue to hold up, regardless of the underlying religious dogma of any particular country (e.g., gravity is still gravity; where God doesn't exist in most of Thailand and parts of Malaysia).  /t
/t