Death Hell Problems stalk the unbeliever

[jeremyp]

The earliest known religious artifact is a carving of the Venus of Willendorf, dated at 25,000 TO 23,000 BCE

And what makes you think that carving has anything to do with the gods you follow (if "follow" is the right word)?

[jeremyp]

Owlswing this is your lunch speaking. Maybe you should be true to your name and be quiet. Your deities do not exist and never have done.

Neither does yours.

[Owlswing]

And what makes you think that carving has anything to do with the gods you follow (if "follow" is the right word)?

It is similar to other artifacts - later ones, found at sites known to be places of pagan worship.

Let's face it, if the description is properly applied ALL religions prior to the arrival of Christianity (not Christ - he was a Jew - Christianity) were pagan. Regardless of how far back, any deity dated prior to about 100CE was pagan and pre-dates Christianity.

Christians can wriggle and squirm and argue definitions but it does not change the fact that pagan deities pre-date the johnny-come-lately Christianity.

To put it bluntly I am fed up with having to say this over and over again because someone, Christian or atheist, seems to think that I am going to have forgotten saying it and I am going to say something different so that they can go "Aha - you didn't say that before so you are making it up".

[OH MY WORLD!]

Hello Matty,
How very strange and interesting that you are unaware that Judaism is NOT a pagan religion. Get your facts straight Matty. Before JUDAISM, there was only those pagan ones. However, I believe that there has always been followers of the Creator going back to Adam.

[Owlswing]

Hello Matty,
How very strange and interesting that you are unaware that Judaism is NOT a pagan religion. Get your facts straight Matty. Before JUDAISM, there was only those pagan ones. However, I believe that there has always been followers of the Creator going back to Adam.

OK - Enough is enough!

Of your last 25 posts 11 have done nothing but take a pop at me - nothing added to anything to do with the subjects of the thread just some inane "Dearest Matty" comment,

KNOCK IT OFF!

You are clearly obsessed!

[SusanDoris]

When are you going to get it through your blind hatred that this is the very reason why it is called FAITH!

Because there is no evidence - only belief and faith in that belief.

This is not going to change just because you keep saying the same thing over and over again, any more than I am going back to Christianity because Hope, Ad_O, Sassy etc keep repeating the same thing - you will not turn me atheist for the very same reason.

In a way, though, your 'faith' or 'belief', or whatever it is still shows that you need some invisible something behind the world as it is (as Shaker says, no need to call it the 'natural' world), , and that you have one , imagined, layer between you and reality.  Why is that, do you think?

Reality, that is, as it is seen as clearly as it can be by scientists etc who study it, and by all those, since the very earliest atheist - oh, how I'd love to have met him/her - probably the latter!! - who knew there was no invisible something.   

#152 'pagan deities'? Surely this should be 'imagined' deities? And by the  way, this is not a 'dig' at you, I have been intending to write this thought at pagans in general for some time.

[Maeght]

Science tells us that things do not create themselves, the law of entropy applies. Therefore they must have been created. That's evidence. You're right that I shouldn't have been rude to owlswing. Sorry owlswing.

Could you tell us your understanding of the 'law of entropy' please Spud?

[Rhiannon]

In a way, though, your 'faith' or 'belief', or whatever it is still shows that you need some invisible something behind the world as it is (as Shaker says, no need to call it the 'natural' world), , and that you have one , imagined, layer between you and reality.  Why is that, do you think?

Reality, that is, as it is seen as clearly as it can be by scientists etc who study it, and by all those, since the very earliest atheist - oh, how I'd love to have met him/her - probably the latter!! - who knew there was no invisible something.   

#152 'pagan deities'? Surely this should be 'imagined' deities? And by the  way, this is not a 'dig' at you, I have been intending to write this thought at pagans in general for some time.

I can't speak for Owlswing but I know many pagans - if not most - accept that their deities could exist within the imagination. Some - myself included - state definitely that this is the case - for me they are archetypes of myth and legend that show me things about my life through the imagination and subconscious.

[Spud]

Not of a god, it ain't.

Of a creator, then?

Maeght,

Could you tell us your understanding of the 'law of entropy' please Spud?

Without looking it up, its where everything eventually breaks up into its constituent atoms and dissipates into space.

[Nearly Sane]

I can't speak for Owlswing but I know many pagans - if not most - accept that their deities could exist within the imagination. Some - myself included - state definitely that this is the case - for me they are archetypes of myth and legend that show me things about my life through the imagination and subconscious.

And, of course, all of you could be fitments of my imagination, or indeed my imagination could be a construct and a figment of other imaginations. Since most gods are defined in ways beyond the purview if science, and since science is about what appears to be a shared reality, than act about reality, i'm never very sure what the claim about them being possible constructs is meant to achieve.

[Rhiannon]

Well, you won't find me arguing that reality is knowable. But nevertheless I find I need a 'reality' in which to function. I quite like my version of it because it changes over time, which keeps things interesting. 'Pagan deities are archetypes' works for me as the way to explain what I experience.

[Nearly Sane]

Well, you won't find me arguing that reality is knowable. But nevertheless I find I need a 'reality' in which to function. I quite like my version of it because it changes over time, which keeps things interesting. 'Pagan deities are archetypes' works for me as the way to explain what I experience.

No, I wasn't arguing with on that assumption, rather seeking to add to your point to show that there is a use of the term imagined here which is not backed up by epistemology. 

[Rhiannon]

Why discuss what is imaginary when everything is?

[Nearly Sane]

Why discuss what is imaginary when everything is?

Agree, if we are using 'imaginary' in the sort of pejorative sense that it seems to be as regards gods as it is here.

[floo]

Science tells us that things do not create themselves, the law of entropy applies. Therefore they must have been created. That's evidence. You're right that I shouldn't have been rude to owlswing. Sorry owlswing.

Even if that were so it doesn't mean any deity was behind it, and certainly not the screw up merchant depicted in the Bible!

[~TW~]

I heard we could face an energy crisis a few years ago,I thought well maybe the powers that be will sort it,today we are told not sorted=downhill de-creation. Also another 33 now claim the winning lottery ticket more evidence of God-less people who love lies and scams all hell bound,goats could it be with hardened hearts.

 So true Death Hell Problems stalk the unbeliever, also the EU say we must print the word fish on fish products and for those of you who cannot think a packet of peanuts contains nuts.

 Another myth is evolution but it is a get out of jail card worth holding on to at least it takes your mind off hell.

    ~TW~

[floo]

I heard we could face an energy crisis a few years ago,I thought well maybe the powers that be will sort it,today we are told not sorted=downhill de-creation. Also another 33 now claim the winning lottery ticket more evidence of God-less people who love lies and scams all hell bound,goats could it be with hardened hearts.

 So true Death Hell Problems stalk the unbeliever, also the EU say we must print the word fish on fish products and for those of you who cannot think a packet of peanuts contains nuts.

 Another myth is evolution but it is a get out of jail card worth holding on to at least it takes your mind off hell.

    ~TW~

How much have you had to drink, or are you on an illegal substance? Your posts are crazy, and suggest that you suffer from a hell paranoia, possibly because you fear that is where you will end up!

[Sassy]

Sassy, I don't agree.

TW has put his "message" in such a way that not only shows a huge contempt for other posters who refuse to see things the way he does, but also that he has no intention of "saving" anyone, (more he's sticking the knife in glee at the fate of other posters on this board.)

Would be one of the knives he has had thrust in his own back?
I think we both know he is often ridiculed and insulted. He insults me too. Water dripping off a ducks back.
Do you think he is a believer or do you think he posts to annoy everyone?
Either way both sides to blame with atheists they give as good as they get.

He hasn't put it in a caring way has he?

Give us the example of putting it in a caring way. Take what he has said and do it for him.

He's reaped what he's sown IMO. ( which is a phrase that originated in the bible )

The truth is they reaped what they sowed... sowed back in the times of the BBC forum.
You want them to change? Well co-operation is a two way street. If you can get it so Atheists and Christians have a common ground then let me know. We can change everything...

[Sassy]

Warning others about fanciful nonsense, which has no evidence to substantiate it is like warning people of the bogeyman under the bed!

Would be better if you could not read or write, it is wasted on someone who cannot use it correctly when it comes to discussions about Christianity or  Christians and Atheists...

[floo]

Would be better if you could not read or write, it is wasted on someone who cannot use it correctly when it comes to discussions about Christianity or  Christians and Atheists...

Poor Sass, you are rather sad!

[Sassy]

"..they did not stop worshiping demons, and idols of gold, silver, bronze, stone and wood—idols that cannot see or hear or walk."

Silver or Gold Jesus' on a wooden cross. Silver crosses, wooden crosses, bronze crosses, gold crosses. Wooden Jesus' on bronze crosses - the list is endless and that is just Jesus.

Seems to me there is a fuckload of Idol worshipping in Church and some act like daemons..

Speaking personally, never liked or accepted crucifix's being gold , silver or cheap metal.
A wooden cross a statement of belief. But when a believer had God and Christ they have no significance at all.

Don't like statues of Mary, Jesus or the whole things. But really some things are just a reminder for some.
Christmas nativity plays or displays of the crib with wise men etc.

No believer worships or acknowledges such things if true believers.
They are no necessary.

[Sassy]

Poor Sass, you are rather sad!

See no answer to the truth just insult the person telling it...

As I said not educated enough to make a decent argument about it...

[floo]

See no answer to the truth just insult the person telling it...

As I said not educated enough to make a decent argument about it...

You wouldn't know the elusive 'truth' if it bit you on your rear end Sass. Your posts are at best good for a giggle, and that is all!  

[Gordon]

Moderator:

Floo/Sass

Please cease the tit-for-tat exchanges: not only is it disruptive, it is also repetitively boring!

[Samuel]

Reality, that is, as it is seen as clearly as it can be by scientists etc who study it, and by all those, since the very earliest atheist - oh, how I'd love to have met him/her - probably the latter!! - who knew there was no invisible something.   

I can't speak for Owlswing but I know many pagans - if not most - accept that their deities could exist within the imagination. Some - myself included - state definitely that this is the case - for me they are archetypes of myth and legend that show me things about my life through the imagination and subconscious.

It struck me that Susan's statement about reality and 'the first atheist' had a ring of the mythological to it. I think it kind of proves your point Rhiannon. It seems always to me that we are helpless in the face of our instinct to create narratives out of an imagined version of reality, and and in how we use those stories to help understand our own lives and times. The only difference is how literally individuals take those stories.