Reaper

I read quite a bit of popular science books, usually in areas outside my expertise. Though, you do have to be careful to differentiating established ideas from fringe theories, because the lines are often blurred in popular science.

I think it's been proven beyond reasonable doubt that no organism does any work unless it is in their best interest, or for reproduction. The use of money is simply just an elaborate manefestation of this phenomenon, so I don't think a moneyless society will ever come into existence. Of course, it's not like people haven't tried to create one in the past. Read up on the disasterous communist revolutions, and you'll learn why it just simply doesn't work.

Sure it does. According to my sources, there isn't any evidence whatsoever for a large comet striking over North America at anytime in the past 20000 years. In fact it isn't even mentioned in most places. A comet has a large amount of kinetic energy, it would do much more to the biosphere than wipe out mega-fauna. In fact, the last major impact in North America was by a medium sized asteroid, 50,000 years ago. It does not coincide with the extinction of mega-fauna 12,000 years ago. Read up on the Clovis culture sometime. And you are still ignoring my point about Australia, which was settled 40,000 years ago, at the height of the ice age. And then, there was the colonization of the Polynesian islands and the New World expeditions, all of which had a noticeable impact on the ecosystems. It only works, though, if they never set foot on the planet, or only use robotic probes that have been sterilized. And in the case of the Amazon tribes, the surviving ones were those who were able to adapt to Eurasian diseases. But that doesn't make any sense. If we couldn't defend against them, why would they cover it up? After all, at the height of the cold war it was known that there was no known defense against nuclear weapons. The U.S. Government didn't cover it up because it was imperative that the population knew what to expect when the bombs started falling (and hopefully save a few more lives). Likewise, wouldn't it be in the best interests of national security to inform the public that there are powerful, hostile aliens out there? It would certainly incite the population to make a much stiffer resistance... Yeah, I know. It's nice speculation, but I just wish there was much more certainty in whether aliens existed or not, or knew where to look.

No, they are. You just don't seem to understanding that biological exchanges can happen quite easily, especially if the aliens have no suits on.

Yeah right. From post one, all you have done was preach.

It's pretty amazing how far one can delude themselves. I could tell you that the physical principles used were not the correct ones, but why bother? You don't seem interested in learning anything new.

That's not what a little known book known as Guns, Germs, and Steel has to say. And I wasn't even aware of the comet theory until now. But even then I doubt it will hold up in scrutiny, why weren't the humans wiped out with them? Why did it only affect North America and Australia, and at different times (separated by tens thousands of years apparently)? Why was much of the plant life intact when the extinctions occurred, apparently enough so that the human settlers could thrive off of? Why did happen to coincide with the arrival of humans, and not at any earlier time? It is not a mainstream theory. A comet impact would have a much bigger impact on the world. On the other hand, there are very well documented cases of organisms alien to one environment wrecking havoc on indigenous lifeforms. It is logical to conclude that visiting aliens would have the same effect, especially if they have been visiting as often as it is claimed. And you have yet to address the fact that they should also influence the societal and technological development of our species, I'm sure our governments would be very interested in trading technology. Why aren't we seeing exotic weaponry or technology being used, that is presumably hundreds of years ahead of anything we can reliably produce? When the Europeans came into contact with the Polynesians and the Maori, one of the first technologies traded was guns, something that they have never seen before in their entire history.

No, that's not quite true. The pantheists are very clear on how many gods are regarded to exist. What is true is that they reject YOUR notion of a God. Don't try to play semantics with me, you are losing miserably here. So, are you going to answer the questions and defend your ideas or not?

You didn't answer my question. This seems to be a re-occurring theme with you. So, he's not all powerful then? Does this mean that, gasp, he isn't really a God! :hihi::lol:

:lol: Again you shift the goal-posts! And you are still making incorrect claims. The stoics were pantheists, period. If you bothered studying Greco-Roman mythology and philosophy, you wouldn't have made this claim. Ad hominems are a clear indication that you have lost. Sure I can. For all the reasons that were listed before in this thread. What makes your beliefs more special than any of the ones held by 4 billion other people?

Why can't God have a color? How do you know that God isn't a horse? And for that matter, how do you know that God isn't a she?After all, nobody has ever SEEN him, have they? 1) You haven't provided any. 3) Can God lift a rock so heavy that he can't lift it? 4) No, that is not a bandwagon fallacy. Clearly you don't know what one is.

Yeah, they were pantheists, as a matter of fact. Their philosophy was inspired from many sources, including their mythology. It's quite funny that you are trying to be sarcastic when you initially claimed that they were monotheists. I understand what you are doing. You are just having a hard time swallowing your own selfish pride and admitting defeat. You make me laugh. You are typical of all the theists that have come before me, both online and in real life. You happen to think that, somehow, your beliefs are more valid than those other ones, based on no evidence or proper logic whatsoever, and then you attempt to push this on everybody else. You give no credence to the myriad of other beliefs and doctrines, and desperately search for any minuscule scientific misquote that lends credence to your own. You clearly see yourself as superior because of this little belief of yours, at the expense of others. It is quite pathetic as a matter of fact. Now, you are entitled to your own opinions, and you certainly have the right to believe what ever you want. However, don't expect the rest of us to just come flocking into your churches. There are 4 billion people on this planet who don't subscribe to the Abrahamic religions and beliefs, and the primary reason is because there is no possible evidence whatsoever that lends any more credibility to belief in God, as opposed to belief in Brahma.

How so? You said that it didn't matter. Why can't it be a unicorn? Oh no, no, no! You don't get to run away from your responsibilities and shift goal posts. You still have many unresolved issues. But I will answer this question for my own entertainment. We know that the Christian God doesn't exist because 1) there is no physical evidence whatsoever for his existence, 2) any accounts of his alleged existence are either very sketchy or just plain made up, 3) given his attributes (all knowing, all powerful, etc), he by definition an impossible object as the supposed attributes quickly lead to paradoxes, 4) the bible is known to be myth, and as such any conclusions drawn from it's premises are most likely to be complete nonsense. I can list a great deal more, but as this thread is titled "Proof of God", I am going to keep it about just that; any and all attempts to prove the existence of God. So, are you going to answer my questions, or are you finally calling "uncle" and conceding the debate?

I know what you said. And I'm telling you that it is completely wrong. The stoics were Pantheists. Their philosophy is inspired, in part, by the Greco-Roman mythologies and stories of the gods and goddesses, demi-gods, etc. Your nitpicking does in no way support your position. You clearly do? It's about time! But, sadly, you still didn't answer any of my questions, especially the first one posed to you: What makes your religious beliefs more valid than the other ones?

NO! Anybody who has studied basic Greco-Roman mythology knows that Zeus was considered the king of gods. All the other deities described were gods and goddesses in and of themselves. There is no need for you to spread incorrect information. That's because you haven't provided any compelling or convincing evidence yet. Stop trying to duck the questions. One has to wonder why :lol:

This thread is turning into quite a comedy :lol:

Well, one that is a false analogy, as we can prove the existence of stars quite easily, while God by definition is not verifiable. And two, C1ay doesn't have to prove the existence of stars, because the burden of proof is on you to provide all the credible evidence. We are giving you every chance to prove the existence of the Christian God, but you aren't giving any compelling reasons or convincing evidence for his existence. And, why God? Why not Brahma, or the Great Spirit, or Zeus? What makes you think that your religious beliefs are more valid and special than the billions of people who don't subscribe to your religion?

Oh, ok. It is a god. So how then did we go from To Are there any other gods you should tell us about that you so desperately want to prove? This still does not relieve you of the original question posed to you.

What a spectacular shift in goalposts. This thread is titled "Proof of God"? And throughout most of the thread, that's what you have been trying to do, without success. Are you seriously telling me that there is none, that you admit that your belief is unsubstantiated?

Not all of them were peer-reviewed actually. And one of them was about human consciousness. What most of them show is that some people have scored better than others, not actually confirm the existence of psychic phenomenon. Of course, since I have studied statistical sciences formally, I can tell just by looking at the numbers and the methods whether or not they do hold up. Regardless of the authenticity of this phenomenon, you still have to show how this would help your case, because the links you provided are trying to test whether or not people can affect others using extrasensory perceptions (or whether or not they even exist), not about supernatural deities affecting people. No you haven't. You have so far ducked the first question I posed to you: what makes you think that your belief in God is more valid than other religious beliefs. And let me tell you where you stand in this regard: Throughout the entire thread, you have not provided one compelling reason for why God exists, or why your belief is more valid than belief in Brahma, Zeus, the Great Spirit, etc. The methods used in your "proofs" are also used to make a case for the existence of those other deities as well. Your best shot at it, psychic phenomenon, is something that is unverifiable at best and all accounts of it are really sketchy, even under experimental settings. You haven't even begun to address the fact that all this might be ascribed to something else entirely. How do you know that this really is God, and not just some fluke of the human brain, or if you really do accept the notion of psychic phenomenon (puke!), just some random person's thoughts? What makes you think that belief in God is more valid than belief in Brahma, especially since you agreed that the same exact reasoning can be used to argue for either deity. There are 4 billion people on this planet who do not believe in, or accept the very notion of a monotheistic, all powerful, single God for the sole reason that there is no physical evidence whatsoever for his existence. What makes you think that their religious accounts are less valid than the Christian account of the supernatural? And so I ask you, are you going to confront the question directly, or are you going to engage in your ridiculous rhetoric and preaching?

Yes, because we can actually see them and detect them. We can't see or detect gods. So, are you going to answer my questions or not?

I think the phrase "psychic malfunction" is an understatement :)

So are you going to answer my questions or not? And, psychic functioning is not usually taken seriously because it is not verifiable, and any experiments that were attempted to study it are sketchy at best, as the links you've provided clearly show. In fact, they show that under controlled conditions it simply doesn't hold up.

I'm aware of this. But you still aren't answering my questions, especially my original one. That's seems to be the current line of thought, as there is nothing to suggest that there is an afterlife.

Ok, I took the time to look through them. Now most of the articles themselves don't really establish or verify the actual existence of such phenomenon (in fact, most of them don't seem all that supportive, or are a bit sketchy, and one is about human consciousness not psychic phenomenon), but that's for another thread. We will assume that, for the sake of argument, that the above do actually happen. In any event, you still have to prove that any of this lends support to the existence of God, so you are still back where you've started: What makes your belief more valid than the religious beliefs of others? How do we know that this isn't something else all together. Psychic or not, you still have the same problems. This is the whole point of rigorous proof; it allows you to weed out the ambiguities and all the other crap and allows you to define what it is you are looking for.