"It’s dangerous for our children to even know that your philosophy exists"

Yeah, I agree with that and that's why the teach it to the kids at school.

I actually want my kids to learn as much of this as they can before they leave for college so that they know that I didn't hide anything from them out of fear and that I can respond to the truth claims of these competing worldviews.

Actually, this doesn't surprise me at all.

In many cases, the fairness or persecution arguments come down to the ideas of 'I have a right to be comfortable'. or 'I have the right to not be offended'. Or even, 'I have the right to think that most people believe and think the same things I do'.

It is dangerous for our children to even know your philosophy exists.

I wonder what sort of news this would've made if that the roles were reversed?

It is dangerous for children to know about Atheism? It's going to stop progress in the state? This country, as was pointed out, has given the right to all it's citizens to enjoy the practice of their religion or not to participate in a religious belief. Rep. Davis from Illinois (the state I was born in) has a really big problem! It's hers and no one elses. I can guarantee the entire state of Illinois isn't Christian! (nor is this country). If she wants a state mandated religion, she should move to a country that gives it's citizens NO choice...Iran, Saudia Arabia, Iraq. Head scarves baby...and lots of religious rules.

Basically sounds like the Rep. is scared of education that might cause children to think and make up their own minds about things.

In effect, Davis (an African-American) was telling the atheist to go to the back of the bus. So much for civil rights in America. Why she's so afraid of a philosophy that embraces reality and truth instead of myth, I'd really like to know. Had she said the same to a Christian or Jew, she'd be gone.

"Why she's so afraid of a philosophy that embraces reality and truth instead of myth"

Realty and truth? You mean according to you? Prove it's the truth.

:-)

Could you believe that we descended from the same ancestor?

No, it wasn't rhetorical, just trying to figure out if you would ignore all the evidence or was open to exploring it.

How about God becoming man? Do you see that as impossible?

"How about God becoming man? Do you see that as impossible?"

A tough and interesting question because I'm not entirely sure what it means. But I'll give it my best shot using an analogy.

The concept of God seems so to be an infinite consciousness existing outside of our time and space that is the root cause of our reality, and has the ability to interact with reality in meaningful ways.

If we think of our universe as a cosmic version of the SIMS with us being characters in the simulation, then I suppose it is possible there could exists a SIM or SIMS that are controlled by a being or beings outside our reality. The SIM and its controller would not be identical with each other, but it would allow a God to interact with other SIMS directly.

I should say I see this as unlikely, but within the realm of the possible. It also raises a bunch of philosophy 101 questions like: "How do you tell a regular SIM from the other kind?", "What evidence is required to prove there is an external reality?", "Does the external reality also have a creator?", and "How do you avoid an infinite regression of nested realities?"

"Whether Christian or atheist, our constitution doesn't give us our rights, God does."

regardless of where our rights come to us from, what our constitution is supposed to do is protect those rights. god doesn't do that for us here.

Nice post! The only place I might differ is that I raise my kids to discuss the issue, not argue from one side. Let them decide from themselves, right? Otherwise it's just indoctrination.

"There are no convincing arguments for the existence of a god."

You're right. There is no proof that will make the blind see. The only way anyone can be convinced of the truth is for God to take away their blindness. I know because that's what happened to me.

"If you want kids so STUPID that they fall for THAT, maybe you should move to Iran where the church rules the state."

I am more concerned that they deny the obvious, I wouldn't want them to be so delusional as to deny that which is evident to most of humanity.

pagansister, evidently the founding fathers thought so.

Thanks, I wrote it quickly and found it awkward after re-reading it.

While death is a natural process which is normally irreversible, a significant intervention can halt or reverse it. So I don't find the concept of a man coming back from the dead to be impossible.

Our species is able to bring people back from what was considered dead only a short time ago. As our skills have grown, so has the length of time that a dead person can be revived if the conditions are right.

An advanced technological civilization might have the skills to analyze and repair damage at the cellar level using something like molecular nanotechnology. The better their technology the longer the time span someone who is dead could be revived if enough information was still present.

Going back to the cosmic SIMS analogy. A God outside the simulation could probably have enough information to restore anyone in the simulation, so brining a person back from the dead is easy if desired.

I'm ignoring the concept of souls and looking at death as a purely mechanical process. I figure if there's a God and souls, then he'll sort things out. If there's no God and we're mechanical processes then there's no issue either.

Certainly I would say it is possible, but this is an extraordinary claim and I'd need some extraordinary evidence before I accepted it as a fact. My need for evidence is why I'm an agnostic.

A requirement for this claim is to accept the existence of a being outside our reality which wanted to do what Christians claim. As I pointed out earlier accepting an outside to our reality raises more issues than it seems to solve with regards to the nature of reality.

But the philosophy 101 stuff is not really my core issue. The problem of evil is my core issue against accepting the existence of such a being with the properties described. As I see it humans were created through the process of evolution. Being red in tooth and claw this process built into us some of the nasty traits which we call evil.

So it seems to me we were created in a broken state and not broken by rebelling against God through our own choices.

Earlier you brought up our common ancestor. The basis for this discovery was the mitochondiral DNA studies which besides showing the common ancestor of humans, also demonstrates our common lineage with other animals and even plants.

If you use this evidence to support the existence of Mitochondrial Eve then you need to accept its ramifications with regards to the theory of evolution. You can't play it both ways, or at least I can't.

So there might be a God, but he seems comfortable using a mechanism to create beings that leaves them effective but imperfect. So this raises troubling question to me about why Jesus would need to do what was claimed.

Sorry if this is rushed but my kids are bugging me to go on webkins.

Unnecessary.

Heck, simply not (according to the theology) having a predisposition toward good. Make good like, well, what liver is for me.

I CAN eat liver, if I had to. So obviously not being 'forced to not eat liver'.

I simply don't like it, so I don't do it.

Rendering 'evil' into something that people don't like/don't want to do, but COULD would still allow free will, and still improve things.

So would removing some of the most common causes for bad behavior. (Not the exclusive reasons, but the most common.) Such as desperation, limited resources, ignorance, fear, anger, etc.

None of which would remove any free will.

Umm.. which I'm interested in hearing a Reform Calvinist arguing anyway.

While I'm agnostic with regards to the facts, I'm a weak theist with regards to belief, so I'll assume the existence of God for the sake of discussion.

I don't think the problem of evil means that God isn't good, otherwise God would have made things much worse. If God liked violent video games instead of the cosmic SIMS think how bad things could be. But it limits at least one of the Omni-attributes and seems to alter God's motivations.

While the abuse of free will is often brought up as a solution to the problem of evil. I think that falls short in two ways: First, humans don't have enough free will and are prisoners of our evolutionary heritage which allows our instincts to overcome our reason and better nature. Second is that natural evil is far deadlier than the human created kind.

Karen brought up resource constraints as a big cause of human cruelty. This relates nicely to my evolution point. The mechanism used to create man means that we have built in biases towards resource hoarding and violence toward our own kind because of the survival advantage conferred. These individuals survive to pass on their genes which reinforces these traits.

There's also all the wars fought over what was ultimately bad reasoning on the part of the participants. This has a basis in the state of nature where ignoring a real tiger can get you killed, while attacking a non-existent tiger behind a bush is only a waste of effort. Placing this instinct in the low trust environment of international politics triggers wars and much suffering.

The natural evils such as disease and disasters have killed more humans than all warfare. For example the 1918 flu pandemic alone killed at least 50 to 100 million people which exceeded the death toll from World War one by at least 10 million. The 2004 Tsunami killed more than 225,000 which exceeds the total death toll of the Iraq war.

Moving to an explicitly Christian issue. There's also the issue of God's motivation with regards to becoming Jesus. I could see a curious God taking on human form seeking to interact with its creations directly, but why the need for Christ's sacrifice? Why would God save us from the conditions he created?

Michelle you're being a good sport about this, plus there's an upside to this discussion. It we keep it up we can get you on the hot topics list.

This is excellent and well-reasoned:

"I don't think the problem of evil means that God isn't good, otherwise God would have made things much worse. If God liked violent video games instead of the cosmic SIMS think how bad things could be. But it limits at least one of the Omni-attributes and seems to alter God's motivations."

"The natural evils"
What makes disease and disasters "evil?" From an evolutionary perspective isn't death just part of the process?

"There's also the issue of God's motivation with regards to becoming Jesus. I could see a curious God taking on human form seeking to interact with its creations directly, but why the need for Christ's sacrifice? Why would God save us from the conditions he created?"

If God's justice demanded that everyone who sinned against him had to spend eternity paying for it, would you stand a chance of remaining sinless? No one can. Christ came to lead the sinless life for us. He is the only one who can meet the standard of obedience necessary to enter heaven. God sent his Son to live the perfect life for us and die in our place to take our punishment. God's standard has been met but Christ and all of those who are united to him will be saved.

An analogy for this is Noah's ark. God's punishment is coming, it will rain down like the rain that filled the earth (I know you don't believe it) and we can't avoid it just as mankind could not avoid the flood. Those in Christ will live and those outside of Christ will be punished for all eternity. That's what the Bible says will happen.

From the Christian perspective Christ's death and resurrection makes sense because we understand the obedience we owe a holy God. Those who don't understand the purpose they were created for won't see their obligation to God as Creator.

BTW, God didn't create this situation, we did. We are free to be obedient to him and do not.

"Michelle you're being a good sport about this, plus there's an upside to this discussion. It we keep it up we can get you on the hot topics list."

I'm not being a good sport, out of all the things I can discuss on this blog, my favorite is discussing belief with others :-) And I don't if I can ever beat anything on God's Politics or the Crunchy Con :-)

I'm not sure what my beliefs regarding man's nature has to do with a state senator ordering a citizen out of a public forum because she doesn't like the group he's part of..

Just for FYI, neither.

I think humans are a messy mix of both. We can be, depending on need, circumstance, environment and a ton of other factors, surprisingly good or evil. And most of us, at different times, can be, and have been, both.

Now, if you can tell me what that's got to do with if the mere knowledge that atheists exist is dangerous to people's children?