How Did Humanity Come To Be

[Illuminatus Primus]

What is the precise distinction between "mysterious ways beyond human understanding" and "too stupid to make sense to anyone's intuition" other than the presumption before we even begin that God MUST exist and have influence in affairs observable and meaningful?

[Patrick Degan]

Because God moves in mysterious ways beyond human understanding but I'm quite sure you'll laugh at that explanation.

An "explanation" that explains nothing. Around these parts, you're going to have to do a lot better than that.

[Stark]

If God's motives are beyond human understanding, how can anything he says or does be accepted? His idea of honesty, morality, value, or priority are obviously totally alien, right?

Oh, you mean 'works in mysterious ways' in that catch-all excuse for everything he'd stop if he was Optimus Prime, and not in any logically consistent way.

[Simon_Jester]

A reply to major points:

1. I'm not really a "liberal" Christian either-other than theistic evolution I am generally conservative in my theological views.

Interesting. Now, I ask a question: what do you think "liberal" means?

3. The question about whether evolution need or does not need God is interesting. If one believes (as I do) God caused the Big Bang than nothing currently in the universe would be able to exist without Him.

Well, then one believes that the universe could not exist without God. Which is a rather different thing than "it is true that the universe could not exist without God."

Because God moves in mysterious ways beyond human understanding but I'm quite sure you'll laugh at that explanation.

Why shouldn't he? Why shouldn't I?

How is that an explanation at all? It's an explanation that can be used to "prove" absolutely anything, even things that are obviously not true, which makes it an extremely bad explanation.

Besides which, it is common for most religions to say that their gods' actions make sense until suddenly they reach the point at which things stop making sense. Then the handwaving about "mysterious ways" starts.

Why should God make sense only some of the time, rather than making sense all of the time (a logical deity) or none of the time (Azathoth)?

[Drooling Iguana]

Because God moves in mysterious ways beyond human understanding but I'm quite sure you'll laugh at that explanation.

I generally only laugh at jokes that I haven't heard before. Once something's been repeated enough times it just stops being funny.

[Alyrium Denryle]

I see where your argument is going:Why did God bother to send His Son to Earth to have Him sacrificed so men could be forgiven? And even the creation account in Genesis could have been more streamlined: why not create the world and everything on it in one moment?

It is even funnier than that. He did not send his son. He sent himself to be sacrificed to himself to save humanity from sins that he defined and set the punishment for. Then he set the path for gaining entry into heaven so high no human could ever reach it on their own and made the secondary entry path for those without absolute perfection not based on the goodness of one's actions or intentions but on their outright prostration before himself.

Your deity is a schizophrenic narcissist. Particularly because he promised to send a messiah to the jews, and the one he supposedly sent met none of the criteria he laid out telling them who it would be. He then expanded the covenant he made with jews, and for some reason applied the law (from whence the christian concept of sin is derived) to gentiles when nowhere in the old testament do they apply to non-jews, and he did so without the collective consent (that whole "covenant" thing) of the gentiles which he had prior obtained from the jews.

You might as well ask "Why doesn't God prove His existence by performing miracles for everyone?"

Given the fucked up nature of the entire holy book, you may as well ask Jehovah to make sense.

No but that I believe in most of the usual Evangelical Christian theology such as salvation by faith and conservative morality; to give an example: if you were to ask me people I'm influenced theologically by I would name Charles Spurgeon, Billy Graham, and John MacArthur although at the same time I believe Graham is too ecumenical and that MacArthur is rather too anti-Catholic.

So in other words you have a bigoted hatred against gays and think women are inferior. How lovely. You also believe that ethics are found not in your behavior and treatment of others, but through how fervently you believe in Jesus.

Because God moves in mysterious ways beyond human understanding but I'm quite sure you'll laugh at that explanation.

Because it is a cop out.

[Samuel]

salvation by faith and conservative morality;

You do realize the second is generally taken to emphasize hard work and the importance of individual achievement (when not oppressing minorities)... which stands in complete contradiction to the former?

Er... I'll stop posting. This is becoming a dogpile.

[Shroom Man 777]

A reply to major points:

1. I'm not really a "liberal" Christian either-other than theistic evolution I am generally conservative in my theological views.
2. I do not need to be told how evolution happened-I know. I was asking your opinions.
3. The question about whether evolution need or does not need God is interesting. If one believes (as I do) God caused the Big Bang than nothing currently in the universe would be able to exist without Him.

Oh, opinions, okay.

I believe that the Big Bang caused God and that nothing in the universe, God included, would be able to exist without the Big Bang. The question about whether God need or does not need evolution is interesting. If one believes as I do, that evolution caused God, then no animal currently in the universe (God included) would be able to exist without evolution.



Now all we need to do is to find some transitional fossils that show which organisms god evolved from, so we can classify him in a phylum or an order or a kingdom. Is god a vertebrate? Since then that means we can find fossilized bones to help our conception of His Divine Evolution. Is he an invertebrate? That makes it a tad bit harder. Now if God is a plant or a fungus, then finding fossils of his evolutionary ancestors is going to be considerably more difficult.

[Covenant]

Our opinions? Our opinions are that evolution is a theory that seems to model reality quite well, and is this quite likely to be the most correct current model of our origin. There's not a lot of room for opinion when you've got so much evidence to lean on. There are things that you can have an opinion on, such as what spurred brain development, but that's mostly just until you find better evidence.

Because God moves in mysterious ways beyond human understanding but I'm quite sure you'll laugh at that explanation.

There has never been a greater load of horseshit. This is not a mysterious deity we're talking about.

Crack open the Bible. What in there is mysterious? He says "I'm jealous," and so he is. He says "don't do this or I'll punish you," and he does. He appears to prophets and creates miracles to convince them, then gives them visions and sets them to work, aiding them with literal mana from heaven, the parting of seas, and the assistance of great powers. And when he decided men needed laws he had then written in stone. He liked burnt sacrifice, veneration, obedience, and set himself as a king on a throne in a temple like all the other fictional gods at the time. He would act rashly at times, such as with the flood, and then make a note of it with a Covenant or so.

When God needed a sacrificial lamb or scapegoat they took that to terms quite literally. When he needed a sacrifice of such great magnitude that only a living incarnation of the divine would work, that's exactly what he did. Nothing about this is mysterious. The motivations may be a bit confusing but there's no mysteriousness.

The concept that "God moves in mysterious ways" is invented to explain why none of us get to see pillars of fire, thundering voices, or seas being split nowadays. The whole "my ways are not your ways" thing would indeed be evidence for a 'moving in mysterious ways' sort of concept if it was not shown time and again that God is moved by the most petty of instincts rather than the most inscrutable ones. But we can go round and round about this, you'll still be refusing to accept what you can verify is true and looking for ways to justify something that does not exist.

[Shroom Man 777]

But Covenant!

God is such a silly concept that's obviously not true, so in order to try and prevent scienticians from disproving the concept of god we have to say that he moves in "mysterious ways" that people can't possibly know and that they have to rely on "faith" to believe in god's existence because he is not true and no truer than leprechauns or unicorns and it's so obviously not true that we need to make some bullshit about being "mysterious" for people to believe with "faith" because there's no other possible way to make god believable aside from that. Believe me. It is mysterious. You can't understands it. Have faiths. Yes there's no way it is real, so the only way it is real is for it to be "mysterious" bullshit. Faith. Mysterious faith!

If it is a mystery, then obviously to debunk this we need the help of Scooby Doo. Turns out God was just a silly man in a mask who was trying to steal money or do other kinds of petty crime, before being foiled by meddling kids and an inarticulate talking dog owned by a hippie stoner. Tee-hee.

[General Mung Beans]

So in other words you have a bigoted hatred against gays and think women are inferior. How lovely. You also believe that ethics are found not in your behavior and treatment of others, but through how fervently you believe in Jesus.

Wrong on all counts. I do not hate gays. I think it's a sin but I see no reason why it should be empahsized more than say fornication or adultery. I do think women should have full legal and political equality however I do think women shouldn't be ordained. Finally I think if one is a truly saved Christian he will act accordingly moral.

[ray245]

So in other words you have a bigoted hatred against gays and think women are inferior. How lovely. You also believe that ethics are found not in your behavior and treatment of others, but through how fervently you believe in Jesus.

Wrong on all counts. I do not hate gays. I think it's a sin but I see no reason why it should be empahsized more than say fornication or adultery. I do think women should have full legal and political equality however I do think women shouldn't be ordained. Finally I think if one is a truly saved Christian he will act accordingly moral.

Well, you just said that a person who is gay is immoral. Kinda hard for me to believe that you are not a bigot.

[Samuel]

I think it's a sin but I see no reason why it should be empahsized more than say fornication or adultery.

I take back not interfering. You think people having sex outside of marriage is wrong... and you think that is as bad as cheating on your spouse?

I do think women should have full legal and political equality however I do think women shouldn't be ordained.

Than they don't have full equality. If you believe that:

Finally I think if one is a truly saved Christian he will act accordingly moral.

That means that the clergy have the keys to moral living. And women are excluded from that vocation. That is an inherently political act.

[Stark]

I do think women should have full legal and political equality however I do think women shouldn't be ordained

Error error error

If your magic book says women are chattels and the root of sin etc and you're prepared to ignore that...

Why are you not prepared to ignore the RCC saying women can't be priests?

[Simon_Jester]

Wrong on all counts. I do not hate gays. I think it's a sin but I see no reason why it should be empahsized more than say fornication or adultery. I do think women should have full legal and political equality however I do think women shouldn't be ordained. Finally I think if one is a truly saved Christian he will act accordingly moral.

Why do you believe any of the above to be true?

While your statements of personal belief are all very well so far as they go, they go practically zero distance, being supported by no arguments of any kind.

[General Mung Beans]

I take back not interfering. You think people having sex outside of marriage is wrong... and you think that is as bad as cheating on your spouse?

All sins are equally bad in the sense that it is a sin although concretely certain things (ie pedophilia) are certainly worse than others (say pickpocketing).

Than they don't have full equality. If you believe that:

It is just that in church men and women have different functions.

That means that the clergy have the keys to moral living. And women are excluded from that vocation. That is an inherently political act.

I do not think the clergy have the "keys" to moral living as such cases as Ted Haggard or Jimmy Swaggert or the Priest Abuse cases show.

[General Mung Beans]

So in other words you have a bigoted hatred against gays and think women are inferior. How lovely. You also believe that ethics are found not in your behavior and treatment of others, but through how fervently you believe in Jesus.

Wrong on all counts. I do not hate gays. I think it's a sin but I see no reason why it should be empahsized more than say fornication or adultery. I do think women should have full legal and political equality however I do think women shouldn't be ordained. Finally I think if one is a truly saved Christian he will act accordingly moral.

Well, you just said that a person who is gay is immoral. Kinda hard for me to believe that you are not a bigot.

To give an example if I said lying or adultery is immoral does that mean I'm bigoted against liars or adulterers? And no I do not think homosexuality can be "cured" or something like that, it should be controlled.

[Ghost Rider]

So comes the question. Why does homosexuality have to be controlled? What are they going to do? Give you cooties?

[Stark]

Does 'immoral' mean 'has sex I don't like'?

Remember men and women in church have different functions!

[Simon_Jester]

All sins are equally bad in the sense that it is a sin although concretely certain things (ie pedophilia) are certainly worse than others (say pickpocketing).

Why do you believe this to be true, instead of drawing a line between, say, mortal and venial sins?

It is just that in church men and women have different functions.

Why do you believe this to be true?

I do not think the clergy have the "keys" to moral living as such cases as Ted Haggard or Jimmy Swaggert or the Priest Abuse cases show.

If you do not listen to or respect clergy, then this is a reasonable position. I doubt that you ignore clergy, so I doubt that your position is reasonable. Instead, I think you believe women should not be ordained because women have historically not been ordained, not for any reason that would stand up to a quasi-rational investigation by modern standards.

Doing something because Grandpa did it that way, and for no other reason, is incredibly foolish if the thing actually matters or harms anyone.

[PeZook]

It's pretty funny since one of the options the RCC is considering in order to get numbers of priests up is to allow women to be ordained.

I wonder what General Mung Beans will say if it's ever done? That it's suddendly not a sin/breach of tradition/whatever if the Pope says it's okay? Even if it wasa grave sin for a thousand years before? And remember, if he keeps his beliefs, it means he disagrees with Christ's messenger on Earth!

[Shroom Man 777]

But they will still have different functions owing to the dissimilar nature of their genital organelles! And it is in this difference between cocks, pussies and milkbags that is part of His Divine Plan that compels the Holy Church to give laymen and laywomen their varying functions!

But Shroomy, men and women in the Church still DON'T use their cocks and pussies at all! I mean, priests and nuns don't have sex! So, what's the point!

Oh no! This means that there is actually NO legitimate logical reason at all for assigning different roles to men and women in the Church, except for the sexual hangups and various discriminatory sexist stupidstitions inherent in a centuries-old organization full of stupid old mens with dumb beliefs that Dung Beans take for as holy writ and heed brainlessly! Damn! Somebody call a nuers! A nuers! But Shroomy, you are a nuers! OH NO!

[Alyrium Denryle]

Wrong on all counts. I do not hate gays. I think it's a sin but I see no reason why it should be empahsized more than say fornication or adultery. I do think women should have full legal and political equality however I do think women shouldn't be ordained. Finally I think if one is a truly saved Christian he will act accordingly moral.

Believing that a person who is born with a certain character state should deny their nature and either be celibate and live a life of isolation and misery, or lie to some poor woman is the definition of bigotry.

You believe that women should not be ordained because they somehow have less worth than a man when it comes to interpreting the massive contradiction that is your religion.

Your definition of morality is such that many "immoral" things cause no demonstrable harm to any person or object. Tell me, how exactly does being gay hurt anyone?

To give an example if I said lying or adultery is immoral does that mean I'm bigoted against liars or adulterers? And no I do not think homosexuality can be "cured" or something like that, it should be controlled.

Theologically, a person who is an adulterer or who lies chooses to lie or commit adultery. A person who is gay has that ingrained in their DNA. They are born gay. Why exactly would god create someone with a character state he considers an abomination except to make a specific group suffer more than others and then damn them to eternal hellfire when they finally ascent to their nature if not to obtain sadistic jollies from their misery?

As I have said. Schizophrenic narcissist. I am glad he is a fictional character like Zeus.

[Lagmonster]

No dogpiling. If I come back and find that he's getting more than two challenges to every one thing he says, I'm swear to god I'm going to start modding the shit out of you people.

[Kanastrous]

The bipedalism was a better way of movement in a Savanna (prodiving a better field of sight against predators and faster propulsion) while intelligence helped to cope with predators etc.

There's an article in the current (or just past) issue of Smithsonian wherein some of the people studying the Ari skeleton say that materials found in the same layer indicate that she lived in a forested environment. They seem to think that the whole came-down-outta-the-trees-to-live-on-the-savannah model for development of bipedalism might need revision.