@Michael
Wow, where to begin.
There are many individual aspects to your comment that I could point to and say how irrelevant they are with regards to whether or not it is reasonable to believe in a god. In fact, I can’t locate a single example in anything that you said that suggests believing in a god is reasonable.
Some great scientists believed in a god. So what? Were they experts on supernatural beings for which there was no evidence? And how do you go from “there is some sort of creator” to “Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden?” You can’t because even if the first statement is true, there is nothing that links the two.
I’m happy for you that science strengthens your beliefs, but as you said, there is no evidence for any god. It’s simply something you assume. If you are making a claim – like, “there is a god” – you have the burden of proof. I don’t have to disprove it. I will believe it if I am convinced it’s true. Up until now, I haven’t seen any evidence for that position, and a great deal of evidence for the opposite position.
You just don’t get something from nothing; sorry about that!
I think your understanding of the current theories is a bit out of date from this statement.
In fact, much of physics boils down to faith because we haven’t even been to Alpha Centauri to prove that the laws of physics work there.
I think you’re confusing faith with trust. We have experimental evidence that the laws of physics are constant on the Earth and in the space surrounding Earth. Unless you have some reason to believe that the laws of physics are different on Alpha Centauri, it would be foolish to assume they are. So we trust that they are the same, because it makes sense. When we get on a plane, we don’t have faith that the plane will fly. We have evidence that it flies, we see them all the time, and we trust that the one we’re about to board will fly too. This is not faith. And unlike faith, if the laws of physics were different on Alpha Centauri, we would use that to modify our understanding of the universe. Faith, on the other hand, is resistant to change, even in the face of evidence that contradicts those beliefs.
…there are many who believe it just came together by accident and have become arrogant because they think that everything (including consciousness) can be reduced to simple classical mechanics. There’s actually much more to it than that.
How is this arrogance? We believe what there is evidence for, and we postulate ideas without saying “don’t know, it must be God.” That is all.
We can agree to disagree in a democracy but to insult someone’s Faith by using the vile word “masturbation” demonstrates that immaturity and lack of genuine respect for other points of view
Here’s a shocker for you, I don’t respect your beliefs either. I respect your right to have those beliefs, and I may even respect you as a person, but just because someone holds certain beliefs does not mean those beliefs should automatically be respected. Unless you can back up your claims, of course.
None of the physics, chemistry, and biology (including evolution) that I know disagrees with anything in my religion.
Then the Bible I’m familiar with is a very different book to the one you are familiar with.
God can create the universe any way He chooses to and that process started with the big bang.
Huge supposition going on here.
You speak about all the wonderous and miraculous stuff in the universe, but what about all the bad stuff? Most of this world is inhospitable to human life, isn’t it? Disease, famine, viruses. Your god must have been responsible for all that stuff, too, no matter how you try to spin it. But I’m sure you rationalise that away because, let’s face it, you assume that the Christian god exists. This is not a scientific approach to the question, so you then have to make excuses for all the things that don’t fit in with your view of the world.
Santa, by the way, was a real person (St. Nicholas)
Hang on, there was really a Santa, that visited all the kids in the world on a single night with presents? No, there was a man called St Nicholas, and I would like to add that the historicity of the Santa myth is a lot more complicated than that. Wikipedia is your friend, if you want to check it out. And believing in Santa can be useful and fun. It can even teach children about critical thinking when they work out he’s not real. But the only reason they don’t grow up thinking he’s real is because it’s a story for children, and society regards adults that believe in that particular myth to be, well, delusional. Religion is just a myth for grownups because they’re never told it’s not true.
But obviously, he is not a very nice, moral person
Oh yes, obviously. Sheesh. If you’re using Christian morality as a yard stick, sir, you are hopelessly on the wrong track.
