>> ^alien_concept:
When is someone going to assasinate Fergie? She is an abomination with a vagina and I detest her


You're treading on dangerous ground there, a_c.

I mean - assassination would only make her a martyr. We don't want that. Better let her fade away into the nothingness that is a miserable self-indulgent ex-celebrity heroin-addict existence.

Rant: I really dislike geographical links to culture, although it's so widespread and popular that it's almost impossible to carry on a conversation without it. I dislike it because it inevitably says minorities within those geographical areas are not the "true" members of whatever area is being discussed. For example, American immigrants often declare white Americans to be "American", and everyone else to be black, Mexican, Chinese or whatever. So despite the fact that they too are Americans, they only see white people as American. Whites only make about 2/3 of the country nowadays, so to have 33% of the citizenry vanish into nothingness is just messed up. But it's extremely common to hear this kind of talk in every day conversation.

Example: "The Germans killed lots of Jews, gays and communists in WW2." Did they? Huge numbers of German Jews, gays and Communists were killed, but in common talk, it's "true" Germans, killing those "outsiders". "Americans are a very industrious, smart people." What about the ones who aren't? Are they less American, not American at all? I just don't see much benefit to this kind of thinking, but I can see massive negative consequences throughout history because of it.

>> ^ShakaUVM:
I think the most compelling argument is this:
1) Before we were born, we didn't exist.
2) We exist now.
3) Therefore there is evidence that we can go from nothingness to existence.
4) Therefore after we die (ostensibly transitioning from existence to nothingness) there is no reason that we could not transition from nothingness to existence again. This supports either Buddhistic reincarnation or a Christian heaven.
5) In fact, the preponderance of the evidence suggests so, since we have evidence that we can transition from nothingness to existence, but nothing supporting the atheistic view that death is extinction, and nothing can happen to us after dying.


Wow. I am so... compelled.

Consciousness is not necessarily anything in itself, as most cognitive scientists would say, it's the illusion of a separate item - it is the features of the brain that make up the consciousness.

Even if consciousness is an illusion, the illusion is real. (Unless you're arguing you do not have any conscious experience? I've always wanted to meet a p-zombie.) Cognitive Scientists study the neural correlates of consciousness, the objective facts about neurons and such, without having any theory at all about explaining how subjective experience is generated.

This "illusion" of our consciousness did not exist (as far as we can tell) before we were born, so the only fact we have is that consciousness can emerge from nothingness. Perhaps you might draw your own conclusions from that, but the factual evidence of reality does support the notion of life after death over permanent nonexistence.

Of course, I don't expect atheists to pay much attention to facts that disagree with them (we're all humans, naturally), but it is amusing to hear, since atheists tend to pride themselves on their evidence-based worldviews.

I'm talking about consciousness / self-awareness / being.
The fact that our consciousness transitioned from nothingness to existence is the sole fact we have in the matter, so the preponderance of the evidence can only point to Buddhism or Christianity
so you're just assuming some kind of dualism. and jumping from that to any specific brand of religion is a giant non-sequitur.

the matter your body is composed of existed before you were born and will continue to exist after your death. sorry

I'm talking about consciousness / self-awareness / being.

The fact that our consciousness transitioned from nothingness to existence is the sole fact we have in the matter, so the preponderance of the evidence can only point to Buddhism or Christianity, and as I said, scientific evidence favors Christianity over Buddhism.

No, I'm not religious... but I prefer Buddhism to Christianity any day of the week!

Of course - this is Videosift.

In my mind the idea of coming into existence strongly supports... the notion of a return to nothingness.

Dust to dust, and all that.

The numbers don't add up for reincarnation. I think people have done studies. Pesky math.

No, I'm not religious... but I prefer Buddhism to Christianity any day of the week!

I think the most compelling argument is this:
1) Before we were born, we didn't exist.
2) We exist now.
3) Therefore there is evidence that we can go from nothingness to existence.
4) Therefore after we die (ostensibly transitioning from existence to nothingness) there is no reason that we could not transition from nothingness to existence again. This supports either Buddhistic reincarnation or a Christian heaven.
5) In fact, the preponderance of the evidence suggests so, since we have evidence that we can transition from nothingness to existence, but nothing supporting the atheistic view that death is extinction, and nothing can happen to us after dying.

>> ^JiggaJonson:
I wish people would get their facts straight on this issue.
1) No one who actually understands the theory of evolution says "We came from monkeys"
- The theory actually states that both humans and other primates came from a common ancestor
2) On the issue of morality, God cannot validate some kind of morality. Either a moral principle is intrinsically valid or it is not. I like the example given by Colin McGinn which goes something like this:
If someone says 'It's wrong to murder,' OK why is it wrong to murder? 'Well God says it's wrong.' And that almost seems to work but try it the other way around, 'It's right to murder,' Wait a minute, murder is wrong, 'Well God says it's right to murder.' That second go-around doesn't all of a sudden convince you that it's right to murder. The reason for that is God (or anyone for that matter) cannot simply put a stamp on something and make it right or wrong, the moral rules we have are intrinsically valid or invalid.


I disagree, our moral rules are not intrinsically anything, and they have constantly changed over time. Your example of murder can easily be modified by adding a situation such as "either you murder this person or I kill your entire family or entire city or entire country or entire world" at some point you'd be willing to murder that person. You could argue that its different because the reason for committing murder is so drastic but theres no objective line of whats a justifiable reason to kill someone and what is murder and thus you end up in a practice of subjectivity.

>> ^gwiz665:
You don't have an explanation for God, thus your "explanation" for anything God did is not valid. It is YOU sir, who is the idiot.


This also isnt true, because you're applying the rules of logic and science to a supernatural entity. See creationists have an easy out because they believe in a divine being of uncomprehensible power that is not of this universe (since he created it)and so they dont have to abide by our universes rules. They can just say "he created himself" and how can you argue with that unless you have a thorough understanding of the nature of God, which you can't and thus its not provable or disprovable. It might seem like circular logic if you give it hard thought but the luxury of the faithful is it doesnt matter, all they need is faith that he exists and everything follows neatly after that.

Athiests have it much more difficult because they're trying to explain the world within a very rigid rule set and through our fairly insuffecient (though constantly progressing) technological and academic observation/reasoning. Even more difficult is the fact that even if you could explain everything in the universe with science, the argument can still be made that it all makes sense because God made it in this way. This might seem unfair but again its not something you can prove or disprove and its not something they have to justify based on their faith in an all powerful divine being.

My biggest concern with science trying to explain existence is that at somepoint there had to be "nothing" and this is not the nothingness of vacuum in space, because even that is something. It is a nothingness in which there is no existence at all, time, space (the 3 dimensional space we exist in not the kind we orbit in), or matter. So the question is how did something come from nothing in a scientific and provable way. Now you could argue that because time did not exist then its not a factor prior to the beginning of the universe, however at that point i think we move outside of our ability to comprehend anythng since our very existence functions based on time existing.

To try and explain waht i mean, imagine a cup falling and breaking, this is time in its forward direction. Now imagine it going backwards in time and it flies back up and back together. Easy enough right? So what happens to the cup with no time? Does anything happen? Does something "happening" require time as a precursor to exist? If so then how can anything "happen" without time? I dont know that we can reason that out, however theres always the possibility of mathematics being able to "describe" it as it does dimensions beyond the 4 we're familiar with. As to whether we can ever go much further than a mathematic understanding of such things I sadly doubt.

>> ^bluecliff:
>> ^braindonut:
Bluecliff, that is exactly correct. I have fun with nothingness every single day. It's called fiction.

Lol. Argument out of slapstick. That's just sad.


I thought I was just being playful, but now I am just sad... Way to ruin my weekend.

>> ^braindonut:
Bluecliff, that is exactly correct. I have fun with nothingness every single day. It's called fiction.


Lol. Argument out of slapstick. That's just sad.

Bluecliff, that is exactly correct. I have fun with nothingness every single day. It's called fiction.

Also if fairies are fun, yet fairies don't exist, does that mean that you have fun with nothingness?

You don't have to be a believer in the divinity of Christ or god or anything else to behave in a 'Christ-like' way. As proof I'll offer the fact that many people still showed 'Christ-like' behavior before Christ was born.

Very true. I don't mean to suggest that only people who attend churches demonstrate Christ like behavior. What I would suggest is that an organization ostensibly designed to train individuals to emulate 'Christ-like' behavior is more generally likely to succeed in getting people to behave in Christ like ways compared to the absence of such instruction.

And to suggest that materialism and nothingness are filling the void left by religion, that is more a matter of opinion than fact.

Has the decrease in the influence of Christianity over the past 10, 20, 30 years been accompanied by an decrease in materialism? If so, I have not observed the trend. Correlation does not equal causation - but it certainly does waggle it's eyebrows in causation's direction...

WFPP, I agree with you. That would have been a much more convincing argument than the derisive chuckling and stuttering the religious proponent in the video produced.

Fair enough.

Now as to your second point, "Christ-like behavior" by this I assume you mean behaving in a way Christ would approve. Perhaps that is true, of course, you don't have to be a believer in the divinity of Christ or god or anything else to behave in a 'Christ-like' way. As proof I'll offer the fact that many people still showed 'Christ-like' behavior before Christ was born.

And to suggest that materialism and nothingness are filling the void left by religion, that is more a matter of opinion than fact. But perhaps a gifted debater could cloud that fact.