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Religion IS crazy!
- Thread starter Sean K
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Chris, I am strong in my Christian faith, but good on you for expressing your thoughts.
From what I gather, reincarnation is Buddhism based, and where the old saying "He is a wise old soul" comes from.
They believe the soul reincarnates until the soul is perfect and it learns all it needs to learn here, then off it goes.
From what I gather, reincarnation is Buddhism based, and where the old saying "He is a wise old soul" comes from.
They believe the soul reincarnates until the soul is perfect and it learns all it needs to learn here, then off it goes.
I’ll second that. Expressing your view on a public forum can quickly make you a target of heavy criticism and rudeness. But that hasn’t fazed Chris – he (she?) expresses his views anyway, and always courteously and reasonably. I think we should acknowledge here that what Chris posted on reincarnation was not necessarily his view, but was just something that he found interesting and thought he’d share with the forum.
That's what makes forums such interesting places.
The Buddhist belief is that every living creature was something else in a previous life. They won’t kill a single living creature because they believe that if you squash a spider or an ant then you might be squashing something that was once a person – maybe even a deceased family member!
They also believe that after this life we could be reincarnated as a snake or an ant or a wolf or whatever. Sounds pretty weird to me, but I guess they’re entitled to their beliefs.
I once asked a recent convert to Buddhism what she’d do if termite infestation was ever found in her house - would she call in a pest control company to eradicate them, or would she sit back and do nothing while they ate her house?
Her response was ‘I won’t get a termite infestation’.
What is your justification for that totally absurd and demeaning categorization?
Clearly your "mind" is NOT open to evidenced based conclusions that fall outside your tight little square of beliefs.
Two prominent scientists publish numerous papers and books on their extensive research covering 40 years of investigations into 3,000 cases of children around the world who claimed to remember past lives, and you dismiss them glibly as "men, whatever their academic qualifications, are just another example of otherwise intelligent men pursuing metaphysical explanations for observations they can't currently otherwise explain."
What insufferable arrogance you exhibit!!!
Since you are so quick to stereotype and condemn anyone who questions your totally inflexible atheism, any further discussion with you about this issue would obviously be futile.
.......
Thanks Tink. Yes, the Buddhists are strong believers in reincarnation, as are the followers of Eckankar. The Jain Monks even go as far as sweeping ants off their path, and wearing gauze face masks so they don't accidentally inhale and kill insects. That sounds a little extreme, although I must confess I also try to avoid walking on ants and breathing in insects so maybe I'm a reincarnated Jain Monk
. If so, I'm failing dismally because I have no hesitation killing things that invade and threaten my house.The Bible talks about Jesus returning to Earth and I seem to remember reading (or hearing) that Christians will be "raised from the dead" at some stage, but I stand to be corrected if wrong about that. The Bible calls it "resurrection" but I suppose that could be considered a form of reincarnation, don't you think? I'd better not go any further here otherwise I'll be accused of the heinous crime of proselytism.
Bunyip, congratulations for beating your leukemia. It sounds like you used a technique similar to that Dr. Ian Gawler used and you are one of the lucky ones who have survived the disease.
I think I understand where you're coming from. Thirty years ago, my mother developed leukemia and for the final few years of her life I lived immediately next door to her and witnessed her daily battle for survival, which sadly she lost. That was my first encounter with the death of a loved one and how I wish I could go back in time and change a few things! A guy said in a recent movie, "Sometimes we don't appreciate what we've got until we lose it", or words to that effect. How VERY true!!!
In addition to her conventional medical treatment, she tried every tactic available to beat it, including brewing and consuming some of the foulest tasting herbal concoctions I've ever encountered. Her efforts paid off and she seemed to be winning the battle until one day her doctor prescribed a blood "top up".
She acquired an infection (early 80s ... HIV, hep C?) and was given a powerful antibiotic which destroyed her hearing in both ears, after which she gave up the fight. At that stage I started to become an atheist.
For about three months, my sister and I took it in turns to sit beside her bed in hospital each night until closing time and give her what comfort we could. Initially we communicated via written notes, then the disease destroyed her vision so we tried maintaining communication by writing with our fingers on her hand and arm. That quickly became too tiring for her so the only option left was to hold her hand and squeeze it to indicate yes or no to her comments and questions.
For three to four hours every second night, I sat beside her and watched a much loved mother waste away as the insidious disease slowly destroyed her until she was little more than a skeleton. I vividly remember her wasted corpse lying on the hospital bed just a few hours after she passed away. One of the nurses had thoughtfully placed a red rose on her chest.
Four months later, I was sitting beside her brother, my much loved uncle, when he exhaled his last breath and died of a cancer. That was an eerie experience.
I disagree with your view of God and I am thankful that, to date, I have enjoyed excellent health and a relatively excellent life but I'm fully aware that at any moment, it could all go horribly pear shaped (like my current physique) but while my mind and body continue to function as normal, I'm thankful. I believe that being thankful to someone (your choice) is good for the mind.
While on the subject of "known unknowns", some years ago I attended a seminar on stock market cycles and it was suggested that cycles also exist in our lives (in addition to the obvious reproductive cycles) but we never bother to look for them. Recently, I decided to investigate this idea and dug out every piece of documentary history I had including photos, bank statements, etc and put the information onto a spreadsheet and then, as objectively as possible, went looking for my cycles. I found them, and I suggest that it's quite an interesting exercise if you can be bothered.
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Captive, slave, bondage etc. (in the context of one's thoughts and actions) are terms that I think aptly apply to the religious and their unjustified strong belief in religious myth and superstition. Such faith based confidence in the existence of supernatural beings as depicted in iron-age scrolls and other fantastic claims therein causes many to order their lives according to the edicts written in these texts and, as mentioned previously, susceptible to all manner of deception and faulty reasoning (as you have demonstrated here time after time). Of course many religious types dismiss the notion that they are captive to superstition and religious dogma but the things that say and do in response to religious teachings clearly reveal lives of religious servitude.
Let me help you out here, atheism is a state of non-belief on the basis of lack of credible evidence. As to the question of so called "research" on reincarnation, if compelling evidence was presented on its existence it would be a very uncomfortable revelation for Christians in particular and throw their faith into turmoil. In contrast, I would find it quite interesting.
What I am inflexible about is the importance of evidenced based belief. I don't condemn the religious for disagreeing with me or questioning my logic or conclusions but unlike them I don't believe such disagreement has any consequences for my eternal soul.
It is generally true that discussion about the fallacies of religion with someone who is thoroughly indoctrinated in religious dogma is futile. Such minds are not just closed, they are conditioned and continuously programmed to believe they have sole possession of absolute truth and only by believing certain things and living in a certain way will you be able to join them in eternal servitude to their particular celestial dictator(s). This is more than just arrogance, it's a breeding ground for the insanity we see playing out in our world today where people are killing each other (and themselves) over disagreement about competing claims in magic books.
Here’s an interesting question that I wonder if religious types have ever thought about.....
If this place called heaven exists (and I maintain there’s no credible evidence that it does), and if all the good and godly people end up there, how the heck are you all going to get on together?
We all know people who we simply don’t like - they may be of good character but they’re just not our type. Fortunately we don’t have to live with them. Different story though if we end up in this place called heaven – there’s bound to be some personality clashes if we’re lumped in with folks who are simply not our type.
And it’s going to be mighty crowded, given that billions of good people are supposedly living there already, and the overcrowding problem will be worsening each day due to many thousands of new arrivals.
Eternal paradise in heaven? One big happy family? I wouldn’t be so sure – even if heaven turns out to be for real.
I once corresponded briefly with a very religious bloke who told me he was looking forward to heading up to heaven when he dies, to ‘sit at the right hand of God the father, and help him run his kingdom’.
I suggested to him that this heaven might be a mighty crowded place, maybe there would be many people there who weren’t his type, and there’d be so much competition for God’s attention that he’d be unlikely to even see God, let alone sit beside him and help him to run the show.
I never heard from him again after that – either he found my suggestions too confronting, or he wrote me off as a heretic who was beyond salvation and unworthy of his time.
If this place called heaven exists (and I maintain there’s no credible evidence that it does), and if all the good and godly people end up there, how the heck are you all going to get on together?
We all know people who we simply don’t like - they may be of good character but they’re just not our type. Fortunately we don’t have to live with them. Different story though if we end up in this place called heaven – there’s bound to be some personality clashes if we’re lumped in with folks who are simply not our type.
And it’s going to be mighty crowded, given that billions of good people are supposedly living there already, and the overcrowding problem will be worsening each day due to many thousands of new arrivals.
Eternal paradise in heaven? One big happy family? I wouldn’t be so sure – even if heaven turns out to be for real.
I once corresponded briefly with a very religious bloke who told me he was looking forward to heading up to heaven when he dies, to ‘sit at the right hand of God the father, and help him run his kingdom’.
I suggested to him that this heaven might be a mighty crowded place, maybe there would be many people there who weren’t his type, and there’d be so much competition for God’s attention that he’d be unlikely to even see God, let alone sit beside him and help him to run the show.
I never heard from him again after that – either he found my suggestions too confronting, or he wrote me off as a heretic who was beyond salvation and unworthy of his time.
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What God really meant when he created homo sapiens.
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Yes! Oliphant is awesome!!
Bunyip, perhaps you should ask this guy:
http://www.newsweek.com/proof-heaven-doctors-experience-afterlife-65327
In an article, titled 'The Prophet' in the August 2013 issue of Esquire, contributing editor Luke Dittrich claims to have found inaccuracies in Dr. Alexander’s story. You have to pay to read it but there's a brief summary here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eben_Alexander_(author)
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...k-debunked-doctor-treated-seven-day-coma.html
A real experience or a meaningless hallucination? You decide.
Trainspotter, see ... even Oliphant understands that intelligent design and evolution work conjointly
.I'll go with the latter.
Bunyip, have you ever compared the evolution of computerized robots to the evolution of life? The element Silicon is chemically similar to Carbon and there are some interesting similarities between how both life forms have and are evolving, including the concepts of "intelligent design" and "evolution by selection" working conjointly.
Robots have hardware bodies and software operating systems just as we have organic bodies and minds/souls/whatever. If the robot's computer brain or body malfunctions and dies, the software can be transferred from one body to another ... the silicon version of reincarnation perhaps?
Have you seen what Honda's Asimo is capable of lately?
Soon we will have intelligent drones to deliver our pizzas and parcels.
The US military is currently working on autonomous killer robots.
3D printers are evolving that can print with stainless steel and other metals in addition to plastic.
Probably in the not too distant future, completely autonomous intelligent automatons may evolve that will be able to reproduce themselves inside 3D printers, and then the silicon based artificial life form will be complete.
If they then acquire consciousness and chat amongst themselves one day, I wonder who they will consider to be their God? Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Linus Torvalds, maybe someone else, ... or will they ignore all of the "ancient texts" etc. and decide that they evolved from a primitive semiconductor diode that spontaneously assembled itself in a sand pit somewhere?
No Chris, I haven't, but I'm surprised to hear a Christian like you talking about the 'evolution of life'.
The element Silicon is chemically similar to Carbon and there are some interesting similarities between how both life forms have and are evolving, including the concepts of "intelligent design" and "evolution by selection" working conjointly.
Robots have hardware bodies and software operating systems just as we have organic bodies and minds/souls/whatever. If the robot's computer brain or body malfunctions and dies, the software can be transferred from one body to another ... the silicon version of reincarnation perhaps?
Have you seen what Honda's Asimo is capable of lately?
Soon we will have intelligent drones to deliver our pizzas and parcels.
The US military is currently working on autonomous killer robots.
3D printers are evolving that can print with stainless steel and other metals in addition to plastic.
Probably in the not too distant future, completely autonomous intelligent automatons may evolve that will be able to reproduce themselves inside 3D printers, and then the silicon based artificial life form will be complete.
If they then acquire consciousness and chat amongst themselves one day, I wonder who they will consider to be their God? Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Linus Torvalds, maybe someone else, ... or will they ignore all of the "ancient texts" etc. and decide that they evolved from a primitive semiconductor diode that spontaneously assembled itself in a sand pit somewhere?
To be honest I'm not all that interested. I'm just a pretty laid back sort of a bloke who's thankful for my life and the world I live in, and I try to make the most of it.
How we got here, how our world got here, where we're going - I find all that stuff pretty boring. As far as I'm concerned I got here because my parents had the ability and the desire to reproduce. I don't know where/how/why they got that ability, but I'm pleased they did.
As for where we're going - who knows, but I'm not going to make assumptions based on age old beliefs that are not backed by credible evidence, and are written in a book that's full of contradictions and hypocrisy and double standards.
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Just a thought ..... If God created the universe and everything in it and loves us all like we are his children why did He create our main light source to give us skin cancer?
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I was peeling onions this morn.
This thought occurred to me.
God does exist ... and she is a comedienne!
This thought occurred to me.
God does exist ... and she is a comedienne!
Good question!Just a thought ..... If God created the universe and everything in it and loves us all like we are his children why did He create our main light source to give us skin cancer?
Also, why did he create irresistibly delicious foods that make us fat and give us heart attacks?
Why didn't he give us a digestive system that just takes what it needs from what we put into our mouths and passes everything else through to the other end?
Why didn't he make our teeth from stainless steel?
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Now you are just being silly ! That is a freedom of choice matter. Adam did have a choice to not take a bite of the apple remember. I am suggesting we do not have a choice to be on this planet with a great big orange thing in the sky burning our skin. Or is it Gods why of saying we have a choice to wear clothes? Hmmmmmm ???
So many "known unknowns". ... Does "ozone hole" ring a bell?
An interesting documentary for those interested: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgOBfCrxS3U
Cameron, ever since he was just a toddler, talks about another family he used to live with, called the Robertsons. Cameron knows the names of his previous family, where they lived, and can even describe the house and the landscape of his previous home on the island of Barra, some 200 miles away. But Cameron has never been there. Doctor Jim Tucker, of the University of Virginia, and Cameron's mother travel to Barra with Cameron to find the house, exactly as Cameron described.
This six-year-old boy is called Cameron Macaulay. He is not much different from other boys of his age. What differentiates him from others is that he likes to talk about his "old mum", his former family and a white house standing on the bay. But none of them is related to his current life. The place he is talking about is a place where he had never been in this life and is on the Isle of Barra, 160 miles away from where he is living now. These things make Cameron's mother feel worried.
Cameron spoke about his former parents, how his dad died, and about his brothers and sisters in the previous life. He also said that his "old mum" was the one in his previous life. Cameron believes that he has a previous life and he worries that the family in his previous life misses him. His nursery school teacher told Norma all the things Cameron was saying about the Isle of Barra and how he misses his mummy and his brothers and sisters there.
He didn't - these foods are the pies and cakes and pizzas and sugary drinks that are made in factories.
There are many delicious foods that help you to stay slim and avoid heart attacks and many other diseases – most vegetables and most fruits fall into this category.
We already have the efficient digestive systems you describe, but we cause them to malfunction by overloading them with excessive amounts of fats and sugars that they were never designed to handle.
No need for stainless steel teeth - tooth decay was unheard of in primitve cultures who ate the natural foods that humans were designed to handle.
Perhaps I should have worded the underlined section as 'that humans were designed - or evolved - to handle.'
Of course I was.
I thought the stainless steel teeth would be the clue.-------
Bunyip, I don't know if you bothered to watch the documentary: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgOBfCrxS3U
If not, there's a summary here: http://www.ianlawton.com/cpl2.htm
One of Dr. Ian Stevenson's papers titled "Birthmarks and Birth Defects Corresponding to Wounds on Deceased Persons" is reproduced here: http://www.childpastlives.org/library_articles/birthmark.htm
If there's a simple logical explanation for all of this, I'm keen to hear it.
The physicists have been hypothesizing about multiple universes and string theory and now they're telling us that the universe is just a hologram! http://www.nature.com/news/simulations-back-up-theory-that-universe-is-a-hologram-1.14328
I don't know about you but I believe our universe is far, far more complicated than we like to think it is and anything is possible.
Don't forget, creation and evolution work conjointly. Eg. people invent (create) things then the "things" evolve and mutate due to natural laws of supply and demand, etc.
Our "things" ... societies, governments, laws, weapons, vehicles, etc. have all been created and have evolved over time. If creation and evolution work conjointly with our creations, why not with life?