REAL debate thread for RELIGION

[jerseydevil]

Originally Posted by RÃ*an

But IMO, the question is important enough to make a decision about, based on whatever evidence we DO have, and personally, I think the existing evidence strongly points to the God as described in the Bible being the one that actually exists. And personally, I think the case for atheism and agnosticism (as I have heard them presented) is comparatively weak.

How can the argument for agnosticism be weak? It merely says they have no idea one way or the other. It's only religious people or atheists that believe one way or the other. Niether atheist or theist is proveable - so regardless - agnosticism logically makes the most sense.

[jerseydevil]

Originally Posted by RÃ*an

Here is a link to the evidence I see and my analysis of it:

link

We can't measure a rock and determine if God exists or not, but IMO, the question is a very important one, and we have to make judgements based on the type of evidence we DO have. Please note that I say "evidence" and not "proof". Obviously the question of God's existence can't be "proved" either way! And if we think that a god exists, we can't "prove" which description, if any, fits.

I thought it was something new. Already seen those. And this is getting really bad rian. Now you are post links to post that link to posts.

[Rían]

You asked the question, JD, and I was kind enough to answer you.

I didn't want to re-type in all those posts - do you blame me? Would you prefer that I copy them all over here?

If you've already seen them and don't agree with them, then fine

[Rían]

(since links ARE very irritating, here's a copy of my posts )

My opening post was about how I became a Christian when I was quite young. However, on Entmoot I am talking to older people, and I think that they would rightly require more to go on if they want to think about Christianity. So here's what I think today:

First question to consider : Does a god exist?

First off, I think it is reasonable thing for a person to at least consider whether or not any evidence indicates a god exists (not proves - it's impossible to prove either that god exists or god doesn't exist!) To me, I think it is ENTIRELY reasonable, as indeed the majority of people in the world have concluded, that it is a reasonable possibility, and it should be investigated. I think this for several reasons.

A. I think it is NOT mere coincidence that SO many people (indeed, I would say the vast majority of whom we have any type of record), across time and cultures, have STRONGLY felt that SOME type of a god exists, and that there is some type of afterlife, and that the god is interested in their actions in some way. I think that we find, here on earth, that all our desires have a corresponding reality. IOW, we are hungry - and there is food. We desire fellowship - and there are other people around us. We desire beauty - and there is beauty around us. And there is overwhelming evidence that the vast majority of people desire a god - I think it is not illogical to conclude that there is very likely a corresponding reality there, too.

B. I look at the alternative, which is atheism. I take atheism, assume it is true, and make logical deductions from it. One of them is that people are necessarily entirely without value, because they are accidental products of mindless processes, IF the atheistic worldview is true. Yet I see, over and over again, that people EVERYWHERE do NOT act as if this is true; in fact, they act quite the opposite way! We all have a STRONG sense of right and wrong and of justice. This would NOT make sense if people were not valuable! This is one of the strongest indicators for me that a god might exist. If a logical deduction drawn from a premise can be shown to be false, then the premise must be false!

C. Another interesting indicator - Freud thought that if you break from reality, it is a harmful thing to your mental (and therefore physical, too)health. Personally, I think he's right, and we can see this around us. Freud was no fan of religion, and thought that belief in God was a sign of mental illness - he called it "universal obsessional neurosis". So one would think, if he was right that God is not real, that people that believe in a god would be LESS healthy, mentally and physically. Yet over and over, in scientific study after scientific study, we find the exact OPPOSITE to be true - belief in God is one of the most consistent indicators of overall health and happiness! There is study after study that shows that religious beliefs go with a much lower rate of things like suicide, drug abuse and depression, and even that religious beliefs correlate with higher sexual satisfaction Religious beliefs even tend to shorten recovery time from surgery!

Anyway, these are some of the indicators that I think are strong enough to make a thinking person continue in the evaluation.

(con't after I pick up the kiddos from school)


refpost

[Rían]

SO - to continue my evaluation, I'll move to the final few things that to me, indicate that a god might exist.

D. The incredible balance of the universe - to me, this is a strong indicator of an intentional design; hence, a designer. The more we find out thru science, the more complex and intricate we find things are. In fact, many things are compared to machines, which also have designers. Just the tiniest little difference in millions of factors would make the universe unstable. Again, this doesn't PROVE that a god exists, but I think it is a very strong indicator that a god MIGHT exist.

E. The incredible beauty of the universe - it seems to me that beauty is scattered everywhere across the universe. And it also seems to me, and appears to seem to others, that there is inherent value in beauty itself - NOT as merely tied into preservation of the species. I see such beauty in the stars, in flowers, in the myriad shades of green in trees and grass; in the ocean, in the clouds; in the sound of birds and the whisper of wind in the trees; in the breathtaking power and beauty of a horse and the comedy of a rolly-polly bug; and most of all, in the incredible beauty - physical AND in the soul - of people. How lovely a woman is! and how breathtaking a man! And together - wow! And the beauty of their SOULS - laughter, courage, love, friendship ... to me, this indicates meaning - which indicates intent - which indicates an intender - which indicates a god.

And the opposite also indicates intent - why do we mourn when a beautiful forest is mowed down to make way for an ugly shopping center? Why do we fight to save a beautiful species, such as the California Condor, from extinction? Why do courageous people make a stand in the face of danger to save others? If there is nothing that made us, then we are necessarily accidental products of mindless processes, and there is no meaning in chance.

So that's a brief summary of why I think it is reasonable to think that a god might exist.

What is the evidence to support the opposite opinion; i.e., that a god does NOT exist? Well, I would say that there is much sorrow and pain and waste and apparently chance happenings that goes on, and on first thought, this indicates that there is no god, or there is a god that doesn't give a rip about what he/she/it made. Yet I think the very fact that we label it sorrow and pain and waste indicates that we think of it as a bad thing - which implies values - which, as I said before, implies a god.

SO - I think it's entirely reasonable to think there's a god, and I think it is LESS reasonable to think there is NOT a god.

And next, I'll move on to Christianity, and why I think it is a worldview which accurately describes the actual reality of the universe. But I may not get to this until Monday - depends how the weekend goes And then any final questions, and I'll hop off the VERY warmed-up seat and let someone else go! (your analogy of the heated Volvo seat after a ski day was perfect, Nurvi!)

(con't)

[Rían]

(con't)

OK - here's hopefully the last major post on why I believe what I believe. The previous biggie post was why I think it is an entirely reasonable thing to believe that a God might exist. Now, given that, I think it's a reasonable thing to investigate the various reports that the human race makes about Him. (Of course, He could exist but not want to be discovered, but that will look the same, to us, as if He didn't exist.)

What I'll do here is summarize why I believe my own particular set of beliefs, just to save time. If anyone is interested, I can summarize the problems I've found with other beliefs.

As I said in my first post, I grew up attending a church, and was somewhat familiar with the Bible. I made a decision to become a Christian myself when I was about 12. At that time, I couldn't have disussed doctrine and history and compare Christianity with other beliefs - I just knew it clicked with something in my heart, and it made sense to me, and I chose to accept it and change the direction of my life. And I have never regretted it (except when I get abused for my beliefs, but I still don't regret making the decision, because I still think it is true.) But thru the years, I have put in a lot of study and thought in this area, as is right and appropriate, IMO, and it makes even MORE sense and jives even MORE with my heart. So I'll share, now, why I continue to believe that Christianity is a statement that reflects the actual reality of the universe and beyond.

Atheism is a worldview that does NOT have any accepted writings, so one cannot evaluate atheism against accept written doctrine. Christianity, however, claims that the Bible is the inspired word of God, and the tenets of Christianity are in the Bible, and therefore it is entirely appropriate to evaluate the Bible as a piece of historical literature when considering the truth claims of Christianity. And when one does that, it's in a class by itself, right at the very top, by all standard of ancient literature.

I think there's a coupla questions that should be asked about the Bible, starting with :

1. Do we know that what we have now is what was actually written?

I think it was Elfhelm who mentioned something like perhaps the miraculous things were added in hundreds of years later, to jazz things up a bit. This is a good question, and one that can be investigated. Did it "grow" over time, like the Paul Bunyan legend? There prob. was a guy named Paul Bunyan who was tall, but the tale kept growing! So let's look at the documents we have.

There's 3 things that historians look at when dealing with ancient literature and its authenticity (is it really what was originally written) :

1. What is the earliest copy in existence? (how much time between when it was originally written and the earliest copy?)
2. How many manuscripts do you have?
3. How do they vary among each other?

Here's some examples of the norm for ancient literature:

Aristotle - wrote in 340 BC - earliest copy in 1100 AD (1400 years from when originally written) - 5 copies.

Caesar - history of Gallic Wars written in 50 BC - earliest copy 1000 AD (1000 years from when originally written) - 9 copies.

The king of manuscripts, besides the Bible, is:
Homer, Iliad, written around 800 BC, earliest copy 2nd/3rd century (1000 years after originally written) - 650 full/partial copies.

Now the New Testament - and these are just simple facts! -
New Testament - completed in 90 AD (Jesus died in 33 AD), earliest fragments appear less than 100 years later (that's ONE HUNDRED - I did NOT drop a zero!) from John 18 - word for word what we have today.

By the end of the 2nd century, we have the ENTIRE gospel of Luke, the ENTIRE gospel of John, and 1st and 2nd Peter and Jude.

By the end of the 3rd century, we have COMPLETE MANUSCRIPTS in Greek of EVERY book in the New Testament (we're still nowhere NEAR the 1000 years between original and copies of the other ancient documents).

By 900 years, which is 100 years EARLIER than the BEST evidence for other ancient literature - there are 5000 manuscripts of the New Testament. Five THOUSAND (compared to 650 of the Iliad, the next closest). Right now, we have about 24 THOUSAND manuscripts.

And the variance between manuscripts is less than one-half of one percent.

Think about this. In terms of authenticity of ancient literature, that's astounding.

My reasonable conclusion - what we have now is what was actually written.


N.B. - As far as variances - you'll hear some high numbers, but you need to analyze them and realize that the numbers will be high because of the sheer amount of manuscripts! For example, if one word is spelled wrong in 10,000 of the New Testament manuscripts, it will count as 10,000 variants. If one word is spelled wrong in the Iliad, at the most it will count as 650 variants. And also, in the Greek language, position of words does NOT matter! In English, "man bites dog" and "dog bites man" are very different; in the Greek, the subject is still the subject no matter where it is in the sentence, so a variant might occur, but WITHOUT ANY change in the meaning of the sentence, which is what matters.

(con't)

[Rían]

(Summary post - con't)

So while the information described above about the authenticity of the NT as ancient literature doesn't prove that the NT is true, it seems to prove, beyond any reasonable doubt, that the Bible that we currently have is just the same as it was written. IOW, it is NOT a tale that has grown in the telling, like Paul Bunyan; the miracles were NOT added hundreds of years later to spiff it up a bit. This is an important thing to establish, IMO, before considering the next question -

2. Do I think it is true?

I think there are several areas that an intelligent person should consider.

Again, there are some important points when considering if any piece of ancient literature is likely to be true; things like were the accounts from eyewitnesses and is there any corroborating evidence.

There are lots of pertinent sentences in the NT about eyewitnesses. Luke's whole gospel was specifically said to have been written in order to preserve eyewitness accounts. He talked to eyewitnesses, and he himself was also an eyewitness of many things. In 2nd Peter, Peter talks about how they didn't just follow tales, but they were eyewitnesses of what happened. Now those are specific claims for eyewitness accounts, but there are a ton of secondary ones. When the apostles were preaching, they spoke to people who were alive when Jesus was, and the apostles referenced things that were general knowledge about Jesus. In Peter's speech at Pentecost, he refers to the miracles that were done "in your midst". When Paul is talking with King Agrippa, he refers to the king's personal knowledge of the events surrounding Jesus, and says that "this has not been done in a corner". And when Jesus was brought before Herod, Herod was glad to see Jesus, because he was hoping to see some of the miracles he had heard about! IOW, it was NOT like the apostles were saying, "Jesus does cool things, but it's only when He is around us - we'll just TELL you guys about the miracles, but you can't see any!" It was general knowledge, because these things were done in the open, in front of hundreds of people.

Now some people have objected to the healing miracles, like they were just thought to be miracles because the people were ignorant, or they were miracles like the "miracles" we see on tv *gag*. However, frankly, I think people that make this objection are not really thinking things thru - I think it's usually a second-hand objection picked up from others, because if one looks at the TYPES of healing, you can see this objection doesn't hold any water. The healing miracles that Jesus did were instantaneous and highly visible, and they were always on people that were known by the locals. For example - the man born blind. Jesus healed him, and the neighbors and his parents knew that he had been blind - it wasn't just some guy that no one knew and who faked being blind. The Pharisees were investigating it, and talked to people that KNEW they guy, and KNEW and SAW that he had been blind since birth. Also Jesus healed lepers - I'm sorry, I don't think a person would fake leprosy for years and years. And the woman with the hemmorage - she had it for years, and had spent all her money on doctors - again, not a set-up - a local person with an ailment that lasted for years. Anyway, people can say I think the whole thing is made up, but I don't think they can say it was faked.

To continue with the eyewitness thing - so there are claims to eyewitness accounts of, for example, the healings. And what makes a credible eyewitness? If the rest of the story checks out in the details. Luke, the physician, is so incredibly accurate - for example, he names 32 countries, 54 cities, and 9 islands with complete accuracy. There have been some things that Luke mentioned but had not been heard of, and were later discovered, and Luke was exactly right. There has NEVER been any detail that has been found to be WRONG in Luke. Even the Lysanias tetrarch detail - I found out some more info, that there were TWO Lysanias's, and inscriptions have been found to support this. One said "Lysanias, tetrarch of Abilene, 14 - 26 AD", which is EXACTLY when Luke said he was!

Another test about eyewitnesses is if they had anything to gain from lying. People have pointed out before that 10 of the 11 apostles died a violent death which COULD have been avoided if they recanted. But there is NO record of them EVER changing their story, even after torture. Now some people say that other people have died for their beliefs in other religions, but that does NOT bear on this issue - we're talking about EYEWITNESSES who died for what they claim to have seen, not just people who believe but were not eyewitnesses, like the 9/11 murderers. So as far as eyewitnesses, this fact makes them extremely credible.

So the NT accounts have been claimed to have come from eyewitnesses, and eyewitnesses of the most reliable kind, and these things were written down during the LIFETIME of hundreds of eyewitnesses, and Christianity was growing during the lifetime of eyewitnesses. And these eyewitnesses appealed to many other people who were also eyewitnesses, and the general knowledge of Jesus and his doings, which could have been refuted by people in the area. And Josephus, the famous historian, refers to the miracles of Jesus. The NT was written in the lifetime of witnesses, and Christianity grew like crazy at that time - it's pretty logical to assume that if it were not true, LOTS of people could have spoken against it and squashed the movement in its infancy.

Again, not PROOF - but strong indication. And as far as the 4 gospels, and how they stand together as eyewitness testimony, Simon Greenleaf of Harvard Law School said this : "There is enough of a discrepency to show that there could have been no previous concert among them; and at the same time such substantial agreement as to show that they all were independent narrators of the same great transaction." And he has also concluded that the kind of evidence, and the way it's listed, would make the resurrection stand as fact in "any English-speaking court of law in the world."

So again - not proof, but certainly something ANY reasonable person could consider and decide that it's true, IMO.


(con't)

[Rían]

(con't)

A coupla more angles on the question "Is it true" and a related one, "Is it God's word?"

I think a pretty cool thing is how the Bible is timeless. It talks about ancient things, but the teachings are timeless. And one would think that the word of God would be that way. A very interesting example is the medical stuff in the Bible. In the time of Moses, the most advanced medical journal was probably the Papyrus Ebers (sp?) of Egypt. In this medical journal, it says things like to save victims of a poisonous snake bite, give them magic water that's been poured over an idol. For embedded splinters, apply a mixture of worms' blood and donkey dung. And these types of things would be reasonable to expect from a human source.

Now as far as the Bible, which is claimed to be inspired by God - one would expect that God would know medical things and not discover them at the same time as we do. What does the Bible say about people with contageous diseases? Quarantine them. What do we do today? Quarantine them.

A doctor in Venice in 1840, Dr. Semmelwise, followed the standard practice of the hospital he worked at : arrive at hospital, perform autopsies, go upstairs without washing, perform prenatal exams. Now there was a terrible mortality rate - they didn't know about washing hands. Dr. S. suggested that perhaps the doctors just dip their hands in a bowl of water after the autopsies, and he was laughed out of the hospital. Now what did the Bible say about what to do after handling dead bodies, thousands of years earlier? Wash clothing, wash hands in running water! And in the Mishna, which are commentaries on the Bible, it goes even further - after washing hands in running water, don't towel off - hold your hands in the air and let the water drip off the elbows. Remind you of E.R. or MASH? It should!

Another area - if the Bible is the word of God, one would think God would know what morals would work, because He made us. Let's take just ONE of the 10 commandments and see if society would be better if it was followed - the one about adultery. If everyone kept the commandment about no adultery (basically, sex is only for a husband and wife), the following would happen - ALL STD's would cease to exist. AIDS would be GONE. Unwanted pregnancies would drop. Single parent homes would drop. Welfare roles would drop. There would be no rape, no incest, no sexual abuse. Well, I'd say that sounds like a better world - perhaps the Bible came from someone that knew what is true!

Finally, one of the biggest indications that the Bible is true is its power of transforming lives. Personally, I could fill post after post with personal stories of how Jesus has transformed my life for the better, over and over again. But this is too long; I think I'll just share a short story that I think illustrates this. There was a pastor, Harry Ironsides, in the early 1900s who was talking to a crowd. An atheist was heckling him and challenging him to a debate on his beliefs. Finally, Mr. Ironsides challenged the heckler back with this : "I'll debate you tomorrow on this condition - you bring with you one alcoholic and one prostitute that have been transformed by the power of your philosophy. I'll bring 50." The heckler never showed up.

Christianity is unique. People try to compare it with other worldviews, but it just doesn't compare. Other religious leaders said "follow me, and I'll show you the way." Jesus said, "I AM the way." Others said, "follow me, and I'll show you truth." Jesus said, "I AM truth." Others said, do what I say, and you'll find God." Jesus said, "I AM God." There is NO other religious leader that made these claims and backed it up with miracles and personal character. (Charles Manson, David Carresh and Jim Jones claimed to be God, IIRC, but didn't support it with miracles or their character.) Jesus's character is the standard for our behavior. Can anyone think of anything Jesus did wrong?

Other religions say "DO this". Jesus said, right before He gave up His life voluntarily on the cross, "It is DONE." And He did it - FOR us. Other religions are man striving towards God. Christianity is God reaching down to man in love.

I can honestly say that over 30 years, I have never found Christianity to fail. Even the little quirky, counterintuitive bits, like it's better to give than receive, are just ... TRUE, when I try them out. And the love of God just staggers my heart. Christianity is NOT a philosophy or a set of rules; it's a relationship with the God that made us and loves us and wants to be with us. When intelligence was my god, my heart cried. Since Jesus has been my Lord, I can't even express how my heart has grown - both in rejoicing and empathy. For me, to deny that Christianity is true would mean denying both my intellect and my heart. And I can't do that with any type of integrity, so I don't intend to.

People here have commented on how what I have presented is logical. Well, after much thought, I have found it to be entirely logical, and this should be the way it is if something is true. And people have commented on how they think I'm kind and things like that - and I tell you guys honestly that God has just grown my heart so much since I accepted him as Lord, and especially over these last 5 or 6 years (I've been praying that God would help me to love others as He loves them for about 6 years now). He has transformed me, and is continuing to transform me. I have so much love and joy in my heart sometimes that it's painful! Yes, I'm still a twerp, too, all too often but I've found that when God shows me error in my life, it's because He plans to heal it!

I don't know how to close - I've just been kinda saying some things at random here - I guess I hope I've shown that it's reasonable to think that God might exist, and it's reasonable to think that Christianity might be true, and that an intelligent person (by the world's standards) can come to this conclusion.

God rocks! and I am filled with love for all of you, and for the God that loves us all. And I have such joy in my heart - yes, I have many sorrows, like all of you do, too, yet I have such joy Joy is NOT dependent upon circumstances, like happiness is; joy is knowing that a loving God loves me and lives in me, and has saved me and is healing me from the sins that had power over me, and nothing gets to me that He has not allowed with his great wisdom and love for a greater purpose, and that I will be with Him for all eternity.

I guess I'll just stop now! It's late. I could say SO much more, but that's probably enough to read for now

[jerseydevil]

Nice spamming rian.

[Rían]

Gee, I just can't win with you Complaints about links, complaints about when I don't link!

[Lief Erikson]

Originally Posted by jerseydevil

Well there you go back to interpretation versus taking the bible at it's word. That's the problem - you can twist the bible to mean anything you want it to really.

It really, really can bother me when people do that. The Bible becomes worthless when it isn't taken at its word. When people don't take it at its word, that is VERY frustrating to me.

However, that said, there are many, many instances where to take something as non-literal is the only way to interpret the scripture as it is meant to be interpreted. This is particularly true with visions. Visions are images people see with their eyes, that God uses to instruct people with. In the Creation account, the description of the days of Creation, man was not around until the sixth day. Hence, man could not have been a personal witness to those earliest events of creation. God must have told them what had happened in some other way.

The Book of Revelation, the awesome portrait we have of the End Times, was given to John in a vision. He saw these things with his own eyes. Visions correspond to reality, just as spiritually delivered dreams can be. However, they are frequently symbolic. For Genesis, the beginning of the world, to be shown to man in the same way as the end of the world has been, makes sense.

For Genesis to have been shown in a vision hence I believe makes a great deal of sense. And just as the Revelation prophecies are amazingly literal in some ways, the Genesis words also are frequently amazingly literal. However, for them to be taken as partially symbolic is perfectly rational and in accord with literal interpretation of the Bible, in view of the fact that Genesis was very possibly delivered through vision and certainly was not an event that mankind was actually around to witness.

[jerseydevil]

Originally Posted by RÃ*an

Gee, I just can't win with you Complaints about links, complaints about when I don't link!

No - it was the amount of your little posts saying....

i just...

...might...

etc etc - each on a new post. Which now you have filled in with all the posts. So it's whatever. You obviously had no idea what I was referring to.

[Rían]

Oh, I see ...

they don't say that anymore

(Lief, you gotta get on AIM or MSN!)

[jerseydevil]

Originally Posted by RÃ*an

SO - to continue my evaluation, I'll move to the final few things that to me, indicate that a god might exist.

It wasn't the links that are so irritaing - why can't you just repost things. I don't mean copy and paste either. I mean restate things. I do it all the time - you don't see me just posting links to the numerous times I explain the constitution there. Nor do I go and I just copy what I have already said - I retype it.

I swear you can't say anything without writing a book.

[Insidious Rex]

Good grief I had something else I wanted to say about Mary Magdalan but that was about 5 hours and 4 pages ago....

[Valandil]

Originally Posted by RÃ*an

How is 1 to the 2017 limited?

Um... I'm a bit rusty with my math, but I think that still equals 1.

Maybe you meant the equation a little differently?

(EDIT: - oh I see... your first time citing it, you gave 10 to the 2017th... WHOLE different number!! )

[Lief Erikson]

Originally Posted by Insidious Rex

Good grief I had something else I wanted to say about Mary Magdalan but that was about 5 hours and 4 pages ago....

When I was going through here today, I posted in response to something on page 67 . Go for it .

Originally Posted by RÃ*an

Lief, you gotta get on AIM or MSN!

Thank-you. (Thinks for a long time) I have no further comment on this .

[Blackheart]

Originally Posted by RÃ*an

including atheism and agnosticism, of course (two VERY "comforting" world views, IMHO )

Atheism might one day become dogmatic. That is a long way off yet.

Agnosticism is a bit less likely to do so. It's hard to proclaim that "this is so" when the central tenant is "I don't know".

Not to mention that neither of those two philosphies makes any moral claims or strictures. I'm sure people will start trying to tack them on eventually, but again it's rather difficult when you are starting from a position rooted in skepticism...

[Blackheart]

Originally Posted by jerseydevil

I personally think it will be more of an individual spiritualism - without the "church" hierarchies we have today.

I would love to agree, however it would ignore all of human history. Humans are political animals. As soon as you get a large enough group of people together with like minded conceptions of "inividual spiritualism", they will form a political group, identify themselves as "us", and everyone else as "them". It's pretty easy to visualize things going downhill from there.

[Earniel]

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

(Gets serious again) There is actually some evidence concerning the massive age span. I posted it for you once before. It takes up about a whole post though, so I don't know if I want to submit it again. I'm not sure it is worth it.

Could you link to it, or tell me where to look for that? I'd be interested in that evidence. (Do it by PM, if you don't want to post it here anymore.)

Originally Posted by RÃ*an

Now down the line, if people migrate and isolate, then the gene pool would become more limited, but that doesn't mean it was originally so. In fact, our ancestors would HAVE to have a more diverse genepool than we have today, wouldn't they? We can't lose characteristics that weren't there to begin with!

Actually, I'm thinking our ancestors must have had a more limited genepool as we do since their populations were more isolated than modern ones. We only have to look at threads here on the Entmoot where people can lay claim to irish, scandinavian, southern european, asian and whatnot heritage all within a few generations. Our gene pool must be more diverse. However, due to the isolation I suppose the genetic differences between different populations must have been greater (Unless that is also your point, that wasn't too clear.).

Originally Posted by RÃ*an

IMO, the species of atheism that goes "I don't believe that God/god/gods exist" is VERY comforting in some very important ways - it removes any idea of a judgement by a holy and righteous and powerful God who cares about how we treat our fellow human beings. Whatever you can get away with here, you've gotten away with! congratulations! - NO ONE will hold you to account for your bad acts that aren't caught, least of all a God that doesn't exist. You can steal with impunity, if you're skilled enough, and there will be no consequences. You can even kill someone with impunity if you're skilled and lucky enough - no consequences! You can lie, cheat, whatever you want, as long as you can cover it up, and you've gotten away with it. IMO, that is a very comforting thought.

I shudder to think about the possibility of this behaviour in people. What you have described here is a real psycho! Just because atheists don't believe in a god doesn't mean they can't have morals (I'll leave in the middle how good ones and how many). Believe me, most of the time the morals you receive from society are more than enough to neutralise/repress any comfort you might have had out of not-believing-in-judging-deities when you commited crimes.

Originally Posted by RÃ*an

What science does show is that at least two genes are responsible for skin color, and that skin color is a function of how much melanin is present. And that two medium-skinned people can produce kids with anything from white to black skin and every shade in between. THAT is what science shows. THAT is directly observable in the present.

The key word being here: at least. You know RÃ*an, I'm not quite sure whether you've grasped genetics wholy... (then again, I only saw the basics in highschool so who am I to say anything?) The amount of melanine in an individual is, as far as I know, not 100% stable during that individual's life. (You can close down all the solariums otherwise.) I remember my lessons on genetica in high school and I remember that certain pink flowers could theoretically have both white and red off-shoots if the right combination of genes is achieved (where the pink is already a bastard of a red- and a white-flowered plant). However I think it is far more complicated among humans. I do not think medium-skinned people can have among their first-generation offspring white, medium-dark and black children. I have yet to see examples of them so I think I'm not wrong in assuming that those would be the exception and not the rule.