Such insect's probably aren't as strange as you might think, it's possible they've adapted to look like things from their environment, it's just the environment is constantly changing as those things they adapted to look like are probably now extinct (which doesn't give much hope for their species)
The religion subfora is being shaken up a bit, a new muslim mod is flipping tables, causing dust and cobwebs to fly in the air. It's a good time to come back to sciforums for me, though I can't really afford it yet. Hope when I get the time to come back here s/he wouldn't have burned out already.
We have a Muslim mod?... Who might that be?... I have been here almost 4 years, haven't noticed. Not that it matters, just curious.
we don't? am not definite. I'm talking about syne. who's very professional and getting the grasp of things quick, playing by the book and cleaning up town by putting the baddies in jail, when they thought they were immune from it for so long. though considering how thorough and dedicated he is, i'm have this gut feeling that he won't last long, he'll get saturated eventually. man how many muslim posters(and i'm sure christian too) have come and left dreaming of this moment of social equality..
S.A.M. used to be a moderator here, but either she resigned the position or else she was forced out because she liked to get down in the mud with the rest of us. Ah now see, the beauty of the atheist position is there's no need to have a team. If you could take two people from completely different societies and cultures who've never met a Muslim before, and have them both independently deduce the contents of the Quran, there would be a lot less doubters in the world.
great experiment. though I don't think that'd accomplish much, i guess a person growing alone on an island would eventually believe in god. but after they do, that won't be enough, personal proof or experiences don't count.
If two people isolated from all contact independently came to believe in a supernatural deity, that doesn't prove much of anything other than people tending to be gullible. If they both came to believe in a specific deity and described its rules and characteristics in a virtually identical manner, and gave a nearly identical history for how this being created everything and revealed itself to humanity through a specific prophet, then it would be extremely difficult to pass that all off as a lucky coincidence. There are plenty of people around the world who've independently deduced the same atheistic conclusions throughout history, and it continues to happen all the time to this day. On the other hand, all the stories about a prophet named Mohammed originate from one specific place, you don't hear about any Aztecs or Navajo or Maoris possessing the same story in their historical records.
Maori got some nice ananga jade though, and the Aztec had imperial green jadeite, also quite nice. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! I recall that she said she had graduated from university, was seeking full time employment and had a couple of solid prospects. While I used to enjoy those little tit - tats with her Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!, as the parent of a university student :itold: I could appreciate her graduating and getting a job.
indeed, but they'd have to meet that prophet. but the same abrahamic god you do, how probable is it that that's a lie?
I actually miss her too..SciForums "wonder woman "... Last I heard, she was about to have a baby, and disappeared... I guess that was some 2 years ago... I wish her well.
last i remember she got offended for some reason and left. she seemed in full mental capacity and speaks of genuine direct experiences with god, which i'd like to explore more with her. very nice and civil person too.
Well in order for two separate people to arrive at virtually identical atheistic conclusions, no miraculous encounters are required. Indeed, it is the mutual lack of such encounters and the lack of evidence for other peoples' claims of encounters that lead to this position. You see plenty of people from different societies and cultures reaching similar or identical conclusions when making atheistic arguments, but when it comes to prophets and Islam, apparently Mohammed and Allah didn't feel that it was worth making their existence blatantly obvious to all of humanity in order to usher in world peace, and that's why all the stories about Mohammed come from one original location. The Christian, Jewish and Muslim gods have different rules and different characteristics. It only becomes the same "Abrahamic" god when one of the three religions is trying to appeal for common ground in order to rationally justify swallowing up the other religions' followers. "You've got Jesus? Well hallelujah, we've got Jesus too!" There's no coincidence there anyhow, because first the Jewish tales were based on the existing beliefs of other cultures in the region, then Christianity emerged from within a segment of early Jewish society, and finally Islam emerged to absorb the tales and followers of Judaism and Christianity throughout the middle east. Now find me solid evidence of the Abrahamic god revealing himself to ancient aboriginals on a distant continent. I reckon Mormonism would be the only "evidence" you could appeal to, and that only counts as evidence if you accept a single random dude's 19th century writings as indisputable fact (Mormonism flies directly in the face of Islam anyhow). Once again, there's no "team atheism", teams are for religions and the accompanying fairy tales people make up to support them; by contrast, atheism isn't a cult with a central prophet telling people what to believe.
what to believe? I would argue 'how to behave' the ppl worshiping that prophet are the ones telling ppl what to believe. this is logical from my perspective, I mean look at the Law.(legislated Law) the Law tells us how to behave(or how not to), if we do not behave that way we will get penalized. but the law doesn't tell us what to believe, its the judges/police/authorities that tell us what to believe: believe the law is in your best interest and is right and justified. 'because its the Law' was never an end answer to me. funny, the Legislated Law was created to enforce certain behaviors or non-behaviors, so apparently Gods laws were not enough..<oops..no.. wrong perspective.. > the fact that we can choose to ignore Gods laws should be evidence for 'free will' which is funny because if we can choose to disobey Gods law, how much more so do we have the freedom to disobey legislated law. what were we talking about again?
The "religious" laws were created for societies as well, only thousands of years ago. And societies change, and usually the law follows, with new laws, old laws seldom get scrapped though. (then again, even though some laws still give you the right to marry your horse, i doubt anyone realy manages to exercise this right ) What is most interesting though, is how a thread, where the opening post only contained a vague jab at the forums/members, seems to hold the most intelligent discussion compared to any average/scientific thread.
