Tom Cruise on Scientology

[blueskied]

Yoshi and B-ri have started their own religion.

This one is much better:

http://www.funnyordie.com/videos/3f716ffebe

[Space Pirate Roberts]

But he Died for your sins.

I still dont figure that one out. He was killed by romans 2000ish years ago because I stole a ream of paper from the office last week? How the fuck does that work?

Basically, it works like this. Old Testament God was a bloodthirsty sadistic motherfucker who demanded payment in death for sins, so the early Jews would sacrifice an animal every day, which would cleanse the whole city. That's right, he doesn't necessarily want the sinner's death, just death in general. Now, if an animal is good for a whole city's sins for one day, how much more would a man be worth? And if that man has inside him God's own soul, why, that would buy enough forgiveness to last the whole world forever.

Yes, that's seriously the "logic" behind it.

[Tommy Tallarico]

No, you really have to answer that either way. The trick with C is you get the easy, supernatural out. You're dealing with magical things that shouldn't and couldn't be there either way. I'm sure well past our time, if man goes on long enough, we'll find out quite a bit that came after the initial bang. But that very first thing is something that I honestly think we'll never be able to answer.

So yours is no better than mine and vice versa. The shitty thing is the crusades people go on because of made up orders from the something in theory C. That's when religion gets dumb. That spark at the beginning, however, is anyone's guess and trying to argue that either way is just being pigheaded.

Edit: I should point out that I'm not trying to specifically argue with *you* here, I think everyone in here who thinks they *know* what's up is kind of dumb.

Who said anything about knowing? I've never (outside of trolling) claimed to know definitively what the answers are, and certainly not in this argument. I've only talked about probabilities.

[g0zen]

No one has absolute metaphysical certainty of anything, but no one asks for that anywhere except in grasping defenses of the supernatural. You don't, for example, wake up every morning worried that when you get out of bed you'll fall through the floor and into a wormhole. Why not? You don't know for certain that the floor will always be there, you never will. So why do you act every time you get up like there is a floor and you have nothing to worry? See how silly that sounds?

[Fe 26]

reading this thread, I've found it interesting that many people treat the concept of God and the concept of no god as both being just theories. It seems that the possibility that ancient people actually experienced something to cause them to believe in such things is just ignored. Which seems weird to me considering we live in a world with powerful mind altering drugs, OOBEs, and people that are just plain nuts.

I can understand treating stuff like greek gods like theories, because they never really assert themselves as historical events. However with religions like Christianity and the religions that are part of it, or the ones it came from, there are many assertions that the events described actually happened.

[Othello Harrington]

well I ran across some really big dog shit one day, doesn't mean I assume that a 500 pound k9 exists but I can see how it may fool someone else.

[kingoffighters]

I want to believe in Sauron.

[Othello Harrington]

I want to believe in Tommy Tallarico

[Fe 26]

Basically, it works like this. Old Testament God was a bloodthirsty sadistic motherfucker who demanded payment in death for sins, so the early Jews would sacrifice an animal every day, which would cleanse the whole city. That's right, he doesn't necessarily want the sinner's death, just death in general. Now, if an animal is good for a whole city's sins for one day, how much more would a man be worth? And if that man has inside him God's own soul, why, that would buy enough forgiveness to last the whole world forever.

Yes, that's seriously the "logic" behind it.

this is something I have trouble with. On the surface it seems to tap into the old belief that our life or soul is in our blood. That belief has been abandoned so long must of us don't even think about it, but it was a very real belief and why we have myths like vampires.

Now, if we make the assumption that for some reason the death and rebirth thing still saves even minus the belief in "life blood", I'd like to know how it works.

[Fe 26]

well I ran across some really big dog shit one day, doesn't mean I assume that a 500 pound k9 exists but I can see how it may fool someone else.

See, its stuff like that. Everyone is making the assumption that people back then were really stupid and just made up fabulously god theories on the fly. I don't buy that. Biologist are pretty sure that from fossil records that we are not that much smarter than our ancestors. That if you could find a man from 6000 years ago, he would probably be as intelligent as anyone else. He wouldn't know as much, but he would be able to grasp concepts and think about as well as we do.

I find it interesting that no one is asking about that. What could make someone come up with beliefs about God when no such concept existed before.

What makes a man make a story in his head a belief about reality, and not just something for entertainment like comics or movies or books?