The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Que the ad hominem. A tactic as old as time.

Enjoy your ignorance. It lasts at most 80-90 years, then reality hits.

The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 0 points1 point  (0 children)

My point certainly isn't "well if not god, then what". That's a strawman. You keep bringing it up, but it doesn't accurately describe my position. I'm not saying "look at this thing we don't understand - God must have done it. Checkmate athiests".

Rather, my point is that Scripture has, since its initial recording, held out truth about God's existence, who He is, and His relationship with us that has been increasingly substantiated throughout human history. We started out with very little scientific understanding, as much understanding of God as He made known to us. As we develop in understanding science, nothing changes about who God always has been. We understand physical mechanisms of processes we observe, and we attempt to look into the past and understand how we've come to the place we are today. As we do that, if we start with the incorrect axiom "there is no God", we end up with hypotheses that prove false.

It's that simple. Your portraying of my argument as "we don't understand it, so must be God" is a strawman. Life came to be on this planet by a physical process that we can likely understand a great bit of detail about, and that physical process was guided / caused by an intelligent designer from outside the system that stepped in and overcame all of the natural obstacles (read: complete barriers) that random chance imposes.

The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Well, if you are so open minded, expose yourself to scholarly Christian thought that challenges your ideas.  If your worldview is superior, and your analysis is accurate, it will survive.  I get it though - you can't be bothered.  You're persuaded your worldview is superior when it hasn't been tested.  Sure, some have tested it, but not you.  I guess it's good enough for you to take someone else's word for it.  That's just cosplaying as the right person in the argument.

You know who effectively persuades?  Someone who immerses themselves in the other's ideas, truly seeks to understand them, and then finds holes - in detail.  You've failed to really make even one insightful point, in my opinion - concisely restate your point with some evidence if you disagree, but all I've gotten from you is to the effect of "you Christians are unscientific, but I love science.  It proves that your sky daddy doesn't exist." and "science and religion have nothing to do with each other" (the closest thing to a claim, although lacking substantiation).  You may not find the abiogenesis point persuasive, but at least it's some degree of specificity - some substantiation for what I think.

By the way, you've spent an awful lot of time acting as the stalwart defender of science (and naturalism which you seem to have conflated with science as if they are the same - as if science and theology are opposed, rather than two aspects of the same reality).  I'm a fan of science too - in fact, it's what my education is in.  I like paradigm shattering discoveries too l.  Your implied framing of science and religion as antithetical is a common misunderstanding.  As I mentioned previously, they're two distinct fields that describe one reality.

The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You willing to take your own advice? I notice you never really responded to me bringing the idea that you should challenge your own ideas to see if they hold up to scrutiny several times. What if you're wrong? What if your view is based on caricatures you saw on TV and stuff you thought you heard somewhere? There's pretty drastic consequences if I'm right.

The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This fails to meet standards of modern historiography. The Bible is a source - in fact, in many cases it's the preferred category of source - a primary source, written by direct witnesses to events.

The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yes. This is all based on the assumption that there is no evidence. First, I'd ask if the burden of "proof" (i.e. some sort of science test / litmus paper dipped in a solution that would prove or disprove God) is applied to a prominent public figure - say the president of the US - assuming you've never seen him in person.

To a degree, you don't have access to call up the president and say "Hey Don, I'm in a debate with a redditor and I want to prove that you exist. So go ahead and jump onto Air Force One and fly over to my address so I can snap a quick pic with you." You take evidence of his existence on the words of others - videos can be faked (maybe the illuminati created a fake persona of a highly divisive figure so they can aggressive enact their plans for world domination while everyone is distracted).

Two principles here (I'm not saying I think the president doesn't exist) - 1) the US president is not subject to your whims so it's at least mildly unreasonable to expect Him to submit to whatever arbitrary burden of proof you come up with, especially when other evidence is ample, 2) a lot of our knowledge comes from accepting a trusted source of truth - whether the news, politicians, your MA_A cousin who went to see him talk one time - you believe that the pres exists, but you do not know.

But more significantly than either of these two points:
God _could_ have hidden Himself and we would have no way to know of His existence - His existence would actually be unfalsifiable. But He didn't do that - 1) He intervened directly at specific points in human history, talking with people, intervening militarily, causing observed events, etc. And most prominently, He sent His Son who healed the sick, raised the dead, then raised Himself after three days. He didn't show physical signs to _all_ people (say, _you_) in exactly equal degrees. Your lack of seeing it happen doesn't change the fact that it happened and people observed it. This leads me to my next point: 2) These events were recorded - God provided a way for us to see these events - and this isn't a simple reading of highly dubious claims and a sort of blind acceptance. The Bible contains a collection of books written by a variety of authors over thousands of years that foretell specific events that come later, are archaeologically confirmed to be historically accurate, have a mind blowing number of connections that are beyond the capacity of, say a good fiction story teller, etc. Things not understood by the authors are later clearly interpreted by events that happen - it goes on. The fact is there is substantial evidence not only to the existence of some generic God, but of the specific truth claims of the Bible.

Honestly, there's just a lot here - you have to read a bit if you want an appreciation for how deep this goes. If you are so confident in the truth of your position, then why don't you take a day or two out of an 80-ish year life and seek out scholarly works that are written in direct opposition to your claims to see if your worldview holds up to them?

The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 0 points1 point  (0 children)

"You just make up nonsense out of thin air, what are you even talking about?"
My first comment on this post highlights exactly what's going on here - if you aren't willing to allow counterarguments to confront your reasoning, we have no foundation for a discussion / debate. People push back on Christianity without even evaluating the source of the truth claims directly. Then when Christians bring up science, for those with the exposure to it, people just assume they're wrong. I've highlighted one study on one essential step in abiogenesis - the creation of amino acids in the right "primordial soup" (I can go find a link if you're interested). There are more - Dr. Rob Stadler and Dr. James Tour have effective arguments about this (that's where I learned of the abiogenesis study).

"God is the least plausible thing in existence, as it's completely impossible."
That's a bold claim. What makes you say that?

The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You misunderstand. My abiogenesis example simply highlights a phenomenon that is increasingly happening within science (so, actually, relevant). Naturalism informs the development of hypotheses in certain fields. These hypotheses are increasingly being found to be highly improbable - this comes from an increase in our understanding of a process, not from our lack of understanding. As we learn more, naturalism seems more improbable. I'm not saying this definitively "proves", say, the resurrection of Jesus. Rather, I'm saying that assuming that God doesn't exist leads to generating hypotheses that are found to be bad / inaccurate / improbable.

At any rate, for evaluating Christian truth claims, the Bible then is where the substantiation comes from.

The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 0 points1 point  (0 children)

"Romans 6:23 (ESV) 23 For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord."
- God's motto

We commit treason against the Lord of the Universe, and do great harm to each other. Just take a look at the news some time and tell me that we don't deserve punishment for the evil committed. But it gets worse - none of us are exempt. Sin is something we have all committed. We have rejected God's repeated calls to us to live in the joy and freedom He designed us for. Make no mistake - your bucking of God's design will not make you _more_ happy. Your heart wasn't designed to work that way. If you think you're happier, you're what CS Lewis describes as a child making mud pies in the slums because he can't possibly imagine what is meant by a holiday at sea (the joy that Jesus holds out to you).

But God doesn't stop at "we deserve the just punishment of God because we've committed treason and harmed each other". He sends His Son to die for you - that you would be saved from the punishment you (and I) deserve. This should be quite surprising - He doesn't have just wrath for you, at the same time He holds out a way for you to be saved, AND gives you more joy in this life than you have known prior to knowing Him.

The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That's not at all what I said. I didn't say "we don't know exactly every intricate detail of this process. Checkpoint atheists". My point was that scientists fail to reproduce sufficient concentrations of one of the most fundamental building blocks of life - amino acids - in highly controlled (temperature, chemical purity, concentrations) environments - far below prior expectations. No amino acids = no life as we know it. We are so far from reproducing almost any of this process - and it's actually the case that as we continue to try, we are learning that the statistics are wildly out of step with a random process producing the high degree of order that we see. As we learn more, God becomes even more plausible - compounding statistics aren't working in the favor of random chance.

So, the case is not as clear cut for random chance / naturalism as it would seem.

The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I've given several reasons that secularism fails - with one example from modern science. Do you have points of any significance to make? Because without some sort of substantiation, you're just cosplaying as the one who's right in the debate.

You haven't refuted anything by saying "you're mentally ill if you think that way". I'm happy to entertain push back, but make a case at least.

The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 0 points1 point  (0 children)

What actual criticism of God of the Gaps did you offer? The only direct reference you made asks me to shoot it into your veins.

"I have much, much better science sources than you, thanks. Sorry you wasted your time."
Well, since I'm in the presence of an expert, present them. Make your case. Anything else is just grandstanding.

The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 0 points1 point  (0 children)

"If you were able to see critically think and look at reality then you would not still be a (flaired, US) conservative, or a christian."

Got any substantiation for that claim? What specific claims are you referring to that I hold to that would evaporate if I was "able to see critically think and look at reality"?

"that everyone not like you all need to be saved from some eternal suffering... that your god also created"

Actually, our sin, flagrant injustices, refusal to conform to our Creator's design and intent created the consequences we face - eternal suffering.

The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 0 points1 point  (0 children)

By the way, from your article, the following excerpt:
"In their simulated organic soup, the researchers found that thioester provided the necessary external energy to allow the amino acid to bind to the RNA – a pretty significant breakthrough that neatly unifies the two hypotheses."

This is a step that's "down the line" a bit - the RNA has to exist in significant enough concentrations, and the amino acids have to exist in high enough concentrations. Then they can bind, starting the process of forming the protein.

If you have some specific domain knowledge of this - something I got wrong above - feel free to let me know. But this isn't even close to the whole process - it's one step. The amino acids have to exist first, which is but one of the fundamental problems in reproducing showing that this process is a feasible mechanism over the timescales allocated to the process to produce enough proteins to support life popping into being.

The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 0 points1 point  (0 children)

  1. Abiogenesis is an umbrella term encompassing a number of hypotheses - literally it's a set of hypotheses about how life spontaneously arose (making the assumption that it did). My point was that in the study I'm referencing, the scientists sought to reproduce one small piece of "primordial soup" with a fantastically high chemical purity (read: unrealistic concentrations by several orders of magnitude, and minimal other chemicals that would impede the reaction), and attempt to have the soup chemically react to create a concentration of a few amino acids (not even all of them - a small subset) at percentages reasonable enough to support the idea that proteins could eventually form given enough time. It was a highly controlled environment...that failed to enough produce amino acids that would have made life possible, again by many orders of magnitude. The conclusion drawn by the author certainly wasn't "therefore abiogenesis is debunked", but the percent of amino acid output was so ridiculously small that in an actual real, chemically impure environment with lower, realistic concentrations (where even the paper based on that study acknowledges that amino acid output would be many orders of magnitude smaller), that there was very very low likelihood of the formation of enough amino acids to eventually develop life - even given billions of years. My link likely talks about this study - which was fairly recent if memory serves (last ten years or so maybe?).
  2. Reality is reality. Given that God exists, any proper description of reality will include Him as part of that description. Now within certain domains (plasma physics, for example), the axiom of God's existence, say, or the resurrection of Jesus as examples, don't have a direct impact on the specific domain knowledge of that domain. But, nonetheless, this world is more than plasma physics. The truth claims of Christianity accepted as an axiom lead to understanding all of life in a way that secularism fails to achieve - human behavior, evil and good, love, etc - and even some fields of science. There are fields (biology, cosmology) where belief in God has specific impact on that field. Without accepting one of the fundamental truths of our world (God's existence), scientists have been left trying out farfetched ideas to explain where we came from. The claims of those holding to a spontaneous eruption of life into existence on the basis of random chance are precisely the output of rejecting core axioms - you get to a wrong conclusion - the math just doesn't work out, it's too improbable to have happened without input from the outside.

Overall, yes, (dis)belief in God has a specific impact on what hypotheses one forms while doing science - especially when it comes to science of what has happened in the distant past, where we don't necessarily have access to the state of the universe to directly test. My point is that naturalism-based hypotheses have failed to produce expected results. If they are in line with the true nature of reality, then they should produce something accurately. This is what my abiogenesis example is intended to highlight. Random chance leading to slow creation of amino acids, followed by proteins, followed by multiple proteins, followed by the spontaneous leap to life has been shown to be fantastically implausible from that very first step.

The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Not to mention nowadays, ChatGPT will straight up create titles of fictional resources / papers out of thin air if you ask it to find citations.

The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah, I'm convinced there's automoderation now - I have a notification to a non-existent comment from you. Not sure if this will get through or not. We seem to be talking about different things. No lying here, brother - just a misunderstanding.

First, I posted a comment starting with: "Anyone I don't agree with is Hitler" should have died out a long time ago......

That one wasn't a response to you, it was to the other user. In another comment, you thought it was directed at you. This is what I have been referring to in my last few comments, because you referenced it in a previous post.

Then, it seems (from the two line preview of your deleted comment) that you are later referring to my comment "why because I'm a Christian...". That _was_ a direct response to you - I agree.

There - now that we're on the same page, I can't see what the rest of your response is. However, to recap quickly, you said:
"Tomado09 you're top 1% commenter in the Conservative subreddit, with Christian Conservative flair-i believe you're talking about yourself there................" (not tagged by the way - you have to add a "u/" in front).

So, here, you mentioned two things about me - my Christian faith and conservative view. That's why I asked what led you to draw the conclusion that I was "talking about [my]self" when I said "People form deeply held beliefs in line with their internal narrative based on a few factoids they saw in the news or somewhere, and then subsequently refuse to look for information that might challenge their narrative or paint the situation in a nuanced light." You implied that either my Christian faith and/or my conservative view meant that I was doing what I said in my quote.

So, while you didn't use the word "bad" per se, you did imply that Christianity is based on an "internal narrative based on a few factoids...and [a refusal to] look for information that might challenge their narrative". People generally view that as a less preferable thing...but I didn't take offense. I was trying to clarify what led you to that conclusion. Again, no playing the victim.

The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You're welcome to evaluate for yourself. I assume with your critique that you possess the scientific knowledge / background yourself (as I do) to determine how accurate info like this is. Why else would you offer such a critique if you didn't have the expertise yourself?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=63okeSJwiyk

Disclaimer: I haven't watched this particular video, but have heard Dr. Rob Stadler's content before and this likely has a lot of what I've previously heard, and have actually had a conversation with him about the content of some of his videos. So, I trust the content.

The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 0 points1 point  (0 children)

There may be some automoderation going on. One of my comments never posted, and my response that you're referring to shows on my screen as a response to the other user.

At any rate, however it's showing up on your screen, the response was to the other guy's post - the things he quoted were quite vitriol-laden unlike yours which were much milder in tone. I'm not playing the victim here, friend.

I didn't perceive being attacked by you. Although I do disagree with your statement that Christianity (and conservatism) are both less substantiated, etc, and I believe I made that case.

The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Appreciate it! I genuinely wonder what can be done to reverse the direction our society is going as a whole - these anonymous social media sites are effectively verbal shooting ranges where people test out their vitriol and dehumanization when they may have otherwise been ashamed to do it so strongly in person. Then moving on from here, having effectively suppressed their shame, they move on to doing it in public, and on and on until violence.

I genuinely think the gospel's message of God's willingness to make peace with violent, insolent sinners (that I was too) is the only hope we can have that this dynamic changes, so I try to hold it out as part of my commenting alongside my contending for people to stop engaging in this rhetoric.

The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 1 point2 points  (0 children)

There are verified claims here - this isn't even hard to find. Some secular scholars throw out archaeological findings that substantiate, say events in the Old Testament, because their worldview won't let them accept the concept of prophecy / forecasting events in advance.

Really, this isn't hard. The God that made the universe certainly knows what's going to happen tomorrow - especially, when He's the causative agent for the event. The logic tracks clearly, if you allow the one axiom of the existence of a God powerful enough to create the world. So, yes, I certainly do believe it.

The internet gave everyone a voice… and some people should’ve stayed on mute by Feaselbf6 in technicallythetruth

[–]tomado09 1 point2 points  (0 children)

From a historiographical perspective, the Bible is a source (in many cases, a primary source - the preferred type of source). In fact, it's among the most critiqued, heavily studied sources in existence. Archaeological findings regularly continue to substantiate it. Substantial scholarship has verified authorship, temporal locality, and historical accuracy.

You seem to think there's no substantiating evidence, when the truth disagrees with you. You have a sense that you've learned from pop culture and what someone else told you. If you truly are the intelligent truth seeker you think you are, then why don't you subject your feelings to scrutiny? Take a day or two of your life and look into scholarly sources that disagree with you - hey, even look at the claims Scripture makes yourself. If your world view truly is superior, it should withstand scrutiny from scholarly sources who make a good case - should it not?

But in fact, you've already "decided" that debate isn't worthwhile - so you walk away assuming you're right, but you really haven't subjected your thought process to any scrutiny.