More questions

After reading what idiot wingnuts do every day, these questions really make me wonder how really pathetic and ignorant you have to be to be so gullible. More from www.godisimaginary.com :

Proof #4 - Think about science

Notice what happens when anyone is "miraculously cured". A person is sick, the person prays (or a prayer circle prays for the person) and the person is cured. A religious person looks at it and says, "God performed a miracle because of prayer!" That is the end of it.

A scientist looks at it in a very different way. A scientist looks at it and says, "Prayer had nothing to do with it - there is a natural cause for what we see here. If we understand the natural cause, then we can heal many more people suffering from the same condition."

In other words, it is only by assuming that God is imaginary that science can proceed.

Proof #5 - Read the Bible

Imagine that we are good friends. One day we are talking:


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Me: Wow, you will not believe this new book I've been reading!

You: What's it about?

Me: It is a manual for living a better life. It is also a guide to creating a better society for ourselves and our children. It has changed my life!

You: That sounds like an important book. Who wrote it?

Me: The author is supposed to be the smartest person in the universe.

You: That's amazing -- if the author is the smartest person in the universe, the book must be absolutely brilliant. I can't wait to see it. Do you have a copy with you?

Me: Absolutely! I carry it with me everywhere I go! Here, have a look for yourself...

You open the book to a random page, and you find this:

Any of the people of Israel, or of the aliens who reside in Israel, who give any of their offspring to Molech shall be put to death; the people of the land shall stone them to death. I myself will set my face against them, and will cut them off from the people, because they have given of their offspring to Molech, defiling my sanctuary and profaning my holy name. And if the people of the land should ever close their eyes to them, when they give of their offspring to Molech, and do not put them to death, I myself will set my face against them and against their family, and will cut them off from among their people, them and all who follow them in prostituting themselves to Molech.

If any turn to mediums and wizards, prostituting themselves to them, I will set my face against them, and will cut them off from the people. Consecrate yourselves therefore, and be holy; for I am the Lord your God. Keep my statutes, and observe them; I am the Lord; I sanctify you. All who curse father or mother shall be put to death; having cursed father or mother, their blood is upon them.

If a man commits adultery with the wife of his neighbor, both the adulterer and the adulteress shall be put to death. The man who lies with his father's wife has uncovered his father's nakedness; both of them shall be put to death; their blood is upon them. If a man lies with his daughter-in-law, both of them shall be put to death; they have committed perversion; their blood is upon them. If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall be put to death; their blood is upon them. [Leviticus, chapter 20]

You are not quite sure what to say. You look at me for a moment.

You: I thought you said that this is written by the most intelligent person in the universe. If we are going to follow what this author says, we have to kill half the people in America. We are supposed to kill everyone who has cursed his father or mother, everyone who has committed adultery, and every homosexual.

Me: Well, that's in the old testament, you see. The book is really two books, and the "old" part of the book doesn't really apply.

You: Are you saying that the smartest person in the universe once wanted us to kill every adulterer and homosexual, but then changed his mind? That somehow makes it better? If the "old part" no longer applies, then why did you hand it to me when I asked to see the book?

Me: Well, parts of it do apply.

You: Didn't you just tell me that it doesn't apply?

You open the book to another random page and you find this:

When you buy a male Hebrew slave, he shall serve for six years, but in the seventh he shall go out a free person, without debt. If he comes in single, he shall go out single; if he comes in married, then his wife shall go out with him. If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall be her master's and he shall go out alone. But if the slave declares, "I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out a free person", then his master shall bring him before God. He shall be brought to the door or the doorpost; and his master shall pierce his ear with an awl; and he shall serve him for life.

When a man sells his daughter as a slave, she shall not go out as the male slaves do. If she does not please her master, who designated her for himself, then he shall let her be redeemed; he shall have no right to sell her to a foreign people, since he has dealt unfairly with her. If he designates her for his son, he shall deal with her as with a daughter. If he takes another wife to himself, he shall not diminish the food, clothing, or marital rights of the first wife. And if he does not do these three things for her, she shall go out without debt, without payment of money.

Whoever strikes a person mortally shall be put to death. If it was not premeditated, but came about by an act of God, then I will appoint for you a place to which the killer may flee. But if someone willfully attacks and kills another by treachery, you shall take the killer from my altar for execution.

Whoever strikes father or mother shall be put to death.

Whoever kidnaps a person, whether that person has been sold or is still held in possession, shall be put to death. Whoever curses father or mother shall be put to death.

When individuals quarrel and one strikes the other with a stone or fist so that the injured party, though not dead, is confined to bed, but recovers and walks around outside with the help of a staff, then the assailant shall be free of liability, except to pay for the loss of time, and to arrange for full recovery.

When a slave-owner strikes a male or female slave with a rod and the slave dies immediately, the owner shall be punished. But if the slave survives for a day or two, there is no punishment; for the slave is the owner's property. [Exodus, chapter 21]

Again, you are dumbfounded. Here the author of the book is advocating slavery, the branding of slaves, and the wholesale beating of slaves. You are not quite sure what to say. You look at me for a moment.

You: You have to be kidding me. Here the "smartest person in the universe" is telling us that slavery is OK and that we are free to beat our slaves.

You open the book to another random page and you find this:

I desire, then, that in every place the men should pray, lifting up holy hands without anger or argument; also that the women should dress themselves modestly and decently in suitable clothing, not with their hair braided, or with gold, pearls, or expensive clothes, but with good works, as is proper for women who profess reverence for God. Let a woman learn in silence with full submission. I permit no woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she is to keep silent. For Adam was formed first, then Eve; and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor. Yet she will be saved through childbearing, provided they continue in faith and love and holiness, with modesty. [1 Timothy, chapter 2]

You are nearly speechless. But you manage to find your voice.

You: Is this some kind of joke? "I permit no woman to teach or to have authority over a man." That is totally sexist! In America, there are millions of female teachers and we have women throughout our corporate and government hierarchies. No intelligent person believes that women should be silenced.

As you page through the book further you find that it is totally sexist from beginning to end.

You keep opening the book to random pages, and nearly everything you find is utter nonsense. Either it is meaningless, completely irrelevant, disgusting or downright wrong.

If you are a scientist it is even worse, and it starts with the very first line:

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth...

That's not true. In the beginning a natural event created the universe as we know it, and the earth did not form until billions of years later. The creation story in Genesis is completely wrong. Simply read Genesis and you can see it. For example, the Bible says that light and darkness are created after the water but before the sun. Everyone knows that the sun came first, then the planet and its rotation (which is what causes light and darkness to occur on a daily basis) and then the water, and this all happened over million of years. There are many other problems with the Bible:

* Man did not come from a handful of dust through some mythological being. Man evolved from other species like every other living thing has for hundreds of millions of years.
* The Bible talks about a world-wide flood that covered earth in 5.5 miles of water and killed everything, yet we know it never happened. That is clear from the archaeological record.
* There was no tower of Babel.

The list goes on and on. The Bible is nonsense in a thousand different scientific ways.

Ask yourself this simple question: Why, when you read the Bible, are you not left in awe? Why doesn't a book written by an omniscient being leave you with a sense of wonder and amazement? If you are reading a book written by the all-powerful, all-knowing, all-loving creator of the universe, wouldn't you expect to be stunned by the brilliance, the clarity and the wisdom of the author? Would you not expect each new page to intoxicate you with its incredible prose and its spectacular insight? Wouldn't you expect the author to tell us things that scientists have not been able to discover yet?

Yet, when we open the Bible and actually read it, we find it is nothing like that at all. Instead of leaving us in awe, it leaves us dumbfounded by all of the nonsense and backwardness that it contains. If you read what the Bible actually says, you find that the Bible is ridiculous. The examples shown above barely scratch the surface of the Bible's numerous problems. If we are honest with ourselves, it is obvious that an "all-knowing" God had absolutely nothing to do with this book.

Proof #6 - Ponder God's Plan

"God's plan" is the way that Christians traditionally explain things like amputations, cancer, hurricanes and car accidents. For example, if a Christian dies a painful and tragic death because of cancer, she dies as part of God's plan. Her death has a purpose. God called her home for a reason. Even if something bad happens to a Christian, it is actually good because it is part of God's plan.

You can see how pervasive "God's plan" is by looking in Christian inspirational literature. For example, if we look in the book A Purpose Driven Life by Rick Warren, we find this remarkable paragraph in Chapter 2:

Because God made you for a reason, he also decided when you would be born and how long you would live. He planned the days of your life in advance, choosing the exact time of your birth and death. The Bible says, "You saw me before I was born and scheduled each day of my life before I began to breathe. Every day was recorded in your book!" [Psalm 139:16]

There is also this:

Regardless of the circumstances of your birth or who your parents are, God had a plan in creating you.

Under this view of the universe, God plans everything.

Take a moment and think about what Rick Warren said. Rick said, "He planned the days of your life in advance, choosing the exact time of your birth and death." Let's examine one simple implication of this statement. What this means is that God has pre-planned every abortion that has taken place on our planet.

If you think about this implication for a few moments, you will begin to realize how impossible "God's plan" is. If the concept of "God's plan" is true, you can first of all see that God wants us to be aborting children. Every single abortion is planned by God, so God must be doing it for a reason. Second, you can see that both the mother who requests the abortion and the doctor who performs it are blameless. Since it is God who planned the abortion of the child (God chose the "exact time" of the death, according to Rick Warren), the mother and doctor are simply puppets who are fulfilling God's plan. You can also see that all the Christians who are fighting against abortion are missing the point. They are actually fighting against God's plan, and their fight is completely futile. God is the all-powerful ruler of the universe, and his plan is for more than a million children a year to die in the United States through abortion. [ref] Each one of those abortions was meticulously planned by God, so fighting against abortion is a totally wasted effort.

If you are a Christian, what you are thinking is, "God does not intend for us to perform abortions!" But if you believe what Rick is saying, then you are obviously incorrect. God is actually the direct cause of every abortion on earth. If you find that notion to be uncomfortable, I would agree with you. Unfortunately, that is the logical outcome of God's plan.

Think about Adolph Hitler. He was evil incarnate, and Hitler is well known for the atrocious things he did. What I would like you to do right now is to consider this statement: "Hitler is part of God's Plan." Think about what Rick said:

He planned the days of your life in advance, choosing the exact time of your birth and death. The Bible says, "You saw me before I was born and scheduled each day of my life before I began to breathe. Every day was recorded in your book!" [Psalm 139:16]

Rick also says:

God never does anything accidentally, and he never makes mistakes. He has a reason for everything he creates. Every plant and every animal was planned by God, and every person was designed with a purpose in mind.

If God has a divine plan for each of us, then he had a divine plan for Hitler too. It is when you stop to think about it deeply that the contradictions hit you.

Now let's imagine that you say a prayer in this sort of universe. What difference does it make? God has his plan, and that plan is running down its track like a freight train. If God has a plan, then everyone who died in the Holocaust died for a reason. They had to die, and each death had meaning. Therefore, Holocaust victims could pray all day, and they would still die. The idea of a "plan" makes the idea of a "prayer-answering relationship with God" ridiculous. Yet Christians attach themselves to both ideas, despite the irresolvable contradiction.

Think about what God's plan means for you personally. If the plan happens to say that you will get hit by a bus tomorrow, or that terrorists will blow you up, or that you will be shot in the head four times, then that's what will happen. It would be the same with any disease. If you contract cancer this afternoon and die three months later, that is God's plan for you. Praying to cure the cancer is a waste. God plans for you to die, so you will die. He has pre-programmed the exact time of your death. There is nothing you can do to change the plan -- no amount of prayer will help -- because your death will have meaning and your death will cause side-effects that are also part of the plan.

Who will you marry? You actually have no choice in the matter. God has pre-planned your wedding in minute detail. Rick Warren says, "God knew that those two individuals [your parents] possessed exactly the right genetic makeup to create the custom 'you' that he had in mind. They had the DNA God wanted to make you." Therefore, your spouse was pre-chosen by God for you so that you would create the children who are a part of his plan. You also have no choice in the number of children you will have -- God has pre-planned their births.

In addition, this sort of universe means that Hitler is blameless. Hitler was not "evil," because Hitler had no free will at all. Hitler was simply an actor forced to play his role in God's plan. God planned for millions of people to die in the Holocaust -- he planned their deaths in exact detail according to Rick Warren. Hitler had to kill those people. Hitler was God's puppet in making that those millions of deaths happen right on schedule.

In the same way then, every murderer is blameless. Since God has planned each of our deaths in exact detail, murderers are actually essential to God's plan. Why do we punish them? We should be rewarding them for doing their God-planned duty. What if you get raped tomorrow and get pregnant? God did that because he planned the exact time of that child's birth and death. God actually pre-planned your rape, and the rapist was God's puppet. Rather than hating the rapist, we should celebrate God's plan.

Do you believe that murderers and rapists should be rewarded? Do you believe that Hitler was sent by God to kill millions of people in the Holocaust? Do you believe that God is the direct cause of every abortion on this planet? Do you believe that you have no choice in your spouse or the number of children you have? If you are a sane individual, then probably not. But that is what you are saying when you state that Hitler or cancer or anything else is part of "God's plan."

The statement "It is part of God's plan" is one of those meaningless palliatives that, when you sit down and think it through using your common sense, makes no sense. That lack of sense shows us how imaginary God is.