Yes, Atheists are actually brainwashed

A little late to the party, but I don’t see the production of ATP as proof of design. The proteins and enzymes that facilitate the production of ATP have evolved over billions of years.

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The Greek for this verse is very specific with Jesus being the speaker. Jesus was also usually clear when he was using metaphors. The obvious question is why would this be a metaphor, but god impregnating a married teenager and going on a suicide mission to change “the law” that was thought to be “perfect” (Psalm 19:7) is not a metaphor?

This is what I call bad error correcting, and I have never found a single theist that doesn’t do this in some way. There is always something about their holy book they don’t like, so then they just assume it was meant as a metaphor. What you are describing is relativism, and you are choosing to ignore the parts of the Bible that say it is the only one. I know other Christians who do this.

You seem to have very different definitions for normal words. The standard definition for truth is: the body of real things, events, and facts

This goes back to a standard philosophical argument against relativism because different people can have vastly different experiences with the same thing and come up with different “Truth”. Meaning is subjective. I am defining subjective as: characteristic of or belonging to reality as perceived rather than as independent of mind. I would argue that each person’s experience can have meaning rooted in real experiences, but a thing can’t be true of itself but when compared to something else. Trees aren’t true of themselves, but I can say I have a tree in my front yard, and that is true.

Once again, see my definition of subjective above. If you were to remove every mind that knew or had a mythology, then mythology would stop existing. That is how you can tell if something is subjective or not.

This doesn’t matter, it exists in the mind which makes it subjective.

I agree with you here :stuck_out_tongue:

Joking aside, this is not the definition of religion, see my previous post for that. Now, some people may seek religion for these reasons, but you assigning those things to religion, is again, subjective.

Agreed, many of us on the forum care about truth deeply, which is why we vigorously vet things using epistemology.

I don’t know, but you are straw manning here because I never claimed that it came from nothing. Just a listen check, you know myth is defined as: an unfounded or false notion. If a myth is objectively proven, then it no longer is a myth, and becomes fact. Then it is considered truth. I, and many others, don’t find meaning by engaging in unproven belief systems.

Once again, this makes it part of the human experience which might have shadows of truth, but by it’s very definition, myths cannot be automatically considered true.

This is an assuming the source fallacy. Since we don’t fully know what causes consciousness, it is impossible for us to say whether it is a fundamental property of matter, although, we have had zero evidence to date for this. We can miniplate the thoughts of mice which are genetically close to humans so it is more likely that the brain is a good bio computer. Silicon has never been shown to have qualia, yet we have used it to control many things.

You then using this to point to the possibility of god is extending it to another assuming the source fallacy. Even if qualia was a property of matter, that wouldn’t automatically mean that there is a possibility that god could exist. The exitance of god is a possibility outside of this argument so I am not sure why this is even needed here.

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Really, you’re going to go with objective evidence to determine what is possible, over a false dichotomy fallacy?

I don’t think I’ve ever been more proud. :sunglasses:

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I kind of am too, but cautious. I’m waiting for the other proverbial shoe to drop and the emergence of a typical rat_spit argument.

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Ha ha! Yeah. I surprise myself too sometimes.

Not this time. My understanding of genetics is that random mutations occur along the gene sequence which generate new protein variants. This occurs over and over again until a viable protein or catalyst is encoded by the DNA and synthesized by the RNA and ribosome. It then becomes a part of the genome. This happens over large time scales precisely because the so called “method of design” is random genetic mutation.

I will marvel at the beauty of nature. I will marvel at the symmetry of the DNA molecule. The intrigue of the 20 amino acids and how an infinite variety of proteins are possible with just A, T, G, and C. The beauty of the three codon system for tagging each of the 20 amino acids. If I didn’t know any better I might just conclude that there is a grand designer behind it. But there isn’t. It’s all random.

I would be exaggerating if I said I even remotely understand the time scale on which ATP synthesizing molecules came into existence or what mutations had to occur and so on. But it’s clear that all of this “design” is really just billions and billions of random collisions between highly functional proteins - the “creation” of these proteins is the inevitable outcome of the DNA or RNA molecule, the genetic code and the propensity for mutations to occur along any given gene.

Now the OP will argue that ATP occurs pre-cellular. This is nothing to worry about. The fact that ATP does occur pre-cellular need not presuppose some third party doing anything in particular. A little chemistry, physics, and biology should suffice to explain the existence of precellular ATP.

The OP’s point is about as moot as saying that the gene for blue eye colour was designed by God as an alternative to the original brown colour gene. It wasn’t. It was a random mutation in the gene sequence which altered the protein structure of the pigment in the iris to reflect the colour blue. Something as small as a single nucleotide being replaced can result in these changes. And that mutation may have served some evolutionary advantage - and that’s why we still see it today.

We need not evoke anything other than the laws of chemistry, physics, and biology to explain life as an evolutionary result of genetics and biochemistry. The depressing part about this reality is that we don’t get the comfort of thinking we were put here for a purpose or by design. It can be a bleak outlook and it was one of the things which turned me off of science in my fourth year. Evolution is bleak and does not have an underlying goal.

The OP seems to be adverse to the idea of “self assembly”. That is in fact exactly what happens with proteins when they’re synthesized. They literally self assemble. And we now have AI models which can predict with some accuracy what a protein will look like assuming any given amino acid chain sequence.

Assigning purpose to the material existence of life is a slippery slope. The DNA molecule is not “designed” to replicate itself. It just so happens that its chemical nature allows it to. And the manifold complexity of life as we know it is an offshoot of the different ways in which DNA accomplishes that goal.

Us macroscopic organisms are just exaggerated packaging for DNA. And that DNA does not serve a purpose. It’s a relatively simple molecule which just so happens to reproduce itself.

I dunno, it’s the one area of the sciences which I’ve studied enough to see the truth that the more secrets to nature we uncover and the more we learn about nature the easier it is to dismiss a mystery third party as the ultimate designer of these things.

The problem I see for Atheists, and I’m not advocating this argument - just stating it - is that they’re posed with the fine tuning argument. How are the laws of physics and chemistry so find tuned that not only the universe exists; but also stars; solar systems; orbiting planets; geology; water; sun light; eco-systems; single celled organisms; multi-cellular life forms? Is there any reason to believe that it is the laws of the universe which were determined by an intelligent being?

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Cough! Begging the question fallacy Cough!

:wink:

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Oh shyt :joy: what have I done now? :man_facepalming:

So, “begging the question” is to “assume the conclusion”. Have we not confirmed through measurement that the universe is extremely fine tuned? Some of our measurements show that if something like the weak force was even slightly more than what it is, we wouldn’t see life?

For example, if the strong nuclear force were 2% stronger than it is (i.e. if the coupling constant representing its strength were 2% larger) while the other constants were left unchanged, diprotons would be stable; according to Davies, hydrogen would fuse into them instead of deuterium and helium.[15] This would drastically alter the physics of [stars]

(Star - Wikipedia), and presumably preclude the existence of life similar to what we observe on Earth. The diproton’s existence would short-circuit the slow fusion of hydrogen into deuterium. Hydrogen would fuse so easily that it is likely that all the universe’s hydrogen would be consumed in the first few minutes after the Big Bang.[15]

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No, the term is a metaphor to describe how extremely narrow the parameters certain characteristics of the universe need to be, in order for the carbon based life we observe to have any chance of developing, or for the universe we currently observe to exist.

That it was actually fine tuned would need to be demonstrated, like possibility.

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Ah, the Finely Tuned Universe Hypothesis - the hypothesis that states that the universe is so finely tuned that it must have been designed!

Ladies and Gentlemen: I submit the Dark Matter Hypothesis - the hypothesis the proposes a placeholder to account for the apparent missing gravity holding galaxies together. Either Dark Matter exists or our understanding of gravity is faulty, My vote is for the latter.

Nevertheless, in a finely tuned universe, the Dark Matter Hypothesis should be unnecessary. I therefore reject the Finely Tuned Universe Hypothesis.

If Atheists are brainwashed then believers are brain rinsed lightly and left to dry in the sun.

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Without their tin foil hat.

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HEY!!! :angry: Why the hell does everybody always have to be dissin’ my tin hat? If I didn’t know any better, I would say you all are jealous. Not MY fault you cannot make it look as good as I do. :triumph:

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Did we ever get an answer on this? I am guessing not, as @sourcecodewizard raison d’etre seems to be making claims, not evidencing them.

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@Tin-Man my sincere apologies Tinny, to you and your hat, but every time you let it loose it ends up on the head of a mythical fanboy. Protected from the natural forces of the cosmos they feel free to prophesize rather than debate. For example:

@sourcecodewizard insists that the watchmaker’s argument is, “valid, complete and correct.” Only brainwashed atheists would argue otherwise. :clap: And this argument seems to depend on magic magnets which either poofed into existence or didn’t. I’ve never heard of magic magnets poofy or otherwise.

So are we we debating what magic magnets are? Even @Sheldon wants an answer to that one. Are we debating whether they poof or not? As I approach 80 I notice that I poof more than I used to. Heck I’m not sure whether I’m using poof in the same context as @sourcecodewizard because he didn’t bother to even tell us what magic magnet are, never mind poof. Tinny this is what I mean when you take that hat off you never know who will find it and put it on.

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Well, if it makes you feel any better, I plan to get it welded on soon if I can ever find somebody who knows how to weld tin. I would use rivets, but all the banging to get them secured gives me a headache.

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No pun intended :crossed_fingers: but have you tried crazy glue. :innocent:

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Have you considered entirely emptying your head first? Just as @sourcecodewizard’s posts suggest he has done?

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If you had lived through the Blitz you’d be blessed to have a tin hat, laddie!

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If you truly have autism and for anyone with Down’s Syndrome then rejoice your gift!
These are, by far, in the top tier of the best people our “humanity” has to offer.
If we only had more.

Are you being fucking serious? Do you have any idea what having a child with Down Syndrome does to a family as they become adults? Would you like to be in your 80’s , and still having to care for your child as if they’re still only a few years old?
It’s fucking cruel, for the parents, as well as the child, mentally, physically, and financially.
Our son’s brother-in-law has 2 children that are both Autistic, and it doesn’t look like they’ll ever be able to live on their own. Do you have any idea what kind of pressure that puts on their parents, as well as their grandparents?
Do you have a family of your own?

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