Facts vs Opinions. I am confused ...

Consider this scenario:

God wanted to save the world, so he appeared and told people that he is GOD. That's a fact.
People smirked at him and said "You are a quack". That's an opinion.
Finally, God gave up and left, leaving people in their misery. That's a fact.

The questions:

1. From God's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or opinions?
2. From the people's viewpoint, what's fact and what's opinion?
3. From an outsider's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or opinions?

Having never received direct revelation from God, I can't answer question 1. I have only opinions about questions 2 and 3, no facts.

My question is that if we all believe in the same God, if we go to war with each other, killing each other in the name of God, are we all going to heaven or are we all going to hell?

Aguru said:

Consider this scenario:

God wanted to save the world, so he appeared and told people that
he is GOD. That's a fact.
People smirked at him and said "You are a quack". That's an opinion.
Finally, God gave up and left, leaving people in their misery.
That's a fact.

The questions:

1. From God's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or opinions?
2. From the people's viewpoint, what's fact and what's opinion?
3. From an outsider's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or
opinions?

Click to expand...

I don't know if this settles the issue, but I think it sheds some light on the problem:

http://www.theonion.com/onion3734/god_clarifies_dont_kill.html

This is meant to be funny, so if it offens anyone, I'm sorry.

Read at your own risk.

Dan said:

My question is that if we all believe in the same God, if we go to
war with each other, killing each other in the name of God, are we
all going to heaven or are we all going to hell?

Aguru said:

Consider this scenario:

God wanted to save the world, so he appeared and told people that
he is GOD. That's a fact.
People smirked at him and said "You are a quack". That's an opinion.
Finally, God gave up and left, leaving people in their misery.
That's a fact.

The questions:

1. From God's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or opinions?
2. From the people's viewpoint, what's fact and what's opinion?
3. From an outsider's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or
opinions?

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

An opinion can be drawn once all the facts are understood. Too often the opinion is developed first, but only based on those selective facts that would support it.

Facts are more important as that helps us develop better opinions. Sort of the chicken and egg philosophy.

I'll let God speak for himself.

Trent

Aguru said:

Consider this scenario:

God wanted to save the world, so he appeared and told people that
he is GOD. That's a fact.
People smirked at him and said "You are a quack". That's an opinion.
Finally, God gave up and left, leaving people in their misery.
That's a fact.

The questions:

1. From God's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or opinions?
2. From the people's viewpoint, what's fact and what's opinion?
3. From an outsider's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or
opinions?

Click to expand...

Here's another question: I was raised as a strict Catholic. I was taught that it is a mortal sin to commit suicide (only God gives life...only God has the right to take it away)...so if someone commits suicide, they are damned to eternal hell. These extremists seem to believe that if they commit suicide, even while killing innocent people, they will have eternal life in heaven, because they are doing it in the name of God. I'd love to know who is right, but that won't ever happen. Worse yet, what if neither is right, and when you're dead, you're just dead (more likely scenario). Seems that religion is causing more problems than anythng else. These are the issues I've been grappling with these last few days. K.

Aguru said:

Consider this scenario:

God wanted to save the world, so he appeared and told people that
he is GOD. That's a fact.
People smirked at him and said "You are a quack". That's an opinion.
Finally, God gave up and left, leaving people in their misery.
That's a fact.

The questions:

1. From God's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or opinions?
2. From the people's viewpoint, what's fact and what's opinion?
3. From an outsider's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or
opinions?

Click to expand...

I would speculate that most religions frown on suicide. The Bible says thou shall not kill, but God allowed the Isrealites to smite their enemys on more than one occasion. Jihad does not necessarily mean holy war, but means path more often used for a good rather than for evil. Having said that, following a successful path could invoke suicide in its' successful completion.

I am certainly no authority on religion, but you could probably make a rational arguement taking the points from above. I don't believe that religion is necessarily the problem, but rather people's interpretation of it that presents the problem.

Trent

koo22 said:

Aguru said:

Consider this scenario:

God wanted to save the world, so he appeared and told people that
he is GOD. That's a fact.
People smirked at him and said "You are a quack". That's an opinion.
Finally, God gave up and left, leaving people in their misery.
That's a fact.

The questions:

1. From God's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or opinions?
2. From the people's viewpoint, what's fact and what's opinion?
3. From an outsider's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or
opinions?

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Here's a news story that may shed some light on your request, Trent:

http://www.theonion.com/onion3734/god_clarifies_dont_kill.html

As stated above, this is meant in jest.

Trent Mulkern said:

Facts are more important as that helps us develop better opinions.
Sort of the chicken and egg philosophy.

I'll let God speak for himself.

Trent

Aguru said:

Consider this scenario:

God wanted to save the world, so he appeared and told people that
he is GOD. That's a fact.
People smirked at him and said "You are a quack". That's an opinion.
Finally, God gave up and left, leaving people in their misery.
That's a fact.

The questions:

1. From God's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or opinions?
2. From the people's viewpoint, what's fact and what's opinion?
3. From an outsider's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or
opinions?

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

I cannot consider this scenario as MAN invented god in the first instance.
FACT.

Everything else is a method of controlling the minds and spirits of people and keeping them paying taxes to a state - VOLINTERILLY. As one religion said, that god said, or rather the god, son of god, said, give unto Caesar what is Caesar’s – of course the Roman were too blind and had to many more powerful gods to allow the effrontery that a foreign god could be more powerful than their own.

Since before this remarkable incident we have gone blindly from war to war, since that incident we knew what we were doing.

Aguru said:

Consider this scenario:

God wanted to save the world, so he appeared and told people that
he is GOD. That's a fact.

Click to expand...

Well, I'm qualified to give you God's viewpoint (yea, right).

Fact is fact; when you let go of a ball, it drops. People might have different opinions on whether it would drop faster than say, a marble. But it doesn't change facts.
From an outsiders opinion... outside what?... what was the question??

Aguru said:

Consider this scenario:

God wanted to save the world, so he appeared and told people that
he is GOD. That's a fact.
People smirked at him and said "You are a quack". That's an opinion.
Finally, God gave up and left, leaving people in their misery.
That's a fact.

The questions:

1. From God's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or opinions?
2. From the people's viewpoint, what's fact and what's opinion?
3. From an outsider's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or
opinions?

Click to expand...

Trent Mulkern said:

I am certainly no authority on religion, but you could probably
make a rational arguement taking the points from above. I don't
believe that religion is necessarily the problem, but rather
people's interpretation of it that presents the problem.

Trent

Click to expand...

Trent, religion IS the problem as it was entirely written and conceived of men. The idea that it was divinely inspired falls apart quickly when you discover the many errors, inconsistencies, and faults of any religion. Yes I have studied religion. Consider the Christian Bible which has more holes in it then Swiss cheese. Is it any wonder that 100 people can read the same verse and understand it to mean 100 different things?! Consider that religion was conceived by men, translated by men, translated from different languages and custom, add private interpretation, and you get a pretty much useless religion. Absent from religion are historical facts, and any consistency or accuracy. To suggest that this was inspired by good should be blasphemy its self! The only thing we know for sure, is religious writings were written by men.

In closing I'd like to quote the late great Joseph Campbell,

"Religion is nothing more then man pointing to god. In effect like signs or pointers to god. And not very good pointers at that."

JK

The Fact is that the ball and marble will drop at the same speeds, regardless of opinion. Which you would prefer to drop, or the aesthetic value of watching either of both of them drop would be opinions.

Brent said:

Aguru said:

Consider this scenario:

God wanted to save the world, so he appeared and told people that
he is GOD. That's a fact.
People smirked at him and said "You are a quack". That's an opinion.
Finally, God gave up and left, leaving people in their misery.
That's a fact.

The questions:

1. From God's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or opinions?
2. From the people's viewpoint, what's fact and what's opinion?
3. From an outsider's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or
opinions?

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Ger Bee said:

I cannot consider this scenario as MAN invented god in the first
instance.
FACT.

Click to expand...

Oops, sorry Ger Bee, no can do. That is an opinion and I'm sure you know that.
This infinitely complex universe evolved from nothing... THAT's an opinion.
FACT.
)

Brent said:

Ger Bee said:

I cannot consider this scenario as MAN invented god in the first
instance.
FACT.

Click to expand...

Oops, sorry Ger Bee, no can do. That is an opinion and I'm sure you
know that.
This infinitely complex universe evolved from nothing... THAT's an
opinion.
FACT.
)

Click to expand...

Brent, judging from your reply here I take it to mean that you would also agree that we can neither prove of disprove the existance of god. Correct?

JK

Mike, the Onion comes up with some excellent satire and pulls no punches (i.e., it mocks all peoples, groups, religions, etc... equally). My favorite was the article featuring Jesus as an NBA player with the Atlanta Hawks. It detailed his patented "Ascension Dunk" in which he flew 20 feet over the heads of his opponents and scored. Try that Kobe. The brilliant part of the article was the mention that Jesus was averaging 13 ppg that season.

Mike M said:

http://www.theonion.com/onion3734/god_clarifies_dont_kill.html

As stated above, this is meant in jest.

Trent Mulkern said:

Facts are more important as that helps us develop better opinions.
Sort of the chicken and egg philosophy.

I'll let God speak for himself.

Trent

Aguru said:

Consider this scenario:

God wanted to save the world, so he appeared and told people that
he is GOD. That's a fact.
People smirked at him and said "You are a quack". That's an opinion.
Finally, God gave up and left, leaving people in their misery.
That's a fact.

The questions:

1. From God's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or opinions?
2. From the people's viewpoint, what's fact and what's opinion?
3. From an outsider's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or
opinions?

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Religion is sort of like a gun, neither kills. But place either in the wrong hands and you have two of the foremost killing devices in man's history.

I cannot refute your points except to say much of the Bibble is parable/stories designed to teach a lesson. Excavations in the last century have done much to equate history with the Bibble - at least enough for those of faith.

Almost all documents good and bad have been written by man or men of inspiration. That doesn't make them necessarily incapable of influencing people to good or bad. If God dictated the Bibble to man or influenced him to write the Bibble is of little consequence to me and does not make it less in my mind. The inconsistencies of the Bibble don't bother me as much as it does others I guess. Most of these posts are folks looking at the same facts and coming to different conclusions

Im afraid we must agree to disagree.

Trent

Jim K said:

Trent Mulkern said:

I am certainly no authority on religion, but you could probably
make a rational arguement taking the points from above. I don't
believe that religion is necessarily the problem, but rather
people's interpretation of it that presents the problem.

Trent

Click to expand...

Trent, religion IS the problem as it was entirely written and
conceived of men. The idea that it was divinely inspired falls
apart quickly when you discover the many errors, inconsistencies,
and faults of any religion. Yes I have studied religion. Consider
the Christian Bible which has more holes in it then Swiss cheese.
Is it any wonder that 100 people can read the same verse and
understand it to mean 100 different things?! Consider that religion
was conceived by men, translated by men, translated from different
languages and custom, add private interpretation, and you get a
pretty much useless religion. Absent from religion are historical
facts, and any consistency or accuracy. To suggest that this was
inspired by good should be blasphemy its self! The only thing we
know for sure, is religious writings were written by men.

In closing I'd like to quote the late great Joseph Campbell,

"Religion is nothing more then man pointing to god. In effect like
signs or pointers to god. And not very good pointers at that."

JK

Click to expand...

Trent Mulkern said:

I cannot refute your points except to say much of the Bibble is
parable/stories designed to teach a lesson. Excavations in the last
century have done much to equate history with the Bibble - at least
enough for those of faith.

Almost all documents good and bad have been written by man or men
of inspiration. That doesn't make them necessarily incapable of
influencing people to good or bad. If God dictated the Bibble to
man or influenced him to write the Bibble is of little consequence
to me and does not make it less in my mind. The inconsistencies of
the Bibble don't bother me as much as it does others I guess. Most
of these posts are folks looking at the same facts and coming to
different conclusions

Im afraid we must agree to disagree.

Trent

Click to expand...

I have no problem with Bibble. I like it better then Q-Image. But I thought we were talking about the bible? I have no problem with agreeing to disagree, except for Bibble, your wrong I'm right ; )

JK

Jim K:

The Bible is less concerned with proof for the existence of God, and is better seen as a way to show one how to walk with God and Jesus (if you're into the NT).

I know your question wasn't directed at me, but I'll provide my thoughts, for what it's worth. I think one can provide very elegant proofs for and against the existence of God. Learned men and women have fought over this for centuries. Aquinas does as good of a job as any modern-day agnostics could ever even try with this question. The difficult answer (for some) is no, you cannot prove the existence of God through logic. Though I've read many, many bright authors that have given their best shot.

I read a fascinating book while in college from a Professor there named Dr. Post, that used symbolic logic to try to develop a theory of God's existence. Before you laugh at such an attempt, the guy won 2 Putnam exams during his undergraduate years in Mathematics. For those of you that have taken this test, you'll know that winning one of these things virtually guarantees you a professorship at the university of your choice. To win 2 is almost unheard of. Absolutely brilliant reading, but ultimately just mental masturbation.

Jim K said:

Brent said:

Ger Bee said:

I cannot consider this scenario as MAN invented god in the first
instance.
FACT.

Click to expand...

Oops, sorry Ger Bee, no can do. That is an opinion and I'm sure you
know that.
This infinitely complex universe evolved from nothing... THAT's an
opinion.
FACT.
)

Click to expand...

Brent, judging from your reply here I take it to mean that you
would also agree that we can neither prove of disprove the
existance of god. Correct?

JK

Click to expand...

Since some of you have felt that religion continues to be an appropriate topic on this forum, I have an inquiry for you. I have always wondered about the logic of religions and hopefully some of you can provide me with intelligent, well-reasoned responses to this post.

I think we can all agree on the following four points:

1) All monotheistic religions portray God as a good, kind and benevolent entity, free from vice and sin.

2) All monotheistic religions portray God as an all-powerful being.

3) All monotheistic religions require their followers to worship God.

4) For millenia, hundreds of millions of innocent people, particularly children, have suffered from starvation, disease, physical abuse, sexual abuse, genocide, etc....

Given those four facts, please reconcile the following:

A) How can God be a truly a good deity if he/she has the power to stop the tragedies mentioned in No. 4 above, yet allows such horrible suffering to continue? The standard "God works in mysterious ways" non-explanation is altogether insuffient to address this question, as is "He will make amends in heaven."

B) How can God be a truly all-powerful deity if he/she is a genuinely good being, but allows such horrible suffering to continue?

C) How can God be a good (i.e. caring, benevolent and free from sins or vices) entity if he/she demands that people worship him/her? Isn't demanding adolation the clearest possible sign of the vices of vanity and extreme egotism? Don't we usually characterize people who crave and demand this sort of attenion as egotists, dictators, self-centered and pathetic? Shouldn't we expect even higher standards from our deities than we do from our fellow human beings?

Is the explanation merely that the fundamentals of theistic religions simply make no sense and cannot be explained by logic or reason? Please fill me in (figuratively, not literally - I can appreciate that some of you may wish to bury me alive for questioning your beliefs).

Aguru said:

Consider this scenario:

God wanted to save the world, so he appeared and told people that
he is GOD. That's a fact.
People smirked at him and said "You are a quack". That's an opinion.
Finally, God gave up and left, leaving people in their misery.
That's a fact.

The questions:

1. From God's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or opinions?
2. From the people's viewpoint, what's fact and what's opinion?
3. From an outsider's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or
opinions?

Click to expand...

You are right. The Bible is not fact until one has faith. Same as atheism saying their is no God. That is faith based. Many have killed for the "sake" of religion as well as for the "sake" of atheism. Boils down to mankind. You have good people and bad people. As long as their are human beings on this earth, their will be conflict. Religion or atheism will not stop that.
Les

Trent Mulkern said:

I cannot refute your points except to say much of the Bibble is
parable/stories designed to teach a lesson. Excavations in the last
century have done much to equate history with the Bibble - at least
enough for those of faith.

Almost all documents good and bad have been written by man or men
of inspiration. That doesn't make them necessarily incapable of
influencing people to good or bad. If God dictated the Bibble to
man or influenced him to write the Bibble is of little consequence
to me and does not make it less in my mind. The inconsistencies of
the Bibble don't bother me as much as it does others I guess. Most
of these posts are folks looking at the same facts and coming to
different conclusions

Im afraid we must agree to disagree.

Trent

Jim K said:

Trent Mulkern said:

I am certainly no authority on religion, but you could probably
make a rational arguement taking the points from above. I don't
believe that religion is necessarily the problem, but rather
people's interpretation of it that presents the problem.

Trent

Click to expand...

Trent, religion IS the problem as it was entirely written and
conceived of men. The idea that it was divinely inspired falls
apart quickly when you discover the many errors, inconsistencies,
and faults of any religion. Yes I have studied religion. Consider
the Christian Bible which has more holes in it then Swiss cheese.
Is it any wonder that 100 people can read the same verse and
understand it to mean 100 different things?! Consider that religion
was conceived by men, translated by men, translated from different
languages and custom, add private interpretation, and you get a
pretty much useless religion. Absent from religion are historical
facts, and any consistency or accuracy. To suggest that this was
inspired by good should be blasphemy its self! The only thing we
know for sure, is religious writings were written by men.

In closing I'd like to quote the late great Joseph Campbell,

"Religion is nothing more then man pointing to god. In effect like
signs or pointers to god. And not very good pointers at that."

JK

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Grab yourself a copy of Summa Theologica and have some fun for the next few months, if you want the best answer to this and many other questions.

Thomas Aquinas, one of the greatest minds of the Middle Ages, basically takes everything that you've thrown out and much more and stiches it together into a grand garbage dump of all of the prevailing theological questions of the time and lays it all out for your edification. Each section starts out with a question, provides the prevailing views that existed up to that time (which haven't changed much since then, in case you're curious) in exhaustive detail, then ends with his opinion on the matter. Sound like fun? You bet. Nothing like a little weekend reading.

If you want to read it quickly, just red the question then the "I answereth that" section of each topic. Aquinas covers everything, some of it simply silly. So what, though. Every prolific and brilliant writer has his or her moments.

The theologians of the Rennaissance and Middle Ages were concerned with reconciling the thought of Aristotle (including his syllogism) and Christian theology. All of these questions are handled quite well, though maybe not to everyone's liking.

Stan said:

I think we can all agree on the following four points:

1) All monotheistic religions portray God as a good, kind and
benevolent entity, free from vice and sin.

2) All monotheistic religions portray God as an all-powerful being.

3) All monotheistic religions require their followers to worship God.

4) For millenia, hundreds of millions of innocent people,
particularly children, have suffered from starvation, disease,
physical abuse, sexual abuse, genocide, etc....

Given those four facts, please reconcile the following:

A) How can God be a truly a good deity if he/she has the power to
stop the tragedies mentioned in No. 4 above, yet allows such
horrible suffering to continue? The standard "God works in
mysterious ways" non-explanation is altogether insuffient to
address this question, as is "He will make amends in heaven."

B) How can God be a truly all-powerful deity if he/she is a
genuinely good being, but allows such horrible suffering to
continue?

C) How can God be a good (i.e. caring, benevolent and free from
sins or vices) entity if he/she demands that people worship
him/her? Isn't demanding adolation the clearest possible sign of
the vices of vanity and extreme egotism? Don't we usually
characterize people who crave and demand this sort of attenion as
egotists, dictators, self-centered and pathetic? Shouldn't we
expect even higher standards from our deities than we do from our
fellow human beings?

Is the explanation merely that the fundamentals of theistic
religions simply make no sense and cannot be explained by logic or
reason? Please fill me in (figuratively, not literally - I can
appreciate that some of you may wish to bury me alive for
questioning your beliefs).

Aguru said:

Consider this scenario:

God wanted to save the world, so he appeared and told people that
he is GOD. That's a fact.
People smirked at him and said "You are a quack". That's an opinion.
Finally, God gave up and left, leaving people in their misery.
That's a fact.

The questions:

1. From God's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or opinions?
2. From the people's viewpoint, what's fact and what's opinion?
3. From an outsider's viewpoint, what's more important: facts or
opinions?

Click to expand...

Click to expand...