1. Darwin's bulldogs

Comment #226416 by elise97 on August 8, 2008 at 3:56 am

it can be both jeepjay

it remains a "philosophy of beauty and imagination" as long as the we keep our 'objective' hats on, and remember that life is really just a load of 'survival machines'.

looking from a non scientific 'fluffy bunny' outlook, it is horrific, its true but so are black holes and other ideas. being horrific doesnt mean the idea isnt intellectually uplifting.

of course, scientists can stray into subjective emotion at the apparent plight and suffering of animals as much as anyone else. that is a human characteristic and hardly detracts from the beauty of a theory, which sets out to do a specific thing, describing things objectively without emotion.

2. Richard Dawkins, the naive professor

Comment #225770 by elise97 on August 7, 2008 at 11:10 am

but libby, the first thing theists ALWAYS seem to drag up (even those lightweight educated ones that you dont think are creationists) is the argument from design.

3. A New Step In Evolution

Comment #188508 by elise97 on June 4, 2008 at 7:01 am

what, no crocoduck?

ha. checkmate, atheists !

4. Vatican: Islam surpasses Roman Catholicism as world's largest religion

Comment #152874 by elise97 on March 31, 2008 at 4:58 pm

yes catholicism is a 'mere' sub division of a bigger religion and not strictly comparable in grouping terms to islam, which is a whole damn religion, encompassing many sub divisions.

so, they shouldnt worry too much. christianity is still by far the worlds biggest delusion.

5. Gay Jesus play blasted by bishop

Comment #114375 by elise97 on January 22, 2008 at 5:37 am

lol - how can someone be gay if they never existed?

6. What We Believe: Atheism

Comment #104316 by elise97 on December 28, 2007 at 10:14 am

one day perhaps, this won't be a newsworthy story. i mean, big deal.

7. The Pagan Christ

Comment #104207 by elise97 on December 28, 2007 at 5:35 am

"Jesus's reply to this when challenged by the religious authorities of his day was clear.."

correction. its an ALLEGED reply, to an alleged question, about something that never happened anyway.

8. The Pagan Christ

Comment #103595 by elise97 on December 26, 2007 at 8:56 am

"Really? Is there any evidence that you exist? "

no, this message was written by someone else. they exist though so not sure what your point is :D

9. The Pagan Christ

Comment #102923 by elise97 on December 24, 2007 at 12:44 am

"He may have been one of many stragglers spouting supernatural rubbish at a street corner, and too insignificant for a historian of the day"

if this entirely hypothetical person did not have the familiar jesus characteristics or did not come up with any of the nuggets of wisdom attributed to a jesus at some point in time, we are still logically justified in saying jesus never existed

10. The Pagan Christ

Comment #102423 by elise97 on December 22, 2007 at 5:34 pm

"The 'original Christians' probably did believe in a historical Jesus, and the majority view of modern academics is that this is what they believed."

not sure why historians claim they came later, if they indeed do. maybe because they were fighting against catholicism and they got noticed then, whilst before they one of many uncontentious mystery cults that nobody saw fit to document. the name jesus might have been invented much later to add to this much older jewish messiah cult.

i wouldnt be surprised if historians also say some of the worshippers of mithras believed in a historical mithras. proves nothing about the origin of the story in myth or fact.

as i suggested before, it wasnt as if the mystery cults rejected an historical story as such, just it was much less important to the system than it later became, and perhaps irrelevant to the preisthoods.

therefore there is a prosaic way for cults to develop without a historical person, which is common to the region, and explaining why there is no contempory witnesses of jesus or documention from the great man himself. religion starting gurus today tend to be shameless self promoters of ideas and that includes written records for posterity. why didnt he write anything down if he had so much to say.

hi sleep of reason, it seems part 1 of the zeitgeist film has some major errors, i wouldnt take it too seriously. im sure there are some central truths there but the sloppy errors make it widely disputed as any way accurate by jesus myth experts, (apparently). it doesnt help that it was lumped in with really paranoid conspiracy claims either. its a horrible film anyway, i enjoyed the religion bit i must say, but when it started on the 9/11 garbage i clicked off. lots of ppl are the other way round, strangely, takes all sorts! there are some better sources of info than this

11. The Pagan Christ

Comment #102198 by elise97 on December 22, 2007 at 1:47 am

"Modern religion does not want to hear that a large majority of their practices, beliefs, etc. come from pagan faiths. This would destroy the uniqueness of Jesus and undo 2,000 years of pagan persecution."

well, we need to remove the distinction/uniqueness that christians have set up in their little minds between themselves and their 'pagan' enemies. we all think we are special but what a crafty trick they pulled there. christianity is just repackaged paganism; whats the difference? christianity, mithraism. same old story, the minor subtlties are irrelevant, its still pagan to the core. pick a godman, they are all the same, make some kind of imbicilic , arbitary 'submission' to it that you think it can hear, and some magical benifit will fall on you at some point, just for doing essentially nothing and for no reason at all

12. The Pagan Christ

Comment #102141 by elise97 on December 21, 2007 at 6:07 pm

"I've never heard the claim that the original Christians didn't believe in the existence of Jesus. (Fantastic!). If possible could you direct me to some more info on this? Thanks. "

this is what ive learned from reading around the subject for a while.

the early christians were gnostics, or those that eschew the material world in order to connect with the spiritual which for them was the real world.

the objects of worship, ie deities such as osiris or dionisus and for the jewish gnostics sects, jesus, were seen as perfect symbolic ideals that through their death and rebirth story could teach initiates how to be reborn into this ideal spiritual world.

they did not necessarily dismiss the deity as having an origination but its purpose was as a first step for initiates, the real intent, revealed later, was for the believer to use the ideal to acheive union with the spiritual self, ie their 'real' world. so the backstory in fact could get away with being entirely mythical right from the start (and could easily be transfered from another myth base such as the jewish one) to serve its function; it did not need to be particularly plausable for it to be used as a gnostic ideal.

the literalist school evolved on from this, took the embryonic jesus story for real and eventually replaced the former deeper gnostic meaning with familiar christianity.

13. The Pagan Christ

Comment #102102 by elise97 on December 21, 2007 at 3:03 pm

"I don't think somebody should be taking a position simply because it is the most convenient for their cause. I would hope that RD and others conclude that Jesus was probably historical (though then 'romanticised' etc) because they think, as I do, that this is where the evidence points. "

but the evidence simply doesnt add up to anything.

all there is just vague mentions of some 'christ', a proven forgery, spiritual dreams of this person by some magic mushroom eating space head, and tales of a life by competing vested interests years after his supposed 'death' using only the above and some pretty vivid imagination as evidence.

sorry but thats not really the type of evidence required for a person of this historical importance. we need alot more considering we also know for a fact the original christians did not believe in him either, a fact hushed up by the later type of christian we still have today, and probably the most important point of all.

however in a way it is probably irrelevant to the arguments of RD, as the existence or not of a particular man in history doesnt exactly prove any supernatural claim associated with him. so no big deal to RD. but in a way it does really matter, because its a probable lie that most people have been forced through history to believe and continue to be misinformed about, and a major reason why christianity continues churning out the faithers.

14. The Pagan Christ

Comment #101999 by elise97 on December 21, 2007 at 11:16 am

there doesnt appear to be any evidence for jesus when you look into it. i cant understand why the general concensus of historians seems to side with there being an historical figure that christianity formed around. beats me *shrugs*. looks like the most plausable explanation is that it is simply the evolution of a jewish version of gnosticism.

ive noticed even keen atheists extremely reluctant to accept the probable non histority of this guy, even richard dawkins goes along with it, which seems odd as its central to the belief system for most christians

15. Clegg 'does not believe in God'

Comment #100774 by elise97 on December 19, 2007 at 10:13 am

He later said he had "enormous respect for people who have religious faith"...

so do i, sort of. apart from their gormless delusional wishful thinking stupidity. oops he missed his chance to be totally honest there. nobody has to respect another persons faith.

16. The Pagan Christ

Comment #96498 by elise97 on December 10, 2007 at 4:18 pm

"It follows there is little good evidence that there was a man called Moses as depicted in the Torah."

is there any evidence for him at all, or need for any considering hes an integral part of a group of stories following on from a stupid creation myth? i read somewhere moses was most likely a demoted god figure, that was appropriated from an earlier civilization.

tricky to prove though, so its most likely he must have been a real man ;D

17. The Pagan Christ

Comment #95754 by elise97 on December 9, 2007 at 6:00 am

steve

"2. He had a twin brother who took over his role."

thats more likely than 1, of course, but to be tedious (again), i still think number 3 is most probable. jesus, his brother, his mum, his dad (both) and his 12 playmates are works of fiction.

18. The Pagan Christ

Comment #95592 by elise97 on December 8, 2007 at 4:44 pm

"I don't think you have read my posts very carefully. See, for example, the last 2 sentences of my reply to Wonderist in Post 106"

ok, pauls belief. seems his ideas were similar to other earlier christians, he came to him in a dream did he not, a mysterious saviour spirit or something? some evidence. wow.

"12 tribes of Israel, not the 12 signs of the Zodiac, "

ok, where do you think the "12 tribes of israel" idea originally come from. im not saying i know, im entirely winging it ;-D

19. The Pagan Christ

Comment #95584 by elise97 on December 8, 2007 at 4:12 pm

sorry, but if your talking about the gospel accounts, they can be totally ignored as credible evidence as they aint contempory. to say the weight of evidence is that jesus was real based on what was popular literature is strange. do you think humans back then were any less averse than today in entirely making up stories as entertainments for themselves. do you think they had the integrity to go back to their source myths about an unknown (to them) historical person to check the ideas were factual before they embroidered them.

20. The Pagan Christ

Comment #95540 by elise97 on December 8, 2007 at 2:55 pm

smithyboy and others

the mystic jesus with the backstory added later is actually the most logical progression of events if jesus really belongs (as appears to be the case) to a line of decent from more ancient mystical 'sons/suns of god' in the greek/roman/egyption tradition. he certainly shares most of the characteristics of earlier or contemporary (to his origin) dieties so why not their type of origination in myth also.

have you looked into how many of his stablemates were also not born from real historical figures. we know the ancient world was a virtual 'myth engine' so why make exceptions for one of them. is it just cultural indoctrination and being familiar with the tales of a 'real jesus' that makes you believe he must have been real.

all the evidence together; the lack of contemporary evidence for a life at all, not even expecting one appropriate to his amazing abilities (apart from forged documents), a backstory that appears to be quite alot more to do with some much more ancient astrology and sun moon worshipping stuff being later condensed and anthropomorphised, and earlier origins forgotton (eg the 12 disciples being the zodiac, and jesus representing an older solar diety), the early christians actually knowing him as a mystical figure, the precedents of other dieties on his family tree not needing a real human as originators, and the knowledge of how religions continuously diverge and fragment from previous myths, i would have thought it entirely uncontentious jesus was probably not a historical person.

i'll just add, your comparison that myths like 'nessy' need a 'real' origin like a floating log is wrong as this in actual fact based on a previous tale, in this case people getting the idea of water monsters from seeing the film 'king kong'. this shows how myths can originate from other ideas in popular culture

21. The Pagan Christ

Comment #95357 by elise97 on December 8, 2007 at 6:12 am

"this imperative however cannot be derived from natural selection. "

ADH, so i think your saying you 'choose' to be good, rather than you are innately good by nature. if you choose to be good by following a holy text, how do you know they are good in the first place, and how are you able to discern between good and less good bits. if you dont have an innate compass of morality wouldnt they be meaningless, and probably rather boring (as they wouldn't 'speak' to your morality).

22. The Pagan Christ

Comment #95244 by elise97 on December 7, 2007 at 5:33 pm

arn't people forgetting that the early christians, who invented the god of jesus christ, like the worshippers of mithras did not have the belief in an actual solid human godman. the backstory of jesus the man that was to be incorporated into the legends of what we recognise as christianity today was invented by later christian cults that mostly destroyed these original christians beliefs. aparantly people are still looking for what was never there, or needed to be at the birth of this religion.

23. The Pagan Christ

Comment #95115 by elise97 on December 7, 2007 at 11:24 am

"The evidence is in favor of Jesus' existence. I don't know why it is necessary to embrace a minority opinion to insist that the man didn't exist and insinuate that mainstream scholars are all Christians and thus unable to engage in honest scholarship, it is an ad hominem argument when you come down to it. "

it is certainly not mainstream opinion that jesus existed, you dont say why you place some historions opinions above others as to whether all the parts mentioning jesus are forged or just some. certainly if one was going to forge a document, thats the bit i'd forge, and if the original mentioned jesus acceptably to convince people a thousand years later id be inclined to leave well alone. but if it is accepted that parts of the josephus document mentioning a jesus are not the forged parts so what. there could have been 100's of the buggers about at the time but that is not evidence that the jesus we mean by jesus existed. any attributes of the jesus we mean by jesus are the bits considered by you are the forged parts and that is why it is not mainstream opinion that jesus existed. sorry but im just assuming you really mean jesus, not just, erm jesus lol! im of the (uncontentious and quite mainstream) opinion all is most likely a forgery.

24. The Pagan Christ

Comment #95073 by elise97 on December 7, 2007 at 9:47 am

i think its pretty ironic that ADH goes all sceptical about wikipedia articles, that have at least to endure a modicum of 'peer review' by possibly experts in their field but seems happy to defend the veracity of much of what is after all a scrappy 2000 year old account, written by someone whose 'journalistic' integrity we havnt the foggiest about, and whose very account of whatever he was on about you agree has been fiddled about with in some way.

25. The Pagan Christ

Comment #94970 by elise97 on December 7, 2007 at 4:38 am

the 'mainstream' historical view is that jesus did exist, due to the fact that most biblical historians are christian apologists with vested interests and nice non christian historians dont bother getting involved in the task of destroying the legitimicy of a subject (which is already false by categorisation as religion). the average layman just assumes its impossible to know either way so takes the agnostic view about it, but thinks there must be 'something in it' (and cant be bothed to look into it). well, if you look into the evidence, there is not 'anything in it'. the only evidence is some alleged paragraph by josephus which was added to later by a christian, and proven by textual analysis to be a fraud.

how about the 'acharya s' books and website. seems to know whats shes talking about (i think she should drop the rather new age like name however).

26. Chimps beat humans in memory test

Comment #93823 by elise97 on December 4, 2007 at 9:13 am

there was a science program on uk tv a few years ago that explained that children had better memory than adults and could win simple memory games because adults have brains geared to do relatively more complex multi tasking; things like working, raising offspring etc and so the memory capability has to diminish to cope

27. VOTE on the 'Faith smackdown': Richard Dawkins vs Francis Collins

Comment #71755 by elise97 on September 19, 2007 at 3:19 pm

"I was watching a Richard Dawkins interview and he explained to the interviewer that he first realized there was no God when he was 14 years old! "

that old! much younger children can pick holes in the 'logic' and 'evidence' for god, such as saying things like 'who created god', which are never answered by adults. any child with an enquiring mind and interest in nature is very quickly going to see major contradictions in content and style between scientific descriptions and religious accounts of things and decide which is true and you can be younger than 14 for this kind of reasoning. i never believed in god or i cant remember if i did, i think at first it always seemed unreal, like a fairy tale [i can remember thinking nativity plays were stupid for instance] and as i got older i realized i was right; there was no blinding realization. there was never anything to suggest otherwise.