The Bible

[STlLLlRlSE]

Do you believe what the Bible says? How do you know all of the information in it is true? Who actually wrote the Bible?

I was watching a program my friend tapped from the history channel, it was about a bunch of scientists discussing the bible and religion, and telling the truth about it all and saying why most of it is a hoax. And of course i was stoned out of my mind and i decided to chat about it in the forums.

Well me perosnally, i don't believe what the bible says, and i'm not saying it isn't true, it could be or it could not, it's just hard to believe. As i was watching that program on the history channel about the Bible all stoned it got me thinking, why do people actually put their devotion to something they don't know really is true or not. They were saying on that program to this day they don't know who really wrote the bible, they say many men wrote the bible, but no specific names. To me that sounds like horseshit lol. But how do you know some guy(s) one day just said "lets write a book about how we want life to be" and just made it up, then again it could be real. I guess everyone has differen't opinions on the Bible. You know that game you play in elementary, where one kid whispers a word to the kid next to him, and the next kid whispers the same word to the next kid, and it keeps going around till it hits the teacher, and by the time it hits the teacher, it's not the original word the first kid whispered, thats what i think happened to the bible and history, bunch of miscommunication and everything got all mixed up.

I believe in a higher being and i do call him God, but Jesus i don't know about, nothing was wrote about about him till MANY years after his death, why is that, just alot stuff don't make any sense to me and i have no reason in believing things without proof. I'd like to hear your opinions, thanks for reading my post. - Peace

PS: Burn one for me, haha.

[Etrain]

Damn, I've engaged in bible conversation 3 times today!! That's funny, well...it's called faith. That's what religion is all about, like I posted earlier...I'm agnostic. Do whatever floats your boat, I'm too tired to type anymore...may return later. Peace.

[Stedric]

Faith isn't a logic based operation.

[Etrain]

He was asking why people believed in it...I responded with "faith."

[ermitonto]

I have no more reason to believe in the Bible than I do to believe in Homer's Odyssey.

[Stedric]

He was asking why people believed in it...I responded with "faith."
I know, I wasn't responding to your answer, I was just quoting Spock. :D

[Etrain]

Oh okay : )

[mellow mood]

yea orthodoxe and ultra by the book christians (lots of that in USA) dont understand that bible is a metaphore. and most of the sacred books are too. plus, humans wrote it. those humans arent gods. i mean its not because they say like we must persecute gays that its true. anyway i dont beleive in god, i beleive in me.

[mellow mood]

yea just an example of metaphore: the genese(is that how u say it?). everybody knows we come from monkeys, etc.. and there have been an evolution. we didnt just appear like that and then procreated.

[Mojavpa]

Many of the bible's stories are based on even older Babylonian, Assyrian, and Egyption myths. Talk about a lack of creativity.

[amsterdam]

you guy's are wild?

[amsterdam]

it's so hip to be a hater of religon these days.

[Hydrizzle]

No, I don't believe anything in the bible except for a few of the more plausible-sounding stories. Although it is almost entirely comprised of bullshit, it is a very interesting read. You will find that god is one pissed-off motherfucker.

[amsterdam]

and that's all peachy,but it's crazy how some folks really try their best to demonize people that choose to find comfort in the bible.if that makes them happy who cares?sure,5%of the super religous are a little off,but so are the 5%of the anti-religon folks,they are noooooooooooooooooo different.

[F L E S H]

Nothing's ever different to you, huh? Nothing seems to make a difference.

In any case, the Bible is a collection of ancient wisdom and myth. It is NOT meant to be taken literally, but unfortunately since around the year A.D. 200 the Church fathers have been telling us that everything in it literally happened.

Let me put it this way: have you ever read Greek/Roman/Chinese/Native American mythology? Of course no one takes those storire literally, as well they shouldn't. However, when you read them, there's always a lesson, a hidden truth which you should think about, or even meditate on. The Bible is not different. It was just the arrogance and the hunger for followers that lead the old Church fathers to lie to everyone; because initially, it was a conscious lie, but eventually, with passing of centuries, the clergy cam to believe their own lies too. Now look at the mess religion is in...

That's not to say that the Bible isn't a good book full of ancient knowledge and wisdom, because it is. Just don't tkae everything in it literally, because it's not meant that way, and I'm speaking of Old and New Testament.

[amsterdam]

i UNDERSTAND your points,i however dont see these huge problems that you do.sure,changes need to be made,,so what.

[amsterdam]

this isnt an intellectual talk.a person need not read a bunch of books to know what you are talking about.

[Loz]

I really don't think i beleive anything in the bible at all. I went to a catholic school and had to study religious education for four years. After four years of that i decided that most things in the bible was all crap. But then again im not a religious person i dont believe in religion

[DonnieDarko]

Most ppl dont believe the bible, they interpret the bible and find their own meaning. It is a collection of stories, inspired by god, written in a diffrent language, in a totlly diffrent time. You can interpret it many ways.

Why do ppl believe ?? IMO, they dont want to think about the possibility that "every living thing dies alone".

[SmokinThaHaze]

faith- the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things unseen........
Evolving from monkeys huh hmmmnnnn....... im not tryin ta dis man but if we evolved from monkeyes then why arent they still evolving to this day?!? are those special monkeys, i personally do believe every thing the bible says and ya im not perfect im far from that im only human, just because i smoke doesnt mean i love jesus or god any lesser i just feel that if u believe u believe and if u dont then u dont there shouldnt be an argument because it will never end, evolution is taught to us because science tries to put a handle on everything, but the bible isnt science many things would be impossible, but with faith the size of a mustard seed u can move mountains, so science tries to explain this by saying we had the big bang theory lol or evolution and thats the "scientific way" im not doggin science its my favorite subject but u cant try to explain everything, i mean how can u state the big bang theory happened, they state all of a sudden cosmic explosion that hurled matter and in all directions. how can u believe that, its just as hard for u people to say that is possible, then y cant the bible be possible but im not tryin to argue or preach im just stating my opinion.......

[Stedric]

it's so hip to be a hater of religon these days.
Amsterdam thats a bit simplistic, I don't hate religion I just find my own spirituality in other things. I hate ignorance, but as stated before (might have been in a different thread) I don't believe ignorance and religion go hand in hand.


Many of the bible's stories are based on even older Babylonian, Assyrian, and Egyption myths. Talk about a lack of creativity.
Not to mention Greek, the story of Jesus Christ especially is very similar to the story of Heracles (better known by his roman name Hercules).


im not tryin ta dis man but if we evolved from monkeyes then why arent they still evolving to this day?!?
Evolution isn't that limited of a biological function, through mutation and natural selection we have evolved to better suit OUR environment, but the monkeys are also still changing to suit THEIR environments.

[Looker]

Dont MAKE me come down there..... :D

[SmokinThaHaze]

yea but monkeys arent evolving into humans, and stating mutation and natural selection is not really educated, yea it sounds like it but there is no meaning sted, i mean based on that saying alone u are stating that we are all a mutation from a monkey offspring, and monkeys do change to adapt to their environments i do believe u there, but it's impossible, illogical, and irrevelant to say that we are a mutational product of the monkey family, furthermore we are closely realated to monkeys, but that alone doesnt mean we are an offspring of them, thats like sayin that just because some plants and animals are similar by the way they do things that animals evolve from plants.......

[ermitonto]

Of course humans didn't evolve from monkeys. We evolved from apes. Study some biology sometime and maybe you'll understand the whole natural selection thing.

[SmokinThaHaze]

ok........."apes" same question y arent they still evolving huh?!? wut does biology have to do with the bible in the first place science and the bible dont mix at all, science tries to have proof that everything has a reason to happen and has a physical form of proof and the bible is soley faith and miracles........

[ermitonto]

They are evolving, just in a differench branch that humans. There are all sorts of different kinds of apes that have evolved features specific for their environment. Again, pick up a biology textbook before you start telling me biologists have got it all wrong. Of course science and religion don't mix (religion relies on faith, i.e. acceptance of things as true without evidence, while science relies on examining the evidence before jumping to conclusions), but you can't make anybody believe your statements that evolution is false without studying some biology first. You need some explanation of WHY the science doesn't work before you convince me we were made by some giant invisible dude, and you can't do that without an understanding of the science.

[ermitonto]

To answer the question "why aren't apes evolving into humans?" is simple. Biology rests on diversity. Things have to evolve in different ways or else the ecosystem crumbles. If every organism on earth was a human, we'd have to resort to cannibalism and eventually we would all die without plant life to bring in energy from the sun. Humans aren't "better" than apes, we're just different. We evolved different features because of specific circumstances our ancestors had to endure, and because certain beneficial random mutations happened that were different from apes. We evolved to fit a different niche in the environment. For some reason, apes tended to survive more in their environment when they walk on four legs and have fur, or they simply didn't evolve any mutations which changed that, and we on the other hand did get those mutations and they helped us out in our particular environment.

Evolution normally happens at a very slow rate. We can't usually see things evolving because most random mutations are not beneficial and do not catch on. But the law of natural selection is really quite simple and makes so much sense I can't see how it could be refuted: things that are different from others in such a way that they tend to survive more are more likely to pass on their genes. Just look at bacteria that evolve because of their resistance to anti-biotics. We kill all the bacteria that don't have immunity to the anti-biotics so only those that can withstand it live on and pass their genes onto the next generations of bacteria, so new antibiotics are required. It happens all the time. Natural selection is an objectifiably observable phenomenon.

[SmokinThaHaze]

pick up a biology book? im a senior i took 4 years of sciences, biology AP, chemistry AP, ipc, and Quantum Physics, so dont talk to me about studying science as it is my fav subject, we are all evolving but if we did evolve from apes then why arent humans still evolving 2 this day that has never been answered, u didnt answer it u just made an indirect reference to my statement............

[ermitonto]

First off, could you give me any proof that humans are not evolving? I would love to see it. That's sort of like asking why we don't see the Milky Way change shape in the sky even though it's spinning. It's too slow for us to observe on the time scales we experience. Humans are biologically indistinguishable from the way they were 200,000 years ago. By contrast, civilization has been around for 5,000 years.

I do agree with you partially in that humans have slowed down their evolution, but this can be explained without tossing natural selection out the window. We simply like to save everybody. Modern people have developed a society that wants to spare everybody's life if possible (with certain extreme circumstances, but you get the point). If people have non-beneficial genetic conditions that they can live with using the help of civilization but they would otherwise die in the wild, they are allowed to spread those genes and the gene pool for humans doesn't really develop much. Most modern humans, barring extreme circumstances, survive well into their reproductive years, so the next generation's genes will be pretty much the same as this generation's. Also, our choice of mates is no longer "how biologically fit is my mate?" but a question of personality, something far more relevant for humans than for animals.

[SmokinThaHaze]

good point but im not trying to argur with u b/c this will never end, u have yo facts and i have mine, and i did say we were evolving maybe u should read more......

[Nullific]

Wow you must have taken Biology in highschool with chemistry and physics, I have too but I wouldn't call myself an authorative figure on any of these sciences nor the evolution of man.
Humans and apes for that matter are still evolving and you should know it doesn't happen overnight. Over the next million years humans will become taller, balder and waker. Hooray!

Moving on, I hate organized religions, and the Bible for that matter.
I am not against spirituality or belief in God, if thats your thing go for it but there is no reason children should be lied to and have religion forced upon them at a young age.
If you want an example of the problems organized religion causes...look at the middle east.

As for the bible, im quoting Bill Hicks for the second time today.

Fundamentalist Christianity - fascinating. These people actually believe that the the world is 12,000 years old. Swear to God. Based on what? I asked them.

â??Well we looked at all the people in the Bible and we added â??em up
all the way back to Adam and Eve, their ages: 12,000 years.â?�

Well how fucking scientific, okay. I didnâ??t know that youâ??d gone to so much trouble. Thatâ??s good. You believe the worldâ??s 12,000 years old?

â??Thatâ??s right.â?�

Okay, I got one word to ask you, a one word question, ready?

â??Uh-huh.â?�

Dinosaurs.

You know the world is 12,000 years old and dinosaurs existed, they existed in that time, youâ??d think it would have been mentioned in the fucking Bible at some point.

â??And lo Jesus and the disciples walked to Nazareth. But the trail was blocked by a giant brontosaurusâ?¦ with a splinter in his paw. And O the disciples did run a shriekinâ??: â??What a big fucking lizard, Lord!â??
But Jesus was unafraid and he took the splinter from the brontosaurusâ??s paw and the big lizard became his friend.

â??And Jesus sent him to Scotland where he lived in a loch for O so many years inviting thousands of American tourists to bring their fat fucking families and their fat dollar bills.

â??And oh Scotland did praise the Lord. Thank you Lord, thank you Lord. Thank you Lord.â?�

Get this, I actually asked one of these guys: OK, dinosaur fossils â?? how does that fit into your scheme of life? Let me sit down and strap in. He said, "Dinosaur fossils? God put those there to test our faith." Thank God I'm strapped in right now here, man. I think God put you here to test my faith, dude. You believe that? "Uh-huh." Does that trouble anyone here? The idea that God ... might be ... fucking with our heads? I have trouble sleeping with that knowledge. Some prankster God running around: "Hu hu ho. We will see who believes in me now, ha ha. I am God, I am a prankster. I am killing Me." You know, you die and go to St. Peter: "Did you believe in dinosaurs?" "Well, yeah. There were fossils everywhere. Aaaaaaarhhh!" "You fucking idiot! Flying lizards? You're a moron. God was fucking with you!" "It seemed so plausible, ahhhh!" "Enjoy the lake of fire, fucker!"

[SmokinThaHaze]

[QUOTE=Nullific]Wow you must have taken Biology in highschool with chemistry and physics, I have too but I wouldn't call myself an authorative figure on any of these sciences nor the evolution of man.
Humans and apes for that matter are still evolving and you should know it doesn't happen overnight. Over the next million years humans will become taller, balder and waker. Hooray!



i never quoted myself as an authorative figure man, but he said i needed to read a biology book so i told him i didnt need to cuz of my credentials....... but the whole evolving thing yea man u r right we are evolving slowly, but u guys always stray away frum the main question asked-------- y arent apes still evolving into humans, u guyz moved on to talk about human evolution....

[F L E S H]

You don't understand, do you.... We've evolved from 'pre-humans'. The creature we evolved from obviously doesn't exist anymore. Chimps and humans have differentiated millions of years ago, and chimps will never evolve into humans.

Besides, do you think tomorrow morning, in some jungle in Africa, a Human will magically be born to some ape? Evolution takes millions of years. No one could ever 'see' evolution take place. That's why it's called a theory, not because it might be wrong, but because we can't see it happen in front of us. If we were to notice a change in our lifetime, that's called mutation, and it's a totally different thing.

[Nullific]

The way bacteria become immune to anti-biotics some would say is evolution.

[ermitonto]

The same reason they aren't evolving into lizards or penguins...human traits work for humans, ape traits work for apes, penguin traits work for penguins. Get it? What benefit would apes get from walking on two legs and losing all their hair? It would be harder for them to walk and for young apes to cling to their mothers.

The exact motives for why humans evolved the way they did are still debated by scientists. There's universal consensus in the field that human evolution did happen (except for a few fringe "researchers" trying to prove that the Bible is literal fact and God did indeed put dinosaur fossils here to fuck with our heads), but the exact circumstances behind the evolution isn't known for sure. There are many interesting interpretations of the evidence, like the aquatic ape hypothesis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquatic_ape_hypothesis) that humans were semi-aquatic animals at some point.

Humans have plenty of features which are totally useless for us but which are useful in animals related to us. For example, the cebaceous glands meant to keep fur slick now do nothing and just cause problems for us since they are the cause of acne. We have a tailbone, but we don't have a tail anymore. And pinky toes...other primates can use theirs for grabbing and such but in humans they do absolutely nothing for us.

And the number one evidence for evolution....FOSSILS! If you reject evolution and don't want to put forth the claim that God is just fucking with our heads, then homo sapiens and homo erectus and homo habilis and homo australopithecus and homo neanderthalensis must have all lived contemporarily with each other (and with pterodactyls and brontosauri and trilobytes) AND were all able to maintain their populations despite all the competition from the other species, even though carbon dating shows them to be from separate periods in time and you have no explanation why all those other homo species aren't around anymore. I find that hardly believable.

[Nullific]

B-b-but all the water from when God floodedd the earth makes your evil scientific carbon dating inaccurate!!!!!
MAN AND DINO COEXISTED PEACEFULLY GOD SAID SO!

(On a more serious note good info)

[weirdo79]

We have the same common ancestor, We did not evolve "from" monkeys or apes (although we fit the criteria for its classification) we evolved from the same common ancestor of such primates. We are Hominids. We come from genus Australopithecus and so do apes. The transitional species (Australopithecus) existed during the Pleistocene era and was quite the successful primate.

P.S. There is genetic similarities between almost all life on earth (except some spore based lifeforms) that share most of the genetic markers of "life" on earth thus insinuating that almost all life is connected genetically(yes plants too) and thus would have evolved to every other form. We all come from the primordial ooze...Deal with it. No man in the sky waving his omnipotent arms....Chance , Circumstance and evolution.

[Stedric]

We have the same common ancestor, We did not evolve "from" monkeys or apes (although we fit the criteria for its classification) we evolved from the same common ancestor of such primates. We are Hominids. We come from genus Australopithecus and so do apes. The transitional species (Australopithecus) existed during the Pleistocene era and was quite the successful primate.

P.S. There is genetic similarities between almost all life on earth (except some spore based lifeforms) that share most of the genetic markers of "life" on earth thus insinuating that almost all life is connected genetically(yes plants too) and thus would have evolved to every other form. We all come from the primordial ooze...Deal with it. No man in the sky waving his omnipotent arms....Chance , Circumstance and evolution.
I will of course side more with you than Creationists, but I think there is more to life than what Science can explain (at least Scientific Knowledge up to this point). Now am I going to chalk this up to a big bearded man in the clouds wagging his finger at me and threatening me with eternal pain and suffering? No, but I still think there is more to life than what we see and feel.

[F L E S H]

I will of course side more with you than Creationists, but I think there is more to life than what Science can explain (at least Scientific Knowledge up to this point). Now am I going to chalk this up to a big bearded man in the clouds wagging his finger at me and threatening me with eternal pain and suffering? No, but I still think there is more to life than what we see and feel.
You might be right. Sure, evolution is an explanation for how things happened, but it doesn't tell us how it began. If there's any place in science for God, of whatever supreme being that floats your boat, it's there. How could a spec of molecules come together and make the first living cell? That is the ultimate questin to which we still don't know the answer, but will one day, I'm sure. That's why it's important studying things like Saturn's moon Titan, which scientists believe has an atmosphere that is evolving almost the same way Earth's did. Maybe we can one day see how the first cell is born there, or maybe it's already there...