The essay which I attached to the email

Religion: The Good, the Bad, and the 2 Thessalonians 1:8-9

Religion is a very important aspect of human life. Throughout history, the effects of religion have reverberated in every society and culture. While many societies have differing religions, ultimately, the religions all share a common purpose: belief in the supernatural. From the belief that the world is an illusion (Buddhist thought), to the concept of an all-powerful god creating the world for a specific purpose (Judaic, Lakota, etc.), religions tremendously differ in their dogma. And this difference in beliefs has caused a lot of strife in the world; religion provides an ample rationalization for many of the conflicts amongst societies. It can be concluded then, that religions have many facets with both positive and negative sides. In order to decide whether or not religion itself is beneficial to society, one must look at the effects of religion upon humans. It is perhaps easy to find support for religion; that’s what most have been taught. However, the faults of religion cannot be ignored, and ultimately, in order to decide whether or not religion is beneficial, one must place the good and the bad against each other and use a scale to decide which one outweighs the other. It is the nature of this scale that will differ in each of our arguments; the utilitarian, ethical egoist, and the Kantian will all use different scales to measure the applications of religion. And when each of these moral system advocates put religion on the scale, all of them will approach them same conclusion: religion is ultimately detrimental to society and must be dismantled.

Part I: Religion and Science

First of all, in deciding whether or not religion is beneficial to society, one must accept a definition of religion. The definition of religion itself has brought about considerable debate; in fact my previous mention of Buddhism as a religion has many detractors. But for the purposes of this project, we define religion using the definition of Dictionary.com:

1.	A set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, esp. when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs. i

So with that squared away, a discussion of the history of religion (Religiongeschichteschule) can begin.

All ancient civilizations have some sort of religion. But for the purposes of this discussion, we will only refer to familiar civilizations and the effects religion had on their respective societies. So we first examine Greco-Roman religion. This is one of the earliest religions and thus can provide insight as to how religion was first constructed. While today, we might think of the stories of Jupiter, Ceres, Vesta, Sol, etc. as merely fantasies and entertainment, the ancient Romans took their gods and goddesses very seriously. Jupiter was the explanation as to why it started to rain; or even why the Roman armies sustained victories^ii,iii.Disagreeing meant death. For instance Socrates was placed on trial because:

“Socrates is an evil-doer and corrupter of the youth, who does not receive the gods whom the state receives, but introduces other new divinities”^iv

So in this case, religion meant an authority on the truth. To disagree meant to deny the fundamental truths of that society. Arguing that Jupiter wasn’t the cause of rain meant that you ought to be put to death.

However, the religion of the Romans provided an emotional overview of life. Everything made sense to them as a result of religion. Because they could not understand the actual mechanisms of rain, the unsatisfied mystics attributed such phenomena to gods and goddesses. And that is why the ancient religions have many gods and goddesses, each one serving as an explanation for each natural phenomenon. Everything had a mystical purpose and reason; and with this knowledge people had a motivation in life.

As history progressed, more and more natural explanations (which did not cater to religious beliefs) arose for such phenomena. Rain, as we now understand it today, is a meteorological process. And this is why as society progressed, the desire for a separate supernatural entity behind every action decreased. But religion responded to these changes by conceding its monopoly on explanations.

Roman religion does not survive to this day; you would be hard-pressed to find a person who actually believed in Jupiter as anything but the 5^th planet around the sun. However, many other religions still exist today, such as Judaism and its offshoots Christianity and Islam. And all three of these religions have changed considerably throughout their histories, and today each of them has many different sects and denominations. And not much different from the Roman religion, each of these also provided supernatural explanations for natural phenomenon which can be observed. And similar to the Roman religion, many of these explanations were found to be incorrect, and the process of finding the errors was a difficult process that warranted death.

We now turn our attention to Judaic explanations. For the ancient Israelites, God (Adonai, YHWH), was the central authority in everything. And He revealed to them the laws by which the Israelites governed themselves. The story of Moses at the top of Mt. Sinai receiving the Ten Commandments illustrates this perfectly. However, that is not set of laws the Israelites received. The entire Tanakh (Torah, Nevi’im, Ketuvim) was divinely inspired prose. So then, it is safe to say that such a divinely inspired set of books should contain no scientific errors. But many errors are observed, for instance:

• In Genesis 1:1-2:3 (בראשית or Bərêšîth in Hebrew), the earth is created before light and stars, birds and whales before reptiles and insects, and flowering plants before any animals. The true order of events was just the opposite. Even if taken as an allegory, the order of events is still wrong.^v

• In Genesis 1:30, all animals, (including lions, hawks, and dinosaurs) were given “green plant for food” i.e. vegetarians.

• In Genesis 2:19, God fashions Eve out of one of Adam’s ribs. This led people to believe that men had one less rib than women, a fact which persisted until the father of anatomy, Vesalius, proved in 1543 that men and women had the same number of ribs.

This is only a small sample of scientific claims which the Tanakh makes. Among other claims include the origin of rainbows (as a result of God’s promise with Noah to never flood the whole world with water again. Next time he’ll flood the whole world with fire. See Genesis 9:13), the origin of languages (The tower of Babel contradicts current examinations of the history of language which tell us that the diversity of languages was a gradual development, not an instantaneous decree of God as punishment for attempting to reach the heavens. See Genesis 11:9), the reason why some people are born with disabilities (because God made them that way. See Exodus 4:11), and so on.

But what does this all mean? One thing that can be concluded from this is that people today no longer take these as literal. But that does not excuse the thousands of years where these verses were taken as literal. For instance, Copernicus was one of the first to offer the heliocentric theory of the universe, which means that the sun, rather than the earth, was the center of the universe. This is of course today known to be false because the sun is merely one of the many stars around the Milky Way Galaxy, and in fact because the universe has more than three dimensions, it makes no sense to ascribe to it a “center”.^vi

But even though Copernicus is wrong, his idea still had to be evaluated. And based on the scientific evidence at the time, the heliocentric system was the best explanation for the evidences available at the time. How the religious authorities at the time feel about Copernicus’s ideas? Interestingly enough, the Catholic Church was not in much opposition to him at the time.^vii However, as soon as his books gained widespread popularity, they placed his book (De revolutionibus orbium coelestium, or On the Revolutions of the Celestial Orbs) on the List of Prohibited books (Index Liborum Prohibitorum).^viii But the Catholics weren’t the only ones who took notice of him. Martin Luther, one of the most important figures of the Protestant Reformation, had this to say about Copernicus:

“People gave ear to an upstart astrologer who strove to show that the earth revolves, not the heavens or the firmament, the sun and the moon.... This fool wishes to reverse the entire science of astronomy; but sacred scripture tells us that Joshua commanded the sun to stand still, and not the earth.”
-- Martin Luther, referring to Joshua 10:13 (above), in his series of "Table Talks" (1539)^ix

Another important figure, Melanchthon (A friend and associate of Martin Luther), stated:

The eyes are witnesses that the heavens revolve in the space of twenty-four hours. But certain men, either from the love of novelty, or to make a display of ingenuity, have concluded that the earth moves; and they maintain that neither the eighth sphere nor the sun revolves.... Now, it is a want of honesty and decency to assert such notions publicly, and the example is pernicious. It is the part of a good mind to accept the truth as revealed by God and to acquiesce in it.
-- Melanchthon, emphasizing Ecclesiastes 1:4-5 (above)^x

And to move away from Lutheran ideology, let us turn our attention to John Calvin, who stated:

Who will venture to place the authority of Copernicus above that of the Holy Spirit?
-- John Calvin, citing Psalm 93:1 in his Commentary on Genesis^xi

So then, it has been shown that these famous Biblical scholars understood these verses to be quite serious in relation with the actual world. This raises the question in general: is it beneficial for religion to preemptively prohibit scientific endeavors on the basis of ancient texts? Now we can examine this question from the ethical systems introduced in the first paragraph.

• Act utilitarian: Science itself has repeatedly brought about pleasures to society. Many people enjoy videos about the cosmological discoveries, magazines such as Scientific American and Astronomy. Scientific discoveries also bring about pleasure, such as cures for diseases. Religion, on the other hand, prohibits such thinking, and entraps the person into accepting dogma. A scientist has the enjoyment of knowing that he’ll learn something from his experiments, whereas a religious person already knows the “truth”. The scientific explanation for rainbows is much more pleasurable and sating than “God made rainbows to promise he won’t slaughter us.” So therefore, according to act utilitarianism, this aspect of religion is not beneficial to society.

• Kant’s categorical imperative #2: I cannot rationally will to live in a society where science is not the foundation of obtaining knowledge. Therefore this aspect of religion is not beneficial to society according to Kant.

Part II: Religious Conflicts

As stated in the first paragraph, religion provides an ample rationalization for many of the conflicts amongst societies. Religious imperialism is one of the most important examples of the effects of religion amongst societies. Perhaps the earliest example of religious imperialism is alluded to in the Tanakh:

11 Obey what I command you today. I will drive out before you the Amorites, Canaanites, Hittites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites. 12 Be careful not to make a treaty with those who live in the land where you are going, or they will be a snare among you. 13 Break down their altars, smash their sacred stones and cut down their Asherah poles.14 Do not worship any other god, for the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God.(Exodus 34:11-14)^xii

i Dictionary.com

religion. (n.d.). Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.0.1). From the Dictionary.com website: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/religion

ii University of Chicago:

“The statue of Jupiter was clothed with a tunic adorned with palm branches and Victories… and a purple toga embroidered with gold… afterwards worn by Roman generals when celebrating a triumph”

“This temple was the centre of the religious system of the state during the republic and empire, and possessed great political importance.”

An article on the University of Chicago website: http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Gazetteer/Places/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Roma/Rome/_Texts/PLATOP*/Aedes_Jovis_Capitolini.html

iii Wikipedia.org:

“Iuppiter Pluvius (“sender of rain”)”“Iuppiter Victor (“led Roman armies to victory”)”Jupiter_(mythology). (n.d.). Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Retrieved December 08, 2006, from Reference.com website: http://www.reference.com/browse/wiki/Jupiter_(mythology)

iv Gutenberg.org:

An online translation of Plato’s Apology:

http://www.gutenberg.org/catalog/world/readfile?fk_files=39508&pageno=8

v Biblegateway.com:

This website contains the text of the Bible in many versions. Here is a link to Genesis 1 in the New International Version:

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis%201&version=31

vi University of California Riverside:

The Physics FAQ: “There is no centre of the universe!”

http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/physics/Relativity/GR/centre.html

viiUniversity of Wisconsin:

^{Beyond War and Peace:
A Reappraisal of the Encounter between Christianity and Science"}

“^{Indeed, various churchmen, including a bishop and a cardinal, urged Copernicus to publish his book, which appeared with a dedication to Pope Paul… Had Copernicus lived beyond its publication in 1543, it is highly improbable that he would have felt any hostility or suffered any persecution. The church simply had more important things to worry about than a new astronomical or cosmological system. Although a few critics noticed and opposed the Copernican system, organized Catholic opposition did not appear until the seventeenth century.}” http://www.asa3.org/ASA/PSCF/1987/PSCF9-87Lindberg.html

viii Positiveatheism.org:

“^{... And whereas it has also come to the knowledge of the said Congregation that the Pythagorean doctrine -- which is false and altogether opposed to the Holy Scripture -- of the motion of the Earth and the immobility of the Sun, which is also taught by Nicolaus Copernicus in De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium, and by Diego de Zuñiga On Job, is now being spread abroad and accepted by many... Therefore, in order that this opinion may not insinuate itself any further to the prejudice of Catholic truth, the Holy Congregation has decreed that the said Nicolaus Copernicus, De Revolutionibus Orbium, and Diego de Zuñiga, On Job, be suspended until they are corrected.}”
^{-- The Roman Catholic Church, from The Decree of the Roman Catholic Congregation of the Index which condemned De Revolutionibus on March 5, 1616}

http://www.positiveatheism.org/hist/quotes/bilecopr.htm

ix Ibid

x Ibid

xi Ibid

xii Biblegateway.com

email debate with aminz (Muslim)

He wrote:

Hi Jason,

I think there are many open directions to which I have to respond (and probably this email will open some more). So, I would be thankful if you could wait a bit until I respond to all the previous emails before replying back to my email. Thank you.

Here is my position:

I think whatever ability and talent humans are given in this world, through natural evolution or through God, is to let them survive, increase in number, live a better and more peaceful life in a harmonic way with nature but NOT *to discover the secrets and truths of this world in the first place*. These abilities include rational thinking, sprituality, common sense, emotions, etc etc but are by no means restricted to pure rational thinking. Further, rational thinking is one tool but is closely attached to other tools(which I will explain). For these reasons I am going to define what Truth is supposed to mean for a person and how it should be acquired.

But let's go back to the issue of logic, science, etc etc and the issue of subjectivity.

According to Ted Peters, during the last 4 decades we have observed that:

1. "The strict empiricism, positivism, and reductionism that had held sway for the first two thirds of the twentieth century was challenged by a new awareness of historical relativity and the sociology of knowledge. Philosophers such as Michael Polanyi, Norwood Hason, Thomas Kuhn, Stephan Toulmin, and Imre Lakatos placed scientific knowing into historically conditioned communities of knowing. This challenged alleged scientific objectivity. The result was a new picture of scientific knowledge that began to look like humanistic knowledge, and even like theological knowledge."

I have not read the works of these scholars but maybe their point is that: Science restricts its investigations to the collection of data and building of physical models of explanation for natural phenomena. It is never the function of science to say that certain data prove or disprove say the existence of God. However, it is natural for a scientist, once having derived a model such as Darwin's, to speculate its meaning beyond the data itself. While this is normal, the scientist is at that point engaging in philosophy or even theology.

2. "From the new science questions of transcedence arose. The confirmation of Big Bang cosmology in 1965 was perhaps more decisive. Continuing debates over quantun indeterminacy and complementarity began to place physics on the theological agenda. Although the double-helix structure of DNA had been discovered earlier the development of molecular biology in the 1960s, accompanied by startling new propspects in genetic engineering, rasied questions of human nature for philosophers and questions of ethics for religous leaders. Science seemed to be asking for religious involvment and interpretation."

3...

Having heard from Ted Peters, I would like to come back to my own thoughts:

As I said before the main purpose of development of our natural talents and capabilities is to survive, have children, live a better and more peaceful life in a harmonic way with nature. There is no reason whatsoever that these tools are supposed to provide us with the secrets of creation. Please consider a statement like "Does God exists". In fact, how do we know that when we project the evidence related to this question to the space of our 5 senses, what we get is sufficient and decisive? Were these 5 senses developed to let us discover this answer to this question, I would have agreed with you. If these tools are not developed in this way, then not only one might cast some doubt on the legitimicy of using them in places where they are not supposed to be used, but also one can doubt their truthfulness.

If some statement like believing in God is very closely consistent with ourselves and serve us in living a natural and peaceful life, then there must be some truth in it. In fact, all my capabilities are supposed to guide me to the *Truth* of my life, which is to live a harmonic life. Some people say people believe in God because they need someone to pray to, to compensate their weekness, ... This, to me, is a confirmation to the Truth of God, and not some evidence against it. Because one simple concept is doing all these things which I need for leaving a good and meaningful life. My quest for truth is to find principles which are most consistent with my nature and I believe if I can find those statements, I would have found the Truth, because I was created by the nature and whatever is most consistent with me is most consistent with the essense of nature and the essense of the nature is the truth.

I have spoken a lot. Sorry. I need to go and study (I have a midterm). I will reply back to your emails as soon as possible. I apologize for the delay again.

My response:

Dorud bar šomâ,

I'm not sure what you mean. You have sent me many emails, some of them devoid of any material. I am quite aware that you have a life outside the Internet. Not everyone can fit in the series of tubes =). There is no need for you to notify me of "midterms", and other complications which may arise. I am fully understanding of such hindrances.

Now, regarding your details:

Ted Peters, which you have quoted, is a Lutheran theologian. I don't understand why you are quoting him. His attempts to reconcile science with his faith are irrelevant to the discussion. You are a Muslim (lest I be mistaken), not a Lutheran. What may work for a Lutheran may not work for a Muslim. Attempting to use wholly different theological axioms to justify your own beliefs seems quite ad hoc. But nevertheless, the opinions which he holds deserve scrutiny:


1. I believe the mistake that Ted Peters makes here is the obfuscation of the purpose of science. While I agree that current trends are causing people to stop looking to science for all the answers, I see nothing wrong with that. Science was cleaved by humans, for the purposes of our own concoction.

Science is explanation, observation, etc. It does not make moral judgments. One cannot look to science in order to understand why, say, abortion is wrong; that requires a different form of reasoning. The view that science makes moral judgments is mostly the cause of Isaac Newton, who created the "natural laws" (gravity, optics, etc.). John Locke then expanded upon this principle by exclaiming that humans also have natural laws as well; thus, "human rights", "natural rights", etc. were created. (See the United States Declaration of Independence for such a thing in action). But the mistake here is the very famous naturalistic fallacy. That is, "is" does not imply "ought". Just because humans have devised laws since time immemorial, does not imply that there ought to be such laws. This objection to "natural law" only came as a result of 20th century science, when the laws were proven to be erroneous in some cases, as a result of Max Planck's solution to black-body radiation and Albert Einstein's solution to Mercury's orbital trajectory. Because the so called "laws" were thrown out, people began to wonder what went wrong in the scientific method which caused such laws to be put in the first place. Karl Popper, with his concept of falsificationism, has contributed much thought to this subject.

And this is why when you make the statement "It is never the function of science to say that certain data prove or disprove say the existence of God", it is meaningless. Definitions of God vary; some say He is falsifiable, some say He is not. Without proper definitions of the components, beforehand, it makes no sense to make statements.

For instance if I say

Ich liebe dich.

to someone, it is meaningless unless that person has knowledge of German. But let's say that I tell them "Ich" means "I", and "liebe" means "love". Does that give them the necessarily information to evaluate the statement and give it a truth value? No. Definitions of every single word are a necessary condition for evaluating the truth value of a statement. So now I tell them "dich" means "you". Now can they evaluate the truth value? Yes. Now, let's say I made a slight change to the statement and instead told someone:

Ich liebe Gott.

And of course, "Gott" means God in German. Can someone identify the truth value in this statement? No, because "God" has many different meanings. In the first example, "you" is very clearly defined; it is the person with which I am speaking. But when I say "God", it means different things to different people. And this ties in with my critique of your use of a Lutheran theologian. His definition of "God", a Lord who sent His Son to save Mankind, is very different from your definition of God (La illaha il Allah). Compare John 3:16 with Qur'an 39:45. Very different messages.

So when you use the word "God" without any qualifications, it is a very big problem; the statement becomes unfalsifiable.

If you don't understand what "Ich liebe dich" means, there is no way for you to check whether or not it is a true statement. In the same way, if I don't know what you mean by "God", there is no way for me to evaluate any statements which use the term "God" in them.

For instance, my conception of God is a very negative one: God is a tyrant, a cruel Being which punishes people for doing what He forces them to do. This is the type of God which I find in the Bible, from Genesis to Revelations. In the Old Testament we have examples of God killing people left and right; the whole world was flooded, and the vast majority of creatures were wiped out without even being given a chance. In the New Testament we have a continuation of this line of action; Jesus approves of God's flooding of the earth. And then Jesus makes further proclamations, such as saying that he speaks in parables to deliberately confuse people and send them to hell (Mark 4:11-12).

That is the God in which Ted Peters is trying to justify belief, not Ar-Rahman Ar-Rahim. A very different paradigm indeed.

So let us return to the statement which you made:

"It is never the function of science to say that certain data prove or disprove say the existence of God."

Now that I have defined God, I can evaluate the truth value of this statement. Or can I? This statement which you made, is admittedly a lot more complex than "Ich liebe Gott". But it follows the same principle. So long as all the words are properly defined, this sentence too can be evaluated. Now often when people say, in defense of religion, "prove that God doesn't exist", they are really trying to convey the notion that if their respondent doesn't have a valid response, then their religion is true (there is of course the problem of proving a negative, as well as who the onus lies on, but let's ignore those issues for the moment). But let's say that I believe in the existence of God. That's not enough. There is no religion whose only requirement is belief in God. Belief in God is a necessary condition for salvation, not a sufficient one. If I believe in God, and I go around murdering and raping people, obviously you're going to say that I don't deserve heaven. There are other requirements as well. There is the belief that Jesus rose again on the third day; there is the belief that angels exist; there is belief that everyone is born of knowledge of God; there is the belief that Muhammad was a messenger of God, etc. etc. etc. All of these beliefs are based on different premises, yet their commonality is God. And this is why when you ask me to prove or disprove God, I don't see the relevancy. What is important, however, is the proof and disproof of each and every religion.

So now we may ask ourselves, what does it mean to "prove" or "disprove" a religion? It is actually a quite simple principle: reductio ad absurdum. Assume that belief X is true. Show that X → c, where c is a contradiction. Therefore, ~X. Here is a logic table:

X	c	X → c	~X
T	F	F	F
F	F	T	T

Note that X → c (the arrow represents "implies") has the same truth table as ~X, which means that they are logically equivalent. which means that if X implies a contradiction, then ~X must be true.

What does this mean?

Well, quite simply, it means that if we can show a religion to be logically contradictory, then it must be false. The contradiction can be internal (the religion is inconsistent with itself), or external (the religion is inconsistent with something other than itself). In the first case, the only thing which comes into question is the accuracy of our knowledge of the religion. And many apologetics plays on this, saying that "passage A doesn't contradict passage B because you don't fully understand it", "Passage A was superseded by passage B (how could you not know this?)", etc. etc. In the second case, not only is the accuracy of the knowledge of the religion questioned, but the accuracy of the externality is also questioned. Your example of Darwin illustrates this. Darwin's theory implied that species were constantly changing, which contradicted the Biblical assumption that species were static. The way to resolve this is in two ways (My current understanding is that these are the only two ways. If you wish to show me a third way, by all means I encourage you to do so.) The first, is the say that Darwin's theory is wrong; this is the stance that religious fundamentalists take. But the problem with this stance is that it forces the religion to become subject to observation. This is where your stance that "science cannot prove or disprove God" is questioned. Science can very easily determine whether or not Darwin's theory is true. It is simple; observe species, and see if they change. And that's precisely what Darwin proposed. Using his example of the finches as a catalyst for inspiring new biology, other scientists began to look for changes in species. There are many examples of this, with degrees of success, but I think that the most prominent example would have to be the Drosophila experiments. So let's say that species in fact do change; this would contradict the fundamentalist assertion that species do not change, which in turn contradicts the fundamentalist assertion that the Bible is perfect and flawless. So then, the highest order assertion must be rejected; the Bible is not perfect and flawless. Fundamentalists cannot accept such a conclusion, so they must disagree on science's methodology (there are, of course, "creation scientists", but those are beyond the scope of this discussion). For further information on this matter, I encourage you to browse the talkorigins.org archives.



The second option is to say that the Biblical assumption is wrong; this is the stance that religious progressives take. The religious progressives say that the understanding of the Bible was wrong at the time, and while people thought that the Bible said X, it really says Y. But the problem with this line of thinking is that the authoritarian paradigm (which is implicit in the structure of religion) is questioned. Who decides what the Bible really says? God does. (or God's Prophets and messengers do). An example of this would be:

Book 32, Number 4092:

Narrated Aisha, Ummul Mu'minin:

Asma, daughter of AbuBakr, entered upon the Apostle of Allah (peace_be_upon_him) wearing thin clothes. The Apostle of Allah (peace_be_upon_him) turned his attention from her. He said: O Asma', when a woman reaches the age of menstruation, it does not suit her that she displays her parts of body except this and this, and he pointed to her face and hands.

This is Muhammad's definition of hijab. Many people who are lulled into progressive religion are often kept ignorant of traditional interpretations of religious books. (I have a Christian example of this, using Martin Luther, Melanchthon, John Calvin etc. arguing that the Bible says the sun revolves around the earth. You can find this in the attached essay, which is of my own authorship). There is also the simple matter of widespread ignorance regarding religion. People who call themselves "Christian", "Muslims", etc. are often very ignorant of the very thing in which they believe! Ask a Christian to quote John 3:16 (the most famous verse in the Bible), and they can very easily say "For God so loved the world, that He sent His only begotten Son, and that whoever believeth in him shall not perish in the hereafter". Or can they? I'll have to investigate this further through surveying local churches and Christian organizations. But in any case, ask a Christian to quote 2 Thessalonians 1:8-9, or Matthew 10:34, or Matthew 5:22, (all of which are important verses), and their voice falls flat. And these are just the New Testament examples. Ask a Christian what the subject of the book "Song of Solomon" is. Not many average Christians will tell you what it's about, since it's not on the curricula of most Sunday Schools. (it is a book about sexual desire in a positive light) Some examples of passages from the book:

1. "Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth: for thy love is better than wine." A fitting beginning for a pornographic poem. 1:2
2. "He shall lie all night betwixt my breasts." 1:13
3. "I sat down under his shadow with great delight, and his fruit was sweet to my taste." 2:3
4. "His left hand is under my head and his right hand doth embrace me." She asks not to be disturbed "till he please." 2:6-7
5. Our heroine takes her lover into her mother's bedroom and asks not to be disturbed "till he please." 3:4-5
6. "Thy two breasts are like two young roes that are twins." 4:5
7. "Come ... blow upon my garden, that the spices thereof may flow out. Let my beloved come into his garden, and eat his pleasant fruits." 4:16
8. "My beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door, and my bowels were moved for him." 5:4
9. "My hands dropped with myrrh.... I opened to my beloved; but my beloved had withdrawn himself." 5:5-6
10. "Thy two breasts are like two young roes that are twins." 7:1-3
11. "How pleasant art thou, O love, for delights! ... Thy breasts shall be as clusters of the vine." 7:6-8
12. "Let us get up early to the vineyards ... there will I give thee my loves." 7:12
13. "His left hand should be under my head, and his right hand should embrace me.... Stir not up, nor awake my love, until he please." 8:3-4
14. "We have a little sister, and she hath no breasts ... But my breasts [are] like towers." 8:8-10

This is the smut which is found in "the good book". Go up to any Christian and show them these quotes, but don't tell them it's in the Bible. Most will immediately call them immoral and sinful. This is the stuff in which Ted Peters is trying to justify belief.

And this is just the beginning. Why do you think that when an evangelist witnesses to someone, he/she never tells the person to read such passages. The Christian always tell them to read the Gospels first, and save the rest for later (read: ignore the rest). If Christians were truthful, they would present the most difficult passages first (Numbers 15:32-36, where a man is killed for picking up sticks on the Sabbath).

But don't think that Christianity is the only one under the spotlight. There's also the Qur'an's punishments; such as cutting off the hands and feet on alternate sides (Qur'an 5:33), and so on. Go to a masjid and ask the Muslims there if they know of Qur'an 5:33, Qur'an 9:5, etc. etc. Most probably aren't aware of such passages.

So whether fundamentalism or progressivism, both are erroneous. The only conclusion is to deny the entire schema of religion.

2. I find this bizarre. There is no explicit relation between theology and quantum indeterminancy. Again, this progressive is preying on the ignorance of his audience. I noticed that you spelled "quantum" as "quantun". I wonder if that is an admission that you are wholly uninformed on quantum mechanics.

And as for raising ethical questions, I do not see how the 20th century's arousal of ethical questions is any different than any other century. When Anton van Leeuwenhoek discovered microorganisms, it also raised many ethical and religious questions ("Is it ok to kill microorganisms?" "Were 2 of every microorganism placed on the ark as well?"). Ted Peters does not explain how the 1960s is any different. (Perhaps he chose that era because it would be more vivid in people's memories).

3. Thank you, as I would very much rather speak with you, than Ted Peters.

Considering "Does God exists", I would respond that such a statement is meaningless because it violates the syntax of the English language =P.

And you also raise the issue of the reliability of the senses. While there can be some ground gained in that argument, it would only be a few feet into no-man's-land, and ultimately the tide will turn. Because you see, the moment you doubt the legitimacy of our senses, then there is no reason to accept God in the first place. Descartes tackled this issue with his famous declaration "Cogito ergo sum" (I think therefore I exist), which he proposed is the only thing of which people can be certain. (But what many people miss is that in order to reach this conclusion, he had to presuppose that God exists. For further reading, David Hume offers some good criticisms of the Cogito.) Believing in God in spite of the unreliability of our senses is in effect putting the cart in front of the horse.

Another issue is degrees of certainty . And this is reminiscent of quantum indeterminacy. While I cannot ever be 100% sure that I'm really typing this (I could be dreaming, or hallucinating, or even a brain in a vat =P), I am fairly confident that I'm actually typing this. Let's say 90%. While 90% belief may work for this, it does not work in the case of religion. Muhammad did not want 90% certainty in Islam, he wanted 100%. You must have absolute and true faith. When you begin to doubt the senses, then you're setting yourself up for a trip to hell. There is no room for doubt in Islam (or in any religion); the Qur'an states numerous times that God has revealed so many "proofs" of the truth of Islam that anyone who even questions it deserves punishment.

Commenting further on degrees of certainty, taking it to the extreme (when applying it to religion) would give an end-result of Pascal's Wager. So by choosing Islam, you're making the wrong choice, since Islam says that members of other faiths may reach heaven. The best bet (according to the Wager) would be to choose the most noninclusive religion, currently fundamentalist Christianity. Because that way, if Islam is right, and you chose Christianity, you still go to heaven. If Christianity is right, and you chose Christianity, you go to heaven. But if Christianity is right, and you chose Islam, you go to hell. (Admittedly, this is a simplification of Pascal's Wager, but this paraphrase is appropriate enough).

And regarding your final paragraph:

I don't wish to be rude, but I have no idea what the fuck you said. What do you mean when you say belief in God is "consistent with ourselves and serve us in living a natural and peaceful life"? Please don't use a whole bunch of words (like "natural", "peaceful", "consistent", and "serve") when they have many different meanings.

Also, you have not spoken a lot. Most of it was from Ted Peters. I hope in your next email I hear more from you. Thank you.

Sincerely,
Jason Macker

Oh my gosh, did I just criticize Islam? There, are you kaffirs happy now? Go away.