Who is really in charge of inspiration?

If there are those who acknowledge that having faith means that they can't be sure -- such as yourself, obviously -- and wish to leave it at that, then fine by me.It's those who claim, either explicitly by statement or implicitly by arguing in support of the position, that they can and do know for sure, whom I wish to hear from. So far, it appears none have given anything to support their position vis. it is definitely -- if I may borrow the Dr's analogy -- Alice the nice girl and not Bob the psycho that did the graffiti.

But we are still talking belief.What difference does it make if they "know" they are right?

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Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

Isn't the whole point of a discussion forum to discuss things?They make the claim, I'd like to see evidence for it. Exactly as you and many others would say if somebody claimed they had evidence 'disproving' evolution.

Except by definition belief is not subject to testing and in particular, supernatural by definition is not testable. If for example they claim personal revelation you have no real recourse. You can of course simply say that you do not believe them, which is fine.If God chooses to speak to them but not to you, where is the problem?

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Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

Except I am not questioning the mere fact that they have been "spoken" to, but also the identity of the speaker.How do they know it is who they think it is?
Were they programmed with some special secret code that would only recognise God? Is there some kind of devil-detector that only certain people are able to use? What exactly is the difference between the sound of God's voice and Satan's voice, or between Thor and Loki's voices, or between Zeus and Hades' voices?

They are satisfied that it is God. What more do you need?Understand, it is a question that I often ask people myself and have never gotten any answer that I consider reasonable.But we are talking about their beliefs. If they are satisfied then why do we care?Edited by jar, : hit ket

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Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

I, for all practical purposes, don't save when someone tries to use what is written as evidence that it was inspired by (Name your inspirer).

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There is no better love between 2 people than mutual respect for each other WT Young, 2002Who gave anyone the authority to call me an authority on anything. WT Young, 1969Since Evolution is only ~90% correct it should be thrown out and replaced by Creation which has even a lower % of correctness. W T Young, 2008

Then perhaps you should ask the people who think they have got reasonable answers to pop in for a while. Because some of them happen to think we should accept their belief as fact on the basis of their evidence and reasoning. So if they want me to accept it, they need to provide that reasoning and evidence, or else do what you have already: admit they don't know and leave it at that.

If they want to convert you to their belief, then yes, to get you to change your mind they need to present evidence that is sufficient to convince you.But if they are simply informing you of their belief then no evidence is needed.

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Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

You're welcome, it was reflective. Where's the claims that it could not have been another entity at all?And if there was entirely no evidence, then that would mean that what was posited was arrived at randomly. Do you really think that people form their religious beliefs all willy-nilly? And I've answered that and you haven't replied...I don't know, I can't. So what? I accept plenty of things without a rational basis, it doesn't bother me. How sure do you think I am? I wouldn't say sure...Surety and faith don't really go hand-in-hand. Faith is trust for when there isn't surety.If I was sure then I wouldn't need faith. I don't "have faith" in evolution, I've seen from the evidence that its happening. We can't know if the Bible was inspired, by I believe it and have faith that it was. But that doesn't mean I don't have any evidence whatsoever. We can look at the contents of the book and try to figure out if its something that we could accept as being inspired. But all you seem interested in is: "well, how do you know that was inspiried?". When people reply, all you gotta do is go back one more: "well, how do you know that was inspiried?", and so on. In the end, yes, we don't have evidence telling us whether or not it was. But that doesn't mean that positions are not being derived and thought about and worked towards. Nah, its more like out-sourcing your thinking But yeah, you're like, totally right, man: Theist don't have any rational thinking at all and thier beliefs are just childish security blankets.You're lucky that your so much better than them. This cartoon character of the believer that you've concocted is grossly inaccurate and the way you've draw it is telling of your pompous conceitedness.You have them as arriving at their conclusions willy-nilly and then demanding that other people believe them as well, but lucky you with your rationality that you are demanding of evidence and if only you could expose them to their lack of evidence then the smart ones will see that they don't have your rationality and then they'll drop their stupid beliefs thereby having nothing to demand others to accept.But we can see that this isn't what the believers are doing, that they're not really sure and that they're not really demanding you believe anything. But you don't want to talk to those people. It seems this is just another atheist's thread set up to make fun of those stupid believers.

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The truth of our faith becomes a matter of ridicule among the infidels if any Catholic, not gifted with the necessary scientific learning, presents as dogma what scientific scrutiny shows to be false. - St. Thomas Aquinas

I'd say that's a pretty fair assessment, yes.The core beliefs might be handed down from family or culture but most people tend to agglomerate a lot of diverse detail from books, videos, etc. Look at some of Buzsaw's outlandish ideas, for example.In my experience, the more "literally" people take the Bible, the less they know about it and the more likely they are to accept willy-nilly ideas from outside sources about what it says.Who is really in charge of inspiration? Ron Wyatt and YouTube.

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"It appears that many of you turn to Hebrew to escape the English...." -- Joseppi

Who is us?

Gods.

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Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

The better question is, what is good and what is evil?Edited by frako, : No reason given.

I'm putting this in a separate post because I think it's important and may even somehow relate to the topic itself.At the time the Genesis Garden of Eden fable was taking form, the idea of gods was quite different. The idea that there was one god, of any of the various forms of monotheism that developed around the middle bronze age, would not just have been alien, it simply would not have even come up.There would have been lots of gods, very human like yet living separately in a place few humans got to visit, capricious beings, more powerful than humans but not unlimited, quick to anger and quick to forgive or slow to anger but never forgiving, pretty much like the petty tyrants of the day.When the author of the story talks about "us" he is talking about the gods.It is only much, much later, around the time the Exodus myth was taking form that the concept of a god of a given people was beginning to evolve. But even there, it is NOT just one God, but rather a god of an area, or of a particular people.Reading the Bible as though ever reference to God describes the same character can only lead to misunderstanding and a cheapening of the stories.

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Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!