Topic: Health and Religion - page 83. (Read 211012 times)

So where is your proof of a god that can cause and effect the whole operation of the universe?

Once again you have not followed through with all of the evidence or thesis. You haven't proven anything but made a simple assumption to meet your need.

You only need to admit that you have no proof, and you only feel that your god is real.

Once you do that, you will begin to understand that religion does not have proof, but relies on the faith of it's followers.

A new study has countered some perceptions that Christianity around the world is on the decline and could be dying out, by pointing out that religious people are having more children than atheists.

The study, titled "The Future of Secularism: a Biologically Informed Theory Supplemented with Cross-Cultural Evidence" specifically tackled perceptions among social scientists that religious belief is on the decline.

Researchers from the U.S. and Malaysia studied over 4,000 students, asking them about their religious beliefs and how many siblings they had, and found that Malaysian atheists had 1.5 fewer siblings than the average, though in the U.S. the gap was narrower.

The experts found that non-religious children from the U.S. came on average from parents who had 3.04 children, compared with the 3.2 in the general population.

The findings, published in the Evolutionary Psychological Science international journal, correlated with other studies which found that Muslims are the most fertile and religious group. Christianity and almost all other religions had a positive association with parental fertility as well, however.

"While cross-sectional in nature, when our results are combined with evidence that both religiosity and fertility are substantially heritable traits, findings are consistent with view that earlier trends toward secularization (due to science education surrounding advancements in science) are currently being counter-balanced by genetic and reproductive forces," the study explained.

It also foresees a decline in secularism, due to the reliance on contraception contributing to lower birth rates, which it traced back to industrial developments.

"By the mid-19th century, scientific discoveries had moved to a point that human reproduction was sufficiently well understood that fertility rates began to be impacted, especially in the emerging industrial countries," it read.

The researchers predicted that "secularism is likely to undergo a decline throughout the remainder of the 21st century, including Europe and other industrial societies."

"It is ironical that effective birth control methods were developed primarily by secularists, and that these methods are serving to slowly diminish the proportional representation of secularists in forthcoming generations," they added.

The Independent reports that some might argue that having religious parents doesn't necessarily mean that their children will grow up with the same beliefs, but other studies have shown that religion is indeed heritable to an extent.

While Christianity's explosive growth has swept through much of the Southern Hemisphere – particularly across Africa – another dramatic story has unfolded in Asia. Some have dubbed it the "Korean miracle."

About one-third of South Koreans are now Christian. Seoul, the capital, boasts 10 of the 11 largest Christian congregations in the world. And South Korea sends more missionaries abroad to spread the word than any other country except the United States.

Christianity has grown from a few hundred adherents in the late 19th century to "about 9 million Protestants and 3 to 4 million Catholics in South Korea today," says the Rev. Samuel Moffett, professor emeritus at Princeton Theological Seminary in New Jersey.
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The dynamism of Korean Christianity, many observers agree, is an outgrowth of the peninsula's unique history as well as the early role of indigenous leadership. Christian teachings were first brought to Korea not by foreigners, but by Korean diplomats who came in contact with Roman Catholicism in Japan and Manchuria. An active lay movement developed, but it led to controversy and periods of great persecution.
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One key to the rapid growth was the strategy adopted by the young pioneer missionaries, which emphasized developing indigenous leadership: "self-government, self-propagation of the faith, and self-support."

"This encouraged national leaders to take care of their own affairs without foreign control or funding," Dr. Park says. "They practiced it from the beginning, advising but letting the Koreans preach and run the churches."

We are talking about a God that is so great that He can cause and effect the whole operation of the universe over periods of thousands of years. What can anyone know about Him, personally, if He doesn't reveal it?

By the definition of the word/term "God," He fits the "thing" that cause-and-effected the universe into existence. Nothing that we see suggests that He has to have a cause. Why not? Because to make something, you have to be outside of it... especially before it exists. This means that the laws of the universe which we operate by don't necessarily fit Him, since He was before the universe, and therefore outside of it. There is no proof at all that God has to have had a cause.

We all die. God has promise me and all those who accept Him, the right to have salvation from death. If I am in the least way desperate to show God, it is for your benefit, so that you can be saved for eternal life, as well. You say you don't want to be saved? Your choice. But you won't like it.

What you have written, is correct, to a point.

Then you use your own assumptions to create your idealism of a god.

Cause and effect: Using your exact same theory places something else as creating your god, and then something else creating that..... this is your perpetual argument.

You are once again correct when you state: "Even though this isn't quite proof of God" but you then fail with your next statement of "almost proof of god". Sorry, but cause and effect cannot just stop. It has to continue. That is the problem of your theory about cause and effect being proof. You stop it when it suits your ideals. You need to continue using the exact same theoretical knowledge and that means that the never ending loop consists.

Your links do nothing apart from show everyone how desperate you are to try and justify a god. If you claim to be an intelligent person then surely you must understand that your argument lacks merit.

So now your proof does not hold up...... try again.

Okay, at least for a start of the proof.

Cause and effect is scientifically understood all over the world. Newton's 3rd Law upholds it. Cause and effect is like a person playing pool (billiards). The pool player hits a ball which hits another ball which hits another ball, etc., which finally knocks a specified ball into a designated pocket.

We know from experience that there is great difficulty in tapping a cue ball in such a way so that it will cause a string of balls - through cause and effect - to finally knock a specified ball into a designated pocket. There has to be a lot of intelligent planning and skilful control, in the mind and body of the pool shark who does this.

Everything that we see in the universe operates by cause and effect. We have found nothing that does not operate by cause and effect. Rather than a simple handful of cause and effect actions as in the pool game, there are countless trillions upon trillions of cause and effect actions in the universe. Rather than simple specified pool intelligence that measures and calculates only a handful of movements to a designated end, the cause and effect movements of the universe create intelligent ends, over all the cause and effect actions of the universe.

The only thing we see in the universe that causes intelligent cause and effect actions is, greater intelligence. Consider all the machines that are made by mankind, and all the simple machines that animals use. The greater the intelligence of the animal or the man, the greater is the cause and effect action that is produced. This hasn't been shown to work any other way, anywhere on earth or in the observations we make regarding the rest of the universe.

Since the only time that we understand the "causer" of complex cause and effect activity is when it is connected to intelligence, and we have no evidence of anything not intelligent behind a string of intelligent cause and effect actions, we can conclude that there is a Great Intelligence behind the cause and effect actions that make up the universe.

Even though this isn't quite proof of God, alone, it is almost proof of God.

Now, about proof. Suppose you live in a wood frame house. Imagine that you are sitting in your home office and responding in the forum, here. Look up at one of the walls in your office. You see the surface of the wall, right. But if there aren't any holes in the wall, you don't see the studs that hold the wall up, right? Because of this, you have no real proof that the studs are there. Even if you saw the house being built, even if you saw the workers put up the studs that would become your office walls, you have no proof that there is anything beyond the paint or the wallpaper that exists now, do you? For all you know, the studs might have disappeared since you saw the workers put them up. In fact, you have no real proof that up until the exact instant of the present, you were even sitting in your office working on the computer, typing into the forum, right.

If you are going to get that nuts with the idea of proof, forget your whole life. You might as well not exist.

However, if you are the kind of person who accepts standard scientific proof that makes science laws, then the above explanation of the almost-proof of the existence of God is entirely credible. It is greater than scientific theory, even though it isn't quite enough for proof as it is expressed. The rest of the proof is expressed here:
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.10718395
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.14047133
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1662153.40
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.16803380.

Wake up, stats. All you have is hot air. And it is turning colder with every breath you take. If it weren't for the fact that political science exists, you wouldn't have any science at all behind the things you say.

Note that I don't write the above for you. Experience shows that you will barely be able to read an comprehend much of it. Rather, I have written it so that other people will have a clearer understanding that God exists, and that everything including our health and religion depends on Him through cause and effect.

Sorry BADecker, you have never done that. You are sad that you are a single person trying to convert the world to your ideology. You claim your god is real yet provide no proof.

It's funny that the majority of religious people say they have no proof yet they can internalize and believe. I don't question that. That is a personal choice.

But you claim you have the proof and all I do is ask you to share it.

You fail yet again!

Actually, you don't need any kind of proof to believe in something, you simply need a source of information you trust.

Really, in order to believe in something, you need some kind of proof. For example, I just believe and this faith gives me and what kind of confidence and belief in a better life in the future. Therefore, what proof of the existence of God is needed, if it is not material.

Don't mind stats. He is simply an emotional character. I pulled the rug of his religion/cult out from under him, and because of this, despite what he believes and knows now, he is simply angry at me for disrupting his little, peaceful, head-in-the-sand, ostrich world.

My answer to this can be found in the links immediately above  especially the second and third link. For an alternative perspective miscreanity also provided a nice argument essentially along similar lines.

Really, in order to believe in something, you need some kind of proof. For example, I just believe and this faith gives me and what kind of confidence and belief in a better life in the future. Therefore, what proof of the existence of God is needed, if it is not material.

The growth of Christianity in China has been astonishing. At this point, it's no longer a question of if China will become a Christian nation, but when. The ramifications of this religious shift are massive, and will shake China's culture and economy to their cores.

Since 1979, Protestant Christianity has been growing in China at a compound annual growth rate of more than 10 percent. There were 3 million Christians in China in 1980, compared to 58 million in 2010, according to Fenggyang Yang, director of the Center of Religion and Chinese Society at Purdue University. By 2025, that number could swell to 250 to 300 million.

Surprised? That makes sense. The Chinese Communist Party has done all it can to downplay this phenomenon and keep a tight media lid on it. Meanwhile, Western media outlets are so taken with the idea that religion is an irrelevant (and declining) facet of modern life that they don't pay attention to its growth in most places outside calcified Western Europe.

But this shift is happening, and it is astonishing, especially considering that China is officially an atheist country. From Chairman Mao's accession to power until his death, China officially banned all religion, the only country in history besides Albania to do so. Then, in 1979, in keeping with its liberalization program, China cautiously allowed a few places of worship to open. But the government's policy is still that religious expression must obey the party. Religion that is not officially sanctioned is still oppressed.

While it might seem surprising that Christianity could grow in the face of such repression, it is repression that prompted the growth of Christianity in the first place. In the third century, the church father Tertullian famously boasted that "the blood of martyrs is the seed of the church."

To better understand what's going on in China, let's look back at the Roman Empire. There, both government and society had values that were at odds with Christianity. The religion was so foreign, the reaction was an incoherent mix of savage oppression, benign neglect, and attempts at cooptation.

Still, Christians eventually became the dominant group in the Roman Empire by compounding with a respectable yearly growth rate. But there was more to it than that. Christians were often over-represented among the intelligentsia, which gave them a strong cultural cachet, even as their innovative welfare work made them attractive to the poor. (Bone fragments show Christians were healthier and lived longer than pagans, almost certainly thanks to the church's welfare system.) And of course, the church's heroic work was great PR. After a plague, while most people fled to the countryside, Christians rushed in to help the people, like they did in China in the wake of the 2008 Sichuan earthquake.

Under Xi Jinping, the Chinese government has stepped up its oppression of Christianity. As the Chinese writer and dissident Yu Jie writes in the magazine

An internal government document obtained by The New York Times in May 2014 shows that the church demolitions are part of a larger campaign to curb Christianity's influence on the public. According to the nine-page provincial policy statement, the Xi administration wants to put an end to "excessive" religious sites and "overly popular" religious activities, but it names one religion in particular, Christianity, and one symbol, the cross.

If history is any guide, this will only increase the popularity of Christianity. As Yu writes: "One of the phrases I have heard most often among [Chinese Christians] is: 'The greater the persecution, the greater the revival.'" Indeed, during the Cultural Revolution of the 1960s and '70s, when oppression was at its fiercest, Christianity actually grew in China.

Interestingly, Protestant Christianity is growing much faster in China than Catholic Christianity, almost certainly because the Roman Catholic Church has practiced a doctrine of appeasement to the Chinese government. Given that Protestantism is a do-it-yourself religion, where anyone is empowered to decide doctrine based on their interpretation of the Bible, we could see the emergence of new and seemingly strange versions of Christianity, acculturated to China, and perhaps mixed in with Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism.

Today, China is pursuing a nationalistic foreign policy, combined with a domestic policy focused almost exclusively on economic growth and productivity. This comes at the expense of families, social welfare, and the environment. To say that these are not exactly Christian values is an understatement. It is not hard to understand why the Chinese leadership is not a fan of Christianity.

But Christianity could be China's only chance to survive. Because of its one-child policy, and sex-selective abortion and infanticide, China is a fast-aging country with a massive gender imbalance. If you add to that the tensions wrought by breakneck crony capitalism and consumerism and inequality and pollution, the country is a powder keg. Most Westerners see China as a strong rival, but China's actual leaders see the country as always teetering on the brink of collapse, which is why their grip on power is so white-knuckled. More deeply, decades of Communism have stripped China of so much of its cultural heritage and left its society and culture aimless.

Christianity's enormous cultural and spiritual heritage, its emphasis on the rule of law, and its traditional focus on fertility are just what China may need to manage the next few decades without collapsing into civil war, revolution, or something equally terrible.

BADecker principle rule number 1: If a point of discussion does not meet criteria of one's own belief, then ignore it and claim it is wrong.

Therefore, your proof is wrong, so please give me more proof.

Besides, it is up to you to prove your god, not me to disprove. But when you say it is real, I will ask for proof.

I don't understand how someone can be (even partially) mind-controlled by a belief which is not falsifiable, and simultaneously claim they are free and are not centrally controlled to some extent.
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This is the point I disagree with. I think we both agree that the optimal way to increase degrees of freedom for individuals is to allow and enable instead of controlling. A universal strategy is an essential foundation that enables freedom. Without that, we have the situation that is developing now with varying viewpoints where some sets are progressing toward destruction and others are being dragged into declining entropy. Competition can take place when there is room for growth but on a globally saturated scale, nobody wins.

Reproductive strategy is likely to become essentially irrelevant for humanity, possibly within our lifetimes. It seems inevitable that our existing biological bodies will give way to different forms that will carry us off-planet. At that point, allowing and enabling all individuals to thrive in a constructive environment becomes paramount. What then is the protocol that keeps that freedom from becoming destructive? Of course, my thinking is that the protocol is outlined in the Christian bible.

The following two (relatively) short videos may be of interest regarding previous discussion:
The moral argument for God
Why Does God Allow Evil?

If it isn't voluntary, how is it that you can choose your own or even to dismiss it?

The future will be decentralized, free, and religious.

Wrong model. Outdated. So you have plenty of useless noise (i.e. not leaders but followers), industrial (or agrarian) age Chinese jumping from the groupthink Communism wok into the groupthink religion deep fry:

The number of Christians in Communist China is growing so steadily that it by 2030 it could have more churchgoers than America

It is said to be China's biggest church and on Easter Sunday thousands of worshippers will flock to this Asian mega-temple to pledge their allegiance – not to the Communist Party, but to the Cross.

The 5,000-capacity Liushi church, which boasts more than twice as many seats as Westminster Abbey and a 206ft crucifix that can be seen for miles around, opened last year with one theologian declaring it a "miracle that such a small town was able to build such a grand church".

The £8 million building is also one of the most visible symbols of Communist China's breakneck conversion as it evolves into one of the largest Christian congregations on earth.

"It is a wonderful thing to be a follower of Jesus Christ. It gives us great confidence," beamed Jin Hongxin, a 40-year-old visitor who was admiring the golden cross above Liushi's altar in the lead up to Holy Week.

"If everyone in China believed in Jesus then we would have no more need for police stations. There would be no more bad people and therefore no more crime," she added.

Officially, the People's Republic of China is an atheist country but that is changing fast as many of its 1.3 billion citizens seek meaning and spiritual comfort that neither communism nor capitalism seem to have supplied.

Christian congregations in particular have skyrocketed since churches began reopening when Chairman Mao's death in 1976 signalled the end of the Cultural Revolution.

Less than four decades later, some believe China is now poised to become not just the world's number one economy but also its most numerous Christian nation.

"By my calculations China is destined to become the largest Christian country in the world very soon," said Fenggang Yang, a professor of sociology at Purdue University and author of Religion in China: Survival and Revival under Communist Rule.

"It is going to be less than a generation. Not many people are prepared for this dramatic change."

China's Protestant community, which had just one million members in 1949, has already overtaken those of countries more commonly associated with an evangelical boom. In 2010 there were more than 58 million Protestants in China compared to 40 million in Brazil and 36 million in South Africa, according to the Pew Research Centre's Forum on Religion and Public Life.

Prof Yang, a leading expert on religion in China, believes that number will swell to around 160 million by 2025. That would likely put China ahead even of the United States, which had around 159 million Protestants in 2010 but whose congregations are in decline.

By 2030, China's total Christian population, including Catholics, would exceed 247 million, placing it above Mexico, Brazil and the United States as the largest Christian congregation in the world, he predicted.

"Mao thought he could eliminate religion. He thought he had accomplished this," Prof Yang said. "It's ironic – they didn't. They actually failed completely."
Like many Chinese churches, the church in the town of Liushi, 200 miles south of Shanghai in Zhejiang province, has had a turbulent history.

It was founded in 1886 after William Edward Soothill, a Yorkshire-born missionary and future Oxford University professor, began evangelising local communities.

But by the late 1950s, as the region was engulfed by Mao's violent anti-Christian campaigns, it was forced to close.

Liushi remained shut throughout the decade of the Cultural Revolution that began in 1966, as places of worship were destroyed across the country.
Since it reopened in 1978 its congregation has gone from strength to strength as part of China's officially sanctioned Christian church – along with thousands of others that have accepted Communist Party oversight in return for being allowed to worship.

Today it has 2,600 regular churchgoers and holds up to 70 baptisms each year, according to Shi Xiaoli, its 27-year-old preacher. The parish's revival reached a crescendo last year with the opening of its new 1,500ft mega-church, reputedly the biggest in mainland China.

"Our old church was small and hard to find," said Ms Shi. "There wasn't room in the old building for all the followers, especially at Christmas and at Easter. The new one is big and eye-catching."

The Liushi church is not alone. From Yunnan province in China's balmy southwest to Liaoning in its industrial northeast, congregations are booming and more Chinese are thought to attend Sunday services each week than do Christians across the whole of Europe.

A recent study found that online searches for the words "Christian Congregation" and "Jesus" far outnumbered those for "The Communist Party" and "Xi Jinping", China's president.