Red Bull ad offends christians!

[Indeed]

Because Africa.

[6souls]

http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/image...7_59141208.jpg

The creator of the energy drink Red Bull, Chaleo Yoovidhya, has died.

Mr Chaleo rose from humble origins to become one of Thailand's richest men, with a wealth estimated at $5bn (£3.2bn) last year.

His pharmaceutical company produced a tonic drink in the 1970s, but it became popular worldwide in the next decade when he went into partnership with an Austrian entrepreneur.

Red Bull also owns two football clubs and a Formula 1 team.

Mr Chaleo was born of poor Chinese immigrant parents in the northern province of Phichit, reportedly in 1932, local media say.

He worked as a salesman before setting up TC Pharmaceuticals in 1962.

It introduced the drink Krating Daeng, which became popular with shift workers and lorry drivers.

In 1984 he launched it as Red Bull with the Austrian marketing expert Dietrich Mateschitz, and three years later began selling it in Austria.

Red Bull is now sold in 70 countries throughout the world.

Forbes Magazine put him equal 205th in its March 2012 world billionaire list.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-17416385

[Indeed]

The power of prayer. Amen.

[Moosey]

Bold 1: Every denomination and sect of christianity thinks they have it right and that all the other christians are stupid.

Bold 2: I beg to differ.

Bold 3: First off, you say that I'm pretty sure thinking of the western world. For the latter part of that, my answer is, Where do I start?

1. That is not entirely true. The major sects of Christianity (Protestant, Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox) pretty much agree on the core foundational doctrine. Anything outside of that is minor doctrine and not relevant to salvation. The arguments concerning minor doctrine are mostly superficial and most of the people concerned with these things are the outspoken minority.

2. Do you not question how life began? The Universe? Why Physics works the way it does, it's fine-tuning to our situation? Why we have the perfect place in the galaxy, perfect place in the solar system, and perfect kind of solar system and sun to not only create life, but to sustain it? Those are just a few evidences for the existence of God in the natural world, but the whole list is quite long.

3. I'm not entirely sure what you mean by your first sentence, but i'll clarify mine to say that, you're on a computer, whether or not you're in the western world, you have access to numerous translations of the Christian Bible. I'd start with the New Testament, Book of Matthew, and continue on from there. Any further questions you have about what you read(if you do actually start) I will be more than happy to attempt to address.

What makes the judeo-christian God more right than any other deity in the world though? Why would someone want to become a part of a religion where all the numerous sects and subdivisions of said religion are warring with each, can agree on very little, and believe different things.

Let me start off by saying, despite what many people think, Christianity is very different from any other religion in the world. People who say they are all basically the same haven't really looked into each of those religions. If you take Mohammed out of Islam, you still have Islam, if you take Buddha out of Buddhism you still have Buddhism, If you take Jesus out of Christianity, then you no longer have Christianity.

Many people will try to say things like "Jesus was a great moral teacher, or a great revolutionary, or a good person, but that's all he was" but if you really look at Jesus' life and have some understanding of the time period he was in, the facts do not offer those kind of answers. Jesus was a good moral teacher? He hung around with tax collectors, criminals, and many other manners of what people of the time generally considered "undesirables". He went into the temple and basically trashed all the shops set up in there, he went into public places denouncing the religious leadership of that time and culture went around declaring his teaching was right and that he was the Son of God, provoked some of the most powerful people in the community, then he went and got himself killed, and didn't even try to get off the hook.

Looking at some of those facts, that doesn't really say to me any of the things I previously mentioned. Jesus was either a charlatan, a lunatic, or he was actually telling the truth about who he was. Those are the only rational options we have to work with. Based on verifiable facts mentioned in the Bible, and other secular accounts and documents, I believe that the most rational explanation is that he was telling the truth, and is in fact the Son of God, and everything else he says is true.

Interesting you note Hell as a place for the "unbelieving dead" and not "the morally bankrupt" as it gives an interesting insight into the system of Heaven and Hell.

Someone who lives a life of compassion, charity and activism is sent directly to eternal torture for simply refusing to believe an idea whereas a person who spends their lives doing morally reprehensible things is locked in for eternal rewards so long as they make sure to accept Jesus sometime before dying.

Now I may be no deity but something seems distinctly wrong with such a system.

Show me a person who has done absolutely nothing in their life but act in compassion, charity, activism, love, without every having done anything wrong, and that is a person who will be admitted to Heaven. One like that existed, his name was Jesus of Nazareth. He was the only such one who has ever existed, and will exist.


You would likely call the person you described "good", correct? And the other you described, "evil"?

Where do you get the standards for deciding what is good and what is evil?
If such a moral system is determined by a human, what makes such a system more right than some other human's moral system? For such a system to exist, it would have to be created by someone that is above humans. The children in a school do not set the rules for the school on their own, a government agency does not take part in the industry that they regulate, nor does anyone in any system that they are actually a part of, because that would make it biased.

It is likely that the second person you mentioned would not keep on living such an immoral life after he has accepted Jesus, because out of love and respect for God, and through God's power, he loses the desire to commit such acts.

The Bible teaches us that we are all inherently flawed, we all know this, many of us accept that we are not perfect beings, that no matter how hard we try, we can never do *everything* quite right, and often get a lot of things wrong. This is why Jesus came to live as a human, and died for us. God loves us SO much, he doesn't want to be apart from us, but since he is Holy and Good, his very nature is incompatible from being in a relationship with our sinful nature, so he sent his only Son to live the life we should have lived, and died the death we deserve, but since he is God, he can overcome that death sentence. Jesus acts as a go-between from us to the Father. If we believe in his sacrifice and redemptive work, and put our trust in him, he will vouch for us when we go to be judged after all is said and done, and our death sentence is pardoned.

Of course most parts of the world are aware of the Gospel as it was spread through slavery, death and conquest. To many of the people who were first introduced to Christianity they had little choice but to convert or be subject to some of the most cruel inventions of man possible bought and paid for by your religious faith.

This isn't to say that the people of far-off lands were living in bliss before Christianity showed up but for a system that professes love and compassion the cruelties unleashed upon those who happened to encounter Christians is well-documented though often forgotten. The world only has as many Christians as it does because it carved a bloody swathe across the planet, destroying anything in its path and very little of this has to do with any revelations from God.

Further this is all while just a few thousand miles to the East no one had heard heads or tails of Jesus until faith traveled by human means. 2000 years ago one of the most significant events in history happened and only the people in a small corner of the ME were privy to the details? Sucks if you were on the wrong continent I guess but the Mormons fixed that little problem.

The history of religion itself, the inconsistencies within the texts, the refusal of believers to follow to the letter what they profess to believe, the lack of physical evidence, the countless sects of religions all claiming to be right, the cruelties that are frequently accepted as being morally acceptable and the divisive nature of the entire affair are what keep me from believing.

I don't deny that there were many out there who said they went out in the name of God, but acted for the sake of their own evil desires. There are still plenty of people who do that. That's human nature though. Look at a politician, they campaign for a year making many promises, get elected to office, but how many of those things they said they would do, actually get done? How many of those things are actually contrary to what they said they would do? Look in your own lives. We have all encountered people who said they would do something, maybe even promised it, but never actually did any of those things, or even did the opposite. That is how people are, by their very nature, without God in their lives.

I also agree that great suffering has been wrought in the name of Christianity, but I also tell you that those people are not doing the work of God. You won't find it anywhere in the New Testament Jesus or Paul condoning violence of any sort, or forcing anyone to believe something.They repeatedly say to do everything in love and respect and humility. Now, don't mistake me for saying that Christians are perfect, we are far, far from it. We know that we are not, nor do we claim that we are perfect. If someone who calls themselves a Christian disagrees with that, then I disagree with them being a Christian, because that is not what the Bible teaches. We do, however, strive for these things. Through our own wills and the power of God, things we do will reflect these values more and more, but it is not at all a quick process, and it's never finished.

That being said, I challenge you to look at the amount of pain and suffering that Christianity, or even religion in general has caused, compared to the pain and suffering Athiestic worldviews and agendas have caused to the world. Religion has had far less of an impact in that regard. Prime example: Nazi Germany and the Holocaust. One of the goals of that horror was to eradicate religion, Jews specifically.[/QUOTE]

Further this is all while just a few thousand miles to the East no one had heard heads or tails of Jesus until faith traveled by human means. 2000 years ago one of the most significant events in history happened and only the people in a small corner of the ME were privy to the details? Sucks if you were on the wrong continent I guess but the Mormons fixed that little problem.

The history of religion itself, the inconsistencies within the texts, the refusal of believers to follow to the letter what they profess to believe, the lack of physical evidence, the countless sects of religions all claiming to be right, the cruelties that are frequently accepted as being morally acceptable and the divisive nature of the entire affair are what keep me from believing.

I can't help you much on the history of religion, but I can help you on the history of Christianity.

The word about Jesus and his mission spread like wild-fire within the first few decades of his death, mainly due to Paul's mission throughout the middle-east, western Asia, and eastern Europe. The eyewitnesses to the events of Jesus' life were in the hundreds to thousands of people, believers and non-believers alike. These eyewitness testimonies are valuable as truth because of how history and culture were recorded in those times. We have the memory of goldfish compared to people in Jesus' time. The majority of them didn't have the means to learn to read and write, so they were taught from a young age to remember everything in great detail. The minds of savants in the present are likely similar to those of 2000 years ago. They are by no means infallible, as they were prone to human error as much as anyone else, but comparatively to us, the level of detail and accuracy of their memories is astounding. Adding to the fact that it was not just a handful of people to witness these events, but many, many people as I have previously mentioned. All these things together make for a large amount of reliable sources of information for the events of Jesus' life.

The Gospels, and even earlier, Paul's epistles, were written and distributed well within the lifetimes of many of the eyewitnesses, and would have been verified and called out if they were incorrect. That didn't happen. If Jesus had never been resurrected, do you think his followers would have been so empowered and encouraged and confident in the message they taught? And what about Paul? He was an extremely opposing force to the early Christian church, he went out and HUNTED Christians down and executed them. Then all of a sudden he is their biggest supporter? This guy was a die-hard Jew, well learned in Jewish beliefs, and very religious, but he abandoned that lifestyle to teach Jesus' message. Why would a guy like that turn to so dramatically if he wasn't telling the Truth? He not only did that, but endured all manners of suffering and even died for his faith in Christ. Jesus found him, and helped him to understand the situation he was in, because that's what Jesus does, he dramatically transforms your life and gives you meaning.

I understand there is a lot of mistrust in the world when it comes to Christianity, when notable events in history are supposedly done in the name of Jesus, but I am not here to defend those people, or to excuse them, but I am here in an attempt to set the story straight with what I know to be the truth. The best I can do for you is explain it to you how I understand it, and attempt to explain it in a way that makes sense to you. I know I have the Truth about Christianity, because it makes sense and fits together, which is why I can tell you with certainty that the atrocious acts attributed to Christianity in the past, and present are not what Christianity is about, because I actually do read and learn from the Bible, often and consistently. Because I know what it says, the same things it has said for the last 2000(NT) or so years, and that none of those evil things are condoned by it in any way shape or form.

I truly appreciate your honesty and willingness to engage in a rational dialogue, and as long as that continues, I am completely open to doing my best to answer more questions and discussing Christianity and God in general. This goes for anyone on here as well.

[Blarg]

great post, I'm a christian now

[Niiro]

So, are you saying I'm an unreasonable atheist and I'm antagonizing Moosey?

You're having a religious debate

on the internet

with a man bearing a giant moose tattoo.

Spoiler: show

Yes.

[Moosey]

You're having a religious debate

on the internet

with a man bearing a giant moose tattoo.

Spoiler: show

Yes.

I don't have a giant moose tattoo


..yet.

[Siatdiat]

You're having a religious debate

on the internet

with a man bearing a giant moose tattoo.

Spoiler: show

Yes.

Nah, it was a response to byrth's post.

Add: I now work 2 jobs and in school part time, so it may take some time before I can get to Mooseys wall of shit, but I will get to it asap.

[Indeed]

I don't understand why Moosey never makes a separate post for what he wants to talk about so that he can discuss it without interrupting a different topic. As a former Catholic, I am intensely amused that he describes the differences between Catholics and Protestants to be superficial issues of "minor doctrine." How would I even begin? No.

Oral history is indeed a rich tradition, and many stories were preserved this way, but the mere fact that these stories were passed down for generations is neither a testament to their truth or their accuracy. Are all tales preserved by memorization and recitation then accounts of accurate factual information, simply by virtue of being memorized and recited? That's not a good basis for determining fact from fiction, and that's easy to see by simply examining other examples of literature that were preserved in this manner first before being committed to paper.

I don't know what to say about his classification of the resurrection. It must be true because people were motivated by it? I don't think it's even difficult to imagine that someone could have removed his body to another location to perpetuate a faith they believed in so strongly. People will go exceptionally far to cover up a truth that invalidates their belief, and keep right on believing a falsehood with every ounce of fervor they had before, if not more. None of what you've presented contains any kind of actual evidence. You assume a conclusion based on circumstances, behaviors, or really through any means necessary to justify a belief that cannot ever be proven to be fact through the presence of scientifically verifiable evidence.

That is where a lot of people really struggle with the concept of "faith," because it is asking you to place unwavering belief in a truth that has no way of being measured and proven. You have to accept the existence of an entire supernatural universe, the idea that the supernatural world exerts its influence on the physical world because it contains sentient supernatural beings(God, Satan, demons, angels, saints, etc.), the idea that supernatural matter (a soul) resides inside every human but not any other living being on earth, and the idea that your actions in the physical world, which have extreme time constraints, manipulate your supernatural matter in a way that determines how your supernatural matter will continue existing for all of eternity. It really does seem to me to be a lot to balance one's eternal existence against maybe 60-70 years (or frequently less) of time. Not only that, but the range of experience for supernatural existence is pretty limited as well. Either your supernatural matter will experience eternal bliss or eternal torture.

[hey]

2. Do you not question how life began? The Universe? Why Physics works the way it does, it's fine-tuning to our situation? Why we have the perfect place in the galaxy, perfect place in the solar system, and perfect kind of solar system and sun to not only create life, but to sustain it? Those are just a few evidences for the existence of God in the natural world, but the whole list is quite long.

Actually it's just evidence that if you flip a coin enough times, you'll eventually get heads a million times in a row.

Where do you get the standards for deciding what is good and what is evil?

Evolution.

[Jefe]

Where do you get the standards for deciding what is good and what is evil?

Evolution.

Wat. Darwin would've spat on his palm and slapped a nigga.

[Greatguardian]

Physics fucking sucks, fuck you. "Hurr durr let's intelligently design this universe where mass increases to infinity as speed approaches C and it's impossible to know both the position and velocity of a particle at any given time". God would not just be a troll, but best troll.

And it's Fitch with the giant moose tattoo.

[Siatdiat]

Wat. Darwin would've spat on his palm and slapped a nigga.

Are you proposing that scientific understanding be limited to the view point of specific initiators of theory in the past? Scientists already had been considering the concept of evolution before Darwin was even born, most notably Lamarck. Darwin did a better job of explaining it.

If you want a firm understanding of how things like free will and morality can evolve, I'd suggest reading some of Daniel Dennett's work. If buying a book is too much commitment, you can look on youtube and I'm sure find some presentations done by him. I say this because he can explain it much more eloquently than I can.

[Yugl]

2. Do you not question how life began? The Universe? Why Physics works the way it does, it's fine-tuning to our situation? Why we have the perfect place in the galaxy, perfect place in the solar system, and perfect kind of solar system and sun to not only create life, but to sustain it? Those are just a few evidences for the existence of God in the natural world, but the whole list is quite long.

1. I don't know where you get "perfect" from. The instance of our sustainability does not do anything to refute the denial of sustainability to other planets and stars.

2. Neither the origins of the universe nor the reason for the laws of physics is evidence of a god. Not only is causation assumed, but the implication of such reasoning commands us to believe that even your god has a god.

Evolution.

Fuck yes.

[Moosey]

I don't understand why Moosey never makes a separate post for what he wants to talk about so that he can discuss it without interrupting a different topic.

i'll get to the rest of your post later, but people asked questions and I merely answered them. I have been, and still plan to make my own topic on these things, when the time is right.

1. I don't know where you get "perfect" from. The instance of our sustainability does not do anything to refute the denial of sustainability to other planets and stars.

2. Neither the origins of the universe nor the reason for the laws of physics is evidence of a god. Not only is causation assumed, but the implication of such reasoning commands us to believe that even your god has a god.



Fuck yes.

I'll get to some of the other responses later, but I wanted to address this one real quick.

When I say "perfect" in terms of our place in the Universe, I am talking about how our solar system is in a relatively safe place in our galaxy, far enough away from where solar system collisions commonly occur. The Earth's place within our solar system is also "perfect" in terms of our survival. The most obvious point is it's placement from the Sun, any closer and we burn, any further and we freeze. Beyond our orbit, we have very large Gas Giant planets that do a great job of protecting us from rogue objects flying into our galaxy, by acting like giant bug zappers of the solar system, and grabbing anything that comes near enough to them and pulling them in for a big ol' planetary hug. The Asteroid belt is the second line of defense, just really making it hard for many objects that would be threatening to Earth to get through it.

All the conditions of the Universe, from the largest things to the smallest things, are so incredibly fine-tuned to the existence of life that it would be quite a stretch to assume all of these things happened by accident.

As for the origins of the Universe, it had a beginning, right? I think most of the scientific community would more or less agree on the Big Bang or something very much like it. Everything that is in existence, had a start, so that would have to include the Universe, correct? Something would have had to be around before the Universe, to start the big bang/create the Universe. One could make a very reasonable assumption in saying that there was some sort of Creator that was before the Universe, and therefore created it.

You say that due to causality, this Creator has to have his own Creator, preceding him? That doesn't really make sense though. If everything has a beginning, and something that caused that beginning, how far back does it go? There can't be an infinite number of events in the past, there has to have been something that has always been there, a true beginning, without beginning, to have started it all. So I think that the most plausible explanation for the beginning of the Universe is an eternal Creator, who has always been in existence, and is without beginning.


Oh, and as far as evolution goes, Darwinism, and evolution in general absolutely do not support moral standards. Are you forgetting survival of the fittest? Isn't that one of the main tenets of evolutionism? Based on that, then there is really no problem with a person going up to you, shanking you in the back, and stealing your wallet so he can use your money to sustain his life. He's just doing his best to survive to pass on his genes.

[Jefe]

Are you proposing that scientific understanding be limited to the view point of specific initiators of theory in the past? Scientists already had been considering the concept of evolution before Darwin was even born, most notably Lamarck. Darwin did a better job of explaining it.

If you want a firm understanding of how things like free will and morality can evolve, I'd suggest reading some of Daniel Dennett's work. If buying a book is too much commitment, you can look on youtube and I'm sure find some presentations done by him. I say this because he can explain it much more eloquently than I can.

That's irrelevant and obviously you missed the point.


Moose, w/e, that watch-maker argument is fallacious. At least analyze St. Anselm's ontological argument and get mind fucked. It's very interesting!

[Siatdiat]

That's irrelevant and obviously you missed the point.

Then explain what your point was.

[Moosey]

That's irrelevant and obviously you missed the point.


Moose, w/e, that watch-maker argument is fallacious. At least analyze St. Anselm's ontological argument and get mind fucked. It's very interesting!

I agree that in most other cases the watchmaker argument would be fallacious, but when paired with something like Aquinas' Five Proofs, I believe it is certainly plausible.

[Yugl]

I'll get to some of the other responses later, but I wanted to address this one real quick.

When I say "perfect" in terms of our place in the Universe, I am talking about how our solar system is in a relatively safe place in our galaxy, far enough away from where solar system collisions commonly occur. The Earth's place within our solar system is also "perfect" in terms of our survival. The most obvious point is it's placement from the Sun, any closer and we burn, any further and we freeze. Beyond our orbit, we have very large Gas Giant planets that do a great job of protecting us from rogue objects flying into our galaxy, by acting like giant bug zappers of the solar system, and grabbing anything that comes near enough to them and pulling them in for a big ol' planetary hug. The Asteroid belt is the second line of defense, just really making it hard for many objects that would be threatening to Earth to get through it.

All the conditions of the Universe, from the largest things to the smallest things, are so incredibly fine-tuned to the existence of life that it would be quite a stretch to assume all of these things happened by accident.

Your argument is that conditions enabling consciousness (What you really seem to mean by 'life') are proof of a god. Furthermore, you contend that these conditions are necessarily (In the modal sense) the work of "fine tuning." The contrapositive of the former is "If there is no god, then the conditions enabling consciousness do not exist." This is typically effective in an argument because any denial of the antecedent renders the proposition true. Rendering the antecedent means we could not have this conversation. However, it is easily applicable to any other antecedent. That is, we may attach any other antecedent, for example, that no god exists, and have an argument just as effective.

That they are they result of fine tuning is going to pose problems for you as well. The problem that arises here is intention. How can you derive intention out of the product? Causality does not prove intention. Features (What you used) do not prove intention. The best we can do to derive intentionality from a product is to examine events that gave rise to the product. Yet, we cannot do so because the religious context places the event outside of empirical analysis. That it, it is not a idea we can come to know a posteriori. Consequently, if we do come to know of this, it is a priori. So unless we take 'god' to be a definite description that picks out whatever created the world, opening up the possibility of other gods or natural events to take that title, you have no argument.

As for the origins of the Universe, it had a beginning, right? I think most of the scientific community would more or less agree on the Big Bang or something very much like it. Everything that is in existence, had a start, so that would have to include the Universe, correct? Something would have had to be around before the Universe, to start the big bang/create the Universe. One could make a very reasonable assumption in saying that there was some sort of Creator that was before the Universe, and therefore created it.

You say that due to causality, this Creator has to have his own Creator, preceding him? That doesn't really make sense though. If everything has a beginning, and something that caused that beginning, how far back does it go? There can't be an infinite number of events in the past, there has to have been something that has always been there, a true beginning, without beginning, to have started it all. So I think that the most plausible explanation for the beginning of the Universe is an eternal Creator, who has always been in existence, and is without beginning.

I don't think you realize that I made you pose the counterargument to your own argument.

Everything that is in existence, had a start, so that would have to include the Universe, correct?

If everything has a beginning, and something that caused that beginning, how far back does it go? There can't be an infinite number of events in the past, there has to have been something that has always been there, a true beginning, without beginning, to have started it all.

See what I mean? It's arbitrary that you assign the "true" beginning to 'god' as opposed to the universe unless, as I mentioned earlier, the term is just a definite description.

Oh, and as far as evolution goes, Darwinism, and evolution in general absolutely do not support moral standards. Are you forgetting survival of the fittest? Isn't that one of the main tenets of evolutionism? Based on that, then there is really no problem with a person going up to you, shanking you in the back, and stealing your wallet so he can use your money to sustain his life. He's just doing his best to survive to pass on his genes.

I've been told that is an incorrect phrasing of Darwinism. Still, the answer is "yes", there is no problem with that if that's all that biology allowed us to morally accept.

[hey]

One could make a very reasonable assumption in saying that there was some sort of Creator that was before the Universe, and therefore created it.

But who made god?

Assuming an infinite series of creators is not reasonable, at all.