If you’ll read my OP in the other thread, I was asking in terms of the story. I’m more than capable of arguing strictly within the terms of a mythological universe. For instance (as I posted in GD), I take the meaning of the story as being that Yahweh is choosing to establish himself as a warrior god for the first time, which role he has not before assumed. Note that in Genesis, when Abraham is obliged to do battle to rescue Lot, he does not call upon God to assist him, but rather gathers an alliance himself. Cite. But there are other interpretations of the Exodus story; I was rather hope someone sane, like Polycarp or tomndebb, would proffer an opinion. I don’t think it was I who moved the conversation there to a debate on theodicy. As I wrote in the OP for the other thread, I think it was better suited for IMHO, but religious threadds always end up in GD anyway.
(And actually I’d say the thread was better suited for Cafe Society, as it is the same general idea as many LotR threads in which we analyze the story as if it had some historical basis.)
Deductive logic can manipulate statements as readily as true ones; the mere fact that a statement is logically valid (i.e., follows, from its premises) does not mean it is not stupid, for the premises may be lies. Moreover, the fact that a statement is false doesn’t mean it follows from its premises.
Here’s an example:
All Memphians are murderers.
Skald the Rhymer is from Memphis.
Therefore Skald the Rhymer is a murderer.
Logically valid, yet untrue. Or take
All people from Chattanooga, Tennessee, are assholes.
Skald the Rhymer is from Memphis, Tennessee.
Skald is an asshole.
Statement 3 is arguably true, but the argument is invalid.
If kanicbird’s god IS real, you’re definitely going to hell. But then so am I, so on the ferry ride over, you bring a six-pack & I’ll bring some burgers. Might as well have one final blowout before they start teh raping with flaming worms.
[hijack]
I was raised a fundie (of the Baptist variety) and my parents repeatedly warned me via the aforementioned logic me that if I had sex with someone demon possessed then I would become possessed too. And of course, the odds were disproportionately greater than not that anyone willing to have premarital sex was very likely just that.
:shrug: It worked for a while… but with long term abstinence even demoniacs are appealing.
You admitted in another thread that your particular brand of faith is unique to you. So maybe you won’t go.
I dated a girl from Arkansas whose father was a well-known fundamentalist preacher (his church described itself as non-denominational, but they seemed to toe the Southern Baptist line pretty closely). By well-known, I mean famous enough that I read his obituary in TIME a couple of years ago.
Anyway, he and her mother had taught her that sex creates a “soul tie”, and that sex with demonic people creates a tie between ones’ soul and the demon.
When she found out that, 1) we were having sex, 2) that I’m not white, and 3) that I’m a demon or demon-possessed*, I thought her head was going to asplode. Then I threw her out of my apartment for saying rather uncomplimentary things about my mother, and went back to corrupting her daughter.
*Saw a copy of The Satanic Verses on my nightstand, and apparently didn’t know it was a work of fiction.
I don’t want to weigh in on the religion thing, since everyone who cares probably already knows my opinion, but I just wanted to say I’m sorry you had to experience that. It’s easy for us to think in platitudes like “Indians/Chinese/Pakistanis/whatever country don’t like to give birth to girls”, but those of us who have no direct experience with those cultures may not think about the very real pain and suffering of many millions of real people due to these so-called cultural “quirks”. It’s hard to imagine what it must feel like to be an individual who actually suffered from this phenomenon.
I’m not saying that I understand your pain or that this is close to what you’ve suffered, but when my dad left for the first Iraq War, I felt a sense of confused abandonment–I was too young to understand what was going on. It was very painful for the whole family. But hearing stories like this reminds me not to throw myself a pity party, because I was one of the lucky ones. Thanks for the reminder and I hope you’ve learned how to cope with the many ramifications of your father’s decision.
FWIW, in India, it’s actually mothers who are generally more likely to reject a daughter than fathers. That said, abortion of female offspring simply because they’re female is a horrifyingly widespread problem- so much so that it’s illegal across the country to perform prenatal diagnostics on a fetus until it’s 20 weeks old*.
*Abortion is legal in India (and paid for by the national medical insurance program) up to 20 weeks.
Well, the notion of either believing in the God of the bible or not believing is no absolute. There’s numerous denominations and sects of the major religions that differ in what the “God of the bible” is. If God does communicate with mankind, you’d think He’d have set us straight by now.
I personally believe God is incapable of communicating with us. We certainly can’t communicate with ants, even though we’re superior to them. If ants have an ant god, it’s a more idealized version of themselves. The ant god certainly isn’t human.
So by the same token, we’re incapable of conceiving God because He’s as far removed from us as we are from the ants. We therefore can’t communicate with Him. Why should He care? We’re just ants to Him.
First, it wasn’t very clear that you were looking to analyze the story as a piece of fiction. You could have made that clearer in the OP.
Second, why are you looking for believers to answer your thread. What do they have to believe in? Your thread title is:
Anyone who read the story should be able to answer. If you were analyzing Harry Potter, you wouldn’t be asking for only those people who believed that Dumbledore existed to answer.
Third, how can you judge any answer based on a piece of fiction. If someone started a Pit thread on the answer to a piece of fiction, wouldn’t that be nonsensical?
Just to be clear, we’re back to discussing the Christian religion, not a piece of fiction as you were discussing above. It’s confusing when you flip back and forth between the two without clarifying which one you’re talking about.
So if the analogy above is to the Christian religion, then premise 1 might be analogized to God exists since that’s the premise from which most of the others flow.
In your analogy above, it can be shown that all Memphians are not murderers. Can you show that God does not exist? If you cannot, the analogy does not apply.
IF premise 1 were true, then the logic works and the claims from that logic are not idiotic unless you’re applying illogic.
Eh?? That’s just non-sequitur. Premise 1 and 2 are not related, so it says nothing about conclusion (?) 3.
That’s not logic; it’s just 3 statements strung together.