Truly he is back.

Furball, the intent of the question was to see his reaction.

And, seeing the lack of green light by his name, his reaction was that he has no arguement.

@abge: Just because something is out of this universe doesn't make it not real.
@PSMongoose: Which question?
@manganese: The Christian God, but I'll defend that tonight, as I'm going to bed now.
@kingdroid: So you're going to mute me. That's funny. The guy who's main argument are 1. You have to absolutely prove something to ever believe in it and 2. All of your logic is flawed, therefore I must be right.
If anything, I should be muting you. I know you think you're brilliant, but you're pretty pathetic. you have not shown a shred of evidence. your debating skills leave much to be desired, and you resort to changing the topic and "no u" cop-out answers in order to prove your point.

@CM

I don't disagree. But, by the same token, wanting something to be true doesn't make it so. What evidence is their of a supernatural being? Why would you jump to the conclusion that contradicts everything we know and can observe?

@abge: How exactly does a supernatural being contradict everything we know and observe? I am going to sleep now, but I look forward to reading your answer in the morning.

Why not Islam? Why not Buddism? Why not Hindu?
Why is Christianity right, and them wrong?

I may have phrased that a bit poorly.

I mean, there has never been any reliable evidence to support a super natural being, so why would you believe one exists?

I'm a little late to the party but. . .

@Stevelers:
Here is where I disagree with your post, you seem to believe that God's

ignore that start of a post, I'm tired and forgot there were six more pages to read :/

CM: Which christian god?

Still have yet to hear how Leprechauns are less likely than the Abrahamic omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent god...

If your personal supernatural being of choice is the most likely - then why do you say that? In what way does Abrahamic God have more evidence going for it than Leprechauns (or, recently in the news, Icelandic elves*)? And I'm not being (completely) facetious here... there *is* eye witness evidence of the Abrahamic God - I'll admit that. What I don't get is why that eye witness evidence is favored over other eye witness evidence of other supernatural beings. Both the Abrahamic God and Leprechauns have numerous eye witness testimonies going for them... people have talked to and seen both... the only differences are: 1) an arbitrary cultural difference - where one was revealed to Semitic people 2,000 years ago and the other revealed to Irish people beginning at least 1,000 years ago, 2) the Abrahamic God is actually a much less likely individual - completely outside of all of our experiences of what creatures/beings are like... Leprechauns, on the other hand, are much more reasonable and likely - they have families and desires and generally act much like people and other real creatures and their range of special powers, though still outside of what we experience in real life, is far more limited than what is claimed for the Abrahamic God, and thus is less unlikely. So... am I to take your silence on the subject as agreement? Resolved: Leprechauns are more likely than the Abrahamic God.

Here, by the way, is an article about recent activities of the Icelandic Elves... and the prayers directed to them:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/07/04/icelandic_bombardment/

This is a stupid conversation, but never stopped me before.

The proof used by many observant Jews that makes the Abrahamic God more believable than any other god (or version of an Abrahamic God) is the method of Revelation. Revelation in religion is typically done to an individual or small groups. There are 2 religions in the world where revelation was done to huge masses of people. The first are the original Harre Krishnas (sp.) but the problem with their story is that although Krishna showed himself to a mass of two opposing armies on a battlefield, all the witnesses but one died, and that one spread the faith. Judaism was revealed to the entire people of Israel at Sinai. Its a pretty ballsy claim. We aren't talking about travelers tails of Leprechauns or a small group of disciples attesting to Jesus divinity. The whole nation supposedly received the law from God's voice, and when the oral law was translated to written, people accepted that fact

@Furball, you said: "Why is Christianity right?
"Now the story of Christ is simply a true myth: a myth working on us the same way as the others, but with this tremendous difference that it really happened: and one must be content to accept it in the same way, remembering that it is God’s myth where the others are men’s myths: i.e., the Pagan stories are God expressing Himself through the minds of poets, using such images as He found there, while Christianity is God expressing Himself through what we call "real things."
— C.S. Lewis
Here, this is why Christians strongly subject that their religion is true."

Huh? I don't see the logic - at all. This seems circular. You say "this is why Christians strongly subject [submit - ?... assert - ?] that their religion is true"... but all you gave was the C.S. quote - wherein he basically says "our religion is based on a myth that happened because God made it"... he offers nothing other than his asserted belief. Apparently Christians believe because they believe. Circular. I mean I like the God's myth idea - it has a certain literary appeal to it... but just because it's charming doesn't give it any validity.

@abge: "I mean, there has never been any reliable evidence to support a super natural being, so why would you believe one exists?"
I consider the evidence I posted earlier reliable evidence, but we likely both have confirmation bias on this issue, so this debate will really go nowhere.

My most reliable evidence (despite being circumstancial) is this: All of Jesus' apostles died horrible deaths for being Christians. If they knew that Jesus didn't rise from the dead and everything was false, why the hell didn't they admit it to avoid being killed?
If all they had to do was admit that Christianity was false to avoid being killed, and they knew it was false, why wouldn't they admit it? Can you answer that? (I know that is circumstancial and is not proof, but I never said I could prove God's existence. But this evidence is pretty convincing to me.)

knew that Jesus didn't rise from the dead and everything was false, why the hell didn't they admit it to avoid being killed?
1. There are countless religions where the original prophets and desciples died horrible deaths without admitting anything
2. If they did, who would have wrote about it?

@Santa, so basically you're saying that the Jewish god has a more substantial claim going for it than the other ones (Krishna, the Christian god, Leprechauns)... Sure - I'd buy that in part. It certainly is consistent with the numerical-superiority-of-eye-witness-testimony-claims-as-a-measure-of-truth measure - which is part of what I was positing. So: Resolved: Judaism is more likely than Christianity. Both posit an omnipotent god but Judaism has more witnesses.

Evidence? I don't think that word means what you think it means.

"@Santa, so basically you're saying that the Jewish god has a more substantial claim going for it than the other ones (Krishna, the Christian god, Leprechauns)... Sure - I'd buy that in part. It certainly is consistent with the numerical-superiority-of-eye-witness-testimony-claims-as-a-measure-of-truth measure - which is part of what I was positing. So: Resolved: Judaism is more likely than Christianity. Both posit an omnipotent god but Judaism has more witnesses."

Yep and more likely than a Leprechaun ;)

@SC: "1. There are countless religions where the original prophets and desciples died horrible deaths without admitting anything." And they all likely still believed what they were saying, bacause nothing had proved them wrong. But with Christianity, everything hinges on Jesus' resurrection. If he didn't rise from the dead, then we know that Christianity is false. So if Jesus' apostles knew that he didn't rise from the dead, then they KNEW that Christianity was false, so why wouldn't they admit it when faced with death?

"2. If they did, who would have wrote about it? "
I don't think I quite get what you mean, could you please elaborate?

@SC and and Manganese: The Jewish God and the Christian God are the same God........

"@SC and and Manganese: The Jewish God and the Christian God are the same God........"
In the sense that they both don't exist

"2. If they did, who would have wrote about it? "
I don't think I quite get what you mean, could you please elaborate?"

If, for example, Peter right befoe he was about to get crucified upside down, started yelling, "whoops, heh, guys, all that shit ive been saying is wrong, Ive been pulling your chain for all these years, please dont kill me" who would have wrote that down? The Early Christian who has devoted his life to Jesus who is sure Peter was under duress, the romans who could care less (and even if they did write it down no one would believe them anyway). Even if perhaps a large portions of Christians heard some form of retraction and hung up their sackclothes a small number could continue on until Constantine made them the official religion of the empire, and christianity gained its power. You are assuming they all went to their death stoically and with a prayer on their lips, exactly what any early Christian would want you to think.

@Dexter - I have hesitated to chime in so far (and have intentionally avoided it), but I must point out that the Jewish God and the Christian God are the same God. The primary variance (and only real significant one) lies in whether Jesus was the Christ / Messiah or whether the Messiah has yet to come. As far as how many people saw Jesus after his ressurection. Paul records in 1 Corinthians 15:5-8 that more than 500 people witenessed the resurrected Christ at one time and most of them were still iving at the time of Paul's writing. While not an entire nation, it is hardly what I would call a small number. In the first century BC, that was a great number of people to be gathered in one place at one moment in time.

first century AD, sorry about that.

"The Jewish God and the Christian God are the same God........ "

No not at all, you may think your god is the Jewish God, but Jews believe you have bastardized their god for your purposes and have a completely new one. God does not take human form in the original religion, God is one, not 3, and God made sure to say that it was forbidden to put any other god before him, which the Christians did with Jesus.

"In the first century BC, that was a great number of people to be gathered in one place at one moment in time. "

So 500 unnamed people. Quite different from the whole nation of Israel which imples EVERYONE was there. yet you say 500 people and you weren't there you can say "hey wish I hadn't missed that party! Were you there? No?"

*and if you wernt there