Nora54

I had to go to church with my parents last night, and ya know what? i actually enjoyed it. it solidified my agnosticism. during the homily, the priest told two stories that (according to him) proved the existance of god.

here's the first one:

A man walks into a barber shop. as the barber is cutting the man's hair, the barber brings up the subject that he didn't believe god existed.
"How can you say that?" the man said, horrified.
"Well, just look around," the man said. "if god existed, would there be war, or poverty, or famine?"
After the man left the barber shop, he saw a man on a street corner with long, scraggly hair and an untrimmed beard. He walked back into the barber shop, and asked the barber "Do barber's exist?"
"Of course barbers exist!" the barber said. "Look at me, i'm standing right here, and i just worked on you!"
The man seemed unfazed. "But after i left your shop, i saw a man on the streetcorner with long hair and an untrimmed beard. if barbers exist, how can people have long hair and untirmmed beards?"
"Well," the barber said, "they just choose not to come to me."
"Exactly," the man said and left.

That story does not prove the existance of god. the only thing it proves is the existance of human free will.

here's the second one:

There was a fourth grade teacher who was an atheist, and she taught evolution in her classroom.
One day, she asked a small boy: "Look out the window. Do you see the grass?"
"Yes," said the boy. "I see the grass."
"And do you see the trees?"
"Yes," said the boy. "I see the trees."
"Now go outside and look up. then come back inside and tell me what you saw."
The boy did so. when he came back in, the teacher asked him: "Did you see the sky?"
The boy said he did.
"And did you see god?" the teacher asked.
"No," the boy said. "I didn't see god."
"god does not exist," the teacher concluded.
There was one girl up front who raised her hand and asked if she could ask a question. the teacher said she could. the girl turned to the boy and asked him: "When you looked out the window, did you see the grass and the trees?"
"Yes," said the boy.
"and when you went outside and looked up, did you see the sky?" the girl continued.
"Yes," the boy said, a little irritated now.
"Now look at the teacher," the girl said and the boy did so. she then asked him: "Do you see her face, and do you see her hair?"
the boy said that he did.
the girl smiled. "do you see her brain?"
"No," said the boy.
the girl said: "So, according to the lesson today, since you can't see the teacher's brain, it doesn't exist."

this one is even more sad than the first. there is definate scientific evidence that people have brains. whether or not they choose to use them or not is up to them. go into any morgue, open a cadaver, and a brain [i]will[i] be there.

i got a kick out of these. i think all of you will too.

George

Hi, very good post and it really gets at the crux of the problem anyone who is not a theist is faced with when having a debate with theists.

That problem is faith vs logic. Faith by it's very definition is illogical. It's the true absense of logic. Debates are fact and logic based arguments so whenever a theist makes an argument it is always defeated by logic.

That is why the concept of faith was born in my opinion. To give people the ability to believe in something even when it goes against logic.

Good for people's confidence in a supreme being but to the logical free thinker it just produces irrational arguments and bad analogies.

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The An-Jel

I think apes bashed peoples unseen brains out before they were examined. Makes you think.

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Nora54

yep. when i was there, the whole congregation laughed when the priest came to the punchline of the second story: the atheist doesn't have a brain... bad analogies and low blows to atheists.

Agnostix

"go into any morgue, open a cadaver, and a brain [i]will[i] be there."

You can just waltz on in these places and do that? I'm so there!

Aaron

The most impressive atheist I ever saw in action knew the bible from cover to cover. Talk about fighting fire with fire. He could bash a theist into the irrational "I pray for your soul" fetal position faster than making toast.

Nora54

haha hypothetically!
but, yeah, if you could really do that, i'd be there too

jaej

Really? Who was he?

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Drizzling Blur

Haha, nice first post, I love the name of the thread though :P

Symposium

That second story is pretty funny though.

Cheeky little brat.

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