Teen stabs her newborn over 100 times, throws her in garbage...

[photon]

Originally Posted by Skyceman

Vast majority? 2.1 BILLION people worldwide think otherwise.

A book that has withstood the test of time would suggest there's alot more to it then some flash in the pan novel. We're talking 2000+ years here.

As Burninator has pointed out, if 2.1 Billion profess to be Christian then that means the vast majority (66% or more) profess to be something other than Christian and follow something other than the Bible.

Plus that's all the organizations like JW's, LDS's, etc that are classified as Christian, but most Christians I know would call those cults.

And that's not taking into account that the first thing that seems to happen in any argument about the validity or interpretation of the Bible is great swaths of "Christianity" are cut out of the pie immediately. Catholics are almost always cut out instantly.

So to use the analogy, it's more like the Bible is a massive 14 hour long piece of music, and groups all calling themselves Christian take the parts out of it that they like, change the parts they don't like to fit with current social norms, and make a nice song. Other groups take different parts and make their own song, but they aren't real Christians because they forgot to include this part of the song, or ignore this other part, or play this part wrong. (This observation coming from someone who has been in it most of my life). And the song's chorus doesn't agree with itself from one part to the next. And the song changes over time.

[photon]

Originally Posted by Skyceman

Vast majority? 2.1 BILLION people worldwide think otherwise.

A book that has withstood the test of time would suggest there's alot more to it then some flash in the pan novel. We're talking 2000+ years here.

Oops, and again just because something lasts along time OR is believed by a large number of people does not in any way make it more or less true. Those are logical fallacies.

[RougeUnderoos]

Originally Posted by Skyceman

Vast majority? 2.1 BILLION people worldwide think otherwise.

A book that has withstood the test of time would suggest there's alot more to it then some flash in the pan novel. We're talking 2000+ years here.

I'm no mathemagician, but if 2 people in a group of 6 believe something and 4 don't, I think it's safe to say that the vast majority of the group doesn't believe it.

Other belief systems have been/were around a lot longer than the bible, so the "it's withstood the test of time" argument doesn't quite cut it.

[Skyceman]

No matter how you slice it - to ignore the fact that Christianity is being followed by 33% of the world population is something that can't be ignored. That's over twice as many as the non-religious population.

I'd like to hear your answer and explain how so many people could be so "deceived" by some little ancient book. How this "book" has caused people to be persecuted or even lose their life just for carrying it around with them. Or how people dedicate and sacrifice their lives to helping others in the world without any monetary reward. Or how a criminal mind is changed into a clean living citizen. I've personally seen it do this very thing.

A fallacy like the world being flat is one thing that can be assumed without much life changing thought but something that has and continues to change people's lives even today 2000+ years later says alot.

[RougeUnderoos]

Originally Posted by Skyceman

No matter how you slice it - to ignore the fact that Christianity is being followed by 33% of the world population is something that can't be ignored. That's over twice as many as the non-religious population.

No matter how you slice it, you can't ignore the fact that anything but Christianity is followed by 67% of the world population. That's 3 times as many as the Christian population.

Originally Posted by Skyceman

I'd like to hear your answer and explain how so many people could be so "deceived" by some little ancient book.

You first. Explain to me how so many people believed in Zeus for so long.

Originally Posted by Skyceman

How this "book" has caused people to be persecuted or even lose their life just for carrying it around with them. Or how people dedicate and sacrifice their lives to helping others in the world without any monetary reward. Or how a criminal mind is changed into a clean living citizen. I've personally seen it do this very thing.

Depending on the time and place, strutting around with a copy of the Communist Manifesto in your pocket might get you persecuted or clipped, so that bit doesn't do much for me.

People do good things all the time and the bible has nothing to do with it.

As for Gowan changing his criminal mind and becoming a clean liver(?), I think that kind of thing can be done sans bible.

Charity, sacrifice, dedication, kindness, successful rehab -- Christianity doesn't have a monopoly on this stuff.

[FireFly]

Originally Posted by RougeUnderoos

No matter how you slice it, you can't ignore the fact that anything but Christianity is followed by 67% of the world population. That's 3 times as many as the Christian population.

Not a math major were you. Cause when I slice it into thirds, and one group has one third, the other group gets 2/3rds, or only twice as much...

[RougeUnderoos]

Originally Posted by FireFly

Not a math major were you. Cause when I slice it into thirds, and one group has one third, the other group gets 2/3rds, or only twice as much...

Ouch!

[photon]

It's not a matter of people being deceived by a book, it's more that we're hard-wired to believe things like religion. People feel a need to be "right", or to believe that they're good while others are evil. One would argue that that's because God made us that way, another would argue that we evolved that way.

That people are persecuted for carrying the book is a criticism of faith itself. If you have absolute faith that a specific viewpoint is unerringly correct, then other viewpoints have to be excluded. Christianity has done it's share of persecuting in the past. Even the Bible itself has many examples of atrocities carried out against unbelievers simply as a result of unbelief. Today most Christians would be very much against burning witches at the stake or going to war under the guise of converting the lost, but some would argue that's simply because they've had to update their values to match the modern world.

People dedicate their lives to helping others regardless of what religion they subscribe to, so that's not an argument for or against Christianity. Same thing as helping people change their lives, that doesn't happen exclusive to Christianity.

It doesn't matter what the subject is, a fallacy is a fallacy.

There's no doubt Christianity has changed many lives in 2000+ years, I'm just not convinced it's been for the better. How many innocent people have lost their lives due to faith in a book? Even today while it's claimed faith improves people's lives and secularism is bad, the reality is that the more a population professes to be based on faith the dysfunctional that population is.

http://moses.creighton.edu/JRS/2005/2005-11.html
http://www.skeptic.com/the_magazine/...healthier.html

Religious democracies experience higher rates of homicide, suicide, low life expectancy, STD infection, abortion, early pregnancy, and high childhood mortality (under five-years old).

There's quite a few good books along these lines. Sam Harris' The End of Faith is an interesting read, while I think he takes an extreme line much of the time, it is interesting to see that perspective.