The Christian Discussion Thread X: Originally there were 15

[Hakons]

Offs,

Hypothetically, if it were conceivable that dogmas could be falsely attributed as truth, and in such a hypothetical situation, a dogma was proven to have been falsely attributed as truth, then yes, any intellectually honest person would have to abdicate belief in such “dogma.


Not that this situation is conceivably possible.

More often than not Christians resort to the argument "You just need faith in God"

So you weren't looking for an answer? You wanted to lead us to an answer and were therefor arguing in bad faith?

[Constitutional Technocracy of Minecraft]

More often than not Christians resort to the argument "You just need faith in God"

A religion tells people to have faith. Shocker

My question is: What makes Christian faith superior to Muslim faith, Hindu faith, or the faith of any other religion?

[Northern Davincia]

The question is both absurd and impossible.

How is it impossible to give a Yes or a No to answer this hypothetical question?

It is important to understand that a godless universe, from the Christian perspective, is a universe that doesn't exist at all.

[Constitutional Technocracy of Minecraft]

How is it impossible to give a Yes or a No to answer this hypothetical question?

It is important to understand that a godless universe, from the Christian perspective, is a universe that doesn't exist at all.

So, you have insinuated that a universe cannot form by naturalistic means such as quantum fluctuations or the Big Bounce theory?

[Lord Dominator]

I'm having an hard time finding something to be salvaged for discussion from him too.
At least that other jab about the Vatican in China opened some interesting research and fact checking. That hauted house reserved for future embassy was also a nice treat.

So, new topic?
On a similar line of what is going on in China, anyone wants to talk about Africa?

I’m thinking of founding an expedition to steal the ark of the covenant from the Ethiopians. Does Kickstarter have a mercenary section?

Disguise it as movie funding to follow the path of Indiana

[Northern Davincia]

A religion tells people to have faith. Shocker

My question is: What makes Christian faith superior to Muslim faith, Hindu faith, or the faith of any other religion?

From the historical record, we know of Jesus and that He was crucified. This removes Islam as a credible religion. Polytheistic religions present a universe in constant turmoil from the gods, yet we see a harmonious universe instead.

It is important to understand that a godless universe, from the Christian perspective, is a universe that doesn't exist at all.

So, you have insinuated that a universe cannot form by naturalistic means such as quantum fluctuations or the Big Bounce theory?

Available evidence does not support the Big Bounce, and in both cases we are left with something coming from nothing.

[Tarsonis]

It is important to understand that a godless universe, from the Christian perspective, is a universe that doesn't exist at all.

So, you have insinuated that a universe cannot form by naturalistic means such as quantum fluctuations or the Big Bounce theory?

Where did the forces that produced said events come from?

[Constitutional Technocracy of Minecraft]

My question is: What makes Christian faith superior to Muslim faith, Hindu faith, or the faith of any other religion?

From the historical record, we know of Jesus and that He was crucified. This removes Islam as a credible religion. Polytheistic religions present a universe in constant turmoil from the gods, yet we see a harmonious universe instead.

So, you have insinuated that a universe cannot form by naturalistic means such as quantum fluctuations or the Big Bounce theory?

Available evidence does not support the Big Bounce, and in both cases we are left with something coming from nothing.

1. How does Jesus' crucifixion automatically validate Christianity? Also, polytheistic religions do not present the gods as omnipotent, and in fact often have them subservient to an omnipotent power.
2. In empty space, particles and antiparticles constantly come from nothing and annihilate each other. That is exactly what quantum fluctuations are. Plus, nothing says that the eternal entity that the universe came from is a deity.

[Constitutional Technocracy of Minecraft]

So, you have insinuated that a universe cannot form by naturalistic means such as quantum fluctuations or the Big Bounce theory?

Where did the forces that produced said events come from?

Simple answer is we don't know. As we don't know, you cannot assume that it was God.

[Northern Davincia]

From the historical record, we know of Jesus and that He was crucified. This removes Islam as a credible religion. Polytheistic religions present a universe in constant turmoil from the gods, yet we see a harmonious universe instead.

Available evidence does not support the Big Bounce, and in both cases we are left with something coming from nothing.

1. How does Jesus' crucifixion automatically validate Christianity? Also, polytheistic religions do not present the gods as omnipotent, and in fact often have them subservient to an omnipotent power.
2. In empty space, particles and antiparticles constantly come from nothing and annihilate each other. That is exactly what quantum fluctuations are. Plus, nothing says that the eternal entity that the universe came from is a deity.

1. Muslims believe that the crucifixion never happened. This is false, therefore Islam is also false (among other reasons). As for polytheism, a weak god is not worth worshipping. Might as well serve the omnipotent power.
2. Isn't contact between matter and antimatter supposed to result in a massive explosion? Where are these being observed? Why haven't they destroyed the universe?

[Tarsonis]

Where did the forces that produced said events come from?

Simple answer is we don't know. As we don't know, you cannot assume that it was God.

Except that assumption isn't just "I don't know, must be God." It's not a God of the Gaps argument, it's a deduction from reason.

This is the mistake that both biblical literalists and anti-theists make, that science and faith are opposed to each other. Even if you could prove say quantum fluctuations, it doesn't eliminate God from the issue. The statement God created the universe is not a statement of {i]how[/i] but one of why. The reason the universe exists is because God created it. All you're uncovering is the methods by which such a feat occurred.

[Tarsonis]

From the historical record, we know of Jesus and that He was crucified. This removes Islam as a credible religion. Polytheistic religions present a universe in constant turmoil from the gods, yet we see a harmonious universe instead.

Available evidence does not support the Big Bounce, and in both cases we are left with something coming from nothing.

1. How does Jesus' crucifixion automatically validate Christianity? Also, polytheistic religions do not present the gods as omnipotent, and in fact often have them subservient to an omnipotent power.

It should be noted that the name YHWH or "I AM' is given specifically to distinct God from those types of Polytheistic gods. It is given intentionally to state that God is above such petty and weak things.

2. In empty space, particles and antiparticles constantly come from nothing and annihilate each other. That is exactly what quantum fluctuations are. Plus, nothing says that the eternal entity that the universe came from is a deity.

But, those fluctuations occur because the quantum forces underpinning our universe create the conditions for them to occur.

[Constitutional Technocracy of Minecraft]

1. How does Jesus' crucifixion automatically validate Christianity? Also, polytheistic religions do not present the gods as omnipotent, and in fact often have them subservient to an omnipotent power.
2. In empty space, particles and antiparticles constantly come from nothing and annihilate each other. That is exactly what quantum fluctuations are. Plus, nothing says that the eternal entity that the universe came from is a deity.

1. Muslims believe that the crucifixion never happened. This is false, therefore Islam is also false (among other reasons). As for polytheism, a weak god is not worth worshipping. Might as well serve the omnipotent power.
2. Isn't contact between matter and antimatter supposed to result in a massive explosion? Where are these being observed? Why haven't they destroyed the universe?

1. Muslims believe that the crucifixion happened, but Allah prevented Jesus from dying. As for your refutation of polytheism, you haven't disproved anything.
2. Well, you don't understand antimatter. When matter comes into contact with antimatter, 50% of the mass involved is converted into energy according to the formula E = mc^2 (so 1 unit of mass converts to 8.98755179 × 10^16 units of energy, aka a lot) - the rest is converted into neutrinos. On the macro scale, this would cause a massive explosion - less than 1 gram of antimatter would create an explosion larger than that of the Fat Man nuclear bomb. However, these particles have so little mass that the energy released by their annihilation is negligible.

[Constitutional Technocracy of Minecraft]

Simple answer is we don't know. As we don't know, you cannot assume that it was God.

Except that assumption isn't just "I don't know, must be God." It's not a God of the Gaps argument, it's a deduction from reason.

This is the mistake that both biblical literalists and anti-theists make, that science and faith are opposed to each other. Even if you could prove say quantum fluctuations, it doesn't eliminate God from the issue. The statement God created the universe is not a statement of {i]how[/i] but one of why. The reason the universe exists is because God created it. All you're uncovering is the methods by which such a feat occurred.

Ah, the Kalam cosmological argument. Thing is, the eternal cause of the universe does not have to be a god. And even if it was, how do we know that it was the Judeo-Christian God, as opposed to a (hypothetical) indifferent god that created the universe, then left it to its own devices and did not interact with it at all, let alone reveal itself to intelligent apes on one specific planet?

[Northern Davincia]

1. Muslims believe that the crucifixion never happened. This is false, therefore Islam is also false (among other reasons). As for polytheism, a weak god is not worth worshipping. Might as well serve the omnipotent power.
2. Isn't contact between matter and antimatter supposed to result in a massive explosion? Where are these being observed? Why haven't they destroyed the universe?

1. Muslims believe that the crucifixion happened, but Allah prevented Jesus from dying. As for your refutation of polytheism, you haven't disproved anything.
2. Well, you don't understand antimatter. When matter comes into contact with antimatter, 50% of the mass involved is converted into energy according to the formula E = mc^2 (so 1 unit of mass converts to 8.98755179 × 10^16 units of energy, aka a lot) - the rest is converted into neutrinos. On the macro scale, this would cause a massive explosion - less than 1 gram of antimatter would create an explosion larger than that of the Fat Man nuclear bomb. However, these particles have so little mass that the energy released by their annihilation is negligible.

1. Polytheists have gods that can be wounded, age, die, or even disagree in spite of having far more knowledge than mortals. Poseidon was unable to stop Odysseus from reaching Ithaca despite putting a curse on him. Occam's Razor helps me deduce that these feeble gods are not worth my time nor my prayers. You misunderstand the Islamic belief; according to Muslims, Jesus wasn't present for the crucifixion whatsoever.
2. Has an equal amount of matter and antimatter been observed?

[Grenartia]

1. Galileo was persecuted (he wasn't executed btw) for spreading heliocentric ideas. Perhaps stop denying the fucking truth?

2. Does the underlined section of my earlier quote help?

Oh for goodness sakes, if Galileo was executed for believing the heliocentric modal, then Copernicus too should have been executed, along with Pope Paul V, Johannes Kepler, a vast chunk of the Jesuit’s order. There is clearly more to this than your simplistic, Wikipedia source, nonsense, that he was executed for heliocentrism. Has it not occurred that his heliocentrism was merely a scapegoat by his accusers (the academics of his time who believed Ptolemy’s spheres mode) to have him executed, while in reality he was removed for simply threatening the established power groups of his time? Why is there such inconsistency? Why was only Galileo executed? And not the growing number of Bishops and cardinals, who had enjoyed Copernicus’s ideas? Indeed, the final account of execution may have been over his “heresy” but anyone with a brain can see that is why he wasn’t executed, it was just an excuse. So obvious is this fact, that only a couple decades later the Church was devoted to heliocentric teachings!

It was quite clear, that Galileo, who proved nothing, in his crass arrogance, made enemies of both the academics of his time (which were often the Jesuits themselves, and Johannes Kepler statement below proves it was for intrigue, otherwise they would condemn their own beliefs!), and personally of the pope himself. To which they found excuse in his “heresy” and offed him.

To prove your point, find me another soul damned for that belief, and that belief alone. Good. Luck. With. That. Here’s such a soul, Johannes Kepler:

“The Jesuits themselves were more Copernican than Galileo was; it is now well recognized that the reason why Chinese astronomy advanced more rapidly than European astronomy was simply because Jesuit missionaries communicated to them their Copernican views.”

Or the account of Galileo and Pope Paul V on his discoveries:

“Now Galileo’s discoveries have been acknowledged by the greatest astronomical and religious authorities of his time. Pope Paul V received him in private audience and showed him so much reverence, that he did not allow him to kneel down in front of him, as was usual. Some weeks later the whole Collegio Romano gathered in the presence of Galileo officially to celebrate his discoveries. At the same time, Galileo met all the Roman intellectuals, and one of the most famous among them, Prince Federico des Cesi, asked him to become the sixth member of the Accademia dei Lincei (Academy of the Lynxes), which he had founded.”

Even Cardinal Barberini himself would praise Galileo’s letters which laid out the heliocentric modal in his letters on sunspots.

It wasn’t heresy, just a classic quality of the courts, your enemy needs to be put down? What better method than an accusation of “heresy”?

Go learn of the nuances of intrigue in renaissance persons before you make ridiculous assumptions that he was executed for a belief which many shared with him at the time, while they, shockingly, weren’t executed!

Oh and what you underlined, was meaningless extrapolation over the course of a century, utterly irrelevant for a discussion on the modern day. What has the year 2100 got to do with a 2018 deal between the Vatican and China? You just shoved it in there as an incessant dig. In your own simple language:

“Perhaps stop denying the fucking truth?”

Why do you keep saying CTM was saying Galileo was executed? He was put under house arrest for the rest of his life by Pope Paul V (the very same one you claim was a heliocentrist) for the heresy of "following the position of Copernicus, which is contrary to the true sense and authority of Holy Scripture".

As for the question of why Copernicus wasn't similarly persecuted, that's because his model wasn't published until shortly before his death in 1543. In fact, by 1532, he had finished his work, but kept it unpublished for the next 11 years for fear of the very scorn Galileo later earned. There is some speculation that the primary reason it wasn't condemned by the Catholic Church was because of a preface that acknowledged that the hypothesis might be wrong, but it was still useful for astronomical calculations. Indeed, up until Galileo and Kepler came forward with substantial evidence in favor of heliocentrism, most astronomers in Europe rejected Copernicus's conclusions. So even if he had lived past the publication of his book, he likely wouldn't have been persecuted, because he wouldn't have been perceived as a threat.

Given that Pope Paul V was the one who persecuted Galileo for heliocentrism, we can safely say he was not, in fact, a heliocentrist. So lets move on to Kepler. His books were also banned for advocating heliocentrism, but apparently Galileo ignored Kepler's work. Its also notable that Kepler was the assistant and successor to Tycho Brahe, one of the most noted and respected astronomers of his time (admittedly, Brahe didn't advocate heliocentrism, but rather his own system, geo-heliocentrism which is basically geocentrism, but acknowledging that every other body in the solar system orbits the sun except the moon), in the court of the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolph II, who wasn't exactly the most devout Catholic, and was quite tolerant of Protestants (which Kepler was). Essentially, the Catholic Church couldn't do much to Kepler like they could to Galileo, at least until Rudolph abdicated, and even then, he was fully aware of the dangers of being a Protestant and potentially finding a new job under Catholic jurisdiction.He sought employment in an area with more religious freedom, and went to Linz, and then later to Ulm due to the Thirty Years' War. So, basically, Kepler wasn't persecuted, because he made sure to stay firmly out of the Catholic Church's grasp.

As for this:

To prove your point, find me another soul damned for that belief, and that belief alone. Good. Luck. With. That.

Allow me to introduce you to Giordano Bruno. Truly a man who was a visionary, and ahead of his time. He hypothesized an infinite universe with no central body, where the stars weren't simply points of light, but other suns, around which other planets orbited, possibly even with their own forms of life. For this, he was tried and convicted of heresy by the Catholic Church, and promptly burned at the stake.

[Northern Davincia]

Except that assumption isn't just "I don't know, must be God." It's not a God of the Gaps argument, it's a deduction from reason.

This is the mistake that both biblical literalists and anti-theists make, that science and faith are opposed to each other. Even if you could prove say quantum fluctuations, it doesn't eliminate God from the issue. The statement God created the universe is not a statement of {i]how[/i] but one of why. The reason the universe exists is because God created it. All you're uncovering is the methods by which such a feat occurred.

Ah, the Kalam cosmological argument. Thing is, the eternal cause of the universe does not have to be a god. And even if it was, how do we know that it was the Judeo-Christian God, as opposed to a (hypothetical) indifferent god that created the universe, then left it to its own devices and did not interact with it at all, let alone reveal itself to intelligent apes on one specific planet?

Miracles strongly indicate that the God which created the universe is indeed the deity that Christians hold to.

Allow me to introduce you to Giordano Bruno. Truly a man who was a visionary, and ahead of his time. He hypothesized an infinite universe with no central body, where the stars weren't simply points of light, but other suns, around which other planets orbited, possibly even with their own forms of life. For this, he was tried and convicted of heresy by the Catholic Church, and promptly burned at the stake.

Ah, Bruno, the same man who believed in reincarnation and rejected basically all Christian theology. He was a heretic for more reasons than cosmology, the likes of which had no scientific backing in his lifetime.

[Tarsonis]

Except that assumption isn't just "I don't know, must be God." It's not a God of the Gaps argument, it's a deduction from reason.

This is the mistake that both biblical literalists and anti-theists make, that science and faith are opposed to each other. Even if you could prove say quantum fluctuations, it doesn't eliminate God from the issue. The statement God created the universe is not a statement of {i]how[/i] but one of why. The reason the universe exists is because God created it. All you're uncovering is the methods by which such a feat occurred.

Ah, the Kalam cosmological argument. Thing is, the eternal cause of the universe does not have to be a god. And even if it was, how do we know that it was the Judeo-Christian God, as opposed to a (hypothetical) indifferent god that created the universe, then left it to its own devices and did not interact with it at all, let alone reveal itself to intelligent apes on one specific planet?

Slow down there Quixote, you just jumped on to like 4 other topics.

Whether or not God exists, and whether or not it's the Christian God, are two different questions.

Le't's just stick to the first one for now. The first question that must be answered is does God exist? If you don't like the word God, then fine, does a demiurge exist?

The Cosmological Argument, despite your repeated assertions that it has, has never been refuted nor has it been proven, mainly because this isn't something you prove through scientific means. Most notable criticism of the Cosmological Argument are so full of holes by Philosophy professor could barely contain his disdain for them when we covered the material.

Now you point to quantum physics as providing proof of spontaneous creation via quantum fluctuations in a vacuum. The problem is when we say "from nothing" we're not talking about a vaccuum. A vacuum is the absence of matter. When we say nothing, we mean nothing. No matter, no energy, no Newtonian physics, no quantum physics, no space time continuum, no E=MC^2. Nothing. Something cannot come from nothing. So the universe and all its underpinning mechanics didn't come from nothing, it came from something. Something created them.

Now, said something must have always been in existence, in a way that is incomprehensible to linearly oriented minds such as ours. That something had to cause all the other things.

Now you say this doesn't have to be a God, it could be a primal force, but this falls apart under scrutiny. To say this thing doesn't have to be a god is to say this thing either was constantly in motion or moved moved itself without moving itself. The first falls apart because it presupposed motion not stationary as the default state, which is ridiculous because if its moving it has direction which means it has linear cause and effect which means time is a constant beyond the universe, etc etc etc, which means there is a t0 where even it didn't exist and were back to the impossibility of the universe.

The other possibility that it moved itself without moving itself, is also absurd. Nothing can move itself, i.e change its orientation without will. If this thing had no will, it would have remained eternally sedentary and the universe would never exist.

In order for anything to have come into existence, the prime mover must move itself. In order to move itself the prime mover most have possessed a will. The universe, necessarily required a god to create it.

[Salus Maior]

Allow me to introduce you to Giordano Bruno. Truly a man who was a visionary, and ahead of his time. He hypothesized an infinite universe with no central body, where the stars weren't simply points of light, but other suns, around which other planets orbited, possibly even with their own forms of life. For this, he was tried and convicted of heresy by the Catholic Church, and promptly burned at the stake.

From your own source:

"Starting in 1593, Bruno was tried for heresy by the Roman Inquisition on charges of denial of several core Catholic doctrines, including eternal damnation, the Trinity, the divinity of Christ, the virginity of Mary, and transubstantiation. Bruno's pantheism was also a matter of grave concern..."

None of those are about how stars were suns, or whatever.

[Nanatsu no Tsuki]

Ah, the Kalam cosmological argument. Thing is, the eternal cause of the universe does not have to be a god. And even if it was, how do we know that it was the Judeo-Christian God, as opposed to a (hypothetical) indifferent god that created the universe, then left it to its own devices and did not interact with it at all, let alone reveal itself to intelligent apes on one specific planet?

Slow down there Quixote, you just jumped on to like 4 other topics.

Whether or not God exists, and whether or not it's the Christian God, are two different questions.

Le't's just stick to the first one for now. The first question that must be answered is does God exist? If you don't like the word God, then fine, does a demiurge exist?

The Cosmological Argument, despite your repeated assertions that it has, has never been refuted nor has it been proven, mainly because this isn't something you prove through scientific means. Most notable criticism of the Cosmological Argument are so full of holes by Philosophy professor could barely contain his disdain for them when we covered the material.

Now you point to quantum physics as providing proof of spontaneous creation via quantum fluctuations in a vacuum. The problem is when we say "from nothing" we're not talking about a vaccuum. A vacuum is the absence of matter. When we say nothing, we mean nothing. No matter, no energy, no Newtonian physics, no quantum physics, no space time continuum, no E=MC^2. Nothing. Something cannot come from nothing. So the universe and all its underpinning mechanics didn't come from nothing, it came from something. Something created them.

Now, said something must have always been in existence, in a way that is incomprehensible to linearly oriented minds such as ours. That something had to cause all the other things.

Now you say this doesn't have to be a God, it could be a primal force, but this falls apart under scrutiny. To say this thing doesn't have to be a god is to say this thing either was constantly in motion or moved moved itself without moving itself. The first falls apart because it presupposed motion not stationary as the default state, which is ridiculous because if its moving it has direction which means it has linear cause and effect which means time is a constant beyond the universe, etc etc etc, which means there is a t0 where even it didn't exist and were back to the impossibility of the universe.

The other possibility that it moved itself without moving itself, is also absurd. Nothing can move itself, i.e change its orientation without will. If this thing had no will, it would have remained eternally sedentary and the universe would never exist.

In order for anything to have come into existence, the prime mover must move itself. In order to move itself the prime mover most have possessed a will. The universe, necessarily required a god to create it.

You're reminding me of Marcionism. Why are you doing this to me? *twitch*

[Tarsonis]

Oh for goodness sakes, if Galileo was executed for believing the heliocentric modal, then Copernicus too should have been executed, along with Pope Paul V, Johannes Kepler, a vast chunk of the Jesuit’s order. There is clearly more to this than your simplistic, Wikipedia source, nonsense, that he was executed for heliocentrism. Has it not occurred that his heliocentrism was merely a scapegoat by his accusers (the academics of his time who believed Ptolemy’s spheres mode) to have him executed, while in reality he was removed for simply threatening the established power groups of his time? Why is there such inconsistency? Why was only Galileo executed? And not the growing number of Bishops and cardinals, who had enjoyed Copernicus’s ideas? Indeed, the final account of execution may have been over his “heresy” but anyone with a brain can see that is why he wasn’t executed, it was just an excuse. So obvious is this fact, that only a couple decades later the Church was devoted to heliocentric teachings!

It was quite clear, that Galileo, who proved nothing, in his crass arrogance, made enemies of both the academics of his time (which were often the Jesuits themselves, and Johannes Kepler statement below proves it was for intrigue, otherwise they would condemn their own beliefs!), and personally of the pope himself. To which they found excuse in his “heresy” and offed him.

To prove your point, find me another soul damned for that belief, and that belief alone. Good. Luck. With. That. Here’s such a soul, Johannes Kepler:

“The Jesuits themselves were more Copernican than Galileo was; it is now well recognized that the reason why Chinese astronomy advanced more rapidly than European astronomy was simply because Jesuit missionaries communicated to them their Copernican views.”

Or the account of Galileo and Pope Paul V on his discoveries:

“Now Galileo’s discoveries have been acknowledged by the greatest astronomical and religious authorities of his time. Pope Paul V received him in private audience and showed him so much reverence, that he did not allow him to kneel down in front of him, as was usual. Some weeks later the whole Collegio Romano gathered in the presence of Galileo officially to celebrate his discoveries. At the same time, Galileo met all the Roman intellectuals, and one of the most famous among them, Prince Federico des Cesi, asked him to become the sixth member of the Accademia dei Lincei (Academy of the Lynxes), which he had founded.”

Even Cardinal Barberini himself would praise Galileo’s letters which laid out the heliocentric modal in his letters on sunspots.

It wasn’t heresy, just a classic quality of the courts, your enemy needs to be put down? What better method than an accusation of “heresy”?

Go learn of the nuances of intrigue in renaissance persons before you make ridiculous assumptions that he was executed for a belief which many shared with him at the time, while they, shockingly, weren’t executed!

Oh and what you underlined, was meaningless extrapolation over the course of a century, utterly irrelevant for a discussion on the modern day. What has the year 2100 got to do with a 2018 deal between the Vatican and China? You just shoved it in there as an incessant dig. In your own simple language:

“Perhaps stop denying the fucking truth?”

Why do you keep saying CTM was saying Galileo was executed? He was put under house arrest for the rest of his life by Pope Paul V (the very same one you claim was a heliocentrist) for the heresy of "following the position of Copernicus, which is contrary to the true sense and authority of Holy Scripture".

As for the question of why Copernicus wasn't similarly persecuted, that's because his model wasn't published until shortly before his death in 1543. In fact, by 1532, he had finished his work, but kept it unpublished for the next 11 years for fear of the very scorn Galileo later earned. There is some speculation that the primary reason it wasn't condemned by the Catholic Church was because of a preface that acknowledged that the hypothesis might be wrong, but it was still useful for astronomical calculations. Indeed, up until Galileo and Kepler came forward with substantial evidence in favor of heliocentrism, most astronomers in Europe rejected Copernicus's conclusions. So even if he had lived past the publication of his book, he likely wouldn't have been persecuted, because he wouldn't have been perceived as a threat.

Given that Pope Paul V was the one who persecuted Galileo for heliocentrism, we can safely say he was not, in fact, a heliocentrist. So lets move on to Kepler. His books were also banned for advocating heliocentrism, but apparently Galileo ignored Kepler's work. Its also notable that Kepler was the assistant and successor to Tycho Brahe, one of the most noted and respected astronomers of his time (admittedly, Brahe didn't advocate heliocentrism, but rather his own system, geo-heliocentrism which is basically geocentrism, but acknowledging that every other body in the solar system orbits the sun except the moon), in the court of the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolph II, who wasn't exactly the most devout Catholic, and was quite tolerant of Protestants (which Kepler was). Essentially, the Catholic Church couldn't do much to Kepler like they could to Galileo, at least until Rudolph abdicated, and even then, he was fully aware of the dangers of being a Protestant and potentially finding a new job under Catholic jurisdiction.He sought employment in an area with more religious freedom, and went to Linz, and then later to Ulm due to the Thirty Years' War. So, basically, Kepler wasn't persecuted, because he made sure to stay firmly out of the Catholic Church's grasp.

As for this:

To prove your point, find me another soul damned for that belief, and that belief alone. Good. Luck. With. That.

Allow me to introduce you to Giordano Bruno. Truly a man who was a visionary, and ahead of his time. He hypothesized an infinite universe with no central body, where the stars weren't simply points of light, but other suns, around which other planets orbited, possibly even with their own forms of life. For this, he was tried and convicted of heresy by the Catholic Church, and promptly burned at the stake.

Bruno wasn't really a scientist, he had a fever dream one night and tried to assert it as truth. He was literally laughed out of Cambridge for his assertions. The fact that he was ultimately right was luck, not rigor.

Secondly his execution for heresy had very little if nothing to do with his cosmological model.

[Tarsonis]

Slow down there Quixote, you just jumped on to like 4 other topics.

Whether or not God exists, and whether or not it's the Christian God, are two different questions.

Le't's just stick to the first one for now. The first question that must be answered is does God exist? If you don't like the word God, then fine, does a demiurge exist?

The Cosmological Argument, despite your repeated assertions that it has, has never been refuted nor has it been proven, mainly because this isn't something you prove through scientific means. Most notable criticism of the Cosmological Argument are so full of holes by Philosophy professor could barely contain his disdain for them when we covered the material.

Now you point to quantum physics as providing proof of spontaneous creation via quantum fluctuations in a vacuum. The problem is when we say "from nothing" we're not talking about a vaccuum. A vacuum is the absence of matter. When we say nothing, we mean nothing. No matter, no energy, no Newtonian physics, no quantum physics, no space time continuum, no E=MC^2. Nothing. Something cannot come from nothing. So the universe and all its underpinning mechanics didn't come from nothing, it came from something. Something created them.

Now, said something must have always been in existence, in a way that is incomprehensible to linearly oriented minds such as ours. That something had to cause all the other things.

Now you say this doesn't have to be a God, it could be a primal force, but this falls apart under scrutiny. To say this thing doesn't have to be a god is to say this thing either was constantly in motion or moved moved itself without moving itself. The first falls apart because it presupposed motion not stationary as the default state, which is ridiculous because if its moving it has direction which means it has linear cause and effect which means time is a constant beyond the universe, etc etc etc, which means there is a t0 where even it didn't exist and were back to the impossibility of the universe.

The other possibility that it moved itself without moving itself, is also absurd. Nothing can move itself, i.e change its orientation without will. If this thing had no will, it would have remained eternally sedentary and the universe would never exist.

In order for anything to have come into existence, the prime mover must move itself. In order to move itself the prime mover most have possessed a will. The universe, necessarily required a god to create it.

You're reminding me of Marcionism. Why are you doing this to me? *twitch*

Cause you don't really understand Marcion's position? He wasn't wrong in his assertion that there was a demiurge, he was wrong in his assertion that it was a being other than YHWH

[Nanatsu no Tsuki]

You're reminding me of Marcionism. Why are you doing this to me? *twitch*

Cause you don't really understand Marcion's position? He wasn't wrong in his assertion that there was a demiurge, he was wrong in his assertion that it was a being other than YHWH

I was mostly joking but I can see you can't take a joke or recognize one. When you mentioned a god and the Christian god it reminded me of the argument that the god of the OT is not the same as the one in the NT. That's all. I'm out.

[Tarsonis]

Cause you don't really understand Marcion's position? He wasn't wrong in his assertion that there was a demiurge, he was wrong in his assertion that it was a being other than YHWH

I was mostly joking but I can see you can't take a joke or recognize one. When you mentioned a god and the Christian god it reminded me of the argument that the god of the OT is not the same as the one in the NT. That's all. I'm out.

Ah, sorry.

[Northern Davincia]

Cause you don't really understand Marcion's position? He wasn't wrong in his assertion that there was a demiurge, he was wrong in his assertion that it was a being other than YHWH

I was mostly joking but I can see you can't take a joke or recognize one. When you mentioned a god and the Christian god it reminded me of the argument that the god of the OT is not the same as the one in the NT. That's all. I'm out.

Jokes are heretical. The Inquisition will be seeing you shortly.