Can God love?
Offline Can God love?
We are told that the mythical bible God is love or the epitome of love.
Archetypal Jesus said that we would know his people by the love, deeds and actions they showed others.
Jesus gave us examples of the deeds and works. Feed the poor, love all our neighbours, do not sin and many others.
Love then, seems to Jesus, to be something that must be shown by deeds, actions and works to be alive and true love. Love, like faith, without works is dead. Both St. James and Jesus agree on this.
It follows then that if God is not doing something to show this love then the love for man expressed in scriptures is wrong and God cannot love.
You are in the image of God. When you love someone you show them that love by works and deeds. This is how the recipient of that love knows it is there and that allows for reciprocity. You will agree that without reciprocity, true love cannot exist between two individuals. We must do things for each other for true love to exist.
Imagine what those you love would think if you never did anything to express your love. Imagine what you would think of the love of others towards you if they never did anything to show they loved you. See what I mean. Love always must have deeds to be real and true and reciprocity must be at play.
Love then has no choice but to be expressed if it is true love.
We are told that God loved his son so much that he planned to have him sacrificed even before the earth was created. This human sacrifice or any other human sacrifice, voluntary or not, is immoral and the notion that it is good to sacrifice an innocent victim to give the guilty believers a free ride into heaven is a completely self-gratifying notion and is completely immoral. One does not show love for someone by having them sacrificed for the sins of others when God himself stated that we are all responsible for our own salvation and cannot put that responsibility of the shoulders of a scapegoat Jesus.
Does love need deeds and works to be expressed?
Have you seen God express his love for us lately?
Regards
DL
These following speak to this issue if you wish to view them.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMXoPhgTkuY&feature=player_embedded
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I don't know of a difference between true love and true lust, but give me lust and nothing but.
The duration of romantic love, marriage to divorce, is only a few years shorter than the time from puberty to average death in the good old days. While more than willing to cheat (nothing propinques like propinquity) we are primarily a monogamous species. And now that life spans are longer we tend to be serially monogamous in general.
Our behavior is what it is. Behavior is linked to survival. We have survived. What is the point beyond that?
Our social world is not our evolved world. We live longer which screws up the monogamy thing. We pass property by clans and families which used to be separate hunter-gatherer bands but found themselves side by side and farmers and in cities. A marriage with its obligations is not for kids to screw up with romantic love as in Romeo and Juliet. Uncertain parentage messes up inheritance and creates blood feuds by rival claims. That is bad for peaceful society.
Christians added another wrinkle, church approved marriages and a couple centuries ago civil society started licensing it. Before that families had a party where the kids announced they were setting up a home together.
Because few societies execute adulterers of both sexes and their offspring with any consistency or enthusiasm if propinquity is a breedable trait it is not going away. More likely it would breed sneakier and more cautious adulterers biological. It would definitely produce sneakier and more cautious socially.
Because lifespan started increasing only a few generations ago there is no way hormone secretion can have begun to increase if it is of value and likely not of value because women mostly do not want children at an age where it might become more common if the parents have a longer lived version.
And of course no knowledge that it is a selectable gene by itself. Propinquity could simply be an interest in variety needed to increase the gene pool that over flows into normal society as adultery. Preventing inbreeding and promoting healthy mixing is more important than preventing a few jealous rages.
Jews stole the land. The owners want it back. That is all anyone needs to know about Israel. That is all there is to know about Israel.
www.ussliberty.org
www.giwersworld.org/made-in-alexandria/index.html
www.giwersworld.org/00_files/zion-hit-points.phtml
And in your study for a physics degree, you learned that correlation means causation?
Science is indeed being debased little by little. Amazing.
Millions, if not billions can and have testified that love, beyond hormones, beyond sex, beyond simple "attraction", exists in their lives. That you, and others, are unable to quantify it really irks you. So you pretend it doesn't exist. There is more in the Universe than just the material and measureable. Euclid's 'line' is an axiom because it does not 'exist in' Nature.
I suppose Iwill respectfully disagree with you here. In my Evolution research I have come across no such evidence. Yes, I have come across very many instances of inferences being asserted as fact, as evidence existing merely because it simply must exist, but we are still in the world of inference not evidenced fact. That there seems to be no description of this common ancestor in the least respect - for example its DNA chromosome profile: does it have 23 or 24 pairs of chromosomes? If 23 then we are dealing with human; if 24 we are dealing with ape/chimp, and so on. I do note your 'perhaps' and 'possible' which is the case: we are dealing with many "perhaps"'s in Evolution. I agree also that we may not be able to back-walk all the way to SCA, but that does noy give us permission to label an unevidenced hypothesis as proven scientific fact.
I also prefer to work within the solid bounds of real science and careful scientitifc theory. I have no room for any Creation Myth in my world of science whether it be a theistic or evolutionary myth.
I acknowledge that hormones can be studied scientifically. I acknowledge that testimonies of "attraction" can be quantified. But for me only a reductionist redefinition of love would allow anyone to suggest that Love can be the object of a materialist examination.
As for defintions, as a deist, I can live with God is Love knowing that that hardly explains much. I can't explain Love; I can't explain why the Universe exists; I can't explain how Life began either. There is much I can't explain. I am more interested in the world of Science's definition of love if scientists believe they have explained it all.
I just sprayed coffee all over my keyboard. Hilarious.
You are the only one that is stating facts with no evidence to back it up. Talk about a pot calling a porcelain sugar bowl black...
It had 24 pairs of chromosomes.
Urhm... You do realize that humans are apes, right?
Your statement makes as much sense as saying, "If blah, blah then we are dealing with a dog; if blah, blah we are dealing with a canine."
Great Apes=Humans, Gorillas, Chimpanzees, Bonobos, Orangutans
Ok, I have to ask. What the heck does SCA mean? Do you take it to mean Same Common Ancestor? Shared Common Ancestor?
The acronym that is normally used is LCA (Last Common Ancestor). The SCA thing must be something you picked up on an Intelligent Design website somewhere while you were doing your "Evolution research". haha
That's not what is happening. At ALL.
"I am an atheist, thank God." -Oriana Fallaci
Thanks for the laugh. It's humourous when people who resort to ad hominem on me, turn around and make fools of themselves.
If you really knew anything about this you would know that SCA means Single Common Ancestor - a term widely used in Evolution circles. It represents that first ancestor of us ALL.
And humans have 23 chromosome pairs; apes have 24 chromosome pairs. Humans are not apes. Humans and apes are hominids.
If you did more research, maybe you wouldn't make these mistakes?
(Enjoy your coffee by the way, I know I am enjoying mine.)
I'm still waiting for the evidence I asked for... I know it's hard for you to drum up evidence when it's just a religion you believe in...
The ancestor for all life is called Last Universal Common Ancestor or LUCA.
I did a quick internet search and I'm just not seeing this SCA being used. I see the words "single common ancestor" not capitalized and used in the middle of sentences but that's it.
http://australianmuseum.net.au/Humans-are-apes-Great-Apes
Human chromosome 2 is an exact duplicate of two ape chromosomes, but they're fused together. Humans also have 1 less chromosome than apes. Coincidence?
A rare mutation exists that can fuse two chromosomes into one. It's been observed in the lab and accounts for several cases of chromosome number discrepancy between domestic horses and wild ones, species of mice, and others. While it normally results in infertility and death, occasionally no important DNA is affected by the chromosome fusion and it can be passed on to descendants.
It's long been known that humans and apes have a different number of chromosomes; some have argued this is evidence they are not related, in fact. But biologists hypothesized that the discrepancy was accounted for by a chromosome fusion and made several tantalizing and very unlikely successful predictions as to how our genome should look.
Chromosomes end in what are known as "telomeres" that are identifiable repeats of the same DNA bases. Conversely, they also contain characteristic "centromeres" near the middle. If our chromosome 2 was fused from two ape-like chromosomes, we would expect to find the inverse; telomeres in the middle, where the two old ones met, and centromeres halfway toward each end from the middle, as opposed to the middle itself.
Both predictions are true. Centromeres and telomeres have been identified in human chromosome 2 exactly as evolution told us they would.
This was another experiment to demonstrate the truth of evolution: had humans had no traces of the fusion, we would be hard-pressed to account for the discrepancy without seeing any remnant of the missing one. Not only would hundreds of genes on the chromosome be deleted in the process, almost assuredly rendering the mutant infertile or worse, but mutations that delete entire genes or chromosomes without leaving a trace are spectacularly rare.
Had this been due to deliberate design, we would likely see two different fused human chromosomes. Or one large one, but without the bizarre misplaced centromeres and telomeres that only lead to the conclusion of common ancestry. Both would be falsifications of evolution.
Endogenous retroviral infections from the ancient past and their role in confirming what is already painfully obvious.
Retroviral infections can occasionally infect a germ line cell. The resulting offspring will have bits and pieces of the virus stuck in every cell in its body. We've observed this very rare process in the lab, and the odds of getting two independent infections to leave the same bit of viral DNA at the same exact locus are astronomically unlikely.
Like pseudogenes, the viral fragments can piggyback on the success of an individual and become established in the species. The chances of any particular viral fragment, even if inserted identically in two seperate cases, becoming established in two seperate populations (a rare event in and of itself) makes this not just improbable, but more or less impossible.
Any offshoot species will have the same unlikely and easily identifiable ERV, enabling us to construct accurate phylogenies from an independent line of evidence.
ERVs have also been used to reconstruct the relationships between dogs, jackals, wolves and foxes; various breeds of domestic cat and wild cat; and even to establish the shared ancestry of cows and whales. (In the last case, two independent viral infections accounting for the evidence is impossible - whales and cows do not even share the same environment, much less are exposed to the same diseases!)
Needless to say, this offers numerous falsification avenues for evolution. Any ERV shared between organisms farther on the phylogenetic relationship than humans and apes must *also* be found in both. For example, ERVs found in New World Monkeys and chimps MUST be present in humans (aside from a few very rare cases where they've been deleted, but we can tell when a deletion has occured) or evolution is falsified.
An ERV in dogs and humans but not chimps would put the theory on its deathbed; so would a phylogeny reconstructed from these viral fragments if it differed significantly from the accepted phylogeny based on morphological, fossil, pseudogene, anatomical, and other evidence.
"I am an atheist, thank God." -Oriana Fallaci
That is likely why you have yet to experience true love.
Lust does not require reciprocity. Love does.
Regards
DL
I did learn not to waste time on questions that assume a conclusion.
How can you possible comment on what you are incapable of understanding?
Testimony is called testimony because it is testimony. That means it is in the same category and testimony to flying saucers and being born again and bigfoot. That means it is not evidence.
However your appeal to testimony is evidence you are a moron at least in the figurative sense.
Jews stole the land. The owners want it back. That is all anyone needs to know about Israel. That is all there is to know about Israel.
www.ussliberty.org
www.giwersworld.org/made-in-alexandria/index.html
www.giwersworld.org/00_files/zion-hit-points.phtml
It is not clear in which way you are lying with that statement or if it is only in one way. You demonstrated you have no idea what evolution is. You lied about Dawkins. You imply you are capable of research. You imply you know what the term research means.
BTW: One has to understand to disagree. You do not understand.
Jews stole the land. The owners want it back. That is all anyone needs to know about Israel. That is all there is to know about Israel.
www.ussliberty.org
www.giwersworld.org/made-in-alexandria/index.html
www.giwersworld.org/00_files/zion-hit-points.phtml
It is not clear why you think scientists would use a redudant term. Why would the term be single when there can be only one? If you are NOT lying you can certainly produce URLs in support of your assertion.
By definition humans remain apes. If you wish your new definition adopted you can get to work on it. As it is you are simply demonstrating your ignorance again ... and again and again and again.
Jews stole the land. The owners want it back. That is all anyone needs to know about Israel. That is all there is to know about Israel.
www.ussliberty.org
www.giwersworld.org/made-in-alexandria/index.html
www.giwersworld.org/00_files/zion-hit-points.phtml
It is not nice to fool with the romantics' idea of unrequited love. Fun but not nice.
Jews stole the land. The owners want it back. That is all anyone needs to know about Israel. That is all there is to know about Israel.
www.ussliberty.org
www.giwersworld.org/made-in-alexandria/index.html
www.giwersworld.org/00_files/zion-hit-points.phtml
Hi Greatest,
Since you are a student of Heraclitus abeit, in complete ignorance, this entire thread is absurd according
to your own worldview.
Also, do you ask this question in reference to your understand of love? Is this an understand that is subjective?
This would be a consistent answer to your Hereclitian worldview. If so, then I have no idea how to ansewr this question
since you have yet to define what you mean by love
So please, what do you mean by love? Did you go to your dusty webster dictionary? Also, in Greek, there are 3 loves, so which love are you talking about. In the LXX there are 4. So are you talking about one of those loves or is there a different love you are talking about?
This thread is like a algebraic problem that cannot be answered since there's not enough information to solve the problem.
Please fill out the problem a little more in order to have a correct answer.
Respectfully,
Jean Chauvin (Jude 3).
A Rational Christian of Intelligence (rare)with a valid and sound justification for my epistemology and a logical refutation for those with logical fallacies and false worldviews upon their normative of thinking in retrospect to objective normative(s). This is only understood via the imago dei in which we all are.
Respectfully,
Jean Chauvin (Jude 3).
Anony, I personally know people that served alongside sailors that were on the USS Liberty during the unfortunate Israel attack. I served with them during my 6 years in the US Navy. And the conspiracy claptrap is utter nonsense. If you consider yourself any small agent of rationality you will curb your innate hatred for the jews to remove that link from your signature.
To leave it is to admit you will default into blatant propaganda bullshit to justify your bigotry.
"I am an atheist, thank God." -Oriana Fallaci
Isn't that like accusing Nony of thought crimes ? Besides, if his ideas are so weak and indefensible then let others like yourself dismantle them with reasoned arguments and not appeals to censorship.
Personally I'm offended by theism but the way to combat it or any other controversial viewpoint is to expose it to debate which is why this forum exists to begin with.
In fairness you should deal with Nony and his political views the same methodical way you have been dealing with others who come here with their own unsavory views regarding religion.
And ultimately, just look at the crap that Jean is allowed to continually spew ( his remarks about a particular forum member who recently died and is "burning in hell" ) and Jean's bigoted vitriol is perpetually tolerated. All Jean received is a Theistard badge. Big woop. Brand Nony with an appropriate badge of his his own and move the hell on.
I'll call out lies wherever I see them. And you can denounce me for that all you want, Prozac.
I will censor blatant lies if I have the power. Any reasonable point of debate is free of censor, even if I'm thoroughly disgusted by it. But blatant lies? Fuck no.
Jean's a joke. Retarded lies are humorous and beneath anything else than superficial amusing comments. Jean is no threat to anyone ever. He's not something anyone would take serious. Some lies are not so funny. Anti-evolutionists, people that argue against the experts for man directed global warming, and this anti-semitism...not so cute.
Don't you have a closet to be cowering in?
"I am an atheist, thank God." -Oriana Fallaci
How does this follow from the lame shot at love? You really need to learn everyone isn't a girlie man whining about feelings being hurt.
You will also note neither I nor the website proposes any conspiracy. No matter how hard you try to mis-state it, there is no conspiracy being proposed. I will not engage your strawman.
As no one knowing the conditions at the time of the attack, the silhouette of the ship, as well as the speed and heading of both the ship and wind agrees it could have been an accident most of the website is filler. The attack was deliberate. 34 Americans were murdered. There is nothing further to discuss. Motivation only has a bearing on the sentencing.
Jews stole the land. The owners want it back. That is all anyone needs to know about Israel. That is all there is to know about Israel.
www.ussliberty.org
www.giwersworld.org/made-in-alexandria/index.html
www.giwersworld.org/00_files/zion-hit-points.phtml
Then call them out. Prove him wrong. Censoring is just taking the easy way out.
You haven't proven anything except that you disagree with him.
I can't remember the atheist forum member's name who died of cancer but Jean's remarks were gloating in this former member's alleged suffering in Hell. I don't consider it cute and I'm sure if his widow had seen it she wouldn't share your nonchalant attitude about it. It was a personal attack against an individual not some insult against a conglomeration of humanity, semites or otherwise.
I'm just calling you out instead of trying to censor you. What's wrong with that ?
When the izziehuggers try to defend it, in the end it is usually some variation upon, you only refuse to believe the impossible/nonsense because you hate Jews. It has been going on since Josephus. It is nothing new.
Usually there is some lame excuse not to look like a fool by attempting a defense. Look for indignation and pretending responding lends merit to the assertion.
I am posting the possibilites in hopes of seeing an innovative reply. I've been here before. It is always the same.
Jews stole the land. The owners want it back. That is all anyone needs to know about Israel. That is all there is to know about Israel.
www.ussliberty.org
www.giwersworld.org/made-in-alexandria/index.html
www.giwersworld.org/00_files/zion-hit-points.phtml
For denunciation to have value one must appeal to authority and other irrational premises.
Jews stole the land. The owners want it back. That is all anyone needs to know about Israel. That is all there is to know about Israel.
www.ussliberty.org
www.giwersworld.org/made-in-alexandria/index.html
www.giwersworld.org/00_files/zion-hit-points.phtml
He is perpetuating a statement like it is fact. The "conspiracy" stating that Israel intentionally attacked an American naval ship.
The onus is on him.
It's blatant propaganda and he has two options. Drop the assertion because he can not support it, or provide world shattering evidence proving that Israel, for some bizarre reason, attacked their most steadfast and devoted ally.
It's not my responsibility to prove him wrong. It's his responsibility to defend his inclusion of that conspiracy fiction in his signature.
"I am an atheist, thank God." -Oriana Fallaci
The issue is against Israel. The point of throwing in antisemitism is to let Zionism hide behind antisemitism. Which is rather odd because in Israel anti-Arab talk is considered antisemitic.
Jews stole the land. The owners want it back. That is all anyone needs to know about Israel. That is all there is to know about Israel.
www.ussliberty.org
www.giwersworld.org/made-in-alexandria/index.html
www.giwersworld.org/00_files/zion-hit-points.phtml
As it could not have been an accident, what is left?
Everyone with naval experience who knows the conditions and such knows it could not have been an accident. Knowing it could not have been an accident what do you propose as the explanation?
BTW: The US rejected the israeli lie that it was an accident.
Israel has refused naval life fire exercises with the US Navy ever since.
Jews stole the land. The owners want it back. That is all anyone needs to know about Israel. That is all there is to know about Israel.
www.ussliberty.org
www.giwersworld.org/made-in-alexandria/index.html
www.giwersworld.org/00_files/zion-hit-points.phtml
Oh, well you would know. I wouldn't. I only spent 4 years, 4 months, and 4 days on an AEGIS class Cruiser including port visits in Israel, in combat operations against Kosovo and Afghanistan.
So I'm sure you're way more salty than I am.
It's called the fog of war. In the first Gulf War us Americans were the number 1 killer of American soldiers.
"I am an atheist, thank God." -Oriana Fallaci
Fair enough.
YOU explain how it could have been an accident as Israel claimed. Take all the time you need to explain how it could have been an accident. Don't forget machinegunning the life rafts.
Jews stole the land. The owners want it back. That is all anyone needs to know about Israel. That is all there is to know about Israel.
www.ussliberty.org
www.giwersworld.org/made-in-alexandria/index.html
www.giwersworld.org/00_files/zion-hit-points.phtml
In replying to my own post I note 12 of them in an hour of my last post.
What incredibly bad luck that just when Watcher's bluff is called he happens to stop posting to the thread.
What bad timing just on the verge of vindicating Israel he misses the immediate opportunity to do so.
Jews stole the land. The owners want it back. That is all anyone needs to know about Israel. That is all there is to know about Israel.
www.ussliberty.org
www.giwersworld.org/made-in-alexandria/index.html
www.giwersworld.org/00_files/zion-hit-points.phtml
I'm not making an assertion. You are. Explain to me, to us, how jews are evil incarnate and will slaughter their most firm allies in violation of all common sense and any shred of intelligence.
Because jews ain't people, are they Anony?
They're animals and not worthy of human affection.
"I am an atheist, thank God." -Oriana Fallaci
I honestly don't know what you are talking about. But I'm a little Aspergers so I'm dense in that regard. All I know is that you are frustrated, and pissed, angry, because I smacked you.
What bad timing, eh? That we were both alive during the same timeframe for me to smack you for being a little islamic whore.
"I am an atheist, thank God." -Oriana Fallaci
A malicious mis-statement of what I said is the best you can do. Not surprising.
The opposite of accident remains deliberate. You put your four years of naval experience on the line implying you would show it really was an accident. You did not address that.
You only addressed the motive which, as I noted, only applies in the sentencing phase.
Jews stole the land. The owners want it back. That is all anyone needs to know about Israel. That is all there is to know about Israel.
www.ussliberty.org
www.giwersworld.org/made-in-alexandria/index.html
www.giwersworld.org/00_files/zion-hit-points.phtml
You really think I care about you.
The opposite of accident remains deliberate. It could not have been an accident.
If you were a Jew you would give Jews a bad name.
Jews stole the land. The owners want it back. That is all anyone needs to know about Israel. That is all there is to know about Israel.
www.ussliberty.org
www.giwersworld.org/made-in-alexandria/index.html
www.giwersworld.org/00_files/zion-hit-points.phtml
If I have to define love for you, then we will not get anywhere. I do not plan to re-write the various definitions and I will likely agree with whatever definition you use.
As I stated, love must have reciprocity and that is my starting point. As long as that is in your definition, I will likely go with your definition.
Regards
DL
I am still waitng, girlie man. Show me all your surface warfare expertise and demonstrate it really was an accident despite the US President and SecDef rejecting that lie. Tell about your feelings being hurt.
Were you a cook? Show off your expertise, PLEASE!
Jews stole the land. The owners want it back. That is all anyone needs to know about Israel. That is all there is to know about Israel.
www.ussliberty.org
www.giwersworld.org/made-in-alexandria/index.html
www.giwersworld.org/00_files/zion-hit-points.phtml
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2012/jul/15/interview-dr-love-paul-zak
extract:
These findings have striking implications for how we think about morality. Economists tend to pride themselves on being hardheaded realists: morality might be a nice set of ideas about how people ought to behave, this way of thinking goes, but economics is the analysis of how they really behave, motivated not by stirring ethical values but by the desire for personal gain.
Perhaps ironically, religions tend to share a similar view: that moral conduct doesn't come naturally, but instead needs to be imposed through fear or the promise of reward. Zak himself was raised in a staunch Catholic household: his mother, he likes to say, took him out of Catholic school because it wasn't strict enough, and "based her child-rearing on the assumption that unselfish, moral behaviour was impossible without the ever-present threat of punishment, the more terrifying the better". Yet the fact that natural selection has given us oxytocin – a mechanism that allows us to be instinctively trusting and kind – suggests that what most of us think of as "moral" is, in fact, part of how we have evolved to be.
Yes you can.
The only possible thing the world needs saving from are those running it.
https://sites.google.com/site/oldseers
Knowledge trumps faith and I'm not a Theist
Lies are nothing more then falsehoods searching for the truth