Steve, the problem is with you describing God as some PHYSICAL being. You have not qualified what you mean by “physical” and it is bound to lead to confusion. Could you please clarify what you mean when you say God is a physical being?
On a quick side note, Kieno says he beliefs in God because he wants to and it gives him comfort. But he keeps harping on about the problem of evil and I feel we should warn him, at least this atheist is evidence that the problem of evil has had a great deal with turning him to atheism. ;D
I suspect Kieno has a proper understanding of the term “good” and “goodness”…
Do you now? What leads to you to believe this?
Oh I donno, Kieno seems like a rational person and rational people tend to have some idea or understanding of “good” and “goodness” right? Maybe it was my intuition pumps that worked overtime…:o 
And that when we just learned that “intuition” should at the very best be regarded as pointers eh?
Did you think my suspicions are anything more than pointers ROFL? Oh well, at least you learned something new.
roflol Not at all. I simply think your “suspicions” are highly suspect and you are a known liar.
Two facts which makes me watch everything you say closely. roflol and stuff.
He actually did point out that it does not make it true.
Oh gee, delightful little character you are, shall I retort:
You are a known liar and think you never began to lie in your life, two facts that make me not want to take you seriously in any conversation.
Stevo, I read your book and listened to the podcast, and one prominent feature that seems to have played a role in you becoming an atheist seems to be your research and knowledge about neurology. You say that after you have learned a bit about it you stopped believing in the soul and the after life.
Now, I am interested in your reasoning why your understanding of neurology or even neurology in general is incompatible with believing in a soul. More specifically, what is/was your conception of the soul? Is it anything like the Cartesian dualistic view that the soul is a complete substance on its own or perhaps a more peripatetic view that the human soul is an incomplete, albeit subsistent substance?
No, what I wanted pointed out is the presenter is implying “what harm can it do if it makes me feel good, it’s a personal thing”. These people have not thought it through that our actions are contingent on our beliefs. A bad consequence of a decision based on a belief that is false is worse than one based on a truth.
For example I have a work colleague who continues to take homeopathic medicine even though she claims to understand that it’s bogus, why, because “it makes her feel better, what harm can it do”.
“Where’s your proof!”
Haha… These people don’t read their own Bible!
Their might be some merit to this statement if people with comforting religious or generally irrational beliefs kept them to themselves or only shared them with like minded people. But generally this is not true. Generally they bother the rest of us with them, or try to put them in laws, or start wars on the basis of them.
I have met a few people who keep their comforting religious beliefs private. Well actually one person who does this. Everyone else is pretty public with these silly beliefs.
I was privileged enough to catch most of the broadcast “live”.
I certainly got the impression from some of Kieno’s comments that the broadcast wasn’t solely to argue for one set of views vs another, but was more designed to show whether tolerance existed on both sides of the fence…perhaps Steve could clarify this for us.
If tolerance was the key focus then the God-Squad came an embarrassing second! The lady caller who insisted that God “lit” the sun every morning and extinguished it last thing at night was anything but tolerant with Steve.
(Can there really be adults living on this round planet that firmly believe that when the sun is switched off over Africa that it must be off everywhere??)
Not sure I would have been as patient and “tolerant” as Steve certainly was!
I was asked by a primary school geography teacher if the earth was really round. Rural farm school - but still, she should know.
Well batted Steve!
The gentleman caller who said that he converted from Christianity to Islam because it felt more “comfortable” to him grabbed my attention. I think he did the atheistic argument a great service by implying that we can pick out a religion pretty much for its fit - dare I add like we do shoes. This by itself cheapens all faiths, because it implies that there is not necessarily a TRUE AND CORRECT one.
Mintaka
Hi everyone. I’m back - please forgive my silence especially in this thread regarding me on the radio. Here is the situation: my computer died. Yup. Wouldn’t start Thursday night so I took it in Friday morning for repairs. Only got it up and running again this morning (hectic weekend with 4 gigs in 3 days).
Ja, we thought Mabus might have unplugged you after your talk.
Heheh. The ever evil Mabus, LOL.
I will try and answer a few concerns now:
@ cyghost: The Jews spoke Hebrew and used a word “Jeshua” which refers to their high priest. Even these days there is a “Jeshua of Johannesburg” - it is a title, not a name. There have been many “Jeshua’s” including some at the time of our notorious “Jesus” (a Greek rendition of Jeshua). Secular scholars have agreed on this. There are still some debates regarding this issue: did Jesus exist?, but the fact remains that the one described in the NT certainly did not (he is modelled after the solar deities like e.g. Mithra, and connected to the Jewish religion via the Essenian Jewish sect living out in Qumran near the Dead Sea who referred to him as their “Jeshua” or high priest). My book goes into more detail on this topic - there is more to it, but the JC of the NT actually being a real person? No longer a debate. This makes Christianity a badly constructed, and easily uncovered, lie (and therefore not a “true religion” - which is what I meant). It was quite difficult to be more clear live on air, and I think it was a good learning experience for me. Evolution proved? I agree that it is merely a model, but a model based on well established facts and clear evidence. I worded it incorrectly on air, probably because I was getting annoyed with the Fundi callers.