Dnarever wrote on Aug 28^th, 2016 at 9:48am:


It's also a non-prophet organisation

issuevoter wrote on Aug 28^th, 2016 at 2:14pm:



Raven has always been of the opinion that it is better to have an idea then a belief. You can change an idea, changing a belief is harder. People die for it people kill for it. Belief drives people to fly planes into buildings, makes everyday people blow up abortion clinics and encourages parents to mutilate the genitals of their sons and daughters.

But if you do have belief then question everything because if what you hold as true stands up then you are stronger for it.

If it doesn't stand up to the questions then you are better off devoting your time to more worthwhile things.

Doomsday comes around and it turns out God exists. Holy smoke! We are in deep do-do now!
St Peter is out there with his shepard's crook seperating the faithful from the crowd. Not that there is many of them. In Revelation, God already said he is only going to redeem a measelly 144,000!

I hear a lot of nashing of teeth and wailing as people dropping on their knees. But it looks like the Jews and Muzlims and Christians got it right after all, but its a pretty small group who actually believed. Funny, I don't see any clergy.

And then there is the rest of us sorry lot, and we're as pissed off as Republicans after the referendum.  A Buddhist says, “See, I told you it was all meaningless.” Mel Brooks wants to talk to Moses about remaking the Ten Commandments. A stoned Rasta still think he and Haili Salase are going to Heaven. But the Atheists step forward and start shaking their fists at St Peter, “Not so fast Pete, we want to know why!”

But St Peter silences them, “None of your God Damn business!”

In the back of the crowd a couple of Agnostics are whispering, “I knew it! I knew it! And all of those wasted lottery tickets!”

Abraham is commending his little band of Jews, Muzlims and Christians, and they all chorus in with “We told you so,” and point at us. And then I hear their sing song taunt.

“You're gunna burn in Hell . . . Nah Nana Nah Nah!”

But there is an Almighty clap as God's two hands come together squashing everything he has ever created, into a blob of clay. And when it is totally silent, he lobs the ball out into the middle of nothingness, and sits back on his throne. Scratching his chin he muses, “Well . . . If first you don't succeed, try, try, again.”

Forget Jesus - the stars died so you could be here today:

13:16

Parannoyed wrote on Aug 29^th, 2016 at 1:58pm:



So what banned member were you? Or are you hiding something from other posters?

I don't know what circles you move in, CW, but I have met many intelligent people who subscribe to one of the self-imposed trinity, Atheist, Agnostic, God worshiper.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-09-01/worlds-oldest-fossils-in-3.7-billion-year-...

The oldest fossils known to date have been discovered in 3.7 billion-year-old rocks in Greenland by an Australian-led team of researchers.

Key points

Evidence of ancient bacterial communities known as stromatolites uncovered in rocks in Greenland
Dating of rock above and below stromatolites places them between 3.7 and 3.68 billion years old
Analysis pushes back earliest known evidence of life on Earth by 220 million years
The discovery of the fossilised bacterial communities, known as stromatolites, could be the first clear biological evidence of the earliest known life on Earth, according to a paper published today in Nature.

Before this find, the earliest accepted evidence for life were 3.48 billion-year-old fossil stromatolites from the Pilbara region in Western Australia.

Lead author Professor Allen Nutman of the University of Wollongong has been investigating ancient rock formations in the Isua Supercrustal Belt in south-west Greenland for more than 30 years.

The rocks were known to contain a unique carbon signature, but until now, it was unclear whether the signature had been created by ancient life forms or changes in the rock caused by heat and pressure.

Twelve of the oldest fossils we've discovered so far



Fossils are the hard evidence behind our picture of life on Earth. Here are a dozen of the oldest-known fossils we've discovered in the last 20 years.
During one of their visits to the area four years ago, the team found a new outcrop had been exposed by increased melting of the summer snow.

"There were some new outcrops that, as far as I can see from historical aerial photographs, have not been exposed in at least the last 40 years or so," said Professor Nutman.

Those rocks bore unusual features that the group instantly recognised.

"We could see this very diagnostic layering where one side of the layering was completely flat and then rising out of that, we had this irregular distribution of bumps or hummocks along it," Professor Nutman said.

Within those bumps and hummocks, they could also see the fine layering that is distinctive of stromatolites, where calcified layers are gradually built up by bacteria over hundreds and even thousands of years.

Analysis of rock layers pins down date

Two fossil researchers holding the stromatolites
PHOTO: Allen Nutman (left) and Vickie Bennet (right) with a specimen of 3.7-billion-year-old stromatolites from Isua, Greenland. (Supplied: Yuri Amelin)
The team used sophisticated techniques to carefully date the layers of rocks above and below the fossils.

The analysis placed the stromatolites between 3.71 and 3.695 billion years of age.

"So we've really pinned it down," Professor Nutman said.

Evidence from the "molecular clock" — the mutation rate of genetic material — has long suggested that life first emerged on Earth around 4 billion years ago.

As the product of bacterial communities, stromatolites suggest some degree of sophistication already existed at 3.7 billion years ago, Professor Nutman said.

The discovery could also help guide the search for evidence of past life on Mars, he added.

"At that particular time on Mars, there was still water on the surface, so if life has taken this path already on Earth by 3.7 billion years ago, it does increase the possibility of finding evidence of life on Mars."
Scientists will be 'queuing up'

Commenting on the finding, biogeochemist Dr David Wacey, Future Fellow at the University of Western Australia, said the find would undoubtedly have paleobiologists "queuing up waiting for more snow to melt and reveal additional new outcrops in this region".

Dr Wacey said the discovery was exciting, but not necessarily surprising, given that microfossils and stromatolite fossils dated to around 3.48 billion years ago had previously been found.

"This shows that life had attained a certain degree of complexity at this point so it follows that some considerable amount of time had probably passed since the origin of life itself," he said.
Dr Wacey stressed that the Isua fossils would need to undergo the same rigorous scrutiny as previous ancient microbial fossils had been before this could be considered 100 per cent proof of life 3.7 billion years ago. But at this stage, he said, there were no other competitors for "world's oldest fossil".

Prime Minister for Canyons wrote on Sep 1^st, 2016 at 8:40am:


İn regards to what?