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iterating Roger W.'s avatar

There is a semantic trick in the word supernatural.

It's pretty old. No one seems to question that it is a trick, but I think it is.

First, it is simply defined that only natural things exist. Natural means "from nature" and nature is composed only of things that are tangible, visible, have a volume and mass. All this is hidden, deeply buried in the assumption.

Then comes the trick: the people who adhere to that hidden definition can simply attach the adjectives "not natural" or "supernatural" to anything whose existence they dislike. Magically, this preference becomes a logical truth, and logical truths are natural, by definition.

All of this is irrational because the definition is wrong. At the very least, they had to expand the definition when they accepted the existence of electricity, magnetism, the invisible "force" of gravity (not a problem for Newton because he was a Theologian), and the atomic models to explain chemical bonding and molecular composition, without which they couldn't have invented genetics and genomics, which today most people believe to be absolutely true by the obvious miracle of cultural osmosis.

And they will have to keep expanding the definition. Which inevitable leads to a Personal God. If nothing else, our language forces every thought to go in that direction, which is terrifying for many.

I think most people, me included, make this mistake often, without realizing. It's the consequence of mental poisoning. I doubt anyone can overcome this problem without supernatural intervention, hehehehe.

By the way, supernatural is Latin for metaphysical or metaphysikos. And many scientists are known to abhor metaphysics.

Now that I think about this, it's weird that the things people fear the most are giants with clay feet: nuclear warfare, infections in general, genetic modification, fetal malformations, viral diseases, quarantines, concentration camps, explosive chips that can control your brain. All of these things would be dismissed as supernatural nonsense if they were delivered in a religious language. But the old myths of world destruction and divine punishment with disease and tyranny are now explained as normal, natural phenomena, and you are allowed to believe it by weirdos like Dawkins and Harris, and you are expected to be terrified by natural things, because the new shamans feast on your fear.

You are allowed to deny sin, but you are not allowed to question officially mandated physical scares.

Jesus died and came back to life to bring salvation from all this man-made abuse, and he made this salvation available to anyone who asks for it. Notice how the true atheists always deny salvation from abuse by any other means but self-deification and self-idolatry. The lesser atheists are ashamed of their own self-importance.

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Jonathan Ramsay's avatar

Christ can to redeem mankind. He had already created everything that exists, what possible benefit could be derived from his procreating again? Secondly, what kind of man would marry and have children knowing that he would be killed very young and leave behind a defenceless and impoverished family, and would those children inherit his sinless nature and then also fall into sin like his first creation had? Thirdly, he had no physical resources to support a family...he only owned the clothes he wore. There are more practical reasons why he remained a virgin, but I think my point is made.

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