I figured that I would take some heat from my original post, but I am honesty tired of responding to all of the posts where people are attacking me or questioning me -- especially since the easiest way to respond is by saying "Google it yourself." It is actually nice to see a posting from a person with an open mind.
You do bring up some good points. If I were God, I would do things differently. However, not having the ability to create a universe from nothing, I am rather unqualified for the job.
The "official" response is that we were created perfect, but Adam & Eve screwed it up, so we are ALL screwed. God, however, threw us a life-line. All you have to do to escape is turn from sin and follow Jesus. God's rules, so he can define sin how he wants. Should being gay be a sin? I would tend to exclude that from the list, but it is not my choice.
As to heaven vs. hell, let's look at things differently. If you do assume heaven and hell exist, then who gets to go where? Would you like to think that Hitler is in hell? How about Stallin? Putin? The guy who cut you off in traffic last week? The guy who sold you the broken used hard drive off of CraigsList and told you it was in great shape? Simply stated, if you just judge people on good/evil, where should the dividing line be? What about the person who is just below this imaginary line? How should they feel? To a perfect being, the ONLY line that makes sense is perfection. Nobody lives up to that, so God had to invent an escape plan.
Of course, if there is not God, then this whole argument is stupid. Nobody gets to heaven. So, the first question to ask is "is there a God?" The way that I look at it is that nobody has explained how the universe came into being. For example, there are a lot of things that have to be perfect, from the rate of radioactive decay, the mass of the electron, so the number fo spatial dimensions. Try figuring out gravity in four spatial dimensions -- orbits become impossible. For orbits, the force of gravity has to be proportional to 1/(r^2). If you try 1/(r^3), everything flies apart. In 2D space, 1/r yields everything crashing together immediately.
Some will say that the anthropic principal applies. To me, that does not really make sense. In order for there to be life, you either need to manually fine-tune the universe, or you need an INFINITE number of universes, all with different physical constants, in order to happen upon one that can support life. Are infinite universes possible? Maybe. According to string theory, a big crunch can rebound into a big bang simply by having some of the 11 predicted dimensions expand, while our three spatial dimensions collapse. However, string theory is looking unlikely, as elegant as it is ( http://science.slashdot.org/st... ). I have always wanted to believe that gravity would cause a big crunch that would lead to the next big bang. However, current models predict that the universe will continue to expand forever, eventually even ripping apart atoms as everything expands. Where would the next big bang come from then? There is some speculation (a foam of universes, new universes popping up in ours when the density gets too low, etc.), but none of them seem satisfying, and there is not a shred of evidence for any of them.
Believing in God takes a leap of faith. However, believing in infinite universes also takes a similar leap of faith.
I am much more comfortable with physics and cosmology than I am with biology. However, evolution seems somewhat contrived. I have no doubt that if you took a bunch of kids and killed off every blond and brunette, it would be easy to get a population of only redheads. That, however, is only manipulating the distribution of existing genes. Making new genes is another matter. No manner of this type of selection would result in children with naturally purple hair -- that would take entirely new genetic sequences. Yes, in theory, random mutations will occasionally be useful. Seems great on the surface. However, most mutations are harmful, and the really useful traits require lots of genes. There is no single gene that makes the wings of a bird. Feathers are needed for flight because they have a large surface area for their weight. Wings are also needed for flight. Hollow bones help a lot too, as well as tiny light legs, strong breast muscles, and a brain that can handle learning to fly. All of these are necessary (well, maybe you could get by without one or the other). The problem is that any one or two of these traits, by themselves, would likely be a hindrance in survival if you could not fly. How would you possibly get ALL of these traits together at just the right time to fly? If you get the hollow bones first, you die because your bones break to easy. If you get tiny legs and huge breast muscles, you can't run properly, so you get eaten. If you get wings without the right muscles, you can fly and are eaten.
This tends to reinforce my belief in "A" god. So, the next question is why the god of the Bible, and not Allah or Shiva?
To me, it all comes down to Jesus. 2000 years ago, people were not stupid. They did not have science, but they understood people quite well. To run a kingdom (say, Egypt, although that was closer to 5000 years ago), you need to be shrewd, clever, and have a very good social system and good organization. Compared to modern people, the people of 2000 years ago were ignorant on matters of science, but not stupid.
Let's look at the historical Jesus. He lived. He started a religion. He was killed. His followers kept on going even after his death. These facts are not in dispute by anybody. The one question to ask is: " was Jesus God?" Let's look at the possibilities:
1) Jesus was actually killed and was never resurrected. So, this implies that the disciples decided that they liked serving others while being persecuted. Most of the Apostles were actually crucified. They were probably thinking: "Wow. You get to give your money to others, serve others, and eventually get killed in a very long and painful manner. All you have to do is lie about who this dead guy is. Sign me up!" Simply stated, I can find absolutely NO reason to lie about Jesus being resurrected. All down-side, no up-side.
2) Jesus wasn't really dead. The Roman Centurions may not have known science, but they were soldiers. They knew death, having caused lots of them. So, you can be sure that Jesus at least LOOKED like he was dead when removed from the cross. So, skip to the next scene when Jesus shows up in front of the Apostles: " Wow, Jesus. You are resurrected from the dead! Shame about all of the bandages.. and the bruises. Say, what happened to all of the skin on your back? I hope it grows back. When do you think that you will be able to walk again? Whoa, dude. When you barf, try to aim away from my robes. By the way, I sure am glad that you miraculously came back from the dead." Sorry, nobody is stupid enough to believe THAT story.
3) Jesus really is who he said he is. Highly improbable. However, once you have eliminated everything else...
