Also, the year "0" is an arbitrary point in the course of human history; Biblical scholars estimate the earth's age to be closer to 4,750 years last I read.
I was using 2000 as an example, because if you didn't notice, it's 2005. And even with 177 million people born per year, that still is a huge amount ( 9,500,000 million ) and iago and I seem to have some of the same views, they speak of heaven like it is a physical place, but nobody has ever seen it, you can't give me the coordinates of heaven.
You're missing my point. I think you're the only one who has attributed corporeality to heaven. Also, the birthrate per year has increased over time in a form more closely approximated by the positive half of an exponential function (where the exponent is greater than 1). Your method for calculating the total number of people born is flawed. Let b(x) = the number of people born per year, with x given as the year from the first two humans to present, and T = total number of humans born, and y = the absolute number of years since then:
T = int(x = 0 to y) b(x)
When humans came into being, they weren't birthing at 133 million per year like they are now.
Do you doubt Plato? Socrates? Aristotle -- that they existed? They lived just as long ago, and you only read it in a book that they existed.
I do not doubt them, they have written books, and have had books and records kept about them from when they were alive, I do not see any books that were written by a "God", or any records proving the existance of god. And there is a difference, all of those people died, and never came back, unlike Jesus who died and came back, and the god nobody has ever seen, or heard. I don't doubt Jesus lived, but he wasn't a carpenter, he was actually royalty, and he was just a normal man.
How do I know that the books supposedly written by or about Plato weren't made up? The skepticism you show fits into your world view: you want to live the way you want to live, and if belief in a God would interfere with that, it fits you to be skeptical.
If Jesus was royalty, there would
certainly be documentation about it. I think your historical perspective is a little off.
I wasn't alive 1972 years ago, so how do I know it really did happen?
I wasn't alive when Plato wrote
Apology. How do I know it was really written by Plato? That was even longer ago.
If you can logically argue for the supernatural (I believe you can, and I've attempted it here or at vL), then you can accept that Christ died and resurrected while staying within the realm of logic.
If that event took place, I'd say that the other claims of Jesus are probably pretty reliable. For example, in a letter written by Paul (one of the New Testament books, I can't remember which), he says that our bodies are the temples of the Holy Spirit. Jesus claimed "Destroy this temple and I will rebuild it in three days." According to the resurrection account, Jesus' body was "destroyed" (so to speak) through death, and he resurrected on the third day following his death.
He'd also said, "I and the Father (God) are one." Most churches take that to mean that they are the same being; essentially, Jesus claimed that he was God.
A small girl made the comment, "Jesus was everything God ever wanted to say to us." Quite well-put IMHO.
Are these words supposed to make me all of a sudden believe?
No, they're not supposed to
make you believe. They're supposed to prompt you to keep an open mind, though, which apparently you refuse to do.
It doesn't matter if they existed or not, so I've never really thought about it; all that matters is the philisophical information in those books.
Sure it matters: where do you think science gets its practices from? It's based on the Socratic method. You know what the Hippocratic Oath is that doctors need to take? It's based on Hippocrates' work and philosophy. Greek philosophers were largely the basis for the lines of thinking used during the Enlightenment.
