One of my favs:

I remember reading this story a few years back & thought it would be worth sharing.

 

The university professor challenged his students with this question.

 

"Did God create everything that exists?" A student bravely replied, "Yes, He did!"

"God created everything?" The professor asked.

"Yes sir", the student replied.

The professor answered, "If God created everything, then God created evil since evil exists, and according to the principal that our works define who we are then God is evil".

The student became quiet before such an answer. The professor was quite pleased with him self and boasted to the students that he had proven once more that the Christian faith was a myth.

 

Another student raised his hand and said, "Can I ask you a question professor?"

"Of course", replied the professor.

The student stood up and asked, "Professor does cold exist?"

"What kind of question is this? Of course it exists. Have you never been cold?"

The students snickered at the young man's question.

The young man replied, "In fact sir, cold does not exist. According to the laws of physics, what we consider cold is in reality the absence of heat. Every body or object is susceptible to study when it has or transmits energy, and heat is

what makes a body or matter have or transmit energy. Absolute zero (-460 degrees F) is the total absence of heat; all matter becomes inert and incapable of reaction at that temperature. Cold does not exist. We have created this word to describe how we feel if we have no heat."

 

The student continued, "Professor, does darkness exist?"

The professor responded, "Of course it does."

The student replied, "Once again you are wrong sir, darkness does not exist either. Darkness is in reality the absence of light. Light we can study, but not darkness. In fact, we can use Newton's prism to break white light into colors to study the various wavelengths of each color. You can not measure darkness. A simple ray of light can break into a world of darkness and illuminate it. How can you know how dark a certain space is? You measure the amount of light present. Isn't this correct? Darkness is a term used by man to describe what happens when there is no light present."

 

Finally the young man asked the professor, "Sir, does evil exist?"

Now uncertain, the professor responded, "Of course as I have already said. We see it every day. It is in the daily example of man's inhumanity to man. It is in the multitude of crime and violence everywhere in the world. These manifestations are nothing else but evil."

 

To this the student replied, "Evil does not exist sir, or at least it does not exist unto itself. Evil is simply the absence of God. It is just like darkness and cold, a word that man has created to describe the absence of God. God did not create evil. Evil is not like faith, or love that exist just as does light and heat. Evil is the result of what happens when man does not have God's love present in his heart. It's like the cold that comes when there is no heat or the darkness that comes when there is no light." The professor sat down.

 

The young man's name: Albert Einstein

I remember reading this story a few years back & thought it would be worth sharing.

 

The university professor challenged his students with this question.

 

"Did God create everything that exists?" A student bravely replied, "Yes, He did!"

"God created everything?" The professor asked.

"Yes sir", the student replied.

The professor answered, "If God created everything, then God created evil since evil exists, and according to the principal that our works define who we are then God is evil".

The student became quiet before such an answer. The professor was quite pleased with him self and boasted to the students that he had proven once more that the Christian faith was a myth.

 

Another student raised his hand and said, "Can I ask you a question professor?"

"Of course", replied the professor.

The student stood up and asked, "Professor does cold exist?"

"What kind of question is this? Of course it exists. Have you never been cold?"

The students snickered at the young man's question.

The young man replied, "In fact sir, cold does not exist. According to the laws of physics, what we consider cold is in reality the absence of heat. Every body or object is susceptible to study when it has or transmits energy, and heat is

what makes a body or matter have or transmit energy. Absolute zero (-460 degrees F) is the total absence of heat; all matter becomes inert and incapable of reaction at that temperature. Cold does not exist. We have created this word to describe how we feel if we have no heat."

 

The student continued, "Professor, does darkness exist?"

The professor responded, "Of course it does."

The student replied, "Once again you are wrong sir, darkness does not exist either. Darkness is in reality the absence of light. Light we can study, but not darkness. In fact, we can use Newton's prism to break white light into colors to study the various wavelengths of each color. You can not measure darkness. A simple ray of light can break into a world of darkness and illuminate it. How can you know how dark a certain space is? You measure the amount of light present. Isn't this correct? Darkness is a term used by man to describe what happens when there is no light present."

 

Finally the young man asked the professor, "Sir, does evil exist?"

Now uncertain, the professor responded, "Of course as I have already said. We see it every day. It is in the daily example of man's inhumanity to man. It is in the multitude of crime and violence everywhere in the world. These manifestations are nothing else but evil."

 

To this the student replied, "Evil does not exist sir, or at least it does not exist unto itself. Evil is simply the absence of God. It is just like darkness and cold, a word that man has created to describe the absence of God. God did not create evil. Evil is not like faith, or love that exist just as does light and heat. Evil is the result of what happens when man does not have God's love present in his heart. It's like the cold that comes when there is no heat or the darkness that comes when there is no light." The professor sat down.

 

The young man's name: Albert Einstein

 

Neat story, although it couldn't have been Einstein since he was an atheist. I've heard another one where the professor "proves" God doesn't exist because you can't see or touch God. The student (allegedly Einstein) replies that since we cannot see or touch the professor's brain, it does not exist either.

 

It is unfortunate but often times atheists take Christian beliefs and attack the simplified versions we use to explain to young children. It's no coincidence they don't attack more complex beliefs like transubstantion or the resurrection.

Neat story, although it couldn't have been Einstein since he was an atheist. I've heard another one where the professor "proves" God doesn't exist because you can't see or touch God. The student (allegedly Einstein) replies that since we cannot see or touch the professor's brain, it does not exist either.

 

It is unfortunate but often times atheists take Christian beliefs and attack the simplified versions we use to explain to young children. It's no coincidence they don't attack more complex beliefs like transubstantion or the resurrection.

 

Your right it is a neat story which makes one think. I know that the story never appears in any of Einstein's writings but I can imagine a young Einstein calling out his professor. I've read Walter Isaacson’s biography of Einstein, a book that presents a far more complex picture of the great scientist’s attitude toward religion than his late career musing would suggest. In 1930, Einstein composed a kind of creed entitled “What I Believe,” at the conclusion of which he wrote: “To sense that behind everything that can be experienced there is something that our minds cannot grasp, whose beauty and sublimity reaches us only indirectly: this is religiousness. In this sense...I am a devoutly religious man.” In response to a young girl who had asked him whether he believed in God, he wrote: “everyone who is seriously involved in the pursuit of science becomes convinced that a spirit is manifest in the laws of the Universe—a Spirit vastly superior to that of man.” And during a talk at Union Theological Seminary on the relationship between religion and science, Einstein declared: “the situation may be expressed by an image: science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.”

So I don't think he was an atheist maybe a deist. He certainly didn't believe in a personal God.

It's a nice story, made somewhat believable by the perception people have that college professors as a group enjoy a "smarter than thou" attitude but often get tripped up in their arrogance, and ignorance. I used to enjoy the banter with my professors but it seemed like they often took things personally and would result to personal insults when they were challenged with questions they could not answer. Of course, the fact that I was smarter than most of them could have had something to do with it. :sssh: