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Does anyone really think Mary had Jesus through an immaculate conception? It is far more likely she got knocked up by someone and kept it secret so as not to get stoned to death.And Moses went up into the mountain and returned with the 10 Commandments? My ass. Did anyone do a body cavity search on the guy before he headed up the mountain? I bet he brought a chisel. Chris "When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward,for there you have been, and there you will always want to be."

A parthenogenetic birth is always female. Science is neither a philosophy nor a belief system. It is a combination of mental operations that has become increasingly the habit of educated peoples, a culture of illuminations hit upon by a fortunate turn of history that yielded the most effective way of learning about the real world ever conceived. E.O.Wilson

/wanders off to www.dictionary.com Chris "When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward,for there you have been, and there you will always want to be."

This cannot happen in humans or I would have heard of it.Quote:A form of reproduction in which an unfertilized egg develops into a new individual, occurring commonly among insects and certain other arthropods.Chris "When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward,for there you have been, and there you will always want to be."

...except during the cloning process. Read me.Chris "When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward,for there you have been, and there you will always want to be."

The point is, "virgin birth" is extremely unlikely but not physically impossible. So when the christians say it happened once, we couldn't rule out their assertion as impossible, except for the fact that the virgin birth of a male is physically impossible (in humans, of course). Science is neither a philosophy nor a belief system. It is a combination of mental operations that has become increasingly the habit of educated peoples, a culture of illuminations hit upon by a fortunate turn of history that yielded the most effective way of learning about the real world ever conceived. E.O.Wilson

Wow Parthenogenesis!The explanation as I have come to understand it is far more prosaic.It seems that Jesus' brother James denied the virgin birth too. He also denied Christ's divinity, and incidentally the same contemporary sources suggest that Jesus was a vegetarian. James led a group of Early Christians who knew Jesus and followed him during his lifetime, this group came to be known as the Ebionites.Perhaps the Ebionites might have remained an obscure Judaic sect if a certain Saul of Tarsus hadn't had a mysterious conversion to Christianity on the road to Damascus. In one of his letters Saul (who renamed himself Paul after the conversion) refers to a mysterious infirmity that he had. It is now thought that he might have had Left Temporal Lobe Epilepsy, which can cause the sufferer to experience profound religious or revelatory experiences. It was Paul to whom God "revealed?" that Jesus' birth was the result of divine intervention and it was he who claimed that Christ was the Son of God.There was a split in the 1st Century Christian church between the followers of James, and those of Paul, which culminated in a meeting at the Temple which has become known as (I think) the Council of Jerusalem. The sticking point was over whether Christians should have to undergo circumcision and follow the Jewish food traditions. Paul knew that it would be difficult to get non-Jewish people to convert, if they were required to follow the laws so he argued against it. The followers of James disagreed. The meeting broke up acrimoniously and ended in violence. Paul only escaped with his life by revealing to the guards that he was a Roman Citizen.In the latter part of the 1st C. there was a massive Jewish uprising against the Romans, which led to the destruction of the Temple and the expulsion of the Jews from Israel and Judea. I suspect that the Ebionites might well have been expelled or annihilated at this time. In any case none of their gospels have survived and the Pauline version of events became the canon of the nascent church.Then again it might have been parthenogenesis Edited by: PeterDF at: 8/27/03 7:44 am

Im always confused by the doctrine of 'what it says in the bible is the word of God, therefore it is absolutely true' when so many versions exist. I would love to know how one tells one 'truth' from another...

Heh, somehow I never thought of in-vitro fertilization, cloning, and some other fertility measures as "virgin births" before. It is probably deeply disturbing to some people to know that there are a significant number of people walking around right now resulting from "immaculate conceptions". (Virgin birth & immaculate conception perhaps incorrectly defined by me as no erect human penis entered and ejaculated inside a human vagina. )Yeah, another disturbing aspect of "The Bible as Ultimate Truth" is the contradictory statements made within it. And another is some of the horrific activities that it supports such as genocide and slavery. Since God's laws do not change, this means the Bible supports genocide and slavery at this very minute... Edited by: LanDroid at: 8/28/03 5:47 am

There's a song by Dick Gaughan, an atheist Scottish folk singer, that seems relevant. It's called "The Son of Man," and the chorus goes:"Are you the MessiahThe one foretold to comeI am the Son of Man he saidThe Son of Man"Isn't it a little silly to be discussing whether the immaculate conception was physically possible? The whole point is that it was a miracle - it doesn't have to be physically possible!