 |
| |
|
|
Kontiki
|
|
Canada
Aug 2001
time: 00:27
|
|
Slightly off topic, but one question that always springs to my mind is "Why do you believe in God?" (in the Christian sense). Don't take this at all as a knock against the belief, but I'm curious as to why many people do. If you believe that you have some personal connection with God, then fine, so be it. But I'd be willing to bet that the vast majority of Christians (or any other religion, for that matter) are placing their faith in something without really knowing why. I mean, is it simply because you were raised with this belief in your family and accept that it's true? Is it what you were taught at school? Have you really thought about it, understand many of the issues involved (including some of the "controversy") and made an informed choice? From my experience, it seems like at least a few of the Christians here have (Obiwan and Rogan Josh spring to mind, and I'm sure there are others) but I'm curious about some of the other Christians here (or members of any other religion).
|
|
| |
|
| |
|
| |
|
|
|
Frogman
|
|
OK, I buy into the hard and soft atheist definition. I guess I always assumed it to be the hard position, but the hard soft thing appears pretty popular in the atheist world so I accept that an atheist doesn't necessarily believe there is no God, just lacks a belief in one.
I'm a theist, I think there is a God, but I'm an agnostic because I think He is unknown to us, an in fact I might even be a hard agnostic because I think he is unknowable, and unproveable.
Three things point me to the God side. First is the lack of data to really prove the mechanism of evolution, I don't see chance and mutation working to get us this far. Second is prophecy. If prophecy can be believed, then our concept of time, chance, fate, everything must be shifted. It means there is an order and a plan. Third is spiritual encounters. People have them. Maybe they can't prove it, but many people say they connect with God and for them its more than faith, its experience. Not having had a convincing experience myself, I am inclined to look at it like people who report alien encounters. Still, you get enough of them and you have to at least consider the possiblity.
Does any religion have it right? I don't think so.
|
|
| |
|
|
|
cinch
|
|
Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
Jul 2002
time: 22:27
|
|
Without getting bogged down in semantics, here's me attempting to answer the question, in regards to myself:
The question, "What happened before the big bang?" is faulty, because 'before' is a term implying time, and time only exists with space, and space only exists after the big bang. So it's a faulty question, and a paradox that can make one's mind hurt. Personally, I feel it's things like that lead me to just say "I don't know". I don't know if there's a greater being, but if there is, it's so far beyond our comprehension that it's no use bothering to worry about. It does not love us, nor does it hate us; it does both. It is the Campbellian duality and Paine's First Cause, mixed. Meh.
Anyway, if I ever were inclined to join a religion, I would definitely go for Hinduism. It's just simply the bee's knees.
|
|
| |
|
|
|
cinch
|
|
Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
Jul 2002
time: 22:27
|
|
Frogman:
quote:
I'm a theist, I think there is a God, but I'm an agnostic because I think He is unknown to us, an in fact I might even be a hard agnostic because I think he is unknowable, and unproveable. |
Wouldn't that make you a deist?
I mean, if we're into self-catagorisation here. It really doesn't matter, though. I'm just wondering.
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Frogman
|
|
quote:
Originally posted by cinch
Wouldn't that make you a deist?
I mean, if we're into self-catagorisation here. It really doesn't matter, though. I'm just wondering. |
According to my Websters Collegiate Dictionary, a theist believes in God, while a deist believes in "natural religion based on reason"
My understanding then is that a deist will discount revelations from God or testimonies to them and they restrict God's abilities to the physical laws of the universe.
Not having really looked at it before, I thought you might be right, but the definitions I have would make me a theist. I'm just not religious. Thats a hard one too since most people who know me would say I'm religious, being a Sunday School teacher and all. On the other hand, when you see all the different beliefs we have under one roof, its easy to say that we don't have God quite figured out.
|
|
| |
|
|
|
cinch
|
|
Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
Jul 2002
time: 22:27
|
|
quote:
Our universe as we understand it is set on a series of laws and limitations...one of those laws is that matter and energy cannot be created nor destroyed. So there MUST exist another dimension or entity that follow a wholly different set of laws (or none at all) that led to our creation. |
That leads to the question, though:
If matter can neither be created nor destroyed, then how can 'beings from another dimension' create our universe? Matter cannot be created, therefore it never was created.
It is my understanding that 'the big bang' simply means that all matter in the universe was compressed, and that it exploded outward. Is it not possible that the matter we know and are has, quite simply, always existed, just in different forms? Why is 'creation' necessary?
I'm just thinking out loud, here.
|
|
| |
|
|
|
cinch
|
|
Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
Jul 2002
time: 22:27
|
|
Frogman (against, just thinking out loud here, no offense intended):
quote:
My understanding then is that a deist will discount revelations from God or testimonies to them and they restrict God's abilities to the physical laws of the universe. |
But didn't you yourself say that God was unknowable? If 'He' is unknowable, then how can revelations exist?
I may be confused about where you stand:
Do you feel that God created the universe, and then took a step back to just 'let it run', without interference?
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Frogman
|
|
quote:
Originally posted by cinch
But didn't you yourself say that God was unknowable? If 'He' is unknowable, then how can revelations exist?
I may be confused about where you stand:
Do you feel that God created the universe, and then took a step back to just 'let it run', without interference? |
Revelations can exist. Its like the blind men and the elephant, (which I use a lot to explain stuff) You can have a good solid hold of Gods "trunk" and you can be sure he exists. But then you have a hard time saying God is like a snake.
I think God created the universe. I think he is outside time and already knows how everything turns out because in fact its already happened. Otherwise prophecy couldn't work. As far as "letting it run" I think God is intimately a part of everything and we can tap into that. If God didn't want to experience His creation, why would he make it in the first place?
Being agnostic of course, I admit that I could be completely wrong and in fact have to be wrong in whatever understanding I have for what God is and what he does.
|
|
| |
|
|
|
gsmoove23
|
|
In response to the first post...
I'm an atheist, I don't "believe" in science or have any proof that God doesn't exist. I simply have a faith that God doesn't exist (a sort of gut-feeling). However, I have no faith in my ability to accurately decide whether or not God does exist, so I never tell anyone "God doesn't exist", but simply "I believe God doesn't exist".
I guess that would be called soft atheism? I never even heard the term before.
|
|
| |
|
| |
|
| |
|
|
|
Rogan Josh
|
|
quote:
Originally posted by Urban Ranger
On the contrary, Rogan, your position requires a contradiction in your fundamental outlook. If you posit that it is possible that something in this universe can't be known by applications of our senses, you are just saying that this something is completely unknowable, thus diving into a mud bog of metaphysics where empty assertions bounce off each other.
|
No - you are misunderstanding me. Perhaps I am not explaining myself very well. I am not saying that there are (could be) things which "can't be known by applications of our senses" (since, by Occam's razor, they then wouldn't actually be there). But what if there are phenomena which cannot be explained by physics, in principle (ie. not just because we aren't clever enough).
What if we were eventually able to do experiments at the Planck scale and found that our experiments gave different answers every time, on a non-statistical basis, so that there was no way to predict the outcome of the experiment. (For example, imagine that there were an (almost) infinitely long string of letters HRISHFKSHF.... which was written into the structure of the universe somehow, and each hour we move onto the next letter. This sequence is "pre-determined" so therefore non-statistical (ie. the probability of letter 'F' is not just 1/26). Each letter triggers a different fundamental "theory of everything" - so our physical laws change every hour in a non-predictable way.
Then science itself breaks down because it posits the assumption that all things are governed by laws, which in principle we can discover. This assumption need not be true for all spacetime (and indeed we have no evidence that it is), and anyone who believes it is, is exhibiting faith.
Going further, the letter sequence is unknowable, infallible, and omnipotent, and could be defined as God (or the manifestation of HIS personality). Or to put it another way, a phenomenum which has the ability to change physical laws in an undefined, undeterminable and all-reaching way IS God. Therefore to be an atheist requires faith in the entire applicability of science and its starting assumption.
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Rogan Josh
|
|
quote:
Originally posted by Master Zen
yes but then would you follow an established religion? That's the issue.
|
But you already have! There is this mass of mainly young, intelligent, well-educated people out there who believe passionately in the infallability of science and the scientific method. Despite being well educated they do not understand the subtleties of physics, so they believe anything the scientists ("priests" if you like) tell them to. Doesn't this look very much like the religions of old?
quote:
If you say then that "god" is the science or laws that govern the existence of the universe, I'll buy it. But do you need to start a religion? do you need to worship it? nope. it is there, it exists, impervious to your faith in it. |
Well, of course, as a Christian, I believe that the Christian God provides the non-predictivity. My sequence of letters was just meant as an easily acceptable counter-example of the infallibility of the scientific method. It was meant to point out that atheism requires 'faith'.
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Lincoln
|
|
quote:
Originally posted by Urban Ranger
Lincoln, would you gracefully quit this regurgitation of the same tripe over and over again? Last time when there was a serious discussion on this, you failed to substantiate your position. As I told you before, I still have the thread archived. |
Are you talking about the "Great Information Debate" thread? If so, please link to it. I recall it perfectly. That would save me the effort here of trashing your arguments again.
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Lincoln
|
|
In the mean time why don't you and Boris tell us what law of physics requires this order of DNA (for example):
CGATTACCGATTGAC and not this one: CGATACCATAGCCA
And while you are at it please explain how the laws of physic divide the code into triplets or codons. Then you can tell us how the code came about and how it came to be translated and by what mechanism, without the aid of intelligent input. Finally you can tell us all how the laws of physics gives meaning to a chemical smbol and translates that meaning to the appropriate parts of the cellular machinery so that the interactive part know how to asemble themselves properly.
The Blind Atheist
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Jack the Bodiless
|
 |
Converted underground reservoir tank.
Jan 1970
time: 05:27
|
|
Lincoln, we DID go over all of this before. We explained how evolution inevitably creates "information" from randomness, we explained that scientists believe the first self-replicating system was small enough to form randomly (and research is ongoing into molecules with the necessary properties) and so on. You were left with no argument other than the faith that intelligence was involved: you failed to demonstrate any requirement for intelligent design.
quote:
In the mean time why don't you and Boris tell us what law of physics requires this order of DNA (for example):
CGATTACCGATTGAC and not this one: CGATACCATAGCCA |
Assuming the first is from a viable organism and the second is not: natural selection.
quote:
And while you are at it please explain how the laws of physic divide the code into triplets or codons. Then you can tell us how the code came about and how it came to be translated and by what mechanism, without the aid of intelligent input. |
Research into the origin of the genetic code is ongoing. However, there is no reason to assume that a system of triplets was initially present, or necessary for life.
quote:
Finally you can tell us all how the laws of physics gives meaning to a chemical smbol and translates that meaning to the appropriate parts of the cellular machinery so that the interactive part know how to asemble themselves properly. |
You have it backwards. The letters G, A, T and C are symbols assigned by scientists to molecules which are of four different shapes. These shapes determine the shapes of the molecules that can be built from them, and the molecules that can interact with those: and, hence, the shapes of the proteins that can be formed.
In organic chemistry, the shapes of molecules are all-important. That's why prion diseases such as BSE and CJD happen: one misshapen prion molecule has the ability to attach to a normal one and bend it into the same distorted shape, which can then bend another into that shape, and so on. A self-replicating molecule has the ability to cause free nucleotides (or proteins) to assemble themselves into a copy of the original.
In DNA, there is a system (itself refined by millions of years of evolution, and inevitably far removed from the original replication mechanism), in which combinations of four standard "building blocks" can be arranged in groups of three to make other useful shapes which fit this pattern: presumably this modular approach is more efficient. There's no reason in principle why a code involving five bases arranged in quadruplets didn't evolve instead: in fact, scientists have succeeded in incorporating an extra "letter" (another nucleotide) into the code.
Given a self-replicator simple enough to form by chance, there is no reason to assume that the later evolution of a more modular system, and hence a "genetic code", requires intelligent input.
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Kontiki
|
|
Canada
Aug 2001
time: 00:27
|
|
quote:
Originally posted by Elok
Actually, not to get too off-topic, but there's a good reason for the dangling testicles: sperm cells don't thrive at normal body temperature. They'd overheat and croak if they were stored inside the body for too long. That's what they told me in sex ed, years ago. |
So? Wouldn't it still be a failure of some intelligent design that this need be the case? The bottom line is that we're far from perfect machines.
|
|
| |
All times are GMT. The time now is 05:27.
Apolyton Time is 00:27. |
top of page
|
| archivepost |
|
Forum Rules:
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts
|
HTML code is ON
vB code is ON
Smilies are ON
[IMG] code is ON
|
|
|
|
|
|
14-04-2003 08:13
No-one knows what we will discover in physics, and to make false, unsubstantiated assumptions and extrapolations is like someone from the 13th centuary assuming the Earth was flat and, for the but beyond, declaring 'here be dragons'. 
|