Political Potpourri - ...anything political goes.

Dook · 2004-11-22 08:51:30

*What's God got to do with this? Maybe there is no God (then the points would be moot).

Cindy when you spend your nights looking at the sky, what do you see?

Beautiful nebula's, star clusters, complexity, beauty, logic, chaos, heat, light, all in an immense dark and cold sea. Somewhere in all of this is a simple planet called earth.

It's not by accident.

BWhite · 2004-11-22 09:01:23

Okay, the text says ten but the point is clear.
Hey Bill, you're R.C., aren't you supposed to take this literaly? Don't you go Protestant on me.

Literal? Nah.

Saint Augustine (in the year 400 or thereabouts) explained quoite nicely how Genesis should be read as allegory or metaphor. The Bible is foundational, not literal.

You got things backwards, clark. We Catholics aren't going to make the same mistake with Darwin as we did with Galileo.

Palomar · 2004-11-22 09:05:33

*What's God got to do with this? Maybe there is no God (then the points would be moot).
Cindy when you spend your nights looking at the sky, what do you see?
Beautiful nebula's, star clusters, complexity, beauty, logic, chaos, heat, light, all in an immense dark and cold sea. Somewhere in all of this is a simple planet called earth.
It's not by accident.

*Hi Dook.

I don't have a hard time believing there's a God when I'm star gazing or beholding wonders in my telescope's eyepiece.

It's only when I read the headlines.

--Cindy

clark · 2004-11-22 09:19:16

Dangerous ground... if you invite an approach to the bible as mythical and allegorical in nature, wouldn't that also invite the supposition that Jesus is an allegory or a myth?

Dook · 2004-11-22 09:25:53

And what is God supposed to do about those things? You blame God for the things people choose to do. He gave us free will in the hope that we will choose to be good.

The only other option is to be a robot, with every action controlled by the supreme rules. But then you would not be responsible for any of your actions. We would be machines, showing up to work on time every day, never complaining, not needing to get drunk once in a while or go out and dance in the rain with the car stereo blasting away.

How could we evolve?

Cobra Commander · 2004-11-22 09:35:34

Beautiful nebula's, star clusters, complexity, beauty, logic, chaos, heat, light, all in an immense dark and cold sea. Somewhere in all of this is a simple planet called earth.
It's not by accident.

I don't know, but I find it much easier to accept the premise that rocks, gas, water, and eventually life happened as a result of random occurences over time than that an omnitient, all powerful supreme being just was and decided to create it all.

I suppose we'll know when we're dead, and either way I'll be cheated of the satisfaction of being right.

Palomar · 2004-11-22 09:36:08

You blame God for the things people choose to do

*No. How can I "blame" a Being for anything if I'm unsure He/She/It exists in the first place? I'm an agnostic.

How could we evolve?

*We've gotten this far, regardless.

Dook, I've "been here/done this" conversation more than once. I see where it's heading. Sorry -- not interested in pursuing this much further, if at all. Your beliefs are your prerogative and I respect your right to your beliefs.

--Cindy

Dook · 2004-11-22 10:45:02

I don't know, but I find it much easier to accept the premise that rocks, gas, water, and eventually life happened as a result of random occurences over time than that an omnitient, all powerful supreme being just was and decided to create it all.

There is a vibration or frequency of the atom that is exactly correct with a tolerance of .000000000000, I don't remember how many zero's but it is so many that it is statistically impossible to achieve by random occurence. Something set the parameters, like a computer game, then began it all with a bang.

If you look at all the other rocks, gas, and water in the solar system you find no life. Maybe there was life somewhere for a while but it didn't last or grow to more than a few molecules. Most of the universe is a cold dark place void of everything but trace atoms and radiation, or incredibly hot places where atoms scramble about in a frenzy. Then there is the Earth with thousands of species thriving upon it. Statistically impossible to achieve by random occurence.

clark · 2004-11-22 10:59:41

given an infinite amount of time, all things are statistically possible.

Cobra Commander · 2004-11-22 11:02:31

There is a vibration or frequency of the atom that is exactly correct with a tolerance of .000000000000, I don't remember how many zero's but it is so many that it is statistically impossible to achieve by random occurence.

Statistically improbable, not impossible. Sure it's remarkable how many factors had to be just right for life to form, but that proves nothing. Life will only form when the conditions make it possible, so being alive under those conditions is no great revelation. For all we know there have been billions upon billions of universes before (or concurrent with) ours that cannot support life, just cold expanses of nothing. We may be a statistical anomaly, but that hardly implies intelligent design.

I respect your beliefs, I just can't agree with them for several reasons not least of which being that if God created all that surrounds us it doesn't really answer anything, only transfers the questions up a level. Where then did God come from?

clark · 2004-11-22 11:19:42

Where then did God come from?

Detroit.

Dook · 2004-11-22 13:40:02

Statistically improbable, not impossible.
We may be a statistical anomaly, but that hardly implies intelligent design.

I remember feeling the same way. I had to know the answer to the difficult questions or I just would not believe.

"Why does God let bad things happen to good people?" Because we wanted free will. We chose it, the golden calf over the ten commandments.

And since the question of "where did God come from" is unanswerable it made it all the more easier. I always had an argument.

When you think about it there really shouldn't be anything. For something to exist it has to come from somewhere but then whatever created it must come from somewhere too and so on.

But we are here.

What's easier to believe? That all the matter in the universe came from an expanding singularity by accident or by grand design? That's a tough one. Accidents can be very strange. But find a picture of the earth, hanging there in space. Blue oceans and clouds, surrounded by black space. If that doesn't affect you then you are not ready. Turn the television off and get away to the countryside for a week. Does everything that was so important once seem as important afterwards?

Religions, in my opinion, and not science are the largest factor for why people do not believe in God. The religions are run by humans, humans who make mistakes. Don't blame God for the mistakes of humans who misunderstand the words. Rather than ten there is really only one commandment. Do no harm.

If you leave your mind open, then that is all anyone can ask.

I didn't believe for a very long time until something happened. Some statistically impossible, okay improbable, thing that changed my mind forever. I know absolutely, positively, without a doubt, that there is a creator of the universe.

I guess you just haven't had your moment yet.

clark · 2004-11-22 13:58:34

"Why does God let bad things happen to good people?" Because we wanted free will. We chose it, the golden calf over the ten commandments.

Nice. Nice, but you find fault with religion yet use it to explain god.

You use one particular mythos of religious origin to explain our purpose, and the exsistence of our creator.

Maybe a better question is, why is god Christian?

Cobra Commander · 2004-11-22 14:02:05

I didn't believe for a very long time until something happened. Some statistically impossible, okay improbable, thing that changed my mind forever. I know absolutely, positively, without a doubt, that there is a creator of the universe.
I guess you just haven't had your moment yet.

I've been from one end of this continent to the other, seen alot of strange stuff, but I've never seen anything to make me believe there's an all-powerful God controlling everything.

Now I'm paraphrasing Han Solo... :hm:

It's not so much the moment as what one reads into it. For example, I should have met my end years ago at the bottom of a deep ravine off a snow-covered road. But at the last minute a tire caught some dirt and the car jerked to a stop with the front tires halfway over the edge. Now I could look at that as damn good luck, or God intervening to save me for... something. Deep down I'd like to believe the latter, quite an ego boost if nothing else, but the former seems to me the more reasonable conclusion.

I'm not trying to ridicule your beliefs, I even acknowledge there's a possibility that you might be right. To tell you the truth I'd like if it were the case if for no other reason than that the idea of an afterlife has some appeal, but then that would be on a long list of "wouldn't it be nice if's" with no supporting evidence.

That said, when I spend time in the countryside I see nature in abundance, but I've never once ran into God out there.

Unless he's a big, angry guy with lots of hair and claws.

clark · 2004-11-22 14:26:10

I talked to god recently. He told me to vote Nader. I don't think he understands.

Dook · 2004-11-22 16:03:40

I've been across the U.S. four times, been to 40 of the states, visited 11 foreign countries, taken many a college class, read philosophy books, science books, literature... God is not a book or a place.

Have you ever thought that you're not doing what you are supposed to be doing, but you just don't know exactly what it is you are supposed to be doing so you keep on working and going to the same places. You keep on doing the same things until someone or something tells you to do something different? Well you know what, I'm telling you now. Think of something you've done wrong, something really bad, the worst. Think about it long and hard, get pissed off at yourself because you did something so stupid. You caused someone harm because you didn't know any better, you didn't think before hand, or because you were selfish. Think about it until it's about to drive you insane. Then simply forgive yourself. From then on when you think about it just know that it had to happen for you to move on, to grow. It had to happen that way for you to learn from it. Children still run out into the street even though their parents tell them many times not too. Only when they hear the horn and tires screeching do they really learn.

I didn't say God was all powerful or that He was Christian. Religions did. And I certainly did not say that He was controlling everything, in fact I said the opposite. I also said nothing about our purpose.

Separate religion from God, they are not the same thing. God does not need you to say ten "Hail Mary's" and donate $20 to forgive you. You just have to forgive yourself and decide never to do that again. If you can then it's remembered, carried on, imprinted on your soul, and you evolve a tiny bit.

Would God be good if He became a human but did not realize His true self? Maybe He would work too much and lay on the couch on the weekends, always doing the same thing day after day, waiting for someone to tell Him what He is really supposed to do.

Religions don't explain God, just our interpretation and understanding of Him. But it's old, unevolving theory. Science explains God more than the bible ever could. Each new discovery is a clue, I always think "So that's how He did that!" And we're just scratching the surface.

God didn't save you from that ravine. Why would he? He didn't save children from the holocaust? He doesn't save them anywhere now so why would He help you or me? I just said that He started it all.

Nature in abundance? Hmm. I believe there you were closer to God than in any church on Christmas day.

Dook · 2004-11-22 16:20:20

given an infinite amount of time, all things are statistically possible.

Take all the pieces of a mechanical watch and toss them up into the air over and over again. How long before they assemble perfectly into a working watch? That's what happened. Statistically possible, made probable with a little help.

Rxke · 2004-11-22 16:28:45

ooh aah... dangerous territory, Dook.

Ever read The Blind Watchmaker or other Dawkins books? The analogy you use is just not valid. Neither is the scrapyard and the 747 forming in it after a hurricane.

Evolution is not like that.

you don't need God to explain that. maybe for nature's laws, but not for evolution. It's not intelligent design. I'm the living proof of that, for starters (crazy grin)

Dook · 2004-11-22 17:08:46

I know the Blind Watchmaker.

My point is that statistically the watch has more chance of assembling itself than an intelligent species evolving in the chaos of the universe. This does not come from the bible, it comes from science.

God is not involved with our evolution. He just started the game. He set the parameters to allow intelligence to happen but He is not participating and never has. Actually the term God is not appropriatte because it's a religious name. Creator is most accurate.

Cobra Commander · 2004-11-22 18:00:33

Have you ever thought that you're not doing what you are supposed to be doing, but you just don't know exactly what it is you are supposed to be doing so you keep on working and going to the same places.

"Supposed" to be doing implies external design, looking at one's life from that perspective almost presupposes God. I sometimes wonder how I can do what I want to be doing, but I'm not supposed to be doing anything.

Think of something you've done wrong, something really bad, the worst. Think about it long and hard, get pissed off at yourself because you did something so stupid. You caused someone harm because you didn't know any better, you didn't think before hand, or because you were selfish. Think about it until it's about to drive you insane. Then simply forgive yourself.

Okay. done. But seriously, I think I know what you're trying to say. We just have a different mindset on this, a different perspective. We can look at the same things and see something very different. We're probably both wrong. :hm:

God didn't save you from that ravine. Why would he? He didn't save children from the holocaust? He doesn't save them anywhere now so why would He help you or me? I just said that He started it all.

And I don't believe he exists. Neither of us can prove our positions, we can only look at the world around us. What we find in it is as much a reflection of ourselves as of the true nature of the universe.

Nature in abundance? Hmm. I believe there you were closer to God than in any church on Christmas day.

Depending on how one defines God. Intelligent design just doesn't jive with me, it seems there's way too much empty space and lifeless junk serving no apparent purpose. Damn inefficient if nothing else.

It's almost as though the people running NASA created the universe.

Shaun Barrett · 2004-11-22 19:06:56

CC:-

... it seems there's way too much empty space and lifeless junk serving no apparent purpose.
...... It's almost as though the people running NASA created the universe.

Ha-ha !! :laugh:
I love it! It's cutting..very cutting, but I love it.

Dook · 2004-11-22 19:47:28

The thing is, you don't have to believe He exists. Some religions wouldn't tolerate this but they are too unbending, stuck in the dark ages. The Creator is not offended. He doesn't even know. You're upset that the God of the bible doesn't know you, doesn't talk to you when you've had a bad day? The bible is a manual for ignorant humans who lived thousands of years ago. It gives warnings about blood, mildew, incest, adultery, evil and attempted to give us some kind of law to live by. The first testament preached 'An eye for an eye' while the next one said 'Forgive your brother'. Did God evolve from one to the other? I believe the angels are the ones who gave us the bible, they tried to help, they screwed up, they tried to fix it. Then they finally realized that we wanted and needed to find our own way.

Take science as a religion but realize that we can only read the first few pages of this new bible. Also there is more to it, science that we can't possibly comprehend now. Physics would not tell you to 'Do no harm'.

Supposed to be doing isn't meant to imply external design. We can take as long as we wish. It's just that little voice inside, always nudging you this way or that. In some people it's stronger, others it's mostly dismissed or ignored, going to the store for milk, cellular phones, work, traffic...these things always get more attention. Sometimes you buy a new car or a big screen television and it makes you happy for a while but then you get bored with it. It's just a thing, a distraction. We fill our lives with one distraction after another but I assure you we are supposed to be doing something. Higher evolution does not happen on it's own, it must be earned. And I can't go without you. In scientific terms it's known as 'Punctuated Equilibrium', long periods of stagnation then, suddenly, great change. In primitive forms it's easy but for us it has to be guided (not by the Creator). What change could you make to the human DNA to improve us? Larger brains? Better vision?

That's why a visit to the countryside is so important now and then. Look at the mountains and wonder how every bump and ridge formed. Continents collided. Rivers formed. How far have the atoms come across the universe to be at that place? How many stars have contributed heavier elements to form that mountain.

What would be the point in starting all of this if it was only going to be empty space and barren rocks? The universe today is not intelligent design, but the chance was there, a good chance. Exactly how, the specifics, well...physics-the evolution of energy-determined those. The evolution of energy rules the universe but it is not just the survival of the fittest. If a predator is so incredible that it consumes all of it's resources, it becomes extinct itself.

Aside from the life bearing planets the universe is a desert, full of empty space, like the Pacific Ocean was to the ancients. A barrier keeping weak life forms separate and protected from the powerful ones. The race has been on for billions of years though and I'd guess that by now we are bringing up the rear.

Cobra Commander · 2004-11-23 07:09:45

We may be using different definitions of "God" leading to a great deal of needless arguing. You seem to be referring to God as merely the creator, that which started the universe. In an effort to clarify I must ask, is God a being? Does God have consciousness? Does God still exist?

If not, we're essentially in agreement on concepts, just using very different terminology. Otherwise, well... right back where we started. :hm:

The race has been on for billions of years though and I'd guess that by now we are bringing up the rear.

Perhaps, or we may be far in the lead. Perhaps no one else has entered the race as of yet. Maybe no one else ever will, we don't have sufficient data to do anything but guess, and again the guess says more about ourselves than the universe. When I go out into the woods I don't find God, but I have seen that we have potential in that regard. Even that says more about my own view of the world and of humanity than the world or humanity themselves.

Algol · 2004-11-23 14:29:37

Maybe a better question is, why is god Christian?

What makes you so sure theres only one? ???

Or that he didnt create the dinosaurs and then walk away when it all went wrong.........

dickbill · 2004-11-23 23:11:00

given an infinite amount of time, all things are statistically possible.
Take all the pieces of a mechanical watch and toss them up into the air over and over again. How long before they assemble perfectly into a working watch? That's what happened. Statistically possible, made probable with a little help.

I beg to disagree.
Statistics evaluate the chances of a particular event over time without respect with the"time variable" itself. It's like the "time" is always equivalent to itself, future or past. But The science of thermodynamic clearly makes a distinction. The arrow of "time" points in the direction of increasing entropy, cf. S. Hawkings for example.
So back to your example. Each time you throw the pieces in the air the system reaches a lower energetic level, more statistically probable and more disorganized. Unless you inject a lot of "good" energy in the system, you will break your pieces in dust, then particles, then atoms etc.
If you inject "heat" into the system (heat is degenerated energy, of maximum entropy, it is just molecular chaos in the form of molecular agitation) the decease will be even faster. If you cool the system, the same happens, just slower. If you cool too much, time is frozen, nothing happen, the statistic fails here since the statistic is dependant on the ****** of events, but there is NO events anymore.
So you might as well throw the mechanic pieces in the air once and then wait that the pieces move by themself on the floor to form a watch.
Negentropy, as defined by Schrodinger by energy with information content, would be the energy needed. But It is nothing else than information. So you need to inject information in the system to have a chance to get a watch at the end. For example, 3 billions base pairs of DNA, plus a source of energy (GOOD food said Schrodinger, not anykind of bad food such as charcoal) and a good glass-magnifier with tiny forceps, screw driver and hammer plus a lot of practice, could do it. Otherwise, no chances.

I forget Natural Selection : The survival of the surviviest...Some unlikely unstable but more complex systems that would survive and give rise to other unlikely etc...
It doesn't contradict the 2nd thermodynamic principle to have a "themodynamic fluctuation" for a relatively short amount of time, and these complex systems would actually appear spontaneously from time to time.
I don't think it is the case however, we don't have an infinite amount of time first of all. But how could we be sure ? could we be transient "thermodynamic fluctuation" of the entropic content of the universe ?
This go very far. As you can see, now on Mars, or on Europa etc, since the conditions are, or were, almost life-friendly, people EXPECT to discover life. I don't know if a "thermodynamic or negentropic fluctuation" must necesserally be spatially and temporally coupled like this, or if it is just a random event, as the name "fluctuation" would suggest. Maybe OUR particular "fluctuation" sucked all the negentropy available in the universe (in the case it is not infinite) and left nothing for another fluctuation for example.

Anyway, books like "What is life" of Erwin Schrodinger and "La Science et la theorie de l'information" of Leon Brillouin (this book has been translated in english but I have the french version) are certainly very ... "informative" on this issue.

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