The Faith & Religion mega Thread

Originally Posted by jamison20000e What did you skip over the words not or fairy tales‽ The devil is you religious fairytale worshipping types for insisting "gods" exist. Some theories make sense and become facts like evolution other theories like multiverses for example are silly... we could supposedly be everywhere, doing everything so you and I are somewhere, in some timeline shooting a baby in the head, theoretically‽‽‽ Religion and its fairy tales atr not theoretically for exploitation, money power and suckers!!!

I am not religious zealot who insists "ģods" exist but they can exist because there are signs and clues around us that suggest about it.

But it also makes sense for holy_books containing at least 10% truth. If matrix 'fairy tale' about Designer is real then it also explains why this human creation is flawed yet it could've happened.

Could be. For this reason i like this quote:

I believe|trust in God|Deity, I just don't trust anyone who works for him. ~Author unknown

Originally Posted by hazel The reason that creation is not and never will be a scientific theory is that science has to assume the brute reality of the existing universe before it can even get started. It can study the earlier history of that universe, but it can't speculate on why and how the universe exists. That is a task for philosophers and theologians.

Of course I absolutely agree, hazel, but need to add that "the brute reality" is we can only see what we can see, measure and test. There is a sliding scale of reliability that at the top is a locus of prediction and confirmation for what is, and also for what is not - falsification. It then drops down to lower probabilities usually because Mathematics has proved to be such an accurate tool in this Universe, that many years may pass before a hypothesis or the rudiments of theory can be tested and confirmed or denied. We can see back to fractions of a minute after Big Bang and can recreate it.

That boundary caused by the absence of light, or more accurately the inability of photons to move through the hot, dense environment of the early Universe (much like how it takes millions of years for photons to escape our Sun) is just now beghinning to be crossed through Gravitational Wave Astronomy BUT nothing we know of or can imagine can see past the singularity and this is why what existed , if anything, before Big Bang, will likely never be the purvey of Science and left only to the speculation, the "what ifs" of philosophy and theology.

If something in your make up or experience allows or makes you "go there" then who am I or anyone to tell you anything? but "It's your life and you have the right to live it as you see fit." While I might wish I could go there, my intellectual discipline does not allow for things without even the possibility of testable evidence. I bet with the odds.

This works as long as those who speculate don't attempt to crossover and apply Reason to what can never be reasonable, has no evidence whatsoever. As soon as one chooses or allows the mixing of The Rules of Evidence with Speculation, there are no longer any rules and validity is out the window. Once falsification is ruled out there can be no Logic, no Science. The concept of a valid premise ceases to exist and all conclusions are both apparently possible as well as obviously suspect. That leads to the common environment we see today where many just doubt anything and everything that "doesn't feel right". There are intelligent and knowledgeable people who can keep those in separate compartments, but many, if not most, don't or apparently can't.

Originally Posted by Arcane I am not religious zealot who insists "ģods" exist but they can exist because there are signs and clues around us that suggest about it. But it also makes sense for holy_books containing at least 10% truth. If matrix 'fairy tale' about Designer is real then it also explains why this human creation is flawed yet it could've happened. Could be. For this reason i like this quote:

Can you possibly cite what "signs and clues" there are that are not in a work of Fiction?

Originally Posted by enorbet That boundary caused by the absence of light, or more accurately the inability of photons to move through the hot, dense environment of the early Universe (much like how it takes millions of years for photons to escape our Sun) is just now beghinning to be crossed through Gravitational Wave Astronomy BUT nothing we know of or can imagine can see past the singularity and this is why what existed , if anything, before Big Bang, will likely never be the purvey of Science and left only to the speculation, the "what ifs" of philosophy and theology.

I think you're confusing temporal with logical priority. They are not the same thing. What happened "before the big bang" may or may not be accessible to us, but it definitely belongs to the same universe, at least in my definition of what a universe is. If you define a universe differently, for example if you define it as the result of the big bang, then the bang itself is still an entity of the same logical kind as a universe. It just isn't organised the same way (or at all). Some people have suggested a "bouncing universe" in which big bangs and big crunches alternate. Each of the intermediate states could be called a different universe (it might for example have different values of the fundamental constants) but they would all exist in the same temporal sequence, a kind of hyper-universe.

Logical priority is different. If there is a God and God created the universe/multiverse, then that means He is outside it, not before it. It also means that He created the whole universe, not just the first second of it. You can see the difference easily if you look at human creations that include their own internal time schemes, i.e novels and plays as against pictures and sculptures. No writer writes just the first second of a novel. He writes the whole novel. And if he does so over a period of time, it's his time which has nothing to do with the flow of time inside the book.

You need to understand what sort of God religious people believe in before you decide whether to believe in Him yourself or not. Otherwise you're just shadow-boxing. If you think God is just a useful "first cause" then whether you believe in him is irrelevant to the argument since hardly anyone else believes in that sort of God either.

what if there was more than one big bang, what if there have been billions of big bangs in what is a multiverse, or an infinite void full of many different universes each with their own laws of physics and the big bang that caused this universe was just like one leaf on a tree with a countless number of leaves/universe (multiverse) and each leaf is a universe in this giant tree of a multiverse

Originally Posted by hazel I think you're confusing temporal with logical priority. They are not the same thing. What happened "before the big bang" may or may not be accessible to us, but it definitely belongs to the same universe, at least in my definition of what a universe is. If you define a universe differently, for example if you define it as the result of the big bang, then the bang itself is still an entity of the same logical kind as a universe. It just isn't organised the same way (or at all). Some people have suggested a "bouncing universe" in which big bangs and big crunches alternate. Each of the intermediate states could be called a different universe (it might for example have different values of the fundamental constants) but they would all exist in the same temporal sequence, a kind of hyper-universe.

Because of Quantum Field Theory and the discovery of the Higgs Field, I can accept that there is at least some possibility for the so-called Multiverse (which in that view would still just be a manifestation of THE Universe), but if it is so that not only Space but Time began with Big Bang, at least relative to a Universe in which we are essentially confined, than I see no difference and no need for any Creator nor do I speculate on what Believers define as such since it is still and always will be just that - speculation. Speculation is fascinating and fun but not for me something to rely on whatsoever.

Originally Posted by hazel Logical priority is different. If there is a God and God created the universe/multiverse, then that means He is outside it, not before it. It also means that He created the whole universe, not just the first second of it. You can see the difference easily if you look at human creations that include their own internal time schemes, i.e novels and plays as against pictures and sculptures. No writer writes just the first second of a novel. He writes the whole novel. And if he does so over a period of time, it's his time which has nothing to do with the flow of time inside the book.

Of course I grasp the concept of "outside" and you've mentioned it very well before, too. It, to me, is just one more reason I can't rely on anything like that any more than Hamlet can imagine Shakespeare, let alone count on him for anything useful in his "life"..


You

Originally Posted by hazel need to understand what sort of God religious people believe in before you decide whether to believe in Him yourself or not. Otherwise you're just shadow-boxing. If you think God is just a useful "first cause" then whether you believe in him is irrelevant to the argument since hardly anyone else believes in that sort of God either.

That seems impossible to me. How can anyone judge anything by someone else's experience, let alone mere beliefs? It's not that I disbelieve in YOUR God, or anyone else's. I disbelieve in the entire concept of God.

A tree is a multiverse, so to speak; as we make it up... some making up for money and power,,, others seek answers and may conclude that a big bang is just one next to another, much like a forest... but, that's just common sense from us not too far off being kindergarteners (if were,) till we die and fertilize those trees grounds‽

Talk hard: https://www.linuxquestions.org/quest...ml#post6038335

Originally Posted by enorbet Can you possibly cite what "signs and clues" there are that are not in a work of Fiction?

I already did. Use "search this thread" function and browse through posts.

But idea that everything is program is interesting..

A basic example of a program: a cake filled with codes to offer taste and pleasures.wikia

Originally Posted by Arcane I already did. Use "search this thread" function and browse through posts. But idea that everything is program is interesting..

I searched: there were no facts that everyone on the planet agrees like e.g. the color red being a portion bounced-back of the electromagnetic spectrum known as the visible spectrum—i.e., light.

Creation falls apart like the big bang!

Ping hazel - I don't know if this will help or not but I am certain it will give you considerable food for thought on the question of the various definitions of God and how that plays out in any conclusion based on logic and reason. I think you may also find it entertaining but that's just frosting on the cake. The cake is rather delicious all by itself. With as sharp as I perceive your mind to be it will almost certainly be time well spent.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ew_cNONhhKI

theologian, Love how it tries to sound scientific as words evolve and revolve. Hey we all got to waste our time somehow, why not relying on the billions the Vatican has? My theory is that all theologians secretly conclude that there's no gods, unless, like us all they're idiots on some point...

^ This is pointless. I already explained valid points. I guess for same reason youtube and internet and libraries cannot give practical experience without actualy doing that stuff themselves that is viewed|watched just theoretical knowledge(not wisdom) people cannot find God or truth without taking such path themselves..

Self-substantiation is the act of a bluepill becoming aware of and/or escaping from the Matrix, without any external help or means. wikia

I was just trying help others. I myself know this.

No, fact is people cannot deny "gods" themselves because it's been pounded into their heads and we are all silly about something! Just some of us make this world suck, like demon lovers!

Can't love gods without loving demons!

Stay delusional my friends!

Originally Posted by enorbet Ping hazel - I don't know if this will help or not but I am certain it will give you considerable food for thought on the question of the various definitions of God and how that plays out in any conclusion based on logic and reason. I think you may also find it entertaining but that's just frosting on the cake. The cake is rather delicious all by itself. With as sharp as I perceive your mind to be it will almost certainly be time well spent. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ew_cNONhhKI

Entertaining, certainly, and a lot more open-minded than anything you get out of Dawkins these days. But in the end, I found most of his arguments irrelevant because in my experience, no one starts by postulating God as a scientific hypothesis and then decides to try and develop a personal relationship with Him. At least, I've never met such a person and I know quite a lot of Christians. There were mediaeval textbooks that worked like that; concepts like the First Cause and the Prime Mover would certainly have been familiar to Thomas Aquinas. But for most religious people, it's the other way around. We start with our own experience of God and then see confirmation of his existence and nature in the majesty and orderliness of the universe, its amazing suitability for life, the pervasiveness of rationality (why after all should the universe be comprehensible to science?), the experience we all have every day of moral absolutes that require our obedience by adding a mysterious "ought to" to science's "is". And of course the experience of finding God speaking to us through the Scriptures and through prayer.

Are you familiar with the Chinese story of a philosopher who dreamed that he was a butterfly? Then he woke up and wondered if he really had dreamed that or if he was actually a butterfly who was dreaming about being human. Once he had raised the question, he couldn't answer it. In the same way, if you dismiss the sum total of your experience as an illusion, there's no way forward. The sum total of my experience proves to me that there is a God and that He knows me and I know Him but obviously that isn't an argument that would prove anything to another person.

Maybe the only answer is the one Philip gave to Nathanael: come and see for yourself.

Originally Posted by jamison20000e I searched: there were no facts that everyone on the planet agrees like e.g. the color red being a portion bounced-back of the electromagnetic spectrum known as the visible spectrum—i.e., light. Creation falls apart like the big bang!

Obviously we agree on the objective evidence for known facts like the visible spectrum and have no idea what question Arcane was answering or thought he was answering, but you got it... there is no evidence of Creation despite Arcane's assertions of "signs and clues all around". There aren't any but maybe that's exactly why his "answer" is so oblique.

OTOH while one might note that Big Bang was neither big nor banged it is wise to recognize that the term was coined to be derisive by an enemy of the theory, holding on to Steady State theory till the day he died, decades after major advances continued to provide solid backing for Big Bang, and utterly disproving any possibility of Steady State. On the flip side of that coin when the Pope tried to use Big Bang or Cosmic Egg as proof of creation, Georges LeMaitre told the pope tro keep to his area of expertise, and leave Science to scientists.

So much time has passed and most importantly a span of time notable for it's incredibly opportune timing of huge advances in technology, any one of which could have trashed Big Bang, yet instead fortified and refined it, that it is demonstrably ignorant of the facts to deny the basic premise of what is unfortunately called Big Bang. The most compelling evidence is that with WMAP we can literally SEE BIG BANG as much as it is possible to see that huge explosions took place whenever comets, or planetoids strike another object. That too was literally seen with Shumacher-Levy striking Jupiter with incredible force. WMAP is the "debris field" of Big Bang. This is true whether you wish to continue to deny it or not. It is objectively true. We all simply choose what demonstrates how we arrive at conclusions - observed events and patterns or mere skeptical or hopeful guesswork. How do you want your conclusions to be judged? Erratic or consistent?