The Faith & Religion mega Thread

Originally Posted by jamison20000e All tho I do support a theoretical physicist more than your average clergyman but which one has the real job again? The answers to everything are a waste of time like lots of jobs today...

As many have said it is often difficult to extract your exact meaning but if I catch your drift here you are saying theoretical physicists are only very slightly more valuable than clergymen. If that is so I'd like to point out we would not be having this conversation without theoretical physics, you wouldn't have wifi let alone a cell phone, nor GPS... shoot! you would not likely have electricity nor much of anything beyond what you can find in an Amish or Mennonite community, but the I read some of those have an online presence. Go figure. So possibly the better look at what life might be like without theoretical physicists is deep Amazonian stone age tribes.

If today's theoretical physics seems far removed from daily existence that is normal. It has always been the cutting edge and sometimes even the lunatic fringe, but as a whole it is essential to modern civilization and the hope for tomorrow. Clergymen? Not so much.

Archaeology used to make sense but for now your right; I'm sorry for picking on the winning team Enorbet, didn't mean to get you all worked up. lol


We can create humans &*see* that's why there's the term "playing "god"" tho ethically non-religious minded debate the same. So, your "gods" must suck at security, maybe they should join the forms here?

Originally Posted by jamison20000e {...}We can create humans &*see* that's why there's the term "playing "god"" tho ethically non-religious minded debate the same. So, your "gods" must suck at security, maybe they should join the forms here?{...}

Really can "play god"? Can show it? I have yet to *see* creation of even one human outside sex. Then you support my comments of humanity being created and articles on internet about free will of choices being seperate from "sucking"(if humans choose not to or are misled into not then result is same as if some lack security) of any of gods. If it was joke then it is different story. But if humanity can be created then idea of gods being created is not too far fetched from reality aswell like in this video. This discussion is endless cause all we do is write our opinions about higher power without knowing for sure..but they have last word if they exist and signs in world we live in do support their existance in one way or another. Quotes pretty much keep these values:

It is easy to understand God as long as you don't try to explain him. ~Joseph Joubert

God is not what you imagine or what you think you understand. If you understand you have failed. ~Saint Augustine

Original mission of science is pursuit of truth. Maybe later we will find out something.

Your quotes only apply to those blind to the rest of space and time...

Facts are what we all agree but religions are plentiful as they're opinions*.

Your quotes also remind me of Pascal's Law where again we should still be sacrificing virgins just in case.

Originally Posted by jamison20000e Your quotes only apply to those blind to the rest of space and time...

But blind faith exist for a reason? Already forgot your childhood?

Originally Posted by jamison20000e Facts are what we all agree but religions are plentiful as they're opinions*.

Really? Some posts ago you wrote that we cannot get all understanding of cosmos by rational thinking alone and if we not adapt(or something else) we keep this world instead of getting another..science and religion are not opinions. Our interpretation of it is.

Originally Posted by jamison20000e Your quotes also remind me of Pascal's Law where again we should still be sacrificing virgins just in case.

Not virgin myself but imho it makes no difference to sacrifice virgin or animal or criminal or other kind cause ritual itself matters from wikia.

I never said we'll get all the answers, I've said we will never need all the answers and some answers won't matter because they don't exist... Infinity (space/time*) didn't come from anywhere it's always existed. Where as religions, non-scientific laws or realities come into existence fadeaway and change.

Wickens or whoever were told &c to sacrifice virgins &sea, Christians are told to eat the body of Christ and drink his blood &sí... some cannot think for themselves so do whatever.
Take on one hand:

• a good loving ethical scientist who doesn't believe in a creator and questions even the occasional "facts" &see
• and then a good loving ethical priest who does believe in a creator also a good loving ethical Buddhist who believes they'll be reincarnated

...which on average do you think is the better person for our worlds?

If you only believe in your set of fairy tales and golden rules among the many others then you seem more susceptible to,,, I don't know say the devil made me do it or let's cause some apocalypse in the name of my Fairy Tail because my faiytail will forgive me if I ask &pee‽‽‽

I wish we were a couple thousand years in the future, I'd go to church to watch our Lord & savior Buzz Lightyear? Then at the end, we'd say: "may infinity and beyond be with you..."

i dont believe in god, but i do believe there are key people that happen to be at the right place and time to make dramatic changes in civilization and they make history doing it, if jesus ever existed at all he was more than likely a disgruntled rabbi that wanted to turn judaism upside down https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pkONCFQujw

as for the bible and the creation myth, evolution has disproved that, and if you think humans are not related to apes, here is a human specimin that looks and behaves as more like an ape than human
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJn5dqxudbQ

Originally Posted by Okie i dont believe in god, but i do believe there are key people that happen to be at the right place and time to make dramatic changes in civilization and they make history doing it, if jesus ever existed at all he was more than likely a disgruntled rabbi that wanted to turn judaism upside down https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pkONCFQujw

I'm pretty sure there is at least some evidence Jesus, the man, existed but very little is known and clouded by a wide variety of often contradictory myth. The term "Symbolic Figurehead: comes to mind.

Originally Posted by Okie as for the bible and the creation myth, evolution has disproved that, and if you think humans are not related to apes, here is a human specimin that looks and behaves as more like an ape than human https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJn5dqxudbQ

Evolution does not disprove Creation since that is an unknowable event, and that video has absolutely nothing to do with our ancestry and more to do with what is likely merely a medical condition not uncommon to many species. I don't understand why so many people seem to get hung up on our ancestors from the ape family. Why stop there? Our ultimate ancestors are bacteria.

I don't understand why so many people seem to get hung up on our ancestors from the ape family. Why stop there? Our ultimate ancestors are bacteria.

thats exactly what the gods of old were, they were angry alpha males that nobody ever dare cross, Christopher Hitchens once said that "the abrahamic religions is exactly the kind of religion you would expect a species that is only half a chromosome away from being an ape would create" and he is right

as far as creation goes, i think this guy figured it out, its all physics https://www.quantamagazine.org/a-new...-life-20140122

the god of the gaps is getting smaller, soon religion wont have a place to pidgenhole their god as a sanctuary to be protected from scientific knowledge, but science is not the enemy of religion, science just disproves the old religious myths & stories in search for the truth, and disproving god/religion was not the objective but merely a side effect of finding the truth

Hello Okie
I don't see how one follows the other here, maybe because I don't think I'm an angry alpha male and don't subscribe to "the abrahamic religions" or any religion for that matter ......

Originally Posted by enorbet I don't understand why so many people seem to get hung up on our ancestors from the ape family. Why stop there? Our ultimate ancestors are bacteria.

Originally Posted by Okie thats exactly what the gods of old were, they were angry alpha males that nobody ever dare cross, Christopher Hitchens once said that "the abrahamic religions is exactly the kind of religion you would expect a species that is only half a chromosome away from being an ape would create" and he is right

... but as brilliant as men like Hitchens, Dawkins and all the so-called Four Horsemen of New Atheism, plus a few like Lawerence Krauss are and as much as I agree with their fundamental views on Science and Religion, I find it a bit hypocritical and rather "angry, alpha male", to take what appears to be a shameless glee in condescending disdain and condemnation to and about Believers as somehow less evolved since that implies Evolution is ever-upward goal oriented and particularly Dawkins should know better. Like most things, very few things are so simple as to be all good or all bad and Religion is complex enough to fit that category. Religion as is historical fact and for both good and ill IS part of our heritage and evolution.

I'm firmly convinced we need to shed "such childish toys" since we have outgrown them (or are fast approaching a time when we will have) but to view Believers as a wretched step down on some illusory evolutionary ladder I find ignominious and childish in itself, somewhat like kicking a chair that had the audacity to bang into our big toe. In some respects it smacks of blaming the victim. True, victims very often become perpetrators themselves, but how far back do we go to point a finger of blame? I think it is just better to wrestle with evidence and "let those embers die out of their own lack of fuel and oxygen" and break the chain.

Originally Posted by Okie as far as creation goes, i think this guy figured it out, its all physics https://www.quantamagazine.org/a-new...-life-20140122

That's very cool! I'm glad to see anyone working out the mechanism for something I've long wondered about. It seems to me that it is quite plausible that Life is just something the Universe naturally does. The evidence so far has been awfully thin but such things as deep sea smokers, deep mine examinations, and geyser pools have forced humanity to expand the limits in which life can form and flourish and the discoveries that the raw elemental components for life are literally everywhere in our Universe, does seem to point there.

Many years ago in rural Colorado a lovely young lady with whom I worked "asked" me, "Yoiu believe in God don't you?" fully expecting the more common answer and was shocked when I replied, "No. I don't" and quickly followed with , "How can you NOT believe?" to which I answered rhetorically, "How can you believe?" and her immediate answer was "well just look out here at all this!" sweeping her hands to encompass everything. I then said to her, "It is perfectly understandable that you might think that since you've been taught that This was all created for us nsteasd of that we grew out of it. Of course we fit and find it lovely. We ARE it. Would you expect fire to break out under water?"

My point was that if it weren't for cyanobacteria, there would be no oxygen for any lifeform on planet Earth above bacteria to ever exist, so should we worship bacteria?.. or should we regress further and just worship the Sun since it is the parent of our entire solar system and everything in it, including cyanobacteria and Us? I think that I treated her with respect and gentility and it did indeed make her think. I doubt that would have happened had I tried to make her feel dirty, small, hairy and stupid, not to mention that would've made me feel ashamed of myself.

Originally Posted by Okie the god of the gaps is getting smaller, soon religion wont have a place to pidgenhole their god as a sanctuary to be protected from scientific knowledge, but science is not the enemy of religion, science just disproves the old religious myths & stories in search for the truth, and disproving god/religion was not the objective but merely a side effect of finding the truth

Absolutely true, IMHO. The internal combustion engine was/is not the enemy of horses and oxen, even though there are now far less of them since it was invented. It's just a progression in which some things are gained and some lost... hopefully at an equitable exchange rate.

Originally Posted by jamison20000e {...}some cannot think for themselves so do whatever. Take on one hand: a good loving ethical scientist who doesn't believe in a creator and questions even the occasional "facts" &see and then a good loving ethical priest who does believe in a creator also a good loving ethical Buddhist who believes they'll be reincarnated ...which on average do you think is the better person for our worlds?{...}

Humanity can think for themselves unless some explanation prevents that..

Depends what they do with their science and religion to our world. But from my own experience being good|bad is not enough for some reason..otherwise would not get undeserved problems hidden as opportunities to earn salary in stressful environment that blocks chakras or tests despite already being normal..i thought holy book characters read mind and already know what is happening without testing..

Originally Posted by enorbet {...}Evolution does not disprove Creation since that is an unknowable event{...}

WOW. So finaly others also wrote this. I was saying this with my own words aswell yet some keep arguing. Real quest for truth can and can not include Deity depending on findings.

Originally Posted by Okie as far as creation goes, i think this guy figured it out, its all physics https://www.quantamagazine.org/a-new...-life-20140122

That's a fascinating article. But the fact that you use the word "creation" in connection with it shows a basic confusion, which I have often noticed in both anti-evolution fundamentalists (who often call themselves creationists) and militant atheists like you.

Creation is a belief about the origin of the universe, not its origin in time, but its logical origin, its reason for existing at all. Evolution is a theory about events within the existing universe, as is Mr England's theory concerning the origin of life. The contents and history of the universe are the proper province of science, but science can never tell us why the universe exists, why there is anything rather than nothing.

If there was a God who created the universe and intended it to evolve living creatures, wouldn't He have created a universe that would do so spontaneously, rather than having to fiddle about inserting events by hand? That's the action of an incompetent programmer, not a God.

the god of the gaps is getting smaller, soon religion wont have a place to pigeonhole their god as a sanctuary to be protected from scientific knowledge, but science is not the enemy of religion, science just disproves the old religious myths & stories in search for the truth, and disproving god/religion was not the objective but merely a side effect of finding the truth

Would it surprise you to know that most well-educated Christians are as fed up with the "God of the gaps" as you are? First, as you point out, the gaps always get filled in eventually so a God like that isn't much use for evangelism. And secondly, as I have already pointed out, such a God is not a fit object of worship for any intelligent person.

The true God isn't in the gaps. He's outside the frame. He's the reason the universe exists, not a cause of natural events within it. He is Shakespeare to the world of Hamlet. Hamlet may have had all kinds of theories about his father's death, but they would have told him nothing about Shakespeare unless he already believed in him.