Religion Thread 2.0

[Jake]

So you think god created evolution, or god created the big bang?

But the big bang theory states that the big bang lead to the creation of earth, whereas the bible says God created it himself.

The bible includes god created things out of nothing. Don't ever try to mix religion and science when religious texts break the very fundamental laws of science. You cannot create things out of nothing, saying "let there be light" will not create light. And if god created evolution I would expect he would do a better job of it.

Really, nipples on males? One tube for food and air? Can't bend our knees backwards? Not directly burning fat for energy? Blindspot in my vision? My spine can't repair itself?

This does not point to intelligent design really...

Are you talking to me? No, I don't believe in the idea of God, or at least what it's come to be, nor do I believe in any religion. If you had to label me, I'd be an atheist with touch of deism. I simply accept the possibility of their being an intelligent creator of the universe and it's laws, whether it be an advanced alien race, or something else. I make no assertions as to whether or not it knows or cares about our existence, nor do I think it is entirely likely.

[Lucifer]

nipples on males

I don't know about you, but I make good use of mine...

[Foly]

The bible includes god created things out of nothing. Don't ever try to mix religion and science when religious texts break the very fundamental laws of science. You cannot create things out of nothing, saying "let there be light" will not create light. And if god created evolution I would expect he would do a better job of it.

This is half true, quantum mechanics says things can be created out of nothing but indeed there is not someone that could say "let there be light" and then there is light (instead of saying let there be light we use light switches).

The argument that god could do better is kinda weird, because why would he? Also why would anything else be better? Why would a world where people instantly be evolved to what we think is "better" be "better" for god?

Now for my point of view on religion:

To keep it simple, i think religion has been created (by human, not by god) to explain things that couldn't be explained and i think it evolved to what it is today. I think the point of believing today shouldn't be to explain things anymore, it should be to believe in something, to give hope and to let people live a better life. Because of this i think the whole argueing between Science vs Religion is kinda silly, the problem is that religion and science explain things both differently. Again i dont think religion should focus on explaining things that can be explained by science but instead they should focus on the things i said.

Now for the existance of a god (or other things):

I do think god can exist. The question is, what is god? And i think there isn't a right answer for this since the question is useless. God is something you believe in or not. The god that exists doesn't need to be real, it just is what you think it is. You could even say that the chance of particles being or appearing somewhere (again quantum mechanics) is god. In that case you just have a different view and use different words for the same thing yet you are not explaining how it haphened.

To summerize all this: I think religion is something you believe in, not something you use to explain things.

And last, i think everyone should be able to belief in whatever they want as long as they dont hurt or affect others in a bad way (like said in this topic before with gay marriage).

[Torch]

Imagine a desert that takes up a world the size of the sun. Now imagine getting one chance to find a specific speck of sand located anywhere on this desert planet. Imagine even further finding the correct speck of sand once per day for a billion years, by sheer chance. The only explanation for this even being remotely possible is if there are infinite amounts of people on this desert planet with the same chance at finding the right speck of dirt for a billion years. The problem is, just because we accept the possibility that infinite amounts of invisible people are trying to do the same thing, making a winner inevitable, doesn't mean we are less surprised when we find out we're the winner. We are now forced to conclude one of two things: Either there are infinite amounts of invisible people on this planet trying to find the speck of sand and we were the lucky one that betrayed all odds, or the system was rigged from the start. Both options seem unlikely if not impossible, yet we deduct that one has to be true. Which do you pick? My thoughts are that the game might just be rigged. By what or who, you ask? I have no effing idea. You may argue that this is pushing the question of life back further, by asking who is rigging the game rigger, and I say it's turtles all the way down (teehee I hope somebody gets my reference).

Not only is it possible for us to be the lucky ones, we have to be the lucky ones. If we weren't we couldn't have this conversation right now. Imagine all the millions of different genetic possibilities that were factored into your birth. The chance that you became that exact recipe of DNA is minuscule. But it's irrelevant because it's not about the chance of something specific occurring, it's about the number of different possibilities there were.

There's nothing significant about earth or our species that makes it any more coincidental than if consciousness occurred in another species on one of the other (again, infinite number of) planets. I'd say it's probably a combinations of overdeveloped brains and the ability to walk on two feet that allows us to think consciously.

To clarify the above, walking on two feet lets us use something like 90% less blood to move around than other animals like apes, allowing us to devote a very considerable amount more blood to our brains. This lets us think while moving, we're pretty much the only species that can do it. Imagine trying to think while swimming front crawl all the time, it's very VERY difficult.

That's just an educated guess though, I'm no cognitive scientist and obviously I don't understand consciousness any more than anyone else. Just seems like with all the planets in the universe, consciousness of some sort was pretty much guaranteed to occur in a few species. We could just as easily be having the same conversation on another planet, in another time, in a different sense, as a different species and the same logic would still apply.

[sayers6]

I myself am a Christian and I strongly believe in it. I believe in evolution on some level, to what measure I don't know, but going off of how bacteria changes, it has to. I believe the world is MUCH older than 6,000 years, and I don't see it in the bible directly saying that anywhere. I believe something like the big bang happened by God, but I don't have time to go deeply into it now. Seeing that in scientfic theory, matter can be made out of energy, and light is made of energy, that is why God said let there be light, and there was. I believe everything else was in a way, made out of light. I had very little time to write this up, so I'll expand on it later when I can.

[Jake]

Imagine a desert that takes up a world the size of the sun. Now imagine getting one chance to find a specific speck of sand located anywhere on this desert planet. Imagine even further finding the correct speck of sand once per day for a billion years, by sheer chance. The only explanation for this even being remotely possible is if there are infinite amounts of people on this desert planet with the same chance at finding the right speck of dirt for a billion years. The problem is, just because we accept the possibility that infinite amounts of invisible people are trying to do the same thing, making a winner inevitable, doesn't mean we are less surprised when we find out we're the winner. We are now forced to conclude one of two things: Either there are infinite amounts of invisible people on this planet trying to find the speck of sand and we were the lucky one that betrayed all odds, or the system was rigged from the start. Both options seem unlikely if not impossible, yet we deduct that one has to be true. Which do you pick? My thoughts are that the game might just be rigged. By what or who, you ask? I have no effing idea. You may argue that this is pushing the question of life back further, by asking who is rigging the game rigger, and I say it's turtles all the way down (teehee I hope somebody gets my reference).

Not only is it possible for us to be the lucky ones, we have to be the lucky ones. If we weren't we couldn't have this conversation right now. Imagine all the millions of different genetic possibilities that were factored into your birth. The chance that you became that exact recipe of DNA is minuscule. But it's irrelevant because it's not about the chance of something specific occurring, it's about the number of different possibilities there were.

It actually is about something specific occurring. A universe being created that can support life isn't a statistical probability, it's an anomaly. It's not like our universe had infinite chances to get it right. as far as we're aware, it had one shot and it made it count. There are two explanations at this point (that I've read about anyway): Infinite universes with infinite combinations of laws and we're one of the universes that didn't implode back in on itself, or the universe was rigged to have those laws. I choose to believe that both explanations are now equally valid based on the knowledge we have of the universe. When and if we find out that there are infinite universes out there (currently being worked on as we speak), I will be more inclined to believe we are the product of chance. If I find out that we're the only universe in existence, which more or less probably cannot be proven, then I will lean towards believing the universes laws were tuned in some way.

There's nothing significant about earth or our species that makes it any more coincidental than if consciousness occurred in another species on one of the other (again, infinite number of) planets. I'd say it's probably a combinations of overdeveloped brains and the ability to walk on two feet that allows us to think consciously.

To clarify the above, walking on two feet lets us use something like 90% less blood to move around than other animals like apes, allowing us to devote a very considerable amount more blood to our brains. This lets us think while moving, we're pretty much the only species that can do it. Imagine trying to think while swimming front crawl all the time, it's very VERY difficult.

That's just an educated guess though, I'm no cognitive scientist and obviously I don't understand consciousness any more than anyone else. Just seems like with all the planets in the universe, consciousness of some sort was pretty much guaranteed to occur in a few species. We could just as easily be having the same conversation on another planet, in another time, in a different sense, as a different species and the same logic would still apply.

The one thing I don't agree with here is that consciousness was guaranteed to happen in our universe simply because it's so massive and has so many planets. There's a very real possibility that there are gazillions of other lonely universes out there with empty planets and absolutely no complex life because the laws of that universe won't allow for complex things like abiogenesis to even start.

[Torch]

Imagine a desert that takes up a world the size of the sun. Now imagine getting one chance to find a specific speck of sand located anywhere on this desert planet. Imagine even further finding the correct speck of sand once per day for a billion years, by sheer chance. The only explanation for this even being remotely possible is if there are infinite amounts of people on this desert planet with the same chance at finding the right speck of dirt for a billion years. The problem is, just because we accept the possibility that infinite amounts of invisible people are trying to do the same thing, making a winner inevitable, doesn't mean we are less surprised when we find out we're the winner. We are now forced to conclude one of two things: Either there are infinite amounts of invisible people on this planet trying to find the speck of sand and we were the lucky one that betrayed all odds, or the system was rigged from the start. Both options seem unlikely if not impossible, yet we deduct that one has to be true. Which do you pick? My thoughts are that the game might just be rigged. By what or who, you ask? I have no effing idea. You may argue that this is pushing the question of life back further, by asking who is rigging the game rigger, and I say it's turtles all the way down (teehee I hope somebody gets my reference).

Not only is it possible for us to be the lucky ones, we have to be the lucky ones. If we weren't we couldn't have this conversation right now. Imagine all the millions of different genetic possibilities that were factored into your birth. The chance that you became that exact recipe of DNA is minuscule. But it's irrelevant because it's not about the chance of something specific occurring, it's about the number of different possibilities there were.

It actually is about something specific occurring. A universe being created that can support life isn't a statistical probability, it's an anomaly. It's not like our universe had infinite chances to get it right. as far as we're aware, it had one shot and it made it count. There are two explanations at this point (that I've read about anyway): Infinite universes with infinite combinations of laws and we're one of the universes that didn't implode back in on itself, or the universe was rigged to have those laws. I choose to believe that both explanations are now equally valid based on the knowledge we have of the universe. When and if we find out that there are infinite universes out there (currently being worked on as we speak), I will be more inclined to believe we are the product of chance. If I find out that we're the only universe in existence, which more or less probably cannot be proven, then I will lean towards believing the universes laws were tuned in some way.

That's a neat way to look at things, considering that the fundamental laws of our universe were intelligent design.

I still go back to my original argument though, our universe is one specific instance in the infinite number of potential universes. It is no more amazing or coincidental than if our universe was created with 20 dimensions and no length/width/depth/time, and somehow a 20dimensional existence was formed capable of questioning its own existence. What is so special about our universes laws that separates it from the other infinite number of possibilities, nearly all of which we can't even begin to imagine.

Thinking about universe possibilities is a philosophical nightmare.

[Jake]

That's a neat way to look at things, considering that the fundamental laws of our universe were intelligent design.

I still go back to my original argument though, our universe is one specific instance in the infinite number of potential universes. It is no more amazing or coincidental than if our universe was created with 20 dimensions and no length/width/depth/time, and somehow a 20dimensional existence was formed capable of questioning its own existence. What is so special about our universes laws that separates it from the other infinite number of possibilities, nearly all of which we can't even begin to imagine.

Thinking about universe possibilities is a philosophical nightmare.

So how do we know there are other potential universes out there? Isn't that just a large assumption? What if the laws of our universe are the only laws that can exist? I'm not trying to be condescending, I'm actually curious.

[Torch]

That's a neat way to look at things, considering that the fundamental laws of our universe were intelligent design.

I still go back to my original argument though, our universe is one specific instance in the infinite number of potential universes. It is no more amazing or coincidental than if our universe was created with 20 dimensions and no length/width/depth/time, and somehow a 20dimensional existence was formed capable of questioning its own existence. What is so special about our universes laws that separates it from the other infinite number of possibilities, nearly all of which we can't even begin to imagine.

Thinking about universe possibilities is a philosophical nightmare.

So how do we know there are other potential universes out there? Isn't that just a large assumption? What if the laws of our universe are the only laws that can exist? I'm not trying to be condescending, I'm actually curious.

Well that's definitely possible. It's also possible that there are many more layers that we aren't even considering. Maybe our universe exists within a cluster of other universes. Maybe that cluster of universes exists within other clusters of universes. Maybe those clusters of clusters of universes exist within other clusters of clusters of universes. Astronomy is one big mind!@#$.

[Mystery]

Everything Jake and Torch have said so far might as well be my thoughts straight out of my head.

Well that's definitely possible. It's also possible that there are many more layers that we aren't even considering. Maybe our universe exists within a cluster of other universes. Maybe that cluster of universes exists within other clusters of universes. Maybe those clusters of clusters of universes exist within other clusters of clusters of universes. Astronomy is one big mind!@#$.

That's the thing, there are quite literally an infinite number of ways it could actually be set up. Maybe combinations of several. There could be infinite universes at different times with different fabric than spacetime as a template. All we can really say is that chance-wise, it's extremely likely that our universe isn't the only thing in all of existence.

2 things I view as quite unfortunate for our universe is that (as far as we know) light speed is the maximum speed at which anything in our spacetime fabric can travel(and even getting close to it with anything would be astronomically difficult, if not impossible), and that it's also extremely likely given the current expansion of the universe increasing exponentially that the entire thing will be altered in a way as to effectively 'ruin' everything inside it for what would be either almost an infinite amount of time, a very long time, or forever.

That's a neat way to look at things, considering that the fundamental laws of our universe were intelligent design.

I still go back to my original argument though, our universe is one specific instance in the infinite number of potential universes. It is no more amazing or coincidental than if our universe was created with 20 dimensions and no length/width/depth/time, and somehow a 20dimensional existence was formed capable of questioning its own existence. What is so special about our universes laws that separates it from the other infinite number of possibilities, nearly all of which we can't even begin to imagine.

Thinking about universe possibilities is a philosophical nightmare.

So how do we know there are other potential universes out there? Isn't that just a large assumption? What if the laws of our universe are the only laws that can exist? I'm not trying to be condescending, I'm actually curious.

The reason why logic holds up so well here is...because, well, it just does. In other areas of existence, on the assumption that is more to existence than just us, I'm positive everything could be so strange as to have an infinite number of possible rules and laws, even mind-bending ones. Another form of 'logic' could then apply there, or even possibly just blatantly things NOT FOLLOWING rules. But again, even though that's possible, it's always best to assume everything just works how it has so far without throwing in unfalsifiable, unprovable concepts like that.

The best possible analogy for existence as a whole that I can come up with is a point on a number line representing our universe. The line itself, however, is one that's essentially infinitesimally inherently complex(all the thing that can be done with numbers), has an infinite possible number of dimensions(it can become 3D, 4D, etc.) and has the potential to go on forever in every direction(the nature of lines).

I find that incredibly awesome.

[Yankyal]

The bible includes god created things out of nothing. Don't ever try to mix religion and science when religious texts break the very fundamental laws of science. You cannot create things out of nothing, saying "let there be light" will not create light. And if god created evolution I would expect he would do a better job of it.

This is half true, quantum mechanics says things can be created out of nothing but indeed there is not someone that could say "let there be light" and then there is light (instead of saying let there be light we use light switches).

The argument that god could do better is kinda weird, because why would he? Also why would anything else be better? Why would a world where people instantly be evolved to what we think is "better" be "better" for god?

Now for my point of view on religion:

To keep it simple, i think religion has been created (by human, not by god) to explain things that couldn't be explained and i think it evolved to what it is today. I think the point of believing today shouldn't be to explain things anymore, it should be to believe in something, to give hope and to let people live a better life. Because of this i think the whole argueing between Science vs Religion is kinda silly, the problem is that religion and science explain things both differently. Again i dont think religion should focus on explaining things that can be explained by science but instead they should focus on the things i said.

Now for the existance of a god (or other things):

I do think god can exist. The question is, what is god? And i think there isn't a right answer for this since the question is useless. God is something you believe in or not. The god that exists doesn't need to be real, it just is what you think it is. You could even say that the chance of particles being or appearing somewhere (again quantum mechanics) is god. In that case you just have a different view and use different words for the same thing yet you are not explaining how it haphened.

To summerize all this: I think religion is something you believe in, not something you use to explain things.

And last, i think everyone should be able to belief in whatever they want as long as they dont hurt or affect others in a bad way (like said in this topic before with gay marriage).

God should create the most evolved things he can because he is a perfect being who "loves" us, and someone who loves their creations probably wouldn't !@#$ them up so bad.

Also I am fine with religion if it is kept private. That isn't the case. People can't just believe in god and keep it to themselves. They have to start wars, and try to persecute anyone different, or pressure children into believing with threats of eternal torture to create more idiots like themselves. I swear if for one generation NO ONE tried to indoctrinate their children, religion would be wiped out entirely.

Again I don't go around hating religious people. I think religion itself is pretty stupid but religious people have their reasons and if they really aren't hurting anyone I see no reason to try and change their beliefs. Unfortunately this is usually not the case, like you said.

Are you talking to me? No, I don't believe in the idea of God, or at least what it's come to be, nor do I believe in any religion. If you had to label me, I'd be an atheist with touch of deism. I simply accept the possibility of their being an intelligent creator of the universe and it's laws, whether it be an advanced alien race, or something else. I make no assertions as to whether or not it knows or cares about our existence, nor do I think it is entirely likely.

You are an agnostic atheist. As am I.

That's a neat way to look at things, considering that the fundamental laws of our universe were intelligent design.

Can you elaborate? Intelligent requires sentience, and I have never read or heard of a law pointing to a sentient creator.

[crozier]

No, I don't believe in the idea of God, or at least what it's come to be, nor do I believe in any religion. If you had to label me, I'd be an atheist with touch of deism. I simply accept the possibility of their being an intelligent creator of the universe and it's laws, whether it be an advanced alien race, or something else. I make no assertions as to whether or not it knows or cares about our existence, nor do I think it is entirely likely.

They got a word for that. Agnosticism.

Well I beleive in God, Jesus, dinosaurs, and aliens. I do not attend church, nor do I pray, nor do I preach to the students at my school. I personally beleive that Judaism, Christianity, and Islam is all correct. They beleive in God, so why should they be punished by God? (ie: go to hell)
But God (imo) created dinosaurs a hell of a lot before 8000BC.

But I am confused at what you guys are trying to accomplish with this thread. Are you attempting to convert people to/away from religion?

[Torch]

That's a neat way to look at things, considering that the fundamental laws of our universe were intelligent design.

Can you elaborate? Intelligent requires sentience, and I have never read or heard of a law pointing to a sentient creator.

You're misreading my post. I think it's neat that Jake was considering the possibility that the fundamental laws of our universe were intelligent design.

@crozier: What's the point of any thread? It's interesting discussion, that's what forums are for!

[Mystery]

No, I don't believe in the idea of God, or at least what it's come to be, nor do I believe in any religion. If you had to label me, I'd be an atheist with touch of deism. I simply accept the possibility of their being an intelligent creator of the universe and it's laws, whether it be an advanced alien race, or something else. I make no assertions as to whether or not it knows or cares about our existence, nor do I think it is entirely likely.

They got a word for that. Agnosticism.

I believe in the possibility(which chance-wise, again, might as well be 0)of any kind of deity.  All atheists do, except for gnostic atheists, who think that it is impossible, PERIOD, for them to exist. Most people don't apply the term properly. Here's a chart:



I would be just under gnostic.

[Jake]

But I am confused at what you guys are trying to accomplish with this thread. Are you attempting to convert people to/away from religion?

Hopefully helping people come to better conclusions about their beliefs. If it causes people to convert away from religion, that is always a good thing.