Just wondering...
POSTED BY: everyworldspinnin
UPDATED: Friday, June 3, 2005 06:14
VIEWED: 19516
PAGE 2 of 12
Quote:
Originally posted by zoid:
Just tell 'em, "God did it!" That ought to make you popular...
The question is how she did it.
It’s an odd thing, but science really says that atheists are stupid, kind of rude I admit, but it’s science it can do what it likes.
The scientific method is, as I recall, observe, formulate a hypothesis, validate or reject hypothesis by predictions based on it and test of said predictions.
Atheism says screw the evidence I’ll believe what I damn well please, Agnosticism says the evidence is inconclusive so I have not decided yet, Theism says, “I’ve looked at the evidence, ignored some, emphasized other bits of it, and decided to believe.”
As there is no evidence supporting atheism, circumstantial evidence supporting theism and a total lack of concrete evidence on either side of the fence, the order from science to blind faith is as follows
1 Agnosticism: Scientific, the results are not yet in.
2 Theism: Semi-scientific, there is evidence but it is far from conclusive, sometimes produces accurate predictions.
3 Atheism: Blind faith, no evidence in support, some evidence against, yet to produce accurate predictions.
So the question isn’t really whether or not god did it, but rather how she did it, that is what science is about. After all:
-If there may be a god you try to find out how that hypothetical god created the universe, or how the universe was created without one
-If there is a god you figure out how that god created the universe
-If you honestly and deeply believe that there is no god you already rejected the scientific method so who gives a damn?
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Sorry that was off topic, I have no job, I am a college student, I sometimes calculate the probability of verifiable miracles using classical physics, I compare bibles, I write novels (which I never seem to finish), and I generally do nothing that contributes to much of anything.
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Ya know...i never thought of it that way... I consider myself an atheist.....
But I would like to point out that it can be viewed that there is no evidence for theism, just some unreliable texts that happen to be old unreliable texts that say what happened. That said, i dont deny that in a way atheism is blind faith in a sense... I dont believe in a god because i dont feel that I have prove that he/she/hem exists...
Having said that, i'd also like to apologize if i have offended anyone of a faith... i have a great respect for religion, and the faith that allows people to follow and be involved in a community, and feel loved by God. I unfortunately cant seem to find that faith, because I can't get my mind around the empirical side, that I can't see any proof of religion in action. On the flipside, science, as I quote myself and probably others as saying, 'is a religion with reliable miracles'.
But while I believe science can, given enough time/etc explain everything, you have a fair point that I don't use the scientific method or anything.... well, something to contemplate.
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Sorry about the thread hijacking... um getting back on topic...
I'm a student... and I um.... do some amateur acting. Yeah. *shifty eyes*
"Some people juggle geese!" -Ancient Chinese proverb.
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I'm a loser. Don't recommend it. The pay stinks.
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Quote:
Originally posted by christhecynic:
1 Agnosticism: Scientific, the results are not yet in.
2 Theism: Semi-scientific, there is evidence but it is far from conclusive, sometimes produces accurate predictions.
3 Atheism: Blind faith, no evidence in support, some evidence against, yet to produce accurate predictions.
Where in the world did you get these definitions from because as an Atheist myself, I can tell you that you are 180 degrees off from what Atheism is about. The whole point of Atheism is that we DON'T subscribe to blind faith. You might want to check out http://www.infidels.org/news/atheism/ for a better understanding of Atheists and Agnostics.
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“It's a real burden being right so often.”
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christhecynic:
Oooohhh! Religious debate! Wait a tick... Isn't that antithetical? Ah, well! You'll get no complaints from me. Have at ye, varlet!
First, and this is just a guess, you're an agnostic, right? Know how I could tell? Whenever someone discusses their religion or (ulp!) their politics, they always spin their beliefs as being the most reasonable and sexy. Take for instance Catholicism: Very sexy. And it's all part of Rome's Master Plan for World Domination.
(Ummm... That was a joke, folks...)
I am a Christian. I find no conflict between Christianity and Science. By 'Christianity', I mean a strict adherence to Christ's teachings, as opposed to, say, the Old Testament's "eye for an eye" doctrine; or some bible-thumper who preaches the Old Testament rather than the New Law as embodied by Christ, in order to foster hatred of homosexuals, women and tax collectors (the symbol of earthly governments).
I believe that God the Creator is neither man nor woman. Why would God need sexual organs? Why would God bother with sexual orientation?
I believe 'She' created the universe as a suitable test for the Human mind. By this, I mean that no matter how often Science peels the onion of Reality, there will always be more levels of reality beneath it. No matter how deeply physicists plumb the quantum realm, they will always find new depths, new puzzles, tantalizingly beyond their grasp. (NB: Though not beyond the 'reach' of one of God's greatest gifts to Humanity: Imagination.)
I also believe that God created the universe in six days -- not six 'ages' euphemistically referred to as 'days', six days. But when 'He' created it, 'She' created it with a past. God's act of creation unfolds in the past to a moment before the Big Bang and in the future to the Big Crunch or heat death, whichever applies. Of course, 'He' might decide to stop the holographic universe before it finishes iterating, too. God's Will, wot?
But I believe there is God. Why? Because I feel 'Her' all around me and in me. I see 'Him' in the animals and the stars; I feel 'Her' in the breeze. Don't you? I don't separate myself from God's creation, nor it from myself. We are all of one wholeness. At the implicate level, everything is one, and that One is part of God. (NB: For those who are wondering 'WTF is he rambling about?', try http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Implicate_order for some hints on where to begin a reconciliation between science and religion. David Bohm was on the right track, by my estimation.)
So, chris', you can believe what you want. Skepticism is good. And it's not like you said, "I don't believe in God." You just don't know who (which sex' turn was it?) 'She' is. Just don't forget God altogether. You can feel it can't you? We're swimming in His omnipresence, Her creation. Don't forget that feeling.
Whether you're Hindu, Muslim, agnostic, Jew... or a worshipper of any of the other 'Infinite Names of God', it matters not one whit to me. Who am I to judge? As long as your God's prime directives are to 'love the other as you love yourself' and 'seek after Me', then our gods are the same, regardless their names. Since Science professes to serve Mankind and seek the deepest mysteries of the Universe, we are of the same God.
These are my beliefs. They do not make me popular with either side of this long-standing rivalry: Science versus God. But then again, the carpenter I've been following for some time now managed to piss off everybody, too (including His own disciples). He may have been on the losing side of His earthly battles; but, I'm certain in my bones it wasn't the wrong side.
Metaphysically,
zoid
P.S.
Can we do politics next? Please, please, please? I don't think we've alienated/aggravated enough people yet. It doesn't even get interesting until people start casting stones at one another. And mark my words: The stones will be wrapped in Reasoning. That's where 'righteousness' comes from, k
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I don't need to look at a web site about what someone calls atheism because I meant the definition of the word not a new usage.
When I say, “Satanist,” I mean, “Person who worships Satan,” not, “Modern hedonist who chooses to rebel against what they see as arbitrary rules that society places on people who happens to use the Christian figure of Satan as a symbol of that rebellion.” So when I say, “Atheist,” I mean, “One who believes in the nonexistence of god.”
That blind belief in the nonexistence of god is very unscientific in all possible ways. If simply blindly believing in things was enough for a scientist we wouldn’t learn very much about the world now would we?
The website you have linked to has a rather odd overlap, agnosticism and “weak atheism” are the same by its definition. I define agnosticism as believing neither in god nor the non-existence of god. Your site agrees with me on this, however it also introduces the term, “weak atheism,” as “lacking belief in Gods” but not “actively believ[ing] that particular gods, or all gods, do not exist.”
In my mind this is Agnosticism as a member of this school of thought believes neither in god(s) nor the non existence of god(s).
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If you want to argue the definition you win already. I'm not getting involved in that kind of thing.
If you want to argue that someone who believes in the nonexistence of god is scientific you’ll have a harder time. There isn’t any proof. Hell, half the things that have been pointed to as proof were known to be lies when they were cited.
For example for thousands of years (about two) atheists have been saying that virgin birth is impossible. It’s a nice target, there is no proof that it actually happened and not all theists believe in it anyway, but many didn’t just say it didn’t happen, they said it couldn’t happen. This of course goes against science as we’ve been able to prove that warm-blooded vertebrae reproduce by parthenogenesis for ages. For as long as people have had turkeys for one thing.
If you want to point to the gap between turkeys and humans that’s fine with me. However I have yet to see any paper in any respectable scientific forum comparing the occurrence of virgin birth in sexual animals to the complexity of the DNA of those animals and then extrapolating the odds of it happening in a human. Not one. We are just meant to take it on faith that it is impossible.
I don’t take things on faith.
On the side of religion you’ve got a lot of experiments, my favorite is the one in Poland, unfortunately I have not been able to get appropriate data on certain atmospheric and solar conditions. Ignoring the atmosphere and approximating on the solar it still comes out as theism 100% correct and atheism 99.9999999999999999999999999999999999999999999777% incorrect.
But this is a pro-theist example and there is still a 00.0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000223% chance that atheism is right, you’d have to take it on faith that this wasn’t just a series of coincidences like that small percent says is possible.
I don’t take things on faith, but for me this is close enough. For many (many, many, oh so very many) others it is not.
A theist looks at the world and says, “There are several a lot of verifiable highly improbable events occurring surrounding the thing known as religion. (And even more things that can’t be verified.) This is indicative of an outside factor; I’ll call that factor God.”
(Yes, it is hasty and unscientific, I never said theism was scientific, I just said it wasn’t blind faith.)
An agnostic looks at the world and says, “There is no actual proof of the existence of that factor, I reserve judgement.”
An atheist has never taken a statistics course.
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How can you argue that? If you chose to believe in something then believe in it. If that belief is in the nonexistence of god go for it, I’ll support you on it and make sure people don't insult you, but admit the truth. To believe in the nonexistence of god is to believe w
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Very interesting points, but I would like to point out that 'proof' of theism, at least in the physical kind, involving the bible n various cousins, could (and many believe are) just a bunch a books someone wrote somewhere to explain stuff they dont understand. Well, i dunno.
I would like to think that I am an open-minded atheist, and on that note, I should point out that if i am so open-minded, were i to encounter proof of god, i should welcome it. Frankly, i probably would. I'd question it, sure, but at some point, i think i could believe in God when looking at something tangible. The thing is, as it remains at the moment, I can explain, or remain confident that someone around can explain, everything around me, and for things really tiny and things really far away... well... we'll know someday.
I would like to offer that athiests believe in science without being scientists the same way thiests believe in religion without being a monk.
I'd also like to say, if anyone ever saw the movie Contact... (i'm afraid i didnt read the book) the main character gives, to me, a convincing atheistic ideal in the phrase "How can you be sure you aren't deluding yourself?"
Just some food for contemplation.
"Some people juggle geese!" -Ancient Chinese proverb.
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Quote:
Originally posted by zoid:
First, and this is just a guess, you're an agnostic, right?
Actually ... no.
I did seriously consider pretending to be one when the first to respond was an atheist though. It's only a belief in honesty over conflict avoidance that stopped me.
My skill is in math, not science. Lack of proof doesn’t hinder me so long as the process I use gets me to the right answer. If the statistics favor that process I’ll call it correct even without solid proof unless the potential results of being wrong are very bad or my gut tells me not to.
Neither of these is the case so I accept god.
Quote:
Take for instance Catholicism: Very sexy.
God I loved the last pope, “Prejudice and enmity have no place in true religion.” Almost makes me want to be a Catholic, unfortunately there are other doctrines too.
Quote:
But then again, the carpenter I've been following for some time now managed to piss off everybody, too (including His own disciples). He may have been on the losing side of His earthly battles; but, I'm certain in my bones it wasn't the wrong side.
An important distinction if ever there was one.
Quote:
Can we do politics next? Please, please, please? I don't think we've alienated/aggravated enough people yet.
Fear the Lord and the king; do not associate with those given to change.
-Proverbs 24:21
Quote:
It doesn't even get interesting until people start casting stones at one another.
You shall stone him with stones until he dies because he tried to entice you away from the lord your god
-Deuteronomy 13:10
Quote:
And mark my words: The stones will be wrapped in Reasoning. That's where 'righteousness' comes from, killing people to save their souls...
Well we always burn down villages to save them, why not bludgeon people do death with rocks to save their souls?
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Quote:
Originally posted by Whitefall:
I'd also like to say, if anyone ever saw the movie Contact... (i'm afraid i didnt read the book) the main character gives, to me, a convincing atheistic ideal in the phrase "How can you be sure you aren't deluding yourself?"
And then you have it bounced back at you. It works both ways. Delusion for god, delusion against god, either way is just as likely. I follow the statistics, you follow your eyes. You base your beliefs on what you see and deny that which you don’t, which is fine. Someone in Chicago has no need to believe that Bangor exists, why should someone need to believe in god?
I base my beliefs on what I understand, I can understand miracles as natural phenomena only if there is an unknown factor, and I see no reason not to call it god. If god is a part of nature or nature a part of god the result is the same to me, so why quibble whether there is an unknown factor that acts exactly like god is expected to, or a god that can be explained (incorrectly) as an unknown factor?
I don't.
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I just wanted to add that it would very hard to prove that Bangor existed, it’s just something you do take on faith. There is nothing I can do to support it’s existence in any solid way and I’ve been there.
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Christhecynic, you compare Bibles? Please explain
Whitefall, the Bible doesn't act as evidence for God. The Bible is only a collection of stories, myths, legends, and histories. Personal belief and the inability to explain 'things' such as the creation of the universe does that.
Zoid, how can you have a strict adherence to Christ' teachings when these teachings vary in different places and are open to different interpretations? Perhaps you mean that you have a strict adherence to your own specific understanding of his teachings, or that you follow a specific domination with regards to their teaching?
It is also inaccurate to consider the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) as presenting 'eye for an eye' teaching. There are many places in the Hebrew Bible where such teaching is proposed but also many other places where it is condemned. Plus, the New Testament has many violent and unacceptable elements - check out the Christ figure in Revelation for one.
The New Testament has just as much (and just as little) hatred of homosexuals, women and so on as the Hebrew Bible with the added addition of a copious amount of anti-Semitism (in addition to the xenophobic elements of the Hebrew Bible but in different forms).
I am a grad student studying the Bible with a specific emphasis on childrens Bibles (I am currently looking at retellings of Jonah) and the secular use of Biblical stories in culture - I am happily working on Christ figures in Buffy.
extremely dimensionally transcendental
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