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Slater
SFN Regular
USA
1668 Posts |
 Posted - 04/17/2001 : 17:35:44
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As I was saying before this redesign got under way.....
The point of (ChristianSkeptic's) "experiment" was that with all of the different ideas of morality that have come along through human history, what fundamental basis under atheism would a president follow to place importance on the moral question of
mass-murder? While that may be offensive to certain people, I think it is an important
question when you get down to its fundamentals.
I've been at this Theist vs. Atheist game since the mid nineteen sixties, I've seen this same "thought experiment" dragged out many times. It is nothing but pure slander based on prejudice.
That Michael the gorilla study is not very exact, and sure doesn't prove that apes can
speak. His "signs" can be interpreted in many ways, and through a little adlibbing we can
pretend he is talking.
Michael, Koko and any number of subject chimps speak (spoke) standard American Sign Language.
Nothing vague about it. Any educated deaf person in the US can chat with them.
I'll give you that they aren't rocket scientists, they have IQs of six or seven year old humans. The conversation about evolutionary advancement of gorillas was a question on why Michael thought that gorillas were "better" "more pretty" than humans.
There is no slight of hand here, they are thinking, feeling, non-human beings.
The question eventually rises of "Who is God?" or "What is it that we would put our faith in?" God's nature and purpose reaches beyond our finite scope and sees all reality, even our free choices.
You have probably heard that statement so many times that you repeat it as though it meant anything. It is like saying "Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain. The Great and Powerful OZ has spoken!!!!"
God has no nature, no purpose. It isn't beyond your understanding—there is nothing to understand.
Again, what gives anything meaning. If survival and social order have no meaning, then neither would morality. How can anything rationally have meaning to us without a type of God?
Did you ever see "Hanna and Her Sisters"? The character that Woody Allen plays comes to realize that without God life has no meaning. He humorously samples different religions and comes to the conclusion that without meaning life isn't worth living. After botching a suicide attempt he winds up at the movies watching the Marx Brothers in "Duck Soup." There he comes to the realization that it is the experience of life that he really wanted and not some meaning.
The "meaning of Life" is whatever you, yourself, ascribe to it. If you want to go with an "off the shelf",pre-packaged meaning– hey, it's your life. Personally I prefer one that is supported by facts and not fantasy, but that's just me.
Are you saying that the human brain cannot do what computers do?
No, I'm saying that mechanical brains cannot (for the most part) do what biological brains can.
Lastly how do you know that the brain, all by itself, can rationally think about its own
existence and rationalize what it does?
There is nothing to suggest otherwise.
I assume you were talking about Immanuel Kant, the philosopher. After my short study,
his ideas seemed very interesting, and somewhat similar to my own, but he also seemed
to be a little off and contradictory from what I read, and he seemed to ignore many important questions.
That's the lad I'm referring to.
Well the brain, all by itself, cannot explain how we would be able to observe wormholes.
We have never observed a "wormhole." Although a mainstay of science fiction, wormholes (as far as we can prove at the present time) exist only as mathematical probabilities.
For instance, if I go into a rocket ship, and fly around the universe near the speed of light,and return to the earth, I would have experienced a different rate of time relative to someone who remained on earth… The universe should not be able to observe itself and then experience two different rates of time, relative to itself. In other words, without
possessing an observational property, time and space should not be recognizable to our minds.
This would be true if we were created out of whole cloth. Say if we instantly sprang into existence out of magic dust. (If you teach children that they are descended from monkeys they will act like monkeys.Then if you teach them that we are descended from dust will they treat people like dirt?)
Fortunately we evolved over eons and have acquired many faculties in that time.
You seem to have a common misunderstanding about what time is. Commonly it is treated as a dimension. The fourth dimension out of Einstein's seven. (The actual existence of 7 dimensions was confirmed by physical experiments performed during the First World War. This would put the kibosh on both Kants' theory of human limitations and Newton's version of gravity. Just thinking about any more than 3 or 4 dimensions sends me straight to the cocktail shaker)
Time is only a side effect of motion and not a constant. Yes, the faster you go the slower time "moves".
Conversely the slower you travel the faster time moves.
If you were able to divorce yourself of all movement—earth rotation, earth orbit speed, suns galactic orbital speed, galaxies sub movement and universal expansion— and remain perfectly still then all of time would occur simultaneously.
There is nothing "fixed" about time. Around these parts (earth) speed remains fairly constant so no real differences are noticeable.
An equally if not more persuasive argument, for a separate observational property in our
minds, is found in Quantum Mechanics.
I don't have the patience to teach Quantum Mechanics 101. Timothy Ferris has done a fine job of that in his books already.
You are the first Christian I have met who has gone this route. Usually it is the "New Agers" like to equate a tortured version of quantum physics with magic.
This does not mean that our brains do not play important roles in our understanding of
things, but without observing the universe as a separate entity, our unique experiences of
time, space, and matter cannot exist. This works like a computer, we can program it to do
one thing or another depending on various circumstances through measuring apparatus, but it cannot reason about or observe the universe.
This is sort of the reverse to the "intelligent design" argument. If we can't do it then nature couldn't.
Actually for the past seven years now we have had computers that reason and observe and react.
These are not PCs mind you.
I know that there is meaning behind everything. I have plenty of proof that is
demonstrated to myself in my own experiences.
Proof, you say? By all means share it. I've been looking for proof for decades to no avail. What proof do you have? Why didn't you share it with us before? How do we independently reproduce you experiment?
I can reason things and thus expect everything to have a reason. It is not just a want on my part, but a fact that I know exists.
At first glance this would appear to be blatant anthropomorphism. But you say that it is a fact. If so then it should be provable—so…prove it.
Science has already given us demonstrable proof for the existence of spirits and a God.
...While the idea of spirits and the God of the bible existing are not entirely provable, I think the underlying principles that they are based on are not only provable but also intuitively known.
You aren't referring to that article in some of the national science magazines "New Theory: God Did It" are you? That was written by Edward K. Lankford a senior at U of G. It's pure sarcasm–humor–not science. It's a joke!
First you say there is scientific proof, then you say it isn't provable, then you resort to "intuition." It sounds like it won't be too long before you are ready to admit the facts to yourself.
I have not found perfect evidence for the bible…scientifically sufficient, and the evidence I am studying seems more than sufficient.
Check your sources. Use Carl Sagan's "Baloney detection kit" on all evidence.
It is not outside of my realm of possibilities that the bible is a fabrication, but that would not negate the truths that I do find in it either. If you can demonstrate to me that truth does not exist, or at least the truth that I find in the bible, then I will cease following it.
There are many, many "truths" in the bible as there are in the mythologies of all the peoples of this world. I am not asking you to ignore Christian "truths" I am asking you to face "facts." You can keep both and be a better person for it.
I try to use history and science to back up the bible I will always come up short, this is for two reasons. Number one is that history is in the past and I cannot experience it in the
present.
And with one fell swoop you wipe out all of history. This is reasoning that would negate any thought of Jesus. He lived (supposedly) 2000 years ago and since we cannot experience the past first hand we can only ignore him. I don't buy that you are serious about #1.
Number two is that to demonstrably prove the God of the bible, I would have to make Him
my slave as He runs through my scientific hoops.
If this holds true for Skeptics then it must also hold true for Believers.
If you cannot, by your own admission, demonstrate proof of god then you cannot make certain claims.
You can't claim to know his likes and dislikes. You can't claim to know his actions. You can't claim to "know" that he even exists.
And yet you do do all of these things, without the slightest desire of proof to back your claims up.
This becomes an ethical dilemma. It's like the truth in advertising laws—you cannot ethically make claims for your product that you cannot back up. (Carter's Little Liver Pills had nothing in any way shape or form to do with livers) It is not moral for you to tell people about what god requires of them if you have
no proof that there is a god.
Your Number 2 seems more like a Catch 22.
I believe that what evidence I have been given is already good enough for me to reason
that the bible is true and that its God is real.
Read over what you have written.(I did) You gave no evidence at all. You said there was evidence but you never said what it was.
Face it, you require no evidence. In fact you imply that lack of evidence is a reason to believe when you say
Again, just because something may be beyond your realm of understanding, is no reason
to assume that it is impossible.
It isn't beyond my realm of understanding at all. In fact it's painfully ordinary and not at all complex.
You, and a whole lot of other people, have been conned.
Occam's Razor at work.
Edited by - Slater on 04/17/2001 17:41:03
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Tiptup
Skeptic Friend
USA
86 Posts |
Posted - 04/18/2001 : 00:49:11 [Permalink]
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quote:
As posted by JohnPaul Slater:
As I was saying before this redesign got under way.....
I'm sorry, but I decided to start a new topic to better reflect what I am debating. Plus I wanted to somewhat distance myself from ChristianSkeptic's original posting. Well, that and I have no idea what Euthyroph-whatever means. I really wish I had a larger vocabulary, that way I might be able to avoid much of the trouble that people have when deciphering my statements (Damn Television!!). (Woops I said a naughty word.)
Anyhoo, in my post I deliberately went into an extensive retouching of what I am trying to say, so that anyone who hasn't seen the original topic thread will get the basics of what I was trying to say. Also I reposted almost everything you communicated in this last post of yours. If you feel that I have left out some necessary information for your position(s), then don't hesitate to reply to my new post and add your thoughts; I don't intend to continue this debate here.
Tiptup
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I DON'T MAKE SENSE-I GOT MY PRIDE; DON'T NEED NO MEANING; I FEEL NO SHAME-I WILL NOT BELIEVE; I GOT NO CHOICE-I'M OUT OF CONTROL; AND I LOVE IT!! |
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ljbrs
SFN Regular
USA
842 Posts |
Posted - 06/05/2001 : 22:00:42 [Permalink]
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All right, already.
Could somebody tell me the meaning of the word: "EUTHRYPHO"?
I looked it up in my dictionaries and did not find it. I do not happen to have the Oxford English Dictionary (too costly and takes up more space than I have available). EUTHRYPHO appears to be derived from the Greek.
ljbrs
If you KNEW better, you'd DO better.
Edited by - ljbrs on 06/09/2001 19:19:31 |
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Tokyodreamer
SFN Regular
USA
1447 Posts |
Posted - 06/06/2001 : 08:59:36 [Permalink]
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quote:
All right, already.
Could somebody tell me the meening of the word: "EUTHRYPHO"?
I looked it up in my dictionaries and did not find it. I do not happen to have the Oxford English Dictionary (too costly and takes up more space than I have available). It sounds like it is derived from the Greek.
Check out the fifth post under "The Source of Morality and Reason (continued)" in this forum heading. Slater posted an explanation.
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Gambatte kudasai! |
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ljbrs
SFN Regular
USA
842 Posts |
Posted - 06/07/2001 : 20:20:23 [Permalink]
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Thanks. I shall look for Slater's post explaining EUTHRYPHO right away.
ljbrs
If I knew better, I'd do better -- but what the h..., nobody's perfect.
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@tomic
Administrator
USA
4607 Posts |
Posted - 06/07/2001 : 21:20:17 [Permalink]
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A search for that word on the forum search engine will swiftly produce all posts with it mentioned. Just make sure it's the search link in the forum and not on the home page.
@tomic
Gravity, not just a good idea...it's the law! |
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ljbrs
SFN Regular
USA
842 Posts |
Posted - 06/09/2001 : 19:24:24 [Permalink]
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Atomic:
Thanks. Eventually I will get the hang of this site. You have a lot of great things here that I would never expect to find.
ljbrs
Perfection is a state of growth...
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