AA - The biology and physics of god - A few thoughts
wcb
creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
in six days.
The question, rarely asked as far as I can see is, how
is all of this done? we understand here in this world
the notion of physics, the 4 great forces, the laws of
phsyics, of quantum chromodynamics, of chemistry,
biochemisry and so on.
The world is regular and understandable.
Gods more resemmble fairy tales, fairy god mothers with
magic wands, pumpkins become coaches, mice, horses.
As a strong atheist, I believe theologists here have been
given a free ride too long
And it is time to start building a critical examination of
underlying claims made implicitly by religion and theology.
What is proof any god can do any of these things anyway?
What possible mechanism is there for doing something like
creating a universe? How does an omniscient god know all
in the universe, or the future?
What is the mechanism by which such things are done?
information is somethiong that is discrete. It must be
saved and handled.
Is god digital or analogue?
How do we know? How would we approach this as a research
project? If we have no competent and workable plan to
approach these questions as a research project we cannot
do research, no answers are possible.
What has been the research program of theology as to
such questions to date? Shaman on drugs?
Was there ever one? If not why not?
I will be staring a project to start thinking hard
about this aspect of gods I rarely see serously approached.
I suppose to give it a working nickname I will call it the
problem of the physics of god.
Am I the only one here that has been bugged by the assertions
made about god without evidence or reason to believe?
Am I the only one here that has been irritated by the ID
types that claim god is scientific when obviously there are more puzzles
than answers?
Am I the only one here that dislikes how the theists have been allowed a
free ride here?
I have a little saying I use, "The Easter Bunny waves her paw and magic
happens!", a sarcastic rejonder to "goddidit", but deeper. How does god do
it? Like a magic fairy godmother with a magic wand?
What is different between a magic god and a magic Easter Bunny anyway?
Or God and a fairy for that matter.
Any thoughts, any thing that people have thought about along these lines
over the years? Comments, ideas, snarky wisecracks?
From now on, my rejinder to such claims will be, what is the mechanism by
which this great miracle is achieved? Oh, God is a spirit? What is that
and can you prove it? Spirits just do that? How do you know that and where
is hard evidence it is indeed true?
No more free rides for god, but I like my Easter Bunny, she can
ride all she wants.
--
You are a fluke of the Universe
You have no right to be here,
and whether you can hear it or not,
the Universe is laughing behind your back.
Cheerful Charlie
Gandalf Grey
"wcb" <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com> wrote in message
news:12grgas...@corp.supernews.com...
> Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
> creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
> in six days.
Only for orthodox believers and cherry picking fundamentalists.
Your problem is that YOUR god is a strawman. YOUR god has already been
demolished by better arguments than yours, which leaves the god and gods
that most people really believe in untouched by your bumpersticker
arguments.
>
> The question, rarely asked as far as I can see is, how
> is all of this done?
Actually it's been asked often.
> I will be staring a project to start thinking hard
> about this aspect of gods I rarely see serously approached.
It's been approached and addressed by many. But if you want to go off in a
corner and constipate yourself with the problem in order to pump up your
narcissistic self-image, go for it.
>
> I suppose to give it a working nickname I will call it the
> problem of the physics of god.
Maybe a better title would be.
The Physics of God: Barwell's Latest Attempt at Ego Polishing.
wcb
>
> Your problem is that YOUR god is a strawman.
What a bitter and hateful little man.
And I mean, little. What made you such a scuttling
bag of hate and mean spiritedness?
Isn't there a pill you can take for this?
Gandalf Grey
> Gandalf Grey wrote:
>
>>
>> Your problem is that YOUR god is a strawman.
>
>
> What a bitter and hateful little man.
He's YOUR god, Barwell. You deal with him.
> You are a fluke of the Universe
You are the liver fluke of the Universe
Sphere
wcb wrote:
> Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
> creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
> in six days.
>
> The question, rarely asked as far as I can see is, how
> is all of this done? we understand here in this world
> the notion of physics, the 4 great forces, the laws of
> phsyics, of quantum chromodynamics, of chemistry,
> biochemisry and so on.
Smells like a god.
>
> The world is regular and understandable.
>
Smells like a belief.
---
No essence. No permanence. No perfection.
Stephen Knight
wrote:
>Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
>creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
>in six days.
I lose it at the 'six' day thingy. Why would a 'GOD' need so much
time to do something it could do instantaneously?
The religers seem to ignore the all powerful aspects that they
themselves define their god by.
Of course, an atheists isn't bound by the 'In the Beginning...'
crap.
Warlord Steve
BAAWA
mass-energy
Stephen Knight wrote:
> On Sun, 17 Sep 2006 16:42:00 -0500, wcb <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com>
> wrote:
>
> >Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
> >creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
> >in six days.
>
> I lose it at the 'six' day thingy. Why would a 'GOD' need so much
> time to do something it could do instantaneously?
>
'He' needed a lot more time than that. About 4.5 billion years.
wcb
> On Sun, 17 Sep 2006 16:42:00 -0500, wcb <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com>
> wrote:
>
>>Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
>>creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
>>in six days.
>
> I lose it at the 'six' day thingy. Why would a 'GOD' need so much
> time to do something it could do instantaneously?
Hmmmm, really hadn't thought about that.
I will have to add it to my list of question for theologians
in my "physics of god" project.
>
> The religers seem to ignore the all powerful aspects that they
> themselves define their god by.
Yes, the god of the OT is not exactly the more esoteric god
of later prophest.
> Of course, an atheists isn't bound by the 'In the Beginning...'
> crap.
Which is the biggest wonderment of all. God sits there for
a small price of forever, and then one fine day decides to
create a universe. Yet he is immutable and unchanging.
"What was god doing before he created the Universe? He
was creating hell for those who ask too many questions!"
- St Augustine.
This is an old question that as you see, made some theologians get
snarky.
I'd like to be able to publish a book of 1001 equally fine questions.
wcb
>
> Stephen Knight wrote:
>> On Sun, 17 Sep 2006 16:42:00 -0500, wcb <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>> >Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
>> >creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
>> >in six days.
>>
>> I lose it at the 'six' day thingy. Why would a 'GOD' need so much
>> time to do something it could do instantaneously?
>>
>
> 'He' needed a lot more time than that. About 4.5 billion years.
>
Uhmmm, at least 13 billion or so, innit?
wcb
>
> He's YOUR god, Barwell. You deal with him.
>
I just did. God is kaput, like your credibility.
GODS WITHOUT OMNIBENEVOLENCE - CAN
THEY BE DISPROVED?
W.C. Barwell 9-16-06
Gods that are said to be all good, omnibenevolent,
soon have problems with the Epicurean problem of evil.
A god that is all good and all powerful should
be interested in eliminating all evil, but evil exists.
This can be used to utterly disprove such gods.
This is not a problem to the strong atheist because
most important religions today have allegedly all powerful,
all good gods, Islam, Hinduism. Judaism, Christianity and more.
Bahis, Sikhs and many others share this set of attributes,
attributes of the OEC class of gods.
But consider the idea of a class of omnipotent, omniscient,
creator gods that are not all good, or not even good at all.
There are few if any religions that have such a god,
but for purposes of strong atheism is a challenge.
A god so created to resisted debunking is a challenges as it dodges
the Epicurean problem of evil by dropping the claims of all
being all good.
Can we logically debunk such a god concept?
If we drop omnibenevolent to simply good, not all good, yes.
Epicurus's Problem of Evil
Epicurus's problem of evil is not found in Epicurus's works,
few have come down to us and then often in fragmentary form.
Epicurus's Problem of Evil is to be found criticized by Lactantius,
a second century Christian writer.
Lactantius A Treatise on the Anger of God
Chapter 13
"But if this account is true, which the Stoics were
in no manner able to see, that argument also of
Epicurus is done away. God, he says, either wishes
to take away evils, and is unable; or He is able, and
is unwilling; or He is neither willing nor able, or
He is both willing and able. If He is willing and
is unable, He is feeble, which is not in
accordance with the character of God; if He is
able and unwilling, He is envious, which is
equally at variance with God; if He is neither
willing nor able, He is both envious and feeble,
and therefore not God; if He is both willing and
able, which alone is suitable to God, from what
source then are evils? or why does He not remove
them? I know that many of the philosophers, who
defend providence, are accustomed to be disturbed
by this argument, and are almost driven against
their will to admit that God takes no interest in
anything, which Epicurus especially aims at;.."
Here we can note that Epicurus does not say god is all
good, omnibenevolent, or all powerful, omnipotent.
Such strong versions are derived, more or less, from David
Hume's 18th century restatement of Epicurus's Problem of Evil.
in Hume's "Dialogues concerning Natural Religion".
Epicurus noted soon after going to Athens, a philosopher named
Theodorus had to flee Athens on charges of Atheism. Epicurus then
tempered his religious arguments. however, Aristotle had
claimed that god, the prime mover, had no interest in affairs of man.
And Plato had claimed all gods were good. Epicurus here then
is able to show indeed gods, if they exist are distant from man.
natural evils happen, drought,floods, epidemics, and gods do not
prevent them.
As Lactantius notes, many found it a persuasive argument.
And it is. If we take that argument to argue against good and
powerful gods on grounds of problems of evil, it is still persuasive.
A god need not be all powerful and all good to at least make some
effort to seem like more than exactly nothing.
Thus a god that is not all good, but is good, not all powerful,
but is powerful, is still easily shown to be impossible.
GODS THAT ARE NOT CONCERNED WITH GOOD OR EVIL
This sort of god is not a god that seems to be worshiped by
any real religion. one might have gods that are not good or
even evil, some animist religions have their good spirits and
evils spirits, but an OEC class type god without the component of
goodness at all, doesn't seem to be a real world god. Such a god
then is of more academic interest to a strong atheist.
can this type of god be disproven?
If such a god is not good, is indifferent to either moral or natural
evil, such a god also loses other usual OEC type attributes.
Love, mercy, justice, and so on.
Actually such a god is pretty alien. Why would such an indifferent
god create mankind? Not obvious for love of mankind, as per usual
gods that love good men and punish wickedness.
Logically if such a god existed, that god would not send us
revelations of laws and morals to be followed with threats
for failure to do so. Nor would such a god be concerned with
our acts or thoughts.
Since we have nothing else to offer, no sort of assistance,
or other advantage, its hard to see what such a god would want
anything to do with mankind. We should expect no revelations,
prophets, or any sort of concern from such a god.
Disproof of any sort of god like this would have to
go to disproving natural religion claims, cosmology et al.
Since gods like this would be indifferent, we can rule out
moral proofs.
The Prime Mover argument has been debunked since science has
shown turbulence from early eras of the Big Bang produced movement
of matter in the Universe, no godly Prime Mover is needed.
We can rule out proofs from revelation.
we can set aside disproofs via Problem of Evil.
Aquinas's (derived from Anslem - See The Prosologian)
proof from degrees of perfection are out since
a god that is not explicitly good lacks that perfection
at least.
leaving -
1. Cosmological
2. Design
3. Necessary being
If god that is not good but otherwise is an OEC class god
can be shown to be impossible because that god is unnecessary,
no more needed than fairies or leprechauns, we can debunk that
god as alledged creator of all.
1. Cosmological
The cosmological argument is:
Everything has a cause.
Nothing is its own cause.
A chain of cause and effect cannot be infinite.
Therefore there must be a first cause.
This is coupled with the idea of a necessary first cause or being
(god).
A chain of cause and effect can be infinite. There is no
real reason to conclude that except as argument by assertion,
or argument by definition. Since there is no logical reason
to think this is true, it may be denied.
There must be a first cause. We can easily imagine many causes,
and even many causes going back into infinity. This is argument
by definition again and argument from ignorance. We can deny this also.
This fails.
2. Design
The design argument claims things are too complex to
have come about by chance. But this is bluntly, argument
from ignorance. The fact is a god is too complex to explain,
how a god comes to exist, has abilities to create universe, et al.
No theist can hazard how a god does these things, what the
physics or biology of a god is. God does not explain anything
and god as a concept needs needs explaining. A god merely pushes
the complexity problem back a level. This fails utterly then.
God is not only necessary but is superfulous all together.
3. Necessary being
God is said to be a necessary being, that is, as first in a chain
of all existant things, god must be necessary. But this makes
the assumption that there must be a first cause. The theists claim
it is impossible there there be an infinite regress of cause and
effect,
but that is simply false. There may well be just that a chain
of cause and effects going back into infinite time. And not just one
cause but a bundle of cause and effects giving rise to matter, energy,
and space and time, and other physical effects that together create
what
we call the Universe. This can be denied as specious.
God is said to be necessary, not contingent. A house cannot be
necessary as it is made up of things, bricks, lumber, roofing
materials et al. These must be existant to create a house, which
is then contingent.
God is said to have essences, omnipotence, omniscience, intelligence,
ability, immutability and so on. These are essences and thus it
implies, like our house, god is contingent, not necessary. Theologians
cheat here with an obvious ad hocism. God is "simple", all his
essences
are one essence rolled into one. We can thus deny this claim because
of its obvious specious ad hocism and its failure to deal with issues,
how is it a god exists at all that has these essences? Where did they
come from, how does god work, what is the physics, the biology of a
god?
It is argument by definition and fails to make an intellectually honest
attempt to deal with these questions.
God is not obviously necessary at all, and there remain many questions
not answered about how a god is supposed to exist and work.
God here then is argument by definition and argument from ignorance.
So god as necessary being fails and we see that underlying this are serious
unanswered questions that call a gods existence into question.
Bluntly all the arguments collectively noted as "Cosmological, first cause,
design, necessary being", tree of Aquina's Five ways, are failed arguments.
God cannot exist as first cause, as necessary being, as designer. The most
glaring problem is necessary being, god as we see has a lot of unexplained
claims made for god implicitly that make it extremely unlikely. And strong
atheism here is obliged to call theism on these problematic complications.
This is rank argument from definition. How does god do this or that, "Why
he just does!". We are expected as Atheists to answer all questions as
to how the Universe does this or that, while basic claims about god are
given a free ride and not to be questioned. No strong atheist must do that.
A god that rests on unanswered questions is no god at all.
it is a magic fairy tale creature at best.
It rests of arguments from ignorance and argument by definition.
Further more, science gets along well without god and explains
a lot with great success. We can see entire galaxies formed and
shaped by natural forces with no use for a god.
Theology has a rather unenviable track record, over 4,000
years of trying to explain natural phenomenon and it has so
far been entirely wrong always and ever. Why pay it any attention now?
God is rather unexplained. What is the physics and biology of god?
How does god work, how does god do anything? What are the theories
and what supporting evidence do we have for any claims to be made for
gods?
Here we see theology is totally silent.
God then is not even a theory.
This we can see gods cannot exist as claimed, cosmologically,
as necessary being, as designers of all. Such a god than cannot
exist, all we are left with a is a pile of unanswerable questions,
specious arguments, and sophistries such as gods "simplicity",
ad hocisms.
All OEC gods then cannot exist and that includes OEC gods where
good is set aside as an attribute. That dodge slides by Epicurus's
Problem of Evil, but does not avoid the problems of being debunked
via the claims such a god is creator of all, and underlying
questions about what is meant by god and how a god can even work.
This idea that god needs explaining,that the physics and biology or
what we may wish to call this problem, is a good one strong atheism
should deal with.
If god is in the final analysis an incoeherent idea with more
problems than explanations, obviously it is a bad idea.
(End)
--
You are a fluke of the Universe
mass-energy
wcb wrote:
> mass-energy wrote:
>
> >
> > Stephen Knight wrote:
> >> On Sun, 17 Sep 2006 16:42:00 -0500, wcb <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com>
> >> wrote:
> >>
> >> >Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
> >> >creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
> >> >in six days.
> >>
> >> I lose it at the 'six' day thingy. Why would a 'GOD' need so much
> >> time to do something it could do instantaneously?
> >>
> >
> > 'He' needed a lot more time than that. About 4.5 billion years.
> >
>
> Uhmmm, at least 13 billion or so, innit?
>
Ah, that's right it's the UNI-verse not Earth.
wcb
>
> wcb wrote:
>> mass-energy wrote:
>>
>> >
>> > Stephen Knight wrote:
>> >> On Sun, 17 Sep 2006 16:42:00 -0500, wcb <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com>
>> >> wrote:
>> >>
>> >> >Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
>> >> >creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
>> >> >in six days.
>> >>
>> >> I lose it at the 'six' day thingy. Why would a 'GOD' need so much
>> >> time to do something it could do instantaneously?
>> >>
>> >
>> > 'He' needed a lot more time than that. About 4.5 billion years.
>> >
>>
>> Uhmmm, at least 13 billion or so, innit?
>>
>
> Ah, that's right it's the UNI-verse not Earth.
>
At least on the inside.....
Gandalf Grey
> Stephen Knight wrote:
>
>> On Sun, 17 Sep 2006 16:42:00 -0500, wcb <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>>Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
>>>creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
>>>in six days.
>>
>> I lose it at the 'six' day thingy. Why would a 'GOD' need so much
>> time to do something it could do instantaneously?
>
>
> Hmmmm, really hadn't thought about that.
And since that's one of the oldest questions in the book, I think we just
got a snapshot on how clueless you really are.
Gandalf Grey
> Gandalf Grey wrote:
>
>>
>> He's YOUR god, Barwell. You deal with him.
>>
>
> I just did.
And as usual, you flopped.
> GODS WITHOUT GOOD AND EVIL
> W.C. Barwell 9-16-06
>
> Gods that are said to be all good, omnibenevolent,
> soon have problems with the Epicurean problem of evil.
A problem that has been stated over and over again by people, unlike
Barwell, who actually know what they're talking about. And in the modern
era for those not bound like Barwell to Hellenistic Philosophy, The
Evidential Argument from Evil is an excellent way of debunking the orthodox
god.
> But consider the idea of a class of omnipotent, omniscient,
> creator gods that are not all good, or not even good at all.
>
> There are few if any religions that have such a god,
> but for purposes of strong atheism is a challenge.
> A god so created to resisted debunking is a challenges as it dodges
> the Epicurean problem of evil by dropping the claims of all
> being all good.
>
> Can we logically debunk such a god concept?
>
> If we drop omnibenevolent to simply good, not all good, yes.
Actually, unless you retain omnipotent, the answer is no.
> Thus a god that is not all good, but is good, not all powerful,
> but is powerful, is still easily shown to be impossible.
Actually, no it's not. A god that is not all powerful is not constrained by
logic or necessity to destroy all evil or make revelations or much of
anything else. A god that is not all good really doesn't change those facts
at all. Leaving you without an argument.
>
> GODS THAT ARE NOT CONCERNED WITH GOOD OR EVIL
>
> This sort of god is not a god that seems to be worshiped by
> any real religion. one might have gods that are not good or
> even evil, some animist religions have their good spirits and
> evils spirits, but an OEC class type god without the component of
> goodness at all, doesn't seem to be a real world god. Such a god
> then is of more academic interest to a strong atheist.
> can this type of god be disproven?
>
> If such a god is not good, is indifferent to either moral or natural
> evil, such a god also loses other usual OEC type attributes.
> Love, mercy, justice, and so on.
>
> Actually such a god is pretty alien. Why would such an indifferent
> god create mankind?
On the other hand, why not?
> Not obvious for love of mankind, as per usual
> gods that love good men and punish wickedness.
non sequitur. A god that 'love's good men' is not logically bound to
'punish wickedness.' Your consuming hatred for orthodoxy has once again
scrambled your thinking. Conflating goodness with 'the desire to punish
evil' is a mindset, not a logical necessity.
>
> Logically if such a god existed, that god would not send us
> revelations of laws and morals to be followed with threats
> for failure to do so. Nor would such a god be concerned with
> our acts or thoughts.
Logically, if such a god existed, there's no logical need for revelation or
not revelation. Nor is there a logical need for threats. Nor is there a
logical need for a concern with acts and thought.
>
> Since we have nothing else to offer, no sort of assistance,
> or other advantage, its hard to see what such a god would want
> anything to do with mankind. We should expect no revelations,
> prophets, or any sort of concern from such a god.
Nor would we logically expect NOT to expect such things. You haven't
logically tied your premise to anything that comes after your original
premise....an ongoing problem with all your quasi 'arguments'.
>
> Disproof of any sort of god like this would have to
> go to disproving natural religion claims, cosmology et al.
>
> Since gods like this would be indifferent, we can rule out
> moral proofs.
>
> The Prime Mover argument has been debunked since science has
> shown turbulence from early eras of the Big Bang produced movement
> of matter in the Universe, no godly Prime Mover is needed.
Which is not a proof that no Prime Mover exists. The notion of what is
'needed' in your pretend arguments is not equivalent to logical sufficiency.
>
> We can rule out proofs from revelation.
> we can set aside disproofs via Problem of Evil.
> Aquinas's (derived from Anslem - See The Prosologian)
> proof from degrees of perfection are out since
> a god that is not explicitly good lacks that perfection
> at least.
>
> leaving -
> 1. Cosmological
> 2. Design
> 3. Necessary being
>
> If god that is not good but otherwise is an OEC class god
> can be shown to be impossible because that god is unnecessary,
And here your argument breaks down. "Unnecessary" is not equivalent to the
idea of logical sufficiency. Being able to prove that god is not necessary
for a particular process is not the same as proving that a god cannot be
involved in the same process.
> God is not obviously necessary at all,
Nor obviously NOT necessary.
>
> So god as necessary being fails
Actually, it's your argument that fails.
> You are a fluke of the Universe
You are the liver fluke of the Universe.
Uncle Vic
(backandf...@yahoo.com) made the light shine upon us with this:
>
> Stephen Knight wrote:
>> On Sun, 17 Sep 2006 16:42:00 -0500, wcb <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>> >Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
>> >creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
>> >in six days.
>>
>> I lose it at the 'six' day thingy. Why would a 'GOD' need so much
>> time to do something it could do instantaneously?
>>
>
> 'He' needed a lot more time than that. About 4.5 billion years.
>
Yet we have evidence the universe has been around for 14 billion +. And
that's only because it's as far as we've been able to see.
--
Uncle Vic
aa Atheist #2011
Supervisor, EAC Department of little adhesive-backed "L" shaped
chrome-plastic doo-dads to add feet to Jesus fish department.
Plonked by Kadaitcha Man
johac
wcb <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com> wrote:
What I would like to know is by what mechanism can a spirit interact
with the physical world? I can pick up a stone because the stone is a
material object and my hand is a material object. The forces associated
with the atoms in the stone and the forces associated with the atoms in
my hand interact so I can grasp the stone and my hand does not go right
through it. That's physics.
The force to lift the stone comes from the contraction of muscle fibers
in my arm. That's biology.
The energy to accomplish the lifting of the stone comes from the
metabolism of the food that I eat. That's chemistry.
Having said that, my question is "How would God (or any other non
material spirit) lift that stone? By what mechanism? Is there any
evidence that the non material can interact with the material world?
Magic doesn't count.
>
>
> No more free rides for god, but I like my Easter Bunny, she can
> ride all she wants.
The EB rocks!
--
John Hachmann aa #1782
"Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities"
-Voltaire
Contact - Throw a .net over the .com
Richo
wcb wrote:
> Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
> creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
> in six days.
>
8-)
You have to admit though - without "God" its still a mystery.
There must be questions which have no answer.
"Why is there something and not nothing?" is an unanswerable question.
"God did it" is not even close to an answer.
"There was a quantum fluctuation" is not even close to an answer.
Those are both a retreat into superstition.
We understand something of what we are and were we come from - but we
dont know "ultimate" answers.
> The question, rarely asked as far as I can see is, how
> is all of this done? we understand here in this world
> the notion of physics, the 4 great forces, the laws of
> phsyics, of quantum chromodynamics, of chemistry,
> biochemisry and so on.
>
> The world is regular and understandable.
>
What we do understand doesnt answer *ultimate* questions - and so there
is always mystery - which is a good thing - but that means there is
always something mysterious and unreachable - and "God" can always be
in charge of that bit.
> Gods more resemmble fairy tales, fairy god mothers with
> magic wands, pumpkins become coaches, mice, horses.
>
Sure - but "ultimate" questions dont have mundane answers - people like
having answers and - this bit mystifies me - they convince themselves
that "God did it" is some kind of an answer.
You and I know that it isnt any kind of answer - but some people are
not capable of understanding that - it's simply beyond them.
> As a strong atheist, I believe theologists here have been
> given a free ride too long
>
> And it is time to start building a critical examination of
> underlying claims made implicitly by religion and theology.
>
> What is proof any god can do any of these things anyway?
> What possible mechanism is there for doing something like
> creating a universe? How does an omniscient god know all
> in the universe, or the future?
>
It's a mystery.
> What is the mechanism by which such things are done?
> information is somethiong that is discrete. It must be
> saved and handled.
> Is god digital or analogue?
>
Its a mystery.
> How do we know? How would we approach this as a research
> project? If we have no competent and workable plan to
> approach these questions as a research project we cannot
> do research, no answers are possible.
>
> What has been the research program of theology as to
> such questions to date? Shaman on drugs?
>
> Was there ever one? If not why not?
>
> I will be staring a project to start thinking hard
> about this aspect of gods I rarely see serously approached.
>
I am afraid it will not be very fruitful - whatever you come up with
the answer will be:
"Its a mystery."
8-)
> I suppose to give it a working nickname I will call it the
> problem of the physics of god.
>
The thing is that physics is an empirical science - you get to study
stuff - heat it up till it glows - pass neutrons through stuff and see
how its deflected - that kind of deal.
God is an idea (well more like a galaxy of ideas) - its not the stuff
of physics.
> Am I the only one here that has been bugged by the assertions
> made about god without evidence or reason to believe?
> Am I the only one here that has been irritated by the ID
> types that claim god is scientific when obviously there are more puzzles
> than answers?
I defend science and science education - because its something I value
in its own right and its critical to the survival of the human species.
If 90% of people dont "get" science - thats OK - Just as long as they
dont actively prevent the 10% that are capable of doing it from getting
on with it.
When there are 8 billion people in the world and possible catastrophic
change to the earths systems we need science and scientists to be
respected and supported like never before.
> Am I the only one here that dislikes how the theists have been allowed a
> free ride here?
>
> I have a little saying I use, "The Easter Bunny waves her paw and magic
> happens!", a sarcastic rejonder to "goddidit", but deeper. How does god do
> it? Like a magic fairy godmother with a magic wand?
>
> What is different between a magic god and a magic Easter Bunny anyway?
> Or God and a fairy for that matter.
>
Good question - In my view the easter bunny, fairy godmother and
leprachauns are indeed gods - just lesser gods.
Lesser gods have lesser powers and more limited "areas of dominion".
Greater gods are in charge of greater powers - but when you come down
to it God is just a very, very Big And Important Leprachaun.
Or conversely a Leprachaun is a teeny tiny God.
Same thing really.
There is another distinction between minor and major gods - and that is
not in the deities themselves or their imagined powers - its in the
respect awe and reverence accorded the gods by their worshipers.
This is a critical point.
Big gods are for devoting your life to - sacrificing your life to -
little gods are for telling stories about to amuse children or for
leaving a little of your food at a shrine or tossing a coin into water
for a little good luck.
People will fight to the death to defend their faith in the Big Gods.
The bottom line:
Gods and spirit beings little and large are a subject of anthroplogy,
psychology, sociology - not physics.
Cheers, Mark.
Christopher A. Lee
wrote:
>
>wcb wrote:
>> Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
>> creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
>> in six days.
>>
>It's a holy mystery.
>8-)
>
>You have to admit though - without "God" its still a mystery.
>There must be questions which have no answer.
>"Why is there something and not nothing?" is an unanswerable question.
Which people who were programmed with that as part of their religion's
metaphysics have.
The rest of us don't.
What do you mean by "why"? And why ask why?
>"God did it" is not even close to an answer.
What's "God?
>"There was a quantum fluctuation" is not even close to an answer.
But you know nobody says that, so why the straw man?
What they _do_ say is that a quantum event is a possibility. At least
there is evidence for quantum events.
>Those are both a retreat into superstition.
Only one is. The other is a strawman.
>We understand something of what we are and were we come from - but we
>dont know "ultimate" answers.
Sigh.
>> The question, rarely asked as far as I can see is, how
>> is all of this done? we understand here in this world
>> the notion of physics, the 4 great forces, the laws of
>> phsyics, of quantum chromodynamics, of chemistry,
>> biochemisry and so on.
>>
>> The world is regular and understandable.
>>
>What we do understand doesnt answer *ultimate* questions - and so there
>is always mystery - which is a good thing - but that means there is
>always something mysterious and unreachable - and "God" can always be
>in charge of that bit.
Metaphysical questions that only have apparent validity inside the
various metaphysics that coincidentally pretend to provide answers to
them.
Feel free to demonstrate that there actually is a metaphysical "why".
>> Gods more resemmble fairy tales, fairy god mothers with
>> magic wands, pumpkins become coaches, mice, horses.
>>
>Sure - but "ultimate" questions dont have mundane answers - people like
>having answers and - this bit mystifies me - they convince themselves
>that "God did it" is some kind of an answer.
>You and I know that it isnt any kind of answer - but some people are
>not capable of understanding that - it's simply beyond them.
It's not even a valid question.
wcb
Exactly! None of this has any explanation, and the
theologists don't even try. Nor do they seem to have
a research progrom for trying to figure these sorts
of thing out for us.
It is sort of accept it or leave it.
What I want to do is make a list of questions
about all of this that need asking.
Omnipotence
Omniscience
Intelligence
Interaction with matter.
Are angels matter? Or spirit?
Heaven? Hell?
Why then are we matter?
wcb
>
> wcb wrote:
>> Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
>> creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
>> in six days.
>>
> It's a holy mystery.
> 8-)
>
> You have to admit though - without "God" its still a mystery.
Well, no,we have a research program for figuring this
out and its called science. Physics has been rather succesful,
though yes, we have a long ways to go, but its doable.
layer by layer we are getting down through layers of the onion
so to speak.
There seems to be no god and at bottom, no real
observations. Nothing to work with like
physics. And we seem t be able to get by wihout a god at all
as far as explaining things. God does not get us anywhere
at all. We do well ignoring god.
We know we will see continuing progress through the ages here.
> There must be questions which have no answer.
> "Why is there something and not nothing?" is an unanswerable question.
> "God did it" is not even close to an answer.
> "There was a quantum fluctuation" is not even close to an answer.
Yes it is an answer, this is what gives us virtual particles
and we know how that works, the idea that the Uncertainty Principle
would guarantee a field of negative and positive energy
as stated by Dirac in the early 30's means virtual particles were a
prediction. And so it was we can measure that directly.
We know how that works. We know this Universe came from a large virtual
particle the size of a proton weighing 20 kilograms or more.
We know how this works and why. It is an answer and
was predicted from first principles and has lead to many successful
observations confirming our understanding is indeed true.
> Those are both a retreat into superstition.
>
> We understand something of what we are and were we come from - but we
> dont know "ultimate" answers.
>
>> The question, rarely asked as far as I can see is, how
>> is all of this done? we understand here in this world
>> the notion of physics, the 4 great forces, the laws of
>> phsyics, of quantum chromodynamics, of chemistry,
>> biochemisry and so on.
>>
>> The world is regular and understandable.
>>
> What we do understand doesnt answer *ultimate* questions - and so there
> is always mystery - which is a good thing - but that means there is
> always something mysterious and unreachable - and "God" can always be
> in charge of that bit.
But if a claimed feature of this universe, god, is
not really observed and cant even really be said to
have a true theoretical grounding that allows
us to make predictions or find confirmatory
evidence of its workings and laws, its not ultimate
at all, its irrelevant.
>> Gods more resemmble fairy tales, fairy god mothers with
>> magic wands, pumpkins become coaches, mice, horses.
>>
> Sure - but "ultimate" questions dont have mundane answers - people like
> having answers and - this bit mystifies me - they convince themselves
> that "God did it" is some kind of an answer.
> You and I know that it isnt any kind of answer - but some people are
> not capable of understanding that - it's simply beyond them.
>
>> As a strong atheist, I believe theologists here have been
>> given a free ride too long
>>
>> And it is time to start building a critical examination of
>> underlying claims made implicitly by religion and theology.
>>
>> What is proof any god can do any of these things anyway?
>> What possible mechanism is there for doing something like
>> creating a universe? How does an omniscient god know all
>> in the universe, or the future?
>>
> It's a mystery.
Part of my program is to demystify god here by examining
the underpinings of god claims rarely examined deeply.
If there is no god this will be somewhere down the line,
glaring obvious. If there is, this would be the only way
to find evidence for that in a manner analogous to physics.
Modern relativity came out of Michaelson - Morley trying to measure teh
speed of light.
Quantum phyisics from Max Plank trying to reconcile
the mathematics of black body radiation.
Paul Dirac lead to understanding of fields and virtual particlas
asking the question, Why don't electrons spontaneously
drop to the lowest energy stae and shed their energy via photons?
God ideas do not work this way which to me strongly suggests
we have not been asking the right questions, or there
is nothing to god as a real idea.
Either way, the stagnant situation should not be allowed
to rest here.
Much physics starts with asking hard questions about things
we know so little about it is hard to ask questions at all.
>> What is the mechanism by which such things are done?
>> information is something that is discrete. It must be
>> saved and handled.
>> Is god digital or analogue?
>>
> Its a mystery.
Its a mystery is no answer.
Here we halt and do no more so it remains a mystery
because we put forth no effort.
>
>> How do we know? How would we approach this as a research
>> project? If we have no competent and workable plan to
>> approach these questions as a research project we cannot
>> do research, no answers are possible.
>>
>> What has been the research program of theology as to
>> such questions to date? Shaman on drugs?
>>
>> Was there ever one? If not why not?
>>
>> I will be staring a project to start thinking hard
>> about this aspect of gods I rarely see serously approached.
>>
> I am afraid it will not be very fruitful - whatever you come up with
> the answer will be:
> "Its a mystery."
> 8-)
>
>> I suppose to give it a working nickname I will call it the
>> problem of the physics of god.
>>
> The thing is that physics is an empirical science - you get to study
> stuff - heat it up till it glows - pass neutrons through stuff and see
> how its deflected - that kind of deal.
> God is an idea (well more like a galaxy of ideas) - its not the stuff
> of physics.
Yes, a problem, but not insurmountable if there is a god.
The Romans were surrounded by little gods on many levels,
the big gods were not what they really worshipped.
they took the "little gods very seriously indeed.
Lares and penitates, genii, tutelary gods, nature
gods and more.
When Anaxagores said "All things are full of gods", this
might be what he meant.
>
> The bottom line:
> Gods and spirit beings little and large are a subject of anthroplogy,
> psychology, sociology - not physics.
>
> Cheers, Mark.
No, theologists make claims. These claims
must be examined. Why one big god rather than millions
as per the Romans?
Again, one never learns anything until you learn
to ask the right question.
wcb
September 11 - Gandy Grey:
> As opposed to someone like you who never worked anything out, Whitehead's
> philosophy is now acclaimed as the philosophy behind modern science.
Clueless? Look in the mirror Mr. Science Expert
wcb
>
>>> He's YOUR god, Barwell. You deal with him.
>>>
>>
>> I just did.
September 11 - Gandy Grey:
> As opposed to someone like you who never worked anything out, Whitehead's
> philosophy is now acclaimed as the philosophy behind modern science.
Flop is your middle name.
GODS WITHOUT OMNIBENEVOLENCE - CAN
THEY BE DISPROVED?
W.C. Barwell 9-16-06
Gods that are said to be all good, omnibenevolent,
soon have problems with the Epicurean problem of evil.
A god that is all good and all powerful should
be interested in eliminating all evil, but evil exists.
This can be used to utterly disprove such gods.
This is not a problem to the strong atheist because
most important religions today have allegedly all powerful,
all good gods, Islam, Hinduism. Judaism, Christianity and more.
Bahis, Sikhs and many others share this set of attributes,
attributes of the OEC class of gods.
But consider the idea of a class of omnipotent, omniscient,
creator gods that are not all good, or not even good at all.
There are few if any religions that have such a god,
but for purposes of strong atheism is a challenge.
A god so created to resisted debunking is a challenges as it dodges
the Epicurean problem of evil by dropping the claims of all
being all good.
Can we logically debunk such a god concept?
If we drop omnibenevolent to simply good, not all good, yes.
Epicurus's Problem of Evil
Thus a god that is not all good, but is good, not all powerful,
but is powerful, is still easily shown to be impossible.
GODS THAT ARE NOT CONCERNED WITH GOOD OR EVIL
This sort of god is not a god that seems to be worshiped by
any real religion. one might have gods that are not good or
even evil, some animist religions have their good spirits and
evils spirits, but an OEC class type god without the component of
goodness at all, doesn't seem to be a real world god. Such a god
then is of more academic interest to a strong atheist.
can this type of god be disproven?
If such a god is not good, is indifferent to either moral or natural
evil, such a god also loses other usual OEC type attributes.
Love, mercy, justice, and so on.
Actually such a god is pretty alien. Why would such an indifferent
god create mankind? Not obvious for love of mankind, as per usual
gods that love good men and punish wickedness.
Logically if such a god existed, that god would not send us
revelations of laws and morals to be followed with threats
for failure to do so. Nor would such a god be concerned with
our acts or thoughts.
Since we have nothing else to offer, no sort of assistance,
or other advantage, its hard to see what such a god would want
anything to do with mankind. We should expect no revelations,
prophets, or any sort of concern from such a god.
Disproof of any sort of god like this would have to
go to disproving natural religion claims, cosmology et al.
Since gods like this would be indifferent, we can rule out
moral proofs.
The Prime Mover argument has been debunked since science has
shown turbulence from early eras of the Big Bang produced movement
of matter in the Universe, no godly Prime Mover is needed.
We can rule out proofs from revelation.
we can set aside disproofs via Problem of Evil.
Aquinas's (derived from Anslem - See The Prosologian)
proof from degrees of perfection are out since
a god that is not explicitly good lacks that perfection
at least.
leaving -
1. Cosmological
2. Design
3. Necessary being
If god that is not good but otherwise is an OEC class god
can be shown to be impossible because that god is unnecessary,
(End)
--
You are a fluke of the Universe
Christopher A. Lee
<ganda...@infectedmail.com> wrote:
>
>"wcb" <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com> wrote in message
>news:12grnqe...@corp.supernews.com...
>> Gandalf Grey wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> Your problem is that YOUR god is a strawman.
>>
>>
>> What a bitter and hateful little man.
>
>He's YOUR god, Barwell. You deal with him.
Hardly, moron. Any more than Zeus is your god. Start using your
allegedly god-given brain for a change.
Christopher A. Lee
<ganda...@infectedmail.com> wrote:
>
>"wcb" <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com> wrote in message
>news:12grgas...@corp.supernews.com...
>> Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
>> creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
>> in six days.
>
>Only for orthodox believers and cherry picking fundamentalists.
>
>Your problem is that YOUR god is a strawman. YOUR god has already been
>demolished by better arguments than yours, which leaves the god and gods
>that most people really believe in untouched by your bumpersticker
>arguments.
Why do you lie? You know perfectly well he hasn't got a god and merely
goes on what hard-of-thinking believers insist to him, and treats that
as an exercise in abstract logic.
Gandalf Grey
> Richo wrote:
>
>>
>> wcb wrote:
>>> Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
>>> creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
>>> in six days.
>>>
>> It's a holy mystery.
>> 8-)
>>
>> You have to admit though - without "God" its still a mystery.
>
> Well, no,we have a research program for figuring this
> out and its called science. Physics has been rather succesful,
> though yes, we have a long ways to go, but its doable.
> layer by layer we are getting down through layers of the onion
> so to speak.
>
> There seems to be no god and at bottom, no real
> observations. Nothing to work with like
> physics. And we seem t be able to get by wihout a god at all
> as far as explaining things. God does not get us anywhere
> at all. We do well ignoring god.
>
> We know we will see continuing progress through the ages here.
Well no, you can't know that because you're not omniscient and you really
know nearly nothing about science, because if you did you'd know that even
physicists have questioned the explanatory adequacy of physics.
>
>
>
>
>> There must be questions which have no answer.
>> "Why is there something and not nothing?" is an unanswerable question.
>> "God did it" is not even close to an answer.
>> "There was a quantum fluctuation" is not even close to an answer.
>
>
> Yes it is an answer,
No it isn't. As Bohm and others have noted, the ultimate answer to the
universe becomes "that's just the way it works" and that's not an answer.
Gandalf Grey
> Gandalf Grey wrote:
>
>>
>> "wcb" <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com> wrote in message
>> news:12gs4gj...@corp.supernews.com...
>>> Stephen Knight wrote:
>>>
>>>> On Sun, 17 Sep 2006 16:42:00 -0500, wcb <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com>
>>>> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
>>>>>creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
>>>>>in six days.
>>>>
>>>> I lose it at the 'six' day thingy. Why would a 'GOD' need so much
>>>> time to do something it could do instantaneously?
>>>
>>>
>>> Hmmmm, really hadn't thought about that.
>>
>> And since that's one of the oldest questions in the book, I think we just
>> got a snapshot on how clueless you really are.
>
>
>
> September 11 - Gandy Grey:
>> As opposed to
BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZTT~~~
>>> WBARWELL
>>>
>>> Something cannot come from nothing.
>>> Therefore something must have always existed
>>> far back into infinity. There was never a
>>> time when nothing did not exist.
>>>
>>> Parmenides nailed this one.
>>>
>>> Something always existed.
>>>
>>> GANDY
>>> Another unsupported assertion
>>
>
> Appeal to logic
Cite where an appeal to logic is a fallacy in a logical argument.
Do it right here, right now---------->
Gandalf Grey
"Christopher A. Lee" <ca...@optonline.net> wrote in message
news:i5ftg2db9gg778lg6...@4ax.com...
> On Sun, 17 Sep 2006 15:54:52 -0700, "Gandalf Grey"
> <ganda...@infectedmail.com> wrote:
>
>>
>>"wcb" <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com> wrote in message
>>news:12grgas...@corp.supernews.com...
>>> Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
>>> creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
>>> in six days.
>>
>>Only for orthodox believers and cherry picking fundamentalists.
>>
>>Your problem is that YOUR god is a strawman. YOUR god has already been
>>demolished by better arguments than yours, which leaves the god and gods
>>that most people really believe in untouched by your bumpersticker
>>arguments.
>
> Why do you lie? You know perfectly well he hasn't got a god and merely
> goes on what hard-of-thinking believers insist to him, and treats that
> as an exercise in abstract logic.
Barwell is no more able to engage in an 'exercise in abstract logic' than
you are able to correctly read an English idiom.
Gandalf Grey
> Gandalf Grey wrote:
>
>>
>>>> He's YOUR god, Barwell. You deal with him.
>>>>
>>>
>>> I just did.
>
> September 11
September 18 - Barney Posts another flop argument.
> GODS WITHOUT GOOD AND EVIL
> W.C. Barwell 9-16-06
>
> Gods that are said to be all good, omnibenevolent,
> soon have problems with the Epicurean problem of evil.
A problem that has been stated over and over again by people, unlike
Barwell, who actually know what they're talking about. And in the modern
era for those not bound like Barwell to Hellenistic Philosophy, The
Evidential Argument from Evil is an excellent way of debunking the orthodox
god.
> But consider the idea of a class of omnipotent, omniscient,
> creator gods that are not all good, or not even good at all.
>
> There are few if any religions that have such a god,
> but for purposes of strong atheism is a challenge.
> A god so created to resisted debunking is a challenges as it dodges
> the Epicurean problem of evil by dropping the claims of all
> being all good.
>
> Can we logically debunk such a god concept?
>
> If we drop omnibenevolent to simply good, not all good, yes.
Actually, unless you retain omnipotent, the answer is no.
> Thus a god that is not all good, but is good, not all powerful,
> but is powerful, is still easily shown to be impossible.
Actually, no it's not. A god that is not all powerful is not constrained by
logic or necessity to destroy all evil or make revelations or much of
anything else. A god that is not all good really doesn't change those facts
at all. Leaving you without an argument.
>
> GODS THAT ARE NOT CONCERNED WITH GOOD OR EVIL
>
> This sort of god is not a god that seems to be worshiped by
> any real religion. one might have gods that are not good or
> even evil, some animist religions have their good spirits and
> evils spirits, but an OEC class type god without the component of
> goodness at all, doesn't seem to be a real world god. Such a god
> then is of more academic interest to a strong atheist.
> can this type of god be disproven?
>
> If such a god is not good, is indifferent to either moral or natural
> evil, such a god also loses other usual OEC type attributes.
> Love, mercy, justice, and so on.
>
> Actually such a god is pretty alien. Why would such an indifferent
> god create mankind?
On the other hand, why not?
> Not obvious for love of mankind, as per usual
> gods that love good men and punish wickedness.
non sequitur. A god that 'love's good men' is not logically bound to
'punish wickedness.' Your consuming hatred for orthodoxy has once again
scrambled your thinking. Conflating goodness with 'the desire to punish
evil' is a mindset, not a logical necessity.
>
> Logically if such a god existed, that god would not send us
> revelations of laws and morals to be followed with threats
> for failure to do so. Nor would such a god be concerned with
> our acts or thoughts.
Logically, if such a god existed, there's no logical need for revelation or
not revelation. Nor is there a logical need for threats. Nor is there a
logical need for a concern with acts and thought.
>
> Since we have nothing else to offer, no sort of assistance,
> or other advantage, its hard to see what such a god would want
> anything to do with mankind. We should expect no revelations,
> prophets, or any sort of concern from such a god.
Nor would we logically expect NOT to expect such things. You haven't
logically tied your premise to anything that comes after your original
premise....an ongoing problem with all your quasi 'arguments'.
>
> Disproof of any sort of god like this would have to
> go to disproving natural religion claims, cosmology et al.
>
> Since gods like this would be indifferent, we can rule out
> moral proofs.
>
> The Prime Mover argument has been debunked since science has
> shown turbulence from early eras of the Big Bang produced movement
> of matter in the Universe, no godly Prime Mover is needed.
Which is not a proof that no Prime Mover exists. The notion of what is
'needed' in your pretend arguments is not equivalent to logical sufficiency.
>
> We can rule out proofs from revelation.
> we can set aside disproofs via Problem of Evil.
> Aquinas's (derived from Anslem - See The Prosologian)
> proof from degrees of perfection are out since
> a god that is not explicitly good lacks that perfection
> at least.
>
> leaving -
> 1. Cosmological
> 2. Design
> 3. Necessary being
>
> If god that is not good but otherwise is an OEC class god
> can be shown to be impossible because that god is unnecessary,
And here your argument breaks down. "Unnecessary" is not equivalent to the
idea of logical sufficiency. Being able to prove that god is not necessary
for a particular process is not the same as proving that a god cannot be
involved in the same process.
> God is not obviously necessary at all,
Nor obviously NOT necessary.
>
> So god as necessary being fails
Actually, it's your argument that fails.
> You are a fluke of the Universe
You are the liver fluke of the Universe.
clifff...@yahoo.com
Christopher A. Lee wrote:
>
> Hardly, moron. Any more than Zeus is your god. Start using your
> allegedly god-given brain for a change.
Stop blaming & hating God for your failure as a human being. And that
goes for most of you angry and bitter misfits of nature. (Assuming
of course that you are not mentally ill--could be big assumption.)
--------
THE ISRAEL LOBBY: Does it have too much influence on US foreign policy?
The London Review will be hosting a debate on 28 September in the Great
Hall, Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, Cooper
Square, New York. Go to the link in my sig to reserve tickets.
-----
Kill ratio of Palestinian children to Israeli children 5.7-to-1,
Israel's favor.
Kill ratio of all Palestinians to Israelis: over 3-to-1.
---------
http://www.lrb.co.uk/v28/n06/print/mear01_.html
----------
"Don't worry about American pressure on Israel. We,
the Jewish people, control America, and the Americans know it."
---Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, 2001
--
Cliff
wcb
GODS WITHOUT OMNIBENEVOLENCE - CAN
THEY BE DISPROVED?
W.C. Barwell 9-16-06
Gods that are said to be all good, omnibenevolent,
soon have problems with the Epicurean problem of evil.
A god that is all good and all powerful should
be interested in eliminating all evil, but evil exists.
This can be used to utterly disprove such gods.
This is not a problem to the strong atheist because
most important religions today have allegedly all powerful,
all good gods, Islam, Hinduism. Judaism, Christianity and more.
Bahis, Sikhs and many others share this set of attributes,
attributes of the OEC class of gods.
But consider the idea of a class of omnipotent, omniscient,
creator gods that are not all good, or not even good at all.
There are few if any religions that have such a god,
but for purposes of strong atheism is a challenge.
A god so created to resisted debunking is a challenges as it dodges
the Epicurean problem of evil by dropping the claims of all
being all good.
Can we logically debunk such a god concept?
If we drop omnibenevolent to simply good, not all good, yes.
Epicurus's Problem of Evil
Thus a god that is not all good, but is good, not all powerful,
but is powerful, is still easily shown to be impossible.
GODS THAT ARE NOT CONCERNED WITH GOOD OR EVIL
This sort of god is not a god that seems to be worshiped by
any real religion. one might have gods that are not good or
even evil, some animist religions have their good spirits and
evils spirits, but an OEC class type god without the component of
goodness at all, doesn't seem to be a real world god. Such a god
then is of more academic interest to a strong atheist.
can this type of god be disproven?
If such a god is not good, is indifferent to either moral or natural
evil, such a god also loses other usual OEC type attributes.
Love, mercy, justice, and so on.
Actually such a god is pretty alien. Why would such an indifferent
god create mankind? Not obvious for love of mankind, as per usual
gods that love good men and punish wickedness.
Logically if such a god existed, that god would not send us
revelations of laws and morals to be followed with threats
for failure to do so. Nor would such a god be concerned with
our acts or thoughts.
Since we have nothing else to offer, no sort of assistance,
or other advantage, its hard to see what such a god would want
anything to do with mankind. We should expect no revelations,
prophets, or any sort of concern from such a god.
Disproof of any sort of god like this would have to
go to disproving natural religion claims, cosmology et al.
Since gods like this would be indifferent, we can rule out
moral proofs.
The Prime Mover argument has been debunked since science has
shown turbulence from early eras of the Big Bang produced movement
of matter in the Universe, no godly Prime Mover is needed.
We can rule out proofs from revelation.
we can set aside disproofs via Problem of Evil.
Aquinas's (derived from Anslem - See The Prosologian)
proof from degrees of perfection are out since
a god that is not explicitly good lacks that perfection
at least.
leaving -
1. Cosmological
2. Design
3. Necessary being
If god that is not good but otherwise is an OEC class god
can be shown to be impossible because that god is unnecessary,
(End)
wcb
>
>>> He's YOUR god, Barwell. You deal with him.
>>>
>>
>> I just did.
September 11 - Gandy Grey:
> As opposed to someone like you who never worked anything out, Whitehead's
> philosophy is now acclaimed as the philosophy behind modern science.
Flop is your middle name.
GODS WITHOUT OMNIBENEVOLENCE - CAN
THEY BE DISPROVED?
W.C. Barwell 9-16-06
Gods that are said to be all good, omnibenevolent,
soon have problems with the Epicurean problem of evil.
A god that is all good and all powerful should
be interested in eliminating all evil, but evil exists.
This can be used to utterly disprove such gods.
This is not a problem to the strong atheist because
most important religions today have allegedly all powerful,
all good gods, Islam, Hinduism. Judaism, Christianity and more.
Bahis, Sikhs and many others share this set of attributes,
attributes of the OEC class of gods.
But consider the idea of a class of omnipotent, omniscient,
creator gods that are not all good, or not even good at all.
There are few if any religions that have such a god,
but for purposes of strong atheism is a challenge.
A god so created to resisted debunking is a challenges as it dodges
the Epicurean problem of evil by dropping the claims of all
being all good.
Can we logically debunk such a god concept?
If we drop omnibenevolent to simply good, not all good, yes.
Epicurus's Problem of Evil
Thus a god that is not all good, but is good, not all powerful,
but is powerful, is still easily shown to be impossible.
GODS THAT ARE NOT CONCERNED WITH GOOD OR EVIL
This sort of god is not a god that seems to be worshiped by
any real religion. one might have gods that are not good or
even evil, some animist religions have their good spirits and
evils spirits, but an OEC class type god without the component of
goodness at all, doesn't seem to be a real world god. Such a god
then is of more academic interest to a strong atheist.
can this type of god be disproven?
If such a god is not good, is indifferent to either moral or natural
evil, such a god also loses other usual OEC type attributes.
Love, mercy, justice, and so on.
Actually such a god is pretty alien. Why would such an indifferent
god create mankind? Not obvious for love of mankind, as per usual
gods that love good men and punish wickedness.
Logically if such a god existed, that god would not send us
revelations of laws and morals to be followed with threats
for failure to do so. Nor would such a god be concerned with
our acts or thoughts.
Since we have nothing else to offer, no sort of assistance,
or other advantage, its hard to see what such a god would want
anything to do with mankind. We should expect no revelations,
prophets, or any sort of concern from such a god.
Disproof of any sort of god like this would have to
go to disproving natural religion claims, cosmology et al.
Since gods like this would be indifferent, we can rule out
moral proofs.
The Prime Mover argument has been debunked since science has
shown turbulence from early eras of the Big Bang produced movement
of matter in the Universe, no godly Prime Mover is needed.
We can rule out proofs from revelation.
we can set aside disproofs via Problem of Evil.
Aquinas's (derived from Anslem - See The Prosologian)
proof from degrees of perfection are out since
a god that is not explicitly good lacks that perfection
at least.
leaving -
1. Cosmological
2. Design
3. Necessary being
If god that is not good but otherwise is an OEC class god
can be shown to be impossible because that god is unnecessary,
God is not obviously necessary at all, and there remain many questions
(End)
You are a fluke of the Universe
You have no right to be here,
and whether you can hear it or not,
the Universe is laughing behind your back.
Cheerful Charlie
--
You are a fluke of the Universe
wcb
> Stop blaming & hating God for your failure as a human being. And that
> goes for most of you angry and bitter misfits of nature. (Assuming
> of course that you are not mentally ill--could be big assumption.)
>
God was not the cause of any failures of any Atheists lives
here and no one blames non-existant gods for such things.
The cause of our failures was too many cheap afternoon cartoons
as youths on TV, especially Hanna-Barberra cartoons.
--
You are a fluke of the Universe
clifff...@yahoo.com
wcb wrote:
> clifff...@yahoo.com wrote:
>
> > Stop blaming & hating God for your failure as a human being. And that
> > goes for most of you angry and bitter misfits of nature. (Assuming
> > of course that you are not mentally ill--could be big assumption.)
> >
>
> God was not the cause of any failures of any Atheists lives
My point exactly.
> The cause of our failures was too many cheap afternoon cartoons
> as youths on TV, especially Hanna-Barberra cartoons.
I still like Johnny Quest (original).
Gandalf Grey
> Gandalf Grey wrote:
>
>>
>>>> He's YOUR god, Barwell. You deal with him.
>>>>
>>>
>>> I just did.
>
> September 11 - Gandy Grey:
>> As opposed to someone like you who never worked anything out, Whitehead's
>> philosophy is now acclaimed as the philosophy behind modern science.
>
> Flop is your middle name.
I rest content knowing that you're only able to spell that word on your good
days.
> GODS WITHOUT GOOD AND EVIL
> W.C. Barwell 9-16-06
>
> Gods that are said to be all good, omnibenevolent,
> soon have problems with the Epicurean problem of evil.
A problem that has been stated over and over again by people, unlike
Barwell, who actually know what they're talking about. And in the modern
era for those not bound like Barwell to Hellenistic Philosophy, The
Evidential Argument from Evil is an excellent way of debunking the orthodox
god.
> But consider the idea of a class of omnipotent, omniscient,
> creator gods that are not all good, or not even good at all.
>
> There are few if any religions that have such a god,
> but for purposes of strong atheism is a challenge.
> A god so created to resisted debunking is a challenges as it dodges
> the Epicurean problem of evil by dropping the claims of all
> being all good.
>
> Can we logically debunk such a god concept?
>
> If we drop omnibenevolent to simply good, not all good, yes.
Actually, unless you retain omnipotent, the answer is no.
> Thus a god that is not all good, but is good, not all powerful,
> but is powerful, is still easily shown to be impossible.
Actually, no it's not. A god that is not all powerful is not constrained by
logic or necessity to destroy all evil or make revelations or much of
anything else. A god that is not all good really doesn't change those facts
at all. Leaving you without an argument.
>
> GODS THAT ARE NOT CONCERNED WITH GOOD OR EVIL
>
> This sort of god is not a god that seems to be worshiped by
> any real religion. one might have gods that are not good or
> even evil, some animist religions have their good spirits and
> evils spirits, but an OEC class type god without the component of
> goodness at all, doesn't seem to be a real world god. Such a god
> then is of more academic interest to a strong atheist.
> can this type of god be disproven?
>
> If such a god is not good, is indifferent to either moral or natural
> evil, such a god also loses other usual OEC type attributes.
> Love, mercy, justice, and so on.
>
> Actually such a god is pretty alien. Why would such an indifferent
> god create mankind?
On the other hand, why not?
> Not obvious for love of mankind, as per usual
> gods that love good men and punish wickedness.
non sequitur. A god that 'love's good men' is not logically bound to
'punish wickedness.' Your consuming hatred for orthodoxy has once again
scrambled your thinking. Conflating goodness with 'the desire to punish
evil' is a mindset, not a logical necessity.
>
> Logically if such a god existed, that god would not send us
> revelations of laws and morals to be followed with threats
> for failure to do so. Nor would such a god be concerned with
> our acts or thoughts.
Logically, if such a god existed, there's no logical need for revelation or
not revelation. Nor is there a logical need for threats. Nor is there a
logical need for a concern with acts and thought.
>
> Since we have nothing else to offer, no sort of assistance,
> or other advantage, its hard to see what such a god would want
> anything to do with mankind. We should expect no revelations,
> prophets, or any sort of concern from such a god.
Nor would we logically expect NOT to expect such things. You haven't
logically tied your premise to anything that comes after your original
premise....an ongoing problem with all your quasi 'arguments'.
>
> Disproof of any sort of god like this would have to
> go to disproving natural religion claims, cosmology et al.
>
> Since gods like this would be indifferent, we can rule out
> moral proofs.
>
> The Prime Mover argument has been debunked since science has
> shown turbulence from early eras of the Big Bang produced movement
> of matter in the Universe, no godly Prime Mover is needed.
Which is not a proof that no Prime Mover exists. The notion of what is
'needed' in your pretend arguments is not equivalent to logical sufficiency.
>
> We can rule out proofs from revelation.
> we can set aside disproofs via Problem of Evil.
> Aquinas's (derived from Anslem - See The Prosologian)
> proof from degrees of perfection are out since
> a god that is not explicitly good lacks that perfection
> at least.
>
> leaving -
> 1. Cosmological
> 2. Design
> 3. Necessary being
>
> If god that is not good but otherwise is an OEC class god
> can be shown to be impossible because that god is unnecessary,
And here your argument breaks down. "Unnecessary" is not equivalent to the
idea of logical sufficiency. Being able to prove that god is not necessary
for a particular process is not the same as proving that a god cannot be
involved in the same process.
> God is not obviously necessary at all,
Nor obviously NOT necessary.
>
> So god as necessary being fails
Actually, it's your argument that fails.
> You are a fluke of the Universe
You are the liver fluke of the Universe.
Gandalf Grey
>
> GODS WITHOUT OMNIBENEVOLENCE - CAN
> THEY BE DISPROVED?
The title alone tells you a whole lot about Barwell's lack of brainpower.
> Gods that are said to be all good, omnibenevolent,
> soon have problems with the Epicurean problem of evil.
A problem that has been stated over and over again by people, unlike
Barwell, who actually know what they're talking about. And in the modern
era for those not bound like Barwell to Hellenistic Philosophy, The
Evidential Argument from Evil is an excellent way of debunking the orthodox
god.
> But consider the idea of a class of omnipotent, omniscient,
> creator gods that are not all good, or not even good at all.
>
> There are few if any religions that have such a god,
> but for purposes of strong atheism is a challenge.
> A god so created to resisted debunking is a challenges as it dodges
> the Epicurean problem of evil by dropping the claims of all
> being all good.
>
> Can we logically debunk such a god concept?
>
> If we drop omnibenevolent to simply good, not all good, yes.
Actually, unless you retain omnipotent, the answer is no.
> Thus a god that is not all good, but is good, not all powerful,
> but is powerful, is still easily shown to be impossible.
Actually, no it's not. A god that is not all powerful is not constrained by
logic or necessity to destroy all evil or make revelations or much of
anything else. A god that is not all good really doesn't change those facts
at all. Leaving you without an argument.
>
> GODS THAT ARE NOT CONCERNED WITH GOOD OR EVIL
>
> This sort of god is not a god that seems to be worshiped by
> any real religion. one might have gods that are not good or
> even evil, some animist religions have their good spirits and
> evils spirits, but an OEC class type god without the component of
> goodness at all, doesn't seem to be a real world god. Such a god
> then is of more academic interest to a strong atheist.
> can this type of god be disproven?
>
> If such a god is not good, is indifferent to either moral or natural
> evil, such a god also loses other usual OEC type attributes.
> Love, mercy, justice, and so on.
>
> Actually such a god is pretty alien. Why would such an indifferent
> god create mankind?
On the other hand, why not?
> Not obvious for love of mankind, as per usual
> gods that love good men and punish wickedness.
non sequitur. A god that 'love's good men' is not logically bound to
'punish wickedness.' Your consuming hatred for orthodoxy has once again
scrambled your thinking. Conflating goodness with 'the desire to punish
evil' is a mindset, not a logical necessity.
>
> Logically if such a god existed, that god would not send us
> revelations of laws and morals to be followed with threats
> for failure to do so. Nor would such a god be concerned with
> our acts or thoughts.
Logically, if such a god existed, there's no logical need for revelation or
not revelation. Nor is there a logical need for threats. Nor is there a
logical need for a concern with acts and thought.
>
> Since we have nothing else to offer, no sort of assistance,
> or other advantage, its hard to see what such a god would want
> anything to do with mankind. We should expect no revelations,
> prophets, or any sort of concern from such a god.
Nor would we logically expect NOT to expect such things. You haven't
logically tied your premise to anything that comes after your original
premise....an ongoing problem with all your quasi 'arguments'.
>
> Disproof of any sort of god like this would have to
> go to disproving natural religion claims, cosmology et al.
>
> Since gods like this would be indifferent, we can rule out
> moral proofs.
>
> The Prime Mover argument has been debunked since science has
> shown turbulence from early eras of the Big Bang produced movement
> of matter in the Universe, no godly Prime Mover is needed.
Which is not a proof that no Prime Mover exists. The notion of what is
'needed' in your pretend arguments is not equivalent to logical sufficiency.
>
> We can rule out proofs from revelation.
> we can set aside disproofs via Problem of Evil.
> Aquinas's (derived from Anslem - See The Prosologian)
> proof from degrees of perfection are out since
> a god that is not explicitly good lacks that perfection
> at least.
>
> leaving -
> 1. Cosmological
> 2. Design
> 3. Necessary being
>
> If god that is not good but otherwise is an OEC class god
> can be shown to be impossible because that god is unnecessary,
And here your argument breaks down. "Unnecessary" is not equivalent to the
idea of logical sufficiency. Being able to prove that god is not necessary
for a particular process is not the same as proving that a god cannot be
involved in the same process.
> God is not obviously necessary at all,
Nor obviously NOT necessary.
>
> So god as necessary being fails
Actually, it's your argument that fails.
> You are a fluke of the Universe
You are the liver fluke of the Universe.
Michael Gray
wrote:
- Refer: <12grnqe...@corp.supernews.com>
>Gandalf Grey wrote:
>
>>
>> Your problem is that YOUR god is a strawman.
>
>
>bag of hate and mean spiritedness?
>Isn't there a pill you can take for this?
Yep: Cyanide.
wcb
Just thinking, is this 27 billon light year wide
universe all there is for god, as far as this physical
universe? Are there other universes? Bible cosmology
sees the world as a dry spot in the primal water covered
by a dome, holding back the primal water.
Apparently out ancient cosmologists had little idea
of what water pressue is like in deep columns of water.
How deep was the water outside the dome?
--
You are a fluke of the Universe
johac
wcb <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com> wrote:
I know. All of those experiments with 'prayer healing' have come back
with negative or very ambiguous results.
>
> It is sort of accept it or leave it.
Their answer would be "God said it, so we don't need no stinkin'
evidence!"
>
> What I want to do is make a list of questions
> about all of this that need asking.
>
> Omnipotence
> Omniscience
> Intelligence
> Interaction with matter.
>
> Are angels matter? Or spirit?
> Heaven? Hell?
That's another one. Many Xtian religions teach that at some point, the
body gets reunited with the soul in Heaven or Hell. If the body is
matter then Heaven or Hell must have physical locations. So where are
they?
> Why then are we matter?
Another one. God could have made us spirits too, like the angels. Why
not?
Richo
wcb wrote:
> Richo wrote:
>
> >
> > wcb wrote:
> >> Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
> >> creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
> >> in six days.
> >>
> > It's a holy mystery.
> > 8-)
> >
> > You have to admit though - without "God" its still a mystery.
>
> Well, no,we have a research program for figuring this
> out and its called science.
Science doesnt figure out how God made the universe - nor can it answer
why there is something rather than nothing - what science does is study
what the universe *is* - and it makes progress - sometimes its two
steps forward one step back.
The current "frontier" is recociling QM with general relativity.
Is string theory a step forward - no one knows yet.
> > There must be questions which have no answer.
> > "Why is there something and not nothing?" is an unanswerable question.
> > "God did it" is not even close to an answer.
> > "There was a quantum fluctuation" is not even close to an answer.
>
>
> Yes it is an answer,
Oh come on!
What is it that fluctuates to give birth to the universe?
There is a tiny number of people in the world who might be able to
speculate about this stuff in a meaningful way - to the rest of us its
a meaningless incantation.
Whatever they finally come up with - Quantum Loop Gravity or M theory
or whatever - when you ask why does it work that way?
The answer will be "its a mystery"
Mark.
Christopher A. Lee
wrote:
>
>wcb wrote:
>> Richo wrote:
>>
>> >
>> > wcb wrote:
>> >> Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
>> >> creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
>> >> in six days.
>> >>
>> > It's a holy mystery.
>> > 8-)
>> >
>> > You have to admit though - without "God" its still a mystery.
>>
>> Well, no,we have a research program for figuring this
>> out and its called science.
>
>Science doesnt figure out how God made the universe - nor can it answer
What's "God"? Why should anybody even bring it up?
Feel free to demonstrate that something you call "God" actually made
the universe. Until you have done that, stop begging the question.
>why there is something rather than nothing - what science does is study
What do you mean by "why"?
"Why" is one of those words used to equivocate between actual
preceding events, and metaphysical "reasons".
When you've explained what you mean by "why" using common shared
understanding that doesn't rest on the unjustified, feel free to
demonstrate that there actually is a metaphysical "why?".
>what the universe *is* - and it makes progress - sometimes its two
>steps forward one step back.
>The current "frontier" is recociling QM with general relativity.
>Is string theory a step forward - no one knows yet.
Which is why theist claims are utterly irrelevant. Even to say "nobody
knows yet" grants them more than they deserve.
>> > There must be questions which have no answer.
>> > "Why is there something and not nothing?" is an unanswerable question.
>> > "God did it" is not even close to an answer.
>> > "There was a quantum fluctuation" is not even close to an answer.
>>
>>
>> Yes it is an answer,
>
>Oh come on!
>What is it that fluctuates to give birth to the universe?
Sigh.
Nobody claims there was actually a quantum event. Just that this
speculation is based on something that actually happens.
>There is a tiny number of people in the world who might be able to
>speculate about this stuff in a meaningful way - to the rest of us its
>a meaningless incantation.
No. And why the deliberately emotive falsehood?
>Whatever they finally come up with - Quantum Loop Gravity or M theory
>or whatever - when you ask why does it work that way?
Again, what do you mean by "why"?
And then feel free to demonstrate that there actually is a
metaphysical "why?".
Richo
Christopher A. Lee wrote:
> On 19 Sep 2006 02:47:44 -0700, "Richo" <m.rich...@utas.edu.au>
> wrote:
>
> >
> >wcb wrote:
> >> Richo wrote:
> >>
> >> >
> >> > wcb wrote:
> >> >> Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
> >> >> creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
> >> >> in six days.
> >> >>
> >> > It's a holy mystery.
> >> > 8-)
> >> >
> >> > You have to admit though - without "God" its still a mystery.
> >>
> >> Well, no,we have a research program for figuring this
> >> out and its called science.
> >
> >Science doesnt figure out how God made the universe - nor can it answer
>
> What's "God"?
The "father" god worshiped by christians I presume..
Although in this particular context it hardly matters.
>Why should anybody even bring it up?
No idea.
Why not ask him (Barwell).
>
> Feel free to demonstrate that something you call "God" actually made
> the universe.
What? Why would *I* be interested in doing that?
You seem a bit confused about who is saying what.
Mark.
wcb
Oddly enough, early Christianity believed in bodily
resurrection. Soul in the OT was merely the life force
of living creatures, it dissipated when they died.
Soul was an alien concept in Judaism and early
Christianity, which came from neo-Platonists (Plotinus
taught we had two souls) and Sophists (who belived souls were
of a form of matter), and cults like Ra/Horus.
I have been rambling tthrough things like the Catholic Encyclopedia and
Aquinas Summa Theological and Contra gentiles and there is no more
confused, messy and contradictory idea in Christianity than the human soul.
I need to rustle around and find out if any good books on all of this have
been published.
Most of what we hear about souls comes from essentially folk religion.
Te Quran is little different, we wil be resurrected bodily to suffer
torments in hell.
St. Augustine in his city of god give and entire book to explaining to
skeptics how a human body can burn physically forever.
>> Why then are we matter?
>
> Another one. God could have made us spirits too, like the angels. Why
> not?
Early bible angels don't seem to be spirits but to have bodies like ours.
Much of what we think we know of angels comes from the rantings of insane
medieval angelogists. And the Poet Milton who worked from folk religion
again. Like I say, on my long, long list of things that need deeper study,
souls seems to be rising up to the top.
Its a bizarre subject that seems to be very confused and
not well figured out by theology who'd rather we not know that.
Avicenna and others had things to say about this that got
his books burned in the Islamic and Western worlds both.
Aristotle wrote a book on the concept of souls I need to hunt down.
wcb
>
> Oh come on!
> What is it that fluctuates to give birth to the universe?
Again, that came from Paul Dirac.
Google up electron sea and work your way up
the chain to field theory.
Fluctuations is a word that really is not correct, more analogical
than anything else, but we have energy fields that are not
flat, that is homogenous, they have spots in them where momentarily
negative and positive energy do not balance out and virtual particles may
momentarily exist.
Nobody believed Dirac at fisrt when he opined there could be negative
particles analogous to electrons.
Til they were created, positrons. Nobody was quite sure he was
correct when he theorized negative and positive energy fields
could exist.
Other suggested virtual particles. It turns out this is true,
they do exist.
This is not theoretical. It has a track record, this habit of thinking has
a proven track record, it produces results that are physically provable.
Google Casamir effect.
Starting from a simple question, "Why don't electrons spontaneously
drop to the lowest possible energy state and radiate away their
energy as photons?" has lead to discoveries and facts that let us know
we are definitely on the right track here.
Asking the right questions is 90% of finding truth.
Religion has a poor record on answering questions about the material world,
science so far is doing well. Occultism and mysticism
don't work either.
johac
wcb <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com> wrote:
Augustine was a sadist. When I was going to Catholic school, the nuns
used to use his descriptions of hell to frighten us. They also used to
talk about the soul a lot, but none of it ever made much sense to me.
Some also confuse consciousness with the soul. We now know that
consciousness is a function of the brain, a material object.
I had an argument once with a theist about the nature of the soul and
where was it located in the body. He said "The heart". So I replied
"What happens if someone gets a heart transplant? Does he get someone
else's soul and what happens to the old one?" "If a person gets a
mechanical heart, does that mean he gets an artificial heart of is he
just soulless?"
The guy never answered. I think that example shows just how confused the
topic is.
>
>
> >> Why then are we matter?
> >
> > Another one. God could have made us spirits too, like the angels. Why
> > not?
>
> Early bible angels don't seem to be spirits but to have bodies like ours.
> Much of what we think we know of angels comes from the rantings of insane
> medieval angelogists. And the Poet Milton who worked from folk religion
> again. Like I say, on my long, long list of things that need deeper study,
> souls seems to be rising up to the top.
Angels is something else that I can't understand. They just seem to run
around doing errands and odd jobs for God. My question is, if God is
omnipotent, why does he need a whole army of flunkies to help out?
>
> Its a bizarre subject that seems to be very confused and
> not well figured out by theology who'd rather we not know that.
>
> Avicenna and others had things to say about this that got
> his books burned in the Islamic and Western worlds both.
>
> Aristotle wrote a book on the concept of souls I need to hunt down.
If you find some good books on the subject, I'd also be interested.
Christopher A. Lee
Michael Gray
wrote:
- Refer: <12gutee...@corp.supernews.com>
>Michael Gray wrote:
>
>Just thinking, is this 27 billon light year wide
>universe all there is for god, as far as this physical
>universe? Are there other universes? Bible cosmology
>sees the world as a dry spot in the primal water covered
>by a dome, holding back the primal water.
>
>Apparently out ancient cosmologists had little idea
>of what water pressue is like in deep columns of water.
>How deep was the water outside the dome?
Makes you feel so, sort of, insignificant, doesn't it?
"Yeah. Yeah. [sniff] Can we have your liver, then?"
Richo
wcb wrote:
> Richo wrote:
>
> >
> > Oh come on!
> > What is it that fluctuates to give birth to the universe?
>
>
> Again, that came from Paul Dirac.
>
He came up with the idea of antiparticles.
> Google up electron sea and work your way up
> the chain to field theory.
>
> Fluctuations is a word that really is not correct, more analogical
> than anything else, but we have energy fields that are not
> flat, that is homogenous, they have spots in them where momentarily
> negative and positive energy do not balance out and virtual particles may
> momentarily exist.
>
Yes I know all this - it doesnt mean that we know why there are only 4
fields and why they have the relative strenghts they do etc etc
Maybe string theory will answer that - then there will be a new
mystery.
> Religion has a poor record on answering questions about the material world,
> science so far is doing well. Occultism and mysticism
> don't work either.
I know.
I honestly dont know why you are saying any of this to me.
It invalidates nothing I said.
Mark.
Richo
mysterious - which bit do you disagree with?
> "Science doesnt figure out how God made the universe - nor can it
> answer"
>
That's right - Science isnt about how God made the universe - and it
cannot banish mystery.
Each of those statements was a reply to Barwell saying something about
God and science.
I dont think I was being anything but crystal clear.
Mark.
Emmanual Kann
> How would God (or any other non
> material spirit) lift that stone? By what mechanism?
By logical fallacy.
Emmanual Kann
>>"God did it" is not even close to an answer.
>
> What's "God?
God is the answer to all unanswerable questions.
Emmanual Kann
> No it isn't. As Bohm and others have noted, the ultimate answer to the
> universe becomes "that's just the way it works" and that's not an answer.
For me it's a perfectly good answer. Why do you think otherwise?
Emmanual Kann
> Asking the right questions is 90% of finding truth.
>
> Religion has a poor record on answering questions about the material world,
> science so far is doing well.
God is the answer to all unanswerable questions. That is why religion has
poor track record on answering questions. There is no reason to find the
answer when the answer is already known. What religion doesn't
understand is that for each unanswerable question answered, an entire new
set of unanswerable questions are created. This means even more reasons
for God.
Christopher A. Lee
wrote:
What's "God", and why even thnk about it?
>> "Science doesnt figure out how God made the universe - nor can it
>> answer"
>>
>That's right - Science isnt about how God made the universe - and it
>cannot banish mystery.
What's "God" and why even think about it?
Christopher A. Lee
wrote:
It doesn't work for religionists who already have an unjustified
metaphysical answer to an equally unjustified metaphysical "why?" and
who can't understand that others outside their religion don't have
that metaphysical question because they don't evan have the same
metaphysics.
Emmanual Kann
> Gandalf Grey wrote:
>
>>
>> Your problem is that YOUR god is a strawman.
>
>
> What a bitter and hateful little man.
> And I mean, little. What made you such a scuttling
> bag of hate and mean spiritedness?
> Isn't there a pill you can take for this?
Try this omnistrawman assertion:
God is the answer to all unanswerable questions(the truth value of all
Goedel statements).
Gandalf Grey
"Emmanual Kann" <ka...@keinspam.de> wrote in message
news:pan.2006.09.20....@keinspam.de...
For those hankering after 'ultimate answers' coming up with "that's just the
way it works" is a cop out and another way of saying we don't understand the
universe. The fact that such an answer is the ultimate explanation for
everything and anything isn't recognized by most people. They don't
recognize that there's a point at which all explanations fail.
>
wcb
Does the waters outside the dome have fishies?
wcb
No, god is the answer to unanswearable stupid questions.
Unanswerable smart question are answered by 'Easter Bunny".
Emmanual Kann
You mean like Barwell?
Christopher A. Lee
wrote:
>An Wed, 20 Sep 2006 09:43:57 -0400, Christopher A. Lee hat geschreibt:
>
>> On Wed, 20 Sep 2006 13:28:14 GMT, Emmanual Kann <ka...@keinspam.de>
>> wrote:
>>
>>>An Mon, 18 Sep 2006 09:49:29 -0700, Gandalf Grey hat geschreibt:
>>>
>>>> No it isn't. As Bohm and others have noted, the ultimate answer to the
>>>> universe becomes "that's just the way it works" and that's not an answer.
>>>
>>>For me it's a perfectly good answer. Why do you think otherwise?
>>
>> It doesn't work for religionists who already have an unjustified
>> metaphysical answer to an equally unjustified metaphysical "why?" and
>> who can't understand that others outside their religion don't have
>> that metaphysical question because they don't evan have the same
>> metaphysics.
>
>You mean like Barwell?
Where did I say that, idiot? Hint: if I had meant that I would have
said it. Please try to be less dishonest next time.
Barwell applies rigorous logic to the ridiculous things theists come
here insisting we take seriously.
Even he would not ive it a second thought if they kept their silliness
to themselves.
Emmanual Kann
Why is it a cop out to admit that we don't know everything? Are you
saying because most people refuse to admit it? Or are you saying that God
is the explanation when all explanations fail (that's my Brother's
position. I think you would categorize him as a process theist). That
answer I find to be a cop out.
Emmanual Kann
It is another way of saying we don't understand the universe. Why do you
say that the truth is a cop out?
Emmanual Kann
Very good, but I don't really care what you think.
Emmanual Kann
> clifff...@yahoo.com wrote:
>
>> Stop blaming & hating God for your failure as a human being. And that
>> goes for most of you angry and bitter misfits of nature. (Assuming
>> of course that you are not mentally ill--could be big assumption.)
>>
>
> God was not the cause of any failures of any Atheists lives
> here and no one blames non-existant gods for such things.
> The cause of our failures was too many cheap afternoon cartoons
> as youths on TV, especially Hanna-Barberra cartoons.
I'll bite. What do you have against the Flintstones and Yogi Bear?
Emmanual Kann
> What's "God" and why even think about it?
Ask Barwell, he brought it up.
Emmanual Kann
> Why do you lie? You know perfectly well he hasn't got a god and merely
> goes on what hard-of-thinking believers insist to him, and treats that
> as an exercise in abstract logic.
You mean like the Easter Bunny. Are you Barwell's sock puppet?
wcb
>
> Yes. I stand by that. There is no God AND the universe is still
> mysterious - which bit do you disagree with?
It beomes a lot ls mysterious with each succes of science. Why so mant
people want to deny that I do not know,.
We see a pttern here, science = successes, religion =
failure always and ever.
some day, we will learn a lot more, but we see
where this is going. No turtles, no gods, its
physics all the way down.
Gandalf Grey
Insofar as they're unwilling to admit that there's a perfectly valid point
where explanations come to an end.
>
wcb
>
> wcb wrote:
>> Richo wrote:
>>
>> >
>> > Oh come on!
>> > What is it that fluctuates to give birth to the universe?
>>
>>
>> Again, that came from Paul Dirac.
>>
> No it didnt.
> He came up with the idea of antiparticles.
Yes, it did, his ideas made the idea inevitable.
When he came up with the idea that there was positive and negative energy,
others pointed out the uncetainty principle would gives us virtual
particles.
they were workng out the logical conclusions of his theory.
>
>> Google up electron sea and work your way up
>> the chain to field theory.
>>
>> Fluctuations is a word that really is not correct, more analogical
>> than anything else, but we have energy fields that are not
>> flat, that is homogenous, they have spots in them where momentarily
>> negative and positive energy do not balance out and virtual particles may
>> momentarily exist.
>>
>
> Yes I know all this - it doesnt mean that we know why there are only 4
> fields and why they have the relative strenghts they do etc etc
> Maybe string theory will answer that - then there will be a new
> mystery.
>
>> Religion has a poor record on answering questions about the material
>> world,
>> science so far is doing well. Occultism and mysticism
>> don't work either.
>
> I know.
> I honestly dont know why you are saying any of this to me.
> It invalidates nothing I said.
>
> Mark.
--
Gandalf Grey
"Emmanual Kann" <ka...@keinspam.de> wrote in message
news:pan.2006.09.20....@keinspam.de...
> An Wed, 20 Sep 2006 09:34:41 -0700, Gandalf Grey hat geschreibt:
>
>>
>> "Emmanual Kann" <ka...@keinspam.de> wrote in message
>> news:pan.2006.09.20....@keinspam.de...
>>> An Mon, 18 Sep 2006 09:49:29 -0700, Gandalf Grey hat geschreibt:
>>>
>>>> No it isn't. As Bohm and others have noted, the ultimate answer to the
>>>> universe becomes "that's just the way it works" and that's not an
>>>> answer.
>>>
>>> For me it's a perfectly good answer. Why do you think otherwise?
>>
>> For those hankering after 'ultimate answers' coming up with "that's just
>> the
>> way it works" is a cop out and another way of saying we don't understand
>> the
>> universe. The fact that such an answer is the ultimate explanation for
>> everything and anything isn't recognized by most people. They don't
>> recognize that there's a point at which all explanations fail.
>
> Why is it a cop out to admit that we don't know everything?
It's not.
Gandalf Grey
I didn't. Read what I said again.
>
wcb
>
> Augustine was a sadist. When I was going to Catholic school, the nuns
> used to use his descriptions of hell to frighten us. They also used to
> talk about the soul a lot, but none of it ever made much sense to me.
>
> Some also confuse consciousness with the soul. We now know that
> consciousness is a function of the brain, a material object.
>
> I had an argument once with a theist about the nature of the soul and
> where was it located in the body. He said "The heart". So I replied
> "What happens if someone gets a heart transplant? Does he get someone
> else's soul and what happens to the old one?" "If a person gets a
> mechanical heart, does that mean he gets an artificial heart of is he
> just soulless?"
>
> The guy never answered. I think that example shows just how confused the
> topic is.
Augustine certainly was and he believed in bodily resurrection.
I like the heart nonsense!
Like I said, its very confused indeed.
Christopher A. Lee
Christopher A. Lee
wrote:
>An Wed, 20 Sep 2006 09:40:54 -0400, Christopher A. Lee hat geschreibt:
>
>> What's "God" and why even think about it?
>
>Ask Barwell, he brought it up.
In response to theists.
Christopher A. Lee
wrote:
>An Mon, 18 Sep 2006 11:36:29 -0400, Christopher A. Lee hat geschreibt:
Do I, liar? I am sure that if I had meant that I would have said it.
But here's a clue: I neither meant it nor said it. Stop lying by
putting words into people's mouths.
Like the rest of us he treats it as an abstract logic exercise.
Emmanual Kann
>
> "Emmanual Kann" <ka...@keinspam.de> wrote in message
> news:pan.2006.09.20...@keinspam.de...
>> An Wed, 20 Sep 2006 09:34:41 -0700, Gandalf Grey hat geschreibt:
>>
>>>
>>> "Emmanual Kann" <ka...@keinspam.de> wrote in message
>>> news:pan.2006.09.20....@keinspam.de...
>>>> An Mon, 18 Sep 2006 09:49:29 -0700, Gandalf Grey hat geschreibt:
>>>>
>>>>> No it isn't. As Bohm and others have noted, the ultimate answer to the
>>>>> universe becomes "that's just the way it works" and that's not an
>>>>> answer.
>>>>
>>>> For me it's a perfectly good answer. Why do you think otherwise?
>>>
>>> For those hankering after 'ultimate answers' coming up with "that's just
>>> the
>>> way it works" is a cop out and another way of saying we don't understand
>>> the
>>> universe. The fact that such an answer is the ultimate explanation for
>>> everything and anything isn't recognized by most people. They don't
>>> recognize that there's a point at which all explanations fail.
>>
>> It is another way of saying we don't understand the universe. Why do you
>> say that the truth is a cop out?
>
> I didn't. Read what I said again.
>>
You wrote too sneaky. Shame on you.
Emmanual Kann
I asserted my brother's God to Barwell to disprove. He used the Easter
Bunny as his argument.
Piss off sock puppet.
Gandalf Grey
I accept that shame, humbly and gratefully.
>
Gandalf Grey
Well, that's our Barwell. His ultimate argument to prove no god can exist
is that any god he can't disprove isn't "important."
Barwell's a real monument to logic.
>
wcb
Flintstones sucky. Yogi boring.
Clutch Cargo bizarre.
Richo
Christopher A. Lee wrote:
> On 20 Sep 2006 06:04:23 -0700, "Richo" <m.rich...@utas.edu.au>
> wrote:
>
> >
> >Christopher A. Lee wrote:
> >> On 19 Sep 2006 17:41:29 -0700, "Richo" <m.rich...@utas.edu.au>
> >> wrote:
> >>
> >> >
> >> >Christopher A. Lee wrote:
> >> >> On 19 Sep 2006 02:47:44 -0700, "Richo" <m.rich...@utas.edu.au>
> >> >> wrote:
> >> >>
> >> >> >
> >> >> >wcb wrote:
> >> >> >> Richo wrote:
> >> >> >>
> >> >> >> >
> >> >> >> >> Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
> >> >> >> >> creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
> >> >> >> >> in six days.
> >> >> >> >>
> >> >> >> > It's a holy mystery.
> >> >> >> > 8-)
> >> >> >> >
> >> >> >> > You have to admit though - without "God" its still a mystery.
> >> >> >>
> >> >> >> Well, no,we have a research program for figuring this
> >> >> >> out and its called science.
> >> >> >
> >> >> >Science doesnt figure out how God made the universe - nor can it answer
> >> >>
> >> >> What's "God"?
> >> >
> >> >The "father" god worshiped by christians I presume..
> >> >Although in this particular context it hardly matters.
> >> >
> >> >>Why should anybody even bring it up?
> >> >
> >> >No idea.
> >> >Why not ask him (Barwell).
> >> >
> >> >>
> >> >> Feel free to demonstrate that something you call "God" actually made
> >> >> the universe.
> >> >
> >> >What? Why would *I* be interested in doing that?
> >> >You seem a bit confused about who is saying what.
> >>
> >> "You have to admit though - without "God" its still a mystery."
> >>
> >Yes. I stand by that. There is no God AND the universe is still
> >mysterious - which bit do you disagree with?
>
Barwell said:
"Somehow, god is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient
creator of all. Able to create a universe ex niliho
in six days."
So logically, since my response was to his post, I suppose I am
refering to that one - ask Barwell for more details.
My mind reading ability is a bit off lately.
8-)
> >> "Science doesnt figure out how God made the universe - nor can it
> >> answer"
> >>
> >That's right - Science isnt about how God made the universe - and it
> >cannot banish mystery.
>
> What's "God" and why even think about it?
>
I think about it because Barwell post long articles about it.
I could ignore his post of course - and you *could* ignore mine.
(I also think about it because people talk about it constantly, build
churches to it, yadda yadda yadda... I would LOVE to be able to stop
thinking about it.)
The reason I didnt ignore his post is that it was also about physics
and science stuff I am very interested in.
I am also into defending science against people who abuse it to advance
their religious idealogy.
> >Each of those statements was a reply to Barwell saying something about
> >God and science.
> >
> >I dont think I was being anything but crystal clear.
> >
> >Mark.
Richo
Emmanual Kann wrote:
> An Tue, 19 Sep 2006 20:59:27 -0500, wcb hat geschreibt:
>
> > Asking the right questions is 90% of finding truth.
> >
> > Religion has a poor record on answering questions about the material world,
> > science so far is doing well.
>
> poor track record on answering questions. There is no reason to find the
> answer when the answer is already known. What religion doesn't
> understand is that for each unanswerable question answered, an entire new
> set of unanswerable questions are created. This means even more reasons
> for God.
EggsZacktekly!
I was begining to feel that no one else "got it".
Like the name by the way....
Mark.
Michael Gray
wrote:
- Refer: <12h31m9...@corp.supernews.com>
>Michael Gray wrote:
>
>> On Mon, 18 Sep 2006 23:44:12 -0500, wcb <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com>
>> wrote:
>> - Refer: <12gutee...@corp.supernews.com>
>>>Michael Gray wrote:
>>>
>>>Just thinking, is this 27 billon light year wide
>>>universe all there is for god, as far as this physical
>>>universe? Are there other universes? Bible cosmology
>>>sees the world as a dry spot in the primal water covered
>>>by a dome, holding back the primal water.
>>>
>>>Apparently out ancient cosmologists had little idea
>>>of what water pressue is like in deep columns of water.
>>>How deep was the water outside the dome?
>>
>> Makes you feel so, sort of, insignificant, doesn't it?
>> "Yeah. Yeah. [sniff] Can we have your liver, then?"
>
>Does the waters outside the dome have fishies?
Of course.
But they are invisible and uncatchable.
A lot like the fish that I try to catch!
johac
wcb <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com> wrote:
> johac wrote:
>
> >
> > Augustine was a sadist. When I was going to Catholic school, the nuns
> > used to use his descriptions of hell to frighten us. They also used to
> > talk about the soul a lot, but none of it ever made much sense to me.
> >
> > Some also confuse consciousness with the soul. We now know that
> > consciousness is a function of the brain, a material object.
> >
> > I had an argument once with a theist about the nature of the soul and
> > where was it located in the body. He said "The heart". So I replied
> > "What happens if someone gets a heart transplant? Does he get someone
> > else's soul and what happens to the old one?" "If a person gets a
> > mechanical heart, does that mean he gets an artificial heart of is he
> > just soulless?"
Should have been "If a person gets a mechanical heart, does that mean
he gets an artificial soul or is he just soulless?"
> >
> > The guy never answered. I think that example shows just how confused the
> > topic is.
>
> Augustine certainly was and he believed in bodily resurrection.
>
> I like the heart nonsense!
>
> Like I said, its very confused indeed.
Indeed. One would think that for something so central to their beliefs,
they should be able to have a ready definition of the soul. I believe
that they are just confused too.
--
John Hachmann aa #1782
"Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities"
-Voltaire
Contact - Throw a .net over the .com
Richo
wcb wrote:
> Richo wrote:
>
> >
> > Yes. I stand by that. There is no God AND the universe is still
> > mysterious - which bit do you disagree with?
> It beomes a lot ls mysterious with each succes of science.
Every new thing you discover leads to new questions.
The universe might not be infinite - but for all human puposes it is as
good as infinite - and not just vast in time and space and energy range
- but structurally *deep*.
Like Newton said - occassionaly we find a bright shiny pebble while
before us lies the vast ocean undiscovered.
>Why so mant
> people want to deny that I do not know,.
>
> We see a pttern here, science = successes, religion =
> failure always and ever.
> some day, we will learn a lot more, but we see
> where this is going. No turtles, no gods, its
> physics all the way down.
>
I am sure it is - but do you know that apart from a few niggling
problems (like explaining the radiation of glowing bodies) physics was
just about finished - all worked out - in the late 19 th century.
Or so some people thought - "We have done physics - now what?"
The more we know the more we know we dont know.
Anyhow... The Elephant in the room we are ignoring...
Religion failures are not the failure to produce a sensible cosmology
or geology or biology - that's not the core business of religion.
The failure of religion is the failure to make human beings *whole* -
emotionally centered balanced and in harmony with our own nature and
the world.
Its meant to make human beings better human beings.
Thats meant to be what they are *for*.
If a religion got that right I wouldnt care one little bit if it got
the order of the planets or the size of the moon wrong.
Mark.
wcb
>
>> > Yes. I stand by that. There is no God AND the universe is still
>> > mysterious - which bit do you disagree with?
>>It beomes a lot ls mysterious with each succes of science.
>
> Every new thing you discover leads to new questions.
And usually closes of old avenues of though that turn
out to be wrong.
> The universe might not be infinite - but for all human puposes it is as
> good as infinite - and not just vast in time and space and energy range
> - but structurally deep.
Following Guth, Linde and others, it is indeed infinite.
Parmenides long ago showed us logically it must be infinite
in time. It has always been. We now are realizing that the
implictions of the big bang ate that the universe is indeed
infinite also in space.
We are but an Island universe imbedded in another island
universe and so on infinitely.
we are begiining to understand how fields can generate a 20 kg
particle the size of a proton that rips the fabric of time and
space open and creates a new universe.
This is to me exciting times and its amazing
how in the last few decade, hubble telescope and
others have peered almost to the edge of the universe
back in time to almost the beginning.
This to me is worth a billion bibles and books of myth,
all the infinite number of false gods man has created
in the past few millenia.
We will 250 years from now or 1000 years from now or
5000 years from now, be as gods ourselves.
Guth is alredy speculating on creating universes.
Who knows some day thanks to technology we will all
have our own universes and be an immortal god-like being.
It is well within the possibility of our grasp!
> Like Newton said - occassionaly we find a bright shiny pebble while
> before us lies the vast ocean undiscovered.
>
And you drop the ugly pebbles of yesteryear.
wcb
I have been scanning the articles on the soul et al from
summa theologica. it is confused as hell.
And of course no proof for any assertion is ever given.
I have downloaded and read Aristotle on the soul.
he has little worth saying and wht he talks about is not
soul but biology, brain, nerves and such. He mentions in
one section earlier speculations of the greeks.
Plotinus is readily available on the net, he would have us
having two souls. I am gathering my materials.
I wil hve to paw through Augustine's vast writings,
avicenna, averoes, al Farabi and others. Tertullian was
one of the first to mention souls.
Souls in christianity seem really to be a Gnostic idea,
derived from neo-platonism and egyptian religions that
are very much religions with souls at center of their theology.
I wonder about that. This is a central theme of Egyptian
religions and yet there is no sign of that in the old testament,
debunking the idea Israel spent 430 years in Egypt.
I can think of no two theologies more alien to each other than ancient
Egyptian religion circa 1200 bce and iron age Israelite
religion. Even by 700 CE they are still alien.
I see far more convergent ideas in Egyptian and Mayan religion than
Israelite.
Greek ideas of souls gave them their versions of hell, hades.
we see no eternel life or hell in early Israelite religion.
the only mention of spirits is god who is a spirit.
Only god would seem to be a soul.
Except for odd idea of Samuel where spirits of the dead can be
contacted by the witch of endor.
Obvious Greek idea here, the Romans of course lived everyday
with their lares and penitates, spirits of the departed.
Which is very alien to concepts of bodily revival and resurrection as per
the bible.
Only by the early middle ages does it seem that christianity starts actually
grafting bodily resurrection and souls together.
It is interesting to see about this time as per Josephus, the Sadduccess are
rejecting ideas of souls and an after life as non-Jewish paganism.
I am finding it hard to find a straight forward account of Stoic
soul theory with decent citations. Apparently no one book
made it down to us with that in it and its a fragmentary and scattered
subject.
Roman soul theory et al is spiritism and is unbelievably complex.
wcb
> I am sure it is - but do you know that apart from a few niggling
> problems (like explaining the radiation of glowing bodies) physics was
> just about finished - all worked out - in the late 19 th century.
> Or so some people thought - "We have done physics - now what?"
>
> The more we know the more we know we dont know.
>
We know only science gets us answers.
The more we know, the more we know that only science has answers,
and we know a lot more than we did 100 years ago.
Our goal, now? To become as gods ourselves.
Once we have essentially immortal life via technology,
we will have all the time in the universe for the rest.
johac
wcb <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com> wrote:
I suppose that the ancients seeing the body still there wondered if part
of the deceased went somewhere else. Some not liking the idea of
oblivion after death conjured up an idea of an 'afterlife' whether they
called it 'the happy hunting ground' , the 'underworld', the 'abode of
the gods', 'Tartarus', 'The Elysian Fields', 'Sheol' , 'Hell', 'Heaven',
'Paradise', 'Valhalla' , or whatever, the rotting corpse was still there
so something else had to go to whatever destination it was bound.
Whatever that was, soul, spirit, essence, etc. must have also contained
the deceased consciousness otherwise there would be no point in the
afterlife. Later this concept was incorporated into religions.
The above is pure speculation on my part.
>
> I wonder about that. This is a central theme of Egyptian
> religions and yet there is no sign of that in the old testament,
> debunking the idea Israel spent 430 years in Egypt.
> I can think of no two theologies more alien to each other than ancient
> Egyptian religion circa 1200 bce and iron age Israelite
> religion. Even by 700 CE they are still alien.
>
> I see far more convergent ideas in Egyptian and Mayan religion than
> Israelite.
And the Mayans also built pyramids. Contact? Not likely, but who knows?
>
> Greek ideas of souls gave them their versions of hell, hades.
> we see no eternel life or hell in early Israelite religion.
> the only mention of spirits is god who is a spirit.
> Only god would seem to be a soul.
>
> Except for odd idea of Samuel where spirits of the dead can be
> contacted by the witch of endor.
> Obvious Greek idea here, the Romans of course lived everyday
> with their lares and penitates, spirits of the departed.
Since the Greeks occupied the region long before the Romans, it may be
that the Jewish religion borrowed the concept from them.
>
> Which is very alien to concepts of bodily revival and resurrection as per
> the bible.
> Only by the early middle ages does it seem that christianity starts actually
> grafting bodily resurrection and souls together.
The Middle Ages gave rise to many strange Theological concepts. Since
the church held absolute power, they could get away with it.
>
> It is interesting to see about this time as per Josephus, the Sadduccess are
> rejecting ideas of souls and an after life as non-Jewish paganism.
I didn't know that. Interesting.
>
> I am finding it hard to find a straight forward account of Stoic
> soul theory with decent citations. Apparently no one book
> made it down to us with that in it and its a fragmentary and scattered
> subject.
>
> Roman soul theory et al is spiritism and is unbelievably complex.
The concept is still very bizarre to me.
wcb
>
> I suppose that the ancients seeing the body still there wondered if part
> of the deceased went somewhere else. Some not liking the idea of
> oblivion after death conjured up an idea of an 'afterlife' whether they
> called it 'the happy hunting ground' , the 'underworld', the 'abode of
> the gods', 'Tartarus', 'The Elysian Fields', 'Sheol' , 'Hell', 'Heaven',
> 'Paradise', 'Valhalla' , or whatever, the rotting corpse was still there
> so something else had to go to whatever destination it was bound.
> Whatever that was, soul, spirit, essence, etc. must have also contained
> the deceased consciousness otherwise there would be no point in the
> afterlife. Later this concept was incorporated into religions.
>
> The above is pure speculation on my part.
>
I strongly suspect things like NDEs, lucid dreaming and
other altered perceptions had a lot to do with this.
But figuring it all out was something else. The old Roman ideas
of spirits would have us as disemboddied spirits hovering around
an area. We would become attached to our homes, and cities and
descendents.
The ancient Nuzi tablets describe Asherah, El's wife in her
descent to the underworld where dead people resided after death.
The ancient Egyptians described 3 later 5, later 7 souls.
Good Egyptians that lived a worthy life went to the Western Lands, a sort
of pleasant after life not unlike this like in a land ruled by a wise
god-king Osiris.
The Stoics and Atomists had far different ideas.
The Christians yet differing theories.
As I research this its just amazing how many differing
theories there were.
Plato, Aristotle and Plotinus had yet different theories.
Its unusual that early Jewish religion had no souls, no afterlife no
underworld, no heaven, no hell. Which surrounded by people seeming
believing in an afterlife is unusual when yiou start thinkinbg about it it
is as if they Jewish religionists purposefully turned theri back on that
concept.
Since their original god was El and his wife Asherah,
This El myth cycle also had an underworld not unlike Greek Hades.
They abandoned this but also all ideas of an afterlife.
johac
wcb <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com> wrote:
> johac wrote:
>
> >
> > I suppose that the ancients seeing the body still there wondered if part
> > of the deceased went somewhere else. Some not liking the idea of
> > oblivion after death conjured up an idea of an 'afterlife' whether they
> > called it 'the happy hunting ground' , the 'underworld', the 'abode of
> > the gods', 'Tartarus', 'The Elysian Fields', 'Sheol' , 'Hell', 'Heaven',
> > 'Paradise', 'Valhalla' , or whatever, the rotting corpse was still there
> > so something else had to go to whatever destination it was bound.
> > Whatever that was, soul, spirit, essence, etc. must have also contained
> > the deceased consciousness otherwise there would be no point in the
> > afterlife. Later this concept was incorporated into religions.
> >
> > The above is pure speculation on my part.
> >
>
> I strongly suspect things like NDEs, lucid dreaming and
> other altered perceptions had a lot to do with this.
OBEs and probably also NDEs may have a physical basis:
http://www.bio.net/bionet/mm/neur-sci/2002-September/051963.html
>
> But figuring it all out was something else. The old Roman ideas
> of spirits would have us as disemboddied spirits hovering around
> an area. We would become attached to our homes, and cities and
> descendents.
Roman literature, at least what I've read, is full of ghosts and
spirits. For all of the brilliant things that they did do, the Romans
were a very superstitious people. No wonder they fell victim to xtianity
so easily.
>
> The ancient Nuzi tablets describe Asherah, El's wife in her
> descent to the underworld where dead people resided after death.
A retelling of the Orpheus or Persephone myths?
>
> The ancient Egyptians described 3 later 5, later 7 souls.
> Good Egyptians that lived a worthy life went to the Western Lands, a sort
> of pleasant after life not unlike this like in a land ruled by a wise
> god-king Osiris.
Seven souls? I guess losing one was not such a big deal. :-)
>
> The Stoics and Atomists had far different ideas.
> The Christians yet differing theories.
>
> As I research this its just amazing how many differing
> theories there were.
I'll have to do some reading on that.
>
> Plato, Aristotle and Plotinus had yet different theories.
>
> Its unusual that early Jewish religion had no souls, no afterlife no
> underworld, no heaven, no hell. Which surrounded by people seeming
> believing in an afterlife is unusual when yiou start thinkinbg about it it
> is as if they Jewish religionists purposefully turned theri back on that
> concept.
Perhaps to set themselves apart from all of the other groups around them
who believed in an after life.
>
> Since their original god was El and his wife Asherah,
> This El myth cycle also had an underworld not unlike Greek Hades.
> They abandoned this but also all ideas of an afterlife.
There seems to be a lot of Greek myth in the bible:
http://ancienthistory.about.com/cs/grecoromanmyth1/a/prometheus.htm
Not only are there similarities to the Garden of Eden myth (Snake =
Prometheus) and the fall of man ( Eve = Pandora) in other accounts there
is even a worldwide flood and humans who save themselves in a boat.
wcb
>
> OBEs and probably also NDEs may have a physical basis:
>
> http://www.bio.net/bionet/mm/neur-sci/2002-September/051963.html
>
Yes, they do, which is not new to us, but to people of old,
they would not know this.
Oddly enough I can find few mentions of such things
from ancient times.
But people had to have experienced it.
wcb
>
> Roman literature, at least what I've read, is full of ghosts and
> spirits. For all of the brilliant things that they did do, the Romans
> were a very superstitious people. No wonder they fell victim to xtianity
> so easily.
It wasn't easy, it took swords and soldiers to do it and
even in the Middle ages the church was still fighting some of this.
Roman spiritism reached back beyond the dim times of written
history and Rome was not truely Christainized till about 600 CE.
So this was religion for 3000 years or so at least.
And some of it became part of the church, the Lares became saints.
Tutelary gods of Rome are common, gods of sailors or children, or farmers,
protective deities. These became saints too,
this saint the parton saint of sailors, that of herdmen, and so on.
Roman religion is very much with the Catholics to this day.
Many ancient Roman gods themselves became saints.
Each Cathedral today by canon law must have a part or relic of a saint
buried beneath the altar.
That saint becomes the Saint of that church or cathedral, its tutelary god,
its lares.
This goes back to ancient Etruscan habits where each building had
a sacrifical victim buried under that building, in some cases, human
victims.
johac
wcb <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com> wrote:
> johac wrote:
>
> >
> > Roman literature, at least what I've read, is full of ghosts and
> > spirits. For all of the brilliant things that they did do, the Romans
> > were a very superstitious people. No wonder they fell victim to xtianity
> > so easily.
>
> It wasn't easy, it took swords and soldiers to do it and
> even in the Middle ages the church was still fighting some of this.
It appears that when religions compete bloodshed isn't very far behind.
If the Romans were a society of skeptics, I wonder if Christianity would
have caught on at all.
>
> Roman spiritism reached back beyond the dim times of written
> history and Rome was not truely Christainized till about 600 CE.
> So this was religion for 3000 years or so at least.
>
> And some of it became part of the church, the Lares became saints.
> Tutelary gods of Rome are common, gods of sailors or children, or farmers,
> protective deities. These became saints too,
> this saint the parton saint of sailors, that of herdmen, and so on.
>
> Roman religion is very much with the Catholics to this day.
> Many ancient Roman gods themselves became saints.
I recall looking at a calendar which listed the feast days of the
Catholic saints. I was a little surprised to find a Saint Mercury and a
Saint Apollo listed there.
>
> Each Cathedral today by canon law must have a part or relic of a saint
> buried beneath the altar.
> That saint becomes the Saint of that church or cathedral, its tutelary god,
> its lares.
The RCC is very big on relics. I recall that as a kid we had to go to
church and watch them parade around an arm bone or a hand of some saint
or another. I thought it was pretty gross.
>
> This goes back to ancient Etruscan habits where each building had
> a sacrifical victim buried under that building, in some cases, human
> victims.
That seems to be a common thread among other religions.
johac
wcb <wbar...@mylinuxisp.com> wrote:
> johac wrote:
>
> >
> > OBEs and probably also NDEs may have a physical basis:
> >
> > http://www.bio.net/bionet/mm/neur-sci/2002-September/051963.html
> >
>
> Yes, they do, which is not new to us, but to people of old,
> they would not know this.
>
> Oddly enough I can find few mentions of such things
> from ancient times.
>
> But people had to have experienced it.
Many ancient peoples revered epileptics since they believed that during
their seizures, they were in communication with the spirit world.
Other holy men and women used drugs to induce a trance like state. The
Oracle of Delphi, when making prophecies, was believed to have been high
from breathing ethane and ethylene gases which were seeping into her
cave from a fissure:
http://www.erowid.org/chemicals/inhalants/inhalants_history1.shtml
I don't know if any of these caused what could be described as out of
body experiences, but it was believed that the altered states also
brought holy ones closer to the gods.
bk
Q: Why do evolutionists think the world is 5.6 billion years old?
A: Because Satan tricked them!
They can't even get their figures straight...